Bombast dominates modern life and communication. It is the way of the world. Virtually everything we taste, touch, hear, or see is sold to us through explosive images, exaggerated expletives, and thundering sound. Subtlety and finesse have gone the way of the dinosaur, and almost everything, no matter its importance, is given the same weight and meaning. Every news story is preceded with the exclamation: “Breaking News!”
Every product or service is new, revolutionary, groundbreaking, and necessary. Whether it is selling toilet paper or automobiles, shampoo or life insurance, every decision is vital and critical to your health, safety, and welfare.
And now that our minds and our psyches have been invaded and reconfigured to the “noise” created by the bombastic onslaught of sights and sounds in our daily life, why are we so shocked and outraged when society reacts in the same manner. In every aspect of our life no matter if we are dealing with our family, friends , clients, or neighbors, is it any wonder that tensions are high, nerves are on edge, and we are wired so tight?
We are a nation on the brink of a nervous breakdown, and there seems to be no cure in sight. Couple this with the rise of A.I. and fake news, and you have a society running on raw emotion that no longer knows the difference between up from down, right from wrong, real or imagined, just or unjust, meaningful or frivolous, and worse of all… good from evil. And in the process, far too many of us have lost our drive and ambition, and our hope and faith in a world that will move forward to a better tomorrow.
Many of you will ask, “What can we do about this? “ How can we restore things to a more peaceful place?” I must confess I don’t have the answer; I wish life were as simple as it is in movies.
I think back to a time in the mid 1970’s which was an intense period of social and political upheaval resulting in profound changes to American identity, when that brilliant, visionary writer Paddy Chayefsky penned the Academy Award winning screenplay for the 1976 film “Network” and created one of the most iconic lines in cinema history: “I’m as mad as hell, and I’m not going to take this anymore!”.
That rant, spoken in the movie by the character Howard Beale, a fictional TV news anchorman (portrayed by Oscar winner, Peter Finch), who, in one impassioned diatribe, encourages his viewers to vent their collective rage and frustration about the state of the nation and the world by yelling the phrase from their windows.
One can only hope that as things spiral further out of control and we approach the tipping point and the lines continue to blur, life will imitate art and society’s collective voice can find common ground, uniting as one and we express our rage and frustration by us bombastically exclaiming just how mad as hell we are at the state of things… and maybe, just maybe we won’t have to take it anymore.
STANLEY ISAACS, Writer, Producer, Director
Stanley Isaacs is a consultant and can be contacted at: sisaacs100@icloud.com
