Google Search: "what white people love" - Part III

Why Black Men Love White Women by Rajen Persaud

The book seems to either be an extremely dry academic perspective on race and gender relations or it could be extremely entertaining. Since this website is essentially an advertisement it is hard to say which is more accurate. The aspect of this website that was most appealing were the questions Persaud asks the visitor to consider.

He starts with the easiest and most provocative questions to tie everything together:

• What really polarized America during the O.J. Simpson trial?
• Why this subject will never leave our media and consequently our minds?
• Why we are constantly reminded by it?
• Why white men are killing their mates more than ever before but O.J. is still burnt into our minds?

We all know the answer to this: a famous black athlete killed his beautiful white wife because he thought she was having an affair with a really hot white man. The media loved it while the public reaction ranged from being mesmerized to angered to annoyed to bored. Even though he was proven not guilty any time O.J.'s mug appears on camera you can not replace the idea of the circus that evolved out of that trial. As for the last point Persaud's theory probably revolves around our idea of celebrity and how we admire and look up to star athletes. If you have never been one of these people then you are probably balance enough to not want to kill you wife.

Then came some really interesting socio-political questions:

• Why corporate criminal activity is at an all time high?
• Why women are not active participants in the society and why this fact will continue to compound and aggravate the above issues?
• Why men will continue to control and dominate?
• Why the full and equal participation of women in the world is the key to all our domestic and global issues?
• Why men will never allow this to happen?
  

There are so many answers to these questions that it is highly unlikely Persaud came to an actual conclusion. In order the gutted, quick answer are:

• Because they can get away with it thanks mainly to technology.
• Because no one wants to listen to them.
• Because that has been the role of men since the dawn of Man.
• Because they need to be.
• Because they wont allow it to happen.

This one just stuck out like a sore thumb, but it is almost required of anyone writing about race to ask:

• Why Black men are the most feared, hated and despised people in the world?

Media, and especially Hip-Hop in the last twenty years, has distorted the image of black men into the caricature of a gun-toting, dope-smoking, ho-slapping, player-hating, thug. This is a complete 180 degree change from the black-faced, spiritual-singing, jive-shucking comic relief that was being portrayed before the 1980's. We all know what the real truth is.

Then comes the really interesting questions which probably make up the meat of the book. They certainly touch upon the issues and belief that we all deal with everyday. Hopefully Persaud deals with them with as much humor as I am about too. He probably switched back to first person too.

• Why Black women continue to be the most secretly desired women on the planet?
• Personally it's not that much of a secret.
  
• Do white women treat Black men better?
• No, just don't yell as loud and their aim is worse.
  
• Are white women more supportive?
• They're just better at swallowing their tongues.
  
• Is money the only thing Black women think about?
• No, there is also getting their hair and nails done, scoring decent weed, and finding someone to look after their kids.
  
• Do Black women have attitudes?
• Is this a trick question because if I say "yes," I am going to get my ass kicked.
  
• Are white women naturally more beautiful than Black women.
• No they just use different make-up and hair products.
  
• Are Black women lousy lovers?
• From past experience I would have to say no. That distinction is reversed for the WASPS I've dated.
  
• Are white women better at oral sex than Black women?
• Oh no, that award definitely goes to Latina women.
  
• Are white women sluttier than Black women?
• Only one hour before last call.
  
• Do white women smell better than Black women?
• Depends on where you are sniffing.
  
• Are white women easier to deal with?
• Their bullshit is less loud and obnoxious.
  
• Are Black women intimidating Black men?
• Only the ones they're related to.
  
• Are Black women scaring their men off?
• Only the ones they're trying to attract.
  
• Are white women less demanding?
• Only when you give them everything they want.
  
• Are white women less bossy?
• Only when you are not in their way.
  
• Are white women sexier than Black women?
• Any woman who wants to have sex with you is sexy.
  
• Are Black men with white women because of a hatred of Black women?
• No, it's just a status thing.
  
• Are Black women with white men because they can't find a Black man?
• Not one over the age of 21 who has one with a job, a car, and isn't paying child support for three other children.
  
• Can a Black man truly love an white woman?
• Only if she keeps her mouth shut. Or filled.
  
• Can a Black person truly love a white one?
• You mean a white person right? Racist pig.
  
• Are interracial relationships real?
• It depends on what you consider reality, but yes.
  
• Is it more than love that brings the races together?
• There is also hot, socially forbidden sex, causing your parents, friends, ex's, and co-workers to be confused, the excitement of something new (Although that can be said for any situation.), rebuking social norms, and in some instances citizenship status.
  
• Is a Black man's love for a white woman different from the way he loves a Black woman?
• Only in the amount of back rubs and blow jobs he receives.
  
• Can Black people be truly honest about their feelings towards whites?
• Not without full protection from the law and retaliation.
  
• Can whites truly be honest with Blacks?
• Not without causing a race war.
  
• Do Black men love their mixed race babies or are they in awe of them?
• Only by the fact that 1.) he slept with a white woman and 2.) she is actually allowing him near the baby.
  
• Would they love the children they have with a Black woman the same?
• Black women seem to be doing just fine with them.
  
• Are white men losing their women and are Black women losing their men?
• Don't worry they're not getting the ones we want to claim as our own anyway.
  
• Will the animosity end?
• If we all receive frontal lobotomies, then yes.
  
• Can the world ever become a racially better place?
• It can become more tolerant and understanding.

All jokes aside the color of someones skin and the kink of their hair does not make them any better or worse of a lover or partner. It is all about how those two people interact and relate.

Chuck D Speaks

The time on the notice stated he would be speaking from 7:30 - 10:00. I thought it was a typo. Chuck D, one of the founding members of the Public Enemy, would be speaking on the topic of "Race, History, Hip-Hop, and Technology" as part of the University of the Pacific's celebration of Black History Month. A pretty lengthy topic, but still, two and a half hours.

When I arrived back home at 10:20 I realized that they were not kidding. The man our attention for over two hours. Impressive considering he had left the notebook containing his speech outline and talking points in San Francisco.

"I will be freestyling it tonight," he cautioned us before leading us on a journey that covered topics ranging from the current Presidential election to the rise of Urban Radio to the history of music from the 1700's to today. Highlights included:

- The new real estate is within your mind.
- Corporations and governments will be more than happy to use you to fit there needs. The only thing slowing them down is education.
- Being intelligent is now perceived as a liability.
- If the music channels acted like the sports networks more people would know were the term R&B came from.
- Obama and Clinton should just say they our running together, thereby ensuring a sixteen year term of Presidents starting with the first person in and the Vice-President taking over.
- That first person should be Clinton. Plus we get Bill for free.
- If you are spending $40,000 (or more) for a college education do not be afraid to get the most out of it.
- Become a complete and absolute geek about what you love.
- Saying you are Black has become a negative in the last ten years.
- Black History and American Music History are one in the same.
- Public Enemy came about during the MTV and VH1 generation. The new music made for the cameraphone generation.
- Flava has always been that way.

Any missed sleep I am going to have tonight making up for the time was there instead of studying and doing homework was well worth it. I can only imagine how much more powerful and consistent the message would have been if Chuck D had remembered his notebook.

Google Search: "what white people love" - Part II

One of the results that came up from "stuff white people love" is this blog . Here is a quick description:

The underbelly of a thirty-something, middle class black woman's experiences being married to a white man, raising biracial children in [a very white] Portland, Oregon. Topics that I blog about are likely thought or ideas that are not so easy to talk about openly, things I'd only tell a close friend. I want to write about race relations and perception from my perspective. AND I DON'T HAVE TO BE OBJECTIVE.

Check it out: That Black Girl

Google Search: "what white people love" - Part I

While Googling "what white people like" (Don't ask.) I found this:

Black People Love Us!

It obviously a joke, but some of the comments in the "Your Letters" section show that more than a few people either don't get the joke or don't think it's funny. My theory is that most of the negative complaints are probably from overall sensitive white folks.

Some of the other results are just as interesting. As we wrap up Black History Month I can't think of a better way to close what is also the shortest month of the year (Coincidence?) than with these varying results.

Homemade Science Experiments

About five months ago I bought a bottle of Safeway's O Brand Organic Apple Juice.

It is really very decent.
Extremely low sugar content - 12 grams per serving.
It has sat quietly in the back of the fridge for the last four months.

Then after pouring way too much rum into my daily nightcap I decided to even after the bite with a little bit of fruit juice.
First up was some mango juice.
It did the job but the rum was still biting fiercely.
My mind turned to the apple juice.
Perfect compliment to the tang of mango.
If I had orange juice available too then this would an excellent way to knock myself out.

With the exciting of finishing off the neglected apple juice I opened the fridge.
There it was silently awaiting it's final mission.
I wrestled and angled it out from behind a loaf of bread, a Helmens jar, and a large can of V-8.
Setting it down on the counter, I twisted the top off and happened to glance down.

'What the . . .'

'Is that a teabag?' I thought to myself. 'If it was then how did it get in there?'
Then I looked closer.



Maybe it's a leaf.



Nope, it is a floating cluster of fungus.

Uncle Ben's Deep Fried Advice - Dating (Part 1)

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The Unsung Writer

The following was posted on my MySpace blog around this time in 2006. It felt fitting to dust it off for a reposting and follow-up in light of the finally resolved Writers Strike.

". . . it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world." - Rick, Casablanca

Humphrey Bogart said it, but I had no idea who wrote it. All that remained in my memory about the writing was that the script wasn't finished until three days before filming and there were constant revisions during shooting. When I look the quote up on IMBD there were six writers attributed to the film. Six people who probably worked far longer on the script than Bogart did for the entire duration of the filming. Yet the only person associated with that line is him.

Really sad when you think about. If you're an aspiring screenwriter it's enough to make you want to go into another line of work.

For the record the following people were responsible writing one of the best, if not the best, film in history:

Murray Burnett and Joan Alison wrote Everybody Comes To Rick's, the play Casablanca was based on.

Julius J. Esptein, Philip G. Esptein, Howard Koch, and Casey Robinson pounded out the final
screenplay.

The only reason for posting this was an article courtesy of the LA Times the day the nominees where announced for this years Oscars from David Kipen, author of The Schreiber Theory: A Radical Rewrite of American Film History.

Here's a brief synopsis in his own words:

Yet this is nothing compared to the treatment screenwriters receive from two powerful arbiters of how we decide which movies to watch: Netflix (netflix.com), and the Internet Movie Database (imdb.com).

Let's assume you enjoyed "The Constant Gardener." Let's further assume that, unlike most moviegoers, you have the cockeyed notion that the screenwriter may have been partly responsible for your enjoyment. Let's say you'd be curious to see another movie written by Jeffrey Caine. If, like me, you're a Netflix subscriber, you might type his name into the search window.

"Michael Caine?," it offers cheerfully. "Jeffrey Wright?," the fine actor who may by now have been nominated for "Syriana." Even, with just a hint of desperation, "Citizen Kane?" You get the idea.

Netflix, despite its pretensions to comprehensiveness, indexes its films by actor, genre and director, but not by screenwriter.

Even if you're not the author of a new book (as I am) arguing that screenwriters have a more legitimate claim to the authorship of their films than directors do, this omission seems wrongheaded in the extreme.

BIG DEAL, YOU SAY. Anyone daft enough to rent movies according to who wrote them can always look writers up on the Internet Movie Database. Oh, really?

Type "Jeffrey Caine" into imdb.com and links to his film and television credits do appear, but just try following one. Click on the above-average James Bond film "Goldeneye," for example, and the writing credits show "Ian Fleming (characters), Michael France (story) and an enigmatic link reading "(more)."

Only after clicking "(more)" do we discover the news that yes, Jeffrey Caine did co-write "Goldeneye" with Bruce Feirstein.

Apparently it's IMDB's policy to bury all writing credits longer than two names even if neither of those names belongs to the screenwriter himself.

After all this effort to answer the simple questions "Who wrote that, and what else did he write?," it seems fair to ask: Is it such a pain to follow a screenwriter's career because, as Netflix and IMDB might insist, nobody cares anyway?

So as you're wading through all the pointless reported tallies of how many nominations each film got in search of, oh, who got them or next month, as you're watching the two screenplay awards announced a good hour before the far more hyped "best director" rolls around spare a thought for the poor, beleaguered screenwriters.

Year in and year out, they write the best Oscar acceptance speeches (sometimes even for themselves), and what thanks do they get?

As a footnote to this article - the films nominated this year on the Academy's own website are listed, but to find out who wrote it you have to follow a link for more information.

My prediction for the names which will be remembered from this years ceremony: George Clooney, co-writer of Good Luck, Good Night, and Woody Allen for Match Point.

The winners that year were Brokeback Mountain by Larry McMurtry and Diana Ossana and Crash by Paul Haggis and Bobby Moresco.

If you like writing and writers as much I do then you recognize the names. Especially McMurty and Haggis. If you don't really pay attention to such details then you probably know these films as the "Gay one with Heath Ledger and the one with Ludacris in it."

That is really the sad part of all of this. No matter how much coverage and attentions the writers strike got they are still the most important unseen face in an industry that is built upon image.

Forbes List: 10 Most Miserable Cities

Before arriving in the suburban hamlet of Stockton, California I did a little research. My only knowledge of Stockton up to that point were the jokes made about it when living in San Francisco. The few positive facts I found out were overshadowed by these glaring tidbits:

- 3rd Highest Unemployment in the state after Bakersfield and Fresno.
- 3rd Highest Percentage of methamphetamine addiction in the nation after Las Vegas and Bakersfield.
- 3rd Highest Percentage of grand theft auto in the nation after Detroit and Las Vegas.

When I came across Forbes Listing of the America's Most Miserable Cities I was expecting Stockton to be in there. You may think I am being pessimistic, but I am merely being a realist. Then I read the criteria for the listing

We looked at only the 150 largest metropolitan areas, which meant a minimum population of 371,000. We ranked the cities on the six criteria above [Commute times, weather, crime, pollution, unemployment, and personal tax rates] and added their ranks together to establish what we call the Misery Measure.

Hands down Stockton has got one of the worst crime and unemployment rates in the nation. Since most everyone works somewhere else reverse commute times can be horrid, but I doubt they counted those. With all the wonderful agricultural and industrial runoff starting in the Sierra Nevada and making its way down the Central Valley to end up here the water pollution here in the Delta is pretty high.

The only catch I could see was the population minimum of 371,000. From all appearances the population of Stockton should top out at 250,000 - 300,000 at the most. With a slight sense of disappointment I opened Forbes' slide show of Misery.

First was Detroit. Not a big surprise there. The Motor City, the Birthday of Motown, and the world's most famous White Rapper has been having a rough time even during the economic boom of the 1990's. With the current mortgage collapse and recession it could only have gotten worse.

Number two was . . . Stockton.

'Really?,' I thought 'This shithole suburban city has more than 371,000 people living in it?'

That was the fact that the was most difficult to swallow. The rest of it - crime rate, unemployment, environmental impact - were not that hard to believe. But it was really difficult for my mind to accept the concept of Stockton having a population bordering on 400,000.

As I flipped through the slides another surprise jumped out: Modesto made number eight. Those of you scratching your head wondering where Modesto is have good reason. Modesto's population density makes it look like Mayberry compared to Stockton. They are relatively close to each other, but in different counties. Stockton is on one side of the San Joaquin/Stanislaus county line. Modesto is on the other. This may explain their separate listings. The only other reason I could see for separating it from Stockton was to highlight the net worth of its most famous Modestian, George Lucus, compared with Modesto's financial woes.

To verify Forbes' population I went to the one true source for reliable information on the Internet - Wikipedia.Under to State of California's Department of Finance the population of Stockton is 289,789 and the population of Modesto is 207,010. What the hell? To be fair to Forbes, the US Cenus Bureau lists the "Core Based Statistical Area," of Stockton to be 673,170 and of Modesto to be 512,138. These are also the exact population numbers for the entire county of San Joaquin and Stanislaus respectively. In my opinion if a publication is going to put together a list of "Cities" they should be just that.

One last complaint about this article is the picture the editors used for the slid show. I swear I am not making this up.

I mean, come on, that is just lazy editorial style. To the uninitiated this photo makes Stockton look like the corporate headquarters of Borders Books. As a side note, that particular strip mall is off of Eight Mile Road.

There is no link to the article because why should I reward unsubstantiated research. For the record here is the complete list:

Detroit, MI - Motown is the worst in the country when it comes to violent crime, with an annual rate of 1,251 crimes for every 100,000 residents. Unemployment in the area is below the double-digit rates it hit in the early 1990s, but at 8.5% over the past three years, it is still the second-highest in the country among the 150 largest metro areas

Stockton, CA - The population of the Stockton metro area soared 28% over the past 10 years as people looked for affordable options to the pricey Bay Area. The population flow helped home prices jump 158% between 2000 and 2005, but they have fallen the past two years, as Stockton has one of the highest foreclosure rates in the country.

Flint, MI - Flint's decline has corresponded with the downturn in the U.S. auto industry. The Flint metro area has experienced a net migration out of Flint every year but one since 1990. One upshot of living in Flint is cheap housing. The median home price was only $104,000 last year, according to Moody's Economy.com.

New York, NY - The Big Apple is the nation's center for financial services, publishing, advertising and countless other industries, making job opportunities plentiful. But the costs can make all but the super-wealthy miserable. Housing costs are through the roof, and income tax rates are 10.5%, more than twice the U.S. average. Commuting times are also the worst, at an average of 36 minutes each way.

Philadelphia, PA - How miserable is Philly? The residents of the City of Brotherly Love once booed Santa Claus and pelted him with snowballs at an Eagles game. Maybe it's the long commutes, violent crime and plethora of toxic waste sites that has people grumpy. Philadelphia scored in the top 20 in all three areas.

Chicago, IL - Residents of the country's third-largest metro face long commutes (31 minutes on average) and high violent crime rates (619 crimes per 100,000 residents). Another chief complaint: the bitter-cold winters. And as for misery, nothing tops being a Cubs fan. The team has not won a World Series since 1908, the longest winless streak in baseball.

Los Angeles, CA - In sunny L.A., the weather is almost perfect. Everything else, not so perfect. If you are not stuck in traffic or forking over your earnings to put a dent in the state's massive budget deficit, chances are, you are choking on the city's polluted air.

Modesto, CA - George Lucas of Star Wars fame was born in Modesto, and one of his first movies, American Graffiti, was about teenagers cruising the streets of Modesto at night. Modesto could use some of Lucas' $3.9 billion fortune, as unemployment was an unseemly 8.7% in 2007. Of course, that is down from the early 1990s, when it topped 15%.

Charlotte, NC - Charlotte ranked in the bottom 50% of all six categories that we examined. Its worst showing was in violent crimes (838 crimes per 100,000 residents). As home to banking giants Bank of America and Wachovia, Charlotte could see an uptick in unemployment, thanks to the problems at those banks.

Providence, R.I. - Only New York City fares worst than Providence when it comes to income tax rates. The top rate for all of Rhode Island is 9.9%. Residents are fleeing the area, with a net migration of 20,000 out of the area over the past four years.

I swear I'm not . . .

My housemate probably thinks I am on drugs. Normally I’m on caffeine combined with a lack of sleep. Such a mixture along with my usual quirks leads to behaviors that can easily be explained. One sentence or two clears everything up. This particular instance was not one of them. Let me paint the scene for you.

My housemate, a sweet, considerate woman to the core, knocks on my door. At first I don’t respond and she opens the door assuming that the music I was listening to was drowning out the tapping. This makes perfect sense since it was at twice its normal level. She cracks opens the door to my bedroom a couple of feet to spy your narrator in front of the door steamrolling on top of a deflated air mattress. The tune vibrating the floor was not the hard rock or electronica you would expect but the hippie-folk music of Dan Wilson’s "Free Life." For a sample check my profile.

But wait there’s more. Even though it is the middle of the day, the lights are off, the shades drawn, and the shutters are closed. The room is in slight disarray - sheets on one side of the room, the pillows on another, the supports for air mattress shoved against the far wall. To cap off this image of wrong ideas incense are filling the gaps of sounds with sweet smell of nag champa.

"Uh, I was going to the . . ." she stops to raise her voice above the music, “ . . . the store. Are you . . . did you need anything?”

When she opened the door I had ceased steamrolling and sat up to give her my full attention. She looked thoroughly confused. As much as I wanted to explain the scene she walked into it would take too much time.

"No, no, I'm good.”

"Okay, just wanted to make sure."

If she wanted to know later I would definitely explain. Right now though we seemed to both silently agree that it would be better not to ask.

If she did ask the explanation would have been as follows:

- The volume. Normally I do not blast my music until it shakes the floor, but I have developed a blockage in my right ear. Hearing in the left is just fine. The sound into the right ear on the other hand has been diminished greatly. So to compensate I cranked the stereo up.

- The song. That was merely by coincidence. It was a playlist of my current favorites on shuffle. The next track was a mash-up of Linkin Park and Jay-Z.

- Steamrolling the air mattress. Sometime during the weekend my air mattress started to deflate at an alarming rate. Since I can’t afford a bed right now my only alternative was to patch the damn thing. After I found to puncture the patching instructions stated that I should completely deflate the mattress. What’s the easiest way to deflate a mattress? Steamrolling. It was pretty fun which may explain the huge grin on my face when my housemate walked in.

- The general disarray of the room. Well, I had to take the sheets and pillows off. Then move everything out of the way.

- No lights, ect. Since this task had been put off yesterday I was much more focused on getting it done. The windows in my room face the north and west, so they get pretty good light. My plan was to finish patching the mattress then throw up the blinds and shades for some light.

- Nag Champa. I have no real explanation for that. It just smells good.

To my concerned roommate: I am not on drugs I swear. And if I could afford a drug habit don’t you think I would buy a bed?

1 Picture < 1,000 Words: Carey's Castle - Joshua Tree National Park

Carey's Castle - Joshua Tree National Park

The air was much cooler inside. Taking off his hat, the Traveler surveyed what was a lonely prospectors world for decades. All in the pursuit of wealth.

Judging from the decayed magazines and other artifacts in and around the homestead, Carey came at the tail end of the California Gold Rush to find his piece of the treasure among the Sierra Nevada Mountains. It is not know whether or not he succeeded.

As he hunched down next to the adobe and stone walls the Traveler wondered if Carey felt it was all worth it. Secluding yourself, working in the hot desert sun, digging and blasting through rock, all for the hope of a glint of gold. In the end the only testament to his endeavors was this "castle" sandwiched between two boulders. Nature combined with a little ingenuity allowed Carey to construct a homestead that far outlasted his life or presumed wealth.

His eyes had adjusted to the light. The quiet was broken by his hiking companions breaking out their lunch. All those years with only the wind and a small collection of livestock to break the dead silence. Most men would go mad. Perhaps this is what happened to Carey.

The Traveler thought that it was more likely that Carey had the same reaction as most of the people who got burned in the second California Gold Rush of the Dot.Com Boom. After a brief 5 years, it was followed by a bust that left many shaken, some broke, and even more wary. Reflection is the roadmap of choices made in haste. His vision of Carey driving out of the desert mountains was the same image the Traveler had of all the people he had come across after the Bust. Many of them brilliant. Almost all of them burned. And not one of them ready to return.

The coolness of the shelter had dissipated and small beads of sweat began to form on his brow. The Traveler let his imagination drift 60 years into the future to a section of Marin County that is yet to be annexed by Golden Gate National Park. Nestled between the redwoods there might be a small cabin, forgotten by time while slowly being eating by the moist woodland. Prying open the door reveals the last stand of the Lonely Coder. Stacks of paper with HTML, Java, and C+ code on them in boxes with books on finance, economics, and sailing have become barely recognizable under the layers of dirt, mildew, and lichens. Empty ceramic coffee cups with the logo of a long forgotten start-up’s logo are stacked on circular conference table.

Against the far wall are several computer terminals. Dead gray screens stare out from behind gauze of green mildew. Vines coming out from the processing towers and servers in the room make it clear that any clues to history of this company have been lost forever. It seems that the only real production that came out this shack is the foliage growing out of the derelict equipment.

After that Lonely Coder’s last VC had backed out and the final connection among the fickle Tech-Nuevo Wave had moved onto the next big hope, the Traveler imagined he had the same look of relieved contempt that Carey probably had. Both sets of prospectors driving back into the East. Losing money while gaining age usually equates to gaining knowledge. The Traveler got up, dusted himself off, and as he stepped back out into the heat, hope that at the very least that was what Carey left with.

When You Talk About Music

There was almost a post for Thursday, but after typing for 45 minutes I knew that it would just have to wait. Instead here is a episode of This American Life that came to mind while writing the entry about music and how technology has changed it.

When You Talk About Music

As an aside, and preview for that entry, technology really hasn't changed how I listen to music as a whole. I know what I do like and always try to appreciate other forms of music and artists before skipping over to the next track. Music is the one constant in my life. When everything else is gone there is always a song in my head.

But more on this tomorrow.

22,000 Songs and Nothing To Listen To

From the Seattle Weekly. Commentary to follow tomorrow.

22,000 Songs and Nothing to Listen To

One day, every song ever recorded will fit into your back pocket. But will you listen to any of them?

By Karla Starr

January 23, 2008

There was a time in my life when I knew what I wanted to listen to, when I was poor but bought CDs anyway. I had stacks of CDs, purchased with enthusiasm and knowledge shared among friends. Finances stopped counting, however, once I discovered Napster and CD burning. When I started storing my music onto my computer, saving songs was no longer a physical, deliberate effort; a mouse-click sufficed. And I kept on clicking.

I'm now closing in on 95 gigabytes—just over 22,000 songs, or 53.7 continuous days—of music. Much of it I've never listened to, but in love and rock 'n' roll (ditto jazz, electronica, novelty bubblegum pop, and Bhangra), there's little logic to be found once passion gets in the way. One might say that I have too much music readily available at my fingertips; one, namely Google VP Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, might say that this trend is only going to be exacerbated. In November, at an industry conference in Singapore, she predicted that by the year 2015, a storage device the size of an iPod will be able to hold 4 terabytes. In seven years, every song ever recorded in the world will fit in our pockets.

"What I can say about it is that the average 14-year-old can hear more music in a month than someone would have heard in an entire lifetime just 300 years ago," says Dan Levitin, psychologist, McGill University professor, and author of This Is Your Brain on Music. Thanks to digital music distributors like CD Baby, the Orchard, and IODA, any independent musician's songs can now appear on iTunes; and heaps of old songs are finding new life in digital files. According to Apple spokesperson Tom Neumayr, more than 6 million songs are now in the iTunes Store.

This means two things: (1) I have 5,978,000 songs to go, and (2) "It's too early to say how this will affect our relationship with music," says Levitin. "You could imagine it going either way—we might become more attached because we have so much choice, or less because the choice causes us not to bond or bind to a particular musical piece."

What we like depends on our expectations, and though it's hard to not get your hopes up at the thought of loving a few of those 6,000,000 songs, it's actually demanding more of those Natalie Portman-esque "life-changing" songs—rather than enrolling in the Zach Braff "School of Pleased Head Nods"— that's bound to frustrate. It's a difference social psychologist and Swarthmore professor Barry Schwartz, author of The Paradox of Choice: Why More Is Less, calls maximizing versus satisficing.

"As the number of options increases, people will likely be less satisfied with the results of the choice than they would have been had there been fewer options. The level of certainty people have about their choice decreases. And the anticipation that they will regret their choice increases," writes Schwartz in a recent essay, "Can There Ever Be Too Many Flowers Blooming?" (Answer: yes.)

Why people desire what they do is intrinsically linked to imprinting, our state during early experiences, and reinforcement—and what gets hammered into our psyches is as influenced by the size of the hammer as it is by our psyches themselves. This is what allows intelligent people to enjoy the Spice Girls because of long-lost friends, tequila, and an impromptu "If You Wanna Be My Lover" karaoke session, but not that genius John Cage piano concerto that their friends find annoying.

Karaoke and Led Zeppelin reunions notwithstanding, a glut of choice means we spend less time listening to the same music as others, reducing reinforcement. Music's increased portability—thank you, technology—leads to more personalization when we do listen to music, leading to "increasing dissatisfaction with radio, music CDs, and any other noncustomized form of music consumption," states Charles Areni, a professor at the University of Sydney who studies environmental psychology, music, and cognition. "Since consumers can now customize their music environments, any "one size fits all" approach will not make anybody happy." (Prime example: Absolutely no one sings along with John Mayer while shopping at Safeway.)

Schwartz identifies changes from our habit of listening to singles, too. "Less album listening means that people aren't forced to listen to things that don't turn them on right away, and as a result, tastes change less." Yep: Having 6 million songs at hand means that tastes actually change less. It's a common predicament for anyone wanting to expand their tastes, knowing that there's no reason to listen to, say, the end of a song, much less an entire album you don't "get" right away. Even though it ultimately will expand my palette, do I really have the patience to get into heavy metal when I already know I love Spoon?

Having so much at hand so easily lets the overwhelmed morph from choosers—people actively involved in critical evaluation—into pickers. "'Picking' is much more passive," states Schwartz. "You lie on your couch as options come by on a metaphorical conveyor belt, and you pick one that appeals to you....This is the ultimate paradox: cultural pluralism leading to individual isolation, and cultural energy leading to individual passivity."

Faced with such an overwhelming amount of music, most people are fine settling into choice-simplifying filters. The danger with such inundation is that we're unaware of how dependent on filters we are and how they filter in the first place. Hence, all of those jocks listening to Top 40 (a cheat sheet of the songs least likely to cause social scorn) and all of those hipsters on Pitchfork and the Hype Machine. And don't forget about the kids and their MySpace, "discovering" new music by checking out which other bands are the "Top Friends" of their favorite bands. (These bands tend to overlap demographically to a calculated degree, as managing MySpace pages becomes big business.)

We're forced to leave out a lot, possibly never even finding the song that will change our lives, and it's to our benefit to be OK with it. But how can I deny myself the potential to hit the jackpot when pressing "shuffle" is as easy as pointing? I never had this problem in high school, listening to OK Computer on repeat; at the gym, my iPod is like a remote control or a slot machine, flicking through 500 songs, searching for another emotive spike. I now find myself getting bored, even in the middle of songs, because I can. The paradox of spending so much time changing songs, trying to find one that you like—without giving it time, meanwhile thinking about what else you could be listening to—is that you wind up attached to none of them. (This sentiment should also resonate with single people in their 30s.)

"Yes, there is too much music product, and most of it is terrible," says Peter Crabb, an assistant professor of psychology at Penn State University. "Kids can spend more time trying to figure out what to listen to and fiddling with their computers and MP3s than actually spending quality time listening to good music."

And there is good music out there. As Ravi Dhar, Ph.D., the director of the Center for Customer Insights at the Yale School of Management and a professor of psychology, says, "At some point, one has to stop looking for the best strawberries and start eating them!"

Attic Of Your Mind

Could I crawl around in the attic of your mind?
To see what forgotten items I could find.
Strike a match to illuminate the room
Thousands of boxes fill this silent tomb.

Scanning the contents on hands and knees
Labels speak out the shuttered memories.
Childhood, adolescent, adult lessons and trials
Expand into space for miles and miles.

Within the darkness spectral points of light
Singing out about times that were bright.
In corners neglected dust encrusted toys
One box overflows with scribblings from girls and boys.

Behind a pyramid of regret, around a wall of fear
A small glowing chest sits alone but near.
“Potential” inscribed across the top in golden letters.
Curious I unlatch the sturdy untarnished fetters.

A life yet to be fulfilled spills out before me.
Torrent of emotions flooding my consciousness to behold:
Love and Laughter
Joy and Jubilation
Pleasure and Peace

All these unfold in the blink of my watering eyes
The life you will build potentially could reach the sky
All these dreams, desires, designs are within you
But this is something you already knew.

The CD Chronicles: Speedy Thief

Central District Chronicles

The Speedy Thief – Version I

With a combination of caution and opportunity his eyes gleamed at me even before I walked up. No words were necessary; his actions - quick shuffling and darting eyes -spoke all the truth needed. The rest of the conversation, spoken too quickly to comprehend sometimes, was simply a slow confession. “I got, I got eighty dollars in Angus Steaks right here. I’ll give them to you for just twenty dollars.” Leaning towards his thin frame hunched over the bags I saw that he was telling the truth. Underneath a bag of Fritos Scoops were shining plastic wrapped packages of blood red meat with the black seal of certified Angus Beef. My opinion of him raised ever so slightly and with it my curiosity. Fighting the better judgment screaming in my mind I chose this stop and wait with this man growing into his shadow.

Our paths would not have crossed if he chosen the same action as I did. “I would have stopped down there,” he said gesturing to the bus shelter fifty yards south of where we stood. Under the darkening sky, figures moved around the shelter. Fellow travelers perhaps, but in his mind they were something more nefarious. “Gang bangers. I didn’t want to have to deal with that.” Spying their movements and fearing he may have been heard, the Thief picked up the bags and moved into the bus shelter. Before moving in and settling myself on the bench on the opposite side of him, I threw a final glance back at these ruffians and hooligans lying in wait.

A pause followed as we both stared out of the traffic buzzing by on the street. The Thief was disturbed by these few seconds of silence and started rocking back and forth to settle himself down. Those movements alone could not contain the energy of coming down or off of whatever was circulating through his system and out spewed secrets, which no sane man should admit to a stranger. From one of the bags he pulled out a beer bottle and using the bench popped it open. Amber foam spurted out alarming the Thief who held the bottle up switching it from hand to hand. The explosion slowed down and he hurriedly drank the suds to keep more from escaping. Smacking his lips and using his clothes to wipe his hands off, he revealed some of tricks his trade.

“It was too easy doing this. I walked in grabbed a little red hand basket and walked around filling it up.” As he spoke the pacing of his rocking slowed. “After I filled the bags, I showed the girl at the front a receipt I found in the parking lot.” I was impressed by this detail; most people would not have been so throral. “You know what the girl at the counter said,” he beamed with pride. “’Thanks and come again.’ You bet I will.”

“There was a deli chicken in there but I ate that.” On the opposite side of the street a van slowed down to wait for the light to change. The woman driving had the window down and the Thief called out his pitch to her. “Eighty dollars in Angus steaks for only twenty dollars.” She waved him off as the light changed and she speed away. Peering down the street he continued, “I’ve got to take the bus down to Capitol Hill to drop this stuff off unless I can sell it first.” Then a thought seemed to grip him. I imagined his mind journeying up from a deep, dark, spiral with moments of clarity as the light filtered in. “Why do I have to drop this off?” He stopped rocking and sat straight up. “I mean, he’s got a car.” The pendulum had moved in his mind, decisions and indecisions with each swing. “He can come and get it,” he snapped his fingers excitedly, “and-and that’s what I told him.” The dark arch of the spiral enveloped him and he sank down admitting, “but I’ve got to get down there and give this stuff to him because he’s gonna pay me.” The Thief exhaled slowly and said almost under his breath, “I hope he pays me. I need him to pay me.”

His next admission caused it all to make sense. “I’ve been on crank all this weekend. Methamphetimines. Speed.” Considering his behavior this was not a surprise. At the mention of these drugs the shakes and rocking gripped him again. “My buddy wanted me to do some crack and I was like, ‘No sir, no thank you.’ I’ve done that shit before and it’s just bad news.” From this point all the information given were pieces in the puzzle of a life that had become a shadow. “I used to be a chef. Took a twelve-week course at the community college to improve my skills. But I’ve been out of work since then. I have interviews lined up. I’m just waiting and hoping.” A long sigh escaped him relieving the physical memories of a past that still appears to torture him and with it the shaking and rocking stopped.

“Why do I keep doing these things that I do?”

I had no answer, but in the distance I saw the bus to Capital Hill approaching.