The Sexism this Cycle just about killed my Brain

[betsuni]

64. I think the cultural poverty is a big thing.

In some countries people live simple lives, not a lot of stuff or money or fancy educations, but they can recite poetry from their nationally beloved poets, are familiar with the famous art and music of their culture. (I feel terribly embarrassed that I can easily recite commercial slogans and jungles from my youth but can't recite a single whole poem.) They have a sense of history, national dishes they're proud of, sit in cafes or pubs or coffeehouses and talk, read newspapers. They know how to have conservations. They walk, aren't sealed up in personal cars all the time.

I notice that when I don't read books for awhile and only read things on the computer machine, I get impatient and can't read long articles, can't pay attention. Then I pick up a book and my brain has to shift, I'm going into the world of the author and I forget about myself, it's a different consciousness. You can get into the heads of people who have been dead hundreds of years! Who live in a different country, experience. You learn how to understand what being human is. Don't need money to read books, but of course Republicans hate libraries and Americans have been brainwashed to hate the taxes that would pay for them, and reading is apparently elitist, so ... the damage is done.

America wastes so much human potential. It's a big country, I guess it can't be helped. Everyone I know in the U.S. is on anti-depressants. What's that about?

Oh, Bruce Springsteen is on TV talking about his love of reading, how it teaches you how to write. This is a good point. The only reason I can write half-way decently is because of reading -- I imitate.