Pink Floyd and Rainbows, the Whys of a News-Fast ~ The Typewriter Chronicles
I don't spend a lot of time reading the news these days. I already know it's usually bad. I know there is good news out there, but the media long ago decided to only report the worst of it because they discovered people pay more attention to bad news, therefore they can get higher ratings and sell more advertisements.
There was a shooting, there was a murder, a nice old man can't pay his zillion dollar healthcare bill, a school closed, a politician did something horrible but rather than apologizing he blamed the other political party (and probably kicked a dog too), there was another battle in another war, another fifty species went extinct, the world is on fire, the sky is falling.
That kind of thing.
I have no need to know about any of that. Of course I feel compassion for the victims of bad things, but me feeling compassion isn't going to help any of them. The only thing reading or watching these news stories is going to do is make me feel bad and/or make me angry. I'd rather start my day with a smile, not a murderous rage, thank you very much. I figure if anything is actually really important, I'll hear about it somewhere else. A friend or family member will tell me, generally. So until I hear it from them, I'd just rather ignore the news.
Call it a news-fast if you want. Some people do. To me a fast is something that you are only doing temporarily and will stop doing at some point. I have no plan to go back to watching/reading the news anytime soon, so for me it's less a news-fast than simply a practice. Or... well, the opposite of a practice, because I'm not really doing anything. I guess I'm avoiding doing something in a way, which is doing something, but it's really no effort to not pick up the newspaper or open Apple news. Hmm..
Well, whatever it is, I'm doing it. Or not doing it. Whatever.
I did happen to catch a bit of news the other day, though. A friend sent it to me for comment. I'm sure most of you have seen it by now. It's the 50th anniversary of Dark Side of the Moon, which is in many people's opinion the best Pink Floyd album. Mine too. In honor of the event, the band changed their logo. To this:
My first reaction was, "Looks nice". If anything it's a little too clean, a little too digital looking instead of some analog job. But I like how they didn't just stamp a 50 on the original art and instead went for something a little different while still keeping it close enough to obviously be a play off the original. At any rate, this isn't the cover of the 50th anniversary edition, just a logo they adopted for the event.
But then I read the rest of what my buddy sent. Evidently there is some outrage from people accusing the band of becoming Woke. The funny thing is, a lot of the people yelling about this are also claiming that they were around in 1974 and bought the original album. I kind of doubt that. Bit if so, evidently they no longer have it and have somehow managed to avoid remembering what the iconic album cover looked like. Because it had a rainbow too.
I don't think many people were being Woke in 1974.
Music fans quickly flocked to Twitter and proceeded to mock the controversy and taunt those who were offended by the rainbow.
The entire thing reminded me of a more personal event.
I've been an Apple user for a long time. They may be the cool company now with the products everyone wants, but not so long ago they were the outcasts. But I digress. About 20 years ago or so, Apple changed their logo, from a bitten apple with a rainbow to the current solid bitten apple.
From this
to this
The rainbow pattern used to be a LSD thing, I think. Turn On, Tune In, and Drop Out, right? The hippie colors. We can picture Timothy Leary walking around in a rainbow suit as he tried to get everyone high. Steve Jobs was very much a part of that culture and in fact credited a lot of his success to LSD, so it only makes sense that he used a rainbow for his company's logo. A lot of people were. Anyway, I suspect them moving to a solid logo was simply an attempt to move the company beyond this druggie, rebellious image.
I grew up with that original logo, so it has a special place in my heart. A few years after they changed it, I ordered some stickers with the original rainbow logo and I put them over the new logo on my Powerbook and iPod (that will tell you how long ago this was).
On a trip back home to the States I was working in a cafe and a guy came up to be and accused me of using the Apple logo to make a pro-gay statement. This took me by surprise and I was kind of flabbergasted. I remember telling him that it was the old Apple logo. He didn't believe me, but he went away so nothing more came of it. So yeah, I guess I was accused of being Woke, before that was a thing.
I never got any other negative reaction to using that rainbow logo. I've thought more than once about ordering some more stickers to do the same on my current laptop, but I haven't yet. Am I cheap, lazy, or is part of me worried about another bad reaction like that? I'd say the second if you asked me, but I wouldn't be surprised if part of me is worried about the last.
Meanings change, and that meaning of the rainbow morphed from a symbol of the drug induced counter-culture to a symbol of gay pride. That's fine. I mean, some things just change and that's neither good nor bad, it just is. Slang gives words new meanings constantly and it's not exactly uncommon for these new meanings to entirely replace the old ones. So too with symbols.
But this outrage over the change to this particular symbol seems more manufactured than organic. And we know who excels at manufacturing outrage.
That's another reason I avoid the news these days. Because it's not the news. As I mentioned above, the modern news has always had the agenda of shocking us to make us watch more. This really kicked into high gear after O.J. when they switched to a 24 hour news format. But even with that, as bad as it was, it was still objectively news.
But somewhere along the way from there to here that changed. You turn on the news now and it is opinion masquerading as news. Usually this opinion is aimed at telling us to hate everyone and everything in the other tribe, to disbelieve everything they say, and sometimes even to commit violence against them.
That's where this irrational anger towards Pink Floyd's new logo comes from and this really rubs me the wrong way.
Personally I don't care what your politics are. You can be socialist, MAGA Republican, Democrat, moderate, anarchist, whatever. We might disagree on ideas, but we can respect each other and have conversation together. I may not like some of the Woke stuff the more extreme radicals on the left are going for, but I'm not going to verbally attack anyone over it. The world is already full of enough bad stuff, why add to it by hating each other?
Yeah yeah, I'm not going to get all hippie on you. Peace and love, man. Be groovy. I just don't like all the anger that's going around these days. This outrage over Pink Floyd's new logo is just a symptom of the problem.
Anyway. After reading that story about the 50th anniversary cover, I kind of wish I hadn't. I want to just enjoy the 50th anniversary of one of the greatest music albums of the prior century without wasting time thinking of a controversy over them still using a rainbow.
They have a pretty cool set planned, by the way. I won't be buying it, but looks great. I'm sure the remixed tracks will eventually find their way to digital and streaming so whenever that happens I'll enjoy the new mixes as well.
To anyone who haven't heard the album before, do yourself a favor and listen:
Even better, find a place to listen that doesn't have the pauses between the tracks.
❦
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David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. |
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Great response. I was flabbergasted about it too - firstly, it is so ridiculous that the LGBTQI community has a monopoly on rainbows AND why believe believe they have this monopoly, and two, mountain out of molehill much, and I'm sure it's the media jumping on a tiny story to create outrage as usual.
Then - and now I've started, haha - there's nothing wrong with being 'woke' per se - surely it means resistant to mainstream oppressive narratives that NEED to be subverted, questioned, kicked to the curb in an age where we are resisting the oppressions of the past. I utterly agree that the extremism of the woke movement is worth resisting too - but like you, I believe any kind of extremism is a bit fucked up anyway and often doesn't listen or create meaningful dialogue to address the complexities of the issues it purports to face.
AND ANOTHER THING! I actually hate the logo, if I cared enough to critique (and I had that album on vinyl, or my Dad did haha, so by rights it's also mine) - it's the prism that makes the rainbow, and there's no prism here.
AND - haha - wtf that guy calling you out about the apple logo. I think support of the LGBTQI movement ANYWAY is important as it forces people to question their own lack of support, understanding, whatever. A bit of solidarity goes a long way.
Anyway, loved your unpacking of this 'news' event. I was seriously just about to put a prismic rainbow sticker of mountains on the Def so I can get rainbows all over the inside of it when the sun shines through. No wokeness. No anything. Just rainbows coz they are rainbows, and who wouldn't just love that!
Yeah, you're right, being woke isn't bad in and of itself. I think it has a bad image because of the excesses of the movement, but the idea by itself is fine. Like you said, some things need to be resisted/subverted/questioned. I may have put that badly in my piece.
Yeah, I don't love the logo. It's not bad, but definitely not good either. Looks more like something an intern whipped up in an afternoon and the guys gave it a thumbs up because, well, it's only a logo, so why care too much, eh?
Thanks for the great comment!
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There may be that old conspiracy about Alan Turing and the poisoned apple too. Who can say on these things.
Excellent read. Enjoyed every word.
Their actual original logo was Newton under the apple tree, so I always assumed that's where the bitten apple came from, and also a nod to the Beatles of course. I hadn't heard the bit about Alan Turing and the poisoned apple. I'll have to look that up!
Thanks for the comment!
!PIZZA
Hahaha, if I'm honest, my first reaction to seeing it was an eye roll, "hear we go, more people jumping on the band wagon." Then I thought, oh, wait, nevermind haha
I like that, news-fast haha you do right, I try not to think about anything going on now. I went through a time where I would read about everything going on in the world, and I was misreble. Constantly thinking, "god, we have to do something about all this." Then I realised nothing can be done, I had to justify it by saying "I'm not apethic, I just don't see the point of winding myself up about all the bad stuff in the world. I'd rather not think about, because the stress is hurting me more than fixing the problem."
Personally, the apple logo could go either way. You can get called woke as an insult or get called woke as a compliment. Or the third option, someone might see it and say, "haha nice, O.G apple."
Everything is militerised now and everyone is ready to fight and argue with strangers in public over their "beliefs." Even if those beliefs are fighting over which new movie is the best. There's people who argue and say, "you have to see this movie, support them for being progressive!" Yes, the hollywood machine really cares about you as an individual.
Who spreads this crap..? Oh yeah, the media, so they can help to sell tickets, products and rip people off under the banner of spreading awerness, and being inclusive, while also helping to rile people up and make sure they're ready to fight for their brands, identity and beliefs lol
I guess it's human nature turned up to 11, the algorthim probably is a bad thing because it shows us what we read or watch most, keeping us in a constant cycle.
You're right though, people get more clicks from anger, it's pretty much, the easiest emotional response to trigger in someone. It's like YouTube even, I've noticed a lot in the last couple of years, if there's a new film, game, or tv show out, people tear it to shreds, because it's what gets the clicks. Everyone just wants to be angry nowadays it seems.
Great post, plenty to think about and talk about, I better stop or I'l have to write one myself hahaha
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Exactly! That's not apathy. It is because we care too much and so we have to look away for sanity.
Yep. Humans falling into tribes is natural enough, but for most of modern history history we have tried to reduce that tendency. The opinion news of the past 20 years really reversed that, and social media has really accelerated it. It goes to 11, indeed.
Thanks for reading and the great comment!
!PIZZA
Absolutely! We'd all love to be in a position to change stuff, but really, most of us don't have that ability or reach, so the main thing we can do is focus on our lives and the people we love. I read this book called The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F*ck. It was entraining and really highlighted that kind of attitude in a funny way.
Yeah man, it's toxic and it's easy to get caught up in it when we're being barraged with it at all hours each day. I remember hearing someone talk about a similar thing before. They said something along the lines of, when you have an issue in your life, it's like your mind zooms in and you can't tackle it with a clear mind. But, when you zoom out and step away for some breathing room, it is much easier to navigate it. I've always tried to keep that in my mind after hearing it.
You're welcome, have a great day, and thank you!
!PIZZA
I've heard of that book many times now. I should give it a look.
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I had forgotten about the rainbow apple logo! You unlocked some memories for me 😂 !LOLZ Totally agreed on the news. I check the news once a week, outside of directly googling things I hear about secondhand. I actually think I may be more informed now than when I woke each morning to read over the headlines 🤷♀ 🤣 !PIZZA
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Rainbow Apple logo forever!
It’s kind of funny, for what ever reason I highly dislike Pink Floyd. I don’t like their sound and I can’t get past it. I enjoy bands like Zeppelin and The Stones among other but Floyd was never on my list of things to listen to and enjoy. I know a lot of people love them and their dark side of the moon album is a hit.
I despise the news and everything about it. I don’t give it a lick of attention either, because it’s all horse shit and largely useless information that has no affect on my day what so ever. Fuck em and their bullshit agendas.
haha nicely put 😂 I completely agree.
Yeah, I can totally get you about Pink Floyd. If you don't like prog, you probably won't like Floyd. See me? I love Led Zep, especially their more folk-ish songs. But the Stones... except for a handful of songs, I never could really get into them. Go figure.