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Add one part satire to two parts sincerity. Sprinkle on a couple of rants. Stir liberally.
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Daily Blah FAQ
Who are you?
I'm the newly-appointed Future editor at Business 2.0 and the former San Francisco correspondent for Time Magazine.
Wow, so does this mean everything you write reflects Time Inc's opinion? Or do you perhaps have some sort of standard disclaimer to the effect that it doesn't?
Naturally, the opinions contained in this blog are not those of my employers. In fact, some opinions may be the polar opposite of my employers. Some may be the same, for all I know. Hey, it's not like I ask my employers their opinions about everything in the news, okay? Let's just say that if this were a Venn diagram with one circle marked "my opinions" and the other one marked "my employers' opinions", there would doubtless be some overlap. But neither I nor my employers are able to pinpoint exactly where that overlap is.
What is this Daily Blah thing?
An experiment for a column I wrote about blogging back in December 2001. All these years later, I haven't been able to kick the habit.
If it's called Daily Blah, how come you don't ... hey, wait, you're writing every day!
See? Told you I'd try harder.
Mister, you talk funny. Are you one of them furrners?
Why yes I am, as it happens. I was born, raised and educated in Great Britain. I've been living in the U.S. since 1996 and identify as British.
I say, old chap, you forgot the "u" in "colour."
No I didn't. I may identify as British, but I am also an American journalist writing for an American audience about mostly American issues. These two different sides of me are a constant source of tension. Nevertheless, Daily Blah will adhere to American English grammar and spelling.
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Daily Blah for... Friday, July 19, 2002
Men and Supermen
The more astute Daily Blah regulars will have noticed the appearence of a comments link beneath each post (thanks again to Mac, who turned a half-assed desire expressed in a brief e-mail from Japan into reality, all in less time than it took to brew a cup of green tea). Take this as my official encouragement to post what the hell you want there: compliments, arguments, abuse, kitten recipes (thanks, Kaila). It's your space. It's a vibrant example of democracy in action. And apart from anything else, it gives me something to talk about in the next day's blog.
Case in point: Lauren's comment about superheroes being just as popular in Hollywood these days as anti-heroes like Hitler. Partly, I think this is down to the fact that Marvel has finally got its act together -- losing money on regular comics sales fast, it discovered (with the wonderful X-men) it could make far more cash out of renting its franchises out to major studios in a careful and fully controlled manner. After all, who's got time to read comic books these days? Far better to get your dose of Spidey for two hours in a darkened theater, safe in the knowledge that Stan Lee has vetted everything you're about to see. The Hulk and Daredevil seem set to turn Marvel into more of a studio itself than a comic house. AOL Time Warner's very own DC comics is getting in on the act too, with the forthcoming Batman vs. Superman. (Rumors that Dick Parsons and the late, great Bob Pittman are set to square off in the title roles are about as unfounded as our current stock price.)
But yes, it is also partly a by-product of the times. When the going gets scary, people need superheroes. Think about the decades in which superhero comics really flourished -- the 30's, 40's and 50's -- and you're talking depression, global conflict, industrialized genocide and finally the widely-accepted certainty of imminent atomic war. It was precisely because we felt so powerless in the face of all this that the costumed legions flourished. There's a great scene in Michael Chabon's Pulitzer prize-winning Adventures of Kavalier and Clay where Joe Kavalier, fresh from the horrors of Nazi Prague, pours out his revenge into a cover image of the Escapist socking Hitler square on the jaw. If today's superhero comics weren't so jaded and cynical and hadn't lost their sense of societal purpose, you could imagine seeing Superman throttling Bin Laden at a newstand near you. I think a lot of us would laugh and gain some small measure of inner comfort from such an image.
As it happens, I started delving into Nietzsche today (it's one of those things you promise you'll do sometime before you die, like take the trans-Siberian railroad and finish War and Peace), and discovered what ubermensch really means. Previously I'd been one of the uninformed masses scared away by the word's supposed fascistic overtones, and was pleasantly surprised to find Nietzsche -- who disdained his anti-semitic sister -- would not have agreed with Hitler's eugenic interpretation. Rather it's a goal, an aspiration for us all to live life and use our minds to the full; more in keeping with what Tim Leary said about the Beatles, that they were "ambassadors for a new race of laughing supermen." Well, I'm there. Sign me up. Let us all live like laughing supermen, gleefully socking the world's scariest inner demons square on the jaw.
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