Zombie shoppers with Dead Eyes in my Malls.

[KoKo]

I've been on a quest for a decent "toaster oven" (one that doesn't burn my kitchen down) this past week. I've been in every store from upscale Crate & Barrel, Belks, Hechts, Target, Bed, Bath & Beyond, K-Mart, Walmart, Lowes, Best Buy,Eckerds and my local hardware stores. This involved my hitting my two major malls plus many "strip malls."

It was a blitz of shopping quest that I haven't done in over a year and I was shocked at what I saw. Shoppers with dark expressions on their faces and dead eyes walking like zombies in an out of stores. From teenagers to some very elderly folks...it seemed the same. Almost like they were "dream walking."

I don't remember seeing anything like this in my part of the South since I've lived here. There's usually a human "buzz" in mall or a store. Busy folks either enjoying looking at the "stuff" or folks there searching for an item and interested to get on with purchasing and get out. People with smiles and lots of conversational Buzz in the "Food Courts" and people talking to each other as they go from store to store. Not this week..not here.

Anyone else notice this where you live? People looking like Zombies?

:shrug:

BTW: I still haven't found a toaster oven that would pass the "fire" test.

[JeffR]

1. If you can stomach the gore

Dawn of the Dead (George Romero's original, not last year's remake) makes exactly this point. It's satire worthy of Swift.

[leftstreet]

4. Right on!

:thumbsup:
The satire in the original is brilliant.

(I liked the remake even though it took a different direction.)

[JeffR]

6. Remake was interesting

And sort of a comment on how consumer culture has evolved (or devolved) since Romero's original.

Have to admit I'm a sucker for zombie movies, with or without social commentary!

:blush:

[chat_noir]

21. 1978 zombies

Zombies rule the mall parking lot in Dawn of the Dead

[JeffR]

22. Thanks for posting this

Looks like Congressional Republicans trying to figure out which way to go to distance themselves from Abramoff.

[SoCalDem]

36. Zoom in..that lady in front looks like Laura Bush

[Beelzebud]

25. Exactly. Romero saw this when malls were still a new thing.

Dawn of the Dead is the greatest horror movie ever made.

For one simple reason:

There is A LOT more to the movie than meets the eye. One person can walk away happy they saw a gorey, violent, splatter-fest. Another person can walk away happy they saw something intelligent, with satire, and social commentary.

[TheFarseer]

137. Saw both versions and loved both

Have you seen Land of the Dead yet? I missed that one (so far) and it's hard to find Night of the Living Dead. I've seen pretty much anything else to do with zombies though.

[revree]

2. Funny you should say that...

I've thought this for awhile now, people don't speak to one another or smile, like they are afraid...and this goes hand in hand with people either having their cell phones glued to their mouths or their Ipods on...as if they are using those devices to avoid having to make contact with other human beings in front of them...

I suspect, and have for awhile, that the subconscious mood of the public is one of fear and literally being 'asleep' and in denial about the terrible things their government is doing. People don't want to admit that the ones they put in power are abusing them, like a child or a woman who is being abused, they don't want to face the truth and fight back because it requires too much of them, or maybe because they don't know how to fight back.

I think those of us that ARE awake and not yet zombified so to speak must do what we can to awaken the others. Ever see the cheesy sci fi movie THEY LIVE? It was on the other night, terrible acting but the theme is so timely...people unable to see the truth about the fact they are being taken over by aliens until they put on these special sunglasses and suddenly they can see all the subliminal messages keeping them asleep and under control. Cheeky movie but powerful, like THE MATRIX...

Anyway, your perceptions are so right on the money, and resonate with a growing number of us who are convinced that we need to do something to awaken the masses, that just fighting for our voting rights and working on campaigns is not enough. We need to shift the paradigm...

Hope you find that perfect toaster, too!

[teknomanzer]

11. I love that cheesey movie!

Yes the acting totally sucks, but I still love it. My favorite part is when Roddy Piper is kicking his friend's ass just to get him to put on the glasses. Maybe that's the greatest metaphor in the movie. We'll have to kick much ass just trying to get people to see the truth, and we'll be taking a pretty good beating ourselves in the process.

[webtrainer]

78. I sure wish they'd do a remake of . . .

THEY LIVE

and I think about that movie quite often, strangely enough. I moved to Nicaragua and the people aren't like that here. People say hello, good afternoon, thank you, here to serve you, etc. They make up for it by being weird in other ways though.

[raccoon]

103. I've noticed that too...some people act like it would cost them

MONEY to even speak to you. I've gotten so I'm apprehensive about speaking to people because a lot of them don't speak back.

I think at least some of that is just bad manners. Some isbeing self-absorbed. Some, as you say, is fear.

Pretty bad when people are fearful of speaking to their neighbors.

[Ladyhawk]

142. Perhaps people aren't talking to one another because we're divided.

In this small town I often find I am surrounded by fundy or freeper talk. It has lessened lately. I think some of the fundies/freepers are getting uncomfortable with recent events. At least I hope they are. When most people in this county were a'wavin' the flag fer Jeeeezus, I actually wore earplugs to water aerobics to avoid the pontificating of an especially vocal wingnut. I wore my outdated mp3 player--not an iPod--to physical therapy to avoid Faux News, which was the channel of choice of the wingnut physical therapist.

Yeah, I feel a real disconnect. I have since I de-zombified myself in 2002 just before the war in Iraq.

Anyway, I just thought I'd throw that in for "possible reasons."

[Armstead]

3. You may just be experiencing "Re-Entry Culture Shock"

I have a theory about it. Maybe what you're experience is different, but here's what happens to me.

There are times when I go shopping more than others. Sometimes I go through long stretches without going to the mall. When I do go after such times, I get disoriented and sort of demoralized at first. The setting tends to dehumanize people, and it strikes me as a herd of mindless consumers. The setting of mass marketing also reduces the human interactions.

But once I get reoriented, I realize that it isn't that simple. I realize, for one thing, that I'm one of the masses too in my role as a shopper. I also recognize that it really is just a collection of individuals....That hits home especially if I come across someone there who I know are smart individuals, but in the setting of the mall they could be mistaken as part of the herd too.

For example, I was in line at a discount store recently. The woman in front of me appeared to be just another empty sullen consumer. But then she noticed that I only had one item and she had a cartfull, so she turned and asked me if I wanted to get in front of her. We got into a conversation, and she turened out to be a lot more thoughtful -- and critical of the department store setting -- than it appeared.

It's just my own experience. Maybe you are referring to a more noticible change. I do think that a combination of winter, a lousy 2004 and a genral sense of malaise has made people grumpier than usual recently.

[leftstreet]

10. I like your theory

It accounts for that unexplained split second of discomfort when recognizing someone you know well in a large crowd.

[OneBlueSky]

5. over time, I've found myself avoiding malls at all costs . . .

this wasn't some kind of rational, well thought out decision based on principle, but just a growing realization that I absolutely hated being in malls . . . and zombie shoppers, I think, were part of what drove me away . . . it's like they're in some kind of uber-consumer zone that's focused so exclusively on "stuff" that it has no room for human contact or acknowledgement . . . I dont think I've been to a mall in over three years -- and I sure as hell don't feel like I'm missing anything . . .

[nickinSTL]

12. The only reason I ever go to malls anymore

is to walk in bad weather.

Can't afford most mall goods, anyway...so, no point in shopping there.

[Saphire]

129. I don't think they are building malls like they used to...mostly it

has turned to the old "strip malls" instead. I know here in San Antonio, they have torn down at least 3 malls, and they are not being rebuilt. Super- whatever's have taken over, after the mall just got to damn expensive to shop at.

[CottonBear]

7. Try a Black and Decker undermount (under the cabinet) toaster oven.

I love mine. it works great and is very safe plus it saves counter space in my tiny condo kitchen.

I avoid malls and discount stores if at all possible. I haven't been to the local mall or any mall) in over 2 years.

[KittyWampus]

31. I love the fact you're recommending a toaster!

:D

After reading the thread where we pretty much all identify with attack fo the zombie shopper syndrome... it's just fun to hear a recommendation :)

[CottonBear]

39. A toaster oven uses less energy than the big stove/oven

and is compact. My Nana always told me to use the toaster oven (I stil have my great grandmas's GE Toast'R'Oven in storage) to bake a loaf of banana bread or corn bread or to bake a couple of taters or a couple of pork chops or a casserole or anything else that's toaster size! It saves time and energy and space! :)

[KoKo]

50. I remember those. But, I never saw one in all my store travels...

maybe they stopped making them? I'll check online though. thanks.

[progressivebydesign]

8. I hate malls and big box stores. No windows = No way.

I haven't seen any of the zombie behavior when I"m out and about in my community, but then I haven't been to a mall, per se, in years. People shop for entertainment now, and a sense of meaning in their lives.

[SmokingJacket]

13. Yes, lack of windows...

maybe that's why I feel dead and depressed in the mall... it's like being in a coffin...

[KittyWampus]

32. the smell of chemicals gets to me... I'm not THAT sensitive but in places

like Kmart or Walmart or big boxes that have mountains of chemically treated plastic stuff... the smell gives me a headache.

[raccoon]

108. I hate malls too. I hate to shop.

I don't mind shopping for groceries, but clothes--aarrgh!

[Catch22Dem]

9. What exactly is the "fire test?"

Just curious. I didn't know there was a big difference in toaster ovens. Four sides, glass door, heating element, and a rack. :)

[KoKo]

14. What's out there has "changed."

I could do a whole post on what's happened to small toaster ovens and the demise of consumer protection. I've brought four of them home and returned them as fire hazards. Black & Decker, GE, Krups.

They are all made in China now and lack proper insulation..plus the heating elements melt on the Black & Deckers. I've had two of them in the past year that have broken. My last toaster oven before this lasted for about eight years and never was a threat in my kitchen.

I'll do a post about it. It's shocking what's going on with the cheapening of our appliances due to GE's manufacturing most of them and passing them off under other brand names. It's been a whole research project for me...aside from noticing the Zombie people...plus very antagonistic salespeople (if one can find them) who seem to want to argue with the customer.

[Catch22Dem]

19. Ineteresting

I've actually never owned a toaster oven. I use the toaster, and the broiler quite a bit though.

[Strelnikov_]

26. I Went Through The Same 'Quest For Toaster Oven' A Few Months Ago

The 13 year old Black and Decker was still working. But it was, to say the least, starting to look like something that food should not be anywhere near. It is in the basement awaiting the coming barter economy.

So, I bought a $30 basic model, as my needs are basic. Got it home, took a closer look, and returned. The quality was pathetic for something that could be a fire hazard. So, I decided to go upscale, pay for quality so to speak. Went through two $80+ models. Same crappy quality, the cost was higher due to more gadgets, all of which were just one more failure mechanism.

So, I ended up with a moderate priced Black and Decker. Fairly basic model in which I have little faith that it is more or less a fires hazard than any other. I now exercise more vigilance in it's use.

I reached the same conclusion you have, that the race to the bottom on price has also meant a race to the bottom on quality and consumer protection. There does not appear to be a 'quality' appliance out there. Just ones with more gadgets and widgets on previously dependable brand names.

[KoKo]

29. There was another shopper checking them out in BB&B with me and she

and I kept opening the doors and checking for "crumb trays" and finally she said to me..."I don't know which one to buy...can't find one that's the right size." I said...I know I've had two in the last year and in one the heating elements melted and warped (a Black & Decker). She said.."You're kidding...I've gone through two this last year myself...what's going on?"

She ended up with one that she didn't want to buy because it was digital but it was small. I passed that one up because the heating elements were too close to the top and bottom and I was afraid they would melt like my last one.

Thanks for replying...I guess there are many of us out there searching for toaster ovens and the companies are glad that we have to now do this twice a year. "I wish I'd saved my receipts" because they both had one year guarantees but I threw out box and receipts." I will definitely keep them both if I ever find a new toaster oven and it breaks within warrantee period.

[Lorien]

54. Same exact situation with my 15 year old Black and Decker

still works great-but looks like a disgrace. I wish there were places that "reconditioned" such things. Right now it's in the garage, also awaiting the barter economy (weird-I had the same thought when I put it there)!

[Lorien]

53. Avoid Oster

I got a new one from Costco several months ago, and it caught on fire two months after I bought it. :-(

Oh, and if you could-post when you find a safe one; I'd like to know what brand it is!

[KoKo]

57. Having looked at every model in every store...and brought home 4 and

checked them out then boxed them up again to return...I'm not hopeful ..but I'll let you know if I find one.

My next thing will be to Google for "Toaster Oven's, Fire Hazard." I should have started with Google but I was desperate...so I started my search. I did check Consumer Reports but they haven't reported on them in several years...so no luck there.

I even bought a bigger version than my little four toast toaster thinking maybe the extra room would keep it from overheating the top and sides..but no luck with the heating not being so hot it would burn hands on sides and it was too BIG for my counter space. Much more than I needed... It was a Krups which is an upscale brand..I bought at Crate & Barrel. It didn't work as well as my old GE which I had for 8 years without a problem or the two that broke this year from over heating that lasted about 6 months each...:-(

[Stephanie]

63. Please do a post on that

I had no idea!

[Lars39]

77. Consider putting an 18 inch tile under and behind the toaster oven.

I did this with my bread maker. Just gives me a little bit more peace of mind.

[KoKo]

79. What a GREAT IDEA!

A simple, inexpensive solution! Many thanks. My problem with the new Toaster Ovens is that they are so hot on the sides (due to metal instead of thermoplastic) that in a small kitchen whatever is beside them could catch on fire...but I think I could improvise something "tasteful" and not visually unattractive with what you suggest...

[Lars39]

80. I understand about the small kitchen!

I haven't gotten another toaster oven since we moved because I haven't quite figured out where to put one. :)

[AnneD]

167. I had one start to catch on fire...

actually young daughter was cooking. Had to unplug and get the fire extinguisher going. It was a Wally world special. We switched to a toaster and keep the crumb tray clean. Just got a toaster oven that works like a dream. Got it at Target. Can't remember the name but will look it up (maybe Oster).

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

15. I usually find Christmas gift shopping time to be like that.

Seriously. Since people are under the "obligation" of materialistic American culture, and under time "pressure", it is a grim task.

[salin]

16. Its called stress

have to work more to pay for things... can I pay for things... etc. Just a guess.

[Beelzebud]

17. Watch George Romero's Dawn of the Dead. The 1979 version.

Not the new 2004 version.

The original Dawn of the Dead had a major social crtique in the form of zombies in the shopping mall. A VERY good movie if you stop and think about what you are seeing.

[cap]

18. I've been doing it myself

a video Ipod for XMas and I am in my own world. I find I retreat to it after a load of bad news. I've stopped talking on the train as much as I used to. I can grab a few minutes of relaxation with the Ipod.

[Virginia Dare]

20. Shopping can be an addiction like many other things..

maybe that's the pheomenon you're seeing, or perhaps it's something more sinister. Millions if not billions of dollars are spent each year on getting inside the shoppers' heads, so maybe those subliminal messages they send have gotten more seditious. I'm donning a nice chapeau made of tin right now.

[MissB]

23. You might try DeLonghi

I had a decent one that I bought about 8 years ago during a major kitchen remodel. I needed a toaster oven to act as a temporary oven while my kitchen was in shambles. I think I paid about $100 for it, and it was well-made. I have no idea if they make them in the US or not, or if their quality is as good as it was 8 years ago.

As far as the zombie thing goes- I dunno. I don't go to the mall, so I don't see groups of shoppers. :shudder:

[KoKo]

30. only one DeLonghi in all my shopping. They've changed in 8 years...

sadly. (I remember when there were several models of that brand) Now no matter the brand they all look alike with the same inner parts and cheap thin construction. They upped the wattage so they get hot faster and that must be why they overheat. :shrug:

24. my boyfriend once called me the anti-mall

I have never liked malls, it is in my DNA.

[hlthe2b]

27. If I have to go into a mall in the pm after work...

I'm sure I'd be one of the "zombies." Seasonal Affective Disorder has me firmly in its clutches and once the sun goes down, I'm worthless...

[FreedomAngel82]

28. I haven't paid attention

I go in the backway to the store because I can get in and out quickly to the specific stores I go to.

[Batgirl]

33. I've been noticing this for a couple of years now

I was grocery shopping at the local mega-mart yesterday and there were lots of pod people in there filling their buggies. The store was strangely silent for being so busy. The colorful, "let's partayyy", piles of Super Bowl merch made quite a contrast with the somber demeanor of the shoppers. Working my way through the grocery aisles, three different times I had to squeeze past someone else's buggy, and each time I smiled at the person and excused myself. Three different times they gave no sign they saw or heard me. One time I was face to face with the person, eye level and less than 2 feet between us, and he stared right through me without even blinking.

You can't go by one shopping trip, but to me, public behavior overall seems different than the way it used to be. We don't smile as much, we look down, we avoid eye contact. I think our country is in the grip of a mass depression. I don't think it a coincidence that these are all common symptoms displayed by victims of physical and emotional abuse.

Not the first one to point out the abuser in this case is our government. As just one obvious example, look how they used the color coded terror alerts to manipulate public fear. Look at the language of intimidation they've used all along to silence dissent or criticism. I think when the torture photos became public, they looked on it as having a bright side, as a way of communicating the idea "look what could happen to you if you step out of line." They did not have to allow those soldiers bring their cameras to those sessions. Those soldiers didn't sneak, in fact they took the pictures openly, and freely traded them back and forth like tropies, and I can't see how all this open activity could escape notice by military authorities. I think, in a way, they wanted to send a message.

They've also been frequently boasting lately about the vast powers they've given themselves, not just to eavesdrop on citizens, but to detain them just as long as they see fit, without having to justify any of this to a judge.They want us to know they literally have the power of life and death over us and we have no recourse, that we are at their mercy. They want us to feel that life as we know it could end at any moment. Either at their whim, or that of the terrists.

I think many people have absorbed this message on some level, even those who aren't well informed because of their reliance on the corporate media. And I think people are depressed as hell, and scared and trying to stay hidden by turning within themselves when they're among crowds/strangers. I don't have a naturally jolly temperament, but I've been making an extra effort to try to make eye contact lately, and to smile at strangers in the store.

[KoKo]

48. The "Battered Spouse" syndrome....sounds like...

I think someone posted about that this week..and I didn't get to read it but it would make sense. A sense of powerlessness and defeat and not knowing what to do.

I've not seen it here like this but our area has been in constant Real Estate boom with many jobs, immigrants and growth. Maybe things are not going as well for folks as it would look and they are waking up.

Maybe the growth has brought a Big City indifference...but people also looked more down than indifferent ...or maybe a combination of the two.

:shrug:

[Skidmore]

34. Too much patriotic shopping will do that to you...cause

burnout.

[marions ghost]

35. Here's a theory...

anyone think there's any truth to this?

Because so many people frequent shopping malls they can be said to reflect the mood of the general public. Shopping has been elevated to the level of a recreational pastime in this country. When my Dad visited his elderly cousin in Texas all they did was go to malls. My Dad was never so bored in his life because he always thought of shopping as a chore. But to his cousin it was a hobby.

So here's my theory. People look like zombies because it's harder and harder to get their recreational 'fix' from a shopping mall. Disposable income is down, the economy is uncertain, and the inventory of merchandise is pared down (not to mention lower quality for the higher price). It just doesn't feel as good to consume as it used to. Too much angst about the cost of things. Without recreation people get depressed. And when Americans don't want to shop, you KNOW there's a serious problem.

A social psychologist could have fun comparing the relative mental outlooks of those who frequent malls vs. those who don't right now. My guess is they would find a correlation with those who make malls their primary recreation, and depression. Those who prefer doing things that don't cost much may very well weather the economic downturn more successfully.
------------

Edit: I also go along with Batgirl's suggestion (above) that zombie behavior can be indicative of a feeling of being abused. There is a loss of trust that permeates all social interactions when the victim is sufficiently stressed.

[KoKo]

61. Maybe, "Mall Fatigue." Everyone is just "shopped out?"

:shrug: You make good points...as have others on this thread. Something has changed for sure. I used to see some of this Zombiness when I lived in New Jersey but have not seen it here in NC where folks in general all seemed much happier. Lots of mixed age groups in the malls here and not so much of the teen groupies I used to see in NJ..where kids just hung out.

Now it looks like whatever it is has moved South..but in a massive way that is effecting everyone.

[SoCalDem]

37. Go online and scope out the models, read up on them online too

and order free shipping, no-tax.. You can save a TON.. and once you zero in on the make/model you want, there's a site that price compares for you..

I order stuff from an appliance place in Miami and have never been disappointed:)

[KoKo]

65. SoCal I've taken four back...become an expert in repackaging foam

protectants, placing the little trays and the booklets back in the baggies and putting the foam protectors back on with the right slots in the right places....:D

It's not something I could order online. They don't tell you hot hot they get or whether two baked potatos will really fit with enough clearance. Even the pix on the boxes show folks roasting a chicken in a little four slice toaster oven. :eyes: The boxes and descriptions lie like George Bush these days.... Crap stuff made in China without proper insulation, sharp edges that could cut your finger off, and everything shaved down to the thinest metal so they can still sell cheap and make a big profit. Although even the $125.000 model from Crate & Barrel wasn't made much better than the $34.00 Target special.

It's been a real learning experience trying to purchase something so ordinary. America is going to hell. No consumer product safety and all products are the same with just different labels all made by probably two manufacturers.

I won't even talk about buying shoes this year....has anyone seen what's happened out there with shoes? Never mind....I won't get started on that.

[SoCalDem]

67. Have you looked at consumer reports? That's the kind of stuff

they rate things on.

I have one in my garage that we have never used.. It's an oldie that my mother in law had and I doubt SHE used it much :) I have never had enough counter space to give up to one of those things:)

and my new oven has a "speed bake" setting so I just use that or my microwave:)

[Joanne98]

38. I been seening it for years. Maybe there's something in the water

[Cats Against Frist]

40. I always save this quote for such posts:

"For me, the best thing about cyberpunk is that it
taught me how to enjoy shopping malls, which used
to terrify me. Now I just imagine the whole thing is
two miles below the moon's surface, and that half the
people's right-brains have been eaten by roboticized
steel rats. And suddenly it's interesting again."
-- Rudy Rucker


Plus, if you're interesting in reading a satanic, hashish-ridden account of the French arcades, the forerunners to the modern shopping mall, check out Walter Benjamin's "The Arcades Project." It's Jungenstil-iscious.

[marions ghost]

41. good quote (saving that one)

however you imply that it is the FORM of the shopping mall that is bad, comparing it to French arcades.
I don't think arcade shopping is the problem so much. There are some great arcades in Europe and a few places in this country. It's what's in the malls and how little the experience of going there is satisfying that is the problem IMO. It used to be that shopping was mixed with recreation, culture, socializing, etc--when it occurred in town squares or downtowns. But when the only focus is shopping, as with malls, then the other functions are lost.

[Cats Against Frist]

42. No, I think Benjamin was addressing all shopping, in general --

the flaneur, the dandy -- the impulse to shop -- particularly for collectibles, mass-produced goods, and things that are removed from their use value or have no use value other than that of fashion -- formal clothing, home decor (the trace), etc. I'm not an expert on Benjamin, by any stretch of the imagination, but the book goes beyond just the form of the malls -- though it does talk about the architecture. It was a different time, too, so consumerism, in general, was sensational. I think the arcades about which he was writing were kind of different from like a town market, bread-maker, fishmonger, general store type of thing.

[marions ghost]

46. OK thanks

I'll have to read that...the early days of consumerism. Sounds interesting.

It isn't all bad, the shopping thing. The urge to brighten up one's world occasionally is not a terrible crime as long as it does not get to be an addiction or a primary form of recreation. I think in this country it has become a national compulsion. I would prefer shopping to be mixed with culture and entertainment (real not canned mall stuff) and better opportunities for socializing. Malls are a totally controlled environment and that's what makes them Disneyworld--all glitz and not much substance.

[atommom]

47. I love it! And I'm sure it will enhance my shopping experiences.

;)

[bobbieinok]

164. for those, like me, wanting to know what 'The Arcades Project' is, here's

one source

http://www.wbenjamin.org/passageways.html

The Passageways of Paris:

Walter Benjamin's Arcades Project

and Contemporary Cultural Debate in the West



by CHRISTOPHER ROLLASON

I

The arcades of Paris should need no introduction to the contemporary scholar. As a social, historical and cultural phenomenon they have been immortalised by the celebrated German-Jewish writer Walter Benjamin (1892-1940), in his immense unfinished study of nineteenth-century Paris entitled Das Passagen-Werk , which occupied his attention across the 1930s and today appears to many as one of the key books of the twentieth century. <2>

Drafted between 1927 and 1940, this monumental work finally saw German publication in 1982, <3> over four decades after its author's death: the English version did not appear until 1999. The Arcades Project is, then, a posthumous work; its enormous bulk (the English edition runs to 925 pages, editorial matter excluded) contrasts with the nature of Benjamin's published output in his lifetime, which consisted for the most part of essays and fragments. He is remembered as a member of the Institute for Social Research (also known as the Frankfurt School), alongside Theodor Adorno (1903-1969), his collaborator and fellow philosopher who outlived him by three decades and helped establish his posthumous reputation. The manuscripts of The Arcades Project are the collected fruit of Benjamin's painstaking investigations, financed in the later years by the Institute for Social Research, in the National Library of Paris in the very heart of the arcades quarter itself. They form the draft of the book that would have crowned his life's work; at the same time, however, they consist of a long sequence of fragments, albeit interconnected and organised according to a master plan. The volume as we have it appears as a compromise between two opposite concepts of writing - the finished work and the discrete fragment. A large part of Benjamin's text actually consists of blocks of quotations from other writers, mostly nineteenth-century, in either French or German; these quotations, generally brief, are arranged in sections, and are interspersed throughout with segments of critical commentary, again for the most part brief, by Benjamin himself.

History decreed that the project would never attain its final form. Forced by the rise of fascism to flee Germany in 1933, Benjamin based himself in Paris until the second world war and its consequences made his presence there untenable. <4> The Gestapo, alerted to the anti-fascist tenor of his writings, asked for Benjamin's expatriation in February 1939; on 3 September of that year France declared war on Germany, and that month Germans living in France were interned. Benjamin was sent to an internment camp in the small Burgundian town of Nevers, but was released at the end of November thanks to the intercessions of friends. He provisionally returned to his researches and to Paris, where he remained until June 1940, when he had to abandon the French capital, leaving his precious manuscripts behind as Hitler's troops closed in on the city of the Enlightenment. Benjamin concluded that safety lay in emigration to the US, via fascist but neutral Spain and Portugal, and crossed the Pyrenees on foot, as a clandestine migrant but with an official US visa in his passport, in the hope of reaching Spanish territory in safety. On the night of 26 September 1940, in the Catalan locality of Portbou just over the Spanish side of the border, Benjamin, who had been stopped in his tracks by General Franco's border guards, was found dead in Room No 4 on the second floor of the Hotel de Francia, a cheap pensión. Most, though not all, commentators believe that he committed suicide by swallowing morphine: be that as it may, two days later Walter Benjamin's remains were buried in Portbou's cemetery. <5>

Despite this tragic finale, it is usually thought that the finished Arcades Project would have had much the same appearance - a mosaic of fragments, quotations and commentaries - as the draft that has come down to us, reconstructed from the manuscripts. The text that we have, although written in the first half of the twentieth century, has, paradoxically, to be seen as a recently released cultural phenomenon that still needs to be absorbed by historians, literary critics, art critics, philosophers and sociologists: if the German edition did not appear till well into the twentieth century's second half, the book burst on the English-speaking world only as the century was in its death-throes. In the brief time of its existence so far, the English version, published by Harvard University Press, has been received with near-universal enthusiasm and admiration by readers and critics; <6> nonetheless, in view of the short time-lapse involved, it will be useful, before examining the wider theoretical dimensions of Benjamin's enterprise, to introduce and explain its central image in some detail.

more....

[Maddy McCall]

43. My son and I have called mall shoppers "Mall Zombies" for years

They will bump into you, walk straight into your path and stop--they are in a rude stupor.

My son and I started calling them Mall Zombies several years ago--that's what they are.

I'm in Mississippi.

[Rosco T.]

44. Try this one. I like it.

http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail&productId=132181-35389-TO160&lpage=none

[KoKo]

49. Thanks for the link....

I saw some of those in my travels. Problem is they are very large for my counter. I just need to toast a couple of bagels and bake potatoes..:D

My old little four slice toaster oven fit fine and did the job...until they started burn up because they were cheaply made. sigh...I'll keep looking.

[MercutioATC]

45. You have to shoot them in the head...

..that's the mistake everybody makes, they shoot them in the chest...

:)

[earth mom]

51. Glad to see that I'm not the only one who can't stand the mall.

Give me a small specialty shop, a thrift store or better yet a flea market any day-especially one that has antiques! :)

[Maru Kitteh]

52. KoKo if you ever find a decent toaster could you PLEASE come tell

us about it? I've been looking for a decent toaster for more than two decades. I'm not sure they exist.

[KoKo]

58. two decades....OMG...

I had only two small toaster ovens in 16 years...and in the last year have gone through two. You should have bought one each decade! :D

It's too late now...they are junk from what I've seen and brought home and tried and taken back. If one had little kids they could be burned from the heat put off on the new ones on the sides and tops. The old toaster ovens had "thermoplastic on the sides" so they didn't get as hot. The tops were hot but not like what's out there now.

I'll post if I find one. But, I've pretty much exhausted all my store resources at this point.

[Telly Savalas]

55. I don't consider a trip to a mall to be a self-actualizing experience.

I just wanna get in and out as fast as possible.

So I too probably look like a zombie.

Sue me.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

56. For what it's worth, I used to shop as a form of recreation when I had

untreated depression. I'd spend hours each week at the mall, and where I lived, I had to drive 30-45 minutes to get to one.

Now that I'm past that stage of my life, I can no longer stand to be in malls and do most of my shopping in stand-alone stores or from catalogues.

I take this as a sign of improved mental health.

[KoKo]

60. I agree...I've always been a small store shopper

but I had to go to some of the bigger department stores in my quest. And, I've not had bad experiences in my malls here in NC until this week. I try to avoid malls and just go into the individual store from the parking space but have not noticed so many folks who seemed so out of it before. And, as I said in my post I was also in my "strip mall stores" and "drug stores" because little stores often carry small toaster ovens as a convenience. Everywhere I went folks seemed really down. And, I'm not in a cold climate where folks would get "Winter Blues" like I remember from when I lived in New England years ago.

It was sad to see so many teen faces looking so dead. I've not seen that here in NC when I moved here ...something's changed.

Who knows, maybe I looked dead, too. Given the Alito confirmation and the rest I've not been exactly myself lately. :-(

[Corgigal]

87. so many teen faces looking so dead

No disrespect but this is the "in" thing now with teenagers. Showing emotion, especially in public is a No-No. My teen aged girl is a red head so her emotions show but I can't say that with all her friends.

It's hard to explain this silliness. I just imagine it's some new hip hop thing I don't understand.

[Swamp Rat]

59. I see zombies everywhere

:hide:

[KoKo]

62. Oh...Jeeze...

:scared:

[BlueStateBlue]

64. Sounds like a job for Ebay!

Surely, someone has recently acquired the same model you had for all those years at a garage sale. You'd be surprised at the things you find at those sales still in the box, unused for years. People receive them as gifts and stash them away unopened. Give it a shot!

[FlaGranny]

66. Since you asked,

no, I haven't seen that, but I did see something else. Last week and again today, at the same supermarket, I saw someone in a car nearly kill a pedestrian. Last week it was an elderly lady who had to jump out of the way of a speeding car. Today, a man was crossing the street when a Jeep-looking SUV squealed out of a side street and came extremely close to running him down. It seemed to be deliberate. Something strange is going on. I've never seen anything like it.

My husband says that everywhere he goes he hears people grumbling about Bush. I'm not out that much, so I haven't heard so much of it, but the mood doesn't seem good.

[clyrc]

68. I'm sorry to see that American sold appliances are crappy now

When I moved overseas, I thought all the new appliances in my house would work well, but we've had nothing but trouble with most of them. Cheaply doesn't begin to drescribe how they were made. I've been telling people that in America the appliances seem to be much better made, but I guess I'm wrong about that, now.

[GoodE2Shoes]

69. 'zombies'?

I think that you were tired with all your shopping and that it was perhaps how you were feeling yourself... (It's very easy to attribute OUR mood to someone else.)

Have you looked for a toaster oven on the Internet?:donut:

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

70. I don't think it was the OP's fatigue...the whole mood of the country is

depressed and many people have suffered financially because of gwb et. al.'s horrific economic policies. (ie enrich the rich more, and take money away from the rest of us).

I noticed this at Christmas and posted something similar at that time. MKJ

[GoodE2Shoes]

71. Well...

...it IS natural for people to want allies in the things they do and to want to find like-minded companions, so I guess I can understand why the OP thinks everyone else feels the same as she/he does.:)

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

72. So do you think the mood of the country is upbeat? I'm just curious

about your own observations of the general feeling of most people in this country. MKJ

[GoodE2Shoes]

73. Logic

No--I think that any one person cannot fairly judge the mood of the entire country.

Even the polls, which call for a vote on such things, only end up getting an extremely tiny percentage of people to vote in them (and, many times, their vote is skewed one way of the other). It would be even more difficult for a private citizen to have an accurate view.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

76. So, you discount any observations made by anyone. Certainly, one can

be very cognizant of their particular geographic area and/or demographic group. I personally have seen many people lose health insurance in the last five years, in my job as a Primary Care clinic supervisor.

We have lost large groups of patients as their employers have gone out of business or moved out of the state/country, and that has increased exponentially the last three years. These are quantifiable metrics.

I would then extrapolate that the loss of a job and health insurance would make one unhappy. And, when I observe this occurrence repeated in my immediate day to day life, I can draw a logical conclusion based on my personal experience.

However, I've noticed you take great enjoyment in being argumentative on several threads, so I doubt even verifiable, replicated data would sway you from your conviction that no one here can make a cogent observation. MKJ

[GoodE2Shoes]

83. Optimism gets things done!

I'm just not into playing 'ain't it awful?' all the time...

And I don't like being told how I feel, and what my experience has been like. I'd prefer to be ASKED.

Your post was entirely correct; you can certainly speak to how YOU feel--and perhaps your circle of friends and people you deal with directly everyday. However, please note that not everyone in America feels that way--not everyone by a long shot.

I'm sorry if you feel that my clarifying such things is 'argumentative'--I'm not sure I have another way to deal with wide sweeping assumptions, exaggeration, or the wishful thinking I so often see here.

My grandmother always said 'If you have to fudge to make something true, then how good was your truth?'

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

85. Well, there's no fudging the data that I've seen for the past three years.

There's no fudging the foreclosures, bankruptcies and layoffs. I've personally seen many (close to one thousand) of our long time patients lose their health care insurance. And, our senior patients are struggling with the coverage gaps in gwb's MMA. Many cannot or will not be able to afford medications they could get just last year.

I'm not talking about how I "feel". I'm talking cold, hard facts. How about gas prices under "I'm an oilman, I know how to keep prices low" gwb? There's no "fudging" those.

I'm glad things are so good for you in gwb's America. gwb always says things are just hunky dory these days. Seems you agree. MKJ

edited to add: if you believe that the country's state of affairs are so wonderful, why are you on this board, which is dedicated to the premise that our country's Constitution is being shredded, our military (I'm a veteran, just guessing you're not) is being abused and the middle class is being destroyed to support corporate profits? You seem pretty content with the status quo.

[GoodE2Shoes]

91. I'm old enough to have lived through many presidencies...

...so far, the sky hasn't fallen in during ANY of them.

In regards to the other things you mentioned that we've 'lost', I did a little experiment. On the 4-5 blogs, magazines, newspapers, and websites that I post, I asked everyone there a simple question:

What civil rights have you lost in the last five years? (I'm not asking what rights you MIGHT lose if, say, you were arrested--no 'in the future' or hypotheticals, please). I'm asking you to name what civil rights/Constitutional guarantees did you used to have, but now don't...

[Batgirl]

94. so you're okay

with warrantless government spying on U.S. citizens?

[GoodE2Shoes]

96. I believe...

...I asked what civil rights have you lost the last 5 years--and how has that affected your life?

[Batgirl]

98. so you won't answer the question?

why am I not surpised.

So you don't think that warrantless government spying on U.S. citizens has anything to do with civil rights?

[GoodE2Shoes]

100. Before...

...I could answer the question, I'd have to know WHO was getting wire-tapped and why.

[Batgirl]

102. so the fact that it's warrantless

doesn't ring any alarm bells for you?

Since they Bush administration isn't about to tell us who they eavesdropped on, are we to assume it was all justified and related to national security? Are we just supposed to trust government not to abuse unchecked power?

The fact that they refused to get warrants tells me something. What does it telll you?

[GoodE2Shoes]

107. It DOES...

...make me want to know WHO they are wiretapping and WHY. I WOULD like to know--and it DOES give me pause.

[GoodE2Shoes]

101. You won't answer MY question?

[Batgirl]

104. as a matter of fact I believe I at least implied an answer

The warrantless government spying is a violation of everyone's civil rights. Our government is operating without judicial oversight to spy on whomever amongst us it wishes. Are you okay with that?

Maybe you're one of those who feels "since I'm not doing anything wrong then the government is welcome to spy on my personal activities and conversations without any judicial oversight."

[GoodE2Shoes]

105. A direct answer is clearer than an implied one.

For the 3rd time--what civil rights have you lost, and how has that loss impacted your life?

[GoodE2Shoes]

110. What bothers me about this whole thing is...

...I read the same posts you do talking about a shredded Constitution, civil rights taken away, and that a police state is a-coming.

However, this is the SIXTH message board I have asked the questions 'What civil rights have you lost--right now, today--and how has that affected your life?' and not ONE person has been able to list even ONE civil right they have lost--and they are leading exactly the same life they've always lived.

What am I supposed to think?

[Batgirl]

112. If you think it's unreasonable to worry about

a "police state", in light of our government asserting its unchecked power to spy on any of us, at any time, for any reason, without having any judicial oversight, then maybe you have access to much better drugs than I do.

[GoodE2Shoes]

113. I didn't say any of those things.

It's just that everyone tells me how we no longer have our rights and how awful everything is, BUT they can't tell me what rights they no longer have, and they can't say exactly how that's diminished their lives.

That's an ENORMOUS contradiction that needs to be addressed.

[Batgirl]

114. you just keep repeating that tired and silly rightwing talking point

Anytime a government insists they would never abuse the overreaching powers they've anointed themselves with, alarm bells ought to be going off at full volume. Apparently you prefer to assume that everything's fine, reserving any concerns until after such time a list of names might be released outlining the exact groups and individuals who were spied upon.

This issue, and what's at stake here, couldn't be more clear.

[GoodE2Shoes]

115. Reality

And you STILL can't list ONE right that you've lost--THAT'S my point; it's impossible for me to get excited over something that doesn't exist or hasn't happened.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

134. yep. We heard "are you better off now that you were 4 years ago"

an awful lot for a while there. This is just the new version.

I was asked that by my repug boss one day before the election, and I answered him straight out. "I am better off, 4 years ago I was unemployed, thank you for the decent job. However, my mother can't afford her medications, my brother can't find a job or healthcare, my grandmother is giving $ to all the cousins who are not better off than they were 4 years ago. I don't measure 'better off' by just my own circumstances, but by the circumstances of all my fellow humans. WE'RE NOT better off."

:evilgrin:

He didn't bring it up again.

[GoodE2Shoes]

143. Well...

...we ARE better off than we were 4 years ago--and not just economically. A lot of our 'being better off' is due to the way we think, what we believe in, and what we choose to do.

I hope things pick up whereyou are.

[Viva_La_Revolution]

158. I'm guessing no one in your family has been sent off to fight for

well, whatever the hell reason they're claiming this week.

I'm glad you're so happy in your little bubble, and my isn't it nice how the suffering of your fellow Americans doesn't effect you in there.

Have a nice day!

[Jo March]

168. Come on, take my bet!

Oh, please, please, please take up my challenge!

If I can prove that rights have been taken away from average Americans, you will have to give me $1000.

Come on! You sound so certain about it all!

[Jo March]

119. Read my post above. nt

[Jo March]

118. I am now relegated to "free speech zones" if I want to protest

If * comes to town and I want to protest, then I have to go somewhere about a mile away to do so. This has affected my life in that I have lost my freedom to freely express myself.

The media is controlled by the right. I have lost the right of freedom of the press which is no longer free - it is bought and paid for.

The Patriot Act has eroded the 4th Amendment. The government can come into my house and arrest me any time that they want without probable cause. That makes me think twice about sending a LTTE or protesting or signing a petition - further erosion of my 1st Amendment right to free speech.

There are other forums where they think that things in the US are great. Here's one: www.freerepublic.com

[GoodE2Shoes]

144. Those are all 'might be's'.

They haven't happened to you, thus, they have not affected your life up to this point.

[Marie26]

151. The NSA is monitoring international

communications. So when I make an international call, or send an international email, I've lost any privacy for those communications. The 4th Am. requires warrants for the gov. to do searches, but right now they're searching all of our conversations. That's a violation of my rights. The Bush Ad. is sending "National Security Letters" to libraries asking them to turn over any records. And the library can't even reveal that the letter was sent. The government can find out what you're reading, without you even knowing. The Bush Ad. just asked Google to turn over search records; so the government can find out what people are searching for on the Internet, without them knowing. That's a violation of my rights. All of these things impact us now, in our everyday lives, and infringe on the rights of every American.

[Jo March]

159. No - the first 2 are REAL

Wow, you are truly a believer, aren't you?

:shrug:

Arguing with you is like banging my head against the wall. If you can't read and comprehend, then there is no hope for you.

Again: www.freerepublic.com

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

122. I would suggest that you are not in the right forum. I'm still not sure

why you post here, since you are so clearly happy with the gwb presidency. MKJ

[GoodE2Shoes]

138. I don't play that.

I get tired of playing 'Ain't It Awful' and 'Poor Little Me"--I also get tired of people who read a bunch of nonsense into my posts and then convince themselves I actually said that.

Let me ask you--do you guys force every new member to post and think EXACTLY like you do yourselves?
Where did you all get that desire for mindless conformity? What are you all SOOOO afraid of?

[Lars39]

123. Here ya go:

Overview of Changes to Legal Rights
The Associated Press
September 5, 2002
the Some of the fundamental changes to Americans' legal rights by the Bush administration and USA Patriot Act following the terror attacks:
* FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION: Government may monitor religious and political institutions without suspecting criminal activity to assist terror investigation.
* FREEDOM OF INFORMATION: Government has closed once-public immigration hearings, has secretly detained hundreds of people without charges, and has encouraged bureaucrats to resist public records requests.
* FREEDOM OF SPEECH: Government may prosecute librarians or keepers of any other records if they tell anyone that the government subpoenaed information related to a terror investigation.
* RIGHT TO LEGAL REPRESENTATION: Government may monitor federal prison jailhouse conversations between attorneys and clients, and deny lawyers to Americans accused of crimes.
* FREEDOM FROM UNREASONABLE SEARCHES: Government may search and seize Americans' papers and effects without probable cause to assist terror investigation.
* RIGHT TO A SPEEDY AND PUBLIC TRIAL: Government may jail Americans indefinitely without a trial.
* RIGHT TO LIBERTY: Americans may be jailed without being charged or being able to confront witnesses against them.
Copyright (c) 2002, The Associated Press

[GoodE2Shoes]

145. And...?

Those are all things that have not happened--which means your life has not been impacted by them. I asked folks to list the civil rights THEY HAVE ALREADY LOST, and how it has affected their lives. You're about the 5th person who's answered by giving me FUTURE doomsday predictions. None of you have mentioned how you life has been affected (which is understandable because they have not happened yet.)

[Lars39]

147. They *have* happened. You are woefully misinformed.

[GoodE2Shoes]

150. Nobody has posted even ONE incident, not ONE.

Things you speculate about in the future are not present-day happenings. (And, if I am uninformed, it is because I've asked YOU all for details and outcome--and you have been unable to list ANY.)

[Lars39]

153. Read the list. There's an example in there.

At a certain point you've got to educate yourself

[Jo March]

160. Are you SURE? Are you 100%, willing to bet your life on it sure?

Are you so certain that none of our rights as Americans have been taken away?

Willing to bet your life on that?

Would you be willing to send me $1000 if I can prove to you that they have happened?

Are you?

Are you???

Come on - put your money where your mouth is. Give me $1000 if I name one incident of our lost rights.

[Batgirl]

86. illogic

Your comment to one poster: "I don't like being told how I feel, and what my experience has been like." would seem to be contradicted by your initial comment to the OP: "I think that you were tired with all your shopping and that it was perhaps how you were feeling yourself... (It's very easy to attribute OUR mood to someone else.)"

You informed the OP that her perceptions were actually due to being tired and projecting her "mood" onto everyone else.
Your perceptions: valid
Her perceptions: invalid
Gotcha.

[GoodE2Shoes]

95. You may wish to read my posts before answering...

In actuality, I said PERHAPS that was how she was feeling, and I said she could, indeed, speak for herself and her familiars--it was only persons outside that group, myself included, that she could not. That's AFFIRMING her observations about herself and her friends--not 'invalidating' them at all.

[Batgirl]

97. and then you went on to assert

that the OP's perceptions, rather than being based on her experiences and observations, were based on projection:

"it IS natural for people to want allies in the things they do and to want to find like-minded companions, so I guess I can understand why the OP thinks everyone else feels the same as she/he does."

[GoodE2Shoes]

99. OP....

She had not had any experiences with the entire population of America, nor was she in a position to observe us all so, absent her asking how all the people felt, projection seemed the most likely causal factor (especially since she said she felt the same way they did.)

[Batgirl]

111. I don't recall her drawing any conclusions

that her experience was indicative of the country as a whole. The OP merely started a conversation and others weighed in with their own observations.

[GoodE2Shoes]

117. Answer #70...

"...whole mood of the country is depressed". This is a conclusion--and it's about our entire country, in general.

[Batgirl]

120. I have to hand it to you

You positively have a knack for looking on the bright side of fascism! :applause:

[GoodE2Shoes]

132. If you are SO completely right...

...then answering my 2 questions wouldn't take but a second. Once again, you leave me with the dilemma of everyone telling me how few rights they now have--but you are completely unable to name me even ONE of them.

You cannot have a case if you have nothing which with to back it up. It's totally NORMAL to question such things.

[Batgirl]

139. I think post #123 spells it out fairly well

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=328197&mesg_id=345798

Not that I expect you to acknowledge any of the information contained therein.

In any case, your game of deliberate obtuseness is becoming tiresome. You are the one who's been doing nothing here but setting up a false scenario and then pouting and whining when no one buys into it. If you want to pretend the Bush administration's unconstitutional power grab is no reason for alarm, knock yourself out. If you're waiting to be alarmed until after the Bush administration releases a list of U.S. citizens whom they spied on illegally -- and with Bush being such a huge promoter of transparency in government, that should happen any day now -- knock yourself out.

When they were passing out fascism detectors, you obviously picked one that had a mute button.

[Tsiyu]

121. Well aren't you just Happy Fun Poster!

It's all good in your world! Yeah for you!!!!

Civil Rights I've lost?

Well. I am most likely on the no-fly list along with 80,000 of my fellow Americans (like Ted Kennedy for a few weeks.) Are 80,000 of us terrorists? Or is it not a right to go where I wish in this world as an American? Remember when we used to be horrified that people in China and Russia couldn't travel freely? Oops! WHat have we become?

I now have to wonder whether my convversations are being recorded by an administration that wants to blackmail the world. Do I not have the right to privacy?

I have lost my rights as a consumer and as a patient to sue for negligence and malpractice - read some of the new laws protecting corporations and physicians from punishment for their wrongdoing and greed. Do I not have the right to purchase safe products and to receive adequate medical care? How about to legally file my grievances?

If I protest somewhere, the Patriot Act allows the government to determine me an "enemy" and to whisk me away with no trial. So much for free speech! If I attend the SOTU they can bruise me and drag me off in tight cuffs for wearing the wrong T-shirt ( of course, if I am a REPUBLICAN wearing the wrong shirt, I will be treated with more respect.)

I have lost the right to a free press - the media are now a propaganda machine run by corporations for corporations. They lie to the people daily. Where is my right to a free and truthful press?

I have lost the right to taxation without representation. First, votes are stolen as a matter of course in this nation. Secondly, the elected representatives couldn't care less about my wants or needs as an American. They are merely tools of this administration and it's oligarchy.

I could go on, but I think if you are smart, and you want to make Bush seem like a benign godly person (as you seem to desire - in YOUR Merica, all is well. Aren't you just the lucky one!), you will stop asking this question.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

125. LOL, "Happy Fun Poster". n/t

MKJ

[Batgirl]

126. I don't think George Bush approves of your message

you need to get with "the Program"

[GoodE2Shoes]

146. You forgot one thing...

YOUR PHONELINES HAVE NOT BEEN TAPPED! LOL!

[GoodE2Shoes]

140. You could not name one...

...right you have lost and how it impacts your life. Everything you mentioned was a supposition--a maybe, might could, perhaps happening--and THAT means it's entirely within your imagination. You woke up with just as many rights as you had going to bed.

[lumberjack_jeff]

148. If you start from the basis...

..that the privacy we enjoyed 5 years ago, or our previously unhindered travel, or our enjoyment of a free press that was not in the hands of 5 people, or our comparatively free use of our internet (i.e. RIAA), are not "rights" then you might have a point.

I don't agree. We have lost rights because of people like you who say; "no biggie, so long as the president doesn't order the CIA to shoot me - personally - as a 'terrorist suspect' it's all good."

I guess so long as Lyndie England is not holding your leash, like the frog, you're happy to sit in the frying pan until the temperature reaches well-done.

[GoodE2Shoes]

152. Well, I WILL agree that...

...our travel has been disrupted. We expect our government to take certain actions to keep us safer--and they have but, yes, travelwas not so impeded before 9/11.

[TheWatcher]

161. Not that anyone really cares what you think

If you look up thread someone challenged you directly, saying the could prove that some of our Civil Rights had been lost. Whether you want to take the monetary end of the bet or not, you completely ignored that Poster who could actually prove their point. A bit cowardly on your part I would say.

With 45 Posts, a completely (perhaps willfully?) ignorant (with arrogance to match) and misinformed view on the goings on in this country, coupled with the fact that you have yet to make a single useful post on this Board (all of them are argumentative without content that would pass as an attempt to exchange facts, ideas, or engage in useful debate), you have proven thus far that we must add you to the growing collection of little critters that seem to come here daily, blissfully treating the seriousness of what is going on in this country as some sort of game, trash talking at a sports event, or a parlor game at a local bar. Now, Join your fellow brothers and sisters:



I can see that some of our more articulate and intelligent posters have chosen to artfully toy with you, but these days, I have completely lost patience at even the sight of you, thus, calling you out as you are.

[Jo March]

166. I was looking forward to that $1000, too

I'm trying to make these arguments pay off in some way, lol!

Love those trolls!

;)

[Tsiyu]

157. Just because I won't jump off a cliff today

doesn't mean that I am not well aware of the danger in attempting to jump off a cliff.

Was Cindy Sheehans's arrest imaginary, too?

Was it imaginary when a senior ranking Democratic Senator was denied the right to fly? Wonder how Specter will feel when Hillary puts him on a no-fly list! Will he be Happy Fun Boy, too?

And the right to sue manufacturers and physicians? Check the new laws out and see if the loss of many of those rights are imaginary.

Let me put it this way, Happy Fun Person:

I am NOT the delusional one in this exchange....... but nice try anyway. You didn't score any points, but I bet there was some steam coming out of your ears.....

[KoKo]

130. No....I said I observed a change from when I moved here...and I was

on a quest to every store from "strip malls" to "Enclosed Malls" and even local drug stores...and everywhere I went people had dead eyes and seemed like Zombies.

I was on a quest for a new toaster oven and I was determined to find on that wouldn't set my kitchen on fire. I was observing and certainly wasn't dead myself. It was a startling change to me to see this everywhere. Normally I'm in and out of my small neighborhood stores and don't really interact with vast numbers of people out there like on this quest.

[KoKo]

81. I posted because I noticed such a stark difference here in NC where

it's Boomtown with new houses, cars and much wealth in evidence. When I moved here 11 years ago the atmosphere was totally different. And even a year ago when I did my last big Shopping...folks didn't look like they did this weekend. I found the change so startling I wondered if it's been going on incrementally since I've moved here and so I didn't really see the change through the years...until it finally reached what I saw this weekend.

We don't always see change if it's gradual...we only see it if we go away for a little bit and then come back and it hits us in the face.

Hey...it could have been a bad weekend I chose for my toaster oven shopping but given that I wasn't only in Malls but in small stores everywhere and saw the same thing...I though it worth a post. If my BOOMTOWN has folks looking like Zombies...then I wonder what Detroit and Cincinnati and other cities are looking like under five years of Bush.. :shrug:

Our real estate is booming and everything is NEW here...so what's wrong?

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

82. For me, it's also being at a mall that used to be busy and which is now

almost empty. With stores closing or going out of business. And most shoppers are empty handed, as compared to five years ago, when this particular mall was always packed and most shoppers carried at least one bag or more of recently purchased merchandise.

Here, we are supposedly coming out of the economic hard times of the last few years, but anecdotal evidence contradicts the rosy predictions.

BTW, my father had open heart surgery at the Cleveland Clinic. Cleveland looks, well, just like a city going through tough times.

However, every Clevelander we interacted with was so friendly and helpful, especially at the hospital.

I'm with you, KoKo01. And, you obviously struck a chord with a lot of us in various communities, as evidenced by this thread. Mood is intangible, yet palpable. I've experienced exactly what you've described in my occasional forays to shopping malls in my area. MKJ

[Marie26]

109. Noticed it too

Hey, I'm in NC too, and I've noticed the same thing. Everything is gleaming new, Lexuses & Porsches zip by, and huge subdivisions of McMansions are everywhere. But when you go out, for the most part people are listless & tired. We're all just shuffling through this glittering consumer culture in a daze. And don't even get me started on how things are in the Midwest cities - it's the same atmosphere, but with an added layer of anxiety & hopelessness. Usually around Christmas, people will smile more or engage each other in conversation, but I didn't see that this year. There didn't seem to be much, well, joy in the season. Maybe it's the bad economy, or hurricanes, or the war, probably some combination. Hopefully it's just the winter blahs - but it does seem to signal something deeper going on in our culture. I'd be curious to hear from someone who's been out of the country awhile to see if there's been a real change - it's hard to see when you live it day to day,

[spinbaby]

74. Nothing useful in malls

Our local mall used to have stores where you could buy useful stuff--there was a hardware store, a newstand, and a pharmacy. Nowadays it seems mostly devoted to trendy fashion and "giftware." It's a waste of space as far as I'm concerned.

[mbee]

75. Have a great microwave that also toasts, bakes like

a toaster over and broils I believe (haven't used that feature yet). It is called Warm and Toasty and I bought it at Linen's and Things!

[skids]

84. YES. And not just in malls.

In restaurants, in cars, in the workplace, in the family -- everywhere.

People are dead inside. If you try to strike up a conversation with a random stranger these days it's a 1 out of 10 shot that it will get past two sentences, and about half will think you're some kind of con man or cultists. It would be one thing if people just didn't trust other people but to be unwilling to engage in a simple conversation means people don't trust themselves. That screams victimization.

I don't think it's so much that people feel victimized by the government though. As we know most are blissfully unaware of all that. They are feeling victimized rather by their fellow zombies... noone, even the people that are most supposed to... actually cares about them, and the only interaction you can get these days is as a "customer" -- even at work. You feel like you are a guest of your employer, then you go to a store and you feel like you are only welcome as long as you are buying something. Nobody has a sense of self-security -- no belief that they have some sort of intrinsic value and would be worth talking to even if they were doing nothing other than sitting on a park bench.

This country has gradually forgotten everything it ever learned about being civil and common courtesy.

(Oh and on edit, one more place I see zombie people -- on the Internet. They're called lurkers, and while most people don't have any way to see how many people just view stuff passively as opposed to how many people comment/participate, I do. While one would expect a much larger number of people to have nothing to add to a particular thread/blog/whatever than those that bother, the proportion of lurkers to people who comment is rather staggeringly large even so.)

[freedom_please]

88. Here's the first place I check for any product...

If I have some time for research, the first place I'd check is http://snipurl.com/Epinions_Toaster"">Epinions.com...

... It shows reviews and a list of where to find the product sorted high price to low.

[Vinca]

89. Re the toaster.

I searched for 3 years for a "Made In the U.S.A." toaster without luck. My love for whole wheat toast finally caused me to cave in and by an import, although I went for the cheapest one I could find (Hamilton Beach, $13 with a grocery store coupon). The thing works fine, but I wouldn't dare leave it plugged in when not in use. In any case, if the house burns down I'm cashing out and moving to Canada.

[BushOut06]

90. LOL - it's the zombie shuffle, I've noticed it myself

In fact, my fiance and I regularly joke about us doing the zombie shuffle at the mall. Although my observation wasn't necessarily from the dark expressions, it is more how people just kind of shuffle along as if they're on autopilot.

[loudsue]

92. It's here in Arkansas, too, KoKo01.

People are generally zombied out. I think part of the problem is how people are being treated by their employers and school officials....sort of like we're powerless and don't count, and we're "replaceable".

I was in the grocery store the day of the SOTU address, and one clerk who was bagging groceries said to the cashier:

"Are you going to watch the SOTU on teevee tonite?"

The cashier tried to ignore the question -- you could tell she didn't want to step on any wingnut's toes -- and just said "dunno".

I said to the bagger: "Why would anyone want to watch George Bush speak? All he'll do is lie some more, if you could possibly understand what he's trying to say."

They both laughed, and the cashier said "boy, isn't THAT the truth! What a waste of time!"

The bagger said "that's what I was thinking too".

We were all laughing as I left, and you could see they were very relieved that SOMEBODY FINALLY SAID IT IN PUBLIC!!

The other two people in line behind me were grinning, too. It was a good exchange, and people finally SMILED!!

I think the "average joe" is not getting "polled" by the gallup gang. People far and wide pretty much know we're in deep shit.

As for the quality of merchandise being sold in the USA -- it's the biggest bunch of GARBAGE I've ever seen. NOTHING has "quality" anymore, no matter what store you go to.

All the clothes hanging on the racks for sale look like yard-sale rejects. Shoes don't fit, and are ugly, and not well-made.

There is absolutely NO style to clothing anymore...the masses are supposed to look "poor", or like we are all sheep. Even the fabrics, which used to be made in the USA, are now threadbare even before you've taken them off the hangers. There's no "substance". There's no pride in workmanship or material.

Welcome to republican USA.

:kick::kick::kick:

[KoKo]

135. Shoes all made in China this year and they "SMELL BAD"

The leather is thin and the glue they use smells terrible. Just opening a box is enough to knock one over with the smell. Rubber soles, too. And, this is high end shoes down to the cheapies. All the same. I couldn't believe that Bass, Naturalizer, Maine Trotters, Sam & Libby and Dockers are all being made in China. And they aren't made correctly for the American foot. They've cut corners so that the shapes are odd.

I remember when the shoe companies left New England and went to Brazil and even Italy. But, those shoes weren't badly made and didn't "smell." This year all I saw were shoes from China and Hubby is having a fit because his favorite shoes are made in China and India and it's the same thing. Bad fit and nasty odors. Bush made a deal to cut out South America and now everything is to give China and India more Trade so that China will buy our bonds and we can keep outsourcing labor to India...

:hi: You are still there in Arkansas. A good job...it sounds like..Hope so.

[Deja Q]

93. My excuse is that I'm downright terrified of people.

What's theirs? I doubt we're a big-ass nation of introverted weirdoes. Case in point: Most of these same folks have "significant others" with them, and some of them have successfully bred too. Ain't no way they're introverts or weirdos.

[bedazzled]

106. bought my toaster at the goodwill - and it's a beauty!

made in the usa! four slices, bagel setting, everything i wanted. makes real toast -- brown on the outside and moist on the inside.

it was nice and clean. obviously, we keep an eye on it when it's in use, but we always do anyway. don't even like to leave the crockpot on without supervision.

i had the same problem with hand mixers. my mom got rid of her antique one and i was so mad. went out to replace it, and all the mixers available now are like outboard motors. there are no slow settings on there -- the lowest setting is "throw stuff out of the bowl" fast...


we've really developed a tolerance for junk.

[KoKo]

131. lol's. That's probably a good place to look. I have a 1940's Oster

blender I scapped from my Mother-in-Law when she moved. It looks like what they are selling at Williams-Sonoma for @200.00. It's "retro" look and has a silver round base which came back into style in the last few years. It works beautifully has a heavy glass base and I even found some small jars that work with it for little blending jobs. Made all those years ago and the quality is better than the Williams-Sonoma but looks exactly like it.

[demgurl]

116. I noticed the same thing for a while.

I have a couple of observations on this. First of all, I believe that the polls that show *'s support are off. The media, of course, is lying about how wonderful things are. I truly believe polls are being fixed as well. And, lastly, I do not think everyone has been so olucky as to have a computer or to find out about us. All of this leads me to my first observation/thought that I think people are like this because they can not get reality to jive with what they are being told in the media. Perhaps a lot of them suspect but are even afraid to talk to others because they are scared of being outcast and branded as unpatriotic. Thus they have sunk into a depression of sorts and have cut themselves off from others.

My other observation happened when I changed the way I acted. I had to do some karma penance back in September. I did three acts of kindness for strangers every single day for close to three months. This meant I had to talk to strangers to offer them change, take their cart, let them in front of me in line (I mystery shop for a living so I am in some sort of store almost every single day), etc..... Well it seemed the more I opened up and started talking to people, the more they smiled and opened up to me. Near the end it was like I was radiating a friendly beacon where others were even starting to talk to me before I even talked to them. Not everyone around me reacted in this manner but I did end up getting a lot more interaction.

Just some of my observations and thoughts.

demgurl

[grasswire]

124. I guess I'm damn lucky

....I accidentally left my toaster oven on all night a couple of months ago. No fire. I love the thing and use it all the time. It's a cheapie; I've had it for about four years.

[KoKo]

133. You missed the cycle when they all went to China, then. It's the ones

that were made in the last couple of years that seem to be the problem. At least the ones I've brought home and tried and the two that melted I've purchased in the last year.

You should be okay for awhile with that one... I had a cheapie that worked for 8 years.

[Greyhound]

127. Consolidation and isolation. A fundamental prerequisite to establishing

"the new order" that the ruling class have ordained. The country is too large to effectively police the whole thing, so they have to be consolidated into smaller, manageable, locations. Once this is accomplished, the natural reaction would be for the sheeple to start bleating to one another about whats going on, which in turn might cause them to become aware of larger events, obviously an undesirable effect. To counter it, the rulers need to isolate them from each other. To accomplish this a permanent state of fear must be induced and what could be better at scaring them than an invisible enemy that is everywhere and nowhere, that will strike with impunity and without warning. Next, all that has to be done is to impose an us versus them mentality and, viola, an easily controlled, compliant populace that will do their jobs and keep their heads down.
An entire nation of 350 million indentured servants to serve in any capacity they desire. Be assured another "experiment" like America will never be allowed.

[Javaman]

128. Don't go to malls, they are living cemetaries...n/t

[TheFarseer]

136. I was at a Walmart the other day

for the first time in about 8 months. It's the only place I've ever found the ESPN NCAA basketball game for playstation that I like and I was looking for the 2006 edition. Anyway, I was amazed that everyone had a full cart, happily pushing it along looking for more sh*t. There didn't seem to be anyone like me that just wanted one thing. Everyone in there had a cart almost overflowing it seemed. I never did find my basketball game and walked out empty handed (found it at Shopko a bit later in the day) I'm so through with Walmart.

[FlaGranny]

141. Toaster ovens

Hey, I happened to be in Lowe's yesterday and happened to look at some toaster ovens and thought of you. Have you looked in Lowe's? They have a brand called Euro-Pro (I think that's it = LOL). Anyway, it looks much sturdier than the Black and Decker and it's heating elements are not so near the top metal. I remembered your post, so I gave each brand the once over. Check out that Euro-Pro. I think they had three models, two of which had fans and acted like convection ovens. The expensive one even had a rotisserie. The Oster brand didn't look too shabby either.

[KoKo]

155. Oh yes....I was there and checked them out. Too big for my kitchen

the EuroPro and Oster. I brought a EuroPro home and it was jammed up against my coffee maker (and it does get hot) so I knew it wouldn't work because of it's size. The small toaster ovens are the ones I'm having the problem with getting overheated...but they fit my counter. More the Toastmaster/Black and Decker types.

Thanks for checking though. :-)'s

[FlaGranny]

156. I really liked the big Euro-Pro

with the rotisserie. It IS big though. For just me and my husband it could take the place of a full-size oven. I almost bought it and then thought, where will I put it?

[slackmaster]

149. They look more like pirates around here

[Dr Fate]

154. "The Kitchen is Closed"

This is what my girlfriend and I say- we dont want any new friends- people are crazy these days...I only trust the people I have known for over 12 years or so.

Zombie people in the South & Midwest, huh? Not as bad in urban areas from what I can see- but I believe it.

Most bought the dream but lost the reciept.

Your post makes me think- perhaps we all need to look at ourselves and how we project to and onto each other.

[hvn_nbr_2]

162. You give yourself away as one of the remaining bio-citizens who haven't...

been replaced by an android or zombie. Shhh! They'll be coming for you.

[Dakini23]

163. Malls

"Mal" in French means bad or sick.

Malls make me sick. Unfortunately, I have to work in one for a little while longer. I have noticed that the people all look unhappy there. Shopping, because the television tells them too. They are over-mediated and don't know what else to do. Yes, programmed zombies. I work at a major department store and see this on a daily basis. I myself, don't even shop. I could care less to. I can't wait to go home and work on my art, writings or to read a good book. On my days off the last place I would be, is at the "MAL"
As far as toaster ovens go....I get at least 10-12 of them returned a week in my department and mostly DeLonghi's. They are all shit and cheaply made in China. Everything is made in China now. We don't make anything here! I can't really tell you what is a good brand to buy. The toaster oven I have at home, is a Black and Decker and I have had it forever! Works great!

I feel that most people are just so empty. They have huge holes in their soul that they are trying to fill. They think that shopping will fill that void and it does for a short time. They get a shopper's high...but it quickly disappears and the hole needs to be filled again. The hole will only close, when the soul is being well fed.

[KoKo]

165. "They have huge holes in their Soul." (Kind of says it all

doesn't it?) At least for me..how do we "fill" these "holes," is the question. :toast:

Quote from you:

"I feel that most people are just so empty. They have huge holes in their soul that they are trying to fill. They think that shopping will fill that void and it does for a short time. They get a shopper's high...but it quickly disappears and the hole needs to be filled again. The hole will only close, when the soul is being well fed."

---------

That so many have "caved" is sad...we have to work on those who haven't.'

Thanks for your post...along with the others here (aside from the "Troll Fest" early on in my thread, the "reasoned comments" have been really good to hear. :-)'s