my mass email re: George Carlin

[hiphopnation]

Thought I would share with DU
it's taken me a while to come up with the words.

-------------

If you’re reading this, you’re a friend, a confidant,
a family-member, a raconteur, a traveler, a dreamer,
an artist, or just someone whom I thought would
appreciate the sentiments.

I have waited until now to say something about George.
It’s taken me a couple of weeks to sit alone in
silence and absorb the information. OK, not in
silence, I’ve spent the past few weeks pouring over
George’s material – the material that has been a
soundtrack to the better part of my life. I discovered
him as an adolescent, the perfect time to get into
George Carlin. In my grief – and I admit, it does feel
strange to feel grief like this for someone that,
after all, I have never met and I further admit
that said grief would likely be the subject of
ridicule and mockery for George which is why my
grief-stricken state has been punctuated with loud,
boisterous fits of laughter – I have reflected deeply
on what George did for me in my life as a struggling,
on-again/off-again, mixed-results artist and I’ve
mostly been rendered speechless.

At least 30% of his material went over my head at the
time I was absorbing it, but it didn’t matter, he
opened up a world of words and imagination to my
young, thirsty ears. At the time I started listening,
he had entered his “curmudgeon” phase, where his
material had turned from the silly in favor of more
weighty, substantive topics. The first album I ever
bought was “What am I Doing in New Jersey ” the first
half of which is a relentless tear on the Reagan
administration. I hadn’t even formed political
opinions yet but I still listened to the routine over
and over again, soaking it all in, and it somehow made
sense. Of course, listening to it now I realize just
how spot-on the whole thing was. After ‘ New Jersey ’
I immediately began listening to all of his recordings
from the 70’s and was hooked. He captivated (and
sculpted and molded) my young mind.

One of the few comforts I’ve been afforded over the
last week is the sheer volume of fans just like me
there were out there. Those of us who would memorize
routines and recite them back to ourselves in bedroom
mirrors. Those of us who had every single album, could
tell you which side a certain routine appeared, the
years of each, where they were recorded - I have
realized this week that I am one of many who had a
reverence and a deep-seated respect and love for George.

So, I am just one of many who realize that we've lost
much more than a just a damn fine comedian. I am one
of many who having difficulty saying goodbye. I am one
of many not prepared for the news. I was looking
forward to him being around another five years. I
needed time to prepare myself, to fill myself up to
the brim with his inquisitive, hilarious, scolding,
endearing views on the world. I needed more time to
convince myself that it was OK to live in a world
without George.

And as funny as George was, I have come to the same
conclusion that the rest of us have who were more than
casual observer’s of his – George’s contribution goes
far beyond his gift of laughter. George was deeply
dedicated to some firmly-held principles that his
abrasive and coarse tone helped bolster. Chief among
them, of course, is our collective right, indeed our
duty as patriots, to exercise the free speech muscle
we’re so lucky to have been afforded and to remind us
the that if that muscle is not exercised, it atrophies
just like any other muscle. It is slowly, bit-by-bit
and fiber-by-fiber, encroached upon, repealed,
challenged, and reversed by self-righteous and
indignant moralists upon whom the concept of personal
liberty being inexorably tied to the ability to speak
without fear violent retribution is completely lost.
George got right in their faces, didn’t he? God bless
him. (He didn’t believe in god, of course, and in his
later years, he took to worshiping the sun. Now
there’s a funny fuckin’ routine.)

I’ll miss the laughs but what will be missed the most,
by me, is that nagging, persistent, needling, irksome,
challenging voice that has been there for nigh on
twenty years, forcing me to look at myself in ways
which I as not always comfortable, but in ways that
made me a better person.

In fitting tribute (it’s obvious to me that George was
a great father, his daughter is gracious, kind, and
keen-witted) Kelly Carlin has directed contributions
in George’s name to two institutions: The American
Heart Association and the Thomas Jefferson Center for
Free Speech. I urge you to give in his name.
www.georgecarlin.com

Godspeed, George Carlin: a patriot, a tireless
champion for free speech, a muckraker, an antagonist,
a dissenter, a lover AND a fighter, and hands down,
one of the funniest mutherfuckers that ever did live.

[Individualist]

1. Very nice tribute to a very special person.

:thumbsup:

[hiphopnation]

2. thanks

:thumbsup:

[Blue_In_AK]

3. I really can't remember a time

when I wasn't a fan of George Carlin's, and that's going back to the early '60s when I first saw him on the Tonight Show. I'll miss him.

[hiphopnation]

4. i will too...

"scratch any cynic and you'll find a disappointed idealist."

i miss him already!

[lonestarnot]

5. A Carlinhead!

:toast: Thank you.

[Echo In Light]

6. Lenny Bruce --

"The "what should be" never did exist, but people keep trying to live up to it. There is no "what should be," there is only what is."

Somehow seems fitting. K&R
======================

George Carlin (his website is here) also talks about how we as individuals have abrogated our responsibility to the Earth by turning it over to 'those in control'. "I think we've turned everything over -- mankind in general, not just our culture -- to the high priests and the traders. Everything was turned over to those who wanted to control us through mysterious beliefs... They twisted and distorted that into these narrow, superstitious belief systems, where you have this invisible man in the sky who's judging you.. And then the traders, the businesspeople, the commercial, the merchant class, they turned everything into acquisition and ownership, to having the latest thing... We're given many choices to distract us from the fact that our real choices have been diminished in number. 35 flavors of popcorn."

Carlin is a cynic about our current situation. "There's no real enlightened self-interest", he says. "I don't think have anything to do with spreading democracy and giving people free choice, because there are no free choices... There is an ownership class in America... People say, What about the antiwar movement and Vietnam? Yeah, how long did it take? And it didn't happen until the ownership class decided it was no longer in their interest. Same thing with the civil rights movement... People are dreaming if they think they have rights. They've never had rights. There's no such thing... These are privileges, temporarily granted to the people to keep them placated so that the market economies can function."

And people say, Oh, your conspiracy thing. Listen, don't be making fun of the word "conspiracy". It has meaning. Powerful people have convergent interests. They don't always need a meeting to decide on something. They inhabit the same clubs. They sit on the same boards. They have all this common ownership and they are very few in number. They control everything, and they do whatever they want. two-party system keeps the people at bay. They give them microwaves, fanny packs, sneakers with lights in the heels, dustbusters, to keep them distracted, keep them just calm enough that they're not going to try something.

You know, of course, that he doesn't think it's that hopeless. "Scratch a cynic, you'll find a disappointed idealist. That really rang a bell with me. Within me there is this flame of wishing it were better, wishing people had better lives, that there was more of an authentic sharing and harmony with nature. So this thing that sometimes reads as anger to people is largely a discontent, a disappointment in what we have allowed to happen to us as a species and as a culture."

http://blogs.salon.com/0002007/2005/08/25.html

[hiphopnation]

13. thanks for sharing that post, btw

great read
:thumbsup;

[Echo In Light]

7. Kick

[scheming daemons]

8. Great tribute.....

I got to meet George in Pittsburgh in 2006 when he was here. I'd been a fan all my life , but this was my first chance to shake the man's hand.


Our generation has lost our Mark Twain.


He is the most quotable of modern "philosopher comedians" and he's shaped my world view as much as any individual on this planet.


To put it in terms that George would understand, as he didn't believe in a "heaven" or "hell" or "afterlife";

I hope your decomposition period is going smoothly, George. Fertilize some flowers.

[hiphopnation]

11. our mark twain, indeed

funny...my sig line is a mark twain quote

thanks for sharing

[logosoco]

9. Thank you for sharing this!

It's nice to know others "out there" are thinking a lot of what I am thinking.
It seems silly to feel sad when a "celebrity" dies...hell, I never really knew them. But
sometimes there are those people who do have an impact on our lives, even if we never met them
in person (hey, bush falls in this catergory, but i won't feel sad when he dies!).
George Carlin has been a thought provoking persona in my life since i was 9 , and i'm glad we have so much of his work on "tape" and in books. I really want to share it with my grandson.
Thanks for sharing!

[Lilith Velkor]

10. "As the sage philosopher George Carlin once said..."

is one of my catchphrases. Just this past weekend, my BF realized I was not really kidding.

Excellent tribute. :patriot:

[hiphopnation]

12. thank you

:thumbsup: