If it is true that this song is based upon the book 'Ismael', then I can definitely see how both the lyrics and the video is shaped. Let me clarify what the book is about, philosphically speaking, and how it relats to the song. This letter is a bit long, so bear with me.
A long time ago, humans did live on Earth amongst nature. Life was simple and humans lived just as simple (eating what they found, not taking more than what they needed). Then, one day, a tribe suddenly thought up the idea of "locking up the food" (storing food away for future). It worked in cases of food shortages, but it also inspired massive population growth. To support this population, more food had to be gathered and grown, which started both concepts: the divisions of labor (large groups of people working for a few appointed leaders) and manifest destiny (conquering other tribes, the land and animals). This very cycle not only broke the natural order of the world, but it also created in humans the very thoughts and feelings that, itstead of the humans being created for the world, it is the world that is created for the humans. And here we are, thousands of years later, with a world that is now the very reflection of man's desire to conquer it. All things of nature (trees, animals, etc.) are more and more rapidly being devoured and/or destroyed, the population of humans is spiraling out of control and man's continued willful ignorance of our present culture continues to wreck havoc, especially amongst ourselves (the most current is now the war on terror). Unless we change the course of man's culture of conquering and destroying, the planet would simply cease to become a habitable place to live and we would die along with everything else we consider to inferior to us.
What is interesting to note about this book is:
1) There does seem to be a religious aspect to it. Note Adam and Eve's expulsion from the Garden of Eden because they ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Man now knows how and decides to take his destiny in his hands and we get to determine which person (or plant, animal, etc.) gets to live or die. Unfortuanately, life is no longer simple and most of us have to struggle to simply exist. You will recall that of all the supposably noble missions and crusades we embarked on, there has never been 'A War on Homelessness' or a public knowledgement by our elected officials that our current culture has a devastating effect on people's ability to live, because to do so would interrupt the status quo.
2) Another religious aspect would the story of Cain and Abel. Remember when I use the words conquer and destroy to describe man's current relationship with the world? Imagine the tribe who discovered this new culture going around and telling people to give them their lands, adopt their culture, or simply move out or die. Those they did not listened them really did die out and, along with them, their knowledge about how to live in this world that worked. With this knowledge the conquerors had to discover new rules to live by that has not been tested by the test of time. Now look out your window and see the mess created from destroying our old ways of life. We are still bickering and fighting over far-overblown issues such as which religion is the right one, how exactly should people live, etc. (Please note I am not downing religion, but the fact that people don't recognize the conquer mentality that is manifested within the religion.)
3) Our current mentality reinforces that notion that we are the masters of this world and will not be held accountable for our actions. Note Azzathoth's debate with his neo-fundamentalist friend. She interpreted the argument of evolution as saying that our worth is the same as bacteria. Now imagine almost every single person on this planet saying the same thing and you'll indeed agree that we are in big trouble.
4) Last, but not least, note that the current conquerist culture depends upon us feeding it time and energy to keep it alive and people would continue to work for it as long as they need or want something. Suppose the food (or house, car, etc.) was no longer under lock and key, that it was free for the taking. Would we still work our lives away maintaining the current societal structure we are currently living in? Should we stop, would this conquerist mentality survive?
It should be noted that both lyrics of the songs and the images of the video can grouped into three catorgories:
1) Our desire to rule the world and everything in it and to hell with the consquences. (This land is mine, This land is free, I'll do what I'll what, yet, irresponsibly.)
2) Our culture in action. (Nazi concentration camps and book burnings, Raping of our environment.
3) Our justification of our actions (I can kill 'cause in god I trust. I'm ahead, I'm advanced, I'm the first mammal to make plans.)
4) The consquences of our actions (Girl stepping on land mine, Nuclear destruction)
Now, as far as the Woman in Black is concerned, I don't exactly know what she represents. I can only guess at being Death (because she is wearing all black) or Mother Culture (as described in the Ishmael book).
While it should be noted that Eddie Veddor is known for his views (I read an article in which a good portion of audience left the concert during a performance because he criticzed Bush), this song wasn't about Bush until later (I remember watching the video on TRL in '99 or 2000 before I stopped watching MTV on a regular basis for the station's decisions on its music choices, but that's another issue for another day.) I'm no big fan of Bush, but I don't believe the blame should go entirely to him regarding today's troubles (The U.S. President, after all, is just the spokesperson of his party, cabinet, close friends and business ties, and campiagn contributors.)
On a final note, regarding what will happen in 2010, I have two possible explanations:
1) It could be referring to the the projected year of in which all the rules are changed. About this time millions of baby boomers will began retiring, withdrawing billions of dollars from Social Security and Medicare. In just a few years, the social programs could become bankrupt and the government will have to start breaking its promises. They will either raise taxes on the current workforce to enormous proportions, thus receiving the wrath of its constiueints or by cutting off benefits of the elderly, which means skyrocketing prescription costs and only enough monetary funds to cover living expenses, if they're lucky. It wouldn't be unusual to see elderly people working past retirement age because they can't afford to quit. Either way, serious questions would be raised and, true to the form in which today's politics are conducted, the Democrats will blame the Republicans, the Republicans will blame the Democrats, and nobody involved will ever take the blame. Of course, people will start taking sides, but that won't really matter since neither party have really offered any real solutions and both have special interests groups who either caused or accelerated the problems. This, of course, will raise budget concerns since politcians are especially weak when it comes to telling the public the truth and ,still at this time, America is still heavily involved in Iraq.
If America continues its out-of-control spending at this point, the very infrastructure of its economy will crumble. However, if it starts cutting down at this point, the consquences of making promises it knew it couldn't keep would catch to it.
2) It was never meant to mean anything, just sometime in the near future. It was meant to be abstract in the way the year 1984 was meant to be abstract. The year 2010 was chosed because it sounded good or because of the significance of the years that go by units of 10.
If it is true that this song is based upon the book 'Ismael', then I can definitely see how both the lyrics and the video is shaped. Let me clarify what the book is about, philosphically speaking, and how it relats to the song. This letter is a bit long, so bear with me.
A long time ago, humans did live on Earth amongst nature. Life was simple and humans lived just as simple (eating what they found, not taking more than what they needed). Then, one day, a tribe suddenly thought up the idea of "locking up the food" (storing food away for future). It worked in cases of food shortages, but it also inspired massive population growth. To support this population, more food had to be gathered and grown, which started both concepts: the divisions of labor (large groups of people working for a few appointed leaders) and manifest destiny (conquering other tribes, the land and animals). This very cycle not only broke the natural order of the world, but it also created in humans the very thoughts and feelings that, itstead of the humans being created for the world, it is the world that is created for the humans. And here we are, thousands of years later, with a world that is now the very reflection of man's desire to conquer it. All things of nature (trees, animals, etc.) are more and more rapidly being devoured and/or destroyed, the population of humans is spiraling out of control and man's continued willful ignorance of our present culture continues to wreck havoc, especially amongst ourselves (the most current is now the war on terror). Unless we change the course of man's culture of conquering and destroying, the planet would simply cease to become a habitable place to live and we would die along with everything else we consider to inferior to us.
What is interesting to note about this book is: 1) There does seem to be a religious aspect to it. Note Adam and Eve's expulsion from the Garden of Eden because they ate from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. Man now knows how and decides to take his destiny in his hands and we get to determine which person (or plant, animal, etc.) gets to live or die. Unfortuanately, life is no longer simple and most of us have to struggle to simply exist. You will recall that of all the supposably noble missions and crusades we embarked on, there has never been 'A War on Homelessness' or a public knowledgement by our elected officials that our current culture has a devastating effect on people's ability to live, because to do so would interrupt the status quo. 2) Another religious aspect would the story of Cain and Abel. Remember when I use the words conquer and destroy to describe man's current relationship with the world? Imagine the tribe who discovered this new culture going around and telling people to give them their lands, adopt their culture, or simply move out or die. Those they did not listened them really did die out and, along with them, their knowledge about how to live in this world that worked. With this knowledge the conquerors had to discover new rules to live by that has not been tested by the test of time. Now look out your window and see the mess created from destroying our old ways of life. We are still bickering and fighting over far-overblown issues such as which religion is the right one, how exactly should people live, etc. (Please note I am not downing religion, but the fact that people don't recognize the conquer mentality that is manifested within the religion.) 3) Our current mentality reinforces that notion that we are the masters of this world and will not be held accountable for our actions. Note Azzathoth's debate with his neo-fundamentalist friend. She interpreted the argument of evolution as saying that our worth is the same as bacteria. Now imagine almost every single person on this planet saying the same thing and you'll indeed agree that we are in big trouble. 4) Last, but not least, note that the current conquerist culture depends upon us feeding it time and energy to keep it alive and people would continue to work for it as long as they need or want something. Suppose the food (or house, car, etc.) was no longer under lock and key, that it was free for the taking. Would we still work our lives away maintaining the current societal structure we are currently living in? Should we stop, would this conquerist mentality survive?
It should be noted that both lyrics of the songs and the images of the video can grouped into three catorgories: 1) Our desire to rule the world and everything in it and to hell with the consquences. (This land is mine, This land is free, I'll do what I'll what, yet, irresponsibly.) 2) Our culture in action. (Nazi concentration camps and book burnings, Raping of our environment. 3) Our justification of our actions (I can kill 'cause in god I trust. I'm ahead, I'm advanced, I'm the first mammal to make plans.) 4) The consquences of our actions (Girl stepping on land mine, Nuclear destruction) Now, as far as the Woman in Black is concerned, I don't exactly know what she represents. I can only guess at being Death (because she is wearing all black) or Mother Culture (as described in the Ishmael book).
While it should be noted that Eddie Veddor is known for his views (I read an article in which a good portion of audience left the concert during a performance because he criticzed Bush), this song wasn't about Bush until later (I remember watching the video on TRL in '99 or 2000 before I stopped watching MTV on a regular basis for the station's decisions on its music choices, but that's another issue for another day.) I'm no big fan of Bush, but I don't believe the blame should go entirely to him regarding today's troubles (The U.S. President, after all, is just the spokesperson of his party, cabinet, close friends and business ties, and campiagn contributors.)
On a final note, regarding what will happen in 2010, I have two possible explanations: 1) It could be referring to the the projected year of in which all the rules are changed. About this time millions of baby boomers will began retiring, withdrawing billions of dollars from Social Security and Medicare. In just a few years, the social programs could become bankrupt and the government will have to start breaking its promises. They will either raise taxes on the current workforce to enormous proportions, thus receiving the wrath of its constiueints or by cutting off benefits of the elderly, which means skyrocketing prescription costs and only enough monetary funds to cover living expenses, if they're lucky. It wouldn't be unusual to see elderly people working past retirement age because they can't afford to quit. Either way, serious questions would be raised and, true to the form in which today's politics are conducted, the Democrats will blame the Republicans, the Republicans will blame the Democrats, and nobody involved will ever take the blame. Of course, people will start taking sides, but that won't really matter since neither party have really offered any real solutions and both have special interests groups who either caused or accelerated the problems. This, of course, will raise budget concerns since politcians are especially weak when it comes to telling the public the truth and ,still at this time, America is still heavily involved in Iraq. If America continues its out-of-control spending at this point, the very infrastructure of its economy will crumble. However, if it starts cutting down at this point, the consquences of making promises it knew it couldn't keep would catch to it. 2) It was never meant to mean anything, just sometime in the near future. It was meant to be abstract in the way the year 1984 was meant to be abstract. The year 2010 was chosed because it sounded good or because of the significance of the years that go by units of 10.
I told you this would be long.
I couldn't explain it better!!
I couldn't explain it better!!