Terms and conditions may apply

Taken from my facebook page........Hey facebookers, or should I say "hey world" hope you are all doing wonderfully and that you are healthy, have love and respect in your hearts for your self and others, have meaningful beneficent purpose and occupation that conveys you deeply to the meaning of your lives. I'm still bed ridden with pericarditis , but on the mend. I've been watching movies and documentaries and just resting - praying to be more function able and useful sooner than later. Doing lots of soul searching and resting. Of course in moments like this you reflect on your mortality and the world we live in. Mostly I've been trying to keep my thoughts light and buoyant and healthy to cope with the natural anxiety already caused by feeling unwell. Today though I watched a documentary called 'Terms and conditions may apply' and it's got me thinking, 'God it's a strange world we have come to inhabit ' - I mean I guess it always was and always will be. Our relationship to ourselves and others and to death and life itself. I think this whole facebook thing which I've seen some close friends opt out of over the years is a whole new playing field. Of course we share our best pics on here and hope to be liked for how we see or choose to represent ourselves (well most of us anyway- those of us naive enough perhaps to use our real names and dates of birth) but I think we do it because somewhere we believe in some kind of common sense good. I mean we don't live in 1941. Most of us - even me who knows well that big business spend influential money where it helps to buy decision makers still take some leap of faith in trusting in some kind of common sense decency that we hope exists for all good people. And who do I mean by good people? I mean anyone not doing harm to others. Anyone putting their best foot forward in the face of what at times seems like an all mighty shadow. I mean it does get complicated when you take into account foreign policy and the wars waged in our name for our freedom and resources and the refugees that are caused in the process etc etc I mean our way of life may well be harming others and maybe it's naive to think you can live a life free of such things. I went down a Buddhist path in my early twenties after my brother died. I became vegetarian for a while because I didn't believe in harming animals- then it occurred to me that a carrot might have feelings too? And what about the harm we're doing the planet? Where do you draw the line? Anyway blah blah there is some kind of common sense good / moral code I'd like to believe most of us live by regardless of religion - although again I had that challenged a few years ago when someone I trusted and welcomed into my home stole a lot of money from my then girlfriends wallet. That was a wake up call in terms of my own blindness - but I think you all get my drift- if any of you are still reading this blah blah blah - I know Ben is no longer on here to humor my rants anyways I will get to the point. I think most of us would like to believe that there are some parliamentarians who are fighting the good fight to protect what is in all faith some kind of common good and that we will move gradually away from food products and lifestyles that are very bad for our health and our future and be drawn in stead toward the light of some kind of healthy , decent and fair society where we each have at least some kind of negative liberty with freedom from the oppression of corporate agendas - but hey I've also been called as John Lennon once put it (not to me personally of course but....) 'a dreamer'. I'm well aware life feeds on life and that that very feeding process creates more life. I'm also not an idealist - I'm well aware of flaws in the machine and flaws in human nature and so I step forward like I believe most of us do with some kind of basic goodness and good will toward others - although our treatment of refugees really does make me wonder - I believe in national security and the protection of the common good. I also understand that it is a very complex issue , but the instinct in my heart and the teachings from my parents and grand parents still direct me to 'do unto others as you would have done to you' - anyway still I digress - what am I trying to say here? Something not quite fully formed in my mind yet but that longs to be expressed in response to this documentary 'terms and conditions may apply'. God my small brain struggles to put this into words..... I think of books like Chomsky's 'manufacturing consent' and the role of the main stream media within our current system. Look I have no problem being marketed to for the goods I'm interested in. I love organic foods, clothes and sunglasses and cameras and good creative software tools and musical instrument stuff and music and art - I love it as much as the next person and I believe I don't have anything to hide, but if ever we were to be ruled by a tyrant government who had no common decency then I think these privacy issues laid out in the doco 'terms and conditions may apply' would become quite problematic for anyone who disagreed with them. I think it's wonderful and healthy that we can express our views on here regardless of whether we agree. I'm not sure that anyone is changed by what they read on here and from what I've learnt about facebook and google they only share posts to those who like similar things anyway so it's all just preaching to the converted anyway - blah blah I'm not sure if I've said anything much here - I guess I've spent way too much time away from people since this ailment and in need of good conversation. I've watched all 8 seasons now of 'Entourage' - I need some more light brain dead things to watch to keep my mind of more serious stuff - any recommendations? P.s I won't be able to play my gig tomorrow night at The Rails in Byron Bay , which I'm disappointed about, but I'm just not quite yet recovered - my band will still play though under the safe leadership of the extraordinarily talented Luke Ferguson - lots of love to you all and may you have a wonderful weekend with the people you truly love and may they love and respect you equally. Xo ( rant over and out) Andy