One of the most powerful influences in our culture operate on folks like me who are involved, whether we like it or not, with the various shifts that come about from time to time, some as reaction, some as possibilities, or suggestions for possibilities. A recent example is a comment I saw from Ron Lammy, positioned abroad, and referring to an email from me, going back a year or more, regarding some possibility or other I had proposed (something I have completely forgotten) but to make the point that while we are presumed to be all on board these ventures with good intentions, as Ron is, the reality is that the creature we are wrestling with is itself going through one morph or another, resulting in change…summarily put, change is the constant, it is not a one-shot post and gone away, or itself on a new track, as time and tide inevitably intervenes again and again, distorting, or renewing, or even abandoning what went before.
For the protagonists, on any side one wishes to use as an example, it can make for some very vexing scenarios where, as in the case Ron Lammy refers to, virtually every aspect of the matter has undergone multiple corrections or alterations and even totally new aspects or factors have come into play, requiring a wholesale revisiting of the subject to include all that has come to the fore since the last exchange. I don’t know how much hair Ron Lammy has, but he must surely be tearing some of it as he wrestles with this unending dilemma of what the product is, and what factors are set in concrete, and what alterations are likely, or even possible. For anyone involved in observing this cultural creature and seeking to make it more productive or even only understandable, the total picture, is a bewildering combination of things abandoned, or revised to the point of not being recognizable, so that the frustration conveyed by Mr. Lammy’s comment is a natural and almost inevitable consequence in this never-ending quest of clarification or edification in such matters, and the creature has become so tangled and so much attacked or revised that recognizing where one started out is an almost hopeless task.
In almost every case, including the one raised by Ron Lammy, the creature under review becomes almost unrecognizable to observers, and resolutions or proposals to put things right will often only muddy the waters even more instead of providing clarity. In many of the issues of content and/or style, time and again, the subject becomes so convoluted that we end up only making matters worse by our attempts to put things right. In these times, what is sorely needed is for the brilliant ones among us, the ones with the incisive minds, to come to the subject and hopefully bring some new light in the darkness, but if we look at the history of the subject honestly, we see that such clarification rarely emerges – the subject, literally, is too tangled, too interwoven, for that winnowing or modification to take place with any efficiency and we end up with simply more confusion than the lesser of our intentions. The other problem in play is also the deeply entrenched positions of this expert or that, and mankind’s abiding reluctance to admit defeat and to so proclaim. People who write commentary are often given to arguing one case or another very strongly for modification or alteration or, in fact, wholesale alteration, but by its very nature, the new dispensation being proposed is immediately lambasted as “total rubbish” or words to that effect, so that the clarification being sought by Mr. Lammy, which is a worthwhile thrust, is therefore not likely to be forthcoming, and I freely admit being guilty of just that reaction as I see others speaking out in that vein. Change, by the very act of what it triggers, is often the propellant of even more discord and confusion than it is seeking to eliminate. If one is attempting to be a spokesman, he or she would be wise to keep reminding ourselves that “if you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen”. By the very meaning of what the word truly is, change is often a thankless creature, as it seeks to replace something already in existence with a host of followers, by a new strain, or flavor, or design.
It is involved with modification and, even worse, removal of one mix and the substitution of another possibility, with each version arriving with both proponents and opponents already firmly embedded in the mix, resulting in more clamour and resistance than previously seen. It is worth noting, however, and Ron Lammy’s comment is an example, that in these matters we are constantly seeing an example of the old adage that “hope springs eternal” in mankind. We wait and watch.
