Specter of The Spectacle

This blog takes its name from the editorial pseudonym of seventeenth century essayist and playwright Joseph Addison (1672-1719). He was an early figure of the Enlightenment, sometimes referred to as a "founding godfather" of the United States. 

Seen here with a poodle on his head.

Between 1711-1714, Addison published a daily periodical out of London called The Spectator, which celebrated the virtues of human progress as achieved through knowledge, ideas and understanding. Its proposed aim was "to enliven morality with wit, and to temper wit with morality."

The articles posted on this site are intended to evoke a similar spirit of enlightened discourse, because only a critical understanding of our common humanity can unite us. 

Do good. 

Be well. 

Change the world.

~ Mr Spectator

Center of the Universe

Back in 270 BCE, an ancient Greek astronomer and mathematician named Aristarchus of Samos had the crazy idea that the sun was actually bigger than the earth... even though from where he was standing, it wasn't much bigger than his thumb. From this, he deduced that it was more likely that the earth revolved around the sun as opposed to the other way around. You know, crazy talk.

The biggest controversy, however, was that this also meant that the orbit of the earth must not be a perfect circle. In ancient Athens, them's fightin' words. You don't fuck with geometry. Most people at the time thought he was insane, sacrilegious, or a combination of the two, like the Ozzy Osbourne of classical Greece... except as far as I know, Aristarchus never bit the head off a live bat on stage (although records from this period are sparse).

In fact, most of Aristarchus’s writing has been lost, which could make for the single greatest library fine in human history... except that much of his life's work is thought to have burnt up when the Library of Alexandria was destroyed in 391 AD under the order of the city's bishop, Theophilus. You see, old Theo didn't like any newfangled 'science' that conflicted with his ideology.

Nonetheless, references to Aristarchus's work have survived in other books, including the work of Archimedes, who concluded that if Aristarchus’s model was indeed accurate, then since the stars do not appear to change position from one year to another, this would mean that they are much further away than anyone had ever suspected.

"That means that one tiny atom in my
fingernail could be... one tiny little universe."

In other words, because of this guy, human beings first started to develop a sense of just how much space there is in space. Granted, they were still way lowballing their estimates, but even then, his fellow members of the Toga Party decided that they were unwilling to let their minds be so thoroughly blown at this time. Instead, they wrote it off as nonsense in favor of Ptolemy’s geocentric model. I presume that Claudius Ptolemy must have sat down to urinate, which is why the P was silent. He was also a mathematician, geographer and poet, a Renaissance Man of sorts about sixteen centuries before the Renaissance.

Almost eighteen centuries later, Nicolaus Copernicus even referenced Aristarchus in an early draft of his manuscript Six Books Concerning the Revolutions of Heavenly Orbs (Swimsuit Edition), first published in 1543 and which is generally credited with introducing the idea of the heliocentric model of our solar system. However, there was one major caveat in Copernicus’s argument: the word “if,” which allowed the work to be read as a hypothesis instead of a theory or immutable law, thereby sparing him from persecution by the Catholic church. He also waited until he was dying before he dared publish it, at which point he presumably said, "Fuck it," then dropped the mic.

Galileo, on the other hand, either had too much foresight or not enough, depending on how you look at it. In 1632, he wrote and published Dialogue on the Two Chief Systems of the World, Ptolemaic and Copernican, which takes Copernicus’s ideas further and was immediately put on the Catholic Church’s list of banned books. After his inquisition, followed by a light lunch, Galileo had to publicly denounce his findings and was forced to live out the rest of his life under house arrest. Hey, at least he had his telescope.

"You know, I probably should have brought a corkscrew, too..."

Galileo died in 1642, and it would be over a hundred years before a heavily censored version of Systems was permitted by the Church to be released.* It was not taken off the list of banned books until 1835, and this was only after another astronomer named Joseph Settle finally settled the issue, so to speak. Back in 1820, he had finally convinced the Pope to believe that the earth does in fact revolve around the sun... you know, less than a hundred and fifty years before human beings would walk on the goddamn moon.

Another 200 years or so, they might even come around on gay marriage.

And it all started with a wild-eyed stargazer in ancient Greece who had the audacity to suggest that maybe human beings aren’t the center of universe after all.

Imagine that.


* Fun Fact: Galileo's middle-finger is still on display in a museum in Florence, Italy, about a hundred and seventy miles from the Vatican.

View from the Top of the World

In 1921, a thirty-five-year-old British boarding school teacher named George Mallory decided that he wanted a change in scenery, so he joined an expedition to be among the first people in recorded history to see what the earth looks like from nearly six miles above sea level.

Basically, given the option of climbing the world’s tallest mountain or educating the insufferable children of the rich, Mallory chose the former. Keep in mind, the summit of Mount Everest is about ten thousand feet higher than even the most technologically advanced airplanes at that time could fly, so this guy makes Mr. Keating's challenge in Dead Poets Society to "Seize the day" seem like empty rhetoric. While Robin Williams's character stood on his desk, Mallory had his sights on winning the ultimate game of King-of-the-Mountain. When asked why he wanted to climb it, Mallory also set a new standard in cockiness when he replied, “Because it is there." Incidentally, that happens to be the same reason why I have ever set foot in a Radio Shack.

As the climbing team ascended the mountain, Mallory himself quickly ascended to the role of lead climber, discovering previously unknown routes through some of the most unforgiving terrain in the world. As a guy who "knows words real good," he was also tasked with writing about their journey. On their first attempt, they made it about 23,000 feet before turning back, only to try again the following spring. This time around, Mallory and seven Sherpas were caught in an avalanche, and the English teacher was the only one who survived. Two years later, he returned to Everest, frostbitten middle fingers a-flailing.

Mallory was joined in his third and final attempt to conquer the world's tallest mountain (above sea level) in 1924 by a twenty-two-year-old undergraduate student named Andrew “Sandy” Irvine. No stranger to cockiness himself, he had been invited based upon the first impression of another member of the expedition, who had climbed a three thousand foot mountain by foot only to discover Irvine at the summit, sitting on his goddamn motorcycle. The young man also proved to be skilled at MacGyvering their oxygen tanks, although their use was actually controversial at the time. A lot of people saw dependence upon breathing apparatus as cheating... kind of like wearing football helmets or boxing gloves. Real men didn't need such amenities.

George Mallory himself was against using the tanks, but when he realized that it would be impossible to reach the summit without being able to breathe properly, he and Irvine pressed on while the others stayed behind. Mallory needed Irvine’s expertise with the tanks and Irvine apparently believed himself to possess all of the powers of invincibility that come with being a college student. Another member of the expedition let them borrow a camera so that they could take the world's greatest selfie when they reached the peak. From a distance, Mallory and Irvine were last spotted on their way up the final pyramid, where it appeared as though they were making steady progress. Then some light clouds rolled in and the two men were never seen alive again.

Mallory’s frozen body was discovered seventy-five years later, with a number of clues suggesting that he had fallen on his way back down from the summit. In other words, there is a good chance that Mallory and Irvine were in fact the first people to climb Mount Everest. They just didn’t make it back down. Nearly a century later, Irvine’s body has still not been found, nor was the camera that may contain the cryogenically preserved photograph that could settle this once and for all. Of course, over the years, the near impossibility of finding it hasn't prevented fearless explorers from setting out in search of this artifact. Why?

Because it is there.

Made in America

The other day, I saw a pickup truck with a decal of an American flag and a bald eagle emblazoned across the rear window, and I thought to myself, "Wow. This guy really loves America." I wasn't sure whether to honk or salute, so my brain just settled on a self-contained chuckle. Don't get me wrong. I love this country as much as anybody. I also love breakfast cereal, but I'm not going to put a giant decal of it on the rear window my car.

"I pledge allegiance to your truck, and the aesthetic for which it stands..."

I figured that oldboy's red, white and blue plastic bling was probably manufactured in China anyway, which made me wonder if this kind of thing is common in other parts of the world as well. Do Herzegovinians, for example, have giant stickers covering the rear windows of their utility vehicles to let other citizens know how much they love their nation's color scheme and/or politico-economic system? What about Greenland? Yes, I did some research, and it turns out that Greenland not only has a flag and a government, but people too. That said, it seems reasonable to assume that some of those people probably drive pickup trucks, which may or may not have tacky window decals.

To be honest, I've always imagined Greenland to be like one big truck commercial.

I also wondered if had these adhesive expressions of jingoistic fervor (i.e. stickers) existed in the eighteenth century, would the Founding Fathers have had them on their carriages... you know, along with some mudflaps featuring Calvin pissing on the British Empire? (Oh, Calvin. Is there anything that you won't urinate on?) After all, the Founding Fathers probably loved their country at least as much as that guy in the pickup truck, right?

"Now we just need some TruckNutz™ and a smokestack."

The difference is that they were looking forward in the direction of a better future, whereas many self-described patriots of today regressively align themselves with a "golden age" of privilege and entitlement that has steadily been slipping away from them. Rather than attribute their declining standard of living to the greedy tentacles of neoliberalism, they adopt a tribe-like mentality and turn their hostility toward people who don't look and talk like them. From their perspective, it all seems acutely unfair, in part because their unprecedented productivity proves that the working class has never worked harder. They just don't see where all of the value of their added labor is actually materializing.

The robber barons, of course, pick the pockets of the working class and then get them to blame each other for the theft. These "job creators," deemed too big to jail by the laws that their teams of high-priced lawyers wrote, willfully nurture the envy of the very people they rob, promising nonexistent opportunities for wealth and power while hoarding exponentially larger percentages of it. The American Dream that the working class has inherited is a lot like the carrot before the horse, ever always just out of reach.

At the same time, Americans are constantly inundated with reminders of just how exceptional we are. We even have a term for it, although it eludes me at the moment. American Awesomeness? No, that's not it. American Betterness? I'm getting warmer. I do know that it is an idea which has made a guest appearance in every State of the Union address that I've ever seen, heard or read... something about how ours is a nation that has been chosen by Providence to lead the world in every respect. It will come to me. Of course, I've never understood how it is that we can be both the exception and the rule.

This painting is like Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band... 
but for Christian conservatives who think rock music is evil.

Through this supposition of superiority, we infer the inferiority of others. Say that five times fast. While you do, think about what it actually means. By defining ourselves as exceptional, we are reinforcing the fallacious assumption that people born elsewhere in the world are inherently less awesome. Then again, if there is such a thing as Kazakhstani Exceptionalism, it seems that they lack the pickup truck decals to properly express it.

"So you say it's a picture of an eagle, huh? Yeah, bro... that sounds pretty badass."

As you may know, the words E Pluribus Unum are featured on the Great Seal of the US, as well as most of our coinage. It literally translates to: 'Out of many, one,' which is exactly how I feel when digging through my change jar for quarters. Incidentally, this phrase also just happens to be composed of exactly thirteen letters... and that, my friends, is a conspiracy fact. Basically, the idea behind the official adoption of this term was that a democratic republic such as ours could be ruled by many as though by one and that one could speak on behalf of the many. And, of course, when it comes to Highlanders, there can only be one.

...there probably should have been only one Highlander movie, too.

It is worth noting that the term E Pluribus Unum was coined (so to speak) at a time when there were only thirteen states with a relatively small, centralized and homogenous population. That said, the idea of 'out of many, one' doesn't really hold up, particularly in relation to our currency if you consider that out of one dollar comes many pennies that are virtually worthless on their own. Not to be cynical, but couldn't the same be said for votes? With that in mind, from this point forward, I think that one-cent pieces (which are only colloquially known as pennies) should be called "vacuum rattlers" and that the aforementioned Latin phrase on the backs of them should be replaced by the far more pragmatic "Do not eat." This is America, after all.

My favorite part is the stylized use of quotation marks.
And what is it about silica gel packets specifically...
that makes them so unbelievably delicious?

As for the other side of the Great Seal, despite common belief, it does not contain a treasure map or a kids menu. It actually features the same psychedelic pyramid with the hovering eye from the one dollar bill, plus two more catchy Latin taglines from the nascent American empire: Novus Order Seclorum, which translates as 'New Order of the Ages' (not to be confused with the British New Wave band's greatest hits album), and Annuit Cœptis, which means 'He favors our undertakings.' As it pertains to the current administration, the 'he' in question is actually Scott Baio.

For my money, the only great Seal is the one who earned
a Grammy in 1996 for his hit song "Kiss from a Rose."

The difference between patriotism and nationalism basically comes down to this: to be a patriot is to love one's country, for better or worse... kind of like being a Cubs fan. You weather the good times and the bad, maintaining an unwavering belief in what your country could be, even if you don't think that it's necessarily living up to its potential at the moment. Nationalists, on the other hand, believe that the geographic borders in which they were born serve to automatically make them better than anyone who may live beyond those imaginary lines. Of course, many of them also believe in building walls for the sake of making those lines less imaginary. You could say that patriotism brings human beings together to a certain extent, while nationalism fundamentally serves to divide people by fostering an "us versus them" mentality.

The idea of American Exceptionalism effectively blurs these related concepts, making it seem as though the two terms are interchangeable. They are not. That said, I am relatively certain that had someone suggested to the driver of that pickup truck that he was anything other than patriotic to the nth degree, any such statement would have been construed as fightin' words. In this hypothetical scenario, I would say that therein lies a clear delineation between patriotism and nationalism, as the latter may involve the imposition of one's own ideology onto others. My belief system can beat up your belief system, and all that (i.e. the cause of virtually every war in human history).

Like any good contemporary R&B song, this is the part where I lean into the mic, get down on one knee and break it down. Dim the lights, because here it is: nationalism is little more than a "socially acceptable" form of racism and a way of rationalizing one's xenophobia, which is itself little more than a manifestation of misdirected fear. Basically, social conservatives (like the guy in that truck, by way of an educated guess) are concerned that the society that they wish to conserve is rapidly changing in ways that they cannot control, which it is. Metaphorically speaking, they feel like useless pennies just waiting to get vacuumed up. Immigrants or other already marginalized groups then become the scapegoats for the depreciated social value of the white working class.

...not to be confused with an escape goat, pictured above.

Nationalism has been making a pretty big comeback lately, too. Recent hits include Brexit, the election of Donald Trump in the US and Rodrigo Duterete in the Philippines, Turkey's descent into autocratic rule, and other far-right "Make [your country] Great Again" candidates around the world. It seems that the forgotten and neglected masses are electing obscenely rich bullies to represent their national interests... because nobody else is.

Meanwhile, of course, these politicians do not share their voters' interests or life experiences, but the prophets and profits of neoliberalism have spent the past as long as anybody can remember leading the misinformed participants of American democracy to believe that wealth and power should in fact be synonymous. Trump, Duterete, Putin, Erdoğan, Le Pen... they were all born wealthy, and so voters think that they must be powerful, shrewd and aggressive, which are apparently qualities that they are looking for in a candidate. They want somebody who they think is going to fight on their behalf. Who better to fight these rich assholes than one of their own? Just like FDR, right? Not exactly. The detrimental flaw in this logic is that these same megalomaniacs who crave excessive wealth and power in the first place know that the best way to keep it and continue to accumulate more is to always look after your own interests first, voters be damned.

If the current political tide maintains, neoliberalism will soon lose all pretenses of being anything other than direct rule by the wealthy elite, who will only use their positions of power to accumulate more, just like they always have. Capitalism is driven by the principle of constant expansion, and ever since Ronald Reagan's "morning in America," nearly all of the wealth generated by that growth has gone to those who control the means of production. Talk about a shitty morning. Meanwhile, the working class willingly acquiesces to a modern form of feudalism and serfdom that is presented to them under the palatable guise of patriotism. Haven't we been through all of this before?

If patriotism is the idolatry of the state (or its economic system), then nationalists are its zealots. It's like the difference between being someone who watches an occasional game on TV versus that guy in the bleachers who painted his chest the team colors, effectively paying fifty bucks to freeze his ass off for something that will almost certainly not have any impact whatsoever upon the outcome of the game. On some level, even he must know that it doesn't really make a whole lot of sense.

"I am desperate to be a part of something bigger."

And here's the two-cent (or "two-vacuum rattler," if you will) version: nationalism is bad, while patriotism is ok, but only if the driver can actually see through that decal from the inside. Of course, it blinds us in other ways, too, such as all of the things that we could learn from other cultures if we weren't so damn full of ourselves.

At least we look cool, though... right?

In the game of rock, paper, scissors, think of humanism as the paper. Just go with me on this. Nationalism is the scissors, as it can tear through our common humanity, while patriotism is the rock. It is the small piece of earth that allows otherwise diverse people to claim a common identity, thereby permitting them to rise above the fear that fuels nationalism. Humanism, however, supersedes patriotism, because when it comes down to it, we are all in this together.

My point is that we should all want our place in the world, wherever we happen to live, to be the best that it can be -- rather than assume that any nation has already achieved for itself the pinnacle of human civilization, whether today or in some mythologized past. We can all learn from each other, and our common humanity should always come first. Nationalism, by definition, only divides us.

In closing, I present you with an escaped goat.

Brand Identity

Imagine if Don Draper from Mad Men accidentally fell into a wormhole in the space/time continuum, transporting him to the real world in the present day. Yes, he would probably spill his drink. But I also think that he would be thoroughly amazed to discover that modern consumers are willing to pay for the right to do much of his job for him, and even pay extra for the privilege to promote their brands of choice.

Look around you. How many company logos can you see right now? Ten? Twenty? Fifty? Even if the only screen to which you are currently exposed is this article (which is advertisement-free, by the way -- you can thank me by sharing my work), you are almost certainly being advertised to right now.

Look at the items on your desk. Look at the people around you. Look at their shoes, their hats, their cell phones that demand their constant attention. Go ahead. I'll wait, while you see how many corporate logos you can find in your immediate surroundings. Think of it like Where's Waldo? -- only I suspect that it will be much easier.

If you do find Waldo, kindly remind him that he owes me five bucks.

Consider that if a plain, white T-shirt costs $6 and that same shirt with a brand name emblazoned across the front costs $22, then the person who buys the one with the corporate logo is effectively paying $16 to advertise on that company's behalf. Any "ad man" from the 1960s would likely have shit himself at the mere suggestion of such a far-fetched idea. This is how far we have come. And let's be honest. If it wasn't for the car crashes, NASCAR would just be product placement and left turns.

Watch the pretty logos go around and around...

The United States emerged from the Second World War as the #1 World Champs. USA!!! We were the reigning global economic superpower, in part because we had sustained the least damage to our factories during the war compared to other industrialized nations. American cars, for example, were in a very good position to dominate the world market after automobile plants in England, Germany, France, Italy and Japan had been bombed all to hell. The same was true with consumer electronics.

Dibs on this as both a band name and an album cover.

When American factories converted back to the production of consumer goods after the war, in order to avoid another economic depression, people had to actually buy the products that these factories were manufacturing. In order for that to happen, the owners of these factories knew that they had to pay their employees a decent wage. However, since there were salary limits in place, a leftover from the New Deal designed to prevent gross income inequality, companies started offering "fringe benefits" like medical and dental insurance in order to compete for skilled American workers, many of whom received free educations through the GI Bill. These combined factors greatly contributed to the booming middle class, and their technicolor suburban homes were populated with all the latest amenities, most of which were produced right here in the US.

Imagine that.

Advertisers were in fierce competition for all that sweet, sweet disposable income, and the audiences that they were marketing to were... how should I put this? Less sophisticated in terms of their awareness of media manipulation. That is to say that commercials back then seemed to assume that their audiences were pretty stupid, and in some ways, maybe they were. Check out this advertisement from the 1950s and you'll see what I mean.

From the makers of Salt & Vinegar Lead Paint Chips.

If you didn't watch the clip, you probably think that the picture above is of the worst boom mic operator in television history. It's actually an ad for a radioactive makeup remover. I know, it sounds pretty space age, doesn't it? It's like the post-apocalyptic future... today! Here's another old commercial, this one is for Kool-Aid. You know, to be honest, after sixty seconds of that, I actually feel a bit dumber myself. I think they even put lead in the commercials back then.

"I'll see you in your nightmares. Oh, yeah!"

Today, advertising is everywhere, and it has gotten considerably more duplicitous. You see, audiences eventually got wiser, so advertisers had to become sneakier in their tactics. Now it seems that they have to get you when you least expect it... which is why they have ads in urinals... and in movies... and on those cement barriers between parking spaces... and on shopping carts (as if you're not exposed to enough brands in the grocery store to begin with)... and just about every other public place in this country. You can hardly look in any direction without being subjected to advertising in one form or another.

"Finally, an advertisement that I can urinate on!"

When was the last time that you went to a restaurant or a bar that didn't have at least three televisions that were viewable from every seat in the place? The corporations that rule the world are ever more desperate for the shrinking disposable income of the American middle class, while hapless consumers are hungry for whatever the next new big thing happens to be. How do they do it? you ask? The answer, of course, is advertising -- an industry that is built almost entirely upon principles of psychological manipulation. How can they trick you into thinking that your life will somehow be better because of this thing?

So they prevent kids from being distracted by constantly distracting 
them? There is clearly some effective marketing at work here. 

Everyone knows that the only time money buys happiness is when it comes to jet-skis. To the best of my knowledge, it is physically impossible to not smile while riding a jet-ski, which, "scientifically speaking," makes this an object that indeed brings happiness. This is probably why you never see commercials for jet-skis. They have very little reason to bullshit you.

As you can see, he's having a lot of fun... 
and she has no idea that he's legally blind!

Let's do an experiment. First, I want you to think of as many kinds of toothpaste as you can. Think about all the different brands and flavors. If you feel so inclined, you could even make a list. After about sixty seconds (no cheating!), how many did you come up with? Five? Ten? Twenty? More? Ok. Good. Now I want you to think of all the current foreign heads of state that you know. You can take a little more time if you need it. I don't need to know what your score was, but I think I can make a safe guess as to how a vast majority of Americans would fare.

So let me ask you this: do we really need an entire aisle at the supermarket dedicated to toothpaste (or cereal, for that matter)? After all, every brand of toothpaste has the exact same active ingredient, and I've yet to determine if there is in fact any difference between Cool Mint and Fresh Mint. And what the fuck is Sparkle Mint anyway, and why does it taste like bubble gum and bananas?

Oh, it has little flecks of plastic in it. Neat.

Here in America, we have a tendency to conflate consumer choice with freedom. We are exposed to literally thousands of advertisements every day, and over the years, we have been programmed to identify ourselves through the brands we buy. Do you prefer Coke or Pepsi? Ford or Chevy? Converse or Nike? Fender or Gibson? Mac or PC? iPhone or Android? Pabst Blue Ribbon or Heineken? Democrat or Republican? Now consider how much of your identity as perceived by others is defined specifically by your loyalty to a certain brand. Who are we without these things?

We are Emilio Estevez in Repo Man.

And why should you have to pay to do the work of advertisers? If you think about it, shoe companies should be paying you to wear a shirt with their company logo displayed for anyone to see. Billboards on the highway cost them money, whereas billboards on people generate revenue. Figure that one out. We willingly advertise on behalf of these companies with the clothing we wear, while also unflinchingly accepting the ubiquity of advertising in our public places. Just so you know, it doesn't have to be like this.

São Paulo is the most populous city in Brazil (and the eleventh most populous city in the world) with a current population of about 21,000,000 people. Back in 2006, the mayor of São Paulo passed a "Clean City Law" that outlawed all outdoor advertisements, including billboards and on public transit. Businesses had ninety days to comply or pay a fine.

Once the billboards and signs were all taken down, it revealed a beautiful city, rich with history and its own unique aesthetics beneath all the layers of corporate ugliness. It no longer looked like just about every other major city in South America -- or the world, for that matter. Local artists were inspired to paint murals as expressions of their culture from the ground up. Of course, removing all of the ads also exposed hidden shantytowns, as well as the city's faltering infrastructure. However, only by bringing these issues to light could they effectively be addressed.

What would be revealed in our own cities if we took similar measures here in the US? How would it change the way that people interact with one another if we weren't constantly distracted by advertisements? Would it change our priorities if we didn't let our senses of need and want be manipulated by commercials? Would our children know what to ask for for Christmas? What would our suburbs look like if the main drags weren't all lined with the same neon signs for the same fast food chains, hotels and gas stations? Would the cities themselves start to look different? Would their own true characters be exposed? Would people suddenly be able to tell the difference between one suburb and another?

Since I don't see an all-out ban on public advertising happening here anytime soon, it seems that the best we can do is just consciously think about these things and refuse to buy products that are advertised to us in places that they do not belong. If a company subjects us to advertising against our will, then perhaps we should not do business with that company. You know you're probably being lied to anyway, right? Of course, here in America, we don't just celebrate bullshit, we elect it to the highest office in the land and then order it with a side of fries.

I'll let you chew on that, along with a quote from contemporary poet and musician Ian MacKay:


                      Merchandise keeps us in line
                      Common sense says it's by design
                     What could a businessman ever want more
                     Than to have us sucking in his store

                     We owe you nothing
                     You have no control

                    YOU ARE NOT WHAT YOU OWN