{"id":407,"date":"2008-02-18T11:22:41","date_gmt":"2008-02-18T17:22:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/index.php\/2008\/02\/18\/we-ran-her-off-the-road\/"},"modified":"2008-02-18T12:30:27","modified_gmt":"2008-02-18T18:30:27","slug":"we-ran-her-off-the-road","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2008\/02\/we-ran-her-off-the-road\/","title":{"rendered":"We Ran Her Off the Road"},"content":{"rendered":"

You can’t have a dope business without dopers.”
\n— Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, No Country for Old Men<\/em>, Cormac McCarthy<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Copyright 2008 Ben S. Pollock<\/small><\/p>\n

Proposed laws about paparazzi are worse-than-useless. There are already laws on stalking, creating a public nuisance and any number of other categories that would apply and hold up in court against photographers (meaning anyone with a cell phone) who prey on celebrities or victims.<\/p>\n

So any such proposal<\/a> clogs up the legal system.<\/p>\n

Second, they cannot work. There is a market<\/a> for photos of celebrities and disasters. And it’s not new, despite the rhetoric of broadcast correspondents. Fan magazines have been around for most of the last century. Is it worse now? Sure, if badmouthing the present makes you feel better, why not. The public demands explanations, ideally in the form of a story. A popular story is that we’re going in a handbasket, that the olden days were better. It’s a story that allows us peace, an unsettling peace but anything must be better than either random coincidence or that human nature stays the same.<\/p>\n

Everything is more-so, everything. There are any number of reasons for such tabloidism. One might be the growing alienation in this country. Some people live their years in or close to their hometowns, but most Americans move then move again. You don’t get to know your neighbors, work mates and fellow congregants well enough to gossip about them to other neighbors, colleagues and pew sharers. We just might have some innate need for gossip, and movie stars and victims of disasters one or three states over fit that bill.<\/p>\n

A need for gossip sounds low. It is. It is a version of humanity’s need for story. But if the needs for food, warmth and procreation have the capacity to cause great harm, then the need for story means anyone who took just a split-second for a waiting-room magazine article on Prince Diana created the marketplace demand that eventually chased her limo into an embankment.<\/p>\n

There’s a Brick<\/strong> from a couple of years ago where I argue that we need essays<\/a> as well as stories. Now, that seems maybe an excuse for my not being Chabon, King, Cormac etc., but maybe that’s putting myself down unnecessarily. All of us from the time we begin talking put stories together, and that puts me somewhere in the middle in terms of skills and success of keeping someone’s attention.<\/p>\n

Sometimes the most pragmatic people will praise medical advice from snake oil to the various biles<\/a>. That’s the need for story. Solid scientific medical discoveries lack narrative. When there’s only so much doctors can do for some illnesses, people often prefer taking a chance on something unproven, even disproven, because it comes both with a complete explanation and anecdotal proofs — the key being anecdotes i.e. stories.<\/p>\n

Yet in science, evolution continues because it is a very good story. It puts otherwise unexplained phenomena together very well, from “Once upon a time” to “ever after.” The biblical creation saga is a bestseller in the same way: it also puts together disparate elements that have to go together to make sense of the world today. If we all could agree to that the former represents physical reality and the latter spiritual truth<\/a> … well that would be a fantasy, i.e. story, wouldn’t it? -30-<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You can’t have a dope business without dopers.” — Sheriff Ed Tom Bell, No Country for Old Men, Cormac McCarthy Copyright 2008 Ben S. Pollock Proposed laws about paparazzi are worse-than-useless. There are already laws on stalking, creating a public nuisance and any number of other categories that would apply and hold up in court […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-407","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-culture"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":221,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/08\/does-mel-hate-ducks-too\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":0},"title":"Does Mel Hate Ducks, Too?","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 1, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"A duck test can be applied to the Mel Gibson story, and it is surprising that it hasn't, so far as readily available online. (Use as search something like \"Mel Gibson driving\" in news.google.com or news.yahoo.com). The talented actor and director (and he is gifted) was pulled over for erratic\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News, Spin"","block_context":{"text":"News, Spin","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/news-spin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":5085,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2015\/06\/hang-separately\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":1},"title":"Hang Separately","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 20, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"America is not a nice country. Hardly any of the other countries think so. If they say the U.S. is a nice nation, that's for show, to stay on our good side. It's just to be nice. We are a nation led by elected officials, often compromised by \"contributions,\" as\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "News, Spin"","block_context":{"text":"News, Spin","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/news-spin\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Animation of light going through a prism","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Prisma-Spectrum-580x360-ani-300x186.gif?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4220,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2013\/04\/steve-and-steve-paul-and-john\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":2},"title":"Steve and Steve, Paul and John","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"April 8, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"Steve Wozniak of all people showed up in Fayetteville, Ark., for a campus speech Sunday night. He spoke engagingly for a senior status wonk-nerd-geek -- he is 62. Is there humility in a guy like that? Yes, after a fashion. \"Woz\" is certainly an electronics genius following a childhood as\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Brick Bats Reportage"","block_context":{"text":"Brick Bats Reportage","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/brick-bats-reportage\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs, 1975","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/1975-woz-jobs-gar-310.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5053,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2015\/01\/losing-miller-williams\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":3},"title":"Losing My Neighbor Miller Williams","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"January 3, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Of course I'd known of him, Miller Williams. In the 1990s, living in Little Rock, I was relearning how to read verse. He was an Arkansas poetry icon, along with Maya Angelou and John Gould Fletcher. We claim a good share of songwriters as well. Miller died Jan. 1, 2015,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Body, Home, Street"","block_context":{"text":"Body, Home, Street","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/body-home-street\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"The documentary series \"Men & Women of Distinction\" of the Arkansas Educational Television Network featured poet Miller Williams. The half-hour video was premiered in November 2010 at the University of Arkansas Global Campus auditorium in Fayetteville. Afterward, Williams was congratulated during a reception and posed for pictures. Here, Ben Pollock (from left), Christy Pollock, Miller Williams, Crescent Dragonwagon and Amy Wilson. Photo by Dwain Cromwell","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/Miller-Williams-Crescent-AmyLou-Pollocks-by-Cromwell-1110-1000x750-300x225.jpeg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":46,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2005\/01\/johnny-carson\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":4},"title":"Johnny Carson","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"January 26, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2005 Ben S. Pollock Wednesday, January 26, 2005: My newspaper rarely does front-page obituaries, particularly of celebrities. The last was Marlon Brando's. Monday morning it gave top-of-2A play for Johnny Carson, the penultimate spot. The front page would have been appropriate. Carson was a significant icon of the 20th\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "American Culture"","block_context":{"text":"American Culture","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/american-culture\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":32,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2005\/12\/excuse-71\/","url_meta":{"origin":407,"position":5},"title":"Excuse 7.1","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"December 2, 2005","format":false,"excerpt":"Friday, Dec. 2, 2005. Can you get by with writing or saying whatever you want because you're sick, and you're lightheaded from clogged sinuses or fever or some-such thing? It'd be nice. So later if what is written makes no sense, or even worse, it does make sense but it\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Technical Difficulties"","block_context":{"text":"Technical Difficulties","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/briefs\/technical-difficulties\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=407"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/407\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=407"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=407"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=407"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}