To the Tribesmen, the Taal Monument looks like the above.
The resemblance is striking, don't you think?
Both of these symbols depict attempted unification gone bad. The former was very expensive, required lots of concrete and steel, and offends large sections of the populace. The latter can be formed with a human hand - free of charge - and can be used to salute other drivers on the road or can be saved for special occasions to add visual emphasis.
It doesn't offend as many people - probably because it's smaller.
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The attempt to enact one universal human language is really an attempt to have universal control over human life and thought. There are stories about towers similar to the Taal Monument going back as far as the book of Genesis. There, in the plain of Shinar, the people desired to "make a name" for themselves via one language and set about building a tower that would reach into heaven (Genesis, chapter 11). God was displeased and ended up confusing their language so that they couldn't communicate, scattering the little bastards all over the globe. Take that!
The Taal Monument is an answer to the question "Why did God do that?" The more I learn about language of men and the towers of men - the more I see how they almost always use them to destroy or control other men. God did them a big favor then and now.
Orwell's 1984, the selective rewriting of national histories, the potent Babel of the Ad-men on 5th Avenue, or the religio-speak of various sects, cults and fundamentalists are all the attempts of men to "make a name" for themselves - to reshape the human condition and the rest of the world in their image. Usually those who resist this imposed universal language (in whatever version it presents itself) are given a Taal Monument as a sign - or its equivalent.
In South Africa, those in power and weilding Apartheid had to be scattered and their babeling nonsense wiped away like the shit it was.
What should now be done with the Taal Monument?
I suggest tearing it down, or better yet, leave it up as a monument to human stupidity and cruelty. Only it should rigged so that all the exhibits should employ all eleven official languages of South Africa. And just for fun? They should all have those little "touch here to play narration" buttons so they can all go off at the same time.
Sometimes a little babel is a good thing.
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Oh we're not done yet...hehe.
3 comments:
i shudder when i think of "1984"
Tabitha- it's interesting. I wrote a paper a long time ago that I need to resurrect on that topic because yes, while Orwell's vision does make one shudder, there has been a strange reversal from his vision.
Orwell saw the world being controlled through millions of lenses being viewed by very few on screens. Kinda like the old 60's series The Prisoner.
In reality, in our culture at least , it is the opposite. There are a million gazillion viewscreens and very few lenses (less and less each day as news agencies conglomerate).
Your thoughts?
sadly, it's true. our nation's mass mentality is really controlled by the media . . . and so many of us take what we are given at face value and never question it. we are fed by the corporations "facts" that they want us to believe and we blindly believe them . . . we are numb and sedated. we waste our lives away watching "reality" tv rather than really experience, deal with, and fight back against our true realties.
good point . . . reason #345 that i hardly ever watch television (esp the news!). i know it is "geeky" but i'll get my news from public broadcasting, free speech radio news, and the bbc before i turn on fox or whatever else is out there . . .
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