Just saw Munich – Spielberg’s latest. Court and I spoke afterwards about the senselessness of killing your enemies. You kill one person, and 20 people mourn for that one person…they avenge, and the tornado of vengeance gathers fuel. I felt like I should have know more going into the film…not more regarding the film, but regarding the history. In general I think I should know more about the world I live in and how things came to pass…
I am pretty ignorant about events in the Middle East…I know this sounds horrible, but it overwhelms me to keep up with things and depresses me. Is that a good reason to remain ignorant?
My friend Dave gives me world updates on things he thinks I should know (in order to not look like a COMPLETE idiot). He filters quite a lot because he doesn’t see the point in upsetting me with morbid details. He usually just sticks to the facts. Is this good or bad?
He also tells me what movies I am not allowed to watch (as in he would recommend strongly that I steer clear of them, and if I do not heed his warning and watch it anyway he doesn’t want to be the ear I lament into, because, well, he told me so.)…Hotel Rwanda being one of those movies. Both Court and Dave saw me online reading about Rwanda and neither of them liked what emmerged from in front of the monitor, however many hours it took for me to unglue my eyes and my mind. It still haunts me. All the images, the frustration, the politics, the lives lost, the blood shed, the pain…and I did not see the movie. Imagine how much more vivid the images if I had.
I would like to know more about these events, but when I chip at the tip of the iceberg, all I get is cold and wet. Is it worth it? If I became a news-watching paper-reading history knowing being, I would not be the me I am today. Is the me I could be, a better me than I am? I guess I am in limbo (the place Catholics are debating again)…is ignorance bliss? Do I count as truly ignorant if I know I don’t know things?
I remember in high school I used to nod and say “uh huh” when people were telling a story and I wanted to pretend I knew everything they were referencing. I thought to acknowledge I didn’t know something was to acknowledge my own stupidity.
Then I went to college and learned that those people (the I know everything you don’t have to explain it-types) bugged the poop out of me, and I hated getting lost in a conversation simply because I hadn’t gotten clarification. It took a while…lots of painful practice…and sometimes I still “uh huh” when I want a story over with or I really don’t care (yikes! What a bitch!), but I now admit freely when I know something or not, and I do get laughed at (especially by Dad after the tsunami last year when he referenced it in conversation and I had no idea what he was talking about), and I do feel dumb, but I guess it’s, in my opinion, a smarter dumb. Now, there’s something to strive for.
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