Tuesday, 2nd June 2009
Truth, Dare, or Logic?
A couple of months ago, I came across one of those sites that purport to sell "original art". Mere daubs, which could easily have been done by Kindergartners, dolphins, chimpanzees, or elephants, sell for tidy sums that could otherwise have furnished a couple of rooms.
My eyes were drawn to the title "A Beach in Malta" - and hoping to guess which one it was, I clicked on the reference. There it was, a mile-long sandy beach, with luzzijiet in all the colours of the rainbow. The backdrop was a wooded hill, and at the bottom of the hill nestled some houses... with sloping, red roofs, some of which had chimneys in them.
I blinked. This beach was as Maltese as much as I am Ann Coulter. So in the "Comments" and "Contact Artist", I wrote that there are regulations and traditions pertaining to the colours of the traditional fishing boats, which had, moreover, the wrong shape and proportions.
I commented that we have no wooded hills, that the roofs of our houses do not slope, and that our beaches are nowhere near as long. In conclusion, I said that had the artist purchased a postcard and copied that, rather than relying on memory, she would have done a much better job.
To date, I have not received a reply from either the moderators of the site, or the artist herself. What is more telling perhaps is that my comments do not appear on the site - unlike others that were written before, and after I sent mine in. This was rather disappointing, seeing that the site ostensibly prides itself in selling "unique, authentic, masterpieces".
Are they so full of themselves that they refuse to take criticism, or seek the truth, or at least to check whether people who point out what they say are glaring mistakes are lying, or telling the truth, as I was.
Alas, being so set in one's ways as not to admit that anyone else may be right (or "have reason" as one of my Slimiżi friends translates "ikollok raġun") is not the prerogative of website owners and artists. It appears to be a National Pastime (capitals mine).
Take (oh, please do!) politicians of every creed and colour. They are all saying, in the run-up to MEP elections, that their party holds the Keys to the Truth, and that everyone else is lying through their back teeth. The bigwigs probably employ people to go through the papers - including the blogs and the comments left beneath them - with a fine-tooth comb in order to latch on to something that may be used (a) to their advantage or (b) to the disadvantage of their rivals.
I will not mention specifics; but I will just relate three stories from my past so that one may draw parallels if one so desires; it is easy to do so.
1. At school one of the nuns arbitrarily - and wrongly - decided that at home, we spoke French - which was why I was "so good" at it. Therefore, she decreed, that was also the reason why I was inattentive and fidgety during her lessons; I wanted to distract the others just so that (according to her, of course) I would win the prize for the subject at the end of the year. She gave me an ultimatum. It was either her, or me, in the classroom. Of course, I had better things to do than deprive my peers of a lesson.
2.There was a time, believe it or not, when local postage was just 3d; my friends and I used snail mail a lot, especially in summer, when we "migrated" to different seaside or countryside towns and villages. Well, the memory sticks, of how one of the mathematics problems at school asked us whether we would like 30, six-penny stamps, or 30 three penny stamps. The class wanted the six-penny stamps, but I wanted three three-penny ones.
My reasons were simple. Being frugal, I didn't want to place a stamp of a higher value than was warranted, on my envelopes. Being lazy, I did not want to walk all the way up to the General Post Office, at the very top of Merchants Street at the time, to exchange them for twice the umber of half the value. The teacher told me I was being silly, and that i always ought to pick the item of higher value when I had been given the choice.
3.During a religion lesson, we came upon the miracle of the man who was told by Jesus that is sins were forgiven, and that he was cured from his paralysis, and could therefore take up his bedding and leave. The teacher asked us which was the more difficult thing to say.
Again, I differed from the rest in my opinion because I reasoned that anyone with enough chutzpah can tell someone that his sins are forgiven, but it would take much forward planning to arrange for an actor to play sick, and then rise up and walk away at my command. I was almost accused of being a heretic - for the simple reason that "Only God can forgive sins". T
he teacher could not see that even if one told a sick man a zillion times to get up, he would not be able to do so, unless a miracle occurred.... and miracles are only wrought through divine intervention... Unfortunately, people with a "teacher's mentality" [i.e. ‘I am always right'] like that of the aforementioned French, Mathematics, and Religion educators (and I use the word loosely) will be with us till the end of time. It is up to us to see through the clouds of hype and select the correct options.
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Comments
You reminded me of another nun in my first school who did not accept my answer that the colour of fire was yellow. "We say", she declared, "AHMAR nar, and not isfar nar!". My invitation to strike a match so that she could see for herself that the flame was yellow, with some blue at the bottom, did not go down well at all.
Unfortunately, many people still persist in ignoring what is staring them in the face, preferring to let 'others' see for them. They are people who habitually quote opinions and seem to be quite incapable of forming their own.
Your unique way of viewing things most definitely complicated your early years, but are probably why you are a writer now. You see things from a unique perspective.
Leona
http://mlburch.wordpress.com/