ANTI-PRESS EZINE #18 "We're Positive About The Negative" A November E-dition (C) Copyright 2000 Anti-Press All Rights Reserved ***THIS E-DITION: Anti-Press on Huntin', Bankin' & Bloviatin' PLUS Viki Reed Chills Out With Cold Readin'.*** NOTE: NENYland is pronounced nee-nee-land. ============================================================= GET OUT YOUR BULLETPROOF VEST-- IT'S SHOOTIN' SEASON By Anti-Press It's that time of year. Shootin' season. This season is much more than hunting season. There's something about this time of year here in NENYland-- northeastern New York State-- that brings out the guns, bad judgment and psychotic episodes. Must be the slide into winter, the long dark nights and usually overcast days cloaked in morbid gray, all of it aggravated by the growing bone-chilling cold in the autumn air. Does something to some folks' brains. Man flips out and takes his girlfriend/wife hostage in their home (typically a trailer). Stand-off with the cops. Bang. Bang. One bullet for his female victim, the other for himself. Or, fortunately, no one is taken hostage, it's just a madman confronting the cops. "You'll have to pry this gun from my cold, dead hands." OK. The cops are willing to go along. Bang. Bang. And then you throw in hunting season, an activity that is regulated with licenses and safety classes and game wardens, whatever. Even though a hunter is supposed to be properly trained in the use of his rifle, somehow another human being becomes a target, near misses and not-so-near misses (i.e. bulls-eye!). Woman taking a shower in the privacy of her home and-- zip-- a bullet goes ripping thru the bathroom. Stray bullets from a deer rifle can travel up to three miles. Or two guys are out hunting, they separate to increase their chances of getting game, but in actuality they're increasing the chances of one screwing over the other. A movement. A shape. Must be a deer. Bang! Got that big buck! But on closer inspection it turns out the buck is really is your buddy. Former buddy, that is. But don't these nimrods take hunter-safety courses, especially with the emphasis on how to recognize a deer from a man? You know, THINK before your shoot. Well, there was another tragic huntin' incident reported in the Local (news)Paper and we found out the criteria used to determine the nature of a target. From what is quoted, statements from the county coroner, color doesn't matter. Ergo, blaze orange vests or caps won't make a difference; you might as well wear camouflage. If you think you have spotted a buck deer, to take a shot at it legally you have to see antlers three inches or longer. Of course, no human looks like a deer with antlers. That's it? That's the main criteria? So for Halloween little Johnny decides to dress up as Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. He's walking down a country road after school to show his costume to his aunt next door. Meanwhile, Buck Nimrod is about a half-a-mile away, ensconced on a tree-covered hillside, relaxing after finishing off his six-pack of malt liquor. His vision is a little fuzzy but what the hey, he shoots better this way. Buck takes a look through his telescopic sight. Jeezum Crow! Look at the antlers on that one! That bouncin' red nose makes it an easy target... ============================================================= FROM THE PRECISION REALITY CENTER: WHAT INTEREST DOES GOD HAVE WITH YOU? By Anti-Press The obituary notice states the recently-deceased was on loan to his friends and relatives from god and he has returned to the arms of the Big Guy in the Sky. If people want to deal with grief this way, fine. But we have the right to question why most people handle reality with blind faith in supernatural illogic. How does a perfect god create such an imperfect world? Why does he play favorites? Why does a good person die in the prime of life while an evil one lives happily to a ripe old age? Wait a minute-- on loan? Prime? Of course-- god is a banker. And we all know what bankers are like. No more misunderstandings about god's interest in-- or with-- us. That explains the collection plate being passed around at church. You have to tithe. Don't tithe and your lack of interest (payments) might result in sudden repossession. Don't forget the prime rate-- tithing-- is ten per cent of your take. Now all those sanctimonious televangalists and their begging for money-- maybe they've stumbled upon the truth with such concepts as "spiritual bankruptcy". And if god controls everything, then he's the ultimate banker who runs-- and rigs-- every game in town. Free market, free will-- forget it! He'll let you win the lottery of life for a while and on a whim he'll decide when you cash in your chips. Don't like the rigged game? Some people try to frustrate god by freezing their assets, i.e. using cryonics to preserve their bodies until future science can bring them back to life. Others look for a better deal with the Loan Shark Down Below but they get caught up with the devil in the details. (And then you'll have to suffer god's eternal punnishment which is worse than this essay.) Here at the Precision Reality Center we propose a new church, a true church, the Other-World Bank of the $upreme One. The purpose of this church will be to rake in the money through indulgences. The highest attainment will be for a follower to be $ouled out. Any sin can be forgiven with enough cash in the collection plate. On second thought, forget it. Who would be stupid enough to think that donating material wealth will guarantee entrance to immaterial heaven? That could never happen, especially with a just god. ============================================================= DINOSAURS STILL LUMBERING AROUND NENYLAND By Anti-Press According to the buzz, the Local (news)Paper apparently ain't doing too well despite its virtual monopoly. It has lost a couple of big advertisers and like most newspapers around the country it's losing readers to TeeVee and the Internet. Hey, it's probably losing readers to bathroom walls. After all, graffiti has less typos and is more accurate. Apparently to create some interest in its fishwrap format the Paper has been featuring two local personalities debating issues of the day from their respective political POVs, i.e. one on the left, one on the right. In the past each columnist has submitted letters to the Paper that have been printed to fill space, taking up the slack from less advertising. Like an ad each columnist is trying to sell something, in this case the validity of his viewpoint. Instead of proselytizing they're just bloviating to the converted. We skip over the leftist's side of the debate because he's too conservative for us. As for the right-winger-- well, fossilized philosophy can be amusing at times. He has a Ph.D. but apparently that degree was awarded by John Birch U. Of course, Mr. Right is always whining about conservative causes, especially as an advocate of the unborn (as if the unborn have any say in their representation). The latest Left-Right debate was in regards to ERA, the Equal Rights Amendment. According to Mr. Right god has a basic blueprint for men and women-- you know, the man stays out late, whores around and gets drunk while the faithful wifey waits at home, barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, reading her King James. As long as the man cleans himself up for Sunday services, promising to lead a better life, he can fug off the other six days of the week. This "blueprint" is healthy, good for America. OK, Mr. Right didn't say it that way. We have a tendency to go off on wild tangents. Then again, so does Mr. Right. As Rod Serling used to say, for your consideration... here's an excerpt from Mr. Right's comments on equality between men and women: "ERA in full bloom guts the military capacity for a variety of reasons. Attempting to make eunuchs of combat personnel is expensive. Psychological neutering and spaying of soldiers and sailors will not provide the most-efficient combat personnel. The military has no second chance to make a first strike." Huh?-- the great U.S. of A. would strike first? We thought this nation was the Good Guy; we only strike when someone else attacks first. This reminds us of those crazy hawks decades ago who thought the only way to end the Cold War was to launch our nukes first and wipe out the evil Commies before they could get us. As for so-called psychological neutering and spaying-- hey, Mr. Right, we think you're suffering from intellectual erectile dysfunction! Here's another enlightening excerpt: "God initiated freedom of choice. Choose rightly and be rewarded. Choose wrongly and be punished. Male and female he made us. Change for change's sake is hazardous." God also made dinosaurs. And despite what your Xtian leaders say, dinosaurs were not on Noah's Ark-- mainly because the Ark is a fairy tale. It's wasn't a Great Flood that killed off the thunder lizards; it was an environmental shift, probably caused by the impact of a giant climate-altering meteor. The hazard for the dinosaurs was the fact they couldn't change, they couldn't adapt to a new environment. Just like you, Mr. Right. ============================================================= CROSSING FINGERS OVER BEHIND YOUR BACK By Viki Reed Life's a bitch, then you die; unless you're dead and make an appearance on "Crossing Over With John Edward" (Sci-Fi Channel). John Edward is a ballroom-dance fanatic from New York who claims to have been communicating with the dead since he was a kid. This youthful, hunky metaphysical Dononhue brings The Dead to television every weeknight for a half-an-hour, practicing what was exposed as pure fraud by Harry Houdini himself almost a hundred years ago. Gone are the days of crystal balls, cheesecloth ectoplasm and table-rapping; but the scam called cold-reading' proved subtle enough to revive. It's a con/profession chiefly commercialized by celebrity mediums like John Edward, Sylvia Browne, James Van Praagh, and George Anderson. Cold-reading is a skill that combines people-watching, emotional stalking, disorientation, and acting. A "medium" scopes out everything that their five senses can discern. They furiously process all information availableand make calculated guesses presented as observations, beginning broad and refining as confirmations or negations are freely offered by the subject. Charging desperate people hundreds of dollars to connect with their loved ones at venues like "The Learning Annex" shouldn't be the path of a devout clairvoyant. But demand overwhelmed their generous spirits. Unable to cater to the thousands of requests for personal readings (which cost considerably more than a seminar), they started appearing on television (usually promoting books and courses) as guests of indescribably idiotic daytime hosts, who promoted them by validating these perverse grief-games with inappropriate displays of mawkish reverence and baseless confirmation. There are a number of earthly problems with Edward and his contemporaries: none have succeeded in performing under real tests of scientific scrutiny despite the Sci-Fi Channel's claim that Edwards couldn't be stumped by a major university study Problematically the testing they refer to was not scientifically conducted nor sponsored by the university that housed it. The psychics' were deprived of sight, only one-fifth of the tools needed to perform cold-reading. Glancing at "Crossing Over" it's blatantly obvious that his subjects repeatedly make the fatal mistake of giving more information than asked for, resulting in Edward's appearing to know things he couldn't possibly know'. A tally of misfires goes unmeasured because he moves so fast, with such charm that subject and viewer alike can't possibly keep track in real time. Gallery members are so busy rolling over into temptation that they don't ask the obvious questions, like why can the dead cross-over from beyond' but can only do so through a misfit handful of otherwise unsuccessful people? Why The Dead-who again have the ability to transcend indefinable realms-communicate only in symbols and vagaries-unable to even state their own full names? Why a medium has to ask any questions at all if they indeed are in direct contact with The Dead? More than smoke and mirrors, it's smoke and flaming mirrors. "Crossing Over" is presented by The Science-Fi (Fiction) Channel, whichshrewdly covers its behind on-air and at its website, by asking viewers to decide for themselves if Edward is for real. Unbeknownst to Edward's fans and gallery members, the prominent modern debunker James Randi (as in The Amazing-the devout atheist-Uri Geller's greatest enemy- Randi) has issued a Million Dollar Challenge for over twenty years through his Scientific Research Foundation. No psychic or medium has ever claimed the prize, few have even taken the challenge. Those who went for the million, like Sylvia Browne, failed pathetically when prevented from using cold-reading techniques. Why is "Crossing Over" all that bad? Yes. For the same reason that when a child is abducted in a small town, no one can sleep with their doors unlocked again. Or when a single stranded motorist is attacked by a "good Samaritan", who can safely accept help again? When you poison the already depleted well of human trust, you taint it for all. These fakes tell you with a straight face, that here, in front of this TV camera, in this studio setting, they are talking to someone's dead mother, father, brother, baby, or college buddy. According to Edward and company, The Dead are together in blissful spiritual plane of existence. Even though your dearly departed can talk to you, they can only do it through these total strangers. "Don't feel badly for me!" The Dead reassure us. "We're happy, free of illness and injury, with long-dead pets. We're with you always. That time you thought you felt my presence, you were right, I was there." No mention of hell and its occupants unless you cut to the tragic Gallery members, falling apart in piles of lost memories and profound ache. At the end of every show, Edward gingerly reminds us to tell the people in our lives that we love them-- now, before it's too late, thank you and good night. How much love is created by someone who takes grief and turns it into zeros on a contract? What good is had from preventing people from honestly grieving and moving on? Isn't giving the living the an illusion of spiritual completion the same as excusing personal responsibility in the present? Like, "It's okay that I cheated on my wife now, because I can acknowledge it when I'm dead!" Why don't The Dead tell Edwards important things, like: the secrets of life and death; what God looks like; or how to definitively communicate at any time with the dead, if not see them, too? Edgar Cayce was alleged to have received thousands of medical cures and homeopathic remedies while in a meditative state. Edward seems only to have conjured up an agent and a syndication deal. I have some questions for John Edward and company: have The Dead given you an approximate date as to when you'll be exposed and what foreign country they're suggesting you should fly to? ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Submitted works must be ready for publication (edited and proofread). Word Limit: 1000 words. No sci-fi, poetry, sci-fi poetry, poetic sci-fi, etc. Do some research and read a couple of issues to find what we want. Submissions and readers' comments should be sent to Antipress1@aol.com. 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