Mark Ulyseas – The Third Word War

Photograph of Flying Fox by Mark Ulyseas

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The Third Word War : Are we seeing the end of the Word as we know it?
by Mark Ulyseas

The Word, for some time, was relegated to religion, its attendant caravan of believers and the ongoing existential conflict that is intrinsic to humankind’s inability to comprehend the magnitude of celestial consciousness. The savage is still playing with fire and has yet to evolve to a higher being.

With the advent of the radio the Word became active and reactive. It did not come from a higher consciousness, it came from another human – groomed and channelled to present a sanitised reality with glimpses of the darker side of humanity to balance the perceived truth.

It was then that the First Word War (WW1) began in earnest.

The radio became the weapon for those seeking mass control over minds, hearts and to sell anything and everything. WW1 destroyed many savages and invented others. It was a primitive tool of mass mesmerisation that infiltrated millions of homes. Broadcasts began for a few hours a day and then morphed into a twenty four seven service.

But this war had its drawback – it had sound but no visuals thereby leaving the listeners to translate the Word into subjective images.

And so the Second Word War (WW2), television, began, taking over where Radio left off.

The first wave was a box transmitting black and white images, which was followed by colour. It corralled many a family at home and pulverised their brains with serials paid for from the sale of soap suds (Soap Opera LINK). WW2 offered a ringside seat (in the comfort of one’s home) to the horrors of wars and other despicable acts of inhumanity. It was enter- taining to watch people in far off lands being disembowelled by high incendiary while eating one’s dinner (Vietnam War LINK). This was the beginning of the end of the Word as we knew it – a disconnection that metaphorically severed the senses of the savage.

The Third Word War (WW3) began with the invention of the internet. It has prodded the evolution in the revolution of communication – the hand held phone that is now a radio, TV and communication device like many scoops of different flavours of ice cream in one cone.

WW3 begins and ends at the fingertips of any soul on earth who desires to share his/her litany of urges and purges – From personal hygiene to preference of faith. The Word is out on the street and morphing as we speak into images that don’t necessarily reflect reality but subjective summations of the self-importance of an individual.

The fallout in the lexicon has spurred the spin doctors peddling politicians and their schemes of hysterical inducements into cloning phrases and thereby inventing the truth. CNN, BBC, RT, NDTV, CNTV, FOX and others vie for a place in the firmament – The slick renditions of news presented from unique angles that defy the gravity of a situation, anchor folk uttering and sputtering the unpronounceable with the backdrop of moving pictures interspersed with other people talking to the drumbeat (soundtrack) of the WW3 to rev up the viewers’ emotions. (I know it’s true ‘cause I saw it on TV – John Fogerty LINK).

And not to be outdone there are Word guerrillas who often hijack a phrase and give it another meaning or ambush the mainstream cavalry of intellects forcing them to accede to yet another addition to the lexicon. (“As happy as a bastard on Father’s Day” – very unhappy or miserable – Oxford Dictionary 2015 LINK).

The Film industry has been used and abused in the Wars. It has careened from one crisis to another, held together by Chinese whispers of Freedom of Speech (whatever this means). It continues to beat a path through life’s wild environs booby trapped by PC guerrillas ready to raise the banner of emotive incontinence (Political Correctness means a black person can call another – a nigger – but no one else can. If anyone else uses this term, read as non-black, the person is promptly branded a racist LINK.  And Black people can call non-black people by obnoxious terms and this includes Asians, this is acceptable).

Fiddling with the Word has now reached schools and colleges where loving hands at home are busy rewriting and sanitising history of one’s country in an insidious attempt to inculcate a sense of the exceptional in the citizens. (Texas officials: Schools should teach that slavery was ‘side issue’ to Civil War – LINK).

While we take shelter in our pathetic little words, the illegitimate offspring of the original Word (How ISIS Is Waging a ‘War of Ideas’ Through Social Media LINK) has embarked on a journey devoid of commas or full stops just exclamations in the blood soaked earth – Beheadings, torture, rape and throwing gay people from rooftops (Gay as in homosexual and not its original meaning – light hearted, carefree, bright coloured, showy).

Will the Third Word War end in silence and a brave new Word become omnipresent? And what would the Word be like then? Perhaps our tongues will be tied and we shall evolve into the personification of the Word, where the Word is one and we are one with the Word.

Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om

© Mark Ulyseas

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