Kiaran Finn on Life Matters!

The Wisdom of Parents: ‘eat everything on your plate and be grateful you’re not one of the starving millions’ a rallying cry and first seed of an obesity epidemic is born. Governor Arnie chastises his children for leaving too many lights on in the house, the environmental cost presumably equates to a punctuation mark in his litany of mind-blowing special effects, and Hummer driven excesses. Global warming is a hysterical theatrical issue that we are cajoled into feeling guilty about in a manner reminiscent of teenage catholic boys reaching an age of carnal curiosity. How exactly is a perpetually drenched and windswept Celt worse off by this advent of clement weather? Perhaps the historically far more prevalent global freezing is the greater grim reaper. Today’s hero invariably morphs in to tomorrow’s villain. Our sporting idols fall, we mimic the outrage of the tabloids until we adapt to their integration as mere mortals amongst us, and then rehabilitate them as rebels incarn...

What a boring bland world this would be in the absence of mass irrational obssessiveness. There would be NO wonders of the world. Forget about the Guinness Book of Records or in fact any significant historical achievement. Why would anyone in their right mind set sail in a barely sea worthy vessel in the direction of the horizon with no reasonable expectation of navigating anywhere but over the edge of the world? We could argue that the Pyramids and ancient Aztec monuments were a response not to obsession but rather to a spiritual impulse. The appeasing of the gods as it were. Let’s not however meander in to that quicksand of philosophy. It would be all too easy to polarize most readers of this brief scribble by even hinting that Religion is an obsession. It’s hard not to be fascinated by the apparent crazy impulsive behavior of many collectors. I’m not referring to those with an eye on turning over a dollar, but rather those whose lives seemed consumed in a never endin...