hmm...

I can't think of anything to write about today, but I'm trying to do a post a day for a while, if I can.  Yet, I think if I force myself to write something tonight, it will end up being about TV.  And then you will judge me!

I am reading Susan Sontag's Regarding the Pain of Others, and am pretty irritated by her, to be perfectly honest.  She definitely has some interesting points, but she elevates photography so much over other art/creation forms that I keep getting annoyed.  Is it any surprise that she is a photographer?  Plus, she keeps mentioning these photographs, but none of them were included in the book-- what the heck?  I don't want to look them up, because they are all war and torture images, but I feel like I should know what she is talking about.

And, if she is so sure that these things can't be expressed in words, why the devil did she write essays about them rather than including the photographs themselves?  It is like she directly countered herself through her methodology!

I don't mean to say that I find words more powerful than photographs- I just think that we see so much more than we read (and we read a lot), that we become apathetic to powerful images.  Sontag argues against this in the case of religious iconography for the truly spiritual- but what the devil does she mean by that?  I have a crucifix on my wall, and I mostly just see it in my peripheral- I don't even think of it as a man being tortured (much less the son of God being tortured).  You have to focus on it to feel something, if at all.

Bother, but this is a boring post.  And it really belongs on my pain blog.  I suppose I'll do a longer posting there once I've finished the book.