Sunday's Tremolo #3

The Common Loon has a call named the tremolo. This "insane laughter", voiced rapidly is an alarm that shows agitation or fear of predators or other loons in the neighbourhood. On Sundays, I have chosen to be opinionated and to share news, policies and or laws that agitate and scare me.

I suffer from a reality TV addiction. This is enough for a tremolo on its own but I'm still in denial so I can't face the truth about it yet. What is troubling me this week was on the Surreal Life. As the gang of "E List Stars" waited around to find out this week's "task" a stretched Hummer pulled up to let out their softball game challengers. This stretched limo was applauded and cheered on with the whole casts approval.

This pissed me off. Why must most North Americans continue living with a bigger is better mentality? There is nothing glamorous about a giant truck beating a path down the road. An army vehicle burns gas and is able to drive anywhere. Stretching it out because you can burns even more gas but confines it to driving on well paved roads. Here more people will see it but they should not envy it. They should be angered because we have environmental obligations that far too many people ignore for the sake of comfort, convenience or eye candy.

I've also been watching a program from England called Property Ladder and in this bit of reality TV heaven, aspiring property developers buy houses and remodel them for profit. Most of the houses that the developers have been working on are by my North American eyes, quite small. I never realized how small and close some houses in Britain were to one another. Now, I am know mansions exist throughout the World but I'm sick of seeing the average size of house grow.

Family sizes are shrinking in the Western world and yet houses continue to grow. This stretches families apart and isolates children. They will do whatever they please. They will feel entitled to do anything they want. It creates a selfishness that only pleases oneself. The impact this will have on future generations is horrible. Bad parenting leads to bad parenting but no parenting leads to some fucked up families. Giant houses can take some of the blame.

Living large is not the answer. It's tacky and disfunctional.