After a long hiatus, I am starting a regular blog-go series again, this time on a dying institution, cinemas, in this blog in particular those in Berlin! I will always post a pic of one cinema and caption it, then blog other stuff...

CINEMA
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Yep, this cinema is so old & respectable, it's just called "Cinema". It's a miracle it still runs - I've never seen it fuller than a quarter - mainly showing movies for German pensioners, I guess. Some snoring may occur, but other than that - simple and dear!

On the media
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(Sorry, I couldn't stop myself with that sub-title, referencing the famed US radio meta-journalistic show.) Whenever Great Pretenders like the heads of (already old & wasted) USA and (newly elected, greedy) U.K. say or tweet something outrageous, the media immediately follow & comment & analyse, endlessly. Am I really to believe that they don't see the manipulative side, intended to manipulate esp. them? When Trump tweeted Greta Thunberg to go "chill", he wanted to divert from the impeachment debacle, which does seem to bother him just a tad (as witness his usual 180°-logical written letter (!?) attack on Mrs. Pelosi yesterday).

I would like the media to concentrate on the failed election systems in the named two countries, and how those affect political disengagement over decades. Majority-winner-takes-all voting mechanisms in local boroughs, towns and (parts of) cities are simply way out of date in the 21st century, I feel.

Hermits
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German government is setting up a task force on loneliness. I wonder what will be achieved at such a far-above-ground level with something that most people have to deal with very personally. Cities may greatly increase personal freedom, but they do also further isolation.

One alternative, I suppose, is to develop a kind of modern form of hermitism. (Is there such a thing? I herewith define it as the state of a positive hermit, if not!) Rejoice in the many chances one has to develop paths of interest/study/timepassing. Get grounded in oneself ("in sich selbst ruhen", Germans say). And then try not to preach too much at all those extroverts running around above, outside the hermit hole, when you do venture outside...

[Toodle-oo, till the (happy!) New Year...]

The basis of a sort of Unified Theory of what makes people do what they do - in Western society, anyway - to keep appreciation coming, the other day. At least that's what the self-praising part of my persona is hoping for. *-)

My basis is a sort of cap on an established basis, formulated by Riemann in his Basics of Anxiety from over half a century ago. There are basically 4 challenges ("Forderungen") that people experience, and they can be visualised as a 2-dimensional field governed by the following axes:

    Change (freedom / explorative drive)
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Closeness ---------+----------- Distance
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Stability (set boundaries, e.g. me vs. you)

Now here comes the Unified Theory, that dropped in my head last weekend: What drives us most of all is the need for love. (Hey, the Beatles got it, long ago! Let it be!) And loneliness or just aloneness often means lovelessness, at least here in the o so civilised Western world.

I axiomise that humans notice this, probably subconsciously, all their lives - from the built-in togetherness of children and their parents/siblings, to the societal coercion of having to be in a stable relationship, to the ever-older good-lookers beyond middle age, to the dark, quiet corners of old age, where people are often increasingly alone. Being not always sapient animals, we also - beyond childhood - equate love with sex, and our own capacity to have sex (am I slim/interesting/strong enough?). And in the "good-lookers" phase mentioned above, at around about my age, you get to see much heatedness among peers - & probably they see it in you - of the "final" surge to catch as much "love" as one can get.

I hypothesize that you can overlay the above diagram with a big sideways tear, dropping in from the East: c> -- Inside this tear area we are likely to be loved; outside it we are preparing for the darker end of the life tunnel, of which we are often at least as afraid as of death, I posit. And with time the tear tends to dry up, the "volume" of love decreasing - for most people.

Ergo: We need to become more loving as a society. And as a truly wise species. So says me...

A brief word on vonderfull Bavaria, Germany's southernmost federal state, and its long but unfortunately sure progression into a retrograde police state, increasingly similar to South Africa during the apartheid years. An interview in the current STERN magazine (#20, theme "German police") lays out how far (down!) the now* approved new law goes - what stands out for me is that police now have interminable power of detainment for people suspected (!) of misdeeds (probably in a terrorist or "similar" vein, but who knows - who categorises?)! All that separates this from the bad S. African example of yesteryear is that a judge has to agree. For the moment.

Butt Shermany iss de most civilised cowntry in de world, ja!?

(People who maintain personal/opinion blogs like this are probably often lonely. Here is 15-years-old proof by me, of a phase when I began to be unrequitedly infatuated with a beautiful & wordwise woman, me thus given to occasional bouts of wild secret prose, in this case at least once unintentionally funny...)

I've always felt it a cop-out to tell a person I'm interested in and who I at the time hope is interested in me: "I warn you, I can be difficult. There are certain times when I can become very hard, however soft I may appear to you now; e.g. I react badly to exploitation - of the I'll-engage-with-you-as-long-as-you-don't-crit-me kind - or manipulation. On the other hand, I'm not one to bear grudges."

It's as if I'm insuring myself against an uncertain future, if, when things developed and then go sour, I can say, "I told you so at the beginning". Friendship or love needs to have an element of true risk, I think - people need to accept that (as I need to, too).

I'd be a fool not to see that you're unsure about wanting to get closer to me. I don't even know if I want to, or want you to; I have my own prejudices against "popular people".

Anyway, I've written the above fast here. Let's hope we get beyond pre-emptive warnings and snap judgements.