Let me take on a hypothetical explanation-mask for a second, before we apply the perceptual filter we’re about to apply. I’m not sure I necessarily believe this is what’s happening on a massive cultural scale, but it’s interesting to speculate. Observable facts are that “green” marketing is being used like crazy in the media. More and more mainstream usages constantly. I tend to watch how people use language. I’d say that’s my number one thing. And what I hear and see influences me. But more to the point and back to the facts: localism as a holistic way of thinking seems to also be on the rise. The hypothetical part is which camp, the “good” guys or the bad “guys”, first originated these ideas. If you think the media is controlled, you probably also have feelings about social control mechanisms on a higher level. Who causes trends, and towards what ends? Certainly complex systems seem to give rise to emergent behavior. Maybe noone is “in charge” but everyone’s infinitely small decisions at each time are influencing upwards into the noosphere semantically charging and rearranging reality on our planet. What a nuisance that would be if it were all down to us, all up to us. Whatever.

One thing I’ve seen in my really minimal studies of international history and politics though is that when strong regional cultures develop, they tend towards separatism. If someone is really at the helm, heading America - and possibly the world - towards a future of New World Non-Violently Re-Ordered Corporatized Bioterrorized Feudalism, well, how do they expect to be able to effectively manage all these little regional principalities. From what I understand of the Turks, they allowed certain small regional areas a level of autonomy to retain their own identity. The Romans were good at conquering local media and re-arranging names and faces to match their gods: sleight-of-hand the Christian missionaries to come after them weren’t quick to forget.

Unless separatism is what such a system thrives on and expects: the constant state of flux, the ever-present state of dynamic, destructive or creative tension. When the strings are snapped, they’re just replaced and you keep on strummin, I guess is the thing. This must be something like what the Olympics are for nowadays. A place to channel ancestral tensions, mastering oneself in public competitions, jousts and spectacles. That CSA.Theatre thing I was just talking about.