the Hyperion Chronicles
“Blessed are my Readers, for they will inherit untold wisdom from this column”
#144 More Prognostications from the Mount
Here now, continued from Monday, are more predictions you can pass off as your own and amaze your friends with.
You gotta fight, for your right…
Keeping on the theme of last time, we’re going to see a new legal strategy based on “everybody does it” or as I like to call it, “Dumbass Common Law.” We already have seen this from the Supreme Court just in the last few months.
Practically everyone (even up here in Canada) knows about Miranda Rights. Whether you’re a fan of Law & Order or just get into trouble a lot, I bet you can say it along with me: “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you do/say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney one will be provided to you at no charge.”
Everyone knows these rights, the ones that protect those who are both of the criminal persuasion, and stupid enough to chat about it after a rendition of the local precinct’s “Good Cop/Bad Cop.” What you might not know, though, is that until last year, that wasn’t really a Constitutional right. When the Supreme Court first ruled on Miranda, back in 1967, they didn’t make it all encompassing. In fact, the very next year, Congress passed a law saying Miranda was a great idea, but not absolutely necessary.
But then, for whatever reason, everyone forgot about this law. (On a side note, wouldn’t it be great if you could forget every law Congress passed?) Anyway, decades passed, and the Miranda Warning became part of the national lexicon. Kids who don’t know who’s on Mount Rushmore (Alf, Falkor, Kermit, and Lincoln) can tell you Miranda.
Finally, a prosecutor challenged the assumption of Miranda, pointing to the 1968 Congressional law. The case made it all the way to the Supreme Court, where the Court finally ruled—and I’m not kidding; you can look this up—that Miranda was indeed a Constitutional Right because everyone knew it was one. In other words, Miranda is now the official law of the land not because of some legal precedent, but because everyone has assumed it the last 35 years, and the Supreme Court felt that you can change the law, but not people’s hearts and minds.
This very well may be true, but it opens a legal can of worms that will not soon go away. I’m sure if you sit there and think about it a minute you can think of some scary implications from this, but I’ll just give you one:
How many of you have ever downloaded software, or signed some sort of warrantee for a product at the store; something like that? How many of you read the entire legal document? Maybe once or twice, but after that, I bet you’re like most other people and just scan them. For the online agreements they got smart awhile back, and now you have to actually scroll down as if you’ve read it, but c’mon: who actually reads these things? They are all the same, and no one takes the time.
Of course, the legalese is there to protect the manufacturer from criminal and financial liability. But, mark my words, soon someone will challenge a signed (or in cyberspace, clicked) agreement based on the legal precept that “nobody reads these things,” or in other words, “Dumbass Common Law.”
Hybrid Theory
I first predicted this almost 9 years ago, and now we’re seeing it in spades: two (or more) things hybriding together. We’ve had a spate of fusion cooking (East meets West, etc.), and music has almost completely gone the way of hybrid collaboration. What genre these days doesn’t have an R&B influence? It doesn’t end there, as violins and banjos are making their ways into Rap, Pop, Rock, and Electronica. We’re seeing hybrids in Entertainment, too. Movies have started playing around with styles, methods, plots, and expectations, and Television has long since branched away from the traditional world of Drama and Sit-Com.
I predict this trend will not soon abate, but rather expand into other fields. We’re already seeing some in sports (has anyone seen that Slamball on TNN?), but I think we’ll see more Hybrid Athletics, as the concept of traditional sports gets more and more marginalized. It goes without saying that games have and will continue to do this too (everything from changing the rules to interactivity). I also think we’ll see it in such lynchpins as Relationships and Religion.
There already are many different offshoots of traditional religions, but I think you’re going to see much more, and more mainstream. I read this book awhile back that had a church of vampires (guaranteeing everlasting life). I’m not saying that will rival the Baptists any time soon, but as the world gets smaller and Media infects more of our culture people are still going to feel isolated and want to belong, and with traditional Churches not filling that void, you’re going to see some heavy non-traditional ones become overnight sensations.
Relationships are also going to morph for a while. We already have a sea change in relationships, with more people living together than getting married. I think you’re going to see it go even further, with terms like “polyamorous” becoming buzzwords. So you can seem knowledgeable, that means having a boyfriend or girlfriend you understand going in is seeing other people. You may think that with human jealousy being what it is, this will never work, but there is a certain segment of the population out there who is tired of being alone, and tired of being cheated on. I bet they figure if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.
This seems like a good place to stop. I have four more issues, but two of them are kind of long, so we’ll continue another day. In the meantime, try not to turn into a Dumbass, and if you do, don’t sue me.
Hyperion
August 20, 2003
Credits
Editing help from Tufloi
Formatting help from Hyperion Institute staff member Koz
@2003 the Hyperion Chronicles
“Blessed are my Readers, for they will inherit untold wisdom from this column”
#144 More Prognostications from the Mount
Here now, continued from Monday, are more predictions you can pass off as your own and amaze your friends with.
You gotta fight, for your right…
Keeping on the theme of last time, we’re going to see a new legal strategy based on “everybody does it” or as I like to call it, “Dumbass Common Law.” We already have seen this from the Supreme Court just in the last few months.
Practically everyone (even up here in Canada) knows about Miranda Rights. Whether you’re a fan of Law & Order or just get into trouble a lot, I bet you can say it along with me: “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you do/say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney one will be provided to you at no charge.”
Everyone knows these rights, the ones that protect those who are both of the criminal persuasion, and stupid enough to chat about it after a rendition of the local precinct’s “Good Cop/Bad Cop.” What you might not know, though, is that until last year, that wasn’t really a Constitutional right. When the Supreme Court first ruled on Miranda, back in 1967, they didn’t make it all encompassing. In fact, the very next year, Congress passed a law saying Miranda was a great idea, but not absolutely necessary.
But then, for whatever reason, everyone forgot about this law. (On a side note, wouldn’t it be great if you could forget every law Congress passed?) Anyway, decades passed, and the Miranda Warning became part of the national lexicon. Kids who don’t know who’s on Mount Rushmore (Alf, Falkor, Kermit, and Lincoln) can tell you Miranda.
Finally, a prosecutor challenged the assumption of Miranda, pointing to the 1968 Congressional law. The case made it all the way to the Supreme Court, where the Court finally ruled—and I’m not kidding; you can look this up—that Miranda was indeed a Constitutional Right because everyone knew it was one. In other words, Miranda is now the official law of the land not because of some legal precedent, but because everyone has assumed it the last 35 years, and the Supreme Court felt that you can change the law, but not people’s hearts and minds.
This very well may be true, but it opens a legal can of worms that will not soon go away. I’m sure if you sit there and think about it a minute you can think of some scary implications from this, but I’ll just give you one:
How many of you have ever downloaded software, or signed some sort of warrantee for a product at the store; something like that? How many of you read the entire legal document? Maybe once or twice, but after that, I bet you’re like most other people and just scan them. For the online agreements they got smart awhile back, and now you have to actually scroll down as if you’ve read it, but c’mon: who actually reads these things? They are all the same, and no one takes the time.
Of course, the legalese is there to protect the manufacturer from criminal and financial liability. But, mark my words, soon someone will challenge a signed (or in cyberspace, clicked) agreement based on the legal precept that “nobody reads these things,” or in other words, “Dumbass Common Law.”
Hybrid Theory
I first predicted this almost 9 years ago, and now we’re seeing it in spades: two (or more) things hybriding together. We’ve had a spate of fusion cooking (East meets West, etc.), and music has almost completely gone the way of hybrid collaboration. What genre these days doesn’t have an R&B influence? It doesn’t end there, as violins and banjos are making their ways into Rap, Pop, Rock, and Electronica. We’re seeing hybrids in Entertainment, too. Movies have started playing around with styles, methods, plots, and expectations, and Television has long since branched away from the traditional world of Drama and Sit-Com.
I predict this trend will not soon abate, but rather expand into other fields. We’re already seeing some in sports (has anyone seen that Slamball on TNN?), but I think we’ll see more Hybrid Athletics, as the concept of traditional sports gets more and more marginalized. It goes without saying that games have and will continue to do this too (everything from changing the rules to interactivity). I also think we’ll see it in such lynchpins as Relationships and Religion.
There already are many different offshoots of traditional religions, but I think you’re going to see much more, and more mainstream. I read this book awhile back that had a church of vampires (guaranteeing everlasting life). I’m not saying that will rival the Baptists any time soon, but as the world gets smaller and Media infects more of our culture people are still going to feel isolated and want to belong, and with traditional Churches not filling that void, you’re going to see some heavy non-traditional ones become overnight sensations.
Relationships are also going to morph for a while. We already have a sea change in relationships, with more people living together than getting married. I think you’re going to see it go even further, with terms like “polyamorous” becoming buzzwords. So you can seem knowledgeable, that means having a boyfriend or girlfriend you understand going in is seeing other people. You may think that with human jealousy being what it is, this will never work, but there is a certain segment of the population out there who is tired of being alone, and tired of being cheated on. I bet they figure if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.
This seems like a good place to stop. I have four more issues, but two of them are kind of long, so we’ll continue another day. In the meantime, try not to turn into a Dumbass, and if you do, don’t sue me.
Hyperion
August 20, 2003
Credits
Editing help from Tufloi
Formatting help from Hyperion Institute staff member Koz
@2003 the Hyperion Chronicles
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