Coup Cares?

Today the news in Sweden was all about the military coup in Thailand. I’m sure the groan was audible everywhere, as the Swedish tourist industry and the White House in Washington D.C. both were upset over the news. Though it was for different reasons.

The Swedes go to Thailand in droves, as tens of thousands travel there every year. It means millions of Crowns in travel fares, transfers, hotels and golf and luxury resort packages.

The White House was groaning in envy, wondering how the Thai military can do this coup thing. “What can they do that we can’t?” is the question that the neo-cons running the United States are thinking.

Of course, I am kidding about the Swedish tourist industry. They will adapt and send the ever-traveling Swede somewhere. Can you say Solomon Islands?

I often wonder that if the media weren’t so insatiable in its need for constant feeding, would a coup in Thailand actually mean anything to anybody outside of the Thais, tourists going to Thailand and jealous autocrats. Really, if you really think about it, for all the talk about the shrinking world due to technology, it still is pretty isolated where we each live. I think back to the TV news showing me warehouse fires from Cleveland, Ohio. And my thought was always the same, “This effects me, how?” I was living in Oregon or Florida, so beside from being something visually striking, who cares?

I saw a show on TV last night about men my age who become the proverbial “grumpy old men.” It was very cathartic about knowing my indifference to the majority of world events is not a singular thing. There’s a lot of me’s out there, finally reaching a stage in their life where they wear the pants they like and not the ones that someone tells them they should be wearing, now matter how uncomfortable they make people.

I know some will say that this is a case that my music, or art or baseball players were better back in my day, but even though that is true, it’s not what I’m saying. The ability to sit back and say, “Look, I’ve tried and tried and worked and worked and finally have reached the point in my life where I don’t care if Tom Cruise is a tool or not. That if you think that a belief in a religion formed by a science fiction writer or by wearing a red string around your wrist will make you a better person, I’m all for you doing it. Just count me out, please. Oh, I still am passionate for things. I’m just not passionate for your thing. So when your next great idea is met with a bored look on my face it is nor because I don’t think it’s great. I’m just having trouble getting out of the chair to cheer.