Before the invasion of Iraq and the Oscars, I went to a theater to view Martin Scorsese’s film, “Gangs of New York.” Set in tumultuous New York City in the mid-1800’s, the opening scene chronicles a battle between an Irish immigrant group known as the Dead Rabbits, led by Priest Vallon (Liam Neeson), and the pre-existing Anglo group calling themselves Native Americans, led by Bill the Butcher (Daniel Day-Lewis).

The meme about the emergence of a global consciousness through the medium of the internet is rising into the general awareness. I don’t think the people who make these pronouncements spend much time actually communicating on the web or other locii of public discourse. The ignorant, brainwashed, and willfully malignant are, if anything, more pronounced online, perhaps because they normally hide behind social niceties in “real” life.

I delivered the following speech at my high school graduation.

We tend to view the future as if the end of the world were just around the corner. Our perception of the passage of time is that the world has been moving faster and faster, and now it is accelerating at a frenetic pace. The state of technology is rapidly advancing, yet there never seems to be enough time to enjoy life. Lately, the media has been saturated with images of natural disasters, unspeakable crimes, and unusual occurrences: tornadoes, hurricanes, blizzards, floods, fires, earthquakes, comets, plane crashes, train wrecks, environmental destruction, terrorism, domestic violence, murder, rape, mass suicide, starvation, war crimes, religious persecution, nuclear threats, widespread mutation, human cloning, government conspiracies, and alien contact - it seems as if the End is near. However, disaster is a normal consequence of existing on Earth. For thousands of years people have felt the same sense of impending doom that we feel now. The world is not ending any time soon, so go ahead and make reservations for the Millennium celebration.