George Carlin on Diminished Choices

Calendar page © Dana Potter (2013)

Above Layout for a calendar page (its theme determined by a quote) by Dana Potter, graphic design student, Department of Art, University of Northern Iowa.

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George Carlin, in an interview in David Jay Brown, Conversations on the Edge of the Apocalypse (NY: Palgrave Macmillan, 2005), p. 191—

We're given many choices to distract us from the fact that our real choices have been diminished in number. Two political parties. Maybe three or four large banks now. Credit card companies, just a couple, a handful. Newspapers, reduced. Ownership of media, reduced, down to five or six companies now. Big stock brokerage firms, reduced in number. In all of these important things we have less choice. Then we're distracted with these frivolous choices: 21 flavors of ice cream, 35 flavors of popcorn. You see specialty shops with 35 flavors of popcorn, like chocolate walnut popcorn. These are absurd distractions from what we are doing to ourselves…