Personal YouTube Night. Vol 2
There's not a whole lot new in my world today, so I figured I'd post some more YouTube favorites from the vault. I didn't get any responses about the last batch, but if you read this and have any personal selections to send along- please don't hesitate to do so.
1. Let's start out with a very subtle one. This starts out looking like any other nonsensical submission, with a couple of youths kicking a soccer ball around. The quality is poor, and it doesn't look like anything much happens. Maybe it's that lo-fi quality that makes the surprise effective for me. I have no idea whether this is a snippet from a genuine home video, or some deliberate foolishness. The reactions seem genuine enough. I guess there is no way to find out, but I enjoy the mystery. Don't blink, or you will miss it.
Watch the Video
2. Everyone seems to have a deep yearning to film their kids for posterity. I understand the desire. On the other hand, such videos on YouTube usually leave a lot to be desired. This little girl is especially cute, and appears to have gotten off on the right track in her education. Naturally some viewers interpret this as exploitation, but I have to say that I didn't see this one coming- even with the title.
Watch the Video
3. Now that the comic relief is out of the way, we can get back to the usual creep fest. Do you ever wonder what happens to a nation's people if you drop a couple of atomic bombs on them? Well, if the Japanese are any guide- they end up liking perverted cartoons, Elvis and Michael Jackson. At the same time they show dark undercurrents that are much more sinister. This video is illustrative of this tendency. (Actually, to be honest, I can't tell you for sure whether this originates from Japan or another Asian country. I'll just have to take the word of whomever posted it.)
Watch the Video
4. Speaking of scary monsters... this next entry documents an earlier moment in a particularly malevolent creature's career. It's not something you'll likely see on mainstream media nowadays, but it's incredibly prescient. If this guy would have been around to share this sentiment a couple of years ago, then we likely wouldn't be in the quagmire we are in now. How long must we wait for the time traveling technology that was promised us by the likes of H.G. Wells, Robert Heinlein and L. Ron Hubbard?
Watch the Video
5. This is quite possibly the most disturbing thing I have ever seen. Is it just another sad case of exploitation? Is this what social workers mean when they speak of a "least restrictive environment"? Or is this not at all what it seems? My suggestion is that before viewing this you consider whether or not there are limits to the kinds of imagery that you can expose yourself to, while at the same time expecting to sleep peacefully through your nights. If you think I am kidding- I assure you that I'm not.
Watch the Video
6. I've always had a special fascination with cemeteries. For one thing the reverence for the preservation of dead bodies seems both absurd and wasteful. Some of the most prime urban real estate is occupied by burial grounds. But there are certain stately cemeteries that I can respect and enjoy from an aesthetic standpoint. Allegheny Cemetery is an especially remarkable one in Pittsburgh. In this clip you can get an atmospheric glimpse of a spooky resting place in Mexico. The only caveat is that some of its inhabitants don't look so refreshed, even with all rest they've received. I want to be cremated when I die. I'm totally serious.
Watch the Video
7. Take a visual tour around a modern ghost city. No, this isn't in the American West... but rather in the former Soviet Union. The Chernobyl disaster was one of the most extremely obfuscated events in modern history. When it originally happened, no one outside of the Ukraine had an idea just how serious it had been. In the service of YouTube-style glasnost, I include this examination of its current state. I don't know how this was filmed, or what type of health precautions the camera operator took before going in. I will say that it is eerie.
Watch the Video
8. To give you a bit of a preview for what I have in store for the next installment of Personal YouTube Night, I've included this little odd ditty... brought to you by the creators of HR Pufnstuf- Sid and Marty Croft. If you are of a certain age, you no doubt will recall the hallucinogenic and slightly creepy shenanigans of the progenitors of today's innocuous (and not so much) life-sized "furries". Enjoy this... because they will only get weirder in my next post.
Watch the Video
1. Let's start out with a very subtle one. This starts out looking like any other nonsensical submission, with a couple of youths kicking a soccer ball around. The quality is poor, and it doesn't look like anything much happens. Maybe it's that lo-fi quality that makes the surprise effective for me. I have no idea whether this is a snippet from a genuine home video, or some deliberate foolishness. The reactions seem genuine enough. I guess there is no way to find out, but I enjoy the mystery. Don't blink, or you will miss it.
Watch the Video
2. Everyone seems to have a deep yearning to film their kids for posterity. I understand the desire. On the other hand, such videos on YouTube usually leave a lot to be desired. This little girl is especially cute, and appears to have gotten off on the right track in her education. Naturally some viewers interpret this as exploitation, but I have to say that I didn't see this one coming- even with the title.
Watch the Video
3. Now that the comic relief is out of the way, we can get back to the usual creep fest. Do you ever wonder what happens to a nation's people if you drop a couple of atomic bombs on them? Well, if the Japanese are any guide- they end up liking perverted cartoons, Elvis and Michael Jackson. At the same time they show dark undercurrents that are much more sinister. This video is illustrative of this tendency. (Actually, to be honest, I can't tell you for sure whether this originates from Japan or another Asian country. I'll just have to take the word of whomever posted it.)
Watch the Video
4. Speaking of scary monsters... this next entry documents an earlier moment in a particularly malevolent creature's career. It's not something you'll likely see on mainstream media nowadays, but it's incredibly prescient. If this guy would have been around to share this sentiment a couple of years ago, then we likely wouldn't be in the quagmire we are in now. How long must we wait for the time traveling technology that was promised us by the likes of H.G. Wells, Robert Heinlein and L. Ron Hubbard?
Watch the Video
5. This is quite possibly the most disturbing thing I have ever seen. Is it just another sad case of exploitation? Is this what social workers mean when they speak of a "least restrictive environment"? Or is this not at all what it seems? My suggestion is that before viewing this you consider whether or not there are limits to the kinds of imagery that you can expose yourself to, while at the same time expecting to sleep peacefully through your nights. If you think I am kidding- I assure you that I'm not.
Watch the Video
6. I've always had a special fascination with cemeteries. For one thing the reverence for the preservation of dead bodies seems both absurd and wasteful. Some of the most prime urban real estate is occupied by burial grounds. But there are certain stately cemeteries that I can respect and enjoy from an aesthetic standpoint. Allegheny Cemetery is an especially remarkable one in Pittsburgh. In this clip you can get an atmospheric glimpse of a spooky resting place in Mexico. The only caveat is that some of its inhabitants don't look so refreshed, even with all rest they've received. I want to be cremated when I die. I'm totally serious.
Watch the Video
7. Take a visual tour around a modern ghost city. No, this isn't in the American West... but rather in the former Soviet Union. The Chernobyl disaster was one of the most extremely obfuscated events in modern history. When it originally happened, no one outside of the Ukraine had an idea just how serious it had been. In the service of YouTube-style glasnost, I include this examination of its current state. I don't know how this was filmed, or what type of health precautions the camera operator took before going in. I will say that it is eerie.
Watch the Video
8. To give you a bit of a preview for what I have in store for the next installment of Personal YouTube Night, I've included this little odd ditty... brought to you by the creators of HR Pufnstuf- Sid and Marty Croft. If you are of a certain age, you no doubt will recall the hallucinogenic and slightly creepy shenanigans of the progenitors of today's innocuous (and not so much) life-sized "furries". Enjoy this... because they will only get weirder in my next post.
Watch the Video
Labels: YouTube
posted by Merge Divide at 10:11 PM
1 Comments:
All I can say is, Wow! Thanks for sharing your selections. Just a couple of comments:
1. Re the creature, I looked at the video twice, and didn't see what was referred to, so I gave up.
2. Curious how I've never seen that Cheney clip in the past. It could have been used as evidence#1 before the Senate took a vote.How apropos.
2. The creepy person clip is indeed disturbing. At first I thought it was a crippled child getting ready for a dance recital. I have been to recitals where special needs kids have performed, and at first they also can be a bit creepy, but after a bit you accept it as a good thing that they can do something they feel good about. On the other hand, as this video keep moving forward (or perhaps backwards), it truly did get CREEPY and seemed totally exploitative. Shame on the person who posted that.
4. The cemetery in Mexico was indeed strange. In Aruba, I took some shots of what I thought was an odd cemetery, with colorful above-ground crypts. I regret, that while in Rome, I didn't go to see what is now an underground museum of many thousands of skeleton parts turned into "art".
5. The devastated and abandoned Chernobyl...hopefully, not some part NYC in our future.
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