Supporting the spirit...

Expressing support for a cause has always sought novel creative canvasses. In the recent decades, it had mostly to do with running. The human instinct to run! in the face of a problem was remarkably turned on its head by multitudes resorting to it as a medium to pronounce their support for various causes – from breast cancer awareness to gay rights. In more desperate times, like ours, measures to display support have also been desperate for novelty. Like the model who recently wanted to boost the morale of the Indian cricket team fighting for the world cup, by altruistically renouncing her clothes – an instance of the medium stealing all the attention and the message getting lost in the bargain!

And to imagine when we were kids, it used to be just the tiny flags and buttons distributed at school, to show our solidarity for a national cause.

Panning back to now, Japan has been flooded with support messages in the wake of the earthquake and Tsunami. And as one of the Japanese lingerie brands unsurprisingly found out, what canvas could be closer to the heart than a corset to showcase these generous outpours - thus consoling one’s heart every time one bends to the pressures of daily life? What better morale booster to convey universal sympathy than a product designed to boost more than just egos?

Yet, last week wasn’t the first time that the bra buckled up for a cause in the intertwined history of underwear and noble causes. The bra was indeed the legendary icon of extremist communication in the late seventies – the mythical burning of which at the stakes of feminism proclaimed freedom from a disconcerting implement that was used to buttress the subservient female ego.

With this latest canvas for graffiti, we are leaving behind the era of those T-shirts and wristbands with poignant messages. Rather, we have unbuttoned a dramatic opportunity to communicate support, perversely hoping that the message doesn’t go unnoticed after all. How much deeper, how much more impactful can it get from here onwards? May be a tattoo that pulsates with the heart, peeking out err... speaking out from beneath the underwear?

Just getting ideas, you see!

So boring, it’s inspiring!

If you thought all bored minds found baneful employment in the devil’s workshop, honing weapons or chiseling graffiti, you are wrong. In their interesting new research on Boredom and pro-social behaviour, Van Tilburg and his friends of Limerick University overthrow all those boring theories that said you could be bored to your death or others’ damage. “Bored George helps others”, they have found out.

It’s relieving to know that it isn’t often that boredom results in the pursuit of less meaningful vocations like unlocking one’s jaw from a gargantuan yawn that got frozen during an ice age of monumental boredom. (http://theoneminuteblog.blogspot.com/2011/04/whats-world-watching-yawn.html) Instead, they have found out that boredom is a sort of dark, dead end from where one would do anything to escape, scaling the formidable walls ahead to achieve heroic feats no less than donating blood, working for charity or at least maintaining a blog!

Stranded on the shores of boredom, Robinson Crusoe turned to the tedious yet tremendously fulfilling activity of shipbuilding. It was on a lazy Sunday afternoon (or was it Monday?) that boredom shoved Alice down the rabbit hole to engage her in some pro-social activity like saving the Queen of Hearts her head.

If only everyone realized this immense use of boredom, they would stop disparaging those poor souls caught in the cocoon of idleness. For those could just be seemingly endless interludes before a moment of epiphany and evolution!

The only one whose boredom doesn’t ever move him to doing anything constructive seems to be Andy Capp. He is eternally comfortable in his couch of idleness but wait a minute… he might be using up all those idle moments thinking up meaningful new excuses!