Much of a recent week was lived in a parallel universe.
It was a world of ideas, hope, imagination, dreams, the
impossible, concepts beyond the status quo and although exciting in the
extreme, it was tiring.
The latter, of course, was not unexpected for once we step
beyond what is familiar and embrace the new, we find ourselves entangled with
fresh intellectual rigour and through just being different, it induces both
physical and mental weariness.
Contemporary society does not encourage us to abandon the
familiar rather; the market system prefers us to have a somewhat narrow view of
value, worth and the causes of contentment to ensure the mental poverty of most
enriches the elite.
Spending much of the week and the University of Melbourne’s biennial Festival of Ideas is an indulgence; gastronomy for the mind, a
reminder of how little we understand, how remote we are from wisdom, knowledge
and intelligence and how distant we are from having any real grasp of how,
what, where and when.
Some would argue such pursuits irrelevant to their lives for
they know who won the footy finals, what’s filling the movie theatres, what’s
on the television tonight and what they need to do to ensure the pay checks
keep rolling in.
But life is more than that, it is more than bread and
circuses for human flourishing is about engaging with an idea that is bigger
than you, an idea that both expands and demands more of your thinking and it is
an idea that at first seems without rationale, but then becomes the solution.
Many things now are humanity’s staples were once ideas
resident on the fringes of society or only thought about in moments of lucid
madness.
We need more such festivals and maybe that is a project for
the new Committee of Shepparton – Shepparton’s own Festival of ideas.
Ideas, no matter how vague, poorly articulated or
inadequately thought through were not, according to the founder of Minds at
Work, Jason Clarke, to be discounted or allowed to wither for all should be
considered and welcomed to the conversation.
 |
| Victor Hugo. |
Shepparton is in urgent need of a new idea as the 20th
century inspirational drivers of several decades are dying and maybe a universe
in which fresh ideas are abundant will be found at our own ideas skirmish.
Melbourne has its Festival of ideas, Sydney its Festival of
Dangerous Ideas and we should have our own agora, that ancient Greece marketplace-like
concept where people met talked, considered and determined for their community,
the best way ahead.
It was Frenchman, Victor Hugo who said: “One can resist the invasion of armies; one cannot resist
the invasion of ideas.”
Let’s initiate that “invasion”
and find a new idea for Shepparton.
