Like lambs to the slaughter, we are. Eager to hop on the next bandwagon of whatever Hollywood feeds us, yet, at the same time, wanting to be "different" and "unique."

You have the same-old same-old. There's months and months where it's the same mindless drivel. Then something offbeat comes along. Suddenly, it's the Second Coming! The medium is saved! Except now everyone starts to imitate the "different" and "unique" thing, making it the norm and it's no longer the alternative.

Case in point, the alternative format of music. We were all swamped with the Linkin Parks and the Limp Bizkits and all them, then lo and behold, the Strokes came along! Whoa! It's brand new! It's never been done before! (Except it has. The adjective "retro" that was so commonly used to describe it is short for "retroactive," which means something along the lines of "extending back to a prior period or time." But I won't push that point for now.) So all of a sudden, we've got the Strokes and the White Stripes too! My head's exploding with all these new-sounding bands! So what do the record companies do? They go out and find sixteen bazillion different "garage" or "lo-fi" bands, kick them to the radio stations and weeks later, we are deluged with bands like the Vines, the Hives, the Doves... the exception has become the norm, except we all still consider ourselves to be listening to "unique" music. So does that make them special just because they're different? Should we still be flocking to them?

I'm still a little mystified at the astounding success of My Big Fat Greek Wedding. No, it doesn't have special effects like all the other films out there. No, it's not a slick fast-paced action/thriller/comedy film. No, it didn't cost $100 million to make. And yet, it's #4 at the box office right now and it's sending hundreds of thousands of people to art theatres, where people are already discussing the fact that they might actually go see another film that cost less than $10 million to make and aren't playing in the local huge megaplex. Is it really that good? I'm not sure. It was amusing to me, although I have to admit that I checked my watch several times while watching it. Whether it will compel me to go see other art films, I doubt it. Whether more lemmings will go running to their art theatres to see the latest thing because of it, and whether the big movie companies will start putting out all these indie films... well, that's yet to be seen.

Resist the tide. Go see or listen to something because you like it, not because you feel you should. Be a salmon, not a lemming.