So, the “Juice” is loose. Now can the American media, popular culture, and law profession concentrate (no pun intended) on something else, please? I hear that millions of seniors are losing their government-sponsored health insurance …

Question: is the following writing about nothing, or about everything? Choose carefully.

What I’m asking lately, is whatever happened to having to earn attention? Its amazing what people fail to do and still expect to be glamorized.

I met a woman in a bar on Saturday, one who wanted me to mention her in this column. I told her that I would, but have since changed my mind (with the exception of this little gambit). It dawned on me that fame isn’t cheap — if it was, everyone would be rich. Sorry, but nothing comes without a price. Don’t just expect to ride the coattails of a jacket belonging to a stranger so easily. I’m not being bitter, really; I’m being fair — play the game, hear your name. Otherwise, this column is hardly a billboard for popularity.

Much along the same lines, I’m reminded of a conversation that I had last Friday, one which concerned the infamy of personal experiences. Ridiculing the “You suck, poser!” complex, two friends and I tried to figure out how people think they can get away with trying to quantify their life. We didn’t get anywhere.

What compels people to say the things about themselves that they do? For example, consider someone talking about Bob Mould. They’ll say, “A fan? A fan? How can you call yourself a fan? Now, I’m a fan. Matter of fact I’ve been a fan way back since …” Whatever.

Why can’t people just have experiences without trying to pull some juvenile one-upmanship on each other? The only thing “posing,” between one person and another one who’s been here and there, done this and that, is the personality that tries to subjugate. Someone else’s happiness is hardly better that anyone else’s because they say so.

I admit that I used to act this twisted way too, but come on, why waste the energy anymore? Growing up has a way of redefining what you value, I guess. Now the question, “Why wear flannel if not from Seattle?,” can be answered with, “Let’s see … winter, wool, warmth …”

The point is, listen to, wear or like whatever the hell you want to. If someone cares, it’s not your problem it’s theirs; they have nothing better to do than concern themselves with your aesthetic tastes. They actually feel threatened. As long as you have some reason (any decent reason) for liking something, then go for it.

Then again, not exactly everything’s so easily resolved. Life is entirely too paranoid these days. It seems like, “What can I do for you?” has become “What are you going to do to me?!”

Tuesday morning, at 3 a.m., I walked home, finally ending the previous day. Life is lonely at that hour; it always give me a sick and hollow feeling. As I approached my apartment, a sleepy-eyed woman ambled by. Should I smile? Say hello? Flirt?

I chose none of the above. Instead, I looked away and pretended she didn’t exist (much like she did); for all practical purposes, she didn’t. Why would I say this? Because if I acted otherwise, been polite, I’d most likely be branded as some freak on a mission that involved an assaulting rampage.

It’s such a shame that you can’t be forward these days, at all hours able to make eye contact. Nowadays, the only eye contact you’ll make with a stranger in the dark involves things like pepper spray.

So, what’s the meaning of all this, why all these loosely connected ideas?

I’m saying that an already frightening world continues to degenerate into a more and more impersonal one. Not good.

Demanding attention and recognition without working for it. Denying that anyone else can like, feel, listen or see what we do (“But … But … then I wouldn’t be original!” *Whine* — Sorry, but that logic doesn’t hold true.) Not acknowledging each other at all, afraid that everyone else is harboring futile, evil or even dangerous pretensions. This is the modern-day social construct. Life disembodied from self. Selves disembodied from one another.

Whoever the perpetrators are, in the ugly disease of being passionless, we’re all victims. I only wish I knew the cure.

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David Ptak is a senior in philosophy from Long Island, New York.