The number of people I'll even talk politics is down to one hand. I don't want to hear the partisan ranting. Both sides say the other side's wimpy or crazy but a vote that has the potential to screw over anyone who pisses off The Powers That Be was pretty damn close to unanimous. But it's different when the other side does it, right Dems? Oh he's not doing enough to keep us safe and he's a wuss, Reps? We can argue about abortion and gay rights but look at what we're doing to the rest of the world.
Have you crawled out of the echo chamber at all and taken a look around in the last six months to a year to ten years? Didn't think so.
I couldn't sleep last night, and lay awake staring up into the darkness feeling the despair of inaction, the weight of encroaching authority, of two minutes hate involving abstract enemies, of a population so numbed by pleasure and violence, every year seems more and more like a brave new world in 1984. I used to think my distrust was just an adolescent pose, now it's only grown more intense.
Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label politics. Show all posts
Friday, December 16, 2011
Friday, November 4, 2011
cut the kids in half
A longer writing, condensed and self-censored, of a not-so-daily grind of constant absurdity on the part of both customers and powers that be, of conversations treading different ground, of procrastination and existential ponderings of the way things are and deconstructing the idealism of my surroundings and finding ways to laugh at things like cat vomit on library books and the absurdity of those we serve, and ourselves.
I tried to be creative tonight, but my brain was racing too wildly to focus on picking one color of glaze to paint a teacup and I don't want to dump my cognitive craziness on unsuspecting artistes, and sometimes I wonder if it freaks people out, that ultimately I will say the wrong thing and totally offend someone or they'll get sick of my rants about third world countries and their favorite politicians, because I don't believe in excusing the unexcusable no matter who it is.
And people talk politics and rant about those awful Democrats and scumbag Republicans and I just want them all to shut the hell up. I hate Election Day with every fiber of my being because one party runs the state into the ground and the other runs the city into the ground and then each of the two takes their turn running the country into the ground but I guess it's like that everywhere right?
Governments do shitty things to powerless people, give the perks and the power to their cronies, and the everyday schlubs are left in the middle, paying taxes, pacified by entertainment or too tired or burned out to even bother trying, grabbing for any bone thrown their way and keeping anyone else from getting close.
I feel like my generation is the kids in a loveless marriage and my country is two selfish and immature parents in a marriage falling apart, where the big shiny house built up so fast is a mess and the credit card bills from years of buying the newest shiniest brightest thing are coming in and there's no money left to pay. In every marriage, it's the fault of both sides, and in this case, they're the same people ultimately, but they'd never admit to that, and they're screaming at each other, dangling promises and baubles for the kids, playing them off of each other, instigating fights that distract from the matter at hand, and the spite fences between us and the next door neighbor. It's for the kids, they say, but they're ultimately thinking only about themselves and what they can get before all of it's gone, because it's all going to be gone someday.
Sometimes the kids will take sides, they'll be loyal to one or the other or whichever one fits their immediate needs. Sometimes they just go and hide in the room or in the treehouse in the backyard with fingers in the ears wanting this big long nightmare to go away.
I tried to be creative tonight, but my brain was racing too wildly to focus on picking one color of glaze to paint a teacup and I don't want to dump my cognitive craziness on unsuspecting artistes, and sometimes I wonder if it freaks people out, that ultimately I will say the wrong thing and totally offend someone or they'll get sick of my rants about third world countries and their favorite politicians, because I don't believe in excusing the unexcusable no matter who it is.
And people talk politics and rant about those awful Democrats and scumbag Republicans and I just want them all to shut the hell up. I hate Election Day with every fiber of my being because one party runs the state into the ground and the other runs the city into the ground and then each of the two takes their turn running the country into the ground but I guess it's like that everywhere right?
Governments do shitty things to powerless people, give the perks and the power to their cronies, and the everyday schlubs are left in the middle, paying taxes, pacified by entertainment or too tired or burned out to even bother trying, grabbing for any bone thrown their way and keeping anyone else from getting close.
I feel like my generation is the kids in a loveless marriage and my country is two selfish and immature parents in a marriage falling apart, where the big shiny house built up so fast is a mess and the credit card bills from years of buying the newest shiniest brightest thing are coming in and there's no money left to pay. In every marriage, it's the fault of both sides, and in this case, they're the same people ultimately, but they'd never admit to that, and they're screaming at each other, dangling promises and baubles for the kids, playing them off of each other, instigating fights that distract from the matter at hand, and the spite fences between us and the next door neighbor. It's for the kids, they say, but they're ultimately thinking only about themselves and what they can get before all of it's gone, because it's all going to be gone someday.
Sometimes the kids will take sides, they'll be loyal to one or the other or whichever one fits their immediate needs. Sometimes they just go and hide in the room or in the treehouse in the backyard with fingers in the ears wanting this big long nightmare to go away.
Thursday, October 6, 2011
it's a dirty job but someone's gotta do it
So I've kind of been following the 'Occupy Wall Street' thing and then the 'Occupy Cleveland' thing, and of course the whole 'Arab Spring' along with my preferred mix of geopolitical ephemerals and the local machinations.
Given that we haven't darkthroned through the city in a little while and the weather was favorable, we decided to amble down to the Free Stamp (which is an ugly piece of public art by the way) and observe the protestations against the Man in the park with the Free Stamp across from the federal building.
I saw protests every other week when I lived in Kent during the Bush years and this was more or less the same thing. Abstract slogans directed against big abstract entities, acoustic guitars, bongos, signs, people just kind of hanging around, people that I know but not really well. Slogans about coming together and changing things and people cheering and instead of feeling thrilled about the possibility of a better world, I realize once again that I just can't believe in it, much in the way I'm sure that my friends are bemused by my embrace of so-called "organized religion."
Having been immersed in reading history among other things recently, I really don't feel like anyone has solutions. Every revolution begins idealistically with flowers and hugs and celebrations, but there are the inevitable power struggles that follow, the old guard and structures of corruption find ways to assimilate within a new framework, and things get ugly and violent because ultimately the same structures that cause suffering will continue to exist. We say we won't get fooled again, but meet the new boss same as the old boss.
I feel old too, and I feel like I look like an undercover cop or something because I'm in my work clothes and so is Randal, even if we're not corporatistas. I wonder if I'm defanged because of my working-stiff-ness but I was just as cynical about this stuff as an equally naive college kid even then, before I really had to deal with unions and overlords and feel like a pawn in the class wars of the boomers.
It's hard for me to take people with an anticapitalist/anticorporate stance seriously when they're texting on their iPhones made with metals from war-torn countries by a big corporation and posting updates to Facebook. Adbusters had some degree of subcultural cool when I was 16 before I realized that they're just marketing a whole other meaningless brand, not to mention that they make their non-brand shoes in China too. I don't want Kalle Lasn running my country any more than I want Barack Obama or Random Republican or whoever. There's a lust for power and control over minds I see there that I find disturbing as well, the kind of thing that draws in disaffected youth and makes them feel enlightened and part of something.
Last time I checked, the drug war was still going on, a whole lot of countries are getting predator droned and we're still in Afghanistan and shady CIA business is still going on. But money talks and those without the scratch are ultimately voiceless until the lives of those in power are threatened. I fear the angry mob just as much as the powers that be. People who think too much are screwed either way.
And I'm looking at the Key Tower, at the Cleveland School District Headquarters, the Municipal Courthouse to the north, and thinking about how if we were really going to raise hell about something, it shouldn't be this abstract raging against the corporate machine, but against the bureaucracy and the unofficial power structure that have screwed over this city with blatant chutzpah for the last forty years. Start local and work your way out. There's plenty of bad to go around in this city within the party machine alone.
Raise some hell about the RTA or the corporate welfare to sports team owners or the Cleveland Clinic not treating the people who live across the street or the slum landlords or the corrupt bureaucracy that keeps anything from getting done or the schools that disenfranchise generations of kids or the gouging by the Water Department.
But wait, that would involve actually having to do something instead of caring a lot.
Given that we haven't darkthroned through the city in a little while and the weather was favorable, we decided to amble down to the Free Stamp (which is an ugly piece of public art by the way) and observe the protestations against the Man in the park with the Free Stamp across from the federal building.
I saw protests every other week when I lived in Kent during the Bush years and this was more or less the same thing. Abstract slogans directed against big abstract entities, acoustic guitars, bongos, signs, people just kind of hanging around, people that I know but not really well. Slogans about coming together and changing things and people cheering and instead of feeling thrilled about the possibility of a better world, I realize once again that I just can't believe in it, much in the way I'm sure that my friends are bemused by my embrace of so-called "organized religion."
Having been immersed in reading history among other things recently, I really don't feel like anyone has solutions. Every revolution begins idealistically with flowers and hugs and celebrations, but there are the inevitable power struggles that follow, the old guard and structures of corruption find ways to assimilate within a new framework, and things get ugly and violent because ultimately the same structures that cause suffering will continue to exist. We say we won't get fooled again, but meet the new boss same as the old boss.
I feel old too, and I feel like I look like an undercover cop or something because I'm in my work clothes and so is Randal, even if we're not corporatistas. I wonder if I'm defanged because of my working-stiff-ness but I was just as cynical about this stuff as an equally naive college kid even then, before I really had to deal with unions and overlords and feel like a pawn in the class wars of the boomers.
It's hard for me to take people with an anticapitalist/anticorporate stance seriously when they're texting on their iPhones made with metals from war-torn countries by a big corporation and posting updates to Facebook. Adbusters had some degree of subcultural cool when I was 16 before I realized that they're just marketing a whole other meaningless brand, not to mention that they make their non-brand shoes in China too. I don't want Kalle Lasn running my country any more than I want Barack Obama or Random Republican or whoever. There's a lust for power and control over minds I see there that I find disturbing as well, the kind of thing that draws in disaffected youth and makes them feel enlightened and part of something.
Last time I checked, the drug war was still going on, a whole lot of countries are getting predator droned and we're still in Afghanistan and shady CIA business is still going on. But money talks and those without the scratch are ultimately voiceless until the lives of those in power are threatened. I fear the angry mob just as much as the powers that be. People who think too much are screwed either way.
And I'm looking at the Key Tower, at the Cleveland School District Headquarters, the Municipal Courthouse to the north, and thinking about how if we were really going to raise hell about something, it shouldn't be this abstract raging against the corporate machine, but against the bureaucracy and the unofficial power structure that have screwed over this city with blatant chutzpah for the last forty years. Start local and work your way out. There's plenty of bad to go around in this city within the party machine alone.
Raise some hell about the RTA or the corporate welfare to sports team owners or the Cleveland Clinic not treating the people who live across the street or the slum landlords or the corrupt bureaucracy that keeps anything from getting done or the schools that disenfranchise generations of kids or the gouging by the Water Department.
But wait, that would involve actually having to do something instead of caring a lot.
Friday, August 26, 2011
the soul is tired and I want to go home
Surrounded by piles of paper, of misdeeds done and handshakes by men who play dirty and remain in power though dirty tricks and apathy. Rather than the stained glass and soaring spires that visually sooth my aching soul, instead it's clippings and sterile city records, a mounting pile of evidence blatant. Men in suits with big smiles and a way with looking like they care about us.
And you wonder why I've been more surly recently. Both parties steal from the poor to feed the rich who are we kidding, but go on, put your hopes on some mere mortal or another, play your partisan cards, they'll work great at that new casino that'll save the city, those platitudes that will save the country, we're all losers in one way or another.
And you ask what I think not knowing the can of worms you've just opened. You really don't want to know. I don't believe that any of us can save the world, we're unable to save ourselves, we don't want to be saved, and we're fooling ourselves to think we can truly save others.
And you wonder why I've been more surly recently. Both parties steal from the poor to feed the rich who are we kidding, but go on, put your hopes on some mere mortal or another, play your partisan cards, they'll work great at that new casino that'll save the city, those platitudes that will save the country, we're all losers in one way or another.
And you ask what I think not knowing the can of worms you've just opened. You really don't want to know. I don't believe that any of us can save the world, we're unable to save ourselves, we don't want to be saved, and we're fooling ourselves to think we can truly save others.
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
de-punked
Is it a shift of opinion or the sharpening of age, the dissolution of the idealism once held dear, the deepening of a spiritual understanding of the darkness of the human heart.
It's hard for me to be thrilled about change when the more history I read, the more I see, it seems like a constant cycle of rise and fall rise and fall, just a new face in charge who talks a good game sometimes while the same games of power are played. Nothing new under the sun as long as this sun lights the earth and keeps it in inertia. Those who lust for power will say what they need to say and trample who they need to trample.
I've been going through old newspaper clippings at work, seeing that the same Powers That Be that rob us now were doing so as long as I've been alive if not longer, or carrying on the proud tradition of sweet talk and stealing in a suit, knowing that name recognition and party line go a long way to further rank incompetence.
I don't know where I fit on the spectrum anymore as I can't believe in either party line. You can talk all you want about saving babies or helping those in poverty, but since neither vote or donate big money to political campaigns, you don't care that much. We talk about cutting the budget, but no one wants to touch the amount of money we use to fight how many wars, how many proxy wars, how many people on the other side of the world that get killed to make us feel safer and secure. I don't believe anything's secure in this world, but then again I live in the almost-hood and divine intervention so I don't lose sleep over terrorists or much else unless I hear gunfire down the street and it wakes me up. That's kind of different.
I heard a song by Sublime on the radio on the way home from work that reminded me of parties in college and everyone singing the line about killing cops even though we were all way too young to really understand riots in Los Angeles or Rodney King. Riot on the streets, a teen-age riot, a riot of my own, and so on so romanticized. Nowell's singing about looting a store for its furniture, stealing guitars and sound equipment because the cops suck. Ironic that the the protesters in Egypt look at the Londoners acting a fool and asking why everyone's setting fires and stealing stuff if it's really about the unfairness. One man's greed enacted in a time of opportunism comes from the same root as the corporations one rails against.
The logic here is ridiculous, and I think about all the struggling store owners who lose when things like this happen, especially in communities of immigrants who often get hit the hardest because suddenly xenophobia has an outlet. If you're going to fight capitalism, there's other battles that don't hurt the average schmuck nearly as much.
As the threads of an already dysfunctional society unravel, the glamour of the masses rising up is replaced with a sense of something not quite acquiescence or fear, maybe a deeper suspicion of the motivations of not just the Powers That Be, but the people on the streets as well. Watching the way that fights break out in the middle of the street over nothing, seeing the melee on St. Patrick's Day, and knowing that this is nothing, since there are no weapons, no guns shot or clubs pounding either by the police or the rest of the people. I don't try to find a moral high ground, I just try to get through the mess to a place of peace.
I don't know what the answer is, but I don't like the answers that I'm being given. To do nothing is easy to do and often wrong, but often how good or beneficial is it to do something just because it's something to do?
It's hard for me to be thrilled about change when the more history I read, the more I see, it seems like a constant cycle of rise and fall rise and fall, just a new face in charge who talks a good game sometimes while the same games of power are played. Nothing new under the sun as long as this sun lights the earth and keeps it in inertia. Those who lust for power will say what they need to say and trample who they need to trample.
I've been going through old newspaper clippings at work, seeing that the same Powers That Be that rob us now were doing so as long as I've been alive if not longer, or carrying on the proud tradition of sweet talk and stealing in a suit, knowing that name recognition and party line go a long way to further rank incompetence.
I don't know where I fit on the spectrum anymore as I can't believe in either party line. You can talk all you want about saving babies or helping those in poverty, but since neither vote or donate big money to political campaigns, you don't care that much. We talk about cutting the budget, but no one wants to touch the amount of money we use to fight how many wars, how many proxy wars, how many people on the other side of the world that get killed to make us feel safer and secure. I don't believe anything's secure in this world, but then again I live in the almost-hood and divine intervention so I don't lose sleep over terrorists or much else unless I hear gunfire down the street and it wakes me up. That's kind of different.
I heard a song by Sublime on the radio on the way home from work that reminded me of parties in college and everyone singing the line about killing cops even though we were all way too young to really understand riots in Los Angeles or Rodney King. Riot on the streets, a teen-age riot, a riot of my own, and so on so romanticized. Nowell's singing about looting a store for its furniture, stealing guitars and sound equipment because the cops suck. Ironic that the the protesters in Egypt look at the Londoners acting a fool and asking why everyone's setting fires and stealing stuff if it's really about the unfairness. One man's greed enacted in a time of opportunism comes from the same root as the corporations one rails against.
The logic here is ridiculous, and I think about all the struggling store owners who lose when things like this happen, especially in communities of immigrants who often get hit the hardest because suddenly xenophobia has an outlet. If you're going to fight capitalism, there's other battles that don't hurt the average schmuck nearly as much.
As the threads of an already dysfunctional society unravel, the glamour of the masses rising up is replaced with a sense of something not quite acquiescence or fear, maybe a deeper suspicion of the motivations of not just the Powers That Be, but the people on the streets as well. Watching the way that fights break out in the middle of the street over nothing, seeing the melee on St. Patrick's Day, and knowing that this is nothing, since there are no weapons, no guns shot or clubs pounding either by the police or the rest of the people. I don't try to find a moral high ground, I just try to get through the mess to a place of peace.
I don't know what the answer is, but I don't like the answers that I'm being given. To do nothing is easy to do and often wrong, but often how good or beneficial is it to do something just because it's something to do?
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
refract and reflect
The drop in temperature is welcome, the rain picking up flecks of red light reflecting in puddles on the roof next door, the flickers of lightning, the thirsty garden watered.
I've been off-kilter the last couple days, a little more visibly cranky as opposed to the mercurial moodiness, brought on by the accumulation of small pet peeves and larger frustrations still minuscule in the great scheme of things. Tacky and catty women and pretentious wuss rockers are nothing compared to dealing with things that really suck, which is what the rest of the world has to deal with all the time.
But it's welcome to finally having a night of some degree of inspiration and time to execute after poring over piles of art books accumulating in the living room of gold covered icons and luminescent stained glass, illuminated manuscripts, architecture of Goa churches, and intricate jewelry from wilder parts of ancient Europe, not really sure why I've been inspired by the medieval and Arts and Crafts lately, maybe it's the abstraction and the richness in detail, the subject matter timeless, the intensity and translucence, the labors of love and sweat for patronage and devotion, great beauty made in dark and uncertain times.
Things have always been corrupt and lame and empires inevitably fall so I've checked out of the political debate, keeping up only enough to know what's going on but nothing more, because each side keeps blaming the other when both sides do the exact same thing especially when it comes to dealing with people on the other side of the world whose blood and lives are evidently considered less worthy than our own. My cousins are stocking up on silver and gold and I guess they have their reasons, but if the shit hits the fan, you can't eat it or wear it to stay warm or burn it for fuel. I don't know.
I've got three weeks left of enameling before the city moves that part of the arts center to the east side and the process of cleaning, scrubbing, filing off fire scale and sifting powders with names like 'flame' and 'wisteria' made of unknown quantities. After a few months of doing this, I can kind of figure out what I'm doing, but I don't do anything all that epic after the unsatisfying attempt at cloisonne, considering that beautiful and handmade Christmas gifts containing unknown amounts of lead and who knows what else may not be the best plan.
Theophilus in his 10th century text on the 'Divers Arts' describes the processes of metalworking, mixing paint, and constructing stained glass and enamelled pieces, and it was even more labor intensive, to keep the coals hot and the pieces melting at the right temperatures, making ones own bellows out of sheepskin and glue from the gooey bits of sturgeon and eel, pigments from mercury, sulphur, lead.
Being unvocationally trained and not affluent, I use canvases found in the closeout section of Marc's, Magic Markers to trace designs and fill in blank spaces. When mixed on gesso, spread by brush, they're forgiving and wonderful, especially when mixed with the wax of Prismacolor pencils. A late night tomorrow means finally getting to break out the acrylics. It's been too long.
I've been off-kilter the last couple days, a little more visibly cranky as opposed to the mercurial moodiness, brought on by the accumulation of small pet peeves and larger frustrations still minuscule in the great scheme of things. Tacky and catty women and pretentious wuss rockers are nothing compared to dealing with things that really suck, which is what the rest of the world has to deal with all the time.
But it's welcome to finally having a night of some degree of inspiration and time to execute after poring over piles of art books accumulating in the living room of gold covered icons and luminescent stained glass, illuminated manuscripts, architecture of Goa churches, and intricate jewelry from wilder parts of ancient Europe, not really sure why I've been inspired by the medieval and Arts and Crafts lately, maybe it's the abstraction and the richness in detail, the subject matter timeless, the intensity and translucence, the labors of love and sweat for patronage and devotion, great beauty made in dark and uncertain times.
Things have always been corrupt and lame and empires inevitably fall so I've checked out of the political debate, keeping up only enough to know what's going on but nothing more, because each side keeps blaming the other when both sides do the exact same thing especially when it comes to dealing with people on the other side of the world whose blood and lives are evidently considered less worthy than our own. My cousins are stocking up on silver and gold and I guess they have their reasons, but if the shit hits the fan, you can't eat it or wear it to stay warm or burn it for fuel. I don't know.
I've got three weeks left of enameling before the city moves that part of the arts center to the east side and the process of cleaning, scrubbing, filing off fire scale and sifting powders with names like 'flame' and 'wisteria' made of unknown quantities. After a few months of doing this, I can kind of figure out what I'm doing, but I don't do anything all that epic after the unsatisfying attempt at cloisonne, considering that beautiful and handmade Christmas gifts containing unknown amounts of lead and who knows what else may not be the best plan.
Theophilus in his 10th century text on the 'Divers Arts' describes the processes of metalworking, mixing paint, and constructing stained glass and enamelled pieces, and it was even more labor intensive, to keep the coals hot and the pieces melting at the right temperatures, making ones own bellows out of sheepskin and glue from the gooey bits of sturgeon and eel, pigments from mercury, sulphur, lead.
Being unvocationally trained and not affluent, I use canvases found in the closeout section of Marc's, Magic Markers to trace designs and fill in blank spaces. When mixed on gesso, spread by brush, they're forgiving and wonderful, especially when mixed with the wax of Prismacolor pencils. A late night tomorrow means finally getting to break out the acrylics. It's been too long.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
confederacy of dunces
Seriously GOP? Invite Trump to your debate and not this guy? Someone I'd actually consider voting for considering that he has experience running a state and actually kind of makes sense? End the drug war, get the hell out of Afghanistan and everywhere else, and not hassle people about their lifestyle choices? Yes please.
I mean, it's not surprising, but dammit, I feel like I waste my vote every four years, I don't want to pick between the lesser of two evils, and I'd at least like to see it get interesting.
I mean, it's not surprising, but dammit, I feel like I waste my vote every four years, I don't want to pick between the lesser of two evils, and I'd at least like to see it get interesting.
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
is this my world?
I read, I listen, I watch, and I'm just a bystander not wholly innocent, an observer.
These systems in other countries, built upon entitlement, intimidation, and corruption, are finally beginning to crack, but I wonder what will replace them, how they will rebuild. So much of history is just one despot after another, talking a different game, but doing the same things all while talking about bright new tomorrows and hopeful futures.
I've got no love for self-absorbed and self-important boomers of either partisanship and their culture wars and politics, the smokescreens of cynical manipulation. Whether they're politicians or unionistas, they'll get what's theirs while the getting's good, the perks they feel entitled to by coincidence of birth and privilege and let the rest of us deal with the fallout.
These systems in other countries, built upon entitlement, intimidation, and corruption, are finally beginning to crack, but I wonder what will replace them, how they will rebuild. So much of history is just one despot after another, talking a different game, but doing the same things all while talking about bright new tomorrows and hopeful futures.
I've got no love for self-absorbed and self-important boomers of either partisanship and their culture wars and politics, the smokescreens of cynical manipulation. Whether they're politicians or unionistas, they'll get what's theirs while the getting's good, the perks they feel entitled to by coincidence of birth and privilege and let the rest of us deal with the fallout.
Friday, February 18, 2011
it's the puppets that pull the strings
With greater wisdom comes greater sorrow, has been resonating with me and my good friend around the corner as we get older and constantly re-evaluate what we've heard, what we see, what we once believed, what we still believe, what that means, how wrong we've been, and also what we've learned about God and ourselves and others.
In other countries, words and expression mean that people die and things get bloody. I wish we weren't as complacent as we are about the terrible things that those in power do, but what would I be doing if I was in Tunisia or Libya or Egypt or wherever?
Would I be out there on the streets or letting other people with more to lose be the ones on the receiving end of state brutality? Right now my life is tenuously comfortable and I catch myself clinging to what shreds I have of perceived stability and not wanting to rock the boat too much. That scares me. It's not that I do nothing, it's just that I try to do something that isn't just about making me feel good for doing something awesome, that doesn't align myself with someone's power trip or ulterior motivations and it seems like that is everywhere.
Part of this is that I look at both sides and I don't have much patience. The lesser of two evils is just a smaller and more petty evil that you can usually steer clear of most of the time. The obliviousness of those who run my state, who exist in a bubble of richness and corporate dress codes but love to trumpet their values and supposed working class roots, seem to forget that we're not all overpaid employees feeding at the government trough.
Some of us are living paycheck to paycheck and finding that harder to do as rent is high, gas keeps rising, and food will too. Most of us don't like our unions either but we're stuck paying them dues like it's the mafia and know that if we didn't have them we'd be screwed over even more by the majority of our overlords.
I caught up with one of my friends from college last night, who voted Republican for fiscal reasons, majored in finance and has been out of work for months after the "soul-sucking bank" laid him off. "It scares me that so much power is in the hands of so few people who are so disconnected from those underneath them," he tells me.
He just applied for an accounting job at a small business and says it feels weird to think about the process of actually working with real money and real things because everything he dealt with in college and in the banking world is so abstract and often has little bearing on reality.
Life was easier when we were kids and our history was whitewashed, our world was small, and we believed everything we were told because we didn't know any better. Knowledge is powerful and good but it also makes things more complicated or messy. The "good people" did a lot of bad things too, though that doesn't justify the bad that the others have done.
Has there ever been a time in human history when we weren't fighting? Is it something in our blood? The stakes just keep getting higher, the more we advance as a civilization, the more creative ways we find to destroy, as the discourse degenerates into mutual ugliness rather than any kind of real discussion.
It's probably easier to deal with people you don't like if you persist in willful ignorance about who they are and this is only reinforced by an education system that is so much more concerned about churning out good little workers than a knowledgeable and curious population who thinks critically and questions. Some of us are going to seek out more than others, and it's something that I'm a bit geeky for, but still, even then, there is so much that I don't know about the world, and the more I learn the more I realize how much I just have no clue about.
I wonder how many of my righty friends actually hang out with people who are more liberal than they are and I wonder the same about my lefty friends because the way that I hear the one side talk about the other, I kind of wonder sometimes.
Just like any other group that feels strongly about something (see: musical subcultures, academia), there are infinite shades and ideas contained therein and heated debate within as well. Not all people more conservative than you are neocons, fundies, or libertarian wackjobs. Not all people liberal than you would call themselves Democrats or long for a socialist paradise. Not all pro-choicers hate babies and not all pro-lifers hate women. It might be more comfortable to paint with a broad brush, but it makes a caricature more than a true portrayal.
The more I see of the world, the more I read, the more conversations I listen to, the more perspectives I hear, it's not that I get more confused, but I don't feel like I can fit comfortably within these paradigms of discourse, and when flawed humans with infinite motivations are involved, no one's completely pure or correct. I don't have all the answers, even as there's some things I do take as absolutes. I've got my views on things just as much as anyone else, and you'd probably disagree with aspects of 90% of them and I'm willing to stand corrected when I'm truly in the wrong.
I'd rather have these conversations face-to-face over coffee or beer than in an abstract forum where words will get misconstrued and language gets tricky. I know I can't always do that, but I prefer it infinitely. I don't expect everyone to magically agree and start holding hands, but I do think we all could use a little more respect and humility, because we do a lot of talking and not a lot of doing or even saying anything that does much good, myself included.
In other countries, words and expression mean that people die and things get bloody. I wish we weren't as complacent as we are about the terrible things that those in power do, but what would I be doing if I was in Tunisia or Libya or Egypt or wherever?
Would I be out there on the streets or letting other people with more to lose be the ones on the receiving end of state brutality? Right now my life is tenuously comfortable and I catch myself clinging to what shreds I have of perceived stability and not wanting to rock the boat too much. That scares me. It's not that I do nothing, it's just that I try to do something that isn't just about making me feel good for doing something awesome, that doesn't align myself with someone's power trip or ulterior motivations and it seems like that is everywhere.
Part of this is that I look at both sides and I don't have much patience. The lesser of two evils is just a smaller and more petty evil that you can usually steer clear of most of the time. The obliviousness of those who run my state, who exist in a bubble of richness and corporate dress codes but love to trumpet their values and supposed working class roots, seem to forget that we're not all overpaid employees feeding at the government trough.
Some of us are living paycheck to paycheck and finding that harder to do as rent is high, gas keeps rising, and food will too. Most of us don't like our unions either but we're stuck paying them dues like it's the mafia and know that if we didn't have them we'd be screwed over even more by the majority of our overlords.
I caught up with one of my friends from college last night, who voted Republican for fiscal reasons, majored in finance and has been out of work for months after the "soul-sucking bank" laid him off. "It scares me that so much power is in the hands of so few people who are so disconnected from those underneath them," he tells me.
He just applied for an accounting job at a small business and says it feels weird to think about the process of actually working with real money and real things because everything he dealt with in college and in the banking world is so abstract and often has little bearing on reality.
Life was easier when we were kids and our history was whitewashed, our world was small, and we believed everything we were told because we didn't know any better. Knowledge is powerful and good but it also makes things more complicated or messy. The "good people" did a lot of bad things too, though that doesn't justify the bad that the others have done.
Has there ever been a time in human history when we weren't fighting? Is it something in our blood? The stakes just keep getting higher, the more we advance as a civilization, the more creative ways we find to destroy, as the discourse degenerates into mutual ugliness rather than any kind of real discussion.
It's probably easier to deal with people you don't like if you persist in willful ignorance about who they are and this is only reinforced by an education system that is so much more concerned about churning out good little workers than a knowledgeable and curious population who thinks critically and questions. Some of us are going to seek out more than others, and it's something that I'm a bit geeky for, but still, even then, there is so much that I don't know about the world, and the more I learn the more I realize how much I just have no clue about.
I wonder how many of my righty friends actually hang out with people who are more liberal than they are and I wonder the same about my lefty friends because the way that I hear the one side talk about the other, I kind of wonder sometimes.
Just like any other group that feels strongly about something (see: musical subcultures, academia), there are infinite shades and ideas contained therein and heated debate within as well. Not all people more conservative than you are neocons, fundies, or libertarian wackjobs. Not all people liberal than you would call themselves Democrats or long for a socialist paradise. Not all pro-choicers hate babies and not all pro-lifers hate women. It might be more comfortable to paint with a broad brush, but it makes a caricature more than a true portrayal.
The more I see of the world, the more I read, the more conversations I listen to, the more perspectives I hear, it's not that I get more confused, but I don't feel like I can fit comfortably within these paradigms of discourse, and when flawed humans with infinite motivations are involved, no one's completely pure or correct. I don't have all the answers, even as there's some things I do take as absolutes. I've got my views on things just as much as anyone else, and you'd probably disagree with aspects of 90% of them and I'm willing to stand corrected when I'm truly in the wrong.
I'd rather have these conversations face-to-face over coffee or beer than in an abstract forum where words will get misconstrued and language gets tricky. I know I can't always do that, but I prefer it infinitely. I don't expect everyone to magically agree and start holding hands, but I do think we all could use a little more respect and humility, because we do a lot of talking and not a lot of doing or even saying anything that does much good, myself included.
Friday, February 4, 2011
another unread open letter
Dear Mr. President,
Haven't we had enough with this "At least he's our s.o.b." business? To send a billion dollars to a repressive regime because it's 'not as bad' as others? To send lots of guns and such to this guy in Yemen to boot? To champion democracy yet prop up leaders who know how to say the right thing to us to get the money? We've already enabled the existence of Pinochet, Stalin, Somoza, Trujillo, Batista, Pahlavi, Niyazov, pre-1991 Saddam, and yet we still do the same with the likes of Mubarak.
For all your high-minded words, Mr. President, you're suggesting that the new ruler of the country be our CIA spook who's done a lot of nasty torturing business, some of it in our name?
The more I see of you, the more I'm glad I voted third party and didn't buy into all these platitudes of high-minded bullshit and hope and change. How are you any better than your predecessor or anyone else before him?
Haven't we had enough with this "At least he's our s.o.b." business? To send a billion dollars to a repressive regime because it's 'not as bad' as others? To send lots of guns and such to this guy in Yemen to boot? To champion democracy yet prop up leaders who know how to say the right thing to us to get the money? We've already enabled the existence of Pinochet, Stalin, Somoza, Trujillo, Batista, Pahlavi, Niyazov, pre-1991 Saddam, and yet we still do the same with the likes of Mubarak.
For all your high-minded words, Mr. President, you're suggesting that the new ruler of the country be our CIA spook who's done a lot of nasty torturing business, some of it in our name?
The more I see of you, the more I'm glad I voted third party and didn't buy into all these platitudes of high-minded bullshit and hope and change. How are you any better than your predecessor or anyone else before him?
Wednesday, January 26, 2011
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
what I see is unreal...
"You never know when those quiet ones will snap."
So says my health/gym teacher in high school after a bad moment where my clumsiness resulted in hitting a girl who was too busy singing to Britney Spears in the face with a basketball during a drill. It wasn't intentional, I promise.
At fifteen, I was already social pariah #1, but after that, even more so. There'd already been a few school shootings in the previous months and then Columbine had happened a week ago. I'd already been to the guidance office for some suspect cuts and bruises and disturbing subject matter in my artwork.
Pale kids like me who wore ball chains and necklaces with Led Zeppelin motifs, took honors classes, had no friends and listened to doomy music were suddenly potential homisuicidal maniacs waiting to have their Carrie moment.
That kind of paranoia permeated the hallways of the already volatile incubator of high school, fueled by parental anxiety, the inevitable rumor mill, absurd Principal Bureaucrats, and media hype. It got so unbearable that I dropped out to catch up on classes via homeschooling for a year before transferring to the local big public high school where I could blend in and get lost, considering that the powers that be were far more concerned about the potheads and the guys with the trenchcoats and heavy eyeliner. And obviously, I've never shot anyone. Most alienated youth haven't.
If it wasn't the Trenchcoat Mafia, it was Y2K and then it was 9/11. Conversations about too many guns and then not enough guns. I was a senior when 9/11 happened, and a whole new wave of fear and jingoism had swept through. The Egyptian kids who were Copt not Muslim got picked on really bad and suddenly those scary teenage metalheads who spent way too much time on the Internet and probably had the Anarchist's Cookbook on their hard drive didn't seem so bad and strange.
No one seemed to realize that Sikh turbans denoted a religion that has nothing to do with Osama Bin Laden. Khaled, who I sat next to in computer class (and whose dad owned the convenience store my dad delivered to) used to talk about going into the military to "blow shit up." I wonder where he is now.
So I read about these incidents that seem to grow more frequent, which have always seem to happen when crackers read too much Ayn Rand and toxic ideology on both sides and decide that the majority of people are stupid and need to be killed. Since they're usually dudes, there's usually some kind of testosterone-driven music involved but that's besides the point.
But then we go off on these tangents to find a cause but it's way more complicated than that. That combination of mental illness, general jerkitude combined with ideology and musical taste that causes one to feel superior to the masses is a combination that can't be quantified.Domestic terrorism has been practiced on all sides as it is. I look at some of the people that I deal with and wonder if they'll come in with a gun and start mowing people down.
But the whole "music made him do it?" Vladimir Putin has probably tortured people and had them murdered and he's a big fan of ABBA. Kim Jong-il's kid likes Eric Clapton but probably prefers "Tears in Heaven" to Cream. Charles Manson blamed the Beatles. Whatever.
And now, the stakes just keep getting higher. The paranoia just keeps ratcheting upward among and about lefties and wingnuts and people who listen to "heavy metal." Considering that I've got some serious love for Jesus and loud music that probably doesn't bode well.
Despite a certain individual's claims that crosshairs are actually survey markers, at least even the trigger-happy crowd is appalled as well.
On a totally unrelated but not totally tangential note, I wonder what will happen when Glenn Beck and his ilk get wind of the taqwacore scene because what's more scary than power-chord-loving nonconformist Islamic teenagers?
(By the way, part of this was filmed in a punk house/performance space in my fair city in my part of town, and the novel on which this film is based is highly recommended.)
So says my health/gym teacher in high school after a bad moment where my clumsiness resulted in hitting a girl who was too busy singing to Britney Spears in the face with a basketball during a drill. It wasn't intentional, I promise.
At fifteen, I was already social pariah #1, but after that, even more so. There'd already been a few school shootings in the previous months and then Columbine had happened a week ago. I'd already been to the guidance office for some suspect cuts and bruises and disturbing subject matter in my artwork.
Pale kids like me who wore ball chains and necklaces with Led Zeppelin motifs, took honors classes, had no friends and listened to doomy music were suddenly potential homisuicidal maniacs waiting to have their Carrie moment.
That kind of paranoia permeated the hallways of the already volatile incubator of high school, fueled by parental anxiety, the inevitable rumor mill, absurd Principal Bureaucrats, and media hype. It got so unbearable that I dropped out to catch up on classes via homeschooling for a year before transferring to the local big public high school where I could blend in and get lost, considering that the powers that be were far more concerned about the potheads and the guys with the trenchcoats and heavy eyeliner. And obviously, I've never shot anyone. Most alienated youth haven't.
If it wasn't the Trenchcoat Mafia, it was Y2K and then it was 9/11. Conversations about too many guns and then not enough guns. I was a senior when 9/11 happened, and a whole new wave of fear and jingoism had swept through. The Egyptian kids who were Copt not Muslim got picked on really bad and suddenly those scary teenage metalheads who spent way too much time on the Internet and probably had the Anarchist's Cookbook on their hard drive didn't seem so bad and strange.
No one seemed to realize that Sikh turbans denoted a religion that has nothing to do with Osama Bin Laden. Khaled, who I sat next to in computer class (and whose dad owned the convenience store my dad delivered to) used to talk about going into the military to "blow shit up." I wonder where he is now.
So I read about these incidents that seem to grow more frequent, which have always seem to happen when crackers read too much Ayn Rand and toxic ideology on both sides and decide that the majority of people are stupid and need to be killed. Since they're usually dudes, there's usually some kind of testosterone-driven music involved but that's besides the point.
But then we go off on these tangents to find a cause but it's way more complicated than that. That combination of mental illness, general jerkitude combined with ideology and musical taste that causes one to feel superior to the masses is a combination that can't be quantified.Domestic terrorism has been practiced on all sides as it is. I look at some of the people that I deal with and wonder if they'll come in with a gun and start mowing people down.
But the whole "music made him do it?" Vladimir Putin has probably tortured people and had them murdered and he's a big fan of ABBA. Kim Jong-il's kid likes Eric Clapton but probably prefers "Tears in Heaven" to Cream. Charles Manson blamed the Beatles. Whatever.
And now, the stakes just keep getting higher. The paranoia just keeps ratcheting upward among and about lefties and wingnuts and people who listen to "heavy metal." Considering that I've got some serious love for Jesus and loud music that probably doesn't bode well.
Despite a certain individual's claims that crosshairs are actually survey markers, at least even the trigger-happy crowd is appalled as well.
On a totally unrelated but not totally tangential note, I wonder what will happen when Glenn Beck and his ilk get wind of the taqwacore scene because what's more scary than power-chord-loving nonconformist Islamic teenagers?
(By the way, part of this was filmed in a punk house/performance space in my fair city in my part of town, and the novel on which this film is based is highly recommended.)
Monday, January 10, 2011
guns and religion
I felt sick and angry to hear about a congresswoman getting gunned down in Arizona, which, with its combination of the worst elements of the conservative and liberal spectrum (thanks a lot rich boomers!), isn't shocking given the particularly nasty strain of politics going down there.
And don't tell me this is loaded imagery, because it damn well is. I don't blame Sarah Palin for this incident any more than I blame Marilyn Manson for Columbine, but for all the complaining about being stereotyped by clinging to guns and religion, this does nothing but perpetuate.
I'm almost relieved that the guy was more nihilistic than crazy and religious but that doesn't change the fact that people are dead. I'm glad that the condemnation of this has been universal on all sides because trivializing ignorant comments don't do any good for anyone.
I've been told by people who are more conservative than myself that the reason that I don't like Sarah Palin is because it's not cool too, and because "the media" is mean to her but that couldn't be further from the truth. She feeds just as much off the media as it feeds off her.
I see a rank hypocrisy, political incompetence, a crass opportunism, and an enjoyment of the media circus, where truth and honesty is subverted in the name of "Real American Values."
She has set herself up as the spokesperson of an entire group, talking about good governance when she quit her job to make a lot of money promoting a bestselling book and a 'reality' tv show. If anything, she's the Al Sharpton of the right, an opportunist who jumps on bandwagons, shows up on TV all the time, makes herself the center of attention and won't shut up.
I don't want to hear about her great morals or middle class values, because morality is more than saying that abortion is bad, it has to do with your character too, being an honest person and a decent human being, as opposed to being a greedy, bullying, loudmouth.
I dread voting in this coming election watching the Republican party eat its young and alienate everyone who isn't rich and old and white, while the Democrats carrying on the same-shit-different-day policies of the last fifty years. Power corrupts whether you're red or blue.
Some days, I think I'm a bit of both. My faith in God is a daily struggle as it is, and I lost faith in humanity and its systems years ago. I do my best to love God with heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love my proverbial neighbor as myself, neighbor being anyone who comes across my path in life, especially those who are vulnerable to getting massively screwed over.
I fail at all of those things frequently. I probably spend more time taking care of yours truly than the others in my world. I say things that I regret and don't always do what I could have done. I rant about the hypocrisy of others to feel better about myself. But I do what I can to not be a jerk and try to seek truth and love mercy and walk humbly with God and others. I don't expect to be perfect or have all the answers, but it's the best I can do.
And don't tell me this is loaded imagery, because it damn well is. I don't blame Sarah Palin for this incident any more than I blame Marilyn Manson for Columbine, but for all the complaining about being stereotyped by clinging to guns and religion, this does nothing but perpetuate.
I'm almost relieved that the guy was more nihilistic than crazy and religious but that doesn't change the fact that people are dead. I'm glad that the condemnation of this has been universal on all sides because trivializing ignorant comments don't do any good for anyone.
I've been told by people who are more conservative than myself that the reason that I don't like Sarah Palin is because it's not cool too, and because "the media" is mean to her but that couldn't be further from the truth. She feeds just as much off the media as it feeds off her.
I see a rank hypocrisy, political incompetence, a crass opportunism, and an enjoyment of the media circus, where truth and honesty is subverted in the name of "Real American Values."
She has set herself up as the spokesperson of an entire group, talking about good governance when she quit her job to make a lot of money promoting a bestselling book and a 'reality' tv show. If anything, she's the Al Sharpton of the right, an opportunist who jumps on bandwagons, shows up on TV all the time, makes herself the center of attention and won't shut up.
I don't want to hear about her great morals or middle class values, because morality is more than saying that abortion is bad, it has to do with your character too, being an honest person and a decent human being, as opposed to being a greedy, bullying, loudmouth.
I dread voting in this coming election watching the Republican party eat its young and alienate everyone who isn't rich and old and white, while the Democrats carrying on the same-shit-different-day policies of the last fifty years. Power corrupts whether you're red or blue.
Some days, I think I'm a bit of both. My faith in God is a daily struggle as it is, and I lost faith in humanity and its systems years ago. I do my best to love God with heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love my proverbial neighbor as myself, neighbor being anyone who comes across my path in life, especially those who are vulnerable to getting massively screwed over.
I fail at all of those things frequently. I probably spend more time taking care of yours truly than the others in my world. I say things that I regret and don't always do what I could have done. I rant about the hypocrisy of others to feel better about myself. But I do what I can to not be a jerk and try to seek truth and love mercy and walk humbly with God and others. I don't expect to be perfect or have all the answers, but it's the best I can do.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
the breaks...
Christmas was wonderful this year with no car crashes or drama, even though we all got the flu one day after another. We did the traditional Polish fish and kluski, breaking the oplatek together before us 'kids' split off for Apples to Apples.
I wasn't expecting everyone to still be hanging out when I split to go to Midnight Mass with a friend from church. We both grew up Polish and Catholic before our search for God took us to the same place, but those roots run deep, that staying up late to sit there and listen to the choir, bask in the echoing quietness, the incense and candlelight. If anything we believe more than we once did.
Most of my cousins on the other side came in on Christmas and we joke that the alcohol consumption has gone up massively in the past few years, which has something to do with all of us getting older, and I got some family history about relatives who were in the IRA and how everyone ended up where they did way back when because back then no one else talked about things.
But it's a week off, and I've got some fresh stuff for my show to get a good world format going again, and friends coming in to visit, and hopefully a trip to the art museum to check out that medieval relics exhibit. It's nice to have a winter break again.
I wasn't expecting everyone to still be hanging out when I split to go to Midnight Mass with a friend from church. We both grew up Polish and Catholic before our search for God took us to the same place, but those roots run deep, that staying up late to sit there and listen to the choir, bask in the echoing quietness, the incense and candlelight. If anything we believe more than we once did.
Most of my cousins on the other side came in on Christmas and we joke that the alcohol consumption has gone up massively in the past few years, which has something to do with all of us getting older, and I got some family history about relatives who were in the IRA and how everyone ended up where they did way back when because back then no one else talked about things.
But it's a week off, and I've got some fresh stuff for my show to get a good world format going again, and friends coming in to visit, and hopefully a trip to the art museum to check out that medieval relics exhibit. It's nice to have a winter break again.
Friday, November 5, 2010
i can't stand it, i know you planned it...
One of our regulars at my place of employment has some paranoid tendencies, and is constantly trying to uncover proof of conspiracies and such everywhere even though it's obvious to anyone that rich, mostly white, people run the world. It's not that much of a secret. And of course, these people have one agenda or another and the means by which to propagate it, whether it's Koch or Soros or Bin Laden or whoever.
Some unclaimed printouts that we found when we came in a few weeks ago had a list of a whole lot of militias in the United States, articles about the Hutaree, and a place that sold HGH and other steroids online but suggested that you should "Buy Now!" because they might get banned soon and supplies won't last.
Some of the names of these groups who love freedom, the American Way, and guns, were pretty much to be expected, though others sounded like the products of some 10-year-olds playing with GI Joes and Playmobils(Fort Eagle) or someone who's watched way too much old TV (Roger's Rangers, which is actually named after a group of colonial fighters who fought with the British, so I don't even get where the patriotism thing comes in here). Another group described themselves as "All the Innocent Americans the Government Hasn't Thrown in Prison," which would presumably be a lot of people.
Another website told its adherents not to boycott their French's mustard along with the freedom fries, because it wasn't actually made in France. For the record, most of these people still had Geocities and Angelfire pages, which made me think of being in high school and those annoying banner ads that seemed to be EVERYWHERE.
Good times.
But lest we think that the righties of the US of A are the only ones susceptible to this, these are just a few of the Greek anarchist groups that were active in the last year. Unlike the anarchists I knew when I was at Kent, who seemed to spend more time eating vegan food, stealing copies of "Fight Club" from Borders and pens from the Cashier's Office to "throw a wrench in the system," and not bathing because hygiene is "fascist," these people actually blow things up.
Summer Entropy Commandos
Summer Tranquility Disturbance
Non-Patriot Saboteurs - Cores for the Spreading Insecurity
Fire Shadows
Comandos Husscheyn Zhachyndhoul Jhachanghir / Revolutionary Intelligence Agency
Antisexist Group
Immediate Intervention Hood-wearers
Wild Wolves
Conspiracists for the realization of insecurity
Immoral City De-Structuralists
Revolutionary Cores Alliance - Speedy Arsonist Agency
Fire Cores Conspiracy / Nihilist Commandos
Destroyers of whatever is left of social peace
Consciousness Gangs
Happy Sleep's Apostates
Arsonists' Millennium Cooperation
Organizers of Night Entertainment
CHAOS: Chaotic Groups of Sabotage
Carnivalists in the tune
Nikola Tesla Commandos
Maybe some of these sound more awesome in Greek or whatever, but having been around people on both loony ends on the political spectrum, I find it interesting as anything to see how people define themselves and their enemies.
Some unclaimed printouts that we found when we came in a few weeks ago had a list of a whole lot of militias in the United States, articles about the Hutaree, and a place that sold HGH and other steroids online but suggested that you should "Buy Now!" because they might get banned soon and supplies won't last.
Some of the names of these groups who love freedom, the American Way, and guns, were pretty much to be expected, though others sounded like the products of some 10-year-olds playing with GI Joes and Playmobils(Fort Eagle) or someone who's watched way too much old TV (Roger's Rangers, which is actually named after a group of colonial fighters who fought with the British, so I don't even get where the patriotism thing comes in here). Another group described themselves as "All the Innocent Americans the Government Hasn't Thrown in Prison," which would presumably be a lot of people.
Another website told its adherents not to boycott their French's mustard along with the freedom fries, because it wasn't actually made in France. For the record, most of these people still had Geocities and Angelfire pages, which made me think of being in high school and those annoying banner ads that seemed to be EVERYWHERE.
Good times.
But lest we think that the righties of the US of A are the only ones susceptible to this, these are just a few of the Greek anarchist groups that were active in the last year. Unlike the anarchists I knew when I was at Kent, who seemed to spend more time eating vegan food, stealing copies of "Fight Club" from Borders and pens from the Cashier's Office to "throw a wrench in the system," and not bathing because hygiene is "fascist," these people actually blow things up.
Summer Entropy Commandos
Summer Tranquility Disturbance
Non-Patriot Saboteurs - Cores for the Spreading Insecurity
Fire Shadows
Comandos Husscheyn Zhachyndhoul Jhachanghir / Revolutionary Intelligence Agency
Antisexist Group
Immediate Intervention Hood-wearers
Wild Wolves
Conspiracists for the realization of insecurity
Immoral City De-Structuralists
Revolutionary Cores Alliance - Speedy Arsonist Agency
Fire Cores Conspiracy / Nihilist Commandos
Destroyers of whatever is left of social peace
Consciousness Gangs
Happy Sleep's Apostates
Arsonists' Millennium Cooperation
Organizers of Night Entertainment
CHAOS: Chaotic Groups of Sabotage
Carnivalists in the tune
Nikola Tesla Commandos
Maybe some of these sound more awesome in Greek or whatever, but having been around people on both loony ends on the political spectrum, I find it interesting as anything to see how people define themselves and their enemies.
Wednesday, November 3, 2010
the morning after...
...is usually sunny it seems.
People are coming in saying that they lost their freedom, but I wonder where they've been the past 10 years or maybe even longer, with the Patriot Act and its continuations and escalations, justifying the unjustifiable under the pretense of "state secrets," not to mention the ways in which people who have the least amount of rights and protection in this country simply "disappear."
"Well at least a Democrat won in our county," as if they haven't been as utterly corrupt on a local level as the other party has been on a national one.
But I can't get emotional about politics anymore. It's so ugly and seems to get uglier every year. I listen to people talk and the ignorance is astounding and the smugness is overwhelming, and each side is acting like they're in middle school with "I'm smarter" or "I'm prettier" or "You suck" and there really isn't much of a difference when it comes down to it.
We're really an oligarchy, run by a select few with a lot of money and connections who either buy their way in or finance the way in for others. I'm convinced that if you start out with any integrity, you've lost most of it by the time you get that far.
It's easy to demand and expect things of others, and harder to take any responsibility to do.
People are coming in saying that they lost their freedom, but I wonder where they've been the past 10 years or maybe even longer, with the Patriot Act and its continuations and escalations, justifying the unjustifiable under the pretense of "state secrets," not to mention the ways in which people who have the least amount of rights and protection in this country simply "disappear."
"Well at least a Democrat won in our county," as if they haven't been as utterly corrupt on a local level as the other party has been on a national one.
But I can't get emotional about politics anymore. It's so ugly and seems to get uglier every year. I listen to people talk and the ignorance is astounding and the smugness is overwhelming, and each side is acting like they're in middle school with "I'm smarter" or "I'm prettier" or "You suck" and there really isn't much of a difference when it comes down to it.
We're really an oligarchy, run by a select few with a lot of money and connections who either buy their way in or finance the way in for others. I'm convinced that if you start out with any integrity, you've lost most of it by the time you get that far.
It's easy to demand and expect things of others, and harder to take any responsibility to do.
Tuesday, November 2, 2010
it's that time of year again.
It's Election Day, and I get to pick the lesser of 6+ evils for the new position of County Executive, try to figure out which judges don't suck, and hope that my provisional ballot gets counted. Yay.
I do what I can to vote my conscience and stay informed and try not to get myself in trouble with everyone I know because I seem to disagree on everything considering that I don't feel represented by either of the major parties and their talking heads. My views on God and human nature occasionally catapult me into quasi-wingnut territory philosophically, yet I also don't believe that a government should legislate morality and I don't assume that most people share my views or expect others to fall in line behind me.
I don't want to get into arguments about a whole host of issues on this forum because I don't know how most of these things work out in practice, but I vote based on the belief that ALL life is sacred and created by God, whether it's the unborn, the elderly, the rich, the poor, people like me and different from me, people who live in other countries and practice lifestyles and religions different from my own.
I'm ashamed that as a country we're responsible for things like torture and death squads in other countries. I'm glad I voted third party and that I didn't have these high hopes of expecting things to change, because Gitmo and the School of the Americas are still open, we're financing corrupt governments that abuse the rights of their people. I can't stand the way that opposing groups talk about each other, the self-righteous echo chamber smugness of both sides, the ugliness and constant justifications of unjustifiable things.
I believe in treating others the way I'd want to be treated, and so I try to screw over as few people as humanly possible, attempt to vote for people that will hopefully not screw others over too much, and don't expect the government to fix everything. I think we project our hopes so often on people who can't deliver on them, and substitute that for doing anything to change the world around us ourselves.
I try to do my best to live out and love and do the right thing by pursuing peace in my own life because that's the only thing I can really answer for and live by this:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life...
I do what I can to vote my conscience and stay informed and try not to get myself in trouble with everyone I know because I seem to disagree on everything considering that I don't feel represented by either of the major parties and their talking heads. My views on God and human nature occasionally catapult me into quasi-wingnut territory philosophically, yet I also don't believe that a government should legislate morality and I don't assume that most people share my views or expect others to fall in line behind me.
I don't want to get into arguments about a whole host of issues on this forum because I don't know how most of these things work out in practice, but I vote based on the belief that ALL life is sacred and created by God, whether it's the unborn, the elderly, the rich, the poor, people like me and different from me, people who live in other countries and practice lifestyles and religions different from my own.
I'm ashamed that as a country we're responsible for things like torture and death squads in other countries. I'm glad I voted third party and that I didn't have these high hopes of expecting things to change, because Gitmo and the School of the Americas are still open, we're financing corrupt governments that abuse the rights of their people. I can't stand the way that opposing groups talk about each other, the self-righteous echo chamber smugness of both sides, the ugliness and constant justifications of unjustifiable things.
I believe in treating others the way I'd want to be treated, and so I try to screw over as few people as humanly possible, attempt to vote for people that will hopefully not screw others over too much, and don't expect the government to fix everything. I think we project our hopes so often on people who can't deliver on them, and substitute that for doing anything to change the world around us ourselves.
I try to do my best to live out and love and do the right thing by pursuing peace in my own life because that's the only thing I can really answer for and live by this:
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace.
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury,pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life...
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Tuesday, November 4, 2008
election day playlist
Requests for Steppenwolf, the Who, and Jefferson Airplane that I couldn't fill.
Otherwise a much more funky show that attempted to be at least a little less political than most. Finally told the caller to go with WNCX if he wanted those tracks. They didn't fit my format this morning for sure.
the pharcyde - hey you
burial - ghost hardware
erykah badu - soldier
the roots w/ jazzyfatnastees - 3 ring government
jurassic 5 - freedom
soul coughing - idiot kings
maxwell - welcome
zap mama - kemake
funkadelic - i got a thing
mala rodriguez - volvere
joy denalane - hochte zeit
love - a house is not a motel
the abyssinians - satta massagana
joe strummer & the mescaleros - techno d-day
aricia mess - tentei
lauryn hill - forgive them father
trevor dandy - is there any love
black crowes - remedy
chambers brothers - all strung out
fugazi - break
habib koite - foro bana
souad massi - eche edeni
love battery - mr. soul
screaming trees - gospel plow
mighty walker brothers - God has been good
rodrigo y gabriela - tamacun
pharaoh's daughter - by way of haran
rufino almeida - bau
pharaoh sanders - oh Lord let me do no wrong
Otherwise a much more funky show that attempted to be at least a little less political than most. Finally told the caller to go with WNCX if he wanted those tracks. They didn't fit my format this morning for sure.
the pharcyde - hey you
burial - ghost hardware
erykah badu - soldier
the roots w/ jazzyfatnastees - 3 ring government
jurassic 5 - freedom
soul coughing - idiot kings
maxwell - welcome
zap mama - kemake
funkadelic - i got a thing
mala rodriguez - volvere
joy denalane - hochte zeit
love - a house is not a motel
the abyssinians - satta massagana
joe strummer & the mescaleros - techno d-day
aricia mess - tentei
lauryn hill - forgive them father
trevor dandy - is there any love
black crowes - remedy
chambers brothers - all strung out
fugazi - break
habib koite - foro bana
souad massi - eche edeni
love battery - mr. soul
screaming trees - gospel plow
mighty walker brothers - God has been good
rodrigo y gabriela - tamacun
pharaoh's daughter - by way of haran
rufino almeida - bau
pharaoh sanders - oh Lord let me do no wrong
Monday, November 3, 2008
m to the a to the s to the k...
The Holy Ghost Party was a super success and we probably had a good 300+ kids come through the doors for pizza, candy, games. We ran out of candy by the end of the night but it was chaos in the best way seeing the parents chilling out and laughing and the kids running around popping balloons and getting sugared up. I was helping out with the foosball table and the darts but eventually ended up being the roving photographer as more people showed up to volunteer.
I also did face-painting for the first time. Attempting to portray the likenesses of Cinderella and Dora the Explorer was a challenge, but soon the girls were requesting flowers and stars and that was way easier.
We also had a zombie for Obama
Speaking of Obama, I got to hear, if not see, the man himself speak yesterday. Decided at the last minute to join my roommate and her brother and his fiancee and a friend of mine from the station, with whom I spent most of Bruce Springsteen's set making jokes about how every Springsteen song is about the same thing more or less.
I think I'm going to be voting third party this year because I really can't get behind either of the candidates running for policy reasons, but I thought his speech was really good and he had a lot of good things to say about personal responsibility and the state of the world and so on.
So we're all getting these warm fuzzy feelings and such and we get on the Rapid, which is all Obama supporters and then this older white lady asks my roommate to give up her seat. Not me, but my roommate. Being charitable types with respect for elders, we move and stand in the aisle, and suddenly the irony of what just happened sinks in as I look around at the people who are sitting down and they are all white except my roommate, her brother, and a lady sitting behind him.
Dear Cleveland, just so you know, it's not Alabama in the 1950s. Lady, you with the Obama pin, fresh from the rally, are really lucky that you ran across two girls who wouldn't cuss you out for being so oblivious. I don't even know if you were being unintentionally racist, just selfish. I don't think you even meant to evoke an iconic era, but the irony of it was just so absurd that we just started laughing at the situation because what else can you really do at that point?
We hear all these things about a new chapter in history and we get a juxtaposition of the old that exists in much more subtle ways all over this land.
My beloved city, we have so much further that we need to go.
I also did face-painting for the first time. Attempting to portray the likenesses of Cinderella and Dora the Explorer was a challenge, but soon the girls were requesting flowers and stars and that was way easier.
We also had a zombie for Obama
Speaking of Obama, I got to hear, if not see, the man himself speak yesterday. Decided at the last minute to join my roommate and her brother and his fiancee and a friend of mine from the station, with whom I spent most of Bruce Springsteen's set making jokes about how every Springsteen song is about the same thing more or less.
I think I'm going to be voting third party this year because I really can't get behind either of the candidates running for policy reasons, but I thought his speech was really good and he had a lot of good things to say about personal responsibility and the state of the world and so on.
So we're all getting these warm fuzzy feelings and such and we get on the Rapid, which is all Obama supporters and then this older white lady asks my roommate to give up her seat. Not me, but my roommate. Being charitable types with respect for elders, we move and stand in the aisle, and suddenly the irony of what just happened sinks in as I look around at the people who are sitting down and they are all white except my roommate, her brother, and a lady sitting behind him.
Dear Cleveland, just so you know, it's not Alabama in the 1950s. Lady, you with the Obama pin, fresh from the rally, are really lucky that you ran across two girls who wouldn't cuss you out for being so oblivious. I don't even know if you were being unintentionally racist, just selfish. I don't think you even meant to evoke an iconic era, but the irony of it was just so absurd that we just started laughing at the situation because what else can you really do at that point?
We hear all these things about a new chapter in history and we get a juxtaposition of the old that exists in much more subtle ways all over this land.
My beloved city, we have so much further that we need to go.
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