Our Descent Into Madness

Though there are some real reasons to dislike or genuinely fear Halloween, I am determined to make good of any appropriate (and sometimes inappropriate) occasion that encourages dress-up.

Of course, I waited ’til the last minute to try and find an interesting, inexpensive costume. I always come up with the best ideas just a few days too late. This year I settled for a hat shaped like a flower pot, with big yellow flowers sticking out from the top. I’m going to wear a black shirt and green plants and be soil and roots. Ha ha…

For other procrastinators out there, Boing Boing’s got a pretty good and easy idea for you. Or, you could make a different sort of statement today by wearing red. And for everyone else: are you dressing up? If so, as what?

And NOW I remember what it is that I’ve been wanting to be for Halloween for, oh, I dunno, forever!

“Beauty is a curse on the world.” The classic villain from my favorite show! (Yes, it really is my favorite. Second only to Daria. Should I be publicizing that on this blog?…)

Duh.

Damn. Maybe next time.

EDIT: In the second paragraph of this post I wrote “plants” where I meant to write “pants.” I like that mistake, though, so I’m leaving it. :)

My coastal comrades: if it is at all possible, please seriously consider moving inland. The time is nigh.

PZ Myers is right… This is a glimpse at the worst side of human nature. The fact that the video is aimed at kids makes it that much worse. Take a person’s natural, lovely desire to help others, to do right by their friends, and pervert it into an ideology that is as evil as it is stupid.

What kind of person is the Christofacist, who fervently worships a God so evil, so cruel, so hypocritical? What kind of God is the God of this video, who happily condemns people to an eternity of unending torture based not on their actions, but on a technicality? What kind of religion achieves compliance by terrorizing its own youth?

From Boing Boing, researchers in Iceland recently discovered the oldest animal on record, a friendly clam. The oldest animal lived to be about 405, because researched killed it and cut it open as soon as they found it.

I wonder how long the amaranthine mollusk would have lived if it hadn’t be murdered. Maybe 410 years, 420? Even 450 or 500 or more?

Well. Now we’ll never know. On that subject…

“Its death is an unfortunate aspect of this work, but we hope to derive lots of information from it,” said Al Wanamaker, a postdoctoral scientist on the university’s Arctica team. “For our work it’s a bonus, but it wasn’t good for this particular animal.”

Uh huh.

I think maybe marine biologists should start taking oaths like doctors, “First do no harm.” ‘Cause this shit just keeps happening. And for no reason at all, in most cases.

Like every book that tackles the horrors of Hitler’s holocaust, Dan Kurtzman’s The Bravest Battle: The 28 Days of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising is painful and difficult and necessary. And always, unfortunately, relevant and urgent and familiar. Such a subject is difficult to react to in words.

Non-fiction re-constructed to resemble something that reads more like a novel, this book aims to focus upon a facet of genocidal histories commonly glossed over: resistance to their perpetrators. The history of resistance to this particular genocide, though rich, is understandably hard to grasp. In a system of extermination so closed and complete, what methods could serve as means for resistance that did not play into the plans of the exterminator? What could the outlawed do in this situation to express dissent without ultimately benefiting their oppressors? Were such acts even possible?

Kurtzman, after sufficiently setting the scene, recounts the detailed events of each day of the Warsaw ghetto uprising. Surely destined for death, the main administrators of the resistance (organized and not) to Nazi Germany and the execution of their people in this place and time were left with jurisdiction over only one thing: their own death. Some of the hunted swallowed poison. Others jumped from buildings after smothering their children. Better to die of their own hands than at those of their enemies, they reasoned.

And some gathered what resources (each other’s cooperation and planning, smuggled or homemade weapons) they could with which to engage the Nazis at their own method of destruction, albeit at a level hundreds of thousands of times less powerful politically and militarily. Diverse groups of resisters worked together or alongside each other, struggling to convince the other members of the ghetto that it was worth it to fight while dying, to convince them that it wasn’t worth acting compliant with the hopes that if they did, they may get off more easily and survive longer. To convince the rest of Poland and the world that the situation was too immediate to warrant rationalization of inaction with their own fear of Nazi Germany.

Self-consciously doomed to failure from the start, and indeed, more successful than expected, the uprising was never meant as a solution. It was not meant even as a struggle toward another, better day because, even though each moment survived was precious and beautiful, it was inarguable that that fight had already been lost (though some resisters did indeed make it out of the ghetto). The uprising was manifest of the desire for some sort of permanence of memory; if the victims were to be struck from the earth, then may some semblance of their own narrative remain of their own accord.

And so by reading their stories, we can each do our part to validate the desperate experience that, were it not for our acknowledgment of them, offer options of retaliation so meager that their enactment has the same result that might occur if they were not enacted at all. In this way, these acts of desperation become acts of resistance when subsequently observed by another, for which the acts were truly committed anyway, and which demonstrate a rebellious spirit merely by imagining compassion.

Oh, shit. Read this Rogue Government response to the Violent Radicalization and Homegrown Terrorism Prevention Act of 2007 just passed by the House (with support from both Democrats and Republicans, mind you).

First let’s take a look at the definitions of violent radicalization and homegrown terrorism as defined in Section 899A of the bill.

The definition of violent radicalization uses vague language to define this term of promoting any belief system that the government considers to be an extremist agenda. Since the bill doesn’t specifically define what an extremist belief system is, it is entirely up to the interpretation of the government. Considering how much the government has done to destroy the Constitution they could even define Ron Paul supporters as promoting an extremist belief system. Literally, the government according to this definition can define whatever they want as an extremist belief system. Essentially they have defined violent radicalization as thought crime. The definition as defined in the bill is shown below.

`(2) VIOLENT RADICALIZATION- The term `violent radicalization’ means the process of adopting or promoting an extremist belief system for the purpose of facilitating ideologically based violence to advance political, religious, or social change.

The definition of homegrown terrorism uses equally vague language to further define thought crime. The bill includes the planned use of force or violence as homegrown terrorism which could be interpreted as thinking about using force or violence. Not only that but the definition is so vaguely defined, that petty crimes could even fall into the category of homegrown terrorism. The definition as defined in the bill is shown below.

`(3) HOMEGROWN TERRORISM- The term `homegrown terrorism’ means the use, planned use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual born, raised, or based and operating primarily within the United States or any possession of the United States to intimidate or coerce the United States government, the civilian population of the United States, or any segment thereof, in furtherance of political or social objectives.

Section 899B of the bill goes over the findings of Congress as it pertains to homegrown terrorism. Particularly alarming is that the bill mentions the Internet as a main source for terrorist propaganda. The bill even mentions streams in obvious reference to many of the patriot and pro-constitution Internet radio networks that have been formed.

A special commission would be established to deal with these loosely-if-at-all-defined terrorists.

And who would most likely be targeted? The Army of God? Something tells me otherwise. Do supporters of this bill really trust not only our current president, but future ones as well, to use this bill justly?

I’m not sure I understand completely (which I assume unsurprisingly is an intended affect), though this is clearly another mound of dirt atop our democracy’s burial plot. And a particularly poisonous one at that. But wasn’t each…?

Via Fetch Me My Axe.

From Boing Boing, take a look at the strange and magical photographs of Robert and Shana ParkeHarrison. They seem to have two series, Listen to the Earth and Book of Life, both of which look like they exist as books, in which case, I want them. So. Bad.

The esthetic is sort of like luminescent steampunk surrealism. Really gorgeous stuff. The only thing it reminds me of is Neutral Milk Hotel, though I don’t know that that makes sense, but: two-headed boys, synthetic flying machines, cars careening in from the clouds, magical sound devices… It’s the same sort of magical realist timelessness thing, technology reimagined as beautiful and poetic, nostaligia for times and places and people that never existed.

Anyway. Really lovely.

Edited to add: Katmeanders commented with a link to their official website — it’s a must-see. Thanks, Kat!

This is the most important post I have ever written, so even if you normally skim over this kind of thing, I request that you read it. I especially request that you read it if you are under twenty-five years of age. I am speaking here from personal experience that I know I share with my friends and classmates; if your experience has been different, do say so.

In class today we were discussing the war in Iraq and activism and the failure of my generation to be a carbon-copy of the generation that protested Vietnam. And out came a story so familiar I have spoken it in my sleep.

Our generation doesn’t care. We just don’t give a shit. We don’t know what’s happening nor do we care to learn. We’d rather get high, we’d rather watch TV.

Bare in mind that we were speaking of a group of people who only this year gained the right to vote.

Bare in mind, more significantly, that these words were spoken with disappointment. Spoken by peers of mine who do, in fact, care. Who care desperately.

I care. I care, I care, I care. I am human. I feel love and I feel hate, and I hate the fascist fuckers who have hijacked my country. I hate this evil war. I hate that thousands — by now millions — have died for it. I hate global warming and the bastards profiting from it. I hate the fundamentalists who want to take away my rights.

And I love my family. I love my wonderful friends. I love humanity. I love art and music. I love everyone who will stand beside me to fight for decency. Everyone who agrees with me that we should spend our collective money feeding children instead of slaughtering them.

I care. I am a member of this generation, and I care. Every single student in my class cared, I could see it in their faces, even as they insisted that our generation lacks the will to even live.

So this is my question: if I care, and all my friends care, and all my classmates care, where are these zombies? Show them to me. Show me the opiated masses, millions of kids glued to their TV screens. Where are they?

I don’t doubt that there are some. But I doubt with every fiber of my being that they are all of us, or that they should win. If they truly don’t care, what obstacle are they to justice? To reform? They will step out of our way.

Where did this story come from? I have been hearing this story since I was twelve years old, or maybe younger — since I was far, far to young to have had a chance to prove myself, to demonstrate my passion or my lack of it. So where did we get this idea?

They say we would rather watch television.

Who makes television? Who produces those shows? Who profits from them? Is it eighteen-year-olds, or is it someone different?

They say we don’t care about this war.

Who started this war? Who is keeping us stuck in it? Who is making money off this death? Is it college students, or is it someone different?

They say we do not read the newspapers.

What is in our newspapers? Truth, or lies? If lies, who is telling them? Who would want these lies believed? Eighteen-year-olds? Someone different?

They say it will be up to us, if anyone, to solve the climate crisis. Are they dead already?

They say it will be up to us, if anyone, to repair our democracy. Are they already dead?

It will be up to us, if anyone, to repair the damage of the conservative backlash. Are they dead?

What group of people is acting like zombies here? Is it eighteen-year-olds? Children so weighted with fear and plans that they can barely stand, children with pharmaceuticals running through their veins to numb them (who prescribed those medications? who made and sold them?).

What group of people doesn’t care? College students, or someone else?

A great lie has been told here — a great crime has been committed.

What do you think it would do to a group of children, to tell them over and over that they are numb? To feed them chemicals to help maintain that numbness? To convince them that they lack not just a voice but the will to even use one if they had it? What kind of bloated monster would this produce?

It is goddamned evil to tell someone that they’re not human, and make no mistake: that is exactly what it means to tell someone they don’t care about mass murder, to tell someone they’re not bothered by the possibility of complete extinction.

Reject this message. Reject it, reject it, reject it. It is wrong, it is bullshit, it is a lie. This story of the apathy generation is piece of propaganda, and a fucking effective piece at that. Reject it, spit it out, curse it with everything you are.

I have stared into the soul of my generation, and I have seen power there. There were adults present for this, our parents and others, people who have sometimes said those lies to us (that it is up to us to save the world, and why don’t we give a shit). They saw what we all saw: fire. Fire and outrage and love. They stared at us for hours, motionless, unable to join in but unable to look away. Paralyzed in the face our strength, our mania, our madness there in the motion of the flames growing taller.

We are not the zombies here.

No, really.

I’m in midst of revising a paper I wrote recently about Judy Chicago. I thought it might be of a general interest to folks around here (feminism + art = awesome), and moreover posting it is a good way to force myself to comb through the damn thing. I’m hiding it mostly below the fold, as it’s quite long for a post.

Here it is:

Judy Chicago is one of those rare individuals whose career is both coherent and multiform. Very accomplished in art, activism, education and authorship, feminism has been the primary driving force of Chicago’s work since even before she undertook the task of monumentalizing womanhood in projects such as The Dinner Party and the less discussed Birth Project. Read the rest of this entry »