update on the Iraqi dead

The number of children killed in 'the string of bombings' is actually now to be 35 not 25 as I originally read. So here's one story on it. I have one question: why is it that only when "insurgents" kill, does an Iraqi civilian body count make the U.S. news?

peace!

Iraq Bombings Kill 35 Youths, Hurt Scores
1 hour, 47 minutes ago

By ALEXANDRA ZAVIS, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq - A string of bombs killed 35 children and wounded scores of others as U.S. troops handed out candy Thursday at a government-sponsored celebration to inaugurate a sewage plant. It was the largest death toll of children in any insurgent attack since the start of the Iraq (news - web sites) conflict.

Meanwhile, early Friday, U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a major attack against the insurgent stronghold of Samarra, securing government and police buildings in the city, the U.S. command said.
In the wake of Thursday's bombings, grief-stricken mothers wailed over their children's bloodied corpses, as relatives collected body parts from the street for burial and a boy picked up the damaged bicycle of his dead brother.
The wounded were rushed to Yarmouk Hospital, where angry relatives screamed for attention from the overwhelmed doctors, many of whom wore uniforms covered in blood. One woman tore at her hair before pulling back the sheet covering her dead brother and kissing his body.
The bombings in Baghdad's western al-Amel neighborhood — at least two of which were in cars — came amid a series of savage attacks that killed at least 51 people and wounded 230 nationwide. At least one U.S. soldier was among the dead and 13 were wounded.
On Friday, the joint offensive came in response to "repeated and unprovoked attacks by anti-Iraqi forces" against Iraqi and coalition forces, the military said in a statement. Its aim was to kill or capture insurgents in the city, 60 miles north of Baghdad.
The statement provided no further details of the fighting. A report by CNN said 2,000 rebels were believed to be holed up in the city and that tanks and jets were being used as troops took the city "sector by sector."
Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad group claimed responsibility for bloody attacks in Baghdad on Thursday, according to a statement posted on a militant Web site.
The authenticity of the statement could not be verified, and it was unclear whether the three "heroic operations" it cites — attacks on a government complex and "a convoy of invading forces" — included the bombs that killed the children.
Early reports said a U.S. convoy was passing by the celebration when the attack occurred. The U.S. military said later that American soldiers were taking part in the celebration but that no convoy was passing through the area.
Deputy Interior Minister Gen. Hussein Ali Kamal said intense military pressure on insurgents holed up in Fallujah, west of Baghdad, was forcing them to turn their bombs on the capital. He said the day's attacks were "definitely coordinated."
"They are killing citizens and spreading horror. They have no aims except killing as many Iraqis as they can," Kamal told The Associated Press. American jets, tanks and artillery units have repeatedly targeted al-Zarqawi's followers in Fallujah, as coalition forces seek to assert control over insurgent enclaves ahead of elections slated for January.
After the bombings at the government-sponsored celebration in the capital, Yarmouk Hospital received 42 bodies, including 35 children, said Dr. Azhar Zeid. The hospital also treated 131 wounded, 72 of them under age 14, added Dr. Mohammed Salaheddin.
Some of the children, who are near the end of a nationwide school vacation, said they were attracted to the neighborhood celebration by American soldiers handing out candy.
"The Americans called us. They told us: 'Come here, come here,' asking us if we wanted sweets. We went beside them, then a car exploded," said 12-year-old Abdel Rahman Dawoud, lying naked in a hospital bed with shrapnel embedded all over his body.
Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman said a car bomb and an explosive device planted in the road detonated in quick succession at the site of the celebration. Soon afterward, a second car bomb plowed into the area as crowds rushed to help the wounded, he said.
Maj. Phil Smith, spokesman for the U.S. 1st Cavalry Division, said all three blasts were caused by car bombs, the first two targeting the celebration and the third aimed at an Iraqi National Guard checkpoint about a mile away. Ten U.S. soldiers were wounded, he said.
Neither official would confirm whether suicide attackers were involved, and the conflicting accounts could not immediately be reconciled.
"This attack was carried out by evil people who do not want the Iraqis to celebrate and don't want (reconstruction) projects in Iraq," National Guard Lt. Ahmad Saad said at the scene.
Hours earlier, a suicide attacker detonated a vehicle packed with explosives in front of a government complex in the Abu Ghraib area, on the western outskirts of Baghdad. The bombing killed a U.S. soldier and two Iraqi policeman and wounded more than 60 people, including three American soldiers.
U.S. forces guard the compound, which houses the mayor's office, a police station and other buildings, police 1st Lt. Ahmed Jawad said.
"I saw people flying in the air and falling on the ground," said Saad Mohsin, who has a table in front of the mayor's building where he helps people fill out forms. "I had fragments in my neck and my back."
Distraught relatives searched the damaged buildings, calling for missing loved ones. Others gathered outside the hospital hoping for news.
Policeman Ali Shihan was hit by shrapnel in his left ear and was covered in blood.
"Those terrorists have no goal except killing Iraqis," he said.
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said he was disturbed by the televised images of the day's attacks, which he said showed the importance of training Iraqi military and security forces and improved intelligence gathering.
"The Iraqi people have suffered enough at the hands of these people," Zebari said on CNN, speaking from London. "We want a new Iraq, a different Iraq."
Also on Baghdad's outskirts, insurgents fired a rocket Thursday at a logistical support area for coalition forces, killing one soldier and wounding seven, the U.S. military said. No further information was disclosed — including the nationalities of the victims.
In the northern city of Tal Afar, a car bomb targeting the police chief killed at least four people and wounded 19, including five policemen, police and hospital officials said. The police chief escaped unharmed.
In another northern city, the Kirkuk mayor's chief bodyguard was gunned down in his vehicle, which the attackers then drove away, police said.
Early Thursday, U.S. forces struck a suspected militant safehouse in Fallujah. Hospital officials said at least four Iraqis were killed and eight wounded.
"Significant secondary explosions were observed during the impact indicating a large cache of illegal ordnance was stored in the safehouse," the military said in a statement.
Thursday's violence came as the Arab news network Al-Jazeera showed footage of 10 new hostages seized in Iraq by militants seen pointing guns at them. They included six Iraqis, two Lebanese and two Indonesian women, Al-Jazeera reported. It was not clear when or where they were seized.
Militants calling themselves The Islamic Army in Iraq claimed responsibility for the kidnapping. There was no mention of any demands. The group also says it is holding two French journalists.
Nearly 150 foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq and at least 26 have been killed. Some were seized by insurgents as leverage in their campaign against the United States and its allies, others by criminals seeking ransom.

"In The Shadow of No Towers" (revisited)

I’m actually quite disappointed that last night I had worked for twenty minutes on a follow up post for Art Spiegelman’s “In the Shadow of No Towers” only to have the internet cut off on me and my post go to, well, wherever they go. Anyhow, here’s my post.

How do the images of September 11th figure into our national consciousness differently from those of other nations? Art Spiegelman offers a fine example of this in his book when he writes of feeling “Equally terrorized by Al-Qaeda and by his own Government…” (2). The images chosen to symbolize and capture the events of that day are repeated over and over again in the same way politicians frame “debate”—to keep people distracted, fearful and traumatized so that they are willing to sacrifice their civil and human rights to the illusion of national security. Spiegelman’s illustration of a terrified man with an albatross around his neck that tells him to “go out and shop” and “be afraid” rather than allowing him time to contemplate the constant repetition of the exploited image and its coming to represent the whole is very telling.

Why is it the planes hitting the towers have come to symbolize the “terror threat”?
To be invoked in visceral image again and again the way one might think a preacher would, to stoke fear of Armageddon, perhaps?
Who decided that this image would be the most important/relevant/meaningful rather than the plane hitting the Pentagon or the people standing, ash covered, waiting for any news of a loved ones’ survival?
When did the Bush govt. have plans to attack Iraq? Institute the Patriot Act?
How do all of these questions tie together with the Adorno/Horkheimer essay on “The Culture Industry”?

The purpose of the Culture Industry is to reaffirm the power of the State, as it is controlled exclusively by the State. The purpose of any image it produces is to tell consumers what to want, buy, think, love, desire, fear and hate. Therefore the images of 9/11 (planes hitting the towers, planes hitting the towers, planes hitting the towers and the towers collapsing) are to keep/suspend the public in a state of perpetual fear. Fear mongering. But more importantly than that, they serve to create a national consciousness around that one image. For example, Spiegelman asks in the book, “But why did those provincial American flags have to sprout out of the embers of Ground Zero? What not…a globe?” (7)

Why not a globe? Why the flag? Why? Because in the time leading up to September 11th, the nation was pretty fairly divided (as it usually is following an election or leading up to one) about the new “President.” What followed September 11th were not only increases in fear and flag production, but also almost the entire world united in mourning. Entire nations rallied around the injustice of the attacks and stood in silence and in tears at the sight of such senseless destruction. Yet, this unity was made useless by the unilateral policy of retribution and “justice” that has been ongoing ever since. The “leader’s greatness” has been determined in many American eyes as having been steadfast and taking charge in the face of the terrorist attacks, yet to the world, the leader has simply followed in the footsteps of other “cowboy presidents,” preferring war to diplomacy and unilateral action to cooperation.

As Spiegelman is running and hiding to the Technicolor rainbow of the terror alert, to hide under an American Flag, he says “I should feel safer under here, but –Damn it! —I can’t see a thing!” (7)

Later he writes, “On 9/11/03 “the unmentionable odour of death” still offends as we commemorate two years of squandered chances to bring the community of nations together” (10).

Both of these examples offer extremes of both ends regarding any hint of “national consciousness” among Americans. There is the exclusive and the inclusive. There is the individual and the community/collective. There is fear and hope. Imagine if we could bring nations together to support our policies rather than mass protest against them?
It is ever ironic to me that other people around the world understand that our government is not necessarily concerned or representative of the will of the American people and yet we often fail to extend the same courtesy to others when we say “kill them all” or even “God Bless America.”


Here’s an excerpt from an interview with Cornel West for your enjoyment.
Check out the whole interview on http://www.alternet.org/

Peace!


“There are three fundamental anti-democratic dogmas. The first is the dogma of free market fundamentalism that fetishizes and ascribes magical powers to the unfettered market. Deregulate. Privatize. These are the mantra of the day among the elites. And the result is what?
We end up with one percent of the population now holding 48 percent of the net financial wealth, and 20 percent of our precious children of all colors living in utter poverty in the richest nation in the history of the world. It’s a moral disgrace.
I’m not even talking about workers being marginalized, not even talking about the ways in which our children don’t have access to high quality education, especially in chocolate cities. We’re not even talking about the forty-seven million citizens who don’t have access to healthcare insurance. We can go on and on and on. This is the internal decay that we have to address in relation to this anti-democratic dogma, free market capitalism.
The other two dogmas are the dogma of aggressive militarism and the dogma of escalating authoritarianism.
The militarism is not just the invasion of Iraq, but it’s the notion of being a military power, and feeling that we can revert to raw force as a means of resolving conflict, and in a unilateral way for the most part..
And it’s the militarization of everyday life. Domestic violence. Cowardly brothers of all colors attacking vulnerable sisters of all colors. The militarizing of our minds. How we live and how we are oriented to each other is inseparable from the imperial identity and mentality that’s emanating now out of Washington.
The escalating authoritarianism has to do with the monitoring of our dialogue. I’m sure you’ve heard of brother Tariq Ramadan, who was supposed to teach at the University of Notre Dame. He had his visa cancelled because the US government does not want to have a robust discussion about what’s going on in the Middle East, about what’s going on in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. So we are unable to be Socratic enough to acknowledge that ordinary Middle-Easterners, be they Israeli or Palestinians or Kurds or Turks or whatever, often have a very different view than their power players, their elites, who are trying to keep them policed as it were. Ramadam’s being able to come to Notre Dame is just the peak of an iceberg. The USA Patriot Act would be another peak.
Free market fundamentalism, the aggressive militarism, and third is the escalating authoritarianism These three dogmas are dangerous. They’re threatening, and it makes democracy matters frightening in our time.”—Cornel West, from “Matters of Justice” By Terrence McNally, AlterNet. Posted September 29, 2004.


"I have earned my disillusionment. I have been working all of my life. I am a patriot and I have been fighting the good fight, but what if there are no damsels in distress? What if I knew that and I called your bluff? Don't you think every kitten figures out how to get down, whether or not you ever show up?" --Ani, from "Not a Pretty Girl"

Be a true "American" Think For Yourself!

With all of these "American" values flying through air, waiving in the brain like a parade of flags in zombie-like, insomniatic hands, spellbound by the television...I'm thinking how about we focus on the best part about living in the U.S., thinking critically. Notice the above title didn't say think only of yourself...
Anyhow, Spiegelman's book has a FANTASTIC challenge to the two party candidate system and it isn't Nadar folks. He says, let's have a third party: The Ostrich Party!
The quote reads:

"Rampaging Republican Elephants...Dimwitted Democratic Donkeys...No wonder real Americans don't bother to vote! The two party animals are both 19th century dinosaurs, interested only in their own survival, not ours! We need a third party that actually represents us...A new and Revolutionary OSTRICH PARTY! Join your fellow Americans before it's too late...Rise up & Stick your heads in the ground!" (a sign on the side reads: Orange alert: Beware of cowboy boots!" (pg. 5)

So, yes, he's being sarcastic but he DOES have an interesting point in that people really do seem to think that their vote doesn't matter. That politics are full of shit. Well, okay, I won't go there but I really love Spiegelman's argument that the two 'party animals' only care about themselves. This makes education and activism all the more important. Either we fulfill that touted belief that others have of Americans as being opinionated, individualistic and rebellious (I kinda like that!) or we go on being as Derrick Jensen termed "a nation of slaves" perpetuated the notion that we don't matter. As someone, somewhere succintly said: If you don't vote, don't bitch. Our ability to educate ourselves and organize to make a difference is the only real weapon we have against reality t.v. and that goofy smile and that cowboy hat and that John Wayne wannabe that is the real threat. I'm thinking we need to design a new t-shirt that says Be a true "American" Think for Yourself!

"Beware the behalfies!" Salman Rushdie wrote in his "Step Across the line."
Beware the behalfies indeed.

peace!

Thanks to John, Keith, Marcy and Patri for posting responses. You rock!

Rights, privileges, responsibilities in art and social criticism

One last thought tonight...
Where do rights become privileges in the realm of art and social criticism? Ezra Pound was imprisoned in an outdoor cage for critiquing America in a time of war and for his rabid support of Italian fascism...so what RIGHT do we have to critique our government, our leader, our "commander in chief"? Is this truly something guarenteed by the Constitution? Or it can be taken away at any time by, say, the Patriot Act, as it was during the times of COINTELPRO?
According to Marxist theory and my soc theory class, the "State" is defined as "that institution with a monopoly on the use of organized violence" or "an organ or instrument of violence exercised by one class against another." So, we know from college history anyway (forget k-12)
that our State has certainly been willing to use legal, organized violence to maintain the status quo even in the face of global pressure and domestic protest. I'm just curious how this relates to art and social criticism. For example, Spiegelman's book (that I have been talking about incessantly it seems) is quite critical of the current administration and its exploitation of the Sept 11th attacks. Bookshelves are lined with authors who call the President every derrogatory name you can print on the cover, from war criminal to village idiot. (There are also countless shelves dedicated to bashing liberals in this same manner). So at what point does the privilege of using your art (whatever that art may be) in a public forum for the purposes of critiquing and challenging the State (or the ruling class, or foreign policy) become dangerous/treasonous/illegal? At what point do our civil and human rights become purely contigent upon the graces and mercy of the State who controls the mainstream media (thus the court of public opinion) as well as the police force, local courts, privatized prisons and even the Supreme Court? These are questions that need to be asked of the two candidates running for the one high office. After all, there are some people who feel that any social criticism of the current administration is treasonous and if you need proof, do a google search and look for the "traitors" list that is increasing in length every day. There are others who reify the public with our government and the military into something that seems to bear the label of "the national consciousness." What this does is make Kerry afraid to call himself a liberal, make any protests about imperial/preemptive war seem like an attack on the troops (rather than the government who sent them), and justify the "need" for the Patriot Act to "assure" a safer America. Who needs the Patriot Act when a band like the Dixie Chicks can be tried and convicted in the court of public opinion for expressing dissent against the President. Hell, HOW MANY jokes were made publicly, privately and internationally at Clinton's expense? I remember reading an interview where even the Dalai Lama knew about the whole stained dress fiasco and laughed.
So...I'm just curious at what point social criticism in art becomes a responsibility (necessary to maintain a democracy, or the illusion of democracy) and what point it becomes a privilege that can be taken away and used against you? Any thoughts?

My son watched the debate tonight with us. Afterward, he said, "I would vote for Kerry if they'd let me." We hadn't said a thing about Bush OR Kerry. My son just thought he made more sense than Bush. It is also funny that more children under the age of 18 think voting makes a difference than those in the 18-29 range do.

peace!

terror, liberty and foreign policy (weighing in on the "debate")

So, I actually sat through at least forty minutes of the "debate" between Kerry and Bush. It seemed a bit repetitive, what with Bush answering almost every point Kerry made with "We can't have a commander in chief who is going to say that this is the wrong war at the wrong time" or "we must show the enemy we will not waiver" blah blah blah. That said, Kerry also slipped a bit into the whole let me repeat what was just said to me crap. I am a bit happy though to have heard Kerry at least TRY to make some legitimate critiques of the Bushites on foreign policy, particularly with reference to going after Saddam and forgetting about bin Laden. I tried to count how many times Bush said the words "strong" and "tough" when referring to America and how many times the words "our enemy" or "the enemy" were mentioned when refering to the Other. I lost count. I can only take so long of staring at his goofy expression before I start to laugh and totally lose count of how often he repeats himself. Okay, jokes aside, one theme kept being repeated that I think needs to be unpacked further. How does terror equal liberty?
Today, (neither candidate mentioned this) bombing in Iraq killed according to AP, 25 children.
So what the hell were those smart weapons aiming for, a school? I would like to know how you can bring peace and democracy and liberty to a country by bombing the shit out of it? Yes, I suppose you could completely decimate it and then no one can challenge you but other than that, I don't see how bombing campaigns (that even our media reported) resulting in the deaths of children can "win the peace" or convince the Iraqi people that you, the bomber, you the occupier, you the arms supplier really really want to give them liberty. According to news reports, the death of these children was a result of a car bombing by insurgents. But what fuels the "insurgents"? Bombing. Terror.

I was happy to hear Kerry speak about the real conditions our troops are facing and how underfunded they are and yet, to hear him speak of continuing this war is sad. I flinched every time he said he would "hunt down and kill the terrorists." I'm sorry to say it John, but Rambo was fiction. How about trying to stop creating the conditions of desparation and despair that brings people to the point of considering terrorism? How about ensuring real faith in the democratic process by retracting imperialism and providing food, shelter, clothing and a working infrastructure to Iraq and Afghanistan. I liked to hear Kerry speak about using diplomacy, building working and respectable alliances and bringing our troops home. Most of Bush's speech was reacting to Kerry and repeating phrases (see above) just as he has done ever since he first decided to run for that office. I had to laugh when Kerry mentioned Florida because for a small moment in time, I thought he might actually bring up the Floridians who were disenfranchised, who couldn't practice democracy in THIS country, who were denied their LEGAL RIGHT to vote for president in 2000. But he was actually talking about the hurricane victims. I find it immensely interesting that they can talk about bringing liberty, fighting terror and strengthening democracy all over the Middle East but neither wanted to mention the denial of liberty (that the courts have since deemed unconstitutional) thanks to the Patriot Act, of suspected terrorists in Guatanamo Bay. Neither spoke of the previously mentioned denial of democracy to the Floridians (whose crime was trying to vote while being African American).
Well, there are still a few debates left and so maybe they are waiting for that moment.
I am hopeful. I am patriotic. I will vote, not for "security" (see the current depiction of the soccer moms for Bush circulating the internet) but for a greater vision of America, one that is a champion of human rights not hegemony. They spoke of America leading the world but neither really mentioned how, where, and into what. Maybe we should send the Howard Zinn quote to them and ask them to reflect upon his words and how our "greatness" could be truly great and visionary. Then let them debate on how to go about transforming this nation into a power for Human Rights NOT hegemony.

Last disclaimer: Thich Nhat Hahn writes alot about sending politicians letters of love and kind encouragement to try to get them to do their best, rather than acting in anger and hatred.
So perhaps we should flood the offices of Kerry and Bush with love letters and kind encouragement. What do you think? How/Do you think they would respond?

peace!

"Our hero is trapped reliving the traumas of Sept. 11, 2001...
Unbeknownst to him, brigands suffering from war fever have
since hijacked those tragic events...
His memories swirl and events fade but he still
sees that glowing tower when he closes his eyes,
Meanwhile, an anniversary came and went...
Many happy returns! (Amazing how time flies while it stands still)."--Art Spiegelman
"In the shadow of no towers" pg. 4

Fighting terror with terror makes the whole world safe?

When you talk things out with others about issues that simply make no sense to you, you start to realize that they make no sense to anyone. An example of which is why would a government "intending" to instill democracy in another country begin by completely destroying the infrastructure of that country (by strategically bombing power plants, major roadways, etc) ensure rampant unemployment, not bother to educate its soldiers on cultural differences or assure translators so civilians aren't "accidentally" shot on their way to stand in those unemployment lines--if the final result to all of this madness is supposed to be a stable, democratic society? Why would another government figure that driving tanks into a REFUGEE camp, essentially terrorizing an already traumatized people, would ensure their safety? (According to a press release from AP 36 minutes ago, Israeli tanks drove into
Jebaliya) Yes, rocks can't do too much damage to tanks, even children know this yet they continue to throw them at tanks and at armed soldiers. This act of driving tanks into refugee camps, it would seem, is intended to "fight terror with terror" in retaliation for/
"response to the killing of two Israeli preschoolers by a Palestinian rocket fired from the area a day before" (AP). This is all ironic if you consider that Gandhi's birthday is October 2nd and it would seem his much quoted but little heeded critique of the "old for an eye" mentality, figures even less in our understanding of "terrorism" and subsequent response to terrorism today.

What is also ironic is how much these leaders claim to be acting out of "faith." Faith in what?
Themselves? Their military might? It certainly doesn't seem to be out of foresight or any serious contemplation on the long term consequences of fighting terror with more bombs, more bullets and more lives. Tonight is the foreign policy debate between bush and kerry and I'm curious to know if they'll get past the easy rhetoric into answering hard questions. Such as,
How can you "win" a war on terror by creating terror/fostering terror/fingering "terrorists" in certain countries with certain ethnicities but not everywhere)? What is your proof that your strategic bombing and your stop loss policies aren't in fact creating the conditions for increasing and worsening terrorist attacks in the U.S. and around the world? How's Afghanistan these days and how has our "presence" there improved the lives and wellbeing of Afghani's? Hasn't this whole "the enemy of our enemy is our friend" approach to foreign policy worn out it's welcome? Isn't it high time for a more progressive, humane, rational approach that centers around the hard but true realization that we are not the center of the globe, nor of the universe and that if we ruin the earth for future generations we better damn well hope we've got the moon ready to inhabit? Or in short, can't we use some of our enormous global wealth and resources in sound policy making that takes into account our interdependence and interconnectedness before its too late? Before we run out of places to outsource and better the world for the sake of capitalism? Before we install and arm too many puppet governments (as if we haven't already) and preach the gospel of human rights to the ears of those tortured, imprisoned and murdered by the very government leaders we train, fund and protect? How about a new approach to foreign policy? How about one that actually uses our "power" in ways that actually DO bring stability, by helping to erradicate TREATABLE and preventable disease and hunger? How about ending the trade in arms entirely? People need their basic needs met much more than they need an assault rifle or the latest, greatest aircraft and tanks. How about educating ourselves and our troops on what international law does entail and about cultural differnces that may help them and the civilian populations of places we occupy militarily, survive the duration without mutually assured annihilation? Well, there are countless other issues that could really use some serious consideration in this global fight against terrorism. Personally, I can't wait for Mary Robinson's lecture at our university. I imagine she has some rather interesting perspectives on these issues that the two "candidates" won't even touch on national t.v.
I'm also going to try to scrape together enough money to send myself to the Harvard Law School Human Rights Conference in mid-October. If that doesn't happen, I would love to spend the summer studying human rights and international law in Geneva. Mostly though, I look forward to the day that the chatter around these issues becomes too loud to ignore and too powerful to be silenced. Right now, the mainstream media seems quite adept at making such points marginal at best but, as even my son has pointed out, it makes no sense to bomb or drive tanks over unarmed people in the hopes of convincing the few who do have weapons to stop shooting at you. Sure, such tactics have an immediate (terrorizing) impact on people. But they also have long term consequences that are sure to be your loss in the unending battle to win the hearts and minds of those you are bombing/napalming/razing etc. You don't need to look too far back into history to see this either. The Vietnam war, that is at the center of questions of character surrounding the two candidates' wartime service, offers more than enough proof of the ineffectiveness and harm of fighting terror with terror.

peace!

"In the Shadow of No Towers"

I've just finished Art Spiegelman's "In the Shadow of No Towers" and I wanted to share my thoughts on it here. First, it is full of overwhelming images that simultaneously convey the horror/fear/shock/disgust/numbness and confusion that Spiegelman (and the world?) felt on September 11th but also the horror/fear/shock/disgust/numbness and confusion of the repetitious onslaught of traumatic images that have not left national (international?) consciousness since. So I found myself while reading it, stuck wanted to look at every inch of every page and yet unable to take it all in. You can't look away nor can you absorb or process much of what you are "consuming." I think it is brilliant that Spiegelman does this. I get the same damn feeling on those rare occasions that I do watch t.v. and particularly "Headline News" as there are usually at least five different frames within your field of vision, all vying for your attention and you can't help but feel a little A.D.D. from the experience. Think about it though. What is accomplished by repeating an image, especially of something like the planes hitting the Twin Towers, or of the Towers falling, or of the people standing there with signs of loved ones asking for any information in their own state of shock? What is accomplished by reliving that moment again and again and again, in rhetoric, memorial, words and visceral images that assault the eyes, body, and mind every time, anew? Why do this? To heal? To remember, Spiegelman argues, but why? Why must we remember it as if it were yesterday? As if it could be tomorrow? Why? My point with the endless child routine here is to reflect upon how trauma creates a wound but what point does the consciousness become infected, unable to think beyond the fear and pain and fear of repeated pain/future trauma? Spiegelman articulates this with images depicting a man who is constantly "displacing" his attention, projecting himself onto other things and others onto himself. First he has his own head, then he has the lamp for a head and his head for a lamp and then the cat becomes him (reading the newspaper) and then his foot is his head. He also speaks about post-traumatic stress disorder and it is important to think about ptsd and how it functions in the brain as a survival mechanism. I've read and heard stories from soldiers who've been diagnosed with PTSD speak about how a loud noise can take them back to a war zone or the smell of something burning. So if seemingly every day things, common place things, can confuse space and time, projecting a person back into their trauma no matter where they are or how many years have passed, then what happens when you flash these images to a traumatized nation? A traumatized (terrorized?) world?

It makes me think of "A Clockwork Orange" and how the "treatment" for decriminalizing was to terrorize the young man with repeated images of brutality, coupled with an overlay of symphony music that he loved. He was not allowed to shut his eyes, nor look away. Food for thought...

Anyhow, Spiegelman's book is at times funny, (sadly) ironic and satirical in its criticism of the current administration. I especially enjoyed his constant reference to "waiting for the other shoe to drop" and the new third party, the "Ostrich Party." What an amazing book. I finished it and yet I'm sure I could spend longer looking at it and still find important themes/images I missed.
More on this later.
Peace!

Blurring the lines between fiction and fact

I wrote a very odd short story today. It is really a series of short stories interconnected by the fact that the individual characters make up a society but also a collective in their shared experiences and community. It is also a highly experimental story in that I am doing things with it that might strike some as lazy writing but in fact, every part of it has a purpose. I use a few strategically placed sentence fragments to convey the splintered emotionality/rationality of individuals subsumed into a National identity forced to equate a single man as "The Leader"
with the Nation, the military, war, and even religion as One. Then I pull all of this apart to explore the facade around the leader (who is really just a scared and scarred little boy trying to impress his father) and the myth of power and power is weilded in this fictitious society. I know this may sound like a social criticism of a certain society but that is also something I am careful not to do. I wanted to build upon what I was reading in Adorno/Horkheimer and my earlier post by blurring the obvious fascism of Nazi Germany with the not so obvious forms in which it manifests still. So, I'm purposefully trying to keep the story non-linear and unrooted in a specific time or even one nation's history. Here's an excerpt from the story.

The Artist
Scott pulls the light until the chord would stretch no further. His images stare back at him, waiting for definition. Waiting for ink to bleed color into their black and white outlines. "Frames," he thought. "Frames are the new prisons. Words form cages of thought." He smudged the last image before signing his name and placing it gently into the editor's box. "Can we speak?" Scott jumped at the sight of his boss, Frank Barnes. "Yeah." Scott smiled. "I was just dropping tomorrow's strip for you." "That's what we need to speak about." Frank said, solemnly. "Come into my office please."

The coldness of the office interior sent chills up Scott's spine. He stared at the press awards Frank had lining his office walls, the pictures, the handshakes, the gold plaques, the memories. All of them felt heavy to his tired eyes. Threatening. Frank sat in a chair opposite Scott and folding his hands, one in the other, as if in prayer. "So is it that bad?" Scott laughed, to break up the silence. "It is probably worse than you think." Frank replied. He drew a long breath in and sighed it out slow, before continuing. "We can't run your strip anymore. Maybe after the election but not right now. Not...right now." Scott sat back in the chair. A thousand thoughts went through his mind at once and he could only catch pieces of them. "Am I being fired?" he asked quietly. "No." reassured Frank. "No, they just don't want political comic strips. They feel yours are too partisan for our paper." "Too partisan or too honest?" Scott asked, anger choked in his throat. "I'm just telling you what they said." "Who's they?" "The board."
"The corporation." Scott sneered. "The very corporation that writes your paycheck." Frank remanded. "So what did they say? I can draw, but only if I draw what they want me to?" "You can draw comics that will unite the Nation. Draw images that will bring joy to the readers and support for the troops. Your personal political beliefs are not to be published by this paper." "Unless they coincide with the official party line, right?" Scott growled. He stood up and pressed his hands against the desk that separated them. "You don't have to fire me, Frank, I quit." "Well, I'm afraid you can't do that either." "What?" "The intelligence agency has a file on you. If you quit, they will come for you and charge you with fraud." "Fraud?" Scott sank down in the chair hard. "Tax evasion, I believe, was one of the charges." "How can they charge me with something I have never done?" Frank sighed again. "You see, it has nothing to do with you as a person. You only matter to the extent that you are and remain, a celebrated cartoonist. People love your comics but this is not the time to be critical, Scott. This is not a time for dissent. We must stand beside our Leader and his party. Otherwise...well...we threaten the very way of life that we enjoy."

Scott left the office numb. He felt as though someone had just pushed him off a cliff and he was still waiting to hit bottom. It wasn't until he got home and saw Elise reading to their daughter Amber, that the weight of Frank's warning hit him. He brushed away angry tears and walked in the door, smiling. Nothing was wrong, he told his wife. Today was a great day at work. Of course, he would check on Amber's present tomorrow. Of course, he remembered they were throwing a pizza party for her third birthday. His daughter came up to him. Her huge blue eyes reminded him of the sky without clouds, without even a chance of rain. This was the first time today he had noticed her shirt, though stained from lunch, had a huge flag on it and pretty sequins spelled out the words "God Bless the Nation." He held her tight, burying his face in her shoulder length red curls, as his sobs were muffled by the local news.


It's not perfect but it's mine. :) If you want to read the rest, email me and I'll send it to you.
As I said, this is really my way of trying to play with the boundaries of fact and fiction and to engage my recent studies in a creative/contemplative way.

peace!

Anti-Semitism and the evolution of fascism

Here, I would like to begin linking Adorno and Horkheimer's chapter "The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception" with the final one: "Elements of Anti-Semitism: The Limits of Enlightenment." I've been thinking over the evolution of fascism from the 30's to the present
and these are the similarities I see (as I understand them).
With regard to Adorno/Horkheimer's "Culture" essay:
Increasing and consolidating State control of the media, education and religious institutions (what Adorno/Horkheimer refer to as the "Culture industry") coupled with increasing economic (capitalist) support led to the absolute power of the Nazi party. This control of culture gave the Nazi's the illusion of power until political power had been consolidated and maintaining the illusion was no longer necessary. Today, our government maintains the illusion of democracy and "free" market capitalism when really, the corporations have replaced the fascist government as the center of power politically, culturally and economically. Corporations decide what candidates are electable, what issues are debatable, and what character flaws are worth divulging and what criticism is acceptable. They do this through the absolute power they maintain over the media and what stories get aired, how they are reported on, who can report on them and what stories are to buried in the back of the entertainment section. They also have amazing control over what is considered entertainment and even news when local news can be packaged by some p.r. company to sell products (such as grape seed extract or the extreme health benefits of encapsulated garlic) as "news you can use." Because fascism relies upon total control of the outside forces that shape social values (religious institutions, education, media) they can shape and distort in their direct influence, the inner values of individual citizens through repeated inundation with State propaganda.

Hitler's power came in his ability to convince the German people that he represented them, that he worked for their wellbeing and most importantly for him, the wellbeing of the German state. Building upon the inner fear that economic depression and WWI had left in Germans, Hitler was able to manipulate Socialist ideals into a tool to unite the people (winning hearts and minds?) under the flag of "one people." How different from this, is corporate fascism? A friend was telling me about an incident at Bronco Stadium recently where they people coming to the game were handed tiny American flags and subjected to a couple of patriotic speeches by local officials during the halftime, at which point, the public was reminded of the necessity of supporting the troops and asked to wave the flag. One of those telling the story commented on how he was half tempted to stand and give the Nazi salute but decided against it. My husband explained to me that in Nazi Germany, the idea of the collective was put higher than the importance of the individual (as in America today). But we do still have a tendancy to unite under a leader (even if we dislike that leader and feel free to ridicule him in the few outlets the corporate media allows) in times of crisis and/or war. So does this blurring of values into one nation, one people, one set of values (one religion?) and at times one leader automatically call for a need of a social/political/cultural scapegoat as found in Anti-Semitism? I think it does. Adorno/Horkheimer offer some thoughts on this that I'd like to share here and then compare to today. They write, "The fantasies of Jewish crimes, infanticide and sadistic excess, poisoning of the nation, and international conspiracy, accurately define the anti-Semitic dream, but remain far behind its actualization. Once things have reached this stage, the mere word "Jew" appears as the bloody grimace reflected in the swastika flag with its combination of death's head and shattered cross. The mere fact that a person is called a Jew is an invitation forcibly to make him over into a physical semblance of that image of death and distortion" (186).

How does American history and present compare to this projection of criminality and othering that made the Jew (to the Nazi's) the subject of national fear, scorn and hatred? Well, we have definite examples in history from the height of McCarthyism and the "red scare" where we put people to death, incarcirated and assasinated American citizens for the sake of national security. Today we have an interesting dynamic going on with the fact that the American public is kept in the dark by the mainstream media as to what our government has done, is doing and plans to do in the future for the sake of national security and global capitalism. All of the "culture industry's" efforts are directed to keep the American public myopic in their focus on "our" troops, "our" values, "our" leader and "our" way of life. What we are not left to consider is who gets to define these values and this way of life and how this way of life is contigent upon ensuring that others live in chaos, war, and poverty so that we may have this illusory peace that coincides with our illusory democracy and illusory freedom of press and separation of church and state. Therefore our "other" is this spectre of "terrorism," the perfect enemy in that it allows the perpetuation of fear and constant threat to justify the ever increasing monopoly of corporate power. I think it is interesting that the power source in this nation is also a faceless entity, deemed "soul-less" by many, but certainly faceless and its current 'enemy' is also faceless, though the primary target to date happen to have brown skin and be from certain oil rich countries and not from other countries that happen to be corporate financiers.

There's another quote from Adorno/Horkheimer I would like to share dealing with this culture of fear and blind conformity. They write, "Since the paranoiac perceives the world about him only as it corresponds to his blind purposes, he can only repeat his own self which is denatured into an abstract mania. The naked pattern of power as such, which dominates all around it as well as its own decomposing ego, seizes all that is offered to it and incorporates it, without reference to its specific nature, into its mythic fabric. ...As a philosopher he makes world history the executor of inescapable catastrophies and declines. As the perfect madman or absolutely rational individual, he destroys his opponents by individual acts of terror or by the carefully conceived strategy of extermination. In this way he succeeds. Just as women adore the unmoved paranoiac, so nations genuflect before totalitarian Fascism" (190-191).

So how does the "paranoiac" translate into a society where there is no one leader to blame? After all, Bush is a product of the power around him and you need no more proof of that than to look at which corporations have primary financial power in the current Iraq. The answer to that is (I think) offered by the example of the U.S. relationship to the rest of America. When we have a dictator in power that we like, he is never criticized by the U.S. press (although the world press sometimes wakes up and does criticize) but should this leader fall from grace and dare try to socialize of nationalize some part of his country against the wishes of corporate fascism, then is he suddenly demonized in the U.S. press and in most cases, subject to being overthrown, imprisoned and assasinated. These leaders are expendable just as worker are expendable just as freedom is expendable. How does this relate to the practice of genocide? Adorno/Horkheimer write, "Hitler demands justification for mass murder in the name of the legal principle of sovereign national rights, which tolerates any act of violence in another country" (194). The national trumphs the individual and the right of national sovereignty hinders any protection offered by international law. The Holocaust led to the establishment of international laws and importantly international tribunals to (in theory) protect against Hitler's justifications. Yet we have had several genocides since and an increasing weakening of international law to be anything other than a mouthpiece for national interests, with the greatest national power at present being the U.S. Individuals are still sacrificed to a certain power but that power is weilding more on more on the corporate level rather than by a single leader or even a single government. Adorno/Horkheimer also have thoughts on this. They write, "When the big industrial interests incessantly eliminate the econimc basis for moral decision, partly by eliminating the independent economic subject, partly by taking over the self-employed tradesmen, and partly by transforming the works into objects in trade unions, reflective thoughts must also die out. The soul, as the possibility of self-comprehending guilt, is destroyed" (198). The individual values are repackaged in a sense, replaced by what they call "stereotyped value scales" in which individual happiness becomes intigent upon complicity and complacency. Questioning, dissent and even debate become co-opted intitially until later denied outright. Do we see this now? Well not RIGHT now so much with the election. Or do we? Are people really allowed the media access to hold an open debate or even public dissent that will remain free from distortion or commentary that labels such acts ridiculous, subversive, unpatriotic, or even "treasonous"? The debates that are shown are offered to maintain the illusion of democracy in an increasingly monopolized system of corporate fascism. This is, as Adorno/Horkheimer explain, the lie that perpetuates itself or the lie that is "obvious but persists" (208).

peace!

a different vision indeed

Today I read how the band Black Tape for a Blue Girl felt about their show in Boise and it was a very cool show, contrary to what the Boise Weekly predicted. What strikes me though, and why I feel it is immensely important to support indy artists/labels is that by doing things yourself you can fight the monolith that is the corporate/capitalist machine. This thing that has a stranglehold on almost every aspect of society (American society especially) from vegetarian food production (MSN recently ran an article on how Americans are consuming more vegetarian foods which has of course led to the absorption of these small business by the larger corporations) to music. So, long story short, the band enjoyed their show here as much as we enjoyed their show. It was such a great environment because a few people brought their kids and danced with their kids to some of the songs and couples danced together. It was sweet.
So thanks to the band for coming. I'm also really glad for the turn out. I took two friends with me who'd never heard of the band and they really loved the show. Support your indy artists.
Here's a few labels/bands I've come across that I adore and feel free to email me some labels or bands you like.

Check out projekt (the label founded by Black tape for a blue girl founder Sam Rosenthal)
http://www.projekt.com

Ani DiFranco:
http://www.righteousbabe.com

Michael Franti/Spearhead:
http://www.spearheadvibrations.com

Also check out a local professor's music/project:
http://www.louiesimon.com/about.htm


peace!

"Bullet the Blue Sky" U2 from "The Joshua Tree"
In the howling wind comes a stinging rain
See it driving nails into souls on the tree of pain
From the firefly, a red orange glow
See the face of fear running scared in the valley below

Bullet the blue sky
Bullet the blue

In the locust wind comes a rattle and hum
Jacob wrestled the angel and the angel was overcome
Plant a demon seed, you raise a flower of fire
See them burning crosses, see the flames, higher and higher

Bullet the blue sky
Bullet the blue

Suit and tie comes up to me
His face red
Like a rose on a thorn bush
Like all the colours of a royal flush
And he's peeling off those dollar bills
(Slapping them down), one hundred, two hundred,
And I can see the fighter planes
And I can see the fighter planes
Across the mud huts as the children sleep
Through the alleys of a quiet city street
Up the staircase to the first floor
We turn the key and slowly unlock the door
A man breathes deep into saxaphone
Through the walls we hear the city groan
Outside is America
Outside is America

(I love this song because I view it as a critique of capitalism but also and most importantly of selling arms and how the trade in arms is so much more expansive than ever before. We'd rather sell people the means to kill one another than we would the medicine to cure their children, the food to feed themselves or simply leave them alone and allow them to support themselves free of our "free" market. So, this song means alot to me).

validation

I want to share an article from UN Wire which I think needs to be repeated:

World leaders urge reform in United Nations speeches A series of speeches by heads of state at the United Nations this week contained calls for broad reform of the international body, with Canada's Paul Martin laying out a vision of a stronger, more active UN. Chilean President Ricardo Lagos said the world needed "a better United Nations," with more transparency and accountability. Robert Mugabe, the controversial president of Zimbabwe, used his speech to denounce U.S. President George W. Bush and U.K. Prime Minister Tony Blair, who he called Bush's "prophet," while Pakistani Prime Minister Pervez Musharraf warned against an "iron curtain" descending "between the West and the Islamic world." The Globe and Mail (Toronto) (free registration) (9/23), BBC (9/23), The Santiago Times (Chile) (9/23), The Boston Globe (9/23)


I especially find the accusation/contemplation of an "iron curtain" descending most interesting.
But I would take that a bit further, in calling it a noose of "terrorism" strangling reason and rational/proportional precautionary measures to prevent further terrorist attacks. This veil of fear is designed to keep people too distracted by that fear to examine gross structural inequality that creates the conditions of terrorism. It is also attempts to limit/silence criticism of blanket surrendering of civil and human rights to yet another omnipresent spectre. Yes terrorist attacks are a very real threat and always changing in intensity BUT where do you draw the line between legitimate fear and fearmongering? For me, that line must be drawn at the point to which the spectre overshadows the reality or overpowers it, transforming grief and legitimate grievance into a rallying call for war, torture, and illegal imprisonment. How does the U.S. response to the 9/11 terrorist attacks differ from that of Spain, Bali and Russia (to list a few recent examples)? This little brief though that I posted here is immensely gratifiying to see but you also have to consider where these critiques are coming from (notice none are from France, Germany, England, China, Russia) and wonder why.

Peace!


"She is running to stand still"--U2

law made flesh (Beccaria on torture and capital punishment)

I'm reading (for a history class) an excerpt from Cesare Beccaria's "An essay on crimes and punishments" and he asks a question I would like to repeat here: "What is the political object of punishments? The intimidation of other men" (530). It just amazes me that there are so many arguments about the ineffectiveness and cruelty of disproportionate punishment, criminality, and even of the notion that mankind should have some dignity of flesh that laws cannot punish arbitrarily. Yes Beccaria is a thinker during the "enlightenment" but I'm wondering how far back you could trace the idea that there is such a notion of "human" rights.
Beccaria doesn't seem to distinguish (at least in this tiny excerpt) between men and women or "men" and all of mankind so I'm wondering if his thoughts on crime and punishment are extended to all women and men regardless. What I really enjoy about both Beccaria's essay and the one I read earlier by Montesquieu is that they both attack the idea that men should be able to punish one another for religious transgressions (questioning the idea of criminality/deviance at the level of thought, rather than basing it in action which is where Montesquieu distinguishes between justice at the public (the only place courts and the laws of men can govern/discipline) and private realm (this, he argues, should be between that of man and God).
What is most striking about this is that you could apply everything they are saying to current events. Beccaria argues extensively about the ineffectiveness of torture to coerce confessions of guilt or to determine innocence and Montesquieu challenges the idea that the government should be able to prosecute crimes against "nature" as these crimes are always changed by the changing social consciousness and should not be punished according to outdated law and pratice/prejudice. This is extensive paraphrasing on my part so please keep that in mind. Beccaria's critique of torture is quite timely considering how torture is still OBVIOUSLY used and in the way he suggested, both to coerce confession but also to instill fear of punishment in those awaiting torture or those already criminalized. Anyhow, the readings come from "The Portable Enlightenment Reader" edited by Isaac Kramnick. I'm off to read Voltaire's views on capital punishment and then (hopefully) to sleep.

peace!

puzzling over legality

I'm skimming over the intro to a book titled: "Beyond the Mountains of the Damned: The war inside Kosovo" in which the author Matthew McAllester writes "This is also the story of the Serb paramilitaries who terrorized Pec. They ruled with murder. Today, most of them are alive and well in the new Yugoslavia. So unconcerned are some of Yugoslavia's paramilitaries about the prospect of ever being held accountable for their crimes that they could sit down over coffee and beer after the war to discuss in detail their brief, brutal reign in the hell that was Kosovo" (1).

McAllester raises an important issue here. What is (or is there a) statute of limitations on the prosecution of war crimes/war criminals? Perhaps one reason (the biggest reason) Nuremberg was such a powerful act/example of justice and judicial process because the trials didn't drag out for ten, twenty, thirty or fifty years. Now though, there is the problem of declaring "genocide" and of demanding action, whether that be through sanctions or military action. So I'm curious what happens to those who are left with the memories and consequences of genocide? What recourse do they have? Will the former Yugoslavia have to remain an occupied zone to prevent a future "quagmire"? Will Iraq? I think that the passing of time is important to consider in relation to criminality and "justice." More importantly though, what happens to the survivors after the world media moves on to something a little more, exciting? Afghanistan rarely makes the news these days, but Iraq is mentioned almost hourly, with sprinkles here and there about Dafur. So, when as someone once said "The court of public opinion" develops ADD and amnesia all at once, what legal recourse remains? McAllester also quotes an interesting perspective on this offered by Michael Ignatieff, "...he suggests that Kosovo will set a pattern for the wars of the future: Television, public opinion, domestic political concerns, an absence of self-sacrifice, computer hacking, and the approval of military lawyers vetting all targets will characterize future wars" (2). I have to say I agree with this. It seems that once a "tragedy" is out of sight, it is out of mind except for those who cannot forget it nor leave it behind. I suppose my big question is how does the international legal system of tribunals and criminal courts succeed and fail in its ability to protect basic human rights? I think one huge aspect of failure is time. Failure to act (often due to all sorts of international wrangling between the major powers over prosecutorial rights and other fun issues of power) to recognize/to keep a consistent standard/to uphold humanitarian intervention when it is called for and refuse to support military aggression that masquarades as humanitarian intervention when it will create further chaos, torture, economic disaster, and genocide. Perhaps the biggest problem is in the definitions and who gets to define/utilize those words "torture" and "genocide." When does murder become genocide? When does rape become a crime against humanity vs. simply being a crime against an individual, an individual violation of the borders of the body that state laws are supposed to protect vs. the violation of the agency of one's body with the intent/attempt to annihilate a culture? How do you strengthen the definitions that seem far too vague, far too easily manipulated into something workable and enforcable if States refuge to relinquish any notion of legal sovereignty in prosecutorial matters? In other words, how can any court have any real dominion if the U.S. or another nation can claim exemption? How is international law ever to be taken seriously if those who are actually able (and supposedly willing) to adhere to and enforce it are in the habit of violating it and worse, setting precedents that others can violate it as well? These are my questions. Feedback is welcome. If you have any good resources/insights/concerns on these issues please send them my way.

peace!


"Mothers of the Disappeared" U2, from "The Joshua Tree"
Midnight, our sons and daughters
were cut down and taken from us
Hear their heartbeat...
We hear their heartbeat
In the wind
We hear their laughter
In the rain
We see their tears
Hear their heartbeat...
We hear their heartbeat
Night hangs like a prisoner
Stretched over black and blue
Hear their heartbeat...
We hear their heartbeat
In the trees
Our sons stand naked
Through the walls
Our daughters cry
See their tears in the rainfall

Monkey see, monkey do

What is it with the "world press" anyway? The president of one nation can command an entire army of mass media to jump when he says jump, and praise occupation when he says so? Wow.
Maybe Bush takes his evangelical stance a bit too seriously. The trend really is that when ratings in those incredible "polls" start to slide a bit, the leader rallies the world around his/their war by reminding how in doing so, we're really supporting the troops. There is nothing WRONG with supporting our troops, in fact we should support them by prolonging their lives and their sanity and their families' wellbeing by bringing them HOME safely rather than using them as an occupying force. Imagine that. I love to watch the weird relationship between the leadership and the media, the way that the 'retraction' and 'blame' slight of hand get played quicker than a game of poker where the establishment always comes out winning. Crazy magician it is. Free press anyone? I know I've read Marx's view that the mass media exists only to further the goals of the ruling capitalist class in Political Sociology but the "world press"??? Is nothing immune from the almighty dollar? I'm stunned by the many ways this administration has been able to unite and divide the entire world either in support of the U.S. (as in directly after 9/11, in suffering) or against it, (as in pre-Operation Iraqi Freedom or "Bush War II")
The mainstream American press obviously has alot to do with the uniting/dividing of the American people, but MUST we continue being content with our role as pawns in some fucking global chess game? If you don't want to be one of those three monkeys (See/hear/speak no evil) then watch the indy media and compare all that the truly global media has to say from those pre-packaged pop tarts masquerading as brain food. Support every troop and civilian (the truly voiceless) by educating yourself beyond what Fox, CNN, CBS, NBC will sell you is "newsworthy" or "truth."

In one of my classes we just finished "The Surrounded" by D'Arcy McNickle and there is an interested parallel in the way the current U.S. leadership seems to think that war/occupation is necessary to help these poor Iraqis into democracy (by force?) just as it once thought it needed to help the Native Americans into "civility" (and I won't even mention the lust for land and resources!) The American people are also treated as children by this administration in its post 9/11 glorification. Let the wounds heal and stop creating new ones please. I've heard people term this "war" (it's actually "peace" now isn't it?) the new Vietnam or American's second Vietnam or America's Afghanistan but I'm thinking its more like America's Palestine. Perhaps on this one case we could do well to learn from Israel in that the more you destroy, the more homes/lives/way of life you destroy, the more anger/frustration/desperation and hatred you create. Imagine that. This point of view seems quite lost on the mass media (and wisely so, I'm sure). If they were to feed the American people a daily diet of the reality of war, do you think that our troops would still be there, yet alone be willing to send more? Bush once spoke of having learned the "lessons of Vietnam" and I think that indeed he has. Our government has never since allowed the media the freedom of press that the US media eventually had in covering Vietnam so that the seething unforgettable images from Vietnam OF WAR are replaced by images of shiny happy troops and shiny happy Iraqis (including the occasional "terrorist/insurgent" photo to reaffirm again and again WHY we MUST stay) .

peace!

"Sometimes, it's easier to live in fiction"--from Michael Franti/Spearhead "Pray for grace"
(Thanks to Marcy for introducing me to the music Franti/Spearhead. They offer great music but also great hope!)


"Do not scold the little birds.
We need their songs.
Do not hate your own body.
It is the altar for humanity's spirit."
"Do not destroy the structure of suchness within you"--Thich Nhat Hahn

a notion in your face, but a world in your eyes

Last thought for the night.
Have you ever stared hard into the eyes of another, to see past the idea you have of them to the beautiful, wonderful, fascinating, creative, intelligent enigma that person actually IS?

I can't wear the identity "American" on my sleeve can I? But perhaps in my walk, talk, or way or dress I do. Perhaps. But perhaps it would be better if I didn't look for a catagory to put you in so that I could relate comfortably to you and in my comfort, in my comfortable numbness, be able to see you as you are, not as I'd think you to be? What do YOU think about when you look at the eyes of a child in a picture? Or a picture from Afghanistan of COUNTLESS men and women running on what legs they have or without legs, but crutches for legs, due to the reality of landmines? What does an image of men holding other men hostage do to your stomach? What does the news story retelling the horrific last hours of children being held hostage (ransom in a horrid political power struggle, really) make you think about the word "terror"? What do you feel when you see a picture of a child who is overweight caught in the act of eating fast food? Or of a child whose belly protrudes from starvation and disease? Or what about the recurrent images that paint those in the Middle East as barbaric, as they drag a body through the streets, lift a bloody flag in the air beneath a parade of fists, or the ones of Palestinian children with faces half-covered, hurling rocks at Israeli soldiers? Perhaps you are already thinking of a catagory to put them in, these images that seem to define a people when in fact all they truly define is the vantage and view of a photographer. I am reminded of the National Geographic article that revisted an Afghani woman whose picture was taken post Sept 11th and her "wild eyes" that "captivated a nation." It is most telling that the woman did not take kindly to her picture being taken yet alone plastered over countless magazine covers. The photographers voyeuristic gaze did not care to acknowlege yet alone respect the fact that her cultural practice of veiling was intended to protect her from such a gaze. Yet I remember that image and her eyes and how for a moment, I thought and sought to understand what it must be like to live in a nation under constant bombs and in a state of perpetual starvation.

Perhaps we search the eyes of others for a communication that goes beyond words, beyond comfort and catagory. So if I'm quiet, it is because I'm trying to see beyond my notion of all that is reflected in your face. Forgive my stare. I'm learning to look at the world in your eyes.

peace!

"Resolution" By Thich Nhat Hahn (from "Call Me by My True Names")
You fight us
because we fight hatred,
while you feed on hatred and violence
for strength.

You curse us
because we don't give man a label
and turn a gun barrel on him.

You condemn us
because you can't use our blood
in paying off your debts of greed;
because you can't budge us
from man's side,
where we stand to protect all life.

And you murder us
just because we bow our heads
before man's love and reason;
because
we steadfastly refuse
to identify him
with the wolves.

"Do not destroy the structure of suchness within you"--Thich Nhat Hahn

being accused of "lazy intellectualism"

I've been accused recently of "lazy intellectualism" which was equated by this person as ingratitude for my freedom afforded by the suffering/lives of others. This is actually not my intended purpose for my blog so if it comes across that way, I suppose I would consider it a perceptual misunderstanding. I feel extremely fortunate to be a citizen of this nation but I also feel that it is my responsibility as such to question (as one would presume one's role to be in a democracy) and hold elected officials accountable for their decisions, particularly those that concern those outside our borders. So, I'm wondering if the words "lazy intellectualism" are actually indicative of a laziness on the part of those who like to sling such mud, unwilling to come up with a more imaginative slur. Why, doesn't this actually lend itself quite well to the idea of mass-produced rhetoric that frames debate to inhibit resistance? Well, my critic was correct in their assesment that I don't "know" anything. I don't. I actually never claimed to either. That's the beauty of intellectualism to me, I can actually work with these theories and not have to pretend to know anything conclusive. Fox news actually spews more fiction as facts than I have ever tried to do here so, while I thank this person for taking the time to critique me, I am too tired at this moment to engage in some sort of battle of wits. I am a student and this blog is my space to try and reflect upon what I am reading/studying/learning. So please consider it as such. I do. I prefer to think of it as a dogma free zone. Thank you.

Peace!

Please don't think (individuals in captivity)

I'm always fascinated by the way that we in the U.S. are always assured of our "choices," of our "individualism" and yet we find ourselves increasingly turned into a non-thinking, pleasure seeking "group." This is the main point of the Adorno/Horkheimer essay as well, that the culture industry exists to assure we feel/think/believe ourselves to be individuals and yet to assure we are anything but. Take this essay out of the "culture industry" context for a second and put it into education. Think about how the meritocracy encourages individualism only to the extent that a child "excels" within a given structure: i.e. excellence = conformity. Children learn very early (sadly enough) that questioning "authority" is useless and can even bring punishment, alienation, and the label of deviant. So, the child that learns to be a parrot, to jump when told, to speak/think/act when prompted is reduced to the lab rat that gets the cheese only when it navigates a maze via mastering the system of learned fear/punishment/pain and reward. The child that jumps through the required hoops is rewarded at the end and taught that they are good/smart/impressive etc. The child that questions why the hoops exist, why the structure must be, why the rules seem oppressive is punished, ostracized, deemed deviant, rebellious or that dreaded word: incorrigible. But children are naturally inquisitive and they LOVE to challenge authority so by forcing them into a system of conformity and obedience we are assuring social cohesion and collective identity NOT individualism nor freedom in any real sense of the word.

This brings me back to my original thought. Why are we encouraged to believe that we are individuals, in the best society possible, without question when everything we know about our individual identity is shaped in relation to others? We do not learn who we are even as a "society" without first defining what we are not. The point here is not to question where the definitions come from, but why they exist and who they protect/promote/privilege?
So how does that work? How is it that we as "Americans" are willing to fight to uphold this notion of individualism that doesn't seem to exist in reality, while still subscribing to a collective identity of Americanism. I just find it interesting that many are so determined to blindly uphold a mass produced myth that perpetuates gross economic inequality in the name of "individualism" while simultaneously arguing that there is such a thing as a "national" identity, this invisible entity of experience that "unites" "us." We can't even agree on a textbook history of every single "American" yet alone approach anything resembling 'class consciousness' that would allow for a collective resistance to the repression of true freedom. Is a "national" identity a good thing, particularly when it can be manipulated into a call for war and violent retribution?
Should a democratic nation look to an "elected" representative as a father figure? Doesn't that dynamic reduce a thinking/feeling/reflecting public to a childlike collective frightened of every shadow? It has been pointed out quite effectively by several of my professors that the very best aspects of U.S. life has come as a result of socialist struggle NOT one for individual freedoms but collective freedoms/safety/security. And yet even the collective can obviously be coerced into thinking "it" needs a "strong, steadfast leader" rather than one that is all too human in places compassionate wisdom above dogmatism and willing to admit mistakes rather than flatly deny even being caught in a lie. Most two year olds can admit when they've been caught in a lie and yet we won't even hold our "elected" leaders to that same standard. This disturbs me.

It also makes me think about the many ways in which people are stripped of their individuality by boot camp/basic training, religious affiliations, EDUCATION, capitalism, family pressure, societal pressure, economic necessity. Well they are many, many ways in which this notion of individual freedom starkly contrasts the reality of life in the U.S. and as Adorno/Horkheimer argue, this respect/adoration/elevation of the individual in enlightenment thinking is now itself a commodity. We are really consumers to this industry that sees us as profits or as they put it, "Industry is interested in people merely as customers and employees, and has in fact reduced mankind to this all-embracing formula" (147).

They unpack the individual vs. collective dilemma quite well, arguing: "Everybody is guaranteed formal freedom. No one is officially responsible for what he thinks. Instead everyone is enclosed at an early age in a system of churches, clubs, professional associations, and other such concerns, which constitute the most sensitive instrument of social control" (150). This makes sense in the way that even debates can be framed in such a way as to prevent actual dialogue or discussion and speeches can be framed in such a way as to prevent critical thought/reflection upon the constant repetition of certain phrases to assure that listeners believe there is such a thing as a national consciousness. Can a "nation" have a consciousness? How often do individuals truly think/reflect/feel exactly the same long enough to develop a shared consciousness? I don't think we communicate enough with each other to actually have a shared world view yet alone a shared consciousness mature enough to be a collective identity. Actually, Adorno/Horkheimer go into this as well, arguing: "Life in the late capitalist era is a constant initiation rite. Everyone must show that he wholly identifies himself with the power which is belaboring him."
"Everyone can be like this omnipotent society; everyone can be happy if only he will capitulate fully and sacrifice his claim to happiness" "In the culture industry the individual is an illusion not merely because of the standardization of the means of production. He is tolerated only so long as his complete identification with the generality is unquestioned" (153-154).

So if I understand this right, (it seems they are arguing Marx's view of capitalism and its relationship to the superstructure) the illusion of the individual's freedom/choice is perpetuated to both distract him/her from the reality of his powerlessness as a worker/commodity and repress in him/her the ability and willingness to resist such oppression. This perhaps is why the "left" is so divided as a group. Those who consider themselves "rightists" are very happy to view their interests as a group and as individuals. In fact, they are so good at it, they convince everyone else that their interests ARE everyone's interests and that their gains ARE society's gains. The "left," on the other hand, seems to be so stuck in factionalism and this factionalism gets grossly overrepresented to the point to where Kerry can't call himself a liberal because it's the new bad word, equated with everything from lazy intellectualism to "tree hugging" environmentalist. The "left" is also underrepresented as a "group" because the few successes are seen as concessions offered to maintain social cohesion rather than the hard earned fruits of a struggle enacted for the good of the social BY concerned and dedicated individuals. They are not represented by the "liberal" media as a positive however, they are either ignored, belittled or presented as a threat to social order: "Unpatriotic" "Anti-" "Protest-happy."
Adorno/Horkheimer offer a great quote to tie this together: "The blind and rapidly spreading repetition of words with special designations links advertising with the totalitarian watchword" (165). I don't think most of us (myself included) truly understand all of the political implications such tiny words "right" and "left" can have but we throw them around anyway because politicians use them as if they were really metaphors for good and bad, success and failure, morality and sin. Right and left are only words but they also offer us catagories of indentification that both fuel the myth of individual choice and collective identity. Do these words REALLY define you? Or do they simply bind you into a way of thinking/feeling/acting that has already been fed to you as a definition/identity? What is SO wrong about thinking of others wellbeing anyway? What is SO wrong about caring for the environment that we all must share? It is most puzzling to me how if you are considered a "liberal" you are denounced as being a foolish "bleeding heart" when every American is dependent upon the work of others (and even the wellbeing of others) to assure their own livelihoods and the success of the U.S. as
a nation. This is also part of the problem with univeralizing a Western model of human rights when even in this country, rights are really privileges that the State offers, delivers, and can take away. More on this later.

peace!

"the culture industry: enlightenment as mass deception"

I'm working through Adorno and Horkheimer's "Dialectic of Enlightenment" and primarily the chapter titled "The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception." From what I gather, the main point of their argument is that what masquarades as culture in society has no true freedom (as one would assume of art/music/literature/film). It is instead a commodity designed to convince a consumer that they have freedom of choice, when in fact that choice has already been made for them. This is an incredible argument given our current society and the manipulation of mass consciousness through advertising and ESPECIALLY political ads in the United States. Just think about the power a "poll" has to raise a political candidate to superstardom or to crush them. Whose voice is represented in these polls anyway? For the past two days I've been keeping up with the news watching specifically for the polls and I haven't been disappointed, in that every news site reads some variation on the same theme: "Bush leads in this poll, tied in others" or "Kerry's lead with women slipping." What does this do then? Does this make their campaign managers and p.r. folks scramble for whatever leverage they can or could it that the truth is closer to what Adorno and Horkheimer are suggesting, that these polls are not designed to gauge any real consumer/social response but to create that response and feed it back to us as if it were our voice? As if we had a collective voice? Do we? Can we?

One question I have with Adorno and Horkheimer's argument is their point that even those appearing to rebel against the culture industry cannot for any sort of rebellion only serves to "...confirm the validate the system" (129). How then do you challenge the system if you risk either alienation from it (which you can see in the demonization of Marxist theories and socialism with a capital "S") or co-optation by it to the point to where everyone from the U.S. president to extreme rightists can use the words of Martin Luther King Jr., Jesus, and Gandhi to give themselves a seeming validity, while damning all notions of the very "liberalism" that each of these men stood for. What this essay does quite well is that it focuses on the economic noose that tightens around artists, essentially forcing some form of acquiesence and conformity or essentially starvation and poverty. Is this true across the board, maybe, maybe not. After all, there have been plenty of cases where people have published their own work, according to their own rules and have made a significant social impact, acquired a decent following but how often does this happen? I was reading another news bit recently about the "rise of American consumption of vegetarian products" and at the bottom of the article, there was a little blurb about how many of these small businesses offering organic produce and organically produced vegetarian goods (including especially non-GMO products) have been bought up by the very corporations that are equally content to put out bio-engineered, radioactive, prettily packaged shit and call it food. So, shouldn't that be a bit troubling?

Some of the most important quotes from this essay (thusfar) are exploring the relationship between the manipulation/monopoly of and the existence of a truly "social" consciousness: They argue "Under a private culture monopoly it is a fact that the "tyranny leaves the body free and direct its attack at the soul. The ruler no longer says: You must think as I do or die. He says: You are free not to think as I do; your life, your property, everything shall remain yours, but from this day on you are a stranger among us." Not to conform means to be rendered powerless, economically and therefore spiritually--to be "self-employed" ..."As naturally as the ruled always took the morality imposed upon them more seriously than did the rulers themselves, the deceived masses are today captivated by the myth of success even more than the successful are. Immovably, they insist on the very ideology which enslaves them" (133-134)

So is this arguing that we are essentially both bound to and responsible for subscribing to the very notions of success that enslave us to remain workers for others rather than masters of ourselves? This is interesting in the context of the hyper-individualism that permeates "American" culture. Where does the individual end and the social begin if the very idea of the individual is shaped by the social and cannot be divorced from it and the social is created to give the illusion of individual choice/freedom? Wow. More on this later.

peace.

Adam Smith and Karl Marx

Imagine for a moment what those two minds might have had to say to one another...
and then think for a moment what my brain went through today trying to follow Adam Smith's "The Wealth of Nations" with a historical intro (intro to "classical") Marxism. I wish we could've talked about Smith's view on Monopolies, but we didn't have time. I wish we could've discussed what Marx actually said about religion and especially about his warning against replacing the capitalist/individualism with "society" as the oppressor. But we didn't. I wish we could've expanded upon this crazy "soulless" entity that is a multi-national corporation and its relationship to capitalism in relation to Smith but we didn't have time, nor was that the point of the class. What I often wonder most is why we can't let these theorists speak for themselves? Why do we (and why must we be encouraged to) assign value judgments and try to impose/impart someone else's "wisdom" on "their words"? I want to hear Marx for himself. I want to hear Smith. I want to hear them divorced of my or anyone else's interpretation, particularly that of a textbook writer bent on either glorifying or demonizing certain said positions. In all honesty, the soc theory text we used did not (to my tired mind) glorify or demonize Marx and the pathetic excerpt in my "Enlightenment Reader" on Smith offered too little to really judge anything of value. But I can't take afford to spend the rest of my life in college taking courses to try to better understand economics so that I can actually make sense of Smith anymore than I can afford to major in anthropology, philosophy, and history to make heads and tails of Marx. So what do you do then with the theory when it is taken out of context and thrown into a book of excerpts? What do you do when a theory is put into a context with which you are not familiar and thus even less able to grasp it? My one complaint with Arendt's book thusfar is that she uses so much Latin and references to the classical theory of Augustine that I feel I need a course on classical theory or at least a "reader" a translator and lots of caffeine to keep up. I really want a dialogue with Arendt and Marx and Smith but I am not sure how to get that if I'm basing all of my understanding of them (if you want to call it that) on the "understanding/interpretations" of others. Why not go to the source, to the authors themselves and then use these "readers" to build upon the foundation and let a critical dialogue unfold from there? I am not by any means criticizing professors in this or their preferred teaching style or even book choices. What I am questioning is the logic of class structures that really could be far more effective if spread over two semesters. If not economized. McDonaldized. I really just think that for me to even come close to understanding Marx or Smith, I need to step back from my worldview and into theirs long enough to see the world through their eyes and in their words. We are encouraged to do this in some classes but not in others. In some courses you are expected to engage the material and in others, the material is simply laid out in front of you to be memorized and recited on an exam later. I don't know how I can understand any of these works terribly well by feeding my brain the fast food version (convenience store version) of the theories. It would be nice if we could actually discuss their views in depth (AND CONTEXT) without it having to be based on whether or not we disagree with them. One thing that struck me about reading what the text quoted from Marx is how easy it is and how often he has been misinterpreted and thus, misunderstood, manipulated, demonized and misquoted. This thought always returns me, rather uncomfortably, to something Hitler said, "What good fortune for governments that men don't think." My Com 101 teacher was the first to use that quote in a class, largely to shock people not by what Hitler said, but by omitting everything but the words "MEN DON'T THINK" and asking people who they thought might've said that. You'd be amazed how many women laughed and how many people suggested that women might've said it. When she revealed the rest of the quote, people were stunned both by the context and by the speaker so in short, I simply wish for what may seem silly and hopeless at the undergrad level... that we be given more time and more opportunity to actually engage these theorists that still shape our world today, not to be fed from the hand of one paid to interpret them but from they themselves. I do not think students are really too inept to be able to read these texts and that with the guidance of a decent professor, would they fall short of accomplishing what theory is intended to do: call for pause, reflection, engagement and action/implementation. What is the point of it otherwise if not to reaffirm the belief held by those "time-card punchers" (students who really don't want anything from a class except a grade and a degree at the end) that the purpose of university is not to grapple with anything but rather to get a degree and then a "real job"? Maybe this is useless complaining on my part. I sat in a class today of a teacher I respect highly for the fact that she teaches in seminar style, only to listen to another student complain "I didn't pay $3,000 to sit in a fucking circle." This student sat out and refused to participate perhaps as a tool of protest, which struck me as funny, how we can protest anything really if we set our minds to doing so. Is it appropriate to say hey, can't we discuss this? I mean authors pick some of those wildest quotes from the theorists and present them as the culminating threads of their theories (which I find rather problematic) but with Marx's quotes I saw something I hadn't read in him before. This, to me, was the unrepresented Marx. The Marx that perhaps could've sat down and challenged Smith on his the simplicity of his assumptions. When I read these words, I felt as though Marx could've said this today, right now, right here. He could've sat right here and said this same thing as so many are doing. Whether or not you fall on the side of Marx or Smith their social criticisms do deserve to be weighed against history and the present for the sake of the future. I still think though (as I seem to be repeating) that we could appreciate or even argue with so much more of their theories/criticisms if we were exposed to them in their OWN words and allowed/encouraged to engage them in a dialogue that seeks not to simply discredit them or even affirm them but rather reflecting upon them critically, as students are supposed to be learning to do.

I suppose I don't understand the idea of a pedagogy that is more "traditional" in that students are simply to read to the point of recitation without actually LEARNING anything other than how much they hate such and such said teaching style or this book or that chair. It seems sad and silly to reduce the wonderful environment and opportunities that higher ed affords to a mechanistic assembly line designed to spit out students into respective categories of assimilation, privilege, productivity and waste. This is especially annoying when you think about HOW EXPENSIVE higher education is and how most of us (me included) are going to have to pay the government back for the opportunity to be categorized. Today the provost commented about how we must convince the community of the importance of investing in BSU students. I think you have to go beyond that. I think you have to convince people that learning for its own sake has value, that a degree should at least be of equal or greater value to the amount of money spent in earning it, and that the quality of students reflects every budget cut, every crammed class, ever overworked and underpaid faculty member and every damn technological "advance" just as well as it reflects every ambition and moment of energy spent in this dialogue we call education. It is a cooperative in that way that however much we put in must be matched by the willingness and the enthusiastic support of a structure that truly does pride itself on providing the best educational opportunities/atmosphere. You can't have that by cutting salaries while raising student fees. Nor will you get it by skimping on the quality of undergraduate education in favor of instituting master's programs. Those students who are pushed through will not make it through grad school, will they? Those professors who are pushed to do so (at least those who actually care) won't appreciate being turned into a commodity either. Isn't it funny how it always comes back to the root problem of individuals having to sell their labor for far less than their work is worth? I know there are many structural problems with the system of education and I'm sure no non-ivy league college is immune to them just as in many of the k-12 public schools. So perhaps my critique of this is all unfounded and I'm really overtired and have read too much today. Perhaps because I am only a student I have no real clue about these things work and why they do, as they seem to. Perhaps I am trying to apply Marxist theory in some deluded manner at almost two in the morning to a situation that I simply cannot understand as I am only a junior at an underfunded State University. I hope for my friend that she does not graduate this University thinking it failed her and that my graduate friend does not continue feeling all of her hard work has been a waste. That would undoubtedly be the greater tragedy in this mechanistic overhaul of higher ed. This is also where I feel that for me at least the two paths of Marx and Smith converge in relationship to today.

"One day you will see clearly:
you've been knocking on a door without a house.
You've been waiting, shivering, yelling
words of badly concealed and excessive hope.
Where you saw a house, there'll just be another side.

One day you will see clearly:
there is no one on the other side,
except-as ever-the jubilant ocean
which won't shatter
ceramically like a dream
when you and I shatter." --from Kapka Kassabova's poem
"The Door: anticipation of wisdom" (anthologized in "Staying Alive: real poems for unreal times" pg 70)

"we make our own gravity to give weight to things
and then things fall and they break
and gravity sings"--Ani (from "Hour follows hour")


Peace.