"Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death!”
Thursday, April 29, 2021
Tuesday, April 20, 2021
Sick 'n' Evil
as i write this i'm feeling totally wiped out. i think i came down with something saturday, for that evening i felt the first symptom: listlessness. i went to bed before midnight, a couple of hours earlier than usual, and slept extra long. yesterday (sunday) i had little energy and spent more time than usual in bed, trying to stay warm (slight fever and chills) with little appetite, but now i'm finding it difficult to get rest, because my whole body, joints and large muscles, ache as i lay down, just as it has this past night, as i lay tossing and turning, trying to get comfortable and get some sleep. in addition, i tended to get too warm as i tried to ward off the chills, and in addition to that, my mind was very active as i contemplated just how dystopian things are, after watching a couple of episodes of the old pbs documentary series about the civil rights movement, EYES ON THE PRIZE (being aired on the world channel), in which multiple scenes documented police brutality and of course the whole array of southern establishment racism, segregation, and white supremacy. but it was the scenes of racist brutal abusive police using clubs and tear gas against peaceful demonstrators and citizens seeking to register to vote that were most upsetting.
lately i've also been listening to youtube clips featuring dr. gail bradbrook, one of the founders and movers and shakers behind the organization EXTINCTION REBELLION. these are a little boring, as she's not a very compelling speaker. also i find her optimism that her little organization can change the world to be wholly unjustified.
i've been in the closet a long time when it comes to my opinions regarding 'conservatives', particularly those i know best here in america. i rail against them in the privacy of my home every day, as they strike me as the embodiment of evil. they outnumber radical environmentalists by at least 100 to 1, but the true measure of their power is found in their dominance in certain professions, like law enforcement and criminal prosecution. of course they've risen to dominance also in the republican party, which takes turns with the luke warm pitifully flaccid 'liberal' democratic party as high powered elected officials in government.
most of my extended family, similar to most sheeple in my area, are 'conservative' republicans. many are open racists. i wish i could understand them, communicate with them, reason with them so that they'd change their ignorant and stupid ways, but of course, unreasonable ignoramuses are defined in part by a lack of reasoning ability.
in a book i just finished reading (which wasn't very good), a book dealing with the civil rights movement in the years immediately following ww2 leading up to the supreme court decision in 1954 outlawing segregation titled UNEXAMPLED COURAGE, the author does a very brief review of a book titled THE MIND OF THE SOUTH, in which it is pointed out that the 'common white' of the jim crow south was characterized by 'intolerance (greatly absorbed by fears and hates), an incapacity of analysis, exaggerated individualism, attachment to fictions and false values, and a tendency to unreality'. sound familiar? these traits characterize modern 'conservatives' to a 't'.
in summary, i find no basis whatsoever for optimism that the very small segment of population that are radicals can overcome the huge segment that are 'conservatives'. we're screwed!
p.s. i wonder if i've come down with covid 19. i had my first vaccination late last month and am scheduled for the second one later this week. i hope to have recovered by then so that i may receive that shot, and not have to self isolate for an extended period of time.
here's one of the better youtube clips i've discovered featuring gail bradbrook of ER. it's only 25 minutes long:
Sunday, April 11, 2021
Harold Pinter Eviscerates American Imperialism
harold pinter was a british playwright who was awarded a nobel prize in 2005. ill at the time and unable to attend the award ceremony in sherson, pinter, a vociferously outspoken critic of militarism and imperialism, used the occasion to record a 46 minute acceptance speech titled Art, Truth and Politics, in which he scathingly attacked american foreign policy and british support for it, to be shown at the ceremony.
the relevant part of this criticism begins 10:40 into this youtube video. i've watched and listened to it a couple of times. i doubt if anyone has ever delivered a more eloquent and coldly impassioned critique on this topic. here's an excerpt:
'Political language, as used by politicians, does not venture into any of this territory [of the artist] since the majority of politicians, on the evidence available to us, are interested not in truth but in power and in the maintenance of that power. To maintain that power it is essential that people remain in ignorance, that they live in ignorance of the truth, even the truth of their own lives. What surrounds us therefore is a vast tapestry of lies, upon which we feed... The crimes of the United States have been systematic, constant, vicious, remorseless, but very few people have actually talked about them. You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for universal good.'
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