GREATNESS ITSELF IS THE BEST REVENGE

The man, the myth, the legend.

   I was sitting here trying to masturbate but it was just not fucking working for some reason so I guess ill "blog" instead. Here we go!

    Ok seriously fucking people shut up about how twitter and facebook and all this bullshit has caused the revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt. I mean dont get me wrong im usually totally in support of unsubstantiated declarations about technology and its socio-cultural implications but this is just stupid. Obviously years of authoritarian quasi-dictatorship, sham elections, social injustice, unemployment, cultural marginalization, and hamfisted economic wrangling (amongst other things) had nothing to do with this social unrest. Yeah, you are right guys, its pretty much just, like, you know, twitter or something. What was happening again? I dont know, im blazed, who cares. Anyway . . .

    Also all of this bullshit about the muslim brotherhood taking over so "oh god we cant let Egyptians have democracy!". Jesus christ, its like im not actually living in America sometimes.Let me take this moment to invite these people to leave my fucking country! The fact that these fear mongering mouthbreathers are actually making arguments against democratically elected administrations only underlines the absolutely toxic pessimism that exists towards our own "values" these days. If these people actually had faith in the democratic process or modernization or free markets or any of this other shit they espouse they would never be making arguments against democratic revolutions. You want to really fuck up islamic fundamentalists? Try doing everything possible to make america what it was supposed to be, the shining city on the hill! (LOOK OUT! IM REGANING!) Lead by example! Greatness itself is the best revenge! When the founding fathers set about to create this utopian fantasy land we are living in it was imagined not that others would come here to experience what was good about america, they imagined instead that other peoples of the world would look to us, look to what was good in america, and seek to emulate it in their own societies (Jeffersons reactions to the french revolution are instructive here). They hoped other nations would think globally and act locally if you will. If the first world (socially liberal democracies) are no longer the role model for marginalized peoples of the world its our own fucking fault. I would contend we, with these kind of pessimistic, xenophobic, colonial attitudes are helping the fundamentalists. I cant even believe people are saying this type of crap "Oh the arab people are not ready for democracy they will only elect to be ruled by backward fundamentalists".This is the worst kind of mystification. So fucking disgusting. What a horrible cynicism. The way to socially progressive leaders and open societies in the middle east is not through "the lesser of two evils" authoritarian regimes or more saudi arabias. As disheartening as it is to see the united states speaking with a forked tongue so often, as disheartening as it is to see political figures and talking heads shooting down the notions of equality and liberty I know full well that as these countries modernize, slowly and surly what will follow is socially liberal democratic governments. The people of Iran, Tunisia, Egypt, they are clamoring, searching everywhere for a way to break the strangle hold of despotic power structures. We can hope they do not choose fundamentalists regimes but we have only ourselves to blame if they do.

   Also though, if any of these fuckers start fucking up (anymore) the national museum where they keep all the little king tuts and shit im going to withdraw all my support for them and call for firebombings on the poorest suburbs because fuck you, you can revolt and not be a fucking barbarian about it you know? 

In this movie im watching Vincent Price is getting murdered with an axe, hmmm . . .OH GOD ELVIRA IS PLAYING SARAH PALIN! LATE NIGHT TV WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!

BLACK & YELLOW, BLACK & YELLOW, BLACK & YELLOW.

    Ive always loved that line Truman Capote had about Jack Kerouacs "on the road". "That's not writing, that's typing!" Its an astoundingly witty and interesting line. It problematizes and simultaneously answers the question it poses. It is a vexing question none the less, one which is confronted by much art of the 20^th century. What is art? What is writing? What is photography? What is painting? The answer seems to be that writing, and indeed all art, is not simply in the behavior or creating of the art itself. There is a subtle connotation touched on by this line. That which is behind the "act" of typing is writing. Not all typing is writing but all writing is typing. It is not simply the event itself but the connotation of the event which is important. It is the connotation of typing which is writing, which is art. Ive always loved this quote also because it draws a specific boundary between two otherwise seemingly identical things. It quite eloquently teases out the meaning of both terms and yet in no ham-fisted way does it define them explicitly.

   Always it seems to me people (sometimes myself included) misunderstand this relationship. The relationship between ideology and behavior. Ideology, in this case, is writing, the behavior is typing. Often we confuse the situation, not even realizing the ideology exists and mistaking the behavior as the totality of the subject. As if all typing was writing. There is no explicit definition of "writing" because writing, like all art and all culture, is about the connotations brought about by ideology. We cannot quantify "art". We cannot apply a scientific method to art. Art is beyond the boundary of "quantity". And in as much as we cannot apply science to art we cannot apply art to science. We cannot predict the outcome or the structure of an experiment via "aesthetics". Two plus two is never five, even when you feel like its the right answer. Moreover this inability to quantify art dovetails very nicely with the separation between ideology and behavior. We might quantify the behavior of an "art" but never its ideology. So say for instance we say photographs have to have such and such a ratio of light to dark space. Or a painting with these specific color values will be pleasing to the eye because the majority of "great" paintings have these color relationships. It is all well and good to analyze art at this level but it would be analyzing the typing not the writing. Judge art on this level, believe that this quantity is the totality of the art and it will forever remain "typing". No, to truly become invested in the art, to become lovers of art, to participate in the ideological exchange, we must divest ourselves of these analytic notions of structural analysis, of quantities. Teaching someone grammar is not teaching them to write. Sticking a brush and palette before them does not make them a painter. Or in the words of Chuck Palaniuk "sticking feathers up your butt does not make you a chicken"

DONT COME TO MY CITY, YOU MIGHT GET STUCK.

I DONT REALLY HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY BUT THIS IS A PICTURE OF KATY PERRY WITH A KITTY SO YOU KNOW, THERE IS THAT

ONCE UPON A TIME IN THE OLD WEST

    I really, in thinking about what I should write about on this blog, didnt want to "talk politics" or do topical news crap but somehow I cant help but write about this shooting last week in tuscon. It was, just like with the whole wikileaks thing, more interesting to see peoples reaction to the event than to see the actual event itself. I had been sitting on the internet that day (big surprise!) when the story broke and immediately hit cnn.com to see what they where saying. In the comments sections on the story, both on cnn and on other websites and messages boards around the internet, I was amazed by how quickly people started to jump to conclusions as to who or what had caused this shooting. The political "bias" of every commenter was evident in each post. One group saying this was a consequence of sarah palin and the tea parties "rhetoric of violence". Others saying the shooter could not of been right wing, he had to be a left wing shooter trying to assassinate the congresswomen because she was not left wing enough for him. Even more ridiculous I saw discussion that this was an assassination carried out by mexican drug cartels in retribution for arizonas drug polices (?who the fuck come up with this shit?).

    Almost no where did anyone state that this was probably just a lone crazed individual, a paranoid schizophrenic most likely, whos untreated and unmedicated mind had finally "snapped". Low and behold a few hours after the shooting the suspects name was released and in a short while myself and many others had found the shooters myspace and youtube videos, full of insane rambling about mind control and currency and whatever other nonsense this poor man was obsessed with. As an aside (as if this entire blog wasnt an aside) the question that he asked  gabrielle giffords in 2007, "How do you know words mean anything?" is quite interesting. Someone should mail him a copy of semiotics for beginners. Anyway, I have no faith in pop psychology but this violent act was obviously not the result of political rhetoric alone. This was, and is I believe, really an issue of mental health, not politics or violent video games or whatever other nonsense.

    None the less the issue quickly went, as we have all seen, from one of murder and violence to one of politics and symbolism. The event was politicized almost immediately after it happened. Quite gross really. It strikes me that this is one of those perfect baudrillardesque moments. The event is completely ignored in every facet. The connotation and implication of the event fascinates us more than the event even while we fully acknowledge that the connotations and implications have nothing to do with the thing itself. A complete "non-event". ""Who was hurt?" "I was! I was hurt by the inflammatory rhetoric of such-and-such party last year! Lets talk about that!". A completely cynical and gross reaction.

    Again, I dont know how else to say this, this is a metal health issue. Some people, through no fault of their own, are afflicted with various disorders and behave in completely irrational and anti-social ways. I couldnt help but notice that on the same day this was going on Jerry Browns budget here in california called for slashing funding for mental health services. Were the attitudes, institutionally and socially, more proactive in identifying and treating these conditions we might have less of these events. Less columbines, less virginia techs, and so on and so on. This type of violence has become disturbingly common. To the point that statical analysis can almost predict them to the day. I am very pro gun, but I must say, this toxic combination of access to firearms, backward and ignorant attitudes to mental health, and a complete lack of engagement by mental health services, combine in an inevitable conflagration of tragedy. To rehash james carvilles phrase, "its biology stupid!" not politics that motivated this event.

    In previous decades it may of been possible to leave the treatment and supervision of these individuals up to their families, their churches, the communities in which they lived. Now however such ties are increasingly fractured or even non-existent. In such a state it stands to social institutions to fill the roll of the "social". Without this kind of supervision such acts will only become even more common. In this case, and as with many others, the individuals involved in this violence came into contact with various "authorities". Their erratic behavior was noticed but did not "rise to the level" that it required intervention. It was "nobodys" problem. In this case the shooter was even expelled from the community college he was attending and was told (both he and his parents) that he could not return without a psychological evaluation. His behavior was such that teachers and students at the college feared he may commit a school shooting. Who was responsible for monitoring jareds state of mind? Was it his parents? The community college? The police? His friends? Jarred himself? I am reminded of the line by jean baudrillard "It is from the death of the social that socialism will emerge". If social interaction is becoming more and more remote, more and more "virtual" rather than "real", doesnt this leave only "social institutions" to fill the gap that "asocial" behavior has left? I dont even like socialism myself but I cant really, because of this uncomfortableness with socialism, be led to say that schizophrenics should be left to deal with their mental problems on their own. This seems a disservice to both the people suffering and society at large. This whole issue is such a messy and ugly business. No good answers.

     Issues of culpability not withstanding, the conversation this shooting has sparked is interesting. We seem to have seen a complete admission by talking heads, political figures, radio hosts and otherwise, that yes, our political rhetoric is uncivilized and sometimes even violent. David brooks, on charlie rose earlier this week, made a fascinating observation. He concluded that as social and cultural bonds have been dissolving in america in the last few decades, as race and even religion no longer holds people together, that politics has come to take that place. That politics has become our "race", our "religion". That our politics has come to define "our culture". The subsequent volatilization of political rhetoric has thus become like a kind of "racism". In which there is no room for dialog or compromise, the other side is just wrong through and through to the core of their being and nothing can be done about it. Brooks observation is to me, piercingly accurate. I have still only just started thinking of the implications of it.

     It is only in our environment of political correctness and pluralism that this "racism" be reborn, sanitized of its barbaric associations with "mere" race. United again with the true "races" of men, ideologies. Everywhere in political discourse we see today deterrence. This amazes me. No one speaks, as it were "positively", they speak from a place of defensiveness. Always aware that the enemies lie just outside the gate(ed community?) ready to attack. Always statements are made to deter the rhetoric of the opponent. A kind of asymmetric warfare of political "dialog". To slightly mangle a quote: "guerrilla armies never win wars but their enemies always loose them." This to me is the perfect commentary on our politics. Parties do not attempt to win, they only attempt to make sure the opposing side loses. You are not elevated by your rhetoric but the enemy is lowered, this passes for "dialog". Everywhere we see this deterrence and yet this is not a rhetorical scientific deterrence. Not a matter of "showing your work" so that teacher knows you know what he or she knows. No, instead this is a kind of subterfuge. Code language makes up our dialog specifically to deter the attack of imaginary political opponents. We double check our language not because we dont actually believe the things we say but because we dont want to get attacked for airing our true beliefs. Moreover our own attacks on our "enemies" are made in such a way as to make our own position unassailable. We attack indirectly with connotations and inversions of rhetoric, with implication and symbolic language. The events of this past week become a mine field. A roadside bomb. This is really a very sophisticated type of warfare. Even someone as seemingly politically inept as sarah palin not only engages in it but has a mastery of it (or is she just more lucky than good?).

     How do we deescalate this violence? How do we disentangle from this conflict? Paradoxically, and truly this is postmodernism at is finest, paradoxically it may be actual violence that begins the deescalation of rhetorical violence. There is now discussion that republicans and democrats will sit together during the state of the union address. What a far cry from "YOU LIE" and so on during the past years. The fact that we are even having a discussion about how to have the discussion is a good sign I think. Further more it seems to me, over the last few years, that these calls for civility have been growing. Perhaps not equally on all side but it has been a trend none the less. It may seem hard for us to envision an american political environment that is not fractious and rude but it was also very hard to imagine the cold war ending in anything but apocalyptic violence. Perhaps we will not continue to see the balkanization that has been the rule these past years. Perhaps the tide of "civilized" voices will become the majority. The observation has been made I think correctly that the uncivilized rhetoric is probably related in part to recent "unilateral" election cycles. With one party holding all the power what can the other do but engage in guerrilla war? Perhaps this uncivilized and asymmetric political rhetoric is a gauge we can use to measure how important it is to not have unilateral power structures within government. Im starting to sound remarkably optimistic about this whole thing. What a difference a week can make.

TALKING ABOUT WHAT WE TALK ABOUT

   If mythology "naturalizes" the cultural traits and the culture creates the mythology then this is a kind of self sustaining perpetual motion. Outmoded myths are "discarded" in favor of new ones. Technology and scientific understanding are two primary causes of this "discarding" of mythology.  We might imagine many discarded mythologies, perhaps one of the most obvious in anglo saxon societies is the catholic church. Discarded or "denatured" from its place of "natural" cultural institution by means of the printing press - and of course, literacy. The myth of the suburban domestic mother, once the image of all american women, largely discarded in lew of modern time saving devices and mass communication in the late twentieth century. Although these myths may fall into relative irrelevance or obscurity their impact still emanates in the society for some time. So that the catholic church still remains - its mythology still serves some culturally relevant function. Other myths still live on in decontextualized forms. The myth of masculinity lives on but now in both women and men. It is our own society which invests these myths with "meaning" and "value" and retells them in its popular media. Whether it be the myth of the "lone wolf hero" or the "rags to riches" story, or any other of dozens of popular mythological tropes. These mythologies seem natural as long as they are culturally relevant and seem backward and old fashioned and "unnatural" as soon as they are no longer relevant. They may be denatured by changing socio-politico-economic realities, or just run their course and end in some other obscure fashion.  There is always a strange way that chance (fate?) plays in these myth constructions, the way clint eastwood becomes the anti-hero post-classical western cowboy, why not charles bronson or any of a dozen other actors? Too specific of an event to really say. Nevertheless I believe it is still sufficiently probable to believe that technology (and an american taste for beef) brought the cowboy - and his mythology - into, and out of, existence. The clint eastwoods are just the faces on these myths. Achilles by any other name might as well be captain america. Or alcibiades, nixon (by which I mean they where both crooks). If we sufficiently examine these mythological tropes it seems you may even be able to understand the inherent "nature" of any culture (at least through one slice of time). Im somewhat apprehensive about that conclusion though, so many variables, so many tropes, isnt pop psychology like this fundamentally flawed? Isnt there always an inescapable chaos we cannot quantify? A ghost in the machine? And dont we tend to an inescapable confirmation bias in these cultural investigations, in which we invest with meaning which has already been invested with meaning? Like anthropologists digging through our own trash bin attempting to draw objective conclusions about how we ought to think of ourselves.This is typically where science might step in, quantify, make objective, experiment. But how do you quantify culture? Crime statistics? Occurrences of the word technology in the state of the union address? GDP? A "happiness index"? Arnt we left spinning tales about trash heaps again?

   That paragraph is way too long, anways. I have a feeling we are examining things on the wrong level. All of this semiotic analysis stuff. Structuralist or post structuralist, seems flawed in its totality of scope. On some level, yes, all cultural value, all that is "natural" - marriage between a man and a woman and so on - is arbitrary. But at some deeper biological level culture is anything but arbitrary, genetics, evolutionary development and so on are truly the "cause" of all culture, all myth, all notions of "natural" behavior and ideology. This is the true "deeply inscribed" structure of human language and human culture, indeed all human behavior. It seems to me, I dont know why, like european intellectual thought is frightened of this conclusion. And has been for decades. They reject these objective conclusions about humanity and its causes. Well not just in europe, lots of people in america too. But the beauty about objective scientific analysis, and let me steal one of zizeks aphorisms, the beauty of objective scientifically substantiated facts is that they work even if you dont believe in them. Gravity, radio waves, the venturi effect, all continue undaunted by humanity. All of humanities "signs" have meaning until you stop investing them with meaning, all of natures "signs" mean precisely what they appear to mean even when you dont see them. So that "X" genetic markers mean you will develop MS and so on.

   There is so much complexity involved in reconciling these apparent contradictions. On one level "I" - and here I mean the denotation and connotation of "I" not simply the arbitrary letter- means nothing. "I" am nothing. A notion at best. A vague concept. And yet "I" most definitely emerges from some biological fact. Some confluence of electrical signals and pharmacology and, well, perhaps in something else we can not yet quantify. Really though now im getting off into some weird metaphysical territory. I shouldnt write and watch the news at the same time like this.

THESE ARE JUST PICTURES OF TILDA SWINTON

HOW TO BE A SKINNY FUCKING BITCH

Im on hold again. This is my favorite blog that I am reading right now because it is the blog that I am reading right now.

CLASSICISM IS NOT A STYLE

I was thinking today, its not that women love guys who act like assholes, its that women turn guys they love into assholes.