I am wondering. These two specific politicans were voted into office on policies guaranteeing better conditions for human rights, more democracy and so forth and so forth. In direct opposition of what the world saw as evil regimes in fact.
And here they are, standing next to each other at the G20 summit in Pittsburgh, USA. A shining beacon of democracy, and the streets are filled with thousands of police in darth-vader-gear. Rubber bullets are flying through the air, tear gas slowly drifting down the streets, protesters arrested and put in unmarked cars by people in military uniforms, students being beaten and street dances broken up. Kinda looks a bit like China all of the sudden, doesn't it? In all this I can't help thinking of the lyrics for the Who's Won't get fooled again. "Meet the new boss, same as the old one".
Boy, you sure got fooled again didn't you? And it won't be the last time.
The police and politicans are here to protect and serve the rich, not you.
The United States of America, supposedly built by the poeple and for the people, practises a most foul, unfair, barbaric and abominable tradition of murdering its poor and undesirable. I am talking of course about death penalty, capital punishment for those of who are unwilling to face the facts of the more proper term. Death penalty. State sanctioned sterilized killing, in the name of justice.
It's despicable, and it's a complete failure in every way but the meat processesing.
As crime prevention it is not just a failure statistically, but because it extende the very crime it purports to hinder: the murder of human beings. There are no statistics that can show that death penalty reduces the prevalence of violent crime - or any other crime for that matter. Absolutely none.
Morally it is a bankrupt practice based on misguided interpretations of ancient religious texts demanding an eye for an eye. Not only does this form of moral logic end up demanding the death of the executioner as well, but it reduces the sanctity of life to mere math. The Bible, that these reactionary retards hold so dear also teaches forgiveness. They would do well to focus a bit more on the "let he who is without sin..." part of this archaic text and less on the killing and maiming. Though the killing and maiming is the more entertaining part of the Bible, it is also the less productive.
Judicially death penalty is also problematic in the sense that it makes reform entirely impossible. Both socially and individually. It is revenge, and has nothing to do with fairness, rationality or societal needs. Rather it is cruel and arbitrary. As supreme court justice Thurgood Marshall so eloquently put it in 1990: "When in Gregg v. Georgia the Supreme Court gave its seal of approval to capital punishment, this endorsement was premised on the promise that capital punishment would be administered with fairness and justice. Instead, the promise has become a cruel and empty mockery. If not remedied, the scandalous state of our present system of capital punishment will cast a pall of shame over our society for years to come. We cannot let it continue."
Killing is killing. Calling it punishment makes it no different from the act of murder. The result is the same: a life is cut short, and will never reach its full potential.
Thinking the convicted Romell Broom in his cell on death row, allready having suffered the anguish of the executioner's intent to murder him once, I can only find solace in the fact that his maltreatment serves the higher purpose of shedding light on this disgusting affair. I am personally very powerless to do anything but talk, or write, but we know that things can change when people write, and maybe one day Ohio will take its rightfull place among civilized parts of the world. I am also reminded of the story of another man who was murdered by the state, for the crime of murder. His name lives on with us still, and monuments have been built and songs been written in his name. His ashes have been spread around the world, and his name will forever mean "framed and murdered by the government". I am talking of course about Joe Hill. Take a few minutes to read the lyrics to the song Pete Seeger and Paul Robeson wrote about him, or better yet, listen to it. Murdering Hill did not kill him, and murdering Broom will not kill violent crimes. Only reform can do that.
(Lyrics below the video.)
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you and me. Says I "But Joe, you're ten years dead" "I never died" said he, "I never died" said he.
"The Copper Bosses killed you Joe, they shot you Joe" says I. "Takes more than guns to kill a man" Says Joe "I didn't die" Says Joe "I didn't die"
"In Salt Lake City, Joe," says I, Him standing by my bed, "They framed you on a murder charge," Says Joe, "But I ain't dead," Says Joe, "But I ain't dead."
And standing there as big as life and smiling with his eyes. Says Joe "What they can never kill went on to organize, went on to organize"
From San Diego up to Maine, in every mine and mill, Where working men defend their rights, it's there you'll find Joe Hill, it's there you'll find Joe Hill!
I dreamed I saw Joe Hill last night, alive as you and me. Says I "But Joe, you're ten years dead" "I never died" said he, "I never died" said he.
Despite my ovious interests in both politics and history this is not going to be a blog about the oral constitution of the Irriquois, even if it sounds very exciting. No, this is about a band I had forgotten.
Oral Constitution was a sort of industrial/goth/neo folk band from Haugesund, on the west coast of Norway. They existed from 1992-1997 and managed to put out several albums and an E.P., as well as being remixed by Genesis P-Orridge. Their apex, atleast in terms of attention came with the album Høgdapreik ("talking about Høgda" in English), which took a great deal of inspiration by the infamous norwegien telephone terrorist Svend Høgda. Høgda became a national celebrity for a flurry of telephone activities in the nineties. He called in false alarms to the police, ordered caskets for various people and other such things. He ended up in jail for it, and Oral Constitution managed to stirr some controversy by dedicating an album to his activities.
Their music has been compared to Current 93, Diamanda Galás and Death in June. Personally I see the Current 93 and Diamanda Galás comparisons as especially relevant. Early Current 93 in particular. It is dark, experimental, playfull, psychedelic and strange. Their first EP Bibelpreik ("bible talk") is certainly their finest work, showing musical affinities and a level of concentration I can't hear in the rest of their work. Granted I have not heard everything, but while this first E.P. is restrained and consistent in mood the other tracks I have heard certainly fall more in the psychotic maniacs-category than mood music. I would recommend bibelpreik to anyone who appreciates Current 93. But it's not a simple copy, there are elements of old school goth in there as well. There are other elements in there as well, even ambient, but there are certainly enough musical similarities to grant a comparison. Except that it's actually darker than Current 93, and more primitive.
Luckily for you I have even managed to track down a copy of this E.P. Floating around in cyberspace, courtesy of this blog. Note that I did not upload this .zip or chose the medium for upload so I take no responsibility for it whatsoever. But judging from experience it should be entirely safe. Click this link to go to the .zip.
Certainly there are good tracks on their other releases, but the production is somewhat inconsistent. Tracks like Für Åse is great, while Galloping Negroes is just silly, with the Stomach Composer somewhere in between. In general the folkish and goth tracks are good, while the more industrial inspired tracks are not so well executed. If you stumble upon something out there, you should certainly give it a chance however. Chances are you haven't heard many bands like them before. However I feel an obligation to point out that the female singer (as opposed to the male singer) has an accent from the other side of the moon or something. And neither the male or the female singer can actually sing, nor is the guitar playing exactly excellent in any way - but I guess that's quite common in this kind of music. It might be an aquired taste...
I just finished watching a documentary about rave, and rave culture. Pretty much of it was mediocre, and served only to trigger my nostalgia about the early nineties, but there bits of it that were very interesting. Mostly those bits containing Genesis P-Orridge. The film is called Better Living Through Circuitry, and you should be able to dig it up somewhere, download and watch.
One of the things GPO said, was that while the punk movement had been about seizing the means of production, techno was about the means of perception as well. It was a really good way of drawing out the essence of, atleast part of, the techno movement as I had known. It also got me thinking of something Pascal from Resistance D said in an interview (atleast my mind remembers it this way, but I could be wrong). He claimed that techno was about taking all those sounds you hear around you every day, such as the hum of the refrigerator, the cars, street lights and what have you, taking control of them and using them to cope with reality. Sampling enables someone to appropriate a part of reality one is usually a passive recipient of, and turn it into creativity. A truly reality altering practise.
When I read this, so many years ago back in 1993, in fact just before christmas, it really got me thinking. I had discovered techno not long before, and I didn't understand just why the crude electronic sounds and thudding beats made me feel alive in a way current pop music (including the pre-digested grunge and metal) could. But this statement was as good an explanation as any. I clearly felt frustrated by the way school and society wanted me to be passive and live my life the way they expected, and I often said that techno makes me feel good, because society wants me to be a machine. But in fact techno was making me feel like the opposite of a machine.
And this is what GPO is talking about. Music as a magickal means of controling your reality and environment. He is ofcourse not just inspired by deconstructionist thinking on this subject, but also by Aleister Crowley himself. GPO and TOPY/TOPI is all about magick, as we know, and seeing reality as in a flux. By altering the way you see reality and respond to reality you gain power over it on some level. In the film he also states that taking over various corporate logos and placing them in a different context "emasculates their power over you", and this statement could be carried over to anything mostly, as I see it.
The music industry is out to control you. Not in the brain washing way, but in the "buy our records, listen to them passively, buy more records" (or files as it's starting to be). The record industry doesn't like it when you start making your own shit and giving it away for free, because it takes away their power over you. The goverment is out to control you too, and they're more than happy to share that control with the record companies. The key element is that you remain passive, go to work, generate economic growth and consume. If people stop doing that reality would collapse. Reality meaning our current mode of capitalist, statist, collectivist, hive society. By grabbing the means of perception for your own pleasure, and sharing in with your friends you create a new reality, and one that suits you more than the one you are being fed.
Unfortunately most people are not very conscious when they create music. They see instruments as instruments, and tracks as tracks, and records as a product. The fail to see music as magick. And all music is magick, whether you are aware of it or not. Music, not just techno, but all music, is an emotional highway of subconscious communication. What you put out in your music, you put into someone (most of all yourself).
As I was into techno, and the whole DIY spirit that came with it, many years ago, I am now also painfully aware of how the superficial trade marks of that movement has become fashion and mass culture (passive). More than anything this so called new rave fashion has highlighted this change. It's quite strange to me, cos I see the smiley t-shirts, and I think "yeah, fucking acid house man" and these kids just wear them cos everyone else is wearing them. Getting old is painful. :)
But there's hope. What techno was about back then is now bigger than ever. People have the means of production so firmly in their hands, and the next step is for them to realize that they hold reality between their fingers. Don't just recieve, transmit! And it's actually happening, with blogs, mp3, p2p, vsti, podcasts, webradio, webtv and so forth and so forth. It's not just for people who get an erection from TB-303 bleeps anymore (or the hippies, punks and beatniks before them).
Get conscious, get powerfull. I guess that's the bottom line.
Historian and librarian by training, nerd and musician by lack of taste. My blog is highly eclectic ranging fra symbol analysis to blatant anarchism, nerdy chit chat and so forth. As a historian I am mostly concerned with myth complexes, symbolism and rituals in nationalist contexts.
