I’m back on track to post Monday through Friday. Nod your head along with a little radical hip hop, have a good weekend!
The Coup-Don’t Ride the Fence
Dead Prez-Hip Hop
Mos Def, Immortal Technique, Eminem-Tell the Truth
Whenever I’m feeling uninspired or down I know it’s time to bust out the Ginsberg! I ran this on MySpace a couple of weeks ago when I was going through a bit of a rough patch and people seemed to really enjoy it, so here it is. The first is a four minute film of him reading a poem he wrote in a plane coming from Prague–after being kicked out–on his way to England. It’s fantastic! He takes shots at Capitalism and Communism. The Second thing is the entire text of his famous poem “Howl.” If you’ve never read it put on your seatbelt! If it’s already one of your faves, read it anyway, it’s different each time. Here is the film:
[Note: This is my first Transmission from work! During nearly the entire existence of this website I’ve been blocked from the internet. Well, me and my co-worker finally found a way around it. Expect much more consistent work here from now on! Oh, it’s on. P.S. with all of this extra time I should now be able to finish a new essay.]
To read “HOWL” click read more now:
30 seconds ago I fired all of my bosses and hired myself as their replacement. I feel better already! Let’s all do this. To the joy of our labor and to never working again! Enjoy The Clash, Career Opportunities:
My new piece “O’ Joyous Treason” will be up Monday morning. Have a great weekend!
max
So I just finished reading the fax from God. For now, I’m going to leave out the more EXPLOSIVE parts. She did say that Pat Robertson was off of her “IM” list from now on. She commanded that I am to read this aloud to whomever I may come into contact with. Since I’m in no mood for a smiting, I’ll do my God-fearin’ duty and send out her Revolutionary message. Here goes:
Dear Imprisoned Chickens Of the World,
I love you so much and have failed you. Just know that I was testing them–not you. So what I want to do now is set things right. I welcome you home my loves. Come on home and…
Roost
PS: I’ve got two serious goodies in the pipeline that I can’t wait to put out. Stay tuned.
“The longing for rest and peace must itself be cast aside; it coincides with the acceptance of iniquity. Those who weep for the happy periods they encountered in history acknowledge what they want: not the alleviation but the silencing of misery.”–Albert Camus–The Rebel, 1951
So I was reading The Washington Post earlier today and learned that there is a great controversy underway.
Apparently the planned memorial of King looks too “confrontational.” King confrontational? Gasp! No!
The first thing that had to go was his furrowed brow. We can’t have a pissed off black man appear to be thinking now can we. The truth is that all of these “tributes” to MLK by the political class have nothing to do with loving him or his work. The truth is they hate his guts and always have. Every “tribute” they offer usually is nothing more than an extension of his first murder. We are told that King “Had a dream” but are supposed to forget that that dream was in fierce competition with the American nightmare. The nightmare persists. We are supposed to forget why they hate him; it’s that he didn’t dance right. When other “responsible Negro leaders” were adjusting to their new found middle class status he radicalized. Forget that he came out against the Vietnam genocide, that he called the US (rightly) the greatest purveyor of violence in the world or that he said things like “A riot is the language of the unheard.” We are told to vaguely talk about this “dream” or maybe now we can safely discuss “change” or “hope we can believe in.” It’s the same way they murder Rosa Parks over and over again. You know, the “meek” and “polite” seamstress who just happened to be really tired that day on the bus. Never mind that she was a committed activist who took a shockingly courageous stand that helped shift the paradigm of that time. King can’t be confrontational now. We’ve moved beyond the “excesses” of that time. MLK should be a friendly brand that can be fit into a CNN love fest or on a Starbucks coffee mug. We aren’t to remember that in his last days he was making the connections between race, class and Capitalism or the implications of his planned Poor People’s Campaign right before he was murdered the first time. They want us to let him die once and for all. Let’s not.
Meet Mr. Mind Fuck USA! Edward Bernays was essentially a much more talented version of Joseph Goebbels right here in the land of the free. Known as the Father of Public Relations he, as Wikipedia states, …”combining the ideas of Gustave Le Bon and Wilfred Trotter on crowd psychology with the psychoanalytical ideas of his uncle, Sigmund Freud, Bernays was one of the first to attempt to manipulate public opinion using the psychology of the subconscious.” Ah yes, in addition to convincing women to smoke, people that bacon is good for them, that water fluoridation is a good idea and that Calvin Coolidge was a likable guy, his techniques for mass manipulation were also put to use in the political process and thus, undermining any chance at meaningful Democracy. His work has helped sell us soap, “clean coal,” George Bush and war just to name a few. Here he is in his own words, keep in mind that what he was describing he thought was a good thing.
“Those who manipulate the unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country. We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of. This is a logical result of the way in which our democratic society is organized. Vast numbers of human beings must cooperate in this manner if they are to live together as a smoothly functioning society. In almost every act of our lives whether in the sphere of politics or business in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires that control the public mind.”
“Propaganda is the executive arm of the invisible government.”
“If we understand the mechanism and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without them knowing it.”
What a fuck face! To read a good article on Bernays click read more for a piece I found at PR Watch.
This is an excerpt from Ken Knabb’s online work at www.bopsecrets.org. There is plenty to debate about here, but it is an outstanding critique of the radical world in 1972. Have fun!
Critique Of the New Left Movement
. . . With all too few exceptions the “democracy” of the New Left was a myth. . . . As for a participatory democracy that would break down the separation between decision and execution, this was present only among a few small groups (for example, some of the earliest agitational experiments in the South) and, very briefly, in such massive actions as the spontaneous surrounding of the police car during the Berkeley Free Speech Movement. Usually whatever democracy there was lasted just long enough to elect a steering committee. . . .
Such democracy as did exist in the New Left organizations cannot be separated from its lack of subversive content. The early SDS maintained a democratized marketplace of ideas which were only the ideas of a democratized marketplace.
This plethora of fragmentary issues finds its echo in the desire for decentralization and leaderlessness (which is less the absence of leaders than the creation of the conditions for leaders to take over) within SDS chapters. . . . Many . . . militants have seen in the relative autonomy of SDS chapters not the early forms of another hierarchical organization — which it is — but a healthy rejection of hierarchies, cell bosses, party chairmen, secretaries. [Robert Chasse, The Power of Negative Thinking, or Robin Hood Rides Again.]