Legal moves are underway to stop Governor Paterson’s attempt to grant civil rights to gays. Joseph Illuzzi of NYPolitics.net asserts that “LIKE ABORTION GAY MARRIAGE IS AN ASSAULT ON THE INTEGRITY OF OUR CIVILIZATION NOT TO MENTION THE INFALLIBLE WORD OF GOD…” Yes, in capital letters none the less. Illuzzi accuses Paterson of secretively abusing the rule of law in this matter. Apparently Illuzzi says he intends to mobilize various forces including the Catholic Conference to halt this “executive directive.”
At this point in his memorandum, Illuzzi confuses reason with rhetoric and includes the gay directive with the attempt to issue drivers licenses to illegal immigrants as both assaults on the integrity of civilization. While both these examples may be instances of legally bypassing the legislative process (and I’m assuming they are legal moves on Paterson’s part even though challengeable in court), surely the attempt to ameliorate the negative effects of millions of undocumented immigrants with the licensing is not an example of “an assault on the integrity of our civilization not to mention the infallible word of God.”
Even though I disagreed with the licensing initiative, the intent was construable as an attempt to possibly help save our civilization and conceivably even live up to the word of God. While Illuzzi will also be calling upon "New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms," whoever they are, to fight his discriminatory cause, he should be consulting with "Americans for Constitutional Obligations." Now I don’t know that there is such an organization as the latter, but there should be. After all what about the obligation of our “civilization” to guarantee “civil rights” for all and equal protection under the law? Why should a medieval theology trump the legal guarantee of conceivably they geatest constitution in the history of the West?
It is considerably more disturbing, if not frightening, when the political integrity of the great American idea of Freedom is reduced to the regressive dark-ages ethic of the Catholic Church. If there ever was an institution that has forestalled and at times turned back the progress of civilization, it is the Catholic Church. If there ever was an ideology that perverted the modern idea of the right to the subjective self-assertion of one's own individuality, the idea at the very heart of Modernity, it was the shock troops of Catholicism whose inhumanity stems the spectrum of historical incidents of such repression from the trial of Meister Eckhart in the 14th century to the present subterranean psychological genocide against countless innocent children at the hands of the “pederasty priests” who unforgiveably abused the power of priestly authority to serve pure carnal interests.
It’s very easy to invoke the infallible word of God. It just depends upon how arrogant and self-righteous you are. Of course it makes it much easier to invoke the infallible word of God when you can change you mind radically as to what that means and still always be correct. Witness the latest Papal Edict which even if in disagreement with a prior edict still gets to be correct and, guess what? INFALLIBLE. Isn’t it great to always have the winning card up your theological sleeve. This is obviously nothing but superstitious fear-mongering.
So as Paterson attempts to extend civil liberties to one of the most heinously repressed minority groups in America, the “infallibility insurgents” seek to selectively apply American liberties to "elect" groups in the name of recreating all culture unilaterally in the image of Catholic and lunatic-fringe Christianist fear and guilt.
The greatest victim in this is the very “people” who could be united on a neo-populist basis in the name of a participatory democracy. If the “the people” could be left alone to reconstitute their communities multi-culturally as will be inevitable in the future, they could restore power to the “forgotten man” in the face of the bureaucratic class whose increasingly centralized administrative apparatus seeks to expropriate culture and instrumentalize it at the service of the neo-imperialist globalist ideologists of transnational capital. Instead these self-appointed but misguided master of monolithic culture continue to pit the people one against the other in the name of bureaucratically conceived conflicts that has nothing to do with the real and true political antagonism that is destroying our country today.
Like a mirror image of the bureaucratic centralists, the cultural Christianists want to make culture and community over in their own image and in their own interests. Somehow both these theocrats and technocrats seem to forget our history of origination in the clash of immigrants, religions, ideologies, modes of existence and radically differing philosophies--all in the context of an agonistic participatory democracy. The only thing that holds this kaleidoscope of differences together without repressive homongenization and one-dimensionalization is a Constitution that guarantees from a neutral standpoint the right of individuals and communities to constitute their lives as they see fit. Such cultural and communal freedom is not intended to be exploited by any one religion or any political/economic ideology.
However the regressively reactionary aristocratic tyranny of autocratic minds such as the Catholic/Christianist theocrats and the Neo-Conservative/Neo-Liberal technocrats insist on further homogenizing autonomous American cultures and individualities in the interest and in the name of metaphysical mumbo-jumbo that does immeasureable injustice to spirituality, constitutionality and the kind of neo-populist federalist political reconfiguration of America that could return sovereignty to the people on a communal and participatory basis.
Saturday, May 31, 2008
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
The Crisis: Individuality in the Age of Nihilism (Part 1)
The first task of a democracy is the acknowledgement of the political sanctity and efficacity of the individual. In a political culture particularly like our own, conceived as a mass democracy in which each individual has an equally valuable and valid vote, the individual especially is the keystone. The proper individuality, consciously autonomous and responsible, is required to legitimize the political culture. Such is the ideal. The reality in America is a far and horrific cry from this ideal.
With respect to Joe Mesi, the subject of my last few posts, I hope his professional career better nurtured his sense of self than we see other professional sporting systems nurture the individuality of their pro athletes. All too often we have seen professional athletes leave the limelight and crumble in the cold, dry air of everyday adult reality. Pro athletes are in effect coddled and cared for without concern for the day they walk out the back door of the locker room. In short sports on the whole does not nurture individuality in our culture, let alone professional sports. Of course and obviously there are exceptions. Yet those athletes who shine as individuals making a new mark after the cheering stops would have done so regardless. Let’s hope Joe is the latter, especially if he wins the Senate seat. If not the latter, and if he wins, lets hope at least for his sake, his Albany handlers manage his functionality as well as his father’s management team.
But this is not about Joe Mesi. It is about the social, educational and political deficit of concern for the democratic individual. Surely the possibility of such a being begins in the family. This is so even though the family is not essentially a democratic institution. But what better way for a child to observe problem solving, cooperation and decision-making than to experience his/her parents dealing with family life and its relation to the community. But given that life in the family, assuming the child has one as such, is equaled by time spent in school, the schools must equally contribute to the formation and cultivation of such an individual.
Individuality is first and foremost a social relatedness. The integral personality is integrated socially and yet always in integrity with itself. The democratic individual is one who can think and act in the interest and good of the whole or wholes to which he belongs. Given that individuality is a product of sociality, the unfolding and fulfillment of the individual self is the conscious production of a community and by a community in which autonomy and responsibility are the dimensions or horizons of social relatedness. The democratic individual is not the narcissistic exploiter nor creator of that community. He does not use it for the masturbatory satisfaction of involuted desire nor the aggrandizement of an infantilized ego seeking self-serving power over that community. He does not seek that power which characterizes relations of domination but seeks that dialogical diplomacy of the communal cooperation of equals.
In a world in which the (a) corporation is conceived as having the legal right of a person, (b)education trains first for functionality as employability, and (c)political candidates are measured according to electability rather than political desireability, the meaning and purpose of the individual person or human being is (a)annhiliated in incorporated interests, (b)functionalized in technically useable learning and experience and (c)instrumentalized as a mechanism of externally constituted power. The wisdom of the world of commodification and consumption requires that you be made over such that (a)business will invest in you and your community; (b)such that you are interesting to the functional world seeking to ‘place’ you; and, (c)such that you are a non-resistant energy source for power as it exists.
T.W. Adorno, German philosopher and Critical Social Theorist, puts it this way:
“In a world that has been thoroughly permeated by the structures of the social order, a world that so overpowers every individual that scarcely any option remains but to accept it on its own terms, such naivete reproduces itself incessantly and disastrously. What people have forced upon them by a boundless apparatus, which they themselves constitute and which they are locked into, virtually eliminates all natural elements and becomes ‘nature’ to them.” (Critical Models, p.12, CUP, 2005)
The consciousness of the individual is reified as the mere reflection of the way things are. Such consciousness is thoroughly naive, yet when rejected, is judged to be the paragon of foolishness and folly. The consciousness of the individual no longer lives and judges ethically but calculates pragmatically in order to successfully conform with the given and all it promises. It can no longer think but only manipulates and maneuvers to the benefit of its perceived, privatized advantage.
So the reason that there is no individual as such today, let alone individuals in government, is that we in fact are “governed” by the things we presume to govern.
The mechanized structures of human construction, material and symbolic, have expropriated the capacity for that very “human measure” which gave rise to but lost control of those structures. Thus the film, The Matrix. If Protagoras is right, that man is the measure of all things, then possibly it is the state of being of individuality which can “smash through” such constructions and within which such capacity for “human measure” can again be sensed, fully experienced and reappropiated.
The socially fragmented and alienated individual must be returned to itself from the ends of the rainbow to which it has been spirited away: returned from the empty irrelevance of its own pseudo-soulfulness and returned from the mechanized animality of purposeless, unending desire, that is, the living death of an irreconcilable comfortable safety, security and equanimity on the one hand, and, on the other, the agitated excitement of thrilling yet unimaginable expectations.
The beginning of this restitution may be in the an-nihilation of bureaucratically centralized institutions such as the Catholic Church and the New International Political Class and the "theme park consciousness" promising bigger and better escapes from reality. False care, on the one hand, and vitiated, vicarious pseudo-experience on the other. False self-control in the first and faux freedom in the latter.
The decompensated individual begins to return to integratd personality and ethical integrity in the political action of reconstituting organic community as political community and democratic culture.
With respect to Joe Mesi, the subject of my last few posts, I hope his professional career better nurtured his sense of self than we see other professional sporting systems nurture the individuality of their pro athletes. All too often we have seen professional athletes leave the limelight and crumble in the cold, dry air of everyday adult reality. Pro athletes are in effect coddled and cared for without concern for the day they walk out the back door of the locker room. In short sports on the whole does not nurture individuality in our culture, let alone professional sports. Of course and obviously there are exceptions. Yet those athletes who shine as individuals making a new mark after the cheering stops would have done so regardless. Let’s hope Joe is the latter, especially if he wins the Senate seat. If not the latter, and if he wins, lets hope at least for his sake, his Albany handlers manage his functionality as well as his father’s management team.
But this is not about Joe Mesi. It is about the social, educational and political deficit of concern for the democratic individual. Surely the possibility of such a being begins in the family. This is so even though the family is not essentially a democratic institution. But what better way for a child to observe problem solving, cooperation and decision-making than to experience his/her parents dealing with family life and its relation to the community. But given that life in the family, assuming the child has one as such, is equaled by time spent in school, the schools must equally contribute to the formation and cultivation of such an individual.
Individuality is first and foremost a social relatedness. The integral personality is integrated socially and yet always in integrity with itself. The democratic individual is one who can think and act in the interest and good of the whole or wholes to which he belongs. Given that individuality is a product of sociality, the unfolding and fulfillment of the individual self is the conscious production of a community and by a community in which autonomy and responsibility are the dimensions or horizons of social relatedness. The democratic individual is not the narcissistic exploiter nor creator of that community. He does not use it for the masturbatory satisfaction of involuted desire nor the aggrandizement of an infantilized ego seeking self-serving power over that community. He does not seek that power which characterizes relations of domination but seeks that dialogical diplomacy of the communal cooperation of equals.
In a world in which the (a) corporation is conceived as having the legal right of a person, (b)education trains first for functionality as employability, and (c)political candidates are measured according to electability rather than political desireability, the meaning and purpose of the individual person or human being is (a)annhiliated in incorporated interests, (b)functionalized in technically useable learning and experience and (c)instrumentalized as a mechanism of externally constituted power. The wisdom of the world of commodification and consumption requires that you be made over such that (a)business will invest in you and your community; (b)such that you are interesting to the functional world seeking to ‘place’ you; and, (c)such that you are a non-resistant energy source for power as it exists.
T.W. Adorno, German philosopher and Critical Social Theorist, puts it this way:
“In a world that has been thoroughly permeated by the structures of the social order, a world that so overpowers every individual that scarcely any option remains but to accept it on its own terms, such naivete reproduces itself incessantly and disastrously. What people have forced upon them by a boundless apparatus, which they themselves constitute and which they are locked into, virtually eliminates all natural elements and becomes ‘nature’ to them.” (Critical Models, p.12, CUP, 2005)
The consciousness of the individual is reified as the mere reflection of the way things are. Such consciousness is thoroughly naive, yet when rejected, is judged to be the paragon of foolishness and folly. The consciousness of the individual no longer lives and judges ethically but calculates pragmatically in order to successfully conform with the given and all it promises. It can no longer think but only manipulates and maneuvers to the benefit of its perceived, privatized advantage.
So the reason that there is no individual as such today, let alone individuals in government, is that we in fact are “governed” by the things we presume to govern.
The mechanized structures of human construction, material and symbolic, have expropriated the capacity for that very “human measure” which gave rise to but lost control of those structures. Thus the film, The Matrix. If Protagoras is right, that man is the measure of all things, then possibly it is the state of being of individuality which can “smash through” such constructions and within which such capacity for “human measure” can again be sensed, fully experienced and reappropiated.
The socially fragmented and alienated individual must be returned to itself from the ends of the rainbow to which it has been spirited away: returned from the empty irrelevance of its own pseudo-soulfulness and returned from the mechanized animality of purposeless, unending desire, that is, the living death of an irreconcilable comfortable safety, security and equanimity on the one hand, and, on the other, the agitated excitement of thrilling yet unimaginable expectations.
The beginning of this restitution may be in the an-nihilation of bureaucratically centralized institutions such as the Catholic Church and the New International Political Class and the "theme park consciousness" promising bigger and better escapes from reality. False care, on the one hand, and vitiated, vicarious pseudo-experience on the other. False self-control in the first and faux freedom in the latter.
The decompensated individual begins to return to integratd personality and ethical integrity in the political action of reconstituting organic community as political community and democratic culture.
Sunday, May 18, 2008
Mesi for Senate -- Neither Heaven Nor Hell, but... (Part III)
The Mesi candidacy, then, is neither Heaven nor Hell. His candidacy will neither make us nor break us. I am neither exhilarated nor defeated. Yet I still do find it depressing and demoralizing if this is the best the Democratic Party has to offer. Neither Heaven nor Heaven, just some nihilistic political never-neverland.
At best his candidacy is mercenary. More mediocrity in a progressively mediocre, if not defeated democracy. And I think I’m being generous with that appraisal.
Where is his self-proclaimed “strong leadership” leading us? Down a visionless path charted by empty clichés and guaranteed by virtues which he may only have exhibited in relevant form in the boxing ring. He campaigns with slogans that rival the ads of pharmaceutical companies for vagueness, empty promise and deliriously inappropriate good cheer. But the drug ads are at least more honest in that they do now warn of side effects some of which can kill you. Mesi’s promotions do not carry such cautions with respect to the deleterious effects such minions can have on participatory democracy.
Just one more note on his claim to be an “independent voice.” What is he independent of? Certainly not the uses the democratic party would make of him. Certainly not the egregiously banal campaign commonplaces that merciless bore and alienate an already disenfranchised mass of non-beleivers in the “system.” Could meaning and language, thought and communication been any more deeply eviscerated? Stick around for the Mesi show.
Despite the picture of democracy that one could paint given the impending Mesi candidacy and all that suggests regarding our sorry state of political affairs, there are possibilities of action and thought. It’s just that the Mesi phenomenon does not point in that direction. Thus through the lens of his hopefulness and bright-eyed boyishness we cannot see such potential for a creative politics. He will join the ranks of the fledgling functionaries, some of whom, like a few of the pro athletes of recent times, may survive and make a mark for himself, carve out a career and maybe even do some good. I’m not holding my breath.
It is more likely that he will disappear among the business oligarchs or corporate-controlled careerists yet possibly some day “succeed” as a mouthpiece of some newfound elitist and autocratic cabal, kind of like George Bush. What a country!
At best his candidacy is mercenary. More mediocrity in a progressively mediocre, if not defeated democracy. And I think I’m being generous with that appraisal.
Where is his self-proclaimed “strong leadership” leading us? Down a visionless path charted by empty clichés and guaranteed by virtues which he may only have exhibited in relevant form in the boxing ring. He campaigns with slogans that rival the ads of pharmaceutical companies for vagueness, empty promise and deliriously inappropriate good cheer. But the drug ads are at least more honest in that they do now warn of side effects some of which can kill you. Mesi’s promotions do not carry such cautions with respect to the deleterious effects such minions can have on participatory democracy.
Just one more note on his claim to be an “independent voice.” What is he independent of? Certainly not the uses the democratic party would make of him. Certainly not the egregiously banal campaign commonplaces that merciless bore and alienate an already disenfranchised mass of non-beleivers in the “system.” Could meaning and language, thought and communication been any more deeply eviscerated? Stick around for the Mesi show.
Despite the picture of democracy that one could paint given the impending Mesi candidacy and all that suggests regarding our sorry state of political affairs, there are possibilities of action and thought. It’s just that the Mesi phenomenon does not point in that direction. Thus through the lens of his hopefulness and bright-eyed boyishness we cannot see such potential for a creative politics. He will join the ranks of the fledgling functionaries, some of whom, like a few of the pro athletes of recent times, may survive and make a mark for himself, carve out a career and maybe even do some good. I’m not holding my breath.
It is more likely that he will disappear among the business oligarchs or corporate-controlled careerists yet possibly some day “succeed” as a mouthpiece of some newfound elitist and autocratic cabal, kind of like George Bush. What a country!
Friday, May 16, 2008
Mesi for Senate -- Or, I Could Be in Heaven (Part II)
Democracy Heaven that is. Part of democracy is having a faith in the people. Mesi is the people isn’t he? Yes. So maybe I’m just an elitist. An intellectual snob who has no right to be especially since I don’t teach at Harvard, and can’t really get a handle on Slavoj Zizek. Or so I’ve been told.
Maybe this is the way democracy such as it is in America should be. Pick an electable body, train him to toe the line and hope he doesn’t step too far out of the box, over the line, beyond the pale. Eventually he will be able to find the bathroom in Albany by himself with any luck. Maybe it’s the best we can hope for. No, sorry, I’m drifting into sarcasm. I’ll try again.
I’ve never met Joe Mesi let alone have talked to him. Maybe the school of hard knocks does inculcate wisdom. Maybe he has a high IQ. But given IQ theory is mostly myth if not mere ideology, that doesn’t work for me either. The question is ‘Should I not have faith in the process given I trust in democracy?’
And the answer is “No, I don’t think so.” Surely democratic conflict does not guarantee truth. Even moreso democratic conflict without good educational grounding most surely does not guarantee truth nor ethically solid recommendable action. So given our educational system does not educate for even minimally competent let alone creative and critical democratic participation, I should not be required to have faith in the process as it stands. And by the way that doesn’t make me a traitorous American. It makes me an authentic American.
Joe Mesi is a symptom, neither a solution nor the real problem.
As Aristotle pointed out the probable truth of practical political discourse and action is not the apodictic truth of scientific inquiry. Maybe the rationality of power is reasonable, media distortion, dirty tricks, institutional disinformation, educational ideology notwithstanding. If reason is seeking first what is in our interest, especially as community(forget about humanity), possibly consciousness of what is in our interest will soon show itself, such that even Joe Mesi can grasp it. Then we won’t need to worry about the arrival of the rationality of the graduate school seminar in politics, which like Godot never arrives.
That is, possibly “greed” does work as the Michael Douglas character opined in the film, Wall Street. But it may just be that we are not greedy enough. We have not been clear and courageous enough to really “desire” what we really do desire. And as such we cannot know what is in our interests, argue for it nor fight for it. Possibly as Nietzsche maintained, we require another 100 years of nihilism to work it out. Let the struggle continue (and hope we survive, yes?). Maybe this is democracy, even if it is based on a mixed martial arts militarized model.
Maybe I am in democracy Heaven.
Maybe this is the way democracy such as it is in America should be. Pick an electable body, train him to toe the line and hope he doesn’t step too far out of the box, over the line, beyond the pale. Eventually he will be able to find the bathroom in Albany by himself with any luck. Maybe it’s the best we can hope for. No, sorry, I’m drifting into sarcasm. I’ll try again.
I’ve never met Joe Mesi let alone have talked to him. Maybe the school of hard knocks does inculcate wisdom. Maybe he has a high IQ. But given IQ theory is mostly myth if not mere ideology, that doesn’t work for me either. The question is ‘Should I not have faith in the process given I trust in democracy?’
And the answer is “No, I don’t think so.” Surely democratic conflict does not guarantee truth. Even moreso democratic conflict without good educational grounding most surely does not guarantee truth nor ethically solid recommendable action. So given our educational system does not educate for even minimally competent let alone creative and critical democratic participation, I should not be required to have faith in the process as it stands. And by the way that doesn’t make me a traitorous American. It makes me an authentic American.
Joe Mesi is a symptom, neither a solution nor the real problem.
As Aristotle pointed out the probable truth of practical political discourse and action is not the apodictic truth of scientific inquiry. Maybe the rationality of power is reasonable, media distortion, dirty tricks, institutional disinformation, educational ideology notwithstanding. If reason is seeking first what is in our interest, especially as community(forget about humanity), possibly consciousness of what is in our interest will soon show itself, such that even Joe Mesi can grasp it. Then we won’t need to worry about the arrival of the rationality of the graduate school seminar in politics, which like Godot never arrives.
That is, possibly “greed” does work as the Michael Douglas character opined in the film, Wall Street. But it may just be that we are not greedy enough. We have not been clear and courageous enough to really “desire” what we really do desire. And as such we cannot know what is in our interests, argue for it nor fight for it. Possibly as Nietzsche maintained, we require another 100 years of nihilism to work it out. Let the struggle continue (and hope we survive, yes?). Maybe this is democracy, even if it is based on a mixed martial arts militarized model.
Maybe I am in democracy Heaven.
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Mesi for Senate -- Or, I Must be in Hell
I’m a slow learner. But it’s becoming clear to me – silly, silly me – that the intelligence and/or education of any given candidate for public office is not a primary consideration or concern these days. I don’t think it’s even a secondary consideration. I guess I’m trying to come to terms with the reason-power equation. I keep thinking that without a dramatic if not revolutionary transformation in our culture such that learning becomes in some sense as exciting as sports or sex, that democracy’s greatest potential doesn’t stand a chance. Possibly even its minimal potential doesn't stand a chance. That is, short of such a revolution, reason or reasoning will never have its rightful place in the power equation.
So the Democratic Party of NY needs to win 2 seats to control the senate and some are saying that Baby Joe Mesi is a good bet, maybe the best bet. Are we betting? Is this reasonable? Well, not to me. But then again I have little respect for someone who through the age of 34 has used his head for seeming little more than stopping punches. Is this “reasonable” according to the logic of the Democratic Party? Apparently, yes, and traditionally so.
I would want Joe Mesi to teach my kid to box. I wouldn’t want him to teach him mathematics. Do I want him to help lead NYS? Probably no more that I would want him to assist in brain surgery.
To quote Mesi, "I am running to bring an independent voice, strong leadership and the average person's point of view and values back to Albany,"
Exactly whose voice would that be? Independent voice? The biggest lie is “average person.” No he is not the average person. As a boxer he is way above average. As a prospective politician he is way below where average starts. And we won’t even mention leadership unless we want God to cause another hurricane in New Orleans. The sequel to Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind is way overdue.
This is funnier than Bush nominating Harriet Miers as a candidate for the Supreme Court. I’m trying my best at humor. But in truth I find this monumentally demoralizing, depressing, tragic, ludicrous. I could go on or I could laugh. However I’m afraid if I start laughing, I’ll never stop. Then the men in the white coats will come and take me away.
And I’ll spend the rest of my days writing anonymous posts to the Niagara Times blogspot, hurling vile epithets at everyone just because I can.
So the Democratic Party of NY needs to win 2 seats to control the senate and some are saying that Baby Joe Mesi is a good bet, maybe the best bet. Are we betting? Is this reasonable? Well, not to me. But then again I have little respect for someone who through the age of 34 has used his head for seeming little more than stopping punches. Is this “reasonable” according to the logic of the Democratic Party? Apparently, yes, and traditionally so.
I would want Joe Mesi to teach my kid to box. I wouldn’t want him to teach him mathematics. Do I want him to help lead NYS? Probably no more that I would want him to assist in brain surgery.
To quote Mesi, "I am running to bring an independent voice, strong leadership and the average person's point of view and values back to Albany,"
Exactly whose voice would that be? Independent voice? The biggest lie is “average person.” No he is not the average person. As a boxer he is way above average. As a prospective politician he is way below where average starts. And we won’t even mention leadership unless we want God to cause another hurricane in New Orleans. The sequel to Allan Bloom’s The Closing of the American Mind is way overdue.
This is funnier than Bush nominating Harriet Miers as a candidate for the Supreme Court. I’m trying my best at humor. But in truth I find this monumentally demoralizing, depressing, tragic, ludicrous. I could go on or I could laugh. However I’m afraid if I start laughing, I’ll never stop. Then the men in the white coats will come and take me away.
And I’ll spend the rest of my days writing anonymous posts to the Niagara Times blogspot, hurling vile epithets at everyone just because I can.
Wednesday, May 07, 2008
Creating a New State Out of Western New York
What Western New York needs to do is secede from New York State. Any political leader that deserves the name of politician in this region is the one who will begin to mobilize the forces and marshall the energy and respect to carrying out such a project. What we have now are mere functionaries lacking the necessary combination of political leadership, vision, authority and creativity.
Given that Albany continues to expropriate the wealth of resources and revenues from Western New York without anything of essentially significant value for our recovery returned, any obligation we continue to have to Albany has apparently long since ended. Albany has legal authority but no real political legitimacy.
Also, given that the Federal Government and the nation benefited from the contribution of this region to the WWII war effort but fails to clean up the mess that was left over, our obligation and loyalty to any claim to control over us that they may believe they have is also ended. They also have no legitimacy caught essentially between meeting the coercive demands of the extra-national corporations while struggling to placate the masses and rationalize the validity of Washington’s pseudo-policies and absolute lack of any sense of American identity or purpose let alone vision.
Western New York has been written off as a lost cause for the much too foreseeable future. We receive lip service and serve well only in prostituting ourselves to Albany, New York City and the Federal Government.
Given that this region is rich in water as such, natural beauty of the Falls, river, gorge, lakes, historical value, cultural riches, universities, winter attractions unlimited and endless artistic and architectural merit, it is time that we recognize the grounds of our uniqueness, potential autonomy and capacity for local self-determination. By comparison, we may with some little thought wonder why it is that Saudi Arabi and Venezula, rich in oil have the lowest oil prices in the world for their people but Western New York, rich in water-generated electrical power, has some of the highest electrical costs in the nation for its own people. Why are we getting ripped off? Because we are letting ourselves be ripped off.
The state of New Niagara has every capability of not just being one of the world’s greatest tourist destinations but THE world tourist destination. Why continue to let ourselves be exploited as has been the local tradition and why let ourselves be at the mercy of real estate speculators buying up property while they wait around for prices to go up. If state authorities such as the liquor authority cannot pass rulings that facilitate the success of our wine industry, then the new state of New Niagara could create such policies.
The Niagara corridor between Buffalo and Niagara Falls is the heart of a new state which could however be joined by all of the state minus New York City and whomever may choose to go with them. But with the western corridor recreated as a new state, northern New Niagara could be a summer paradise and southern New Niagara could be a winter paradise, not that it isn’t equally attractive in the summer. Possibly only the western corridor and the Finger Lakes would be the limit of such a State. I don’t know. But this is what needs to be discussed and considered.
The Indian “nations” also have to realize that they must now be part of a regional strategy and give up the illusion that they are actually a nation. It is probably only a matter of time that they will lose such autonomy as it is to New York State when financial push finally comes to fiscal shove. They need to join in a neo-populist con-federation of communities that must realize that they either will re-create their identity and image or they will continue to be an afterthought of the NY state and the Federal governments.
These governments do not represent what we should be and they can not claim to have had the authority to sell out Niagara Falls to the so-called Indian “nation” to appease the ethnic Indians in their untenable jurisdictional relation. Such past arrangements cannot change the past and only serve to shackle real regional development in the future. Casinos are a good gig but merely serve the purpose of extracting capital from the region without considering the well-being of the region as a unifed whole upon which their very survival in the long-run depends. If in fact the Indian nation believes it can extract wealth without helping to secure the sovereignty upon which the regions survival depends, then they must be judged as exploitative as the other two aforementioned governments.
The leaders of Western New York need to stop playing petty pretend parliamentary politics, passing out what crumbs they can manage to weasel out of Albany and Washington. They need to call upon the legal, financial, managerial and scientific talent of Western New York and propose talks for the creation of a new regional community as a new state of New Niagara or whatever its name may be.
All real politics really is local politics in the sense sketched above. It’s principal is that of subsidiarity, that is, whatever can be done at home must and should be done at home. This neo-populist and authentically federalist secession could be the beginning of a true federalist reconfiguration of the relations of all local American regions and communities with the central government in Washington. Given that Washington has reached the limits of governmental sanity and has gone far beyond the limits of rational fiscal responsibility, selling out the middle class, conducting irrational neo-imperialist wars, striving for an empire in which all lands would be subdued and transformed in the name of a Liberalist Democracy which we ourselves fail to practice let alone believe in.
Washington has failed to represent, value, reflect or desire in any reasonably expressed way a national unity that imbues local regions with as much consideration as it gives corporations, trading partners and other nations which serve the interests of the networks of corporations and banks that no longer value the history, geography and integrity of local peoples, their traditions, cultures and continuing needs and aspirations. When the communities and localities are no longer treated as ends in themselves but utilities of a “greater good” from which the communities do not benefit, then the center does not hold and new decentralized centers must be created. Only in this way can a new political center be non-violently forced to be recreated as a regulative administrative center as opposed to the constitutive bureaucracy and autocracy that now exists. Washington and Albany are our “capitals,” all right, in the sense that they will “capitalize” on every opportunity to continue to use us to sustain their solvency as a bureaucratic social class, a class-based power as purveyor of the interests of trans-national corporations and as an advanced guard of the military-industrial complex’s interest in empire.
So someone or more true politicians that the region will listen to must step forward and call for a “constitutional” convention of sorts to begin the process of re-constituting, planning and declaring our independence. Otherwise given our situation and status, we are probably doomed to a slow cancer-like loss of vitality and vision, a diamond in the rough treated as a stepping stone for the benefit and advantage of others. If we don’t constitute ourselves as a self-responsible, self-regulating and autonomous State, then we will be constituted and again reconstituted at the whim and in the interest of “foreign” powers perpetrating a vision of us as mere raw material and a kind of “disposable income” for the well-being of “states” in whose essence and abundance we do not seem to share.
Why not?
Given that Albany continues to expropriate the wealth of resources and revenues from Western New York without anything of essentially significant value for our recovery returned, any obligation we continue to have to Albany has apparently long since ended. Albany has legal authority but no real political legitimacy.
Also, given that the Federal Government and the nation benefited from the contribution of this region to the WWII war effort but fails to clean up the mess that was left over, our obligation and loyalty to any claim to control over us that they may believe they have is also ended. They also have no legitimacy caught essentially between meeting the coercive demands of the extra-national corporations while struggling to placate the masses and rationalize the validity of Washington’s pseudo-policies and absolute lack of any sense of American identity or purpose let alone vision.
Western New York has been written off as a lost cause for the much too foreseeable future. We receive lip service and serve well only in prostituting ourselves to Albany, New York City and the Federal Government.
Given that this region is rich in water as such, natural beauty of the Falls, river, gorge, lakes, historical value, cultural riches, universities, winter attractions unlimited and endless artistic and architectural merit, it is time that we recognize the grounds of our uniqueness, potential autonomy and capacity for local self-determination. By comparison, we may with some little thought wonder why it is that Saudi Arabi and Venezula, rich in oil have the lowest oil prices in the world for their people but Western New York, rich in water-generated electrical power, has some of the highest electrical costs in the nation for its own people. Why are we getting ripped off? Because we are letting ourselves be ripped off.
The state of New Niagara has every capability of not just being one of the world’s greatest tourist destinations but THE world tourist destination. Why continue to let ourselves be exploited as has been the local tradition and why let ourselves be at the mercy of real estate speculators buying up property while they wait around for prices to go up. If state authorities such as the liquor authority cannot pass rulings that facilitate the success of our wine industry, then the new state of New Niagara could create such policies.
The Niagara corridor between Buffalo and Niagara Falls is the heart of a new state which could however be joined by all of the state minus New York City and whomever may choose to go with them. But with the western corridor recreated as a new state, northern New Niagara could be a summer paradise and southern New Niagara could be a winter paradise, not that it isn’t equally attractive in the summer. Possibly only the western corridor and the Finger Lakes would be the limit of such a State. I don’t know. But this is what needs to be discussed and considered.
The Indian “nations” also have to realize that they must now be part of a regional strategy and give up the illusion that they are actually a nation. It is probably only a matter of time that they will lose such autonomy as it is to New York State when financial push finally comes to fiscal shove. They need to join in a neo-populist con-federation of communities that must realize that they either will re-create their identity and image or they will continue to be an afterthought of the NY state and the Federal governments.
These governments do not represent what we should be and they can not claim to have had the authority to sell out Niagara Falls to the so-called Indian “nation” to appease the ethnic Indians in their untenable jurisdictional relation. Such past arrangements cannot change the past and only serve to shackle real regional development in the future. Casinos are a good gig but merely serve the purpose of extracting capital from the region without considering the well-being of the region as a unifed whole upon which their very survival in the long-run depends. If in fact the Indian nation believes it can extract wealth without helping to secure the sovereignty upon which the regions survival depends, then they must be judged as exploitative as the other two aforementioned governments.
The leaders of Western New York need to stop playing petty pretend parliamentary politics, passing out what crumbs they can manage to weasel out of Albany and Washington. They need to call upon the legal, financial, managerial and scientific talent of Western New York and propose talks for the creation of a new regional community as a new state of New Niagara or whatever its name may be.
All real politics really is local politics in the sense sketched above. It’s principal is that of subsidiarity, that is, whatever can be done at home must and should be done at home. This neo-populist and authentically federalist secession could be the beginning of a true federalist reconfiguration of the relations of all local American regions and communities with the central government in Washington. Given that Washington has reached the limits of governmental sanity and has gone far beyond the limits of rational fiscal responsibility, selling out the middle class, conducting irrational neo-imperialist wars, striving for an empire in which all lands would be subdued and transformed in the name of a Liberalist Democracy which we ourselves fail to practice let alone believe in.
Washington has failed to represent, value, reflect or desire in any reasonably expressed way a national unity that imbues local regions with as much consideration as it gives corporations, trading partners and other nations which serve the interests of the networks of corporations and banks that no longer value the history, geography and integrity of local peoples, their traditions, cultures and continuing needs and aspirations. When the communities and localities are no longer treated as ends in themselves but utilities of a “greater good” from which the communities do not benefit, then the center does not hold and new decentralized centers must be created. Only in this way can a new political center be non-violently forced to be recreated as a regulative administrative center as opposed to the constitutive bureaucracy and autocracy that now exists. Washington and Albany are our “capitals,” all right, in the sense that they will “capitalize” on every opportunity to continue to use us to sustain their solvency as a bureaucratic social class, a class-based power as purveyor of the interests of trans-national corporations and as an advanced guard of the military-industrial complex’s interest in empire.
So someone or more true politicians that the region will listen to must step forward and call for a “constitutional” convention of sorts to begin the process of re-constituting, planning and declaring our independence. Otherwise given our situation and status, we are probably doomed to a slow cancer-like loss of vitality and vision, a diamond in the rough treated as a stepping stone for the benefit and advantage of others. If we don’t constitute ourselves as a self-responsible, self-regulating and autonomous State, then we will be constituted and again reconstituted at the whim and in the interest of “foreign” powers perpetrating a vision of us as mere raw material and a kind of “disposable income” for the well-being of “states” in whose essence and abundance we do not seem to share.
Why not?
Tuesday, May 06, 2008
NT UNANIMOUSLY ENDORSES CHRISTY'S LEGISLATIVE JOURNAL
Tonight the North Tonawanda City Council unanimously passed a resolution supporting the return of Legislative Journal with Tom Christy to the airways of LCTV. In supporting this resolution, the Republican majority council caste a vote for open, free political discourse in Niagara County. It took the council apparently little time to see that what was at stake was the openness and integrity of the public sphere that constitutes the democratic process of our community and our Republic.
The Council transcended the opportunity for partisan gain and took a stand to defend the primacy of a fair and free process of political inquiry, information and self-expression. They are most surely to be commended and thanked for their championing the return of one of Niagara County's few forums for the public scrutiny of our legislators, city and town officials and other citizens who work for the public good.
The North Tonawanda Council was able to see that the return of Legislative Journal with Tom Christy was not simply about the person of Mr. Christy. Yet they were able also to see that the democratic substance and energy of the inquiry that occurred on that show was a function of his courage and constancy in asking in the questions whose answers remained in the dark. The Council rejected the politics of secrecy and partisan power. They opted for a politics that seeks to know the motivations and justifications for the actions taken by government officials that affect all of our lives. The council sees that Mr. Christy deserves to be returned to the forum he created and nurtured with his quirky, earthy, unpretentious repartee, rapport and honest vulnerability.
The actions of the LCTV Board of Directors in ousting Mr. Christy is a black mark for public integrity in Niagara County. Also, the virtual wall of silence and callous lack of compassion with which Niagara County Legislators confronted the many citizens who pleaded for the return of the show they loved is a frighteningly disheartening sign of the depths of indifference to which local politics has descended.
Senator Maziarz feigned ignorance of the coercive abuse of power at LCTV and denied having any knowledge of anything "except what I read in the papers." Such disingenuousness is insulting to the intelligence of the citizens of this county and a final reminder that the Republican majority has no respect for any citizens other than those who toe the line and support the limbo of business as usual, the status quo which has been good for the few but is failing and defeating the many of our county.
Plato once said in his discourse on the Law that the task of the true Legislator was to bring harmony to the community through the mechanisms of law and the authority of leadership. In so far as the Republican majority of the Niagara County Legislature chooses to claim they have no right to intervene to achieve such harmony in our county in this case and insofar as our senior leader, George Maziarz, prefers the display and application of administratively coercive force rather than cooperative solution to our problems, Niagara County will in the foreseeable future remain in a state of political violence, that is, a state of suspicion, animosity, destructive antagonism, character assassination and incredulity. The unity, harmony and integrity of democratic process and the respect for the spirit and intent of law will remain secondary, compromised and scoffed at in the name of partisan power and privilege, a strategy that history shows has not worked and is certainly not now called for.
It is unfortunate that the Legislative majority of our County could not learn a little political prudence from the leaders of North Tonawanda.
The Council transcended the opportunity for partisan gain and took a stand to defend the primacy of a fair and free process of political inquiry, information and self-expression. They are most surely to be commended and thanked for their championing the return of one of Niagara County's few forums for the public scrutiny of our legislators, city and town officials and other citizens who work for the public good.
The North Tonawanda Council was able to see that the return of Legislative Journal with Tom Christy was not simply about the person of Mr. Christy. Yet they were able also to see that the democratic substance and energy of the inquiry that occurred on that show was a function of his courage and constancy in asking in the questions whose answers remained in the dark. The Council rejected the politics of secrecy and partisan power. They opted for a politics that seeks to know the motivations and justifications for the actions taken by government officials that affect all of our lives. The council sees that Mr. Christy deserves to be returned to the forum he created and nurtured with his quirky, earthy, unpretentious repartee, rapport and honest vulnerability.
The actions of the LCTV Board of Directors in ousting Mr. Christy is a black mark for public integrity in Niagara County. Also, the virtual wall of silence and callous lack of compassion with which Niagara County Legislators confronted the many citizens who pleaded for the return of the show they loved is a frighteningly disheartening sign of the depths of indifference to which local politics has descended.
Senator Maziarz feigned ignorance of the coercive abuse of power at LCTV and denied having any knowledge of anything "except what I read in the papers." Such disingenuousness is insulting to the intelligence of the citizens of this county and a final reminder that the Republican majority has no respect for any citizens other than those who toe the line and support the limbo of business as usual, the status quo which has been good for the few but is failing and defeating the many of our county.
Plato once said in his discourse on the Law that the task of the true Legislator was to bring harmony to the community through the mechanisms of law and the authority of leadership. In so far as the Republican majority of the Niagara County Legislature chooses to claim they have no right to intervene to achieve such harmony in our county in this case and insofar as our senior leader, George Maziarz, prefers the display and application of administratively coercive force rather than cooperative solution to our problems, Niagara County will in the foreseeable future remain in a state of political violence, that is, a state of suspicion, animosity, destructive antagonism, character assassination and incredulity. The unity, harmony and integrity of democratic process and the respect for the spirit and intent of law will remain secondary, compromised and scoffed at in the name of partisan power and privilege, a strategy that history shows has not worked and is certainly not now called for.
It is unfortunate that the Legislative majority of our County could not learn a little political prudence from the leaders of North Tonawanda.
Sunday, May 04, 2008
McCain Spills the Oily Beans
John McCain spilled the beans this past week. He proudly declared that his energy policy would make us free of Mid-east oil. Then, he said, we would no longer have to send our soldiers to die in such foreign wars.
I thank John for finally saying openly and honestly what we already knew. Not that he has a great energy policy, but that Iraq is all about the oil.
Greenspan said as much in his recent book. He said he knew it was "politically" ineexpedient to admit it, but the fact of the matter was that Iraq is simply all about the oil. Why such inexorable deceit? The most astounding aspect of this deception that doesn't deceive anyone is that it is effective in preventing any political action in opposition to such an evil war.
Is it America's insurmountable selfishness? Narcissism? Have we suffered so little, that we can't see the pain we are causing over there, not to mention over here? God, I hope the law of Karma isn't true because if it is we are in for some "blowback" that you can't even imagine in your worst nightmares.
I thank John for finally saying openly and honestly what we already knew. Not that he has a great energy policy, but that Iraq is all about the oil.
Greenspan said as much in his recent book. He said he knew it was "politically" ineexpedient to admit it, but the fact of the matter was that Iraq is simply all about the oil. Why such inexorable deceit? The most astounding aspect of this deception that doesn't deceive anyone is that it is effective in preventing any political action in opposition to such an evil war.
Is it America's insurmountable selfishness? Narcissism? Have we suffered so little, that we can't see the pain we are causing over there, not to mention over here? God, I hope the law of Karma isn't true because if it is we are in for some "blowback" that you can't even imagine in your worst nightmares.
Thursday, May 01, 2008
SODOMY IN GOMORRAH: Westless Willies in Wilson, N.Y.
Well, what do we make of these shenanigans on the bus in Wilson. This is a new take on the “object of my affection.” It’s a good thing they didn’t have any baseball bats in the back of that bus. I guess there are all kinds of bats and balls, uses of bats and ball, meanings of bats and balls. “Base” and “homerun” take on new meanings too. Base-ball!!
Ok, enough attempts at humor. It’s obviously not a funny situation. But how seriously are we going to take it? There will be and already are various attempts to deal with this “situation” in short “shrift.” But I’m not sure the priest is the one to be shriving to in this situation, if you know what I mean. Of course you do. (If you don’t, just look up ‘shrift’ or ‘shrive’ in the dictionary and you’ll get the joke.)
Ok, I’ll get serious. The short shrift crowd won’t really want to try to understand what happened on the bus in Wilson. There will be various rationalizations such as “this has been going on for a long time.” Or, “it’s a tradition.” Or, some will say that this was a fluke and such things never happen around here, implying it won’t happen again. So there’s really nothing to really worry about let alone understand. Some will look for the failure in ’supervision,” that is, the “cause” of the situation in failed “management.” Others will blame the students who should thusly be treated as “adults,” whatever that is these days. As if just arbitrarily assigning a number to determine when adulthood starts solves the problem of ‘adult’ mature behavior. As if heinous behavior could automatically catapult a minor into the category of “adult” for legal purposes. Silly, no? The quest for the “cause” in the administrative structure may go to the top: Principal, Superintendent, Commissioner… maybe the whole to blaming God? How about just dealing with it legally and then tightening the screws on behavior. More discipline! Throw them in jail and set an example! How about police in the schools? On the bus? In the bathroom? We’re good at quick, easy, pragmatic answers and then we can forget about it.
By the way, the lawyers are enjoying this, aren’t they!? It won’t be the windfall it was down Texas way. Hundreds of lawyers descended on the FLDS trial. More lawyers than defendants. Nevertheless the Niagara County lawyers should do well here.
Well, back to perversion in Wilson. No one really wants to anal-yze this do they? No one really wants to understand this phenomenon. Why? The rational attitude is that all we need to do is anal-yze the “facts” and then make legal and administrative judgments. Just get things under control and do damage control of course such that no one gets suspicious that just maybe the moral and social fiber and fabric of the communities is going to hell. We want immediate explanation that is somehow satisfying such that it comforts or explains away the phenomenon as any kind of a really serious problem or symptom of a serious problem.
Someone such as myself will always be accused of making a mountain out of a mole hill. People actually believe that the surface “facts” of the immediate issue will explain and help us understand it. But can we understand this event such that we can do something about it or about the real problem? Unfortunately most all of us will see the real problem as this event itself rather than what this event –sodomy—is a sign or symptom of. The real fact is that this act of perverse violence is one variation on the theme of violence, cruelty, indifference and defensiveness that permeate the schools, especially junior and senior high schools. How is it that such crass, vulgar, tasteless and ignorant behavior can take root and thrive in our schools? Is social and intellectual refinement a lost cause? Can we pretend that such “extracurricular” activities are only marginal and minority behaviors and are not a function of the cultural bankruptcy at the very heart of the educational system? Why is such barbaric behavior considered merely a matter of immaturity as opposed to a reflection of the incivility that thrives at the center of adult behavior? In fact the inability of the schools to maintain and nurture civility, some semblance of refinement and an interest in taking the high road regarding human self-fufillment, is a reflection of the inability of the communities to do the same.
Why is degrading another human being the price of gaining access to belonging to certain groups? Why now is a baseball team mimicking the initiation rites of some of the most murderous street gangs in LA? It seems to me that such rites of initiation are required by groups that in some sense conceive themselves as being at war with the world around them. They require absolute loyalty. Is it that they know that you must really want to be a loyal part of them if you are willing to be abused in order to be a member?
There may be a positive aspect to this. Given that the communities we live in are less than desireable, failing to have a common value system or common vision even, such trials required for membership may well indicate an instinctual recognition, even if unconscious, of the primacy of the group and even the sacredness of the group. We all know that the “community” is filled with parasites, lone wolves, exploiters, loan sharks, con artists, etc. Thieves, rapists, robbers, murderers, drug dealers, addicts, pedophiles, hate-mongerers, mentally ill souls, etc. The center of communities may not hold very well or at all especially without police forces, media mediated identities and hopes for futures the likelihood of achieving is less and less realistic. Apparently the aspirations and standard of living of this generation is lower than the last. When joining the military and fighting a meaningless and barbaric war in order to find a way out of the cul de sac of your life and to thus buy a possible future is actually attractive if not reasonable, then the culture of main street, small town America and the middle class is lost. Maybe these sodomistic students are just trying to guarantee a solidarity, a sense of belonging, an integrity of the group that they can't find in their family, school, community or church.
Why is sensitivity, civility, intelligent activities of learning and creativity, camaraderie and socially festive celebration less attractive than violent sports, tire burning events, barbaric imperialistic wars, loud noisy machines roaring around in circles and other absurdities? Why are we eating ourselves to death on foods that taste like shit and fail to have any taste for good foods, the art of cooking. What happened to the art and science of gastronomy? What happened to singing songs on the bus and celebrating a victory? Why is humiliation of our peers a celebration, an initiation, a condition of belonging and sociality?
Is it surprising that a dying culture —if we ever were a culture-- cultivates child psychologies that are violent, narcissistically self-absorbed and indifferent to the meaning, feeling and value of their actions?
Ok, enough attempts at humor. It’s obviously not a funny situation. But how seriously are we going to take it? There will be and already are various attempts to deal with this “situation” in short “shrift.” But I’m not sure the priest is the one to be shriving to in this situation, if you know what I mean. Of course you do. (If you don’t, just look up ‘shrift’ or ‘shrive’ in the dictionary and you’ll get the joke.)
Ok, I’ll get serious. The short shrift crowd won’t really want to try to understand what happened on the bus in Wilson. There will be various rationalizations such as “this has been going on for a long time.” Or, “it’s a tradition.” Or, some will say that this was a fluke and such things never happen around here, implying it won’t happen again. So there’s really nothing to really worry about let alone understand. Some will look for the failure in ’supervision,” that is, the “cause” of the situation in failed “management.” Others will blame the students who should thusly be treated as “adults,” whatever that is these days. As if just arbitrarily assigning a number to determine when adulthood starts solves the problem of ‘adult’ mature behavior. As if heinous behavior could automatically catapult a minor into the category of “adult” for legal purposes. Silly, no? The quest for the “cause” in the administrative structure may go to the top: Principal, Superintendent, Commissioner… maybe the whole to blaming God? How about just dealing with it legally and then tightening the screws on behavior. More discipline! Throw them in jail and set an example! How about police in the schools? On the bus? In the bathroom? We’re good at quick, easy, pragmatic answers and then we can forget about it.
By the way, the lawyers are enjoying this, aren’t they!? It won’t be the windfall it was down Texas way. Hundreds of lawyers descended on the FLDS trial. More lawyers than defendants. Nevertheless the Niagara County lawyers should do well here.
Well, back to perversion in Wilson. No one really wants to anal-yze this do they? No one really wants to understand this phenomenon. Why? The rational attitude is that all we need to do is anal-yze the “facts” and then make legal and administrative judgments. Just get things under control and do damage control of course such that no one gets suspicious that just maybe the moral and social fiber and fabric of the communities is going to hell. We want immediate explanation that is somehow satisfying such that it comforts or explains away the phenomenon as any kind of a really serious problem or symptom of a serious problem.
Someone such as myself will always be accused of making a mountain out of a mole hill. People actually believe that the surface “facts” of the immediate issue will explain and help us understand it. But can we understand this event such that we can do something about it or about the real problem? Unfortunately most all of us will see the real problem as this event itself rather than what this event –sodomy—is a sign or symptom of. The real fact is that this act of perverse violence is one variation on the theme of violence, cruelty, indifference and defensiveness that permeate the schools, especially junior and senior high schools. How is it that such crass, vulgar, tasteless and ignorant behavior can take root and thrive in our schools? Is social and intellectual refinement a lost cause? Can we pretend that such “extracurricular” activities are only marginal and minority behaviors and are not a function of the cultural bankruptcy at the very heart of the educational system? Why is such barbaric behavior considered merely a matter of immaturity as opposed to a reflection of the incivility that thrives at the center of adult behavior? In fact the inability of the schools to maintain and nurture civility, some semblance of refinement and an interest in taking the high road regarding human self-fufillment, is a reflection of the inability of the communities to do the same.
Why is degrading another human being the price of gaining access to belonging to certain groups? Why now is a baseball team mimicking the initiation rites of some of the most murderous street gangs in LA? It seems to me that such rites of initiation are required by groups that in some sense conceive themselves as being at war with the world around them. They require absolute loyalty. Is it that they know that you must really want to be a loyal part of them if you are willing to be abused in order to be a member?
There may be a positive aspect to this. Given that the communities we live in are less than desireable, failing to have a common value system or common vision even, such trials required for membership may well indicate an instinctual recognition, even if unconscious, of the primacy of the group and even the sacredness of the group. We all know that the “community” is filled with parasites, lone wolves, exploiters, loan sharks, con artists, etc. Thieves, rapists, robbers, murderers, drug dealers, addicts, pedophiles, hate-mongerers, mentally ill souls, etc. The center of communities may not hold very well or at all especially without police forces, media mediated identities and hopes for futures the likelihood of achieving is less and less realistic. Apparently the aspirations and standard of living of this generation is lower than the last. When joining the military and fighting a meaningless and barbaric war in order to find a way out of the cul de sac of your life and to thus buy a possible future is actually attractive if not reasonable, then the culture of main street, small town America and the middle class is lost. Maybe these sodomistic students are just trying to guarantee a solidarity, a sense of belonging, an integrity of the group that they can't find in their family, school, community or church.
Why is sensitivity, civility, intelligent activities of learning and creativity, camaraderie and socially festive celebration less attractive than violent sports, tire burning events, barbaric imperialistic wars, loud noisy machines roaring around in circles and other absurdities? Why are we eating ourselves to death on foods that taste like shit and fail to have any taste for good foods, the art of cooking. What happened to the art and science of gastronomy? What happened to singing songs on the bus and celebrating a victory? Why is humiliation of our peers a celebration, an initiation, a condition of belonging and sociality?
Is it surprising that a dying culture —if we ever were a culture-- cultivates child psychologies that are violent, narcissistically self-absorbed and indifferent to the meaning, feeling and value of their actions?
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