A Scene We'd Like To See Repeated

In Baghdad and Kabul...

Journal Irresponsable

Truth in advertising...

The appeal to Universal Principles as justification for the sheer Middle School puerility of CH's "humor" is like something out of a bad dream.

Chomsky On Charlie Hebdo

A tireless voice of reason, in command of the relevant facts, weighs in...

The Question We Ought To Be Asking Ourselves

Were the Kouachi brothers attacking Western Civilization or embracing it?

Nota Bena the Interconnections

Racist provocation and the “war on terror”

The Trouble With Nat Turners

History is the record of unintended consequences.

In addition to the death of innocents and the mayhem that they cause, the Nat Turners of the world always manage to play into the hands of their enemies.

Oppressors use each Turnerian uprising as a pretext to tighten the screws on civil liberties. The sheeple, anxious for protection, acquiesce. The future grows ever more dystopic and Orwellian.

The only light I see at the end of this very dark tunnel is the tendency of the oppressors to overplay their hand. Add to that their deep dishonesty and overwhelming greed--internecine quarrels are sure to erupt. We must never forget that God is Ironist-in-Chief.

What happens to the rest of us in the meantime, however, is always the question. My advice to one and all is to stay lucid--lucidity is the best revenge.

And literary intelligence redeems the world.

Noam Chomsky on the Five Hundred Years War

The 500 Years War and the Opiate of the Masses

Some say we are living in the midst of a religious war, but I don't think so. We are living in the midst of a war, alright, but it is not "religious" at base--for that might imply that ideals are at stake and would give the protagonists too much credit.

The war we are living in the midst of is the Five Hundred Years War.

It started when Europeans developed the military capacity to conquer, colonize, and enslave diverse populations around the world (roughly five centuries ago).

Slavery was eventually outlawed (de jure, but it continues by other means, e.g., wage slavery, de facto).

Following the Second European Civil War of the 20th century (in which the victors continued their internecine struggle over the spoils of the 500 Years War to date), there was a move toward something called "de-colonization."

De-colonization turned out to be the first phase of neo-colonialism. It's all a shell game, but no matter how often the "liberated" try to point this out, their observation is simply ignored by the players.

Be that as it may, some of the natives do get restless from time to time. Occasionally, they rise up, Nat Turner fashion, and take a swipe at their overlords. What is amazing to me is how infrequently this happens given the amount of inequality and suffering that has become normalized throughout the world.

The Kouachi brothers decided that they weren't going to take insult with injury any longer. But think about it: there are approximately 4.8 million Muslims in France. The Nat Turners grab the headlines because they expose the worm in the apple--and anyone who does that must be dealt with ruthlessly. But they represent just a fraction of a percent of the population that goes ahead and eats the apple, worm and all. And don't think they eat the worm without knowing it. I'm sure some do, but many more just swallow it as their lot in life and hope for better days.

Hope, it turns out, is the opiate of the masses.

All the Terrorism the U.S. Taxpayer Can Buy...

Pop Quiz

Where was this photo taken?

a) Ferguson Missouri

b) The suburbs of Paris

c) Colonial Sudan

d) All of the above

Let's Celebrate Satire!

What? Not so funny anymore?

Another Nat Turner

Engaging Peace

Great blog!

The Further Confessions of Nat Turner

Why wasn't Osama bin Laden taken alive? Or, for that matter, any of the suspects in the recent shootings in France? Could it possibly be because white people are not interested in hearing the further confessions of Nat Turner?

Hitler Was Fond of Children

A laudable trait. Unfortunately, he wasn't fond of all children--only those belonging to the "Aryan" race.

Human beings are complicated. When considering them, we must not settle for partial information, half-truths, or single images.

We must learn to think critically, even if it means contradicting what our "guts" tell us is self-evident.

Every picture tells a story, yes. But what, precisely, that story is takes time to parse out. We need background; we need context, context, context.

When we do not demand to know all that we can about a given assertion, we are left with statements like the title of this post: which is true enough in one sense and terribly false in many others. If we acknowledge only the true sense of the statement, we bury the false senses and the truth we acknowledge becomes a screen for a whole host of lies.

Journalism is a genre of reporting to a deadline: the race to "get the story" and get it out. Partial information is unavoidable. Half-truths are rampant. Single images purport to tell what words cannot.

Interrogate every assertion. Question every image. If you don't, you'll play the fool.

Have You Ever Noticed...

That when white people suffer at the hands of people of color, it is an outrageous crime against humanity; but when people of color suffer at the hands of white people, it's business as usual and/or they had it coming?

Clarification

Jonathan Swift, Satirist.

Satirists are moralists. Those who engage in gratuitous ridicule or vilification are not satirists. They are boors.

Joe Sacco On Satire

Everything that happens on planet earth takes place within a context.

Like Clockwork.

Shock and Grief Must Not Prevent Us from Asking Difficult Questions

Gunmen were “probably followed” by French police before Paris massacre - World Socialist Web Site

I'll Say It Again: If We Truly Wished To Make Sense of the Paris Shootings...

We would be asking this question.

Given the fact that mass shootings are ROUTINE in the United States, forensic psychologists here should be in a strong position to advise the French government as to what to do and what not to do in response to the Charlie Hebdo massacre.

Moreover, we should all be bracing for that most peculiar phenomenon that tends to appear in the wake of a tragedy such as this: the copycat killings.

Our utter refusal to deal rationally and realistically with these kinds of crimes--wringing our hands and chalking them up to irrational religion--only guarantees the repetition of the cycle.

Wake up, study, act.

Je Ne Suis Pas Charlie

Let cooler heads examine what lies beneath the media-promoted response to the infamous criminal acts lately perpetrated in Paris--a city that I love.

And, by the way, it is not the mere fact that Muhammad is depicted that outrages some Muslims--Muhammad has been depicted BY MUSLIMS THEMSELVES.

No, it is the manner in which some cartoonists have chosen to depict the Prophet. I have viewed a sampling of the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists' work and it appears to me to range from the gratuitously provocative to the downright inflammatory. I get no sense from the cartoons that I have reviewed that the intention behind their publication was to spark civil conversation about the place of religion in a secular society or other significant issues of the day involving religion in general or Islam in particular. From what I have seen, the intention behind the publication of the cartoons was to ridicule Muslims and their most cherished symbols.

Of course, these facts IN NO WAY JUSTIFY the murderous actions of the Paris shooters--who, I do not doubt, have put themselves on the fast-track to a very bad end. But nothing happens on planet earth outside of a context. Nothing is got for nothing. The Charlie Hebdo cartoonists appear to me to have been spoiling for a fight for at least the last five years. I learned in elementary school that, if you go looking for a fight, you are quite likely to find one. And in the present context where many Muslims feel that they are under siege throughout the world, a few (and, if the news reports can be believed, it was quite literally a few) may show up to the match with automatic weapons. At that point, all arguments about the "pen being mightier than the sword" are rendered academic.

According to the Pew Forum, the Muslim minority in France is roughly 4.8 million souls. It is difficult to believe that only the three suspects in the Charlie Hebdo shooting were offended by the cartoons that the magazine published about Muhammad. And yet, only 3 out of 4.8 million chose to engage in a violent act of retaliation. Do the math: that is a tiny percentage of the Muslim population of France. It is for this reason that I think that the question we ought to be asking about this tragedy is one that forensic psychologists might be able to answer: why these three?

Instead of asking this very sensible question, the media is filled with speculation and pontification about "religious violence" and "freedom of speech." That chatter is nothing but unhelpful noise.

Attempting to understand how and why violence occurs in the world is NOT tacit approval of violence. This blog is committed to disseminating the Tolstoyan philosophy of NON-VIOLENT NON-COOPERATION WITH EVIL. I want to see the resort to violence as a way to settle disputes stopped. NOW. But I see nothing in the current hysteria that will even begin to take a responsible step towards that goal.

This Is What Responsible Journalism Looks Like...

Twelve dead in terrorist shooting at Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo - World Socialist Web Site

Intentional Homicides Per Capita

According to World Bank statistics.

The Liberator

We love the land of our nativity, only as we love all other lands. The interests, rights, and liberties of American citizens are no more dear to us, than are those of the whole human race. Hence [all of our current politics to the contrary], we can allow no appeal to patriotism, to revenge any national insult or injury....

We register our testimony, not only against all wars, whether offensive or defensive, but all preparations for war; against every naval ship, every arsenal, every fortification; against the militia system and a standing army; against all military chieftains and soldiers; against all monuments commemorative of victory over a foreign foe, all trophies won in battle, all celebrations in honor of military or naval exploits; against all appropriations for the defense of a nation by force and arms on the part of any legislative body; against every edict of government, requiring of its subjects military service.

--William Lloyd Garrison, "The Declaration of Sentiments," September 20, 1838.

By the early 19th century, only two generations after the revolution, it was clear to Garrison that the promise of freedom which the revolution had betokened was illusory: for the very means by which the colonies had secured their independence--military--would ensure the new nation's continued slavery.

To whom? Why, to the "military chieftains" within the government itself. Our economy bends to their will. We cannot liberate ourselves from the military-industrial-complex.

Garrison was a voice crying in the wilderness and his prophecy, now fulfilled, has been relegated to the history books.

One would think that, in a religion-mad country such as the U.S., masses of people would be hungry for prophecy--particularly prophecy that has proven itself genuine through its fulfillment. But religion-mad Americans only give lip-service to the prophetic tradition. Their true investment in religion amounts to little more than self-affirming Feel-Goodism: the life-boat Christianity that promises "salvation" in exchange for one's willingness to affirm the incredible. They have neither the time nor the stomach for Garrison's prophetic challenge.

Liberation asks too much from us: too much intellectual honesty, too much energy, too much personal courage.