By: Grainne Rhuad

There is a thing keeping everyone’s lungs and lips locked; It is called fear and it’s seeing a great renaissance. –The Dresden Dolls, Sing

Fear, it’s one of most living beings’ great motivators.  It arouses the senses telling us to pay attention, something may be coming, and we may need to act.

There is nothing wrong with fear, base fear in and of itself.  However most living things address whatever is causing them fear.  When the rabbit escapes the fox, it ceases to be afraid.  When it dies, its compatriots do not live in fear of ever leaving the warren.  Fear and its usefulness have come to its culmination and passed.

Human beings however are different.  We like fear, or we seem to.  We gather around campfires and tell stories of Unseelie things like Balor and the Sluagh, we watch movies to elicit fear responses and a great good deal of us get our fear fix from the nightly news, streaming into our homes, our consciousness, our being without even our notice most of the time.

Unlike the rabbit that allows fear to pass, we bathe in it.  We sit about talking about dreadful things, working each other up.  Interestingly enough, more talk occurs about ‘being’ afraid than ‘doing’ anything with those fears.

When we fear things I think that we wish for them … every fear hides a wish.-David Mamet, Edmond

It often seems that we make fear our pastime.  Do we secretly wish for the things we fear to come about?  Would the actuality of our fears be as terrible as we imagine?  Or would they in fact alleviate our suffering?  Is it possible that even with the most terrifying of our fears realized that we would have the relief of never again having that fear?

Some people say yes.  There are countless behavioral interventions for those perpetually in fear that expose them to those very same fears.  Beyond that, in interviews with survivors of war, torture and abuse the people who come out the other side very often live fearless lives; they have made it to the other side of what was terrifying them.

Other people however say no.  There is evidence that people witnessing their fears, as in say a car accident or death of a loved one will fold up into themselves even further, taking that occasion as proof that every doubt they have whether reasonable or unreasonable is going to happen.

Of course the latter is correct.  Everything we fear will happen, sometime to someone.  But, should we let it destabilize us?  The rational amongst us say “no of course not.”

And yet, we destabilize ourselves every day.  Purposefully, by constantly watching, talking about and thinking about everything that is wrong in the world.  By putting such a great amount of energy into the fears of the day, we are to a great extent missing the things that would normally balance out such fears.

No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear.-Edmund Burke, On the Sublime and Beautiful

Is fear in fact a passion?  Sometimes it seems so.  There are a good many people who make it their business to seek out and find things that are fear inducing in order to share them with the world.  You see this on news-like shows.  In comedy, on the internet with your friend postings.  The effect is the same:  “Here is something you should be afraid of.”  Almost never with a suggested solution.  This lack of solution runs counter to the very biological function of fear.  Fear is supposed to kick in to jumpstart our bodies into responding.  But, when we are exposed to fears that are seemingly insurmountable, with no discussion further than, “Yes that is fucking crazy and I am afraid.”  All of the fear is backed up with no action in sight to help us realign ourselves.  This creates in us an exacerbated state of stress.  How on earth can we combat all these things?

What is typically seen are people following up discussions like these with comments like, “Time to throw in the towel.” And, “Time to run away.”  This also instills fear into people.  How on earth are they going to manage that?

This brings us to the next bit.

Fear is the enemy of logic.

Frank Sinatra said it in The Way You Wear Your Hat but he’s not the only one.  When we are reacting in a fear based moment, we are making decisions based on preservation, but not logic.  We are not taking time to think things through and make a real and concerted difference.

The big question is why are we not spending more time dispelling fear?  Why are we not instead empowering each other?

It’s easy to blame all of our fear mongering on recent events like 9/11 and the resultant color coded terror scales we suffered through, which thankfully have been retired for now; as well as the constant ticker tape news updates which seems unlikely to go away.  However, it would be unfair to lay all of this at this particular door.

Since the advent of WWI people in the States and Europe have been afraid.  Initially this fear found outlet in an emerging art source: DADA, which on the surface non-sensical was indeed trying to make sense of the extreme shock and fear dealt out by a new type of war.

Humans being humans however; did not stick with the “let’s do something with our feelings,” route, and instead decided almost across the board to beef up on ammunition and war machines, further illustrating when people are afraid it’s easy to make them more afraid and control them.

We still are seeing the effects of this today.  Our fear caused the most recent war in Iraq. Saddam  Hussein obviously had no nuclear weapons.  There was absolutely no evidence of it, and yet our fear of him wielding it was enough for us to universally put a stamp of approval on an invasion.  We almost did the same in North Korea.  Who knows, we may still do so, we have spy submarines off the coast listening in fear to them right now.

If we were thinking with our logical minds we would wait and work with others.  A prime example is the situation in the West Bank.  Logic dictates that no matter how we feel about the “Holy Land”, people were there before the state of Israel was created and no plan was made for any of them.  Thus, logically we are all to blame for the ugly state of affairs and poor treatment of Palestinians.

But we don’t see it that way, because we are afraid.  Afraid of pissing of Israel whose pockets are helpful to us; afraid of the unrest recombining will cause; afraid of Asiatic dark people; and most of all afraid of admitting the world made a huge kerffufleing mistake.

Fear has many eyes and can see things underground.-Miguel De Cervantes, Don Quixote

The character Don Quixote may have been mad, but he was imbued with the madness of a saint.  He quite succinctly pointed out that our fears very often have us seeing problems that are not there.  This is true of things great and small.  We have very often discussed at Subversify our irrational fear of Russia during the Cold War.  We currently have an irrational fear of Mexico and Mexicans whether they are citizens or not.  We fear drugs; we fear not having drugs at the very same time.  We fear a police state and we fear not being protected.

But, one thing Don Quixote also illustrated is that throwing off that fear, while it may have you tipping at windmills you think are dragons, gives you a liberation that allows you to live happily, fully and without regret and longing.  Isn’t that what we all really want?

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it has gone past I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.-Frank Herbert, Dune

By: Grainne Rhuad

So, what did the SOPA/PIPA blackout achieve?

First of all, anything announced that has to do with internet and internet freedoms gets the attention of most people using the internet.  There are precious few people who want restrictions placed on their internet activity and those who do belong in one of two categories.

1. Government /Law enforcement agencies-because they need laws-at least superficially to go after people.  Especially people in other countries. 
2. Large Corporations and Industries like Music and Film licensing ones and Media outlets who want to make money off of people’s work.  Being able to give away your own work for free or sharing music, stories etc. with your friends really puts a dent in their pocketbook.

News of the shutdown seemed to bring retaliation from hackers who claimed credit for attacking the Justice Department’s website. Federal officials confirmed it was down for hours Thursday evening and that the disruption was being “treated as a malicious act.”

‘A loose affiliation of hackers known as “Anonymous” claimed credit for the attack. Also hacked was the site for the Motion Picture Association of America.”

P.S.-I love how the news outlets discribe and downplay Anonymous…scared maybe?

It seems to have worked however since a postponement has been called by SOPA’s author which will be discussed in a moment.

Whose Minds’ did it change?

It didn’t initially seem as if it changed anyone’s mind.  Those who were for SOPA/PIPA got up bright and fresh this morning and arrested people in New Zealand in exactly the manner SOPA lays out should be acceptable to us. 

4 people from the company Megaupload.com including the founder Kim Dotcom and 4 of his executives were arrested in New Zealand for breaking piracy laws in Virginia where one of their servers is located.  Even though they hadn’t broken any laws of New Zealand where they legally reside and at least Kim Dotcom is a dual citizen of Germany and Finland, The U.S. wanted extradition and received it.  Of the other three defendants two were German citizens and one is Dutch. 

Other people whose minds weren’t changed ranged from Musicians themselves to most of the U.S. representatives voting on the bill. 

In a bit of strangeness.  Robin Davey, an Independent Musician lately of the group Bastard Fairies, Writer and Award Winning Filmmaker. Came down on the side for SOPA.  Stating in an article he wrote for Gizmodo “People have further been led to believe that music holds no worth, and can be shared or streamed at little or no price. Piracy will remain as prevalent as ever having seen the legal alternative settle so low, and the artists, content owners, and creators suffer even further as they try to cope with ever diminishing returns.” 

See he is concerned with losing money on his creative potential, which is interesting as his band The Bastard Fairies has given away complete and partial albums for free as well as created music by inserting rap and reading around stolen beats from other artists.  In fact, complete songs produced by Robin Davey are pirated. 

But early this morning Senator Harry Reid (D- Nevada) went public with the following statement:

“In light of recent events, I have decided to postpone Tuesday’s vote on the PROTECT I.P. Act.

“There is no reason that the legitimate issues raised by many about this bill cannot be resolved. Counterfeiting and piracy cost the American economy billions of dollars and thousands of jobs each year, with the movie industry alone supporting over 2.2 million jobs. We must take action to stop these illegal practices. We live in a country where people rightfully expect to be fairly compensated for a day’s work, whether that person is a miner in the high desert of Nevada, an independent band in New York City, or a union worker on the back lots of a California movie studio.

“I admire the work that Chairman Leahy has put into this bill. I encourage him to continue engaging with all stakeholders to forge a balance between protecting Americans’ intellectual property, and maintaining openness and innovation on the internet. We made good progress through the discussions we’ve held in recent days, and I am optimistic that we can reach a compromise in the coming weeks.”

Also, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas) announced on Friday that he will postpone consideration of his Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) until there is wider agreement on the controversial legislation.

“I have heard from the critics and I take seriously their concerns regarding proposed legislation to address the problem of online piracy,” Smith said. “It is clear that we need to revisit the approach on how best to address the problem of foreign thieves that steal and sell American inventions and products.”

Just in case you didn’t know, Smith was the author of SOPA and its most vocal proponent. He had repeatedly said the bill did not need to be changed and accused the critics of “spreading lies.”

Do the Internet Outlets in fact have any power?

This is a question I was looking for in this whole Blackout.  Pretty big companies joined the blackout.  Like Google and Wikipedia.  Granted, they didn’t entirely Blackout, their services were still availably but they were pretty clearly supportive, one had to get around their front page to go to anything else.  The message was there.  People use both of these sites every day, several times a day and they will most likely continue to do so, however it didn’t initially seem as if they held much sway in this case.

People went about business as usual the day after and even the day during.  Most News outlets declined to participate and very many individuals commenting in social forums made light of the attempt to sway the government in their decision making.  A fact that at very least shows the lack of confidence the people have in those who govern them. 

Yet in light of the above statement from Sen. Reid and others today it would seem that the public outcry and new type of boycotting did have the effect intended.  Lawmakers took note and at least slowed down to take a better look at this particular set of laws. 

This is in and of itself is a sort of victory.  Yes this sort of protest works.  Particularly it seems if some big names are behind it.  Google and Wikipedia-A big thanks to you. 

Who is hurt by this thing called Piracy?

The people the lawmakers will have us believe are hurt by piracy are individuals who have created things, like art, music, literature, research.   However as we all know by now, at least here in the U.D. an “individual” can be a Corporation thanks to “Corporate Personhood”. 

Other people piracy could potentially hurt are those artists particularly musicians who are just starting out who have been known to have their material swiped off of sites such as YouTube and lately Mac’s Cloud application. 

Most for- sale download sites like ITunes, Amazon and Barnes&Noble make it clear that you are purchasing copyrighted material.  Their TOS already addresses the issue that SOPA and PIPA seek to put in place making them redundant.

It’s not like the early days of Napster where music is freely shared and nobody gets a piece of the pie except the one 13 year old whose mum bought him/her a CD for the holidays.  Although, Spotify raises some of these questions again…but there again their TOS is pretty clear.

Others who claim to suffer from piracy are those like J.K. Rowling who gets really pissed off at any fan fiction using her characters.  I frankly think this is in bad form.  If you have inspired a new generation to write with your characters as a jumping off point you should be quite proud.  Instead she has been quite litigious in her approach to dealing with anyone and everyone.   

Who is helped by it?

With 150 million registered users, about 50 million hits daily and endorsements from music superstars, Megaupload.com was among the world’s biggest file-sharing sites. According to a U.S. indictment, the site, which was shut down Thursday, earned Dotcom $42 million in 2010 alone.

Although the company is based in Hong Kong and Dotcom lives in New Zealand, some of the alleged pirated content was hosted on leased servers in Virginia, and that was enough for U.S. prosecutors to act.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, which defends free speech and digital rights online, said in a statement that the arrests set “a terrifying precedent. If the United States can seize a Dutch citizen in New Zealand over a copyright claim, what is next?”

Alleged piracy seemed to help this company quite a lot as it was reported they had 150 million registered users and about 50 million hits daily.

Along with the arrests the company’s New Zealand Bank Accounts were frozen in amounts that equaled over $10 million dollars.  Also seized where rare vehicles like a Rolls Royce Phantom Drophead Coupe valued at over NZ$500,000.and various pieces of fine art.  So it seems they were making a pretty penny off of this thing called piracy.  Most of which was of Motion Pictures. 

The foreseeable trouble with this case is the films were uploaded by other registered members. The company, much like Napster did not put them up for sale nor did they upload them.  They simply offered a membership fee enabling people to share more content.  They were also supported by the very people they were supposedly pirating from.  Music industry giants like Black Eyed Peas and Jamie Foxx participated in videos supporting the service. Although after the arrests most parties denied it.

 

Besides being trance inducing…it’s pretty clear from the video they can’t deny they were a part of the commercial.

Is there a different, better-ish way?

Is there a way for us all to be happy, share content, practice writing, create fan fiction/videos/cartoons while making everyone happy and not costing artists money?

I think the answer is maybe. 

I say maybe because it will require less greed on the part of the J. K. Rowlings of the world.  A lot of artists whose books, movies, music sells on the internet were in fact against the bill and issued statements to that effect. 

Artists against SOPA including Trent Reznor, OK-Go, Neil Gaiman, and more wrote an open letter decrying the bill.  Many artists and celebrities added Stop SOPA to their twitter accts. The difference is these are people who are actively connected to their audience.  They make use of the new ways of communicating and encourage others to emulate them.  They very often give away their works for free.  This is because they have moved with the times and know the best way to get your work out to the people is to let them know about it.  If they love it they will pay.  We see this work very often at places like Bandcamp where naming your own price for music, even if it’s zero very often nets musicians more than they would get from the record companies.  People understand the work that goes into producing something and mostly they are willing to pay for it.  Name your own price works because of that and because of this trust in the artist-fan relationship nobody needs to worry about Piracy.

What have we learned in the last few days?

What I’ve taken out of this whole experience is that unexpected people care about unexpected things.  I never would have thought Robin Davey gave a shit about piracy.  I also never would have thought that the author of SOPA would listen to the world of the internet.  I am pleasantly surprised in that.  I went into this year feeling pretty good about the world in general.  Yes it’s in pretty bad shape and yes we are losing choices daily.  It’s definitely not 31 flavors out there anymore.  But we do still have the choice to stand for something.  And sometimes we are heard.  Which is really nice.  But what’s more important than being heard is standing up, because integrity is everything. 

Also pirates are not all bad, sometimes they take what is on offer and give it away to those who will improve on things and make them better.  It’s really the very wealthy and non-creative people who are most afraid of pirates, because they can’t make anything new.

By: Karla Fetrow

America has an issue with responsibility.  Not only with accepting it, apparently, a very large number aren’t even sure of the definition.  This shouldn’t be too surprising, considering that responsible action took some major hammer blows through a paper trail of insurance liability and law suits that found home owners guilty for allowing neighbor kids to play in their yards; consequently injuring themselves; judged more favorably in two vehicle accidents for the one who had the highest insurance premium, regardless of the circumstances and determined that unauthorized people can be arrested for using life saving equipment, belonging to a public service, in a major crisis.  When the question should have been one of responsible behavior, it was an anal retentive view of statutes, policies and regulations.

The counter-cultural movement of the 1960′s – 1970′s put out a lot of effort to create self-sustaining communes and communities, but most of them failed.  The most common explanation for this was the rampant drug use and consequent abuses.  Drugs were prolific in many of these small societies retreating from mainstream life.  Drugs were often involved with property vandalism, break in’s and violent encounters.  At the same time, you also saw builders, artists, farmers, fishermen, teachers, firemen, counselors who used drugs but did not seem to see any reason for letting drugs consume them or drive them to make poor ethical decisions.  It wasn’t the drugs that ruined the early communes, but a lack of commitment by those who saw the liberal leanings and isolated environment as a free ride.

Drugs are an easy way of saying “lack of responsibility”, and an even easier excuse for keeping drug use under control.  As generally happens whenever the public begins taking a little more lenient attitude to marijuana laws, the adversaries of decriminalized marijuana have begun beating their drums.  A recent “My View” in the Anchorage Daily News stated, “those stoned don’t contribute to the common good”.  That’s basically all the author said, in five hundred words or less.  No statistics.  No documentary evidence of the malfunctioning of stoners; just a short comment by the writer that after giving up marijuana thirty years ago, he now experiences failing cognitive function.

The most debatable part of his short argument was the contribution to common good.  Marijuana use, as a medically approved drug or for recreation, is pretty wide-spread across the work force; from college professors to truck drivers.  They all seem to be doing their jobs efficiently, and appearing to the public as completely normal.  The most non-contributing stoners seem to be among those who must take invasive drug tests to land a minimum wage job.  It might have something more to do with motivation than getting stoned.

Fortunately, My View is a little more tolerant toward homeless alcoholics, although homeless alcoholics don’t contribute greatly to the common good either; at least not in the measurable terms of holding a job and paying taxes.  Karluk Manor, the Anchorage response to the nationally led “housing first” project, opened on December 8th of this year.  Its purpose is to provide shelter for chronic alcoholics that have no place to go.  Fifty-four year old John Kort, one of the Manor’s first clients, was found dead on New Year’s Day.  Beside the usual grumbling about an establishment for undesirables becoming a draw for alcoholics to the neighborhood, there was an outcry that the project wasn’t working because in less than a month since its opening, it had already experienced a tragedy.

What was important for the supporters of the Karluk Manor was that John Kort didn’t have to die out in the cold, filled with misery, with no soft place to lay his head.  What was important to My View was that the motel was an act of mercy.  What’s even more important was that the City had assumed a sense of responsibility to a dispossessed population that has been dying off at a rapid rate of as many as twenty a year, in a city with less than half a million people.  Their deaths have been attributed to alcoholism, foul play and occasional accidents such as drowning or stepping out into traffic, but mainly to exposure.

That’s a step in the right direction, but a small one.  Orlando, Florida recently made the news when it arrested three members of the “Food not Bombs” movement for feeding more than twenty-five people in a park within two miles of City Hall and that allows only two permits per year for feeding people.  Although the organizers of “Food not Bombs” had behaved responsibly, choosing a priority of satisfying hunger over statutes and city ordinances, the City of Orlando had not.

Said spokesperson for “Food not Bombs”, police waited until everyone had been served, than began making arrests. “They basically carted them off to jail for feeding hungry people,” said Douglas Coleman.  “For them to regulate a time and place for free speech and to share food, that is unacceptable.”

Much has been unacceptable over the last few decades through the blurring of the fine lines of responsibility.  The organizers and participants of the early communes dreamed of equitable societies living in harmony with nature and healthy food; a responsible commitment, but one that was shaken by those that came along for the free ride.  Corporations fought for and won the recognition to be a person under the law, giving it all personal rights as listed under individual freedoms, but relieving them of all responsibility as a corporate entity.

This is the year to resolve ourselves to responsibility.  The media has not done its job.  During the New Year’s countdown in New York City, a summary of what the Occupy movement wanted was more jobs.  Jobs are certainly on the wish list, but when you read the demands in their entirety, it really boils down to one thing.  The Occupy Movement wants the corporations and governments to take responsibility for their actions and begin making amends.  There has been no indication so far that they intend to do anything except extend their free ride by any desperate measure possible.

If the governments won’t do it, and the corporations won’t do it, we must.  There is a time when law biding citizens must question the laws that remove personal responsibility and puts innocent people in harm’s way.  That time is now.  There is a time when law abiding citizens must choose between restrictions of the law that handicap them in aiding the homeless, the hungry, the disturbed and the disenfranchised.  That time is now.  There is a time we must take our own tools, our own resources into our hands and do the right thing.  A time to be responsible.  That time is now.  The time for the corporate free ride is over.

Subversify’s Best Moments of 2011

It’s been an incredible year for Subversify.  The International counter-cultural magazine that began with a few scattered stories and a reader base of a few close friends is now a bustling weekly edition, with six feature spots and a roll call of over thirty contributing and guest writers.  It has become the magazine that brings you the news before the media has even had its morning coffee.  In fact, we’ve been so on the ball, the official website, News before its News, wanted our stories.  Unfortunately, their conditions were a little unfavorable.  They wanted all our stories, without crediting the authors or the magazine, and they wanted them for free. Needless to say, Subversify said no.

We started the year with a big bang.  Grainne Rhaud told the world why Bradley Manning matters, Bill the Butcher warned that India was a famine in the making and Karla Fetrow raised objections to TSA gropes.  She also explained how the baby boomers destroyed the world.

In March, the unthinkable happened.  A devastating earthquake destroyed the nuclear reactors at Fukushima, Japan.  While the media downplayed the event, confident the disaster would be contained, Subversify said, not so.  The reactors were melting down.  This statement caused quite a fuss, but as the months rolled by with no respite from its nuclear woes, even the nay sayers had to say that Subversify was right.

In July, guest writer, Chris, gave us a personal account of his experiences with civil rights fighter, Mikey Weinstein.  The glowing tribute complimented an earlier interview Will Noble had contributed on Weinstein’s efforts to bring religious freedom to the non-Christian military personnel.

Ronald West has spent the last several months revealing the secret little dealings of the CIA and how those naughty little fellows get involved with all kinds of underhand dealings, including narcotics trafficking.  His reports rocked the site and it seems we’re still rocking. The Cracking the Matrix series soared into the all time top 10 and gave Subversify a much needed dose of espionage and political conspiracy.

In fact, we rocked so hard with Mitchell Warren’s essay of the censorship of Nibiru, a celestial body that hasn’t yet been determined to be a planet or a menacing asteroid entering our orbit, our shared server could no longer handle the skyrocketing traffic.  Subversify had a break down.

Whatever Nibiru’s constitution, it definitely knocked Subversify out, for a short while.  Within three weeks, the magazine bounced back, bringing with it a variety of new, exciting guest writes.  Professional travel writer, Alexandra Pratt carried us deeply into astonishing places, bringing the sights, colors and sounds of the frozen polar zone of Antarctica to the vivid greenery of Ireland.  We sponsored our first film company, Groundswell, the creators of the heart-wrenching documentary, “The Return of Navajo Boy”.

Then, Subversify went Viral.  Beginning with the recordings of “Stranger Advice”, an online talk show featuring interviews with experts on alien encounters and psychic phenomena, it also featured “Black Vampires”, a six member band whose music is described as “Hard Alternative Gothic Soul”, and “Decadent Nation”, whose four member band picked up their luggage and went on tour to rock the Nation pushing urgently against the machine.

Subversify is the news.  Early October and there is a rumble, the trembling quake of things to come.  Contributing writer, Eddie SantoPrieto drops from the board to join a protest in the streets of New York City; the beginning of Occupation Wall Street.  At the same time, Will Noble, a staunch writer who has been with Subversify almost since its beginning, marched off to join demonstrators in Washington D.C., protesting the government’s foreign wars.  From October sixth to October 12^th., Will kept a live diary of the events that were published at Subversify Viral, giving Subversify up to the minute coverage of an event that was destined to become the world’s most defining moment of the year; the beginning of a global Occupy movement.

November and December brought us a number the final thoughts of the season, and fittingly, they were bittersweet, always thankful for the memories, even while remaining trepidations of new resolutions, new promises and new, inevitable disappointments.  The Advocate’s Devil, Azazel, known for a few years as an edgy commenter and a defiant voice to even the most experienced Subversives, begins his manifesto, not so much an ode to violence, but a dire prophesy, foretelling an upcoming revolution destined to be something less than peaceful, and one that perhaps cannot be prevented.  In “The War is Coming Home” the argument reaches a zenith, even as conspicuous behavior, namely the defense authorization bill, is reported in the mainstream media.

Perhaps it is only fitting that Mike, or Wicklowmick, ends a subversive year with some soul-wrenching and very often heart-warming tales of history, of holidays and of wintry friskiness.  From Three Wise Men, to The Little Donkey’s Tale, to an Irish dog show, Mike eloquently reminded us that “subversity” is not just about challenging the news media…it’s also about reporting the most wonderful, quizzical and amazing moments of this odd triviality named life, through history, through memoir and through shared experiences with friends.

All in all, we have enjoyed a wonderful year and tip our collective hats to the many writers, journalists, poets, cartoonists and smart-ass commentators who have made Subversify 2011 such an inglorious and incorrigible party.  A virtual bacchanalia of questions, answers, dogma, sarcasm, dirty limericks, lamentations and allusions to much smarter people than ourselves—what more can you ask of an online magazine?

Mid Winter Gozebo @2010 Karla Fetrow

By:Karla Fetrow

These are the hours of darkness, of nights so long and frigid, time itself heaves to a standstill.  The dull ache of rising to a morning filled with blackness, the reluctant light returning in dull grey shades against a backdrop of blue mountains.  The blue fills up the vision.  Deep blue against grey skies and rattling trees.  Deep blue dropping heavily, folding in more hours of darkness within a few hours.  No sun on the horizon, not one golden ray, only a stark, ravaged world of twilight and night.

So death like the sleep, so heavy the dreaming.  It sinks down, below the mantle of snow, down, below the iron hard earth, into the cradle of roots softly twisting and turning, the tendrils weeping for warmth.  There the dream nestles as the shadow passes over, as the black night turns crisp with stars.  The light continues to dwindle, minutes at a time until the sweeping hand of deep velvet is all you remember.

This is the reality of the far north; a summer of endless days, a winter of nights.  It is a time of taking away.  The reserves, so hardy in October, are staggering under December’s demands.  The old, the sick and the weak fall like trees in a wind storm.  It is a time for grief, for memories.  Yet, our sorrows do not drown us.

On December 21st., the clock begins ticking back in the other direction.  The hours of sunlight so quickly lost, we slowly begin to gain back.  There is no immediate, noticeable change; we have gone too deeply into the shadow, facing the endless stars instead of the sun, and the rotation is sluggish at first; two extra minutes today, a couple tomorrow, practically meaningless when you’re getting only five hours of near daylight before evening returns.

spirit of light @2008 Regina Fetrow

But something happens deep inside.  Something in the dream resting under layers of winter’s covers.  Something in the tendrils burrowed in the ground, remembering at last to reawaken.  It is a movement.  Be not afraid for I bring you tidings of great joy…

It is marvelous this burst called life, that is at once both a spark and a sound.  Not a crackle, or an explosion, but inexplicably, indescribably poignant music.  Such gentle, such humble beginnings; the breathless waiting of a slumbering world.  One little note, than another softly whispers.  One agreement.  One accord.  One glistening light gleaming in the wilderness.  It dances.  Through fairy spooked woods and rolling hills, the music thunders.  On the darkest day, the darkest hour, we are alive and something has changed.  We are no longer moving into our slumbers, but into our awakening; no longer walking in the shadow of death, but into renewal.

We live in a candid world, a world of instant communications, a world that has revealed its sorrows, its strife, its truth to its understanding.  These communications that began as a bright new day has carried us into a perception never experienced before; the personal encounter with people we’ve never met, in places we’ve never been to, with viewpoints we’ve never considered.  As a world consciousness, we have evolved.  We’ve become more aware of those around us, the people we effect and how we effect them.  We’ve questioned our moral integrity and examined our ethics.

In many ways, we have not liked the answers.  We’ve discovered that morals are a slippery slope, and morality is a question of cultural/ religious persuasion.  We’ve discovered that ethics can mean doing the unpopular or uncomfortable thing, possibly dissolving our material wealth, possibly jeopardizing our personal well being.  We have learned how much each of us, individually, can tolerate disagreement without hostilities.  We’ve drawn lines.

What these lines have represented were fractures; a splintering of common accord into discord, unity into confusion, effective debate into shouting matches and stand-off’s.  These were the darkest hours, the hours when we searched for a common enemy that was not among our own, when we sought to articulate a truth that drew us together in a clearly defined purpose.

ice berries @2010 Karla Fetrow

For each individual, for every nation, there is the moment to decide between truth and darkness, to blossom forth or become the blight.  In these bleak hours while life slumbers under a mantle of despair, there are many who question their ability to survive out the year.  We are threatened by forces from within and without; loss of jobs, loss of freedoms, poor International relations, environmental disasters, and always, the whispers and rumors of war.  War that would not give the fractures time to heal themselves.  War that would not give us a chance to re-build.

In these bleak hours, it is difficult to say with conviction, “we will survive”.   Or, if we think of survival, we think within the most minimal terms, as survivors of disaster, conflict or homelessness.  The future painted for us looks grim; a future of totalitarianism versus anarchy, a future where a changing climate looms with threats of mass flooding, mass erosion, an increase in earthquakes, sink holes, furious storms and unrelenting hurricanes.  We’ve been careless even with the air; radiating it, filling it with the fumes of noxious chemicals, depleting our oxygen supply by cutting down the rain forests.  The future world promised to us is a hostile one, raining as much war down upon us as we engage in among ourselves.

As we approach the New Year, we are reminded that according to the Calendar of the Mayan, we are approaching the end of a cycle; a cycle of the darkest hours.  This is the cycle of alignment, the quiet tick-tock of the outer stars readdressing their own places in the Universe.  This is the year of upheaval as we pass through the spectrum of the Horizon Event.  This is a year for rejoicing for this is the year of change.

An enemy has been defined.  Not an enemy by nationality, color or politics, but an enemy of deceit.  An enemy of Earth.  An enemy of the people of Earth, an enemy so removed from the common populace, it lacks the emotions for empathy, so focused on profit making enterprise, it fails to acknowledge the destruction in its wake.  The question of the year has been, how do you combat something that controls the resources, global finances and spends billions of dollars each year on media propaganda?

The answer is, because it is propaganda.  This was the first musical note, the child’s exclamation that the Emperor has no clothes.  Although the Emperor might try to continue his fantasy of impeccable taste, the populace has seen and knows what their eyes and a child’s voice has told them is the truth.  The musical note has been answered by another and yet another until the sky is ablaze with an orchestra of sound.  This is the day the sun begins to return.

There are many long, dark hours ahead of us as we grapple with this new awareness of each other.  Leaderless, we must lead ourselves into the monumental tasks ahead of us.  It is a time of great opportunities.  At turn of the twentieth century, with the world rumbling unaware into two great wars, it also rumbled into civil upheaval.  As kings were toppled from their thrones, systems of government were considered to replace them; socialism, communism, popular government, two party or multi-party systems.  The battles were as much internal revolution as they were occupation of other countries.  When the wars finally ended and the smoke had cleared, there were two sharp dividing lines; two governing polarities; capitalism and communism.

Over the years, the political definition of these two ideologies have blurred, the Western democracies supporting the free enterprise of capitalism, shifting more power to the State and the Communist Nations experimenting more and more with democratic process.  This new era, beginning its second decade of the twenty-first century, does not have a defined political view because that statement begins on the individual level; one of self-determination.

There is one equitable law; do no harm to others by intent or carelessness.  No government that shields those who willfully commit harm through irresponsibility, recklessness and squander is a lawful government.  No government that aggressively pursues hostile relationships with its neighbors is a government that behaves lawfully.  No government that needs a militia to enforce its laws is a government worth defending.

These are our darkest hours, but these are the revelations that have come with the year.  We are not alone, we are a part of a global community, filled with caring, compassionate people.  We have a mutual desire for lawfulness and justice.  We are strong.  We have the will and energy to unite for a healthier planet.

It is a time for renewal.  It is a time for rejoicing.  Although the withering branches still tremble in the mid-winter’s storms, the burrowing roots are awakening.  They stir with the remembrance of life, sparkle beneath the deep of evening’s sculpture.  The sun is returning and the music has begun.  As the melody comes together, the words will be clear.  We are each a part of the message, a message that will shape the  new era . Be not afraid.  We cannot define the future because the future is in the hands of the children.  The children hear and they are singing.  The people of the earth are dancing.  The solstice has begun.

By Bill the Butcher

Dear Editor,

(Or, rather, your sub-editor or whoever it is who reads your mail, because I am sure your exalted status relieves you from the onerous task of handling correspondence from mere readers.)

Before I go further, please note that the contents of this letter will be posted online on my blog and elsewhere, with full mention of The Shillong Times, because it has been my experience that there is some kind of unofficial “ban” in place on publishing my criticism of your articles and your alleged opinions (more often than not regurgitated wholesale from so-called “national” newspapers). Therefore, even if you choose to maintain your unspoken “ban” (which has endured by my reckoning for about four years now), you will have been named and shamed online. Be warned.

One of these alleged “editorial opinions” of yours is titled “Tactical Retreat” and was published on your paper of the 9th December. In it, you make some sweeping statements, which deserve examination in detail.

First, you (or, as is more likely, whoever you lifted your “opinions” from) claim Manmohan Singh had the “last laugh” in the end on the Nuclear Deal. I don’t know whether you are unaware of the nuclear reactor meltdown at Fukushima in Japan earlier this year, and the strong anti-nuclear-power agitations now ongoing in several parts of the country, or whether you merely chose to ignore it. From your newspaper’s flagrantly exposed ignorance of basic geographic and scientific facts in the past, the first is a real possibility. If not, you will note that not one of these nuclear reactors that were supposed to have solved our power problems (the USP of the Nuclear Deal) has come into service yet, and that the last four years of Congress party misrule has so devastated the nation that even such cravenly pro-Congress media outlets as yours cannot have escaped noticing the people’s disenchantment with the party. How is that the “last laugh”?

Then, you claim that you hope that Singh “will prevail again on the FDI in retail issue” because the “advantages are many”. Said advantages – according to you – are as follows:

1.     India needs organized (sic) retail. Does it? Can you justify this statement? A look around shows that India is doing well enough with competing small-scale shops selling just about everything one needs. The huge and bustling markets of the cities may not be pretty, but they provide just about everything, at a reasonable price, and employ an uncountable number of people. Can you honestly state that organised retail outlets will be able to provide the same services? Who will absorb the millions thrown out of work? Will you, or those who you lifted your opinions from, provide these people with alternative employment? If not, how do you justify your claim?

2.     Foreign investment in retail will bring in capital, expertise and competition. Capital to achieve what, precisely? Is there a shortage of capital in this country? If there is, why are we still talking about our alleged “booming” economy? If there is not, why should we bring in foreign capital, since said foreign capital can be as quickly withdrawn? If there is a threat of sudden withdrawal of this capital – for example, due to pro-worker labour laws – and a consequent fall in the stock market, will the government of the day stand by and allow this withdrawal, or will it bend over backwards to change laws and entice the capital to stay? What has been our experience so far on this point? And do you really have to be reminded that the East India Company first came as traders, got “concessions”, and used the excuse of “defence of trade rights and concessions” to colonise India?

As for expertise, is there a shortage of expertise in this nation? If so, why do we have Indian Institutes of Management?

As for competition, a look around any of the markets I just mentioned will show you how much competition there is already, quite happily coexisting. Do we need more competition? If we do, does that competition have to come from foreign-owned retail chains?

Assume, for the sake of argument, that FDI will bring in increased “competition”. Basically, what this will mean is that the huge international retail chains like Wal-Mart (which have tremendously deep pockets) will undercut and push out the original retail outlets from business. A look around the USA, where the traditional stores have vanished after the advent of these mega-stores, shows that this is not unlikely by any means. And once that happens, exactly what is to stop these retail chains – who then have a monopoly – from charging whatever they want? Nothing.

While on the subject, the ethics, not to say legality, of these retail chains are deeply suspect. As we all know, the same neoliberal “economists” who push FDI are also strongly in support of weak labour laws and “hire and fire” policies. This basically means that nobody is secure in his or her job, and can be replaced at any time by someone asking for even lower wages – no matter how much work he or she has put into the job or is willing to. This sounds very nice to those people sitting on a huge cushion of money, but I wonder if you – the editor of a minor, fifth-rated newspaper – or your minions would like to live in a situation where you could be dismissed without notice because someone else is willing to work for a thousand rupees less a month. Would you? No? Then by what right are you wishing this fate on others?

3.     The produce of farmers will fetch higher prices. How, exactly, is this miracle supposed to happen? FDI will result in the big retail chains looking for the cheapest sources in order to maximise profits. If they paid higher prices, it would go directly against the idea of competition reducing prices, which was your earlier point. Therefore, it will directly result in farmers undercutting each other in order to sell to them – and even there they will be undercut by organised factory-farming – the kind of factory-farming the West is now trying desperately to abandon in favour of more sustainable, not to mention healthy, practices. As for technology, that can be imported without the necessity of handing over ownership of the economy to foreign concerns. Your argument veers dangerously close to the idea that colonialism was good because the colonised countries wouldn’t have got trains and telegraphs otherwise, something once again being claimed by neo-imperialists these days.

4.     The supply chain will be shorter and more efficient. How? By the retail chain owners going direct to the farmers in the fields and buying from them? In that case, what is to prevent them from beating down the farmers’ prices since only those who sell at the cheapest rates will get the sales orders? If the government has to step in to ensure a fair price to the farmers, what’s the difference from the current system?

5.     (T)he consumer will be benefited, price-wise and in getting easier access to essential goods. How will the consumer get easier access to “essential” goods? If we define “essential goods” as food, clothing, and medicine, they are available in most markets already, in every city and village. And about prices, if the FDI is allowed, according to what we’ve seen worldwide, the consequences will be that the prices of medicines, especially, will rise sky-high in the name of protecting intellectual property rights.

6.     New investment will pour into manufacturing and more jobs will be created in the sector. Is this “jobs” in the sense of “slave-labour style sweatshops”? Because that’s the kind of “jobs” that have been created by the advent of FDI as seen worldwide. FDI will only “create jobs” where profit can be maximised – meaning where the least wages have to be paid and the maximum work extracted for the minimum side benefits. And if the economy of the nations the produce is to be marketed in suffers, and the market collapses, the factories will close and the slave labour workforce thrown out of even the pittance they are earning. I trust even you are aware of the parlous state of the European and American economies at the moment?

7.     Giving in to the opposition and dropping the proposal would seem unwise and pusillanimous on the part of the UPA government. This is called the democratic system. It’s why an Opposition exists and this is not a monarchy under the Nehru-Gandhi dynasty. The Opposition is meant to pressure the government into abandoning unwise or unpopular policies. If your paper does not like the system, it should openly state that and suggest what kind of system it wants.

I would love to read your replies to these questions, if you are capable of answering them. After all, there’s no reason you shouldn’t be. Since you either wrote this editorial or allowed its contents to be published in your paper, you obviously subscribe to its contents. You are a national prize-winning columnist with the entire resources of your editorial staff to call on. I’m only a private citizen with no education in economics. You should find it easy to blow me away.

If, however, you are unable or choose not to respond, it means you have no business publishing opinions you are unable to defend. I would go further and state that you have no business being the editor of a newspaper at all.

I look forward with keen interest to your response. If any.

By: Jane Stillwater

http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2011/11/madam-jane-predicts-american-wars-will.html

I just had a dream that it was the end of the world. So should I still go Christmas shopping or not?  Why bother, I thought.  But just to be on the safe side, I also asked the mysterious psychic Madam Jane for some input.  “Are my dreams and the Mayan calendars and all those Rapture freaks right?  Is the end of the world actually on its way?  Are we really all gonna die soon?”

“Yes of course,” replied Madam Jane.

Oh dear.

“The amount of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere is mounting at a catastrophic rate and will cause irreversibly-disastrous climate change in the next five years — and by far the biggest cause of this problem is the U.S. military and its allies.  Every time NATO bombs Libya and Americans bomb Pakistan and Israel bombs Gaza or a helicopter takes off in Afghanistan or a U.S. carrier fleet steams toward Syria and the Persian Gulf, we move one step closer to irreversible climate change,” stated Madam Jane, swaying back and forth with her eyes closed.

“Would it help at all if I had my car smog-checked today?” I then asked her hopefully.  Madame Jane just rolled her eyes.   “We’re doomed,” she replied.

So.  How do I want to spend my last days here on Earth?  Not a clue.  If you knew that seven billion people had approximately five years to live before climate-change-caused floods started pouring in from our rivers, and deserts started taking over our farmlands and oceans started drowning our coastal cities and a dreadful ice age started to set in, what would you do?

“I’d move to Hawaii,” replied Madam Jane.  Not me.  I’d buy hip-waders, ear muffs and really warm coats.

PS:  According to a recent AlterNet article entitled “Game Over for Planet Earth,” we’re all gonna be fried like fish in a skillet first before we even get a chance to freeze to death or drown.

AlterNet says, “[Here's a] prediction offered by Fatih Birol, chief economist at the International Energy Agency:  Without an effective international agreement to staunch greenhouse gases within five years, the door will close on preventing a potentially disastrous rise in the planet’s temperature.”  http://www.alternet.org/economy/153092/game_over_for_planet_earth%3A_the_month%E2%80%99s_biggest_story_you_never_read

PPS:  Madam Jane’s ominous-sounding and doom-like claim that irreversible climate change is only five years away is actually erroneous.  And AlterNet’s five-year claim is wrong too.  According to the Christian Science Monitor, irreversible climate change is already here.

“Even if all the world’s smokestacks and tailpipes were to suddenly stop spewing CO2, if all the trees everywhere were to be left standing, and if all the remaining coal, oil, and gas were to stay in the ground [and the American war-machine would suddenly stop spewing CO2 like there's no tomorrow as well], the planet would still be feeling the effects of global warming a millennium from now.” http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/Bright-Green/2009/0127/report-calls-climate-change-irreversible

PPPS:  How can we keep cheering on American wars abroad — without bringing those wars back home to us too, like the recent violent shootings in Oakland and the recent pepper-spraying at U.C. Davis?

My Christmas shopping may just have to wait.

EXTRA!  EXTRA!  Madam Jane also predicts that the “American war” on Iran is about to happen too!

Remember back when, long before the war on Iraq was declared, millions of tons of war material was being amassed at various East Coast military bases here in the U.S.?  Well, Madam Jane states that they are at it again.  “Long endless lines of container trucks are currently pouring into supply depots all over the East Coast.”  Oops.

Plus America’s bottom-kissing “yellow journalism” media is already geared up to make Iran look like the ultimate bad guy — just as it did right before Bush’s illegal invasion of Iraq.

And not only that but, according to Middle East specialist David Pratt, the video game Battlefield 3 has just come out with a brand new version — starring good old Iran as the penultimate evil villain.  It just doesn’t get any more “War Profiteers Gone Crazy” than that!  http://www.heraldscotland.com/comment/david-pratt/demonisation-of-iran-carries-a-whiff-of-war-1.1137797?18451

And when Iran does get attacked, just THINK of all the air pollution that will be released!  Good grief.  Then Battlefield 3 will have to put out an even newer version — featuring deadly hand-to-hand combat with radioactive smog.

*****
From Sue [regarding even MORE air pollution]:  US government openly admits arming Mexican drug gangs with 30,000 firearms — but why?:  It is now a widely-reported fact that under the Obama administration, U.S. federal agents actively placed over 30,000 fully-functional weapons into the hands of Mexican drug gangs, then halted all surveillance and tracking activities of where those weapons were going. http://www.naturalnews.com/032934_ATF_illegal_firearms.html

It’s difficult to feel thankful these days.  A pall has spread over the earth, a darkness that whispers with rumors of wars, corruption in the highest places, financial ruin; rumors that once substantiated by facts, were whisked away, denied, or shamelessly ignored.  And the pall grows darker in a winter of poverty, a season of unblushing violence, a year when even false promises have been abandoned, a year of dissolution and discouragement.

It has also been a year of change.  It wasn’t the change promised us when we first began to look around and realize we were speeding headlong into economic disaster and something needed to be done to avert it.  It was not the change promised to us for an environmentally friendly society, equality in jobs, education and adequate health care.  It was a change that began with some very simple observations; nothing was working; not the bi-partisan vote, not the committees and organizations representing public petition, not the fair administration of the courts.  What would work against a controlled media, blatant invasion of privacy, and authorities with no interest in the common good of the public?  Only the unified voice of the affected.

It’s not to be supposed the idea to look for the true voices of leadership among the dispossessed masses, the disillusioned and disenfranchised came suddenly and all at once.  Decades of accepting media sources as the true measurement of public support was not going to be shrugged off as quickly as taking a cold shower, nor the mentality that there must be pyramids of power and authority, with the leaders on top as the winners.  It took the digestion of information from countless sources, the comprehension of cultural choices and a deepening regard for the meaning of equality.

In Alaska, it’s widely suspected that a homeless man in Anchorage was the first true occupier.  After a raid on homeless camps in early summer, authorized by Mayor Dan Sullivan, John Martin decided he wanted his belongings back and sought an audience with the Mayor.  His request was refused.  Several more attempts brought the same result.  He then resolved to sit on the court house steps until the worthy representative of the city found time to see him.  This did not suit Mayor Sullivan very well at all, and he immediately sought to make it illegal to sit or recline on city sidewalks.  Unfortunately for Mayor Sullivan however, the public is a little more sympathetic to the homeless man than to the Mayor, and John Martin continues to seek his audience with the distinguished court.

His was an idea, and ideas have a habit of occurring simultaneously or falling into place with other problem solving minds very quickly.  John Martin had a practical solution.  If you can’t get anyone to listen to you, stay in one spot until someone notices you.  It was bound to occur to others sooner or later as people began to realize, “I’m talking.  I’m speaking words, I’m tapping them down in my blog rolls, but I might just as well be speaking a foreign language.  Nobody is listening.”

A Day of Thanks @2011 Karla Fetrow

That no one is listening was mainly an illusion created by the media still industriously trying to capture an audience with election races that had lost their appeal and Hollywood news that had lost its glamor.  The media wasn’t listening, and neither were the recipients of the complaints.  However, the dispossessed were listening.  The jobless and the working class who felt their jobs in jeopardy or their taxes unwisely spent were listening.  The veterans of pointless foreign wars were listening.  Most importantly, the youth whose future hung in balance, were listening.  Occupation Wall Street or a sister activity was inevitable, as well as the viral, simultaneous response across the globe.

It’s difficult to give thanks when you’re not even sure if the occasion is appropriate.  Thanksgiving Day is not an official, time honored religious celebration.  It’s not an event that takes place at the same time, with variations in customs, the world over.  It’s celebrated on a National level, with the emphasis placed on a colony that had managed to survive a year of crisis; isolation, building from the ground up, hunger, disease and exposure to the elements of a new climate.  Even the politically correct wonder as to how appropriate Thanksgiving is, considering what had happened in the events of history to the friendly neighbors who had taught these early colonialists how to hunt, fish and plant crops.  In recent years, guilty consciences were given an avenue for Thanksgiving relief through the invention of Black Friday; scrap the big meal with family, relatives and friends, and begin your shopping frenzy early for one colossal holiday; Christmas.

A feast for the humble @2011 Karla Fetrow

A day set aside for Thanksgiving isn’t profitable to any great degree for any industry except food sales, isn’t a customary religious celebration, universally practiced and there seems to be a lot of confusion as to who to thank and what to be thankful for.  At a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, you’ll usually find the head of the table giving thanks to a spiritual benefactor for the ability of the family members to come together once more, for their health and for whatever blessings had been bestowed.  That’s a good start.  Even among the non-religious, family bonds are precious.  There is no grief quite as enduring, no absence quite as missed as the loss of a family member.  The families that give thanks while the unit is intact have memories to share for years to come and draw strength from their unity through the hard times.

Yet, not everyone lives in a strong family unit.  Life styles, alienation, divorce, internal conflicts have dissolved many family structures, leaving only fragments struggling to find something on an official food gorging holiday.  For the economically sinking population, that Thanksgiving meal could mean the first time they had felt full in months.  What is there then, to be thankful for?

This is a new era, an era that began with an idea, and like all ideas, there is no true way of knowing what shape that era will take or the direction it will go in, but it is an era that has begun with a heightened sense of equality.  We have then, perhaps to thank the first visionaries of equal worth, the first academicians to craft this into writing, the first communities to demonstrate and support the individual values that contribute to the whole.  We have those to thank who first understood the very human right to pursue happiness, to gainful employment, regardless of religion, color or creed.

Family Values @2011 Karla Fetrow

We have those to thank who understand that freedom of the press is not just a way to gain fame and riches by publishing for a favored few, that it is a valuable commodity for exchanging information, for sharing cultural norms, for vacationing a moment in a far away land, rambling through an adventure and for speaking the truth when the truth is necessary.  We have those to thank who have risked their reputations, endangered their lives, were imprisoned and vilified while seeking to present the truth.

We have those to thank who have chosen to sit on the steps and sidewalks until they are heard, for without them, these freedoms our ancestors worked so hard to earn, and which the world waits breathlessly to expand, are just pieces of paper, crumpled and thrown in the trash can for a more convenient world of controls, manipulations and materialistic values.  Each day, they risk their lives, they risk their well-being, they jeopardize their positions in society, and yet they stay.

We have also to thank the youth coming out of the wilderness to take their own future firmly in hand.  The child learns from the parent all that he can, and then comes the day when he teaches the parent.  This day is coming.  We can’t say exactly what this era will bring.  The circumstances of our global situation is comparable to, but not quite like, any other.  Never before have we had the rapport of instant communication.  Never before has a movement universally decided to find its spokes people, its direction from among its numbers instead of an hierarchy of authorities and leaders.  But it will be unique, and the youth are what will carry it into the future.

It’s possible Thanksgiving, as a National holiday, is on its way out, crippled under the frantic glare of preparing for the real holiday.  It’s possible it isn’t really all that convenient.  Yet, what if this day, marked by internal conflict on an International scale, mired in poverty and fear, is actually the first day of a new beginning?  What if a year from now, we all look back and realize how far we’ve come instead of measuring how much more is left to go, and we are thankful for the men, women and children who have braced their shoulders against the wheel and pushed?  It’s a whimsical thought, inspired by an idea, the idea that we can change the future if we really tried, that we could become more equal and equalizing, giving fair value to each others abilities, skills and production.  While the National holiday celebrating the survival of a colony that in turn, behaved quite poorly toward its hosts might be on its way out, what if another type of thankfulness took its place?  Perhaps in our future world, so full of hope, so courageous, so erstwhile, there will be a Universal day of Thanksgiving for the warriors of today.

Palace of Fine Arts, San Francisco-Grainne Rhuad 2011

By: Grainne Rhuad

We were headed to the City by the Bay to Listen to Neil Gaiman read and listen to Amanda Palmer play the shit out of her Keyboard and Ukulele and as it turned out the Mandolin as well.

Right off we learned something.  Never trust what you read online when booking a hotel.  We booked a “boutique hotel” that was four blocks away from the venue.  Somehow however, I didn’t understand that “boutique” meant “painted over in trendy brite colors”.  Because as far as I could tell that’s as far as they went in their upgrades.  Also never in my life have I known “continental breakfast” to mean toast and instant coffee.

Also while I did advertise a perverse request for haunted hotels I did not expect to be kept up all bloody night by the sound of a cleaning lady’s cart going up and down the quay above.  I think that’s what it was; I was too exhausted to check it out.  If it was a ghostly cleaning lady I feel bad about that, I should have found out more about her story.

What did make me feel better was the fact that parking was free and the Palace of Fine Arts was literally 10 min away by foot.  A big plus as we and most everyone that night were held up on the bay bridge and got in late.

The venue was lovely, if what you crave is a working theatre-which I do.  You are surrounded by smells of dust and preservatives and old velveteen curtains.  There isn’t a lot of extra fancy inserted but you feel warmish and comfortable.

Opening up for Amanda and Neil were The Jane Austin Argument, an indie group from Oz that stole my heart with their story telling lyricism.  Nicely done and also they have a new Album coming out, Under the Rainbow.

I was wondering how a reading (which Neil did) and a punk cabaret bent rock goddess (AFP) was going to fit together on stage and the answer was while not seamlessly; it was better, it was comfortable.  It was just as they announced, quite different from what one would expect from the both of them.   Almost like being let into their parlor.  Maybe that had something to do with the crowd as well which was comfortable, and while definitely not silent, neither were they dancing.  I have heard that other venues have been different.

Especial favorites from the night were Neil’s reading of “The Man Who Forgot Ray Bradbury” which I assume to be about and for Terry Pratchett.  As far as Amanda’s performance, I cannot pick a favorite although Ampersand has not left me, following me to very awkward places as I sing it in my head during the last week.  But then again the same is true of Half Jack which was taken by request from the audience.  I did miss Brian Viglione on that one though.   The honest sharing of experience and emotion was electric and lingering in its effect.

The plan for the next day which was a Saturday was to try to connect with the Occupy group in San Francisco.  We missed them at the reserve bank where we had planned to catch them as the timing and/or event changed.   The main camp, what can I say: in some ways it was very much like a festival.  It made me wonder when people were going to get bored, broke or cold and head home.  In other ways it was one of the best organized Occupy groups I have seen thus far.  Check their webpage HERE.

As a side note, Amanda Palmer has been stopping to play her Ukulele at every Occupy protest she has travelled through from Boston all the way to Vancouver (thus far) follow her tweets @amandapalmer and her BLOG to get her take on the vibe of the different Occupy movements.

Here she is playing to a crowd at Occupy Wall St.:

While we were wandering about however, there was something I noticed.  It was brought up last week on South Park of all places.  You can watch their episode HERE.  In any case the question has been raised, does the 99% actually represent 99%?

Guy Fawkes masks are manufactured under contract by the 1%

I saw as we walked about the homeless queuing up for food, they weren’t at the Occupy rally.  Indeed I have read in several places that they are either pushed out or hidden from sight at the Occupy rallies around the country.  It seems to me that those who are most active in Occupying are those who still have the means to do so.  Does this represent 99% of Americans?  Who are we if while we are protesting we are not feeding the neediest amongst us because we see them as dangerous or detracting?

Homeless Queue- Grainne Rhuad 2011

As I watched I had to ask myself, are the Occupy protesters going to keep to the streets until these homeless queues disappear?  And while they are doing this occupying, who is serving?

Another split I see occurring in the so-called 99% is the shame heaped upon those who decide it is in their families’ best interest to still work.  I have listened and read comments to the effect that to not take to the streets to protest is to turn your back on your fellow man.

It seems to me that protest at this point is almost an elitist’s game.  It’s something the very young and those who are near retirement can do.  I didn’t personally come across any occupiers that were without shelter or the means to purchase food.  This is not something someone who is raising a family can do.   We cannot expect those with dependants to support who still have jobs to give them up and cart their children out for the one week it would take them to blow through their resources in order to make a point.

I’m not entirely sure that the protests themselves however well meaning are going to make a long term difference at all.  Our President who has sent support to other protesters in other countries has said almost nothing about the Occupy movement.  More importantly he has done nothing other than lose his cool in sophomoric fashion whenever the congress cock blocks him.  As commander in chief doesn’t he at least have the power to call off police forces that are abusing protesters like the ones at Occupy Oakland?

What taking to the streets has done is raise awareness.  Now that we are not ignoring the problem quite as much as before it’s time to bring this message home.   We can I think be more effective in our homes for much cheaper than it costs to buy a tent and travel to an Occupy location.

Here’s how:

1. Save your money for a month and pay nothing other than what is absolutely necessary for survival.  That means food and shelter
2. Get some Kerosene, Butane, Solar power or something in place because when you stop paying your bills you will be going dark.
3. Along the same lines stock up on water (and winter is the perfect time to set some barrels out) and food.
4. Close your accounts.
5. Dig in

Here’s the thing, not enough is going to change until we effectively shut down commerce.  As long as people are Occupying places they are promoting consumerism.  They have to buy their coffee, water, food and whatever else they feel they need.  If Americans stop paying for things for a month or two guess who else won’t have money?

The people who can make a difference.  The companies that benefit from our money will ask for help from the government and they will be heard much louder because guess what?  They paid to put people in office.  Something absolutely will be done when we close down the flow to companies’ pocket books.

Also there’s no better time than now, with the holiday season gearing up, there is always an expected spike in spending.  What if the gift we gave ourselves was a little bit more freedom instead of trinkets under the tree?

China Town-Grainne Rhuad 2011

We finished up our visit in Chinatown, which somehow was fitting.  It wasn’t planned, we had some time and pulled neighborhood names out of a hat.  After fuelling up on noodles and soup we tooled about the fresh food markets where the colors were more filling than anything we could possibly eat.  Somehow we ended up in one of those tiny shoppes that sell both trinkets and treasures talking with the proprietor about Fung Shui.  By the end of our discussion our house had been remotely Fung Shui’ed by sketch.

All in all it seemed we had a good house and with some tweaking we could expect prosperity or da ji da li. The proprietor explained to us also the difference between the cheap tourist trinkets and the more lasting strongly built relics.  “This coin here,” he showed us bends.  “While this coin while it costs more, my grandparents used for money, it is strong, it will last.”

It was a tad bit oxymoronic when we ponied up for this prosperity.  Prosperity it seems can cost a lot.  The shock on my companion’s face was almost worth the price but I did skim it down.  Leaving the shop he made the remark “I think my wallet has been Fung Shui-ed.  Indeed it had.

But herein is the lesson. While we had participated for fun, it’s one that applies to all belief systems. When you are in the right state of mind, things will fall into place.

It’s the same I think for the Occupy movements.  Keeping our minds and hearts in the right place which to me seems to be providing for those who cannot provide for themselves will help us reach our goals.  It will help us to make the large sacrifices, the ones that really cost that perhaps others cannot make, so that they can have prosperity.

It’s also not an easy task; shiny promises easily broken can be enough to let us off the hook.  We must wait for the stronger commitment.

Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan pied by Aron Kay

By: Grainne Rhuad

There is something the new protests are missing.  It’s humor.  Humor goes a long way to alleviating the both the people involved and the people who have to watch it at home.

Meet the Pie Man.  His real name is Aron Kay.   He has been protesting since the 1960’s when he made a name for himself throwing pies and running.  He has been saying it with pies for longer than some of us have been alive and it’s more than just tomfoolery.  In the words of Aron Kay it’s “Assassination without bullets.”  It’s a sense of public ridicule which dethrones the high and mighty and makes them for just a moment, human.

When one watches a person being pied they should watch for the reaction.  There is the ‘What the Fuck’ moment followed closely by ‘How could this happen to me, ME! I am all powerful.’ Then there is the anger and disgust.  Therein you see how someone really feels about the people they are talking to.  You know in that instant whether they have a deep seated disgust for their audience, constituents or whomever.

If they take it gracefully, tasting to see if it’s a good pie or a crap pie or maybe just a bunch of cool-whip you know, okay they maybe are a bit human.  This behavior is usually followed by a joke.

Most often though people react with anger.  Like Rupert Murdoch whose wife attacked the pie thrower.  This shows undoubtedly that their egos cannot stand a little bit of cream and crust.  They are unmasked for one moment and if people are looking they can see that.

Aron Kay has in his time pied such luminaries as: William Buckly Jr., Phyliss Schlafling, Sen. Pan Monihan, E.Howard Hunter, Quinton L. Kopp, Abraham Beame, G.Gordon Liddy, William Rubell, Jerry Brown-who we think needs another due to his lack of response in Oakland, McGeorge Bundy, Edward Tellel, Randal Terry, William Shatner and Andy Warhol

And most recently he got Geraldo Rivera at the Occupy New York protest it wasn’t with a pie, but the Pie Man makes due with white powdered rations, some report were strawberry drink mix in some reports it was milk.  In any case you have to make due when you don’t bring a pie.

Geraldo Rivera poses with The Pie Man

Geraldo wasn’t fazed and indeed posed with the Pie Man later; it was more about the Fox news coverage of the event anyway.

I contacted Aron on the outside chance that he would get back to me.  He’s very busy with the Occupy Wall St. movement.  He got right back to me and gave me a few minutes of time on the phone.  This is the thing with the Yippies they want to connect, to help and to share.  He shared stories of Ireland when he found out my name was Celtic.  But more importantly he told me about how his humor and connectivity helps keep people involved. 

He talked about hooking up with others he hadn’t seen in years including someone he “recruited” as a 17 year old to the Yippie movement.  His big wish is that he could do a bus tour of all the occupations.  Frankly so do I.  I wish it was cheap enough and easy enough to still travel and do this.  Build morale and visit the different movements that have decidedly different feels.

When asked who he would most like to pie he did not hesitate, it was Glen Beck.  Coming in a close second was Sean Hannity. Both of which I agreed were excellent choices however unlikely they were to come down off of their judgemental seats and visit an actual protest. 

He also was quick to point out that humor in areas other than slapstick is present and hopfully growing.  He pointed out Randy Credico who has been active in pointing out the lighter side of the Occupy movement.  He has also recently run for N.Y. Senator on the ideal that a comedian may be the only honest person left.

The principle of the pie has long been a vaudevillian standard.  Employed to mostly relay; “this guy/gal needs to be brought down a peg or two.” It took off from there as film became popular as a slapstick standard and who amongst us has not watched the classic Three Stooges’ “In The Sweet Pie and Pie.” or my favorite from Our Gang “Rascals Pie Fight: (If you haven’t, shame on you! Here’s the links: http://youtu.be/tPtVxrQOzpc  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8sYMDHPYsM&feature=related )

The Pie Man’s advice for throwing pie:

Did you know in some states pieing is considered Battery?  Like in Michigan where In August 2010, a Michigan State University student named Ahlam Mohsem, 23, threw a Dutch apple pie into Michigan Senator Carl Levin’s face and was arrested on assault and battery charges. The police also charged a man who allegedly distracted the senator before the pie was thrown. Mohsem said she threw the pie to protest the Senator’s support for war crimes by Israel.

It is also apparently illegal in Canada where several people have gone to jail for pies.  I guess they have absolutely no sense of humor or they prefer pudding.

It’s not that pieing is a dead art at all as many have taken up the torch.  Groups like Al Pieda and The Biotic Baking Brigade have begun sharing and planning pie events.   Mostly though pieing is a lone act.  Which makes it easier to do, there’s not a lot of planning involved and you are almost guaranteed to get your statement on TV.  People will see and talk about a pie in the face.  They will laugh, shake their heads and then talk about whether or not that person deserved it.  And then laugh some more.   It is a simple and perfect thumb of the nose at those getting the pie and the media who would normally never take the time to talk to dissidents much less show them.

Then there’s the bit about it being fun.  Fun is actually what is necessary to keep a movement going.  We can be concerned angry and rebellious but if we never have breaks to smile, laugh and remember there is and should be more, then there is nothing to fight for really.

Some Pietry
Say it with pies, sometimes it’s
hard to find the words.
although we search for hours;
and so, on those occasions,
we might’ say it with flowers
—our tenderer emotions,
by people felt, and possums,
expressed in the universal
language of blossoms.
But how do you respond to
cover-ups and outright lies?
fortunately there is a way
—say it with pies!
Instead of trying to decide
which flower would be more thrilling,
you’re standing there deciding
between a choice of filling;
should it be apple, mincemeat, or
a cream pie?
Here’s your chance to be creative and come up with a dream pie.
Satisfaction’s in the baking, and sheer joy when it flies;
it’s a noble undertaking
—SAY IT WITH PIES

 ~Author Unknown

http://pieman.org/

http://www.whisperedmedia.org/piepage.html

https://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=15190356261&v=wall