"Guilt is a device of the ego to make you feel like you're doing something about your 'failure' — that somehow you're atoning for what you've done with how bad you feel."
- my friend Manuela (or my best memory of what she said)
Monday, January 30, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Suicide or Sell-Out? (Jesus' Dilemna)
Last night, I watched this 'amateur' music documentary, and it's probably the best I've ever seen. Well, at the least, it's the best I've seen on what it's really like to be in a band, and the struggles that go along with it. This includes questions of 'selling out,' what it means to succeed or fail, and 'why you do it.'
Things got particularly interesting from 40:30 on, culminating at 48:11, when Randy Blythe from Lamb of God confesses that he was perfectly content to have no money when he was 25. But now that he's nearly 40, and has put 15 years into his band, it would sure be nice to have enough to have kids and maybe even own a house.
Because my brain takes weird left turns like this, a little while later I started wondering...
If Jesus would have lived past thirty, would he have sold out? Decided that money, or government, or religion weren't really that bad after all... made his peace with such satanic things... settled down with a wife and a mortgage, content that he deserved a secure life and a decent living in return for his teachings?
[Watch it in youtube here]
Things got particularly interesting from 40:30 on, culminating at 48:11, when Randy Blythe from Lamb of God confesses that he was perfectly content to have no money when he was 25. But now that he's nearly 40, and has put 15 years into his band, it would sure be nice to have enough to have kids and maybe even own a house.
Because my brain takes weird left turns like this, a little while later I started wondering...
If Jesus would have lived past thirty, would he have sold out? Decided that money, or government, or religion weren't really that bad after all... made his peace with such satanic things... settled down with a wife and a mortgage, content that he deserved a secure life and a decent living in return for his teachings?
Monday, January 2, 2012
Brains are funny sometimes
The thing I like about books is that I can put them back on the shelf when I don't want them anymore.
The thing I like about fiction is that it allows me to live vicariously through stories that are much more easy, meaningful, and satisfying than my own.
The thing I like about movies is that they let me stare at pretty girls who can't look back.
The thing I like about fiction is that it allows me to live vicariously through stories that are much more easy, meaningful, and satisfying than my own.
The thing I like about movies is that they let me stare at pretty girls who can't look back.
Best commentary on Attawapiskat I've yet heard
Last month, the plight of people in Attawapiskat captured the attention of the Canadian media. Attawapiskat is a reserve/First Nation in northern Ontario, near Kenora. (The best background on the immediate crisis might be this article, by the MP for the area, which helped launch the media frenzy; this blog post by Pam Palmater gives excellent historical context).
This is a piece on Attawapiskat written by Bob Lovelace. Bob's an elder and former chief of Ardoch Algonquin First Nation, and lecturer at Queen's University. I was lucky enough to attend a presentation he did on the history of the Ottawa Valley and its original people, the Algonquins.
___________________________________________________
Seeing the Forest and the Trees
If you can cut through the racism, ignorance, and half-baked opinions of pundits, politicians and sound-bite media most folks will realize that Attawapiskat and many other First Nations have been laboring under the repression of Colonialism far to long. The antidote for poverty is self-determination and no one can give you that. You have to standup and take action yourself to make it happen. Colonialism does not give way on its own; it must be defeated through vigorous and enlightened opposition.
It is difficult in the face of human suffering to turn attention to the systemic and structural reasons that have led to this catastrophe but this is the very time when thoughtful analysis is needed. The homes are small and cold. The tedium of poverty bears down day-by-day and those who have stolen your children’s future call the daily bread on your table a “handout”. It is difficult to feel anything but shame through the numbing that is required to get-by every day. But there are reasons behind this suffering. There is a history. There is a structure to oppression, denial and indifference that houses this suffering and there is a system that perpetuates it.
...
___________________________________
Read the rest of the post here, at Bob's Decolonization Blog.
I'm certainly no expert on the situation, and haven't even done a very good job of following the media coverage. But two thoughts occur to me:
1) Government representatives in damage-control may toss around impressive-sounding figures that they've sent to Attawapiskat, implying that the money must have been wasted through corrupt management. But per individual, on-reserve natives get 2/3rds of the spending for government services that other Canadians receive. (Hello! That's racist!) So the amount spent on a similarly-sized group of 'regular Canadians' would be even greater.
2) If there's no place for natives to live on-reserve, maybe they'll move away and assimilate properly into mainstream Canadian society. Wouldn't that be convenient?!
This is a piece on Attawapiskat written by Bob Lovelace. Bob's an elder and former chief of Ardoch Algonquin First Nation, and lecturer at Queen's University. I was lucky enough to attend a presentation he did on the history of the Ottawa Valley and its original people, the Algonquins.
___________________________________________________
Seeing the Forest and the Trees
If you can cut through the racism, ignorance, and half-baked opinions of pundits, politicians and sound-bite media most folks will realize that Attawapiskat and many other First Nations have been laboring under the repression of Colonialism far to long. The antidote for poverty is self-determination and no one can give you that. You have to standup and take action yourself to make it happen. Colonialism does not give way on its own; it must be defeated through vigorous and enlightened opposition.
It is difficult in the face of human suffering to turn attention to the systemic and structural reasons that have led to this catastrophe but this is the very time when thoughtful analysis is needed. The homes are small and cold. The tedium of poverty bears down day-by-day and those who have stolen your children’s future call the daily bread on your table a “handout”. It is difficult to feel anything but shame through the numbing that is required to get-by every day. But there are reasons behind this suffering. There is a history. There is a structure to oppression, denial and indifference that houses this suffering and there is a system that perpetuates it.
...
___________________________________
Read the rest of the post here, at Bob's Decolonization Blog.
I'm certainly no expert on the situation, and haven't even done a very good job of following the media coverage. But two thoughts occur to me:
1) Government representatives in damage-control may toss around impressive-sounding figures that they've sent to Attawapiskat, implying that the money must have been wasted through corrupt management. But per individual, on-reserve natives get 2/3rds of the spending for government services that other Canadians receive. (Hello! That's racist!) So the amount spent on a similarly-sized group of 'regular Canadians' would be even greater.
2) If there's no place for natives to live on-reserve, maybe they'll move away and assimilate properly into mainstream Canadian society. Wouldn't that be convenient?!
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