Tom Robinson
Only the Now
As of this writing, it's been thirty-eight years since Tom Robinson first burst onto the music scene with his eponymous band's debut single "2-4-6-8 Motorway", and sixteen years since he released his last full-length album. He's still got it.
This album is very different from both the punk-inflected rock of the Tom Robinson Band and the softer, more pop sound that he leaned towards with Sector 27 and his previous solo records. It opens with the acoustic guitar and glistening strings of "Home In The Morning, a fantastic farewell song that perfectly suits the world-weary, slightly hoarse voice that Robinson has developed in recent years. After that, it's on to "Merciful God", a solid, rage-filled rant that harks back to the barely-restrained anger of "Power in the Darkness". Its subject matter of imperialism and religious violence could fit perfectly into a standard punk song, but the arrangement Robinson gives it is sinuous, reminiscent of the Pogues' "Turkish Song of the Damned", which adds a fresh vibe to the glorious cacophony of Adam Phillips' guitar. Personally, I loved the stomping, bass-heavy version of "The Mighty Sword of Justice" that Robinson did when I saw him play earlier this year, but the more melodic album version is just as good, largely thanks to Frank Rollock's steel pan and the backing vocals by Billy Bragg, Martin Carthy, and most of all Lisa Knapp.
"Don;t Jump, Don't Fall" is one of Tom Robinson's most affecting songs, a half-spoken lament that is made all the more heartbreaking by a crushing string arrangement. Crushing really is the right word here - the strings seem to descend like a lead blanket, pushing you down into the song, forcing you to listen. Probably the best song on the album. "Holy Smoke," the next song, takes us from the sublime to the ridiculous, but in the best possible way. It's a song about using Bible pages to roll joints, and God is voiced by Ian McKellan - what's not to love? Swami Baracus' contribution provides yet more evidence that Robinson really knows how to pick collaborators.
I'd like to shake the hand of whoever made the decision to get John Grant to sing "Cry Out". This has been one of my favourite Tom Robinson songs since I heard it at the first gig I ever went to, and Grant's soulful, melancholic voice is perfect for the desperation conveyed through the lyrics. Tom Robinson and John Grant each have their own distinct sound, but their duet here works brilliantly.
Personally, I found the second half of the album underwhelming. It's good - I like the Beatleesque melody of "In My Life" and "Only the Now ends the album on a sweet note, but it just didn't grab me the way the first half did. Still, it's a great album, and I'd definitely recommend it.
Rating: 7/10
Thursday 31 December 2015
Wednesday 2 December 2015
Thinking Out Loud: The Political Spectrum
So I recently took the political compass quiz, and as expected I ended up in the bottom-left corner (for those that don't know, the horizontal axis is economic left/right and the vertical axis is authoritarian/libertarian, so the bottom left is libertarian socialism). That got me thinking - how exactly should the political spectrum be laid out? We can agree that the left is socialism (that is, worker ownership of the means of production) and the right is capitalism (that is, private ownership of the means of production), but what about terms like "far left", "centre-right" and so on? In this post, I'll be setting forth my idea of how we define these terms.
If the term "left-wing" refers to socialists, then it makes sense that the more stringently someone applies the principles of socialism, the further left on the spectrum they should be placed. The most basic principle of socialism, as mentioned above, is that workers should control their workplaces. There are two different schools of thought in regard to how this should be acheived. On the one hand, authoritarian socialists (Trotskyists, Marxist-Leninists, Maoists etc.) hold the view that the state should control the means of production and the workers should control the state via a dictatorship of the proletariat - that is, a democratic society with an active and politically conscious working class. On the other, libertarian socialists (anarchists, communalists, council communists and some Marxists) take the view that the workers should exert direct control. Libertarian socialists, then, advocate for a greater degree of worker control than their authoritarian counterparts, and so should be placed further to the left, with the most dogmatic anarcho-communists and individualists at the extreme end of the spectrum due to their refusal of any workplace hierarchy at all; they would be followed by anarcho-syndicalists and the other libsocs, then the Trots, Maoists, and finally the Marxist-Leninists. On this newly rearranged scale, Stalin would be only slightly to the left of Jeremy Corbyn.
But now that I've mentioned Corbyn, we come to a new question: what about democratic socialists? Their insistence on building socialism by slow reform sets them apart from the rest of us, who agree - from Mao Zedong to Renzo Novatore - that violent revolution and the suppression of reactionaries is the only way to break the power of the ruling class. This, to me, speaks of a fundamental ignorance of the nature of capitalism, and it is enough to place Attlee, Chavez and their like closer to the centre than the Leninists, especially since demsocs are so vague on how, exactly, they intend to change the class character of the state.
I'll go into the right-hand side of the spectrum in my next post, as to do so here would make this post way too long.
If the term "left-wing" refers to socialists, then it makes sense that the more stringently someone applies the principles of socialism, the further left on the spectrum they should be placed. The most basic principle of socialism, as mentioned above, is that workers should control their workplaces. There are two different schools of thought in regard to how this should be acheived. On the one hand, authoritarian socialists (Trotskyists, Marxist-Leninists, Maoists etc.) hold the view that the state should control the means of production and the workers should control the state via a dictatorship of the proletariat - that is, a democratic society with an active and politically conscious working class. On the other, libertarian socialists (anarchists, communalists, council communists and some Marxists) take the view that the workers should exert direct control. Libertarian socialists, then, advocate for a greater degree of worker control than their authoritarian counterparts, and so should be placed further to the left, with the most dogmatic anarcho-communists and individualists at the extreme end of the spectrum due to their refusal of any workplace hierarchy at all; they would be followed by anarcho-syndicalists and the other libsocs, then the Trots, Maoists, and finally the Marxist-Leninists. On this newly rearranged scale, Stalin would be only slightly to the left of Jeremy Corbyn.
But now that I've mentioned Corbyn, we come to a new question: what about democratic socialists? Their insistence on building socialism by slow reform sets them apart from the rest of us, who agree - from Mao Zedong to Renzo Novatore - that violent revolution and the suppression of reactionaries is the only way to break the power of the ruling class. This, to me, speaks of a fundamental ignorance of the nature of capitalism, and it is enough to place Attlee, Chavez and their like closer to the centre than the Leninists, especially since demsocs are so vague on how, exactly, they intend to change the class character of the state.
I'll go into the right-hand side of the spectrum in my next post, as to do so here would make this post way too long.
Friday 13 November 2015
Liberalism on Film: Externalising Racism in American History X
American History X is racist. There, I said it –
everyone’s favourite anti-racist film is, in fact, more racist than a minstrel
show directed by Leni Reifenstahl. I’m not talking about the overt kind of
racism, as displayed by the film’s characters. Instead, I’m going to look at
the way American History X, by
focusing so much on that overt, stereotypical race hate, plays into the
externalisation of racism. By this, I mean the tendency, particularly prevalent
among white liberals, to think of racism as something other people do – and that those other people are exclusively the
kind of shaven-headed, swastika-tattooed thugs portrayed in the film.
Externalising racism means reducing racism to individual actions and beliefs,
and then assigning those actions and beliefs to a group so outlandish, so far
from yourself, that you don’t have to even consider the possibility that you
might be complicit in racism.
This is exactly what American History X does. The only
racists in the film are the most cartoonish caricatures ever put to celluloid;
they’re actual neo-Nazis, complete with brown shirts and copies of Mein Kampf on their bookshelves. They
could have been interesting if they’d been given more depth[1],
but Saving Private Ryan puts more
effort into humanising the Nazis than American
History X. To illustrate, here’s the main character’s story: he’s racist,
because black people killed his dad; he goes to prison for killing some black
people; he gets raped by the concept of racism (well, technically it’s a group
of neo-Nazis, but the symbolism is so unsubtle it would make CS Lewis blush);
then meets a black bloke and decides not to be racist anymore. At no point is
any of this remotely interesting – in fact, I think director Tony Kaye deserves
credit for being able to make a brutal prison rape boring.
But enough about the artistic flaws
in the film. It has the emotional complexity of a Hallmark card, but what I
want to talk about is its tacit approval of liberal racism. By making its
subjects so grotesque, American History X
allows every person watching to rest assured in the knowledge that racism is
something done by scary working-class people with tattoos and no health
insurance, rather than something they and their middle-class friends might be
guilty of. The message of American
History X is not “racism is bad”; it’s “Nazis are bad”. And if anyone who
saw that film didn’t already agree with that message going in, I doubt they
agreed with it by the end.
The radical
feminist writer bell hooks has suggested that, instead of “racism”, we use the
more accurate term “white supremacy”. This is because when you say “racism”,
people think of individual actions and thoughts (as discussed above) but when
you say “white supremacy” it is clear that you’re talking about a system that
allows the domination of one race by another. While criticising white
supremacists, American History X lets
white supremacy off the hook, by not mentioning it at all. And if you’re making
a film about racism, in a country that is built on the enslavement of black and
brown people both in the past and in the present, you need to mention white
supremacy; to not do so is the equivalent of making a film set in 1930s Germany
without mentioning Nazism. American
History X is a film about white supremacists made in a country built on
white supremacy; a country that has been the principle enforcer of white
supremacy worldwide since the fall of the British Empire; a country where the
black people enslaved by the prison industrial complex today outnumber those
who were enslaved on plantations two hundred years ago; and it passes over all
this, instead choosing to focus on a small, powerless, inconsequential group of
thugs.
Even with
all that considered, though, the film didn’t have to go the way it did. After
all, fascist groups are a growing problem in Europe and the US; given that
fascism thrives in difficult economic conditions, imagine how effective a different
American History X could have been.
Imagine if Edward Norton (I know his character has a name, but I honestly didn’t
care enough to remember it) and his gang had been stopped by antifascists –
imagine if the central message of the film had not been “fascism is bad,” but “fascism
is dangerous, and here’s how to stop it.”
But, of course, that didn’t happen.
Instead, where does Norton see the light? In prison. In a fundamentally racist
institution[2],
run by a white supremacist state that has a history of enacting racist laws and
imprisoning – even murdering – anti-racist activists. At the end of the day, it’s
the forces of law and order that save the day, something that I suspect the
families of Eric Garner, Tamir Rice, Sandra Bland or any of the other victims
of racist police brutality might have reason to take issue with.
In
conclusion: it is possible to make a safe, profitable film for a mass audience,
and it is possible to make a truly, radically anti-racist film, but it is not
possible to do both.
Sunday 1 November 2015
Workers of the World, Relax: An Antidote to Pro-Work Propaganda
It's happened, as we all knew it would. After spending five years attacking those of us unable to find work, the Conservatives have now broadened their assault to include low-paid workers. Jeremy Hunt's recent remarks urging Britons to "work hard in the way that Asian economies are prepared to work hard" followed Conservative plans to cut tax credits, further increasing the burden on Britain's working poor. To see a man who has never done an honest day's work in his life idolising a country that works its citizens literally to death is a slap in the face to those of us who spend our time labouring to create the wealth that he and other capitalists leech off, but enough has already been written on that subject. What I want to talk about is the ideology behind his words. Hunt asks us if we want to work as hard as the Chinese. To any sane individual, the answer is obvious: of course we fucking don't. The people of this country already work far too hard for far too long, only to see the majority of the wealth our work creates siphoned off by wealthy parasites who then dare to lecture us on the dignity of labour. This Victorian idea that wanting to work less is somehow immoral is a key element of capitalist propaganda. When you have the public convinced that a good person is a hard and willing worker, it is easy enough to sell them on the idea that when workers ask for shorter hours, or higher pay, they are Bad People. We must accept our lot, we are told; work will set us free. But what will set us free from work?
The great anarchist theorist Petr Kropotkin(2) theorised in the early 20th century that, with the correct management of resources, people would only have to work four or five hours per working day in order to maintain a decent standard of living for everyone; John Maynard Keynes predicted that by the twenty-first century we would have reduced the working week to fifteen hours. And yet here we are, working forty-plus hours per week, many of us still struggling to make a living. The question is, Why? And the answer is very simple: because our society is still ruled by a class of people who live off our work, and so long as we continue to support them, they will continue to drain our resources. Therefore, it is in their interests to keep us working as hard as possible, for as long as possible, so that they can live in ever-increasing luxury, literally at our expense. The ruling class are clever - that's why they still exist as a class - and they know that overt force is an inefficient tool when it comes to keeping the masses in line. The times in history when workers have suffered the heaviest repression have also been those times in which workers have offered the strongest resistance, because people don;t like being pushed around, and therefore any overt exercise of authority will generate resistance. Stalin learned that; even with one all the coercive power of the Russian state at his disposal, he was still forced to invest in raising living standards for workers in order to deal with the epidemic of slacking and sabotage that plagued the USSR during his time in power(1).
The British government, and their capitalist backers, know that the stick is not enough, and the carrot is too costly to them. So they use propaganda. They demonise the unemployed, and spread a poisonous "strivers vs skivers" rhetoric that glorifies the work ethic to an almost Calvinist degree. In our present society, any calls for us to work less and live more will be met with accusations of selfishness and laziness by those who have internalised this rhteoric so completely that they are reduced to the status of dogs in love with the leash.
So how do we counter this? Well, there are numerous tactics that people have used and are using, to varying degrees of effectiveness. There's the dropout culture espoused by writers like Bob Black and bands like Crass; there's the approach of fighting for shorter hours and higher pay through union organising; and there's the approach of fighting propaganda with propaganda of our own. Personally, I think all of these approaches are useful and important for a libertarian, anti-capitalist movement, and that we should use whatever methods work best in our own circumstances. But, most important, we need to unify - we will not win this fight through the sectarianism and petty ideological squabbles so beloved of the modern left and liberal activists. Instead, we need to build bridges between the insurrectionary dropouts, the unionists, and the liberal activist groups that provide a fertile ground for radicalisation. As the late, great Rob Crow put it - spit on your own and you won;t acheive anything, but if we all spit together, we can drown the bastards.
(1) The Political Economy of Stalinism, Paul R Gregory
(2) The Conquest of Bread, Petr Kropotkin
The great anarchist theorist Petr Kropotkin(2) theorised in the early 20th century that, with the correct management of resources, people would only have to work four or five hours per working day in order to maintain a decent standard of living for everyone; John Maynard Keynes predicted that by the twenty-first century we would have reduced the working week to fifteen hours. And yet here we are, working forty-plus hours per week, many of us still struggling to make a living. The question is, Why? And the answer is very simple: because our society is still ruled by a class of people who live off our work, and so long as we continue to support them, they will continue to drain our resources. Therefore, it is in their interests to keep us working as hard as possible, for as long as possible, so that they can live in ever-increasing luxury, literally at our expense. The ruling class are clever - that's why they still exist as a class - and they know that overt force is an inefficient tool when it comes to keeping the masses in line. The times in history when workers have suffered the heaviest repression have also been those times in which workers have offered the strongest resistance, because people don;t like being pushed around, and therefore any overt exercise of authority will generate resistance. Stalin learned that; even with one all the coercive power of the Russian state at his disposal, he was still forced to invest in raising living standards for workers in order to deal with the epidemic of slacking and sabotage that plagued the USSR during his time in power(1).
The British government, and their capitalist backers, know that the stick is not enough, and the carrot is too costly to them. So they use propaganda. They demonise the unemployed, and spread a poisonous "strivers vs skivers" rhetoric that glorifies the work ethic to an almost Calvinist degree. In our present society, any calls for us to work less and live more will be met with accusations of selfishness and laziness by those who have internalised this rhteoric so completely that they are reduced to the status of dogs in love with the leash.
So how do we counter this? Well, there are numerous tactics that people have used and are using, to varying degrees of effectiveness. There's the dropout culture espoused by writers like Bob Black and bands like Crass; there's the approach of fighting for shorter hours and higher pay through union organising; and there's the approach of fighting propaganda with propaganda of our own. Personally, I think all of these approaches are useful and important for a libertarian, anti-capitalist movement, and that we should use whatever methods work best in our own circumstances. But, most important, we need to unify - we will not win this fight through the sectarianism and petty ideological squabbles so beloved of the modern left and liberal activists. Instead, we need to build bridges between the insurrectionary dropouts, the unionists, and the liberal activist groups that provide a fertile ground for radicalisation. As the late, great Rob Crow put it - spit on your own and you won;t acheive anything, but if we all spit together, we can drown the bastards.
(1) The Political Economy of Stalinism, Paul R Gregory
(2) The Conquest of Bread, Petr Kropotkin
Friday 30 October 2015
How To Make An Insomniac: 7 Horror Stories to Lose Sleep Over
Everyone enjoys a good horror story, and with Hallowe'en just around the corner, I figure it's as good a time as any to suggest some terrifying reads to scare you shitless. Here goes.
1. "Ghosts With Teeth" by Peter Crowther
How many ghost stories have you read where the ghosts don't really do anything except show up and look creepy? In my case, far too many. Now, imagine that all that changed; imagine if, instead of being mischievous spirits who just liked to move stuff around, poltergeists were supernatural sadists with the ability to control your mind. In this story by Peter Crowther, the ghosts want to hurt you, and there's nothing you can do to stop them. Now that is some scary shit.
2. House of Leaves, by Mark Z Danielewski
Some books will make you afraid of the dark. Some will make you afraid of strange noises in the night. House of Leaves will make you afraid of your own house. I can't quite explain how Danielewski makes this novel so frightening, but there is something deeply disturbing about the idea that your own home may be entirely beyond your control. If you only read one book about a book about a film about a house this year, read this one.
3. The Little Oxford Book of Nasty Endings
I read this when I was about nine, and I had nightmares about it for ten years. There are a lot of stories in there, most of which I can't remember, but in one that has always stuck with me, a small town is hit by a hurricane-force wind. Twenty four hours later, it comes back. Then twelve hours later, then ten. Eventually, the townspeople come to the realisation that they, and the rest of the world, will be engulfed in a never-ending storm. I've always found that idea profoundly disturbing - the idea of realising that you'll be trapped in an horrific situation, and it will never end, and there's nothing you can do about it. There's a great deal of originality in this collection, which is something too few horror authors possess. There should still be a copy in the children's section of Gants Hill Library, if they haven't got rid of it in the last decade and more.
4."I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream," by Harlan Ellison
There's something uniquely terrifying about the idea of Hell. Waking up after your death and realising that you will be tortured, for ever, is just about the most frightening thing I can think of, so it's fitting that this entry deals with a similar concept. The Hell that Ellison creates is not an afterlife - instead, it is the aftermath of a nuclear war, where the four surviving humans have been imprisoned by a near-omnipotent supercomputer that takes its only pleasure in torturing them relentlessly. The final line of the story - which is also its title - is truly chilling.
5. Learning Kneeling by Howard Barker
Howard Barker is well-known for putting his characters through hell, but even in a body of work filled with horrific subject matter, Learning Kneeling stands out. The main character - the ironically named Sturdee - has a seemingly perfect life, until a group of men from an unidentified militia break into his house and begin torturing and killing his family. This isn't your standard home invasion story, though - what really drives home the horror is the way Barker humanises his characters, and makes the audience care about them. I'm still not sure if I like this play, but it's certainly an intense experience.
6. The Room by Hubert Selby Jr
It's a little known fact that Tommy Wiseau based his film on this book. Well, it's not so much a fact as something I just made up, but tell that to the next person you meet who's seen the film and watch their reaction after they've read Selby's novel - I garuntee it'll be funny. The Room concerns a man who has been locked up pending trial for an unspecified crime, and it takes place almost entirely within the confines of his mind as he takes the reader through an almost unbearable series of revenge fantasies against the police officers who arrested him. Selby is seriously inventive when it comes to the tortures that his protagonist dreams of inflicting on the officers, and it's that creative approach to suffering that makes this novel such a hard read. I couldn't finish it - maybe you can.
7. The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter is rarely referred to as a horror writer, largely because fans of so-called "literary writing" tend to hold the horror genre in contempt, but a surprising number of his plays are quite obviously horror stories, in that their primary purpose is to frighten the audience. A Slight Ache and The Dumb Waiter both fall into the horror category, but I've decided to go with his most well-known and most controversial play, The Birthday Party. The real fear in Pinter's horror plays is the fear of the unknown, a subject he explores to terrifying effect in this story of a man who lives in a boarding house in an English seaside town, who is sought out by agents of the shadowy yet menacing government agency for whom he used to work. What really elevates this story above Pinter's other horror plays is the way in which he writes about the smaller fears of everyday life, but manages to make these things as frightening as his main storyline.
Well, that's my list - if there are any stories that have terrified you that weren't included here, feel free to let me know in the comments. Happy Hallowe'en.
1. "Ghosts With Teeth" by Peter Crowther
How many ghost stories have you read where the ghosts don't really do anything except show up and look creepy? In my case, far too many. Now, imagine that all that changed; imagine if, instead of being mischievous spirits who just liked to move stuff around, poltergeists were supernatural sadists with the ability to control your mind. In this story by Peter Crowther, the ghosts want to hurt you, and there's nothing you can do to stop them. Now that is some scary shit.
2. House of Leaves, by Mark Z Danielewski
Some books will make you afraid of the dark. Some will make you afraid of strange noises in the night. House of Leaves will make you afraid of your own house. I can't quite explain how Danielewski makes this novel so frightening, but there is something deeply disturbing about the idea that your own home may be entirely beyond your control. If you only read one book about a book about a film about a house this year, read this one.
3. The Little Oxford Book of Nasty Endings
I read this when I was about nine, and I had nightmares about it for ten years. There are a lot of stories in there, most of which I can't remember, but in one that has always stuck with me, a small town is hit by a hurricane-force wind. Twenty four hours later, it comes back. Then twelve hours later, then ten. Eventually, the townspeople come to the realisation that they, and the rest of the world, will be engulfed in a never-ending storm. I've always found that idea profoundly disturbing - the idea of realising that you'll be trapped in an horrific situation, and it will never end, and there's nothing you can do about it. There's a great deal of originality in this collection, which is something too few horror authors possess. There should still be a copy in the children's section of Gants Hill Library, if they haven't got rid of it in the last decade and more.
4."I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream," by Harlan Ellison
There's something uniquely terrifying about the idea of Hell. Waking up after your death and realising that you will be tortured, for ever, is just about the most frightening thing I can think of, so it's fitting that this entry deals with a similar concept. The Hell that Ellison creates is not an afterlife - instead, it is the aftermath of a nuclear war, where the four surviving humans have been imprisoned by a near-omnipotent supercomputer that takes its only pleasure in torturing them relentlessly. The final line of the story - which is also its title - is truly chilling.
5. Learning Kneeling by Howard Barker
Howard Barker is well-known for putting his characters through hell, but even in a body of work filled with horrific subject matter, Learning Kneeling stands out. The main character - the ironically named Sturdee - has a seemingly perfect life, until a group of men from an unidentified militia break into his house and begin torturing and killing his family. This isn't your standard home invasion story, though - what really drives home the horror is the way Barker humanises his characters, and makes the audience care about them. I'm still not sure if I like this play, but it's certainly an intense experience.
6. The Room by Hubert Selby Jr
It's a little known fact that Tommy Wiseau based his film on this book. Well, it's not so much a fact as something I just made up, but tell that to the next person you meet who's seen the film and watch their reaction after they've read Selby's novel - I garuntee it'll be funny. The Room concerns a man who has been locked up pending trial for an unspecified crime, and it takes place almost entirely within the confines of his mind as he takes the reader through an almost unbearable series of revenge fantasies against the police officers who arrested him. Selby is seriously inventive when it comes to the tortures that his protagonist dreams of inflicting on the officers, and it's that creative approach to suffering that makes this novel such a hard read. I couldn't finish it - maybe you can.
7. The Birthday Party by Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter is rarely referred to as a horror writer, largely because fans of so-called "literary writing" tend to hold the horror genre in contempt, but a surprising number of his plays are quite obviously horror stories, in that their primary purpose is to frighten the audience. A Slight Ache and The Dumb Waiter both fall into the horror category, but I've decided to go with his most well-known and most controversial play, The Birthday Party. The real fear in Pinter's horror plays is the fear of the unknown, a subject he explores to terrifying effect in this story of a man who lives in a boarding house in an English seaside town, who is sought out by agents of the shadowy yet menacing government agency for whom he used to work. What really elevates this story above Pinter's other horror plays is the way in which he writes about the smaller fears of everyday life, but manages to make these things as frightening as his main storyline.
Well, that's my list - if there are any stories that have terrified you that weren't included here, feel free to let me know in the comments. Happy Hallowe'en.
Tuesday 22 September 2015
Thinking Out Loud: Gender and Sexuality
What's your sexuality? Gay, straight, bi, ace?
That's a question that most people would have little difficulty in answering - most people can comfortably put themselves in one category or another. But what I've been wondering is, what do those labels actually mean?
On the face of it, it's pretty simple. A straight man is attracted to women, a straight woman is atracted to men, and so on. But what do we mean when we say "I am atracted to men" or "I am attracted to women"? Gender, after all, is neither a personality trait nor a physical characteristic; seeing as attraction is based on physical appearance and personality, gender should logically be irrelevant. Certainly genitals can be a factor - there are many men, women and non-binary people who would not want to have sex with someone who had a penis, just as there are many who would only want to have sex with someone if they had a penis. But that doesn't say anything about whether they're gay or straight - plenty of women and nonbinary people have dicks, and plenty of men don;t.
Let me give you an example. Let's say you're on a date with Scarlett Johansson (for simplicity's sake, I'm assuming you're atracted to women - feel free to substitute Denzel Washington or whoever). Things are going well - you think there's a pretty good chance you'll end up in bed. Then, near the end of the evening, she makes a confession - she's a man. Her physical apearance is exactly the same as it is now; nothing is different whatsoever from how you've imagined her. All that's changed are her pronouns. Do you still find him atractive? My guess is you would.
So, to return to my earlier point - what does that mean for your sexuality? Maybe this is just because I'm bi and I don't get how monosexuals work, but does gender really have any impact on sexuality at all? And if not, isn't the language we use to talk about sexuality hopelessly inadequate?
That's a question that most people would have little difficulty in answering - most people can comfortably put themselves in one category or another. But what I've been wondering is, what do those labels actually mean?
On the face of it, it's pretty simple. A straight man is attracted to women, a straight woman is atracted to men, and so on. But what do we mean when we say "I am atracted to men" or "I am attracted to women"? Gender, after all, is neither a personality trait nor a physical characteristic; seeing as attraction is based on physical appearance and personality, gender should logically be irrelevant. Certainly genitals can be a factor - there are many men, women and non-binary people who would not want to have sex with someone who had a penis, just as there are many who would only want to have sex with someone if they had a penis. But that doesn't say anything about whether they're gay or straight - plenty of women and nonbinary people have dicks, and plenty of men don;t.
Let me give you an example. Let's say you're on a date with Scarlett Johansson (for simplicity's sake, I'm assuming you're atracted to women - feel free to substitute Denzel Washington or whoever). Things are going well - you think there's a pretty good chance you'll end up in bed. Then, near the end of the evening, she makes a confession - she's a man. Her physical apearance is exactly the same as it is now; nothing is different whatsoever from how you've imagined her. All that's changed are her pronouns. Do you still find him atractive? My guess is you would.
So, to return to my earlier point - what does that mean for your sexuality? Maybe this is just because I'm bi and I don't get how monosexuals work, but does gender really have any impact on sexuality at all? And if not, isn't the language we use to talk about sexuality hopelessly inadequate?
Sunday 13 September 2015
Where Now for the Left?
He did it - Corbyn won the Labour leadership contest. For the first time in more than twenty years we have a Labour party led by a genuine socialist. So the question that everyone's asking is this: what now? We have a genuine left-wing opposition, with huge popular support, so what exactly do we do?
Firstly, and most importantly, we need to avoid being sucked into the electoral trap again. We need to remember that, even though Corbyn seems to be a genuinely committed, genuinely conscientious man, he cannot fix the problem, because capitalism is the problem, and you cannot abolish capitalism through the ballot box. Every time someone has tried to do so, one of three things has happened:
1. They've slipped into reformism
2. They've been voted out
3. They've been crushed by the capitalist class
The first is likely what will happen with Corbyn. I have no doubt that he genuinely wants to build socialism, but in order to get anywhere in politics, you have to make serious compromises. First, you say to yourself "Ok, we need socialism, but that's not achievable just yet. For now, let's focus on reversing the cuts". Then, in order to build support for that transitional demand, you make yourself appear more and more moderate in order to appeal to a wider section of the electorate, which will involve dropping more radical policies, making deals, and appeasing the ruling class. You decide to tone down the rhetoric and make more "reasonable" demands, because you have to keep your career going - after all, if you're not in government, you can't do anything. Once a politician is in power, their priorities shift - they become primarily concerned with holding on to that power, not because they are power-hungry or selfish, but because they become convinced that they need that power to change things for the better, and so any compromise is justified so long as it helps them keep it. Even great figures like Fidel Castro and Clement Attlee took on a downright reactionary role when the masses were moving faster than they were. Attlee sent in troops to break strikes, Fidel suppressed labour unions, and Corbyn is no more radical than either of them.
Less likely is the third option - that Corbyn will stay true to his radical roots, introduce reforms that will genuinely pave the way for socialism, and then be met with the full force of the global ruling class. That's what happened to Hugo Chavez in Venezuela - he stood up for the poor, the disadvantaged, the workers, and the capitalists came down on him like a ton of bricks. That's the problem of trying to tax your way into socialism - it leaves property in the hands of the big capitalists, who can simply take their business elsewhere. Democratic socialists want to stop paying the Danegeld without getting rid of the Dane, a strategy that works about as well as any refusal to pay protection money. In order to prevent this occurring, we need to organise on the lowest level and directly take the property of the capitalist class into our (the workers') hands - that would require direct action, which would inevitably bring us into conflict with the police and, therefore, the government.
This is why the capitalist state can never be on the same side as the workers - by its very nature, any government in our current system has to play by the rules, and the rules are designed so that the boss always wins.
Which brings me back to my earlier question - what do we do now? Well, first of all, don't base your revolutionary strategy on a blog post by a politically semi-literate twenty-three-year-old. But that aside, here's my very general, very provisional strategy. First, we need to capitalise on the Corbyn phenomenon - there are thousands of people out there who know something's rotten in Denmark, and who want to change things. They represent a vast number of potential allies, so long as we can reach out and convince them of our position. Propaganda and mass work are always vital, and will be especially so in the coming years.
Second, we need achievable short-term goals. Let's face it, we're not going to be storming parliament any time soon, and in the meantime we need to be able to show people concrete gains, or they'll have no reason to trust us or get involved with us. This could be something as simple as organising events to raise funds or donations for a cause - the current refugee crisis is a good example of where we should be really getting involved. Whatever we can do - and that will differ depending on different people's capabilities - we should, whether it's stopping evictions, union organising, helping people avoid workfare or whatever. Thirdly, we need to build a mass support base by uniting existing left organisations - we mustn't be sectarian. Whether someone's a Maoist, an anarchist or a liberal doesn't matter, so much as whether they're willing to fight capitalism and austerity. We need numbers, and we need to convince people that the solution to their problems lies outside parliamentary politics.
Firstly, and most importantly, we need to avoid being sucked into the electoral trap again. We need to remember that, even though Corbyn seems to be a genuinely committed, genuinely conscientious man, he cannot fix the problem, because capitalism is the problem, and you cannot abolish capitalism through the ballot box. Every time someone has tried to do so, one of three things has happened:
1. They've slipped into reformism
2. They've been voted out
3. They've been crushed by the capitalist class
The first is likely what will happen with Corbyn. I have no doubt that he genuinely wants to build socialism, but in order to get anywhere in politics, you have to make serious compromises. First, you say to yourself "Ok, we need socialism, but that's not achievable just yet. For now, let's focus on reversing the cuts". Then, in order to build support for that transitional demand, you make yourself appear more and more moderate in order to appeal to a wider section of the electorate, which will involve dropping more radical policies, making deals, and appeasing the ruling class. You decide to tone down the rhetoric and make more "reasonable" demands, because you have to keep your career going - after all, if you're not in government, you can't do anything. Once a politician is in power, their priorities shift - they become primarily concerned with holding on to that power, not because they are power-hungry or selfish, but because they become convinced that they need that power to change things for the better, and so any compromise is justified so long as it helps them keep it. Even great figures like Fidel Castro and Clement Attlee took on a downright reactionary role when the masses were moving faster than they were. Attlee sent in troops to break strikes, Fidel suppressed labour unions, and Corbyn is no more radical than either of them.
Less likely is the third option - that Corbyn will stay true to his radical roots, introduce reforms that will genuinely pave the way for socialism, and then be met with the full force of the global ruling class. That's what happened to Hugo Chavez in Venezuela - he stood up for the poor, the disadvantaged, the workers, and the capitalists came down on him like a ton of bricks. That's the problem of trying to tax your way into socialism - it leaves property in the hands of the big capitalists, who can simply take their business elsewhere. Democratic socialists want to stop paying the Danegeld without getting rid of the Dane, a strategy that works about as well as any refusal to pay protection money. In order to prevent this occurring, we need to organise on the lowest level and directly take the property of the capitalist class into our (the workers') hands - that would require direct action, which would inevitably bring us into conflict with the police and, therefore, the government.
This is why the capitalist state can never be on the same side as the workers - by its very nature, any government in our current system has to play by the rules, and the rules are designed so that the boss always wins.
Which brings me back to my earlier question - what do we do now? Well, first of all, don't base your revolutionary strategy on a blog post by a politically semi-literate twenty-three-year-old. But that aside, here's my very general, very provisional strategy. First, we need to capitalise on the Corbyn phenomenon - there are thousands of people out there who know something's rotten in Denmark, and who want to change things. They represent a vast number of potential allies, so long as we can reach out and convince them of our position. Propaganda and mass work are always vital, and will be especially so in the coming years.
Second, we need achievable short-term goals. Let's face it, we're not going to be storming parliament any time soon, and in the meantime we need to be able to show people concrete gains, or they'll have no reason to trust us or get involved with us. This could be something as simple as organising events to raise funds or donations for a cause - the current refugee crisis is a good example of where we should be really getting involved. Whatever we can do - and that will differ depending on different people's capabilities - we should, whether it's stopping evictions, union organising, helping people avoid workfare or whatever. Thirdly, we need to build a mass support base by uniting existing left organisations - we mustn't be sectarian. Whether someone's a Maoist, an anarchist or a liberal doesn't matter, so much as whether they're willing to fight capitalism and austerity. We need numbers, and we need to convince people that the solution to their problems lies outside parliamentary politics.
Thursday 28 May 2015
The Police, False Neutrality and the Rhetoric of Submission
If you've ever argued with someone on the internet, you're probably aware of certain logical fallacies - there's nothing the internet loves more than point out an ad hominem, a naturalistic fallacy or an appeal to authority. I'd like to submit a new addition to the list of fallacies: false neutrality. This is the argument that is most common among police apologists whenever the actions of the police at demonstrations are questioned. Whenever protesters decide to go beyond peaceful, polite, closely-regulated protest - whenever, in other words, they decide to do something that will actually have an effect - the police respond with batons, CS spray and the other tools of their trade. And, predictably enough, liberals are the first to defend them - they argue that they were "just keeping order". This is what I mean by false neutrality - the idea that the police are a neutral force, that they don;t take sides, that they are merely "keeping order". But let's unpack that phrase, shall we? What, exactly, does "keeping order" really mean?
Well, in its most basic sense, it means keeping things as they are. To keep order is to prevent turbulence, prevent upheaval, make sure noone rocks the boat - to keep order is to maintain the status quo. This argument is borne out by facts. The police have never been shy when it comes to controlling the actions of protesters - if you so much as try to walk down the wrong street, they'll be on you like Prince Andrew on an unprotected child. But they seem strangely unwilling to take the same approach when it comes to those in power. Where were the police when the government were implementing benefit cuts that have killed appalling numbers of innocent people? Where were they when Jimmy Saville was abusing unknown numbers of children? Where were they when peers and MPs were doing the same? Allegedly, some of them were taking part in the abuse. When you look at the long history of the police ignoring or covering up the crimes of the rich and powerful - not just on the level of "a few bad apples" but on an institutional level - how can you possibly believe that the police are on anyone's side but their employers'?
But I'm getting off topic. The point I'm intending on making in this post is that liberal attitudes to the police exemplify what I term false neutrality. Liberals assume that, at a protest, the police are a neutral force - that they do not take sides, but simply "keep order". Of course, keeping order inherently involves preventing anything from changing, as all significant change creates disorder - how could it not create disorder to throw out one system and replace it with another? When the police prevent protesters from blocking a road, or occupying a building, or carrying out property damage, they are taking the side of the government and the capitalist class against the protesters. You may argue that this is a good thing, but it is indisputable that this is what they are doing.
So we've established what false neutrality is - the assumption that something is somehow neutral (morally neutral, unchangeable, or exempt from judgement in some way) when it is not. But what do I mean by the rhetoric of submission?
By rhetoric, I mean language intended to have a persuasive effect. The rhetoric of submission is the language, the narratives, the lines of argument that persuade us to submit to authority. When those on the right say that, now that the Tories have been re-elected, we should obey the democratic process, they are using the rhetoric of submission. When liberals tell us we mustn't challenge the wealthy too much for fear that they will leave the country, they are employing the rhetoric of submission. When pacifists condemn those who engage in violent struggle against oppression, they are employing the rhetoric of submission. This is because all these people are telling us to obey, and submit - to bow to the will of the government; to allow the rich to hold us to ransom; to restrict our resistance to the methods sanctioned by our rulers. These people, make no mistake, are telling us to give in to the will of the enemy; if we want to break the British left's cycle of failure, we must refuse.
Well, in its most basic sense, it means keeping things as they are. To keep order is to prevent turbulence, prevent upheaval, make sure noone rocks the boat - to keep order is to maintain the status quo. This argument is borne out by facts. The police have never been shy when it comes to controlling the actions of protesters - if you so much as try to walk down the wrong street, they'll be on you like Prince Andrew on an unprotected child. But they seem strangely unwilling to take the same approach when it comes to those in power. Where were the police when the government were implementing benefit cuts that have killed appalling numbers of innocent people? Where were they when Jimmy Saville was abusing unknown numbers of children? Where were they when peers and MPs were doing the same? Allegedly, some of them were taking part in the abuse. When you look at the long history of the police ignoring or covering up the crimes of the rich and powerful - not just on the level of "a few bad apples" but on an institutional level - how can you possibly believe that the police are on anyone's side but their employers'?
But I'm getting off topic. The point I'm intending on making in this post is that liberal attitudes to the police exemplify what I term false neutrality. Liberals assume that, at a protest, the police are a neutral force - that they do not take sides, but simply "keep order". Of course, keeping order inherently involves preventing anything from changing, as all significant change creates disorder - how could it not create disorder to throw out one system and replace it with another? When the police prevent protesters from blocking a road, or occupying a building, or carrying out property damage, they are taking the side of the government and the capitalist class against the protesters. You may argue that this is a good thing, but it is indisputable that this is what they are doing.
So we've established what false neutrality is - the assumption that something is somehow neutral (morally neutral, unchangeable, or exempt from judgement in some way) when it is not. But what do I mean by the rhetoric of submission?
By rhetoric, I mean language intended to have a persuasive effect. The rhetoric of submission is the language, the narratives, the lines of argument that persuade us to submit to authority. When those on the right say that, now that the Tories have been re-elected, we should obey the democratic process, they are using the rhetoric of submission. When liberals tell us we mustn't challenge the wealthy too much for fear that they will leave the country, they are employing the rhetoric of submission. When pacifists condemn those who engage in violent struggle against oppression, they are employing the rhetoric of submission. This is because all these people are telling us to obey, and submit - to bow to the will of the government; to allow the rich to hold us to ransom; to restrict our resistance to the methods sanctioned by our rulers. These people, make no mistake, are telling us to give in to the will of the enemy; if we want to break the British left's cycle of failure, we must refuse.
Monday 11 May 2015
Review - Lightning Bolt
Lightning Bolt
Fantasy Empire
Lightning Bolt are not the kind of band you forget. Once you've heard their trademark combination of pummelling drums, distorted bass and garbled, incomprehensible vocals, they will remain stamped on your mind. So I was understandably excited when I found out they had a new album out. My enthusiasm waned a little when I noticed it was 48 minutes long - that shouldn't work. Lightning Bolt's style permits very little variation in song structure, and over the course of an album, this long they should get really, really boring. But the normal rules of music don;t apply to Lightning Bolt. They make this album work through sheer kinetic energy - somehow, despite every song being basically the same, my attention never drifted, nor did I get bored. These guys know how to keep things fun - the rhythms are perfect, the bass notes range from almost guitar-like highs to the kind of lows that I'm used to hearing in dubstep; and the interplay between the two instruments is perfect. I don't know whether these songs were carefully written out beforehand or improvised in the studio, but the dynamic between the two band members reminds me of the tightest jazz musicians. Their playing is unpredictable and technically adept without being wanky, and the entire album feels about half as long as it actually is. If you like fun, groove-based noise rock, check these guys out.
Rating: 7/10
Fantasy Empire
Lightning Bolt are not the kind of band you forget. Once you've heard their trademark combination of pummelling drums, distorted bass and garbled, incomprehensible vocals, they will remain stamped on your mind. So I was understandably excited when I found out they had a new album out. My enthusiasm waned a little when I noticed it was 48 minutes long - that shouldn't work. Lightning Bolt's style permits very little variation in song structure, and over the course of an album, this long they should get really, really boring. But the normal rules of music don;t apply to Lightning Bolt. They make this album work through sheer kinetic energy - somehow, despite every song being basically the same, my attention never drifted, nor did I get bored. These guys know how to keep things fun - the rhythms are perfect, the bass notes range from almost guitar-like highs to the kind of lows that I'm used to hearing in dubstep; and the interplay between the two instruments is perfect. I don't know whether these songs were carefully written out beforehand or improvised in the studio, but the dynamic between the two band members reminds me of the tightest jazz musicians. Their playing is unpredictable and technically adept without being wanky, and the entire album feels about half as long as it actually is. If you like fun, groove-based noise rock, check these guys out.
Rating: 7/10
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