Thursday, June 30, 2011
asshole doctors
accusation
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
what is war?
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
possibly of interest
Saturday, June 25, 2011
something nice
The general assemblies are always held in public spaces, usually symbolic places in the center of the city: Puerta del Sol in Madrid, Plaza Cataluña in Barcelona, Plaza de Encarnación in Sevilla, etc., all reminiscent of the Agoras from ancient Greek city-states. The fact that those squares are public has not been obvious to all observers. The traumatic experience of police repression in Barcelona on June 27th illustrates this. As a matter of fact, public spaces are only public insofar as we actually use them. Our rights as citizens cannot be weighted against commercial considerations or a "bad image" for tourism. Neglecting that right leads authorities to treat it as touristic "capital" and to undermine our collective property right. Participatory democracy begins with reclaiming that space and our right.
Friday, June 24, 2011
Thursday, June 23, 2011
fuck austerity
Greece granted €120bn EU bailout""
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
social forces
Saturday, June 18, 2011
usa notes
where do they learn to talk like that?
Thursday, June 16, 2011
the hell that is the usa
future! what future?
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
the american nightmare
You mentioned appealing to the rich over inequality. Glasgow University commissioned a poll testing the popularity of a one off wealth tax on the richest 10% so as to pay off the national debt. It found slightly higher support for the measure amongst wealthy respondents.
It’s even stronger in the United States where the poorest are most against what they call death taxes and generic taxes. The poor in America have been told to hang on to the dream that one day you or your children might make it. The very worst thing you can imagine if you are really poor in America is for one your children to become superrich, only for some bastard to come and take the money off them. If what keeps you going through the day is the idea of winning the lottery or that one of your children might be the one to strike lucky, then how can you keep that as your motivator and still believe that taxing the rich is good?
the interview:
http://www.zcommunications.org/the-geography-of-injustice-by-danny-dorling
Monday, June 13, 2011
elitism eptx style
Sunday, June 12, 2011
oh dear
Saturday, June 11, 2011
fuck google
Friday, June 10, 2011
sadder and sadder
A local dance group is devoting an evening to the subject of alcohol,
a dance group whose choreographer is a dance major at the local university...
The theme is illustrated by such questions as (I don't quote precisely)
Are the young controlled by alcohol or do they control alcohol?
Or, why are the young obsessed with alcohol?
Nowhere is there recognition that different nations have different attitudes toward alcohol,
or that this is a Puritan nation.....no sociological awareness of the role that economic matters
play....no appreciation of the basic biology of addictive substances.....No attempt to ask if this is a real problem, or just a mis-perception, a kind of hasty generalization based upon one's personal experience, with no attempt at all to take an external perspective on one's subjective impression.
and I say again< this must reveal something about the education system, and, indeed, the broader culture.... Or might it be that the "problem" is simply that people are socializing, not working, and enjoying themselves? But, you say: they have hang-overs! Yes, that's a problem
but nothing serious. It's excess, an error, not a sin....unless, of course, you assume a Puritan framework, and then, oh then, you are in trouble for revealing your lack of "self-control", your sinfulness.... as opposed to saying: people make mistakes, they mis-calculate; eventually you learn to control your drinking (unless you have a real problem, or maybe if you've lost your job and fallen into despair)....
And, so finally, you wonder what happens at the universities in this country if a university
educated person is so naive....(In fact, it seems as though what's going on is that a person living in an insane Puritan country who has recently acquired the ability to drink alcoholic beverages legally would simply like to celebrate that fact......and talks about the problem of the young as if alcohol abuse were not primarily a problem for the dispirited, the unemployed, those without hope.....and those attributes are not the exclusive property of the young...)
I note in passing that I recently read an essay by Bertolt Brecht in which he emphasized the importance of education for artists, a broad education in culture outside one's specific specialty,
and this pleased me because Brecht seemed to be having a thought I've had many times,
a thought that seems absent locally, even at the local university....
Thursday, June 9, 2011
nie su sympaticki...
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
weather report
Rip off the Consumer: American Style
Monday, June 6, 2011
three sisters...
electric cars?
"Electricity; Not Magic"
and the link provided.....
at:
http://www.consumertrap.com/
journalists
i say that after reading "The Guardian" interview with Arundhati Roy
I couldn't read the whole thing.
The journalist is fighting hard to say certain things, to see things a certain way.....
It's so interesting how the establishment deals with the truth.
Roy says India is a place where investments go, so there's a ban on bad stories.
The journalist finds this unbelievable. And of course, it is his business to know!
(He's a journalist, after all.) (But what is a journalist anyway?????)
(So, it's the level of argument: I say yes, you say no...)
Well, I find it very believable!((-: These sorts of bans are subtle but effective.....and only
an outsider like A. Roy would dare speak of them.....
(I have heard this strategy (deny something as incredible) used before before...)
The article itself is a bit ridiculous, but the truthful person who is Arundhati Roy escapes nevertheless....
Reference:
(Article on A. Roy in the Guardian, Sunday 5 June, written by Stephen Moss)
recommended site:
medialens:
http://www.medialens.org