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Tuesday, December 24, 2013

publishing first remaster & re-release of inriched (inri021)

and here it is, finally - done.

the editing here was much deeper than the first cd demo. while i was initially less excited about this one, the end result is comparable - there's one specific track, the 6th, that i just wish didn't exist.

in every way, it's a bit more extreme. the bad decisions were worse; in the sense that i've removed them, it doesn't matter, but in the sense that they remain they're painful. it's mostly related to vocal tracks. but where the first failed on content, this one fails more often on singing. thankfully, there's only two or three tracks that are painful.

the rest of it is actually pretty good. the noisy/experimental/glitch sections are more extreme. the techy parts are more elaborate. the ambient sections are thicker. the silliness is sillier...

as before, the record/demo bounces back and forth between "songs" and "experiments". on this demo, though, the songs are no less interesting than the noise.

the problem with the sixth track is explained on the page. i was being ironic, but not obviously, and it's kind of left me in the awkward position of identifying as queer and yet having a queer-bashing song. *shrug*. it's not queer-bashing, but it would be easier if it just didn't exist...

for the rest of it, i need to reiterate that it is valid, even when it's trite, because it's real. that is to say that it sounds like i'm 18 and less than well-adjusted. if it could be better than it is, it would lack the authenticity of being a demo produced by a troubled teenager. i might not articulate my feelings of being ignored at a very high level of thought or with much compelling poetry, but i'm certainly feeling them and that feeling certainly gets across in my unique and goofy sort of way. likewise, when i go into juvenile shock rock i am actually convincingly juvenile and convincingly shocking (unless i'm trying to be ridiculous, in which case i pull that off just as well).

that means you have to listen to it from a certain distance because a big part of what you're listening to is the spectacle of a demented child being demented, but when you do that it comes off as some of the most idiosyncratic leftfield synth pop i'm aware of. you've never heard anything quite like this.

so, if i could remove the 6th track without killing the flow of the disc, i would. beyond that, the edits that i've made have left me comfortable with throwing this out there as it is - under the existing caveats.

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inriched-lp

==

this is very much a follow-up to the previous demo (there's a pun, here) and in fact is largely constructed of "leftover tracks" from that period. this demo may be a bit glitchier/noisier than the last one, jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inri-lp.

some of these songs are reworked versions of tracks i had recorded previously. in almost all cases, i consider the versions here (and on the previous demo, inri) to be the authoritative versions of these tracks.

the demo is consciously constructed to alternate between "conventional songs" and "experimental pieces", although both definitions are stretched. it generally takes the form of connecting passages. it's meant to give the record the feel of a cohesive work rather than a collection of songs.

lyrically, i'm still a teenager, but i'm starting to grow into myself a little more. there are some points of significant embarrassment on this recording, but it's really only the sixth track that makes me cringe to the point of regret. i was also experimenting with an "ironic distance" type of spoken word style that, in hindsight, doesn't come off so well.

the guitar work is one of the things that separates the sound from a typical industrial aesthetic. i've never been a fan of heavy metal and largely shied away from creating that kind of thing. yet, i found myself connecting more with psychedelic guitar at this point than punk rock. industrial psych generally implies something like trance, but it need not to. industrial hendrix? well, maybe it ends up sounding more like synth pop, which has historical roots in psychedelic music and progressive rock. the point is that the music does manage to carve out a unique space between industrial music and synth pop that i don't know of any clear comparisons to. people have suggested mid-period swans, the legendary pink dots and nine inch nails - only the last of which was a significant influence, and none of which are really that close. a better comparison, although still not a significant influence at this time, would be joy division - who would become a significant influence after this phase. my actual influences at the time would have been more like brian eno (through his 70s and 90s work with david bowie, as well as his work with u2), early prog (genesis/floyd/crimson), peter gabriel, the beatles, radiohead, the smashing pumpkins, REM, sonic youth, the tea party and a bit of contemporary electronic music (prodigy, nin, coil, foetus, autechre, nitzer ebb, ministry, econoline crush, gravity kills, stabbing westward, skinny puppy and side projects). the sense of humour is coming from frank zappa and matt groening, if they are not actually the same person. i wasn't listening to much tears for fears, i don't think, but you can hear them lurking underneath everything.

this material was recorded throughout 1998 and the very beginning of 1999, but some of it was written as far back as 1994. unfortunately, i decided that the songs sounded better in mp3 and consequently compressed everything before burning. i understand now that i was hobbling together a crude mastering process, but it means (unfortunately) that the closest thing i have to the finished tracks are low quality mp3s and a cd-r. these tracks were taken off of a cd-r and run through digital post-production in dec, 2013 in a process that also included minimal editing (mostly the removal of badly placed samples, but also the removal of some vocal sections where it was possible). as always, please use headphones.

credits:
j - guitars, effects, bass, synthesizers, drum programming, sequencing, sampling, digital wave editing, vocals, cool edit synthesis, production, found sounds, strategies

released feb 10, 1999

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inriched-lp

(this was a rant posted in response to somebody pondering a nuclear holocaust)

a concept developed out of the 60s, called mutually assured destruction, pointed out that any future large scale war would be against the interests of virtually everybody. if you accept the idea that war is economic, it follows that that kind of war isn't likely.

the one caveat to that is the idea of population control, particularly in the developing world, but climate change may make that unnecessary.

in short, i don't think there's a serious threat of anything blowing out of proportion. obama buckling to russian pressure on syria just enforces that point. that doesn't mean people shouldn't take the idea seriously; specifically, it doesn't mean that "decision makers" shouldn't behave as though the threat is real. it just means realizing that we're actually not that stupid.

again, the way that that analysis could be flawed is the threat of extremist movements, which could be religious or political - anything ideological. just groups that actually are that stupid. looking at the world, the greatest threat is religious. the americans have pakistan under control, but india is persistently on the brink of hindu extremism. the jews are currently actually pretty prudent but there's a sector of their ruling class that is very frightening. and the saudis are flat out insane.

there's also the republican right in the united states, but they're subservient to the military-industrial complex. the americans can't be too destructive because it would be bad for business. it's a balancing act between ensuring the flow of profits and cutting them off entirely.

i think it's worth cautiously acknowledging that the political situation in russia is somewhat fragile and that, despite western perceptions to the contrary, the most likely successor to putin - at this point - exists on the hard, pro-nationalist right. putin is reacting to populist forces that are further right than him in an attempt to maintain power, not pushing right-wing policies out of his own desire. if elections in russia lead to a shift to a fascist government, the whole calculus of power in asia changes. conflict instantly develops with china, to begin with. that's a wild card, but it's a threat at the moment rather than a reality.

china's expanding nationalism looks scary, but it's hard to see how anything can break in the region, except by accident. it's more just an excuse to build arms. again: it's scary, and if anybody fucks up it could be lethal. but even if such a flare-up did accidentally happen, it's hard to see why it wouldn't be glossed over quickly. well...there might be a proxy war in southeast asia. vietnam II.

the series of proxy wars that we're fighting right now in the middle east and africa - which is between nato, israel, japan (and allies) and the gulf monarchies on one side and iran, russia and china on the other, with india and south america wavering as neutral - is the closest thing to a world war that we're likely to see any time soon. which isn't to say it isn't a world war, so much as to point out that it's been the state of normalcy for roughly 70 years.

this explains the world war that currently is being fought:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_for_the_New_American_Century

...but it's just an extension of the cold war. and the same basic ideas of MAD apply, even when extrapolated to missile defense.

btw, for those that are all like "that's old news, it died with bush", behold:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Center_for_a_New_American_Security

(i put the see also link in wiki. no comment on other wiki entries i've written :P)

and, creepier, the "new american" thing seems to come from a periodical by these fuckers:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Birch_Society

....which is to say that the americans are still trapped in the cold war.

except the cold war is older than the cold war:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Game
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crimean_war
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Japanese_Alliance

this is apparently the actual source of anglo-russian hostilities, driven by the russian tzar being sneaky and the british developing a distrust of dealing with russian officials:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-Russian_War_%281807%E2%80%9312%29

yeah. that source doesn't discuss it. but apparently the tsar signed a secret agreement with napoleon that was uncovered by british intelligence, and the british have refused to trust them (except when they had to, like in wwii) ever since.

"Alexander agreed to join Napoleon's Continental Blockade against Great Britain, and in a secret addition to the treaty, Europe were divided into an eastern and a western part, the eastern Russian part including Sweden. Europe was thereby and in this way, divided between the two great empires."

^ that, there:
http://www.multi.fi/~goranfri/bioalexander.html

lol.

i can't compute this one. is google censoring on behalf of the cia or is the moscow times (a legit and big moscow paper) working with the kgb?

http://www.google.ca/interstitial?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.themoscowtimes.com%2Fnews%2Farticle%2Fraids-on-german-ngos-may-harm-ties-berlin-says%2F477544.html

what i was looking for was this.

apparently, the americans have (unsurprisingly) rejected the proposal.

but, see, it's a cynical ploy in the first place. the russians are trying to build international sympathy in the face of blatant american aggression against them, from containment strategies in the middle east to ops in the ukraine to ballistic missiles hovering over them....

http://rt.com/business/russia-usa-trade-shuvalov-111/

i've laughed at them for being naive, but it's become clear that it's a strategy: every time the americans act belligerent, they respond with fig leaves.

they know it's not going to get a response, but their options are limited. and one gets the impression that they mostly mean it, in the sense that they don't want to fight.

to an extent, i think it seems to be working. we'll have to see in the upcoming months how effective it is.

http://www.haaretz.com/business/.premium-1.562773

it's nice to realize that my bedroom is perfectly positioned to take maximum advantage of the winter's mid-afternoon sunlight. the last few places i've occupied have been less ideal, to say the least.

it's also sort of neat to realize this right after the solstice.

place must have been built by druids...

jessica amber murray
....and, now, to attempt to have a few drinks without smoking any cigarettes. considering the temperature outside (along with my absolute aversion to indoor smoking), i think i'm likely to do well. we'll see.

regarding the smoking thing...

the packs have been almost entirely cut out. i've bought probably around ten packs, total, since the beginning of september. what i've been doing instead is falling back to these single cigars that can be picked up at the corner store for around $1 whenever i'm about to crack. it's a little more costly on the face of it, but it's a good shot of nicotine so it works for a while. one of the problems quitters will run into is that when they crack once they want another one almost right away; the cigars seem to mitigate that. more importantly, it has broken me of a lot of routines, like smoking after meals. to me, that's the harder part. i know nicotine is a physical addiction (meaning that coming off of it will produce physical effects, like drowsiness) but i don't really feel hooked on that level. it's more about breaking routine...

...and not drinking. i've always been a social drinker, so no people has meant no drinking. i mean, i spend most of my time reading, and i'd rather be sober for that. i prefer marijuana as a creative aid. what i'm about to do is uncharacteristic.

so, i can't claim i'm nicotine-free. but i *have* broken the routine, to the point where i can honestly state that i'm not a habitual smoker anymore.

which is all i really wanted to accomplish in the first place. i don't mind being a social smoker that specifically smokes around alcohol and marijuana. what i no longer wanted to be was a solo smoker. on that point, mission accomplished.

(meaning i'm not going to get too mad at myself if i buy a pack on christmas, just like i didn't get too mad when i bought a pack a few weeks ago when it was over 10 degrees, just as an excuse to hang out outside for the day. stuff like that is enjoying the drug, not being a slave to it.)

mom
Wow! That's Great!...Wish, I could have that much self-control!

jessica amber murray
i don't think it's a question of self-control so much as it's a question of doing what one wants. i kind of strongly believe that smokers smoke because they want to, not because they're zombies. the physical withdrawals are coercive, no doubt, but it comes down to wanting or not wanting to quit.

mom
Addiction Stinks!....And in the end it WILL TAKE CONTROL!.....DENIAL is an addicts BEST FRIEND.

jessica amber murray
well, sure. but the semantics break down when you speak of control. what i'm really doing is giving myself permission to indulge, not controlling myself from indulging.

i guess i have a level of broad consistency in my concept of "self-control" that goes into a lot of areas and that my perspective regarding drugs is more of a consequence of how i see things more broadly. consider governments and this idea that their laws dissuade anti-social behaviour, the idea that laws act as disincentives to control people's desires. this is an idea that is, i think, very wrong. sure, on the one hand, you have the logic of poverty that often triumphs over the laws of social order. circumstances where property crimes exist are often circumstances where it's logical for an impoverished person to steal something or otherwise break property laws. governments can produce laws to catch people when they do this, but the laws don't actually succeed in preventing property crime. they merely succeed in criminalizing poverty. rather, eliminating that sort of crime requires a lot of social work to both eliminate the conditions that lead to it as logical and to create a populace that sees it as morally wrong. once you get to that ideal point, preventing crime is less of a process of people controlling themselves from committing crimes and more of a process of people choosing not to behave in a way that is anti-social. that's the ideal.

the way we treat addiction is sort of a cop-out. i mean, i'm not denying that addicts need to admit their addictions. i agree that acknowledgement is the first step. but actually working through it is a process of transcending the desire, not repressing it.

i think it's possible to use drugs without abusing them.

with alcoholism (and for random readers, that's not something i feel i have a problem with), the way to get beyond it is not to have the "self-control" to avoid it but to develop a desire to be sober.

(and i think i'm being a little bit buddhist, but it's something i connect to accidentally and intuitively rather than consciously)

in a moral sense, i find buddhism more rational than western religion. in the west, we've fallen into a sort of false dichotomy between "master morality" and "slave morality". the irony is that the dude that developed that false dichotomy is also the dude that transferred a lot of eastern ideas into the western sphere. he completely missed the obvious synthesis that was sitting right in front of him.

you need to be careful studying buddhism in the west, though, because most of the literature is misinterpreted hippie nonsense. there's a danger of turning into a new age weirdo.

for example, avoid anything that tries to connect buddhism with science.

i kind of like the idea that "only lost people require religion". which is to say that walking into a church or a temple or a synagogue isn't likely to find you people that understand how to behave morally on an intuitive level, but people that are struggling with it. people that "get it" find the whole thing boring and trivial.

not to put myself above it or anything. not declaring myself perfect. but there's a lot of truth to it. and if one can separate the social help from the control and brainwashing [which is difficult, especially for people in fragile states], i'll accept it could have some value.

what i'd rather see, though, is a resurgence of secular social institutions that strip out the brainwashing. i think there's a really open space here for socialist thinkers to walk into and am not really sure why they haven't, given that it connects quite well to the idea that "the social revolution must come first".

Monday, December 23, 2013

"It's a fools errand to believe that the future could be better than the past. President Obama and I reject that cynicism." – john kerry

http://www.ekospolitics.com/wp-content/uploads/131219_slide13.jpg
http://www.ekospolitics.com/index.php/2013/12/stephen-harper-and-the-middle-class-crisis/

roach situation

From: Jessica Murray <death.to.koalas@gmail.com>
To: the initial landlord

hi.

i just want to say things are going well here. and merry christmas.

there's actually not what i'd call a "roach problem" in the unit itself. i've seen a few here and there, exclusively where there are cracks in the wall. that is to say that i don't think there are roaches in the unit, but it is certainly the case that sometimes roaches wander into the unit from elsewhere in the building. i saw one the other day near the dead heater in the kitchen, and hadn't seen one before that since about october - when i had seen a few near the hole for the pipe in the closet. when i covered up the pipe, they went away. so, i've filled the cracks around the dead heater up with a pile of old hole-ridden socks i had hanging around for rags and expect that will keep them out of there. it seemed like the roach i saw in the kitchen was actually looking for water, not food. it was attracted to the sink. i'm very careful to ensure all the food in the unit is in the fridge - even like bread and stuff.

i do, however, feel a responsibility to point out that there are roaches in the building. my perspective regarding that is that there are bugs everywhere; i'm content to simply patch up holes when i see them and keep them out that way. but, as a tenant, i think i have a responsibility to inform you that they do seem to have a nest in the building somewhere.

j

mom
Hi J....How are you? I am fine(fucked up, insecure, neurotic, emotional)...lol. Oh Well....Hate this time of the year! For Sure! Anyways....Did you ever activate that XP? Just wondering? I have a friend that I was going to give it to, if you haven't, of course...Although...I am hearing from a few different people that when it is a home edition...One can have multiple activations of it?? Not sure? You would prolly know for sure...

jessica amber murray
the purpose of activation is to ensure that the purchased product key is used on one, and only one, computer. i'm not currently using it, and don't really see how i could use it, to be honest. i'm running pirated versions...

mom
So, it would be safe to give it to my friend then? But, if you feel that you want it, I will not give it to him.

jessica amber murray
no, go ahead.

mom
K...Thanks!...It will be his Christmas gift then. Just a friend. Not a boyfriend...Very nice older fellow...He just hates his windows 8, and was wanting a copy of XP.

But, You didn't answer me about how you are!?....This time of the year kinda sucks a bit(more than a bit!)...I am living in the bottom of a brown bottle right now...I know....Pathetic!....I have a few left and then am going to go through a bit(more than a bit) of horrible with-drawl...And then will be going to my friends place(his name is Paul)(He is the one I want to give my XP to,(but only if you are sure you don't want it) to cook up the Traditional Christmas Dinner...Nanny&Leo are coming too...Will be soooooo nice to see her(not so sure about Leo though)..LOL... Do you have any plans for that Annoying Day?

jessica amber murray
i actually haven't been to a christmas dinner in a few years, now. for me, it's just wednesday. if anything, i'm irked that the recycle doesn't come until friday, because i couldn't get it all out last pickup.

i'll probably have a sandwich and listen to music.

mom
That sounds quite peaceful to me.... I kinda wish I could just do the same...I have spent more than a few Christmas Days the same...And rather enjoyed it that way. I am a little stressed about my Christmas Day this year. Just hate that feeling!

jessica amber murray
i just have no patience for religious holidays or hallmark holidays. it's merely a wednesday.

mom
I hear you for sure!...Feeling quite the same!.....The only thing I am looking forward to is the yummy turkey dinner(as I am going to be the one cooking it!..And, I do make a yummy dinner for sure!)...What, I am finding that I am feeling a bit stressful about, is that...They are ALL depending on ME to get my old(fairly undependable ass) over there to prepare it!...LOL...What if, I decide to change my mind!(I won't, of course)...Just hate the feeling of it all.

how can a head of state be a terrorist? that's a contradiction in terms.

i'll say this again: when this is done, and people read through the history linearly, it's going to look like the military was running an op to root out the muslim brotherhood, which was underground for years.

http://www.democracynow.org/2013/12/19/morsi_charged_with_terrorism_as_egyptian

translated: this is where they're setting up camp to expand influence in the region to counter the chinese presence.

we're likely to hear of many human rights atrocities committed by american troops in the region.

http://thecable.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2013/12/19/can_samantha_power_wage_a_war_on_atrocities_in_central_african_republic

ok.

but the idea that divestment ended apartheid is....it's borderline racist, really. talk about denying agency.

in order for divestment to really work, it has to be at the point of being sanctions. "free markets" do not have the power to do this. only governments or oligopolies (trusts, which still exist) can effectively carry this out.

in promoting this, there's also a danger in falling into the myths of market theory.

but it's a first step in creating government sanctions so long as everybody understands that markets do not have the leverage to get to such an end.

http://briarpatchmagazine.com/articles/view/tarsands-divestment-and-its-discontents

they had a congressional hearing in washington to look into the extent of the extra-judicial criminality around drone strikes in central asia. some kids that watched their grandmother get blown up for the crime of taking her grandkids for a walk showed up, flown in from pakistan.

number of congress-people that bothered to show up: 5 senators.
of those 5 senators, number that were republican: 0.

despite promises by nixon to end it (which probably won him the hippie vote, which probably won him the election), vietnam didn't end until the mid-70s when congress cut funding. instead, nixon attacked cambodia. "hope and change" = secret war. "defoliation". people like to compare obama to carter. no. nixon.

the current congress is a diminished shadow of the one that managed that feat. five democrats...

http://www.democracynow.org/2013/10/31/these_drones_attack_us_and_the

you can't "enforce democracy". the premise is flawed. what they did was set up an authoritarian system that had some characteristics of democracy.

regardless, agrarian muslims that live in the side of mountains don't have the same concepts of governance and human rights that white, urban liberals in boston do. the whole point of democracy is that these kinds of things can't be abstracted to universals, they need to determined on the ground.

http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/12/18/too_much_of_a_good_thing

seems like good news. cautiously.

this is the worst government we've ever had to throw this in the lap of, though. i fear it may backfire.

i'm reminded of the abortion fiasco, with mulroney in power. mulroney decided not to touch it, and it led to two consequences: no abortion laws whatsoever and a new political movement in canada.

harper's not likely to make the same mistake, but he's not likely to build a system that tacitly "permits" prostitution, either, as it would collapse his support base - like not legislating on abortion was one of the primary factors that led to a rebellion against mulroney and the pcs. harper will learn from this in some way...

the wording of the abortion ruling is actually very fragile. the aim of the ruling actually seemed to be to increase funding for abortion in order to make it easier for women to get the certificates. mulroney wrongly calculated that it would be politically more expedient to ignore the issue than to set up a system that would tacitly sanction it. the only other thing he could have done would have been to overpower the brand new constitution, which would have cast him as a reactionary despot.

if harper's aim is to not repeat mulroney's mistake, what that means is approaching it in a way that is not "sanctioning", which means overriding the constitution.

while it's sort of unprecedented, harper isn't mulroney. if harper had his way, he'd burn the charter of rights and replace it with the ten commandments.

so, if this is important to you, now is the most important time to pay attention and get the info out. harper's reaction is not going to be progressive...

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/supreme-court-rules-on-prostitution-laws/article16067485/

this is a really interesting debate. swanson takes a sort of libertarian/liberal perspective, whereas jay takes a marxist perspective (with shades of gramsci). it's also interesting on the level of where they agree.

i just want to add that swanson continually cites syria as an example of where popular opinion stopped the war. this isn't a very informed extrapolation of events. it's generally acknowledged that pressure from russia and china prevented the invasion. especially russia. it's not entirely clear what the russian threats were, but i suspect that may be flat out shocking when they come out.

http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=11188

it's slowly become apparent that liberals have taken over the third wave, which was a reaction against liberal feminism.

people that argue in favour of maximizing utility, or think there's freedom in pursuing carnal pleasure, present a problem in building truly free societies. a free society requires a population that is able to suppress it's impulses, not one that is based around the idea of acting them out.

a society that celebrates impulsive behaviour, from shopping through to sex, is actually what we have right now.

it's a larger problem on the left. utilitarianism has been masquerading as socialism for quite a while, now.

http://truth-out.org/opinion/item/20459-betty-dodsons-feminist-sex-wars

i remain in the school of people (punks) that argues that drugs and sexuality are a means of control.

the americans don't even pretend they're not meddling, here. there's no curtain over events. it's wide in the open.

could you imagine the leader of the communist party going to canada and making a speech like this?

http://www.theguardian.com/world/shortcuts/2013/dec/17/john-mccain-vladimir-putin-ukraine-protests-bitter-feud

this doesn't answer anything useful, though. it's understood that a mix occurred, and the male lineage was probably sephardic. the interesting thing to study is mt-dna.

and how is anybody supposed to take something seriously when it begins with the premise that a "levite founder" exists?

https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms3928

Sunday, December 22, 2013

i just clued in that the distance one lives from their timezone split can have a huge difference on the way the sun is experienced. i suppose that this is obvious, but i never realized it before.

the sun wasn't up until almost 8:00 today. sure, it's the shortest day of the year, but that's still pushing it. it wasn't up until around 8:00 before they turned the clocks back, too. in ottawa, the sun is never much later than 7:30. most confusing to me was that i'm comfortable in the knowledge that windsor is south of ottawa, meaning it's closer to the equator, meaning i would think it should be a few seconds (maybe a minute or two) *earlier*, not apparently a half hour later. it seemed late in the fall, too. i'm used to the sun being up before 7:00 most of the year, and it really wasn't. so, what, precisely, is the fuck?

well, it's pretty obvious if you look at the map. it's not that the sunrise is later here, it's that synchronizing clocks across timezones is something that sort of doesn't actually make sense. here's where it gets weird, and we're moving from east to west across the eastern time-zone here, within a relatively small latitude change:

boston - 7:11
nyc - 7:17
montreal - 7:32
ottawa - 7:40
toronto - 7:48
detroit - 7:59
indianapolis - 8:03

then...

chicago - 7:15

right. time zone shift.

as is now obvious, it's the move east-west that makes the difference. humans may possibly exist at infinitely many points within each time zone, producing a different experience of the sun in each that varies by as much as an hour on the edges. the difference between living in detroit and living in chicago could be dramatic for some people. what i've done is move a half hour within the zone, and it's produced noticeable effects.

there's a benefit, though, if you're the type that is inclined that way, especially in the summer:

sunset in ottawa today - 4:23
sunset in windsor today - 5:03

so, the thing to adjust to is the sun coming up a half hour later and setting a half hour later.

mom
i was wondering why the sun wasn't coming up when we drove in.

jessica amber murray
well, it was freaking you out. i just thought it was cloudy. it wasn't until around october that i realized something wasn't right.

mom
the summer days were always a lot longer in prince rupert, so i thought the days got longer when you moved north and shorter as you get closer to the equator. so, shouldn't the days in windsor be shorter?

jessica amber murray
that's a big latitude difference, though. almost 10 degrees. and the shift isn't linear - it changes faster as you move further north. so, you'd expect to notice a measurable change with longer days in the summer and shorter days in the winter. ottawa to windsor is only 3 degrees. i mean, i'm sure you could measure it down to a few minutes, but it couldn't really be that noticeable.

actually, sunrise in binghampton, new york was about 11 minutes earlier than sunrise in ottawa, today. so that's the straight comparison, north-south. at the solstice.

really, the longitude thing is totally obvious when you think about it. of course the sun does rise later over windsor than over ottawa if measured from outer space (my language up there was a bit weird). i'm just a half hour further away from the earth coming out of darkness. the thing is we tend to expect that time zones work that kind of shit out and don't think about the changes that exist when moving across the same time zone.

also, the fact that we were moving west overnight might have exaggerated the effect. we got to experience the earlier sunset in ottawa, then the later sunrise on the way into windsor.

something i've learned though is that if you like an early sunset (and i'm often up all night, and do like to watch the sun rise) then you want to be on the easternmost edge of your timezone. relative to your clock, the sun rises earlier in chicago than in detroit (although it of course passes over detroit first). somewhere like the gaspe peninsula would be perfect for those that like early sunrises..

"western capitalism is almost a better product than heroin." - genesis p-orridge

heavy dream...

i wish people would be a little less coercive in enforcing conformist concepts that reject being square. being square is a personality trait, but it's also often a reaction to events. the quality of being square exists at the core of a square person's individuality.

square people exist.

so, instead of enforcing norms through insults and coercion, why don't we just accept that people have different value systems?

i'm consequently reclaiming the term.

http://johnpilger.com/articles/mandela-is-gone-but-apartheid-is-alive-and-well-in-australia
https://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/the-sad-and-puzzling-story-of-abbas-khan-the-british-doctor-found-dead-in-syrian-jail-9010993.html
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/as-we-move-towards-the-great-wars-centenary-its-time-to-recognise-the-reality-of-its-horror-9006197.html

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/nov/05/australia-apartheid-alive-aboriginal-history
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=unraveling-the-mystery-of-ssris-depression

http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/chinese-collider-expands-particle-zoo
http://www.nature.com/news/cosmologists-at-odds-over-mysterious-anomalies-in-data-from-early-universe-1.14368
http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/december-2013/mu2e-attracts-magnet-experts
http://popular-archaeology.com/issue/12012013/article/discovery-pushes-back-the-clock-on-human-hand-evolution

we're slowly proving that there is no ether, i mean dark matter.
http://physics.aps.org/articles/v6/136

http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/12/direct-measurements-of-the-wave-nature-of-matter/

this is awesome.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=inhaled-stem-cells-might-replace-lost-neurons

http://phys.org/news/2013-12-nsa-unconstitutional.html

i'm happy that the linnaean teleology is continuing to be dismantled.
http://phys.org/news/2013-12-ancestor-snakes-lizards-gave-birth.html

http://mitne.ws/1cwDL7P

their effect on bees is probably not as strong as claimed (it's not helping, but the truth is bees were already dying and the source isn't fully clear) but there's plenty of other reasons to reduce dangerous pesticide use.
http://blogs.nature.com/news/2013/12/controversial-pesticides-linked-to-human-neurotoxicity.html

http://www.symmetrymagazine.org/article/december-2013/four-things-you-might-not-know-about-dark-matter

kind of like blacks, whites, asians and native americans. these weren't different species. it's just variation.
http://popular-archaeology.com/issue/12012013/article/neanderthal-genome-sequence-reveals-interbreeding-in-four-early-human-species

http://news.sciencemag.org/archaeology/2013/12/genome-neandertals-reveals-inbreeding
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=human-exposure-to-possibly-neurotoxic-pesticides-should-be-reduced-eu-safety-agency-recommends
https://phys.org/news/2013-12-trio-rsa-encryption-keys-noise.html

indeed. there's nothing spectacular about a base 2 system, except how inconvenient it would be. the babylonians were using base 60 systems thousands of years ago. take that for obtuse.

the question as to "why?" is interesting, because it's sort of like asking why people would uninvent the wheel. base 10 took a long time to come up (it's not as simple as how many fingers we have, that doesn't add up to historical evidence, it was more about religion and mysticism in the early days) with and is really quite ingenious when you break it all apart. why bother?

http://phys.org/news/2013-12-polynesian-islanders-combined-binary-decimal.html

great. just what we needed.

http://phys.org/news/2013-12-algae-crude-oil-million-year-natural.html

ok. so, the process is in theory cyclical if you expect oil companies to build giant carbon catching windmills rather than recycling the captured carbon they've put aside from burning coal.

if it completely replaces burning geological carbon, it's an idea that could help. in reality, it sounds like a way to make a profit off of stored carbon created by burning coal.

regardless, i haven't interpreted biofuels quite like this before. it's sort of understood that the carbon can't be recycled like this because oil can't be created on demand. once that's presented as possible, the whole argument shifts.

i'm not sure it's feasible to shift entirely, and i don't think it's a "get out of alternative energy" card. but it seems like it's an idea to add to the options.

i'm usually critical of ethanol because the energy in exceeds the energy out. that's another question to explore and that i don't feel the article answered.

probabilistic teleology. misses the point, every time. drives me up the wall. it's a neat article, though.
http://phys.org/news306660276.html

obviously. no royal road to geometry, either.
http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/computers_math/mathematics/~3/8zwV6rRbJWA/131216102844.htm

how to completely eliminate sweatshop labour!

i'm not even thinking about people having these in their homes. robots are even cheaper than slaves. gap and the like are going to set these things up in abandoned factories in the rust belt.

that's an immediate decrease in carbon from shipping, to begin with. asians can then decide what they want to do with their means of production..

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/15/fashion/3D-Printing-Clothing-fashion.html

"This is not about waiting for a better life in the hereafter!"

this is what pissed marx off about christianity. he wasn't nietzsche or anything close to it. he wasn't even bakunin. the truth is he actually liked christianity, he spoke positively of "utopian socialism", but he was just really adamant that it was never going to be possible to build meaningful institutions that cater to real, existing human beings if they're ideologically driven entirely by fantasies of the afterlife. he thought it was an impossible strategy that had no outcome but co-option.

i think it's important to be cautious about taking strategic insight from the guy that thought the way to build communism was to start off with a state where one class dominates all the others. the cited engels text actually seems to want to present marxism as a tool that elites can use to replace christianity with. yes, engels actually explicitly makes the argument that marxism is a system that could be used to control the proletariat for the aims of the ruling elite by comparing it to christianity, which was previously successfully used for that purpose. marxists are generally kind of mum on that whole thing. and i realize this is where a lot of people put marx down and go their own way. but, personally, i think his deconstruction of christianity (less so than his ideas about how to replace christianity with marxism) is just about the only thing that's really worth taking from him intact without incredible modification, "de-hegelianizing", "sciencification", etc. specifically, it is the insight that workers are more likely to be revolutionary when they discard a belief in the afterlife (and that that belief in an afterlife is an impossible wall for revolutionaries to break through) that is a deep insight.

the soviets had people worshipping icons of stalin. no, for real. stalin was worshipped as a demigod. when this is spoken of at all, it's written off as a sort of megalomania. a cult of leadership. but it does come out of a certain reading of marx that implies that the proletariat needs to be controlled with a "secular religion" that denies an afterlife.

also, merry christmas.

http://redflag.org.au/article/contradictions-christianity#sthash.Qjw2Gup1.dpuf

Saturday, December 21, 2013

i play pretty close attention to global conflict spots and i don't even pretend to have a solid grasp of what's happening there, with muslims fighting christians and blacks and arabs and europeans fighting each other, and china fighting the united states, and corporations fighting each other and governments competing over resources to export and a dozen different tribal groups all mixed up in it...it makes syria seem easy to understand in comparison...

the one thing i think i get is that, despite all the myriad forces fighting for control, it's only the gangs on the ground that actually have any control, and they've turned war into a mercenary business. the ideologies are really just a gloss. they're for hire. and that's the devastating reality on the ground.

http://www.msf.org.uk/article/central-african-republic-arriving-midst-violence

this is legit, and legally binding in iran. there's been some establishment propaganda recently trying to rationalize it away as mere words, but that kind of doesn't add up as consistent with their own propaganda - is iran a totalitarian theocracy or not?

the reality is that they're not building anything.

http://www.ww4report.com/node/929

1) smash up a google bus
2) ????????
3) communism

i suppose it's a shocking way to get the issue covered. unfortunately, the kind of press this produces is

"luddite bay area idiots go tourettes on taxpaying citizens"

it's not a question of supporting or condemning them. i'm very vocally of the opinion that rent is too high, but i blame property owners and not workers. i certainly don't blame "techies". the tactic is too uninformed, counteractive and bluntly stupid to get to the point of asking that question.

i mean, if you're opposed to pipelines do you attack a ketchup factory and then claim diversity of tactics? there's no sense in this. it's just derp.

http://pando.com/2013/12/20/breaking-protesters-attack-google-bus-in-west-oakland-smashing-window/

of course, this has all the signs of infiltration by the cops in the sense that it was a random act. the anti-gentrification groups (and i hate that concept, as it enforces class division instead of fighting against it and shifts the target of attack from people who own property to people who rent it) all expressed shock and confusion.

i mean, this is what cops do. they've been doing it since bismarck. it's deeply documented. the derp of it all is hard to explain through other means.

we shouldn't be reducing the issue to increasing living conditions OR maintaining livable rent, then condemning wide swaths of the city to crime-infested and impoverished slums. we should be demanding increased living conditions (through a combination of community work and investment) AND livable rent, possibly through cooperatives. that requires refocusing the attack on property owners.

there should ultimately be an attempt to build solidarity with these tech workers to try and convince them to help create low rent solutions, possibly through subsidization programs involving tactics like the state buying up property. these are workers. they pay rent themselves. they're not likely to lack empathy on the issue.

attacking them solidifies feelings of us v them, creating arbitrary divisions that are not actually class divisions. it pits proletariat against lumpenproletariat. smart socialists understand that the lumpenproletariat needs to form the infantry for proletariat revolt because employed workers are too co-opted by capital to form a revolutionary class of their own. so, who benefits by turning them against each other?

....and, no, you can't scare them out of the neighbourhood; they have riot cops, you have sticks, that's delusional.

so, it just creates division across a dispossessed front when the focus should be on building solidarity against bosses and property owners.

if it's not the cops, these people need better class politics and it's up to the anti-gentrification groups to make sure they get that education.

publishing first remaster & re-release of inri (inri015)

so, this is completely, totally done now, no going back to it. i boosted the bass in a few places and actually reverted back to the cd rip for a few of the sound collages. i think it sounds pretty good, actually, for the most part.

there's one specific track, the 8th, on the second demo that is causing me headaches. the mix is just so saturated and muddy that i'm constantly getting information overload listening to it. i'm having a hard time building reference points. i want this done with by the end of the day, so i can move on, so soon.

====

it took a little longer than i wanted it to, but i've finally got this cleaned up to a final state.

....and now that it is mastered decently and has had a handful of bad decisions removed, i have to say it holds up fairly well. when comparing it to other late 90s electro-rock hybrids, it carves out a really unique space in it's exploration of more abstract electronics. i'm not content to recycle depeche mode or new order yet again; i want to mix in elements of glitch, throw in sound collages and even get a little proggy sometimes. really, i wish there were more people working in this removed a space, both then and now. it's really rather refreshingly creative.

the record/demo bounces back and forth between "songs" and "experiments". while some of the songs are more compelling than others, the more consistently interesting material is actually the experiments.

where it drags is in the vocals, but only to an extent. the eighth track is indefensibly bad; incoherent to the point that i don't even remember what it was about, if it was about anything at all. the rest of it is valid, even when it's trite, because it's real. that is to say that it sounds like i'm 17 and less than well-adjusted. if it could be better than it is, it would lack the authenticity of being a demo produced by a troubled teenager. i might not articulate my feelings of being useless at a very high level of thought or with much compelling poetry, but i'm certainly feeling them and that feeling certainly gets across in my unique and goofy sort of way. likewise, when i go into juvenile shock rock i am actually convincingly juvenile and convincingly shocking (unless i'm trying to be ridiculous, in which case i pull that off just as well).

that means you have to listen to it from a certain distance because a big part of what you're listening to is the spectacle of a demented child being demented, but when you do that it comes off as some of the most idiosyncratic leftfield synth pop i'm aware of. you've never heard anything quite like this.

so, if i could remove the 8th track without killing the flow of the disc, i would. beyond that, the edits that i've made have left me comfortable with throwing this out there as it is - under the existing caveats.

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inri-lp

====

my first cd demo represents a dramatic shift in sound that, at the time, was meant to be permanent but that ended up being merely a step in a long journey. on one hand, the shift in sound reflected my changing tastes away from alternative rock and towards industrial music. on another level, it was a return to my childhood roots in 80s synthpop. i was also expanding my tastes into glitch, noise and what could be called "musique concrete".

the shift to using drum machines was dominant in the new sound, as was the reality that i had a synthesizer available to me starting in the beginning of 1998. another major factor was the use of a pc. however, my main songwriting tool remained the guitar and these are still mostly guitar-driven pieces.

the guitar work is one of the things that separates the sound from a typical industrial aesthetic. i've never been a fan of heavy metal and largely shied away from creating that kind of thing. yet, i found myself connecting more with psychedelic guitar at this point than punk rock. industrial psych generally implies something like trance, but it need not to. industrial hendrix? well, maybe it ends up sounding more like synth pop, which has historical roots in psychedelic music and progressive rock. the point is that the music does manage to carve out a unique space between industrial music and synth pop that i don't know of any clear comparisons to. people have suggested mid-period swans, the legendary pink dots and nine inch nails - only the last of which was a significant influence, and none of which are really that close. a better comparison, although still not a significant influence at this time, would be joy division - who would become a significant influence after this phase. my actual influences at the time would have been more like brian eno (through his 70s and 90s work with david bowie, as well as his work with u2), early prog (genesis/floyd/crimson), peter gabriel, the beatles, radiohead, the smashing pumpkins, REM, sonic youth, the tea party and a bit of contemporary electronic music (prodigy, nin, coil, foetus, autechre, nitzer ebb, ministry, econoline crush, gravity kills, stabbing westward, skinny puppy and side projects). the sense of humour is coming from frank zappa and matt groening, if they are not actually the same person. i wasn't listening to much tears for fears, i don't think, but you can hear them lurking underneath everything.

some of these songs are reworked versions of tracks i had recorded previously. in almost all cases, i consider the versions here (and on the follow-up demo, inriched) to be the authoritative versions of these tracks.

the demo is consciously constructed to alternate between "conventional songs" and "experimental pieces", although both definitions are stretched. it generally takes the form of connecting passages. it's meant to give the record the feel of a cohesive work rather than a collection of songs.

lyrically, i'm still a teenager, but i'm starting to grow into myself a little more. there are still some points of embarrassment, but it's really only the 8th track that is causing me any serious grief. my singing style has changed quite a bit though - most of the lyrics here are in a spoken word style, rather than sung. it's partially the result of insecurities with my voice, but it's mostly due to the shift to something electronic. i found the dead pan vocal delivery more appropriate. it's something that stuck with me though until relatively recently.

some of this material was written as far back as 1994, but was only sequenced in the second half of 1997 and recorded in the first half of 1998. unfortunately, i decided that the songs sounded better in mp3 and consequently compressed everything before burning. i understand now that i was hobbling together a crude mastering process, but it means (unfortunately) that the closest thing i have to the finished tracks are low quality mp3s and a cd-r. these tracks were taken off of a cd-r and run through digital post-production in dec, 2013 in a process that also included minimal editing (mostly the removal of badly placed simpsons samples). this is my first official record; as always, please use headphones.

credits:
j - guitars, effects, bass, synthesizers, drum programming, sequencing, sampling, vocals, cool edit synthesis, windows 95 sound recorder, found sounds, strategies, soundraider, hammerhead, sound design, metronome, digital wave editing, production

released june 20, 1998

https://jasonparent.bandcamp.com/album/inri-lp

Friday, December 20, 2013

on the middle class nature of socal punk

happyhooliedaze
Punk is punk and has nothing to do w/electonic or hiphop.

deathtokoalas
i'd say punk has a lot to do with hip-hop, politically. further, this is a type of punk that was popular in california; rave/industrial was a type of punk that was popular in england.

happyhooliedaze
real punk is rebellious and libertarian,NOT political .Rave has NOTHING to to w/punk.Ravers are a bunch of drugged up rich kids that listen to talentless.pre-programmed garbage. Don`t talk about u don`t know as its obvious,ur "standin` on the outside,lookin` in".

deathtokoalas
the reality is that most punk, especially socal punk, was also put together by upper middle class kids. bad religion were centered around rich mommy's basement. they wrote most of their lyrics as a criticism of wealthy white culture from a first person perspective. great band, don't get me wrong, but bringing class politics into punk rock has always been perilous. joe strummer was actually an aristocrat.

rave is derived directly from industrial, which was an offshoot of punk. this is a question of historical fact. it's not a matter for debate.

ron paul is not a libertarian.

the major thing libertarians don't understand is that markets are inherently coercive. they base their ideas around concepts of freedom from the responsibility to contribute, rather than freedom to choose how to contribute responsibly. the end result is a freedom to exploit, rather than a freedom from exploitation.

Paul Boisvert
First off, all of your facts are correct and I'm sure others can agree on that. Also I completely agree with your opinion of Libertarian ethics. With that said, the subliminal opinion within your comment displays a vast amount of Class Envy. I think that your opinion of this band's writing material and your own personal beliefs make no sense because the lyrics to these songs can give you the proper information to fuel your conflagrations against the Upper-Middle/Upper Class. Also, your general thesis on discontent for Class Politics involved in Punk Rock music into a rant on Class Politics was completely hypocritical. I'm truly not trying to throw any hate in your direction because I can admit to suffering from Class Envy as well, of course those of us who have been truly affected by this recession have many of the same beliefs in that specific area. Good luck to you!

deathtokoalas
i was responding to a previous comment, which was a response to a previous comment of mine. the privacy settings that have come with these new youtube/google+ rules have created the problem of not being to reply to replies on your own comments. i think the context would clear things up.

but "class envy" is sort of a weird concept from a leftist perspective, where the aim is to abolish class. i think all leftists have something that is sort of like class envy, but that that isn't a very astute way to articulate it.

i mean, "class envy" is sort of the same concept as "distributive justice". i don't want to completely discard it as nonsense. it's just that, envy is an almost comical way to describe the process of recognizing the injustice of inequality.

Marios Laskaris
Who told you their parents were rich? They were shopping clothes from Walmart from what I know. I am not saying they were starving, but they were not rich either. Writing generic stuff without having done your research is unacceptable and far more off putting than middle class 17 year olds writing songs about what they think is wrong with the world!

deathtokoalas
i don't know or care where brett & friends shopped before they became very wealthy from epitaph records, but if you had done that basic "research" yourself, you'd realize that this entire genre is the reaction of upper middle class suburban white kids - and that, yes, bad religion is a band that mostly operated out of upper-middle class garages.

to be clear: these were guys that lived with their parents well beyond any socially normal cut-off point. they fit any conventional definition of the word "loser". self-releasing records isn't cheap, and they partially offset the cost of that by not taking responsibility for paying for living expenses like rent. if you share the mindset, you realize why climbing up social hierarchies isn't important to some people. but, socal punk as a reaction to suburbanite living (and this is a distinct thing from other kinds of punk) couldn't have happened otherwise. that's exactly what this is.

which is fine. i'm not really criticizing them for this, i'm just correcting somebody's flawed perception of punk having this kind of ghetto hip-hop romanticism. that's not true. the prominent, influential bands were mostly rich kids, which reflects our social reality. it would be a remarkable triumph of capitalism if kids could actually climb out of the projects with socially relevant art projects!

the reality is that it's how most of the audience connects with it. i grew up in a project, but by the time i was in my mid-teens i was living in a white, upper middle class reality. there were a lot of things i didn't like about that. socal punk bands like the offspring, the dead kennedys, bad religion and others helped me make sense of this upside-down reality i was living in and work my way through it's contradictions. upper middle class white kids are humans too; they need ways to cope with reality like everybody else. they may see some problems with the composition of the current system (even as it privileges them). more importantly, they may very well reject it on it's axiomatic basis. it's those upper middle class white kids that this was written by and for.

in a sense, understanding bad religion (and socal punk in general) is very simple: teach a generation of kids a moral code when they're growing up, then tell them to go out and break it in order to be "successful" and finally watch them react in confusion and horror when faced with such daunting contradictions worked into the basic process of survival. this whole cycle of events - from the moral teaching, to the opportunities revolving around being "successful" to the freedom to rebel - is a reflection of the privilege that socal punk was birthed within.

so, rather than reject the idea of these bands coming from wealth, you'd be better off to look into it a little further. it's kind of a vitally important aspect of actually understanding what this is/was all about.

Marios Laskaris
Upper middle class can be punk too. As Graffin says and I totally agree, a girl from an affluent religious family who consistently shows up to church on Sunday with her green mohawk and "Fuck Jesus" shirt is punk. But so is a biology professor who claims that Charles Darwin's ideas were wrong and has his own. Going against the grain is punk.

And what you're asking for/your idea of the "proper punk band" is impossible. You're asking for a bunch of 17 year olds that have no money to somehow aquire guitars and drums and convince Atlantic records (since epitaph would not exist in your "punk world") to release their album! Not possible! Most punk bands had to "create record labels", because no one would release a punk album from an unknown band back in 1975-1980. And if epitaph was not created, offspring, pennywise and NOFX and so many other punk bands probably wouldn't exist now and I definately wouldn't have been able to listen to them/discover them over here in Greece. So thank f**k for that! You need to think about reality too and not just theory!

I'll help you get an idea of their world back then. Sure they were not living in the streets like bums, but they were not living an untroubled life either:

''In 1976 I moved with my mom and brother to the San Fernando Valley in Los Angeles. Like millions of other victims of divorce in the 1970s I had to deal with the fact that my father was now living far away (in Racine, Wisconsin) and I would not get to see him as much as most other kids see theirs. This pain was compounded by the bewildering alienation I felt as a Wisconsin boy at Junior High School in the Los Angeles unified school district. I had entered a landscape unlike anything I experienced in my 11 years of life. I had dark brown fluffy, wavy hair, unfeatherable, impossible to mold into the cool rock-and-roll hairdos of the 1970s that were so popular. I wore velour kids shirts from K-Mart, and corduroys and because they were less expensive than jeans and we didn't have a lot of money. I had cheap shoes, usually also from K-Mart or Payless, always worn out, with goofy logos that emulated the real popular brands that all the other kids wore. I could see fellow 7th graders come to class with squinty eyes and euphoric smiles reeking of pot smoke. If you went along with the flow, unquestioning and complacent, you were accepted and rewarded with social status. If you questioned the norm, or went against the grain in any way, you were in for a rocky ride down the social ladder.

I came to be friends with a particular class of people who were labeled geeks, nerds, kooks, dorks, wimps, and pussies (or "wussies" if you combine these last two). We hung out together and did creative things after school...''

deathtokoalas
as pointed out in a previous comment, i was responding to a previous comment about prominent punk musicians and class. i've never presented an ideal of a punk band, or criticized anybody for the class they were born into. i was merely rejecting the idea that punk (and especially socal punk) had any kind of inherently "lower" class politics, for the sole reason that it just simply isn't true.

lukmruk
"ron paul is not a libertarian." oh sure he is randroid

deathtokoalas
right-wing libertarians tend to reject rand and objectivism. it isn't very good with ideas like the nap. and paul is racist, homophobic and sexist - ideas that tend to be weak in libertarian circles. libertarians tend to be in favour of gay marriage, to the extent that they acknowledge marriage at all. not paul. libertarians tend to be pro-choice on abortion. not paul. and libertarians tend to be "colour blind", they don't write up racist newsletters to try and control a white supremacist voting demographic.

paul, like rand, is just a peculiar type of american conservative. there's no value in analyzing him more deeply than that.

miaumiaucatmagician
you're making very good comments all the way

mattlaureys
here are some words from greg himself from "no direction" :

"a righteous student came and asked me to reflect
he judged my lifestyle was politically incorrect
I don't believe in self important folks who preach
no Bad Religion song can make your life complete"

Alfredo Rodriguez
The reality is, you have no clue. You weren't there when they wrote this, and fuck your political agenda. Fuck Joe Strummer, he wasn't even in a punk band. Sorry, but I can't even think of his useless bands name right now. Dance music, isn't punk rock, go rock the cashbah on the dance floor.

deathtokoalas
i don't really enjoy the clash, either, but there are a lot of other early punk bands (like the buzzcocks) that double very well as dance music. again, i don't know where people are going by disconnecting punk from dancing. what's the motive for that kind of revisionism? hardcore was something else, but it was as much of a reaction against punk as it was an evolution of it.

i also don't know why there's so much hostility to rave culture. ignoring the historical connections, just the similarities in outlook should be enough to see a set of political allies. they're both dead now, but rave was arguably more successful than punk in building a viable counter-culture. i guess there were punks that hated hippies, too, but they must have been no less close-minded.

randomusername987
I agreed with the first part, but how the hell was all the rest relevant?

deathtokoalas
i think it follows from the conversation. i mean, can you be more specific?

randomusername987
Well i was referring to the original post. What does ron paul etc have to do with Suffer?

mattlaureys
what are you even ranting on about ? that guy was making solid points and you start going on a rant talking about things that are completely insignificant. the reasons people disconnect genres from eachother is because they are diff genres and completely diff music duh. you're just ranting and linking everything to punk. and you say "they're both dead now" punk is very much alive tons of punk bands still making music and rave is also , still plenty of raves going on. you like to bash on punk don't you ?

Alfredo Rodriguez
I guess Bad Brains was also a rich band of white kids from the "burbs" as well. All these bands come from blue collar working families. Greg and Brett's parents are educators. Teachers don't make much money. Fuck Ron Paul fucking racist piece of shit!

deathtokoalas
the last time i checked, bad brains weren't skate punk from southern california. further, it's rather insensitive for you to suggest that teachers don't make a lot of money. relative to who? doctors? it's a certain sort of cluelessness that would argue that teachers are not comfortably in the middle class.

as mentioned repeatedly, that has nothing to do with what i was talking about. i really couldn't imagine dropping a bad religion record off at a mcdonalds and expecting the employees to connect to it. the songs do not discuss issues that are of relevance to the most desperate members of the working class. rather, they discuss topics that are of concern to the middle class children of teachers.

Sam steinhauer
Average yearly salary for a public school teacher in the US is about $50,000. However, Greg's parents were Professors which is most certainly an upper middle class job. Still don't get why this should change my opinion of the band.

deathtokoalas
i at no point suggested it should....

Thursday, December 19, 2013

file downloaded:
https://unctad.org/en/PublicationsLibrary/ditcted2012d3_en.pdf

thoughts regarding a repressed memory

it's amazing how repressed memories can just throw themselves back at you. i remember this clearly, now. which is remarkable, because i couldn't have been older than 2.

i'm sitting in a high chair, eating chocolate cake. which means it was probably my birthday. i've long deciphered the language that these humans around me are using. i'm struck by their deep corruption, and ultimately frightened by them. i understand that my safety in their presence is never certain.

somebody, perhaps my mother, tells me that once i learn to talk i'll be more like them. i can't remember the language, i can only remember the reaction, which was horror.

it was probably something parents or grandparents reflexively say on early birthdays. getting big. be talking soon.

my decision not to speak as a child, which lasted for several years, was a fully conscious attempt to keep myself pure from what had been identified as the source of human corruption: language.

...and i can now also remember myself walking around the hospital in circles, kicking a toy around the waiting room, and weighing the pros and cons of keeping my innocence by maintaining my silence, which i would, of course, eventually break.

for whatever reason, i've never told anybody this.

apparently, what the doctors determined is that i was disinterested in human interaction - not autistic, but simply highly introverted.

there was more to it than that.

and i'm not sure i've changed much.

existential dread is usually measured in terms of "teenage angst", but i wonder if anybody's studied it in toddlers.

i was saying "g-houst", with a soft g like j, but i interpreted gh the same way as ch or sh - always soft and never hard.

(i hadn't yet seen words like 'chromatic')

the day-to-day pronunciation of "ghost", as in "ghostbuster", struck me as a populist fallacy. i was certain that true poltergeist experts in the actual field would pronounce it correctly, correctly meaning in a way that conformed to my understanding of phonetic rules - gh must be just like sh and ch.

what was actually driving my insistence was a fallacy of precedence. i seem to have believed that words existed inherently in written form first and were only later taken up in speech. as such, they are defined by the rules of phonetics first and foremost and then corrupted by human speakers who impose populist fallacies upon them. i know now that it's actually the other way around, that written language is designed to capture the sounds of human speaking and that when humans change how they speak, written language changes as well.

i do, however, have specific and clear memories of what i'm saying.

i probably arrived at that fallacy of precedence (which is actually some kind of platonism, funnily enough) through experience. i mean, it's not like i had it formally postulated, but it seems to be the not-thought-through assumption i was working with because it's how i approached it: i was reading before i was talking.

the concept of the unwashed masses being too ignorant to pronounce 'ghost' correctly, gh clearly being just like sh or ch, must have also been an example of the fallacy of generalizing the specific.

so, i do fully admit to relying too much on deduction and not enough on experience and coming to some faulty conclusions as a result of that. in my defense, i'll state that i learned the value of scientific thinking very early - PRECISELY due to making deductive errors very young.

again, though, i specifically remember wrestling with the idea of whether i should talk or not and going through a long period of not talking due to rejecting it.

but, yeah, that's what i was thinking: ghostbusters was just watered down pop-sci for the masses, whomever put it together screwed up the pronunciation, and real ghostbusters that had advanced degrees in the topic would know how to pronounce it properly because they would understand that gh must be just like sh and ch (which i had never seen in a hard usage).

just to put it more in context, a word like 'zucchini' would have deeply bothered me as well. i would have argued until i was blue that it should be pronounced 'zook-cheen-ee", and then proceeded to phonetically deconstruct the word in a perfectly reasonably demonstration of that fact. i would have used phonetic rules that i only vaguely remember today, like the first i making the second long and the double cs making the u long. it would have actually been pretty complicated and impressive - and completely correct, in the sense of a formally logical deduction from first principles. i would have then accused anybody that maintained the popular, fallacious pronunciation as being functionally illiterate.

in other words, i would have not just expected there to be an underlying theory of pronunciation, i would have thought myself well-versed in it's rules, and then expected people to follow those rules. i would get very upset when people denied those rules and denounce them as pretenders and anarchists. my universe was very ordered through strict rules of structural logic.

of course, in time, i learned this isn't true. it was a valuable learning process.

ultimately, i wanted the world to be easily analyzable: i wanted everything around me to be understood through logical deduction. that way, i could say "this is why things are like this". the why, and the knowing why, and the knowing how to know why, was very important to me.

suggestions that the universe was different than this, that there were exceptions that could not be understood deductively, bothered me very deeply and would put me into temper tantrums.

the way to convince me, btw, would have been to argue with me on a phonetic basis, rather than simply tell me what is true and what isn't on an authoritarian level. and i think that's what eventually ended up happening. somebody explained to me that i had the 'gh' sound wrong, phonetically, that it's not soft before a vowel as one would expect by analogy through ch, and i went from there.

in fact, i remember that this person was my grandmother.