From The Morgue

Any city where it’s easier to find drugs and prostitutes than chocolate is a city with its priorities seriously screwed up.
More to come.

When you tell people you’re weekending in Amsterdam, they give you an odd sort of nudge-nudge-wink response. All of them, regardless of age or class, feel compelled to shake their shoulders and cock their eyebrows. Its sort of charming, really.
We’re landing at 9.30 tomorrow morning Netherlands time. Monday morning we plan on heading on to Rotterdam via the Hague where we want to see the international court of justice. Everyone says Amsterdam is wonderful. I look forward to plenty of happy walking-around, but I also expect it to be cold. I have no idea what to expect of Rotterdam.
This will be my first time out of the UK since July. I am thoroughly excited. It’s been a long period of bedding down, and this is the first sign of coming out the other side.
—
Like all movie geeks, I follow the Oscars despite knowing its all a sham, a farce, etc etc. Find the funniest coverage on the net at www.fametracker.com, “the farmer’s almanac of celebrity worth”. Seriously worth a look.

(More politics. Man, I’ve gone all political this week. Some non-political stuff will come soon, I promise.)
A couple of commenters have pulled me up for not making clear that the either/or rhetoric isn’t exclusive to the political right. It isn’t, of course, and it was remiss of me not to make that a bit clearer. However, I do identify the creation of false dichotomies as a major current rhetorical tactic by the political right, all over the world. I also think it is far less common in the rhetoric used by the political left. Both sides use it, but it fits the right’s agenda more.
This is not to say that the left use less rhetoric than the right – just that this one tactic turns up more on the right than the left.
A counterexample would be the left’s tendency to demonize the right. A great deal of leftist rhetoric revolves around revealing the ‘true motives’ behind a political act, and pointing out how abhorrent the motives are. This rhetorical strategy is appeals to the left’s people-base, because lefties almost by definition tends to view acts in terms of the purity of their moral intention. It is used by the right, but much more so by the left.
A great deal of this commentary is vacuous. (Especially at the extremes, where David Icke-alikes construct ever more absurd conspiracies around what are often fundamentally sound insights.) It’s an effective rhetorical strategy playing to the converted or the wavering, but it is rarely legitimate. Ultimately, it’s too reductive – it reduces complex human beings acting in complex systems to units of simplistic motivation. This is the irony of this talk from the left – the side that prides itself on its humanity is constantly dehumanising its opponents.
A subset of this is to characterise the mass of rightist voters as dupes of the wicked minds of those pulling the strings, along the lines of the old Marxist idea of ‘false consciousness’. This is a rhetorical strategy too, but I am not as quick to dismiss it as vacuous.
While too simplistic, I believe that there such a thing as ‘false consciousness’, after a fashion. I believe that the mass of all people are not ‘self-aware’, in the sense that we do not truly comprehend the implications of our own actions or the meaning of the words we speak.
In fact, I think that this is scientifically and spiritually undeniable. It’s also a pretty tough-sell of an idea.
Hmm. There’s more, but it can wait.

It seems to be an overwhelming tactic of the reactionary right – to structure all issues as an “either/or” choice.
This means that any challenge to their position “x” is taken as proof that the challenger supports position “y”. Instead of defending “x”, they attack “y”.
It is an old, old, old rhetorical trick.
Most recently it has been used, in a bunch of forms, by those who sought to garner support for the war in Iraq. Any challenge to the invasion of Iraq is instantly met with “but the Iraqis are better off!”, as if the choice was between “x” an invasion where lots of innocents died and “y” Saddam Hussein running his totalitarian state unchecked.
The whole point of opposition to the war was that there was *another way*. There were many, many other courses of action that were vastly preferable and at least worthy of exploration but which were completely ignored. They continue to be ignored, because it suits those who went to war to use that simple rhetorical device of “either/or”.
The media do not make this clear. The media, print media especially, seek balance through “quote/counterquote”. So someone says the war was unjust; the counterquote is “but the Iraqis are free”. Nowhere in the mainstream media is the illegitimacy of this argument made clear – it is left to the columns of left-wing pundits, if it is even mentioned there.
Yet this is the most important thing we need to know about the debate over the rightness of the war – the proper parameters of the discussion.
It is not an “either/or”, but the media portrays it as such. Recognise this, and you have a disconnect. A step along the road.
—
And while I’m thinking about the war, and disconnects associated with it, how come no-one has pointed out the most damning fact to come to light in the whole Hutton inquiry, namely this: Downing Street sought to make the dossier as strong as possible in order to garner support for the war.
The only conclusion one can reach from this is that they had already decided to go to war on grounds other than WMDs.
If they already had enough evidence of WMDs to go to war, they would not have needed to strengthen the dossier.
(There is another possible conclusion, namely that the PM had been convinced but didn’t think his backbenchers would be. This is hardly any more flattering for those involved.)
It’s a logical puzzle and there’s no way out of it that doesn’t make the government look bad. However, the mainstream media has done nothing to point it out. That’s why you’re reading it here in a blog by a New Zealander instead of somewhere more reputable. But hey, don’t take my word for it – do the sums yourself. If they were trying to strengthen the dossier, then they’d already decided to go to war based on reasons other than WMDs.
Maybe this just proves that the real reason they went to war was to liberate the Iraqis, after all. Silly me.

Further to the rant on disconnection yesterday, Cal and I have been getting the Private Eye this year. It’s a great little satire-paper that comes out ever 2 weeks to rip into all the latest nonsense of the media and government and law etc. I’ve known about it forever, you can pick it up in several mag shops around Wellington, but it really makes a lot more sense when you’re in the UK. It’s even more dense in references to a specific social context than the brilliant sarcastic tech-geek journal Need To Know.
Private Eye is the closest thing I’ve found to the kind of disconnect-encouragement I was talking about. It isn’t exactly right – it’s more about pointing out hypocrisy and manipulation of all flavours rather than illuminating readers as to the ways in which the pop media is limited – but it’s better than nothing. Of course, it’s all very upper-middle-class and wry and arch, so much
so that I suspect it’s pretty much integrated into the whole system here, like a court jester.
Anyway. I like it. Is fun.
—-
Cal and I went to see ‘Osama’ last night, about a girl posing as a boy in order to get work in Taliban-run Afghanistan. Harrowing. Most reminded me of ‘Bandit Queen’, a similar catalogue of a society’s systematic abuse of women. I have a strand of political indignation running at the moment, though, so one strong reaction was ‘all those who supported the invasion/bombing of Afghanistan will use this film to justify their position, and they have no right to do so’. Grrr.
I’m also grumpy because of the increasing tendency of US liberals to denounce Michael Moore in order to gain legitimacy in the eyes of US conservatives. Moore’s sins are tiny and his positive impact huge – denouncing him only serves the interests of the those you claim to oppose! Grrr again.
And grr to the row of people who talked through the first half of Osama, and harrumphed with indignation when I told them to shut the fuck up. Grrr.
—-
Enough grr. Love instead. Love to you all.
Especially love to Leon. Verily, he is like unto a god. But more on that later.

It’s been almost a year since the massive and historic protests against the then-pending Iraq war. I went to the march in Glasgow, as well as a few other marches and talks earlier and later. They were fascinating, as well as worthwhile, and my belief at the time that they were the point when suspicion of the Bush administration’s push for war became entirely mainstream. I feel that point of view has been utterly vindicated. A documentary was shot over those months about the school students who took days off school to protest, and it has been screening off and on, generating a lot of support for what was widely decried at the time by even the most moderate of commentators. It was an extraordinary moment, and the only time in my living memory when such dissent had been so much a part of the mainstream around me.
Last night Cal and I went to ‘The Road To Peace In Palestine’ at the Edinburgh City Council chambers. Much less of a cause than the Iraq war, but very much continuous with the anti-war movement. The elegant chambers overlooking the royal mile were packed out, and the demographics had shifted even further from the anti-war protests – the largest groups by far were retired white people (Scots, I presume) and middle eastern people in their mid to late 20s. There were only a handful of white faces under the age of 40 – quite a change from every single protest march I’ve ever seen. I’m not sure if that’s a positive step, but if nothing else it makes it hard to tar the concerned people I saw with the brush of ‘foolish middle class white kids’.
Reverend Alistair McGregor of the Church of Scotland spoke first, and his overwhelming message was to go to Israel/Palestine and see the situation first-hand. He emphasised the psychological pressure being placed on the Palestinians by the occupiers. I found his speaking was unpleasantly locked in the Tony Blair Brit politician tradition – lots of ‘friends, believe me’ type rhetoric – but his message of seeing first hand was hard to fault. Also of note, and a big change from last year, was his haste to raise the issue of anti-semitism and proclaim his innocence. It’s a sign of how high that issue has been raised in recent months.
Then Rabbi Cohen spoke. He presented as fact something I’d never heard before – that active modern Zionism, forcefully creating a Jewish state, is actually against God’s will. He spoke movingly, and I certainly wish his interpretation to be correct since it is so profoundly rooted in humane concerns, but if I know anything about Talmudic lore it’s that readings are endlessly disputed. The most valuable contribution he can make, I think, is to give Palestinians a Jewish person to welcome and talk to and debate with, and so demonstrate that the anti-semitism charge made against their whole people is likewise without merit.
Finally, and best of all, Ibrahem Hewitt. A Geordie plain-speaker, he was compelling and sharp, and spoke of how his organisation has been and remains labelled as a terrorist threat by US security, preventing a lot of international freedoms. Of course, it has been thoroughly investigated by UK officials and utterly cleared. A sign of the way in which these matters are dealt with. I felt he was too quick to characterise the enemy (Israeli government, US government) in terms of their most extreme exemplars, which could lead inadvertantly to demonising of the Israeli people, but within its own context he was impossible to fault.
It was an interesting night and raised a lot of questions for me. None of which I’m going to share right now. It’s time for bed.

I had an elaborate analogy involving writing and DNA sequencing and cloning and genetic engineering and stuff. But I deleted it because it was a bit crap. However, by telling you it existed, I somehow still get the kudos for my amazing ideas, without having to put up with the scorn that would result had any of you read what I wrote. Amazing how that works. Hey, in high school, when arm wrestling competitions were all the rage, I shrugged and refused to take part because I knew I’d lose. Despite me saying this, there was a small section of my classmates who were convinced I’d actually be able to beat them, if only I’d cut loose. See? Credit for nothing, in the face of all available evidence. People are funny sometimes.
Timely: I read in some of the comments on Teresa Neilsen Hayden’s essential blog Making Light that Robert Heinlein was firm that the proper response to the receipt of a rejected manuscript is to package it up and send it somewhere else. Don’t look at it, don’t dare edit it, just send it off. Keep it moving.
Of course, I’m no Heinlein, but I don’t think he meant it to apply only if you’re a writing god. It makes that perfect kind of simple sense – editors refuse good manuscripts all the time, so keep trying, and while you’re still trying, write something else and submit that too.
In the process of getting writing momentum going again I’ve realised that one of my continuing problems is having too many projects on the go at once. I have, seriously, about twenty to thirty live projects at any one time. With that many things in progress, ‘live’ becomes a creative description rather than an accurate one.
Now, on the face of it I don’t have a problem with this – I can justify time spent on every one of them.
The trouble is that they get in the way of each other. It’s too easy, when the going gets tough on something, to let it slide and turn attention to something else. There’s always lots of somethings else to turn to. Hey, that play you’ve been writing for four years about those guys choosing a video? Written twenty pages and some character notes and not sure what to do next? Not a problem, because look over here, it’s that comic script about one-hour parties you left half-done in 2000!
I’ve decided I need to sort this out. In my notebook I’ve made a priority list of projects to get sorted this year. I want to get rid of some of these long-lasting excuses. Bonus: by finishing things, I gain momentum and sense of satisfaction and confidence etc etc.
The dREAL ruleset was the first of these. It’s being distributed on the net at the moment, and people are making use of it, so that’s cool. And it’s a long-term project finished.
I’ve been taking down a few of the smaller ones as well. Now I’m back on to a big fish: Fell Legacy.
Fell Legacy was the fantasy novel I wrote a few years back with the support of Dale Elvy, whose own fantasy trilogy was published by HarperCollins. I wrote a damn good story that was sort of a Lord of the Rings in reverse – a muddy, angry, claustrophobic story about communities and friendships falling apart in difficult times. I sent it, of course, to Dale’s publisher, dropping the name and all. Sadly the manuscript was rejected. (I claim to this day that it was rejected because, of course, they have Dale – why would they need me? As this makes both Dale and me look good, alternative hypotheses have been deemed unnecessary.)
So I got this manuscript back, and then I went to the other side of the world.
It is the height of folly to have a completed, awesome manuscript on the shelf with but one rejection letter to its name. I have done that story wrong through my traveller’s neglect. On my list: Fell Legacy. Get it out there again.
So I have to get it ready to submit. I pulled open the file – 630 or so pages of manuscript. 130,000 words. Cool. And I can make it better.
Heinlein Alert! No, you fool! Wrap it up and send it off! Those who’ve been involved in my writing travails will know I’m always ready to re-draft anything I’ve written. I was sorely, sorely tempted.
But Fell Legacy had something I wasn’t happy with – a saggy opening. The most crucial part of the book, at that. Revise it, the voices said, reviiiiise it!
So I struck a deal with Heinlein. I would re-edit the prologue. And no more. I have forbidden myself to read over what follows.
And a matter of days later I’ve made the opening kick seven times of rear over the old version, and I’ve left the rest alone, and it’s all good. Time to knock on some doors.
Thanks Mr Heinlein. Thanks for helping me kick the habit.
—-
Everyone should go read Nate Cull’s blog entry on rockets and stuff, too.
~`morgue

This computer, our nifty laptop, with speakers, and broadband, is the best soundsystem I’ve ever owned that accepts mp3s. And so I finally catch up to the cool kids!
So I’ve been busily downloading a bunch of music files that have been sitting on the web for some time, and enjoying them tremendously.
Of course the power of knowing the creators led me to start with the files at aquaboogie and nonwrestler – some tracks I’ve heard, some I haven’t (but, sadly no Satan’s Vomit. Stuart, where is the love?) and all now residing merrily on my hard drive.
Next mission: Marxman.
It’s a little known fact that the whole reason I came to the UK was to find a copy of Irish Communist hip-hop outfit Marxman’s second album, Time Capsule. (True. This mission has been, sadly, a failure. In my naivete I assumed that somewhere in the UK there would be record stores along the lines of, say, Real Groovy. Um – no. Nope. No. At least, not anywhere I’ve been.)
Time Capsule was released free on the web by Oisin, the DJ for Marxman. I had a copy of this on one of my previous destined-for-burning hard drives, and listened to it on my tinny wee speakers. I remember the first track, Dazed & Confused, as insanely good and I was pleased to find that it mostly lives up to my memories.
(Marxman – yah!)
Next up – still on the hiphop vibe – Public Enemy’s unreleased ‘Bring the Noise 2000‘. I have a lot of love for late-period Public Enemy, and Chuck D’s messages about the rise of electronic music distribution released a decade ago on ‘Muse Sick in Our Mess Age’ sound pretty on the money now.
And now I’ve rediscovered www.loveisdashit.com which archives Michael Franti’s/Spearhead’s live performances, in the spirit of Franti’s ‘record and distribute my live gigs’ philosophy. And it’s damn cool.
And I’m just scratching the surface of what’s out there. Cool. I should finish with some nifty word-type-image like ‘I’m catching the technology wave’. How about: ‘I’m swaying on the weeble carousel of the new era.’
See, I can do this.
Needless to say, check all this stuff out if you’re so equipped.
—
One of these days I’m gonna do a serious-type post like I’ve been threatening to do. But Cal just messed up my hair until I screamed. So not now.