From The Morgue

Billy mentioned in the comments below a recent essay by columnist Michael Ventura. I want to draw more attention to it.
I know how it is on weblogs – on the web as a whole, actually – you see someone saying “check this out, it’s great!” and you might check it out but you probably won’t. I usually don’t.
Make an exception this time. It’s worth reading. Short, too, so don’t worry your eyes will fall out.
Read it here.

From daily commuter freebie Metro, Weds March 16 2005:
“The 25-year old London based Canadian investmaent banker was dumped just before New Year’s Day last year and discovered within a couple of weeks that his ex had a new beau. However, instead of moping around resigned to his fate, David offered 1500 pounds to anyone who was willing to seduce his competitor and show his ex what an unfaithful toerag she’d left him for.”

There’s a photo of the guy. He’s grinning at the camera.

This is what a lifetime of Hollywood romantic comedies will do to you. Remember, folks: in a movie, it’s cute. In the real world, it’s creepy.

Rachel Corrie died two years ago today.

It matters to me for the way the aftermath of her death discouraged me. Palestinians die in Palestine all the time at the hands of the IDF, and the world doesn’t seem to care. When Rachel died, I felt sick, but also I thought, finally – now this situation will be understood. She was pretty, young, white and American – the most cynical committee couldn’t have designed it better. But it didn’t take. It didn’t stick. Even this.

It matters to me for the sickly, mocking hatred thrown at her by so many of those opposed to justice for Palestine. If there is anything that demonstrates the moral bankruptcy of the progressive movement’s foes, it is this. And don’t fall into the trap of thinking these voices are the extreme – they are not, at least not in the USA – there they are the overwhelming, mainstreamed voice of right-wing political discourse. Remember: they operate from false premises. Remember: we are right and these people are wrong. And remember: we are better than them.

It matters to me most of all for the human being on show in the emails she wrote. She speaks for every non-Palestinian who cares about Palestine, and every person who cares about justice movements around the world. She’s just like any of us. She’s just like you.

“Just want to write to my Mom and tell her that I’m witnessing this chronic, insidious genocide and I’m really scared, and questioning my fundamental belief in the goodness of human nature. This has to stop. I think it is a good idea for us all to drop everything and devote our lives to making this stop. I don’t think it’s an extremist thing to do anymore. I still really want to dance around to Pat Benatar and have boyfriends and make comics for my coworkers. But I also want this to stop.”

Justice won’t come by itself. Start thinking about what you can do.

Then stop thinking, and do it.

http://www.rachelcorrie.org/

So I caved and downloaded the leaked first episode of the new Doctor Who.
Y’all should know: Doctor Who is the one sci-fi thing that really gets me. I mean, really really gets me. I am helpless before its premise (both thematic and actual). I like the theme tune. I like the blue box. I even kinda like the daleks.
(Hell, I even kinda liked Bonnie Langford’s character.)
Well, I’ve been eager for this since it was announced in 2003. There was no safer pair of hands, I thought, than Russell T Davies – he wrote a great Doctor Who book (featuring gaybashing and council estate nastiness alongside dimension-hopping Lovecraft-by-way-of-Grant-Morrison scifi weirdness) then established rock-solid professional TV credentials, then came back to his first love. He has the love of a fan, but the nous of a professional – a desperately rare combination.
Well: I have seen the first episode, and it is all good.
What makes it Doctor Who? The Doctor sneaks into the monster’s lair with a vial that will be deadly to the monster that is trying to conquer earth. His new friend Rose tells him to hurry up and use the vial. The Doctor replies: “I didn’t come here to kill it! I have to give it a chance.”
And then he goes and chats to the monster.
I told my brother he has to watch it when it hits NZ. Now, he’s never been a Who fan – and (unlike, say, with Buffy or Freaks and Geeks) I’ve never been much of a Who proselytiser. But I have given him the instruction and I give it to you as well. From the email I sent him:
“It’s bloody marvellous though. The *pace* of it! It races through, barely
pausing for breath, delivers some great subtle comedy along with the [SPOILER REMOVED!!] stuff, and shock of shocks Billie Piper (ex crappy pop kiddie)
holds her own opposite Chris Eccleston (who will finally stop being known as
‘the one what was killed on Cracker’ with this role).
It’s daft but massively enthusiastic and you *will* give it a shot.”
The last shot of the episode – that last one second – it just about made me cry.
But mostly, I was just laughing. Did I say? It’s funny – really funny.
In the UK: Sat 26 March, 7pm, BBC1.
In New Zealand: Prime TV, date yet to be announced.

Back in January, sparked by a documentary marking Martin Luther King day, I wrote an entry about the strong beliefs of those who opposed his social justice movement. I closed on a deliberately provoking question: “of what value is belief when it can lead us so catastrophically astray?”
Carla echoed the question in a comment on the perspective she found in the wake of the Iraq war: “[I found myself] wondering whether there is something inherantly wrong with actions motivated by passionate belief.”
Matt‘s reply: “A great many actions that have transformed society in wonderful ways have been motivated by passionate belief… Belief as a phenomenon itself isn’t the problem. It’s *what* people belief that can cause trouble.”
(There were a bunch of other amazing responses, also from Jamie and Billy. Go check ’em out. The comments continue to be the best bit of the serious stuff on this blog.)
—-
The keystone of my understanding of the world is this: we misconceive what it is to be human.
We overestimate our self-authority, the reliability of our memory, our ability to think rationally, our ability to evaluate others, the robustness of our health.
We misunderstand how we fit within our cultural context, how we are governed by the laws of probability, how our bodies interact with the environment both short- and long-term, how our experience of consciousness relates to our experience of emotion and vice versa.
Many of us don’t even understand what makes us happy.
We do not know what we are. I studied psychology and anthropology to get at these issues, and in all my study I only scratched the barest surface of our failure to comprehend ourselves. I learned humility, there, I think. The sheer breadth of our failure – it astonishes me still.
I also learned that knowledge is not power. My awareness of these misconceptions does not give my the power to escape them.
The best I can do to is to strive towards mindfulness. To question, always, what I see of myself, and to fail over and over again but carry on regardless. Once I thought that journey into myself might some day have an ending – but no. It never will, nor does it need to. That journey is its own purpose.
We do not understand what we are – but how does this relate to belief?
On one level, it addresses belief through direct example. Our beliefs about our selves are pervasive, fundamental, and frequently incorrect. The process of ongoing interrogation, however, itself serves as some measure of correction – not the outcome, mind, but the process itself. Belief interrogated by doubt.
On a deeper level, it raises the possibility of adopting a different way of thinking about reality. Belief (as it usually is) requires a coherent self. Take that away, and all belief becomes subject to doubt.
Or, rather, belief becomes replaced by something new – an ongoing internal relationship between doubt and faith. An internal suspension.
I believe this would be a better way to live. I believe aspects of this are at the heart of the spiritual paths alluded to by Matt and Jamie.
Doubt is the worth of belief.
Matt: “Ecclesiaties 3:11 says that all men have eternity in their hearts. But then it goes on to say that they have not understood it…”
Jamie: “This is how to change belief – by not changing others, but allowing them to wake up.”

When you are coming down with a cold, follow this prescription:
* begin treatment the day after you can hardly talk from the pain in your throat
* purchase some cold/flu capsules. take at the maximum dose allowable.
* go to meet friends in a restaurant. ignore your shaking limbs. do not join them for lunch.
* go to your roleplaying club. improvise a hugely important game for four demanding but enthusiastic players. drink a large latte.
* go to a pub to meet the earlier friends.
* FROM THIS POINT ON, begin drinking whiskey straight, alternating with pints of lager.
* go Curling. Get ass kicked but don’t fall over on the ice.
* go out to nightclub after curling. Keep drinking. Play, extensively, with a menagerie of fingerpuppets.
* catch the 3.45am bus home.
* eat some toast (4 slices, butter only)
* sleep
Come Sunday morning, er, afternoon, you will feel great.
Apparently.

Still no real content. I had a home-cooked meal tonight for the first time in, oh, two and a half weeks?
It has been strange times. Not so easy on the wallet.
Speaking of not-so-easy-on-the-wallet: I seem to be going to Gen Con Indy.
Tim and Gen had a lovely time, thanks for thinking of them. It was good for me – Tim’s one of those people I never had a chance to really get to know well back home, but he always seemed worth it. Still does now.

Still busy. Just about to go meet Tim and Gen, who have come to stay in Edinburgh for a couple days, hurrah!
Check this out if you want to read an excellent exploration of how rhetoric can dismantle worthwhile political discussion – it’s from 2000 and American but I was impressed mightily. From, as ever, the indispensable Making Light.

I have not had an easy last few days.
To say the least.
But there have been many happy instances and entertaining people and plans are being hatched for travel and I’m starting to get my head around all the projects I want to complete while here in Scotland. If I can only squeeze the time out to do them…
And I’ve booked plane tickets home to New Zealand. Just in time for Christmas, as they say.
And I found Concrete: The Human Dilemma issue 2. It is soooo gooood. At least partly because it resolves a tension that has been simmering since, oh, Concrete’s first stories back in the 80s?
Sun is shining. Peace to all.

In the sidebar I’ve added hix which is a link to Multi-dimensional, the blog of Stephen Hickey. hix is a professional writery person, and co-creator of the lovebites TV series that ran to, er, mixed reviews a few years back – those who were around me at the time can attest that I liked it, and not just because I knew some of those involved. He writes about interesting stuff, so go check it out if you are interested in writing, TV, or writing for TV. (I’ve also consolidated the livejournal friends I’d called out into the single Livejournalists link. My friends feed on lj keeps me terribly amused.)
Jamie, I know I owe you a reply, but I can’t remember what I’m meant to be replying to. Er.
I just realised that Concrete: The Human Dilemma issue #2 *wasn’t* massively delayed, I just missed it. D’oh. Must search around.