mooBlog 11-1-2011: Reread the works of infuriation

I'm glad I keep a blog. It's important to remind one's self of the principles that we guide ourselves by. Thank god I reread this today, it's very helpful considering how things are at the moment. Anyway, this is a blog from 2008, I just wanted to repost it, because it's relevant.

mooBlog 15-9-08: Putting To Sleep A Lion

Current mood:crushed

Déjà vu is a stiffening emotion. It brings with it something optimistic, yet somehow sad. 'How is that possible?'

My mind rebels against the weather, the first spring day, the start of the warmth.

I can't express this thought correctly. I'm attempting to verbalize the idea that I've been here before. New people seem known. Locations seem familiar, like I've walked those streets before.

What does it mean? It's an unfair situation to be in.

I've grown tired of the old clichés; the repetition of rejection by this world. I've seen the love around me, offered to me even. What do I do with it? I let it slide away, forgotten like an old sepia photo in the back of a borrowed book. I'll probably end up regretting a lot of this. It's not my fault though. If those who I showed my true colours to actually cared enough to realise what I was risking by doing so, things would be different. I give and I give. I allow opportunities for people to know me, but no second chances though. I'm not gonna ever wait around. This is MY life. Waste my time and you'll never hear from me again. Ignore me, and YOU ARE ALREADY FORGOTTEN. No apologies for this, because this is me at my most honest.

Cameage Lyrics. Artist(Band):Descendents

I'm looking straight down
I'm sick and I need a friend
I didn't know they came like that
I'm thinking things now
I thought I'd never think
I didn't know they came like that

You came so quickly right in and out of my life
I didn't know they came like that
Did I ever tell you how much I love to hold you
I didn't know they came like that

It doesn't even matter if I live or die
The only thing that matters is you're by my side
There's no turning back from this one

I judged too quickly, I've never been good at trust
I didn't know they came like that
But did I ever tell you how much I love to love you
I didn't know they came like that

It doesn't even matter if I live or die
The only thing that matters is you're by my side
There's no turning back from this one
No turning back from this one

It's not that I don't want your love
But I don't deserve anyone
I didn't know they came like that
I will return to you
When I am 32
I didn't know they came like that

Michael Moore, patron saint of not sitting still.

Moore's latest letter to us all:

"How Corporate America Is Pushing Us All Off a Cliff ...a letter from Michael Moore

Friday, November 19th, 2010

Friends,

When someone talks about pushing you off a cliff, it's just human nature to be curious about them. Who are these people, you wonder, and why would they want to do such a thing?

That's what I was thinking when corporate whistleblower Wendell Potter revealed that, when "Sicko" was being released in 2007, the health insurance industry's PR firm, APCO Worldwide, discussed their Plan B: "Pushing Michael Moore off a cliff."

But after looking into it, it turns out, it's nothing personal! APCO wants to push everyone off a cliff.

APCO was hatched in 1984 as a subsidiary of the Washington, D.C. law firm Arnold & Porter -- best known for its years of representing the giant tobacco conglomerate Philip Morris. APCO set up fake "grassroots" organizations around the country to do the bidding of Big Tobacco. All of a sudden, "normal, everyday, in-no-way-employed-by-Philip Morris Americans" were popping up everywhere. And it turned out they were outraged -- outraged! -- by exactly the things APCO's clients hated (such as, the government telling tobacco companies what to do). In particular, they were "furious" that regular people had the right to sue big corporations...you know, like Philip Morris. (For details, see the 2000 report "The CALA Files" (PDF) by my friends and colleagues Carl Deal and Joanne Doroshow.)

Right about now you may be wondering: how many Americans get pushed off a cliff by Big Tobacco every year? The answer is 443,000 Americans die every year due to smoking. That's a big cliff.

With this success under their belts, APCO created "The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition." TASSC, funded partly by Exxon, had a leading role in a planned campaign by the fossil fuel industry to create doubt about global warming. The problem for Big Oil speaking out against global warming, according to the campaign's own leaked documents, was that the public could see the "vested interest" that oil companies had in opposing environmental laws. APCO's job was to help conceal those oil company interests.

And boy, have they ever succeeded. Polls now show that, as the world gets hotter, Americans are getting less and less worried about it.

How big is this particular cliff? According to the World Health Organization, climate change contributes -- right now -- to the deaths of150,000 people every year. By 2030 it may be double that. And after that...well, the sky is literally the limit! I don't think it's crazy to say APCO may rack up even bigger numbers here than they have with tobacco.

With this track record, you can see why, when the health insurance industry wanted to come after "Sicko," they went straight to APCO. The "worst case," as their leaked documents say, was that "Sicko evolves into a sustained populist movement." That simply could not be allowed to happen. Something obviously had to be done.

As Wendell Potter explains, APCO ran their standard playbook, setting up something called "Health Care America." Health Care America, according to Potter, "was received by mainstream reporters, including the New York Times, as a legitimate organization when it was nothing but a front group set up by APCO Worldwide. It was not anything approaching what it was reporting to be: a 'grassroots organization.' It was a sham group."

Health Care America showed up online in 2007 (the year "Sicko" was released) and disappeared quickly by early 2008. You can still find their website archived here. As you'll see, their "moderated forum" allowed normal, everyday, in-no-way-employed-by-the-insurance-industry Americans to speak out. For instance, here's something Nicole felt very strongly about:

"Moore shouldn't be allowed to call his film a 'documentary.' It should be called a political commercial. We need to fix our health care system, but we shouldn’t accept a Hollywood moviemaker’s political views as the starting point."

Here's what Wendell Potter revealed about the insurance industry's media strategy:

"As we would do the media training, we would always have someone refer to him as 'Hollywood entertainer' or 'Hollywood moviemaker Michael Moore.' They don't want you to think that it was a documentary that had some truth."

Thanks for your perspective, "Nicole"!

Now, how big was THAT cliff? A pretty good size -- according to a recent study, 45,000 Americans die every year because they don't have health insurance.

And here we are in 2010. A lesser PR firm might be resting on its laurels at this point, content to sit back and watch hundreds of thousands of people continue to be pushed off the various cliffs they've built. But not APCO! Right now they've taken on their biggest challenge yet: leading a giant, multi-million dollar effort to help Wall Street "earn back the trust of the American people."

We may never know the size of this particular cliff. But we can be sure it's gigantic. According to the New York Times, one of the things Wall Street's recession gave us is "the crippling of the government program that provides life-sustaining antiretroviral drugs to Americans with H.I.V. or AIDS who cannot afford them." Internationally, organizations fighting AIDS and other diseases are "hugely afraid" of cutbacks in funding.

Of course, there are the 101 ways recessions kill quietly. For instance, children's hospitals are seeing a sharp 55% rise in the abuse of babies by parents.

And that's just the previous cliff. If APCO and its Wall Street co-conspirators lull us into turning our backs on them again, we can be sure the next cliff -- the next crash -- will be much bigger.

Anyway, this is all just a way for me to say to APCO: No hard feelings! My getting mad at you would be like a chicken who's still happily pecking away getting mad at McDonald's. Compared to the millions you've already turned into McNuggets, you've actually treated me much, much BETTER! Spying on my family, planting smears and lies about me, privately badgering movie critics to give the film a poor review, scaring Americans into believing they'd be committing a near-act of treason were they to go to the theater and see my movie -- hey, ya done good, health insurance companies of America. And, most important, you stopped the nation from getting true universal health care. Good job!

There's only one problem -- I'm not one of those "liberals" you fund in Congress, the ones who fear your power.

I'm me. And that, sadly, is not good for you.

Yours in good health,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

P.S. It seems to me that APCO's discussion of pushing me off a cliff should legitimately be part of their Wikipedia page. And why not something about their role in Wall Street's new PR offensive? So I'm asking everyone interested to write something up that meetsWikipedia's guidelines and help bring the APCO Worldwide entry up to date. Post it somewhere online and send a tweet about it to@mmflint. I'll award a signed copy of "Sicko" by noon Sunday to the best entry...and then deputize you to post it on Wikipedia for real and make sure APCO's minions don't take it down. Just be sure afterward not to walk near any cliffs!

P.P.S. The late, great comedian Bill Hicks had some thoughts about marketing and the people who do it."

mooBlog 20-11-2010: Absence, Exams & Internal Apologies

I had an exam today. I guess I haven't really been prepared for an exam since my final year of high school. When I walk out of every single exam that I do throughout my course, I always think to myself "That really doesn't say anything about my ability as an engineer!"


I believe that there will be so few instances throughout my career when I'll have to rely on the knowledge between my ears, no conversing with colleagues and peers, no books, no internet. So really, exams are a redundant means to assess someone's ability to be able to function in the workforce. Actually, I do see the point of them; there has to be a way to separate the A's from the B's and so forth. Or does there? This point got raised by a comrade of mine a few days ago. The current system of higher education is failing to do what it is supposed to; prepare its students for industry. That is all. All that grades do is place pressure on students to do well in their subjects, and not take on anything else. I'm ashamed to say that I was one of these people. If all that students got was a pass or a fail on a subject, then employers then have to actually look at the most suitable candidates for a job by means other than subject marks. They have to look at experience, interests, other skills and personality. However, for most companies, the recruitment process is structured so thin that for any one professional graduate position, there are usually scores of people without the grades to even get an interview. My younger brother (who will graduate from uni at the end of this year, one year before me mind you,) showed me the hourly wage for some graduate positions in his field of study. Let me say, I could probably earn more as a checkout operator at a supermarket (in fact, I can say that I definitely would, and the work would be a lot easier.)


My point is this. Today's universities are not education institutions, where young people can learn a profession, discuss openly and liberally about the world around them. They are certificate factories. They are companies, made for profit, running under the guise of a NFP government regulated organisation. My university makes a profit of over $40million per year, and this fact has not caused me ease. Students pay high fees (some would say excessive, especially for international students) for their courses. Every semester the university like to boast about all of the infrastructure that they are introducing, failing to simultaneously state what resources they are taking away. Every time one wanders into my uni's library, a lab room, computer room, canteen, etc, it is clearly evident that the profits (which technically shouldn't even exist) are not being reinvested.


Anyway, back to my main point; exams. My idea for exams is this: Present some information, new concept, methodology etc. in the exam. Ask students to learn from this, and apply it to a new situation. Surely this is the only examinable method that actually relates to how students will work when they get out into the workforce. It is the only solution that I can think of, and it surely beats cramming for a week. An exam under the current system is nothing more than a competition to see who can remember the most things and repeat it onto paper. In many instances (like my exam today) I could easily say that I didn't understand about half of what I was actually learning. So in writing it down correct, doesn't make it right. Right is what comes from your intelligence, wisdom and application of knowledge, not from your memory.


Anyway, good night folks!


x




The Big Lebowski: What makes a man, Mr. Lebowski? 
The Dude: Dude. 
The Big Lebowski: Huh? 
The Dude: Uhh... I don't know sir. 
The Big Lebowski: Is it being prepared to do the right thing, whatever the cost? Isn't that what makes a man? 
The Dude: Hmmm... Sure, that and a pair of testicles. 

mooBlog 16-11-2010: Stealing Hipster-ism...

In my last blog "If We Settle For Nothing Now" I raised the question of the changing role of hip hop, and in more general terms, other fringe music genres, in the role of social change. I guess I was frustrated by the lack of quality musicians, both in terms of talent, but with regards to raising important issues as well. I think it goes further than the lyrics of the new age hip hop songs, the new indie songs, the new punk songs. I think regardless of the intentions of the musicians themselves, the fact that the most popular music genres have huge fan bases of people from lower economical circumstances is an interesting point to look at. It is the fans of the (oh-too-often-used-term) "up and coming band" that either make or break their success. It's ironic, that although these people, often simply normal, or even quite poor members of our society, can have such influence on the popularity of a band. But it doesn't ever last long. And it's not only the music which is taken over by the ruling class within our society. 


Over the last few years, we've seen a rise in what is now referred to as hipster fashion. A while back, this thriving video meme caught my attention.





 while incredibly funny, it also provides an amazing social commentary of how 'beatnik' culture is once again thriving, but also how those who are more well-off are also inclined to follow this "poverty-chic" culture. 


It was frustrating, and I wasn't sure as to the reasons behind this phenomenon. Until I stumbled up an essay published in the New York Times a few days ago. Titled "The Hipster in the Mirror," the essay looks at the sociology of the hipster culture, the reasons why this culture has expanded so much, and what this says about our culture. The main argument which it's author, Mark Greif, puts forward, is that fashion is a weapon in the class struggle. People from poorer demographics often have to resort to completely new fashions in order to identify themselves. It is one of the only areas in which the working class have a superiority over the ruling class within our society. So, like in any area of society, when the poor latch onto a new culture, the buzzards of the ruling class come to join in the fold, or as Greif puts it "Think of Paris Hilton in her trucker hat."
When this occurs, it is no longer the fashion per say, but the branding of this fashion which counts toward superiority. 


People from the ruling class like to think that they have better taste than people of lower class, so when the working class actually pushes a new sub-culture, it is no wonder the higher classes want in. But they don't only want in, they want to control this new sub-culture. It is no surprise that you see so many so called "fashion rebels" wearing hats with 59fifty stickers still on them. Although it would seem that this is simply superfluous, it is a tactic by the brand to involve the poorest people within society to force the cultural change. In fact, I actually heard someone on the train complaining because his sticker was coming off. He could only be consoled when a friend of his told him to reapply it with some fabric adhesive. I just couldn't understand this, until I realised that this is a statement, part of the brainwashing of the working class. It's aim is to dilute any possible means for the working class to gain social superiority over the ruling class. If we have nothing to identify us from those who steal our wealth, how can we resist it, how can we change it?


I don't mean to say that I don't think that fashion isn't important. In fact, I think that it is one of the greatest means of self expression. Out of all of this, we can easily say, however, that the those far better off will always envy the poor for their superior taste in fashion, music and art.


From one of my favourite books of all time, "100 Years of Solitude" comes a great quote quote which almost sums up what I'm trying to say:

"Poverty is the servitude of love"

mooBlog 13-11-2010: If we settle for nothing now...

As I finished work today, I started thinking about modern popular music. Something told me that there was, and still is something definitively wrong with it. I guess it started by thinking about the most recent of pop music, and possibly the most popular current genre today, that is Hip-Hop. When I think about the history of this music, in particular, what the most well known artists had originally been trying to achieve, I can’t feel a little let down by the state of it. Take this song for example.

When I think about the message that this song carries, I guess I feel slightly refreshed to know that in a time when the tides of the civil rights movement seemed to be receding, that a group of young black men in America were able to say what the problem was, and to say it right to the face of the people oppressing them. They stood for nothing other than the idea that they should be able lead the lives that they choose, without the persecution of the government and their enforcers, namely, the police. In the years that followed, somehow, this music that continued this message was high-jacked by corporate America. They saw hip-hop as a medium to put forward their brands and products, because they were sly enough to recognize that this was the easiest way to reach the fastest growing ethnicity within their country. Artist, after artist was swayed into trusting that what they were doing was right, it is little wonder that those groups who actually did verbalize about the injustices of the world had to bow out under the pressure of the combined attacks from the corporation machine (which were ironically the people ‘the message’ was aimed at taking the power away from.) Bands such as Jurassic Five and Rage Against the Machine, had to indefinitely halt the progression of their groups, as they saw this as the only alternative to eventually being used as an advertising mule, someone with enough following to generate profit for the very people they were attempting to stand up to.

My point about hip hop is this: When all the kids are listening to an artist ‘rapping’ lyrics like 50 cent's "In Da Club," who the FUCK is going to take the notion of social progressiveness seriously?

This isn’t to say this mutilation of a pop-music genre is isolated solely to hip-hop. In fact, punk rock, rock, dance, disco, etc, etc, have all had moments where they end up selling out their fans for free lunch, and quite honestly, it sickens me. Songs from these originally rebellious genres should never be used to sell you a product. They should be a protest, a verbal riot and A BIG FUCKING MIDDLE FINGER to all those who think that this pilfering of the people’s music is acceptable.

I’m not saying that these bands are the devil. And I’m definitely not saying that there isn’t amazing hip-hop doesn’t exist anymore. I just want you to know that we can fight against the robbery of OUR music, whatever genre that may be.

Some wise words to finish this one off:

“If we settle for nothing now, then we’ll settle for nothing later!” – Rage Against the Machine

mooBlog 7-11-2010: The Art of Self-determination

Solitude proves itself as the only form of true peace. The inevitability of death outlined by the wind, arriving as strongly as it departs, shows us an able but unjust life.

In my dreams and the antiquity of nostalgia, I dream of my childhood, when the company of others made me feel secure. Just as I had once thought that man's eternal battle was against the universe, I now see that it is against himself. Man cannot describe his life in the battles won, but the battles lost. It is human nature to verbalize our victories, to shut out the desperate haunting of our losses.

However, loud voices are carried by stronger men, who, inevitably also pass onto the next world without it. It is this inescapable destiny that has assured me that my vulnerabilities are completely redundant. Those who go quietly, still go, just as those who scream and bellow at the unjustness, those who suffer at the hands of the gods and those who believe in the virtue of solitude still go. Memory is not concrete, which is an incredible thing to remember. In the heat of the dire summer, when the dryness of the air seems overwhelming, when the trees lose their leaves, not through natural process, but through a sickly thirst, it is then that we see the world at its natural pace. Solemn and sober, we wander the streets of our towns, wondering upon the stupidity of rushing, and we recognize the importance of knowing that that which forces us to lose our pace is wonderful.

A burden of memory has fixed itself in my life. It is certain. Regardless of the poisoness ales and long rivers of tears, the dense and heavy heart that remains is tormenting. The false grins hide the long soul within, allowing me to function without the momentous task of swallowing my pride, of begging for another chance, which if it were granted, would only serve to move my torment to another time, and the entire proven process would eventuate once more.