Please stop hitting my friends when they are riding their bicycles!
I really appreciate your attention on this matter.
Sincerely, Lily Sage
 |
| Kunle says goodbye to Donkey |
Sincerely, Lily Sage
Tuesday, October 18, 2011
Saturday, October 15, 2011
ON THE RECENT #OCCUPATIONS A COMMUNIQUE FROM THE W.I.T.C.H. ARMY FACTION
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ON THE RECENT #OCCUPATIONS
A COMMUNIQUE FROM THE W.I.T.C.H. ARMY FACTION[a]
BALTIMORE, AMERIKKKA
This occupation is inevitable, and yet we need to make it. There is no way for capital to continue its reign -- this is clear. And yet, capital will not behead itself: we know that we need to struggle in some way if we are to overcome it. This statement is not a rejection of the occupation -- as if it could be avoided, as if the present conditions were not so grave, as if we haven’t all had enough. But there are things that need to be said. We submit this critique in the deepest solidarity with those people of color, women, queer, and trans* folx that have endured this occupation while labouring on making it more livable from the inside.
Before anything else, we must frame this movement within a prior occupation, that of white settlers on Nanticoke and Susquehannock land. The genocide, expulsion, and dispossession of native peoples is foundational to the ascent of the US as a center of global capital; we cannot reclaim this country, only acknowledge it as a unit of capitalist destruction.
“We are the 99%.”
If we want to use this figure to underscore how far polarized the rich and the poor are today, fine. But those of us that don’t homogenize so easily get suspicious when we hear calls for unity. What other percentages hide behind the nearly-whole 99%? What about the 16% of Blacks that are “officially” unemployed, double the number of whites? The 1 out of 8 Black men in their twenties that on any given day will be in prison or jail? The quarter of women that will get sexually assaulted in their lifetime? The dozens of queer, trans*, intersex, and gender-variant folks that are murdered each year, 70% of whom are people of color? Is a woman of color’s experience of the crisis interchangeable with that of the white man whose wage is twice hers? Are we all Troy Davis? As austerity grinds down on us, who among us will go to prison? Who will be relegated to informal, precarious labor? Whose benefits will be cut, whose food stamps canceled or insufficient? Who will be evicted? Who will be unable to get healthcare, to get hormones or an abortion?
Don’t get us wrong. We’re not asking for better wages or a lower interest rate. We’re not even asking for the full abolition of capital -- there’s no one to ask. For now, we are simply critiquing this occupation for assuming we are there, while we have so far been left out. Because we know that whatever is next will be something we make, not something we ask for. Even if we don’t feel safe there, even if what little analysis and structure that has emerged thus far makes clear we are not a part of this movement, we radical feminist, anti-racist revolutionaries are going to keep bringing our bodies and ideologies to the occupation, for the same reason that women of color support and attend Slutwalk despite critiquing its white-centered politics: because we see potential for building resistance in our communities and affecting material change. But for this potential to be realized, we have to work together in solidarity with the understanding that unity must be constructed with an analysis of difference, not just plastered blindly over inequalities. Consider this text a chip at the plaster.
Anti-finance or anti-capital?
Nothing is more clear in the American debt-scape than racial character of everyday finance -- but it is sexed, too. And not only because women, like people of color, were disproportionately solicited for subprime mortgages (across all income levels). There is no better indicator that women and people of color cannot be assimilated to the faceless borrowers of the 99% than the strategic location of payday loan offices, tax-preparation outlets, and banks that specialize in subprime mortgages. A map of foreclosures, of adjustable-rate mortgages, a topography of interest rates: all these overlap neatly on the demographics of racialized and feminized poverty. It’s not a coincidence: today, race and gender are not grounds to deny credit, but indexes of risk. And as long as risk can be commodified, as long as volatility can be hedged against and profited from, our color and gender will be blamed for the inevitable collapse. This is the absurdity of everyday finance. We are the risk? We are the predators? Finance’s favorite game must be the schoolyard refrain: “I know you are but what am I?”
We know that economic crises mean more domestic labor, and more domestic labor means more work for women. Dreams of a “mancession” fade quickly when one realizes male-dominated sectors are simply the first to feel a crisis -- and the first to receive bailout funds. The politics of crisis adds to the insult of scapegoating the injury of unemployment and unwaged overwork. And the nightmare of fertility politics, the ugly justification of welfare and social security “reforms.” “Saving America’s families,” the culture war rhetoric that clings to heteronormativity, to patriarchy, in the face of economic meltdown. Crisis translates politically to putting women in their place, while demanding queers and trans people pass or else. And the worse this crisis gets, the more the crisis is excused by a fiction of scarcity, the more the family will be used to promote white supremacy by assaulting women’s autonomy under the guise of population control. The old Malthusian line: it’s not a crisis, there’s just not enough -- for them.
Let us be clear: finance is not the problem. Finance is a precondition and a symptom, a necessary and contradictory part of capital. Deregulation, globalization, deindustrialization: none of these words can provide a substantial explanation for the present context. Each is only a surface phenomena of capital’s tendency to make its own systemic reproduction increasingly difficult for itself. Crisis and the reconcentration of wealth among capitalists is not only regular but necessary; the tendency to financialization has many historical precedents. Genoa in the 1557-62 looks like the Dutch Republic in 1780-83; Britain in 1919-21 looks like the US today. But even if financial booms and busts are as old as mercantilism, there is a qualitative change to the nature of these crises over the course of the eighteenth century, when capitalist production is imposed on the British countryside. Capitalist production creates an unparalleled need for credit, an unprecedented need to consolidate and centralize capital, a grotesque scale of fungible assets that strives to make everything solid melt into the sophistry of mathematics. Asset-backed securities and credit default swaps didn’t make this crisis, they only allowed it to heat up and billow out of control.
For those that recall the warm and golden age of American industrialism with dewy-eyed nostalgia: this crisis began with the failure of US industry in the late sixties. Real wages have been stagnant since then. The oil crisis of 1973 was the hinge; we are living in the declension of US global power. There’s no going back, no exchanging unproductive finance for good old-fashioned productive exploitation. Or is there? Today, American industry is indeed firing up again, as capital that had long flown from its shores returns to find wages lower than the so-called third world. “Reshoring”: a name for the farce that follows the tragedy of the post-war boom.
History insists on the eradication of capital as the only possibility of preventing crisis. Finance reform and “sanctions” are not enough: we will never see “the military industrial complex dismantled, the police disempowered, and the public sector fulfilling its obligations to the people” by redistributing wealth. Corrupt politicians and greedy financiers are only a superfluous, insulting layer on the thing that must be truly condemned: capital, which in our time is inescapable. With this realization, we don’t need to occupy Wall street, or any bank. We could pick any corner, any room, any building, and it would carry the social significance of what needs to be either appropriated or destroyed. The better question to pose when deciding what to occupy, is what do we want to inhabit? (On this point, it is worth mentioning that the tactic to occupy has evolved since its recent revival in the 2008 occupation of the Republic Windows and Doors factory in Chicago. What struck students in New York, California, Puerto Rico, London, Athens, etc. about this tactic was that its strategy to re-appropriate equipment, space, and organization could take place without recognition from the authorities. Demands were auxiliary to the best part: the immediate process of retaking control over the means of production.)
Whatever this occupation is, it is not a camping trip from capital -- we are still in the patriarchy, still in a white supremacy, still in a transphobic and disability-loathing society. In these places, assuming we are unified will only obscure the divisions produced by capital, divisions that need to be confronted before anything else.
On the politics of the occupation: liberalism, policing, and the uses and abuses of equality
The “99%” rolls their eyes at anyone that takes offense to signs referring to the current economic climate as “Slavery 2.0,” or asserting that “The free hand of the market touched me in a bad place.” Comparing (white) student debt to hundreds of years of violence and forced subjugation, entrenched as a system of enduring systematic racism; mocking sexual assault for effect -- these statements send a clear message to those of us linked to such oppressive acts. By trivializing our experiences, these signs simultaneously control and silence how we talk about our marginalized statuses and traumas. To those of us who hoped for Occupy Baltimore’s status as a safe, anti-oppressive space, we read these signs as “BEWARE.”
While some are already bristling at the “identity politics” of those that are offended by racist, misogynistic, survivor-hating signage, the placards that have been denounced the most loudly are those that attack capitalism. Concerns about “public opinion” being able to identify and sympathize with our collective messages abound. These so-called debates actively skew the agenda towards the watered down, apolitical, and (com)modified. GAs play out as if we (the comprehensive “99%”) all endorse these views, but communist, anarchist, and anti-capitalist perspectives are in fact excluded before they are given a chance to be voiced. Meanwhile more privileged niche groups like (hella pro-capitalist) small business owners remain front and center. We who are “taking things too far” get left behind by the “99%”.
As a result of this policing, liberal populism has dominated the occupation’s process, statements, and proto-demands. Or better, populism tinged with a healthy dose of hippie new-age individualism (a vaguely counter-cultural disposition suits contentless politics perfectly). Liberalism uses platitudes of “unity” and “equality” not to insist that we should act in order to be unified and equal, but to say that we already are -- and as such, should “put aside our differences.” Liberalism refuses to see racism, sexism, and class inequalities as material and systemic, reducing these to the level of individual attitudes of perpetrators and victims. Because liberalism only registers and disciplines individual oppressors, never structures, it cannot account for the systemic biases that enable and justify individuals’ oppressive actions. In the process, the demands made by the oppressed for changes in their actual material conditions are ignored, or worse -- appropriated, co-opted. (Take, for example, so-called “reverse racism”: the idiotic triumph of the liberal individual over history.)
The police are not “just workers” and they are not our friends
More than anything, the 99% will be divided by our relationship to the cops. They say: in the interests of “radical inclusivity” that we should avoid anti-police messaging; the police, after all, are part of the 99% that have seen wages, benefits and pensions cut along with the rest of the public sector. They say: we must remember that the police are people too, and not exclude them from our movement before they’ve had a chance to express solidarity with us. We say: just wait. These arguments assume that an individual can be separated from their institutional/social roles, that a police officer can be engaged with in a purely personal sphere, completely distinct from their occupation as an arm of state repression. A classic liberal tactic to humanize the oppressor, and thus to derail a structural analysis of oppressive systems, and invalidate the anger of those experiencing institutional violence. Advocating a cooperative, amiable relationship with the police brushes aside the violence of widespread racial profiling, sexual assault with impunity, the murder of innocents, and the war on drugs by universalizing a white, middle-class position that believes the police really serve and protect.
And it’s not only about police brutality. How can there be non-violence when there are still police? We need to know that as soon as we present a threat to any element of capital -- before this point, even -- we will be violently repressed. A peaceful, lawful protest by no means guarantees immunity against arrest and brutality: we only have to look at the women who were penned and maced at #Occupy Wall St. to know that. But unless this knowledge is at the forefront of our minds, the first to be arrested will be those that are most vulnerable to police brutality and to breaches of security. (A journalist in the room is a tip-off to immigration officials, not “good press”.) We must make our movement a safe space for the undocumented, for the homeless, those with criminal records, and for anyone else for whom contact with the police never takes place on friendly terms. However “nice” a police officer may be to you (FYI: police are often very “nice” to those from the right class and race) does not change the fact that the police are a powerful instrument of violent repression, deployed by a capitalist state to enforce its interests: namely, white supremacy, male domination, ruling class power, and the limitless pursuit of profit.
Why say “99%” when you mean “me”?
The reason #occupy Baltimore has not yet been anti-capitalist is because, for all its rhetoric of “unity” and “inclusivity”, it is really a movement organized by and for the white middle class. There is a reason why the people most afflicted by capitalism are not coming down to the McKeldin Square. When the organizers act like racism is a “second-tier” issue (for instance, by saying “We don't have time for that - We need to bring this back to the real issue: finance reform.” As if reinstating Glass Steagall will do a fucking thing!) it becomes clear whose movement this is. Let’s drop the false rhetoric: what’s wrong with the system is not that it isn’t fair to the 99%, but because it isn’t fair to them. The disappearing middle class reappears in the concrete environs of the business sector -- to better envision the jobs and upward mobility they desperately want. Don’t get us wrong -- there can be a lot of good in indignation, discontent, disillusionment. But we need to exorcise the living ghost of the middle class: the spirit of not giving a fuck who you fuck over. Why say “99%” when you really mean “me”?
And you know how it goes: the neutral “me” is the white dude with all the time in the world (we have to say it: the ideal occupier). Whiteness and maleness have been duly reinforced as the not-so-secret standard at this occupation, in many ways. One example: an announcement made by a young white man at a GA that “everyone is accountable when they speak to media, because they represent the occupation as a whole” (FYI: there is no literature, no point person, no infrastructure to guide new members; only judgment). The countless snaps and twinkles in support of such a statement demonstrated clear consensus. Those twinkles expressed a range of assumptions that people who are largely comfortable in their own skin tend to make: being present in a space makes you in charge of its representation; most everyone agrees with you (and should). Those of us that have daily to prepare ourselves for an immanent bash; immanent fight with hostile, privilege-denying strangers; an immanent insult (intended or not), we take issue with this coercion into representation. We don’t ask you to represent us (please god no); don’t fucking assimilate us to your views, and then make us responsible for them. We won’t even mention how much and how loud white dudes have been speaking.
Rather than policing the radical voices taking anti-capitalist, revolutionary, and anti-police positions, we should give these voices space to be heard, and listened to seriously. The anarchist in-joke “Make Total Destroy” has a grain of truth: that the real political agenda consists[b] in destroying state power, capitalism, and all its forms of coercive social control. Why was this phrase deliberately excluded from the agenda cards read out during a GA, while such platitudes as “We are All One” and “Peace on Earth and Good Will to All,” were deemed worthy to be shared? The liberal-or-else reformism of Occupy Baltimore is perfectly encapsulated by the imposition of goals of peace and love. Fuck peace: we need to formulate a coherent political analysis and a revolutionary agenda to destroy capitalism and dismantle state power. Rejecting outright the eventual need for an armed uprising reflects an unwillingness to pursue the logic of our own (proto-)demands to their full extent.
Don’t tell us to be “pragmatic,” to focus on piecemeal reforms and wait for our day in the revolt. Actually, reformism is idealistic: reformism believes in democracy under capital, in the possibility of redistributing wealth that is systematically dispossessed from its producers. Our revolutionary desire to destroy capital is not idealistic, abstract, or merely theoretical; nor is it inactive: this aim is embodied in a multitude of actions towards different immediate and faraway ends. To us, this means the revolutionary aim is not purely negative, not only about destruction: we work to confront racism, sexism, and class war in our community as an immediate goal, without losing sight that we ultimately cannot live like this anymore. For Occupy Baltimore, this means the 99% must relinquish its presumed equality and acknowledge division if it is to grasp the real conditions of society, and what must actually be done.
“The 1% are winning every time we fight amongst ourselves.”
When the excluded call out a movement, we are often told to put aside our differences: it’s only common sense that to accomplish anything, we need unity. But the only unity we have, the only equality we share, is the thinnest commonality -- the democracy of consumers. Already, in conversations with supposed comrades, our critiques have been met with concern that the “mainstream” won’t get it, that the precious, delicate momentum will be stopped. Interventions to a white-washed and patriarchal agenda (which is any agenda that denies the differential impact of capital on people of colour and women) are always received as interruptions. At best, they are conceded to with invitations, with “outreach”, and with promises to be more inclusive. We say: inclusivity without an adequate analysis is just unstated exclusivity. This is not identity politics: this is the anti-identity politics. For it is capitalism that pushes us to rank facets of our identities; to select one group as the vanguard and press marginalized identities to choose which aspect of their oppression to make a priority. We refuse this choice: we know that our difference is produced and reproduced by capital and therefore cannot be erased within it, that these differences are real (the most real) and thus should drive our analyses and our actions, and that no unity can be claimed until every social relationship is no longer defined by capital, but by us.
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ON THE RECENT #OCCUPATIONS
A COMMUNIQUE FROM THE W.I.T.C.H. ARMY FACTION[a]
BALTIMORE, AMERIKKKA
This occupation is inevitable, and yet we need to make it. There is no way for capital to continue its reign -- this is clear. And yet, capital will not behead itself: we know that we need to struggle in some way if we are to overcome it. This statement is not a rejection of the occupation -- as if it could be avoided, as if the present conditions were not so grave, as if we haven’t all had enough. But there are things that need to be said. We submit this critique in the deepest solidarity with those people of color, women, queer, and trans* folx that have endured this occupation while labouring on making it more livable from the inside.
Before anything else, we must frame this movement within a prior occupation, that of white settlers on Nanticoke and Susquehannock land. The genocide, expulsion, and dispossession of native peoples is foundational to the ascent of the US as a center of global capital; we cannot reclaim this country, only acknowledge it as a unit of capitalist destruction.
“We are the 99%.”
If we want to use this figure to underscore how far polarized the rich and the poor are today, fine. But those of us that don’t homogenize so easily get suspicious when we hear calls for unity. What other percentages hide behind the nearly-whole 99%? What about the 16% of Blacks that are “officially” unemployed, double the number of whites? The 1 out of 8 Black men in their twenties that on any given day will be in prison or jail? The quarter of women that will get sexually assaulted in their lifetime? The dozens of queer, trans*, intersex, and gender-variant folks that are murdered each year, 70% of whom are people of color? Is a woman of color’s experience of the crisis interchangeable with that of the white man whose wage is twice hers? Are we all Troy Davis? As austerity grinds down on us, who among us will go to prison? Who will be relegated to informal, precarious labor? Whose benefits will be cut, whose food stamps canceled or insufficient? Who will be evicted? Who will be unable to get healthcare, to get hormones or an abortion?
Don’t get us wrong. We’re not asking for better wages or a lower interest rate. We’re not even asking for the full abolition of capital -- there’s no one to ask. For now, we are simply critiquing this occupation for assuming we are there, while we have so far been left out. Because we know that whatever is next will be something we make, not something we ask for. Even if we don’t feel safe there, even if what little analysis and structure that has emerged thus far makes clear we are not a part of this movement, we radical feminist, anti-racist revolutionaries are going to keep bringing our bodies and ideologies to the occupation, for the same reason that women of color support and attend Slutwalk despite critiquing its white-centered politics: because we see potential for building resistance in our communities and affecting material change. But for this potential to be realized, we have to work together in solidarity with the understanding that unity must be constructed with an analysis of difference, not just plastered blindly over inequalities. Consider this text a chip at the plaster.
Anti-finance or anti-capital?
Nothing is more clear in the American debt-scape than racial character of everyday finance -- but it is sexed, too. And not only because women, like people of color, were disproportionately solicited for subprime mortgages (across all income levels). There is no better indicator that women and people of color cannot be assimilated to the faceless borrowers of the 99% than the strategic location of payday loan offices, tax-preparation outlets, and banks that specialize in subprime mortgages. A map of foreclosures, of adjustable-rate mortgages, a topography of interest rates: all these overlap neatly on the demographics of racialized and feminized poverty. It’s not a coincidence: today, race and gender are not grounds to deny credit, but indexes of risk. And as long as risk can be commodified, as long as volatility can be hedged against and profited from, our color and gender will be blamed for the inevitable collapse. This is the absurdity of everyday finance. We are the risk? We are the predators? Finance’s favorite game must be the schoolyard refrain: “I know you are but what am I?”
We know that economic crises mean more domestic labor, and more domestic labor means more work for women. Dreams of a “mancession” fade quickly when one realizes male-dominated sectors are simply the first to feel a crisis -- and the first to receive bailout funds. The politics of crisis adds to the insult of scapegoating the injury of unemployment and unwaged overwork. And the nightmare of fertility politics, the ugly justification of welfare and social security “reforms.” “Saving America’s families,” the culture war rhetoric that clings to heteronormativity, to patriarchy, in the face of economic meltdown. Crisis translates politically to putting women in their place, while demanding queers and trans people pass or else. And the worse this crisis gets, the more the crisis is excused by a fiction of scarcity, the more the family will be used to promote white supremacy by assaulting women’s autonomy under the guise of population control. The old Malthusian line: it’s not a crisis, there’s just not enough -- for them.
Let us be clear: finance is not the problem. Finance is a precondition and a symptom, a necessary and contradictory part of capital. Deregulation, globalization, deindustrialization: none of these words can provide a substantial explanation for the present context. Each is only a surface phenomena of capital’s tendency to make its own systemic reproduction increasingly difficult for itself. Crisis and the reconcentration of wealth among capitalists is not only regular but necessary; the tendency to financialization has many historical precedents. Genoa in the 1557-62 looks like the Dutch Republic in 1780-83; Britain in 1919-21 looks like the US today. But even if financial booms and busts are as old as mercantilism, there is a qualitative change to the nature of these crises over the course of the eighteenth century, when capitalist production is imposed on the British countryside. Capitalist production creates an unparalleled need for credit, an unprecedented need to consolidate and centralize capital, a grotesque scale of fungible assets that strives to make everything solid melt into the sophistry of mathematics. Asset-backed securities and credit default swaps didn’t make this crisis, they only allowed it to heat up and billow out of control.
For those that recall the warm and golden age of American industrialism with dewy-eyed nostalgia: this crisis began with the failure of US industry in the late sixties. Real wages have been stagnant since then. The oil crisis of 1973 was the hinge; we are living in the declension of US global power. There’s no going back, no exchanging unproductive finance for good old-fashioned productive exploitation. Or is there? Today, American industry is indeed firing up again, as capital that had long flown from its shores returns to find wages lower than the so-called third world. “Reshoring”: a name for the farce that follows the tragedy of the post-war boom.
History insists on the eradication of capital as the only possibility of preventing crisis. Finance reform and “sanctions” are not enough: we will never see “the military industrial complex dismantled, the police disempowered, and the public sector fulfilling its obligations to the people” by redistributing wealth. Corrupt politicians and greedy financiers are only a superfluous, insulting layer on the thing that must be truly condemned: capital, which in our time is inescapable. With this realization, we don’t need to occupy Wall street, or any bank. We could pick any corner, any room, any building, and it would carry the social significance of what needs to be either appropriated or destroyed. The better question to pose when deciding what to occupy, is what do we want to inhabit? (On this point, it is worth mentioning that the tactic to occupy has evolved since its recent revival in the 2008 occupation of the Republic Windows and Doors factory in Chicago. What struck students in New York, California, Puerto Rico, London, Athens, etc. about this tactic was that its strategy to re-appropriate equipment, space, and organization could take place without recognition from the authorities. Demands were auxiliary to the best part: the immediate process of retaking control over the means of production.)
Whatever this occupation is, it is not a camping trip from capital -- we are still in the patriarchy, still in a white supremacy, still in a transphobic and disability-loathing society. In these places, assuming we are unified will only obscure the divisions produced by capital, divisions that need to be confronted before anything else.
On the politics of the occupation: liberalism, policing, and the uses and abuses of equality
The “99%” rolls their eyes at anyone that takes offense to signs referring to the current economic climate as “Slavery 2.0,” or asserting that “The free hand of the market touched me in a bad place.” Comparing (white) student debt to hundreds of years of violence and forced subjugation, entrenched as a system of enduring systematic racism; mocking sexual assault for effect -- these statements send a clear message to those of us linked to such oppressive acts. By trivializing our experiences, these signs simultaneously control and silence how we talk about our marginalized statuses and traumas. To those of us who hoped for Occupy Baltimore’s status as a safe, anti-oppressive space, we read these signs as “BEWARE.”
While some are already bristling at the “identity politics” of those that are offended by racist, misogynistic, survivor-hating signage, the placards that have been denounced the most loudly are those that attack capitalism. Concerns about “public opinion” being able to identify and sympathize with our collective messages abound. These so-called debates actively skew the agenda towards the watered down, apolitical, and (com)modified. GAs play out as if we (the comprehensive “99%”) all endorse these views, but communist, anarchist, and anti-capitalist perspectives are in fact excluded before they are given a chance to be voiced. Meanwhile more privileged niche groups like (hella pro-capitalist) small business owners remain front and center. We who are “taking things too far” get left behind by the “99%”.
As a result of this policing, liberal populism has dominated the occupation’s process, statements, and proto-demands. Or better, populism tinged with a healthy dose of hippie new-age individualism (a vaguely counter-cultural disposition suits contentless politics perfectly). Liberalism uses platitudes of “unity” and “equality” not to insist that we should act in order to be unified and equal, but to say that we already are -- and as such, should “put aside our differences.” Liberalism refuses to see racism, sexism, and class inequalities as material and systemic, reducing these to the level of individual attitudes of perpetrators and victims. Because liberalism only registers and disciplines individual oppressors, never structures, it cannot account for the systemic biases that enable and justify individuals’ oppressive actions. In the process, the demands made by the oppressed for changes in their actual material conditions are ignored, or worse -- appropriated, co-opted. (Take, for example, so-called “reverse racism”: the idiotic triumph of the liberal individual over history.)
The police are not “just workers” and they are not our friends
More than anything, the 99% will be divided by our relationship to the cops. They say: in the interests of “radical inclusivity” that we should avoid anti-police messaging; the police, after all, are part of the 99% that have seen wages, benefits and pensions cut along with the rest of the public sector. They say: we must remember that the police are people too, and not exclude them from our movement before they’ve had a chance to express solidarity with us. We say: just wait. These arguments assume that an individual can be separated from their institutional/social roles, that a police officer can be engaged with in a purely personal sphere, completely distinct from their occupation as an arm of state repression. A classic liberal tactic to humanize the oppressor, and thus to derail a structural analysis of oppressive systems, and invalidate the anger of those experiencing institutional violence. Advocating a cooperative, amiable relationship with the police brushes aside the violence of widespread racial profiling, sexual assault with impunity, the murder of innocents, and the war on drugs by universalizing a white, middle-class position that believes the police really serve and protect.
And it’s not only about police brutality. How can there be non-violence when there are still police? We need to know that as soon as we present a threat to any element of capital -- before this point, even -- we will be violently repressed. A peaceful, lawful protest by no means guarantees immunity against arrest and brutality: we only have to look at the women who were penned and maced at #Occupy Wall St. to know that. But unless this knowledge is at the forefront of our minds, the first to be arrested will be those that are most vulnerable to police brutality and to breaches of security. (A journalist in the room is a tip-off to immigration officials, not “good press”.) We must make our movement a safe space for the undocumented, for the homeless, those with criminal records, and for anyone else for whom contact with the police never takes place on friendly terms. However “nice” a police officer may be to you (FYI: police are often very “nice” to those from the right class and race) does not change the fact that the police are a powerful instrument of violent repression, deployed by a capitalist state to enforce its interests: namely, white supremacy, male domination, ruling class power, and the limitless pursuit of profit.
Why say “99%” when you mean “me”?
The reason #occupy Baltimore has not yet been anti-capitalist is because, for all its rhetoric of “unity” and “inclusivity”, it is really a movement organized by and for the white middle class. There is a reason why the people most afflicted by capitalism are not coming down to the McKeldin Square. When the organizers act like racism is a “second-tier” issue (for instance, by saying “We don't have time for that - We need to bring this back to the real issue: finance reform.” As if reinstating Glass Steagall will do a fucking thing!) it becomes clear whose movement this is. Let’s drop the false rhetoric: what’s wrong with the system is not that it isn’t fair to the 99%, but because it isn’t fair to them. The disappearing middle class reappears in the concrete environs of the business sector -- to better envision the jobs and upward mobility they desperately want. Don’t get us wrong -- there can be a lot of good in indignation, discontent, disillusionment. But we need to exorcise the living ghost of the middle class: the spirit of not giving a fuck who you fuck over. Why say “99%” when you really mean “me”?
And you know how it goes: the neutral “me” is the white dude with all the time in the world (we have to say it: the ideal occupier). Whiteness and maleness have been duly reinforced as the not-so-secret standard at this occupation, in many ways. One example: an announcement made by a young white man at a GA that “everyone is accountable when they speak to media, because they represent the occupation as a whole” (FYI: there is no literature, no point person, no infrastructure to guide new members; only judgment). The countless snaps and twinkles in support of such a statement demonstrated clear consensus. Those twinkles expressed a range of assumptions that people who are largely comfortable in their own skin tend to make: being present in a space makes you in charge of its representation; most everyone agrees with you (and should). Those of us that have daily to prepare ourselves for an immanent bash; immanent fight with hostile, privilege-denying strangers; an immanent insult (intended or not), we take issue with this coercion into representation. We don’t ask you to represent us (please god no); don’t fucking assimilate us to your views, and then make us responsible for them. We won’t even mention how much and how loud white dudes have been speaking.
Rather than policing the radical voices taking anti-capitalist, revolutionary, and anti-police positions, we should give these voices space to be heard, and listened to seriously. The anarchist in-joke “Make Total Destroy” has a grain of truth: that the real political agenda consists[b] in destroying state power, capitalism, and all its forms of coercive social control. Why was this phrase deliberately excluded from the agenda cards read out during a GA, while such platitudes as “We are All One” and “Peace on Earth and Good Will to All,” were deemed worthy to be shared? The liberal-or-else reformism of Occupy Baltimore is perfectly encapsulated by the imposition of goals of peace and love. Fuck peace: we need to formulate a coherent political analysis and a revolutionary agenda to destroy capitalism and dismantle state power. Rejecting outright the eventual need for an armed uprising reflects an unwillingness to pursue the logic of our own (proto-)demands to their full extent.
Don’t tell us to be “pragmatic,” to focus on piecemeal reforms and wait for our day in the revolt. Actually, reformism is idealistic: reformism believes in democracy under capital, in the possibility of redistributing wealth that is systematically dispossessed from its producers. Our revolutionary desire to destroy capital is not idealistic, abstract, or merely theoretical; nor is it inactive: this aim is embodied in a multitude of actions towards different immediate and faraway ends. To us, this means the revolutionary aim is not purely negative, not only about destruction: we work to confront racism, sexism, and class war in our community as an immediate goal, without losing sight that we ultimately cannot live like this anymore. For Occupy Baltimore, this means the 99% must relinquish its presumed equality and acknowledge division if it is to grasp the real conditions of society, and what must actually be done.
“The 1% are winning every time we fight amongst ourselves.”
When the excluded call out a movement, we are often told to put aside our differences: it’s only common sense that to accomplish anything, we need unity. But the only unity we have, the only equality we share, is the thinnest commonality -- the democracy of consumers. Already, in conversations with supposed comrades, our critiques have been met with concern that the “mainstream” won’t get it, that the precious, delicate momentum will be stopped. Interventions to a white-washed and patriarchal agenda (which is any agenda that denies the differential impact of capital on people of colour and women) are always received as interruptions. At best, they are conceded to with invitations, with “outreach”, and with promises to be more inclusive. We say: inclusivity without an adequate analysis is just unstated exclusivity. This is not identity politics: this is the anti-identity politics. For it is capitalism that pushes us to rank facets of our identities; to select one group as the vanguard and press marginalized identities to choose which aspect of their oppression to make a priority. We refuse this choice: we know that our difference is produced and reproduced by capital and therefore cannot be erased within it, that these differences are real (the most real) and thus should drive our analyses and our actions, and that no unity can be claimed until every social relationship is no longer defined by capital, but by us.
THE TYRANNY OF NON-VIOLENCE
The Occupy movement, committed to peaceful protest, espouses a politics of non-violence. At Occupy Baltimore, this is made clear by the list of rules posted around the space, half of which are prohibitions of political violence, illegality, and police-antagonism. While outlawing violence among group members itself is necessary to the cooperative functioning of the movement, and essential for establishing Occupy Baltimore as a safe space for all marginalized identities, the political platform of non-violence in relation to the state raises concerns for those of us with radical, revolutionary agendas which cannot be pursued by peaceful means alone.
The doctrine of non-violence essentializes and polarizes political struggles into violent and non-violent movements, ignoring the fact that successful struggles use a variety of tactics which cannot be so easily categorized. Advocates of non-violence point to the civil rights movement in America as a winning example of non-violent protest, refusing to acknowledge the legitimacy of the Black Panther’s militant actions. Drawing a moral line between Martin Luther King’s dream and Malcolm X’s nightmare, and characterizing their movements as oppositional, white pacifists fail to recognize the solidarity between civil rights struggles and black militants. It was in the interests of the white media and politicians to emphasize the conflict between the non-violent and militant factions of the movement, in order to divide and conquer Black resistance. Malcolm X was well aware of this white agenda when he said, “Instead of airing our differences in public we have to realize we are all the same family.” While these leaders criticized each other’s tactics, their understanding of racial oppression shared an analysis, and their political actions collaboratively contributed to the momentum of the whole civil rights struggle. Black activists all over the country used a variety of tactics to advance their political struggle, including both the Black Panther’s Free Food program, and the forming of armed groups to protect homes and churches in Black communities from racist attacks. Riots, armed resistance, and revolutionary rhetoric were a part of the struggle just as much as marches, sit-ins, and boycotts, and this integrated diversity of tactics worked to strength communities, raise awareness, develop analyses, and win legal reforms. Those who claim the civil rights struggle as a non-violent movement, or attribute its power to non-violence alone, fail to see the struggle in its totality, manipulating history to support their ideology.
The occupation insists on non-violence without a critical analysis of its own position, or an understanding of what non-violence even means in this era. The pacifists rely on vague platitudes, claiming to be objective and reasonable. We are supposed to be non-violent because violence is always bad, and we want to create a peaceful society. But this position assumes a dichotomy of peace=good, violence=bad which fails to account for the ways in which political violence can be purposeful and constructive, and peaceful action can reproduce and support the status quo. This pacifism, a product of white middle-class activism, appeals to a particular moral code, assumed to be universal, i.e. violence is never the answer, ever, in any situation, and those who use violence to attain their goals will suffer the karmic consequences. MLK prescribed non-violence as a strategy for resisting the institutional, social violence inflicted on the Black population every day; but, he also considered it necessary to support the armed liberation movements in Palestine and Vietnam. Thus, his ideas had root in a specific history of oppression, rather than being theorized, abstractly, as the morally superior tactic. Assuming a moral high ground runs beneath the Occupation’s advocacy of non-violence, unchecked by an analysis of lived, everyday violence: it snobbishly equates direct confrontation with immaturity and ignorance, and passive resistance with dignity and spiritual victory. Like the liberal insistence on police inclusion, this idea speaks from a position of privilege which can choose whether or not to engage in violence. It presupposes an emotional, physical distance from conflict. Would these people tell Palestinians besieged daily by Israeli military brutality that they can’t throw rocks at the armed IDF soldiers, that such violence undermines the legitimacy of their struggle against Israel’s political, economic hegemony, and the forced occupation of their lands? Would they tell a woman who has been raped that she has no right to inflict violence on her attacker, or a community of color experiencing a violence police presence that they have no right to organize armed resistance? No person whose privilege exempts them from the direct experience of oppression has the right to tell someone else how to respond to or resist racial, gendered, and class violence.
Surely the pacifists would characterize the recent London riots as opportunistic vandalism perpetuated by ignorant mobs, which was the standard position of the bourgeois media, the UK government, and political conservatives. Yet the riots, perceived as inarticulate and apolitical, spoke the disenfranchised anger of Britain’s young, urban, people of color loud and clear. Beginning in response to the police murder of an innocent Black man, and specifically targeting corporations and the police, the riots had a radical anti-capitalist, anti-racial violence agenda--which is much more than we can say of the Occupy movement.
The platform of non-violence refuses to acknowledge the violent conditions of everyday life, or recognize that direct conflict is sometimes the only effective response to inhumane, brutalizing systems of racial, gender, and class oppression. Certainly any hope we have of dismantling these systems must not be limited to legal reforms and peaceful protests; we must not rule out the violent strategies of defensive action, factory occupations, riots, vandalism, and armed resistance. Proponents of pacifism warn that violence only leads to more violence, that the only way to end the cycle is through peaceful action which will call attention to our reasonable demands, and mobilize public/political opinion in our favor. Therefore, when peaceful protests are suppressed by the police, the protesters gain the moral highground, and highlight the unfair brutality of the state. But in order to come out of the struggle on top, karmically speaking, the protesters must only exhibit passive resistance. Otherwise, people might think we somehow deserved this brutality. People in the movement spoke about the incident of women being maced by police at Occupy Wall St. as if the violence they experienced was ‘good press’ for the rest of us, as in ‘see look what they do to us when we try to be peaceful!” The press made sure to characterize the women as “non-threatening,” and indeed they were all young and white. Would they have been perceived as more threatening if they were women of color? What if they were fighting back against the police? Would the video have gotten as much media attention? Would they still be 'good press' for our movement, or would they have deserved to be maced. Whether the women were threatening or not should not be factored into our sympathy for them as the recipients of police brutality. We should condemn all police violence against political protesters and agitators, not only those who meet the criteria of pacifists. We are calling out the hypocrisy of a position which disparages all violence, while strategically courting it for political aims.
The pacifist claim that we should all be martyrs to our cause, that suffering the violence inflicted on us ennobles our cause in the Objective Eyes of the World, becomes extremely problematic when applied to feminism. In this patriarchal society, women are socialised to endure the sexual, social, economic domination of men which often manifests as violence against our bodies and minds: this violence takes the overt forms of rape, forced motherhood, trafficking and prostitution, and the more covert forms of economic disadvantage, unrealistic standards of beauty, and the cultivation of submissive personalities. People who do not conform to the gender-binary and its assigned characteristics are policed through institutional discrimination and actual social violence into assimilating with dominant heterosexuality. The non-violence argument applied to gender leads to the conclusion that people should not form organized resistance against gendered violence, but suffer it nobly in the hopes of winning over the hearts and minds of men to our cause. In this case, women are queer people have been practicing non-violence for centuries, and where has it gotten us? Putting the power to end gendered oppression into the hands of the people who most benefit from it only further dis-empowers oppressed people, and reinforces the patriarchal construct of men as the arbiters of all decisions. We do not want to wait for these men to decide we are human enough not to be brutalized. We realize that we have the power to challenge patriarchy with our organized resistance, and that this resistance must embrace violence as an effective political, defensive tactic.
From amazing friends in Baltimore, eat it up kiddies! REPOST
Thursday, October 13, 2011
New Orleans, Louisiana, 6 years after Katri
Forstall St. vicinity, Lower 9th Ward
Spring 2011
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| Second weird captains house |
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| there was a creepy doll head that you can't really see in the window |
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| we were gonna have a garden but someone stole the bathtub with the plant starters in it |
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| thank the lord for the community garden |
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| the gator's speech bubble reads "help!" |
And this was a relatively populated street, by lower 9th standards.
Trash rules everything around me, cream get the money, dolla dolla bills y'all!
Friday, August 19, 2011
NEW PORTFOLIO WEBSITE!! OMG
So, after much ado for many months I finally got it together after many tries and made a website that I actually kind of like (for the moment.) Things to come include, but are not limited to:
-A link up to an etsy site that will eventually have crafty content
-An herbarium
-More taxidermy (yes, yes, yes!)
-Embarrassing self-portraits for my early teeeeeeens
-Older drawings
-Process work towards other more complete projects
-More recent drawings of more current fixations
-Scans of zines I have made/have been a part of making? In the meantime the link is to my e-mail account and if you send me postage I will send you a photocopy of my zine/s.
-Songs?
-Links to other artist who's work I admire and feel inspired by (Friends)?
-A link up to an etsy site that will eventually have crafty content
-An herbarium
-More taxidermy (yes, yes, yes!)
-Embarrassing self-portraits for my early teeeeeeens
-Older drawings
-Process work towards other more complete projects
-More recent drawings of more current fixations
-Scans of zines I have made/have been a part of making? In the meantime the link is to my e-mail account and if you send me postage I will send you a photocopy of my zine/s.
-Songs?
-Links to other artist who's work I admire and feel inspired by (Friends)?
Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Thanks for showing up in my dream last night!
It was so nice to see you, Ryan! Thanks for letting me smell your scalp and kiss it and squeeze you. I love you.
Friday, October 22, 2010
Wednesday, October 6, 2010
Sarkozy, what the fuck?
Sending the Rom to Romania & Bulgaria? Really? Why do you have to be such a giant racist flaming paper bag of turd?
Monday, September 13, 2010
circa 2006?
My dreams are full of shoplifting and minor acts of defiance
My subconscious can’t stay out of jail for more than a week
I’ve been stickin’ it to the man every evening since 2003.
What type of a refuge is sleep,
When big brother peers at me from beneath my eyelids
And I’m always running from the po-lice?
The standard psychology text of the western world mislead us
No, Freud didn’t do it on purpose!
He couldn’t help but project his neuroses,
(It was a neurosis of his)
Instead of Freud I’m hoping Jung will do
Or maybe looking to aboriginal dreamtime would be of use?
My dreams are full of shoplifting and minor acts of defiance
My subconscious can’t stay out of jail for more than a week
I’ve been stickin’ it to the man every evening since 2003.
What type of a refuge is sleep,
When big brother peers at me from beneath my eyelids
And I’m always running from the po-lice?
You see, all I really want is a nice flying dream
My homies have them all the time
I need to find a way to save my subconscious from being subversive!
I’m tired of being singled out.
Lucid dreaming: great.
But what’s a poor girl to do once her metaphysical pockets are already full?
If I can’t keep my sleeping brain out of the big house,
Well, maybe I’m made up entirely of former felon’s, you know, their quarks.
Would that explain this slumberous anomaly?
The aborigines might answer that waking life isn’t the real thing.
My dreams are full of shoplifting and minor acts of defiance
My subconscious can’t stay out of jail for more than a week
I’ve been stickin’ it to the man every evening since 2003.
What type of refuge is sleep?
Sunday, September 12, 2010
More old writing, Propaganda for the Multitude:
Manufactured from Scratch about 4 years ago
Anarchism has always seemed to me to be the very hopeful and empathetic politics of humanism, which is infinitely appealing. Inherent within its principles is the preservation of the individuality of the self-reflective human spirit as a valuable participant in collective process, and a respect for all of the creatures of the world. The goals of the anarchist can be furthered with the help of others through principals of solidarity, reciprocity, mutual aid, critique, direct action, and PRAXIS all of which work towards the ultimate goal of symbiosis, for the anarchist of today could be a Black Panther, a radical environmentalist, a primitivist, an animal rights activist, a feminist, or an advocate for the rights of those who chose to identify outside any pre-fabricated pigeon-holes to forge their own way. Peaceful co-existence is often spoken of today as a far-fetched dream, but the anarchists of today are committed to the intolerance of intolerance, and when they can’t organize themselves (and they often manage pretty well) either because of factions within the movement (everyone has their own adjective following anarcha/o-) or any other reason, their decentralization can sometimes work to their advantage too. As subscriber to some of these previously described ideals, and what Teddy Roosevelt might have deemed a “rugged individualist,” I chose no affiliation over having an affiliation. And as accepting, inquisitive, and fluid as anarchism is, I haven’t been kicked out of the club yet.
Published in the zine Harmful Free Radicals from the Marlboro College "anarchism tutorial" with Meg Mott
Published in the zine Harmful Free Radicals from the Marlboro College "anarchism tutorial" with Meg Mott
Old Writing/process work
An open letter to my Mother: 10-11-08
Dear Mama,
I’ve been reading this zine “On the Road to Healing: A Booklet for Men Against Sexism”, as I do with all of the zines that I receive before submitting them to the zine library. The zine contains a number of articles, creative writing pieces, and testimonials from men confronting their sexism, and there is a transcript of a conversation had between three men who are engaged in a self-reflexive re-education process for themselves and other men who are involved in the struggle against hierarchy based on socialized gender particularly within the “punk” or “anarchist” community. One of these men has a moment where he’s very earnestly describing his feelings of remorse for his behavior towards his mother and his sister while he was growing up, continuously challenging their feelings with a logical argument, and generally de-valuing the voice of his mother because it wasn’t a male voice.
It made me think of how critical I used to be of your part in our arguments, and how I always used to try to take on a male voice to defy you and defeat you, to argue my way out of something that made me adolescently indignant; like not getting to go to Toquet Hall with my friends late at night, when I hadn’t been to school that day or had arrived late or hadn’t done my homework in a week. It wasn’t the content of the verbal altercations we got into that was unusual, I think it was typical adolescent fare, but it was the way in which I engaged with you that seems rather grotesque to me now in hindsight. I guess that I was intuitively aware of how little power feminine discourse has in the political sphere, so within the private sphere I tried to replicate masculine discourse (on my end) to manipulate the outcome of our arguments, using the tools that I saw being advantageously used by male students and teachers against me in the classroom. I’m so sorry for bringing the oppressive language of the patriarchy home, and acting as an adversary instead of an ally!
When that didn’t work, I would switch up my tactics, trying to appeal to you using the whiny circumstance of “exploration” and my “lack of social life” using language I knew we had in common. I was a female chauvinist pig! Fuck!
And it wasn’t always my perceived lack of confidence in your speech or your approach with arguing me that I would take issue with and decide to despise, but I also used to make fun of a phenomenon that you exhibited symptoms of, and that I now notice in myself as well, that we can trace back to grandpa Max, and of course, foreign language acquisition. Dogberryism. Malapropisms. Malapropisms are extremely endearing (and a sign of an active and creative mind) if you’re feeling tender, they are a good jabbing point if you’re not. How hypocritical of me to jab. I’m so sorry!
Love you very very much, Lily Sage
Saturday, July 24, 2010
I have to go run around but...
I just wanted to post this from Kropotkin about Mutual Aid/evolution to write about later, mostly just because I wanted to post a photo of him because I love the way that his beard fans out
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Tonight I saw Slingshot hiphop, watched DAM perform, and talked with one of the members about
birthright unplugged, divestment, beta israel, and solidarity. as well as having mentioned them in my thesis (big upps). it was amazing. + autographed soundtrack for exposure. in other news german mc's are not even noteworthy, nevermind.
Monday, June 28, 2010
No signs from the outside world for 4 months and now 3 packages in one month?
Hoorah!
edit July, 1st: 4 packages!! friendmade lady gaga shirt!
edit 2 July, 6th: +2 beautiful letters from texas!!
edit July, 1st: 4 packages!! friendmade lady gaga shirt!
edit 2 July, 6th: +2 beautiful letters from texas!!
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
My friend, fellow sociologist, and fellow paranoid: Introducing Elle Jhe
I've invited my friend Elle Jhe to be a contributor to this blog which I am very excited about, here is ze's first contribution:
Driving and the Downfall of Society
This weekend my boyfriend and I ventured from Albany, NY down to Ocean City, NJ. I make the pilgrimage down there yearly to spend some time with my extended family and swim in the ocean. But I dread the drive down every time. It’s a long and arduous trek through one of the most densely populated areas in the country, and I added a lot of extra miles on by taking a detour east of the Hudson to hang with some old buddies in CT.
We left around noon and headed down 95 South to 287. Regardless of time of day, there is always a good amount of traffic. I get irrationally angry when stuck in traffic, as if god had conjured up the bottleneck just to piss me off specifically. We cross the bridge, which I am terribly frightened of crossing (NY has no money…this bridge is really long…I wonder if they still do repairs…have they rated this bridge for safety? I wonder what it ranks…. *images of Tacoma narrows flash*…our infrastructure is crumbling everywhere else, why not when suspended over three miles of deep river?...It’s not like the government gives a fuck if we all die anyway….) We survive the bridge and make it to the next peril, the Garden State Parkway.
Here in the Northeast of America each state has its stereotypes about other states drivers. NY drivers are fast and aggressive jerks. CT people never use their turning signals and step on their breaks all the time for no reason. People from MA drive like assholes, hence, mass-holes. Jersey drivers are just completely insane. Like all stereotypes these obviously are not entirely true. But in my experience driving all over the NE it seems that there is a certain culture of driving that distinctly differs from place to place. If you think about it, driving on America’s interstate system is a sociological experiment: put all kinds of people into extremely fast metal machines, give them a set of rules to follow, and set them loose to interact with one another as they may. Over time people develop certain expectations of what constitutes “acceptable” behavior and that varies from place to place. And just like the rest of society, while the planners have a vision of how a system functions, the reality is much different.
I noticed that in the areas around NYC people drive incredibly fast. I usually go 65, sometimes 70mph, and on both sides of me cars were whipping past. Not only that, I found that many people tended to also weave unpredictably in and out of traffic. At one moment I was surrounded by cars on all sides, going extremely fast; I had a horrible feeling that I was just moments from a wreck. I could see people ahead of me accidentally drifting across the dotted lines that mark the lanes, and when I passed them I would see that they were on their cell phone, or reading, or looking at a GPS—pretty much anything except looking at the road. When we got off at a rest stop to the left of the highway and tried to merge again, a SUV going about 90mph cut into our lane and I pulled off to the shoulder just in time not to die. Jesse took the wheel for the rest of the ride down because I was too shaken up to keep driving after that.
And I was wondering as I finally got safely to the beach; how could all of these people I encountered be so nonchalant about the act of driving? When you really think about it, it is a very dangerous undertaking. People’s bodies can’t withstand the impact of a crash at the speeds many people travel. I felt like there was a fundamental lack of respect for the act of driving and of other drivers as well. People screaming and flipping each other off, not letting people get in lane when they have to exit, depending on technology instead of their own instincts. I feel as though the culture of driving has become, “My car will protect me if I get in a crash, so I can drive however I want. I don’t have to look at the road because my GPS system is guiding me, and if I want to watch TV--hell, I’m gonna do it.” Car companies are inventing cars that parallel park for you, that sense if you’re drifting into another lane and correct your steering, that stop if they sense that you are about to crash into something in front of you; essentially, rationalizing peoples’ obliviousness to surroundings when behind the wheel. It seems to say, “Don’t worry about thinking-- the machine will do it for you.”
But let’s just think people; how many times does your home computer glitch out and do something totally unpredictable? You want that happening when you’re flying down the road at 90?? The more and more I think about it, the whole system of driving is inherently flawed. It’s a system that’s designed in such a way that it is only safe if everyone obeys all the rules all the time. And that never happens, regardless of how many fucking state troopers you pay to sit on the highway and pull people over, or how many computer programs you write to compensate for human error.
And the most ironic part of this whole experience is that I was using an oil-burning vehicle to take a vacation by the ocean, which is being destroyed by an oil spill. Next year maybe I’ll travel on horseback.
This weekend my boyfriend and I ventured from Albany, NY down to Ocean City, NJ. I make the pilgrimage down there yearly to spend some time with my extended family and swim in the ocean. But I dread the drive down every time. It’s a long and arduous trek through one of the most densely populated areas in the country, and I added a lot of extra miles on by taking a detour east of the Hudson to hang with some old buddies in CT.
We left around noon and headed down 95 South to 287. Regardless of time of day, there is always a good amount of traffic. I get irrationally angry when stuck in traffic, as if god had conjured up the bottleneck just to piss me off specifically. We cross the bridge, which I am terribly frightened of crossing (NY has no money…this bridge is really long…I wonder if they still do repairs…have they rated this bridge for safety? I wonder what it ranks…. *images of Tacoma narrows flash*…our infrastructure is crumbling everywhere else, why not when suspended over three miles of deep river?...It’s not like the government gives a fuck if we all die anyway….) We survive the bridge and make it to the next peril, the Garden State Parkway.
Here in the Northeast of America each state has its stereotypes about other states drivers. NY drivers are fast and aggressive jerks. CT people never use their turning signals and step on their breaks all the time for no reason. People from MA drive like assholes, hence, mass-holes. Jersey drivers are just completely insane. Like all stereotypes these obviously are not entirely true. But in my experience driving all over the NE it seems that there is a certain culture of driving that distinctly differs from place to place. If you think about it, driving on America’s interstate system is a sociological experiment: put all kinds of people into extremely fast metal machines, give them a set of rules to follow, and set them loose to interact with one another as they may. Over time people develop certain expectations of what constitutes “acceptable” behavior and that varies from place to place. And just like the rest of society, while the planners have a vision of how a system functions, the reality is much different.
I noticed that in the areas around NYC people drive incredibly fast. I usually go 65, sometimes 70mph, and on both sides of me cars were whipping past. Not only that, I found that many people tended to also weave unpredictably in and out of traffic. At one moment I was surrounded by cars on all sides, going extremely fast; I had a horrible feeling that I was just moments from a wreck. I could see people ahead of me accidentally drifting across the dotted lines that mark the lanes, and when I passed them I would see that they were on their cell phone, or reading, or looking at a GPS—pretty much anything except looking at the road. When we got off at a rest stop to the left of the highway and tried to merge again, a SUV going about 90mph cut into our lane and I pulled off to the shoulder just in time not to die. Jesse took the wheel for the rest of the ride down because I was too shaken up to keep driving after that.
And I was wondering as I finally got safely to the beach; how could all of these people I encountered be so nonchalant about the act of driving? When you really think about it, it is a very dangerous undertaking. People’s bodies can’t withstand the impact of a crash at the speeds many people travel. I felt like there was a fundamental lack of respect for the act of driving and of other drivers as well. People screaming and flipping each other off, not letting people get in lane when they have to exit, depending on technology instead of their own instincts. I feel as though the culture of driving has become, “My car will protect me if I get in a crash, so I can drive however I want. I don’t have to look at the road because my GPS system is guiding me, and if I want to watch TV--hell, I’m gonna do it.” Car companies are inventing cars that parallel park for you, that sense if you’re drifting into another lane and correct your steering, that stop if they sense that you are about to crash into something in front of you; essentially, rationalizing peoples’ obliviousness to surroundings when behind the wheel. It seems to say, “Don’t worry about thinking-- the machine will do it for you.”
But let’s just think people; how many times does your home computer glitch out and do something totally unpredictable? You want that happening when you’re flying down the road at 90?? The more and more I think about it, the whole system of driving is inherently flawed. It’s a system that’s designed in such a way that it is only safe if everyone obeys all the rules all the time. And that never happens, regardless of how many fucking state troopers you pay to sit on the highway and pull people over, or how many computer programs you write to compensate for human error.
And the most ironic part of this whole experience is that I was using an oil-burning vehicle to take a vacation by the ocean, which is being destroyed by an oil spill. Next year maybe I’ll travel on horseback.
Sunday, June 20, 2010
I'm just shedding my DNA everywhere
I've been watching Star Trek: The Next Generation (Season 2) compulsively to help me avoid being present in the world and recently (while remaining entirely unproductive, distracted, and in a state of stagnancy) there have been several episodes in which members of the bridge crew of the Enterprise are lost or have nearly been lost due to varying circumstances and have had their DNA/DNA imprint/atomic imprint used in order to bring them back to life in deep space aboard the Enterprise in a healthy state. As a result of this inundation of fictitious 24th century imagery, I have naturally no doubt become more aware of the amount of DNA I leave around all the time. For example, I have a live hair follicle on my lap right now.
The more reclusive I become, the bigger the weirdo. I'm a little worried about myself.
The more reclusive I become, the bigger the weirdo. I'm a little worried about myself.
Friday, June 18, 2010
I didn't go to the 5th day of my apprenticeship today
sometimes I just don't have the strength within me to walk in a mans world with my head held high.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
HEY FELLAS, WHAT'S YOUR DAMAGE?
Dear various Croatian men,
PLEASE STOP IRKING ME
(I hope this isn't some kind of unfortunate cultural trait.)
Love, Lily
Dear Morino,
Have I ever once called you back? You've been calling me now for over a month, and I have never reciprocated. Do we really have anything to talk about on the phone? Your German isn't that good, and neither is mine. Do we know each other at all? Do we really have anything to say to each other? Yes, I should never have given you my phone number to begin with. Yes, you get points for being persistent, but I've had enough. Please cease and desist.
Love, Lily
Dear Milly,
You seem like a nice guy, really you do. You were helpful n' all on the first day showing me around. So why are you constantly trying to get a rise out of me? Yes I know I'm a girl in an all male workshop, and no doubt you and your co-workers are feeling shaken up and want to shake me up, my existence there no doubt in your mind makes me a deviant or some kind of a threat. You behave in a misogynistic way all the time and I'm growing tired of it (after all of 4 days) but my verbal skills in German aren't really good enough to articulate precisely enough what I mean. Can you stop teasing me about every little thing? Yes, to respond truthfully to your question I am a model (for art.) But what does that have to do with my right to wear a hat when its raining outside? And, no, I don't want to be a good housewife. I don't want to be anyone's wife. You say that you're a good husband. Do you think that your wife would take pleasure in seeing you tapping me on the ass with a piece of museum glass while I'm trying to put together a wood frame for the first time?
When I asked you not to do that, to leave my body alone, you told me that wasn't my body, it was an ass. Umm... how revealing of you being a big fucking misogynist, objectifying a part of my body, as if it wasn't a part of me, as if I wasn't connected to it at all. Then you asked if all American girls are as "gefährlich" as I am. Now, just what did you mean by that? The usual meaning is "dangerous." Is that what you meant? Or did you mean one of the plethora of other definitions of the word? Such as: risky, unsafe, awkward, or harmful? In any case, I should have shot back: "I dunno, are all Croatian men so disrespectful of the bodily autonomy of women and their consent to being touched, particularly while engaged in a task requiring concentration?" or "Do all Croatian men always try to thwart the way of young women in their new workplaces?" or "Ask Stevie, he's from Texas." or "Yes." or "How would you respond if I tapped you on the ass with a piece of museum glass while you were engaged in a task requiring your attention at work?" or "How would you respond if I touched any part of your body with or without museum glass?" or "Yes, they all don't like getting hit with glass." I could go on like this all day, but I have someone else to write to. I hope I can sleep on this and not have a problem with you at work tomorrow. You seem like a nice guy afterall, and I wouldn't want tension in the workplace.
Love, Lily
Dear Eban,
I appreciate all of your help with showing me how to sand a frame (despite how condescending you were about it, as if I'd never sanded anything in my life before, but maybe that's just your sense of humor) but why, me being an apprentice and all, would you ever tell me that I can't cut frames because "that's not women's work?"
WTF?
Love, Lily
On an unrelated-ly pleasant note, Jill is playing the piano right now and it is SO lovely!
PLEASE STOP IRKING ME
(I hope this isn't some kind of unfortunate cultural trait.)
Love, Lily
Dear Morino,
Have I ever once called you back? You've been calling me now for over a month, and I have never reciprocated. Do we really have anything to talk about on the phone? Your German isn't that good, and neither is mine. Do we know each other at all? Do we really have anything to say to each other? Yes, I should never have given you my phone number to begin with. Yes, you get points for being persistent, but I've had enough. Please cease and desist.
Love, Lily
Dear Milly,
You seem like a nice guy, really you do. You were helpful n' all on the first day showing me around. So why are you constantly trying to get a rise out of me? Yes I know I'm a girl in an all male workshop, and no doubt you and your co-workers are feeling shaken up and want to shake me up, my existence there no doubt in your mind makes me a deviant or some kind of a threat. You behave in a misogynistic way all the time and I'm growing tired of it (after all of 4 days) but my verbal skills in German aren't really good enough to articulate precisely enough what I mean. Can you stop teasing me about every little thing? Yes, to respond truthfully to your question I am a model (for art.) But what does that have to do with my right to wear a hat when its raining outside? And, no, I don't want to be a good housewife. I don't want to be anyone's wife. You say that you're a good husband. Do you think that your wife would take pleasure in seeing you tapping me on the ass with a piece of museum glass while I'm trying to put together a wood frame for the first time?
When I asked you not to do that, to leave my body alone, you told me that wasn't my body, it was an ass. Umm... how revealing of you being a big fucking misogynist, objectifying a part of my body, as if it wasn't a part of me, as if I wasn't connected to it at all. Then you asked if all American girls are as "gefährlich" as I am. Now, just what did you mean by that? The usual meaning is "dangerous." Is that what you meant? Or did you mean one of the plethora of other definitions of the word? Such as: risky, unsafe, awkward, or harmful? In any case, I should have shot back: "I dunno, are all Croatian men so disrespectful of the bodily autonomy of women and their consent to being touched, particularly while engaged in a task requiring concentration?" or "Do all Croatian men always try to thwart the way of young women in their new workplaces?" or "Ask Stevie, he's from Texas." or "Yes." or "How would you respond if I tapped you on the ass with a piece of museum glass while you were engaged in a task requiring your attention at work?" or "How would you respond if I touched any part of your body with or without museum glass?" or "Yes, they all don't like getting hit with glass." I could go on like this all day, but I have someone else to write to. I hope I can sleep on this and not have a problem with you at work tomorrow. You seem like a nice guy afterall, and I wouldn't want tension in the workplace.
Love, Lily
Dear Eban,
I appreciate all of your help with showing me how to sand a frame (despite how condescending you were about it, as if I'd never sanded anything in my life before, but maybe that's just your sense of humor) but why, me being an apprentice and all, would you ever tell me that I can't cut frames because "that's not women's work?"
WTF?
Love, Lily
On an unrelated-ly pleasant note, Jill is playing the piano right now and it is SO lovely!
Monday, June 14, 2010
Weird dreams/New things
Sometimes you gotta write and for me this is one of those times. Lacking in filtration, editing, ceremoniousness, or even necessarily poignancy. I'm a stranger in a strange land with some allies but not much emotional support (though that's shifting.) So here's today's VERY necessary unloading. Oh, and vapid or no, yr mom's still a ho.
I had South Western nostalgia dreams mixed up with Vermont nostalgia dreams last night. I woke up and wrote my dream down before my eyes had time to adjust to the light (my handwriting is evidence of this) and realized my new turquoise earring (flea market 75 cent booty/ibiza hippy market?) had fallen out of my ear while I was sleeping. I was afraid that it was too late even though I woke up 12,000,000 times between 6:30 and 9:00AM and poured tea down my throat and gobbled down the last piece of my gluten-free vegan lasagna (have to make more this week, that stuff is the best thing I've ever had in my mouth.) Got on the bike and went to my new apprenticeship as a framer and for 5.5 hours proceeded to cut mats. I did this while standing on a stool/simultaneously stooping because without the stool I was too short and with it I was towering over the mat cutter, causing difficulties in maintaining the expected level of precision for such a task. Freddy cooked a bangin' white asparagus soup for lunch, apparently he cooks lunch for all of his workers everyday and then when its nice out goes and takes a nap in the bench in the back yard. Talk about a chill work environment.
(Arco + Haenle Rahmen + Grafik Kunstverlag)
I wanted to go talk to him about hours but he was asleep on the bench. I just pretended I was checking to make sure my bike still existed. (It did.) As it turns out I can come and go as I wish. I wrote him a note to try and communicate about this issue (while I thought he was still sleeping in the garden) and he simply corrected the grammar and told me he would have it framed. No one who works in the workshop is German. We have me, two Croatians, and a Texan. Everyone is really really nice and solicitous and everyone's name ends in the "ee" sound. Freddy, Moopy, Milly, Stevie, Lily. OK, except maybe Eban. And maybe the lady who does the gold leafing on the frames but I haven't met her formally yet (although that is something I am SUPER interested in learning about.) Brigitte called and I'm getting an art class/puppet making class with her next week!!!! And then going to her birthday party! I was so excited to hear from her.
OH MY GOLLY I PARTIED WITH THE MOST AWESOME GROUP OF MONGOLS!
I was hanging out at Crystal's and we took a walk and had been wondering who was partying so hard outside of her house for however many hours-a group of super warm, lovely Mongolians. I talked with them for a while, can't say how long because my time-space orientation isn't that good in general and was particularly loopy at that hour but I'm guessing maybe an hour? It's incredible how thrilled people from really obscure countries with even more obscure languages are when you show that you've made some effort in learning their language. It totally makes the effort worthwhile. I kind of envy the experience from their side in a certain sense, being a native English speaker, I'm not expected to try, I'm always addressed in my native language which makes it difficult when I do, and I have no default secret language.
Strangely, this meeting of the Mongols occurred around the time I must have received an e-mail canceling my Mongolian Sprache Kurs for the rest of the semester, and also around the time that someone from Mongolia "friended" me on a virtual social networking utility? Bizzarro. The preceding floh-markts were effective, somewhat profitable, and generous. I sold almost all of my stuff or gave it away and had enough money to get myself some beautiful (space efficient) items: coral necklace I had been coveting (deadly sin) for some months at another vendors' booth (I get obsessive sometimes), bathing suit (much needed two weeks ago), etc. It was really good also to hang with Diana.
I say that I needed a bathing suit two weeks ago because I was in Amsterdam then and it was really hot and my lil' cuz Eva (wanna hang out with her more) & I went to too many flea markets and I bought 2.5 bathing suits there. I really don't need any more bathing suits, this is getting excessive. I went from none to 4.5.
In other news I just finished the first season of Star Trek: Next Generation and I feel a sense of loss. It is just so profound and nuanced and sophisticated and I have no space to download the next season (ha.) Also I cried all morning yesterday because I was watching coverage of the oil reaching Alabama's "White Beaches" and "Nature Conservatories." Ugh.
OK, this is starting to look like a livejournal entry of yore (like, c. 2001), I need to start writing in a real journal, and not just my dreams.
Right quick, projects:
-wings
-tryptych
-die kleine hexe
-puppen
-quitting the bad thing
-mongolian homework
-summer plans
-budget
P.S. Budapesht was also the shiat. Going to Berlin/Leipzig soon, then Prague, and hopefully Mongolia and more central Asia/Russia/the Balkans? Speaking of which I have an invite to Greece (and also to my G. Uncle in Switzerland), I should really take them up on it this time. I miss the U.S., hard. But right now I'm really happy to be here. Also to be riding my bike every day. Thank you uncle Robert! Hallelujah!
P.P.S. My mo sent me an amazing package in the mail with nine pairs of shoes and my brother's album.
P.P.P.S. JORDAN HAD HER BABY TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I had South Western nostalgia dreams mixed up with Vermont nostalgia dreams last night. I woke up and wrote my dream down before my eyes had time to adjust to the light (my handwriting is evidence of this) and realized my new turquoise earring (flea market 75 cent booty/ibiza hippy market?) had fallen out of my ear while I was sleeping. I was afraid that it was too late even though I woke up 12,000,000 times between 6:30 and 9:00AM and poured tea down my throat and gobbled down the last piece of my gluten-free vegan lasagna (have to make more this week, that stuff is the best thing I've ever had in my mouth.) Got on the bike and went to my new apprenticeship as a framer and for 5.5 hours proceeded to cut mats. I did this while standing on a stool/simultaneously stooping because without the stool I was too short and with it I was towering over the mat cutter, causing difficulties in maintaining the expected level of precision for such a task. Freddy cooked a bangin' white asparagus soup for lunch, apparently he cooks lunch for all of his workers everyday and then when its nice out goes and takes a nap in the bench in the back yard. Talk about a chill work environment.
(Arco + Haenle Rahmen + Grafik Kunstverlag)
I wanted to go talk to him about hours but he was asleep on the bench. I just pretended I was checking to make sure my bike still existed. (It did.) As it turns out I can come and go as I wish. I wrote him a note to try and communicate about this issue (while I thought he was still sleeping in the garden) and he simply corrected the grammar and told me he would have it framed. No one who works in the workshop is German. We have me, two Croatians, and a Texan. Everyone is really really nice and solicitous and everyone's name ends in the "ee" sound. Freddy, Moopy, Milly, Stevie, Lily. OK, except maybe Eban. And maybe the lady who does the gold leafing on the frames but I haven't met her formally yet (although that is something I am SUPER interested in learning about.) Brigitte called and I'm getting an art class/puppet making class with her next week!!!! And then going to her birthday party! I was so excited to hear from her.
OH MY GOLLY I PARTIED WITH THE MOST AWESOME GROUP OF MONGOLS!
I was hanging out at Crystal's and we took a walk and had been wondering who was partying so hard outside of her house for however many hours-a group of super warm, lovely Mongolians. I talked with them for a while, can't say how long because my time-space orientation isn't that good in general and was particularly loopy at that hour but I'm guessing maybe an hour? It's incredible how thrilled people from really obscure countries with even more obscure languages are when you show that you've made some effort in learning their language. It totally makes the effort worthwhile. I kind of envy the experience from their side in a certain sense, being a native English speaker, I'm not expected to try, I'm always addressed in my native language which makes it difficult when I do, and I have no default secret language.
Strangely, this meeting of the Mongols occurred around the time I must have received an e-mail canceling my Mongolian Sprache Kurs for the rest of the semester, and also around the time that someone from Mongolia "friended" me on a virtual social networking utility? Bizzarro. The preceding floh-markts were effective, somewhat profitable, and generous. I sold almost all of my stuff or gave it away and had enough money to get myself some beautiful (space efficient) items: coral necklace I had been coveting (deadly sin) for some months at another vendors' booth (I get obsessive sometimes), bathing suit (much needed two weeks ago), etc. It was really good also to hang with Diana.
I say that I needed a bathing suit two weeks ago because I was in Amsterdam then and it was really hot and my lil' cuz Eva (wanna hang out with her more) & I went to too many flea markets and I bought 2.5 bathing suits there. I really don't need any more bathing suits, this is getting excessive. I went from none to 4.5.
OK, this is starting to look like a livejournal entry of yore (like, c. 2001), I need to start writing in a real journal, and not just my dreams.
Right quick, projects:
-wings
-tryptych
-die kleine hexe
-puppen
-quitting the bad thing
-mongolian homework
-summer plans
-budget
P.S. Budapesht was also the shiat. Going to Berlin/Leipzig soon, then Prague, and hopefully Mongolia and more central Asia/Russia/the Balkans? Speaking of which I have an invite to Greece (and also to my G. Uncle in Switzerland), I should really take them up on it this time. I miss the U.S., hard. But right now I'm really happy to be here. Also to be riding my bike every day. Thank you uncle Robert! Hallelujah!
P.P.S. My mo sent me an amazing package in the mail with nine pairs of shoes and my brother's album.
P.P.P.S. JORDAN HAD HER BABY TODAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Sunday, June 13, 2010
An American in Mongolia: Part XX
Appendix
(AN AMERICAN IN MONGOLIA)
Personal Introduction presented at the start of an interview:My name is Lily, I go to Marlboro College in the Northeastern United States, and I’m an anthropology168 student studying abroad in Mongolia for the semester. My focus of study while I’ve been here has been spiritual life in Mongolia, although I’ve also been studying the Mongolian language, history, government, economy, art and culture. For my final project I am looking at the correlations and differences between shamans practicing in the city and in the countryside. So I hope that it’s alright if I ask you some questions to better help me understand shamanism in Mongolia. It’s my homework!
The answers that you give me will hopefully be incorporated into my research, so if you would like for me not you use your name, you can tell me now, or at the end of the interview.
Thank you!
Basic question set:
-The current age of the shaman as well as the time of life when subject became a shaman and their ethnicity (Khalkh, Buriyat, etc.) and shamanic color identification (white, black, or yellow.)
-The home aimag of the shaman, and the shaman’s breadth of knowledge concerning shamanism prior to becoming one.
-What the shaman’s “sickness” consisted of, if it occurred, and how it manifested, as well as if the shaman had a teacher. If not, how did the shaman discover s/he was a shaman.
-If the shaman had known ancestors who were also shamans, and if not then what the origins of their ongod were.
-That there was an occurrence of ongod partial possession or trance.
-What the working hours of the shaman are, if they operate on the lunar calendar or using symbolic numbers.
-If the shaman has a day job or alternate source of income.
-If the shaman has experienced any physical, psychological, emotional, and/or spiritual changes since becoming a shaman. If the shaman has had improved luck or health since becoming shaman.
-If the shaman has any memory of their own behavior during shaman-izing (while in trance/partial possession mode.)
-Who produced the shamanic costume and paraphenalia, and if the costume and paraphernalia were created under the direction of ongod or passed down by generation.
-Name, age, where from?
-How long have you been practicing shamanism, and how old were you when you began? Where did you become a shaman?
-How did you become a shaman? Did you have a teacher? Did you have some form of shaman’s sickness? Did your luck/health improve after you became a shaman? Do you have any shamans in your family?
-How did your emotional/psychological/
-Who are your personal ongods, and where is there home? What is your ethnicity?
-Was your shamanic costume designed under the direction of your ongod, as well as the way that your ger is set up, the instruments of your ritual, the way that the ritual itself is conducted?
-Do you have any personal awareness of your voice, behavior, or thoughts when you go into trance? If not, how do people tell you you’ve changed while you’re in trance?
-What color would you identify as? Black, white, yellow or something else?
Specific Question set:
Technicalities:
Did the subject have a set price-per-scheduled-ritual or a sliding scale based on what a client could afford or no tariff whatsoever; was there a non-arbitrary or spiritual basis for deciding upon working hours, and were they dictated to the subject by her/his ongod (s)?
Greater contextual consciousness:
Was there an expressed openness to practical shamanic intercultural exchange present; were there any articulated opinions by the subject about other city shamans and their practices; had the subject noticed the attitudes of others change towards the her/him after coming out as a shaman, and what was the subjects’ view on the evolving course of shamanism in Mongolia today?
Did the subject belong to or know of any groups of shamans, and if so, was s/he aware of what their affiliations were based upon; was there a desire for anonymity or notoriety, and would the subject ever consider ritualizing on a large scale on behalf of the public or for (gasp!) tourists?
Responsibility as spiritual leader within community:
Did the subject feel as if they were accountable to their clients, how would the subject define his/her relationship with clients and how many might they estimate to have had since becoming a shaman? In the subjects’ evaluation, was his/her clientele made up primarily of one socio-economic class, and was there a general trend in the expectations the clientele had of the subject? And finally, what did the subject feel was their role within society as a self-identified shaman?
-Do you know anything of the shamans of other cultures? What do you think about them? Might you ever incorporate the practices of a foreign shaman into your ritual?
-Do you have a schedule of practice, i.e. working hours? How did you decide on them? By the lunar calendar, (zar, tinger) or under the direction of your ongod? Do you rely upon shamanizing as your primary source of income?
-Do you have a set rate that you charge (tariff) those who seek your help? Why or why not?
-Do you know approximately how many people you have shamanized on behalf of?
-Do you know how many other shamans live in your area? What do you think of their practices?
-What have you heard about shamans practicing in the countryside/city?
-Do you have any aspirations to move into the countryside/city? Why/why not?
-How would you define your relationship with your clients? What kind of people seek your help (would you say?) Where do they come from? What do they hope to gain/lose by visiting you?
-Would you ever consider performing a shamanic ritual for tourists or for the public? How would that make you feel?
-Would you prefer to be well known in your community or maintain some kind of anonymity? Why?
-How did people react when you first became a shaman in this area? Have their attitudes towards you changed? How so?
-When you first began practicing here, were people familiar with shamanism? Were there any other shamans here?
-Would you consider yourself a leader of your community? Why/why not?
-What do you feel is your responsibility to your clients, and what is their responsibility to you?
-How do you think shamanism in Mongolia has changed (along with public perceptions of it) since you became a shaman? Since the Soviet era?
Shamanism survey: шашиний судалгаа
I’m an anthropology student studying abroad in Mongolia for the semester doing a comparative study of urban and rural shamanism. I would greatly appreciate if you took the time to answer the questions below, as they would help my research. Thanks very much!
Би Монголд нэг семестрийн хугацаатай сурч байгаа антроплоги судлалын оюутан одоогоор хот болон талаар харьцуулсан судалгаа хийж байгаа юм. Цаг гарган миний судалгааны асуултанд хариулж байгаад тань туйлаас талархаж байна.
Would you describe yourself as a religious person? Та рийг гэж боддог уу?
If so, which religion do you subscribe to? Хэрэв тийм бол ямар шашинтай вэ?
What are your views on shamanism in Mongolia today (briefly)? нгийн Монголын шашины талаарх таны бодол юу вэ? (товч)
Would you ever consider visiting a shaman for help? Why/why not? Та бдээр тусламж авахаар очиж байсан уу? Яагаадочсон?/Яагаад ?
Do you know any shamans? If so, do they live in the city or the countryside? Та хэн нэгэн мэдэх ? Хэрэв тийм бол тэр хотод амьдардаг уу амьдардаг уу?
What do you think about the practices of shamans in Ulaanbaatar? Улаанбаатарт байдаг бнарын талаар та гэж боддог вэ?
Баярлалаа.
Results of shamanism survey for laypeople at the artists union 6-4-08:People identifying as religious: 7/10, 1/10 said “a little bit”, another said “maybe”, one said no.
Religious affiliation: 5/10 Buddhist, 1/10 Buddhist/Shamanist, 2/10 Shamanist, 2/10 “No” or “Don’t worship no religion.”
Sampling of Views on Shamanism in Mongolia today: “My ancient ancestors spirits stayed”, “National Religion”, “It is our most ancient religion, worshipping nature; sky, earth, fire, water is the most correct thing”, “Ancient tradition, perhaps origin of Buddhism”, “Restarting again”, “Don’t know”, “Too bad”, “Mongolian’s original religion”, “Very good”, “I think it’s normal for me.”
Consider visiting a shaman for help: “Yes, because I needed help”, “Yes I visit because I’m Mongolian”, “My family has own ongots”, “I don’t know any shamans”, “Myself shaman”, 2/10 “No”, “Yes”, “No, don’t know well”, “No never.”
Know any shamans, and where: 3/10 “No”, “2”, 2/10 “Lives in UB”, 2/10 “Don’t know”, 2/10 “Both city & countryside.”
Perceptions of shamans in UB: “I don’t care where they live if they can communicate with ongods”, “I don’t think much about them”, “It seems most shamans moved to UB, I hear many people talking about shamanism”, 2/10 “Don’t know”, “Just shamans”, “Bad”, “Many fake shamans”, “Depends, they are different. Some of them really good. But others only interested in making money. That’s what I think.”
The rules of Chanar for non-shamans, Bayan Uul 2008:
- Don’t go into the fire circle, or you’ll anger the spirits.
- Don’t spit near the fire, or eternal fire will be dirtied.
- Don’t fight.
- Don’t walk around the fire.
- When making offering to the fire, take three steps backwards immediately afterwards.
- No garbage near or in the fire.
- Don’t swear near the fire.
- Don’t pollute the environment.
- Near/in the prayer circle (sky’s blue temple/altar) obey Mongolian customs, that is, keep your hands in your lap while sitting, at your sides while standing, out of your pockets, don’t cross your legs, take off your hat, etc. It will also offend the spirits if you drink vodka, or smoke in this area.
- Be careful not to set things on fire.
- Follow the rules.
- Don’t poke or point with your fingers towards the fire, you’ll call the demons.
- Don’t burn anything with a bad smell near the fire (plastic, skin, hair, etc.)
- If you’re on your period, leave or you will dirty the fire.
- Don’t point or show the fire tongs at the heavens.
- When making offerings to the fire, you must add argal (dung) by hand, vodka by cup, and butter by ladle.
- Don’t sit with your legs open. Sky will be upset.
- Don’t warm hands by ceremonial fire, or your life will be cold.
- Don’t chop wood near the fire. Or the fire will be decapitated.
- If you recently gave birth, leave.
- Don’t show the bottoms of your feet to the fire.
- If you’re pregnant, don’t make offering, or your baby will be miscarried.
- Don’t offer milk to the fire, or you will go blind.
- Don’t offer water to the fire.
Bibliography
(AN AMERICAN IN MONGOLIA)
Books:Abram, David. The Spell of the Sensuous: Perception and Language in a More-Than-Human World. New York: Vintage, 1997.
Altangeral, D., trans. Mongolian Folktales (In English and Mongolian). Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia: Haan Printing Company Limited, 2003.
Dikov, Nikolai N. Early Cultures of Northeastern Asia. Moscow, Russia: Nauka.
- Dulam, Bumochir. Mongol Shamanic Ritual. Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia: Mokhiin Useg Company Limited, 2002.
- Eliade, Mircea. Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy. Trans. Williard R. Trask. New York, New York: Arkana, Penguin Group, 1989.
- Empson, Rebecca, ed. Time, Causality and Prophesy in the Mongolian Culture Region: Visions of the Future. Kent, Great Britain: Global Oriental Limited, 2006.
Walter, Mariko N., and Eva J. Neumann Fridman, eds. Shamanism: An Encyclopedia of World Beliefs.
Journal/Magazine Articles:
Batmonkh, Sh. "Businessmen will sue government in court." UB Post 21 Feb. 2008. 10 Jan. 2008 <http://ubpost.
Batmonkh, Sh. "Market Children in Mongolia." UB Post 6 May 2008. 5 Jan. 2009 <http://ubpost.mongolnews.mn/
Carlyle May, L. "A Survey of Glossolalia and Related Phenomena in Non-Christian Religions." American Anthropologist New 58 (1956): 83.
Humphrey, Caroline. "Shamans in the City." Anthropology Today 15 (1999).
Shimamura, Ippei. "More than One Homeland?: Diasporic Imaginations of the Aga-Buryats." Minpaku Anthropology Newsletter (2004).
Wingfield-Hayes, Rupert. "Mongolia's Drinking Epidemic." BBC News Asia-Pacific 25 Sept. 2003. BBC News. 12 Jan. 2009 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/
"What is a Twinkie." Yahoo! GeoCities 04 May 2009 <http://www.geocities.com/
Lectures:
Bumochir, Dulam. "Shamanism in Mongolia." School of International Training at the University of the Humanities premises, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Mar. 2008.
Mend-Oyo, T. "Morin Khuur, not just a music instrument." School of International Training at the University of the Humanities premises, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. 21 Apr. 2008.
Patrick, Father. "Catholicism in Modern Mongolia." Catholic Compound, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. Mar. 2008.
Sandagjey, E. "Khomii: Mongolian Traditional Throat Singing." School of International Training at the University of the Humanities premises, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. 23 Apr. 2008.
Uranchimed, Ts. "Ancient and Contemporary Art in Mongolia." School of International Training premises at the University of the Humanities, Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. 29 Apr. 2008.
Interviews conducted by the author:
Alexander. 2008. Formal conversation with author.
Bayan Uul, Dornod; Mongolia. May, 25.
Bayermaa. 2008. Interview by author.
Bayan Uul, Dornod; Mongolia. May, 20.
Chantal. 2008. Interview by author at the Mahayana Center NGO
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. April, 25.
Deggie. 2008. Interview with author.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. June, 2.
Erdentorch. 2008. Interview by author.
Onderkhan, Khentii; Mongolia. May, 18.
Ganbold. 2008. Interview with author.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. May, 31.
Tsetseg. 2008. Interview by author.
Onderkhan, Khentii; Mongolia. May, 17.
Zaya. 2008. Interview with author.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. May, 29.
Zorigtbaatar. 2008. Interview by author.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. May, 13.
Zorigtbaatar. Ritual observations by author.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. May, 29.
SKY DOOR OPEN.....P.S. there are literally over 70 long and informative footnotes missing from this blog if it feels like there are holes, my apologies, there's only so much copying & pasting a person can do before they feel like they're gonna kill themselves.
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