Proud to be an American

I am American, and proud to be an American. My name is Darren Reiley, which I usually point out to people is very Irish, and I often call myself Irish, even though I’ve never been to Ireland, because my ancestors came from there, and for some reason I think of that as my racial identity more than my English great grandparents or Cherokee great great grandmother (though I mention them sometimes too; white folks do that a lot here.)

I like to think about being American sometimes.  We’re great thinkers here in America.  Just this morning, I was thinking about the New Year, which we celebrate here generally by getting really drunk and setting off explosives.  The year we recognize starts with January which was named for a pagan Roman god.  The rest of the months, too, were named for either a Roman god, emperor or number.  As far as I know, no Romans ever lived in America; if they did, the other immigrants here probably called them Italians, or something worse.  Oh, by the way, I call myself American because of an Italian explorer named Amerigo Vespucci, who never set foot in what is now my country.  (As Americans, we often forget there is a South America, and they’re Americans too.  This is a technicality.)

As Americans, we begin our week with Sunday (or Monday).  We have catchy little songs about the days of the week to teach our children to remember them.  They must be hard to remember at first since those days are named for Viking gods like Tiu, Woden and Thor.  Somehow, Saturn snuck in there too.  Those Romans again.

When we teach our kids math in school, here in America, we take some time first to make sure they know how to write their numbers clearly, and put them in the proper order, with the smallest numbers on the right.  We do this because we get our numbers from Arabic, not just the order and system, but the shape of the numbers themselves.  We now require all of our kids to know al-gebra (an Arabic word), because it’s a REALLY good way to do math.  We do this because back when white folks in Europe were hanging out in the Dark Ages, forgetting how to read if they ever knew, dying from plagues or local feudal lords or corrupt priests, the Arabs and Persians were doing really well, making art and developing math and astronomy and writing poetry.  We don’t teach that part in schools.  We mostly prefer to think of the numbers we use as “American.”  Then we can be proud of them.

Christianity is the official state religion here in America.  People say it isn’t, and that we have a separation of Church and State, but we’ve never had a non-Christian President—can’t even imagine having a non-Christian president—so I know that’s wrong.  A lot of Christians here like to say God Bless America, because they’re proud to be Americans too, and that means God must be on our side, whatever we’re doing.  We usually show pictures of Jesus as a white guy, even though he was Jewish and probably looked more like a Palestinian.  We talk about Jesus a lot here in America, with a hard “J” even though that name came from the Latin Iesu, which came from the Greek Iesu which came from the Hebrew Yeshua, which was his real name.  We don’t teach that in school or in church either because, well, He likes America enough to bless it all the time, so He must understand, especially with Christmas coming up.  What's more American than Christmas, when a fat Turkish saint with a Dutch name rides a sleigh with eight reindeer, most likely inspired by the same Viking god who gave us Thursday, and delivers presents made by children in China?  

Because I'm American, I speak good English, which is a strangely accented and often poorly spelled descendent of Anglo-Saxon, heavily seasoned with French, Latin and Greek.  I speak this language because the land where I live was colonized by people from the island of England, who took the land, most often by force, from the Native American people who lived here first.  The English found out about this land because it was apparently “discovered” by another Italian explorer, sailing for the Spanish, who was looking for India, and who also never actually set foot on American soil, but we name a lot of our cities, rivers and schools after him anyway.  If we know about it at all, we don’t worry too much about the fact that he was personally responsible for killing at least 100,000 Arawak Indians.  I was taught in school that genocide is bad, but that Columbus was brave and adventurous and clever.  So was Andrew Jackson.

I was also taught that slavery is bad, but money is good.  Sometimes these things are hard to think about at the same time, since much of America's wealth came from 150 years or so of white folks forcing black folks to work for free.  It’s easier to think about how this country also got really wealthy because all those Chinese folks built all those useful railroads.  They got paid $7 per week.  It sure was nice of them to work so hard for so little.  I bet they were proud to be American too, even if the white folks at the time didn’t call them American and wouldn’t let them be citizens.

Then again, America might also be really wealthy because of all of those helpful migrant workers who still harvest all of our fruits and nuts and vegetables.  They must be proud to be American too, since they’re willing to work so hard for six bucks an hour, when minimum wage is nine.  As a documented American citizen, I sure wouldn’t do that.  I know my rights.

Finally, I’m proud to be an American because I’m free.  Free to buy plastic stuff I probably don’t need that was made in China; free to wear nice, stylish clothes made by small children in Bengladesh; free to drive my Japanese car using oil from Iraq.  I won’t forget the men (black, white, or Arab) or the women or children (Cambodian, Indonesian or Guatemalan) who died, who gave those rights to me.   And I know I'm free, and I have these rights, because the Constitution, the greatest American invention, which was largely based on the Haudenosaunee Confederacy, says so.

I’m American, by God.  I know who I am.  Do you?

Analogs

A curious thing began to happen in the 1970’s and 80’s. A new creature emerged from the primordial soup of intellectual evolution, a creature destined to dominate the future development of that soup, reshaping the thought-environment in new and unexpected ways, while virtually annihilating its predecessor. The creature I’m referring to, of course, is Digital Technology. You see, in the creation or reproduction of waves (generally sound waves at that point), people had always relied on the principle of analog reproduction, which maintained the smooth shape of the sound wave, preserved the curve, so to speak. Ye olde dinosaur Vinyl Record was one of the last true species of Analogosaur, except for the rugged survivor the Film Camera.

When Digitalus Erectus showed up on the turf, with its ability to store vast amounts of information in a small space, it multiplied so rapidly and easily that its evolutionary advantages made a rational mockery of the analog systems (consider the ease of copying a tape, or a CD, compared to copying a vinyl record). And yet, with all such dramatic evolutionary changes, so much that was beautiful is lost... must cold, heartless reason always govern evolution, or can aesthetics, can beauty have a say as well?

And just what is lost under the reign of the digital paradigm, you ask?

Allow me to explain.

The digital transfers its information, its sound, or its image by dividing it up into little blocks, little pixels, rather than transferring it in a direct representation of its original, curvy self. So if we look closely at the digital image, listen closely to the digital song, we see blocks and corners, blocks and corners. The audacious Etch-a-Sketch of Progress has carved right angles into the sumptuous curves of the Grand Design, and much of the integrity of analogy (some would argue) has been lost in cutting those corners.

When we think of using words to communicate our thoughts, for example, we’re tempted to think that the transfer of information, the exchange of ideas, takes place solely in the words. However, particularly with some of the more muttish languages like English, a great many words have three or four, or more, meanings, and can mean entirely different things in different contexts. Some words, like “so,” for instance, don’t even have any meaning on their own. “So” is completely reliant on context, on its relationship with other words: “I have so much time,” or “I can take only so much”; “and so,” “like so,” and so forth.

You get the picture.

Words, like little digital blocks of info, don’t carry the entirety of the meaning, then, do they? Ah no, Great Etch-a-Sketch! The music lies in between the words, in the lyrical spaces wherein dwell the Goddesses Intention and Context. When we focus too much on the discrete particles, on the isolatable pixels, we lose the transliteral, we lose the curves that bring the contours of Beauty to the communication of ideas. When we focus on the digits, we grow deaf to the Divine Whispers in the interstices.


Where am I going with all of this?  Ever toward the Mystery.  Living is a dance, yes a dance that requires music and image.  The little blocks of meaning and consequence we pick out of the pixellated landscape of Time cannot hold the pattern that ties us all together, step by step.  It is the steady stream of Consciousness, the mysterious flow of relationship, that allows us to dance, to write poetry, to make art, to LOVE.  And I would argue-- I have experienced-- that all manner of communication can happen in those spaces between.  One might call it telepathy, or psychic abilities, but I believe it is only the organic ability to transpose the sibilant curves of life-energy into understandable information.  Before, that is, the digital Left Brain, with its almost compulsive insistence on linear cause and effect (blocks and corners, blocks and corners) pulls out the pixels and mistakes them for the picture.

Don't get me wrong, the Left Brain is almost half of the whole; the Etch-a-Sketch must have a say as well.  But, whatever else I may be, I am a poet.  Let me draw my tongue along the curvy lines of Life.  Let me not get so stuck on single moments, single words, single acts, but dance the vibrant timelessness between.

Who's with me?

American Imperialism is Catching Fire: an Analysis of the Hunger Games Trilogy

I recently watched Catching Fire, the film production of the second book in Suzanne Collins' riveting Hunger Games trilogy.  I had high hopes for this film, as I found the first one to be a stunning manifestation of the grim world of the Capitol and the indentured Districts.  I was not disappointed.

I feel the need to say a few things about the film itself, such as the usual praise: the continued fine performances of Jennifer Lawrence as Katniss and Josh Hutcherson as Peeta, the superb casting of new characters, like Jena Malone as Johana Mason, Jeffrey Wright as Beetee, and Sam Claflin as Finnick Odair, all of whom perform beautifully.  Stanley Tucci again proves himself one of the most skilled actors of the age with his incarnation of Caesar Flickerman.  The visual effects, the costuming, on and on.

But watch the film for yourself and make your own evaluations based on your own tastes.  I'd rather talk here about the story itself, about the world of Panem, because I think Suzanne Collins deserves a closer look at what she's done.  And for those of you who have thus far condescended to read the series because it looks like young adult fiction, another coming of age, or coming into her power narrative, I challenge you to look again.

The nation of Panem, perhaps a linguistic derivation of "Pan-am" or "Pan America," is a futuristic world in which the fabulously wealthy and technologically superior Captiol, nestled in the Rocky Mountains, rigidly controls the outlying twelve Districts, the citizens of whom live in poverty behind electric fences under martial law.  As explained in the the first book and film of the series, each year the Districts must suffer the Reaping, in which two of their children are chosen at random to compete to the death, gladiator-style, in the Capitol's favorite sporting event, the Hunger Games.  This event is a constant reminder of the Districts' failed revolution attempt 75 years prior, and of the overwhelming might of the Capitol.

In Catching Fire, the second book and film, we get to see more of the culture of the Capitol, in which fashion is everything, the citizens vacuously follow the publicly televised narratives and lavishly indulge their every luxury, either unaware or unconcerned that their own wealth is bought at the expense of the Districts subservience. In the books, Collins hints, through beautifully rich characters like Effie Trinket, that the Capitol citizens whose awareness brushes that harsh truth excuse it quickly as a just consequence of the old Rebellion.  In Catching Fire, we also get to see the Ball at the Presidential Palace, the opulent event that culminates the Victor's Tour.  At the Ball, Katniss and Peeta, both of whom grew up in severe poverty and near starvation, witness a Saturnalia kind of excess at which cocktails are served that instigate vomiting so that guests may continue to eat and sample the full array of dishes.  Saturnalia, if you're not up to snuff on European history, were Roman celebrations of luxury and excess at which feasters would do the same.  Collins makes frequent other references to Rome by means of the character names of Capitol citizens, like Flavius, Octavia, and Plutarch, the current Game-master played by Phillip Seymour Hoffman.

But let's not get too distracted by allusions to that classical paragon of imperialistic might and hubris.  This series can be as much a commentary on the American Empire of right now as the Roman Empire of posterity.  When I read Collins' novels, and when I watch these films, emerging as powerful mouthpieces for more-than-ever-needed self-reflection, I see an increasingly vacuous and selectively ignorant American public glued screen-to-eyeball to "Reality TV" shows, to Ultimate Fighting tournaments and to Call of Duty first-person shooter games.  I see an American marketplace so awash in fashion and appearance that, on the whole, we are either unaware or unconcerned that our vast selection of apparel comes out of District factories in Bangladesh and Guatemala, made by workers who get paid less than two dollars a day and few other options thanks to "Free Trade" agreements.  And most horrifying of all, I see an American foreign policy predicated on martially enforcing economic interests in the oil-producing Districts around the world, like Iraq and Nigeria.  Should any be so brazen as to withhold their resources from our market shares, American Peacekeepers will shortly be arriving at their borders.  How long before reality TV gives us live footage of foreign battlefields and opportunities to gamble on the outcomes?

Of course, the parallels only go so far.  Even as I see American Imperialism in the Panem of Suzanne Collins' trilogy, I also know that, more than ever before, citizens of the Capitol are waking up to these truths.  More than ever, we are investigating drone warfare and the grave implications of a vast Defense establishment coupled with an arms industry motivated solely by profit.  More than ever, Americans are attentive to and critical of the so-called Free Trade practices that have crippled and indentured other nations around the world.  (If you want to research this for yourself, by the way, I recommend reading up on the history of family-owned sugar cane plantations in Brazil over the last century.)  I really want to believe that readers (and viewers) of the Hunger Games trilogy see these connections, but I'm afraid that too many see the Capitol only in the much-villified One Percent , and not nearly enough in their own Roman excess and roaming attention spans. 

Even so, I am hopeful.  Collins, in the highest use of science fiction, as social commentary, has given us much to consider and a possible future against which to measure our present course.  It is up to you and me, Fellow Citizen, to watch closely, to think carefully, and to use our vast resources for something more than Empire.

The Phoenix

The Phoenix speaks to me through signs and happenstance—

like all good spirits do—through strangers’ words in passing,

increasing frequent emblems sidling through my glance.

“Do you really want to burn?” he asked, out-gassing

in a moment when my ego-mountain reared and rolled,

reminding me how much I still do care when former friends

judge and criticize my motives—so I’m told,

friends I’d have thought would know my heart and share my ends. 

But my ego-mountain, says the Phoenix, is volcanic,

filled with fire, destined, like Saint Hel’n, to blow her top.

Not much help, when my inner Pleaser starts to panic,

and shame informs me that my rhymescheme has to stop—

It’s not your business, says he, what others think 

of you, you must know this first, 

before any talk of death, rebirth or fire.

Your ego-mountain is a molehill, little man,

though crucial (like a cross), to understand desire,

to know who you are NOT, with all the masks you hold

before your soul to shape and mold perceptions rather

than let your spark be seen for what it is—

a singularity, infinitely hot and dense

from which escapes no light or sense

that prods each nodding ending to begin

and warms awaiting universes poised within.

“Do you really want to burn?” he says again.

“Once burnt, you cannot live in blissful ignorance,

cannot ignore the duty, debt or ken.

The path of fire is no easy, lazy dance.”

The question hangs like dawn and greets my everyday,

even as I reassemble sense and rhymescheme,

that Phoenix animates each step along my Way,

ignites whatever else it is that I may dream.

On Labor Unions, Militias, and Big Govern-business

Maybe I’m missing something.  It could be that I simply don’t understand, in a comprehensive way, the complex relations between government and commerce, between the ethics of the personal human conscience and the inhibitions enforced by legal mandate.  But even so, I see some patterns that I can’t help but point out.

For example, I often find myself, as a natural converser with people, meandering into conversations about politics, the economy, regulation, and so forth.  Such conversations are, of course, treacherous territory in modern America.  I was raised largely by Texans and Southerners and was often told never to talk about religion or politics.  Apparently those subjects are too emotionally charged to be included in genteel discourse.  But those particular subjects happen to be my very favorite, so they always seem to come up when I’m around.  Of course, in broaching those topics, especially politics, and especially insofar as politics relates to the economy, one immediately runs the risk of being branded either with the ominous epithet “Liberal,” or still more ominous “Conservative.”  Generally, I cheerfully run the risk and talk to people, and emotions get charged, and then I get to practice my conflict resolution skills, another hobby of mine.

Here’s the example I was making: When I do talk politics and economy with people, I often find that those who brand themselves “Conservative” hold great contempt for both labor unions and the government regulation of trade, indoctrinated into those opinions, I think, largely by that Great American and Friend of Freedom Rupert Murdoch.

And here’s where I scratch my head.  When I think about free market capitalism, which I’ve spent a modest amount of time doing, I humbly submit, it seems to me very akin to anarchy.  In Wealth of Nations, that great anarchist Adam Smith argues that it is simply the nature of competition that, in the end, the people will vote with their pocketbooks and the businesses that best supply the community’s needs will be the ones that prevail.  As long as government keeps its dirty hands out of it, that is.  It’s an interesting argument, and the Industrial Revolution has provided us with ample evidence for exactly how often the unhampered wealthy have been forced by competition to act in the best interests of the community.  (Only slightly less often than unhampered dictators have, which is to say, almost never).  And even more to the point, when I hear people argue that free market capitalism will take care of itself if the damned Big Government just quit regulating and let it do its Thing, I usually ask this question:  Do you believe in Anarchy too?  Do you believe that, if there were no laws, people would eventually do the right thing on their own?  That the powerful would never take advantage of the less powerful for their own gain?  I don’t often get an affirmation of that one.  Ironically, most anarchists I know are also dead opposed to free market capitalism.  Go figure.

Here’s another thing that I find befuddling.  A lot of zealots in the Church of Rupert Murdoch these days have been singing rabid hymns against the labor unions.  Again, maybe I’m just confused and don’t really understand these relationships, but it seems to me that if government regulation of trade is objectionable, that it places too much power and too many resources in the hands of a government that the Common Folk don’t have a lot of control over, then somebody needs to be around to keep hounding the big corporations.  Somebody needs to be organized enough to be investigating the board room decisions and clandestine behaviors of the big businesses that have such an enormous impact on the world.  If unions shouldn’t do this, and government shouldn’t do this, then who?  The clever, well-informed and level-headed American consumer?

More and more I think of big business like government.  In fact, I think that, in every real sense, the massive multinational corporations that drive our debt-based, fractional-banking, petroleum-dependent Cardhouse Economy hold most of the political power in the world.  As we saw with the Bailout in 2008, expecting the government to regulate unethical business practices is like expecting a standing army to keep an eye on the weapons manufacturing business, in case it gets too extravagant.  And if government regulation of business is akin to a standing army, then I think labor unions are kind of akin to militia groups.

Very few people these days really pay much attention to the history of the conversations around standing armies in this country.  In fact, very few people even know that the U.S never had a standing army at all until after World War 2.  President James Madison considered a standing army one of the greatest threats to liberty.  “The means of defence against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home…The armies kept up under the pretext of defending have enslaved the people.”  And so it was throughout much of the first 200 years of this country’s history that the arguments against maintaining a standing army always prevailed.  That is, of course, why the Second Amendment was so important as well.  A standing army, argued the Framers, allowed a small number of people to command too much brute force.  Even through World War 1, this argument was maintained, and when the nation’s leaders decided to go to war, they drafted and trained troops then.

Hitler changed all of that, of course, that rascal.  He and Mr. Hirohito and Il Duce all made having an “ever-vigilant” standing army look like a good idea, which the weapons manufacturers naturally encouraged.  Standing army plus private arms industry equals lots of sales on guns and tanks and other fun toys.  But even as Eisenhower, on his way out of the White House door commented on the necessity of having a “defense establishment of vast proportions,” he also said famously, “we must not fail to understand its grave implications.”  Thus did he coin the term “Military Industrial Complex,” and thus did big business and government start sleeping together with a standing army as the bedsprings.  Sure, you could go back further than that to Woodrow Wilson and the Federal Reserve Act, or to J.P Morgan before that, but my point is, the squeaky bed of the Military-Industrial Complex reveals a much deeper sort of affair

That is to say, if Big Business is in bed with Big Government, then labor unions are one of the last protections that workers have.  Sure, we need to keep an eye on the ways that Unions have become like big Businesses themselves.  And sure, we need to be vigilant about those unions, especially the public employee unions, having too much influence in government spending.  But the American public needs to be vigilant about everything right now, and this vacuous idea that somehow big business is more trustworthy to keep the public’s best interests in mind than labor unions or elected officials is pretty preposterous to me.

And finally, I want to know what the hell happened since the last McCarthy-era Red Scare that made capitalism synonymous with democracy, when the international business conglomerates that dominate trade are looking more like empires than ever.  There seems to be a concerted effort to keep these kinds of questions out of our schools, out of our public debates, and even out of newspapers with any kind of circulation.  Am I really missing something?  

Maybe it's intelligent conversation...