Looking forward, looking back

Well, it's only early days, but so far, I think the new year's been going pretty well, and my time away seems to be paying off. Having said that, I haven't gotten around to writing anything for this week's post. So, I thought I'd just ask if anyone has any plans, or new-year's resolutions, or things they want to get done in 2020?

Also, feel free to reflect on the previous year, or the previous decade, if you're so inclined.

I may update this post with my own thoughts at some point, but probably not. I don't really have any big plans or deep thoughts at the moment.

I've been away

The contents of this blog post have mostly been cleaved from an email conversation I've been having with Melba. Sorry Melbs, there's nothing here that you haven't already read.

I came back from holiday a few days ago. All of the posts that have been posted here for the past several weeks were written over a month ago, and set to auto-post. I've checked in a couple of times, but only to respond to comments.

So, where have I been? Basically, my parents noticed I wasn't doing so well, and convinced me to have some time off, and go and visit one of my Aunties who lives out in Western NSW. She and her husband are about 80 years old, and own a house with a yard the size of a decent sized city block. The house itself is huge, and sprawling, with many, many bedrooms, and a dining area that can easily accommodate thirty people. Behind the house, is a gigantic shed, that basically has a second house built inside one end of it. Their many children own and operate a number of farms and businesses around the local area, and their many, many grandchildren work for said farms and businesses. Their house operates as a central hub, from which people are constantly dropping in and out, having a meal, spending the night, dropping off or picking up children or goods, etc, etc. Basically, I've just spent the past month living in what you might describe as a family commune.

And I loved it.

I didn't think I would, considering I'm used to living on my own, but I really loved it.

One thing I noticed (and found quite funny) was how "tribal" the gender divide was. The house was women and children territory. Men and older boys were basically relegated to the shed, except when eating, or sleeping, or fixing something. The women handled all of the cooking and cleaning, and were fiercely protective of their roles. If men came over to the house and tried to cook or wash something, they were quickly shooed away, and told they were getting underfoot. All of the women worked in family enterprises, and none of them had a career outside of what their spouses did. Having and raising children was top priority. Still, I wasn't made to feel like an odd duck. In fact, my ability to fix problems with computers made me a little bit of a celebrity.

Normally, the only kids I interact with are my brothers', and it felt good to pass on my knowledge and life-experience to a whole different bunch of girls and young women. And spending time coddling the really little kids fed something inside me too. But that's kind of what it was all about y'know; a house full of females, aged 0 to 80, chatting, passing on wisdom and knowledge, and generally helping each other out ... oh, and basically managing their menfolk like livestock.

I dunno how to put this, but a lot of the time it kinda felt like I was being true to nature. Like, this was how my monkey ancestors evolved to live, and it was satisfying primal instincts buried in my DNA. I dunno if I'd still feel the same if I had to live that way day in and day out for years, but as it stands now, I feel refreshed and recharged. And I definitely plan to go back at some point in the near future.

And here's something else you might find interesting.

Some of my cousins are running farms or businesses, that look like they might go under, due to the drought; yet none of them seem to be particularly stressed about it. During the whole time I was there, I didn't witness a single serious argument; there was no bitching, or sniping; and despite all the gossip, nobody was complaining about their fella in a way that would suggest relationship problems. It was all very, very laid back.

The only thing I can put it down to is that nobody seemed to have any personal investment in their work, besides making enough money to provide for their kids. And since there was this feeling that if anyone actually went bust, the extended family would provide them with whatever they needed (including employment) until they got back on their feet, there wasn't really anything to worry about. It was like everyone was waltzing through life with this incredible safety net. I guess that must be how a lot of really rich people feel, too.

Actually, that's not the only explanation I can think of. I've gotten to wondering if the whole concept of the nuclear family as an insular entity might actually be antithetical to human nature. When I was younger, all of my relationships seemed to fall apart soon after I started living with the bloke, day-in and day-out in the same house. What's that saying about familiarity breeding contempt ... and then alcoholism? Maybe if we'd had somewhere we could piss-off to on a regular basis - where we could share a bed, but not a living space - things would have worked out differently.

Who knows.

Film and Book Review

Joker (Film)

I saw the new joker film the other day. See, despite the fact that none of them have any interest in comic books whatsoever, the nibblings are all big fans of comic book movies. Who can blame them; the bloody things have absolutely dominated the film landscape for the last twenty years, which is longer than any of the little buggers have even been alive. It's the only world they've ever known. But my siblings have not let them go to see the new Joker flick in theatres. Understandable, given that the blurb on the Event Cinemas website simply reads "A failed stand-up comedian is driven insane and becomes a psychopathic murderer". Actually, given that the film has an MA15+ rating, most of them wouldn't be allowed in anyway, even if accompanied by an adult.

But of course, we all know that's not where it's going to end. Before you know it, the damned thing will be out on DVD and online, and all of their little mates will be talking about it. So, my brothers asked me if I could get a copy for them to preview. In case you're wondering, there is a proper digital transfer getting around, and it's pretty good quality too … so long as you don't mind hard-coded Korean subtitles … just saying. So, while the nibblings were tucked up in bed this past Saturday night, myself, my brothers, and my sisters in law, sat down and gave it a gander. I don't plan on giving too much away, but in case you don't want to risk it, skip over this next part.

Click here for possible spoilers!

I think the Aussie film classification board has got it pretty right on this occasion. Fifteen is probably about where I'd draw the line on Joker too. It's not a super-hero action flick, that's for sure. There's no goofy quips or drawn-out cartoon combat sequences. Batman doesn't even exist yet in this universe. It's a bleak, nihilistic character study that makes no attempt to hide the fact that it's borrowing heavily from Martin Scorsese's Taxi Driver. However, unlike the '70s films that it's obviously aping, there's no gratuitous nudity or obligatory sex scene, and the course language is kept to a handful of "fucks" towards the end; but the violence—whilst infrequent—is graphic, realistic, and probably too disturbing for most youngsters. As a film for adults, my feelings are mixed.

I love a good tragedy. Call me a masochist, but I tend to enjoy fiction that makes me feel sad. Actually, I tend to enjoy fiction that makes me feel anything other than frustrated or bored, but I'll get to that in a minute. Do they even make movies like this anymore? I think the last time I saw a film about the modern-day rat-race pushing some poor prick over the edge, it was "Falling Down", and that must have come out nearly thirty years ago. Joker adds a little bit of "Natural Born Killers" to the mix, in that the protagonist's decent into violent anarchy ends up making him a cultural icon for everyone who feels like they don't have a stake in society. Unfortunately, it's not quite as well executed as NBK.

First off, I have to admit that Joker is really well acted. Everything you've heard about Joaquin Phoenix's performance is true. It's also a good looking film. For the most part, the cinematography is top notch. I wasn't so keen on the sound design, though. Like pretty much every movie I've seen in the past twenty-five years, I thought it was over-scored, and there were a number of scenes in which I just wanted the dramatic music to piss off and leave me with some nice atmospheric silence. On top of that, the writing isn't anything special. Most of the time, the story feels like a blunt instrument with which the writer is hitting you over the head. For example, since this movie is about a crazy person, a number of the scenes mix "reality" with hallucination (does anybody else find this approach as tiresome and non-clever as I do?), but it also goes way out of its way not to leave anything up to audience interpretation. Also, the Joker's inevitable climactic monologue is pretty underwhelming. I was hoping for something a little more tense and chilling. And ironically, I thought the film was slightly held down by the fact that it had to fit within the confines and expectations of preexisting Batman lore. Of course, if the film had been its own original thing, without ties to a big-name DC comics villain, probably nobody would've given a shit about it; which is kind of frustrating in its own way, don't you think?

Lastly, I suppose I should touch on the controversy that surrounded the release of this film. When it came out, both the left and right leaning podcasts I listen to were debating whether or not this film was some sort of sympathetic dog-whistle for straight, white, men who lash out when their sense of entitlement is challenged. The only response I can make is that, this film is such an overtly ham-fisted attempt at critiquing economic inequality, that anyone who sees this as having anything to do with race or gender has had their perception of reality utterly retarded by identity politics. If that was your take on it, I suggest you go and have a good hard look at your own internal filters.

Which brings me to the next thing I wanted to talk about …

Ship Of Fools (Book)

I don't know how familiar any of you are with Fox News presenter, Tucker Carlson. I have mentioned him on here before. He gets a lot of favourable coverage from both the dissident left and dissident right, primarily because he constantly runs stories critical of neoliberalism, the military industrial complex, major financial donors to both political parties, and Fox advertisers. Basically, nobody can work out how the fuck he hasn't been sacked yet. The most recent example that had podcasters buzzing was this piece he did on vulture capitalist Paul Singer.

Recently, I decided to check out Tucker's book "Ship Of Fools". Since I don't read anything anymore, I of course opted to go down the audio-book route … oh boy, did that leave me underwhelmed. The only place I could find it was on Audible (An Amazon Company™), who seem to have a near monopoly on audio-books these days. Am I the only person who doesn't love Audible? I find the whole idea of "subscribing" to an online retailer to be a wholly unwanted root-around. I don't want to pay a monthly fee to get a "free" audio-book every month. If I'm interested in a book, I want to go and buy that fuckin' book; end of transaction, end of story. Oh, and I want to own the fuckin' thing, not have it held by the retailer as part of some sort of indefinite loan scheme, that they can terminate on a whim.

In the end, I just pirated the fuckin' thing. Fuck it. Tucker's a multi-millionaire. He's not going to miss the money, and I couldn't give a flying fuck about Amazon's financial viability. Jeff Bezos is a cancer on society, and I hope the monster he's built eventually gets torn apart by angry villagers.

Anyway, I thought the audio-book itself was pretty good. What took me by surprise is that it's an attack on the American political left from the left, with the built in presumption that the political right has always been crap. In a lot of ways, he covers the same stuff that I've been bellowing about here for years. He puts forward the thesis that social, economic, and intellectual snobbery has caused the concerns of the left's leadership to become utterly divorced from the concerns of the working class people they're supposed to represent. For example, he talks about Cesar Chavez, a union boss of Mexican extraction, who—in the 1970s—organised gangs of vigilantes to defend the Southern border, and attack Mexican workers who tried to cross illegally. See, Chavez wasn't a racist; he represented the practical interests of American farm workers, regardless of the colour of their skin, and therefore opposed the illegal importation of cheap foreign labour which was driving down their wages and working conditions. Nowadays, 95% of left-wing thought-leaders consider any enforcement of border security whatsoever to be inherently racist on principle. Whereas previous generations of lefty journalists would have hounded Apple Computers relentlessly for outsourcing manufacturing jobs to Chinese sweatshops—ringed with suicide nets—and supplied with resources mined by literal African slaves; the current crop will happily sing Apple's praises, provided they turn their Twitter avatar rainbow coloured during pride month and occasionally talk about increasing the number of black women they employ at their corporate headquarters. Some of them have crawled so far up their own arses that they find it impossible to even address the issue of poverty-induced family breakdown, because doing so would be a slap in the face of single mothers, by tacitly endorsing a colonial, patriarchal, hetero-normative power structure, in the form of the traditional nuclear family … or some such horseshit. In fact, the modern left-wing intelligentsia are more likely than not to sneer down their noses at the workers whose welfare they once would have championed … particularly if those workers happen to be poorly educated, and poorly payed, heterosexual white men.

So, what has this led to? According to Tucker, a situation where the leadership of the political left is now largely allied with the leadership of the political right against the interests of the common working man. Sure, they fight like never before, but the issues they oppose each other on are issues that nobody outside of Washington DC gives two shits about. Hence, the political "left v right" power struggle reflected in the media, has become little more than a dog and pony show; while the true political power struggle—the one that nobody wants to talk about—embodies more of a "bottom v top" dynamic. The election of Donald Trump wasn't an endorsement of Republican party policy—remember, Trump wasn't really a Republican, and a lot of his rhetoric was openly hostile towards mainstream Republicanism—instead, Trump was a brick that the electorate wanted to hurl through the front window of the political establishment. A pity they never got the message.

Anyway, I thought it was a pretty decent book, even if it didn't cover a lot of stuff that I didn't already know. Check it out if you're so inclined. It's competently narrated by Tucker himself, with a running time of about six and a half hours—or two and a half, if you like to listen to stuff at high speed.

Fear The Bugman

In my post on European nationalism, I touched on the concept of globo-homo; the idea that if left unchecked, globalised free-market capitalism would erase all ethnic and cultural diversity, and leave the world with a single homogenised culture; a culture built around instant gratification and empty consumerism.

What I didn't mention was "The Bugman"; the far-right's vision of the sort of man who would thrive in this future dystopia.

The Bugman is so named because of his insectoid behaviour. All of his decisions, from what to eat, to how to dress, where to work, how to speak, what to believe, and even how to vote, are delegated to the great hive-mind that is social media. His entire personality is derived from what he consumes, so all of his conversations revolve around the games he plays, the videos he watches, and the music he listens to. If The Bugman creates anything, it is shallow and derivative; usually taking the form of fan-art, or fan-fiction. Being far more comfortable interacting with people through a screen than face-to-face, The Bugman is unable to maintain functional relationships for any length of time. He lives alone and is an avid consumer of pornography. If he has children, they invariably live with their mother. He does not act like one would expect a father to act, instead assuming more of a big-brother/best-friend type of role. Forever trapped in a warped adolescent phase, he is obviously not a child, but can't really be described as a man either. He is The Bugman.

Of all the concepts I've been exposed to while investigating white nationalism, I think I like Bugman the most. In fact, I think I'll keep him.

*** ASIDE ***

Remember when I said that a lot of far-right European nationalists sound an awful lot like blue-collar Australian lefties from forty years ago? Well, apparently, that version of left wing politics is still alive and kicking, and is sometimes referred to as the "non-woke"/"anti-woke" left (as opposed to the more modern "woke" left). Apparently "dirt-bag" left is also used, but I'm not 100% sure on the particulars of that one. If you're interested in learning more, I suggest you start by looking into Irish academic, Angela Nagle; in particular, this piece she wrote about the left's case for closed borders; a piece which inspired the more rabid and extreme parts of the "woke" left to come after her for being a "far-right neo-nazi".

If you're like me, however, and you don't want to spend time reading things, the best stuff of hers that I found on YouTube is as follows:

There's this two hour chat she had with some bloke called Justin Murphy, where they cover the savage cannibalistic bullying that "woke" lefties engage in, and how it's turned the academic space into a hollowed out, dogmatic husk.

There's this short segment from the Tucker Carlson show, where they play clips from the 2019 "Democratic Socialists of America" convention, and discuss what woke leftism has done to that particular organisation. If you want to take a look at the unedited video streams … well, you can't. For some reason The DSA took most of them down once other people started watching and talking about them. There are still plenty of "reaction", and "highlights" videos available on YouTube, and they might be worth checking out; especially if you're a supporter of the Greens, or some other left-wing party. It might help you identify this rot early on, so you can get on top of it before it takes over.

Then there's this guest appearance she did on "The Red Scare" podcast, where they talk about trends in relationships, sex, and family; which eventually leads into economics. It's only an hour long, and I really recommend it. In fact, when I heard it, I got quite excited, because I thought I'd found a decent lefty podcast to add to my regulars; however, having listened to a few episodes now, I'm sad to say that the crap to cream ratio just doesn't make it worthwhile. *sigh*. Oh well, the search continues, I guess.

Roosting Chooks

While I was babysitting the nibblings the other weekend, I got to sit in on my sister-in-law composing a school "incident report". She sat at the dining room table, with her laptop open in front of her. My brothers and my other sister-in-law sat around the table too. Every detail of the report was discussed in excruciating detail; the order in which things needed to be mentioned, where the emphasis needed to be placed, how much detail to go into. Everybody knew this was serious business. This document could very well end up being used in legal proceedings. The "I"s needed to be crossed and the "T"s dotted. Arses needed to be covered.

This was teaching in the modern era.

I won't go into the specifics, for obvious reasons; but my siblings filled me in on some interesting background information, which I shall now pass on to you, dear reader. But first, if you would be so kind as to indulge me in a little trip down memory lane …

When I was a wee lass, a certain level of violence was considered a regular part of everyday life. Kids played red rover and tackle footy; when you played up at home, you got belted; when you played up at school, you got caned; and if you had a problem with another kid, it wasn't unusual for you to both end up with bloodied noses. You could argue that it toughened us up, but I think it did more than just that. It forced you to develop a certain kind of social sensibility. You knew that if you made a total cunt of yourself, somebody would eventually take you to task for it, and nobody would be sympathetic when they did. "Hmmm, sounds like you were asking for a good arse-kicking, 'ay Lexy? Might teach you to pull your head in a bit from now on, 'ay?" It also taught you that you weren't bigger than the system; that you had so much room for freedom, but if you stepped outside of those limits, the system would physically fuckin' flatten you. Important lessons to learn before you get out into real world, perhaps?

Well, as we all know, that way of thinking has fallen entirely out of fashion. I guess it probably started with the hippy movement in the '60s, but the big societal shift seemed to occur in the '90s. Obviously, the cane is long gone; and I'd wager there's now more parents who don't smack their kids than parents who do; and a lot of schools have implemented zero tolerance programmes when it comes to unwanted contact—throw a punch at one of your classmates and it's instant expulsion.

So, after twenty-five years, are we starting to see any negative side-effects?

Well, apparently, yes. According to my siblings, there's now a growing number of kids—mostly boys—sometimes alarmingly young boys—and often boys growing up with single mothers—in care, because their parent/s simply can't control them. These are kids who have worked out that the statement, "Fuck you, you can't make me do that!", is entirely true. Kids who know that if an adult tells you you can't have something, you can smash the television set, throw a chair through a window, kick a hole in the wall, or get a kitchen knife, and start slicing up the furniture; and eventually the property damage will get so expensive, that the adult in question will give up and cave in to your demands. As long as you don't lay a finger on anyone else, nobody can lay a finger on you.

The ones that are well behaved enough to attend regular schools are an absolute menace. They engage in targeted harassment campaigns, in which they will annoy, insult, goad, and provoke another student into taking a swing at them…at which point, the victim finds themselves either suspended or expelled. Rinse and repeat.

To paraphrase my sis, "The boy he was bullying was twice his size and a gun rugby player. I wanted to lock the two of them in a room together and tell them to just go at it—no repercussions. Would have sorted the problem out in five minutes."

I don't know how these kids get on once they reach adulthood. I imagine most of them probably end up in gaol, at which point, I expect they learn very quickly about how violence works in the real world. I can't help but wonder though, if it wouldn't be better to let them learn that lesson sooner rather than later.