totalitarianism today

A penchant for geeky men (and other worlds).

Science fiction author China Mieville comes out about his geekiness, which, I might add, is the sexiest quality a man can possess in the world of smooth talkers and well-suited resumes. In an interview with Lou Anders, Mieville admits:

Yeah, I am completely a geek. I find it very interesting entering my thirties, because the early thirties basically seems to be the era of the revenge of the geek, when those of us who didn’t have particularly exciting teenage years because we were too busy obsessively collecting comics and playing Dungeons & Dragons suddenly start running the world. But geeks are able to use their powers for good and evil, and when I look at people like Rumsfeld I definitely think I’m seeing a fellow geek, just a geek on the dark side. But yes, I feel fantastically geeky. I’m not one of those people who’s enormously proud of being a geek, but nor am I particularly ashamed of it.

And then he hits the nail on the head of my personal affinity for geeks:

What geeks have, geeks in any field, be it a field like science fiction or a field like tropical fish, is that they are moved to do what they do because of a love and passion for the field above all else. No one ever got into science fiction for the sex or prestige. They got into it because they love it.

The ability to imagine a world governed by different laws, social norms, and taboos says alot about an individual. Namely, it says that he/she sees the big picture-- the current rules or regime do not represent the entire realm of possibility. So what holds Mieville back from being the perfect geek? Well, in the Iron Council, he can't get past the trade unions as a means of empowering workers. Granted, no man is perfect, but faith in trade unions won't get you past first base.

Saving the world for American tourists who want to see the "quaint and natural".

Cat killers.

Amy Phillips asks interesting (even rather charming) questions about the governor of Wisconsin's opposition to cat hunting. However, I wouldn't consider asking her to cat-sit if I were of the feline-raising persuasion.

Nice year for a Chinese wedding?

The New York city Chinatown market for all-things-marriage-related might not be doing so well this year. Jada Yuan explains why:

This is what’s known as a “widow” year in Chinese culture. It’s an almanac quirk that recurs every four years or so when the first day of the Chinese New Year (set by the lunar calendar) falls after lichun, the first day of spring (set by the solar calendar). A year with no lichun means no harvest, no passion, no new beginnings—and possibly no children.

The widow year began on February 9th, which might explain the 50% increase in marriage licenses for Asian couples during January. While some Chinese Americans are choosing to take warnings about bad luck seriously, others are effecting a more pragmatic approach. Yuan notes that green cards and competition with Super Bowl games require a balancing act with tradition. Thrify yet somewhat inauspicious Chinese Americans should consider economizing by getting married in a widow year-- the cost of a Chinatown-adorned wedding might even be lower due to overstocking and decreased consumer demand.

Fukuyama on state-building and De Soto.

Now that state-building has become an official "practice" for those in the field of foreign policy studies, it makes sense for Frank Fukuyama to share a few of his "lessons learned" with state-builders-in-the-making. This is a truly fascinating interview in which Fukuyama discusses all things foreign policy. When asked about the role played by Hernando De Soto in the current aplomb for new institutionalism, Fukuyama remarks:

I think that Hernando de Soto is probably the single person that is responsible for this focus on governance in developing countries, because his book, “The Other Path,” was really about weak governance in places like his own home country of Peru. He has this famous example of trying to get a small business license and it took something like nine months and $1,400 in bribes and so forth in order to simply open a business. Th is example does not simply illustrate too extensive government, because any government has to register small businesses, but it shows well how ineffective a government can be. So he set the agenda that you need strong institutions and you need a rule of law. He emphasizes the informal sector a great deal, but a lot of the reason that you have an informal sector in poor countries is that the formal sector is so bad. In fact, in his first book, he’s got a whole section on why it is better to live under rule of law rather than have to live by all of these informal laws. He also talks about how much you lose by not having regular, transparent, and understandable rules by which people can interact with each other.

Snide appreciation for the end of love.

Clem Snide's latest album, End of Love, is their best work to date, combining lyrical strength with comfortable, unflashy use of instruments. Singer Eef Barzelay's lyrics grace love, desire, age, friendship, the mundane, fear, status, homosexuality, and all the usual emotional upheavals without the cheapness of prosletyzing or the ennui of the savoir-faire so common these days. In the vein of The Cowboy Junkies' The Caution Horses, End of Love tastes best with a hammock, a breeze, a little unsavored longing, and a little iced tea sweetened with mint and bourbon.

Barzelay wrote most of the songs for this album while "knee-deep in dark and slippery emotional goo"-- his mother was dying of cancer, his wife's mother had just passed away, he was moving his family from Brooklyn to Nashville, and he lacked the requisite financial resources. In his own words:

I wrote many of the songs in my head while touring in the van, and with so much chaos going on at once, the words just seemed to pour right out. For me, this record is about failing triumphantly.”

It's been a long time since a musician celebrated a taboo-laden topic like failure so well (maybe Frank Zappa's approach to his own death is comparable).

I disagree with Thomas Vale's review, which locates the album's influence as closer to Brooklyn than Nashville. The album is Nashville to the core-- Nashville once the stage outfits and bar brawls and Hank Williams imitations are no longer pertinent, the Nashville of heavy summer heat and cloying scent of magnolias mixing with barbeque and dusk. In fact, one of the reasons for the flowing, well-fitted quality of this album might very well be the Nashville influence. Those of us haunted enough to be raised in the South know that failure isn't greeted as banefully in Nashville as it is in Brooklyn.

The title song, "End of Love", is a sharp mockery of the angsty enfant miserable, the kid who avoids love for fear of what it might do to his/her impeccable resume of cool. Barzelay seems to suggest that knowledge of love's inevitable end is not reason enough to foregoe it.

You're so sophisticated
Your mind's been liberated
You're the first to know when the movements come and go
Just as the curtain closes
I stroke authenthic poses
Now that we know all the words to history's sad song

"Collapse" observes the death of his mother, describing her funeral as a "grassroots initiative" which "haressed the power of dust". The banjo keeps the distance from sounding cold, while the lyrics break affection and grief into its component public parts.

One of the most beautiful songs on this album, "Fill Me With Your Light", is about attraction and the soft dynamics of seduction. The guitars border on dreamier Cure tunes, and the loops are as exciting as the moment when mere crush turns to translatable desire.

A true seduction's what it is
The parts are neither hers nor his
I would prefer you don't remove your gloves       
Fill me with your light
I will not make a sound
Always throw the fight
And take it lying down
And if you wear the mermaid suit
There'll be no sliding down your chute
My sailor's left to flunder in your wake
See the bubble- it goes pop
A false start, an unlikely stop
I'm not convinced of anything I say

As a band who started on the grunge scene and chose their name from William Burrough's professional asshole character, Clem Snide might take their own lyrics more seriously-- "Now that I'm found, I miss being lost". Don't miss this album or any of the other gems on it, including "God Answers Back" (what Bill Graham might say to God if he really believed in a loving Christian deity), "Something Beautiful" (the sexiest song on an album released this month, and a paean to rapprochement with lust), "When We Become", and "Weird".

For  more information on Clem Snide, the band, the individuals, the shared interests, and the latest venture, see:

• Book of Love
• "Fill Me With Your Light" MP3
• The Self-Starter Foundation

 

Are the kids alright?

The Partnership for A Drug-Free America, long known for its unbiased approach to the political war against drugs, released a report entitled "Generation Rx", showing the rise of prescription and over-the-counter drugs by youth and teens. Apparently, one in five American teenagers (or 18%) reported "abusing" presciption painkiller Vicodin. Hope to dismayed drug warriors-- try expanding the Bush Doctrine of preemtpive war to include prescriptions. If you can't reason with the drugged-out youth, just bomb them.

Lyrics for thunderstorms.

Lest anyone accuse of me of being unprepared for the realities of life, I spent the afternoon making a playlist for the impending thunderstorms. Lyrics interact well with lightning, so the quality of lyrics was a primary consideration, though in a few cases, lack of lyrics made the case for inclusion:

• Idiot Wind by Bob Dylan
• Righteously by Lucinda Williams
• Black Flowers by Chris Isaak
• The Other Kind by Steve Earle
• Neighborhood #1 (Tunnels) by The Arcade Fire
• Temper by John Cale
• Avalanche by Leonard Cohen
• Mademoiselle Chante Le Blues by Patricia Kaas
• Cause Cheap Is How I Feel by Cowboy Junkies
• The Wind by PJ Harvey
• You're The Storm by The Cardigans
• Magic and Lies by John Cale
• Chinese Handcuffs by The New Year
• Havalina by The Pixies
• Natural High by Vanessa Paradis
• Am I Too Blue by Lucinda Williams
• Blue Valse by John Coltrane
• Flute Concerto (1999) by Martin Kennedy
• Illegal Smile by John Prine
• "Infrared Roses" album by the Grateful Dead, esp. Magnesium Night Light

And lest I be accused of "not seeing the big picture", my preparations for life extend beyond mere music-- I also purchased Scourge of Worlds for viewing tonight, in the impasse between hearty thunders.

Back to the future.

The French National Library has decided that Google is a tool for the domination of Anglo-Saxon or American ideas, and therefore antithetical to French culture. Not even my Francophilic side can muster enough sympathy for the French cultural elite when they exhibit their whininess about failure to compete on the international cultural market.

L'ennui.

Cedric Kahn's 1998 film, L'Ennui, reveals the banality of narcissism as it destroys an ill-fated sexual affair. Most reviewers mistake the narcissism for something more run-of-the-mill, namely, sexual obsession (see Sean Axmaker's mind-numbingly dull review). Based on a book by Italian novelist Alberto Moravia, the film tells the story of a philosophy teacher (Martin) who, just separated from his wife, meets the young and buxom Cecilia, former model of a painter who died making love to her. As their relationship grows, we follow the teacher into despair (when he is unable to quit her even if he wants to) and even jealousy. Since very little of Cecilia's personality is revealed-- she is depicted as a young girl who has learned her value in providing sexual pleasure to older, bored men-- the possibility of love between them is never explored.

Moravia himself is a fascinating character-- Bill Marx even went so far as to suggest that his "kinky subversive realism" is back in style. Marx understands Moravia's writings as related to his opposition to Italian fascism and his critique of commercial culture. On Marx's interpretation:

Moravia's plots and characters are ambivalent about repetition; half-heartedly, they treasure the pleasures of the familiar, the joys of routine. Moravia uses sensuality to explore the individual's response to the leveling political and technological pressures of modernity: sex offers a convenient intersection of nature and automation, instinct and habit, the public and private, fetish and freedom. Thus the most striking aspect of Moravia's fiction isn't its once-daring sexual focus but the cool calculated way it looks at love—or the lack of it—in the modern world."

Marx's understanding of Moravia's fiction is similar to my own intuitions about the film, Lénnui, which is based on the novel, Boredom. Moravia's tragic view of life is intimately tied to his fear of man becoming a machine-- a fear that could only be exacerbated by the sound of Mussolini's parades, marches, and culture of conformity. Revealing his inner Kantian, Moravia states, "the use of man as a means, and not as an end, is the root of all evil." Certainly, extreme patriotism and reverence for a quasi-mystical "state" which rules in the best interests of the ignorant, easily-led masses, makes precisely such use of individuals as a means to protecting the power of the ruling elite. Moravia's fear that over-identification with a "national interest" might turn people into mindless, simpering tools is certainly not a misplaced one.

Cecilia is a tool for Martin's mid-life crisis and post-divorce identity issues. She is nothing save beautiful on her own. And Martin certainly doesn't want to treat her as a fellow human being-- you can almost see him rolling his eyes when she opens her mouth. Dutifully, Cecilia limits most of her screen presence to silent stares and sex. Moravia would be pleased with Kahn's film adaption of his novel, although the extent to which reviewers have focused on it as a film about sexual obsession might be worrisome. L'Ennui is about much more than sex-- it is about the end of human intimacy and the insubstantial quality of relations in which true partnership and mutual respect have been replaced by manipulation.