Archive for June, 2007

07w26:1 A Variety of Links Lunk and Thoughts Thunk

by timothy. 2 Comments

An overview: Since the last Goodreads arrived in your inbox,

  • Rob Labossiere was kind enough to review the first of my Timereading Series, Outdoor Air Conditioning on Sally McKay’s blog (but I had nothing to do with the gun-cock-cop)
  • I felt the need to comment on the recent Luminato festival over at my blog.
  • Commentator LM asked last week (at Jennifer MacMakon’s Simpleposie) why I wasn’t included in the recently opened MOCCA show featuring disagreeable artists, since I (along with Eldon Garnet and Thrush Holmes) piss off and irritate lots of people.
  • I also found time to contribute to the discussion on Sally McKay’s thoughts on the Toronto art-scene here (but I wish she could have deleted my accidental dupe).

In blog news, after surviving cancer, Cedric Caspesyan has apparantly realized life is too short for the art-world’s mean people, Chris Hand’s Zeke’s Gallery blog has been apparently sued out of existance (and yet, the ads remains) and Franklin Einspruch doesn’t plan to update his blog until the Fall.

I did manage to develop a Goodreads podcast link, to provide an alternate and direct way to access whatever mp3 links I find (and have found): http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/rss/podcast.php

Supporting the Troops

Meanwhile, three Canadian soldiers died last week prompting the City of Toronto to reverse the decision to remove the stupid ‘support our troops’ decals on firetrucks and ambulances in favor of leaving them on indefinitely since pacifists are still considered more loathsome in our society than the people who actually volunteer to kill. And if you think I’m exaggerating, consider that Afghani President Hamid Karzai was shown on the CBC news last Saturday night complaining about NATO’s heavy-handed tactics of ‘shelling a village from thirty-some kilometres away’ and killing civilians in the process (ref video clip here; CBC related here and here).

The report went on to say that as of Saturday, (23 June) 90 Afghan civilians had been killed in the previous ten days. Notice that this report was buried on the Saturday 11 o’clock news, and that when things like this are reported, suddenly it’s the problem of the ‘NATO coalition’ and Canada’s pride at the fact that the Cdn forces are the ones doing most of the heavy-lifting in the region is obfuscated. But we have to support the troops, or keep our mouths shut otherwise, and ignore the ratio that 3 Canadian lives are worth more to our conscience than the 90 or so people who were alive at the beginning of the month, whose names and faces we will never know, and who ‘we’ are not supposed to be there to accidentally kill but rather to accidentally help, through what could be called ‘aggressive peacekeeping’ in the bullshit lingo of the military.

I also write this in light of seeing last April the Frontline World report (video available on July 9th) on the Canadians in Afghansistan, which prompted commentator Alex March from Edmonton to say: ‘I am afraid the Canadians are treating the Afghanistan people with a combination of traditional Department of Indian Affairs false promises and CISIS paranoia. Sad it will cost many lives unnecessarily,’ with a rebuttal by one of the soldiers Mr. Annoymous, who tells us the reporters did what they typically do, which is to obfuscate and simplify, which of course prompted a response by the filmmakers … and… on and on, the cycles of animosity never do end to they?

Andrew Cash wrote about the decals in Now Magazine during the first week of May, notable to me for including this facile sentence indicative of the whole problem of the ‘support the troops’ sloganeering (people choosing stock phrases rather than a conscious awareness of what they’re saying): ‘Who among us isn’t deeply saddened by the news of ever increasing numbers of uniformed Canadians killed or seriously injured in the war.’ I stand up to say I am not deeply saddened because I don’t pretend to be an idiot out of social convention. Out of a population of heroin users I understand some will turn up as corpses with needles hanging from their tourniquet arms. Similarly, I understand that some soldiers going to war zones will come home in body bags. Why should I feel upset about either when it’s continually presented to me as a fact of the world that no one seems to have any intention of changing? If we do want to change it, how about we start by stopping the rhetoric and unquestioning support of militarism? Therefore, I don’t support the troops.

The Human Union

I found this when I was researching the Human Network links below, although I have to ask, why do progressive websites often display such poor design?

From ‘The Human Union Declaration’ found on the site:

To force me to act in compliance with a political system that goes to war against my fellow humans is a denial of my humanity and I will resist such efforts to the best of my abilities.

To force me to act in compliance with a political system which discriminates politically against my fellow humans is a denial of my humanity and I will resist such efforts to the best of my abilities.

Human Union
http://humanunion.info/

The Human Network

The recent anniversary of the Tienanmen Square Massacre prompted PBS’ Frontline to rebroadcast their April 2006 documentary The Tank Man, which is available online at the Frontline website, in four parts. In the fourth and last part, Yahoo!’s complicity in facilitating Chinese censorship led into a report that Cisco Systems has sold the latest technology to China to enable such control of information. I laughed when I heard this, given how Cisco’s latest advert campaign, launched last autumn, announces itself as facilitators of ‘the human network’. Interestingly, their commercial features Toronto, leading to one of those WTF? moments – is it because we have the world’s largest communications tower? Is it because relational aesthetics is hot here? Nevertheless, the scene illustrating ‘welcome to a world where people subscribe to people and not magazines’ in which girls meet up in front of City Hall through coordinating on their phones inspired me somewhat. I like the idea of living in a city where people subscribe to people and not magazines. But I also have this sense that Goodreads has managed to blur the two – a subscription to a webzine/Mr. Timothy person. If only more people bought me diner….

The Tank Man | PBS Frontline
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/tankman/view/

Welcome to the Human Network on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x60pWzJvb9Q
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEfPxnbWr8U

Welcome to the Human Network| Cisco Systems
http://www.cisco.com/web/thehumannetwork/index.html

Facebook

Welcome to the world where people are subscribing to people via Facebook. I joined Facebook at the end of April.

Let’s face it, Facebook is here to stay | Michael Geist
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/211078

Facebook banned for Ontario staffers | Robert Benzie
http://www.thestar.com/News/article/210014
// it’s great how this story is illustrated with a picture of an old man

Art

The Art World by its nature is nepotistic. Jerry Saltz had a problem with that a few months ago:

Not Buying It | Jerry Saltz
http://www.artnet.com/magazineus/features/saltz/saltz4-30-07.asp

Some Links I found myself forwarding to friends

On Shakespeare

Shakespeare: the Biography (Paperback) | Peter Ackroyd
http://goodreads.ca/shorty/amazon/shakespearebio/
// I’m currently reading this biography of Shakespeare and it’s so so good. Yes, that’s two so’s for emphasis, not a typo.

In Search of Shakespeare | Michael Wood
http://goodreads.ca/shorty/amazon/shakespeardvd/
// I saw this when it was first broadcast on PBS in 2004. It was so good I actually found it haunting. Especially the bit with the photographs. When I found the accompanying book later that year in a remaindered store, I of course bought it.

On Teenagers

Trashing Teens | Hara Estroff Marano
http://goodreads.ca/shorty/psychologytoday/teenagers/

Chomsky on Pomo

On Postmodernism | Noam Chomsky
http://cscs.umich.edu/~crshalizi/chomsky-on-postmodernism.html
“Now Derrida, Lacan, Lyotard, Kristeva, etc. — even Foucault, whom I knew and liked, and who was somewhat different from the rest — write things that I also don’t understand, but (1) and (2) don’t hold: no one who says they do understand can explain it to me and I haven’t a clue as to how to proceed to overcome my failures. That leaves one of two possibilities: (a) some new advance in intellectual life has been made, perhaps some sudden genetic mutation, which has created a form of “theory” that is beyond quantum theory, topology, etc., in depth and profundity; or (b) … I won’t spell it out.” // Haven’t I sent this out before? If I haven’t, I always meant to.

The Norman Finkelstein Case

Dear Canadian Universities: you should hire this guy and prove that you’ve got more going on than the so-called superior American schools.

The Commonplace Cowardice of Responsible Professors; What the Finkelstein Tenure Fight Tells Us About the State of Academia | Robert Jensen
http://www.counterpunch.com/jensen05252007.html

Noam Chomsky Accuses Alan Dershowitz of Launching a “Jihad” to Block Norman Finkelstein From Getting Tenure at Depaul University | Democracy Now!
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/17/1327203

“It Takes an Enormous Amount of Courage to Speak the Truth When No One Else is Out There” — World-Renowned Holocaust, Israel Scholars Defend DePaul Professor Norman Finkelstein as He Fights for Tenure
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/09/1514221

Norman Finkelstein | Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norman_Finkelstein

NormanFinkelstein.com
http://www.normanfinkelstein.com/

Good riddence Blair

British Author Tariq Ali on the Resignation of Tony Blair: ‘The Fact That He’s Leaving is Because He’s So Hated’
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/11/1531215
2007-05-11

Selections from Democracy Now!

Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson Slams His Friend Mitt Romney for Flip-Flopping on Abortion, Stem Cell Research, Torture in Attempt to Win GOP Presidential Nomination
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/25/1421228
2007-06-25

John Perkins on “The Secret History of the American Empire: Economic Hit Men, Jackals, and the Truth about Global Corruption
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/05/149254
2007-06-05

The Task Force Report Should Be Annulled – Member of 2005 APA Task Force on Psychologist Participation in Military Interrogations Speaks Out
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/06/01/1457247
2007-06-01

100th Anniversary of Rachel Carson: Remembering the Woman Who Helped Launch the Environmental Movement
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/31/1412219
2007-05-31

In Debt We Trust: America Before the Bubble Burst
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/04/1343218
2007-04-04

In Rare Joint Interview, Noam Chomsky and Howard Zinn on Iraq, Vietnam, Activism and History
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/16/1338223
2007-04-16

From SDS to Life After Capitalism: Z Mag Founder Michael Albert on Activism, “Parecon” and a Model for a Participatory Society
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/17/1327211
2007-04-17

Howard Zinn Urges U.S. Soldiers to Heed Thoreau’s Advice and ‘Resist Authority’
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/17/1851213
2007-04-17

Legendary Broadcaster Bill Moyers Returns to Airwaves With Critical Look at How U.S. News Media Helped Bush Admin Sell the Case for War
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/25/1414222
2007-04-25

Fighting Fascism: The Americans – Women and Men – Who Fought In the Spanish Civil War
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/30/1321243
2007-04-30

Abraham Lincoln Brigade ‘Represents an Important Part of the American Soul’ – Harry Belafonte Pays Tribute to U.S. Vets Who Fought Fascism in Spain
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/04/30/1321250
2007-04-30

Banned by Army: Folk Singer Joan Baez Can’t Sing to Wounded Soldiers at Walter Reed
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/04/1419207
2007-05-04 // Of course I feel the need to point out here that maybe the reason Joan Baez was uninvited to sing for wounded soldiers was not because of politics but because young hurt boys would probably prefer a Britany Spears tits-and-ass show than an ethereally voiced sixty-something ex-hippy.

Mother’s Day for Peace: A Dramatic Reading of Julia Ward Howe’s Mother’s Day Proclamation
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/11/1531255
2007-05-11

Studs Terkel At 95: ‘Ordinary People Are Capable of Doing Extraordinary Things, and That’s What It’s All About. They Must Count!’
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/16/140218
2007-05-16

George Monbiot: If We Don’t Deal with Climate Change We Condemn Hundreds of Millions of People to Death
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/18/1429219
2007-05-18

Author Paul Hawken on ‘Blessed Unrest: How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming’
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/23/1430208
2007-05-23

War Made Easy: How Presidents & Pundits Keep Spinning Us to Death
http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=07/05/29/1322235
2007-05-29

Charles Taylor Roundup

A roundup of the Charles Taylor content I’m aware of, and which flourished after he won the Templeton Prize.

The Enright Files – A Celebration of Charles Taylor | CBC Ideas
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/audio/taylor2007-05.mp3 [Goodreads Mirror]
Michael Enright, host of The Sunday Edition, in conversation with the Canadian philosopher, thinker and winner of the 2007 Templeton Prize, Charles Taylor.

Modern Social Imaginaries | Charles Taylor & David Cayley
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/audio/taylor2005-12.mp3 [Goodreads Mirror]
What makes modernity different from all previous ways of life? Canadian philosopher Charles Taylor talks to IDEAS producer David Cayley about what makes us modern.

Charles Taylor’s Modern Social Imaginaries and Cultural Transmission Theory | Mark E. Madsen
http://www.mmadsen.org/2006/01/kens_comment_to.html

Charles Taylor and the Hegelian Eden Tree: Canadian Philosophy and Compradorism | Ron Dart
http://www.vivelecanada.ca/article.php/20070430235045487

Canadian philosopher strikes paydirt | Michael McGann
http://www.mercatornet.com/articles/canadian_philosopher_strikes_paydirt/

Charles Taylor ‘Religion and Violence’ | Charles Taylor
http://www.tvo.org/podcasts/bi/audio/BICharlesTaylor042207.mp3
// I was at that lecture (standing-room only!) and posted my lecture notes for Goodreads 05w08.3

Religion and Violence | Charles Taylor
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/lectures/taylor/rel_violence04.html
Religion and Violence explores the complex relationship among modernity, religion, and categorical violence – namely, violence directed against people on the basis of their belonging to a certain category or group. Professor Charles Taylor will discuss the rising tide of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and terrorism, and ask what connection this phenomenon has to modernity.

Charles Taylor on Religion and Violence | The Sunday Edition with Michael Enright
http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/media/taylor_se041128.ram
Real Audio file on the above lecture, recorded a week later (48.53min)

Philosophy, spirituality and the self – Part 1 | The Philosopher’s Zone ABC Radio
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/audio/taylor2007-04_p1.mp3 [Goodreads Mirror]
Charles Taylor, the distinguished Canadian philosopher, has just been awarded the Templeton Prize, the world’s most highly endowed award for intellectual achievement. This week on The Philosopher’s Zone, he talks to ABC Radio National’s Tom Morton, about how we are intellectually and how we got to where we are.

Philosophy, spirituality and the self – Part 2 | | The Philosopher’s Zone ABC Radio
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/audio/taylor2007-04_p2.mp3 [Goodreads Mirror]
Charles Taylor, the distinguished Canadian philosopher, has just been awarded the Templeton Prize, the world’s most highly endowed award for intellectual achievement. This week, we hear the second part of his conversation with ABC Radio National’s Tom Morton, about how a moral view of the human self might be possible in an age of scepticism and neo-Darwinism. And Danny Postel, senior editor of opendemocracy.net returns to the program with news of Iranian dissident journalist, Akbar Ganji, who is touring the West talking to eminent philosophers and political thinkers.

Manuel Delanda Roundup

Since Darren sent me the link which I included in the last Goodreads (reproduced below) I found more Delanda stuff, which I quite enjoyed listening to at work, and which lead me to get his books, A Thousand Years of Non-Linear History and A New Philosophy of Soceity.

Manuel DeLanda on Deleuze | Manuel DeLanda
http://goodreads.timothycomeau.com/manueldelanda
wrote Darren: “here’s an interesting video of manuel delanda taking a trip through deleuze and it’s not all that confusing”

From Manuel DeLanda Annotated Bibliography:

Manuel DeLanda, ‘Deleuze and the Use of the Genetic Algorithm in Art’ presented at the Art & Technology Lectures, Columbia University, New York, 08.04.04
http://ccnmtl.columbia.edu/itc/visualarts/dmc/ramfiles/delanda_04_08_04.ram
// (Real Video, 84 mins)

Manuel DeLanda, Democracy, Economics and the MilitaryÕ presented at Democracy Unrealized, Vienna, 20.04.01
rtsp://81.3.51.68/platform1_vienna/de_landa.rm
(Real Video, 62 mins)

Deleuze Day 3 | Tate
http://www.tate.org.uk/onlineevents/archive/deleuze/deleuze_day2_3.ram
(Real Video, 50 mins)

Manuel DeLanda, ‘Nature Space Society’ presented as the first Nature Space Society lecture at the Tate Modern, London, 05.03.04
http://www.tate.org.uk/onlineevents/archive/naturespacesociety/delanda.ram
DeLanda argues for a Deleuzian philosophy of nature. In the first half he rejects a sharp distinction between culture and nature. He demonstrates instead the direct interaction between the biological and social, citing examples from William McNeill’s Plagues and Peoples, and Alfred Crosby’s Ecological Imperialism. We must dismiss social-constructivism’s obsession with language and cultural representation. In the second half, DeLanda argues that, in order to avoid this provincial anthropocentrism, we must be realists, but not essentialists. We must historicize nature, and replace ideas about ‘laws of nature’ with Deleuze’s singularities (special, topological points) and affects (the capacity to affect and be affected).(Real Video, 3 hours)

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