Monday, August 11, 2014

Idle minds

After generations have passed what will be looked on in regards to the state of humanity in this early century? Or will they be swept up in the moment of their time in some incalculable world of self-centered bubbles of technology and affirmations, unable to fathom what it was to be human in some part of the universe they don't need anything to do with as the serotonin levels in their brains sky rocket from a programmed chip instilled in wrist or some other scannable limb?
Think about that for a second...
This year was met with the public reality that Facebook was conducting emotional manipulation studies on almost a million of its users. It has all ready been proven that positive reinforcement from things like social media ticks and stuff like looking at a lovers profile drastically changes your levels of serotonin. 
Even now in searching for the article- I can't find it. Try typing "how does social media affect your serotonin levels" and you get nothing but facts about depression and anger.
It takes a little while but you can find it.

What does this have to do with anything? Bianca, you're being paranoid.

Correct.

I am very worried.

History has been repeating itself. We had all ready been told growing up that some shit in the world is beyond peoples' control. But reading constantly about the ever increasing state of  turmoil and injustice in America and how helpless I feel is enough to get me to write about the things I'm feeling as a way of i don't know... at least trying to deal with it logically in my head in hopes that one person might at the very least think about their actions daily and not readily accept the terms on which society has laid out for us to be "acceptable".

Don't get so distracted, is all I mean, and don't give in so readily to what you're fed, including this post.

The inspiration for post come in two forms of time: past and present...  

The present article that I read about is the recent shooting of Brown in St. Louis in which an un-armed 18 year old was shot by an SLPD officer eight consecutive times times while raising his hands in the air. The officer is currently on PAID leave and is being investigated to determine whether he is able to RETURN TO DUTY.... The Cheif Officer Belmar has not yet confirmed witnesses' statements that he had his hands in the air. The SLPD has yet to officially reveal the name of the deceased or the officer who shot him.

R.I.P. Michael Brown 




The second source for my inspiration comes from a series of interviews from Firing Line with William Buckley. A then very conservative and somewhat judgemental William Buckley goes on to talk about topics I have interests in currently in these three clips with Chuck D. about racial profiling, Allen Ginsberg on Avant Garde in which Ginsberg talks about police brutality, and a panel discussion on "hippies" and the transition from the beat generation to the hippie movement with Jack Kerouac, some idiot sociologist, and Ed Sanders.

These were filmed well over 25 years ago... that's over a whole quarter century in which these issues are very much still alive and still in question. How is it that possible? How are we STILL dealing with this kind of bull shit and in that; accepting it?

Also one more thing I just have to get off my chest...

I am indeed for hippies. I am not, however, talking about the pseudo-ketamine driven burning man internet driven colloquial fake of a hippie who thinks that because they attend some corporate sponsored festival every year with a name like "earth beam awakening" or "psychedelo-douche-my-fur-boots gathering" in a garish neon costume getting their event filmed by oh i dont know? some company like TACO BELL and MTV..

Look- the only thing I'm trying to say, and I'm only going to say it once and never talk about it ever again, is that if your idea of a spiritual awakening is going to FUCKING BURNING MAN... then you seriously... SERIOUSLY need to reconsider your reality and maybe go through a few more revolutions.. the only way I could explain it to people is like this.. if you've been to asia.. burning man is like the full moon party of the west filled with stark commercialism, corporate sponsorship and exploitation, and factual entrapment by state and federal police forces (i.e. while in the kitchen at the flowershop in 2013 I overheard someone on the phone with someone driving back from burning man talking about how these naked lady cops were coercing people in admitting to having illegal drugs and then arresting them on the spot... that's FUCKED)

and oh yeah.. try to stay off the k... for reals... mushrooms are so much safer and better for you. 



Allen Ginsberg



Chuck D.


The "Hippies"



*i am, as a human subject to my own hypocrisies. I just have a lot of questions to pose, and this is how I deal with it. Writing, reading (maybe too much), playing music, drawing, painting, and sucking at skating around.


PUBLIC ENEMY


Last rhetorical question- Who cares what I think?

Wednesday, August 6, 2014

No Gods, No war, Know Gods, Know War?

Everybody else was in bed sleeping.
"If you want we can turn this off, if this isn't the kind of thing you want to listen to?"
Swimming in wine in a lake house in the south of France, I look at him in front of me in all honesty, glowing from the fire we lit for warmth and ambiance, and say,
"No I want to listen. I think it's important"
"That's good. Sometimes, I don't know, I just have to now whats going on and think about what is going on."
"It's refreshing. I don't mind listening at all. You know, back home if I mentioned something about war or brought up the word "Gaza" to most of my friends it'd be like talking about unicorns or something to them. A lot of them think it's pointless to think about like 'oh, I cant do anything about it so why should I think about it?' It makes me kind of mad sometimes. Like... OK you spent all this time getting yourself famous for your art, or how good you can party or whatever, on your instagram and all these supposedly cool media outlets, all these magazines, but you can't say anything about the real world or things that are going on at home even? and to that, you can't DO anything? Don't you have legs that walk, or a mouth with a voice in it? It's pointless to be mad at them about it, how 'uncool' they think it is to have opinions on things like this, but it is frustrating that in fact they can do things but just choose to not."
We listened to the radio on his podcast about the increasing violence shed on Palestinians in Israel, how it's hard to defend either side as they are both actively engaging in a war, and how it's impossible to believe that anyone in their right mind actually wants death for people or for this case, whole nations. We discuss both possibilities that both nations are wrong and just need to cease immediately both offenses.
But what do we, as people soaked in comfort, really know?
The next day we walked up a hay ridden road from a lily pad covered, wondrous lake we swam in. We had just seen a wild snake for the second time. I think, there in that moment, that I feel eternally lucky to have been brought up in  the San Francisco Bay Area.
That I am allowed freely to have thoughts like these ones, and that my mother taught me well.
I propose, "What do you do about these things? Do you go in mass right up to the borders of these countries and demand that they stop this? That you are indeed for life and prosperity for everyone?"
"I dont know. There are some people who have said that- that people should just go to the country and demand peace. It's unrealistic but it's a good idea. Obviously a very dangerous one, but still good. "

to be continued...

On Violence 2 - CCSF's Unexpected Encounter with SFPD officers




Violence.
City College of San Francisco students were given permission to meet with one of  CCSF's special trustees, Robert Argrella, to discuss his recent proposal for a payment plan that would make it impossible for undocumented students to continue studying and to demand that he resign. The meeting was to be held at Conlon Hall, a facility that is open to the public for admissions and for other student services. With permission, the protesters met and proceeding to the building where they were met, by surprise, by city college police and then shortly after the SFPD arrived to aid in barricading the building 







Shortly after, violence errupted. It seems as though no one has heard and everyone just forgot.