Cry Little Sister

Dutch singer Charlotte Wessels covers Gerald McMahon's song written for Joel Schumacher's 1987 teen vampire flick, The Lost Boys.  McMahon wrote the song  at Schumacher's request without seeing the movie.  It's easy to see why Schumacher was pleased.  In its broody unspecificity, it manages to be one of those magical fits.

Whose moon?

William Blake, 1793.

In 1970, an anthropologist in Alaska asked the members of the Inuit village she was visiting if they were aware that NASA had landed a crew on the moon the previous summer.  As reported in a 1987 article by a colleague recounting the incident, she informed them of the mission and the artifacts that were left by astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on July 20, 1969 including their footsteps, containers of human waste,  and an artificially billowing American flag (thanks to springs and wires) that had been difficult to raise and that had toppled in the blowback of the lunar lander as it rose from the surface of the moon to reunite with the orbiter.  Told of the achievement,   

[t]he Inuits began laughing, and when the anthropologist inquired why, they replied: ‘We didn’t know this was the first time you white people had been to the Moon. Our shamans have been going for years. They go all the time. . . . The issue is not whether we go to visit our relatives, but how we treat them and their homeland when we go.

In 1970 it was easier to find pockets of uncolonized peoples from Alaska to Brazil to Africa to Asia and Oceania, and we know that the Inuit reverence and affinity for the moon was not unique among those less tuned into the strains of the developed world.  But you didn't have to be an Inuit to be alarmed a few decades later at intimations from the Latrobe Brewing Company division of Anheuser Busch  that it intended to beam advertisements for its Rolling Rock Beer on the surface of the moon to be visible to all on Earth.  The feat, which at various other times has been hinted at as a PR aspiration by both Coke and Pepsi, turns out to be prohibitively expensive to engineer and may even be impossible, and the threat turned out to be the extent of it, but experience with capitalism was all you needed to feel violated by the mere suggestion that it was a corporate ambition.

The topic of Mary-Jane Rubenstein's Astrotopia is the subtitle: "The Dangerous Religion of the Corporate Space Race."  In short it is about the unacknowledged religious foundation to the impetus of certain billionaires of the Western hemisphere to turn capitalism's destructive tools toward the heavens (having nearly depleted the home planet with them).  Never mind the "for all mankind" pretext of NASA's mission statement; the space race was undertaken as much for American glory and pwning of the Soviets who with Sputnik and subsequent orbits of the earth with manned (or rather "dogged") spacecraft had caught Washington off guard in the Eisenhower years-- Rubenstein demonstrates that in this privatized age of exploration, the hobby of Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos and  Richard Branson (for which we are all paying thanks to generous grants to these billionaires to the tune of billions and billions of dollars on our behalf from our Federal government) is for very little mankind.  

David Gruber and David Wengrow's The Dawn of Everything argues that the organization of human society is not an inexorable linear march to the logical conclusion of neoliberalism but rather a fluid thing that has taken turns in multiple directions and degrees of egalitarianism at every point in human history -- and is not prohibited from turning again.   But Rubenstein notes that the religious foundation of Western colonial capitalism in the first chapters of Genesis-- in which God grants those he created in his image dominion over creation-- is what fueled and rationalized European dominance of the planet in its Christian origins* and, in the absence of planetary consensus continues to justify agnostic capitalism's designs on the extraterrestrial.  In this view, the moon belongs to whoever exploits it first-- the hell with Inuit shamans, lunar relatives and the rest of us.

There have been strains of commonality in the attitude of the international community to space exploration even since Sputnik.  In 1957, the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) was founded with headquarters in Vienna, as a means of monitoring that the nascent era of extra-planetary exploration be to the benefit of all nations (if not explicitly all humans).  From the beginning, the mission of keeping outer space de-militarized was waylaid by the ongoing heating of the Space Race between the United States and Soviet Union.  Nevertheless, COPUOS in spite of periods of inactivity managed to carve out several treaties. including the Outer Space Treaty in 1967 and the Moon Treaty in 1979,  promoting peaceful cooperation between nations with emphasis on scientific investigation rather than belligerent competition in the service of commerce in whatever would come as earth expanded its reach into the heavens.  The trouble was getting signatories beyond non-spacefaring nations. 

Over the decades-- as the smog of space junk surrounding the planet and obscuring the view of the universe even to the dwindling few who remain uncolonized to the developed world has exploded to millions of objects of varying size-- the list of spacefaring nations has grown beyond the original 2 to 17, with China joining the US and Russia in sending manned craft since 2003.   India intends to follow suit with a crewed mission by 2025 and to follow it up with a permanently crewed space station by 2035 and eventually its own lunar base.  China and Europe are cooperating on plans for their own base, with the US shut out thanks to its unfriendliness toward an Asian superpower.  Privatization of Space has been on the American agenda from its origins as envisioned by  Wernher von Braun in influential popular writings about the promise of space that began debuting in the 1950's after the ex-Nazi was welcomed into the bosom of American rocket science shortly after surrendering to the Allies in 1945.  American presidents had always emphasized American superiority over international cooperation in the space race-- those were American flags it planted on each landing on the moon, not Earth flags.  But naturally it was during the Reagan era that participation of the private sector in the development of the American space program became official policy.  Subsequent legislation by Bush elder, Clinton and Bush younger guaranteed that the future of the American program lay in private enterprise, but it was  Barack Obama's Commercial Space Launch Competitiveness Act (CSLCA), a bipartisan achievement that made it law that whatever resources any US citizen was able to extract from outer space exploration was the property of the citizen that really opened up the floodgates to the ambitions of Musk, Bezos and Branson.  

The question of whose sky, moon, sun, stars and universe we see as we look upwards was answered by fiat during Trump's last year in office.   As Mary-Jane Rubenstein notes in Astrotopia, 

In the language of Executive Order 13914, “the United States does not view [outer space] as a commons. Accordingly, it shall be the policy of the United States to encourage . . . the public and private recovery and use of resources in outer space.”

In a symbolic gesture NASA has already sold you down the river with a dime.  As Rubinstein writes, 

since “practical purposes” are all that really count, NASA decided to prove space isn’t a commons by buying some of it. In September 2021, the space agency paid Lunar Outpost ten cents as a down payment for some lunar soil. Once the space-mining company gathers the regolith and deposits it elsewhere on the Moon, NASA will pay the firm ninety more cents for the “delivered” materials. As NASA explains, “this process will establish a critical precedent that lunar resources can be extracted and purchased from the private sector in compliance with Article 2 and other provisions of the Outer Space Treaty.” In other words, buying lunar resources will demonstrate that it’s possible to buy lunar resources. And if anyone objects, they can bring it to COPUOS, which will dutifully record the objection in minutes that nobody reads.

So much for the benefit of all humanity.   The best things in life may be free, but the sky and everything in it are not among them.

~~~~~

* Characterized by a brutal exploitation and extermination of otherness emulated, with unambiguous American encouragement and assistance, by the Israeli government of Binyamin Netanyahu's policy toward Palestinians and playing out in real time in Gaza before our very eyes.

Ambivalence Waltz

Before whatever upheaval occasioned Cornel West's recent exit from the Green Party presidential race to re-re-launch his campaign as an independent, I was surprised to find myself closer to voting Green in 2024 than I have been since 2000, but even that was contingent on not having to listen to actual Greens in the meantime.   

This paragraph from a substack article a Green friend shared with me is a good example of what I'm talking about:

... the voting base of the Green Party are people who identify as more liberal, more progressive, socialist, communist even, and as being to the left of the Democrats. They care about anti-imperialism more, they care about anti-racism more, they care about anti-sexism more, they care about healthcare and taxing the rich more. That is the electoral base of the Greens, so the liberal media apparatus is directly aiming fire at it constantly at all times with the line: “Don’t believe them, they’re liars, they’re frauds, they’re actually Trump supporters, they’re wolves in sheep’s clothing, we are the real liberals, we are the best you have, we are the only real left option to you.”

While there was much else in the article to agree with, the above is what stood out as emblematic of my problem with voting Green.  How is aligning with a powerless party that only does presidential campaigns every 4 years “caring more” about anything other than purity?  There is no  “electoral base” of the Greens because the Greens do not get elected.  I don’t get it.   I don’t see the value of aligning with a few people with no power and no plan to get power just because they want the best things as much as I do, versus (given our stupid fucking system) aligning with as many people as possible who want the same things I do in the hopes that with the power in that number some of those things will happen.

  

In his stated aim of bringing down the duopoly, Cornel West had found common cause with the Greens before he saw fit to reject party politics altogether with his latest reboot.  Whether the purification of his position on electoralism will sustain any support he had garnered as a Green through November of next year remains to be seen, but there is no doubt that by refusing from the beginning to even entertain a run as a democrat, instead choosing principle over mainstream political relevance, he is representing an anti-duopoly strain that is a continuing source of contention between the faction of the left that includes Greens and followers/subscribers of Jimmy Dore, Briahna Joy Gray, the Revolutionary Blackout Network and the like, and the amorphous nervous majority of pants shitters like myself who identify with the left  (and behave like it in Primary season) while succumbing to appeals to vote for the lesser evil of the two major party candidates when it comes to the general election.

I think I get the RBN critique of my kind a bit – in short my general election hangup about keeping the GOP from winning and taking everything outright appears to the RBN types (and to similar irritating types on the left) like Dem complicity, and more to the point duopoly complicity.  It is perceived as neoliberal.  And counterrevolutionary in that it contributes to perpetuating the status quo (so they think).  And even more annoying, should I express my belief in the importance to myself of not just handing everything over to the GOP, especially if it involves anything that could be viewed as exhortation of others to likewise put harm prevention (as though Dems are less harmful than GOP) above their taste for destruction, that is viewed as an infuriating counterproductive request of people who are trying to make everything come crashing down.  Only someone with low stakes would put out a fire intended to destroy a monstrosity because it could cause a fire that might cause the prison that the monstrosity is keeping us all in to burn down so long as  prison or not, it’s the roof over our heads.  

 My critique of the RBN critique of me is, if Dems and GOP are almost the same then why are you focusing only on people who hate capitalism war poverty injustice oppression just as much as you do who are in good faith trying to mitigate the harms of our system in some small way in one of the few ways allowed?  If electoral politics does nothing then why does it matter if Dems win?  If you hate the duopoly, at least you don’t have to do anything to maintain it.  If I’m just neurotic, so what?  Back the fuck off, maybe!    

I make explicit for anyone tuning in late that it’s not dems who I think hate capitalism war oppression etc just as much as RBN types but me, who is not a dem but who votes for dems on a theory of harm reduction.  I always come back to, what’s the alternative?  That’s where people like me and RBN and their ilk differ.  I realize I do a bit of taking for granted that of course dems are not as bad as republicans, and the reason for this is that in my view Republicans are actively and openly trying to destroy everything good and free for everyone who is not an owner.  Dems in my view are actively but quietly trying to preserve things for their personal selves which the GOP has pretty much made ok and a lot easier for wealthier people to do in private, while openly but much less actively validating that Republicans are bad for everybody else.  I know it’s a small difference, but republicans take away women’s right to an abortion by appointing young reactionary justices and what not, whereas dems who of course fundraise off of this but do almost nothing to mitigate it, nevertheless occasionally get someone who’s not a young reactionary on the supreme court.  I’m trying to be generous to the other side of this left-ish debate.   Let’s just say, anybody who is openly inclined or engaged in reducing harm in our government is probably there because of dems.  An effort to put a stop to Republican momentum at the polls, even if it amounts to merely a gentle tapping of the brake seems to me substantial to the extent that it prevents crashing into a wall of complete fascism.  It may not seem that way to accelerationists, but my point is, if I am engaged in what I think is the prevention of fascism and if my activities at worst fail because a GOP president/congress/supreme court succeeds anyway and accelerates the march toward fascism, or even if my efforts contribute to dem success that you think at best does nothing, I still fail to see why this disqualifies me from what those who see through my delusion would consider the left.  Especially since I really do not hear a whole lot of alternatives proposed.  I hear no alternatives proposed other than 3rd parties and rank choice voting-- perpetually stubbornly unconstructed electoral tweaks.  Outside of electoral politics, the alternative to harm reduction seems to be to let it burn.  Ok if the dems are just as bad as the GOP (or are so bad that a dem victory is worse than the GOP) then aren’t I actively contributing to the acceleration of the end of it anyway?  

Does it really need to be made clear that people like me who vote for harm reduction in the general election without reservation are only doing what they think is the best they can do given two terrible choices?  I know there are still plenty of people who parrot the mainstream liberal platitudes about how unbelievably bad the republicans are while avoiding the topic of how great the dems are --- it feels implied and I don’t doubt that many people have not given that side of the equation a lot of thought.  I happen to agree they’re not wrong that Republicans must be stopped.  But I identify with a sizeable group of people who yearn for the end of capitalism and imperialism, of inequality, oligarchy, planet destruction etc.  (i.e., same base clean slate as people who think harm reduction is asinine I assume).   This is my biggest beef with the know-it-alls who condemn harm reduction, this implication that harm reducers want to perpetuate the status quo--- no they want to destroy the status quo but without harm.  That to me is the essential difference.  My question of what is the alternative means that.  What is the alternative to harm reduction?  I fear the alternative is, Let’s find out.  People like me don’t want to find out because history does not indicate that the answer to Let’s find out is going to be good.   I’m not opposed to all my possessions and assets etc. being liquidated, meaningless, worthless.  That doesn’t scare me.  What scares me is slavery, genocide, surveillance.   

I think the rift on the left may be insurmountable for as long as each side sees the other as part of the problem.  How come people who want the same things are so irreparably on opposite sides anyway?  I don’t think it’s strictly because of doctrine.  When the RBN side flirts with anti-trans anti-woke MAGA pro-Trump shit, am I wrong to be fucking pissed to have my side called counter-revolutionary? 

To be continued (or dropped as we see fit).

Tears on my mousepad

Is there a loneliness epidemic among men?  Is there a reason to hang on for an answer?  As an inveterate YouTube lurker I am at the mercy of the algorithm.  Somehow over the past month or so, I have noticed a preponderance of videos on the subject of male loneliness.  My first thought on seeing a wave of videos on topics I didn't ask for is what did I do or say that YouTube overheard?  My family has been away for the past month and I have been on my own (with an adult male cat as my only companion.).  Did I sigh too loud one day?  Am I talking to myself too much within range of a microphone connected to the Internet of Things?  I'll admit the topic of male loneliness (even my own) does not interest me in the least but perhaps it wasn't me but some wave of interest in the culture at large that was behind the onslaught. Whatever the reason, the volume of titles wore me down to a nub and I eventually clicked on one at a moment of least resistance.  It turned out to be a meta video about the controversy that took place on Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti's cross-populist Breaking Points channel and featuring apparently the leading culprit behind the trending of the topic, one "Shoes-upon-the-head", or SUTH as I'll call her.

The first thing I noticed about the Breaking Points video is that the topic is introduced as "The Epidemic of Male Loneliness" as though it is a thing.  By way of introduction, the interview quotes from SUTH's video:

The men are not okay. ...  Men have no friends, no girl friend, no college education, no money, are breaking their legs and inserting metal rods in their bones to be a few inches taller, and listening to AI Batman to help them overcome their pornography addictions.  Turns out the society that was built by and allegedly for men has indeed let them down.  Now you may be thinking "Oh look, another boo-hoo-poor-men video from Shoes-upon-the-head."  Yes!

Apparently SUTH, who looks about 12 has been talking about this subject for nearly 10 years, or approximately since she was 2. Driven to the topic in reaction to what she describes as an anti-male pop-feminism online, she claims now that the left, which ignored the problem for years has only now become interested in response to a reported growth in conservatism among young men and the coming to light of the exploitation of male loneliness by such figures as Jordan Peterson and Andrew Tate.  (The things and people you have to learn about to bring yourself up to speed on internet phenomena!)  Meanwhile, offering herself as a preferable alternative to the "manosphere", SUTH attributes male loneliness to exactly the same thing: women (read feminism)*.  On the culpability of women, she contradicts herself right in plain view in the Breaking Points video-- opening with a statistic pulled from the gut suggesting that 80% of the women on dating apps are picking the same 20% of men and five minutes later protesting that the backlash to her video must have come from those who never watched it since she refers to women (she thinks) only once, and only to say that they're also lonely.  Also lonely, and if you watch her video heartless cruel emasculating harpies (except for herself) who for shallow, hypocritical reasons think if a man is lonely it's because he's a bad, undesirable person.

As someone who considers himself to be on the left, I object to the notion that I've become more interested in male loneliness. I actually found my attention waning in the course of the video, but I confess,  something about this topic as presented in the Breaking Points video and in the Shoes-upon-the-head video that occasioned it cranks up the fire under the old blood boil in me.  My bullshit detector went a little bit out of control as I watched both videos.   It isn't male loneliness that irritates me (although I fail to find any fault in the friendly advice to lonely men to please maybe try to look a bit inward for answers before gunning down strangers at a mall).  I think what irritates me is the pawning off of a dishonest right wing internet grift as concern for the health of vulnerable marks.  I guess you can't really fault a gal for trying to make a living, but must we pretend the saucy dial-a-friend act is about anything other than clicks, likes and ad revenue?

Here's the thing, lonely men (and other lonely people).  Living as we are at the end of history, are we not all lonely, together?  If your loneliness troubles you, it may not feel this way now but you are not only not alone, you are really loved, valued and wanted.  It doesn't feel this way now because we live under a system in which no one is loved, valued or wanted except insofar as they can contribute to the wealth of grifters of all kinds-- not just those on the internet.  This goes for the lonely women too, and I'm talking about the lonely men and women and others of every race, creed,  age, gender, orientation, education level, economic status, ability and ideology who overpopulate our unmarvelous uncinematic universe.  You are loved by the system that we need to build together to replace our soul destroying, alienating, disparity-building capitalist neo-liberal hell on earth. Whatever your gender, your loneliness is a message.  It is an invitation to participate in the dismantling of the barriers between us that keep us from constructing a world of our making.  There is a way to begin, but it may require us to engage with each other.  

It may feel sort of good for 5 minutes to listen to the strokes of a cartoon 12 year old internet buddy telling you it's not your fault (or her fault) but theirs.  It feels good and then better and then oh god!  crazy awesome but  as AI Batman will tell you, we all know what comes after that.  To hell with the shame and the clean up.  To make that crazy awesome feeling last a bit longer, after looking inward for your own strength and your own juice, look outward for our common purpose.  You'll find it!  It's out there.  Way away,  beyond the computer screen, across the room, up the stairs and out the keyhole.  Out beyond the gates that keep you in, alone with your loneliness.  I'll meet you out there!

It feels good to be seen, but are you being seen or are you being jerked around?

~~~~~

* How is it that those who make a living reviling the identity politics of every other group on principle insist on seeing everything through a lens of straight white male identity?  It's a rhetorical question.