December 30, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

I suspect that one of the things that really hinders politics on the left is the endless sniping of so-called “pragmatists” against what they identify as “radical” or “revolutionary.” A recent example came to my attention in the form of a diary entry over at Daily Kos which is just plain muddled in its mangling of philosophy, history and politics to explain why “revolutionaries” are just plain wrong.

To start with, it’s fairly obvious that Dracowyrm is not talking about Pragmatism in the sense of John Dewey’s vision of participatory democracy, and certainly not Cornel West’s prophetic pragmatism which explores the ways in which expressions of radical Utopian vision have contributed to American politics. And it’s also unclear as to whether the “revolutionism” really represents actual groups, or is just an invention.

Dracowyrm: Pragmatism, as I would define it, seeks incremental change in a positive direction by charting a course which consistently pursues outcomes which are achievable and, while somewhat ambitious, are not so wildly so that they are unlikely to be accomplished. After each such outcome is achieved, conditions are reassessed and another step forward is charted. Pragmatism’s hallmarks, therefore, are positive change over time, taking smaller, more conservative steps than are pursued by revolutionists.

Revolutionism swings for the stands. It pursues great leaps of positive change in a minimal number of steps–often, a single radical change– arguing that pragmatism doesn’t do enough, or that moral imperatives such as injustice obligate pursuit of fundamental or radical shifts in politics, however unlikely they may be to be achieved. Moral imperative is often argued by revolutionists: we have no choice but to stand for this–anything less would be moral failure.

He then goes on to talk about the effects of these two different approaches, arguing that “pragmatic” battles lead to progress, while “revolutionist” battles lead to totalitarianism.

Dracowyrm: What progressives have accomplished in this country has come through incremental cultural shift. Civil rights activism on the part of African-Americans had been going on for nearly 150 years before the desegregation of the military and Brown v. the Board of Education. Enough Americans knew that racism was wrong by the time those steps had been taken that those who did not were in the minority.

Likewise the women’s movement. The failure of the ERA ended up not mattering, because its principles were rapidly taking root in the culture. Likewise environmentalism: advances in law came as a result of growing awareness of the need for it. Likewise labor law.

The problem is that this doesn’t stand up to closer scrutiny. Somehow progressive revisionism has made MLK into a warm and fuzzy incrementalist. However, MLK’s writings contain some of the most beloved and wonderful statements of American radicalism. In his “I Have a Dream” address, MLK prophesies (in the Cornel West pragmatic sense) that his cause will never be satisfied until full equality is reached. His benchmarks for that equality are rather lofty:

MLK (I Have a Dream): I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

MLK advocated radical direct action in Letter from a Birmingham Jail, and dismissed the notion of holding off on making strong demands until some sort of critical consensus is reached.

MLK (Letter from a Birmingham Jail): We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was “well timed” in the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of segregation. For years now I have heard the word “Wait!” It rings in the ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This “Wait” has almost always meant “Never.” We must come to see, with one of our distinguished jurists, that “justice too long delayed is justice denied.”

MLK’s role in the civil rights movement involved forcing the consensus by demonstrating that the injustices of segregation and discrimination were so severe, they justified civil disobedience by otherwise law-abiding citizens. MLK invoked traditions from the American Revolution and the Bible as justification for direct action tactics. Before MLK came Ida Wells and the NAACP.

The women’s movement, labor law, and environmentalism were also built in a large part by people who forced the issue by expressing an underlying moral cause and principle. They may have accepted incremental change as positive steps forward, but they never shirked from making statements that absolute and full social justice is the only acceptable end goal.

Dracowyrm is specifically talking about the impeachment of Bush. Personally, I have no stake in that because I don’t believe that the Democrats have the moral authority to do so after having enabled him for 6 years. Impeachment doesn’t particularly strike me as revolutionary. The threat or use of impeachment has not fundamentally changed party politics when invoked. But Dracowyrm is making a broader statement.

Dracowyrm: The core of my argument is that you cannot achieve lasting results if you try to push the people farther than they are willing to go. You haven’t addressed that, and that’s the heart of it.

Which misses the whole point of MLK’s activism. This is completely wrong in regards to LGBT rights which were won because LGBTs were willing to push the envelope by announcing, “we’re here, we’re queer get used to it.” The vote for women was won by women taking to the streets. Labor battles were won by workers on the picket lines. You don’t achieve lasting results by staying well within th comfort-zone of contemporary politics. Civil rights activists in the United States spent two centuries pushing whites further than they wanted to go. And they still need to do it.

One difference that I see between radicals and progressives here is that radicals see small steps as a means to an end, while progressives are mired in gaming the electoral politics. The radical approach to strategic voting is to hold our noses and make the least noxious choices, while the progressive approach is to push key issues back into the closet during an election. Radicals often serve as the moral consience of left-wing politics by refusing to talk about issues such as social justice, and refusing to pretend that candidates are not often lacking in some areas.

Which brings me back to my previous post. Something I feel that is missing at the moment in regards to LGBT rights is a similar statement to that of MLK that nothing less than complete equality will be ultimately acceptable.

Posted in opinion | No Comments »

December 29, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

I’m wondering, what happened in 15 years. Once upon a time I was part of a community that saw heterosexism as a serious problem, and was willing to say, “hey, you know, perhaps heterosexuality is not all that they claim it to be. Perhaps it doesn’t slice, dice, and cure warts and cancer.”

Now it seems, it’s all about separate-but-equal “partnerships” and “marriage” and supporting the Democratic party as long as it doesn’t blatantly throw lgbt’s under the bus for political advantage.

I’ve come to the following two conclusions over the years:

First, the primary goal of political operatives of either of the two main parties is to expand that party’s power. Perhaps this is an over-generalization, but I think left-wing activists should act as if it were true.

Second, none of the civil rights battles in history were won by a pragmatic acceptance of compromise. People like Ida B. Wells and Martin Luther King expressed the view that full social, economic, and legal equality were necessities for a just society. We remember King’s “I have a dream” speech because it is a blatantly utopian vision of the end goal.

Which is why I find myself unwilling to applaud John Edwards’ rather half-hearted answer to the question of same-sex marriage equality. (Pandagon) I suppose I should be willing to shower praise on his willingness to take baby-steps. But I’m increasingly unwilling to give politicians slack for weaseling around making a commitment to the right thing.

Mostly I’ve lost faith in the electoral process as a way to effect fundamental change, which is where I think lgbt-activists and friendly people should start to explicitly claim an agenda. That agenda is nothing less than full social, economic, and legal equality. Domestic partnerships is a step forward, but not the final goal. When someone like Edwards goes part way, perhaps we should say, “good, but not quite there.” We should give our unreserved praise for those who give unreserved support.

Posted in opinion | 1 Comment »

December 23, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

Now that I’m buying comic books again, I feel the need to buy mainstream comics that feature lesbigay characters to avoid the inevitable “it didn’t sell well, so we will sweep it back into the closet for the next decade.” This means I’m buying two teen-angst superhero team books right now: Young Avengers and Runaways. I started working back through Runaways after the Young Avengers-Runaways team-up for the “Civil War” mega event. (Which I try to ignore as much as possible.)

I must admit I have not collected the digest volume of Runaways that introduces this relationship, but blond vegan alien Karolina Dean becomes involved with Skrull alien shapeshifter Xavin. In the Young Avengers-Runaways mini-series, Xavin is always drawn as male, but with the implication that Xavin can become female at will. Runaways #22 shows Xavin spontaneously morphing between two human genders and a very masculine Skrull form.

Young Avengers build up the relationship between Wiccan (Billy Kaplan) and Hulking (Teddy Altman). This leads to the revelation that Teddy is also an alien shape-shifter with Skrull heritage. Teddy/Hulking is always shown as male. In fact, his most usual form mirrors that of the The Hulk, which maximizes secondary sexual characteristics.

There is something that bothers me about how two gay/lesbian relationships, in two very similar genres of comic books, end up both involving shape-shifting aliens. Partly because as we saw with the Young Avengers-Runaways team-up the writers can put those relationships back into the closet in public. But also I suppose that it gives people reading the strip a way out of considering what kinds of affection is shared in these relationships. It gives a way out for those readers whose first question is, “who is the man/woman in the relationship.”

On the other hand, Runaways #22 shows a willingness to deal with gender ambiguity that is refreshing.

Molly: It’s just, I think everybody would be more comfortable if you could mabye just look like a girl forever.

Xavin: And I’m sure some people would be more comfortable if Karolina like males or if you were not a genetic mutation. But I am not like everyone else, and that means you may have to learn to accept something new and different, as my betrothed already has.

Overall, I’m becoming more impressed with Runaways both for its genre-twisting, but also for its willingness to crack open some of the more interesting aspects of adolescence. I’m still expecting Marvel to turn-around and sideline or throw those characters back into the closet.

Posted in comics, Uncategorized | No Comments »

December 21, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

Up the escalator I went. This is a massive gleaming escalator - it takes you up two stories, just to give you an idea. You are encased in a long gleaming white-tile tube - and plastered on the walls are pictures of furry brown bears - and also repetitive (like cult-brainwashing repetitive) advertisements for Charmin, the company that obviously foot the bill for this G-rated poop magnet in Times Square. (Maybe parents with little kids think pooping is cute, and maybe they feel the need to make going to the bathroom akin to a trip to Disneyworld … but I’m an adult and I was strictly creeped out by the potty-training YAY FOR YOUR BODILY FUNCTIONS ambience of this entire place.) However, there was something highly amusing about it as well The escalator was packed with people. We all were being carried, passively, to the 2nd floor - where the toilets were, I guess. And I regressed. I became an 8 year old emotionally, giggling at everybody around me, because I was thinking, “hee hee, you have to poop! hee hee you have to pee!” It was my own version of Everybody Poops. I found it hilarious. I resented the brainwashing influence but I still found it hilarious.

Blogger Sheila O’Malley visits Charmin’s mega-bathroom in Times Square.

Posted in werid | No Comments »

December 19, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

One of the things I tend to do in my spare time is quite a bit of twiddling with software and stuff. I must admit that I’m a bit of a free software and shareware trial junkie. All of this stuff is for OS X unless otherwise specified.

WriteRoom is a “minimalist” text editor similar to TextEdit with the additional option of throwing the user into a full-screen mode with no menus, toolbars or buttons. Perhaps the thing that won we over on it was that the current beta version allows you to open the contents of any text field from a cocoa enabled application (such as mail, or Safari) in WriteRoom. One of the irritations though is that it doesn’t have a proper user manual.

About once a year I go on a quest for web browser nirvana which has brought be back to Safari. The primary reason is that I’m back to fiddling with DevonThink as a supplement to my brain. Pimp My Safari provides links to several plug-ins including the add-blocking software SafariBlock and the search plugin sogudi.

Posted in geekstuff | No Comments »

December 19, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

… for the mythical “war on Christmas.”

One of the nice things about being an all-American mutt, a Heinz-57 is that I can claim “founding fathers” on all sides of any conflict in which they are invoked. My Puritan ancestors for example were not overly fond of celebrations of Christmas, partly because they were not that big on fun, partly because Christmas feasts were seen as too Catholic, and partly because worship was supposed to be a solemn event. On the other side, I had ancestors whose celebrations started with the feast of St. Nicholas in early December, and ended in Epiphany in January. Then there were my ancestors in the fellowship of Friends who just sat in meeting. Which just goes to show that our “founding fathers” in the rather messy multi-cultural society that was the early United States may not always agree with our modern celebrations of Christmas. The culture gap between the segregated varieties of post-reformation faith was as broad as nationality today.

At any rate, the “war on Christmas” rhetoric puts those of us who do not attach special religious significance on the season in a rather difficult position. If we abstain politely from religious expression, we are engaged in a war to remove Christmas from the public sphere. If we appropriate symbols and traditions as family occasions, similar to national holidays, we are guilty of secularization. The only acceptable solution for the people complaining about a siege on Christmas is for non-Christians to vanish from the scene entirely.

And many of the complaints seem to be amazingly petty and silly. My association of “Happy Holidays” comes from Bing Crosby singing Irving Berlin songs in a film that also included, “White Christmas” and “Easter Parade.” When I use “Happy Holidays” or “Season’s Greetings” it is the recognition that there is a vast span of celebrations in the season, and I may not see you again in the short interval between St. Nicholas Day, Christmas, Boxing Day, New Years Day, 12th Night, Epiphany, or even Martin Luther King Day. I say it with best wishes for you and yours, and without any of the snide malice attributed to it. When you say “Merry Christmas” to me, I as a non-believer take it as a friendly expression of goodwill. This war is largely a non-starter.

Posted in opinion | No Comments »

December 11, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

It seems that already Apocolypto has been drawing some attention for some of the same criticisms of portrayal that plagued Passion. Traci Arden, a Maya scholar attempts to critique the over-the-top violent portrayal of the Maya and the anachronism of Spanish missionaries showing up to save the day. In reality the Spanish invasion occurred more 300 years after the cities were abandoned. Arden argues that the pseudo-realism and use of Mayan dialect may lead people to believe its documentary claims, when it is just an ultra-violent action movie that attempts to attack modernism.

Arden argues that Gibson’s portrayal of the pre-Colombian Maya does injustice to the modern-day persecution of their descendants, and follows in a long string of cinematic justifications for “civilizing” the Americas through extreme portrayal of their savagery.

Posted in movies | No Comments »

December 10, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

My reward for myself in finishing the dissertation was picking up a used Nintendo GameCube. I have to admit that I’m a bottom-feeder in videogaming, spending too much money on the coin-op games at the laundry, or scamming time playing Atari at other people’s homes.

One of the first games I picked up was the critically-praised but undersold Beyond Good and Evil (flash and music). This was a game that both impressed me and frustrated on my badly aged PC, but runs great on the GameCube. I like games with big epic storylines with character development, and this game has some great characterization. The graphics and music are also beautiful.

Posted in games | No Comments »

December 10, 2006 by kirkjobsluder.

One of the things I love about get fuzzy is that every now and then there is a strip that is wrong on so many different levels. This one starts with a dead lizard, and the revelation that the lizard has been in their living space for weeks. Then you have vegetarian and cat engaging in fisticuffs, with the typical dog reaction.

Posted in comics | No Comments »