Several blogs have reported on plans by the Westboro Baptist Church(famous for GodHatesFags.com[1]) to picket the memorial service for Heath Ledger. They even produced a flier. I’m not sure whether the picket did go ahead, but the point is that they are protesting him for being a ‘fag enabler’ for his role in Brokeback Mountain.
For those who do not know the Westbo Baps, they are a bunch of lunatics from Topeka, Kansas. In the words of Wikipedia, they condemn lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people (LGBT), Roman Catholics, Muslims and Jews, as well as populations it believes are supporting the forementioned groups, including Swedes, Canadians, Irish, British, and Americans.. It is their belief that all disasters/tragedies/problems in the world can be attributed to society’s condolence of homosexuality in that these are all results of God’s punishment for tolerating homosexuals. Their MO is to protest by means of picketing with slogans that are meant to shock and offend.

Hate

The family that hates together stays together

Hating for God out in the cold

Hating for God out in the rain

And so the Heath Ledger tie-in is obvious. He enabled fags(probably was one himself) and this here funeral sho’ will generate a mighty amount of media.
This is also not the first time that the Westbo’s have taken their unique form of Christianity to funerals. In 2006 they picketed the funeral of Matthew Snyder. The Snyder family sued for defamation, invasion of privacy, and intentional infliction of emotional distress. The defendants were eventually found guilty on the latter two charges and damages totalling some $10million awarded to the family. All ends well then, the balance of the universe restored and fag haters hated upon by the just and decent court, right? Well, not so fast there dude.

In his instructions to the jury U.S. District Judge Richard Bennett stated that the First Amendment protection of free speech has limits, including vulgar, offensive and shocking statements, and that the jury must decide “whether the defendant’s actions would be highly offensive to a reasonable person, whether they were extreme and outrageous and whether these actions were so offensive and shocking as to not be entitled to First Amendment protection”. [...] also [in another case - Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire - ] certain personal slurs and obscene utterances by an individual were found unworthy of First Amendment protection, due to the potential for violence resulting from their utterance.

Unworthy of First Amendment protection. The US generally holds the First Amendment to be the best thing since wooden false teeth and the crowning glory of their democracy. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you have to say, you’ll always have the First Amendment[2]. But lo! you don’t. If your statements are extreme and outrageous they might be deemed so offensive and shocking as to not be entitled to First Amendment protection. An obvious problem, then – what qualifies as extreme and outrageous? Well, it seems that a jury of your peers will decide. And their concept of extreme might include anything from statements of very strong blasphemy to aggressive racial hatred. And what qualifies as statements that have a potential for violence resulting from their utterance? But what is pertinent here is that this concept of extreme includes, in the case of the Snyder family, verbal attacks on people in a state of severe emotional distress.

This is an problem for anarchism – not that it cares about the US constitution or how it is interpreted by the US judiciary. Emma Goldman wrote Free speech, means either the unlimited right of expression, or nothing at all. The moment any man or set of men can limit speech, it is no longer free. It follows that she would have supported the Westboro crew’s right to spit their hate at the Snyder family and that if the cops were to attempt to prevent the Westboro picket she would be right there with the haters shouting down the cops. But is that fair and equal treatment for the family of the deceased? In my opinion there is an aspect to coercion here as well. The foundation of anarchism is the rejection of all authority and all coercion (whether physical, psychological or emotional). Is the Westboro picket coercive? Well, it’s not coercive in the sense that it does not try to force(coerce) the targets of the picket to do anything against their will[3]. But I do think that it is coercive in that it unduly crushes the spirit of another person, coerces them into despair.

So what would be the anarchist thing to do? Here’s my opinion (which I feel clunky about giving since I am only an observer in this situation and not committed to any action on it). Firstly, obviously, the Westboro Baptist church should have the right to picket and say whatever they want, no matter how hateful or personally and viciously hurtful it is. No-one has the right to prevent them from doing that[4]. Secondly, if the authorities were to try to shut down the picket I would have to side with the Westbo’s in keeping the picket going. But, most importantly, my sensibility would have to – must – picket in opposition to the Westbo’s and in compassion with the family. This is the key, my understanding of anarchism is that the Westboro church should be allowed to picket and shout whatever obscenities and accusations they want, but not without opposition. And that opposition should not be in the form of louder or more aggressive shouting back at the Westboro assholes but in the form of quiet and genuine support and respect for the Ledger family’s grief and their right to a dignified memorial and funeral.

[1] I was wondering whether I should link out to them – not that my one little inbound link would boost their google rank, but still. Yes, they are morons, but it would be unfair to not link to them when I always do link to the idiots in my other posts.
[2] And the second, the right to bear arms. There is no other commandment greater than these.
[3] other than to repent their perceived sins
[4] anything less and I wouldn’t be able to claim the right to busk outside my local church on a Sunday morning with an acoustic guitar singing Crass’s Asylum.

Man! This is great! With thanks to The Barefoot Bum I have come across the Net Authority Offenders Database – a hilarious steaming pile of shit.

In short it is the site of a bunch of people who have taken it upon themselves to define a set of rules for what is not acceptable content for the internet. Here they are:

Since this policy applies to the entire Internet, we felt that it should be spelled out as simply and as universally understandable as possible.
As a result of this, we decided that the best way to write this document would be to model it after something that everyone knows and follows (or at least should!) in their daily lives already. We chose God’s own law—The Ten Commandments. To help keep things simple though, we have narrowed it down to five simple rules.

They then produce these five wonderful rules for the entire internet

1. Thou shalt not post pornographic material.
2. Thou shalt not post hateful material.
3. Thou shalt not post blasphemous material.
4. Thou shalt not post materials of an offensive political nature.
5. Thou shalt not post materials concerning bestiality, including interracial relationships.

That’s it then, five simple rules. But what about Thou shalt not post material that places thou in judgment of thy neighbours? As I recall Jesus indicated that no commandment is more important than the first two[1] and while they may argue that they are not in judgment of me, only of my postings I could still feel judged – not loved – by them. But let me make this plain, I don’t feel judged by them. At best they provide some comedy relief and an opportunity to highlight the absurd levels to which people can take a fundamentalist world view. What I should say here is that I have no problem with their world view being Christian; it would be the same if it were Muslim or Buddhist or Scientologist. The absurd bit is that they (a) reckon that they can provide a glorious umbrella of good vibes for the internet and (b) that rational people would give a shit about what they list in their database. If they had called themselves the Christian Net Authority I would have gladly accepted and supported their right to evaluate and classify my content. But the Net Authority? Fuck you.

And so, in the hopes of being included in their database and therefore being allowed to display the coveted Net Authority Violator badge I have submitted this site to them for evaluation claiming the offenses of Blasphemy and Offensive political material. Unfortunately I cannot offer anything in the way of Pornographic material, Bestiality or Hateful material (as far as I know).
I’ve also decided to provide a list of a few of my existing posts that would hopefully qualify as blasphemic or politically offensive, so if you’re here from Net Authority to check me out don’t forget to click on the links below.

Violate!

But before I get to the list I’d like to mention one more item on the Net Authority list of no-no’s which doesn’t seem to be explicitly covered by the five rules (perhaps a sixth is in order?) being:

You might think that a site that contains stories about dinosaurs for children would be innocent—but let’s stop and think about that for a moment. If you read the bible (you should, it’s great!) you know that dinosaurs never actually existed, and that God put those fossils and bones there to test our faith in Him. While the stories themselves may not contain any offensive material, the simple fact that they are about dinosaurs may cause a child to question his faith in the one true God.

I’ve written before about the Creation Museum, a popular Christian museum in the US that promotes a creation story in which dinosaurs were actually carried on board the Ark with Noah, and that people and dinosaurs co-existed to the extent that humans actually rode dinosaurs with saddles. Given the above statement from Net Authority I have also submitted the Creation Museum’s site to them for evaluation. I hope that they get canned too. Wouldn’t it be interesting if this site were to be included but the Creation Museum’s not? However, given many Christian groups’ propensity for arguments and judgment of one another, I doubt it. But, I would bet money that while I intend proudly displaying my violators badge the Creation Museum wouldn’t do the same. I await the outcome with glee.

God’s dinosaurs!

OK, on with the list.

Blasphemy

• Psychedelic Christian Worship in which I belittle Christian religious experiences as being no different to those produced by illegal psychedelic drugs.
• Buraq – Mohammed’s Wild Ride which derides the literal interpretation of the Islamic story of Mohammed’s ascent to heaven. I know that this post is about a heathen god who does not exist, but I hope that the Net Authority would consider blasphemy against gods of other religions to also count.
• Blasphemy pt1 – enough said. I still have to write part 2 in which I will publish some of my own blasphemic poetry.

Offensive political material

• Ron Paul is an Asshole – Strip Mall Advocacy is about Ron Paul (that blasphemous libertarian candidate) but it does have the word asshole in the title – ’nuff said.
• Blackwater – Guns for Hire – T-shirts for Sale is about the commercialisation of mercenaries. It criticises the very people who keep the soldiers in Iraq safe from those horrible terrorists.
• Bok van Blerk and the kids next door isn’t directly about politics, but it does suggest that minority groups who identify with past (often racially segregated) glory often become totally irrelevant to modern society. Hopefully that will be enough to count as a violation.

I haven’t searched through the blog’s archives, but I’m sure there’s more good stuff there too.

OK, enough with the satire. So what if a group of people want to make rules that, for them, define acceptable content on the internet. I’m really sincere when I say that I believe that to be a good thing. All groups, whether they are liberal or conservative or even anarchist, develop concepts of what the group finds acceptable or not. But to expect that I should feel obligated to abide by them just because you claim that they are for the entire internet is ridiculous. Net Authority; consider yourself ridiculed. Now give me my badge!

[1] Love my dad and love one another

I’m always surprised when people bemoan the perceived demise of print media. Print media isn’t going anywhere; it is changing radically[1] but the demand for printed media will remain strong for years to come. And the reason is simple: it’s about the glossy. South Africa has seen an explosion of niche glossy magazines. These are aimed at the very top end of the South African spending pyramid and are all essentially lifestyle magazines. Ostensibly they are about self actualisation or home improvement or leisure pursuits, but in truth they are all about the lifestyle; they’re aspirational – nothing more.
Now don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against aspirational products[2] as long as they don’t claim to be anything else. And here’s a hot new straight-chipper of an entrant to that market: Golf Punk.

Hey punk!

The magazine (published in South Africa under a UK license) launched in late 2007 and seems set to turn a tidy profit from casual golf punks. Here’s their pitch to advertisers:

[Golf Punk is] a magazine with the express intention of making players look like Hollywood stars, introducing equipment in a whole new light, and shooting the best fairway fashion ever seen.

Damn. I can dig on that. If I were a golf advertiser looking to sell some rad shirts I would be crapping my pants right about now. Hollywood! fashion! punks! Who could ask for more?

Seriously though, I think that this is a brilliant ads pitch and I would be willing to bet that the management team spent as much time crafting that sentence as they did planning their launch issue. Golf Punk is totally up front about their goal – inject as much sex as possible into golf and sell nothing but the wildest products off the back of that.

Punks

So go ahead, check out the Golf Punk site. Browse their Bunker Babes or check out golf clubs styled like sex toys under Golf Junk. It’s brilliant from the opening tee to the clubhouse. And next time you find yourself in that snaking, air conditioned food market queue, pick one up and travel along to their fantasy golf destinations: you know you want to.

[1] for example I certainly don’t think that the broadsheet will survive in its current form.
[2] I own a pair of Nike shoes that belong to their Sports Culture range. Can you fucking believe that? It’s not even Sports Leisure or Recreation anymore, just Sports Culture. Plop those babies onto a footstool while you watch Snooker on ESPN and you’ve made it, you’ve filled the mandate that those shoes put to you.

I was recently browsing my local Christian book/music store[1] when I noticed two music albums displayed in the same area whose covers immediately struck me as interesting. They are Michael W. Smith’s Worship Box Set and Hosanna!’s Experience His Presence.

Michael W. Smith – Worship Box Set

Hosanna! – Experience His Presence

I’ve always been interested in the brain chemistry behind[2] powerful emotional experiences and in particular religious experiences. The little that I know about the neurotransmitters that influence our emotional responses has been gathered from some lite reading into the effects of certain illicit chemicals, particularly traditional psychedelics. Now let me state immediately that I’m not convinced that religious experiences are purely chemical, though I do think that psychedelic experiences are[3]. But it certainly seems plausible that brain chemistry plays a significant part in religious experiences and that psychedelics and other drugs (particularly Ecstasy[4]) produce a very similar experience.
But that’s not really what I’m interested in here, other people can argue to what extent religious/spiritual experiences are produced by brain functions. What I am interested in is these two fucking album covers. Aren’t they wild? Think about it for a second; the purpose of a music album cover[5] is to give some sort of visual form to the tone/mood/content of the music it wraps. The best art that accompanies music are those images that connect with the intention of the music without bluntly shaping what the listener should experience. R.E.M.’s cover for Murmur might be slightly pretentious, but it does have a very subtle connection with the mood of the music that makes it one of my favourites. So check out these two covers; they practically blurt out ‘Hey man! Listen to this! Feel God’s closeness! It’s like a fucking explosion in your head, yeah! It’s gonna rock!!‘.

But the fact that these are poor covers is still not what I’m interested in. What’s interesting is that this is the experience that they want to associate with Christian worship[6] – the experience of a fucking firecracker going off in your head. Other worship music might emphasise experiences of redemption(tears) or hope(doves descending from heaven) or love(open arms), but these want that fucking explosion in the head. That is a very psychedelic thing; to emphasise the listener’s experience of an opening of the head is a radical thing to do. And the link to a psychedelic experience is undeniable. The mental state portrayed by the Michael W. Smith cover is the same as that produced by a rush of bent serotonin/dopamine at the peak of a psychedelic experience.
I certainly don’t begrudge anyone this state however they may choose to produce or explain it. Whether you believe that the spirit of a god has ascended within you or that you’ve broken through an inter dimensional divide or simply that you’ve flipped a switch in the beautiful circuitry that is your brain is up to you. But it blows my mind that this state, an explosion of the mind, is what these albums emphasise of the worship experience. What’s important here is not the presence of God, but the worshiper’s own glowing mind.

[1] As one does
[2] Or, at least, contributing to
[3] I’m strongly opposed to the idea that DMT will actually let you contact other dimensions for real. I don’t buy that shit.
[4] Let’s not bullshit around and call it MDMA/MDA or whatever other ‘legitimising’ term peeps use. It’s a drug, it’s Ecstasy – there’s no need to apologise for it.
[5] Or any piece of art that accompanies another piece of art, think book covers
[6] Of course not all Christian worship music, but theirs.
[7] Yes, I know, the images are specifically selected to emphasise their similarity and are therefore not a real representation of the relationship between religion and raves blah blah – bite me.

PS as I mentioned a little earlier I’m not really interested in the debate around whether religious experiences are chemically induced or not, but in looking around I’ve come across some images that you might find entertaining.

I love Americans! They’re so warm and cuddly.

Apart from the long slow public death of Britney Spears there’s no bigger story in the states at the moment than the presidential election primaries and particularly the race between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton for the Democratic Party nomination.

Obama in the Sun (Time for a Change)

Before Iowa the common understanding both in the commercial media and on the internet was that Hillary Clinton would win the nomination because she is the preferred candidate with the Democratic Party establishment(the old boys). But then Obama blew Hillary away in Iowa, mostly because he was able to radically mobilize independent voters(who typically don’t vote in large numbers) behind his slogan of Change! – whoopdedoo.

The Hillary Show (More Change?)

All of a sudden Hillary was dead meat. The internet was abuzz with Obama-praise with some writers comparing him to JFK and even Martin Luther King Jr[1]. Within days the common understanding switched to one in which Obama would continue to produce record turnouts of independents who would board his all-singing-all-dancing change-train. Obama arrived in New Hampshire ready to drink champagne from Hillary’s cold skull. But then Hillary cried on TV, or at least almost cried. And before you could say Oprah a furious debate started up in the media over whether the tears were real or faked and whether voters would see it as a turn-on or proof that women aren’t strong enough to be president[2]. As it turns out On Monday Hillary Clinton teared up in despair. On Tuesday she had reason to cry with euphoria. The televised secretion may have changed the election.

Breakingdown News

As we all know by now she stormed back into the lead in New Hampshire by out-doing Obama in the mobilzing-of-a-record-number-of-voters stakes. So where does this leave the primaries? Well, it’s a sure bet that the democratic race will now settle into a standard drawn-out battle for Super Tuesday. Both candidates have shown their mettle and found their voices. Obama will continue pitching his promise of hope and change. Hillary will continue pitching her message of being up to the task and strong while not being afraid to show some emotion. And the Republican primaries will remain a very, very distant second as far as star power[3] is concerned.

Mike Huckabee tries to be as cool as Bill Clinton

But what I’m interested in is why Americans responded so strongly first to Obama and then to Hillary. What is it about that great(?) nation that makes them so absurd?
Through my visits to the US and my lifelong consumption of its media I’ve come to learn, among others, two things that seem to be ingrained deep in the psyche of the overwhelming majority of Americanos. And I believe that these two characteristics, bred and refined over generations, were demonstrated with unique power and in close succession in the Hillary v Obama drama.
But let me first say that while I consider these behaviours to be weaknesses in the US overmind/oversoul they are also two of the fundamentals that give the American nation is undeniable strength and part of the reason why they have come to dominate the planet. It’s swings and roundabouts, what the individual looses is gained by the group.
The two characteristics[4] that I believe drove the primary votes are, firstly, a very strong need to belong and, secondly, reverence for the act of ‘opening-up’.

Belonging

American kids are raised to(among other things) belong; belong to a family, belong to school, belong to a team. Nowhere in the world is the notion of supporting your school, your alma-mater as strong as in US college football. Men wear signet rings of the years that their schools won the State Championship with more pride than their wedding bands. When attending a conference they might remove their wedding band when screwing the PA, but no-sir that 1998 Mid-Western States Championship ring aint goin’ nowhere.
What makes this drive to belong even more amazing is that it isn’t seen as fear of isolation, people don’t join church groups and soccer lift pools and community watch teams and fucking veterans’ appreciation societies because they fear being isolated. Somehow they’ve developed an understanding that belonging is a positive thing, it’s warm and friendly and makes the world a better place. They really do believe in that shit. They really believe that there is no reason to not belong to every grouping imaginable because there’s nothing to loose. So what if we all wear identical uniforms when we go bowling or drive 9 hours in convoy supporting our school’s cheerleaders when they compete out of state, it makes us a community. It freaks me out that they don’t get the fact that while belonging to a group isn’t a bad thing it doesn’t come without a price, there always is a part of your individual identity that you have to give up.
And Barack Obama tapped into this glowing need to belong. He found his voice when he pitched himself as the man to change US politics once and for all – to deliver it from the evils of partisanship and self-serving infighting. But while his campaign advisors certainly did expect to get a big bite from disgruntled voters from this pitch I bet that never in their wildest dreams did they expect to pick up so many independent voters. In a veritable showering of love and belonging hundreds of thousands of independents have bought into Obama’s message and have joined him in his crusade. They’ve joined him and are ready to heal the world, because they know that Together We Can! Chant that until you puke.

I belong to Obama

Opening up

If there is one thing more bizarre about Americans than their overwhelming joy at belonging to something[5] it is their reverence for the act of opening up. There seems to be a subtle distrust of people who don’t share their feelings with the group. Reality TV is a prime carrier of this sentiment. In a previous season of The Bachelor one of contestants[6] was continually berated by the other chicks for ‘not sharing’. She was ostracized from the group and described as ‘not real’. Later during the season the chicks got together, after what seemed like several glasses of wine, and through a series of confrontations eventually this girl broke down and cried a little. She then sat down with the girls on the couch and explained how she was afraid of being hurt so didn’t want to show too much emotion but that she now realised that they would all support her blah blah blah blah. A later interview with the ringleader of the chicks was revealing; suddenly she ‘really appreciated’ how the first girl ‘opened up’ and ‘shared her feelings’. How fucked up is that?
And so, the voters responded when Hillary opened up, when she shared. And if there is one thing that is more powerful than simply sharing it is the redemption of a person who previously was cold and aloof who then opened up to the warm embrace of her loving community. Beautiful.

Obama got voters to join him in his quest, to be part of his mission. Hillary opened up and shared her hopes, dreams and fears with the nation. And for both of them the nation responded in a cascade of votes. An absurd and beautiful land.

[1] This is reasonable comparison given the fact that he is a truly fantastic orator.
[2] No-one has actually seen GW Bush cry while he’s been in office though many think that he probably does from time to time.
[3] Talk about mega-celebrity, Obama’s roadshow features Oprah and Hillary’s feature’s Bill – two of the most gifted entertainers of our time.
[4] Characteristic isn’t really the right word. These are so strong that I almost want to call them *shudder* values.
[5] Something, something! Anything!
[6] Who actually turned out to be the most interesting person by far