Explaining my song : The Government Hates"

Three documentaries and an article have inspired me to write this explanation of my song “The Government Hates” …… in which I compare the freely available life enhancing realities of nature and the terrorising of civilians, indigenous and peasants freely wrought by various Governments...... The deaths of millions upon millions of children have all but been written out of 'history'......ever asked yourself why?

Here's why.

I'll tell you why!

The first two documentaries, Rick Steves' Iran Documentary, And Rageh Omar’s Inside Iran, took a peek inside Iran.

Rick Steve’s clearly goes for the feel-good factor as he visits various parts of Iran.. He states clearly that his interest is to meet Iranians as people and to see their culture first hand. And he does. And it is clear that the people he met have no interest in war, be it military or economic. He explores the history of Iran, and reveals the longstanding series of ‘interventions’ by British and US Military, and mercenaries to ‘protect valued resources’ …. to keep the oil flowing…. He acknowledges the strong anti-American sentiment visible in Iran. His subjects tell him it is government-government, not people-people. They are of course correct, and Rick stays schtum… interesting.

Rageh Omar opts for less of a tourist brochure, and does more interviews, delving deeper into Iranian perceptions and realities, at least for those in Tehran… he carefully avoids too much detail on the historical stuff that involves the west, and ignores the ancient roots … however he is sympathetic towards the Iranian people.. (well he’d never get anyone to say anything to camera except “FUCK “OFF in Farsi, would he?)

Both portray well the people of Iran as people. Different, with their own problems, their own joys … Do they need another war? Did the Iraqis? And is it Government-Government? Well the next documentary reveals something about this.

In Yer Face

The third documentary is Vietnam : American Holocaust, a shocking and deeply disturbing account of the Vietnam War, from well before it was official….. Back to before WWII, the French and Americans were involved in ‘exploiting the natural resources’ of Vietnam. Long story, Old Story. Same old Story.

In the documentary we hear various US presidents lie, publicly, whilst their ‘private’ conversations reveal their planning and execution of the entire project. Their obvious callousness is shocking. Cold, venomous and conceited. As ever those who ‘rule’ “and cry; let loose the dogs of war!” for to do so is the most callous act, the supreme crime, a war of aggression.

And for what?

For profits. A Corporation that makes weapons, must make more and more, and develop new weapons, in order the guarantee that the investment made by the shareholders of that corporation will increase in value and deliver an annual or quarterly dividend. A cut of the profits.

Who owns these Corporations? How many of their ex-employees are in Government? How many Former Government Officials are now working for those Corporations?

And of course there’s the protecting of‘ natural resources’ and that vague euphemism, a kind self-important fig leaf of a word, “strategic interest” as well, as a cover-up. A distraction.

Ad in a bit of dehumanisation, the media will comply ….

The documentary says none of this. It doesn’t need to. It’s fucking obvious. Amazing. At last.

Propaganda

And the article, by George Monbiot, The Propaganda of the Victor makes up this days exploration.

Truly Great article. Not a word wasted. Sometimes George writes something I really, really get and also am delighted that he’s writing about that particular subject.

His book ‘Captive State’ isone such piece ... it is essential reading for UK citizens, if not all citizens of Industrialised States - and it set me on fire. The combination of info and explanation, narrative and anger, poetry and prose George Monbiot crafts when he's on fire is liberating at it’s best. Captive State is all that. You will read how the UK Government became a business ‘merge and acquisition’ project by business, at the grass roots as much as at National Government level. Great book. I digress. Praise George!

Anyways, his subject for this essay I dig so much is the lands held in trust for the nation by the National Trust ….in particular the lands and Stately house "Stowe Landscape Gardens. I know them well, for I enjoyed the astonishing unearned privilege of attending the school that’s housed there. The gardens (really a landscaped deerpark) were a vast playground of crumbling follies and overgrown lakes, of coverts and laurel brakes in which ruined monuments could, like Mayan temples, be discovered by adventurous boys. Licensed by tolerant teachers, I played swallows and amazons here for five years."

hw writes, and he also reveals the history, which is not the official history (the official history is the National trusts sanitised version, redolent of school tetx books) of their ‘transfer’ from commons to estates. A protracted history. A very violent history. Relatively recent history.

And Monbiot reveals that the writers of that history portrayed themselves as civilised, as the winners. They were the 'winners'. If they consider having all the gold, all the land to themselves, then yes. These self-styled winners forced the peasant people off the land that was commons by ancient right, and by fact of occupation, land upon which they had long subsisted, mostly healthily enough.

Evicted Violently.

And when people resisted, the military was called in, and those not murdered were press ganged, or sent to colonies as slaves and prisoners. Those who did not resist were forced into factories, the Industrial Revolution was underway and needed man, woman, and child power. EP Thompson’s, ‘The Making Of The English Working Class’ documents what happened when the weavers and some factory workers resisted.

State espionage, murder, assassinations, smears, agent provocateurs, kangaroo courts ….. All to protect the evolution of the Factory System and the profits and immense wealth and power that accrued.

Only an institutionalised and bred or nurtured hatred can sustain this kind of behaviour, this kind of constant brutality, sheer depravity over such long periods of time. A psychotic hatred, a cold hatred, and controlled hatred. Only that could possibly engage generation after generation after generation of mass-murder most foul. And it is merely bullying. No more banal than that. Not Empire building ... that's a PR job. Merely bullying, with extreme violence...

And that is what the song “The Government Hates” is all about. It’s about those people who take the side of the Institutions that carry out such ‘policies’ as much as the Institutions themselves. Far too many of us succumb to that conditioning..

And only a cold, cold reading of History, or a severely edited one, or one presented as a ‘boys own’ annual special, a ‘costume drama’ … could ever manage to justify these horrors as part and parcel of ‘what makes us(?) Great Britain’ …. as part of human progress!

Since WWII the death rate for civilians/soldiers in ’wars’ is over 90% ‘in favour’ of civilians, ie: more and more civilians and fewer soldiers die. More in favour of soldiers, actually. And this is progress?

I cannot ‘adjust’ to this! I will not adjust to this!

I hold those who made the rules for the teachers who taught me such lies responsible for my own lack of knowledge, and for the lack of understanding that pervades this society, that is the product of 'state education' and well, it’s time it was said.

Such lies amount to a crime against all children they are told to. To demand a child treat the victors history as the truth, and to coerce it via schooling and testing, is a psychological crime. It makes all those children accesories after the fact. Legally this is the case, though it has yet to be tested in a court. This must be faced. This must be said. Share these thoughts, my friends, add to them. Be a transmitter.
I will not be not afraid of these cold, callous monsters and their bullying. They are just men. Insecure men. Damaged goods.

I will not be afraid of to unveil those sacred cows such as History, Commemorations, Heroism in service of country. I am freeing my mind and my and heart and I will object, I will disobey in a civil way, whatever way I can.

I free myself and I carve my own values, the ones that meet the needs of a person; values that meet the needs of a natural healthy community, out of the raw ingredients of this rotten culture, and my nature and maybe, just maybe, I’ll be fortunate enough to be one of those who will start the process of building a humane and balanced way of society. Whatever it may look like, it will feel centered, it will be a place for all children for all time. That is the destination. Nothing esle.

This may well be discussed here and there, with a little bit of action here and there and for sure millions upon millions do sincerely, billions I would say, want this is happen…. But it isn’t really started yet, not in the UK, not in Europe….. We’re behind the curve on this one, It’s almost as if we just don’t quite get it yet?

How long will those at the harsh end of the history that George W Bush and Anthony Blair wrote have to wait for justice and honesty, truth and reparation?

Sudan, Iraq, Afghanistan, the People of Tibet, the San People of the Kalahari, The villagers of the Congo, How long?

Who is next on the hit list?

The Government hates …people thinking these kinds of thoughts, and fears people with these thoughts might act upon them. The orchestrate, with business, the means to demonise the very possibility of these thoughts. That’s the function of the war on terror at home. Shut up!

The ‘Government’ shouldn’t be frightened. They should be proud we hold these thoughts and they should look to us for resolution. We mean them no harm. We want the wars and the greed driven stupidity to cease.

It’s not rocket science.

And it should not be taboo.




Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's your gift to universe



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Direct Experience, Understanding and Meaning.

Of crucial importance to my sensing of life, and my work as a performer, writer and polemicist is the concept of the existence of innate sensory acuity (skills) in all living beings that enable the cognition of change in the immediate and extended environment and thus the generation of appropriate responses, from the micro-bacterial to the largest living entity, in a constant sensitive precise feed-back loop : natural karma, if you will.

Starting from there, realising that this is also the nature of the natural child, perhaps one can begin to sense the implications of POWER, regarding the way such power is exercised in our society, the consequences of which we are all too sadly familiar.

In that the omission of that natural feedback loop that permeates natures processes is one of the key dynamics of POWER, we can look at how we treat children, in cultural terms, and how that culture impacts upon the personal, in our homes, our streets, our communities, with each other.

The more we understand about nature’s details through the medium of science, the more we realise that there is much in our language, and in the tools we use to discern nature, that is inadequate to the task.

Indeed in a recent issue of New Scientist, January 24th, the editorial explicitly acknowledged this. “ It is now accepted that the tree of life is something we impose on nature in an attempt to make the task of understanding it more tractable.“

As was the fact that the model of Darwinian Evolution as a linear process is also inadequate : ‘evolution’ or unfolding of life is non-linear, and works sideways, backwards, upwards and downwards as much as forwards.

What runs concurrent with that realisation is that the interconnectedness of all life forms is incredibly deep, is profoundly detailed and precise and that that quality is indeed the basis of life’s regenerative powers. We can in various ways, sense or know that quality, yet our scientific understanding does not yet describe the fullness of that quality.

Both of these understandings, of the use of sensory acuity and the interconnectedness of all life, form a large part of indigenous land based peoples ways of living. And this begs the question : from whence did these peoples ‘gain’ this understanding?

Put it another way : is there a direct experience of life, of nature, of habitat, one which our enables such understandings to accrue as a body of knowledge and thus inform the behaviour of living beings? What is that process of direct experience?

These are questions of supreme importance, for if there is such, then it is in that direct experience that the resolution of our problems will be found.

Taking this basic premise, (as I do) one can begin to understand the psychosis of POWER and how that leads towards cultures that impose beliefs, that cut off children from their innate sensory acuity, that justify harm as long as it protects or projects POWER.

I draw from my own personal experience as a dysfunctional adult for personal prima facie evidence of this. I have in the past justified my bullying of people. Even to the extent of blaming the one I have harmed for being the cause of the harm. In that I was no different to the US Government, the local gangster, the abusive spouse, the bigot. The personal is also the transpersonal. The personal is also the cultural. The personal is also the political.

I also draw on personal experience for evidence of that sensory acuity, of the near amazing ability to ‘jam’, to flow, to find exactly what is needed for my own life.

I have never been comfortable with the idea that I hold a particular skill, a unique power, that is not available to all. I have never been comfortable with the concept of innate human superiority. Thus when I receive ‘praise’ for these ‘skills’ I share as a musician or performer or facillitator I am always uncomfortable … almost embarrassed…. For me that is not the point of the performance - for me the point of the performance is to share something deeper than skin or skill. To reach to the life force quality within, to say 'we recognise each other'.

Many of my friends who perform and inspire likewise feel this combination of embarrassment and awareness. All these people have, like I do, a great sense of loving self as part of nature, a natural comfort in ones skin, that is in conflict with the culture we are born into, and of course we are often confused by the cultural paradigms of stars and audiences……of hierarchy…. and power. POWER.....

And that is the subject of my song "The Heart Song", which is third track on the reverbnation player to your right! Enjoy!




Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's your gift to universe



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Helen Caldicott : Another sensible woman..

Helen Caldicott, who I have great regard for, was interviewed for the English Independent Newspaper, as part of the credo series. What she has to say is instructive.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/credo--helen-caldicott-424003.html

That she spearheaded the international movement against nuclear power and nuclear weapons, is because of her ability to speak deeply, intelligently, without jargon, to the facts and the figures, to the human cost. And that her thinking is very, very clear on the matter.

As I wrote - instructive.

Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's your gift to universe



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SUSSEX OCCUPATION: Occupation Victories, Divine Divestment, Disciplinaries, Debates and Free Popcorn!

SUSSEX OCCUPATION: Occupation Victories, Divine Divestment, Disciplinaries, Debates and Free Popcorn!

Students, about their recent and ongoing universityoccupations :

"We feel it’s important to emphasize that the student occupation should be understood not simply as a tactic or a bargaining chip in getting our demands... At it’s best, the occupation provided a space for a process far more democratic than what conventional university structures are able to achieve. The changes we want to see will be attained through our direct action but also by creating such spaces, and expanding them indefinitely."

Thats a clear statement of intent.

Good for them! Good for us all!


Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's your gift to universe



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The Selfish Green - deconstructed, satire...

The Great and The Good of The Straight World discuss the future of humanity in the light of so much poverty, climate change and over population. War is off the agenda for this discussion!

David Attenborough, Richard Dawkins, Jane Goodall and David Leaky discuss the parlous state of affairs as regards the issues of the day...... before a rapt audience in good old Bristol. They are all good people, definitely well-meaning. Some easier to like than others. They have worked hard on others behalf. And they are straight. I mean really straight. Excruciatingly so.

One may view it here :

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4921860418188427146



by way of warning :

1. They don't mention war - a basil fawlty moment short of a laughing gnome ... well she did mention getting rid of the military... Jane Goodall.... smart girl!

2. Dawkins claims the idea of a species caring for the future, (were western civilisation to do the right thing) is a novel idea, an unique moment in time. Seems he missed out on all the indigenous peoples known proclivity in those very areas. As in "All is Born of Woman. No Harm Shall Come To The Children" doh!

3. Dawkins claimed we have ended slavery! oops! that's another 300 million people, alive today who missed a meeting!

4. Ok so Attenborough did say we need to look at nature as a unity, and there's agreement on this, yet he misses that the natural biodiversity is the best path during climate change, so give land back to nature to recover, put people to work repairing the land...

5. They miss that nature is a self-organising living paradigm ...... that the solution lies in tapping into that very self-organisational living paradigm. Nature KNOWS what to do! doh!

6. The men are boring, Jane Goodall is almost excluded....

7. They skirt around the issue of power, the minority who wield it and their naked willingness to harm anyone and anything so as to keep their power....

8. Leaky is hoping to convince the 100 people running industrialised humanity to change course? Really?

9. That's going to solve poverty? Oh yes, that and the Canadian steel charcoal burning stoves for African 'peasants'. The stoves I understand. The mind boggles.

really short review :

Man talks ... blah blah blah ... more men talk..... blah blah Jane Goodall - passion and common sense -men talk blah blah blah. man talks. man laughs. man sighs. blah blah blah. Jane Goodall says get rid of the military....men talk blah blah blah....blah blah, Jane Goodall says that it's unacceptable that we leave this planet worse than we found it, think about the children...... men talk blah blah blah.... men sigh, ponder weighty questions, pretty much offer no detail of any possible shift we need to make .... ..... very, very frustrating.

I know at least 200 people who would have given these people some answers and insight into the interconnectedness of all these issues - and there are millions of people like that.

Just have to get on with it, 'cos these fools are LOST!




And I'm not. No-one needs to be. Though many are. Thankfully it's not as bleak as that, we know we have nature within us.... that's some force to be reckoning with.... many millions of humans....


Kindest regards

Corneilius

Do what you love, it's your gift to universe



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