C.P. Salt • C.P. Salt ℗ 1982
1 hour ago
Saturday, 13 November 2010
Shit name but...
Tracklist:
Telespazio – ‘Telemetric’ (Arto Mwambe Remix) – Tiny Sticks
Spectacle – Prism – Permanent Vacation
Mango Boy – If It Ain’t Broke – Mango Boy Records
Neal Howard – The Gathering (Joey Negro edit) – NRK
Miranda – Jacques Renault Edit – On The Prowl
Lee Curtiss – Freak On – (Get Physical)
Layo & Bushwacka – The Raw Road (Nic fanciulli remix) – Olmeto
Basic Soul Unit – In The Trunk – Room With A View
DJ Sprinkles – Grand central Pt.1 (Deep In The Bowel Of House) MCDE Bassline Dub – Mule Musiq
Hrdvsion – Captivated Heart – Wagon Repair
Murk – Bugged out – Solid Pleasure
The Orb – Little fluffy Clouds (Cumulonimbus mix) – Big Life
The White Anti-Racist Is an Oxymoron: An Open Letter to 'White Anti-Racists'
I received an annoying e-mail about white people and their struggle to do anti-racist work. I keep reading and hearing white people talk about their struggle to do anti-racist organizing, and frankly it gets on my nerves. So I am writing this open letter to white people who engage in any activist work that involves or affects non-whites. Given that the US social structure is founded on white supremacy, and that there is a global order in which white supremacy and European domination are at large, I would challenge any white person to figure out what movement or action they can get involved in that will not involve or affect non-white people.
That said, I want to begin with what has become a realization for me through the help of different politically conscious friends. There is NO SUCH THING AS A WHITE ANTI-RACIST. The term itself, "white anti- racist" is an oxymoron. In the following, I will explain why. Then, I will begin to detail how this impacts non-white people in organizing work specifically, along with how it affects non-white people generally.
First, one must realize that whiteness is a structure of domination. As such, there is nothing redeemable or reformable about whiteness. Intellectuals, scholars and activists, especially those who are non- white, have drawn our attention to this for years. For example, people such as Malcolm X, W.E.B. DuBois, Marcus Garvey, James Baldwin, Toni Morrison, Ida B. Wells, Sojourner Truth, Frederick Douglass, and many, many others who are perhaps less famous, have articulated the relationship between whiteness and domination.
Further, people such as Douglass and DuBois began to outline how whiteness is a social and political construct that emphasizes the domination, authority, and perceived humanity of those who are racialized as white. They, along with many other non-white writers and orators, have pointed to the fact that it was the bodies who were able to be racialized as "white" that were able to be viewed as rational, authoritative, and deserving. Further, and believe me, this is no small thing, white people are viewed as human. What this means is that when white people suffer, as some who are poor/female/queer, they nevertheless are able to have some measure of sympathy for their plight simply because they are white and their marginalization is considered an emergency, crisis or an issue to be concerned about.
Furthermore, even when white people have been oppressed by various dimensions of classism, homophobia and heterosexism, they have been able to opt for what DuBois, in his monograph "Black Reconstruction" brilliantly called "the psychological wage of whiteness." That is, whites that are marginalized could find comfort, even if psychological, in the fact that they were not non-white. They could revel in the fact that they could be taken as white in opposition to non-white groups. The desire for this wage of whiteness was also what drove many white people, albeit marginalized, to engage in organized violence against non-whites.
Of course, legal cases such as the Dred Scott Decision along with many different naturalization cases involving Asian individuals, has helped to encode a state-sanctioned definition of whiteness. But there are other ways in which white people can be racialized as white by the state. They are not stopped while driving as much as non-white people. Their homes and businesses are not raided and searched as much by police officers, INS or License and Inspections (L&I). White people's bodies are not tracked and locked up in prisons, detention centers, juvenile systems, detention halls in classrooms, "special education" classes, etc. White people's bodies are not generally the site of fear, repulsion, violent desire, or hatred.
Now some might point out to me that white people are followed, tracked and harassed by individuals and state agents such as the police. This is true. Some white women get sexually harassed and experience state-sanctioned discrimination. Queer whites are the subject of homophobia, whether by individuals or by the state through laws and the police. Some queer whites are harassed by cops. Activist whites are stopped by police. White people who play rap music and wear gear are stopped by cops. Poor whites can be criminalized, especially by the state around welfare issues. What I want to point out is that, while I do not condone police violence and harassment, there is a way in which white people will not be viewed as inherently criminal or suspect unless they are perceived as doing something that breaks particular norms.
Conversely, other racial groups, particularly Blacks and Native Americans, are considered inherently criminal no matter what they do, what their sexual identity is or what they wear. Further, it has always struck me as interesting that there are white people who will attempt to wear what signifies "Blackness," whether it is dreadlocks (which, in my opinion, should be cut off from every white person's head), "gear," or Black masks at rallies. There is a sick way in which white people want to emulate that which is considered "badass" about a certain existential position of Blackness at the same time they do not want the burden of living as a non-white person. Further, it really strikes me as fucked up the way in which white people will go to rallies and taunt the police with Black masks in order to bring on police pressure. What does it mean when Blackness is strategically used by whites to bring on police violence? Now I know that somewhere there is a dreadlocked, smelly white anarchist who is reading this message and who is angry with me for not understanding the logic of the Black masks and its roots in anarchism. But I would challenge these people to consider how they are reproducing a violence towards Blackness in their attempts to taunt and challenge the police in their efforts.
Now back to my point that white anti-racism is an oxymoron. Whiteness is a social and political construct rooted in white supremacy. White supremacy is a structure and system of beliefs rooted in European and US imperialism in which certain racialized bodies (non-white) are selected for premature negation whether through cultural, physical, psychological genocide, containment or other forms of social death. White supremacy is at the heart of the US social system and civil society. In short, white supremacy is not just a series of practices or privilege, but a larger social structure and system of domination that overly-values and rewards those who are racialized as white. The rest of us are constructed as undeserving to be considered human, although there is significant variation within non-white populations of how our bodies are encoded, treated and (de)valued...
Don't forget Boss Goodman's benefit tonight if you are in London
BIG hugs and kisses from Angie and I
(The Dingwalls Down Under Duo)
XXX
HA!
jackofkent Have just been told by a journo that a certain tweet is now the most RT'd tweet ever. Is this correct? How wd one know? Twitter anger over bomb tweeter
Henryk Gorecki RIP
Polish composer Henryk Gorecki has died at the age of 76, the country's national orchestra has announced.
He was best known for his Symphony of Sorrowful Songs, which was composed in 1976 and sold more than a million copies following a 1992 re-release.
The symphony, re-issued to commemorate those who died in the Holocaust, featured vocals from US soprano Dawn Upshaw.
It was often played on radio station Classic FM when it launched in 1992.
Monumental style
Gorecki had been suffering from a prolonged illness, a spokeswoman for Polish Radio's National Symphony Orchestra said.
He was born close to the industrial city of Katowice in southern Poland where he studied music and became a professor at the city's music academy.
The composer's earlier works in the 1950s and 1960s explored folk music traditions, but by the 1970s had formed into the monumental style he became famous for.
He was often at odds with the authorities in communist Poland, withdrawing from public life in the 1980s to concentrate on composing music.
Gorecki's Symphony No 3 became the best-selling record by a contemporary composer, with its slow and stark style dealing with the themes of war and separation.
The composer had completed his fourth symphony, but its premiere was shelved due to his illness.
He was awarded the Order of the White Eagle last month, Poland's highest honour.
Friday, 12 November 2010
RT
exilestreet Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week to get your shit together, otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high! #IAmSpartacus
David Dawson: Lucian Freud, Working at Night (2005)
This photo of Lucian Freud working at night in his studio was taken by long time assistant David Dawson. The photo was part of an exhibition held by Hazlitt Holland-Hibbert to coincide with the book launch of Freud at Work (Knopf, 2006). The photo, along with a dozen others, was reproduced by the catalog put forward by the Centre Pompidou for its recent exhibition Lucian Freud. L’Atelier (March 10 2010 – July 19 2010
Twitter joke trial: Paul Chambers loses appeal against conviction
The man convicted of "menace" for threatening to blow up an airport in a Twitter joke has lost his appeal.
Paul Chambers, a 27-year-old accountant whose online courtship with another user of the microblogging site led to the "foolish prank", had hoped that a crown court would dismiss his conviction and £1,000 fine without a full hearing.
But Judge Jacqueline Davies instead handed down a devastating finding at Doncaster which dismissed Chambers's appeal on every count. After reading out his comment from the site – "Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high!!" – she found that it contained menace and Chambers must have known that it might be taken seriously.
He was also saddled with a legal bill three times higher than his original £384 with £600 costs, as the court ordered him to pay a further £2,000 legal bill for the latest proceedings.
Chambers, who lost his financial manager's job after his arrest in January, sent the message to a contact called @crazycolours, a young woman from Northern Ireland who was among 650 people who regularly followed his 140-character tweets.
They had arranged to meet in Belfast and Chambers told an earlier hearing he was desperate and frustrated that heavy snow might close Robin Hood, near Doncaster, and ruin their plans.
He used Twitter's private service to joke with her late at night about hijacking a plane, noting wryly that its pilots might expect to be diverted to somewhere more exotic than Northern Ireland. But his facetious bomb threat was sent on the network's public system, allowing anyone to see it – including staff at Robin Hood.
Chambers's conviction this summer caused huge controversy both on Twitter itself and among civil liberties lawyers because of its implications for the cyberworld's freewheeling style. The Crown Prosecution Service caused controversy by using a law aimed against nuisance calls – originally to protect "female telephonists at the Post Office" in the 1930s – rather than specific bomb hoax legislation, which requires stronger evidence of intent.
Judge Davies refused a request by Ferguson to cut the sentence to an absolute or conditional discharge. She effectively branded Chambers a liar by calling his denials about realising the possible implications of the tweet incredible.
She told the court that he had been an "unimpressive witness" and said: "Anyone in this country in the present climate of terrorist threats, especially at airports, could not be unaware of the possible consequences."
She also described some of his earlier evidence as "self-serving" and cast doubt on his claims not to have kept up to date with current affairs through newspapers or TV. As for the tweet at the centre of the case, she called it "menacing in its content and obviously so. It could not be more clear. Any ordinary person reading this would see it in that way and be alarmed."
Chambers and @crazycolours, who now live together in Northern Ireland, left court disconsolately and will now meet their legal team to consider a further appeal. The cost will be weighed against clearing Chambers's name and the wider issues, which have caused an international debate on social networking sites.
Chambers said he was also aggrieved at the heavy-handed handling of his case, saying that he had been held for seven hours in a police cell. He said: "I wouldn't have minded if they had told me off for being stupid, which was clearly how they saw things really, but it wasn't like that."
The wider implications were fanned by news of a second arrest under the same "nuisance call" law of a Conservative councillor in Birmingham who posted a tweet crudely attacking the columnist Yasmin Alibhi-Brown. The post by Gareth Compton, now removed, reportedly said: "Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan't tell Amnesty if you don't. It would be a blessing, really."
Compton, who represents Erdington on Birmingham city council, apologised after his release on bail and said: "It was an ill-conceived attempt at humour. I apologise for any offence caused. It was wholly unintentional."
The tweet was criticised in the House of Commons by the Leader of the House, Sir George Young, who was asked to allow an emergency debate by Steve McCable, Labour MP for Selly Oak in Birmingham.
Young said: "Stoning to death is a barbarous form of punishment which the government, and I am sure every member of this House, deplores. I hope that no elected person will threaten any member of our society with that form of punishment."
Martin Wainwright @'The Guardian'
Secret Files Show Kopassus, Indonesia's Special Forces, Targets Papuan Churches, Civilians.
Secret documents have leaked from inside Kopassus, Indonesia's red berets, which say that Indonesia's US-backed security forces engage in "murder [and] abduction" and show that Kopassus targets churches in West Papua and defines civilian dissidents as the "enemy."
The documents include a Kopassus enemies list headed by Papua's top Baptist minister and describe a covert network of surveillance, infiltration and disruption of Papuan institutions
The disclosure comes as US President Barack Obama is touching down in Indonesia. His administration recently announced the restoration of US aid to Kopassus...
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Thursday, 11 November 2010
Four Tet:: 'The music industry is scared'
With more albums to his name in a decade than some artists release in a lifetime, Four Tet (real name Kieran Hebden) has mastered the art of musical legacy, using each record as a testimony to his evolution as an artist rather than to his ability of adapting himself to suit trends, buzzwords, and the music industry in general. “When I make records, I’m not thinking ‘maybe they’re all going to call this chillwave and I’ll jump on that new thing’,” he begins. “I’m thinking to myself ‘how am I still going to be able to look back on this record and be comfortable with it in 40 years time’. To me, that’s the sort of thing that really counts.” “I want to make music that’s relevant now in terms of communicating to people and people enjoying it and touching them in that moment,” he continues. “But in terms of fitting into current genres and the music business as a whole, it’s much more important to me that it looks good in the history of music and in the future than it does now.” Resistance to industry agenda and it-band popularity aside, since his debut as Four Tet in the late 1990s, Hebden has grown a devout following of critics, listeners and musicians alike, with his 2009 release, There is Love in You earning overwhelming praise and adding further proof to his longevity as an artist. “I think my whole concept of why I’m putting out records and why I’m doing it has changed a lot – especially in the last four or five years,” he explains. “I think when you start making records – or maybe it was just my experience – you’re working towards some sort of magical goal by putting out your ‘best record ever’. But I’ve come to realize now that I don’t think it’s about that at all. I’m not sitting down to make a record and thinking about how I can make it better than the last one – to me, that’s kind of meaningless.” In the spirit of greats like Miles Davis, Hebden aspires to hone a catalogue that documents and reflects his transition as an artist and doesn’t waver to suit the status quo. “To me, my record is a document of my personal journey and I want to see my whole catalogue in the records lining my shelf that tells my musical story,” he shares. “And if you suddenly have a record in the middle of there that’s heavily manipulated by the record company . . . that would be a blip in the history. That would be where it all went wrong.” Now playing dates in Europe after wrapping his North American tour, Hebden has no immediate plans to record his follow-up, but feels comfortable taking his time since he feels so many bands seem to be suffering from the industry’s blatent cash-cow agenda. “[The music industry cashes] in on acts as fast as they can because they’re scared,” he maintains. “You don’t hear about record companies signing bands and being like, ‘oh, on their sixth album we’ve got to do something special’.” “Everything about the way things are done now is quite bazaar (sic),” he adds. “But maybe it’s brilliant. Maybe it’s the most exciting time ever. But I never want to decide. And people [are trying] to decide whether it’s an exciting time or not – but I’m going to be more interested to look back on it in the future.”(via aux) @'Extra Music New'
sunny_hundal Funny how police are quick to launch investigations when they don't use enough force, but not when they go too far http://bbc.in/9TJ7JY
SQWUBBSY!!!
Julian Cope performing 'I Wanna Know What's In It For Me'
Joe Strummer Memorial Busking Tour
October 27th 2008 C.E.
Swanborough Tump
Joe Strummer Memorial Busking Tour
October 27th 2008 C.E.
Swanborough Tump
(RePost) The 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month
In Memory of
Private ARTHUR JOHN HADDOCK
2766529, 6th Bn., Black Watch (Royal Highlanders)
who died age 20
on 24 April 1944
Son of Robert Arthur and Catherine Haddock,
of Orrell, Bootle, Lancashire.
Remembered with honour
CASSINO WAR CEMETERY
Watch Out: The World Bank Is Quietly Funding a Massive Corporate Water Grab
Billions have been spent allowing corporations to profit from public water sources even though water privatization has been an epic failure in Latin America, Southeast Asia, North America, Africa and everywhere else it's been tried. But don't tell that to controversial loan-sharks at the World Bank. Last month, its private-sector funding arm International Finance Corporation (IFC) quietly dropped a cool 100 million euros ($139 million US) on Veolia Voda, the Eastern European subsidiary of Veolia, the world's largest private water corporation. Its latest target? Privatization of Eastern Europe's water resources.
"Veolia has made it clear that their business model is based on maximizing profits, not long-term investment," Joby Gelbspan, senior program coordinator for private-sector watchdog Corporate Accountability International, told AlterNet. "Both the World Bank and the transnational water companies like Veolia have clearly acknowledged they don't want to invest in the infrastructure necessary to improve water access in Eastern Europe. That's why this 100 million euro investment in Veolia Voda by the World Bank's private investment arm over the summer is so alarming. It's further evidence that the World Bank remains committed to water privatization, despite all evidence that this approach will not solve the world's water crisis."
All the evidence Veolia needs that water grabs are doomed exercises can be found in its birthplace of France, more popularly known as the heartland of water privatization. In June, the municipal administration of Paris reclaimed the City of Light's water services from both of its homegrown multinationals Veolia and Suez, after a torrent of controversy. That's just one of 40 re-municipilazations in France alone, which can be added to those in Africa, Asia, Latin America, North America and more in hopes of painting a not-so-pretty picture: Water privatization is ultimately both a horrific concept and a failed project.
"It's outrageous that the World Bank's IFC would continue to invest in corporate water privatizations when they are failing all over the world," Maude Barlow, chairwoman of Food and Water Watch and the author of Blue Covenant: The Global Water Crisis and the Fight for the Right to Water, told AlterNet. "A similar IFC investment in the Philippines is an unmitigated disaster. Local communities and their governments around the world are canceling their contracts with companies like Veolia because of cost overruns, worker layoffs and substandard service."...
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Scott Thill @'Aternet'
johannhari101 Nick Clegg warned before the election of "riots" if Tories introduced extreme cuts. Now the riots have begun. And Clegg is a chief cutter
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