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Ian MacEwan and Jason Leivian: The Yankee

admin — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 23:52:12 +0000

Ian MacEwan (aka popjellyfish) has published his online comic The Yankee.

The Yankee is a dumb American. He’s Cosmo Vitelli. He’s Prince Rogers Nelson. He’s a Richard Pryor monologue. Psychedel-economic fiction set in the Nation States of America.

See Ian’s previous work in OVO 20 JUVEN(a/i)LIA for Evil Eye by Hakim Bey.

Trevor Blake: SOPA / PIPA Blackout, Left and Right

admin — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 19:23:15 +0000

I believe in the complete freedom of thought and speech [...] I believe that it is better to tell the truth than to lie. I believe that it is better to be free than to be a slave. And I believe that it is better to know than be ignorant . – H. L. Mencken

Wikipedia:

In carrying out this protest, is Wikipedia abandoning neutrality?

We hope you continue to trust Wikipedia to be a neutral information source. We are staging this blackout because (as Wikimedia Foundation Trustee Kat Walsh said recently), although Wikipedia’s articles are neutral, its existence is not. For over a decade, Wikipedians have spent millions of hours building the largest encyclopedia in human history. Wikipedia is a tremendously useful resource, and its existence depends upon a free, open and uncensored Internet. SOPA and PIPA (and other similar laws under discussion inside and outside the United States) will hurt you, because they will make it impossible for sites you enjoy, and benefit from, to continue to exist. That’s why we’re doing this.

Today, 18 January 2012, a number of the websites I read have made their content inaccessible or difficult to access in protest of two proposed laws in the United States. These laws (Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act) seem likely to have a chilling effect on the internet. If I’m understanding these laws correctly, my linking to a site that in turn links to a site found to be in violation of copyright laws would get me in trouble as well as the site I link to. As I am unable to monitor the content of the sites I link to in my 19,100+ blog posts, I may unknowingly be in violation of these laws when all I wanted to do was point out a funny video or an interesting article.

I make it a point to read across the political spectrum. This is my greatest hope to foster ongoing critical thinking, and often I learn of laws or events from one side of the sausage factory that the other side of the sausage factory is silent about. That silence may be based on ignorance or it may be a willful silence. Whatever the reason, I am not diminished by taking in more information.

I note that the SOPA / PIPA blackout is not common to sites that are likely to self-identify as ‘not-left.’ I use the vague term ‘not-left’ deliberately. My compilation of this list is no claim that these sites are of a kind, aside from a likelihood they would not identify as being on the political left. How far not-left they are, how that is manifest, varies. The sites I list below are not necessarily aware of or in agreement with each other. I am certain that some of them are antagonistic to each other. Inclusion in this list is not at all a claim that anyone on this list agrees with or is aware of anyone else on this list. I have looked at each of these sites at least briefly, and I can say that I also do not agree with the entire content of each one. The problem with SOPA / PIPA is it applies the contagion theory to information: if I link to a site, I’m guilty of what that site contains. If you think my linking to these sites contaminates me, then I suggest you speak out in favor of SOPA / PIPA – and reconsider reading my site any more, lest you yourself be contaminated. At the same time, I caution the reader that some of the following sites are factually incorrect, mean spirited, possibly illegal outside the United States, discriminatory and almost certainly not to be read at work. To the best of my ability, I have confirmed that these sites all reside in the United States.

The Occupy movement in the United States has been allowed months of free speech, then had it taken away. American Renaissance has been denied a single second of public meeting time for two years. Occupy is decidedly ‘not-right’ and American Renaissance is decidedly ‘not-left,’ but both share the thirst for freedom of speech and association. All ‘not-left’ sites are at risk from SOPA / PIPA. But few ‘not-left’ sites are participating in the blackout today.

Not-Left Sites Critical of SOPA / PIPA:

Antiwar.com
Apocalypse Cometh
At Liberty at Leisure
Beast
Hawaiian Libertarian
HBD Chick
Rhymes With Cars & Girls
Stares at the World
Veritas Aculeus
View From The Right [Revision at 11:27pm PST 1/27/2012: added]

Not-Left Sites Not Discussing SOPA / PIPA

Trevor Blake at the Curiosity Club 7 February 2012

admin — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 22:04:03 +0000

Tuesday 7 February 2012
6:00pm to 7:00pm PST (GMT+8)

Hand-Eye Supply
23 NW 4th Ave
Portland, OR, 97209

503.575.9769
Regular Hours: Monday-Sunday: 12pm – 6pm PST (GMT+8)

Trevor Blake: The Sound of the Hammer Greets You on Every Side: Portland Memorials

Between 2009 and 2011 Trevor walked the length and breadth of downtown Portland. When he found a memorial, he transcribed what it said and where it was. Portland Memorials includes all the memorials in downtown Portland. The book is entered this book into the public domain for the same reason Joseph Shemanski gave Portland the Shemanski Fountain: “to express in small measure gratitude for what the city has done for me.” Trevor will discuss the book and the remarkable memorials he found while writing it.

Trevor Blake was born in Knoxville, Tennessee and moved to Portland in 1992. He works as a freelance sign language interpreter. Besides Portland Memorials, he is the publisher of OVO (1987 – present); author of The Buckminster Fuller Bibliography; contributor to The Journal of Ride Theory Omnibus (Portland, JORT 2003); In Extremis (Athens, Survival Kit 1994); Pozdravi iz Babilona (Ljubljana, KRT 1987); and the literature of the Church of the SubGenius.

Hand-Eye Supply

Curiosity Club

Curiosity Club Streaming Video

Portland Memorials
144 pages, 8.5 x 11, $15.00
Thousands of memorials in Portland, Oregon.
[Information] [Print] [Kindle]

Lisa Loving: ‘Portland Memorials’ Lists City Histories Depicted in Park Benches, Fountains, and More

admin — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 01:14:05 +0000

Portland writer Trevor Blake’s book, Portland Memorials, is a compilation of historical markers to be found by walking through the downtown area. Sound simple? Consider that the author must at some points have practically crawled on his hands and knees to transcribe dates and names from the thousands of “plaques, buildings, statues, benches and fountains” that were grist for his investigations. He even discovered that a few memorials touching on Black history were likely thrown into the Willamette River. The Skanner News traded electronic letters with Blake to get his story on how, and why, Portland has chosen to remember its past.

The Skanner News: Trevor what made you want to put this book together?

Trevor Blake: I wrote Portland Memorials for three reasons. The first reason is an echo of one of the memorials found in the book. The Shemanski Fountain is located at the north end of the South Park Blocks. It was a gift to the city by Portland shopkeeper Joseph Shemanski (1869-1951) in 1926. Shemanski gave the fountain to the city “to express in small measure gratitude for what the city has done for me.” And that is exactly the reason I have written Portland Memorials. I moved to Portland in 1992 and the city has given me as many opportunities, experiences and challenges as anyone could ask for. The second reason is writing a book is a good way to learn a subject, and I wanted to learn more about the architecture and history of Portland. The third reason is it provided some good exercise for the legs and the brain.

TSN: How did you research it, how many memorials are contained in it, and how long did it take?

Blake: I researched Portland Memorials the old fashioned way: I used my feet and my eyes. Over a three year period I walked around every block in downtown Portland, usually two or three times, and whenever I found a memorial I wrote down what it said and where it was using a pencil and paper. No special training or equipment was needed. There are a few websites and books that might have helped but I decided to see for myself what was there, and in doing so I’ve documented many thousands of memorials that are found in no other resource. I thought it would be a fine project for a Summer and include a few hundred items. It is a fine project, but it took three years and includes thousands of names. The best way to find a particular memorial is to look in the index, then find that page, then go to that memorial.

TSN: Can you talk a little bit about the Portland memorials that touch on the African American experience here?

BLAKE: I’m glad you asked this question. One of the most lively memorials downtown is for the Golden West Hotel at 707 NW Everett. This hotel was owned and frequented by African Americans from the early 1900s onward. Of all the memorials I found, this is the only one that includes photographs, text and a recording – the blind can enjoy and learn from this memorial, making it accessible to even more Portland citizens. The Walk of the Heroines on the campus of Portland State University includes the name of nearly thirty Black women civil rights pioneers. Strangely enough, there are three civil war cannons in downtown Portland. Two are in Lownsdale Square and were taken from Fort Sumter, the third was melted down and made into the church bell of First Presbyterian Church. There are some sidewalk plaques in the Old Town area that honor how the Chinese community has interacted with other communities, and one of them (on NW Flanders between 3 and 4) talks about how the Chinese and African American community mingled at the Royal Palm Hotel. There used to be a memorial park downtown dedicated to the Liberty Ships built by many African American workers in Portland during World War Two, but when that property was converted to condominiums most of what was in the park was thrown into the Willamette River.

TSN: What do you want to come from this book?

BLAKE: I want people to read about a memorial and go see it for themselves. Not to read about it and forget it, not look it up online, but to go see it for themselves. It’s a reminder that each of us will just be a memory some day and that we’d best make hay while the sun shines.

TSN: What’s the most important thing about this town that you hope people take away from reading Portland Memorials?

BLAKE: Portland has preserved much of its history, and that can’t be said about many cities. Sometimes the preservation was by design of the city leaders, but often it was the efforts of individuals. In the 1950s many older buildings were torn down for being old fashioned. The decorative iron work on the sides of some of these buildings was, shall we say, ‘privately preserved’ by individuals who couldn’t stand to see the art destroyed. Decades later, when Portland again appreciated its history, these works were returned to the city and can be seen in the Saturday Market area. I hope Portland Memorials is read for years to come by those who care about our city’s history.

TSN: Is there a website or other place people can access your book, or any other of your writings?

BLAKE: My book can be purchased in print or for Kindle at this address http://ovo127.com/ovo/ , where there is also a free sample chapter to download.

Originally published by The Skanner News on 19 December 2011. Many thanks to Lisa and The Skanner.

Rev. Ivan Stang on OVO 20 JUVEN(a/i)LIA and PORTLAND MEMORIALS

admin — Sat, 17 Dec 2011 04:33:44 +0000

Rev. Stang:

Dr. Onan Canobite sent two self-published books, one a best-of from his OVO zine and one about the monuments and plaques of Portland Oregon, his town, which he loves, having grown up in Knoxville TN.

Trevor Blake: What Sort of Man Reads OVO?

admin — Sat, 03 Dec 2011 18:14:28 +0000

Image c/o Retronaut.

Thanks to the following for linking to OVO.

Eithin links to Liberating Wednesday.
Monday Vatican links to The Concordant Story.
Financial Advices Blog links to The Bonus Army.
Rambone at Indiana Gun Owners links to The Bonus Army.
The American Book of the Dead links to Unspeakable Horrors.

Ferdinand Bardamu: Bardamu’s Bookbag

admin — Fri, 18 Nov 2011 03:03:30 +0000

This review of OVO 20: JUVEN(a/i)LIA by Trevor Blake was written by Ferdinand Bardamu, and appeared at his blog In Mala Fide in November 2011.

This is a best-of collection of articles and artwork from OVO, a zine founded and edited by friend of the blog Trevor Blake, “a public record of [his] interests and inquiries.” It’s interesting, it’s weird, and I don’t entirely know what to make of it. I guess it’s because I’m too young to appreciate it – I was barely out of diapers when Trevor was printing up the early editions of OVO on his pal’s company’s copiers in the eighties. To someone of the Internet Era, where narcissistic self-expression is just a couple of mouse clicks away, the effort and dedication involved in compiling an entire magazine, from writing and gathering the material to binding the physical copies and mailing them out, is difficult to relate to.

Still, this is a great little collection of oddities, ranging from poetry to short stories to investigative journalism on offbeat subjects. They include “Holding Games for Ransom,” about how one tabletop game creator found a way to keep online piracy from cutting into his profits; “A Pit Stop Along the Inward Journey,” a stream-of-consciousness tale beginning with white guilt and ending with madness; and “23 Sperm Stories 23,” the longest article in the book, on just about every aspect of sperm, from its discovery, its function, and its future. Of particular interest to us in the manosphere are “Warbucks Intra-Family Communique” and “Becoming More Free” by Ernest Mann. The former is a satirical article on the emptiness and mindlessness of American consumerism; the latter is on how Mann unplugged himself from the Matrix of American culture:

I am wasting less of my time (LIFE) watching, listening to and reading THOUGHT LEADERS, ie, TV, movies, radio, music, newspapers, magazines and novels. These are like spectator sports. They cause me to live life vicariously, ie, second-hand, not real, only in fantasy. These mind conditioners are subtly designed to create not only fear and anger emotions but also create feelings of guilt and inadequacy. These feeling stifle growth and keep one securely in one’s rut. And of course the more visible purpose of the media is to create the desire to acquire (BUY! BUY! BUY!) and keep up with the Joneses. ‘Buying’ uses up my savings. I spent 22 years of my TIME (life) working as a Wage Slave. I helped perpetuate the status quo, ie a world of 98.6% Slaves and less than 1% Elite (Billionaires). I don’t wish to do that any more.

But the real prize is Trevor’s own writings, comprising the second half of the book. They include book reviews (including an exhaustive review of one of my favorites, L.A. Rollins’ Myth of Natural Rights), interviews with such diverse individuals as a bulimia sufferer and an expert on out-of-body experiences/bilocation, and my favorite, “Trajectory Through Anarchism,” in which Trevor tracks the evolution of his political beliefs:

1996: Feeling free of anarchism and a little burned by what I now see was my own hooded thinking, I call up the imp of the perverse to see what other forbidden ideas might be out there. Ayn Rand is suggested, and I read her works. Having already shed one hood I’m less inclined to put another one on, and I do not become an Objectivist. But moving through Objectivism brings libertarian thinking to my attention. It’s something about the sovereignty of the individual… but I’ve walked down that path already and don’t sign on as a libertarian either.

Like The eXile, OVO 20 comes in a 8 1/2 by 11 inch size, to fit artwork and cartoons on the pages – I was particularly amused by “Attack of the Giant Killer Sperm.” One minor issue I have with the design is that all paragraphs in OVO 20 are punctuated with bullet points. I suppose they’re there to make the book look distinctive, but I found them mildly distracting, fooling my eyes into thinking I was reading a series of lists instead of articles.

Still, if you want to take an excursion into the bizarre and come back a little more enlightened, OV0 20 is a fun and informative read. If you’re still not convinced, Trevor maintains a free online archive of all OVO articles here. He also has some words of wisdom for aspiring writers and publishers:

…First and most important, get busy. Your time is already diminished by work and mortality, and neither of those situations is going to improve. Keep a printed copy of what you make and write down the date of when you made it. Large bodies of work and the pleasure they bring are made a few small pieces at a time. Learn about the history of what interests you. Novelty is rare and not always of value for being novel. Your friends are not being documented right now and you are the one who can do a good job with that. Read with regularity outside your area of interests. Nothing will point out your own ignorance and error better than attentiveness to those who disagree with you, nothing makes what you know make sense like learning something unrelated to what you know. Take as many chances as you are willing to take the lumps for.

But most of all, get busy.

Peter Lamborn Wilson – Back to 1911 Movement Manifesto: Telephone

admin — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 04:05:01 +0000

Those who long to live in 1911 choose that year – really any year from 1890 to 1914 would be equally ok – just because it’s safely in the middle of that long lingering last “decade” of the long 19th Century – which was also the first heroic decade of true modern radicalism – e.g. – the Wandervogel, Stirnerite anarchism, the IWW and Jim Larkin, Ascona, Sex Radicals & Nudists – etc. And still far removed from the future of total war & totalitarianism to come – a time of utopian revolutionary hope.

Also of course it’s the Age of Decadence – final year of the Manchu Dynasty – opium ten cents a bottle at any country store – the Paris of J. K. Huysmans. Gaslight. Also: the last gasp of true agrarianism in the USA – age of Populism, the Grange, Farmers Alliance – the last rural decade.

But there’s another reason we choose 1911 (or thereabouts) for our little Golden Age. It has to do with technology. In 1911 almost all the actual conveniences of modern tech already existed: the car, the telephone, the electric bulb, the phonograph… Now we Luddites do not approve of cars or any of these inventions, which all subtract from the quanta of Imagination available to individuals & to the Social. But we have to admit – they’re convenient. In their primitive forms they’re almost likable. The only real convenience invented since then – the electric refrigerator – can be replaced by an Amish-built propane refrigerator – OR – we could re-invent the ice-box. We hope someday to learn to sing again, but till then we can accept a few hand-cranked shellac records (but no radio or TV). Computers are NOT in any way part of a revived 1911 however. It’s time to wake up & smell the rot of technopathology.

The telephone easily corrodes social presence & reduces selves to disembodies “voices of the Unseen,” as the Arabs called the invention. But again the primitive version, with its “party lines” & snoopy local Operators, had a social aspect now completely leached out of the medium. If we must be thus haunted let it be via one of these elegant sinister objects – a real murder weapon.

Full play of Imagination becomes possible only without modern technology, because tech has become the heartless operation of Capital, which hates all forms of sharing. Let’s work for a secular Anabaptism, bold enough finally to refuse everything back to the steam engine – at least. Whereupon we may resume human life.

Peter Lamborn Wilson – Back to 1911 Movement Manifesto: Photography

admin — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 02:48:54 +0000

Everything has already been said about photography. We have it here in 1911 but even now we can see how it may have been a big mistake.

The Byzantine Iconoclasts were no mere smashers of idols – their arguments ran deep, subtle & profound. They claimed that the Image colonizes the Imagination – other people’s magic overcomes your own personal magic & imprints itself on your soul. Only the Imagination free of such (mis)representation can truly be called autonomous & capable of poiesis, the creative act. To depict the sacred (& all things are potentially sacred) is to degrade it & thus to blaspheme. Only the Eye of the Heart can actually see.

Many Sufis would agree with these sentiments, as would many Jewish & Protestant mystics. The more accurate & scientific the representation the more it lies & blasphemes. “Abstract” art is more moral than any form of realism. Music & architecture, which are simply themselves (ideally), are considered permissible, although Islam suspects even music of threatening the soul’s integrity. But painting & sculpture & especially photography must surely be damned. Looking itself is a compromised or even guilty pleasure, lacking the intimacy of touch or smell or even hearing – too akin to “pure reason” – to cruel.

Against these arguments however we might assert the possibility of Hermetic Imagery – which (as Giordano Bruno or Athanasius Kircher would say) can allow us to free ourselves from the Image through the Image.

Certain symbols, Emblems, hieroglyphs or works of art can liberate the Imagination rather than “enchain” it. These images stimulate your own creativity rather than stifle or suffocate it under their beauty or shock-value or subliminal potency etc.

In the Renaissance this theory of art was called “Egyptian,” thanks to a fortuitous misunderstanding of the ancient hieroglyphs (ie that they were “magic”). Cagliostro was pushing the same notion in the late 19th Century. I believe we need such a theory in order to redeem our various arts – to save them from merely forming new chains, like advertising or propaganda.

Does this argument rescue photography from its own special hell? Maybe not. But maybe there’s something to be said for a touch of damnation. Maybe photography is a vice, like pornography, but then perhaps it could be a magical vice.

If we must have photography in 1911 let it be slow, clumsy, alchemical, rare – somehow still innocent of theory – not so much a spectral doubling but rather Magic Lanterns, a kind of stained glass, primitive & luminous, posed & formal, static, sepia-toned, nostalgic & slightly comical.

Peter Lamborn Wilson – Back to 1911 Movement Manifesto: Energy

admin — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 02:48:47 +0000

ACME, you remember, was the company that made all those safes for Coyote to drop on the Roadrunner. If only it were that simple.

Everyone simply can’t go “back to 1911″ – there wouldn’t be enough energy there to support our wasteful habits. The last viable population density must’ve occurred, in fact, around 1911. After that – the crowd. The utopian reversionism I’m proposing, I guess, is only possible for a self-chosen elite.

Petroleum was a rare commodity in 1911 – like whale oil today. Stoves burned wood – a renewable resource. Plant an acorn, reap a cord of fixed sunlight. I’m not saying everyone should to it now. I’m saying that we – carefree luddites – will burned wood in our ornate victorian stoves, while everyone else poisons themselves with petrol & electricity.

The alchemists tell us that not all forms of heat are simply the same calories delivered by different tech. The heat of a brooding hen, heat of a manure pile, heat of a woodstove – & the heat of a nuclear reactor disaster – are qualitatively different, not just quantitatively.

Woodfire has been used since the cave people discovered fire. It comes from heaven (as lightning) – it warms the Zoroastrian temple in Persia, the Vedic sacrifice in India, the Celtic bonfire on May Day, the outdoor barbecue invented by buccaneers on Hispaniola. Woodfire is basic everyday magic. It transforms food alchemically. It alchemizes the domestic hearth. It engenders visions. It is the body of the djinn.

Frankly we no longer care very deeply about the end of the world. It’s too late for “everyone” to go on gulping down oil & shitting out pollution. The only solution to the energy crisis is voluntary poverty, as Ivan Illich used to say – so the secret is to learn to enjoy it.

Frenchfry oil, wind power, solar panels, nuclear power plants – none of them will allow the whole world to go on sucking up oil & other forms of dead energy like us Americans in 2011 – like it’s “going out of style” (which it is) – so let’s just do without it, & revert to 1911, comrades. Abandon the suckers to their doomsday scenarios (Rapture, Global Warming, Peak Oil, band, whimper), & stoke up your ACME woodstove with aromatic pine, & sit around it all winter with the complete works of Balzac, Scott, Dumas, Stevenson, Proust. Roast some apples. Simmer your poppy-head tea. Dream on.