Death trips, freedom, and redemption

Everyone has heard about this.

There's a line of argument in radical circles (which I unfortunately can't find the reference to right now) that says that the rights enshrined in the constitution are fought over so vehemently because they are actually a drop in the bucket compared to the rights that people want (freedom from debt, guaranteed health care, peace in local and foreign affairs, freedom from want and destitution, etc...) I was not surprised to see so many people defend Don Imus especially on digg, and on the internet, where freedom of speech provides so much empowerment (and why so many people are against the blogger code of conduct.) If the major source of your social relations comes through unregulated communication, and not through other kinds of solidarity (labor, kinship, or the state), you're going to fight damn hard to prevent them from being diminished.

So too with the second amendment. Although some have claimed that the second amendment is specifically designed to ensure that states have the rights to create and maintain militias, and that the second amendment was never intended to allow individuals to possess guns, I find myself not caring so much about whether this is the founders intent or not. This is especially true since, as Charles Beard pointed out three quarters of a century ago, the "intent" of the founders was about creating conditions for producing profit. "Rights" under this framework, were about enshrining those conditions into immutable law, and secondarily about buying off the populace in order to gain their support. Maybe the founders really believed that everyone should own guns, and maybe they just wanted to give states the power to corral a populace hungry for more than what they saw fit to give them.

But it's moments like this, when I hear about the deaths of 32 people from one man, and from one gun (which of course, pales in comparison to the over 70,000 Iraqi, US, and other international soldiers and civilians who have died in Iraq, and the millions who died from sanctions , and the thousands who died in Afghanistan, and the thousands who died on 9/11, etc... on and on, throughout the 20th and 21st centuries), that I just get tired of the "guns=freedom" argument, and the fetishism of the constitution. I don't want to hear about "our rights" or how important it is to defend the constitution in the face of this kind of blood and fire.

Get rid of all the guns. Now. Not tomorrow, not in a year. Now. Put them on a spaceship with James Doohan and shoot them toward the sun. Bury them "deeper than did plummet sound". Melt them down and use them to build homes and cheap, clean public transportation throughout the world. I don't care. And while you're at it, illegalize profit. Give everyone a house, and food, and health care--not one human being excluded, as Bill Hicks used to say.

Here's my soundtrack for today, with half the songs about destruction, nihilism, and murder, and the other half about seeing the light at the end of the tunnel of suffering and fear:

Side 1: Death trip

1 .)"Sister Ray" by the Velvets--violence, drugs, and suicide. I can't even imagine what it must've been like to hear this in the 1960s, though, in reality, it was probably the perfect soundtrack.

2.)"Pretty Polly" performed by Dock Boggs. When he played this for Mike Seeger in the 1960s, his voice was old, and his fingers had lost some of their metallic tenacity. But as he tells the tale of a young girl going off into the forest with a mysterious man, he begins to speed up. By the inevitably end, he stops short of describing her death, claiming that "she soon fell asleep". The whole thing may be a dream, or a nightmare.

3.)"The Curse of Milhaven" by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. As I've said many times, this will be the polka playing in the waiting room in hell. A fictional story about a young girl who murders and kills 23 people indiscriminately, and without remorse, because in the end, "everything is groovy".

4.)"Lightsabre Cocksucking Blues" by McLusky. Shrieking, maniacal, and somehow kind of tongue-in-cheek, which makes it far worse. Are you cumming?

5.) "Jerk Off" by Tool. In a society based on punishment of the individual for transgression, rather than healing and treatment of people for their shared conditions, consequences dictate the course of action, and I should play God and shoot you myself.

Side two: Redemption

1.)"Jesus" by the Velvet Underground. Mirroring the first side, asking for forgiveness, taking refuge in the hope of one of histories greatest radical pacifists. I can't imagine what it must've been like to hear this after "Sister Ray".

2.) "I'm gonna cross that river of Jordan" performed by Jaybird Coleman. Old time for old time, a journey for a journey, with freedom at the end, instead of torture and death. One guy, shouting and singing, missing verses, and accompanying himself on a bleating, fiery harmonica. One of these days, hallelujah.

3.)"World Turned Upside Down" by Billy Bragg. Against a fictional story of senseless violence, I'd set the true story of the diggers rebellion , about peasants in England in the 17th century who returned to lands from which they had been forcibly removed. They reclaimed the lands, believing that common people should own all things in common. They were crushed by the landlords and the government, but what they represent continues today, and gives us hope that a better world is possible.

4.)"Biomusicology" by Ted Leo and the Pharmacists. Our suffering and our world will not let us be complacent. We always act, even if we wish to withdraw. Therefore, we must act as our lives tell us, as our conscience dictates; to be, and love, what we know to be true.

5.)"New Day Rising" by Husker Du. Where Tool gives a reasoned argument, culminating in death, Husker Du only utter three words, sung louder and louder as the song progresses. An exaltation, and a cry for freedom.

Peace, and strength on your journey.