I've been so focused on the new job that I haven't had time to stick my head up and take a look around. Financial markets crashing, the investment pundits have fires to put out in their own houses but they are still stoking the flames throughout the rest of the market (witness Apple's major drop yesterday despite being a company with *no debt* and I think $20B in reserves. I guess the argument could be that they are sort of unAmerikan with no debt.
Don't really have anything deep to say here today, but as I continue to get pushed around to vote for Obama in November, I'm starting to lose sight of where the nation goes after the election. I'm glad that I'm focusing my efforts locally - my head starts to hurt with how screwed up things are, and how no matter how good the new president is, there's a lot to be undone from 8 years of Bush II, 8 years of Clinton, and everything that came before. I may believe in miracles, but this is gonna take a sturdy pair of thigh-high shit-wading boots and one mo'f'ing huge broom.
Have a good Tuesday, ya'll. More regular posting to come, when I get that work/life/sleep balance down.
Sep 30, 2008
The Long Road Into Darkness
Sep 23, 2008
Third World Rising: Paraguay
Not much in this new world order gives me that much hope. Even as I struggle with the decision of whether to vote a mainstream candidate for President for the first time in 12 years, I'm not overcome with "hope" for American democracy. But there's something incredible afoot in South America. The latest turn left comes from Paraguay, where former liberation theologist Fernando Lugo was elected on a platform of land reform and peasants' rights.
So much of South America is moving in this direction, it can't be seen as a fluke anymore. With Asia split between isolated dictatorships and Americanesque capitalist states, and Africa dealing with extreme poverty, violence and corruption, and the preventable spread of disease, South America may be the only truly successful manifestation of the Nonaligned movement of the 40s and 50s. The nations and people of the South are moving on their own, and it seems like even the main early players (Castro, Hugo Chavez) aren't as influential as indigenous folks stepping up to take leadership.
Sep 17, 2008
When the Wall (Street) Came Down
So the morning shows today, in the wake of yet more "bad" news about the financial companies going under (and Federal takeover of AIG), in addition to the expected comments on Wall Street greed, there was an interesting focus on "Main Street greed." Basically, after name-checking some of the splurging CEOs, they said "hey, it spread to all of us, with our moderate salaries, we were still buying $4 Starbucks, houses we couldn't afford on our salaries because of downpayment-free mortgages, etc etc.
It didn't sit well with me right away and here are the key reasons:
1) CEO greed and my neighbor's "greed" are one thing, but what about corporate greed? In my opinion, the culture of organizational greed far exceeds the impact of individual people grabbing for what they can get. Not only does it push people internally to strive for larger and larger margins, but the voice of common sense (i.e. "WTF are we doing?!") is silenced in the process. There is no room for alternative visions of community wealth or the common good when everyone is pushing for more, and dissent will cut you off from your ambition of rising to the top.
2) You're telling me that the person with the $30,000 salary who buys the $400K house is the reason that the economy is teetering now? Give me a fucking break. Blaming the individuals on the bottom of the economic food chain for the madness at the top is a lie. "Food chains" are an apt analogy: the companies managing the deals and looking the other way from their own economic forecasts were feeding off the dreams of the little guys. Zero-down mortgages have created some of these issues, but keeping people financially illiterate: give them the dream/end goal, but not the roadmap or tools to get there in a way that makes sense for their economic situation, is fraudulent. While the corporations trade in bundled, broken dreams packaged as mortgages in default, the rest of us could either keep sleeping or wake up.
3) Which brings me to my final point this morning: this should be a time to look at systems, more than just individual "greed." Reducing this to a "sin" analysis instead of another damning lesson about free market capitalism misses the point. When I hear people say "we've been here before, and we'll be here again" it makes me want to scream. This is not an inevitable thing, people: we could get some security if we weren't all driving 100 mph towards a cliff all the time. And who's setting that pace? Who's created this culture of greed?
Sep 16, 2008
Film: The Prestige (2007)
Like so many films during law school, I slept on this one. Not through it, mind you. On it. I think this came out at just around the same time that The Illusionist came out. Isn't it funny how things like that happen? You get multiple movies about talking ants, sharks, what have you, all in the same year. Well, those are animated, these are not. Anyway, caught afore-mentioned Ed Norton flick on video first. I think it's better that way. If I saw this one first, I may have stopped watching the Norton film after the first 15 minutes because it didn't have the same level of attention-grabbing.
Directed by Christopher Nolan, of Memento and the great new generation of Batman features fame, and starring Hugh Jackman and Christian Bale in great roles as rival magicians at the turn of the century, I have to say: this one was fun to watch. Where else will you see two superheroes go head on without possessing actual powers? Or is it that simple? The film isn't perfect, but there's enough mystery and period sets to keep things interesting. I definitely enjoyed it, but with plot holes and various jumps and skips, I'd have to give it 3.5 out of 5 stars. Still, there are some really interesting questions that the film makes you think about, particularly the way science and magic were perceived at that time (and maybe even still), and the line between performance and reality. It's a good ride.
Sep 14, 2008
New job is kind of kicking my ass, but in a good way. I'm learning each day and feel like I have the space to grow. I'll find some time to write up some thoughts soon, so thanks for checking in once in a while. I have to say - being where I am, I feel like I can be positive about community-based work again. It's funny: law school is supposed to kill that spirit and kill your creativity. I was feeling that for a while, but I was lucky: found some community while putting in my three years, and found some faith in myself in the process.
As I've mentioned before, I may have to find another space to write more directly about my work, but starting out as someone who's waiting to see if he's licensed to practice law, it's less about confidential client information and more about this being a small community and all. But I'm definitely starting to think about how things connect - and it's nice to not just be someone sitting in cyberspace idly hypothesizing about things. Real talk, real walk is possible.
Anyway, time to catch some shut-eye before another full week. Keep the faith, ya'll. More to come.
Sep 11, 2008
Seven Years Have Passed.
Seven years have passed.
The elementary school near where I live broadcasts its morning announcements to the streets via a speaker or two on the outside. Today, they took a moment of silence for 30 seconds and I wonder "Is this what it was like in the decade immediately following Pearl Harbor or the Triangle Shirt Factory tragedy?" Do kids who only read or hear about recent tragedies through newly edited textbooks feel anything, or are they all just going through the motions like we tend to do in so many other circumstances?
Seven years have passed.
And what was once too immediate and present to speak about with anyone, has now become almost too distant and faded. I had a hard time dealing with what other people were feeling and experiencing, and hadn't really addressed or come to terms with my own feelings, and now I wonder if the time has passed. Is it time now to "move on"?
Seven years have passed.
I got a message yesterday from an old friend from whom I've grown a bit distant because of time and place. But we had worked together in communities affected by the aftermath for more than 2 years. And his mind returned to that place and time, even if he just said that he was checking in. Something remains.
It's odd to think about time before a date was reduced to a soundbite and the same video clips played over and over. I'm just as tired as anyone else, but the memories trigger something, and I'm forgetting what that innocence was. And I start to feel conflicted sometimes, because I have a better idea than many of what real loss in the wake of that loss was like, but it wasn't my own or even that of people who I knew personally. And seven years have passed.
Sep 8, 2008
More Unsolicited Advice for the Dems
Not much to write about, so I'll give the Dems some new ideas to pound their opponents:
1) Obama should start talking more about how Americans should be able to retire at 65, like they used to. I'm pretty sure that people are working longer, because they have to, and it's a way to talk to seniors, talk about the direction of the economy, and suggest that McCain should be able to sit on a beach and get some color on him rather than apply for a new job. I mean, we keep hearing about his service to the country: doesn't he deserve a break already?
2) The Dems should stop running from the "they want to make government bigger and they want government to choose your doctor, your school, etc." They can win this debate: government exists to fill in the holes, build and maintain society, and make sure that while all the greedy little capitalists are scheming to squirrel away more dollars, those who are less fortunate do not get eaten up in the process. It does not exist merely for its own sake, nor just to wage war.
And what's more, the Dems should flip the "family values" thing: we want to make sure that everyone has healthcare. We believe there are some minimum requirements that should be in place in a country as great as America. But they want government to tell you who you can love, what you can do with your own body, what faith you should follow, and even who will be allowed to see you in the hospital, provided you can afford one in their wholly privatized system. We don't need the government to tell us our values: we can do that part for ourselves.
These suggestions aren't even controversial, but I think at least the second one may strike a chord with the libertarians and energize people who want government to butt out. If the Dems want to win this thing, they have to move to new ideological ground and elevate this debate from where it's been in the past.
Sep 4, 2008
What is Meat? (Pt. 3: The Beer Conundrum)
This is the last installment of this set (read Part 1 and Part 2 if you haven't) but I think I'll likely revisit the topic, particularly regarding Asian American spaces and vegetarianism.
While writing the previous posts, I discovered a very troubling fact from a search related to a non-alcoholic drink (Jamaican Irish Moss) I had recently. Apparently, some beer companies use isinglass in the filtration of their product. Isinglass is basically extracted from fish swimbladders, so therefore, pretty non-vegetarian. Check out the details on the substance here.
While getting more and more worried about what I've been drinking, I found these lists of beers that are vegetarian (with emails from the companies to back it up). Here's another list of acceptable vegetarian beers.
Note that Guiness is NOT on this list and therefore not a vegetarian beer. *sigh* I guess this means that I should have hard alcohol if I'm going to drink. Man, Jains had it right not to allow alcohol in the diet. But who the hell knew that you can't have beer without eating fish/etc parts?!?!
This is almost as disturbing as the ground-up insects in some of my favorite candy.
It kind of begs the question about what it is that some people won't eat. I guess some large part of this is the big corporation deciding what corners to cut and what preservatives and other substances will get the desired effect, without really stopping to think whether their consumers want to consume these pieces of animals, insects, and fish. Does it matter? For people like me, the answer is "definitely yes," but what for others? Aside from the grossout factor, is this as disturbing to non-vegetarians as it is to me?
Whatever the case, in post #1 I was crying out against the "pork: the other white meat" campaign in NYC subways. Maybe this revelation about non-veg beers could lead to a new slogan: "beer, the meat with hops."
Sep 3, 2008
Liveblogging the RNC
Rudy must be a vampire. He doesn't age. I wish the ground would open up and take him back home.
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Woah, though. He said "nada" a few times to move the RNC masses: I don't know how the English only lobby feel about that. And he should stop emphasizing how frail and injured McCain is. Not doing wonders
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I really hate Rudy: mofo had the crowd laughing at community organizers. Wish we could stick our collective, community empowered boot up his ass.
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Man. These speeches are so long. Thank God Rudy is gone. 30 years of him was enough, and he still managed to both mention 9/11 and say Dems were afraid to do so.
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The chants of "USA! USA!" used to get on my nerves. Now I keep thinking "Ali bombaye!" Go figure.
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"I guess being a small town mayor is kind of like being a community organizer, except you actually have responsibilities." Um, yeah.
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If I were the Dems, I would get child advocacy groups - from the adoption advocates to the folks working on behalf of the developmentally disabled - to start making a lot of noise about how both Repugnicans are using their kids as political props.
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Sep 2, 2008
Film: Batman: Gotham Knight (2008)
To take it back, I loved the Batman: Animated Series cartoon. It took me a while to get into it, because it was different from the other stuff that was out there (and I think I was in high school or something when it came out). I remember first watching and thinking "this is it? why is there so little music? It's just him talking, and then there's some action, then more talking." I finally gave it another chance, and realized what was going on.
The creators wanted to bring Batman back to his roots from the comic books - Frank Miller's reinvention of the character as a much more complex, dark figure in the DC Universe.Batman was much more aloof, harder to connect to the sunny optimism (and red, white, and blue Americanism) of Superman. He had a dark back story that led to the character that we know. He lived in the shadows, did not have supernatural or extraterrestrial origins to make him special: he was a bad mofo with a lot of money and personal discipline (most of the time).
Because of this, Batman was more human this way, and tapped into something deeper with real readers. Additionally, his realm, Gotham is a dark, sinister version of NYC, where retro, modern, and futuristic forms and technology clash and combine in interesting (but almost always gothic) landscapes. I think Nolan's Batman Begins and Dark Knight also went back to the source material, which is why the fans of the comic have been so taken by them, and the films worked in shadows and shades of black and gray.
I had mixed feelings about the film, only because it made me nostalgic for the old series, which I would record on VHS whenever I could (time to dig out that tape... and buy a VCR?) but it's definitely worth seeing for the fans. I don't think I could rank it better than Mask of the Phantasm, which I actually saw in the theater. You know, this just made me realize that I never saw Batman and Mr. Freeze: Subzero, which is actually ranked higher than Mask of the Phantasm on Rotten Tomatoes...
Sep 1, 2008
Three Cheers for the U.S. State Dept: Modi Denied Visa
Well, this is what happens when the government actually does what it's supposed to do. Chief Minister Narendra Modi, the butcher of Gujarat, whose anti-Muslim (and anti-Christian, which I'm sure is most relevant here) positions and actions are legion, was denied his visa request by the U.S. State Dept. Modi was going to come to the U.S. to speak at the World Gujarati Conference, to be held this weekend in NJ.
I think the legislation was a hindutva move to address a history of conversion or perceived forced conversion in India (Hindus in India sometimes "Muslims in India used to be Hindu and were forceably converted en masse" instead of recognizing that people convert, it's part of human history). I wish the letter and the State Dept.'s stance reflected the genocide that Modi oversaw in Gujarat in 2002, when more than 2,000 Muslims were slaughtered and more than 50,000 displaced from their homes while the military and police stood idly by (or helped out). But we take what we can get, I suppose.
Flash forward to tons of hate mail to the government (this is what they choose to get upset about) and angry letters to the Indian American media by capitalist Gujaratis who don't care about hindutva (though they benefit from it) but see Modi as the chief architect of the economic boom that the area has witnessed in the last 5-10 years. Read More......
Aug 31, 2008
Film Recommendation: Heavy Metal in Baghdad
One of the most amazing things is that the band had been together since 2002, but until their "reunion" show in Syria, they'd only played 6 times together. Their rehearsal spot in Baghdad was blown up by a rocket. They had nothing left, and yet they still push ahead to try to make music. It's phenomenal and really sad and triumphant all at once. Even if you're not a fan of the genre, you have to see this film. It's just very moving to see these young guys who have seen so much yet keep on pushing. And again, like that monk from Italy, they say that Metallica is an influence, but they kick Metallica's ass all over the place: their playing really rips.
On top of all of this, the film was co-directed by a South Asian Canadian: Suroosh Alvi - he has a welcome perspective that made me much less suspicious of it from the get-go (seeing the film-makers wearing kevlar vests just so they could make the trip out to Baghdad from the airport to meet the band in 2006 was pretty striking). They had to travel in an armored SUV and hire 2 gunmen and a fixer/translator.
You know, when I was talking about the film with a friend over breakfast yesterday, I realized that beyond the music element, the story personalizes the very real heartbreak playing itself out over and over again for people who have been forced to leave their homes as refugees, seeking asylum in places that are not as war-torn or dangerous. But it also reminds me that the story never ends with their entry into the accepting country: asylum seekers do not have it easy, and the band's travails and sharp observations of life in Syria (and to a lesser extent, Turkey) was quite telling. On the flip side, the way that the global metal community, upon watching the film and hearing that the guys had to sell all their gear to eat, came together, and raised money to get them more gear. Regardless of what people think about this subculture, there is a community here, and reading that just reminded me of that fact.
Anyway, not your average documentary about metal. Check it out. You won't be disappointed.
Aug 30, 2008
What is Meat? (Pt. 2)
Continuing where I left off in post 1, I'm just talking more about vegetarianism here. Not in an effort to convert you, just thinking about it, particularly in an Asian American and "socially conscious" (whatever that means) context.
You know, I still can't take the cruel sad joke that's played on me every time I go to an event where the planners "didn't anticipate" that there would be more than a few vegetarians. I have a friend who gets visibly upset because she wants the offering to contain proteins, not solely starches. Heck, I'm happy if I can get black beans instead of refried, and white rice instead of Mexican, just because I'm careful about whether there are meat by/products used in the production of my food, beyond just big meaty chunks. You'd think that it's not that fringe anymore, but somehow, even if mainstream NYC has caught up, large segments of the Asian American "activist" community are still clueless.
As I said, it's not that I'm trying to convince anyone, because I tend to like the steak-eaters who don't push their diet on me more than the militant tofu-pushers, but I do see vegetarianism to represent many facets of social and personal consciousness:
First, and perhaps most obviously, I do think of it as a moral stance regarding animal welfare. The idea that the act of killing is for sustenance is a brutal and overstated worldview, especially when people have shown in Buddhism and Jainism that it is not necessary to kill to live. But beyond that - the way that animals are treated in massive industrial farms is simply beyond the pale. Upton Sinclair's seminal book, The Jungle, shone a light on the conditions of meatpacking for the humans involved, and Eric Schlosser's Fast Food Nation did a similar job regarding the animals and the systems created to turn fellow life forms into just another (by)product of/for human consumption and waste.
Second, I could argue a health stance regarding my personal health (i.e. heart, blood, etc), and that of global public health for communities and populations around the world. Meat production has shown, especially in recent times, how susceptible it can be to widespread infection. And to think of how many people could be fed on the grains that are given to factory livestock just to "create" one pound of "good" meat. Farm-fresh meat, which is free of growth and other hormones, and allows the animals to live without eating pieces of their brothers and sisters in the animal kingdom, is ever more rare to find. The health consequences are off the chart. Do you really want to be eating that stuff?
Third, I could take an environmental/ecological stance with mega-farms and industrial commodification and genetic manipulation of species as destroying ecosystems and playing god where we shouldn't be. Why aren't those driven by "faith" more angry about this? We're meddling in God's designs: shouldn't there be a line here, as easy to draw as all the lines they draw about morality and abortion? In addition, the level of waste connected to the meat production industry is again, phenomenal. Animals are treated like fodder for the human shovel-headed kill machine, and even as their habitats are cleared and decimated to house our people, their lives have become meaningless and wholly subsumed into serving our "needs." There are also studies that directly link massive meat production to climate change.
Fourth, I could take an intellectual stance regarding the necessity of violence for self-sustenance. Have we not evolved from the "instinctual" enough to think before we destroy? Granted, we always like to think that we're at the top of the food chain, but it's sickening, really. To argue that there is some kind of perverse justification for the wholesale destruction and harvesting of other species in the framework of simple hunter/gatherers is reprehensible to me. The extreme species bias that humans have is reflected in the racial bias that I write about the most on this blog. Maybe man's newfound ability to reason pushed him to separate himself from the rest of the beasts and animals that surrounded him. The separation quickly became the grounds to decide that we are better than the animals, that a higher force put animals in front of us as our sustenance and for no other reason.
This attitude breeds the callous relationship most people have with animals - from the insects and small invertebrates that they carelessly kill, to the beautiful animals that they hunt for "sport." When we place our own interests, even entertainment and recreational, over life, we have lost something and we have become a risk to the rest of the world. There is little that shows that we are at the "top" of the evolutionary chain: it is just that our particular adaptations of reasoning, which led to technology, have allowed us to overcome natural challenges like disease and predators, and allowed our populations to flourish and edge out the natural order in ecosystems around the globe. But we were very wrong to allow this success to go to our heads in a kind of species chauvinism that recasts other species as grist for the mill of human progress. The reckoning, for Earth's own survival, will not be pretty.
Finally, as a matter of faith, vegetarianism and the respect for other life is an important consideration for me. I don't smash bugs or run over animals with my car on purpose. I try to let insects and spiders escape most of the time through an open window rather than just kill them. The Jain philosophy of my ancestors has rejected killing: it has decided that humans and our path on this earth must preserve and respect life. I don't agree with all of the tenets of Jainism, and there are always contradictions inherent in the interaction of these world views (especially those that are millennia old) with modern times, but the fundamental equalizing of the value of life across life beings is very striking. Is it an evolution for humans not to kill? Is our ability to reason our escape from what others believe is the inevitable "circle of life" that makes animals that are striving to survive killers for food, for territory, or for self-defense? I don't know. But it is remarkable for people to actively stop killing, or at least eating the spoils of others' killing.
I'll close here, though there's one (very unfortunate) thing that I found out in the process of writing this piece that will have to come out in part 3. Stay tuned, and whatever you do, don't forget the gravy!
Aug 29, 2008
Jessica Yu's Ping Pong Playa
Okay, just listened to a report on Asia Pacific Forum (if you are reading this, you should be listening to the weekly show from the prog/rad collective in New York) about Jessica Yu's new film, Ping Pong Playa. I definitely want to see this film - seems like an insider's send up of a lot of the cliches in Asian American activism and community dynamics. Here's the synopsis from the Asia Pacific Forum piece:
Christopher "C-Dub" Wang, a suburban Chinese American kid, aspires to make it in pro basketball. He spends his days talking trash and overreacting to perceived slights against Asian Americans. But when misfortune strikes his family, C-dub must overcome living at home, working a dead-end job and living in the shadow of his older brother, a physician and ping pong champion, to run his Mom's ping pong classes and defend the family's athletic dynasty. We’ll be joined in the studio by director JESSICA YU and by JIMMY TSAI, who created the character of C-Dub and played him in the film. Ping Pong Playa is the first narrative feature for Yu, an acclaimed documentary filmmaker.Catch the film as it debuts in NYC, LA, and the Bay Area next week! Read More......
Aug 28, 2008
Heavy Metal Monk: Fratello Metallo
This is a real monk from Italy who was so taken by heavy metal that he decided to create a band and sing without pushing his faith on people too hard. The dude says he was inspired by Metallica but he could sure teach those losers a thing or two.
There are a range of really interesting metal books and films coming out. Heavy Metal in Baghdad made the circuits in film festivals last year. There's a new film that I'm very anxious to see, called Global Metal, by the excellent director (metalhead who is also an anthropologist) of "Metal: A Headbanger's Journey." The film tag "7 Countries, 3 Continents, 1 Tribe" captures a lot of the allure for me, actually. I'm looking forward to seeing that one and will report back once I track it down.
Meanwhile, get a good trappist beer and rock out to Fratello Metallo. Man, these monks are cool.
Aug 27, 2008
Tropic Thunder: Appropriation Revisited
Without ruining too much, the whole film is a satire on the industry, and Downey plays a five-time Oscar winning Australian actor who is such a method actor that he decides to undergo a medical procedure to "look black." Downey plays his role to perfection - making fun of extreme method actors (Day-Lewis, anyone?), cultural appropriation, and the seeming paradox of actors with huge egos and overwhelming insecurity. There was also a black actor on the team calling him out each step of the way ("there's only one role for a black man in this film, and you get it!").
Stiller surprised me: I was expecting nothing but slapstick and bathroom humor (they make fun of some of that as well). I know there are criticisms of the film regarding its approach towards the mentally disabled, but I have a feeling that some of that was also tongue-in-cheek (saying to the viewer, we're so clever about race that we have multiple levels about that, but Hollywood doesn't get everything). Maybe that's giving them too much credit, but some of the "retard" comments were so over the top that I feel like they knew what they were doing.
But this also makes me think about representation and appropriation, particularly in light of some of the weird Mickey Rooney denial of the racism inherent in his much reviled Asian caricature in the otherwise classic Breakfast at Tiffany's.
Is there a space where this kind of caricature is acceptable? And does it matter who is doing it and for what reason? The film features Asian actors playing members of an Asian drug ring, and it begs the question: we get pissed off when white people play our people, even in "sympathetic" roles, but then our people play our people in crazy terrorist/trafficker/bad driver/whatever roles, and we're okay with it? Because an Asian/POC actor has to live and "Hollywood's fucked up - you have to play the game so you can get to where you don't have to play the game"? I'm not feeling that. But I guess I'm not an actor, either.
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Anyway - if you want to see two octogenarian actors/movie people talk about this film (it's not perfect because they get caught up in the whole "PC" discussion) check this review out. But it's kind of funny to hear them talk to each other and about this film. Woah - just watched their review of the Dark Knight. Not cool.
Aug 26, 2008
Kucinich Speech at DNC today
The new call to wake up America. I'm glad Dennis got the stage. Probably one of the more impassioned speeches on that platform. But don't type "wake up america" into Google: you'll get a lot of right-wing dribble.
What is Meat? (Pt. 1)
With the early onslaught of Halloween preparations, a holiday that's never been the same for me since I found out that many of my favorite candies have shredded beetles and other unsavories in them, I thought this as good a time as any to post my consideration of the more-complicated-than-I-thought-it-was question: "what is meat?"
I have been surprised by the different ways that people in the Northeast (my only frame of reference) consider the various subgroups of "food" and justify the exclusion of each from their personal definition of "meat." I don't know if this is true in other parts of the U.S. or if even this is another one of those uniquely American propositions. But it just knocks me out that this is as debated (or at least contested) as it is. Pescatarian, Vegan, Non-Red-Meatatarian... the variations have promulgated in a way not unlike the many permutations of American Christianity.
I actually think it's not so complicated for people who aren't in the United States. Or maybe that's a massive generalization that isn't large enough - perhaps it is more the whole Western, Christian world that doesn't quite get the difference between a carrot, a crab, a carp, and a canary. Whatever it is, there are a number of observations and impacts on people who are trying to stick to one or more of these diets, and more importantly, the assumptions that come from people who just don't get the difference. It also has ramifications for movement work in communities that have heterogeneous and specific diets.
I know it's been a source of frustration for the older desi generation (well, my Mom is the sample for me here) when someone asks if they eat seafood or poultry right after they've said "I don't eat meat." Because to them, "meat" is anything that used to be an animal. And "animal" means anything that's not a plant, fungi, monote, or phytoplankton. For many of them, even eggs are included in that definition, but milk and dairy are not "meat" because they are not directly "animals" but rather animal products, I guess. For some reason, this is really hard to understand for a lot of people - I don't know if it's the penetration of the concept of "vegan" into the American psyche or sheer, complete ignorance. The number of questions about whether "x" or "y" are acceptable under old school immigrant definitions of "vegetarian" is sometimes frustrating. It used to be basic questions like "where do you get your protein?" and "that's weird!" but now that the concept of vegetarianism has permeated mainstream American life more, the questions have actually multiplied and become more specific.
Anyway, I believe that the regular exclusion of fish (and even poultry) in the Western conception of "meat" strongly normalizes carnivorism. Anthropomorphism is also a fairly common way of describing diet: "I won't eat anything with a face" translates to me that some of the Disney animated shows with cute talking animals must be having some lasting effect, at least on the subliminal level, and maybe some of the kids who watch the films over and over again will grow up wondering why Bambi equals venison, and Thumper makes a good stew. But then, why is Sebastian the crab is less sympathetic and more likely to find himself taking his final dip in a giant hot tub that is really a hot pot? Let's not even get to the fact that people get all freaked out by insects and spiders, but are more than happy to crunch into other, larger, many-legged arthropods like lobsters, shrimp, and crabs. I just don't get the logic: eat a damn spider already. And that's not because I'm an Indian, and we eat that kind of stuff regularly.
I also think that the inability of some people to fully understand that fish, crustaceans, mollusks, and the various other exceptions to the meat rule seem, at least to me, to signify one of two things: 1) "I don't care about science, I'm proud that I don't know what an animal is, and you should go screw yourself," or 2) "It's too hard to include all of these things, and as long as I'm not taking a bite out of a live whale's trachea or something, you should leave me alone to my drumstick. At least I don't go hunting these things (off season)."
Ah. Yes you do. You may not lay the trap, throw the net, or reel in the line, but you are hunting them as you maneuver between the CostCo, the Super WalMart, and the other discount food retailers (the nutritional-industrial complex?) to get your best price. You're driving this crazy market for faster, cheaper, and more "consistent" tastes in meat products. Your attenuated tolerance for variation and regional nuances in food and food preparation have lead to the mass production of these food products. For shame! Your burger just had to taste the same as what you just had in Chicago after your week away from home. I may have philosophical and faith reasons for rejecting a carnivore's diet generally, but I can accept eating for the sake of sustenance and survival, and in a way that doesn't turn fellow species into a commodity. But that's not what the modern method of meat and food production is about.
The furthest extreme includes so called "white meat" in the list of acceptable and consumable flesh. And does anyone remember the posters in the NYC subway announcing "pork: the other white meat"?! Man, come on. You've got to be kidding me - pig is the meat forbidden even to the most meat eaters. I'm convinced that the campaign was some crazy Christian right thing to piss off the Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, and other assorted veggie heathens in one fell swoop. Ugh. I'll take those annoying peanut ads any day of the week.
I'll revisit this theme in at least one more post, to go through some thoughts on vegetarianism as a framework for social and political consciousness, and also for the challenges that remain for vegetarians in Asian American spaces.
Aug 25, 2008
Blue Scholars are in Denver
DotBS revolutionary hip-hop faves, the Blue Scholars, are in Denver this week, performing at and checking out the anti-, agit-, and alterna-convention activities going on outside of the "main event." Check out this great post on Day One by Geo with images by Sabzi. Geo has sung about participating in the 1999 Seattle uprising, but also about how the last thing he wants to do is get arrested at these things, unlike many of the white radicals who agitate and wear their arrests as badges of honor. Geo alludes to this again in the post, where there were a handful of folks of color who just stood back and let the white folks do whatever they wanted to do to aggravate the police in riot gear.
"We all agree that while direct action is necessary in principle, its practice must be timely and tactical."
A lesson to live by.
I'm Getting to Hate the Post Office
I have written earlier that I was enamored with the dying art of letter-writing and connecting through postal correspondence. I'm so over that now. As the price of sending letters continues to soar, and the range of possibilities for sending packages through the mail for anything less than exorbitant fees shrink, I'm thinking we need another option. Yeah, there are courier services, UPS, and FedEx, but those commercial venues are so focused on business clients that their offerings to poor schlubs like me are not very attractive. Also, there's a post office nearby, but not a UPS or FedEx depot (or whatever they call them).
That said, we need an alternative to the Post Office that is also fueled by public money. Before the establishment of the postal service's monopoly, there was competition with the pony express, and a variety of other alternatives. I know that the internet is supposed to play some kind of equalizing role, but if we want to send and get packages, if we want to reach out to loved ones in a personal way, the internet isn't doing it. So what do we do? I say we set up an alternative pathway, create nodes for the movement of letters and things, and bring it back to basics. There's something wrong when it costs me $8 to send a book that I'm selling for $3 via Half.com.