The State as Religion: Similarities between the Churches and the State

Religion, as many are aware is a freqent tool of those who seek control. The State has long been argued to be a separate institution. While there are notable differences (for example, ideological supremacy is more highly valued by religions as opposed to physical supremacy, though traditional religion does often seek these things as well where it can). This is most notable today in the so-called third world nations, who are still being sold lies by the various churches that were thrown out in the West 100 years ago.

The State, as an organ, however, shares many characteristics with religion, and it’s useful to understand how they relate.

Holy Writings:
These are partly visible in the form of laws. Particularly, however, constitutions are rendered as some sort of holy text, above that of ordinary law. What these constiutions actually contain is largely irrelevant. As with relgiious texts, whole passages are often either ignored or glossed over. Barbaric or archaic section which no longer represent the public interest are held aloft as being written in stone. This is most evident in the United States, where the Constitution and many of its amendments are held up as some sort of immutable standard in political debate (particularly by the Right), but similar documents (the Magna Carta in the UK, various laws here in Australia etc.)

This is not to say that these writings were not important markers, nor that all of their content is worthless – indeed, in many cases, the ideas contained in these documents are actually quite worthwhile – but it is not so much the letter of them that is respected or held as holy as the idea of them; they are re-cast by use of propaganda to be what leaders wish them to be, rather in the way that the religious often ignore the live and let live sections of their texts for the “condemn the unbeliever” and “down with the different!” sections.

Sermons:

These are not as frequent in political discourse, but occasionally, a politician will take time out to speak to his/her people. This is most often observed by the leaders of parties; Calls to “God and Country”, “tradition”, “national ethics”, “national security” are frequent; these principles are the lessons they preach from their pulpits, and they preach them well. Much like a pastor, whose sermons are usually prepared with the help of understudies and the like in larger churches, a small army of people are often involved in crafting a speech, and very often these statements are paperings over the speakers actual intent.

Clergy:

Most nations have a single figure that can more or less be identified as a leader (this is not always the one with the most actual influence – it is largely the corporations who bankroll politics with the largest say these days), but usually there is a figurehead leader: A so called “pope of the state”. Most actual leaders aren’t elected; Many are purely ceremonial, but the idea is the same: there must always be a master.

Similarly, there are intermediate clergy – lesser politicians at the higher level, lower governments with their own councils and committees, etc.

Exclusion/Excommunication:

Religions traditionally (and most still do) have some kind of method of casting an individual from the community irrevocably; In the case of the religion, this takes the form of excommuncation or incommunicado orders;

In the state, these functions are largely handled by the levers of deportation or imprisonment.

Entreatment to “Keep the Faith”:

Much like a church, a state encourages fealty to its ideas. It uses a variety of means to encourage this; there are holy days (public holidays). There are times set aside to reflect on the “great works” of the state (usually taking the form of the rememberance of some awful war); Most importantly, people are encouraged to express their love of the state (usually covertly expressed as “independence” ceremonies or days).

Lack of Real Foundation:

When it comes down to brass tacks, the main argument that all other religious argument hangs upon is “people need religion, because otherwise they go astray”. This argument is actually almost identical to the one used as the foundation of the state, which can be summed thus:

People need government, because otherwise they will harm each other. There would otherwise be chaos.

This is strongly belied by most people’s first hand experience with most other people. Even many people who hold quite extreme right-wing views are generally quite amenable to agree to disagree under proper circumstances (I have had many discussions with right-wing American gunlovers, and they see many of the problems I see coming from a left perspective, they have just been misled into thinking (by well-crafted propaganda, to be fair) that some combination of government and capitalism is the ideal remedy, whereas I have no illusions that both are not ultimately in the public interest.

As strong as the higher level arguments may be, surely this weak foundational assertion of state legitimacy, coupled with the repeated failures of the state (most notably in the forms of corruption, barbarity, war, and just plain incompetence), surely the state has had its time, and we, the people and workers of the world, should be responsible alone and in common for our own fate?

---

Beginning to start my hand at writing stuff. I’m quite certain these arguments are nowhere near as strong as they could be – this is very much an early draft; I’ve posted it in hope of getting perhaps a little feedback, help with wording, etc. I am not a scholar by any stretch of the imagination – simply a layman who thinks about things alot (perhaps too much in some cases). It’s just some observations and ideas I had after re-listening through the Librivox recording of Bakunin’s God and the State, which I love for many reasons. I am also certain that there are other analogues between the concepts of the State and Religion.

On the extremely remote chance that people think it’s fine as is and want to use it, that’s perfectly fine by me. No extravagant acknowledgement is necessary (a link back would be nice, though), though I would prefer any derivative work be published under the same terms, to allow the ideas to percolate and be refined. I am a firm believer in the idea that ideas should be open to scrutiny, but also to development; we have been a closed society in this regard for too long, and I am a firm supporter of the open source idea. Ideas are enlarged, not reduced by the attention and refinement of many minds.

It should be noted, the primary aim of this piece is to ultimately form the basis of perhaps some sort of pamphlet, so the relative conciseness of the sections of this are key. I’m quite certain pamphlets dealing with this angle exist somewhere, but I’ve not come across anything, and I feel like many minds would be opened if there was a simpler, more concise introduction to the problems presented by the apparatus of the state, and more importantly, the often unspoken arguments that support them. The religious are being called out on these faulty arguments, the State and statists also should be.

The title is very much a working title; I’m open to alternatives, though I do like the “State as Religion” part, and I would like to keep that.

Melancholic Joy

Music is a wonderful way to soothe the soul.

It has been, is, and always be a refuge for me when I need solace. It will always be a comfort when even friends might turn against me.

Perhaps I turn to that refuge too much, but I can’t help but be thankful for it in my current, somewhat melancholic mood. (Chopin is wonderful soup for the “soul” in such a mood, as well as being hauntingly beautiful). As the audio replays, I’m reminded of friends i don’t hear from any more, of my naivete. Of my former incredulity. And then my mind turns again to the smouldering shell that is the world we live in.

And I weep internally. I mourn deeply the great losses and setbacks, at the myriad hatreds that set us apart, at the empty arguments and grudges we hold against each other, often for no reason at all.

It sounds awful, but I have come to appreciate these moments. For me, it should be experienced, it should be embraced. Emotion is not a weakness of our species, but one of its greatest strengths. Yes, it must be tempered and treated with caution at times and we should always be mindful that it does not cause us to lose sight of our mental faculties, but we should not ever deny it in all of its beauty and terror. I consider it a part of the human experience, and that we should all be so lucky.

Sadness for me is a form of joy; it is a reminder that I am indeed human. For me it is deep, it is profound, it sometimes borders on depression, but I would not change it for the world. In these moments, at least, I feel, I am nearly free. I am nearly certain this illusion is one I will be disabused from in short order.

I have much to do. I have much to learn. I have many new faces to meet, ideas to expound, people to encourage, hope to instill, even when the world seems hopeless.

And I turn back to the music as the last note rings out, as it echoes across the stage of my mind. Such a beautiful melody.

On the degradation of unemployment…

So, I’ve been unemployed for a long time now…

It’s not that I hate doing work. I like doing stuff that makes me feel fulfilled and that benefits others. I love to read. I love to learn. I do some stuff refurbishing and repairing PCs. Yes, it’s with a religious charity (and I do somewhat detest religion), but this group actually seem to care, viewing it as more than just their religious duty, but also as simply a good thing that needs doing, so they do it. I am quite happy to work with such people; we may disagree bitterly on matters of religion, and almost certainly on politics (I’ve never really asked, but I’m quite certain none of them are fascists, at least), but for the greater good, I’ll quite happily set such things aside in the here and now.

We do charge for the work we do (power bills don’t pay themselves, sadly), but it’s often waived for hard luck cases, and there’s pretty much an “ask and you can have it” policy with regard to things like keyboards and stuff (which is how I got the keyboard I’m typing with). You can see the effort they put in. The person who’s effectively in charge of the place works tirelessly.

But, you know, the constant job hunt takes its toll. I suppose it’s a reflection of the modern world when in order to get work, you basically have to sell yourself.

I hate selling myself. I’m not a product! I’m not for sale! Maybe for now I might do labour in exchange for that terrible stuff we call money because I wish to survive, but I am not yours to be dictated to in thought, and I won’t do more than I have to. Ever as I work away, I would quietly resent you profiting from my effort.

I hate money! I hate that so many of our interactions are arbitrated through the exchange of note and coin! It cheapens us, and sells us short of our true value, the social value we have that is more than any note or coin can express.

More, I hate the modern world. It has become the very opposite of what it promised: full of greed and profit taking for the rich where it promised equality; exploitative where it promised fairness; destructive where it promised to improve the world.

It is also ultimately part of the root of sexism, racism, and general bigotry. When society pushes you to compete against your fellow-person, with it being either your or your comrade, it’s quite natural that you seek out ready labels and easy things which you can use to socially reduce your competitor’s standing in the race for that elusive job/status/social credit/etc. that you so crave because the system has taught you to crave it and the products that said system is trying to sell you.

The world we have been sold by our politicians, by our religious leaders, by our bureaucrats and by our capitalist class (aka business leaders, CEOs etc.) is a lie. It never existed. Using the means it has, it never *could* exist, because its very basis was fraud from the beginning; it is only now we are beginning to see that what we were actually being sold was a road back to our own servanthood.

Note I do not include scientists here; most of the chemicals and such that have had detrimental effect have been designed and produced at the behest of these charlatans and liars. Science is merely a blind tool, one that requires people to wield it.

Yes, I’m angry. I’m angry for two reasons: one because we have been mislead by these crooks and liars, two that we have been so eager to hand them the keys, and so willing to destroy our own emergency copies in the vain hope for some scraps, which of course will not be forthcoming.

Yes, I am an anarchist. I’m not ashamed of that fact, either. And I am more than willing to bite the hand that currently feeds me as well, because ultimately, that hand – government – must surely pass into the annals of history if humankind is to progress, along with the shackles of capital and money.

A World Aflame

A little bit of writing I felt like doing. It’ll probably end up as part of a larger story, but I wanted to share this anyway for anyone that might happen to be interested. “I” in this story am somebody not entirely unlike myself. Though the coffee thing… yeah. I don’t really enjoy coffee, it’s too bitter for my tastes.

I’m still not sure about the background of the other fellow, he’s fictional. It stands as a one-off for now, but I really want to continue with this story, I feel like there’s a tale I can tell – I just need to work out what it is. Perhaps it would centre around that book.

A few thoughts on the nightmare of suburbia, that great behemoth

On the return journey home I reflect as I watch the city go by – dense suburbs at first, but slowly petering out to suburbia, with the occasional clutch of towers, typical of my city’s form.

The major problem with suburbia is that it grows incessantly. As I watch the life-sucking tendrils of suburbia expand towards my place of residence, a mere twenty kilometres east of the near impenetrable barrier represented in the form of the Blue Mountains, it dawns on me that this tranche of expansion will likely be Sydney’s last. After this batch, our basin is basically full. 100 years ago, this would have been unfathomable to planners. I mean, shit, the growth centre I live within is basically the size of Canberra, and when completed, will have a similar population to modern Canberra.

Anyone who has lived in suburbia is well aware this is a lie. Instead of combining the best aspects of urban and rural areas, it ended up combining the worst: Everything at a distance so that a vehicle is a veritable necessity; Scarcity of public services because larger catchments are required due to the lower density. This is hardly the largest problem of suburbia, however.

The suburbs are heading out in the general direction I’m travelling, and the edge is moving fast; my mother’s boyfriend remembers clearly when the line was much closer to that local centre. The area he speaks of is now firmly entrenched suburbia, mankind’s horrible compromise between country and city. This compromise was based on the faulty assumption that largish lots with a somewhat greater spacing than further in (Sydney’s lovely townhouse districts, which were largely saved thanks to the famous ‘green bans’ of the 80s), would provide a “country lifestyle in the city”.

This, of course, is the worst damned lie in the history of damned lies. Suburbia is a nightmare. Car-dependent, isolating, and horribly inefficient. all of these opposite to how the idea of suburbia is sold. It is sold as a relief from the inner city.As a more spacious way of living.

The lie is betrayed by the disastrously huge houses that people place on these suburban lots. The backyard of these places barely deserves the name, and in many cases you can look directly into the windows of your neighbour’s house.

For those who do not know, Sydney sits within something of a basin, surrounded by hilly terrain on three sides (there’s only one direction heading out of Sydney where there is scope for further growth. With these growth centres, the basin will be basically full.

This symbolically echoes the environmental, social, and economic walls society is beginning to hit the edges of. We must turn now. I still think it is possible, though it will be close. And the window of opportunity to turn back without cataclysm is closing rapidly.

We knock on the doorway to decline, in foolish hope there will not be an answer, but there are rumblings from within, and society sits paralysed, in hope another door will present itself. The other door that has always been there, despite our protestations, sits ignored, denounced, and its occupant has been steadily raising their voice. They yell warning at us, but we stand still, entranced by the doorway that lies in front of us, in awe of the machine that runs inside, this machine that runs both it and that which has drawn us to its door, that manipulates us into mindless consumption. That machine, called capitalism, is the cause of our ills.

We can break free. We first must choose to do so. Our current society has outlived its usefulness. Certainly we should not mourn its passing, but surely we should never forget the lessons learned. A system dependent of perpetual growth cannot, ultimately, be reconciled with a finite world. Eventually, nature will come to collect its debt.

A reflection

As I sit here flanked by capitalism’s skyscrapers on one side, and the towers of the church on the other, I begin to ponder… What will become of this society? Is capital to consume and destroy the world (and by extension, ourselves)?

Will we, as capitalism fails, turn in desperation to religion to save us, desperate for comfort in an era of decline, seeking always a master, afraid to acknowledge our wrongs and work on a solution?

I stand in a dying world, one rapidly embracing ignorance, and at once my soul weeps. I do not cry – I’ve never been one to physically cry except when experiencing physical harm to my person – but I do pause in reflection. All the anger, all the war… For this? For a machine that tears out the souls of people in the name of the profit motive? Right at eye level, the name of the local shopping centre megacorporation tries to seduce me with consumeristic tendencies.

I mourn a world gripped by fear, swift-boated by propaganda and long betrayed by its leaders, more concerned in the hottest fashion label than each other. And all at the same time wondering why we’re being screwed over.

A flag flies nearby, subversively calling me to love my country. How can I? It associates itself gladly with a bully such as the US, while at the same time appeasing China – heir apparent in world affairs – while that nation oppresses its people with vigour.

How can I, when its national leader, representing a party that purports to represent the ponies and its workers in particular, betrays those very ponies with its trade deals and other policies?

Of course, the opposing side is openly a party of the capitalist class, in a time when capitalists have reaped massively at the expense of the ponies (not that Labor isn’t as well, it just attempts to hide this fact – poorly).

No, I do not love my country. I do not love any country. I despise leaders, and pity those who are their followers, who willingly subject their otherwise capable minds to those who would lead them into subservience.

This madness must end. We are putting the foot to the floor while rapidly approaching a brick wall, and it is destroying our world, our brakes having given out about a week ago, and our engine having been giving a distinct thunking noise for the past month. We are more intelligent than this. We are better than this.

All of us.

–

A little something I wrote while popping into the CBD to get out of the house. Inspiration struck, and I wrote this sitting calmly in Hyde Park. Just to add, to the scene I’m presenting here, there was a busker playing White Christmas. In November. In a city of blazing heat. This is a slightly amended (added to, actually) version of what I posted on my Tumblr (which, if you’re there also and following this, you should follow, as I tend to be more active there).

For the record, there were actually two flags within my sight, but only one was the national flag.

Banners and Flags

Banners driven through our hearts,
Our colours held aloft;
We drive our flag into their lands,
And chart our maps on pages freshly pressed.
Arbitrary lines we draw – seeds of division, mistrust,
Claiming possession of that which cannot be possessed.

Unjust authority,
That which causes us to rage against our brothers, our sisters,
Our sons and our daughters.
Our fathers and mothers.

Always, we see borders – them and us.
Always, we see not our common blood,
Instead, we see, black, white, yellow, and shake in fear,
Handing our rights to others to defend us from non-existent threat.

We defend “our” land from “them”,
While pointing weapons at ourselves,
Reassured by our own foolishness,
Finding comfort in anger.

War rages.
Blood is spilt.
Martyrs die for their causes, oft in vain.

How long!
How long will we continue to fight
For lost and broken causes, for false hope?
How long till we see the lies we’ve been sold?
How long?

While men die on far flung battlefields,
While blood is spilled in the name of pointless vanity,
Or lines on a folded page,
Because “they” must be kept down,
Or “they” will be like “us”
How terrifying the thought – a common humanity!
How frightful the idea of being each other’s equal?

How long will we say, “the fault is not mine?”
And turn our eyes, downing another drink,
drenching our sorrows in the blood of innocents,
Dying at the hand of our wilful ignorance,
And profiting at “their” expense,
And turning to our televisions, consoling ourselves that this is our lot,
Believing again the old lie*.

The sorrow is just, the ignorance not.

Will we always deny ourselves our right and responsibility to run our own lives?
Are we such societal masochists,
Clutching to a flag?

Why are we worshing it as an icon,
Why are we buying in its name?
Why do we murder for a piece of cloth?

How long must we sit by as politicians sell us ideological poison?
How long will we fight ourselves, slaughter more?
How long will we buy in to cycles of death and war?

Capital makes of us vultures,
Preying on the burnt out shells of innocents,
Profit rises from suffering.
The stock market floats,
While the men and women who built its foundation sink.

How long will it take ‘til enough is enough?

‘Til unity we seek. ‘Til rapport we wish to build.
‘til we lay down our weapons,
unclench our fists,
Recognise how we have become complicit in our own slavery.

And until we set our thoughts and actions higher.

———————————————————————————————————-

Probably the best poem I’ve penned in quite a while.

*As you’d expect, this is a reference to “Dulce et Decorum est pro Patria mori” (roughly translates to: “It is good and honorable to die for your country”), and is a also a reference to Wilfred Owen’s excellent Dulce et Decorum est, which was the poem that pretty much cemented that I would always be anti-war.

This started as a spoken part to a song I’m working on called “Pure capitalism, which I’ll likely post over at my tumblr (see link at the end of this post).’

————————————————————-

We need a change in key,
A change in our way of thinking,
Indeed, a change in the very way we do the world.

Above all, this is no time for us to give up on the idea of change, because there’s no denying that this burnt out shell of a system calls for change.

It is no time however to continue stumbling along, letdown after letdown. The system is broken BY DESIGN, and was flawed from the very beginning. To be honest we should have seen this: Capitalism causes people to seek wealth, and arbitrary power causes people to seek more power.

Wealth in the capitalist sense is a form of power, and in that sense, it is no surprise that capitalists seek to consolidate capital, and it is also not a surprise that capitalists are quite happy to use violence (oft in the guise of the state) where it suits their ends.

Forgive me for a minute while I take the essence of the words of two revolutionary thinkers (and mangle them somewhat – forgive me, I’m no great revolutionary thinker like Mario Savio and Martin Luther King Jr.) and throw them together. We need to tell the people running this awful machine that we don’t want to take part in its mindless destruction, that is caused not only at the cost of our environment, but at the cost of our very humanity. And so I feel like I am prepared to stand on the wheels, on the gears, on the levers, and tell them: this will not stand. This system, quite frankly cannot be reconciled with MLK’s standard of “wisdom, justice and love”.

It is pure capitalism – pure greed, pure hatred of our fellow men and women. I include women because they are of course our equals, and who would leave them out? As for the Gays, lesbians, Bisexuals and Transgenders, we’ve Gotta Let them Be Themselves. They’ve been denied this far too long. It is time that ended.

I have, many years ago, made to myself a commitment that I am indeed prepared to die to leave this world a better place, but also that I want to make a mark in some way BEFORE I go. I have also given account that I will not give up with a weak suicide. I bring no shame on those who have taken their lives, but I decided long ago that it was not my way.

My life is, however, but one of many, inconsequential against the greater arc of spacetime. If I have to put myself into harms way to achieve change, then so be it.

 

We have achieved much in spite of corrupting power; we have developed a system for understanding the world (science). We have developed powered flight, spacecraft, we have visited the moon, we have sent a couple of probes that have now left our solar system (I refer of course to the Voyager probes).

Humankind is capable of so much more than we have seen. We can do it better by ourselves. But first, we must acknowledge that we are capable, and that is unfortunately something we seem fearful or reluctant to do. Possibly because we know that the struggle will cost lives, but the status quo is suicidal.

This must end. We are not mere human resources, serfs or otherwise servants of power. We are the people of the world, and we wish to decide our own fate, whether that be as workers, as members of the community, or as citizens on a global stage.

To achieve this, we must unite. It is time for us to set aside our differences, permanently. Religion, our colour, our sexuality – they do not need to be markers of division. They do not matter any longer. The stakes have become too high for us to let these walls stand any longer.

One people. One struggle. Solidarity forever.

I hope the world I die in is not the one I live in now. I will be deeply saddened if it is.

ALSO:

I’m moving my main blogging activity over to affirmedatheist.tumblr.com. I’ll still update here occasionally, but I’m more active there now.

It’s mostly because of my pony tumblr and it being easier to have everything on one site. Yes, I’m a brony. What of it?

The Challenge of Thinking Anarchically

One of the the things I think that doesn’t get talked about so much in the anarchist circle (or at least it doesn’t seem so in my fairly extensive reading over the past couple of weeks) is what I’m discovering through my move to anarchism; It’s a radically different way of looking at the world – and I think this is why we get so much pejorative thrown at us.

To put it in layman’s terms:
People are so used to thinking hierarchically it doesn’t often occur to them to even think anarchically. I really think this is a key reason why there’s such a hard time in the contest of ideas. It’s rather like combating fundamentalist religious thinking. I really think hierarchic thinking presents the same kind of mental trap.

For me the transition is occurring relatively quickly because I went through a similar experience when I deconverted from Christianity. Christianity is very much hierarchic at its root: there is a God, responsible for all creation. We’re supposed to worship him, or else (anyone reading this will likely be familiar with at least the basic Christian doctrines; If not, look up the Nicene Creed, which states them fairly succinctly. Or read that most unholy of texts, the Bible).

Anarchic societies require fundamentally different organisational structures. They’re sideways, not vertical relationships. Like between a brother and sister as opposed to a traditional Father/mother > Child relationship. I say ‘traditional’ because there’s no reason at least certain aspects of anarchic thinking can’t be applied even to family situations. My mother is by no means an anarchist (actually, my family’s quite right-leaning), but she always gave me a certain level of trust; There was always at least room for me to have some say. But since high school, she spoke to me like an equal.

I was fortunate to have teachers that were largely the same – that’s why I never really rebelled in high school. I had good teachers, a genuine interest in learning, and I didn’t see the sense in giving these teachers, who it seemed genuinely had my best interests at heart, any further trouble (it’s a fair assumption they have enough to deal with).

Sure, I’ve occasionally abused this trust in small ways (I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t), but I’d like to think that overall, I’ve kept it.

I’ve come to a few conclusions:
There is one struggle. It is the struggle for the betterment of humankind. This means throwing off oppressive authorities, restrictions on freethought (an important backbone of human progress, and the reason that, despite the increasingly hierarchic structure, some societal progress has been made) and destroying capitalism in all its guises. For the social aims to be successful, capitalist, hierarchical religious (pantheism for instance is actually quite compatible with anarchistic thought), and statist structures must be reckoned with, stared down, and ultimately, defeated by the will of the people.

Freedom cannot not exist until we acknowledge that we must continually fight for it. The revolution is continuous; it is not just a physical, not just a social act, but also a mindset. Thinking is, indeed, one of the great forms of resistance. The technology is being developed that allows the reading of thoughts, but it’s not quite there yet. Until that time, our minds are a refuge.

I do not yet consider myself free, but merely in the process of freeing myself; If I am honest, I may never reach that point. There is always something, some deep, hidden urge to submit or control, that rises up within us. It is this we must crush; and finding these holdouts in our minds is difficult, because we rarely want to acknowledge a desire for such within ourselves.

For those who say hierarchy isn’t a problem, google the following and read some of the hits: police brutality, oppression.

I am anti-capitalist because it is hierarchic, but also because of its exploitative nature, ripping off people and the planet. This is obvious when you see what happens in the third world, but it’s also visible here in the first. It chews up and spits out those least able to support themselves. The disabled get screwed by the system, valued less by this system because they cannot slave for it to the same extent as fully abled-bodied persons (My inability to obtain employment is testament to this – and my disabilities are relatively minor!). Also, many of the homeless are so for unjust reasons (there’s a disporoprtionate number of the mentally ill among the homeless, who in many cases can’t hold down a job in the modern economy).

The same hierarchic structures exist of course in the religions. The catholic church is the most obvious example of the abuse, but smaller churches and religious groups can be just as (sometimes, even worse!) exploitative.

As an anarchist, my conception of a future society is one where each individual has a say in everything that affects him/her/[insert gender descriptor that I can't think of when half asleep]). Would it be a lot of work? Yes. But then, freedom always has required a lot of work. Besides which, far less work is required from each when you have full employment, something I’d also envision in society. Each taking benefit for his work. Each would get his required food and water. There is enough produced for humankind NOW; The capitalist mechanisms of distribution are just so hopelessly inefficient as to result in millions going without. Sure, some in the first world might have to do with a bit less, but I think that’s an acceptable outcome. We don’t “need” a lot of the things we have.

I might be over optimistic. But I’d rather aim high and miss, than aim low and hit.

Our ballot box is broken. Our society is broken.

It’s time for a revolution in our way of thinking and acting. We CAN do it, but it will take work. And sadly, it will eventually get violent, but we cannot and should not tolerate such a society. Only once the revolution of thought is nearing completion can we fairly contemplate the overthrow of hierarchy.

Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt [Lyrics]

I thought I’d shared these lyrics somewhere, but now is as good a time as any.

As I said a few posts ago, the censorshit is apparently still lurking in the corridors. Ever it will so long as we have a hierarchical structure above us.

The pacing of this one would be more like a living end song than a punk tune, anthemic.

It’s called

Prior warning if you’re sensitive to swearing: go elsewhere. This contains swearing.

Fear, Uncertainty, Doubt

Won’t somebody think of the children?
Who’s gonna guide ‘em through the madness?
Political class, with their “new” agenda
‘nother coat on the same shit stain

‘Cos in the end
We’ll just pretend
And generate some noise
And if you don’t agree
Well, you’re the enemy
And if it all goes wrong, we’ll blame the other side!

‘Cause all we know
To get your vote
Is fear, uncertainty, doubt
Yeah, all we need
To make you plead
Is fear, uncertainty and DOUBT!

Last call to escape the new madness!
Wear the shirt, profit, gain
Backroom deals to keep the fundies happy
Tramplin’ rights like they’re fucking dust

Censorship is the new black
Dancing shadows on the moving train
Your silence is your “approval”
Your opposition will be in vain

Pre-Chorus
Chorus

It makes me wanna scream
How blindly we believe the lies
All along our rights being trampled
Our only reply:
Silence or consent

Go!

[madd ass guitar solo here]

Last chorus:
Because all we know (need)
To get your vote (to make you plead)
Is fear, uncertainty and doubt
Because all we do (the media cowed in silence)
To get your vote is play on (or pleading the case)
Fear, uncertainty and doubt

Can’t we live without the fear,
Uncertainty and doubt?

———
Wow, that was quite a rework (I just reworked the handwritten lyrics I have in front of me onto the screen.

I wrote this before my politics shifted to anarchism, but I think the song still has some gusto.