NOVEMBER 11 IS APPROACHING . . .

and while we all obediently gush about the unquestionable virtues of young Canadians who unwittingly (one can only hope unwittingly) died in the service of British Imperialism in World War One, let us consider the Mackenzie-Papineau Battalion. These chaps were the sort of people who were more likely to think about what they were doing before risking their lives and killing others. They fought fascism in Spain while so much of the rest of the world was just hoping fascism would go away. These Canadians did not wait for their governments or the bourgeois press to tell them what to think or what to do.

But are they ever remembered on Remembrance Day? Alas, they were Leftists. And Leftists who go to war without state sanction must be sent down the memory hole. Doubtless they would be called "terrorists" now: the bourgeoisie's pet word for violence not sanctioned by the governments of alleged democracies.

LEFT WING CANADIAN NOVELS

Do they exist?

NO. There are none (except for mine. But I have not been able to get any publisher or agent to look at it yet.)

I repeat: there are no Left Wing Canadian novels.

Somebody tell me (please!) that I'm wrong. I've got to be wrong. I must have missed something somewhere. My search has been by no means exhaustive. I know of Left Wing Canadian poetry (e.g. Milton Acorn) Left Wing drama (e.g. David Fennario) but novels?

I write to provoke thee!

Have at thee, I say, oh vacuum land! Canada has produced no Lefty novelists at all. Somebody please slaughter me (verbally). It's the only way I'll learn.

CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS SAYS

the gentleman pictured to the left here was not a Christian.

Oh dear.

Dear me, Chris, deary, deary me. What are we to do with you? I'm at a loss. Anyway, here's a little poem on the matter:

There was an angry atheist,
who with the Lord was greatly pissed;
religion burned him up as well,
because it talked too much of hell,
but when a man of Christian mission
turned out not to be a villain,
spoke of peace and not damnation,
Hitchens did a thought negation,
fiddling with the definition
of what made a very Christian.

Damn his fustimystication!
And mendacious truculation!
Words are public property,
dithering dishonestly

by changing meanings at a whim,

and flexing them aback again,
to sate your ego,

serve a grudge,

will turn you into a soggy pumpkin.

(Osama Bin Laden, I've heard tell, is actually a Freemason. No, really.)

YOU MAY HAVE NOTICED

a new button just to the left here with a maple leaf and the word "progressive" on it. This will take you to the Canadian "progressive bloggers" site and its many links. I just registered with this group and there are a lot of terrific blogs out there. Check it out.

CELEBRITY

The existence of the Celebrity is the result of an imposed ontological competition: one cannot BE unless one IS more than another IS. Just as in capitalism prosperity is not possible for all because capitalism necessitates the exploitation of many, in capitalism there cannot be anything like universal wealth of being. In capitalism people are pushed into self-contempt just as they are pushed into poverty; both self-contempt and poverty are built into the system.

Wealth in capitalism is generated by poverty. Being in capitalism is generated by feelings of worthlessness. In capitalism, if one wants prosperity one must emulate the capitalist and exploit workers. Likewise, capitalism pressures one to enjoy peace with the self by finding a way of consigning the masses to the role of inferior and spectator. Hence, genuine love of self and of other are always, even if not consciously or directly, at war with capital.

What I am criticizing here is the very structure of pride, in the worst sense of that word. Beware the eyes that take in the light and give none back.

THE BOURGEOISIE CALL US "EXTREMISTS"

and themselves "moderates." It is as if some political position, by virtue of its being in the middle (however "middle" is defined) is automatically true. You know how intolerably stupid someone on the radical Left would sound if he were to say "my opinion is further to the Left than anyone's! Therefor it must be true!" However, the "moderates" think that just by being in the middle somewhere one is automatically holding the truest position--or at the very least, a respectable position. Why is this? When did the truth commit itself to moderation? Does it never occur to these bourgeois that looked at from their perspective, the truth might turn out to be radical? Did it consult human proclivities before coming into being?

Consider as well the exalted Henry Kissinger. Was he not always portrayed as a master of calm and reasoned moderation? Yet he was a genocidal maniac.

"Right," "Left," and "Middle" are vague though useful terms which categorize various ideas and attitudes with relationship to each other. But none of these terms has by definition any inherent relationship to the truth. They cannot measure the truth. It is the truth that measures them.

WOOHOO!

Spank! is book of the day at author island. Check it out. Grab your chance to win a free copy there.