Asian Life Versus North American Life

Somebody let me know if they’re holding a telethon on NBC or CBS or QVC or whatever. Drop me a line if every website and its mother has a banner to help the victims of the earthquake in Kashmir. Inform me if your preferred news station immediately flew Anderson Cooper or some other khaki-clad gumshoe to the scene and he got emotional about the world sending help. Cause honestly, I don’t think they’re doing it, and I will never stop finding the lack of value for human life in non western countries, by the wealthy western international community, disgusting.

Whats the toll in NOLA at… 1,000? Fugetaboutit… I see your grand and I raise you 30,000 minimum. Where the hell are all the dedicated movie stars and their money donations? Maybe they’re on the way, let me know.

PS — I bet the Pakistani and Indian military got there faster. If so, they should send instructors to the US to help teach the so-called emergency management experts.

bicyclemark73: Individualism, Public Relations, and Politics Part 2

This is part 2 in my miniseries on how Public Relations, inspired by theories of Freud and other social theorists, manipulate the public for the benefit of business and government.

AudioCommunique #73(mp3)
30min+, 80kbps, 17Mb+

Once again I follow the audio from Adam Curtis’s Century of the Self documentary, which is now available for download on archive.org.

The discussion gets into:
A response to comments on part 1
The challenge to Freud’s theory of the unstable self
Wilhelm Reich’s theories and an except from “Listen Little Man”
Marcuse and the student movement against brainwashing
The mass appeal of individualism and improving yourself
Business’s attempt to galvanize the individualist movement
How politcs borrowed these techniques with the Reagan, Clinton II and Blair campaign.
The result of all this manipulation on democracy

Music:
Sweet Honey in the Rock – Your Children
Dresden Dolls – Bank of Boston Beauty Queen
etc. etc.

Amstel Heaven


Yet another endearing Amsterdam factoid – you’re never more than 30 minutes from total nature. And by total nature I mean lush green fields, old men fishing, stinky fat sheep, and endless bike trails without petrol powered monsters.

I’m involved in a top secret internet related project in a town called Ouderkerk on the Amstel (pictured). All I have to do is ride south along the Amstel river, for about 45 minutes, and I see the cityscape turn into farmscape. In the blink of an eye its cow paddies everywhere. Hell, even that repulsive smell is charming; I kind of lose myself in a blend of nature and podcasts as a cruise down there on my two-wheeled grey goose.

Occasionally you run into tourists on those open roads. I act like I don’t see them, because that’s part of my snobbish – Im a local – attitude Im working on.

A Peruvian Trap

You know how it goes when you’re a world citizen blogger. One day you’re talking about Poland, then Frisbee in Amsterdam, and before you know it, it’s time to talk Turkey. Or as we say in Portuguese “Peru” .

Not sure how much you know or the world’s media tells you, about Peruvian history and politics, but myself – I’ve been watching the events unfold for the last 6 years with great frustration. Let me catch you up:

From 1990 to 2000 there was a most terrible president by the name of Alberto Fujimori. A tyrant and dictator who used all kinds of violence and secret tactics to maintain power and oppress oppositional groups. But fortunately in 2000 his ass got chased out of Peru and back to Japan (where he is also a citizen). The country slowly started a process of investigating the crimes of the Fujimori administration, eventually arresting one of the major murderous assholes- Vladimiro Montesinos, who was the head of the secret police during that time, and was also very talented at profiting from drug smuggling. Unfortunately they still haven’t gotten their hands on Fujimori, because Japan refuses to hand him over.

So now there are elections coming up, and Fujimori – even while hiding in Japan – says he will run for president again. And having heard about this, I have a plan for Peru:

Being that it is necessary to deal with the past in order to face the future. And being that Alberto is responsible for a whole lot of human rights violations during his time as el presidente, I say he must be captured – in a clever way. Therefore – I say tell him he is running for president. Tell the whole country to “make pretend” .. and then pretend he wins.. and when he arrives at the airport with that smug “I killed lots of you the first time and youre stupid enough to elect me again” look on his face, ARREST HIM! YAY! Then comes the trial and people can throw tomatos and poof.. national reconciliation mixed with justice and even a bit of fun!

bicyclemark72: Manipulating the Public, Part 1 (fixed)

AudioCommunique #72(mp3)
29min+, 80kbps, 16Mb+

Too much to mention, but the discussion involves :

    The documentary: Century of the Self, by Adam Curtis
    The Father of Public Relations, nephew of Siggy Freud – Eddie Bernays
    Freud’s theories on the nature of people and psychoanalysis
    Corporations and the US government get into the business of understanding how to manipulate people
    Making it acceptable for woman to smoke
    WWI and WWII and the parallels with Nazi propaganda
    Buying Stocks, Cars, Clothes… buying an image
    Creating a link between Democracy and Business as well as The good of the country and business
    United Fruit’s PR campaign and war in Guatamala
    Bernays Fake News Agency and Propaganda machine
    The neverending parellels with Iraq and virtually everything today

Frisbee Champions

Since Ms Thingk told me to talk more about Amsterdam life, especially the personal details, this is going to be an exciting update to my fledgling ultimate frisbee career here in the Netherlands.

As many of ye readers well know, I’m a very active new member of the Amsterdam City League, and I practice with the team known as Crunch, one of a few great teams from Amsterdam which play around the country and the continent (i think). Normally I avoid the weekend road trips to god knows where, simply because I treasure my weekend time, especially for podcasting. However this past weekend I joined the Crunch-3 squad in the final games of the outdoor season, in Arnhem. What followed was a whole series of firsts in my life:

The first time I played ultimate frisbee outside of amsterdam.
The first time I joined the team Ive been practicing with for months.
The first time I played on state of the art new fangled almost grass-turf.
The first time I scored a whole lot of points against a Wageningen team that just could not control me.
The first time I collapsed midway through the third match of the day with violent leg cramps and was carried off the field.
The first time I watched the amsterdam red lights play live.

And sure enough, for the first time ever, I was part of a team that won the Netherlands 2005 Division 5 outdoor league.

It’s pretty incredible to see how seriously the Dutch can take frisbee. So many players of so many different ages (the old guys intimidate me). So many teams with so many funky names like the B-Frisbee-2’s or IceyDykes. While there may have been lots of international people present, I really felt like I had entered into a secret dutch sect of frisbee worshippers… and I kind of liked it, despite the sharp pain in my legs.

And YES, Frisbee Girl fans, she WAS there… and she still gives me those looks and I still feel light headed when we talk.

Speaking of flying discs, look- a ninth planet!