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Earth-Sized Company Towns
For a program that has created so many original, prescient musical numbers, South Park’s most blunt commentaries on common complacencies are sometimes found in straightforward reflections scored with throwback tracks. The decades-old song usually functioning as two reminders in one – of the cyclical lessons we face and their almost routine repurposing behind different masks.
Some people say a man is made outta mud
A poor man’s made outta muscle and blood
Muscle and blood and skin and bones
A mind that’s a-weak and a back that’s strongThis version of 1946’s “Sixteen Tons” (itself referring to a coal mining practice in the 1920s) was sung in 1955 by Tennessee Ernie Ford. It relays, as effectively in 2024 as back then, the forceful allying to an exploitative entity. Except today, the company towns are earth-sized; the swelling digital monopolies that tie themselves to our collective political economies at immeasurably large scales. The Titanics that carry with them the fate of markets, elections, freethought, and our environment.
You load 16 tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
St. Peter, don’t you call me ’cause I can’t go
I owe my soul to the company storeIt is a strangely vanilla, yet efficient, montage in an episode with quite a few absurd zeniths. (Not every day does a man in a box end up the leader of a union drive.) No mystery why it came to mind as I went out to grab some takeout today. The two individuals ahead of me were on their phones, each awaiting a number of orders to be placed within a large, thermally insulated bag, each with a different food delivery app’s logo stamped across it.
I was born one mornin’ when the sun didn’t shine
I picked up my shovel and I walked to the min
I loaded 16 tons of number nine coal
And the straw boss said, “Well, a-bless my soul”The laboriousness of labor may change, but its structure remains consistent. And we have done not-too-well to find ourselves in similar places in relation to the power brokers of society, nearly a century apart.
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McFerrin
It is a curious refrain embedded into key moments throughout 2017’s The Square. Calm moments surrounded by uncomfortable situations; intonations amplifying unwelcome serenity.
When I first heard this portion of the soundtrack, I thought it was a unique instrumental. By the time it resurfaced during the last scene – the calmest of emotional climaxes to the story, where a young girl looks up at her father from the back seat, her previous respect undermined by his unstable actions and not-so-well-hidden mistreatment of others – I knew I needed to look it up. The track is such a perfect auxiliary to the ridiculous, and occasionally important, musings of Ruben Östlund. And of his many flawed characters.
I was pleasantly surprised to learn that it was Bobby McFerrin’s improvisations that scored this maelstrom of a film. In many ways, appropriate accompaniment.
An indie ditty for the middle of this, a most testing, week.
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Suitcase Diaries
Il est minuit à Tokyo, il est cinq heures au Mali
Quelle heure est-il au paradis?A couple of days ago, a decent chunk of a city was glued to their screens as their affiliated team produced a classic comeback to win a playoff game. The fifth of sixteen they will want to claim top spot in North America’s premier ice hockey league, for the time being.
I had wanted to join them but found myself exhausted. Falling asleep on the couch, I relented and headed to bed, only for my envisioned nap to turn into a night-long sleep. My energy levels can be an issue when I am away from my regular abode and routines, as I have been for the past two weeks. A combination of interrupted sleep, more arduous daily excursions, and social exuberance needed during times of increased movement.
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Last calendar year, I spent just over four months away from my apartment. (I refuse to call it my ‘home’; that designation has not yet been earned.) Living out of a few bags and transporting myself from location to location, mostly for work and a little on vacation. This year and only ten days into May, I have already racked up over two months in the same situation. Transience has been a regular theme of my life for the past eight orbits. A voluntary one, for the most part – I have enjoyed going to every corner of BC and witnessing transformative projects in person.
No complaints on my chosen path. But I was reflecting on the transitory life; a microcosm of our long existence.
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Interpretations: Bach, Cello Suite No. 1, Prélude
Do you know it? An introduction to one of the most widely interpreted suites in the history of the humble cello.
In its singular form:
Presented with visual flair:
In context of the full set:
And always inviting innovation:
A late night entry, filed under ‘M’ for mesmerizing.
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Singularly Felt but Universally Relatable
A take-it-all-in hacktivist mystery. No spacetime for blink-and-you-miss-it shenanigans. Mild spoilers for A Murder at the End of the World below.
Imagine yourself an adolescent with no knowledge of British idioms, culture, reference points – British life, in general. Now imagine picking up a random Agatha Christie novel and reading the first couple of chapters. Would you latch onto it? Would its unapologetically English characters, class tropes, and personification of European vignettes resonate? Christie was my introduction to murder mysteries. As a high schooler, I must have read most of her catalogue. At times, the prose and characters were difficult to get a grip on, but worth grappling with regardless. The twists and turns so worth it.
Christie knew how to construct a setting, place characters in context, prescribe them motivations, interests, and suspicions, and lead the reader down several rabbit holes of possibilities. It did not matter if the cultural touchpoints were not always obvious or easily understood, at least to this reader unfamiliar with the world of twentieth century Britain at that time. The author was doing enough to keep you engaged and develop the people you were following. The strangeness of the stage provided plenty of intrigue.
Sometimes, she cheated. A clue left unshared or a spurious revelation plucked from speculation that could not possibly be confirmed until the author was ready for us to hear it. And Then There Were None was guilty of this; The Murder of Roger Ackroyd the exact opposite.
Not every mystery writer sprinkles their literature with puzzle pieces to the full picture. Nor do they need to. It may be fun to go through a Sherlock Holmes story with the aplomb and brilliance of the eponymous detective, but alas, that is not easy given the number of red herrings overlaid within the narrative. When entering the world of a murder mystery, we are also conditioned to be suspicious of everyone and ascribe intention or ulterior motives to every little action. We cannot let anything go. It is as much a game to play as it is a story to absorb. Pleasantly surprising, then, when we happen upon a thriller or murder mystery having gone in blind – now we have to re-read or re-watch it at some point; what clues did we miss along the way?
This brings us to FX’s A Murder at the End of the World, created by Brit Marling and Zal Batmanglij. With “a murder” in the name, the only surprises ahead are the ones you are expecting. It is a whodunit that primes the viewer to be doubtful of everyone and everything. Except this one actually plays nicely on the trope of revealing a grand master plan, instead dwelling on the evolving mess at hand.
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Weekly Picks – March 17, 2024
Credits (clockwise from top left): Stefano Summo for ProPublica; Edges of Earth / Adam Moore; Mutual Aid (2009). Photograph by Timothy Vollmer / Flickr; Apu Gomes / AFP / Getty; Brian Snyder / Reuters / Redux; Cole Burston / AFP / Getty; Jon S. / Deed; Alice MartinsCollective struggle – a possible foundation for radical care; solidarity and its discontents the hallmark of destabilizing systems of oppression. Stories from those on the street facing their own unconquerable peaks. Hell on Earth in the heat of the desert, a growing fallout of sustained war, where neglected souls and zealots alike seek peace but remain trapped in turmoil. The surrender of a province and its environment to fossil fuel fanaticism. A historical review of a central African conflict, itself an allegory of how colonialism seeps through social strata. The compounding research behind the ill-effects of rising wealth disparities worldwide. Triads, illicit drug trades, exploited immigrants, and a cavalcade of avoidable problems linking nations who choose to criminalize substances to support their home-grown industries of terror. Freedivers off the coast of Japan preserving community as much as an ancient way of life. Finally, a comment on change in the media landscape, and on trust’s declining value as a commodity used to buy political engagement.
This week’s collection:
- The Revolution Will Be Caring
- Sisyphus on the Street
- The Open-Air Prison for ISIS Supporters—and Victims
- ‘Fire Weather’: Big Oil’s Climate Conflagration
- Intractable Crisis
- Why the world cannot afford the rich
- Gangsters, money and murder: How Chinese organized crime is dominating Oklahoma’s illegal medical marijuana market
- The Plight of Japan’s Ama Divers
- Journalism’s Slow Death Threatens Democracy
Quite a lot of doom and gloom shared above and below. A final comment for this week – you may remember one of the more recent reimaginings of Tears For Fears’ “Mad World”, as interpreted by Michael Andrews and Gary Jules, and popularized by 2001’s Donnie Darko, tv shows, trailers, and video games:
People often remark on Gary Jules’ vocals, but the video’s exhibition, simple yet remarkable, should also be noted, carrying Michel Gondry’s signature in its frames. Worth revisiting as our perpetual cruelty towards one another seems unceasing, gaslighting the collective or impressing upon us, whether falsely or not, a powerlessness to act. But there is hope in preservation – in words, no less. An ongoing reassurance that alongside our deepest laments there exists a choice to latch onto a wider reality, one that persists through inferno.
Note that only excerpts (often introductory) are quoted. For full text (and context) or video, please view the original piece.
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Memories, Randomly Accessed
(Note for those scrolling past: this post contains a gallery of snapshots from Tokyo in 2014. Click “read more” to view.)
A decade ago, nearly half a kilometer above the most populous metropolis in the world, a conversation began between a professor and student of English from two different worlds. The professor was Japanese, born and raised in Tokyo. He was treating his grandkids to a day atop the capital city, their faces eagerly leaning as far as they could towards the slanted glass that overlooked the concrete jungle. The student was Canadian, by citizenship it should be said; attachment to national identity already too nefarious a notion to adequately stomach. He was on a vacation and had come to the tower to spend a few hours photographing the vast steel lanes and their skyscraping endpoints, in light from above during the day and when lit from below at night.
“I do not teach grammar, I want to be clear about that,” the older man explained in a soft tone, “I teach literature.” How to read human beings and their complexity through discussions of their textual output.
The two chatted while the kids ran through people’s legs, mostly young couples, as the evening view transformed from ‘diurnal smog’ to ‘twilight neon’. They spoke about how students approached their studies and of their seriousness in attending to life’s challenges. The professor was empathetic and non-judgmental. He had been born after the big war and lived through the Japanese adoption of global (mostly American) culture. The influx of democracy and capitalism – of modernity and its customs – alien from the pre-war empire but only separated from it by “a few years”. He had watched his neighborhood’s wooden roofs subsumed by a growing encasement of metal, glass, and machinery. He did not own a vehicle, simply stepping outside and catching a train two minutes from his doorstep that took him straight to campus.
The student, a visitor, did little talking, choosing instead to ask questions. A lecture voluntarily attended and with great enthusiasm, in a classroom within the clouds.
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Formative Fires
Raining ash, a now common occurrence, settles on the hood of my vehicle. July 2023.
July 2023
Another summer and another long drive ahead. From BC’s Northern capital to its swarming metropolis via its paved blood vessels. It is a cool Saturday morning and I have the heater going and a light jacket on, despite knowing it will soon be above 30 C. Another hot day in a drought-stricken summer, driving around in a carbon belching sedan that burns prehistoric life. Luckily, I have some tunes to underscore the journey.
My iPod Touch, bought back in mid-2009 and still going strong, is plugged into the vehicle’s sound system. It carries 800 or so songs and has not been updated in a couple of years. An extended time capsule covering my high school days to my late twenties.
I have my coffee and everything is packed in the back. Time to head off. Initially, in silence. The daylight is barely present and the roads are quiet. Not too many giant metal prowlers – comically big pick-ups and SUVs, to the rest of you – out and about. It feels nice just starting off without any noise in a city that is usually bathed in it. I navigate past the bridge construction and make my way onto the main highway. The signs change from 70 to 100 and I am off. Cruise control set; time to hit play.
It is Paul Simon’s reworked “Can’t Run But”. I turn it up and settle in.
I can’t run but I can walk much faster than this,
Can’t run but.
A cooling system burns out in the Ukraine,
Trees and umbrellas protect us from the new rain,
Armies of engineers to analyze the soil,
The food we contemplate, the water that we boil.
July 2017
Over an hour on transit in with a suit and tie on, during a fairly busy morning, to make my way to downtown Vancouver. I am not a morning person, nor a suit person. Some people say suits are comfortable and/or that the formality they impress upon onlookers is worth the rigmarole of putting one on. Comfort is a moot point – my objections go beyond soft fabric on skin. Identity can be expressive or hidden and clothing only its most visible articulation. What one chooses to wear is then just a social dance, a jig of conformity or non-conformity with various in and out-groups. Suits, thus, associated with many things I choose to avoid. As for the onlookers, I wish I could care less.
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Vangelis and the Past Future of LA
The person runs, futility in motion. The water cascades down, each window and mortar wall a riverbed. The drains overflow with a mixture of muck, covering the cracked ground with black filth. It is the middle of night, but the darkness lies above and below. Here, at street level, the effulgence of neon signs blinds anyone who look anywhere but down.
They splash their way down the high street, screaming for help. People look up, notice the blaring red and blue illuminations, and look down again. There is an order to things, and this is no aberrance. The runner looks back and sees the flying lights nearing. They pivot into an alley and rush past dumpsters, lightly floating but tightly chained. The darkness has crept in here, but not enough to hide in; nothing can shroud those chased by the hunters of the sky.
The person slips and falls into a thick splatter. Tar! The ever-seeping liquid asphalt abundant below the crevasses. This city eats people. Those living in alcoves a little easier to pick clean from its stained edifices.
“Halt!” The car blares as it rounds the corner. “Replicant, halt!” It is almost over their broken body, breathing heavy as the fumes of the city begin to overwhelm them.
“I am no replicant!” The plea goes unheard. “I am a threat to no one!” They unstick themselves and stand up, a stark silhouette against a malicious glare.
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Journey
When this post is published, I will be in Los Angeles, having driven 800km South from Prince George and having caught a flight from Vancouver. One of many stops that I will be making over the course of this month. From the moderate chill of middle BC to the balmy sunshine of Southern California, before heading back to work up North to travel across frigid Yukon, to reach some of the most remote communities in Canada.
Boy, what a large carbon footprint I carry. I suspect no one, from the gaudiest campaigner to the most ardent activist, will quit travel entirely until we are forced by the climate itself to confine ourselves to little squares on the global grid. For now, no carbon emissions more egregious than any other, from the ones we produce directly to the ones we wear or consume. All the more important to recognize since we are having quite the ‘winter’. Though Prince George has had a couple of weeks at or below the -30 range, it has also been much warmer than usual. Not to localize large climate patterns, of course, only to point out the observable results of their compounding impacts. It is no longer strange seeing headlines about wildfires and drought as early as February.
And I am a contributor.
I share that as a grim caveat to a fond feeling I am reminded of on a sporadic basis. As a young adult attending post-secondary, I used to dream of living a life where I get to travel regularly. Not engage in tourism. Rather go from place to place as a learner and appreciator of the differences that define us and the similarities they disguise. I did not care where – you can find plenty that is foreign in familiar surroundings left unexplored – but I did not want to remain unmoved.