Comments on: Canon & Fugue (Hyperpost 11) (The End Of The Road)

By: Holly

Holly — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 12:13:03 +0000

Oh just write the damn book already. Don’t make me look over my glasses at you about this.

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:38:51 +0000

Very good point.
However, what he’s trying to do here is talk about economic/crime policies and ‘liberalism’ in general – it’s a paper designed to win over Labour voters, and so concentrates on a few specific areas. But you’re right, those things should be mentioned more.

However, the Lib Dems *are* by far the strongest party on those issues (for example being the only one of the big three to have a commitment to gay marriage as opposed to civil partnerships – and I bet we’re the only party that has an organisation specifically for ‘gay action’ – http://www.delga.org.uk/pages/thenamedelga.html )

You can see LD policies on gay rights at http://www.delga.org.uk/pages/our-record.html .

By: Gavin Robinson

Gavin Robinson — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 16:23:44 +0000

I’ll try to read it properly when I get time, but a keyword search suggests a worrying trend. Just look at these word frequencies in a text of about 70 pages:

women: 2
woman: 1
gender: 0
sex: 0
sexuality: 0
patriarchy: 0
gay: 0

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 13:42:30 +0000

Have a look, for example, at Nick Clegg’s new thing – http://www.nickclegg.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/the-liberal-moment.pdf . His is a much more conservative ‘vision’ than mine, but still far from ‘moderate’, I would say…

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 18:55:06 +0000

Well that explains it… as well of course as nicely tying in with the comments to the Crisis post…

By: Justin Zyduck

Justin Zyduck — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 17:58:31 +0000

And guess which ’80s superstar writer-artist it is who says that!

I suppose he interprets that quote as somehow *diminishing* the magic of storytelling rather than elevating it. “Clearly this guy thinks he’s too cool for school!” or something. Some people perceive Grant Morrison, after all, as *hating* superheroes, and while it seems like an absolutely ridiculous notion to you and me (and Morrison, I can only imagine), maybe if you squinted and looked at it from a totally alien angle…

It does not go unremarked by Morrison (and Kirby as well) that some people perceive capital-F Freedom as *terrifying* and therefore restrictive in its own way. The Invisibles is all about seeing unusual things and interpreting that same thing as either wonderful or horrible.

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:45:21 +0000

Do people who can *READ* do that?! I mean, that story is as celebratory as you can possibly get…

By: Justin Zyduck

Justin Zyduck — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:42:04 +0000

It kills me when people get mad at Moore for the “…aren’t they all?” line,
interpreting it as some sort of sneering dismissal rather than a *celebration*.

Anyway, just wanted to say I thought this was a brilliant endeavor. I didn’t reply much either, largely because the structure of the pieces had an assertive momentum to the point that I just wanted to see where it was going and didn’t want to get in the way. I’m a micro guy more than a macro guy, anyway, and these posts are about as macro as it gets.

By: Andrew Hickey

Andrew Hickey — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:15:18 +0000

Oh, I agree totally – where ‘liberal’ is a synonym for ‘moderate’ I have no time for it whatsoever, but then nor do most of the true liberals I know (even the ones who are also right-libertarians, who I disagree with profoundly). I have no sympathy for that kind of thing whatsoever. I want to see radical changes to the very basis of our society, to make it more free (and I think in order to do so we also need a radical redistribution of wealth from the privileged to the unprivileged). I’m an idealist and not prepared to compromise at all on fundamental rights.

Most liberals don’t care as much about ‘equality’ as ‘freedom’, incidentally, but some, myself included, see the one as a prerequisite to the other – economic power over others is just as pernicious as political power…

By: Gavin Robinson

Gavin Robinson — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 15:04:16 +0000

The main problem I have with liberalism is that I think gradual progress, "reasonable" compromise, moderation and balance tend to benefit conservatism more than liberalism (although it's important to note that your cybernetic liberalism doesn't seem to depend on any of those things and could potentially be much more radical). Liberals might use those things as tactical ploys to get things moving in the right direction, but they also necessarily deny the possibility of freedom and equality for everyone right now. When we're thinking about what we want to happen in the future, progress doesn't necessarily have to be gradual - it might be fast and radical. But once we use progress as the main theme of a historical narrative over a long period it pretty much has to be slow and steady, and then progress obstructs radical transformation and leads people to accept oppression and inequality in the past because "that's just how it was". There was a great discussion at Historiann about how history as progress disadvantages women and contributes to patriarchal equilibrium. Then we got onto how it disadvantages black people too.