Posts by George Darroch
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Thank you for this David, it's entirely wonderful. A few notes and thoughts, in somewhat unstructured form:
Staging the self seems to come directly after the first experiment. Staging is learned, a combination of tradition and desire. Whether self-portraiture is always aspirational is a moot point, but aspirations go in many directions. There are desires to look mad, bad or dangerous to know, just as there are professional or socially-elevating ambitions.
The selfie is the epitome of performativism, and because it reshapes the body, it has transgressive potential. Compare the selfies of the young and the interesting with those of everyone else - because of Facebook, Twitter, and (horror!) LinkedIn, we're all attached to a form of representation that must convey essential information about us. Whatever we are in that image is us. We've all been dragged into the labour of self representation, whether we like it or not.
Here, I'm still a still stolen boat, resting on the South Pacific, but elsewhere I'm crisply dressed for a date and floating 100m above Jakarta, or perched under an Aceh sunset. I've considered gaining a face here, but people know me well enough. I have more than enough faces elsewhere.
The object itself is represented as it were obtruding itself for our enjoyment while we strive against it with all our might. And the artistic representation of the object is no longer distinguished from the nature of the object itself, and thus it is impossible that it can be regarded as beautiful. - Immanuel Kant
From: Textual Relations: The Young Girl and the Selfie, a different kind of meditation on rejected bodies and their representation.
I don't agree with Kant; reflective (pun intended) representations of the self are regarded as impure because they enact a form of autoregulation, rather than an unencumbered self immune to social constructs and constraints. That person/body does not exist.
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You wouldn't have realised this, but the emergency exit doors cannot be opened while the plane is at altitude, or even while it is moving, as safety locks activate and prevent it from occurring. At cruising altitudes the pressure differential makes the force required to open the door equivalent to lifting a small car, rendering the locked door doubly secure.
As soon as the plane starts rolling down the runway, your child may attempt to do so, with impunity. This may not endear you to long-suffering flight attendants, or provoke the warmth of other passengers, but for a brief moment your loved one will experience pure joy. That, surely, is worth something?
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A wonderful, fascinating thread. I've been looking through, thinking of hacks to contribute.
Firstly, the coffee grinder is broken: does anyone have a reliable hack for turning beans into espresso-able pieces? (We don't have a bread maker either - I'm the guest of a French pastry-chef.)
The last six months I've been mostly reliant on a single electric plate, slow to warm. My hackery has mostly consisted of elaborate bean salads, and things cobbled together from limited ingredients (contrary to popular belief, not every developing country is a food paradise). I'm staying with friends in Bali today, and to have a full kitchen is such a rare luxury.
I realised however that the use of kecap manis*, or sweet soy, is rather limited in NZ. It's an excellent accompaniment to tofu, tempe and many other things. A dash alongside chilli, lime, or cumin or sumac makes for an excellent meal. What it does very well is balance out spices, and add a caramelised warmth to the meal, and makes everything just a little stickier. Once I get back to NZ I'm going to experiment with it in a few more things.
*(pronounced kechup mahnees - the origination of the term ketchup)
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It was common when I played waterpolo for penalties to be given for even raising one's eyebrows about a referee's call. To say something about it was considered disrespect and could easily result in ejection for the whole game. To actively harass the referee almost never happened, and in the one case I remember, the player was suspended from playing for about 3 months. Furthermore, the referee had the power to eject spectators from the pool complex for anything they didn't like.
I like this. Passion and abuse are distinguishable, and should be kept separate. Ugliness manifests in sport in many different ways, and often comes out as thinking it's acceptable to abuse less powerful members of society.
Asking what the call was (in the expectation that you're seeking information so that you won't do it again) shouldn't be an offense. But in this era of videocameras, you're probably better to watch the game afterwards and try to figure it out post-facto. Making light of the ref's decisions, even in a neutral light, doesn't seem like a winning strategy in any sport.
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A really good long interview with Lorde by Katherine [is Awesome] Lowe.
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Wow. I would have guessed Lorde being another 5 years older, on the basis of the talent she brings. That's a fascinating interview; she brings out insights beyond her age.
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Hard News: Friday Music: Enter Audioculture, in reply to Simon Grigg,
we have a large Dawn Raid story coming from Phil Bell, Peter McLennan’s Phil Fuemana story is on hand and will go up in a few days and there is a lot more, including the deep south (as in South AKL) country scene, on the way.
Sounds good.
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What everyone else said. She's a beauty. Thanks to Simon particularly - I hope you can get back to living a somewhat more normal life now! I hope there's plenty of room and enthusiasm for the site to grow, and (in a curated and supported fashion) for those with more music, art, stories, and ephemera to contribute. It isn't Wikipedia, but it isn't the National Archive either.
[ETA: I hope there's some thought to pulling in some of the history of music in South Auckland, which is under-storied and under-documented. It's large, important, and it's who we are.]
On a completely different subject, this is probably the most interesting and amusing review of the year's best disco record (see below). I'm loving it.
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Hard News: A plea for sanity on the…, in reply to Matthew Hooton,
Look on the bright side about all this. For the first time, Aucklanders are having an ARGUMENT about the future of our city/region. Like all arguments, it may not be as well informed as it should be.
Yes, but your lot are sucking information from the debate. When that happens, it’s not an argument but a tantrum.
The bad faith of this lot is legendary. The chief opponent of “3 story houses” is himself extremely proud of his specially built 3 story house. I don’t have a tape measure, but it looks quite a bit higher than 8m to me. Fair enough, it looks like a nice place to live in. What's offensive is that he is spending his time and energy to prevent anyone else from being able to do so.
What these people are trying to do is to enforce an imagined future on us, derived from their perceptions of the past. This is instead of allowing the flexibility to create the great range of things that present people already want, and that future people are likely to desire.
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Hard News: Friday Music: That Hammer Time, in reply to Simon Grigg,
Oh, and AudioCulture goes live a week today at 10am.
Congratulations on the impending birth of this big baby.