I was born and raised in a small town. Most of the time, I was anxious to get away from that small town with its small town ideas, small town attitudes and small town culture. So, when I was finally able to make the break to university, I was gone like a shot. Ever since, I’ve lived in large cosmopolitan cities that have offered myriad opportunities to experience and enjoy many ideas, attitudes and cultures.

I’ve come to realize since, however, that with something gained, something has been lost. While I no longer have to endure small town people, they no longer have to endure me either. And isn’t that the conundrum of antipathy? With the mobility offered by wealth and the car, we have created self-imposed cultural ghettos for ourselves. And, in the process, we have created “anonymous others” that we can disdain as either effete city-slickers or ignorant hillbillies. If we shared the intimacies of our daily lives with each other, as happens in a small community, there would be more opportunity for cross-pollination of ideas and attitudes. Or at least more effort to come to terms with those we bump into every day.

The same thinking is at the core of much city planning today thanks to Jane Jacobs. She advocated building communities of mixed incomes and races within cities. Such engineered community diversity has virtually eliminated the ghettos that perpetuated negative attitudes within and without.

That is a formidable success in the realm of civic geography but I`m seeing a new kind of self-imposed ghetto beginning to appear. This time, though, it`s virtual. It`s on the web in Facebook groups, in Twitter lists and in many other kinds of virtual tribes. Take a look, for example, at your Twitter friends.

• Are you following anyone with opinions you don’t share – other religions, other politics?
• Are you following only topics important to you and ignoring topics important to your neighbors, parents or children?
• Do you shy away from people younger or older than you?

Of course it`s helpful to engage with like-minded people for sharing and support but, as with biodiversity in nature, we need cultural diversity in our communication. Sometimes, we need to engage with others not like us – we need to argue so they can learn from us and us from them. Roger Walsh, in the Journal of Integral Theory and Practice, put it this way.

Elective Segregation: Failure to Engage the Mainstream. One of the gifts of our mobile technological culture is the ability to be and communicate with like-minded people. It is also one of the contemporary cultural traps. The danger is that in being able to find like-minded people, we can fall into a kind of elective segregation, in which we communicate almost exclusively with those who share our views. What sociologists find is that this selective communication tends to reinforce people’s more extreme viewpoints, whereas mixing and communicating with more diverse populations tends to moderate extreme views.

In fact, I would say the need to engage with those not like us is modeled by the most successful biological breakthrough in nature: sex. Organisms that learn (genetically) from others are much more robust that those that reproduce asexually. Perhaps it`s time to take a hint and start building web applications and communities that bring opposites together instead of the same old same. We can only learn so much from people just like us; we also need to find the courage to mix it up.

A quotation came to mind. It seems very appropriate at the moment since we’re also struggling with the issue of Net Neutrality.  John Milton delivered this 400 years ago in a speech for the liberty of unlicensed printing to the parliament of England.

I cannot praise a fugitive and cloistered virtue, unexercised and unbreathed, that never sallies out and sees her adversary, but slinks out of the race where that immortal garland is to be run for, not without dust and heat.

Ghettos français

(source : Le Monde 30/11/09)
Il faut entendre le cri d’alarme que lance Claude Dilain, le maire de Clichy-sous-Bois (Seine-Saint-Denis), un de ces élus en première ligne dans la crise sociale et urbaine : “Nous sommes revenus à la situation d’avant 2005″, s’inquiète-t-il, faisant référence aux trois semaines d’émeutes qui avaient frappé le pays, il y a quatre ans, après le décès de deux adolescents originaires de sa commune.

Car les quartiers “sensibles”, selon la terminologie officielle, continuent d’être relégués et leurs habitants frappés par le chômage et la pauvreté. La crise actuelle n’a évidemment pas aidé. Mais il serait erroné de penser que la conjoncture économique explique l’ampleur des difficultés.

Si les banlieues vont mal, c’est parce qu’elles sont victimes de l’accumulation, depuis des décennies, d’inégalités de toute nature, sociales, économiques, urbaines ou scolaires. C’est aussi, comme le montre le rapport de l’Observatoire national des zones urbaines sensibles (Onzus), rendu public lundi 30 novembre, parce que les pouvoirs publics n’ont pas réussi à inventer les politiques permettant de rattraper les retards. Qu’il s’agisse du taux de chômage, de la pauvreté ou du niveau de formation, les quartiers sensibles, soit 4,5 millions d’habitants, demeurent des territoires à part au sein de la République.

La sortie de crise, si elle se confirme, ne suffira pas. L’expérience montre même que les périodes de reprise peuvent être plus difficiles pour les quartiers sensibles, moins préparés, moins attractifs, et pour leurs habitants, en dernière place dans la file d’attente du marché de l’emploi.

C’est dans ces périodes, paradoxalement, que les écarts entre les territoires risquent de se creuser, entre ceux qui végètent et ceux qui rebondissent vite. Dans ces périodes, aussi, que le gouvernement, rassuré quant aux risques d’explosion sociale, peut être tenté de réduire les moyens, déjà limités, consacrés à la politique de la ville pour les redéployer sur d’autres priorités. Or c’est l’inverse qu’il faudrait faire. En effet, le potentiel de colère ne s’est pas réduit, et il ne faut pas sous-estimer la frustration de ceux qui se sentiraient exclus de la “sortie de crise”.

Sauf à renier quelques-unes des valeurs qui fondent son identité “nationale” – celle-là même que le gouvernement veut promouvoir -, la France ne peut tolérer que subsistent autant de quartiers qui sont devenus de véritables ghettos. Ou alors il faudra accepter de vivre avec le spectre permanent de nouvelles crises urbaines, prévient Claude Dilain.

 

Quartiers sensibles: la politique de la Ville échoue à endiguer pauvreté et chômage

(SOURCE : AFP 30/11/09 De David DIEUDONNE )
PARIS — Quatre ans après les émeutes en banlieue, la pauvreté et le chômage persistent dans les quartiers sensibles, où un tiers des habitants et près d’un mineur sur deux vivent avec moins de 908 euros par mois, malgré les efforts annoncés en matière de politique de la Ville.

Le rapport annuel de l’Observatoire national des zones urbaines sensibles (Onzus), publié lundi, dresse un bilan sombre mais nuancé de la loi d’orientation et de programmation pour la ville et la rénovation urbaine du 1er août 2003, dont l’objectif était de réduire significativement les inégalités en banlieue sur une période de cinq ans.

En 2007, 33,1% des habitants des Zones urbaines sensibles (Zus), en progression par rapport aux 30,5% en 2006, vivaient en dessous du seuil de pauvreté (908 euros/mois), contre 12% dans le reste du territoire, note l’Onzus. S’agissant des moins de 18 ans, cette proportion atteint 44,3%, soit près d’un mineur sur deux, indique le rapport.

Les Zus sont les 751 quartiers retenus par les pouvoirs publics pour être la cible prioritaire de la politique de la Ville. Environ 5 millions de personnes y habitent.

“Sur l’ensemble de la période, le taux de chômage en Zus est passé de 17,2% en 2003 à 16,9% en 2008, ce qui représente une baisse de 2% du nombre de chômeurs”, note le rapport.

Le taux de chômage reste néanmoins très supérieur à celui observé dans les autres quartiers des mêmes agglomérations (7,7%) et y a diminué moins vite que dans les centre-villes, selon l’Onzus.

La loi de 2003 ambitionnait de “réduire d’au moins un tiers le nombre de chômeurs dans les Zus sur une période cinq ans, et de rapprocher le taux de chômage de l’ensemble des Zus de celui de leur agglomération de référence”, rappelle l’Onzus.

Les jeunes sont les premières victimes du chômage, particulièrement les garçons, souligne le rapport: “la proportion de jeunes au chômage ou en activité est toujours deux fois plus importante dans les quartiers qu’ailleurs”.

“Au total, un jeune des quartiers sensibles sur quatre est au chômage ou en inactivité contre un jeune sur huit dans les autres quartiers des mêmes agglomérations”, note le rapport qui pointe l’écart entre le taux de chômage des jeunes hommes (41,7%) et celui des jeunes femmes (29,6%).

En outre, l’emploi stable (CDI ou CDD de plus d’un an) est 1,7 fois moins accessible à ces jeunes qu’aux autres et cette inégalité dépasse la qualification des candidats, note l’Onzus qui montre du doigt l’enclavement, l’absence de réseau personnel et “d’autres discriminations”.

S’agissant de l’éducation, même si le taux de réussite au brevet des collèges est passé de 67,2% en 2004 à 71,9% en 2008, “l’écart de réussite entre les collégiens de Zus et les autres s’accroît, passant de 9,9 points de moins en Zus en 2004 à 12,1 points en 2008″.

En matière de sécurité, l’Onzus note que la délinquance de proximité est inférieure de 12% dans les Zus par rapport à leurs circonscriptions de rattachement, notamment en raison de plus faibles atteintes aux biens. Mais les atteintes aux personnes sont légèrement plus fréquentes et “le sentiment d’insécurité au domicile ou dans le quartier est plus important”.

Enfin, les quelque deux ans de retards accumulés au début du programme national de rénovation urbaine (PNRU), se comblent grâce à une accélération des engagements pour reconstruire et réhabiliter les cités, souligne l’Onzus.

It’s my impression that here in Hamilton we have a disproportionately high percentage of the population living in poverty. And yet there seems to be an entire industry devoted to alleviating or eliminating it.

It has been my experience that two of the most valuable things that we can give to someone, at any age and in any situation, but particularly to people who are struggling with poverty, is access to examples and opportunities.

Most of us are not lifestyle innovators. We go with the flow and are influenced by peer groups and the examples that surround us. And there’s no good reason we should each need to reinvent the wheel. And yet, if the wheels keep turning and we’re still struggling with the same problems, problems we may not even be able to identify, then maybe we need a new wheel.

The key word is ACCESS. It seems to me that many of the classic efforts to fight poverty actually create barriers to access for many people. Consider low-income housing projects where they lump everyone in together providing no alternative examples to anyone, or schools within a public system that are not created, maintained or valued equally and therefore actively create barriers to opportunities for many students.

Once upon a time I delivered the mail for Canada Post and for a while I delivered to a particular stretch that was full of overly large buildings each of which seemed to be stocked full of people with identical problems as if some agency said, “Lets stick all of these people here and all of those people there, that will make OUR jobs easier.” But it didn’t make the lives of the tenants any easier, as evidenced by the building in which everyone in it was on some form of disability pension. Each of the customers that I dealt with was either blind, or in a wheel chair or was physically challenged in some way that made it clear that there wasn’t a lot of opportunity for them to help each other.

“Can you change my light bulb for me?”

“Lady, I can’t even see your light bulb!”

Another route that I delivered to had a good mix; it had a fancy condo building, a city homes building, a co-op townhouse area, a school, a community centre, a commercial strip and a park at the centre of it all. This model provides access to diverse examples for everyone and untold opportunities; for work, engagement or relationships that will be mutually beneficial.

Now the city of Hamilton is faced with some development opportunities, and I keep hearing about plans that are homogeneous. Plans that lump people into little ghettos; poor ghettos, old ghettos, business ghettos, arts ghettos. It doesn’t matter what or who you ghettoize, it’s still a ghetto. And it will become one unless enlightened people take advantage of successful examples and have access to opportunities to create value for others.

Lets mix it up folks. The gene pool benefits from variety and so does our community. Now is our opportunity to look for good examples and ask; “What do we really want to create?”

Six million Jews were murdered in World War II.  A lot of them did not have to die.  Instead of  Walking themselves into the ghettos and concentration camps they should have fought with all their might.  Instead they walked to their untimely death with the Nazi’s leading them like sheep into the gas chambers.

The Nazis terrorizing methods where no match  for the faint of heart. Yes the Nazi’s did what they did, but the Jewish victims allowed their perpetrators to dominate them. Whether it was safer to follow the marching orders of the day or,  to stand up and fight the enemy is for you to judge.

When, the going gets tough so must you.  Being a victim is sometimes a choice not to be made.  Americans are a people who like their freedom.  President Obama’s Administration  is hell bent on throwing the freedoms of the Constitution under the carpet, and replacing it with a Radical Socialist Marxist agenda that has no place  in the United States Government.

The Obama administration will continue  using Chicago style intimidation tactics to further strengthen their radical agenda, for as long as they feel safe doing so.  It is up to every Conservative, Liberal or Independent citizen, who is worth their salt,  to stand up and take back our government.  Tea baggers of America , you need to double your efforts and start marching into Washington. Bring the city to a deadlock. Remember who you are, and what you stand for.  To all of you that are watching  America turn into a third world country, I say stop whining and behaving like victims.  This is your Country too.  To all of you I say” Stand up, Unite and Fight back”.  It is time to claim back what is yours. 2010 is coming quickly.

Should Americans sit back and do nothing, they will truly know and discover what it is to live with tyranny, sickness and abject poverty. This is the only way a Marxist Socialist government can rule.  The new America will be a nation whose citizens will work for the government, and whose every freedom will be non-existent.  And, the lessons learned by the Poles, Czechs, Romanians, Germans, Russians – the list goes on of failed Socialist “empires” who were eventually destroyed.

Andrea

Le mémorial de Caen

Le mémorial de Caen nous offre depuis le mois de juin l’opportunité de voir l’exposition « survivre –les enfants dans la Shoah » ; exposition dirigée par Gérard Rabinovitch qui est un philosophe et un sociologue ; il est chercheur au CNRS (le Centre de Recherches : Sens, Ethique, Société).

Banc public avec inscription "interdit aux juifs" exposé dans la salle d'exposition du mémorial de Caen

Cette exposition explique l’extermination des enfants juifs et tsiganes : « stigmatiser, exclure, traquer, déporter, assassiner, survivre » voici les grands thèmes de cette exposition à partir de témoignages, de photos, d’images de propagande et d’objets (comme des vêtements ou des dessins). Cette exposition aborde un sujet très délicat : les camps de concentration mais c’est un sujet d’autant plus sensible car il traite de la situation et du devenir des enfants persécutés par le nazisme. Cette terreur, à cette époque, était omniprésente : tous  vivaient dans la peur ; la peur de perdre sa  mère, son frère, la peur de ne pas rentrer, la peur des SS et des kapos… Cette exposition est le reflet de cette peur, de cette souffrance, de cette angoisse perpétuelle.

"1 250 000" enfants juifs tués

Quelque chiffres pour se rendre compte de ce génocide infantile :

 Sur les 4 918 enfants déportés de Belgique à Auschwitz, seulement 53 rentrèrent.

Sur les 15 000 enfants isolés dans le camp de Theresienstadt, seulement 100 rentrèrent.

Sur les 11 400 enfants déportés de France, seulement 200 rentrèrent.

Environ 5 100 000 juifs disparurent en Europe pendant la Shoah, parmi eux  1 250 000 enfants furent assassinés sous toutes les formes possibles de cruautés, soit 9 enfants sur 10.

Pour les survivants, orphelins pour la plupart, il fallait encore subir l’ « isolement intérieur ».

 Comme en avertissait la philosophe Hannah Arendt : « il n’y a pas d’histoire plus difficile à raconter dans toute l’Histoire de l’humanité […] En elle-même, elle n’offre rien d’autre que peine et désespoir » ajoutait-elle.

Duisburg ,SPD Stadtplaner Jürgen Dressler hält türkische Stadtteile für sinnvoll

Duisburg. Zu viel Tradition, zu wenig Perspektive: Duisburgs Dezernent für Stadtentwicklung fordert mehr Mut und geistige Beweglichkeit im Ruhrgebiet. Jürgen Dressler( SPD) findet, dass Migranten bei der Weiterentwicklung des Reviers eine zentrale Rolle zukommt.

Zitat

15.10.2009

http://www.derwesten.de/nachrichten/waz/rhein-ruhr/2009/10/14/news-136968444/detail.html

Hinweis: Aufgrund vermehrter Verstöße gegen unsere Nutzungsbedingungen wurde die Kommentarfunktion deaktiviert. Vielen Dank für Ihr Verständnis; DerWesten, Community-Management

Die Kommentare waren wohl politisch nicht korrekt

Der Beigeordnete Jürgen Dressler ( SPD )leitet das Stadtentwicklungsdezernat. In seiner Verantwortung liegt ein weites Feld von Tätigkeitsbereichen der Stadtverwaltung. Hier werden die Grundsteine für die Zukunft Duisburgs gelegt.

Stadt Duisburg
Stadtentwicklungsdezernat
Friedrich-Albert-Lange-Platz 7
47051 Duisburg

Telefon: 0203-283 3405
Telefax: 0203-283 3972

E-Mail:

j.dressler@stadt-duisburg.de

Meine Meinung:

Jürgen Dressler hält türkische Stadtteile für sinnvoll. Anatolien im Ruhrgebiet , eine tolle Idee von einem SPD Mann. Türkische Zuwanderer sollen das unterentwickelte Ruhrgebiet retten.

Entwicklungshilfe aus Anatolien, die große Lachnummer.

Felix

Das von SPD und SED regierte Berlin ist Spitze bei linker Gewalt

Berlin ist Spitze bei linker Gewalt

139 Brandanschläge zählte die Berliner Polizei seit Jahresbeginn, die vermutlich linksextremistisch motiviert waren.

Friedrichshain führt die Statistik an (67 Fälle), gefolgt von Mitte (37).

Berliner Zeitung, 23.9.2009

Zitat

http://www.berlinonline.de/berliner-zeitung/berlin/139786/139787.php

Das von SPD und SED regierte Multi-Kulti Berlin

Berlin , Zentrum der Russen-Mafia in Europa

Berlin , die Randale-Hauptstadt

Berlin , größte türkische Stadt außerhalb der Türkei

Berlin , Hauptstadt der Hartz-IV-Empfänger

Berlin , 700.000 erhalten staatliche Sozialleistungen

Berlin , die ärmste Region in Deutschland

Berlin , Straftaten im Jahr ca 500 000

Berlin , No go Areas für Deutsche

Berlin , Ausländer-Ghettos mit eigenen Gesetzen

Charles Burnett, « Killer of Sheeps », 1977

En juillet 1990, je découvrais Charles Burnette au Musée du Cinéma (festival Cinédécouverte) avec « To Sleep with Anger ». Une belle claque, l’impression d’entendre un réalisateur parler un langage nouveau, révéler un regard inédit sur l’histoire des africains-américains, montrer autre chose, construire les personnages « noirs » de manière inhabituelle, déjouer les clichés de l’esthétique afro, raconter l’histoire que l’on ne voit. Curieux comme un cinéma sobre et réaliste, presque documentaire et construit en forme de résistance, peut décontenancer, venant percuter une quantité d’idées reçues, d’images toutes faites. Instructif de constater à quel point, même en se croyant dégagé des conventions, une représentation fidèle du réel semble plus fictionnel, “inventé” esthétiquement que toutes les images relevant plus de modèles inculqués par des constructions tronquées, manipulées… Ce n’est pas pour rien qu’en 2006, lors de sa résidence au Louvre, Toni Morrison avait initié un cycle consacré à ce cinéaste: il est incontournable dans la constitution d’un patrimoine africain-américain autonome. Incontournable pour documenter l’histoire de ce peuple qui débute par une tragédie dont les retombées s’effilochent à peine après des sicèles. Pourtant, il faut 32 ans pour que « Killer of Sheeps », tourné en 1977 dans le ghetto de Watts, en noir et blanc et selon un tempo lent et déséquilibré, sorte en DVD. Charles Burnette évite soigneusement les images raccourcies et galvaudées des événements violents dont raffolent les médias, les transformant en icônes indélébiles. Il ne filme rien qui puisse exploiter l’imagerie sensationnaliste des soulèvements. Il n’emprunte même pas une forme d’enquête sur ce qui s’est passé ou pourrait se passer., il n’adopte pas les formats de la dénonciation, de la mise en garde, ce n’est pas un « j’accuse » raccoleur. Il filme le feu qui couve, profondément, d’une façon que personne ne voit, ne peut voir ni sentir s’il n’est à l’intérieur du cratère et s’il n’est un cinéaste-auteur. Pour traduire cela et l’exprimer, il faut le vivre à l’intérieur, être intégré à la communauté et inventer un langage adapté à l’esprit de ce peuple. Pas évident, cela exige de combattre.C’est un des plus beaux portraits filmés, cliniques, une des incarnations la plus réussie de la mélancolie. A priori pas un rôle pour un « black ». La qualité de la représentation transcende la couleur de la peau, atteint l’universel.  – C’est une œuvre qui aurait pu (du) être intégrée à cette fameuse exposition thématique de Jean Clair sur la Mélancolie (je n’ai pas souvenir que des regards modernes non-occidentaux y étaient représentés). – Pas de super misère, rien de monstrueux, le ghetto est à peu près net, un peu désuet, à l’écart, surfaces parsemées de débris, étendues tristes, temps suspendu, inactivité oppressante. Certains abandons urbanistiques, architecturaux, sont presque “beaux”, sortes de paysages perdus. Sans dramatisation, l’ensemble est filmé comme un immense angle mort. D’où il est difficile de sortir; c’est après de longues tractations, marchandages, bricolages, magouilles que l’on finit par s’approprier une bagnole, vieilel carcasse que l’on retape de justesse et le jour où l’on file vers la campagne, le penu crève, il ne reste qu’à rentrer et foncer sur les seules pistes de fuite: “jouer un cheval 10 contre un”… Mais ça commence par une scène de « dressage » : un père engueule un de ses fils, parce qu’il faut toujours être sur ses gardes, « tu as laissé quelqu’un s’en prendre à ton frère sans réagir », il ne faut rien laisser passer, « il est temps que tu comprennes comment ça fonctionne ». Cette tension est permanente pour garder la tête hors de l’eau. Le personnage principal hésite, se demande s’il ne va pas se laisser couler, est en perte totale d’appétit. Il se traîne sur le fil, fatigué de lutter pour ne pas sombrer avec sa famille dans la vraie pauvreté. Il continue tout par habitude. Il bosse dans un abattoir où il dépiaute des moutons à la chaîne. Job de merde. Le film pue le sang et la dépouille tièdes, parfums fades, les membres qui continuent à trembler après le coup fatal, secousses d’habitudes qui évoquent le somnambulisme du personnage principal, la graisse, le couteau qui fend les crânes, les baquets pleins de tripes, les crochets, les bêlements. «Tu ne serais pas mal si tu fronçais moins les sourcils » lui dit une voisine. Les tentations de faire des coups sont permanentes, c’est plein de « copains industrieux qui cherchent toujours un complice. Il faut résister. Sa femme y veille. Les enfants et les adolescents sont partout, ils jouent, comme n’importe quels jeunes, à la guerre, à rechercher des pratiques risquées, sauter de toit en toit, bataille de caillasses. Les jeux normaux des jeunes dérivent, s’anarchisent, frôlent les envies de destructions, de démolir cet environnement de merde, ils sont à la limite de l’incontrôlable. Ils échappent tout doucement à l’autorité. C’est un film qui fixe ces moments étranges avant que ça ne bascule. Superbe langueur mélancolique, morbide. Le feu couve. Il couve aussi dans la musique. La bande son est remarquable de par les bruits, les ambiances sonores mais aussi les morceaux de musique choisis pour leur résonance avec l’état des lieux, l’état des habitants, le vide, l’absence d’espoir, de perspective. Une vraie leçon musicale, une introduction à la culture musicale africaine-américaine. Liée à ces hommes qui tournent en rond, aux enfants qui piétinent et aux femmes attendent, dans un décor prévu à cet effet, organisant l’absence de perspective. La seule chose qui avance, qui fasse pétiller un lendemain possible, une lueur d’espoir, qui donne un peu de légèreté aux corps, c’est la musique. Comme la petite fille qui joue avec sa poupée en chantant sur l’air torride et triste qui passe à la radio, ces deux adolescentes radieuses dans la ruelle ou, surtout, cette danse du désespoir, lente, lente, mimée de très loin, lascive et difficile, voluptueuse et maladive où un couple cherche ses retrouvailles, prêt à signer avec le diable pour étreindre la délivrance, magnifique jeu d’ombres. Tentative d’exorcisme pour réveiller le désir à partager. Slow funambule, automate déséquilibré, comme une toupie en fin de mouvement, tournoiement saccadé avant la chute. L’envoûtement du blues est trop fort, la fatigue des combines de la survie trop lourde, le moteur en rade. Dinah Washington, Etta James, Paul Robeson, Little Walter, Earth Wind and Fire, rien que des perles, puissantes, dynamiques et douloureuses, associées à des images, à un genre de cinéma qui en libère tout le sens, toute l’âme et toute l’odeur du feu qui couve. Le film donne la géographie urbaine de ces musiques, voire leur géographie fantasmatique, ou plus exactement leur absence de territoire parce qu’iici, bien que tout soit bien trop matériel, poussiéreux, tout est semblant. Ce n’est pas un lieu pour habiter, ce ne sont pas des maisons pour de véritables chez-soi, on ne peut habiter là qu’en étant étranger, étranger dans ce lieu de résidence (les noirs y étaient cités à résidence, sans choix), étranger chez soi, définition de la mélancolie la plus noire. Ce que traduisent finalement l’essence de ces musiques qui ont quelque chose de paradoxal, exprimant à la fois le déracinement, la perte, la disgrâce et, là-dedans, laissant filtrer des consolations, des accueils chaleureux, des maisons éphémères, des mirages de réconforts, les mouvements dansés, comme ces oiseaux mythologiques censés construire leur nid dans le vent, dans le rien. (PH) – Charles Burnett en médiathèque – Extraits vidéos -

The Poet Dines Alone

Excerpt: SNEAKY PEOPLE, unpublished novella.

Okay, this is a story about me.  It’s my diary, so I can write about anything I want – even things I wouldn’t tell other people.  I’m a sneaky person.  I come from a long line of sneaky people – really sneaky people.  We’re part of the anonymous swarm that comes out like rats – day or night – picking off top or bottom of the midden heap (depending upon status in the pack) – seeking sustenance while awaiting the ever-approaching End of the World.

Which is pretty much occurring every day.  The End of the World is both cumulative and individual specific.  On the upper end of the End of the World Scale is Global Warming, which promises wholesale extinction (and, some bitch winters and summers between then and now); and, on the other is, the latest starving Somali, homeless person, or helpless geriatric.  Somebody’s pretty much meeting the End of the World every single second.

I was born in San Francisco a bit before the mid-point of the Twentieth Century.  My parents were apprehensive about the spreading World War of that time and, I believe, my arrival was an oasis of joy for them – odd as that seems to me now.  My birth was an opportunity for them to hold the rest of the insane world temporarily at bay, basking in the momentary glow of life’s continuity.  Like all young people, they huddled secretly under the covers with their arms around each other, whispering about futures and possibilities – hopes.

My presence – miniscule and infantile – was accepted as God’s reassurance that all of us – each one: Dad, Mom, and Jr. – would come out all right.  In the end, the enemy would be defeated and the world brought majestically into the bright, painless peace of Forever After and the New Deal (which sounds like a rock group and if someone cops the name, I’ll sue).

However, my parents honestly felt that they were finishing the “undone business of World War I” – there were still German vermin to exterminate and, unexpectedly, the sudden need to fumigate Italy and delouse Japan.

Shortly after I was born, father was sent to the war by our beleaguered government and mother moved in with his mother – grandma – and three maiden aunts who were all destined to have affairs with transient servicemen who “might be killed in a matter of weeks,” and were.  None of my aunts’ fellahs made it back.  One aunt went bonkers, one married a dull-witted postman, and the third wed a fat automobile dealer and got a divorce from the rest of us.

Anyway, we waited at grandma’s for dad to come home.

He arrived late at night three years later.  He was flown into San Francisco International and taxied seventeen miles to his mother’s Oceanside home – to his wife and growing son.  I looked up at him as he stood over my bed.

“Did you fly home?” I asked.

“Yes,” he said with a pleased laugh.  “Do you remember me?”

“I have your picture,” I replied, pointing to his image on my dresser.

He looked at himself in the photograph for a long time, silent and withdrawn.  The day the photo had been taken, he had been a young soldier, vibrant, self-assured, and alive.  His face now was subtly different from the one in the photograph mounted between fifty-caliber machinegun rounds.  In the picture he was young and proud with new sergeant’s stripes on his Eighth Army Air Force uniform.  Standing there looking at himself, he was weary and grim.  A trace of the young man remained – a hint of optimism, which fired his eyes.

“I’ll see you tomorrow,” he said at last, hardly believing that this would and could be so, that the bombs were left far behind, and gratefully forgetful that half the world’s population was still awakening in a world of ruins – picking hungrily through the rubble, hunting rats for nourishment.

I learned that he’d been in photoreconnaissance.  I liked the sound.  The French word “reconnaissance” had a lean mean underground battlefield sound.  I was a romantic kid.  (That drove Dad nuts – among other things).  I learned, too, one evening when he was drinking, something he did more and more, that he had helped empty a rocket-hit orphanage one night in downtown London, carrying out its dead and dying children and their bloody parts.

He saw and lived with death as a routine for three years.  His photograph war souvenir album had pictures of massive bombers dumping lethal rain on Dresden, Berlin, German gun emplacements in Normandy, French coastal towns, war ships and hospitals, trains, cars, horses, wagons, canals and villages.  Now, home, he attacked normal civilian life as if it was the new enemy.  He had lost time to make up, things to do, family to feed and a top to possibly find.

In his free time, he watched boxing on the new-fangled television, tense with pleasure waiting for the knockouts, heavy K. O. punches, and T. K. O. s swimming in blood.  He watched the gymnastic exhibitions of professional wrestling until he realized that the mayhem wasn’t real.  He watched John Wayne repeatedly and successfully storm Iwo Jima.  He saw Errol Flynn shoot his way single-handedly through the entire Japanese Army in Burma.  He observed as Jeff Chandler really died of pleurisy while filming a mediocre account of Merrill’s Marauders on location in Imperial Indochina.  Pa’s latent violence had to translate into real life.

He punched Ma.  He punched me.  He drank himself finally and completely to death.  In his scarred wake, he left two sons, one daughter, and his frightened, yet indefatigable wife.  He also left behind the lingering echoes of Henry David Thoreau, “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”

Father was a desperate man.

I’ve thought since that he was born in belief, raised in faith, condemned to hell, pardoned to purgatory, and eventually dispatched to…wherever he went.

Mother always said, “The War changed him.”  This is certainly so – I’ve seen other young men come back from Korea and Viet Nam.  They all have Dad’s eyes.  The men who fought at Salamis probably looked that way too.  Bloody fields and death process slowly.

Because of all this, justifications of violence appall me.  Its price is too high.  Brought home in the eyes of our young men, violence compounds as it seeks its vent.  Within the peacetime marketplace, it ripples out on a high, spreading across the schoolyards, streaming into ghetto back alleys.  Man against man, clan against clan.  So it goes, as Vonnegut says, and I?  I go on, watching to left and right, mindful of the dangers on the street, wary in my sleep – as restless as I was at the mouth of my cave one million years ago.

The history of mankind is a dry narration of famous battles, famous generals and famous kings, interspersed with profiles of failed political, social, economic and religious systems, which all rose and fell on the profit line.  The chronicle of anything else is incidental, a coffee table book.  Art, music, literature, dance, theater, magic are a sideshow to the main show.  Those things are the province of dreamers, romantics and fools.  For, if anyone is able to live a placid life, outside the maniacal slashing and hacking of whole peoples intent on the obliteration of other whole peoples, then one is, indeed, fortunate.

I concluded that my frustration was born of impatience and intolerance, and must inevitably yield to a violence and insanity equal to my fellows.  Sooner or later I had to succumb to it and fight to the death for my own right to life.  I, therefore, made plans, laying down stratagems by which I might succeed in killing before being killed; others, determining the best places to hide.  My thought, I will survive.

You see, like my poor, wounded father, I am also a desperate man.

Life is a series of accidents.  Chance, not choice, governs (although, why we are in one spot at a particular time and not in another may be divinely inspired).  However, I doubt there is a Master Plan.  Master plans and master crimes require cumbersome plotting.  One can, or should be able to see their patterns, but impulse fires most of us.  We deal with consequences afterward, which is when they should properly be dealt with, I guess.

I’d like to do something to help my fellow human beings, but I don’t know what.  Everybody’s fighting and clawing, biting and scratching.  I’m hiding.  Scared to death.  Who wants to attract attention?  The threat to life may be worldwide conflagration, or in the mouth of some filthy city alley, with a knife wielding, coked-up assailant standing over one’s punctured corpse.  “Neither a peacekeeper, nor a lender be”; it’s too painful, too expensive, and too dangerous.  Experience is a great teacher; if we survive the lesson, but we’re still not gonna get out of this life alive.

I wish I could stop the clock.  Turn back time until I’m just short of the primordial ooze – watch by degrees the slow progression of life.  See just how long it takes to make a human being out of all that gloop.  Think about just how quickly that complex organism can cancel itself out with a single bullet.

The universe is infinite.  I don’t really understand what that means, and it’s expanding, but into what?  It’s cosmic and vast and when you think about it, without the artificial augmentation of religious zealotry, perhaps meaningless.  Even so, this ship was pilot less before we knew that it had no pilot and continues so and nothing changes that.  Either way, I don’t expect the Creator to wash my dirty laundry or lift my heavy load.  It’s clear I gotta hoe my own corn.

I am alive, well, and living at the immoral end of the Twentieth Century and on the ignorant cusp of the Twenty-first – unhappily still under threat of the A-bomb, dismayed by Russians and Chinese, the System and the World, as ever.  “Is it just for the moment we live?”  You betcha.  What’s it all about, Alfie?  The End of the World is only a heartbeat away.  Whether one is one of a half million at Hiroshima, alone in the pool of a cliffside villa in Monterey, or in the arms of a lover on a sunny Egyptian Sunday.

Well, Diary, that’s my Summer Vacation.  I’m going home now.  Wonder what I’ll find?  It’s still the End of the World and Sissy Wagner doesn’t love me anymore.  Who’s going to do my laundry? 

– JL:PDX, 8-09

IMPORTANT LINK:

Bats are on a clear trajectory toward oblivion.  For months, the Center for Biological Diversity has warned that the bat crisis is dire while calling for more funding to try to determine what, exactly, is killing America’s bats — and how the disease can be stopped.

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/campaigns/bat_crisis_the_white-nose_syndrome/index.html

Little Brown Bat with White-nose disease.

By JONATHAN COOK

Stop Ethnic cleansing

Ghettos, Demolitions and Housing Shortages

No one would have been more surprised than Fawziya Khurd by the recent pronouncement of Benjamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, that Israel operates an “open city” policy in Jerusalem.

Mr Netanyahu told his cabinet on Sunday that Israel’s annexation of East Jerusalem following the 1967 war — what he called the city’s “unification” — meant that all residents, Jews and Palestinians alike, could buy property wherever they chose.

“Our policy is that Jerusalem residents can purchase apartments anywhere in the city,” he said. “There is no ban on Arabs buying apartments in the west of the city, and there is no ban on Jews building or buying in the city’s east.”

Mr Netanyahu was trying to justify recent construction in East Jerusalem by settler organizations in defiance of demands from the US that Israel halt all such work. In particular, US officials are objecting to the recent takeover of property by settlers in the Sheikh Jarrah neighbourhood, where Mrs Khurd used to live, as well as the Old City, Silwan and Ras al-Amud.

According to experts, however, the reality is that in both a practical and legal sense Mr Netanyahu’s “open city” is a fiction, extended only to the settlers and not to Mrs Khurd or to the 250,000 other Palestinians of East Jerusalem.

Mrs Khurd, for example, has been forced to live in a tent after settlers ousted her from her East Jerusalem home of five decades in November. She also has no hope of moving back to the house taken from her family in Talbiyeh, now in West Jerusalem, during the 1948 war that established Israel.

In addition, movement restrictions mean that almost all of the nearly four million Palestinians of the West Bank and Gaza are banned from entering the city or visiting its holy sites.

Inside Jerusalem, as in the West Bank, Israel enforces a strict programme of segregation to disadvantage the Palestinians, says Jeff Halper, of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions.

Israeli Jews have the freedom to live in both parts of the city, with 270,000 in West Jerusalem and a further 200,000 living in East Jerusalem in rapidly expanding settlements heavily subsidized by the state.

Palestinians, meanwhile, are denied the right to live both in West Jerusalem and in many residential areas of East Jerusalem. Even in their tightly controlled neighborhoods in the city’s east, at least 20,000 of their homes are subject to demolition orders, according to Mr Halper.

Daniel Seidemann, a Jerualem lawyer, says that in his 20 years of handling residency rights cases for Palestinians he has never heard of a Palestinian with a Jerusalem ID living in West Jerusalem.

The reason, he points out, was that almost all land inside Israel’s 1948 borders, including West Jerusalem, has been registered as “state land” managed by a body known as the Israel Lands Authority.

The authority allows neither Palestinians nor Israelis to buy property on state land. Instead long-term renewable leases are available to Israeli citizens and anyone eligible to immigrate to Israel under the country’s Law of Return — meaning Jews.

The settlements in East Jerusalem — now covering 35 per cent of the eastern city, according to Mr Seidemann — are also built on land declared as “state land”, in violation of international law. Again this means that only Israelis and Jewish foreign nationals are entitled to lease land there.

Because they do not hold Israeli citizenship, the Palestinians of East Jerusalem are disqualified from acquiring property either in West Jerusalem or in the settlements of East Jerusalem.

“The extraordinary situation is that a Palestinian who had his land expropriated to build the settlement of Har Homa [on the outskirts of East Jerusalem] cannot lease land there, whereas a Jew from Paris or London who is not even an Israeli citizen can.”

Mr Seidemann also pointed out that the country’s Supreme Court ruled in 1978 that a Palestinian family forced out of what became the Jewish quarter of the Old City in 1967 had no right to return to their property.

The court justified its decision on the grounds that each religious community should have its own quarter. “However, that ruling has not stopped the Israeli government from helping Jewish settlers to encroach on the Muslim and Christian quarters.”

This week, the Israeli media reported, several families from a settler organisation, Ateret Cohanim, had moved into a building in the heart of the Muslim quarter. The property was bought by Ariel Sharon in the 1980s to assert Jewish sovereignty over all of the Old City, although he never moved in.

Mr Halper says that in addition Jerusalem’s Palestinians, unlike its Jews, face municipal policies designed to make life as unbearable as possible. Demolitions of Palestinian property are widespread. Police, for example, have torn down Mrs Khurd’s tent on six occasions since November and she faces a series of fines.

“Even according to Israeli figures, East Jerusalem lacks 25,000 housing units to cope with the Palestinians’ minimal needs,” said Mr Halper. “The land is available, it’s just that Israel wants to induce a severe housing shortage for Palestinians.”

The hope is that they would move to the West Bank, he said.

Mr Seidemann said a handful of Palestinian families — faced with this housing shortage — had managed to rent homes short term from Israeli owners in East Jerusalem’s larger settlements, such as French Hill and Pisgat Zeev. This marginal phenomenon, he said, had been misleadingly trumpeted as proof of the “egalitarian  nature” of Israel’s property laws.

According to the Israeli media, Mr Netanyahu’s remark may have been intended to throw mud in the eyes of the US Administration as it steps up pressure on Israel to halt settlement building in East Jerusalem.

Mr Seidemann said: “The [US] State Department understands these issues better than Mr Netanyahu. There is zero possibility that his comments will be treated as credible by any of their negotiators.”

Source: Counterpunch

A shorter version of this article originally appeared in The National (www.thenational.ae), published in Abu Dhabi.

Jonathan Cook

Jonathan Cook: A British journalist based in Nazareth, Israel. Jonathan has written articles on the Middle East published in international newspapers, English-language Arab publications and specialist magazines since 2001. Jonathan is considered as one of the most knowledgeable writers on the Palestine-Israel conflict. His book: Disappearing Palestine is a must Read!

Machtlose Polizei : „Verpisst euch von hier“

Welche verheerenden Folgen diese Entwicklung für die städtische Gesellschaft hat, lässt sich in Berlin beobachten: Im Jahr 2008 registrierte die Polizei dort 1200 solcher Intensivtäter, wovon 71 Prozent einen Migrationshintergrund aufwiesen und wiederum die Libanesen überproportional stark vertreten waren.

In den Bezirken Neukölln und Wedding haben sich regelrechte Ghettos herausgebildet. Hier herrschen die Großfamilien, staatliche Vorschriften und Gesetze gelten wenig. Streitigkeiten werden von privaten Friedensrichtern geregelt – oder wie in Bremen mit Waffen ausgetragen.

Zitat

20.07.2009, 0:31

http://www.sueddeutsche.de/panorama/588/481064/text/8/

Marie Luise Beck (Grüne):

Die Andersartigkeit in unserer Gesellschaft müssen wir aushalten

28.01.2008

An empty room with hundreds of seats...

Europe has long been the home to Christians and Jews. From the time of Christ, many Christians flocked to Europe where they both spread the faith and established their domains. The mighty Roman Empire eventually converted to Christianity which only further strengthened and bolstered the region while establishing Vatican City as the central source of Christian doctrine. Multiple times in its history, Europe has been the center of change and progress while the rest of the world lagged behind.

Islam came to Europe through exploration, trade and through Arabic manuscripts and scientific research as well as territorial expansion. It further grew with the arrival of many Muslim immigrants from countries that had been colonized by European powers as the United Kingdom and France colonized much of the North Africa, the Middle East and Asia. Yet, despite the influx of so many Muslims into Christian-dominated Europe, the attitude towards Muslims hasn’t changed. Regarded by many European Caucasians as a lesser race that belongs to the immigrants, Islam and Muslims have been subjugated to being second-class citizens in these countries. Muslims are often mired in poverty and inferiority across Europe with a small proportion living well.

My brief escapade across Europe allowed me to get a brief glimpse of this subjugation. While in France, I noticed that the subways and underground were filled with mostly North African migrants. There were several beggars who clearly weren’t Caucasian Franks. The “better” areas of Paris seemed to be almost completely devoid of any minorities. In a short period of time, it became clear that Muslims and minorities truly were regarded as second-class citizens. I talked briefly with some Algerian Muslims – using my poor French skills which were enough to get me by – while in France and learned from the exchange a little bit of their difficulties in France. I suppose it’s no wonder that there were riots in the French ghettos in 2005 because of the poor situation for Muslims in these countries. The impression of change and progress is a mirage it seems with glass ceilings in the way of progress and growth.

What does the future then have in store for Muslims and Europe? Various reports say that the Muslim population in Europe will double by 2050 due to immigration and birth rates. If that truly is the case, does that mean that the Muslim population will be better able to dictate their status or will it just be a growing lower-class segment subservient to their colonial masters?

“Still got that work if you got the right fee…”
- Slim Thug (I Run)

I belong to the German-way listserv, which is largely geared towards expats living in German-speaking countries. Below is my response to someone who had some pretty wacked out ideas about Germany. For the most part it also answers the question we often get from others: “And how do you like Germany?”, which is why I included it here. I thought it might also be interesting for those who are interested in the experiences and opinions of expats.

Dear Zd:

First of all, I want to begin by saying that no place is perfect. And that in general, I dislike sticking people into broad categories.

Americans are very good at going to extremes. You’re either a liberal or a conservative. In my opinion, neither group has really done any critical thinking about trying to solve some of the world’s more difficult problems. It’s more fun to lob shit at eachother and despise eachother.

Me personally, I find life in Germany to be more satisfying and I believe that a greater percentage of people have a better life here than they do, say in the US. Your comment: “Liberals generally want to make laws or restrictions in which they benefit off other other peoples work or gain.” would seem to be a criticism pointed at Germany, where taxes are high and there is a fairly generous social system.

I don’t want to get all haughty here, but my husband and I had decent jobs (salaried, insurance, 401 K) and prospects in the US, however my husband (who had lived in Germany previously for 5 years) was miserable in the US– he felt like he couldn’t breathe. After visiting Germany and other parts of Europe, I too felt a desire to be here. After living in Germany now since 2006, I feel the differences even more so. For us, choosing to live and work in Germany is a philosophy. We are happy to pay high taxes because we are largely satisfied with how the money is being spent here. We also feel like the ability to take more vacation is also important and contributes to our health, happiness and ability to be productive.

The US is a place for winners. Great. I was a “winner.” I grew up with “winners”. But not everyone has the same chances, the same luck (yes of course some people are lazy–you always have some of those.). But tell that to the college educated in California who are living in tents now.

In Germany, you have to live within your means. In the US, you can hang yourself with credit. When you’re a “winner” maybe that’s okay, but if you’re living pay check to pay check, pretty soon you’ve missed a payment and you’re living in your car. And all for what? So some banker could earn more interest off of you and you could live a life that you hadn’t really earned?

“The funny part about it, is for the most part, any human being would have a better shot at a better life under capitialism. “

Lots of people in the US never see them, but consider the ghettos. There are entire communities in the US who have no services. The garbage piles up, the roads are a disaster, the police don’t want to go there. We are letting some of our own people rot. Tell me, can you ever imagine that happening in Germany? Sure, let the economy do as it pleases. Yet, now, everyone wants to be bailed out? The US needs a revolution and fast.

“The liberal point of view, in general, is government control, high taxes or the other various types of pervisions that are anti family and/or anti god.”

Is that one god or two? Whether it’s liberal or not, I certainly don’t consider myself anti-family or anti-god, especially by living here in Germay. Germany pays people to have children, gives them generous time off so they can actually know their children, and does it’s best to keep families together (family members are usually granted automatic rights in Germany if a spouse is already settled here. hmm… sound different from somewhere else we know?)

I do not adhere to any major religion. That seems easier to do in Germany than in the US. The Abrahamic religions are not tolerant, at least if you look at their literature, which is supposed to be the word of God. The Bible commands people to stone people who do not believe in their God. That doesn’t mean that the major religions have not done some good things for people as well. I won’t deny that. For me, the world, all of nature, is spiritual. I cannot believe that God created the world and people and then damned most of them because they wouldn’t believe in one religion, Christianity, for example. To me, that’s ludicrous. Most cultures have beliefs, Christianity to me is just one of many. If you read texts like the Gilgamesh, you see how Christianity borrowed from more ancient texts. There’s no shame in that, but then see it if for what it is. This is my pov, and I feel like it is easier to have this pov here in Germany than it is in the US.

I think it is easy for Americans (and I include myself in this category) to think of ourselves as self made people. And maybe there is more to that in the US than in other places. But don’t forget, the roads you drive on to get to work were built with tax money, the schools you attended were paid for by taxes, the programs that helped some of our grandparents and great-grandparents during the depression or after the war were also funded thru tax dollars.

If you want to be an island, go live on the moon. If you want to join the human race, I’d be happy to have you as a neighbor. I’m on Konkordiastrasse in Duesseldorf.

Best,

Jill Keehner

New Page 1

I watched the film “The Pianist” this weekend, which chronicles the true story of a Polish pianist named Wladysaw Szpilman in Warsaw during World War II. To say that this film was like an iron fist in my stomach wouldn’t even be the entire truth. It winded me and even now, days later, I am left shaken.

To see the cold reality of the Jewish ghettos, the blind inhumanity and absolute cruelty — I felt queasy the whole two and a half hours. I can’t hardly imagine how something this gutting could happen only within the last 65 years; that’s not even an entire lifetime ago. Yet it did. The desecration of it was overwhelming. Out of 500,000 people in the Warsaw ghetto, only a handful survived. 500,000 — not just numbers, but people with lives and dreams and homes and families. Even as someone born 40 years after the war ended, I still feel haunted by those voices, and the millions of others that were silenced in those six years. The atrocities of it will never stop shocking me. I cannot imagine stepping out my door to a reality like that; I cannot imagine that actually being my life when it’s not on a movie screen or in a book or museum. How does someone survive something like that?

What I found so amazing about this film in particular was that the director, Roman Polanski, was a survivor of the Jewish ghettos in Krakow, Poland, and of the Holocaust itself. He saw the cattle trains being crammed full of people being sent to the slaughter, like animals; his neighbors, the local grocer, piano teachers, children, even his own family. And yet to still be able to make a film like this and have it end on a note of hope, to be a testament to the strength of the human spirit and not the frailty of it; it’s something truly and humbly beautiful.

The kind of hell on earth that Poland and many other places saw during those years should not be able to exist shoulder-to-shoulder with anything normal, like laughter or wildflowers or even color. I feel like that kind of collision should have made the world implode on itself, because it was just too much. I do not understand what it is in a human being that can fill you with such inhumane rage, with such poisonous hatred for another person. I cannot fathom what it is to take away the dignity of a person until they are closer to an animal than a human being. I can never stand for a way of life or religion that builds itself up on pounding others down. Yet still, in a world where we are so convinced that we can live in black and white, the truth is always painted in strokes of grey. Even those of who hate evil are still susceptible to the disease of being brokenly human.

Chaim Potok, an incredible author who has written prodigiously of Jewish culture, said this in his book The Promise:

The Master of the Universe has so created the world that everything that can be good can also be evil. It is mankind that makes a thing good or evil, Reuven, depending upon how we use the wonders we have been given.

I would think that you’d have to cling to that belief in order for any shred of faith to be left after going through something so traumatic. When you look around you to see that the life you lived and the place you lived it in are leveled to rubble and bones, you’d have to believe that there is something bigger than humanity and our broken decisions. You’d have to believe that evil is a choice and not a punishment from an angry God. Elie Wiesel, who also wrote of the Holocaust from a Jewish perspective, once said, “In a world of absurdity, we must invent reason.”

There is this beautiful moment in “The Pianist,” where Szpilman is discovered hiding in the ruins of the ghetto by a German solider. Gaunt, feathered in rags and starving, he seems to almost welcome the idea of death. After the years of surviving horrors that shouldn’t exist outside of Hell itself, he seems nearly at the end of all hope. His entire posture of being is a lament for what he has lost. When the officer finds out that Szpilman is a pianist, he asks him to play him something. His breath coming out in deep, rattling clouds, Szpilman pulls a chair up to the piano and begins to play. Never in my life have I heard or seen something that spoke more strongly of hope, a strength that may flourish even as it finds itself weak and battered in the midst of absolute destruction. As he played, it was like that one last crumb of faith he had left was sparked on fire, and it poured forth from him like thunder. His music reminds him why he’s fighting to survive. And in those gray shades of truth that we are all so lost in, the German solider takes pity on him and helps him hide, providing him with food and his own coat to keep warm.

Even now, days later, this film is haunting me.

I cannot and will not stop grieving for times such as those. I refuse to forget that things like this happened and continue to happen, because it reminds me that there is always something to fight for. When we find ourselves destroyed with the weight of suffering and pain and inhumanity, we are reminded that it is not what we were made for, nor is it what we are expected to endure without promise of hope. The Jews are a people defined by a Promised Land and a God who is leading them there. Yet Jews or Christians or Muslims or atheists, we are not left without that same promise, by a God that loves us with a power that cannot forsake. God save us from the things we do to each other in His name.

……

We are constantly being astonished these days at the amazing discoveries in the field of violence. But I maintain that far more undreamt of and seemingly impossible discoveries will be made in the field of nonviolence.
- Mohandas Gandhi

Blogue de Françoise David et Québec Solidaire

Raymond Viger                         Dossier Blogue et Internet

Un autre blogue que je ne commenterai pas. Suite à la rencontre de Michelle Blanc et de Pauline Marois lors de leur passage devant Guy A. Lepage à l’émission Tout le monde en parle, il était à prévoir que les politiciens québécois se lanceraient bientôt dans la blogosphère. Barack Obama venait tout juste de démontrer la force et le pouvoir de la blogosphère dans les résultats d’une élection.

Les politiciens se lancent un peu partout et un peu n’importe comment pour attirer l’attention: Star Académie, Dieu Merci…

Voilà que Patrick Lagacé nous annonce que Françoise David se lance dans la blogosphère. Wow! Est-ce que les blogues vont devenir un nouvel outil de démocratie pour aides les politiciens québécois à se rapprocher du peuple? C’est pas parti pour ça de mon côté.

Françoise David: un blogue en circuit fermé

C’est vrai que Françoise David a lancé un blogue. Mais son blogue est en circuit fermé. Il n’accepte pas d’afficher l’identité des blogueurs (OpenID) qui viennent la visiter ou qui laissent des commentaires. Comme a souligné BAxT, Françoise David se crée un ghetto d’internautes, comme les plateformes de Cyberpresse et de Canoe.

Sur les 41 commentaires reçus au moment de publier ce billet, son assistante, Anne-Marie a répondu 2 fois. Ça laisse déjà présager que les internautes vont parler tout seul et que les échanges ne seront pas fort. Et s’il y a échange, c’est Anne-Marie qui répond. Pourquoi ne pas avoir ouvert un blogue directement à Anne-Marie?

Françoise David rejoint Patrick Lagacé

Dernièrement, j’avais annoncé que, même si je le lis et que je le présente dans ma blogoliste, je ne commenterais pas directement sur le blogue de Patrick Lagacé. Maintenant je rajoute celui de Françoise David. Sauf que Françoise David ne se retrouvera pas dans ma blogoliste.

Je suis convaincu que Françoise David va avoir son fan club. Mettons que j’appelerais ça une sorte de news letter ouverte plutôt qu’un blogue.

VOS COMMENTAIRES SUR LE BLOGUE DE FRANÇOISE DAVID ET QUÉBEC SOLIDAIRE.

PUBLICITÉ

L’amour en 3 dimensions. Roman de cheminement humoristique. Pour dédramatiser les événements qui nous ont bouleversés. Pour mieux comprendre notre relation envers soi, notre entourage et notre environnement. Peut être lu pour le plaisir d’un roman ou dans un objectif de croissance personnelle.

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Enfermés dehors 

Enquêtes sur le confinement des étrangers

Carolina Kobelinsky, Chowra Makaremi (dir.), Enfermés dehors – Enquêtes sur le confinement des étrangers . Editions Du Croquant, mars 2009

Centres et locaux de rétention, centres d’accueil pour deman¬deurs d’asile, zones d’attente, prisons… En France, comme ailleurs en Europe, la mise à l’écart des étrangers dans des lieux d’enfermement ou de résidence provisoires est devenue de plus en plus courante. Quelle est la vie réelle de ces lieux qui sont à la fois des espaces de relégation et des espaces transitoires de la circulation ? Quelles frontières physiques, symboliques et morales se (re)configurent à travers ces dispositifs de gestion des étrangers « indésirables » ?

Les auteurs de cet ouvrage – anthropologues, sociologues, historiens, politistes – proposent une série d’études empiriques qui apportent de nouvelles données sur une réalité difficile d’accès. Leurs enquêtes s’interrogent sur les enjeux politiques du confinement, mais aussi sur son traitement institutionnel et ses modalités concrètes dans les pays européens. Elles proposent une réflexion sur la réalité de nos pratiques migratoires en partant des nouveaux espaces qu’elle crée et de la situation vécue par ceux qui y transitent.

Cette constellation de zones, de centres, de structures d’hébergement sont des nœuds dans des trajets d’exil de plus en plus compliqués et ambigus. Le quotidien de l’attente, de la détention et de l’expulsion des étrangers doit en effet être resitué plus largement dans des itinéraires et les expériences de vie qui sont le plus souvent méconnus, parce que ceux qui les font restent tenus à distance. Au-delà de l’enfermement, les dispositifs de gestion orchestrent une expérience de relégation – hors d’une communauté – et d’emprise intime de l’État – sur des non-citoyens – en engageant de nouveaux modes d’être. Quelles conditions d’existence ces nouvelles façons de gouverner produisent-elles dans le contexte global dans lequel nous vivons ? Comment se repose la question de l’identité, de l’identification et des valeurs ? Quelles sont les marges de manœuvre, les stratégies de contournement et les possibilités de résistance ?

Il s’agit d’investir le lieu où se formule le débat et où se construisent les consensus sur le « contrôle migratoire » en cherchant à y imposer les données du problème telles que nous les observons en situation.

Plus d’informations et table de matières