tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1670387556309253822024-02-08T02:43:37.035-08:00Politically Incorrect LeftistGeorge Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-31702927253719097752024-02-04T08:30:00.000-08:002024-02-04T08:30:40.704-08:00Mental Health Writings: Another Original Poetic Contribution of Mine to the Discussion of "Spirituality"<p> </p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">SO WHAT IS
SPIRITUALITY?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is Torquemada;<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and</i> it is <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Catholic priest-pedophilia,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; tab-stops: 189.0pt;">and its even
more foul <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; tab-stops: 189.0pt;">and disgusting
<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; tab-stops: 189.0pt;">deliberate
cover-up.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is the idiotic and senile<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Pat Robertson<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">spewing his vile, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">vitriolic drivel <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">over the TV airwaves.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is persecuting Galileo<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">and burning Giordano<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Bruno at the stake <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">for teaching as supposed<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">heresy that which <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">modern science now affirms, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">and affirms with deep conviction.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is burning alleged witches <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">alive, along with supposed<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">heretics and homosexuals.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is what Enda Kenney,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Prime Minister of<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">overwhelmingly Catholic<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Ireland, sick and tired<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">of Vatican obstruction,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">called out as the <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">Catholic Church’s<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">culture of “disconnect,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">dysfunction, narcissism<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">and elitism.”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is constantly haranguing<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">people about abortion,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">birth control, and the mores <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">of allegedly “proper and <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">improper” sexual intimacy<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">in sharing love with those <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">whom they specially care about,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">regardless of sexual
orientation.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is being constant genital
police,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">a special inquisitorial office<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">reserved notably <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">for celibate old males.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">It is all these, and more—<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">or less, as it is <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">so profoundly<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">anti-human, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">inhumane, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt;">and just plain abusive.<o:p></o:p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-53353548414582301282024-01-06T17:18:00.000-08:002024-01-06T17:18:50.027-08:00The Duties of the Left-Wing Intellectual<p> </p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">First and foremost, the duties of
the left-wing intellectual comprise those of any intellectual, regardless of
ideological predisposition—to be an independent seeker of truth, and to follow
the pursuit of truth no matter where it may take him/her, even into regions
discordant with his/her already-established political, social, and cultural
beliefs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other words, the pursuit of
truth, no matter what, is a journey into knowledge, not faith; and should
knowledge and faith conflict, for the true intellectual, knowledge, not faith,
not belief, will win out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If what I
believe is now contradicted by the facts, I will abandon or modify my belief in
favor of the facts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not the other way
around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is what true
intellectualism is, and it holds regardless of any ideology, be it left, right,
center, or any combinations or hybrids of those.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">For the left-wing intellectual, be
s/he a true intellectual, is a knowledge-seeker first, a committed ideologue
decidedly second.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>S/he is decidedly not a
missionary, a proselytizer, a salesperson, an influencer; s/he is a mentor, a
guide to others on what is truth and how it is to be found, not a pastor or guru
with special arcana to impart.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
left-wing intellectual, same as any intellectual, relies on logic, reason,
proof, demonstration, and evidence to raise awareness of knowledge; s/he does
not rely on word magic, manipulation, one-sided talking points, loaded
language, or other forms of irrationalities to convince others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The left-wing intellectual trusts in human
reason, even though such trust is bound to sometimes disappoint when dealing
with the myriads of diverse humans, because s/he knows it is the only sure way
to impart new knowledge, or reconsideration of old knowledge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other words, there is no quick fix, no
magic Philosopher’s Stone, to bring masses of people over to one’s own left-wing
personal convictions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The building of
consciousness is thus a slow but steady process, and is ofttimes maddeningly slow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But quick fix shortcuts are ephemeral; what
is affirmed today can just as readily be denied tomorrow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For it is not the specific belief that
counts; it is the proper process for coming to the belief that is crucial.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, it is indeed possible (as we all
know from probability) to come to “correct” answers by incorrect or specious
means.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just randomly guessing the answer
on a multiple-choice test all but absolutely guarantees that a certain percentage
of the answers, e.g., 25% on a series of four-answer questions, are going to be
correct, even if only chosen by randomness bereft of any actual knowledge!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Further, this process of correctly ascertaining
new knowledge is also the most integrally democratic, i.e., democratically
socialist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It relies on the capacity of
each to reason, and to be trained, educated, into the procedures for right reason.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is this, the capacity of ordinary men and
women endowed with ordinary intellectual skills to be able to be
knowledge-seekers in themselves, that is the core tenet of a truly democratic
socialism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We need no condescending
saviors,” says the third verse of the <i>Internationale</i>, and it is
eminently correct.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We ordinary people do
not need arcane “vanguards,” infallible “leaders,” or magically endowed “saviors”
to know what is best for us overall, although we as individuals, or even as
groups of individuals, may stumble and fall sometimes, stumble and fall even
badly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is well put in Abraham
Lincoln’s noted dictum:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“You can fool
some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but
you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, there will arise, even after a long
historical slumber, the bold ten-year-old boy who exclaims, “The Emperor has no
clothes on!” even as the sycophantic courtesans insist that he is dressed in
the most exquisite finery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus does a
Hitler, or a Stalin, or a Pol Pot, become exposed for what he is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is what we of the left mean by the
development of historical consciousness. And that is precisely where we, the
left-wing intellectuals, have a role to play in furthering, developing, and
nurturing this consciousness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Through
education, dissemination of knowledge (<b><i>not</i></b>, decidedly <b><i>not</i></b>,
mere belief!), and advancing the processes of right reason, along with
dissemination of awareness of those negatives which impede this—logical
fallacies, rhetorical tricks, use of magic or loaded words, hyperbole,
misleading half-truths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is why we,
the left-wing intellectuals, are always students ourselves; learning both from
books, and from life, what is the best way to continue our search for
knowledge, and not just be content with resting on a cushion of comfortable
belief.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-34779104045593308152023-12-31T19:41:00.000-08:002023-12-31T19:41:57.275-08:00Letter to the Comrades of Central Indiana DSA (CINDSA)<p> </p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Comrades,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The strength of Central Indiana DSA
(CINDSA) has lain in its positive, non-ideological, pragmatic approach that has
concentrated on such vitals as housing and union organizing, items that
directly<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">affect the working and personal lives of
ordinary working people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This has
enabled CINDSA to reach out positively into the Indianapolis community, and
draw support from people who would not ordinarily be drawn to an organization
espousing socialism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With good results,
as we’ve seen in the recent campaigns for seats on the Indianapolis City-County
Council for its new term that starts in 2024.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While CINDSA members may not be “thoroughly informed” on the often
arcane left ideological causes of DSA at the national level and in the key
national chapters, and where CINDSA has also been blessed by not having warring
national caucuses who are roiled on these issues, its non-ideological,
pragmatic approach has paid off and enabled CINDSA to do good work, from what I
can see from my limited vantage point of not being able to participate much in
CINDSA.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I have of necessity to work a political
life-killing second-shift job at Kroger, which, because it is in retail, also
means not having weekends available either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(However, politically I’m able to somewhat make up for this by being a
member of my union at Kroger, UFCW Local 700, and participating in the movement
to build a strong reform caucus within this union.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I participate somewhat more at the national
level through Facebook, through a network of left Friends there, and I keep
abreast of what national DSA is doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Although I am not a formal member, politically I’m aligned with the
traditional social-democratic caucus within national DSA, North Star, and a
strong adherent of DSA founder Michael Harrington’s “left wing of the
feasible.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I too am essentially
pragmatic, and strongly believe that positive results, far more than “correct”
ideology, are what are crucial and draw ordinary working people to support DSA
politics and proposals.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, I will
say bluntly that much of what comes out of national DSA and its leading
chapters is ultraleft, often drivel, and is even a throwback to
neo-Stalinism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">CINDSA has not become embroiled on
issues such as Ukraine and the Israel-Hamas War, which are very much dividing
points for DSA at the national and key local levels.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is in fitting with CINDSA’s pragmatic
approach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For myself, I do not believe
the struggle in Ukraine is a “proxy war” between Russia and the US and
NATO.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I support the Ukrainian drive to
preserve its independence, and achieve national self-determination.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is, to me, consistent with the Marxist
principle of, above all, the right of small nations to self-determination, even
independence, and to be free of Great Power bullying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For this same reason, I support (support
which is only theoretical at this time) the rights of Xinjiang, Hong Kong, Tibet,
and Taiwan to their own rights of self-determination, and to be independent of
China should their peoples wish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wrote
this up in an article published earlier this year by the excellent left group,
the British Trotskyist Alliance for Workers Liberty, which is linked here, and
which I hope CINDSA comrades will read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(</span><a href="https://workersliberty.org/story/2023-06-26/marxist-case-tibet-xinjiang-hong-kong-and-taiwan-independence"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">https://workersliberty.org/story/2023-06-26/marxist-case-tibet-xinjiang-hong-kong-and-taiwan-independence</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">; see also,
published as an addendum to my post here, </span><a href="https://workersliberty.org/story/2023-06-26/stalin-1913-and-national-question-note"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">https://workersliberty.org/story/2023-06-26/stalin-1913-and-national-question-note</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">) On Hamas-Israel,
I consider what Hamas did on October 7, 2023 to be atrocious and reprehensible,
and although I am not at all an automatic pro-Israel supporter, I do defend
Israel’s right to defend itself (which Sen. Bernie Sanders also supports), and believe
Hamas must be extirpated, as it is an Islamofascist entity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know I differ from some comrades here, as
the issue came up with two of them on Facebook, and they defriended me over my
views, but that’s no matter—friendships often come and go on Facebook.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What was appalling to me was DSA’s support of
the antisemitic “Free Palestine” rally in support of what Hamas did that
occurred the very next day, October 8, in New York City, and which both New
York DSA and national DSA doubled down in support of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No, comrades, terroristic attacks on
civilians <b>are not, decidedly not</b>, “resistance” and “decolonization,” and
anybody who asserts so has lost both moral compass and intellectual bearing!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some things are just simply beyond the pale;
so atrocious there is no way to ever justify or excuse them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Examples are the Pearl Harbor attack of
December 7, 1941; 9/11; and the October 7 attacks by Hamas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one, now matter how grievous it is alleged
they acted (and in the case of the October 7 attacks, all the Israeli victims
did was be in the wrong place at the wrong time), certain things are never,
ever justified.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must be morally and
intellectually clear on that, in my opinion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It is to the great discredit of both national DSA and certain key DSA
chapters that justified or even celebrated the Hamas attack that they did
so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such is to be rooting for, act as
cheerleaders for, unconscionable mass murderers, and far too many in DSA were
simply, egregiously, wrong here.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Comrades of CINDSA, you are
youthful for the most part, far younger than am I, 77 years old now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am a veteran of the 1960s left, an active
left force that existed long before many of you were born, and which also petered
out from both an onslaught from the right (Nixon, Reagan) and, just as
tellingly, from its own inadequacies, principally its substitution of moral
indignation for concrete political programs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Comrades, the great US early 20<sup>th</sup> Century philosopher,
Santayana, tells us so well:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Those who
do not remember history are condemned to relive it.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, please, Comrades, I urge you—learn the
history of earlier left movements, both for the positive lessons they can give
us, as well as for the negative ones. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">On a positive note, youth is a time
of vitality and questioning; however, it is also a time of know-it-all
arrogance and stupidity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be willing to
learn from older comrades, many of whom are resigning now in disgust from DSA,
despite being members for decades, because of DSA’s present de facto pro-Hamas
attitude.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This, Comrades, is no time for
“Good riddance!” flippancy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of the
great failures of the 1960s New Left was the great youth of its activists and
leadership.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We of the New Left were
young and arrogant, and so we made a lot of mistakes we needn’t make.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in the end, following the fiasco of the
1969 SDS National Convention, literally went “poof!” overnight—from an
organization 100,000 members strong to nothing!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That could happen too easily to DSA too—already it has lost 20% of its
membership.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The youthful enthusiasm of
those under 35 who are now drawn to DSA because of Israel-Hamas are not enough
to make DSA grow if DSA alienates those of the population 35 and older, who are
far more pro-Israel than those younger, with ignorance notable among the young,
I’m sad to say.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A recent poll indicated
that 20% of Gen Zers believe the Holocaust was a hoax!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>67% believe that Jews as a class are
“oppressors.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Far too much of the US
public believes there was an independent country called Palestine before the
creation of Israel (as a fact, there was no such entity).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Comrades of CINDSA, “left” antisemitism is a
big problem, every bit as significant, or even more significant, as
Islamophobia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Which brings one more point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What can I do now to participate well in
CINDSA given my work limitations?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well,
for one thing, I could serve as an intellectual resource.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m well read on left literature, am a
university graduate, am an extensively published writer in left magazines and
on left websites, and have also taught adult education courses on China after
Mao, Marxism, and the <i>Communist Manifesto</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also have a BlogSpot blog, “Politically
Incorrect Leftist,” (politicallyincorrectleftist.blogspot.com), which I urge
all of you to check out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This Letter
will also be posted there.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Finally, to end on a positive note,
you Comrades of CINDSA are so much better than the hidebound, tired old
leadership you replaced!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A leadership
that no longer gave a damn about DSA, and certainly didn’t give a damn about
you, young Comrades who wanted to carry on the organization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You will be interested to know that these
hidebound oldsters also were against me too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Even though they had participated positively in my Marxism and <i>Communist
Manifesto</i> classes, and was not the ogre I had been portrayed as being by
the equally hidebound “peaceable religious progressives” of Indianapolis (with
whom several of these old DSAers overlapped), I had committed the “unpardonable
sin” of criticizing one of their cronies for designing and installing for
Indianapolis DSA a most inadequate website.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In Indiana, overgrown high school clique that it is, one just does <b>not</b>
criticize cronies!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so, these
hidebound “leaders” plotted against me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’ve published two blogs on what happened with them on my “Politically
Incorrect Leftist” blog, the first one on August 14, 2010, “Dregs” (linked
here: </span><span style="color: #2b00fe; font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">https://politicallyincorrectleftist.blogspot.com/2010/08/dregs_14.html</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">),
and a second one that drew on the critical testimony of a lifetime resident of
Indianapolis pointedly noting he’d never even heard of DSA here before meeting
me. This second blog, published on
February 17, 2011, with the pointed subtitle, “Letter from One of ‘the Masses’”
is linked here: </span><a href="https://politicallyincorrectleftist.blogspot.com/2011/02/dregs-aftermath1-letter-from-one-of.html"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">https://politicallyincorrectleftist.blogspot.com/2011/02/dregs-aftermath1-letter-from-one-of.html</span></a>,<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> I bring up this old history not to re-fight
old sectarian battles, but to let you know, much younger Comrades, that roiling
conflicts with the hidebound “old ‘progressives’” are nothing new here in
Indianapolis, or in Indiana, truly a State of Mediocrity! (Which the dictionary tellingly defines as
“not good enough.”) I hope you young
Comrades will check out these blogs of mine, and realize the fight for a good,
effective left confronts many obstacles, some of them even internal. So, thank you, Comrades, good luck, and keep
up the good fight!</span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">In solidarity with you,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Comrades of CINDSA!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">George
Fish,</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">DSA
member<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">since 1996</span>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-40968548451705389512023-11-14T09:15:00.000-08:002023-11-14T09:15:32.522-08:00Still More Poems on "Spirituality": Three Early Irreverent Poems of Mine<p> <i>All written in the first decade of the 21st Century, when I started writing in earnest anti-religious poetry, starting Christmas Eve 2004. I present these as still relevant, irreverent in appropriate ways that really do tackle and bring down religion, and just as timely and as well-done as my later irreligious poetry--GF.</i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">I AM GODZILLA.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">I AM GREATER THAN GOD!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I am Godzilla.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I am greater than God!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">For one thing,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I have a last name.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Further, I destroy cities,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I don’t just sit on a cloud<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">for all eternity<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">and fart.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Moreover, I am greater<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">than Jesus Christ.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I destroy churches,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I don’t allow them<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">to do evil<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">in my name.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">So, who am I?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I am Godzilla!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Godzilla!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Godzilla!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Godzilla!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Godzilla,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 171.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">greater than God.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal"><o:p><br /></o:p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">A PRIEST-PEDOPHILE’S
SOLILOQUY<o:p></o:p></p><i></i><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">by<o:p></o:p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">After finishing
off a bottle <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">of the sacristy’s
<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">Communion wine,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">the Catholic priest
opened up<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">and said exactly <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">what was on his
mind.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">“You know,” said
he,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">“I reflect so
strongly,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">so positively, <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">on the words of
our <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">Lord and Savior<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">Jesus Christ <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">when he said,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">‘Suffer the
little children<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">to come unto me.’<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">I enjoy being as
Jesus<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">and having the
little children <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">come unto me.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">And yes, they do
come,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">and while they
may sometimes<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">feel they’re made
to suffer—”<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">He became
agitated<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in;">as he
interjected, <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">“But
remember, <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">they
brought <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">it
on themselves,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">they
asked for it.<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;"><i>They</i>
seduced me—”<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">He
calmed down,</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">smiled,
and continued,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">“What’s
far more important is,<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;">I
will <i>come!</i>”<o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; tab-stops: 2.0in; text-align: justify;"></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">MARY IMMACULATE<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mother of the<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Son of God!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Lifelong virgin,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">never touched by man.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><i>Schtupped</i> by the Holy
Ghost<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">instead.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate indeed!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">But tell me, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">bearer of the Divine Child,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">but also woman of the flesh,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">precious for it,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">vulnerable and easily<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">taken advantage of<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">for it,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">how did it feel<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to be told by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the angel Gabriel<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">that God had chosen <i>you</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to bear his Son<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><i>sans </i>the joy of<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">carnal copulation?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Did you mutter to yourself,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">perhaps disgustedly,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">“Fuck!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here I am,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">a mere fourteen,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and a virgin too,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and now I’m made pregnant?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">God, why the hell<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Are you making <i>me</i><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">go through this shit?”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Yes indeed,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">bearing extraordinarily<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the Divine Child!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">The Divine Child<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">come supposedly<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to heal<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the hurts of<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the human flesh,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">but <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">too goody two-shoes<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to be born of that flesh<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">itself<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">like everybody else.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">But poet Etheridge Knight<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">exulted that he was<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Born of a Woman,<span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and even published<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">a book of poems<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">honoring it<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">by having his little book<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">bear that title.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Bobby Seale <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">openly, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">defiantly<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">affirmed it<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">when he wrote,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">“Everybody got here<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">through good old<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">downhome screwing.”<a href="file:///C:/Users/George%20Fish/Desktop/OLD%20FILES/GEORGE%20FISH/Desktop/Users/Fish/Documents/MARY%20IMMACULATE.docx#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Yes, yes, indeed!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">What’s so horribly wrong <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">with that,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">O stern, puritanical<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">God the Father?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">What’s so wrong with that,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">O Jesus Goody Two-shoes?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Is<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">there<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to atone for<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the supposed sin of Eve,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">who did nothing more<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">than anyone really human<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">would do,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">exercise the mind’s natural
curiosity<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and thirst for knowledge, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">even if,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">in naïve innocence,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">it should inadvertently<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">transgress<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Big Daddy God,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">aristocratic overseer<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">straight out of a<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Tennessee Williams play?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Is that such a crime?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">A Hitler, a Stalin, a God,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">or a Big Daddy<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">would think so,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">but not a fully human being<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">exulting in our race’s humanity<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and thirst for knowledge<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and freedom.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">And so I celebrate you<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">for your agony,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">you yourself<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Born of a Woman,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">you yourself<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">conceived through the flesh.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Immaculate yourself<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">in your oh-so-human<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">agony and sorrow,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">watching even your<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Divine Son,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Jesus Goody Two-shoes himself,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">die cruelly through the flesh<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">as nothing but<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">an ordinary criminal.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Mary Immaculate!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><i>Schtupped</i> by the Holy
Ghost<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">or not,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">deflowered or not<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">By Arrogant Divine Manipulation,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">or just the end-result of<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">the natural in Man,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">I honor and celebrate you!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">As I celebrate all<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">who are Born of a Woman,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">all of us<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">who come to our lives<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and our best selves<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">not through the<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Divine <i>ersatz</i>,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">but through <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">becoming fully <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">human<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">ourselves. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">All of us,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">naturally, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">affirmatively,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Born of a Woman,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">and not the mating product<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">of “virginal” <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">sexual intercourse<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">with a mere bird!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoFootnoteText"><a href="file:///C:/Users/George%20Fish/Desktop/OLD%20FILES/GEORGE%20FISH/Desktop/Users/Fish/Documents/MARY%20IMMACULATE.docx#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 10.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
Bobby Seale, <i>Seize the Time, </i>Vintage Books, 1970, p. 248.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Seale was a leader of the Black Panther Party.s<o:p></o:p></p>
</div>
</div><br /><p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-88374195475763112572023-11-13T07:35:00.000-08:002023-11-13T07:35:30.450-08:00Yet More on "Spirituality": My Poetic Communing with the "Spirits"<p> <i>Alcoholic, that is. Here's my poetic take on that--GF</i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">THE SPIRIT RESIDES WITHIN ME<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">(My Understanding of True
Spirituality)<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-align: center; text-autospace: none;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 135.0pt; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">The Spirit resides within me.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I think it’s Jack Daniels.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or maybe it’s Jim Beam.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or Beefeaters.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or possibly Tanqueray.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or could it be Stolichnaya?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or Grey Goose?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Or even Old Overholt?<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I’ve communed<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">with so many Spirits<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">these past few days<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I don’t know<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">which ones remain.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Which ones will stay <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">for awhile,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">and which ones <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">will go quickly,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">or have even already left.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Hell, for all I know<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">the Spirit within me now<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">has a flowery demeanor.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Because that Spirit<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">I now have inside<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">could well be<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">Richard’s Wild Irish Rose!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;"><o:p> </o:p></p><i></i><p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-58454802232379779452023-11-12T20:22:00.000-08:002023-11-12T20:22:37.235-08:00More on "Spirituality": My Three Most Favorite Original Irreligious Poems<p> <i>One of the ways I positively sublimate my anger at my victimization by Catholicism and by professed Christians (overwhelmingly; though I was also victimized by a religiously observant Jew who I thought was a true friend) is to write irreverent, even blasphemous poetry, poetry I've found out, is also liked by others, has an artistic feel and edge to it, and, as my close friend and fellow ex-Catholic John Triplett notes, is also "theologically correct" while also being sardonic and quite edgy. Below are my three most favorite original irreligious poems--GF</i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">JESUS CHRIST, JESUS
CHRIST!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Really!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some Son of God,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Savior and Messiah<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">you are!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Creating Christianity!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Or at least<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">uncritically lending your name<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">to this dubious enterprise.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Sheesh!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Your own omniscience<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">should’ve told you<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">that was a really bad idea!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">Yet you did it anyway.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">No wonder you got crucified—<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;">you deserved it!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p> </o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p><br /></o:p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">SO I’M SUPPOSED TO BELIEVE<o:p></o:p></span></p><i></i><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">(revised)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">by<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">that
some guy<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">named
Jesus Christ,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">who
was supposedly<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">the
Son of God,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">as
well as God himself<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">in
human form,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">died
of crucifixion<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">on
the cross<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">to
save me from<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">my
sins and thus<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">enter
the Kingdom <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">of
Heaven when I die,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">where
for all eternity <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">I
will praise God<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">incessantly,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">same
as<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">the
people of North Korea<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">praise
their Kim family<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">leaders—<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">all
because<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"> a couple of<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">thousand
years earlier,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">in
a mythical bucolic<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">place
between the<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">Tigris
and the Euphrates rivers,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">which
is gone now forever<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">without
a trace <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">(rather
like Camelot,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">or
Atlantis),<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">a
naked young woman,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">who
didn’t know at the time<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">she
was naked,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">ate
of a forbidden tree fruit<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">because
she was beguiled<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">by
a talking snake<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">that
stood on its hind legs?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">What
do you take me for,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">an
utter rube?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">Do
you believe I’m<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">really
that stupid?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">C’mon,
get out of here!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">If
you’re going to<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">insult
my intelligence<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">like
that,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">I
want nothing to do<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.25in;"><o:p>
</o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">with
you at all!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>JESUS
IS<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>OMNIPOTENT,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>OMNISICIENT,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>AND
IMMORTAL<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>by<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span>George
Fish<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">He is the Christ,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the Son of God,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the Savior,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the Messiah.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">He can do anything<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">he wants, even to—<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">fucking dogs!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And why would he <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">not want to fuck
dogs?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">After all, being
up there<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">in heaven for all
eternity<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">must get really
boring;<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">fucking dogs might
well be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">a welcome
diversion from<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">a steady diet of—<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">angel pussy! (But since <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">all angels are
male, <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">it’s not so much
angel pussy<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">as it is—angel
asshole.)<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Besides, how do
you know<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Jesus doesn’t fuck
dogs?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You don’t.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And if you say
indignantly,<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“Jesus would never
<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">fuck dogs!” I can
properly<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">retort, “Who are <i>you<o:p></o:p></i></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">to claim to know
the—<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Mind of God??”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">
</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-29318923620931021392023-11-07T15:37:00.003-08:002023-11-07T15:37:39.677-08:00Mental Health Writings: A Poetic Take on What Is Also "Spirituality"<p><i>This poem of mine, my angry screed on the booze-soaked unctuous hypocrite Catholic priest who was my high school principal in the small-town Catholic school where I became the first National Merit Finalist in the school's history, was written originally some time ago, yet, in view of my blog post on "spirituality," takes on a new timeliness. This priest/principal, who previously to my achieving the National Merit honor, had talked to me only three times prior, and all those times only to reprimand me. But now, since I was National Merit, he couldn't have enough to do with me! His unctuous fawning made me feel unclean. A teacher I had then said this priest was a very shy man who used alcohol to overcome his shyness. So, my "spiritual" victimization was probably also an alcohol-induced victimization!--GF </i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">IN UNSENTIMENTAL
REMEMBRANCE<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">(A True Story of a
True Priest)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">by<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Padre Pop-Tart Jesus!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Holy Priest!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I’m sure you don’t remember me,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you ignored my existence when I was a
junior.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You spoke to me just three times then.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">each time only to reprimand me.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I’m sure you’ve also forgotten how<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I was the first National Merit Finalist<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">in St. Mary’s history,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and how you oozed on me for that.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Always wanting little chats about my
glorious future,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">your unctuous fawning on me<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">making it clear<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">that it wasn’t my future that mattered.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">What really mattered<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">was your chance to bask in my reflected
glory.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Padre Fish-on-Friday Anchovy!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Holy Priest!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">How I hate you for your oily slime.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You made my National Merit honor<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">turn into ashes in my mouth.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You showed me how much contempt you really
had for me<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">when you unctuously fawned all over me.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">For you saw not the person I was,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you saw not the troubled brainy youth<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">trying to survive in a world that hated
him.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">No, you saw only the National Merit honor.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">An honor you wanted to aggrandize for
yourself.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I was just a pawn in your venal chess
game.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You make me want to vomit!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Padre Divine Quintessence Pizza!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Holy Priest!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Is there plenty of booze for you now<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">in that nether world wherever you are?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Is there a stand-up bar in Hades?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Do you still use booze<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">to cover up<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">your shyness,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">your inauthenticity,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">your unctuous insincerity?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Are you still as phony as you were<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">when you were my high school principal?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Always being sure to be oh-so-so<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">much on the right side,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the respectable side,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the winning side.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You weren’t one to back losers.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Nosiree!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">And I was a loser when I was a junior,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">a transfer student with so-so grades,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">coming from a school where gangs ruled<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and I had to play dumb so I wouldn’t be
beaten up.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You were much, much more concerned<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">with outward appearances and surface
gloss.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So you didn’t see me at all<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">when I was a junior.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">But that sure changed when I became a
senior!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I’d gotten a new paint job—<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">one that had “National Merit” written all
over it.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Ooh, you loved that!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">At last!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Your big chance<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">to steal some light from my radiant glory.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">How much had you been drinking<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">when you oozed all over me?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">More—or less—than when you reprimanded me?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So busy hiding your drinking,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">so dishonest,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">so unwilling to face up to your problem<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and what you really were.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">No, you couldn’t do that.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">That was too authentic.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So you went on burying your shyness behind
booze,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">unctuousness and lick-ass fawning.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Not caring at all whom you hurt,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and whose achievement you turned into<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">cheap and tawdry tinsel.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Not caring at all.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Padre Blessed Virgin Spirit-rape!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Holy Priest!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You’ve been dead many, many years.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">But you know what?<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I still hate you for what you did to me.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Yes, Padre Spirit-rapist,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you still make me want to vomit!<o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-42778746733397030022023-10-31T21:19:00.006-07:002023-10-31T21:19:48.912-07:00CONTRADICTIONS OF FEMINISM<p><i> (My first political blog since 2022, short but pithy. No, I'm not "misogynist" (a point I also make below), but I am intrigued by the finding of psychology that we humans often believe contradictory things simultaneously--GF) </i></p><p></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Now that we are into third-wave
feminism, where women managers proudly have signs on their desks reading “Girl
Boss,” and the ultimate goal of “women’s liberation” is for women to be CEOs
and managers, such as the female head of GM, which is now feeling the heat of
the UAW </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">strike against it and the other Big
Three automakers </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 16px;">(Update: GM just settled with the UAW, making major concessions to the union. Ford also settled, and made major concessions to the union.)</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">, and who makes $29,000,000 a year salary alone [!], far and
above what any rank-and-file auto worker makes, perhaps we should revisit
Freud’s pensive and irritated, yet honest for its time, question, “What does a
woman want?”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">(Freud, who could be so
iconoclastic on certain matters of sexuality, while simultaneously being a
prisoner of then-prevalent societal Victorian sexual norms.)</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">This admitted cis male’s jaded answer is,
“They want both the derivative perks of being on the pedestal as well as full
equality with men, and the want them both at the same time.”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Yes, I say cynically, women want
simultaneously to say to a man, “You’re a heel, and a louse” while dining in a
fancy restaurant with that man she is berating, and with that man picking up
the whole of the tab, plus tip, for both of them!</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">But this is not meant to be either
anti-feminist or misogynist:</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">it’s just
to point out one of the many contradictions of life and protest, such as what I
experience as a worker in my workplace, where so many of my fellow work
colleagues both resent management, yet long to become managers themselves!</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Such is life; and such is one of the
ironies—and ironing boards—of lived life.</span></p><i></i><p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-16978082510898892462023-10-27T13:39:00.002-07:002023-11-07T16:03:05.699-08:00Mental Health Writings: NAMI’s Wretched Writing Style<p> <i>(The last of my mental health writings for a while, which was true at the time of posting--GF)</i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I know NAMI well, having been a member
since December 2019 (but not going to renew my membership when it expires
November 2023), receiving its publications, including its national magazine, <i>NAMI
Advocate</i>, and reading many of the articles it publishes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus can I properly pass judgment on what
I’ve seen:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>what I’ve seen is truly
wretched, article after article (and the same goes for NAMI oral presentations
at conferences) in the same breezy, superficial, saccharinely cheery “positive
thinking” vibe that does massive injustice to the seriousness of the topics it
deals with: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>mental illness, its
treatment, and its effects on families, caregivers and others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moreover, it’s a very homogenous style, where
one presentation is interchangeable with another, as though they were auto
parts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This even carries over in the
first full-length book NAMI has commissioned, NAMI Chief Psychiatrist Dr.
Kenneth Duckworth’s <i>You Are <b>Not</b> Alone </i>(New York: Zando, 1922),
wherein the breeziness and good cheer of the presentation once again belies the
seriousness of the topics covered: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>mental health and its treatment, and the
successful navigation to get such treatment through the maze of clinics and
practitioners, insurance companies, “stigma,” and the myriad of people affected
by being involved with a person under psychiatric care, such as caregivers,
family members, friends, and others.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">This kind of language, which is
assiduously promoted by many nonprofits, of which NAMI is one, and which is
designed to be “inclusive” (even though some of us with a more “elitist” regard
for language might regard it as “dumbing down” or “speaking only in
euphemisms”), has been masterfully dissected by <i>Atlantic</i> staff writer
George Packer in the April 2023 issue of that esteemed magazine (which is a
hallmark of genuinely good writing).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His
short but pithy article, “The Moral Case Against Euphemism” devastatingly mocks
such “inclusive” but vapid language, language that Packer dismisses well and
with flourish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He writes:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Imprecise language is less likely to offend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Good writing—vivid imagery, strong
statements—will hurt, because it’s bound to convey painful truths.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such as, in the case of NAMI, the actual
realities of living with, and suffering through, mental illness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Imprecise language” also
infantilizes—another hallmark involved in its usage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again, as Packer points out, the euphemistic,
“inclusive” language of the new nonprofit Language Police is pitched to a
sixth- to eighth-grade reading level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>While such may theoretically garner a larger reading audience—after all,
according to statistics I’ve seen, 57% of the US population reads only at a
sixth-grade level or below—it does so by trivializing and infantilizing
content, and making the expression of adult content childish rather than adult;
thus radically oversimplifying and brushing off the inevitable hardships that
will attend in the real world when people have to deal with mental illness and
psychological disfunction, either in themselves, or in loved ones and
acquaintances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Remember, the sixth-grade
level is only the beginning of real literacy, and is too young to acquire
critical reading skills and understanding, which don’t even <b>begin</b> until
the eighth-grade level. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">NAMI’s wretched language also suffers from
all the defects adult writer (who wrote as an adult for adults) Barbara
Ehrenreich pointed out in her excellent critique of the cult of “positive
thinking,” her book <i>Bright-Sided</i> (New York: Picador, 2009).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ehrenreich’s book is aptly subtitled “How
Positive Thinking Is <i>Undermining</i> America” (emphasis in original), and
tears apart all the “positive thinking,” “look on the bright side” pabulum that
infests the culture particularly of the US in the present time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This includes the world of the nonprofit
advocacy groups such as NAMI.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Being
forever “bright-sided,” always “thinking positive” undermines what Ehrenreich
properly calls for:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>not negative
thinking but (her words) “realistic thinking.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Infantilizing the issue of mental illness rather than writing about as
an adult speaking to other adults doesn’t make its understanding any less
onerous or palatable, and doesn’t extend the realm of proper diagnosis,
treatment, and provision of help one iota.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And Ehrenreich should know—she wrote <i>Bright-Sided</i> by becoming
involuntarily immersed in the universe of “positive thinking” when she had to
deal with her own breast cancer, where the realm of “positive thinking” in the
face of a serious medical condition abounded!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Yet, mental illness and its often-painful
realities can be properly dealt with in adult ways by adult prose aimed at
adult readers in very compelling ways.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We need not the saccharine nostrums of the <i>NAMI Advocate</i> or <i>You
are <b>Not </b>Alone</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As an
excellent example, take a good reading of Jonathan Rosen’s “American Madness”
in the May 2023 issue of the <i>Atlantic</i>, the poignant and often wrenching
account by Rosen of his childhood best friend, a brilliant young man who became
schizophrenic and, in a fit of schizophrenic hallucination, murdered his fiancé.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rosen’s account brings home not only the
realities of mental illness, but also, our failure to provide adequate
psychiatric treatment for it all too frequently.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is adult writing for adults.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And thus makes a positive contribution to the
subject.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A greater contribution, I might
add, than I think NAMI makes.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I, too, am a writer who’s had to deal with
my own mental illness (or, technically, “mental disorder”) of borderline
personality disorder accompanied by bouts of acute depression.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Often my own disorder would interfere with my
writing, and chagrin not only myself, but also editors, who were understandably
irked at my not always delivering on time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I had to write under the double burden of professional pressures and
mental illness going on simultaneously, and had to overcome both.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But overcome I did, had a fairly successful
(not monetarily, but in quality and quantity of output) several-decades long
writing career (which still continues, by the way).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I even became a biographee in <i>Who’s Who in
America</i> for both 2019 and 2020, thus achieving my Andy Warhol
fifteen-minutes-of-fame!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, I can say,
without the help, but only the hindrance, of NAMI.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I’ve written on NAMI’s hindrance elsewhere
in my other mental health writings such as my “Politically Incorrect Leftist”
BlogSpot blogs of September 19 and 28, 2023.) <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">All of which makes me very appreciative of
adult writing for adults.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Over the past
few years, I’ve been reading adult writers who wrote for adults in both the
socialist press and popular literature, from Frederick Engels to Ernest
Hemingway, and can tell you firsthand, reading adult literature written for
adult readers is a joy to behold!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
will also “spoil” you, make you not want to go back to “inclusive”
infantilizing, “positive thinking” pabulum such as NAMI proffers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But being so “spoiled” is definitely worth
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p><i></i><p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-14508520903516370292023-10-22T07:21:00.001-07:002023-10-22T09:03:43.476-07:00Mental Health Writings: This Too Is “Spirituality”<p> <i>(This is a long post, nearly 6, 250 words, but if I may say so, an eminently worthwhile read, with much autobiographical detail about my upbringing, my mental health struggles and recovery, and who I am, that will be revealing to many who think they "know" me--GF)</i></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Like so many other psychiatrists
and mental health professionals, Dr. Kenneth Duckworth, national NAMI’s Chief
Psychiatrist, notably in the book he recently wrote for NAMI, <i>You Are <b>Not</b>
Alone</i>, praises “spirituality” and its close cousin, “positive thinking,” as
coping mechanisms for those recovering from mental illness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Like so many other mental health
professionals, Dr. Duckworth sees “spirituality,” and its organized form,
“religion,” as “warm fuzzies” (to use Transactional Analysis terminology) that
impart “values” “sense of morality,” and “belongingness” to people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This bias goes all the way back to arguably one
of most important first books of modern psychology (along with Freud’s writings
of the 1890s), William James’s 1902 <i>Varieties of Religious Experience</i>,
which is very pro-religion, if only implicitly so—giving a very sentimental
gloss to a wide variety of so-called “religious experiences” and their
popularizations, and being thus a psychology book much beloved among the
religious who’ve read it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Spirituality”
and “religious experience” (unless obviously psychotic, i.e., hearing God
actually talking to oneself, thinking of oneself as Jesus Christ, etc.) are
looked upon by psychology and psychiatry as essentially positive, while atheism
is not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This bias extends to NAMI
itself, an organization that, while having a large part of its membership and
leadership actual mental health professionals, is formally a lay organization
advocating on behalf of psychiatry and psychiatric treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This bias also boils down to a very treacly,
simplistic,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>definition of “spirituality”
as a warm emotional feeling of being loved, protected, and looked out for by a
divine figure of benevolence. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>An
Indulgent, Forgiving Sugar Daddy in the Sky, if you will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Sometimes psychiatry will
distinguish between “spirituality” and religion itself as being separate,
because, of course, mental health professionals often see a variety of patients
who’ve been wounded by religion, i.e., live in morbid fear of a God<a href="file:///C:/Users/George%20Fish/Desktop/OLD%20FILES/GEORGE%20FISH/Desktop/Users/Fish/Documents/NAMI%20Paper%20This%20Too%20Is%20Spirituality.docx#_ftn1" name="_ftnref1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></a>
who sentences them to hell, viewing their mental disturbance as a just God’s
punishment, deathly afraid of excommunication from their church, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, <i>Webster’s New Collegiate
Dictionary</i> defines “spirituality” itself as “sensitivity or attachment to
religious values,” so the spirituality/religion link is always present.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And truth is, many cruel things have been
done by humans to other humans in the name of religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From inculcating into young children a
deathly fear of God and spending an eternity in hell to engaging in human
sacrifice to appease a god or gods, to the auto-da-fe and burning alive of
alleged witches, heretics, and homosexuals by the medieval Catholic Church, to
the Inquisition, which was both Catholic and Protestant, to the burning alive
of Giordano Bruno and the persecution of Galileo for the “heresy” of teaching
modern science, to Catholics gleefully killing Protestants and vice versa
during the Reformation, to Christianity’s and Islam’s open animus against the
Jews, and much more, the crimes committed by religion, and in the name of
religion, are myriad and nefarious.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That’s simply a fact of history, and impossible to reconcile with a
“good” religious value system or “spirituality,” which either overlooks,
tolerates, or engages in them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And how,
pray tell, does a “spiritual” person believe a benevolent God is specially
looking after him/her when so often, both in history and the present, such a
benevolent God is clearly <b>not</b> looking after such as Giordano Bruno,
Galileo, all those burned alive and otherwise brutally killed during the
Inquisition, the Reformation, and the other 900-some wars over religion in the
West itself?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not to mention today’s
homeless, the mentally and physically ill, the poverty-stricken, and those
subject to bullying and abuse?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Where is
the God looking after <b>them</b>?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
why can’t he be found, even though all this misery supposedly has a “bright
side,” because it’s all part of “his plan,” which is “loving” by definition?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The “spiritual,” the religious, can’t answer
that!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, the only logical
explanation is that of the reprehensible Calvinist doctrine of predestination,
that a “loving” God deliberately created some humans to suffer while he also
created others to prosper, and that he deliberately created some to suffer
eternal torment in hell.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Islam believes
much the same thing, as it is stated in the Quran that Allah deliberately
causes misery to those on earth that he has also willed will suffer eternity in
hell for their alleged “evils,” “evils” he has willed upon them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For that, according to the Quran, is Allah’s
Will! <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I myself came to atheism precisely
through immersion in “spirituality”—that formal version that is Catholicism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I attended Catholic schools from first grade
through senior in high school, where every school day I was taught the Catholic
religion, and again through the priest’s sermon at Mass on Sunday and
obligatory holy days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went weekly to
mass on Sunday, and in high school had to attend mass daily on school
days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I thought of myself as Catholic,
and didn’t even question it until I was 16, although I first developed doubts
in sixth grade, where it was hard to reconcile my sympathy for Galileo as a
scientist with the Church’s then-teaching (during the Pope Pius XII reign) that
he was a “heretic,” a teaching still in place though it was embarrassing for
the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was enthusiastic about
Vatican II, and thought “religiously” [! My sense of irony comes here to the
fore] that it would renew the Church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
was close to a then-liberal Catholic priest, and thought of myself then
(1963-5) as a liberal Catholic, although as a senior I began to skip Sunday
mass and go out for coffee instead (needless to say, not telling my parents I
was skipping church).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only when I
attended college (fall, 1965) did I first call myself an agnostic, and a little
later, an atheist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My Catholic parents,
of course, thought I’d become an atheist because in college I’d been “duped by
communists.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I’d also simultaneously
become an open New Leftist, though as a high school junior I’d first thought of
myself as a socialist, telling my classmates but, of course, not my parents.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve never regretted my atheism since, and
regard Dr. Duckworth’s positive view of “spirituality” for mental health coping
as embracing a reliance on a thoroughly unneeded crutch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing in my mental health recovery required
any form of “spirituality” whatsoever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Nor did I ever feel unhappy over my atheism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was often unhappy, needless to say, while I
was fighting my mental illness of borderline personality disorder accompanied
by chronic depression, but that was completely independent of my atheism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today I proudly sport on my car a bumper
sticker from the outstanding nonprofit, the Freedom from Religion Foundation
(FFRF):<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Unabashed Atheist: Not Afraid
of Burning in Hell.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I deliberately
write sardonic irreligious poetry that one of my fellow atheists (also an
ex-Catholic) pointedly notes are “theologically correct.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(As far as I’m concerned, all theology, of
any religion, is logical hash.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My old
academic advisor (himself a Jewish atheist) and I used to joke that, if we died
and found out afterwards that there was a God, a heaven, and a hell, we hoped
“God had a sense of humor”!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In short,
I’m completely happy and “normal” as an atheist.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">That above was my own personal
immersion into “spirituality.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My
immersion into the “spirituality” of others, however, was horrendous—decades of
abuse, deliberate social ostracism, bullying, backbiting, and deliberate
rejection at the hands of the “spiritual,” those professing religion, and
wearing their “religious progressivism” on their sleeves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People with no inkling of Jesus’ “Love thy
neighbor as thyself,” even though they went to church and professed
Catholicism, various shades of mainstream Protestantism, even Judaism (which
attributes the same thought to the rabbi Hillel).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People who were just plain cruel and
insensitive, though their formal religious beliefs said otherwise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of the 520-710 professed Christians or
students at Catholic schools I estimate I’ve personally known over my lifetime,
only 60 or so were at all moral toward me; that is, lived up to the moral and
ethical codes of their professed religions, especially the “Love thy neighbor”
part.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The rest all “conveniently sinned”
against me as the pariah, as Buber’s Other, as the one they needn’t give a damn
about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were the classmates and
upper classmen who deliberately physically bullied me, and then, in high
school, deliberately socially ostracized me, making my older childhood and
adolescence a living hell, and contributing mightily to my social awkwardness
and inability to socially interact. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then
there was the nun I had in fifth grade in the Catholic grade school who
deliberately picked on me because I had once corrected her when she maintained
that salt was “sodium nitrate” and I correctly informed her it was “sodium
chloride.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were my Catholic
parents, who were both abusive and neglectful:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>neglectful because they utterly ignored me when they weren’t screaming
at me at the top of their lungs, which they did regularly albeit capriciously
from late childhood on, through adolescence and even young adulthood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My Catholic father called me “sissy” and
“n****r-lover” regularly, and yet, when I was a young adult, had the temerity
to say to me he wished I would at least be a Unitarian, so that I would just
believe in God!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, when I was the
victim of a homosexual rape, he showed he cared and expressed consideration of
me by—acting utterly indifferently toward me!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Yes, because, if he’d been upset with me (as my mother later was, and
showed it by spewing venom at me), he would’ve screamed at me!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That was the way both my parents were toward
me (but not toward my five younger sisters): they were silent toward me when
they weren’t screaming at me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
raised me by the “Out of sight, out of mind” manual of childrearing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could never talk to them because they were
too busy watching TV, and one of us “mere” kids just didn’t interrupt our
parents’ TV watching.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I had to keep
all my pain and hurt from the bullying and ostracism at school inside of me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My mother would go off on me at a trifle,
screaming at me at the top of her lungs, her face red and the veins and tendons
in her neck standing out, “All women just hate that”!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b>That</b> was not putting the toilet seat
down, or even “worse,” urinating standing up, thus allegedly “dripping and
splashing.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My mother was obsessed with
toilets and toilet cleaning, and when, as an adult in my early 30s I had sent
her a long, heartfelt letter on my abuse as a child, she responded only with an
indignant “You never had to clean toilets!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(Even though that had been one of my adolescent household chores, along
with mowing the lawn, and that I had also worked as a young adult as a building
janitor; both of which she knew, but now conveniently forgot.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I was 15 my father, in a rare display of
gathering up the family to engage in a whole family activity, took us all
bowling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was the first time I’d ever
bowled, and thus, naturally, I wasn’t very good at it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So my father took it upon himself to scream
at me constantly for my “failure” in the public bowling alley, humiliating me
publicly for it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of my classmates,
who was among my school enemies, worked at the bowling alley that day,
witnessed all this, and was doubled up laughing, further adding to my humiliation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The next day, a Monday, my humiliation was
all over school, and I was laughed at constantly for it; this provoked me to
get into two fights, both of which I lost.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A couple of decades later, I wrote my father about this incident; he
responded back tersely by letter, “I’m sorry you don’t like bowling.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few years later, my mother and my father
took my baby sister bowling for the first time, and glowingly reported back how
good she’d been for a first time—she got a score of 86!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d gotten that fateful day a score of—87.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I’m sure many a psychiatrist would
say, “Your parents obviously also had personality disorders, same as you
did.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, personality disorders
are 47% heritable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And one of the major
signs of a personality disorder is over-the-top emotional responses, such as my
parents constantly yet unpredictably screaming at me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet that hardly absolves them of their
atrocious behavior toward me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To
understand is not necessarily to forgive, not by a long shot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, to my parents’ “credit,” while they
certainly verbally and emotionally abused me, they never physically abused
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They didn’t have to—they’d already
cowed me by forcing me to always walk on eggs around them, lest they suddenly
go into a raging fit.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Further, new psychiatric research
demonstrates that while not all child abuse leads to mental illness, <b>all</b>
those with a diagnosed personality disorder <b>did</b> suffer from such
abuse!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(And, of course, I have such a
diagnosis.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moreover, from what little I
know of my own parents’ upbringing, they may well have themselves suffered from
abuse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, probably did. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(They were very secretive about their
upbringings, never really ever talking about them; however, when I was twelve,
I met my father’s father for the first and only time; and was struck by what a
cold and unfeeling man he was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As for my
mother, she was raised by very orthodox Catholics, and surrounded by other
relatives who were very orthodox Catholics, with all the Church’s misogyny—and
my maternal grandfather, when he became the undisputed patriarch of the whole
extended family, indulged in his favorite pastime, which was giving morality
lectures to the young!)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As for me,
growing up Catholic, I got the triple whammy of abuse—from parents, from
classmates, from teachers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A couple of
years ago I confronted the three Catholic dioceses where I had been abused by
their Catholic school systems, and two them, where the office handling such
matters were run by lay persons, apologized for what I’d endured.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The third, which did not, and where I had talked
to a priest, gave me a very telling reply by that priest on why that diocese
would not apologize:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“If we apologized,
we’d be admitting our guilt, and you might sue us.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, at bottom it's all about Mammon!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">On Pearl Harbor Day 1979 I left
Fort Wayne, Indiana, to move to Indianapolis to take up a job as statistician
with the State of Indiana—my first full move away from my parents since moving
back with them in January 1971, although I did live independently from them for
a while in Fort Wayne.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I lost my job in
Indianapolis six months later, due especially to my heavy drinking (but as a
later excellent psychotherapist later informed me, my drinking was not that of
the typical alcoholic, but was instead a form of “self-medication” for my
psychic pain as a now-seemingly-perpetual consumer of psychiatric services,
without which I couldn’t seem to cope).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>When I had started the new job, my addled thought to myself, “Oh
boy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now with my new job, and the
substantially more income, I can drink the way I want,” without
constraint.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, in June 1980, I was
once again without a job, without hope or prospects for another one, and
feeling like a whipped dog with its tail between its legs as I contemplated
moving back to my parents.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I
vigorously rejected this last option, as it would’ve utterly defeated me for
the rest of my life, and would’ve also been disastrous for my mental
health.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, even though I had only
poverty to look forward to in the immediate future, I toughed it out and stayed
in Indianapolis—where I’ve been ever since.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That definitely turned out to be the right decision.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In September, in a rare bout of complete
sobriety brought on by lack of money, I wrote my first short story, submitted
it to a local literary magazine for possible publication, and had it accepted
in December.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At last, I was the writer
I’d for so long wanted to be, but had been too busy drinking to actually write.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By spring of 1981 I was writing for
publication regularly in local publications, in 1984 I published my first
national article, in 1992 I was included in <i>Who’s Who in the Midwest</i>, in
2004 I branched out into writing poetry as well, and in 2019 and 2020 I was
further included in <i>Who’s Who</i>, with long biographical entries about me and
my writing in both the 2019 and 2020 editions of <i>Who’s Who in America</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had achieved at the very least my Andy
Warhol fifteen minutes of fame!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(“in the
future, everyone will be famous for fifteen minutes,” Warhol had said notably.)
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I’d been a left activist since
1965, and so, once in Indianapolis, tried to connect with the left here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Indianapolis left was dominated by
self-proclaimed “religious progressives,” overwhelmingly Christian, mainstream
Protestants with a smattering of Catholics and a handful of Jews; but although
I agreed a good 90% with them politically it was not to be, as I was shunned
because of my atheism, my Marxism, and my alleged “mental instability” for even
seeking psychiatric help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had opened
up to one of Indianapolis’s leading “progressives” (that’s how they referred to
themselves back from 1980 on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b>Never</b>
as “leftists” or “socialists”), a prominent local Quaker, telling her of my
atheism, my Marxist background prior, and how I’d suffered what I termed
“psychiatric oppression,” none, absolutely none, of which she liked at
all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Atheism was taboo, for it violated
the local “religious progressive” mantra:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>“Karl Marx bad, Jesus Christ good;” Marxism, ditto; and as for
“psychiatric oppression,” this person, Jane H., drew the following “false
‘Aha’”:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“George has seen a
psychiatrist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He’s one of Those
People.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, he’s too mentally
unstable for us, regardless.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, I
was intelligent, and as I proved later, could write, so I was more or less
tolerated, but never, ever, fully accepted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Jane H. slammed me behind my back, groused about my writing, “George
uses too many big words” (Jane would’ve considered “prolix” a “big word,” but
not “granddaughter,” even though, by letter count, it’s twice as “big”!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, despite having a Master’s degree), used
the alleged defects in my writing to impugn my moral character, and did this
for twenty-six years, from March 1980 until around January or February
2006.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She also busily recruited, from
her ample circle of cronies and admirers, others to also shun and demean
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One such example was a certain
ordained Presbyterian minister who worked as a computer programmer for a
private insurance company, had a Master’s in theology and a Ph.D. in
comparative religion and was a part-time adjunct college professor to boot, so
should’ve known better, who said to me, “I avoided making your acquaintance
because I heard you had ‘mental problems’.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Sheesh!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This was the bigotry
among the “religious progressives” I was up against!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Almost 100% from every Indianapolis
“progressive” man or woman!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, in
her later days, after 2006 but before her death from liver cancer in 2009, Jane
H. did once offer me an “apology” that my best friend and closest political
comrade sneered as being “an apology not an apology” when she wrote me:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“My comments were wrong to say that your
writing was confusing. The comments were made when I was reading them as a part
of the Journal [the <i>Indianapolis Peace and Justice Journal</i>, monthly
newspaper of the Indianapolis Peace and Justice Center, 1986-2006, for which I
wrote regularly] and the complexity of detail that you included probably is why
I was left with the impression of confusion.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A classic, even textbook, case of psychological projection:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>she was <b>confused</b> by a self-evident <b>strength</b>
of my writing, my “complexity of detail,” so I became—“confusing”! <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I was to find no welcoming place on
the Indianapolis left, or what passed for it, until 2001, when a group of
feisty anarchist youth founded Solidarity Books, a local non-sectarian left
bookstore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were verbally militant,
though, in practice, nonviolent and democratic; most considered themselves
atheists, and were openly anarchist and friendly toward punk rock.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, from the beginning they drew the ire of
the Indianapolis “religious progressives,” who, above all, were “respectable,”
while these youth in their eyes, were anything but.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Affectionately called “The Kids;” they
ranged in the original group from 17-25, and welcomed me heartily.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All but one or two ended up leaving
Indianapolis in frustration, disgust, and anger in 2005, and I wrote an
affectionate blog about them here in “Politically Incorrect Leftist” that was
posted <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>October 15, 2021.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></i></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">In 1996 I was asked to join a
resuscitated DSA (Democratic Socialists of America, the local affiliate), which
I did and in which I was active, despite being red-baited and mental
health-baited (an opponent of my joining characterized me as an “ex-Maoist
[never, ever true; I was a Trotskyist, but never a Maoist] with a long history
of mental problems”).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there was
never anything of consequence to local DSA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Same as with the inconsequential local here of the Socialist Party, we
met regularly, much fewer always than even a dozen of us, and discussed matters
of which we had no influence on anyone outside our own very tiny circles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Always.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>However, in 2010 I did conduct classes on Marxism and the <i>Communist
Manifesto</i> that drew a small but appreciative student body from both the
Socialist Party and DSA, and both the classes, and I, were well received.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We who met regularly, both Socialist Party
and DSA, met together as the Socialist Coalition. However, when I criticized
the website for the group created by one of its members as inadequate, these
“comrades” of the Coalition (who were also students in the classes I taught on
Marxism and the <i>Communist Manifesto</i>) turned against me and plotted
against me behind my back, and vindictively drove me out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This whole sordid matter is the subject of
two blogposts on “Politically Incorrect Leftist” by me, August 4, 2010’s
“Dregs,” and February 17, 2011’s “Dregs Aftermath1; Letter from ‘One of the
Masses’,” which quotes a letter to the Coalition<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>from a friend and supporter of mine which
pointedly comments and asks:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in 0.25in; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">At the outset, I’m amazed that, considering my 65 years of
Indiana residency, I’ve never even heard of your organization! You’re <em>who</em>,
and you do <em>what</em>?</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><br />
<br />
<span style="background: white; color: black; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">If your
group were a major force in the political arena, perhaps making major
contributions to American society, I’d like your club a lot more.</span><span style="background: white;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in 0.25in; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">In December 2001 I’d also joined the
nationwide socialist group Solidarity, which had no presence in Indianapolis
other </span>than me<span style="font-size: 12pt;">, an At-Large Member.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">However, I was active in the group, regularly
writing for its bimonthly national magazine </span></span><i style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Against the Current</i><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">, as well
as its internal discussion bulletin, and tried to sell Solidarity literature
(with poor to middling success) in Indianapolis and the college town to the
south, Bloomington (home of the main campus of Indiana University, my Alma Mater).</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">But, despite this positive activity for the
organization, the national leadership of Solidarity drew up charges for
expulsion against me, on the grounds that, in </span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;">writing "Dregs<span style="font-size: 12pt;">,” I’d insulted other socialists.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">My “trial” was held by phone conference in
October 2010.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">However, as my witness
commented afterward, the whole thing was a “kangaroo court” in which I could
not possibly get a fair hearing.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">The
vote to expel me was unanimous, save for one “No” and one abstention, and I was
out.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">I can’t say at all
regretfully.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">My expulsion proceedings
made me see forcibly the fraud behind Marxist-Leninist or Leninist-Trotskyist
(which Solidarity was) organizations, with their rigid internal discipline that
allows no real freedom of thought or action whatsoever.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Well, today Solidarity is an irrelevant left
sect, same as it was in 2010.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">However,
back to Indianapolis (as Solidarity was based in Detroit), the Socialist
Coalition dissolved, the Socialist Party part of it essentially dissolved into
nothing, and the old leadership of DSA, the leadership that had railroaded and
ostracized me, was replaced by a new body of activists who’d come to DSA
following Bernie Sanders’s two runs for the Presidency, 2016 and 2020, and who
held the old leadership in contempt—which was fine with the old leadership, as
it had become tired of DSA, and no longer wanted anything to do with it.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">Today, October 2023, DSA in Indianapolis is a
vibrant organization with a core of a good thirty or so activists, is on the
verge as I write of electing one of its members to the Indianapolis City-County
Council, and actively participates in tenant and labor organizing, electoral
politics, and strike support.</span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><span style="font-size: 12pt;">And I am a
member in good standing of that DSA.</span></span></span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">This above does tie into Indianapolis
“religious progressivism” in the following ways:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jane H. and her husband were members of the
Socialist Party (though inactive by the time I was railroaded; Jane had died
the year before, and thus her husband, without her to drive, didn’t attend
meetings), and the head of DSA locally from 2010 onward was someone who, while
calling himself an “agnostic,” nonetheless had a theology degree from
Indianapolis’s Christian Theological Seminary, and like everyone else on the
left (save for the Solidarity Books youth, who’d been driven out in disgust
five years earlier) kowtowed to the “religious progressives” and made sure
their “progressivism” was “religious” in nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No room for secularists here!</span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">But that is no longer the case here
in Indianapolis as I write, September-October 2023, as all the old “religious
progressives” who were such banes to me are either dead, incapacitated, or
retired, while I myself am 76 going on 77.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A new crop of youth, to whom I relate well, has taken over the helm.</span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">I also joined the local
freethought/atheist group, the Indianapolis chapter of the national Center for
Inquiry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately, same as with the
“progressives,” I wasn’t really accepted, due, I think, mostly to my rather
plebian employment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found out the hard
way that my “fellow” Center for Inquiry members were a bunch of well-off,
upscale snobs, many with terribly bad politics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It got even worse when I attended Center for Inquiry’s showing of the
Irish film <i>Magdalene</i>, on Ireland’s infamous Magdalene Laundries, where
“wayward” young women were sent for “rehabilitation;” the open Catholic-aegis
sadism depicted in <i>Magdalene</i> really caused an intense emotional reaction
in me, as personally this wasn’t just a film, this was a mirror held up to my
own life as an abused Catholic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, in
discussion on the film that night, my emotional upset came out, as did
four-letter words when I spoke, much to the consternation of the Center’s Executive
Director, who was primly self-righteous herself (not only would she have made a
very good Catholic, she would’ve made even an excellent Carmelite Catholic
nun!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is, cloistered, removed from
reality, and self-righteously sanctimonious).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So she banned me permanently from the Center for Inquiry in<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indianapolis, and that ban was upheld
knee-jerk by the national leadership.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Further, no matter how I tried, I could never apologize or explain
myself “adequately” to this sanctimoniously prim “freethinker/atheist.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just another way in which everyone, it
seemed, kowtowed to the “religious progressives” in smug, cliquish IndiaNOPLACE
(as it was also ruefully known), even supposedly “bold freethinkers.”</span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">In September 2001, in good
Indianapolis news for me for a change, my thirty-eight years of unemployment,
underemployment, fitful employment and unemployability finally came to an end,
as I landed, at age 54, a job scoring the standard achievement tests mandated
by the No Child Left Behind Act, a job that required my college degree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I worked it for the next ten-and-a-half
years, even though it was only a seasonal, albeit regularly recuring, job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This job was a tremendous breakthrough for
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only was I making decent money
while I worked, and qualifying for unemployment when work wasn’t available, I
also loved the work I did as a test scorer, especially scoring math tests.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And my immediate supervisors were quite
pleased with me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moreover, I was
surrounded by appreciative co-workers who were not only bright college grads
such as myself, they were also folks who had never even heard of the
Indianapolis “religious progressives,” a closed, cliquish, incestuous lot—so I
no longer faced the invidious discrimination I’d faced at the hands of the "progressives”!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This employment really
enhanced my life, and was made even more rewarding when even the anxiety caused
by my case worker’s dereliction in my applying for SSDI did not remove me
permanently from this job I loved!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My
supervisors all came to bat for me, and enabled me to keep my employment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a final coda on this, though, let it be
pointedly noted that in 2006, when I’d confronted my case worker about his
malfeasance and he conceded the point, he had the chutzpah to tell me, “If I
hadn’t have messed up, would it have made any difference?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Only” several thousand dollars’ worth of
income, my continued employment, and my self-esteem and mental health, that’s
all the “difference” it would’ve made!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(From my many rueful experiences with “mental health professionals,” I
often wonder which rock or rocks they crawl out from under.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But even after I no longer had test scoring I
had other temp employment, and was fairly regularly employed for a total of fourteen
years, 2001-2015, after which I landed my current job, grocery stocker at
Kroger, a job which not only is full-time and permanent, but one in which I
also have union protection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I’m proud
to say I’m a member of UFCW Local 700, the Indiana mega-local of the United
Food and Commercial Workers, AFL-CIO.)</span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">In March 1980 I sought psychiatric
help again, now in Indianapolis, same as I’d sought it since 1965 off and on at
university clinics and CMHCs while at Michigan State University, Indiana
University, and living in Fort Wayne.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This time, though, I was pretty much continually involved with it
weekly, with regular psychotherapy—psychotherapy that turned out, although with
some notable exceptions (especially with a psychotherapist I had from
1983-1996), just as ineffective and wretched as it had been at Michigan State,
Indiana University, and in Fort Wayne.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(By the way, I’m presently working on a complete account of my
experiences with psychiatry; I’m currently up to the spring of 1971, when I was
finally successfully, permanently, treated for my Tourette’s Syndrome, which,
somehow, had gone unnoticed by psychiatry or indeed by any medical practitioner
until 1970.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, in Indianapolis
especially I was reduced to a desperate, dependent psychiatric outpatient until
2012 by the CMHCS in Indianapolis I had to rely on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I was a mess as well at Michigan State,
Indiana University, and in Fort Wayne, an extremely troubled young man; and
though it showed in my behavior and in my inability to successfully cope, all
that had been missed by psychiatry almost completely!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That, in a nutshell, was my psychiatric
history from 1965-2012—forty-seven <b>years </b>of malfeasant and inept
psychiatric treatment!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i>Substantially
cancelling out almost five decades of my life! </i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I resumed psychotherapy in 2014, only this
time successfully.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>sixty-nine months I received outstanding
psychiatric help from practitioners of their own versions of Cognitive
Behavioral Therapy, 2014-2022, and finally completely recovered.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My psychotherapist from 2014-2021 said it was
“unconscionable” the way past psychiatry had “allowed [me] to fall through the
cracks.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I couldn’t agree more. </span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">Although I consider that my mental
health recovery considerably advanced after 2019, it was already advancing
earlier, although I didn’t realize it at the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The psychotherapist I had from 1983-1996,
Allen F., said to me notably in our last session: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Congratulations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By rights [by which he meant “by statistical
probabilities”] you should’ve been institutionalized, incarcerated, a hopeless
alcoholic or drug addict, a suicide, or otherwise prematurely dead, but you
turned out to be None of the Above.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This same psychotherapist had a ten-minute long-distance phone
conversation with my father in the early 1990s, and relayed his impressions of
my father to me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He said that, after
talking ten minutes with my father, he’d concluded that my father “was just an
asshole out to vindicate himself,” “an ignorant fascist,” and “a tyrant and a
bully”—all of which I found tremendously vindicating!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For this was the first time ever a therapist
had realized the true nature of the father I had known so ruefully all my life
since at least the age of eleven.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
was also the first time my father had been seen by others as quite other than
what the relatives lectured me constantly on what my father was:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>somehow, a “good parent,” though obviously I
had experienced otherwise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the first
time in psychotherapy, I felt tremendously vindicated!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wasn’t so “crazy” after all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I also felt much vindicated—and thus much
recovered—when my last psychotherapist, Max, noting I was angry, said simply,
“Your anger is justified.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the
patient is made to feel properly and appropriately vindicated, when the patient
is no longer dismissed as simply “crazy,” then recovery can ensue—a most
valuable lesson from therapy I pass on especially to “mental health
professionals.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, accept that
ofttimes your patient is grounded in ugly reality, even though his or her
responses to it may not always be the most “appropriate.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If this is “Freudian,” so be it!</span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">I’d also made substantive progress
on my alcohol problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the late
1990s, early 2000s, I became more concerned about my heavy drinking, though I
couldn’t seem to overcome it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, one
afternoon in October 2004, I noticed that—though my living situation was none
too good and my anxiety over it was still high, I wasn’t responding to it in my
usual way: by drinking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, I was
spontaneously, unconsciously, refraining from drinking—and feeling good about
it!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From then on, my dependence on
alcohol noticeably abated, and I became a strictly social drinker, not someone
who was half-buzzed all the time (I was rarely fall-down drunk in these later
years, the early 1990s on).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That has
continued ever since; I’m not an abstainer, but also, don’t feel the need to
self-medicate myself with alcohol the way I used to do. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Allen F. had noted, as mentioned above, that
my drinking was not of the usual alcoholic sort—it was more along the lines of
psychological self-medication.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Further,
I hadn’t had a major depressive episode since 2003 (I’d been successfully on
antidepressants, lithium and Prozac, since 1986), and when my antidepressants
became unavailable for me due to my being frozen out of Gallahue Community
Mental Health Center in the summer of 2004, I found out that I neither needed
them nor missed them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I was able to
go back to Gallahue in February 2005, I told the staff psychiatrist how I’d
been off antidepressants since November 2004 and had experienced no depressive
episodes; he agreed to continue monitoring me off them, and then said, in
December 2005 I no longer needed them. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And haven’t since.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">I’ve also had active Christian
friends, even as an atheist—which may surprise some.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d become good friends with Roy Bourgeois,
the noted former Catholic priest of conscience and determined advocate of
women’s ordination, and wrote four articles on him and his work in <i>In These
Times</i>, a nationwide socialist news monthly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(Two of these articles were long ones.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He continues to be a good friend, and someone I stay in touch with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My Indianapolis Quaker friend Gilbert
apologized to me for mistreating me in the summer of 2015, the only “religious
progressive” who’s ever done so!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Even
though my mistreatment at the hands of Indianapolis “religious progressives”
goes back to 1980, as noted above.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Also, my fellow writer friend Cheryl, who’s written books on her
childhood and adolescence in Kokomo, Indiana which are well regarded, and even
garnered notice in the <i>New York Times</i>, and who believes that she got
through her rough growing up because there was a God watching personally over
her—she also is a supportive and encouraging friend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And there are a couple of others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While I am indeed a militant atheist, and
express my atheism pungently in irreligious poetry, I do not act in a bigoted
way toward other believers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I believe in
“‘Live and let live;’ but also, ‘Don’t tread on me.’<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t proselytize me in your religion, and I
won’t proselytize you in atheism.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That
doesn’t prevent me, of course, from sharing my irreligious poetry with those
who want to read it, although I don’t force such reading upon anyone against
their will and desire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: -4.5pt; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in -4.5pt; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; color: black; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-color-alt: windowtext;">So thus is the “spiritual journey”
of my life to date—without any “spirituality” on my part, but plenty of
victimization by the “spirituality” of others!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Yet, I am anything but psychologically unhealthy for rejecting all
notions of “spirituality.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For me, it is
but a crutch, a blind spot one is better off leaving behind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not needed, and never will be. Grabbing
ahold of reality earnestly and firmly is a far better tonic than any notion of
“spirituality” will ever be, or indeed, can ever be—for it is but a
chimera.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That, to me, is what
“spirituality” really is, and the mental health profession and NAMI are just
dead wrong to think otherwise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in 0.25in; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-right: 0.5in; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .25in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.5in 0in 0.25in; text-align: left;"><span style="background: white; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="tab-stops: 6.0in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<div style="mso-element: footnote-list;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><br clear="all" />
<hr align="left" size="1" width="33%" />
<!--[endif]-->
<div id="ftn1" style="mso-element: footnote;">
<p class="MsoFootnoteText" style="text-align: justify;"><a href="file:///C:/Users/George%20Fish/Desktop/OLD%20FILES/GEORGE%20FISH/Desktop/Users/Fish/Documents/NAMI%20Paper%20This%20Too%20Is%20Spirituality.docx#_ftnref1" name="_ftn1" style="mso-footnote-id: ftn1;" title=""><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="mso-special-character: footnote;"><!--[if !supportFootnotes]--><span class="MsoFootnoteReference"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">[1]</span></span><!--[endif]--></span></span></span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"> My capitalization of “God” is used
to refer to the Judeo-Christian sense of a god, which is what we are de facto
referencing here.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
</div>
</div>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-48347369325727590422023-09-28T16:17:00.002-07:002023-09-28T16:17:45.215-07:00Mental Health Writings: Parenting--the Minimum Necessary to Be a Parent<p> <i>All expressed in my short poem, "So Your Mate Is Pregnant." All that is minimally required to be a parent, period. Not necessarily a good parent. Just a parent!--GF </i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">SO YOUR MATE<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">IS PREGNANT<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">by<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">And you’re both going<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">to become parents.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">Congratulations!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">You’ve proved, <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">both of you,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">that you have the—<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">ability to fuck!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">Because that’s all it takes<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">to become a parent.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">But becoming a good parent,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">or even a halfway decent<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">parent, that’s a whole<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">other matter.<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">Remember, every bad<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">parent, every lousy parent,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">even every sexually, physically,<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">verbally and emotionally abusive<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">parent, became one precisely<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">the same way every good parent<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">did—by fucking!<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">Biology only cares<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">about reproducing the species;<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">it doesn’t care in the least<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">how many new fucked-up<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">individuals it brings into<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 184.5pt;">the world. <o:p></o:p></p><i></i><p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-87406294605972997762023-09-28T16:04:00.002-07:002023-09-28T16:04:59.524-07:00Mental Health Writings: NAMI’s Attitude toward Mental Health Consumers such as Me Is—Decidedly Unfriendly!<p> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">I used to call my mental health
writings “The NAMI Papers,” but as I no longer consider myself part of NAMI,
even though formally I’m a dues-paid member until the end of November 2023,
which I explained in detail in the post just below this that detailed Indiana
NAMI’s egregious malfeasance toward me, I now call my mental health writings
simply “Mental Health Writings.”</span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Simply and directly, I am fed up to
my Fish (my last name) fishy gills with NAMI at all levels, national, Indiana,
and Indianapolis. Indiana NAMI’s actions
against me on June 6, 2023 (of which I wrote on my last blog, September 19,
2023), was the absolute last straw. I
won’t dwell on the details of what happened then, as you, the readers, can
easily read them for yourselves, but I had finally had it with the
insensitivity and malfeasance of NAMI at all levels toward me: from the condescending e-mail sent me by one
David Binet of national NAMI (who hoped for me to “heal” after he’d rejected my
complaint in its entirety by simply referring to the Executive Directors of
both Indianapolis and Indiana NAMI as “professionals,” implying they could do
no wrong); the slight and refusal to get back to me as promised by the former
Indianapolis Executive Director, with whom, before Covid, I had met cordially
once a week, and, because of this, felt validated as a mental health consumer;
Indiana NAMI’s Executive Director refusing to respond to any of my e-mails sent
her prior to June 6, 2023, but in response to that one only, accused me of
“harassment” to the Indiana NAMI Board of Directors, which then reprimanded me,
barred me from NAMI activities even though I was a fully dues-paid member, and
same as Mr. Binet, said to me that because it and the persons I had contacted
in NAMI disagreed with my complaints, that mere statement of disagreement meant
”they consider the matters closed,” to quote directly from Indiana NAMI’s Board
of Directors June 6 letter! (No matter
whether or not <b><i>I </i></b>considered the matter closed; I was
irrelevant.) Only one person in the
whole of NAMI, at any and all levels, has been at all kind and considerate to
me: Dr. Kenneth (Ken) Duckworth,
national NAMI’s Chief Psychiatrist, with whom I’ve shared several pleasant
e-mail correspondences.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">But all this horribleness from
2019-2023 was not the first time NAMI had shafted me. All the way back in 2005, it did a number on
me too. Back then my application for
SSDI benefits I was entitled to wasn’t going through, and though I asked about
this repeatedly with my Gallahue CMHC case manager in Indianapolis about this,
all he’d reply was, “It’s not going through,” though each time I asked me to
tell me what he was doing , he <b>refused</b> to do so, which was causing me
great anxiety. (Needless to say,
although I was working, a regularly but strictly seasonal job that left me
unemployed much of the year, I needed that SSDI badly.) I complained about this to Indiana NAMI and
Indiana NAMI responded by—barring me from further contacting it on this! However, the anxiety I suffered caused me to
be “liberated” from my job, and so I went over to the case manager’s office and
asked him pointedly to show me just what he was doing that was holding up my
application. I found out, ruefully: he was entering as the address of Gallahue
CMHC only “Gallahue Mental Health,” an obviously incomplete address that the
computer, being the big idiot that it is, was rejecting. Needless to say, I was appalled, and
rightfully so! So I entered the complete
full address, “ Gallahue Community Mental Health Center,” and voila! the
application went through, while my case manager stood there dumbfounded as an ape. Within twenty-four hours all the necessary
paperwork was completed, after being incredibly, stupidly, held up for four
months! That was June 2005. In August, I received all my SSDI, current
payments as well as back payments. I
gave my case manager, whose last name was Bell, and whose intelligence clearly
was not ringing clear as a bell, the invidious moniker “Dull Thud,” and even
wrote a satirical song about him and this incident, “He’s Just A Dull
Thud.” I also volubly complained about
this all to both my case manager and my Gallahue psychotherapist, both of whom
responded by—refusing all contact with me whatsoever for a year, not resuming
contact with me at all until August 2006!
(However, later on my therapist became quite helpful with my other
complaints against Gallahue.)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Although mental health consumers
such as myself should be the raison d’etre of NAMI’s existence—after all, it’s
official full name is the National Alliance on Mental Illness—sadly, not only
are we not, but the above experiences that other mental health consumers and I
have had with NAMI only show that we are essentially held in contempt. Although we who suffer mental illness are
urged to overcome the “stigma” associated with psychiatric treatment and get
psychiatric treatment ourselves, we are considered by NAMI to be far less
important than “caregivers,” i.e., those families and their members who care
for mentally ill persons as adult dependents—which is both classist (only the
rich can afford to care, perhaps for a lifetime, an adult dependent who does not
work, or works only part-time) and counterproductive to actual mental health
recovery. As I found out ruefully when,
suffering from my devastating disorders of borderline personality disorder and
acute depression I lived far too long under the same roof as my abusive,
blaming parents, my recovery made vast strides when I lived independently of
them, and had to function as a self-sustaining adult. (By the way, neither of my parents would’ve
been caught dead at a NAMI meeting or contacting NAMI: they blamed me for seeking psychiatric help,
saying I brought “shame” upon the family by doing so!) Independence from my alleged “caregivers” was
liberating for me, as it is for so many other mental health consumers. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Unfortunately, too many families as
well as NAMI and mental health professionals don’t see it that way—they see
“recovery” as only being dependent and perhaps qualifying for a pittance of
SSDI or SSI funding, and not at all being independent and actively
participating in the workforce like “normal” people. Now I grant, not all mental health consumers
are capable of doing this: triage is in
order, and some consumers will need to be cared for as dependents, some perhaps
for a lifetime, and completely unable to work, while others will only be able
to work part-time; but many others can recover fully, and recover well, only
all too often they’re not enabled to do so; neither by the psychiatric system,
by NAMI, by the overtouted Clubhouse system, nor by their alleged “caregivers.” However, now in my full recovery, living a
completely “normal” life and making a decent income, I am mentally healthier
than I ever was. For which I owe much
more to my own gumption than I do to NAMI or psychiatry; and although I
benefitted massively from sixty-nine months of excellent psychiatry, my life
was also put on hold and I was reduced to a desperate, dependent outpatient by
forty-seven <b>years</b> of malfeasant and inept psychiatric “help.” Further, despite my mental illness, I also
earned a college degree; I would make an excellent mental health aide to NAMI
if I qualified, but alas I don’t, simply because my college degree is in
economics instead of social work or psychology, which is but a most arbitrary
distinction. (NAMI’s peer-to-peer
recovered mental health consumer assistants are required to have either social
work or psychology degrees; but as far as I’m concerned, too often psychology
or social work degrees are merely akin to degrees in the storied, infamous “basket-weaving.” My college degree required mastering math and
logic skills as well as learning a foreign language, I pointedly note.) <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">So, goodbye, and </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">good riddance,
NAMI! Don’t let the door hit you on the
way out of my life! </span>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-78324275283081584382023-09-19T13:21:00.007-07:002023-09-19T13:21:45.400-07:00Mental Health Writings: I criticized Indiana NAMI. Indiana NAMI “Read” My Complaint—and Banned Me!<p> </p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I’ve been a dues-paying member of
Indiana NAMI since December 2019, which also makes me a member of Indianapolis
and national NAMI.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had planned on
attending Indiana NAMI’s Leadership Summit on June 17, 2023, its first live
meeting since Covid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, I was
unable to get the day off work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I
e-mailed Barb Thompson, Indiana NAMI’s Executive Director, on June 6 informing
her I would not be at the meeting, and thus would not be able to “confront” her
(my word; I meant verbally, of course) for ignoring all my earlier e-mails to
her raising issues about the Circle City and other Clubhouses (a most
inadequate “mental health recovery resource” I’d participated in), as well as
Indiana and Indianapolis NAMI, numerous e-mails to Ms. Thompson she never had
the courtesy and respect for me ever to respond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For which I properly felt miffed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, this time Ms. Thompson “responded,”
sort of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She took my June 6 e-mail as
“harassment,” reported it to Indiana NAMI’s Board of Directors, which acted on
her complaint that very day, and, sure enough, later that day I received a copy
of a letter written to me by the Indiana NAMI Board of Directors, dated that
very June 6, informing me that henceforth I was “<i>barred from attending any
forthcoming NAMI Indiana in-person or virtual events, </i>[Emphasis added—GF]<i>
</i>specifically including the leadership conference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you trespass, appropriate steps will be
taken, no matter how much NAMI Indiana would regret the need.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Additionally, you are barred from contacting
NAMI board of directors, staff, or members and from appearing at NAMI Indiana’s
offices.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, I was not removed
from being a member of Indiana NAMI or any other NAMI body!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I simply could not attend or participate in
any “forthcoming NAMI…events” indefinitely, nor could I contact NAMI in any
way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A perfect Catch-22 statement from
Indiana NAMI’s Board of Directors! <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Further, the Board accused me of
stating “publicly” (I did so only by an e-mail to Ms. Thompson, not through any
other forum.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I didn’t even tell personal
friends of it) that while I would “confront” (the Board of Directors did get
that right) Ms. Thompson, I would do so, I allegedly stated (which I didn’t) I
would do so for “her behavior” (which is false; I did not use those words,
which in the Board’s letter to me were put in quotation marks as though I’d
stated them verbatim), when I was only going to confront Ms. Thompson on
refusing to honor me by responding to at least one of my several e-mails to
her!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyway, I had e-mailed Ms. Thompson
on June 6 precisely to inform her I would not be attending the June 17 Leadership
Summit, as I’d earlier planned, because I—was scheduled to work instead!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All of which was clearly stated in plain
English!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">As to the original e-mails sent Ms.
Thompson, which uttered specific complaints against the Clubhouse system (of
which I was a member, by the way, though a deliberately inactive one) and the
speech given on the Clubhouse system by one of its leaders back in 2019 (a
speech I said at the time, in a private online chat, I though was nothing but
empty public-relations fluff), for which I was barred by Ms. Thompson at that
2019 virtual meeting, and my $40 registration fee confiscated, I registered my
obvious dissatisfaction, for which I had every right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indiana NAMI’s Board of Directors didn’t see
it that way, however, as the Board wrote me on June 6, “The various individuals
you contacted heard your complaints and responded to you their disagreement;
they consider the matters closed.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While
Ms. Thompson did have what she euphemistically called a “conversation” over the
phone with me about the Clubhouse, and I did receive one very condescending
e-mail from one David Binet of national NAMI, it is simply not proper for only
one party to a dispute to render the matters “closed!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the old saying goes, “It takes two to
tango,” two parties to a dispute to decide if the matters are closed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Obviously, on my part, they were not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, I will give Indiana NAMI’s Board
credit for doing one thing properly: it sent me a check by mail for the $40
improperly confiscated from me, which was the only thing the Board did
appropriately. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I mentioned above that while I was
barred from participating as a fully dues-paid member of NAMI (which I was, and
still am, until the end of November 2023), my NAMI membership was not
rescinded—I was simply suspended in midair, held in a state of limbo, by the
Board of Directors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was soon made
aware of this when I received unsolicited e-mails from Indiana NAMI asking me
if I’d like to volunteer for certain NAMI activities (from which “forthcoming”
NAMI activities I was indefinitely barred), would like to vote for NAMI
officeholders, and would even like to attend the Indiana NAMI State
Convention!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, Indiana NAMI directly
asked me if I’d like to participate in “forthcoming” NAMI activities I was
barred from attending—and no, you can’t make this shit up!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I noted this discrepancy once again in an
e-mail to Ms. Thompson (which I was at least technically barred from sending),
but once again, as per usual, I received no response.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This, the personal slighting of me by
Indianapolis NAMI’s former Executive Director, the degradingly condescending
e-mail mentioned above by national NAMI’s David Binet, and the deliberate and
ongoing slights and insults from Ms. Thompson and the Indiana NAMI Board of
Directors has made me seriously rethink my NAMI membership; so, most likely, in
fact, 99% assuredly, I will not be renewing my NAMI membership when it expires
the last day of November 2023.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">On my “Politically Incorrect
Leftist” BlogSpot blog, I specifically criticized both the Circle Clubhouse,
and implicitly the Clubhouse system, in blogs on April 18 and May 12, 2023, and
specifically criticized all levels of NAMI, Indianapolis, Indiana, and
national, in a blog also on May 12.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
stand by these criticisms 100%, and according to the letter I received from
Indiana NAMI’s Board of Directors, these blogs caused consternation within
NAMI.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, tough beanies!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Free speech is free speech, and if I’m wrong,
let the Clubhouse system and NAMI prove me wrong!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As for me, I proudly refer all interested
readers to my blogs, where the articles I’m referencing are very easy to find.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-62032180031438580592023-05-14T17:33:00.001-07:002023-05-27T21:04:55.879-07:00NAMI Paper: Psychiatry Finally Makes a Necessary “Mea Culpa”<blockquote><blockquote><p> </p></blockquote></blockquote><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">As part of my process of recovering
from borderline personality disorder, I’ve been reading psychiatric textbooks
on its etiology, development, and treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I also read NAMI’s first book written by its chief psychiatrist, Dr.
Kenneth Duckworth, <i>You Are Not Alone</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One of the heartening things I’ve learned from this reading is,
psychiatry is finally offering “mea culpas” for its past mistakes—at least to
other psychiatrists, and people interested in the dynamics of psychiatric
treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While heartening, it’s also
both surprising and disheartening, because psychiatry is just not known for a
public face of admitting it was wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Which it has been, and so, while it is heartening to finally see
psychiatry admit it’s made errors, it’s also disheartening, because its usual
public face is, “Don’t worry, we know all the answers.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which has been the public face of psychiatry
at least since the days of Freud, and maybe even all the way back to
Kraft-Ebbing, the inventor of the modern case study, who was so sure that the
cause of mental illness could be found—in masturbation!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Freud and later psychiatrists were also so
sure the causes lay in their own often arcane theories of the unconscious mind,
even though they were also so sure that competing psychiatric theories of the
unconscious were so very, very wrong!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Following B.F. Skinner, the behaviorists were all so sure that we humans
were basically like pigeons, and could be trained just like pigeons to modify
destructive behaviors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so it was,
and so it has been, until very recently.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Of course, none of these
psychiatric notions was at all noted for providing empirical evidence to back
up their various claims of successful treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If they relied on evidence at all, it was
only anecdotally, through carefully-written case studies, or else by referring
to an alleged self-consistency in their various theories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But that is not, needless to say, how they
were presented to the public at all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What we can properly call the “psychiatric spin machine” was busy triumphing
how it had found the way, or a handful of various ways, to solve the problem of
mental illness, and restore its sufferers to “normality,” whatever that
meant—as so much of what was touted depended on who was doing the touting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Whether it was freed libido (for the
Freudians) or modifying behavior to stay within acceptable bounds (for the
behaviorists), the answer to the “unacceptability” of mental illness was now at
hand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were even those who touted
the superiority of the “mentally ill” (think Foucault, </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">who, in his
confusion, sees humane treatment of the mentally ill as depriving them of their
“liberty” to be mad, and who reduces all of psychiatry except Freudian
psychoanalysis to mere “positivism;</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">” or R.D. Laing, who maintained that
insanity was but a sane way to respond to a crazy society; or all those insisting
that those on psychotropic medication go off such drugs immediately, and be
“cured naturally”).</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Freud was probably
the first one to tout his particular way—psychoanalysis—as </span><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">the</b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> way to
cure mental illness once and for all, but he soon enough spawned psychiatric
and psychoanalytic rivals to challenge </span><b style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">his</b><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> particular way.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Needless to say, all these various claims
were advanced without much in the way of clinical evidence demonstrating their
success, but relied more on beguiling theories that were supposedly
self-consistent as evidence of efficacy.</span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Such, in a nutshell, was the
history of psychiatry before the advent of the current fashionable notion (for
lack of better terminology) of “evidence-based treatment,” i.e., supposedly
statistically sound analyses of large groups of psychiatric patients receiving
certain treatments, with comparisons to control groups not receiving such, and
from such studies, assessing their effectiveness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From such studies, it was determined that
psychoanalysis did not pass the evidentiary bar, but that other therapies did—Cognitive
Behavioral Therapy, Dialectical Behavioral Therapy, certain drug and other
medical treatments for schizophrenia, bipolar, depression, etc.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They passed the evidentiary bar based on
measured outcomes, were thus “scientific” treatments with proven efficacy,
finally making psychiatry a “real science,” a “real medicine.” <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">But even in the heyday of
“unscientific” psychoanalysis, the psychiatric spin machine touted it as not
only <b>the</b> way, but even as the <b>only</b> way!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So also with its chief rival, behavioral
modification.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Same also for Jungian,
Adlerian, Gestalt, and other approaches. Thus, each treatment had its own spin
doctors, its own pitchmen and admen when it was touted before the general
public, which, of course, lacked the ability to discern truth or falsehood
among the various claims, and claimants.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But the psychiatric spin machine, nonetheless, was adamant: “Despite the
various rival claims, we, Official Psychiatry (representing whatever claimant
sounds most acceptable to you, John and Jane Public) now have all the
answers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are the Authorities, and
authoritative as such.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such was the
marketing of Official Psychiatry: “We have all the answers you are looking
for.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And such was how psychiatry and
psychiatric efficacy was sold to the general public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“We are also Real Medicine,” touted Official
Psychiatry—whether Freudian, Jungian, Gestalt, behaviorist, or whatever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“When you are looking for Mental Health,
come to us, for we have All the Answers.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Now, psychiatry is admitting, at
least among other psychiatrists and informed students of psychiatry, “No, we
don’t have all the answers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a lot of
the answers we had in the past have not panned out.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Gone thus is the universal efficacy of
psychoanalysis, gone also is the notion that schizophrenia results from bad
parenting, gone as well is the notion that personality disorders are
untreatable, and being questioned is the notion that there will come a time
when there will be a pill for every psychiatric disorder, that it’s all a
matter of unbalanced brain chemistry, and other nostrums within psychiatry,
each one fashionable at one time, many of them now discarded, with
psychiatrists themselves admitting (at least among themselves), “No, we
oversold ourselves to the general public.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We simply have not produced a lot of the results we promised.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our State of the Art isn’t so Stately after
all.”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">This was most ruefully brought home
to me in my life, during my 47 <b>years</b> of inept and malfeasant psychiatric
treatment, where I was reduced to a desperate, dependent outpatient with my
life literally on hold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had believed
in the promises of psychiatry, and as a troubled youth, I literally jumped at
the chance to get psychiatric help for my troubles and depression when it was
offered to me by my Resident Advisor in the dorm I occupied as a college
freshman.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So began my fruitless odyssey
of nearly five decades spent in university clinics and CMHCs (Community Mental
Health Centers), where all I did was age, nothing more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found out the hard way that many of the
oversold promises of psychiatric treatment simply weren’t true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But within it I remained, feeling quite
hopeless without my psychiatric “fix,” which somehow got me through to the next
session without making things any better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I felt trapped:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>unable to advance
within psychiatric treatment, but convinced by psychiatry itself that, without
it, all would be hopeless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there I
stood (or rather, sat) immobilized, somehow suspended between a sense of
“almost (but not quite) normality” and “abject mental sickness,” with little
actual life going on around or about me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I was trapped.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Later, after this 47-year debacle,
which went on and off (but mostly on) from 1965-2012, I did finally get the
psychiatric help I needed from a private therapist, beginning in 2014.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He applied his version of Cognitive
Behavioral Therapy (previous therapeutic approaches had been pretty much
haphazard, directionless), which was both conversational and helpful, but most
of all, he was engaged with me, and I felt it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I felt his empathy, his compassion, his understanding, whereas with so
many of the previous therapists I sensed only their indifference, their
unconcern with me personally, even their boredom, their sense of “I have to put
up with this to get a paycheck, so I will.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>My good therapist of now once said to me it was “unconscionable” the way
the university clinics and the CMHCs had let me “fall through the cracks,” as
so often I was not 100% qualified for this offering, but also not 100%
qualified for that offering, so I got nothing, according to the rules set by
these most bureaucratic systems.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I had encountered good, capable
therapists in the university clinics and CMHCs, which is much of what kept me
going back in anticipation, but for the most part they were either fired or
quit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seemed only the most
bureaucratic, the most merely timeserving, were the ones that survived, and I
got far too many of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I didn’t have
much contact with psychiatrists as such in the clinics and CMHCs, as my
condition wasn’t deemed responsive to medication, which suited me fine, as I
was all too aware of medicinal side effects from the medications psychiatrists
prescribed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, in 1986 I was
finally put on effective medication for my chronic spells of depression, which
would often immobilize me in despair for days at a time, and out of which I
emerged usually jobless, when I was finally prescribed lithium, later
supplemented with Prozac.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was on these
antidepressants for 18 years, 1986-2004, when my CMHC suddenly abandoned me for
a year because I had too “volubly” complained about the case manager messing up
most ineptly my application for SSDI benefits I was entitled to, but found
myself, in 2004, without my Prozac and lithium—and also, most importantly, <b>without
depression</b>!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When this CMHC let me
back in, February 2005, I saw the staff psychiatrist and told him directly I’d
been off antidepressants since November 2004 and hadn’t had any depressions, so
he agreed to monitor me while off antidepressant meds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He so monitored me until December 2005, after
which he said I didn’t need them anymore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What had happened, I surmise, is that the antidepressants I’d been on
did actually change my brain chemistry, my way of thinking, so I was now
permanently thinking in a non-depressive mode.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I haven’t suffered from a depressive spell since 2003, 20 years ago as I
write now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, no, my experience does
say one doesn’t have to stay on medication forever; however, if one does go off
meds, always be sure to be monitored off them by a psychiatrist or other
medical doctor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That I have learned.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I kept with my Cognitive Behavioral
therapist until 2020, and shortly thereafter went to other therapists at a
private clinic (both these places were exceptional among private practitioners,
as opposed to public CMHCs, in that they accepted my Medicare, without which I
couldn’t have afforded them).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In all, I
had 69 months of effective psychiatric care, which wiped out the previous 47 <b>years</b>
of inept care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That, and the scientific
fact that personality disorders do tend to heal themselves over time, actually
made me able to feel fully recovered, and to be a “normal” person now, although
I was in my early 70s when I finally had such success.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, my own experience does not make me
anti-psychiatry; however, it certainly does make me anti-bad psychiatry, which
I do definitely feel is all too common.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
I do believe a lot of psychiatrists and other mental health professionals would
agree with me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Certainly that was the
lesson I drew from my dismal years in the university clinics and CMHCs, which
do not pay well, but which do provide perks and benefits, among them “iron rice
bowl” security of employment once hired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It should be pointedly noted, though, that I did file three written
complaints against four therapists I had in the CMHCs (two of them worked
together as a team, the other two saw clients alone) who had been especially
pernicious in their psychiatric treatment of me, and I do wish now I’d filed
complaints against several more. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Modern evidence-based research on
treatment of personality disorders indicates that there are several effective
modalities of treatment, but that it is also important for the therapist to be
not only skilled, but also empathetic, considerate, and understanding.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would generalize that to say, that applies
to <b>all</b> therapeutic relationships.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If the so-called therapist is hostile or indifferent to his or her
client (and in the university clinics and CMHCs, as I found out myself, so many
are), then the whole relationship is undermined, and effectiveness of therapy
is reduced to naught. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Sadly, even though I am a strong
believer in public medicine and supporter of Medicare for All, I have to admit
that CMHCs were a good idea that just had too many obstacles in the way to make
them effective, which is why so many of them give only mediocre care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Their budgets are set by politicians who are
often hostile to the whole concept, and the community resources truly needed by
the mentally ill are often beyond what is available.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The result too often is inadequate care,
neglect, jail instead of treatment, and the proverbial “falling through the
cracks.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(By the way, I was once jailed
for a week for a suicide attempt; I was placed in a cell for psychiatric
observation because there were no hospital beds available!)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My own rueful experiences in CMHCs attests to
this. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">This excursion into my own mental
health recovery history indicates how I went from an uncritical believer in the
automatic effectiveness of psychiatric care into an informed skeptic of so much
of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I once myself was a true believer
in what the psychiatric spin machine peddled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I learned better the hard way, though lived experience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is why my welcoming of the “mea culpas”
psychiatry now gives (at least to itself) is so rueful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But in our capitalist society day, so often
marketing is everything, and can spin the bad or indifferent into the positive
good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Think only of cigarettes, sugary
soda pop, or bottled water instead of tap water!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in the end, I did indeed benefit from
good psychiatry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But it is necessary
here to do the math, and to point out that my 69 months (5.75 years) of good
psychiatry in a “career” of 52.75 years as a psychiatric outpatient (with occasional
hospitalizations; from which I was often prematurely released as too “normal”!)
had to overcome 47 <b>years </b>of bad psychiatry.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This meant that the good psychiatry came only
to 11% of my time, as opposed to 89% of my time trapped in the bad!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not a good augury, by any means.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">But the spin continues, always
trying to put a pretty face on what are not always good results.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For example, an online psychotherapy site
advertises that therapy is effective for 75% of its patients.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what of the 25% for whom it is not
effective?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Too often the blame for
ineffectiveness is put on the patient, going all the way back to Freud’s famous
case of his patient Dora, who was blamed by Freud himself for not positively
accepting his rather hairbrained suggestion that she <b>marry</b> the man she
accused of harassing him!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was simply
dismissed as “hysteric.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Which was a
common psychiatric diagnosis of women back in Freud’s time, the ending years of
Victorian prudery, with its expectations of what was socially “proper” for
women, i.e., submissive acceptance.)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">But the history of psychiatry is
often a history of fads, and what was the cutting edge of yesterday is often
dismissed as wrongheaded nonsense in trendy today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But as a former work colleague put it so well
metaphorically, “Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn sometimes.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The leading figures of psychiatry both
historically and now were, and are, intelligent, educated men and women.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So there is often a kernel of truth in what
they said and wrote, even if much is dismissed later.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That goes for Freud, as well as for
others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what is considered “cutting
edge” today may well be cavalierly dismissed in the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“State of the art” should thus be regarded as
tentative, “the best as we know now,” but always, subject to later change or
modification.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Same as in physics, or
chemistry, or in any science.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">But such honesty, such “This is
what we know now, but that could all change,” goes against the effectiveness of
marketing the product.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, after all,
psychiatry is a business, an income-generator, as much as it is a profession or
science.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a good business does not
plant doubt, even informed doubt, in the minds of its prospective
customers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if psychiatry were to be
truly honest, psychiatrists and psychotherapists would admit to their prospective
clients seeking help:<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .3in; margin-right: .3in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.3in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">I may well be able to help you, but
perhaps not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I believe I am a skilled
and able practitioner, <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .3in; margin-right: .3in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.3in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">but perhaps I am not right for
you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then again, although I feel I am
State of the Art in what I know, we in psychiatry don’t yet know as much as
we’d like to, and perhaps what problems you bring to the table may be beyond
our present state of knowledge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Having
said that, it is now up to you to decide if you want to give it a go with me.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .3in; margin-right: .3in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.3in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Needless to say, such blunt honesty
could be bad for business!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Good for
ethics, of course, but bad for business. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And goes against the grain of the psychiatric
spin machine, with its omnipresent messaging that it has all the answers, even
when it doesn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the examples given
above demonstrate. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With psychiatry as
with so much else, “Caveat emptor.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Which is why, though psychiatry’s “mea culpas” are welcome, and we the
public should be glad they have finally been given, there may well be more to
come.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of necessity, of course, as times
change, and knowledge grows.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As <i>the
Communist Manifesto</i> states so notably, “all that is solid melts in
air….”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That holds for psychiatry as
well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .3in; margin-right: .3in; margin-top: 0in; margin: 0in 0.3in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: -0.5in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-17160113397261956792023-05-13T11:04:00.004-07:002023-05-13T13:17:12.637-07:00A NAMI Paper on NAMI: Malfeasance at All Levels, Local, State, National<p> <span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">I’m a member of NAMI (National
Alliance on Mental Illness), have been since December 2019.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">I joined as a mental health consumer hoping
to find support in my recovery from my diagnosed psychiatric disorders,
borderline personality disorder with chronic depression, and also to advocate
for my fellow mental health consumers, to ensure they get the excellent
treatment they deserve—treatment not only competent and evidence-based, but
also given with empathy, compassion, and understanding.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Alas, I was to be disappointed.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Despite that they should be the focus of any
group supposedly advocating for mental health, I soon found out that mental
health consumers are given short shrift in NAMI at all levels, delegated to the
“back of the bus” in favor of rich “caregivers,” i.e., families that can
financially afford to support dependent adult children with mental illness, as
well as also favoring both the Psychiatric Establishment and Big Pharma.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">Tellingly, all three are major donors to
NAMI.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">As the old saying goes, follow the
money.</span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Prior to Covid, in 2019 and into
early 2020, I was feeling quite positive about my relationship with NAMI. I met weekly with then-Greater Indianapolis
NAMI Executive Director Julie Hayden, in friendly and extensive chats that made
me feel valued as a mental health consumer.
I attended Indianapolis NAMI’s Christmas party and Hayden encouraged me
to write on mental health issues (I am an extensively published writer and
poet). She even sent me a Christmas and
birthday present (my birthday’s in December) on behalf of Indianapolis
NAMI. But all changed with the onset of Covid
restrictions, which, it certainly does seem to me, NAMI at all levels—local,
state, and national—used as a pretext not only to shut down operations, but to
also have its staff members use as an excuse to take extended vacations,
leaving ordinary NAMI members in a lurch.
Certainly, that was true of both Indianapolis and Indiana NAMI Executive
Directors, the aforementioned Ms. Hayden, and Indiana NAMI Executive Director
Barbara Thompson, who simply became unavailable for the next three years
(Hayden went to another job), as well as NAMI local and state presidents, who
neither answered phone calls, letters, or e-mails. Which I, as a blue-collar Essential Worker
grocery stocker, who had to keep on working in a public setting, and thus faced
coming down with Covid myself (though I did get all my vaccinations, including
boosters, as available), found not only wrongheaded but unconscionable. Ms. Thompson has yet to respond to any of my
e-mails over this period of time, which, quite frankly, I find <b>rude and</b> <b>vulgar. </b>Same goes for one<b> </b>David Binet of
the national NAMI staff, who sent me one very condescending e-mail in response
to my expressed concern on both Hayden and Thompson being so incommunicado, and
who also has never responded to any other e-mails from me. Seriously—if NAMI employees lack the courtesy
to even answer e-mails, how is that <b>not</b> egregiously rude and
dismissive? Does it not indeed show
contempt for the rank-and-file NAMI dues-paying membership? However, I do have to state that national
NAMI’s chief psychiatrist, Dr. Ken Duckworth, has been unfailingly polite and
responsive to my e-mails sent him! The
one sole bright spot in this whole affair.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">In 2021 I attended two Indiana NAMI
statewide virtual meetings by Zoom, and in both meetings, I was wrongly
treated. In the first, a supposed
Leadership Summit, not only was my mute <b>off</b>, I responded only by silent “chat”
to the remarks by a spokesperson for Indiana’s Clubhouse system, which, quite
frankly, I found to be only public relations fluff, and lacking in
substance. For this, Ms. Thompson
abruptly removed me from access to the meeting, thus causing me to forfeit my
$40 registration fee. She later
contacted me (only once, and the only time she’s ever contacted me, in a period
of <b>two</b> years) to have what she termed a “conversation” about this, where
it was clear she had a clear misunderstanding of what I’d actually done, and
the “conversation” was left hanging. I
have e-mailed her repeatedly on this, but she has not responded, and, as far as
I’m concerned, Indiana NAMI <b>owes</b> me my $40 wrongly forfeited. Indiana NAMI is having its first in-person
meeting, another Leadership Summit, in late June of this year, 2023, and I
promise all, I will confront Ms. Thompson on her behavior!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">At a later meeting in 2021, I was
victimized by another Indiana NAMI staffer, who pulled a bait-and-switch on
me. I submitted a query to the
panelists, mental health professionals who had been mental health consumers
themselves, asking for their feedback on the 47 <b>years</b> of inept and
malfeasant psychiatric “care” I’d received at Indiana CMHCs and university clinics,
which had put my life on hold and reduced me to a desperate, dependent
outpatient not receiving the help I really needed. The staffer host read my question, which
pointed out the bad care I’d received, then asked the panelists to comment—not on
the bad care I’d received, but on the good care they’d received! This soon degenerated into a back-and-forth
on art therapy, and I signed out of the meeting in disgust. Again, this was neither addressed nor
redressed. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">As for national NAMI, the same
indifference to my concerns as a mental health consumer NAMI member have
prevailed, with the sole exception of Dr. Duckworth, who expressed warmth
toward me and a wish that he’d been able to interview me on my experiences for
his recent NAMI book, <i>You Are Not Alone</i>. I have submitted my mental health writings to
the appropriate NAMI body for publication, but they have not been published,
because, quite frankly, I write in an adult style and format for adult
readers. I simply do not write in that
breezy, superficial 6<sup>th</sup>-8<sup>th</sup> -grade-level way NAMI demands
of its writers (including the hapless in this regard Dr. Duckworth), so that
even a half-literate housewife does not feel intellectually “challenged” by
NAMI’s message, which comes across to me, a college graduate, as ofttimes far
too superficial and saccharinely overoptimistic. NAMI would do well to behoove itself of both George
Packer’s “The Moral Case Against Euphemism,” his devastating critique of “woke”
language and fashionable “dumbing down” in the April 2023 issue of the <i>Atlantic</i>;
and the late trenchant writer Barbara Ehrenreich’s <i>Bright-Sided</i> (Picador,
2009), her equally devastating critique of “positive thinking” and eternal
optimism (for which she urges substituting—realism). As a NAMI member, of course, I receive its
state-affiliate newsletters and its national magazine, the <i>NAMI</i> <i>Advocate</i>,
which I routinely find hopelessly superficial and tritely breezy in their
presentations, and overoptimistic to the point of being treacly in their
subject matter. No, this is not good writing,
not by a long shot. It’s not even
conventionally adequate. No, it’s just
irritating and simplistic. Certainly,
all that comes across in the latest issue of the <i>Advocate</i> (Spring 2023),
in its articles devoted to “Identity and Mental Health,” where “identity” and “culture”
are given, in tune with the superficial approach of postmodernism, very static
and set-in-stone connotations. Reality,
needless to say, is far more complex and flexible. While I personally have a superficial “identity”
of cis white male, I also have deeper and more substantive identities of
blue-collar unionized Essential Worker; university graduate in economics with a
strong math and statistics background; extensively published writer and poet,
even at the national level; ex-Catholic militant atheist who has moral as well
as intellectual objections to religion; abused child and adolescent, victim of multiple
abuse from parents and relatives, teachers and bullying classmates, ignored
when not denigrated; and that far from exhausts all my various “identities,”
which all come together to give me my own particular, integrated, <b>unique</b>
personality! (I should also add, not
just “mental health consumer,” but “victim of psychiatry” as well!)<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Thus does all this sum up my thumbnail sketch of
objections to all levels of functioning that characterize NAMI today, of which
I am, as well, a dues-paid member who will renew his membership at the proper
time, and who also promises to fulfill my “proper role” as a NAMI member by
being critical of it when it deserves criticism, at the local, state</span>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-983054686032430932023-05-12T18:05:00.001-07:002023-05-13T06:24:09.109-07:00Another NAMI Paper Sharply Critiquing the Circle City Clubhouse<p> </p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">This critique supplements my
January 13, 2023, letter on the Circle City Clubhouse, which was posted in
April 2023 on this very “Politically Incorrect Leftist” blog, and builds on the
information brought forth in that letter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What is different is, I researched the criteria for Clubhouse
affiliation given by Clubhouse International, as well as noting that while
Clubhouses have been extensively covered in the academic social science
literature, the studies done to date have numerous flaws:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>among them, no randomized samples or
randomized control groups, use of mental health recovery measures that are
limited to self-assessment, and I would add, only looking at certain select
Clubhouses, and improperly generalizing from that sample.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which has led, in my informed statistical
opinion (I have a college degree in economics), to the Clubhouse model being
vastly overrated, and wrongly credited for achievements it has not made.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is certainly true for Circle City
Clubhouse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Clubhouses, although extensive
geographically, vary widely in quality and availability of programs, with
Circle City Clubhouse, the main Clubhouse in Indianapolis, having a major
paucity of programs, thus being really limited in the mental health consumer
services it provides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Carriage House, the
Clubhouse in Ft. Wayne, as one example, has a savings bank available for use by
its members, but no such exists for Circle City.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Clubhouses are supposed to offer three tiers
of employment programs, 1.) transitional employment, 2.) supported employment,
and 3.) independent employment; but Circle City only offers transitional
employment, and that is spotty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Circle
City Clubhouse has only one transitional employer now that I’m aware of, and
has lost several transitional employment sites in just the last few years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As for supported employment (i.e., employment
with staff support assistance for maintaining employment) and independent
employment (i.e., Clubhouse members finding, with help and encouragement,
employment on their own), neither exists at Circle City.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nor are Clubhouse members encouraged or
cajoled to seek employment, even when they’re capable of doing such, so that
many Circle City Clubhouse members who could benefit from employment do not, in
fact, do so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Though Clubhouse International
maintains it seeks employment for its members at “prevailing wages,” here in
Indianapolis the “prevailing wage” varies considerably depending on the nature
and size of the business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would
imagine Circle City Clubhouse’s transitional employers in Indianapolis and
environs pay only minimum wage or maybe a little above, which is still at a
truly dismal $7.25 an hour; but also here in Indianapolis, my employer, Kroger
pays a starting wage of $14.25 an hour, nearly double!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Crew Car Wash and Target here pay starting
wages of $15 an hour, so as is easily seen here, what the “prevailing wage” for
the type of work Clubhouse members get to engage in can mean either an income
that is indeed very low-wage, or an income nearly double that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a trade unionist supportive of the union
in my workplace, I naturally find that appalling!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet, I don’t see Circle City Clubhouse or any
of its staffers trying to address that. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Another major gripe I have with
Circle City, and one that may extend to many other Clubhouses as well, is that
in its “work-oriented program” of having Clubhouse members do simple
maintenance, food prep and other labor to occupy themselves and contribute,
these members work for free, are given absolutely no wages or incentives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such labor for others (and the Clubhouse is
an “other,” it stands as an institution with rules and structures that members
must subject themselves to) is the very dictionary definition of—slave labor!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a person influenced by Marxism, I
definitely agree with Marxism’s premise that humans are fulfilled by productive
labor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the only labor available at
the Clubhouse is all unskilled mindless menial labor such as cleaning toilets,
emptying wastebaskets, pushing mops or brooms, or simple food prep.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Labor that gives no chance to grow in
productivity and competence, or learn new work and employment skills.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s all dead-end labor for free, and saves
Circle City Clubhouse much money it would otherwise have to spend on outside
maintenance or food prep contractors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>All this fits the direct dictionary definition of labor
exploitation:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Clubhouse members add value
through their labor to the Clubhouse, but get nothing back in return.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, not even a staffer saying to one
worker (but not to all), “Job well done,” <span style="mso-font-kerning: 0pt; mso-ligatures: none;">for that would violate the Clubhouse meaning of equality:
high quality and low quality of performance are on an equal footing alike!<o:p></o:p></span></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">That is a key reason why. when I
would show up at the Clubhouse, I would always refuse to do any work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wasn’t about to allow myself to be used as
a source of slave labor for free, and certainly was not, as a university
graduate, going to allow the Clubhouse to confine my labor, skills, and education
to uses that were menial and mindless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
note that at my present job at Kroger I do mindless menial physical labor, but
it is far more <b>therapeutic</b>, for I gain a decent hourly wage out of it. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Currently $16.60 an hour, or about $35,000 a
year.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I put up with its mindlessness
and physical strain because I <b>am</b> rewarded, <b>am </b>given incentive,
for doing so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Totally unlike the
Clubhouse, where the workers don’t even receive a simple “Thank you” and are
just taken for granted, denied all opportunity to advance in work skills that
would be useful in a real job situation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They are consigned, thus, to being mere myrmidons used unconscionably by
Circle City Clubhouse to save money through what can only be called a form of “wage
theft.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They don’t even get minimum
wage, but just how much money <b>do</b> they save the Circle City Clubhouse
each year?!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">To add insult to injury, Clubhouse
members are also pressured and dragooned to help the Circle City Clubhouse in
its incessant fund-raising campaigns—again, for free!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">That does much to explain why the
Circle City Clubhouse can’t retain its college grad or even high school grad
members, but, as I surmise, is but a resting lounge for what are, in so many
cases, only high school dropouts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Circle
City Clubhouse grotesquely maintains it has helped 310 mental health consumers
recover, but that 310 is only the total number of people who have passed
through its doors, and only a few remain for any length of time. (Many come one
time, and never come back.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From my experience,
the core membership of Circle City is only about 20 people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But once a Clubhouse member, always a
Clubhouse member, at least on paper, even when one has no interest whatsoever
in the Clubhouse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I once looked forward
to participating in the Clubhouse, having finally found a home for myself as a
mental health consumer, a hope also shared by my friends and my
psychotherapist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Alas, it was not to
be!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I ran early on into a wall of
cliquishness and clannishness, a wall so extensive other Clubhouse members didn’t
even say “Hi” to me, and was soon stymied by my inability to use my educational
and other skills productively in any kind of Clubhouse setting (though I did
manage to publish articles in the <i>Circle City Clubhouse Newsletter,</i>
which was fulfilling, even though no one seemed to read them).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet, it was so apparent things could be so
much better!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, a Culture of Mediocrity
prevails, both among members and staffers alike.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Staffers are, in social work jargon, regarded
as “generalists,” but really they are mere baby-sitters who play a very passive
role in the Clubhouse, even though they’re required to have college
degrees.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course, from what I’ve been
able to determine, they’re only paid like baby-sitters, an unconscionably low
hourly wage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Marissa, a Circle City
Clubhouse staffer, admitted I earn more than she does at her job, at $16.60 an
hour, which will go up to $17.10 an hour in July; 2023 yet my job only requires
a high school diploma, and hers a college degree!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Clubhouse International is aware of
these and other deficiencies at Circle City Clubhouse when it does its periodic
accreditation review, but to date has only given Circle City a “Tut, tut, do
better” admonition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In my opinion,
Circle City shouldn’t be accredited at all, given its overall lousy performance
that does little, if anything, for real mental health recovery (my recovery,
for example, owes nothing to the Clubhouse, despite my formal membership in it
since January 2016).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nor should it be
given charitable donations—that’s just throwing money down a rathole, in my
opinion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, to be honest, I will
grant that Circle City has recently made some positive changes, but they are, in
my opinion again, not only long overdue, but too little, too late.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’ve only marginally improved the
functioning of Circle City Clubhouse, but which still stands at mediocre or
worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And probably will continue to do
so.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Supporting details for my arguments
above can be found in my January 13, 2023, letter to the Clubhouse, which
should be read in tandem with this essay. Perhaps the effect of these two highly critical Clubhouse posts will be salutary--waking up the Circle City Clubhouse to do much more, be much more, be more effective at it! That, thus, would be the "constructive" role I could play as a Clubhouse member: by being one of its most scathing critics, I'd be giving it a very much needed wake-up call.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-89359802566662592772023-05-08T01:21:00.005-07:002023-05-14T05:47:32.164-07:00NAMI Paper: I’m Outraged at the Killing of Jordan Neely<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I’m outraged that Jordan Neely is
dead.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t have to die.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was no reason he had to die.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He may have been very verbally upsetting, but
he was a danger to no one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He was a
mentally ill man in the throes of his mental illness—that’s all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At other times, in fact, he had been very
much liked and appreciated for his Michael Jackson imitations, where he had
done Jackson’s famous Moonwalk, to the delight of passers-by, who rewarded him
with tips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But on this particular day,
May 1, 2023, his schizophrenia and PTSD had gotten the better of him, and so
there he was, on a New York City subway train screaming at the top of his lungs
some very disturbing things, which surely were upsetting to his fellow
passengers, but he was keeping his verbal hostility to merely acting it out
orally, and not assaulting anyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
only provocative activity Neely is accused of is throwing his jacket on the
subway floor in a very dramatic way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Passenger
Daniel Penny, a 24-year-old ex-Marine, took him to the floor in a chokehold
that lasted for 15 minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As an
ex-Marine, Penny surely knew that a 15-minute chokehold was bound to be lethal
for Neely—yet he persisted in it anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Penny hollowly claims “self-defense,” but the online forum Reluctant
Habits calls it more accurately, calling Penny “sociopathic,” “murderous,”
someone with a “sick smirk,” and a “thug.” [On May 11, Penny was charged with secondary manslaughter. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">As of May 13, thanks
to an endorsement from DeSantis, Penny’s Go Fund Me legal defense account had
raised $1 million</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;">--GF.]</span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Neely was, of course, black.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Penny is white.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many white people have a deathly fear of
being victims of black-on-white crime, but really, how often do we, as both a
society and as individuals, talk about white-on-black crime?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such as the murder of Emmett Till (the white
woman who lied about teenage Till making a pass at her died recently—of old
age)?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or Minneapolis police officer
Derrick Chauvin murdering George Floyd?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Or Breonna Taylor shot in bed by Louisville cops based on an erroneous
search warrant?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or, needless to say, all
the “Strange Fruit” lynchings of black people in the South by the Ku Klux Klan
and other white segregationist terrorists?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But these only start the list!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Media coverage of this atrocity has
been fairly extensive, especially since Penny was named as suspect when the
coroner ruled “homicide” as cause of Neely’s death.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve read the details in three online
sources:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>in addition to the Reluctant
Habits blog site mentioned above, there was a detailed story in the online
Intelligencer of <i>New York</i> magazine on May 5 (updated on May 7), and a May
6 story by NBC News.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Intelligencer
story featured a longish video of Penny holding Neely in a chokehold, a
disturbing video to say the least, as Neely’s legs are flailing, then go limp. <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">In the wake of this, both New York
City Mayor Eric Adams, a law-and-order ex-cop, and New York Governor Kathy
Hochul both issued mealy-mouthed statements in the face of indignation over Neely’s
death, admonishing people to merely stay calm while the investigation
proceeded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Neely was homeless at the
time of his death, had been arrested several times, and had warrants
outstanding—but he really died as a “mentally ill” person once again allowed to
fall through the cracks of a callous and unresponsive mental health system.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(According to the societal conventional
wisdom, the mentally ill “bring it on themselves,” most conveniently “blaming
the victim” for whatever happens to them.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Ironically, it was Adams himself who had proposed rounding up New York
City’s homeless mentally ill and putting them in treatment!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which never happened, of course, and isn’t
happening now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But grandstanding on “mental
illness” and proposing toughlove actions sells well to voters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even when nothing of substance happens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Truly, the way we treat mental illness in
society today, especially those without residences, insurance, or money, is
insane.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And horribly, unconscionably,
victimizing. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-65964151773931571772023-04-18T07:09:00.004-07:002023-04-18T07:09:54.862-07:00NAMI Papers on and about the Circle City Clubhouse <p> <i>A fit retort, these three mental health articles of mine below, on the pretensions and ineffectiveness of the Circle City Clubhouse, the Clubhouse system generally, and what real mental health recovery looks like. Sadly, mental health consumers such as myself have few resources available, and in fact, more pseudo-resources than actual resources-- among them the Circle City Clubhouse and Indiana NAMI, bot of which I'm a member of, but a highly distressed one. --GF. </i></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-70799486200599275292023-04-18T07:04:00.002-07:002023-04-25T09:47:52.841-07:00I’M WHAT MENTAL HEALTH RECOVERY LOOKS LIKE<p> <i>My latest mental health/mental illness writing, finished April 16, 2023, and submitted for publication in the <b>Circle City Clubhouse Newsletter</b>. I think it's pretty much self-explanatory, and in combination with the other mental health writings on the Circle City Clubhouse, a positive statement on the whole process of actual mental health recovery back into "normality," not just the pseudo-recovery of being warehoused that the Clubhouse actually promotes. But on April 25, it was rejected for publication by the Clubhouse, which alleged it was but a "personal statement" and could lead to decline in participation in Clubhouse activities. With good reason, I'd note: the Clubhouse model is based on doing mindless menial labor for it <b>for free. </b>Which is the very definition of slave labor! Work for the Clubhouse, save the Clubhouse money it'd otherwise have to pay for janitorial and routine maintenance services, and get no reward for it. Not even an encouraging "Job well done" from the Clubhouse staff, for that contradicts the Clubhouse definition of "equality" of members. All are equal--in mediocrity and expectation of staying mediocre! No wonder the Clubhouse has such massive turnover in active members; do more than what is condescendingly "expected" of you, become infantilized by the Clubhouse itself! --GF. </i></p><p></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Excuuuuse me if I toot my own horn,
so to speak, but I’m precisely what full mental health recovery looks like—and
can stand thus for Clubhouse members as a role model for mental health
recovery. Think of me as I am now: a self-sufficient adult living fully on my
own, with a full-time job at decent wages.
I live in my own apartment without the bother of having to have
roommates to enable me to afford the rent, own my own car fully (a good one, by
the way, a 2015 Toyota Camry, completely paid for), pay all my own bills, buy
all my own groceries, without outside assistance from welfare, disability, or
food stamps, and hold a full-time unionized job which is layoff-free, pays a
decent wage with built-in wage increases, and has benefits and seniority
protections. I make $46,000-$49,000 a
year through the combination of my wages, my Social Security (I’m over the age
of 65), and my small pension through the union.
I’m now a normal, successful, self-sufficient adult, no longer living in
poverty, no longer having to demean myself to qualify for welfare benefits, and
what’s more, I’m also psychologically healed through a regimen of 70 months of
excellent psychotherapy, which made up for (finally!) being stuck in 47 years
of inept and malfeasant psychiatric care, which simply allowed me
unconscionably to fall through the cracks.
I no longer have the outward signs or behavioral problems assorted with
my psychiatric illness, borderline personality disorder with chronic
depression. I now live a normal life
with a normal adult lifestyle. <o:p></o:p></span></p><i></i><p></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I haven’t had a major depressive
episode since 2003, haven’t been on antidepressants since November 2004 (went
off them in the first place because Gallahue CMHC of Indianapolis, the CMHC for
my catchment area, in a fit of pique, denied me psychiatric care or access, as
well as medicine, from June 2004 to February 2005), was finally moderated off
antidepressants by a psychiatrist (at Gallahue, ironically) from
February-December 2005, following which he ruled I no longer needed them. And I haven’t since! I’ve suffered no major bouts of depression
since 2003. Sure, I get irritable or
melancholy sometimes, like any person, but no longer have recurring bouts of
debilitating depression, bouts so severe they would immobilize me for days—<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">haven’t now for two decades! <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">I have now finally “outgrown” my
mental illness, and am no longer trapped by it.
You can too, many of you Clubhouse members, if you have the gumption to
work on recovery instead of resigning yourselves, as though by unchangeable fate,
to your diagnosis; and if you can get needed help to do this from the
psychiatric system and from the Clubhouse staff. (Unfortunately, getting such from either one
of these is often challenging, to say the least. But that’s why you need to be stubborn and
demanding when dealing with both CMHC and Clubhouse staff! Yes, you must demand the adequate treatment
you need to recover.) I was helped
luckily by a private psychotherapist and a private psychiatric clinic which
accepted my Medicare, so I was no longer in the clutches of the CMHC and
university clinic system, which simply put my life on hold for 47 years (all
the while getting paid for it by state agencies, either in Michigan or
Indiana). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Some of you will be able to do this
easier than others; but do it anyway as you are able, and support and encourage
each other in your efforts! As my
excellent private psychotherapist noted, “Recovery means meeting challenges and
overcoming them.” We’re all faced with
challenges, but it lands squarely on our shoulders to overcome them, and not
let them overcome us or defeat us. So,
go to it, I say! <o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal">
</p><p align="left" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">You too can be like me, a fully
recovered mental health consumer; you don’t have to resign yourselves to the
second-class status of a “mentally ill person” the whole of your lives. You can go out and get a good-paying job (as
I did), you can complete your education (as I did: earning my college degree
despite my mental illness), you can maybe even buy a car, perhaps live without
a passel of roommates needed to make rent affordable, and certainly, with a
decent-paying job, live on what is no longer a poverty-level income. It won’t be easy, but it can be done. And I say finally, if I can overcome nearly
54 years of being trapped in “mental illness,” then you can too! You may not all recover to the same extent;
but I believe almost all of you at the Clubhouse are capable of being more than
what you are now. The Chinese have an apt
saying on that, on making the effort to do better: “Don’t fear going slow; fear
standing still.” Too many of you at the
Clubhouse are merely standing still, are merely stagnating. But I offer you myself as an example that it
doesn’t have to be that way. It won’t
happen overnight; it didn’t for me. But
it’s like climbing a mountain—sooner or later, you reach the peak if you keep
at it! <o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-6910324221692472272023-04-18T06:57:00.002-07:002023-04-25T15:55:55.443-07:00A “Modest Proposal” Reply to Susan C. and Rob<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-align: justify;"><i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Susan C. and Rob
went to the Meet and Greet session of Indiana’s General Assembly, where they
earnestly urged lawmakers to fund mental health services, and which they wrote
about in the March 2023 issue of the <b>Circle City Clubhouse Newsletter</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Circle City Clubhouse is a “mental health
recovery” program, in my opinion not a very good one, of which I am also a
member, although certainly not an active one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>However, I have previously published seven articles in the <b>Newsletter</b>,<b>
</b>the most to date by any bylined author.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Given the very poor state of mental health services in Indiana, and a foreboding
sense that funding such uncritically would be pouring money down a rathole, I
wrote this satirical reply to Susan C. and Rob along the lines of Jonathan
Swift’s noted “A Modest Proposal,” which I also submitted for publication in
the April 2023 issue of the <b>Newsletter</b>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Publication of my reply, however, was declined there on the grounds that
it would be “discouraging.”—<o:p></o:p></span></i><span style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman, serif;"><i>GF.</i></span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p>
<p align="left" class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in; text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">English satirist
Jonathan Swift (of <i>Gulliver’s Travels</i> fame) wrote his very noted “A
Modest Proposal” in response to the problem of Irish poverty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ireland was then a British colony, and the
British were fretting about what to do about massive poverty there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was also a “can-do” time, this 18<sup>th</sup>
Century, full of all kinds of cockamamie schemes for “uplifting” the poor—so
Swift suggested one of his own in “A Modest Proposal”:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>sell the Irish children to the British rich
as food!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In that spirit, I’d like to
suggest my own “Modest Proposal” to Susan C. and Rob in the March 2023 <i>Circle
City Clubhouse Newsletter</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They
called on the Indiana state legislature to fund mental health treatment here,
but I say “No!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s just pouring money
down a rathole.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I say instead, “Defund
mental health care in Indiana, because mental health care here is so very poor,
so downright crappy!”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14pt;">
</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12pt;">Indiana
NAMI ranks Indiana as 45<sup>th</sup> out of the 51 states plus D.C. in quality
of mental health treatment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Other
indices also place Indiana in the bottom 10 of the states in terms of quality
and access to mental health care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So why
should we, the taxpayers, pay for mental health “treatment” that is mediocre
and worse?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why should we, the taxpayers,
pay the salaries of “mental health professionals” who are abysmal, who are just
deadwood who need to be bagging groceries or driving trucks?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why should we, the taxpayers, pay for “mental
health treatment” the patients just don’t even receive, because what they do
receive is so bad, so terribly inadequate?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Why, why, why?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I say,
“Defund the whole bad lot!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s my
“Modest Proposal.” <o:p></o:p></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-85156919867249594652023-04-18T06:52:00.001-07:002023-04-18T06:52:57.624-07:00January 13, 2023 Letter to the Circle City Clubhouse<p style="text-align: left;"> <i>The Circle City Clubhouse is an alleged "mental health recovery program" that is not effective at all! I've been a member of the Clubhouse since January 2016, and my disappointment with it, as well as the disappointment with it expressed by my friends and my former psychotherapist, is quite manifest. Yet it continues when it should not, and even gets uncritical endorsement from Indiana NAMI, which it certainly doesn't deserve, as this letter to the Clubhouse below makes quite clear. We mental health consumers need effective programs, not pseudo-programs such as the Circle City Clubhouse; yet it is a sign of the refusal of society as a whole to respect the natural needs of us who've been struggling with "mental illness" that, instead of effective programs, we get stuck with pseudos such as the Circle City Clubhouse. I researched what I wrote in the letter, and I stand by it 100%. Clubhouse Executive Director Jay Brubaker told me pointedly he would not respond to my "insults," to which I answer that the appropriate response to "insult" is "If the shoe fits, wear it!"--GF.</i></p><p style="text-align: left;"><i><br /></i></p><p style="text-align: center;">TEXT OF MY LETTER TO CIRCLE CITY CLUBHOUSE</p><p style="text-align: center;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: left;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Dear
Circle City Clubhouse:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Your
newsletter asks me to contribute my employment news as a loosely defined
Clubhouse member (because I don’t consider myself a Clubhouse member anymore,
even though I am a mental health consumer), so here it is. I was successfully employed at my job at
Kroger before I even became a Clubhouse member—I became a member in January
2016, but had been successfully employed at my job since August 15, 2015. I started out at $10.70 an hour. I’m still employed at Kroger, and now make
$16.60 an hour, a 55% increase in my hourly wage, and the first job I ever held
where I actually got regular wage increases!
I attribute this to the fact that my job is unionized (UFCW Local 700),
and that thus, wage increases are part of the union contract, as are many other
benefits and protections I have. Between
my wages, my Social Security, and my Kroger pension, which is also through the
union, I made nearly $49,000 in 2022.
Not only that. After 69 months of
successful psychotherapy that overcame 47 years (yes, 47 <i>years</i>!) of
malfeasant and inept psychiatric treatment, overwhelmingly through Indiana
CMHCs, I’m now fully recovered from my mental health malady of borderline
personality disorder and chronic depression.
I’ve been successfully off antidepressants since November 2004, had it
confirmed by a psychiatrist in December 2005 that I didn’t need antidepressants
anymore, and haven’t had a depressive episode since 2003. I <i>am</i> what mental health recovery looks
like! And you notice how different it
looks than the average denizen of the Clubhouse, overwhelmingly comprised of
people who are <i>not</i> recovering, but who are sadly staying the same, and
stagnating!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">I’ve
gotten news updates on the Clubhouse from other former members, and what is
clear is that the Circle City Clubhouse is one very flawed institution, one
that does <i>not</i> advance mental health recovery! Circle City Clubhouse has the chutzpah to
claim it’s helping 310 mental health consumers recover, but that’s utter
nonsense—perhaps 310 people have gone through the Clubhouse, but most do not
stay. Your hard-core participants only
number about 20, and not only has the Clubhouse driven out all its college
graduate members, it’s also, I say, driven out most, or even all, its members
who are high school graduates. What I
saw of the 20 people who attended the Clubhouse regularly, though I don’t know
this as a fact, but it seems to be a reasonable surmise, is that the majority,
or even all, of the regular Clubhouse attendees are high school dropouts, and
the Clubhouse is thus but a rest lounge for unskilled, uneducated, menial
workers! This last point is important,
because I do mindless menial labor at my Kroger job, but I get paid $16.60 an
hour for doing it. Which is why I will <i>never</i>
do work at the Clubhouse for free, as it demands—doing work for free is the
very dictionary definition of slave labor, lest we forget. The Circle City Clubhouse’s “work therapy” is
nothing but mindless menial work, and is limited to such unskilled jobs as toilet
cleaning, emptying wastebaskets, and peeling potatoes. The Clubhouse relies on this free labor to
save money on cleaning and other needs, otherwise it would have to hire someone
to do these. The Clubhouse thus exploits
its members. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The
Clubhouse now has to insist all its hires be college graduates, as it should
be, yet it only pays them about $11.50 an hour—for a job that <i>requires</i> a
college degree! Sheesh! Do I need to remind the Clubhouse that my
Kroger job requires only a high school diploma, although I have a college
degree (in economics), and I make $16.60 an hour at it! This coming summer my pay will go up to
$17.10 an hour, and in the summer after that, to $17.60 an hour. Yet you hire required college degree holders
as substantially less than that! No
wonder you get such bad, inept help, such as Evan (whom I nickname Evan the
Inept) and Marissa (ditto, Marissa the Cipher).
In fact, except for Peter, whom you laid off, you have never had decent
employees at the Clubhouse! Peter was
easily your best employee, yet you paid him so little he had to dip into his savings
to make ends meet. Then you laid him
off. Now he works at an auto parts store
making more money at yet another job that requires only a high school diploma
than he did at the Clubhouse at a job requiring a college degree! He was easily the best employee you ever
had. So how did you treat him? By sticking it to him!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Then
there was Lindsay Brock, the Assistant Executive Director, who was an employee
under Executive Director Jay Brubaker’s supervision, and is now—Jay's live-in
girlfriend! Do I need to mention the
obvious conflict of interest here, or mention the CEO who was fired for having
a consensual affair with his Chief Financial Officer? But then, Jay is but a schmoozer and toady who
sucks up to the Clubhouse Board and has the Board in his back pocket. He’s a lawyer by training, but was not a good
one, as I’ve found out—one prime example of his lawyering being that he was so
proud that, after a long period of wrangling, he got his client into
arbitration, even though referring to arbitration was in in the original
contract to begin with! I’m a trained
paralegal who worked under good lawyers, so I know inept lawyering when I hear
about it—and that’s why Jay is not a lawyer, but an NGO worker! He’s just not good enough for effective
lawyering—which became massively evident when the Clubhouse members came up
with a statement on what constituted acceptable free speech and what did not,
which was drawn up more strictly than it needed legally to be. Jay could’ve played a constructive role as a
trained lawyer by advising the Clubhouse members on what was required, but he
refrained from doing so. The supposed
“mental health professionals” who are Clubhouse employees thus don’t even do
the jobs they’re supposedly capable of, what they really should be doing—they
are but glorified babysitters who don’t supervise the children under their
watch! And very sadly, that is what
many, if not most, regular Clubhouse attendees are—adult children in their
mindsets, capabilities, and actions. No
wonder college graduates such as I, not to mention those with at least a high
school diploma, find the Clubhouse so utterly lacking.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">But
I did participate in the Clubhouse until 2019, and in 2018 even went to the
effort to draft a 14-page paper I submitted to the Clubhouse retreat that year
in an attempt to offer constructive criticism and suggestions that in my
opinion would’ve improved the Clubhouse.
Lindsay, who was Chair of the retreat, promised me I’d have the chance
to present my paper, but then she reneged—instead, she allowed Savella (ah,
good ol’ Savella the Special Bella!), another person, and Nathan (ah,
Nathan—chronological age, 40s, emotional age 13!), none of whom had read my
paper, to speak instead, and who trashed me personally! Now, if that isn’t severe ineptness at one’s
job!! But such is par for the course at
the Clubhouse.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Let
it also be noted that I’ve contributed seven articles under my own name to the
Clubhouse newsletter, more than any other signed writer—yet they were all just
ignored! Well, what do you expect from
people who are most likely not even high school grads, and thus functionally
illiterate? I’ve heard reliably that
Chuck (yes, Chuck the Muck, rhymes with f**k!) can’t even read, yet he always
wants to do everything, even that which he’s incapable of, and relies on
manipulative appeals to pity to get his way.
<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Recently,
but only recently, the Clubhouse has done some things right. It reached out to its member list (which is
overwhelmingly comprised only of paper members, not actual participants in the
Clubhouse) during COVID-19 back in 2020 to see if anyone needed anything. I didn’t, of course, but that was
thoughtful. The Clubhouse newsletter has
now gotten around to including words of praise and encouragement to members who
get involved in Transitional Employment or other jobs, but it’s a case of,
despite this, “too little too late,” in my opinion. Despite this small but good improvement in
the newsletter, the newsletter still remains insipid and infantile, not a vital
read by any means. Thus, I cannot in any
way, shape or form consider the Circle City Clubhouse an asset or a resource
for mental health consumers.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">This
letter needs to be widely shared within the Clubhouse, and presented to all the
alleged members, paper and otherwise. It
should be included as an insert in the next newsletter. I invite all, Jay, Board members, all staff
members, all Clubhouse members, to reach out to me with comments. You may e-mail me at </span><a href="mailto:georgefish666@yahoo.com"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">georgefish666@yahoo.com</span></a><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">, or else mail me
at my address. I welcome feedback, and
will make an honest effort to respond (although since I work full time, I have
massive time constraints), but feedback sent to me must be civil. I will not tolerate nastiness, ad hominem
arguments, or name-calling. Also,
criticism of what I wrote must be based on the facts of what I wrote, and must
make an earnest effort to be concrete, accurate, and constructive.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Critically
yours,</span></p><p style="text-align: center;">
</p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">George
Fish<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p style="text-align: center;"><i><br /></i></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-34135865078663206152023-02-04T13:43:00.002-08:002023-02-04T13:43:47.525-08:00The Graduate<p><i>While a member of Solidarity, I actually encountered a self-proclaimed woman comrade who called herself a "fat activist," which I found incredibly short sided, and not at all a good way to advance real leftist ideas. But there is this contrarian streak on the left, especially the far left, of which Solidarity was a part, that anything approved of by the "mainstream" must be opposed in principle! Even--of all things--obesity. So, as a conscientious radical who upholds science, I penned an article for Solidarity's discussion bulletin pointing out that the CDC had pointed out that obesity in the US was a major public health problem. My article was denied publication on the grounds it was--get this--"offensive"! Well, truth is, obesity is a major health problem in the US, and can lead to many other diseases, among them high blood pressure, diabetes, and vulnerability to heart attacks. While some people are obese due to natural conditions (for example, my friend's daughter, who has fibromyalgia), or to certain medications (such as many of the drugs used to treat bipolar disorder), in too many other cases it's due to lack of exercise, poor eating habits (i.e., too much sugar and junk food in diets), alcohol consumption, or a combination of these. In other words, it's a bad habit that may be difficult to overcome, but be overcome it must, for a healthy body. Which is the point of my sardonic brief article posted below. I'm going to advance here another short bit of sardonic humor, this brief "advertisement" for legal services:</i></p><p><i><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> GET RID OF UGLY FAT</span><br /></i></p><p><i><span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> Divorce him/her now!</span><br /></span></i></p><p><i><span><span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> W.E. Splittem</span><br /></span></span></i></p><p><i><span><span><span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> Attorney-at-law</span><br /></span></span></span></i></p><p><i><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></i></p><p><i><span><span><span><span>Now to my actual post, below--GF</span></span></span></span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="background: white; color: #050505; font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Did you hear about the left-wing "fat
activist" (yes, such do indeed exist, and so publicly proclaim themselves,
on the left today!), who fights female "body-shaming" with—obesity?
She graduated. She's now a "diabetes activist," a "high blood
pressure activist," and a "heart attack danger activist"!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p><i><span><span><span><span><br /></span></span></span></span></i></p><p><i><span><span><br /></span></span></i></p><p><i><span> </span></i></p><p><i><br /></i></p><p><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span><span> </span> </p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-9876159410780247962022-12-26T14:04:00.000-08:002022-12-26T14:04:08.055-08:00Can Marxist-Leninists and Leninist-Trotskyists be real democratic socialists?<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">[Self-disclosure:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a young socialist radical in the 1960s and
a member of SDS. I was enamored with the “far left,” particularly
Leninism-Trotskyism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>During the fierce
faction fight within SDS that began in earnest in 1968 between the
Maoist/Stalinist Progressive Labor Party (PL) and the SDS National Office
(N.O.), I reluctantly aligned myself with PL’s Worker-Student Alliance (WSA),
as I considered them actually pro-working class and serious Marxists, in
contradistinction to the SDS N.O., which I viewed as a bunch of hippies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After the collapse of SDS and disillusionment
with PL borne out by a summer of working with it and WSA in Chicago, I joined
the youth group of the Trotskyist Socialist Workers Party (SWP), the Young
Socialist Alliance (YSA), from which I was expelled—twice!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The late, great Peter Camejo congratulated me
sincerely on this, telling me that as he got deeper into the SWP, he realized
just how Stalinist it was internally also.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>From 2001-2010 I was an at-large member of Solidarity, attended the 2006
Solidarity Summer School and Convention, and was an active writer for both <i>Against
the Current</i> and the Solidarity internal discussion bulletin, until I too
was expelled from Solidarity in October 2010 on “discipline” charges at a
hearing before the National Committee, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>which my defense witness called a “kangaroo
court.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today, I wear all three
expulsions as a—badge of honor!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In 2015
I became an enthusiastic supporter of the Presidential campaign of Bernie
Sanders, and even wrote an article supporting his candidacy that was published that
year on the website of the Third Camp socialist magazine New Politics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve also “moved politically” from the Third
Camp “far left” to Third Camp democratic socialism because I enthusiastically
embrace Michael Harington’s idea of socialist politics as achieving the “left
wing of the <i>feasible”</i> (emphasis added), am a signatory to the DSA North
Star Statement of Principles, and a member of Central Indiana DSA, which has
adopted a pragmatic approach free of doctrine and jargon as its operating
political philosophy—GF]</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: center;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Can
Marxist-Leninists and Leninist-Trotskyists be good, real, democratic
socialists?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to answer that in the
negative.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Marxist-Leninists and Leninist-Trotskyists
<i>cannot</i> be good, real, democratic socialists—and it’s <i>not</i> because
democratic socialism is merely “social-democratic” in its politics, proposals
and orientation; or insufficiently “anti-imperialist;” or “beholden to the
Democratic Party and against the independent mobilization of the working
class.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No, it’s because democratic
socialism is resolutely anti-authoritarian; values concrete results in the
here-and-now, not off in some distant but “inevitable” future which no one can
seriously predict; believes strongly in civil rights and civil liberties for <i>all</i>,
even for those deemed “bourgeois” or “incorrect;” distinguishes between
“incorrect” thoughts and writings and terroristic, violent, or discriminatory
deeds, and while supporting appropriate criminal punishment for the latter,
leaves the former alone—to be dealt with by open, democratic criticism and
counterproposal, not by punitive sanction; and because democratic socialism
respects the autonomy of the individual, and relies on his/her own personal
political consciousness and ethical conscience instead of authoritarian,
robotic, “discipline” imposed from above.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Contrast
that to Marxism-Leninism and Leninism-Trotskyism, which closes off discussion
and criticism once a decision has been made by the “proper” higher-ups;<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>imposes an inviolable<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“party line” on its members and adherents, and
requires them to uphold that line affirmatively in all situations, even
requiring them to vote robotically as a bloc at meetings and assemblies; and acts
like an infiltrating sect in broader groups, assemblies and movements, where
the goal of the sect is to impose its (and overwhelmingly, only its) “correct”
line, proposals and programs upon others, whether they agree with them or
not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be it with the CPUSA, Maoist
groups, or Trotskyist groups such as the SWP/YSA, ISO, or Solidarity,
historically that is precisely what has happened, and why so much of left
history, notably in the US, is that of acrimony, sectarianism, accusations of
bad faith, and other movement- and organization-dividing charges and
countercharges, which has enervated the process of building a genuinely mass
movement of the left.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even at those
times when there were mass movements of the left, notably here in the US,
everyone politically aware knew that there were leading individuals and groups
one did not cross or too strongly criticize.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That was true in the Popular Front era of the CP, within SDS, and, I
fear, will become the new norm within DSA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>DSA has responded in the past with its <i>principled </i>ban on
democratic centralism (the organizational hallmark of Marxism-Leninism and
Leninism-Trotskyism, even of the “soft” Leninism-Trotskyism of Solidarity), but
since DSA’s explosive expansion, that ban seems to be going by the wayside, so
to speak; while not formally rescinded as of yet, it is becoming a dead letter
in practice with the influx of Marxist-Leninist and Leninist-Trotskyist
individuals and caucuses within DSA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Which, I am convinced, will be the downfall of DSA as a viable democratic
socialist organization, and cause it to be but another Solidarity, ISO, Maoist
sect, other authoritarian grouping of the left, or all of the above, a gaggle
of competing rivalries—and lead to its collapse, same as the influx of
competing Marxism-Leninisms and Leninism-Trotskyisms into SDS in the 1960s led
to its downfall.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The
only solution, I assert, is for DSA to affirm its principled ban on democratic
centralism within DSA, both in principle and in practice; while I certainly
don’t want, or support, a wholesale expulsion of Marxism-Leninism- or
Leninism-Trotskyism-sympathetic individuals, groupings or caucuses from DSA, I
do steadfastly support a ban on their acting as such; let them, the supposed
“far left,” participate openly within DSA and advocate for their policies and
proposals, yet demand of them that they not practice any form of democratic
centralism—which means a ban on robotic voting blocs held together by
“discipline” instead of autonomous fealty to certain positions by individuals
and groups of individuals.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every
individual and caucus member within DSA must to be free to dissent from and
abstain from voting on caucus and group proposals, even as members of those
caucuses or groups.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Individual autonomy,
trust by comrades in the good consciousness and conscience of other DSA
comrades, must become the sine qua non across the board—be they groupings and
caucuses of Solidarity, as but one example, or of their “social-democratic”
opposition, such as North Star!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Let a
hundred flowers bloom, let a thousand schools of thought contend” within a
truly “big tent” DSA where a “disciplined” voting bloc does not determine the
DSA “line” due to organizational maneuvering, but only through truly free,
democratic and open debate involving all DSAers, or chapter delegates, who wish
to participate, in truly free, democratic and open DSA meetings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Otherwise, I fear, the inevitable takeover of
DSA by some “disciplined” democratic centralist clique, caucus, or organization
is inevitable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If not in the foreseeable
future, then eventually, as it did in SDS—to the complete disarray and
unviability of SDS!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which went from a
mass organization of the mostly-student left of 100,000 members to poof!
overnight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Already we are seeing the
ill effects of this within DSA itself, which has seen its membership drop 20%,
from 94,000 to 74,000; and while those numbers may seem large, remember, the
whole of DSA membership in either case could fit within the confines of the
average pro football stadium, which should give the reader a sense of just how
small, in a country of 330 million, the organized left really is—GF)</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Already
we are seeing it within DSA in proposals, programs and resolutions of a “far
left” cast being rammed through as supposedly the consensus thinking of the
whole of DSA.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Further, from such as support
for BDS to the “rank-and-file” strategy, and for several others, these DSA
“proposals” are not only causing havoc and consternation within DSA itself, but
also, in how DSA relates to other organizations of a progressive and leftist
bent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And may well be leading to DSA
members dropping out in significant numbers, by not renewing their dues, for
example, or not attending DSA meetings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That surely is not what we in DSA want, but it is what all too easily
could happen; and then DSA becomes but a shell of itself, just as the various
Marxist-Leninist and Leninist-Trotskyist sects were but shells, sects little
noticed or paid attention to in the outside world until their members and
sympathizers (formally or informally) joined DSA and thus organizationally
amplified their voices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such a DSA is
not the DSA we of the democratic left, such as a caucus whose approach I generally
support, but am not a member of, North Star, want, but it may become the DSA we
are saddled with—as long as democratic centralism is given its new lease on
life within DSA itself, as it has since 2016, with the explosive influx of new
members.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is why the principled ban
on democratic centralism within DSA <i>must</i> be reaffirmed and upheld, both
in principle and in practice:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>not to
squelch the voices within DSA that are “far left” (as will inevitably be
charged), but to save DSA as a “big tent” organization itself, one where both
socialism (in its many varieties and advocacies) <i>and</i> meaningful democracy
can prevail.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">While
the “far left” may decry this as “bad faith” or even “anticommunism,” they
would completely miss the point, which is—not to silence their proposal of
ideas and policies, but to prevent them from being implemented by a mere voting
bloc of robotic adherents acting under “discipline,” despite what others may
think or wish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Marxist-Leninists and
Leninist-Trotskyists defend democratic socialist organizational norms as needed
to create a “fighting army of the proletariat,” conveniently forgetting that an
army is but a body for fighting that lacks a head; and thus, in this all armies
are but instruments that can be used for fighting for good, or for fighting for
ill.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this, both the organizations of
the Red Army under Trotsky which successfully staved off the Whites and the foreign
imperialist invading armies in the Russian Civil War, and the Japanese Imperial
Army which ravaged East Asia in the 1930s and 1940s, were exactly the
same.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, the reactionary Guomindang
(Kuomintang), which massacred thousands of Communists and workers, was a
democratic centralist organization! (Specifically reorganized as such under the
aegis of Comintern agent Michael Borodin as the “leading force of the “national
democratic revolution” in China in the 1920s, let us recall.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Democratic centralism is but an instrument,
and a blunt one at that, and historically, has always been far more centralist
than democratic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trotsky, before he
became enamored of it, spoke trenchantly in 1904 of what becomes of democratic
centralist organizations:</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">The
organization of the party will take the place of the party itself; the Central
Committee will take the place of the organization; and finally, the dictator
will take the place of the Central Committee.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">This
dreary prognosis has been exactly confirmed historically, not only from the
ascendancy of Stalin in the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), but
also right up to the present, in the unquestioned and unopposable ascendancy
not only of Mao and others,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and now Xi,
in the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), but also of Jack Barnes in the SWP (which
led to the demise of this venerable political voice of US Trotskyism) and Bob
Avakian in the Maoist/Stalinist Revolutionary Communist Party (RCP).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hardly models for a mass democratic socialist
“big tent” organization such as DSA!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Democratic
centralism can also be strongly criticized from the standpoint of
“revolutionary socialism” itself, notably in the trenchant critique of it,
solidly documented, by Rosa Luxemburg. </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">In </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">The Letters
of Rosa Luxemburg</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> (London and New York: Verso, 2011), in an October 20,
1913 letter to the Editors of </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Social-Democraten</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">, (pp. 325-328) she
specifically excoriates Lenin (pp. 327-8) for organizational heavy-handedness
and factionalism in attempting to split the Polish Social Democracy “in a
planned and deliberate manner…as the one they [the Leninists—GF] pursue as
their specialty in the Russian [Social-Democratic Workers’] Party [RSDRP]” (p.
327) . </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">The Russian Revolution and
Leninism or Marxism?</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961)
consists of two notable essays by Luxemburg that criticize both democratic
centralism and the undemocratic aspects of Bolshevism as found early on after
the Russian Revolution of 1917.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">
</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">“Leninism or Marxism?” was what her essay was titled in English; it was
originally published in 1904 in </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Iskra</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">, the newspaper of Russian
Social-Democracy, in Russian, and in German in </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Neue Zeit</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">, the newspaper
of the German Social-Democracy, as “Organizational Questions of the Russian
Social Democracy;” and excoriates Lenin’s </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">One Step Forward, Two Steps Back</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">
as advocating Blanquism, undue centralization, and opportunism. (See especially
pp. 84-91 in this volume.) Her unfinished 1919 “The Russian Revolution” is
famous not only for its line, “Freedom only for the supporters of the
government, only for members of one party—however numerous they may be—is no
freedom at all.” (p. 69) But her following lines, a paean to individual
freedom, are even downright “bourgeois liberal”! (In a positive sense, of
course.)</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">She writes (ibid.) “Freedom is
always and exclusively freedom for the one who thinks differently.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Not because of any fanatical concept of
‘justice’ but because all that is instructive, wholesome and purifying in
political freedom depends on this essential characteristic, and its
effectiveness vanishes when ‘freedom’ becomes a special privilege.”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">In footnote 579 in </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Letters of Rosa
Luxemburg</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> (p. 330), it is noted, “On August 4, 1914, the SPD [German
Socialist Party, Germany’s mass socialist party headed by Kautsky]
parliamentary group—</span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">with group discipline applied against the minority </i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">(emphasis
added—GF</span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">)</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">—voted in favor of the war-credits motion of the imperial
government.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">The decision to approve
money for war was made on August 3, after a heated debate within the SPD
parliamentary group, by a vote of 78-14.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">
</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">The support given by the majority to the war meant that an open split in
the SPD was inevitable.”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">“Group
discipline” was also applied in the CPUSA in silencing and later expelling the
Trotskyists, the followers of Earl Browder, and others, as well as causing
splits within Leninist-Trotskyist groups to become especially acrimonious.</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Further, as Hal Draper, perhaps the leading
ideological interpreter of Third Camp revolutionary socialism, notes in his </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">The
“Dictatorship of the Proletariat” from Marx to Lenin</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;"> (New York: Monthly
Review Press, 1987), Lenin and the Bolsheviks in power too easily made it into
a “dictatorship over the proletariat” enforced by “party discipline.” (See especially
pp. 101-105) Last, Trotskyism-sympathetic scholar Tom Smith, “Beyond Hero
Worship: A Marxist Critique of Bolshevik Terror and Its Indebtedness to
Jacobinism,” </span><i style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">Socialism and Democracy 20</i><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: justify;">, Vol. 10, No. 1, Summer 1996, writing
at length that (p. 48)</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; margin-left: .5in; margin-right: .5in; margin-top: 0in; tab-stops: 40.5pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif;">Bolshevism has failed to be
effective after 1917, or to inspire the masses of the world to revolution, or
to prevent the Stalinist degeneration within its own process of
development.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I would argue that <i>one
important</i> reason for these failures (though by no means the primary or
exclusive reason) is the following assumption on the part of the
Bolsheviks:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>that popular fear of
arbitrary violence and of minority rule is actually irrational, a fear that the
masses need to and should “get over.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
also believe that such nonsense is a big factor in the tendency of Leninist
groups to degenerate quickly into cults, with practically no effect upon the
real world whatsoever. (Emphasis in original)</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Later, (p. 75) Smith critiques Lenin’s
“Can the Bolsheviks Retain State Power?” for arguing that 240,000 Bolsheviks
could be “a permanent, collective, one-party ‘Lawgiver’….In other words, the
soviets would become the means of whipping up support for the Bolsheviks’
policies—but not so much, for significantly challenging those policies.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or in other words, the Bolshevik Party would
become the tail that wags the soviet, working-class, dog!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But such authoritarianism, that such “popular
fear” of “minority rule” is “actually irrational,” is, as the critiques of
Luxemburg, Draper and Smith show, a built-in feature of democratic
centralism!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, as Draper’s book so
well shows, and as Smith’s essay also demonstrates, the “social democratic”
rejection of democratic centralism, i.e., the organizational feature of
Marxism-Leninism and Leninism-Trotskyism, is integral to Marx’s and Engel’s own
conception of the “dictatorship of the proletariat.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But not only that:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>democratic centralism not only embraces and
enhances myriad evils, but rejection of democratic centralism is far closer to
what Marx and Engels themselves envisioned as constituting socialism and
socialist organization.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Marx’s famous long
essay on the Paris Commune, <i>The Civil War in France</i>, makes this
abundantly clear, as does Engels’s remark that the “dictatorship of the
proletariat” looks exactly like the Paris Commune—where the Marxists were
actually a minority, and had to compete for influence with Prodhonists,
Blanquists, and others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">All this makes a strong, even overwhelming,
case that democratic centralism has <i>no</i> place within DSA, and that its <i>principled</i>
rejection by DSA must not only be upheld, but also deepened and enforced!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">So let our “far leftists” within DSA
eschew any practice of democratic centralism, not force through resolutions and
policies based on robotic “discipline,” and trust the political instincts and
consciousness of DSA members themselves to come to the “right” conclusions, and
I would gladly say to all of them—“Welcome, comrades!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While we may disagree, we will, above all,
agree to disagree, and agree wholeheartedly that dissenting comrades are not
automatically class enemies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We will win
over by persuasion, not by the robotic force of ‘disciplined’ voting blocs.”</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Our comrades in the British Leninist-Trotskyist
organization Alliance for Workers Liberty (though some will call them only erstwhile
comrades, or not comrades at all) strike a good balance between party
discipline and individual autonomy with the following stipulation to its
members that they must first present the Alliance’s position on an issue; then,
if they disagree, they are fully allowed to present their dissent from that
position without fear of discipline or expulsion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, striking a most acceptable balance
between upholding the group’s position and individual autonomy within the
organization as a trusted, principled member.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That is the way it must be within the organized caucuses within
DSA:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the right to affirm the caucus’s
position, the right to dissent from the caucus’s position, and the right to
abstain—even when it comes to voting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Sadly, that is not the way Marxist-Leninist and Leninist-Trotskyist organizations
or caucuses work:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>it’s either uphold the
“line” or risk expulsion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which is
unacceptable within a “big tent” democratic socialist organization such as DSA,
or really, anywhere!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, there is
nothing more cringeworthy than the way “freewheeling” Marxist-Leninists or
Leninist-Trotskyists will fold in terror and fear when faced with threats from
the organizational “disciplinary committee”!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Right now, this tolerance of democratic centralism (for that is what
Marxist-Leninist and Leninist-Trotskyist organizational philosophy is, what it
invokes is) has made DSA essentially inoperative except as a sounding board for
outrageous ultraleft, often Stalinist, political positions, as each disciplined
caucus tries to outdo the others in displays of “how left we really are.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such a political approach, however, will doom
DSA to the 100+-year irrelevancy that has politically characterized
Marxism-Leninism and Leninism-Trotskyism in the US, and from which the growth
of DSA was as a beautiful flower emerging through the concrete cracks in the
pavement. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">My autobiographical note at the end of my manuscript is also of high relevance:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">George
Fish is a Central Indiana DSA member living in Indianapolis, Indiana, and a
North Star Statement of Principles signatory.
A socialist writer and poet, he is a regular contributor to New Politics
and other left periodicals and websites.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"><br /></span></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-30000497368812571492022-12-17T18:36:00.000-08:002022-12-17T18:36:09.472-08:00While left ideals are excellent, and left theory overall is pretty good…<p> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Yes,
while left ideals are excellent, and left theory overall is pretty good, left
practice leaves much, very much, to be desired.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Our left political practice is not good enough for our left movement, to
put it bluntly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We of the left lack not
only political understanding and sophistication, but our tactical and strategic
acumen is woefully inadequate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As a
result, all we can appeal to is our ideals, which we ofttimes simply can’t put
into practice, make realizable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is
why, while the left ofttimes punches above its weight (to borrow a phrase from
fellow critical leftist Barry Finger, my closest political comrade), we
leftists normally remain a minority, and an often beleaguered and marginalized
minority at that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While we incessantly
talk of galvanizing the masses, typically we don’t galvanize them; they ignore
us, or express hostility to us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that
is our great tragedy as leftists.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Try as
we may to be effective, ofttimes we fail at that.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">This
abstractly expressed argument above was made concrete for me recently, as I
read a book about how Jeremy Corbyn became British Labour Party head in 2015,
staved off a challenge to is leadership in 2016 (where the book ended), only to
go down to ignominious defeat in the British elections of 2019, where Labour
was trounced, suffering its greatest defeat since 1935.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Corbyn, who in 2015 was a little-known left
backbencher Labour MP (Member of Parliament) from a safe district near London
with no previous leadership experienced, galvanized many Labour Party members,
it is true; he was especially strong among the young (under 39) and with women,
but garnered only a plurality among trade unionist Labour members, had the open
hostility of many fellow Labour MPs and the Labour bureaucracy, and his
stunning win in 2015, coupled with his stunning reduction to ignominy in 2019,
proved decisively that it takes more than a surprise insurgent candidacy to
transform a party hierarchy that is strongly in place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He came out of the antiwar and Palestinian
movements, and many of his political views can be described as naïve at
best.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Personally a nice, if somewhat
colorless, person, he was drafted reluctantly as the left Labour leadership
candidate, and while probably not anti-Semitic himself, had a real blind spot
to left anti-Semitism, which rendered him open to attack on that front; also,
his campaigning in support remaining in the EU, both in 2016 and in 2019, was
tepid at best also.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He also had a
campaign team that was enthusiastic and earnest, but inexperienced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His seeming strengths overshadowed his
glaring weaknesses.</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">There
were similarities, of course, between Corbyn’s insurgency and the insurgent
Democratic Presidential campaign of 2016 by Bernie Sanders, which also started
in 2015.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But there were important
differences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For one thing, Sanders was
a much more adept and eloquent politician than Corbyn, who, coming from a safe
Labour seat of little importance for decades, where he was just another
backbencher, had never been tested as a leader.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Also, Sanders was much more discriminating in who he publicly allied
with and supported than was Corbyn, whose past uncritical and campist
solidarities came back to haunt him not only throughout his campaign for Labour
leadership, but also his time serving in office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Chief among these was his seeming support
for “left” antisemitism, to which he was notably blind.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Further, although British English is notably
drier and more formal than American English, Corbyn’s spoken English in
speeches (of which this writer has only seen snippets in print; but revealing
snippets) was far more colorless and lackluster than was Sanders’s, who could
be notably aggressive and forceful in making points—which he did with cogency
and alacrity!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In short, Sanders was much
more a natural-born leader than was Corbyn; and he had demonstrated that
successfully not only while in legislative (and executive—he began his
political career as Mayor of Burlington, Vermont) office, but during his
campaign for the Presidential nomination.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Notably in this regard was the way Sanders responded on Sunday-morning
TV to journalist George Stephanopoulos’s redbaiting objection that calling
himself a “democratic socialist” would only hurt him, Sanders snapped back,
“What’s wrong with that?” and proceeded to briefly but effectively explain what
democratic socialism was.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Both
Corbyn and Sanders galvanized youth support for their candidacies, and turned
out the youth vote.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Corbyn won the
Labour Party leadership by strong support among new Labour members (62%), women
(63%), those 25-39 (67%) and newly affiliated trade unionists (57.6%), but
among overall Labour members who voted, only won a plurality (49.6%), not an
absolute majority.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Data taken from Alex
Nunn, <i>The Candidate</i> [New York and London: OR Books, 2016], the book I
read referred to above, pp. 301-302.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Bernie Sanders, though arguably his base of support was larger and more
diversified, was also only a minority candidate—he won 47% of the Democratic
primary votes in 2016, and before he aborted his Presidential campaign in 2020,
40% of the vote.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which indicates that,
in both cases, while support for the left is strong, it does not constitute an
absolute majority.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In forming his shadow
cabinet after winning, Jeremy Corbyn reached out to his opponents and
non-supporters in Parliament, only to have them turn against him in the summer
of 2016 (ironically, among his most vocal opponents was Hilary Benn, a
right-wing Labourite, and son of noted left-wing Labour leader Tony Benn!);
while Corbyn won that battle, and under his leadership in the elections of
2017, led Labour to an admirable showing (though not enough to form a
government), Labour with him at the helm was massacred in the election of 2019,
ousting him not only from power, but making him very vulnerable to his Labour
enemies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(2019 was Labour’s worst
showing since 1935, as mentioned above.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Truth be told, Corbyn had important baggage he
carried, and it was very noticeable in 2019:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>although possibly (no one is really sure) not personally an antisemite,
he had a serious antisemitism problem due to his uncritical pro-Third Worldism,
notably in support of the Palestinians against Israel, no matter what; he was
also a tepid supporter of Britain remaining in the European Union, and his call
for a second Brexit referendum, after three years of Brexit, Brexit, Brexit!
turned many past Labour voters against him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As for the ambitions Labour Party manifesto of 2019, exit polls
indicated that a large number of voters thought it unrealistic, and doubted it
Labour could fulfill it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This in sharp
contrast to Conservative Party Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s cry on
long-regurgitated and talked-about Brexit, “Get it done!”</span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">There
was also a clear class divide between the young who supported the Labour left,
and the older, more socially conservative and traditionalist, working class and
trade unionists who had formerly voted Labour—just as there is such a divide
here in the U.S., although the left doesn’t want to admit it, or even talk
about it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The young are often
college-educated, in contrast to the older, and come from backgrounds of
privilege that enable them to go to college.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They are often better employed than older workers, and despite the rise
of the precariat among the young, have better prospects for the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is especially noticeable in the U.S. in
the death rate for white males 55 and older, many of whom have lost their
once-secure blue-collar and ordinary white-collar jobs—and now die prematurely
of opioid addiction, alcoholism, and suicide, while other demographic groups
see their lifespans increase.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today’s
left, both in Europe and in the U.S., is focused on social issues rather than
economic ones because, truth be told, youth are more beneficiaries of
neoliberalism than have been older workers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Deindustrialization and globalism have brought layoffs and job
disappearance to the traditional working class, or else severe drops in income
and status as workers are forced to trade higher-income employment (often in
manufacturing) for lower-income employment (often in services).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While youth doesn’t have it that great
anymore either, they have employment options in NGOs and in professional
employment lacking for the non-college educated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the youth, economic precarity is not a
compelling issue, despite neoliberalism making it more prevalent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hence the turn of youth to social issues away
from economic ones, and of course, the rise of neoliberal, pro-capitalist modes
of supposedly radical “isms” such as feminism and anti-racism.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But as many a worker will tell you, in the
end, there’s no difference, except perhaps stylistically, between a woman boss
and a man boss, a boss of color and a boss who’s white!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As The Who sang tellingly, “Meet the new
boss/Same as the old boss.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Bernie
Sanders grasped that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t think
Jeremy Corbyn ever did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Among other left
leaders in the U.S. besides Bernie, only AOC seems to grasp what is really
going on—and she often gets accused of “selling out” by certain persons on the
U.S. left!</span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">The
Sanders, Corbyn, struggles for leadership encapsulate many of the failings of
the contemporary left.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are long past
the golden days of Marxism and Marxist leaders of the first part of the 20<sup>th</sup>
Century such as Trotsky, Max Shachtman, Rosa Luxemburg, her nemesis Eduard
Bernstein, Gramsci, even Lenin and Kautsky, not to mention Marx and Engels
themselves, who lived and died entirely within the 19<sup>th</sup> Century; and
we are sorely missing later leaders such as Michael Harrington.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In my opinion, our current left “leadership,”
as represented by such figures as Noam Chomsky, Vijay Prashad, and Medea
Benjamin, are really not suitable leaders at all; hence our left descent into
mediocrity, obsessive focus on cultural and social issues, including identity
politics to the detriment of real class analysis and focus on economics and
economic reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today’s left, as it
has been since the 1960s, is overwhelmingly college-educated, but not any
smarter because of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We of the left
are not terribly good at talking <b>to</b> average workers; we are far “better”
talking (or rather, lecturing, hectoring) <b>at</b> them!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is especially noticeable in the rise of
“cancel culture,” the left equivalent of irredeemable Original Sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If we of today’s left were truly honest, we
would read to everyone we talk to or about this version of their Miranda
Rights:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Not only will anything and
everything you ever said or wrote be held against you, it will mark you
forever, even at the expense of losing your reputation and employment.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While leftists may protest, “But we have good
intentions!” such intentions are never enough; politics, especially left
politics, is not a morality play; it is a push to achieve power to effect
substantive change.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is not, decidedly
not, about forming consensus-agreeing affinity groups, it is about forming
coalitions, often diverse and even on some issues, contradictory coalitions,
where not everyone agrees on every single issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is also about using tact, sophistication,
and nuance in organizing, and having a healthy skepticism of what we advocate,
what we are for, so that we of the left are able to say to ourselves, “While I
think I’m right in this, I will also admit I could be wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I do not think so at present, because I have
thought this over thoroughly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I may
have overlooked something.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let us
recall as leftists, many of us as Marxists, the dialectic, and how the
dialectic means change, transformation, over time, so that what is so certain
today may be substantially not so in the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is what we of the left must do
today—come to that understanding.<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-167038755630925382.post-66478826062633103112022-11-15T10:01:00.006-08:002022-11-15T10:10:28.011-08:00"Christians, Have Mercy!"--a Poem on Christian Love and "Immoral" Atheism<p><i>This poem was also formally rejected, but as with "Rubicon," I believe it too good not to be published. I think it is quite effective as a poem, notably with its use of change of voice, and the ironic humor. Also, as an atheist and ex-Catholic, the subject matter is indeed close to my heart--GF</i></p><p><br /></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 14.0pt;">CHRISTIANS, HAVE
MERCY!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">by<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">George Fish<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Show a little of that<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">vaunted Christian love, <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">that “love thy neighbor<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">as thyself” feeling—<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">especially toward us<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“immoral” atheists!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Please realize just how<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">hard we “immoral”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">atheists have it:<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">after a hard day of<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">raping, robbing,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">pillaging and murdering,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the only way we atheists<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">can relax in the evening<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">is through wild drug and<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">sex orgies, until we finally<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">get some sleep by passing<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">out in a drug-and-alcohol-<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">induced stupor! Damn it,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">we’re so busy in the daytime<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">raping, robbing, pillaging<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and murdering we barely <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">have time for lunch—all we<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">can do is grab a baby to eat<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">while on the run! Please!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">It just ain’t that easy being <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">sleazy!
And besides, surely<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you Christians yourselves <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">know something about<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">moral sleaze—after all,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you’ve practiced it regularly<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">for two millennia to date,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and still counting! You’re<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">the ones who burnt people<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">alive for allegedly being<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">witches, heretics, or homosexuals,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">you’re the ones responsible for the<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">ecclesiastical murder of Giordano<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Bruno and the persecution of Galileo,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">not to mention the infamous<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Magdalene laundries in Ireland,<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">or the mass graves of Indigenous<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">children in Canadian schools<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">run “for” them by the <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Catholic Church, which even<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Pope Francis couldn’t bring <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">himself to fully apologize for!<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">You’re also the ones who gave us<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Catholic priest-pedophilia and its<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">deliberate cover-up by bishops and <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">cardinals, “Prosperity Gospel”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">hucksters like Joel Osteen and <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Creflo Dollar, venomous hate<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">preachers such as Pat Robertson<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and Jerry Falwell, and the <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Christian Nationalist zealots who<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">rally around “I’m proud to be a<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">Christian” Donald Trump, with his<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">three wives and two divorces, his<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">“grab ‘em by the pussy” rhetoric, <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and his notably—Stormy—relationships<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">with women! And the list goes on <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">and on—and on! Yet, you Christians accuse<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">us, the atheists, of being the “immoral”<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">ones!
Have you tried looking in the mirror <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">sometimes, Christians? Try it.
That’s <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">where you’ll find the “immorality” you <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">think is everywhere under the Goddamn sun,
<o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">lurking under each and every secular bed, <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 2.5in;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman",serif; font-size: 12.0pt;">hiding in each promiscuously tolerant <o:p></o:p></span></p>
<p style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 12pt; text-align: left;">nook and cranny!</span> </p>George Fishhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16932838809857108803noreply@blogger.com0