{"id":170786,"date":"2020-10-19T12:00:26","date_gmt":"2020-10-19T11:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=170786"},"modified":"2020-10-18T06:54:09","modified_gmt":"2020-10-18T05:54:09","slug":"to-rebel-against-necessity-and-more","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2020\/10\/to-rebel-against-necessity-and-more\/","title":{"rendered":"To Rebel against Necessity and More"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cCompassion has no place in the natural order of the world, which operates on the basis of necessity.\u00a0 The laws of necessity are as unexceptional as the laws of gravitation.\u00a0 The human faculty of compassion opposes this order and is therefore best thought of as being in some way supernatural.\u00a0 To forget oneself, however briefly, to identify with a stranger to the point of fully recognizing her or him, is to defy necessity, and in this defiance, even if small and quiet\u00a0 and even if measuring only 60cm. x 50cm., there is a power that cannot be measured by the limits of the natural order.\u00a0 It is not a means and it has no end.\u00a0 The Ancients knew this.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u2013- John Berger, \u201cA Man with Tousled Hair,\u201d from The Shape of a Pocket<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Autumn is the dying season.\u00a0 This morning when I came home from a walk, he was lying there on his back.\u00a0 He was dead.<\/p>\n

Yet an autumn day like today in the mountains is so beautiful that everything vibrates with life. The air chimes.\u00a0 The clouds tango across the blue dance floor above.\u00a0 The leaves sway to some celestial tune.\u00a0 And the lake laps in synchronicity to singing hearts.<\/p>\n

My heart was singing before I found him.\u00a0 His blueness and his beauty startled me. I touched him in the hope that he would move, but he stayed still, on his back with his eyes open. A still life.\u00a0 A life stilled.\u00a0 Only one of millions of fallen birds, yet I felt an immense sadness at the sight of him, as if he were waiting there to tell me something.\u00a0 I wanted so badly to resurrect him, for he seemed so alive in death. I felt myself returning to the blues I felt before my walk.<\/p>\n

Vincent Van Gogh wrote to his brother Theo these words:<\/p>\n

I feel more and more that we must not judge God on the basis of this world; it\u2019s a study that didn\u2019t come off.\u00a0 What can you do, in a study that has gone wrong, if you are fond of the artist?\u00a0 You do not find much to criticize; you hold your tongue.\u00a0 But you have a right to ask for something better.\u00a0 It is only a master who can make such a muddle, and perhaps that is the best consolation we have out of it, since then we have a right to hope that we\u2019ll see the same creative hand get even with itself.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

This bluejay was a small creature, and many people hate his kind.\u00a0 He\u2019s a bully bird, they say.\u00a0 In the celebrated novel, To Kill a Mockingbird<\/em>, the hero, Atticus Finch says one shouldn\u2019t kill a mockingbird but kill all the bluejays you can hit.<\/p>\n

I am wondering who or what killed this beautiful bluejay at my feet, but I will never know.<\/p>\n

I do know that \u201cOperation Mockingbird\u201d<\/a> killed many minds and hearts, and resulted in untold numbers of deaths worldwide.\u00a0 This CIA media propaganda program in which all the major media were doing the bidding of the CIA was allegedly dismantled after its discovery in the 1970s, but it no doubt operates today under a different name.\u00a0 Perhaps its code name is Operation Bluejay, since the bluebird was already used for \u201cProject Bluebird,\u201d a predecessor to MKULtra, the CIA\u2019s other massive mind control program.<\/p>\n

The bird names migrate, but they seem to return under different nomenclature for people who are in the business of killing singers of songs of freedom.<\/p>\n

They are the killers of Ernesto \u201cChe\u201d Guevara.<\/p>\n

For before my walk, I had started to read an article, with declassified CIA and U.S. government documents, from The National Security Archives<\/em><\/a>, <\/em>about his death.\u00a0 For on this date, October 9, in 1967, the Argentinian revolutionary Che, Fidel Castro\u2019s right-hand man in the Cuban Revolution, was executed by the CIA-led Bolivian military, after having been captured in a firefight in the Bolivian mountains. Fascists killed the courageous Che as he fought to inspire the oppressed to rise up against U.S. imperialism.\u00a0 They executed him in cold blood, consciously and proudly.\u00a0 They posed with his dead body, like macho hunters who pose holding a bird they have just shot.<\/p>\n

Writing in The Nation<\/em><\/a> magazine three year ago, Peter Kornbluh, the director of the National Security Archive<\/a>‘s Chile and Cuba Documentation Projects, described how he had met in Miami with Gustavo Villoldo, who had been the top Cuban-American CIA operative assigned to assist in tracking down and capturing Guevara,\u00a0 the iconic revolutionary, in Bolivia. Villoldo told Kornbluh how he cut off the dead Che\u2019s hands and pieces of his hair and beard before secretly burying his body, which was discovered and dug up in 1997, minus his hand bones.\u00a0 Kornbluh writes:<\/p>\n

At one point during the conversation, Villoldo opened the binder and pulled out a white envelope. Inside was a clump of brown hair. As the ultimate souvenir of this Cold War victory, Villoldo proudly stated, he had cut off strands of Che\u2019s hair before disposing of his body. \u2018I basically took it because the symbol of the revolution was this bearded, long-haired guy coming down the mountain,\u2019 Villoldo later explained. \u2018To me, I was cutting off the very symbol of the Cuban revolution.\u2019<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Maybe a hawk killed the bluejay, but if so, it didn\u2019t gloat over its body.\u00a0 It would have been operating under the laws of necessity, where as far as we know, compassion has no place. Not true for Che\u2019s killers. Here they are posing for the camera, guns still aimed at the dead man, as if he still posed a great danger to them.\u00a0 They were right, at least in the long term.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Ernesto Che Guevara is also lying on his back, eyes open. Seeing the bluejay in a similar pose an hour after seeing this photograph, which I had studied for many minutes, gave me a jolt. The bird\u2019s blueness entered my soul. Blue blue blue \u2013 I felt I was sinking into a deep hole of sorrow and despair.\u00a0 My sorrow for the bird was nothing compared to the deep rage and anguish I felt when once again I viewed the photo of Che surrounded by cowards, and I thought of all the victims from Bolivia to the Congo and all around the world who have suffered and died \u2013 and continue to do so \u2013 at the hands of all the ruthless forces he opposed.\u00a0 I wanted so badly to resurrect him, for he seemed so alive in death.\u00a0 And his CIA killers so dead by comparison.<\/p>\n

Here was a man of immense courage who gave his life for his beliefs, who was the embodiment of the Cuban Revolution, who cared deeply to liberate the world\u2019s oppressed from U.S.-led imperialism.\u00a0 I kept thinking of another revolutionary on the run from fascist forces, Pietro Spina in Ignazio Silone\u2019s great novel, Bread and Wine<\/em>, who, disguised as a priest in Mussolini\u2019s Italy, tells a frightened girl who is worried what will ensue if the government captures the rebel leader, who is actually the \u201cpriest\u201d she is talking to.\u00a0 \u201cAnd if they catch him and kill him?\u201d the girl asked.<\/p>\n

Killing a man who says \u2018No!\u2019 is a risky business, the priest replied, because even a corpse can go on whispering \u201cNo! No! No!\u2019 with a persistence and obstinacy that only certain corpses are capable of.\u00a0 And how can you silence a corpse?<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We know Che\u2019s voice has not been silenced where victims of imperialism continue to suffer and be killed around the world.\u00a0 But here in the United States, the image-makers have fashioned him into a celebrity whose message is lost, another casualty of mind control and the propagandists who control the corporate media.\u00a0 The people he fought against.<\/p>\n

Everyone has seen Che\u2019s image somewhere. Posters of his visage adorn college dormitory rooms. You know, the man with the tousled hair and the beard. The\u00a0 cool charismatic guy!\u00a0 The handsome man who road a motorcycle, was articulate, and could write and speak eloquently. The Che on coffee mugs and tee-shirts everywhere.\u00a0 All derived from one photograph<\/a> taken by Cuban photographer Alberto Korda for the revolutionary newspaper Revoluci\u03ccn<\/em> in Havana in 1960.\u00a0 A photograph that never earned Korda a cent, but has been exploited by countless money vultures, including the artist Andy Warhol. Che wrote in Socialism and Man in Cuba:<\/a><\/p>\n

A school of artistic inquiry is invented, which is said to be the definition of freedom; but this ‘inquiry’ has its limits, imperceptible until there is a clash, that is, until the real problems of man and his alienation arise. Meaningless anguish or vulgar amusement thus become convenient safety valves for human anxiety. The idea of using art as a weapon of protest is combated. Those who play by the rules of the game are showered with honours\u2014such honours as a monkey might get for performing pirouettes. The condition is that one does not try to escape from the invisible cage.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Then as now, escaping from that invisible cage is our task, a cage that teaches us not to rebel against what is called \u201cnecessity,\u201d but to exploit others every way we can. To profit from their suffering, which is the nature of imperialism. To close our eyes and make believe it is possible to live in an imperialistic country abroad and have a democracy at home. Sooner or later, this pipe dream will come crashing down. Perhaps that is happening now.<\/p>\n

One does not have to agree with every thought Che expressed more than five decades ago. Or with all his tactics.\u00a0 But if you read his words, you will see that the conditions for oppressed people throughout Latin American and around the world have not changed very much in all these decades. Of course, the propaganda has become far more sophisticated, and the temptation to play by the rules of the game and pirouette like caged monkeys is stronger than ever.\u00a0 Now as then, the religion of consumption is a private devotion for the public, and it is not just things that people are consuming but illusory images of a good and decent life. But their pursuit \u201cis a race among wolves; one can win only at the cost of others’ failure,\u201d wrote Che.\u00a0 Such a system is not necessary but is imposed and must be resisted.<\/p>\n

For the little dead bird I encountered this morning, all I can offer is my compassion that opposes the order of necessity \u2013 my \u201csupernatural\u201d resistance.\u00a0 So I buried the blue creature out of respect and reverence.<\/p>\n

But war and imperialism are not natural, and so I cannot bury my conscience, but must try to find ways to resist such human cruelty.<\/p>\n

I ask myself, says Don Benedetto, the elderly priest in Silone\u2019s Bread and Wine, <\/em>\u201cwhat is to be done?\u201d\u00a0 He pauses and continues:<\/p>\n

I am convinced that it would be a waste of time to show a people of intimidated slaves a different manner of speaking, a different manner of gesticulating; but perhaps it would be worthwhile to show them a different way of living.\u00a0 No word and no gesture can be more persuasive than the life, and if necessary, the death of a man who strives to be free, loyal, just, sincere, disinterested: a man who shows what a man can be.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Che did that.\u00a0 Now it\u2019s up to us.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt the risk of seeming ridiculous,\u201d he wrote, \u201c let me say that the true revolutionary is guided by great feelings of love.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is such love and sacrifice supernatural?<\/p>\n

If so, let us fly to the heights.<\/p>\n

__________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Edward Curtin is a widely published author and a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment<\/a>. His new book is <\/em>Seeking Truth in a Country of Lies<\/a> \u2013 His website: Behind the Curtain<\/a> – email: edcurtinjr@gmail.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 edwardcurtin.com<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cI am convinced that it would be a waste of time to show a people of intimidated slaves a different manner of speaking, a different manner of gesticulating; but perhaps it would be worthwhile to show them a different way of living. No word and no gesture can be more persuasive than the life, and if necessary, the death of a man who strives to be free, loyal, just, sincere, disinterested: a man who shows what a man can be.\u201d Che Guevara did that. Now it\u2019s up to us. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":108249,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[716],"class_list":["post-170786","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transcend-members","tag-che-guevara"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=170786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/170786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/108249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=170786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=170786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=170786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}