ENVIRONMENT

Tell Me Why – Stu Who?

by stuwho

My latest wee vid, done whilst trying out new editing software, as a learning exercise … and a long, slow fukken annoying process it was
I did the music on an old steam-driven prog … vox added on the laptop … rather lo-fi, but that’s the way I like it
After lotsa mistakes and hassles, I give up … this’ll have to do
The next one will be better … as I dumped that software and will start afresh
The words are from poem that I wrote, performed over a bit of music that I also wrote, and played, … they just fitted perfectly together somehow
“Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings” sounds like screen directions for a crap, porn film  … but it also has that ring of truth to it … Kids can ask the most naive and simplistic of questions that cut through the bullshit and flim-flam, getting right to the heart of the matter … the real questions which need answering
 

http://youtu.be/UI9Hz18DGQA

Mall Teaser

by stuwho

Sculptor, Tony Morrow, famous for his Loby Dosser & El Fideldo statue in Woodlands Rd, used to live near me, in Kildrum, here in Cumbernauld.    At that time, he was a fireman, hadn’t yet been to art-school, and was a mate of mine .. with a great sense of humour.  The first time I ever visited his flat, I sat down on the couch, as he went to put the kettle on, and I started to skin-up, a wee  number on his large coffee table

 

Situated at the opposite end of the table was a box of Maltesers … but a box which was maybe four or five times bigger than even the biggest, family size, Malteser box

.

“That’s some fukkin size of a box of Maltesers, Tony!” I shouted through to Tony in the kitchen

“I love Maltesers. Have one”  he shouted back

I lifted the partially opened flap top of the box.

.

 ‘

Inside was one HUGE brown, chocolate Malteser, the size of a volleyball.

“But don’t eat the last one”  Tony shouted ….

“Leave the last one fur me”

I doubled up, pissing myself laughing

“That is fukkin genius … You should do stuff like that professionally”  I told him … constantly for the next few years, … and eventually, he did

Over the years, I saw dozens of people fall for his little trick … he’d made the box and Maltesers, perfect to scale, and it was typical of the daft visual gags he eventually did in his sculptural work

BEAT YOURSELF UP – SAVE THE POLICE TIME

by stuwho

Beat Yourself Up – Save The Police Time

For most of my adult life, maybe the past 45 years or more, I’ve been hearing the same phrases repeated endlessly
Things have never been as bad as they are now
Things are getting worse … there’s no hope for the future
This is the worst government we’ve ever had to deal with
The last government created the problems
The next government will solve the problems
We’re heading for economic collapse
We’re heading for a nuclear war
The apocalypse is predicted to be imminent
The majority of people in this country are selfish, greedy, and stupid.
The majority of people in other countries are selfish, greedy, and stupid.
The majority of people in the World we live in are selfish, greedy, and stupid.
YOU have never met and have no real knowledge of the majority of people in this country. 
YOU have never met and have no real knowledge of the entire population of seven billion people who comprise the Earth’s population, so you must be basing this negative deduction on your knowledge of yourself, and on your knowledge of your immediate friends and associates … therefore, YOU and everyone you know must be selfish, greedy, and stupid.
Right?
Wrong.
Armageddon, in one form or another, has been predicted, on a yearly basis, for almost every single one of the sixty-two years of my life.
Like the boy who cried wolf, or the chicken who predicted that the sky was falling, eventually anyone with sense eventually stops listening to such fear-ridden blather.  I stopped worrying that the sky was falling many years back, and have noticed that the downfall of civilisation, the rise of fascism, the erosion of all our civil liberties, the creation of new concentration-camps, the round-up of liberals hasn’t happened as expected and foretold …  and the runaway train that is civilisation hasn’t crashed yet either.
On the other hand, over the past 40 years I’ve witnessed an astonishing change in the levels of social responsibility and political awareness around me, the rise of a highly effective and powerful environmental movement, the liberation of women both in politics and everyday life, the decriminalisation of homosexuality and a level of social acceptance of gay lifestyle that I never expected to see in my lifetime, the denunciation of everyday racism, sexism and homophobia in the media, in government, the workplace, and on the street, a level of social interaction and communication on a global level that wasn’t predicted in even the most prescient of science fiction, and a potential for positive change within the Global Village that I never even dreamed possible when I went on my first ever street-demos back in the 60’s & 70’s.
In many ways, as far as I can see, things have never been better, as the potential for change has never more eminently possible, and the tools of change ie. Mass communication, and education as a product thereof, have never been more readily available and accessible.
So stop succumbing to the fear, the hype, the bullshit, the propaganda, the fairy-tales and horror stories designed to make you fear the worst, expect the worst, and give up trying because there ain’t no point … because resistance is futile.
In my early days as a political activist, our mass communications were limited to Roneo and Xerox leaflets, screen-printed posters, underground magazines and newspapers, and cheaply produced button badges … simple, but effective forms of spreading our doctrines, and a far-cry from the easy access of emails, Youtube, Facebook and Twitter.
One very popular button badge wryly proclaimed the slogan:
BEAT YOURSELF UP – SAVE THE POLICE TIME
That, my friends, is what you and your negativity are doing.  You’re doing The Power’s job for them.   That is the tactic that seems to be working highly successfully at present with the wave of rampant negativity I see on so many articles, and blogs, and vids and Facebook postings: …..

“The Future is Hopeless”

No, my friends … Your attitude is what is Hopeless … The Future is just fine.

Fight The Power … Free The Future

Thanx to my Facebook buddy Brian Spencer for the motivation to write this … one of the many Good Americans I know

This Shit Must Stop!!

by stuwho
Oh Boy … I can certainly relate to this, having watched the endless cycle of insanity and stupidity which repeats the same old bullshit, justifications, and excuses, decade after decade, after decade, after decade, after decade.
We have more than enough for everyone’s needs, but never enough for the elitist greed which dominates our tortured wee planet

STEPHEN FRY: WHAT I WISH I’D KNOWN WHEN I WAS 18

by stuwho
Mr Fry constantly amazes me as he seems to be the only person I ever hear nowadays whose pronouncements, wisdom, humour and outright common sense  constantly makes me nod in agreement, and occasionally sit upright in shocked awareness , as I learn something that I’d never before realised … and at my age, that really is a surprise
Stephen Fry … nearest thing I have to a hero … makes me smile when I imagine what a dinner party with Stephen Fry, Frank Zappa, Emilie du Chatelet, George Carlin, John Pilger, Charlie Chaplin, and Maya Angelou would be like .
Me? … I’d be the waiter!!