Uncensored
**taken from strangebeast.ca**A Rant By Loren Letourneau
It rises out of some blackened pit - bile and bilge, the scum that would quiet and distort the reality of living. Is life always a nice little place? No! Then why the hell should it only be reported as such. Who would dign to take offence at exposed sexuality, exposed brutality, exposed cruelty? It's there! No amount of shying away, no angel-eyed money-sucking politician can convince me otherwise. And yet, we're told that for the safety of our children, for the safety of our national stability, for the sanctity of our person, you've got to shut up or be shut down.
I loath censorship, with every fibre of my being.
But what of hate-literature, they scream! What of the evil belly that produces trash to subjugate, injure, and disseminate wrong?
Do you really think that it could hold up to truly open competition. Isn't it always the most inegalitarian and corrupt of societies that are the first to clamp down on free speech? What the hell's wrong with a society that it so needs to hide behind some mock public decency screen, to shelter itself from alternative views? Do you really think that given all the opportunity in the world to see and be heard - take money and power out of the picture - that only the slime would surface? Sure as hell wouldn't see the same ra-ra-America - or wherever you're from - dominating the picture, but is that really a bad thing?
Or a different question: do you think that the nasty shit that everyone rushes to condemn would have real staying power if it were open - to be read and criticised and exposed to the masses? Who'd want to pen that crap and put their name by it? If it stops shocking its readership into a willfull acceptance that it's okey-dokey to kill or abuse others, if it just can't cut through the voices screaming for life and liberty, if it loses its naughty little niche, then where is it? Exposed; thin; rooted in suppressed fear, helplessness, impotence, anger... Not powerful.
No. The real crime and the real criminals go on under cover of silence. No one's privy to their actions. No one's privy to their motivations. They lull unprepared, scared, and hurting masses to rally behind an empty cause, an empty promise, a power-trip that pumps them up better than the most depraved junkie.
We take the power from the people. We twist responsability into a grotesque cirque-noir grin. We pretend to know what's best for each other - on the people's dime. We shit all over our freedom, strap us into steel diapers and tie us to a post. They keep feeding us a line that says we can't take care of us - and there's the hooked barb - they'll do it for us. Sure we need police to stop from being robbed, raped or beaten. But wouldn't that be easier if it were all visible? Instead, they'll rob, rape, and beat our brains into submission... am I missing something?
Kill censorship, kill protectionist policy, kill privacy, kill opacity, kill this leash - by whatever name - that tugs us around, legs hobbled and arms torqued behind our backs.
I hate censorship. I can't possibly be sympathetic to it. I am an artist and it is antithetical to my purpose in life.
I live to expose and create.
The censor exists only to conceal and supress. How fucking virtuous.
posted by Loren @ 5:25 p.m.
2 Comments:
You may think differently when you have a child of your own that you want to protect from exposed sexuality, exposed brutality, exposed cruelty.
Not all of the world is made of rational adults like yourself.
Some of the human race, are still young and innocent and have the right to have a childhood, unmaimed by the filth of exposure that would destroy their innocence, and alter their experiences and ultimately their reality.
You are who you are because you grew up in a protected environment, with rights- yes, but also protected.
You were not exposed to sexuality, exposed to brutality, or exposed to cruelty.
The future children of the world have the right to be protected.
Gaila - both mother and grandmother
Gaila, points taken and I appreciate your interest. You are right to question, and I need to be more specific.
I said nothing about limiting access. I certainly don't endorse sending violent / pornographic / cruel or whatnot images in the direction of children. Developmental stages, variable parenting, whatever the reason, I do believe in limiting exposure. I also believe that some of that policing, as it is now, is in the hands of individual parents. But that's a different question entirely.
Essentially, what I am opposed to is the censor where it does not apply: to adults (and hope for the rational ones to win out - exposure and open criticism seem the best ways to assure that). That is to say, I do not believe there is justification for a censor when it's a case of the state handing down edicts on what's good for you. I live in such a state. Although ignorance may build an illusion of bliss, it's incredibly fragile and the misinformation and rampant closed-mindedness is bracing.
I am who I am because I grew up in an open and accepting environment.
I am who I am because I grew up with supportive parents and a supportive 'I can do anything' home environment.
I am who I am because I was born into this life as my own solid person.
I am who I am.
And I am who I am because life for me was filtered as I needed it to be as I was growing up.
And at the same time... as I have grown, as I have matured, and as I have experienced in the world; I am more convinced than ever before of the necessity to preserve that right to an open conversation, such as does not even exist in North America.
So, I rail against the censor such as it is here, and such as it is there. So, I wrote the rant.
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