Hegelian Crash Outs

    I have signed up to join a free reading group/lecture on Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit. It is a three month commitment that happens twice a week (peak unemployment activity I know). I am very excited to go! I am interested in continental philosophy and want to better understand one of the most important influences on Marx and Marxism, but I also have a kind of unhealthy fetishism of knowledge, especially obtuse and difficult ones. That is, I crave the prestige that comes with "having read Hegel."  

The big H himself, drawn with the lasso fill tool.

     The instructor recommended that I read the introduction and the translator's preface by Terry Pinkard, as well as the preface and introduction by the Heg-dog himself. Upon finishing the portions by Pinkard and starting Hegel's preface, I am immediately filled with fear and regret. Even though the course states that no prior experience with German idealism is necessary, I still feel that it might be too hasty to go straight to Hegel without having first read my Descartes, Hume, Spinoza, Kant and the like. I knew it would be difficult and I would struggle with the famously opaque text, but to actually confront a wall of incomprehensible text, to read every sentence in a 539 pages book at least three times, really shook me out of my romantic dark academia fantasy and into the reality of my inadequacy. 

    From this, I thought about REALLY understanding the ins and outs of Western philosophy, about sinking my teeth into the entire canon, from Socrates to Derrida. How long is that going to take? Even if I get an okay grasp of Hegel, which would take me maybe 10 years (idk), I would open guys like Heidegger and be faced with the same experience of needing to get used to a totally foreign way of talking, and have to throw in another 10 or so years to understand it. After that it can be Lacan, or Deleuze, or Derrida...by the time I have a cursory understanding of all of these guys I would be 100 years old. 

    I think beneath all these frankly stupid fantasies and anxieties is a very instrumental view of reading and knowledge. I think a lot of men suffer from this kind of attitude that views reading as valuable only as far as it can be transform into something concretely useful in one's life. It is a view of text as only a vehicle for the facts and ideas that are the true goals of reading. It is the logic behind those books apps that uses AI to summarize the main ideas of a book to you so you can pretend you've read it; it is also the logic behind my inability to enjoy reading fiction and my preference for "useful" non-fiction books. (I feel like this is a gendered thing but I'm not sure.)

     I think I need to just suck it up and try my best and go to the lectures. It will be fun. It will be fine. I will learn how to work with Hegel. I will learn how to tackle difficult philosophers. It is fine if I'm wrong about Hegel. It's fine if I only get to Derrida when I'm 90. It's okay. It'll be helpful and interesting. No one will laugh at me. (I should also just read some fiction...)

Long Live Animation: Bird Bros at TAAFI

     I directed an animated short film with a team of friends some time ago. It is a Freudian drama about a cuckoo bird killing his brothers to win his mother's exclusive love (you can watch it here). The film was selected for the Toronto Animation Arts Festival International (TAAFI) and as the director I got to attend the festival FOR FREE!!! The festival was held at TIFF Lightbox from April 8-12. I got to watch so many cool animated films and shorts and I need to talk about them.

    The ranking of the films requires some explanation. While to express one's enjoyment of a film in five starts will always be incomplete and arbitrary, here are what each rating means in my head:

★★★★★ Life changing, unparalleled, god tier impact and beauty.

★★★★☆ Love the film very very much. Will watch one william times and share it with everyone.

★★★☆☆ Great 

★★☆☆☆☆ Enjoyable, pretty good, nothing to write home about

★☆☆☆☆☆ Don't hate it, whatever experience.

 

 ✷  

 

K-Pop Demon Hunters ★★☆☆☆

     This first film I watched in the festival was K-Pop Demon Hunters. I think what everyone has been saying is true. The art direction was top notch, the characters (especially Zoey imo) are super well acted. Not to mention the insanely catchy songs. I couldn't get these dang songs out of my head ever since I saw the movie.  

    I caught the K-pop Demon hunters behind the scene panel after I saw the film and I learned about how the animators designed and approached timing, as well as the way they seamlessly transition between the regular style and the cartoonist chibi look. It's all very cool and I think every animator ought to check it out! 

    I do, however, think the story was a bit stupid. I felt that the "accept yourself" story is a tad overdone and I don't feel like the film has much to add to the tropes, resulting in kind of a formulaic and generic story that I don't really feel has much staying power.   

 

 ✷  

 

Goat ★☆☆☆☆

    On day 2 of Taafi, I attended some panels about indie animation and watched Goat at 7pm. The movie was whatever. Much like K-pop Demon Hunters, Goat looks amazing and has fantastic art direction. I especially like how the film take the body mechanics of different animals into account when animating them playing basketball (it's called roarball in the film but whatever...). The quadrupeds play basketball on all fours, the Steph Curry giraffe use his long neck and height to his advantage, etc. It makes the basket ball scenes quite dynamic, interesting and fun to watch. 

    However, Goat is yet another case of a post-spiderverse Sony film that looks very impressive but has no story to back it up. The main character Will Harris is small and he's the first small animal to break into the basketball league. Despite everyone looking down on him (literally) Will manages not only to find a place in the team but elevate the whole team in some way. I've seen this story one million times; I know his inspiring speech before it's uttered; I know every montage before it happens, and I was quite bored the whole time.

    I feel this is even weaker than KPDH because whereas in KPDH I can enjoy the songs, I have very little interest in basketball. It makes for a pretty bland viewing experience for me personally.

 

✷  

 

Kaleidoscope Kollection 

    After Goat, I watched a bunch of short films in the film block, Kaleidoscope Kollection. This is a film block for the experimental, unconventional and the uncatagorizable. The following lists the ones I especially enjoy.

 

A Black and White Story ★★☆☆☆

     I really like the look of the film!  It is very meticulously done. The cross hatching and the use of comic panels reminds me of the photo realistic rendering in Fun Home. But I find the story of the film to be a bit emo in a high school kind of way. I guess I am not in a place of my life to be finding the story of a man not feeling authentic, finding the world to be fake, and wanting to commit suicide to be especially meaningful. (See trailer here, director's instagram here)

 

Marc Page and the round goat cheese ★★★★★ 

    I LOVE THIS FILM!!! I was feeling a bit down because I wasn't feeling that enthusiastic about any films I saw thus far. But this film totally make me feel like the trip and the loud environment was worth it! I don't really know what this film is about. I think the main character Marc Page is reliving a memory of losing a wheel of cheese and the sadness and regret therein. I'm not sure. But at the beginning of the film it instructed me to turn my brain off and watch with my heart, so I am not going to worry too much about what the correct interpretation of the film is. 

    In any case, the film is energetic, exciting, heartfelt, and extremely funny. The design of the characters and the locations are so adorable and fun, and the choice of using very rough watercolour contributes to the absurd, dream-like feel of the story. 

    This is the highlight of the entire event and I can't wait for it to be posted online so I can see it again!  (See trailer here, film instagram here)

 

 Warp and Weft ★★★★☆

    I love this film almost as much as the last one! It is a series of interviews set to stop motion animation done on textile art. The interviews address the charm of art forms like embroidery, quilting, and knitting, their relationship to gender, and much more. The visuals are so beautiful and stylish, it exudes love for the medium of textile art. Impressive and moving work! (Director's instagram here) 

 

✷  

 

The Horrors Persist

    Day 3 is when my film would be screened, so instead of going to every panel and screening I hung out with the team before heading to the festival together in the evening. My film is in The Horrors Persist film block. Once again, here are the ones I really like.

 

Luz Diabla ★★★☆☆

     This film is about a flamboyantly gay man on his way to a party seeing a mysterious light that led him to crash his car in the Argentinian country side. This film is so suspenseful and it keeps you on the edge of your seat. The approach of Argentinian folk lore through a queer lens is also interesting. Beautifully animated, weird and entertaining short film! (See trailer here, artist's instagram here)

 

TV Entreaberta ★★★☆☆

    If judging the films by creepiness, I think this film is without a question the best in the block. It takes a very simple idea – a girl being trapped in her TV – and manage to keep the horror at a same level for the entire duration of the film. The character animation was also amazing! Especially in a scene where the creepy TV host plays the piano. It was so energetic and unnatural that I was in awe for the whole sequence. 

    However, the best thing about this film in my opinion is its commitment and fidelity to the old TV aesthetic.  I love the frantic editing, the sound design, and the mock advertisements inserted throughout. And I absolutely adore the credits being done in the style of old TV menu screens. Everything works together to make the film so immersive and unique! Fantastic work. (See film instagram here)

 

Skin Flick ★★★★☆

    The hit film from the hit school Gobelins is, to no one's surprise, a hit. The character design and animation is just so expressive, the use of colour is so nice, and the story is entertaining, absurd, and strangely heartwarming. You don't need me to tell you that the celebrated Gobelins film is good, you just need to watch it again. (See film here)

 

✷  

 

Soy Frankelda ★★★☆☆

    Day 4!!! I was supposed to wake up early to see the Mexican stop-mo feature film, Soy Frankelda, at 9:30 am. I was however too sleepy and got to the theatre about 15 minutes late. As a result, I think I didn't understand the whole story very well, nor do I really get what point the film was trying to make (something about truth and/in fiction, creating art as a woman, etc.) 

    What I will comment on is the absolute beauty and craft in this film. Every puppet and every set in this film is so complex and so intricate. Every shot is full of details and are so stunning. I also like the rough way the characters move. It reminds me of old Christmas movies animation and heightens the childish wonder of this whimsical dream world. 

    I cannot wait for this film to be released so I can watch this film in full and finally find out what it's trying to say! Before then, I think it's super fun and an amazing technical achievement. I love it!

 

✷  

 

Generational Gems 

    After a Cuban sandwich and a cafe con leche for lunch, I headed over to the Generational Gems film block, which includes short films that are for kids as well as adults.

 

STRIDE & SHINE! ★★★★☆

    This is a simple and beautifully vibe-based film about a little blue guys exploring a colourful world. The bright colours, the simple character design and the delightfully expressive and lively animation makes this a memorable and joyful watch. The whole thing reminds me of the animation of Masaaki Yuasa, who is my favourite animation director. Great stuff!!! (See director's instagram here)

 

Chirp Talker ★★★☆☆

    This film is made by a ten year old girl, telling the story of her making an machine to interpret the chirping of birds. I found this film to be so charming! I think the kid has an astonishingly strong and cohesive artistic vision. Watching the film, you don't think that it's "good for something made by a kid." Instead, the childish drawings and the crude animation are paired with genuinely inventive composition and storytelling to support a story precisely about childish musing and day dreaming. It's fun and cute and very very effective. Really goes to show that great art can come from anywhere and anyone. 

    This film is also cool cause it's about birds in Taipei! (See film here from 19:37)

 

✷  

 

LAAFI

    After Generational Gems I felt exhausted, so I hung out in a quiet area with my friend Somsom (not real name). After having dinner I watched the LAAFI film block, the block for funny haha short films.

 

 Interview with a Dragon ★★★★☆

    A mocumentary film about an interview that goes awry when the dragon being interviewed doesn't do any dragon stuff. The interviewer follows the dragon around in his house and found out the dragon's true passion is making yogurt. This film is so funny!!! I love the stupid design of the dragon and the dialogue is so natural and well written. And when the film become about making yogurt and the joy of taking care of something in a seemingly pointless life it's actually weirdly moving. Amazing! (See director's instagram here)

 

The Murderer ★★★★☆

     This film was so fun! It's a stop motion adaptation of a story the director wrote when they were a child. It's about a man who collects dead bodies in his back yard, as well as his arrest, which results in the end of crime forever. 

    This film operates with such a delightful kid logic and the visuals did such a good job reflecting that. I love that the characters' arms all bend downwards (horse style) in profile view because that's how little kids draw arms; I love how crime is forever solved after the one murderer is jailed; and I love how the story is voiced by the director's little niece and nephews. Great execution of a great idea! (See film here, director's instagram here)

  

Potion of Wizard ★★★★★

    POTION OF WIZARDDDDD!!!!!! This is the film I most look forward to being dropped online because I NEED TO SHOW IT TO EVERYONE!!! 

    This is a story of a wizard making a potion but missing one ingredient, ear of worm. He follows a sketchy looking cat, who secretly plans to murder him,  on a journey to find this ingredient. This film is so packed with jokes and visual gags and is sooo funny from minute one to minute done. Normal things are referred to as "thing of thing" to sound magicy, it's so stupid and I love it. The mixed media in this film also looks so fun and cool. There's hand drawn stuff, there's photos, there's stop-mo, there's puppetry. It make the film look so unique and insane. 

    I met the creators of the film after the screening and they said the film was made just by the three of them in two years. They have two guys on 2D stuff and one guy on all of the stop-mo stuff. That's crazy. That's insane work. POTION OF WIZARD FOREVERRRRR!!!!!! (See studio's instagram here)

 

ReRooted ★★★★☆

    This film is about a little green guy trying to escape his gruelling assembly line job to be a celebrated animator while the world burns. This film was very loud and fast paced. It is very effective in communicating the insanity and the overwhelming dread of living through the end of the world. I love the collage look, and the style reminds me of UPA animation. 

    Just a very well made, depressing little film that pokes fun at the absurdity of this crazy and fucked up world of ours. Nice! (See film instagram here) 

 

✷  

 

Death Does Not Exist ★★★☆☆

    After LAAFI, I watched the Quebecois feature film Death Does Not Exist. This film follows Hélène on an assassination attempt of an ultra-wealthy old woman with a group of her comrades. During the operation, Hélène freezes and, when all of her comrades are slaughtered, runs away. Hélène is haunted by the ghost of her comrades and reflects on activism, revolutionary violence, and love.

    This film is quite contemplative and slow, and because it was 11 o'clock and I was very tired I don't think I fully grasp what the film is trying to do or say. I think it is exploring the tension between the revolutionaries' romantic view of the cleansing quality of revolutionary violence and the ugly reality of killing another person, however much it is deserved. I think it wants to ask whether it is worth it to uproot a comfortable life that is full of injustice and contradiction to pursue a better world and, if yes, what sustains this commitment. It is a very comfortable-leftist-in-the-imperial-core film and as a comfortable leftist in the imperial core myself I find it difficult and thought provoking. 

    It kinda seems like the film asked many difficult question and then just drop a poem and ends??? But I suppose it is the nature of a film like this that I have to watch it more times and to understand what it's saying to me. As it stands, I find it to be a visually gorgeous and thematically interesting film!

 

✷  

 

    Taafi this year started out a little underwhelming for me but at the end I was so inspired and pumped up about animation!!! It is so cool to be reminded of how much animation can do. And I love to see that beautiful films are still being made all the time despite the animation industry crashing and burning at the moment. I love animation!!!!!! What a cool and versatile medium!!!! Long live animation! Everyone start animating NOW!!!!

The Trinket Post

A collage of my assortment of stuff

 

     One of the most fun type of post I've see since the start of my remarkable blogger journey has been trinket posts. I love seeing people's stuff and their unique way of presenting them. A few days ago I thought "Why not me? Why don't I do a trinket post?" This is a result of that. 

 

    I am quite a shoddy photographer, so these are not the most beautifully photographed images of all time. But I have a very fun time putting these together and I hope you like looking at them as much as I liked making them.

 

 

1. A finger puppet of founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. 

2. A finger puppet of Freud's famous analyst couch. These two finger puppets are a birthday gift from my boyfriend. I was in my peak Freud phase at the time. On that birthday I received the finger puppets, "the Freudian slippers," mint in a Freud tin, and Psychoanalysis and Feminism by Juliet Mitchell. I felt loved and blessed but I no doubt looked like an insane person walking around with all of my Freud items.

3. Shrimp I stole from school. The shrimp was found in a cup in the sound recording room. He seemed grimy and unloved, so I decided I can provide him a better home.

 

 

4. Chiikawa key chains. You can spin their faces and give them different expression! I got Chiikawa (right) first in a blind box but I soon feel he needs a friend. To my surprise, the second one I got is also an identical Chiikawa. Fortunately, I was working at the Chiikawa store at the time so they let me use my second Chiikawa as a display and get another one for free. To my dismay, the new one I get is my enemy Momonga. (left) Terrible.

 

5. Pixie Hachiware is a gift from my friend, Gracie. Hachiware is my favourite Chiikawa, look at him! What a delight.

 

6. Hachiware with a bad haircut. I like this one not only because he has a funny haircut, but also because I love how he's melting. 

 

7.  My final foray into blind boxes that left me broken and bitter. Aiming to get any of the main trio, (3, 4, 5 from the left) I purchased two boxes, only to get two mfs I don't care about (1 and 6). A man of weak will, I went back for another and got another one I dislike (2). At this point, I had gotten all of the dumb ones in the set and if I stop I would be clearing the bad ones out just for some random asshole to get my beautiful sons. I had no choice but to get the rest of the friends. I learned from this experience, much to my chagrin, that with the gentlest push I too will become a gambler and an addict. It was my lowest moment, but I did get seven beautiful friends out of it.

 

 

8. A birthday gift from my friend, Jo. I've been wanting a garden gnome for some time but I never got it because it's a very stupid purchase. I was very happy to receive this jolly friend into my house. I like to bring him to art markets and display him with my comics and prints. He fits in very well with the nature theme of my work and setup.

 

9. A gift from my sister on her trip to Japan. This is a character in one of my favourite web comics, nmeneko. The comic is about a very dumb cat and a very caring cat. It melts my heart and makes me cry.

 

10. Paddington from Paddington station, gifted to me by my friend, Abby. 

 

 

11. Ikea meatballs keychain. This is a free gift for Ikea members in Taiwan. I dragged my mother (Ikea member) to Ikea specifically so I could get this man. I love that he's very polite and has a sweet smile. Terrific fellow!

 

12. A clay pumpkin I made two Halloweens ago.

 

13. A creature from a blind box series my friend likes. She already has this one so she gave it to me.

 

14. A wooden bear I got from Hokkaido a number of years ago. These wooden bears with a salmon in their mouths are everywhere in Hokkaido and I absolutely adore them. I have a soft spot for wood carved things but the shape of the bears is so simple but dynamic. This one that I have is a small one that fits in my palm. A perfect travel sized bear.

 

 

15. This is a plushy that my boyfriend's aunt gave us one Christmas. When I was in Taiwan last year it I brought it with me and it was stolen by my dog, Jet. It is now stinky and covered in dry slobber. I will never wash this guy because I like to be reminded of Jet's stink.

 

16. A rat pope my boyfriend got for me on his trip to England. He got this from the Lincoln Cathedral and I think it's very funny. 

 

17. A miniature statue of 風獅爺 (Wind Lion Grandpa). This is a local deity common in Kinmen, an island near Taiwan. The island is very windy and people there put down stone statues of these lions everywhere to calm the wind. In high school a few of my friends went to Kinmen for a school trip, I begged them to bring a wind lion back for me and they did. It cost 100 New Taiwan Dollars (about 5 CAD).

 

 

18. Bionicle 1 (Lerahk) These are the two bionicles that I brought with me to Canada. I like this guy because he has a bug in his back. 

19. Bionicle 2 (Toa Kopaka) this one is cool because he has asymmetrical face. For more about bionicles, see the bionicle post.

 

✷

 

I am thinking I should make this post into a zine. The collage is already done and everything is already written out. People will probably be into this I think.

Overcoming Paddington

My lovely friend Abby got me this Paddington from THE Paddington Station. My prized possession.

*Spoilers for Paddington (2014) and Paddington in Peru (2024)*

    On March 18, I watched the 2024 film Paddington in Peru with my dear friend, Gracie. There were little things about the film that I was mildly dissatisfied with. For example, they recast my beloved Sally Hawkins and I didn't like the new actress as much. But all in all I quite enjoyed the film. I love Olivia Coleman and Antonio Banderas's iconic performances that live up to the long tradition of high profile actors having a great time performing delightfully quirky villains, and I love it when Paddington runs toward Aunt Lucy and gives her a big hug (it never fails to make me a sobbing mess). It is without a doubt the weakest entry in the Paddington trilogy, but that speaks less to the poor quality of this film and more to the life-changing beauty of the first two films. 

    There is, however, a persistent critique that is levelled against P in P, and I fear it is quite a valid one. Despite being set in Peru, P in P seems terribly uninterested in the country, its culture, and its people. A usual UK-centred Paddington story stresses Paddington's relationship with the UK, his interaction with its people and his struggle to form a unique British identity. Paddington is situated in the UK and the story explore how this situated-ness shapes and drives him as a character.  P in P on the other hand doesn't feature any speaking Peruvian role nor any (human) populated Peruvian locations. After a pretty stereotypical travel montage featuring bustling marketplaces, locals in unfamiliar attire, and many, many llamas, the narrative moves into the hidden-away home for retired bears, and eventually, the empty darkness of the Amazon forest. The only speaking local roles are reserved to the (stunning) English actress Olivia Coleman and Spanish actor Antonio Banderas, who are later revealed to be gold-lusting treasure hunters descended from a line of Spanish colonizers. 

    P in P is, above all else, a take on the classic treasure hunting narrative -– that uniquely colonial trope and tradition. After all, what is a good treasure hunting story but a fantasy of a rugged individual embarking on an adventure to an uncharted tropical jungle –– one where the natives are either nonexistent or bone wielding savages –– to extract an ancient resource previously unharvested? While at the end of the day, P in P might want to condemn endless greed of its colonial treasure hunters, it nonetheless exists in the shape of a colonial dream. It is unable to challenge the narratives that strips the colonized of their voices, agency, and humanity.

✷

     Paddington is no stranger to postcolonial critiques. This is because at the core of the Paddington story is an assimilationist narrative. Coming from "Darkest Peru", Paddington must learn proper English etiquette, he must forgo his bear name in favour of a name easier for English speakers to pronounce. To be sure, it celebrates the new life immigrants bring to the community, yet it takes for granted the disproportionate accommodation expected of immigrants, as well as the erasure, or at least dilution, of their identities. Paddington is one of us, but not before the Browns guide him to shed his savagery and embrace the ways of civilization. 

    Yet having re-watched Paddington (2014) last night, I find the film's handling of this material to be destabilizing, exciting, and odd. To start, the film presents the opposite of the assimilationist position –– the exclusionary position –– in quite an insightful fashion. We were introduced to our first racist, Mr. Curry, who is the archetypal working class racist. Mr. Curry's racism is really rooted in ignorance and his lack of understanding of the other. His objective is to maintain the imagined British way of life. Yet Mr. Curry's racism is presented as toothless and abstract. It is only mobilized and concretized by Nicole Kidman, who espouses an entirely different form of racism. For Nicole Kidman, the end goal is never to expel the other, but to stuff, taxidermize, and display them. The other is, for Nicole Kidman, useful. As Susan Sontag observed in Regarding the Pain of Others, the display of the other automatically objectifies the other and solidifies the spectator as an "us". She wrote about the disproportionate coverage and display of the suffering Non-European bodies, 

The exhibition in photographs of cruelties inflicted on those with darker complexions in exotic countries continues this offering, oblivious to the considerations that deter such displays of our own victims of violence; for the other, even when not an enemy, is regarded only as someone to be seen, not someone (like us) who also sees.

    So is the case with Kidman's view of Paddington. The other must be exhibited for all to see. He must be emptied of subjectivity, stuffed with European projections and ideas, and ultimately frozen in his abject barbarity. The savages are made as much as they are found. Power is, as Foucault observed, as productive as it is repressive. 

     The characterization of the assimilationist position in the film is just as surprising. The film presents the assimilationist view not only through the Brown family, but also through an original character created for the film –– Montgomery Clyde, the explorer. In an especially intriguing part of the film, the members of the Geographers Guild ––  supporters of the exclusionary-exhibitionist position –– question Clyde as to why he did not kill one of the bears and bring it back as a specimen. Clyde's response states clearly what the Browns say only in a repressed form, "Gentlemen, these were no dumb beasts, they were intelligent, civilized." 

    The members are not impressed. "Come off it Clyde," they retort, "they don't even speak English. Did they play cricket? Drink tea? Do the crossword? Pretty rum idea of civilization you've got." 

    The scene moves on and Clyde does not get to reply, but it makes one wonder what he would say to the geographers. Why would he use this word, civilized? Does he understand civilization to be something more than the superficial signifiers that the members list out? Or perhaps he was merely thinking of his own list of superficial signifiers: they love marmalade the way we do, they yearn for London the way we do...The narrative, staunchly on the side of Clyde and the assimilationist position, seems to indicate that the latter is true. After all, the film suggests that Paddington may be incorporated into British society precisely because he is civilized in this superficial sense, because he speaks English, enjoys tea, and maybe even plays crickets and does crosswords. When all is said and done, the bears are included with the exact logic by which they are excluded.

 ✷

    It is in this nuanced understanding of the exclusionary-exhibitionist position and the complicating of the assimilationist position that the film reaches its most astonishing dialectical insight –– Nicole Kidman is the daughter of Montgomery Clyde. The seeming contradiction between the assimilationist position and the exclusionary-exhibitionist position is revealed to be working within the same colonial framework of the Geographers Guild. It is in the colonial encounter that the colonized other, that quasi-subject stuck between beast and man, becomes a problem to be solved by the European man; and it is through the same colonial gaze, the same will to power-knowledge, the same need to domesticate and master the other that these opposing solutions are articulated. 

    Assimilate Paddington into the dominant culture or freeze him in his savagery for all to see. It doesn't matter which side you choose, the logic of colonialism remains intact.  

    As much as Paddington praises the possibility of assimilation, as much as it tries to tame Paddington's otherness with his English politeness and love of marmalade, it cannot help but undermine itself, to gesture at the unity of the seemingly opposite positions. Under the loud and apparent privileging of one side as opposed to the other, it can't help but ask under its breath: Is there a possibility of overcoming this contradiction? What might be lying beyond?

Comic Research Notes #1

State-Building and the White Terror: The Cause of Political Persecution in Early 1950s in Taiwan, Ching-Hsuan Su (Master Thesis)

 

Today I learned that the founder of Taiwan's communist party and 

a leading figure in many anti-KMT movement was a women named Xie Xuehong.  

 

The cause of the White Terror is usually interpreted in two ways. 

The first is to place Taiwan in the global context of the Cold War and the Chinese Civil War. This position understands the persecution of left-wing activists and intellectuals as following the direction of the US Empire. The difficulty with this view is that it ignores the agency and semi-autonomy that the KMT possessed under this period. It underplays the fact that in order to secure its rule on the island, the KMT also persecuted pro-US forces that threatened its power. 

A more subtle version of this view is best exemplified by left-wing historian 藍博洲 (Lan Bo-Zhou), who understands the White Terror as a campaign to root out the left-wing organizations on the island who play a leading role in anti-KMT movements. The US is the condition of possibility for KMT's rule in Taiwan, and the rooting out of the left is the necessary process of KMT security. This view, however, is not without problems. It over-inflates the impact exerted by the Taiwanese Communist Party (TCP) and its movements. The TCP was a major anti-KMT actor during the period but not the only one, nor did it take a leading role. In reality, the masses largely neither express solidarity with the communist success in China, nor identify with the left-wing project of its Taiwanese counterpart. 

The second view, in conversation with the first, is advanced by the scholar 李筱峰 (Li Xiao-fung). This view understand the White Terror chiefly as the KMT's effort to ensure the security of its rule. In his article, 台灣戒嚴時期政治案件的類型 (Categories of Political Persecution Cases under Taiwan's Martial Law Era), Li describe 8 types of political persecution cases which include communists and left-wing actors, Taiwan independence activists, indigenous elites, liberal and democracy activists, etc. He provides examples of each category and describes the challenges they present to the KMT rule. 

This view attempts to demonstrate the source of White Terror violence as a stabilizing mechanism internal to the authoritarian state as opposed to the direct influence of anti-communist geopolitical forces and influences. This explanation, however, is unsuccessful in challenging Lan's subtler version of the first view, in which US imperialism and US interest create the ground for KMT's activities. (does it need/want to challenge it? if so, why?) (authoritarian security vs Cold War framework, p17)

 

Drawing from the recent theories of "state-building" and "state-formation", scholar 吳叡人 (Wu Rwei-Ren) subsumes the above two views into the three interconnected and temporally overlapping contexts that condition KMT's chosen path of monopolizing violence and securing its territory –– of state-building.

1. State-building Project from Mainland China, 1945 - early 1950s: difficulty of incorporation of Taiwan in to the larger Chinese Republic after WWII, resulting in (1) the violent suppression of the 228 movement and (2) the persecution of non communist actors in the early 50s.

2. KMT's state-building in Taiwan, 1949 - 1987: difficulty of moving the state apparatus from China to Taiwan after the lost of the Chinese Civil War, resulting in (3) violence enacted to achieve minority rule (what's the difference between (2) and (3)?) and (4) the anti-communist persecution as the extension of the Chinese Civil War. 

3. The Cold War, 1947 - 1989: US interest and support for KMT's Taiwan tacitly permits and provides stability for the KMT to achieve violent process of state-building. (A little unclear on this whole argument.) (State building+three contexts, p12) 

Under these constraints, KMT, as a nascent state weakened by a brutal war, built its state in Taiwan first through a terroristic and easier-to-develop "despotic power" while developing infrastructure of power, under the protection and stability provided by the US,  to penetrate into society and more effectively exert control. As this "infrastructure power" became more developed, the use of despotic power becomes more sparing. (despotic power v. infrastructural power, p14)

 

All of the above interpretations assume the state as a unitary rational actor. This is a useful framework when discussing intentional acts of political persecution, cases such as the elimination of communist and left wing actors, the suppression of independent movement and liberal activists, and the removal of political factions threatening the ruling Chiang family within the KMT. Yet this view proves to be insufficient when discussing a specific class of cases –– miscarriage of justice (冤錯假案), or cases where the intelligence agencies knew a person's innocence*,  but decided to carry out the persecution nonetheless. 

That the cause of these cases are usually attributed to collateral damage or the corrupting influence of absolute power points to the need of clearer theoretical elucidation. 

The author believes that to understand the source of these miscarriage of justice, one must understand state actors not as "one solid piece of steel", but in three agentic levels: 

1. The Chiang family as the face of the KMT, the seemingly unitary agent whose motivation is analyzed above. 

2.  The multiple intelligence agencies whose existence and overlapping area of jurisdiction is the result of clique politics bubbling in post-WWII China, and the difficulty of cramming all of the agencies from the whole of China onto one small island. The two main intelligence agencies of the period are Military Intelligence Bureau (Whampoa clique) and Ministry of Justice Investigation Bureau (CC clique). The MIB and MJIB, controlled by powerful cliques, exercised semi-autonomy within Chiang's KMT. Yet their overlapping functions and the limited resources of the state created pressures on both agencies to compete, withhold information, out-perform, and even frame members of one another.  (保密局v.調查局, p113)

The miscarriage of justice committed under this level may be further subdivided into (1) inter-cliques struggles, where members of the agencies or their associates are framed and (2) institutional rationality: the offer of prize money or the enforcement of performance requirements, in order to out-compete the rivalling agency, which motivates the false accusation of innocent civilians  (inter-cliques struggle v. institutional rationality p173)

3. The individual agents that may actively seek out people to persecute for the prize money or passively hand in innocent civilians to meet the mandated performance requirement. (institutional rationality and individual agents, p184) 

It is in the interaction of these three levels of rational actors ––  Chiang's power over the continued existence of the cliques, the cliques' struggle for power with each other, the motivation presented to the individual agents –– that the explanation for the widespread miscarriage of justice is to be found. 

* By using the word innocence, I do not wish to convey that the other persecution cases were legitimate or right, that the people persecuted are "guilty". By "innocent" I only mean that they are unrelated to KMT's project of anti-left wing suppression, security of power, and state building.

 

Chapter arrangement:

Chapter 1: Introduction, literature review (p10)

Chapter 2:  Development and elimination of KMT's primary internal enemy Taiwanese Communist Party.  Strategies and missteps in each periods. (p37)

Chapter 3,4: KMT's strategy of countering internal enemies. Chap 2 focuses on 1945 - early 1950s (228 incident), chap 3 focuses on 1949 - 1987 (elimination of internal enemies, two intelligence agencies). Showing the gradual development of infrastructural power. (p78, p100)

Chapter 5:  Imagined threat of internal communism as a driver of state building, fabricating internal enemies and the logic of wrongful and framed cases. (p162)

Chapter 6: Conclusion (p208)

Appendix: Relationship between early communist leader Xie Xuehong and Cai Xiaoqian. (p213)

About That French Romeo and Juliet Musical

Have any of you heard of the 2001 French musical, Roméo et Juliette, de la Haine à l'Amour?

It is a show that I periodically remember exists and become obsessed with before forgetting it all over again.

In my first year of high school, I had a friend named Maxime. Maxime is half French, and his dad is a stage producer. One time, Maxime invited two other friends and me to see the Taipei performance of Roméo et Juliette, de la Haine à l'Amour with the original cast, which his dad worked on. We got to look at the sets and the backstage area up close, and we get to watch the show from the front row, FOR FREE!!! It was honestly one of the most amazing nights of my life.

At the time, I was only moderately into musical theatre, having only really loved one musical – Tom Hooper's 2012 film Les Misérables – which I watched in my second year of middle school. Roméo et Juliette, then, was the first ever musical I saw not through the language and medium of film, but as live theatre. It changed me as a person and made me the most obnoxious of theatre kids (even tho that archetype doesn't really exist in Taiwan). Because I saw this in the theatre, I am now cursed to love Hamilton.

 

The show is pretty popular in France and has toured many countries in Europe and Asia. Although aside from Quebec, it doesn't look like it has ever been to North America. Which is a big shame because this show is frankly iconic and would no doubt be a big hit with you emo fuckers and Phantom heads.

The show is a deliciously melodramatic rock opera retelling of (you guessed it) Romeo and Juliet. One where everyone yearns and pines and wails and moans, from minute one to minute done, from when they haine all the way to when they amour.

After a tender overture that disclose the tragic ending of the story, the stage lights up, and the ensemble sings the opening song, Vérone . Even before anyone sings a note, the show already oozes style and angst. The Montagues and the Capulets showed up in brightly coloured costumes. The leathery costumes are shiny and tightly fit, accented with over-the-top buckles and shoulder pads. It's giving X-Men and it's giving Star Trek, a look that is on-its-face queer and over-the-top but taken absolutely seriously. Camp aesthetic par-excellence.

      

      

 

The sets in the show are simple but very effective. The huge and immovable brutalist marble structures feel oppressive and weigh down on the show. The big openings of the structures also function like comic book panels, cutting up the space between events happening at the same time. Very cool use of the set.

 

My favourite song of the show is La haine, in which Lady Montague and Lady Capulet lament the senseless hatred that led to the destruction of so many lives and plead with the world to "listen to women's words.

This song is so good!!! I love the contrast of voices between the women, Lady Capulet clear and powerful, Lady Montague raspy and resentful. It blends so well together and conveys the emotion of the song perfectly.

   

   

The song also gave us this frankly iconic moment in which – to demonstrate that the Montagues and the Capulets are like marionettes controlled by hatred – the dancers pull the famous Jojo Siwa Karma's a Bitch dance move, 23 years before it was cool.  

 

I also really like the casting of Romeo. The man that plays him is such a generic handsome man. He looks like he stepped straight out of a bodice ripper novel. It's really hard to take him and his flowing long hair seriously, even when his best friend just died.

And in case you are wondering, the weird white woman is Death. She does interpretive dance in the background whenever something consequential comes up. Amazing stuff.

 

In conclusion, if you are into brooding men with long hair lamenting their situations through songs, if you like Phantom-style rock operas, or if you like the original Shakespeare play, I think this show might be for you. You can find the whole thing on YouTube, although the uploader interpolated the video to make it 50 fps, which gave me a huge headache when I watched it recently. Watch at your own risk.

Comic Break Through

 

Chiang Kai-shek more like Chiang Kai-shit amirite fellas???

As many of you know, I was drafted in the Taiwanese military last year and I am currently making a comic about my experience there. 

What I've been really struggling with is that I don't have a take about all this. Or at least not one that I feel confident and comfortable sharing. Not only because I am not that well read about any of this, but also because there are some obvious tensions between the Marxist me and the Taiwanese me.  

Now you might say "Justin, you don't need to have a take on this." And until today I was begrudgingly following that advice, making the comic primarily as a documentation of my short time in the barracks. I was taking a lot of inspiration from Hideo Azuma's Disappearance Diary, covering a pretty serious subject matter through comedic and light-hearted anecdotes and letting the readers draw their own conclusions. But even though it works well for Azuma's subject (his experience with alcoholism and homelessness), I feel my subject matter is much more tied up with history and politics, and the omission of that context feels somewhat avoidant in a way Disappearance Diary's ommission was not. (It is less so that homelessness is not political. It obviously is. I think it's just easier maybe to speak of homelessness as if it is not part of larger society, as it is an experience of being violently cast out by it; whereas the draft is a mandatory inclusion of the individual into society... idk.) If a US soldier in the Iraq war make a story about his time with the boys in Iraq while totally omitting the politics of the Iraq war, it would be very odd and obvious to anyone reading. 

My boyfriend says it might be okay because compared to the US military the Taiwanese military is less obviously evil and less of a hot button issue, but I think he just doesn't know the history that well. I also think it is not really true, as every time I bring up my comic to someone, they'd say "wow that is important work especially in today's political climate." A military comic probably cannot work without explicit politics.

 

I talked to my mom this morning and because it is recently the anniversary of the 228 incident –– a campaign of mass incarceration and murder of Taiwanese intellectuals, activists, and suspected communists carried out by the US-backed dictator Chiang Kai-shek and his Nationalist Party (KMT) ––we talked about state violence and civil repression when she was little. 

After the KMT lost the Chinese civil war and retreat to Taiwan, it declared martial law on the island that lasted for 38 years, the longest a country has been under martial law at the time of its repeal. During this time, the KMT disappeared, assassinated, executed, and imprisoned whoever they want for no more than mere suspicion. My mom had a first grade friend whose dad got kidnapped one night and no one knew what happened. This is known as the White Terror. Many families of the victims still don't know what exactly happened to their family, 30 years after Taiwan's democratization.  

I feel this has to be what the comic is about, yeah? A parallel narrative about a society under military rule and one of the last pockets where that culture lives on, ossified and refusing to change. I also think this is one of the places where Marxists and progressives in Taiwan can begin a dialogue. A dark history where the influence of US imperialism and the global interest of capital is undeniable. 

 

I think I will interview my grandparents, and the parents of a prof whose parents are White Terror survivors. Maybe I'll try to find some Taiwan independence activists and Marxists. 

This is going somewhere!!! 

Fetish of Structurelessness

A day ago, the reel captioned I think this is how we do it guys. 🌱🫘 was uploaded to Instagram. In the video, OP described what they envision a "Gen Z solar punk revolution" to look like. 

The main theses of the reel are as follows: 

1. The Gen Z revolution would be achieved without strong organization or centralized discipline, but instead arise by Gen Z collectively decide to "stop playing the game." A movement that is "a little feral, a little chaotic and completely impossible to control." 
2. By collectively deciding to opt out of the system and building our own networks of mutual aid and community, the world might be changed without a direct and violent confrontation with capitalism. "the Gen Z revolution isn't going to look like a war, it's going to look like a giant party." 
3. The Gen Z revolutionaries create a "parallel power" –– an alternative mode of production to the dominant power under which goods are produced communally and shared freely. 
4. The example of living a better life can be spread online, inspiring more people to do the same. 

Despite its unfounded level of confidence and its grandiose proclamation of revolution, the video is misguided, infantile, and reeks of the worst excesses of liberal mysticism. 

 

To start with the most obvious critique, the OP's commitment to non-violence (thesis 2) seems totally absurd in the face of what they wish to achieve. In a different reel defending this commitment, OP claims that the creation of a parallel power –– mutual aid networks, growing one's own food and sharing them for free –– is more dangerous to capitalism than an angry man with a gun. They do not seem to recognize that this threat to capitalism necessitates violence, whether they like it or not. Two common examples of parallel powers in recent memory: the Black Panther Party and Hamas, are groups that fill in the needs that the dominant power fails to satisfy and gain legitimacy through that act. Absolutely! But neither of these parallel powers are short of angry men with guns. How this violence is to be avoided by the parallel powers they do not say, preferring instead moralizing slogans like "violence is the language of the empires, it's what they're most prepared for." (In fact, there is not much argumentation happening in these videos, only plenty of one-liners and zingers masquerading as arguments.) 

Aside from the quasi-logical moral "arguments" advanced above, OP also attempts at making historical arguments. The problem is that OP doesn't seems to know much history and wish instead to will historical fan fictions into reality.  "Look at history," they say, "the most transformative movements in the world did not win because they were more violent than the empire. They won because their pacifism, their commitment to integrity, honour, justice......made the empire morally and socially unstable and unsustainable." They claim that "...the revolutions we remember are the ones that begin with some dramatic event and it's usually super violent, but the ones that stick are the ones that just kinda like... happen when people stopped playing by the old script." They do not disclose which secret revolution they are speaking of, nor do they discuss the Algerian revolution, October revolution, Haitian revolution, French and American revolutions or any other massively transformative and incredibly violent revolutions of recent history. The most revealing entry of this flaccid historical argument is a joke video captioned Me Explaining How Violent Revolution Leads to Violent Societies and Peaceful Revolutions Lead to Peaceful societies, in which they show an image of the French revolution when discussing a violent revolution and then a stock image of a block party when discussing peaceful revolutions. An astonishing appropriation of history, an incredible rhetorical escape from the reality principle any postmodern fascist would no doubt envy. 

OP occasionally exclaim what seems to be their catchphrase, "respect existence or expect resistance," which is the only situation in which resistance is named. But if he "draws a firm line" at violence, what does this resistance look like? How are we to resist in any meaningful way in the face of the destruction of the parallel power we wish to build? Is there any historical example we can learn from? With the OP not addressing these questions, I can only conclude that they are deeply confused and unserious about their own project.

The difficulties with thesis 1 is very much continuous with that of thesis 2 described above. Refusing to view the reaction of the bourgeoisie –– organized consciously and without hindrance around a common interest while having access to the repressive state apparatuses –– as a real threat, OP favours sporadic, uncontrolled, and structure-less activities that are "a little feral, a little chaotic and completely impossible to control." They speak disapprovingly of "waiting for the political moment or the perfect coordinated date where everyone rises up at once" without realizing that that –– organization, coordination, a united front, centralization and discipline –– is the only means we can take advantage of our numbers, which is our only edge against our more powerful enemy. As Lenin wrote so convincingly in 1920,

how is the discipline of the proletariat’s revolutionary party maintained? How is it tested? How is it reinforced? First, by the class-consciousness of the proletarian vanguard and by its devotion to the revolution, by its tenacity, self-sacrifice and heroism. Second, by its ability to link up, maintain the closest contact, and—if you wish—merge, in certain measure, with the broadest masses of the working people—primarily with the proletariat, but also with the non-proletarian masses of working people. Third, by the correctness of the political leadership exercised by this vanguard, by the correctness of its political strategy and tactics, provided the broad masses have seen, from their own experience, that they are correct. Without these conditions, discipline in a revolutionary party really capable of being the party of the advanced class, whose mission it is to overthrow the bourgeoisie and transform the whole of society, cannot be achieved. 

The fact is that when facing the stronger class the timeless revolutionary motto, apes together strong, holds true. Revolution, then, is hard work, requiring not only heroism but also persuasion, creating broad but wise coalitions, tactics and much more. 

Compared to Lenin's vision of revolution,  OP's ideas of revolution are painfully childish. In an absolutely embarrassing moment in the video, OP describe the style of their revolutions as "Like, remember when our generation was literally stealing toilets out of high school bathrooms? Like, there was no meeting! There was no manifesto! We just started doing that shit!" The "revolution" turns out to be nothing but a pubescent lashing out.

 

Thesis 3 seems like a reasonable statement for a left-leaning person to make. Yet with theses 1 and 2 –– that is, without a strong centralized organization nor a the willingness to use violence –– thesis 3 becomes laden with problems of its own. Without the forceful seizure of land, where will this society plant food for the entire community? Without seizing the means of production, how will we produce enough goods to satisfy people's needs? Paying closer attention to OP's language, "Build tree houses, start little forest tribes," it is exceedingly clear that instead of addressing these problems, OP can only paper over them with a condescendingly European fantasy of a primitive society, in harmony with nature and disconnected with the modern means of production (or all technology for that matter). A society "less like cyberpunk, a little more like Minecraft." 

Mark Fisher pointed out the pitfalls of this anti-modernist Pocahontas ideology in his now iconic blog post about James Cameron's Avatar (blue Pocahontas). "What is foreclosed in the opposition between a predatory technologised capitalism and a primitive organicism, evidently, is the possibility of a modern, technologised anti-capitalism. It is in presenting this pseudo-opposition that Avatar functions as an ideological symptom." It is not difficult to understand why people distrust technology and modernity. After all, technology as we know it is the most effective instrument of domination and control. But to identify technology fully and totally with capitalism, to equate a historical form of appearance of technology with technology as such, is pure ideology. Under capitalism, technology is developed to increase productive capabilities, to ensure labour's submission, to extract resources and surplus value wherever it finds itself –– to serve capital. It cannot appear in any other form under this mode of production. But to turn against technology and embrace primitivism is not only to embrace a false idealization of premodern life, but also to forego the great emancipatory potential technology presents.

The great insight of Marxism against utopian socialism of Marx's time is that we cannot conjure a better world out of thin air, nor can we discern its shape from first principle. 

"What we have to deal with here is a communist society, not as it has developed on its own foundations, but, on the contrary, just as it emerges from capitalist society; which is thus in every respect, economically, morally, and intellectually, still stamped with the birthmarks of the old society from whose womb it emerges."   

The revolution and the world it ushers in must be grounded by the understanding of the opening presented by the contradictions of capitalism and the material conditions it creates. It cannot work otherwise. 

The truth is that we can now and only now build a better world not because people in the past didn't understand having fun is fun, but because for the first time in history the productive power and technology is so developed that we as a species may finally be liberated from necessity and scarcity. That the only viable path forward is not the gruelling return to back-breaking premodern life (for it will look nothing like Minecraft) but to seize technology thus developed for the project of human emancipation. There is no way out of capitalism except for going through it. 

 

Permeating through all three theses, I think, is an understanding that the state of a movement is determined not by the material conditions it exists under but by the positive or negative attitudes of its members; that the masses may will an entirely new world, willy-nilly and untainted by the old world, into existence –– in short, idealism of the most vulgar and unsophisticated kind. 

By idealism, I do not mean it in the colloquial sense of striving towards an ideal, the opposite of realism; but rather in the Marxist sense of the upside-down view of history as shaped and driven first and foremost by human intentions and will. The OP argues for this position explicitly when they say that social movements "won because their pacifism, their commitment to integrity, honour, justice......made the empire morally and socially unstable and unsustainable." or more pithily and proclaimed in an arrogantly matter-of-fact fashion, "politics is downstream of culture." 

The problem with idealism is that it posits the human mind to be apart and above the material world, the breath of God inside the sons of Adam that are ordained to shape the world to their liking, when in reality the mind is inextricably a part of the material world. Human ideas, then, does not arise in a vacuum, but from the human engagement with the sensuous world and is constantly tested and confirmed by it. Marx wrote in Theses on Feuerbach,

The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question. Man must prove the truth, i.e., the reality and power, the this-sidedness [Diesseitigkeit] of his thinking, in practice. The dispute over the reality or non-reality of thinking which is isolated from practice is a purely scholastic question. 

It must be noted that for Marx the material condition doesn't only mean the natural world, but also the social reality, i.e. the practical engagement with nature by humanity, her ever changing ways of organizing production, distribution, and reproduction –– the social world. It is in this two-fold world that humanity is thrown in, where she must form her ideas of truth and justice, where she must develop her culture and her relationship to art and music and dance and joy, where she might try to effect change. To stand OP's upside-down statement on its feet, we can say that politics –– understood as the struggle to alter the material conditions, the relations of production, and the relations of domination therein –– determines the shape of culture. 

It is simply insufficient to build OP's solar punk utopia through good vibes alone. "...little seeds of cooperation, resistance, creativity, love," is absolutely meaningless without the collective ownership of the means of production, without the fundamental restructuring of capitalist social relations. 

 

To envision a utopia, to dare dreaming of a better world after the collapse of the USSR and the pronouncement of the end of history, is a rather difficult business. To OP's credit, it is good that in the current crisis people like them are once again daring to dream. To say that a different social order, one we might actually want, is possible. 

It is true that, as revolutionary writer Anton Ego wrote, "...the work of a critic is easy. We risk very little yet enjoy a position over those who offer up their work and their selves to our judgment...... But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is probably more meaningful than our criticism designating it so." 

It is therefore not the intention of the present blog to discourage the dreamers, finally shedding the shackles of neoliberal era left wing melancholia, to continue their approximation of the future they want. The hope is rather that the dreams might, through this critique, come into clearer focus. That the dreamers might look onto comrades and movements before us for inspirations and lessons to learn, rather than seeking a clean break from their tradition. 

The task is thorny and terrifying, but to quote the immortal words from The Communist Manifesto, "The proletarians have nothing to lose but their chains. They have a world to win."