Sad rappas

Listening to Eminem – the melancholy of rap. Rage over grief.

Also my habitual response now to current events: grief and rage. Does Pynchon have an alternative: “anger is only one mode of resistance, that resistance itself is not always the right term for whatever takes us out of the day or sets us against it”?

Zakis & Theodora
Kounadis

Is Zakis’ resistance – non-participation – adequate? Surely not: it cedes the commons. Does the Black-Eyed Peas’ rap hold clues?

If it smells like funk, it must be us
No one funky like us – we keep it snaky

To stand for social justice, to affirm a fundamental equality between us, is to affirm the value of the ordinary. Not just Marx’s “dignity of labour”, but the value of the unexceptional life, in stark contrast to our celebrity-fascinated, career-worshipping culture.

We stand in our messes, possessed of an invincible summer. And I think this has to go beyond even Gillian’s few moments that redeem a shitty life.

I’m going to hold a garden party and get to know some of the neighbours.