student uprising - 2015 - In Defiance

In Defiance

Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois

BTS

2015

In 2012 a broad coalition of Quebec University and Cegep students went on strike to challenge a tuition hike proposed by the province’s liberal government. The strike grew out of a student’s general assembly vote at Valleyfield Cegep, southwest of Montreal, to include over 150,000 students and protests that involved over 200,000 people. Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois was one of the spokespersons for CLASSE,  Coalition large de l’ASSÉ, an organization formed out of the Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante, one of the largest student unions, specifically for the purpose of challenging the proposed hike. As a figurehead of a successful social movement he was the target of a ton of criticism issued by the press, professional politicians, and other sources. In Defiance is the English translation of Nadeau-Dubois’ these events as he saw them, and his response to some of the criticism he received during the events of spring/summer 2012.

In In Defiance, Nadeau-Dubois is telling the story of the student strike from his perspective, which was often situated in a meeting room or some other nerve centre of decision or communication, rather than out on the street. His book tells the story of the student strikes but it also subverts the standard modes of representations of the dominant institutions of Quebec society, and it subverts the myth of the younger generations as apolitical. Nadeau-Dubois book, and the events of 2012, reveal his supposedly apolitical generation rather as deeply engaged in politics and social justice, while it was the dominant political establishment that cynically sought to prevent his generation’s participation in politics through undemocratic authoritarian means and dismissively shallow and trite communication practices. Secondly, if one sees the government as protectors of democracy, the media as a source of enlightenment, the courts and police as sources of order and justice, then Nadeau-Dubois reveals all of these institutions to function in opposition to how they represent themselves. The Government is undemocratic, the media is a source of confusion and disinformation, the courts produce injustice and the police create violence and chaos. The overarching message of Nadeau-Dubois book seems to be that while these institutions champion democratic liberties and social progress in practice they seek to constrain society into a shape formed by a very specific neo-liberal worldview, but in spite of that change is possible.

punk - 1994 - Get in the Van: On the Road with Black Flag

Get in the Van: On The Road With Black Flag
Henry Rollins
2.13.61
1994
302 pages


What a great book. I've been reading a lot of punk books lately and so many of them are retelling the story of how The Clash in London, and the Ramones in NYC came to be in the tone of a newspaper concert reviewer working with the punk thesaurus on hand. I never hear the names of bands like New York Dolls or Dead Boys spoken in conversation but they're always in the foreground of punk books. No thanks. Way too many punk books tread the same ground of London and NYC and I'm left thinking about how uninterested I am in most of the music being discussed.

Many of those who were part of that first wave of NYC punk bands ended up with major label deals and I find that reading those histories of early punk gives me the sense that, at the time, punk was just a new trend in rock music, rather than a subversive subculture. Bands like Suicide may have been so transgressive in music and performance that they have nothing to offer a major label, but the rest were on board. The real punk of refusal and DIY sensibilities came after that first wave.

Black Flag, one of the originators of hardcore punk, created some of the most intense music of the late twentieth century. For nine years they played everywhere, every day, with as much soul as any group of musicians in history, and by their frontman Henry Rollins' telling, they did this for audiences that hated them. I had heard of Henry Rollins before I ever really heard Black Flag, first from the Liar video and then when I saw him in the film Johnny Mnemonic. When I first mentioned to older friends that I was listening to the Damaged album they would warn me that Black Flag was better Rollins became their singer and that Henry Rollins just plain sucks. In Rollins' written record of his time in Black Flag, he experienced these sentiments being expressed constantly by his audience who often communicated them with violence.

Get in the Van is Rollins' published journal of the time he was the lead singer of Black Flag, from 1980 until the band broke up in 1986. It's subtitle is 'On the Road with Black Flag' and the stories of criss-crossing the USA on an adventure does evoke Kerouac's novel of joyful discovery, but Rollins' story is dark and mean. Black Flag suffered to carry out their tours, and while they may have had one of the biggest names, nationally and even internationally, in hardcore punk, they often went without eating. One Rollins journal entry will have him laughing at being called a rockstar sellout, the next entry will describe the literally starving band saving the food audience members threw at them. Most of the book is about hardship; coping with cold, hunger, lack of money, and the relentless violence that Rollins experienced at every show. I wonder how many of the people who threw a beer a beer at Rollins or did some other stupid thing while he was on stage read this book out of nostalgia for their punk past and felt a stirring in their hearts when Rollins called them idiots or worse.

A lot of the punk books are written for the reader to submerge themselves in nostalgia or dive into the fantasy of being strung out back at CBGB the first night Television played. Rollins book describes the punk scene, from moment to moment, as encounters with the same dumb cowardice thats present everywhere else in society. No nostalgic idealizing is at play here, Rollins journal captures the brute stupidity of their audiences and the cruel grind of touring non-stop by van. Part of what makes his book so great is not only that its an honest and authentic record of hardcore punk life, but the 2004 second edition includes a lot of photos as well as reproductions of many of the flyers drawn by Raymond Pettibon.

street gangs - 2010 - Nothing to Lose, Everything to Gain

Nothing to Lose, Everything to Gain: How I went from Gang Member to Multimillionaire Entrepreneur
Ryan Blair
2010
Portfolio
222 pages

Before now, I've never ever even opened the cover of one of the mass-market books by some business guru investment whiz. My economic worldview is anticapitalist and I have pretty much zero interest in entrepreneurship but I also haven't read any of them because they generally look like trash published to exploit the gullibles who live in the fantasy of making millions by following a few trite adages. I highly doubt that any of these investment guru/success advice books are required readings in any MBA programs and I also doubt you can mention you've read these books on your resume. I've always assumed that these books have nothing other than the cliches they're drenched in to offer their readers.

As of today I've read one such business guru book, Nothing To Lose, Everything to Gain by Ryan Blair. God, speaking of cliches... just look at that title. I read this one because Ryan Blair says he was a gang member. I don't really believe that claim but whatever, his gang past is a small part of the book. It's his street gang background he draws upon when he mixes Jay-Z quotes in with the Sun Tzu quotes that I'm sure appear in every other book in the genre. I am convinced that every other book of this kind is exactly like this with some surface details altered and its basic elements rearranged from item to item and books like this have no value other than capitalist mythmaking.