Here by the way is a picture of pk and his son bk from that period: 1969 or 1970: it's a passport photo: we were on our way to see his grandma in Switzerland.
I share an email I just sent to bk:
Today's Straight Dope has this question: "People diagnosed as clinically obese are sometimes said to have a hormonal condition that makes them unable to lose weight even if they cut calorie intake to a minimum. Surely if you forced them to exercise while making certain their dietary intake and vital signs were healthy, they'd be slim and trim in a couple of years. In the end, isn't obesity always in the mind and not in the hormones? — Guy Scarsbrook"
I love it except for the "if you forced them to exercise" part. Who's "you"? I believe mama should be able to force Benjamin to eat his carrots and papa ought to be able to force Benjamin to wear a hat in the winter, but who else should have rights to force anybody to do anything? People can force people, but then they're rapists, thugs, muggers ... without general social support. Only parents of infants "should" be exempted.
I say "should" meaning: IF we want life to be what I (or any speaker) want(s). (If we don't, if we want to be dead, then we "should" misbehave in all possible manners.)
Anyway, groups, political groups, seem generally to think without thinking that force is OK if the mass of men do it ... then that that force is OK if the mass of men appoint the brown shirts to do it ...
The anarchist who first invited me in 1970 to be interviewed with her Free U anarchists on WRVR radio was called by her anarchists "Mercury." They met at the Methodist Church on Sheridan Square in the Village: big People's Yellow Pages banner out front: they were doing community bulletin boarding before Illich, before me!
Mercury also had a speaking gig at Hunter College, and invited me along. in 1971 I was getting most of my speaking gigs through her. (She and that group also introduced me to a wonderful bunch of European anarchists.) (Though my favorite guy of all was local: he wore a Stamp Out Human Chauvinism button!)
Anyway, at Hunter: some woman wanted to "take" children from abusing parents. Clearly she seemed intent on "helping" children: children who weren't hers! and was willing to trespass to do it. I wanted us to watch our trespasses. So I dragged my feet with her.
She didn't get it. No one got it.
The original email has been edited a bit: improved I hope.
PS: Benjamin is the four year old son of bk and his wife Nathalie.
PPS: There was a Quaker church which also supported the Sheridan Square anarchists. All FLEX literature was printed by me on a Quaker owned multilith in a loft on W 18 St. (Mercury taught me to clean it, ink it, run it ... and loaned me the plates, paper ...)
The only church that supported my FLEX was the United Methodist Women division. Every church ought to have.
PSS: Jan came over as I had the above pic open in Photoshop for retouching: I cloned out the passport stamps, fixed my teeth a bit ... Jan didn't know me in 1969, had seen only one photo from 1971: she assumed that the above was a pic of Brian and Benjamin; not pk and bk! Hilary, bk's mom agrees: she likes our passport photo, always did, and sees a lot in common among grandpa, son, and grandson.
Jan knocked my socks off when she noted resemblances between pk of 1970 and Shakespeare of the woodcut in the 1623 Folio (which I always have on the wall by my computers)! Sure: look at the shape of the hair over the ears.
No comments:
Post a Comment