Well I just watched the new robin hood starring Russell Crowe, and I have seen a bit of controversy on what people think of the movie. I myself thought it was great. I thought the story was very believable and the characters were well played. I found myself actually feeling for the victims of the Tyranny, and getting a little pissed at the lies of the king. As I watched the movie it made me see some if the parrallels to the real world. Where men will follow orders often putting their job first before what they know to be right. I have seen this many times in my own life, and just as the sheriff of Nottingham in the movie was no great man, and knew what Robin had done for the village that he was a part of, he let his jealousy, and his job title steer him to become a villain. I see this happen many times in our very own police force. Men who may join for honorable reasons soon become brainwashed into the status quo of their job, and see people as guilty first. They stop treating men and women as citizens of this country, and look at them only has criminals and cattle to be herded. They stereo type men like bikers, and the like will do anything they can do to destroy their lives, and it truly doesn't matter if they are guilty of anything or not. So far in my short life I have seen already what damage an overzealous and unchecked police force can do. In the death of a friends brother, and the death of an aquaintance, both killed by police, both died in vain, and both families were given no justice, and the victims were painted in ways I know neither of them to be. I have also had two brothers of mine, arrested, one of thems life is ruined losing family, friends, career, all for nothing. All to justify a paycheck by our wonderful government, and the other is awaiting trial. The victim of a police force who has made a personal pledge to destroy this man, and his friends lives for no other reason than he wears a patch on his back. This man faces two felony charges for a fist fight in which no one went to the hospital. This man will be banned from factories, and government installations where he works as an electrician severely limiting his ability to support his family. He will be denied the right to vote, and his firearms privileges will be revoked all for a fist fight where no one was seriously injured, that was started by the people who are witnessing against him. Why? You might ask. Because he wears a patch and the guys who started the fight and picked it do not. They were questioned only as witnesses, and he was railroaded and judged guilty immediately while they went home. I know this is not much of a movie review, but it was a good movie, and I think that if a movie is good it will cause you to have feeling and emotion and this definitely has. I do not say fuck the cops because I do not believe we need a peace keeping force, or someone to protect the people. I say fuck the cops because while not everyone of them are bad, the system itself is corrupt, and they are the happy foot soldiers who never stop to think that what they are done is in opposition to the freedom that this country garauntees from the founding.
Tuesday, October 5, 2010
Monday, October 4, 2010
Integrity
Ok I want to talk about the band integrity. Integrity has to be one of my most influential hardcore bands, not necessarily because I ever tried to emulate their style like some bands have in the past, but because they never seemes to care what was cool or popular at the time. I know that their singer did has been somewhat of a controversial figure in the hardcore scene in the past, but integrity was always a very original band, both in sound, and lyrical content. To this day few things will get me as stoked as hearing the opening bass line of hollow or the first few bars of systems overloaded. I know most people who might stumble upon this blog at some point in the future probably long after I have stopped contributing to it, will cite a variety of other bands to fill the slot that I have put this band in, and I have already heard people who want to give a band like cursed or some other band that is just not the same some kind of on the same level description but to me, integrity will always stay in a sub genre all it's own as one of the last hardcore bands to ever have a real mystique about them, and for that I am eternally greatful. One of the best and worst things about hardcore to me is bringing the band down to the level of the audience. When I was a kid I loved that aspect of punk, but as I became an adult and all my dreams of bands, and what they were doing and the lives they were leading were shattered by the truths of what band life was really like. I remember loving the stories that as I got older I realized how naive they were that bands were out there doing all these insane things, and I wish they all still had that level of mystique about them, but somehow a few bands were able to maintain a little bit even if not to the extent that they used to and for bands like integrity, neurosis, etc I will be eternally grateful for if nothing else that fact.
