Manifesto:
The Mad Farmer Liberation Front

by Wendell Berry

One of the articles in Reclaiming Politics (IC#30)
Fall/Winter 1991, Page 62
Copyright (c)1991, 1996 by Context Institute | To order this issue …

Love the quick profit, the annual raise,
vacation with pay. Want more
of everything ready-made. Be afraid
to know your neighbors and to die.
And you will have a window in your head.
Not even your future will be a mystery
any more. Your mind will be punched in a card
and shut away in a little drawer.
When they want you to buy something
they will call you. When they want you
to die for profit they will let you know.

So, friends, every day do something
that won’t compute. Love the Lord.
Love the world. Work for nothing.
Take all that you have and be poor.
Love someone who does not deserve it.
Denounce the government and embrace
the flag. Hope to live in that free
republic for which it stands.
Give your approval to all you cannot
understand. Praise ignorance, for what man
has not encountered he has not destroyed.

Ask the questions that have no answers.
Invest in the millenium. Plant sequoias.
Say that your main crop is the forest
that you did not plant,
that you will not live to harvest.
Say that the leaves are harvested
when they have rotted into the mold.
Call that profit. Prophesy such returns.

Put your faith in the two inches of humus
that will build under the trees
every thousand years.
Listen to carrion – put your ear
close, and hear the faint chattering
of the songs that are to come.
Expect the end of the world. Laugh.
Laughter is immeasurable. Be joyful
though you have considered all the facts.
So long as women do not go cheap
for power, please women more than men.
Ask yourself: Will this satisfy
a woman satisfied to bear a child?
Will this disturb the sleep
of a woman near to giving birth?

Go with your love to the fields.
Lie down in the shade. Rest your head
in her lap. Swear allegiance
to what is nighest your thoughts.
As soon as the generals and the politicos
can predict the motions of your mind,
lose it. Leave it as a sign
to mark the false trail, the way
you didn’t go. Be like the fox
who makes more tracks than necessary,
some in the wrong direction.
Practice resurrection.

Manifesto: The Mad Farmer Liberation Front” from The Country of Marriage, copyright © 1973 by Wendell Berry, reprinted by permission of Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, Inc.

Test on tumblr, where i will potentially move my blogging for my stay in DC next semester.

There are a bunch of wind generators about to go online near my home in Illinois, and I went to take photos of them while i was home, and while they were still pointed in different directions. Once they go online, they will always be pointed the same direction, into the wind. They have quite an incredible effect on the landscape. Somehow, though they are a good change from the coal power that is typical in Illinois, the landscape will never be the same. The flat horizon line will always be interrupted from now on, and any home within sight will never see sun rise or set quite the same ever again. It is a changing of the times.

-Mark Andrew Fenton

Kari, Kathryn, and myself went over to the swing set at Park View Mennonite and connected with our youth, pondered a few things, and enjoyed a cool July evening.

The artful snapshot has been around in the photography world for a while now, but I have discovered a that in the world of film, the home video can also become a unique and powerful art form.  In his music video for the song “En hand i himlen” or “A Hand in the Sky,” Jonathan Johansson simply sings and dances  to the music, which seems to be straight out of the 80s.  The entire video looks like it was shot from a sony handycam or some similar tiny consumer video camera, but the art is in the edit.  Frame by frame detailed choices, using light, composition, and beat driven editing makes this video top notch in the artful music video world, at least in my book.  After finding this, I realized that I’ve seen it before some years back, so aparently I’m not the only who likes the song.  It seems to me that in difference between a home video and art is the care and choice put into every cut, and I would venture as far as to say that in your typical music video there is far less care taken in the edit than in this video.  Anyways, take a look and enjoy.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7-TIba-dw5A&feature=related

Yesterday, over an extended lunch break, I watched the documentary “Jesus Camp,” a long exposé on a Missouri woman’s quest to save the souls of America, starting with the young children.  No age seemed off limits as she preached fire and brimstone to the youngest of elementary age children.  The cameras follow the preacher, Becky Fischer and  several children from the point of recruitment into the summer camp to the end of a week of preaching, speaking in tongues, condemning of abortion, and many more acts that seem typical of the Christian Right.  The shocking part of the whole film was the fact that the children were so unbelievably young.  The filmmakers provided a contrasting opinion to the mix by following radio talk show host Mike Papantonio, who’s flabbergasted response to the extremism could be viewed as the film’s only sensible commentary, or as the antagonist fighting against Fischer and her goals, depending on your viewpoint.  Papantonio was a quite clever device set up by the directors in that role.

Throughout the film I constantly squirmed as such young and impressionable minds were ruined with half truths and even lies about the Bible, humanity, and the world beyond the United States.  Again and again the children were told  that the world was a hopeless place, lost and unredeemable and the only hope left was the saving knowledge of Jesus Christ, who was supposed to be their free ride to heaven.  Escapist theology, in a nutshell.  Several times Fischer mentions just wanting to get out of this “sick ol’ world,” both to the camera and then telling the children that they should not desire to be in the “sick ol’ world.”

As a child, I went to a summer camp somewhere from age 8 till age 18, and I spent a number of weeks throughout a few summers as a staff member and counselor at various Christian camps.  Much like the camp in “Jesus Camp,” theology was boiled down a bit for the children, depending on the age, but never was I scared into any belief.  I treasure my times at those camps, regardless of my growth away from the theology and teachings there, because I was loved there above all else.  I never had an out loud conversion experience at any of the camps I went to, but I was still loved.  The teachers and counselors at those camps loved the children above all else, but in “Jesus Camp” the sole point was conversion of children into “warriors for Christ.”  Quoting Becky during one of her many sermons to the children, “This means war!  This means war!  This means war…”  And so on and so forth.  The children were nothing more than spiritual cannon fodder in a war against Satan.  Those poor children never had a chance to believe in the hope and love that God has for humanity, and that is the saddest thing I can imagine.

another test…

Due to the nature of summer, I’m wasting time and messing with new web apps, especially flock and twitter.  While I’m fully aware that I’m probably signing a contract with the devil, I have finally gave into twitter and putting my life on the web, or at least a censored version. 

Things I’m thinking about:
-tearing apart old broken things and making them new
-Regina Spektor
-Iron & Wine
-Donald Miller

During my summer travels last May through August I encountered a lot of interesting graffiti in all sorts of curious places, and ever since I have had a great appreciation for all things graffiti.  I recently ran across an incredible artist who goes by the name of Banksy.  The works displayed on the website are non-traditional, provoking, and very well crafted.  I am quite inspired.

http://www.banksy.co.uk/

~ma