When does a contradiction, become so expansive, so over-extended that it becomes a farce or travesty? Spewing double-speak & running rivulets of torrential dishonesty whilst triple-backflip hysterical-hypocrisy that outrun cogitable capabilities.
Twerk for tyranny. Nicki Minaj, the once brilliant US Rapper who has long since been frayed by fame, commercialization & crippled by institutional appropriation & artistic nullification (a fucking $ell-out basically), is to headline the Jeddah World Fest in Saudi Arabia next month. Nicki’s arse gyrating & sordid quips will compete with other live Sharia spectacles, such as the mass execution of 37 Saudi citizens (public beheadings as is customary for the Kingdom) a few months earlier (topping 2016’s record of 47 in a single day). All women who attend the concert will be forced to preserve their modesty by wearing the abaya (I am not making this up) & potentially require a male escort in adherence to the Kingdoms uniquely autocratic, ultraconservative, Wahhabi monarchist theocracy (with exceptions, Abdul Aziz bin Nazir al Saud included). ISIS will presumably provide security for the event. Jared Kushner´s extraordinarily abnormal, surely unlawful & unprecedented off-the-record conspiratorial couplings with his close chum MBS are swiftly yielding results (the concert will be beamed globally via MTV & others, & fast & elementary electronic visas for international visitors are assured).
From MBS to BDS. Open Source Festival over in Düsseldorf have “disinvited” the rapper Talib Kwelli after he refused to publicly disavow his support for the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement (BDS) which resulted in the cancellation of his impending German tour. Germany has been accused of “imposing political conditions on artists who support Palestinian rights” by a group of 100 academics, writers, musicians & creatives. They wrote an open letter to the Guardian which quoted their solidarity with 240 Jewish & Israeli scholars who had recently written “The three main goals of BDS – ending occupation, full equality to the Arab citizens of Israel and the right of return of Palestinian refugees – adhere to international law”.
In December last year, London ‘Drill’ rappers Skendo & AM were jailed for a duration of nine months – for performing one of their songs “Attempt 1.0” at a live concert (yes! really!) They had apparently violated a specialized gagging order, specifically tailored to censor their music, which I believe is referred to as a “gang injunction”. After almost a decade of grievously decimating Tory implemented Austerity, the deliberate & total extermination of front line charity Kids Company, the liquidation of the Child Poverty unit, the abnegation of the child poverty elimination targets, the redefining of the definition of ‘child poverty’ to avoid liability & criminal charges, record inequality, record “in work poverty”, massive societal mutilation through extremist fiscal policy combined with severe cuts to policing – almost every category of crime is exploding, including youth & gang related violence. The Conservatives are, & continue to be, the prime architects, instigators & culprits of this massive increase in criminality & instability. Their scapegoat in this deliberate push for societal collapse (“Victorian values”, plutocracy, carrion capitalism, – ”there is no such thing as society” <Margaret Thatcher>) is being unforgivably foisted onto young rappers, who obviously are to blame for everything right? A few days ago, no less than 5 former top police officers seriously attacked the Conservatives for their atrocious & criminal, crisis-addled fiasco fuck-up-fest on crime prevention/public safety & security, which included the following dramatic language: “feeling of lawlessness” “the public have perilously low expectations of the police today” “virtual destruction of neighborhood policing” “emasculation of British policing” “parts of the criminal justice system were failing” “the wider criminal justice system was ‘dysfunctional and defective’”. They called for a royal commission. The Conservative party & its entire membership of MPs (‘joint enterprise’) needs to go on trial for crimes against the British people, treason, willful neglect & gross negligence, abuse of power, abuse of office, fraud, reckless endangerment, corruption, conspiracy, malicious intent, war crimes, “failure to prevent & failure to protect”, manslaughter, perjury, making misleading false or deceptive statements or forecasts & a whole other litany of major corruption & misrule-related offenses.
Sir David & Sir Fredrick Barclay, often referenced as “the Barclay brothers”, the murky & lucifugous billionaire owner of the Daily Telegraph who have one residence on the Channel island of Brecqhou (they own the island) complete with “gothic-style castle” (which they had built) & a whole other swag-bag of ventures, have recently been trounced in a French court. They had been trying to sue the French playwright Hedi Tillette de Clermont-Tonnerre for both defamation & invasion of privacy after he scripted a play based on the brothers christened “Two Brothers and the Lions” billed as “a satirical fable on capitalism”. Throwing his weight behind Hedi & the hosting theatres, the judge concluded that – “ in the text, there were no facts revealed that were unknown, egregious, intimate or even imaginary and pejorative which are likely to constitute a particularly serious intrusion”. Lawyer Olivier Morice summed it up accordingly – “You don’t have the courage to plead censorship but you are asking for the play to be banned.”
Editorially independence indeed…pull a Kushner! An “official investigation” has been launched by the UK government (public interest intervention notice) into the sale of stakes in the Independent & London Evening Standard newspapers to a Saudi ‘investor’. This new putsch comes on the back of the publications already existing collaboration with The Saudi Research & Marketing Group, which is a subsidiary of the Saudi government, led by our man Mr. Bone Saw. Not wanting to be short on intimacy, further shares in the paper (Lebedev Holdings) were sold off to a “Saudi businessman with ties to the state owned bank” (‘take back control’) last December for a sweet 25 million pounds. All set then for externally exploited skew, spin, manipulation & of course – omission (straight out of the Jared Kushner New York Observer stratagem). Problem is, the fantastically corrupt UK government that is in abject cahoots with the Saudi’s has appointed the Competition & Marketing Authority & Ofcom to investigate. Neither of these vehicles can be trusted to arbitrate with the necessary teeth, autonomy & veracity amongst “vested interests” for doted VIP clients in an era of profuse & unparalleled rot in British politricks.
Some good news & nobility in this putrefactive plutocratic downward cyclone – British Petroleum, that sick, mass murdering, apocalypse baiting, poisonous, mega polluting monolith of corporate death & blight, is getting thoroughly belabored for its rancid, self-serving sponsorship of the arts (the National Portrait Gallery) for company whitewashing purposes. Five Turner prize winners have demanded the company desist from its subvention of the gallery & have joined a throng of over 70 prominent artists doing the same. This was preceded by Mark Rylance taking the highly appropriate & most commendable step of resigning from the Royal Shakespeare Company due to its sponsorship deal with BP. – “Art has always been a practice of hope. BP have demonstrated that they have no interest in our collective future & will jeopardize it in the pursuit of profit”. Jim Ratcliffe, aka “the Community Rapist”, Britain’s richest man, most rapacious Fracker & head of the truly diabolical, deranged, toxic apogee, petrochemical, oil, unnatural gas & plastic conglomerate Ineos needs the same attention (he recently brought Team Sky & rebranded them Team Ineos as well as relocating the company’s headquarters to Monaco to avoid paying tax in the UK).
Human-horror-story & champion of excremental illness Jair Bolsonaro managed to vault the lunacy, desperation & stupidity to a new record cataclysm with his herculean-chicanery & manicured-coup riddled “surprise win” earlier this year after extraordinary interventions, circumstances, events & efforts in Brazils political climate. The reservoir of sewage & shit-talk that stained the way included frequent bombast about aggressive, if not unhinged & berserk, pledges to lay-waste to corruption & drugs in particular. As soon as he seized power (arguably before), he made the polar-opposite overture of aligning with Israel’s notorious Benjamin Netanyahu, a man openly beset by multiple corruption, bribery, breach of trust & fraud indictments by his own countries attorney general & police force & facing down probable impeachment as the result of such criminality (Netanyahu’s wife Sarah was recently convicted of illegally misusing state funds to fund her gluttonous decadence after accepting a plea bargain rather than face a conviction for fraud a-la Jeffrey Epstein)). Bolsonaro has also established an incestuous relationship with Chump, the absolute personification of human corruption & fraud splashed with the most potent septic venality ever tallied. A great start then. well, it gets even greater. On the back of other bank-bursting-shit-stream that we won’t even get into (even the rightwing & his hitherto supporters are laying into this shit-scrape of an idiot just six months into his term), Bolsonaro’s son Flavio is fending off accusations of drug dealing, corruption & affiliation with Brazils notorious militias (third party, ex-security service criminal vigilantes & drug pushers). Start as you mean to go on! but astonishingly, unbelievably, monumentally – it gets even more ridiculous! – Last month, Bolsonaro attended the G20 shit-sham in Osaka with the rest of the finks, dolts, thieves & dotards. A military delegation travelling with Bolsonaro stopped over at Seville, Spain on its way to Tokyo. A member of Bolsonaro’s personal entourage was caught with 39kg of cocaine in his hand luggage! I repeat – 39 KG of cocaine! Bolsonaro’s boys (could it be his fall guy?) caught trafficking cocaine into Japan! Here & now! Bolsonaro has also stated he would like to reinstate the death penalty for rapists. Late last month, E Jean Carroll became the 23rd? 24th? Or is it 25th? Woman to make a public accusation of sexual molestation (in this case actual rape) against the “Grabber of Pussies” & hush-money serial abuser Donald “Dunce” Chump. It’s a wonderful world.
Fresh off tha vine! – Nicki Minaj found the stones to cancel her performance in Saudi Arabia this month. After “careful reflection” she went on to state – “while I want nothing more than to bring my show to fans in Saudi Arabia, after better educating myself on the issues, I believe it is important for me to make clear my support for the rights of women, the LGBTQ community and freedom of expression.”