Articles by: Phil Rockstroh

Veritable Uprising or it’s The (Faux) Real Thing™: Greta and Climate Activism in a Wilderness of Projections

Veritable Uprising or it’s The (Faux) Real Thing™: Greta and Climate Activism in a Wilderness of Projections

by Phil Rockstroh and Kenn Orphan PR: Kenn, recently, this observation of mine provoked a measure of ire:  Street demonstrations, even large ones, are apropos of nothing as long as they are manifested as de facto state sanctioned protests. A march proceeds, chants are cast into indifferent air, speechifying comes to pass by the usual gasbags then the assembled head[Read More…]

by 30/09/2019 1 comment Climate Change
A Careless Bully At The KFC At The End Of Empire

A Careless Bully At The KFC At The End Of Empire

Will Trump go to war with the Iranians or the homeless? Or both? Trump is a coward. The nation of Iran has the means and the will to fight. Do you recall the will displayed by Iranians when repelling foreign invaders when Iraq attempted to invade Iran as a de facto US proxy force? Conversely, the homeless do not possess[Read More…]

by 24/09/2019 Comments are Disabled Imperialism
Photo by bobosh_t

Thus Spake Oprah As The New York Times Spots UFOs Over The Comb Over Empire

I remember my first impression of the Reality Television program American Idol. I cringed at the thought, what if, a young Bob Dylan, Patti Smith, or the members of The Clash had been forced to have their talents appraised by the sort of shallow celebrities, supercilious moderators, and gallery of lowest common denominator-giddy cretins attendant to the hype-driven fare. Yet[Read More…]

by 15/01/2018 1 comment World
When The Unthinkable Becomes Quotidian: Thermic Runaway And Strangelovian Palaver

When The Unthinkable Becomes Quotidian: Thermic Runaway And Strangelovian Palaver

  The effects of humankind created climate chaos are proving to be more devastating than even the grimmest predictions. Today’s wealth inequity is worse than in the Gilded Age. Around the world, the U.S. empire wages perpetual war, hot and cold, overt and covert, including military brinksmanship with the nuclear power, the Russian Federation. Speaking of the latter, the U.S.[Read More…]

by 26/12/2017 1 comment World
What Was Verifiably Great About America: Fragments Of A Memoir Set To A Musical Soundtrack

What Was Verifiably Great About America: Fragments Of A Memoir Set To A Musical Soundtrack

  Having been born in a coal and steel company town but destiny delivered, as an adult, to reside, during extended intervals, in the East and West Coast cities of Los Angeles and New York City, and, at present, the continent of Europe, I have come to conclude, people born into situations providing economic advantage, both liberals and conservatives alike,[Read More…]

by 17/12/2017 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Capitalism’s Failure Of The Flesh: The Rise Of The Robots

Capitalism’s Failure Of The Flesh: The Rise Of The Robots

  Humankind, being an inherently tool-making species, has always been in a relationship with technology. Our tools, weapons, machines, and appliances are crucial to forging the cultural criteria of human life. At present, amid the technology created phantomscape of mass media’s lurid — yet somehow sterile — imagery, one can feel as if one’s mind is in danger of being[Read More…]

by 10/12/2017 2 comments Life/Philosophy
A Partisanship Of The Heart: Interior Measures Towards A Re-Visioning Of Capitalism’s Imperium Of Death

A Partisanship Of The Heart: Interior Measures Towards A Re-Visioning Of Capitalism’s Imperium Of Death

  According to a nationwide study [[https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/drug-overdose-data.htm] conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a greater number of U.S. Americans died (approximately 65,000) from drug overdoses last year than were killed during the course of the Vietnam War. All part and parcel of capitalism’s war against life itself. The emotional and physical pain, anxiety, and depression inflicted by the[Read More…]

by 21/11/2017 1 comment Life/Philosophy
The Voiceless Left Stands Before The Monster Of History

The Voiceless Left Stands Before The Monster Of History

  Rumors of war and the lexicon of war permeate the culture of empires, and the U.S. empire is not an exception. In a concomitant manner, the specter of violent death pervades the imagery of the U.S. entertainment industry and stalks the citizens’ dreams. Present circumstances merge with the sleeping monster of history: Close your eyes and images of cross[Read More…]

by 29/10/2017 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The confirmation comes soon after a report from the U.K. Met Office in June warned that the planet was well on its way toward that grim milestone. (Photo: Kevin Gill/flickr/cc)

Sex, Rage Displacement, And Ecocide: Wanderings In An Interior Archipelago Of The Colonised

  Human sexuality mirrors human culture. Mating dances of seduction and refusal, and acts of non-consensual aggression cannot be separated from traits witnessed, practiced, and internalised by the people of a particular society. It is impossible to close the bedroom door to the culture at large. Eros not only inhabits the genitals and the heart but Anima mundi as well.[Read More…]

by 26/10/2017 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
 2 or 3 Things I Know About Capitalism (with apologies to Jean-Luc Godard) 

 2 or 3 Things I Know About Capitalism (with apologies to Jean-Luc Godard) 

  A number of recent, press articles, including an over 8,000-word feature piece in The New York Times have asked, to quote the Times’ headline, “Why Are More American Teenagers Than Ever Suffering From Severe Anxiety?” Although the question was proffered, the reporters and editors responsible for the articles remain resolutely obtuse to the obvious: The bughouse crazy environment of[Read More…]

by 18/10/2017 Comments are Disabled Life/Philosophy
The World Is Too Big To Rig

The World Is Too Big To Rig

The bad news is we have been deluged with bad, even mortifying, news, and for such an extended period of time, the mind reels in bafflement as the spirit sinks. Despair seems an apt response to events one cannot reconcile, of circumstances of which one cannot gain perspective nor control. “The only sadnesses that are dangerous and unhealthy are the[Read More…]

by 12/10/2017 1 comment Life/Philosophy
Photo by adamnsinger

Shelter Within The Storm:  A Dialog On Politics And Culture 

By Phil Rockstroh, John Steppling, and Hiroyuki Hamada, Phil Rockstroh: I awoke, in our family’s flat in Munich, Germany, lashed and buffeted by thoughts of massive, Climate Change-strengthened storms, and jotted down the musings below, and then was seized by thoughts of the means terrifying storms, storms that deliver the vast, monstrous message of the indifferent, terrible fury of nature’s compensatory[Read More…]

by 18/09/2017 1 comment Life/Philosophy