Month: July 2014

Built from the street?

| Henna Timanttimetsä
I idealize prostitutes, sex workers. Should I defend myself for it? In movies they are often the most beautiful characters, flamboyant, fleshy, flashy, loud, hurt, always getting up from some deep hole, beaten, spat at, surviving. Cars and prostitutes, clothes and postures, bending, asses, legs, shoes, gestures, suggestions, make-up, fed up faces, police stations. Prostitutes the individuals and persons, strength, misery, injustice, choice, fast lived life, death which somehow is around the corner. In my mind there is an image of unshameful femininity and not at all defeated, but standing on high heels. To me it seems I am not alone with this. They, those women, hookers are well represented in our culture, talked about, shouted out, shouted at. We are curious about those beings who sell their bodies. Generally prostitutes are seen the lowest of the low, victims and drug users and in this country hookers are not visible other than in movies and on TV. So they as people are kind of real life imaginary creatures, secrets and whispers, forbidden and wanted. In movies prostitute is a common character. They light up the police station and the dark alley, brothels are colorful hideaways where people can anonymously get whipped.
Whores are interesting people to whom happen things that normal working people may not face. The ordinary and normal can be appalled by it. Prostitutes look like fairy tales, fairy tale figures, fantasies themselves fulfilling fantasies of others. It is terrible to call someone a whore. It is terrible to end up a whore against will of one’s own. Much is emphasized on the horror of prostitution, brutality of sex trade. Abolishing the business hardly is possible, hypocrisy on the other hand makes lives of prostitutes difficult. Contradiction is curious as I see prostitutes are much imitated in entertainment, fashion photography = advertising. Dangerous living is a luring image, a fantasy which is the imitated possession of prostitutes, their wealth, a lifestyle.

Lack of it

| Henna Timanttimetsä
Intelligence is on everyday level a matter of opinion. It’s stupid, it’s clever, it’s whatever. Do we have to go through this? I think we do. It is a tender spot and we like to see ourselves as smart to whom others can be compared to. Right? We toss the matter to each others’ faces as blame. It is the most common feature to discriminate, judge and bully for. How do we come to know intellect of others is kinky stuff, because we often do not. We just think we do. Mostly it feels like an easily accepted sadistic thinking model we repeat because it feels like a good win. We often like to make conclusion and analyse starting by the look of people what goes on in there. To me it seems the most important quality of people since it is so much praised, talked about and pointed out quality. Intelligence is ability to learn, be creative with things learned, invent new ways of doing, thinking and seeing, develop ideas, develop oneself, make progress and grow as a human being and let others grow as well. Do you think you are intelligent? What do you think intelligence is?

It is also a learned strategy of knowing, lying, scheming, plotting and trying to defeat. We become manipulated to know certain things since birth. Manipulated to live proper lives in set ways. Calculative and manipulative behavior is seen as intelligent as is cynicism, meanness and millions of ways to con. We become to know norms of society and what is stupid or clever and accepted ways to make it. We like to call our society intelligent as it is a highly evolved system. Logical and well-thought. Particular kind of accurate exact activity seems intelligent to us. We know where it is going. Someone makes a fortune out from scratch, dresses smartly, behaves correctly, builds a life of one’s own, knows what one wants can be intelligent. There is a lovely contradiction there as new and clever ideas may seem impossible and stupid, useless. Our society does not encourage to think in new ways, but it encourages to become well-off. For some that is the only way to be clever.  

Part of intelligence is the will to provide for weaker ones, share one’s own, have empathy, clean up a mess made, apologize, consider other beings worthy and equally important. It is a civilized look on the complex issue of intellect. It is all not problem solving and technological advancement. Personal intelligence is under suspicion all the time. It is part of the test of in which group one belongs to, is the person on the same level or not. This of course is not practice of civilized people. To be able to accept difference in others is part of the intellect I would call intellect worth having. Constant measuring and testing is neurotic and abusive pattern of those who want to be part of elite and wish society to have elite. In search for similarity, acceptance and admiration we want to do well and succeed. Testing each other on every day basis is a normal practice of finding suitable partners and allies, find out who get you and who don’t.   
Accuse and comment the lack of it is a weapon and meaning is to diminish and dominate. It is a very traditional way of facing someone with stereotyping with instant prejudiced mindset refusing to think otherwise. As embarrassing and shameful as it, stupidity, the whole thing of measuring is to put to shame and down below. Stupid is like dirt, an invisible creature without much value. Can it be talked about and should it be or are we set ready? We live in the world of smart things, although machines develop quicker than human intellect. Does possessing those smart electrical devises make us more clever and aware, knowledgeable, well-informed? I think it is the meaning of our current culture to create an illusion of our cleverness and so doing we are analyzing intellect wrong and shallow. We get stuck to wrong kind of idea of intellect so easily.

Oil company silently poisoning indigenous people for decades with government permission in Peru.

| Henna Timanttimetsä

http://warriorpublications.wordpress.com/2014/04/25/indigenous-protesters-occupy-perus-biggest-amazon-oil-field/
http://news.mongabay.com/2011/0105-peru_kirkland.html

Unreported World – Peru Blood and Oil

It has taken this long for government of Peru to start awareness and worry over environment in rainforest area. Though they have not been worried over health of indians living in the area where oil is being drilled. People who began to die mysteriously. Clearly corrupt justice system and unjust laws do not exist to protect ordinary poor people, but large crooked companies like Pluspetrol and the wealthy. Situation has been and remains the same and critical. Same old story continues as indigenous Peoples are oppressed and abused and do not profit from exploitation of natural resources. They remain exploited and killed. Weak governments help and support large companies to thrive for few to prosper. It is hard to believe Peru’s government of not having enough information about the situation. Indigenous people have been fighting against being poisoned by ill capitalist bastards for years.

“We know that there has been bad environmental behaviour by the company in the past because there were no regulations but also in the present because it’s not acting responsibly and it’s not giving the correct information about what’s happening in the zone,” Peru’s environment minister Manuel Pulgar-Vidal said of Pluspetrol to local media. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/mar/26/peru-declares-environmental-emergency-rainforest 

It is something we need to have and be all the time at constant conflict with ourselves.

| Henna Timanttimetsä
We need reassurance that we are beautiful and worthy as we are and yes people need to be told that they are worthy, needed and meaningful. But it seems we do not know how to appreciate originality and personal appearance enough in a world where nothing is enough. It is a task for women’s magazines and zillions of websites targeted at women to make women feel good about themselves as they are incapable in convincing themselves. It is a question of comparison and thinking that the other has things better than me. A sign of low self-esteem and culture that is filled with hate against difference. Fear of sticking out and abandonment is present. It is a horror stage play of bullies and those who are scared of being left alone and want to believe in pleasing tactics. We seek to be similar to those who get the attention and are adored because of their outer beauty which fits the standards set. Ultimate desirable teenage dream of finding a perfect fuck buddy, flawlessness which is close to nothing in the end. The scare of losing, being defeated and put down keep us going and never grow up. Perfection is someone to own and show off, to conquer like a piece of land and property. It is so much easier to perceive a person as an object and treat people as such. To grow beyond that requires emotional and intellectual effort which can be painful and revealing our weakness. One who is afraid of oneself in the process is not going to change. Those cowards are many who stay unable to face themselves. It is very different to alter your outer self than your inner mind. A learning process which is very lonely and insecure scares the shit out of people. And what can be found or discovered and will anything change eventually for better can raise doubts. It is to live on chance.
What is it to actually charm anyone? Do you charm yourself?

“Learn the art of Charm & Cheek: Kitty Cavalier’s School of Charm & Cheek is for women who want to learn how to reclaim those two elements as a source of power and to know themselves more deeply and intimately. She explains that Charm is the sensation of pleasing or delight, and Cheek is endearingly irreverent. They’re the Ying & Yang of living a really fun & joyous life. Too much charm can be cute & pretty but you always need a little cheek”. – See more at: http://www.elisemcdowell.com/2013/06/how-to-love-your-flaws-and-adore-your-body.html#sthash.ox7s83m3.dpuf
http://www.sheknows.com/health-and-wellness/articles/842543/5-body-flaws-that-are-beautiful

Celebrities operate surgery of souls, brainwash of minds making mindless production of culture and abuse acceptable norm.

| Henna Timanttimetsä
The one thing molding the whole idea of womanhood now, and of course manhood as well, is celebrity culture which is overwhelming. Movies, music, fashion, technological advancements and people who get to be on the spotlight for what ever reason, create the culture we live in right now and in the future. It is incomprehensible mass of images, videos, interviews and texts which do not have any other function than to promote certain people, make them be seen and make them wealthy. This is what we have agreed to do. We enjoy to follow these people who we think we know and want to be like them. Have position and status of theirs, looks and bodies of theirs. Surgery of souls is an acute phrase to use as we are slaves to this media madness and liking it without wanting to get rid of it. How could we even do that. The atmosphere and public opinion seem to note there is nothing we can do to change something that is bigger than us. What is bigger than the public? There is a misconception of influence of one, influence of a consumer. That we are users and abusers, discarding and selecting out of variety of choices choosing what to say and share. We make choices as individuals as much individualistic as we can be, but are we eventually one mind or do we become one mind at any point? It appears as mindlessness of billions of minds, messages multiplying image of ours and of celebrities. We choose to have celebrities as guides, we choose to be interested in their lives and love them. Give them attention and affection. Spend on them.

Pure belief in goodness and kind sharing of a precious moment.
Queens and kings:
Beyoncé has made it by sinking into the world of plastic as something different. Sinking into money maybe in a new way, making it with a bang. She sings about love and making it as a woman. Strength is the word women obviously desire to have and that is what she likes to praise. Female strength. Do we all know what that is? 
 
Strength, is it the same as power, energy, force of life that moves us. Will power with strategy to win. It is a godly thing, religious belief in oneself because you are a star and as Beyoncé says everybody is and she was born to be. Huge or small a bright thing, unreachable and mysterious with something to give and with shine to dazzle. Potential. One just has to find the thing one is good at and can shine in on everybody and most of all over oneself, because empowerment is what being a star is about. Star does not exist because of others, but because itself. 
 
Even though it is clear feminism has never been gone as women have to struggle their way to the top. Women breath feminism whether they like it or not. We are bound to feminism and what it has accomplished in over a hundred years and continues to accomplish. The United States offers a peculiar scene of a dream so many want to reach, but very few do. Yearly listings of financially most successful people in entertainment are part of making that dream a concrete happening. To be part of something admirable, happiness, hard work, luck and talent. Wanting badly.