Two trials in Toronto: On Jian Ghomeshi and due process

            Jian Ghomeshi is a creepy douchebag, who, until recently, was one of the chief arbiters of Canadian culture. Think about that for a minute. What does it say about a country’s art scene that would choose to be represented by such a goof? I digress.

            A lot of things have come out about this demented hipster lately that leaves little doubt in most people’s minds that he is a narcissistic letch; but there just wasn’t enough to convict him of a crime.

            This has made a lot of people understandably upset, and inspired many to call for drastic changes to the system. Just what kind of changes I’ll leave to the experts, but in this highly emotionally charged atmosphere, I would caution everyone to remember that a conviction is never guaranteed.

            If there is one thing that protects us from the wrath of dictators, or the hysteria of the mob, it is that. It’s what separates democracies from tyrannies, free societies from closed ones. Innocence is the default assumption, allegations must be proven, and everyone, but everyone, gets to defend themselves.

           Now I would never make excuses for an evident scoundrel like Ghomeshi. But I would never deny him his trial either. Some seem upset that there was a trial at all. What they apparently wanted was an automatic conviction in a kangaroo court. Many are angry with the Defense lawyer, Marie Henein, but don’t specify how they themselves would have conducted the defense, or what sort of defense they would have allowed under their ideal system. These are not technicalities; until such things are specified, calls for change aren’t much more than demands for a witch-hunt.  And while “I believe the victims” hashtags all sound very nice, they do reject outright the presumption of innocence.

            There probably are changes that do need to be made to the justice system, there are indeed things that the law and society at large need to do to improve the lot of victims, and there is possibly the political will to do it now. But whatever changes end-up being made, don’t forget that a conviction is not supposed to be easy, and it is the prosecution’s responsibility to prove guilt. If there’s anyone the demonstrators should be angry with, it’s the prosecutors, who completely failed to make the case; it was their responsibility, their opportunity, and their bungle. Any reforms that weaken the threshold of evidence or weaken citizen’s rights to defend themselves would not serve justice any better.

            In the aftermath of the acquittal, it may be of some comfort that Ghomeshi is not getting off scott-free. His life is ruined, his career is over, and he's got no one but himself to blame. He’s not getting his job back at the CBC; he will never work in broadcasting again. He will be lucky to scrub the toilets at any radio station from here on in. He’s the public face of sleaze: who’s going to hire him?  He will be lucky to appear in public without getting pelted with lettuce. No one will read his book. No one will remember or care about Q, or Play, or Moxy Fruvous. Nothing he does again will ever matter. He will only be remembered as a guy who liked to hurt women. It will be the denouemant of his Wikipedia entry, and main plot of his obituary. For a narcissistic primadonna like him, that’s probably a worst punishment than anything the judge could have handed down.  

      

       His day in court seems almost irrelevant. 

Two Trials in Toronto:On Law Enforcement and Due Process; Sammy Yatim and James Forcillo.

Two trials in Toronto. One finished some months ago. The other only just. One ended in a Guilty verdict. The other in a Not-Guilty one.  Both verdicts of both have made people very upset. One has upset people who hold a great deal of power; the other, people who hold a great deal less power. Some are so upset, they want to see the whole system changed. 

I don’t care very much about media circuses (though compared to high profile US trials, these ain’t nuthin’), but I do care very deeply about due process – as far as rights go, I’d argue it’s just about the most important one. The one that allows all the others. And during emotional cases like these, it’s at its most fragile.

The first trial was about a cop who shot a kid. That sounds bad, but it gets to the heart of the matter. Use “Police Officer opened fire on a knife-wielding teenager” if you prefer. The whole thing was caught on Youtube, a lot of people thought the cop didn’t need to shoot (nine times as it were), there was a trial, and the jury agreed. Officer James Forcillo was found guilty.

Having never confronted a knife wielder myself, I’m in no position to judge how someone else should handle the situation. But, like most Canadians, I’m appalled by gun violence, and when such stories come out I think it’s entirely fair to ask “was there no other way”?  Alas, a lot of the time isn’t. Sometimes though, there is. That’s what inquiries are for, and when enough questions are raised, trials.

Officer Forcillo had his day in court. He made his case, he told his side of the story. The jury heard the evidence, deliberated, and found that yes, he had used undue force. They found him guilty. Some people are upset about this (just as many people would have been upset if the trial had gone the other way) – they think it sends a disturbing message to police, that it punishes them for doing their jobs. Nothing of the kind. The message it sends is that they too will be held accountable for their actions, and that nobody is above the law.

But everybody gets their day in court.

Which brings me to the next trial. . .   

On Liars. . .

             While I studying at Ryerson, one of the things I had to read was Joe Gould’s Secret  by Joseph Mitchell. In it, Mitchell, a New York reporter, tells of his encounters with Joe Gould, a homeless man and local celebrity. While Gould possesses a great many eccentricities, what interests Mitchell most is the “oral history” Gould is supposedly in the process of writing, a massive collection of all the city’s little stories, legends, and anecdotes, which he claims will soon be longer than the Bible. Just about everything Gould has ever seen or heard has found its way into the oral history, and he is keen to bring it up in almost every conversation. Despite all this, he’s never actually shown it to anyone, nor has he told anyone where he keeps it (he is homeless remember). It sounds all very fishy to Mitchell until one day he clues in:

            There is no oral history. It doesn’t exist.

            When confronted, Gould is speechless, and goes into something of a trance. Mitchell backs off, and Gould goes straight back to telling his stories, not even acknowledging the conversation. He had become so invested in his stories that he came to believe them, and could no longer face the reality, or lack thereof.

            Have you ever met someone like that? Someone so obviously full of shit, but utterly convinced of it? I don’t mean the occasional fibber, or embellisher – we all do that now and then. I mean. . .

            People who always have some crazy story to tell, but can almost never provide direct evidence of it happening. . .

            People who never seem to have any witnesses, can never produce anyone to corroborate their stories, never have any shared experiences with common acquaintances. . .

            People who’s experiences never seem to have any logical consequences – no long, or even medium term affects. Nothing ever comes back to haunt them, and they never follow-up on things they mentioned before. . .

            Who didn’t take pictures, or save their receipts. Who don’t ever have any souvenirs from their adventures. . .

            People who who’s stories are always more interesting than yours, who’s triumphs are greater than yours, whose sufferings are greater than yours, who’s coincidences are stranger than yours, who’s celebrity encounters are greater than yours, who’s dealings with bureaucracy are more frustrating than yours. . .

            Who remember things in just bit too much detail; who’s experiences sound just a bit too scripted. . .

            Who seem to be trying just a bit too hard. . .

            You see what I mean? Not to mention body language and tone of voice. Do they look you in the eye? Do their voices ever waver? Police investigators are experts at detecting all the little ticks of the liar, but on an instinctive level, most of us can just tell. Really good liars know this, and learn how to control themselves, but most. . .don’t.

            I saw a good movie once (forgive me, I forget the title) in which an East German Ustache instructor lectures an auditorium full of bright-eyed-bushy-tailed would-be interrogators “An honest person will make mistakes, forget things and contradict themselves. A liar will stick to a script they’ve memorized beforehand.” Possibly contradictory, but it makes sense on some level: most of us don’t memorize the details of our lives. We simply take them for granted. Often as not, we can’t remember where we were at two o’clock last weekend, how many times we’ve been out in the past week, what we were doing at such-and-such a place when we ran into such-and-such a person. Where we put our car keys and television remote controls.  As Sky Masterson tells Nathan Detroit: “I’ll bet you can’t remember the colour of your tie.”

            Yet the liar of this magnitude will remember their experiences in excruciating detail, and recall conversations with scrip-like accuracy.

            Now, who knows: possibly some people can do that. Some people do have very good memories and some people do lead very interesting lives. But sometimes. . .you can just tell.

            Here’s the other thing: most people, when caught telling tall-tales, will own up. They confess, equivocate or rationalize (maybe apologize), and probably cling to that little kernel of truth around which they built their tale. But some, like Joe Gould, will not.

            What to make of such people? Is reality so intolerable that they need to construct fictions in which to live? In which case it’s for their benefit rather than ours. Despite their colossal untruths, liar doesn’t quite seem to fit. I often think they genuinely believe what they’re saying. Delusional? Maybe.

            Every now and then I run into a guy at the bar. He’s friendly and gregarious, and just plain full of it. I don’t believe any of his fish stories, for all the reasons listed above. But because he’s friendly and gregarious, and because I’d rather be greeted by friendly people than unfriendly people, like Mitchell, I let it go. No difference to me. 

            But supposing it was skin off the nose? What happens in those situations where the stories are not harmless; when they lure you into their lives with their tall tales and convince you to make important, possibly life changing decisions based on them? Do they really not see what they’re doing? Do they need their fictions so much that they’re willing to drag you into them?

            I’ve met people like that too. But that’s another story. . .  

Joel Ivany is a pretentious. . .

Joel Ivany is a pretentious fucktard who ruined ruined a perfectly good production of Mozart's Requiem.

There. That's all that needs to be said really. Anything else is just expanding on the point.

Pity - no, tragic - because Requiem really is an amazing work, and I was looking forward seeing this production. And let it be said, the singers and musicians were simply beautiful. Let's be clear on that. But under Ivany's asinine hand, they are wasted utterly. The latest TSO production is exactly the sort of piss-up-circle-jerk you'd expect from a fine arts wanker with an ego. A sycophant surrounded wanker who's never been told he's full of shit. How else to explain the nonsense going on here?

 Ivany is not the conductor - he is the "stage manager". What does a production like this need a stage manager for? Well, this is Requiem is "semi-staged". Yes that is what it says in the program. Now what the fuck does "semi-staged" mean? In this case, "random movements and unnecessary gestures which serve no purpose except to distract the audience and give Joel Ivany something to do".

So, the choir raise their hands, cross their arms, stand up, sit down, clasp each other's shoulders. . . it is staggeringly, shockingly, mind-bogglingly pointless. It rather feels like sitting in the audience while the people around you keep getting up to go to the bathroom. It not only doesn't add anything to the music, it is a really awful distraction and constant interruption. We are never allowed to absorb and process the music; there's not a single moment where Ivany doesn't thrust his existence upon our consciousness.

The problem is that Requiem isn't an opera. There is no story, no narrative, no characters. There are no actions to perform. It's a requiem. A religious song for the dead. Have a look at the words:

http://www.stmatthews.com/choir/mozartsrequiem.htm

See what I mean? At no point does it say "now raise your right hand with your palm to the ceiling". This isn't Simon-fucking-says! "Stand up, sit down, raise your other arm, cross your arms, turn to your left! Wander around." Apparently such gestures are considered meaningful.

I suppose the idea is to put a new spin on things. My question is: why??? It never occurs to anyone in these circles that the reason works like Requiem have been performed a million times is because they're brilliant, and they deserve to be performed a million times. No one needs to raise their arms.
What guys like Ivany are really saying when they pollute such works like this, is that they have no faith in the source material: they really don't think it can stand on its own. It needs to be tweaked .  Furthermore, tweaked their way. It's not much different from pop-music videos really: superfluous imagery imposed over music without regard to content or intention. It's why we've got gang rapes in Rossini now.

 It's why classical music is dying.

On Star Wars

             To call Star Wars a little derivative is a bit like calling Donald Trump a little irresponsible. It’s more than an understatement, it’s a redundancy. The original Star Wars concept was derived from every previous fairy-tale archetype known to man, and this new one is derived from the original. It’s a mirror image copy of the original, with bits of episodes five and six thrown in completion. Watching it, I thought two things:

           First: Did it need to be? Did we need to begin with a young orphan in a desert? Did we need a cute little droid with secret plans hidden within him? Did the super-villain need to wear a mask? Did we need a cantina scene, complete with mock bar-band? Another planet-sized planet destroyer, with more holographic visitations from the Big Boss guy? More familial strife? More long dog-fights through stretches of impossibly lengthy duct work? Did we need to undo three films worth of Han Solo’s character development to bring him back exactly as we found him[1]? Did we need to restore the status quo to this mythical world?  Sure. Why not?

            Second:. This is so fucking cool. Despite all the above, I loved every minute of it, the contrived plot, the cliched dialogue, the snarling villains, the blatant self-reference and the shameless melodrama. Especially the shameless melodrama. I loved it all. I didn’t think they could do it anymore; I thought space opera of this kind was extinct forever, banished in the wake of disco-dancing irony. Hallelujah! There’s no irony to be found here. And no disco songs! Abrhams and company aren’t joking around here: they mean it. They believe it. And it shows. Despite all the above, traits which I normally despise in a movie, it’s done here with such panache, gravitas and wide-eyed sincerity, I could not help but be swept along for the ride, my reservations left far-far behind.

            Best of all: there is no trace of the prequels. No Jar-Jar Binks, no planet Naboo, no crude racial stereotypes. The rules of good (if simple) story-telling and tasteful aesthetics apply here – the villains are menacing, the heroes are charismatic, there is emotional investment in the story, and it actually looks good. We get a world here that looks like people actually live in it, not the blue-screen barf of the prequels. In fact, there’s not a trace of the garish, asymmetrical ugliness that defined the prequels. We can finally pretend they never existed. That is probably the best thing of all.

            I probably could pick it apart and find all sorts of things to get annoyed with. Let’s be honest here, this is more of a video-game than a movie, written by committee, designed for merchandise, specifically constructed to appeal to our sentimental attachment to childhood memories. But I think it’s high time someone respected my sentimental attachment to my childhood memories. In this rotten world, where ISIS exists but Motorhead no longer does, and where even Doctor Who will let you down, I’ll take what I can get. I want my adventure stories back, and finally I got one.

            Hallelujah.   

  

---

[1] To be fair, this is sort of explained – he was reacting to trauma, the only way he knew how. Fair enough. 

The Man who Sold the World meets the One to Sing the Blues: on Lemmy and Bowie

            No sooner did Lemmy shake off this mortal coil than David Bowie followed close behind, stealing most of his thunder. Bowie was more respected, and so got more coverage, most of which was sincere and heartfelt (though there was on piece from the Toronto Star – typical – which pissed me off. Less a tribute to Bowie than a passive aggressive snipe at some of his contemporaries and – presumably – their fans. I even detected a bit of dig at some Bowie’s own material, the “stadium-friendly” stuff of his earlier days (which this author happens to overwhelmingly prefer). It made me wonder who gets to decide what’s “cool”, respectable, credible and worthy of notice. More on that another time).

Grizzled veteran

            Bowie surprised me. I hadn’t realized he was as old as he was, and had no idea he was sick (not sure anyone did besides his doctor). See, Lemmy looked his age. He always seemed on the cusp of death, playing poker with Pinhead, if not chess with the Reaper. His lifestyle was about as unhealthy as was possible, and mortality was a constant theme in his music, as if he’d come to terms with it long before it became an issue, unlike his fans who thought that if it hadn’t killed him already, it probably wouldn’t. But Bowie? I didn’t realize he even aged.

            Immortal each, but in pretty much opposite ways.  

            Among Metalheads, Lemmy was a sort of revered grandfather figure, whose approval we all craved. His songs all had the aura of hard-won experience born of having been there and done it all first.  He was already a grizzled veteran by the time he started Motorhead, and did the whole grizzled veteran thing so well it was impossible to imagine he was ever young. He was walking monument, a museum, a historical tome, etched in stone, ageless and eternal.

Bowie was the other side: he always struck me as some kind of font of eternal youth - always being

Always young

reborn, regenerating Doctor-like every few years into new forms, always at the forefront of what was new and innovative, always inventing and creating, always new and vital.

There are pratfalls to both: obsession with age can lead to conservatism and stagnation – I’m always amazed how many older Metalheads simply refuse to support younger bands. The cult of youth can bring about cultural amnesia, neurosis, and art with the lifespan of a mayfly. Nor would it surprise me if it contributed to the deaths of so many young musicians. But there's a right way to go about it as well. 

I daresay these guys were the best of their kind. . .

Ace of Spades: In which one of the Author's idols is Killed By Death

Oh no. No no no no no. Not Lemmy. You can't get Lemmy. He'll live forever he will, he's indestructible he is, invincible, invulnerable, in in in. . .

Inevitable.

It was silly to think Lemmy Kilmister's lifestyle wouldn't catch up to him. All the same, he seemed so durable, so powerful, a hurricane or a tidal wave rather than a man. I can't believe He's gone.

You see, the world isn't just a quieter place without him, a duller, more timid place. For all intents and purposes, Rock'n'Roll died with him. No one can take his place. Nothing else measures up. After Motorhead, everything else sounds just. . .wimpy.

Words fail me at the moment, but I feel I gotta say something. The thing with Lemmy wasn't just his gargantuan bass sound, or his riffs or his lyrics. All this did put him on the path to Greatness, but with Lemmy it was more. We all thought Lemmy was invincible because he was the Man Who Would Not be Stopped, who just kept Rockin' long after the rest of us got too tired. When he got fired from Hawkwind, when his records wouldn't sell, when the Record companies wouldn't back him. Throughout it all, Lemmy kept Rockin', on his own terms, in his own way, immune to commercial pressures and sub-cultural demands. Lemmy could shrug off commercial failure, and critical indifference and heartbreak and keep right on going, Long as he had Rock'n Roll. Long as there was Rock'n Roll, ("the only religion that never lets you down") nothing else truly mattered. And if that's all there was, that wasn't so bad. 

Lemmy just kept calm, and carried on. Would that all of us had such thick skins, such determination such single minded dedication to what mattered to us.

Maybe it killed him in the end, but my god what a crater it left. . .