Happy Birthday Bob Dylan - 3

This blog does a few posts from time to time concerning Mr. Bob Dylan.

Some are in the context of his Birthday (Happy Birthday Bob Dylan), some vary from that theme a bit (Happy Birthday Bob Dylan - 2).

Other Dredd Blog posts deal with how the MOMCOM press has never had much of a clue about Dylan (Bob Dylan Sings In "China" - 2).

The painting shown in this post is an example of other talents Mr. Dylan experiences.

I like his artwork.

Nothing more to say except Happy Birthday Mr. Dylan!

Bob Dylan Sings In "China"

The self-righteous (self-rightie) journalists are in mob mode because Bob Dylan "sold out" by singing songs in China, following Chinese government censorship that would not let him play certain of his songs.

Those journalist self-righties here in "China" are like those righties in China, they do not understand Dylan's lyrics.

As I understand it, Bob was allowed to sing at least “Hard Rain", “Desolation Row”, “All Along the Watchtower”, as well as the most popular rock song of all time so far, "Like A Rolling Stone".

I suppose the self-rightie journalists here in "China" think those young folk who buy Bob Dylan's albums will only listen to the songs on those albums which the China censors allowed him to play?

They won't listen to any other songs they bought?

Here are some lyrics from the songs he sang there for those who have ears to hear what he was saying:

Oh, what’ll you do now, my blue-eyed son?
Oh, what’ll you do now, my darling young one?
I’m a-goin’ back out ’fore the rain starts a-fallin’

I’ll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest

Where the people are many and their hands are all empty

Where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters

Where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison
Where the executioner’s face is always well hidden
Where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten
Where black is the color, where none is the number
And I’ll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it
And reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it
Then I’ll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin’
But I’ll know my song well before I start singin’
And it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard, it’s a hard
It’s a hard rain’s a-gonna fall

(Hard Rain)

---

Now at midnight all the agents

And the superhuman crew

Come out and round up everyone
That knows more than they do

Then they bring them to the factory
Where the heart-attack machine

Is strapped across their shoulders

(Desolation Row)

---

All along the watchtower,
princes kept the view


While all the women came and went,
barefoot servants, too


Outside in the distance
a wildcat did growl


Two riders were approaching,
the wind began to howl


(All Along The Watchtower)

---

The self-righties won't get it no matter in which "China" he sings "I’ll know my song well before I start singin’" ...

He also sang the one about self-rightie exceptionalist journalists who live in empires but they don't know that the empire is going down (Like A Rolling Stone) or warn the people to try to change things for the better before it is too late.

---

I am glad it was a sell out
if you know what I mean
now Absolutely Sweet Marine ...

---

Evidently Dylan also sang Ballad of a Thin Man, which is a criticism of journalists who do not know what is going on.

The New Yorker be knowin' in the wind.

Gadfly Polemics or Enlightened Dissent?

Is there a fine line or any line between dissent and belly aching?

If so, what is it?

Here are some quotes which are purported to be from the 'was that a gadfly comment?' department:

'Oh, to be able to be a gadfly!' --Terry Gilliam

'Sacred cows make the tastiest hamburgers.' -- Abbie Hoffman

'Life in Lubbock, Texas, taught me two things: One is that God loves you and you're going to burn in hell. The other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on earth and you should save it for someone you love.' -- Butch Hancock

'When a true genius appears in the world, you may know him by this sign, that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.' -- Jonathan Swift

(BBC Article). Either way, it changes when you add 'polemic' to the fray. That word comes from a Greek word attached to the concept "war", and is explained in part by:

polemic: 1638, "controversial argument or discussion," from Gk. polemikos "warlike, belligerent," from polemos "war." Meaning "one who writes in opposition to another" is attested from 1680.

"The worst offense that can be committed by a polemic is to stigmatize those who hold a contrary opinion as bad and immoral men." [John Stuart Mill, 1806-73]

(Dictionary). How does the gadfly polemic syndrome morph into essentially a "repugnant ideology"? They become unfair.

Take the case of the new US president, Barak Obama, who has not yet taken office. Some in the world of "gadfly polemics" are making racial slurs against him, or otherwise condemning him, even before he has any legal power. While he still, pursuant to American law, has to wait.

Blogs can have a lot of good content but still tend to elevate their opinions and preferences over his national mandate (after all, he is president to "us" and to "them"). And whether or not he or anyone else could comply with the demands of the politics of these gadfly polemics on steroids, our Office Of The President is by design an office that will listen. Listen both to "us" and to "them".

Surely most people would agree that gadfly polemics steps over the line of enlightened dissent, and gets far afield and even into foolishness, when a fair and common decency ... "give him and/or her a fair chance" ... is yet to manifest.