RT: You sound very angry. Liberals are supposed to be a cut above conservatives because they are open-minded, peace-loving, kind, and gentle.
JM: First of all, I’m not a liberal. Early in my sociopolitical evolution I called myself one, but that was before I understood the meaning of the word and had begun to deepen my convictions.
Liberals are reformists. I see no possibility of reforming the American Way of Life. f*ck Bush, Cheney and whomever else has said it’s non-negotiable. The death of the American Way of Life is what’s non-negotiable. Whether revolutionary forces or Mother Nature take it down, our abominable way of being is going to meet a violent end. And I’m doing my part to help facilitate the demise of American capitalism, which is the term I prefer to use when referring to the ruthless, myopic, irrational, hyper-individualistic, selfish, greedy, narcissistic, speciesist, patriarchal, grotesquely hypocritical, and imperialistic "civilized savagery" we US Americans and our sycophantic allies love to practice.
And, yes, I’m angry. In fact, I feel morally outraged and furious more often than I’d like. Television is both a cause and a symptom of our diseased existence. Consider the corporate media. I can only take its onslaught of pro-corporate, ahistorical, Zionist, and contextually deficient "reporting" in very small doses. Mentally deconstructing the barrage of propaganda posing as news, depraved reality shows, inane sit-coms, and the intermittent Madison Avenue attempts to mind f*ck me can be entertaining once in awhile, but more often than not I find myself infuriated by the time I turn off the TV. So I rarely gaze into that highly addictive electronic portal to our hollow, shallow, artificial, instantly gratifying, egocentric, self-indulgent ‘culture’ that pelts critical thinking and deep feeling individuals with a steady barrages of insults, irritations, frustrations, and reasons to be incensed almost constantly.
RT: If you’re not a liberal then what are you?
JM: I’m fairly eclectic actually. Mostly free-thinking Marxist and animal liberationist, I also lean a bit towards anarchy and have some strains of anarcho-primitivism to my worldview. I’m deeply radical in almost all of my thinking but moderate my actions to the extent necessary to function in a sociopolitical environment that lacks the conditions essential for a revolution.
RT: Since you’re a radical, you advocate the use of violence, right?
JM: Personally, I’d rather solve problems without resorting to violence. However, sometimes one has little or no choice. I own more than one gun and would not hesitate to use them if the need were to arise—and I don’t hunt, by the way.
I hate to burst the bubbles of the mean-spirited regressives who, despite Obama’s victory (which was still a victory for corporatism and militarism) still tend to predominate in our cesspool of a society, but not all intellectuals who feel compassion for the defenseless, weak and exploited are pacifists, Hippies, Gandhi-ites, or ‘sniveling little book-worms.’ My father was an intelligent, athletic, successful (by capitalist standards) man with an abusive, explosive temper that he frequently unleashed on the family. I didn’t let him beat me down when I was a child, and as I’ve grown older, my antipathy toward, and resistance against (by whatever rational means become necessary), regressive bullies have strengthened.
RT: So are you taunting or challenging "regressives" as you call them?
JM: Not at all. I’m simply expressing the fact that not all of us who oppose uber-capitalists, neoconservatives, paleoconservatives, Christian fundamentalists, and reactionaries are latte sipping, Volvo driving, Obama supporting "Blue Staters" or carbon copies of Fox’s liberal caricature, Alan Colmes.
RT: Maybe you’re just projecting your anger at your father onto the world?
JM: I did that for a long time, but not anymore. My anger is focused—I know why I’m angry and I have learned where and how to direct it. I was a slave to rage at one time, but I now channel it so that it is useful and effective. If my ire is still invoked by my father at some unconscious level, it isn’t by him specifically; it’s by the capitalist archetype he represented.
Remember, I’ve been working as a corporate wage slave for 15 years now—in fact, I was promoted to ‘overseer’ of my section of the ‘cubicle farm’ about a year ago. Aside from doing the work I do to pay the bills for my family, I have learned to function effectively in many ways within a system premised on ‘principles’ that grate at the very core of my being.
RT: If our society is so bad, why don’t you withdraw to the wilderness or move to another country?
JM: I get those types of questions a lot.
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