note: misanthropaganda is so much more fun when you view it on your desktop or laptop. Your tablet is fine I guess, as is your phone, but for full enjoyment and understanding of the artist's (ha ha) vision, take my suggestion. It gives the posts a look that's a bit more reminiscent of an old 90's fanzine layout, which is the whole point of this bullshit blog...
Gotta frown cause of that thorny crown? Well, turn it upside down!!
I am officially OFF of brandishing the inverted cross as a fashion/political statement. Yes it's the end of three decades of flashing that little doozy at any opportunity where I was sure that some Christian 'Ham-and-Egger' might have a conniption over it. Like, why wear an inverted cross to, say perhaps, an evening of boozing at Churchill's Pub? Of course I am referring to a time before the pandemic when an outing was actually a thing, just for the sake of illustration, mind you. These days, we just drink at home while waiting for the grim reaper to come and sneeze on us. Back to my point -everybody at a place like Churchill's is either wearing an inverted cross or has one tattooed on their forehead, or inserted into their cervix, so where's the satisfaction in rocking that offensive little number? I like to wear it where there will be civilians that don't often get to see the needlessly menacing icon. A good opp would be while grocery shopping at Publix on Sunday morning, for example. You get a real reaction of repulsion and disgust that I relish oh so much, and rightly so. After all, I am forced to sit behind you for an hour on the Palmetto Expressway staring at how you've been "washed in his blood" and how your "Boss Is A Jewish Carpenter".
Who has ever heard of a Jewish carpenter?
When I'm on line at the Drive-Thru window, I am constantly being told by your mini-van back window how Jesus is coming soon to make sure that I go straight to hell. Meanwhile, all I want is a fucking medium coffee with oat milk and six sugars and a goddamn plain bagel. So you know what ?! Now I want to be a jerk, now I want to antagonize. Only now, I need a new symbol to stir the calm. The "upside-down" cross is 86'd. In its place I'm thinking of getting a tattoo on my forehead of Christ's head with a machete through it.
Antagonism is one of life's unknown and seldom visited joys. I consider it an artform. I also think that it is probably one of the pillars of what my colleague Adel "156" Souto has defined/instituted as "Cultural Terrorism", a cause for which I will gladly be an agent for under any given, adversarial icon that my fellow misanthropes wish to rally under. However, in this case the iconoclastic icon in question is not iconoclastic at all... The thing is, that while inverted crosses can be big, big fun, at the end of the day it's really not an emblem of antagonism but rather just another dopey Christian symbol.
No, seriously, the inverted cross is a symbol known as 'the Cross of St. Peter'. As lore has it, Saint Peter (JC hanger-on number one) who was also condemned by the Romans to suffer the same fate as his little boyfriend over there chose to be crucified upside down, so as to not imitate his Nazarene dreamboat (he who had only imitated the demise of virtually every "messiah" figure that came before him.)
Without a doubt, the slaughtered "Lamb Of God" made crucifixion into a household word; and much like band merch and floor polish, branding is everything. But some would be surprised to know that crucifixion had been going on way before the events that transpired atop Golgotha. Jesus (or his script writers) totally bit from the apocryphal history books. The fact is that about a half of a dozen "messiah" figures throughout religions of the ancient world were killed via crucifixion prior to Christ. Among them are the Egyptian god Horus, Dionysus -the Greek god of wine, insanity and religious ecstasy, and the Persian deity Mithra just to name a few. Unfortunately, this was way before the Tribes of Israel had invented Entertainment/Copyright Law and the concept of infringement upon intellectual property.
The first known uses of crucifixion or anything of its kind date back to the brutal Assyrian empire under the rule of King Shamanezer in the 9th century B.C. The Assyrians spent 35 years killing, raping and pillaging any and all who may have been unfortunate enough to stand in the way of expansion and anyone left standing would get impaled.
(I mean, they were just real jerks.)
Impaling is the earliest incarnation of crucifixion. Impaling, or the art of erecting a human body via a wooden or iron stake inserted into the anus is quite an uncomfortable ordeal for most. Yet for some, forms of impalement can make for a great Saturday night if you have a couple of bucks in your pocket to make it happen.
The Romans were the true innovators of crucifixion. They were the first to implement the actual crucifix that we all know and love today. The "Latin Cross", or the lowercase 't', that which typically depicts the crucifixion of the Christ has been argued by historians, however, who say that it was not the model that would have been used in actuality. Also, it has been established that if Christ really did exist and was crucified, that it would not have been through the hands, but through the wrists. It's all in the wrist!
The Roman reboot of the cross was believed to have been done to maximize the element of physical anguish and public humiliation. In other words, "how can we keep this gavone alive a little longer so as to make him suffer more before his worthless ass croaks?".
You see, it isn't really the crucifixion that kills you, but the horrific scourging that occurs before and during that really just fucks you all the way up. The Romans would crucify any poor hump at the drop of a hat mostly for political motives, and did it publicly for the purpose of deterring future offenders. There have been actual accounts found that tell of Roman battalions leaving more than 6,000 people crucified by a roadside, rotting under the sun and being pecked away at by vultures. Fun, fun, fun!
But it was the world's all time favorite 'Gay-in-the-military' that really razzle-dazzled the ancient world with a crucifixion body count that'll knock your socks off. In 332 BC, Alexander the Great and his army staged a seven month siege on the island city of Tyre. Al and the guys wasted more than 10,000 mooks, while sparing 2,000 others whom were made into the Tyre Welcome Committee, meaning that they were impaled all along the Mediterranean coastline; their gored bodies holding up pretty ribbon and festooning and a billboard-sized banner that read "Welcome to Tyre, Now Under New Management".
Now you may be thinking to yourself "Geez, the ancient world was barbaric!" Well, don't think that all of the gruesome fun ended in the middle ages. There are still cultures in the world where these shenanigans are still occurring. Just as recently as 2014, a man was crucified AND beheaded in Saudi Arabia for anti-government protesting. Overkill much?! They really didn't want him to come back to life! Ah, you just have to love the Muslim world, where barbarity and piousness went on their first few dates! In the United Arab Emirates, crucifixion is an actual means of punishment that is on the books. This is so in Sudan as well. The terrorist group ISIL (ISIS) get real shits and giggles out of nailing people up to a plank on a slow Friday. In Iran, crucifixion is considered to be "hadd", meaning that it is punishment that is mandated by god (yeah, that's right. lower-case, bitch.) They're actually real sweethearts in Iran about crossing you up, though. Apparently, if you're still alive after three days on a cross they'll let you go; which is great, except that most who are let down from an Iranian crucifixion die by the time that the valet brings the car around.
How about the wahoos that voluntarily get pinned as a "devotional practice"? This is most common in the Philippines, where although the Catholic Church has frowned upon the practice, some of the more pious parishioners of that island country have said "FUCK THAT" and get themselves tacked up for Good Friday. But wait, get a load of this... Right here in the U-S of A, in New Mexico a local sect performs a passion play of the crucifixion, only the participating members tie the man-of-the-hour to a cross rather than nailing him up. However, real self-flagellation is still performed prior to the main event to get a nice bloody lather going. It seems with Christians that there is a whole lot of self-mortification that needs to be exchanged for "god's" love (Yeah, lower case AND quotation marks! How's that for a little grammatical heresy?)
Try Crucifying someone next time you've got a score to settle! It is a great way to show someone that they done pissed you off. I would especially encourage/recommend it over the Holidays. And just in case you are like me and you like to have a little mood music that you can whistle to while you perform your gruesome work, well then I've got just the record for you...
I choose Where No Life Dwells by Sweden's Unleashed. This is an old-school Death Metal album released in 1991 that instantly caught my eye with their logo which prominently incorporates the Cross of St. Pete dead-center. This was one of the very first Death Metal albums that I remember advertised towards the back pages of Metal Maniacs magazine (R.I.P.) and both the bleak, icy feel of the cover art along with that logo grabbed me on the spot and has stuck with me for years. It is so strange that it took thirty plus years to finally collect this one. Musically, if we're talking about a good score for the next time you crucify a foe, this joint is as good as any. I used to think that Autopsy's Mental Funeral was my favorite Death Metal record until I heard this. This is what Death Metal should sound like (in my mind). Every element on this joint sounds just right, from the guitar tone to the mix on the bass, even the vocals sound 'just-so' to me. I am not really sure what the rest of their discog' holds in store besides lots of viking lore, but as far as this debut is concerned this is brutal old-school Scandinavian Death Metal, no bullshit "Gothenburg sound" detectable here. I can definitely see myself decked out in fine Roman wares, driving railroad spikes through some poor schlub's wrists while spinning a couple of tunes from this album; such as "Dead Forever", "For They Shall Be Slain" and "Violent Ecstasy".
Speaking of 'Roman wares', if you want yet another soundtrack for a scourging/crucifixion, I also recommend the Roman Acupuncture EP by Bolzer. I have given this EP by the Swiss two-piece an honorable mention just based on its title. Musically, this band has an original albeit peculiar take on the alchemy of Death and Black Metal. "Roman acupuncture", what a brilliant euphemism for crucifixion! Also note the album cover which I find particularly striking as well...
Alright, that's all I got. The sun is coming up. Time for a skate... Write ya' soon...
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