Simon Kanzen

Commentaries on Spielberg’s Munich: From Then (2005 Post-9/11) to Now (2023 Israel-Hamas War) | Old Drafts

Unfinished old draft of a companion piece to Munich’s Cycle of Vengeance… composed of paraphrased quotes organised into themes, followed by the source list.

CATEGORIES

The Intellectual Substance of Munich
Munich on Modern Terrorism and Counter-Terrorism
Spielberg’s Sacrifice of Ethnic and Artistic Esteem
Munich Raises the Underlying Factors of the Middle-East Question
Themes Within and Related to Munich
Spielberg as “Anti-Israel” or “Terrorist-Apologist” (Moral Condemnation of Constructive Critics)
The (Attempted) Political Assassination of Munich
Munich Reflected in the 2023 Israel-Hamas Conflict

The Intellectual Substance of Munich

While being an excellent film as an action thriller, Munich eschews the typical shallowness of the genre and instead bases its storytelling on moral complexity: a focused exploration of personal motives complicated by tragic implications.¹ In so doing, Munich acknowledges that there are no easy answers to the Israel-Palestinian conflict; for if there were, it wouldn’t be the most intractable conflict on Earth.¹⁰

Apopheniac – Episode Two: Freudian Slips | Old Drafts

Second old unfinished draft of a series planned to be at least four parts, of which this was the last drafted.

Months had passed since the RoboCop episode, which my might call ‘apophenesis’. Encouragingly (from our compassionate perspective), Tom – that innately curious young fellow – had given little thought to it since. His interests were with a wide variety of subjects, all of which he judged to be of some significance—more so than esoteric name games in Hollwood, it seems.
For instance, today Tom is reading an assortment of articles, one of which is in the field of sociology. Whilst reading the text, a particular word appears that is not often used, but which he has heard spoken and basically understands the meaning of: schadenfreude. Perhaps he had never seen it in print before; but either way, Tom now perceived something in the word that prompted him to investigate.
‘ “Schadenfreude”. That’s when someone takes pleasure in another’s misfortune. Like if a person trips and falls flat on his face and a couple of bystanders bursts out laughing despite… no, because of this embarrassing and painful incident. Basically pleasure from pain (of a someone else). Ah yes, “schaden” must be connected to “sade”, as in sadism (makes sense).’

Apopheniac – Episode One: A Tale of Two Murphys | Old Drafts

An old unfinished draft of a series that would have been at least four parts, of which I drafted two, this being the first.

As the credits began to roll, Tom begun recollecting the scenes of the movie, desiring to apprehend the essence of the story.

[Habit of watching movies consciously and critically, rather than pure entertainment. Values discerning the structural features and understanding their designed affects (i.e. intended and actual influence on the mind and feelings of the viewer, the agendas of society and the spirit of the culture).]

[DVDs had made rewatching movies a more accessible and enjoyable experience. The movie this evening was RoboCop, released in the new format a decade after the theatre.]

Backed by the pleasing sound of the exit music, endless sequences of names reeled down the screen—as if to the oblivion of afterthought. Yet, unusually, Tom kept a modicum of attention on the scroll, curious as to what (if any) significance this conventional roll call may contain.

[credited names, their specialized job titles]

But within a minute or so, he glimpses something pass down screen that astounds him. Rewinding to check if he did indeed see what he thought he saw, pausing the frame in question, there it was, plain as can be:

Signs of Evil: Socio-Spiritual Sabotage by Pervasive Veiled Attacks {Poeticised Transcript} | Old Drafts

The first of a few unfinished old drafts I didn’t care to complete, which I’ll be uploading since they’re not far off from completion. This one relates to the previous post about systematic covert persecution, a.k.a. zersetzung and gangstalking.

“Chosen Ones”: a new genre of video that seems to proliferate on YouTube in a semi-automated manner (i.e. AI-based). From the few I’ve seen, Chosen Ones videos promote a form of ‘messiah complex’ to individuals who feel indirectly persecuted by society at large, and who tend towards a spiritualistic or neo-religious outlook.

Since “the Messiah” – a.k.a. Jesus – is an archetypal representation of a persecuted man, who was of course of good spirit, the correlations in this Chosen Ones narrative are not totally unwarranted. However, they are exaggerated and emphasised in an implicitly aggrandising way, as if to engender a kind of reverse-narcissism, and which also serves to undermine the validity of its themes (as will be mentioned below). Nevertheless, this exaggeration may serve useful as an inspirational device, given that one doesn’t identify with its messianic complex and doesn’t adopt its implicit flatteries.

Civilian Collaborators in the Systematic Covert Persecution of Individuals: Methods, Effects, and History

Outlining the current research and historical precedents of the organised, supra-state operated covert persecution of individual civilians by employment of networked civilian collaborators, this article presents insightful extracts from various literature, concluding with a summary of key points.

Civilian Collaborators in the System of Covert Persecution: Introduction

This article concerns a covert system of individual control and social engineering that corresponds to an obscure but important subject termed (inappropriately) “gang stalking” or “organized stalking” by alternative media. For the most part, I simply select and present extracts from researchers into this subject to outline an abusively controlling social system that is, by design, commonly unacknowledged, rarely spoken of and systematically discredited. Despite its main principles of operation being detailed in the recent histories of major nations, the essential details of this abusive system are confined to alternative media wherein it’s discussed with increasing frequency, albeit in a highly distorted fashion. Pre-eminently complex, the system and its practices are based on the main facets of ultra-modern intelligence operations, techno-social civilian “collaboration”*, and classified advanced technologies.

*As will be featured in this article, the term “collaborator” is taken from the term “unofficial collaborator” used to classify civilians who “unofficially” participated in the Stasi’s covert persecution of civilians. Note that the modern-day “gang stalking” equivalent term is “perp”, as in “perpetrator”, which is more appropriate yet still inadequate to represent this particular form of agency.

So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed, by Jon Ronson – Notes & Themes + Related Media

Thematically organised book notes (enhanced extracts) from Jon Ronson’s seminal book on modern (online) public shaming, supplemented by references to relevant media.

So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed: A Micro Book Review

The book So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed by Jon Ronson (2015) is a seminal examination of the modern form of public shaming – namely, online shaming – which been made increasingly prominent by the expansion and intensification of social media culture.
Although the text is a little lightweight for my preferences, the writing is effective and revealing of its topic. Ronson’s documentary style approach that blends some philosophy into investigative interview is quite fitting here, particularly in introducing the world of online shaming. Shamed seems especially valuable in that it appears to be the first popular work to explore and assess the nature of online shaming in its social and personal effects.
Since the book is based on a broad variety of personal insights that are revealing of human nature and cultural conditions, I imagine that most would find interest in its content even if not particularly engaged with social media (ironically, it so happened that I only signed up to ~~Twitter~~ 𝕏 a few months after having read this book).

The Book Notes

The notes featured in this post are composed from my extracted highlights of the book and consist largely of my paraphrases of the original text. However, I have also altered, elaborated, and added to Ronson’s details and points to represent what I considered to be the essential significance of each passage. Thus, instead of creating a notes summary of the book I’ve compiled its most substantial information such to enhance the reception of its significance.

Munich’s Cycle of Vengeance in View of the Israel-Hamas War/Palestinian Conflict

An analysis of the 2005 Spielberg film Munich in the context of the Israel-Hamas war and Israeli-Palestinian conflict that identifies universally significant themes of profound current relevance.

Preface: Either With US or Against US

“Every nation, in every region, now has a decision to make:
Either you are with us, or you are with the terrorists. (Applause.)”
—President George W. Bush on September 20^th 2001 inaugurating the ‘War on trr’ (sic).

This article analyses Spielberg’s 2005 film Munich for its thematic relevancy to the Israel-Hamas War and resurged Palestinian Conflict begun by the October 7^th attack; and more essentially, to the globalised ideology of counterterrorism. Before doing so, I outline in this Preface the context in which I interpret the current war and significant themes from the film.

No Emily Blunt as audience proxy… is extremely dangerous to our democracy

Something’s familiar (and disturbing) about this…

Preface

Together, the emboldened sentences say it all.

The rest is details.

Introverts and Socialising – Insights & Themes (Enhanced Extracts)

A compilation of extracts from a variety of articles to reveal the nature of introverts in relation to the conditions of socialising and their experiences with it. Organized by ten themes, this series of concise passages aims to provide much needed perspective on an obscured topic, and a source that may serve as a useful reference.

The nature of introversion and the conditions of socialising.

Last year I discovered and read the book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, by Susan Cain (2012). Having not explored the topic of introversion and extraversion personality types, I gained much perspective on these concepts through the author’s research and insights. Being an introvert herself, Cain clarifies not just what it means to be of introverted nature but to be so in a world conditioned by extraverted traits, behaviours, and ideals.

Since then, this general perspective of introversion vis-à-vis extraverted culture has remained at the back of my mind in relation to my routine social experiences. Recently, I decided to further explore not the general topic, but rather discussion of introverted nature in the context of the social experiences of introverts. In other words, I sought information that was more personally relevant to being introverted in an extraverted social world; and essentially, to identify, clarify, and examine the conditions, effects, and factors of this inter-personality relationship.