Richard Tillman appeared on Real Time With Bill Maher on September 24, 2010. During the interview he discusses the military cover-up and murder conspiracy theories revolving around his brother Pat’s death. He also had some choice words about religion.

Richard’s take on religion is particularly passionate. In a video clip aired on the show, his response to comments made at his brother’s funeral by Maria Shriver and John McCain, in which they envision Pat having gone to a heaven overseen by a loving god, is particularly powerful.

Pat’s a fucking champion and he always will be. Just make no mistake, he’d want me to say this. He’s not with God. He’s fucking dead. He’s not religious so, thanks for your thoughts, but he’s fucking dead.”

In his interview with Maher, Richard elaborated:

I don’t go into your church and say this is bullshit, so don’t come to my brother’s service and tell me that he’s with god.”

The Tillman gene needs to be cloned.
 

 
Thanks Lauren Morrell.
 
Previously on DM: ‘The Tillman Story.’

 
If you have been following the story about the “gay kiss” scandal that erupted from the pissed off blog post that I posted here on Saturday and went international within… um, minutes, then you have probably also heard that Facebook subsequently apologized.

This is wildly inaccurate, to say the least…

The so-called “apology” touted by the likes of Perez Hilton, Pink News, The Advocate and even mainstream news sources like AOL, Huffington Post and Gawker, as if some kind of “victory” had been won by the LGBT community was nothing more than generic “Oopsie! We goofed” text left by a low level Facebook employee six pages in on the comments to the original Dangerous Minds post. Here is the screen shot:
 

 
THIS two sentence squib is what is being described as “an apology” and repeated over and over again by SHITLOADS of extremely lazy reporters as an “official” statement from Facebook!

Is it? Doesn’t look that way to me. I mean, at least say it like you mean it!

Prove this to yourself by googling the exact words that appear here and you will see exactly what I mean. This supposed “apology” was nothing more than a “comment.” That’s it. I used to work at the Los Angeles Times and believe me when I tell you that 99% of the articles I have read about this matter would never have gotten past the copy desk there. This was ONLY shoddy reporting and nothing but shoddy reporting. Britain’s Daily Mail newspaper was the very worst of all. That “reporter” got almost every single major fact WRONG. And then that article got rewritten by even lesser news sources all over the Internet.

Furthermore, it’s not saying anything specifically about a gay kiss. This generic text could also refer, for example, to a photo of a breastfeeding woman that someone reported as “abusive” (their word not mine) to Facebook’s censors. Don’t break out the champagne so fast, folks.

Read what John Hudson had to say, writing at The Atlantic Wire today:

This week, with some satisfaction, a number of gay and lesbian news sites reported that Facebook had “apologized” for removing a photo of two men kissing on its site. The initial censorship had sparked a week-long protest and attracted coverage from The Huffington Post, MSNBC and other news outlets. But now, the man who started the controversy says he’s not satisfied with Facebook’s response. “This is being presented as some kind of victory or that there’s a reason to go do a conga line down Christopher Street,” says Richard Metzger, who posted the photo of two fully-clothed men kissing that was removed from Facebook on Saturday for containing “nudity, or any kind of graphic or sexually suggestive content” according to a notice from the social network.

On Monday, after many gay men and women protested the decision by putting up pictures of themselves kissing on Facebook, the company issued a statement to a handful of media outlets [RM note: I disagree w/ John here, I don’t think it was sent to anyone, I think The Advocate got it from DM’s comments section and that it got repeated over and over again from that report until it became “true”]: “The photo in question does not violate our Statement of Rights and Responsibilities and was removed in error. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

But Metzger doesn’t see why anyone’s celebrating that acknowledgement. “It’s just generic PR speak that doesn’t even refer to a gay kiss,” he says. “The real problem here is certainly not that Facebook is a homophobic company. It’s that their terrible corporate policy on censorship needs to stop siding with the idiots, the complainers and the least-enlightened and evolved amongst us.”

According to Facebook’s FAQ page, a “Facebook administrator looks into each report thoroughly” when deciding whether to remove an item. “There shouldn’t be a human being making that determination,” says Metzger.  He would prefer a censorship system that removes flagged photographs based on an automatic, crowdsourced method similar to the one used by the comedy site Funny or Die. Essentially, he’s promoting a “wisdom of the crowd” system that would work like this: One user flags an item and a second alert pops up asking other users if the material is offensive or not. That way, no single person could get a photograph banned.

But would a “majority rules” system make for a more tolerant Facebook? We’re not sure. Asked if he thought his proposed system could result in more homophobic behavior, Metzger responded as such:

“That’s possible, but in our ecosystem that kind of behavior would be expelled. On Free Republic-type groups, behavior like that might get voted up but it wouldn’t affect the whole Facebook ecosystem. These groups stay with their own kind.”

Still confused? Here’s the back story, just in case:

Richard Metzger: How I, a married, middle-aged man, became an accidental spokesperson for gay rights (Boing Boing)

 
I present you all with an early Easter gift of some YouTube videos of children who are absolutely terrified of the Easter Bunny. You know what? He scared the crap out of me, too. Maybe it’s time to stop all the Easter Bunny madness because I think the kids are trying to tell us something….

 
More videos after the jump…

 
Oh dear… And if you’re not too sure what a “goatse” is, it might be better you leave it that way.  Probably best not to Google it… trust me.

Photo via Pazzer’s Flickr photostream.

 
Fans of modern indie rock might recognise the name Seb Thompson. Apart from being an incredible drummer and a production powerhouse, he is a founder member of Trans Am and also drums for Ian Svenonious’ excellent Weird War. He now has a new solo project called Publicist that does away with rock stylings and goes straight for the disco jugular.

Publicist is essentially a one man band, that features electronics programmed by Thompson, vocodered vocals, and live drumming. Though still a pretty new concern with only a couple of singles under the belt (including “Momma” featuring vocals from Svenonious, and last year’s Keep It Off The Record 12”) even at this early stage it looks and sounds great. This shouldn’t be a surprise to Trans Am or Weird War fans, as it’s obvious from those groups how talented Thompson is. For me it’s great to see him directly expressing the electronic dance elements audible in Trans Am.

There’s not much info floating about on Publicist so far, but you can see and hear more at his MySpace (*spit*). Publicist is making a live appearance tonight at Brooklyn’s Zebulon, and for an idea of how fun that will be watch this live clip: 
 
Publicist - “Make It Right” (live)
 

 
Publicist - “Hand To Mouth”
 

 
I’m very curious to find out what my American cousins make of Russell Brand. Yes, I know you know he’s a comedian, and it’s pretty obvious that guy has the gift of the gab. His reboot of Arthur has just been released (to some pretty damning reviews) so we’re seeing a lot more of his promotional material at the moment. But have you seen him in a context like this? His mouth is off the leash here as usual, but the focus is not on wackiness and jokes but on serious conversation and in particular ruminations on celebrity culture, media narrative and his part in that.

Newsnight is the BBC’s nightly investigative news broadcast, and Jeremy Paxman is the BBC’s masthead “serious” anchorman (Chris Morris’ character in The Day Today is basically Paxman amped up). It’s safe to say they are taking this interview seriously, and it’s great that Paxman doesn’t patronise or talk down to Brand but speaks directly to his intelligence. 

Brand has been a well known TV personality in the UK for the best part of a decade now. He really hit his stride as the host of Big Brother’s Little Brother, a daily, live, audience-based re-cap show where he developed his motor-mouth dandy routine. To see him handle a large crowd of drunken, excited young-people with nothing but the power of words was very impressive. As with Andrew WK, it’s refreshing to see someone dropping their public persona and revealing themselves to be highly intelligent:
 

 
Thanks to Aylwyn Napier for the link!

 
Pat Tillman was killed, perhaps murdered, by “friendly fire” in Afghanistan seven years ago today.

“I’m Pat Tillman! I’m Pat fucking Tillman! Why are you shooting at me?”

With those livid last words, pro-football star and Army Ranger Patrick Daniel Tillman Jr.—who gave up a multimillion-dollar contract with the Arizona Cardinals to serve his country and become the most famous enlisted man in Afghanistan—died in a fusillade of friendly fire on a rocky hillside near the Pakistani border. The bullets, coming at him from 40 yards away at a rate of 950 rounds per minute, were from a machine gun wielded by a member of his own platoon.

Update May 3: Was Pat Tillman killed in order to keep him quiet? General Wesley Clark thinks it’s a possibility. In a July 2007 interview with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC, Clark had this to say about Tillman’s death:

Tillman was an intelligent man who, when he realized that the war in Iraq was based on propaganda, deceit and lies, was prepared to return to the States as an outspoken critic of the war. Tillman had contacted Noam Chomsky to plan a joint anti-war statement and support John Kerry’s presidential election campaign. Radical for a soldier, to say the least, and an indication of just how fed up he had become with the path his country was taking in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In March of 2003, Tillman told his buddy Spc. Russell Baer, “You know, this war is so fucking illegal.” He urged his platoon to vote against Bush in the 2004 election. He had gone from being a political asset to the Bush administration to their worst nightmare. Certainly, it would be in the best interest of the war machine to have Tillman eliminated. 

In Amir Bar-Lev’s illuminating and heartbreaking The Tillman Story, we are confronted with the horrible truth of how our government manipulates its citizens and sacrifices its young in an effort to wage wars that are not only immoral but criminal.

Pat Tillman died for our sins—the sins of ignorance and blind allegiance to leaders who are nothing less than the embodiment of pure fucking evil. Will we be led into another pointless, endless war in Libya where once again the lines between the good guys and bad guys are so blurred that we don’t even know who to hate anymore? Maybe it’s time to hate ourselves for being weak-willed, spineless sheep. Maybe we deserve to be addressed in the same way that Pat Tillman’s father, Pat Sr., addressed the “investigators” involved in the cover-up of his son’s murder: “fuck you and yours.”

Watch the movie and then take your love for Tillman and your anger and do something with it. You can start by visiting the Pat Tillman Foundation’s website.
 

 
Parts two through seven after the jump…

 
Patti Smith plays dress-up for a pirate-inspired photo shoot by Annie Liebovitz in the London studio where the latest Johnny Depp pirate movie is being filmed for Disney. The shoot took place last September.

In the video, Patti makes the connection between rock and rollers and pirates and manages to look like both.

 
Think of it as a Schoolhouse Rock episode about the varieties of right-wing assholes…

The Dipshit Doodlebug Institute takes an in-depth look at the Republican Party and breaks them down into 10 distinct types.

Philip K. Dick, Germs-manager Nicole Panter, author KW Jeter, and artist Gary Panter, at Philip K. Dick’s Santa Ana condo. From Nicole Panter’s Flickr account.

A rare look at the inside of Philip K. Dick’s condo! Here is the attendant interview, from Slash magazine, May 1980:

Philip K. Dick is 51 years old. Since 1955 he’s written 35 books that have been translated into eighteen languages. He has five ex-wives, two cats and lives 10 minutes from Disneyland. Of the books he has written, his personal favorites are, The Man in the High Castle, Dr. Bloodmoney, and Through a Scanner Darkly. His latest book, VALIS, will be released in February, with the sequel to be published sometime in the spring. Mr. Dick says he doesn’t take drugs anymore, but thinks about them all the time. Despite stories to the contrary, he’s a real charming guy.

The interview was conducted in Mr. Dick’s conapt by Gary and Nicole Panter. K.W. Jeter, one of Dick’s close friends and author of the yet unpublished but excellent DR. ADDER, attended and added his comments.

DICK: Um … fuck.
JETER: Beer?
SLASH: I don’t drink beer.
DICK: I don’t drink beer either. What’s so … so … I’m tired of all this circle of … of effete intellectual … this circle of intellectuals who drink beer. (laughter)
SLASH: Is this a conapt?
DICK: It definitely is a conapt.
SLASH: Is a conapt a combination of condominium and apartment?
DICK: Yes.
SLASH: So the people in your stories own their own apartments?
DICK: They own them and are doomed to live in them. And they are also doomed to participate in meetings with the other owners and have complaints made about their moral lives.
SLASH: Like in small towns … do you go to these meetings?
DICK: Yes, it’s mandatory.
SLASH: What do they say?
DICK: They say how come your car has got dust all over it? So I park in a dark corner of the garage so no one can see it. This one old lady built a little door for her cat to go in and out of and in a meeting someone complained that they saw cat shit out on the walkway and now she’s responsible for all the cat shit anyone sees around.
SLASH: Can they make you move out if the other tenants don’t like you?
DICK: No, they can’t get you out they can just sue you to death.
SLASH: Were you raised in a religious organization?
DICK: No.
SLASH: Are you anti organized religion?
DICK: Yes. Technically, I’m Episcopalian, but I don’t ever go. I’m interested in them because they’re a barrio church and they do lot of civil service work … technically I’m a religious anarchist.
SLASH: Is this Orange County?
DICK: Very Definitely … I bet that’s good beer. The Germs are breaking up, huh? The cat’s laughing at me … But Darby Crash is going to start his own band.
SLASH: Yeah, how’d you know?
DICK: I know … I know this stuff. Did I do that right? I sure like the Plugz. Now the beach bands like the Circle Jerks …
SLASH: Darby has a mohican now which brings up the kids you wrote about that modeled themselves after South American Indians or was it Africans. When did you begin to write about mutant youth cultures?
DICK: In my writing? TIME OUT OF JOINT in 1958.
SLASH: Were you a beatnik then … a bohemian?
DICK: I was all of those things. I knew the first beatnik. His name was Charles McLane … oh, the first hippy. I’m sorry. He was into drugs - that would be hippy.
SLASH: What made a beatnik, alcohol?
DICK: Some were into drugs. The difference was there was more of an emphasis on creative work with the beatniks. You had to write … much less emphasis on drugs.
SLASH: How far does a bohemian or lunatic fringe go back?
JETER: To the Bohemians in the twenties …
DICK: Wrong! Puccini’s LA BOHEME describes people who were poets and singers and who burned their pictures in the 19th Century. The furthest I can remember back is the thirties to the WPA artists paid by the government. They became the bohemian strata of the United States.
SLASH: What prompted you in 1958 to begin writing about this kind of youth culture? Kids with teeth filed to points?
DICK: Yeah, I don’t know. It wasn’t until ‘71 in a speech I delivered in Vancouver that I was consciously discussing the rise of the youth culture. I glorified punks “kids who would neither read, watch, remember, or be intimidated.” I spoke of the rise of a youth culture which would overthrow the government.
SLASH: Do you still think that’s the case?
DICK: I certainly do.
SLASH: Have you got a timetable?
DICK: What time is it now? (laughter) Any day now I expect to hear that swarms have entered the White House and broken all the furniture.
SLASH: What comes after that?
DICK: Oops!

More of the Philip K. Dick interview from Slash magazine after the jump