It’s hard to enjoy the writings of Franz Kafka, though in some of his story telling we find a reflection of the contemporary or perhaps a dirty glass panel into the past. In his book, The Trial, we experience a bureaucracy of inhumanity through the eyes of an unnamed man. He is arrested and prosecuted for an unspecified crime, taken on a journey where he has no rights or agency and is one in many victims of an oppressive system. To live in a world where one does not know or understand the law, and where the layers of administration are so great one is not even considered human, no longer...

“Don’t be mean, we don’t have to be mean, coz remember, no matter where you go, there you are,” said Buckaroo Banzai as he stood on stage with his band of as multi-faceted men. The Hong King Cavaliers. Buckaroo, the scientist, surgeon, rock star, comic book character among other things, above all else, a hero. Champion for the human race, even as two rival alien empires battle one another. Earth a weak proxy in such a struggle, the ‘ally’ aliens are not good, rather less evil and see us humans as useful, a malleable race to manipulate and threaten into helping them with their war. Despite...

Greg was irate. It had been the second time in a week he had been cut off like that. His car recovered from the swerve, the offending gaggle of cyclists barely paid him notice. He pulled into a nearby service station, checked his tyre. All seemed alright. “Those pricks think they own the roads,” he said loud enough for a nearby man to hear. “Yep, like a plague.” The men agreed while others looked past their conversation including two Lycra clad bike riders who looked Greg up and down as he entered the service station. A pair of police officers were entering as he was leaving, Greg nodded and...

He stood composed, the wind pushed him. The trees waved and leaned above and around. Clouds considered rain, though retained a deep grey. Birds, breeze and his own breathing a convalescence of harmony. He was alone. Standing as if on a horse, the ancient position tested his legs. If his eyes were closed, he could see. When open, he saw nothing. With each breath, he wandered free of thoughts. No mind, no past, no future on the presence of the present. With each, breath, breathe, breath, breathing, breath. Only a Now. Anger, rage, it boiled and simmered. Concealed beneath the skin of formality...

Money has less value than it’s ever had, and yet to sell out is an open goal. We have become accustomed to being lied to, not just from politicians but the celebrities who compete for our attention online. They use their platforms as infomercials or to advertise scams. Charlatans to grift, whether as ‘content creator’ or gatekeeping podcaster using the platform to push products and guests. Marketing tends to ruin everything and even though we are often adverse to it, for some reason it still seems to be profitable. Those who have established themselves as a person with principles or a...

Another war. It’s not enough that it’s now been claimed almost seven hundred thousand are dead in Gaza, nearly half of them children. It’s not enough the Sudan bleeds or the war continues between Ukraine and Russia. It’s not enough the US, has threatened another round of attacks on Iran or that it continues to bomb Africa in open silence. It’s not enough that the world reels in such misery, death, carnage, that now the United States has attacked Venezuela. Though, it’s developing and details are unknown at the time of writing, footage is available of attack helicopters firing at Venezuelan...

I grew up in and around paddocks full of livestock, the abattoirs where they were slaughtered and dressed to the butchers, super markets and catering companies where they would eventually end up on someones plate. A man covered in blood was a common fixture in my child hood, it was more normal than a teacher in a tweed jumper. I was fortunate to have this appreciation for the world, an understanding of a part of the real world which goes mostly unseen despite the countless bellies it fed. I could read Upton Sinclair’s, The Jungle and not feel shock or disgust. Despite the exaggerations and...