The Tithe #6- A Microcosm of the Insanity that is the Modern US Progressive Movement

Writer: Matt Hawkins
Co-Creator & Layouts: Rahsan Ekedal
Artist: Phillip Sevy
Publisher: Top Cow/Image Comics
Released: 21st October 2015



The unholy marriage between progressivism and Islam is exposed for all to see in this unintentionally hilarious, blind to reality, desperate not to offend PC comic book.

A violent hate mob of ignorant Islamaphobes.

I love it, I really do. This is a perfect case of giving a progressive US comic book writer lots and lots of rope, standing back and then watching as he trips, stumbles, falls on his arse, and inevitably ends up swinging from a noose of his own creation.

I don’t wish any misfortune on writer Matt Hawkins, I really don’t. I want him to keep on writing these comic books, to keep on talking down to his readers, and to keep on exposing the self-destructive madness that is at the heart of the US ‘progressive’ left.

In The Tithe #5 good old left thinking Matt engaged in classic, textbook progressive doublethink. He wrote a book about an Islamic suicide bomber blowing himself up in a Christian Church, but being a progressive type he couldn’t bring himself to blame Islam for the murderous event, so he did what any progressive would do in such a situation. Yes, he ended up blaming white, racist, far right Christian skinheads for the bombing instead.

Muslims would obviously never dream of doing such a dastardly deed. Of course not and all of the things that have happened in Syria and Libya over the past couple of years must be part of the right wing conspiracy as well, right?

The story in The Tithe #5 was outstandingly ‘progressive’ work from Mr.Hawkins, but he was missing that one vital ingredient in his politically correct cocktail. That ingredient is duly added in The Tithe #6. What ingredient am I talking about here? What is this progressive text missing?  Take a second, think about it, and then come back to this review.

What does every ‘progressive’ comic book need in 2015?

Oh no, that poor man. Who will save him?

If you guessed ‘Young woman of colour as heroic protagonist’ well done, because that’s exactly what is added in The Tithe #6.

Here she comes, the biggest cliché in contemporary comic books, jogging down the street, listening to feminist icon Beyonce, coming across a bunch of ignorant, racist ‘rednecks’ beating up a poor innocent Muslim, and jumping to his rescue with high kicks and empowered punches to the face. Oh, throw in the fact that she’s a Muslim, of course she is, and you have that progressive wet dream of a fictional character, the empowered Muslim girl fighting against evil, ignorant racists.

This empowered female Muslim character gets around quite a lot in comic books today, and she’s always fighting against evil men. Not Muslim men of course, she never does that, but she sure does know how to kick ignorant Christian butt. It's strange that, don't you think? Why is the liberal comic book world full of empowered Muslim girls who don't appear to be doing anything to stop what is happening within their own Muslim communities, preferring instead to kick a load of white guys around? Ummm, strange that, it's almost like comic book writers are trying to avoid something.

A couple of weeks ago the WWE toured Saudi Arabia. The female wrestlers did not attend the tour, and all of the shows played to male only audiences. Back home on US television the WWE continued to push it's female division as feminist icons for young girls to look up to, even though none of the female wrestlers said a word about not being allowed on the tour of Saudi Arabia. And what did feminists say about the WWE touring a country where females are not even allowed to drive a car? Absolutely nothing. That’s how pathetic it all is, and it just goes to show how blind to reality the modern feminist movement really is.

The progressive cliché heroine is the only addition to the narrative in 'The Tithe' this month, apart from a guest appearance by a right wing Donald Runsfeld look-alike politician. He’s the guy behind the skinheads, and his genius plan is to stage terrorist attacks all over the US in order to demonise the poor innocent, peace loving Muslims and to ensure he gets elected as the next US President.

Don't fret worried citizen, here comes liberal wet dream Girl.

I’m not joking here, that’s the actual story in The Tithe. This book is so ignorant to the reality behind extremist Islam (Sunni and Shiaa) that it cannot conceive that Islamic suicide bombers blow themselves up for the simple reason that they are faithful believers in the violently intolerant group-think, collectivist ideology that is the religion of Islam.

All of those beheadings and suicide bombings that we see every day on our television sets and all over the Internet in graphic detail, have nothing to do with Islam. No. It’s all a big right wing conspiracy of racist, sexist, white Christian lunatics, and as this book ‘progresses’ I’m sure that this devious plot will be uncovered by the progressive wet dream Muslim girl and her reluctant (he’s black, so he’s a good guy) cop father.

The whole thing is so completely ridiculous, not just because it flies in the face of reality, but because the FIRST people that would be blamed for any ‘Islamic’ terrorist attacks in the US right now would be right wing groups. It’s the first thing that would spring to the progressive mind, and that progressive mind is all over the mainstream media right now. It’s not a fringe belief, it’s the status quo consensus and it’s pushed by the corporate media on a hourly basis, not just in their ‘news’ reports, but all over their drama programming (usually about cops) as well.

Why do progressives always blame somebody other than Muslims whenever Muslims commit a terrible crime? For a recent example look at what happened in Israel last week with Palestinians randomly stabbing Israeli citizens in the streets. Look at who is getting the blame for that. It’s not the hate filled, knife wielding perpetuators, is it? No, it’s the Israeli’s who are getting the blame because they are defending themselves from getting stabbed.

That’s how ridiculous the progressive mind-set is. They have victim categories, and if you are not black, Islamic, female, gay, transgender, or whatever is trendy this week, then you must be part of some evil, sexist, right wing, patriarchal conspiracy, as is pushed in this comic book.

The progressive left doesn’t appear to understand that if Islam starts to have a major influence in the west (and that is the goal) then the first people to be targeted will be the progressive left themselves. All of the victim groups that they themselves are supposed to be championing would be hit the worst. I’m talking about women who disobey their husbands, atheists, new-agers, homosexuals and many of the other groups in the west that are currently enjoying freedoms that simply do not exist in the Islamic world.

Under Islamic law many of the freedoms that have been won from the tyranny of the state over hundreds of years of western civilisation would disappear overnight. That’s why the state loves progressivism, that’s why the television and newspapers push it, and that’s why we should be doing all that we can to stand up to it and call it out as the self destructive ideology that it is.

The sexy agents of the US police state.

The progressive mantra of ‘tolerance’ is opening up the western world to a group of people who are as intolerant as you can possibly get, so intolerant that they will chop your head off in the street if you disagree with them.

The marriage between Islam and progressivism then is completely one-sided, with the soft left welcoming a patriarchal death cult that will put them to death as soon as speak to them. It’s completely nuts, and that’s exactly the kind of suicidal mindset that is exposed for all to see within the pages of this painfully PC comic book.

I’ll conclude this review by restating something that I said at the beginning. I love it, I really do. This comic book is perfect, and long may it continue. What it is unwittingly doing is exposing the self-destructive unreality that is at the heart of politically correct, identity politics progressive ideology.

Matt Hawkins has been given some rope, and just look at what he’s done with it. Great job Matt, keep up the good work. What you are exposing here is vital, and your attitude of tolerance towards violent intolerance is a message that we all need to understand, correct, and start to do something about, something that involves defending ourselves, rather than waiting for the inevitable downward arc of the Jihadi Islamic blade.


Rating: 7/10 (A vital comic book that must be read in order to understand the insanity that is at the heart of the modern US progressive movement)


* Credit goes to writer Matt Hawkins (really) for pointing out the differences between Sunni (Saudi Arabia, ISIS, Wahabi, supported by the west) and Shia (Iran, supported by Russia, feared by Israel, for very good reasons). There is some real ignorance and street level bigotry caused by a confusion between the two sects, and some of this is explored within this comic book, though not in the detail that I would like, plus it's very convenient for narrative and ideological reasons as it frames 'rednecks' as ignorant people who don't know the difference between the two groups. The problem with Islam is not our ignorance between the two major groups, the problem is bigger than that. It's a problem of an entire group of people that want to completely change every single thing about western civilisation and the freedoms that we now have after hundreds and hundreds of years fighting against the state, usually backed up by the collectivist ideology of religion.  Islam is a backwards, intolerant religion that does not respect women's rights and the right of the individual to live his life free from the collective ideology of religion. Islam is a step backwards, and the west needs to be very, very careful with it.

Comic review: Alan Moore’s Providence #3- A black, fishy comedy that mocks Christianity

Writer: Alan Moore
Artist: Jacen Burrows
Publisher: Avatar Press
Released: 12 August 2015



I’ve read this book more than a few times now, and have been afraid of reviewing it. The reason being, it’s complex, and a review wouldn’t be easy, and I don’t want to mess it up. However, I’ve read it again today, and can see a slither of meaning amongst the murkiness, and so, I’m ready to give it a go.

Fishy men collecting souls in bottles.

Okay then, so what’s it all about? I think that the following quotation (from the book itself) nicely sums it all up:

‘It’s leaking from the future.’

That’s how I see the book now. That’s why in issue #3 there are weird, disjointed dream sequences, giving hints that are confused (as all dreams are) with events that are currently happening in the life of the main protagonist.

Our man is dreaming of the future, but it’s mixed up with his every day anxieties, his feelings of guilt, and his longings for answers in the present. We are seeing the world through his eyes (as is reinforced by the diary extracts that follow the main comic book narrative) and the confusion that he is experiencing is being transferred into the reading experience of the reader.

The dream sequences (of the main protagonist) are explored in great detail during the diary sections of the book and expand the narrative after the main illustrated part of the book concludes. Within this diary section are clues for the reader, clues that hint at both what is happening, and what is to come. It’s a fascinating story-telling device, and something that adds so much to the comic book reading experience, adding subtle elements, and details that would otherwise have been lost within the necessarily truncated comic book story format.

After reading the main comic book text, and the diary extracts, I cannot help but conclude that our protagonist is a bit of a dim detective. He is preoccupied with homosexual urges that distract him from the clues that can be picked up by the attentive reader, and although he records everything, he is not exactly coming to any big conclusions for himself. I guess that’s our job. Our protagonist records the evidence, and it’s up to us to unravel and make meaning of it all.

Into the caverns of the mind.

Providence is an occult mystery narrative that is dropping clues as it goes along. It’s a complex, involving book, and that’s exactly what you want in a genre book of this type.

The protagonist has to be a bit dim, as he’s laying out the clues, not solving them. The enjoyment to be had here is in following the story, and speculating about what is going on, whilst always being a bit in the dark as the full picture has yet to be revealed.

As for the deeper meanings that lay behind the narrative, that’s even murkier, but at the moment I detect a black comedy that involves jews, fish people, and homosexuals. It’s hinted that all three groups are about to be persecuted by the upcoming Nazi regime, with the black comedy being that two of the group are real, and were persecuted, whilst the other is pure Alan Moore weirdness.

The main focus of Providence #3 is the aforementioned fish people. These half-human, half fish follow a religion that’s part Christianity, and part worship of an ancient Mesopotamian fish God called Oannes.

‘Oannes, in Mesopotamian mythology, an amphibious being who taught mankind wisdom. Oannes, as described by the Babylonian priest Berosus, had the form of a fish but with the head of a man under his fish’s head and under his fish’s tail the feet of a man. In the daytime he came up to the seashore of the Persian Gulf and instructed mankind in writing, the arts, and the sciences. Oannes was probably the emissary of Ea, god of the freshwater deep and of wisdom.’
http://www.britannica.com/topic/Oannes

The fictional fish religion in Providence substitutes Oannes into the role of Christ himself, and is thus blackly blasphemous, disrespectful and contemptuous of Jesus Christ and Christianity as a whole.

Dream sequences include gratuitous nudity, be warned. 

What writer Alan Moore is doing here is insinuating that Christianity itself is a mixed up religion that has taken weird elements from earlier cult worship, creating a new cult that is equally as ridiculous as what came before it.

To further reinforce this point, the book concludes with the ‘Church of St. Jude’s Parish Newsletter.’ This is a comedic, absurdist attack on the origins of Christianity, mocking Jesus by making him a fish on a slab, resurrected and thus followed by all fish that have come after him as the one true messiah of all fish.

‘And they said, let us thake him out and hang him upon hooks that he may cure. Yet many tides did not pass before he was risen from his slab and was descended unto Heaven, through black abysses to dwell amidst wonder and glory for ever.’ (The Parish Church of Saint Jude, 138 Bridge Street, Salem, Mass. June- August, 1919)

Pretty silly, isn’t it? Christians are often mocked for taking allegorical Bible stories literally, but this really is taking things to a whole new level.

I have to point out that Alan Moore is picking very low hanging fruit here in mocking the origins of Christianity. It’s something that is allowed, and even encouraged, so I’m not going to applaud him for doing it. If he was mocking Judaism or Islam then I’d applaud him, but he’s not doing that, probably because doing so would be truly controversial, and dangerous.

Alan Moore is not being brave, or outrageous, or scandalous, or cutting edge in mocking the origins of Christianity and talking about a weird fish cult, insinuating that Christianity itself is pretty much the same thing. Sorry, he’s just not. He’s doing what you are allowed to do in our neo-liberal, atheist times, but he’s doing it very well, and Providence is noticeably superior to 99% of the other comic books that I read on a weekly basis.

Providence #3 then is a studious, intelligent, dark occult comic book, but it’s also, very much nestled within the centrally planned social consensus norms and mores of our neo-liberal, cultural Marxist times. Get it, enjoy it, have a laugh with it, but please, recognise it for what it actually is.


Rating: 9/10 (Blackly comic tale that is mocking the origins of Christianity)



Note:
I do realise that Providence is packed with references to H.P Lovecraft and that this book is more than likely a progressive/liberal critique of the identity politics issues within his work. I recognise that, but as I’m not particularly familiar with the PC thought crimes committed by H.P Lovecraft I’ve reviewed this new book by Alan Moore as a stand-alone text. 

Comic review: 2000AD PROG 1942- Spider Monster in the Snow

Writers and artists: Various
Publisher: Rebellion
Released: 5th August 2015


Last week I tried something new. No, I didn’t buy all of the Marvel and DC books about young girls, government agents and identity politics, load up on aspartame and overdose on mental illness masquerading as normalcy. No, what I did was a lot more sensible, and enjoyable, than that.

What I did was put on some Black Metal music (the new album by Abyssal is awesome, and not as bleak and despairing as I though that it would be) and read 2000AD, story by story, stopping along the way and reviewing the book as I read it.

This resulted in a disjointed and slightly odd review, with me making my mind up about the book in real time as I read, and reviewed it. I enjoyed the experience, so that’s what I’m going to do again this week, so on goes Antikatastaseis, and let’s get into PROG 1942 of 2000AD.

There’s a really nice front cover this week, with Dredd in what looks like an evil version of Superman’s fortress of solitude. Nice job Glenn Fabry. Now lets open up this beauty and see what we have inside.

Tharg is talking about downloading the comic this week. I’d rather touch something than look at it, so it’s always going to be the hard copy for me.

Onto my old nemesis, Judge Dredd, lost in the beautiful, poetically pure snow, so although I might dislike the old uniformed control freak, at least his adventures are going to be pleasing to the eye.  The narrative read pretty well this week. The story is getting increasingly simplified, and I like that. It’s about a Judge hating monster, looking for revenge against the trigger happy Judges. Go on monster, you can do it. Kick their authoritarian backsides, you will be doing us all a favour. The artist on this one is Henry Flint, and he’s doing an excellent job. His snow monster is part alien, part arachnid and it looks awesome.

That’s a good start then, let’s get on to the second story.

Oh crud, it’s the ever annoying, old man media student lame cultural reference machine that is Harry Absalom, the most irritating fictional character outside of a Kevin Smith movie. Okay then, here I go.

Two references to old television shows and a bit of Christianity bashing, insinuating that all of the priests are sex abusers, that’s what’s on offer this week. Good news though, as this is the end of the story.

It should have been something that I enjoyed, but the Christianity bashing (lame, easy and ubiquitous in atheistic 2015 UK) and main protagonist killed it for me. It was supposed to be about institutional child abuse (see the breaking news about ex UK PM Ted Heath this week) but all it actually did was have a go at Christianity. Not big, not clever, and it distracts from the real life paedophile MP’s that actually did abuse kids in the UK, and continue to do so today. It’s not the Church. It’s the state, dummy.

Hang on. I need to brush my teeth to wash out the foul taste of Harry, back in a sec.

Ahh, that’s better, minty fresh, now on to the next story, the happily colourful and always enjoyable Helium.

Good news, it’s enjoyable again this week, the dialogue is fun, and it ends with a villain determined to end the life of our sparkling heroine. This is a good one. There’s a lightness and sense of gaiety to it, and it makes me smile. It’s the subtly of the writing that does it, but the art certainly helps as well. It’s big, bold, colourful and fun. I like it, how could I not?

Oh good, the next story this week is the steadily improving Outlier. It’s going to be good. I’m starting to have confidence in this one. Is that breasts? Yes, there are definitely breasts in this one, so if you are a fan of the mammary glands you’ll want to pick up 2000AD this week. I jest, but not about the breasts. It’s good, it’s green, it has breasts and it’s all action. So another win for Outlier, and the story continues to be a lot better than I thought that it would be.

Oh dear, the last story in 2000AD this week is Jaegir. I haven’t been enjoying this one, although last week it did show how you cannot expect uniformed order followers to investigate their fellow uniformed order followers and get magical results that transforms immorality (following orders) into morality. Fingers crossed, wish me luck. I’m going in.

Oh, a brilliant start, with our protagonist explaining that following orders is actually a good thing because it saves lives. Nice one, I see what you did there. Turning immorality into morality based on blind trust in ‘leadership’ and authority figures. This really is army indoctrination going on here. Hey kids, be your own man. Don’t let them tell you that they are doing it for your own good. Don’t believe the lies, break from the programming, be free, be independent, be a real man.

Oh, it gets even better now, with the leader girl admitting that she is ashamed, that she was responsible for condemning three hundred people to death, but as she is doing this she is still talking about ‘duty’ like that is something that everybody should be proud of. What is this? Oh yeah, I know. It’s militaristic collectivism, but dressed up as heroism because the protagonist is a woman. Yuck, this one is starting to really get my gander up. Do I have to read on? Okay then, I’ll try.

I made it, just about. The story really is a piece of work. It’s a right muddle of messed up morality and justifications for wearing a uniform, following orders, doing your duty, fighting to survive and just about every other idea that comes straight out of an army recruitment video. I didn’t like it at all, and it leaves me feeling a bit depressed as I finish up this week’s 2000AD.

Okay then, happy face on, and now for a quick summary. I’ll ignore the muddled morality of Jaegir and the irritating Absalom, and give PROG 1942 of 2000AD a solid thumbs up. The art in Dredd was great, and the story isn’t as annoying as usual. Helium made me smile and Outlier continues to be a bloody good little story. Add in the great front cover and that makes 2000AD well worth purchasing this week. I’ll leave it here with happy thoughts, all of the bad is fading already, as I’m looking at the front cover, smiling and feeling pretty good about the book as a whole.



Rating: 7/10 (Some bad, but the good wins out.)