skandalon

Fiction’s about what it is to be a fucking human being. If you operate, which most of us do, from the premise that there are things about the contemporary U.S. that make it distinctively hard to be a real human being, then maybe half of fiction’s job is to dramatize what it is that makes it tough. The other half is to dramatize the fact that we still “are” human beings, now. Or can be. This isn’t that it’s fiction’s duty to edify or teach, or to make us good little Christians or Republicans; I’m not trying to line up behind Tolstoy or Gardner. I just think that fiction that isn’t exploring what it means to be human today isn’t art.

✖ Via “An Interview With David Foster Wallace” by Larry McCaffery, Review of Contemporary Fiction, 13.2, Summer 1993, 127–150. [PDF]

• Sep 13, 2010 link notes tagged: art novel book author Foster Wallace contemporary modernity United-States America human becoming interview suicide

An especially disturbing section of the book delves into a lawsuit brought against Eli Lilly by survivors of a rampage by Joseph Wesbecker, who was the company’s worst nightmare: a Prozac user who went on the rampage in 1989 with an AK-47. Fortunately for Eli Lilly, the 1994 trial was concurrent with the O. J. Simpson trial, the facts were carefully manipulated, a secret settlement was made between plaintiffs and the drug company even as the trial continued, and Prozac avoided a warning label about possibly violent or suicidal behavior. All the particulars of this remarkable legal travesty are laid out here.

✖ Via The New York Times: “Exploring a Dark Side of Depression Remedies” by Janet Maslin, June 29, 2000.

The quote above is an excerpt from the review of the book Overcoming the Dangers of Prozac, Zoloft, Paxil and Other Antidepressants With Safe, Effective Alternatives by Joseph Glenmullen, M.D. (383 pages. Simon & Schuster). On the same subject, read also “Papers indicate firm knew possible Prozac suicide risk” by Tom Watkins, January 3, 2005:

An internal document purportedly from Eli Lilly and Co. made public Monday appears to show that the drug maker had data more than 15 years ago showing that patients on its antidepressant Prozac were far more likely to attempt suicide and show hostility than were patients on other antidepressants and that the company attempted to minimize public awareness of the side effects. (more)

Previously on Skandalon: Eli Lilly and Co.

• Sep 03, 2010 link notes tagged: technology rampage lawsuit antidepressant drug Prozac depression suicidal suicide homicide violence psychiatry pharmaceutical science industry capitalism individuation

In less than two months, China has seen six cases of men charging into schools and kindergartens to kill and hurt children. On April 28, 29 and 30, there was one incident per day in three separate cities. Last Wednesday, a man with a cleaver killed seven children and two adults in a central China kindergarten, while on Saturday the man behind the April 29 attack was sentenced to death for stabbing 29 children in an eastern province. The situation has become not only very dark but very surreal.

✖ Via next: “Behind China’s killing spree” by Huang Hung, May 21st, 2010

“Huang Hung is a columnist for China Daily, the English-language newspaper in China. She is also an avid blogger with more than 100 million page views on her blog on sina.co”

• May 30, 2010 link notes tagged: communication excommunication killing murder murderer suicide kids school China lost loser destruction desintegration

Gus Van Sant and author Bret Easton Ellis will team to write a feature about the double suicide of artists Theresa Duncan and Jeremy Blake. PalmStar Entertainment, Celluloid Dreams and K5 Film have acquired screen rights to “The Golden Suicides,” a Vanity Fair article written by Nancy Jo Sales. Van Sant, who helmed “Milk” and is prepping the Columbia Pictures drama “Restless,” is involved only as writer at this point. Ithaka Entertainment’s Braxton Pope will produce with PalmStar’s Kevin Frakes and Celluloid Dreams’ Hengameh Panahi. Duncan and Blake formed a popular couple on the downtown New York and Venice, Calif., art scenes. She was one of the first videogame designers for girls, and his “digital paintings” — kaleidoscopic images shown on plasma screens — established him as a rising star on the circuit. The couple descended into a paranoid spiral when the artists developed a consuming belief that government and religious organizations were conspiring against them. She killed herself in 2007. Blake found her body on the floor of their bedroom, and walked into the Atlantic Ocean a week later, ending his life.

✖ Via Variety: “Scribes make suicide pact. Gus Van Sant, Bret Easton Ellis team on film” by Michael Fleming, Oct. 13, 2009

• May 21, 2010 link notes tagged: art movie suicide destruction lost loser artist movie film script news

Why do leaves commit suicide
when they feel yellow?

✖ Via The Book of Questions by Pablo Neruda, tr. by William O’Daly, Copper Canyon Press, 1991 [Amazon]

Previously on Skandalon

• Mar 24, 2010 link notes tagged: art poem poet life death suicide color automn

technology news terror terrorism suicide lost loser destruction building plane_crash death critic

✖ Via Wikimedia Commons: Piper PA-28-236 Dakota

That’s the same model of plane as the one Andrew Joseph Stack III crashed in a IRS building last Thursday.

• Feb 23, 2010 link notes tagged: technology news terror terrorism suicide lost loser destruction building plane crash death critic

technology communication plane_crash destruction suicide self_destruction building lost loser alone society economy

✖ Via The Daily Dunklin Democrat: “Man angry at IRS crashes plane into building” Feb. 18, 2010. (AP Photo/Jack Plunkett)

“Firefighters work on putting out a fire at a seven-story building after a small private plane crashed into a building that houses the Internal Revenue Service in Austin, Texas on Thursday Feb. 18, 2010.” (more)

“The 2010 Austin plane crash occurred on February 18, 2010, when Andrew Joseph Stack III, flying his Piper Cherokee PA-28-236 (Aircraft registration: N2889D) plane, crashed into Building I of the Echelon office complex in Austin, Texas, United States. Two people were killed (including the pilot), and thirteen injured. An Internal Revenue Service (IRS) field office is located in the four-story office building along with other state and federal government agencies. Prior to the crash, Stack had posted a manifesto dated February 18, 2010 to his business website.” (wikipedia)

• Feb 22, 2010 link notes tagged: technology communication plane crash destruction suicide self-destruction building lost loser alone society economy

technology internet social network humor death suicide

✖ Via TechCrunch: “Wipe The Slate Clean For 2010, Commit Web 2.0 Suicide” by Erik Schonfeld, Dec. 31, 2009

“Are you tired of living in public, sick of all the privacy theater the social networks are putting on, and just want to end it all online? Now you can wipe the slate clean with the Web 2.0 Suicide Machine. (Warning: This will really delete your online presence and is irrevocable). Just put in your credentials for Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, or LinkedIn and it will delete all your friends and messages, and change your username, password, and photo so that you cannot log back in.” (read more). Visit the website : http://suicidemachine.org/

• Jan 01, 2010 link notes tagged: technology Internet social network humor death suicide