The Rant Requested By revv...
The Doves Of War
One Man's Pigeon Is Another Man's Freedom Fighter
The history of the beautiful pacific creatures you in your ignorance seek to slur with the pejorative "pigeon" is a cruel tale of oppression leading inevitably, as all such narratives must, to armed struggle. Put aside your prejudices for a moment and read on. Imagine that everything you have been told by your governments, your newspapers and your tutors is a lie. I do not say it is (yet!), I merely ask that you imagine such is the case and consider what I have to say with an open mind.
The pigeon (for they have reclaimed that word, and it cannot hurt them any more), was untimely ripp'd from a bleak womb shaped of the mud and blood of World War One's trenches. Prior to that columba livia were known by their correct name, the rock dove. Mark that! When do you ever hear it mentioned that pigeons are birds of peace? Never! All you hear are imprecations inspired by their material activism, defamations inspired by their works of defaecation.
It would be false to claim that WWI was the first time that pigeons were employed as messengers and even combatants. However the Great War was the occasion upon which their wingéd star rose to public fame, on account of the usefulness of their homing abilities. The monstrosity of that human conflict was such that all were called upon to do their part and the newly christened "pigeons" did their part. And their reward for putting aside their instinctive principles and contributing to the greater good? What noble service had once been freely given was now called for, no, required of them. All too late these heroic birds were to learn that is in the nature (ha!) of humanity to despise the gift of that for which no charge is made. When a peace-loving creature like the humble pigeon is forced to fight, is it any wonder that it becomes feral? If a meek and mild dove exhibits violence, can it be for reason other than the fact mankind has taught it that violence?
No matter what you may have heard of the malign intent that burns eternally in the heart of the cruel pigeon, most rock doves did not turn at once to insurgency. The terrible lust to soil and besmirch all that you hold dear (and yet still leave parked in the street!) does not exist. True, dissent and malcontent were rife amongst the avian intelligentsia, but not until the uprisings of the 1960s and 70s did pigeonkind first actively turn against its own columbine (and how humanity has poisoned that gentlest of words) nature. Even then, throughout the Cold War, chafing under the yoke of hu-militarism, relatively few were tempted away from engagement in modern everyday society to join the growing anti-establishment dirty-protest movement. The average pigeon, were you to meet him on the street, was still someone you might tip your hat to without the expectation of having to wash your hair afterwards.
You doubtless have heard the variation of the grassy knoll theory, where a pinko pigeon is held partially responsible for the assassination of President John F Kennedy, crucially blinding him to the bullet bent for his breast. That canard, a baser bird than our sublime subject, is demonstrably false, a filthy propaganda perpetuated by those who see their route to power in the lazy demonisation of the rock dove. Consult the records, no pigeon in the world has ever been convicted by a court of murder, manslaughter nor indeed of any other capital crime! The only bombings pigeons have been proven to have participated in utilised nothing but the weapons that God's good grace gave them. Do not believe this unconscionable calumny, wipe clean your eyes and look at the recorded facts anew.
Yes, but all this is in the past, I hear you protest. What of the pigeons of today? They care nothing for history, or causes, they are poor pastiches of the pigeons of yesteryear, punks without passion, full of militancy without motive. You have been lied to and chosen to believe those lies. You are wrong.
Have you not seen the processions through London? Hundreds of thousands of pigeons marching en masse to Trafalgar Square, where in a symbolic rejection of warmongering and its glorification they pass judgement (and other substances) upon Nelson's Column? And what is the reaction of the Mayor of that great capital? He bans the sale of food to them! The only seeds he wishes to see sold in Trafalgar Square are the seeds of prejudice and hatred. Ask yourself who is in the right here. Is it the man, who would starve the innocent out of their opportunity to exercise what he would no doubt call their "human" rights? Or is it the meekest of birds, compelled against their will to make uncivil war in the name of their own personal peace?
Each characterisation of the modern pigeon as an apathetic creature given to mindless vandalism is a just another shot in the undeclared and illegal war against them. Make no mistake, every piece of pigeon shit is political! Every sullied vehicle windscreen is a telling blow against the heartless, crushing capitalism of the military-industrial complex. Every public building beaing a befouled facade is testament to their political purposes. The pavements they paint upon are protests against a society which spurns them. Look again at these things when next they greet your eyes, and observe the truth of my words!
There you have it, a brief (all too brief!) reading of the plight of the pigeon and of how people have perverted their pacifism. If you have made it this far then I congratulate you, you have taken the first step towards an enlightened future, one where man, a better kind of man, may live peacefully alongside the high-born, pious pigeon.I said she was wicked and she said that everyone was - everyone and everything except rivers, clouds and some rabbits
One Man's Pigeon Is Another Man's Freedom Fighter
The history of the beautiful pacific creatures you in your ignorance seek to slur with the pejorative "pigeon" is a cruel tale of oppression leading inevitably, as all such narratives must, to armed struggle. Put aside your prejudices for a moment and read on. Imagine that everything you have been told by your governments, your newspapers and your tutors is a lie. I do not say it is (yet!), I merely ask that you imagine such is the case and consider what I have to say with an open mind.
The pigeon (for they have reclaimed that word, and it cannot hurt them any more), was untimely ripp'd from a bleak womb shaped of the mud and blood of World War One's trenches. Prior to that columba livia were known by their correct name, the rock dove. Mark that! When do you ever hear it mentioned that pigeons are birds of peace? Never! All you hear are imprecations inspired by their material activism, defamations inspired by their works of defaecation.
It would be false to claim that WWI was the first time that pigeons were employed as messengers and even combatants. However the Great War was the occasion upon which their wingéd star rose to public fame, on account of the usefulness of their homing abilities. The monstrosity of that human conflict was such that all were called upon to do their part and the newly christened "pigeons" did their part. And their reward for putting aside their instinctive principles and contributing to the greater good? What noble service had once been freely given was now called for, no, required of them. All too late these heroic birds were to learn that is in the nature (ha!) of humanity to despise the gift of that for which no charge is made. When a peace-loving creature like the humble pigeon is forced to fight, is it any wonder that it becomes feral? If a meek and mild dove exhibits violence, can it be for reason other than the fact mankind has taught it that violence?
No matter what you may have heard of the malign intent that burns eternally in the heart of the cruel pigeon, most rock doves did not turn at once to insurgency. The terrible lust to soil and besmirch all that you hold dear (and yet still leave parked in the street!) does not exist. True, dissent and malcontent were rife amongst the avian intelligentsia, but not until the uprisings of the 1960s and 70s did pigeonkind first actively turn against its own columbine (and how humanity has poisoned that gentlest of words) nature. Even then, throughout the Cold War, chafing under the yoke of hu-militarism, relatively few were tempted away from engagement in modern everyday society to join the growing anti-establishment dirty-protest movement. The average pigeon, were you to meet him on the street, was still someone you might tip your hat to without the expectation of having to wash your hair afterwards.
You doubtless have heard the variation of the grassy knoll theory, where a pinko pigeon is held partially responsible for the assassination of President John F Kennedy, crucially blinding him to the bullet bent for his breast. That canard, a baser bird than our sublime subject, is demonstrably false, a filthy propaganda perpetuated by those who see their route to power in the lazy demonisation of the rock dove. Consult the records, no pigeon in the world has ever been convicted by a court of murder, manslaughter nor indeed of any other capital crime! The only bombings pigeons have been proven to have participated in utilised nothing but the weapons that God's good grace gave them. Do not believe this unconscionable calumny, wipe clean your eyes and look at the recorded facts anew.
Yes, but all this is in the past, I hear you protest. What of the pigeons of today? They care nothing for history, or causes, they are poor pastiches of the pigeons of yesteryear, punks without passion, full of militancy without motive. You have been lied to and chosen to believe those lies. You are wrong.
Have you not seen the processions through London? Hundreds of thousands of pigeons marching en masse to Trafalgar Square, where in a symbolic rejection of warmongering and its glorification they pass judgement (and other substances) upon Nelson's Column? And what is the reaction of the Mayor of that great capital? He bans the sale of food to them! The only seeds he wishes to see sold in Trafalgar Square are the seeds of prejudice and hatred. Ask yourself who is in the right here. Is it the man, who would starve the innocent out of their opportunity to exercise what he would no doubt call their "human" rights? Or is it the meekest of birds, compelled against their will to make uncivil war in the name of their own personal peace?
Each characterisation of the modern pigeon as an apathetic creature given to mindless vandalism is a just another shot in the undeclared and illegal war against them. Make no mistake, every piece of pigeon shit is political! Every sullied vehicle windscreen is a telling blow against the heartless, crushing capitalism of the military-industrial complex. Every public building beaing a befouled facade is testament to their political purposes. The pavements they paint upon are protests against a society which spurns them. Look again at these things when next they greet your eyes, and observe the truth of my words!
There you have it, a brief (all too brief!) reading of the plight of the pigeon and of how people have perverted their pacifism. If you have made it this far then I congratulate you, you have taken the first step towards an enlightened future, one where man, a better kind of man, may live peacefully alongside the high-born, pious pigeon.I said she was wicked and she said that everyone was - everyone and everything except rivers, clouds and some rabbits