
“Murder Most Foul” and the haunting of America - tintinnabula
https://thereader.mitpress.mit.edu/murder-most-foul-and-the-haunting-of-america/
======
pc2g4d
"The small towns of Faulkner, the paranoid communities of Pynchon, the tangled
but discrete “cases” of Raymond Chandler, all reflect beyond themselves onto
the guilt, corruption, and greed that power our national political “progress”
and economic “growth.”"

I really hate cynicism. It's considered hip nowadays to think everything is
degraded, monstrous, corrupt garbage. It's like people have forgotten that
there's more to humans than the murderous. Must we blind ourselves to the good
in order to recognize the bad? How about the respect for human dignity, the
love of family and country, the sacrifice, the self-restraint, the growth and
change, the reform that we've seen through human history, and American history
in particular? Was the Civil Rights Act powered by "guilt, corruption, and
greed"? Was the establishment of drug safety standards? Was the abolition of
slavery?

People are so blithe in proclaiming everything horrible. I just worry it's a
self-fulfilling prophecy.

~~~
paganel
In practice the Civil Rights Act didn’t accomplish all that much, as I’d say
the de facto racial segregation in the US is now even larger compared to the
1950s. The progressive white component of the US population decided that the
fight had been won by the late ‘60s and they moved on to other endeavors.

The racial riots from the early ‘90s should/could have been a new sign to re-
open the fight but nothing of the sorts happened, by now most of the black
population is resigned with the horrendous status-quo while most of the white
population doesn’t find the current status-quo at all horrendous, at most they
protest against some punctual anti-black population actions which they only
see as individual abuses (the Ferguson case, the helpless Florida kid case
etc).

~~~
RHSeeger
We could be doing better now, especially at the system level. But we're
certainly doing better now than we were in the 50s.

~~~
monadic2
The mistake is thinking in terms of linear social progress, which is trivially
perverted for rhetoric. People are _certainly_ more civil and aware of acute
racism and racial discrimination. But in material terms, being black makes you
acutely more vulnerable to all of society’s problems: poverty, prison, poor
healthcare, poor access to jobs, poor education, low wages. The civil rights
movement—and MLK’s life—ended before addressing this. More relevantly to now,
only 1 in 5 black Americans are able to work from home.

Segregation still exists, it just largely uses other mechanisms today other
than red lining and direct racial discrimination in businesses and government.
I recognize claims similar to “we”re doing better now than we were in the 50s”
as one technique of many to focus on social, not material or systemic, gains,
though I suspect in many cases this does not come from an intent to do so.

------
adaisadais
Darkness at the break of noon Shadows even the silver spoon The handmade
blade, the child’s balloon Eclipses both the sun and moon To understand you
know too soon There is no sense in trying

-Bob Dylan

The music Dylan was making in the 60s is just as relevant today as ever
before. “Murder Most Foul” hit me in the gut. Truly an epic.

------
blast
I love how ever-enigmatic Bob releases this now even though it was "an
unreleased song we recorded a while back".

~~~
rst
Dylan's notorious for leaving brilliant songs on the shelf, sometimes for
decades. Some of them leak and circulate among collectors/rabid fans, but some
of them don't.

~~~
blast
Oh indeed. That's part of what makes the timing of this release enigmatic.

Do you have any favorites that were released this way? I've fallen off the
bobwagon in recent decades.

------
neonate
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NbQkyvbw18)

------
ericzawo
An important song for today from a legendary American artist.

------
AndrewBissell
From a good Twitter reaction thread by a longtime JFK assassination
commentator: "there's a continuous thread of reference to mostly-black pre-
rock music as knowledge of just what happened to JFK and mostly white pop/rock
as a kind of rebellious sublimation or, if you like, extrovert denial, acting
out the rage but not admitting what happened"

[https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625](https://twitter.com/corpseinorbit/status/1243409386262810625)

One theory is that the lyric "howl Wolfman, howl" may be a reference to George
H. W. Bush, whose CIA codename was Timberwolf and who claimed for years not to
remember where he was the day JFK was assassinated.

~~~
ratww
Wolfman is most certainly Wolfman Jack, the 50s/60s DJ and cultural icon,
immortalised in George Lucas' American Graffiti.

His whole name is mentioned in the fourth verse, and he did start his
broadcasts by howling.

~~~
AndrewBissell
If the theory is right it wouldn't be the only name in the song Dylan uses as
a play on words or with double meaning. The first reference is sandwiched
right up against a bunch of rumination on the nature of Kennedy's murder and
the people who carried it out.

------
vearwhershuh
Daily reminder that congress looked into the JFK assassination and found:

"Scientific acoustical evidence establishes a high probability that at least
two gunmen fired at the President."

and

"The committee believes, on the basis of the evidence available to it, that
Kennedy was probably assassinated as a result of a conspiracy. The committee
was unable to identify the other gunmen or the extent of the conspiracy."

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Com...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_House_Select_Committee_on_Assassinations)

But then the conspiracy theory meme just kinda mopped everything up, and that
was that.

~~~
AndrewBissell
The real skill was not in the cover-up (which left a ton of breadcrumbs) but
in browbeating the American public into accepting and ignoring it.

Right there in front of everyone's eyes

Greatest magic trick ever under the sun

Perfectly executed, skillfully done

~~~
catalogia
To be fair, most Americans don't believe the official 'lone gunman' narrative:
[https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-
kil...](https://news.gallup.com/poll/165893/majority-believe-jfk-killed-
conspiracy.aspx)

But what can anybody do about it?

~~~
AndrewBissell
Not electing the guy who probably helped plot the assassination to the office
of POTUS would have been a start. There's a whole lot of daylight between "he
wasn't killed by a lone gunman" and actually taking some minimal steps to
identify and oppose the people responsible.

~~~
catalogia
While the majority doubt the lone gunman narrative, I don't think there is any
majority consensus beyond that. People have loads of different theories,
different ideas for who the perpetrators were or what their motivations might
have been. It's easy to say that something should be done, but actually
getting that something done is another matter.

