Tag: amazon

The Coors Family

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

Today’s discovery revolves around the Coors family. For those unfamiliar with shit beer, they’re the ones who invented ‘Coors’ back in the nineteenth century and who still insist on pushing it on ignorant confused people who presumably don’t know any better. This is an episode of the podcast The Dollop, which I think I’ve mentioned before on here, but it’s premise is two comedians, one telling the history the other with no knowledge of the usually bizarre subject, making jokes and taking the piss. They’re quite long episodes which can put people off, this one is over one hundred minutes, but there’s worse you can and will do with your time.

There are a few companies I’ve boycotted over the years, from Nestle to Coco Cola to Amazon, and now after listening to this I can add Coors to the list. Thankfully I wouldn’t go near it as a drink anyway but now I have an ethical reason not to. The problem with that though is like any of these mega corporations they also own virtually everything else and while a lot of their range is equally mass produced crap there are a few beers I have enjoyed over the years such as Caffreys, Staropramen and Cobra, and when desperate Blue Moon – Coors own the Blue Moon Brewery itself. They also seem to own the old Mitchell and Butler brewery but I can’t find confirmation whether they also own the pub chain by the same name or whether they’re now two separate entities. Admittedly they’re not always great pubs but they can serve a purpose. Over the years my boycotts have never been one hundred percent successful but my beer purchasing habits will certainly now be affected.

What’s he talking about I hear you screaming. Yes this is such a long winded intro into the Coors family but I don’t really want to give too much away. Adolph Coors emigrated from what was Prussia to America and set up the Coors brewery in 1873. The family itself seemed to be loveless and hateful towards each other, and once his son Adolph II took charge he ruled the family through dictatorial fear. Some members of the family suffered from debilitating extreme right wingness, while others found God and became Christian extremists, or Evangelicals if you so desire. They lobby vehemently against women’s right, racial equality, LGTB rights, workers rights and so on. William Coors who ran the company in the latter part of the twentieth century once gave a speech to a room full of black businessmen on how the black mans brain was inferior and that they should be grateful their ancestors were brought across as slaves as it allowed them to become civilised. His brother Joseph was the right winger who he described as “being slightly to the right of Attila the Hun”, which coming from a racist is quite the statement. Joseph was also a special adviser to and part of Ronald Reagans ‘Kitchen Cabinet’. They were even involved with Oliver North and the Iran-Contra scandal. The family currently fund right wing think tanks and other organisations trying to challenge equality in all those forms mentioned. There is more but I both can’t remember everything and don’t want to give it all away. There were murders, suicides and such hatred that it does suggest there may be some truth in the idea that right wingers are just projecting their own self-loathing and anger onto the rest of us. The Coors Family are just vile, unfortunately very powerful, people. I’m amazed that I have never heard about them and all they get up to. Clearly it was a very informative podcast.

Most of the juicy stuff mention above comes towards the latter part of the podcast with earlier stuff just discussing the internal workings of the family itself. They seemed mainly to just do damage to each other and themselves until about the 1960s at which point all the above happened. Seriously, fuck them. The world doesn’t need people like that. They make the human race worse.

We, The Uncontacted Species

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

This is going to be one of those pieces in which I remember half an idea and then try and wing it. A couple of days ago I was reading an article about the possibility of life on other planets. I planned on writing a piece about something in the article that same day but I forgot all about it. Now the only bit I can remember is the idea itself that gave me one of those wow moments. It wasn’t any great achievement or possibility of something but was in relation to us. Human beings. The author was talking about why no aliens have made contact with us. While there were a few obvious suggestions such as they don’t know we’re here, there are no aliens and they have made contact we just don’t know. He also raised the idea that they know we’re here and keep an eye on us but without revealing themselves, and it’s for our own safety. He related us to uncontacted tribes in the Amazon and for a second it blew my mind.

We as a species seem to have this sense of our own worth and greatness. Human achievements are blasted out and in our face at a near constant rate. While we accept there may be other species out in space more advanced than us, we don’t ever see ourselves as primitive. I don’t like that word because arguably it suggests a certain superiority, which always depends on who is measuring and what they’re measuring. In many ways our advanced technological societies have become emotionally primitive, we’re disconnected and cut off from what it was that helped us evolve as a species. Just imagine though for one second, we are a tribe intentionally cut off from the rest of life in the universe.

In truth I’m struggling to convey the feeling I had in full. It felt incredibly important to view ourselves in this way. Almost as if it’s something our collective ego should understand for it’s own good. It’s also almost impossible to explain what I mean without using words that are degrading towards secluded tribes. It’s my own understanding of worth, my own worth ultimately, and it doesn’t correlate with the image I like to have of myself and show others. It was such a powerful moment of comprehension because as I related to it it just exposed my unconscious sense of superiority. Not so unconscious anymore it appears. To see in others is one thing but to experience it in ourselves is another. What an interesting little moment to explore. Well I enjoyed it anyway.

What’s The Fucking Point

Hamar WilliamsLeave a comment

Jonathan Pie said it best “What’s the fucking point” and you know what the man is right. He’s also not but he is. We drink with our paper straws, carry around our tote reusable bag and eat organic tofu before driving to work in a Land Rover. Those are also more or less his words.

I gave up trying to save the world about ten years ago. I had just given up being an environmental pescatarian – completely missing the point obviously. Those were my dark days when I was oblivious to the stupidity I’ve now just learnt to shut out or laugh at. Then there are vegetarians who lead a completely pointless life; don’t eat meat but keep them in pain as slaves until they don’t serve a purpose just so you can have milk in your coffee in the morning, the dairy cows still need the soya from what was once the Amazon, they still feel pain. It has to be vegan or just eat meat and be done with it. Despite what people attempt to say there are no ethical or rational arguments for continuing to eat meat, you just eat it because you want to. I still eat meat but I do so because I like it, am lazy and manage to shut out the little voice.

But back to the main point that there really is no point. About the time I started eating meat again all those years ago I also started flying again. Apparently a return flight from London to Melbourne is the equivalent of 16.8 tonnes of carbon. If we are to do anything positive in regards climate change we need to cut emissions by two tonnes per person per year, or at least that is what it was ten years when I gave a shit. Now fuck knows, most likely a hell of a lot more. When in Greece with the refugees I discovered they weren’t all escaping war but many were arguably climate refugees as their homes had now been made inhospitable. This isn’t talked about. Nor incidentally was the massive amounts of carbon produced from the many flights people took coming out to rescue them. But then that doesn’t mean fuck all in comparison to the one hundred and two thousand flights per day in the world as a whole. It’s good business you see. Creates jobs apparently.

Clearly I am frustrated but ultimately I am just frustrated with myself. I’m not going to tell anyone what to do when I still eat meat and buy vegan vegetables which been flown in from Spain, Israel and South America. Maybe I’ll buy the vegan burger from McDonalds to show I care. The television series The Good Life sums it up best; life now is so complex it makes it almost impossible to live a good life. From the clothes we wear, the food we eat, the books we read, the vehicles we drive, the jobs we work, the batteries for our phones to virtually every aspect in our lives we are simply doing harm one way or another. If we really wanted to save the Earth we would just commit suicide as a species. That or end this ludicrous system of constant economic growth. We can’t have both. I would say it was time to choose but lets be honest it has probably been time to choose for a while now.