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Mickey Z
Cool Observer
the Department of Homeland Security.
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Nick Mamatas interviews Mickey Z. (Summer 2004)
(I never got around to posting this here when it was first done so the election references are obviously dated. However, with the March 19 protests on the horizon, I thought now might be a good time.)
Nick: “I first met Mickey Z. in 1999 when I was doing some freelance editing for New York’s Soft Skull Press. The early draft of his radical critique of ‘The Greatest Generation’ myths, ‘Saving Private Power,’ was more than just the usual by-the-numbers leftism; the book was shot through with insights and a taste for irony that grad school usually drums out of even anti-authoritarian historians. I was still surprised to find out that Mickey wrote the book with little more than a high school diploma, a New York Public Library card, and a vision of a world where social justice is something other than the punchline to a joke about how naïve the Left is.
Nick Mamatas
http://www.livejournal.com/users/nihilistic_kid
“Since then, Mickey has written or edited several other books: ‘The Murdering Of My Years’ (Soft Skull) is his 2003 collection of interviews with artists and activists on how escaping the day job and finding a life filled with self-valorizing labor. This year, Mickey released two books. ‘Seven Deadly Spins’ (Common Courage) investigates and dissects a century of US war propaganda, and A ‘Gigantic Mistake: Articles and Essays for Your Intellectual Self-Defense’ (Wildside Press) goes beyond politics to tackle the absurdities and inanities of everyday life itself.
“Mickey lives with his wife Michele in Queens, and when not agitating, he writes poetry and teaches kickboxing.”
SAMPLE Q&A:
NM: You’re an anti-war vegan activist who still supports Nader at least partially because Kerry will simply extend and perpetuate the war in Iraq. However, you’re also a martial artist of no small renown. What attracts you to the art?
MZ: I’m not violent. In fact, the martial arts served to counter my juvenile delinquent tendencies. I was a martial artist well before I identified as an activist and I see no contradiction in being a proficient fighter who is anti-war. It never fails to make me chuckle when some yahoo e-mails me with something like this: “You little wimp. If I ever met you, I’d kick your ass for disrespecting America.” In cyberspace, many assume I must be a tweed-wearing professor hiding in an ivory tower. They have no idea that I’m the guy who whipped their ass on the local basketball court last weekend.
To read the complete interview, please click on “more” below:
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