The Filth 3

Spartacus is a very interesting character. He creates chaos wherever he goes, but he has a mind full of legitimate reasons as to why he does the things he does. I like this comment he makes to Slade after he's given the president a boob job, "That's the great thing about democracy: ANYONE can be president." I like this because he's trying to redefine what it means to be someone "important" in our society (or any human society, now or in the future). He's showing us that the president is a person too, just like any of us, he makes stupid choices and does stupid things, but yet his choices change the way we (the public) think about him -- the choices we make don't necessarily change what people think about us because our choices aren't broadcast for the entire country to scrutinize. Although, there is a reason the president is the president and he/she is supposed to be someone that we trust enough to make the right choice for the greater good. We expect him to live up to our expectations and take care of us, and when he fails us we lose our respect for him and in that regard we also lose our patriotism. Also, I might add how Dmitri shoots the president and claims, “Another asshole will take his place and no one will smell the difference.” Dmitry isn’t human and is obvious with his dislike for humanity and how we choose to run things, “Humanity can eat my SHIT” (194).

Another thing Spartacus says to Slade, "In the END, humans always pick themselves up, ORGANIZE into roles and start piling up the building blocks of CULTURE again." What an interesting way of looking at our society or all societies for that matter. By ‘culture’ I wonder what he’s referring to…is Spartacus referring to the way we live our lives: the way we grow up, the way we learn, the way we enjoy ourselves? Or is he referring to the way humans have an innate sense of community and how the lack-there-of is devastating for us to imagine? Also, there are a few things that lead me to believe Spartacus isn’t human; one would be this statement he makes as if he’s not a part of humanity and is almost disgusted with our ritualistic ways of creating ‘culture’ and the second would be how he died in a previous section of the novel, but appears now as if nothing happened to him. Are there many Spartacus Hughes? Or is he simply an immortal, or is he real at all? Maybe he’s just a hologram.

So, I’m also wondering why it is that the women in the comic all talk like this, “Oh aye. Time tay get tay fukk.” (195). Well, not all the women, but all the women involved with The Hand. I don’t understand it, the guys and even the chimp talk normal. I doubt all the women are supposed to be from a different country and this is merely an accent. They sound less educated than the men. Also, I notice how most of the scenes involving women from The Hand involve sex. The women do other things, but I’ve noticed at the beginning of many scenes when the women are introduced they have sex, and then they go do some hardcore shit. The men are seen time and time again, but they don’t have sex (with the exception of the Tex Porneau scenes) unless there is a woman present. The women are only present once in a while and they’re always doing some kinky sex scene. For example: the first scene between Greg (or Slade) when the woman from The Hand is in his shower, the scene with the woman giving oral sex to the richest pervert, the scene with the woman blindfolding Slade, and another would be the woman interrogating Anders Klimakks. The women’s roles in this story are really baffling to me, are they helping or are they supposed to be there for certain unspecified reasons? Are we, as readers, supposed to get the impression that they’re not important at all in this futuristic society except to procreate, give sexual pleasure, and helpt the men when it may be necessary? I see women in the porno scenes on the TV and being almost nothing more than sexual toys…although one exception would be Greg’s neighbor who watches him from her window.