{"id":9541,"date":"2013-09-07T12:17:45","date_gmt":"2013-09-07T16:17:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/?p=9541"},"modified":"2013-09-07T13:22:50","modified_gmt":"2013-09-07T17:22:50","slug":"get-your-megadeath-fun-stuff-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/2013\/09\/get-your-megadeath-fun-stuff-here.html","title":{"rendered":"Get Your Megadeath &#8216;Fun Stuff&#8217; Here"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=wUQBb3KWPIY\">Words by Heathcote Williams. Narration and montage by Alan Cox.<\/a><\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"480\" height=\"360\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/wUQBb3KWPIY\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><font size=5><strong>The National Atomic Museum<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p><font size=1><strong>\u2018Hiroshima bomb earrings for sale\u2019<br \/>\nKatherine Butler and Fiona Bell, London: <em>The Independent,<\/em> 6 August, 1999<\/strong><\/font><\/p>\n<p>In the National Atomic Museum<br \/>\nAt Albuquerque, New Mexico,<br \/>\nYou can buy souvenirs of \u2018Little Boy\u2019,<br \/>\nThe bomb that demolished Hiroshima,<br \/>\nAnd of \u2018Fat Man\u2019, named after the bomb<br \/>\nThat destroyed Nagasaki three days later.<\/p>\n<p>They come from what the Museum<br \/>\nCalls its \u201cExclusive\u201d collection:<br \/>\n\u2018Little Boy\u2019 earrings in sterling silver<br \/>\nCost twenty-four dollars for the pair;<br \/>\nAnd \u2018Fat Man\u2019, the counter clerk says,<br \/>\n\u201cComes in at thirty dollars\u201d as<br \/>\n\u201cMore precious metal is used.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey\u2019re a great seller,\u201d says the museum storekeeper,<br \/>\nMike Romero, who assures enquirers,<br \/>\n\u201cWe don\u2019t hold political opinions.<br \/>\nWe only present the facts.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you go to a zoo you can buy a stuffed elephant.<br \/>\nWe are the only atomic museum in the US<br \/>\nSo we have to sell related merchandise.<br \/>\nI don\u2019t think it\u2019s tasteless. It was before my time<br \/>\nAnd it doesn\u2019t strike at my heart at all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>But the fact that the atomic \u201cfacts\u201d<br \/>\n(Namely everything being obliterated<br \/>\nWithin a three mile radius of the bombs)  \u2013<br \/>\nDoesn\u2019t strike at his heart at all<br \/>\nEvokes D.H. Lawrence\u2019s unforgiving view:<br \/>\n\u201cThe essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic and a killer.<br \/>\nIt has never yet melted\u201d \u2013<br \/>\nWritten when Lawrence was living in New Mexico,<br \/>\nLater to become the bomb\u2019s birthplace,<br \/>\nWhere a global bully\u2019s big stick<br \/>\nDesigned to dish out mega-death<br \/>\nWas first tried out at the Alamagordo test range,<br \/>\nSowing the seeds of an apocalyptically murderous meltdown  \u2013<br \/>\nA mad Empire\u2019s bargaining chip in an unwinnable game. <\/p>\n<p>The \u201cfacts\u201d are also that to vaporise two Japanese cities<br \/>\nAnd to sneak new, distorted sicknesses into man\u2019s DNA<br \/>\nWas the very lowest and most pointless point<br \/>\nIn the entire history of humanity on earth: <\/p>\n<p>For the Japanese had been seeking an honourable surrender<br \/>\nBut US militarists, keen to stretch the war into World War Three,<br \/>\nSeized the moment to show Russian rivals who was the Alpha Male<br \/>\nAnd which of their misguided boffins was the best, \u2018USA! USA!\u2019 \u2013<\/p>\n<p>Bang went \u2018Little Boy\u2019. Bang went \u2018Fat Man\u2019, then their pandemics of pain<br \/>\nLaunched radioactive waves of political paranoia:<br \/>\nPoison clouds, charged with madmen\u2019s thoughts of life on earth being ended,<br \/>\nHovered over foreign affairs like blood-sucking bats.<\/p>\n<p>In the Cold War the US had bomb-casing arsenals in 27 countries<br \/>\nWith the plutonium charges needed to render them nuclear<br \/>\nHidden in 27 embassies and threatening a hundred holocausts.<\/p>\n<p>The Atomic Museum was established by Congressional Charter<br \/>\nTo indicate the pride the Empire took in its deadly heritage<br \/>\nThough, when the UK journalist James Cameron<br \/>\nWitnessed an atomic test on Bikini Atoll,<br \/>\nWhich would turn the surrounding seas into a desert<br \/>\n(Now lovingly commemorated in the Museum<br \/>\nWith \u201cAuthentic bomb blast goggles, as used in the Pacific<br \/>\nDuring nuclear testing\u201d being available for purchase),<br \/>\nCameron said he thought he could hear a door slam in hell.<\/p>\n<p>The Museum\u2019s entrance is guarded by phalanxes of missiles<br \/>\nPointing, like admonitory fingers: \u2018Be afraid. Be very afraid.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Four California girls drift round the museum\u2019s Heritage Park.<br \/>\nThey paw at the bombs, and stroke the undercarriage of a B-29<br \/>\nThen emerge, giggling, from a mocked-up atomic shelter<br \/>\nTo enter an area set aside by the Museum for more \u2018Fun Stuff\u2019.<br \/>\nAnd sprawl over its showcases sizing up the goods on offer.<\/p>\n<p>There\u2019s a \u2018Fat Man\u2019 shot glass, and a \u2018Little Boy\u2019 wine cork<br \/>\nPosters of mushroom clouds with palm-trees in the foreground;<br \/>\nKnick-knacks decorated with bombers and their waving crews;<br \/>\nReprints of the Daily News, \u2018ATOM BOMB ROCKS JAPS,\u2019<\/p>\n<p>A \u2018Get a Half-Life\u2019 mug for your favourite beverage;<br \/>\nAtomic hatpins; atomic tie-clips and nuclear golf balls. <\/p>\n<p>The Museum once even had a line in Atomic Bomb perfume<br \/>\nWhich reputedly smelled like the end of the world.<\/p>\n<p>The laid-back visitors spot the Atomic Museum\u2019s jewellery \u2013<br \/>\nMiniature versions of the huge bombs they just strolled past,<br \/>\nLying around the Heritage Park like bloated gravestones.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHey, guys. Cute!\u201d One says, poring over the showcases,<br \/>\n\u201cYeah, gotta have them, dude; you think they come in gold?\u201d<br \/>\n\u201cWhat about platinum? Platinum would be dead cool.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For a split second, the word sounds like \u2018plutonium\u2019 \u2013<br \/>\n\u2018Plutonium would be dead cool\u2019, one appears to have said.<br \/>\nUnfazed, with a numb, laconic smile, as if embodying death itself,<br \/>\nThe clerk slides the triumphalist trophies  and trinkets<br \/>\nAcross the counter to satisfy their short attention spans. <\/p>\n<p>All four then sidle out of the shop in the Atomic Museum,<br \/>\nWith their bang bang bling now dangling from their ears<br \/>\nFor Cameron to hear another door slam in the same place as before<br \/>\nAs if, returning from one more mission to make fear-mongering fun,<br \/>\nThe devil has now returned, perhaps to polish his Zyklon-B paperweight;<br \/>\nOr to buff up his \u2018Arbeit Macht Frei\u2019 keyrings; gloat over Death\u2019s Head kitsch<br \/>\nAnd tweak his software upgrade of Nazi Playstation 3. <\/p>\n<p>Then he cackles, recalling Mary Meyer the Washington hostess<br \/>\nWho\u2019d turned Kennedy onto marijuana and to coke-fuelled sex,<br \/>\nAnd who\u2019d joked with him in a White House bedroom<br \/>\nAbout his being high when about to press the nuclear button. <\/p>\n<p>So then the devil picks out a roach-end, a condom and a rolled-up bill<br \/>\nAnd covers them in gold-leaf before giving them pride of place<br \/>\nIn one of the gleaming showcases of the Atomic Museum \u2013<br \/>\nAmongst the other imperial souvenirs of nuclear folly.   <\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Heathcote Williams<\/em><\/strong><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Words by Heathcote Williams. Narration and montage by Alan Cox. The National Atomic Museum \u2018Hiroshima bomb earrings for sale\u2019 Katherine Butler and Fiona Bell, London: The Independent, 6 August, 1999 In the National Atomic Museum At Albuquerque, New Mexico, You can buy souvenirs of \u2018Little Boy\u2019, The bomb that demolished Hiroshima, And of \u2018Fat Man\u2019, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[18,20],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-9541","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-literature","7":"category-media","8":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pbvgEs-2tT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9541"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9541\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/herman\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}