UNLIMITED holist appreciation thread

[Dildo Argentino]

And you hear no pitch problems with the album? Well then...

I'm also not a musician.

Which is even better.

Though, holist is right that regular set ups are good policy. Maybe I should set up a set up holiday or something. Actually, I really should figure out how to do that shit myself, because then it's free.

In my experience it's a bit like tuning your own piano. Ultimately you can do it, but it requires a tremendous deal of effort.

[Dildo Argentino]

This is a response to the "Putting More Hippy Bullshit To Rest ("All is Maya") thread.

I'm sorry to be such a bore but... I think there's actually
a great deal of self-deception in this thread. What's really
going on is actually this: Hippie is not a world-view, hippie
is not a philosophy: first and foremost, hippie is a style
of emotional self-regulation. A way of managing emotions,
responses to problems, tensions. A style of affect. It involves
the ability to chill and the realisation that, strictly for the hippie
himself/herself, spending a greater than strictly necessary
amount of time in arousal of any sort, particularly
fear, anger, indignation, doubt, aggression is counter-productive.
I mean if one's intended product is The Good Life
aka Getting The Most Out Of It.

It is an approach to being human that you, Roger,
along with LMNO and Mangrove, and possibly Cainad and
Demolition_Squid (though it's harder to tell with them)
don't like.

As to why you don't like it, I am hard pressed to say.
You seem to have chosen a more dramatic, sometimes
stressful, more theatrical style of emotional self-regulation.
Which has its merits. Which you seem happy with, at least
some of you keep reasserting that you are happy with it...
that it's the best way to be, for you, at least... (the general
subject "you" here, by the way, is not intended as a way of
offering a blanket description, you, dear readers, are all free
to take it or leave it as you will).

Perhaps there's even a little nagging envy there, though
I would be somewhat surprised if any of you actually
admitted this: is it possible that there are humans in the
world who rarely stress and generally take things
as they come, and usually manage to have a good time?

(I'm not talking about habitual, addicted stoners, and neither
am I talking about fake hippies, who try desperately to project
this image while actually not having such a great time but keeping
that largely secret.)

So it's important to you not simply to not like the hippie way of
life, but to feel superior to them. But antipathy in itself is an uneasy
foundation for superiority. So you pretend that it's the "hippie
worldview", the "hippie way of looking at things" that you object to,
because it is so patently false and ridiculous that a man of even
average intellect, not to mention cerebral heroes such as your good
selves, could not possibly be serious about holding those beliefs...

...which, by the way, you yourself make up (or collect from the hippie
wannabes who do, clearly, outnumber the real hippies) and ascribe them
to hippies.

Because actually, if you tried to approach it with a modicum of respect
and magnanimity, the maxim "everything is an illusion, nothing exists"
can easily be read as a paradoxical statement, aimed to shock and rattle
the bars of that famous black iron prison, not very far in intent from
the summation of Discordianism offered in another thread by the Dark
Empress herself: "a philosophy related to Taoism, that encourages us
to question everything and not take ourselves too seriously."

Unreformed hippie that I am, I once went to do "Chakra Diads". Of all things.
This involved sitting on the floor, facing a total stranger who was sitting
about a couple of feet from me, facing me, and asking him a question,
listening to the answer while attempting to withhold all reaction to it, then
asking the question again... until he ran out of answers, at which point
he would start asking me the same question. When I ran out of answers, I
would move to the next question and repeat the procedure. There were
seven questions altogether, one for each chakra. The exercise lasted about
four hours. The questions were something like this:

What are you afraid of?
Where do you come from?
What do you need?
Who do you love?
What do you wish to say?
What do you wish to know?
Why won't you let your life fall apart?

I liked it, despite the fact that the osho-meditation-practitioner woman who
offered this exercise was an asshole, and I left halfway through the two-day course,
this exercise itself was an important thing to happen to me. Something like
seven years on, I still remember the feelings, the focussing energy that
this sequence of questions was able to generate.

Or Kill Me.

[Mangrove]

Holist,

I don't know if this is helpful but Roger's use of the word 'hippy' covers a multitude of meanings. Now, I don't want to seem like I am speaking for him, and if he's reading this, please jump in and make the necessary corrections. However, I've been on the forum for a good while and I can say that when Roger says 'hippy' he is describing:

(a) Hippies in the classic sense
(b) New Agers
(c) Pagans
(d) Occultists
(e) Any other unscientific belief or worldview
(f) Self indulgent philosophies with little/no redeeming pragmatic value
(g) Special sub-category: People with superficial, speculative interpretations of Quantum Mechanics
(h) Stoners
(i) People with poor personal hygene

There may be more classifications but these are the ones that end up in common use on PD. Might be useful to not interpret 'hippy' in a literal sense.

I have more to add on this subject, but dinner is ready 

[Dildo Argentino]

Mangrove,

It would be helpful except for the fact that it is obvious and trivial. Short while I have spent on this forum and yet I have successfully gleaned that those are indeed the sorts of people that Roger has in mind when he goes on about hippies.

But the thing is, I find it difficult to read your message in a manner that is in the least relevant to the point I made, which, allow me to reiterate, is that the general disdain that "hippies" are held in by several people here is actually indicative of self-deception (actually, it sticks out like a sore thumb). This is sometimes called hypocrisy because people tend to imagine that at least the most blatant examples cannot possibly be unintentional... but in fact it usually is unintentional and people practising this kind of behaviour are not in fact hypocritical (= believe, or at least claim to believe one thing, while acting as if they believed something very different). They are just practising self-deception. They believe (through hard work and tremendous effort, practically all of it unconscious) that they are doing one thing while they are in fact doing another.

In this particular instance, they believe they are having some laughs at the expense of "hippies" (largely people in the groups you listed, but with the added qualities of being insincere, inauthentic, conflicted, self-deceiving and indeed on occasion hypocritical - although of course the hippy-basher likes to think that all hippies are like that), when in fact their laugher has a nervous overtone to it: by returning to this point (laughing at hippies in a superior manner) with the obsessive repetitiveness of true ritual, they are actually attempting to alleviate a nagging fear. The nagging fear being that actual hippies (who are, by and large, sincere, authentic, capable of dealing with their conflicts and correcting themselves promptly should they fall into self-deception, and who are rarely hypocritical, at least unintentionally - and let me hasten to add that you can be all of those things and not be a hippie!) may be having a better time of it... than they are.

Furthermore, though your disclaimer is noted, your entire message is indeed about how you think Roger defines/classifies hippies. I would be more interested to hear your views on the subject, of possible. It's been four days and I hope at least three dinners, so, please, do elucidate.

[Mesozoic Mister Nigel]

Hippies are just another commercial byproduct of the manufacture of Rugged Individualism™.

It's just one of many products we export.

[Dildo Argentino]

Hippies are just another commercial byproduct of the manufacture of Rugged Individualism™.

It's just one of many products we export.

I don't see how they are commercial. People that buy colourful items to decorate themselves, their homes or the inside of their heads with in order to adopt the appearance of drop-outs while actually dropping very much in (in order to be able to afford that colourful stuff) are pseudo-hippies. The pseudo-hippy is indeed a particular, rather successful flavour of the "manufactured pseudo-Rugged-Individualism" product (marketed, of course, as "Rugged Individualism^TM", but that's beside the point, marketers will lie like water will seek the level). But real hippies (when am I going to get accused of using a "no real Scotsman" argument, by the way? What happened to vigilance around here?  ) are actually just rather ruggedly individualistic. In a way that's just not open to manufacture. AND, AT THE SAME TIME, they are community minded: those two things (individualism and valuing community) do not contradict each other in any way. Quite the contrary, they go well together.

I do see how they could be described as a by-product: their stance, to a significant aspect, is shaped by the fact that the "Rugged Individualism^TM" product (along with the "Sense of Community^TM" product is being manufactured and consumed by such a large proportion of humanity. This is a fact they dislike (though they accept it! - nothin' much else you can do with facts). And many of them would prefer to see the practice discontinued (as to the chances of that happening, they might hold a variety of views).

Apart from throwing a flip, ill-considered remark, what were you attempting to say? Remember, you are talking to an aspiring aspie what doesnt speak proper Ahmericun.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Hippies - Naive wankers who think that harping on about the peace and love and shit is a legitimate solution to taming a planet populated by insane, highly aggressive primates.

Antihippies - People like me who think that more and cheaper ammunition is a legitimate solution to hippies

[AFK]

Hippies - Naive wankers who think that harping on about the peace and love and shit is a legitimate solution to taming a planet populated by insane, highly aggressive primates.

Whilst sipping their "fair-trade" organic green tea. 

[P3nT4gR4m]

Yup, cos "fair-trade" organic green tea and the reek of patchouli  is sure to tip the balance of power right the fuck over in their favour. No ... wait ... that's total air superiority I'm thinking about.

[Dildo Argentino]

Hippies - Naive wankers who think that harping on about the peace and love and shit is a legitimate solution to taming a planet populated by insane, highly aggressive primates.

That is an interesting fantasy you haf dere!

The fact of the matter is: hippies are not naive. Some were, to begin with (that's like 45 years ago, man!), but natural selection has done its thing. The naive have either gravitated towards pseudo-hippie (working for the man, but pretending not to at weekends and occasionally even breaking the law slightly by surruptitiously smoking pot) or wised up.

Peace and love are both nice things to have, trust me on this. Trouble is, you can only make them for yourself, and once you have made them, you need to keep pretty quiet about it unless you want desperate hordes in dire need of peace and happiness to descend on you. You see, they labour under the misapprehension that you can also have your peace and love by taking them away from someone else. (Early hippies of the naive variety also believed this, though they usually attempted to take their peace and happiness from someone else in pill or powder or possibly liquid form.)

Further, for your information, homo sapiens sapiens is the mentally most resilient while also the least aggressive primate ever to have lived on this earth. Ask any ethologist. That doesn't mean that as a species it is not up shit creek without much of a paddle, but still. Also, for your information, the planet does not need taming (subduing using coercion).

Antihippies - People like me who think that more and cheaper ammunition is a legitimate solution to hippies

That's actually the description of a psychopath wannabe. Pick a group you identify against and fantasise about killing them en masse. Well, if that's the way you want to go, feel free... do report back occasionally. And seriously, firstly, more and cheaper ammunition is already in place. Secondly, an antihippie like you would have to sober up first to hit a hippie standing still at five paces. Oh, and thirdly, be careful: hippies may also own guns, even ammunition.

[Dildo Argentino]

Hippies - Naive wankers who think that harping on about the peace and love and shit is a legitimate solution to taming a planet populated by insane, highly aggressive primates.

Whilst sipping their "fair-trade" organic green tea.

You do realise you are describing lazy fashion-victims with a false-consciousness life-style, don't you?

Does feeling superior in this manner make you feel better? Or did you just come into my cave sublet because you are the type of person who enjoys hippie-baiting I mean troll-baiting I mean innocent on-line bullying and stereotypical sniggering in good company?

[AFK]

I know precisely who I'm describing because I'm surrounded by them here. 

[P3nT4gR4m]

Hippies - Naive wankers who think that harping on about the peace and love and shit is a legitimate solution to taming a planet populated by insane, highly aggressive primates.

That is an interesting fantasy you haf dere!

The fact of the matter is: hippies are not naive. Some were, to begin with (that's like 45 years ago, man!), but natural selection has done its thing. The naive have either gravitated towards pseudo-hippie (working for the man, but pretending not to at weekends and occasionally even breaking the law slightly by surruptitiously smoking pot) or wised up.

Peace and love are both nice things to have, trust me on this. Trouble is, you can only make them for yourself, and once you have made them, you need to keep pretty quiet about it unless you want desperate hordes in dire need of peace and happiness to descend on you. You see, they labour under the misapprehension that you can also have your peace and love by taking them away from someone else. (Early hippies of the naive variety also believed this, though they usually attempted to take their peace and happiness from someone else in pill or powder or possibly liquid form.)

Further, for your information, homo sapiens sapiens is the mentally most resilient while also the least aggressive primate ever to have lived on this earth. Ask any ethologist. That doesn't mean that as a species it is not up shit creek without much of a paddle, but still. Also, for your information, the planet does not need taming (subduing using coercion).

Antihippies - People like me who think that more and cheaper ammunition is a legitimate solution to hippies

That's actually the description of a psychopath wannabe. Pick a group you identify against and fantasise about killing them en masse. Well, if that's the way you want to go, feel free... do report back occasionally. And seriously, firstly, more and cheaper ammunition is already in place. Secondly, an antihippie like you would have to sober up first to hit a hippie standing still at five paces. Oh, and thirdly, be careful: hippies may also own guns, even ammunition.

Oh, yeah, and no fucking sense of humour. Totally forgot that criterion. Remember kids, having bare feet and stinking like a fucking yak is serious bizness   

[insideout]

Hippie is not a world-view, hippie
is not a philosophy: first and foremost, hippie is a style
of emotional self-regulation. A way of managing emotions,
responses to problems, tensions. A style of affect. It involves
the ability to chill and the realisation that, strictly for the hippie
himself/herself, spending a greater than strictly necessary
amount of time in arousal of any sort, particularly
fear, anger, indignation, doubt, aggression is counter-productive.
I mean if one's intended product is The Good Life
aka Getting The Most Out Of It.

The level of defense you go to of this argues with the notion that it applies to you, but the implication seems to be that it does indeed apply to you.

just sayin', you defend a little too intently for this to be all that good of a fit.

[Dildo Argentino]

Oh, yeah, and no fucking sense of humour. Totally forgot that criterion. Remember kids, having bare feet and stinking like a fucking yak is serious bizness   

Don't go getting all het up. Deep inside (I mean, not THAT deep inside, but let's say inside), you would like to slaughter people who have sinned against you by not agreeing with everything you say, not wearing shoes and smelling bad. Oh, and they go on about peace and love and shit. What's the big deal? Happens to the best of us.