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Messages - Kaienne

#1
Principia Discussion / Re: Operation: Surprise Yourself
January 02, 2010, 07:58:53 PM
Would slipping an armed mousetrap into the pocket of a pair of pants you don't usually wear while hammered and forgetting about it count?
#2
Two vast and trunkless legs of stone / Re: ATTN: EMO's
December 23, 2009, 10:01:50 PM
Quote from: Rip City Hustle on December 23, 2009, 09:19:13 PM
Meh. I still think it basically boils down to a lack of mental and emotional self-mastery, which sort of seems like it oughtta be something that's taught to new recruits everyone, ever and/or screened for in the case of people with "tells" for being predisposed to PTSD.

I also think that this applies, in a larger context, to society at large. I know it sounds like oversimplifying but really, people just need to learn to deal with their bullshit sans melodrama.

Fix'd. I think the problem though is that no one (save for perhaps a select few monks living up on mountaintops) actually fully attains mastery of the self; and, the path by which they got there may not actually work with other peoples' sets and settings. Also I'm totally with you on board with the sans melodrama bit; I'd like you to show me someone who doesn't. Anxiety and angst : anger and rage : ridicule and incredulity. Everyone exaggerates their emotions, people just have different emotions; for every person there is to say "I don't get these fuckin' emo kids, what is wrong with them?" there's an emo kid to say "I don't get these fuckin' cynical bastards, what is wrong with them?"
Normalcy is an illusion projected by surrounding oneself with like minds.
#3
Literate Chaotic / Re: R. D. Laing - Knots
December 23, 2009, 09:03:12 PM
Yeah, my interest in it waned towards the middle, and picked up again towards the end. The "if it's not me, it's me" section went clear over my head (although I'll avoid passing judgement as to whether this is because it's inane, or because I don't understand it).
#4
Literate Chaotic / Re: R. D. Laing - Knots
December 23, 2009, 08:56:29 PM
Quote from: LMNO on December 23, 2009, 08:48:11 PM
It's a book that uses ambiguous pronouns in vague ways in order to describe the complicated relationships people have with each other.

Pretty much, yeah. It provides an abstract account of how people get into the mental and social tangles that they do.

The friend who showed it to me told me that he found it in a library, read the first chapter, then went out and bought it.

Like, first two verses:

"They are playing a game.
They are playing at not playing a game.
If I show them I see they are, I shall break the rules and they will punish me.
I must play their game, of not seeing I see the game.

They are not having fun.
I can't have fun if they don't.
If I get them to have fun, then I can have fun with them.
Getting them to have fun, is not fun. It is hard work.
I might get fun out of finding out why they're not.
I'm not supposed to get fun out of working out why they're not.
But there is even some fun in pretending to them I'm not having fun finding out why they're not."

And then it goes up from there. Laing hisself was like, some hugely skilled psychiatrist who wrote it towards the end of his career, after an entire lifetime of observing person after person after person get into the same basic tangles. The last few verses switch to being about nirvana, and are executed impeccably.
#5
Just because other people are doing it doesn't mean you have to.


Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on October 12, 2009, 07:40:17 PMThen I get too excited, and hobble around hooting unintelligible things from between my toothless gums.

There are times when you don't do this?
#6
Literate Chaotic / R. D. Laing - Knots
December 23, 2009, 08:41:43 PM
is pretty much the most influential book I've ever read. Anyway, there's an online version here: http://www.oikos.org/knotpageen.htm
#7
Oh. And obtain and learn bass. My roommate is a drummer and says that he'll cover half the cost just so we can start a band. XD

Quote from: LMNO on December 22, 2009, 07:32:25 PM
publish the Chao te Ching

WANT
#8
Two vast and trunkless legs of stone / Re: ATTN: EMO's
December 23, 2009, 08:32:25 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on December 23, 2009, 01:51:24 PMNot true.  One of the programs I run, the one that trains the teenagers to be good listeners, has a section on identifying and referring kids with intent to commit suicide.  What we found in our research while putting together the curriculum is that 4 out of 5 teens who attempt suicide give very clear warnings.  I don't know what the figures are for adults but my guess is they would be very similar.  It is actually a rare thing when someone who commits suicide didn't give warnings ahead of time.  The problem is, those warning signs go unrecognized.  Most people who are suicidal don't really want to die.  They want to get rid of emotional pain.  And that's why they give warning signs.  They want someone to help them, but they don't know how to get it otherwise.  Most of these signs show up in the week or two preceding their attempt. 
It's true; when I attempted suicide, it was because I was too broken and afraid to continue living through what I was living through (kicked out of home, daily panic attacks, living with constant transphobia in a closed-minded town, just had a nervous breakdown and lost my job in the process and was now facing eviction and homelessness just as the weather was starting to get cold), not because I actually wanted to die. I had been giving really subtle tells for a long time but never actually out and said it, until the night of when I wrote my suicide letter (asking people not to hate me, telling them that I still loved them and that I was sorry, etc.).


Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on December 23, 2009, 02:55:14 PM
I was there too.  And my Mom and Dad didn't necessarily see the signs either.  But, I don't blame them.  I mean, there is really a pathetic amount of education and awareness raising when it comes to suicide prevention.  Nobody wants to talk about it.  It's just one of those things our society doesn't want to address in any kind of meaningful way.
Yes. Absolutely. It's fucking ridiculous. People are so actively engaged in trying to pretend that suffering isn't there that they refuse to look at it when it comes up. I've been doing a lot of counseling for youth with issues surrounding depression, self-harm, and suicide lately, and it's fucking opened my eyes, and it's taught me a fucking lot about myself. I had one girl whose parents told her they didn't care if she tried it. And so in addition to all of the internal trauma and pain these people are going through, they're also treated like they're invisible- and that is something that has a fucking profound effect on one's mental/emotional stability, I don't care who you are. I have a friend who is literally the most intelligent and educated person I know, and is the embodiment of logic and reason, and when my roommate recently started pretending he didn't exist because he started dating my roommate's ex, he got fucked up over it. Imagine what that does to someone who doesn't understand theirself, doesn't understand others, doesn't understand society, and is desperate for someone- anyone- to help them.

And of course, it doesn't help that most people don't know how to effectively help. You k now how sometimes someone will say something to you, and it will be meant to be helpful, but it's really, really not? When I started dealing with my own issues involving recently starting cutting again, I wound up in a really, really dark place because- even though it seemed totally normal to me, I've been self-injuring for 10 years now- everyone I spoke to treated it like a crisis and kept telling me to stop and to figure out ways to stop as fast as possible. Not having had a grasp on my own motivations and intentions at the time, other people telling me it was a crisis actually made me think that it really was a crisis.
#9
Quote from: Hoopla on December 22, 2009, 06:11:53 PM
What do you mean "have" to tazer ten year olds?  They want to!
With just a little bit of cognitive tinkering, you'd be surprised at how easy it is to equivocate the two.
#10
So, for the past few years I've done up resolution lists, and promptly forgotten about them three weeks later. 2009 was an absolutely awesome year for me, though, so I think my New Years' Resolution this year will simply be "keep doing whatever the fuck it is that I'm doing". I'd be cool if I finished the art piece I'm working on, but I'm not going to rush it.

Quote from: P3nT4gR4m on December 22, 2009, 06:29:32 PM
I'ma get shitfaced drunk and kick the living crap out of an motherfucken eagle
Best ever.
#11
Principia Discussion / Re: Discordian Evangelism
December 16, 2009, 02:02:55 PM
Quote from: Cain on December 16, 2009, 08:33:17 AMBoth the Dadaists and Situationists [...] have lots of uses.

Okay. It seemed as though your intention was to specifically select a group of people, overtly target them, and use the ensuing uprising as the springboard into getting acknowledged. Utilizing whatever resources naturally arise makes total sense.
#12
Principia Discussion / Re: Discordian Evangelism
December 16, 2009, 01:10:08 AM
Quote from: Cramulus on December 15, 2009, 10:31:04 PMB) Discordian Conspiracy Theory - this is the plan where we hint at the giant spooky discordian society which battles against the illuminati [in all of our souls]. Is there a piece of media we can generate, a rumor we can start, or some other way to put out more feelers to the paranoid lunatics out there? In terms of fliers, this is territory Vex and others have actually explored. Anybody feel like rounding up that media and seeing what we've got / what we're missing? (All the PDFs from vex's ftp is now housed on scridb with the tag "vexftp".)

Someone mentioned The Examiner. There's also the National Inquirer. Perhaps these are options. I'd be most amused if we could generate a war between the two societies, using either publication as the voice of either side. Other media than tabloids would also work.
#13
Principia Discussion / Re: Discordian Evangelism
December 15, 2009, 10:06:19 PM
Quote from: Doctor Rat Bastard on December 15, 2009, 09:56:23 PMOne act of poetic terrorism that we've often played with in Columbus is soap bubbles. It's amazing wwhat happens to people in traffic when simple soap bubbles start appearing in the intersection at a red light. We've seen dull looking nearly comatose drivers perk up, laugh and clap... we've seen other drivers freak out and wind up their windows or cuss at us for blowing bubbles... we get a reaction, but I have no idea if that action is long lasting or merely for a second.

This is precisely the kind of stuff I'm taking about.

Quote from: Hoopla on December 15, 2009, 10:02:08 PMPersonally I can't stand the Toronto art scene, and avoid it at all costs.  However, that's not to say your approach wouldn't work... but you would only get people who pay attention to art.  Just like flyers only get the attention of those who pay attention to flyers, which is also only a segment of the population.

All ideas should be considered viable until proven otherwise.  If each of us actually took our ideas and ran with them we could inundate the population from all sides. 

Very true. Thank you.

Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on December 15, 2009, 09:25:08 PMJust read the rest of that.  A summarization:  "You're all doing it wrong.  Do it my way.  My "art" is superior to your "art"."

Hm. Perhaps I have misrepresented myself. I do not wish to express that any art is better than any other art. I only wanted to suggest avenues I thought perhaps weren't being explored as deeply. I apologize if I came off as commanding.

Quote from: FP on December 15, 2009, 09:50:00 PMAre rants and raves and flyers, not also a creation of art? Or are you saying that some forms of art are more successful than others? I agree that works of "great art" are more likely to bend minds, but how to create an environment more conducive to and supportive of this, other than having a healthy eco-system of smaller art statements of all different types and genres?

You're absolutely right, and I respectfully retract my assertion otherwise. This is the direction I was trying to go in by bringing up Sketch, and the sorts of 'non-arts' such as rock balancing and whatnot. Yes; the concept I was trying to communicate was one of creating an eco-system of openness and nurturing to all types of self-expression. To answer the Good Reverend Roger, I have seen an enormous number of people influenced by these things. There is a man named Sunjay who does rock balancing- and like, towers of boulders and cinderblocks that don't seem like they are physically possible- on Queen St. for change; his sign: "May the proceeds from these sculptures go into the benefit of all living things". It's a powerful statement, and it shows people that there are people out there who are fighting for the well-being of everyone, instead of only the well-being of some.

We can't get people to be theirselves if they are afraid that they will receive negative attention for being theirselves. If we make it cold, unsafe, and hostile for people to come out of their shells, they will not come out of their shells.
#14
Principia Discussion / Re: Discordian Evangelism
December 15, 2009, 09:16:14 PM
Quote from: Cain on December 13, 2009, 04:12:38 PMEnemies.  We need individualized enemies to rail against.  Polarization is a wonderful tactic, and if we start hating on someone, other people who hate on them will take notice.  Also, their allies will take notice and hate on us, further spreading our ideas.

I would think this to be counterproductive to the 'choosing creative order and disorder over ordered creation and destruction' bit, although the book is of course by no means law. I'd personally like to see the spirit of the Principia be captured; a good-natured call out to people to take their lives into their own hands and discover the power within them. Overt manipulation- which is ultimately a form of control- strikes me as a tactic which can only damage the cause of trying to free people. Utilizing political tactics which have been used time and time again would be kind of disruptive to the notion of utilizing novelty and creativity to overcome the mindless repetition of historical events [unless given some sort of twist people haven't seen before].

I think the greatest weapon we have at our disposal is art. We can rant and rave or distribute flyer after flyer, but these are the same tactics advertisers have been throwing at people for the past century, and they're becoming less and less impactful. Flash someone a high-res poster (or, if you're really lucky, the real thing) of, say, Raul Casillas' Entanglement (caution: large file) or Alex Grey's New Man/New Woman or Mark Henson's Illusions of Reality, however, and you can't not be struck by it. (See Metagallery for more random shit.)

And this goes back to what Payne said about quality over quantity; you can spend four years writing and editing and distributing and rebuffing and trying to convince person after person, one by one, that you know what you're talking about, or you can paint Entanglement and show them that you know what you're talking about. The conceptual notion of going into seclusion for four years and not proselytizing to anyone except maybe your close circle is bound to conjure up feelings of wasted time; it's only when you actually see the finished product in front of you, and have it to show to people and can see the immediate profound impact it has on them that the entire episode actually starts to pay off. So, there's this aspect of having faith to it.

But yeah. Art. Everywhere. All kinds. As much as possible. Rock balances, street performance, graffiti, music, even something so simple as dancing like an idiot while listening to your .mp3 player at the bus stop; when people see other people acting like they're having fun and not giving a shit if they're being judged, it gives them the idea that it might actually be okay to have fun and not give a shit if they're being judged.

I've witnessed the transformative power of art first-hand; in Toronto here there is an agency called Sketch, which is a working arts studio for homeless and street involved youth. The number of people who I have seen in the past two years go there, discover theirself, and change and grow by bounds as a human being has been staggering. Hell, I was one of them. Sketch has been by far the most important contributer to my recovery. There's inspiration hanging on every wall and tucked into every nook, and the people who've been there for awhile become leaders and inspirations unto theirselves. There are so many different kinds of art on the walls that appeal to so many different kinds of people that 'good' and 'bad' lose their objectivity, and when that happens, people feel free to express theirself without fear of inadequacy. I've heard numerous people refer to it as heaven-on-Earth. People have gotten off the streets, out of prisons and shelters and into stable housing, into college and university, and into meaningful employment because of this agency, which is explicitly art-oriented.

Global News did a cover of them recently, the video can be found here.

So, creation. Ordered creation, disordered creation, doesn't matter. Just create.
#15
Quote from: Sepia on October 12, 2007, 04:54:50 PM
Thanks to all kind words and also to Kaienne for making me laugh.

I'm still confused here so I'll wait untill I'm off medication by posting but damn I'm giggling.

But Kaienne, the point of my post was to whine and hope I get run over by a truck/step out infront of one because I can't live my own life and I do not wish to face reality?

All critique is indeed very welcome and yours is no exception.

I'm glad someone enjoyed it.

The primary motivation for my post was just to be oppositional. Sepia's OP claimed 'you this', 'you that'; negative, negative, negative. Lies! None of it was true for me, I'm an extremely happy person, so, I wrote my own. Any quarreling that came as a further result was in counter to people's reactions, and not the OP itself. (Including What's-His-Name's initial reaction, claiming it to hit close to home. If you want to get technical, it was him I was shitting on.  :lol:)