Architecture

[DJRubberducky]

More than anything, I'm trying to sort out my thoughts on the matter, not really inflict them on anybody.  But you're welcome to discuss, as that may help the sorting process.

From what I can tell, the exterior walls of the BIP are put in place by our existence as humans.  As has been said before in other treatises, our perceptions are limited by the relatively narrow ranges of our physical senses, and by the fact that our brains can only process so much information at a given time.  Even when we try to expand our sensory ranges by building and using mechanical devices, it's very difficult for us to observe both those expanded ranges and our "natural" ranges - we have to focus our attention on what's under the microscope and can't necessarily notice the fire that just caught in the far corner of the laboratory.  This is why we can never fully escape the Black Iron Prison - we either don't have the sensory perception, or we don't have the mental processing power, and if we try to expand both at once, we end up frying our brains with data overload.  None can look upon the face of God and live.

However, the BIP is chock full of interior walls, and we can smash those to our heart's content because we're the ones who put them there, or who allowed them to be put there (which is almost the same thing).  Smashing those walls doesn't change the fact that we're in prison, but it gives us a little more wiggle room.

One of the troubles in wall-smashing, though, is that many of us knock down a wall, then take those bricks and use them to build a new and different wall.  I actually had that revelation back in high school, but only in a very specific sense - I was complaining about how so many guitarists wanted to sound like Jimi Hendrix because "he was so innovative".  That idea just totally boggled my mind.  They admired Hendrix for being innovative, so they were going to very diligently copy everything he had already done, and think they were somehow better for it.  Hendrix had smashed a wall, and these kids were very meticulously picking up the bricks and building a new one - but it was okay because this was a Hendrix wall and therefore cooler than the other walls out there!

On the other hand, is it bad to rebuild walls in new and different places?  If you knock down too many walls without rebuilding at least one or two somewhere else, do you risk collapsing the ceiling on yourself and going completely mad?  (If you want to argue whether or not going mad is a bad thing, let's do that elsewhere.)  And is it somehow less offensive to live with walls that you have built, since you chose to have them there and you will probably remain aware of their existence?  I tend to think it is - if a girl who grows up reaping all the benefits of gender equality who *chooses* to be a stay-at-home mom when she grows up is IMO better off than a girl who grew up never knowing that she didn't have to do that if she didn't want to.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Works for me. Awareness of what you're doing is liberation. The truth will set you free. Walls are just a metaphor. You don't knock them down as much as you knock down your own preconceived notions of what power these walls have to contain you.

(*edit*) I'm trying to say something here but missing by a bit. Help!

[LHX]

to stick with the metaphor:

you can rip down walls and use the material to help solidify your foundation


the grass is never greener in other places
but
there is some benefit to be had from viewing things from a different perspective


you bring up some good issues here

perhaps part of the trick is also to become a expert at putting them up and tearing them down

painting on them then cleaning them up


variety

[nurbldoff]

Maybe the trick is to realize that breaking the walls doesn't necessarily mean you have to escape through them afterwards; the important thing is knowing that you can if you want or need to.

Of course this might lead to laziness if you just convince yourself there is no wall but never actually investigate. Then in a sense you might as well still be locked up.

Oh I don' know.

[LMNO]

DJ - right on the money, IMO.

I like the Hendrix anectdote.

[Jenne]

About the "knocking down a wall just to build another with the bricks of the now-destroyed wall" thing...I think there's also a problem with people WANTING there to be walls.  They are not comfortable with the knowledge and subsequent actions of freedom.  When you've lived in a prison all your life, and you are shown said-prison, you miss the prison when you're able to remove it, even if you've worked hard to break it down.  For some people, anyway.

I mean, whatcha gonna blame everything on now you're free?  Yourself?  Nah.  You've been told over and over that it's your parents, your schooling, your president that have you under their thumbs.  When you remove those thumbs...what's next?

So you run to another thumb, because without that pressure, you're not sure what to do anymore.  Living and breathing on your own, like a newborn babe, is a scary venture, esp for the self-aware.

[LMNO]

...OR...



Order and Disorder balance, right?  The structured order of words inside the poetry of ee cummings, et al.

So, when you break down all walls, you've removed all structures you can control.  So, what do you do?  Where do you go?  You've essentially obiterated all internal aspects of reality.  In order to function in the external reality, you need to rebuild.

Only this time, you can draw up the blueprints.

[P3nT4gR4m]

...OR...



Order and Disorder balance, right?  The structured order of words inside the poetry of ee cummings, et al.

So, when you break down all walls, you've removed all structures you can control.  So, what do you do?  Where do you go?  You've essentially obiterated all internal aspects of reality.  In order to function in the external reality, you need to rebuild.

Only this time, you can draw up the blueprints.

I was going to post a reply there but yours is better worded :-D

[Jenne]

And if you haven't thought it through, you can forget the reasons why you were taking the wall down in the first place, panic, and put the wall back in a rush to embrace the familiarity.

[Jenne]

In other words, drawing up that blueprint is rather a process, isn't it?  And it's not easily taught, because it's different for every person.  So, if you suggest to people that they tear down that security wall (remember, the prison protects you even as it protects others from you), you have to give them the CAD to draw other blueprints.

[LMNO]

Well, we don't have to, but it would be nice of us.




This is where the "think for yourself, schmuck" meme comes in.

[Jenne]

Well, you do if you want your impression to last and not be discarded for just another mf.

You accuse people of being jailed (rightly so), but in showing them how to destroy said cell, you leave out the part of what to do next?  That will create as many problems as it does solutions.

[LMNO]

Actually, I don't think we have shown people how to destroy their cells.  So far, we've just pointed out the bars.

But the techniques are out there, in most religious disciplines.

[Jenne]

Naw, you have.

The people on this forum, at least, are very integrated in showing others how to take their cells apart.  Which bricks are the weakest.  Which of them you can pull out with your pinky fingers.  Which  need a sledgehammer to remove.

Yeah, you guys have offered the tools alright.

[P3nT4gR4m]

Naw, you have.

The people on this forum, at least, are very integrated in showing others how to take their cells apart.  Which bricks are the weakest.  Which of them you can pull out with your pinky fingers.  Which  need a sledgehammer to remove.

Yeah, you guys have offered the tools alright.

That's the easy bit. Telling them what to do next is downright dangerous. Cults get started that way. Fuck 'em they're on their own - same as we were. But hey, we're still here innit?