SLC Graffiti - Ranting for the Helluvit

[Zurtok Khan]

Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival.
-W. Edwards Deming



Everyday when I get on the train to go to school (in order to complete my indoctrination, don't you know), I see the graffiti on a few of the buildings in Salt Lake City.  Now, as you may imagine SLC isn't a place with alot of gang activity (but, we do have a nice big happy cult!), so the graffiti is minimal, and often amusing.  I suspect that much of it was put up by board little Mormon boys and girls who wanted to "rebel" with their sad emo anarchy.

The most prevalent piece of graffiti says, "No government can ever make you free."  I laugh every time I see it.  And, for good reason.  No dogma can ever make you free.  No catma can ever make you free (although it might confuse you, which can be fun for all of 30 seconds).

Discord has no dogma, which is a dogma in it's self, of course.  It is the paradox that is supposed to make you free.  But, no paradox will ever make you free (again, a dogma).  So, where does that leave you?

Do what you want, fucker.  Stop listening to me.  Every teacher ought to make themselves unneccissary.  Every scripture ought to make it's self obsolete.  Every lesson, once learned, need not be learned again.  But, that there is the catch.  Learning the lesson.  People repeat the same mistakes over and over again because they are too fucking retarded to learn from them.  They watch other people make the same mistake that they themselves make, but they are so blind they cannot see that it is not the action that makes them angry, only the reflection they see of themselves.  

Hypocrites, fascists, fundamentalists, ad absurdum.  I am calling you ought.  Learn your lesson and you make yourself free.  Otherwise you deserve all the pain and grief and ridicule given to you.

-Zurtok Khan
Under the influence of various asthma medications giving him a wicked headache.

[Eldora, Oracle of Alchemy]

Sorry about your headache  

Mormon graffiti  

[BADGE OF HONOR]

Actually, there are several gangs in SLC, the main ones being the Mexicans, the other Mexicans, and the Koreans.

I always liked the Andre the Giant stencil.  And the one of the map of Dublin on the date that Ulysses takes place.  Course, those happened years ago.  Now they're mostly just anti-Bush stuff.

Oh, and Mormons would never think to make graffiti.  They don't think about most transgressive behaviors.  It's the anti-cult that makes SLC so interesting, in my book.  I miss it there.  Ironically, there are more hippies per square foot than Chicago.  That's a metric shit-ton of hippies.  Fun for the anti-anti-cult, yo.

[the other anonymous]

Why do people always say "Think for yourself" but never say how?

n00b: "I want a HowTo on self-illumination."

1337 54g3: "Think for yourself."

n00b: "How?"

1337 54g3: "Make your own decisions."

n00b: "Okay, I decide to trust the president. We elected him because he knows what's best for us."

1337 54g3: "Dude, no! That's just stupid. Don't be a dupe."

n00b: "You told me to make my own decisions!"

1337 54g3: "But you're doing it wrong!"

n00b: "Then what's the right way to do it!?"

1337 54g3: "Think for yourself!"

toa: "I have an idea! Let's make a font!"

Roger: "I have an idea! Let's rant!"

fnnordiscordia: "I have an idea! Let's troll 'em!"

ECH: "img: STFU"

L.M.N.O.: "Somewhere deep in the heart of The City..."

Synaptyx: "SCRID!!!"

Eldora: "My kid just did the keeewlest thing!"

n00b: "Can anybody here tell me HOW to think for myself?"

Malaul: "Dude, if you have to ask for it, you're gonna get it."

n00b: "But I just wanna know---oh. I get it. Nevermind."

BGP: "DANM STRAIT HIPPIE! FOR GRATE JUSTICE TYPE INA LL CAPS AND SAY NOTHIGN USEFUL OR INA NY WAY SENSIBLE CUZ ITS TEH INTRENETS AND INTERNET SUXXORS!"

1337 54g3: "Come to think of it, how does one think for themselves?"

fnnordiscordia: "img: pwned!"

In Anerisian circles, Illumination is a suppressed taboo.
In Discordian circles, Illumination is merely an accident.

[Hoshiko]

Mormons get a lot of crap for being docile, but here there are so many historic sites and quiet places to go that people become complacent. Show me a freestanding historic site in Utah and I'll show you a place that will be torn up and covered in bad graffiti and condoms within a year, guaranteed. I'll say this for Mormons and the non-mormons who love them: They're not lazy.

<end semi-hijack>

I have this nightmare in which I realize that understanding the lesson does not exclude you from being doomed to live it. Basically, do you think you get it? How about now? Live it again and again and tell me how much more you get it now. How about now? Understand the depths of the problem yet? Wait, there's more there. Not rock bottom? Keep going... there's more. And here's a new way of seeing it, and a new voice telling you that you don't understand it form this angle just yet. A lifetime of it, over and over and you're not safe until you're dead. Hopefully, unless you believe the stories. Reincarnation? An eternity of that.

I understand things mentally. Do I KNOW them? Have I lived them? Do I comprehend every facet? I see the choices other people make. At times I look down on them, I always think I see things clearer than they do. But you can't learn from other people's mistakes unless they effect you, truly and surely. And even then, there's more to understand.

It's this fear that makes me think that I'm doomed to repeat some of them anyway. It's the curse of humanity. it's not enough to hear something or see it. We need to KNOW it, to experience it. And the experience fades and our memories fail us.

Can you shut off that switch that makes you curious or wanting to experience? I know I can't, so I try to control it. But I often think that it's not that some people are stronger and learn better from perceiving the world around them, it's just that they're not as passionate about life. There's no risk in boredom.

A lot of the people you (and I, a lot of the time) look down on or judge for making the same mistakes are much closer to living life than we are, or are taking more risks. Serious risks. There's a twisted kind of beauty to that.

I dunno, the longer I see things like that, the less I care about what other people do, and the more I start to question what I'm doing wasting my time watching them, being above it, and playing it safe.

There is no freedom from it, anywhere. You pay either way.

[Hoshiko]

Damn, beat me by 2 minutes.

Curses!

[LMNO]

Zurtok's rant, and ToA's observation, are both pretty right on.


Even though Zurtok is my arch-enemy.

[Irreverend Hugh, KSC]

Zurtok. You get an A plus.

[Zurtok Khan]

Actually, there are several gangs in SLC, the main ones being the Mexicans, the other Mexicans, and the Koreans.

I always liked the Andre the Giant stencil.  And the one of the map of Dublin on the date that Ulysses takes place.  Course, those happened years ago.  Now they're mostly just anti-Bush stuff.

Oh, and Mormons would never think to make graffiti.  They don't think about most transgressive behaviors.  It's the anti-cult that makes SLC so interesting, in my book.  I miss it there.  Ironically, there are more hippies per square foot than Chicago.  That's a metric shit-ton of hippies.  Fun for the anti-anti-cult, yo.

Yes, but they aren't real gangs.  Sure, if I see a bunch of mexicans dressed in proper gang attitire, I'm not going to fuck with them, but I won't be afraid to walk down the street past them.  The gangs in SLC only fuck with each other (and anyone who starts shit with them).  They leave everyone else alone, which is why they really don't worry me.

And, yes, I know "Mormons" who would make graffiti, you'd be amazed at what alot of the "mormons" at my highschool did for fun (considering I was one of 5 people in the school who didn't identify as mormon...).

And, LMNO, I will get you one day.  PH33r me!

Thanks Hugh =)

[East Coast Hustle]

The gangs in SLC only fuck with each other (and anyone who starts shit with them).  They leave everyone else alone, which is why they really don't worry me.

umm, that's ALL gangs, douchebag. "gangsters" who fuck with random passersby aren't gangsters, they're fucking idiot kids from the suburbs trying to be "hard".

now, please continue to shut the fuck up.

[Shibboleet The Annihilator]

*kills posters # 1, 2, and 4*

[the other anonymous]

*kills posters # 1, 2, and 4*

Yay! I can't distinguish between positive attention and negative attention! Fnnordy loves me!

[Shibboleet The Annihilator]

*kicks TOA square in the balls*

I sure do!!!!1

[BADGE OF HONOR]

Awww.  I feel so...unkilled.  

Better'n loved.

[Shibboleet The Annihilator]

Try kicking TOA in the nuts, you'll feel better.

*kicks TOA, who is now curled up in the fetal position, in the nuts again*