O.K. I'm going to start by addressing an idea from The Diceman by Luke Rhinehart. It's been coming for a long time now, I just need to shit it and get it out of my system.
I always felt this was an enjoyable enough book, with some clever ideas, principly the idea of our egos being made of a large number of conflicting desires and emotions, the large number of which are chained down and oppressed by One Self, a monolithic ego that we identify as being our "real Self".
I never really liked the solution in the novel, the idea of rolling a die to decide what you are going to do in any given situation and being absolutely bound by the dies decision.
It seemed inelegant - a destruction of any form of responsibility, which I personally feel is ultimately counter-productive. (Of course the complete abandonment of responsibility can lead to some really good opportunities for horrormirth, as long as you don't mind being the guinea pig).
Saying that, I don't really know if there IS a solution to this "problem" of chained mini-egos, but I'd like to find one. As Discordians, many of us try to stick crowbars under the One Self of ourselves and others, to break roles and habits and shake people up a little. We perform mindfucks in an effort to do this usually, or go straight to the root and attempt to change habits and roles directly (usually to ourself, using one self as a test bed).
There are some of us that will intentionally play a specific role for a time, let that mini-ego have it's time in the spotlight. We try to do it to others by making attempts to derail their One Self momentarily, allowing one of their mini-egos to step forward temporarily.
What other methods could we be looking at? Are there any new ideas out there to achieve these aims?
I feel that the larger the amount of tools at our disposal, the greater the chances of our success. The more cutting edge our techniques, the more likely we can avoid our targets in built defences, slicing past the scar tissue caused by years of a specific type of shrapnel.
I'm not talking about evolving the Mindfuck concept, I'm wanting some bluesky thinking on what we could conceivably replace it with in the future.
Go.
The only thing that comes to mind is asking somebody who they are, and rejecting all descriptions of themselves as just a descriptor. (No, that's your name, who are you?) Start by asking yourself this, of course. You look (and feel) really stupid if after a little bit of this the other person asks who you are and you don't have better answers than the ones they gave. Not to mention the whole splinter vs. beam in the eye thing.
Also, I believe the Buddhists have some experience with this. Which would make meme-bombs kinda like weaponized koans... ?
Also: this seems suspiciously like saying, "I've found the best model of the human mind, what can I do to convince people that it's correct?"
QuoteOpensource discussion on O:MF and what comes after.
It's not like that at all.
Quote from: GA on September 19, 2008, 02:03:06 AM
The only thing that comes to mind is asking somebody who they are, and rejecting all descriptions of themselves as just a descriptor. (No, that's your name, who are you?) Start by asking yourself this, of course. You look (and feel) really stupid if after a little bit of this the other person asks who you are and you don't have better answers than the ones they gave. Not to mention the whole splinter vs. beam in the eye thing.
How
do you answer that, by the way? I never could figure out how to answer that question properly. Probably doing it wrong.
Quote from: Valerie on September 19, 2008, 04:12:03 AM
Quote from: GA on September 19, 2008, 02:03:06 AM
The only thing that comes to mind is asking somebody who they are, and rejecting all descriptions of themselves as just a descriptor. (No, that's your name, who are you?) Start by asking yourself this, of course. You look (and feel) really stupid if after a little bit of this the other person asks who you are and you don't have better answers than the ones they gave. Not to mention the whole splinter vs. beam in the eye thing.
How do you answer that, by the way? I never could figure out how to answer that question properly. Probably doing it wrong.
Beats me. That's why I've only ever done it to anybody once.
Right now, I'm leaning towards "a motley crew of desires, impulses, and experiences with a unique cognitive style."
Phil Hine on Invocation:
QuoteOne of my colleagues had to sit a computer exam, and was wracking his brains trying to think of an appropriate god-form to invoke upon himself to concentrate his mind on programming. Mercury? Hermes? And then he hit on it - the most powerful mythic figure that he knew could deal with computers was Mr. Spock! So he proceeded to invoke Mr. Spock, by learning all he could about Spock and going round saying I never will understand humans. until he was thoroughly Spock-ified. And he got an A., so there!
The thing with rolling a die to make every decision is that it doesn't really completely rid you of responsibility, you still decide what each roll represents, and how you are going to follow the die's instructions. Further, there is a limit to the options a die can give you (6 for a normal person, 20 for a D&D player).
However, the mindfuck concept is rather broad idea, it may be better just to build on it.
Also, I like what you said, GA, about memebombs being weaponised koans, I/we/they should use that sometime.
You give yourself the options, yes, but after you do something because of it you say "The die made me do it". Unless they tell you that you can't say that.
I don't like being told what to do by anyone, or anything.
Building on the OMF idea, ok that's fine. If thats what comes out of this so be it.
My idea really stems from the fact that we seemingly aren't doing anything particularly new anymore, just slightly tweaking old ideas. Again, that's fine, but I personally feel it's better to brainstorm about where we might be headed next, and where everyone else might be headed next.
Preparing for eventualities and all that.
I am currently re-reading Luke's book. My first read was a good year ago and while having his ideas soak in I already started playing around with the dice. Little did I know back then that it was already an expansion of my selfexperiments to let out supressed impulses and free myself of habits and the boring self that was solidifying within me. Recently I started rereading the book - a whim of the die actually - and there are quite a couple good points in there...
The destruction of the personality, to become egoless, to be the the "Random Man" and live with consistent inconsistency - this is what he is after. I particular like the passage where Luke writes about the multi-lie society which conflicts directly with the tradition idea of a one-lie personality. Humanity, he argues, suffers from the illusion that only a few selected selfs are allowed to be lived out and thus a lot of minor selfs are repressed. Were we to live out all of our impulses we'd need a just "system" or higher power to decide when to act upon which. A conscious decision would always be subject to the impulses that currently the strongest.
I should try to find the quote from his speech at the PANY meeting; my English is insufficient to properly explain this.
Personally speaking... I wonder; am I outside the cell or just in another box where I finally get to be DM? Am I just redecorating my prison, bursting bubbles within bubbles in an infinite effort to get somewhere that doesn't exist? The more I get to consciously explore my erratic, chaotic multiverse of a personality, the more I feel liberated but also isolated from the rest. And I don't get the feeling like I am waking anyone up, non-thinking people usually just put the blanket a bit tighter while turning around.
Do I have to yell louder? How loud may I yell before security comes around the corner to pummel me down?
I am full of questions, and have few answers. So I keep on gathering misinformation, processing it and then shitting out some wall of text here and there.
Shaking up other people by rattling at their cage, forcing them to change position is a start. But these slight nudges don't really wake people up from the coma they are in. This is not sleep anymore! The situation I have been observing in Germany and Sweden during the last years is disgusting.
To cut this short: I see the internet becoming a powerful tool to spread information fast and wide. What if we can create a piece of misinformation that is an effective mindfuck, but also plausible enough to actually spread around through office emails, digg, youtube, fakebook, the chans, fauxnews even? Maybe a delayed mindfuck, something to build on with successive pieces which culminate in one giant orgy of mental rape...
Quote from: planeswalker on September 21, 2008, 01:10:49 AM
To cut this short: I see the internet becoming a powerful tool to spread information fast and wide. What if we can create a piece of misinformation that is an effective mindfuck, but also plausible enough to actually spread around through office emails, digg, youtube, fakebook, the chans, fauxnews even? Maybe a delayed mindfuck, something to build on with successive pieces which culminate in one giant orgy of mental rape...
I think you may have something there. The internet is a
very effective tool for spreading information. Take, for example, the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyers. I would never have picked up those books if it hadn't been for flair on facebook. I saw so many of them, and heard about the books from a couple of friends, that I felt compelled to read them so that I could keep up with popular literary culture. Obviously, if we could do a mindfuck of that magnitude, it wouldn't work out that way, but the example illustrates the magnitude of the power of the internet, or even just the potential of the internet to influence people. I'm sure I'm preaching to the choir on this one, though...
Anyway, I think Cram would probably be the best one to talk to about that.
Well that's exactly what OMGASM is about... It's about making O:MF viral. It's also been successful so far and is still growing.
I think Payne is right, we need new ideas, but I'm a bit skeptical about whether this kind of thread will really yield them... It may at least get us thinking, which is important, but the ideas themselves will probably come out of other discussions (like the GASM idea started in a hate thread about the FSM spags...)
Quote from: VERB` on September 21, 2008, 05:27:15 AM
Well that's exactly what OMGASM is about... It's about making O:MF viral. It's also been successful so far and is still growing.
I think Payne is right, we need new ideas, but I'm a bit skeptical about whether this kind of thread will really yield them... It may at least get us thinking, which is important, but the ideas themselves will probably come out of other discussions (like the GASM idea started in a hate thread about the FSM spags...)
Yeah, well, I don't hold much hope for this thread either to be honest.
I'll keep thinking about it on my own.
It might be worth thinking about efficiency...
Do we really get something worthwhile for our time and energy spent?
There seems to be a big part of people out there who just won't respond to classic mindfuckery any longer. The moment of confusion is too short and there is no lasting change occurring in the targets. The coma continues and we end up with nothing but giggles and that warm fuzzy feeling of "at least we tried". There's nothing particular wrong with that of course, but we might want to rid ourselves of the illusion that the current course of action is actually changing anything.
These robots need to get a bigger dose of their own illusionmechanisms... They are comfortable living in a society with multiple conflicting lies, adding one more here and there will not shake them up enough since they can just adjust easily and forget about it again later.
In order to overwhelm a person that is used to deal with a complex system of conflicting illusions we need something with more punch to it. The details are still out of reach for my young discordian mind but I imagine a mindfuck so powerful that it will rock the very foundation of average joe's personality: something that can't just be unseen, unheard and most of all - unthought.
A global project with several groups preparing the right materials, other groups that are specialising in getting these materials up on the tubes and on tv, in papers - into the heads of joe and mary everyman. Misinformation to get mainstream journalism cover it during primetime, mislead the whole fucking bunch until the actual bomb goes off after a month of wild goosechasing. Play on their fear, their horniness. I don't know; maybe it's impossible to do...
thoughts?
I think going large scale has it's benefits, but as you say, we need to be sure that the result is actually worth the effort.
Just because it's bigger doesn't necessarily mean it's better. It's doesn't mean it's worse either, of course.
But really, I think efficiency is a good route to go down, even though that is more about refinement than it is about getting around the defenses that are building all the time to what we do.
We have to remember that the media, large corporations and even governments are starting to do things like what we are doing now. Thinking in memetics, communicating in cut-ups. They do it for different reasons and results than what we are doing,but people are becoming more and more immune to it through exposure.
Haven't got time for a long ass reply.
Here are some ideas from other people you may want to incorporate into the discussion however.
Skilluminati:
We live on a planet with 6 billion humans, and most of them are uninformed and ignorant. Here in the United States, despite high standards of living and abundant material wealth, the situation is no different.
[...]
Don't mistake this for crowing about how dumb people are. This is a serious and intractable problem. The vast majority of voters in the United States are dangerously ignorant and easily manipulated.
Here's the moral quandary: is it ethical to use deception in order to control these people? If you don't do it, guess who will? Karl Rove. Rick "not about the issues" Davis. The same paid operatives who have been running the real power structure of the United States since John Rockefeller and Edward Bernays were alive.
Here's the logistical problem: how can you and I compete against multi-million dollar budgets? The business of spectacles, like any other, is a business that runs on money. Those who have money shape the spectacle, and the rest of us are consigned to...well, meaningless critiques on obscure websites.
[...]
As I said at the outset of this project, "my interest in 5GW (5th Generation Warfare) is rooted in it's potential for positive social and cultural change." I am investigating warfare for the same reasons I investigated psychology and marketing -- beacuse the tools of social control will be less damaging when they're widely distributed. Executives who have power over millions of other humans are inherently dangerous -- millions of humans with executive control over themselves is where we're headed this century.
The dinosaurs of governments and corporations and media conglomerates and think tanks and universities -- the old legitimate White Control System -- will not let go quietly and politely. So I think every future mutunt has a common-sense obligation to learn how to disable and disarm them as effectively as possible.
Matt Mason, The Pirate's Dilemma:
Disruptive new D.I.Y. technologies are causing unprecedented creative destruction. The history of punk offers us valuable insights into how this new world works. Punk was an angry outburst, a reaction to mass culture, but it offered new ideas about how mass culture could be replaced with a more personalized, less centralized worldview.
Punk has survived in many incarnations musically—it became new wave, influenced hip-hop, and conceived grunge and the notion of indie bands. But more important, its independent spirit also spurred a do-it-yourself revolution. D.I.Y. encourages us to reject authority and hierarchy, advocating that we can and should produce as much as we consume.
[...]
Punk had high ideals—it looked aggressive and scary, but through its angry critique of society and subversion of it, it sought to change the world for the better. Punk capitalists are using the same techniques, subverting a world full of empty corporate gestures, manufacturing businesses and products with meanings that attempt to inject substance back into style. Punk injected altruism into entrepreneurship, a motivator of people long overlooked by neoclassical economics. Not only that, punk made the idea of putting purpose before profit seem cool to an entire generation. It manufactured new meaning in an area where it was really needed.
[...]
Hip-hop has forged such a strong connection with so many, it can create change like no music scene before it. "I don't think there is any place it doesn't exist," says Daymond John of the movement he grew up with. "Hip-hop artists are addressing the U.N. It could actually overthrow governments. This is the communication of the poor. Music is one of the most powerful ways people communicate with each other. There is no limit to this." Hip-hop has proved to be a great way to generate money, but it's now in a position to generate some serious social change, too.
Chang also cites studies such as the UCLA freshman survey that points out that "the hip-hop generation's rate of participation in voluntarism, in political protest and in activism on a wide range of issues is much higher than that of the baby boomer generation during their youth.. . . The myth of an apathetic generation—one even upheld by some of our youngest public intellectuals—is one of the most baseless and insidious lies of our era."
[...]
Today's flash mobs are the digital Situationists, increasing the peace, subverting the norm, and making us laugh. Each one is different and unique; the only thing they have in common is their transience. But flash mobs are just one new phenomenon; many things are becoming just as temporary. Nanocultures rise and fall in months. Goods are ever more disposable. Owning something is becoming less important than the right to access it. Gibson was right: things that used to be meaningful no longer carry the same weight. Youth cultures and fads have become marketing tools, but deeper underground, something else is happening.
Instead of the subversive words of youth cultures such as punk and hip-hop, the actions of a new breed of nanomovements and subversive systems are sweating the smaller stuff, tearing old models to shreds, and finding new ways to construct meaning and movements. The nanos still add up to something. It seems depth is a thing of the past, but again, this is just how it looks on the surface.
Welcome to youth culture's great disappearing act.
The Art of Memetics:
In contemporary society examining survival pressures means looking at the socioeconomic system within which people are embedded. Memes that make their host unemployable have smaller potential populations, and contravening the social mores and norms endangers the host's survivability and reduces the meme's communicational effectiveness. It is detrimental to memetic survival to promote behavior that destroys the host's ability to maneuver in a social space.
However, there is no reason to assume memetics requires language to operate. All identity construction, in addition to being a kind of bricolage, is also existent only within a social context. You do not have an identity without some kind of community formation against which to project that identity. This community space is also a theater in which performance and stress builds connections....The propaganda of the deed is most commonly pictured as terrorism, but can mean any dramatic or awe-inspiring action designed as communication. In the past the actions only affected those who were physically present. If those not present were effected it was via a retelling or textualizing. Today's media environment in which events and actions are filmed, associated with various emotional markers through juxtaposition and shown directly to many people repeatedly has widened the impact of these types of communication. It is against this backdrop of our current communication structure that terrorism has gained its modern power and prevalence, as it is one thing to be told that hundreds of people have died in an event, but it is quite another thing entirely to be shown the event in all its drama, movement, and color.
You don't convince someone by pushing what you believe against what they believe. It is when their belief system is questioning itself that you can lean in and offer what you want them to do or believe as the answer to the instability. Point out contradictions inherent in their belief system and they themselves may throw it out of balance. Get them to question one end of their beliefs using another end and then offer your meme as the solution to the feelings of doubt.
Adorno and Horkheimer, The Culture Industry
Those who are so absorbed by the world of the movie—by its images, gestures, and words—that they are unable to supply what really makes it a world, do not have to dwell on particular points of its mechanics during a screening. All the other films and products of the entertainment industry which they have seen have taught them what to expect; they react automatically. The might of industrial society is lodged in men's minds. The entertainment manufacturers know that their products will be consumed with alertness even when the customer is distraught, for each of them is a model of the huge economic machinery which has always sustained the masses, whether at work or at leisure—which is akin to work. From every sound film and every broadcast program the social effect can be inferred which is exclusive to none but is shared by all alike. The culture industry as a whole has molded men as a type unfailingly reproduced in every product. All the agents of this process, from the producer to the women's clubs, take good care that the simple reproduction of this
mental state is not nuanced or extended in any way.
Jay Abraham, Techniques of Stealth Marketing
Education is a powerful marketing technique. Educate your prospective buyers about everything (including a few of the bad or less positive aspects of your product or service) and you'll sell to almost twice as much people as you do now.
The Psychology of Entertainment, Wyer and Adaval
The images created by the entertainment media, whether encountered in a darkened movie theatre or in sitcoms, soaps, news reports, and advertising, do appear to blur the lines between reality and what we perceive it to be. These images can have a persisting influence on people's attitudes, beliefs, and behavior in ways that we have only recently begun to uncover. O'Guinn and Shrum (1997) paint
a compelling picture of the consequences of excessive television viewing. They find that heavy viewers of television are more likely than infrequent viewers to overestimate the frequency with which individuals drive luxury cars, have swimming pools in their backyards, or manifest other characteristics of an affluent lifestyle (see Shrum, Burroughs, & Rindfleish, this volume).
These effects occur in part because people are typically unmotivated or unable to identify the sources of information they have acquired (Hasher, Goldstein, & Toppin, 1977; Jacoby, Kelley, Brown, & Jasechko, 1989; Johnson, Hashtroudi, & Lindsay, 1993). Thus, they fail to distinguish between their memories for actual events they have read about or personally experienced and their memories of fictional events they have seen on television. Consequently, they often retrieve and use these latter events to estimate the likelihood that the events occur in daily life. In many instances, people are unaware of the biasing influence of the media on their estimates. But even when they are conscious of bias, they do not know how much they should adjust to compensate for it (Petty &Wegener, 1993). Consequently, they can often fail to adjust enough or, at other times, can adjust too much.
Bob Altermeyer, The Authoritarians
I have discovered in my investigations that, by and large, high Right Wing Authoritarian students had simply missed many of the experiences that might have lowered their authoritarianism. Take that first item on page 59 about fathers being the head of the family. Authoritarian followers often said they didn't know any other kind of families. And they hadn't known any unpatriotic people, nor had they broken many rules. They simply had not met many different kinds of people or done their share of wild and crazy things. Instead they had grown up in an enclosed, rather homogeneous environment--with their friends, their schools, their readings, their amusements all
controlled to keep them out of harm's way and Satan's evil clutches. They had contentedly traveled around on short leashes in relatively small, tight, safe circles all their lives.
Interestingly enough, authoritarian followers show a remarkable capacity for change IF they have some of the important experiences. For example, they are far less likely to have known a homosexual (or realized an acquaintance was homosexual) than most people. But if you look at the high RWAs who do know someone gay or lesbian, they are much less hostile toward homosexuals in general than most
authoritarians are. Getting to know a homosexual usually makes one more accepting of homosexuals as a group. Personal experiences can make a lot of difference, which is a truly hopeful discovery. The problem is, most right-wing authoritarians won't willingly exit their small world and try to meet a gay. They're too afraid. And "coming out" to a high RWA acquaintance might have long-term beneficial effects
on him, but it would likely carry some risks for the outgoing person.
A New Spin on Groups: The Science of Chaos
Butz explains that, during stable periods in their lives, individuals are able to achieve a fixed, yet transitory, sense of self. However, these periods remain stable only until the psyche encounters novel material, which it is unable to integrate within its current mental configuration. When the mental apparatus is disrupted, chaos ensues, followed by a period where the organism reorganizes at a higher level of complexity. This process seems compatible with that inferred in Freeman's brain research mentioned earlier. As the organism develops higher and higher levels of complexity and adaptation, it alternates between periods of stability and chaos. However, as Butz notes, the chaotic periods are far less frequent than are the stable ones.
[...]
According to Butz, psychic chaos and subsequent self-organization signal a creative gestation period wherein the psyche reorganizes itself to accommodate or integrate novel material. Both Butz and Jung discuss the link between chaos and creativity, recognizing what so many others have—that psychic turbulence is a necessary condition prior to new insight or creation of a new psychic structure. As an artist might struggle with containing chaos to create, so too must an individual in the throes of psychic upheaval manage chaos while undergoing a transformation.
During chaotic periods, the unconscious issues forth symbolic images or mandalas. These mandalas, containing symbols of the self, are expressed in a mathematical structure. They appear to be compensatory. Mandalas both express and create order in opposition to ongoing psyche chaos. Butz concludes that "these symbolic representations of the transitory self may also act as a container to focus chaotic experience toward an organized state. As a consequence, the mandala (Fig. 4.2) or the symbol seems to function as an attractor that brings about order. "What is fascinating about these mandalas are the incredible similarities they have to the fractal images so prevalent in the geometry of chaos.
Culture Jamming
Meanwhile, the question remains: How to box with shadows? In other words, what shape does an engaged politics assume in an empire of signs?
The answer lies, perhaps, in the "semiological guerrilla warfare" imagined by Umberto Eco. "[T]he receiver of the message seems to have a residual freedom: the freedom to read it in a different way...I am proposing an action to urge the audience to control the message and its multiple possibilities of interpretation," he writes. "One medium can be employed to communicate a series of opinions on another medium...The universe of Technological Communication would then be patrolled by groups of communications guerrillas, who would restore a critical dimension to passive reception."
The Power of Persuasion, Robert Levine
Psychological disarmament is what often sets the stage for persuasion. One of life's crueler ironies is that we're most vulnerable at those
very moments when we feel in least danger. Unfortunately, the illusion of invulnerability pretty well defines our resting state. Even when there is no manipulative outsider pulling our strings, most of us have a tendency to view our futures with unrealistic optimism. Studies have
shown that people generally approach the threats of life with the philosophy that bad things are more likely to happen to other people than
to themselves. With uncanny faulty logic, most people will tell you they're less prone to become victims than everyone around them.
[...]
Research shows that if you subject people to weak versions of a persuasive message, they're less vulnerable to stronger versions later on,
in much the same way that being exposed to small doses of a virus immunizes you against full-blown attacks. In a classic study by William McGuire, people were asked to state their opinion on an issue. They were then mildly attacked for their position and given an opportunity to refute the attack. When later confronted by a powerful argument against their initial opinion, these subjects were more resistant than were a control group. In effect, they developed defenses that rendered them immune.
sweet jesus, there's a lot of good shit there.
I'm immediately thinking that Rogers call to jack the media is not having enough effort put into it.
I'm thinking that we may need to reconsider doing some things for one result only. (such as the lulz, as noble a cause as that is).
I need to consider this a bit more, maybe I'll have something in a week or two.
I want people to remind me to revisit this, if they can, please?
Some questions to consider when this gets revisited.
Mindfucking as freeing mini-egos from the chains of the monolithic self.- Can this be operationalized?
- Is there relevant psychological or sociological research?
- How does one know a mini-ego has been freed?
- What skills does a person need in order to free mini-egos?
- When does a person know it's time to begin/end?
- What costs and gains is the mindfucker/mindfuckee likely to face from free mini-egos?
- personally
- in their larger social circle
- in society at large
- in their pants
- What role does the mindfuckee's volition play in the larger self freeing smaller selves?
- Hypnotists are fond of saying that all hypnosis is self hypnosis, is all mindfucking self-mindfucking?
- How does this inform the role of the mindfucker?
- Do the mini-egos have discrete volitions?
- Is a larger volition emergent out of this collection of smaller ones?
- Who appeals to who during a mindfuck?
Replacing the mindfuck concept rather than evolving it.- What specifically was the mindfuck concept to be replaced?
- How did it function?
- Why does it need to be replaced?
- How do we know we have replaced it rather than evolved it?
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 21, 2008, 08:51:22 PM
sweet jesus, there's a lot of good shit there.
I'm immediately thinking that Rogers call to jack the media is not having enough effort put into it.
I'm thinking that we may need to reconsider doing some things for one result only. (such as the lulz, as noble a cause as that is).
I need to consider this a bit more, maybe I'll have something in a week or two.
I want people to remind me to revisit this, if they can, please?
Link to that discussion pls?
http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=17624.0
I started thinking about it, but I'm thinking either too small, too indirect, or both.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 21, 2008, 09:00:51 PM
Some questions to consider when this gets revisited.
Mindfucking as freeing mini-egos from the chains of the monolithic self.
- Can this be operationalized?
- Is there relevant psychological or sociological research?
- How does one know a mini-ego has been freed?
- What skills does a person need in order to free mini-egos?
- When does a person know it's time to begin/end?
- What costs and gains is the mindfucker/mindfuckee likely to face from free mini-egos?
- personally
- in their larger social circle
- in society at large
- in their pants
- What role does the mindfuckee's volition play in the larger self freeing smaller selves?
- Hypnotists are fond of saying that all hypnosis is self hypnosis, is all mindfucking self-mindfucking?
- How does this inform the role of the mindfucker?
- Do the mini-egos have discrete volitions?
- Is a larger volition emergent out of this collection of smaller ones?
- Who appeals to who during a mindfuck?
Replacing the mindfuck concept rather than evolving it.
- What specifically was the mindfuck concept to be replaced?
- How did it function?
- Why does it need to be replaced?
- How do we know we have replaced it rather than evolved it?
I don't know, I think my original ideas and thoughts in this thread are flawed to begin with.
I need to think on it and perhaps rework it from the ground up.
Some of these questions may still be relevant afterwards, many will not.
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 21, 2008, 09:08:17 PM
I don't know, I think my original ideas and thoughts in this thread are flawed to begin with.
I need to think on it and perhaps rework it from the ground up.
Some of these questions may still be relevant afterwards, many will not.
Well, it's not brainstorming if you're not dealing with a large amount of flawed and irrelevant ideas.
You almost always have to sort through them to get to the really good ones, IMO.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 21, 2008, 09:24:18 PM
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 21, 2008, 09:08:17 PM
I don't know, I think my original ideas and thoughts in this thread are flawed to begin with.
I need to think on it and perhaps rework it from the ground up.
Some of these questions may still be relevant afterwards, many will not.
Well, it's not brainstorming if you're not dealing with a large amount of flawed and irrelevant ideas.
You almost always have to sort through them to get to the really good ones, IMO.
Indeed.
I'm writing a bigger piece now, which hopefully will be torn to shreds.
If I'm going to start with flawed ideas, I might as well start with grandiose ones, they're more likely to still have some meat on them when we're done.
Quote
GIN I was God, sittin' up there abeen,
(IF I were God, sitting up there above,)
Weariet nae doot noo a' my darg was deen,
(Wearied no doubt, now all my work was done,)
Deaved wi' the harps an' hymns oonendin' ringin',
(Deafened by the harps and hymns unending ringing,)
Tired o' the flockin' angels hairse wi' singin',
(Tired of the flocking angels hoarse with singing,)
To some clood-edge I'd daunder furth an', feth,
(To some cloud edge I'd saunter forth and, faith,)
Look ower an' watch hoo things were gyaun aneth.
(Look over and watch how things were going beneath.)
Syne, gin I saw hoo men I'd made mysel'
(Then if I saw how men, I'd made myself)
Had startit in to pooshan, sheet an' fell,
(Had started out to poison, shoot and fell,)
To reive an' rape, an' fairly mak' a hell
(To steal and rape and fairly make a hell)
O' my braw birlin' Earth,--a hale week's wark--
(Of my fine spinning Earth -- a whole week's work --)
I'd cast my coat again, rowe up my sark,
(I'd drop my coat again, roll up my shirt,)
An' or they'd time to lench a second ark,
(And, ere they'd time to launch a second ark,)
Tak' back my word an' sen' anither spate,
(Take back my word and send another flood,)
Droon oot the hale hypothec, dicht the sklate,
(Drown out the whole shebang, wipe the slate,)
Own my mistak', an, aince I cleared the brod,
(Admit my mistake, and once I'd cleared the board,)
Start a'thing ower again, gin I was God.
(Start everything over again, if I were God.)
Operation: MindFuck. What a great idea, seriously. It's a game we play, a weapon, a comedy and a tragedy. It allows us to express our creativity, and also exposes out lack of it.
It exposes a lot of small things, flaws (as we see them) in others and in ourselves. For a Discordian, O:MF is almost a commandment, we are supposed to go out and fuck with peoples minds, firstly our own. How we are meant to actually do this is never made particularly clear, but we have (almost) all developed our own particular ways of working.
If our methods are ambiguous, our goals, our "reasons" are more so. Such is the nature of discord, I suppose.
We bring almost as many personal viewpoints and prejudices to the table here. The tension this can create has been noted many times and exploited a few times (nothing like a bit of tension to get the creative juices flowing, right?). But ignoring the tension for a moment, multiple viewpoints mean we have a broader field of fire. We can attack one person, idea or concept from many different angles at the same time. In almost any circumstance, we "have you surrounded, come out with your hands up!"
Why aren't we taking more advantage of this? As I look around here, I see quite a number of projects going on. Good ones, and almost all of them are Crams or are being kept going by him.
It's good that we have someone like Cramulus who can manage a project, push it through,get people motivated to take part. Cram is a good guy, and has all the qualities of a good leader, but we need more people to take up the reigns, to push through these projects, to create more of their own.
We need more varied ideas and people who are willing to step up to the plate and have their ideas heard and implemented.
Roger recently called for us to start fucking with the media. I agreed then, and I still do, but I'm begining to think that what we have discussed so far for this "plan" is too small time, is not pushing our limits. We DO need to jack the media, but I think we need to do it directly, or at least more directly than I have been thinking about.
We need people on the inside. OK, so we're not going to get a news anchor, or even the guy that does his teleprompter, but we need to start speaking with people who ARE involved with the mass media, with students who shortly will be. We need to raise our sights a little and focus our attention on places and people who, if we can affect change there, will have a larger and broader effect. We almost had this with the Adam Weishaupt Society (another of Crams projects), we need to revisit that idea and REALLY put some effort into it.
For the media, we can read all sorts of other things. Popular Culture, large institutions, maybe (a real long shot here) the underbelly of Government.
This is what we should be doing if we are focusing on effecting change with O:MF outside our own minds.
Within our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
When we step up to the plate and announce our ideas, I believe we need to be more willing to adopt a different role in seeing them implemented (we could possibly find ourselves auto-mindfucked into taking a leadership role, so that Cram can get on with the projects he enjoys taking forward more). We need to see more people willing and able to take on any role, be it leader, artist, writer, ranter, thinker, debator and a myriad of others.
In the badlands, we are all capable of being anything we want. It is by actually pushing our limits that we'll see what we can actually do and what we as a group are capable of achieving, both for ourselves and for advancing our own and each others causes.
It is in this way that I feel the mini-egos and One Self idea I began with in this thread can be resolved. It is by truly pushing ourselves and over reaching that we will discover more about hidden aspects of our personality, about what we can use to achieve more with less effort, and what we can then turn our attention to "fixing" or "improving".
More ideas as and when they come, I just had to shit this out.
Addressing Payne first. Then others.
I like that song thing-jig at the beginning of your post. Interesting. Where'd it come from?
I agree with all that you said about Cram. A lot of times, it seems like he's the only one seriously mindfucking. I certainly see him at the center of the concept. And that's good in that he's a great leader and horrendously creative, but there definitely should be more people there with him in the center. It makes me think again about his rant awhile back about us being trolled. It seems like he has such visions for what we could do, as a group, and we let him down a lot. So, I definitely agree that more people should help him. He shouldn't be our Atlas.
Overall, I really liked your post. I'm not sure if you meant it this way, but I saw it as a galvanizing call to action.
Quote from: Cain on September 21, 2008, 07:23:16 PMYou don't convince someone by pushing what you believe against what they believe. It is when their belief system is questioning itself that you can lean in and offer what you want them to do or believe as the answer to the instability. Point out contradictions inherent in their belief system and they themselves may throw it out of balance. Get them to question one end of their beliefs using another end and then offer your meme as the solution to the feelings of doubt.
This. This seems like what we should be doing, at least in terms of affecting other individuals. Make acquantices with lots of people and wait until they have a questioning period before introducing our memes. It would take much longer to do, but maybe it would be more effective? 'course, if y'all are already doing that, just ignore me...
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 21, 2008, 09:00:51 PM- Hypnotists are fond of saying that all hypnosis is self hypnosis, is all mindfucking self-mindfucking?
This relates to the above quote, I think. We can mindfuck all we want (by posterGASMing, etc), but if an individual is not receptive to the memes at that point in time, it will have little affect on them.
Quote from: Cain on September 21, 2008, 07:23:16 PMResearch shows that if you subject people to weak versions of a persuasive message, they're less vulnerable to stronger versions later on...
I'm seeing this as posterGASMing is ineffective and actually detrimental to our work if our aim is to "wake people up." I'm probably wrong, and if you posterGASM just for lulz than it doens't really matter anyway, but that's the first thing I got from this.
Quote from: Valerie on September 22, 2008, 01:54:05 AM
Addressing Payne first. Then others.
I like that song thing-jig at the beginning of your post. Interesting. Where'd it come from?
I agree with all that you said about Cram. A lot of times, it seems like he's the only one seriously mindfucking. I certainly see him at the center of the concept. And that's good in that he's a great leader and horrendously creative, but there definitely should be more people there with him in the center. It makes me think again about his rant awhile back about us being trolled. It seems like he has such visions for what we could do, as a group, and we let him down a lot. So, I definitely agree that more people should help him. He shouldn't be our Atlas.
Overall, I really liked your post. I'm not sure if you meant it this way, but I saw it as a galvanizing call to action.
First, the poem was one my http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Murray_(poet) a poet from very near where I live.
I'm not saying that Cram is the only guy fighting the good fight, I'm saying more that he's leading from the front in a way that all of us are (probably) capable of, but aren't doing.
It is, in many way a call for action, but more for thought. I want people to shred down the ideas in it and debate them. And the same for other things I'm planning to write.
Quote from: Valerie on September 22, 2008, 01:54:05 AM
QuoteYou don't convince someone by pushing what you believe against what they believe. It is when their belief system is questioning itself that you can lean in and offer what you want them to do or believe as the answer to the instability. Point out contradictions inherent in their belief system and they themselves may throw it out of balance. Get them to question one end of their beliefs using another end and then offer your meme as the solution to the feelings of doubt.
This. This seems like what we should be doing, at least in terms of affecting other individuals. Make acquantices with lots of people and wait until they have a questioning period before introducing our memes. It would take much longer to do, but maybe it would be more effective? 'course, if y'all are already doing that, just ignore me...
See, this is what I mean.
It takes a lot of effort to go for a lot of people for a long time.
Maybe, ultimately, what we need to do is refine the Mindfuck so that it doesn't take either too much time or need to be individually targeted. Then we can focus on doing a lot of different things, for the same amount of energy and concentration.
Quote from: Valerie on September 22, 2008, 01:54:05 AM
Quote from: Netaungrot- Hypnotists are fond of saying that all hypnosis is self hypnosis, is all mindfucking self-mindfucking?
This relates to the above quote, I think. We can mindfuck all we want (by posterGASMing, etc), but if an individual is not receptive to the memes at that point in time, it will have little affect on them.
QuoteResearch shows that if you subject people to weak versions of a persuasive message, they're less vulnerable to stronger versions later on...
I'm seeing this as posterGASMing is ineffective and actually detrimental to our work if our aim is to "wake people up." I'm probably wrong, and if you posterGASM just for lulz than it doens't really matter anyway, but that's the first thing I got from this.
For this, I would refer to Crams "Why I put up Posters". It doesn't really matter if they are effective on others, it's more of a personal thing.
Most of my questions still apply, especially surrounding this theory of mini-egos (which is compelling though I think it's inaccurate).
QuoteIf our methods are ambiguous, our goals, our "reasons" are more so. Such is the nature of discord, I suppose.
Mine aren't. Mostly.
QuoteWe bring almost as many personal viewpoints and prejudices to the table here. The tension this can create has been noted many times and exploited a few times (nothing like a bit of tension to get the creative juices flowing, right?). But ignoring the tension for a moment, multiple viewpoints mean we have a broader field of fire. We can attack one person, idea or concept from many different angles at the same time. In almost any circumstance, we "have you surrounded, come out with your hands up!"
Why aren't we taking more advantage of this? As I look around here, I see quite a number of projects going on. Good ones, and almost all of them are Crams or are being kept going by him.
I'll tell you what holds me back. There's little to no criteria for failure or success for most projects. The ones with better defined criteria have gone much farther—look at Colbertgasm and Postergasm. Colbertgasm succeeded because there was a testability to it and specific real world action to take, however providing plenty of room for creativity. The same is true with Postergasm. You succeed if you put up posters and take a few pictures of it. You succeed if you make posters that someone else puts up. You succeed big time if you hear about a poster making an impact on someone. But it's also possible and very likely IMO, that most of your successes will never be known, that you really made someone's day or royally pissed someone off but they had no way to contact you.
Valerie suggests that the arguments made in Postergasm materials are weak, but I disagree. I doubt she's very familiar with the project... Which ones are weak?
QuoteIt's good that we have someone like Cramulus who can manage a project, push it through,get people motivated to take part. Cram is a good guy, and has all the qualities of a good leader, but we need more people to take up the reigns, to push through these projects, to create more of their own.
What do you attribute to his success?
QuoteWe need more varied ideas and people who are willing to step up to the plate and have their ideas heard and implemented.
How can YOU help make this happen? And how badly do you really want it to happen?
QuoteRoger recently called for us to start fucking with the media. I agreed then, and I still do, but I'm begining to think that what we have discussed so far for this "plan" is too small time, is not pushing our limits. We DO need to jack the media, but I think we need to do it directly, or at least more directly than I have been thinking about.
We need people on the inside. OK, so we're not going to get a news anchor, or even the guy that does his teleprompter, but we need to start speaking with people who ARE involved with the mass media, with students who shortly will be. We need to raise our sights a little and focus our attention on places and people who, if we can affect change there, will have a larger and broader effect. We almost had this with the Adam Weishaupt Society (another of Crams projects), we need to revisit that idea and REALLY put some effort into it.
I'm interested in how I can help to
collectively fuck with the media. I know there are a lot of other people who have a similar inclination, however the devil is in the details... I've come to expect that when I press discordians for the details of their plans that they probably won't have them and may even actively avoid fleshing things out with some half-baked rationalization about disorder. It's a flying by the seat of your pants gamble that usually doesn't even occur because people lose interest as soon as they realize how much effort is required to make it happen.
You're talking in glittering generalities. What kind of larger effects? What people and places? What will speaking with insiders and students do for you? I'm a student of the mass media, albeit a subsection, but that is the environment where I'm being taught to succeed at. It's quite possible that I'll be much further inside the belly of the beast in the next few years, but then what? I hope you don't think that I'd risk my entire design career for a prank. Well, maybe I would, but it would need a much better mission statement than, "Let's fuck with the media, LOL."
What got me about Roger's call to action was the potential for the "social fiction" meme. That's hella juicy.
QuoteFor the media, we can read all sorts of other things. Popular Culture, large institutions, maybe (a real long shot here) the underbelly of Government.
This is what we should be doing if we are focusing on effecting change with O:MF outside our own minds.
This is why nothing gets done. It sounds good on the surface, but really you're not saying anything in real world terms. Once you embellish these ideas with concrete, testable elements they'll grow legs.
QuoteWithin our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
Lead by example. A lot of people like you and respect you, myself included. If you started doing something like that you'd be assured to influence people.
Could you really go a week without WOMP though? Do you remember when Roger got all nice? People were terrified.
How would you know that enough people are playing more roles? What can one do to encourage it? When would it be contraindicated?
QuoteWhen we step up to the plate and announce our ideas, I believe we need to be more willing to adopt a different role in seeing them implemented (we could possibly find ourselves auto-mindfucked into taking a leadership role, so that Cram can get on with the projects he enjoys taking forward more). We need to see more people willing and able to take on any role, be it leader, artist, writer, ranter, thinker, debator and a myriad of others.
And again,
how to do this?
I've been considering writing a rant recently but there is little of my writing that doesn't implode from the force of my own analysis.
The leadership idea is good too. I'd like to see that happen as well, but I could see hostile competition between would-be leaders fucking everything up.
Perhaps what we need more of is taking initiative and collaboration not necessarily someone explicitly playing "leader."
QuoteIt is in this way that I feel the mini-egos and One Self idea I began with in this thread can be resolved. It is by truly pushing ourselves and over reaching that we will discover more about hidden aspects of our personality, about what we can use to achieve more with less effort, and what we can then turn our attention to "fixing" or "improving".
While this all is helpful, I'm not sure I agree with the theory of mini-egos versus the One Self. In lieu of an operationalized idea of "mini-egos..." I'm not sure the model is very useful either.
I think you're absolutely correct about pushing ourselves and overreaching though. RAH!
Quote from: Valerie on September 22, 2008, 01:54:05 AM
Quote from: Netaungrot- Hypnotists are fond of saying that all hypnosis is self hypnosis, is all mindfucking self-mindfucking?
This relates to the above quote, I think. We can mindfuck all we want (by posterGASMing, etc), but if an individual is not receptive to the memes at that point in time, it will have little affect on them.
Well, Postergasm is just one tentacle in my bag of tricks. Also, you're not accounting for the sleeper effect or priming, which arguably Postergasm could function through.
How do you define a mindfuck, Valerie? And would you mind editing your post to reflect where your quotes came from?
Good stuff Net, I'll get some replies to this tomorrow. If I can think of any,
As you say there are a lot of generalities and not much substance, but I'll try :)
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 22, 2008, 04:00:52 AM
Good stuff Net, I'll get some replies to this tomorrow. If I can think of any,
As you say there are a lot of generalities and not much substance, but I'll try :)
No, you have more substance than generalities IMO, it's just I'm overly sensitized to general language from studying hypnosis. Which is probably how you got that impression (besides being too hard on yourself).
I probably was too critical. Or not supportive enough, it's an inspiring post. Most of my questions are to build on what you have, and are pointed at my own brain as well.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteWithin our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
Lead by example. A lot of people like you and respect you, myself included. If you started doing something like that you'd be assured to influence people.
Could you really go a week without WOMP though? Do you remember when Roger got all nice? People were terrified.
How would you know that enough people are playing more roles? What can one do to encourage it? When would it be contraindicated?
I think I'll accept the implicit challenge in this though.
We'll see if it does actually have some merit, changing roles from WOMPer and fluff specialist (I figure this is what I am, mostly, looking from a fairly objective point of view) to a more serious poster.
I won't even open MSPaint for a week, and I'll try to stay out of the fluff threads. I'll try to rise above any drama, and write more intellectual pieces.
In this, I hope to explore a part of myself that
wants to do these things, and not be distracted by my usual entertainments. If I come through it with a different mind set, or more capable of performing this chosen role, then we can take it from there, if not then I will need to re-assess (again).
With some actual material and results to work with, we can actually get moving with this.
What do you think?
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 04:22:48 AM
Quote from: Dr. Payne on September 22, 2008, 04:00:52 AM
Good stuff Net, I'll get some replies to this tomorrow. If I can think of any,
As you say there are a lot of generalities and not much substance, but I'll try :)
No, you have more substance than generalities IMO, it's just I'm overly sensitized to general language from studying hypnosis. Which is probably how you got that impression (besides being too hard on yourself).
I probably was too critical. Or not supportive enough, it's an inspiring post. Most of my questions are to build on what you have, and are pointed at my own brain as well.
No, I like it. I WANT this to be sliced and diced, and you are certainly qualified to do so, as a poster on this board if for no other reason.
the trick is can you this with a bucket over your head and singing Polly wally want a cracker?
Actually forget the bucket, lets go for uh a squid... ideas IDEAS think of it.
Something should be painful but not too much, to squirt something far worse than mere ink and more OF it as well.
Quote from: YattoDobbs on September 22, 2008, 11:33:32 AM
the trick is can you this with a bucket over your head and singing Polly wally want a cracker?
Actually forget the bucket, lets go for uh a squid... ideas IDEAS think of it.
Something should be painful but not too much, to squirt something far worse than mere ink and more OF it as well.
:facepalm:
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
Most of my questions still apply, especially surrounding this theory of mini-egos (which is compelling though I think it's inaccurate).
QuoteIf our methods are ambiguous, our goals, our "reasons" are more so. Such is the nature of discord, I suppose.
Mine aren't. Mostly.
This is fair enough, perhaps I was painting with too broad a brush when I made that statement. I suppose I also have to be more aware that many of our personal gigs and gags are subject to KYFMS
However, I would probably say it is no bad thing to have diverse and "ambiguous" reasons and/or goals. It may not give us strength in depth, but it creates a wide pool of expertise and resource to call on.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteWe bring almost as many personal viewpoints and prejudices to the table here. The tension this can create has been noted many times and exploited a few times (nothing like a bit of tension to get the creative juices flowing, right?). But ignoring the tension for a moment, multiple viewpoints mean we have a broader field of fire. We can attack one person, idea or concept from many different angles at the same time. In almost any circumstance, we "have you surrounded, come out with your hands up!"
Why aren't we taking more advantage of this? As I look around here, I see quite a number of projects going on. Good ones, and almost all of them are Crams or are being kept going by him.
I'll tell you what holds me back. There's little to no criteria for failure or success for most projects. The ones with better defined criteria have gone much farther—look at Colbertgasm and Postergasm. Colbertgasm succeeded because there was a testability to it and specific real world action to take, however providing plenty of room for creativity. The same is true with Postergasm. You succeed if you put up posters and take a few pictures of it. You succeed if you make posters that someone else puts up. You succeed big time if you hear about a poster making an impact on someone. But it's also possible and very likely IMO, that most of your successes will never be known, that you really made someone's day or royally pissed someone off but they had no way to contact you.
Valerie suggests that the arguments made in Postergasm materials are weak, but I disagree. I doubt she's very familiar with the project... Which ones are weak?
Addressing firstly, the measurement of success in a project, I always feel that the best projects have some kind of goal included in the initial pitching of an idea. Not all of them have grand aims (like Colbertgasm), but I think the most effective ones are when we do aim high and go all out to achieve it. Even getting Colbert to throw out some of Discordias more recognised memes and jokes would have gotten a whole bunch of people excited who were in no way connected with this site. The benefit of this is yet to be really assessed, but as an achievement of our personal goals, it is priceless.
Postergasm, I always feel, is done more for personal reasons than for it's impact. I did learn some things with the spree I went on with Syn, Trip and Broken AI in Edinburgh last month, though.
It's good to have an actual back up piece of literature to hand to someone if they ask you what you're doing, complete with contact details. This was suggested more for people who seemed interested and excited in what we were doing, but holds just as much for people who are hostile to it. This should probably be addressed on (at least) some of the posters themselves.
I don't speak for Valerie, I'm not sure which ones she thinks are weak, or for why.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteIt's good that we have someone like Cramulus who can manage a project, push it through,get people motivated to take part. Cram is a good guy, and has all the qualities of a good leader, but we need more people to take up the reigns, to push through these projects, to create more of their own.
What do you attribute to his success?
Cram is charismatic, driven and well liked. People listen to his ideas because they work, and, building on past successes, he is able to galvanise a core of people into action on a specific short or long term goal.
Mostly he is successful because he actually puts himself into a position to be so.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteWe need more varied ideas and people who are willing to step up to the plate and have their ideas heard and implemented.
How can YOU help make this happen? And how badly do you really want it to happen?
I'm going to practice what I preach, and try and throw out some ideas. How badly do I want it to happen? Not sure, where this is a call to action, I believe it now hinges on my first experiment on changing my self-perceived role in PD from my usual WOMPing, fluff specialising caricature of myself into one (which I've always wanted to try, but never actually done for a sustained period of time) that writes interesting thought provoking articles and the like.
If it works, great. If it doesn't work, then I need to revise my hypothesis again.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteRoger recently called for us to start fucking with the media. I agreed then, and I still do, but I'm begining to think that what we have discussed so far for this "plan" is too small time, is not pushing our limits. We DO need to jack the media, but I think we need to do it directly, or at least more directly than I have been thinking about.
We need people on the inside. OK, so we're not going to get a news anchor, or even the guy that does his teleprompter, but we need to start speaking with people who ARE involved with the mass media, with students who shortly will be. We need to raise our sights a little and focus our attention on places and people who, if we can affect change there, will have a larger and broader effect. We almost had this with the Adam Weishaupt Society (another of Crams projects), we need to revisit that idea and REALLY put some effort into it.
I'm interested in how I can help to collectively fuck with the media. I know there are a lot of other people who have a similar inclination, however the devil is in the details... I've come to expect that when I press discordians for the details of their plans that they probably won't have them and may even actively avoid fleshing things out with some half-baked rationalization about disorder. It's a flying by the seat of your pants gamble that usually doesn't even occur because people lose interest as soon as they realize how much effort is required to make it happen.
You're talking in glittering generalities. What kind of larger effects? What people and places? What will speaking with insiders and students do for you? I'm a student of the mass media, albeit a subsection, but that is the environment where I'm being taught to succeed at. It's quite possible that I'll be much further inside the belly of the beast in the next few years, but then what? I hope you don't think that I'd risk my entire design career for a prank. Well, maybe I would, but it would need a much better mission statement than, "Let's fuck with the media, LOL."
What got me about Roger's call to action was the potential for the "social fiction" meme. That's hella juicy.
My problem with pushing my ideas forward with regard to jacking or fucking with the media is I'm so far removed from the actual scene and, I admit, unfamiliar with how much of the system works. General ideas, I'm good for in this case, actually pushing for specific details and assigning people to different tasks, I would need to collaborate with someone who DOES know the system. And that's what we need, to assign people tasks and hope that they do them.
I'm not suggesting that people risk their careers on a prank, I'm suggesting that having a sympathetic ear and voice in areas where we are trying to affect change is not a bad thing. If our target is the media, then it's not a bad idea to have someone on the inside who can tell us when something is not going to work (for example). Yes this is another generality, but this is just an idea I've thrown up to see if it has any merit, it's not a detailed call for action. Maybe we DON'T need people on the ground, maybe we can do everything from our computers.
And yes, Rogers social fiction idea is awesome. Just hitting message boards with it isn't going to have a great impact though.
I will try to think through a couple of ideas for it, and post them in the relevant thread today.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteFor the media, we can read all sorts of other things. Popular Culture, large institutions, maybe (a real long shot here) the underbelly of Government.
This is what we should be doing if we are focusing on effecting change with O:MF outside our own minds.
This is why nothing gets done. It sounds good on the surface, but really you're not saying anything in real world terms. Once you embellish these ideas with concrete, testable elements they'll grow legs.
Working on it.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteWithin our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
Lead by example. A lot of people like you and respect you, myself included. If you started doing something like that you'd be assured to influence people.
Could you really go a week without WOMP though? Do you remember when Roger got all nice? People were terrified.
How would you know that enough people are playing more roles? What can one do to encourage it? When would it be contraindicated?
Working on it.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteWhen we step up to the plate and announce our ideas, I believe we need to be more willing to adopt a different role in seeing them implemented (we could possibly find ourselves auto-mindfucked into taking a leadership role, so that Cram can get on with the projects he enjoys taking forward more). We need to see more people willing and able to take on any role, be it leader, artist, writer, ranter, thinker, debator and a myriad of others.
And again, how to do this?
I've been considering writing a rant recently but there is little of my writing that doesn't implode from the force of my own analysis.
The leadership idea is good too. I'd like to see that happen as well, but I could see hostile competition between would-be leaders fucking everything up.
Perhaps what we need more of is taking initiative and collaboration not necessarily someone explicitly playing "leader."
About your writing, fair enough. God knows I've started plenty of pieces of writing which I've scrubbed and never posted. By the same measure though, the WOMP perspective that I've been honing the last year or so, that "it doesn't matter if it LOOKS rough, someone will find merit in it, even if it's only you" is something I've applied more and more to other things.
It isn't really about the quality of writing, for me, it's about having my ideas heard. And the good thing I've found about this board in particular is that while most of the attention is paid to the ideas who show up in Mercs wearing suits, the ones who come in looking like a diseased tramp will ALSO have some attention shown to them.
I haven't yet been completely torn down for anything that I've written, but I have to of course admit that that could be because I have a certain reputation on here, and people don't want to hurt my feelings or some shit.
The leadership idea isn't to give everyone a sense of authority entitlement. If they've been doing their homework, they should already have that, and I don't see an outright war on the boards over it. I see it more as helping people here to develop skills that they already have, but never exercise. If it leads to some friction, so be it. (look to my quick analysis of why Cram is so successful for what I'm trying to promote in others, myself included. We are all capable of it, but few of us are actually trying to achieve it.)
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
QuoteIt is in this way that I feel the mini-egos and One Self idea I began with in this thread can be resolved. It is by truly pushing ourselves and over reaching that we will discover more about hidden aspects of our personality, about what we can use to achieve more with less effort, and what we can then turn our attention to "fixing" or "improving".
While this all is helpful, I'm not sure I agree with the theory of mini-egos versus the One Self. In lieu of an operationalized idea of "mini-egos..." I'm not sure the model is very useful either.
I think you're absolutely correct about pushing ourselves and overreaching though. RAH!
Maybe the model isn't useful, my experiment should help test it. My One Self, I see it as the WOMPing fluff artist. My "Mini-Ego" in this case, the one that never gets it's chance in the spotlight, is the more intellectual and serious side of me. I'm trying it on for size, to see if it changes my perspective, or improves my skills in any way.
Also, thanks for the second part. :)
As far as postergasm:
I've been putting an email address on mine. So far two whole people have emailed me. :D
Then again, I don't see GASMs as persuasive or evangelical at all. I just wanted to bring a little weirdness to my campus, and so far people seem to like it.
ETA: Thanks for the ideas about the mini-egos, by the way. So far I've identified Cerebral (intellectual and withdrawn,) Animal (impulsive, likes to do shit,) and Turtle (likes to idle.)
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
Valerie suggests that the arguments made in Postergasm materials are weak, but I disagree. I doubt she's very familiar with the project... Which ones are weak?
Ohh, no no. I wasn't trying to say that arguments made in posterGASM materials are weak. I was just saying the first thing that came to mind when I read that quote.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
Well, Postergasm is just one tentacle in my bag of tricks. Also, you're not accounting for the sleeper effect or priming, which arguably Postergasm could function through.
What is the sleeper effect and priming?
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
How do you define a mindfuck, Valerie?
I'm not quite positive what I define a mindfuck as. So far, I have that it is something that causes a person to stop and think, if only for a second. It jolts them out of their daily grind. That's kind of in terms of poserGASM, but that's all I have.
Quote from: GA on September 22, 2008, 02:56:44 PM
So far two whole people have emailed me. :D
What have they said?
Quote from: GA on September 22, 2008, 02:56:44 PM
Then again, I don't see GASMs as persuasive or evangelical at all. I just wanted to bring a little weirdness to my campus, and so far people seem to like it.
This is more responding to Net than you GA, though I don't really see posterGASMing as persuasive or evangelical, either. Unless you're using Roger's rants, there's not really enough material on them to be persuasive or evangelical. I've only done it once, but I didn't do it to preach or persuade. I did it for fun, for the lulz. I did it in hopes that someone would see them and be amused, or see them and wonder what the fuck it was about. And I did it because it feels like something that's illegal or against the rules and I got a thrill from doing it.
When I get to do it on my campus, it will also be to bring some weirdness to my environment. I believe Cram said in one of his posts (possibly Why I Put Up Posters), that part of why he does it is to reclaim his environment and make it his. I see value in that, too. There are a lot of flyers and stuff posted around my dorms. I figure that if I have to look at posters and flyers in my environment, they should be ones that I would enjoy looking at, or that have meaning for me.
That's how I feel about posterGASMing. In my last post, I mentioned the aim of "waking people up". I mentioned that aim because I think I read it somewhere on here, though now I'm thinking I didn't and that I just made it up. It isn't one of my personal aims, it was just the aim that occurred to me when I read that quote.
Going to chart my progress here, if anyone is interested.
http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=17809.0
I am new here but this thread really got me thinking.
I have to admit I've been reading too much conspiracy-stuff, and my head feels like it's exploding. Messing with the media sounds like a good idea especially since it seems that media is heavily biased and serves corporate interests.
I was thinking that one way to do the MindFuck would be to plot some kind of an misinformation campaign. We would basically need one really good story and ridiculous amount of weird rumors about it. I have not quite figured out if this would work or not, but throwing in some ideas might be good anyhow.
The way I see it is that the worst that could happen to the prison guards (and to the prison itself), would be to realize that people know what they are doing and disagree with them. In other words some kind of display of global resistance, or unity would possibly be unnerving.
Quote from: Ianna on September 23, 2008, 06:02:53 AM
I am new here but this thread really got me thinking.
I have to admit I've been reading too much conspiracy-stuff, and my head feels like it's exploding. Messing with the media sounds like a good idea especially since it seems that media is heavily biased and serves corporate interests.
I was thinking that one way to do the MindFuck would be to plot some kind of an misinformation campaign. We would basically need one really good story and ridiculous amount of weird rumors about it. I have not quite figured out if this would work or not, but throwing in some ideas might be good anyhow.
The way I see it is that the worst that could happen to the prison guards (and to the prison itself), would be to realize that people know what they are doing and disagree with them. In other words some kind of display of global resistance, or unity would possibly be unnerving.
Hey there, yes we actually had a misinformation campaign going, search the forum for "Adam Weishaupt Society" or AWS. Quite successful, but as I recall, a lot of hard work.
I don't know exactly what you mean by the prison and the prison guards. If you're talking about the BIP, then the prison and the guards are both YOU. If you are talking about the Con instead, well any kind of unexpected behaviour can confuse them. Unity where there should be factions and splinter groups, or vice versa. Things along those lines.
Also, welcome to the boards!
Quote from: Payne on September 23, 2008, 11:01:23 AM
Hey there, yes we actually had a misinformation campaign going, search the forum for "Adam Weishaupt Society" or AWS. Quite successful, but as I recall, a lot of hard work.
I don't know exactly what you mean by the prison and the prison guards. If you're talking about the BIP, then the prison and the guards are both YOU. If you are talking about the Con instead, well any kind of unexpected behaviour can confuse them. Unity where there should be factions and splinter groups, or vice versa. Things along those lines.
Also, welcome to the boards!
Oh wow. AWS seems like something I would really have liked to be a part of. And also a kind of thing I had in mind: secret societies and stuff. I should perhaps lurk here awhile so I wouldn't post ideas that have been posted hundreds times before.. :D I have to be more cunning next time.
I'd love to see a bigger plan in work, but then again, those are not so easy to come up with.
Quote from: Ianna on September 23, 2008, 08:21:26 PM
Quote from: Payne on September 23, 2008, 11:01:23 AM
Hey there, yes we actually had a misinformation campaign going, search the forum for "Adam Weishaupt Society" or AWS. Quite successful, but as I recall, a lot of hard work.
I don't know exactly what you mean by the prison and the prison guards. If you're talking about the BIP, then the prison and the guards are both YOU. If you are talking about the Con instead, well any kind of unexpected behaviour can confuse them. Unity where there should be factions and splinter groups, or vice versa. Things along those lines.
Also, welcome to the boards!
Oh wow. AWS seems like something I would really have liked to be a part of. And also a kind of thing I had in mind: secret societies and stuff. I should perhaps lurk here awhile so I wouldn't post ideas that have been posted hundreds times before.. :D I have to be more cunning next time.
I'd love to see a bigger plan in work, but then again, those are not so easy to come up with.
If you want to be part of it, resurrect it. Nothing like getting stuck right in, after all.
As for proposing ideas that have been posted before.... This entire forum is made of Cock, Repost, Lail and Fail.
Most everything has been seen at one point or another already, what you bring to it is perspective, and arranging the puzzle pieces of disparate ideas in new and amusing ways.
and puns.
Yes, puns too.
NO FUCKING PUNS, GODDAMNIT!
No puns, no Rule#34. Those are the terms, I believe.
So, the trickster... in myth, is often associated with openings and opportunities. That is, they create an opportunity, wait for someone to take advantage of the opportunity and then close the door when they walk in.
So, it seems to me that this is an area that we could improve upon. PosterGASM, takes advantage of an opportuntiy (all the eyeballs walking by) but it doesn't make an opportunity for the victim. Colbertgasm was just a jake (an awesome and highly successful jake... but I digress), no serious trickery there.
Thus far, we've been the Merry Trickster, the crazy people that invade forums and inundate them with cream pies. Perhaps, we can raise our challenges to the Trapping Trickster level ;-)
I am reminded of Joey Skaggs and his pranks on the Media. Although I think he has become somewhat stagnant in his philosophy and a bit of a pretentious asshole (with way more focus on CAUSES than I would like...), he has pulled some fantastic pranks by creating an opening, letting someone in and then springing the trap. The geoduck prank, for example, was a great instance of what I'm talking about. It required relatively little preparation, a few photos, an 'article' and then getting the story into the right ears...
It seems that it might be easy to put too much into the prank, to invest to heavily or too obviously. I think the trick is in the mechanism, not the bait, or the victim...
Let's open some doors ;-)
Quote from: Valerie on September 22, 2008, 07:45:09 PM
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
Valerie suggests that the arguments made in Postergasm materials are weak, but I disagree. I doubt she's very familiar with the project... Which ones are weak?
Ohh, no no. I wasn't trying to say that arguments made in posterGASM materials are weak. I was just saying the first thing that came to mind when I read that quote.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
Well, Postergasm is just one tentacle in my bag of tricks. Also, you're not accounting for the sleeper effect or priming, which arguably Postergasm could function through.
What is the sleeper effect and priming?
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 22, 2008, 03:56:14 AM
How do you define a mindfuck, Valerie?
I'm not quite positive what I define a mindfuck as. So far, I have that it is something that causes a person to stop and think, if only for a second. It jolts them out of their daily grind. That's kind of in terms of poserGASM, but that's all I have.
Quote from: GA on September 22, 2008, 02:56:44 PM
So far two whole people have emailed me. :D
What have they said?
Quote from: GA on September 22, 2008, 02:56:44 PM
Then again, I don't see GASMs as persuasive or evangelical at all. I just wanted to bring a little weirdness to my campus, and so far people seem to like it.
This is more responding to Net than you GA, though I don't really see posterGASMing as persuasive or evangelical, either. Unless you're using Roger's rants, there's not really enough material on them to be persuasive or evangelical. I've only done it once, but I didn't do it to preach or persuade. I did it for fun, for the lulz. I did it in hopes that someone would see them and be amused, or see them and wonder what the fuck it was about. And I did it because it feels like something that's illegal or against the rules and I got a thrill from doing it.
When I get to do it on my campus, it will also be to bring some weirdness to my environment. I believe Cram said in one of his posts (possibly Why I Put Up Posters), that part of why he does it is to reclaim his environment and make it his. I see value in that, too. There are a lot of flyers and stuff posted around my dorms. I figure that if I have to look at posters and flyers in my environment, they should be ones that I would enjoy looking at, or that have meaning for me.
That's how I feel about posterGASMing. In my last post, I mentioned the aim of "waking people up". I mentioned that aim because I think I read it somewhere on here, though now I'm thinking I didn't and that I just made it up. It isn't one of my personal aims, it was just the aim that occurred to me when I read that quote.
Valerie, I think those are valid reasons for Postergasming, for sure. I have other motivations but we certainly don't need to agree about this.
You do seem ambivalent towards "waking people up," as well as the nature of your "weak" comment. It appears to me that you dodged those questions and could explain them much better.
There are, generally speaking, two main modes of persuasion—slow and logical, and fast and emotional. I think Roger's work on both levels, making them quite powerful indeed. The rest rely on the emotional route and in my mind are creative seeds that may sprout when a more conducive mind state is present later on down the line, if not immediately. These also have additional persuasive power by the placement genius of most of the people who distribute them. A clever context can add a surprising amount of ooomph...
Please to Google sleeper effect and priming.
Payne, I ought to have the time to compose a fully assed response later today.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 23, 2008, 09:12:47 PM
Payne, I ought to have the time to compose a fully assed response later today.
It's all good.
Quote from: Ratatosk on September 23, 2008, 08:59:14 PM
So, the trickster... in myth, is often associated with openings and opportunities. That is, they create an opportunity, wait for someone to take advantage of the opportunity and then close the door when they walk in.
So, it seems to me that this is an area that we could improve upon. PosterGASM, takes advantage of an opportuntiy (all the eyeballs walking by) but it doesn't make an opportunity for the victim. Colbertgasm was just a jake (an awesome and highly successful jake... but I digress), no serious trickery there.
Thus far, we've been the Merry Trickster, the crazy people that invade forums and inundate them with cream pies. Perhaps, we can raise our challenges to the Trapping Trickster level ;-)
I am reminded of Joey Skaggs and his pranks on the Media. Although I think he has become somewhat stagnant in his philosophy and a bit of a pretentious asshole (with way more focus on CAUSES than I would like...), he has pulled some fantastic pranks by creating an opening, letting someone in and then springing the trap. The geoduck prank, for example, was a great instance of what I'm talking about. It required relatively little preparation, a few photos, an 'article' and then getting the story into the right ears...
It seems that it might be easy to put too much into the prank, to invest to heavily or too obviously. I think the trick is in the mechanism, not the bait, or the victim...
Let's open some doors ;-)
The trickster archetype is certainly interesting. Most trickster tales fall into two basic types:
1.) The Trickster takes advantage of someone.
2.) Someone tries to take advantage of the Trickster, but he outwits them and they get taken advantage of instead.
Either way, there is a winner and a loser, the Trickster and the Victim. (Although in the second case, the victim 'deserved' it.)
If GASMs have a loser, you're doing something wrong. I'd rather be the Wise Fool, who rejects common sense and thereby has insights and sees the opportunities that others miss. GASMs, then, highlight the absurdity in the world and thereby try to make those opportunities a little more visible to people cursed with common sense.
Quote from: Payne on September 23, 2008, 09:31:41 PM
It's all good.
uh-oh.
you're already starting to sound like someone ... else, Payne ;-)
thanks for the cross-linking of threads btw, i don't have time to read all of these forums anymore and i'm trying to keep a littlebit on top with what's going on.
Quote from: triple zero on September 24, 2008, 11:46:03 AM
Quote from: Payne on September 23, 2008, 09:31:41 PM
It's all good.
uh-oh.
you're already starting to sound like someone ... else, Payne ;-)
thanks for the cross-linking of threads btw, i don't have time to read all of these forums anymore and i'm trying to keep a littlebit on top with what's going on.
If it helps, I actually feel a bit like someone else just now, not majorly so, just a little.
I wrote my thesis on the sleeper effect. :mrgreen: (as it relates to memory)
Basically
The Sleeper Effect states that over time, your have increasing trouble remembering whether or not information came from a credible source. Especially if the information was compelling, emotionally evocative, or something you
want to believe. So weeks later, you may forget that what you read was a blogger's speculation and not hard
news. (I got a $2000 science grant from pepsi to research this effect!) (no, pepsi wasn't interested in the results, they just fund cool experiments, and I was just name dropping)
Priming (I believe) is when you set up someone for an effect.. like when in the morning, you say to yourself, "This is going to be a bad day," and lo and behold, all the input channels are broadcasting 'Bad day'. You can use priming to formulate a lot of interesting reactions. Before the H.Clinton/Obama debate, I was watching the newscasters prime us for the issues they thought were important. "Will Hillary depict herself as destined to win?"
I really like this thread, but I haven't been posting in it 'cause I've been flagged as some sort leader type. As flattering as that is, (srsly)
- I don't want to risk everybody listening to me and my ideas rather than leading on their own. So brainstorm, you fucks!
- I know what you people do to leaders. And I don't wanna end up on no cross
:lulz:
I actually plan to go somewhere with this so please bare with my insufficient articulatory skills:
We are slowing gaining momentum here in Göteborg. The Mighty Boosh Cabal is small, and I am essentially the only one disorganising anything but I found a good handful of people who seem to be enjoying letting go of the traditional ways of thinking.
Fuck, I am even getting a deeply christian girl from Poland to read and discuss discordian documents with me.
Roger's rants are being translated, posters are being prepared - things are slowly picking up I dare say.
The methods I could employ in Germany don't work here. A new battlefield demands new tactics. And this is just the present I am talking about. It seems to me that our modern society hasn't really changed much in the last 30-40 years. I am thinking fundamentals here, obviously things have changed in some way - and a lot of the tools you have been working on and with are in good shape to tackle the present-day mind of the average sheep. But the last 5-10 years were a wild ride, we're rapidly going somewhere.
With the information-age and the revolution around it our society is in a state of imminent change. On this forum I have seen some very keen observations on what is happening and where we are most likely to end up, damn I could lurk these forums for hours and would still find something interesting that I missed due to my late arrival. The tools to fuck the present-mind might are possibly not efficiently fucking the future-mind. So maybe some thought should be put into the investigation of this change of mind and how to penetrate it properly.
I am having some notes on that matter but it's all chaotic and I don't feel like I am having nearly enough data to actually write something proper about it.
pw, I would be interested in hearing about your methods from Germany... me and some others in Germany might be able to learn from them.
Payne in italics.QuoteMost of my questions still apply, especially surrounding this theory of mini-egos (which is compelling though I think it's inaccurate).
If our methods are ambiguous, our goals, our "reasons" are more so. Such is the nature of discord, I suppose.
Mine aren't. Mostly.
This is fair enough, perhaps I was painting with too broad a brush when I made that statement. I suppose I also have to be more aware that many of our personal gigs and gags are subject to KYFMS
However, I would probably say it is no bad thing to have diverse and "ambiguous" reasons and/or goals. It may not give us strength in depth, but it creates a wide pool of expertise and resource to call on.
I would argue that it is a bad thing to have ambiguous goals. There is evidence that specificity in attitude predicts the associated behavior while generalities in attitude are not linked with the associated behavior, source on request. But also, imagine playing basketball where the players and the crowd aren't exactly sure where the hoop is. The game would be too hard to play and to watch for that matter. It also can be too specific, for example, designing hoops and backboards which are so bright and vivid that they're distracting.
QuoteWe bring almost as many personal viewpoints and prejudices to the table here. The tension this can create has been noted many times and exploited a few times (nothing like a bit of tension to get the creative juices flowing, right?). But ignoring the tension for a moment, multiple viewpoints mean we have a broader field of fire. We can attack one person, idea or concept from many different angles at the same time. In almost any circumstance, we "have you surrounded, come out with your hands up!"
Why aren't we taking more advantage of this? As I look around here, I see quite a number of projects going on. Good ones, and almost all of them are Crams or are being kept going by him.
I'll tell you what holds me back. There's little to no criteria for failure or success for most projects. The ones with better defined criteria have gone much farther—look at Colbertgasm and Postergasm. Colbertgasm succeeded because there was a testability to it and specific real world action to take, however providing plenty of room for creativity. The same is true with Postergasm. You succeed if you put up posters and take a few pictures of it. You succeed if you make posters that someone else puts up. You succeed big time if you hear about a poster making an impact on someone. But it's also possible and very likely IMO, that most of your successes will never be known, that you really made someone's day or royally pissed someone off but they had no way to contact you.
Valerie suggests that the arguments made in Postergasm materials are weak, but I disagree. I doubt she's very familiar with the project... Which ones are weak?
Addressing firstly, the measurement of success in a project, I always feel that the best projects have some kind of goal included in the initial pitching of an idea. Not all of them have grand aims (like Colbertgasm), but I think the most effective ones are when we do aim high and go all out to achieve it. Even getting Colbert to throw out some of Discordias more recognised memes and jokes would have gotten a whole bunch of people excited who were in no way connected with this site. The benefit of this is yet to be really assessed, but as an achievement of our personal goals, it is priceless.
Postergasm, I always feel, is done more for personal reasons than for it's impact. I did learn some things with the spree I went on with Syn, Trip and Broken AI in Edinburgh last month, though.
It's good to have an actual back up piece of literature to hand to someone if they ask you what you're doing, complete with contact details. This was suggested more for people who seemed interested and excited in what we were doing, but holds just as much for people who are hostile to it. This should probably be addressed on (at least) some of the posters themselves.
I don't speak for Valerie, I'm not sure which ones she thinks are weak, or for why.
Well I think we're on the same page here.
Also, that was directed at Valerie, I probably should have put it into another post.
QuoteIt's good that we have someone like Cramulus who can manage a project, push it through,get people motivated to take part. Cram is a good guy, and has all the qualities of a good leader, but we need more people to take up the reigns, to push through these projects, to create more of their own.
What do you attribute to his success?
Cram is charismatic, driven and well liked. People listen to his ideas because they work, and, building on past successes, he is able to galvanise a core of people into action on a specific short or long term goal.
Mostly he is successful because he actually puts himself into a position to be so.
Do you believe we can model these qualities and adapt them to our own personalities? I do, and I think a small number of posters stepping up to the plate in such a manner would be necessary for a large payoff in activity and results.
QuoteWe need more varied ideas and people who are willing to step up to the plate and have their ideas heard and implemented.
How can YOU help make this happen? And how badly do you really want it to happen?
I'm going to practice what I preach, and try and throw out some ideas. How badly do I want it to happen? Not sure, where this is a call to action, I believe it now hinges on my first experiment on changing my self-perceived role in PD from my usual WOMPing, fluff specialising caricature of myself into one (which I've always wanted to try, but never actually done for a sustained period of time) that writes interesting thought provoking articles and the like.
If it works, great. If it doesn't work, then I need to revise my hypothesis again.
I'm looking forward to your experiment. What exactly is your hypothesis?
QuoteRoger recently called for us to start fucking with the media. I agreed then, and I still do, but I'm begining to think that what we have discussed so far for this "plan" is too small time, is not pushing our limits. We DO need to jack the media, but I think we need to do it directly, or at least more directly than I have been thinking about.
We need people on the inside. OK, so we're not going to get a news anchor, or even the guy that does his teleprompter, but we need to start speaking with people who ARE involved with the mass media, with students who shortly will be. We need to raise our sights a little and focus our attention on places and people who, if we can affect change there, will have a larger and broader effect. We almost had this with the Adam Weishaupt Society (another of Crams projects), we need to revisit that idea and REALLY put some effort into it.
I'm interested in how I can help to collectively fuck with the media. I know there are a lot of other people who have a similar inclination, however the devil is in the details... I've come to expect that when I press discordians for the details of their plans that they probably won't have them and may even actively avoid fleshing things out with some half-baked rationalization about disorder. It's a flying by the seat of your pants gamble that usually doesn't even occur because people lose interest as soon as they realize how much effort is required to make it happen.
You're talking in glittering generalities. What kind of larger effects? What people and places? What will speaking with insiders and students do for you? I'm a student of the mass media, albeit a subsection, but that is the environment where I'm being taught to succeed at. It's quite possible that I'll be much further inside the belly of the beast in the next few years, but then what? I hope you don't think that I'd risk my entire design career for a prank. Well, maybe I would, but it would need a much better mission statement than, "Let's fuck with the media, LOL."
What got me about Roger's call to action was the potential for the "social fiction" meme. That's hella juicy.
My problem with pushing my ideas forward with regard to jacking or fucking with the media is I'm so far removed from the actual scene and, I admit, unfamiliar with how much of the system works. General ideas, I'm good for in this case, actually pushing for specific details and assigning people to different tasks, I would need to collaborate with someone who DOES know the system. And that's what we need, to assign people tasks and hope that they do them.
I'm not suggesting that people risk their careers on a prank, I'm suggesting that having a sympathetic ear and voice in areas where we are trying to affect change is not a bad thing. If our target is the media, then it's not a bad idea to have someone on the inside who can tell us when something is not going to work (for example). Yes this is another generality, but this is just an idea I've thrown up to see if it has any merit, it's not a detailed call for action. Maybe we DON'T need people on the ground, maybe we can do everything from our computers.
And yes, Rogers social fiction idea is awesome. Just hitting message boards with it isn't going to have a great impact though.
I will try to think through a couple of ideas for it, and post them in the relevant thread today.
What criteria does someone need to fulfill to consult with them about "the system." What parts of "the system" have the most importance or relevance? This plays into developing a specific plan, so we can focus our energy more effectively on what is important and relevant to the objectives.
It's my understanding that few people have a meaningful idea of how national and multinational media systems work because it's an emergent phenomena that arises out of a wide array of specialized personnel working together. Having a resource like that would be nice, but I don't think it's necessary for us to either get close or achieve our plans.
How do we know if we need people on the ground until we have crystallized the desired objective?
QuoteFor the media, we can read all sorts of other things. Popular Culture, large institutions, maybe (a real long shot here) the underbelly of Government.
This is what we should be doing if we are focusing on effecting change with O:MF outside our own minds.
This is why nothing gets done. It sounds good on the surface, but really you're not saying anything in real world terms. Once you embellish these ideas with concrete, testable elements they'll grow legs.
Working on it.
To further clarify, I'm not saying that we shouldn't discuss heavily abstract ideas, but in the interest of pragmatism to continually move these ideas toward the concrete.
QuoteWithin our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
Lead by example. A lot of people like you and respect you, myself included. If you started doing something like that you'd be assured to influence people.
Could you really go a week without WOMP though? Do you remember when Roger got all nice? People were terrified.
How would you know that enough people are playing more roles? What can one do to encourage it? When would it be contraindicated?
Working on it.
What role would you like to see me play, for example? Or Cain? Or some noob that just rolled in?
QuoteWhen we step up to the plate and announce our ideas, I believe we need to be more willing to adopt a different role in seeing them implemented (we could possibly find ourselves auto-mindfucked into taking a leadership role, so that Cram can get on with the projects he enjoys taking forward more). We need to see more people willing and able to take on any role, be it leader, artist, writer, ranter, thinker, debator and a myriad of others.
And again, how to do this?
I've been considering writing a rant recently but there is little of my writing that doesn't implode from the force of my own analysis.
The leadership idea is good too. I'd like to see that happen as well, but I could see hostile competition between would-be leaders fucking everything up.
Perhaps what we need more of is taking initiative and collaboration not necessarily someone explicitly playing "leader."
About your writing, fair enough. God knows I've started plenty of pieces of writing which I've scrubbed and never posted. By the same measure though, the WOMP perspective that I've been honing the last year or so, that "it doesn't matter if it LOOKS rough, someone will find merit in it, even if it's only you" is something I've applied more and more to other things.
It isn't really about the quality of writing, for me, it's about having my ideas heard. And the good thing I've found about this board in particular is that while most of the attention is paid to the ideas who show up in Mercs wearing suits, the ones who come in looking like a diseased tramp will ALSO have some attention shown to them.
I haven't yet been completely torn down for anything that I've written, but I have to of course admit that that could be because I have a certain reputation on here, and people don't want to hurt my feelings or some shit.
The leadership idea isn't to give everyone a sense of authority entitlement. If they've been doing their homework, they should already have that, and I don't see an outright war on the boards over it. I see it more as helping people here to develop skills that they already have, but never exercise. If it leads to some friction, so be it. (look to my quick analysis of why Cram is so successful for what I'm trying to promote in others, myself included. We are all capable of it, but few of us are actually trying to achieve it.)
How do you know someone has heard your idea? Could you give an example of when you've been heard and an example of not being heard?
How do we know people have an interest and motivation to develop leadership skills?
If everyone tried very hard to be the leader in projects, nothing would get done. The point I'm trying to make is that a collaborative mindset may be more important than a strong leader. It may be that Cram isn't so much a leader, but very good at getting people to work together. I think we may be missing the forest for a particularly attractive tree.
QuoteIt is in this way that I feel the mini-egos and One Self idea I began with in this thread can be resolved. It is by truly pushing ourselves and over reaching that we will discover more about hidden aspects of our personality, about what we can use to achieve more with less effort, and what we can then turn our attention to "fixing" or "improving".
While this all is helpful, I'm not sure I agree with the theory of mini-egos versus the One Self. In lieu of an operationalized idea of "mini-egos..." I'm not sure the model is very useful either.
I think you're absolutely correct about pushing ourselves and overreaching though. RAH!
Maybe the model isn't useful, my experiment should help test it. My One Self, I see it as the WOMPing fluff artist. My "Mini-Ego" in this case, the one that never gets it's chance in the spotlight, is the more intellectual and serious side of me. I'm trying it on for size, to see if it changes my perspective, or improves my skills in any way.
Also, thanks for the second part. :)
I don't see the separation between egos as desirable. I think using language that assumes divisions can help create divisions in your personality.
Could you compare and contrast the idea with Carl Jung's shadow and collective unconscious? They seem similar. I believe most of Jung's ideas are still untestable so if the mini-ego/main-ego theory is also untestable why should I prefer it over Jung's?
Quote from: Cramulus on September 24, 2008, 03:29:43 PM
Priming (I believe) is when you set up someone for an effect.. like when in the morning, you say to yourself, "This is going to be a bad day," and lo and behold, all the input channels are broadcasting 'Bad day'. You can use priming to formulate a lot of interesting reactions. Before the H.Clinton/Obama debate, I was watching the newscasters prime us for the issues they thought were important. "Will Hillary depict herself as destined to win?"
I'm not sure priming works internally like that. I think your first example is a better instance of self-fulfilling prophecy. Priming doesn't seem to rely on a prediction that you believe and manifest. I think it's related to the mere exposure effect where familiarity makes people more inclined to like something. Perhaps the exposure effect is just priming on steroids.
I'm not sure Postergasm ever could get prevalent enough for the benefits of the mere exposure effect to kick in. But I'm fairly sure that the posters could conceptually prime people to experience more weirdness in their day as well as respond more favorably to discordia should they ever stumble that far down the rabbit hole.
Quote from: Ratatosk on September 23, 2008, 08:59:14 PM
So, the trickster... in myth, is often associated with openings and opportunities. That is, they create an opportunity, wait for someone to take advantage of the opportunity and then close the door when they walk in.
So, it seems to me that this is an area that we could improve upon. PosterGASM, takes advantage of an opportuntiy (all the eyeballs walking by) but it doesn't make an opportunity for the victim. Colbertgasm was just a jake (an awesome and highly successful jake... but I digress), no serious trickery there.
Thus far, we've been the Merry Trickster, the crazy people that invade forums and inundate them with cream pies. Perhaps, we can raise our challenges to the Trapping Trickster level ;-)
I am reminded of Joey Skaggs and his pranks on the Media. Although I think he has become somewhat stagnant in his philosophy and a bit of a pretentious asshole (with way more focus on CAUSES than I would like...), he has pulled some fantastic pranks by creating an opening, letting someone in and then springing the trap. The geoduck prank, for example, was a great instance of what I'm talking about. It required relatively little preparation, a few photos, an 'article' and then getting the story into the right ears...
It seems that it might be easy to put too much into the prank, to invest to heavily or too obviously. I think the trick is in the mechanism, not the bait, or the victim...
Let's open some doors ;-)
I like the trap format you've got there. That's the kind of pragmatic strategy that can be applied to some of the more general ideas floating around here.
I don't like the suggestion that it's bad to get too invested in the prank. I think it's entirely too rare for people to take their pranks too far and par for the course to settle for an underdeveloped scheme.
What do you mean about the mechanism being more important than the bait or the victim? Are you saying that the slamming of the door of the trap is the mechanism? I think Skaggs goes off on the revealing of the prank being of critical importance, is that what you're referring to?
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 25, 2008, 12:02:55 AM
Quote from: Ratatosk on September 23, 2008, 08:59:14 PM
So, the trickster... in myth, is often associated with openings and opportunities. That is, they create an opportunity, wait for someone to take advantage of the opportunity and then close the door when they walk in.
So, it seems to me that this is an area that we could improve upon. PosterGASM, takes advantage of an opportuntiy (all the eyeballs walking by) but it doesn't make an opportunity for the victim. Colbertgasm was just a jake (an awesome and highly successful jake... but I digress), no serious trickery there.
Thus far, we've been the Merry Trickster, the crazy people that invade forums and inundate them with cream pies. Perhaps, we can raise our challenges to the Trapping Trickster level ;-)
I am reminded of Joey Skaggs and his pranks on the Media. Although I think he has become somewhat stagnant in his philosophy and a bit of a pretentious asshole (with way more focus on CAUSES than I would like...), he has pulled some fantastic pranks by creating an opening, letting someone in and then springing the trap. The geoduck prank, for example, was a great instance of what I'm talking about. It required relatively little preparation, a few photos, an 'article' and then getting the story into the right ears...
It seems that it might be easy to put too much into the prank, to invest to heavily or too obviously. I think the trick is in the mechanism, not the bait, or the victim...
Let's open some doors ;-)
I like the trap format you've got there. That's the kind of pragmatic strategy that can be applied to some of the more general ideas floating around here.
I don't like the suggestion that it's bad to get too invested in the prank. I think it's entirely too rare for people to take their pranks too far and par for the course to settle for an underdeveloped scheme.
I think I meant that its easy to be focused on pranking the Big Prank... pranking the National Media, rather than pranking Pajamas Media, or Local Media. Skaggs with the geoduck prank, hit local media which propagated it outward. I recently saw a video on YouTube that was trying to create a meme viral video like rickroll... except that it was WAY to obvious.. for example it was called *the guys name*roll and said on the side "Post this everywhere and trick people into clicking it!!!"
Too obvious, too invested. Rather than setting the trap and then waiting to see if it worked, he sort of took the trap and threw it at people.
Quote
What do you mean about the mechanism being more important than the bait or the victim? Are you saying that the slamming of the door of the trap is the mechanism? I think Skaggs goes off on the revealing of the prank being of critical importance, is that what you're referring to?
Revealing the prank is very important, but that's just showing everyone that the trap worked (and spotlighting the mechanism). The mechanism of the trap, the thing that makes the mark take the bait, appealing to the greed, or hubris, or automated responses, or herd mentality or whatever thats the key I think. For example the geoduck prank took advantage of the media hyping anti-Japanese stories. He knew the bait would be taken, because he saw the flaw in the victim. Much of our Mindfuckery relies on a random person reading something, it seems to me like variations on the Jake. Those are great pranks, but they're all sort of the same kind of category "surprise=information" (they are moree like pit traps or mine... ready to take any poor sod that happens by) whereas a lot of the 'prankster' pranks seem more like traps based on weaknesses in the specific victim,, traps designed to exploit and oftem spotlight the weakness...
Perhaps the art of the trickster lies in understanding the nature of his target. We have a lot of people around here that seem to be really good at grokking the nature of individuals and groups. It's why we can troll, no? If we can develop pranks based on that understanding, and designed to exploit/expose flaws in the nature of the victim (perhaps just to the victim themselves, or to the world at large) I think that would be an interesting O:MF of the future ;-)
For example, if instead of ColbertGASM, we had done BillOGASM, Bill O'Reily could have been convinced that a private presidential task force was being assembled to deal with 'left wing media bias'. Of course, we would accidentally give him the address to a Klan rally and make sure that plenty of the evil Left Wing Media were on hand with cameras. (Obvious hyperbolye is obvious; Exaggeration for effect and examination... and the LOL that my imagination gave me at the thought)
:lulz:
These are just ideas and I don't consider anything I'm typing here as true or more correct... just ideas about 'the next level'... and obviously I nay have no idea how many awesome traplike pranks are being pulled off around here ;-)
Net, I will reply to this later on.
I am coming round to your point of view, somewhat.
QuoteTosk said:
So, the trickster... in myth, is often associated with openings and opportunities. That is, they create an opportunity, wait for someone to take advantage of the opportunity and then close the door when they walk in.
So, it seems to me that this is an area that we could improve upon. PosterGASM, takes advantage of an opportuntiy (all the eyeballs walking by) but it doesn't make an opportunity for the victim. Colbertgasm was just a jake (an awesome and highly successful jake... but I digress), no serious trickery there.
Thus far, we've been the Merry Trickster, the crazy people that invade forums and inundate them with cream pies. Perhaps, we can raise our challenges to the Trapping Trickster level ;-)
I am reminded of Joey Skaggs and his pranks on the Media. Although I think he has become somewhat stagnant in his philosophy and a bit of a pretentious asshole (with way more focus on CAUSES than I would like...), he has pulled some fantastic pranks by creating an opening, letting someone in and then springing the trap. The geoduck prank, for example, was a great instance of what I'm talking about. It required relatively little preparation, a few photos, an 'article' and then getting the story into the right ears...
It seems that it might be easy to put too much into the prank, to invest to heavily or too obviously. I think the trick is in the mechanism, not the bait, or the victim...
Let's open some doors ;-)
Net said:
I like the trap format you've got there. That's the kind of pragmatic strategy that can be applied to some of the more general ideas floating around here.
I don't like the suggestion that it's bad to get too invested in the prank. I think it's entirely too rare for people to take their pranks too far and par for the course to settle for an underdeveloped scheme.
Tosk said:
I think I meant that its easy to be focused on pranking the Big Prank... pranking the National Media, rather than pranking Pajamas Media, or Local Media. Skaggs with the geoduck prank, hit local media which propagated it outward. I recently saw a video on YouTube that was trying to create a meme viral video like rickroll... except that it was WAY to obvious.. for example it was called *the guys name*roll and said on the side "Post this everywhere and trick people into clicking it!!!"
Too obvious, too invested. Rather than setting the trap and then waiting to see if it worked, he sort of took the trap and threw it at people.
I don't think that wannabe rickroll guy was invested
enough. I see what you're saying about being too invested. You're referring to people's egos being too invested in the prank, I'm suggesting that the conceptual basis for the prank itself is not invested in. Both of which apply to the shitty appropriation of the rickroll.
Quote
Net said:
What do you mean about the mechanism being more important than the bait or the victim? Are you saying that the slamming of the door of the trap is the mechanism? I think Skaggs goes off on the revealing of the prank being of critical importance, is that what you're referring to?
Tosk said:
Revealing the prank is very important, but that's just showing everyone that the trap worked (and spotlighting the mechanism). The mechanism of the trap, the thing that makes the mark take the bait, appealing to the greed, or hubris, or automated responses, or herd mentality or whatever thats the key I think. For example the geoduck prank took advantage of the media hyping anti-Japanese stories. He knew the bait would be taken, because he saw the flaw in the victim. Much of our Mindfuckery relies on a random person reading something, it seems to me like variations on the Jake. Those are great pranks, but they're all sort of the same kind of category "surprise=information" (they are moree like pit traps or mine... ready to take any poor sod that happens by) whereas a lot of the 'prankster' pranks seem more like traps based on weaknesses in the specific victim,, traps designed to exploit and oftem spotlight the weakness...
Perhaps the art of the trickster lies in understanding the nature of his target. We have a lot of people around here that seem to be really good at grokking the nature of individuals and groups. It's why we can troll, no? If we can develop pranks based on that understanding, and designed to exploit/expose flaws in the nature of the victim (perhaps just to the victim themselves, or to the world at large) I think that would be an interesting O:MF of the future ;-)
For example, if instead of ColbertGASM, we had done BillOGASM, Bill O'Reily could have been convinced that a private presidential task force was being assembled to deal with 'left wing media bias'. Of course, we would accidentally give him the address to a Klan rally and make sure that plenty of the evil Left Wing Media were on hand with cameras. (Obvious hyperbole is obvious; Exaggeration for effect and examination... and the LOL that my imagination gave me at the thought)
:lulz:
These are just ideas and I don't consider anything I'm typing here as true or more correct... just ideas about 'the next level'... and obviously I nay have no idea how many awesome traplike pranks are being pulled off around here ;-)
If I were to model this classic prank format as a process I think it would look like this:
1.
Identify weakness to exploit
2.
Plan bait/trap to fit weakness and method of exposing to the public
3.
Gather resources and/or insertion of operatives
4.
Implement the fuck out of that bitch
5.
Review the efforts for improvement or memoirs
Does anyone have issues with this strategy? What would you change?
Quote from: Payne on September 25, 2008, 12:08:54 PM
Net, I will reply to this later on.
I am coming round to your point of view, somewhat.
Swote.
Note: I will leave Net to trim the fat off of these quote trees, he seems to be better at it than me. I tried, and it horribly distorted the conversation.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
Payne in italics.
QuoteMost of my questions still apply, especially surrounding this theory of mini-egos (which is compelling though I think it's inaccurate).
If our methods are ambiguous, our goals, our "reasons" are more so. Such is the nature of discord, I suppose.
Mine aren't. Mostly.
This is fair enough, perhaps I was painting with too broad a brush when I made that statement. I suppose I also have to be more aware that many of our personal gigs and gags are subject to KYFMS
However, I would probably say it is no bad thing to have diverse and "ambiguous" reasons and/or goals. It may not give us strength in depth, but it creates a wide pool of expertise and resource to call on.
I would argue that it is a bad thing to have ambiguous goals. There is evidence that specificity in attitude predicts the associated behavior while generalities in attitude are not linked with the associated behavior, source on request. But also, imagine playing basketball where the players and the crowd aren't exactly sure where the hoop is. The game would be too hard to play and to watch for that matter. It also can be too specific, for example, designing hoops and backboards which are so bright and vivid that they're distracting.
In putting of a plan into action, yes, ambiguous goals would hinder us. I believe I was originally referring to the milieu of personalities within this community. We all want subtly (and sometimes not so subtly) different things. We bring different skills and viewpoints and strengths and weaknesses to the table.
In planning a mindfuck, we would be looking to corral the most interesting and useful (for the specific circumstance) of these together, and hope the "chemistry" creates something truly great.
However, I am reassessing this assumption. I don't think it's possible to really "corral" these things together, and get anything good from it. We'd get a hell of a debate, but nothing productive beyond a lot of words.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteIt's good that we have someone like Cramulus who can manage a project, push it through,get people motivated to take part. Cram is a good guy, and has all the qualities of a good leader, but we need more people to take up the reigns, to push through these projects, to create more of their own.
What do you attribute to his success?
Cram is charismatic, driven and well liked. People listen to his ideas because they work, and, building on past successes, he is able to galvanise a core of people into action on a specific short or long term goal.
Mostly he is successful because he actually puts himself into a position to be so.
Do you believe we can model these qualities and adapt them to our own personalities? I do, and I think a small number of posters stepping up to the plate in such a manner would be necessary for a large payoff in activity and results.
This is largely the point I've been trying to make all along. Maybe I'm just using the wrong wording or imagery.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteWe need more varied ideas and people who are willing to step up to the plate and have their ideas heard and implemented.
How can YOU help make this happen? And how badly do you really want it to happen?
I'm going to practice what I preach, and try and throw out some ideas. How badly do I want it to happen? Not sure, where this is a call to action, I believe it now hinges on my first experiment on changing my self-perceived role in PD from my usual WOMPing, fluff specialising caricature of myself into one (which I've always wanted to try, but never actually done for a sustained period of time) that writes interesting thought provoking articles and the like.
If it works, great. If it doesn't work, then I need to revise my hypothesis again.
I'm looking forward to your experiment. What exactly is your hypothesis?
By casting aside WOMP, and as much of the fluffy and trite posting, then taking up a role (seldom played) as a more serious poster, in this case more interested in posting ideas and thoughts in debate threads, and rising above petty drama, I hoped to prove a few different things:
1- That I can (and by extension, we all can) develop different parts and different kinds of productivity, making me more of an all rounder when it comes to projects.
2- That I COULD stop WOMPing for a week, as per your challenge.
3- That my general productivity would increase, affecting a change on the quality of my posting.
I also thought that if it was spectacularly successful, a "different" Payne would become noticeable, giving me something to work with for my chained mini-egos idea.
It's still ongoing, but so far, it hasn't been a great success. I think I have only partially achieved 1 and 3. I haven't WOMPed at all, at least.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteRoger recently called for us to start fucking with the media. I agreed then, and I still do, but I'm begining to think that what we have discussed so far for this "plan" is too small time, is not pushing our limits. We DO need to jack the media, but I think we need to do it directly, or at least more directly than I have been thinking about.
We need people on the inside. OK, so we're not going to get a news anchor, or even the guy that does his teleprompter, but we need to start speaking with people who ARE involved with the mass media, with students who shortly will be. We need to raise our sights a little and focus our attention on places and people who, if we can affect change there, will have a larger and broader effect. We almost had this with the Adam Weishaupt Society (another of Crams projects), we need to revisit that idea and REALLY put some effort into it.
I'm interested in how I can help to collectively fuck with the media. I know there are a lot of other people who have a similar inclination, however the devil is in the details... I've come to expect that when I press discordians for the details of their plans that they probably won't have them and may even actively avoid fleshing things out with some half-baked rationalization about disorder. It's a flying by the seat of your pants gamble that usually doesn't even occur because people lose interest as soon as they realize how much effort is required to make it happen.
You're talking in glittering generalities. What kind of larger effects? What people and places? What will speaking with insiders and students do for you? I'm a student of the mass media, albeit a subsection, but that is the environment where I'm being taught to succeed at. It's quite possible that I'll be much further inside the belly of the beast in the next few years, but then what? I hope you don't think that I'd risk my entire design career for a prank. Well, maybe I would, but it would need a much better mission statement than, "Let's fuck with the media, LOL."
What got me about Roger's call to action was the potential for the "social fiction" meme. That's hella juicy.
My problem with pushing my ideas forward with regard to jacking or fucking with the media is I'm so far removed from the actual scene and, I admit, unfamiliar with how much of the system works. General ideas, I'm good for in this case, actually pushing for specific details and assigning people to different tasks, I would need to collaborate with someone who DOES know the system. And that's what we need, to assign people tasks and hope that they do them.
I'm not suggesting that people risk their careers on a prank, I'm suggesting that having a sympathetic ear and voice in areas where we are trying to affect change is not a bad thing. If our target is the media, then it's not a bad idea to have someone on the inside who can tell us when something is not going to work (for example). Yes this is another generality, but this is just an idea I've thrown up to see if it has any merit, it's not a detailed call for action. Maybe we DON'T need people on the ground, maybe we can do everything from our computers.
And yes, Rogers social fiction idea is awesome. Just hitting message boards with it isn't going to have a great impact though.
I will try to think through a couple of ideas for it, and post them in the relevant thread today.
What criteria does someone need to fulfill to consult with them about "the system." What parts of "the system" have the most importance or relevance? This plays into developing a specific plan, so we can focus our energy more effectively on what is important and relevant to the objectives.
It's my understanding that few people have a meaningful idea of how national and multinational media systems work because it's an emergent phenomena that arises out of a wide array of specialized personnel working together. Having a resource like that would be nice, but I don't think it's necessary for us to either get close or achieve our plans.
How do we know if we need people on the ground until we have crystallized the desired objective?
I don't know about this anymore. We can probably dump this part of the debate until I actually CAN debate it. As you've said, I'm being far too general about it.
My only thought was we should develop resources, regardless of whether we actually need them or not, in the areas we seem to be focusing on. For the media, this suggested to me that having people on "our side" in the media for intel (if nothing else, considering job security) would be a good thing. Maybe it's a waste of time. I don't know enough about it.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteFor the media, we can read all sorts of other things. Popular Culture, large institutions, maybe (a real long shot here) the underbelly of Government.
This is what we should be doing if we are focusing on effecting change with O:MF outside our own minds.
This is why nothing gets done. It sounds good on the surface, but really you're not saying anything in real world terms. Once you embellish these ideas with concrete, testable elements they'll grow legs.
Working on it.
To further clarify, I'm not saying that we shouldn't discuss heavily abstract ideas, but in the interest of pragmatism to continually move these ideas toward the concrete.
I understand that, it's just that I was (and now am) "working on it".
~~~Payne: Trying his best to keep up.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteWithin our own minds, O:MF as a self-mindfuck, we should perhaps be considering adjusting our roles more often. Within this community many of us seem to have a well defined niche, a certain service, viewpoint, shtick that we are noted for having or providing.
This is all well and good, it's nice to know that there is a certain constancy, a familiarity in our interactions on this board. It lends a small amount of stabiliy to an otherwise fractious group of individuals, but it tends to stifle a great deal of creativity, (of which there is still plenty, but we can always do with more).
Lead by example. A lot of people like you and respect you, myself included. If you started doing something like that you'd be assured to influence people.
Could you really go a week without WOMP though? Do you remember when Roger got all nice? People were terrified.
How would you know that enough people are playing more roles? What can one do to encourage it? When would it be contraindicated?
Working on it.
What role would you like to see me play, for example? Or Cain? Or some noob that just rolled in?
Whichever you felt like. Preferably one that you see others do, and think to yourself "Man, I wish I could do that half as well".
I am never going to be Roger, Cain, Netaungrot or any of the distinct personalities and experts on these boards. But I would like to develop some of the skills and personality traits anyway. So instead of thinking "I wish Roger was here to lay down some intelligently applied hate", I can do a fairly good job of it myself with my own spin on it.
I'm not going to tell people they should try to change and develop, but I would like people who want to, to do so.
QuoteWhen we step up to the plate and announce our ideas, I believe we need to be more willing to adopt a different role in seeing them implemented (we could possibly find ourselves auto-mindfucked into taking a leadership role, so that Cram can get on with the projects he enjoys taking forward more). We need to see more people willing and able to take on any role, be it leader, artist, writer, ranter, thinker, debator and a myriad of others.
And again, how to do this?
I've been considering writing a rant recently but there is little of my writing that doesn't implode from the force of my own analysis.
The leadership idea is good too. I'd like to see that happen as well, but I could see hostile competition between would-be leaders fucking everything up.
Perhaps what we need more of is taking initiative and collaboration not necessarily someone explicitly playing "leader."
About your writing, fair enough. God knows I've started plenty of pieces of writing which I've scrubbed and never posted. By the same measure though, the WOMP perspective that I've been honing the last year or so, that "it doesn't matter if it LOOKS rough, someone will find merit in it, even if it's only you" is something I've applied more and more to other things.
It isn't really about the quality of writing, for me, it's about having my ideas heard. And the good thing I've found about this board in particular is that while most of the attention is paid to the ideas who show up in Mercs wearing suits, the ones who come in looking like a diseased tramp will ALSO have some attention shown to them.
I haven't yet been completely torn down for anything that I've written, but I have to of course admit that that could be because I have a certain reputation on here, and people don't want to hurt my feelings or some shit.
The leadership idea isn't to give everyone a sense of authority entitlement. If they've been doing their homework, they should already have that, and I don't see an outright war on the boards over it. I see it more as helping people here to develop skills that they already have, but never exercise. If it leads to some friction, so be it. (look to my quick analysis of why Cram is so successful for what I'm trying to promote in others, myself included. We are all capable of it, but few of us are actually trying to achieve it.)
How do you know someone has heard your idea? Could you give an example of when you've been heard and an example of not being heard?
How do we know people have an interest and motivation to develop leadership skills?
If everyone tried very hard to be the leader in projects, nothing would get done. The point I'm trying to make is that a collaborative mindset may be more important than a strong leader. It may be that Cram isn't so much a leader, but very good at getting people to work together. I think we may be missing the forest for a particularly attractive tree.
[/quote]
Being heard, and not being heard. Well, I will use this discussion for that. You missed one of my points (one that I thought was important) regarding my hypothesis for my experiment, even though it was fairly central to what I was saying. I've already addressed that above, and I think it comes down to a lack of clarity on my part. Something I need to personally work on. Which is really my whole point. Being heard? Well, the rest of this discussion... :)
People who want to develop leadership skills, ideally would identify themselves. Hence trying to publicise what I'm doing to the rest of the boards.
I'm not arguing for a chairman of the board style of leadership. I'm arguing for someone to get people collaborating (my idea of what a leader should be, especially here, and one that Cram does indeed embody)
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 24, 2008, 10:59:19 PM
QuoteIt is in this way that I feel the mini-egos and One Self idea I began with in this thread can be resolved. It is by truly pushing ourselves and over reaching that we will discover more about hidden aspects of our personality, about what we can use to achieve more with less effort, and what we can then turn our attention to "fixing" or "improving".
While this all is helpful, I'm not sure I agree with the theory of mini-egos versus the One Self. In lieu of an operationalized idea of "mini-egos..." I'm not sure the model is very useful either.
I think you're absolutely correct about pushing ourselves and overreaching though. RAH!
Maybe the model isn't useful, my experiment should help test it. My One Self, I see it as the WOMPing fluff artist. My "Mini-Ego" in this case, the one that never gets it's chance in the spotlight, is the more intellectual and serious side of me. I'm trying it on for size, to see if it changes my perspective, or improves my skills in any way.
Also, thanks for the second part. :)
I don't see the separation between egos as desirable. I think using language that assumes divisions can help create divisions in your personality.
Could you compare and contrast the idea with Carl Jung's shadow and collective unconscious? They seem similar. I believe most of Jung's ideas are still untestable so if the mini-ego/main-ego theory is also untestable why should I prefer it over Jung's?
The idea for the mini-ego and one self thing came directly from reading The Dice Man. It was supposed to be shorthand (as far as I'm concerned) for developing latent skills and desires that are normally oppressed. You are maybe right about divisions in your personality. I've been seriously depressed the last few days, for no really discernible reason. It's entirely possible my experiment is causing this.
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 25, 2008, 10:47:59 PMIf I were to model this classic prank format as a process I think it would look like this:
1. Identify weakness to exploit
2. Plan bait/trap to fit weakness and method of exposing to the public
3. Gather resources and/or insertion of operatives
4. Implement the fuck out of that bitch
5. Review the efforts for improvement or memoirs
Does anyone have issues with this strategy? What would you change?
No, that's pretty much it. Quite good, straightforward. I personally like having a plan like this, a lot.
Step 1 is sometimes called the "hacker mindset" or "security mindset", Rat probably knows what I'm talking about here, and I suppose
a lot of discordians (especially the prankster and hacker subtypes) have it as well.
It is when you walk around and see some kind of security mechanism (in the widest sense of the word) in action, it is being trusted
upon to do its job, and pretty much involuntarily (i'm not going to say subconscious, but it is involuntary for me) you mentally poke
at it and see if it can be circumvented or subverted in some manner.
i do this all the time, examples, my guest-parking card that has a 16h/week quota that i must sign on and off on a website
(
begging to be hacked, no?) or whenever i call some helpdesk phoneline service number and they give me a lot of my personal info
with hardly any proper identification (read Kevin Mitnick - The Art of Deception for great examples of exploiting the latter holes).
for me, step 1 and 2 kind of merge together, but they are steps that i am pretty good at. it's the actual putting things into motion,
transmuting theory into practice (steps 3 and 4) that often get me stuck in some way.
fortunately we have a wide array of different personalities in our group, so there should be others, given a brilliant plan, being
able to pick it up from there, right?
on a different note, Ratatosk, could you perhaps expand on the need to expose a prank once it's completed?
because i can see two scenarios, that differ on the "point" of the prank.
- if the "point" is the exploitation of a weakness that you/we think the target should not have, it is important to reveal the
prank, so it becomes obvious that the target has this weakness. examples of these weaknesses range from general egoism, closed-
mindedness or herd-behaviour to real practical examples such as responsible disclosure of security vulnerabilities.
- but if the "point" of the prank is to complete a certain kind of goal that is related to the exploitation of the weakness, but in
a different way, say, shifting the outcome of some poll one way or another, or trolling/fueling a board-war between two un-allied
boards, it may be extremely counterproductive (or sometimes even dangerous) to reveal/expose/disclose the prank, trap, mechanism and
whatnot. it could prevent the same technique from working again in the future (which is the point of the responsible disclosure in
the previous scenario) or at its worst it could negate the outcome of a prank (the poll-results being discarded as non-representative,
for example). also related to our KYFMS-rule.
thoughts?
Skaggs said he liked revealing his pranks because it was the only time you get to talk to the media really honestly about your cause. It's the whole point of the prank. According to Skaggs, everything is just a set-up from stage 1 to get your face on the camera and have the anchor say "why'd you do it, Joey?"
but you know my take on causes and other baggage:
A Cause is just an Excuse you don't have to appologize for.
Oh I love where this thread seems to be going :)
Quote from: Netaungrot on September 25, 2008, 10:47:59 PM
I don't think that wannabe rickroll guy was invested enough. I see what you're saying about being too invested. You're referring to people's egos being too invested in the prank, I'm suggesting that the conceptual basis for the prank itself is not invested in. Both of which apply to the shitty appropriation of the rickroll.
Ah yes, precisely what I was aiming for (and missed!) the EGO INVESTMENT! Planning, plotting, laying out the trap are all important... but often, the entire prank seems situated on the ego of the prankster, rather than the weakness of the victim... does that make any sense?
Quote
If I were to model this classic prank format as a process I think it would look like this:
1. Identify weakness to exploit
2. Plan bait/trap to fit weakness and method of exposing to the public
3. Gather resources and/or insertion of operatives
4. Implement the fuck out of that bitch
5. Review the efforts for improvement or memoirs
Does anyone have issues with this strategy? What would you change?
I agree with 000, this is nice and follows the basis of what I do when dealing with security assessments.
Quote
on a different note, Ratatosk, could you perhaps expand on the need to expose a prank once it's completed?
because i can see two scenarios, that differ on the "point" of the prank.
- if the "point" is the exploitation of a weakness that you/we think the target should not have, it is important to reveal the
prank, so it becomes obvious that the target has this weakness. examples of these weaknesses range from general egoism, closed-
mindedness or herd-behaviour to real practical examples such as responsible disclosure of security vulnerabilities.
- but if the "point" of the prank is to complete a certain kind of goal that is related to the exploitation of the weakness, but in
a different way, say, shifting the outcome of some poll one way or another, or trolling/fueling a board-war between two un-allied
boards, it may be extremely counterproductive (or sometimes even dangerous) to reveal/expose/disclose the prank, trap, mechanism and
whatnot. it could prevent the same technique from working again in the future (which is the point of the responsible disclosure in
the previous scenario) or at its worst it could negate the outcome of a prank (the poll-results being discarded as non-representative,
for example). also related to our KYFMS-rule.
THIS!!!
Revealing the prank is an important step if you're dealing with the sort of prank intended to expose. Cram's comment on Joey seems in line with his goal, which, in all honesty is about Joey promoting Joey's opinions, ideas and philosophy (see 'too invested') ;-)
However, what seems more traditionally trickster and less traditionally part of the 'prankster community' (or whatever its called), is tricking to teach the victim, or tricking to exploit the victim for personal gain of some sort.
Pranktivism requires the revelation of the prank, because it promotes the view of the prankster. The Yes Men, Joey Skaggs, etc all seem to fall into this group. They prank for the ideals that they believe in, particularly to promote those ideals. Thus, the revelation is very important.
The trickster/prankster, particularly in story, however, was not focused on the revelation of the prank (the revelation of the prank was almost always by the storyteller, by telling the story). Rather the prankster/trickster played his pranks and tricks for personal gain or to teach someone something... though usually, I must say it appears for personal gain. Crow teaches man to fish, then learns how to trick the fisherman and steal the bait for dinner. Coyote loses his eyes, so he tricks other creatures into giving up theirs for him. Hermes steals Apollos cows, kills them and sacrifices them, so HE can attain godhood. Eris slings the apple for revenge.
In most of those cases, the TRAP, the mechanism is based on failings in the victim. Man trusts Crow and doesn't grok that Crow is nipping off with the bait (Crow exploited trust), Coyote tricks animals into giving him eyes through flattery (appeal to vanity) or cunning, Hermes tricks Apollo through exploiting Apollo's personality. Eris knew the goddesses vanity and how to exploit it (remember, 'The prettiest one' at a wedding is always the bride...)
The humans, animals and Sun God may have learned something about themselves and the trickster. If so, however, it was incidental to the tricksters main goal, feeding his belly, seeings, gaining power, getting revenge.
In those examples, the mechanism of the trap, the vulnerability and the way in which it is exploited, become the primary focus. The victim gets all the attention, while the trickster perhaps puts on a mask, hides his intent, changes his nature... in order to catch the victim. Modern day pranksters seem intent on their nature and their intent and thus, if there is a mask, its a temporary one, only there long enough to CATCH the victim, then torn away to reveal the Purpose.
Trickster in archetype though, often takes on a disguise, changes his nature or somehow obfuscates his involvement in a prank. Even after the trick is done, trickster often seems to simply fade away, slip into the crowd or otherwise sneak off without revealing himself to the masses (See Loki and Balder).
So for us, I suppose it will depend on the type of trick, if we hope to show someone a weakness, or to exploit a weakness to show the world... then exposing the prank will be very important. However, if the goal is to gain an advantage, to screw with a norm or to otherwise play trickster... then the mechanism seems far more impoarant, and perhaps revelation is less important, or not at all important...
IN SOME SENSE.
If you reveal the exploit, you cannot continue to use the exact same one.
In other words, if you intend to blow it, do it with either a high impact one, or a one-hit wonder exploit that you won't be able to use again.
Quote from: Ratatosk on September 29, 2008, 05:39:21 PM
... but often, the entire prank seems situated on the ego of the prankster, rather than the weakness of the victim... does that make any sense?
Yes, and it's more than pranks - I've seen lots of ego in online Discordia too. Look at the Wikipedia kerfuffle... everyone trying to get their names on there and getting seriously pissed off about it. Ego is something that it is hard to transcend. I got a bit of a thrill when some of my horrible writings showed up in the Apocrypha or wherever... but I got to a point where I just didn't care anymore... especially when I got involved with the Babylon Project, where no one's name was on anything... unfortunately, that doesn't seem to have panned out.
off-topic, but -- what was the Babylon project?
Project Babylon was a project allegedly commissioned by the Iraqi president Saddam Hussein during the Iran–Iraq War to build a series of superguns. The design was based on research from the 60s Project HARP led by the Canadian artillery expert Gerald Bull. Although the details are sketchy, it appears that there were four different devices in total included in the program.
Or its this
http://www.babylonproject.org/index.html
Quote from: Cain on September 21, 2008, 07:23:16 PM
Haven't got time for a long ass reply.
Here are some ideas from other people you may want to incorporate into the discussion however.
Skilluminati:
We live on a planet with 6 billion humans, and most of them are uninformed and ignorant. Here in the United States, despite high standards of living and abundant material wealth, the situation is no different.
[...]
Don't mistake this for crowing about how dumb people are. This is a serious and intractable problem. The vast majority of voters in the United States are dangerously ignorant and easily manipulated.
Here's the moral quandary: is it ethical to use deception in order to control these people? If you don't do it, guess who will? Karl Rove. Rick "not about the issues" Davis. The same paid operatives who have been running the real power structure of the United States since John Rockefeller and Edward Bernays were alive.
Here's the logistical problem: how can you and I compete against multi-million dollar budgets? The business of spectacles, like any other, is a business that runs on money. Those who have money shape the spectacle, and the rest of us are consigned to...well, meaningless critiques on obscure websites.
[...]
As I said at the outset of this project, "my interest in 5GW (5th Generation Warfare) is rooted in it's potential for positive social and cultural change." I am investigating warfare for the same reasons I investigated psychology and marketing -- beacuse the tools of social control will be less damaging when they're widely distributed. Executives who have power over millions of other humans are inherently dangerous -- millions of humans with executive control over themselves is where we're headed this century.
The dinosaurs of governments and corporations and media conglomerates and think tanks and universities -- the old legitimate White Control System -- will not let go quietly and politely. So I think every future mutunt has a common-sense obligation to learn how to disable and disarm them as effectively as possible.
Matt Mason, The Pirate's Dilemma:
Disruptive new D.I.Y. technologies are causing unprecedented creative destruction. The history of punk offers us valuable insights into how this new world works. Punk was an angry outburst, a reaction to mass culture, but it offered new ideas about how mass culture could be replaced with a more personalized, less centralized worldview.
Punk has survived in many incarnations musically—it became new wave, influenced hip-hop, and conceived grunge and the notion of indie bands. But more important, its independent spirit also spurred a do-it-yourself revolution. D.I.Y. encourages us to reject authority and hierarchy, advocating that we can and should produce as much as we consume.
[...]
Punk had high ideals—it looked aggressive and scary, but through its angry critique of society and subversion of it, it sought to change the world for the better. Punk capitalists are using the same techniques, subverting a world full of empty corporate gestures, manufacturing businesses and products with meanings that attempt to inject substance back into style. Punk injected altruism into entrepreneurship, a motivator of people long overlooked by neoclassical economics. Not only that, punk made the idea of putting purpose before profit seem cool to an entire generation. It manufactured new meaning in an area where it was really needed.
[...]
Hip-hop has forged such a strong connection with so many, it can create change like no music scene before it. "I don't think there is any place it doesn't exist," says Daymond John of the movement he grew up with. "Hip-hop artists are addressing the U.N. It could actually overthrow governments. This is the communication of the poor. Music is one of the most powerful ways people communicate with each other. There is no limit to this." Hip-hop has proved to be a great way to generate money, but it's now in a position to generate some serious social change, too.
Chang also cites studies such as the UCLA freshman survey that points out that "the hip-hop generation's rate of participation in voluntarism, in political protest and in activism on a wide range of issues is much higher than that of the baby boomer generation during their youth.. . . The myth of an apathetic generation—one even upheld by some of our youngest public intellectuals—is one of the most baseless and insidious lies of our era."
[...]
Today's flash mobs are the digital Situationists, increasing the peace, subverting the norm, and making us laugh. Each one is different and unique; the only thing they have in common is their transience. But flash mobs are just one new phenomenon; many things are becoming just as temporary. Nanocultures rise and fall in months. Goods are ever more disposable. Owning something is becoming less important than the right to access it. Gibson was right: things that used to be meaningful no longer carry the same weight. Youth cultures and fads have become marketing tools, but deeper underground, something else is happening.
Instead of the subversive words of youth cultures such as punk and hip-hop, the actions of a new breed of nanomovements and subversive systems are sweating the smaller stuff, tearing old models to shreds, and finding new ways to construct meaning and movements. The nanos still add up to something. It seems depth is a thing of the past, but again, this is just how it looks on the surface.
Welcome to youth culture's great disappearing act.
The Art of Memetics:
In contemporary society examining survival pressures means looking at the socioeconomic system within which people are embedded. Memes that make their host unemployable have smaller potential populations, and contravening the social mores and norms endangers the host's survivability and reduces the meme's communicational effectiveness. It is detrimental to memetic survival to promote behavior that destroys the host's ability to maneuver in a social space.
However, there is no reason to assume memetics requires language to operate. All identity construction, in addition to being a kind of bricolage, is also existent only within a social context. You do not have an identity without some kind of community formation against which to project that identity. This community space is also a theater in which performance and stress builds connections....The propaganda of the deed is most commonly pictured as terrorism, but can mean any dramatic or awe-inspiring action designed as communication. In the past the actions only affected those who were physically present. If those not present were effected it was via a retelling or textualizing. Today's media environment in which events and actions are filmed, associated with various emotional markers through juxtaposition and shown directly to many people repeatedly has widened the impact of these types of communication. It is against this backdrop of our current communication structure that terrorism has gained its modern power and prevalence, as it is one thing to be told that hundreds of people have died in an event, but it is quite another thing entirely to be shown the event in all its drama, movement, and color.
You don't convince someone by pushing what you believe against what they believe. It is when their belief system is questioning itself that you can lean in and offer what you want them to do or believe as the answer to the instability. Point out contradictions inherent in their belief system and they themselves may throw it out of balance. Get them to question one end of their beliefs using another end and then offer your meme as the solution to the feelings of doubt.
Adorno and Horkheimer, The Culture Industry
Those who are so absorbed by the world of the movie—by its images, gestures, and words—that they are unable to supply what really makes it a world, do not have to dwell on particular points of its mechanics during a screening. All the other films and products of the entertainment industry which they have seen have taught them what to expect; they react automatically. The might of industrial society is lodged in men's minds. The entertainment manufacturers know that their products will be consumed with alertness even when the customer is distraught, for each of them is a model of the huge economic machinery which has always sustained the masses, whether at work or at leisure—which is akin to work. From every sound film and every broadcast program the social effect can be inferred which is exclusive to none but is shared by all alike. The culture industry as a whole has molded men as a type unfailingly reproduced in every product. All the agents of this process, from the producer to the women's clubs, take good care that the simple reproduction of this
mental state is not nuanced or extended in any way.
Jay Abraham, Techniques of Stealth Marketing
Education is a powerful marketing technique. Educate your prospective buyers about everything (including a few of the bad or less positive aspects of your product or service) and you'll sell to almost twice as much people as you do now.
The Psychology of Entertainment, Wyer and Adaval
The images created by the entertainment media, whether encountered in a darkened movie theatre or in sitcoms, soaps, news reports, and advertising, do appear to blur the lines between reality and what we perceive it to be. These images can have a persisting influence on people's attitudes, beliefs, and behavior in ways that we have only recently begun to uncover. O'Guinn and Shrum (1997) paint
a compelling picture of the consequences of excessive television viewing. They find that heavy viewers of television are more likely than infrequent viewers to overestimate the frequency with which individuals drive luxury cars, have swimming pools in their backyards, or manifest other characteristics of an affluent lifestyle (see Shrum, Burroughs, & Rindfleish, this volume).
These effects occur in part because people are typically unmotivated or unable to identify the sources of information they have acquired (Hasher, Goldstein, & Toppin, 1977; Jacoby, Kelley, Brown, & Jasechko, 1989; Johnson, Hashtroudi, & Lindsay, 1993). Thus, they fail to distinguish between their memories for actual events they have read about or personally experienced and their memories of fictional events they have seen on television. Consequently, they often retrieve and use these latter events to estimate the likelihood that the events occur in daily life. In many instances, people are unaware of the biasing influence of the media on their estimates. But even when they are conscious of bias, they do not know how much they should adjust to compensate for it (Petty &Wegener, 1993). Consequently, they can often fail to adjust enough or, at other times, can adjust too much.
Bob Altermeyer, The Authoritarians
I have discovered in my investigations that, by and large, high Right Wing Authoritarian students had simply missed many of the experiences that might have lowered their authoritarianism. Take that first item on page 59 about fathers being the head of the family. Authoritarian followers often said they didn't know any other kind of families. And they hadn't known any unpatriotic people, nor had they broken many rules. They simply had not met many different kinds of people or done their share of wild and crazy things. Instead they had grown up in an enclosed, rather homogeneous environment--with their friends, their schools, their readings, their amusements all
controlled to keep them out of harm's way and Satan's evil clutches. They had contentedly traveled around on short leashes in relatively small, tight, safe circles all their lives.
Interestingly enough, authoritarian followers show a remarkable capacity for change IF they have some of the important experiences. For example, they are far less likely to have known a homosexual (or realized an acquaintance was homosexual) than most people. But if you look at the high RWAs who do know someone gay or lesbian, they are much less hostile toward homosexuals in general than most
authoritarians are. Getting to know a homosexual usually makes one more accepting of homosexuals as a group. Personal experiences can make a lot of difference, which is a truly hopeful discovery. The problem is, most right-wing authoritarians won't willingly exit their small world and try to meet a gay. They're too afraid. And "coming out" to a high RWA acquaintance might have long-term beneficial effects
on him, but it would likely carry some risks for the outgoing person.
A New Spin on Groups: The Science of Chaos
Butz explains that, during stable periods in their lives, individuals are able to achieve a fixed, yet transitory, sense of self. However, these periods remain stable only until the psyche encounters novel material, which it is unable to integrate within its current mental configuration. When the mental apparatus is disrupted, chaos ensues, followed by a period where the organism reorganizes at a higher level of complexity. This process seems compatible with that inferred in Freeman's brain research mentioned earlier. As the organism develops higher and higher levels of complexity and adaptation, it alternates between periods of stability and chaos. However, as Butz notes, the chaotic periods are far less frequent than are the stable ones.
[...]
According to Butz, psychic chaos and subsequent self-organization signal a creative gestation period wherein the psyche reorganizes itself to accommodate or integrate novel material. Both Butz and Jung discuss the link between chaos and creativity, recognizing what so many others have—that psychic turbulence is a necessary condition prior to new insight or creation of a new psychic structure. As an artist might struggle with containing chaos to create, so too must an individual in the throes of psychic upheaval manage chaos while undergoing a transformation.
During chaotic periods, the unconscious issues forth symbolic images or mandalas. These mandalas, containing symbols of the self, are expressed in a mathematical structure. They appear to be compensatory. Mandalas both express and create order in opposition to ongoing psyche chaos. Butz concludes that "these symbolic representations of the transitory self may also act as a container to focus chaotic experience toward an organized state. As a consequence, the mandala (Fig. 4.2) or the symbol seems to function as an attractor that brings about order. "What is fascinating about these mandalas are the incredible similarities they have to the fractal images so prevalent in the geometry of chaos.
Culture Jamming
Meanwhile, the question remains: How to box with shadows? In other words, what shape does an engaged politics assume in an empire of signs?
The answer lies, perhaps, in the "semiological guerrilla warfare" imagined by Umberto Eco. "[T]he receiver of the message seems to have a residual freedom: the freedom to read it in a different way...I am proposing an action to urge the audience to control the message and its multiple possibilities of interpretation," he writes. "One medium can be employed to communicate a series of opinions on another medium...The universe of Technological Communication would then be patrolled by groups of communications guerrillas, who would restore a critical dimension to passive reception."
The Power of Persuasion, Robert Levine
Psychological disarmament is what often sets the stage for persuasion. One of life's crueler ironies is that we're most vulnerable at those
very moments when we feel in least danger. Unfortunately, the illusion of invulnerability pretty well defines our resting state. Even when there is no manipulative outsider pulling our strings, most of us have a tendency to view our futures with unrealistic optimism. Studies have
shown that people generally approach the threats of life with the philosophy that bad things are more likely to happen to other people than
to themselves. With uncanny faulty logic, most people will tell you they're less prone to become victims than everyone around them.
[...]
Research shows that if you subject people to weak versions of a persuasive message, they're less vulnerable to stronger versions later on,
in much the same way that being exposed to small doses of a virus immunizes you against full-blown attacks. In a classic study by William McGuire, people were asked to state their opinion on an issue. They were then mildly attacked for their position and given an opportunity to refute the attack. When later confronted by a powerful argument against their initial opinion, these subjects were more resistant than were a control group. In effect, they developed defenses that rendered them immune.
Quote from: Cain on October 01, 2008, 04:22:58 PM
Or its this
http://www.babylonproject.org/index.html
Both! :)
Most of what is currently at Castlechaos is output from that project, but Tales of Eric has much more to it than what I have on CC and there is much more output than is on the project site. I think it may have been lost by one of our operatives, however.
Quote from: Cain on October 01, 2008, 04:22:18 PM
Project Babylon was a project allegedly commissioned by the Iraqi president Saddam Hussein during the Iran–Iraq War to build a series of superguns. The design was based on research from the 60s Project HARP led by the Canadian artillery expert Gerald Bull. Although the details are sketchy, it appears that there were four different devices in total included in the program.
Gerald Bull. The most awesome Canadian ever, hands down.
Better even than Pierre Trudeau.
I think I had a breakthrough on this last night, ironically while I was reading my notes on 5GW.
Here is Curtis Gale Weeks, explaining how 5GW warriors may organize an attack on society:
In considering unnatural natural disasters, my primary focus, though unstated, was a consideration of the use of physical force: how could a 5GWarrior utilize physics to goad a target down a path, confuse a target, and ultimately create effects beneficial to the SecretWarrior's war on its target. But each of the methods mentioned or implied has a weakness, since the creation of unnatural natural disasters, the application of terrorist acts, etc., are traceable. Such acts have effects which are not only obvious — thus, may raise suspicion — but because they rely on the physical world, they allow the target to piece together physical evidence and, thus, they allow the target to build a clearer picture of the cause. They allow the target to observe what is real even though a target may fail to do so and therefore may fail to properly piece together the physical patterns.
Framing a patsy or proxy may serve to confuse the target for a time; it might be an effective tactic, leading to a false puzzle as pieces of physical evidence are joined; but as already implied, the 5GWarrior may not want to depend so much on a patsy's complicity — and, physical evidence never lies, though a victim might fail to hear the truth.
How does a 5GW force initiate activity; or, put another way, how does a 5GW force influence its targets to take the steps toward self-destruction? One way may be through some application of physical force, but a direct application risks discovery. Framing a patsy risks discovery. What if, however, another organization committed the act? What if al Qaeda or some domestic terrorist organization could create the disaster the 5GWarrior wants to inflict (as a goad) on the target? But then, how do you get that organization to do it?
One way might be a cross-framing, which is an old method: simultaneously commit acts against two parties who already hate each other, but make it look to each of them as if the other did it. Done well, such a framing — or, multiple framings in quick succession — could lead to the escalation of conflict between the two parties, and once the conflict reaches a certain tempo, the original acts are nearly forgotten. Cross-framing is a risky enterprise, however, because unless conflict escalates at a very quick rate, the target of 5GW may have time to observe the physical evidence of the terrorist acts. For instance, 9/11 has been observed and studied, over and over, in the current GWoT; if al Qaeda had been framed — a favorite conspiracy theory — chances are good that we would have discovered this fact and tracked the evidence back to the actual perpetrators. At the very least, we would be looking for those perpetrators.
What things are hardest to track? Answer: memes.
I think that it may only be fitting for 5GW to derive its difference, its evolutionary superiority, from the greater role of meme transference in our modern world; and that, in general, successive generations of war have developed as technologies and societies developed. The quick media cycle has observable effects on policy and decision-making, and 5GWarriors will make full use of media.
Dan tdaxp, quoting a song by VNV Nation:
"Soundless:
I'm saying nothing for the good of myself
but I'm still talking and you're not listening"
Why are you not listening? You are not listening, because you are already deciding, adding your voice to the chatter (if only mentally.) Listening is a different function than hearing. The 5GWarrior may still be talking, you may be hearing, but you are not listening. Why? Because you already agree or disagree with what is being said — I'm saying nothing for the good of myself. The 5GWarrior is speaking so that you have an opportunity to agree or disagree; he is giving you the opportunity to take a position and, thus, is making you free.
In Effectors, I contemplated on one nature of the SecretWarrior: The SecretWarrior as Benefactor:
No society is 100% homogenous, but the most influential members of the society (whether the society is a small group or a nation) are those who can promise the most benefit to the other members of society, whether the benefit is material in nature or psychological or social. To give an example: should a string of natural and not-so-natural disasters occur, those leaders, thinkers, and other members of a society who are able to mitigate or nullify the effects of those disasters are most likely to have the freest reins. They are certainly more likely to avoid suspicion — if, and only if, their efforts actually seem to lead, and ultimately do lead, to benefits.
A couple of successive comments on the Coming Anarchy thread point in a similar direction:
arherring said:
I agree that 5GW will be a networked organization, but I think the main weapon it will wield will be the idea of connectivity. I imagine it to be sort of viral, with each person in the organization being a vector to spread the idea be they a soldier, a diplomat, an engineer, or a relief worker.
John Robb said:
I'd like to offer an alternative to the above. What if GG's ignore the decision making of the government entirely (their entire OODA loop) and focus directly on the population/economy. This is the equivalent of turning the government's decision making loop into a tire in mud. You can work perfectly, but it can't get any traction.
A 5GWarrior may indeed focus on the population and may suggest methods of connecting, by offering new methods to arouse agreement or disagreement — depending on the effect he wants. How direct will the offering be? We certainly cannot discount the possibility of a messianic politician, celebrity, or religious figure for a 5GWarrior — nor, some powerful celebrity scoundrel, who offers the negative to reinforce our positive. But there may be other ways to do it: a new book is published, a new movie made, a new pop song is created, which strikes the right chord and influences large numbers of people; then, the SecretWarrior is not seen, because that actor is thought to be some member of the intelligentsia or is an artiste just doing his thing, and the new idea introduced is just "an idea whose time has come."
The 5GWarrior may operate in relative isolation, as well, as some adviser to a politician or business mogul, as a ghost writer, or as a friend or inspiration to an artist, who whispers in the ear of (media) power. This may be the most effective form. Certainly, this will be the least traceable form. He might be the friend of the adviser; there could be networks spanning across many fields.
Thinking of John Robb's implication in Emergent Intelligence (but also my follow-up conceptualization) that individual members of an emergent system may not even know they are members of that system — they are focused on local effects and activities, but their activities lead to the large-scale emergence — leads me to wonder if whispers in the ear might be tracked back to 5GW operatives by individuals. Those who have heard the whispers may later be able to know and remember who whispered, but because they are not fully aware of the total emergence in advance, they can't put 2 and 2 together until it's much too late to do any good. But on the other hand...
...the 5GW network will use physical force in a way that is not traceable to the 5GW network, because others will choose to be the actors. The patsies have chosen to be patsies, but they think they are doing their own work. What happens when you introduce the idea of "a clash of civilizations," in the right way to the right people? For instance. [Not that this is actually what happened.] So this 5GW theory is not mere politics, diplomacy, business, or punditry. Actual force, and particularly the reaction to force, are methods utilized by 5GW actors.
The 5GW force, in order to be effective, will look for emergence in advance, and will create the memes that will lead to the desired emergence. "Emergence in advance" is potential, unformed, no-form. In order to be effective, the 5GW force will highlight inequalities and insufficiencies which are already present although perhaps largely ignored; they will be market creators:
A more powerful reason that innovation is related to market shaping goes back to the military idea of the initiative. Companies take the initiative in the marketplace by offering a stream of new products and services. Where do new products and services come from? The only answer possible, discounting elves and gamma rays, is through the initiative of the people who work for and with the organization. A market creator uses the almost symbiotic relationship all of its people have with its customers to generate ideas for new features or capabilities or whatever. Stalk and Hout were dead on, when in the middle of describing how agile companies become entwined with their customers, they observed that "Sometimes it's difficult to know who's leading whom." [ed. — emphasis added.]
[Chet Richards, Riding the Tiger]
The Tao also describes the phenomenon, when describing the best leaders:
Hesitant, he does not utter words lightly.
When his task is accomplished and his work done
The people all say, 'It happened to us naturally.'
[last lines of #17, cited in Effectors]
Dan tdaxp, quoting himself in an earlier entry:
Formless:
In contrast to "hearts and minds," 5GW focuses on the enemy's "fingertips and gut." "Fingertip feeling," what the Germans called fingerspitzengefuhl, is the ability to know without thinking. This is what Americans call "gut feeling." To a certain extent, it means a commander trusting his intuition. It is critical in 5GW because fingertip feelings, or "hunches," will be the only way for the enemy to sense the fighter.
I think, however, that the target will not sense the fighter for a slightly different reason. The 5GWarrior does not subvert fingertip-feeling or confuse it. He utilizes it. The target has a true fingertip-feeling, but he is put in the position of having that particular hunch by the 5GWarrior. Part of the positioning is the introduction of data which then causes a "click" in the psyche of the target. The data can be a meme, and so influence rather directly; or, the data can be a physical manifestation of power created by the person who has been influenced by a meme. Such data can play into ignorances, biases, and bigotries, much in the same way that the introduction of a new product on the market can play into insecurities, fetishes, and hungers. Hunches are sometimes proved wrong — too late. (So when I say, true fingertip-feeling, I'm relying on this aspect of hunches.) In order to influence the largest number of people however, the data must be true if partial. Its partiality may serve to confuse in a larger system, and debate may then paralyze the target; but it is certainly true from some perspective, or the debate would be resolved rather quickly. Ideology and religion are powerful tools of the 5GWarrior, but the trappings of science may also serve the fighter. Once these things have "taken hold" of a society, tracing them back to the origin is nearly impossible.
So, then, how could a hidden 5GW force defeat a fuzzy 4GW force? Influence it to fight another force, one it already despises — and, preferably, one it cannot defeat. Or, introduce dispute within it, of the sort that would paralyze its activities, create massive amounts of in-fighting. Or, befriend it; give it real accomplishments (perhaps by surreptitiously influencing other parties who can give them these) which, nonetheless, lead to final outcomes quite different than it originally intended. Because a 4GW force tends to be decentralized, dependent on local actors and local activities, focus on influencing them. Do not try to destroy the 4GW force; focus on changing it.
5GW: No Gods, but Men. And Women. And Others.
Structure is so intimately bound up with strategy that it is difficult to imagine how one could make any lasting change in an organization's behavior without first making equally profound changes in its systems.
[Chet Richards, Riding the Tiger]
I think that, unlike 4GW networks, 5GW networks will not tend toward emergence but will consciously utilize emergence. They will not focus on local activity and a repetition of tactics on local scales hoping for an emergence of Victory!, nor will the masterminds simply deliver grand objectives to focus their low-level warriors on those local tasks. Because the direct application of force will rarely be a tactic used by 5GW operatives and psychological manipulation will be a primary role, each operative will be required to be a mastermind of sorts. Secrecy will require less communication with the actual mastermind if such a person exists, although networks of communication might be established between operatives which will be the typical communications networks for the positions they have secured. If low-level operatives are utilized, they will not realize they are being utilized, or at the very least they will not be aware of the 5GW organization.
Similarly, close-knit cells may or may not exist in 5GW networks, since quite possibly each 5GW operative will be assigned one person to influence, and operatives may be spread far apart. Such cells may form eventually as centers of power are created; but as this occurs, the cells will become dormant for a time or at least the operatives within them will be much less active. (If they act, they risk the discovery of the entire network.) Whatever nodes are created, in the form of close-knit cells, may be abandoned after a certain objective is achieved; i.e., these nodes may be receptors of information which will be used by other operatives in other places. Operatives in these cells will no longer work on manipulation, but will provide the information for those in other places who do manipulate. However, individual operatives may be assigned to individual targets within a single organization to better gain influence within that organization — they are essentially operating alone, however, on individual targets. (Each strategy of manipulation is highly dependent on the character, intelligence, and history of the target.)
Unlike 4GW networks and the organizations of other types of military organizations, 5GWarriors will utilize 4GW, 3GW, etc., forces to accomplish their goals, as well as financial organizations, NGO's, artists, journalists and celebrities. This might not necessarily be an attempt at destruction of any of these other entities, since the 5GW network might actually benefit from the ascension of another force.
The strategy of a 5GW force, in utilizing emergence, is the shaping of new paradigms which will shape the geo-economic-social-political framework. The only theater of operation is global; and the only goal is global domination. But most people will not realize that they have been dominated.
That's some good shit in there.
Even though I know little of 5GW, I think there are a few bits and pieces in there that are quite similar to my own thoughts. I don't know if I have the capacity to pull them all together though, and make something more from this.
Still :mittens:
A sort of artistic secret society, propagating what we consider useful memes, was where my mind originally went. But recall, I was reading this at 1am and so was pretty tired. I may have to think on it more. But going back to Discordian roots, in a sense (in producing books, music, works of art etc which act as carriers for Discordian memes) was what immediately struck me as the obvious way to do this.
Of course, that requires going back to our trusty copies of The Art of Memetics and putting in some serious introspection. As a basic prerequisite.
Quote from: Cain on October 02, 2008, 01:21:28 PM
A sort of artistic secret society, propagating what we consider useful memes, was where my mind originally went. But recall, I was reading this at 1am and so was pretty tired. I may have to think on it more. But going back to Discordian roots, in a sense (in producing books, music, works of art etc which act as carriers for Discordian memes) was what immediately struck me as the obvious way to do this.
Of course, that requires going back to our trusty copies of The Art of Memetics and putting in some serious introspection. As a basic prerequisite.
On my "to do list"
Actually read the art of memetics (I still haven't, I have no idea why not)
Actually read your 5GW thread, instead of just skimming over it.
I may be able to make something with this if I give myself the tools to do so.
This may be of interest. Its a segment from William Gibson's Pattern Recognition which Weeks mentioned, and which I read most of last night:
[Bigend] "This business of ours is narrowing. Like many others. There will be fewer genuine players. It's no longer enough to simply look the part and cultivate an attitude."
Cayce has imagined something like this herself, and indeed has been wondering whether she's likely to make it through the narrowing, into whatever waits on the other side.
"You're smart enough," he says. "You can't doubt it."
She'll take a page from his book, then. Caltrop time. "Why are you rebranding the world's second-largest manufacturer of athletic shoes? Was it your idea or theirs?"
"I don't work that way. The client and I engage in a dialogue. A path emerges. It isn't about the imposition of creative will." He's looking at her very seriously now, and to her embarrassment she feels herself shiver. She hopes he didn't notice. If Bigend can convince himself that he doesn't impose his will on others, he must be capable of convincing himself of anything. "It's about contingency. I help the client go where things are already going. Do you want to know the most interesting thing about Dorotea?"
"What?"
"She once worked for a very specialized consultancy, in Paris. Founded by a retired and very senior French intelligence type who'd done a lot of that sort of work on his government's behalf, in Germany and the United States."
"She's ... a spy?"
" 'Industrial espionage,' though that's sounding increasingly archaic, isn't it? I suppose she may still know whom to call, to have certain things done, but I wouldn't call her a spy. What interested me, though, was how that business seemed in some ways to be the inverse of ours."
"Of advertising?"
"Yes. I want to make the public aware of something they don't quite yet know that they know — or have them feel that way. Because they'll move on that, do you understand? They'll think they've thought of it first. It's about transferring information, but at the same time about a certain lack of specificity."
Quote from: Cain on October 02, 2008, 01:34:54 PM
This may be of interest. Its a segment from William Gibson's Pattern Recognition which Weeks mentioned, and which I read most of last night:
[Bigend] "This business of ours is narrowing. Like many others. There will be fewer genuine players. It's no longer enough to simply look the part and cultivate an attitude."
Cayce has imagined something like this herself, and indeed has been wondering whether she's likely to make it through the narrowing, into whatever waits on the other side.
"You're smart enough," he says. "You can't doubt it."
She'll take a page from his book, then. Caltrop time. "Why are you rebranding the world's second-largest manufacturer of athletic shoes? Was it your idea or theirs?"
"I don't work that way. The client and I engage in a dialogue. A path emerges. It isn't about the imposition of creative will." He's looking at her very seriously now, and to her embarrassment she feels herself shiver. She hopes he didn't notice. If Bigend can convince himself that he doesn't impose his will on others, he must be capable of convincing himself of anything. "It's about contingency. I help the client go where things are already going. Do you want to know the most interesting thing about Dorotea?"
"What?"
"She once worked for a very specialized consultancy, in Paris. Founded by a retired and very senior French intelligence type who'd done a lot of that sort of work on his government's behalf, in Germany and the United States."
"She's ... a spy?"
" 'Industrial espionage,' though that's sounding increasingly archaic, isn't it? I suppose she may still know whom to call, to have certain things done, but I wouldn't call her a spy. What interested me, though, was how that business seemed in some ways to be the inverse of ours."
"Of advertising?"
"Yes. I want to make the public aware of something they don't quite yet know that they know — or have them feel that way. Because they'll move on that, do you understand? They'll think they've thought of it first. It's about transferring information, but at the same time about a certain lack of specificity."
Ah Gibson, though that's one of my least favorite Gibson books, its a damn fine read! ;-)
Why not view the self as a vast collection of separate entities (memes) that fight for temporary control of your body's agency? In that sense, there is no singular self, but instead a community of conflicting beings all of whom are selves.