I was looking to make something I can thumb through before bed, and also something I can share to tell people about the great stuff Dolores LaPicho is doing, so I compiled a bunch of the Chaos Marxism (http://chaosmarxism.blogspot.com/) posts into a document.
This doc will probably change. There's still a lot of formatting that needs to be done, and I wasn't sure which posts should be included. I'm waiting for some pointers from Dolores as to which ones should definitely be included. But I basically made this for myself, so I'm not sweating it too hard at the moment. If people seem to dig it, the energy may kick it up to a higher orbit of effort.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/48887820/A-Chaos-Marxism-Primer
Sounded OK until it got to the really hippie-dippy shit towards the end (I'm referencing the top post on the blog page).
I was asking myself something along the lines of "hmm, this sounds pretty spot-on so far...I wonder why they had to ruin something with so much promise by calling it something as stupid as 'Chaos Marxism'?"
Then I got to #12 and vomited in my mouth a little, but at least the ridiculous terminology suddenly made sense.
I think Chaos Marxism is actually a pretty apt name for it.. Dolores combines marxism and discordia - from my point of view, it's a pretty fresh take on things.
Personally, I've been experimenting with the gnostic reality tunnel; I've been following a trail that Dolores has blazed, but I'm definitely arriving at a new place.
I'm not real big on revolutionary grandstanding or far left ideologies, but I think the meat is that Dolores is showing us how to connect our small day to day actions with a higher cause. Unifying the micro and the macro. Also some good insight on slaying the ego, which is something I struggle with. Dolores' presentation of the nafs shook me up proper.
To me, it has the same vibe as that section in the BIP about how we can't change the world, but we can change our reality, and eventually there will be an overlap and we will have build a new world together.
Yeah, I wrote that section and believe me, any sort of marxism was not what I had in mind. :lulz:
well duh :lol:
My intuition is that much of this stuff will resonate with people here if they can get over kneejerk reactions to words like Marxism and Magic. Personally, I find it all very challenging. It comes from outside my reality tunnel, so it's provoked me to think things in new/different ways.
Dolores is one of the few people outside our community to be influenced by the Black Iron Prison, so I don't want to just brush it off because some of the language does not mesh well with our subculture.
ANYHOW - here's an x-post from Chaos Marxism:
CHAOS MARXIST APHORISMS
BASIC CONCEPTS
1. YOU ARE WHAT YOU DO. If you want to be something else, do something else.
2. Belief follows action.
3. You are NOT a Beautiful and Unique Snowflake. Nor are you the Chosen One.
4. Just because a friendly voice is muttering in your head that You Are The Chosen One does not mean it's telling the truth.
5. Nothing is more fatal to magickal success than a magical worldview.
6. Politics, magick, psychology, advertising, propaganda are ALL THE SAME THING – attempts to describe and alter consciousness.
7. The only true witch or Magus is she who realises that there are no cosmic forces.
8. To be a witch or Magus, you've got to learn three things – what's real, what's not real, and what's the difference.
9. There are no mistakes except one – the failure to learn from a mistake.
10. Destroy your own icons and enabling narratives. They will keep you safe and neutered. Most people would rather destroy life, limb or property than do this.
11. The world doesn't owe you jack, no matter how brilliant or unique you are.
12. History will prove you right.
13. There is no Big Other. Once you have figured this out you have grasped the central point of all revolutionary politics and magick.
THE GOALS OF CHAOS MARXISM
14. Marxist revolutionary politics seek the coming to consciousness of the vast majority of people in the world – the goal of magick, the tools of politics.
15. In this sense, the Leninist cadre party is – ideally - a magical order of adepts.
16. The central goal of Chaos Marxism is to integrate chaos magick and dialectical materialism.
17. You may have a wrong idea of what being a Marxist is about from the idiots who try to sell you badly-xeroxed newspapers. Being a "revolutionary" is, in most cases, a mass-produced consumer product, just like any other lifestyle. People can talk all kinds of revolution and yet still be completely harmless.
18. The way you can tell a revolutionary from a political lifestyler is – are they trying to figure out how to engage the masses? Or are they just interested in recruiting to their cult?
19. For both the Leninist party and the disciplined magickal order, by making yourself available to it you are also used by it. If this offends your notion of yourself as a Beautiful and Unique Snowflake, then you are in the wrong game.
THE ENEMY IS LIFESTYLISM
20. Chances are, the "tribe" you cling to is a mass-produced consumer product.
21. If you're entirely hung up on your own "lifestyle", so determined to surround yourself with a fortress of The Right Kind of Stuff that you're incapable of thinking beyond your own self-image, then you're part of the problem.
22. Consumer culture is the opium of the 21st century masses.
23. "I am the Chosen One" is the opium of 21st century niche markets.
24. A lifestyle or a subculture is neither politics nor magick. It is a religion.
25. People will believe any insanity if it allows them to belong to a real or imagined community.
26. The logic of the "in-crowd" or the "enlightened few" is precisely what we are trying to destroy.
27. Civilization isn't about sealing yourself off from the rest of the world and your responsibility to it, and you don't get bonus marks just for being a nice or politically correct person.
28. The only antidote to mass-produced identities is an Identity of Opposition which is combined with a practice of effective opposition.
29. "The proletariat" is not a mass-produced consumer product. It is more like a kind of industrial waste. No-one wants to be a wage-slave. But in wage-slavery there is the potential of power.
30. The Real World of Horrible Jobs is everything that the Corporate Egregore sees as "chthonic" or even the Qlippoth. It's the dirty underside which you're not even supposed to look at. Here lies power, for those brave enough to grab it - but only collectively, not individually.
CHAOS MARXISM IS MATERIALIST
31. The idea that "ideas shape the world" could only have been invented by people who earn a good living from creating ideas.
32. If you believe in ideas as the highest good, you will find yourself incapable of effectively fighting actual material evildoing.
33. Middle-class intellectuals fall harder for propaganda than anyone else – because their entire lives are based on propaganda.
34. You can stay in your ivory tower and change your own reality infinitely. Until, of course, you need to go to work or deal with anyone but your immediate friends. That's the point where nasty reality cuts in. And nasty reality cuts in more and more the less money and internet access you have.
35. Blind materialism always has a dirty idealist secret in the background – and vice versa.
36. Dialectical materialism is the process of seeing which futures are possible, based on the contradictions of the present, and what kind of pressure on what kind of points right now will bring about which future.
37. There are not two words with a bridge between. There is only one world.
38. Meaning is material.
39. Ideas are material.
40. Ideas become real forces when they seize the masses.
41. Chaos Marxism is interested in practicality above all.
42. Your power lies in how much external reality you influence, not in how doctrinally pure you are.
43. Where is the money and the surplus labour going? Who pays and who benefits? Those are the questions you have to ask in every situation
44. There is no place for democracy and collective reality-tunnel-formation except in a materialist thought-system.
CHAOS MARXISM IS COLLECTIVIST
45. The "individuality" you are so proud of is also a mass-produced consumer product.
46. Once you accept that reality is individual rather than collective, you will never be a threat to the system.
47. The more I looked at the mystics and the psychonauts, the more I realised that for them "Question everything" meant "Question everything except the idea that individual consciousness is a thing unto itself which can be worked on in isolation".
48. If you start saying that people are not individuals - that they are created by their upbringing and the role they play in real, nasty, going-to-work-in-traffic society - then you open the door to the idea that only a social revolution can actually solve the real problems with humanity.
49. Everyone has their own part to play, no matter who or where they are.
50. No-one will ever be sane and healthy until we are all sane and healthy.
51. If the subconscious, unseen and cultural levels of the world are the ocean, then magick is all about being able to dive, swim, and get back on dry land safely. Eventually, we should be able to become psychic and cultural surf-lifesavers – a role that will be integral to a new society.
THE NECESSITY OF ACTION
52. Technology will not solve your problems for you.
53. The Apocalypse will not solve your problems for you. Global civilization will not collapse in a friendly manner so as to leave you and your buddies unscathed.
54. Since you are what you do, you will have to DO to BE. There is no substitute for doing.
55. There is no place to run, and no place to hide. So you will have to fight.
56. Socialism doesn't fall from the sky. Nothing does, except rain, snow, meteorites, and airplane toilet droppings.
57. Any course of action which can be summed up in the words "Wait and see" is the wrong one.
58. As far as religion or magick goes, ANYTHING works if you do it enough. It might not work as advertised, though.
59. Success breeds daring and failure breeds passivity.
60. The proper stance for a revolutionary is: pessimism of the intellect, optimism of the will. To know which is the winning side, and still join the other.
61. To use Situationist jargon, détournement which remains on the symbolic can always be recuperated. The only thing which really can dissolve all magic spells whatsoever is the self-activity of the masses.
62. A Marxist might call a picket line or a militant demonstration "an altered state of consciousness", since it takes place in an area not acknowledged to exist by the dominant paradigm of reality.
63. This side of the revolution, the revolutionaries are a minority.
64. Success comes to the strong. The struggle is hard and the struggle's long.
THE PAINKILLER OF THE MASSES
65. Religion, like any other painkiller or hallucinogenic, can be used for good or evil purposes. It can encourage you to lie around and stare at the ceiling, or kill your family, or it might take the edge off enough to allow you to accomplish something in the real world.
66. The way cults operate is just a boiled down and spiced-up version of the way in which all authoritarian society operates.
67. Some of the nastiest religions preach atheism and rationalism.
68. Judge every school of politics or magick, every religion or subculture, as to whether it enhances and promotes conscious, rational thought and ability to shape the world, or the opposite.
69. Most people do not base their actions on rational thought related to material reality. They base their action on stories which they partly pick up from their culture and partly make up themselves.
70. People who base their lives in images and narratives expect those images or narratives to be "morally true" – or "truthy" - not physically true or even logical.
71. Even if I know on an intellectual level that X is bullshit, if I act like it's real it becomes real for me at least.
72. People will happily swallow lies if it enables them to maintain the narratives that they live by.
73. Addictions, whether to chemicals or to abusive personal relationships or whatever - are a natural reaction to the World-As-Is.
74. Basing your life on images and narratives rather than the hard facts of material existence is much, much, much easier. And it will virtually ensure that you don't ever change anything.
CULTURAL REVOLUTION – A DO IT YOURSELF GUIDE
75. To put it in magical jargon, we start with the memes and thoughtforms which arise spontaneously from anti-corporate activity, transmute them magically to give them the best chance of survival and replication, and then release them back into the infosphere of the activity where they were born.
76. Metaphorical, narrative language can help people understand real although intangible forces better than intellectual jargon.
77. An effective political or advertising slogan has all the same characteristics of a meditative mantra.
78. The most effective advertising does not say "Brand X has qualities Y and Z"; instead, it presents a meme which associates X with Y and Z and leaves it up to the recipients to connect the dots. All the most virally infective memes require that the readers/viewers/listeners do some work to make some sense of what they are given – they are "pull" rather than "push" marketing.
79. Make your memes open-ended in possible meaning.
80. If you're not being misunderstood, you haven't been properly understood.
81. If you're not being attacked, you won't be supported.
82. Leave it noncommercial for as long as possible.
83. If you don't have a party, a mystic order or a scene, you have to start one.
84. A meme will spread if it fills a niche in the materially existing noosphere.
85. A successful memetic operation will work backwards in time - in other words, pick a possible future, and attempt to make it a real present.
86. Invoke often.
HACK YOUR OWN PERSONALITY
87. The rationality you were taught to survive in this world is often diametrically opposed to the rationality you will need to change it. Drugs or religion may create the "altered state" necessary to build an alternative rationality. Or they may screw you up.
88. Engaging in hostile banter is not politics or magick. It's a kind of sado-masochism.
89. Keep your recreational activities separate from your work, or one will begin to substitute for the other and both will suffer.
90. If you're not hated by a large group of people when you die, you didn't do it right.
91. Seek out mystical enlightenment, then subject it to the most merciless skeptical examination.
92. Arguments over what is 'good' rest on arguments about reality, even if they seem not too. 'Ought' does rely on arguments about what 'is'.
THE WORLD AS IS
93. The Devil (however defined) owns this world. It's his. You can either sell your soul, fight the power, or be irrelevant.
94. Propaganda and consumer culture fills the gap left by the decline of traditional forms of religion in modern society.
95. Capitalism destroyed all the old myths, but then had to create new myths to continually expand consumption and win our consent to the system.
96. An egregore is a magickal term for an ideological construct with a will of its own. We can see corporate capitalism in these terms.
97. It's no accident that psychology was born at the same time as mass consumer society and universal suffrage.
98. Corporate Psychology wants to make us functional, not to make us well.
99. The corporate egregore creates the needs it survives by supplying – including the need for meaning.
100. Our culture promotes isolation, alienation and paranoia as not only an ideal, but the highest ideal.
101. The "Green Zone" in Baghdad is the most effective microcosm of the World-As-Is.
102. Less bread means more circuses – the less food and shiny consumer items there are to hand out, the more lies and spectacles must be provided.
103. Corporate politics and management are memetics combined with brute force. Memetics are generally cheaper and have less unpleasant side effects than brute force, but need to be continually updated to remain effective.
104. Corporate (or Black, or brute-force) Memetics works through a barrage of constant mutually reinforcing impressions.
105. When corporate capitalism had succeeded in fulfilling the basic physical needs of its workforce, it then had to create new needs and desires in order to perpetuate itself.
106. The corporate egregore will stop existing the instant that the masses stop believing in it. That will only happen once the alternative begins to make sense to them. Your work is judged on how successful you are at making an alternative to the World As Is a real thing to real numbers of people.
107. Diversion of consciousness into impractical reality tunnels is one of the prime means by which the Corporate Egregore maintains its power.
108. Sometimes in the World-As-Is, you've got to shake the hand that feeds you. There is no virtue in starving. If you have a job, then you are at a point in the belly of the beast where it is possible to wound it – with help.
109. There is change in the World-As-Is, once you accept that the World-As-Is exists.
DON'T CONFUSE THE LEVELS
110. The struggle has to be carried on on three levels at once: industrial, political and ideological. Don't confuse these.
111. The map is not the territory - that symbols are only useful in so far as they serve the actual purpose on the ground. Ideology is an imaginary solution to a real problem – an attempt to "live in the map".
112. If you try to live in the metaphor you constructed, rather than using it as a guide to action, you will at best create just another religion, and at worst, create an internet subculture that people will laugh at.
113. The most powerful magic of all is what causes change on the level of the subconscious mind; on the level of Industry; on the level of the reality which doesn't go away when we stop believing in it.
THE FUTURE
114. The main indication that the future will be different from the present is that the present is different from the past.
115. Believing that there is change, that the future will be more than the present with faster cars and smellier air, is in fact a revolutionary act in itself.
116. Will the corporations collectivise humanity? Or will humanity collectivise the corporates?
117. Revolutions are not predictable. People don't wear nice colour coded symbols in a real revolution. They get drunk and smash shit up and in all other ways go over the top.
118. We adopt a reality-view that maximises our effectiveness in causing change-in-accordance-with-will in the real, physical, material world.
119. The revolutionary organisation must organise counter-hegemonic cultural movements.
120. We are not initiators of the New Culture - we can only hope to be its midwives.
121. Culture-from-below is always free, and often illegal – mainly because it subverts the intellectual property laws. The new world will have different definitions of property and reward.
122. Revolutionary commercial culture is ideally a kind of virus in the system, but sustained on the same logic as the system itself – the ideas contradict the commodity format.
123. Don't blame the media - become the media. Turn readers into writers, consumers into producers, buyers into sellers.
124. Propaganda and agitation are transitory, art is eternal – but they can have the same effect.
125. There is no future for small, independent capitalism. The only way to defeat the corporates is to go through them.
126. To defeat an enemy you must become symmetrical to it - then we need some kind of "egregore" (or cultural metaphor for struggle) equally strong on our side.
127. We will make sure the Ghost Point never happens. The 21st century is where it all starts – or stops.
see, as hard as I try, I just can't make it past the terms "magick" and "marxism".
Sometimes I think I have even more of a problem with people who KNOW that "magick" is bullshit and insist on using it to describe NLP/self-hypnosis/behavior-changing memes anyway than I do with people who actually think they can shoot fireballs from their fingertips.
I mean, we already have words for that sort of thing. I could probably even ignore the tenuous and somewhat idiotic-seeming connection to marxism if it weren't for that. This Dolores seems like they might be an intelligent and forward-thinking person but they definitely aren't taking their own advice regarding destroying their own icons and enabling narratives.
Right - but read Dolores' definition of magic in Aphorism 6. "Attempts to describe and alter consciousness." Most of what we discuss here on the board is magic in that sense. The language is similar to the model in the Art of Memetics - that politics, marketing, and magic are all ways of transforming both the world and the self. (The AOM carefully avoids the word Magic because it's such a loaded term, they probably wanted to avoid this exact discussion)
Dolores expands further in Aphorism 7 - "there are no cosmic forces."
And a magus is somebody who can make sense of these things and figure out what's real and what's not. Dolores isn't telling us what's real, he's saying we need to figure it out. As it says in the Chao Te Ching, "What works in the real world is correct." Who cares what word we use, so long as we all know what we're talking about? There is so much more here than the words "magic" and "marxism".
I feel like we're building this ivory tower. It's difficult to discuss things outside of the PD/forum norms because people get hung up on little things like this. It sort of reminds me of this this recurring discussion I have with an atheist I know - I talk about some aspect of religion or spirituality, and he is compelled to interject that All Religion Is Control. He's so stuck in that rigid idea that it shuts down any other thought. You can't talk to him about these things, he's so wound up for the opportunity to tell everybody what bullshit it all is and how stupid religious people are. It ends up being a very insular position.
It's not really such a little thing, though. Why not just call it what it is instead of FORCING the term "magick" onto it? Also, I read further despite how it made my eyeball twitch...it takes a sharp left turn into "Adbusters for the intellectually pretentious", doesn't it?
I mean, as hard as I tried, this:
Quote75. To put it in magical jargon, we start with the memes and thoughtforms which arise spontaneously from anti-corporate activity, transmute them magically to give them the best chance of survival and replication, and then release them back into the infosphere of the activity where they were born.
is just too fucking much for me to take.
The One Key and Nine Commitments of Chaos Marxism (amended draft)
We can sum up in one word the core of the Chaos Marxist approach. Mindfulness. Or, if you prefer, consciousness, or even Gramsci's good sense. Or Gurdjieff's "Remember yourself". The Sufi tradition, Buddhism and modern cognitive-behavioural therapy agree - being able to step back from compulsive thoughts and the compulsive feelings they evoke, to recognize them as not real, is the essence of psychic health and enlightenment. And Marxist theories of ideology insist that the way our rulers impose their control over us is by reification - mistaking illusion for reality, social relations for concrete things, narratives or memes for actual laws of existence. You can't live without an ego any more than you can live without money, but you must remember that it's not real, it's a convention, it only exists if you and others believe in it, and that it's a great servant but a hideous master.
On the micro-level, Chaos Marxism stands for the ruthless "obedience training" of the ego. Imagine that your ego is a badly trained dog - it barks when not necessary, it requires far more attention than it really needs, it humps your leg or otherwise annoys you when you're trying to do something. But you don't need to take it out and shoot it, you just need to teach it that its perceptions are not reality and it should submit to rationality and discipline. You'll all be happier that way. Indeed, your ego is the way it is because it evolved to help you survive in capitalism as it is; and one of the main ways that capitalism makes money in this day and age (and fosters obedience) is by selling pre-fab ego-identities to people. The ego cannot change "what is" because it has adapted to work with "what is". The "Greater Work" of Chaos Marxism, therefore, consists of the following commitments:
1. to learn how your ego works, and how it fits in with the broader culture, the media-industrial complex, the "identity industry" and mechanisms of social control;
2. to discover what your own physical, mental and spiritual needs and joys are, independent of the ego's needs, and to learn to provide for those needs;
3. to commit yourself to the service of Something Greater than your ego - humanity, the biosphere, God however defined, etc.
4. to bring the ego to the service of this Something Greater by discipline and rationality, rejecting all irrational beliefs, compulsions and pre-packaged identities as a snare and a delusion for the ego;
5. to "tune up" the ego so that the needs of Something Greater and your own personal needs can both be served. (If they appear to conflict, then you have misconceived one or both of them.)
On the macro-level, Chaos Marxism acknowledges that capitalism pollutes the cultural/information space, and therefore the psyche of all those subject to it, just as badly as it poisons the ecosphere and thus our physical health. Therefore, we encourage any and all social or political activity which increases consciousness of objective reality and dispels illusions. We suggest that would-be social activists combine their activism with the work of disciplining their own ego. Only that way can you get actual real objective knowledge of the World-As-Is, and what needs to be done, rather than prejudices reflected back off the inside of your skull. And also, only that way can you teach people by example that their own egos are part of the problem rather than part of the solution. This "Lesser Work" consists of a commitment to:
6. serving the Something Greater, as above, by concrete action for a better world where it will be easier for everyone to live free of illusion and slavery, physical, mental and spiritual;
7. practicing compassion for all living things, including yourself, by helping whoever wants to be helped in whatever way you can;
8. putting the lessons learned in the Greater Work into practice, by creating propaganda, art, and magick however defined that calls to awaken the "good sense" of the broad mass of people over the top of the "common sense" of ego and the cultural-ideological apparatus of oppression;
9. keeping the ego out of this Lesser Work by refusing the role of "guru", "leader", or in any other way trying to submit other wills to your own rather than liberate them on their own path to Something Greater.
I'm no guru or shaikh. I can't claim to be doing any of the above with anything other than fitful success. This is a path that I hope might be useful as a framework to others, but it's something I'm struggling with myself. For example, I will know that I have humbled my own ego when I feel free to use my real name on this blog, i.e. when I am no longer afraid of ridicule or abuse. So please, your comments and criticisms, please. This only becomes real when it's real for someone else but me.
Hey Cram, remember when we were doing the book club on Angel Tech, and people were complaining about A.A.'s use of language, so I started paraphrasing the chapters in terms we could digest more easily?*
Maybe you can take Dolores' core ideas and reword them so we don't get all facepalm-y?
*And that I never finished... Whoops.
ehhh I'm not really interested in rewriting all of Dolores' ideas so that they're inoffensive to this community. I wanted to discuss them, not sell them to you.
I couldn't get through Angel Tech in part because of the vocab -- so I can grok that the terminology is an obstacle to discussion here. I guess I'll tuck this one away for another forum. C'est la vie!
I do like some of what this guy says, I can't really accept the idea of forsaking individuality or destroying the ego. I think a lot of problems come from people not actually thinking for themselves, not actually being individuals.
As for the ego, letting oneself become consumed by it is bad, but destroying seems to be bad as well. Instead of hitting one extreme or the other, how about we find a nice middle ground?
We all just need to transmute ourselves magically and release ourselves back into the egosphere.
I think that's a pretentious way of saying "go rub one out", but I'm not sure.
Isn't that "releasing oneself into the used-sock-o-sphere"?
Quote from: Rip City Hustle on February 15, 2011, 08:04:34 PM
Quote75. To put it in magical jargon, we start with the memes and thoughtforms which arise spontaneously from anti-corporate activity, transmute them magically to give them the best chance of survival and replication, and then release them back into the infosphere of the activity where they were born.
is just too fucking much for me to take.
Is that saying much more than take the default reactions people have to X, and use that as a basis to put conscious effort into culture-jamming X? E.g. people get pissed at adverts being played louder than the shows, so a story about kids suffering hearing loss as a result may have legs.
I dunno, maybe it's because I come from a programming background, but I'm happy using different languages to express different ideas.. the translation isn't that hard if you don't allow yourself to get offended by the flowery jargon.
But the flowery jargon is not only offensive, it's unnecessary and counterproductive. How many people are likely to dismiss the ideas being presented because they DON'T make mention of things like "magick"? I'm guessing the answer is "damn near zero".
And I also don't understand why there is a need to tie something as universal and important as "learning to see the world for what it is and to react accordingly" with something as culturally niche-specific as an anti-corporatist or anti-consumerist stance.
I really like the piece, am still finishing it off at present.
It seems to collaborate a lot of ideas that are fairly useful. I'm having trouble understanding exactly what the goal is though; as far as I can tell it sort of seems to imply that if enough people begin to form systems and cultures built around a rejection of Capitalism, that some other system will win out. However, that's pretty contrary to the advice to ignore 'wait and see' answers.
The idea that the Ego is a badly trained dog is interesting.
I like the use of the magic stuff, but it does go over the top here and there. I noticed with AoM, one of the points was that it was selling the thinking as much as the thoughts; that the thought processes themselves were what were being sold. I suppose this is a similar situation though.
ECH you keep saying we already have a word for that sort of thing so why call it magic, but you never really mention what word. What's the magic word, ECH?
Personally, I think it's a perfectly fine term for people with a certain belief system. It's still about belief, though. And just like Christianity, there's a lot of different ways people use it or follow it. There's Christians that don't believe in evolution or that Jesus actually rose from the dead, and there's Christians that use the NT teachings as a sort of moral compass and are actually quite respectable (I get the impression you don't get those in the US, but they exist, some of them are my friends, too).
IMO it's useless to compare belief systems based on their worst examples. Because then, everybody is crazy.
One difference though, is dogma. Even the most sane Christian, still has some dogmas. While the most sane people working with magic, they often don't even believe in it themselves, let alone have dogma. I can respect that somewhat more.
And I think it's really a shame we can't discuss these topics, obviously written by the saner ones, without some asshole having to pretend he's one of the crazies and make shitty remarks like this:
Quote from: Rip City Hustle on February 15, 2011, 09:00:25 PMWe all just need to transmute ourselves magically and release ourselves back into the egosphere.
I think that's a pretentious way of saying "go rub one out", but I'm not sure.
Because I don't think we need to bring out the "Earth is 6000 years old" theory every time someone mentions Christian theology or quotes somebody that uses Christian metaphors in their writings (believing them or not), either.
Yeah zilch -- frequently on this board, people just scan until they find something they disagree with, then focus on that. *shrug* I think we've lost a lot of collective momentum because we get too hung up on sorting things into "good" and "bad".. We're quick to throw out the baby with the bath water. Whether or not you like the people Dolores is writing for, we have a lot in common with them -- many of us want to participate in something that makes the world more free, and improves ourselves in the process. I think it's useful to examine their ideas even if we use different vocabulary.
I've picked out some more aphorisms that I think might resonate here...
118. We adopt a reality-view that maximises our effectiveness in causing change-in-accordance-with-will in the real, physical, material world.
5. Material and social reality determines consciousness. The only real way to improve one's psychic health is to clean out the psychic toxic waste dump which passes for the mass media and popular culture under capitalism.
6. You don't have to believe in Marxism to be a Chaos Marxist. In fact, it's better that you don't.
7. Properly understood, Marxism (as in the reality-tunnel elaborated by Karl Marx, not his dodgy "acolytes" and "followers") is a cure for all forms of dogmatism and regimentation.
8. Human society and culture can be studied scientifically.
9. Knowledge is power - to be able to control what's real you need a damn firm grasp of what is real and what is the "common sense" of your personal and social reality-tunnel. That's the basis of the scientific method.
10. On all issues of the macrostructures of nature and the cosmos, Chaos Marxism is totally agnostic. All issues of contention should be appeals to scientific experiment - that is, if you do this, do predictable consequences ensue? That is our only yardstick for the usefulness or otherwise of particular reality models.
22. The aim is twofold: (a) to build unity between the workers in language and information, and the workers in physical production and services; (b) to learn the skills of the media priesthood to create our own "worker's symbolic universe" or "proletarian noosphere", independent from bourgeois culture (but not rejecting it - instead, building something better on its foundation).
24. Chaos Marxism calls for a firm commitment to what both Marx and Crowley would have recognized as science - dismissal of all myths, firm concentration on what forms of belief and systems of knowledge enable you to measurably and predictably cause changes in material and objective reality. Everything has to begin and end in the $2.99 material world (what the Maatians call "Level 10"), and if you're not doing that, you're not doing real magick, you're just astrally wanking.
25. The task for organic intellectuals / cultural-political magi / revolutionary witches / whateverthehell can't just be coming up with the ideology needed for our side to win. We need to come up with an entire culture, and by extension, an entire identity - or at least a framework in which new and better identities of opposition can grow. If we don't do that, people have no choice but to continue to believe that they are who the TV, the teacher, the boss and the priest tell them they are. We don't just need our own academy - we need our own entertainment, we need our own mythology, until the day we break through and can just be human.
44. Both New Age claptrap and mechanical materialism - both ideologies common among the corporate culture and the various subcultures which have sprung up as an "opiate" to it - are designed to render you powerless.
45. Most Marxist and anarchist sects use ritualised and useless forms of "political activism" as attempts to shore up their self-image and give them acceptable social and leisure opportunities, rather than actually trying to change the world, i.e. change mass consciousness.)
48. The pretend-Marxist cults, although holding to materialism as a dogma, by that very act betray Marxism - any dogmas, any ideas which are untouchable and unamendable, and the associated belief that those who hold the "correct" ideas are the elite, are against anything that Marx or indeed Lenin would have recognized.
50. Certain vulgar "illuminates" will tell that that that's as may be for the common herd (i.e. the people who empty their garbage, not the people who write the books they like to read), but the true homo superior are those who have evolved past such conditioned responses. If you believe that, just say the word "Marxism" to 99% of the Cosmik Consciousness Warriors based in the USA and listen to the drearily predictable responses you'll get.
61. A protest movement is NOT a community - when it becomes a "community", with its own "permanent" power structures and ethos, you're in the realms of small-group psychosis and you by Goddess should be looking to bust out.
84. Whether you like it or not, the unwashed, reality-TV watching, football-loving masses do the work which make it possible for you to eat. Unless you want a life of monastic poverty on a self-sufficient allotment, your only choices are to live off the proceeds of a system which requires that the vast majority of humanity be psychically and socially oppressed - or join with them on a mission of mutual enlightenment.
93. The idea is that human individuality will become possible for the first time after capitalism.
101. Consciousness and personality are performative rather than essential.
106. People who hang around on the internet are not the primary interest of Chaos Marxism, but they are a pretty good "petri dish", since they embody facets of the concrete global society "speeded up".
123. Lose your ego - your image of "yourself" and where "you" fit into your social setting, and your obsession with defending it - and you can become one with a current or force which can actually shape material reality.
143. Virtually any "radical cultural product" in this day and age is generally spot on about the problem, but falls down on the solutions.
153. The media priesthood have perfected memetics to the point where they can actually bypass the rational brain altogether and provoke, literally and directly, "gut reactions" (or groin reactions, for that matter). HOLY SHIT if we do not learn to do this ourselves and socialise the means of production and distribution of media signals (exchange will not mean anything in a post-itellectual property era), they may well perfect the means to control us with pleasure rather than pain and the species will be doomed.
156. RAW suggested that primate social reality was mainly based on simian territorial/dominance games. Chaos Marxism thinks that's a bit simplistic. For the last 200 years, the laws of market forces have taken more and more of a primary role, and we think that the cash nexus works on a different logic than primate dominance rules - which is why capitalism is much more progressive than any previous socio-economic system, and also much more destructive.
167. ye Illuminated Ones, make ye a choice right now - are you going to hypnotise yourself into being happy living on a quickly collapsing toxic waste dump, or are you going to hypnotise yourself into waking everyone up so we can clean the dump up together? Are you going to visualise yourself levitating over the bars of the prison, or are you going to lead a prison riot, take the place over and then figure out how to get everyone out?
170. A revolution will mean the people who don't have to lie to make their living taking over
171. To lead you have to learn as well as teach.
172. I'm not sure whether I'm thrilled or terrified by the idea that the central secret of consciousness is "I did it for the lulz".
Quote from: Dr. James Semaj on February 15, 2011, 08:55:26 PM
I do like some of what this guy says, I can't really accept the idea of forsaking individuality or destroying the ego. I think a lot of problems come from people not actually thinking for themselves, not actually being individuals.
I think that Dolores' position is that the ego we have now is made of capitalism. We wear it like a suit of armor, obsessed with identifying ourselves through products and tribe. We need a better one! Dolores thinks that the real individual will only be possible if we can develop our egos and individuality outside of the constraints and concerns of capitalism.
QuoteAs for the ego, letting oneself become consumed by it is bad, but destroying seems to be bad as well. Instead of hitting one extreme or the other, how about we find a nice middle ground?
Well you can't fully destroy the ego, we built it for survival. I see it as kind of like being on a diet - your GOAL is to cut the sugar out of your diet, but you know that you'll still sneak a cookie now and then.
I have to work against my ego, constantly. It's a distraction. I strive to act selflessly, but one can never really do that, so we have to settle for what we can.
Dolores writes about the Nafs, an idea in Sufism...
Quote from: http://chaosmarxism.blogspot.com/2010/04/was-it-all-just-hoax.htmlThe Sufis teach that the nafs (aka ego, aka "false self") is the trickiest little bugger, and will continually disguise itself as something else (God, the Greater Good, ascended Space Brothers, the Muse) in order to continue your slavery and addiction to it. Actually - connect the two paragraphs above. The individual ego is very, very much like money, in that (a) neither of them have any objective reality; (b) the capitalist system is defined by its elevation of both to the fundamental principle of life.
Quote from: http://chaosmarxism.blogspot.com/2010/12/youre-afraid-of-us-youre-afraid-of.htmlIt is said that the nafs (the self-perpetuating ego which has evolved as a defence mechanism to keep you alive and safe in this world but will try to ensure you don't change or grow) will tell you any lie in order to keep you trapped, and "YOU HAVE BEEN ENLIGHTENED, THEREFORE YOU HAVE MORE RIGHTS THAN THE BLINKERED SHEEPLE, INCLUDING THE RIGHT TO UNLEASH VIOLENCE ON THOSE WHO GET IN YOUR WAY" is a pretty effective trap.
good entry about ego here too http://chaosmarxism.blogspot.com/2010/06/oh-this-is-excellent.html
QuoteThe ego tries to remake the world according to its own self-perceptions. The ego will expect others to be friends with the same people we perceive as good and stay away from folks we see as bad. The ego will try to convince others of religious, political or other viewpoints. The arrogant ego will try to force others to be complimentary. The negative ego will see every bump in life's road as proof of their unworthiness.
Perhaps killing the ego is more along the lines of killing the desire to create 'proof' of personal perceptions. Perhaps it is closer to killing the need to force the world to fit within our parameters.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 04:06:21 PM
I have to work against my ego, constantly. It's a distraction.
Do you mean to weaken it, or redirect it?
Me personally? Sometimes I get elbow deep in a project, and I wonder what the real effect of that project will be. If I realize I'm only doing it to communicate something about myself, I have to take a big step back.
Likewise, my ego has this set of tastes ... if I listen to it, I end up approaching things I like and avoiding things I don't like. Over time this becomes a rut. The only way to snap out of the rut is to approach something I'm not comfortable with. The real trap of the Black Iron Prison is that you think the bars are protecting you.
As a really base example, this year I discovered that I like green peppers. I didn't like them as a kid, and eventually "I don't eat peppers" became part of my ego, something I use to explain myself and justify my actions. I had to slay this part of me, I had to overcome my petty little aversions, in order to grow.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 04:23:32 PM
Me personally? Sometimes I get elbow deep in a project, and I wonder what the real effect of that project will be. If I realize I'm only doing it to communicate something about myself, I have to take a big step back.
Likewise, my ego has this set of tastes ... if I listen to it, I end up approaching things I like and avoiding things I don't like. Over time this becomes a rut. The only way to snap out of the rut is to approach something I'm not comfortable with. The real trap of the Black Iron Prison is that you think the bars are protecting you.
As a really base example, this year I discovered that I like green peppers. I didn't like them as a kid, and eventually "I don't eat peppers" became part of my ego, something I use to explain myself and justify my actions. I had to slay this part of me, I had to overcome my petty little aversions, in order to grow.
Shit, I keep hanging around here, I'm going to have to start keeping a notebook and writing this shit down to remind me when I've got my head up my arse.
related discussion: http://www.blackironprison.com/index.php?title=Ego_Sickness
Thank you.
ETA: Spectacularly useful, at the moment, given that I've got a lot of changes going on (the divorce is just a start). Gives a little more form what I've been doing lately, which is, more or less, "hey, who the hell AM I, anyway?"
The language doesn't bother me so much, I mean its just words on a screen and probably won't taste good even with ketchup. I can get the general idea of what's being promoted. On the one hand, there are some interesting ideas and maxims here... on the other hand, I'm not particularly in agreement with this "Changing the World by going against The Man" kinda vibe i get from reading her stuff. This is the second time I've bumped into Delores work on Chaos Marxism... and I still find myself thinking that there's a disconnect between preaching that we must 'destroy our Ego' (or train it like a good dog) and 'Changing the World through <insert ideology here>'. There seems to be lots of Is and Is Not and Must and Should for someone that is talking about perception not being reality, belief being a bad idea and Ego being a general nuisance. There's also some self-deprecating "I'm just struggling to" kinda statements, but they seem to get overrun by the 'Truthiness' of the aphorisms, the Isness of the commentary on Capitalism and 'your responsibility to fix problem X'.
For Discordians/Chaoists/ChaoMarxists etc etc who WANT to be social activists from a left leaning perspective, this is probably good stuff. However, to me, it seems to have ego and belief all throughout it, while dismissing such things as bad at the same time.
Just my initial thought after looking at the topic a second time.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 04:23:32 PM
Me personally? Sometimes I get elbow deep in a project, and I wonder what the real effect of that project will be. If I realize I'm only doing it to communicate something about myself, I have to take a big step back.
Likewise, my ego has this set of tastes ... if I listen to it, I end up approaching things I like and avoiding things I don't like. Over time this becomes a rut. The only way to snap out of the rut is to approach something I'm not comfortable with. The real trap of the Black Iron Prison is that you think the bars are protecting you.
As a really base example, this year I discovered that I like green peppers. I didn't like them as a kid, and eventually "I don't eat peppers" became part of my ego, something I use to explain myself and justify my actions. I had to slay this part of me, I had to overcome my petty little aversions, in order to grow.
What I'm asking is.. if the urge to grow, the urge towards enlightenment, is not just another trick of the nafs? Does it set up a bundle of things (e.g. ruts, preferences against green peppers) just to shoot you a dopamine rush when you nuke those? And for what?
I mean, to me it seems like the quest for enlightenment makes people less effective at directing tangible change (http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=24825.msg1000830#msg1000830) in the world. It's stripping away aspects of individuality, and for what? Why is it so repugnant to want to express aspects of your individuality? Isn't it just branding? It may not be pure, it may leave an unpleasant taste in your mouth, but we know it's an effective way to enact change.
None of this is aimed at you, it's just I feel angry when I think I might have wasted years on self-doubt/purging/enlightenment quests, and for what?
"Nasruddin went galloping through Baghdad one day on his donkey. He went up every street and into every alley and across every plaza. Every place he goes, an unending race, a hunt and search. Everybody got curious, everybody came out of their houses, and they were all yelling, "Nasruddin, Nasruddin, what are you looking for?" He said, "I lost my donkey, and I'm looking for it."
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 16, 2011, 04:49:50 PM
I mean, to me it seems like the quest for enlightenment makes people less effective at directing tangible change (http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=24825.msg1000830#msg1000830) in the world. It's stripping away aspects of individuality, and for what? Why is it so repugnant to want to express aspects of your individuality? Isn't it just branding? It may not be pure, it may leave an unpleasant taste in your mouth, but we know it's an effective way to enact change.
Our reality has archons, prison guards if you will, who create the world we're living in. These are people whose beliefs and attitudes and goals affect us on a day to day basis. Most of these people work in politics or commerce. Sometimes we get lucky and a guy like Ghandi or Julian Assange or Timothy Leary rises to the top and something new gets injected into the system. What makes those the "good guys" IMO is that they base their actions on the betterment of our world, not just their own bank accounts. Timothy Leary didn't try to wake up the public so that he could get laid. He wanted to wake up the public, teach people how to operate their brains, and he cared about this so much that he was willing to go to jail for it.
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
Quote from: Chao Te ChingChapter 61
A successful cabal is like a dust cloud,
arriving from nowhere,
ungraspable,
and fading into nothingness.
The tallest blade of grass gets cut,
while the crab grass creeps unharmed.
Keep your head down.
Keep your fucking mouth shut.
Thus by concentrating on goals
without playing ego games,
much can be accomplished.
If all you want to do
is brag about how cool you are,
you might want learn to play the guitar, instead.
It seems like an extreme use of the word "ego", however. Keeping in mind that we're primates, the natural pack heirarchy needs to be taken into account, as well as individualistic problem solving. By imposing hivemind, the group structure becomes more fragile, and robs the group of the individual's specific quirks that may help overcome a specific obstacle.
Which is why Chapter 61 says "Thus by concentrating on goals/without playing ego games", instead of "Thus by concentrating on goals/and abandining ego".
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
And again, how can someone hold that kind of stance if they themselves do not have a strong Ego?
I keep trying but I haven't been able to recall a group of ego-less individuals that 'changed the world'. Yet, I can think of plenty of egocentric individuals, and groups which have.
Parts of this philosophy seem kinda confused to me.
You know, it is entirely possible here that the word "ego" is being used as a modified form of false consciousness (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness).
We're gonna need a glossary form Dolores to clarify the terms, then.
Quote from: Ratatosk on February 16, 2011, 05:32:46 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
And again, how can someone hold that kind of stance if they themselves do not have a strong Ego?
I keep trying but I haven't been able to recall a group of ego-less individuals that 'changed the world'. Yet, I can think of plenty of egocentric individuals, and groups which have.
Parts of this philosophy seem kinda confused to me.
Do you think that the civil rights movement would have taken off if people weren't willing to go to jail for it?
Imagine if Martin Luther King tapped out before they cuffed him.
If you really believe in something, you have to be willing to put your self in the back seat.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:42:48 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on February 16, 2011, 05:32:46 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
And again, how can someone hold that kind of stance if they themselves do not have a strong Ego?
I keep trying but I haven't been able to recall a group of ego-less individuals that 'changed the world'. Yet, I can think of plenty of egocentric individuals, and groups which have.
Parts of this philosophy seem kinda confused to me.
Do you think that the civil rights movement would have taken off if people weren't willing to go to jail for it?
Imagine if Martin Luther King tapped out before they cuffed him.
If you really believe in something, you have to be willing to put your self in the back seat.
And yet he put himself in the posistion for that to happen instead of just accepting the status quo.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 16, 2011, 04:49:50 PM
I mean, to me it seems like the quest for enlightenment makes people less effective at directing tangible change (http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=24825.msg1000830#msg1000830) in the world. It's stripping away aspects of individuality, and for what? Why is it so repugnant to want to express aspects of your individuality? Isn't it just branding? It may not be pure, it may leave an unpleasant taste in your mouth, but we know it's an effective way to enact change.
Our reality has archons, prison guards if you will, who create the world we're living in. These are people whose beliefs and attitudes and goals affect us on a day to day basis. Most of these people work in politics or commerce. Sometimes we get lucky and a guy like Ghandi or Julian Assange or Timothy Leary rises to the top and something new gets injected into the system. What makes those the "good guys" IMO is that they base their actions on the betterment of our world, not just their own bank accounts. Timothy Leary didn't try to wake up the public so that he could get laid. He wanted to wake up the public, teach people how to operate their brains, and he cared about this so much that he was willing to go to jail for it.
My knowledge of Leary is low.. but didn't he effectively invent his persona to enable him to launch/lead the psychedelic revolution? In the sense that it matters little if he threw his ego a bone here and there, because being the hip prof who gets funky with tripped-out hippies was all part of the narrative. If "free love" wasn't branding, I don't know what was.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind.
Absolutely.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
To me the trick seems to be to create a narrative which enables your ego to keep itself occupied/content with toys while satisfying a much broader goal.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:42:48 PM
If you really believe in something, you have to be willing to put your self in the back seat.
I disagree that it's a hard rule - sometimes self-martyrdom is ego-fulfillment.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:42:48 PM
Quote from: Ratatosk on February 16, 2011, 05:32:46 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
And again, how can someone hold that kind of stance if they themselves do not have a strong Ego?
I keep trying but I haven't been able to recall a group of ego-less individuals that 'changed the world'. Yet, I can think of plenty of egocentric individuals, and groups which have.
Parts of this philosophy seem kinda confused to me.
Do you think that the civil rights movement would have taken off if people weren't willing to go to jail for it?
Imagine if Martin Luther King tapped out before they cuffed him.
If you really believe in something, you have to be willing to put your self in the back seat.
Willing to fight, go to jail or be a martyr aren't necessarily ego-less acts, are they?
In fact, wouldn't the sense of self be almost a necessity for people involved in civil rights?
I guess it depends on what we mean by 'ego'. In the Freudian sense, the ego would be absolutely necessary for anyone like King to function. If we use the term "false consciousness" as mentioned by Cain, I don't think it would necessarily enter into the discussion of King and the Civil Rights movement.
But, again... it all depends on what we mean by 'ego'.
I think we're having another Term War.
Is the goal to abandon the idea of self, or to submit the self to a higher cause? Because those are two very different things.
Good point. I should really read more of the source material before spagging up this thread :-D
Quote from: Ratatosk on February 16, 2011, 05:32:46 PM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 16, 2011, 05:18:14 PM
Dolores thinks that individuals are incapable of changing the world - only groups can change the world. And any kind of group work involves a degree of surrendering the self to the group mind. As long as you're tied to the toys that we use to play dress up with the self, you are a bad channel for the new world to come through.
And again, how can someone hold that kind of stance if they themselves do not have a strong Ego?
I keep trying but I haven't been able to recall a group of ego-less individuals that 'changed the world'. Yet, I can think of plenty of egocentric individuals, and groups which have.
Parts of this philosophy seem kinda confused to me.
There's a difference between having a strong ego and doing things for the sole purpose of feeding that ego.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 16, 2011, 05:55:22 PM
I think we're having another Term War.
Is the goal to abandon the idea of self, or to submit the self to a higher cause? Because those are two very different things.
I agree.
The way I followed it;
1. Capitilism is inherently bad because it needs an opressor and an opressed.
2. A group can destroy capitalism by making a viable cultural alternative.
3. This change can only come from real things.
4. Ideas can become real things when they alter human behavior (we can think of this as magic)
5. To spread real ideas and be part of a group solution you need to be a part of something larger than yourself.
6. This is hard because we see ourselves as individuals, but...
7. Our ego has grown up in an abusive home.
8. Because our ego has been shaped and moulded by Capitalusm, our sense of individuality is built around choices that are adventagous to the continuing supremacy of Capitalusm.
9. To dedicate ourself to a higher cause we must retrain our ego into serving this new master, against it's subcobcioys Capitalist inclinations.
I've been following this, and I think that I can add some understanding.
From the language used in this thread, "Ego" has the connotation of a static object, or at least one that stays in the same "shape/form", like say, your Thumb, or your Nose. You consider your ego "an extension" of yourself, but the only thing we have to model that on is our own body image, which changes slowly and "keeps it's basic form".
But I think this is EXACTLY where the problem lies. The Ego is not a static thing, you are constantly building it from the 'chaos' where the internal you and the external environment meet. It DOES have feedback loops, and these can lock it down into a dangerously static state.
When we say that the Ego is an Illusion, do not mean that it is "not real", we mean that it has no Permanence.
But, as that is the case, if we Kill it, oooh, it'll be back. We might find our ego in a formless, structureless void for a brief time until it re-coalesces, but it WILL be back.
The experience of 'no-mind' helps, because we come back with a greater understanding of our Ego, and how to hack it, even if just on an intuitive level.
Quote from: Placid Dingo on February 16, 2011, 09:38:45 PM
The way I followed it;
1. Capitilism is inherently bad because it needs an opressor and an opressed.
2. A group can destroy capitalism by making a viable cultural alternative.
3. This change can only come from real things.
4. Ideas can become real things when they alter human behavior (we can think of this as magic)
5. To spread real ideas and be part of a group solution you need to be a part of something larger than yourself.
6. This is hard because we see ourselves as individuals, but...
7. Our ego has grown up in an abusive home.
8. Because our ego has been shaped and moulded by Capitalusm, our sense of individuality is built around choices that are adventagous to the continuing supremacy of Capitalusm.
9. To dedicate ourself to a higher cause we must retrain our ego into serving this new master, against it's subcobcioys Capitalist inclinations.
:mittens:
Quote from: Telarus on February 16, 2011, 09:55:03 PM
The experience of 'no-mind' helps, because we come back with a greater understanding of our Ego, and how to hack it, even if just on an intuitive level.
yes, that's apt... The Nafs that we're talking about can be translated as "ego" but also "everyday mind". Kill it with fire! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_death)
and I would agree that Dolores has False Consciousness in mind as well
"Not to borrow the strength of another, nor to rely on one's own strength; to cut off past and future thoughts, and not to live within the everyday mind... then the Great Way is right before your eyes."-
Samurai Lapin (http://www.matazone.co.uk/animpages/samuri-3.html) Yamamoto Tsunetomo Edit to add: I just learned this word Kenosis (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenosis) which seems to point at a similar idea - of emptying yourself so as to act as a vessel
With that in mind I will read it again.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 15, 2011, 05:47:02 PM
I think Chaos Marxism is actually a pretty apt name for it.. Dolores combines marxism and discordia - from my point of view, it's a pretty fresh take on things.
Marxism doesn't work. There's no point in throwing energy into something that is utterly non-functional.
No matter what is supposedly meant by terms like "magic" and "marxism" and "ego", they lost me when it was revealed as some rinky-dink anti-capitalist neo-revolutionary hogwash.
Anyway, I rather like Capitalism.
I don't see it that way, but I (perhaps mistakenly) interpreted the Marxism aspect as a reference to Classical Marxism (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical_Marxism#Main_ideas_of_Classical_Marxism) rather than in the pejorative sense. The basic concepts do seem to be a tight fit:
- alienation - the alienation of people from aspects of their "human nature"
- class consciousness - the awareness, both of itself and of the social world around it, that a social class possesses, and its capacity to act in its own rational interests based on this awareness
- exploitation - the exploitation of an entire segment or class of society by another
- ideology - According to Engels, "ideology is a process accomplished by the so-called thinker consciously, it is true, but with a false consciousness. The real motive forces impelling him remain unknown to him; otherwise it simply would not be an ideological process. Hence he imagines false or seeming motive forces"
Aren't those some of the core issues we're discussing here?
Captain U: you don't need to read my blog. Your post sums up everything that I've been trying to explain for the last five years in one post. You get it. I'm trying to unify the forces. Well done.
To some degree, the best thing about using contentious words like "magick" and "Marxism" is to watch people who are supposedly Enlightened Psychonauts Who Think For Themselves have precisely the mass-media-approved kneejerk slogan-regurgitation reaction to them. Perhaps said Enlightened Psychonauts can then recognize that they're having that kind of reaction, and question it. Many have suggested that I use more "neutral" words so as to reach a mass audience, but right now I think I kind of like how deep the dog is buried.
On another topic, certainly some of the Aphorisms are badly written and jargon-encrusted. This is because I wrote some of them up to 5 years ago when I was far less cool than I am now. Also, because I never edit anything on that blog, it's just as it is dictated to my mind by my Holy Guardian Angel or the Space Bankers or whoever. Cram's effort in bringing them into book form will always have that problem of taking a synchronous look at a diachronous reality (or is it the other way around?)
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 17, 2011, 01:53:23 AM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 15, 2011, 05:47:02 PM
I think Chaos Marxism is actually a pretty apt name for it.. Dolores combines marxism and discordia - from my point of view, it's a pretty fresh take on things.
Marxism doesn't work. There's no point in throwing energy into something that is utterly non-functional.
Marxism =/= Communism (necessarily).
It's a big philosophical camp, with a lot of differing schools. I'm not too hot on some aspects of Marxism myself (teleology, historicism). At the same time, Marx himself was one of the few people who actually ever attempted a scientific study of politics and economics, and while his biggest prediction ultimately failed, he discovered some quite interesting things on the way, and others added to them or built on them over time. Naturally, so did a lot of idiots, but they are easily ignored.
I personally believe Historical Sociology provides better models for periods of historical change (in particular, Charles Tilly and Theda Skocpol) and so
probably a better model for predicting the future but it probably would have never developed as a discipline in the first place without the Marxist influence on World-Systems Theory.
Quote from: Doloras LaPicho on February 17, 2011, 08:42:09 AM
Captain U: you don't need to read my blog. Your post sums up everything that I've been trying to explain for the last five years in one post. You get it. I'm trying to unify the forces. Well done.
To some degree, the best thing about using contentious words like "magick" and "Marxism" is to watch people who are supposedly Enlightened Psychonauts Who Think For Themselves have precisely the mass-media-approved kneejerk slogan-regurgitation reaction to them. Perhaps said Enlightened Psychonauts can then recognize that they're having that kind of reaction, and question it. Many have suggested that I use more "neutral" words so as to reach a mass audience, but right now I think I kind of like how deep the dog is buried.
Gurdjieff is dead. Time to exhume the dog.
QuoteOn another topic, certainly some of the Aphorisms are badly written and jargon-encrusted. This is because I wrote some of them up to 5 years ago when I was far less cool than I am now. Also, because I never edit anything on that blog, it's just as it is dictated to my mind by my Holy Guardian Angel or the Space Bankers or whoever. Cram's effort in bringing them into book form will always have that problem of taking a synchronous look at a diachronous reality (or is it the other way around?)
With that in mind, do you have any more recent writings that adhere closer to your current style/jargon? Perhaps that might help.
Hey Dolores, since you're here there's a thread you might like called 'We don't do brands' by 000 which might help with the stumbling point of some of the language being accepted. http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=28319.0
Quote from: Doloras LaPicho on February 17, 2011, 08:42:09 AM
Captain U: you don't need to read my blog. Your post sums up everything that I've been trying to explain for the last five years in one post. You get it. I'm trying to unify the forces. Well done.
To some degree, the best thing about using contentious words like "magick" and "Marxism" is to watch people who are supposedly Enlightened Psychonauts Who Think For Themselves have precisely the mass-media-approved kneejerk slogan-regurgitation reaction to them. Perhaps said Enlightened Psychonauts can then recognize that they're having that kind of reaction, and question it. Many have suggested that I use more "neutral" words so as to reach a mass audience, but right now I think I kind of like how deep the dog is buried.
On another topic, certainly some of the Aphorisms are badly written and jargon-encrusted. This is because I wrote some of them up to 5 years ago when I was far less cool than I am now. Also, because I never edit anything on that blog, it's just as it is dictated to my mind by my Holy Guardian Angel or the Space Bankers or whoever. Cram's effort in bringing them into book form will always have that problem of taking a synchronous look at a diachronous reality (or is it the other way around?)
OK... So rereading the material leaves me with some other thoughts now.
I get the general idea (I think) that you're proposing. I'm not sure that I agree with that idea, but we'll leave that bit alone for a minute.
My initial problem lies in a bit of ConFusion as it were... on the one hand, your writing reminds me a lot of Bob's view that 'the only thing I believe is that the Universe is far more complex than I will ever understand'. Several of your Aphorisms seem to support the view and its a view I agree with so that's easy enough. However, on the other hand, the meat of your writing tends to feel more like "I Know Whats Up and So Should You".
If we are "liv[ing] according to "consensus realities" - the totems of [our] particular tribe", is Chaos Marxism not simply an expression of your tribal totems? I mean bully for not being in the Consumerism Cult, but what makes the Discordian Tribe Totems not equally flawed? I say this because some of the things you say, appear stated as fact, when I'm relatively certain that, at least some of it might be conjecture at best. For example:
- Creativity does not come from the ego, but from some other part of the psyche outside consensus reality.
- Psychic disturbance comes from the ego squishing down the other parts of the psyche in response to its own survival objectives
- Mental illness we can say comes from another, worse world existing concurrently with that of consensus reality.
These are very interesting statements, but I can't help but see them as tribal beliefs, rather than scientific fact ("There is only one physical reality, and only one real scientific understanding of why the world of human beings is the way it is"). This seems somewhat inconsistent to me.
Also, I feel a tendency toward an "Us vs. Them" kind of situation. Us being the enlightened Chaos Marxists who Know The Right Way To Fix This, vs Them the Capitalist Pig Dogs that want to destroy the world. Not only does that seem to be a clear tribal argument, it also seems to give us a Damned Thing which now has a Label.
QuoteEvery ideology is a mental murder, a reduction of dynamic living processes to static classifications, and every classification is a Damnation, just as every inclusion is an exclusion. In a busy, buzzing universe where no two snow flakes are identical, and no two trees are identical, and no two people are identical- and, indeed, the smallest sub-atomic particle, we are assured, is not even identical with itself from one microsecond to the next- every card-index system is a delusion.
-H. C.
How is "He is a Capitalist and therefore trying to destroy the world" any different than "He is a Jew and secretly controls all the money", "He is a Muslim and is a terrorist", "He is a Man and therefore a Pig"?
I'm not even sure its Capitalism that should be getting the poke here as much as its Consumerism... but maybe that's just a word game.
QuoteIt is for this reason that even the more rigorously scientific, materialist analysis of human culture will be incomplete, because it cannot understand art, creativity, religion, madness etc. by its very nature.
Those who really want to bring goodness into this world have to fuse science and spirituality, as Aleister Crowley said. "Science" in the sense of we have to understand on a physical, rational basis how humanity really works; "spirituality" because we have to accept that humans are not and can never be 100% rational, and indeed so much of what is truly glorious about our species-being works by non-rational rules.
"New Atheism" is particularly pernicious because it seeks to demolish belief in "God" (i.e. a supra-human consciousness), but by default leaves all the totems of the currently dominant tribe (Consume Mass Quantities, Have A Good Time All Of The Time, We Are The Superior Culture And Deserve To Own The Planet And Tell Everyone Else What To Do) alone, because they're not "God" in the way that they understand it.
I think this is an excellent way to assess the gap between hippy dippy spiritualism and hard core materialism... I like it a lot.
On the topic of individuality, I like some of what you're saying... but I'm not sure how I feel about the conclusion. On the one hand, it can be extremely beneficial to put the ego in the back seat while you play with a larger group of people to reach a specific goal. Anonymous, as you point out on your blog is a good example of that. However, knowing some of the people in 'Anonymous', while somebunal of their attacks/work/hacks/etc get attributed to the Hive, the hive is not without its own individual egos... nor do they eschew their own ego in their other work/hacks/games. Yet, from what I've read of Chaos Marxism thus far, it would require far more than the partial ego-lessness that we see with Anonymous. Honestly, most of the Anon folks I know (most black hats I know) see themselves as Individuals... they see themselves as individually choosing a different path, a road less traveled. To use anon as a basis to conclude that "we don't need to be individuals" seems kinda reaching.
In fact, that single concept is probably the one I like the least about Chaos Marxism. I think that individuality is not only desirable, but absolutely necessary for the evolution of our species, socially, psychologically and indeed physically. As Hagbard said above, all of us are unique, maybe not unique wonderful awesome snowflakes... but unique nonetheless. Giving up individuality would mean giving up the ability to "Think For Yourself". How would science progress, if not for the individaul scientist considering old information in a new way, or correlating new ideas that have not been matched up before?
What I have read feels inconsistent to me, based on how I'm understanding it. Can you clairfy some of this for me?
Thanks,
Ratatosk, Squirrel of Discord
Chatterer of the Words of Eris
Muncher of the ChaoAcorn
POEE of The Great Googlie Mooglie Cabal
Who the fuck is a psychonaut?
Not me.
Use a word that has a distinct meaning, and you'll get distinct responses. And there was no "knee jerk" required. I've examined Marxism from asshole to breakfast, and it simply doesn't work.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 17, 2011, 05:38:09 PM
Who the fuck is a psychonaut?
Not me.
Use a word that has a distinct meaning, and you'll get distinct responses. And there was no "knee jerk" required. I've examined Marxism from asshole to breakfast, and it simply doesn't work.
Psychonaut has a distinct meaning. It generally refers to individuals that explore or experiment with their own psyche. That includes people that do 'self-mindfucks', 'magick' (ala the kind we generally agree exists), NLP, brainwave experiments, meditation etc etc and (depending on the purpose etc) various drug experiments (ala Aldous Huxley).
The term has been around since the 70's and Pete Carroll wrote a book with that title in the early 80's, it shows up in a lot of material from the 'RAW" collection of favorites.
Quote from: Ratatosk on February 17, 2011, 05:43:57 PM
Psychonaut has a distinct meaning. It generally refers to individuals that explore or experiment with their own psyche.
Well, that leaves me out. It's fucking filthy in there, and I wouldn't poke around in it without a fill environment suit, 6 condoms, and BIG RED STRAPS.
It must be opposite day, because Rat's critique of Dolores is something I can get behind. Beneath the poetic language, easily dismissed, there appear to be flaws in the presentation.
It might be useful for me to be a little bit more explicit about my goals
I am interested in looking at these ideas from a pragmatic lens.. There are a number of correspondences between Doloras' work and what I perceive to be the collective goals of PDCOM or discordians in general. Speaking as a mother, I sense that Dolores has the same energy that made me kick off PosterGASM and Intermittens, and the same energy that fueled some of you cats to want to create the PD06 (eventually the BIP). I'd like to capture the parts of this philosophy that resonate with people here and will be useful in crafting "What's Next" for our little Discordian Society.
I'm sure we could very quickly fill up a thread titled "Reasons to Dismiss Chaos Marxism" - or reasons to dismiss anything for that matter - but we're getting away from what I feel could be a productive and useful discussion for us.
You're looking to scavenge the good bits? I can get behind that.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 17, 2011, 06:31:38 PM
It might be useful for me to be a little bit more explicit about my goals
I am interested in looking at these ideas from a pragmatic lens.. There are a number of correspondences between Doloras' work and what I perceive to be the collective goals of PDCOM or discordians in general. Speaking as a mother, I sense that Dolores has the same energy that made me kick off PosterGASM and Intermittens, and the same energy that fueled some of you cats to want to create the PD06 (eventually the BIP). I'd like to capture the parts of this philosophy that resonate with people here and will be useful in crafting "What's Next" for our little Discordian Society.
I'm sure we could very quickly fill up a thread titled "Reasons to Dismiss Chaos Marxism" - or reasons to dismiss anything for that matter - but we're getting away from what I feel could be a productive and useful discussion for us.
Well as I said above, I very much like the succinct commentary on the issue with fundamentalist materialism vs hippy dippy spiritualism. I thought it was well worded. And she certianly has a lot of energy, lots of detailed essays and thoughts collected there.
Ok, the first thing I feel the need to do is parse out the "you are not a unique snowflake" meme with the concept of "individual".
I've always taken the meme to be shorthand for, "You do not get special rules. You are made up of the same stuff as everyone else. Universe does not take you into account when making plans. Nature is allowed to kill you. You are a monkey, just the same as the rest of us."
However, I've taken that as a starting point. "You are not special" does not preclude "You are an individual". After realizing that you're just another monkey at the zoo, then it's up to you to create the differences. Any differences between you and some spag on the street are not Cosmic Blessings, they're ENTIRELY YOUR OWN CREATION.
In short, don't wait around for Universe to give you what you need. Go out and fucking take it.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 17, 2011, 07:13:48 PM
Ok, the first thing I feel the need to do is parse out the "you are not a unique snowflake" meme with the concept of "individual".
I've always taken the meme to be shorthand for, "You do not get special rules. You are made up of the same stuff as everyone else. Universe does not take you into account when making plans. Nature is allowed to kill you. You are a monkey, just the same as the rest of us."
However, I've taken that as a starting point. "You are not special" does not preclude "You are an individual". After realizing that you're just another monkey at the zoo, then it's up to you to create the differences. Any differences between you and some spag on the street are not Cosmic Blessings, they're ENTIRELY YOUR OWN CREATION.
In short, don't wait around for Universe to give you what you need. Go out and fucking take it.
Very well said, LMNO!
I'm still irritated that a fair amount of good ideas are being used towards such a naive and self-serving end (the whole anti-capitalism thing).
People who try to mix "guru" and "revolutionary" (especially under the guise of promoting egolessness) are not to be trusted or even listened to, IMO.
Upon a second look at the 127 points, I have to agree that Doloros' "ends" aren't that exciting, but the "means" certainly deserve more attention.
Quote from: Rip City Hustle on February 17, 2011, 07:29:45 PM
I'm still irritated that a fair amount of good ideas are being used towards such a naive and self-serving end (the whole anti-capitalism thing).
People who try to mix "guru" and "revolutionary" (especially under the guise of promoting egolessness) are not to be trusted or even listened to, IMO.
There is a kinda vibe that seems particularly strong among some Discordians which is a left leaning anti-capitalist sort of thing. I used to be somewhat confused by that, since all the fools that kicked the movement off were, in fact, capitalists. However, I've come to think that when most of these people say "Capitalism" they mean "Consumerism", and "Commercialism". Reading the CM stuff, i think thats the brunt of Delores' target. I mean, she doesn't seem to rail against people having money to invest in things.
However, I agree that anyone who is promoting a 'solution' is likely not egoless (IMO, you gotta have an ego in order to promote your philosophy), especially if that 'solution' involves revolting against the status quo.
On the other hand, a mass movement can dislodge even well entrenched 'reality'. See Egypt, for example. If millions and millions of Americans just said 'No' to crass commercialism and consumerism, we'd probably see some changes. I personally don't think such a movement is very likely... at best you may get a few hundred or thousand (far too few to tilt the board).
A lot of these ideas would apply very well to the individual though. An individual can modify their BiP, and they can they extract themselves from a given tribal system or place their ego in the backseat to join a cause they care about. Doing that at a macro level though, I think is where this sort of concept begins to break down. Again, given my past with converting people, I may be baised.
"When men are free, then Mankind will be free. Discordian, Free Thyself."
TO ME what really stands out is this idea that we can create alternatives to culture which will in turn create new types of identities. That seems especially powerful in this part of the information age, where subcultures can form at the drop of a hat, based on anything at all (this community being a prime example). We are living in Strange Times.
I've gone through some real rough financial periods (http://s209.photobucket.com/albums/bb163/wompcabal/whatever/) over the last few years, and at the bottom of it, the only thing saving my sanity was a dismissal of capitalism. "It ain't all about the dolla bill - you could be flat broke and be a scholar still".. I was working a shitty job, living in a shitty place, and the only thing that kept me going was the idea that You Are Not Your Bank Account. When you can't take your girlfriend out for dinner, you can only afford ramen noodles and oven pizza, it really starts to wear on your self worth. But the silver lining is, if you can detach from that stuff, you don't have to feel bad all the time. I destroyed capitalism in my own life by going for a long walk in the woods every day with my girlfriend. Yeah you still gotta live and die by the paycheck, but you can give yourself different priorities.. Speaking as a mother, that's one of the things that stimulation from a community can really help with.
Burning Man strikes me as a good example. I've never been to Burning Man, but people tell me that it's a parallel universe. People spend all year making costumes and floats for Burning Man. And why? Not because of capitalism. You've got a network of artists and other whackjobs with their own currency of ideas and creativity, putting REAL EFFORT into doing something which makes the world better in some way. And why? Because that community has its own set of feedback loops which reward creativity and innovation.
There's nothing like it out here on the east coast. When I tell people about the projects I work on, they always ask me how much money I make off of it. When I tell them "usually nothing" they act like I must be crazy. Why spend so much time on stuff that isn't profitable? That's what needs to be destroyed IMO -- how money becomes the measuring stick for worth and validity.
When I read the Black Iron Prison pamphlet, it shifted something in my head. In hindsight, this was possible because I was ready to transform myself, and I was looking for input. To me, the BIP pamphlet woke me up, snapped me out of the magical thinking pinealist haze I had been living in. Doloras thinks that we can build an alternative culture which has that property, merely finding out about it will snap people out of their trance. We probably disagree about what that trance is, but I think we DO agree that a lot of people are living in one.
My only hope for the future is that we can build islands in this sea of bureaucracy, things that people can latch onto so they can develop in new ways.
The Archons are gradually making us into better consumers and subjects. They are getting better at marketing and persuasion. So we too need to become masters of media, able to create charged ideas which create actual change in this world. We talk a lot about how masturbatory it is to jerk off to squiggles - how this a waste of energy that could be spent better pursuing actual change. This begs the question: what IS the avenue to pursue that change? How can we create real change in the material world using our words, images, thoughts?
Quote from: Cramulus on February 17, 2011, 08:13:35 PM
TO ME what really stands out is this idea that we can create alternatives to culture which will in turn create new types of identities. That seems especially powerful in this part of the information age, where subcultures can form at the drop of a hat, based on anything at all (this community being a prime example). We are living in Strange Times.
I've gone through some real rough financial periods (http://s209.photobucket.com/albums/bb163/wompcabal/whatever/) over the last few years, and at the bottom of it, the only thing saving my sanity was a dismissal of capitalism. "It ain't all about the dolla bill - you could be flat broke and be a scholar still".. I was working a shitty job, living in a shitty place, and the only thing that kept me going was the idea that You Are Not Your Bank Account. When you can't take your girlfriend out for dinner, you can only afford ramen noodles and oven pizza, it really starts to wear on your self worth. But the silver lining is, if you can detach from that stuff, you don't have to feel bad all the time. I destroyed capitalism in my own life by going for a long walk in the woods every day with my girlfriend. Yeah you still gotta live and die by the paycheck, but you can give yourself different priorities.. Speaking as a mother, that's one of the things that stimulation from a community can really help with.
Burning Man strikes me as a good example. I've never been to Burning Man, but people tell me that it's a parallel universe. People spend all year making costumes and floats for Burning Man. And why? Not because of capitalism. You've got a network of artists and other whackjobs with their own currency of ideas and creativity, putting REAL EFFORT into doing something which makes the world better in some way. And why? Because that community has its own set of feedback loops which reward creativity and innovation.
There's nothing like it out here on the east coast. When I tell people about the projects I work on, they always ask me how much money I make off of it. When I tell them "usually nothing" they act like I must be crazy. Why spend so much time on stuff that isn't profitable? That's what needs to be destroyed IMO -- how money becomes the measuring stick for worth and validity.
When I read the Black Iron Prison pamphlet, it shifted something in my head. In hindsight, this was possible because I was ready to transform myself, and I was looking for input. To me, the BIP pamphlet woke me up, snapped me out of the magical thinking pinealist haze I had been living in. Doloras thinks that we can build an alternative culture which has that property, merely finding out about it will snap people out of their trance. We probably disagree about what that trance is, but I think we DO agree that a lot of people are living in one.
My only hope for the future is that we can build islands in this sea of bureaucracy, things that people can latch onto so they can develop in new ways.
The Archons are gradually making us into better consumers and subjects. They are getting better at marketing and persuasion. So we too need to become masters of media, able to create charged ideas which create actual change in this world. We talk a lot about how masturbatory it is to jerk off to squiggles - how this a waste of energy that could be spent better pursuing actual change. This begs the question: what IS the avenue to pursue that change? How can we create real change in the material world using our words, images, thoughts?
See, I absolutely agree with you on this stuff. I just really intensely dislike how it is presented in the whole "Chaos Marxism" thing (which I think is about 140 points too long). What you just said was clear, concise, and contained elements that damn near anyone anywhere can relate to (the point about being broke and going for long walks instead of measuring the worth of what you did that day by how much you made and/or spent), which makes it infinitely more valuable than a bunch of commandment-style bulletin points mixed with seemingly-misused esoteric jargon.
Seriously, man, I'm not trying to harsh your enthusiasm for projects that bring people together and try to make the world a better place. I'm all for it, regardless of whether I think the desired outcome is likely. I think it's important just to get people to try...but, I'm a pretty reasonable and open-minded skeptic and a fairly middle-of-the-road guy in terms of where I'd fall on the political and social spectrum. I found both the blog and the original list of points to be incredibly abrasive and off-putting. It's just not something that regular people are going to want to listen to, and if your target audience isn't big enough to include regular people, what's the point of the exercise?
Quote from: Rip City Hustle on February 17, 2011, 09:06:00 PM
See, I absolutely agree with you on this stuff. I just really intensely dislike how it is presented in the whole "Chaos Marxism" thing (which I think is about 140 points too long). What you just said was clear, concise, and contained elements that damn near anyone anywhere can relate to (the point about being broke and going for long walks instead of measuring the worth of what you did that day by how much you made and/or spent), which makes it infinitely more valuable than a bunch of commandment-style bulletin points mixed with seemingly-misused esoteric jargon.
Seriously, man, I'm not trying to harsh your enthusiasm for projects that bring people together and try to make the world a better place. I'm all for it, regardless of whether I think the desired outcome is likely. I think it's important just to get people to try...but, I'm a pretty reasonable and open-minded skeptic and a fairly middle-of-the-road guy in terms of where I'd fall on the political and social spectrum. I found both the blog and the original list of points to be incredibly abrasive and off-putting. It's just not something that regular people are going to want to listen to, and if your target audience isn't big enough to include regular people, what's the point of the exercise?
You have made it abundantly clear ITT that you don't like the way the ideas are presented. Your fixation on these things is starting to sound reminiscent of that dismissal we used to hear all the time, "The Black Iron Prison is a load of pretentious crap because it's
too dark and
not funny enough."
It's not without a little irony -- what have we
tangibly affected with the Black Iron Prison writings? a very small number of people. Honestly we've probably drawn more flame than we have blown minds. Doloras is one of the few people outside of our community who read the thing and liked it enough that she incorporated it into her philosophy. Personally, I think that merits some attention. If we dismiss everything that isn't phrased so as to not offend our delicate community sensibilities, we're nothing more than an ivory tower.
BUT if we can analyze ideas, and pass them through a feedback loop with the intention of creating Quality, then we may be able to come up with something meaningful together.
SO I present the question - what's the next step for Discordia? How can we wake people up? How do we resist the guru trap? What can we do that will actually help the sad, confused, lonely people out there, starting with ourselves?
let's start by looking at other people, like Doloras, who are working on the same problem.
I would have assumed that "analyzing ideas and passing them through a feedback loop" includes honest criticism of the packaging of those ideas. And if I'm belaboring the point, it's because you've thus far failed to address it in any fashion other than condescendingly. If you have a great idea and you won't tailor your delivery to maximum effect, well, you're an asshole and I hope your ideas get cancer of the balls.
Since I already know what comes next (accusations of sabotaging our energy, only focusing on negative stuff, ignoring valid points because they poke holes in this really awesome THING you've found), I'm going outside.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 17, 2011, 07:13:48 PM
Ok, the first thing I feel the need to do is parse out the "you are not a unique snowflake" meme with the concept of "individual".
I've always taken the meme to be shorthand for, "You do not get special rules. You are made up of the same stuff as everyone else. Universe does not take you into account when making plans. Nature is allowed to kill you. You are a monkey, just the same as the rest of us."
However, I've taken that as a starting point. "You are not special" does not preclude "You are an individual". After realizing that you're just another monkey at the zoo, then it's up to you to create the differences. Any differences between you and some spag on the street are not Cosmic Blessings, they're ENTIRELY YOUR OWN CREATION.
In short, don't wait around for Universe to give you what you need. Go out and fucking take it.
:mittens:
I don't want any balls to get cancer.
:)
However, I do think that there are some valid criticisms, not only of the package, but the overall message.
Be that as it may, I will skip on to Cram's point.
What's the next step for Discordia?
I see/hear Discordians ask this all the time, but I don't know what it means. When I read the PD, I figured the next step was to act less like a cabbage. When I read RAW I figured the next step was to try to apply the Cosmic Schmuck Principle to myself.
I love Discordia, I like fnords and 23's and even, albeit begrudgingly, the BiP. I like the idea, the philosophy... but I'm not sure what is with the idea that we have to take it to 'the next level'. Its seems to me that we'd be better served by allowing that awesome philosophy to feed completely new ideas, like Chaos Marxism or Maybe Logic or Hip Hop Shamanism... but none of those things take Discordia to the next level IMO, they apply some of the ideas of Discordianism to something brand new... or at least newish, or maybe with a twist of lime.
But my point is, its not superceeding, expounding or 'taking' Discordia anywhere. The beautiful thing about Discordia IMO, is its simplicity. "Think For Yourself, Schmuck!", although a later addition to the Discordian repertoire seems to sum up the whole damn thing. Reality tunnels, Starbuck Pebbles, Hot Dogs, 23's, Law of Fives, Black Iron Prisons, Golden Spheres of Possibility etc etc etc are just ways to poke us into realizing that, more often than not we may not be thinking for ourselves.
So what do you mean by the next step for Discordia? Whats the next set of memes we use to drive home the punch? Whats the next big prank? Or is it more whats the next thing we can do to drive disciples to our Discordia?
How can we wake people up?
From what? I mean its like the Matrix, do you really want to wake people up and show them the shithole that is reality? If they're happy praying to Mammon and existing through crass commercialism, why not let them be. If you wake them up and drop the TROOF on them, maybe they'll never be happy again. IF we can 'wake' people up, do we want that responsibility? What about all the nominal Discordians we 'wake up'? All the ones that don't understand how to think for themselves, and maybe never will? Shall we start a laity class to help them figure out how to metaphorically tie their shoes in the morning?
The Machine is bad, for those of us who don't like it, but there are a lot of people that survive because of it. Before we decide HOW to wake them up, I think we should consider IF we should wake them up... and what it is that we would be waking them up to.
I will say however, that "energy" is not the key here... You need something to offer the poor schmuck when they wake up... We can have all the energetic projects in the world, but if the project wakes people up and they find themselves in an egoless Hive, a Black Iron Prison or a joke book from the 1950's... well a lot of people may not find that a good trade.
"I gave up my Benz, for a fnord." might be great for those of us that prefer to drive fnords... but I sometimes think there's may be something wrong with us anyway.
How do we resist the guru trap?
This I think is the biggest and most important question.
"Think for yourself, Schmuck!" is pretty straightforward and non guru-ish. But, thats because its not telling you the Answer to your problems... its just smacking you in the side of the head and saying "Think for yourself, schmuck!" When we go from 'Yo, fool use your brain!' to "Let's all change the world to make it better (that is , better in my perception)" then I think the guru trap becomes inescapable.
You can give people 'stuff to think about' or you can hand people your 'philosophy'. The former may end up with some disciples trying to follow you around, the latter will drop you headfirst into a guru trap.
*All, of course, in my opinion :)
I think either Discordia is either an ongoing process, or it is a static ideology.
No scratch that, I see it as an ideology about being an ongoing process.
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 17, 2011, 10:42:48 PM
I think either Discordia is either an ongoing process, or it is a static ideology.
No scratch that, I see it as an ideology about being an ongoing process.
Ye GODS that soo close to my response.
Having Cram's 1st question re-framed through Tosk's response, my take is:
Cram's asking us if Discordia is a philosophy (a dead thing that some-one wrote, and that we now need to think/wank about and or incorporate into new things)... or a religion (something that has a core history but changes over time, with rate of change being equal to dogma:catma ratio).
If Discordia 'is' something actually practiced, and not just talked around / used to inspire other creative work, we have a very low dogma:catma ratio. The fact that we Stick Apart make it kinda difficult to get a 'read' on 'Discordian culture'. I think Cram want's to see Discordia as an active player (like a Colbert or Gaga) instead of a passive resource (like the local newsman, or the Black Eye Peas).
What comes next -> How do we get there?
I thank everybody for very thoughtful answers...
Let me be a spag for a second and shift the goal posts over by a few inches...
I want to amend that question What's the next step for Discordia?
I think a better question might be What's the next step for us?
Quote from: Cramulus on February 17, 2011, 09:35:22 PM
How can we wake people up?
Do we want to wake people up? I'm not so sure, anymore.
I'm going to keep throwing together my dot points and then expand on a few ideas.
10. The way we understand ego in this context is as a sense of self built around a very specific idea of individuality.
11. This idea is a capitalist/consumerist one, built around expressing yourself through corporate choices
12. Real individuality is impossible inside capitalism, because capitalism makes itself essential for expressing individuality, or for even surviving.
13. By identifying as part of a group offering an alternative to capitalism we create a new shared identity.
14. This shared identity begins to offer us freedom to seek a more authentic sense of being an individual, without capitalist tools.
15. We achieve this by embracing action over aesthetic. We are what we do, not how we look.
Ok, back to the link before. The reason I suggested 000s article was because I think the nature of capitalism is changing, to meet the needs of the kinds of tribes that are developing now.
Cram expresses the kind of simple idea a non-branding system is good for; there's something more than/better than/different to money to strive for in life.
How do you make this a popular idea?
For starters we need to acknowledge a truth about the idea of consumerism; it is in itself parasitic. To sell products to a market you first need a market to sell products to. Companies know this, and employ 'cool hunters' to find authentically developing trends to adapt and market (aka rape and pillage).
Commercialism has successfully made itself a key point, or even the key point of many cultures. To be a punk you need the right anarchy shirt. To be a rider or a hip hopper or a fitness buff you need the right gear.
Chaos Marxism suggests we need to develop a counter culture to combat this culture. I suggest we need cultures instead.
In a talk on TED (you can also find a link from the AoM page) Malcolm Gladwell talks about universal variability in relation to spaghetti sauce; the culture shift from finding the right recipe to the right recipes. So not all people are the same. Not all people are going to be easy to infect with the ideas of Chaos Marxism, but many many groups would be open to a personally minibranded message similar to Cram's above; there is a higher goal than consumerism.
Punks should know which of their Ilk have the best shows, not who sells the best hair dye. Rappers need to know where to find inspiration, not hip-hop apparel. Exercisers need to know the best street to run down, not the price of a pump bottle. And so on.
Perhaps chaos Marxism works better as a banner uniting propagandists promoting action over aesthetic/consumerism, than as the counter culture itself.
Also; http://placiddingo.com/?p=166 is an article I did on the aesthetic vs actual thing.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 18, 2011, 12:29:12 AM
Quote from: Cramulus on February 17, 2011, 09:35:22 PM
How can we wake people up?
Do we want to wake people up? I'm not so sure, anymore.
When I started a creative writing course, a lecturer relayed an authors explanation of why he writes. There is a child in a library. He's planning to kill himself. He reads a book and that book changes his life and his mind. The author (who was the boy) said that the books he writes are for that child.
I imagine most of us are writing/designing/pranking for our younger selves as we were craving answers/meaning/lulz/whatever. Speaking to the waking rather than waking the sleeping.
Quote from: Cramulus on February 17, 2011, 11:34:49 PM
I thank everybody for very thoughtful answers...
Let me be a spag for a second and shift the goal posts over by a few inches...
I want to amend that question What's the next step for Discordia?
I think a better question might be What's the next step for us?
Create something. Doesn't matter if it's a song, a poem, someone's dinner, a set of shelves, an angry letter to Congress, whatever. Just create something. Create something
you really want to create. Put your heart in it. Take pride in it. Create.
It doesn't even have to explicitly be about or reference Discordia. Because, when you put your heart in it, it will contain what you believe.
Then, create something else. Or create the same thing. If you keep creating, someone will notice. It doesn't have to be someone who will put it on YouTube or someone who will give you a $1M marketing budget. It could be your neighbor. Could be your boss. Could be your family. Someone will notice. And someone will ask about it. And if you're putting your heart in it, they'll want to know about what you believe. And you can tell them. And after you tell them, you make them create something.
You see, Discordia (for me) isn't about worldwide movements. It can't "sweep the nation" and change people like Damascus. It's viral, but it's
analog. You have to get into someone's space and transmit the ideas. It's not something that can be passively caught. Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear. It's like Hep C -- You have to get
really messy and up close with it.
In short:
Transform Yourself.
Transform Your Environment.
Transform Others.
That's damn near poetic, right there, LMNO.
Thanks. Sometimes I get the feeling we overthink things too much. There's no need to create massive sociological theories and philosophies that would work if only everyone would play along exactly the way I want them to.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:25:27 PM
Thanks. Sometimes I get the feeling we overthink things too much. There's no need to create massive sociological theories and philosophies that would work if only everyone would play along exactly the way I want them to.
Pft. Trying to change the way large groups of people behave is like trying to stave off a stampede by standing there waving your skivvies. Momentum is gonna crush you flat.
But, if you can convince one or two to shift course... Others will follow.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Then, create something else. Or create the same thing. If you keep creating, someone will notice. It doesn't have to be someone who will put it on YouTube or someone who will give you a $1M marketing budget. It could be your neighbor. Could be your boss. Could be your family. Someone will notice. And someone will ask about it. And if you're putting your heart in it, they'll want to know about what you believe. And you can tell them. And after you tell them, you make them create something.
I love this thought. Go to a chrysler forum and they'll be doing their own versions of womp. Go to a knitting forum and you'll find a subset of them writing poetry or competing in one or two other arenas. That's not to mention the subject-matter of expertise that drew them together in the first place. Whenever groups of people get together it seems that we
naturally start creating stuff. Often we get together just so that we can compete and learn from each other. It's how we started with rocks and ended up with highly crafted stone axe heads.
My problem with this though, is that the participation model for groups tends to follow a power law distribution. Here Clay Shirky goes into a fairly detailed explanation (http://www.shirky.com/writings/powerlaw_weblog.html).
(http://i1008.photobucket.com/albums/af205/spiff_bucket/plc.png)
For every awesome thing you create, you have 1000 people who appreciate it, but figure they can't even compete and so don't even bother starting to invest the time required. Now not to get too meta, but I think PD avoids this problem somewhat, and displays an incredible amount of creativity because we applaud
all forms of creativity with the possibility of some exceptions I can't think of. If you don't feel you can write, then you can still legitimately hold a claim to the group energy if you're wowing people with your awesome topiary.
But crucially, this is part of the
narrative of the site. It doesn't happen everywhere else at the same scale.
So for this to work, I think you'd also need to transmit that "every form of creativity is cool" narrative, and so we're back at square one? :?
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
One reason springs to mind - if we successfully craft that golden apple, then we have responsibility for something we lose control of the second it leaves our hands.
here's my contribution to this vibe for the morning
http://www.scribd.com/doc/49099137/PosterGASM-Sparks
edit: feedback here plz: http://www.principiadiscordia.com/forum/index.php?topic=28443.msg1009778#new
CU, you're thinking too small. Who says the creativity is even part of a forum? Create things in your environment, the one in which you live. Create things IRL. Create things in your entire life, not just your online life.
Log off, shut down the computer, and go do something that will physically affect your environment. Hanging out with a bunch of online spags isn't going to change the people around you. Posting on a forum isn't going to traumatically affect the people who read it (please, no pedantic exceptions).
When Cram says, "Be the trouble you want to see in the world," he doesn't mean hiding behind an alt while trolling MysticWicks. He means going out the front door and CREATING something that's interesting. Or at least, that's what I think he means.
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:59:15 PM
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
One reason springs to mind - if we successfully craft that golden apple, then we have responsibility for something we lose control of the second it leaves our hands.
We lose control of damn near everything the second it leaves our hands. Control isn't as important as people think it is. Build it as close to right as possible, wind it up, and let it fly.
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
If Thinking for Yourself was easy, everyone would be doing it. But I wish you the best of luck, and look forward to your efforts.
Cram, those posters are wonderful! I'll definitely be putting them up. Btw - are these kopyleft? I don't like the account requirement for downloading stuff from scribd and so I'm archiving all the (k) stuff I can find at eb&g.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 03:06:55 PM
CU, you're thinking too small. Who says the creativity is even part of a forum? Create things in your environment, the one in which you live. Create things IRL. Create things in your entire life, not just your online life.
Log off, shut down the computer, and go do something that will physically affect your environment. Hanging out with a bunch of online spags isn't going to change the people around you. Posting on a forum isn't going to traumatically affect the people who read it (please, no pedantic exceptions).
When Cram says, "Be the trouble you want to see in the world," he doesn't mean hiding behind an alt while trolling MysticWicks. He means going out the front door and CREATING something that's interesting. Or at least, that's what I think he means.
I agree absolutely, which is why there's now a real-world/collaborative forum dedicated to doing that at the bar and grill. As in - making it easier to meet up with other like minds in your area, because having local groups dedicated to making mischief in the real world makes it incredibly easier for the long-tail to contribute.
There are people reading this right now who could meet up for drinks tonight and start something going in meatspace together, they just don't know it.
I fear I'm not explaining myself very well. I apologize. When I suggest creating something, I don't really mean "go out and meet people and spread the word of Discordia."
What I mean is, essentially, make Creating Things a part of your everyday life. Live your life creatively, unabashedly Discordian-- and you don't even have to announce that you're doing so. In fact, it's often more effective when you don't preach The Word. If you spend your time creating and being creative, you will change the reality of the people around you. Don't get me wrong, going out on sprees of Creative Disorder with a pack of friends is fun, but the best way to convince someone to Think For Themselves is simply living that way by example.
As the song says,* "Freedom is something that can't be given/They say it comes from the way that you're living." Show, don't tell.
*Gerund -"The Jailor" (http://www.reverbnation.com/earfatigueproductions#!/artist/artist_songs/284942)
Show, don't tell - I agree 100%. But okay - say we manage to increase the number of people making and creating things - how does that translate into more people Thinking For Themselves? For example, the Maker Faire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maker_Faire) has over 60,000 people attending it - wouldn't we just get swept up into their narratives if we get too close without one of our own?
First off, if someone is being creative (remember, building shelves or making a good meal, or even repairing your driveway can be creative), then they most likely already are thinking for themselves.
[an aside]Call it semantics, but for me the words 'create' and 'make' are two different thing, even if they discribe the same actions. To me, 'create' has a joyous spirit, while 'make' somehow lacks that.[/an aside]
So, as long as people are creating, and Thinking for Themselves, who cares if they're Discordian? You'll have a better time interacting with them, and communication of ideas will be easier. Think pragmatically rather than idealistically: So long as other people are behaving in a manner you like, who gives a fuck what their core belief engine is?
For me, I don't care if I hop on other narratives... if I hijack existing memes... or if I hide entirely in the fabric of other movements. If I enjoy my experience, if I happen to encourage others to think for themselves... it doesn't matter if they 'see' the Apple that I smacked them with. It doesn't matter if they realize that they ARE Discordian (every man, woman and child). If they think a little more for themselves, if they can take themselves a little less seriously, if they can find a bit more creativity in their life... then it doesn't matter to me if they think that they're Discordian, Sub Genius, Makers, Crafters, SCAdians, Anonymous or any other random label...
Individuals are individuals, if you wake up one individual, aka yourself, that's awesome. If you happen to influences some other spag to wake themselves up, its even more awesome.... It doesn't matter as much, IMO, if they find out about Eris, the Principia Discordia, or this forum.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 03:58:16 PM
So, as long as people are creating, and Thinking for Themselves, who cares if they're Discordian? You'll have a better time interacting with them, and communication of ideas will be easier. Think pragmatically rather than idealistically: So long as other people are behaving in a manner you like, who gives a fuck what their core belief engine is?
That's the end-game/winning scenario, definitely.
What is driving my car at the moment is the thought that the link between "Creating" and "TFY:S" could be much stronger, and I don't see how to make it stronger without putting conscious effort into a Message.
Unless you're saying that Creating is the Message? In which case - in recent history we moved from being a society of creators to a society of consumers - was there more "TFY:S" around back then? Is there more "TFY:S" in developing nations who are less dominated by consumer culture?
I disagree, and I'm glad I put that aside in my last post.
Most people tend to be Makers, rather than Creators. A shift from Maker to Non-Maker (or, consumer) is far less tragic than from Creator to Maker.
America's history as a nation of Industry has been one of Makers. I would hazard a guess that the amount of Creators has always been fairly small.
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 04:26:46 PM
America's history as a nation of Industry has been one of Makers. I would hazard a guess that the amount of Creators has always been fairly small.
Modern industry promotes Makers. Produce MORE shit, not lovingly crafted, better stuff.
Getting people thinking about, "wow, that's cool, I can do that, and make something of my own" is, IMHO, a good thing. If you're creating something new, you are, pretty much by definition, stretching your mind into thinking for yourself.
Was gonna add this to my earlier comment, but multiple posts have already hit ;-)
ETA: Thats one very positive thing about Chaos Marxism... Delores is doing something. It is a creative work and while there may be inconsistencies or confusion in some opinions (including mine), its Discordia, inconsistency and confusion are part of the game. In fact, I think I would prefer to see Discordian philosophies with confusion and inconsistency, it makes it easier to take them less seriously and provides more opportunity for someone to 'Think For Themselves'. I didn't really consider this when I was offering my critique earlier... but I thought about it last evening.
The more philosophies we have that relate to Discordianism, be it Black Iron Prisons or Chaos Marxism, the better. For every competing philosophy, ideology or metaphor we provide another avenue for proto-discordians to Think For Themselves. They get to choose between Fnords, BiP's, GSP's, Chaos Marxism etc ad infinitum!
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
Because there's already enough screaming going on. Average Joe, he has a worldview he can live with (Obama is a socialist/Bush is Hitler). He's accepted this worldview because he likes it, and it lets him sleep at night.
99% of the people in the world are perfectly happy with this sort of nonsense. Do you
really think they'll thank you for tearing off the vinyl and showing them the rather ugly Truth of what's going on in their lives?
Certain groups of people - myself included -
want to know what's going on. Most people think they do, but they really don't (This is why people believe outlandish conspiracy theories. At some level, they know it's make-believe, therefore harmless.) Someone who doesn't want the Truth won't be enlightened by it, they'll either start screaming and never stop, or they'll kill you and go back to watching the TV.
I'm at a turning point in my life, beliefs-wise. I used to want to wake people up...Until I learned what that entails. Now I'm torn between a) wanting to leave them nice and sleepy & quiet, or b) Wake them up as punishment, let them know they can't buy security with their freedom or indeed at
any price, and then sit back and watch them go mad.
So, yeah, the question isn't as simple as it seems.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 18, 2011, 04:53:58 PM
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
Because there's already enough screaming going on. Average Joe, he has a worldview he can live with (Obama is a socialist/Bush is Hitler). He's accepted this worldview because he likes it, and it lets him sleep at night.
99% of the people in the world are perfectly happy with this sort of nonsense. Do you really think they'll thank you for tearing off the vinyl and showing them the rather ugly Truth of what's going on in their lives?
Certain groups of people - myself included - want to know what's going on. Most people think they do, but they really don't (This is why people believe outlandish conspiracy theories. At some level, they know it's make-believe, therefore harmless.) Someone who doesn't want the Truth won't be enlightened by it, they'll either start screaming and never stop, or they'll kill you and go back to watching the TV.
I'm at a turning point in my life, beliefs-wise. I used to want to wake people up...Until I learned what that entails. Now I'm torn between a) wanting to leave them nice and sleepy & quiet, or b) Wake them up as punishment, let them know they can't buy security with their freedom or indeed at any price, and then sit back and watch them go mad.
So, yeah, the question isn't as simple as it seems.
Fine, fine motorcycle you got there Roger.
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on February 18, 2011, 04:53:58 PM
Quote from: Luna on February 18, 2011, 02:55:18 PM
Quote from: Captain Utopia on February 18, 2011, 02:52:56 PM
Quote from: LMNO, PhD on February 18, 2011, 01:17:48 PM
Discordia isn't like crabs, caught as easily as sharing underwear.
I believe we could craft something that infectious. Should we?
Why not?
Because there's already enough screaming going on. Average Joe, he has a worldview he can live with (Obama is a socialist/Bush is Hitler). He's accepted this worldview because he likes it, and it lets him sleep at night.
99% of the people in the world are perfectly happy with this sort of nonsense. Do you really think they'll thank you for tearing off the vinyl and showing them the rather ugly Truth of what's going on in their lives?
Certain groups of people - myself included - want to know what's going on. Most people think they do, but they really don't (This is why people believe outlandish conspiracy theories. At some level, they know it's make-believe, therefore harmless.) Someone who doesn't want the Truth won't be enlightened by it, they'll either start screaming and never stop, or they'll kill you and go back to watching the TV.
I'm at a turning point in my life, beliefs-wise. I used to want to wake people up...Until I learned what that entails. Now I'm torn between a) wanting to leave them nice and sleepy & quiet, or b) Wake them up as punishment, let them know they can't buy security with their freedom or indeed at any price, and then sit back and watch them go mad.
So, yeah, the question isn't as simple as it seems.
STOP PUSHING YOUR NEGATIVE TRIP ON ME, BROSEPH! CAN'T YOU SEE I'M TRYING TO CHANGE THE WORLD?
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