Eulogy for the Living: a rant

[East Coast Hustle]

Now look what you,Äôve done. Are you happy now? Do the cookies taste good? Will those same crumbs that nourish your body so delightfully also provide the spiritual and intellectual nourishment that you are so devoid of? One day there may come a point when your cookies and pie no longer provide solace. One day THEY may come and take your cookies and pie AWAY FROM YOU. And what will you do then? Will you lash out? Will you organize and fight back? Of course not. ,ÄúDiscordians stick apart,Äù, you say. ,ÄúWe have to enlighten them with laughter and poetry,Äù, you say. And eventually, when you run out of happy shiny cop-outs and are forced to confront the ugly realities of the post-american century, you won,Äôt have any idea what to do about any of it. ,ÄúOK,Äù, you say, ,Äúwhat do YOU think we should do about it?,Äù Well, I,Äôll tell you.


No, I won,Äôt. Seems I misheard you. What you actually said was ,ÄúWhy can,Äôt that guy just shut up and let us enjoy our cookies and pie? Why,Äôs he always gotta bring us down?,Äù You know why? Because you,Äôre smarter than most. More imaginative than most. More articulate, more charismatic, maybe even better looking. And you KNOW that something is horribly wrong. You haven,Äôt been blinded by the new shiny cars and the reality TV shows and MTV Cribs and the Atkins diet. And for you, with the skills and talents that you possess, to know something is wrong and REFUSE to do anything about it is FUCKED UP. And guess what? NO ONE IS BEING ENLIGTHENED WITH COOKIES AND PIE. Buck up. Step to the plate. Seize your destiny and strike a blow to the MACHINE ,Ñ¢, for the sake of your poor fellow cabbages who aren,Äôt capable of taking that step yet. THAT is how we help the rest of the unwashed masses to see behind the smoke and mirrors.

,ÄúYeah, yeah, yeah,Äù, you say, ,Äúyou always say shit like this but you never say what in specific we should do to this MACHINE ,Ñ¢ that you speak of.,Äù And you,Äôre right. I don,Äôt really know what we should do. But I know that we should do SOMETHING, and I,Äôm willing to take that step. If I take that step by myself, or with one or two other like-minded people, the best thing that can happen is that no one will notice. More likely, we,Äôll be detained/deported/shot/whatever and our entire non-movement will be irreparably damaged by the all-knowing COURT OF PUBLIC OPINION ,Ñ¢. We need to act in concert. We need to drop the ,ÄúDiscordians stick apart,Äù cop-out. If you cling to that attitude out of apathy, then you should probably just stop reading now and go back to playing EverQuest in your parents,Äô basement, but if you cling to it out of fear then you are doing yourself a grave disservice, because you DO have it within yourself to not be such a pussy. Or maybe you don,Äôt. That,Äôs for you to decide, not me. But I,Äôm done being complacent about your complacency. I,Äôm done trying to just get along. ,Äúyeah, right,Äù, you say, ,Äúwhen were you trying to get along?,Äù But I did try. For a week or so, even. And it made me sick. So you can expect me to be strident, be in your face, be a PAIN IN THE ASS. Or maybe not. Again, that,Äôs for you to decide. Maybe you think I,Äôm not totally full of shit. Maybe you think I,Äôm totally full of shit but I might still have a point. Maybe you,Äôve got that same itch between your shoulderblades that seems to get worse every time you open a newspaper or turn on your TV ,Ñ¢ or listen to your ugly neighbor or your cubicle-mate spout off some uninformed retread conservatard bullshit. Maybe. But probably not. You probably just think I should shut up and go away. Or that I should get with the PROGRAM and start squealing and mewling over imaginary cookies and pies.  But if you think I,Äôm being harsh, if you think I,Äôm being UNREASONABLE and ruining ALLYOUR FUN, then I have some valuable advice for you. I advise you to go study. Read the works of the great scholars. Find the writings of our most hallowed scribes and take their wisdom to heart. Particularly the prime teaching of the Mad Monk known as Horab the Brown, who said in his infinite wisdom:






STFU, n00bz!



We now return you to your regularly scheduled reprogramming.

[Horab Fibslager]

good rant there. i was thinking over a bottle of fine candian lager lat night about change. abotu wanting change so much, one might be willing to take whatever change, wether it's wrse or better or the same, as long as it's got different scenery, differeny blinds on teh same window.

now part of this thought was because i coudl really use soem change. i'm cleanign my room right now. it'sa fuckign disgusting mess. i've really let it go, alogn with alot of the rest of my life. i'm trying to think abotu what this/these changes should - need- to be. soem thigns that have happened in teh past few months have really limited those options.

and turd is right, ess tee eff yoo ing wouldn't be a bad idea in soemcases. i guess. you can't even intiate that change if you refuse to look at what you want to change, wether it's your own behaviour or the behaviours of others, or teh paradigm under which those behaviours operate.

tho iot would not be otu of line to say "horab, why aren;t you changing the world?" well frankly idon't want to. it's nto that i agree with it, but i get the feeling it not only will change itself, but it is doign so every day.

oen of those taoists guys, lao tzu maybe, said, a think that reaches the pinnacle of existence then starts movign towards teh lowest form of it's exstence, ebfore moving back otu of existence.


the world is kidna liek that i reckon, but it's kinda of a complicated mishmash of things moving towards their pinnacles, and other things moving towards their lowest forms, and other things moving, or totterignor oscilating aroudn some state of meicority. tho eventhen thetruth is the peaks and valleys are stillt here.

my concern is, will thso ewho want and act towards change desre it so much that they will take soemthign worse? worse not onyl for them but maybe for everyone?

i see these things paralelled in my life atm, i see peopel taking any change as good, eventerribel changes, myself included. well right at this moment i can be sure i am taking a postiive step by cleanign my room. i'm not really sur ei fthat can be taken as a usefull metaphor in regards to teh original statement, given by turd/bs.

btw, this is going into the book of ripoff turd.

[Bob the Mediocre]

my concern is, will thso ewho want and act towards change desre it so much that they will take soemthign worse? worse not onyl for them but maybe for everyone?

I think that's been happening for a while now, to drastically understate it. I prefer to try more subtle ways that revolution to change things, but who knows what I'll think in a few years.
And, as an odd coincidence, see the last quote in my sig.

[DJRubberducky]

Why is it that people only remember Rule #1 when it's their own stuff, and forget that other people abide by that rule too?

[Horab Fibslager]

Why is it that people only remember Rule #1 when it's their own stuff, and forget that other people abide by that rule too?

i agree with this as well.

in argument with the stick apart deal, what do you think is easier to avoid- the giant sized hammer you can see from over the horizon, or the thousand of little sized hammers that look like bunny rabbits swarming you from all sides?

the laputians will have their revenge!

[Zurtok the Lazy]

We have rules?  Since when?

Great Rant, dude.  You may be the Bath Saint (or whatever the hell that says) but you're still the same old Turd to me.

love love love love

Cookies!

And who says I'm not changing the world?  I even helped a catapillar the other day.

[East Coast Hustle]

Why is it that people only remember Rule #1 when it's their own stuff, and forget that other people abide by that rule too?

Rule #1 applies when it's just you or a small group out making mischief. If that group was suddenly composed of thousands or tens of thousands, rule #1 would cease to apply, as the whole POINT would be to make our collective voices heard.

Is it better to do little mindfucks by yourself or with a small cabal for the rest of your life in the hopes that you might enlighten a half-dozen people amongst the hundreds that you piss off, or is it better to pull one big mindfuck that effects a quantum shift in the socio-political paradigm in order that we might actually change things enough to be able to live in a place that isn't so FUCKED UP that we feel obligated to pull those small little mindfucks all the time just to keep our sanity?

[East Coast Hustle]

Why is it that people only remember Rule #1 when it's their own stuff, and forget that other people abide by that rule too?

i agree with this as well.

in argument with the stick apart deal, what do you think is easier to avoid- the giant sized hammer you can see from over the horizon, or the thousand of little sized hammers that look like bunny rabbits swarming you from all sides?

the laputians will have their revenge!

I would agree with that sentiment if I thought for one second taht those thousands of little hammers were acting in some sort of meaningful direction instead of just flailing around without any guidance or point.

[agent compassion]

#1. Good rant, but it's the same rant you always have.

#2. KYFMS applies. Always.

#3. I definitely have the itch, but I have no desire to go out and do exactly what has been done a thousand times before and get the exact same results as everyone else(i.e. massive destruction.) You don't shit in your own bed, after all.

#4. Until I/we DO figure out ways to cause massive mindfucks that have lasting effects on the social order, it's best to tread lightly and slowly in my opinion. Cookies and pie and jakes harm nobody, but they ARE good practice for studying how mindfucks work, and why - which will come in handy later. And bonding over stupid stuff is STILL bonding, which you argue that we need if we're going to unite and have a strong effect...

#5. For the millionth time, Turd, there is a need for BOTH cookies and pie AND big stuff. So bear that in mind. I know that coming here was a great boost to my own spirit, because there was comfort in realizing that we ARE everywhere, pulling jakes both great and small, and it made me more daring when it came to planning my own. I don't know if I could be so bold if I didn't know that others were doing the same all over the world.

#6. Big change often starts from small, unlikely sources. Will we discount every small ripple in the pond? Or will we be the ones to see the ripples for what they are, and make them bigger?

#7. I don't want you to go away. And I don't know that anyone else here does either.

[cat~maxwell]

i don'tr want to believe that someone might have looke dta the SubGenius philosophy and seen the thing BEHIND the thing -- the lkurching venal truth of the hatefilled spiritual MateriaLust. i WANT  to.

i have gotten way way over listening to the deep stupidity and true inane prode in loserdom of some of them  -- both the tree and theone branch have become sort of...well i can see it.  

i want to ask you if you are for real.  but i bet you are.

SubGeniuses and Discordians -- or so they say --
bible beating,. in tune with dogma like neo pharaisees.

well, pleased to hear it.  i believe in beauty. i'm venus as a boy. i am thinking i may have something for at least YOU.  but...
more later.

[East Coast Hustle]

[agent compassion]

I'm with you on that one. WTF?!

Anyway, Turd, think about what I said. Small changes are no less needed than big ones - after all, it's totally within the realm of chaos theory for one small change to set off a whole chain of others, growing in size.

[East Coast Hustle]

I understand, and I'm not arguing the point.

I just think that the negative changes are happening too fast for that approach to do us any good at this point.

I feel like we're the modern-day version of the last dozen people in the Weimar Republic who were arguing that the Jews were people too and we really should leave the Sudetenland alone.

and look how well it worked for them.

[agent compassion]

I understand where you're coming from. However - three things:

1. The very fact that we feel that way now means it's not quite as bad as that yet. When you get tuned in to these things, you tend to feel them long before they actually happen. Will the sleeping sheeple have such an advance warning? No. There is still time. We got the wake up call, paranoia is protecting us.

2. To me, cookies and pie represent the little things that make life good. Happiness for its own sake, laughter and silliness. Luxuries. Things worth fighting for. You have, I'm sure, your own "cookies and pie" that you care about. We aren't all talking about literal confections here, but honestly, why would anyone fight a diseased, oppressive system if there wasn't something that they cared about enough to fight over?

3. As far as a grand plan goes, regardless of the stick-apart mentality, we can't avoid the reality that at some point we will need to get over our little tiffs wherever we are and start demonstrating our unity. That's no reason to abandon the small plans though. We can't put all our eggs into one basket. And some of us are n00bs at this mindfucking business, but we will get better at it if we practice.

[East Coast Hustle]

dammit, AC, you're making it awfully difficult for me to sustain my vitriol.