Jul 12 2007
What Lies Beneath: Privileged Grotesques, Ordinary Monsters and the Iraqi Deathscape.
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by Phil Rockstroh
7/12/07
At present, George W. Bush is unpopular with the majority of the American public not because of the murderous mayhem he has unloosed in Iraq; rather, his standing has plummeted, due to the fact that he didn’t deliver the goods. Americans are fine with fueling our republic of road rage using the blood of Iraqis (or any other distant and darker people) as long as “the mission” doesn’t drag on too long or reveal too much about ourselves.
How did we come to be a nation of vampires who live by sustaining ourselves on the blood of others? Is our mode of collective being so toxic in the United States that a writer must bandy about metaphors culled from Gothic horror fiction to describe it?
I’m afraid it’s come to that: We are a people whose psyches have grown monstrously distorted from an addiction to imperial power and personal entitlement. (Imagery of Smurfs and Teletubbies won’t rise to the analogy, albeit as terrifying as those demons of hell-bound cuteness are.)
The corporate culture of exploitation has begot a hellscape of narcissists. It is an authoritarian culture riddled in kitsch and cruelty, in nationalistic hagiography and displaced rage – all the distortions of national character inherent in privileged grotesques and ordinary monsters.
A narcissist’s actions are monstrous because his only love is the image of himself wielding control and power. (Does this remind you of anyone, perhaps someone who struts about in a flight suit — someone prone to proclaiming himself “the decider” – someone who grows intoxicated to the point of becoming insensate from a whiff of his own pheromones as he swoons in macho-narcissistic self-worship?)
And what about the everyday monsters, those who feel nothing — not outrage, not remorse, nor sorrow – by the conscience-devoid attempt made by our vampiric leaders to sustain “our way of life” on Iraqi blood? Are you not a monster as well when you feel nothing before immense human suffering? If you are impervious to, grown inured of, or have chosen to remain ignorant of the agony of the Iraqi people, then you might as well join the ranks of the undead — because the distant landscape of corpses in Iraq and Afghanistan matches your internal deathscape.
In short, our empire’s dependence on the resources (the life’s blood) of others renders us a nation of vampires. Moreover, the corporatist character (our national character) is defined by the vampire’s trait of taking, never giving. Accordingly, what do the big monsters at the top take from us, the little monsters?
To name one: our time, the precious hours of our finite lives. The corporatists are Time Vampires: For a moment, reflect on all the hours of life you’ve wasted away — in office cubicles, in commuter traffic jams, in the addictive pursuit of consumer dreck, or simply numbed-out and exhausted, rendered inert from the incessant, soul-sucking stress of the corporate state.
The corporatocracy devours our time and, like the charges of a vampire, has made us dependent and slavish in return. In our bloodless enslavement, we lose the vitality borne of existing within life’s inherent mysteries and grow estranged from the deep resonances of participation mystique.
How does one begin to take back one’s soul from these elitist usurpers? Start with this: The ebullient skepticism engendered from calling out soul-numbing, self-serving authoritarian lies.
In an era as perilous as ours, it’s imperative we act with utmost urgency. Yet, tragically, the exigencies of our age are being played out against a panorama of longer, more stressful work hours, superficially ameliorated by a mass media culture comprised of ceaseless trivia and mindless distraction.
This pathology began years ago when our ancestors offered up their life’s blood to the early corporatists of the Industrial Age. Henry Ford was a gray ghoul who measured out our flesh with his productivity-measuring stopwatch; he was a cunning practitioner of the black art of convincing human beings they’re mere cogs in an inhuman machine. It was only a short trudge from there through history’s slaughterhouse to Adolf Eichmann, insulated within his vampire’s coffin of cold calculations that shielded him from the horrific implications of the system of mechanized extermination he devised.
The corporate vampire’s creed is defined by ruthless efficiency; the fear of a “loss of productivity” is the driving force of the death machine. The system is so ruthless and inhuman that it must conceal its true face, hence the rise of the telegenic undead known as the corporate media. Do not look to them to report the facts of our condition: After all, a mirror can’t reflect the image of a vampire. A vampire is empty to the core; therefore, there is nothing to reflect.
Furthermore, his emptiness is the progenitor of his destructive nature. Rather than face himself, his appetite for death will devour all in its path: rain forests, Arctic glaziers, the people of Iraq, the hours of your life, as well as your inner being.
It is the force that holds Democratic politicians in the thrall of their own fecklessness, because they answer to the same blood-sucking, corporate masters as the rest of us. Quite simply, they’re afraid of their bosses too. The Washington Beltway is a version, in miniature, of the entire soul-dead, American corporatocracy. The careerist politicians within the Beltway are afflicted with the same diminution of choice — the same hyper-attenuation of the will to freedom — as the rest of us.
And what remains for us: an existence (or lack thereof) within this hierarchical hellscape of narcissists. What sort of a pathetic mode of being is this, a life shackled to the service of a monstrous system wherein one must evince the obsequies of a vampire’s bloodless lackeys?
To reverse this situation: Now is the time to drag the lies of the corporate state into the sunshine where they will wither to dust. We are not powerless: We live in a world where our collective, hidden intentions are made manifest by our outward actions. This is why Gothic — even B-movie — metaphors are not an overwrought description of our present condition. Ergo, by the vehicle of cultural collaboration, we are a nation of world-destroying, B-movie monsters — we are a hack-scripted, second-billed feature at the drive-in movie of existence — a laughed-off-the-big-screen of the cosmos, box-office poison of a people.
We are soul-sucking creatures of kitsch. Flesh-eating zombies of conformity. Road-rage werewolves. Right-wing, talk show demons whose wrathful voices rage into empty air. Hungry ghosts wandering the aisles of supermarkets, convenience stores, restaurant chains and the food courts of shopping malls. We are: The Fat, Mindless Blobs That Ate the Planet.
To survive, first, we must find the monster within, then drive a stake through its heart.
Phil Rockstroh, a self-described, auto-didactic, gasbag monologist, is a poet, lyricist and philosopher bard living in New York City. He may be contacted at:
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Funny…for years & years I’ve been telling people that Vampires to me are symbolic of Politicians, Religious Leaders, Business People, & Educators…That the Roman System of Govt. the Europeans set up coming here is all economic blackmail…
Discussed with two friends of European Heritage that Jesus’s original disciples tried to set up a communal system but they were still living in a Mammon/Money based system while at the same time the Native Tribes of this land were living as Tribal Communalists in a Non-Mammon/Money based system…
I discuss with them that the Israelites were a tribal people & Jesus was born of the Tribe of Judah…so if they don’t think he understood Tribal Life…they are mistaken…as his teachings like most Native Tribal teachings are in the Symbols of Nature…Planting..sowing…reaping…and animal symbols of being as wise as serpent & as harmless a dove…
The Tribes lived by the way of the circle..and Jesus’s teachings form spiritual circles…Forgive..and you will be forgiven…return good for evil done to you…pray for those who use you despitefully…
I discuss with them there are stories from within some Tribes that Jesus lived in land long ago when it was Turtle Island..but there aren’t any stories he killed anyone..stole from anyone..nor was killed by anyone…
As he did tell his disciples after his Resurrection he had to leave them to go feed sheep in other lands before he ascended back into Kingdom of God/Heaven…
Does your fag ass realize as soon as U say the words ‘George W’ we close the page & move on? We ‘Americans’ R bored with your ‘left-right’ herding antics. U R part of the problem - as if HIllary or that nigger would B N E better? The corruption runs infinitely deeper than the spokesperson (president). Grow a brain, U queer
I definitely agree with your analogy with vampires. In fact, some time ago I coined the term “Vamperialism” to describe the state of affairs. Please see http://vamperialism.com
Wrong.
We are not the vampires.
We (and the rest of the people of the world) are the victims.
Everybody is against the war.
Most folks know 911 was a psyop.
Sure lots of Americans are idiots but so are a lot of other folks in the world.
The war is not sustaining us it is draining us.
This phase of the freak show is designed to weaken the US.
If it was not for the freak show the US would be too powerful.
The elites of the world want the entire world to be like China.
http://home.earthlink.net/~root.man/sci.html
to George w Irrelevant:
Only a person who is insecure about his
own sexuality would toss around
words like fag and queer. I pity you
and hope you get help with that, and
your blind support of Bush!!
The writer of this uncomfortably observant piece should be congratulated. I would like to add that the USA is not alone in this immoral vampirism which is the war on terror and the imperialist consumption of the souls of citizens and riches of the earth. Britain is not too far behind the monstrous deceptions of an uncontrollable elite - too many of my fellow citizens are being led as lambs to the corporate slaughterhouse.
Very depressing assessment of our world. Most depressing of all is that it is true. It’s all true!
God help us.
The article was well-written, well-worded and articulate…if one is into allowing oneself to be eviscerated “for being human.” No doubt the author has a strong bend toward the macabre. Vampires??? Puhleeeze.
Since the dawn of time, when two or more humans got together, troubles soon arose. Period. End of story. And what we humans are doing to each other today is absolutely no different than it was over 500,000 years ago. We just have far nastier ways [and motivations] of disposing with things and ‘other tribes’ we don’t like while we observe life from the comfort of the boxes we’ve upgraded ourselves to from caves or while driving around in the boxes we’ve put wheels on.
Wanna know what life is REALLY like? Just let Bush, Cheney and the entire mad administration unleash a few ‘false flag nukes’ in well-chosen cities and I can guarantee you that you will witness some of the most base human characterisitcs in a real short time. Don’t think someone will gun you down just to get at your wallet? Don’t think someone won’t cut your throat to steal your car?? Don’t think someone won’t break into your home and steal damn near everything you have just so you can’t have it anymore??? My advice - buy a shotgun, lots of ammo, stock up on food and water and just dare anyone to come knocking!!
And it is all an extremely sad tale of “…an ape escaping.” (Credit to Emerson, Lake and Palmer for that.)
(Note: Of course, too, we can’t rule out the possibility that we’re all much more than just mere ’star stuff.’ There are more than a few thousands of other civilizations in the cosmos that could have ’seeded’ us here. Problem with that thought process is that someone forgot to upgrade our brains (or did they mean to???) My advice - enjoy your ‘education’ while you’re here - you signed up for it a long time ago!
discussing the actions of the US in the mideast without any consideration of the role played by israel/aipac is like looking
at the coin of war and believing that it has but one side.
the US and israel: 2 sides of the same coin. talk about vampires and blood lust…
say for instance there is no god or satan. man is just trying to survive anyway he can.drastic times brings out the beast.we kill,or steal to survive everyone wonts to be worthy .we do what we must to survive.a rich man has no need for a god.heaven is here on earth for them. only the weary have need for a god.things of the world are but desires of the wicked.trust no one,love only yourself,pity no man,be proud,never tell the truth,take from anyone you can. hate everyone. kill only for money.
For the record. I knew we as a nation were being duped. I know this war is about oil. I know our government has deluded the masses. My heart burns every day that our children are in Iraq dieing attempting to make a difference in what is basically a war of ideaolgy. That innocent Iraqi’s are brutally torn apart by bombs. How is murder and dieing good in any way shape or form. We have been conditioned to believe the Muslim world will kill us all. I’m not buying it. If they had water polo over there I don’t believe we would have invaded. I want our troops on the borders.
The likes of which are a going joke.
Woe to the Bush administration who has taken us down the wrong hill. I am so sorry my tax dollars were used for this madness. All the dead. For what purpose and to what end. What a terrific waste. How tragic, irrepsonsible and unforgivable. Impeachment and public thrashing would be a start. The decider of death. This is not the great land that has been so revered in delivering help to stricken areas. So wanted to be moved to. It will take decades to heal our foreign policies with the right leader at the helm.
Unfortunately the planet as a whole is crashing and burning and anyone who cannot see it is blind.
Our problems are far greater that the U.S. or Muslim extremism. We are facing global attrocities of warming and ecodeath the span of with is not even understood. There has been a great pain in my soul for three years. I have an idea of how badly the environment is going to be for future generations.
It is going to get really ugly. The prophesies speak of suicide boats. I believe they are true.
What we must do as a world, not a nation, not a state, not a city, but as a world entity that believes in love, human contact, and a higher spirtitual force. God. Be he Buddha, Jesus, Mahammad, or any of the other numerous names that we know exists. He is very very unhappy. How can we slaughter each other like cattle? Are we that barbaric. The answer is yes. I would lay down my life rather than to kill. That I could not live with or go into eternity with. God Bless. I wish the world well.
El Diablo is insulted by Chavez. Bush makes Satan look like an angel he once was according to the jew book. No amount of evil can equal Bush. He scuffs at scorn and laughs at the millions he has murdered while he and his family live in a Palace surrounded by 100s of servants and security costing 10s of billions annually. He has no regard for human life other than his own worthless squalid one or his family who are no better than him.
Is is true that Ms Daddy and Mr Mommy had anal sex 60 yrs ago and this human turd was concieved of it? nothin else explains this human turd and evil is an insult to evil itself and Satan runs for cover.
I did not answer my own question. What are we to do?
Love each other and try to heal the earth.
Fossil fuel is going to kill us all. The Illuminati would like for that. Tesla had notions that would have saved us 40 yrs ago. When I wake up dead tomorrow I dreamed of world peace. So much stupid money at stake that is going to wind up worthless pieces of paper. Then the world euro, then the lighted antichrist of corynthians, then ba bye. I liked the world the way it was.
May compassion and kindness be Our religion.
May We be able to forgive Our ancestors and Our neighbors and Our selves.
May joy and happiness be common, safety and abundance be clear, and blessings of family, friends, community and caring be Our desire.
May love be Our guiding light.
I am a drop of water, swimming in a vast blue ocean, trying to figure out what is this thing we call “water”.
May Our days be filled with blessings and sacredness, and Our nights filled with love and passion.
Amen! Aho! Booyah!
Sure there are bad things about the world and there are plenty of good things as well. Don’t concentrate on the bad things, focus on the good. The world around you is a reflection of what is going on on the inside of yourself. When things are good and going well for you, the world seems like a beautiful place but when things are not so well with ourselves the world around us seems a terrible place.
Change yourself and your own life and the world around you will change. What goes around, comes around. It’s all an illusion and you can change reality anytime you want. Complaining about how bad the world is will not change it. “Be the change you want to see in the world” Mohandas ‘Mahatma’ Gandhi.
This writer has certainly bought into the party line. We are all evil vampires? Crap. That is exactly what the vampires want you to think, don’t you know?
I am neither of those things: uncaring, soul sucking, that he mentioned. Nor are my family, or my friends. Yes, we may be a bit unaware at times; we have also been forced to survive in a world that is and has been controlled by creatures who are uncaring and soul-sucking, but those creatures are a small minority. They are known these days as psychopaths. They do not have a conscience and they do not care about anyone but themselves; they are predators disguised in human bodies. A major part of their disguise is to convince us that they are not different from us, that their actions are “human nature.” That is a lie. Humans care, they do have a conscience, they do not find pleasure in causing harm to another to benefit themselves, and they do not find pleasure in causing another pain. Real humans wish to live their lives in peace.
The word is psychopaths. Learn about them. They are not human.
Bush et al is just a prelude to what is really coming to this world. The Anti Christ is just around the corner. You think the Bush-Cheney cabal is bad, well this is all “child’s play” compared to what is coming.
It is pretty damn scary out there. It started to dawn on me around the end of 2001 (not long after September 11) - basically when the flags started coming out en masse. That’s when everything changed. Women started looking more alike(and dressing more seductively), the tv shows and movies suddenly got really nasty and unbelievably dumb, less people seemed to be reading and scariest of all is average people started becoming extremely arrogant and rude. I agree with you 100% - America has devolved into a terrifyingly mindless and nasty place. Are you thinking of moving like I am? Is there anywhere to go?
Yeah its true,although I would downgrade the majority from vampires to zombies.
The future looks bad,very very bad. Maybe the world is just too lazy or evil to live.
Maybe its too drugged on flouride or whatevers in the chemtrail cocktails. Who knows?
Yet we ought to realize we have sold our souls and the souls of our kids while we were in competition over the imaginary shiney thing. I’m an optimist so I like to think of the world as fair so don’t worry you(we) are going to get what we deserve for sleeping at the wheel. Oh lawd I pray that I will be shot while my mind is still pure.lol
This is the right spirt. Skip the labels , get to ther point . There will be a great number of corporate human resoures die before this message gets out. “The trouble is not in the trap but in the traped ones” Wilhelm Reich” [ banned and burned by the usa corporate state ala the FDA yr.1955 NY.city] I can’t stop throwing up ,it’s like they hate life itself. Stop . They do hate life . Life is moving , movement can’t be tolerated by damaged humans beyond a bare min.Too much and they run screaming to the mayor or the priest or prelate or official, who knows more than them and will do something about it., ie: stop it. They used us, they used us all . Cry for days, take one last look behind, then fight for your life, defend natural decency, everywhere. But start here in this place, this new country, this locale, this little republic of yourself. Learn, Heal, Teach. good little amerikan sheeple must grow up now. Or die stupid. sincerely WLB.
Comment for “Patriot”
your education is limited. you are speaking from a perspective which accepts humanity as being limited. This idealogy is simply part of a current belief system valid to western culture and monotheistic religeons. To assume that your belief is the truth, simply characterises the maturity of your intellect and your emotional range. your emotional range is significant, as your words, language and information imply a very linear thought pattern and a significant lack of information.
You are clearly intelligent and thoughtful. it would be worthwhile to challenge yourself. More education….and someone to introduce you to a more expansive form of logic.
Please do not decide that all of humanity is as limited as you are (currently). your government of course has very purposefully directed an education system to dumb your thinking ability down. the rest of the world is aware that it worked well. if you have been paying attention many specifically american ‘experts’ sociologists, psychologists etc began to inform Westerners (especially during the 1980’s) that humans were limited. Think. When you are informed “you are stupid” enough times anyone will begin to believe it. Check with any abuse counsellor.
learn to ask more questions. Guns, Ammo and and a stockpile of food is a fear-based resolution worthy of a very badly bred four year-old, whos’ parents require admonishment. It is sad that so many in your country have fallen into ….aaah this destructive lifestyle choice, so willingly.
Come on, grow up intellectually and emotionally and challenge the limits you have fenced yourself into. You may not beleive that you are smart enough. so, i am reminding you….you are smart enough. your letter indicated this.
p.s. the article was wonderful. it is sad that intelligence and the many levels it functions through…is denied by your education system and the differences are not even recognised by so many in your country.
Perhaps those who would criticise this most insightful assessment of our enlightened depravities, are far too accustomed to seeing nothing, when they gaze into their mirrors.
The problem is not the lack of patriotism (futile to mount yet another flag onto your motorcar); rather, it is the lack of humanity.
My thanks to Mr. Rockstroh.
Americans, it’s not all your fault. If the UK Prime Minister had not acted as international cheerleader for the mayhem, your own leaders would never have gone it alone. Bush and Blair; two cheeks of the same arse.
The amerikan sheeple-both ignorant & arrogant–are indeed heading over the cliff..and into oblivion…baaa baaaaa…… mj ssg usa ret
gee dubya ,god’s choice.heil to the king.gop’s are inbreeds .it’s hard for them to think when your mother is also your aunt.when put in charge they can’t help it .their brain just don’t work right.most have swelling in their brain,you know fat headed.
Just as the world’s nations could stop US Imperialism tomorrow by pulling the plug on the collapsing dollar if they wanted to, the world’s people could stop buying our decadent culture if they wanted to. It is not that Americans don’t deserve what they will get as yes, most Americans actually do want to suck out the resources for themselves. But collective blame? Regardless of how many years of “collective” history humanity has, Americans are just another in a long series of “vampire” ethnicities, following the Brits, Spaniards, Mongols, Romans, Greeks, Persians, etc., and we won’t be the last. Unfortunately, all the other govts. and all the other peoples are perfectly happy not loving and not giving, taking whatever they can, along with Americans. It isn’t as if Americans invented greed and nastiness. Anyway, humanity will change, but only when it is forced to become that potential of which the article speaks. I think Shadow Dancer has a clue…most of you don’t, however.
One can easily understand and empathize with the psychology and politics of denial in the face of disturbing information and disconcerting facts.
Who would really want to know the revelatory folly of wisdom, and the kind of knowledge it swiftly and mercilessly unveils? When one conceptually dwells primarily in a cocoon of hierarchical control, the bliss of ignorance is far more comfortable and compelling.
At the very basis of our problem as a species is the ease with which we can substitute ideas and beliefs for what relates directly and substantially to our organism, or personal nature. I am including the notion of scientific objectivity and rational, logical thought, along with all forms of spirituality and transcendental concepts, in that dilemma. Yet, a mere, (but spotentially illuminating) recognition of our ability to abstract the world and model reality, both individually and collectively, is more of a perspective and recognition than a solution or chastisement of thought and the mind.
From there, seeing that everything we think is actually a metaphor and that all of our comparisons are mostly meta-metaphors, et al, we could look at the analogy of the vampire used in the article in many ways, but none of them are literal or concrete, just as other ideas, beliefs, and ideologies illustrate.
I think the article fails to illustrate and convince readers just how , and why, they might be involved members of the vampire society, as the author suggests. It is far too easy to splash rhetorical invectives, (be they clearly precise or dismally distorted) onto the canvas of cybernetic exposition for our digestion.
As we have noted, a good share of commenter’s have replied to the article with rather telling expressions of comforting beliefs . While we see that beliefs, (supported by “fact” or otherwise) are not really issue, we can learn more by paying attention to that and try to understand how mindsets function to help people keep a sense of equilibrium and a capacity to function within their environmental variables and social construct.
More articles that clearly relate just how members of a culture/society, (both rather huge abstractions with as much substance as the pixels that render them) can function as vampires and even vampire supporters without that being obvious or even appearing to be voluntary at all.
I think that this dynamic and condition is obvious to the author and more astute readers here. Or, at least, I would hope so.
Rather than turn this comment into an article-in-itself, it is hoped that the relationships and mechanisms would be rendered in a way that makes the move to an openness towards introspection and awareness more palpable and acceptable.
One does not reach individuals who cannot see their own cooperation and involvment by slapping them rudely with ideas as if performing an intervention. That only initiates stronger boundary building and defense mechanism activation.
Our species is extremely prone to the soothing elixirs and pain-killing opiates of belief and the ensuing denial that is one of the contraindications of the addiction to symbolic substitutions. Even when this phenomena has led to some very dire issues that now wait on our collective doorstep, patience and compassion are just as appropriate for the wakeup calls we make while that is still feasible.
“#
# frankon 13 Jul 2007 at 10:35 am
to George w Irrelevant:
Only a person who is insecure about his
own sexuality would toss around
words like fag and queer. I pity you
and hope you get help with that, and
your blind support of Bush!!”
First, U do a straw man fallacy routine. Who I am & what I say has nothing 2 do with the fact both sides R infinitely corrupt & changing the ’spokesperson’ is just a charade 2 neutralize real progress.
It’s interesting how a fags say N E 1 who doesn’t support a nigger or dyke 4 president is therefore in support of Bush. U R retarded, but then, so R all fags. U have 2 B - 2 have no will 2 survive. U can’t argue your way out of that, dead-ender. Fags don’t procreate. & if U do, well U R not actually gay R U? HAHAHAHA
retards
Longhair/MatrixEscape … Is that you?
I appreciate your cogent, sane comment.
In my defense, regarding your criticism of the piece lacking the means to pierce the bubble psychology of the majority of the public at large, I will quote an earlier essay of mine, if you will allow me the indulgence.
“I often receive e-mails from readers who ask, in essence:
“And what of those of us — those who remember and grieve our republic’s passing. Is there some place of sanctuary where we could rally our spirits; a place where we might gather our strength — where we might have a rapprochement with our own hopeful hearts, where we might rise in the cool air of morning in some location no longer haunted by the malicious and manipulative spirits who have usurped our names and stolen our country. Is there any place on earth where we might dodge the mind-grinding, soul-killing, death-worshipping legacy of the militarist/corporatist/consumerist state?
“Don’t you see, Phil, these readers implore and admonish me: We’re besieged and outnumbered by the mindless worshippers of Death around us — and, by the way, fella, your incantatory prose will not move, nor even interest them.
“I’ll answer these entreaties by quoting from a documentary I viewed recently, Punk: Attitude, in which independent filmmaker Jim Jarmusch posited that art movements (and political ones as well) don’t need the masses, they just need a committed five percent . . . the masses will follow. There is no need to inform the mob; a mob, by its very nature, is uninformed — and unteachable. The belief in the existence of an informed mob is like believing in the existence of that chimera called compassionate conservatism — and we’ve seen where credulity to that sort of crazy talk leads.
“As was the case with Punk, which Jarmusch termed “do it yourself art,” one needs passion, commitment, conviction — tempered by an ability to apprehend and uniquely interpret changing realities and circumstances — plus an inner reservoir of courage and follow-through. These things can’t be bought retail. And that is exactly the advantage we hold.
“Hence, it might be instructive to look at the mode of being evinced by the pioneers of Punk Rock. Tired of endless guitar solos and of Arena Rock and Roll’s egomaniacal inanities, they learned to play three chords — real fast — and would play for little or no money in shot-out downtown clubs, thereby reintroducing the danger and allure of the subversive intimacy of early Rock and Roll to a new generation, and forever establishing the enduring principle that being an imbecilic Rock and Roll egoist should be a democratic process — not limited to only corporate, guitar technocrats (or even those individuals possessed of the tyranny of talent).
“Point of clarification: I’m not speaking here of literally becoming a punk rocker. (Although, a convincing argument can be made that independent websites and blogs are the new Punk Rock.) I’m talking about the initial passion of the progenitors — not the conformist banalities displayed by their mindless followers. I’m speaking of the mode of being of the folks who created the art form — not the hollow mimicry of those who mummify it into dogma.”
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Dec06/Rockstroh01.htm
To reiterate: I don’t know if the majority of the populace can be jolted out of denial … just enough, perhaps, to bring about meaningful change.
I don’t know if it’s even possible to reach quintessential victim’s of American pathology such as m.astera — “I am neither of those things: uncaring, soul sucking, that he [that would be yours truly] mentioned. Nor are my family, or my friends. Yes, we may be a bit unaware at times; we have also been forced to survive in a world that is and has been controlled by creatures who are uncaring and soul-sucking, but those creatures are a small minority.” nor Nicky — “Sure there are bad things about the world and there are plenty of good things as well. Don’t concentrate on the bad things, focus on the good. The world around you is a reflection of what is going on on the inside of yourself. When things are good and going well for you, the world seems like a beautiful place but when things are not so well with ourselves the world around us seems a terrible place.”
The self-centeredness and naivety of those comment defy logical intervention. It take would channeling R. D. Laing and Carl Jung, jointly, from the great consulting room beyond, plus a copious supply of Ayahuasca, I suspect, to transport folks such as m.astera and Nicky away from their tiny planet of comforting banalities that they’ve mistaken for a description of the cosmos.
I generally don’t attempt it: I try to reach the aforementioned five percent.
I’ve found all the comments here very interesting, I read the anger based, the fear based, and the hysterics (image based), they move towards the perceived problem, away from the problem, or they try to make nice.
Look at the comments again, do you agree or disagree with them. Yours and my reaction to the comments will tell us more about the type of person we are, what’s needed is understanding on a personal level of how we view the problem (Vampires).
Self understanding is a new way of looking at things, people are not seen as a group to con-vince. Individual actions taken, is the one thing that is not ever seen, it will change things, there are those 5%, they have made the decision to act alone. They are crazy. They see the Big Picture. That will make you crazy
It works both ways, the 5% on top know this and control, water seeks it’s own level, which seems to say 5% on the bottom has not yet been realized.
Individual action taken will change both the inner self (if there is one) and the situation as perceived. I speak from my own experience, which is crazy.
A wise guy I knew at a bicycle shop said to me when I was caught in my own view of things “Here take this broken bike and fix it with your mouth”.
I wonder if the man who said Give me Liberty or give me Death, followed through with an action, and if he did or didn’t did anything really change?
Even the future fast food workers standing on a street corner, passing back and forth some mind altering substance, looking at the people with nice cars telling themselves (if their is such a thing) I/we are as good as them in their fancy cars, even these know that if you want something bad enough, you have to do things you don’t want to do.
By the way I’ve been on the corner, and I’ve been in the car, when I was in the car and saw the guys on the corner, I never thought “I’m as good as them”,
I am up at 1 am writing this and wondering if I will take the Mandatory drivers license, partly wondering if I am a vampire, or a vampire’s stooge, or GOT BALLS, I have a business and a woman and a child. I remember in the latest Alamo movie the actor Billybob Thorten says”If i was just David Crockett I’d take my chances and jump over that wall, But Davy Crockett can’t do that.”
This turned into a rant,
Fred
The only vampires you need to stake and who have been well known for years are JEWS.
Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh knew their traitorous minds well.
Jason Miller never broaches the word because he is part of the obfuscation that is detroying the US and the world.
Sayanim is their name. AIPAC rules congress. All Zionists are Jews.
what are Jews?
Read. http://judicial-inc.biz/e.eric.gielbe.htm
Jason has blocked my emails. So much for Tom Paine and Cyrano.
His nose is long like a certain wooden puppet we all know.
Jews did 911 and all world wars.
www.Jew-Crime.com
Guard your children around Purim and Passover especiallly. Blood Libel is still causing myriads of missing children.
Moses of 10 Commandments fame was a rapist and murderer of little girls. Reference: Your King James Bible at Numbers Chapter 31, Vs 15 on. Have your priest, minister or RABBI have the primary school kids give that as a real passion play for the whole congregation.
Kol Nidre anyone????????
Oy Vey!!!!!!
as one, er, “sentient being” to another, I was disappointed in what I found here.
Your writing style is first convoluted and then over-cooked.
Could you sneer in plainer, more concise, terms?
(Finally, the culture is a rapacious one, yes, but not every individual in it deserves that charge.)
Fred Wahlstrom,
I found your comments interesting as well, yet: Beware of reductionist demons who bandy false correlatives.
If I were you, I would thank your bicycle mechanic for his proffered wisdom — but I would ask him to: attempt to use his bicycle tools to write a love sonnet or compose a symphony or offer them as alms for grief.
Not doable, huh?
There are many things in this word that require being touched by words, for words alone can suffice to take us deep and lift us up and ameliorate our alienation.
Author:
You’re another huggie on the anti-racist bandwagon. You say our republic burns the blood of “distant and darker” peoples—yet you forget WWII. 800,000 white Germans were murdered by Allied bombing raids on Dresden and Hamburg. Deliberately calculated deaths. The ordnance was high-explosives and incendiaries.
Later on Eisenhower allowed one million German POW’s to die of exposure in American camps. He also turned in thousands of Russian soldiers who had fought against the Soviet government–turned them over to Stalin, who of course shot them all.
Your morality is selective. Germans don’t count. Or better, white people don’t count.
I look forward to better days–that is, anarchy.
DR
Baltimore
Hmmmm….. lots of words, lots of labelling, the same stereotyping I see too often that says *everyone* feels this, or “This group” feels that, yawn…..
As journalists and perhaps those others who simply want to try and “bear witness to *The TRuth*” as much as we are each able, may I simply suggest trying to be more SPECIFIC rather than generalizing. (I know we all do it). I would say in all fairness though the MAJORITY of Americans based upon those I personally know and what the so called “polls” tell us, are against these wars for OIl, Israel, $$$$$, and bases and it isn’t because the U.S. isn’t ‘winning’ as such any occupation, it’s simply that we know they are based on LIES– And the killing of so many innocents and destruction based on those lies.
Let’s remember too many Americans still are getting their disinformation from a state-run/corporate media that would make the old Soviet Pravda proud and Goebels would admire. It is hard to really BLAME dumbed down people personally because they have taken the bait of the daily Orwellian Ministry of Non-truth that spews out of sphincter holes like FAUX and Corporate News Network.
C’mon we have enough “American bashing”, the American people (if I might generalize myself) might be on OCCASION dumber than rocks, but they have I think good hearts, mean well, ARE WAKING UP even if Slowly, and WE who have the ability just need to wake them up a bit further, get them to unpug the idiot box, start thinking for themselves and start questioning EVERYTHING.
Let’s try lifting up our brothers and sisters. There are plenty of other forces of Darkness swirling around to constantly put them down, THEY don’t need our help.
T.A.
Phil, I appreciate your critical eye, here in this place and time words have there use, In my life to undo what is false, like seeing a belief is just that, a belief. The thrust of my post was going it alone, taking actions not based on beliefs,l but on a type of intuition which intuits what is right or wrong, acting on that and not knowing what the results are going to be.
This seems to work for me, as long as I don’t blame others for the outcome, and take the responsibility on myself.
Kind of like knowing I am responsible for everything, and at the same time because I can’t know all the forces acting at that time (except in retrospect), understanding I’m responsible for nothing.
Reading your article awoke something in me, which is why I replied, knowing I can’t fix anything with my mouth, but seeing words can unlock a door, and what was always there is seen for what it is. I have taken to calling this a BFO (blinding flash of the obvious).
As for the reductionist demons they serve their purpose if making something simple is a starting point to an event which will become complex, I have to work on the understanding that all evolves towards complexity not simplicity, and keeping my perception moving at that same speed, but being human I sometimes go too fast or slow, and I can return to the reductionist starting point, at that time the demon becomes a daemon. I can best show this by the feeling I have in reading your reply, and intuiting the truth of being less alienated. You do very well with ‘bike shop tools’, which in regards to ‘others’ (if their is such a thing) is hard (for me) to point out where someone is going off track, or getting ready to be locked into tunnel vision, which I see as terminal reductionism ie: all alone together.
I thank you for taking the time out to point this out to me, and ameliorating my tendency toward isolating. (temporarily)
Fred
Do we prefer the forest, do we prefer the trees, do we prefer the words, or do we prefer the actions from the words, do we prefer the microscope, do we prefer the telescope, do we make distinctions, is it all good, is it all one, is anything more effective, less effective, heads, tails, the coins edge, is it all just a preference? Probably. Just a view? Likely. Does it matter? If you want it to.
George W. Irrelevant is probably just another closeted, self-hating homosexual like the rest of the GOP; just see Mark Foley, Ken Mehlman and the Florida GOP representative arrested for soliciting to perform oral sex on a police officer last week as examples. That’s not to mention Tranny Coulter and his/her enormous Adam’s apple. Nothing like projecting your own psychoses onto people who disagree with you, eh?
What a very accurate and well written article. Now I’m even more glad that I moved to India four months ago. I’m telling all my best friends and family members to get out of Merika (rhymes with naraka, the Sanskrit word for hellish) while they still can. After the next Terrorist Event, which will be coming up much sooner than most people expect, there will be a major shut down. You can even expect a sunset curfew. It will be selectively applied however. People in gated communities needn’t worry too much but if you’re in a more downtrodden neighborhood and you’re out after dark, you can expect to be scooped up and will very likely find yourself in one of those huge decommissioned military installations. You think the present power holders will easily turn over the reins to the vagaries of some election process?
Instead of pretentiously Pseudo intellectualising and analysing yourselves, each other and the world around you, why don’t you get off your fat, hairy, arseholes and change the world, if you want to change it, for better or for worse!
Thanks, Phil, for your response to my post. I understand and empathize with your position. We each have a definite place, or presence, in the pattern and our function is to unfold this by process, as I call it.
For those who would chastise those who spend their time digesting the Gestalt of today’s reality, processing it, and then relating it via various mediums, I say you are totally misguided and are not considering the function and place of ideas in the schemata of human activity and actions.
Please consider the history of the written and spoken word before you jump to erroneous conclusions and righteously demand that lucid and poignant authors exchange their well-honed swords of words for a sword of activity! You are selling yourself short on that knee-jerk perspective.
I could point you to a host of historical documents and books that where nothing more than words on paper, but then blossomed, dramatically, into incredible activity and reactions, observed, lived, and felt by many people — hundreds, thousands, even millions. The Bible, The printing press that brought the Gutenberg Bible to the masses, the Magna Carta, Martin Luther’s posting on a church door, Carl Marx’s writings, The Declaration of Independence, etc., etc., and so on. It is totally absurd to postulate that mature and effective action is not preceded by ideas, thoughts and words — printed or spoken.
The mass media combined with education has worked at a fevered pitch to dumb down the masses, (with America as the poster child for that effort). One could most reasonably expect that, in a so-called advanced, technologically infused and dependent “civilization” that the average person would have a vocabulary far exceeding the suggested, and often adhered to, tenth or twelfth-grade level. An artist can call upon many colors, hues, and shades to express ideas and emotions, so why insinuate that Phil is no more than a thesaurus junkie looking to impress people with “big words’? It is a tragedy, (and yet a realization of the Orwellian nightmare) that, rather than expanding and growing, the palette of subtle meaning and precision that so many people have to express themselves, (and think with) appears to be shrinking, rather than growing exponentially.
We are dealing with the mind, first and foremost, on this battlefront! While even Phil may not see that the mind itself, (no matter how celebrated, venerated, honored, and above reproach it may be for intellectuals especially) and that tool that we possess is one of pure and simple oneupmanship. In that case, it is as pertinent and potent as a sword, gun, or even a nuclear weapon — in the right hands of course.
The constant, numbing exposure to mass media, commercials, and endlessly banal topics, may actually be leaving its mark, not on the power of the spoken and written word, but on the value that people place upon the impact and effect that verbal communication has on a species that has come to almost totally encapsulate itself in abstraction and ideas while failing, miserably, to notice it! We are becoming, in a general way, so very far removed from our nature, (read:organism) that the power of the word can be more effectual and impacting than a blow to the head with a brick.
We, like it or not, live in a world that is mostly symbolic and less tangible than we might assume. The people who understand this in a scientific and factual way are the ones who move the mountains and turn our whines into water. The spin doctors, “think tanks”, rhetoric forgers, speech writers, media pundits, and the rest of that cavalcade of thousands are hoping that all of you will never pause to see how words, ideas, symbols and beliefs have become the bars and walls of a prison that you stay in voluntarily and without objection. And I assure you, it is a prison where the doors are not locked, but you are thoroughly convinced that there is no escape. In fact, the very idea of escape conjures very frightening images and ideas that would make you recoil in disgust and despair, should you be brave enough to even entertain them.
It is so very hard for me to comprehend that, when it comes to blow by blow, people who respond here could commit the kind of hypocrisy where they type words into a comment box that are intended to motivate an author of an article to “get off his ass” and “act” in some way. Let he who is without typing cast the first cybernetic, silicon stone! But what else could you do to Phil, other than convey a message, ey?
Phil has a gift, a capacity, and a platform. He, from the escapee’s POV, uses it extremely well and without flinching or mercy. Disagree with him, if you must, (dissent is the friction that sharpens the sword of mind) but I implore you, don’t be so quick to denigrate his ideas or quickly undermine them with your cherished prejudices based on nothing more than habitual perspectives and culturally-inserted beliefs.
The Matrix is real! The movie may have become nothing more than a fad, (fads have assured us that nothing in our minds can easily take hold and stand for long) but, through a glass darkly, it conveys what you essentially need to know if the liberation of the mind is at all your desire or interest.
Matrix Escape,
I appreciate your defense of my efforts against the kvetching armies of crackpot realists that have encircled this comment section.
Americans are trained since birth to adapt to and serve the corrupt corporate structure by way of avoiding introspection and being in constant (empty) motion or in the thrall of mass media distraction.
The are taught that passivity is for losers, yet find themselves nearly powerless before the corporate/consumer/military/police/entertainment state. Hence, their helpless rage must be displaced. The act of reading is seen as passive; to the crackpot realists, it seems useless, unproductive, a feckless act of the effete. When reading, the crackpot realist displaces their feelings of self-loathing for their own imagined passivity upon the writer.
In this way, they serve their corporate masters. It serves the corpocracy that the lower orders refuse meaningful introspection. If one were to glimpse one’s own illusions, then it follows one might begin to question collective delusions — and this would upset the social order.
You might find this essay of mine of interest:
Six Flags Over Neo-Nuremberg: Bush, Oprah, the San Diego Chicken, and a
Proto-Fascist Panopticon of the Mind
http://www.dissidentvoice.org/Oct06/Rockstroh06.htm
Thanks again for your eloquent defensive of the sublime of language and those of us who have surrendered to her service.
for crying out loud i think the president has done a great job. god bless george w. bush.
To defeat our enemies we must first overcome our fear of them. We must not let fear enter our minds planting false seeds, destroying our hopes to defeat the enemy. We must all first recognize our enemy. We must not waver between right-left policies, but connect on common ground. The way to destroy a leech is to take away its blood. The leech can live a very long time without feeding. So, the way to beat the Jews at their own game is to stop giving them all our money! If the Bush mob had to pay for some of the Iraqi War money, how long would the war last? Stop being played for a fool by the American Corporate Welfare System. Its time now to beat your plows into swords.
“proud to be an american” I’m sure you’re being sarcastic and trying to give us all a good laugh to brighten the dark clouds of destruction and death and misery the Neo-CONS have brought to the world…. but just in case you’re NOT joking…and are still part of that less than 20% who still believe Bush isn’t among the WORST Residents in American history…. what might he have “done a great job” on? Hundreds of Thousands of innocent dead Iraqi women and kids, 1000’s of our own dead, tens of thousands more wounded, environmental destruction using depleted uranium, record profits for the oil companies, destroying any last bits of The Bill of Rights, looting billions from the treasury for his cronie pals, teaching Americans new phrases such as “stand down” and False Flag”….what exactly?
T.A.
“fat, hairy arsehole”?!?!? Nicky have you been looking in my bathroom window again?
well…….
for crying out loud,if you liberals dont like what the president is doing, go buy a one way plane ticket.when rupert murdoch buys the stock market we jews will control this shitter,ha-ha then you will be our slaves.we already get your money next well have your souls.only thing you’ll hear then is rush limbaugh.ditttooooo.
you fools are now paying for our oil.listen slaves the war in iraq will never end. israel needs the oil morons.then we take the land retards.we control your money,your media,we even tell dumb dubya what to do, he knows what happen to kennedy, could happen to him.you think dum-dum could have pulled off 9/11 ha-ha.if nothing is done in iran soon,it could happen again.who do you think busted up the ussr reagan ha-ha.we control the whole dam world.we put who we wont in your white house,you do what our controlled media tells you.slaves heeeee-heeeeeee.
Hey, that’s not bad, You’ve got the Elitist thing down pretty good…. so who’s yo daddy
gee dubya,you jews will soon be just a bad memory,tangled in your own web,snared in your own trap.jesus- you jews know there is no god to save you. thats why you put no trust in him. you put your trust in your nuke’s .listen if you are the chosen ones,why take from the labor of the american people.let god fight your battles for you. he will provide right.thats why you dont butcher all the palistinians because the world would know you as the monster you are.
just look at all the great things they do for the world.we get to tour the birth place of jesus.we get to watch all their porno.they make a small amount of money selling pill& medicine,maybe a couple hundred billion a year.i just love their supreme court stucture,i bet maybe the american people helped build that wall,the great rupert murdoch helps his brother jews.while the fool americans take in fox as if it was true,they got um,they got um,they got um,they got gospel.iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,iraq,saddam,saddam,saddam,saddam,stay the course,iran,iran,iran,iran,iran,iran,ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh.
werewolves is what i call the gop.
heee-heeeee now the fox is in the hen house.you fools will lose all your money on the stock market.jewish brother murdoch heeeeee-hee has got complete control now.you slaves bow down and lick the dog shit from our boots slaves.we will kill all the arabs,then lock down starts in the useless of a .heeeeee-heeee.you will then work for us for a dollar a day.heeeee-heee.
look for the beauty in all things. love thy neighbor let your words only be kind. god laughs at the proud, all people are born to die.jesus came to heal the sick. he died for the sins of the wicked. so they to may have hope.thank you jesus .let us kill the fatted calf and rejoice.for they was lost but now are found.