What I do not accept

I think I’ve always had an aversion to power. Our culture is replete with power structures and power structures are ingrained since early childhood. But there are certain concepts I simply never accepted. They just didn’t pass muster. Ever.

I never accepted:
-that I was inherently bad or born bad or tainted or defiled or not whole as a matter of consequence such that I would need to impose internal order on myself in order to become whole or pure or good.
-that human nature is fundamentally corrupt or perverse or bad.
-that there is such distinctions as good and evil.
-that an absolutist reward/punishment structure (heaven and hell) is a healthy belief to internalize.
-that morality cannot exist separate an external authority.
-that compassion and empathy would not exist separate an externally imposed moral framework.
-that I need to be saved.
-that I should not trust myself.

The last one especially society presses very hard against. Society, as a corollary to damaging our self-trust, works to separate our mind-body connection. The mind-body connection is one of my new favorite interests and one which I believe is necessary to a whole, integrated person.

Society wishes us to rely on external feedback systems rather than well-balanced internal mechanisms. Society is also highly authoritarian in its methods, science just as much so as religion.

The human organism is built for external feedback however and the feedback received goes a long way in influencing each individual. Humans are also built to need guidance. This can make self-trust difficult when social norms are rejected. It poses an ultimatum: go it alone or abdicate self-trust. Neither is an appropriate or healthy option for an individual.

And herein lies the problem of authoritarian structures. But when people in such structures do reject social norms, they become adrift and prone to strong attachments. This can lead to surrender and total abdication of self-trust, despite oneself.

I have been through periods of such abdication and I’ve had widely varying amounts of self-worth. I am starting to come to a more complete understanding of the whole issue, but I am still at a loss as to what is to be done. That is something I will continue to explore.

Visions of D

There are different analogies that can be made to the modern world. The Matrix is perhaps one of the most apt and popular. But my favorite… the one that has always stuck in my mind… is Leviathan. To me it conjures up simultaneous images of every sort of industrial complex: military-industrial, agricultural-industrial, educational-industrial, medical-industrial. It conjures images of a corporate capitalist system that relies on heavy government favoritism to maintain its dominance. It conjures images of a system that is ultimately destructive and extractive without producing much, if any, real wealth. It makes me think of passive submission and unawareness. It makes me think of clandestine control. And that’s the real issue with Leviathan: inescapability.

Those are issues I care to explore in my real blog, but here I present the idea. And make no mistake; Leviathan does wish to be inescapable. Anytime somebody wants to “opt out” in some fashion, there are suddenly an inordinate amount of laws and regulations. The challenge for those of us living today is to find some form of meaningful work and attempt to rebuild something that has been all but obliterated.

I don’t accept passivity and I don’t accept passive, consumptive culture. My life has been a fight for things that feel like they’re lacking but shouldn’t be. The more self-aware and worldly-aware I become, the more I learn there are reasons for this. Leviathan is taking away.

So whence this Leviathan? It is the vision of D. Not “I have a dream” vision, but “I see dead people” vision. As in… she really did see it. But I am telling you this story third-hand. D is nobody I knew personally. It is simply a story of a friend recounted by localroger as a potent introduction to his article on the history of American education. See the article here, and read especially the two paragraphs on D. I am not so concerned here with the views of John Taylor Gatto (In fact I have yet to read his work). I am just concerned with D and her vision.

And so I make use of it again, as a potent introduction to all the things I wish to share and discuss and perhaps change, or at least provide support and some semblance of escape. May we all have the sanity to see clearly the vision of D but also may we have the fortitude to stand against such a challenge.

Second Life: First Impressions

So I’ve finally gone and checked out Second Life and I’m a little less than impressed. I get the model of interaction and a movement towards an online realm which is sort of the techno-dream of the early internet. But I have a problem with all these online worlds, whether they be Facebook, World of Warcraft, or Second Life. That is they don’t bring us closer together.

At least I don’t think so. Real human interaction is a rare and difficult thing. Well actually it shouldn’t be but it seems like it sometimes. It requires friendships and relationships that have been built slowly over time. I get concerned with things that feel like throw away culture or may promote loose or easily shifting allegiences.

To be fair, I know I am too much of a Luddite. I resisted cell phones at first and am now resisting the Google and iPhones. My thing is I want to know how a technology is directly useful. Cell phones have proven themselves useful not only in personal relationships but also in much broader areas as well. I don’t feel like there’s much contention in that. But Facebook I am still resistant to. Facebook to me feels like a stand in for real human interaction. In fact, I think too much reliance on Facebook would tend to leave one feeling more isolated and I know friends that resist it for this reason. Much has been written about the social impact of Facebook so I don’t want to go too much into it here. There are ways, I’m sure, Facebook can be useful but I’ve found it to be limiting and often annoying.

But there’s another thing about Second Life I don’t like, and that’s the avatar. Second Life clearly bills itself as the solution to whatever’s lacking in normal life. And yes, I think the avatars look like pseudo-porn. My spidey sense tells me this is just going to lead to people having a lower overall sense of self-worth. But oh well. I guess TV’s already doing this. Not that I watch much of it.