\"Our lives, our fears, it all depends upon how we believe.\"--John Trudell, Santee-Sioux spokenword (c)hampion\r\n<\/p>
\r\nPaths towards an in-the-heart solution
\r\nSolutions for those with the nerve to dig deeper than the \"Known\".\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\npoints to be considered:<\/b>
\r\na dedication, intellectual self-defense, informal resistance consciousness \r\nand pros and cons of formal organization, the meta game, wizards of Is, An explanation for Perpetual War, a new imagination, liberation of our desire and an obstacle, Continue the war, or understand and implement liberatory desires? \r\nspirit liberation or psychological ju-jitsu, crazy people, a personal \r\nexample, another example, the problem of institutionalized fear. \r\n<\/p>
<\/p>
\r\nIntellectual self-defense<\/b>
\r\nIntellectual self-defense has been deeply articulated by the much despised \r\nluminary, Noam Chomsky. Basically, the method is to \"undertake a \r\ncourse\" (of self-instruction via Chomsky et al's *institutional analysis*) so \r\nthat we may better understand how we are collectively manipulated via \r\nnotable methods of thought control by major influence institutions: i.e. \r\nthe mainstream media and the State. \r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nResistance consciousness <\/b>
\r\nAdditionally, John Trudell (still quite well-marginalized) articulated a \r\nbasis for Chomsky's idea in a broader way in his *We Are Power* speech, \r\nback in 1980. Trudell basically says to look the 'virus' (or fever) of \r\ncoercive society's aggressions upon *all*; and unmask the value system \r\n*behind* the hiding and often thinly veiled aggression. Speaking in his \r\nart, sober speeches, and conversation (i.e. see Stickman excerpts) about \r\nways to avoid being *smashed* as well as dead-on insights about the \r\nillusory nature of the military terrorism that tries to pass itself off as \r\n'power' (thus going deeper than Chomsky's idea that such is \"Real \r\nPower\").\r\n<\/p>
\r\nHaving digested much of this, I come away with the idea of conscious \r\nutilizing (tooling) of the best of what formal resistance can offer, while not \r\nletting its destructive sides tool us.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nFormally organized resistance<\/b>
\r\nFormal resistance, as the model lives in the popular imagination (and \r\nespecially the imaginations of institutionally \"well-educated\" persons (a \r\nphrase to ask significant questions of)), brings into our imaginations \r\ncertain camoflauged angles which we need to scrutinize more carefully if \r\nwe are to see exactly when we become tooled and fooled. Now what \r\nexactly is the definition of \"formal\" here? Formal usually (popularly) \r\nmeans, even within extreme dissident circles (on both the Right and Left), \r\nthat \"activists\" utilize a way of doing things that is pre-fabricated. Usually \r\nmodeled on traditional European-originating theories, which in my view \r\nare reflections of the severe wars of that history. Passed down as \"the \r\nonly\" or \"best\" method, without updating, users usually uncritically \r\naccept the model, or are coerced into it (my own experience is more \r\n\"wise\" activists seeking to manipulate by attacking my \"ego\" or \"self-\r\ncentered\" inclinations).\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\n Ideology in formal resistance<\/b>
\r\nLet's take ahold of this way of coercing relatively inarticulate, or \r\nnewcomers to the formal scene. Basically, we are talking about ideology \r\n(rigid belief systems as they occur in formal organizations).\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThe prevailing belief is that one must subordinate one's \"serious\" sides (at \r\nthe very least) of their individualities to this Given belief system. Once \r\nyou get into the middle of these situations, you can see that it is very \r\nmuch like an organization of war--though appearing more benign at first \r\nglances, like so-called \"diplomacy\". \r\n<\/p>
\r\nConventional imagination and reproduction of the social order \r\nFormal organization also imposes a conventional imagination of \r\nconfining concepts like \"memberships\" and \"leaders\", \"dues\" and \"social \r\nettiquette\"; and a usually uncritical acceptance of the kind of orthodoxy \r\nwhich provides these models of formal, \"reputable\"--or what is supposed \r\nto be \"serious\"--organization in the first place. (Incidentally, this model \r\nhas, over and over, proven disasterous to groups not yet allowed \"a place \r\nat the table\"--much less the 'right' to negotiate for their independent \r\nsurvival). \r\n<\/p>
\r\nNote:<\/b> Among the most pointed examples of this disasterousness for groups not yet allowed such social *appearances* of acceptance, has been \r\nthe continuing havoc wreaked by legal and illegal official covert action \r\nupon formal organizations since at least the 1950s; historians Bud and \r\nRuth Schultz (in It Did Happen Here and The Price of Dissent may \r\ndisagree, however). The best, most contemporary lessons, however, may \r\nbe gleaned from more recent events, such as the f.b.i.'s once illegal \r\nCounter Intelligence Program (COINTELPRO). (Much of the methods of \r\nthis program now appear to be legal, upon reading the ACLU's \r\ninterpretation of \"The Patriot Act\") For those into reading offline, try \r\nthat websites booklist.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nAdditional note:<\/b> See also the trenchant post-left critique of organization, \r\nby such marginalized luminaries as Venomous Butterfly and Feral Faun. \r\nQuestion: Are there any \"pros\" to formal organization that you can think \r\nof?<\/b> Please read the section on the value of *informal organization* first!\r\n<\/p>
\r\n
\r\n \"...Any politics we pick up and follow, they are...alien politics...[and] do \r\nnot reflect the reality of who we are, but our culture and art does. ...if we \r\nare going to use [politics] then let's recognize that's what we are doing. \r\nIt's a tool. It's not an identity...\"--an American Indian\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nInformal self-organization<\/b>
\r\nInformal resistance, on the other hand, offers much more room, at least \r\nas far as the informal member's individual imagination may be \"allowed\" \r\nto go, since, members of this grouping stand on more equal footing with \r\neveryone else, like any friendship.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nWith no clique (or hardline vanguard) to coerce or significantly \r\nmanipulate (as in Jaques Ellul's discussion of *when* propaganda is most \r\nthreatening) a friend's ideological conformity, or have *rules* and \r\ninterests to \"protect\" (i.e. the \"survival of the project over its members) \r\nwhich keep them from going into \"dangerously\" independent inquiry, or \r\neven simply escaping the list of tasks and needs so \"authoritatively Given \r\nby organizational functionaries, informal resisters have much more \r\nfreetime to explore areas that interest them.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThis especially rings true when we see that informal resistance motions are \r\nusually made up of individuals who are oriented to working\/playing on \r\ntheir own, or with small groups of friends or \"affinity groups\". They may \r\ncome together in order to carry out direct actions, but most of their time \r\nis spent doing activities they, individually, are enamored to. They remain \r\nfocused on the activities they're interested in, whereas in formal \r\norganizations, they may become *burnt out* by tasks which run far from \r\ntheir original desires (re: fund-raising, newsletter editing and mailing, and \r\nother formal organizational wants). They can still take advantage of peer critique or support, when they ask, but the interaction remains much more oriented to directness, and has less of a chance to be clouded over by the need to conform ideologically, and remain \"in good standing\" in the formal \r\ngroup. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nFurther, when we organize ourselves informally, we are also not limited by \r\nideological demands about what sources we may make use of. In fact, we \r\nmay utilize a broad variety of resources. This is what has been called \r\ncreative self-mobilization... Myself, i've found much value in insights \r\nfound in methodological anarchy and situationism, as well as from \r\nReader's Digest and other places one wouldn't normally expect to find \r\ngems. The trick is *reading between the lines* and keeping one's ability to \r\ncompare and try out, intact; this comes back to critical thought and \r\nintellectual self-defense.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nFinally, a word should be said about the way formal traditions have been made largely obsolete by the now legal hardline tactics of State coercion. Leaders & core groups, particularly, can be picked off by all manner of specious court actions & other warfare designed to further weaken the resources of the usually quite small core vanguard.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nthe meta game<\/b>
\r\n\r\n\"...I discover there is a meta-road...[Society] is playing a \r\ngame. They are playing at not playing a game. If I show them \r\nI see they are, I shall break the rules and they will punish me. \r\nI must play their game, of not seeing the game.\"--R.D.Laing, \r\nin a biography called A Divided Self p.151 \r\n<\/p>
\r\nThere is something going on behind the scenes presented. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nPersons called adults can see this in the way most parents and other groanups-er, \"grownups\", think about acting when kids are around. On the one hand, 'adults' act more freely when, say, they are partying together away from kids; then, if they are \"learned\" in what is considered \"appropriate behavior\" around kids, and kids come into their domain, they change their manner.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThis is the same way that policymakers and elite implementers of policy think concerning those subordinate to them (at least in formal interactions, such as while on the job). Institutional analysts, such as Chomsky, have written extensively on this, if you care to look.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThe more we look, the more we can see this type of meta game all throughout the imagination called \"society\" and culture, and as well, formalized concepts of organization and resistance. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nSo, again, we see parents and other 'adults' playing the game. We can also see teachers (and their bosses, in the school administration) playing it upon parents and kids. Administrators, in turn, play it upon implementers of policy called teachers. And elite policymakers play this meta game upon elite implementers. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nAll throughout \"reality\" as it is presented to us, we find this methodology at work. Who maintains this version of \"The Way Things Are?\" Is this method a conscious effort, in the heart of it? I tend to see it as a smattering of conscious beliefs and unconscious, or **internalized values**.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThe sum situation is that most of us find ourselves neatly corralled and confined within something that is not always as constructive as we want; something that doesn't align with our desires; a something i call a situation like \"Oz\", as in the Wizard of Oz, where there is a man behind a curtain who is running a fake operation. But i go further and deeper, and call this prevailing and imposed imagination \r\n*Is*.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nWizards of Is<\/b>
\r\n**The Wizards of Is**<\/i> keep us \"properly\" subordinated, \r\nunthreatening, tooled, and mentally confined. We are modern-day \r\npeasants with neon. Living in \"dark ages with neon glasses\" as John Trudell has shared. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nWhy this happens, why this meta game has to be played at all, probably \r\nhas the most to do with those elites running and maintaining our \"information society\" being, on the one hand, completely \r\nsubordinated to the needs and values of *propaganda* (see Jacques Ellul) THEMSELVES, & on the other hand, severely alienated from not only their 'publics' but also their self-desires found or perhaps repressed and forgotten in the deepest parts of these people's own<\/i> being (or psyches);--inside their own experience of colonization<\/i> into the dominating value system! One need only spend a little time in your typical boarding school or military academy (or even psychiatric hospitals) oriented to grooming the world's elite, to see the various coercions at work both by the school system and one's peers.<\/b>\r\n<\/p>
\r\nWhy do none<\/i> of the existing social challenger momentums (and imaginations) in the Left or Right (or in between and outside) find it \"useful\" to contemplate the reality that, at base, the worst aggressors (the most severely alienated and yet, \"powerful\", in terms of terroristic connections within the so-called \"Legitimacy\" of States) are THEMSELVES victims of conditioning not extremely dissimilar, in the heart, from the rest of us!\r\n<\/p>
\r\nWe are ALL initiated coercively into the Given or Spoonfed \"Reality\"; we are ALL coerced to silence or water-down our original, quite excellent spirits! So, it seems to me quite valid, quite USEFUL to understand this similar origin in which we all share!<\/b>\r\n<\/p>
\r\nThe problem, as I see it, is that we are all divided away from each other, and consequently become alienated, and forget the value of empathizing with each other, basically. And in our alienation, we come to conclusions where we believe \"We Know Best\" for other groups of people (and individuals within such) whom we really DO NOT know!\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nAn explanation for Perpetual War<\/b>
\r\nTo offer an explanation as to why European-based methods (which are, by far, the worst aggressors in the world) for relating do not take this into consideration, as far as i can see, may be because European experience may be so long-stuck in struggles for survival in quite crowded domains ridden with disease, cold, and lack of resources. So, a long heritage of all-out War may be the root of this truth. (As for the rest of the world, I admit lack of even a very good general knowledge, past a smattering of awareness.)\r\n<\/p>
\r\nAs a result of this orientation to War, all institutions and their public relations apparatuses utilize forms of \r\nmanipulation-or propaganda (see excerpts from J. Ellul here)--as THE method of choice for getting mass \r\naudiences\/\"consumers\" to pay attention, get connected into the system, and remain connected. In a basically WAR-oriented culture, the war of propaganda, of subtle and meta manipulation, instead of consensual communications at least systematically **tried**, comes with the territory. And \r\nthus this game that \"must\" be played while not speaking of the game; and \r\nthose who do speak of it, being viewed as a danger because they might ruin a \r\nparticular aspect of the propaganda that \"MUST\" rein in everyone's mind-set; a belief<\/b> instituted from our earliest socialization which, if challenged, has a way of messing with well-socialized people's ENTIRE worlds. And since we've all been forced into the places we now occupy, especially in our beliefs, FEAR is the immediate response!\r\n<\/b><\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\na new imagination<\/b>
\r\nThe only way out that i can see, beyond continuing to naively strengthen \r\nthat (including propaganda) which systematically attacks all of us in \r\ncontinually rotating ways (continually finding new differences amongst us \r\nto exploit and keep us alienated or atomized, and\/or against each other at all costs), is by escaping the heart of the situation, and bringing forth a new imagination.<\/b> My study and experience leads me to the conclusion that FEAR, followed closely by severe alienation, and how persons who exploit these, is the heart or crux of our challenge as humans at this juncture. \r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nTo escape, we need to **liberate** ourselves from the imagination which has been \r\nimposed upon ALL of us (including elite policy makers, as discussed above).<\/b> And from times when war is or was viewed as the only option, as in the history of all so-called \r\n\"civilized\" organization, as well as what is popularly believed of pre-\"civilized\" groups, like the American indigenous folks; that all \"Have Always Been\" committed to senseless violence, and that \"This is the Nature of [Hu-]Man\". \r\n<\/p>
\r\nYet I maintain that there is a context<\/b> to that which cannot be \r\neasily understood by domesticated man's severely confined imagination about what \"Can Be Real\". Take the following poem for example:\r\n<\/p>
\r\nIndigenous folk of olde
\r\nwere in harmony with
\r\nall around
\r\n
\r\n& when so, they tended
\r\nto reflect the spirit of depth
\r\nall around.
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nSo, when the fever,
\r\nthe virus, of
\r\n'invaders' came
\r\nthey perfected the
\r\nreflected
\r\nin the best artz they knew
\r\nor were trickily moved into.
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nStill perfecting now
\r\nwith many many otherz
\r\nSometimes connecting
\r\nOthertimes stuck in
\r\nSame Old..................Reflecting.\r\n<\/p>
\r\nPerhaps a discussion of this orientation to reflecting should be gone into deeply elsewhere, but to basically go over this, and perhaps inspire further discussion, we see that formal institutions (of European origin) are seldom oriented to spontaneous wisdom and intuition, unlike the informal indigenous ways of, say, the Vision Quest, or even traditional dances (despite what is paraded for tourists). There is much more room amongst groups oriented to living harmoniously with nature, than those who seek to conquer it.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nLiberation of our desires and an obstacle <\/b>
\r\nWe can see already where our desires tend to want to escape to, when we \r\nthink of young children of age 3 or 5. Their spirit is still full of the \"spirit \r\nof discovery\" and the love of life; and the misery of \"Reality\" has not yet \r\nbeen imposed upon them (via our social 'norms'). The lucky few (those who \r\nsee at least portions of this anyway) whom find time to walk down paths with them and notice \r\nthings that otherwise would be missed, says oodles about this all too \r\nprivate joy, alone. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nParents have regularly spoken fondly of \"being able\" to \"revisit \r\nchildhood\" through their youngchildren. Through this imagination we \r\ncall \"childhood\" we experience a renewing of our own spirits, and this is \r\nto be celebrated; yet, at the same time, due to our alienated \r\nconditionining, this way has turned into a way which we *mine* for our \r\nown nursings, while allowing little of their natural vitality to escape to where our children may grow and become enriched and thus genuiniely strong and capable. \r\n<\/p>
\r\nIn our generally single-minded, severely alienated interests (even unconscious), we've turned the \r\nyoungpersons moving through us into objects we use to live through. An object similar to what \r\nJohn Holt identified as, in his book Escape From Childhood<\/u>, \r\n\"superpet\". A youngperson not allowed to be viewed as fully human \r\nalongside us (thanks to the work of the convenient, and the systematically \r\nsuperficial analysis of the highly political, state-subordinated, social \r\nsciences).\r\n<\/p>
\r\n\"No one is more truly helpless, more completely a victim, than they who can neither choose nor change, nor escape their protectors.\"--John Holt in Escape From Childhood: The Needs and Rights of Children<\/u>\r\n
\r\n
\r\nProbably because of this value that we find in this somewhat natural time \r\nof life, the whole realm of \"childhood\" has become a highly \r\nsentimentalized and distracting time of all-too-escapist entertainment, aloof play, \r\nunthreatening fantasy, industry and business, keeping the very *objects* \r\nwe claim to so avidly cherish and wish to \"protect\" locked up in this 'prison \r\ngarden called childhood' (As Holt characterized this situation; see also: Paul Goodman: Growing \r\nUp Absurd<\/u> and Gerald Farson: Birthrights<\/u>). We think nothing of this, \r\nuntil, for whatever reason, we finally allow ourselves to step back and \r\nlook at a bigger picture. (Perhaps we are moved by youth liberationists of yesteryear or today, or remember our own feelings as kids)<\/b>\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nContinue the war, or understand and implement liberatory desires?<\/b>
\r\nThe trick, then, is to not allow our severely alienated desires to get the \r\nbest of us. To step back and look at what we are doing; to realize the value of being as conscious as possible<\/i> --if in fact we are committed to any type of solidarity with or towards kids. This is the \r\njuncture where liberation may be had, or where struggle\/war may continue to ram forward, attacking our weakest points, like any war machine, towards the war machine's most severely alienated and increasingly unempathetic ends.\r\n<\/i><\/p>
\r\nEven if that dissent is still \"only\" inarticulate--as we see with so many quite young kids whom also fall under the rubric of possibly \"dangerous\"<\/i> dissent, re: \"Oppositionally Defiant Disorder\"<\/b>. Or, perhaps, like with the the earliest deployments of MBD\/LD\/ADD\/HD\/ADHD, kids are the easiest, least-protected front to begin a larger campaign of ever-more-clear Soviet-style psychiatrization of dissent.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n\"...A large part of this task is assumed by ideological institutions that channel thought and attitudes within acceptable bounds, deflecting any potential challenge to established privilege and authority before it can take form and gather strength. The enterprise has many facets and agents...\"--Noam Chomsky in Preface to Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies<\/u>\r\n
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nLiberation<\/b>
\r\nLiberation is the situation in which people learn the value of shirking off \r\nconfined imaginations about themselves and others. Liberation is when \r\nmany many people start to let their imaginations freer than ever thought \r\n\"possible\" before. The 1960s\/early 70s was such a time where serious liberation \r\n(called a \"crisis\" by the ruling war order) gained a quite wide-spread momentum, and clearly had *begun* to take in-depth root. All too quickly \r\nfor the terrorist powers of everyday social and cultural \"management\" the \"dangerous\" example of a heightening black civil rights momentum \r\nand its younger sister, the anti-war movement, inspired all sorts of groups and individuals to start imagining \r\nthat they might be able to be heard if they dared to speak up. So we had more militant challenges by the American Indians, women, gay men, even young people in the form of the *youth liberation* movement.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n\"Democracy was regarded as entering into a crisis in the 1960's. The crisis was that large segments of the population were becoming organized and active and trying to participate in the political arena. Here we come back to these two conceptions of democracy. By the dictionary definition, that's an advance in democracy. By the prevailing definition, that's a problem, a crisis that has to be overcome.\"--Noam Chomsky in \"Media Control: The Spectacular Achievements of Propaganda\"<\/i>\r\n
\r\n
\r\nWhere the 1960s\/70s liberation movement went wrong, in my view, is that \r\nthey got stuck up in the game that their consciously political \"leaders\" \r\nplayed. Reformist-oriented or \"revolutionary\", the same underlying \"Us \r\nvs. Them\" dichotomy was (and continues to be) as rigid and \r\nnot realizing the crucial value of radical<\/i> empathy<\/b> as the establishment! (Certainly, as well-domesticated, er--\"educated\"--as most European-hailing theory is, such refelction of the dominant culture would come as no surprise!) Of course, most of those who thought nothing of following along with the Givens, even in the \"alternative\" cultures, didn't see this, or didn't feel capable of pointing it out, or tried and were eclipsed bya much more clamorous, yet superficial, milieu. And so, for whatever reason, they didn't see that they were being manipulated against each other--tooled; for the needs and interests of their even more severely alienated \"leaders\" and owners, \"managers\", \"influence professionals\" and various other forms of puppeteers.\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\ngo to next section in \"comments\" section below; if it's not up now, will be soon; or see the badly edited version at: www.intheheart.net\/going2heart.html\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\n<\/p>
\r\nSection 2 includes:
\r\nSpirit liberation and psychological ju-jitsu
\r\ncrazy people
\r\nmaking sense to you yet?
\r\na personal example: jumping into my fear
\r\nAnother example: \"Good Peasant, Bad Peasant\"<\/b>
\r\nthe problem of the institutional fear<\/b>
<\/p>\n","contact":"intheheart2@ziplip.com","link":"www.intheheart.net","address":"","phone":"","parent_id":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","summary":"intellectual self-defense; informal resistance consciousness and pros\/cons of formal organization; the meta game; wizards of Is; An explanation for Perpetual War; a new imagination; liberation of our desire and an obstacle; Continue war, or understand and implement liberatory desires? spirit liberation and psychological ju-jitsu; 'crazy' people; a personal example: jumping into my fear; another example: 'Good Peasant, Bad Peasant'; the problem of institutionalized fear.","numcomment":0,"fileurl":"\/uploads\/2003\/10\/keephuichl2.jpg","filesize":"17.3 kibibytes","article_url":"\/news\/2003\/10\/86693.php","image":{"original":"\/uploads\/2003\/10\/keephuichl2.jpg","small":"\/uploads\/2003\/10\/keephuichl2.jpgthumb.jpg"}},"attachments":[],"comments":[]}