Project Suggestions; was 'Re: Dreams and Surrealism'
Horace Confab
<378DC036...@gte.net>...
|
|
| RCWilk wrote:
| >
| >
| >
| > For many of us, when Surrealism is mentioned the image that generally
come to
| > mind is the liquid melting clocks of Salvador Dali. But In Europe,
Surrealism
| > was also a social , political, and poetic human liberation movement
that
| > championed the dream.
| >
| Yes, but in this "discussion" group you will find that surrealism
| appears to be about...
|
| ... one-sided power struggles over ephemeral bandwidth
| ... harassment of the working class
| ... non-sequitors with a distinct middle-school flavor
|
| It is disheartening, but you must go to the "new managers" -- yes; now
| surrealism is also about who gets to be the Manager! To Hades with
| collaborative actions! Get me someone who can tell me what to do!) --
| to get information on that.
|
| Run! It is not too late to escape...
|
| DMH
Don't run!
Here is a possible version of management that isn't so bad.
A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions manager
of that thread. His or her control is in the form of suggestions. People
either like the suggestions or not. There is no law against them
responding in which ever way they care to. In fact, it is encouraged so as
to make things more interesting.
The suggestion manager's role is to suggest to a large group various "good
ideas", which not all members may have thought of. As usual, the areas
that get sustended amounts of attention will be a matter of "usenet
democracy".
In the first post, one could suggest --
lines of inquiry that seem particularly interesting
appropriate websites to fill gaps in a reader's knowledge
that everyone give a certain area a certain kind of attention, e.g.
"please focus on the positive aspects only; tomorrow we attack everything
-- mercilessly"
that his (or her) thread is meant to be regarded as a project, and not
just a thread
new directions for the thread as it progresses, for example if things seem
to be going wayward.
Here is a suggested format for the first post of this sort.
Subject: Project Biblical Surrealism
Author: Horace Confab
----
This project is for exploring issues relating to the Bible and surrealism.
At this point I would like people to help me explore the following areas.
1, Who first came up with the term surrealism, and what was suggestive in
his (or her) biography?
2, The relationship, if any, between automatic writing and the Bible
stories.
3, The combination of deep immersion in the Bible with something that
alters consciousness, like LSD or meditation.
4, Connecting the figures in the Bible with the various figures in
surrealism.
5, The "revelation" of surrealism
6, Does surrealism require grace or works; style or substance?
7, Surrealist heaven and hell; what are they like? For example, is surreal
hell normalcy, or unhappiness?
As well as suggestion managers, there can be "suggestors" who drop
suggestions onto various posts without having started the first one.
--
Don't listen to me
Susanna Lee
<punsl...@hatmail.com> wrote:
>Don't listen to me
Me, either.
But, you didn't hear it from me here. You read it in the
Bible.
God's Honest Truth! And you read it!
And it said, don't listen to me.
-Susanna, think?
Dale Houstman
Horace Confab wrote:
>
> A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions manager
> of that thread.
I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable; is it really necessary to
give a title to a person who merely posts a thread head? It is just more
useful and productive to attempt to act collectively, forgoing the
notion of managers (even spurious and temporary ones), and to quit the
knee-jerk animosities of RJM, Andrea and iv. These are huge distractions
that merely mimic thought and lead to rather endless threads dedicated
to nothing beyond the gratification of their own need to disrupt. Thus
they can take several positions, or no position at all. It is all well
and good to speak of "responding in which ever way" you care to, and
certainly people do. But three or more people with agendas based merely
on a desire to "win" rather than on a need to forge collaboration rather
neatly dissolve the very essence of surrealism in a muck of dishonest
antagonism and intellectual horseplay. I can scarcely recall a time when
these infections haven't scarred the vital tissue and festered inside
the core issues of surrealism. Luckily (and this they always forget) the
real work of surrealism occurs quite outside their policing embraces.
>There is no law against them responding in which ever way they care to. In fact, it is encouraged so as
> to make things more interesting.
But it isn't more interesting; the arguments are always the same;
someone posts something outside the venue of The Chen / RJM / iv league,
(it need only be the most innocuous postings by someone they have
determined to "bomb") and they pick and choose portions they can distort
to their slander and idiocy. And this goes on and on; we never are
allowed to achieve anything beyond the most shallow silliness, or
endless debate over nothing. One can ignore it, and I do more and more,
but one cannot claim it is in any way a part of what the essential
surrealist experiment is supposed to be about, and that is individuals
acting collaboratively to investigate and produce processes by which one
can liberate corrupted desire from the very "control" you allow in, even
if only slightly. A little boss soon wants to be a big boss.
> The suggestion manager's role is to suggest to a large group various "good
> ideas", which not all members may have thought of. As usual, the areas
> that get sustended amounts of attention will be a matter of "usenet
> democracy".
Except for the "manager" title I agree, but the strange thing here is,
this sort of process occurs *naturally* amongst equals, and the fact
that we need to discuss it as a "goal" says all that needs to be said
for this ng.
> Here is a suggested format for the first post of this sort.
>
> Subject: Project Biblical Surrealism
> Author: Horace Confab
>
> ----
> This project is for exploring issues relating to the Bible and surrealism.
Haven't we been down this road enough? The gravel is polished smooth..
>
> 1, Who first came up with the term surrealism, and what was suggestive in
> his (or her) biography?
Guillaume Apollinaire first used it in a play, althgough in a completely
different sense than it came to have under Andre Breton, who
appropriated the term but built around it a flexible (and people who
haven't read him enough or well enough forget this intellectual
flexibility) system of engagement with reality. I know almost nothing
about his early life, but do know he was a medical man, and thus a man
of science. This scientific approach (even to mysticism) is to be seen
throughout surrealism.
> 2, The relationship, if any, between automatic writing and the Bible
> stories.
Who knows? The term "automatism" is psychological and was used by
Gertrude Stein as well as Breton, but its existence as a distinct entity
in Biblical time is something I never consider. There is probably little
doubt that some of the Bible's texts were composed rapidly, or in a
state of disassociation brought on by malnutrition, thirst, ecstatic
desire, or any number of self-derangements. Ezekiel comes to mind. And
much of the Old Testament partakes of the common fund of mythos; there's
not much "new" in it. But we can't (or at least I don't) forget that
(for the most part) these efforts are geared towards exaltation of a
Boss with an Attitude, rather than toward self-revelation and
liberation. The Songs of Solomon are a marvelous exception (although
limply claimed by Christians as a paean to the body of Christ) and are
obvious relics of a hugley human desire for another's physical being.
But automatism? Don't know...
> 3, The combination of deep immersion in the Bible with something that
> alters consciousness, like LSD or meditation.
The fact is that "deep immersion" and LSD don't commonly ride the same
bus, and a "deep immersion" in a comic book is probably just as
productive. There are no great "mysteries" to poke out of the Bible like
a snail from its buttered shell. Of course evangelists will go to great
depths to "mystify" the book with arcane and performance-enhanced
readings (as the Catholic Church will do by downplaying it altogether),
but the separate books can be easily read for their sometimes charming
fairy tale qualities. The New Testament has a class of writers closer to
intellectuals, but their strong rhetorical skills have rather oppressive
feel, especially Paul, whose notions on sex and domesticity have ruined
Catholics lives for centuries now.
> 4, Connecting the figures in the Bible with the various figures in surrealism.
Jesus is Loplop? Leonora Carrington is Mother Mary?
> 5, The "revelation" of surrealism
Not enough info.
> 6, Does surrealism require grace or works; style or substance?
I don't see that "grace/works" is a useful dichotomy; could you
elaborate? The argument between style and substance (as the one between
form and content) really bores me. If anything I have learned from
surrealism that the gesture contains both and more, and there is no
useful separation.
> 7, Surrealist heaven and hell; what are they like? For example, is surreal
> hell normalcy, or unhappiness?
Heaven and hell are not considerations for me. "Normalcy" borders on a
non-idea.
> --
> Don't listen to me
Don't tell me what to do...
DMH
Susanna Lee
<dale.h...@gte.net> wrote:
>Don't tell me what to do...
Did they snap towels at you, too, when you were younger?
-Susanna
Horace Confab
|
|
| Horace Confab wrote:
| >
|
|
| > A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions
manager
| > of that thread.
|
| I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable; is it really necessary to
| give a title to a person who merely posts a thread head?
It depends. It may be useful to speak of unconscious suggestion
management.
I'm going to create some new parts. There's this ruler scale. The scale
points in the direction of "suggest new ideas". The highest point on the
scale corresponds to when the suggestions manager is operating within "a
new kind of thread": a project thread. This is where he is most able to
effectively make suggestions; it's his project. At the bottom of the
pointing scale is when he finds himself posting to an ordinary thread. His
techniques for directing the readers attention include underhanded methods
such as style, attitude and derision; in comparison the relative
straightforwardness of projects makes motives more visible. The techniques
he uses to direct attention outside of a project are more likely to be
unconscious, as well as the motivation behind them. What does he want us
to do? Celebrate him, give him feedback, marry him?
A project, with stated goals and methods, is something of a liberation from
unconscious imperatives, because a project says what a person wants done,
and ideally, why. This starter person might say, please give your
attention to this area and tell me whether it could support this idea. He
could request the "collective unconscious" of a group's advice, and get
them flowing along the same lines by also requesting it.
| It is just more
| useful and productive to attempt to act collectively, forgoing the
| notion of managers (even spurious and temporary ones), and to quit the
| knee-jerk animosities of RJM, Andrea and iv.
What do you think about projects, where there's a topic and ten or so
questions? As you can see from our example below, there's no need to
actually mention the term "suggestion manager". It can just be there,
invisibly, as a kind of standard (which hasn't been defined yet).
Suggestion management and projects are intimately entwined.
| These are huge distractions
| that merely mimic thought and lead to rather endless threads dedicated
| to nothing beyond the gratification of their own need to disrupt. Thus
| they can take several positions, or no position at all. It is all well
| and good to speak of "responding in which ever way" you care to, and
| certainly people do. But three or more people with agendas based merely
| on a desire to "win" rather than on a need to forge collaboration rather
| neatly dissolve the very essence of surrealism in a muck of dishonest
| antagonism and intellectual horseplay.
I like the people you mention; I haven't experienced their dark sides.
Andrea Chen has boldly shown some subtlety in trying to juggle being
serious with being playful, always difficult; "iv" is obviously a useful
sort of person, if you swing literary; and I like RJM's writing.
You could get revenge on the gang for the tactics they use, by creating a
surrealist project. That would be a kind of revenge. Or not.
There's no reason why someone couldn't contribute to every kind of project;
no divisions are necessary. A suggestion manager is like a unifier. The
only problem I can see at the moment is that I don't think surrealism is
interesting enough to generate very many stimulating projects. Although,
just a few could last forever, even spawn newsgroups.
| I can scarcely recall a time when
| these infections haven't scarred the vital tissue and festered inside
| the core issues of surrealism. Luckily (and this they always forget) the
| real work of surrealism occurs quite outside their policing embraces.
Well there's one thing crystal clear: we're both dissatisifed with how
things are at the moment. Another clear thing to me is that we need new
concepts and ideas to make things better; we can't just eject the baddies
you know.
My suggestions are just a first go; maybe someone else will think of some
better ones and save the world.
| >There is no law against them responding in which ever way they care to.
In fact, it is encouraged so as
| > to make things more interesting.
|
| But it isn't more interesting; the arguments are always the same;
| someone posts something outside the venue of The Chen / RJM / iv league,
| (it need only be the most innocuous postings by someone they have
| determined to "bomb") and they pick and choose portions they can distort
| to their slander and idiocy.
Well, by starting projects, there is some pressure for people to do them,
and if projects become popular, the gang cannot help but be somewhat swayed
by "usenet democracy" to also do them, thus in fact making things more
interesting with them, if not necessarily better.
| And this goes on and on; we never are
| allowed to achieve anything beyond the most shallow silliness, or
| endless debate over nothing. One can ignore it, and I do more and more,
| but one cannot claim it is in any way a part of what the essential
| surrealist experiment is supposed to be about, and that is individuals
| acting collaboratively to investigate and produce processes by which one
| can liberate corrupted desire from the very "control" you allow in, even
| if only slightly. A little boss soon wants to be a big boss.
America has a president for a reason. The problem with the world is that
we have a civilisation of ideas, but it's an old civilisation. We need
something to be different. Something more playful, surreal, explorative.
Annoyingly, structures that free also restrain. The best solution I have,
better than suggestion managers, is unconditional love, but that is fraught
with complexities it seems.
| > The suggestion manager's role is to suggest to a large group various
"good
| > ideas", which not all members may have thought of. As usual, the areas
| > that get sustended amounts of attention will be a matter of "usenet
| > democracy".
|
| Except for the "manager" title I agree, but the strange thing here is,
| this sort of process occurs *naturally* amongst equals, and the fact
| that we need to discuss it as a "goal" says all that needs to be said
| for this ng.
It wasn't the definitive statement about suggestion managers. I prefer the
news things I wrote at the top of this post.
Maybe suggestion management is the way to liberate the collective
unconscious.
| > Here is a suggested format for the first post of this sort.
| >
| > Subject: Project Biblical Surrealism
| > Author: Horace Confab
| >
| > ----
| > This project is for exploring issues relating to the Bible and
surrealism.
|
| Haven't we been down this road enough? The gravel is polished smooth..
You mean talking about surrealism and the Bible, as opposed to projects in
general? Well, I think this has merit, and so much so that it could become
a unique newsgroup. But then I say that about everything.
| > 1, Who first came up with the term surrealism, and what was suggestive
in
| > his (or her) biography?
|
| Guillaume Apollinaire first used it in a play, althgough in a completely
| different sense than it came to have under Andre Breton, who
| appropriated the term but built around it a flexible (and people who
| haven't read him enough or well enough forget this intellectual
| flexibility) system of engagement with reality. I know almost nothing
| about his early life, but do know he was a medical man, and thus a man
| of science. This scientific approach (even to mysticism) is to be seen
| throughout surrealism.
Wasn't Breton something of a leader? He managed to combine flexibility
with enough substance to be remembered. Maybe there's something new to be
learnt from him.
| > 2, The relationship, if any, between automatic writing and the Bible
| > stories.
|
| Who knows? The term "automatism" is psychological and was used by
| Gertrude Stein as well as Breton, but its existence as a distinct entity
| in Biblical time is something I never consider. There is probably little
| doubt that some of the Bible's texts were composed rapidly, or in a
| state of disassociation brought on by malnutrition, thirst, ecstatic
| desire, or any number of self-derangements. Ezekiel comes to mind. And
| much of the Old Testament partakes of the common fund of mythos; there's
| not much "new" in it. But we can't (or at least I don't) forget that
| (for the most part) these efforts are geared towards exaltation of a
| Boss with an Attitude, rather than toward self-revelation and
| liberation. The Songs of Solomon are a marvelous exception (although
| limply claimed by Christians as a paean to the body of Christ) and are
| obvious relics of a hugley human desire for another's physical being.
| But automatism? Don't know...
Perhaps automatism combined with some kind of drug, combined with deep
immersion in metaphors of society produced the Bible.
| > 3, The combination of deep immersion in the Bible with something that
| > alters consciousness, like LSD or meditation.
|
| The fact is that "deep immersion" and LSD don't commonly ride the same
| bus, and a "deep immersion" in a comic book is probably just as
| productive.
What I should have said was that dreams often reflect the day and, perhaps
after reading a lot of the Bible, then having an eyes-shut LSD trip there
would be a similar, but more interesting, effect. I didn't mean reading
the Bible while tripping.
| There are no great "mysteries" to poke out of the Bible like
| a snail from its buttered shell. Of course evangelists will go to great
| depths to "mystify" the book with arcane and performance-enhanced
| readings (as the Catholic Church will do by downplaying it altogether),
| but the separate books can be easily read for their sometimes charming
| fairy tale qualities. The New Testament has a class of writers closer to
| intellectuals, but their strong rhetorical skills have rather oppressive
| feel, especially Paul, whose notions on sex and domesticity have ruined
| Catholics lives for centuries now.
The mystery is how the Catholics managed to project mystery onto the Bible.
Hmm.
| > 4, Connecting the figures in the Bible with the various figures in
surrealism.
|
| Jesus is Loplop? Leonora Carrington is Mother Mary?
Hmm..
| > 5, The "revelation" of surrealism
|
| Not enough info.
Well, what do surrealist texts make of the future, if anything. I mean, do
they make predictions like the Bible does; perhaps that one day surrealism
is going to be ubiquitous for all? How vast is the chasm between
possibilities and surrealist possibilities?
| > 6, Does surrealism require grace or works; style or substance?
|
| I don't see that "grace/works" is a useful dichotomy; could you
| elaborate?
Style is a kind of grace or form (of self); works is to do with content.
No great use at this time.
| The argument between style and substance (as the one between
| form and content) really bores me. If anything I have learned from
| surrealism that the gesture contains both and more, and there is no
| useful separation.
Well, clearly I'm sort of pro form, with my suggestion management and
project parts. I put the emphasis on form over content, but I also have
them together as one-- self-organising system, where structure is
provocation and content is movement. Provocation is anything that bounds
the universe; where it exists, I say there's been a failure to
unconditionally love reality. But that means chaos.
| > 7, Surrealist heaven and hell; what are they like? For example, is
surreal
| > hell normalcy, or unhappiness?
|
| Heaven and hell are not considerations for me. "Normalcy" borders on a
| non-idea.
|
|
| > --
| > Don't listen to me
|
| Don't tell me what to do...
|
| DMH
--
Leo Sgouros
> immersion in metaphors of society produced the Bible.
Sounds like monastic life, or a shaman.
How much information can a person learn at a time, really?
I was exposed to something really interesting years ago, that was basically
an accelerated crash learning program.We were given problems to solve,
problems that had no solution with existing tools.
We had to solve the problems to make the new tools to solve the
problems.Leaps were made using isolation and other techniques along with
dedicated imagery.
The place is gone now.
Biblical Accelerated Production Program tugs at me in a strange way.
Just a thought.
_L_
Susanna Lee
<lsgo...@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
>I was exposed to something really interesting years ago, that was basically
>an accelerated crash learning program.We were given problems to solve,
>problems that had no solution with existing tools.
Did you have twins, too?
-Susanna
Leo Sgouros
Susanna Lee <mommy...@garden.net> wrote in message
news:379070b0...@news.garden.net...
No but I certainly got the message!
_L_
Horace Confab
<G5Wj3.102$YU3....@newse3.tampabay.rr.com>...
| > Perhaps automatism combined with some kind of drug, combined with deep
| > immersion in metaphors of society produced the Bible.
|
|
There must be different shaman recipes. If we could get the Bible writers'
one, that would be great. And a recipe to maximise the ability to learn.
| How much information can a person learn at a time, really?
With a visual language to make things compact, and a digital concept map of
varying detail for each wall of a house, there wouldn't be much of a need
to learn things. If everyone had access to the system, learning might be
irrelevant; creative thinking for generating new concepts would be the only
thing that matters. Actually though, this system might make it easier to
learn. ("The houses system")
There would be a need for individuals to be able to manipulate the concepts
and see the results (ideally the results would reorganise automatically).
Being able to send updates to other households would also be important.
| I was exposed to something really interesting years ago, that was
basically
| an accelerated crash learning program.We were given problems to solve,
| problems that had no solution with existing tools.
| We had to solve the problems to make the new tools to solve the
| problems.Leaps were made using isolation and other techniques along with
| dedicated imagery.
Got any recipes to share? Like, the techniques -- what is the isolation
technique?
| The place is gone now.
| Biblical Accelerated Production Program tugs at me in a strange way.
| Just a thought.
| _L_
So it goes.
Andrea Chen
> |
> | > A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions
> manager
> | > of that thread.
> |
> | I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable;
This is what makes it necessary. Neu Surrealism is about daring (at
least symbolically) the unacceptable.
>
> It depends. It may be useful to speak of unconscious suggestion
> management.
>
It certainly is. But at that point you enter onto a taboo subject, the
suble often unconscious manipulations of the group mind (which involves
a "politics" similar to those dealt with by RD Laing) is not something
that polite people care to talk about.
Which is why neu surrealists (and possibly Christian surrealists)
should talk about it and make it conscious
(neu surrealism is a process of revealing the unconscious)
But how?
By formalizing it and mocking the structures of the world.
Rather than imply "my glorious inspired surrealist imagination has
inspired (yes inspired, I'm truly inspired for I am artist! Hear me
talk about my liberated imagination!) I repeat I have been inspired for
reasons of glorious art to post this thread..."
we say (dryly):
"It is in the agenda of Christian surrealism to raise this topic."
Of course we hope for many surrealisms to exist on this thread so that
we may here a reply that the committee of red shoe surrealists objects
to this thread because there is no mention of Kate Bush (let us mock the
usual bickering)
while the neu neutopian provisional government demands that both
parties submit to examininations by the Texas Anti Grey Militia to
determine whether or not they are controlled by implants.
Let us insult each other, but lets do so with a bit of story telling
and having ritualized this process (with each of us asserting absolute
management) we may actually discuss the topics at hand. If in fact
there be any topics besides personalities.
The neu surrealist movement will reluctantly admit that the Christian
surrealists have indeed raised some interesting topics (rather than
merely reacted.) Therefore despite the damage it does to pure democracy
(led by the one woman who cares about humanity) we reluctantly admit
them into the governing management of alt.surrealism in which and every
member claims to be absolute boss.
Those who would like to join this elite ruling class must raise some
interesting topics of their own.
The above has been voted on and affirmed.
Thankyou for your cooperation in this matter.
Leo Sgouros
> Got any recipes to share? Like, the techniques -- what is the isolation
> technique?
>
Isolation meaning there were members unknown to each other in the same
project.
To be successful at certain problem solving it was decided that the
questions that the volunteers posed were as important as the testors
questions.What followed was the decision to provide the participants,
individually, with *any* information held, on any subject.Think about
that.It is no use to have a team solve a puzzle without all the pieces.
What ended up happening was the people who put on the program shut the
switch off out of fear of too much, too fast, and the complete breakdown of
the meaning of special compartmentalized information.The system thus
insulates itself from true oversight, as nobody is allowed to know enough to
prevent a bad or inordinately expensive system from being deployed.Imagine
discovering our most vaunted systems, when viewed as a whole in their naked
splendor, are nowhere near the bells and whistles they are supposed to be,
but since nobody was allowed all the pieces, who is the wiser?
*That* is how you get a 2 billion dollar plane that is useless in the rain.
I know the first question I asked, when tasked to perform a certain military
intervention, was "am I allowed to steal to carry this out"?
Meaning if I am tasked to prevent a ballistic missile launch, in my wargame
scenario, am I allowed to steal a Patriot Missile Battery?I was not, so I
came up with ionizing WW2 radar chaff using the same idea as "meteor burst
transmisssion"
Oberkommando Gneral Letenant Gilbert Van buren will now explain SCI, the
joke, and his coronary.
Looking at this tragedy unfold on the TV makes my fears of revealing this
stuff evaporate.
Fuck the old order.
> | The place is gone now.
> | Biblical Accelerated Production Program tugs at me in a strange way.
> | Just a thought.
> | _L_
>
> So it goes.
It hasnt yet begun to go.
But it *will*.
Horace Confab
<379094...@earthlink.net>...
| >
| > |
| > | > A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions
| > manager
| > | > of that thread.
| > |
| > | I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable;
Well, I chose the term because I saw "manager" in the tail of the post I
responded to and that inspired me to think of suggestion management.
Suggestion management is somewhere in between business management and
unconscious imperatives. Where in the middle? Well, on the ground level.
It's about being clear in motives and what you want.
| This is what makes it necessary. Neu Surrealism is about daring (at
| least symbolically) the unacceptable.
I do not think that suggestion management is at all unacceptable. The
problem is I chose a word that has such negative connotations. Perhaps if
I had chosen the term "Sugarsiza" it would have been easier to swallow.
| > It depends. It may be useful to speak of unconscious suggestion
| > management.
| >
|
|
| It certainly is. But at that point you enter onto a taboo subject, the
| suble often unconscious manipulations of the group mind (which involves
| a "politics" similar to those dealt with by RD Laing) is not something
| that polite people care to talk about.
I do like the word subtle.
I would like to introduce a new term, synthesis-sheets. These are possible
syntheses of any two opposing views. There could be a great variety of
sheets to any particular case.
You could say, A=one view, B=opposing view (valued attention), C=result
(reward). This is always true, I conjecture.
| Which is why neu surrealists (and possibly Christian surrealists)
| should talk about it and make it conscious
Yes; making conscious how to liberate the collective unconscious, is a
godly activity: the only way to pray.
| (neu surrealism is a process of revealing the unconscious)
|
| But how?
|
| By formalizing it and mocking the structures of the world.
I don't like mocking very much, although I do sometimes. But perhaps
there can be a number of synthesis-sheets involving different clashings of
suggestion management within the neu management system, both within and
against the pinks.
| Rather than imply "my glorious inspired surrealist imagination has
| inspired (yes inspired, I'm truly inspired for I am artist! Hear me
| talk about my liberated imagination!) I repeat I have been inspired for
| reasons of glorious art to post this thread..."
From a different angle, what I hate is when I post something artsy and no
one bothers to explore it. That's what I want, new ideas based on what I
produced. I don't want celebration. That's what's wrong with the world
today, people don't say what they want.
| we say (dryly):
|
| "It is in the agenda of Christian surrealism to raise this topic."
|
| Of course we hope for many surrealisms to exist on this thread so that
| we may here a reply that the committee of red shoe surrealists objects
| to this thread because there is no mention of Kate Bush (let us mock the
| usual bickering)
An unconditional loversurrealist doesn't mind anything. He thinks it's
surreal to be an accountant. He's like a little kid. Although, he would
never be an accountant.
| while the neu neutopian provisional government demands that both
| parties submit to examininations by the Texas Anti Grey Militia to
| determine whether or not they are controlled by implants.
|
| Let us insult each other, but lets do so with a bit of story telling
| and having ritualized this process (with each of us asserting absolute
| management) we may actually discuss the topics at hand. If in fact
| there be any topics besides personalities.
There is no need to insult. Personalities are the antithesis of
exploration. I'm sure we can explore this conflict successfully. Perhaps
not with each other, for exploration may be impossible, but definitely
unconsciously over the next five years. And derive new ideas. That is the
payoff. If you cannot generate relevant ideas on demand through surreal
means then you cannot be a member of the neu movement. Naturally, those
found inadequate in this area will be hanged.
Standards are good.
| The neu surrealist movement will reluctantly admit that the Christian
| surrealists have indeed raised some interesting topics (rather than
| merely reacted.) Therefore despite the damage it does to pure democracy
| (led by the one woman who cares about humanity) we reluctantly admit
| them into the governing management of alt.surrealism in which and every
| member claims to be absolute boss.
The Christian Surrealists... believe we are all basically surreal. How
could anyone argue with that? But they speak in platitudes. Or parables.
| Those who would like to join this elite ruling class must raise some
| interesting topics of their own.
It's okay with me if they can just post anything, So there's a bit of an
optional component here. Although as I say, my preference, my suggestion
is that the emphasis of posting be on what can be instead of what is (for
example, on new syntheses instead of on bickerings).
| The above has been voted on and affirmed.
|
| Thankyou for your cooperation in this matter.
I cast ye down!
Susanna Lee
<lsgo...@tampabay.rr.com> wrote:
>> So it goes.
>
>It hasnt yet begun to go.
>But it *will*.
Put me down for two boxes. Thin Mints (tm), as usual.
-Susanna
Susanna Lee
<fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>This is what makes it necessary. Neu Surrealism is about daring (at
>least symbolically) the unacceptable.
>
>(neu surrealism is a process of revealing the unconscious)
>
> But how?
>
> By formalizing it and mocking the structures of the world.
Thus discovering why we have structure in the world, to
protect our sensibilities, which we have been born with.
Why not just play nice and call it a draw?
-Susanna, or run around in circles
Ali Hassan Ali Hassan
Is this your way of asking her out on a date, Horace? How surreal.
Dale Houstman
Horace Confab wrote:
>
> | > A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions
> manager of that thread.
> |
> | I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable; is it really necessary to
> | give a title to a person who merely posts a thread head?
>
> It depends. It may be useful to speak of unconscious suggestion
> management.
But once we speak of it and give it a title doesn't it lose some of its
unconscious panache?
> I'm going to create some new parts. There's this ruler scale. The scale
> points in the direction of "suggest new ideas". The highest point on the
> scale corresponds to when the suggestions manager is operating within "a
> new kind of thread": a project thread. This is where he is most able to
> effectively make suggestions; it's his project. At the bottom of the
> pointing scale is when he finds himself posting to an ordinary thread. His
> techniques for directing the readers attention include underhanded methods
> such as style, attitude and derision; in comparison the relative
> straightforwardness of projects makes motives more visible. The techniques
> he uses to direct attention outside of a project are more likely to be
> unconscious, as well as the motivation behind them. What does he want us
> to do? Celebrate him, give him feedback, marry him?
Don't get it; this appears to me to be merely a overly complex way of
approaching what happens naturally.
> What do you think about projects, where there's a topic and ten or so
> questions? As you can see from our example below, there's no need to
> actually mention the term "suggestion manager". It can just be there,
Why? If there is no reason to mention it (which, by the way, has already
happened), why allow it to exist as a possibility at all?
> invisibly, as a kind of standard (which hasn't been defined yet).
> Suggestion management and projects are intimately entwined.
>
> | These are huge distractions
> | that merely mimic thought and lead to rather endless threads dedicated
> | to nothing beyond the gratification of their own need to disrupt. Thus
> | they can take several positions, or no position at all. It is all well
> | and good to speak of "responding in which ever way" you care to, and
> | certainly people do. But three or more people with agendas based merely
> | on a desire to "win" rather than on a need to forge collaboration rather
> | neatly dissolve the very essence of surrealism in a muck of dishonest
> | antagonism and intellectual horseplay.
>
> I like the people you mention; I haven't experienced their dark sides.
You haven't tried hard enough.
>
> You could get revenge on the gang for the tactics they use, by creating a
> surrealist project. That would be a kind of revenge. Or not.
Who wants revenge? This entire subject is anathema. What I want (if I
want anything from Usenet except a casual diversion) is for people to
stop playing games they think are immensely deep, but in actuality are
just fancy forms of childish temper tantrums. "If I scream will mommy
drop her plate?" And the like. Name me one
thing Andrea has "discovered" that isn't common knowledge in a high
school psych course? It isn't whether or not you can get people to buy
into whatever piece of tripe you're fronting, or whether you can fool
others into believing the silliest statements and thus (like a fool)
taking them at face value. If that's all this is about (and I suspect it
is) then who cares? What I want is precisely what Andrea her ilk exist
to disrupt, a relatively calm discussion of surrealist theory. Nik
doesn't like "conversations" but what else is there here? A line of
debate and discussion and poems and drawings, political debates also.
And done with a degree of collaborative spirit, rather than gvw's "you
stupid fucking cock" crap and RJM's "throbbing member" and "I have a
history degree" brouhaha. I mean - who really cares? Everyone is
striving to create some revolutionary concept, or to panic people on the
street. But the fact is that collaboration amongst individuals IS
revolutionary, and certainly would be here.
>The only problem I can see at the moment is that I don't think surrealism is
> interesting enough to generate very many stimulating projects.
Again, this is the nature of the ng; my friends and I are filling up a
magazine regularly with contributions from like-minded individuals, and
the group is growing. We collaborate on texts, and events, and images.
They surely seem "interesting" to me. I'd say that too many of the
people who post here simply don't know what surrealism entails, so they
aren't interesting in the least. They somehow believe surrealism is
about a series of extremely repetitive confrontations so as to prompt
what are rather predictable responses. Andrea has prompted the same
responses for several months now, and she mainly aims for a stultifying
stasis created by purposeful confusion. This doesn't strike me as being
intriguing in the least, but she is obviously tickled to death by her
own "cleverness." So?
> Although, just a few could last forever, even spawn newsgroups.
Oh boy... more salmon eggs in the river!
>
> Well there's one thing crystal clear: we're both dissatisifed with how
> things are at the moment. Another clear thing to me is that we need new
> concepts and ideas to make things better; we can't just eject the baddies
> you know.
Yes and no: as mentioned in my replies to Nik, I am not particularly
expectant of this media becoming any more useful than TV or radio is for
the most part. It's a mildly amusing sideline.
>
> America has a president for a reason.
Someone has to gather the big money in his tiny hat.
> The problem with the world is that we have a civilisation of ideas, but it's an old civilisation.
America has a civilization, since it is full of cities, but it barely
has a culture, since almost all its true cultural artifacts are
outsider; blues, jazz, comic books, etc. America's sanctioned culture
(look what it has done to film!) is mainly shit. This isn't depressing
to me, as it could have been predicted, and my work lies elsehwere at
any rate.
>We need something to be different. Something more playful, surreal, explorative.
Progress and a too powerful urge toward "originality" can be as
destructive as tradition, since they tend to become ungrounded and
self-congratulatory. "Look at me, I'm burning a tampon painted like thew
Israeli flag! Applaud now..." Excrutiating...
>
> The best solution I have, better than suggestion managers, is unconditional love, but that is fraught
> with complexities it seems.
Or with risks.
>
> | > The suggestion manager's role is to suggest to a large group various
> "good
> | > ideas", which not all members may have thought of. As usual, the areas
> | > that get sustended amounts of attention will be a matter of "usenet
> | > democracy".
Of course, but this goes without saying.
>
> Maybe suggestion management is the way to liberate the collective
> unconscious.
Probably not, but...
>
>
> Wasn't Breton something of a leader? He managed to combine flexibility
> with enough substance to be remembered. Maybe there's something new to be
> learnt from him.
If you read him enough you'll see how flexible this notoriously
inflexible man could bne when it came to intellectual honesty, BUT he is
reviled and not read.
>
>
>
> Perhaps automatism combined with some kind of drug, combined with deep
> immersion in metaphors of society produced the Bible.
Well, the Bible isn't a book but a loose collection of tracts. Some may
well be the creation of some form of quick writing, or oral
transmission, but a lot of it (particularly the New Testament) is
obviously quite thought out, and the result of political consideration.
so it is difficult to speak of "the Bible" as a unity. It isn't.
>
> The mystery is how the Catholics managed to project mystery onto the Bible.
> Hmm.
By strenuously avoiding much mention of it, and by giving the orations
in Latin.
> | > 5, The "revelation" of surrealism
> |
> | Not enough info.
>
> Well, what do surrealist texts make of the future, if anything. I mean, do
> they make predictions like the Bible does; perhaps that one day surrealism
> is going to be ubiquitous for all? How vast is the chasm between
> possibilities and surrealist possibilities?
Breton (in the third Manifesto) speaks of the future of surrealism, and
admits that it is primarily out of his hands, but should have recourse
to what has gone before. It's not much of a prediction, and I don't
cotton to prophecy much (except as another aspect of imagination). I
don;t think considering the possibility of surrealism's "spreading
popularity" is productive.
>
Oh hell! What's the point... we're being watched!
DMH
Andrea Chen
> | This is what makes it necessary. Neu Surrealism is about daring (at
> | least symbolically) the unacceptable.
>
> I do not think that suggestion management is at all unacceptable. The
> problem is I chose a word that has such negative connotations. Perhaps if
> I had chosen the term "Sugarsiza" it would have been easier to swallow.
>
Horace breath deeply and try to understand my writing style. I state
that we *should* dare the unacceptable, that we should question all
these implicit assumptions and challenge them.
Therefore I support you. Someone says something is unacceptable and I
say that is reason to experiment with it. It's called challenging
authority.
Similarly in other parts of my post to which you responded I satirized
and acknowledged the personal spats to which Usenet threads often
(typically) descend. I personally believe the only way we can deal with
this is for all parties to admit they are potentially guilty rather than
blaming the other.
I go on the assumption that none of is innocent.
My style is one of (perhaps poorly done) irony and satire, I try to
include ambiguity to throw the mind off and make it think of certain
words and certain ideas in different ways.
Try to read my writing in this context. Otherwise you will find
yourself arguing with statements which are actually in substantial
agreement with what you have to say.
Horace Confab
| >
| > | This is what makes it necessary. Neu Surrealism is about
daring (at
| > | least symbolically) the unacceptable.
| >
| > I do not think that suggestion management is at all unacceptable. The
| > problem is I chose a word that has such negative connotations. Perhaps
if
| > I had chosen the term "Sugarsiza" it would have been easier to swallow.
| >
|
|
| that we *should* dare the unacceptable, that we should question all
| these implicit assumptions and challenge them.
My first such attempt found that the only reason it was unacceptable was
because it wasn't sugar coated.
I find "dare" to be a problem word, since it can mean two opposite things.
I am disappointed that you chose not to play with me as I was with you. If
you change your mind, the last thing that happened was that I cast you out
of Surrealist Heaven for being unable to generate relevant new ideas. The
garden of Eden is the collective unconscious liberated.
You see an apple tree.
Horace Confab
|
| Horace Confab wrote:
| >
|
| > | > A person who starts a new kind of thread is called the suggestions
| > manager of that thread.
| > |
| > | I find the word "manager" to be unacceptable; is it really necessary
to
| > | give a title to a person who merely posts a thread head?
| >
| > It depends. It may be useful to speak of unconscious suggestion
| > management.
|
| But once we speak of it and give it a title doesn't it lose some of its
| unconscious panache?
Unconscious suggestion management is a useful term in the sense that it has
something to do with unconscious imperatives and intention.
As Andrea says, this is something of a taboo subject, and is interesting.
Exploring, or "daring" the area has merit.
On the other hand, unconscious pananche has a high value to surrealists,
artists, and most people I suppose. You wouldn't want knowledge, true or
skew, to reck that.
This elan, or spirit, is the "signature" of the human being.
It may be the label usm will make the signature more beautiful, more
flowing; or the opposite might occur. Both seem equally possible.
Either a stepping stone or hay and a hole.
Consider usm and memetics. I have the opinion that memetics will open up a
world of unconditional love, mainly because memetics denies the self and
that is very compatible with ul. The ul environment could well be the
liberation of the unconscious, to be what it wants to be.
Or things like memetics and its babies-in-the-womb could lead to a new kind
of society where the only thing to be done is to cry together about how
terrible things are.
Could go either way.
| > I'm going to create some new parts. There's this ruler scale. The
scale
| > points in the direction of "suggest new ideas". The highest point on
the
| > scale corresponds to when the suggestions manager is operating within
"a
| > new kind of thread": a project thread. This is where he is most able
to
| > effectively make suggestions; it's his project. At the bottom of the
| > pointing scale is when he finds himself posting to an ordinary thread.
His
| > techniques for directing the readers attention include underhanded
methods
| > such as style, attitude and derision; in comparison the relative
| > straightforwardness of projects makes motives more visible. The
techniques
| > he uses to direct attention outside of a project are more likely to be
| > unconscious, as well as the motivation behind them. What does he want
us
| > to do? Celebrate him, give him feedback, marry him?
|
| Don't get it; this appears to me to be merely a overly complex way of
| approaching what happens naturally.
I do like imagery; that is my excuse.
I'm just saying that what happens naturally is a bit disappointing at the
moment and needs a bit of a booster shot.
Suggestion managers, who appear briefly then dissolve to be replaced by
other ones with different projects, is a possible approach.
He is the self, for a while. Then he is not.
I think it is about institutionalising a better kind of natural (my
suggestion).
| > What do you think about projects, where there's a topic and ten or so
| > questions? As you can see from our example below, there's no need to
| > actually mention the term "suggestion manager". It can just be there,
|
| Why? If there is no reason to mention it (which, by the way, has already
| happened), why allow it to exist as a possibilMú ]
ity at all?
Oh. Well, because I want a better kind of natural. There is a need to
discuss it, in fact; what I meant was there is no great need to do so
inside of a project. That would be a distraction, unless the project was
about projects. The point of the term is to create a framework that may be
useful.
| > invisibly, as a kind of standard (which hasn't been defined yet).
| > Suggestion management and projects are intimately entwined.
| >
| > | These are huge distractions
| > | that merely mimic thought and lead to rather endless threads
dedicated
| > | to nothing beyond the gratification of their own need to disrupt.
Thus
| > | they can take several positions, or no position at all. It is all
well
| > | and good to speak of "responding in which ever way" you care to, and
| > | certainly people do. But three or more people with agendas based
merely
| > | on a desire to "win" rather than on a need to forge collaboration
rather
| > | neatly dissolve the very essence of surrealism in a muck of dishonest
| > | antagonism and intellectual horseplay.
| >
| > I like the people you mention; I haven't experienced their dark sides.
|
| You haven't tried hard enough.
I'm trying.
| > You could get revenge on the gang for the tactics they use, by creating
a
| > surrealist project. That would be a kind of revenge. Or not.
|
| Who wants revenge? This entire subject is anathema. What I want (if I
| want anything from Usenet except a casual diversion) is for people to
| stop playing games they think are immensely deep, but in actuality are
| just fancy forms of childish temper tantrums. "If I scream will mommy
| drop her plate?" And the like. Name me one
| thing Andrea has "discovered" that isn't common knowledge in a high
| school psych course?
I don't know. Andrea?
| It isn't whether or not you can get people to buy
| into whatever piece of tripe you're fronting, or whether you can fool
| others into believing the silliest statements and thus (like a fool)
| taking them at face value. If that's all this is about (and I suspect it
| is) then who cares? What I want is precisely what Andrea her ilk exist
| to disrupt, a relatively calm discussion of surrealist theory.
I would like that, but I think I have proved that it can exist. Look at my
two projects so far. The lines of inquiry in them may have been a bit slap
dash, but it's a start. The most important thing is to have a goal, I
think; although that may be my greatest mistake. Might be. I currently
just want to develop my ideas a bit more so they appear to have real
substance.
| Nik
| doesn't like "conversations" but what else is there here? A line of
| debate and discussion and poems and drawings, political debates also.
| And done with a degree of collaborative spirit, rather than gvw's "you
| stupid fucking cock" crap and RJM's "throbbing member" and "I have a
| history degree" brouhaha. I mean - who really cares? Everyone is
| striving to create some revolutionary concept, or to panic people on the
| street. But the fact is that collaboration amongst individuals IS
| revolutionary, and certainly would be here.
Well, I hope it happens.
| >The only problem I can see at the moment is that I don't think
surrealism is
| > interesting enough to generate very many stimulating projects.
I don't really know much about surrealism and of course it shows. I have
some bonds with it, and it's getting more interesting I admit.
| Again, this is the nature of the ng; my friends and I are filling up a
| magazine regularly with contributions from like-minded individuals, and
| the group is growing. We collaborate on texts, and events, and images.
| They surely seem "interesting" to me.
That sounds great. It would be good to have something like that here. One
day perhaps.
| I'd say that too many of the
| people who post here simply don't know what surrealism entails, so they
| aren't interesting in the least. They somehow believe surrealism is
| about a series of]
m extremely repetitive confrontations so as to prompt
| what are rather predictable responses. Andrea has prompted the same
| responses for several months now, and she mainly aims for a stultifying
| stasis created by purposeful confusion.
There's been rumors that her mother was a bot.
| This doesn't strike me as being
| intriguing in the least, but she is obviously tickled to death by her
| own "cleverness." So?
I think she'd be better off if she started some nice projects with goals
and lines of inquiry.
| > Although, just a few could last forever, even spawn newsgroups.
|
| Oh boy... more salmon eggs in the river!
I'm imagining surreal versions of all knowledge areas would be possible and
stimulating. Surreal biology for instance, combining The Waste's resources
within an ambient House System (concepts).
| > Well there's one thing crystal clear: we're both dissatisifed with how
| > things are at the moment. Another clear thing to me is that we need
new
| > concepts and ideas to make things better; we can't just eject the
baddies
| > you know.
|
| Yes and no: as mentioned in my replies to Nik, I am not particularly
| expectant of this media becoming any more useful than TV or radio is for
| the most part. It's a mildly amusing sideline.
I say the usenet cup isn't half empty, it's 51% full (with potential).
| > America has a president for a reason.
|
| Someone has to gather the big money in his tiny hat.
Yeah.
| > The problem with the world is that we have a civilisation of ideas, but
it's an old civilisation.
|
| America has a civilization, since it is full of cities, but it barely
| has a culture, since almost all its true cultural artifacts are
| outsider; blues, jazz, comic books, etc. America's sanctioned culture
| (look what it has done to film!) is mainly shit. This isn't depressing
| to me, as it could have been predicted, and my work lies elsehwere at
| any rate.
The internet is here to stay; it'll never leave -- at least not until
something that does everything it does and more replaces it. Prediction:
If things are to get more cultural, it will be within an internet system.
But for this to happen there has to be the necessary concepts in place.
Whether they are straight-out surrealist liberatory concepts, or something
of a variation, things have to change; and are sure to.
| >We need something to be different. Something more playful, surreal,
explorative.
|
| Progress and a too powerful urge toward "originality" can be as
| destructive as tradition, since they tend to become ungrounded and
| self-congratulatory. "Look at me, I'm burning a tampon painted like thew
| Israeli flag! Applaud now..." Excrutiating...
Standards make it real.
| > The best solution I have, better than suggestion managers, is
unconditional love, but that is fraught
| > with complexities it seems.
|
| Or with risks.
Perhaps they will become less over time. The entrepreneur doesn't just
take risks, he also minimises risks.
| > | > The suggestion manager's role is to suggest to a large group
various
| > "good
| > | > ideas", which not all members may have thought of. As usual, the
areas
| > | > that get sustended amounts of attention will be a matter of "usenet
| > | > democracy".
|
| Of course, but this goes without saying.
Although, I think it is good to use the term "usenet democracy" every now
and then. It doesn' t go without saying necessarily; some believe in
impenetrable cliques, and it's not true.
| > Maybe suggestion management is the way to liberate the collective
| > unconscious.
|
| Probably not, but...
But it could be; I am the "champion" of that idea; and I have to prove its
worth. It may be that in a week I will have thrown it away for something
very different.
| > Wasn't Breton something of a leader? He managed to combine flexibility
| > with enough substance to be remembered. Maybe there's something new to
be
| > learnt from him.
|
| If you read him enough you'll see how flm Ä Ä exible this
notoriously
| inflexible man could bne when it came to intellectual honesty, BUT he is
| reviled and not read.
He was apparently an iron fisted suggestion manager, sculpting surrealism
as he saw fit.
If surrealism could give me a Nikola Tesla quality visual imagination...
but I don't think it can do that.
| > Perhaps automatism combined with some kind of drug, combined with deep
| > immersion in metaphors of society produced the Bible.
|
| Well, the Bible isn't a book but a loose collection of tracts. Some may
| well be the creation of some form of quick writing, or oral
| transmission, but a lot of it (particularly the New Testament) is
| obviously quite thought out, and the result of political consideration.
| so it is difficult to speak of "the Bible" as a unity. It isn't.
Perhaps the old testament is god's unconscious and the new is his conscious
(expressed in Jesus).
| > The mystery is how the Catholics managed to project mystery onto the
Bible.
| > Hmm.
|
| By strenuously avoiding much mention of it, and by giving the orations
| in Latin.
Right.
| > | > 5, The "revelation" of surrealism
| > |
| > | Not enough info.
| >
| > Well, what do surrealist texts make of the future, if anything. I
mean, do
| > they make predictions like the Bible does; perhaps that one day
surrealism
| > is going to be ubiquitous for all? How vast is the chasm between
| > possibilities and surrealist possibilities?
|
| Breton (in the third Manifesto) speaks of the future of surrealism, and
| admits that it is primarily out of his hands, but should have recourse
| to what has gone before. It's not much of a prediction, and I don't
| cotton to prophecy much (except as another aspect of imagination). I
| don;t think considering the possibility of surrealism's "spreading
| popularity" is productive.
Ah.
| Oh hell! What's the point... we're being watched!
|
| DMH
--
We're being watched!
Dale Houstman
Horace Confab wrote:
>
> Consider usm and memetics. I have the opinion that memetics will open up a
> world of unconditional love, mainly because memetics denies the self and
> that is very compatible with ul. The ul environment could well be the
> liberation of the unconscious, to be what it wants to be.
>
> Or things like memetics and its babies-in-the-womb could lead to a new kind
> of society where the only thing to be done is to cry together about how
> terrible things are.
>
> Could go either way.
The lint trap of dualism. It could more likely go another way entirely,
since the cognitive net is so tiny in this case. Seine or Inseine? I
accept the Ur-notion of unconditional love but only under certain
conditions:
(1) We "hermeticize" all the broken articulations, leading to an
outbreak, or firebreak, across the path of the brush fire called
passion. Save the deer, forget the stones. Dream outlets into trees and
run!
(2) Social "connectiveness" is sacrificed for fleeting fun. We have to
catch the zombies on the run.
(3) I get to wear the ritual overalls to the barn dance of thanatopsis.
>
> I do like imagery; that is my excuse.
Good enough reason...
> I'm just saying that what happens naturally is a bit disappointing at the moment and needs a bit of a booster shot.
Maybe here, but e-vivre is bound to disappoint, because it's the
creature's character. We cannot escape to the outside of the "natural"
(whatever that means at this end of the century), we only drag the
perimeter line along with each new consideration. We can pretend to be
outside. We can pretend not to care about the difference (there is none)
between outside and inside. Baudelaire supports the artifice of fashion
over the fearful nakedness of the natural. One learns to love the
make-up more than the meat of the matter.
> Suggestion managers, who appear briefly then dissolve
The Fizzies of rhetorical forensics? The Alka-Seltzer of incentive?
Catalyst or dogalyst? Soluble Fits?
> Oh. Well, because I want a better kind of natural.
Nautral-Lite? Lo-cal natural? Naturalina, with flavor rinds?
> The point of the term is to create a framework that may be useful.
Down with the useful! Handling or being handled?
>
> I'm trying.
(Old Pleasantry): you certainly are!
> Well, I hope it happens.
Like most ideas for revolution, it already happens in experimentally
tiny forms and forums, and (honestly) that is enough for me. Like most
ideas for revolution, it will come to largely nothing, but an avoidance
of the midnight shootings and "procedural" floggings might not be all
bad. The world is pre-sold, and bought with unrecompensed labor.
Revolution one person at a time; one learns to savor the tiniest bites
from the rich, white flesh. It's a matter of sensual sensitivity, as
opposed to programmatic embolisms.
>
> That sounds great. It would be good to have something like that here. One
> day perhaps.
When and if, let me know. Frankly it would be happening here if it
weren't for a few more "energetic" individuals than myself; I am more
than content to find my low point and flow into it.
>
DMH
Andrea Chen
> I am disappointed that you chose not to play with me as I was with you. If
> you change your mind, the last thing that happened was that I cast you out
> of Surrealist Heaven for being unable to generate relevant new ideas. The
> garden of Eden is the collective unconscious liberated.
>
I will unhappily admit to being an idiot and reading your own post too
quickly thus illustrating through my example one of my dominant themes.
Actually I kind of like it, but damn it I shall deny this on
principle!
You can't throw me out of surrealist Heaven because according to a well
known authority surrealism and religion can't mix and even the mention
of heaven is oppressive! Wait a second! I never agree with that
expert! However in this case I do. Why? Because in this case his
opinion is useful to me and in addition I want to protest the tyranny
you are imposing on this group.
You can't toss me out of surrealist heaven! I wouldn't let you!
Mommy! The big boy is picking on me and being a fascist!
All right, you win. But let me tell you now that your totaltarian
antics are completely unacceptable! I shall return!
But for now I'm the evil bitch witch demon from surrealist hell!
(the sound of evil laughter fades in the background)
Andrea Chen
> On the other hand, unconscious pananche has a high value to surrealists,
> artists, and most people I suppose. You wouldn't want knowledge, true or
> skew, to reck that.
>
This is a common attitude among artists, but by definition it's in
opposition to surrealism.
"Automatic writing" was a technique borrowed from Freud which was
designed to bring forth the unconscious. The ghostly depths of dream
and what not were considered a "truer reality" than the conscious world,
they were the surreality.
The "surrealist project" is to "liberate the unconscious," to make it
conscious, to bring it into our world and make it visible, the
assumption being that with each layer stripped from the onion new layers
remain which become reachable only when the old has been revealed.
It's perfectly legitimate for an artist to treat the unconscious as a
black box which shouldn't be tampered with, but surrealism is about
loosing the world of dreams into the world of waking reality. This
requires that we find such things as "the mechanisms of dreams" build
them, wind them up and release them in this world.
>
> Could go either way.
>
> | > I'm going to create some new parts. There's this ruler scale. The
> scale
> | > points in the direction of "suggest new ideas". The highest point on
> the
> | > scale corresponds to when the suggestions manager is operating within
> "a
> | > new kind of thread": a project thread. This is where he is most able
> to
> | > effectively make suggestions; it's his project. At the bottom of the
> | > pointing scale is when he finds himself posting to an ordinary thread.
Interesting. But if we are serious, we need to discuss organization a
little more deeply. for example:
One problem is that those of us with big plans focus only on our
projects. Others slip into discussions and are ignored, important
possible lines are lost along with contributors.
> I'm just saying that what happens naturally is a bit disappointing at the
> moment and needs a bit of a booster shot.
>
I agree.
Do note that this puts you in conflict with the idea of the unexamined
unconscious and it's spontaneous upbursting (or stagnation.) You are
trying to manipulate human discourse.
> | > | But three or more people with agendas based
> merely
> | > | on a desire to "win" rather than on a need to forge collaboration
> rather
> | > | neatly dissolve the very essence of surrealism in a muck of dishonest
> | > | antagonism and intellectual horseplay.
This repeated charge starts to irritate me. When I first encountered
Dale it was he who took up "winning" as a goal. I pointed out that no
one could win on Internet because no one admitted using.
I also described the neu neutopian project and some of it's techniques
and how it successfully attracted some interesting writers. One idea I
mentioned was the issue of buttons which are essentially symbols or
statements which have certain effects (there is nothing original in this
general idea, but few of us have watched how they worked.)
Dale was appalled. His post didn't address issues, but compared me to
a scientologist, a landlord evicting widows and orphans, someone who was
tolerate of fascists (though over the years I've gone up against quite a
few hate mongers on the net) etc.
I responded calmly and noted each of the nearly dozen remarks of this
kind pointing out that they were buttons of the most blatant and
uninteresting type. I was told I was having a "hissy fit."
Over and over again I try to address Dales on specific issues be it the
unconscious or anarchy. We find out that my knowledge of psychology is
limited to that of high school or that I'm a fascist but we never sem to
be able to get down to the actual details of the matter.
As for the act of collaboration, it's me who raises over and over again
that it is possible that it can be done with some success in this
medium (this here and now were we play) and that I have some experience
in experimenting.
If someone doesn't like me that's fine. I could care less about being
a leader, but I *do* know something and not all of my ideas are stupid,
some are worth looking at and could be helpful to someone who wanted to
organize even if they didn't want me.
Instead we get remarks on how banal and trivial all my ideas are AND
claims that Usenet is not a good place for artists to organize, we
certainly don't get any attempts at organization here. I've seen a
number of people driven out for such crimes as liking Dali or being a
"nostalgic surrealist" (which isn't the proper kind.)
It's true I like horseplay. As for the desire to "win" you don't see
me engaging in hundreds of enraged posts to a single thread. I do
sometimes flame a bit, but then I typically leave the thread though I
may take up elements of the dispute at some later point. And rightly or
wrongly I have attempted to create collaboration in this here and now
while Dale has said that this isn't the place.
The charges above are pretty much a reversal of reality with Dale using
me to reflect himself. One can see why he is uncomfortable with
exploring the unconscious.
In the last week I have strived to refrain from mentioning certainly
issues by name though I do at times brush on certain topics because I
think them important. It is interesting that those who accuse me of all
sorts of disruptive behaviors take every chance they can to level vague
charges.
Certainly an interesting example for the discussion of manipulation.
> | drop her plate?" And the like. Name me one
> | thing Andrea has "discovered" that isn't common knowledge in a high
> | school psych course?
>
> I don't know. Andrea?
>
This could get long. But it won't. One issue I raised was "buttons"
which are essentially words and ideas which have effects. For example
"Bill Palmer" is a button (Bill Palmer is the worlds greatest writer is
another) "inform" is a button (good!) "manipulate" another (bad!)
I will happily admit that there is nothing original in this. I have
done so at least 3 or 4 times to Dale (yet he continues to claim that I
claimed to discover the idea.)
I do find the examination and experimentation with "buttons"
fascinating. In a lot of respects all I see is the obvious (but I still
don't believe it, a lot of me rebels against this quality of humanity.)
but it's still fascinating and I think discussion of buttons (we can
chose some other word) and experimentation in a sort of metadialogue
where we illustrate the tools of manipulation is useful.
Maybe not. But here is a real world example with Dale. A few months
ago Dale ripped apart a young ladies poetry rather cruelly. So with one
post I lined him to rec.arts.prose where he immedietely started to
engage in a flame war with a certain Robert Maughan. After a few weeks
of 3 or 4 posts daily I explained to Dale what I'd done and why. That
the encounter which was making him so furious was just a game for
Robert. He couldn't stop, he continued and it only stopped when I took
over alt.surrealism a few weeks ago.
Yet one of the first things I warned Dale about was the "endless loop"
the flamewar that goes on forever along with advice about how to pull
out of such a thing. If everything I say is so obvious and so trite why
is he so helpless?
If anyone doubts the fact that Dale can be easily controlled go to
dejanews, use the power search to set the group to rec.arts.prose and
look for Dale's name.
One of the parts of my "surrealist project" is to make people aware of
how we are so easily controlled by buttons. I also wish to desensitize
certain buttons and sensitize others in a different way so we look at
certain good words like "liberate" in a cynical way, this doesn't mean
the user doesn't have somethinbg valid to say, but given the history of
the 20th century I think such words should automatically raise a bit of
a warning.
This is perhaps reprogramming the unconscious.
Horace Confab
| >
| > I am disappointed that you chose not to play with me as I was with you.
If
| > you change your mind, the last thing that happened was that I cast you
out
| > of Surrealist Heaven for being unable to generate relevant new ideas.
The
| > garden of Eden is the collective unconscious liberated.
| >
|
|
| I will unhappily admit to being an idiot and reading your own post too
| quickly thus illustrating through my example one of my dominant themes.
..Dominant themes as pets.
| Actually I kind of like it, but damn it I shall deny this on
| principle!
Sounds like someone's got some popcorn on the oven.
| You can't throw me out of surrealist Heaven because according to a well
| known authority surrealism and religion can't mix and even the mention
| of heaven is oppressive!
..I'm pumping for bee heaven.
|Wait a second! I never agree with that
| expert! However in this case I do. Why? Because in this case his
| opinion is useful to me and in addition I want to protest the tyranny
| you are imposing on this group.
..You really are the craftiest of all my creatures.
| You can't toss me out of surrealist heaven! I wouldn't let you!
| Mommy! The big boy is picking on me and being a fascist!
..You're out already.
| All right, you win. But let me tell you now that your totaltarian
| antics are completely unacceptable! I shall return!
..Of course you will.
| But for now I'm the evil bitch witch demon from surrealist hell!
|
| (the sound of evil laughter fades in the background)
..You slither over to the apple tree.
..You see Eve.
.."Eve," you say, "Horace Confab knows very well that the instant you eat
that apple up there you will become like him, for your eyes will be opened
and you will be able to distinguish surrealism from repression!"
..How lovely and free the apple looked.
Horace Confab
|
| Horace Confab wrote:
| >
|
| > Consider usm and memetics. I have the opinion that memetics will open
up a
| > world of unconditional love, mainly because memetics denies the self
and
| > that is very compatible with ul. The ul environment could well be the
| > liberation of the unconscious, to be what it wants to be.
| >
| > Or things like memetics and its babies-in-the-womb could lead to a new
kind
| > of society where the only thing to be done is to cry together about how
| > terrible things are.
| >
| > Could go either way.
|
| since the cognitive net is so tiny in this case. Seine or Inseine? I
| accept the Ur-notion of unconditional love but only under certain
| conditions:
..Conditional unconditional love? cul.
| (1) We "hermeticize" all the broken articulations, leading to an
| outbreak, or firebreak, across the path of the brush fire called
| passion. Save the deer, forget the stones. Dream outlets into trees and
| run!
..Furry and purple of type broom-broom.
| (2) Social "connectiveness" is sacrificed for fleeting fun. We have to
| catch the zombies on the run.
..Go so fast that the cabal knocks them over.
..Then we help them up.
..Then knock them over again.
| (3) I get to wear the ritual overalls to the barn dance of thanatopsis.
..Yee and of course haw.
| > I do like imagery; that is my excuse.
|
| Good enough reason...
|
| > I'm just saying that what happens naturally is a bit disappointing at
the moment and needs a bit of a booster shot.
|
| Maybe here, but e-vivre is bound to disappoint, because it's the
| creature's character. We cannot escape to the outside of the "natural"
| (whatever that means at this end of the century), we only drag the
| perimeter line along with each new consideration. We can pretend to be
| outside. We can pretend not to care about the difference (there is none)
| between outside and inside. Baudelaire supports the artifice of fashion
| over the fearful nakedness of the natural. One learns to love the
| make-up more than the meat of the matter.
Test of liberation is in whether you have the gumption to put lipstick on
dead men's soles.
| > Suggestion managers, who appear briefly then dissolve
|
| The Fizzies of rhetorical forensics? The Alka-Seltzer of incentive?
| Catalyst or dogalyst? Soluble Fits?
A form and then a dissolution. The field is white. Snow.
| > Oh. Well, because I want a better kind of natural.
|
| Nautral-Lite? Lo-cal natural? Naturalina, with flavor rinds?
Banana split natural.
| > The point of the term is to create a framework that may be useful.
|
| Down with the useful! Handling or being handled?
Useful is a tool of the oppressors! I never realised.
| > I'm trying.
|
| (Old Pleasantry): you certainly are!
I believe in the power of Try. Try this Try that. There's so much to Try.
It's very deep. Deeper than the seas.
| > Well, I hope it happens.
|
| Like most ideas for revolution, it already happens in experimentally
| tiny forms and forums, and (honestly) that is enough for me. Like most
| ideas for revolution, it will come to largely nothing, but an avoidance
| of the midnight shootings and "procedural" floggings might not be all
| bad. The world is pre-sold, and bought with unrecompensed labor.
| Revolution one person at a time; one learns to savor the tiniest bites
| from the rich, white flesh. It's a matter of sensual sensitivity, as
| opposed to programmatic embolisms.
Mmmm.. flesh.
| > That sounds great. It would be good to have something like that here.
One
| > day perhaps.
|
| When and if, let me know. Frankly it would be happening here if it
| weren't for a few more "energetic" individuals than myself; I am more
| than content to find my low point and flow into it.
That's not Try talk.
| >
| DMH
|
Dale Houstman
Horace Confab wrote:
>
> That's not Try talk.
Are you a member (throbbing or otherwise) of the Tri-lateral Ommision?
I must admit that I am not as enamored of struggle as you are (or seem
to pretend you want to be). That this might be a function of my age or
my natural inclination toward laziness. Don't Do It!
What if everyone laid down to sleep or to take it easy at the same time?
A sort of a couch revolution? A case of Divan Intervention?
DMH
Ali Hassan
universe as "Horace Confab" <punsl...@hatmail.com> wrote:
>Andrea Chen <fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote in article
><3792F7...@earthlink.net>...
>| >
>| > I am disappointed that you chose not to play with me as I was with you.
> If
>| > you change your mind, the last thing that happened was that I cast you
>out
>| > of Surrealist Heaven for being unable to generate relevant new ideas.
>The
>| > garden of Eden is the collective unconscious liberated.
>| >
>|
>|
>| I will unhappily admit to being an idiot and reading your own post too
>| quickly thus illustrating through my example one of my dominant themes.
>
>..Dominant themes as pets.
A pet theme as a dominatrix. Now, *that* is surreal. But,
unfortunately, all too common.
>
>| Actually I kind of like it, but damn it I shall deny this on
>| principle!
>
>Sounds like someone's got some popcorn on the oven.
>
>| You can't throw me out of surrealist Heaven because according to a well
>| known authority surrealism and religion can't mix and even the mention
>| of heaven is oppressive!
>
>..I'm pumping for bee heaven.
>
>|Wait a second! I never agree with that
>| expert! However in this case I do. Why? Because in this case his
>| opinion is useful to me and in addition I want to protest the tyranny
>| you are imposing on this group.
>
>..You really are the craftiest of all my creatures.
>
>| You can't toss me out of surrealist heaven! I wouldn't let you!
>| Mommy! The big boy is picking on me and being a fascist!
>
>..You're out already.
>
>| All right, you win. But let me tell you now that your totaltarian
>| antics are completely unacceptable! I shall return!
>
>..Of course you will.
>
>| But for now I'm the evil bitch witch demon from surrealist hell!
>|
>| (the sound of evil laughter fades in the background)
Oh, Jesus. My kids were meaner when they were still wearing Oshkosh
B'Goshes. Which, come to notice, you "surrealists" still are. Well.
That explains a few things.
>..You slither over to the apple tree.
>..You see Eve.
>.."Eve," you say, "Horace Confab knows very well that the instant you eat
>that apple up there you will become like him, for your eyes will be opened
>and you will be able to distinguish surrealism from repression!"
>..How lovely and free the apple looked.
Nobody ever asks the apple's opinion in this goddammed story. That's
why this particular universe is so unbalanced. The snake was a
bystander. What a scam.
Susanna Lee
<punsl...@hatmail.com> wrote:
>Useful is a tool of the oppressors! I never realised.
The *most* useful tool. Your enlightenment comes better late
than never.
>I believe in the power of Try. Try this Try that. There's so much to Try.
> It's very deep. Deeper than the seas.
Don't overlook "goals" and "enthusiasm". They are both very
useful.
-Susanna
Andrea Chen
> Oh, Jesus. My kids were meaner when they were still wearing Oshkosh
> B'Goshes.
This is *so* true. I'm such a nice and sweet person and I can't do
anything mean and everyone always picks on me and says I'm a tyrant and
stuff, but I just smile and try and be a nice girl even though Horace
through me out of surrealist heaven which means I don't get to ride on
the Zeppelin and meanwhile I've got to form a shadow government to run
alt.surrealism because my guidance counselor said it would look really
good if I wrote that "I managed and directed an organization of over a
thousand imaginery people and I knew all of ther names." This seems to
be the kind of experience that large corporations are looking for, but
does anyone help me?
No! Right now I'm reduced to selling Apples on the street. Fortuntaly
lots of people buy them, but there's this bad boy who keeps screaming
that my Apples are coated with a mind altering drug and that anyone who
bites one will become a zombie. And I mean, yeah, like big deal so
what? People need variety in their lives. Lots of people get to be
zombies, but hardly anyone gets to be *my* zombie (though there's hope
for civilization that this will change.)
So it's really hard for me to recruit the 1,000 imaginery people for my
imaginery organization which is really too bad because if more people
don't start buying Apples I won't be able to turn in my resume to
MacDonald's before summer is over which means I won't have any new
clothes!
Waah! Why is everyone so mean to me?!
Susanna Lee
<fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Waah! Why is everyone so mean to me?!
Nothing personal. No one even knows you.
All cross-posters wind up in the cross-hairs.
-Susanna
SereneBabe
>
> On Tue, 20 Jul 1999 12:17:00 +0000, Andrea Chen
> <fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>
> >Waah! Why is everyone so mean to me?!
>
> Nothing personal. No one even knows you.
Oh, good god.
It's *NOT* all about me.
I'm red in the face.
And probably red in the bottom from sitting in front of this
damned computer for far far too long.
Good night, I'm off to write my column and sleep sleep sleep.
Heather
****************
"It's All About Me!" a weekly column by SereneBabe
http://members.aol.com/serenebabe/index.html
July 14, 1999: "I Got to Meet a Pop Star"
Ali Hassan
> Waah! Why is everyone so mean to me?!
>
Because.......
Jesus WANTS IT THAT WAY!
( tm. Peter Boyle)
Susanna Lee
<seren...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>Susanna Lee wrote:
>>
>> On Tue, 20 Jul 1999 12:17:00 +0000, Andrea Chen
>> <fallin...@earthlink.net> wrote:
>>
>> >Waah! Why is everyone so mean to me?!
>>
>> Nothing personal. No one even knows you.
>
>Oh, good god.
>
>It's *NOT* all about me.
It couldn't possibly be. You promised not to cross-post.
>I'm red in the face.
Next time you forget your sunscreen, wear a hat.
>And probably red in the bottom from sitting in front of this
>damned computer for far far too long.
But, there's nothing else to do!
>Good night, I'm off to write my column and sleep sleep sleep.
At least you have a column. You should be thankful for that.
>Heather
-Susanna