Oh I feel a ballooning essay coming on. Yes, over a lawn.
I got yelled at by a third person in this neighborhood for letting dogs pee on their lawn. I find this reaction to be pretty hilarious on several dimensions of thought, which is what I'm going to try to demonstrate without becoming unhinged. I'll begin within a limited argument and expand out as I go.
The first time someone yelled at me I threw my head back and laughed in a comical and exaggerated way. I felt a little sorry about this response - though I was talking on my phone so it is hard to tell how the lady interpreted the gesture - so I subsequently tempered my response on later occasions.
This fixation on lawns is understandable: in a world growing increasingly chaotic, and increasingly aesthetically horrifying by a combination of neglect, automobile-based asphalt/concrete ubiquity, and the expediency of mass-produced, monocultural beauty, the average lawn-owner just wants to have a small patch of land that can be controlled and made visually pleasing in a semi-naturalistic way (though most of these efforts collapse into the corporate monoculture category for reasons I'll get to). I do get it. And it is sad to watch the look on these people's faces...that quivering mixture of despair and horror as they fixate their gaze on the offending dogs hovering sordidly over their beautiful grass. It doesn't seem as though they particularly relish snapping at people to get off their lawns, but they are left with no choice given their own inner perturbation.
However this commitment - and the concordant behavior - is ultimately misplaced and futile. First, this is a heavy dog-populated neighborhood. For every dog the owners happen to catch and shoo off their lawn, there are dozens more which escape their gaze and unleash rivers of urine into their lawn. People walk their dogs at all hours of the day. There are tons of them going by all the time. There is no way to reverse this grim tide of dog pee. Besides, though Americans are actually part of one of the most obedient mainstream cultures in the world, they typically refuse to be dominated by their peers - so you could say Americans on average are obedient to authority, a vertical quality, while they are allergic to any hint of obedience to their peers, which is a horizontal quality (this trend is changing though). What this amounts to - and I've seen this in family and several neighbors - is that scorned dog owners go out of their way to get their dogs to pee on the lawns in question out of reaction to being insulted; the preventative act is reversed in its effect and becomes a magnet for undesirable consequences. Besides, it is much easier (and more friendly to the community) to simply shrug and water the lawn, which helps too.
But wait, water the lawn? What of lawns? For now we've been entertaining the key premise that joining the community and having a nice green lawn is desirable. But is it? This makes one stop, pull further out, and consider the greater argument.
The fact of the matter is that the mass adoption and propagation of the manicured lawn is one of the greatest environmental disasters in the history of human civilization...on par with the deforestation of Easter Island. I'm not even kidding! Lawns are fucked.
Now granted, if you recycle your mulch, you can get a nice organic fertilizer and your lawn acts as an effective carbon sink, plus it allows wildlife like bugs and wormies and birds - which eat the wormies - to settle in. But then plenty of other forms of plant life and soil have this effect too.
Lawns need lots of water to survive. Now, meadow grass is at least sustainable wherever it happens to grow in its natural habitat. Wild lawns can survive just fine where there is plenty of rainfall to feed it. But the problem is the lawn as it exists now has become a product of mass-produced monoculture. It is spread and grafted in stylized form to the far reaches of the country: we plant it in deserts, in the mountains, on top of concrete, etc. In these environments, it is almost impossible to grow and maintain lawns without three elements: fertilizers, pesticides, and lots of artificially administered water.
Chemical fertilizers and pesticides are disasters in themselves. Generally they are petroleum based, which on top of contributing to global warming, are seeing global supplies strained as the conventional sources are being sucked dry, with proxy wars taking place over many of the remaining conventional sources and energy companies increasingly pursuing dirty, environmentally destructive, energy intensive, and economically inefficient unconventional methods (fracking, tar sands, deep drilling). Plus, every time it rains, pesticides are deposited to god knows what receptacles everywhere they happen to flow to. These chemicals are incredibly toxic and have many documented negative effects on human beings, wildlife, crops, pest resistance, whole ecologies (they kill bees in mass amounts) and more. While giving temporary boost to agricultural yields, they destroy soil and the life around them in the long run.
We also typically prefer to manicure our lawns, with...drumroll...gasoline powered lawnmowers. Few people use hand-pushed mowers. They're hard to use (I've used one) and most suburbanites are overworked and low on energy anyways. Plus, most gardeners stick to gasoline-powered equipment themselves due to the nature of their profession.
Wow! Now the water. Lawns, if they are grown in inhospitable environments, take lots of water to sustain. An insane amount of water in fact. Otherwise they just grow brown and dull, defeating the purpose. Consider the dilemma this furthers. The US (and many other places in the world) is increasingly experiencing water shortages and drought, which is growing worse. We are running out of fresh, potable water due to population strains. Plus, you have pesticides and fertilizers contaminating certain water tables, sewage disposal systems becoming outdated, farmers fighting over water supplies for agriculture, and frackers vying for water supplies to do their fracking (which consequently also contaminates water). Cities are beginning to feel the pressure and even whole institutions are trying to come up with guidelines to start rationing water. But even incremental reductions aren't going to cut it.There is going to come a time when we simply don't have the water to keep lawns green, which basically defeats the purpose. No one wants a brown lawn. And the crop is basically useless in the capacity we use it in. This is insane!
Now, further out. This conventional monoculture phenomena of repetitious mass production is very striking; it seems to emerge out of size and scale. The lawn can be traced to the British upper class. The British upper class supposedly loooved their fresh green manicured lawns. So much that many of them took turf with them to the colonies to transplant it there and make things more like home. This look caught on, eventually becoming integrated into the American Dream mythology, with everyone wanting a nice manicured green lawn as part of the package. As population mushroomed out as a consequence of the second industrial revolution (mass production through assembly lines and industrial agriculture) it was now possible to distribute a growing amount of reproduced manicured lawns based on the mass produced suburban model.
It seems as though a social body that grows large enough to be considered a civilization is centered around a common set of ideas, with resultant patterns being multiplied throughout the population. A monoculture forms, with accompanying pressure to conform, thus the phenomenon of the manicured green lawn multiplied across the landscape, even amidst clearly hostile environments. A monolithic idea is thus spread across a diverse land, resulting in strains to sustain the idea where it is unsuited.
The distinctly American brand of mainstream culture is directly hostile to the surrounding environment, which puts strains on everything from the material circumstances to the social relations that take place within. The lawn people are those unfortunate products of convention, those nodes which strain to maintain a given aesthetic continuity within their culture, however misplaced, and despite greater destruction to the greater surroundings. Their attempts at control are based on a greater model that has to be cast aside by the entire population to avoid disaster. The larger a living system grows that separates itself from the greater living fabric, and the more inputs required to sustain such a living thing, the more is taken from the surrounding environment, the more tension forms between that thing and everything else, as a general principle. To paraphrase the Hopi, the more you take from the earth without giving back, the more forcefully you invite disaster.
This now relates to the religious idea of giving up on a previous conception of order that is based on the ghostly image of an old, dying mythology that is projected universally. There is emergent order even within chaos; it just appears differently from a hierarchically organized, top-down distributed mode of order that materializes as green trimmed lawn. This means giving up on the old, and letting oneself be swept away by the new.
You see some homeowners ripping up their lawns and placing indigenous, low-water plant systems on their land. Or you see permaculture practitioners rejecting industrial agriculture and building whole ecologies while attempting to harmonize with principles of nature. More is needed, but these are good steps.
That is why the spectacle of these angry lawn owners cracks me up. It is as if they stand on a Wyle E Coyote style sliver of cliff hanging out over the abyss, complaining about the spidering cracks forming underneath their feet. I also check myself and try not to laugh too much, as many people simply just don't know and we are facing some very serious problems. Perhaps I'm being a bit dramatic. Or perhaps not.
Thursday, October 24, 2013
Monday, October 21, 2013
Incrementally Disappointing?
I suppose a better course of action is just to drop the high art designation altogether. It creates too many problems. Who is to say what is high art? Well, consensus built around evaluation and emotional feeling certainly, but then what's consensus? I have to admit my conceptions of greatness are colored by what my own ideology posits as great.
Anyways, I'm here second-guessing myself because of a particularly brilliant analysis from someone who knows how to critically talk about video games, which is relatively rare. You won't find anything like this on any of the online magazines.
I keep forgetting about the covert radicalism of Valve's games, a radicalism that shouldn't come as a shock when you consider their internal organization (it employs several anarchist organizational principles without going full anarchist). I've also never seen Valve's games discussed in that way. That is partially why they have slipped under the radar as well. No one talks about the hidden radical meaning within the multiple layers of play mechanic and surface plot. Plus, consciousness has to spread. One has to become aware of the hidden themes embedded in said works to identify them, a consciousness which I think is spreading.
I sit here complaining about the archaic, stagnant nature of the first-person shooter, but what I have forgotten is the very conservative nature of this mechanic (along with its mass popularity) allows one to bury some very radical ideas within its husk as secret messaging to those sympathetic souls that experience the game. Of course, that is also part of the reason why these things don't get discussed: many people just miss them altogether, which is ok. That's really been a constant pattern throughout history when it comes to the social transmission of radical ideas.
Anyways, I'm here second-guessing myself because of a particularly brilliant analysis from someone who knows how to critically talk about video games, which is relatively rare. You won't find anything like this on any of the online magazines.
I keep forgetting about the covert radicalism of Valve's games, a radicalism that shouldn't come as a shock when you consider their internal organization (it employs several anarchist organizational principles without going full anarchist). I've also never seen Valve's games discussed in that way. That is partially why they have slipped under the radar as well. No one talks about the hidden radical meaning within the multiple layers of play mechanic and surface plot. Plus, consciousness has to spread. One has to become aware of the hidden themes embedded in said works to identify them, a consciousness which I think is spreading.
I sit here complaining about the archaic, stagnant nature of the first-person shooter, but what I have forgotten is the very conservative nature of this mechanic (along with its mass popularity) allows one to bury some very radical ideas within its husk as secret messaging to those sympathetic souls that experience the game. Of course, that is also part of the reason why these things don't get discussed: many people just miss them altogether, which is ok. That's really been a constant pattern throughout history when it comes to the social transmission of radical ideas.
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Trauma
The curious thing abut the brain is that when it undergoes a trauma significant enough, especially at a young age, though this can happen at any age, it kicks itself down to a survival mode and orders its incoming stimuli in accordance with this new framework.
One psychologist came up with an elegant metaphor for it: the brain's connections are like flowing rivers, with the information flowing in certain directions and over certain circuits in accordance with necessity. When the brain experiences trauma, it is as if a heavy rain and flood cuts a new, broader pathway for the information to travel through, in this case straight for the brain's survival center.
This results in adaptive behavior that although would be quite useful in the wild (probably excluding schizophrenic and schizotypal disorders), proves to be nonconstructive in a complex, civilized world. Adaptive behaviors and effects can range from radically self-interested and sociopathic behavior, to anxiety disorders and PTSD, oscillating depression, distrust, low self-esteem, drug abuse and more. These behavior patterns can then calcify and form psychological structures that then order much of the individual's behavior, persisting long past the original trauma.
If that isn't enough, the trauma can then be transmitted across generations. Violence begets violence, but even stressful behavior that isn't violent can have adverse effects on the development of a child's mind, as children's brains are incredibly delicate and impressionable. The re-ordering of adaptive mechanisms can also transmit itself through the genes, which can be expressed in people with relatively good childhoods as they become young adults and encounter stressful situations.
Violence then - and this can be hard violence or soft violence, such as verbal/emotional abuse or general cruelty - is incredibly radioactive. Outbursts of violent energy don't just cause sympathetic chain reactions, they take generations upon generations to disperse, and the collateral effects of such a dispersal increases the probability for future patterns of violence and the related traumas.
So, societies held together by violence (police states and warring imperial powers) simply cannot last. A healthy society requires trust and communication among other things to correctly function over a long period of time, and these elements are eroded as damaged individuals behave in ways that alter basic social assumptions.
However, violent societies themselves are formed out of the rending forces of collective historical trauma, so this is an incredibly complex and difficult problem, but well-worth thinking about and deliberating over.
Our conceptions of private property, indefinite accumulation, and radical egotism can be seen to be forged out of the turbulent forces of violence. Scaled out, these phenomena betray a systematic social distrust in which power and control is restored artificially through the rule of law and applied violence. The process of the hyperconcentration of wealth in limited individuals unleashes forces of soft violence, while the legitimization and enforcement of such a concentration inflicts systematic violence via contact with the police state and the necessary generation of poverty, which itself produces a pervasive climate in which violence and trauma is to occur. In this way our society can be viewed in the lens of trauma, both in its relation to itself as it begins to feed on itself, and in relation to outer societies and the increasing catastrophic failure engendered by colonialism and imperialism, though there is much greater complexity beyond this limited reading.
The result of such a state of affairs is a condition of perpetual disintegration that is only slowed by the temporary and illusory establishment of order and control through force, which itself only generates further chaos and division over a longer period of time. The answer to such a state of affairs is a radical redefinition of values and a daily healing practical action which is set against and in spite of the ongoing effects of social trauma.
One psychologist came up with an elegant metaphor for it: the brain's connections are like flowing rivers, with the information flowing in certain directions and over certain circuits in accordance with necessity. When the brain experiences trauma, it is as if a heavy rain and flood cuts a new, broader pathway for the information to travel through, in this case straight for the brain's survival center.
This results in adaptive behavior that although would be quite useful in the wild (probably excluding schizophrenic and schizotypal disorders), proves to be nonconstructive in a complex, civilized world. Adaptive behaviors and effects can range from radically self-interested and sociopathic behavior, to anxiety disorders and PTSD, oscillating depression, distrust, low self-esteem, drug abuse and more. These behavior patterns can then calcify and form psychological structures that then order much of the individual's behavior, persisting long past the original trauma.
If that isn't enough, the trauma can then be transmitted across generations. Violence begets violence, but even stressful behavior that isn't violent can have adverse effects on the development of a child's mind, as children's brains are incredibly delicate and impressionable. The re-ordering of adaptive mechanisms can also transmit itself through the genes, which can be expressed in people with relatively good childhoods as they become young adults and encounter stressful situations.
Violence then - and this can be hard violence or soft violence, such as verbal/emotional abuse or general cruelty - is incredibly radioactive. Outbursts of violent energy don't just cause sympathetic chain reactions, they take generations upon generations to disperse, and the collateral effects of such a dispersal increases the probability for future patterns of violence and the related traumas.
So, societies held together by violence (police states and warring imperial powers) simply cannot last. A healthy society requires trust and communication among other things to correctly function over a long period of time, and these elements are eroded as damaged individuals behave in ways that alter basic social assumptions.
However, violent societies themselves are formed out of the rending forces of collective historical trauma, so this is an incredibly complex and difficult problem, but well-worth thinking about and deliberating over.
Our conceptions of private property, indefinite accumulation, and radical egotism can be seen to be forged out of the turbulent forces of violence. Scaled out, these phenomena betray a systematic social distrust in which power and control is restored artificially through the rule of law and applied violence. The process of the hyperconcentration of wealth in limited individuals unleashes forces of soft violence, while the legitimization and enforcement of such a concentration inflicts systematic violence via contact with the police state and the necessary generation of poverty, which itself produces a pervasive climate in which violence and trauma is to occur. In this way our society can be viewed in the lens of trauma, both in its relation to itself as it begins to feed on itself, and in relation to outer societies and the increasing catastrophic failure engendered by colonialism and imperialism, though there is much greater complexity beyond this limited reading.
The result of such a state of affairs is a condition of perpetual disintegration that is only slowed by the temporary and illusory establishment of order and control through force, which itself only generates further chaos and division over a longer period of time. The answer to such a state of affairs is a radical redefinition of values and a daily healing practical action which is set against and in spite of the ongoing effects of social trauma.
Incrementally Disappointing
I made a mistake in the last piece. Roger Ebert's last claim - his argument grew progressively weaker over time as opponents weighed in - was that perhaps video games could be high art, but not in our lifetimes. What I meant to say, and I guess didn't articulate very well, was that yes the argument he made in limited form was probably right: we probably won't see a great work come in the form we are expecting it in: in a large-scale high budget game.
We might see contenders rise up from the indie underworld, and they'll definitely be less sophisticated and glossy, and we can expect a resumption of progress in the far, far future, since the interactive medium has really seemed to have seized our imaginations.
There's also the indeterminacy of the march of history. It is really difficult to predict just what will happen next, though what will occur will have to occur within the increasingly defined restraints posed by resource depletion and social disintegration. But to reiterate, life is a strange and unpredictable thing.
We might see contenders rise up from the indie underworld, and they'll definitely be less sophisticated and glossy, and we can expect a resumption of progress in the far, far future, since the interactive medium has really seemed to have seized our imaginations.
There's also the indeterminacy of the march of history. It is really difficult to predict just what will happen next, though what will occur will have to occur within the increasingly defined restraints posed by resource depletion and social disintegration. But to reiterate, life is a strange and unpredictable thing.
Friday, October 18, 2013
Infinitely Disappointing
Well maybe not infinitely so, as this gentleman thinks. I finished Bioshock Infinite a week or so ago and I've been playing Dead Space 3 and the experiences have helped me to understand the greater trajectory the video game industry is taking.
I've been catching up on some video games I've missed and have found myself continuously disappointed. However the bitterness has been taken away by understanding and resignation.
I wrote a few bubbly pieces for a nascent video game media outlet that has since collapsed, and these pieces were bursting with optimism but ultimately naive in their understanding of material reality. Video games are an incredibly complex phenomenon and have evolved far past their original rule-based entertainment iterations. You have basic virtual copies of traditional games, then linear story-telling games that play like an interactive movie, then non-linear (or more accurately branching linear) story-telling games and sandbox games that considerably expand player freedom and give rise to a variety of emergent phenomena within their bounds, simulation games, management games, god games, radically emergent games that give you almost complete freedom, and so on and so on. There is a game for pretty much every mode of interaction we have, so you'd imagine that sooner or later a great human work will be come along in the form of a game.
Roger Ebert made the argument that video games will never be high art, and my essays were a response to that argument, showing the incredible shapes games have taken and that they will achieve high art status. Now it is true that video games have come a long way and they've done some pretty remarkable things, but I'm beginning to think that damn Mr. Ebert might have been right, but not in the way he probably thought.
We have entered an era in which large-scale human projects that are not ultimately conservative or configured towards the purpose of capital accumulation for a small owning class are pretty much no longer possible. Now today's mainstream video game is incredibly complex and a development crew often requires hundreds of people and millions in productive capital. Most productive capital today is owned by people who are really not interested in transformative ideas; they are risk-averse businessmen who wish to stick to tried and true methods that funnel great amounts of money into their gaping maws. Plus, many of these businesssmen have come into contact with such an immense concentration of capital because of the way our society is set up, and because of the underlying ideology that legitimates that arrangement, so anything that threatens that state of affairs is going to be rejected instinctually.
And well who can blame these guys? To be a part of that class, you share the same social platform with bankers, energy barons, defense contractors, and all those other types. You're talking about guys who buy islands and multiple houses and giant cruise yachts. There is immense social pressure to do everything it takes with the economic platform you have to acquire as much capital as you can, because everyone is in competition towards greater private gain. Any sort of national or greater public purpose is gone. The logic of our times necessitates it. Both Hollywood and TV-land suffer from these problems as well, though there are always exceptions that make it through.
So, we arrive at this state of affairs due to the ravages of time and catastrophic mistakes encouraged by human nature. I have plenty to say about all that, but back to the games.
Bioshock Infinite has some incredible artwork. The world is absolutely gorgeous and there is a nice constellation of relevant themes that crop up: the messianism, cultism, and hypocrisy of organized religion, the construction of mythology and the ugliness that writhes beneath pretty images, subterranean racism, the oppression of labor and the political smearing of socialism and communism, the list goes on. The satire of anti-labor propaganda in the factory section of the game was especially delicious. But then all of these themes just hover impotently in the background amidst an ongoing orgy of senseless violence. The game is drowned in it. I was dismayed to find that you suddenly turn against labor and the lower classes for a really ridiculous reason, so you are a given an expanded stable of enemies to shoot, besides the insidious establishment.
These glaring contradictions can be attributed to the tenacity of the first-person shooter mechanic. The mechanic has been refined to perfection due to its popularity and simplicity, and sells a shitload of games. So many of these games you have these simplistic mechanics like shooting, or just general killing (even the cartoon games have a similar mechanic of elimination) with all of the more refined ideas embedded within this banal engine. Because it all has been found to work, and it all sells. Bioshock is one of them. You can tell the writer is trying to say something, but then collapses into frustration upon finding himself shackled to these economic chains.
The ending shows this. After turning against everyone and standing for absolutely nothing, the orgy of violence is ended upon a revelation that you are both the good and the evil emanating from other worlds, and so the whole absurd, sordid journey is ended like a collapsing star: all of the human drama, worthwhile causes, and struggles are sucked back into the ridiculous anti-climax of the life of a single character. The ending shows an incredible fatalism and narcissism, that becomes understandable considering the greater dilemma posed by the video game medium. Dead Space falls into similar traps but I haven't finished it yet.
I still enjoy playing these games. At least the process is often satisfying, and there is great beauty in the constructed worlds: graphics and aesthetics are one aspect of the art form that continue to progress, as they are basically value-free. But I am always plagued with the nagging complaint that they can be so much more.
Some exceptions do get through. You can expect some transformative ideas to come out of the indie sector where financial and social constraints aren't so prevalent. Minecraft is probably one of the great triumphs of the video game world, which came out of the indie sector. Here you have a game that doesn't even have a guiding story, and the market-system is completely eschewed for building your own tools out of resources you gather yourself. It has enjoyed wide success and now capital is behind it of course.
Some games do get through. But high art? I'm not sure. Who knows. There is more to consider, but I've run out of time for now.
I've been catching up on some video games I've missed and have found myself continuously disappointed. However the bitterness has been taken away by understanding and resignation.
I wrote a few bubbly pieces for a nascent video game media outlet that has since collapsed, and these pieces were bursting with optimism but ultimately naive in their understanding of material reality. Video games are an incredibly complex phenomenon and have evolved far past their original rule-based entertainment iterations. You have basic virtual copies of traditional games, then linear story-telling games that play like an interactive movie, then non-linear (or more accurately branching linear) story-telling games and sandbox games that considerably expand player freedom and give rise to a variety of emergent phenomena within their bounds, simulation games, management games, god games, radically emergent games that give you almost complete freedom, and so on and so on. There is a game for pretty much every mode of interaction we have, so you'd imagine that sooner or later a great human work will be come along in the form of a game.
Roger Ebert made the argument that video games will never be high art, and my essays were a response to that argument, showing the incredible shapes games have taken and that they will achieve high art status. Now it is true that video games have come a long way and they've done some pretty remarkable things, but I'm beginning to think that damn Mr. Ebert might have been right, but not in the way he probably thought.
We have entered an era in which large-scale human projects that are not ultimately conservative or configured towards the purpose of capital accumulation for a small owning class are pretty much no longer possible. Now today's mainstream video game is incredibly complex and a development crew often requires hundreds of people and millions in productive capital. Most productive capital today is owned by people who are really not interested in transformative ideas; they are risk-averse businessmen who wish to stick to tried and true methods that funnel great amounts of money into their gaping maws. Plus, many of these businesssmen have come into contact with such an immense concentration of capital because of the way our society is set up, and because of the underlying ideology that legitimates that arrangement, so anything that threatens that state of affairs is going to be rejected instinctually.
And well who can blame these guys? To be a part of that class, you share the same social platform with bankers, energy barons, defense contractors, and all those other types. You're talking about guys who buy islands and multiple houses and giant cruise yachts. There is immense social pressure to do everything it takes with the economic platform you have to acquire as much capital as you can, because everyone is in competition towards greater private gain. Any sort of national or greater public purpose is gone. The logic of our times necessitates it. Both Hollywood and TV-land suffer from these problems as well, though there are always exceptions that make it through.
So, we arrive at this state of affairs due to the ravages of time and catastrophic mistakes encouraged by human nature. I have plenty to say about all that, but back to the games.
Bioshock Infinite has some incredible artwork. The world is absolutely gorgeous and there is a nice constellation of relevant themes that crop up: the messianism, cultism, and hypocrisy of organized religion, the construction of mythology and the ugliness that writhes beneath pretty images, subterranean racism, the oppression of labor and the political smearing of socialism and communism, the list goes on. The satire of anti-labor propaganda in the factory section of the game was especially delicious. But then all of these themes just hover impotently in the background amidst an ongoing orgy of senseless violence. The game is drowned in it. I was dismayed to find that you suddenly turn against labor and the lower classes for a really ridiculous reason, so you are a given an expanded stable of enemies to shoot, besides the insidious establishment.
These glaring contradictions can be attributed to the tenacity of the first-person shooter mechanic. The mechanic has been refined to perfection due to its popularity and simplicity, and sells a shitload of games. So many of these games you have these simplistic mechanics like shooting, or just general killing (even the cartoon games have a similar mechanic of elimination) with all of the more refined ideas embedded within this banal engine. Because it all has been found to work, and it all sells. Bioshock is one of them. You can tell the writer is trying to say something, but then collapses into frustration upon finding himself shackled to these economic chains.
The ending shows this. After turning against everyone and standing for absolutely nothing, the orgy of violence is ended upon a revelation that you are both the good and the evil emanating from other worlds, and so the whole absurd, sordid journey is ended like a collapsing star: all of the human drama, worthwhile causes, and struggles are sucked back into the ridiculous anti-climax of the life of a single character. The ending shows an incredible fatalism and narcissism, that becomes understandable considering the greater dilemma posed by the video game medium. Dead Space falls into similar traps but I haven't finished it yet.
I still enjoy playing these games. At least the process is often satisfying, and there is great beauty in the constructed worlds: graphics and aesthetics are one aspect of the art form that continue to progress, as they are basically value-free. But I am always plagued with the nagging complaint that they can be so much more.
Some exceptions do get through. You can expect some transformative ideas to come out of the indie sector where financial and social constraints aren't so prevalent. Minecraft is probably one of the great triumphs of the video game world, which came out of the indie sector. Here you have a game that doesn't even have a guiding story, and the market-system is completely eschewed for building your own tools out of resources you gather yourself. It has enjoyed wide success and now capital is behind it of course.
Some games do get through. But high art? I'm not sure. Who knows. There is more to consider, but I've run out of time for now.
Monday, October 14, 2013
October
In California, this is about when the cooler fall weather begins to creep in, oscillating with bouts of warm sun. Nice and warm today with a pleasant cool breeze. Walking the dogs this evening, upon gazing down a street with dual rows of trees slowly growing gold in the waning sunlight, I detected a faint whiff of Cola gummies, which gave way into a cloud of gasoline and exhaust as a car passed. The dwindling light and creeping cold induces occasional waves of dread, supposedly a common trait among those with an affective disorder.
Perhaps an inheritance from primitive ancestors that grew to fear the coming winter frosts, as their very survival was threatened by it? With an affective disorder, which is basically an increasing emotional instability, it is almost as if the shielding obscuring the lower brain is lifted as it struggles to assert itself, bringing into full view an engine fashioned in ancient times, with all of the attendant quirks. And the executive's eyes grow into saucers as it becomes apparent it will have to manage an increasingly turbulent landscape of sinking despair with occasional eruptions of manic grandiosity and urgency.
In the course of a single day one can find oneself lost amongst surging currents of incredible grief, to be deposited on a distant shore shaken, yet alive, with the subsequent euphoria that comes with survival triggering another mad rush of thought and feeling. Exhausting, this life, but worthwhile.
Pathology Pt. 2B
Every neurotic mechanism has a positive and negative signature. OCD, for example, is negative in its restraint of emotion and activity, but then positive in that the executive issues directives for positive behavior that often ties back to a prevailing world view and code of ethics. Both the positive and negative behavioral aspects contain advantages and disadvantages.
Pathology Pt. 2
The experience of the obsessive compulsive style is that of tormenting restraint. The executive functions work in overdrive, setting vast byzantine networks of rules, regulations, and restraints over a bucking emotional engine that is growing restless. The more powerful and unstable the emotional movements, the more desperately the region vaguely referred to as the superego drives in its tendrils to reassert control. The result is an electric state of tension in which the body and the lower brain clash against an evolved rational navigation system, which increasingly becomes a prison - an agonizing conundrum.
One's first instinct is to attempt to suppress the executive through various means. Intoxication, meditation, exercise, etc. These things work temporarily, but as I've written before, the environmental inputs can snap oneself right back into neurosis. One's attention shifts then to the environment and the greater system that one is a part of. But then there is another trap here as well; this trap forms the basis of a major mistake I committed a couple of months ago that was very costly (but not without its educational benefits): if you focus too intensely on the outer system, without paying attention to or even willfully ignoring your own inner system and how it relates to the outer, you run into serious problems.
There is another dimension to consider as well. There is a paradox in the escape from the perils of overcomplexity: to learn how to properly escape, which is actually an exceptionally difficult thing to do, you must temporarily increase complexity when trial and error produces failures, which necessitates a richer understanding for going about things. For some people, simply letting go is the clearest and best way out. However for others, me included, it isn't so easy. So I cast myself into the unknown while giving my superego the proverbial finger and found that it wasn't ready to let go.
Alas, the superego can be construed as a living system itself, whose constituents seek to assert themselves just as much as the emotional engine in you. The superego can't be amputated any more than a sector of society that is perceived to be troublesome can be amputated from the greater social body. Everything is connected, and what is more, everything is seeking to assert itself and sustain itself with the help of the surrounding connective tissue. For each system that grows in power, a connecting system that is deprived of power will eventually require repayment.
The superego is useful merely because it exists, and it is used to navigate a world whose structure mirrors its own.
A chicken or egg question arises when you try to think about what came first: this executive brain system or the increasing complexity in social systems that necessitates its existence. The answer is usually that everything grows together and reinforces each other.
Again, for some people, simply letting oneself go and letting oneself be washed down some great spiritual river is the way out. For others, unfortunately, escape lies in committing acts of violence. Another unfortunate group wishes to subsume itself in some amorphous totalitarian family. And yet another seeks to reason out. There is a different path for each personality. Some paths lead to the good, some to the evil, but none can be forced. We could only hope that the good is identified, amplified, and encouraged.
But then I think my central point is becoming unwound; I am losing focus. Every personality contains all of the cerebral and emotional structures of the other, but each personality emphasizes certain structures over others, which gives that person their central thrust. No disparate structure is entirely useless, nor is any entirely emancipatory.
Above all, the greater overarching objective lies in achieving balance, a balance that is necessary both within and without. One's own stability depends on the stability of others, so both outcomes should be pursued simultaneously. Needless to say, this idea of balance sounds familiar because it is an ideal pursued by countless cultures across time. Infuriatingly, to make things even more complicated, pursuing balance often requires thrust, when one is going in the wrong direction.
Imbalance then, could very well make up part of the cradle which gives rise to pathology. Whence comes this imbalance? And how to achieve balance? Such topics we can explore next.
One's first instinct is to attempt to suppress the executive through various means. Intoxication, meditation, exercise, etc. These things work temporarily, but as I've written before, the environmental inputs can snap oneself right back into neurosis. One's attention shifts then to the environment and the greater system that one is a part of. But then there is another trap here as well; this trap forms the basis of a major mistake I committed a couple of months ago that was very costly (but not without its educational benefits): if you focus too intensely on the outer system, without paying attention to or even willfully ignoring your own inner system and how it relates to the outer, you run into serious problems.
There is another dimension to consider as well. There is a paradox in the escape from the perils of overcomplexity: to learn how to properly escape, which is actually an exceptionally difficult thing to do, you must temporarily increase complexity when trial and error produces failures, which necessitates a richer understanding for going about things. For some people, simply letting go is the clearest and best way out. However for others, me included, it isn't so easy. So I cast myself into the unknown while giving my superego the proverbial finger and found that it wasn't ready to let go.
Alas, the superego can be construed as a living system itself, whose constituents seek to assert themselves just as much as the emotional engine in you. The superego can't be amputated any more than a sector of society that is perceived to be troublesome can be amputated from the greater social body. Everything is connected, and what is more, everything is seeking to assert itself and sustain itself with the help of the surrounding connective tissue. For each system that grows in power, a connecting system that is deprived of power will eventually require repayment.
The superego is useful merely because it exists, and it is used to navigate a world whose structure mirrors its own.
A chicken or egg question arises when you try to think about what came first: this executive brain system or the increasing complexity in social systems that necessitates its existence. The answer is usually that everything grows together and reinforces each other.
Again, for some people, simply letting oneself go and letting oneself be washed down some great spiritual river is the way out. For others, unfortunately, escape lies in committing acts of violence. Another unfortunate group wishes to subsume itself in some amorphous totalitarian family. And yet another seeks to reason out. There is a different path for each personality. Some paths lead to the good, some to the evil, but none can be forced. We could only hope that the good is identified, amplified, and encouraged.
But then I think my central point is becoming unwound; I am losing focus. Every personality contains all of the cerebral and emotional structures of the other, but each personality emphasizes certain structures over others, which gives that person their central thrust. No disparate structure is entirely useless, nor is any entirely emancipatory.
Above all, the greater overarching objective lies in achieving balance, a balance that is necessary both within and without. One's own stability depends on the stability of others, so both outcomes should be pursued simultaneously. Needless to say, this idea of balance sounds familiar because it is an ideal pursued by countless cultures across time. Infuriatingly, to make things even more complicated, pursuing balance often requires thrust, when one is going in the wrong direction.
Imbalance then, could very well make up part of the cradle which gives rise to pathology. Whence comes this imbalance? And how to achieve balance? Such topics we can explore next.
Saturday, October 12, 2013
Simple But Obscured
There is a very basic act of communication that forms and fuels part of the integral base of human social experience: the act of showing appreciation for each other's existence.
That and consuming whiskey and tequila both in the same night.
Hah. Kidding. Not about the first part, just the second.
That and consuming whiskey and tequila both in the same night.
Hah. Kidding. Not about the first part, just the second.
An Alternate Definition for "Windbreaker"
Someone whose defining characteristic is that he or she breaks wind.
Pathology
I've been reading "Neurotic Styles" by David Shapiro (a quick search failed to turn up a Wikipedia link) as part of a greater attempt to understand the inner workings of my own psychology. Turning one's own subjective experience into an object to be studied is made much easier with a text that was fashioned by somebody who is a professional at such a task. Otherwise you are plagued with blind spots. It is difficult to escape the subjective experience because it is through that experience that your life unfolds. Self-reflection only goes so far.
I find it curious that my attention has shifted so significantly to my own inner life. It seems as though the more disastrous one's efforts to move about in the world, the more occasion there is for one's attention to wander further into one's own inner workings. It makes sense from a practical perspective. If you can't move about in the world effectively you should really make an attempt to understand why. But I'm pretty bored of myself at this point. I do hope I can get back off my feet and resume my attention on the world (though some of it still remains). The inner world is just as expansive and rich as the outer of course. You can always find patterns that seem to be repeated across nested systems, whether they are found in one's own emotional movements, the earth and the oceans, or the cosmos.
Neurotic Styles delineates four crystalline analyses of distinct pathological neural functions. There is the obsessive compulsive, paranoid, hysterical, and impulsive styles - this book was published in 1965, when the language of psychoanalysis was still widely in use. The styles can be mixed and matched, and then coupled with any other condition you can think of such as depression or bipolar disorder. The human brain, along with its pathologies, is quite complex!
Now I'm only through the obsessive compulsive section, which is the first, but I believe that I function with a mix of obsessive compulsive and paranoid styles. We will see what traits turn up. As far as I understand, the hysterical style has to do with a preponderance of emotional affect, while the impulsive style has to do with uncontrollable actions and thoughts. The paranoid style is pretty self-explanatory: a constant fearful sentry leering over your shoulder.
The obsessive compulsive section almost describes the mechanics of my thoughts and perceptions to a "T." Though we are always a mix of many things, so some of the characteristics I don't share. There is a rigidity of attention: the laserlike focus on certain things and a refusal to break concentration. Also an internal nagging navigator so to speak: always planning courses of action, setting goals, scolding arbitrary failures based on self-created ideals and etc. There is this loss of pure experience; there is always a mediating layer of thought which seeks to valuate and direct experiences, so there is a difficulty to simply be and take in the world unfiltered. This is something I am always fighting against, whether through meditation and music or whatever else.
Such a mode of function confers certain advantages and disadvantages. For engaging in highly technical work - putting together a written work, researching details and facts, understanding complex subject matter - OCD is a godsend. But when it comes to experiential modes of interaction such as conversation, daily practical actions, sex, relating with others on a human level, etc., it creates a living hell that is only amplified upon emotional perturbation. You can dampen the effects of OCD with meditation, certain drugs, and the general redirection of emotional energy away from your superego. But that's the kicker! Our society feeds off of a strengthening of the very organs which generate OCD. I should explain further.
I think OCD is a symptom of over-complexity. The region of the brain in which it is activated seems to be the region that is used the most for complex, logical tasks, which is what this society is demanding in ever greater amounts. We've reached a point of over-saturation, in which more complexity is leading to a breakdown in thought. There are only so many resources available for complex processes that require more and more, and on top of that, complexity seems to dampen communication. Increasing complexity is how our civilization has solved so many problems and there is a deeply ingrained impulse (perhaps one of our collective driving motors) to increase complexity to solve yet more problems. Good god this is what I'm doing now!
You see a lot of people suffering from OCD these days, and for good reason. We continue to rely on this mode of function for survival, even though it is now becoming counter productive. With basic economics, our actions are continually forced in the direction of complexity: complex disciplines pay off because capital needs them. And our appetites for entertainment demand greater complexity as well.
There is something striking though, about the way in which we assign labels of "pathology" to these neurotic styles. They're all adaptive. The technical OCD people craft complex tools to survive with. The paranoid people ascertain threats. The impulsive people spread ideas, communications, and materials to others. The hysterical people exercise our emotional capacities. Why are all these styles considered pathologies?
All of these styles arise from what could be construed as an "inflammation" of classic archetypal figures. Each of us is a certain constellation of traits that has a certain quality, and together we all fit into this pluralistic society of ours. Pathology seems to occur when we are foiled in our attempts to enjoy life, or live a decent life, or feel a sense of dignity or accomplishment. Pathological styles take their content in part by the characters we are. Each of us breaks along a certain seam, or shape of character, and that break manifests as one of the pathological styles.
It seems strange to call the characteristics of a certain person who might be a little different from "normal" something that is "pathological." After all, what is normal? It seems to be whatever is "statistically significant," to borrow the brilliant term from a philosopher I am having trouble identifying, thought it seems to have originated from a statistician by the name of Robert Fisher. The normal person is whomever is present in abundance, and so society takes its definite shape from the accumulation of the people power and total mass of "normal."
But then pathology itself suggests the need for a cure. But we shouldn't be trying to cure what is simply outside of what is statistically significant. The richness and diversity (and sustainability) of our world is characterized by difference, not sameness.
So why call these deviations pathologies? And why are these pathologies occurring at greater frequencies?
Well, I'm exhausted and becoming distracted. I'll attempt to finish this thought with another post.
I find it curious that my attention has shifted so significantly to my own inner life. It seems as though the more disastrous one's efforts to move about in the world, the more occasion there is for one's attention to wander further into one's own inner workings. It makes sense from a practical perspective. If you can't move about in the world effectively you should really make an attempt to understand why. But I'm pretty bored of myself at this point. I do hope I can get back off my feet and resume my attention on the world (though some of it still remains). The inner world is just as expansive and rich as the outer of course. You can always find patterns that seem to be repeated across nested systems, whether they are found in one's own emotional movements, the earth and the oceans, or the cosmos.
Neurotic Styles delineates four crystalline analyses of distinct pathological neural functions. There is the obsessive compulsive, paranoid, hysterical, and impulsive styles - this book was published in 1965, when the language of psychoanalysis was still widely in use. The styles can be mixed and matched, and then coupled with any other condition you can think of such as depression or bipolar disorder. The human brain, along with its pathologies, is quite complex!
Now I'm only through the obsessive compulsive section, which is the first, but I believe that I function with a mix of obsessive compulsive and paranoid styles. We will see what traits turn up. As far as I understand, the hysterical style has to do with a preponderance of emotional affect, while the impulsive style has to do with uncontrollable actions and thoughts. The paranoid style is pretty self-explanatory: a constant fearful sentry leering over your shoulder.
The obsessive compulsive section almost describes the mechanics of my thoughts and perceptions to a "T." Though we are always a mix of many things, so some of the characteristics I don't share. There is a rigidity of attention: the laserlike focus on certain things and a refusal to break concentration. Also an internal nagging navigator so to speak: always planning courses of action, setting goals, scolding arbitrary failures based on self-created ideals and etc. There is this loss of pure experience; there is always a mediating layer of thought which seeks to valuate and direct experiences, so there is a difficulty to simply be and take in the world unfiltered. This is something I am always fighting against, whether through meditation and music or whatever else.
Such a mode of function confers certain advantages and disadvantages. For engaging in highly technical work - putting together a written work, researching details and facts, understanding complex subject matter - OCD is a godsend. But when it comes to experiential modes of interaction such as conversation, daily practical actions, sex, relating with others on a human level, etc., it creates a living hell that is only amplified upon emotional perturbation. You can dampen the effects of OCD with meditation, certain drugs, and the general redirection of emotional energy away from your superego. But that's the kicker! Our society feeds off of a strengthening of the very organs which generate OCD. I should explain further.
I think OCD is a symptom of over-complexity. The region of the brain in which it is activated seems to be the region that is used the most for complex, logical tasks, which is what this society is demanding in ever greater amounts. We've reached a point of over-saturation, in which more complexity is leading to a breakdown in thought. There are only so many resources available for complex processes that require more and more, and on top of that, complexity seems to dampen communication. Increasing complexity is how our civilization has solved so many problems and there is a deeply ingrained impulse (perhaps one of our collective driving motors) to increase complexity to solve yet more problems. Good god this is what I'm doing now!
You see a lot of people suffering from OCD these days, and for good reason. We continue to rely on this mode of function for survival, even though it is now becoming counter productive. With basic economics, our actions are continually forced in the direction of complexity: complex disciplines pay off because capital needs them. And our appetites for entertainment demand greater complexity as well.
There is something striking though, about the way in which we assign labels of "pathology" to these neurotic styles. They're all adaptive. The technical OCD people craft complex tools to survive with. The paranoid people ascertain threats. The impulsive people spread ideas, communications, and materials to others. The hysterical people exercise our emotional capacities. Why are all these styles considered pathologies?
All of these styles arise from what could be construed as an "inflammation" of classic archetypal figures. Each of us is a certain constellation of traits that has a certain quality, and together we all fit into this pluralistic society of ours. Pathology seems to occur when we are foiled in our attempts to enjoy life, or live a decent life, or feel a sense of dignity or accomplishment. Pathological styles take their content in part by the characters we are. Each of us breaks along a certain seam, or shape of character, and that break manifests as one of the pathological styles.
It seems strange to call the characteristics of a certain person who might be a little different from "normal" something that is "pathological." After all, what is normal? It seems to be whatever is "statistically significant," to borrow the brilliant term from a philosopher I am having trouble identifying, thought it seems to have originated from a statistician by the name of Robert Fisher. The normal person is whomever is present in abundance, and so society takes its definite shape from the accumulation of the people power and total mass of "normal."
But then pathology itself suggests the need for a cure. But we shouldn't be trying to cure what is simply outside of what is statistically significant. The richness and diversity (and sustainability) of our world is characterized by difference, not sameness.
So why call these deviations pathologies? And why are these pathologies occurring at greater frequencies?
Well, I'm exhausted and becoming distracted. I'll attempt to finish this thought with another post.
Tuesday, October 08, 2013
Tented Houses
I wonder if anyone ever thinks about the actual bugs in tented houses. I mean, I understand the necessity as a homeowner. If you find a termite infestation, you've gotta get that shit out.
But it is kind of sad thinking from the actual bugs' perspective. You're in the midst of a golden age of expansion. Food is plentiful and you are multiplying and flying about in fuck circles or whatever it is they do in the spring, and the Bug Mind is on its glorious path to infinite utopia.
But then abruptly the light levels drop - do they even use light? You're like, "hey who turned out the lights," then, "what is that smell (or taste, or disturbance in the bug sense)," and then your nervous system goes haywire and you're like "ach I'm dead."
But it is kind of sad thinking from the actual bugs' perspective. You're in the midst of a golden age of expansion. Food is plentiful and you are multiplying and flying about in fuck circles or whatever it is they do in the spring, and the Bug Mind is on its glorious path to infinite utopia.
But then abruptly the light levels drop - do they even use light? You're like, "hey who turned out the lights," then, "what is that smell (or taste, or disturbance in the bug sense)," and then your nervous system goes haywire and you're like "ach I'm dead."
Whoops
The memory of a mistake, so long as one cares to access it, functions as a positive constraint, or a safety restraint that prevents one from falling, or at least prevents one from falling in the exact same way one fell before.
A micromoment in learning, and ideally the eventual mastery of a given path.
A micromoment in learning, and ideally the eventual mastery of a given path.
Monday, October 07, 2013
Scrounchins Pt. 2
With every new day, Scrounchins' lunacy is slightly more amplified. We took in a new dog called "Peaches," and Peaches goes after Scrounchins because she's a dog and Scrounch is a cat. They're in the process of getting used to each other, but then there must be some intense shit happening out in the town at night because Scrounchins continues to get crazier regardless.
I sympathize with her. Her life was kicked off with a childhood of trauma - I do still intend to write about this fascinating phenomenon of trauma - as she was raised by a highly volatile drug addict, and who knows what happened to her in that apartment of his.
It makes me very sorry to think about it but Scrounchins started out as a very sweet cat. She would hop down from her fence meowing - which sounded like "scrounch" which is why we called her that - and then she would start purring. She loved to be scratched; she was very affectionate.
She started to get neglected, which is when we took her in, and she was pretty crazy by then. And the thing about crazy, or the thing about trauma in general, is that it rewires the brain to account for this compelling emotional imprint caused by the traumatic event(s), and as it happens, the brain becomes wired to feed the crazy. It switches into survival mode. So all the stressful moments in her life were filed away in her crazy cat head as ringing endorsements for continuing to be crazy because the world is in fact a stressful place.
Now you can scratch her for a few seconds and then she freaks out and hisses, and if you're not quick enough, she wraps her claws around your arm and scratches and bites you. She usually gets a nail or two into my skin and catches it, so I have to grab her paw and ease it off.
I'm not angry with Scrounchins. Sometimes when she gets me good, I become enraged and imagine flinging her across the lawn by her tail. After all I am an animal too. But it only takes a few seconds to review the broader context and I am pacified. I'm not even angry with this drug addict. Who knows what horrors he experienced in his lifetime...and the brain is a powerful thing. It gets a taste of instinct and it doesn't let go after that.
My brain is wired for the crazy too, but I never had a traumatic childhood. I just inherited the cognitive effects via genes, which I guess happens all the time. I understand what it means at least, on a subjective level...as far as I know.
Scrounchins now refuses to come inside. We put her food and water out and she seems fine. There's another outdoor cat nearby named "Rosie" that comes by every once in a while. Seems like a nice cat. Seems like it wants to make friends. But then I hear her and Scrounchins fighting at night.
Scrounch likes to follow us surreptitiously when we walk the dogs. And once she faced off with a pitbull that was barking at our dogs. Not sure what she was gong to do, but I suspect she thought she was protecting us. Strange cat. Still love her.
I sympathize with her. Her life was kicked off with a childhood of trauma - I do still intend to write about this fascinating phenomenon of trauma - as she was raised by a highly volatile drug addict, and who knows what happened to her in that apartment of his.
It makes me very sorry to think about it but Scrounchins started out as a very sweet cat. She would hop down from her fence meowing - which sounded like "scrounch" which is why we called her that - and then she would start purring. She loved to be scratched; she was very affectionate.
She started to get neglected, which is when we took her in, and she was pretty crazy by then. And the thing about crazy, or the thing about trauma in general, is that it rewires the brain to account for this compelling emotional imprint caused by the traumatic event(s), and as it happens, the brain becomes wired to feed the crazy. It switches into survival mode. So all the stressful moments in her life were filed away in her crazy cat head as ringing endorsements for continuing to be crazy because the world is in fact a stressful place.
Now you can scratch her for a few seconds and then she freaks out and hisses, and if you're not quick enough, she wraps her claws around your arm and scratches and bites you. She usually gets a nail or two into my skin and catches it, so I have to grab her paw and ease it off.
I'm not angry with Scrounchins. Sometimes when she gets me good, I become enraged and imagine flinging her across the lawn by her tail. After all I am an animal too. But it only takes a few seconds to review the broader context and I am pacified. I'm not even angry with this drug addict. Who knows what horrors he experienced in his lifetime...and the brain is a powerful thing. It gets a taste of instinct and it doesn't let go after that.
My brain is wired for the crazy too, but I never had a traumatic childhood. I just inherited the cognitive effects via genes, which I guess happens all the time. I understand what it means at least, on a subjective level...as far as I know.
Scrounchins now refuses to come inside. We put her food and water out and she seems fine. There's another outdoor cat nearby named "Rosie" that comes by every once in a while. Seems like a nice cat. Seems like it wants to make friends. But then I hear her and Scrounchins fighting at night.
Scrounch likes to follow us surreptitiously when we walk the dogs. And once she faced off with a pitbull that was barking at our dogs. Not sure what she was gong to do, but I suspect she thought she was protecting us. Strange cat. Still love her.
Sunday, October 06, 2013
Friday, October 04, 2013
BB
I also wanted to write briefly about the ending to the last season of Breaking Bad.
Breaking Bad is a complex show with much that can be said about it. I suppose I've been asleep at the job in that regard. But the ending to the series is very interesting.
You would definitely call this show a tragedy. Like many of the other excellent premium channel shows in this new golden age of premium TV, its longer story arc is that of The Fall. The Fall is a fixation of our era and for good reason. It is reflected in our art, our comedy, our drama...
Now what is really curious about this particular fall is its shape. The classic tragedy, as far as I understand it, consists of a deteriorating state of affairs in which a redemption occurs when there is a rupture that obliterates all human attempts at control and the observer is forced to give up their commitments and let themselves be swept into the abyss along with the protagonists and antagonists, which is paradoxically cathartic.
In Breaking Bad this happens as well, but a little differently. The evil begins with the character of Walt attempting to seize back this vast store of power that he was denied, and the resulting degeneration of affairs as he claws his way to this prize. The arc is redeemed when it reaches its nadir, and upon its rupture, all of the evil is seemingly sucked back into its place upon the destruction of its apparent origin. However, instead of a chaotic descent where the lead manipulator is stripped of his or her autonomy, the lead in this story is almost completely out of control until the very end, where he is able to control his final descent with a rare perfection, and all loose ends are neatly sealed as the lights go out.
There is great destruction in the aftermath, but the observer is left with a sense of closure and catharsis when the smoke clears.
The real question we should be asking is what sort of environment, or society allowed for this grim progression of events in the first place? The entire time we have been focused laser-like on the interpersonal dramas between individuals, but what of the context? Why? But perhaps that is best left to the spectator.
The genius of Breaking Bad lies in the characters. Everyone is both a victim and a willing operator in their own trajectories. There is no clear way out. There is no clear cartoon villain, or hero (though Walt comes close to the former before partially redeeming himself). It is up to the spectator this time (as opposed to the artist) to sift through the ashes and rebuild reality in his or her own mind.
You can watch as those powerful elemental forces toss human actors violently about, with those actors attempting to control these violent events with their symbolic maps and manipulations, until the power grows too great and casts everyone violently into their place, with the symbolic realities dissolving hideously. And the spectator is forced to gaze on and make sense of it all.
Breaking Bad is a complex show with much that can be said about it. I suppose I've been asleep at the job in that regard. But the ending to the series is very interesting.
You would definitely call this show a tragedy. Like many of the other excellent premium channel shows in this new golden age of premium TV, its longer story arc is that of The Fall. The Fall is a fixation of our era and for good reason. It is reflected in our art, our comedy, our drama...
Now what is really curious about this particular fall is its shape. The classic tragedy, as far as I understand it, consists of a deteriorating state of affairs in which a redemption occurs when there is a rupture that obliterates all human attempts at control and the observer is forced to give up their commitments and let themselves be swept into the abyss along with the protagonists and antagonists, which is paradoxically cathartic.
In Breaking Bad this happens as well, but a little differently. The evil begins with the character of Walt attempting to seize back this vast store of power that he was denied, and the resulting degeneration of affairs as he claws his way to this prize. The arc is redeemed when it reaches its nadir, and upon its rupture, all of the evil is seemingly sucked back into its place upon the destruction of its apparent origin. However, instead of a chaotic descent where the lead manipulator is stripped of his or her autonomy, the lead in this story is almost completely out of control until the very end, where he is able to control his final descent with a rare perfection, and all loose ends are neatly sealed as the lights go out.
There is great destruction in the aftermath, but the observer is left with a sense of closure and catharsis when the smoke clears.
The real question we should be asking is what sort of environment, or society allowed for this grim progression of events in the first place? The entire time we have been focused laser-like on the interpersonal dramas between individuals, but what of the context? Why? But perhaps that is best left to the spectator.
The genius of Breaking Bad lies in the characters. Everyone is both a victim and a willing operator in their own trajectories. There is no clear way out. There is no clear cartoon villain, or hero (though Walt comes close to the former before partially redeeming himself). It is up to the spectator this time (as opposed to the artist) to sift through the ashes and rebuild reality in his or her own mind.
You can watch as those powerful elemental forces toss human actors violently about, with those actors attempting to control these violent events with their symbolic maps and manipulations, until the power grows too great and casts everyone violently into their place, with the symbolic realities dissolving hideously. And the spectator is forced to gaze on and make sense of it all.
Apocalyptic Comedy
I watched This is The End tonight, which was fairly entertaining, and striking for several reasons.
There is a large group of people that really despises the whole Seth Rogan, Jonah Hill, Danny McBride, etc. crowd, and then there is a large group of people that really love their movies. In short that whole troupe is polarizing, with each side having fairly reasonable arguments that support their given positions.
The detractors often compare these people with the classic comedians, such as Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and so on maybe up to the comedians of the 80s or 90s and argue that their movies are shit compared to the works of genius that were created by previous artists. In a sense this is true. Our best comedies today are postmodern junkyards, landscapes of recycled jokes, myths, archetypes, and what have you. This is the End is no different: it is a movie that is in the same decadent strain as all of the other similar attempts before it: 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Superbad, Pineapple Express, etc.
But then the supporters chime in and say they just like this stuff. It is funny and relevant. Now considering the old cliche that we have to work with what we have, I have to agree with the supporters. These guys are painfully honest. They are widely despised because they don't attempt to construct any sort of comic ideal and they don't try to push any sort of moral position; they simply portray the nitty gritty as it is in their comedy. It feels real when you watch it because they simply act out what is in front of them, and in turn what is in front of many of us.
The only problem with their comedy is their white male, upper class dramas. That in the end is what produces so many detractors. Feminists especially hate these guys, and I really don't blame them. But then if you consider the increasing isolation of disparate demographics, you just try to go along with the stories they tell and see things from their perspective. There is an extra sting from the fact that the white male upper class perspective is highly over-represented in Hollywood, but then other perspectives do get through, thanks especially to the Indie and Foreign sectors, but anyways.
In all honesty these guys don't have much to work with. The old myths are all but dead. If you attempt to reboot one of the old comedic templates today it comes across as insincere because it is. Times have changed and as genius as the old comedic greats are, their lessons are no longer relevant. They may be relevant in a future time when the eternal cycle returns, but today we are in a descent, and that said I'm perfectly happy with comedy that reflects that.
This is the End is the prototypical fin de siecle comedy. It is a comedy of the follies of egotism, materialism, hedonism, and the dog eat dog jungle of a civilization in decline. Everyone is against everyone, and everyone is constantly at each others' throats. It portrays these themes as experienced by the upper class, and this is probably appropriate, as these effects are most likely more pronounced amongst the upper classes, seeing as how they have more desire-objects to fight over and more prestige and respect to lose.
The first quarter of the movie consists of a party that just gets worse and worse. The party scene itself was especially interesting as it displaya all sorts of those strange animal antagonisms that you see when damaged people get intoxicated and get together. The social dynamics are believable, if exaggerated.
And then there is the apocalypse and everyone is eventually forced to give up their prime desires and sacrifice for each other (or be destroyed) due to the collapse of decadent living into bare survival, which necessitates a return to animal instinct.. The biblical imagery is a little hackneyed but it all makes sense. Without revealing too much, the movie is short-circuited at the ending. Instead of some revolutionary change, we get the positing of some thoroughly exaggerated and reconciled version of the initial state of affairs: everyone gets their hedonism and their egotism and their desire-objects in their heavenly paradise after sacrificing themselves in the real world, and so the overall story arc is ultimately highly conservative and cyclical. But then that is how organized religion works anyways so what are you going to do?
It is this repeated mistake that keeps these guys from being great. Their comedy is good, but not great, because they refuse to transcend themselves. Their idea of revolution is a return to some mythical ideal extracted from the past.
Ignoring the ending, the process getting there is mostly entertaining.
PS - This post was fueled by Johnny Walker so my apologies if it is meandering or confused.
PSS - Johnny Walker is pretty good. Especially Black Label. It has a smoky taste.
There is a large group of people that really despises the whole Seth Rogan, Jonah Hill, Danny McBride, etc. crowd, and then there is a large group of people that really love their movies. In short that whole troupe is polarizing, with each side having fairly reasonable arguments that support their given positions.
The detractors often compare these people with the classic comedians, such as Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, and so on maybe up to the comedians of the 80s or 90s and argue that their movies are shit compared to the works of genius that were created by previous artists. In a sense this is true. Our best comedies today are postmodern junkyards, landscapes of recycled jokes, myths, archetypes, and what have you. This is the End is no different: it is a movie that is in the same decadent strain as all of the other similar attempts before it: 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up, Superbad, Pineapple Express, etc.
But then the supporters chime in and say they just like this stuff. It is funny and relevant. Now considering the old cliche that we have to work with what we have, I have to agree with the supporters. These guys are painfully honest. They are widely despised because they don't attempt to construct any sort of comic ideal and they don't try to push any sort of moral position; they simply portray the nitty gritty as it is in their comedy. It feels real when you watch it because they simply act out what is in front of them, and in turn what is in front of many of us.
The only problem with their comedy is their white male, upper class dramas. That in the end is what produces so many detractors. Feminists especially hate these guys, and I really don't blame them. But then if you consider the increasing isolation of disparate demographics, you just try to go along with the stories they tell and see things from their perspective. There is an extra sting from the fact that the white male upper class perspective is highly over-represented in Hollywood, but then other perspectives do get through, thanks especially to the Indie and Foreign sectors, but anyways.
In all honesty these guys don't have much to work with. The old myths are all but dead. If you attempt to reboot one of the old comedic templates today it comes across as insincere because it is. Times have changed and as genius as the old comedic greats are, their lessons are no longer relevant. They may be relevant in a future time when the eternal cycle returns, but today we are in a descent, and that said I'm perfectly happy with comedy that reflects that.
This is the End is the prototypical fin de siecle comedy. It is a comedy of the follies of egotism, materialism, hedonism, and the dog eat dog jungle of a civilization in decline. Everyone is against everyone, and everyone is constantly at each others' throats. It portrays these themes as experienced by the upper class, and this is probably appropriate, as these effects are most likely more pronounced amongst the upper classes, seeing as how they have more desire-objects to fight over and more prestige and respect to lose.
The first quarter of the movie consists of a party that just gets worse and worse. The party scene itself was especially interesting as it displaya all sorts of those strange animal antagonisms that you see when damaged people get intoxicated and get together. The social dynamics are believable, if exaggerated.
And then there is the apocalypse and everyone is eventually forced to give up their prime desires and sacrifice for each other (or be destroyed) due to the collapse of decadent living into bare survival, which necessitates a return to animal instinct.. The biblical imagery is a little hackneyed but it all makes sense. Without revealing too much, the movie is short-circuited at the ending. Instead of some revolutionary change, we get the positing of some thoroughly exaggerated and reconciled version of the initial state of affairs: everyone gets their hedonism and their egotism and their desire-objects in their heavenly paradise after sacrificing themselves in the real world, and so the overall story arc is ultimately highly conservative and cyclical. But then that is how organized religion works anyways so what are you going to do?
It is this repeated mistake that keeps these guys from being great. Their comedy is good, but not great, because they refuse to transcend themselves. Their idea of revolution is a return to some mythical ideal extracted from the past.
Ignoring the ending, the process getting there is mostly entertaining.
PS - This post was fueled by Johnny Walker so my apologies if it is meandering or confused.
PSS - Johnny Walker is pretty good. Especially Black Label. It has a smoky taste.
Wednesday, October 02, 2013
Irvine and Nature
I was in Irvine today and happened to take a walk around their wetlands ecological preserve. It isn't very big, but it is beautiful nonetheless, especially for an urbanite like myself. Or semisuburbanite? What do you call Long Beach?
The trail struck me as odd. A huge asphalt-paved trail circles the wetlands. No benches. Nowhere to sit down and enjoy the view. You have to keep moving, or wander into the bushes. Keep moving on the concrete we put down, ya hear? That's Irvine.
The trail struck me as odd. A huge asphalt-paved trail circles the wetlands. No benches. Nowhere to sit down and enjoy the view. You have to keep moving, or wander into the bushes. Keep moving on the concrete we put down, ya hear? That's Irvine.
Coming Back Up (With Thoughts on the State)
Temporarily out of another lull. Like a cloud cover that obscures the sky, or even a dense fog that obscures everything, mental depression and confusion obscures the teeming world beyond one's own pain. In a way, it is a selfish thing, but biochemically necessary.
There are various things floating around in my fog-addled mind that I'd like to write about, if I can just muster up enough energy to do so. Domesticity, the actual appreciation of living things as opposed to the appreciation for the logical symbols we construct that take their place, the nature of trauma...The list goes on. We'll see.
One thing that continues to strike me again and again - it demands my attention with its hypnotizing force - is the strange, ongoing evolution of this state of ours, and the dialogue and impressions that go with it. One especially striking aspect that hit me this morning is just how close in functionality we came to a dictatorship with the reign of Bush. Of course only the fringe political left ever talks about it, and they talk about it in a way that tends to alienate anyone in the mainstream, such as tossing about words like "fascist" and "totalitarian" and whatnot.
Now I admit to such hyperbole myself. I've called this state totalitarian at premature times, and the fact remains that with our working definition of "totalitarianism", the state is probably not there yet. A totalitarian regime seeks to subsume the body politic into a single, amputated family, so to speak, and control the personal lives of its populace. We are still seeing the administration (or the attempt to manage and simulate one at least) of a competitive capitalist society. A more accurate term for this phase would be Sheldon Wolin's "inverted totalitarianism."
But there is a semantic difficulty here that is obscuring a greater reality that should be alarming more people. Our national politics is still very much static and in an adolescent state. We refuse to take note of the dynamism of societies and ongoing change, and so with our linguistic tools we are doomed to mere crisis management, or to utilize a medical analogy, we attempt to treat the disease as it flares into its advanced stages, as opposed to utilizing the modern practice of prevention, or arresting the illness in its early stages.
That said, if you look at the actual facts of the Bush administration, things appear a bit more chilling than many would like to admit. It has become apparent by a growing consensus of historians and political scientists that he stole the election, and so this would very much qualify as a coup. Then you take into account the shocking corruption and the emergence of the market state, or the melding of state and market power ever more closely, and the sheer psychopathology of the administration that surrounded him. Consider the militarism based on deception as orchestrated by the neocons. Consider his primary constituency, the Christian right, and then evaluate the classic components of fascism: the desire for a national rebirth, the desire for a market-state solution, race-based ideology (though it is hidden this time), elimination fantasies, and etc. Now he is out of power but they are all still there, very angry and thirsty for power, eager to recouple church and state.
Now the case could be made that the state was heading in this direction for some time, and this is true. But there has been a dramatic change in the quality of political feeling since at least 2000. Bush made a dramatic impression after he left office (this follows the patterns found in trauma) that Obama inherited when he came into office. They say things have gotten worse under Obama, and this is also true. But the curious thing is Obama's character. Setting aside his rhetoric and PR, his actions betray that he is a people-pleasing type. He is just trying to hold everything together, and is becoming a monster as a result.
The majority of the populace repudiated the Bush-style authoritarianism and jingoism with the re-election of the Democrats, but what they got was merely a state of affairs that was deteriorating a little bit slower than if another Republican president had been installed.
Economies, oligarchies, state institutions...these are all heavy things. With each new trauma ( and the processes unleashed by crisis) the ecosystem with which empire sustains itself is altered, and these heavy things follow the trajectories of necessity.
The direction the state is going displays all of the telltale signs of an embryonic totalitarian society: the surveillance, the militarism, the subsuming of all cultural activity into economic activity, etc. Most people don't want to think temporally though. Someone says, "This is a totalitarian society!" and they may be partially right, while another says, "No that's ridiculous! Study an actual totalitarian society like Nazi Germany or Stalin's Russia," and they would be partially right as well. But the two of them are talking about two conceptually related phenomena that are temporally separated, so they appear to be different, whereas the two are effectively the same on a greater time scale.
I speak from an observer's view, as if I can calculate the trajectory of empire. All I know is that it has to break apart. Past that, I have no idea what is going to happen, and anyone else observing at this point can only speculate. Our socio-political context has changed, probably for the better. There is more communication and information, though the Internet is really the Wild West and contains just as much propaganda as earnest talk. People seem more exhausted with war, less bloodthirsty, though there are still plenty of crazy reactionaries out there. And we have a deteriorating environment to attend to, which affects everyone, not just delineated nations or races or interest groups, to repeat again and again. Collective progressive political and religious consciousness has changed drastically. Things are objectively different now than they were a century ago. Anyways. More later.
There are various things floating around in my fog-addled mind that I'd like to write about, if I can just muster up enough energy to do so. Domesticity, the actual appreciation of living things as opposed to the appreciation for the logical symbols we construct that take their place, the nature of trauma...The list goes on. We'll see.
One thing that continues to strike me again and again - it demands my attention with its hypnotizing force - is the strange, ongoing evolution of this state of ours, and the dialogue and impressions that go with it. One especially striking aspect that hit me this morning is just how close in functionality we came to a dictatorship with the reign of Bush. Of course only the fringe political left ever talks about it, and they talk about it in a way that tends to alienate anyone in the mainstream, such as tossing about words like "fascist" and "totalitarian" and whatnot.
Now I admit to such hyperbole myself. I've called this state totalitarian at premature times, and the fact remains that with our working definition of "totalitarianism", the state is probably not there yet. A totalitarian regime seeks to subsume the body politic into a single, amputated family, so to speak, and control the personal lives of its populace. We are still seeing the administration (or the attempt to manage and simulate one at least) of a competitive capitalist society. A more accurate term for this phase would be Sheldon Wolin's "inverted totalitarianism."
But there is a semantic difficulty here that is obscuring a greater reality that should be alarming more people. Our national politics is still very much static and in an adolescent state. We refuse to take note of the dynamism of societies and ongoing change, and so with our linguistic tools we are doomed to mere crisis management, or to utilize a medical analogy, we attempt to treat the disease as it flares into its advanced stages, as opposed to utilizing the modern practice of prevention, or arresting the illness in its early stages.
That said, if you look at the actual facts of the Bush administration, things appear a bit more chilling than many would like to admit. It has become apparent by a growing consensus of historians and political scientists that he stole the election, and so this would very much qualify as a coup. Then you take into account the shocking corruption and the emergence of the market state, or the melding of state and market power ever more closely, and the sheer psychopathology of the administration that surrounded him. Consider the militarism based on deception as orchestrated by the neocons. Consider his primary constituency, the Christian right, and then evaluate the classic components of fascism: the desire for a national rebirth, the desire for a market-state solution, race-based ideology (though it is hidden this time), elimination fantasies, and etc. Now he is out of power but they are all still there, very angry and thirsty for power, eager to recouple church and state.
Now the case could be made that the state was heading in this direction for some time, and this is true. But there has been a dramatic change in the quality of political feeling since at least 2000. Bush made a dramatic impression after he left office (this follows the patterns found in trauma) that Obama inherited when he came into office. They say things have gotten worse under Obama, and this is also true. But the curious thing is Obama's character. Setting aside his rhetoric and PR, his actions betray that he is a people-pleasing type. He is just trying to hold everything together, and is becoming a monster as a result.
The majority of the populace repudiated the Bush-style authoritarianism and jingoism with the re-election of the Democrats, but what they got was merely a state of affairs that was deteriorating a little bit slower than if another Republican president had been installed.
Economies, oligarchies, state institutions...these are all heavy things. With each new trauma ( and the processes unleashed by crisis) the ecosystem with which empire sustains itself is altered, and these heavy things follow the trajectories of necessity.
The direction the state is going displays all of the telltale signs of an embryonic totalitarian society: the surveillance, the militarism, the subsuming of all cultural activity into economic activity, etc. Most people don't want to think temporally though. Someone says, "This is a totalitarian society!" and they may be partially right, while another says, "No that's ridiculous! Study an actual totalitarian society like Nazi Germany or Stalin's Russia," and they would be partially right as well. But the two of them are talking about two conceptually related phenomena that are temporally separated, so they appear to be different, whereas the two are effectively the same on a greater time scale.
I speak from an observer's view, as if I can calculate the trajectory of empire. All I know is that it has to break apart. Past that, I have no idea what is going to happen, and anyone else observing at this point can only speculate. Our socio-political context has changed, probably for the better. There is more communication and information, though the Internet is really the Wild West and contains just as much propaganda as earnest talk. People seem more exhausted with war, less bloodthirsty, though there are still plenty of crazy reactionaries out there. And we have a deteriorating environment to attend to, which affects everyone, not just delineated nations or races or interest groups, to repeat again and again. Collective progressive political and religious consciousness has changed drastically. Things are objectively different now than they were a century ago. Anyways. More later.
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