-------- Original Message --------
From: Chris Case <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Some excerpts from:
SO YOU WANT TO BE AN ORTHODOCTOR?
http://www.nancho.net/memes/orthodoc.html
by W.David Kubiak
>>>"Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together
again in new shapes of our own choosing." George Orwell
>>>..What orthodoctors essentially
do (is to) configure the psychic
attention fields, the habits of mind, that animate and synchronize
vast
social bodies and render them agreeably servile to the current
tenants
in head-quarters.
>>>Threats are obvious tools of the trade, but threats are tricky.
The
efficiency of a body that must individually threaten its members
into
line is abysmal. An orthodoctrinal threat must not just inspire
a
specific fear, it must conjure a nameless dread. The best threats
are
thus implicit, generic, and external to the hierarchy they benefit.
>>>Threats justify emotional appeals for individual self-sacrifice
in
the name of the Greater Good, which inexorably entail the sacrifice
of
personal rights, freedoms and liberties - "since we must single-mindedly
resist this terrible scourge, you will immediately renounce any
mind of
your own..."
>>>...All viable orthodoxies dominate not only the content of their
constituents' vision, but also its inclination. They must control
who
members look up to or down upon, what rules will be observed or
overlooked, and how frequently their unifying symbols receive ritual
re-spect and re-gard.
>>>Without historical exception, orthodoxies exist solely to enforce
and
embody egregious inequalities. The social bodies they in-form are
always
vertically aligned - whether by caste, race, class or corporate
ranking
- with all those beneath the noble brow inescapably working more,
owning
little, deciding less, and being steeply looked down upon to boot.
>>>It appears so self-evident that challenging the corporate crew's
invulnerable power today would be so clearly, plainly and obviously
futile, that we may justifiably suspect we are caught up in some
vast
translucent orthodoxy ourselves. For even if we do not personally
inhabit either a major corporate org or recognizable hierarchy,
we all
still abide in a psycho-social environment that has for many intensive
generations been cultured from Big Bodies, by Big Bodies, and for
Big
Bodies. And that ubiquitous miasma just has to affect our air,
not to
mention taste and vision.
>>>An orthodoxy is not merely a static assortment of canons, codes
and
myths of regulation. It is above all a vital morphogenetic force
field
that aligns and synchronizes our beings within a hierarchical Greater
Whole. Over time, these Wholes become tightly integrated entities
bonded
with common symbols, customs, language, etc. But the key adhesive
is
attention. Ultimately, it matters little how unified your values,
myths
or goals if your members don't pay any attention to them. Rapt
attention, whether elicited with fear, love or fascination, is
thus the
vital precursor of all social synchronization and the life force
that
in-forms, nourishes and animates all corporate bodies.
>>>Next to Japan, Inc., the happiest exemplar of social organismics
has
to be our ancient amigo, the slime mold. The slime mold is not
a
civilized beast but, for a brief and shining moment at least, it
is a
paragon of orthodoxy and a startling corporate parable. A typical
specimen starts off as hundreds of thousands of rugged individual
amoebas trysting and boogying across the forest floor. One day,
however,
if the good life starts to wane and the living gets un-easy, low
frequency angst starts to reverberate through the population. Out
of
this troubled time, a leader or "founder cell" rises up and sends
forth
a gaseous clarion call. The masses quickly throng to its charismatic
chemistry, swarm atop its bandwagon, and eventually form a micro
skyscraping spire of sweaty melded bodies called a grex. This pulsing
phallic collective then magically comes alive with its own esprit
de
corps, subordinates all individual liberties to the Will and Progress
of
the Greater Whole, and single-mindedly inches off toward a promised
Babylon. OK, that part is civilized enough.
The wild part is that grex leaders
keep their promises. After long but
swift migrations, they bring their incorporated brethren to some
auspicious eminence and expose them to the light. When a shaft
finally
strikes a grex from behind, it reacts with yet another miracle.
Its
leadership hunkers down and launches its members aloft in a glowing
group gondola where each working class cell reclaims its individuality,
identity and a buoyant spore parachute. They burst free, ride the
wind
and resume singular life in some brave new world. This final rite
of
passage is called fruition, and is doubly wondrous because the
leaders
profit not. In a truly mythic display of public spirit, they selflessly
deliver their charges, re-equip them for independence, and
philosophically remain behind tidying up the launch pad of liberation.
"He who is firmly seated in authority soon learns to think security,
and not progress, the highest lesson of statecraft." James R. Lowell
The only visible difference between
grex execs and all known orthodox
leaders is the latter never willingly let go. Whatever their mandate
or
proclaimed purposes, once in charge of the corporate body, they
get
hooked on the collective's power and stubbornly resist any thoughts
or
behavior that might lead to its fulfillment, completion or liberation.
Left to their own centripetal devices, these bodies would never
stop
growing, let alone dis-integrate.
>>The Establishment-applauded "End of History" doctrine did not
just
hail the passing away of orthodox communism, it celebrated the
death of
heretical opportunity, the end of significant choice. None of the
remaining ideological options are now likely to menace the primacy
of
the incorporated powers-that-be.
>>>...To avoid enormity and the gross irony of growing into all
we
abhor, let us once again wildly affirm the Taoist Centrifugal Principle:
Thou Shalt NOT Counter-Organize! Aggregate, associate, alchemically
synergize - fine, but for Christ's sake, just don't get your shit
together en masse.
>>>"The press, with very few exceptions, is a kept press. Kept by
the
big corporations the way a whore is kept by a tycoon." Theodore
Dreiser
Admittedly this is a tough heresy to hawk in the face of corporate
mass media. And local sales prospects are also a drag, with the
only
sympathetic outlets being video, bumpers, pamphleteers and perhaps
sexy
skywriting. Globally, however, propagation's a snap with the great
awakening organ of the Net at our sweaty fingertips, so that's
where the
first heretical cascade is now loaded. You, on any other hand,
are urged
to concoct your own disseminative devices. Stunt, shout, rap,
seditiously insinuate - anything but kneel and wait until Small
Change
finally comes...
The Full Monty: http://www.nancho.net/memes/orthodoc.html
.
.
---------------------------------------------------------------------~->
"Let us lift our vision high
enough to dominate the problem."
- - Pierre Teilhard de Chardin
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