,

The ‘versus’ mentality.

The issue is that of a false dilemma, between right and wrong, left and right, liberal and conservative, us and them, etc. It manifests an error of omission, on the largest part, by ignoring most, or indeed any of the middle road. Particularly in the political sense, but also widely apparent in others, a visual metaphor is apt: imagine your right hand, and your left hand. How they oppose, is one thing. It is notable, and interesting. However, while imagining only the right hand, and the left hand, one foregoes imagining the whole body of matter, whole being, of that which the hands arise. When seeing only the right and the left, one misses the center entirely. The incessant propping-up of these false dualisms by media and other social structures continually highlights either end of this spectrum while simultaneously drawing attention away from whatever middle road (or road around, for that matter—as circumvention is entirely possible) may exist. What there really may be, in place of these dualism ideals, are a variety of gradients between either pole of these various spectra. That is: on the way from ‘good’ to ‘bad’, not in a personal sense but in a moral sense, as in the consideration of the meaning of the concepts themselves, there is not, explicitly, anywhere which is at one point something ‘good’, and then the next point ‘bad’, as in some chart which would illustrate the qualifications for either. No, but this is the impression granted by a heavy-dualistic interpretation of the world. This is to say: it is not as though there is a fence of sorts between ‘good’ and ‘bad’, separated by which on either side lie the definite contents of either. No – the fence is not a solid line- in any case, it is a more hazy distinction than is popularly perceived.

We ought, heartily, to discredit and question such distinctions as ready-made and apparent! Furthermore, we must, obviously, recognize the nature of these, and other, conceptions and the effects they might possibly have. Both ends, of these dualisms, are two of the same; yet they are merely perceived as somehow separate, disjoined – at least somehow morally juxtaposed, in many cases: for often, what one side (the left, or the right for example) claims is ‘right’ or ‘O.K.’ is set up in a polar-opposite distinction from the other side, as what is ‘wrong’, etc. This is to some length an absurdly reductionistic generalization, however, to the same or greater extent, it is indubitably valid for consideration.

miseryking asked: its actually been 2, we started September 1st 2009. Twin's mum's birthday, probably the worst time to form a band XD

Oh ok, for some reason I thought it was summer ‘09. Still, that’s over 2 and a half years - good going!

This was pointed out to me today

The Teletubbies is not a harmless, nonsensical kids TV show. It is much darker than that.

The Teletubbies is a depiction of a totalitarian Orwellian dystopia. A brainwashed population go about the same meaningless routine every day, fulfilling no goals; the only emotion they seem capable of is an empty happiness at everything they encounter.
There are no sharp edges, no mountains, no rocks, nothing the teletubbies can use to injure themselves, and their every move is monitored and controlled by a Big Brother dictatorship masquerading as a baby’s face in the sun. Speakers rise from the ground and bark out commands. The only available food is a flavourless slime or a stale bread-like foodstuff with a smiley face on it again reminding them to be happy. The only other inhabitant of their land is a robot. Gender is ambiguous, colours and patterns are simple, and the plant life is synthetic.
No meaningful conversation is had. Few words are even distinguishable in the useless sounds they have developed from a once complex language.
The televisions in their bodies play historical documents from centuries past when the human race was flourishing. These videos show no glimpse of war, pain, sadness, authority, pose no questions, and brook no debate or conversation. They are just another tool to sterilize the minds of the teletubbies.

The Teletubbies grooms children into accepting a totalitarian authority without question. It quenches individuality and even imagination in favour of monotony and ignorance.

How could I have been so blind?

The man remembers easier days.

Sailing the Mediterranean - Part 6

Day 9

I was the first awake as light crept through the portholes next to me,  awoken by my alarm at what my phone told me was 7am, though I deliberately had set it slightly fast. This gave me 2 minutes of introspection before the crew would be up and moving. I was lying on a sofa in the cabin of a one hundred thousand pound yacht, moored up in the harbour of a small Mediterranean island, still five hundred miles from the final destination, and severely behind schedule due to weather delays. We had unwillingly eaten into all of our allotted ‘holiday time’ that we had saved for Corsica, and if departure did not occur immediately, then we risked missing our flight home from Marseilles. Mercifully though, on this morning it was clear and calm, and the sailing conditions appeared to be favourable - an observation that was confirmed by the skipper as he got out of bed and rallied us all into action. The sense of relief was palpable.

We were so eager to leave that we had ourselves and the yacht ready to go by 9am, which was no mean feat judging from our previous standards of preparation. I made a last minute trip into town to pick up some personal food supplies (I’m a fussy eater), and then made it back on board as Chris fired up the trusty engine. Carmen was freed from the mooring ropes that had held her for far too long, and we then gently manoeuvred her out of the small harbour which we were certainly glad to see the back of. We were back on the open ocean, and free at last, or so we thought. It transpired that one more drama would unfold before the island of Ustica was finished with us.

Ustica is essentially just a rocky outcrop of volcanic origin, and the rocks don’t stop at the coastline. This was affirmed by the myriad of lobster pots that we were carefully weaving in and out of as we were tracking northwest from the island. It was probably due to that distraction that we didn’t notice the vast, white expanse of breaking waves on our bow – a clear indicator of shallow water. John was aware of the existence of these shallows because they were illustrated very clearly in ‘red for danger’ on the charts, but he was under the mistaken impression that he had plotted a route around them. People who don’t sail may not understand the hazard that rocks pose to yachts, or how much we really didn’t want to wreck or ground ourselves in such treacherous waters. It’s was akin to the watchman on the titanic seeing that infamous iceberg.

The general and immediate consensus was that the best course of action would be to slow the yacht to a crawl and go hard to port in order to get away from the island and into deeper water. The danger lay in the fact that the confusion with the charts meant we no longer knew exactly where we were, so it was a very tense half hour. Being the youngest crew member it was assumed that I had the best eyesight, so I was put on ‘rock watch’, which meant hanging off the bow with sunglasses on trying to peer beneath the sparkling ocean’s surface for any sign of the bottom. This task was made more difficult by the nervous sweat running into my eyes – I was convinced that any at moment I would see some giant rocks looming out of the deep.  Fortunately the only thing I saw was a lone turtle.

Thus began the longest leg of our journey; 250 miles across the Tyrrhenian sea to reach Bonifacio, Corsica, three days and two nights of sailing. I had already surmised that it would be the most challenging stretch, and indeed things seemed to be panning out that way, as a nasty headwind picked up almost straight away. The subsequent tacking and zigzagging made for some frustratingly slow northward progress and we were drifting further west than originally intended. For about the hundredth time on the trip we were being impeded by unusually bad climatic conditions, and I was beginning to get the distinct impression that Mother Nature did not want us to succeed. The only thing we could do was to keep beating upwind and hope that things improved. They didn’t.

As sunset approached the wind rapidly dropped, before becoming eerily still. There sea remained choppy though, which was weird. There was also a line of tall black clouds silhouetted against a crimson sky, and although they weren’t as impressive and some of the hammerhead formations I’d seen back at Stromboli, they certainly added to the foreboding atmosphere. I think humans can sense the onset of storms before their inception, for we were all discussing how we felt ill at ease. Our fears weren’t allayed by the yacht we saw heading in the opposite direction, with their sails completely furled – an indication that they’d experienced some very extreme weather from the location we were heading to. Fantastic.

The forecast came through in the usual format of what I’d describe as unintelligible gibberish, but listening to it put some furrows in John’s forehead. He explained that we were due to be battered by an unseasonal ‘Minstral’ – a local weather phenomenon. It’s basically a harsh wind that comes off mainland France and gets channelled through some alpine valleys before being unleashed on the Mediterranean. It also causes sudden storms, especially since it was September and the sea temperature was at its warmest. This was exactly what we didn’t need, but turning around was not an option so we readied ourselves and the boat for a long and sleepless night …again.

Cycling.

It’s something I’ve been doing a lot recently. The feeling of mastering your itinerary, of forcing concrete backwards and clawing at the horizon. Contemplating one’s position on life’s great meandering trail of logic driven pursuits whilst constantly doing battle with the vagaries of borderline sociopathy and moral obsoletion. Blotting out pedestrian talk and suburban chatter - obtaining brief respite from innumerable and unrelenting twenty-first century annoyances.  Learning not to magnify, for fear of missing the forest for the shrub. Learning that we exist in literal eternity, but practical finity. A sharp intake of breath, upon each and every salient realization. Chiselling the imperfections. Moulding effigies. Seeing some things from a different angle and rolling cigarettes in unlikely places. Enduring the slings of life, but being so tired at the end of it all. Yes, I could get used to cycling.

A Perfect World

“Live in shelter all your life blindfolds tied tight, your first step into the streets they’re going to eat you alive. Harsh reality fucking slapped your face, your whole life’s been fed to you on a silver plate.

Twenty year waged war, time to face the facts, time’s running out for you, a noose around your neck.

Your fucking lost with nowhere to fucking go, you step out into the streets, they’re going to eat you alive, there’s no fucking way to leave that shit behind you, there’s no fucking way you’ll ever make it out there.

No fucking way.

Except what you have, a life spent in shame. Sit and stare while you fucking dig your grave.”

- Ceremony

(You won’t find these lyrics anywhere else on the internet)