The Notes-ification of everything online has turned me inside out. I'm meant to view and consume the replies and shares of everyone, but why should I?
The internetification of everything offline has turned me off digital devices. I'm meant to participate in it and believe that it embodies a sacrosanct open space for communion with others, without the strictures of physical locality. Nothing online is speech as this is the definition of speech https://dictionary.justia.com/speech that's pure bullshit. Speech is face to face expression to another, via vocal cords shaping sounds to shape words and sentences that impart meaning, de facto, create meaning when spoken in real life!
Really enjoyed your ramble, I feel much the same. It's not so much about the enshittification of everything that makes me beguiled by misanthropic ennui - it's the sudden denouement cast upon online consumption / social media communication as the terminal engine of accelerationist devolutions.
It’s all too much isn’t it? The social terrain over which we now have governance is too vast and lacks context. We simply unite around a topic but that is not enough. We know nothing of those to which we interact. It usually degrades into an insult-fest.
I can’t think of anything that has gotten better recently. I guess there have been considerable advances in electric bikes (e-farthings lol) and cars etc. I suppose I was thinking more about institutions and how impossible and corporate they have become yet we still need to engage with them or nothing gets done. What I really loathe is the subscription model, especially for things like essential software - you can never own it, you must pay for your entire life - monthly to have use of it. I heard that the new Toyota Camry requires $500 per year in subscriptions to keep the car running.
It almost seems as though social media has run its course. If they can censor it then it ain’t worth a damn. Back to meeting at the docks at midnight…. Make sure you ain’t followed.
Nope, nope, all the nope. I've seen The Beach (one of my fave movies ever actually)....too many "idealists" trying to create the "utopian society" inevitably leads to more of the problems that we were trying to escape from 🙄...which is a shame because the Thailand beaches in the shadow of those majestic mountains look fucking amazing! 👌
Nope, nope.... don't be a rope-a- dope . You guys are just laying on the ropes, waiting for godot . Godot ain't coming .
And The Beach is like a movie ! Next thing you're gonna imagine is Apocalypse Now with crazed soldiers running through the jungles with napalm .
Oh boy..... LOL . I came here to escape , not any utopian society (it was a long time ago) but just the beginnings of the tyranical state that now is firmly entrenched in US, much of Europe, and maybe the poster child for tyranny; your lovely homestead.... Aussieland . (might be too late for your escape, as the noose keeps getting tighter and tighter . "your papers please,
Madame ticktock !") I understand your and DB 's reluctance to make a run for it . It's damn scary !
Only the very brave will leave their PC desks to try to get out . Hopelessly resigned to the role of "useless eater" it is, for most .
Tick Tock be trippin. She thinks you're in a commune or something. Lol. You're just a dude livin in Thailand. I aint reluctant. Sounds like a good plan.
Tick Tock would love it. She's a summer child. I've been to Thailand and think i could probably adjust to the heat and humidity - eventually, after a few years of grumbling. It's a lovely place. Something I will definitely keep in mind and having someone know how to do it would be indispensable!
I'm seeing the internet as a symptom rather than a cause. The underlying predicament, pre-dating the net considerably, being that we've allowed our social fabric to unravel, the commons to be enclosed. We float in anomie, alienated though connected, isolated though surrounded by billions. Without a network of trust, the monkey jibber jabber of those billions rushes over us in a raw, unfiltered storm, rendering it functionally meaningless.
I call it a predicament because this is not a problem we will solve, just a reality we will endure. We're heading toward a crunch point, where our current habits will become impossible to sustain. Thermodynamics will intervene in our delusions. Thrown out of the system, we will either rebuild meaningful social structure or perish. Just ask people living in the third world.
Yes absolutely. The internet is something of an amplifier and transmitter and a very powerful one at that. It disperses the signal - unpicks social interactions. Talking to a person over a cup of coffee is a very different experience to ranting anonymously online. Without some context it’s all just noise. Agendas are too easily concealed and prominent people use the web to push ideas into the collective, sometimes employing vast resources to do so. In short - it’s not real. They don’t call it virtual reality for nothing.
I guess I’m trying to figure out how much I want in and I’m a really light user, only the one platform - this one. I’d go insane if I was also a user of X etc … It may be a symptom but never before, since perhaps the printing press, have we seen such a radical change to the way humans interact. I really don’t want any of it. I’m just figuring out if that’s a reasonable thing to do. My life is lonely enough as it is. I need more real friends but I’m 50+ and find making connections in the real world difficult especially since I have no employment. As usual it’s a nebulous thing … on a deeper level, on a “spiritual” level I’m trying to figure out what’s best.
Although I'm not a fan of censorship at all, there may be a positive from it. I wonder if a lot of people will just stop using social media, and other online platforms to get their info? Especially people like myself who "woke up" 40 years ago and don't really need a good "awakening?" I owe my awakening to word of mouth and print media that I found on bumper stickers, in the laundry mat, on the top of a gas pumps, etc. "Free" speech isn't going anywhere. It just won't seem as prolific because it won't be on the "internet." The "militias" and all of the so-called "scary" groups we are supposed to be terrified of have been with us for hundreds, if not thousands, of years and those all started without the internet. They aren't going anywhere either. Could government censorship actually force us to start talking to each other again? It will be interesting to see. Personally, I've found that people who are *really* awake to the situation in the world are those who don't owe their awakening to the internet anyway. The ones who have woken up from experience, and by talking to others are the ones who are actually trying to do something and aren't just sitting behind a keyboard complaining. Again... will be interesting to watch the next couple of decades... assuming I live through them. Another thought provoking post by Dollyboy. :)
Hi Rob! I think so. Many, like me, will just give up on certain platforms if they censor. But most will just endure because they don’t consider the censoring to be impacting their daily posting of cat videos etc. and others will even celebrate it, toeing the line about safety and community standards, not knowing how such excuses are used throughout history to stamp out opposition and gain total control.
I always imagined if there was any groundswell of criticism against the system - which really is fucked, it would come about from people meeting face to face. That obviously makes you a target for the government goon squads but ultimately it will be real bodies clashing with real bodies. Most people have a much higher tolerance for bullshit than me. I only wish they didn’t. I only wish, like those stern characters of old, we had more resolve - had more pluck and swagger. It makes me smile when I see an upstart, someone who pushes back. I’m a fan of the attitude that if the powers that be insist upon certain behaviours then we insist on making that task as difficult as possible. You might be arrested but in doing that there will be consequences. There needs to be a price paid for every attempt to control a man. To go meekly into the arms of your captors is weak but this is the very attitude they expound.
Anyway … getting a bit off topic and starting to ramble. The ultimate truth is that one can and should do away with internet - especially if you are just ranting on a controlled platform. Real strength comes from ignoring all the noise and endless blather and becoming better through self control, right action and principle.
Postscript - saw a young lady homeless on the street the other day, she was crying. She had a sign. She looked very broken so I bought her a Banh mi and gave her $20. Maybe she goes and spends that 20 on meth - I dunno but I’m not going to walk past the needy in blind arrogance. The numbers of people on the streets is very disturbing.
Great comment. I have also found myself "softening" (for lack of a better word) my pre-judgment about people like the homeless lady you helped. *This is what matters! We never know when something we do (selflessly) will restore someone's faith in their fellow humans. We must start being "human" again. At least those of us who feign caring about restoring some sense of sanity to the world anyway. You reminded me of an experience that, to this day, haunts me. I used to be an avid church goer. I still consider myself a Christian, but I threw off "organized" "religion" decades ago. Anyway, I was in a church service and in walks what appeared to be a homeless man and his two children. They were dirty and they had the stench of life without a shower (or hope) on them. They sat very close to me. The "pastor" proceeded to go and get a bottle of cologne he had stashed and walked by these poor souls and sprayed this cologne around them and looked at me with a look like, "these people are disgusting." Unfortunately, my look probably mirrored the pastors. The reason I am haunted by this experience is because, A: These people were exactly where they should have been able to come and feel safe, loved, and accepted without judgement. B: The witness of "God's Love" that we as a church body showed these people was anything but.
I always wonder what ended up happening to these poor souls. I wonder if the way they were treated caused a hatred for Christians and everything we claimed to stand for?
I could go on and on, but I won't. I share that story only to make a point about your postscript. Something I learned from the above experience and other experiences in my life. "If it is within our power to do something good for someone, make someone feel happy, safe, or loved, we should do it. Even if we don't feel like doing it."
I don't know if that makes sense or not. Anyway, we can all sit here behind our keyboards and complain about "vaccines", the horrible food system (especially here in America), the government, the "laws", the housing crisis, the (fill in the blank), the censorship, etc., but until we start *doing something* we really don't have any room to complain. Most of us still have the ability to make choices. We can choose whether to go along with unethical and downright evil "laws", or we can say F no and risk fines, imprisonment or whatever. We can choose what we eat. We can choose whether to just go along with a "doctor" who decides they want to shoot something into us, prescribe a "pill", or cut something out of us or off of us, or we can politely say, "thanks for your time" and leave. My argument (and you and I have followed each others work for years now) has always been, as you know, that we have the power. We might not feel "powerful" but every single time we do *anything* that goes against what the "approved" narrative is, we are exercising our power. And, with practice, it gets easier and easier to wield that power. Even something as simple as not ignoring a crying woman on the side of the road and *choosing* to take matters into our own hands and not just say, "poor lady, I hope someone helps her or that she finds a government program" shoves a *huge* middle finger in the face of the monsters who so desperately want to destroy everything good in the world.
I better stop. Haha. Sorry to get long winded... you know how I am.
"I always wonder what ended up happening to these poor souls" .
That was me, Rob ! Don't worry, one day when i was destitute, sitting on the sidewalk , some guy walked by and threw 20 of these funny looking things in my hat . Couldn't even use them at the 7-11 , said they were fake money.
Well, i held onto them, don't know why (they were kinda cute) , and about 10 years later (i had some work cleaning the office of some big shot) ... he saw me holding one of these playthings.
"Hey! Where'd you get that ! "
"Oh, had it a long time . Got a bunch of 'em " , i answered .
So, I got a house now (but damn taxes ridiculous) . Also a pretty nice car .
I think i remember you, btw . That was a long time ago, before this funny thing happened when i got these things they call Bitcoin. Lord works in mysterious ways . I still don't use cologne !
It’s frightful. I myself have been very close to being that person on the side of the road begging. People can be so callous - some say they’re faking it but let me assure you doubters that if you rise in the morning and decide that your day will consist of sitting on a busy footpath with a sign - you have issues and need help. Others say “they make a lot of money” and I think compared to who? Compared to a CEO? Even if they raked in $200 … so what? That’s like a low wage and it’s not regular. I’m a long way from rich. Tick Tock has a part time job and she is like a Brazilianaire compared to me but $20 and a sandwich I can afford to give away now and then. I only wish I had more confidence to talk to them and get their story and empathise. I usually give them the money and run. I’m cowardly like that.
Yes that’s it. No one need be a revolutionary. I haven’t the organisation and people skills for such a thing but some do. All we need to do is push back. The powers that be break the law, the natural law, daily by using violence against us. It’s the greatest trick - to convince a population that The State is somehow entitled to force you to do things. Put people in a costume, make up a bunch of supposed rules and people believe. But it’s all make believe - no one has the right to harm you or compel you to do anything against your will if you are just minding your own business and not hurting anyone. Tax is theft, the law is unjust … it’s basic Anarchism 101. They will kill you. Ultimately they will. You disobey long enough and hard enough and men with guns supposing they have the right will come and take your life. That’s the truth. Power concedes nothing without force. If cops got shot every time they tried to enforce the law they’d start thinking twice about joining the force. Pushing back is similar. Don’t make their job easy - be as prickly as you can so you ruin their day.
Of course my interactions with the law is zero. And that’s just it - I have an attitude that doesn’t get me “in trouble.” I’m just live and let live and if any injustice is to come about it will no doubt be The State that is at fault. Throughout history it is always the pricks in costumes that are doing all the killing - it’s never farmer Joe, his lovely wife Greta and their three children stirring up trouble. So yeah a bit of push back. The State is not your friend. They want you dead or at best compliant and paying taxes. We have lived under this tyrannical system for so long now that people see it as normal but it is anything but. It’s monstrous but all have been hypnotised to think such violence is normal.
Hello old friend ... Well Substack didn’t card me so I’m still here. They already have my bank account details so if the government really wanted to find me they could probably track me down. It’s a lot easier to disappear when you are homeless that’s for sure and I miss being The Phantom - adds to my mystique! But the new digs are great. It’s nice to have a base and I have a bit of a thing for interior design. I’m beautifying the place and have decided to cover the walls in art. You can buy frames from op-shops for nix and just print out pictures that you like.
Yes I could give up social media with ease. Like you Substack is all I do … I’d miss the occasional fine essay but meh … I think Substack has been a net positive for me despite my concerns about dealing with the tsunami of data that is spews at me on a daily basis. It was a genuine lifeline at the height of Covid. It reassured me, let me know I wasn’t crazy to think the way I did when everyone in the real world had lost their tiny minds. But now … well …
The Notes-ification of everything online has turned me inside out. I'm meant to view and consume the replies and shares of everyone, but why should I?
The internetification of everything offline has turned me off digital devices. I'm meant to participate in it and believe that it embodies a sacrosanct open space for communion with others, without the strictures of physical locality. Nothing online is speech as this is the definition of speech https://dictionary.justia.com/speech that's pure bullshit. Speech is face to face expression to another, via vocal cords shaping sounds to shape words and sentences that impart meaning, de facto, create meaning when spoken in real life!
Really enjoyed your ramble, I feel much the same. It's not so much about the enshittification of everything that makes me beguiled by misanthropic ennui - it's the sudden denouement cast upon online consumption / social media communication as the terminal engine of accelerationist devolutions.
It’s all too much isn’t it? The social terrain over which we now have governance is too vast and lacks context. We simply unite around a topic but that is not enough. We know nothing of those to which we interact. It usually degrades into an insult-fest.
I can’t think of anything that has gotten better recently. I guess there have been considerable advances in electric bikes (e-farthings lol) and cars etc. I suppose I was thinking more about institutions and how impossible and corporate they have become yet we still need to engage with them or nothing gets done. What I really loathe is the subscription model, especially for things like essential software - you can never own it, you must pay for your entire life - monthly to have use of it. I heard that the new Toyota Camry requires $500 per year in subscriptions to keep the car running.
How discouraging, and I agree with virtually every point. As with you, Substack is the only "social media" site I use. And I never even go to "Notes".
It almost seems as though social media has run its course. If they can censor it then it ain’t worth a damn. Back to meeting at the docks at midnight…. Make sure you ain’t followed.
Remember...... i can show you a better way here in Thailand . Save your (or tick tocks) money for the escape.
DO Not invite others . lol place getting too infliltrated already (and not really by the right people) .
question: how many "right people" are there, really? hmmmmmm
Nope, nope, all the nope. I've seen The Beach (one of my fave movies ever actually)....too many "idealists" trying to create the "utopian society" inevitably leads to more of the problems that we were trying to escape from 🙄...which is a shame because the Thailand beaches in the shadow of those majestic mountains look fucking amazing! 👌
DB says "you be trippin'" ..........LOL
no communal living here , me lady . no work, no eat 😀
Nope, nope.... don't be a rope-a- dope . You guys are just laying on the ropes, waiting for godot . Godot ain't coming .
And The Beach is like a movie ! Next thing you're gonna imagine is Apocalypse Now with crazed soldiers running through the jungles with napalm .
Oh boy..... LOL . I came here to escape , not any utopian society (it was a long time ago) but just the beginnings of the tyranical state that now is firmly entrenched in US, much of Europe, and maybe the poster child for tyranny; your lovely homestead.... Aussieland . (might be too late for your escape, as the noose keeps getting tighter and tighter . "your papers please,
Madame ticktock !") I understand your and DB 's reluctance to make a run for it . It's damn scary !
Only the very brave will leave their PC desks to try to get out . Hopelessly resigned to the role of "useless eater" it is, for most .
Tick Tock be trippin. She thinks you're in a commune or something. Lol. You're just a dude livin in Thailand. I aint reluctant. Sounds like a good plan.
Tick Tock would love it. She's a summer child. I've been to Thailand and think i could probably adjust to the heat and humidity - eventually, after a few years of grumbling. It's a lovely place. Something I will definitely keep in mind and having someone know how to do it would be indispensable!
if you have my email (where i get your posts) ....... drop me a hello if interested
in seeing some pics .... and getting acquainted on level 2 of the anonymous web . Willie
I did i think, shoot me another kronos2400@gmail.com
Yeah but how fucking stupid were Penny Farthings tho? 🙄
Haha! True dat … worst bicycle design e v e r.
e-bikes and e-scooters are prettty good tho ay
I'm seeing the internet as a symptom rather than a cause. The underlying predicament, pre-dating the net considerably, being that we've allowed our social fabric to unravel, the commons to be enclosed. We float in anomie, alienated though connected, isolated though surrounded by billions. Without a network of trust, the monkey jibber jabber of those billions rushes over us in a raw, unfiltered storm, rendering it functionally meaningless.
I call it a predicament because this is not a problem we will solve, just a reality we will endure. We're heading toward a crunch point, where our current habits will become impossible to sustain. Thermodynamics will intervene in our delusions. Thrown out of the system, we will either rebuild meaningful social structure or perish. Just ask people living in the third world.
agreed and wonderfully put!
Yes absolutely. The internet is something of an amplifier and transmitter and a very powerful one at that. It disperses the signal - unpicks social interactions. Talking to a person over a cup of coffee is a very different experience to ranting anonymously online. Without some context it’s all just noise. Agendas are too easily concealed and prominent people use the web to push ideas into the collective, sometimes employing vast resources to do so. In short - it’s not real. They don’t call it virtual reality for nothing.
I guess I’m trying to figure out how much I want in and I’m a really light user, only the one platform - this one. I’d go insane if I was also a user of X etc … It may be a symptom but never before, since perhaps the printing press, have we seen such a radical change to the way humans interact. I really don’t want any of it. I’m just figuring out if that’s a reasonable thing to do. My life is lonely enough as it is. I need more real friends but I’m 50+ and find making connections in the real world difficult especially since I have no employment. As usual it’s a nebulous thing … on a deeper level, on a “spiritual” level I’m trying to figure out what’s best.
Although I'm not a fan of censorship at all, there may be a positive from it. I wonder if a lot of people will just stop using social media, and other online platforms to get their info? Especially people like myself who "woke up" 40 years ago and don't really need a good "awakening?" I owe my awakening to word of mouth and print media that I found on bumper stickers, in the laundry mat, on the top of a gas pumps, etc. "Free" speech isn't going anywhere. It just won't seem as prolific because it won't be on the "internet." The "militias" and all of the so-called "scary" groups we are supposed to be terrified of have been with us for hundreds, if not thousands, of years and those all started without the internet. They aren't going anywhere either. Could government censorship actually force us to start talking to each other again? It will be interesting to see. Personally, I've found that people who are *really* awake to the situation in the world are those who don't owe their awakening to the internet anyway. The ones who have woken up from experience, and by talking to others are the ones who are actually trying to do something and aren't just sitting behind a keyboard complaining. Again... will be interesting to watch the next couple of decades... assuming I live through them. Another thought provoking post by Dollyboy. :)
Hi Rob! I think so. Many, like me, will just give up on certain platforms if they censor. But most will just endure because they don’t consider the censoring to be impacting their daily posting of cat videos etc. and others will even celebrate it, toeing the line about safety and community standards, not knowing how such excuses are used throughout history to stamp out opposition and gain total control.
I always imagined if there was any groundswell of criticism against the system - which really is fucked, it would come about from people meeting face to face. That obviously makes you a target for the government goon squads but ultimately it will be real bodies clashing with real bodies. Most people have a much higher tolerance for bullshit than me. I only wish they didn’t. I only wish, like those stern characters of old, we had more resolve - had more pluck and swagger. It makes me smile when I see an upstart, someone who pushes back. I’m a fan of the attitude that if the powers that be insist upon certain behaviours then we insist on making that task as difficult as possible. You might be arrested but in doing that there will be consequences. There needs to be a price paid for every attempt to control a man. To go meekly into the arms of your captors is weak but this is the very attitude they expound.
Anyway … getting a bit off topic and starting to ramble. The ultimate truth is that one can and should do away with internet - especially if you are just ranting on a controlled platform. Real strength comes from ignoring all the noise and endless blather and becoming better through self control, right action and principle.
Postscript - saw a young lady homeless on the street the other day, she was crying. She had a sign. She looked very broken so I bought her a Banh mi and gave her $20. Maybe she goes and spends that 20 on meth - I dunno but I’m not going to walk past the needy in blind arrogance. The numbers of people on the streets is very disturbing.
Great comment. I have also found myself "softening" (for lack of a better word) my pre-judgment about people like the homeless lady you helped. *This is what matters! We never know when something we do (selflessly) will restore someone's faith in their fellow humans. We must start being "human" again. At least those of us who feign caring about restoring some sense of sanity to the world anyway. You reminded me of an experience that, to this day, haunts me. I used to be an avid church goer. I still consider myself a Christian, but I threw off "organized" "religion" decades ago. Anyway, I was in a church service and in walks what appeared to be a homeless man and his two children. They were dirty and they had the stench of life without a shower (or hope) on them. They sat very close to me. The "pastor" proceeded to go and get a bottle of cologne he had stashed and walked by these poor souls and sprayed this cologne around them and looked at me with a look like, "these people are disgusting." Unfortunately, my look probably mirrored the pastors. The reason I am haunted by this experience is because, A: These people were exactly where they should have been able to come and feel safe, loved, and accepted without judgement. B: The witness of "God's Love" that we as a church body showed these people was anything but.
I always wonder what ended up happening to these poor souls. I wonder if the way they were treated caused a hatred for Christians and everything we claimed to stand for?
I could go on and on, but I won't. I share that story only to make a point about your postscript. Something I learned from the above experience and other experiences in my life. "If it is within our power to do something good for someone, make someone feel happy, safe, or loved, we should do it. Even if we don't feel like doing it."
I don't know if that makes sense or not. Anyway, we can all sit here behind our keyboards and complain about "vaccines", the horrible food system (especially here in America), the government, the "laws", the housing crisis, the (fill in the blank), the censorship, etc., but until we start *doing something* we really don't have any room to complain. Most of us still have the ability to make choices. We can choose whether to go along with unethical and downright evil "laws", or we can say F no and risk fines, imprisonment or whatever. We can choose what we eat. We can choose whether to just go along with a "doctor" who decides they want to shoot something into us, prescribe a "pill", or cut something out of us or off of us, or we can politely say, "thanks for your time" and leave. My argument (and you and I have followed each others work for years now) has always been, as you know, that we have the power. We might not feel "powerful" but every single time we do *anything* that goes against what the "approved" narrative is, we are exercising our power. And, with practice, it gets easier and easier to wield that power. Even something as simple as not ignoring a crying woman on the side of the road and *choosing* to take matters into our own hands and not just say, "poor lady, I hope someone helps her or that she finds a government program" shoves a *huge* middle finger in the face of the monsters who so desperately want to destroy everything good in the world.
I better stop. Haha. Sorry to get long winded... you know how I am.
"I always wonder what ended up happening to these poor souls" .
That was me, Rob ! Don't worry, one day when i was destitute, sitting on the sidewalk , some guy walked by and threw 20 of these funny looking things in my hat . Couldn't even use them at the 7-11 , said they were fake money.
Well, i held onto them, don't know why (they were kinda cute) , and about 10 years later (i had some work cleaning the office of some big shot) ... he saw me holding one of these playthings.
"Hey! Where'd you get that ! "
"Oh, had it a long time . Got a bunch of 'em " , i answered .
So, I got a house now (but damn taxes ridiculous) . Also a pretty nice car .
I think i remember you, btw . That was a long time ago, before this funny thing happened when i got these things they call Bitcoin. Lord works in mysterious ways . I still don't use cologne !
the bitcoin story...... is a work of fiction. 😀
FTW (for those wondering)
It’s frightful. I myself have been very close to being that person on the side of the road begging. People can be so callous - some say they’re faking it but let me assure you doubters that if you rise in the morning and decide that your day will consist of sitting on a busy footpath with a sign - you have issues and need help. Others say “they make a lot of money” and I think compared to who? Compared to a CEO? Even if they raked in $200 … so what? That’s like a low wage and it’s not regular. I’m a long way from rich. Tick Tock has a part time job and she is like a Brazilianaire compared to me but $20 and a sandwich I can afford to give away now and then. I only wish I had more confidence to talk to them and get their story and empathise. I usually give them the money and run. I’m cowardly like that.
Yes that’s it. No one need be a revolutionary. I haven’t the organisation and people skills for such a thing but some do. All we need to do is push back. The powers that be break the law, the natural law, daily by using violence against us. It’s the greatest trick - to convince a population that The State is somehow entitled to force you to do things. Put people in a costume, make up a bunch of supposed rules and people believe. But it’s all make believe - no one has the right to harm you or compel you to do anything against your will if you are just minding your own business and not hurting anyone. Tax is theft, the law is unjust … it’s basic Anarchism 101. They will kill you. Ultimately they will. You disobey long enough and hard enough and men with guns supposing they have the right will come and take your life. That’s the truth. Power concedes nothing without force. If cops got shot every time they tried to enforce the law they’d start thinking twice about joining the force. Pushing back is similar. Don’t make their job easy - be as prickly as you can so you ruin their day.
Of course my interactions with the law is zero. And that’s just it - I have an attitude that doesn’t get me “in trouble.” I’m just live and let live and if any injustice is to come about it will no doubt be The State that is at fault. Throughout history it is always the pricks in costumes that are doing all the killing - it’s never farmer Joe, his lovely wife Greta and their three children stirring up trouble. So yeah a bit of push back. The State is not your friend. They want you dead or at best compliant and paying taxes. We have lived under this tyrannical system for so long now that people see it as normal but it is anything but. It’s monstrous but all have been hypnotised to think such violence is normal.
Hello old friend ... Well Substack didn’t card me so I’m still here. They already have my bank account details so if the government really wanted to find me they could probably track me down. It’s a lot easier to disappear when you are homeless that’s for sure and I miss being The Phantom - adds to my mystique! But the new digs are great. It’s nice to have a base and I have a bit of a thing for interior design. I’m beautifying the place and have decided to cover the walls in art. You can buy frames from op-shops for nix and just print out pictures that you like.
Yes I could give up social media with ease. Like you Substack is all I do … I’d miss the occasional fine essay but meh … I think Substack has been a net positive for me despite my concerns about dealing with the tsunami of data that is spews at me on a daily basis. It was a genuine lifeline at the height of Covid. It reassured me, let me know I wasn’t crazy to think the way I did when everyone in the real world had lost their tiny minds. But now … well …