07-25-2020, 12:02 AM
They'll get you, one way or another. Convert you into a Christian; or if you're trying to write, someone will try to make you into a real scholar. Thinking a certain way for a long while molds a path in your brain, and to be open to other religions and political positions does violence to your brain. You'll get drawn in somewhere if you don't keep moving and lashing out in every direction. The classics have their positions, and their restrictions. Sobriety has its restrictions. Self-defense has its restrictions. Offensiveness has its restrictions. Drunkenness has its restrictions, and does its damages, but those are only superficial. You use the old ideas until the new ideas are sufficient. And if you love the old ideas, you can steal them and integrate them in yourself.
I used to rage against culture. Now I have no problem with culture. Denounce society, and embrace people's cultures; embrace their holidays and their rituals, and avoid their genocides and political affiliations, and then you only have their quirks and traumas and human frailties to worry about.
That's my game plan. It's not working. But who says it has to?
America is still in infanthood. Defeat destroys rather than enriches their decency and integrity. Americans have been fighting each other over their own land the whole time the nation's existed. America immortalizes its crooks and serial killers and failures, and does everything it can to destroy them and hide them away. America believes in democracy and freedom for all, and can't see anything beyond its borders. And every state has its own borders. Every man and woman is independent, and independence leads to anxiety and confusion and embarrassment. They turn to strong leaders, and strong leaders have to be ruthless, self-protecting assholes, or they'll get shot for advocating peace and understanding.
America depicts itself as being guided by a book few people read, written in languages spoken by another culture in another area of the world, centuries ago, that most Americans actively and vocally despise.
And deep down, every American has a kind of pride.
I myself would prefer to be a citizen of the world. But my passport keeps getting revoked.
I used to rage against culture. Now I have no problem with culture. Denounce society, and embrace people's cultures; embrace their holidays and their rituals, and avoid their genocides and political affiliations, and then you only have their quirks and traumas and human frailties to worry about.
That's my game plan. It's not working. But who says it has to?
America is still in infanthood. Defeat destroys rather than enriches their decency and integrity. Americans have been fighting each other over their own land the whole time the nation's existed. America immortalizes its crooks and serial killers and failures, and does everything it can to destroy them and hide them away. America believes in democracy and freedom for all, and can't see anything beyond its borders. And every state has its own borders. Every man and woman is independent, and independence leads to anxiety and confusion and embarrassment. They turn to strong leaders, and strong leaders have to be ruthless, self-protecting assholes, or they'll get shot for advocating peace and understanding.
America depicts itself as being guided by a book few people read, written in languages spoken by another culture in another area of the world, centuries ago, that most Americans actively and vocally despise.
And deep down, every American has a kind of pride.
I myself would prefer to be a citizen of the world. But my passport keeps getting revoked.