Holding Forth

To pretend that there are absolutes is necessary in making relative judgments, but to believe that there are absolutes and to order one’s judgments accordingly is folly and disastrous. ~ Gore Vidal, Selected Essays – p. 6.

Consider the implications of this for a second, if you will. (Entire article here.)

Humans paying in cash, a largely non-traceable form of monetary transaction, would be flagged as suspicious. The measure of a non-suspicious human then becomes a reflection of their allegiance to a corporate entity (since if one cannot use cash, one would most assuredly use credit cards). Therefore, to not be suspicious, one much be fully traceable by corporations and governments. A bit too 1984-ish for my tastes.

People who have managed to make/save enough cash, once a measure of true financial independence, are now the suspects. Where I come from, people who pay in cash often don’t have the means to extensive lines of credit; they are regularly people of lower socioeconomic standing, immigrants and minorities. From that perspective, such a move as this suggests an increased stratification of social demographics.

Furthermore, such a policy would only encourage the continued abstraction of monetary value (as cash, a material mode of monetary representation, is called “suspicious”), arguably one of the contributing factors to this latest global financial fiasco. The more it is just numbers bankers are pushing around, the easier it is to push competing companies and countries into default. (I realize I am being rash, but too bad.)

We live in a complex world and our methods of analysis and response are in dire need of re-innovation.

Don’t these two dudes look just thrilled to be in a photo-opt for the signing of draconian legislation?

Perhaps there is too much romance in my mind, but such images make me feel like there is a lot of potential for re-birth. I just spoke to a local Detroit lady who didn’t think so, though.

The time is fast arriving for us to move towards creative thought as a replacement for logical thought.

Logic is like a machine, but now our machines are much better at their duties than we are, so there is less need to compete. The new “logic” is of the intrinsic shade, a melding of the sensual and the essential. Thought gives way to feeling gives way to thought as a more thorough and adept tool in a point-less age; in a time when the objective wavers in the heat and invigorating, de-centered shadows replace knowledge pavilions as the sources of vibrant effort.

Moist cool air constricts the vessels in tightened focus.

The replacement of the logical with the creative as a re-calibration toward and acknowledgment of the complex, animated grayness that is society, art and thought. No matter how abstract the question, it never escapes the earthly human. The mudded edges of the “objective” are constantly on display, so hewing to regulated scholarly modes and creative means, whether borne of history or popularity, is only one frail method. Every single thing is gossamer, but populated diversity is durable. Exuberance is what we need to ask from those we look to for inspiration and advice. The human condition has always been made of interminable instances and always will be. We suffer from top to bottom, but only those of us on the top have time to consider the question. So what do we do with that? Inspired effort, calculated ignorance of odds, and a willingness to look down are what we need to engender in ourselves and in those around us.

Our toes are still firmly in the dirt…why not wiggle the toes a bit?

funky s     ş

big funky s    Ş

i without dot    ı

funky g    ǧ

Íoanna Kuçuradi

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