File spoon-archives/nietzsche.archive/nietzsche_2002/nietzsche.0205, message 1


Date: Thu, 2 May 2002 13:47:17 -0700 (PDT)
From: Lewis Vella <lewisvella-AT-yahoo.com>
Subject: THE EXISTENTIAL TIMES - v.1, #10 Special McNugget Issue


 
               THE EXISTENTIAL TIMES

        'A Philosophical(?)View from Scratch'
                   Volume 1, #10
 
__________________________________________________
MUSIC TO WASH AWAY THOSE PHONEY-MEAT McNUGGETS
Kit Watkins offers a long, soothing interlude, just
right for this week's TIMES:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheExistentialTimes/message/376
__________________________________________________
AND NOW FOR THE REAL McNUGGETS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
To fall through and through something that doesn't
truly exist in itself, but which, just the same, takes
you deeper and deeper into the vortex of whatever it
may be, say, for example, the conceptual idea of a
golden nugget -- this is what, in the last analysis,
will carry one pass the established order, to a place
whose meaning rests in a symbiotic relationship
between  the self and its immediate surroundings. It
is the womb of gestation which continuously expands
something into more than what was, engulfing itself
rapidly in a complexity beyond its own grasp, but
which no sooner shall become the gateway to an
inimitable rapture, a forgotten presence whose state
we must attempt to preserve, regardless of how
inexplicable the occasion may be. For when we
experience the pristine innocence of being, we capture
independently the last bit of sanctity left in our
lives which is not at all subject to the auction
block, something that has made its way to us, quite
mysteriously, on its own accord, unscathed, and
therefore unaffected by the laws of supply and demand:
that troublesome science which, in our late
capitalism, controls more and more of our mind-state,
that is, by guiding the "modernization of poverty,
where the growth-rate of frustration largely exceeds
that of production" -- to borrow Ivan Illich's
terminology. Poverty as such is due to the fact that
in our modern, technocratic, industrial age, rampant
capitalism manufactures an endless scarcity, whereby
it creates more needs than it fulfills. This is by no
means an accidental paradox of the production process,
but rather a highly calculated, ruthless manipulation
of reason, used to sustain the required inequalities
and hierarchies which a growth-oriented economy is
dependent on. In its historical advancement, however,
some of its more subtle, hidden intricacies -- for
example, the dominating qualities of its functionist
structuring -- inevitably, make their way to the
forefront of the everyday life-world, be it felt as an
effect of the increasingly bureaucratical conditions
found in the private and public sectors that serve the
institutionalized apparatus of the commodity economy,
or whether it is felt more directly in the growing
disparate relations found amongst ourselves in both
the  community and the family. 

In dealing with these distresses, however, it is
important not to add to discomfort by pointing a
finger at any of our neighbors, but rather, I would
say, open our minds to the bigger picture. For our
present circumstance is not the exclusive cause of any
personally-responsible malfunction, but the end result
of a capitalistic social production which bases itself
upon a division of labor regulated by the market
place, and, as such, out of control of the individual.
It is precisely this type of conditioning that keeps
the working man wanting more and more tangible things,
while he becomes less and less in touch with what he
likely needs most, that is, peace of mind, love of
neighbor (or, at least, that potential to love), and,
of course, a personal connection with his higher
source, his transcendent being, if you may.

Indeed, at this point in time, contrary to what some
may think, a 'repositioning' of the self is probably
what this highly jeopardized world needs most.
Certainly, it is true that one man alone cannot bring
about a noticeable change of course, but, nonetheless,
any independent effort, through mere cause and effect,
shall always stir the collective will, one way or
another. So why, then, scoff at someone who takes a
labor stance one day, an ecological one the next? The
everyday crisis is neither this or that, but the way
things are (or should I say are not) coming together.
After all, it is quite natural to digress. Case in
point: the original McNugget question (see indices at 
bottom). A straight forward enquiry which, so far,
drew just under 100 messages from some 25 different
respondents on 3 separate lists, all of which, I
think, only one has actually answered the question,
and inadvertently at that. Now why the difficulty in
answering a simple question? In the uncontrollable
surfeit of privilege, do I detect a slice sense of
forsakeness and maybe even guilt in our global
conscience? Perhaps, then, there is more to gain in
this 'repositioning' thing than meets the eye, more to
it than you say 'to-may-toe' and I say 'to-mat-toe',
that is, if our dialectical struggles are not to be
taken as ends in themselves, but rather as
evolutionary means of enhancement not only for the
individual but for all humanity. Or as one person put
it previously: The free development of each is the
condition for the free development of all. (The Marx
quote is from Andre Gorz's introduction to 'Ecology as
Politics'. A brief excerpt from it, touching on the
inequality of civilization, is provided at the
following link -- quite worth the read, I'd say):  
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TheExistentialTimes/message/381

So what, then, you may wonder, happens when there is a
lack of free development in society? Why, to answer
this, all you have to do is to take a closer look at
any one of its interdependent, intertwining service
sectors, and you'll more than likely begin to notice
how each separate sphere begins faltering as a cause
of  the larger system -- what is commonly referred to
as the infrastructure. Take health services, for
instance. 
Can anyone, nowadays, be foolish enough to trust his
or her body to the so-titled 'licensed practioner' who
has worked his way up from the various service sector
enterprises in question, be it from McDonald's through
Med School? From my experience, this hapless soul who
may indeed have worked his way diligently, and in
earnest, through the system, is still, regrettably, in
my humble opinion, less a doctor with an intuitive
feel for the human condition, than he is a textbook
pill-pusher more interested in getting you out of his
office -- perhaps even with that same patent smile he
earned at McD's years ago -- and to move on and serve
his next patient/customer (these once 2 very separate
and distinct terms are now used almost
interchangeably, all because of the dominance of
commercialization). The end result, I find, is a
medical professional whose a far cry from, say, the
old-world physician type, who, with his gifted
insight, we are told, could tell what was wrong with a
patient just by sensing, that is, by getting a 'feel'
of the person's spiritual aura which surrounded his or
her body.

But I mustn't drift off like this as I really should
be looking for work. It is my duty, you know, as an
unemployed citizen of the capitalistic welfare state,
to be actively seeking employment, that is, if I wish
to remain eligible for assistance. Yet, where in this
hopeless mess should a guy like me start to look.
Everywhere I go its the same cancer. In the prevailing
economic system which caters to the blind mass,
nowhere, for certain, can a man contribute himself
authentically. Instead, whatever natural talent he
possesses is stripped fundamentally of itself, in
order that his mind and body may be reshaped
schematically to fit the corporate program. Only then
-- if he's fortunate enough to have held on to just a
smidgen of his essence -- can he return home to his
now even greater void. Nowhere can he escape these
powers that be. Not even in the public washroom is he
free to rest privately for a moment.

As crazy as all this may sound, it is not meant to be
a joke. There is much more at stake here than I think
most people are willing to admit, and, even if, to get
the point across, I must speak from personal
experience, should it liberate anyone in the slightest
way, myself included, then, I think, in the long run
it is all well worth it. So, then, I'll tell you a
true story that happened to me just last week. It
starts in a downtown-T.O. nightclub, where I happened
to notice an advertisement on the wall. How could I
miss it? The well-endowed damsel with the superimposed
text was placed at eye-level right above the urinal.
The message read: Various types wanted for XXX
video/dvd and live internet shows. No experience
necessary. Great income! Female-owned company. Have
fun working with beautiful models.

Now, you see, to fill my mandatory job-search quota
for the week, I just had to give them a call.
Moreover, I thought, in these frugal times why let the
family nuggets go to waste. So I managed to schedule
an appointment for the next day. It was in a small
commercial-residential house uptown. When I arrived,
there were 4 other males -- half my age and barely
legal -- waiting in line. (Ever wonder where your
teenage kids go? I mean, after that affordable meal at
McD's -- they're probably heading to some rave or
after-hours club where, lo and behold, they'll be
exposed to the same type of wall ads found in the
adult bars. This is the grand ol' capitalism
discriminating against nobody while it kindly urges
each and everyone of us to the furthest limits of a
repressive freedom. But I seem to be  getting ahead of
myself here.)

Anyway, as we sat there on the couches, a silent
television played at sampling of the company's
previously-made porn, while a ghettoblaster, placed on
the floor next to the TV, aired some trance -- or
whatever that hipster music is called now. As for the
porn, it was, without a doubt, pure ambiance, the
Muzak of the industry, with all the toys and dildos,
but virtually no story-content and hardly any dialogue
at all. This stuff was so formulaic it could almost
make some of that envelope-pushing porn, from the
'70's era, pass for art. And how on earth did all this
depravity, this endless sea of desire, come about in
the first place? My guess is that it came part and
parcel with an artificially-induced supply-and-demand
curve. But I don't think those curves were the type
the kid next to me came to see. He was almost passing
out on the couch now. He must have been up all night
at some rave. Eventually, he couldn't take it anymore
and just got up and left. The wisest of us all, maybe.

Well, when finally this women called me into her
office, I learned that the operation was actually a
subsidiary of an American-owned conglomerate, a
Canadian talent agency that went a step further by
converting its premises into a porn-production house,
thereby allowing its investors, again who were
primarily American, to take advantage of the low
Canadian dollar, not to mention the established
Canadian film-production industry, with its 'virgin'
pool of talent. Now, this was no fly-by-night
operation, but your seemingly well-respected
organization producing their fair share of everyday,
mainstream commercials (like those McNugget ads), that
was cashing in on a ready-made foreign facility which
could cheaply produce a generic type of porn, and
whose end-product could be easily shipped back to the
States where it would be distributed internationally.
As it goes on unannouced through the regular channels,
the entire operation, being legal, continues without a
flicker of contention from the local Canadians, who --
being traditionally more conservative, maybe even
prudish, compared to their American counterparts --
remain practically oblivious of it.

As for myself? Well, I left Ms. Casting Director, who
didn't even leave a card , a resume, and an old
headshot of me taken some 10 years ago. Then she gave
me the same line she gave to the rest: We'll call you
if we need you. Right. And as I got up to leave I
asked myself: Yeah, but will I show up? Probably so, I
thought. But the real question should have been: Will
I be able to get it up? I mean, how erotic can
porn-ambiance production be, when most of the time
your rotting away there in the sidelines, waiting for
the okay? Sounds as torturous as celibacy, if not
worse. Just think of sitting on a set for hours, where
real imagination and spontaneity is put on hold, and a
erect member attached to a torso, dead from the neck
up, takes its place. There is not a single drop of
masculinity that doesn't seem to be wasted here, say,
for example, on the next women's face. But, hey, 'it's
all good', right? Isn't that the popular saying. But
where could that have come from? Some Hollywood
sit-com perhaps. Or maybe it was from the mouth of
Chris Rock, the former minimum-waged McD employee
turned multi-millionaire comedian and actor. Now
here's a guy whose performances I've never seen or
heard, and of whom, I can say quite honestly, I have
no intention to. I think there's only so much of that
regular stand-up stich one can take in a lifetime, and
after you've had your share, you're probably better
off on your own, even if it means a future that may
hold no more in store than a loaf of bread and some
spam . . . check that . . . a loaf of bread, a
to-may-toe, some salt, and maybe, if you're lucky, a
dash of olive oil -- than to be force-fed another
jolly-schloppy, fun-filled happy meal. As far as I'm
concerned, the biggest joke is on the Chris Rock
success story itself -- though I've heard no more of
him than what I've already mentioned, I can just about
imagine it already --  that same old rehashed tale of
another noveau-riche guy, whose craft would take
nothing short of a miracle to separate it from the
rest, that is, if he really did wish to make it a
genuine art and not just another formulated by-product
of the lifeless service-obsessed world it came from.
Ever wonder why America's most popular porn star, Ron
Jeremy, whose claim to fame is having done some 4,000
women on screen, is also a top-drawing comic who could
sell out any Yuk Yuk's, from coast to coast? Could it
be because America is so deprived of authenticity it
no longer knows what's funny anymore, and so is
compelled to laugh at whatever and whenever it is
told? Could the American audience be so well trained
and behaved that it now laughs on cue, as promptly and
surely as its porn stars get off on cue? Could this
decadence be really a last, desperate call for a
semblance of anything more real -- as fleeting as it
may be -- than the next Coca Cola combo, served by
that oh so wholesome, respectable McD kid? (How one
can figure serving malnutritious food for personal
gain to be respectable, even after it makes some
people puke, I beg to know.)

Now if you're thinking that this is a half-baked
academic response from someone in their ivory tower,
think again -- my highest education came and still
comes from circumventing the University, while most
those around me have or still enter it. No, you'll be
more on, I think, if you consider this to be just
straight-up, man-to-man talk -- and when I say
'man-to-man' I mean that to include women, too, the
way the half-baked English language meant it to be
from the very beginning, before the feminists and
post-modernists got their hands on it, and sabotaged
it for more ill-got purposes than good. So how's that
to relieve the tension, ladies? Sure, I might not come
off as sweet as those fragrant roses you place in the
vase, but even if I could, with all the thorns by my
side, you're probably better off leaving me outside in
the yard, to wither away with the rest of the bunch,
while you go on doing whatever it is you do behind
those blinds.

Yet, isn't that the way it always was? No, I can't say
much has really changed between us. So, please,
please, don't take me too seriously, because, believe
it or not, if you still haven't noticed I'm really not
one to take part in active discussions -- academic or
otherwise. Remember, besides autodidacts, there are
ARTodidacts, and all kinds in life. So why worry about
sophistication? Come to think of it, why even worry
about the kids? Do you honestly think they worry about
you, or, moreover, need you? Surely you don't think
you're threats to join your ways or else is going to
change anybody's mind, including mine, do you? And yet
you still have the gall to say you would like "to take
an active role in the teaching of ordinary folk to
understand what we've so painstakingly thought out."
But have you ever considered that maybe there is
really nothing you can offer them to make them want to
'understand'. I mean have you ever stop to think that
perhaps the very core of your position was rotten form
the very start, and it is now on the verge of
catastrophe. And indeed such a catastrophe may be just
what we need today, that is, to bring down the many
more repressive walls in the world, and begin anew
without the biases and ostentatious behavior one is
bound to find at the dinner table. And why not YOU
learn the etiquette of the outsider, rather than your
wishful thinking of having him learn yours?. You know,
maybe, just maybe, we might be all a little better off
getting just a tad closer to earth, like sitting down
on the ground, the next time we think about eating
communally. Now I know you know some will say all this
is irrational, but, to me, many times it seems more
like it is them condemning irrationality who are
really being irrational. 

Then, again, what do I know? I'm just this loner whose
light of day may or may not shine on your side of the
fence. So why must we go on banging our heads against
the solid brick, thinking about survival in these
trouble times, and worrying about the end, when death
is no more than our definitive birthright to life?
Without it there would be no existence whatsoever.
Still, I can see why some may think they would be
better off dead, for from the standpoint of any type
of growth-oriented economy -- whether capitalistic or
socialistic -- if we were all to follow former U.S.
President Kennedy's advice, and believe wholeheartedly
in his philosophy of "think not what your country can
do for you, but what you can do for your country,"
then, by the simple math alone, it would be for many a
hell of a lot more sensible just to blow their brains
out and, thus, do their country a favor.

And so on that enlightened note I shall now leave
. . . you . . . all . . .

             . . . in . . . the . . . 

. . . midst . . .
                        . . . of . . . 

      --------- A McNUGGET CRISIS ----------
   "HOW MUCH WORK MUST YOU DO TO EARN 6 McNUGGETS?
     Get The Exclusive Inside Story Right Now In
              THE EXISTENTIAL TIMES:

INDEX-1: DAILY McNUGGET WISDOMFORUM CORRESPONDENCE: 
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INDEX-2: DAILY McNUGGGET HABERMAS-ML CORRESPONDENCE:
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INDEX-3: DAILY McNUGGET EXISTLIST CORRESPONDENCE:
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____________________________________________________

Copyright: 2002 Lewis Vella

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