Hi Lawrence,

quote:

... When I first read this 'mal adaption' I thought it was a misprint on 'male adaption'... Hehehe, I'm sure Riane Eisler would chuckle as well...

Indeed! Only her "male" in this instance would be the culturally conditioned patriarchal authoritarian male, not the soulful, spiritual one we may be trying to find. But I'd too agree, that male is destructively mal-adapted to the planet. It's time for a bit of language reorientation though. We need to move beyond the symbolic male/female cultural-dependent symbolism now that it's been called to our attention. I like being male, but I don't like the patriarchal male association whatsoever.

In regards to that intellectualized creation, what is your impression of objectifying your being and considering yourself to be a object of self ownership? I can only express my own immediate shock and my response of, but I am my self, I don't own me. Why be so complicated about it? Of course the answer to that can be figured out if one takes a minute...

quote:

Originally posted by _Ren:
Hi Lawrence,

In regards to that intellectualized creation, what is your impression of objectifying your being and considering yourself to be a object of self ownership?

... 'Ownership' -or even 'self-ownership'- is just another one of those clever framing devices that seems to be used so often which somehow makes us 'indentify' with a particular argument, or point of view, without really having to even 'intellectualize' it to any great degree at all... You say the right combinations of words, and people fall into line without ever even questioning the fact that they are being manipulated in the first place, by some very smooth operators indeed...

... Like 'God, Country, and Mom's apple pie.' After you recite the proper bendiction first, you can then rape and pillage with impunity, 'cause who could be against 'God, Country, and Mom's apple pie.' right?...

... I call it 'Sophist Rhetoric used to justify the 'Objective' Status Quo'... many others call it by its more familiar, and common name which is -'Hypocricy'... The Premier Sin of the human species, as far as I'm concerned...

quote:

I can only express my own immediate shock and my response of, but I am my self, I don't own me.

... Yes, but if you prayed to the God of the Market FORCES, and worshipped at the alter of the OWNERSHIP society, and knew that life was simply a titanic 'us and them' battle between the forces of 'good' that your team represents, and the forces of 'evil' -which is best epitomized by those who disagree with your very one-dimentional view of reality- well, life would be much simplier then. and if you were careful enough not to 'think too deeply' on these matters -you might not get any wiser, but you would always 'belong' to a certain 'majority' of the population, and that is just about 'all' that seemingly 'half' of the population seems to want anyway...

... Now -as an aside- does the 'red pill/blue pill' analogy that is described in the movie, 'The Matrix' also correspond to our very own 'red state/blue state' metaphor as well? I mean if one takes the 'blue pill' is that the equivalent of 'waking up' to more expansive 'blue state, (not 'blue meme') liberal, progressive, unconventional truths and realities?' And will taking the proverbial 'red pill' be the similar equivalent of maintaining ones own, personal ignorance, and staying 'asleep' to the whole Matrix in the first place?... Just curious...

quote:

Why be so complicated about it?

... Because that is the only way the Matrix -or the Status Quo- can continue to maintain the illusion -with constant reinforcement. Otherwise, even the blind will begin to feel around in the darkness and discover one or two clues, if only by accident... Ohhh, I know somebody said something very wise once about the idea of 'constant vigilance' -I just can't recall it at the moment...

quote:

Of course the answer to that can be figured out if one takes a minute...

... What, 'constant vgilance?'... oh,oh, yeah... "Why be so complicated about it?"... yeah, that was it...
... and of course the answer to that can be figured out in only a minute, 'IF'...

... 'If' you take the metaphorical 'Blue State Pill' and wake yer ass up!...

quote:

Lawrence:

... 'Ownership' -or even 'self-ownership'- is just another one of those clever framing devices that seems to be used so often which somehow makes us 'indentify' with a particular argument, or point of view, without really having to even 'intellectualize' it to any great degree at all... You say the right combinations of words, and people fall into line without ever even questioning the fact that they are being manipulated in the first place, by some very smooth operators indeed...

Just to be clear about word meaning here, to frame something is well within the meaning of "intellectualize" as I was intending it. In this case, to make an object of oneself is an intellectualizing process. It's a necessary first step in a series of intellectualizations that ends with a framed idea from which many knee jerk reactions, including blasting the life out of others in the name of this intellectualized concept, can be self intellectualized as ok, if you get the gist... Yes, hypocrisy could be a resulting mental condition.

Other than that, I'd appears that the way you went off on what I little I said, you must have had a similar gut reaction to the video.

By the way, here's a link to the site from where a link to the video can also be found:

The Adventures of Jonathan Gullible

And what better recommendation for the material on the site than one from the highest of the high priests on the Alter of the Ownership Society, Milton Friedman, Nobel Laureate in Economics:

"It certainly presents basic economic principles in a very simple and intelligible form. It is an imaginative and very useful piece of work."

Ren - Regarding the slothful reasoning in the "basic property ownership concept video", I first thought this deserved it's own thread in perhaps a different catagory like "Last Hours", or "Economics", but it actually fits well with the title of this thread "The sign of the times."

I found it interesting that before you posted this link I had recently gone to the local library to check out the book 'The Science of Good and Evil', and a few books over from it was Ayn Rands 'The Virtue of Selfishness', so I checked that out too.

The video you sent seems based on the same flawed thinking of Ayn Rand. Here's an excerpt that underlies the basic (flawed) premise:

"Yet the exact meaning and dictionary definition of the word 'selfishness' is: 'concern with one's own interests'. This concept does 'not' include a moral evaluation."

**She's wrong about the "exact definition", which includes 'qualifier words' like: "chiefly" concerned with ones own interests, and she's wrong about the "moral evaluation." "Selfishness" is a moral evaluation.

There's nothing wrong with being concerned with one's self interests, but there is something wrong with thinking this can be done sanely or wisely by excluding the needs of others which 'share' the same environment with you. Ignoring reality isn't a sign of intelligence, and it's also not in one's actual "self-interest" to do so. But that's precisely what's going on when a person thinks they can ignore the interconnected/interdependent relationships we all have with other humans and the environment, and the actions that are called for to maintain a healthy relationship, when they act in this selfish, confused manner. But I'm sure I'm not telling you something you don't already know. I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say on the issue.

Regards - Howard

quote:

There's nothing wrong with being concerned with one's self interests, but there is something wrong with thinking this can be done sanely or wisely by excluding the needs of others which 'share' the same environment with you. Ignoring reality isn't a sign of intelligence, and it's also not in one's actual "self-interest" to do so. But that's precisely what's going on when a person thinks they can ignore the interconnected/interdependent relationships we all have with other humans and the environment, and the actions that are called for to maintain a healthy relationship, when they act in this selfish, confused manner.

Hi Howard, how are you?
I absolutely agree with the above statement. Ignoring the real message/reason of our actions is destructively taking from this planet in a
huge way. And we can only be in denial about reality for so long, it will always come back and bite us in the bum.

Hello usha - I seem to be doing fairly well, thanks.

I hope you're doing well also.

Regards - Howard

Thanks Howard, I'm great but I'll get better

Andger, Usha,

Fine here. How you two doing? Well I hope!!

I haven't been following this thread although I did read it when Chris started it so I'm sorry if this takes the discussion in a direction not intended. I just picked it up again to say hi to Kenny, so, Hi Kenny.

quote:

Originally posted by _Ren:
Hi Lawrence,

In regards to that intellectualized creation, what is your impression of objectifying your being and considering yourself to be a object of self ownership?

Lawrence and Ren, when you talk about ownership of self, you are making the distinction between being taking responsibility for your life and being able to enjoy the fruits of your efforts and slavery in which neither responsibility or personal achievement exist.

When you say that "I am myself" that is always true on some metaphysical plane with which I am not concerned, being who I am.

Hi Sawdust,

quote:

When you say that "I am myself" that is always true on some metaphysical plane with which I am not concerned, being who I am.

The discussion is really about how different people create a world in their mind through different "metaphysical" mental processes. Then how that individual world is shared with others who are doing much the same thing to create a certain type of shared society.

For instance, one doesn't have think "I am myself", one just is. No mental objectification, which is an intellectualized process, need occur. It's that turning oneself into an object that can then be considered property that is of interest. So this is part of an examination of thought and an attempt to identify fundamentals of thought that has entered the discussion.

Ayn Rand's philosophy of Objectivism and all it's inherent ramifications may come into this discussion now that Howard has introduced her "Virtue of Selfishness". Howard also linked a discussion where a Native American points out how this process within Western culture leads to a different perception of nature than he claims is found in indigenous world views.

Ren

quote:

The discussion is really about how different people create a world in their mind through different "metaphysical" mental processes. Then how that individual world is shared with others who are doing much the same thing to create a certain type of shared society.

For instance, one doesn't have think "I am myself", one just is. No mental objectification, which is an intellectualized process, need occur. It's that turning oneself into an object that can then be considered property that is of interest. So this is part of an examination of thought and an attempt to identify fundamentals of thought that has entered the discussion.

The best bit of advice anyone ever gave me:

quote:

You don't think yourself into a new way of living, you live yourself into a new way of thinking.

Don,

Were you a republican back in the sixties too? If not, what happened? What caused the leap to the dark side?

Kenny,

Nice to see you again.

Chris, here is the short story of my life.

Out of high school, I enrolled at Bowling Green State University. I spent more time in the bars than in class and didn't last long.

After I dropped out of the Bowling Green, I got drafted. I spent 14 months in Korea and returned to Toledo when I got out of the Army. I enrolled at the University of Toledo and lived on the GI bill for the next few years. I started what some might say was a commune which at one point had 17 people living in a three bedroom house and a huge attic. We supplemented our income with some really strong homegrown. We traveled to Washington for the big war protest, I think it was about 72 or 73. Back then, everyone was a hippy.

After college, I sold everything I owned and my girl and I went to Mexico for a couple months. We traveled to Orlando after Mexico and then visited St. Pete where we moved in with friends and I ran out of money.

I started my first company with my roommate at the time in about '75.

My goal when I left Toledo was to drop out of society, own a little piece of land, grow my own food and hang out with my friends listening to music and getting high. By 1980 I had a federal ID number, a bunch of employees that depended on me for their lively hood and was working 80 hours a week.

I kept that up for about 20 years, had some success, had some failure made a small fortune, lost it, made it again, lost it again and hopefully learned enough by my mistakes that this time I won't have to start from scratch again.

I've always been pretty confident in my ability and when I quit smoking pot in the 70's, I unplugged my head phones, got off the couch and realized that if I was ever going to be independent I had to do something to achieve it.

Someone told me once that when you are young if you aren't liberal, you don't have a heart. When you get older if you don't become conservative you don't have a head. The truth is that the Republicans have become much to liberal for me so I can't identify with them. My transformation is probably a result of years of taking responsibility for myself and creating employment for hundreds of people over the years. All I want from the government is for them to get out of my way. It's pretty much where I started. My hair is just shorter.

Sawdust, that sound like one hell of a life story. I be you are not a boring person.

Miles, if you walked a mile in my shoes, you'd be a mile away and you'd have my shoes. That story just scratches the surface.

quote:

Originally posted by Sawdust:

Lawrence and Ren, when you talk about ownership of self, you are making the distinction between being taking responsibility for your life and being able to enjoy the fruits of your efforts and slavery in which neither responsibility or personal achievement exist.

… Well first of all, let me say ‘thank you’ Sawdust, for not simply dismissing these ‘interpretations’ as the mindless babble of a couple of liberal prognosticators, and for ‘opening up’ an opportunity for either one of us to try again and make our point a little more concretely… Howard will be pleased…

… When I initially read your question, and thought it over, the first thing that came to mind was that ‘no, that’s not I was talking about at all.’ What I was talking about was how the very concept of ‘ownership’ itself is just another one of those catchwords –or to use the more contemporary phrase, ‘framing’ devices- which has the desired affect of packing lots and lots of emotional ‘identification’ into said word –or framing words- much like advertisers use catchy slogans –or colorful logos- to get consumers to ‘identify’ with their various products and services… ‘Ownership’ is just one such word that is very heavily identified with republican, conservative ideology, followed by corresponding ‘feel good emotions’ of a certain long established tradition of ‘conventional wisdom’ as well as a certain tried and true system of values. Much like ‘commerce, free-enterprise, the profit motive, market forces,’ and even the word like ‘freedom’ has been drilled into our collective psyche’s to such a degree, that whenever we hear any of these particular words, we automatically ‘think, or imagine’ republican, conservative, status quo, instead of liberal, democrat, and unconventional… Simply because we have been ‘conditioned’ through deliberate ‘framing,’ ownership becomes the lexicon of the neocon…

… I also added the fact that it also seems to playing on the innate desires of most of us on the planet to feel like we are a part of something greater than ourselves, and that we can somehow ‘belong’ to a much larger community or whole, and all that is required of us –is that we simply believe in the wisdom of proven intellectual minds, much greater than our own…

… I also tried to suggest, once again –this time with a little sarcasm- that this very concept of ‘objectivism’ itself, where phenomenon a is divided into a subject/object dichotomy, is chiefly where this whole problem lies in the first place. When we divide our world up into ‘subject/object’ whereby ‘we’ the subject, find ourselves miraculously ‘separate ‘ from all objects –well, it’s not too hard to imagine just how we would perceive another group of fellow Americans who just happen to see life through a slightly different lens of interpretive reasoning. Liberal separate from conservative, democrat separate from republican, subject separate from object… And I would guess that it is ‘here’ that we enter that ‘metaphysical plane’ of which you hold so little interest…

quote:

“When you say that "I am myself" that is always true on some metaphysical plane with which I am not concerned, being who I am.”

… Another typical framing device that I see all too frequently is when this ‘subject/object’ divide gets artificially stretched to even its own already exaggerated extremes, when the loyal opposition takes a seemingly benign argument like ‘ownership of self, taking responsibility for your life, and being able to enjoy the fruits of your efforts’ –and then takes it upon themselves to presenting the ‘opposite’ of this rosy scenario with the concept of ‘slavery’ itself- is just another primary example of how this divisiveness continues over and over without end… Now, I just used a few paragraphs myself, to describe what I thought ‘ownership of self’ looked like to me, once it was stripped down of its ‘framed’ pretenses. It doesn’t look to be anything like just another word for ‘taking responsibility for ones life, and enjoying the fruits thereof’ –but I am beginning to see how that slavery metaphor might apply, now that you mention it…

Don,

Interesting story. You want govt. off your back, I want corporations off mine. Go figure!

Hi Lawrence,

Good ramble, and I'm pleased to see this concept of self ownership is starting get deconstructed in various ways so we can do a little “perspective analysis” on it. And I too thank you, Sawdust, for joining and adding your perspective. I think I'll keep working at it myself in pieces instead of one big chunk which so few like to read, anyway.

The subject/object dichotomy you've identified, Lawrence, is a good call. I suggest it's a good analytical device for revealing the more subconscious elements of these symbolic frames you've identified, like "personal responsibility", "being responsible/taking responsibility", associating "liberal/conservative" with these concepts, just to identify a few of the potential linguistic tricks we can play on ourselves with this use of language. I'm focusing on these specific ones because I found that Sawdust seemed to emphasize them, and you've picked up on it in an interesting way, worth a few more turns on the dialectic spiral, I feel.

Sawdust, I enjoyed reading your quick snapshot of your life story, and I doubt any of us can present the intricacies of our step by step process in anything short of a novel form. What's interesting if we attempt a brief historical summary is what we offer in terms of an underlying philosophy about why we are where we are now. Two things came out of interest to me for the discussion. One was the implicit frame of liberal and conservative: You were liberal when you were sitting around on a couch, taking bong hits and living in a commune (which you organized, the ever leader even as liberal lurking in there), living with no purpose but sheer irresponsible pleasure, and you were conservative when you got up off your ass and began to organize your life and provide jobs for people, thus taking responsibility for yourself. So we get, doing drugs, living in a commune, having a heart equals liberal, and we have picking up a hammer, putting together a business, taking responsibility for self and others, using one's brain equals conservative, based on the pattern of your life.

Is that fair? Probably not, but that's what happens with framing unfortunately, it creates a kind of black and white picture.

quote:

… Another typical framing device that I see all too frequently is when this ‘subject/object’ divide gets artificially stretched to even its own already exaggerated extremes, when the loyal opposition takes a seemingly benign argument like ‘ownership of self, taking responsibility for your life, and being able to enjoy the fruits of your efforts’ –and then takes it upon themselves to presenting the ‘opposite’ of this rosy scenario with the concept of ‘slavery’ itself- is just another primary example of how this divisiveness continues over and over without end… Now, I just used a few paragraphs myself, to describe what I thought ‘ownership of self’ looked like to me, once it was stripped down of its ‘framed’ pretenses. It doesn’t look to be anything like just another word for ‘taking responsibility for ones life, and enjoying the fruits thereof’ –but I am beginning to see how that slavery metaphor might apply, now that you mention it…

In relation to the slavery metaphor, the first flash I got when looking at this self ownership metaphor, and this conservative/liberal duality was a correlation with the once predominantly Democratic Southerners, who once hated the Republican Party because of Lincoln and the Civil War, who have been persuaded by the Reagan based imagery of an “ownership society” to become Republicans. So while they can’t own others, at least they can own themselves. Small time slavery, but still… It was just one of those flashes that make me laugh, nothing serious.

In regards to what Howard brought up about Ayn Rand’s tome on the “Virtue of Selfishness”, I have a few thoughts. I was exploring the Ayn Rand’s philosophy in high school when I read that piece, and my gut reaction to it was, in the end, to reject it. I remember it fairly well, because that period was where I was beginning to intellectualize about things, and turn preconceptions around in my mind. So the idea of seeing “selfishness” with it’s bad connotations in a different way appealed to me. But in the end, after reading it, I found it violated something deep in my upbringing that has to do with a natural desire to pitch in and do my share where I see a need. Separating out other peoples needs as Rand does and making them not mine to be concerned about somehow just couldn’t work for me. That doesn’t mean I want to go around helping everybody out or that I extend it to some sort of welfare state scenario, but that I see people trying and my hear goes out and I want to help. According to Sawdust’s formula, I don’t really have a heart because I wasn’t “liberal” when I was young. And now I don’t have a brain, I guess, because I’m not really conservative.

At the same time, I was living in a very Republican family environment back in Michigan. It’s still predominantly Republican, but not lock step conservative. They’re kind of old fashioned, not very political about it. Personal responsibility was not even an issue. Everybody just pitched in. I did what I did to keep our 250 acre farm going because it needed to be done. My father and I would drop what we were doing and go help my uncle unload a semi truck of sod when his sometimes not very dependable help didn’t show up – he had a landscape business. Sometimes he’d come and help us. There was never any money involved, we didn’t rent each other’s bodies. We were all kind of self employed small business types, my father was a Rodale enthusiast (organic farming did not begin with a bunch of folks wearing Birkenstocks and eating granola bars), thus one of the first of the organic oriented farmers. Not the thing to be back then (late fifties, early sixties). I guess the thing about objectifying self interest, and then the idea of personal responsibility is then you can create a story that makes it look like once you weren’t, and then you were. In that sense, I never “was”, except all my life I’ve been told by various people at various times I’m “too” responsible, I need to lighten up. I still don’t give it much thought in regards to who or what I am.

If there’s any real point to this, it might be related to the advice Chris says someone gave him:

quote:

You don't think yourself into a new way of living, you live yourself into a new way of thinking.

And maybe it doesn’t hurt to think about what that is if you get there.

Now, was that a "big chunk"?

Well, Ren and Lawrence, you both said a lot. Chris said a lot too but didn't say any extra words.

A couple observations. I never intended to use slavery as a metaphor. I meant that either you owned your life or someone else owned it in which case you were a slave, in real bondage with actual metal three dimensional chains, which unfortunately still exists in some parts of the world. I didn't mean "wage slave" or any other conceptual machinations that are thrown around so loosely here. I didn't mean I am me, he, she or it. I hope that clears it up.

Secondly Ren what I said about myself was just in response about Chris's question about turning to the dark side. I never intended to illustrate anyone else's transformation other than my own. There are just as many stories as there are people and everyone is different. I will tell you that my political philosophy was largely a result of peer pressure. When I lived in Toledo, we all thought we were part of the "revolution". Remember that? When I moved away from most of my revolutionary friends and started living in the real world, many of my opinions changed. Many of those same revolutionaries who stayed in Toledo are just as liberal as when I left, possibly more so. They also still smoke lots of pot curiously and for the most part, we are still friends.

Lawrence you made an interesting observation about emotive language. I never thought of the word ownership as an emotive word. I find it interesting that you and Ren apparently do. It probably says something about the way we all live although I'm not sure what.

Chris, Proctor and Gamble never sent OSHA to inspect my plant and doesn't take money out of my check unless I buy toothpaste. I have made my peace with that.

Dear Chris:
I say thank goodness for people like Abbe Hoffman, who could raise our consiousness, to challenge the system, and what it means. I thrived on this, and others, like John Lennon, and to think of Peace, and the flowers as well. The images of young people putting flowers into the guns, have been most inspiring. So therefore, I think maybe, there is hope for us, and humankind.
PEACE & BLESSINGS!

quote:

Secondly Ren what I said about myself was just in response about Chris's question about turning to the dark side. I never intended to illustrate anyone else's transformation other than my own.

Sawdust, everyone's story is filled with metaphor, it can't be helped. Most writers don't sit down with a head full of metaphors and start intentionally writing stories with them. It's like painting, you may even discover the metaphors as you paint and work with them.

I'm not opposed to metaphor or a clever turn of phrase. Often I just say what I mean however and leave the painting to the painters.

Hello again, everyone. In regards to 'living myself into a new way of thinking': Chris, could you remind me where to find that 'recipe' you had posted, back when, about a 'health liver cleanse'? I'm curious as to any background on that / your experiences with it, also. Thanks, K.

Don, Usha, Kenny, Andger, Mark, Chris and everyone else I've forgotten

I picked up this thread to say hi. I'm back on line. After being in business for almost 2 years I can now afford a computer and broadband (as well as living in paradise that is)

Nice to be back,
claire