Apocalypse September 2023
Start of Green Lane
Once bitten, twice shy. Three too many pints, one too many pubs. Motivated by unease. Unsafe. As they say, luck is when preparation meets opportunity. All down to individual agency, or all collective inevitability, or all chaos and random chance. If you want to see a man not dealing very well with the situation, look no further. Every little thing is hard won. Heightened aesthetic sensitivity, ideas and delusions of reference — attaching strong personal significance to innocuous events or mere coincidences. Believing you have an instinct for survival. The world is reset. Lightweight material, crumbles under pressure. Hollowed out feeling, quite relaxing cold. How much do you share? How present do you want to be in your everyday life?
The system of code is being invented by the scholar. It takes half a lifetime to get your head around the 20th century, to then look at what is actually no longer pertinent, as the age and time march later, on. History, literature, languages, etc. That’ll be useful surely. It seems preposterous. The internet has flattened time. Emboldened mediocrity. Lazy stupid takes, lowest common denominator. Skimming for gist. Visually oriented platforms. Quicker and easier and cheaper to buy new. Musk says it is infinitely preferable to be attacked by strangers on Twitter than indulge in the fake happiness of hide-the-pain-Instagram. Let’s argue, argue, argue. Or be surrounded by everybody who agrees with you. I went to try and start some work, but I got distracted. That’s absolutely fascinating. Onward.
Anything can happen if you stick to with it guys, know what I mean? This is stupid but I have to carry on. AI art — you have to look closely to find the imperfections. But the longer you do study it the worse it gets, the work deteriorates from initial glance response, the inverse of human art. Something kinda misogynistic about AI generated porn, if incel-type guys are getting turned on by not even needing a real woman. Don’t answer back! Terrible decisions when shown affection. Predator brutality, the adventuring is a metaphor for philandering. That’s part of the superlatative nature of the project. Performative outrage. Russell Brand, a misogynist in plain sight. Sixteen — you see how they’re a child when they’re voting but an adult when they’re consenting to sex? It’s okay to love something that’s problematic, as long as you acknowledge it. Or? But, you’re making a statement whether you intended to or not. Brand claims the government wants to censor him, for exposing too much of the trews. Throw a bit of elastic on it. Sooner or later, you see everything. Is it negligence, or lack of capacity, or do you play me false?
Paris Games ban Olympic athletes wearing headscarves. France is pretty nuts, eh? You must by law wear slinky swimwear, you must not wear an abaya to school. Secularism is under threat, is it? It is not a constraint, it is a liberty. Hence all the fashion police, hard lines and enforced traditions. Either no human culture is natural, or all of it. A baby was crowd-surfed at a Flo Rida concert. Employees at Denver airport have been known to prank the media by wearing lizard masks. Sea lions have escaped from Central Park Zoo. The floods aren’t because of climate, maybe it’s more of an infrastructure and drainage issue? Yes, exactly. Not being adaptive. Byzantine, no longer nimble. That as well, dipshits. Game drive. Long sequence. Moscow seeking arms supplies from Pyongyang. Meet with Putin on a remote base for weapons talks. Kim is likely to want to emphasise a sense of Russian backing, and may seek deals on arms sales, aid, and sending labourers to Russia. Really it’s embarrassing to own the gear if you aren’t creating with it, for then you’re just a material consumer. You cannot hope to understand it but you must believe it.
The concept of process — we edit our pasts to better serve our present needs. We recognise and greet people with an alien memory, we live from alien labour. Why don’t you just stop thinking about it? Why don’t you let it go, get over it? Why don’t you just not look at that? Half at least of all morality is negative and consists in keeping out of mischief. The Lord’s prayer is less than fifty words long, and six of those words are devoted to asking God not to lead us into temptation (1). Not in idling or alternative behaviours but in the established, mainstream corruption, unfairness, violence and exploitation. Stealing, in the legal sense as well as the illegal. Lying and defrauding, hoarding knowledge and awareness and blocking other people from its access. In digital media, disillusioned workers no longer able to create a distribution bottleneck. Soon there will be no way to strike. Well, that would put me out of a job, wouldn’t it?
Air displays do have a future, says leader of the Red Arrows. Chopper Rich. Personal jets, bulldozed slums. Sunak, Biden and other world leaders descend on Delhi for G20. One Earth, one family, one future. Height of privilege to never want to feel pain or discomfort… It’s all a bit too self-congratulatory. Kings are subject to fate, not luck. The social experiment was deemed to have failed and so has been abandoned. Your home may be at risk if you do not keep up the payments on your mortgage. Birthright. Enclosure, and then rent seeking. It’s a system that, when things kick off, seems to want to protect itself over doing the right thing. And that’s law enforcement itself. Those who resist the prevailing categories can hardly be surprised to fall through the cracks when the official histories come to be written. Taoiseach Varadkar says the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland are on the path to unification, predicting that a united Ireland will become a reality within his lifetime.
What’s the thing, what’s real? How big or uncomfortable a situation can we create that still feels believable? You only have to look at the front page of the papers to get that anger. It’s got to be open to multiple interpretations, otherwise it’s probably bullshit. Not subtle, interesting, good, or true (2). Think six impossible things before breakfast. Go a bit mad without losing your mind. Fuck, you’re laughing in the wrong way! In love with the melancholy beauty of existence. Hey, I always felt that we were destined for something great. Pessimism, though understandable, I would point out that optimism is the only potentially useful approach to this. We have to be able to imagine a future. It feels like there’s this alternative but there isn’t. The unpredictability of the emerging behaviour from deterministic processes leads to a perception of free will. I can’t choose what I’m being offered. If you don’t take the pill, you’ll feel worse. Not just scares. Fears. It’s in your house. It’s in your head. I am going to take your Lego and throw them into the river. Hereof nor you nor any of you may fail as you will answer the contrary at your Peril. Things are supposed to end. Have the fucking guts, while you’re ahead, to stop.
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(1) Aldous Huxley
(2) Jesse Armstrong
