Teaching juveniles to learn how to say "No!" and "Why?" to authority is among the best gifts, and as a parent you get to do that by example, which makes the lesson ring true.
Have to admit, I first read it as "I'm going down singing." and though "What a cool twist to the phrase, that's even more to spit in the eye of the enemy".
Building on that, what would be a good ditty to sing in the face of an oppressor? Something to really grind it home just how banal and pointless they are.
My pick would be a song by a swedish singer, Bengt Sändh: "På rutinens brant". The title is a pun on "rutin/routine" and "ruin/ruin", from an idiom "on the edge of ruin". It's about how all fascist states are dependent on the civil servant just doing rote routine work without ever thinking what exactly he/she is doing, and people snitching on eachother instead of sticking together.
I can't find the proper place in the thread to comment, so I'll just put it here: Fuck you, Gutter. Even though you are younger than me, you are the older sister I wish I had.
As I've probably mentioned in past writing, Fathermouth was a serious alcoholic for most of my life, and especially while I was growing up. Mostly times when he was drunk were scary, because he was quite dangerous. But occasionally he would act merely confusing, or sometimes funny, and once in a very great while, usually when he'd stopped before going way too far, it made him simply gregarious and loose-tongued.
On one such occasion, I asked him what the significance of my name was- how he and mom had chosen it. I think I was maybe 8 or 9? Anyway, he told me that it had been the female protagonist of one of his favorite books growing up, <redacted>, because she had been the big sister to all the other main characters. He was extremely close to his older sister, who was (IIRC) at least 12 years older than him, and said many times that "having a big sister is the best thing in the world."
He had planned for me to be the big sister of an extensive brood he would have with Mothermouth that never came, because he could barely talk her into having me before it was (to her great relief) too late for more.
I think about that from time to time. I am the product of many regrets. But I enjoy the role when life presents it.
Ah, drunken fathers. Mine was a useless drunk, so I guess I got away easy. I'm glad you have a relationship with him now. Ours was out of our lives, gratefully, until he died about 5 years ago. I just feel bad for my brother, who didn't have a stable father figure in his life growing up.
Incidentally, there are decent studies that conclude that spite is the strongest human motivator over time (only have to get past fear which does not last indefinitely). So probably a good choice! i have LOTS of spite left in me.
Exactly! I've told a few folks that wonder how I'm still alive...that I do so simply to spite the couple people who profoundly wish for my demise. Its enough! 😁
Things change and they don’t change back. I suppose a good why is pure curiosity. Survive to see what’s coming. If you don’t, that’s OK. There’s value (amusement?) in the effort.
Might pull a Mark Twain myself. Wait for Halley’s Comet then shuffle off.
While unregulated markets can be a problem, it really takes central government meddling where it ought not to really enable crony capitalism, rent seeking and horrors such as compelled "vaccination" or arms shipments generating huge fake profits. A fake injection that AT BEST is of net neutral benefit shouldn't be profitable. Sending armed vehicles to Ukraine to be blown up by Russian artillery should not be profitable. It's all so parasitic and it wouldn't be possible without be possible without centralised corruption
2008 was the perfect illustration. The banks got bailed, no one was reprimanded, fired or prosecuted and the banks are being sold back to the sector at a loss after all their losses were absorbed by the taxpayer.
It seems the promise of centralised control is just too strong for some to ignore, despite the absolute horrors we witnessed in just the last century alone.
GM, Another gem from you. You are perhaps the most underrated voice on Substack. We need to figure out what to do about that in 2023.
Incidentally, early in your article you have the word "story" where you mean "store". Might as well make it perfect.
Have a wonderful Holiday. May 2023 see the end of all of your health and economic issues and the discovery/emergence of a long list of really good things.
Re the people in the villages off the techno grid thing, I never really understood why in Brave New World the state let the savages stay on the reservation... Maybe as a way to scare the society like as an implicit threat that they could he banished there or just as a way to contrast the primitive lifestyle with the sanitized painless one they created?
It only made sense if they were sufficiently squalid as to be a cautionary tale. Why would you allow a successful refusenik colony to show that you don't need the state?
Well, you don't see many 1st world people moving to Africa or some random villages in a third world country to live. Hell, you don't see many people moving to rural areas (perhaps over represented among our online click.) I suppose it makes sense that there would be a much lower standard of living option around, just as a safety valve to get the most likely to go ax mad out of the general population on their own. Most people don't value freedom as much as soymilk latte or whatever, so you probably could point to "look how those savages live. you want freedom like them?" People say that shit with regards to Somalia all the time to minarchists.
There was nowhere to flee to in the gigantic and backwards USSR. It will be much easier to gain complete control today. Stand and resist where you are now. It is folly to believe that the Masters of the Universe would allow such pockets to exist, except perhaps as a living history exhibit.
Maybe pick up some of the Tom Brown survival books, watch a few series on people living in the wilderness and plan to live a life of nomadic stealth. Perhaps the overloads will send their killer drones to find and eliminate you, but you took your shot at a real 1st world problem. Eventually perhaps it is inevitable that humans will 'evolve' to some sort of AI machine. They will eventually have the ability to travel to worlds that can support the organisms that preceded them and in an act of reparation or just curiosity will plant some of that preserved DNA on one or more of those planets. Anticipating that they will return some day to see what the outcome is. Perhaps that is why we are here now. Personally, I think the microorganisms will win and something different will happen with the next round. Perhaps t.rex will make an encore appearance. Who knows, but in the meantime I'm sticking around for the show. Merry Christmas 🎄 and Happy Solstice to all the GMs.
I just don't see those real jobs that you and the clan are doing being automated away--food production, animal husbandry, plumbing, mechanics, truck driving, electricians, carpentry ... But i agree with you about UBI. It's a trick.
I've heard that this solstice is the turning point of a 13 yr cycle, from some, and a 26,000 yr cycle from others. I'm going with the first because I can wrap my brain around it. I don't think the evil villains are as smart or omnipotent as they're cracked up to be. Bad shit is happening and it will definitely get worse before it gets better. But it will get better, imo.
Needs are met in order from bottom level 6 to top level 1.
level 6:
cyber existentialism / virtual presence / social media and mainstream media diet / multi intraday feedings / blue screen sustenance
level 5:
narrative compliance / safety from persecution
level 4:
group think / comfort of belonging in the herd
level 3:
cancelation of contrarian individuals / exercise of individual power backed by group power / dehumanization to defer cognitive dissonance of inhumanity
level 2:
virtue signaling / self-promotion and manufactured self-esteem
level 1:
aspirational authoritarianism / self-actualization via positional authority in a totalitarian hierarchy
Yule Tidings, GM, to you and your kin! The Sun,bringer if Light and Life,is witnessed again as we enter the crystalline stillness of Capricorn season. We evaluate, plan,and ready our mental and physical bodies within the womb of winter for the exploration and growth that comes after deprivation.
Refection
As per usual,I enjoyed your post. Pictorial and verbal. It always leaves me to ponder, and I enjoy the effects it has on Gutterballs.
I'll try to get back and say something...cogent? You know, not my usual. As if. 🤣
The two birds sharing a meal ... out of necessity?
Do they use a lot of heavy-duty pesticides around there?
Around here, the windmill farms and the over-use of the wrong pesticides are, I suspect, responsible for a lot of wildlife die-off. [NOT 'climate change']
Pollinators to songbirds and rabbits, we seem to be losing them.
And the hawks around here are hell-bent on getting hold of our chickens. [But that's normal, I'm just kvetching.]
I suspect small game is getting harder to come by. Patterns change by necessity. Those who can't or won't change ... well ...
Thankfully, public sentiment around here has spared us wind or solar farms. They are aggressively voted down by all the townships around here.
And the majority of our local farms do not use aggressive/industrial-scale pesticides.
Bald eagles and ravens simply don't normally range here. It was highly unusual to see them at all. Our only raptors are sparrowhawks and vultures and our corvids are crows. And the raptors around here don't tolerate the crows, and when the crows are in sufficient numbers they run off the raptors.
Plenty of deer and unfortunately plenty of roadkill. The fawn was probably the latter.
Wonder what drove them into your area? Actually could partly be ahead of a cold front (still not 'climate change'). There certainly is a nasty one doing a big sit and spin right now.
I'm very happy for you that you have neither wind farms nor the nastier pesticides near you.
Off on a different tangent -- why don't you have a 'buy me a coffee' type option?
i think this idea that AI will take all the jobs is for people who work in offices, you cant get AI to fix your plumbing or dig up roads to repair power lines etc.
>> you cant get AI to fix your plumbing or dig up roads to repair power lines etc.
You absolutely can and it is already in the works.
But honestly the biggest blow to the working class will be automated freight.
Yes, there is always something to do. There is not always something to do to sustain yourself on. The Great Depression is pretty good evidence that jobs can just go away, and you just die.
Jobs can go away but the work doesn't, and the work is what sustains. In the GD, the houses still existed when people were made homeless. Who moved into them? I've been wondering this for awhile. Did they get sold to new immigrants? I forget if it's Ben Franklin or someone contemporary who says that a lack of money in an economy is like saying you can't build a table because you don't have enough inches. It's a concept. When things get bad enough, we'll take that concept back. Or ... I'll just keep talking to myself about how we could do that for the next 10,000 years ;-)
>> In the GD, the houses still existed when people were made homeless. Who moved into them? I've been wondering this for awhile.
They were generally repossessed by the banks and were usually sold by said banks to the nascent Big Ag.
This was also the era in which John Deere was born, which was the first American company to sell their merchandise using private (as opposed to needing a bank loan) financing, which allowed some farmers to survive the GF with their farms intact as they were extended credit for farm equipment when no credit was basically available anywhere.
My dad was a farm kid during the GD. They never bought a tractor nor other internal combustion engine driven equipment. They use d animal labor and plows. They had a mule and cart, too.
When their city relatives ended up destitute, they fixed up the lost a bit so there would be room.
Strange to even imagine such social cohesion within familes anymore.
edit to clarify: they did not "fix up the lost a bit", they fixed up the loft (as in hayloft) a bit ...
Some of the old Grange songs from that era are "Do Not Mortgage the Farm!" Bank credit, like money, is an artificial construct like inches. I'm not saying that credit shouldn't exist. Credit creation is the pumping heart of an economy, without it the blood doesn't circulate. If the purpose of issuing debt and credit was sustaining the community, we wouldn't be vulnerable to banks and corporations who can repossess the land, houses and jobs.
the great depression was a way to bankrupt large parts of industry so the powerful could buy their businesses very cheap. it was very successful in its aims
I'm going down swinging. Despite my selfishness as a young adult my purpose is closely linked to my children now.
So I feel like I have no choice.
It is the right thing for me to do.
I do NOT accept the new normal.
Teaching juveniles to learn how to say "No!" and "Why?" to authority is among the best gifts, and as a parent you get to do that by example, which makes the lesson ring true.
Have to admit, I first read it as "I'm going down singing." and though "What a cool twist to the phrase, that's even more to spit in the eye of the enemy".
Building on that, what would be a good ditty to sing in the face of an oppressor? Something to really grind it home just how banal and pointless they are.
You Are My Sunshine, but Johnny Cash’s version.
😂😂
Had to listen to it, good choice.
My pick would be a song by a swedish singer, Bengt Sändh: "På rutinens brant". The title is a pun on "rutin/routine" and "ruin/ruin", from an idiom "on the edge of ruin". It's about how all fascist states are dependent on the civil servant just doing rote routine work without ever thinking what exactly he/she is doing, and people snitching on eachother instead of sticking together.
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBxz-5BDRT4] It's in swedish, obviously :)
Spite is a fine why. I wholly approve of this.
Pretty much the only plan I've got.
I can't find the proper place in the thread to comment, so I'll just put it here: Fuck you, Gutter. Even though you are younger than me, you are the older sister I wish I had.
Fuck you too, tough guy. :)
Funny story about "older sister."
As I've probably mentioned in past writing, Fathermouth was a serious alcoholic for most of my life, and especially while I was growing up. Mostly times when he was drunk were scary, because he was quite dangerous. But occasionally he would act merely confusing, or sometimes funny, and once in a very great while, usually when he'd stopped before going way too far, it made him simply gregarious and loose-tongued.
On one such occasion, I asked him what the significance of my name was- how he and mom had chosen it. I think I was maybe 8 or 9? Anyway, he told me that it had been the female protagonist of one of his favorite books growing up, <redacted>, because she had been the big sister to all the other main characters. He was extremely close to his older sister, who was (IIRC) at least 12 years older than him, and said many times that "having a big sister is the best thing in the world."
He had planned for me to be the big sister of an extensive brood he would have with Mothermouth that never came, because he could barely talk her into having me before it was (to her great relief) too late for more.
I think about that from time to time. I am the product of many regrets. But I enjoy the role when life presents it.
Ah, drunken fathers. Mine was a useless drunk, so I guess I got away easy. I'm glad you have a relationship with him now. Ours was out of our lives, gratefully, until he died about 5 years ago. I just feel bad for my brother, who didn't have a stable father figure in his life growing up.
Incidentally, there are decent studies that conclude that spite is the strongest human motivator over time (only have to get past fear which does not last indefinitely). So probably a good choice! i have LOTS of spite left in me.
Exactly! I've told a few folks that wonder how I'm still alive...that I do so simply to spite the couple people who profoundly wish for my demise. Its enough! 😁
Agree!
Throw a million random words into the right Gutter and out comes magnificence.
Bravo
One of the most thought-provoking articles I've read this year
Merry Christmas GM to you and all your Gutterkin
Things change and they don’t change back. I suppose a good why is pure curiosity. Survive to see what’s coming. If you don’t, that’s OK. There’s value (amusement?) in the effort.
Might pull a Mark Twain myself. Wait for Halley’s Comet then shuffle off.
i'll be 85 next time halley shows up
I'll be 90 and I plan on being around for it!!!
Guttermouth Halley Comet Meetup confirmed
I like this idea. We can all wear matching sneakers and tell people we're a doomsday cult.
I always wanted the unsettling ability of being in a cult without having to be a fucking idiot.
Not an actual cult?
Awe. :(
I mean, we can do a real cult, I just don't expect anyone here to go for it.
Fun fact: in my high school year book I was voted "most likely to have the ATF storm my cult compound." (this was around the year of Waco)
Like you said; she won't be able to help herself out of spite!
im sure by then we can do a fly by
91 actually...:)
oh no i draw the line at 90, im not hanging out with some ancient 91 yr old
No! I have always learned from the youngins'
LOLOLOL
I’ll be 80. We can do it!
When's that due?
2061
I'm going to be 95. You guys better plan on lending me an elbow to lean on...
Go full cyborg :)
But....I always envisioned being Sarah Conor...not the Terminator...🤔
The third one in the phone book
Oh crap, I'd be 103.
Never mind.
I'll bequeath the Gutterballs my ashes.
🤣
While unregulated markets can be a problem, it really takes central government meddling where it ought not to really enable crony capitalism, rent seeking and horrors such as compelled "vaccination" or arms shipments generating huge fake profits. A fake injection that AT BEST is of net neutral benefit shouldn't be profitable. Sending armed vehicles to Ukraine to be blown up by Russian artillery should not be profitable. It's all so parasitic and it wouldn't be possible without be possible without centralised corruption
2008 was the perfect illustration. The banks got bailed, no one was reprimanded, fired or prosecuted and the banks are being sold back to the sector at a loss after all their losses were absorbed by the taxpayer.
It seems the promise of centralised control is just too strong for some to ignore, despite the absolute horrors we witnessed in just the last century alone.
Your random thoughts, such as this post, are the reason I subscribed.
GM, Another gem from you. You are perhaps the most underrated voice on Substack. We need to figure out what to do about that in 2023.
Incidentally, early in your article you have the word "story" where you mean "store". Might as well make it perfect.
Have a wonderful Holiday. May 2023 see the end of all of your health and economic issues and the discovery/emergence of a long list of really good things.
Re the people in the villages off the techno grid thing, I never really understood why in Brave New World the state let the savages stay on the reservation... Maybe as a way to scare the society like as an implicit threat that they could he banished there or just as a way to contrast the primitive lifestyle with the sanitized painless one they created?
It only made sense if they were sufficiently squalid as to be a cautionary tale. Why would you allow a successful refusenik colony to show that you don't need the state?
Well, you don't see many 1st world people moving to Africa or some random villages in a third world country to live. Hell, you don't see many people moving to rural areas (perhaps over represented among our online click.) I suppose it makes sense that there would be a much lower standard of living option around, just as a safety valve to get the most likely to go ax mad out of the general population on their own. Most people don't value freedom as much as soymilk latte or whatever, so you probably could point to "look how those savages live. you want freedom like them?" People say that shit with regards to Somalia all the time to minarchists.
There was nowhere to flee to in the gigantic and backwards USSR. It will be much easier to gain complete control today. Stand and resist where you are now. It is folly to believe that the Masters of the Universe would allow such pockets to exist, except perhaps as a living history exhibit.
Quoting myself (so what, I already have hairy hands...):
The point of having those villages is threefold:
1) The compulsively non-conformist can be allowed to go there, note allowed, not forced.
2) By letting those villages exist, the hegemon maintains a self-image of benevolent tolerance.
3) The villages serve as a deposit for genetic variance and creative cognition.
Maybe they needed a healthy reservoir for organ donation purposes, who know?
Maybe pick up some of the Tom Brown survival books, watch a few series on people living in the wilderness and plan to live a life of nomadic stealth. Perhaps the overloads will send their killer drones to find and eliminate you, but you took your shot at a real 1st world problem. Eventually perhaps it is inevitable that humans will 'evolve' to some sort of AI machine. They will eventually have the ability to travel to worlds that can support the organisms that preceded them and in an act of reparation or just curiosity will plant some of that preserved DNA on one or more of those planets. Anticipating that they will return some day to see what the outcome is. Perhaps that is why we are here now. Personally, I think the microorganisms will win and something different will happen with the next round. Perhaps t.rex will make an encore appearance. Who knows, but in the meantime I'm sticking around for the show. Merry Christmas 🎄 and Happy Solstice to all the GMs.
I would very much enjoy being around to see the return of Tyrannosaurus- either to be eaten by one or bring one home for dinner.
Ya know...ys could probably just try munching on an iguana for T Rex substitute. Let us know if it tastes like chicken!
I've actually gotten to eat quite a few reptiles, and I can confirm most taste like chicken. Others are kind of oily.
Like pleasant oily, or unpleasant?
🤣🤣🤣
I just don't see those real jobs that you and the clan are doing being automated away--food production, animal husbandry, plumbing, mechanics, truck driving, electricians, carpentry ... But i agree with you about UBI. It's a trick.
I've heard that this solstice is the turning point of a 13 yr cycle, from some, and a 26,000 yr cycle from others. I'm going with the first because I can wrap my brain around it. I don't think the evil villains are as smart or omnipotent as they're cracked up to be. Bad shit is happening and it will definitely get worse before it gets better. But it will get better, imo.
Can you explain more about the context of these two different cycles?
IMO our long term goal should be to make sure these people are not the "victors", who write the accounts of history during these bleak times.
To me that would be a fail on our part.
Just my two cents
Two species of birds sharing prey a metaphor of things to come? Best wishes to you for the holidays.
got me thinking on this...
A 21st Century’s First World Needs Hierarchy
- with apologies to Maslow
Needs are met in order from bottom level 6 to top level 1.
level 6:
cyber existentialism / virtual presence / social media and mainstream media diet / multi intraday feedings / blue screen sustenance
level 5:
narrative compliance / safety from persecution
level 4:
group think / comfort of belonging in the herd
level 3:
cancelation of contrarian individuals / exercise of individual power backed by group power / dehumanization to defer cognitive dissonance of inhumanity
level 2:
virtue signaling / self-promotion and manufactured self-esteem
level 1:
aspirational authoritarianism / self-actualization via positional authority in a totalitarian hierarchy
Boo!
Yes, boo on the normies that behave per this model
Indeed!
Yule Tidings, GM, to you and your kin! The Sun,bringer if Light and Life,is witnessed again as we enter the crystalline stillness of Capricorn season. We evaluate, plan,and ready our mental and physical bodies within the womb of winter for the exploration and growth that comes after deprivation.
Refection
As per usual,I enjoyed your post. Pictorial and verbal. It always leaves me to ponder, and I enjoy the effects it has on Gutterballs.
I'll try to get back and say something...cogent? You know, not my usual. As if. 🤣
Thanks, Gutter, for the thought inspiring article.
Merry Christmas / Happy Solstice / Festivus / Hanukkah to you and yours!
The two birds sharing a meal ... out of necessity?
Do they use a lot of heavy-duty pesticides around there?
Around here, the windmill farms and the over-use of the wrong pesticides are, I suspect, responsible for a lot of wildlife die-off. [NOT 'climate change']
Pollinators to songbirds and rabbits, we seem to be losing them.
And the hawks around here are hell-bent on getting hold of our chickens. [But that's normal, I'm just kvetching.]
I suspect small game is getting harder to come by. Patterns change by necessity. Those who can't or won't change ... well ...
Thankfully, public sentiment around here has spared us wind or solar farms. They are aggressively voted down by all the townships around here.
And the majority of our local farms do not use aggressive/industrial-scale pesticides.
Bald eagles and ravens simply don't normally range here. It was highly unusual to see them at all. Our only raptors are sparrowhawks and vultures and our corvids are crows. And the raptors around here don't tolerate the crows, and when the crows are in sufficient numbers they run off the raptors.
Plenty of deer and unfortunately plenty of roadkill. The fawn was probably the latter.
Wonder what drove them into your area? Actually could partly be ahead of a cold front (still not 'climate change'). There certainly is a nasty one doing a big sit and spin right now.
I'm very happy for you that you have neither wind farms nor the nastier pesticides near you.
Off on a different tangent -- why don't you have a 'buy me a coffee' type option?
Honestly? I'm not sure how to do that in the context of Substack. Help is welcome.
Of I knew how I'd tell you. Not being much of a writer, I haven't been even slightly tempted to hatch a stack.
Merry Festivus!
I gotta lot a problems with you people!
i think this idea that AI will take all the jobs is for people who work in offices, you cant get AI to fix your plumbing or dig up roads to repair power lines etc.
theres always something to do!
i think you need a try of dmt
>> you cant get AI to fix your plumbing or dig up roads to repair power lines etc.
You absolutely can and it is already in the works.
But honestly the biggest blow to the working class will be automated freight.
Yes, there is always something to do. There is not always something to do to sustain yourself on. The Great Depression is pretty good evidence that jobs can just go away, and you just die.
Jobs can go away but the work doesn't, and the work is what sustains. In the GD, the houses still existed when people were made homeless. Who moved into them? I've been wondering this for awhile. Did they get sold to new immigrants? I forget if it's Ben Franklin or someone contemporary who says that a lack of money in an economy is like saying you can't build a table because you don't have enough inches. It's a concept. When things get bad enough, we'll take that concept back. Or ... I'll just keep talking to myself about how we could do that for the next 10,000 years ;-)
>> In the GD, the houses still existed when people were made homeless. Who moved into them? I've been wondering this for awhile.
They were generally repossessed by the banks and were usually sold by said banks to the nascent Big Ag.
This was also the era in which John Deere was born, which was the first American company to sell their merchandise using private (as opposed to needing a bank loan) financing, which allowed some farmers to survive the GF with their farms intact as they were extended credit for farm equipment when no credit was basically available anywhere.
My dad was a farm kid during the GD. They never bought a tractor nor other internal combustion engine driven equipment. They use d animal labor and plows. They had a mule and cart, too.
When their city relatives ended up destitute, they fixed up the lost a bit so there would be room.
Strange to even imagine such social cohesion within familes anymore.
edit to clarify: they did not "fix up the lost a bit", they fixed up the loft (as in hayloft) a bit ...
Some of the old Grange songs from that era are "Do Not Mortgage the Farm!" Bank credit, like money, is an artificial construct like inches. I'm not saying that credit shouldn't exist. Credit creation is the pumping heart of an economy, without it the blood doesn't circulate. If the purpose of issuing debt and credit was sustaining the community, we wouldn't be vulnerable to banks and corporations who can repossess the land, houses and jobs.
I plan to write a few thoughts about this early in the new year. Thanks for the reminder.
the great depression was a way to bankrupt large parts of industry so the powerful could buy their businesses very cheap. it was very successful in its aims