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No More Anonymous

Posted by  on 20 April 2012, 5:05 pm

I hereby give notice that I am formally and publicly disassociating myself from Anonymous Hackers.

 I do not believe in nor do I support the disruption of freedom of speech, freedom of religion, and freedom of the press when the exercise of such freedoms does not interfere with the rights of others.  I do not believe in the interference of fundamental freedoms in the guise of protecting those freedoms whether that interference is made by a governmental or non-governmental individual or organization.

 I am not by this notice disassociating myself from, nor am I acknowledging any association with, the Cult of the Dead Cow, Umbra Data and the Dark Side Intelligence, LulzSec, Twitter Anonymous, the Sinister League of Evil Badguys, Hacktivismo, the Illuminati, or Terrorists for Truth.

 Nothing in this declaration shall be construed as indicating participation in any illegal activity, whether in the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Australia, or any other country or portion of the world.

 I also hereby give notice that I do not intend to reveal the legal names, pseudonyms, locations, methods, or plans of any members of any of these groups, nor do I acknowledge having any such knowledge whatsoever.

Posted at 23:05 UTC on the 20th of April in the year 2012 CE/Setting Orange, Discord 37, Year of Our Lady of Discord 3178

 ’Anonymous should take a leaf out of the IRA’s method of operation and use a cellular structure, with only 3 or 4 in each cell so if there is a snitch in the organization it has minimal damage.’

- Stephen, St. Ives, England, 07/3/2012 02:33

Quote from http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2111020/Top-members-hacking-groups-Anonymous-LulzSec-arrested-leader-Sabu-turns-in.html

Image from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Anonymous_at_Scientology_in_Los_Angeles.jpg

(Remember, this cellular structure is a fundamental part of the origin and success of Discordianism).

Filed under Announcements, Eris in the Mainstream, Jakes, Personal. Tagged 
6 Comments

The Discordian Monk

Posted by  on 19 July 2011, 1:43 pm

Brain dump.

I haven’t written a lot about it, but the brand of Discordia I’m indulging myself in right now is called the Main Way, based out of the Main Street Monastery and Waffle House. The image of the Discordian monk is slowly coming together.

Who is the Discordian monk?

He lives a monastic lifestyle – that’s not to say he lives alone, but that he is anchored in the internal world. It’s a simple life, and everything that is in it is a choice. It is largely based on the Chao Te Ching, the study of useful illusions. There is a chord between a monk’s “cell” and a cell of the Black Iron Prison. And this is the crux of Discordian monasticism, it plays with which parts of the world are inside your cell and which parts are outside.

My Discordian monk is both silly and serene. He might be a student of the Rinzai school. The thing I like best about the Rinzai school is its founder, Linji. Linji’s favorite “teaching” method was to surprise the fuck out of his students through shouting and hitting them. He would disturb their meditation. And through this jarring experience, they’d experience a form of awakening. (we might call this the Roger Method)

The Discordian Monk lives a creative and enjoyable life, is able to manage his internal experience of the world (he is “the master who makes the grass green and the flowers beautiful”), and is able to detach himself from human desire. If presented with the Golden Apple, he can choose to ignore it. Through this detachment, this viewing the world at arm’s length, he is able to cultivate a beautiful internal laughter. This “monk’s belly laugh” is playful and irreverent. Like a bo staff, it can be used to block or strike, but if you try to use it when you’re not balanced, you’ll fall flat on your ass.

And then the Great Teacher* comes along and shows him that it’s all bullshit.

This lesson is nearly always akin to a slap in the face. Or a barstool to the head.

When you hit a Discordian Monk with a barstool, two things might happen.

– He might retreat further into the illusion
– He might laugh and wake up

And the mistake I often make is thinking that one of these is desirable and the other is undesirable. But it’s not that one of these things is Good and the other is Bad — they are both different phases of a cycle. (You don’t really WANT to live in a world of Pure Reality and No Illusions anyway!) It’s like how ignorance and knowledge have a symbiotic relationship. In order to learn something, you must not know it first.

And it bears saying that some barstools are illusions too, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hit you full force.

* Eris is the teacher, but she wears many masks. 

Filed under Ataxia, Personal, philosophy.
3 Comments

Jesus in the Garbage Compactor

Posted by  on 10 June 2011, 9:39 am

Remember this part of Star Wars: A New Hope? Luke and Han and Leia and Chewie have fallen into the trash compactor. Here is a scene of modern spirituality.

I think we can all relate to our hapless heroes. They’re trapped deep in the bowels of the soul, being slowly crushed by the waste products of modern living.

Han draws his laser pistol and fires at the hatch. The
laserbolt ricochets wildly around the small metal room.
Everyone dives for cover in the garbage as the bolt explodes
almost on top of them. Leia climbs out of the garbage with a
rather grim look on her face.

LUKE
Will you forget it? I already tried
it. It’s magnetically sealed!

LEIA
Put that thing away! You’re going to
get us all killed.

HAN
Absolutely, Your Worship. Look, I
had everything under control until
you led us down here.

And here we are, screaming into the void, hoping that some golden godhead will deliver us from entropy. And the truth is, that guy is practically useless, all he’s doing is waving his arms around like a ninny. The guy we want to be talking to, R2-D2, doesn’t even speak English! Some savior deity, huh?

I’d love to post the scene in question here, but because I’ve been on a “modern reinterpretations of religious symbolism” kick, here’s a contemporary passion play instead. As you watch this, remember: this is actually  happening inside of your soul.

 

Filed under Ataxia, Personal.
2 Comments

“Self Improvement is Masturbation. But Self Destruction…”

Posted by  on 18 May 2011, 11:05 am

FILE THIS UNDER “PERSONAL”

I’ve been blathering on at this blag about Detachment, Slaying the Ego, Changing your Life, yadda yadda yadda. This is largely because I’ve been projecting the kind of advice I needed to hear. I’m changing gears. Shedding my skin. Becoming a new feathered serpent. Escaping my black iron prison.

My goal has been to annihilate all the things I identify with …and see who emerges.

You don’t have an identity without a community to reflect it. So my first move was to step away from the PD forums, the addictive Internet community I used to post at every day.  There are some great people there and I miss them terribly, but I had to get away from that network of influences. It took me a while to realize that I wasn’t having fun there anymore, and I was spending too much of my life interacting with a screen. (There are other reasons too, but that’s immaterial for now.) The main thing is that I had become hooked on the identity I created by posting 15 times a day for four years. So I decided to abruptly stop being Cramulus.

Springtime — specifically Lent — is a time for sacrifice. If you give up something that you love, it makes for a bountiful fall harvest. I am not Christian, so I don’t celebrate Lent. But I figured I’d give it a try, if only because it’s so out of character for me. For Lent, I gave up Discordia and my mental relationship with Eris.

What does this even mean? There are no rules about what makes somebody a Discordian, so severing my ties to Discord was as simple as saying “I’m not a Discordian” out loud. It was harder than I thought. I’ve been a Discordian since I first read the HTML copy of the Principia at age 16. It took some patience and discipline to force myself to think about things in different ways, but in time, it happened.

And that was probably for the best. Discordia is not meant to be a real religion, but it had come to occupy that slot in my life. You can get intense about it, you can keep it in your heart, but it should still be something that you can laugh off or throw away at a moment’s notice. Mal and Omar warned us about letting some silly old book drive our lives. In the last years, I’ve taken Discordia very seriously, I’ve put a lot of effort into Eris’ society, and somewhere up on Limbo Peak, Eris was laughing at me. So screw that crazy bitch! Class dismissed.

The next part of my identity was wrapped up in my appearance. I’ve had long hair since I was like 15 years old. What would I even look like with short hair? It was time to find out. I took a big breath and got it chopped off. My Nafs, that tricksy demon, loved having long hair. The little bastard is more attached to who I am than who I could be. Fuck him too.

Freedom is invigorating! For the first time in years, I felt like I had new kinds of freedom. With my new hair cut, my new attitude, my new identity, I have different options. I can apply for different jobs, I can talk to different girls, and I can tell an entirely new story about who I am. I had slain most of the things I identify with. So who will emerge from the smoke and wreckage and aftermath? I erased personal history, I banished the Nafs, I escaped the Black Iron Prison.

Don’t worry, cats. With laughter, I let Eris back into my heart. But now the self is tempered, it’s been reforged in the fires of self destruction. It was scary, but I told you it could be done! I wish I could adequately describe how exciting it is to have this opportunity. It’s 9 months pregnant with uncertainty. I’m on the edge of my freaking seat.

My name is Dan and you still know nothing about me.

Except that I’m a total spag.

 

 

 

 

Filed under Children of Eris, Personal.
4 Comments

Flip The Goddamn Tables

Posted by  on 23 March 2011, 9:08 am

Jesus beating the shit out of some dudes. Grab your beating stick, these asshole moneychangers are hanging out in your soul.

You want to change your life? It’s a really quick, two step process.

Step one: detach

Step two: jump!

They’re both really hard steps though. First, because we love our baggage, and second, because of  uncertainty.

The buddha says that ALL SUFFERING IS CAUSED BY DESIRE. And I have found this to be true – if you can snuff out your attachment to the world, if you can be comfortable drifting, then you can be at peace no matter what’s going on with the news, or your bank account, or your social environment.

But I also find that this detachment is somewhat paralytic. Because to get ready for step two, you need the FIRE. Be like young Jesus: If you want to cleanse the temple, you’ve gotta flip over some goddamn tables!

I’ve been on this Gnostic kick. I found this really great podcast series that Erik Davis did for maybelogic academy, it’s definitely a good intro. The core of the gnostic experience is this moment of awakening, this sudden realization that the world you’ve been living in is an illusion, a distraction, and that the higher self is ready to get to work.

You’ve got this little demon called the Nafs.  His job is to keep you distracted. You get lost in your job, social scene, chasing tail, creative projects, human drama, whatever, and you lose track of the higher self.  Why do people only ask themselves the tough questions when bad things happen? It’s because the Nafs finally shut up for a second. You have to be willing to banish that little bastard, even though he keeps bringing you things you like. The higher self is calling, are you going to pick up the phone or what?

And that’s why I resist the idea that life is just about the pursuit of happiness. You often hear people talk about just doing “whatever makes you happy”. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of sad and twisted people out there who need to treat themselves to a large dose of hedonism. But this is just a way to keep you running on the tread mill. The petals of the soul open at midnight, when everything is dark and quiet.

So if you want to quiet the babbling chorus of selves, if you want to jump off the precipice and land in the skin of the coolest motherfucker on the planet, you’ve gotta take the higher self by the hand and have a good heart to heart. If you can shut up for a second, he’ll show you what you’re doing wrong, and this will give you the FIRE. Then you flip over some fucking tables.

 

Filed under Ataxia, Personal.
2 Comments
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