Legend of the Dragonfly gets two thumbs up from me. I really enjoy parties that offer more than just music. (And they had some damn good cookies last night.)
My only complaint is the lighting. There was too much of it, making both the main rooms too bright.
I was first introduced to Jeff Vail (former Intelligence Officer for the US Air Force) last Winter by Anthropik – which will probably give you an idea of what he’s all about. His book, A Theory of Power, has been called “the most innovative approach to anarchist theory in a generation”. It has received praise from both John Zerzan and Noam Chomsky, and includes people such as Hakim Bey, Aldous Huxley, and Robert Anton Wilson in the bibliography. Impressed? I was. And I was right to be. It’s excellent.
The book is based, not surprisingly, on Vail’s theory of power, that “connections, not the parties connected, may best represent our world.” By analyzing the connections between genes and organisms, furthering this to the connections between memes and society, he “unravels the functioning of our world” and shows us the inevitable downfall of Civilization – but then he goes further.
Hakim Bey gives us the T.A.Z.. Jeff Vail gives us the Rhizome, a way to operate outside – and inside – of the T.A.Z.’s space in time.
Rhizome acts as a web-like structure of connected but independent nodes, borrowing its name from the structures of plants such as bamboo and other grasses. By its very nature, rhizome exhibits incompatibility with such critical hierarchal structures as domestication, monoculture-agriculture, division of labor and centralized government. Unlike hierarchy, rhizome cannot suffer exploitation from within because its structure remains incompatible with centralization of power. It provides a structural framework for our conscious organization of memes. Each node in a rhizome stands autonomous from the larger structure, but the nodes work together in a larger network that extends benefits to the node without creating dependence. The critical element of a world that focuses power at the level of the individual, that can meet the demands of our genome while providing the flexibility and potential to achieve greater goals, remains the small, connected and relatively self-sufficient node of this rhizome structure. In human terms, such a node represents an economic and a cultural unit at the size preferred by our genome: the household and the tribe. Functionally self-sufficient but not isolated, cooperating but not controlled, the rhizome economy, combined with a self-awareness of control structures, provides the real-world foundation of stability and freedom.
At only 50 pages, and freely available online, there is little excuse not to read this book. Go now. Forward, to Rhizome.
It always confuses the hell out me when people say Washington and end up referring to that other Washington, but now people in D.C. are being called Washingtonians. This just isn’t going to work. Someone is going to have to change their name.
In his article on giardia, Dave McBee gives a graphic description of what this parasite does and his experience with it. He tells first of his attempt to cure the illness with modern medicine, but that left him worse off than he was in the beginning. Following that failure, he consults a naturopath, who, after a brief examination, prescribes a few herbs. This natural method is able to succeed where modern medicine failed. A telling tale, no?
One can always depend upon Tamarack Song to have a different – dare I say hollistic? – view of things. Over at Nature Skills, he has an article on Mosquito Bite Prevention. Some of his more interesting advise is thus:
In his article Lord of Machines: Into Middle Earth with J.R.R. Tolkien, James Bell compares Tolkein’s Middle Earth myth with today’s Earth First/Earth Liberation Front movements.
I find it interesting that we admire Tolkien so much, but put today’s eco-activists in jail.
My political opinions lean more and more to anarchy (philosophically understood, meaning abolition of control not whiskered men with bombs). There is only one bright spot and that is the growing habit of disgruntled men of dynamiting factories and power stations.
In a related article, Starhawk compares Tolkien’s trolls to corporations.
The following excerpt is from an article concerning Wilderness Walkabouts, which I’ll be participating in in a couple weeks.
I once heard Tom Brown Jr. proclaim that, "If you don't have any place to be or a time to be there you will never be lost." This is the essence of the art of a Walkabout. You are searching, but not necessarily for anything in particular. You are following your heart and the mysteries that the world leaves for you, be they elk tracks, the top of an unknown peak or a "blank" spot on the map. Your goal is to discover beauty and blend into the landscape. Along the way you sample the wild edible plants, gather your water from the creek or spring, shelter yourself under an ancient tree. When it rains you get wet and when the sun beats down you are hot. Whether it's one day or a week, by yourself or in a small group, on a good wilderness walkabout you are constantly faced with the unknown, both in the world around you and within. Where does this canyon go? Where will I sleep tonight? How will it be to not see anyone else for an entire day? What sort of tracks are these? Will I be able to start a fire in the pouring rain? You have left behind the known comforts of family, school, home, work, four walls and electricity in exchange for a chance to interact with Mystery for a time. The world around you becomes a metaphor for your internal landscape as you face your fear of a dark starless night and the unknown future that waits for you when you return.
An obvious follow up to DP, today I finished reading Adventure Travel in the Third World : Everything You Need To Know To Survive in Remote and Hostile Destinations by Jeff Randall and Mike Perrin. Unlike DP, I’m not a big fan of this book. Though I did learn some things in the wilderness survival and first-aid sections, the book is written rather poorly and the travel advice is, I think, common sense.
It’s not necessarily a bad book, and I certainly respect the authors for their experience and knowledge, but I don’t recommend it.