The Work of Conspiracy Theory

[David Morris]

This might interest you:

http://www.esquire.com/_mobile/blogs/politics/edward-snowden-sxsw-031114

*Edward Snowden called into a panel* at South by Southwest today. He was
somewhere in Russia, still on the lam from a United States government that
views him as a traitor and wants him imprisoned for it, and he was
answering questions from the public, on camera, for the first time.

Before this, he was a packet of information lopped on a table. He was
access to all of the NSA's misdeeds and little else. He was part of the
package deal.

Instead, today, Snowden spoke cogently and urgently about action. Not for
himself, by the way. He did not speak to clear his name. He pleaded for
more advances in the tech community to help Americans ensure that any
future economy -- any Technological Revolution -- is entirely their own.

"There's a political response that needs to occur, but there's also a tech
response that needs to occur. The people in the room in Austin, they're the
folks who can fix this," he said. "We need public oversight, some way for
trusted public figures to advocate for us. We need a watchdog that watches
Congress, because if we're not informed, we can't consent to these
policies."

It was a call to action, but this was different. This was not a politician
promising vague, intangible change in an effort to win influence. There was
no hand waving, no music, no parade.

Instead, Edward Snowden is the best kind of American leader: A man, in the
face of immense harm, pursuing a concrete idea that will better every
person, check unchecked power, and allow us more access to what we know
about ourselves.

*There are two movements* clashing here. One of the movements is dying.

The people in one of them are dying, and not at the hands of the tyranny
they dream up around them, but of sad, slow, typical death. There are no
cathartic last stands on the front lawn, a man and his hunting rifle
getting in a last hurrah against an ATF coming for the gun rack. There is
no last-second poetry penned while withering away because the socialist
gruel rations finally ran out. People are dying of the regular ol' stuff,
afraid.

The other movement is adapting to the world around them. They are accepting
the beauty in information and one another, instead of fearing for the sake
of fear. They are on the offensive.

In Washington D.C., Sarah Palin delivered the keynote address to the
Conservative Political Action Conference on Saturday.

She literally read a children's book to adults to raucous applause. It was
a modified Dr. Seuss book that she got from an email chain
letter<http://www.mediaite.com/online/palins-green-eggs-and-ham-cpac-bit-was-ripped-off-a-chain-email/>
.

In that other movement, there are meetings like the one today at SXSW. They
talked about the complexities of data collection -- and how to synthesize
it, transparently, for good. It was about exposing data collection programs
to scrutiny -- to uncover abuse -- so it can only be used *for* people, not
*against* them. It was about, as Snowden said today, "how do you interpret
(these communications), how do you understand them."

All this tech talk is, invariably, filled with compassion.

It's no longer a question of if we will or will not have a better America.
It's a question of how long it will take the younger and brighter and
better to drown out the institution that is impeding American progress with
grade school debate, bullying and pettiness. It's a question of when they
will be able to communicate to America that they are the only chance at a
productive future.

On Tuesday, March 11, 2014, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net> wrote:

>  A conspiracy of evolutionary exodus.
> "The theory of exodus proposes that the most effective way of opposing
> capitalism and the liberal state is not through direct confrontation but by
> means of what Paolo Virno has called "engaged withdrawal,"mass defection by
> those wishing to create new forms of community. One need only glance at the
> historical record to confirm that most successful forms of popular
> resistance have taken precisely this form. They have not involved
> challenging power head on (this usually leads to being slaughtered, or if
> not, turning into some--often even uglier--variant of the
> very thing one first challenged) but from one or another strategy of
> slipping away from its grasp, from flight, desertion, the founding of new
> communities."
> -- David Graeber, Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology
>
>   As Emma Goldman pointed out, dancing is  also critical.
> On Mar 10, 2014, at 9:40 PM, David Morris wrote:
>
> > Chaos is status quo.  It wears a shiny suit. It wants to look pretty,
> but will take whatever cover it can get.  Chaos is Fox News :). Chaos has
> bad motives.  It isn't natural. It is toxic. Chaos is an evil use of primal
> energy. But evolution is anti-chaos.  Evolution is unstoppable. Evolution
> is a sure bet.
> >
> > From my pulpit post Mardi Gras,
> > Peace and Love,
> > Darwin
> >
> > On Monday, March 10, 2014, Joseph Tracy <brook7 at sover.net <javascript:;>>
> wrote:
> > Chaos however is a weird word. Is life a conspiracy against chaos?, is
> chaos a conspiracy to bring forth life ? Is chaos a dream, the allure of
> dissolution and death?
> > <photo1.jpg>
>
> -
> Pynchon-l / http://www.waste.org/mail/?listpynchon-l
>
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