Today I have a little rant about ideas. I am going to try to get the whole text of the justification for the decision on line. I have never transcribed that, and I think it would be good to make their actual words generally available. That justification is the only public argument about what they did what they did. It is an interesting piece of literature that I am sure you will enjoy. Thanks again for the letters, and scroll down to the last two blogs for the overview of the case. Also, be sure to check out the book and the plays if you haven’t done so already. When I get the regular site up, there will be a lot of cool pictures to see as well. I am working on it. And thanks again for the letters.
Over the last few days I have written some idealistic essays. I guess it is Ok to call them idealistic because they were about fundamental ideas and about the philosophy behind some of the actions of the people who were involved in my being held. But anytime that there is opinion there is argument that comes along with it. And I ant to respond to this. Not necessarily to the criticism directed at what I am writing about, but about the philosophy behind the criticisms. I do not feel that any of the things that have been said against me engage in any way the things I have been talking about, but instead exist solely for the purposes of getting a dismissal of my arguments. We are not debating the righteousness of my claim, but rather trying to make life easier by making me go away.
I call this “The philosophy of dismissal.” Do you like that? It has a nice ring to it. Nice sound bite.
We all practice this you know. We all, all of us trying to do our own thing, to live our own independent lives of personal happiness, practice this philosophy. We dismiss that that is not directly correlated to our pleasure. And after a while, anything that isn’t easy enough or fast enough. Like spoiled children fighting only for the right to be spoiled further.
I have heard some people say that I have been acting foolish in my quest for compensation and the righting of the wrong done to me. I should concentrate on finding pleasure for myself rather that making a stupid fight against stupid people who are never going to change anyway. This is the way to live I am told, this is the philosophy I should consider.
Now, in my opinion, I am told this generally because people simply don’t care anymore about such things as doing something for the greater good of mankind. Social conscience, along with funding for the arts and/or high school sports has been apparently economically strangled from existence. I understand what is being said, but I strongly disagree. I know that the reason for the diminishment of these “extra, idealistic pursuits” is a lack of recourses to pay for things. But what I am saying is why not ask why we have not enough recourses? Why must we accept less? But these sorts of questions are not asked either. And when I ask about that, the answer is of course, because that is the way that it is. And the extra energy needed to deal with these sorts of problems is not generally available to people because their own lives apparently lack sufficient recourses to allow them time to do it. It becomes someone else’s problem, some else’s burden. And if you ask them to deal with things that they feel are not of thier business, they become uncomfortable and find the person asking them to think to be somewhat burdensome. Too bad.
MY PROBLEM folks, is that I have been thrust into the position of being the one who needs to ask such questions. I am now the burdensom, boring guy, and I tell you it sucks having to do the job. And for no pay too!!! And I can’t even bitch about it because if I do, people just tell me to quit and go on to something else. And I can absolute guarantee you that the people connected to this situation in Poland are simply waiting for this issue to become too much, boring, passe. They played this game of attrition with me while I was there and are still playing to this day. And when the Polaks quit, the weight of the bureaucracy too much for them, they accepted the much easier argument that I was simply a horrific a guest who thinks little in general of Polaks. Of course, this I suppose, their reasonable justification for stealing from me everything they could find to steal, while also demanding that I pay for my stay. So much for ideas…
But I am still here bitching day in and day out though I can absolutely guarantee you that ALL that the people I am talking about want is to find a way to turn these blogs of idealism into simple disposable and easily dismisable, burdensome rhetoric. All they want is for me to go away, and to do so in such a manner that they can slander me some more as I am on the way out. I understand this. I have been sneered at before in my life when I painlessly accept when I am called a philosopher. It is always a problem to my name callers when they find that I don’t find that moniker to be insulting. But I have always been this way. It is very natural for me TO BE this way. I don’t mind the work. And you know what I say?
Well, thank God for the internet!!!!!!!!!!!
I like ideas. I love em. And I bet there are a whole hell of a lot of other people who are simply dreaming of actually being able to engage such ideas as truth and justice and fairness. I find that idealism has great value and I have decided that I am not going to let people take such things as my ideas from me so easily, and i bet there are lts of people who feel the same way.
And, that IS what is going on here, you know. That’s what this website and my fight with Poland is all about. This is a battle about ideas. Or better, it is a battle for the existence of real ideas. And I have been fighting this battle since that son-of-a-bitch drive his stupid car into me over a year and a half ago. It’s about ideas. Let me try to make that point here.
During the incident on May 15th, there were two opposing ideas that came into violent contact with each other at the intersection of Solidarnoci and Andersa. I was saying something and Zaremba was making his counter argument. I was saying that riding bicycles is generally a very good thing for the world. Zaremba was saying (that is, if he wasn’t paid to do this) that he had a right to drive his car into a person riding a bike should the mood strike him. Or better said, that he had a right to do violence as a way of demonstrating his displeasure for the world. Now, after he made his statement, I got off my bike and bespoke my disagreement with such an argument in a similarly worded argument to his own: I punched Zaremba in the mouth. What I was saying by this remark, is that I strongly disagree that life-threatening violence is a proper manor of showing ones personal displeasure. I punched him so that he could see for himself both the pain and the folly in such a statement. I of course didn’t threaten his life as he had threatened mine, but I did hope to change his view of the world by doing something that would create for him such a memory, which would not soon be forgotten. Perhaps I wanted to permanently sit on the road between his sense of reason and his desire to do something rather ugly to the next guy. I imprinted a little on him.
But, as with all of the too lazy to really argue about life people I have referred to in this essay, Zaremba’s next reaction was to try and steal some money. And that, has been the biggest philosophical argument of the whole thing.
I said that you may not arbitrarily ruin my life.
Zaremba and Poland claim that they can.
I say that theft is still a crime.
They say, that this is true, but only for other people, and not for those who are above the law.
Perhaps I say that bicycles are a better, cleaner, quieter and safer manner of urban transport and their rights to exist on the roads should be honored and respected.
They say that bikers are dangerous outlaws because the buck the system, and therefore need to be contained and controlled.
I say that there needs to be justice based on truth.
They say that justice needs to be controlled.
I say that cops are people too and are as indictable for crimes as anyone else.
They say that police are above the law.
I say, that people are interested in ideas and are not willing to lay back and have all of their rights and freedoms taken away from them by petty thieves and extortionists.
They say that people are simply lazy little children who have no real understanding of how to take care of themselves.
They ask whom would you believe?
I ask: Who are you?
It has been a long time. Sometimes I ask if there are any ideas in the world worth thinking about any more?
Does anybody think about anything more important than making money? We used to speak of civilized people, of cultured people. Have we evolved, or have we only evolved to the point where grubbing for peanuts is all there is to do. I met a guy at a film festival in Canada several years. He had an opinion that what was the real global effect from the end of the Soviet Union was that there was no second party of competition to balance out capitalism, to demand that capitalism remember its attachment to humanity. The results he said could be seen in the greed and disregard of our current world. He said the future effects of this, a monumental diminishment in general quality of life for all people would eventually reach catastrophic conditions. Was he right. I mean, it’s an idea right? There are currently 6,000,000,000 of us and seemingly no real social order to our world. Response to this from those who claim to govern will only be, as we have seen in America and as I have been writing about these last few weeks, will only be to attempt to forcefully attempt to control us further.
Are we all really wanting to play the game of “Island Survivor?” Is this in the end what we really want for all of the work that has ever been done in the world? After all of the art and the science and learning. After standing on the moon and sending several mobile telephones outs into the stars and cloning sheep and high school Rambo style killings and aids and cable television and fleece coats and built in obsolescence and wireless internet and hollow point shells and laser guided missiles and GPS’. After filling the world to the brim with people who spend their whole lives with nothing to do to help and nothing to be a part of, is this really what we want for ourselves. Is it really Ok to help a shit hear traffic cop to steal from a guy simply because… because… I’m sorry, I think I missed the point of their argument. Why was it Ok for them to do this? Sorry for being so boring.
Over the last few days I have written some idealistic essays. I guess it is Ok to call them idealistic because they were about fundamental ideas and about the philosophy behind some of the actions of the people who were involved in my being held. But anytime that there is opinion there is argument that comes along with it. And I ant to respond to this. Not necessarily to the criticism directed at what I am writing about, but about the philosophy behind the criticisms. I do not feel that any of the things that have been said against me engage in any way the things I have been talking about, but instead exist solely for the purposes of getting a dismissal of my arguments. We are not debating the righteousness of my claim, but rather trying to make life easier by making me go away.
I call this “The philosophy of dismissal.” Do you like that? It has a nice ring to it. Nice sound bite.
We all practice this you know. We all, all of us trying to do our own thing, to live our own independent lives of personal happiness, practice this philosophy. We dismiss that that is not directly correlated to our pleasure. And after a while, anything that isn’t easy enough or fast enough. Like spoiled children fighting only for the right to be spoiled further.
I have heard some people say that I have been acting foolish in my quest for compensation and the righting of the wrong done to me. I should concentrate on finding pleasure for myself rather that making a stupid fight against stupid people who are never going to change anyway. This is the way to live I am told, this is the philosophy I should consider.
Now, in my opinion, I am told this generally because people simply don’t care anymore about such things as doing something for the greater good of mankind. Social conscience, along with funding for the arts and/or high school sports has been apparently economically strangled from existence. I understand what is being said, but I strongly disagree. I know that the reason for the diminishment of these “extra, idealistic pursuits” is a lack of recourses to pay for things. But what I am saying is why not ask why we have not enough recourses? Why must we accept less? But these sorts of questions are not asked either. And when I ask about that, the answer is of course, because that is the way that it is. And the extra energy needed to deal with these sorts of problems is not generally available to people because their own lives apparently lack sufficient recourses to allow them time to do it. It becomes someone else’s problem, some else’s burden. And if you ask them to deal with things that they feel are not of thier business, they become uncomfortable and find the person asking them to think to be somewhat burdensome. Too bad.
MY PROBLEM folks, is that I have been thrust into the position of being the one who needs to ask such questions. I am now the burdensom, boring guy, and I tell you it sucks having to do the job. And for no pay too!!! And I can’t even bitch about it because if I do, people just tell me to quit and go on to something else. And I can absolute guarantee you that the people connected to this situation in Poland are simply waiting for this issue to become too much, boring, passe. They played this game of attrition with me while I was there and are still playing to this day. And when the Polaks quit, the weight of the bureaucracy too much for them, they accepted the much easier argument that I was simply a horrific a guest who thinks little in general of Polaks. Of course, this I suppose, their reasonable justification for stealing from me everything they could find to steal, while also demanding that I pay for my stay. So much for ideas…
But I am still here bitching day in and day out though I can absolutely guarantee you that ALL that the people I am talking about want is to find a way to turn these blogs of idealism into simple disposable and easily dismisable, burdensome rhetoric. All they want is for me to go away, and to do so in such a manner that they can slander me some more as I am on the way out. I understand this. I have been sneered at before in my life when I painlessly accept when I am called a philosopher. It is always a problem to my name callers when they find that I don’t find that moniker to be insulting. But I have always been this way. It is very natural for me TO BE this way. I don’t mind the work. And you know what I say?
Well, thank God for the internet!!!!!!!!!!!
I like ideas. I love em. And I bet there are a whole hell of a lot of other people who are simply dreaming of actually being able to engage such ideas as truth and justice and fairness. I find that idealism has great value and I have decided that I am not going to let people take such things as my ideas from me so easily, and i bet there are lts of people who feel the same way.
And, that IS what is going on here, you know. That’s what this website and my fight with Poland is all about. This is a battle about ideas. Or better, it is a battle for the existence of real ideas. And I have been fighting this battle since that son-of-a-bitch drive his stupid car into me over a year and a half ago. It’s about ideas. Let me try to make that point here.
During the incident on May 15th, there were two opposing ideas that came into violent contact with each other at the intersection of Solidarnoci and Andersa. I was saying something and Zaremba was making his counter argument. I was saying that riding bicycles is generally a very good thing for the world. Zaremba was saying (that is, if he wasn’t paid to do this) that he had a right to drive his car into a person riding a bike should the mood strike him. Or better said, that he had a right to do violence as a way of demonstrating his displeasure for the world. Now, after he made his statement, I got off my bike and bespoke my disagreement with such an argument in a similarly worded argument to his own: I punched Zaremba in the mouth. What I was saying by this remark, is that I strongly disagree that life-threatening violence is a proper manor of showing ones personal displeasure. I punched him so that he could see for himself both the pain and the folly in such a statement. I of course didn’t threaten his life as he had threatened mine, but I did hope to change his view of the world by doing something that would create for him such a memory, which would not soon be forgotten. Perhaps I wanted to permanently sit on the road between his sense of reason and his desire to do something rather ugly to the next guy. I imprinted a little on him.
But, as with all of the too lazy to really argue about life people I have referred to in this essay, Zaremba’s next reaction was to try and steal some money. And that, has been the biggest philosophical argument of the whole thing.
I said that you may not arbitrarily ruin my life.
Zaremba and Poland claim that they can.
I say that theft is still a crime.
They say, that this is true, but only for other people, and not for those who are above the law.
Perhaps I say that bicycles are a better, cleaner, quieter and safer manner of urban transport and their rights to exist on the roads should be honored and respected.
They say that bikers are dangerous outlaws because the buck the system, and therefore need to be contained and controlled.
I say that there needs to be justice based on truth.
They say that justice needs to be controlled.
I say that cops are people too and are as indictable for crimes as anyone else.
They say that police are above the law.
I say, that people are interested in ideas and are not willing to lay back and have all of their rights and freedoms taken away from them by petty thieves and extortionists.
They say that people are simply lazy little children who have no real understanding of how to take care of themselves.
They ask whom would you believe?
I ask: Who are you?
It has been a long time. Sometimes I ask if there are any ideas in the world worth thinking about any more?
Does anybody think about anything more important than making money? We used to speak of civilized people, of cultured people. Have we evolved, or have we only evolved to the point where grubbing for peanuts is all there is to do. I met a guy at a film festival in Canada several years. He had an opinion that what was the real global effect from the end of the Soviet Union was that there was no second party of competition to balance out capitalism, to demand that capitalism remember its attachment to humanity. The results he said could be seen in the greed and disregard of our current world. He said the future effects of this, a monumental diminishment in general quality of life for all people would eventually reach catastrophic conditions. Was he right. I mean, it’s an idea right? There are currently 6,000,000,000 of us and seemingly no real social order to our world. Response to this from those who claim to govern will only be, as we have seen in America and as I have been writing about these last few weeks, will only be to attempt to forcefully attempt to control us further.
Are we all really wanting to play the game of “Island Survivor?” Is this in the end what we really want for all of the work that has ever been done in the world? After all of the art and the science and learning. After standing on the moon and sending several mobile telephones outs into the stars and cloning sheep and high school Rambo style killings and aids and cable television and fleece coats and built in obsolescence and wireless internet and hollow point shells and laser guided missiles and GPS’. After filling the world to the brim with people who spend their whole lives with nothing to do to help and nothing to be a part of, is this really what we want for ourselves. Is it really Ok to help a shit hear traffic cop to steal from a guy simply because… because… I’m sorry, I think I missed the point of their argument. Why was it Ok for them to do this? Sorry for being so boring.
posted by BEING HAD at
11:19 AM
