 
Date: Tue, 21 Apr 92 07:50:15 -0400
From: grigsby@occs.cs.oberlin.edu (Spiral Death Trap)
Message-Id: <9204211150.AA10071@occs.cs.oberlin.edu>
To: +dist+~js9b/Public/camc.dl@andrew.cmu.edu
Subject: More social musings:

=>I would be willing to do whatever is necessary to start such a tribe,
=>provided I am not helping to create another of the structures I have
=>been trying to get away from these past years.  We must heed Nietszche's
=
=That depends on us, our integrity, our emotional, and possibly
='spiritual' maturity, our psychological health, and the system of checks
=and balances that we build into these tribes.

Very true -- and this is the hardest problem we face.

=To put it brusquely, assholes tend to seek power, and relish exerting
=power over others. Therefore, we must be sure that we are not assholes,
=so that we will be respected and be able to be efffective members and
=leaders of such tribes, and we must set up systems, filters, to
=locate assholes and potential assholes, and steer them into some type of
=healing environment, and/or steer them out of the villages.

Some thoughts: I live in a ~60 person co-op that runs on consensus.  That's
right, each person has the power of major objection, and discussions are run
via feminist process.  Takes longer, but issues come out and are discussed
instead of smoldering beneath the surface.  On the other hand, one person
can clog things up badly, though I've not seen anyone cause a total 
standstill (after all, you're living with these people and have to deal with
their reactions.)  All systems of voting or whatnot either depend on the
good intentions of everyone (this) or of the majority (approval voting)
or a privileged class (Congress).  Whatever system we choose, the best way
to avoid these difficulties is to minimize rules and control -- one reason
we're doing this in the first place.

This means that given an action that I have a problem with, if it doesn't
involve my personal space or destruction of communal property, I am 
generally the one with the problem.  Means you have to get used to strange 
people such as ourselves and other neophiles, but creating a safe space 
for ourselves is the reason we're doing this in the first place!

=Despite what many might see as a centralized and planned approach in the
=ideas I've been tossing, I see it as vital to start small and
=diversified; so small, and apparently harmless, that the governmental
=masters will ignore us in it's ceaseless automatic scan for enemies and
=dissidents to be crushed.

We can get fairly large so long as we do not publicize our revolutionary 
aims, by which I do not mean 'overthrow by force' but rather 'change in 
life paradigm'.  "Yep, we're jest out here workin' on the farm, growin'
our veggies, playin' computer games and settin' on the porch."  Having
fun IS the revolution, but don't tell them that or they'll make fun 
illegal...even though it mostly is already.

=I, unfortuneately in some ways, need to stay in the central pennsylvania
=area until my daughter is off to college-- five years from now.

We've all got short-term plans, but- what requires you to stay there? 
(I don't expect a public reply, just some thought -- I'm thinking money
issues but I've been wrong before.)  If my parents had wanted to
pull up and start something like this (not!) I'd have been on it in 
a nanosecond.  I urge everyone to think about how important this is to
them -- if we give straight 'meanwhile...' jobs and other things priority
we'll never get anything going.  We'll be taking a risk, and it will be
scary in any way, but it's all part of the fun.  What's the worst that can
happen?  We end up a few years later with no money, which is where many
of us are now, and lots of good experience.

=
=Why universities?-- well, the university is a trype of microcosm of
=western society, it has 'smart' people living and working there, it has
=big libraries, and it has computers and network connections....

Don't overrate the 'smart' people, but the physical resources are nice to
have around, and will probably be necessary as we start up.  Also gives us
a market for some of the services we're likely to be able to provide.

=>BTW:  Did my last (and first) message ring any bells or push any buttons?
=>I was trying to be controversial and deliberately take the extreme social
=>position, which I happen to espouse, and if no one bothers to disagree I'll
=>just have to assume everyone here is a bunch of sexually perverted drug-
=>suckin' black magician nudist techie freak eco-anarchists and go from there.
=
=That pretty much describes me, but I'm not at all into pulling others
=into my trip. Or, more accurately, that describes me on the inside--
=externally I'm a pretty damn straight fellow..... I'm a big believer in
=camoflauge.
=
=If you start a tribe that is too obviously a bunch of etc, etc, etc,;
=the authorities will do just about everything in their power to shut you
=down.

We'd better feel safe in being freaks within our community, otherwise there
is no point to this project at all!  "If I can't dance, I don't want to be
part of your revolution."  I don't mind pulling others into my trip, myself-
it's too weird for 99.5% and I can't pull you if you won't come.  The 
problem with camouflage is that you start to become it, and your rich life
becomes an interior fantasy.  Hey, I've got hair halfway down my back and
I worked in the Washington office of a U.S. Senator (Herb Kohl from 
Wisconsin, an almost-sane legislator).  I taped anti-war flyers to my
cubicle (this was during Operation Desert Shit) and never once wore a
gray suit.  The only non-positive comments I got were "Don't people bother
you about having long hair?"  No one did:  I did my job well, got a great
recommendation, and got invaluable experience.  I even ditched a U.S. Army
rep who was half an hour late for a lunch meeting (one of my friends from 
high school was getting a security clearance and they were checking his
background.  Didn't need me to do it, I guess, since they never called back.)

The point?  I've seen fellow weirdos get really paranoid that they're being
watched by the FBI, neighbors, the Illuminati, etc. because of drug busts 
in their house or just things that go bump in the night.  If we're not 
selling drugs or burning flags we'll have to get pretty obnoxious before 
anyone decides to give a shit.  A good priority would be to find a lawyer 
who can keep us from being illegally harassed and help us through the 
gray areas we are likely to inhabit.  Unfortunately I know no one going
to law school.  Maybe we could feel around for a liberal-type city lawyer 
who is about to break down from stress-overload and offer them an out...

=>Like I said before, it's the social prospects that worry me:  I have no
=>doubt that we are technically capable, and the money game takes time to
=>play, but I am worried that people will hit a Weirdness Threshold sometime
=>after we get going and shut off: "I can't deal with you  or
=>your ."
=
=This is part of the reason why I think starting several differing types
=of communities, with comunications between them, is very important. This
=is also part of the rationale behind the rural/urban partnership. With
=partnership communities, and differing approaches, if a person gets out
=of hand, or feels unhappy, in one community situation, they can try
=moving to another site. This way we may be able to salvage good people
=who just can't stand, or be stood by, other members and habits in one or
=another specific situation.
=
=I also expect we'll need psychological experts, somthing on the order of
=emotional healers, to work out such problems and help everyone
=understand and adjust to each other.

True: but we'll all have to be our own experts too.  Modern psychiatry tends
to address the problems an individual has fitting into society and getting
hir to adapt.  This is not what we want.

=I tend to think the way we've been brought up in this nuclear
=family/regimented education society has made us all more socially
=screwed-up than we need to be. In effect, we've been set at each other's
=throats since we were young, and almost none of us have learned the
=skills of co-operation, negotiation, and community living. Instead,
=we've been taught to live pretty much alone in one big box, and stare
=into picture boxes for entertainment, and work in other boxes staring
=into other types of picture boxes. We have to start out by accepting
=that we're 'retarded' in certain emotional/co-operative ways, and
=practice some type of healing and interpersonal-communications
=psychology within the community.

Right, and the first step is a building of trust between members.  We are 
rebuilding a sort of extemded tribal family here: the temptation to simply
isolate ourselves in the same retarded ways will be great, and will doom 
us long-term to Just Another Failed Experiment Due to Interpersonal Tension,
Sexual and/or Political.

=Maybe you should take on the role of our mailist co-operative housing
=expert...;-).

I'll do my best to communicate my relevant experience.

=One of the things I've worked on over the years are models
=for a co-operative household constitution-- many of the problems I've
=seen arose because the basic household rules and expectations just
=wern't spelled out specifically enough. That, and money-- people not
=being able to pay their share, poverty among students being what it is.

The more minimal we keep them the less likely they are to be broken.
I think that the best thing we can do is find people who like to _do stuff_.
Just about anything is fun if you can do it your own way and don't have to
do it too often.  Activity can be channeled -- passivity can't.

=Having seen years of problems with co-operative and communal housing-- I
=live in a college town, and have lived in co-operative households, and
=been a standard presence in many others; I now prefer to live alone
=(with my girlfriend, actually) out in the country--- I think we have to
=be real careful about _expecting_ others to adapt to and accept a
=communal lifestyle. Some just can't handle it.

And we don't want them, at least to start.  Community is what this is all
about, and maybe later we can educate lots of people about how our 
community works and why it's more fun .  Starting up is going to 
be hard enough without dragging reluctant people into it and dealing with 
their adjustment pangs.

=What I always expected was that there would be a combination of
=communal housing, more private housing for some people, and even more
=private housing for couples and families. Youngish newcomers without
=much seniority would be expected to live in the cheapest communal
=housing, ordinarily, and as members got more seniority and had made more
=investment in the community, they would get access to more private
=housing if they wanted it.

You seem to want to isolate family units with 'even more privacy'.  This 
isolation is the major problem with the nuclear family.  You also assume that
privacy is a privilege that everyone will want and that will have to be
parceled out to the deserving due to scarcity.  We shouldn't have to do this
after our setup period: everyone should be able to crash in the fuck room, 
their own space, or wherever.  I value my time alone, but I also value
time with trusted friends, and familiarity is necessary to engender trust.
Others may balance differently, but we must make sure that people do not 
request more isolation out of fear of the group or some of its members.

=>I guess it boils down to the fact that I'm a hardcore neophile, and it is
=>my firm (yet tender and juicy) belief that any such experiment must
=>consist entirely of such hardcore neophiles.  Put this way: there are any
=
=I pretty much assume this for the starting communities, but after a
=while we'll have to be including a fair number of less adventurous
=people into these communities.

I hold that this is impossible.  No neophobe would dare touch any sort
of setup any more revolutionary than cohousing with a ten-foot pole.
There are literally _millions_ of closet neophiles out there: it's amazing
how many people are trapped in their current circumstance due to not 
knowing their options.  Especially the young and idealistic, like me.
The problem is to catch people before they start condemning experiments
such as these as impossible to justify their horrible existence.  This is
all too common.

=All neophiles can be a very intensely reactive and unstable mix, prone
=to odd emotional explosions and sexual games.

And that's what makes life fun!  The unpleasantness comes when we view these
things as unnatural and try to suppress them internally: thus my points
about nudity/other taboos, and pinning the Weirdness Meter.  Bad sexual games
happen when people are not honest and open with each other about their needs
and desires (read: fantasies), as do odd emotional explosions.  To achieve 
this openness we must trust each other to Mind Yer Own Business and not
freak out when we speak of and act on forbidden desires.  One of the best
qualities of the co-op I live in is that it is almost impossible to shock
people.  Talk about consensual cannibalism and anal masturbation, fence with
knives and pot lids in the kitchen, belch loudly, write revolutionary 
anarchist graffiti on the refrigerator, go through and smoke everything in
the spice cabinet, have shower parties, wear a clown nose all day, and 
no one will try to stop you, or even bat an eyelash.  Remember the lost
freedom of youth?  It's yours to take, if you dare.  When did you last
howl at the moon?

A final note: We must be very careful about who we decide to let in, and 
mechanisms for separating oneself or someone else from the community should
exist should the match turn out badly.  The more we base our lives around
trust and cooperation, the more one person can fuck things up with hir 
actions.  I don't like the idea of booting people out, but sometimes a
person can cause lots of havoc, and it doesn't have to be in an active way.
We must know when to trust and when to distrust.

=Later, Bill

// g

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