GET IN THE PIT!!!! need to connect with like-minded folks before you go crazy? Click here!

PEOPLEMATH - THE WAY WE HANG

3/8/2000, 4:18am

I love conversations. I crave more of them. And I want these interactions to be SUBLIME in some way. These moments are transcendent to me. It's like two different colors of paint blending into one. Completion is an interesting thing, because it's never really finished; it's almost like whe have these stages of evolution along which we pass, and we are changed before and after these moments of interpersonal SHAZAM! So here I type, trying to work the caffeine out of my plasma, and it comes to me that it is up to me and me alone to create a community which factors were somehow "spiritually" thrust upon us, and what was ENGINEERED. You got questions?

 

 

What do you mean when you say that a moment can be engineered?

 

I mean that it came about as a result of direct and willful action on the behalf of one or both parties. We meet, we talk on the phone, we make plans and we meet again - all in pursuit of that transcendent moment of interpersonal SUBLIMATION, when we're communicating so hardcore that we forget all else but the other; we are lost in each other's souls at these moments, totally caught up in the rapture of SUDDENLY NOT BEING ALONE AT ALL. Music makes these moments happen; seeing a great movie with a packed house makes this happen; from time to time, the Web has accomplished this in my life as well. To me, these moments are Everything That Is Good with a capital G; if they can be engineered, might it not be imaginable to reverse-engineer the steps towards these moments so that they might take place more often and more dependably? Might it not possible for a WEBSITE to enable these conversations to take place?

 

Yes, of course, but how does this relate to the Unamerican vision?

 

This conversation-oriented attitude will inform this People section as it develops. To me, people ARE the Revolution. This entire site exists to train revolutionaries; you do this by examining the characteristics of revolutionaries and offering these characteristics up as an education by those interested in learning the art of revolution. The People section, therefore, must necessarily address the single most pressing concern of any revolutionary - how to build a movement out of a collection of individuals. To do this, groups must be encouraged and set free to make autonomous decisions; skills must be built to teach individuals to network their ideas, will, and abilities; and a cause must be outlined to give direction and focus to the group. Have you seen the movie Fight Club or read the book The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress? Both detail plans on creating a revolutionary underground through encouraging the creation of autonomous collectives to implement a planned mode of attack on a society. These are the kinds of movements that grow to impact a society (though the former's emphasis on violence to wreak that change is sorta Hollywood). The battleground is nothing less than the national media and ultimately the government itself.

 

So then, what is your specific goal with hosting a People section?

 

Unamerican is an attempt by one person and his friends to create a revolution. In my opinion, a revolution looks a whole hell of a lot bigger than me standing on a corner handing out "fuck work" stickers; but a thousand kids, all handing out the same brochure in fifty cities at the same time, and then putting out a press release about it - WOW!!! You see, direct action rarely emerges from an AOL chatroom. Group direct action - its visualization, preparation, and execution - is a dangerous (and sometimes illegal) game. Simply put, focusing on action is nearly impossible for strangers whose only common denominator is the urge to spend some leisure time on chat; it's so easy as to be trivial to a group of tight friends. Therefore, out of this section must emerge new groups of tight friends ready to engage in direct action. I think that engineering a community designed to make friends out of its visitors is a really cool goal for this section. and I believe that just the fact that the people in this community are Unamerican-minded ought to put a revolutionary spin on whatever actions come out of it (although that's up to you)

 

You make it sound easy!

 

Well, I've got a theory on how to attack the task of forming and visualizing this groups. Here it is in basic, the core PEOPLEMATH doctrine: Combinations of people are like combinations of atoms; some are stable and some fall apart immediately or decay with time. This chemical/mathematical metaphor implies that people somehow ADD UP in various combinations - and occasionally subtract from, multiply and divide each other. Add a person to an existing combination, and she or he may reinforce the existing bonds or dissipate the entire combination. I'm trying to work out a way to maximize the stability and intelligence of the "molecules" that are born on this page; think of me as a farmer trying to keep his crops in sync with the seasons and each other. I have some theories on what can galvanize connections between groups, and over time you'll be seeing some of those theories fleshed out here and amplified if they work. You see, organizing and motivating a small group - three to twenty is the average group size - it's a skill as well as a talent, and through this section I'm hoping that you people will figure this skill out and steer your "molecule" towards some serious chemical reactions; first interpersonally, and then inevitably towards other groups and finally the outside world (to be accomplished either in carefully plotted stages, or in a blast of energy; that's entirely up to you).

 

In what way is just meeting people "revolutionary"?

 

One must remember that I define "revolution" somewhat differently than you might. I think a revolution happens EVERY time people meet and benefit from that meeting, no matter what actually transpires. Even if the only result of an exchange is the further development of an idea, it's totally valid and can ultimately result in greater action as the idea develops in people's collective minds. I believe that simply interacting on a level unknown previously constitutes a revolution. Yes, that means that I believe that the Internet is revolutionary; but I believe that this People section (along with groundbreaking work done by The Fray and others) is going to push our idea of social interaction, and ultimately social movements, to a whole new level. And I betcha, given enough time to develop fully, this section is going to be a potent laboratory for the conceptualization of gradual social change accelerated by intentionally-willed group direct action. By using the attention-economies of scale that the mass media and the Internet provide us, we merely have to create local legends that "get out" and give people revolutionary ideas, rather than worrying about what the National Guard is going to do. Small groups are ALWAYS faster than the authorities, and the Internet gives us the tight and (eventually) secure communications that are critical to a subversive movement's success.

 

So, what's this movement all about then?

 

That's the part of it that I don't know (well, white lie; I know some of it). I want the groups themselves to decide what they're going to do - that's the "autonomous" bit. I want the groups to be regionally congruent, but strategically diverse; where one member of the group might be a designer, another may be the kind of person who is willing to scale a billboard. The two of them put together are greater than they are individually as far as their ability to perform revolutionary actions is concerned. Unamerican Activiites means to be a forum by which people can search for others to round out their autonomous groups; while there are thousands of similar projects on the Internet, none that I know of will be so tightly focused on generating hundreds of instances of direct action. While the individual instances of these actions might be quite small (as simple as developing a group page on Unamerican.com, or a set of flyers to post around a high school), I am certain that they will add up to something that can really pack a wallop against the System. Look, capitalists have the group-coordination thing down to a science; they use programs like Microsoft Project to coordinate vast projects involving hundreds of people and millions in budget on tight timelines. If this sounds square to you, think of what a revolutionary underground could DO with such abilities!!!