#anti-nature

[athousandgateaux]

The scribes of [civilization] call their nature-hatred Rationalism and their misanthropy Humanism. Naming things the opposite of what they are is a talent inherited from the Church. Until the Renaissance, a proposition or a deed was reasonable if it was in harmony with the human and natural context. Irrational, Unnatural and Inhuman were kindred terms if not actually synonyms. Yet now that human powers of reasoning are placed at the service of the most inhuman and unnatural as well as irrational propositions and deeds, the accomplishment is hailed as Rationalism. The later so-called Enlightenment will sever reason from every human and natural context, and the full harvest of this triumph of the irrational masked as reason will be reaped when atoms of Hiroshiman living beings as well as their environment are splintered by the next-to-last invention of this irrational ‘reason.’ Unprecedented misanthropy is clothed as Humanism by masters of inversion schooled by a millennium of Vicars of Christ.

Fredy Perlman, Against His-Story, Against Leviathan! pg. 231

[mizelaneus]

The Return of the American Wolf Hunt

Humans kill wolves when they want to privatize nature.

[alternateworldcomics]

Created to sell Wheaties, Jack Armstrong the All-American Boy ran on the radio from 1933 to 1951 with stop offs in various other media such as comics and movie series along the way. In 1963 Hanna-Barbera tried to bring him back as a cartoon but the deal for the name fell though so instead they created Johnny Quest.

 Which I guess sort of makes Jack the pop cultural grandfather of the Venture Brothers, and I’m pretty sure Dr. Thaddeus "Rusty" Venture could get behind the abomination and general crime against nature going on in the above story from the Parent Magazine’s Jack Armstrong comic # 11, 1949.

[audenstieber]

around me are the discarded layers of second and third skins. piles of monochromatic Nike and Adidas reaching for the ceiling of my room.  one pile is so massive it is blocking most of my corner window.  the outside light, filtered through the black and white fabrics, is coating my room with a dim, desaturated wash.  i didn’t realize how much online shopping for sports clothing i had done until i freaked out and massed everything in front of all the light producing surfaces like a heroin addict.  

i am naked except for a pair of skin tight Under Armor boxer briefs.  

i took all my clothes off because i realized i couldn’t actually feel it on my body and i wasn’t leaving the house any time soon, so why bother.  in fact, i can’t actually feel the boxer briefs but i’m leaving them on for the sake of decency (?).  i can only feel the warm caress of internet breezes (pushed along by the occasional notification from facebook or tumblr or twitter).  a little red globe in the corner of my facebook window gives me a jolt and i feel alive.  it’s not physical, only mental—but it reminds me of physical feeling.

[audenstieber]

i realize now that i must go off the grid.  this is the only hope for humanity if we hope for it to be called humanity in the future.  to be consumed by the beast of nature is a better future for me (and for you all).  we must return to nature.  we must return to our natural state.  i think back on my experiences in nature (when i sat beneath the cherry tree) with increasing fondness, i long to go back there, but this time without a phone, without a social media identity (without my watch, without my glasses, without my pencils and books, without my apartment room, without my clothing).                                                                   (without my friends?)

my body (if i have one) is pulled towards Arcadia

so here, i must leave you, readers and followers, and cease my existence online.  only i will find if i truly exist in the real world—if i am not the imagination of someone, if i am truly the shared identity of some person.  i will never be able to tell you what i find because i will either be reduced to nothingness (this is my digital suicide after all) or, if i do survive, i can never return here for i will be in Arcadia.  i will be my natural human self.  the angels will blow their trumpets for me as i stride back home, touching me and holding me with their long (un-prosthetic) arms made of pure human skin.  their hands will carry no hidden micro-chips that relay their location to a parent, a spouse, a government and their fingers will have never brushed the keys that displace the self inside the glowing box.  the keys that fuck the body up into ambiguous pulp with each key-stroke (like i am doing right now, in my final moments).  the cherubs will dance for me beneath the canopies of cherry trees and i will rejoice with my fellow humans.  i will be drunk on the life and wholeness they give me through approving stares and pats on the back.

when i arrive we will surely party—but then we must hasten to work!  the fruits and vegetables will not grow themselves.

[audenstieber]

i am afraid i only exist here, on the vague plane (or is it more like an expanse of tubes?) of the internet.  i have lost my body.  i can’t be sure i ever had one.  i fear for my future, our future.  

people say, “i wish i could delete my facebook.”

i say, “delete, leave.” i say, “we have lost the part that is important.”

this is not our home.  humans cannot live on the internet (no matter how detached).  something is lost the moment we project our minds into this undefined space—something is split, fractured, sacrificed.  we lose the human, we lose the self.  the internet is a dead place, it is a cold place.  dead, ambiguous space.  the internet is composed only of empty architecture—there is no cherry tree on a patch of grass to provide shade and beauty, there is no sun, even, to warm the concrete and provide the need for shade.  (perhaps the problem is that we don’t feel the cold of the internet and, therefore, can’t grasp the folly of our ways.)  the internet is no substitute for nature—it is all artifice.  we created it.  we have complete control.  but to be human is to be out of control.

i’ve become a brand.  i’ve become an imitation of a human (and a cheap one at that).  a human cannot be truly recreated—humans are composed of stars, fate, magic, not lines of code.  it is as if i am only the imagination of some living, physical person.

i feel: “contrived” (like seaweed or octopus “arms” arranged to look like an inkblot on a pebble beach.  some see a person, some see the apocalypse.)

i long to really feel again.

[mauvais--sang]

Là surtout le moyen âge s’était montré dans son vrai caractère, l’Anti-Nature, faisant dans l’unité de l’être des distinctions, des castes hiérarchiques. Non seulement l’esprit est noble, selon lui, le corps non noble, — mais il y a des parties du corps qui sont nobles, et d’autres non, roturières apparemment. — De même, le ciel est noble, et l’abîme ne l’est pas. Pourquoi ? « C’est que le ciel est haut. » Mais le ciel n’est ni haut ni bas. Il est dessus et dessous. L’abîme, qu’est-ce ? Rien du tout. — Même sottise sur le monde, et le petit monde de l’homme.

Jules Michelet, La sorcière, 1862

[rantingsofanairwitch]

Gotta Be Ranty Again

I'm so tired of the pagan tag being overrun by "you're only a real pagan if you love nature!" posts. Well I'm pagan, and nature can kiss my ass, because nature is the reason I've been nearly bed ridden for three days with the sinusitis from hell. Not all pagans are nature lovers. )o( Rowan Aura