— jdemeta

A discussion I’ve had time and time again with friends and family is one regarding consumerism. We usually discuss politics and collapse (in that order) until the early hours and eventually one person usually states something along the lines of,

“Well yeah, but the root of all this is the mindless consumerism! That’s what we need to stop!”

A statement which used to frustrate me, largely due to the fact there was lack of shared coherent definition regarding what ‘consumerism’ means. See, I figure that most people who are critical of consumerism see it as external to themselves, something which they don’t do and is only a problem for the dumb masses. I used to agree with such a definition, for it takes quite the stomach to admit that one might have traits of the sheep in their nerves.

This typical definition of consumerism is a general critique of mindless behavior as opposed to an exposition on the meaning itself. Consumerism in the stereotypical sense means someone who wants/desires the latest car, flatscreen-TV, Marvel Movie etc. Basically someone who is entirely caught up in the spectacle of consumption and wishes to have the latest purchasable piece of the spectable, as to prove that they are indeed in-on-it, they are in-the-know and are ultimately, normal and worthy of popularity, status and attention. I see this definition as basically wrong, in fact, it’s not only wrong, it’s extremely misleading.

The above definition is more like the worst parts of the whole, the most extreme example of consumerism. And as prevalent and obvious as that part of the definition is, it’s only the glaring top layer of the consumerist cake. In fact, I’d argue it’s the layer that almost needs to stay alive for consumerism to continue flourishing. We’ve all read or seen Fight Club, ‘you are the shit you buy’ etc etc. blah blah, misreadings all over the place, angsty morons begin lobbing their half-baked anti-I-don’t-even-fucking-know ideology about the place and generally using the pithy pseudo-ideology of an OK novel to legitimize their own bullshit. This of course implies that there’s a whole other level of consumerism going on, one which most people really…really don’t want to admit to, at least those who are supposedly critical of consumerism at large.

It’s easy to be critical of those buying the latest sports car, the latest TV, the biggest house etc. of consumerism, because, well, the things they’ve purchased are so large, garish and obvious that one cannot help to project their own insecurities into phrases such as “Compensating for something?”, “I just think people should live within their means.” and “Urgh, his/her life must be so empty.” Shut up. You’d have bought the same empty shit if you had the money or the chance. How do I know this? Because within your current ‘means’ you continue to buy the bullshit you can now! Every year or two you buy a new iPhone because, well…it came out – your old phone was fine of course, you just kinda…wanted the new one. You buy designer clothes even though you have perfectly fine clothes at home, you buy new editions of books because they’ll look nicer on your shelves, you – like 82% of the country (UK) – bought your ugly new car on finance, you just got new sofas because you changed your colour-scheme, you of course had to try that new sauce/meal/burger/wrap/drink from [insert food chain here]. The list goes on and on and fucking on! You are not outside of consumerism, you are so totally within it that you exist solely on hypocrisies at this point.

Thus far one could quite easily mistake the overarching idea of consumerism which I’m writing about here as simply a material ‘ism’. And that which we consume is only material, things and/or items etc. This is, once again, completely incorrect. The items of consumerism are secondary. Secondary to an idea. A shit, vacant, idiotic idea. The idea itself can’t be encapsulated by one phrase or statement because it subsumes lots of other socio-parameters into it. Status, normalcy, popularity, anxiety, paranoia, cultural-capital, to name just a few, are the fuel for this idea. The idea is of course simply consumption as means and meaning, but it’s so absolutely unconscious that – as I have stated – even those who attest to hate it, understand how it works or who are virulently against it continue to fall prey to its allure.

The problem is – as opposed to creation, mutation, differentiation and communication – consumption is very easy. So easy in fact we don’t even realize we’re doing it.

Let me ask you this dear reader, is your personality merely a culmination of your vices?

Are you an end-product of compounding material desires, ideological consumption and identity traits into a ‘being’?

Almost everything falls into the realm of consumption and it takes quite the alteration in perspective to remove yourself from the realm, so that your acts become somewhat ‘authentic’ (though I don’t want to venture into that avenue) or at least taken self-knowingly.

Remember when you were a child and you and your buddies stayed up late and watched some action-packed war film? The next day you went off the woods and pretended sticks were guns and rocks were grenades, you consumed the media and let it infect your identities – hey, at least when children do this is completely transparent. Hey, Brits, remember when Skins first came out and almost every other moron at school began to morph their personalities around those idiotic self-serving characters? Well I do, it was less transparent, but still a clear example of consumption at large.

After your teenage years I guess it becomes, at least for the masses, a little more tricky. See, the education system and the state – the two teats adults suck on for security of both an individual and collective kind – teach very little (if anything) about that which is external to consumption. Your classes at school were all formed in a manner of consumption – consume data to prove X, you consume various bits of state red-tape to be able to form your life and then continue to discuss said consumption in such a way that it fills your day and makes you seem real and connected to the norm.

“Fucking tax man took a bite out of my paycheck!”

“Got this weird housing letter about my rent…”

“I hope I pass X-exam, I’ve studied hard'”

There’s nothing in any of this, it’s the filler conversation which makes up 99% of life – unless you make the decision to exit from those people and places, which is relatively easy…but perhaps you just life comfort.

“So Meta, if all adults are is this weird culmination of bits and pieces they’ve consumed, what makes you so special? How can anyone not be some odd creature of consumptive habit?”

Well dear reader, that’s a very astute question, thank you for asking. When I write these posts I generally think that I come across as a condescending arsehole, I don’t massively care. Those who’ve I’ve offended are offended solely because of resentment, and wish their comforts had not been questioned. Those who are angry now, but willing to look inward will be thankful later.

#Anyway, the question at large I guess is this, ‘How can you not be a consumer?’ I mean, everyone consumes at a fundamental level don’t they? Water, food and shelter are things we need and so we consume them, the key point of argument then is the difference between a need and a want, or in French, between a need and a desire. You need shelter, water and food. You don’t need a new TV, a fancy car and brand name clothes. All of these are simply lifestyles being sold to you, visions of a future wherein you have higher status, greater popularity and more people life you. Look at that guy in the prototype Audi A333, wrapped in 30 layers of Ralph Lauren with a TV implant in his head, he is cool…he is alpha. For a good novel on this absurd form of consumerism I recommend James Palumbo’s TOMAS.

Anyway, the reason everyone consumes, and no one is immune from the consumerist lifestyle is that pretty much everyone is, at least in some way, weak. I’m weak to books, especially esoteric and obscure books, I consume then like a rabid animal. In a certain sense I’ve bought into some ideal there and am beginning to move from it. If this is the case then consumerism at large, in definition, is largely defined by the reasons why someone is purchasing something as opposed to act of consumption in itself. It doesn’t matter if you’re buying McDonalds or organic, fairtrade, homegrown, vegan, non-GMO, gluten free jam, it’s the reason you’re buying them. You’re probably buying the formed because some remnant of a heartfelt kitsch McDonald’s advert is lodged in the back of your mind and you suddenly just ‘fancied’ a burger, think on your actions for more than a second and you will immediately stop consuming as much, the latter however might be bought out of sincerity, but it also might be bought out of virtue. Hell, a lot of that kind of vegan, wholefoody stuff must be bought out of virtue alone…’cus it tastes like shit.

Strangely, this is were my now not-so-recent flirtation with Occultism come in handy. (With that said, I think continued reading, research and practice of Occultism means it’s no longer a flirtation and something more…) See, in my Greer interview he notes of the animatronic Santa Claus figures you get at Christmas. You know the ones, you press the button, he dances and sings a tune, the family laughs for 2 seconds, it gets thrown out in a few months. The point is if people actually thought about their purchase decisions for more than a nano-second entire industries wouldn’t even exist. Consumerism in its entire is a demonic force that preys on passivity and apathy. You’re not thinking, you don’t care and you’re hardly even mentally awake, and that’s why you feel alienated and empty, you’re simply the crass compound human-butter made solely of vapid desires and parasitic dreams. In short, you’re an unthinking idiot.

Want to get ‘out’ of consumerism and edge a little closer towards authenticity and a more content, fulfilling being, it’s quite simple, practice meditation. Specifically discursive meditation:

“To get the best results, discursive meditation requires the same sort of preliminaries that the more familiar forms of meditation do. The standard advice among old-fashioned occultists was to sit in a chair with your spine comfortably straight, not leaning against the back; your feet are flat on the floor; your legs are parallel to each other, and bent at a right angle; your hands rest on your thighs close to your knees, and your elbows are at your sides. Every muscle you don’t need to use to stay upright is as relaxed as you can get it. Having assumed the position and deliberately relaxed the muscles just mentioned, you breathe slowly and deeply for several minutes, paying attention to the inflow and outflow of the breath, and turn your mind away from every topic of thought except the theme of your meditation.” – Foundations of Magical Practice: Meditation

I practice (though not as routinely as I’d like) 2 forms of discursive meditation. Firstly the one above which I practice prior to bed for 15 minutes, or until the question has been answered and dissolves. I also practice a form of questioning/discursive meditation with a friend – this is a personal invention, but great for quick problem solving. Find a friend in whom you can trust to tell the depths of your soul. Your question or predicament may be serious or harmless etc. Have them question you after every answer.

“I think I need a new job.”

“Why?”

“This one isn’t fulfilling.”

“Why?”

“The work doesn’t suit me.”

“What is it about the work?”

“It’s dull, meaningless.”

“What work do you think would have meaning for you?”

You get the picture, anyway, I find both of these forms of ‘meditation’ extremely useful in day to day life.

And so you want to exit consumerism, perform a discursive meditation either on a consumptive habit that is frustrating you (Netflix, smoking etc.) or on your consumptive habits in general, note the results, reflect on the initial problem and the answer that helps you find some peace with it. Often the two would have be very difficult to connect.

So I said that when I finally finished my dissertation that I would delve deep into Z/Acc. Well, now is that time. I wasn’t sure what to call this series. Mainly because I know it’s going to be my longest yet, I’ve got so many ideas for blog posts on this topic its almost crazy, as a blogger you get a certain kind of buzz from finding new points of overlap. I was initially going to call it Dirty Future as a sort of tongue-in-cheek jab at the sphere I’ve been working in prior, yet, that doesn’t feel right. I can’t say for certain that the prophecies of Kurzweil, Land etc. haven’t/wont come true. Many most definitely have (see here), and many will come true in a stranger fashion…not the future we wanted, but the one we got etc. Then I was going to call it Notes from a Dead Dog, because that sounded cool and sort of harsh, the corpse of a rotten, loving mutt seems apt and I can’t really explain why. Perhaps Z/Acc journal, I don’t know, anyway, I’m writing this post as a means to figure out what it should be called, so I can group it all together.

A few thoughts,

“It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child.” – Pablo Picasso

I’m not much of a fan of Picasso, yet I always liked this quote, not in its relation to art, nor even aesthetics. You see, it took me 25 years to exist as a modern man, and it’s going to take me a lifetime to simply exist again. I grew, and much like the rest of the West (male and female) I sort of nonchalantly was whilst being parasitically infected by various external stimuli. This could be misconstrued as a Chomsky-esque Manufacturing Consent type thing, perhaps it is, I don’t massively care. Either way, as I grew, I became slowly formed. Mass-media, TV, Internet, Carbohydrates, Diet-Fads, Low-Fat, excess sugar, video-games, ‘public education’, binge drinking, smoking and more, more…more. Always a distraction.

I note Picasso’s quote because I feel, at current, that the task set for me is to strip off as much of this excess modern/progressivist/consumer bullshit as possible. Sounds angsty, it is, it can’t be helped. I haven’t watched TV for years now, I borrow a Netflix account but can’t really focus on it anymore, it seems like a mimicry of TV more than TV in itself. I highly recommend David Foster Wallace’s E Unibus Pluram on this. I kept up with the political stuff for a while, moved back and forth, up and down, between colours, isms etc. It’s all sort of dry after you come to accept GNON in abstract. Even then I couldn’t care less, largely because anyone whose very nature inclines them to be interested in becoming a politician leads me to distrust them (I am pro anonymous-leader). The Internet was great, most of the old net is gone, weirdly lost. Now we’re post-Facebook-slump. An odd malaise of repetition where due to the absolute influx and accessibility of data very rarely are arguments even formulated, we can attend to multiple biases at one time, alluding to the fact that we probably don’t really know, or maybe we do, either way, there’s something inherently shut-the-fuckable about the internet in general. The carbs thing is a little bit of a quip, sure, but it’s true. I grew up in this era of culture so removed from its substance that what one interacted with was either consumption & production, or malaise and a sense of mourning. Normie or death. I could go on.

My point being is a point that has been repeated time and time and time again, you’re probably not very close to yourself, strip back the layers and see what you find. A digression. At work, before I leave off, I eat a can of tuna out of the tin prior to the gym. My work colleagues still sort of grin, grimace or poke fun at the act, it doesn’t bother me…it bothers them, ha. However, it was an act that made me realise how utterly removed from reality the average person is. “Look at this dude! He’s eating food in…in a…err…not normal way! HA! Got ‘im!” What happened? It’s like Oedipus got an upgrade between 2000 and 2010, was Facebook Oedipus’ upgrade?

Anyway, it was strangely enough a sort of pinnacle moment for me. I was just finishing up my dissertation around the time the tuna-mocking began and was going to be freed up so I thought for a long time on why it resonated with me so much, why that simple act had really conceptually rattled me. I’ll be honest, I still can’t really pinpoint why, or what about it is so apt, but the long and short is, it was the most perfect metaphor for the reality of the average homo-economicus, it was as ‘the consumer’ had suddenly popped out of the simulacrum as a pure concept and laughed at me. Imagine being that locked into to some strange form of consumerist normality that someone else just eating bland food is cause for disruption, cause for annoyance, anger…perhaps even a sort of gut level disgust at social tenacity. It was the moment that made it all click, ‘Yes,’ I said to myself ‘we are literally amidst a global socio-economic and environmental collapse…and that attitude is the nerve-system.’. All of a sudden I was free to do what I wanted, I always have been, but another layer of social gravity had fallen off – one of the last, the one just before living in the woods in a loin cloth – and I no longer gave a shit about so many more things.

Firstly I ditched my smart phone, there’s nothing smart about them. In actuality, they’re likely the most boring things ever made. Pray tell, what do you do on a smartphone? Check Facebook, dull. Check apps, you don’t need to do that all the time. There’s little point to them and most likely you’ll never look at anything you do on them after the first time. So I’m back to an old phone and text mobile, which is basically just for calls…so it’s basically always off and I’m free to do what I want without people interrupting me. Mobile phones are inherently rude, “Sorry, I’ll just stop you there, I have to answer this.” Wait, what? Since when did that become the norm. Then I basically stripped back my possessions. I still have a few bits I’m clinging due largely because of sunk cost, but I’d argue that in monetary terms my possessions (leaving aside my car and home) are as follows: 80% books, 10% clothes, 5% memberships (gym, karate and online) and the other 5% is random. I eat a carnivore diet but will be transitioning to locally sourced soon ‘cus of the collapse. Get Used to Local Potatoes Now and Avoid the Rush.

I’ll be honest once you ditch your smartphone, Facebook, Netflix, TV and having a PC on all the time, your half way to getting back to some sort of original state. By that I don’t mean authentic, I just mean as close to un-tampered with as possible. You suddenly have loads of time, more worth, less worry and more concern and conscientiousness.

You ever try take a walk in the woods in last 5 years, on your own, no attachments. Try it, your brain will most likely act like a worm having a seizure. “But…but…what the fuck do I….DO!” Go be.

Anyways, that was a little thing I wanted to sort of shoot out very quickly tonight, will touch on many of these topics again. But be prepared for Z/Acc stuff, lots of it.

Rarely do I break into anything administrative on this blog. But as my Twitter gained quite a bit of traction over the last 6 months and I decided to begin Hermitix I feel a note on my quasi-silence is in order.

Basically, I started up Hermitix at entirely the wrong time in relation to a multitude of in-real-life things out of my control. As soon as episode 4 landed irl decided to plummet downward in many directions all at once. Everything is somewhat ok, though it really isn’t great to be quite frank. I mean, in terms of irl details it’s the usual shit. I met a lovely girl though. So god knows how long this odd intermission will be, maybe months to be honest. That said, I’m still jotting down ideas and have actually recorded some of series 2.

It’s quite odd that a blog that brings in no revenue – though Hermitix has a few Patreons now – adds quite a bit of pressure, the idea I need to constantly keep up with content creation or everything will just explode. So everything is still going ahead, I am still here, just this really isn’t a priority right now. Maybe when I come back I’ll add a load of stuff to the blog, I’ve been meaning to do a blogroll for ages. There’s really great content out there at the moment. Everything’s moving so quick, you lose focus for just a second and you feel like your volumes behind.

Stay safe everyone. My DMs are still open as always.

“The objective man who no longer curses and grumbles like the pessimist, the ideal scholar, in whom the scientific instinct after thousands of total and partial failures all of a sudden comes into bloom and keeps flowering to the end, is surely one of the most valuable of implements there are, but he belongs in the hands of someone more powerful. He is only a tool, we say. He is a mirror – he is no “end in himself.” The objective man is, in fact, a mirror: accustomed to submit before everything which wishes to be known, without any delight other than that available in knowing and “mirroring back” – he waits until something comes along and then spreads himself out tenderly so that light footsteps and the spiritual essences slipping past are not lost on his surface and skin. What is still left of his “person” seems to him accidental, often a matter of chance, even more often disruptive, so much has he become a conduit and reflection for strange shapes and experiences. He reflects about “himself” with effort and is not infrequently wrong. He readily gets himself confused with others. He makes mistakes concerning his own needs, and it’s only here that he is coarse and careless. Perhaps he gets anxious about his health or about the pettiness and stifling atmosphere of wife and friend or about the lack of companions and society – indeed, he forces himself to think about his anxieties: but it’s no use! His thoughts have already wandered off to some more general example, and tomorrow he knows as little as he knew yesterday about how he might be helped.” – Friedrich Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 207

Oh but what of the subjective man, the nu-man of the latest years! Who grumbles and whines like a sordid lamb, blithering to and fro attending to its delicate wool and mutton. An ideal scholar no more, but a pitiful researcher tumbling into the destitute forever of the internet, pulling data and e-ink around in a whirlwind of self-obsessed conformity. Nothing no but agreement with the self. No bloom, no Spring, no Summer – in fact, no season at all for he to live within, only a stagnant existence of identity and the tug of each and every social whim. Nietzsche speaks of a mirror, a mirror that no longer exists as far as I can see. The reflection acts a way to see that one is not an end in himself but a labyrinth of mirrors, ducts and chambers splaying out into a willed infinity. But of course, the mirror was shattered, I know not when, only that each fragment of its death has been taken away, most likely chained the bottom of the deepest ocean – objectivity death as the mirror shatters – No more ‘mirroring back’ only continual self, identity and progress, without the reactionary reflection of he who can see he’s but a flesh, there can be no real progress, only a dainty skipping into miserable weakness. The new man does no spread himself, nor act upon himself, no. He directs himself to a supposed causal linearity towards which is his most politically dutiful desires…he thinks. Virtue, hedonism, liberation, emancipation. I spit on these terms with a smile and call them what they are, empty-headed lack of reflection from he whom knows not even the possibility of reflection.

No essence past the skin, for flesh is all, flesh for fucking and diving and frolicking and licking and sucking, flesh to be hungover, flesh for the comedown and flesh to get fat, flesh to get cut off again once the whale begins to cry. The surface of the skin has lost every trace, it’s a toxic container for socio-political determined delights, extrinsic personalities flood the sublime, and it rots and rots. Of course he who cannot reflect is left for eternity entirely whole, a unification of failures kept as successes, of idiocy maintained as truth, and of activism as a replacement for the heart. For he who never had the possibility of a mirror, and as such of reflection remains alone in an acidic humanist reverbaration, pulsing into the tug of the absolute fall. OH! He is not confused with others! Never confusing himself with no one! He knows himself and only himself, his loop, his return, his eternity is only he. And it is such a he that couldn’t change, a priori identity branding, flesh as a tag of self-righteous cawing.

Line the streets with placards high! Higher! Cast them to the sky and feel your lack pulse into ther ether! Walking through the thresher of the socius a virtue-clad cunt, destined to fall upon a cosmically pathetic handout. Oh poor boys and sons, groveling into the tear filled gutters, I beg you arise, but begging’s not my business. I’m neither sat atop a mountain, nor am I down in the abyss. I’m imminent to you all, as you are to me. Without a mirror to see, without a mirror to cast your gaze anywhere else but into a Cartesian echo. My mirror is weak, but into its bleak stains, and cob-webbed haeccity I witness you, all of you…sucking the infected ringworm out of the cosmos’ anus, allow to the defecation to tumble into your nostrils and hair, delighted in your stench. A phase-shift of patheticism emanates from your very being, all because you lack the mirror, the mirror that was never allowed for you!

Callous anxiety and pithy depression/ pilled hedons run amock/ A thousand more to the fall/ landfill humanity acts as reverb/ and the beat goes on.

This is a disappointing entry into my series, it really is, there’s no questioning the feeble nature of my analytic skills this time around. We begin with Murnau’s Tabu (1931) and hell, I got nothing to say, the film bored me, I struggled to watch, I found it utterly tiresome with very little to drag from its odd domain. Le Million (1931) was a non-find. Which brings me to this entry’s biggest flop City Lights (1931) often heralded as Chaplin’s magnum opus this film did very little for me. Chaplin’s ‘Tramp’ is a try-hard and I cannot be bothered with him, I find something so utterly despicable about his presence, his fumbling, tripping and accidental luck frustrate me, his conclusions make me role my eyes and his faux-sentimentality makes his suspicious, I said before and I shall say again, Chaplin simply doesn’t fit this era…Chaplin and school shootings cannot coexist. A Nous Le Liberte (1931) forgettable, I left it a little while before writing this entry and I cannot remember a single thing of this film.

Finally, some light in the darkness, Fritz Lang’s M (1931) is a masterpiece, there’s no question. I wont bother with comparison, ranking against Metropolis, they’re too different. From its very beginning M brings from the outside sounds and paranoia, a danger lurks just out of sight for us viewers, there’s a constant unease – even with killer in shot – that control has been lost and something entirely unnannounced may enter diagonally into the social-linear at any moment. This world of M rife with purchase of crime fiction, with crime and danger as capital and commodity, a societal lust for both overrides the real danger of a psychotic break. And thus from this mass connection via the overarching spell and enticement of crime begins the media’s hysteria, fuelled by fear, paranoia and murder; a mass contagion brough into existence by the failure of authority to act, to secure and to make those accountable safe. And so the murder is needed by many as a structural pivot. The media needs its existence to fuel their profits, the police their job and so society, the public are the ones left nearest the outside. A lot gets lost amongst the smoke of a hundred smoking gents here. The truth of danger flutters into a nothingness amongst the lusts and profits of the apathetic. The whistle warning offscreen marks the neglect of family, of children, of the family-unit. That which should be protected is currently at danger from the malicious whistle.

The idle Progville citizens began their vote. A chaos ensued complete with shouting, debating, crying, whining, screaming, kicking, more whining, gossip and the tiniest flickers of rationale, each and every voter attempting to hold-their-own opinion amongst the blithering of the crowd. Few had reason nor thought as to why they thought the way they did, the majority, like the stock markets of the old times, merely based their vote on whether or not it would favour them in relation to popularity; and thus, from afar one could watch as the Mexican-wave of opinion rolled throughout, one side barking ‘No!’ and the others a ‘Yes!’, the pendulum had been cast and now all there was to do was wait.

‘Seriously, Chem, look for a fucking exit!’

‘Well what’s that going to look like…’

‘If I’m honest with you here, no one really knows, but it definitely doesn’t look like Democracy!’

‘Huh, what you chatting about mutt?’

‘Oh, I’ll explain once we’re outside this dump.’

The citizens continued their democratic wailing long into the night, all the while Chem and Narax wandered the streets shadowed by no one. Peering into window after window, display after display, their eyes attempting to fixate onto a morsel of authenticity.

‘Narax, what’s happened here…’ Chem stated whilst gazing upon a ‘sculpture’.

‘This is what they call art Chem, a strange mixture of consumer capital and virtue signalling.’

‘A’right, I get it, you’re smart. Explain’

‘This sordid mess of wires and rust Chem is now…art. It is the end of the line in terms of democratic creation, for once the democracy is in place there is only one direction down which to travel, especially in terms of public display.’

‘And that direction is?’

‘The expansion the state, or in this case the ‘ville’ of Prog. That is the democratic process keeps on striving towards a bureaucratic nothingness of inefficiency, virtue and egalitarianism.’

‘For someone who licks his own balls you sure do use a lot of fancy words…’

‘This ‘sculpture’ wasn’t born from some creative act Chem, it was born out of the artist’s lust to signal virtue…sorry, to signal to his fellow man that he ‘gets it’, that he’s ‘in’, that he will abide by the latest social fad, the latest minor grievance. An artistic act tied up both in virtue, but also red-tape, for to display anything external to virtue becomes an impossibility, for it simply will not be shown. And thus, the majority of art within a democracy, unless historic, is merely nothingness, proof only of democratic assimilation.’

‘And the eggy-tarian-ism?’

‘Egalitarianism, put simply, is the belief that all are equal.’

‘Ok, what’s wrong with that?’

‘Nothing’s wrong with it…it’s just not true. Nothing’s wrong with saying these apocalyptic wastes are lovely, or men and mutts are the same, nothing at all…it doesn’t make those statements true though.’

‘So, you’re saying you think some people are better than others?’

‘No. Why do people always assume this. The problem lies herein: Once everyone is equal to one another, once ‘equality’ is achieved – which is impossible by the way, I hope you can see that – everything that someone wants to be tolerated, needs to be tolerated and thus has to be tolerated. For if all are equal my dear Chem, then no need, want or desire is of greater importance than the next and thus the all of everything must be tolerated.’

‘And what the hell is wrong with tolerance?’

‘Because tolerance as a condition of government eventually comes to be used as a political tool. If those with the power, the know-how or the numbers wish to enact something they needn’t worry about laws, legislation or thought, no, all they need do is make it widely understood that to stand in their way is to be intolerant. And to be intolerant is to be many things…’

Chem lets out a long sigh ‘Such as…’

‘Well to be publicly intolerant is to draw scorn from your neighbour, to be known as the mean spirited ‘-ist’ of society, it is to quickly become marginalized and no longer listened to. A rigorous or lawful intolerance is to walk on a tightrope, for if you win your case then it’s only a matter of time until you’re outed as something-or-other, to lose your case is to lose all political footing…and in both cases it is to align yourself, once again, with those deemed ‘fringe’, radical or dissident a priori.’

‘What’s a priori?’

‘Knowledge of something prior to experiencing it. To know someone is bad without even hearing their case. A sad state of affairs indeed. And thus why we’re currently searching for the way out…’

‘Narax, have you ever been jolly?’

‘…very briefly, when I was a pup. Now, what’s this here?’

Chem and Narax had stumbled upon Progville’s rear entrance, or their exit. A strange, multi-layered contraption, filled with gears, levers, small screen-based inputs, a questionnaire, a depository and bundle upon bundle of wires.

‘Looks like we got two choices here Chem, back the way we came via the maddening crowd and packs of wanderers, or out through this…thing.’

‘I think we shou-’

‘Ha! There was never a choice, I’ll take my chances getting garotted by wires before facing that intolerable mass again.’ Narax said.

Narax looked back upon the crowd one last time before swiftly stepping into the exit-contraption. Slowly moving each paw onto a patch of uncovered ground.

‘Ok Chem, hurry up.’

Chem followed in Narax’s footsteps, holding his rifle to his chest as he lifted a bundle of wires over his head.

‘I’m in, now what?’

‘We try get to the other side of this thing as quickly as possible.’

Both Chem and Narax began making their way through the contraptions mechanisms and wires, quickly interrupted by a polite, yet machinic voice…

“Hello Gentleman and hound, how are you?”

The small display screens littering the contraption clicked on, each loading into:

E X I T – P R O G R A M

“Nothing to fear. This is merely a series of questions and tasks. You’ll be out before you know it.”

‘Chem get a fucking move on, this strangely gracious robot is freaking me out.’

“Question 1: Why is it you wish to leave?”

‘Do we answer Narax?’

‘No, just move…and watch your footing!’

“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that. Question 1: Why is it you wish to leave?”

Chem and Narax were roughly 10 feet from an opening before the wiring began to contract.

“You will be detained if you do not answer the questions. Question 1: Why is it-”

‘Quick, think of the answers it wants to hear…needs to hear!’

The wires slowly beginning to constrict Narax’s legs.

“We just wish to visit another town, we’ll be back!” shouted Chem.

“Question 2: On a scale of 1/10 how would you rate your stay?”

“Errr…7, 7 out of 10!”

“That score is rather low,-” The wires tightened “-why is that score so low?”

“Wrong score! Wrong sco-” Chem attempted to shout whilst a cable fastened around his neck.

“Question 2: On a scale of 1-10 how-”

“10. 10 out of 10.”

“Fantastic, and finally what improvements could we make to our town?”

‘Say something menial Chem…something material that won’t change shit!’

“You could have a…a cleaner gate!”

“Thank you for volunteering your time to take part in our quiz. Now if you wish to donate some DNA for our records please say ‘Yes’.”

“…No.”

“Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that. If you wish-”

‘Chem, haven’t you worked it out by now…’

“Oh for fuck’s sake…YES!”

“Thank you.”

Two needles extended from either side of the contraption, one for both Chem and Narax, slowly sliding into their legs, before retracting back into the walls.

“Thank you once again, and have a nice day.”

The contraption quickly shut off before any questions could be asked. Chem and Narax tore the wires from their bodies, and Narax looked back through the machine, witnessing a small screen slide along the wall of Progville and out of sight. The duo exited the contraption and the town, heading off into cinder-world.

The screen slid along the wall of Progville until it reached the front gate, where it slid into the hands of the mutated floor guard, the captain.

“Those fuckers said our gate is dirty! 10 out of 10 again though.”