Tuesday, June 12, 2007

puppets, space monkeys, cubicle dwellers

You just do your little job.
Pull a lever.
Push a button.
You don't really understand any of it.
Then you die

The life of a Space Monkey. How different are we. really ?

I hadn't read the Fight Club book until now.
I started reading it a couple of days ago. I haven't finished it yet.
I am clamped between surprise, awe and a healthy skepticism. Overlap
and interlock used to be the side-effects of my rambling stream of
consciousness.
Now they are all too real.
I wonder if the book echoes me, or whether I am now a programmed clone
repeating Tyler's words.

The book's got it all. The human condition. Dominion & the slavery
that follows. Mind-control .Social tools, civillization-hacking &
hijacking. Control culture.
King-making. Empire building. Home chemistry . Smart interesting
facts. Slivers of Buddhist references for the exotic touch. Arson,
violence, crime to keep you interested. Boring-as-death bosses and
eminently hate-able work to resonate with your reality.
Playing Ceasar and Age of Empires and reading Machiavelli is a waste
of time. Or maybe you should read the book first.When the pupil is
ready, the master will appear.

The movie complements the book, but is not enough to stand alone.
Subversively, the movie makes the viewer feel good like any decent
cult does, and hides the larger picture of the ubiquitous puppet
strings that tie us all to ourselves, as we know it. The movie cuts
the book out and puts the pieces in order, makes it simpler for the
simple mind.

Tyler replaces existing puppet strings with his own.

If a system were to invent a completely valid reason to be happy
within its own system of logic but this reason were invalid outside
the system, would the adherents of this system be rational or
irrational ? would the system be a cult ?

"You are the same decaying organic matter as everyone else, and we
are all part of the same compost pit"

When you get down to it, the Buddha didn't say anything pleasant or
exotic. What he said amounts to "Everything decays and dies", but the
mind can't handle this.
A human being is supposed to identify his/her abilities and weaknesses
and live accordingly. A space monkey will be programmed to do so
otherwise.
"Your suffering is our programming job. Thank you for your time and
have a nice day !!"

Is true love and affection reserved for babies only ?

"I am Ozymandias, king of kings" is a line from the book .

3 Comments:

Blogger AaaDee said...

This comment has been removed by the author.

11:54 PM, June 12, 2007  
Blogger Aslan said...

umm.. dunno whether its cuz i've watched the movie so many times or whether i did it with subtitles, but i really felt that the book was just a transcript of the movie, esp'ly 'cuz it's mostly narration. so really nothing new..

11:58 PM, June 13, 2007  
Blogger yesbob said...

deepika : thanks !! that's only because the sentences are all disconnected... :D

aslan : the story twists a bit more in the book, i thought ..

2:25 PM, June 14, 2007  

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