BARBELITH underground
 

Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.


Underground > Comic Books >

Invisibles philosphy 101 - Making friends with your enemies

  
 
dlotemp
23:07 / 14.12.02
All the talk of Iraq and N. Korea has made me seriously explore my reservations regarding armed conflict and its usefulness. Personally, I loathe armed conflict, but I do believe someone has the right to defend themselves against a threat, possibly with arms. Both pacifism and agression have served society in different capacties but not without pros and cons. So, I wondered if there were a 3rd choice to my dilemma, which lead me to the Invisibles, that wonderful, meditative work.

Getting straight to the point, Dane aka Jack Frost, espouses an interesting, perhaps pertenient, approach to ideological conflict. When KM asks him they can stop bastards like us from telling everyone how to live their lives...without killing them, Dane replies - "You just gotta make friends with 'em. Make friends with them until they BEG for mercy."

At first, I didn't think Dane actually applied this idea in the series but perhaps it occurs when Dane assimilates the Archons into his essence. He sort of makes friends with them by recognizing how they apply to his life, and by doing so, he overcomes their conceptual limitations.

Does anyone think this approach actually works in their life? Has it worked? Because if we ever needed a strategy to peacefully assimilate our differences in the world, it's now.

Food for thought. Thanks in advance for all comments.
 
 
Sebastian
13:46 / 15.12.02
Yeah, but I don't like the word "friends". I would prefer symbiotes, to make everyone your symbiote and you theirs, which implies that everybody gets what he wants by cooperation of the others who also get what their want. I like this because its sort of challenging and you have to always keep an eye that someone will not inadvertently eat your arm while trying to get what he wants. It may also involve allowing someone to die or kill himself as long it does not take away something from you or the rest.

Ecology, pondering how much you can get what you want without disturbing the others from also getting it. I like that. Even if others don't get to share the concept, you can still work on it by facilitating them to get what they want, even without them realising it. You just put them on a faster track to their tomb.
 
 
PatrickMM
16:53 / 15.12.02
All the talk of Iraq and N. Korea has made me seriously explore my reservations regarding armed conflict and its usefulness. Personally, I loathe armed conflict, but I do believe someone has the right to defend themselves against a threat, possibly with arms.

That last sentence brought to mind another Invisibles theme for me: who would be the ones defending themselves? If the US is planning on launching attacks on Iraq, or N. Korea, don't they have a right to defend themselves, and if we can hold weapons of mass destruction, why can't they? It really is all about what perspective you view something from, there is no absolute right or wrong.
 
 
dlotemp
19:44 / 15.12.02
PatrickMM - I agree. Perspective alters the view. There are of course people who feel even armed defence is improper. To poorly quote Margaret Atwood - "context is everything." How do you feel your point relates back to the question of the "friends" strategy?

Should a friend (symbiote) assimilate all perspectives?

Sebastion - I like the symbiote idea because it reminds me of game theory, which is eminently useful. the obvious flaw is that the target enemy symbiote can achieve greater short-term outcomes by disregarding the symbiotic relationship. Reminds me of the fate of some Native American tribes that practiced an equitable social system and where destroyed by Western settlers.
 
 
Sebastian
20:31 / 15.12.02
I agree. But in the symbiote perspective no one is an enemy, everybody wins.

The Western-Native game was a game of overpowering the supposeddly "primitive" ones for a "better" more "civilised" perspective. They preached to their own "animal" totems and feared their own primitive "demons", for centuries. Of course, because they were basically primitive. So Western civilisation came and started and in less than 50 years started preaching its own totems: simvastatin and Prozac, and fearing its own demons: cholesterol and depression.
 
 
--
02:17 / 16.12.02
This reminds of something that happened in my life a few weeks ago. I'm an officer in my campus' gay/straight alliance. Recently we had a workshop on homophobia. Only one student showed up. a big guy, kinda jock-looking. He told us a lot of his friends were homophobic and that he himself had some bigoted attitudes towards gays (though not as bad as his friends). But then he told us he had come to our workshop because he wanted to see if he could get over these feelings he had toward gay people. A few days later he came to a workshop we had on transexuals. Just this week he helped support us at a bake sale we held. Now it seems he's not uncomfortable around gay people anymore. Once he took the time to see past the differences between the two sexual orientations he was able to, in a way, get past his own "conceptual limitations". Or something like that. Fuck, I don't know, I just want to contribute to the thread, I'm not even sure if this applies.
 
 
iconoplast
02:40 / 16.12.02
Jack Frost: "We didn't have MeMes when I was little. 'Personalities,' we called them."
Reynard: "Which is why you had war. You tried to hammer your enemies into shape: you wouldn't understand how you allow them to define the boundaries of your self-sense."

Is there another way to define self, besides in opposition to 'other'? The Invisibles seems to be a lot about blurring these distinctions and turning them inside out. But what better way to construct a national identity than to point to someone outside your nation and define them as the opposition?

Without enemies, we won't have boundaries. Is that where we're headed?
 
 
The Natural Way
07:10 / 16.12.02
Sypha: I think that's brilliant. God, he sounds like a really cool guy: the fact that he realised it might be HIM that had the problem.... Wow. That's real self-awareness for you.
 
 
yawn - thing's buddy
09:59 / 16.12.02
nah, I reckon he fond of rolling the dough meself, this big jock type lad.
 
 
The Natural Way
10:58 / 16.12.02
It did occur to me, but I really want to believe there are some STRAIGHT big jock types who are trying to better their heads.
 
 
Sebastian
11:08 / 16.12.02
Is there another way to define self, besides in opposition to 'other'?

I currently think the self can only rely on cosntruciton of opposites for interpreting the world. Not only because opposition is present in language, but because it is also present empirically as far as normal perception goes: where there is a tree there can't be a dog.

Semantically we can conceive the dissolution and marriage of opposites, like in zen riddles, but its a long and dramatic stride to simply experience it. In fact, the experience of it is precisely the dissolution of the self/no-self boundary which is usally -and necessarily- interpreted as "death" by the self. And death is just the opposition to "life" also conveniently constructed by the self. When it dissolves, everybody comes back illuminated with the seemingly rather incongruent knowledge that "there is no death".
 
 
Axel Lambert
11:10 / 16.12.02
If the US is planning on launching attacks on Iraq, or N. Korea, don't they have a right to defend themselves, and if we can hold weapons of mass destruction, why can't they? It really is all about what perspective you view something from, there is no absolute right or wrong.

There is no absolute right (or wrong), as there are no absolutes. But surely there are specific rights and wrongs, one being the difference between democracy and dictatorship. And just maybe this applies to who's to be trusted with weapons of mass destruction.
 
 
--
13:17 / 16.12.02
posted by Runce:
It did occur to me, but I really want to believe there are some STRAIGHT big jock types who are trying to better their heads.

Well, so do I.

posted by yawn:
nah, I reckon he fond of rolling the dough meself, this big jock type lad.

I doubt it, I'm the only gay male in the alliance.
 
 
yawn - thing's buddy
14:51 / 16.12.02
I'm such a force for negativity you know!
 
 
dlotemp
23:12 / 16.12.02
Sypha - that's a great story and one that I think fits within the question at hand. Like Jymnn Runce said, that's some self-awareness!

Sebastion - I appreciate your comments because I had overlooked the empirical issue as it relates to perception. I'd also like to point out, and I'm guessing many people will know this information, that the dissolution of self is also seemingly possible through deep meditation, which can cause a diminishment of ego. That'd be a hell of a solution, eh. Deep meditation before all United Nations meetings and such.

So where does that leave us - a jock who courageously takes a leap into his own prejudice, events that result in ego negation, and the symbiote relationship. I'd discount the second since it seems impractical on a larger scale, unless I happen to have a device that can cause the Supercontext to descend (snicker). What about the jock? What does his example offer us? has his new relationship with Sypha's alliance resulted in any changes for him? What do his original jock friends think? One of the issues I have with the "make Friends till they beg" idea is that what happens with friends who are stuck in an old mentality and see you making friends with enemy?

What about when you attempt to befriend those who don't want your friendship?

One of the things that this topic has brought to my attention is a conceptual model developed by Ken Wilber. He created a chart that showed the development of human thought, see his book A BRIEF HISTORY OF EVERYTHING, and this chart was basically divided into 4 quadrants. One side (2 blocks) represented exterior concepts and the other side (2 blocks) represented interior concepts and then each of the blocks were then equally divided into individual and social arenas. I'm murdering this description but the point was that Wilber theorizes that each conceptual leap, from hunter/gather to eglatarian to industrial to information and so on, accepts the previous concepts and overcomes their dialectices. Each conceptual level has its own dialectical limits though, reinforcincing Sebastion's suggestion that the polar distinction - us/them - exists within any empirical world. I'm unaware of Wilber's predictions for the next conceptual level but perhaps it is akin to what Sypha's jock experienced: a moment of self-awareness accompanied by an attempt to leap past limitations.
 
 
--
02:45 / 17.12.02
Actually, I'd be interested in hearing what his friends think too. I don't know the guy that well, he's just shown up for some workshops and helped us out at the bake sale, it's not like he's a member. Still, every bit of support helps our little Alliance (of 7-8 members).

Actually, the whole incident made me question some stereotypes I have of my own towards jocks. Maybe they aren't all misogynistic homophobic louts. Maybe once you get to know "the enemy" they stop being scary.

There's a cashier at the supermarket I work at, a religiuos woman. Her solution to the war on terrorism? Nuke the Middle East. She said that, sure, a lot of innocent people would die, but at least Americans would be safe. This appaled me. Maybe if she actually took the time to make friends with people from the Middle East she'd realize they aren't all American hating terrorists. But sometimes facing up to your own bigotry can be too much for some people I guess.
 
 
zarathustra_k
03:20 / 17.12.02
A lot of the stuff you are going over reminds me of Gandhi in some ways. He has an idea known as satyagraha, which is a love or soul force that one can tap into to try and change ones enemy. What is also interesting is within this one is to respect their enemy as well. Whether Gandhi use this against the Brits is open to debate?

In my own opinion it is very useful to understand your/the enemy, of course people read the enemy in different ways. Is Bush's view of Iraq/Hussein the "correct" view? Personally, for the most part yes, he is a tyrant that needs to be watched and kept in line. HOWEVER, his approach of dealing with the situation is extremely questionable and wrong.

Know the enemy.
 
 
glassonion
11:48 / 17.12.02
i try to listen to music i had previously thought i wouldn't like, and bravely experiment with foods i found repulsive as a child. when it works i feel pretty smug, let me tell you. about as smug as king mob looks throughout the second book. is that what being an invisible's all about? you can make friends with whoever and dissolve whatever boundaries you want, but they ALWAYS recoalesce and will need to be dissolved again. in the meantime the rest of the world's pretty much like it was before, except now it might hate you. all sorts of tales about enlightened ones believeing everyone they saw was enlightened and getting royally fucked with for it. what was it 'it won't help you if you get attacked by a lion or tax inspector'?
 
 
dlotemp
23:20 / 17.12.02
glassonion wrote - "you can make friends with whoever and dissolve whatever boundaries you want, but they ALWAYS recoalesce and will need to be dissolved again."

or put it in another Invisibles way...Initiation never ends.

Maybe I/we are looking at this friends/enemy tactic too dogmatically. How many of us have friends who stay friends with us for life? Oh, there will always be a few but friends always seem to slip away like rain on a windshield. Making friends with the enemy can only last as long as a friendship would normally last and I shouldn't be blind to that. We will always need to reconcile ourselves with others who think differently.

I'm beginning interprete Dane's strategy in a different light. When we begin to perceive something as an enemy, as the other, then that could be a signal to re-appraise your ego manifestations, like convictions, beliefs, etc. The enemy can be a time to strengthen your limitations or change them. The initiation never ends.

Hmmm....

I really appreciate everyone's comments on this topic. You've all given me much to pardon. Thank you.
 
  
Add Your Reply