• undergroundoverground@lemmy.worldEnglish
    34·
    2 days ago

    The most gilded cage in human history. More than pretty enough to fool the labour-cattle. Worse than not noticing, many have fallen in love with their chains and there’s nothing more pathetic than someone who loves their chains.

    To head off the inevitable “go live in the woods then.” Do you not see the problem with your only two options being either working 80% of the time you’re awake as an adult, for predominantly someone else’s gain, or go live in the woods as an outcast? It’s not really a choice is it? People don’t mind contributing to society, hospitals, roads, schools etc. It’s filling pockets of the already wealthy that people take issue with.

    • SkyeStarfall@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      4·
      22 hours ago

      Going out into the woods isn’t even a choice. The woods where? Without owning land the state is gonna come knocking telling you what you’re doing is illegal

      • compostgoblin@piefed.blahaj.zoneOPEnglish
        2·
        20 hours ago

        You can stay in National Forests free of charge for dispersed camping, you just have to move your campsite at least every two weeks

    • downvote_hunter@midwest.socialEnglish
      2·
      21 hours ago

      During the recording of the album Wish You Were Here (WYWH) ex band member Syd Barrett showed up. They didn’t recognize him though because he had gained a bunch of weight and shaved off his hair. Shine On You Crazy Diamond is about him. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wish_You_Were_Here_(Pink_Floyd_album) Happy 50 years to WYWH!

      Edit: in case it wasn’t known Syd had mental health problems at the time. He was probably undiagnosed in his youth and just considered “a weird kid” and then took LSD as a young adult which most likely sent him over the edge.

    • Zorsith@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      3·
      1 day ago

      Come on you target

      for faraway laughter

      come on

      You stranger

      You legend

      You martyr

      and shine!

      Pink Floyd - Shine On You Crazy Diamond (part I-V)

        • explodicle@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          10·
          2 days ago

          I guess you’ll have to just keep moving. If you try your weirdest and meet no resistance ever, then I’d assume we’re going in the right direction.

          “The amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigor, and moral courage it contained. That so few now dare to be eccentric marks the chief danger of the time.”

          — John Stuart Mill

        • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.netEnglish
          4·
          1 day ago

          I think that going to extreme lengths to try to prove one’s own freedom is just a convoluted way of caging yourself all over again.

          It is important to keep moving, but it’s got to be for more than just proving that you can. Figure out what direction you’d like to move, and then after you’ve started moving in that direction, keep asking yourself what it is that you want — the world can start to look quite different once you’ve moved, so being mindful about things is how you can keep moving in a manner that’s true to you, even throughout all the change.

          When we know that our choices are constrained in some way, it’s easy to convince ourselves that we never actually wanted to go in that direction anyway, even if that’s not true; sometimes that lie is more comfortable than reckoning with the reality of our chains. It can be hard to discern the truth of the matter in these scenarios. Freedom is not just a quality that’s bestowed upon us, but an active skill that we can train, and with time and mindful effort, we can improve our ability to discern between all the places we’re told we can go, and where we genuinely want to go. If it doubt, if you suspect that you’re self-policing your wishes to avoid being disappointed by chains that you subconsciously feel are there, it can be useful to push in that direction, and see how it feels. Sometimes, you’ll find that you were in fact free to go that way, but you actually didn’t want to, in which case, you can just reroute, with greater knowledge of what you want. In other cases, you will confirm that there are indeed chains constraining your movement, which you’ll have to figure out how to escape. Either way, you’ll know more, and be better equipped to actually be free.

          I don’t think that we can ever move far enough to prove that we are free, largely because of what happens when we improve our capacities for things, including freedom. The more we grow, the more that becomes possible to us, and so our appetite for more freedom will always increase. This can be dangerous, because it can appear that the most effective way to enable our own freedom is by adding to others’ chains. This isn’t a sustainable strategy though, because it means that when we find a direction we wish to go but are unable to, there will be no-one to help free us. None of us are free until all of us are free

  • klep@lemmy.mlEnglish
    61·
    2 days ago

    I have a collection of Rosa Luxemburg writings on my bookshelf. I need to pick that up when I finish Trotsky’s History of the Russian Revolution.

  • starik@lemmy.zipEnglish
    4·
    2 days ago

    The human condition. Try not eating for a day, or not breathing for a minute.

  • Optional@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3·
    2 days ago

    As so often times it happens
    We live our lives in chains
    And we never even know we have the key