The longer texts in the dusty stacks
that can be accessed through the flashing arrow above were written
for the print media over the last 30 years. They are static and linear,
never intended for this new interactive, multi-media world of today. In
the months ahead, I may breathe new life into a few of these relics with
a few links and some sharp editing. Using typography and color creatively
should make reading fun on a computer. Experiment with e-books. They should
end up looking like kids' books. Great!
A stimulating labyrinth steers in various
unexpected directions: like entering a Fun House. Moving forward in open
corridors and retreating from dead ends. An individual trip not
a collective one: someone's dead-end is another's open-corridor. As the
old saw that used to make me and my cousin laugh as a kid goes: "One
man's meat is another man's poison." Neither Robert nor I even knew
then why it was funny?
Using e-links, reminds me of browsing
through the dusty stacks of great libraries those soaring cathedrals
of undigitalized data like that shrine to the Titanic, the Widener
at Harvard.
Fed up with TV, even MTV we were told
we needed so badly. Sure, I cruise with the X-generation. Why not? I cruised
with the Hippies when I was over 30. Proof: look at those Hippy clothes
in my Tadzio book. I wore them when Janice was still around.
Moving on in this quick-take whirl, Warhol
reality. Actually, 15 minutes is asking quite a lot, don't you think? And
those kids on THE REAL WORLD are pushing it a little too far. I know this
is the age of the common man, but even the common man needs a break from
the common man.
I feel sorry for these kids when that
show goes into syndication in 10 years as Retro MTV and their own children
will be watching it for the first time with the rest of the yet unborn.
You still out there? I'm talking to myself.
Guess that guy was right about few words and many links...
Like it or not, we are the modern day
locusts. [How's that for an unexpected link you didn't even have to click
on: invisible link #1] And you don't have to be a brain surgeon (I like
that phrase, but do you have to be intelligent to be in that line of work
or just technically proficient like a computer nerd?) to realize we're
barely hanging in there as we drag ourselves over the edge of yet another
millennium. Yawn.
If you're in doubt check out those kids
on THE REAL WORLD or is the title a misnomer? It's boring enough to be real.
But more real that my real life which is somewhat less boring.
I'm always amused by people who claim
to want to Save the Planet - like those who want to save my soul from eternal
damnation. If you can buy their logic, then I guess you can buy their product.
The fact is the planet will survive quite nicely with or without us. It's
the human race that's threatened with extinction, not the planet that has
all the time in the world to get over us like a bad Sunday morning hangover.
As I said: If you can buy their logic,
then I guess you can buy their product: the single biggest reason for Madonna's
worldwide success! Great logic; a woman I admire like millions of others
do because she knows what to put out there and more importantly how to do
it. If the word genius has any meaning it applies to Madonna.
But can the internet prevent
us from destroying ourselves [Isn't this what the WWW is all about, or is
it merely an extension of Capitalism that is transforming a lot of ENERGY
but for whose benefit? No one's.
It ain't about the Commies no more [to
my world audience, 'Commies' refers to the American preoccupation with the
World Communist Conspiracy for nearly 50 years after WW II that led to Senator
Joseph McCarthy and the world's largest arms build-up, nuclear and otherwise....
get me out of here. I need a link].
What it's all about now are attacks on
the global environment created by an exploding world population. Bet it's
the first time you heard this. This seems like a real issue to me which
leads me right into the next high speeding curve. Watch out for the cliff...
When will people wake up: homosexuality
is part of nature's solution to the crucial issue of population control?
I wouldn't even begin to imagine how much faster we'd be all be heading
toward oblivion if gay men began putting their dicks where popular consensus
wants them to put them. And a similar, perhaps even stronger, argument can
be made regarding Lesbianism and its role in this area of awakening consciousness.
Don't they know, we are the sexiest of
the bunch! It takes a lot of motivation from down there (I'm not referring
to Australia) to break these social conventions.
Where are the popular songs celebrating
all this. You songwriters out there the great pop educators of your
generation show the way you the Pied Pipers.
A lot of things sound nice, but they just
don't work.
When did you last hear someone say publicly
they were responsible for anything in this society? Yes, you and me included.
We all have convenient alibis to justify whatever we do. It's called 'denial.'
We all see the Truth from our own perspective.
Change comes from within. Two cliches that need reexamining. Perhaps something
to meditate upon instead of staring out in space with empty mind.
We all know how social programs initiated
without compassion in this country during the past decades were doomed to failure
from the start. They were created with the conscious or unconscious intention
to fail. Strategic planning by some; ignorant behavior by others! Regardless
the results are the same: if one ignores compassion, human endeavors self-destruct.
It's not about being nice, it's about being effective.
No amount of money can make up for lack
of compassion. We are highly spiritual beings, more so than we may at first
imagine. We are led to believe that money rules the world, yet we are more
affected by the 'spirit' in which things are done in our lives than by the
money we receive. And what imbues this spirit?
You cannot legislate compassion.
People cannot be coerced into liberation
especially when claims are made that it is not their own liberation that's
at stake but someone else's. Hostility,
like compassion, tends to reflect back upon itself. Without a change of
heart, there are only legal rights and lawyers.
We are not victims; we are co-conspirators. It's our reality that needs changing, not the
reality of an imaginary ruling class that shares all of our problems with
the exception of money. And then, it's not some imaginary "them"
that make our everyday lives heaven or hell, but the people we deal with
every day that participate in our real world.
I doubt I will ever have any direct contact
with a major political figure in my entire lifetime. They have no more interest
in me than I in them. Why then should I blame them for my misfortunes? They
have their own set of people and problems to contend with that does not
include me?
Isn't the rest, the sex-politics, never-ending-racism,
and the whole enchilada of fragmented subculturalisms just a smoke-screen
shielding us from recognizing Capitalism's attempted friendly takeover of
world consciousness. Co-conspirators.
Capitalism, like all myths, must first
be identified, analyzed, evaluated and ultimately discarded for yet another
mythology which hopefully will have a better survival plan for human race.
Time's running out.
For the political left (whatever that
may mean in 1997), PC (Political Correctness)
is part of this denial. You think your
hands are clean, cuz you don't blow smoke in people's faces, stop at stop
signs, and know how to say 'African American' instead of 'Black,' but your
still floating in the same polluted waters with the rest of us. A great
theme for a new song; It's all yours if you want it Madonna. Copyright free.
I just removed the © on it, right here for all to see. So if you want
it take it, but please don't mention me.
Not even the rich and middle-class [the
aspiring rich with their lotto mentality] can escape by moving to the suburbs.
Their next suburbs will have to be on Mars or the moon. Not kidding, some
people would like to evacuate when things get a little worse. Judging by
the public transportation system here in San Francisco, CA USA that day
must be just around the corner.
"And what about the new unbridled
forces of World Capitalism - the emerging world religion for the 21st Century.
Let's all bow down to the almighty whatever currency that's currently dominating
global markets. 90% of the USA population controls 10% of the wealth in
the USA."
That previous paragraph in quotes is what
the political rhetoric of the 70's sounded like for those of you who missed
it. It certainly inflamed people, and sometimes got things done, but did
it include the necessary ingredient of compassion? I think not. Hence, the fundamental failure of
the political accomplishments of our lifetime. For another example of this
kind of rhetoric, read my 1976 article: "THE ADVOCATE: Gay Capitalist
Manifesto" in the book section. [No link. I wouldn't want to encourage
you.]
Not a Doomsday prophecy, just a hope we decide to move
forward thinking about quality (always a spiritual consideration) as well as
quantity (always a material consideration). "Better" and "more,"
like everything else, can be dealt with in non-dualistic terms. Global ,holistic,
integration , linked-online are concepts that all come from the same viewpoint.
We simply cannot afford not to choose it All. In the mathematics of the
new world, we must learn how to add, not how to subtract.
In the meantime, I believe, like W.C Fields,
that virtual reality is better than none. [invisible link #2] You'd probably
never think it by reading this, but I now prefer to say it with PHOTOS than
with WORDS.
It's not that I don't write, it's just
that I've lost faith in words. Language is a weapon of power and deception
of the worst kind: self-deception. Yet like old friends that I've had my
differences with over the years, they seem to just hang around.
However, unlike old friends, PHOTOS and
WORDS can live on forever. Dreams of immortality: I can image assuming
we survive the challenges ahead someone looking at my photographs
several hundred years down the road and enjoying them much the same way
I hope you do today: with passion = compassion. [This
is it: my one and only link to illustrate what I've been trying to say so
badly with words.]
The thought that a photo I create may
excite someone in 200 years is very exciting to me and indicates just how
far I can stray from the NOW. But the observant eye the third eye
always knows better for that is my NOW. How else can you explain that
smile on the Buddha's face, and the Mona Lisa's, or that crazy horse-laugh
of the Dali Lama which encapsulates all of his wisdom?
Speaking of the Dali Lama, let's not put
his Holiness under the microscope for inconsistencies in statements he may
have made regarding homosexuality or anything else for that matter.
As the reincarnation of Avoluktusvara,
he simply represents the Spirit of Compassion that exists in all of us and
makes no exclusive claim to Buddha nature. Nor, like the Pope's, are his
pronouncements to be taken as dogma.
Avoluktusvara never had an historical
face and body; Avoluktusvara is a visualization, a sign, a metaphor for
the spirit that is understood as compassion. Avoluktusvara = Compassion.
No more: No less. That's all folks!
Tibetan Buddhism quite valuable
as a practical outlook is a highly sophisticated world view, not subject
to crass Western anthropomorphisms that has encouraged an exaggeratedly
ego-centered grasp on reality with all of its resulting difficulties.
Biron
February 1997
Now to get down to business...
All of the Photos by Biron on this web
site (with a few exceptions) and a brand-new Photo CD-Rom are for sale.
So, step right up folks, don't be shy, and click on the dollar while the
link is still hot! This way   There is a second link, isn't there?
In true Capitalist fashion, I will judge
the success of this web site by the revenues it generates. Remember the
Capitalist paradox: You want it. You need it. You simply cannot live without
it. And with it you will die.
ENJOY YOURSELF! Whatever ails you now
will all seen quite trivial in another hundred years.
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