sinfest

http://www.sinfest.net/archive_page.php?comicID=3547


apparently i can't copy and paste this - so, click the link and enjoy

Sleeper Awake

Socrates argued, once upon a time, that what we see are but shadows of reality, where the essence of all things dwell. Everything in matter is but a reflection, a shadow of this perfect, absolute form, and when in this reality it is but a weak imitation that may be graced with forever striving to fulfill its 'true nature'. Socrates suggested that this higher reality was the true one, and all else but a crude imitation.
Those striving for this truth all their lives, diligently exercising their nature predilection for such endeavors, would make the best, most good leaders in the best most good states. The concerned, caring, quintessential alpha-person; the philosopher.

The philosopher is a never ending inquiry into the nature of good, seeking the most right reasoned knowledge, beyond hypotheses. Known. Absolutely known. This questing requires an excellent body cultured by the best education in music and gymnastic, where these excellencies are nurtured in those who bear most promise; there is natural superiority in men, but relative equality of treatment. There shall be no ownership of items, no superiority in pay between differently dutied-folk. There is no possession over lovers as all are held in kind; there is no lineage with all children assigned parentage based on birth-month and a correspondence system with another adult. A common pool, they are all each others fathers, and all each others sons.

This society is divided into crude bronze for the laboring artisans; a silver for the auxiliary security forces, the guard dogs of the state known for their fierce courage and duty towards the laws given by the state; and gold quality people, the philosophically oriented ruling class - the most precious metal. This caste system is maintained, but not so rigidly as to prevent upward mobility for those bronze or silver who occasionally prove to be gold. It doesn't prevent the downgrading of a gold to another class either. But still, these are the rulers, over all chattel and slave...

Its an interesting parable, and it gradually unfolds as the writings/readings that are informing this continue, yet I can't help but wonder; I'm gold, right? Like, untarnished, pure gleaming gold?

Ha, jokes - I wanted a blog post and ended up writing about Philosophy. Whatever does that mean? Plato on the brain!

I like that there is such a huge emphasis on social construction, where what one does is because it is at the apex of society. The cultivation found in such a specific regimen of 'absolute-seeking' activity, the curriculum of musics and literatures and religious-praise and physical activity, the designation of the economic system and child-rearing - all of this needs to come before we start to achieve peak philosophy, before the 'alpha-persons' are fully capable of coming into fruition.

Socrates/Plato recognize (or do they?) the importance of the proper social architecture in the facilitation of epistemological development. It is essential that society perform in a certain way in order to seek to be more than just shadows on the wall. Or does it?

Hello Everybody!

If you have postings, ramblings, ideas, or sourced-documents about pot, love, resistance, philosophy, the world, knowledge, the self, the soul, the state, community, people, sharing, helping, caring, community organising, changing the world - share it. Share it here, share it there. Share it everywhere. If you share it here, it may get published as a 'zine.

I'm warning you now - this site is a rough-space, a space for projection and then selection, a perpetual whiteboard if it can be. Take this space and make it what it can be, and the things that are coolest, most inspiring, timely, or important will get selected for either 'K-Doob', or for the 'Collabo-'Zine'. K-doob is a pot-zine; write about ending prohibition, pot organising, how much you fucking hate the green dragon, whatever. I don't care. But if you write something awesome, its going in. I'll make efforts to contact you first, but don't get mad if it doesnt happen.

The second 'zine, Collabo (name not set in stone) was just an idea that wanted to bring all the crazy 'zine projects together into one awesome slapshot of intended artify. Yeah, the verb tense was off - but it was a moment meant for sharing, where all 'zines and poems could come together. There will be a 'zine making workshop on the 14th of June. That will be a place where this comes together. Looking forward to it.

Anyway, time to sleep.
More about life later.
Cheers.

What is happening?

This is mental expelling, this is nothing more than a vent - if you want a 'professional publication', this one isn't it, but you're welcome to read and tell me what you think. I'm not going to lie, I don't think it all makes sense - its just me getting some thoughts in order.
Take it as it is.
But if you don't want to waste your time, don't say I didn't warn you. The next ones might be more publishable - I've kinda decided that anything posted on the blog will be 'rough', and the best stuff that emerges will come up again in print.


My last blog post was in 2009. I think that's sad - so check this; it's not as if there hasn't been any production, it's just this blog became so neglected it's coughing up dust-balls. That has to change.
That changes tonight.
Brizban's article "Thoughts on S-10" is a great place to start a new phase in dedication. I'm glad that it was received, and that there is a wider community in our midst which supports initiatives in reaching a common voice.
Like today, in Waterloo Town Square, "Poets against G-20" met again - it was July 1st, Canada Day of all days. We met for solidarity and reflection, part of a...grieving process? A purging - or a changing - an embracing and rising - a resilience? What? What?!
They met again because they had met before. A few times. At a People's Summit Slam where more than 15 people spoke and shared their art and their rage. Today, more than 4 hours and 50 people stood and did the same, but this time more enflamed - the quiet spoke. They spoke loud. Their world had changed and they couldn't take it anymore.
The rage of some. Some people getting riled up, and rallied - and that's shocking. I've never seen it out of team sports and lame pep-talks to convince us we were the best thing since showers. The empathy - the "fed-up"ness of people who know that their world isn't perfect, and that to push it to the limit is a duty, but it's sad to know where it will end. Because you know where it will end. Because it went there. There. It went to a cell, a little place in the...the back of your mind - never really 'known' but often considered. And its not that you're there, or may even ever go there, or have been there, but its that your friends and family and allies and social support and community are there. They are there. Right now. In body and soul. Not free to make snide jokes about Canada Day, lighting up a fatty. Not free to enjoy fireworks by a lake or a forest, or out on a canoe. Not free. Not free for a long time now, and further time still.
...
Its hard to wrap your head around.
I can think of at least 10 people who's world just changed.
Like, no going back? Nothing will ever be the same?
What? What does this mean?
I am so at a loss as for what it does mean its beyond ridiculous.
Conceptually, I believe - preface this 'belief' with the understanding that the casual accumulation of thoughts on the matter, through years of not-applied study and investment of time, which have generated the summation of these thoughts so that they are recognized as the epistemically weak position of 'beliefs', and not necessarily 'knowing' but serving the same function in this case - that once you're in the criminal justice system, you're in until it is done with you. Does this mean no traveling outside of Canada? Does this mean no jobs, or losing jobs when people find out - does this mean no more working with kids? Can you teach? Can you mentor? How will people treat you?

What --- the --- fuck.

I'm somewhat...wiped by this. I'm actually, physically impacted by this - and I am so far from the centre of this gyre that it make's the hurricane's eye unimaginable.

To all comrades in this time - there are no words that accomplish what is at once a want and a need and a thing which has already passed by but needs to pass more, the sentiment of the whole-body expression, so felt, so somatic but being expressed right now in a way which has been trained, taught, conditioned to consider itself something, to consider itself alien when it so desires, and that alien has led to today, to this moment, this feeling, this neck-craning infusion of a reality check. Analysis is not enough - all thoughts and feelings are tied to actions, and when some thoughts and feelings are denied through social-architecture, like the institutions of the culture and the state, then some thoughts are prohibited. That prohibition is a cessation, culling, and killing of a life-way, a way of self-care, or a narrative-construction venture in which the radical free-agent is perpetually 'discovering' itself, becoming itself through its choices of reality - the words, ideas, beliefs as all expressed through the highly-influenced media of language and culture, but also in how it is entertained and how it is fed, how it interacts with the world and why and where those images came from and what leaving all that unconsidered means...

I am so all over the place. I think I'm just purging. Good. That's what I want. I want to be scraped clean of this. Not for not wanting to be with the moment, but for wanting to take from this what is most necessary. To be sharp, focused and action-oriented. To be ready. To be willing. To be able and articulate and there and acting in lock-step with the 'right thing at the right time' - the esoteric proper path.

Plato had it right when he chose the forms of entertainment and education in his state. Purposely, a nation with selected musical harmonies will inculcate a feeling of affection for those things it identifies as more 'good' and more 'true'. If they have an inclination to want to seek what they recognize and empathize with as 'good' and 'true', then they will act that way - ideally cultivated citizens.

Music is subversive. Plato said it first (To my knowledge?), and this is an example of meta-individualistic choices that affect how one thinks about the world. By choosing to frame ones social interactions purposefully, one is constructing what I (and I'm hoping I heard this somewhere else too) want to call 'social-epistemic architecture'. 'Social-epistemic architecture' appears to me to be a framework, or system of thought, which acts as a vehicle for behavior in relation to those factors. Plato's music inculcates a presumed desire for 'the good', 'the true', 'the beautiful', and 'the harmonious', and this world is one where everyone has a particular 'nature' that guarantees them an embodied place. 'Social-epistemic architecture' is what seems 'natural' when considering how to think, feel, and behave about an issue. It is a meta-individualistic choice because it is something that functions individually, but gets its origins from the environment, the phenomenological experience beyond 'the self'. It is still a 'choice' because accident and agency are responsible for its prominence, and are responsible for its maintenance.

Why am I saying this? Why am I blabbing about this?

To the best of my knowledge, you can go to jail for acting a certain way - breaking the law. I have been argued and taught and educated for a long time about what is 'the right way' to live. (Or as one of Peter Braid's '10%'ers has said what 'good Canadians' who "live by the rules" do.) We assume that the basic rule of people is to live together and be kind, honor your word in deed or kind, to not steal or kill, and to help those within 'your community', however you choose to narrow that. This seems so common! Its a presumption, a...an expectation - if you do not have this basic level of commonality, we can not live together, and you are exiled one way or another. In today's case, contra Socrates', a jail is more likely to house dissidence than exile would. An isolation like jail is an alienation from the rest of the public, because they, never likely to really experience it, will only go on the assumptions that they have, learned from their environment. But I digress - fuck, I digress, apologies.

The 'rules'. The 'golden mean'. How do you step off this path?
What is it to not superimpose this ideal upon your life and into your worldview - when does that happen? It happened in Toronto for those who had contrary political views - it happened to Marc Emery for contrary political views in a country hell-bent on squashing illegal trafficking in narcotics. It wasn't even the country he was in, but he was arrested and extradited for it. They wouldn't even charge him in this country, they never felt it was a problem. Why would they? He operated a functional business that supported many with the promise of a timely deliver of quality product - he paid his taxes, supported a world in which he felt things would be better. That was wrong. He is not allowed to make the world better - it is contrary to the superimposed cultural architecture of the state. It is a deviance from the accepted norm, the 'rules', and in that it must be culled. Deviant thought is dangerous, and those people with them are punished with the threat of social-cultural-economic isolation-marginalization. They are imprisoned, shunned, stigmatized, beat-down, auto-suspected, economically-burdened in order to make the vital transfer of knowledge that comes from being able to reproduce, to live as 'fully' as possible. That way that embodied-knowledge, or 'lifestyle' is more likely to die off.

So political ideas are endangered because they represent a divergence from the mainstream, and they are dangerous when they challenge the prominence of other lifestyle norms. The power struggle between newcomer and habit is articulated in the ways permitted by the social architecture. If something is 'dangerous', i.e. if it challenges the 'security' of ones 'lifestyle', then it needs to 'treated' with 'dominance, precision, or force' - a zero-sum, win-lose understanding, if that is what the social-epistemological architecture permits.

Dangerous ideas collude with like. It is a community of thinkers, a 'community of thought', that is affected by this. What that means, to me, is that the time, resources, mental-labor necessary to deal with these super-impositions is costly, and therefore debilitating not only to those whom are the direct targets, but to the wider community 'network' as well. Because it is a 'network'. Solidarity. Voltaire - I may not agree with you, but will still stand for your right to say it. When your right to think, believe, act, and feel how you wish to feel is threatened, even if only indirectly, it is an imposition on ones self-care, on ones life! So, when you have ideas in common, other ideas that you possess are also affected by their criminalization. Finding a correlation, i.e. a mechanical 'proof' of this would require sociological analysis, but it can be done. I'm just presuming the truth of this. So, ideas on the margin, found undesirable, confederate to other ideas on the margins but not necessarily identifying with them, are endangered by association. And this is how the embodiment of the thinker affects what you are to think about.

Shit.

I am...all over the place. Purging. Purging. I met with JC tonight and he taught me a meditation technique. Pop the thought. Sit for half an hour, and every thought that comes up, acknowledge its 'thought-ness' and send it on its way - if you're on a train of thought, don't punish yourself, but keeping 'popping' them by sending it out of your mind. Pop. Thought. Pop. Thought. Pop.

Pop.

Meditate - clear head - be fresh. Focus. Work harder.

This purging process has been good - I needed, wanted, to just write and feel and express and not worry about making sense - I just needed to uncloud, recloud, wade through the mist. There is still so much to talk about, but right now. I don't know if I want to talk. No, that's a closing.

I want to talk more. There is so much that needs to be purged, to cleanse, to feel, to express, to share, to expel.

Where to next?

Thoughts on S-10

Thoughts on S-10

***Please note; this is a new writer! On the blogspot page, it says "By Nikki Spliff"; NOT TRUE! Will fix shortly(?) Recognize the author!

Written by Brizban

With the introduction of bill S-10 (actually, first with the introduction of bill C-26, and then again with C-15), the Conservative government of Canada has clearly outlined their vision of Canadian Justice reform: less focus on rehabilitation, more focus on punishment. With the proposed implementation of mandatory minimum prison sentences, discretionary powers are removed from judges and given to politicians and police. Judges will be forced to send people to prison, regardless of their own opinions on the case. The aim is to create an automated justice system. Go directly to jail. Do not pass GO, do not collect two-hundred dollars.

We continue to hear ‘tough on crime’ rhetoric from politicians who claim bill S-10 was drafted to combat organized criminals. However after careful examination of the bill (which is actually named the Penalties for Organized Drug Crime Act), it becomes evident that organized criminals will be the ones who truly benefit.

Bill S-10 seeks to increase the risk for low level drug offenders, particularly small scale cannabis gardeners, by introducing mandatory minimum prison sentences. Under the proposed legislation, growing six plants or more would result in a mandatory prison sentence of nine months. This will effectively deter low level gardeners from growing personal amounts of cannabis, and allow large scale grow-operations to control the market. After all, professional, organized criminals aren’t deterred by the possibility of jail time; average, otherwise law abiding citizens are.

The politicians who created this bill are treating cannabis production as if it is a chemical process, similar to that of methamphetamine production, forgetting that it's a plant which grows naturally all over the world. The simple fact that penalties for growing cannabis are based on plant count, rather than the number of lights used in an indoor garden, exposes the ignorance of the individuals who drafted this bill.

The bill also states that creating cannabis concentrate, such as hash, would hold an even harsher penalty than cannabis production alone (eighteen months!). This is yet another example of the ignorance perpetuated by the war-on-drugs mentality. Cannabis concentrates contain very little plant matter and are therefore much healthier to smoke, requiring far less to be inhaled to obtain the same effect. They are also widely used for making edible products, which are the least harmful form of ingesting cannabis. Most people who produce concentrates are doing so for medicinal purposes, and this bill seeks to penalize them heavily.

I urge everyone who uses cannabis and supports both freedom and justice to educate themselves on the details of this bill and to fight together to stop it. The Conservative government has declared a culture war on all cannabis users and they want to imprison us. This bill does not only effect cannabis growers, it effects all cannabis users. It is time to end the complacency that exists in the cannabis community and stand up for our right as adults and free citizens to enjoy this wonderful plant. Stop bill S-10!

Hash In the Attic

Howdy Folks!
New mission; if anyone wants to, take the time to jot down notes when you're watching videos online, on any and all drug/pot topics. Such as the Following - these are rough notes for the BBC Scotland Investigates film "Hash in the Attic". How delicious! Did you know that their is a bread of super-skunk that can yield up to three hundred pounds per plant - mind you, I might be confused; yield weight or their money, which is also in pounds - sounds fun, though.
I watched this film on Ninja Video, and so can you! Enjoy!

BBC Scotland – Hash In the Attic

Multi-Million Pound Criminal Business Sprung up over night in Suburbia; prostitution, murder, slavery – ‘sea of green’ fuels these criminal transgressions. (First Minute). Marijuana is a hardcore drug grown by syndical people with predatory natures who will do anything to ensure their fortune.

The 6o’s influenced us, cannabis ‘getting one over on the system’, soft drug, 2 ½ million brits still smoke it – harmless, right? Darker side of the business.

Dark side of cannabis farming – police preparing for a raid. ‘Warning; this guy has history of violence and weapons, so pack spray and batons”.

Growers need one thing – unobtrusive property to set up in (like suburban Scotland).

Suspect does the ‘smart thing’, opens door. (2:41).

Officers are inside stripping the place in a flash – ‘despite his violent past’ suspect cooperating; Pulp Fiction poster. Suspect arrested ‘cause there is pot there. In attic, suburban cannabis farm.

“Roughly fifty adult plants.” Watering cans, though sometimes timed irrigation system. Ventilation system through rough for ‘heat and smell’. All specialized lighting comes from ‘bypassed’ metre, ‘just two thin strands’. (4:44). “Insult to injury” – ‘wee bit of knowledge is a dangerous thing’.

50 plants – more than enough for personal use, constitute dealing amounts, more than personal use – officers have faces covered with masks.

Police reckon 10, 000 (money pounds) worth of Cannabis – and its everywhere, all the nice places in Scotland. Police seizures total roughly Ten million pounds a year (money) –worth around 1oo million pounds per year (money). All in the last three years.

This is worth more than 2x eggs, 10x Scottish raspberries, equivalent to all Scottish vegetable crop – equivalent in moneys.

Almost all farms discovered in rented properties “could be right next door to your eye” – value of plants “thousands and thousands of pounds” – setup cost 3000 pounds – small outlay for profit potential.

Grow op only found after electrical fire burned into ‘family home’ below – Insurance companies pay out 10’s of millions in damages, electrical companies lose millions in utilities (8:00), 17,000 pounds damage on average that the owner (small leaser) will have to pay because they have mismanaged their home (as the fire was caused by their lease).

Not difficult if you’ve got the know-how to do it; Space, accommodation, anyone can grow it…

Who are the people being chased by Alan Buchannan and anti-pot team?

Kaya Russell-Whittaker. Something of an ‘expert’ in Cannabis Farming. Well educated with University Degree. Interest in marijuana more than academic. ‘More than 117, 000 pounds made in one year – easy as baking a cake, by end of second crop one is a mature grower able to go on and grow their own, aware of the potential problems…”

Makes growing seem almost ‘romantic’…(11:07) – ‘all feels like being in a James bond Movie!’; rucksack of marijuana and one gets 12-16 thousand pounds in cash.

Kay ‘fearful’ of old drug contacts, with ‘scores to settle’. Her ‘neighbour’ recognized her, time to flee…

Addicted to her own product, life began to fall apart. ‘Dealing with paranoia, depression, fringes of society. May have bag full of cash, but really nothing else…’

Kay “Legacy, marijuana from 60’s, sexual revolution, wonderful drug, fantastic hippie drug, those days are gone, history, marijuana is a hardcore drug grown by syndical people who will use anyone, their own children, accomplished predators, will do anything to make their profit. Will use anybody to launder money (14:00).

Why is this drug so different, and a moneymaker? Forensic testing lab.

Three main forms of cannabis;

Traditional Imported.

Resin.

New Product; Skunk Cannabis. The above two are ‘traditional’, dating back to 10-20 years ago, skunk is now the new product. Much more valuable. Dominates market 3/4 – shift in market domination is chemically very different to resin – can be up to five times as strong, typically three times as strong, huge difference – pint of beer: pint of port….

Officers see more and more people trying to get into the pot industry – concern over who the operator is supplying with new super-strength drug – school children? Suspect, a woman, in bed (naked!) – find cash and list of drug clients; more significant, chunks of cannabis resin, indi’ wrapped for sale. ‘For schoolchildren?’

Officers find ‘veritable library’ of books for ‘growing’ – tried twice in past, failed miserably; ‘no green fingered gardener’; possibly only her ‘incompetence’ preventing her from setting up a ‘skunk-factory’ to serve the local school children, “suggestion was” (18:55) she was actually dealing to the kids there. “Alleged potential customers…”!!!!

Asking Kaya whether she can accept her role in transforming the accessibility of a ‘super strength drug for the next generation’ – ‘Guilt?’ ‘Who will I have to blame (if my children get into marijuana)? Myself!’

Farms on different scale; factories fueling the skunk market – (20:30); scale of cultivation, hundreds of hundreds of plants. Everywhere police turn, more and more plants, “plants heavy with bud”…

“Each plant will yield approximately three hundred pounds per plant!!!” (23:33)

How much cash can a factory like that generate?

Only consistent research produced by a team in Wiggin – Matthew Acka and his team?

3-4 hundred pounds every three-4 months, used by grower themselves.

Grow room, 10-15 pounds worth; grower and friends.

15, 000 pounds (money) per crop, thousands of pounds a year (5 crops)

Industrial ones can produce 100 thousand (pounds of money) per year.

Massive capital investment required to do this – only one business, ‘organised crime’ – that’s what worries police.

‘…could end up with violence down the street.”

A ‘global business’ - those ‘chinese, chineese green tea, Chinese food, chopsticks’ (26:33) – most of these criminal growers are Chinese individuals, illegals, making millions of pounds out of us, people trafficking, prostitution. Individuals ‘locked in’ forced to grow cannabis, while ‘money men’ take the cash and none of the risk – abduction, trafficking, forcing people into brothels and sex trade – next time you think about rolling a joint, think about the consequences your money is funding.

An industry which is growing, and growing – do you know who is living next door to you?

California made legal?

California was the first to make medicinal marijuana legal ('96), and now those who pushed for and maintained this exceptional social project are pushing even further in order to obtain an economic boon, and to cut down on crime.
An estimated 60-70% (their numbers, not mine) of the Drug Gang's funding comes from pot, and the logic goes 'remove their income, mitigate the violence'. Legalising has the added perk of potentially netting the 'billions' of dollars (1.5 billion $ at the articles estimate) to help fund state activities.
People are coming around to this line of thought because of a growing perception that 'the war on drugs' has failed miserably. California state Assemblyman Tom Ammiano says that "Prohibition is Chaos, Regulation is Control."
Read for yourself at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8275794.stm