On the possibility of a modern "noble savage"

The simplistic dichotomy of “civilized man” vs “lusty savage” must start to give way to a new, embodied ideal.

For this is utterly, absolutely true: I am man, and I want to hold wo-man (as urgently as lion wants to hunt gazelle).

But also, I have heard talk of quantum mechanics, existentialism, and the coming super-storm of global warming plus 9+ billion humans.

The major lesson of the Trump revolution (as filtered through post-tolerance “Zizekian theology”) is simply this:

Naive liberal political discourse (particularly on the national level) is simply an unworkable mode of realizing actual human progress, since it takes for granted the notion that the current international money system is the only conceivable way of organizing anything more than trivial human societies, on the order of 2-5 people – the size of a typical Western family (eg, a married couple with anything from 0 to 3 children).

The problem for all committed progressives is that, it is, apparently, only by virtue of this money system that “real” human value creation can possibly happen.

But, of course, appearances only can take us so far, and successful progressives must therefore be able to show average, uncommitted people – ie, “philosophical realists” – that there is, indeed, a better way.

The way I see it, the only thing left for progressives to do is to finally live lives that are adequate to their words, vis-a-vis organizing themselves around systems (no matter how crude they might initially be) that somehow transcend the given (money) system of the day.

In order to accomplish this, progressives will be forced to become a kind of ultra-modern (post-postmodern ?) “noble savage”, by way of retaining the possibility of authentic human relationships (including deeply loving, romantic relationships) through principled stances against the de-nobilizing tyranny of the homogenous, trivial, thoughtless, thumb-swipe-my-way-through-life consumer culture of the late 2010’s.

Ways to make this happen:

Introduce the next generations (currently, Millenials) to the power of authentic, urgent rock music. I particularly like the periods of the late-60’s (the hippies) and the early-90’s (the grunge revolution).

Introduce the same generations to the “existentialist” philosophers, including the transcendentalists, the beatniks, and the more recent popular expositors of “a better way”, such as Robert Pirsig, who wrote Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

Slowly introduce them to more hardcore Western philosophers of existentialism (eg, Heidegger and Sartre).

Finally, the various Eastern philosophical traditions (both ancient and modern) can be explored at the student’s leisure.

Given this kind of intellectual armour, a new form of nobility can slowly begin to arise in young people, and the kinds of progressive modes of organizing larger scale (perhaps on the scale of 1000’s of people) human societies can begin to emerge. These will be the kinds of societies that are effectively immunized from the spiritually devastating effects of the “everyone is connected but nobody really knows who anybody is” mode of human co-existence that thoughtless adherence to the current money system has led us into.

Can a non-progressive know what the best course for progressives would be? This Trump thing and brexit will blow over and the progressives will carry on from before imho. So what will the savages do, is there anything tangible here? E.g. I can’t see the world getting less mobile and blended, and the generations fuelling this will eventually die off.

  • genuinely interested in what the plan is, if there actually is one.

Dennis Kane wrote

Oh, you’re The Peace Guy.

Okay, Peace Guy, how do you want to hold wo-man exactly?

Old school barter systems where artisans trade their hand-crafted material objects that are needed creates real human value.

See the above post. I am actually somebody in this world: google.com/search?q=the+peace+guy

Just today, in fact, I was interviewed by a reporter from alligator.org (a student-run newspaper that has been active for >100 years). I am absolutely legendary on two college campuses: UF and UCLA.

The idea that there is indeed a better way (and that living philosophical badasses are “on the case”), requires hard evidence presented to young, impressionable minds, and I am the embodiment of court specimen Numero Uno (or however the hell that idea is supposed to be phrased).

For deeper discussion of who, exactly, I am as a living human being, please see the post that I just made earlier today in Mundane Babble (or whatever stupid name that forum goes by nowadays).

The crucial point about this new kind of “noble savage” is that this is precisely the kind of person that is needed to carry on the torch of anything approaching true progressivism in this insane “ignore everything but a 2-square-inch grid of fucking pixels” consumer culture that we live in.

The question of the possibility of noble, intentional homelessness is perhaps the first thing that must be tackled by the greatest living minds. (As an aside, I am not currently homeless, though I have been in the past, and I may one day decide to do so again… particularly, if I can convince an awesome group of “noble savages” to join me.)

Students at UF often ask me this insane question (which they cannot possibly mean in a literal sense): Without a job, how do you survive?

I am pretty sure that homeless populations in the USA have much greater risk of obesity (and related ailments) than actual malnutrition.

WendyDarling,

I will not attempt to prove the validity of any internet forum posts I may or may not have posted in the past (you can’t prove it was me!).

The only forum that I truly care about is a real forum, called Turlington Plaza, the free-speech zone on the University of Florida campus.

This week happens to be spring break, so there is plenty of time for me to kill.

If anyone really wants to help me get this “revolution thing” actually started (whatever form that might happen to take), it is crucially important to raise these kinds of concerns where real, impressionable college kids exist (and they are there by the droves).

Yea but that’s about a person and not a specific principle, set of, or ideal. You need to actually say what that is. I don’t get the ‘point’ there.

Lucky they live in the richest nation on earth [atm] then. Its quite shit being homeless here but I expect it gets worse the poorer the nation you look at. Here they kinda make it as bad as they can on purpose, its all part of the way they work - to make most people not want to loose in life. Their philosophy doesn’t actually make any difference of course, because people mostly don’t want their lives to suck anyway.

Thanks for answering my question. Con artist of the “noble savage” variety comes to mind.

Sounds like you want ignorant guys to join an ignorant quest. You make threats to strangers online then play the denial card, uniformed you talk propaganda on a college campus, then without any plan you bring this absentee “noble savage” idea here. Is there snake oil for sale too?

Now, you really need to understand the specific context within which I am currently being a progressive. I live in a fairly small town (Gainesville) that surrounds an absolutely huge state university in Florida (UF). Progress, after all, is always only made in specific places at specific times, in response to specific crises.

The only crisis that I can truly claim that exists as of Tuesday, March 7 at 9:02 am in Gainesville, Florida, is my absolute inablility to find anything approaching true romantic love during the entirety of my adult life (I am well into my middle age years). The good thing about this (admittedly) very specific crisis situation is that I am pretty certain that very, very many people feel the exact same urgency that I feel.

Regarding the fact that I have been speaking of a certain, shall we say, “personality type”, rather than of an identifiable principle/ideal…

Given the absolutely depressing nature of the cellphone-always-in-hand-with-blank-expression mode of existence (at least in the current generation of 20-somethings), I do not feel much of a need to attempt to define either what, precisely, the problem is (the absolute impossibility of any and all outward manifestations of human emotion), or what the ideal solution would be (pretty much any kind of outward manifestation of human emotion).

Now, let me dig a little deeper into this concept of noble, intentional homelessness. I want to sharply distinguish that from the concept of simple shelter-lessness. We can think of “having a home”, as more of a legal status, in terms of being “officially documented” (for example, having a license with a valid address, proof of insurance, an electric bill, etc). Let us, for instance, imagine a situation where somebody has all of the official documentation for the ownership of a legal domicile, but all of the sudden one day (perhaps due to a quirk of quantum mechanics such as a group of garden gnomes waking up), it becomes physically impossible to enter the dwelling (due to the obvious magical powers of said gnomes).

Say that person, while sleeping on a bus stop bench, were to be woken up in the middle of the night by a policeman. The policeman would definitely not make the determination that the legal status of the person was in any way one of “homelessness”.

The point that I want to make is that, beyond any sort of legalistic mumbo-jumbo, that person is indeed “really homeless” (ie, lacking a physical shelter in the middle of the night), and the extent to which the person has various things such as:

-The company of friends
-A padding to lay on
-A sleeping bag (if it is cold)
-A portable radio with batteries
-A pillow
-A good book with a portable lamp

…we can say that the person is living with more nobility that if he (or she) were to have none of those things.

Now we can imagine a homeowner that is not locked out of their house, and their life seems to possess (to all outside observers, at least), all of the trappings of “success”. But the person is truly a rock star (or poet, drag queen, etc.) trapped in the body of an accountant (or stockbroker, luxury car salesman, etc). The person might have an absolutely amazing (sexy, smart, etc) significant other, but if the raison d’etre of the relationship is built upon a foundation that is a sheer lie, then you can bet your bottom dollar that said person, if presented with an offer to live the life of their dreams as a “noble savage” who is no longer allowed to be a homeowner (and must have a legal status of “homeless”), then that person will, at the very least, have to suffer through many sleepless nights in order to finally make the decision.

The point that I am trying to make is just that the extent to which a typical Westener’s life “sucks” or is “quite shit”, is much more of a multi-faceted thing that deals with more existential notions such as “being true to oneself” or “having awesome friends”, rather than the kinds of simplistic determinations that, for example, a court of law is supposed to make when determining winners or “loosers” :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

I, for one, am very proud to be a noble savage!

I am truly an awesome conman!

I instill confidence in people by being a truly awe-inspiring (larger than life) figure.

Please understand this: The vast majority of the Western consumer economy consists of power plays of ego vs. ego, in terms of who is worthy of respect (and therefore, who gets love and friendship) and who is relegated to the sidelines as a mere worker or worse, a passive observer.

In many ways, it is all, as Gaga sang, a “lovegame”. The only way to be able to win at that game is to actually put yourself out there as a player, and to do so with much confidence.

If I can instill confidence in others with style and artistry, then, I guess I will take the con artist label as a compliment. But in my case, it is all about convincing people (particularly the ravishing beauties that are everywhere in this crazy little college town) that I am worthy of getting their love rather than their money.

And I do this in front of everyone, in the middle of day!

That is typical anonymous internet trollishness. At least I am being totally open and honest about who and where I am. The idea of making “threats” to anonymous strangers on a message forum doesn’t even make logical sense. For a threats to be threatening, they sort of need to be directed at specific people that inhabit specific locations. Anybody in the world is capable of finding me. (If you are really claiming that I have ever threatened anybody online, I would love to see an example.)

You are just a boring troll.

You could answer the question if it’s not a threat from a hacker.

Dennis, you are invited to join my boards. You seem like the only ‘real’ person on these forums.

What’s your forum, Trixie?

It’s in my signature, right above your post.

I see no signatures. I wonder why mobile version does not have them.

Oh. It is this theantitrump.forumotion.com/

Yup, I am in that club too.

Ah so the complaint concerns >societal detachment< even though we are more connected than ever. I agree, and for me the difference is that we are now more connected - in the third person, and not as connected in the first!
Secondly less is more; in the past you couldn’t scroll through thousands of images of people in a vague manner, you knew and met only a few people, and so you would see more in them. The less you observe about someone [like a quick flash-past of an image on your phone [I don’t have one]], the less there is to relate to. The more time you spend with someone, the more you see in them and can get attracted too. I’d prefer a tiny university to a vast one for those reasons.

Ah I see now. Yes freedom from being known to the authorities is a freedom. If I won the lottery or something I’d like to ‘disappear’ completely, just because I want to be invisible except to those I don’t want to be like that with. When I was a young punk me and my pals lived and squatted by that very ethic, and it felt much freer. The authorities over the years have done everything they can to close up the loop, and I think it will get increasingly difficult to disappear. Hence terrorism. Its a way to force vetting - knowing, about all people. You may have noticed on the news prior to the Russians retaking Aleppo, that the allies ‘accidentally’ allowed munitions to go walkies and end up in terrorists hands. I guess after the fall of communism they had to take whatever enemies they could get or manifest. It all comes down to security/insecurity and not to mention power requires that you know what and where people are - so you can pin them all down.
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