NaNoWriMo

Destiny is not controlled by an outside force, merely spun, suggested, and nudged. That is the beauty of a chaos system. If you want to be a catalyst for change, just start manifesting the change you desire. Your actions will cause turbulence within the chaos. Some memes will be stamped out, cast aside, or drawn back into the flock. A surprising number will infiltrate, infect, and irreparably alter the culture.

This is the curse of the counter-culture. While the process is slow, most alternative notions will find their way into mainstream culture. By the time they are assimilated, those ideas are twisted into a design that is acceptable to the majority. In the late 1980’s there was a huge push in the self-publishing industry. In an attempt to shun the banal similitude of major media outlets the people publishing these alternative journals would use type-writers for blocks of text, xeroxed photos with none of the stipple that made pictures printable in the popular papers and magazines, and common scissors with a glue stick for layout. In an age when desktop publishing was quickly becoming the standard practice, these alienated publishers rejected not just the medium, but all of the tools of the profession. Fifteen years later there are books, magazines, and websites that all try to emulate the look. Photo editing software includes automatic filters that can replicate the look of a photocopied picture. Font sets have emerged that look like scribbled letters, fat tipped markers, punch labels, stencils, and even collaged letters. The meme was brought into the mainstream. While the idea of rebelling against traditional media is (and forever shall be) an outsider idea, the creative tools they developed while propagating the notion were found to have some merit and eventually embraced. The counter-culture has to start all over again. Of course the whole idea was ripped off from folks who created the Principia Discordia and other subversive literature back in the 1960’s.

Take heart, young rebel. Did I say that rebelling against traditional media forever shall be an outsider idea? Of course. That is a necessity. There will always be a dominant media form to whom the majority of people will turn for their information. There will always be a minority who see the flaws of that system and rage against it to develop new media. Don’t despair just because the counter-culture can never win. Rejoice in the fact that the counter-culture will always be there shoving needles into mob culture voodoo dolls.

Victory has always been the major flaw of any revolutionary or counter-cultural movement. Change is not something that can be won. The so-called Summer of Love was a turning point in that battle. The societal outsiders somehow got it into their heads that this was a war that could be won. There was strength in their numbers and it was just a matter of time before the establishment would break and listen to their demands. The establishment pulled out all the stops, beat them back, and let them know that the majority liked things just the way they were, thank you very much. They had been defeated the moment the idea of winning became the popular meme. If you can win, you can certainly lose. Since then there has been a giant crater in the counter-culture that everyone stands around and stares at asking, “What went wrong?”