How much longer before we realize that we need to disentangle Canadian life as much as possible from that of Great Britain & the United States?
And I responded:
Useful question, Brian. I have French citizenship, Canadian citizenship, American citizenship, and a fourth I don’t tell anybody. So, I’m not too nationalistic per se but I sympathize with your yearnings. I start with this quotation in thinking about art and politics:
1. “The future of government lies in the area of psychic ecology and can no longer be considered on a merely national or international basis.” – Marshall McLuhan and Barrington Nevitt, TAKE TODAY: The Executive as Dropout, 1972, p.227
I suggest it is impossible to decide who is an artist today. The term isn’t even appropriate for defining a network. McLuhan was the last successful theorist of art.
Since the 60s, I’ve been interested in THOUGHT artists. My favorites are Arthur Kroker, William Irwin Thompson, Lyndon LaRouche, and Marshall McLuhan.
I suggest one should be an expert in their thinking to possess a comprehensive quadrophrenia. And I suggest one shouldn’t be timid in engaging their respective communication “networks” (websites, Facebook pages, publications, etc.). If they are “cults”, they are soft ones.
I start with this quotation when thinking about art, ontology, and subjectivity:
2. “Now disregarding if you can whatever your political views may be (and mine are partly communist and partly fascist, with a distinct streak of monarchism in my marxism, but at bottom anarchist with a healthy passion for order)… ” – Wyndham Lewis, THE ENEMY, Vol.3, p.70, 1929
Wyndham Lewis – the first case of stated quadrophrenia.
I’m in a very interesting situation right now:
My bride of 48 years and I have developed incredibly powerful and beneficial health and food products. Nobody on the planet can equal ours. Trust this statement for the moment.
We’ve also developed an “energy device” (some might call it “cold fusion” but we call it “coldplay”) that can topple present-day energy systems. Trust THIS statement, also, for the moment.
Both situations require great responsibility. We don’t reveal the second invention because somebody can grab it for “national security” reasons.
Taking quotation #2 above, I break it down this way:
a. I’m partly a “communist” because our energy device puts everybody on a level playing field economically.
b. I’m partly a “fascist” because I have no problem telling people, “you’re a freakin’ idiot if you don’t take our products.”
c. I’m partly a “monarchist” because I’m a “king” thanks to Web 2.0 which makes millions of people their own broadcasting stations.
d. I’m partly an “anarchist” because our digital membrane is impossible to control and I’m in the middle of it, like everybody else whether they have a computer or not.
Since Carolyn and I do a lot of “networking” and broadcasting” in our separate fields, we have colleagues all over the planet.
We are quite consciously creating a new civilization… and we have very influential allies.
It is in this context(s) that I view “Friends of ICARDI”.
