Reflections on Uncivilisation 2011

[Terry Wassall]

Since I posted my own initial reflections on the festival on my blog I have read quite a few others and found them very interesting and illuminating. Although there are some similarities in the reflections it is clear to me that there were subjectively many parallel festivals depending on what each person brought to the party - their previous knowledge and dispositions, their interests and concerns, the forms of language they constructed their experiences through and so on. Re-reading my own reflections after reading these others I find that, from the point of view of many, I may have rather missed the point! One piece that articulated some of my concerns was that by Andrew Lainton - http://andrewlainton.wordpress.com/2011/08/23/the-dark-retreat-and-...

He starts by quoting from the Dark Mountain Manifesto

We reject the faith which holds that the converging crises of our times can be reduced to a set of ‘problems’ in need of technological or political ‘solutions’….
We will not lose ourselves in the elaboration of theories or ideologies.

Given the main question I had about much of what I heard and enjoyed at the festival - where is the politics in all this - I can now perhaps see why this didn't seem to resonate with anyone outside the immediate circle of friends I went to the festival with and why my blog post now seems a little out of kilter with the general tenor of most of the others post I have read. I hasten to say that I only partially recognise Andrew's characterisation of the festival and my experience seems to have been much more positive. But I too am looking for a constructive way forward from our current critique and understanding of the capitalist dystopia we are living in. I would take a more positive interpretation of the quoted manifesto. Rejecting the faith that we can reduce our crisis to a set of problems that can be solved with technological and political solutions does not necessarily mean rejecting technology and political thinking and activism as part of what is needed. In any case, it is by now quite clear that what is required are significant social, political, economic and personal changes that go way beyond any possible technological and managerial solutions to environmental problems.  And I do not see, as Andrew implies, that the Dark Mountain project in its latest development is necessarily or inevitably anti-civilisation and a deeply primitivist turn. As the session on Luddism made clear, it was not a rejection of technology per se, but of technology that destroyed sociality and conviviality. And the desire not to lose ourselves in the elaboration of theories or ideologies (and I would be interested in how this distinction is to being made) does not preclude the necessity to engage in some theoretical and/or ideological work. After all the development of ideologies is the elaboration of meaning and the process whereby it becomes our commonsense and the taken-for-granted background to the conduct of our everyday lives. The battle against fascism, growthism, corporatism, the Washington consensus, the power of neoliberal ideology (so powerful that the neoliberal category of the individual was alive and well in many of the discussions at the festival) must also be fought at the level of ideology.

My intial reflections on the festival are at:

http://terrywassall.org/blogs/notes/2011/08/24/camping-conversation...

[Stranger]

Some folks, like Jesus, have been through death and resurrection to show us we come back t the body, and reassure us that religion is lying for political reasons [empty cos' they all pertain to grabbing what one can in this life off those who believe love is coming and so out of love make themselves voluntarily vulnerable to abuse in this life, even death for sake of love]
Most folks think death is inevitable , and indeed even most saints die [for sake of what it shows others], but in fact , as Jesus said, he did not have to die, he could have chosen translation and not suffered unjust crucifixion as God's trial of the depth of his love in showing us the way beyond death and earning the right of the loving to rule in God's kingdom when it is established in the new earth [for we utterly ruined even the process of life which supports our lives in this world , we killed our own home and it's just waiting to die , rather terribly ... God will not stop that because we have to see how wrong we all are to live the way we do, to allow a few to destroy the life on earth for sake of the power they wield through fear , not love...
but you see a few folks never died at all :-
Hebrews 11:5 By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.

Genesis 5:24 And Enoch walked with God: and he was not; for God took him.

Which brings one to understand the judgement of God with mercy, that judgement is only the decision by God that one has perfected one's love in life and is thus responsible enough for the freedom of the spirit ... the point being that no-one dies permanently , the spirit returns to God at death , is either freed if God so judges IN LIFE or is 'asleep' in death awaiting resurrection once the new earth is ready ... but those who died for love's sake are resurrected first to life and translated at Jesus return to freedom of the spirit and manifest to create a perfect loving kingdom ready for the later resurrection of the many sinners of this earth...so the many are all freed from death only to learn love in a way they can accept and countess many do by judgement day [Rev 7:9-10] , but the rest who just won't believe in love even after resurrection to life are separated to live separately from the loving , so that they can no longer prey on the loving, so they suffer their own unloving tricks and learn how bad for them is unlovingness, just so that they change their minds and turn to learn how much better is love as the way of life for all ... for none can be truly happy with life until all are happy with life , over twelve billion ... and that's the point about fear of death, we cannot die permanently and none knows anything about being dead, there is no awareness in the dead ,,,and death is denied one if one has been resurrected twice , one cannot continue with suicide... time however goes on until all see unlovingness fails them as a way of life and lovingness is simply a vastly better way to live and the only way beyond life to freedom of the spirit [to create as-it-were new worlds of endlessly different natures as is the lot of endless existence, of the 'spirit']
We have the evidence of the words of those who have been beyond death as against the words of those with vested interests in enslaving us to the sick ways of this world, the words of the loving agaist the words of the loving... and we have our own conscience, hearts, and spirit, that believe fundamentally in lovingness despite what sinners have done to make life a misery and destroy this world for all life... it ain't that hard to see which is true and so have the sure hop of faith in one's own inherent love...
But fear of death is menaingless, we cannot truly die in essence, we KNOW there is something endless because som