Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
Burn, Recycle, Blame
Tiger Hunting in Hugo Oklahoma - Kurt C0bain - Archaelogical Discovery - The Arcology of Violence: Christmas Day Massacre - Seven Simple Steps to Being Cyber-Organic - Action Adventure Cliches
From bladex@bga.com Sun Feb 12 12:18:15 1995
Date: Sun, 12 Feb 1995 01:43:39 -0600 (CST)
From: David Smith <bladex@bga.com>
To: scream@bga.com
Subject: The Burn, Recycle, Blame Issue
"I've got a bad feeling about this"
-- Luke Skywalker
babybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybaby
babybaby yba aby byba abyb byba babybaby
babybaby bybabyba babybaby byb yba babybaby byb yba ba ba babybaby
babybaby yba babybaby yba aby yba ba ba babybaby
babybabybabyb yba babybaby byb yba babybaby byb yba ba ba babybaby
babybaby yba aby byb yba aby byb yba ba ba babybaby
babybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybabybaby
The "Burn, Recycle, Blame" Issue
February 11, 1995
__________________________________________________________________________
| |
| Editor : Blade X | Call Tejas at 512-467-0663 for BBS pickup |
| bladex@bga.com | Send e-mail to majordomo@bga.com with the |
| Neo-Wobblie Node # 269 | message "subscribe scream" in the body. |
|__________________________________________________________________________|
INDEX
Ediborial #1 -- Tiger Hunting in Hugo Oklahoma........ Me
Ediborial #2 -- Kurt C0bain........................... Me
Ediborial #3 -- Archaelogical Discovery............... Me
The Arcology of Violence : Christmas Day Massacre .... Me
The Future of Scream N *me*me......................... Me
Seven Simple Steps to Being Cyber-Organic............. Me
Action Adventure Cliches ............................. Keith Goolsbey
The Subscribers Strike Back .......................... Not me
"I've got a bad feeling about this"
-- Princess Leia Organa
Ediborial
Just got back from Hugo, Oklahoma. I had read in the newspaper about
Shawna, a 250 pound Bengali tiger escaping from the circus holed up
there, and how the experts expected to take up a week to catch her. So
I did what any Quentin Tarentino cult wanna-be would do : rounded up a
posse. Wrote my friend Matt, asking him to grab his shotgun, pickup
truck, his dog Pig, and to have his wife Heather pack him a nice lunch
because we were going tiger hunting!
I was to bring the Shiner Bock and 80 pounds of raw beef as bait. Matt
was saying that it smothered Oklahoma media, each station leading with
the same news story. DON'T GET DRUNK, TAKE MEAT OUT TO THE WOODS, AND
TRY TO CATCH THE TIGER YOURSELF! Like where did you think I got this
idea? Then they would interview Farmer Bob, who would report seeing
something orange and black slinking through the trees.
Shawna is safe and sound back home, and so am I.
* * *
Ediborial #2
There is something horribly wrong with hearing Kurt Cobain on the radio.
First time I heard his voice on the radio again I just stopped. Here
was someone who was dead, someone who had taken a shotgun and blown his
head off just eight months before, and in the process abandoning his
wife and small child, here he was singing a new song for a new album. I
leapt out of my chair, heart both pounding and frozen, unable to
understand, unwilling to process this new information.
Afterwards, I listened to the radio, read newspapers, magazines, Usenet
articles, and all of those other information conduits which I am
hard-wired into, but nobody said anything. I listened, but no one spoke
it, so it's like no big deal. Whatever rip in reality has been sewn.
No, it's not. I know it, and you know it, so I'm saying it here :
there's something horribly wrong.
So no, I am not buying the damn album.
Or the next one.
* * *
Ediborial #3
Recently, my computer was in the shop for an upgrade and tune-up. So I
fired up my old computer, the one that had been lying in the corner of
my room, unplugged, disconnected, for several months, maybe even a year
or more. Inside was several articles, notes, tidbits, and selections
that I had saved for copies of Scream Baby that I had never used.
Hey, it's no Tomb of Alexander the Great but one must choose your own
adventures in the 90s.
Much of this I don't remember what I was writing it for, or what I was
talking about, but liked it enough to include anyway. I've also
included subscriber statements, when I demanded an essay question before
I would add anyone to the list. I started compiling an issue I was going
to call the Subscribers Strike Back! and include only answers to these
essays, but stripped out all of the names and forced it into this you/me
continuum.
Those days are gone; now one only needs to know a Majordomo subscribe
command. I guess I've gotten fat and lazy like everyone else in the
information age.
* * *
"I've got a bad feeling about this."
-- Han Solo
* * *
Ediborial
Date Unknown
People are terrified of possibility. It's not that they are scared, but
rather unsure of what to do with it. Before I created the mini-poll [see last
issue] the horizon was unbounded. There wasn't nothing I couldn't do! But I
don't dare tell you people that, for I would have gotten no response at all.
Rather, I severely limit reality to seven or eight options, call it a "choice"
and sit back while people gleefully herd through like cattle to the
slaughterhouse.
How disgusting.
* * *
The Arcology of Violence : The Christmas Eve Massacre / Charlie Manson
Written December 1994
One of my friends (B______) and I have an ongoing conversation that we refer to
simply as "The Christmas Eve Massacre". Imagine, if you will, the sheer number
of people packed in the malls searching for that one last gift. Imagine, if
you will, the notoriety given to a single gunman -- or small group of armed
assailants -- if he "opened up". The single day mass murder record of 25
(Bakersfield, California, 1983) suddenly seems not worth mentioning.
B______ and I have some disagreements, of course. I argue that one has a chance
of scoring more points on the day after Thanksgiving, which is the biggest
shopping day of the season. B______ counters that being known through history
as "The Day After Thanksgiving Murderer" doesn't have quite the same ring. What
one loses in body count is compensated by style/shock points. We both agree on
avoiding the department anchor stores. Not enough people, too many places for
them to hide, too many opportunites to be bogged down.
Another point of disagreement revolves around escape plans. I'm like, why
bother making them? There is no way someone will be able to walk into a mall on
Christmas Eve, drop concussion grenades into the atrium in order to wipe out
people on the ground level while simultaneous strafing the mall hallways with
automatic fire, and expect to escape alive. It's not the mall police that you
have to worry about, but armed shoppers. Either way, B_____ wastes a lot of
our quality time together discussing vans, helicoptors, switching vehicles,
and emergency routes.
So given the conversation that I have about malls, and given that there is just
*something* about the holiday season that brings one's innate hatred of
humanity crawling to the surface, you can imagine my response when Paco asked
me to write an article about "going to the mall". Sure! I'd love to! But
when it was time to go.....well, someone swiped my enthusiasm.
I did go at least once, however, for the purpose of doing research for this
article. Let's just say it was an apocalyptical nightmare. I am not going to
delve into the gory details, but will provide this example. I was drained I
couldn't even manage marching into one of the stores selling nothing but
calendars of half naked men, half naked women, fantasy figures, flowers, cute
animals, celebrities, and Star Trek : The Next Generation idols and ask for the
1994 Johnny Marr Murder Can Be Fun calendar.
I am sure that Johnny will cover the issue in a more detailed, less frentic
attitude, but let me talk now about the new controversy brewing around Chuck
Manson.
First, a brief history lesson for those who may not know. Chuck Manson and his
cult "Family" brutally murdered seven people in California some 20, 25 years
ago. The only reason anyone cared then or now is that one of the victims was a
movie star : the actress Sharon Tate, wife of film director Roman Polanski, and
heavily pregnant with his child.
Chuck's plan was simple : by committing heinous crimes on white people and
making it appear that blacks were responsible, he hoped to instigate a race
war. The Family would then flee to Arizona and wait. The blacks would win the
war, Chuck surmised, due to superior survival tactics and pronounced physical
prowess. They would take over the White House and start the business of
running the country. But because of inferior intelligence traits, the blacks
would be unable to do the job. They would then turn to Chuck, waiting
patiently in the desert, and ask him to be President.
Now that's a plan!
People were killed, the Family got caught, and Chuck got thrown into the
slammer, and will probably never, never never be released from jail, no
matter how many times he appears at parole hearings with swastiskas carved
into his forehead. I mean, what better way to show that one has reformed
and is fit and able to be reintegrated into mainstream American culture?
History lesson over. Fast-forward to the future.
What people are upset about now is that Chuck is going to be *rich*.
The new Guns N Roses album (called spaghetti something) has an uncredited track
on it, penned by no other than...well you know how. According to a wire
report. estimates are that Chuck will receive $60,000 royalties for each
million copies of an album that is expected to easily sell several million
copies.
In addition, there are t-shirts with Chuck's face and imagery available.
[NOTE 2/11/95 -- I have a note written here about recommodification of
icons, but never finished this article. What I would note today is a
similar phenomenon surrounding the controversy over witnesses to crimes
being paid money by the tabloids for their stories. Only certain people
are allowed to make money -- law enforcement, judges, politicians, and
the media. Dan Rather can make hundreds of thousands of dollars talking
about the latest "development" in the O.J. Simpson Trial but if someone
is paid $2500 to tell Hard Copy, I saw four people walking down the
alley at the time of the alleged murders, something has been
compromised. The criminal justice system and those who feed off it
garnered millions by playing off the shock and fear generated by crimes
and it is just a little sanctimonious to start drawing lines of
accept-a-ble-ness.]
* * *
"I've got a bad feeling about this."
-- Lando Calrissian
* * *
[Est. date : Summer of 1992. Before I did Scream Baby, I did this huge
multimedia hypertext monster called Scream N *me*me.]
EDIBORIAL #4
THE FUTURE OF SCREAM N *ME*ME
There are going to be 287 issues of Scream N *me*me. At the current rate
of almost 4 issues/year, then I will be done in another 70.75 years. I'll
be 95 and most-of-you will be dead by then. Most-of-you are already dead,
but I digress.
So what should you, the reader, expect for the next 70.75 years? 283 more
lethargic editorials, for one. For those who have not yet noticed, I have
a pretty bad attitude towards editorials.
[Thus the title, stolen from the
music&culture zine Ben is Dead.]
If something is *really* important, then it will be found in other sections
of the magazine; most ediborials are merely attempts to prop up the ego of
the author by justifying opinions not able to be found anyplace else.
Maybe it's because I consider every kilobyte to already-be an editorial.
I'm open for suggestions on making this space fun, rather than the burden
of being beaten with a lead pipe.
Scream N *me*me is, and always will be, "Stuff I Think Is Cool".
Everything else is secondary, especially format and subject matter. Scream
N *me*me may not always be an electronic publication; we may not always be
focused on cultural and social aspects of cyberspace.
[<hushes the gallery complaining
that it's already not>]
Scream N *me*me is an environment, not a thesis.
There's no point to any of it.
You're not supposed to learn something.
You are supposed to wallow.
So what monstrosity do I wish to unleash on you next?" you ask? Well.......
[Deleted discussion of plans for what turned out to be Scream Baby.
Though I made a mistake -- I was considering calling it Snuffleupagus
Revenge.]
Well, with 283 more episodes to create, I don't have anything else to say.
There are plenty of other wonderful writings in this issue, though, but
then again, there always is.
Go read something.
* * *
"I've got a bad feeling about this"
-- Young Indy Jones
* * *
Seven Simple Steps to Being Cyber-organic!
0. If you don't have a computer, go get one.
1. People jump into cyberspace for these things : software, sex, games,
services. Then there is a small percentage (10% or so) who use the
technology of communication to think, to create, and to explore.
Join us.
2. Have an Internet e-mail address. Mine is bladex@bga.com.
3. Balance your information input : television, movies, newspapers, magazines,
zines, books, comics, radio, shortwave, et. all. Balance one against
another.
4. Believe who you want but not what you want.
5. Swim upstream. Create your own information output : television, movies,
newspapers, magazines, zines, books, comics, radio, and shortwave
broadcasts. Submit samples to Fringeware, Inc. and who knows, if we like
it, maybe we might distribute your work for you!
6. You have a moral imperative to tune in and turn on as many of your friends,
family members, and associates to the online world. Think of yourself as
a multi-level marketer for cyberspace! If you recruit two people and they
recruit two people..............
7. Never forget that there is another human being on the other end of the
screen. This step, alone, will eliminate the practice of flaming.
8. Send me your suggestions on Making Cyberspace A Better Place (sm).
You may send me snail mail (that's what us cyber-organics call the US postal
service :-) c/o of this magazine, or you may send e-mail to my address
listed in step # 2 above. I am looking forward to hearing from you, because
only by working together can we fulfill the promise and potential of
cyberspace.
Final note: This article is an excerpt from a work-in-progress, The Handbook
for Humanity, a helpful guide to living wise in this unwise day and age. If you
haven't seen anything similar in Whole Earth Review yet, don't worry.......
You Will.
* * *
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
;; Action movie cliches
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;
; written by keith goolsbey
; goolsbey@mcc.com
I. Bad Guys
Bad guys are always men.
Bad guys are always ugly.
Bad guys come in three categories:
(1) Fodder
Fodder always come in groups (> 3).
Fodder all look alike.
Fodder never have speaking parts.
Fodder are never on screen for more than 5 sec.
Fodder never hurt the good guy in any way.
The good guy kills all the fodder at once.
(2) Thugs
Every thug has their own distinctive, almost stylishly sinister look.
Thugs usually have speaking parts.
Thugs are always fought and killed by the good guy one at a time.
Thugs will usually hurt the good guy once.
A group of thugs must have a representative from every major ethnic group.
Thugs never have real names; they instead have single word nicknames ala
the American Gladiators.
(3) Boss
The main bad guy is the boss.
There is only one boss.
The boss is always psycho.
The boss is always played extremely over-the-top.
The boss only fights after all thugs have been eliminated.
The boss hurts the good guy nearly to the brink of death.
The boss is killed by the good guy via either:
(a) impaling
(b) annihilating explosion
The boss will always injure one of his own thugs in an emotional outburst.
II. Good Guys
Good Guys are always ruggedly handsome.
Good Guys are always athletic and muscular.
If there are a group of good guys, only one will be left at the end.
Good guys have monosyllabic first names, usually Nick or Max.
Good guys have simple English surnames (even when portrayed by Austrian
or Belgian actors).
Good guys never run out of ammo.
Exception: If they run out of ammo, they at least have another weapon.
Good guys never run out of weapons.
Good guys always get caught by the bad guys at least once, after which
they escape.
If a good guy is caught by a thug, the thug is always under orders to
present the good guy to the boss alive.
III. Sidekicks
Every Good guy has at least one sidekick.
The sidekick never gets the girl.
The sidekick is wittier than the good guy.
The sidekick is uglier and less athletic than the good guy.
The sidekick always dispatches exactly one thug.
The sidekick always does something stupid to get the good guy in trouble once.
The sidekick always does something lucky to get the good guy out of
trouble once.
The sidekick always favors higher-tech/less personal methods of fighting.
The sidekick never dies.
Exception: if the sidekick is a partner, they die early in the movie.
Sidekicks have ethnic surnames, usually Polish, Italian or Czech.
IV. The Girl
The girl is beautiful.
The good guy always gets the girl.
The girl is always physically assaulted by the bad guys.
The girl doesn't do much else.
IV. Fights
The good guy and his opponent always fight with similar weapons.
All thugs and good guys will favor a lower-technology/more personal
approach to fighting whenever possible, i.e. guns over explosives,
knives over guns, blunt instruments over knives, fists over blunt
instruments.
Bosses favor high/tech approaches to fighting, much like bad guys.
Before dispatching a thug or higher, the good guy states a one-liner.
At least one thug must be dispatched by the good guy using each of the
following methods:
(a) shooting
(b) throwing off a ledge
(c) breaking their neck
(d) burning
The effects of life-threatening injuries inflicted on a good guy by a
thug only last until the next thug is encountered.
Women are never killed.
Exception: If a woman is a boss or thug, she may be killed offscreen.
Bystanders are never injured in public fights.
Horses and other animals are never even injured.
Outdoor fights occur in the rain.
Final fights take place in factories.
* * *
MUTTERINGS FROM MY MAILBOX
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Are CYBERPUNKS waiting for ANARCHY? If so, who will work at NUCLEAR POWER
plants?
Cyber Fetish
[Editor's Note: Actually, my brother. He is an engineering student intern/co-
op at the South Texas Nuclear Power Plant. Thanks for asking! -- Me]
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
I, Your-name-here, have read the software licensing agreement and
promise to abide by any restrictions on distribution that may apply as
determined by the publisher. Amen, So Mote It Be, may the Good Lord zap me
with a thunderbolt and reduce me to a pile of smoldering ashes should I so
much as entertain the THOUGHT of violating this agreement. =) No, honest,
I swear upon my honor as an Eagle Scout...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ESSAY QUESTION:
While walking on the campus of the University of Texas one Sunday, I found a
cassette tape whose film had been torn and the entire cassette thrown/wrapped
around a tree and the surrounding bushes. Curious, I picked it up.
Side A: Sexual Therapy Session I
Side B: What is Man? Mineral or Drug
In 100-200 words, describe what you think was on this tape, who made it, and
why would they rip it up and wrap it around a tree?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Obviously, the individual who made the tape is (well, was) a professor
at U of Texas. He has been having marital problems and his wife
forced him into counseling. A cassette tape was made of a conversation
between the therapist and the prof, and the counselor ordered the prof to
listen to it and figureout what was wrong with his attitude.
This very same professor teaches undergraduate biology. When the counselor
insisted on an all-day three-way session to "help sort things out," the
prof realized that he would miss his 11:00 lecture. He grabbed a random
cassette tape out of the pile and recorded a bullshit lecture on it, the
upshot of which involved whether it was better to see the human body as
component elements or as a collection of enzymes. He stopped by campus
just long enough to hand it to his T.A. and order him to play it.
The T.A. turned the tape over, and LO AND BEHOLD, saw tape side #1. Since
the real reason for the wife's dissatisfaction stemmed from the T.A.'s
superior lovemaking skills, he listened to the tape out of curiosity and
a nasty thought occurred to him. He switched the labels from one side to
the other, then played the correct side in class (the side labeled
What is Man: Mineral or Drug?) which of course was actually the sex
therapy discussion.
The Ugrads loved it. Several of the anal-retentive students had recorded
the lecture, and passed copies around to <everybody>, including the
prof's wife and the department head.
Upshot: she threatened to divorce him. In a fit of rage, he stormed the
T.A.'s apartment, killed him with a rusty fork, recovered the tape, and
spread it all over the forest. Then, he returned home and used the same
fork to kill and eat the family cat (his wife wasn't home -- her cat.)
Recovering part of his senses, he emptied his bank account and drove to
the most desolate place he could imagine, the University of California at
San Diego. He now lives as a homeless person on campus, dodging UC police
and fighting others for scraps of student leftovers.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Anxiety. Remorse. Explode. Energy. Violence. Rip. Pull. Twist. Reach. Bend.
Tie. Not. Enough. More. Turns. Wrap. Wrap. Leaves. Jogger. Blush. Glare.
Turn. Hide. Duh. Damn. Bitch. Cause. Remorse. Stupid. Go Home.
69 more words to go.
That's my intiutive feeling of what happened when the tape got wrapped around
thebush. The tape was probably made by someone's conselor. They guy is
having some kind of problems opening up, of letting go, during sex. He
might have taken acid or some kind of other substance and made the second
side. Sort of his reactions to it. He probably got pissed that the therapy
wasn't working. So he took the tape out of his backpack and took out his
agressions on the closest thing to his problems, and those are the thoughts
recorded on the tape and the voice of the sexual therapist. Why, though,
did he choose a time when he was walking by some plants? Fertility.
Phallicism. Vernacular sexuality. All mapping roughly to plants, trees, and
bush. It's all associative.
Anyway, that's my best Hannibal Lecter -- style analysis. Can I get a
subscription?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Not that I am going to try to do anything stupid, but is this really binding?
After all, I all did was hit the 'paste' key. Just some thought for food.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ANSWER TO ESSAY QUESTION:
Side A is an elect/ronic simulatory attempt at remote masturbation through
sonic overload of auditory passages. Side B is blank.
The maker of the tape clearly apprehends his/her/its existence as a polarity
between "mineral" (static nonreactive be/ingness) and "drug" (fluidicity in
the sense of "space on the move"); s/he/it establishes Side A as a
proximity-based temporary reality dichotimzation, i.e., an escape in the
traditional sense.
The aggressive destruction of the cassette demonstrates clearly the maker's
final conclusion that postmodernist pro/fessors are full of shit and should
be set in a colloidal suspension with complete sensory deprvvation for 24
hours per week, dammit, and I don't care if I flunk out!!!
(Writer of above essay attends Williams College and is taking courses from
the religion department, a well-known bastion of postmodernist mindfuck.)
#include<statement>:
"I have read the software licensing agreement and promise to abide by any
restrictions on distribution that may apply, as determined by the
publisher."
<siged> <dated>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
drug,mineral,sextherapy, tree]
wrapped it because of some lower polar cystallization ruach]
tit for tat intellectual BARKER ,
theory put on some tape, which pronnged a poor peons brain
tomaximum absurdity. went to the tree spirit for advice,
the tape was a sacrifice, wrapped it like joes penis in
flesh, mineral? agonist? . roots of being? man=root=tree,,
drugs are from trees/plants primarily.. many religions assert
their beginings from doing drugs, any energy is sex energy
, a neat albeit ineffective , jesture of juxtaposition
fairly inflexible nature meets the mind of human all bent
out of shape with kali yuga.
I have no idea bout scream baby, Ive read a few boings
liked it enought to order their back issues, MOndo strikes
me astoo slick at times, FAD is interesting because it reminds
me of the old WETznne. however, I am just rambling and
though I would send this out of net-technoboredom,
too bad I cant acesss the bbs from VAX here,, Ive heard
its more interesting in some areas from other people
as well..
+=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
I solve abstract puzzles. Fortunately, I live in an advanced civilization
where abstract-puzzle-solving is a socially rewarded activity. If I lived a
few hundred years ago, I would be a mathematician or kabalist and nobody would
pay any attention to me. I'd have to get a day job. But around here and now,
a puzzle expert is called a "computer scientist" and is generally supposed to
be useful.
"The Journal of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery". People are silly putty.
How we look is not limited by nature. It is only limited by what we are
willing to do.
+=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
To: bladex@wixer
Subject: plea
Comments: Just like !YOU!.
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 92 17:57:53 MDT
Organization: Not damn much.
Hi, this is my rant to get put on the list.. I am You, aka Handle-for-You.
Sometimes "k_rAD Ei1+e!!" person but mostly just me, a 23 year old wondering
about my life. Some times when I read all the "new edge" stuff like mondo &
boing boing and future culture I find my self saying to my self Neat, but does
it really matter? will it make a difference?"
I try not to dwell on it too long.
+=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=++=+=+=+=+=+=+=+
"I've got a bad feeling about this."
-- my lawyer
