What you said about watching it all unfold on television and feeling somehow like it “wasn’t real” is spot on and it’s just what I felt. I was probably more impressionable than most of you guys at that time because I was around 14-15. I’m not sure whether it was 9/11 exclusively, but it was just after those events that I began to take an interest in politics, the planet and everything I dig now. So I guess I got the good side of the initiation.

“That’s a crucial symptom of traumatic dissociation. Your mind splits, blinks off for a moment, creating a critical space which can be filled with a new story, a new mythos.”

This fits in really well with what Taoist (and others) try to achieve in meditation. The first part of meditation is to clear your mind. I think when you get good at this, you can stimulate some kind of mind split, like dissociation. Taoists say that when your mind is clear, it acts as a mirror of the Tao itself from which you can gain divine insight which is an idea I love. It fits in nicely with what you said about the mind being filled with a new story or mythos. I think there are probably a load of other leads between meditation and dissociation which could be cool to look at. I may post on them.

I thought I’d mention it as it’s a really good example, but probably one that wouldn’t be thought of. And just in case you’re curious, no I don’t have any kids of my own. I was thinking over your last paragraph of us using it, and then wondering if there were instances that people did actually use it, maybe without realizing, and I thought of this as one.

crasspastor, i’d like to hear that. ill toss you an email

If anybody would like an MP3 of the song email me and I’ll fire it off your way. You’ll probably need a “real” email account though, one that can accept multi MB transfers, not a playtime hotmail account or such. crasspastor at dunneiv dot org. Trust me, the song is GOOD!

From the Cradle to the Grave

Well they took you from your mother’s womb and put you in a school
Told you how to run your life by following the rules
Told you not to pick your nose or disrespect the queen
Scrub your teeth three times a day keep mind and body clean
Save up all your pocket money, nothing is for free
And you’d better trust your parents cos there’s no one else you see
And then they send you off each day remember what you’re told
“You may think you don’t need teaching but you’ll need it when you’re old”

And if you’re too intelligent they’ll cut you down to size
They’ll praise you til you’re happy then they’ll fill you full of lies
Cos intelligence is threatening and genius is sin
If you could ever see through them they know they’d never win

So they channel your ability into the right direction
If you’re good enough and rich enough you can be a politician
On the other hand if your too thick they’ll tell you that you’re lazy
They’ll put you down and wind you up until it drives you crazy

They’ll say you ought to learn a trade to help you in your life
Success is written in three parts: A job, a house, a wife
They’ll say that school prepares you for the awesome world outside
Well it certainly gives you bigotry and patriotic pride

Racism, sexism teacher to class
From school to work remains the sameare you white and middle class?

You’ll learn that bad men dress in black and good men dress in white
And the pamphlets in the playground say that’s right
And that girls were made for housework and boys were made to fight
And the naughty pictures on page 3 make everything alright

And so from school to the outside world these morals you will take
And unless you can reject them you’ll have your mind at stake

They’ll give you a decision when you get to 18, too
The right to vote for someone else who says he cares for you
But the only thing he cares about is getting to the top
By conning you with empty words that promise you a lot
But the end result is slavery to a false set of ideals
You’ll be tempted to believe them cos they’ll seem so very real
The slavery of attitudes that make you keep in line
Subconsciously devoted to the morals of our time

And when you end up on the dole which you very likely will
They’ll offer you a brand new trade: Learning how to kill

Why don’t you join the army? Be a man and not a fool
There’s someone else to think for you just like there was at school

They’ll promise you absolution from the murders you’ll commit
In the name of god and country they can get away with it
They fill you full of orders and promise you rewards
Like busting up your family by sending you abroad
A holiday in Germany or Iceland or Hong Kong
Making money being useless well it seems it can’t go wrong
But then it’s off to Northern Ireland where you’ll practice what they preached
You’ll shoot to keep yourself alive and kill to keep the peace
And then it won’t be so much fun as you hear the wounded crying
Cos before they couldn’t speak english and you didn’t know what they were saying
But when the children call you “Bastard” it will make you think again
When you cannot tell the difference between animals and men

Animals don’t wear uniforms but they kill as much as you
But the army kills for money and animals kill for food
It’s the basest degredation in the name of what is right
Become something you never were and regret it til you die

Cos your father will tell you “Sonny, you must do as you are told”
And you’ll say the same thing to your kids when you’re 32 years old
And unless you can react against the brainwash from the start
Your government will rule your mind and your mind will rule your heart
You’ll conform to every social law and be the system’s slave
From birth to school to work to death, from the cradle to the grave…..

I felt a huge sense of betayal when the newspaper headlines immediately tried to tell us how we were feeling; That we wanted revenge; yeah, the word “al qaeda” became a trigger word for a collective alter. I felt there was no “al qaeda”, that it was just term to manipulate us into aggression. New Yorkers by majority did not vote for Bush, in 2004, New Yorkers, by majority, did not want to go to war, the rest of the country that only the World Trade Center on televison did.

So many incredible points here, Tim. What a great piece of writing. It does seem that 9/11 was traumatic conditioning at it’s most devious. En masse trauma based conditioning.

In the psyche split, and in that moment, incredilble love and good can be thrown in, but our evil manipulating leaders wish to pour in mistrust and fear.

Perhaps this is how those who have exp. trauma based conditioning heal. By pouring in something *which cannot be broken* in that split space of the psyche.

And in that period of lag, there was an enormous outpouring of grief and a temporary shift of values. Remember all the news reports about how Americans briefly didn’t care about celebrity news? Remember the reports that Americans were staying at home with their families instead of shopping? I remember an article where some bra manufacturer gave a soundbite telling Americans that in the middle of the recession, it was our patriotic duty to buy bras.

I’m bringing this up because I wonder if it fits or complicates your theory. That doesn’t read to me as the kind of disassociation you’re discussing. For a few weeks, maybe a month or so, 9/11 seemed to compel a substantial amount of Americans to disregard all the consumerist programming we’d grown accustomed to. Maybe I’m naive or recalling things incorrectly. But the need for propaganda and imprinting new values almost came as a reaction to that period as much as the event itself.

In the primitive initiation rites, the initiating men are often disguised as demons or gods because something bigger (not personally human) is “in control”. Similarly, in the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna says: “I have already destroyed all these warriors. You are only an instrument, O Arjuna.” There is a sense, then, in which mighty cultural forces are operating and “using” individuals to act out the roles in some divine drama. It may seem a little callous to acknowledge this, but sep11 did seem like a giant piece of theatre.

After seeing things on that kind of grand scale, yes, it’s good to return to the role and responsibility of the individual. We each in our own way contribute to this human/divine drama and the whole story is within each of us as well, every one of the characters is in there, inside of us.

Like Alice growing very large or shrinking very small, we perceive ourselves as mighty (in control) and as helpless (controlled). Until we emerge from the rabbit hole and need to get back to our daily chores, lol.

I like the balance you’ve achieved here, Tim, and the innovation in how you’ve fitted things together.

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