A long sleep and late afternoon has arrived.  The sound of a 

subtle rain gently taps upon the roof above and a confusion 

comes over me.  Recollecting the perfect weather from recent 

days, it’s impossible to comprehend that rain is now upon us.  

Sliding the curtain and stepping out onto the balcony, the 

sky is blanketed in grey and the colors of the surrounding 

gardens are vibrant.  The leaves extend, fully stretched up 

and outward yearning to grasp each and every flailing drop 

with an awareness that the wealth that is being momentarily 

granted may be short lived.  A nostalgic calm encapsulates me 

within a serenity that accompanies an unscheduled and 

unexpected rain.  Almost a blissful sorrow with a hint of 

joyous isolation vibrates through me as I decide to join the 

outdoors and feel the warm rain fall upon me. 

Stepping onto the pathway, the mist from above stimulates an 

intense presence and today is the first of it’s kind, 

blocking me from falling victim to the pattern of days prior.  

Slight hints of question arise from my being, as the simple 

energy addictions and habitual routine is being distracted 

and altered.  The faces and movements that have become 

indicative of my existence have shifted and the space that is 

usually filled has now become empty and different.  It’s 

surprising how simple changes can stimulate subtle fears 

within your functional being forcing you to include your 

thought process within your moment to moment awareness. 

The velocity of the mist increases and a more passionate rain 

begins to fall as I step foot on the empty beach.  The 

restaurant to my right is quiet yet there are a few guests 

dining in the rain underneath the covered garden patio.  My 

thoughts converge with two opposing desires, one based on 

eating and sitting quietly as an observing, the other based 

on participating on a more visceral level with what nature is 

presenting.  Accepting the reality that this may be the last 

rain I see here, my body abruptly pushes towards the ocean 

observing the colors that stain the horizon. 

Pulling off my shirt and emptying my pockets into my hat, I 

head with unbending intent, directly out and into the ocean.  

The currents move about with a force that I had not 

experienced previously, and though there was a strength 

within the movement of the tides, it was not angry or 

threatening.  It was animated with a childlike excitement 

that was giddy to have you as a guest.  It was almost showing 

off it’s power in a manner that including you, like a dolphin 

pulling you for a ride and waiting to be rewarded with a fish 

at the end.  Lying flat in the water, floating on back, I 

allowed the currents to push and pull me wherever it wanted 

me to go.  

My body was weightless and calm and the movement was like a 

maternal sway though not enacting a paternal role, but 

instead felt like a brother or best friends tossing you 

around playfully and never once stimulating fear. 

The sky above was filled with millions of shades of grey and 

in the distance there were darker grey V-shaped shadows where 

you could confirm the strength of the storm.  Glancing up and 

down the coast, the ocean was empty.  I was the only one in 

either direction for as far as I could see.  I closed my eyes 

and bobbed for an unknown duration of time in an effortless 

meditation.  Leaning forward, I noticed that magically and 

with no warning, there was another man swimming approximately 

thirty yards away from me.  He looked Eastern European of 

some sort and within moments I could feel his energy.  It was 

experiencing the exact same sensation as was I.  I continued 

to watch him, trying to identify what it was that we were 

embracing.  His eyes were looking to the sky and in one 

gesture, I could comprehend what we were both attempting to 

fulfill.  A moment that will be ours, individually, forever.  

His movements are confident and there is a smile that shines 

from his presence, and by describing the gesture that he was 

about to carry out, is the most articulate way I can describe 

the sensation that was living inside of me. 

He gently laid back into the water with his face pointing up 

to the sky, closed his eyes and opened his mouth to feel the 

water fall inside.  Stretching his mouth wide, he absorbed as 

much of this moment as possible hoping the rainfall would 

scar itself deep within his being, ingraining this moment of 

presence in his emotional memory banks forever.  He continued 

to hold his face absolutely silent and still for nearly ten 

minutes, swaying with the moving tide. 

As I returned to my body, allowing him to leave me in my 

space, I floated within effortlessly on my back while the 

warmth and the salt keep my face and feet above the water.  

My stomach and chest begin vibrating with a higher frequency 

of energy as I think of it now.  My body rotates with the 

tides until my face heads towards the coast instead of out to 

sea.  Feeling absolutely no fear and trusting that the waves 

that would fall over me were nurturing and harmless.  My body 

would thrust gently upward as the swell passed and then 

quickly drop flat again coming into my line of vision and 

crash upon the shore.  The rain fell hard and created an 

illusion of sparkling bubbles that surrounded me in every 

direction.  My senses were getting such an abundance of 

stimulation that again, I was experiencing a drug induced 

state of being without ingesting anything that would cause a 

false sense of presence and/or hallucinatory experience.  The 

bubbles had the appearance similar to a pot of boiling water.  

They were rising from the sea floor and upon reaching the 

surface they would pop as they had reached a temperature high 

enough to break the oxygen molecules apart, altering their 

form and sending them back up and into the atmosphere. 

I was trapped.  Nothing in my body could pull me away from 

this moment and though I felt like it was time to go, I 

couldn’t impose the action upon my body.  Think of the most 

potent lust that reaches such an intensity and for the first 

time you have the opportunity to embrace the human that has 

stimulated this lust within you.  You don’t want it to end.  

It can’t end.  There’s no need for it to end, and if it is 

going to end, let it end on it’s own without my influence 

prematurely ending it.  I remained motionless within the 

moving tides for well over an hour and finally decided it was 

time. 

The entire time I had floated about, the awareness of the 

tsunami had faded and I was reminded of the loving qualities 

that the ocean possessed.  It almost felt as if it had it’s 

own personality and it was trying to rekindle the kindness 

that it was so accustomed to receiving.  The demeanor that 

the water possessed felt almost like a humble insecurity.  It 

reminded me of a puppy that had unknowingly wronged you 

somehow and was tapping on your leg, dropping a ball at your 

feet while you’re in the middle of working.  As if it were 

asking forgiveness without the comprehension of what it had 

actually done to upset you.  Maybe this was nothing more than 

a self-imposed illusory thought that I had conceived, however 

it felt as if it had been approaching my awareness from the 

outside in, as my mind had been silent and judgment was on   

hiatus when the sensation entered. 

Returning to the beach, my shirt, towel, and cigarettes were 

drenched.  I passed through the restaurant to find a group of 

travelers huddled around a TV screen intensely watching 

Batman Returns with Thai subtitles.  As I walked through the 

man made jungle that led to my room, the colors were more 

alive than ever and the rain had brought out all of the life 

that secretly inhabited the land.  Baby frogs jumped past my 

feet as I approached.  Geckos scurried up trees to escape the 

potential approaching danger that I represented. 

Cracking open my door, the pain of the air conditioning was 

excruciating, it was like diving into an ice pool on an 

already cold day.  Throwing myself into the shower as the hot 

water arrived, my brain was still silent.  There was no 

thought.  There was no noise.  Not just within me, but within 

the environment around me.  It was uncommon for this space to 

experience silence.  It was serene.   This was the first day 

that I had honestly spent alone since my trip began and I was 

happy. 

As I opened my bag to find something new to wear, a hint of a 

rotten odor snuck out of the bag and into the atmosphere.  It 

is a smell that will always live in me and when approached 

with something similar will function as a button that 

triggers the emotional sensations from moments and glances 

that occurred while that smell encompassed me.  Like the 

smells that scarred images from your childhood into a storage 

area for odors in your mind.  A type of bubble gum.  A 

certain animal.  The breath of your grandmother.  The smell 

of bacon as you open your eyes and realize that it’s 

Christmas.  The stench of a massive arena of decomposed 

bodies had now scarred itself into the category of sense 

memories that I would now carry with me for the rest of my 

life. 

Within a millisecond of the molecules entering my nose, my 

muscles quickly tightened, desperately attempting to keep it 

from entering my body.  The fear of my energy shifting away 

from the moment of presence that I had been gifted to receive 

on this rainy day was precious. My desire to protect it from 

disseminating was fervent and unbending.  Today was not the 

day to sit inside of the newfound memories I had acquired 

over the past weeks, but to relearn what it felt like to be 

alone with myself, without the crutches and parasites that I 

had been relying upon, and without the cell phone, and 

without the E-mail, and without all of the external entities 

that I would usually embrace in a day, to justify and confirm 

my existence without taking responsibility for it. 

Pulling my focus back to the rain, I stepped out onto the 

balcony and a gentle humidity of warmth reminded me where I 

was.  A childlike feeling emanated from my body as the 

parenting rain was dictating what and how all of the humans 

that usually filled this beach, with bodies and beer bottles, 

would live this day out. 

Some days, it’s nice to be guided. 

The innocent idea of a statue, or sculpture, or a shrine, or any sort of thing that people impose power onto… a mythical figure, a religious zealot, a holy person, a healer; basically, anything that people sit in front of and worship is a pretty comical idea to me.  The concept is actually quite brilliant however.  If you organize and structure a specific space for humans to come with the intention of worship or even just a simple focus, they arrive prepared to exert large amounts of focused energy.  They present it, focus it, and send it wholeheartedly to this one specific space.  The space is the actual entity, not the shrine.  The frequency of vibrations that move through this space, would potentially vibrate at a much higher velocity

and with more abundance creating a sustained visceral core.

Moving into this core, you would feel a shift in your being based on your sensitivity to your surrounding environment.  So, simply by arriving, a subtle physical sensation might enter your body which then receives a judgment from your mind.  The judgment is obviously subjective, but

hypothetically, and by nature, it would be the label imposed to represent something spiritual or for some people, religious.

Other comparable locations containing an intensified, focused energy presence would be places like bars, night clubs, or physical locations where parties are consistently thrown.  Any place where on a consistent basis, people arrive with an intense presence and an openness to express or receive energy from themselves and others.  Not only do we present our hopes and desires within these spaces, but also, it tends to be quite common to induce chemicals into our

bodies to assist us in becoming more present and less conscious.  At which point, our focus intensely searches for another individual, or even multiple individuals to impose our energy upon, either physically or energetically. Obviously, the shrine and the bar are two absolutely varied experiences, however there is a common similarity here.

The Institutionalized Dissemination of the Individual 

By Christopher Jaymes 

Using the films One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest and Dead Poet’s Society to dissect the 

layered dynamics between the Institution and the Individual, intended for The New Yorker 

Stillness in nature is disrupted by the industrialized man as an automobile passes through a 

serene mountain setting in the opening frame of Milos Forman’s Academy Award winning 

interpretation of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, based on the novel by Ken Kesey.  

Distractions in nature sporadically occur throughout Peter Weir’s Academy Award winning feature 

film, Dead Poet’s Society, however the opening scene establishes young boys being 

photographed to blend into a classically painted mural residing upon the wall of an upper class 

prep school.  The children are almost camouflaged as a part of the painting as they prepare for 

the morning ritual which will set the new school year into motion.   Two images; the disruption of 

something structurally sound, nature, by an opposing force, man; and the inherent molding that 

engulfs the unsuspecting youth to follow in the footsteps of conformist tradition.  Cuckoo’s Nest 

and Dead Poet’s Society explore the reactionary affects carried out by the institution, be it a 

mental hospital or a prep school, as it is forced to confront a disruption brought forth by an 

individual in opposition with the standards set forth and the methods used to voraciously 

disempower the nonconformist.  Without proper guidance and delicate force, the expansion of the 

conformist will stimulate the abolition of the individual and the extinction of civil liberty as a whole. 

Dead Poet’s Society is about a man returning to his prep school to replace a retired English 

teacher.  His efforts to instill a newfound awareness in his students, enforcing the need to look 

past the text and awaken the individual within, are in direct opposition with the standards and 

mores of the traditionally structured institution.  The boys come together inspired by Mr. Keating 

to meet after hours in a nearby cave, breaking out of the oppressive all-male academy to find 

liberation within the writings of Walt Whitman, Henry David Thoreau and a myriad of Romantic 

poets, forming what they call the Dead Poet’s Society.   This sets a series of individual journeys in 

motion where each of the boys are forced to approach and confront various issues surrounding 

the life of an evolving adolescent yearning to shed the suit of the child and stand forth with the 

posture of a free-thinking independent man.  The pseudo-liberation experienced by the boys is 

accompanied by the reciprocal desire of a stubborn institution to retain it’s stature. 

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is the story of a criminal feigning insanity to avoid serving a 

prison sentence.  Instead, he enters an all-male state mental institution and struggles to elude the 

bureaucratically-imposed dehumanization tactics presented.   MacMurphy, the felon, is 

consistently emasculated by the informally butch head nurse, Nurse Ratched, as he persistently 

attempts to instill a confidence and camaraderie amongst the somewhat feminized male inmates, 

most of whom are there based on issues stemmed from some emasculating female once 

prominent in their lives.  Throughout his stay, we witness the extremist tactics induced by the 

institution in order to disempower the nonconformist. 

In both circumstances we have a group of individuals forced to adhere to the strict demands 

imposed upon them by the institution, regardless of personal desire.  As MacMurphy enters his 

newfound doctor’s office he comments upon a photograph portraying the smiling doctor holding 

up a thirty-something pound fish, the doctor exclaims how it took him a whole day to get it under 

control and how reeling it in took every last bit of energy he had.  This image perfectly mirrors the 

power of the institution over the individual.  Only occasionally does the fish actually free itself from 

the hook, and even when it succeeds, the scar exists eternally.  MacMurphy’s journey will 

replicate that of the hooked fish en route to it’s imminent demise.  Upon entering the facility, in 

Poet’s Society the prep school, in Cuckoo’s Nest, the asylum, the individual’s freedom is 

immediately forfeited; freedom summarized as the power to ask, speak or think without the 

hindrance or restraint of another force.  The institution, in both cases, is empowered with the 

authority to grant or remove the possession of free will to the individual; to dictate the acceptable 

and allowable actions the individual may exercise.  This inhibition of free will stimulates a 

disruption amongst the newcomer, assuming the individual has not been previously stripped of 

the intrinsic desires inherent to all humans, resulting in a power struggle between the newfound 

slave and his keeper.  In both settings, the individual interprets the situation as the stripping of 

individual freedom by an external power.   

Levels of power can be remedially separated into a few categories: external power being the 

power outside of the walls you are bound by, including universal, natural, technological and 

transportation based powers, society, government and law; internal powers could be those within 

the environment you most inhabit, the home, the workplace, school, clubs, prison, family, sports, 

committees; individual power can be broken down further to mental, emotional and physical 

levels of control.  However, regardless what level of power or freedom the individual is faced with, 

it cannot function outside of the arena summarized by Plato’s Allegory of the Cave.  The shadows 

projected upon the wall by the Ruler of the Cave throughout the lifespan of the individual, is the 

sum total of the available vocabulary of which the individual’s perspective of freedom and power 

is based.  The laws of relativity must be reinterpreted and applied in each moment of one’s 

existence and reapplied to each fragment of thought, feeling and breath to properly comprehend 

the equation of moment-to-moment perception evolution.   One man’s freedom is another man’s 

prison.  One woman’s power is another woman’s weakness.  A teacher finds freedom hiding 

behind the thoughtlessness of tradition and preordained structure.  Certain individuals classified 

as mental patients might find empowerment by disassociating themselves from the perils and 

responsibilities of the outside world, associating the gates of the institution as protection, while 

finding liberation within the ingested chemicals delivered daily to quiet the controlling factors of 

the mischievous clamoring from within the cavity of the person.  While a paraplegic may find 

freedom floating in a pool with high salinity where for a short moment he experiences a lift within 

the constraints of physical motion.  All of whom would define power as possessing the authority to 

practice these freedoms.  Freedom and power are relative, and when this relativity is infringed 

upon, by either the individual or the institution, conflict is unavoidable as the institution must rise 

to diminish the individual and more often then not, the individual will not prevail.  

The Welton Preparatory Academy in Dead Poet’s Society is based on tradition and conformation, 

structured to function as a production-assembly line in a factory molding middle to upper-class 

young men to suit the needs of a bureaucratically organized society.  Rewards are based on the 

individual’s capacity to excel within the practices of mimicry and memorization.  The individual is 

programmed with the mindset that the grade is the resulting success, instead of the functional 

and thoughtful mind.  The institution must contain this order to sustain it’s power.  Anything 

outside of the prescribed information becomes threatening to the standards of the comprised 

structure, therefore to contain the power of ‘tradition’ one must monitor the menu of information 

that the mind is allowed to ingest.  Hence, the liberty to evaluate media from the outside world is 

stripped from the students as a precautionary tactic to avoid the entrance of a potentially 

contradictory mindset within the institution.  This runs concurrent with the practices of the mental 

ward under Nurse Ratched’s leadership when the patients request additional television liberties to 

view the World Series.  In both cases, censorship is practiced in the same manner that Plato’s 

Cave Ruler kept the enchained slaves captive to avoid rebellion.  The projection of shadows in 

Plato’s Cave, Welton’s ‘light of knowledge’ and the ideology of the mental hospital all comprise 

the single and solitary dictating voice that the enslaved are empowered to embrace.  This is the 

necessary guideline for a structure to retain authority, be it a government, a hospital or a parent, it 

all amounts to the same statement…  

WE will give you the knowledge to focus upon.  Your line of sight will remain at that focus and it 

will not shift away.  Your heads will rest in chains facing the direction of the shadows that I will 

cast. 

Until all chains are diminished, the individual can technically be defined as an enslaved being; to 

the universe, to nature, to society, to career, to family, to friends, to self and finally, to science 

which comprises the structure of the physical self.  Since no qualifying state exists outside of 

death where the individual functions on a truly independent basis, it must be assumed that we are 

all enslaved in some manner and only illusory-based liberation from relativity is actually plausible. 

The students of the all-male Welton Academy represent the slaves of a society in every form, 

from the conservative uniforms, to the ritualistic chants and the manner they are whipped when 

their conduct is inappropriate.  The institution has been hired to mold the individual’s thought 

process in preparation for conformist society by the once removed parental figures that have 

placed them here.  In essence, the child lives a dualistic existence as the genetic mirror of the 

parent, as well as, slave to the parental perspective, as the child is captive to the sole subjective 

voice of the parent, acquiring the absolute vocabulary of all beliefs, ethics, misperceptions, 

weaknesses and strengths at a cellular level.  The student is now slave to the parent and the 

teacher.  The concept of individualistic thought is foreign and could only exist in flailing minutia 

unless introduced by an outside voice.  The voice of rebellion or opposition will always possess a 

magnetic and appealing demeanor, as by nature, power fearless of confronting the omnipotent 

looming structure represents survival, the driving inherent force engrained into the subconscious 

intention of man’s every waking breath.   This voice of rebellion may be fearless, selfish, or 

absolutely ignorant, regardless of the source, it’s presence will inevitably stimulate an awareness 

within the enslaved while forcing the institution to protect itself. 

Within our two films we are presented with two such voices, stimulating a fearful and foreign hope 

within the enslaved group of males.  Mr. Keatings, a product of the institution, has returned in a 

position of power as a professor to fulfill an agenda that was lacking from his perspective, to 

stimulate the ability of the individual to evolve as a ‘free thinker’.  From his perspective, his 

intentions are pure and selfless, however, being a Welton graduate, Keatings must understand at 

some level that his tactics would not be welcomed.  His purpose in one sense must be to 

overcome the power that he could not confront as a child, and in another sense, to assist the 

students in escaping from a Cave that once held him prisoner.  Since one can only truly 

comprehend the Cave that has engulfed him throughout his existence, you must assume that the 

quotes he brings forth, and the teachings he presents are those most significant to his own 

survival.   

 “…most men live their lives in quiet desperation” –Professor Keatings 

He is speaking about himself and the existential conflicts that he has encountered and imposing 

his personal objectives upon the students, therefore, you must assume that regardless of 

presentation, or lack of self awareness, his mission is a selfish mission. 

Randall Patrick MacMurphy is a sexist, racist, forceful convict, convicted of battery and charged 

with statutory rape.  He enters the asylum under the assumption that it will remove him from his 

exhausting work detail and be a relaxing environment to carry out his sentence.  MacMurphy’s 

intentions are purely selfish and the awakenings that occur for the surrounding patients tend to be 

more of a residual effect than a specific intention.  His nature to create a team of supporters 

reflects the nature of a savvy politician, as he understands that masculine camaraderie is 

necessary to overthrow a leader.  Therefore, he constantly builds the confidence of the inmates, 

attempting to convince them that their capacity is far beyond what the hospital might imply.   

In both scenarios, you have two selfish liberators influencing extremely permeable minds, some 

of which are incapable of handling this type of transition at all, none of whom are capable of 

handling it alone.  Throughout Dead Poet’s Society, recurring images of birds flocking are 

juxtaposed with the grouping of students, implying the inherent nature of the individual to conform 

to a societal structure, as is common throughout the nature of man and society.  The individual 

constantly yearns for liberation, yearns for independence, yearns for power, yet fears that this 

may lead to his potential demise, hence, the structure of a grounded team provides the false 

courage and necessary sustenance for the embark towards relative liberation.  Isolation is 

generally an illusion of perception, as very seldom are we actually alone; however, a common 

sensation of isolation is prevalent within most humans, though technically inaccurate.  We feel 

much more alone than we actually are.  This insinuates the condensation of time within thought 

sensation, allowing extensive processes to occur within our conceptual thought-feeling 

awareness than comprehensible on a physical external basis.  The result of feeling isolated and 

alone generally equates to a sense of helplessness against the whole.  Another conceptual 

misinterpretation possessed by the individual is that the ‘whole’ is something that exists outside of 

you, as something others experience as an internal sensation; being part of whole.  However, the 

idea of being part of a whole may allude the individual to embrace the whole under the 

assumption that it will mask or eradicate the eternal isolation the individual believes to be 

engulfed within.  As is true in nature, is true in society, people crave to be a part of something 

larger than they can be alone.  Generally, there is a desire to be led or guided to this state of 

participation, which then can only be sustained by the individual if the foundation of the whole is 

intact; the foundation can only remain intact with proper guidance from the leader.  As the boys 

assemble to form the Dead Poet’s Society, each of the boys pressure one another to participate, 

to embrace the group, to conform to the new standards and principles.  In essence, the individual 

has no alternative but to exchange one cave for another. 

In the Cave of Welton, the ‘Light of Knowledge’ is offered; basically. a piddly candle for a crap 

tradition.  In the Dead Poet’s Cave, we function solely by flashlights which could be interpreted as 

false light.  Welton is based on structure and tradition, while the Dead Poet’s are based on 

Romantic thought and passionate innovation.  Welton consists of conservative elderly uniforms, 

while the Poet’s dress in hooded robes and mimic the symbols of hedonism practiced by their 

elders, smoking pipes and cigars.  They attain validation from one another by a mutual 

conformation towards the notion of becoming a ‘free thinker’.  This becomes their identity, existing 

as an underlying hopeful force that they are worthy of receiving a life vibrating on a level higher 

than the surrounding others.  They want something more.  They are hopeful of receiving liberation 

from the repressed existence they have lived until now, or maybe not.  Maybe they are infected 

with the inherent fear of missing out on something else.  Something different that may be better.  

In either scenario, they reach out to find some validation that they are worthy of being alive.  Each 

of the individuals alone, have only their ego to protect, to sustain, to gratify and validate.  They 

interpret the prison surrounding them from within the helplessness of their age and circumstance.  

Their reality cannot see outside of now, as this is the whole, the end, the everything… being 

stretched and pulled from all sides, their spirit struggles to find ground.  Time does not exist, there 

is only now and now they are trapped within the Cave dictated by someone outside of 

themselves.  The ego is blinded and is seemingly dead as it searches to find identity.  For now, 

belonging to the whole becomes their identity, however identity is false and flailing, as permanent 

as the projected shadows upon the wall in Plato’s Cave.  Both, the ideologies of Welton, and 

those of the Dead Poet’s, are simple ideas representing two separate conceptual notions of 

relative freedom; however, you must first break out of one Cave in order to properly embrace 

another.  Though you must not confuse moving from one cave to another as the creation of a 

greater, more liberated being necessarily.  Individual evolution of perspective must occur and 

awareness of both realities, and your assumed identity within both of these realities is necessary 

for any honest and organic liberation to occur. 

Within both films, we are presented with a varied demographic of individuals, most of whom 

possess developmentally vulnerable minds, susceptible to conformity while desperately yearning 

to be led.  Both of our leaders embrace their subjects with tactics of confidence, building 

masculinity while continuously exhibiting variable practices of questioning authority.  Keatings 

presentation is deceptively gentle and feminine while his tactics could be viewed as somewhat 

extremist against the tradition of the institution, as he influences the students to eradicate the 

introductory section within their text books, which summarizes methodical practices of measuring 

the effectiveness of poetry and exclaiming- 

  “… THIS IS A WAR.  … YOU WILL LEARN TO THINK FOR YOURSELVES AGAIN.” 

The students embrace their liberator with varying levels of maturity. The stimulus to free one’s 

self reverberates throughout the previously oppressed mannerisms, shifting their somewhat 

premature foundation.  At this point in one’s existence, confusion is inexorable as the body no 

longer contains a child, however the mind has not yet arrived with the perception of a man.  

Adolescence is the Age of the In Between where the parented male defies the parental figures 

completely and disconnects, or accepts the role of the eternal child-feigning-adult, the latter of 

which summarizes the characters filling the asylum who could no longer successfully sustain the 

feigned existence.  In either case, the individual journey is subjective to each of the participants 

based on the present state and primary focus of ego-awareness.  A priority for one individual may 

be to defy the father, while another’s is to gain validation from a woman other than mother, much 

as the Knox character achieves with Chris, the angelic public school girl from the next town over.  

Knox defies the demands of the institution, continuously placing himself at risk by secretly leaving 

campus, while also placing himself in a position open to physical harm by Chris’ hyper-masculine 

jock boyfriend.  The voice of the liberator combined with the foundation of the team creates the 

necessary support for Knox to embrace the vulnerability and courage necessary to confront his 

boyish perception of love.  This drives the individual out of the parentally oppressive Cave of 

youth into the vulnerable arena of pseudo-adulthood, yearning to confirm his worthiness and fulfill 

the illusion that he, as an independent being can be viewed as something worthy, good and 

acceptable from an object outside of himself that he categorizes and identifies as premium or 

pristine.  The result will be used to falsely define his self-worthiness.  The Billy character from 

Cuckoo’s Nest and the Neil character from Poet’s Society are prematurely led to embrace the 

notion of self-evolution and liberation leading to their unnecessary suicide and imminent demise. 

Neil cannot carry this newfound liberation without the support of the team.  As he is confronted 

with the demands of his father, he crumbles and surrenders to the concept of non-existence.   To 

be taken from the team, to live under the ruling of a dictator, he would rather die.  He imposes a 

crown of thorns upon himself, and accepts his self-determined fate over living a life within the 

confines of his father’s Cave.  This best exemplifies the irresponsibility of our featured liberators 

to properly guide the individuals throughout their simulated transformation.  Premature rebellion 

to the institution of one’s self is as debilitating as if it were against a structured society.   

As vehemently as the foundation of the self retaliated over Billy and Neil, the retaliation of the 

institution will retaliate with redoubtable force and most definitely slaughter the individual.  The 

Ruler of the Cave must eradicate the external noise and repress the prisoner, returning the 

perspective to his perspective and the reality to his reality.  Nurse Ratched’s capacity to quickly 

alter the rules with MacMurphy’s request to watch the World Series.  Initially, she suggests they 

put it to a vote however as MacMurphy wins she alters the rules and retains control of her 

domain.  As Billy’s confidence expands from spending the night with the hooker, his stuttering 

dissipates and a masculine presence arises within his demeanor.  Nurse Ratched quickly 

stimulates his primary fear by threatening to tell his mother about the hooker.  Emasculated  

completely, he enters a frenzied state and cuts his throat.  Ratched’s intentions were to diminish 

Billy and regain control of the ward, regardless of the cost.  MacMurphy dutifully attacks her, 

choking her to death, were it not for the guards yanking him away.  He is promptly taken to the 

Disturbed Ward where a lobotomy eradicates his Voice eternally.  The existence of the institution 

requires the oppression of the Voice of the individual.  No Voice, no opinion, no power… no you.  

Defiance to conform results in the forceful stripping of the individual.  If you will not conform, you 

will not exist.    

One Cave to the next, one identity to another, man moves through his existence ultimately 

confused and yearning for confirmation of a place, a structure, or some form of validating 

foundation to coexist with.  A Cave to Rule or a Cave to inhabit as one of the enslaved.  In 

essence, the metaphor of the Cave is simply explained as the boundaries of the individual’s 

awareness.  The most significant Cave is the universe of the individual, trapped within the 

geography of the Earth, within a physically composed unconsciously functioning structure, within 

an instable thought process incapable of comprehending it’s own self-absorbed existence.  The 

Cave of breathing in and out with a false concept of control and the inherent need to find 

something absolute to ground your existence.  The Cave of the essence of life outside of an 

incomprehensible death granting you the sole power of surrender.  The victims in our stories were 

incapable of the surrender necessary to sustain the existence of the Self, and exchanged their 

omnipotent helplessness for the esoteric escape from the Cave of the breathing individual, as the 

necessary path to individual liberation.   This theme runs throughout both narratives from the 

night-visiting hooker in the asylum singing Row Your Boat… 

  – “…Life is but a dream.” 

…to Keating presenting the images on the wall reflecting the likeness of the now deceased 

students from years prior.  Upon their first interaction, he immediately attempts to ingrain the 

concept of death into the minds of the boys.  A tactic that will only momentarily flutter through the 

conceptual forefront of the mind’s thought process, as the incomprehensible can never satiate the 

awareness in a grounded or absolute form.  As the prisoners in Plato’s Cave cannot comprehend 

the external light, or the reality existing outside the walls of the surrounding Cave, we, as humans 

cannot comprehend the concept of death, as nonexistence burns our eyes as intensely as the 

sun tears through the unlearned cornea of the Cave dwelling slave.  In essence, the life engulfing 

us, the oxygen satiating us, and the body containing us is the Cave we are entrapped within and 

that is all we can comprehend.  This Cave is the only Cave within the essence of man that is 

absolute.  In Poet’s Society, Neil willingly steps out of this Cave while Keatings is still enslaved.  

In Cuckoo’s Nest, Billy Bibbit willingly exits, while Mac is unwillingly taken by the institution, and in 

Plato’s Cave, the enlightened one unwillingly exits at the hand of the prisoners that he attempts to 

awaken.  Keating says early on… 

“… we are but food for worms, boys.” 

And this is what we can conceive of death.  Our remains will be ingested and decomposed by 

creeping, burrowing blind hermaphrodite invertebrates with multiple hearts living below the 

shadows, engulfed in absolute darkness.  In the end, even they prevail over the individual. 

Hierarchy is the Natural Law.  The weak are the Kings of the weaker and the weaker are the 

Princes to the weakest. Without delicate guidance, the Institution will destroy the individual and 

the individual will destroy the Self and inevitably, the worms will prevail. 

Without reminding the uprising generations that the constancy of curiosity is necessary, the 

constancy of thoughtful outrage is necessary liberty is endangered.  If the individual is not 

specifically trained to ask the questions, he or she will not miraculously know that it is appropriate 

and necessary to do so.  Thoughtlessness allowed civility to dissipate from our society and 

without it the empowerment of the institution will prevail.  Without proper guidance, one cannot be 

assumed or expected to comprehend Western enlightenment and civil liberties, or to intrinsically 

advance such ideologies. These concepts are not passed psychically or virally.  They are 

conveyed through the institution.  They are passed from the people.  Conspiracy did not remove 

civility from our capitalist society, laziness did and it’s demise is aggressively nearing.  Without  

re-learning and re-educating our society to eradicate the fear of disrupting our leaders, and 

regaining our demands for answers to the questions based on logic and factual objectivity, 

without allowing thoughtful outrage to surface out of responsibility to the sanctitude of ethical 

human consciousness, the desire to sustain a non-oppressive society, and the liberty of the 

individual, without reimplementation of these concepts, this ideology will find itself extinct.  The 

question needing to be taught is the simple inquiry and the asking of the self “what am I 

responsible for?” instead of looking to others waiting for them to dictate what we should do.  

Otherwise we remain living amongst the shadows, much like the shrewd and knavish Puck, the 

ferry in A Midsummer Nights’ Dream.  At the end of the play he makes a speech explaining his 

actions and trivializing the play itself. 

“If we shadows have offended, Think but this, and all is mended: That you have but 

slumb’red here, While these visions did appear.”  

This line essentially includes the audience as participants within the play itself, comparing them to 

the Athenian lovers who within the play did also awaken from the absurd happenings of the fairy 

world as if it were a dream.  He speaks in double meanings, encouraging the ignorant to remain 

enjoyably ignorant while the educated members of the elite may comprehend the larger 

statement.  If you misunderstand or disagree, go back to sleep, he promotes, it’s all a dream.  

The irresponsibility of allowing the ignorant to remain sleeping is the initial building blocks for the 

dissemination of liberty and the potential beginnings of an oppressive and segregated existence.  

Even through the selfish perspective of a felon, MacMurphy’s sacrifice alongside his presentation 

of individuality does successfully restore Chief’s self-confidence, helping regain his former 

stature, both physically and symbolically, and as an individual, he is able to escape the ward and 

face the outside world as a liberated man, as the final image of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest 

is Chief, returning to his Native American Indian roots, the institution of Nature, leaving the 

technology and conformity of the white man behind, while also reminding us how quickly and 

effortlessly a population can disappear into extinction as the dream comes to an end, and reality 

returns, and this becomes nothing more than a distant and fleeting memory… existence. 

Was going through the day with the usual distractions, doing my best to avoid completing the writing I needed to finish until glancing up to find the VanityFair article about the 9-11 tapes.  Ahh!!  Perfect justification to stop writing!!  

Basically, an ‘exclusive’ story and playback of a bunch of the tapes from the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD), an organization dated back to the Cold War era to protect us from the evil scary Russians who might have crossed over into ‘our’ air.  

Anyway, all of the productivity was eradicated and I was off and reading this exceedingly long commentary rebuilding the sequence of events and constructing the conversations that were occurring.

Basically, tons and tons of information that my obnoxiously junkie-esque mind needed to tear apart.  Fuck the meetings, fuck the writing… this is what I really need right now, and this is what my focus is gonna embrace.  Brilliantly, useless information.  And way too much of it.  I will absolutely avoid commenting on my actual opinions, thoughts and conceptual feelings regarding the matter at hand, because in the end it will get me nowhere, aside from eternal arguments about nothing that you can ever form a case about.  

You can have all of the logistical mathematics regarding where you actually acquired the Chlamydia, and the instinctual thought process will point in a very specific direction towards the male and/or female that harvested and nurtured the bacteria prior to signing the lease over to you, but in the end… it’s all just noise to distract you from the actual events at hand and to keep you from focusing on the present.  Instinctually, we all know who, when, why and how things occur… though strangely, our instincts in politics match up with one another like a vegetarian potluck put on by pigmies and pilgrims.  

The people closest to you will have the instinctual and compassionate convictions that reside on the opposite side of M. Night Shyalamanamanam’s Village and the shock from the obvious stupidity they encompass will drive you insane to the point, that you will allow days to pass where you seriously conclue that your best friend has definitely lost his mind, his integrity, and basically everything you ever actually liked… and generally, he’s simply not who you thought he was.  Maybe, I just never knew him from the start.  Wow?  It all makes sense now… he doesn’t even know me?  No wonder he had sex with that dutch lawyer in Morocco who seemed so nonchalant about Rwanda?? 

And on and on, until you have justified working on nothing productive the entire day.  And this will repeat again and again and again and in the end, you’re better off swallowing something with hallucinogens and amphetamines because it’s absolutely more productive, because even then, knowing the truth is a subjective illusory fucking gratification and much like a video game, is temporal and useless within moments.  Another ‘I told you so’ stacked up in a pile of ego-fueling drawers and dressers, waiting for a time to justify the not-so-uselessness of your nature.

It’s a simple tactic.  Once the infamous ‘they’ (those illusory and/or unidentifiable beings secretly strategizing and dictating whatever event we are not currently the ‘they’ of) realized the propaganda wars of decades past were far more complicated to sustain with the evolution of instantaneous communication around the globe, a shift in strategy was needed.  Since the use of a single lie can be easily proven false, it became imperative to scramble the communication lines with as much varied information possible from as many sources as possible.  New voices popping up, randomly chiming in, blanketing angles and tones from all possible coordinates, stirring up a not-so-unilateral confusion, so much so that you’ve got the public arguing about how someone dealt with an occurrence that stems from an event stimulated from one of the voices that no one even noticed wasn’t a commonly accredited voice from above, but the voice of an unidentifiable stranger chiming in amongst the chaos and quickly disappearing into the shadows without anyone noticing; those arguing about the RE-action, never confirmed that the initial ACTION ever actually occurred.  But of course it did.  And exactly as we were told it did.  Because why wouldn’t it have?  The pigmies made the most amazing Vegan potluck while I was spending time with them in Peru.  Have you been there?  It’s really beautiful and the most wonderful people, a good spot for a pilgrimage.

And this is why I should never drink caffeine at night… or watch news during the day.

The simple concept that the United States of America was conceived and composed by a type of personality, desperate to attain ‘more’ regardless of the sacrifice and potential isolation that was in store for them, has created a world where satisfaction is unattainable.  The abundance of immigrants that crossed oceans to find a new life of abundance in the New World, abandoning their comforts, their home, their friends, their families, their stability, for an idea of something more, has now created a New World.  A genetically mutated world that stemmed from an initial population that put their lives at risk on an illusory idea based on greed and desire and eternal abundance.  Hundreds of years later, these genetics have spread back across the world creating a gentrification based on something quite far from human love and kindness.  And now, as humans, we’re presented with the task of eradicating that ingrained form of self-imposed judgment that lives within our cellular composition and bases our human success on external haves and have nots, regardless of our sense of humanity.

My eyes open.  I am awake.  Glancing at the clock, my mind quickly counts the hours that I have slept.  Thirteen.  Thirteen hours.  How the hell did thirteen hours pass, while I lay in this overheated space without flinching strong enough to awaken.  My thoughts spin and I quietly confuse myself as to why I am now awake.  Immediately, that expands outward, shifting to… I quietly confuse myself as to why I’m alive.  The articulation may be false, as I question whether I am honest with my use of the adjective quietly.  Is the confusion actually occurring within what would be considered a quality of quietly, or did I simply use the term for the cheapened purpose of poetic inference that inherently comes along with placing this specific adjective in front of the action at hand.  Quietly.  Actually, the bouncing residual trails following the thought patterns that pass through the vacancy within, are somewhat quiet at the moment, confirming at least a subtle honesty with the statement above.

Moments pass with urgency as I remain still.  Actions that will never occur pass with each ongoing idea that spins just behind my eyes.  The extent of my universe is massive, both internally and externally, regardless of the fact that ninety-nine plus percent of it will only be for me to see.  A lone witness riding a visceral trail following  tracks laid in real time.  Mathematical logistics constantly stimulate the minutia of each event, and still I lie awake in question.  A revolving fantasy that I am a participant within my own right.  Of what?  An esoteric, internal and isolated series of images and thought patterns representing episodic cinematic phases of time used as memories to prove that existence occurred?  To give a relative center used as a basis of judgment for times to come?  Or an external series of geographical spaces, presented as physical rooms to pass through, constructed from frequencies similar to those you’ve previously visited, stimulating recurring instances and emotional memories summarized by the mathematical chemical equations configured from past experience.

Probably time to awaken.

A series of significance.  Something significant must fester outside of timelessness, otherwise we are all just waiting to confirm the irrelevance of thought.  Constantly searching.   A validating instance must occur once every fifteen minutes to keep the frequencies vibrating at a velocity that inhibits me from placing a judgment of weight upon myself.  The validation can be from a myriad of sources, internal or external.  The being behind the body is impartial in this matter, assuming the schedule of delivery is not interrupted.  Consciousness is nearly conscious enough for the clock to begin counting.

Masses of contradicted thought-feelings rapidly berate the claustrophobic lobe resting just behind my forehead.  Trickling bits of punctuation float invisible to my eyes, but their temporary presence is sophisticated.  As they expand, the space between the particles defining their shape, masculinates to such an extent, their identity is eradicated and though they exist, their appearance is deceptive and a quality of nonexistence emanates.  This is the quality that confuses our moment to moment existence the most.  Much like the smoke drifting from the tip of a burning cigarette.  The particles drift further and further from one another, falsely conveying a disappearance, or transformation to a nonexistent form.  However, particles moving directionally apart from one another don’t signify non-presence.  Their punctuality and potency is still exceedingly present, however the quality in which they function might be best defined with the use of the term, quietly.

Is one better than the other?  Or more potent?  Possibly.  However, things that function quietly, would accurately be summarized as being somewhat more deceptive than quiet’s antithesis. 

Plato’s Allegory of the Cave summarizes the illusion of freedom and the enslaved nature of both, man in society, and man with self. It serves as the quintessential summary of both, the corporate conglomerate of the modern day media monopoly and the practices of the Bush Administration and in various other elements, certain practices and strategies carried out in government of all forms, including the United States of America. Sadly, the Cave exhibits that however significant technology has evolved, it is no reflection of the evolution of man. Two thousand years have passed and the most significant transformation is the enhanced sophistication going into engineering the Cave and man’s willingness to financially support the Cave he inhabits. Man is somewhat frozen in time, regardless of the body that seems to be moving and the breath that appears to be breathing.

It’s all an illusion.

The Allegory should be broken into two sections. The first is a parable about a group of men enchained in captivity since birth; the second, a discourse on the transformation of the whole, from the ignorance of darkness to the truth of the light and the difficulties inherent in finding a noble man to govern.

The parable paints a portrait of men held in captivity inside a cave since birth, bound by chains, head immobilized, allowing their eyes to view only the wall directly ahead. Behind the prisoners, people pass holding various objects before a small fire, sending flickering shadows crawling across the wall in front of them. These ambiguous shapes and reflected symbols would be the only images the prisoners had seen up to now. Life outside of this, was inconceivable, or more accurately, nonexistent. Plato suggests that if somehow they had the capacity to communicate, what would they speak of outside of the projected images; any sounds produced outside of the prisoners would inevitably have been generated by the concurrent shadows. Now, within this world of the cave, assume one of the prisoners were forced to exit the cave and accept that this existence was based on trivial illusion. Initially, the prisoner rejects this new reality as trickery and demands that the truth lie in his previous existence. The light of the sun is much brighter than that of the fire and a painful acclimation is unavoidable. His eyes would first find comfort in the shadows and reflections in corners and crevices, slowly progressing towards the light of the moon and eventually, his eyes would open completely to find the radiant light of the sun exposing the true nature of the world surrounding him. Soon he accepts that the sun is the dictator of all things, and realizing this newfound truth, may find sorrow for the prisoners and their ignorance. He
would sooner die than return to his darkened past. Assuming he did return however, his eyes would struggle to see with the same detail in the darkness and the fellow prisoners would laugh at his demise. Witnessing the ruin of the man who had seen the light of the sun, inspired a camaraderie within the comforts of their familiarity. They would sooner kill the man who tried to set them free, than embrace this unknown.

The second section begins with a discourse on the Form of Goodness, which Plato claims to be the last thing man perceives.

In the world of knowledge, the last thing to be perceived and only with great difficulty is the essential Form of Goodness. Once it is perceived, the conclusion must follow that, for all things, this is the cause of whatever is right and good; in the visible world it gives birth to light and to the lord of light, while it is itself sovereign in the intelligible world and the parent of intelligence and truth. Without having had a vision of this Form no one can act with wisdom, either in his own life or in matters of state. (The Republic vol. VII)

Plato then embraces the idea that one who has witnessed this higher level of being, of truth, of the Good, would never consider spending life managing the lives of other men, as the selfish desire to bask in the Good would be far too compelling to deny. With great passion and an instable ethical equilibrium, the liberated one would be compelled to shine the light, desperate to awaken the others in the cave and prosecute those that held the others in chains. However, the sensible man is aware that it is more acceptable to move from ignorance to awareness than the other way around. He moves forward, lashing out at those who claim to educate, claiming that education is irrelevant without guidance towards the light, that Wisdom is harmful if not directed towards the greater good. Had these beings been properly guided away from greed and desire in their youth, they would now face truth.

His resulting question embraces the issue of who the rulers should best be, since those who have never been exposed to the harsh realities of truth cannot lead, and those who spend their existence philosophizing and seeking absolute truth have an awareness much too lofty to attempt to rule. The solution? His sarcasm exclaims the ignorant must be educated; those in captivity must be brought to the light, without being allowed to bask. They must return to their previous state with this newfound knowledge regardless of any newfound ideas or desires, because in the end it’s not about their happiness, it’s about unification of the people for the betterment of the whole. The difference is that now, you will return to the dark and view it with a greater eye, because now you have a much greater understanding. For government to be pure, man cannot be allowed to fill the
emptiness of his soul with the power instilled by ruling another man. Truth will exist in
government only when the rulers have no desire for power. From here, the decision is made. Only the well-intentioned, selfless philosopher who takes the job as a necessary responsibility for the good of the commonwealth as a whole is capable of respectably handling a power of this stature.

Most immediately, the cave could be simplified symbolically as Plato’s statement on man and society. The true prison of man is man’s own ignorance and the architecture of this prison is molded by the ruling class. In more recent times, our architects, or at least, those dictating the design, have evolved, shifting the distribution of power from the individual holding office, to the individual hiding behind the constructs of the corporation. The corporation dictates the media which is somewhat monopolized, so much like the prisoner in the cave, the information is projected from a single source. In the cave, the information is delivered to the prisoners in the form of a shadow; an indirect manipulation of reflected light from a man-made fire pit in the back of the room. Though the breakdown of the arena seems representative of a cinema, the actualization concurs more directly with that of a broadcast television network and the conglomeration of internet service providers. People of the modern age spend proportionally extensive periods of their existence focused on these sources, under the general assumption that the information presented is factual and complete, much like the inhabitants of the cave view the shadows.

The fire is the source of delivery, manipulated by the ruler, or most probably, the servants or slaves of the ruler. Assuming the sun would be representative of information originating from a direct source, the fire becomes a reproduction. The shadows are bent, blocked, reflected and refracted bits of information derived from a source that is already one step removed. This removed source is then influenced by the interpretations of what the Cave’s ruler, possibly even the Cave’s ruler’s second or third-in-command have articulated to those in charge of obstructing the flame. Unless of course, the flame was obstructed solely by people passing in transit, which would then simply amount to basic interference that inhibited the delivery of slightly more direct shadows. In either case, the shadow acts as the voice and teacher, much like the media, the book, the newspaper, the source of knowledgeable information being sculpted by the slave standing before the fire. The shadow is the educating source. The prisoner absorbs and interprets the shadow and is therefore a product of the shadow. Those who control the shadow, control the man.

After extensive discourse, you may convince a man that he exists within a cave and that his
existence is controlled by a wealthy few. His humility may accept this on a myriad of levels,
however, even the simplest of men quietly, yet unquestionably know, the wisdom he possesses far exceeds that of those surrounding him. This opens a passageway from the initial Cave to a secondary cavernous level lying far below the surface of the first; a level where man steps forward, becoming the architect of his own dominion, a state of unconscious sovereignty. Unfortunately, man is stubborn and his desire to govern himself leads him to the distant edges of the cavern. His shrewd vision regarding the expansion of his individual kingdom stimulates a giddy ambition; not only will he assume the position of architect, but also contractor and construction crew. Aggressively, he goes to work, molding the cave into a false identity, a pretense that he will hide behind as a basis for all thought and judgment from here onward, much like a mask, or more accurately, the cave becomes his ego. The essence which makes up the man becomes the prisoner, helpless to the omnipotent dictator. The burning fire is his only hope, it holds his awareness, his human love and kindness, the capacity of unification and the antithesis of isolation. The ego sends slaves to skew the light of the fire, blocking the connection to the eternal
good. They stand with picket signs and megaphones lobbying for greed and temptation,
constantly reminding us that we are eternally alone in this cavernous darkened state. The shadow is distorted, ego-influenced propaganda that the prisoner ingests as truth and then, reverberates the essence of the shadow as a his proprietary identity and sense of self. However, Plato’s prisoner is pulled from this darkness and set free to experience a somewhat forced liberation. Eventually, the prisoner returns to the Cave to find himself awkward and dazed. Exposure to this newfound awareness is extreme. Apparently, acclimation of comprehension is somewhat gradual when you forcibly restructure the core foundation composing the basis of one’s existence. He returns to the prisoners who make fun of him for the ruin of his previously poignant vision within the shadows, as his eyes cannot quickly acclimate to the darkness of the Cave. Plato implies that the prisoners can speak amongst one another in some verbal context, so to stay in line with the tone Plato has composed, you must assume that their training came from dancing, teaching shadows. These shadows were free to teach in any language, with any vocabulary, with any well-
defined grunts and moans they could conjure, which proves that Plato in some ways was a
prophet as he meticulously summarizes the current public education systems offered by the
government of the United States of America with a savvy accidental esoteric insinuation.

Within this communication, the prisoners berate the enlightened one for his ruin and would
sooner kill him than be exposed to a demise of similar ruin. The enslaved will initially oppose what they cannot comprehend, regardless of the liberation that may come. Liberation delivered in a form outside of man’s predetermined conception, whatever that may be, is unacceptable and vehemently disqualified. The desire of enlightenment is only a desire insomuch as it fulfills the illusory form of the preordained enlightenment.

In a broad light, the cave summarizes the illusion of freedom and the relativity of the nature of freedom. Your awareness cannot extend outside the universe that surrounds you. Knowledge is an incarnation of man; a deceptive device initially created for the survival and empowerment of the physically weak. Voluntary participation within the arena of the knowingness of man, subjects the participant to a world of cavernous terrain and an eternity of cave dwelling; a world composed of shadows, as even direct information is interpreted by a subjective perspective. Everything legible could be categorized as misinformation in one form or another.

The caves surrounding me exist in myriad layers extending far beyond comprehension and will continue to compound exponentially for the length of my existence. From the first actualized moments of conception, born into the cavernous uterus of a woman, imprisoned genetically, spiritually and sociologically in the most literal levels of my own allegory. From there, I was born into a cave of specific race and class, trained to breathe, function and think under an umbrella of predetermined ethical content appropriate to the geography of my birthplace. Raised in a Catholic school, I was programmed to believe that religion would dictate my existence in a later life, that Jesus was responsible for everything, and for whatever reason, it was my job to make him happy. The scrutiny imposed upon me extended to various other mythical beings, including religious and holiday icons, both of which were apparently spending the majority of their existence meticulously observing and judging mine. Not only was I being misinformed, but the information began influencing a somewhat egocentric perspective of my place in the universe. As I progressed through my youth, I moved from one cave to the next, from the four basic food groups being the road to optimal health, to the idea that evil Russians were coming to kill me, simply because they were evil Russians and that’s what they do. The layers spiral and compound from here without limitation or impartiality, and more recently, the caves have evolved into a cynical form of entertainment. The idea that Saddam Hussein was a danger to the people of the United States, the idea that electronic voting machines are objective and that our current elections were honest and fair, the idea that a skimpy man with a bad-kidney was responsible for the largest attack this country has ever seen, the illusion that words in print are accurate and that the spoken word is true and honest and more than anything, the idea that someone outside of my innermost circle actually cares for my better good.

Plato speaks about the form of Goodness which though he presents in what seems to be a
somewhat exoteric display of ideas, it reads much more esoteric and less grounded than the
passages both preceding and following. When he speaks of the Cave, there is a farcical humor and authority within his tone. There is also a profound and grounded quality within certain stages of the final ideas, summarizing a philosopher’s lack of desire to rule; however, the adjoining section regarding the Form of Goodness feels like an entirely separate passage, almost as if it were inserted at a later period. Either my lack of conceivable perception cannot interpret it in a grounded manner, or this is the area where Plato is least grounded, assuming the translation is intact. As he states early on, the Form of Goodness is the final and most difficult thing for man to perceive; if man is a prisoner to his awareness, and awareness can decipher only what it has been previously trained to conceive, then man has never been properly exposed to the Form of Goodness, and this Form holds the place, as what Plato indirectly summarizes as the most esoteric Form that man has encountered up to date.

Freedom is relative to circumstance. The empowered entity, be it a ruler, a government or the ego of the self, will always dictate the reality of the enslaved. Man can only interpret the
presented reality and one’s awareness cannot exceed the unknown. Man’s inherent state is one of fear, and this fear cannot subside as long as survival is in question. Human nature will first deny and destroy the unknown, rather than objectively welcome the possible convergence of the new, regardless of the potential validity this new may present.

So, please move forward and don’t panic, there is plenty of space for everyone, the Cave is much larger than it looks from the outside.

Watching Zidane lose his cool today hits on a raw emotional quality that seems to come up in a large majority of humans on a somewhat recurring, moment-to-moment basis.  Judgment will fly regarding the ethical rights and wrongs without a complete understanding of the moment.  Fans of France will find justification, blaming the inappropriate banter flinging from the mouth of the every Italian, while fans of Italy will smirk about Zidane’s incapacity to handle missing his header after Materazzi succesful one earlier in the game, while the media will simply enforce how unfortunate the action was.  In the end, Zidane only has to live with Zidane, and Zidane is the only one who must accept his finish.  His actions are nothing more than a momentary conversationalist’s wet dream that will quickly disappear into a mind filled with data that takes precedence over the lives of others.  If Zidane feels wrong or that his legacy is tattered, he will take the necessary steps to alter his perception of the occurrence until his conscious finds satisfaction, or end up suicidal. 

For those of you who didn’t witness the occurrence, Zinadine Zidane, the captain of the French team and one of the greatest players in the history of soccer announced his retirement from the sport upon France’s elimination of this year’s World Cup.  Upon successfully working their way into the finals, Zidane scored from a penalty kick in the first ten minutes of play.  Italy tied the game ten minutes later and they finished in a draw.  During overtime, upon exchanging words with Materazzi, an Italian player, Zidane turned and head butted his chest, sending him to the ground.  Zidane was given a red card and sent off the field, scarring his final moments of professional soccer and being remembered for his ‘unfortunate finish’.

You may say that this is not the act of a leader.  A childish, bratty action carried out by someone incapable of controlling their temper.  It could be considered temporary insanity in a court of law, as within a passionate moment potential unconsciousness blanketed over, stimulated by the taunting comments of the other.  A myriad of opinions could be placed upon the issue and all of them would be equally incorrect… unless you feel the opposite.  Maybe that is leadership.  Who are the most prolific leaders that were the most affective?  Churchhill?  Kennedy?  Bush?  Hitler?  Mao?  Shaq?  Kobe?  Which leaders are ethically correct?  Which leaders don’t have moments of an ‘unfortunate finish?’  Personally, I can’t say I’m much of a fan of any of the leaders mentioned, however I will say that all of them accomplished a hell of a lot more than I have.  Good, bad, right, wrong.  There is proof that they all attempted something passionately, as well as, proof that all of them are equally ugly… or attractive, if you prefer.

Just days ago, I had rushes of rage moving through my body.  The desire to inflict harm upon an obstacle being imposed upon me by others.  Had it occurred while in their presence and had they taunted me in that given moment, there is a solid chance I would be under investigation or imprisoned.  Fortunately, since most of our dealings with others occur via internet or phone, you have time to use your intellect to forcibly calm your animalistic rage.  However, you can’t be blamed for being a human with reactive emotional surges.  This is what we are and we are built upon.  Society has trained us that one is acceptable and one is not and for good reason I would say, otherwise people would be living in a sea of violence, but the question becomes… where should that line be drawn?  At what time and place should someone take responsibility for their mouth, their hypocrisy, their lies and deceit, the idiosyncrasies of a dripping and vehement dishonesty that most humans practice regularly as nothing more than the art of moment-to-moment survival.  At what point is it acceptable to deal with things in a more immediate manner as it is in sports?  Someone gets knocked around a bit, they banter, and then it’s over.  Those reactions outside of that arena lead us to an immense amount of paperwork,  over-sized lawyer bills and tax-payers dollars for the cast of the local courthouse, as well as, a significant amount of ongoing stress towards the ambiguousness of our potential punishment.  Of course it’s wrong to harm others.  At least that’s what we’re taught by all those who aren’t in a powerful position of leadership.

Sometimes I find myself in fear of being looked upon as ‘the bad guy’ in a circumstance, regardless of my being wronged or of my wrong-ing of others.   No one else thinks twice about it in a meaningful way, only moments of gossip or a fleeting thought.  However, my thought process persuades me of the omnipotent presence of the act, the event, the moment or thought.  As I’m growing older, I’m beginning to realize… It’s all a lie.  None of it matters all that much, does it?  Or at least, it doesn’t outside of you.  If I had done what Zidane did today, in this moment my stomach would be below my knees and I would be certain that I was an awful human to be hated by others eternally.  I manage to feel this way after hesitantly honking at a faceless human who doesn’t budge through an entire green light and I gently press the horn as it shifts to yellow.   But you know, maybe it’s better to sit at the stoplight for another round?   Who knows?  Either way, we’ll see how the rest of the day goes.

The simple concept that the United States of America was conceived and composed by a type of personality, desperate to attain ‘more’ regardless of the sacrifice and potential isolation that was in store for them, has created a world where satisfaction is unattainable.  The abundance of immigrants that crossed oceans to find a new life of abundance in the New World, abandoning their comforts, their home, their friends, their families, their stability, for an idea of something more, has now created a New World.  A genetically mutated world that stemmed from an initial population that put their lives at risk on an illusory idea based on greed and desire and eternal abundance.  Hundreds of years later, these genetics have spread back across the world creating a gentrification based on something quite far from human love and kindness.  And now, as humans, we’re presented with the task of eradicating that ingrained form of self-imposed judgment that lives within our cellular composition and bases our human success on external haves and have nots, regardless of our sense of humanity.