Here are a few metaphors that I hear thrown around in activist circles that, as Inigo Montoya might say, “do not mean what we think they mean.”

Low-hanging fruit

The first is not unique to activism, business uses it left and right as well. In case you happen to have never been in a meeting when someone uses it, the phrase “low-hanging fruit” is meant to convey benefits that can be attained with minimal action. So, if I want to get 500 signatures to put in a bike lane, the low-hanging fruit might be bike messengers. I could probably quickly acquire a few hundred signatures with not a whole lot of effort.

The problem is, that’s not how you pick fruit. Fruit is normally picked starting with the “high-hangers” for two important reasons. First, pickers start at the top and fill their basket as they go down, otherwise they’d be climbing with ever-heavier loads. Second, the fruit lower on the tree is partially shaded by the higher branches and often last to ripen.

So, for the bike lane example, the “low-hanging fruit” would be folks whose names would make it more difficult to get others to sign and who probably aren’t high value names to begin with. Elementary school kids, maybe.

Silver bullets

Silver bullets often come up when we’re looking for a simple solution to a complex problem. An example might be installing solar panels in remote African villages. This fairly simple solution manages to address issues ranging from social (providing power without making the community reliant on fuel) to environmental (cleaner than coal or nuclear) to political (no foreign-owned powerplants requiring a government-owned grid).

However, the term comes to us from old European legends about werewolves. Werewolves, immune to normal bullets, can only be killed by silver ones. Far from being simple solutions, silver bullets are actually more difficult to make than regular ones and substantially less bang-for-the-buck, as silver is both softer and more expensive than lead. In short, you’d probably want to avoid using a silver bullet unless you’re facing something like a werewolf that can’t be defeated through conventional means (which addressing energy needs in developing nations just may be).

Radical

Perhaps the most understood metaphor, yet one that activists employ to the point of self-identity, is the notion of “radicalism”. Literally “radical” refers to the root of something, most often a plant. Activists who identify as “radical” maintain that they are getting to the root of the problem—with the implicit or explicit suggestion that all other strategies will fail to produce true change. Accusations of not being radical enough equate to not being serious about one’s beliefs.

Again, reality begs to differ.

Instructions for removing an unwanted tree all begin with cutting the tree down first. Once you’ve removed a tree’s leaves and its ability to photosynthesize its food, it’s much easier to deal with the leftover roots. The stump can continue to generate new growth, but diligence will ensure that it never amounts to a new tree, leaving the stump to eventually die. Removing stumps is so difficult that the most common methods include drilling poison-filled holes and setting them on fire.

Knowing the truth behind this metaphor encourages a remarkably different angle for activism than “radical”, namely removing the ability of destructive systems to feed and perpetuate themselves before attempting to address the “root” of the problem. Maybe everyone working on corporate power should switch to campaigning against advertising. Afterall, it would be difficult for companies to lobby Washington if no one bought their products.

You’d think something as inconsequential as measuring spoons could escape being blogged about. Of course, you’d be wrong—especially if you were also someone who had committed to blog every day for two weeks and you had drank a lot of coffee at 8pm on a Sunday night and hadn’t posted yet. Under these conditions, you just may start to imagine deep philosophical dilemmae contained in scones, bellybutton rings, and mason jars.

These were not just any measuring spoons, they had the measurements for a drop, a smidge, a pinch, and a hint. In case you didn’t know, those were in order of volume smallest to largest. Yes, a hint is bigger than a smidge. I’ve been subscribed to Unclutterer for a while now and my guess is that these fantastic spoons would qualify me as a hopeless clutterer. Since we spent many minutes in Sur la Table and I made it out the still proud owner of zero ramekins, I’m counting the foray as a success.

And yet (two coordinating conjuctions back-to-back for extra emphasis!), how is a pinch any different from a foot? What is a foot anyway? It’s not some universal carved-in-stone measurement. After reading through Wikipedia articles on the subject, it seems that best guesses say a foot is simply 12 inches (as the “ynche” predates the foot). And an inch was just the width of the base of the fingernail until formalized in 1958 as 25.4 millimeters.

The meter is slightly less subjective, as it represents one ten-millionth of the distance from the equator to the North Pole. It was first calculated in 1798 and remarkably close (within 1/5 of a millimeter) to what we now calculate via satellite. The next time you drop that interesting bit of knowledge at a party, please remember—if only to yourself—that you know it solely because I decided to blog about spoons.

Perhaps the formalization of the smidge is just another victim in civilization’s continued efforts to dehumanize our conceptualizations of the world (or at least our baking) and replace them with cold, hard science. But if it improves our risotto, is it all worth it?

I’ve mentioned before that I worry that truly revolutionary communication is fast becoming impossible. I’m not one of those “there are no creative works left for our generation!” kinds of artists; instead I’d trace the problem to a new totalitarian semiosis. Let’s define those words quickly.

to·tal·i·tar·i·an, adj.

of or relating to a system of government that is centralized and dictatorial and requires complete subservience to the state

sem·i·o·tics, n.

the study of signs and symbols, how meaning is constructed and understood

Let’s dive a bit deeper, shall we? By totalitarian, I am not referring to any government that controls its people by force, as is commonly understood by the word. We don’t live in that kind of culture. Police are not beating down my door, I’m allowed to vote and even have a blog to express my views, for the most part people don’t disappear to some secret prison.

Still, ideas concerning what a life might be like where I didn’t pay rent or concerning a life-long romantic partnership that was not a state-sanctioned marriage are difficult to express if only because we lack both the literal vocabulary but also the emotional vocabulary to allow such feelings to transfer between one another. For this reason, I make a distinction between semiotics and semantics, as I’m primarily interested in the emotional resonance of a phrase and not its discrete meaning. Looking up “Hippie” will probably not accurately convey what is meant by calling someone one. Maybe I’m still rehashing The Spectacle.

Last week I chatted with Patrick Reinsborough of smartMeme concerning my thoughts on activating the creative class (more on that some other time). He brought up his surprise and fascination with Capitalism’s ability to account for the Commons, which he had previously thought an incorruptibly non-Capitalist idea. Indeed, even anti-Capitalist ideas have a place in Capitalism. In fact, as Capitalism grows more oppressive and undesirable, demand for anti-Capitalist or revolutionary ideas grows, creating a price point for dissent. All is accounted for. Patrick describes such a world and offers some solutions in his seminal “Decolonizing the Revolutionary Imagination“.

Yesterday, I walked into a comics store and walked out with “Channel Zero“. The introduction from Warren Ellis claims:

We’re in cultural lockstep, taking holidays in other people’s misery, asking for our stinking badges, dead heads nodding over phosphordot fixes.

The actual comic follows Jennie 2.5, a media activist who gradually becomes a media terrorist, who gradually becomes just a face on a t-shirt like Che Guevara (sidenote: a friend tried to get “ClicheGuevara” as an AIM name, but it was taken). Though the book was written in 1997 and imagines a world of overt censorship—this was in the middle of Giuliani’s rampage against art—it gets everything else right. It’s not apathy that undercuts the modern revolution, it’s that revolution reaffirms the status quo. Subversion has been subverted.

Nor is the truth being suppressed. Bush gets caught violating the Constitution left and right. How many scandals can he weather? Honestly, he can probably keep going until the food runs out. The American that needs to revolt in order for revolution to occur, the mass consumers of mass media that provides the social mass that lowers the momentum of social change to zero, doesn’t have it that bad. But when they do, will they realize it?

Perhaps brigades of Black Bloc standing against riot cops are doing more than inviting violence. Perhaps they’re taking and holding the territory necessary in case the rest of us need to join them. Considering that Giuliani is the current Republican front-runner, we may both get another chance re-enact Channel Zero.

This video also marks my jump to Revver… How’s the quality compare to the old YouTube stuff?

McDonalds, a hamburger company who claims to have served billions of us—possibly someone you know—is now upset that the Oxford English Dictionary contains the word McJob. Specifically, they’re upset with the definition:

An unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects, esp. one created by the expansion of the service sector.

They say that it’s disrespectful to the all the hard-working employees in the fast food world. Maybe they should have thought of that 17 years ago when crappy conditions first allowed the word to come into usage.

First of all, I don’t believe that the word “McJobs” is necessarily describing jobs like the one of working at McDonalds. No, my perception of the word has always been that it describes jobs like the hamburgers McDonalds produces. Cheap, mass-produced crap devoid of any craft or humanity. I’ve had a McJob, at a record store. There were no hamburgers anywhere but slinging Beyonce and Clay Aiken, being told to “think less” at work, and drinking cough syrup to get through the day definitely evoked a certain McQuality.

McDonalds has always been a bit persnickety about their branding. Similarly, it’s always bothered me that someone owns the word McNugget. “Pardon me but that oscillation in your vocal chords which subsequently produces a specific longitudinal air pattern perceived by others as ‘McNugget’… you know that one? Yeah, I fucking own that.”

It seems completely just to me that, with McDonalds’ insistence that the prefix “Mc” is their Manifest Destiny, it’s that very prefix that bites them in the ass.

The Oscars are just around the corner. I know this because there are advertisements for the broadcast on every corner in San Francisco. The ad strategy consists entirely of large famous movie quotes (memes, if you prefer that nomenclature), like “I coulda been a contender!” or “May the Force be with you.” It has a done a great job of reminding me how movies were so much better decades ago (On the Waterfront was ’59, and Star Wars: A New Hope was ’77).

Black Snake Moan will probably not be nominated for anything shiny anytime soon. Nonetheless, while I have not seen any more than the trailer, I’m already excited. Though the title itself (from an old blues song) is vastly more ambiguous that Samuel L. Jackson’s last flick, the plot seems to be relatively easy to summarize:

1. There exists a skanky ho.
2. Skanky ho gets chained up until she learns to be less skanky.
3. Profit.

The brilliance of this movie is not in its compelling narrative, multi-dimensional characters, or rich cinematography (granted I have not seen the movie and these may well be brilliant as well). No, it’s all about social relevance—relevance to the extreme of necessity. The “Black Snake Moan” treatment is precisely what America needs. Clearly, our celebrities are out of control. Can you honestly say that Britney would not benefit from some serious de-skankification? She needs chains… strong chains.

All that’s left is to come up with a good term for the process of getting chained up until you’re less skanky. My first thought was perhaps, “Blacksnaked.” As in, “I hear you’re Blacksnaking Nicole Richie this weekend, can I watch?” I then briefly toyed with “Chain-trained.” As in, “Yes, she’s pretty, but is she chain-trained?” But I eventually settled on “Moaned.” As in, “Damn girl, you needs get Moaned in a powerful way.” Until the movie actually comes out and Mr. Jackson bellows that perfect phrase to rival, “May the Force be with you.”, let’s leave it at that.

Start spreading the news.

I first read Tao Te Ching back in college and it really spoke to me, as any Eastern philosophy might to a college freshman double-majoring in Fine Art and Philosophy who grew up in smalltown Indiana with the only radio stations playing classic rock and “hot” country. The concept of action by inaction (wei wu wei) connected with my existing understanding of art at the time. As much could be said by the absence of a line as by its inclusion. It’s been almost a decade since I’ve read it (having given my copy to my father during his “simplify my life” phase) and thought that I may have a different understanding of it now that I’m a smidge closer to Enlightenment.

Unfortunately, there were no fewer than 6 different translations at my local bookstore, all of them subtly different. I decided to pick a random passage (Tao 33) and compare them. Here’s the first line from several of them (please forgive the poor quality of my cameraphone).

From John C.H. Wu‘s translation, Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching:

A good enough start. I put a copy aside and kept browsing.

Gia-Fu Feng‘s Tao Te Ching, 25th-Anniversary Edition:

I’m not a huge fan of the “requires force/needs strength” here. It handles the parallelism between others and self a little clumsily, almost suggesting mastering others is as worthy as mastering oneself. Points for gender neutrality though.

Penguin Classics‘ translation, simply titled Tao Te Ching:

Roman numerals? Ick. The designer in me rejects them for being unsuited to the nature of the text, the reader in me doesn’t want to have to decipher them everytime I look up a passage.

Wow, even Ursula K. LeGuin has a translation, Lao Tzu: Tao Te Ching: A Book About the Way and the Power of the Way:

Uhm… What’s with the title colon title colon title? Seems almost disrespectful. As do the quick summaries at the top of each passage. Maybe let the text stand on its own?

Stephen Mitchell‘s translation, Tao Te Ching: A New English Version, had a very pretty cover:

The book itself was a little big for my tastes and seemed a little over-designed. I was too soon distracted by this next one…

Jonathan Star‘s translation, Tao te Ching, had tiny writing saying “The Definitive Edition” (of which I was quite skeptical):

Wow. I don’t know what to say. That certainly covers all the bases. Any questions I had about the variations in translations seem to be handled by this comprehensive, if overly clinical, approach.

In the end, I bought John C.H. Wu’s translation. It was the cheapest and fit in my pocket. Plus, there’s something vaguely Tao about its ability to transcend the other versions by just not doing anything wrong.

Growing up, I was always taught that America was named accidentally by mapmaker Amerigo Vespucci, who sloppily signed his name in the middle of the continent. In actuality, Amerigo was an explorer (though also a mapmaker) who visited South America as early as 1499. He was the first to propose that explorers of his day had discovered not a new route to Asia but an entirely new continent. It was this somewhat contentious assertion that led a different mapmaker, German cartographer Martin Waldseemüller, to name the new continent after him (Waldseemüller later changed his mind, but by then Gerardus Mercator had already popularized the name).

Fast forward 400 or so years to Indianapolis, IN. My father and I are looking at his new house and he says, “you’re creative, tell me how to make my house pretty.” I’m a web designer—though I did date an architecture student back in college—and don’t really know what to say. Unfortunately, my father did help finance my BFA so I can’t let him down. I bravely suggest checking out MocoLoco, full of Modern Contemporary madness. “Actually,” my father notes with fatherly confidence, “the style of my home is ‘Usonian‘.”

Those of you reading carefully will notice that I just mentioned “Usonian”, the word for which this post is written. Yes, we’re getting close to a point.

When I do a little more research on “Usonian” architecture, I discover that its origins begin with famed architect Frank Lloyd Wright. The term was coined out to describe simply designed, inexpensive homes built of locally available eco-friendly materials. Large common areas and small bedrooms encouraged socialization. Unlike the monarchist Victorian or retro Neoclassical, this would be an architecture style unique to the powerful nation of the United States! And so it will be named… Usonian!

“Why Usonian, and not American?”, you may ask. And that’s probably because you, yourself, are Usonian. As mentioned a few paragraphs back, the entire new continent (two of them, actually) named back in 1499 is referred to as “America”. So “American” equally describes Canadians, Mexicans, Cubans, Bolivians, and Uruguayans as well as citizens of the United States. We (being Usonians) like to shorten “Citizens of the United States” to “Americans”, but in doing so disregard our neighbors to the north and south. Imagine if “New Yorker” only applied to Manhattanites, and you lived in Brooklyn. You’d get a little pissed, right? Maybe want to teach the uppity Estados Unidos a thing or two, eh? Well, luckily we have the CIA to keep an eye on your kind. Still, “Citizens of the United States” is so annoyingly long and we’re kind of in a hurry—being the U.S. and all.

Enter “Usonian”, short for United States of North America (USONiA). It is the skeleton key that opens those doors to humility previously locked for want of a proper lexicon. It is the word missing from countless conversations between otherwise well-meaning folks trying not to be oppressive. It is my Word for 2007 and it is my mission is to spread it far and wide, all over Usonia.

As for my father, I advised him to plant vines, keeping with the Usonian style of melding organically with the natural landscape. Then I stumbled across this quote:

“A doctor can bury his mistakes but an architect can only advise his client to plant vines.”
—Frank Lloyd Wright

Maybe I’ll just make him a website.

I realize that this post really could be condensed to a single sentence, but it wouldn’t carry the same sense of mystery and reward that following my journey of discovery would, right?