The Altered States of Halloween

(Source: CowGow AI World.  Another nice one.)

Halloween may come but once a year for some of us, but, for the rest of us, a subtle sense of horror runs through our daily lives like background noise; the essence of Halloween is on our menu 365 days a year.

But, this is not always a bad thing. Think of the Essence of Halloween as an aerosol that comes in a can, a sort of air freshener. But, it's odor is not one of dead mammalian flesh as much as it the smell of dying leaves and burning candles in the cool night air. It has hints of sugar & spices mixed with church incense and the odd scent of a funeral parlor.

Halloween then bleeds into the Day of the Dead. Everyone knows, at least, one of those people. But, none of us can comprehend that most altered state of all... death itself.

And, so, we threw a party! 👻

Halloween, which likely originated from the old Celtic holiday of Samhain , is the culmination of a year of spookiness we can finally give a name to. "Oh, that explains it, it's officially Halloween!" Witches, demons, gremlins, ghouls, phantoms, zombies, psychopaths, haunted houses, memes of death, magic, fascination & horror - officially have free reign on this day... provided there is that certain element of humor... or satire. The irony of death is all around us. Let's dance!

For instance, my day was considerably brightened recently by a .gif starring the one and only Death Fairy (inset right), a wonderful, satirical character found here. Invented by the artist, Kiszkiloszki, the Death Fairy is quite possibly the best Halloween character ever!

But, all this talk of apparitions, fortune-telling, hallucinations, premonitions, trances, spell-casting and dreams of the living dead can be interpreted as being elements of our collective unconsciousness which have recently fallen under more serious scientific scrutiny: the altered states of consciousness (ACS).

"Although classical psychoanalysis has tended to regard altered states of consciousness (ASCs) as symptoms of regressive states, other schools of thought, such as Jungian, humanistic, and transpersonal psychology, regard them as higher states of consciousness and, often, as indicative of a more profound level of personal and spiritual evolution."

- A quote sourced from the APA Dictionary entry for altered state of consciousness.

"According to the Wiley-Blackwell Handbook of Transpersonal Psychology, excessive dancing, meditation, and mind-altering plants were used in ancient civilizations to modulate the activity of the mind. Terence McKenna, an American ethnobotanist, even thought that the use of psychedelic mushrooms had led to the 'evolution of human language and symbol use.'

The  production and use of substances that alter perception, change consciousness, and create illusion and hallucination seems to be embedded throughout the natural world, as a thread somehow woven into the fabric of life itself,' writes Dr Peter Brace from Swinburne University."

- Via the article: Altered states of consciousness: the elusiveness of the mind.

“I’m being greeted by these beings, they’rle not human but they’re oddly familiar. I know them as if they are family. They’re telling me how happy they are to see me, and that I’ve found this technology to communicate with them again.”

“Yesterday, I finally broke through and met a male and female entity in the place where we exist before birth, and after death. I was in complete shock about what happened, it seemed so real, and it honestly felt like a very familiar place. They were welcoming me and it felt like I was home.”

- Quotes from participants in a DMT study via the Big Think article: “I’ve been here before”: DMT study explores a strange memory phenomenon.

DMT is a chemical naturally found in numerous plants and some mammals, including humans. It is the hallucinogenic ingredient in Ayahuasca.

I was particularly impressed by the line: "They’re telling me how happy they are to see me, and that I’ve found this technology to communicate with them again.” Technology is an odd word to describe what is essentially the effects of a plant product.

As it happens, humans have been deliberately attempting to alter and enhance their conscious states - for quite some time... somewhere around 30,000 years, if not more! While psychotropic plants have often played a part in this process, the true altered state is not dependent upon them. Alcohol (another plant product) consumption, meditation, orgasm, music, dancing, ceremonial rituals, lucid dreaming - and, to this I add, the processes used to create many forms of art - are among the many activities that may produce an altered state. *

(Inset left above is an example of the Geometry of DMT.)

(More below the jump...)

Cause for Pause: the Rot at the Core

Hitler - oil painting - 1934, Victor Brauner.

"Each painting that I make is projected from the deepest sources of my anxiety..."

- Romanian-French Surrealist artist, Victor Brauner, (1903-1966). Although not always as well-known in the States as he was in Europe, recognition of his importance in Surrealism is more evident now than it was when I first featured him in an old TD post, The Magic of Art & The Art of Magic. In the post I included a link to the Hitler image (above), referring to it as "Brauner's voodoo doll." Nowadays I would use the word Vodou, but I would still interpret it the same. I imagine André Breton did, too, when he added it to his eccentric art collection. (Brauner's haunting portrait of Breton) Hitler would be dead 11 years later... No, not soon enough for an authentic correlation, but, in this case, it's the thought (and the passion) that counts. From this excellent online source we have:

" One of the most significant symbolic aspects of voodoo dolls is their role as a conduit for energy and intention. In many traditions, the doll is believed to act as a vessel, allowing the practitioner to channel their desires, whether for healing, protection, or even retribution, into the physical form of the doll."

But, can weaponized art fulfill the requirements of aesthetic beauty? Apparently, it depends upon who you ask. For some members of the Young Republican National Federation here in the States, Hitler had an "aesthetic." (See quotes below.)

'I love Hitler’: Leaked messages expose Young Republicans’ racist chat

"Peter Giunta, who at the time was chair of the same organization, wrote in a message sent in June that 'everyone that votes no is going to the gas chamber.'

Giunta was referring to an upcoming vote o@n whether he should become chair of the Young Republican National Federation, the GOP’s 15,000-member political organization for Republicans between 18 and 40 years old.

'Im going to create some of the greatest physiological torture methods known to man. We only want true believers,' he continued.

'Can we fix the showers? Gas chambers don’t fit the Hitler aesthetic,' Joe Maligno, who previously identified himself as the general counsel for the New York State Young Republicans, wrote back.

'I’m ready to watch people burn now,' Annie Kaykaty, New York’s national committee member, said."

For most of us, this latest Republican gaff is old news. But, I must admit, of all the nightmares presented to us in the past year, this one made my blood run cold. While it's possible that the words may have been taken out of context, the message is clear. The "Hitler aesthetic" is the cherry on this shit-sundae. I can find no element of grace or beauty in Hitler's pathological hate tale.

What is particularly scary is that most of the members quoted actually worked for the government, up to and including a Senator!

Yes, this chat was immediately condemned by the Republican base, but it was too late to get the cat back into the bag. The rot at the MAGA core was exposed.

Bravo, Politico, this story makes for a "charming" Halloween horror vignette!

It is, after all, the witching season; Halloween is arriving soon, along with the Day when the Dead shall rise. But, while Halloween is a great time for confronting ones deepest fears, in the modern world, we do so almost as a form of play. The vintage animation below is an example of this. Created by Disney studios in the late 1920s, Skeleton Dance was the first of the Silly Symphonies. Ah, maybe this fits the "Hitler aesthetic"...

... along with another seasonal title, Mel Brook's Springtime for Hitler.

(Source: the Laughing Place.)

***

UPDATE - October 18, 2025

LIVE - NO KINGS Protests, USA

PBS - Live coverage in DC

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CNBC-TV 18 Live Nationwide Coverage

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The Daily Discourse - Live National Coverage

They Live (Updated 11/5/2025)

 

"Nada retrieves one of the boxes from the church and takes a pair of sunglasses from it, concealing the box in a trash pile. He finds out that they make the world appear monochrome and reveal subliminal messages in the media to consume and conform. They also disclose that many people are ghoulish, bug-eyed aliens hiding under human façades."

- Via the Wiki article for They Live, a sci-fi film from 1988 directed by John Carpenter, a master of the horror genre. Interestingly, it was written in response to Ronald Reagan, the US president at the time. The article goes on to say:

"...Carpenter decided to use the pseudonym "Frank Armitage", an allusion to one of the filmmaker's favorite writers, H. P. Lovecraft (Henry Armitage is a character in Lovecraft's Dunwich Horror) Carpenter has always felt a close kinship with Lovecraft's worldview, and according to the director "Lovecraft wrote about the hidden world, the 'world ally'. His stories were about gods who are repressed, who were once on Earth and are now coming back. The world underneath has a great deal to do with They Live."

And, so it does. But, John Carpenter is no smug evangelist and there's an element of high camp present in They Live which prevents it from being taken too morbidly, thereby taking the fatal sting from it's central motif: the horror of losing control over ones autonomy, ones own anatomy and existence, while relinquishing all existential freedom to an alien foe, an unrelenting monster whose agenda is to destroy the world upon which you and your loved ones must exist. Carpenter foresaw the immediate future.

Can't beat that for an introduction to the witching season... although discussions of evil technocracies also has its sinister appeal.

Stay tuned for more Halloween merriment! ;-)

(For more They Live and numerous other cool clips visit the YouTube channel, Fonoptikon.)

NEW! (11/5/2025)

Just found: a vintage clip from the YouTube channel Mind Matters Most.

The mid-20th century brought young television viewers in the States a number of science fictional treats, but shows like the Twilight Zone - hosted by the darkly debonair Rod Sirling - and it's competitor, Outer Limits, represented a more sophisticated, existentialist World of the Weird that influenced its viewers in a more subliminal way... possibly opening the door for further experimentation regarding the altered states that would follow soon thereafter. There was always a kind of moral to these fantastical stories, very evident in the little vignette above... very evident, and very prescient! 🦉👻💀

Vale to an Extraordinary Scientist, Jane Goodall

The cover of Jane Goodall's The Book of Hope.

"Sentient beings are numberless; I vow to free them."

- In Tibetan Buddhism, the first vow of the enlightened Bodhisattva.

"Sometimes people would ask her, which do you like better, chimps or people? She'd say well, it depends.

'Chimps are so like us," Goodall said, "that I like some people much more than some chimps and some chimps much more than some people.'"

- Via the NPR's tribute to Jane Goodall who passed away October 1st.

"Instead, let's assume for adventure's sake that we're sharing the planet with a flesh-and-blood offshoot of the human species. As I've tried to demonstrate, the prospect isn't as absurd as it initially seems; indeed, I expect it will seem much less so when we've learned more about our world and our relatively brief tenure here. (It bears mention that eminent primatologist Jane Goodall has defended the scientific search for "Bigfoot," a cryptohominid commonly described as enormous. Assuming a gigantic and purportedly foul-smelling primate can successfully lay low, it may be substantially easier for an intelligent technical society, with a tested capacity for stealth and a full repertoire of disinformation tricks, to dodge our radar.)"

- Mac Tonnies, from a Posthuman Blues post from March 31, 2006. In it, he begins to describe his Cryptoterrestrial Hypothesis in its infancy, citing Jane Goodall as one of his influences.

***

I was saddened when I came upon the news that Jane Goodall had slipped the mortal coil yesterday. If anyone was influential in establishing the truth regarding the sentience of animals in the 20th Century, surely it was she. At a time when many scientists were still on the fence about the true nature of animal cognizance, Goodall proved that primates could invent and use simple tools... a game-changer that totally blew away all preexisting theories regarding animal behavior, and opened the door for new definitions of the word "sentience." Interestingly, the "new" definitions mirrored observations of philosophers from an earlier century:

"In the 17th century Thomas Tryon, a self-identified Pythagorean, raised the issue of non-human suffering. Soon thereafter, many philosophers used the anatomical discoveries of the Enlightenment as a reason to include animals in what philosophers call "sympatheia," the principle of who or what deserves sympathy."

When I study Jane Goodall's uniquely beautiful face, it really appears to me as if she was illuminated from within, with the unspoiled grace of a true Bodhisattva. I don't think I'm imagining things.

Midnight Update!

I spent some time tonight trying to find the perfect video of Dame Goodall to post here, and I finally found it. Sadly, it's too long to view here, but, Jane Goodall's First Time on the Subway is must-see, in part or whole.

No, she doesn't come across as a Bodhisattva as much as she does a charmer; an artist's scientist with a child's curious nature, a cat's amazing ability to always land on its feet, and a mind like a steel trap! Then again, maybe that does describe the nature of a Bodhisattva. 🏵️

"Illumined Black" Back in Print (updated: 9/27)

 

Wormhole - photograph of a local KC, MO sculpture - 2000, Mac Tonnies.

"What does the mind experience when severed from the body?

What are the ultimate limits of artistic expression in a post-human age?

These intriguing questions and more are answered in Mac Tonnies' macabre, mind-expanding collection of science-fiction short stories... 

Originally published in 1995, Illumined Black was a sensation among the science-fiction community. Mac Tonnies was a radical new voice in the genre, and his storytelling — combining JG Ballard, Philip K Dick, and internet-age verve — was a breath of fresh air"

This new Solar Press edition of Illumined Black greatly expands on the long out-of-print first-edition, containing both the original 9 story 'Illumined Black' collection, and 9 new stories collected from magazines, ezines, and the Mac Tonnies archive — including 'One-Hundred Years,' Mac's apocalyptic magnum opus, originally published in Flurb #3 (edited by cyberpunk godfather Rudy Rucker)."

- Several quotes from the Solar Press "Illuminated Black" page announcing its new edition of what was the first publication of Mac's fiction. (The original edition is inset left, above, and is discussed in this post.) Mac was all of 20 years old at the time, but, already his aesthetic sentience was boiling over with new forms.

***

Black is back!

Think of it as a belated gift for Mac's 50th birthday, projected forward in time: the republication of Illumined Black in a new package (inset right).

Aesthetically, I feel that Mac would've preferred one of his own illuminations gracing it's cover... like his photograph "Wormhole" circa 2000, (cropped and rotated). But, well, I was not in the loop on this one.

Regardless, this is good news, and long overdue! The addition of new material is a special treat. My thanks go out to all involved, and, as ever, to Dana Tonnies, who enabled the news to appear here.

(More good news below the jump)

50 Years Ago Today...

Credit: Space Universe by Digital Dreamscape.

Happy Birthday to Mac in the Multiverse!

Mac would've turned 50 today; a sobering thought for myself and, I suspect, for those who knew him. But, I think, turning 50 would not have been as big of a deal for Mac. For one thing, I believe he'd remain eternally youthful at heart. I also imagine he'd possibly be a crypto currency multi-millionaire by now. And, that would be a good thing, but, I have my doubts about how comfortable he'd feel living in the present political climate in the country in which he was born. All that comes to my mind is how much he enjoyed visiting Paul Kimball in Nova Scotia.

He loved Nova Scotia.

About today's AI video, well, it's a cool, ancient-future kind of thing with plenty of magnificently designed spaceships. I know Mac would appreciate the spaceships. What got me is the frame they chose to present the video. It isn't merely a weirdly attractive image, it's Golden.*

Would Mac love AI? I wonder. (My guess is that he'd love the videos for sure and might want to create his own. For more spacecraft from Digital Dreamscape try this Stargate-themed offering.)

Below are some links for further entertainment. It seems, in spite of the "present political climate" science is flourishing. So, if science (and art) are flourishing, Mac would probably assume things weren't too bad... especially if he was a multi-millionaire! ;-)

***

Photos show the cosmic calling of extraterrestrial enthusiasts at Indonesia’s UFO Festival

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New Research Finds That ChatGPT Secretly Has a Deep Anti-Human Bias

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How far will AI go to defend its own survival?

"Recent safety tests show some AI models are capable of sabotaging commands or even resorting to blackmail to avoid being turned off or replaced."

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The ‘dead internet theory’ makes eerie claims about an AI-run web. The truth is more sinister

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Scientists discover new type of life form living in the human body

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"Third state" of existence between life and death confirmed by scientists

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A 'Third State' Exists Between Life and Death—And That Suggests Your Cells Are Conscious, Some Scientists Say

“But the emergence of new multicellular life-forms from the cells of a dead organism introduces a ‘third state’ that lies beyond the traditional boundaries of life and death.”

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* In other words, if ever an image needed a Phi-shell this would be it. See the Golden Meme footnote in Clouds, Time & Spiraling Planes.

AI Alchemy

 

The cicadas are in full swing today. At least, the metallic drone-like sound is similar. However, last night, I noticed a weird, overly large green bug outside on the cement wall of the motel - a kind of alien grasshopper - which was weird enough to be an AI confection. I have just learned via Google, however, that the katydid makes shorter sounds, not the long, extended pneumatic-drilling whine of what is the annual NM cicada I am currently hearing.

Incidentally, I learned all of the above in about 3 minutes. Of course, you realize this would not have been possible 30 years ago (in the century I was born). I wonder if anyone has charted the effects of such rapid-fire information gathering on human life, intellect and consciousness... and, cumulatively, what we can refer to as the Collective, that is: all species of intelligence and consciousness, which we've only begun to acknowledge.

Moving right along, we arrive at another broad topic, alchemy, and why the "chemical" constituents of the universe behave like they do. Hermetically, this is the fool's journey which leads to wisdom. Does this apply to the example of AI Alchemy above with all its digitally-enhanced minerals undergoing contrived chemical reactions? Well, yes and no. But, who cares? It's eye-candy, addictive, and it's at one's fingertips... thanks to AI artist/alchemists over at Vimora ASMR.

(Note: Ah, but it's possible to do so much more with labradorite!)

Interestingly, this video was given a warning label: "Altered or synthetic content. Sound or visuals were significantly edited or digitally generated." Apparently, this was necessary because enough people were assuming it was real. I've been mistaken myself with a few AI videos and think warning labels are a good idea.

Meanwhile, the aptly named Dog Days of summer are drifting by again in the angst-ridden, hot August winds. But, although this is never a good thing - and this year it's potentially Ground Zero - we have one reason to party: it's time for Mac's 2025 birthday celebration!

See you then.

Related links:

This just found, another, cool alchemical video by AIDITOR: Virtual Lab Alchemy - The Complete Elemental Experiments.

Scientists Baffled by "Alien Mineral" That Acts in a Weird Way When Heated Up

Rebirth

 

Somewhere near the middle of this video a series of transdimensional shifts occur - worlds seamlessly spill into other worlds - which I find strangely satisfying. The video's maker -Tetouze - is also a musician and this might explain Rebirth's engaging fluidity. Enjoy!

An interesting and related article from Big Think:

The cinematograph, the “noematograph,” and the future of AI art

Hugo-winning author Ken Liu explores what early cinema and Chinese poetry can teach us about AI’s potential as a new artistic medium.

The Giant Awakens

 

The Giant Awakens, a cumulonimbus cloud formation over the Sandias, Albuquerque, NM - filtered cellphone photo - 2025, DS.

"According to the legend passed down from the Quinnipiacs, a wise man cast a sleeping spell on Hobbomock and stopped his destructive rampage. He gave him plenty of sleep-inducing oysters to eat, and the giant fell to the ground on his back, where he remains to this day, still sleeping.

But someday, the story goes, the sleep spell will wear off, and Hobbomock will awaken, hungry once more."

- Regardless of how destructive the giant is described in this excerpt of text (found here), the Sleeping Giants were primarily the good guys in Native American tales. In a similar Ute tale the Giant saves the People from an ogre and, in his honor his body is surrounded by rattlesnakes which are there to protect his remains... in case he returns.

Meanwhile, Hobbomock is in reality the steward of Nature's entities - be they plants or animals - and it's only when the People disrespect his kingdom will he become a menacing figure.

***

The Giant Awakens - detail

It's monsoon season in New Mexico. It rains at least twice a day... and this is good for several reasons. One reason is that, between sudden downpours, the sky transforms into something spectacular.

This post features one cloud formation that was so bizarre, my cellphone could not capture it. Whatever I witnessed that Sunday evening hardly resembled what my device recorded. What I saw was a gigantic, ark-like cloud (visually) butting up against a nearby tree. The camera, however, saw the sequence of images found below the jump (with their time & date stamps).

(continued below the jump...)

More AI Eye-Candy: Alien Realms

 

When Alice (that is, moi) jumped down the Safe Haven portal she inevitably, but delightfully, discovered Alien Realms, the YouTube channel from which the video shown (above), Floraxis, emerged. (Also: Floraxis 2)

Well, there's absolutely no way I can resist organically designed structures so I was hooked from the very first frame. And, there's a mysterious (and lovely) alien, too... all quite delectable.

What's more, other potential worlds are also explored. Try Xylos or Vexillia. Gorgeous, gorgeous!

While Floraxis, Xylos, and Vexillia might not qualify as authentic "Safe Havens" - and I've yet to qualify the meme - they surely are worthy of a visit or two!

Cloud Cities on Venus

Clouds seem to be an ongoing topic over at Trans-D these days. But, oddly enough, Cloud Cities have appeared on this blog before: in 2011, in a post introducing the work of Venezuelan artist, Tomás Saraceno. (But, the video (above) about cloud cities - which may or not be scientifically feasible (although NASA is allegedly involved)* - is of a different persuasion. However, art and science are conjoined in both examples... which leads us to a third Cloud City... which began as iCloud, a data storage service, but morphed into a digital real estate market. From the article:

"Indeed, the urban populace is now utterly reliant on cloud-based platforms, accessed via their cloud-connected devices, for everything from remote working to navigating transit systems, ordering groceries to finding a life partner. As these activities continue to feed into analytics and prediction platforms – in the cloud, naturally – the ultimate shape of these emergent, integrated urban systems is yet to be decided."

Somewhere there seems to be a meme developing here. However, for a different cloud experience see my corresponding post Growing Roses in the Clouds - A Safe Haven.

Also see the BBC's: The Amazing Cloud Cities We Could Build on Venus, and this Tomás Saraceno page.

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* (See comment section.)

The Crow-kins Unite! (New video link, April 13, 2025)

The Growing Resistance... (detail) - ceramic - 2025, BG Dodson.

_____________________________________________

Here’s what to know about Saturday’s ‘Hands Off!’ anti-Trump protests

"The “Hands Off!” rallies are taking place in more than 1,000 cities across all 50 states, and nearly 400,000 people have signed up to attend them...

'Donald Trump and Elon Musk think this country belongs to them,” the movement’s website states. “They’re taking everything they can get their hands on, and daring the world to stop them. On Saturday, April 5th, we’re taking to the streets nationwide to fight back with a clear message: Hands off!'"

Video (above): HANDS OFF! Chicago, IL, USA, 4/5/2025) 

‘Hands Off!’ protesters across US rally against President Donald Trump and Elon Musk

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Comic Relief:

SNL - Trump Tariff Cold Open

NEW!

Trump Easter 2025 Cold Open - SNL

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Tens of thousands in France join protests against racism and far right

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Thousands of Slovaks protest in Bratislava against PM Robert Fico and his Russia-friendly policies

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Hungarian Opposition Rallies in Massive Protest Against Orbán’s Rule

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Serbia's largest-ever rally sees 325,000 protest against government

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Bernie Sanders, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the courage to brawl for the working class

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Hundreds of thousands join mass opposition protest in Istanbul

***

Everywhere around the world a rallying cry is beginning to rise... against tyranny... against censorship, against incompetency and indifference to injustice. Perhaps, it's humanity's last stand before the self-designated overlords do what overlords do best: suppress... oppress... distress.

It pays to stay one step ahead. We might ask ourselves: "where will I be a year from now?" If present global trends continue - that is, the continuing disablement of the working class* - the choices we have may be limited. This applies especially to the most vulnerable members of society. (Inset left, Dodson's Scenes from the Circus of Dreams, 2023.)

How do the powerless practice dissent? First, keep in mind, no true individual, nor group of individuals is without power. We swim in the same primordial ocean. We each have the ability - and the authority - to express ourselves. And, if, within our lifetimes our autonomy is threatened, it is our responsibility to defend it. It is our right; it is our life. And, so it goes...

(Continued below the jump)