Radical: The age of the recursive meme. You all are infected and festering. The stench is sickening.

We've come to view the viral element of illness as a purely biological affliction. Viral agents, microscopic in nature, enter the host to drop dna in certain cells, reproduce, and continue on their rampant path of destruction. Usually, the immune system responds accordingly or there are outside influences that assist the body in overcoming the invasion.

That is a well known 'for dummies' life cycle of a viral infection. It's far too simplistic and leaves out a significant amount of detailed factors, but it covers the general progression of the idea for the purpose of the thread.

I've come here today to say, without a doubt, that western and eastern society is infected with a recursive agent that has reached pandemic levels. I believe, with the risk of being incorrect, that we're all infected. Maybe we've always been infected, but that's neither here nor there. We're infected and the symptoms of the viral agent is showing itself in our lives, actions, thoughts, and hearts.

What is this recursive agent? Well, it's more or less a meme. A meme is not just a funny internet diddle. No, it's far larger and encompassing than that. A meme is defined as a an idea, behavior, style or usage that spreads from person to person within a culture.

Memes can work for the benefit of society or contribute to its downfall. Agricultural techniques, architectural designs, military tactics, and the like can all be documented as societal memes. However, there are various "ills" that plague societies that are, by definition, memes as well. They spread from person to person within the given culture, rooting themselves in the minds of the masses to cause a degeneration of culture, social norms, and the fabric of society.

We're experiencing something similar within the developed and undeveloped world alike. An old, yet deadly meme is on the rise. We created a new plane of transmission for this dangerous meme to spread. The internet acts just as air, water, liquid secretions, and contact. However, it is a much more efficient means of transmission. The only vectors that need exist are time, legibility, and literacy. As you know, literacy is at an all time high and the dissemination of information increases exponential over the rolling of the years.

Susceptibility is also a factor that plays into this new pandemic. You're all hurting or anticipating something that hasn't arrived now, more so than ever. Something in your immune systems is defective. I'm not simply talking about you, ATS. I'm talking about humanity. I don't know what it is, as it could be the state of the global economy, the increasing contradictory loneliness we're feeling despite being more connected by proximity and ability to communicate, general media misinformation (doubtful), the increasing distrust in elected government, the inevitable realization that all current economic systems share a common fatal flaw that devastates all societies, etc etc.

Your immune system is damaged. The meme established root in your very minds and personalities, and because you're "hurt" you have attached yourself to this meme's direction. You've chosen a group, community, ideal, or theory and you've gone absurd with your belief and faith in it.

The meme: Radicalism.

From the progressives to the conservatives, world wide east and west, I've witnessed a slant toward imbecilic radicalism. The awful part is that no one realizes that they are sick. The stench is everywhere, and it's putrid. Sometimes I find it difficult to breathe as the rot permeates every avenue of society from entertainment to academia. Unfortunately, I gag daily as the sensation causes my stomach to churn and my thoughts to blur.

It would be simple enough for me to ask of you all, "Please, for the sake of the children, end your radical ways." However, that would be foolish. I can't simply ask someone to stop having a cold, or to casually end their bout with ebola. That's asinine.

The best I can do, for the moment, is call attention to the self perpetuating and recursive meme known as radicalism. However, the infected are likely to turn the identification of the pandemic around and point to those not in their specific in group and call them the "infected". The stench is horrid.

It appears that the vaccine shares the same vectors for transmission; however, it is identified as dangerous to the immune system by the infected host. How does one introduce Moderation to the people once more. The meme itself must be soothing, engaging, lively, and healing. I think the problem lies in the aspect of Susceptibility. Why are you all so prone to the infection. If I can answer that question, maybe I can begin to understand what it will take to ameliorate the problem and cut off further infection.

Until then, just know. You're sick. Your scent sullies the very air that we all breathe. Take precaution, evaluate your health. We're sick and we need to help one another to find the proper means of ending our ailment.

on the opposite side, the general interconnected nature of our current society also means that a meme could be insterted and spread.

controlling what we would like that to be is the first step.

generating a meme that can penetrate the psyche that is bombarded with nothing but standardised meme is hard. the option is allow the meme to be dictated, or dictate it ourselves.

a reply to: TheOneElectric

As you know, literacy is at an all time high

Unfortunately this is completely inaccurate, especially in the west and the US. Most could not even pass an 8th grade test from 100 years ago. We are more technical but certainly not more literate as a civilization.

From the progressives to the conservatives, world wide east and west, I've witnessed a slant toward imbecilic radicalism.

Is it radicalism for people to want to be free? For their voices and ideas to be a acknowledged by their representatives? Is it radical to believe that honest work will improve our lot in life and all of that hard work not be stolen by central bankers manipulation of economies? Is it radical to believe we should speak to our global neighbors and not implement regional war against them when they have something we want?

I don't think so. The elites of this world, the 1% who control most of the globe are the problem. Not people who are struggling against them.

a reply to: Bassago

Incorrect. Worldwide. The world isn't the US or your western view. This is not a discussion of classical education, skill, and aptitude. Literacy rates are on the rise in most developing countries (that hold the most dense pockets of population worldwide) with data from 1990 to 2010.

I'm not here to argue with the ill. I'm simply here to state what appears to be an opinion that everyone may evaluate on their own. By sitting here and attempting to defend every attack I can exacerbate my symptoms and the attacker's as well. What an anti discussion based topic, right? Which is why it's in the rant forum and not the metaphysics area. Feel free to provide your thoughts, just know I'm not going to participate in a slugfest that will merely perpetuate the infection.

a reply to: TheOneElectric

Feel free to provide your thoughts, just know I'm not going to participate in a slugfest that will merely perpetuate the infection.

Well I did and you discounted it as is your prerogative, fair enough. Since you make such a huge blanket condemnation of humanity yet refuse to back it up with anything other than your perspective that's it I guess. Carry on.

originally posted by: TheOneElectric
I'm not here to argue with the ill. I'm simply here to state what appears to be a opinion that everyone may evaluate on their own. By sitting here and attempting to defend every attack I can exacerbate my symptoms and the attacker's as well. What an anti discussion based topic, right? Which is why it's in the rant forum and not the metaphysics area. Feel free to provide your thoughts, just know I'm not going to participate in a slugfest that will merely perpetuate the infection.

yeh, good luck with that.

We have been infected by 1984 as we fight for peace while our work is freedom. The idea of an Islamic state has been the theme of hate week while our ministry of truth continues its lies to whip up this feeding frenzy of festering disgust. I love big brother.

So everyone's a radical? No not really. If anything I'm irradiated.

a reply to: okamitengu

I know right?

a reply to: TheOneElectric

That's actually not a bad theory and one I've thought about myself. As far as the cure or a possible way to diminish the effects maybe just a removal from the constant reinforcement would do it.

When you remove someone from the environment where the infection has a good host environment as well as a host, the other infected members of said group also help to reinforce the meme itself. So to some degree I would say that by removal of the infected to a neutral environment it may actually begin to die off naturally as it has nothing else to feed on. This would also require some effort of the infected to actively starve the meme mentally by redirecting their mind toward something other than the memes agenda.

What do you think???

originally posted by: TheOneElectric

I'm talking about humanity. I don't know what it is, as it could be the state of the global economy, the increasing contradictory loneliness we're feeling despite being more connected by proximity and ability to communicate, general media misinformation (doubtful), the increasing distrust in elected government, the inevitable realization that all current economic systems share a common fatal flaw that devastates all societies, etc etc.

Radicalism: the opinions and behavior of people who favor extreme changes especially in government : radical
political ideas and behavior.

Yes people have radical thoughts because of the global economy, because of the increasing contradictory loneliness we're feeling (because we are raised to think only of ourselves & our family & to forget everyone else), because of the general media misinformation & why you doubt that is beyond me & pointless because not everyone shares the same feelings as you. People are mad that the MSM spreads misinformation & wants to see a change there.

Yes people have radical thoughts because of the increasing distrust in our elected governments. People have radical thoughts about the inevitable realization that all current economic systems share a common fatal flaw that devastates all societies.

Why should people not favor an extreme change when the way things are is not working?

Your immune system is damaged. The meme established root in your very minds and personalities, and because you're "hurt" you have attached yourself to this meme's direction. You've chosen a group, community, ideal, or theory and you've gone absurd with your belief and faith in it.

Again, Why should people not favor an extreme change when the way things are is not working?

From the progressives to the conservatives, world wide east and west, I've witnessed a slant toward imbecilic radicalism. The awful part is that no one realizes that they are sick. The stench is everywhere, and it's putrid. Sometimes I find it difficult to breathe as the rot permeates every avenue of society from entertainment to academia. Unfortunately, I gag daily as the sensation causes my stomach to churn and my thoughts to blur.

Imbecilic: contemptibly stupid or silly. What is this stupid radicalism you speak of? Oh wait, it's not actually imbecilic, you just find it that way because...god only knows why you think radicalism is stupid and why people should just be content with the horrible things going on in life & not want something better.


A truly sick person is the person who ignores the world around them and what they have to say, and lives in their own little fantasy world, refusing to acknowledge a change is happening. I am sure there are many people during the fall of Rome who thought just as you do. Trends in our society, such as these, have been acknowledged historically during times of upheaval and change.

When your only two options are to bend over and take the situation as it is or to explore new and/or unfamiliar influences on society in hopes for a positive change at the risk of a negative change, only an imbecile would chose to remain in an oppressive society then to seek change.

Until then, just know. You're sick. Your scent sullies the very air that we all breathe. Take precaution, evaluate your health. We're sick and we need to help one another to find the proper means of ending our ailment.

If the means to "cure" the aliment is to stick your head in the sand, go ahead & dive on in & breath deep, while the rest of us engage and actively pursue alternatives to something that clearly is not working for the majority.

a reply to: TheOneElectric

I would agree that radicalization is problematic, but at least it's passionate. We live in a world where the wealth equality gap is widening at a phenomenal rate. I suppose part of the problem is that governments are simply "puppets" that actively and consistently work against the people they allegedly represent, so we do know they are liars. But then we can also take the position that in order to lie as much as they do, they must be getting paid off. Which brings us to their handlers in the form of multinational CEO's and international bankers. The entire game is rigged, the legal system is corrupt, most politicians are corrupt and the CEO's and bankers are corrupt. We operate under a usury based legalized ponzi scam and a stock market that is actually worse than a casino while being fed BS by corporate mouthpieces and talking heads.

Unfortunately, governments, multinational CEO's, the military/industrial complex and of course the international bankers have become a "cancer" on humanity and I might add, not a benign cancer, but a malignant outgrowth of psychosis, malicious determination, controlling and parasitic in their actions.

What do you do with a cancer, well, you surgically remove it. I would hope that some day soon that can be done, legally if possible, but if they do not provide a legal solution, I am quite sure other methods of removal will ensue. People have had enough.

Cheers - Dave

a reply to: TheOneElectric

You put forth a believable analogy. There are many factors that contribute toward the disease of "radicalism". I think the most important in this regard is tradition. Most people fall prey to the sins of nationalism. In the western world, since the days of the French Revolution, extreme nationalism has been used to rally the majority against the perceived enemies of the ruling class. The reasons for succumbing to this ideology are numerous.

I can say with confidence that I do not adhere to the broad mold of your brush in the OP. I can't say that with pride in the social sense. The majority of my life I have been a social and political outcast because I refuse to accept the "popular view of things" in a social and political aspect.

The world lacks free thinkers in this time period. Those who are free thinkers are rare and often criticized and rejected. I mean this in a very broad sense that has no affiliation with the radical points of view that think themselves liberalized and accepting when they are anything but.

I honestly don't know of any solutions besides laying low and looking out for oneself. I have been attacked from so many angles that doing so is the only way to achieve a moderate amount of personal peace. Every single group that is politicized and organized has, in my experience, considered important the narrow trains of though that define those organizations. Even the most stout representatives of tolerance and equality will turn against me with a vengeance if I happen to point out the flaws in their beliefs.

Society is going to implode.

originally posted by: mOjOm
a reply to: TheOneElectric

That's actually not a bad theory and one I've thought about myself. As far as the cure or a possible way to diminish the effects maybe just a removal from the constant reinforcement would do it.

When you remove someone from the environment where the infection has a good host environment as well as a host, the other infected members of said group also help to reinforce the meme itself. So to some degree I would say that by removal of the infected to a neutral environment it may actually begin to die off naturally as it has nothing else to feed on. This would also require some effort of the infected to actively starve the meme mentally by redirecting their mind toward something other than the memes agenda.

What do you think???

That's very true. For about a decade I lived in the UK. All during that time, there was this constant fear-mongering in the news about how the Arab countries were going to bomb Europe with quark bomb SCUD missiles within 45 minutes. Funny thing was, once you left the UK and watched the news from a different country, this apparent threat disappeared. Everyone else had already given up watching the news channels because it was so depressing. Then once you stopped watching, went outside, everything was bright and sunny with the birds chirping.

Then you go back to the UK and see that every building and rooftop is covered in surveillance cameras.

a reply to: TheOneElectric

Radical...

All thought which aims itself toward immediately effective actions, which have advantages for ones position in the short, medium, AND long term, are radical. For a nation whose health service is dictated to by insurance rather than need, switching to taxation based funding for that service would be radical, but it would not necessarily be wrong, nor evidence of a disease in society!

Furthermore, those who create new technologies, or find ingenious methods of repurposing old ones, do so by thinking out of the box, and many of the revolutions in technology that we take for granted now, were, or are still radical in their implementation and effect on those who use them.

Today the world is radically different than it was two hundred and thirty nine years ago. The USA was not independent at that time for one thing, back in 1776. It is now, that difference is pretty radical.

People who want their government to be immediately accountable, people who want companies to take their responsibility to the nation the operate in seriously, who want companies to operate in an ecologically neutral fashion, people who want to be allowed to develop power systems for their homes which do not necessitate access to the national power grid, all of these people are considered radical, but all of these people also have totally valid points, and it is wrong to dismiss them, and many others, just because radicalisation has become a dirty word.

Notice please, that "radical" has taken on a similar mantle to the term "freedom fighter". The term freedom fighter has been linked to terrorist action all over the world, and now the word radicalisation is being tarred with a bad brush, simply because it is the word which people use to describe the process by which terrorists are being conditioned to do evil in the name of their chosen deity.

I call bogus, on the entire premise of this thread. There is nothing wrong with radicalisation, as long as the radical thoughts inspired by it are not harmful and destructive. Radical thought is any thought which does not conform to a norm, which explores new territory, any thought which occurs specifically in the minds of those who refuse to be lead by a purely populist agenda as directed by the media and propagandism of government, all of these things are radical, and all of them have the potential to be part of the solutions to the problems in the world, rather than the cause of them.

To take anything ground breaking and wonderful, and bracket it along with the devastating and corrupting influence of violence and madness which is sweeping the world, is an error in my opinion. Radical thinking is what gave us the internet, the World Wide Web, the television, the computer, the motor car, the telephone, the mobile phone, the many ways we communicate these days, not to mention new surgeries saving lives in hospitals the world over.

Radical thinking will one day free our species from fossil fuel dependency, and may see us pick our way amongst the stars in time to come. Staying between the pre-established lines, an apathetic attitude toward all things, that is the real killer, because it destroys by stagnation, that which cannot be destroyed by fury.

a reply to: TheOneElectric

You have done quite well not to argue with the ill, but you did kinda set things off with a 'radical' meme rather than just keeping the basic meme 'idea' as the topic. I guess in some ways ideas are like virus and other codes, but work in a different way through neural networks and what other aspects of consciousness may apply. There is still a dna and cellar base going on but more in tune with the faster electromagnetic, chemical and other nerve signals where a lot of processing takes place.

If an meme was a virus, then yes our immune system would be damaged. But since a meme is an idea, then it is our thinking and brain that is damaged. Neural networks are not perfect, they grow, build and adapt through trial and error. As we grow and interact with our environment our thoughts are conditioned. Somethings are the same for everyone like language and laws while other things are more diverse and personal like fashion and occupation.

Public thought is a very powerful force, has been a lot of work gone into how to tame this monster over the years. To introduce moderation, unless you own a powerful media organization one place you can practically start is with yourself.

originally posted by: TheOneElectric
I'm not here to argue with the ill. I'm simply here to state what appears to be an opinion that everyone may evaluate on their own. By sitting here and attempting to defend every attack I can exacerbate my symptoms and the attacker's as well. What an anti discussion based topic, right? Which is why it's in the rant forum and not the metaphysics area. Feel free to provide your thoughts, just know I'm not going to participate in a slugfest that will merely perpetuate the infection.

So we should simply agree with your verbiage and shut up, assuming you are not right and offer no challenge to your overly wrought point?

a reply to: TheOneElectric

Radicalism is an emergent property of a meme. It's not a meme in an of itself. It's only possible in memes that reach a certain level of maturity.

For example, Islam is a fully mature meme. It has rules that govern every important aspect of life and reproduction itself. The radicals spend all their time enforcing orthodoxy to the meme rules, putting it above organic life.

Radicalism is just blind orthodoxy, surely destructive for competing memes but also with significant collateral damage for the meme itself.

I believe "America" and the "American Dream" are memes. A huge self delusion if you ask me, but people still flock to the US for citizenship. The meme is alive and well on this 4th of July.