 The
Indri - Issue Forty-Seven |
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How to Exercise Your Insanity by Lowell Weber The human condition includes insanity. In a world of violence, insanity is considered unsanitary, unseemly, unsatisfactory, a legal refuge for the privately violent. Yet violence and insanity are not synonymous. Violence is far more likely to result in insanity than insanity to be the cause of violence, simply because the vast majority of death and injury by violence, if not it's actual frequency, is deliberate or 'state sponsored'. The problem with insanity, the word as well as the condition, is that it assumes there is a state of mind equivalent to sanity, a non-insane state. However, sanity is an arena of thought and action defined largely by what it isn't. Sane people don't do or think this or that. The mental health profession prefers the words like 'mental disorders' for insanity, which has the same problem, an assumption that there is order in the first place that is somehow definitive. Unlike sanity, insanity and disorder are clearly and specifically defined by behavior, brain chemistry, genetics and the entertainment industry. Since normal is slippery, no one wants to be the one who formally, academically, decides what normal looks like and how it behaves. If you are not identifiably insane or abnormal you must, by default, be sane and normal. Except no one who knows better would go that far either. Everyone is insane occasionally. Call it stress or trauma or terror or reaction to circumstances beyond personal control, people can react in ways that surprise even themselves. Panic is a form of insanity, but so is courage. Even the most staid and stable of us are hard wired to be part time or partly out of our minds. The Law, itself teetering on the brink of the less than sane, attempts to decide what's normal and abnormal behavior, or at least tries to be a deterrent to the perpetration of individual violence. An eye for an eye, and all that. To the legal system, it's okay to be insane as long as you keep it to yourself, keep it within the rules. The same is true with the medical establishment, bounce your head off the walls at home as long as you don't damage yourself to the point where you need to be sewn up by one of them. Being a demonstrable threat to yourself requires getting help. Being a threat to others is another matter entirely. Sane people don't hurt others which is why war is insane. Doesn't say much for the sanity of civilizations that they are so frequent, so brutal and so long lasting. But then, civilization qualifies for Einstein's purported definition of insanity, repeating the same experiment over and over while expecting a different result. Utopia is always just around the corner or would be if it weren't conceptually crazy, a destination where the wheels fall off rounding the curve. Feel like civilization is looking for the next pretext to destroy itself again? Panic rumbling around in your bowels? Maybe it's time to exercise your insanity and get some relief. Some general rules of acceptable insanity are:
The idea is to be an inoffensive head case. The last thing you want when you're out walking your looney is someone else making decisions for you! Keeping it on a leash won't be good enough, they'll want you to keep it in a kennel and never let it out. Where's the satisfaction in that? Because being harmlessly insane is fun. It feels good. For many of us it may be what we do best. What can a self-confessed, non-violent, insane person do to exercise their God given right (a handy bit of insanity to absorb blame) to be an object of avoidance? Good question. The arts, of course. You can drool all over a canvass with a brush, brutalize a guitar, torture a keyboard, chisel a rock into dust, you name it. If it has no practical redeeming value, if at least half the people who see or hear it think it's awful or worse, you know you're on the right track. To embrace art you must embrace insanity. Try to be sympathetic to those pathetic creatures who don't understand this basic principal. Art judged by the sane is like mutton curry judged by Scottish sheep, there's something unnatural, unsavory about it. So don't waste your mental aberrations worrying about critics or they might drive you sane. Then what good are you? It's not the quality of the art that counts, it's the quantity of the insanity behind the art that matters. No one can excuse themselves for not being artistic, lacking any talent. To do so is to claim they lack the capacity for insanity, which is completely nuts. Step in it, wallow in it, laugh hysterically at the benighted (might require practice in front of a mirror), take pride in your worst. No one else needs to appreciate your insanity as long as you do. If you don't, try harder, you can do it. You have until your last breath to get there. Artistic insanity is timeless. Art is by, for and about the mentally unbalanced, which is to say art is by, for and about everyone. Creativity can be contagious. Look for the inevitable, enviable, nonsensible crack in your reason. Find that secret place in yourself and you can in others, the place where they hide their latent disorders. Do that and wealth, fame and prestige, all that pedantic mainstream stuff, will fall on you like a tonne of poop. You're on your own then. A shark infested toilet if ever there was one. Good luck. On the other hand, if these trifles trip you up briefly during your jog through the aberrant, congratulations. Nothing fails like success. Being driven by others is the best way to lose your grip on your precious maniacal dysfunction. The mainstream is for bottom feeders, those who choose to resist being swept away. Insanity is all about eddies, swirling slowly round and round not getting anywhere because there's no place better to be than in the warm embrace of a disconcerted dissipation. Thinking outside of the box is for people stuck in boxes. Thinking outside of logic, outside of your skull, is how true art gets secreted. Art is the emesis of your insanity. Never clean up after yourself. Pity anyone who feels your inspired miasma should be tidied up. They live in nested boxes, think outside of one and they run smack into the next. Be kind, they are unenlightened, they aren't trying hard enough yet. Exercise your insanity like you would your heart and muscles, from a comfy chair wondering why people jog because they always look miserable. Go the extra kilomile, don't stop with contemplating your navel; imagine your anus ranting about philosophical inanities and you are on your way to true artistic disarticulation, viral idiosyncratic cacophony. But don't take my word for it. I'm crazy.
Lowell Weber is the illegal clone of half a dozen famous people. He believes there is nothing wrong with genetic modification as long as you say please.
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The Indri is one of the largest lemurs and is native
to the lowland and montane forests along the eastern coast of Madagascar,
from the Réserve Spéciale d'Anjanaharibe-Sud in the north to the
Mangoro River in the south. Herbivorous, they feed mainly on young,
tender leaves, but will also eat seeds, fruits, and flowers. Their
large greenish eyes and black face are framed by round, fuzzy ears.
Their silky fur is mostly black with white patches along the limbs,
neck, crown, and lower back. Different populations of the species
show wide variations in color, with some northern populations consisting
of mostly or entirely black individuals. Their face is bare with
pale black skin, and it is sometimes fringed with white fur and
they have only a rudimentary tail. They are about 64-72 cm tall
and weigh between 6 and 9.5 kg. They maintain an upright posture
when climbing or clinging and practice long-term monogamy, seeking
a new partner only after the death of a mate. They live in small
groups consisting of the mated male and female and their maturing
offspring. Like many other species of lemur, indri live in a female
dominant society. The dominant female often will displace males
to lower branches and poorer feeding grounds, and is typically the
one to lead the group during travel. Many groups move 300-700 m
daily, with most distance travelled midsummer in search of fruit.
They sleep in trees about 10-30 m above ground and typically sleep
alone or in pairs. They reach sexual maturity between the ages of
7 and 9 and females bear offspring every two to three years, with
a gestation period around 120-150 days. The mother is the primary
caregiver, though the father assists, remaining with his mate and
offspring, despite the infant clinging to their mother's belly until
they are four or five months old, at which time they move onto her
back. The indri begins to demonstrate independence at eight months.
They are the only mammal other than humans so far discovered which
can use rhythm. They make loud, distinctive songs, which can last
from 45 seconds to more than 3 minutes. Song duration and structure
varies among and even within groups, but most songs have a three-phase
pattern. Usually, a roaring sequence lasting for several seconds
will precede the more characteristic vocalizations. All members
of the group except the very young participate in this roar, but
the song proper is dominated by the adult pair. Different indri
groups typically sing sequentially, responding to one another. As
well as solidifying contacts between groups, the songs may communicate
territorial defense and boundaries, environmental conditions, reproductive
potential of the group members, and warning signals. Countless variations
are given on the legend of the indri's origins, but they all treat
them as sacred animals who are not to be harmed. Despite the origin
myths and traditional taboos (fady), however, in practice where
western influence is felt and economic times are tough, they are
hunted and their habitat destroyed due to slash and burn agriculture,
fuelwood gathering, and logging. They are a critically endangered
species. While population estimates are uncertain (1000 to 10000
individuals), the population appears to be rapidly shrinking and
may diminish by 80% over the next three generations.