freaking out the squares

i went and saw this new thing abt asia or something at the guggenheim this weekend and they had a bunch of stuff by fluxus, kaprow, ono & the like--the 'happenings' and all that shit. and then today tuomas repping hard for the flash mobs reminded me of this.

i have a sort of knee-jerk hate reaction for stuff like this, probably as much b/c i used to be one of those weenies who was all about freaking out the squares and now am horrified by what i used to be.

is it defendable tho? was there a point where this kind of 'art' or whatever wasnt narcissistic, exclusionary & condescending? is exclusionary a word? have squares ever actually been 'freaked out' enough to the point of a life change?

I used to be one of those weenies, too, but I think that's the reason I find these kinds of things endearing. Not awesome, per se, but defs makes me go, 'awwwww, look at those kids doing that thing.'

i spent a year after one summer camp placing every pay phone handset that i could find upside down

you still talk a bunch of shit to get attention.. is your remorse due to the fact that you used to get physically in peoples' faces and now hide behind the internet?

This really depends on whether you're inviting people toward the thing or thrusting it out on them, doesn't it? I really hate the mentality that tends to come with the latter -- it contains a really amazing combination of arrogance and point-missing.

(Also I'm sure I've gone on enough here about not liking the artsy American habit of being in love with "transgression" for its own sake.)

This really depends on whether you're inviting people toward the thing or thrusting it out on them, doesn't it?

i agree with this but im having a hard time coming up w/ examples of the former? and if they existed--i guess they maybe dont count as 'freaking out' the squares which i think sort of requires the FREAK OUT bit

dunno whats up with u finefinemusic but sorry if i offended u

anyway fluxus isn't a person (which is what you imply, saying you saw "art by fluxus, krapow, ono..") but most of the fluxus artists I've encountered attempted to get the viewer to think or re-examine things in new lights (Yoko's Instruction Pieces, for example) and I don't see the connection to turning pay phones upside down?

i spent a year after one summer camp placing every pay phone handset that i could find upside down

― max, Monday, 9 February 2009 19:31 (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

max 1, The Man 0.

i am aware that fluxus is not a person...

nothing personal max, just thought it was funny that you project an image of being this 17 year old dude who wants to get all in peoples' faces (from the posts I have seen) and then start this thread

Fwiw, I don't get that impression from Max.

As a dude who made many, many efforts to freak out the squares in his youth, I'm not a big fan of this kinda stuff now but like Abbott can't help finding it endearing that some people still think it's so significant. It's usually not significant--I doubt it results in a whole lot of life changes--and it's often short-sightedly stupid and dangerous for no reasonn

This kind of stuff isn't going to bring about massive social change, but you might hit some people right between the eyes. For the people who do this kind of stuff that's probably enough.

I don't mind anyone trying to freak me out so long as they retain a semi-civilized atitude about it. Then it becomes just another species of wit.

Max, I was thinking about art pieces, where anyone who's experiencing them is voluntarily walking into your world, whatever that might be. (Though there's a whole other question about a lot of art where people seem to sit together congratulating themselves on how the art is a grand assault on types of people who aren't even there to see it.)

There's also stuff that's yours -- like your personal appearance -- and if you get a kick out of using it to appall other people, well, that could be considered lame or juvenile, but it's not like you're really imposing that reaction on them.

nothing personal max, just thought it was funny that you project an image of being this 17 year old dude who wants to get all in peoples' faces (from the posts I have seen) and then start this thread

u crazy--max doesn't post like he's 17 at all

Can we have some examples of attempted square-freaking other than messing with payphones please?

hey, my impression is my impression. I'm not going to start looking for examples because that is psycho territory

er xpost to Q

YOUNG HOOS aka the attentionseeker: lol high school xxp

When I was 19, I spent most a summer walking around everywhere with a croquet mallet, just to see if I could. (Result: I could.)

lol i would love it if this thread were not about me

when I was 18 I was in Prague with friends and got v drunk then bought all the daily papers from two girls who were selling them on the street. it was rush hour in the morning and we stood there with a huge stack of papers, so masses of people streaming by assumed we were selling them. we gave some people free papers, for others we would just give them a sports section, or tear a paper in two and hand it to them, or just say "no, these are mine". people started to get really annoyed so we stopped after a short while.

hahahahahaha that is awesome

It was during that summer that Dan met and inspired the young man you now know as Fonzworth Bentley

XD

I, along with a few other people, once wore bedsheets to breakfast as "togas" while in Greece. To the hotel restaurant. The staff was pretty nice about it, considering.

Beatboxed extremely ineptly with my friend in central Manchester in the small hours, until we stopped and went home. Luckily we didn't get our heads kicked.

its not very surprising to me that so many posters on ilx have a history of square-freaking-out activities

and i guess looked at through that silly nostalgia lens it can be endearing--but the extreme narcissism of a lot of it still rubs me the wrong way, even when its innocent 17 yr olds.

There was a recent thing where people were reprogramming LED road signs to warn of impending zombie attacks; I thought that was actually pretty hilarious despite the evident potential danger involved.

the other day on the subway these two kids--looking like college frosh prob--were walking thru the cars with a big empty guitar case--one held it out and the other had this schpiel, something to the effect of "my friend here is trying to collect nothing, as much nothing as possible. please help him out by giving him nothing" and they solemnly walked down the car.

haha dan that was hilarious but i thought that was less freaking-out-the-squares and more pranksy lulz

When I was 14 years old, I expressed my disdain for a synagogue youth group "mall scavenger hunt" by using the hunt to instead approach random strangers and ask if they "would be interested in converting to Judaism."

I like to retroactively think of this as some kind of happening or situationist prank. It did sort of have that spirit.

Hurting, pls to turn your situationist lens on my church youth group going to a mall and ACTUALLY asking people if they'd like to convert to Evangelical Christianity. That kind of thing rly needs some fucking with.

I mean, is it so far out there that it's right back here again? Perhaps, perhaps....

teenagers are terrible

Oh, the idea of teenagers doing this stuff is totally natural, and I think most people put it down to just, umm, "kids, jacking around."

What's weird is when people manage to "grow up" without ever moderating this impulse, or -- worse -- actually adopting it as their deep and serious approach to life. And telling you about it. Really intently. I kind of blame the arts for this, because it's one of very few things that can allow people to pretend that mentality is an impressive reaction to life.

my sophomore year at college these kids studying allen kaprow were supposed to do a 'happening' and they made all these flyers saying zack braff was coming to talk at our school--and all these kids showed up to the place where it was supposed to be and it was this tiny little room that they crammed themselves in--and then all was revealed: zack braff wasnt coming and they had just been 'happened' or whatever.

There was this guy in my class freshman year who would regularly get really high and prance around the Store24 in Harvard Square following people trying to get them to dance with him. We called him The Hopper. He stopped doing this after we caught him at a meal in the freshman union and shouted "OMG IT'S THE HOPPER! DANCE, DANCE FOR US!" at him.

Actually I don't think I ever saw him on campus again, I hope he didn't kill himself.

ugh mall roving; I used to run into Victoria's Secret, shout "the thing I hate about this store is that they never have anything in my size!" then run away. God that was terrible.

xp: lololol max

Oh, the idea of teenagers doing this stuff is totally natural, and I think most people put it down to just, umm, "kids, jacking around."

What's weird is when people manage to "grow up" without ever moderating this impulse, or -- worse -- actually adopting it as their deep and serious approach to life. And telling you about it. Really intently. I kind of blame the arts for this, because it's one of very few things that can allow people to pretend that mentality is an impressive reaction to life.

― nabisco, Monday, February 9, 2009 2:55 PM (49 seconds ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

yes this is roughly my least favorite personality trait in an adult, the 'hey have i blown your mind yet' attitude

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Third_Wave

(xxxpost) and then the kids that organised it got the shit kicked out of them?

the wave is an awesome movie

not really sure zack braff fans are the ass-kicking type

They might pelt you with Xanax.

yeah this is definitely more "acceptable" for teenagers than adults but that still doesn't make me want to actually be near any teenagers for any period of time

yes this is roughly my least favorite personality trait in an adult, the 'hey have i blown your mind yet' attitude

seems these dudes always end up working for those charity subscription street gangs

I feel kind old now: if I had told people sophomore year of college that Zach Braff was going to be somewhere, they'd have said "is that that one theater major"

yeah i did this shit all the time too. made elaborate plans to do a thing called "safety pals" where 2 of us would wear full on safety construction gear in coffeehouses and have another dude some through like running with scissors or something which we would then interrupt and deliver a short monologue on the inherent safety issues while the other one videotaped, did it once and it didnt work well. other videocamera impromptu interview stuff. realized that Coyle and Sharpe had done everything i could think of better in the 50's so i stopped.

i guess stuff like that is fine when yer in your teens, maybe early 20's. but more like a "its ok kid youll get over it" kind of thing for me than really any nostalgia i guess.

xpost hahahahahahaaaa dan i remember you doing that victorias secret thing. you probably remember some of the dumb awful shit i used to do better than i do o_O.

You can see these sorts of things as "pranks" or you can see them in a more pretentious way as "disrupting the comforts of people's mundane reality" or something. But I think there are differences between the former and latter, e.g. toilet-papering a tree is a "prank" because it's so within the acceptable realm of prankdom at this point that no one experiences any confusion when they see a tp'd tree. The zombie sign thing strays a little beyond "prank" for people actually experiencing it on the spot but once it makes the blogs it becomes a run-of-the-mill internet funny and no longer disorienting in any way.

Nabisco, I agree with you about the overemphasis on "transgression" in art, but I think part of the problem is that it's often transgression that is aimless and/or takes place within such a carved out "safe space" for transgression (like a graphic performance art piece at some art-lover's loft party or something) that it doesn't have any impact. In a way I think Andy Kaufman did more to genuinely confuse people by reading Great Gatsby at a college comedy event than a lot of proper "artists" do with their work.

Marilyn Manson Now Going Door-to-Door Trying to Shock People

I love to watch jackass reruns fwiw

yes this is roughly my least favorite personality trait in an adult, the 'hey have i blown your mind yet' attitude

Ugh, yes.

Actually, what someone DID do when I was in college was put out a bunch of fliers about how you could make $200 for participating in a research thing about condom sizing, and you should show up at 7am if your penis was longer than 9 inches, and 8am if it was fewer -- people who showed up at 8am found a sign saying the study had been canceled due to the school's lack of penis size. This got a lot of dudes out of bed at 7:30 in the morning, is the thing.

(Thankfully, despite being poor, I slept through it, so I don't know if/when Braff showed up)

i think this is also related to another thread i wanted to start about 'funny assholes'--like reading about rauschenberg's appearance on japanese tv where he was supposed to be interviewed by a famous art critic + the audience--and he just sat there and ignored everyone and made a combine and then pasted the questions to the TV set or something. kaufman reading gatsby sort of counts as this too.

and its pretty lolzy but its also a totally dick move--imo this goes from being "funny but assholish" to just straight up assholish when you add in "oh yes i am an asshole but its in the name of art/politics/a point"

also (maybe this is too obvious to say) a lot of it has to do w/ the people who the prank is played on--i.e. im all for playing pranks on college comedy fans or zack braff fans (sort of), but japanese art lovers?

people do things lets talk about them

when I was 6 years old I stole a bit of chalk from my class and wrote FUCK in large letters on the wall outside where we lined up to go back in to class after break just to see what kind of consternation it caused. It caused quite a bit and I got snitched on by someone who had seen. Got made to sit outside the headmaster's office for the rest of the day before he gave me a telling off that lasted roughly 20 seconds and was really half-hearted/clearly not particularly serious.

u happenin'?

I mean, 7:30 is pretty early to get up for a dick joke, is what I'm saying.

Hurting, my "transgression" issue is the thinking-though, exactly -- I feel like it should be self-evident that there are useless conventions that are worth transgressing on, and there are also very good conventions that we should support. But there's a kind of rhetoric in a lot of places where transgression is valorized as if it's just a positive thing no matter what, no matter what it signifies or erodes or builds.

When I was in Montreal during the comedy festival one year (not there for the festival) there were a lot of street "happenings" that were on the whole quite fun and no more than moderately disruptive (one group sort of pestered people eating dinner in an outdoor cafe, but they were funny.)

I guess the dance thing in the train station (on the other thread) is annoying partly because it's sort of empty of any social or political content AND purports to be this cheerful, day-brightening thing and what it in fact did was clog the station and make people late for their engagements. I don't think there'd be anything wrong with that if it weren't disruptive or if it had some EXTREMELY pressing and immediate political nature (and it'd have to be a really good one of local relevance, not just, like, Free Tibet.)

when I was 6 years old I stole a bit of chalk from my class and wrote FUCK in large letters on the wall outside where we lined up to go back in to class after break just to see what kind of consternation it caused. It caused quite a bit and I got snitched on by someone who had seen. Got made to sit outside the headmaster's office for the rest of the day before he gave me a telling off that lasted roughly 20 seconds and was really half-hearted/clearly not particularly serious.

I did the exact same thing aged around 5...but on the blackboard. Someone also snitched on me.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/17/19653879_4ac91ef71b_m.jpg

I did the exact same thing aged around 5...but on the blackboard. Someone also snitched on me.

― Local Garda

Haters everywhere.

I love this video:

(John Cage performing water walk on the tv show "I've Got a Secret" in 1960)

I'm sure a large majority of the TV audience probably just did their rehearsed "THIS is MUUUUUUUSIIIC?!" routine and moved on. But maybe some of them at least brought it up at the next dinner party they went to and had a conversation about what music is, and maybe a few even spent some time thinking about how they define the boundaries of music, and I think that's a pretty good thing.

regardless of the attitude actually behind (or merely projected onto) "art" like this, i am totally in support of people who get out and do stuff - unusual stuff, creative stuff of whatever sort. it's rare and cool and way too easy to sneer at.

way too easy

in what why is this stuff creative or unusual tho

xpost

infalulz @ this thread tho

fluxus? or flashmobbing? or just "freaking squares" in general? everything's less than unusual, if you're inclined to be a hardass about it. and everything's specific, distinct, individual if you wanna come at it the other way. most people don't organize events of this kind, so "unusual" works for me. and creative isn't any big deal, just that which creates.

that to the x, not to infalulz

in what why is this stuff creative or unusual tho

In what way is WHICH stuff creative or unusual? The kind of sneering generalization you're making smacks of either 1) latent conservatism or 2) a jaded "i've seen it all" mentality which is a direct result of people doing things like this too many times.

it's rare and cool and way too easy to sneer at.

Whereas sneering at the squares takes an enormous amount of effort.

And if it's the latter, generalizing seems wrong since it assumes that it's no longer possible for anyone to surprise you.

I think the "which stuff" question needs answering before y'all get into it! I mean, we seem to be talking mostly about the teenage "weirding people out" upthread, which isn't particularly unusual and typically isn't in the service of anything great or creative -- it's just, you know, jacking around.

i'm consistently surprised by my own inability to type correctly fwiw

Yeah, but there's such a wide range of "weirding people out."

Also if you're actually criticizing even teenagers for doing this kind of thing you're basically sucking the fun out of being a teenager.

the phrase 'jacking around' is freaking me out. is this a eastcoastism like being 'on line' instead of 'in line'?

"and creative isn't any big deal, just that which creates."

semantic cop out

Where in the U.S. do people not say "jacking around?"

(Is this an old-people term that kids have given up in order to avoid sounding like they've been masturbating together?)

(When I say "jacking around" to people born after 1985 are they looking at me like o_O???)

(AM I A FREAKED-OUT SQUARE?)

I've never heard that phrase before.

pretty sure if youre talking about jacking around with teenagers youre the one freaking other people out

me neither and I am older then nabisco. screwing around is more acceptable.

I say "dicking around," though my parents always found the pharse a bit crude.

the beginning of college does seem to coincide with a phase in everyone's lives where they become more exhibitionistic and narcissistic

It is pretty damn o_O as a group of words.

xp: Yeah, I/people around me definitely use the phrase "screwing around" to denote idle-mischief type things. Where the hell did "jacking around" come from.

"dicking around", too

I say "jacking around" the way you're using it, nabisco, and when someone gives me the old o_O I figure I'm just freaking out the squares and figure they're at least paying attention to what I'm saying.

me, i prefer to fuck around

to dmr - it's not a cop out. people like to make creativity into some big deal, like the kind of creativity that gets you into artforum is of a different caliber & kind than that which inclines yr. grammy to make you latch-hook wall ornament or some teenager to wear hilarious clothing - but it isn't. i'm in support of it either way, and hate the privileging of the "important" sort over the un. honestly, i just like it when people make & do, color outside the bounds, act stupid in pursuit of attention or self-expression or whatever. i find it endearing, and at its best, transformative.

I think I agree with you.

Thx for the Cage video, Hurting. Wonderful stuff.

Oh wow, it's true -- Google search volume suggests "jack" is one of your less popular words in that construction. It's not exactly hard to get your mind around in context, though, surely.

jerking, screwing, messing, dickign, fucking yeah pretty much. i like 'mucking about' but that's not for americans is it? (i kind of lose track from being on the internet where people from all different backgrounds bring their own twist on the english language to the mix)

i just like it when people make & do, color outside the bounds, act stupid in pursuit of attention or self-expression or whatever. i find it endearing, and at its best, transformative.

― dagmar at full power (contenderizer), Monday, February 9, 2009 3:49 PM (1 minute ago) Bookmark

Yeah, agreed.

who the hell is dmr? I am the original (creative) three initial poster goddamnit

Also, all the people on ILX who are saying things like "I don't hate fun, I just don't need assholes like this to show me how to have it," -- I DON'T BELIEVE YOU

I hate fun if other people are having it at my expense.

i don't hate fun, i just hate assholes

I DON'T BELIEVE YOU

I do hate fun

i dont believe those people because saying things like that implies that participating in flash mobs is fun, which i cant imagine it is

It seems like that kind of fun where you are inwardly cringing

You mean a SMASH MOUTH concert?

hurting i don't necessarily dislike this stuff if it's not so pointed and intrusive and makes allowances for the fact that maybe the assailee already commits random acts of kindness, is hip to chemtrails etc. usually when you show knowledge of or empathy with the freakers' position or whatever you see a flash of disappointment that tells you their crusade is coming from somewhere more narcissistic and narrow than they're letting on. obviously.
i think people should look up at the sky more often, it tends to help me sort out all types of things mentally (beyond 'where's the sky at? haha) but i do it by suggesting that they look up at the sky, simple is best. also i say it to people i know

you tell people to look at the sky?

http://www.worldofstock.com/slides/PAD4343.jpg

I went to a Smashmouth concert and it was totally fun! (I didn't pay, though.)

Also I have nothing in particular against "freaking out the squares" per se but I do have a problem with "fucking up public transportation for no reason".

look, over there, it's worldofstock.com

Also I have nothing in particular against "freaking out the squares" per se but I do have a problem with "fucking up public transportation for no reason".

herein lies the thin line between artist and asshole

FFM OTM about instructional and participatory art not equalling douchebaggey shit done as a teenager or freshman art student.

xxp watch out she has a bazurlka.... lunchtime

i feel like i should extend the benefit of the doubt to "fluxus, kaprow, ono & the like" because i basically have no lived experience of the context in which those happenings happened. the cold war social consensus pretty much sucked.

haven't really been following the thread tho.

i'm practically a duchamp stan but acting like flashmob dudes are anything other than reprehensible is crazy to me

herein lies the thin line between artist and asshole

― Mr. Que, Monday, February 9, 2009 9:12 PM (4 seconds ago)

weren't fluxus trying to freak out the HIP?

what about.. the bread and puppet theatre? they somehow manage to be a big spectacle and sort of freak people out a bit but also completely avoid the jerky irritating aspects of any of this, though if you just read their pamphlets you might think otherwise ("ART should be everywhere because ART is the INSIDE OF THE WORLD" - yet somehow when they say it you totally believe them and want to run away with them!)

^^^their puppets and stilt people totally freaked me out as a kid

btw:

run-of-the-mill internet funny

is an u&k concept that should be investigated further

who the hell is dmr? I am the original (creative) three initial poster goddamnit

― bnw, Monday, February 9, 2009 2:53 PM (22 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Sorry, dude, jel was posting a good two months before you.

WHERE THE FUCK IS WESTLIFE........
I WANT THERE VIDEO CLIP....

AND MYA WELL SHE IS A DYKE

― Rick, Friday, October 5, 2001 8:00 PM (7 years ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

sorry there is obv a difference btw the fluxus/ono/kaprow side of 'this' and the flash mob side (and btw fluxus and ono and kaprow themselves) not that i have any clue what 'this' is anymore but does someone w/ an art history degree or whatever want to drop some knowledge abt the fluxus-axis (incl also cage, young, rauschenberg) re: square-freaking?

I have no art degree, but I'm not aware of the Fluxus types doing much of anything that people weren't voluntarily showing up to experience.

What's weird is when people manage to "grow up" without ever moderating this impulse, or -- worse -- actually adopting it as their deep and serious approach to life. And telling you about it. Really intently. I kind of blame the arts for this, because it's one of very few things that can allow people to pretend that mentality is an impressive reaction to life.

― nabisco, Monday, February 9, 2009 7:55 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

http://theicarusproject.net/downloads/Adbusters07Cover.jpg

maybe i shouldnt speak out of turn but i def dont think that fluxus was about square-freaking it was really a conversation between experts/practicioners within the art world rather than dudes taking the train home from work

http://www.helmethairblog.com/entries/freaking-out-the-squares/

also: wherefore art thou ken kesey

i demand a taxonomy of freaking squares out

self-expression, like freaking people out, is extremely over-valued and doesn't qualify as a legitimate artistic intention, imho. i happen to think that self-expression is a condition of ALL expression and that it carries the mark of its creator by that virtue. by the same token, if your 'art' however it's presented is challenging and controversial in its content, it stands to reason that you'll shake more people up than if your intention is just purely disruptive -- even if it's disruptive in a playful way.

pwned by the xls again :( (i was on ama though!)

max i have a very large book of interviews with contemporary artists, all of whom are very interested in freaking out squares. they will tell you all about it at length and i will sell it to u for $200 us

http://7deadlysinners.typepad.com/sinners/2006/10/2006_calgary_zo.html

Ha, I hadn't considered the Adbusters types. I guess artsy square-freakers are way preferable, in that I feel like the insane endpoint of that impulse is something like being an aging transit worker who does horrible performance art, or just living off disability payments in a squalid SRO, whereas the insane endpoint of people who want to free us all from the yoke of capitalism is either terrorism or a life of asking extremely tedious non-questions at panel discussions while two ISO friends nod gravely

i should admit: i have been in the past an admitted georges bataille stan, for reasons i will not go into here.

See that's the thing though: the Adbusters types I know make lots of gestures at activism, but it's pretty clear to me from extended contact that they're much more interested in freaking out the squares via "social subversion"

xp

Hoos are you really trying to tell me those subtly doctored ads you saw didn't FREE YR MIND?

Hoos are you really trying to tell me those subtly doctored ads you saw made didn't FREE YR MIND?

― nabisco, Monday, February 9, 2009 9:39 PM (1 second ago) Bookmark

someone wrote vivez sans temps mort on a wall once

Mad magazine has done a better job of that than Adbusters for years & years, on the real. OTOH it had a big rep for 'freaking out the squares' for a long time.

It is good bcz it is actually funny.

Haha, I can't believe I didn't remember this sooner, but about a week before college graduation, I sat down and wrote about 50 weird "messages," mostly just surreal poetry in the second person, and e-mailed one of them, randomly, to each person in the senior class. I got a few funny responses, but most people ignored them. And so I thought that that was that until the dean called me into her office a couple days later and informed me that this handsome swimmer dude who was our valedictorian had reported a potential e-mail hack on campus: he and several of his friends had received cryptic e-mails and were concerned for their safety. (I had sent the messages from an anonymous Hotmail account but used the same idiosyncratic username as my college e-mail address, which I thought would at least indicate that I was a student.) A subsequent meeting was set up with the director of information services, who told me, in response to my defense that it was an "art project," that there were more appropriate outlets for art projects, like for instance art school. Also that c'mon, it wasn't really "art." After which I went to the library and checked out a book about conceptual art and e-mailed her a transcription of Sol LeWitt's Sentences on Conceptual Art. Which was the last word, because I never heard from anyone about it again.

Good times. In highschool a few friends of mine and I were goofing off, and I decided to have some fun and pull a few pranks that day. In one of them I dressed up in a scary way, with a black trenchcoat, slicked back hair, smoking a cigarette, and we saw this old lady walking down the street ... and I took this metal pipe I saw on the ground. I begin trailing this old lady slowly ... then faster ... and she starts walking faster ... and then I start banging the metal pipe against the curb. She practically starts running away. The best part was she thought she was going to die.

So yes, the stuff I do online I once did in real life. I'm an awful person.

jesus christ burt

O_O

three cheers for burt_stanton

HILARIOUS!

The best part was she thought she was going to die.

Golden!

hey maybe that little old lady realized that life is short and her breakfast the next morning was the best she ever tasted in her life etc etc

Well, there's not much fun around when you grow up in a dingy urbany hell hole... combines the boredom of the suburbs with the misery of crumbling infrastructure and abandoned hope.

and alligators and hipsters

And making people fear for their lives!

I mean, why stay at home and learn to draw or learn the guitar or how to cook or try and find a girl to make out with when you could be scaring the shit out of the innocent!

Well, when you grow up getting your ass beat just for walking around, you develop a taste for antisocial behavior. I'm nothing like that anymore, but environment does play a role. Note: this is North Jersey. Uhg.

e-mailed her a transcription of Sol LeWitt's Sentences on Conceptual Art.

lollll

on that ass

i should admit: i have been in the past an admitted georges bataille stan, for reasons i will not go into here.

― max, Monday, February 9, 2009 10:38 PM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

would it be self-parody at this stage to say OHHH GODDDD NOT THAT GUY?

srsly tho wtf. i don't even pretend to get his deal.

Other popular hobbies in where I grew up (none of which I did, btw): throwing things at people on the street from moving cars (usually Slurpees), hiding behind bushes and throwing rocks at passing cars, taking furniture in peoples' backyards and running it over in the street, etc. etc.

burt i think you are on the far side of the line that separates self-conscious eccentricity which we have been discussing and dissociated sociopathic impulse which we have not

When everybody's doing it, can it be sociopathic? It's simply being ... attuned to prevailing social attitudes.

i am thankful to burt_stanton for allowing me to see that burning down my neighbors mailbox and bushes was an artistic statement.

enrique i was half-thinking of your and doms 'leftists who hate the working class' thread when i was making this

Basically you don't want to raise your kids in a grubby lower-middle class North Jersey town. I remember as a 14 year old these two Puerto Rican guys got off at our bus stop and my friends were trying to start a fight with them ... and we got back to the hometown and they threw -me- up against the wall and beat me, even though I said nothing! That is life, my friends.

i apologize for bringing up bergson's essay on laughter again (actually not really because it's brilliant and everyone should read it) but it occurs to me that if there's any social impulse behind "freaking out the squares" (that goes beyond simply wanting to establish an "inside" that you get to be part of (even if it's an "inside" of one, wearing a trenchcoat)) it's along the lines of what tuomas was saying about flash mobs - to zannggg people out of whatever routine they're in - to surprise people, to goose them out of a rut.

bergson says this is what laughter is for. he says that laughter occurs when we see something mechanical embedded in the living; laughter communicates that we've seen it, reminding ourselves (and possibly the person who we are laughing at) to be more attuned to the slippery litheness of actual life. to illustrate this he gives examples of a couple of timeless gags - the absent-minded professor and someone walking into a lamppost - in both cases the person has allowed themselves to behave mechanically and has ceased to be aware of reality.

so, flash mobs need to be funny if they want to accomplish their social function (if they have a social function)

not totally related but:

inspired by some lefty newspaper from medocino county i once walked through my undergrad parking lot with a sharpie adding "why?" to every "question authority" bumper sticker i could find.
― gygax! (gygax!), Monday, March 3, 2003 7:22 PM (5 years ago)

burt stfu you maniac

how many were there? xp

so, one time when i was living in DC, i got off the subway and started home, and this young woman got off at the same time as me, and then we were both walking together in this urban moonscape, and it was really late at night, and she kept going in the same direction as me, about 20 yards ahead, and i could tell it was starting to freak her out, cuz she kept looking back and speeding up and slowing down and crossing the street randomly, but i coudn't help it cuz i just wanted to go home and we apparently lived in more-or-less the exact same place. eventually, i pretended i lived somewhere else so i could stop following her, and walked around in the dark for a while until i figured it was okay to actually go home

funny story

it was a big school and it was a kind of en vogue statement at the time (George Bush was prez, war in iraq, recession, housing crash, hey wait a sec....)

there's also a weird rhyme going on here with modern terrorist theory, i.e. dumm old drones need to be SHOCKED into recognition of their opressed and compromised status and only a mammoth spectacle will do it

it never, ever "works"

what seems to link dada, surrealism, fluxus, situationism, and flashmobs -- at least the way people talk about these things now, and probably because of the great chic of situationism -- is the desire to "break the boundary between art and life".

this seems to me a fatuous idea tbh.

xpost

there's also a weird rhyme going on here with modern terrorist theory, i.e. dumm old drones need to be SHOCKED into recognition of their opressed and compromised status and only a mammoth spectacle will do it

yep exactly. that irish guy who was trying to bomb something (hazy but this is all true) claimed performance art as a defence. and the baader-meinhof lot would have been aware of the situationists. setting off a small bomb in a department store -- it's just a demo, something 'performed' amid life. bertolucci's 'partner' (1968), directly informed by situationism, is an interesting take on this bit of psychodrama.

If being smug and condescending helped people recognize their own oppression, we'd be living in utopia by now.

so basically you picked on old ladies cuz you were a big pussy that talked shit to some puerto rican dudes and got your card pulled. nice.

im interested in the fluxus & neo-dada guys b/c from what people seem to be saying on this thread they werent really square-freakers so much--but for some reason they have passed into the popular (?)/my imagination as such. did this happen? why? who turned fluxus from a bunch of art nerds into ken keseys merry pranksters?

i dont think im imagining this take on fluxus or ono or kaprow, since this was very much the tone of the descriptions of these works @ the gugg.

if there's any social impulse behind "freaking out the squares" it's along the lines of what tuomas was saying about flash mobs - to zannggg people out of whatever routine they're in - to surprise people, to goose them out of a rut.

isn't this like culture jamming challops 101

Not really, M@tt, those incidents were years apart. It was just to demonstrate that there was a general air of malevolence to the prevailing culture. If you grew up in say, Brooklyn back in the day, it wouldn've probably been that x 10. It's just how it goes.

haha, my mom was telling me a story about how when she was a teenager she and her friends uprooted an entire tree with their car and dragged it into the middle of the road. I mean, this is how it is. If you grew up in some pussy town that has cafes with "poetry nights", then fine, this might seem weird. New Jersey is a strange place, my friends.

(note: my mom was a rich DAR girl from a rich town, so it's not a class thing ... NJ just sucks).

hoos yeah i was just recapitulating the idea in order to set up the parallel with bergson's theory of laughter

this thread is like gazing into the abyss

in knoxville on christmas eve about 110 years ago a mob of people dragged FENCES onto the RAILROAD TRACKS

the same night, a huge mob convened downtown making a deafening racket with pennywhistles and when police attempted to intervene they were SURROUNDED and WHISTLED AT

((c) secret knoxville)

http://www.amazon.com/Knoxvilles-Secret-History-Jack-Neely/dp/096504260X

If you grew up in some pussy town that has cafes with "poetry nights", then fine, this might seem weird.

i grew up on a farm outside of small town. we didn't have cafes or poetry nights. we did all kinds of retarded shit and ppl got beat up by hesher dudes or whatever but, you know, i guess i never thought about peformance art like threatening old ladies with a pipe as an outlet...mostly just drank and chilled and listened to heavy metal and punk.

ok then pussyton

You were a punk who was nice and polite and threw your jacket down on puddles so old ladies could cross without getting their orthopedic shoes wet. Very nice of you. When you grow up in a boring, over crowded shit hole with lots of people from lots of different backgrounds all of whom hate each other, there might be some conflict. There's a reason the area I grew up in was one of the main hotbeds of X_HARDCORE_X.

god wtf am i doing? you are burt_stanton.

okay thread just got 1000x better

Have you lived anywhere besides NJ? I think this isn't NJ-specific stuff you're saying.

"so, one time when i was living in DC, i got off the subway and started home, ..."

I saw a short film once that had this exact plot. It was pretty funny, but I can't remember the name.

Flash Mobs: hipsters that burt_stanton can get behind.

NJ poets:

Walt Whitman
William Carlos Williams
Amiri Baraka
Robert Pinsky
Stephen Crane
Marianne Moore
Dorothy Parker
Richard Wilbur
Allen Ginsberg
Yusef Komuyakaa
Gerald Stern
Maxine Kumin
C. K. Williams
Lynda Hull
A. R. Ammons
X. J. Kennedy
Stephen Dunn
Rafael Campo
Jane Cooper
Stephen Dunn
David Ferry
Toi Derricotte
Alicia Suskin Ostriker
Ntozake Shange
Laurie Sheck
Judith Viorst
Elinor Wylie
James Richardson

NJ is pretty unique in these respects, Abbott. It's not a city I"m talking about, you know.

thread titles makes me think 'faking out the parents'

not really sure why i thought a thread about freaking out squares would end up anywhere else than burt_stanton arguing with someone about something

I am loving burt_stanton's posts on this thread because I'm convinced he's a sockpuppet (of a poster I won't name) that is being used as a conceptual art project. Through the looking-glass...

I have a theory too

if so, it's some very high level puppetry.

he has rounded himself out as a puppet recently. props.

yes, it's a high-level poster if I'm right (but enough about that)

burt_and_puppets theater

http://thegoodparts.files.wordpress.com/2007/11/bruce-springsteen-silence-is-unpatriotic-2.jpg

pussyton

I missed this genre, but it sounds great: someone email me some tracks and start a rolling thread on ILM, please

http://www.bigthings.ca/alberta/pictures/kbassa1.jpg

i agree with fucking shit up when you are a kid because you live in a fucked up place and because whatever, but i do not agree with threatening to pulverize old ladies. you can't blame everything on your cityscape or your peers or whatever. then again, i did some SUPER horrible crap as a kid, so whatever...

anyway, i don't think art that disrups the "surface order" (surface complacency, etc.) of society is necessarily horseshit, and dragging in sociopathic terror-art doesn't help clarify the debate. one of the things that's most stultifying about urban life is it's rigorous, chaotic normalcy, the flow and pattern of large scale events. this is what gives a magical, otherworldly quality to large-scale disruptions, whether they be as peaceful as unexpected snowstorms or as violent as the feeling of lawlessness that reigns during riots.

we understand social spaces because we understand the rules that govern them. these rules are, for the most part, useful and valuable and cool - but they're also so fully integrated into our experience of life that we often don't even recognize them. it's nice, therefore, to see what the city actually looks/feels like when the rules are, for whatever reason and in whatever way, suspended. it makes it easier to see the city for what it is, rather than just what we expect it to be. one doesn't have to learn from or be changed by this experience for it to be valid. for me, sometimes it's just pleasant, and i thank the engineers, conscious or unconscious, of the disruption.

three whatevers in one paragraph. where is edit button for undoing shame?

no wait, it was joke? see?

hah

contenderizer's united states of whatever

dammit now i'm starting to read that other thread as "Facebook flashmob shuts down stanton"

rule 1 don't make it so obvious
rule 2 get paid!
rule 3 is a bit cruel nevermind

lol stan ryland. stan of evil morelike

"It's not the image you want in your head as you're about to board a plane," said Christie Carlson of the Denver suburb of Thornton. "My daughter asked me `Is that the devil's horse?'"

In 2006, Jimenez was killed when a section of the unfinished horse fell from a hoist at his Hondo, N.M., studio. Jimenez's sons, Adan and Orion, completed the sculpture, which was installed Feb. 11, 2008.

Yeah, that thing's gonna curse an airplane sometime soon.

Jimenez then proposed the mustang — wild horses that symbolize the West and provided long distance travel, like airplanes today.

Yeah yeah right: I think we all know everyone in that room was like "yeah, totally, go Broncos!"

http://ztatic.net/grphx/lit/re-search%20-%20pranks1-1.jpg

^^ max for your taxonomic purposes i would consider this a definitive source, a plus five star

http://ztatic.net/grphx/lit/re-search%20-%20pranks1-1.jpg

THIS

one of the things that's most stultifying about urban life is it's rigorous, chaotic normalcy, the flow and pattern of large scale events. this is what gives a magical, otherworldly quality to large-scale disruptions, whether they be as peaceful as unexpected snowstorms or as violent as the feeling of lawlessness that reigns during riots.

what on god's green earth is 'rigorous chaotic normalcy' supposed to mean?

i like snowstorms, but they're not otherwordly. or at least: we have had a mild three decades, at least in the uk. violent, lawless riots i can live without.

'rigorous chaotic normalcy'

i think that i had a dude that was this in D&D when i was a kid

A couple of the famous NJ poets on that list are actually from Stanton's hardscrabble town, iirc (Paterson, yes?).

I was born in Ptown but grew up in the surrounding area (which looks like Queens, basically). Allen Ginsburg, William Carlos Williams, etc. etc., are all Paterson associates. Lots of famous people were born there ... it's a lovely place, really.

20 minutes ago I used the word "hardscrabble" to describe a mother and son as sympathetic plaintiffs before a jury. Was it just on TV or something? Weird.

by "rigorous, chaotic normalcy" (ha) i meant the way the surface texture of "ordinary" day-to-day human interaction seems to allow a huge degree of diversity, but at the same time takes place within rigorously defined limits. lights change at intervals, trains run more-or-less on time. people wear clothes and do not shoot guns at one another. most conversations take place in a few shared languages. commuter traffic flows into town in the morning and out in the evening. there is a great deal of moment-to-moment chaos & variation, but the larger patterns are remarkably consistent.

this remarkable (and thus unremarkable) consistency is what makes social disruptions so transformative. when, in seattle, it snows unexpectedly, because it does not often snow, the ordinary laws that govern human interaction and perception are slightly, temporarily altered. people make more noise, play more, speak more openly with strangers. the city looks different and we are forced to relate to it in new ways. i noticed something similar during the WTO (police) riots a while back. the sense that the normal social contract had been lifted (or broken) transformed the city, making it seem new, strange, provisional open to a huge variety of otherwise impossible possibilities. for worse in many ways, but also for better. it was a liberating experience.

i'm not advocating for social collapse, just suggesting that small deviations from prevailing norms can have a big effect in what urban spaces mean to us, and how we conceive of ourselves in them.

all that "rig chao norm" business presumes to describe the experience of existing in an orderly, functional, well-maintained and controlled society. understand that lots of folks do not enjoy the luxury of rigorously controlled chaos, one upshot being a lot more gunplay.

Anyway, surviving New Jersey gives you a really ... boisterous personality, which is sometimes called a "New Jersey swagger".

lol

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2197/2027993543_9ee108bfa0.jpg

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/48/105921725_1a612fa818.jpg?v=0

less flattering

Is that your wife?

boisterous, pipe-wielding, new jersey

they dont call it 'dirty jurzz' for nothin

in my experience most kids from genuinely tough neighborhoods do not do things like menace old ladies with pipes for no reason

NOTE: no one actually calls it that xpost

It's not tough in the working class sense. It's tough in that everyone's a malcontent lunatic mixed in with angry immigrants and there's nothing to do except get drunk and do drugs.

north jersey is like one of those cartoon fights that's the giant cloud with fists and feet sticking out of it.

that sounds more like what I was picturing

xpost, I mean, not that bizarre cloud metaphor

hahaha bizarre

You're like my straight man. and I'm the guy looking down his wayfarer sunglasses with his thumbs up in a sassy way. awesome, man!

burt never stop

when i first read that, i thought you were saying, "there's nothing to do except get drunk and do legos." which was fucking with my mental image.

substance-influenced lego building is definitely worthwhile, btw, and may even wake you out of your industrial age slumber

freaking out with squares (of legos)

I think I need to go on one of those spirit retreats ... you know, the kind of things you'd see in family movies in the touchy-feely early 90s.

"I'm having a mid life crisis." What losers.

Jesus Christ it's NJ and it's not all that unique esp for areas surrounding large cities.

NJ is pretty unique in these respects, Abbott.

I take it you've never been to Long Island?

Long Island is artificial. BIlly Joel. New Jersey? Got the 'Steen. nuff said.

fwiw NJ does not have the steen

who does, "the american people?" that's bullcrap.

Well there's no question that Springsteen > Joel. All I'm saying is the kind of environment you're describing is found outside of N Jersey etc.

Texas has the Steen(driver)!

Nah, NJ has the stereotype of being a hotbed for weirdos, particularly by real tru-blu New Yorkers. "there's somethin in the watah oveah there"

I'm having custos level fantasies about an lj and bs FAP

burt does have a point about NJ, tho. not many people know that todd solondz's happiness is actually a documentary.

i wish people did say "oveeah"

particularly my bizarre cloud metaphor. that's the most accurate part, according to hurting 2.

clouds is another thing i wish were so, like when people fought, there'd just be these big puffballs with angry faces and popeye fists sticking out, little stars here and there

that would rule imo

yeah, totally. see, we're all pro-cloud here, all except: HURTING 2.

Haha, I actually totally misread your post, I just realized. Was picturing an angry cloud with two fists and two feet, raring for a fight with another cloud.

that would be cool too

BATTLECLOUDS

There we go, new flash game sensation.

who can make it happen

i will not condone cloud-on-cloud violence. sorry guys.

http://www.worth1000.com/entries/275000/275417SxAW_w.jpg
squaring out the freaks

^ holee shit

http://i274.photobucket.com/albums/jj242/donaldparsley/squarehed.jpg

Titles and credits fade in and out against a plain white background, later understood as a bright but overcast sky. Silence at first; then, distantly, gradually augmenting: strange, hollow music.

The clouds begin to rush downwards as the camera climbs higher and higher. As the uniform white begins to disperse, patches of blue assert themselves briefly. Shortly, the camera comes to a complete stop on the floor of a cloud bank below a clear blue sky. Pan left. Right. Only this music, growing louder. Finally, as though sensing something, the camera pans hard right, falling upon the unmistakable glow of Mr. Rainbow, clad in white shoes and carrying a serrated machete.

Mr. Rainbow: “Prepare yourself you…bastard.” [Spits.]

Hard left. The King of Clouds! Gold Crown tipped forward rakishly and carrying, as always, a beautiful harpoon.

KoC: “I’mma KEEEEEEEL YOU!”

As they rush towards each other an electrical storm develops. KoC hurls his harpoon, sending it directly through Mr. Rainbow’s thigh. Mr. Rainbow crumples, pretending to be unconscious. Blood spreads across his white tights.

KoC, now standing over Mr. R’s seemingly lifeless body, laughing:

“Looks like there’s a storm a-brewin. Best to stay indoor-ahs. Ha ha ha.”

At that, Mr. Rainbow throws his machete directly at the head of the King of Clouds. His aim is true, but the knife passes clear through, causing only some wisps to fly up from his head. The King of Clouds flattens them back down on his head, like a cocky car-salesman, and adjusts his crown.

KoC: “Don’t you get it? I’m made...of Vap-ah! HA HA HA HA …..”

While the King of Clouds throws his head back and revels in his fortuitous constitution, the camera cuts away, and we see Mr. R fiddling for…something…in his back pocket. A second later he jumps up, and with all the leverage his one good, noodle-like leg can provide, launches towards the King of Clouds’ face, smashing Skittles into his eyes until their sharp candy shells temporarily blind the august God.

KoC: “Naaaaaaaaooooooh!”

They then continue to tussle for exactly seven minutes and thirty-nine seconds, whereupon the Sun from the Raisin Bran box ascends from below the clouds. The two fighters immediately kneel in reverence.

Sun from the Raisin Bran box: “Don’t you see? We are all Sky creatures. Without the clouds, rainbows wouldn’t have anywhere to get their moisture. And without the rainbows, children would never go outside to play underneath the clouds. And children…[speech edited due to extreme sanctimony]…so you see I am very wise. Always listen to what I have to say.”

The camera follows the Sun as he then rises higher, up and up. He pulls some skittles from his back pocket, catches a handful in his mouth, and winks. Fade out.

i wrote that once, i forget why

there's nothing to do except get drunk and do legos

this kind of describes the town John, Sara and I grew up in

I couldn't sleep last night, wondering how bernard snowy rated the rest of this thread.

I like how Fluxus is put on the same level as a 17 year old turning a telephone upside down.
Seriously, I never really freaked out the squares. Never rebelled but I did defend modern art. I distinctly remember my parents and I (10 yrs old) having a BIG FIGHT over what is art. "It's not art! It's a RED SQUARE! Anyone can make this!" roffles Also had a big fight with my husband in the Tate Modern. hahaha

i read this whole thread so imna say important things

square freaking is all about projecting ones own conventional baggage onto the squares - u just dont get it maaan NO U JUST DONT GET IT MAN - look inside little freak

if its funny its ok

you've really given me a lot to think about, ice cr?m. Thanks.

godspeed lil freak

the one thing I miss about the late 90s were all the fat "misunderstood" kids who wore stretched out versions of that hopskotch on a crumbling cliff scene from that video. those kids weren't misunderstood. they just had to jog a mile a day and lay off the doritos.

I couldn't sleep last night, wondering how bernard snowy rated the rest of this thread.

― Tracer Hand, Tuesday, February 10, 2009 12:42 PM (2 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

basically I think that "haha man I used to do _____ when I was a kid, god I was so lame!" is about one step removed from "it's hard for me to watch American Idol because I have perfect pitch"

but it IS hard for me to watch American Idol because I have perfect pitch

once "transgression" became something taught in art school and artists who sought to freak out the squares applied for government grants -- and complained of "censorship" when they didn't get the $-- the very idea of avant-garde art became meaningless. so max flipping phones in booths >>>>>>>>>>>some mfa pissing on the squares at the whitney or whatever.

A good example of this is the work of Heinrich Strawmann.

oh yeah I attended his early performances before you were born ;-)

the one thing I miss about the late 90s were all the fat "misunderstood" kids who wore stretched out versions of that hopskotch on a crumbling cliff scene from that video. those kids weren't misunderstood. they just had to jog a mile a day and lay off the doritos.

― burt_stanton, Thursday, February 12, 2009 4:01 AM (6 days ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

ladies & gents!

A good example of this is the work of Heinrich Strawmann.

― You just got HAPPENED (Hurting 2), Wednesday, February 18, 2009 6:45 AM (1 hour ago) Bookmark

this is dumb imo but i lold

a lot of people got really butthurt at the thought that i might be comparing fluxus with my adolescent habit of turning phones upside down

ok wait i take that back

no one got butthurt

REMIX:

a lot of people might be turning phones upside down at the thought that i got really butthurt with my adolescent habit of comparing fluxus

you just freaked me out

wild stuff

what would momus do?

turn a phonebooth upside-down and cum on a japanese girl's face

oh was that a rhetorical question?

no, it's for a report

is this what joaquim phoenix is doing right now, with his life

seems to be the emerging consensus - tho might be more accurately described as "prank movie directed by casey affleck" - i feel bad 4 him that hes gettin found out the internet ruins everything

i spent a year after one summer camp placing every pay phone handset that i could find upside down

― max, Monday, 9 February 2009 19:31 (6 years ago)

lol

http://linguafranca.mirror.theinfo.org/9811/inside.html

ON APRIL 22, 1969, SHORTLY AFTER BEGINNING a lecture in his course on dialectical thought before an audience of nearly one thousand students at the University of Frankfurt, the eminent Frankfurt School sociologist and Marxist cultural critic Theodor W. Adorno found himself in an unusual situation. A student in one of the back rows interrupted him, demanding that he engage in "self-criticism." Another student silently walked up to the blackboard and wrote the following words: "He who only allows dear Adorno to rule will uphold capitalism his entire life." After Adorno told the class that they would have five minutes to decide if his lecture should continue, three female students dressed in leather jackets rushed the podium. They showered him with roses and tulips, exposed their breasts, and tried repeatedly to kiss him. Incensed and humiliated, Adorno stormed out of the lecture hall.

lol (adorno could do with some joeks) but aw, seriously.

The story that these volumes tell ends on a sorry note. Adorno and Horkheimer, the grand old men of the German intellectual left, saw their lectures heckled, their institute occupied, and their own students, notably Adorno’s protégé Hans-Jürgen Krahl, turn against them. In a moment of despair during the student occupation of the institute in January 1969, Adorno called the police. Students were outraged at his betrayal. "Adorno as institution is dead," declared a flyer distributed by a radical group of sociology students in April of that year.

Adorno himself would survive just another few months. He died of a heart attack in Switzerland on August 6, 1969, at the age of sixty-five. Six weeks earlier, he had written to Marcuse of his "extreme depression" and of his revulsion at the fascist overtones he sensed in the tactics and demands of the students.

I sometimes feel not square freakout but square weariness/ exasperation.

Busenaktion ("breast action")

http://johannagel.files.wordpress.com/2014/07/adorno.jpg

freaking out the squares is mostly a question of location; a lot harder to freak out the squares in downtown manhattan than in a kansas shitkicker bar but it's lame to tape that and haw haw funny rubes on the borat tip
it's complicated

plus the internet means that curious people have already watched online beheadings and divine eating shit via netflix all manner of outre wildness before they hit puberty. perhaps all the squares have already been rounded?

do college kids ever do radical things anymore? feel like unless it's a sports scandal you never hear about college kids anymore.

Why did the knight put the phone upside down

To freak out the squires

xxp and racist frats

yeah, racist frats too. they are all the rage.

colleges used to be hotbeds of ferment and unrest. i've seen pictures. the government has them locked down pretty good now though.

is there a thread for college shanty towns? they always look like fun.

http://www1.easternct.edu/pressreleases/files/2014/11/shackathon-2014-best1.jpg

http://onthejourneyofrhetoric.weebly.com/uploads/2/3/3/1/23316502/1803858_orig.jpg

http://www.crescentavalleyweekly.com/wp-content/uploads/cache/13302_NpAdvHover.jpg

http://www.mnsu.edu/media/newsletter/2006-06-07/20060607-03-large.jpg

yeah the beaming scrubbed faces peering out from the refrigerator boxes and tarps seem a bit at odds with whatever message they're trying to send

it's a kicky way to have fun AND help.

God, I loved climbing in large boxes when I was a kid. No idea what the message was, but any excuse to climb in huge boxes.

they are beaming because they are getting duke basketball tickets, no?

climbing in the squares

http://www1.easternct.edu/newsflash/2014/12/22/students-sleep-in-boxes-to-raise-awareness-of-homelessness/
" “It’s pretty windy and cold out, but it’s not that bad in the box,” said math major Emily Cameron, a senior from Terryville and club president of Habitat for Humanity. “And we have the luxury of unlimited duct tape and boxes, which the homeless don’t have.”"

The Unlimited Duct Tape of the Ruling Class. should be a book.

and an album title.