"You are marred... mishapen... measley."
In an article (thanks, shepjoe) sketching out Genesis P-Orridge's contributions to Western civilization, s/he recounts his first conversation with William S. Burroughs:
"He asked me, 'How do you short-circuit control?'" Gen remembered. "And we eventually realized that the program that's really in control is our DNA. It determines so many areas of life, biologically as well as culturally. So in that sense, DNA is the enemy of our freedom. We have to fight it."
This sentiment has motivated Gen's life-long body/gender/psyche modifying extropian project. While I appreciate the lush fruits that have grown from this personal struggle, it's in some sense difficult for me to understand why. I fundamentally disagree with the transcendental girding that makes possible framing life and identity in this fashion. If we are not our genes, what are we?
I could go into this question at length, but for now I will leave it as an assertion and focus on the question of what I find so compelling about this project. Rather than it being the object of the struggle that I find so beautiful, I think it's the quality and degree of that fight that has produced such results. Conflict itself, kept thick with perfumes of his orison, is the grimoire of Gen's creations. The Primum Mobile arose from pushing back.
"He asked me, 'How do you short-circuit control?'" Gen remembered. "And we eventually realized that the program that's really in control is our DNA. It determines so many areas of life, biologically as well as culturally. So in that sense, DNA is the enemy of our freedom. We have to fight it."
This sentiment has motivated Gen's life-long body/gender/psyche modifying extropian project. While I appreciate the lush fruits that have grown from this personal struggle, it's in some sense difficult for me to understand why. I fundamentally disagree with the transcendental girding that makes possible framing life and identity in this fashion. If we are not our genes, what are we?
I could go into this question at length, but for now I will leave it as an assertion and focus on the question of what I find so compelling about this project. Rather than it being the object of the struggle that I find so beautiful, I think it's the quality and degree of that fight that has produced such results. Conflict itself, kept thick with perfumes of his orison, is the grimoire of Gen's creations. The Primum Mobile arose from pushing back.