What is wrong with this picture?

Cultural Terrorist is beginning to conceive of the International Dada Centennial Committee as a piece of abstract art. This is fitting, since Cultural Terrorist did, after all, major in abstract art. But if the IDCC is a piece of abstract art, it is not the sort that has squiggles of paint on it. It is composed of actual abstractions...you know... the kind that can not be seen, e.g., Basic Rights, Traditional Values, Non-Basic Rights, Social Justice, Antisocial Justice, Non-Traditional Values, Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness, Life, Liberty, and the Capture of Happiness, Tall, Dark and Handsome, etc. That said, I will now proceed to do what artists do: look at the piece and ask, "What is wrong with this picture?"

Oh no! It is Shabbes! I am not supposed to do any creative work today! Ah, but, but, but....maybe asking the question "What is wrong with this picture?" is not making art, but merely indulging in art appreciation. Yeah, like the rabbis decided that while one must not compose music on Shabbes, it is okay to play the piano. And while one must not lift 165 pounds, on Shabbes, it is okay to jog your body of that same weight around the track in the interest of living long enough to hear your grandchildren tell you that they wish their father were as nice as you are.

So, we have been exploring the idea of artists becoming the dominant life form on Earth so that they can more effectively manipulate humans into not nuking themselves into oblivion. But, considering the universal corruptibility of Earthly sentient life, one suspects that the main motivation for the artists fostering the continued existence of humans is so that humans will continue to pay artists for their art, or, lacking anyone who wants to buy it, continue to give the artists grants to make art that no one wants to buy. Self interest, in other words.

Ah, but is there any interest that is not self interest? When I was a child, I got twenty five cents weekly allowance. I once tossed the entire quarter into the basket of a blind beggar while accompanying my mother on a shopping trip to Jamaica Avenue. It felt good to give my entire allowance to a blind beggar. So there was self interests involved....you know... making oneself feel good.

So. We are again exploring the idea of artists becoming the dominant life form on Earth. Sweet. The humans look at us and feel resentful that we, putting Dada into practice, manipulate cultural climate change so that human not only do not nuke themselves into oblivion, but actually fight no wars at all. In fact, due to the arcane work of the artist, humans no longer murder, steal, rape, torture....no longer do a great many things humans once believed to be loads of fun.

Do humans have any fun at all? Oh sure. they live much the same as middle class suburbarnites of today. They have loads of fun. In fact, they do not even notice that they are being manipulated by the artists into not committing senseless mass slaughter etc. Oh, but with six billion humans on the planet, surely one or two will notice and start kvetching. You know, like Hitler kvetched about how the Jews controlled everything. I wish. Such a non-murderous people.... don't get me started.

So perhaps the prime directive of Post Human Ethics is Thou Shalt Not Let Humans Know That They Are Being Manipulated By Artists Into Not Committing Senseless Mass Slaughter Because It Will Make Them Feel Bad And Then Come To Your House To Kill You And All Of Us. Is this a sort of forbidden fruit in the middle of a sort of Garden of Eden, tended by a sort of newly created intelligent life form, just waiting for a serpent subtle enough to successfully tempt some Eve to eat and feed her Adam the forbidden fruit? To be continued.