Let's shift the cultural paradigm

Shire Renaissance
#1

This seems to be a good place to make a suggestion about embracing liberty, and bring about a paradigm shift. (as the group description says)

A thought… might there be any interest in a festival in NH that would
bring together all the various liberty threads in a joyful manner. It would not be like Liberty Forum, or even Porcfest. I haven’t been to Forkfest yet, but I will try to make it this year.

It might be sort of a combination of Burning Man, Starwood, Fantasy Fest (Key West), Woodstock music festival (1969) and, from what I hear, Forcfest. There are probably other festivals I’ve never heard of that would fit in here.

I suspect that we would have to find a space larger than Roger’s Campground. I’d bet that we could draw at least 2,500 the first year.

The only one of these festivals I have been to is Starwood. I have
worked admissions, security, and heraldry duty at SCA events, but
SCA is a bit too refined for what I have in mind.

If you have any thoughts on this, I’d love to hear them.

1 Like
#2

Okay, that’s one “like”. So let me expand. Again, any commentary
will be greatly appreciated.

Some basics would be… nudity definitely approved of… this is a common
thread through all of the festivals I’ve mentioned above.

Recreational drug use definitely approved of… at least marijuana and other
hallucinogens like LSD, peyote, etc. Alcohol would definitely be allowed.
How many of you have passed a bottle of Fuki plum wine around a campfire?
(this is sometimes called a “Black Hole”, because once you are pulled in by
this exceedingly sweet, wonderful plum wine, you probably won’t leave)

There is always music, at any of these events. It can be offered for free, or
as outside bands, but whoever does it would have to be a part of the community
nonetheless - those who cannot accept nudity, sex, and drugs would not be
welcome to participate at all. I’m betting there will jams, drum circles,
ritual music, etc. performed by the participants, and accept all who wish to
join in. An open stage might be a good idea

Food would be provided by the participants. The Hog Farm provided a lot of
food at Woodstock, and I believe I saw in videos of Burning Man that different
people/groups have provided free bacon, coffee, etc.

I have been at events during which sex in more or less public venues was
practiced. At Starwood I have seen it in the presence of children during a
nightly bonfire. The children were mostly just bored by it.
I once listened in, from a distance, on a group of 6 young teens at Pennsic
War who were trying to find more condoms for a last-day group sex orgy. The
children appeared to be about 12-16 years old. I saw something similar
at Starwood. In this age range, an exception for close in age would probably
apply, so would be legal. But it would be nice to have a community that would
actually nurture teen sexuality instead of speaking/acting against it.

We could have something similar for those over the age of consent. A large
tent or so. It might even be set up as a sort of brothel, however, no money
should change hands on site. Since age of consent is 16 in NH, 16 year-olds
would be allowed to seek the services of a “prostitute”, or serve as a “prostitute”.
Actually, even thirteen year olds would be allowed to be either “prostitutes” or
“clients”, so long as the sex would be only with those 17 years old or younger.
These “prostitutes” would be available in the “brothel” during a given shift,
to serve the needs of the “clients”.
Maybe at the end of the day the “clients” would throw a feast for the “prostitutes”,
maybe with other entertainment as well.
Of course, dungeons would probably be set up for those with a kinkier bent.

While I personally would opt for no weapons, as a liberty person I must accept
the open carrying of firearms or other weapons. However, the site of an
otherwise naked person dressed only in firearms, in my imagination, looks
awesomely hilarious.

Tattoo artists have been a mainstay at many of the festivals I have listed above.
As has body painting, and piercing booths.

Some kind of “burning man” might be set up, for the closing bonfire. I have seen
videos of this at Burning Man, and as a participant at Starwood.

Religious services have been offered at Pennsic for at least Catholics,
Protestants, Hindus, Moslems, and Pagans/Heathens, that I know of.
I have taken part in Church of All Worlds spiritual programs.

Security would mostly handle lost children, lost objects, drunks in the middle of
the street, and persons who become aggressive, as well as manning the entrance
gate(s) and parking.

Any comments?

[Edit: We would have to have a competent medical staff. These would have to be
professionals, just for legal purposes]

#3

As a clarification of what I mean by “cultural” paradigm:
I mean what the “Freedom In the 50 States” rankings put
under “Personal Freedom”.

“PERSONAL FREEDOM
The personal freedom versus paternalism dimension (Figure 7) consists of
the following categories: (a) incarceration and arrests for victimless crimes,
(b) gambling freedom, (c) gun rights, (d) marriage freedom, (e) educational
freedom, (f) tobacco freedom, (g) alcohol freedom, (h) marijuana freedom,
(i) asset forfeiture, (j) other mala prohibita and miscellaneous civil liberties,
(k) travel freedom, and (l) campaign finance freedom. Weighting these
categories is a challenge because the observable financial impacts of
these policies often do not include the full harms to victims.”

“The term mala prohibita refers to acts defined as criminal in statute, even
though they are not harms in common law (mala in se). This category is
a grab bag of mostly unrelated policies, including raw milk laws, fireworks
laws, prostitution laws, physician-assisted suicide laws, religious freedom
restoration acts, rules on taking DNA samples from criminal suspects
without a probable cause hearing, trans-fat bans, state equal rights amendments,
mixed martial arts legalization, and, new to this edition, bans on racial
preferences in the public sector. Of these, the policies with the greatest
potential cost to victims are racial preferences in the public sector (more
than half of this category), prostitution prohibition, and trans-fat bans.”

The arrests for victimless crimes includes a number of things not listed
elsewhere. Consensual sex should be included somewhere in here,
although victimless sex crimes are a very small portion of the victimless
crimes.

#4

The thrust of your messages definitely changes course from passively allowing freedom in my last “thumbs upped” message to supervising a lot of followers in your followup message.
How many followers do you have now?

#5

Supervising? I have no idea what you are talking about supervising.
Um, followers? Some of my posts receive a lot of views, but I don’t
know anything about “followers”, or how to calculate such a number?

Any suggestions that have been in my post on this thread are only
what “could” be done. Any event would have to be driven by the
participants. If they don’t want music, then no one will opt to provide
music. If they don’t want nudity, then they won’t be nude. If they
don’t want to participate in sex, they are free to not. Etc.

I am just putting out some ideas for tentative consideration.

#6

There is a song “Alice’s Restaurant” I have posted elsewhere. Most of the song is actually about a man
going into the selective service examination station
and finding out that the littering he’s been found guilty
of is considered a huge crime. So he starts singing
about the Alice’s Restaurant situation, and eventually
the psychiatrist says that they don’t want his type.

The words that most impressed me near the end of
this song are:

“If one person, just one person does it, then they think it’s really sick,
and they won’t take him.
If two people, two people do it, in harmony, then they’ll think
they’re both faggots, and they won’t take either of them.
And if three people do it, can you imagine three people walking
in singing a bar of “Alices Restaurant” and walking out, they
may think it’s an organization.
Can you imagine 50 people a day, I said 50 people a day, walking
in singing a bar of “Alices Restaurant” and walking out, then friends
they may think it’s a movement, and that’s what it is.”

We might have one person doing some activism, and they can
ignore one person.
If two people take part in the same activism, well, they’ll just think
there are two idiots in the world.
If a small group take part in some action, like say attending Liberty
Forum, or PorcFest, they’ll think it’s an organization (say, FreeState Project).
But friends, if thousands and thousands of people are going about
ignoring the powers that be, and living their daily lives in liberty,
well, then they’ll know for a fact that it’s a social movement.

I believe that we are in the emergent stage of that last group. Most
of us don’t know each other, afraid to admit that they are breaking social
taboos, and not wanting to even mention it to strangers, or even their
friends.

But, if we all had a place to go, an event we could go to where we knew
we would not have to hide our lives, well, that will become the groundswell
I have mentioned in other posts.

You know, I’ve been to maybe 20 Pennsic Wars (SCAdians will understand),
and their first words to me at the check-in station were always “Welcome Home”.
When I came to New Hampshire, some of the first words I heard when I
introduced myself at Keenevention were “Welcome Home”.
When I attended Starwood, some of the first words I heard were “Welcome
Home”

I’d like the chance to say “Welcome Home” to thousands of people who are
hiding their real lives from public view because of the social taboos
surrounding how they live. I’ll say it here, too, because I know there are
many of those New Age/Pagan/Freethinkers/etc here on this forum:

“Welcome Home”

#7

Everyone yearns freedoms that are held taboo by others.
You touch on much of that in your post, specifically your taboo for guns with understanding others have such yearning for self empowerment.
You planned a very organized festival in much detail that follows the edge of state law regarding the most controversial taboos among intolerant control freaks.
While most people pretend to follow their governments laws or some written creed, the reality is that most people have deeply ingrained hatred towards those social taboos, even some widely accepted.

What are you contributing towards the free society you seek the things you write as needed.
Do you have land and living spaces to attract the like minds you seek?
Without people expressing a willingness to do those jobs you described to demonstrate such society, it will never happen.

For several years now, in an effort to alleviate the desire for voluntaryists to seek Statism to solve their disputes and allow such voluntaryists to resolve such disputes voluntarily, I offered mediation via agorist.market and word of mouth towards that goal.

The sad reality is that people are generally complacent with the status quo and prefer to avoid leadership and work towards a free society in favor of mental masturbation about such.

The best way to attract participants to join in perspn freedom oriented groups is to stay away from clearly written rules, mission statements, requirements, goals, etc. This allows potential participants to maintain their illusions that their beloved freedoms and taboos are shared by others en masse.
Now that FSP clarified the rules on nudity at their events, I forecast attendance will never peak again until they make it less clear.
Vague rules, secreted budget info, and unclear purpose are more effective to prevent breaking the illusions of attending a “freedom festival” than a tightly unifying written creed as we have here in our tribe.

#8

El_Stone, I agree with most of what you said.
I have a couple of things to clarify. My dislike of firearms is not
because it is taboo… I just don’t like them, just as some people
don’t like nudity, or porn, or control of others.

At present I do not have the land to do this on a large scale.
I agree that many do not want to do much of the work themselves.
Another of the commonalities between the festivals I have mentioned
is that everyone pitches in to help out. It requires that people are
reliable enough to actually do what they say.

I have actually not planned anything. I have suggested things that
might appeal to some persons to organize among themselves.
Have you ever been to any of the festivals/events I have mentioned?
There are millions of people out there who take part in such festivals.
They get together and provide, within subgroups of the larger group,
a place for people to get together to enjoy in their own particular way.
I’m only saying that I’d like to see something like that for the liberty
community.

I have read just one article in the Manchester Free Press about New
Hampshire Libertines, and a search online doesn’t bring up any other
references. Kinky Porcs are out and have their own events. I’m
trying to get away from “voluntaryists [seeking] Statism to solve their
disputes”. I am trying to get away from the economic and political
emphasis that most [nearly all] liberty activists are involved with.
We have forgotten that people don’t care about government, as long
as they can live their own lives. We need people to address those issues.

I have posted songs elsewhere that are mostly about individuals singing
about people, yes ordinary people like truck drivers, or students, or…
doing things to counter the effect of the powers that be.

I was not aware that the FSP has clarified the rules on nudity at their events.
Frankly, I didn’t even know that there was a rule(s) on nudity.
Nor is it important to me. The FSP was just the “three persons” that form
an organization. I long ago left that behind… but now many more people
are leaving it behind. Most of the best people in the FSP have long ago
left it behind… not all, there are still some really great people that stay with
the FSP. But I personally think that the FSP is trying to maintain its existence
far beyond its usefulness.

I guess that what I’m really trying to do is try to bring together the liberty
community outside of the FSP. I know for a fact that it is much, much
bigger than the few thousand people associated with the FSP.

You yourself have posted about the Olympic Parade, and the possible
problems that that entails. I’m trying to reach out and let others know
about the myriad ways in which the dominant cultural paradigm can
be altered. A festival is just one way to manifest this. Such a thing
is certainly in an incipient stage. Will it be stillborn? Maybe. Then
again, there are millions of people out there who are seeking an
alternative, they just need to find out about each other on a personal
basis.

Do I have followers? Don’t know. The first thread I ever posted, about
the problems I found with the CACR-32 hearings, is now over 1k views.
The thread about making New Hampshire the most libertarian state
is approaching 500. If you click on the “users” link, and sort each column
from high to low, you will see that, this week, I am at the very top - except
that I do share first place with RidleyReport2 in one column.
You’re pretty high up there too.
Do I have followers? I don’t know. What I do know is that I am among the
most active on these forums, and have been since I joined a year and a
half ago. If you sort these same columns for the past year, I’m still on the
first page of the listing. Do I have followers? Maybe, but I think that I am
improving in my choice of topics that people might be interested in, and
in so doing I have also brought out a different perspective liberty and the
liberty community.

I’m not willing to sit back and say “The sad reality is that people are generally
complacent with the status quo and prefer to avoid leadership and work towards
a free society in favor of mental masturbation about such.” without doing
something about it. These forums are a way for me to do that.

1 Like
#9

There are some other ways of shifting the paradigm.
For example, on World Naked Bike Ride, while total
nudity is banned in NH, a World Topless Bike Ride
is permitted through many of the towns. I know there
are some cities in NH that would ban such things,
but many of the towns could do it, even passing through
several towns along the route

On Go Topless Day there are more topless women at
Hampton State Beach than normal. The event is sponsored
by Free the Nipple. But most people don’t even know
about this day. Men are sometimes asked to wear
pasties or tape over their nipples, while women are
encouraged to bare their breasts, including the nipple.
I know that Hampton Beach, the town, allows topless
women, at least in the summer, to go across the road
and into the shops along the way. During the summer
there are mostly visitors from Europe who go to Hampton
Beach.

Individual women might feel uncomfortable with
baring their breasts, but groups of women, acting as a
sort of protest, might not feel so uncomfortable. If, for
say, a group of women would plan to attend the local
swimming hole topless, it might be a good way to
encourage others who might feel uncomfortable acting
alone, to join in.

A curious thing, though: White Mountains National Forest
has a regulation banning nudity and topfreedom for women.
You have to actually leave the forest before it’s legal for
women to bare their breasts in public.

1 Like
#10

I’ve visited many festivals.
A couple of us just visited the National Rainbow site to check on their cleanup. Aside from well trampled paths and countless cleared out campsites, a cardboard egg carton melting into the ground was all I found.

That resonates with my comment above.
I generally agree with your thoughts regarding FSP and was muted from their chat for vocalizing such.

I hope your progress towards Shire Society based community flourishes.

#11

I was once on a Rainbow Tribes discussion group, is this the
Rainbow you are speaking of. I’ve never been to a gathering,
and am not very familiar with their overall ideology or
spirituality. But they did seem to embrace nudity, polyamory,
self, and cooperation, a kind of anarchism in their lives.
But they also seemed to have a lot of more formal structures.

Still, they’re doing their own thing, and I can laud that.

#12

A particular phrase comes to mind when talking about paradigms.
I have been unable to find the origins of the phrase,
“Subvert the dominant paradigm”, but the literature is replete with
applications of it

In essence, subverting the dominant paradigm is the way a culture
learns from its previous experiences, and changes the model under
which that society operates.

By looking back and seeing what works, and what doesn’t, or what
is essentially meaningless, we should be able to improve our culture
(in shifting the cultural paradigm), and improving the culture demands
that the religious, political, and social aspects all be seen as the
result of a specific series of steps. When we can look at each step,
question our motives for taking that step in that direction, we can
then learn from that questioning.

It is a methodology steeped in history, from Plato and Socrates on.
When things are not working the way we think they should be
working, we have to ask ourselves a few questions:
Is it because we made a mistake, as a society, in our beliefs about
cause and effect?
Did we misstep in our application of our beliefs?
Is it even possible to achieve a given outcome through rational
analysis?
Can we achieve the ends through the means, or through the
algorithm we have applied?
Etc.

Law is a perfect example of this. Is law capable of keeping us
safe? The answer is obviously “no”. This is because while
our laws try to control what people do, or even think or feel,
if we believe that we know what people are thinking and feeling
and these beliefs turn out to be wrong, or the reaction of people
to the steps imposed on them do not have the effect that the
lawmakers desire, the lawmakers do not make any attempt
to change their methodology to obtain a given end.

Is it social control possible through law? Again, I must answer
no.
Is social control possible through enforcing taboos? No,
because we don’t all have the same taboos.

All of these things rely on a uniform mental, emotional, and
spiritual frame of mind. But we are different from each other
in those respects, not uniform.

A culture that arranges itself based on differences, then,
is the only answer that “might” in the long run, work.

I think we need to work toward that idea, at least until we
know that it is founded on untenable presuppositions.

#13

We’ll be discussing and practicing legal docs at upcoming Sunday Schools here at t.me/BarterTowne with mindfulness towards the information available at How to become a Contract Killer — One Stupid Fuck
Also, our last call for presenters at our next gathering:
So far, skills to be shared as desired by guests of the Shire Society Hunter’s Moon Skill Share Gathering:
Sausage making, wild game tracking, plant medicine/s, Druid ritual/s, bonfire/s, mushroom & wood foraging/ harvesting, tours of property/ trail blazing, music & DJ/s, dancing lessons (salsa or Bachata), Boggle Tournament, guided meditations and stretching/ yoga, etc.
All leaders committing by September 5 are guaranteed free parking and VIP lodge access for the event.

1 Like
#14

When mentioning what those events had in common, one thing
was not mentioned… some of them had in common the fact
that they held “classes”. I personally have given classes at
Pennsic on how to do literature research, basic and advanced,
and attended classes on natural dying, heraldry, the role of
technology in the middle ages, Japanese heraldry of the mon,
archery, armor making, papermaking, and many many more.
At Starwood I attended discussions on polyamory, BDSM
from a Pagan perspective, an information class given by
leaders of the Church of All Worlds, an intensive workshop
on nudity and body consciousness, etc.

But I also see a need for someplace/some way for people to
let their hair down, enjoy themselves in activities they don’t
often get a chance to do, and where they can be unafraid to
break taboos and indeed perhaps be welcomed by others
of the same mind.

Something more like Fantasy Fest or Woodstock festival, where
there was no structure to speak of, and I might add into that list
the Sturgis gathering. I’ve known many people who have been to
the Sturgis gathering (officially now the Sturgis Motorcycle rally).

Something that does not concentrate on learning new things, but
rather, allows expression of already accepted behaviors that might
not be welcome outside of the event.

We need all of these things, the kind of thing you do, and also
the kind of thing I’m suggesting.