conversation with ben.
conversation with ben. walking through the streets. of suburbia.
talking. austin. people so pretentious. why. so i try to explain.
getting lost in explanation. but understanding more. so i explained in
general. someone comes up to me. i overhear. oh. im a rebel. i skipped
school today. im a drug user. i do pot. shes such a slut. shes slept
with five different guys. mentioning these things to be elevated in
their group. put others down. but everything is relative. i get
annoyed if someone who sniffs coke thinks their anything special. a
real "hard core" drug user. because i know people who shoot up
cocaine. speed. junk. people who smoke crack like others smoke pot.
people who shoot up crank. those are hard core drug users to me. and
yet they are not even the extreme. one can never be the extreme. there
is always one more extreme. and when you actually are extreme you dont
care anymore. so someone saying they are extreme bothers me.
especially when they are nowhere near. but this was the conversation
with ben. ive seen real rebels. real prostitutes. real homeless. real
drug users. real anarchists. and even those arent real. i thought for
a time they were. but. talking to ben i learned something. how
everything is relative. everything everything i mean. you can never
judge a person for their actions without first looking at the society
the person lives in. someone may be a heavy masochist because they
enjoy biting and scratching in a society in which this does not
normally occur. to a hardcore straight-edge a coffee drinker is a
drug user. as with alcohol. different societies. different values. i
once met a man raised in a religious cult who hadnt seen a tv or heard
a radio until age twelve. at thirteen he started daily use of cocaine.
smoked opium on a regular basis. part of the society he lived in.
normal. everythings relative. to deal with my past i must learn to
judge less. people have not experienced what i have experienced. so i
cant expect them to have the same values. act by them. they act by
their values. and that is how i must learn to judge them.
but in that system the one who believes in murder. or child abuse.
because its part of their culture. is justified. the only true crime
is a crime against oneself. doing what is not you. what you dont
believe in. but thats a pretty poor philosophy if you want to better
the world. i dont know. ill have to think about it.
muse@musespace.com