Rites of Passage in Richmond Virginia
Rites of Passage in Richmond, Virginia
“I think it's very comforting to be able to say that we've got the same old problems: we've got war, we've got poverty. That way we don't have to see the main problem – if you want to call it that – is that people are free all of a sudden; they're rich and they're fat and they're free.”
-Tom Wolfe
'I love freedom, Gouriewa, and I didn't find freedom among our libertarians.'
'Well, of course not. We're not free. We're only humble workers for future freedom.'
'I use to think that too, once upon a time, But now it seems to me that it would be far better if everyone just took all moral, intellectual and material liberties now, from today onwards, regardless of the sanctions of modern society. Let each individual emancipate him or herself! General emancipation won't come any other way. . .'
- Isabelle Eberhardt's Vagabond
Richmond, Virginia was a surprise. For I did not know that there was such a vibrant, energetic, community oriented, and, yes, livable city on the east coast of the USA. Richmond Virginia is an awesome place. I made some good friends there and had some good times.
I entered Richmond by Chinatown bus from Washington DC last month. It was near mid-night and I was waiting for some friends to pick me up. They did. We went to a party.
--------------
Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Bangor, Maine, USA- December 2, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
--------------
I did not really find many people to talk to at the party. Sometimes I am a little awkward around people - I tend to either play alpha-male or I abscond completely to the social exterior. I absconded on this occasion, as the house was full of young people with ideas – they seemed to concern themselves with affecting political and social change - and I realized that it would not be to my advantage to let them know that I was not a part of their club. I despise politics in any form, I hate the manifestations of liberalism and conservatism with equal passion, and I can only be intrigued and entertained by the rash ignorance of radicals on either side of the line.
So I rode out the wave of the party just drinking beer and trying not to be burned as a witch. I was not burned. Good.
It is funny to me how group dynamics breed ignorance. As soon as right and wrong are defined as black and white, as soon as there is an “us” and a “them,” it is time for me to see my way out. It is my impression that being part of a group feels good – I was once a part of a similar group as the people at the party and I know that it felt good – but I fear that once this happens it is very easy to change your own idea structure to fit the ideological demands of the group. Groups mean that there is an inside and an outside. I now hope to always remain on the outside. To be a part of a group seems to demand an exercise in self-stupefaction: you exchange your own ideas, feelings, and opinions for that of a community sanctioned identity. I have experienced how ignorant a group ideology can make a person (myself), and I know that I never want to wear any uniform again.
The group, in any form, is the slayer of self-determination.
But the kids at the party were hospitable: they let me drink their beer and seemed to have no real intention of talking with me. So I drank their beer and looked around their house. I scoured their bookshelves, as the place served as a haphazard anarchist library, and found them strewn with books about how the world's political systems need to be fought and how “liberty” needs to be brought” to the “people.” I laughed as I recognized that I use to read these same books, have these same high ideas, talk the same talk, and pretend to believe the same things.
I realized that I have gotten old. Everyone at the party was younger than me (I am only 27 years old) and it became apparent the anarchist communities are for the young. They are constantly being revitalized with youth as the older kids get too smart, busy, or old to bother themselves with radical politics. This was the same when I was young. I wore the same cloths, said the same slogans, and read the same words as kids did 20 years before me and these kids were doing 10 years after me. What I once took for a revolutionary movement was only youthful revolt at a system at which the young have no real role.
How can adolescents not rebel in the USA? They often hold no real responsibility, are coddled as incompetent, and receive little respect until they are in their late twenties. I rebelled because I faced a society that did not have the convention of treating me up to the level of my competence. I wanted to destroy this society and exert myself over it.
Perhaps the eventual social application of responsibility, role, and respect that one finds in later years are the forces that drive kids to abandon the youthful extravagances of radical politics. Perhaps I find no reason to rebel because I have become, in a very odd sense, a part of the system. Perhaps all of my youthful anarchist friends also abandoned radical politics at the confluence of becoming respected by their society and allowed to have a role.
Friends in Richmond: I was shown great hospitality by a couple of great people and given free reign to haphazardly ponder the paths of youth and the rites of passage of my culture.
It is interesting to me how the ages of “youth” in America has been extended into the late twenties. It is also interesting how the cycle of maturity works in this country: a child is coddled by their parents until they are well into their twenties, they rebel and try to smash all vestiges of their socialization, and then they eventually come back to the culture they scorned and realize the wisdom behind their parents' lessons. Rebellion is an important stage in the maturity of Americans, as I believe that it is in our character to first smash and destroy in order to be able to pick up the pieces and put them back together. We are taught to test theories for ourselves, and I feel that there is no better way to test something than to challenge it. So I challenged the words of my parents, clawed at their roots, and eventually found them to be full of wisdom.
I cannot say that I have yet came back into the fold, but I can now see that there is a little substance behind the culture in which I was raised.
Rebellion is perhaps one of the most fertile aspects of American culture, it is a rite of passage.
Old train yard in Richmond, Virginia.
Related Pages:
USA- Buffalo NY Friends Anarchy Nostalgia
USA- New Years Eve, Buffalo,NY
Links to previous travelogue entries:
Rites of Passage in Richmond, Virginia
“I think it's very comforting to be able to say that we've got the same old problems: we've got war, we've got poverty. That way we don't have to see the main problem – if you want to call it that – is that people are free all of a sudden; they're rich and they're fat and they're free.”
-Tom Wolfe
'I love freedom, Gouriewa, and I didn't find freedom among our libertarians.'
'Well, of course not. We're not free. We're only humble workers for future freedom.'
'I use to think that too, once upon a time, But now it seems to me that it would be far better if everyone just took all moral, intellectual and material liberties now, from today onwards, regardless of the sanctions of modern society. Let each individual emancipate him or herself! General emancipation won't come any other way. . .'
- Isabelle Eberhardt's Vagabond
Richmond, Virginia was a surprise. For I did not know that there was such a vibrant, energetic, community oriented, and, yes, livable city on the east coast of the USA. Richmond Virginia is an awesome place. I made some good friends there and had some good times.
I entered Richmond by Chinatown bus from Washington DC last month. It was near mid-night and I was waiting for some friends to pick me up. They did. We went to a party.
--------------
Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Bangor, Maine, USA- December 2, 2008
Travelogue -- Travel Photos
--------------
I did not really find many people to talk to at the party. Sometimes I am a little awkward around people - I tend to either play alpha-male or I abscond completely to the social exterior. I absconded on this occasion, as the house was full of young people with ideas – they seemed to concern themselves with affecting political and social change - and I realized that it would not be to my advantage to let them know that I was not a part of their club. I despise politics in any form, I hate the manifestations of liberalism and conservatism with equal passion, and I can only be intrigued and entertained by the rash ignorance of radicals on either side of the line.
So I rode out the wave of the party just drinking beer and trying not to be burned as a witch. I was not burned. Good.
It is funny to me how group dynamics breed ignorance. As soon as right and wrong are defined as black and white, as soon as there is an “us” and a “them,” it is time for me to see my way out. It is my impression that being part of a group feels good – I was once a part of a similar group as the people at the party and I know that it felt good – but I fear that once this happens it is very easy to change your own idea structure to fit the ideological demands of the group. Groups mean that there is an inside and an outside. I now hope to always remain on the outside. To be a part of a group seems to demand an exercise in self-stupefaction: you exchange your own ideas, feelings, and opinions for that of a community sanctioned identity. I have experienced how ignorant a group ideology can make a person (myself), and I know that I never want to wear any uniform again.
The group, in any form, is the slayer of self-determination.
But the kids at the party were hospitable: they let me drink their beer and seemed to have no real intention of talking with me. So I drank their beer and looked around their house. I scoured their bookshelves, as the place served as a haphazard anarchist library, and found them strewn with books about how the world's political systems need to be fought and how “liberty” needs to be brought” to the “people.” I laughed as I recognized that I use to read these same books, have these same high ideas, talk the same talk, and pretend to believe the same things.
I realized that I have gotten old. Everyone at the party was younger than me (I am only 27 years old) and it became apparent the anarchist communities are for the young. They are constantly being revitalized with youth as the older kids get too smart, busy, or old to bother themselves with radical politics. This was the same when I was young. I wore the same cloths, said the same slogans, and read the same words as kids did 20 years before me and these kids were doing 10 years after me. What I once took for a revolutionary movement was only youthful revolt at a system at which the young have no real role.
How can adolescents not rebel in the USA? They often hold no real responsibility, are coddled as incompetent, and receive little respect until they are in their late twenties. I rebelled because I faced a society that did not have the convention of treating me up to the level of my competence. I wanted to destroy this society and exert myself over it.
Perhaps the eventual social application of responsibility, role, and respect that one finds in later years are the forces that drive kids to abandon the youthful extravagances of radical politics. Perhaps I find no reason to rebel because I have become, in a very odd sense, a part of the system. Perhaps all of my youthful anarchist friends also abandoned radical politics at the confluence of becoming respected by their society and allowed to have a role.
Friends in Richmond: I was shown great hospitality by a couple of great people and given free reign to haphazardly ponder the paths of youth and the rites of passage of my culture.It is interesting to me how the ages of “youth” in America has been extended into the late twenties. It is also interesting how the cycle of maturity works in this country: a child is coddled by their parents until they are well into their twenties, they rebel and try to smash all vestiges of their socialization, and then they eventually come back to the culture they scorned and realize the wisdom behind their parents' lessons. Rebellion is an important stage in the maturity of Americans, as I believe that it is in our character to first smash and destroy in order to be able to pick up the pieces and put them back together. We are taught to test theories for ourselves, and I feel that there is no better way to test something than to challenge it. So I challenged the words of my parents, clawed at their roots, and eventually found them to be full of wisdom.
I cannot say that I have yet came back into the fold, but I can now see that there is a little substance behind the culture in which I was raised.
Rebellion is perhaps one of the most fertile aspects of American culture, it is a rite of passage.
Old train yard in Richmond, Virginia.Related Pages:
USA- Buffalo NY Friends Anarchy Nostalgia
USA- New Years Eve, Buffalo,NY
Links to previous travelogue entries:
Rites of Passage in Richmond, Virginia
Labels: americas, travel philosophy, usa
posted by Wade Vagabond Journey.com at
6:33 PM
8 Comments:
Hey old man...... It only gets worse as you get older. Wait until you look back at the twenty-somethings and realize that they "don't know nothin' about life or anything". Or the thirty somethings. or 40... you get my drift. With age comes.... age. We look at it as wisdom, but it is really just experience. With luck, some learn something from this experience (I learned just a little) without forgeting too much about how to be young.
I usually like be outside the group too. Sometimes, when in a party situation like you were in, if I have the energy, I will play games with the people, starting out bringing up arguments to refute what they are saying, and if enough alcohol is involve, bring them around until they are arguing against their initial arguments. Always fun to see their faces when they realize they've been had. Of course, these days I usualy just go to bed early and save my energy for the next day.
Bob L
And as always, someone else said it better and with less words:
"Wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then..."
--Bob Seger
Bob L
Noam Chomskey is 70.
For some people it isn't about rebellion, its more about giving yourself and other people a chance at a decent life. Yeah, definately there are those that just want to rebel, but those that are oppressed, the choice is conformity or action.
Yeah, Chompsky also gets paid hundreds of thousands of dollars for the work he does and, I imagine, lives pretty comfortably. I also do not think that he is much of a rebel.
You have a decent life Steve-O because you took it yourself. . . you made it yourself. Nobody gave it to you. You followed no pre-set path. You found a way of living that made you happy and went for it all the way. I am not talking about you, here. You didn't conform to any group by any extent of the definition . . .
What I meant to say was that groups . . . any sort of group dynamic tends to breed a form of ignorance. There are those inside and those outside. I also do not think that a community can exist with diversity, as it is neccessary for each member to conform within the bounds of the group to continue participating.
Thanks for the comment.
Going to try to get to Japan within the next year.
Have Fun,
Wade
Hello Bob,
I can only hope that I think that I am an idiot twenty years from now.
Haha, yeah, reving people up is fun sometimes . . . but I do not think that my real friends would have liked it too much .. . it probably would have put a big black mark over us haha.
"We look at it as wisdom, but it is really just experience. With luck, some learn something from this experience (I learned just a little) without forgeting too much about how to be young."
This is excellent.
Thanks,
Wade
"For some people it isn't about rebellion, its more about giving yourself and other people a chance at a decent life."
Yeah, you are right on here Steve-O. I think that you are a good example of this.
Thanks old buddy,
Hopefully we will be drinking chu-hi together again soon!
Wade
Yeah, I do agree with you about group thought. Once people grab on to a dogma, it becomes so hard to let go and see what else is out there. I feel priviledged to be an outsider in most social situation s. to quote the great Bill Hicks
"I get a kick out of being an outsider constantly. It allows me to be creative."
one of the things I get a kick out of from you is your ability to mess up the harmony, people need to be freed from their reality tunnels.
walk slow, dance like an ass, drink like a sailor.
Steve-O, you are one of the wisest people that I have ever had the priviledge of going on a Chu-hi pilgrimage with!
Hoping to be a pilgrim again soon,
Wade
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Feel free to comment on these posts, ask questions, or give any feedback that you would like. Walk Slow, Wade
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