Fundamentalism

Creating & Consuming

Or--and this may be a different angle—
what happens when the consuming part
determines or limits what it seems
legitimate to ask in the creating part?

My consuming part
dominates my
creating part,
damnit.
My bottom
lined Mazlow’s
hierarchy rules for
crying out loud. You
got a problem with that?

I think I know what I mean in my own field—
the old adage that you can't break the rules
until you know the rules--but I'm not sure
how it applies to the sciences, or even the
humanities.

Rules that Count: I don’t
know till I’ve broken
thru oops, o hell,
damnit; the
other ones are
covered in the
transition sessions
& ongoing presentations
& zoomerang assessments.

And even in the arts, I know from personal
experience how hard it is to get outside the
accepted paradigm once you've, well,
accepted it.

I can’t GET outside the
accepted paradigm. I wish
I could. I can talk about it
and talk about talking about it.
That’s as far as I can go unilaterally.

So sometimes I want to bust that adage wide
open and say, "Why CAN'T you wade in without
first learning the rules?" (and I can sure hear all
the answers to that one!).

Bob Yeager would advise me:
“Look, Sam: you can’t teach
theory. They don’t know
enough to theorize. "

How much value we give to attending to what's
really going on at the moment: How do we think
about how we think about it. Part of the picture,
anyway. Graham Paul. .

The moment of be-here-now?
The moment of un-postponed joy?
In-performance moments: moments
of service-to-the service-project muse?

I’m not aware in those moments. I lose
my self, damnit. Dead to the whirl &
industrial assessment & and even
sustainability issues.

Out of control.

@@@@@@@@@

Oil on the one hand
Water on the other.
Ice Cream on the
one hand.Hell on
the other.

I mean to emphasize the polar...
(& incommensurate: a word I over-use
and actually it may emerge from your
neck of the words: a Wither-spoonerism
indicating the fundamental im-measurable-
ness of stuff we nevertheless measure: like
assessing the analogical quality of Quality,
say (our learning& teaching processes), in
digital terms: 1.6923 -- my AmLit overall
course rating, plus a standard deviation of
0.8549)

...differences in value-set or attitude or
outlook & procedure when one's in
CREATOR MODE as opposed to
when one's in CONSUMER MODE.

Descriptively "hostile" values--any one can
reflect on one's own experience. Get Carla
Creative and Carl Consumer in the same room
& let them discuss the SUSTAIN-ABILTY of
our Academic Program, say--and see how they
get along or just do not.

The two complement, as you say: interact &
relate on the basis of difference. 2 sides of the
same coin.

But if the sheer distinction between them isn't
sustained, turned up (I'm claiming, for the sake
of argument), it's likely they are conflated and
confused and I'll bet: Consumer Attitude
dominates.

I used to teach Composition in terms of
PLAYBOY & PURITAN--trying to get
this same wonderful split-potential schizo-
phrenia in play as a way of talking about
COMPOSING:

Playboy: fool around with any idea that
comes to mind, be wasteful and prodigal:
throw it away throw it away: trial and
many margins for error and rooms for play.

Puritan: reformation and revision, purge
and scour, get serious: wash it down in the
blood of the lamb for crying out loud: so as
to make it GOOD.

Etc. Turn up the difference which then allows
the possibility of sustainable relationship
between the two. They can Just Get Along
if not mushed together. Otherwise--if the
distinction isn't sustained--"consumer mentality"
rules. Industrial Finished Product-ism dominates.

[A former dean told me I shouldn't abuse this
happy metaphor because it might offend students
in class who have been victims of playboy-ology:
an example of how puritanical in the worst sense
and cautious and conserving and litigiously careful
a consumer mentality can be. Get it RIGHT,
damnit.]

So much depends on coming to shared terms.
But that's a messy creative process, which--in
our Consumer Mode--we can’t fool with. Too
much to get done. Too little time.

Still: it's always worth ongoing argument.
Fundamental. Collegially, Sam.