Sep 21 2015

Be Leery Of The Leary [Update]

 

2015 leary sarandon

There has been a lot of press this year about Susan Sarandon’s ceremonial procession to lead Timothy Leary’s ashes to the Totem of Confessions, where they were placed underneath the Masturbating Nun (supposedly locked up to censor protect children from offensive art).

Now, further details are coming out. Most of the people in the parade partook of the “sacrament”, which meant drinking the ashes. It wouldn’t surprise me in the least if some LSD was mixed into this magic punch.

A number of videos of her speech have been posted online, and covered in mainstream publications like the Daily Mail – but strangely most of them cut the video before she started talking about the CIA. This one contains the full speech, and some analysis about the broader occult context behind it:

Sarandon says “If anyone doesn’t know who Timothy Leary is and you’ve taken acid, you should be ashamed of yourself…he was the leader of the whole thing to take acid away from the CIA, and make it a means of exploration for everybody”.

After the Burn, Sarandon went on the talk show circuit to promote the ritual. Media coverage included People, Hollywood Reporter, Vogue, Entertainment Weekly.

 

She told Jimmy Kimmel: “Burning Man is a celebration in the desert of all different kinds of people. It’s about self reliance, it’s about acceptance, it seems to be about drugs and nudity – there’s a lot of that too. A lot of art all over the place. This year I had a mission, which was to take Timothy Leary’s ashes, which I had some of, and take them to a chapel…we did drink them”.

Who gave Susan this mission? And who gave Timothy Leary – the man who wrote the CIA’s entrance exam, known as “The Leary” – his mission?

Leary said “at least 80% of the people I ever worked with were part of the CIA”. He described the “Liberal CIA” as “the best mafia you can deal with in the Twentieth Century”. He gave “total credit” to the CIA for creating the entire counter-culture movement.

John Lennon also said “we must remember to thank the CIA and the Army for giving us LSD” in his last interview. He was assassinated by a mind-controlled patsy in front of an ex-CIA doorman a few days later.

Timothy Leary and Billy Mellon Hitchcock at the Millbrook Estate

Timothy Leary and Billy Mellon Hitchcock at the Millbrook Estate

In fact it was British agent Aldous Huxley who tasked Leary with forming an “LSD Illuminati” to spread the drug. He did this with the help of members the powerful Mellon banking family, who provided a castle for his cult and helped fund global drug distribution networks after LSD was made illegal in 1966. At that point the CIA was the biggest purchaser of LSD in the world, having bought an estimated 100-250 million trips, or a third of all the acid ever manufactured, from Sandoz in Switzerland – owned by another powerful banking family, the Warburgs.

Huxley’s goal was to use drugs to create painless concentration camps for entire societies. His brother Julian is generally regarded as the father of transhumanism.

Today's Titans of Transhumanism - now called ABC.XYZ

Today’s Titans of Transhumanism – now called ABC.XYZ

Leary’s famous catchphrase “tune in, turn on, drop out” was actually developed on Madison Avenue by marketing guru philosopher Marshall McLuhan.

There are some interesting parallels between the values of the hippies in the Sixties, who thought they were changing the world with drugs and free love, and today’s socially engineered Burners, who think they are changing the world with “drugs and nudity”, as Sarandon puts it.

Robert Anton Wilson said “perhaps the final secret of the Illuminati is you don’t know you’re a member until it’s too late to get out”…sound familiar, Burners?

Nothing to see here, move along…and be sure to worship the prophets you’re told to.

sarandon kimmel

Sarandon on Jimmy Kimmel live:

The official mini-documentary from Future Eyes TV:

“America is going to become a Burning Man country”

 

[Update 9/22/15 5:09pm PST]

This occult ritual-within-an-occult ritual was promoted in Burning Man’s official newsletter The Jackrabbit Speaks V19#35, the week before the event started. As usual, not all of the information coming from this source was accurate. In particular, they got the details of his most famous catch-phrase wrong.

 

Burning Man 2015: Final Resting Place of Timothy Leary

Date: Thursday, September 3

Time and Locations:

6:00 pm – Gathering at Cirque Gitane (8:15 & Geek)

6:30 pm – Art Car Procession to the Man.

7:00 pm – Join forces with the Billion Bunny March Against Humanity.

7:30 pm – Marching Band, Art Car, Kazoo processional to Totem of Confessions. Electric Kool-Aid party

Lauren writes:

“One of the most famous countercultural icons of the 1960s, Timothy Leary, was among a small group of renowned social scientists who abandoned traditional Western methodologies for the sacred culture of Tibetan Buddhism in an effort to pursue mystical revelation and personal liberation. As an advocate of guided meditation through hallucinogenic drug use, Leary initiated a cultural renaissance with his ‘turn off, tune in, drop out’ mantra. After his death in 1996, several grams of Leary’s ashes were launched into space aboard a Pegasus rocket. The rest of his ashes were dispersed amongst loved ones, some of which are making their way to the playa this year through Cirque Gitane, an intergalactic travel camp located at 8:15 & Geek.

On Thursday at sundown, Cirque Gitane will encourage everyone on the playa to be a part of a Timothy Leary extravaganza. This celebration of Leary’s life will turn into an elaborate funeral procession that will travel through the playa to veteran artist Michael Garlington’s ‘Totem of Confessions’ on the 3:00 Promenade and 1600 feet from the Man.

The march will culminate with the ashes being placed inside the ‘Totem of Confessions,’ and when the Totem is burned, the ashes will burn with it. Burning Man will be one of the final resting places of this exceptional man, who President Richard Nixon called ‘the most dangerous man in America’. Leary taught people to tap into the wisdom of indigenous cultures and to treat the natural world as an extension of themselves.”

(Photo by Philip H. Bailey, CC-BY-SA)

165 comments on “Be Leery Of The Leary [Update]”

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  10. This video in the original post was fairly good as a representation of Burning Man. No added music track – all actual camera track sound. Some good editing in the camera – needs some work. Points off for screwing around with the optics over the lens, and the “man in the street interview” cut ins. Otherwise the video post was pretty clean.

    Reply

  12. Some further reading on Huxley’s involvement in MKULTRA, corresponding with its key players, having his personal physician (who dosed him with mescaline before he wrote the Doors of Perception) brought in to play a major role by CIA founder and Rockefeller lawyer Allen Dulles (both he and Huxley were members of the Century Club, East coast version of Bohemian Club)

    http://tavistockagenda.iwarp.com/whats_new_43.html

    http://www.levity.com/aciddreams/docs/aldous.html

    Reply

  13. Steve, you might enjoy adding to your soupcon of pieces of the 50s LSD puzzle my discussion of its little-known role in the nascent libertarian movement in the 50s, on pages 271-282 of my book RADICALS FOR CAPITALISM. Might be able to add some new suggestive bits of sinister shadow to your sense of the story of Acid in America…

    Reply

  15. After reading this stuff I am going to go put Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon on the Victrola – and cue up Wizard Of Oz on the VHS – because, as Thomas Pynchon said, “Everything is connected”. . . Well, it appears to be in certain parts of California (and now a week in Nevada) anyway.

    Reply

  16. From the author of Acid Dreams, via Jan Irvin. Note Hubbard was employed at SRI by Willis Harman.

    MARTY LEE. That is one story. There is another story which I did not put in my book. According to Captain Al Hubbard, Hofmann did not discover it in 1943, nor in ’38, but much earlier. (Captain Alfred M. Hubbard was the spy who became the first Johnny Apple- seed of LSD) According to Hubbard, Hofmann was part of a small group of people who were nominally connected with Steiner’s anthroposophy group in the early 30’s and they systematically decided and set out to make a peace pill to help mankind. They saw the beginnings of the Nazi emergence, so they consciously set out to make something like LSD, which they did and then kept it secret from the world.
    Now there is absolutely no evidence to confirm that, and Captain Al Hubbard is an exaggerator. Hubbard is an aggrandizer. He likes to be the one who knows. That’s his character. But it’s a curious story and I would not completely discount it. Hubbard knows a lot of things. The basic outline of one rather wild story he told a friend of mine proved correct, although some of the details may be exaggerated. This particular tale, I could not confirm.
    Regarding secret societies — well, when you come down to it, the CIA is a secret society. And within the CIA, there are all kinds of secret societies operating. The Freemasons are in the CIA. The Knights of Malta are in the CIA, and other groups. These different secret societies are not just within the CIA but in the corporate world, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the FBI, the Defense Department, etcetera. These societies, if we understood them, might help delineate certain factions within the power elite. I think it works on two levels. For the proletariat — for the rest of us — the Rotary, Masonry, doesn’t really mean anything.

    Reply

    • Hubbard was a super interesting character. But he was also an egomaniac and pathological exaggerator. I won’t even say liar, because I know his type, they like to exaggerate and implicate themselves in things of import, and like the quote says, “be the one who knows.” As soon as either he’s debunked or on the off chance he was right and that knowledge gets into the mainstream, he’ll invent something else just to be back in that position of exclusive knowledge.

      Anyway, the quote above questions the veracity of Hubbard’s story multiple times, so I’m not sure why you’d include it here as evidence.

      Reply

  17. Also cite in Leary’s own words that he was a “big time eugenicist” if he’s one of the people you mean by “these guys.” It sounds like you have a well developed con theory about who “really” invented LSD; cites on that as well? (Though we are obviously in a world where “cites” are meaningless as we can just presume any words written by anyone we decide doesn’t fit our narrative are lies or myths. Might be!)

    Reply

      • That’s a basic intellectual difference between us, and one we aren’t going to hash out: let’s just say that my own experience and understanding of life does NOT lead me to believe in a generally cultish or conspiratorial view of how the world works, which includes not believing that anyone who in anyway had “links” or even a paycheck from an organization is in fact a lifelong worker toward its goals, or even that orgs on CIA or US govt level HAVE unified goals that are being worked toward in a singularly intelligent way. That said, it is worth remembering that ALL of what goes on not in front of our own eyes and about half of what does, we might have NO IDEA about no matter what anyone else says or writes. But that includes the scary weird cult conspiracy stuff that the very skeptical of all the sayings and writings of faraway strangers seem to think must be gospel if a faraway stranger said or wrote it.

        Reply

        • Once CIA, always CIA… That’s not just my opinion. We can’t hash out intellectual differences with references and primary documents? Shame. Well, at least your book exposed Danger Ranger as a drug dealer! “Federal fugitive” indeed.

          Reply

          • Your documents don’t prove what you think they prove. (I also am missing the smoking gun document that Leary received a CIA paycheck, but please post it below.) Leary described the meaning of association with CIA quite well with his “mafia” comment. I am politely admitting that once one chooses to believe everyone is a sinister liar, then “history” becomes pretty meaningless. I’m just saying my experience in life on the peripheries of some circles of power lead me to a core different view of how the world works—one that might be wrong. You seem quite sure your scary cult conspiracy one is not wrong, and of COURSE I’m not going to convince you otherwise. For other readers, jsut remember: if a whole bunch of books and sayings from the “norm world” can all be complete lies, so can books and sayings from the “cool conspiracy world” minus lots of corroboration that goes beyond other words other people said.

          • “Once CIA, always CIA…”

            There’s a difference between being employed by the CIA as an agent, with all the training and security clearances and lifetime secrecy oaths that entails, and having done work for the CIA on a contracting basis, which is what Leary did, at best.

          • Unless I’m missing even wilder accusations, the best people pin on Leary is (and I don’t even know if this is DOCUMETED fact or just surmised) is: CIA money went to the program at Harvard under which he taught and researched. So, like, you work for an organization and that organization gets money from another org, so you are a lifelong supporter of every goal that organization supposedly had, even if you never actually said or wrote or did anything in direct support of those supposed goals. (Eugenics in this case.)

      • I do recommend anyone who cares read that gnosticmedia link and decide for themselves if it proves anything sinister or conspiratorial at all about Huxley, Leary, or Esalen. It’s an incredibly undocumented series of bizarre assertions, and, once again, interpreting Huxley’s ALARMED PREDICTIONS for sinister plans.

        Reply

      • From that article:

        “My feeling is that the word “X” for MDMA is directly related (to the X Club).”

        My feeling has always been that “X” referred to the first syllable in the word Ecstacy, truncating a word like much of street slang does. I mean seriously, which interpretation is a greater logical leap? And this kind of thinking permeates not just that article, but conspiracy theory thinking in general.

        Reply

      • Harman says a lot of things, and they are weird and disturbing so those wired to accept (without evidence…) weird and disturbing things can choose to believe them. Do you believe he’s provided corroborated or verifiable evidence for his occult secret society claims?

        Reply

        • I have proof that he [Willis Harman from military contractor SRI] attended Bohemian Grove. And that his IONS has been conducting occult scientific experiments at Burning Man. Is that the sort of thing you’re looking for? What constitutes “verifiable evidence of occult secret society membership” to you? Do you have any evidence AGAINST these claims?

          Reply

          • Evidence besides Harmon writing the words that LSD-25 was invented by the secret society he asserts and not via the story Hoffman has been telling for years and that has survived the standard means of corroborated history as far as I know. What does attending Bohemian Grove mean to you? I attended a Boho Grove meeting, tho at an LA restaurant, not the Grove. “Can you prove it ISN’T true”—it was the Church of Scientology that last tried that one on me. Nope, but I’m just reminding you that Hoffman’s story has been out there going thru the standard things that every bit of “understood history” goes thru, and Harmon just seems to have written a bunch of words. I repeat, if we choose to think it, we have NO IDEA about anything at all that happens not in front of our eyes. But I have decided to have a little faith in the standard way history and journalism is done. Skepticism is great, but be exactly as skeptical of the “alt” story as you are of the “mainstream” one. Or don’t, it really doesn’t matter.

          • Your evidence is that Harmon typed some words. Mine is that HOffman did, and did so very publicly for many decades through the standard processes of establishing historical truth, and as far as I know no one has provided any evidence he was lying. Harmon, from what you’ve presented, typed some words. Did he have any documents or letters from this alleged SS discussing the invention or use of LSD and psylocibib i 1938 (Hoffman of course acknowledged invention of it then, claims no use til 43). Or did he just type some words? Why do you believe those words, besides that they make the world seem stranger and scarier and that feels interesting?

          • Actually if I followed the trail on that Harmon quote correctly he was said to have SAID it on an ABC Radio news program of some sort in 1977 in an academic paper by Piper on the Perutz novel that seemed to have predicted an LSD like substance Is that it? If there’s more I’m interested but I gotta say that’s thin evidence to believe that that statement from Harmon’s mouth is true, or verifiably true.

          • Your comment about conspiracies is a very good reason to believe that conspiracies can occur. If you believe they are sufficient reason to believe that anything anyone says that states or implies a conspiracy is occuring must be true because, well, conspiracies can and do exist, that’s perhaps not entirely reliable epistemology. But if you are enjoying it, enjoy! The Harmon thing seems REMARKABLY thin, and even the only apparent academic reference to it admits that there is zero evidence for it besides words out of Harmon’s mouth.

          • Thank you Brian for writing more clearly and eloquently about conspiracy theories than I have been able to muster. I also believe it comes down to fundamentally different ways of experiencing the world, most specifically in the need to pin most if not all of the world’s ills on identifiable sources, which of course lends some certainty that some people need in an uncertain world. Same thing that religion, or even scientism, does.

          • Perhaps you think all history is just a string of unconnected random events, that mysteriously repeat themselves in similar patterns. Study a bit deeper and you find that most big historical things are connected. Follow the money is always a good way to start.

            It’s no conspiracy theory that Leary worked with/for the CIA or that Huxley was a eugenicist. Whatever evidence I provide to support it is not going to change the minds of those who refuse to consider it.

          • Agreed, Leary did some work for the CIA, and Huxley was a eugenicist. The CIA has proven through the decades to want a piece of just about anyone doing innovative work. That doesn’t mean Leary and Huxley and the CIA were conspiring to create mental concentration camps.

            It’s been my experience that lots of things are connected in unintentional ways based on proximity and basic human interdependence. But to go from that to a grand intentional conspiracy is a leap of faith. I disagree with Brian that conspiracy thinking makes the world scarier. To me, it seems to make the world less scary, more orderly and easier to understand and, ultimately, control.

          • Yes, exactly like that. In that conspiracy, there is a small group of people controlling the world. With the belief that someone is steering the ship, we can then blame the world’s ills on an identifiable source. I’m sure that’s comforting to some.

          • Because it’s from Virgil, dude (thank you Classics lectures!), it translates to “new order of the ages”:

            The great order of the ages is born afresh.
            And now justice returns, honored rules return

            And a quick search shows this:

            “It was proposed by Charles Thomson, the Latin expert who was involved in the design of the Great Seal of the United States, to signify ‘the beginning of the new American Era’ as of the date of the Declaration of Independence.”

            As Brian said, we can choose to believe whatever sources we want. I choose to believe those put under the most scrutiny.

        • Here’s Hoffman in his own words, revealing that his boss Arthur Stoll was the first to isolate ergotamine, in 1918.

          ” Looking for a new field of research, I asked Professor Stoll to let me continue the investigations on the alkaloids of ergot, which he had begun in 1917 and which had led directly to the isolation of ergotamine in 1918. Ergotamine, discovered by Stoll, was the first ergot alkaloid obtained in pure chemical form…
          Ergot, more than any other drug, has a fascinating history, in the course of which its role and meaning have been reversed: once dreaded as a poison, in the course of time it has changed to a rich storehouse of valuable remedies. Ergot first appeared on the stage of history in the early Middle Ages, as the cause of outbreaks of mass poisonings affecting thousands of persons at a time. The illness, whose connection with ergot was for a long time obscure, appeared in two characteristic forms, one gangrenous (ergotismus gangraenosus) and the other convulsive (ergotismus convulsivus). Popular names for ergotism—such as “mal des ardents,” “ignis sacer,” “heiliges Feuer,” or “St. Anthony’s fire”—refer to the gangrenous form of the disease. The patron saint of ergotism victims was St. Anthony, and it was primarily the Order of St. Anthony that treated these patients. ”

          http://www.psychedelic-library.org/child1.htm

          Reply

          • Yeah, I could be wrong on this but isn’t the “official story” that HOffman was working on multiple derivations (possibly misusing a technical term) of ergotamine and LSD-25 was one of them, derived in 1938. This does nothing to suggest HOffman is a liar, or that the SRI buddies Hubbard and Harmon are correct that it was a secret society occult experiment for mind control or whatever.

          • Please say what that bit about ergotomine is meant to be evidence FOR beyond its own simple fact. What I’m arguing is your claim that LSD and psylocibin were deliberately developed by theosophists for mind control goals and that the standard via Hoffman tale of LSDs derivation and first use are lies. What you wrote has nothing to do with any of that.

        • Just saw an early treatment for the movie. Opening premise is that these guys’ bodies were all surreptitiously stolen by the CIA and kept in the “body locker” for research. Early line: “We hack into centrifuges and depose presidents. Do you really think some funeral parlor or crypt is going to be a challenge?”

          As the movie opens, a new resurrection drug is being tested on them. Leery and Huxley are the first to rise. They go into a duet arguing about intent vs. results, and the effect this new drug would have on the practice of eugenics.

          Generally seems like a ripoff of “1776” as to musical structure. Might do better on Broadway.

          Reply

      • Here is the one mention of the word “eugenics” from that article:

        “Although Leary’s book is silent when it comes to eugenics, he depicted SMI2LE as a way for humans to improve themselves via ‘neurogenetic evolution pre-programmed by DNA.'”

        Is that eugenics? There are lots of people running around today looking to improve their own and/or humanities mental and physical capacities through various means, but I don’t think of most of them as eugenicists. For my own clarification, here is the dictionary definition:

        “the study of or belief in the possibility of improving the qualities of the human species or a human population, especially by such means as discouraging reproduction by persons having genetic defects or presumed to have inheritable undesirable traits (negative eugenics) or encouraging reproduction by persons presumed to have inheritable desirable traits (positive eugenics)”

        Was Leary advocating for discouraging or encouraging reproduction of any group of people? Is someone like Aubrey de Grey a eugenicist for wanting to extend human life expectancy?

        Reply

        • Rather than second hand commentary, I’ve read and in some cases re read everything Tim wrote along SMILE lines and it so exactly entirely 1000 percent reversal from “elite enslaving humanity toward eugenics” that, well, it’s as nutty as believing that everything Huxley said and wrote warning about drugged tyranny was actually an attempt to create drugged tyranny. It’s not worth arguing with, really, but as always this is for readers, not the people supposedly having a back and forth. SMILE was about taking the power to transcend limits of time, space, and genes for yourself and everyone. Very libertarian in spirit.

          Reply

          • Eugenics. Not dysgenics. Utopias, not dystopias. People want to be led to a utopia, a “brave new world order”. Like Burning Man!

            Huxleys comments in his speech are not accidental. He is not lamenting that his dystopian novel turned out to be true. He was part of the Children of The Sun occult secret society and worked with Fabian head of British Intelligence HG Wells and Eric Blair (Orwell) .

          • A writer comparing notes with another writer. I agree with Huxley, his version is more plausible. Does that mean I’m also advocating for it?

          • I think what’s under debate is if Huxley was advocating his dystopic ideas . Brian and others think he spent 30 years of his life promoting them ruefully, and marveling at how they accidentally came true against his wishes. Whereas I think he spent those years developing the ideas with some of the smartest scientists of the day, as did his brother. When he gave a speech discussing in detail his ideas, that was to promote them, not decry them. Huxley was all about the 0.5% ruling the 99.5% with pharmacological and electronic means.

        • There isn’t really any “debate” about it. I mean, if you are just going to assert because it fits a preconceived invented notion that someone meant exactly the opposite of what they said or implied about something their whole professional life, with as near as I can tell no evidence WHATSOEVER for it (not a single instance of, hmm, in this personal letter to a friend he admitted “heh heh for some reason I let EVERYONE IN THE WORLD misunderstand the meaning of my most famous book decrying drugged tyranny in dramatic form and mislead everyone into thinking I believe it was “malevolent” and a “problem” because somehow fooling people about that will help my REAL goal of imposing a drugged tyranny via my satrap Leary who I gave marching orders to (and yet also in personal letters to friends complained that he was being far too reckless and quick to encourage the use of this drug I want everyone to use, which couldn’t possiblye be of any value in creating a drugged tyranny and of course has not led to such in any way” then there is nothing to debate about. You’ve decided you believe it, and since EVERY BIT OF EVIDENCE IN THE WORLD is against it, there is nothing to debate about it!

          Reply

          • Steve, you’ve caught me being hyperbolic. It’s one of those bits of “literary” expression that you and Irvin seem to think don’t exist. But I said it, and there it is. Let me expand: of course neither I, you, Irvin, or anyone but God has seen “every bit of evidence in the world.” But it’s my way of showing respect to Irvin and you, smart guys who care about this topic more than about 10 other people on earth as far as I know and who seem to be very dedicated to proving your point. And I figure you guys would lay out the evidence you have, out of respect for the people in the world you are trying to convince. And since you guys, as far as I’ve seen, have got nothing that doesn’t involve asserting that Huxley actually meant the complete opposite of everything he said or wrote or implied (and the definition of “implication” is so key to all this con theory stuff), with no reason given for why he would do that except that he’s evil (or his brother is evil, or some organization that funded an organization that funded a conference that he attended has members who are evil….), and no context for claiming he’s evil other than asserting that you think he is, I don’t know how far down that road I can walk with you guys.

          • Sorry if I didn’t lay out every piece of research myself and others have ever done about Aldous Huxley, Julian Huxley, Thomas Henry Huxley, and their cohorts such as H G Wells, Charles Babbage and the Webss, in comments to a story about Susan Sarandon and Timothy Leary.

            I have noted your point about insufficient evidence and will be addressing that shortly, I hope to a satisfactory level of thoroughness…”coming soon”. The counter culture is a funny old thing, and didn’t just magically emerge by accident one day in a spontaneous pit of naked people and free hallucinogens.

  18. Citation in Huxley’s own words that “His idea was to drug people into thinking they were free when in fact they were in a concentration camp.” (If it’s just that you think that his novel BRAVE NEW WORLD was actually sincere wish fulfillment, then never mind.)

    Reply

    • You can listen to the entire speech at UC Berkeley here Brian. I am not putting words in Huxley’s mouth!

      I never said I was quoting BNW, although of course he outlined this concept “fictionally” in that book, The Island, and others. BTW he was a founder of Esalen, along with a couple of Stanford/military guys.

      http://burners.me/2014/07/22/soma/

      Reply

        • Sure. And there’s a huge body of evidence showing that Huxley spent most of his career working towards it. I just re-listened to his 1962 SF speech in its entirety, it sure is a shocker. He references BNW as being ideas 30 years before when he wrote it, and being totally possible with today’s technology. (That was 53 years ago. It is my sincere belief that technology has developed significantly over the last > half century)

          Clearly, he succeeded – as the Orwell/Huxley cartoon in my SOMA link shows.
          I am on a plane now so can’t post any further links for you, but please check out the many ones I already did.

          Reply

          • So it is exactly what I guessed at the start….you think that BNW was not cautionary but what he was advocating. I don’t think that’s true, so no amount of pointing to “he wrote or said that the world would be that way!” at all proves he worked toward or wanted it to be that way. You are just scaring yourself, which is cool if you enjoy it.

          • “Denying this is foolish. Gore said and wrote that global warming would lead to icecap melting and sea level rise over and over. Listen to his hideous, mocking southern drawl…”

          • “Island” (not “The Island” as suggested) was a refutation of BNW in Huxley’s own hand. BNW was written before he tried psilocybin. “Doors of Perception” and “Island were written after, when he realized some drugs didn’t dull perception, but enhanced it. Huxley came to believe society would be greatly improved if our best and brightest used psychedelics (he didn’t think they were for the masses). Leary thought anyone who wanted to try psychedelics could benefit from them and they should have the freedom of their own consciousness. Kesey believed everyone could benefit from the experience, even if they were dosed against their will. Read “Storming Heaven”. Best book ever written on the subject.

          • I don’t believe any more that Steve even believes this; it’s just too completely obviously on the surface not true. But for readers., here is the fuller context of Huxley’s “revolution” comment in the 62 lecture: ” “It seems to me that the nature of the ultimate revolution with which we are now faced is precisely this: That we are in process of developing a whole series of techniques which will enable the controlling oligarchy who have always existed and presumably will always exist to get people to love their servitude. This is the, it seems to me, the ultimate in malevolent revolutions shall we say, and this is a problem which has interested me many years and about which I wrote thirty years ago, a fable, Brave New World, which is an account of society making use of all the devices available and some of the devices which I imagined to be possible making use of them in order to, first of all, to standardize the population, to iron out inconvenient human differences, to create, to say, mass produced models of human beings arranged in some sort of scientific caste system.”

        • Guide me to the part in that too long speech where Huxley clearly states something like “everyone thinks I intended BNW as a horrible cautionary tale, but that’s not true. I WANT the world to be chemically enslaved.” The quote you already gave doesn’t come close.

          Reply

          • “There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And this seems to be the final revolution”
            Aldous Huxley

          • That sounds like he’s warning people about the possibility, not advocating for it. I mean come on. Has Al been Gore warning people about climate change or advocating for it all these years. Can people make predictions without wanting them to come true?

          • I’m sure he was your typical cynical, imperious upper-class British intellectual. Ever here Martin Amis sneer at how the world is falling apart in an almost gleeful manner? Or Will Self? Do you think those two are advocating for it? How about Christopher Hitchens? He made all kinds of predictions, usually while drunk and chuckling to himself. Come on, man.

          • A web site in 40 years: “Al Gore, whose links with the CIA were well known, for years conspired to warm the earth enough so that ice caps would melt and destroy coastlines as part of their longterm plan for eugenics.”

          • “…but will rather enjoy it…”” > a/k/a Professional Sports. Bread, circuses, drugs, cake, religion – all ways to placate and divert the attention of the masses so they don’t notice what the people in charge are doing.

            …Oh, look at that Burning Man commercial…

          • Is every recreational or spiritual activity a deliberate construct to divert attention away from the wizards behind the curtain? That’s a rather dire and condescending view of humanity.

          • Yes, if it’s pointless, circular and not productive. And nothing I said was spiritual or even recreational: Bread, circuses, drugs, cake, religion. Cheering for professional sports is not. Eating cheap or sweet food is not. Taking drugs is not. Religion and it’s dogma are not. If spiritual activities enrich your perspective or understanding, or recreation helps your spirit, or health, that’s productive.

          • Oh boy, you’ve really got it all figured out. Please tell me you’re not older than a college sophomore.

          • Yes, when it comes to placating the masses. Is it a mystery to you why Trump is leading the in the polls? Do you know why we spend more in sports facilities than libraries? Do you know why we have “pollution standards” for cars?

          • The quote you are sighting is a warning, not what he wanted. It is the same warning that is the theme of BNW. BNW was a early work, he changed his opinion after taking psilocybin and wrote “Island” as an example of a society where drugs were a tool leading to wisdom. The inhabitants of the Island were Buddhist pacifists that allow themselves to be destroyed rather than abandon their principles. Naturally Huxley thought a society like BNW was more likely (our drugs are TV and consumerism) but he didn’t advocate it, just the opposite.

          • OK, I’ll bite some more. “Studies have shown” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/01/30/sports-fan-mental-health-benefits_n_6565314.html) that being a fan of a sports team and socializing with other fans and, yes, cheering for your team, are actually beneficial to one’s health, mostly due to the communal nature of sports fandom. Similar benefits have been found for belonging to a church (any church) and attending services (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/04/21/opinion/sunday/luhrmann-why-going-to-church-is-good-for-you.html?_r=0). It’s all about community and collective focus.

            There’s also recreation for recreation’s sake. Humans aren’t meant to be productive 24/7.

          • Same could have been said of the Nuremberg rallies.

            If you choose to do something, that’s great. When government takes its money and selectively enhances an activity for diversion and profit, that’s something bad. Pickup game of B-ball, good; professional Basketball teams, bad.

            Do you know who has the highest paid state job is in most states? Really, how does that move us forward? Nobody ever got hired or invented a new cancer therapy because their alma-mater had a winning football team.

          • I have to say, it took longer than I expected, but gladly, the Hitler audible has finally been called. Whew!

            Professional (and big college) sports is corrupt like most all large institutions are corrupt, that doesn’t mean being fan of it in some way has no benefits. I agree, college coaches are WAY overpaid. I’m not a big fan of publicly funded stadiums, but government selectively enhancing, through funding, all kinds of things. Stadiums, solar power, soybeans, etc. etc.

          • Documentary proof that Huxley received CIA money as part of MK-ULTRA? Not just some loon on the internet typing it, but some actual document or report from an academic or researcher who reliably reports seeing such documentary evidence, or verbal report from multiple verified CIA MK-ULTRA agents or operatives.

          • If one is claiming someone is working for an organization for that organization’s sinister goals, one should know that someone WORKED FOR THAT ORGANIZATION. Look, psychedelics existed. They are interesting things. Organizations like the CIA became interested in them. Intellectuals like Huxley became interested in them. THey said and did things in the world involving them. But why associate Huxley with MK ULTRA if you don’t know that he was doing things as part of/paid by/under direction and for the goals of the CIA? You are just thoughtlessly lumping anything anyone said or did involving psych drugs into one muddled sinister plot. It doesn’t make any sense. He thoughts they were interesting drugs and could have positive effects, but was (in my mind) way too elitist and mandarin about who should be using them and why. The likes of Leary and his aftereffects kind of blew that up.

  19. I wonder if Martin Shkreli and other Turing Pharma associates go to Burning Man? It is now the perfect vacation for brainstorming radical CEO schemes.

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  21. This whole charade was all about and for Sarandon. Leary was merely a vehicle for this attention grab.

    It worked too.

    Too bad Entertainment Tonight wasn’t there to record every moment of this sacred event. Maybe next year!

    What a joke.

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  22. Dear Burners, this is soooooooo very timely. It was indeed Susan Sarandon’s Camp, Cirque Gitane, located at 8:15 & G, that I reported about the Latino laborers discrimination.

    http://burners.me/2015/09/19/el-sherpo-latina-labor-abuses-at-plug-n-plays/

    I had long heard that Susan Sarandon was a good Burner. And she writes: “Burning Man is a celebration in the desert of all different kinds of people. It’s about self reliance, it’s about acceptance, it seems to be about drugs and nudity – there’s a lot of that too….” But this shows that she does’t even know the discrimination that happen in her own camp. My hope is that this very article reaches her………. and that she works to align her Camp to the Ten Principles……….. and that if she decides to bring Latino laborers again in the future, they are treated as EQUAL BURNER Participants!! Someone please forward my article to her!! THANK YOU! Buena Chica

    Reply

    • “My hope is that this very article reaches her…”

      You must not be very committed to what you wrote. If you were, as the primary source, you would get your info to all the mainstream media that have mentioned her and the NV burn.

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      • She’s @susansarandon on Twitter. Seems like a good a burner to me. Coincidentally, we were in the Petit Ermitage a few days before BM this year. She was there, as well as a big French contingent heading to the Burn. We got shushed for laughing while a comedy film was playing.

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    • >I reported about the Latino laborers discrimination.

      Again, the only basis for your charge of discrimination and racism against this camp is that the workers weren’t allowed to partake in the festivities. They did the job they were hired to do and that didn’t including partying with their employers. That’s neither discrimination or racism, and quite careless and offensive to make such unwarranted accusations.

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      • It’s Burning Man. There is no ‘hiring’. There is no ‘job’. There are no ’employers’. Such distinctions, ranks, classes are not allowed. These people are not commodities. They are All participants partying with other participants.

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        • Um, there were over 9,000 paid positions on the playa this year according to the population statistics that have been reported. Look it up. It appears you’re living in a delusional bubble filled with the Burner cult kool aid.

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          • My information is 9350 last year and 15500 this year – not necessarily “paid positions”, more “anyone but paid participants”. There were 70,000 paid participants according to Pershing Sheriff Jerry Allen

          • For fuck’s sake, that’s the number of people who didn’t pay for tickets – primarily volunteers and art grant recipients.

            The number of paid workers on the playa is far lower. Most are long-time volunteer burner Org employees who have been “promoted” from volunteer positions into volunteer supervisors and other temporary management roles and put in a huge number of hours as worker/participants (on 3 or 4-week contracts). Others are specialized contractors who pump potties. Law enforcement, although not contracted directly by the Org, sort of fits in that category as well, and certainly count as paid workers on the playa.

            Some burners are paid (in cash or kind). This is where the borders start to get more fuzzy – I don’t personally have a problem with a burner (veteran or not) working off their ticket and camp fees in order to participate in the event. I think that is somehow different that a camp hiring laborers off the street or through an ad

          • “I think that is somehow different that a camp hiring laborers off the street or through an ad” > Let me make this simple: if going to the NV burn helps you pay your rent, you are not a burner. That is all.

    • >…I reported about the Latino laborers discrimination.

      You didn’t report about any discrimination, you cited no examples of discrimination. You simply reported that Latinos built their camp. Hiring Latino laborers is not discrimination.

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  24. The procession was pure narcissism. Why make a big show out of what most people consider a somber and subdued act? Oh right, because she’s famous and Leary was famous, so she needs that ego hit even out on the playa. And people are paying attention to it because of her fame. It’s about as removed from what makes Burning Man unique as possible.

    Reply

      • Huxley fought for a prison of the mind. His idea was to drug people into thinking they were free when in fact they were in a concentration camp. Learys idea was to drug people into thinking they were free and then drop out of society to join communes. If you can’t see the parallels, you may already be imprisoned…maybe lay off the acid and shrooms and prescription pharmaceuticals

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      • Leary was a nut and an egomaniac, but I think he was genuine in believing LSD was the answer to freeing the mind. Of course, looking for external, and especially manufactured (literally) solutions to spiritual and/or psychic (as in psyche) matters is always just a dodge. Gotta look in the mirror, Tim.

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          • Hadn’t heard that about Leary. I’m sure he was an elitist, but I’d have to see some evidence about his views on eugenics.

          • Leary believed in improving human consciousness and thus improving humans. Not by eliminating bad genes, but by freeing the mind. His later work was on using computer technology to stretch and train the brain. His partner in the Harvard studies was Richard Alpert, who became the spiritual teacher Ram Dass, who wrote “Be Here Now’ and founded the Seva Foundation dedicated to the yoga of service. He studied with a Guru in the east after having spiritual epiphanies on LSD. What Ram Dass said about LSD and spirituality was “LSD is like taking the elevator to the top floor…sometimes it is healthier to take the stairs”. I was fortuante to see both of them speak a number of times.

          • Nobody believes Hoffman invented ergotomine. Ergotomine is a natural substance derived from a specific mold. Hoffman had the idea ergotomines could be used for migraines and was looking the right formula when he stumbled onto LSD. How do we know this is true? What are ergotomines used for now? Migraine medications.

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