hi all. I like my anonymity and usually dont post a lot of personal stuff, or at least its been awhile. I guess my personal posts & details have probably declined over time in my posts as I got stuff off my chest.

one of the great things about blogging is the timeliness of it. and yeah I like to post stuff & time it with [compelling/intense/meaningful etc] current events.

I have some misc thoughts on the aurora 16 shooting.

this has a very personal connection for me. I feel that talking about events like this is a bit of bad luck. sort of like the shuar indians of ecuador who feel that its bad luck to talk about their head-shrinking secrets on their enemies they've killed (like, how to do it, where the heads are kept, etcetera...)[1]  but on the other hand it can also be a little cathartic (another key pt of blogs). so Im a little torn but here it goes anyway.

I just went to that theatre with the sig.other about 6 wks ago. I saw "dark shadows". she just told me less than an hour ago, "I never want to go to that theatre again. I dont care what movie is playing, no matter how awesome it is."

the theatre is right next to the Aurora Mall which is large and has major chains like Macy's and a good food court. Aurora is not really large enough to have a "downtown" but this is within an area that could be described as as close as possible to a "downtown" aurora; the city/county/govt buildings are 5min from the location.

in fact I liked that theatre in particular for a cool geek feature-- it has a small but great arcade, usually with 2-3 pinballs, air hockey, & other cool video games. for several years, up until recently (a few mos ago) they had the arcade/standup version of Guitar Hero. this is an amazing game that costs something like $8K new.
 
unfortunately the arcade is behind the ticket boundary in the theatre. therefore, I would sneak into this theatre from exit doors, just to play this video game. of course I could have easily watched movies this way too (sssssh... dont tell anyone)! I probably blew more than $50 over the years on that particular game.

and then I read in the news that the shooter liked to play Guitar Hero.

Im pretty sure at this theatre I saw the trailer for "gangland" which is a new movie coming out, with a violent scene where gangsters shoot up innocent theatregoers with machine guns, from behind the screens.  I wouldnt be surprised if the shooter actually saw this trailer himself. maybe he wouldnt remember it consciously, but it seemed to have played on his subconscious. the similarities are just too uncanny to ignore/dismiss.

"crazy synchronicity". we use that word "crazy" in the english language in a lot of diverse ways, some of them so different as to be almost opposite.

the studio has just pulled this trailer from theatres all over the world and even wiped off of youtube! [3] I remember cringing on watching it, thinking "wow-- what a creepy scene". the unconscious undertones make the mind "reel"...! how many people selfconsciously realize they're in a theatre when they saw that trailer? in fact I wonder if the shooter saw that trailer. I think theres a pretty good probability that he did.

theres that word "synchronicity" ... its great its made its way into mainstream vernacular. I believe this was actually coined by Jung decades ago. Jung didnt have as huge an impact to Freud, hes sort of like the moon to Freuds sun [in more ways that you can realize] but theres a word that deserves to be more widely studied.

Im not an overly religious person but I do believe in cosmic synchronicity, of a sort of hidden order that we dont have access to, which is related in things like dreams, archetypes, and synchronous events. its also a higher order. an intelligence that organizes the universe, things seen and unseen.

another weird coincidence is that young newscaster/reporter lady who was at the Canadian shooting just a few months ago [jessica ghawi], and wrote about it on her blog. she said she had creepy feelings and left the scene just minutes before the shootings. and now in this new massacre-- dead. isnt that bizarre synchronicity? [2]

* * * 

when jung invented the term I dont think he ever applied it to negative situations. there are zillions of stories of "obviously positive" synchronicity. a classic one Ive heard in a book is that a woman loses her wedding ring in a lake, and she and her husband give up on it. later the husband is fishing in the lake, and catches a fish-- and inside the fish is the ring. wild stuff huh? I have several books on the subject, all very cool.

but here in aurora within the last 24hrs, in a faraway surreal reality, or right next door to me [15m drive].. sometimes its hard to tell the difference between the two.. we seem to have some intense negative collective synchronicity playing out. so its hard to interpret but I think the universe is indeed sending us a sort of "twisted" message that few will notice, but which is meaningful nonetheless. you might ask, how could the universe be twisted? the universe is not so twisted, I would say, but human beings are. (oh well maybe even the universe is a little "warped"....)
 
heres some negative synchronicity in my life. my parents lived near columbine in 1997, about 15min drive. I lived in denver at the time. I recall reading about it with sinking feelings on the internet.

I went to "windows on the world", the wtc bar at the top of the building, in ~1997 or so. I recall looking out the window and seeing the tops of higher buildings beside it, far below me. "wow, I am high enough for a plane to crash into this building, this floor".

my brother, my fraternal twin, died after committing suicide in 2010. after suffering a long mental illness that combined symptoms of depression, anorexia, and schizophrenia. ie probably what is called "schizoaffective" disorder. fraternal twins are a sort of familial/dna synchronicity...

what is the meaning of negative synchronicity? I think it exists & is meaningful. Im not sure exactly, but it probably points to our individual and collective shadow side.

obama says wrt the tragedy that "we cant know what makes people choose to kill other people" or something like that. but I think the mere use of language to describe killing, other than to say its senseless, is inadequate. language is about logic, sanity, lucidity. you need to be these things to comprehend language. violence is incomprehensible. but somehow we are conditioned to comprehend it in contradictory ways.
 
in a way, we do "know" exactly why that deranged man did what he did. he was crazy. doesnt that fully explain it? of course we then might want to know "why" he went crazy, why he snapped. that is more of an impenetrable mystery that we each have to ponder in our own personal way. it is indeed astonishing however from news accounts that he seemed to be a "high functioning" individual with not much prior history, even in a graduate neuroscience study program.

I have this new Time glossy book from the newsstand about Disasters. its a litany including things like the Titanic, the NYC shirtwaist factory fire, the Hindenburg, etcetera. famous historical disasters. but the book has absolutely nada about the indian ocean tsunami. ok fine, exclude natural disasters. but then, what about WWI or WWII, or 911, or the holocaust, hiroshima/nagasaki-- grandaddies of all disasters. are they not disasters? with inconceivable loss of life in the millions? if not, then what are they?what causes humans to rationalize and minimize warfare as disaster? surely its a kind of psychological defense mechanism at the societal/collective conscious level. what is sometimes called "consensus reality"....

I guess war is literally not seen as an actual disaster in our minds. perhaps because war has been recurring since the beginning of civilization, for thousands of years, all of recorded history. its possibly/probably even older than civilization... right? I think it is recorded that packs of male gorillas will sometime rampage in gangs, right? that must be the early biological origins of war. and ants engage in many warlike qualities. but one would think-- are humans more evolved than gorillas? than ants? is the aurora 16 massacre any less rational than warfare? I say it is not. I say warfare is organized irrationality on a scale that makes the bloodbath at the aurora 16 look like childs play.

* * *

so about 12 people died in a theatre in aurora yesterday night (its maybe too early to know the exact count-- someone could still die in critical condition etc). but every few weeks, roughly that many people die in drone attacks in afghanistan. on average. some of them women & children. some of them weddings... think Im wrong? the govt keeps no statistics and will not release what information it has. hows that for government accountability? did you read that recent NYT article on the Assassin In Chief? (CIA in reverse!) the number cant be that far off.

yeah a few people read it, a few pundits, there were a few ripples, there was an official petition in congress with a few representatives and senators complaining. about the assassination part, or being out of the loop, or something like that (hmmm, actually I dont recall exactly what they were complaining about). and McCain accused the obama admin of political theatre/near propaganda. quite a mixed reaction there....

do you know the name "awlacki"? ring a bell? hes the terrorist that obama recently executed by remote control drone. as far as I can tell he was mainly an al qaida figurehead. one of those "inspirational leaders". I dont think he was involved in planning or even carrying a weapon. was he? Id sure like to hear otherwise. the US Govt is not saying otherwise. I guess its a little like that old joke line from some old spy movie or show (or comedy?). "we dont have to tell you. we cant tell you. if we told you, we'd have to kill you."

anyway, some other negative synchronicity: I went to school with awlacki at CSU, colorado state university, around 1989-1993 timeframe. I saw him in the hallways in the engineering school. I think he was getting a civil engineering degree. there was a rumor about him being affiliated with islamic groups or fundamentalism, not much else. he was a little bit of a creepy figure. I could feel some strange feeling when I heard about him. he had a weird/vibe aura anyway, even if you werent all that psychic, because he walked around in his muslim regalia with a sort of turban, an unusual sight.

did you know awlacki is a US Citizen? not that it "means" anything. I mean theres this thing in the constitution about Freedom of Speech, freedom from cruel and unusual punishment, freedom from illegal search and seizure etc... but this whole drone world is a Brave New World. your standard operating rules no longer apply. its a Warmachine wet dream! awlacki had a young son too, from news accts, who was also killed in the drone strike. do you suppose he was the same age as any of the kids shot in the aurora 16 theatre?
 
I heard the shooter shot a 3 month old baby in the back. the media dutifully reports that latter factoid as if its relevant and helps us understand and conceptualize better. details like that matter. I wonder if awlackis son was vaporized completely or if there were body parts around, or maybe the whole body was mostly intact after the "attack"....?

and of course the wars of the world, and our latest ones, have caused uncountable human "casualties". what the heck is the meaning of that word? what is casual about casualties? are they casual because the Warmachine considers them casual? that the rest of the population regards them, and also the Warmachine itself, as casual?

* * *

my sig other feels that if a person is deranged, or commits heinous atrocities, that for sure his or her parents are to blame, that the person surely came from a dysfunctional family.

I guess it is really a way of trying to feel secure in an insecure world. to imagine that healthy families cannot have unhealthy children. and to assert that she grew up in a "healthy/normal" family. this is a concept in psychology called "splitting" that helps the ego maneuver the world, but can sometimes become pathological. there is some )( small smidgeon of reality there in that idea, but I also think its false. I think "mostly normal" families can (occasionally) have crazy offspring.

re crazy shooters. Cho, from a few yrs ago, ended up shooting himself right?
its a small miracle the police took the shooter alive. I know it doesnt make much sense to call it a miracle, but Im not sure how else to describe it. maybe we can learn something from this situation. maybe the shooter being alive will help us learn from it. I do believe there is something to learn. I think we will learn something over the next few weeks and months.

the shooter is described as a loner. nobody even in his own residence knew who he was. I have at various times in my life lived alone. the tension of society vs being a loner has been a quandary for me. I have lived a few fairly long periods as a loner myself. Ive definitely felt my mind go in strange directions. I admit it was an empirical reality that my behavior shifted during those periods... the shooter was working on graduate studies in neuroscience. I worked in a neuroscience laboratory 4 yrs as an undergraduate.

I was alone for 9 months after I graduated college, without a job. I didnt want to work, I was tired of working hard, so I took a long vacation. rollerblades, an apple computer (LC-- yeah it really existed), and internet mailing lists/email were my only company. I admit I got into some weird emotional and psychological states at the time. they say human brains are still not fully formed/grown until mid20s or so-- I guess thats my only excuse (or rationalization.. wink).

years later I took off time between contracting jobs. I sometimes spent many months, even up to years not working at jobs, but also with not too much social contact. I had brief contacts. it was an experiment at times. I disliked what I call "the matrix". the invisible, controlling system of reality composed of family, society, corporations, its expectations.

so we say the guy is a loner, as if that somehow, subconsciously excuses us from any responsibility. after all, who has any contact with a loner? societal connections are what keep us all together, interwoven, intertwined, interacting. they are for all sane and lucid people.

and yet, something is off, maybe wrong. our american culture has been described as increasingly atomized. there is a breakdown in the existing family structure. a classic book on the subject, "bowling alone" by sociologist robert putnam[4], is semifamous in academic circles. I remember years ago a young lady immigrant from armenia told me when I asked her what she saw as most alien about US culture. she said that we didnt know our next door neighbors, we didnt interact, we didnt socialize based on proximity like that-- or maybe dont even socialize a lot at all-- compared to other cultures. sound weird? but I think I asked another immigrant from kazakhstan the same question who told me something close to the same thing, as I recall....

so therefore, we can look at loners as anomalies, as people we cant help or couldnt help because they are inherently disconnected and isolated. or we can see them as symptoms of a deeper separation/rift that is endemic in american culture. perhaps they actually epitomize the rips in the social fabric. maybe a shooter like the one we just met are the poster boy for this phenomenon. maybe we are staring ourselves in the face, in the mirror. as pogo says, "we have met the enemy, and he is us". crazy thinking? in more ways than one I guess.

* * *

the media is saying the shooter seems to have "no terrorist connections". so theres another bizarre twist of our language. wasnt what happened in that "theatre" the epitome of terror?[what does it mean that warfare is said to take place in a "theatre"?] isnt it far beyond what we could call "terror"? its beyond horrible, beyond an atrocity. its unspeakable. isnt it terrorism? are we saying terrorism only has a political component? but terrorism clearly cannot have a rational political component, because terrorism is inherently irrational. perhaps our idea that terror has a political component is itself irrational.

the shooter was a human monster, but I say he is an embodiment of our collective shadow side. we think that our wars are safely waged in distant lands by a small minority of our population, the soldiers. and remote control drone warfare-- a technology that has gone from the gleam of an eye to a major corporate juggernaut/profit center and international government foreign policy in less than a decade.

but here we have the "same" insanity visited on us, on our families and children, in a movie theatre. how many humans, women & children, have died in our wars waged over the last decade alone? some would say the comparison makes no sense, but I would say it makes more sense than our entire culture does.

why is it the "same"? because, I radically assert, they're both equally senseless! blasphemy, heresy, sacrilege? only against the Warmachine.... which lives in pieces inside all of us, and is the collective embodiment of our powerful but ultimately insane shadow side.

I would say our blindness to our capacity/propensity for systemized violence and atrocity makes this aurora 16 massacre face our shadow side directly. and the mass population does so uncomprehendingly. they will assert the atrocity has no deeper meaning, has no deeper connection. that larger society bears no responsibility or connection to this "random, senseless violence". but that is a deep denial of what could be called "negative synchronicity".

this time the atrocity is in a movie theatre. I feel almost somewhat reassured somehow. it didnt happen in a classroom at least this time, after two prior incidents [littleton & the cho incident]. I almost would rather it happened in a theatre than a classroom, at least there are fewer children around right? does that make any sense?

the movie theatre element is a bit surreal. the shooter dyed his hair red and told police on arrest that he was "the joker". he had just shot up dozens of people but "did not resist arrest". was his gun still loaded? I suppose this story will be clarified over the next few weeks maybe.

the movie theatre may feel like a small sanctuary to us, somewhat like a classroom. but is it more of a sanctuary than a classroom? is it more of a sanctuary than the hot, distant, mountainous, remote lands of afghanistan farms and tiny rural villages? which is the sanctuary? I say, we have to figure out a way to make every location on this earth a sanctuary. classroom, theatre, post office, remote field of afghanistan, government offices, the whitehouse/oval office.

that task begins with us, with our culture, because we are the world travellers and the world policemen, "the leaders of the free world" [that now-tarnished, laughable, dismally ringing/hollow phrase]. that is a task that we have appointed ourselves to. are we policemen, or madmen? sometimes the distinction gets blurred in our minds. how could that be? do we draw distinctions where there are none, and do not draw them where they are distinct? is this the definition of irrationality? of madness?

in jungian psychology there is a connection between an archetype-- the joker, the trickster, the shadow. the shadow plays tricks on your mind, does it not? makes you see things that arent there? in the shadows. where deep truths lie. I say, do not be terrorized by the truth... the truth will set you free.

* * *

re on the subject of creating a sanctuary, a sacred place, a temple. director nolan of batman in his public statement calls the movie theatre "that innocent and hopeful place". I would like to quote from an amazing book called "tantric quest" by daniel odier[5] about a female mystic/tantriki named Devi. [while I said Im not religious, I do believe in spirituality, and this book has touched me deeply. I highly recommend it although I havent been able to get anyone else to react to it after years of plugging it].

devi says of tantra, "there is only an immense umbilical cord, which reunites each being and each thing in the divine. ... what does the worshipper do? he cleans the temple. how?" she says that the fears that define our lives exist in our consciousness like "gray men". we try to evict them from our temple, but they whisper their insidious persuasions in our ears and thoughts. isnt the gray also like the shadow side?

[1] reality is as you dream it. teachings of the shuar indians. by john perkins
http://www.amazon.com/The-World-You-Dream-Teachings/dp/0892814594
 
[2] jessica ghawi
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/huff-wires/20120720/us-colorado-shooting-victims/
http://jessicaredfield.wordpress.com/2012/06/05/late-night-thoughts-on-the-eaton-center-shooting/

[3] director nolan on the tragedy, the shooter arrested with red hair saying hes the joker, gangster squad movie pulled
http://abcnews.go.com/Entertainment/dark-knight-rises-director-calls-shooting-senseless-tragedy/t/story?id=16819555#.UAnj3vXjLq4

[4] robert putnam, bowling alone. collapse and revival of american community.
http://www.amazon.com/Bowling-Alone-Collapse-American-Community/dp/0743203046/
 
[5] tantric quest, an encounter with absolute love, by daniel odier.
http://www.amazon.com/Tantric-Quest-Encounter-Absolute-Love/dp/0892816201/
 
 
^{note: this is my 1st post composed on my new Ipad. I wrote it on the notepad. it has some quirks and I almost lost several paragraphs but managed to undelete them. sheeeewww. also it changed the font & I didnt expect that at 1st but now I decided to keep it. it actually matches somewhat one of the fonts in my blog banner. cybersynchronicity.}