triumphs and pitfalls of having empathy

by Claudia Berdella

Imitation

flattery or misery?

Empathy gets you both

Facial recognition software

Projections between seer and seen

Human roles  are tongue and cheek

Brutes are weak

subject to the clever

Strength is subjective

Circumstantial evidence

Cognitive bias

Hindsight horrors en mass

Faces

Molded Masks

What you see is only what you can perceive

Eyes can lie

cheeks can deceive

And what you want to believe

Empty empathy

such ecstasy

Reductive revolver reciprocal altruism

Manipulated sympathy

Pity is pseudo sexual glee

"Love thy enemies"

Misery: marketing machine

Love: a five letter word

Misanthropy trophy

Fellow Travelers

Payed enablers

Oligarchical ouroboros

so many Charlie's girls

but it's all just tongue and cheek

dressed in torn Shein

"white

  suburban

  middle-class

  never have to work again"

Nihilism is ever the rage these days

Though that's really nothing new by it

bags of bones wearing meat

Mass hysteria and mobs jump to their feet

What is rioting if just disorganized acts of monkey-see monkey-do?

It's an orgasmic thrill it seems

Most in riots are there for violence first 

and use ideology to evade responsibility

Because what ends when we shatter symbols?

When one world ends something else begins

Man has always made gods in his image

there are no gods anymore

just crutches and ideologues

Fellow Travelers and fundamentalists

All trying to steer clear of seeing the abyss

Stare into the candle rather than stare into a mirror

The only mirror is cognitive bias

Vices used and jumped to and fro-

like a whore on a popular floor

What is ideology?

but aversion of personal responsibility?

Stripper of authenticity

A prostitute might be nude but you don't see a body

vulnerably inauthentic

Yet grandiose in presentation

Projections of persona

What is any of it for?

Claudia's car conversations 2

God Is A Weapon: Review of Falling In Reverse & Marilyn Manson's collaborative track

by Claudia Berdella 

Speculation of a collaboration between the two began in January of this year when Ronnie Radke posted multiple pictures onto his social media's of himself with the God of Fuck. It made sense, as the Falling In Reverse frontman seems to have an affinity for unique collaborative songs, Drugs with Corey Taylor or more recently All My Life with Jelly Roll as other examples. As notably it is the first song released to feature Marilyn Manson since he worked with Ye on Jail Pt 2.

image from Radke's twitter

 Now come four months later, it was rumored for a bit online that some sort of track that the two invented would be released on May 20th (today), what exactly was in store is a pleasant as always surprise from the creative effort of both parties. 

 The track is as usual in a different and hard to pin down exact genre with Radke's musical genius. Some parts are oddly (at least personally) reminiscent of Fall Out Boy in a way, I want to say it's akin to Centuries in a weird way. Then lyrically,  I'm not the first to notice and I won't be the last but there is also a line in the song which goes, "You try to take this ring from me, watch me detonate" sung by Manson, which is obviously open to interpretation but considering recent years happenings in the life of the Antichrist Superstar, as well as Ronnie Radke's own personal story- especially with some recent quite hilarious events involving Tommy Lee's estranged wife- could be seen as an accusation of jealousy. It's possible, I personally find it highly likely that much of the (now quite discredited) allegations against Marilyn Manson where on the behalf of some people's jealousy that they didn't get to be Mrs. Warner as opposed to Lindsay Usich. Though I can't say on either behalf directly, I don't know what goes on in other people's heads and can't pretend to exactly. The song speaks about obsession though whether personal or aimed at another, if you point a finger at something there's four more pointing back at you, even in music (see the documentary Heart Like A Hand Grenade for a better explanation).

"If God is a woman God is a weapon"
Lust and obliteration?
To quote another Manson song, "God or guardian?"
Infatuation and refutation

It could be a lot, that said, I love the track. 

one-liner

 Venus is a bastardized vulkan and Mars just as deadly polar

The Founding of The Satanic Temple Their Secrets Revealed! out now online for free

 Founding of The Satanic Temple Their Secrets Revealed! 

NOW AVAILABLE FOR FREE HERE: https://archive.org/details/satanic_temple_founding_bugbee

The Satanic Temple has spent a decade propagating lies and deceiving the media and their membership. BUT WHY? Find out in this explosive expose as told by one of the founders and, an actual authority on Satanism - Shane Bugbee. Bugbee was a longtime friend and mentor to Lucien Greaves / Doug Mesner as well as the last person Anton LaVey chose to represent modern Satanism, a philosophy LaVey created in 1969 - THE YEAR FLESH BECAME LAW. The idea for the Satanic Temple dates back two decades when the two met over the book Might is Right. Why would Bugbee's young protege of over a decade, Doug Mesner, aka: Lucien Greaves hide the role his mentor and muse played in creating the Satanic Temple? Shane knows Dougs secrets and, with the brutal honesty Bugbee is known for, he tells them in his new book- FOUNDING OF THE SATANIC TEMPLE - THEIR SECRET BEGINNING EXPOSED! This book is full of stories straight from Shane Bugbee's mouth and also features original writings and comments from Karla LaVay, Stanton LaVey and Peter H. Gilmore as well as rare correspondence between Anton LaVey & Bugbee. ``

It was fun to help make, it was certainly an experience no other 16 year old(s as Baphy was there too, though a few months younger than I am.) 

Weekly meetings, hours and hours, well in my case literal months of research and studying-- there's a reason I'm the Official Shane Bugbee Historian-- hundreds of dead internet pages via the wayback machine, hundreds of hours of audio and a few dreary drudges through a really terrible propaganda film. 

Animals are better than people 

But animals are not akin in flesh

Human skin

Caught in my grin

Like the dead in Kensington 

Oh what a wonderful fucked up world

When you hang you do a little twirl

Less elegant than a ballet girl 

Best and brightest stars, 

too little in between 

Burn bright; live fast and die fast too

This is a stupid fetish 

Post-mortem iconoclasts become black holes

Does their influence reverberate or pull in?

After all the most powerful ones collapse into said singularities. 

Pictures of celluloid

Silver-screen dopamine-tweaked nostalgia

Life is not a dream, darling this isn't a game

Claudia’s Car Conversations: a new podcast

Norse mythology, black holes and the eternal return via different means

Recorded by Berri

The Apple of my Eden

Just an atom bomb in the brain

"every woman adores a fascist" [1]

Identity is a prison; labels the sell 

Mitochondria of commodity

The ego is starved; it's bought too easily.

Oh look, your pants are a bit messy now.

Auto-erotic asphyxiation en mass everyday

Like I said [once] before:

Sexuality sells and authenticity kills

"Beyond being fuckable."[2]

-----------------

References:

[1] Sylvia Plath

[2] Brave by Rose McGowan page 229

What You Have Eaten…

“What You Have Eaten…” [1]

By Claudia Berdella

Program the machines

Bitch about the outcome

I’m curious why people negate 

that they reap what they sow

Unintentionally Calvinistic 

Statistical self-prescribed determinism

A confused ego

But, when is it not so?

Identity is ego:

Fluid, grandiose and vulnerable

Degradation can be exhilarating. 

People revel in misery

Matrix is a metaphor 

for what, are you really sure?

What it really is I think

is a piece of pop culture overly fetishized

for knockoff gnostics

Wannabe wanderers

Yet they make heretics of ‘fellow travelers’ 

“Oppression is the opiate of the masses” [2]

But it’s the chicken and the egg

inside a bucket of pill-pumped crabs

People reap what they sow 

“Prison is in the mind”

Totalitarianism is initially self-imposed and welcomed in open arms

Thunderous applause, so to say

“One thousand mothers are praying for it

  So full of hope and so full of shit

  Build a new God to medicate and to hate…” [3]

Fate is fake

Self-fulfilling prophecy is the butterfly effect in real time

Present action seals future dates

But in the end

the world keeps spinning

———————

References

[1] Rock N Roll Nigger by Marilyn Manson: 

“'Cause I am the All American Antichrist

I was made in America
And America hates me for what I am
I am your shit you should be ashamed
Of what you have eaten, I'm a rock 'n roll nigger”

[2] Assume The Position by Boyd Rice:

“Oppression is the opiate of the masses People generally get off on it Those at the bottom thrive under conditions of oppression And those at the top revel in imposing such conditions Human nature demands it Society, exactly as it now exists Is the ultimate expression of sadomasochism in action This isn't S&M as a mere game There's no role-playing involved The roles are all real With real masters and real servants There's no dressing up required to be a player in this enactment You don't have to wear your handkerchief in a certain pocket to signal your position as a sadist or masochist either You simply assume the position This is sadomasochism not as a fetish, but in practical application The sting of the riding crop is replaced by a more generalized sort of malaise But when all is said and done It is still an expression of people luxuriating in pain and submission To say that people love to suffer is viewed as decadent cynicism by many But a cursory glance at the world around us would definitely seem to support such a thesis How telling it is that even in the context of a system created in absolute ignorance of man's true character He remains true to his nature regardless”

[3]Rock Is Dead by Marilyn Manson