Amerika

Kirsten Brydum pedaled away from the Howlin’ Wolf club into the darkness of another American city that she didn’t know very well.

She arrived in New Orleans in late September with a rail pass, a little red notebook and a head full of ideas about the oppressive forces of capitalism and government, and how they might be replaced with something better.

Brydum and an old boyfriend drew up the list of places she would visit: alternative health centers, collectivist punk communes, anarchist bookstores and “guerrilla gardens” planted by activists on land they do not own. Her plan was to document on a website what she found, allowing radicals to share ideas and strengthen tiny institutions that she believed would “prefigure a world without capitalism.”

At the now-defunct New College of California, where she earned her bachelor’s degree, she immersed herself in contrarian thinkers, particularly the anarchists: Emma Goldman, imprisoned by U.S. authorities for opposing the draft in 1917; David Graeber, the anthropologist who studied the egalitarian communities of northwest Madagascar; and Hakim Bey, a scholar who extolled history’s “pirate utopias,” which operated beyond the grasp of governments.

Central to her thinking: “She didn’t believe that we lived in a world of scarcity,” Viola said. “That scarcity was a myth that was used to keep people divided. And so if resources and goods are taken care of and shared equitably, then there’s enough for everybody.”

LA Times

We don’t live in a world of scarcity.

We live in a world of plenty, where minimal effort — using scientific methods, and learning, and common sense — yields good results.

But then idiots destroy it with disorganization, illusion, chaos, etc. so stuff ends up scarce, and the rest of us end up defending ourselves against masses of delusional fools.

Her body had been found by a church group gutting houses in the 9th Ward; it was lying unidentified in the morgue. Brydum had been shot four times in the face. New Orleans police detectives began their search for a killer, but have thus far had no luck.

When the news reached the Bay Area, some of her fellow activists wondered if there had been a conspiracy. Some suspected the CIA.

Other family members noted, with a disgusted irony, that the killer may have been covering up a robbery. Brydum’s bag and bicycle were not found at the scene.

That’s because they’re loony narcissists who think anyone cares about their cult of disorganization.

This story is designed for your amusement. Pompous young “activist” decides she knows better than others, and determines to justify herself with false humility; New Orleans criminal laughs, takes her bicycle and shoots her in the face.

Satan is illusion and Brydum gave her soul to Satan, who never announces that he’s evil. (Insert your own token of evil, selfishness, stupidity, solipsism, illusion, delusion, dysfunction, deception, corruption and monkeyness in place of “Satan”; I use the term for convenience.)