Ian On The Red Dot

Harphoon left a comment on an earlier post and per his request, I am posting it here.

—————————————————————————————

Hello Inspirid,

Where do I start? What can I say? You have no idea how, I feel about all this. All I know is when I look back - I spent hours writing mostly alone giving up so many things. I am not like darkness – the man who can produce an article in what he calls the “filler” and “in-between-moments.” Within the span it takes to cut an apple – writing doesn’t come easily to me Inspirid. It’s laborious and a struggle but I labor through it not because I believe in the brotherhood. Rather I believed in what you were trying to achieve – to create a better world in this new thing that has descended on us all so suddenly in our generation – the internet.

I am a Pre-Science officer in the brotherhood, one of those who build worlds in the virtual, seeding the wasteland, irrigating it and making sure things come alive in the hope one day even a great will civilization from it all. I am different from Nacramanga, Trajan, AB and SB, for me it always the anticipation of what can be and never what must be - not for gain, recognition and glory that to a Pre-Science officer is the greatest reward: to simply see life take off even if it means reveling in the first tender shoots which rise from what was once a waste land. In this respect, that is probably why I can share your dream of a better Singapore blogosphere better than anyone else in the brotherhood. Was it worth it?

Again I am not like darkness, I haven’t lived long enough or experience the world as much as him to take defeat philosophically, there is still a lot of confusion, anger, disbelief accompanied by a deep sense of remorse – when a man plants a seed and tends it lovingly everyday even if the field doesn’t belong to him, he harbors the hope to reap a bountiful harvest. Instead, I feel like a farmer who has to watch helplessly as his field is consumed by a swarm of locust. I hate myself for being so vulnerable, naïve even, it just doesn’t seem fair and so I am still reconciling myself with the sense of loss.

I tell myself maybe I am yet to cut my philosophical teeth like Darkness who is able to stretch his heart, mind and soul to simply move on, but how can I be like him. He has fought two wars in the virtual, men like him and Nacramanga have seen whole cities burnt to a cinder, virtual cities once lovingly built with people who put all their heart, soul and love into making it as real as possible - they had to see their pride and joy being ravaged by invading armies only to bow their heads in supplication – the real and virtual world isn’t so different Inspirid - someone always has to put their heart into something for it to come alive, be it a bridge or even a lamp post and to see it destroyed is painful irrespective of whether it is real or in the virtual. And this is the same with a blog, it may not real or may even be read by a few, but when it is gone it is truly just as painful because the same love, dedication and effort was once invested into in the hope it will even last forever. I have never had to go through this. I have never even once fought in a virtual battle or so much as seen a virtual barn burn to the ground, these proportions of loss are alien to me, so it hits me hard in every direction.

To me it seems hard to walk away, darkness says, it is because I haven’t honed the nomadic spirit, it still tugs on my heart, the yearning to see the end of it all, but when I asked him whether it was worth it, he said, “yes” and there was a firmness in his voice.

He said it was because real power only begins when people respect themselves, it can be seen in their posture and the way they regard themselves only as the custodians of power – that is the concept of real power – the only thing that truly endures, the rest you can throw out of the window. Only fools and lightning conductors hold on to power till the day it corrupts and kills them, they know nothing of real power as it controls so much of their thinking, they are no better than glorified drunks and we know they don’t have a shortage of stories when it comes to telling us why they always need to be around – the plain truth is they cannot give power up, just as a drunk cannot go through a day without his daily fix – cannot means cannot!

He told me your blog the Intelligent Singapore doesn’t suffer from that delusion and because we gave it all up when we were perhaps the best equipped people to seize the day, that just means the Council of the dumb did us all a great favor without even realizing it!

The IS is a very special blog, very special indeed even to qualify as one that occupies a completely different quadrant in the socio-political scene, the voice may be garbled along the way (he said because of some of the nonsense and rubbish he wrote in the post) but as far as the articles was concerned we all disciplined ourselves and the line was very clean under the stewardship of Inspirid. And if you assemble the jig saw it’s the purest voice representing the opinions of many, not only the brotherhood press, who were all united in one common cause, we all wrote not for money, recognition or even glory, we all came together despite our little quarrels and tiffs and this cannot be by some flux or even some grand strategy – it was against attributed to Inspirid’s stewardship. But more importantly, the IS was free from the influences of all affectations of false power.

Neither does it have anything to do with formality and restraint. Many of these bloggers who were aggregated by Inspirid threw themselves into the wind of setting their mind into words and when they do this it will certainly soar. This blog as dead as it appears, will never just disappear into the garbage heap of history like so many others, not because of the brotherhood.

Only because of the compelling realities of economics: pure thoughts and noble intentions will always be a rarity in any age, so it will attract a cachet of dedicated readers by design or chance, it is like writings on the wall. Neither does the narrative have to be complete either or reach a pre-destined goal, there is no need for that, if the seed was planted with a pure and noble purpose, it will simply have to grow into a mighty oak even without the benefit of the caretaker and even from afar many years later it will stand tall, every branch, every leaf, every symmetry will show itself to be true and it’s expression will take care of even our best delusions that we were once responsible for it being what it has grown to be, that’s the great lie every leader needs to leverage on – without me, you are a dead duck! – it’s a dangerous lie reasonable minds should never ever entertain, that is why power if it cannot be set down should never ever be picked up in the first place, never! - he went on to say, the great lie of any age is the tree of life (the blog) needed us to grow tall and strong – how can that be when we all know neither real love, intelligence or nobility needs to show itself off – the tree didn’t need us and he went on to say, you (inspirid) have already planted the seed, the rest will care of itself as surely as the sun will rise tomorrow – you should never be sad, never look at it with regret or even harbor the slightest hope of what could have been – as the custodian of power, it couldn’t have been done any better, history will prove you right! We must all have the confidence to believe if we throw it all to the wind rightly and truly in the first run off the cliff – it will certainly take off and fly. That was what you did Inspirid, you allied yourself with the brotherhood and the price you paid is probably a hundred times higher than all of us put together in the eyes of many in blogosphere, you are seen as a supporter of a pariah – do not think I do not know this! He went on to say. But let me say to you, it is not whether it is the right or wrong decision, but rather ran with us to the edge of the cliff. While the rest were still haggling whether the edge held the end of their known world, they will accomplish nothing because they are ruled and controlled by a certain form of power - the power of fear, trepidation and ineptitude which they pass off as courage - so lift your head up high, take pride in what you have accomplished, it is something that is momentous and happens in probably once in ten generations when technology intercepts so clearly the fate of mankind – the internet – like the first ape who drew a stick man in a cave, it soared through history to produce great works of art like the works of Michelangelo, never forget where it all began, it started from the point when the seed of life was planted with a curious, noble and pure mind and this was how the IS started and you open your doors to us while others turned us away. As you know we cannot blog, it is against our ways, don’t ask me why.

So what else is there to complete? Our work is finished.

It will not happen tomorrow or even next month, but one day, this seed you have planted Inspir3d will grow into a mighty oak tree, like all things to do with the law of nature it will start in a small and modest way at first usually slowly. A few will first visit Inspirid’s site the Intelligent Singaporean and they may even linger long enough to read and then the magic will happen – another seed will be taken by the fertile mind only to be transplanted elsewhere – a tree from the same lineage that will continue to ask many of the questions we once asked: where we all know events are never governed by chance, but rather man through his unceasing questioning mind.

Eventually this new generation will realize life is not the story of a man lost in the wilderness where the law of hazard hides at every corner –they will become more anxious as they begin to ask who are these people who once wrote this or that? What occupies their beliefs and motivations? Why are they questioning the known world? By what authority do they do all this? By then the lone tree will be a forest.

Many, many years from now, in an age when even cities will have cities within cities this one mighty oak tree will grow into a forest of thinkers – to believe this is strategy, is to believe you are God – to believe it would not have happened without you is the highest form of contrition mixed with heady parvenu inspirations – to believe it would not have happened without even you is to display the ignorance that supersedes even arrogance.

All one really did to accomplish all these great feats is not so different from what Inspirid did when he woke up one day and started his little blog called the intelligence Singaporean in one corner of blogosphere – all he did was to plant the seed and walk away, the rest will take care of itself - if you say that is nothing, then just walk through the red wood forest in America and history will tell you with every leaf, branch and trunk you are so very wrong, Inspirid it all started from something as small as a seed in the palm of your hand.

There is a time to make this happen and a time to let things happen – this is the latter, it is a start a very good start and Inspirid you must never ever forget that, always hold your head up high because you were the man who started it all with the of a better tomorrow – when you see it in those terms one is true to oneself, so what if the world chooses not to see, hear or even consider it does it really matter? They can go and take a hike over a cliff – this is what I call real self assurance, not the false pride that comes from the asshole – real pride is no different from the seed of hope and it must never be placed in a ‘better’ world (we all delude ourselves we can create), but in a true heart and a gentle vision that Inspirid had when he started the IS, that is why the job is done – that is why it will one day grow into the a mighty forest as far as the eye can see.

We the brotherhood - we just like the first monkeys being blasted off to space in the IS – we may have been there, but hey do you see monkeys building spaceships to go to Mars. We were just there for the great ride, the seed that Inspir3d planted was more important than all of our history put into the palm of your hand.

Best Wishes

We are nomads and there is a saying where our waters are mixed, we will drink again from the same cup.

Keep well and God Speed.

Harphoon