Some introductory food for thought...

“What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy?”
    - Mahatma Ghandi

“Totalitarianism is not only hell, but all the dream of paradise-- the age-old dream of a world where everybody would live in harmony, united by a single common will and faith, without secrets from one another."
   - Milan Kundera

"Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it."
  - George Orwell


Technocracy as scientific Totalitarianism?
Technocracy is the institutionalised control over all aspects of society by scientific and technological means through a centralised autocratic bureaucracy, whose totalitarian control is secured by the exploitation of its means. Universal utilitarianism over the psychologies, sociology, technology, pharmacology, etc. Whose state authority relies solely on the implementation of systematic indoctrination and propaganda, and the methodical interception of political dissidence or heresy against the established ideological order (in whatever form it takes). Human beings, as the most exhaustively studied species on Earth, have no shortage of data, nor any famine of instances littered among history that create the foundation of a deterministic human proclivity to be influenced by covert forces, often even when staring us in the face.


The institutionalisation of Peace as a political concept?
Peace, among the broader consensus, means to many and ideal not only of great significance, but too, a matter of urgency in a world of almost instantaneous advancement in the technological means of warfare, with the capability of mass destruction or even global fallout ever possible at the push of a button. Peace, however, as a political concept (like all concepts) is multilateral in the diversity of its manifestation, and is one of vague understanding to those who might purport its value, or perhaps not to those who might reap its more nefarious facets. Institutionalised ideology (possibly even Peace as a concept) has a tendency to shift to the extreme spectrum of its implementation in order to compensate for, by physical and ideological assets, the inevitable opposition that will rise in its wake or during its implementation. This is why, despite the seemingly sympathetic characteristics of Marxist ideology, it requires, when in its institutionalised from, a means of repressing antithetical views or activity, for instance, within the Soviet system. Because of this proclivity, it is thus safe to assert that even Peace, when in an institutionalised state could adopt a form of despotic hard and soft power in the enforcement of its ideological tenets.


Peace as an ideological control system?
It is necessary to understand the extent to which the concept of peace can be applied and that to which it's linguistic value could be altered or even neologistically reinvented. Peace, as generally perceived, means a vague ideal of harmony between people, generally applied to warfare and violence and the unnecessary suffering it causes. However, it is surely necessary to contemplate the id of its concept, which could still, by technicality, represent peace. Here is a legalese style list of how it could be applied, utilised as an ideological system of control:

• Opposing dialectic or political discourse between two or more groups or individuals as a breach of peace, for it produces a state of non-neutrality and thus a state of conflict (of ideas).
• Opposition to the state by activism or an expression of opinion as a breach of peace, for it may incite a state of conflict, or a spread of opposition.
• Multi-partisan politics as a concept that produces conflict (of ideas) and thus would be a breach of peace, and therefor is necessary to maintain a single-party system.

These are some ways in which I have tried to apply the political concept of peace as could be utilised for an ideological system of control through the rule of law or other means. Peace is generally perceived as a concept existing on the macro, however, here having been applied to the micro, it becomes scrutinous and can target by technicality, basic liberties. Theoretically, peace can mean absolutist ideological neutrality.


- a short essay by JDH

Sometimes I miss Baltimore,
as it was,
in this ragged snapshot from 1999.
Smoky bars, diffuse light,
the dusky anonymity of proto-digital consciousness,
A city teeming with its own subversive imagination.

Palpable in the night air,
the questionable intentions of the still willfully living,
A dim seediness skulking in the corners and alleyways,
bearing impartial witness to the transgressions of all those nights, preordained to bleed into mornings,

A time,
A town,
that was fearless,
rogue in the absolute saturation of its moments,
Shimmering in the mists like slick cobblestone,
like points of light upon dark water,
the winking reflections of a neon harbor,
paused somewhere between future and past,
A bastion of the new prehistory.

I miss Baltimore,
covert and alive,
In its hour of renegade persuasion,
however quaint or illusory,
its voice was distinct,
in the chatter of the underground.

There was a relevance to the present then,
a sanctity in the moment.
There were questions left unanswered.
There was intimacy in a shared secret.
Misfits were permitted to revel.

I miss that Baltimore most,
the one that curated me,
called me out of myself.
With a history cemented in the arcane,
its raven-dark undercurrent
like smooth cognac softening the edges,
melancholy,
delicate as roses,
giving the rage a moment's pause,

Giving human momentum a breath,
to observe and retain the poignancy,
of  itself,
In all its uneasy coexistence,

Baltimore,
as it once was,
steeped in the tradition of the unsung,
like an archeological dig,
On the surface,
merely crumbling dirt,
and broken things.
but  deeper,
an uncanny relic of rich insights,
and richer delights.

But one had to know where to look,
and one had to know how to let it take lead.
And one could never be too scrupulous,
or scrutinous.
The Carnival of Dissonance,
was not for the uninitiated,

A cabinet/room of curiosities,
Kunstkammer--fringe stuffs.
Let's (said 17th century affluence) retire to a den of delicious: now-where-weren't-we.
A space of sea legs, a space to clutch a
ceiling for balance--amid the perverse liberties of imagination's selves.
A continental doubletake at reality,
magic objects from the greater world--
another world.
Bouncing off the walls, cluttered proof of the unknown--unsuccessfully watered
down by familiarity.
Objects, things that shouldn't be there--
as if they overstayed the moment to be gone.
The haunts of the greediest awe, the
pacts of Faustian must-haves.
Stretched juxtapositions of
taxidermic parrots, speaking
prehistoric bones that turn into the weapons of witchdoctors.
Alchemical globes turning over Abraxas
to geographic purification periods--under
scrutinous van **** beards.
Tortoise shells emanating the wooden
knocks of a tribe's forest family.
Leatherbound books ornate as gemstones, seemingly lived-in by hermits.
A perfumer's castle of scent upon the
next cloud--a zephyr's afterimage.
Scents that were whole lives distilled of
continuum's essence.
Cabinets of curiosities, tried the
peculiarities of their cocked-brow sitters.
Quietly thinking them a peacock's dressing room compared to their changeability.
The cabinet's gestating stimulation conjured appetites fit for their creator.
These cabinets of curiosities were often
unsupressable aphrodisiacs, voluptuous
women would softly roundout sin.
Lick, **** & bite into fruits as their curves swole with feathers.
Where flesh was made & remade again,
lusting after itself in exitless release.
Those who solitarily sat in these rooms
by candlelight & glowed beyond its glow,
gained the graces of darkness.
A space where natural light aspected
exotic variety, a space where a waking
dream outdid itself.
To recoup & assess a fraction of the things
that exist in the smallest hours that region the earth.
These modest places to withdraw, wandered into what became museums.
We've always sorted these cabinets.