mattmoore.blog()

While I was growing up my mom cut my hair. She owned her own salon for many years before giving it up when I was twelve. In fact, other than one other person (who I’ll get to) and myself, my mom has been the only person that has cut my hair. I’ve never been to a barber/hairdresser and never paid for a haircut. In fact, the thought of going into a hair cutting store makes me anxious and sweaty.

There are benefits and downsides to having your mom cut your hair. The obvious was convenience–but even that was not always a given. Often times it was hard to schedule an after-hours appointment with her. She worked another job and often cut hair out of our house, so the last thing she wanted to do at night was cut someone else’s hair. Now working a full-time job, I can’t blame her.

The downside was that my hair was completely dictated by my mother’s fashion sensibility. From the time I was born until this year, I had a standard boys cut. Sometimes I would let it grow longer and shaggier and bigger, but for the most part it conformed to her standard template–which also happened to be the same for my brother. The one exception to this rule was when I tried to cut my own hair when I was 21, however, my attempt was piss-poor and it showed.

The only other time someone cut my hair, was when I was about seventeen. I knew, from growing up, that my dad has taken six months of hair dressing school while in his 20s–he dropped out because he was allergic to the chemicals. I was really overdue for a haircut and my mom was being difficult. In desperation, I asked my dad. I also knew that he was cutting his friend Steve’s hair regularly so it wasn’t unfounded that I would ask him. He gladly welcomed the ability to break the monopoly that my mom had on my head. He didn’t do a bad job even though his hands were more clumsy.

Because my hair was something that was always dictated for me, I never thought to try something different. I wasn’t part of a social group or identity growing up that promoted hair style as a form of expression. As a result, I never viewed my hair style as a choice in the way that most people do. When I cut my own hair the problem was not an issue of skill or scissor precision, it was that I didn’t know any other way to cut my hair other than that one that I was given. It’s the same reason why post-communist Russia is really crappy at capitalism.

Since I moved out to California, things have really changed. I’ve gotten better at doing my own hair and occasionally ask my roommate for help–I even shaved my head once! It’s taking me while to think outside the social constructions that is my hair style, but I have hope for the future.

the lifeless bed snail
with her consumerist ways
and orgasms that never pay

the titanic was sinking
the stock market was shrinking
hale bop in the sky
anti-depressants were prescribed
high school was too intense
they couldn’t afford the medical expense
the deal for the rapture was sealed
tb, aids, and hunger couldn’t be healed
villages and homes were lost
homeowners couldn’t pay the cost
ceos were caught taking bribes
perversions destroyed the tribe

We make moral concessions to live in a monoculture
because it allows us to participate and migrate without little resistance.

We listen to music that is played on any radio
even if that music is abrasive to our moral fiber.

We consume food that can be obtained anywhere
knowing that it is not healthy or delicious or pleasing to our souls.

We have money that we can spend anywhere
even though we work for oppressive institutions to earn it.

We speak a language that can be understood in any country
even if that language has destroyed and absorbed other indigenous languages.

Any ecology who’s keystone is a monoculture will destroy itself.

Cultural diversity and unique spheres of culture allow
for a meaningful participation and resistance toward moral concessions.

Acts of kindness towards those beyond our immediate kinship have a significant survival advantage.

Witnessing or participating in altruism makes us feel good. Our biology rewards us for a behavior that has kept humans alive for hundreds of thousands of years. We learn empathy, but we are programmed for altruism.

The potential for altruism is loyalty.

In a tribe we are connected by the finite resource of social bonding. There is a point at which a tribe become ineffectual as it’s scale increases. The point when social bonding breaks is when blind loyalty encroaches.

Totalitarian agriculture is, by it’s very nature, inefficient and laborious.

Totalitarian agriculture exploits our propensity to care for those whom we have no direct social connection. Blind loyalty is the keystone of this system.

The moral apex within totalitarian agriculture is to offer assistance to the victims it creates. All major world religions have variations on the “golden rule”–also known as the ethics of reciprocity.

Nationalism is a synonym for blind loyalty. Civilizations have collapsed when people stop caring about caring for people they don’t know.

The altruistic survival advantage is had only in the context of a tribe.