It seems, though, that we often have to live with, study with, or work with people whose ideas of truth are different from ours. The real challenge is to be able to navigate those waters with the assuredness that we won't drown in other opinions.Deleuze’s idea of lines of flight can help us clear up a common misconception about the sixties counterculture. The counterculture was not fundamentally oriented against mainstream society. It was oriented away from it.
The Tim Rayner article is interesting. Thanks for the link. I'd say the 1960s-1970s counterculture was oriented against the worst elements of mainstream society (as represented by perhaps Nixon). Some people wanted to get away from it for sure, but many more wanted to change it, so I'm a little hesitant to buy into sweeping statements about the counterculture, especially since I was there. Meanwhile, you end your essay with My desire to differentiate myself does not mean I have to condemn these people; simply that I acknowledge them. I am not against them. I simply want to be free from them. I want my line of flight.
I agree that it is a very good idea to decide who you want to associate with. I suspect, as we get older, we all do that: limit your contact with people that try to block your line of flight. On hubski we call this muting and ignoring.
The blanket statement made me uneasy, too. Perhaps I swept over it because I was focused on the personal significance. Still, I think there is something to it. If most in that culture had the option to a) change the culture, or b) start their own culture, my guess is that many would go with the latter. That, to me, is the difference Deleuze is getting at.
In my own experience of 1968-75 counterculture, it was more of a both-and rather than either-or. There were definitely people who saw only repression and conformity in the mainstream culture. Some started their own back-to-the-land communes, free universities, and more. Others wanted to get away from nuclear families and live in urban communes, keeping a foot in both worlds. But yes, Deleuze was stressing the "away" vs "against" -- in some cases (as in the Prisoner's Village), getting away is the only option. Bringing that metaphor into your own choice for interpersonal interactions makes sense.
|I suspect, as we get older, we all do that: limit your contact with people that try to block your line of flight. On hubski we call this muting and ignoring. I'm sure this wasn't what you were thinking, but I've recently been reading into Rogers' Person Centred Therapy and it came up with something very similar to this in the concept of a person. You have your urge to develop yourself, your Organismic Valuing Process, against your Social Mediation; how much you limit yourself to keep your social life. So someone might want to move to America because it'll benefit themselves developmentally, but their family in the UK would prevent that move. In this case their social mediation limits their OVP and they don't go. If the family didn't exist they would develop more from moving, but with the family moving might lead to less development because of the problems that comes with moving an entire family rather than one person. Some people don't have these in balance. They're either too happy to risk the happiness of others to help themselves develop, or they risk their own development to please other people. Rogers' original theory had your side of it as more prominent; some people are unhappy because their development is blocked by others and so their mediation must be cut down so they can become happier. Then they realised that it has to be a balance. Blocking your line of flight is sensible if you're trying to fly into the sun, but that's a risk for less people. Too many people find themselves pinned down because their opinions differ.
I agree. In any attempt to change our lives, change our identities (gender, religious affiliation), or change our location, there are always multiple factors to consider. In some cases our direction is so clear that, while we are sympathetic with those who are affected by our decision, we proceed regardless. Those are the most significant and interesting transformations. In rboone's post suggests that he is running into obstruction as he seeks his line of flight. He fairly considers the other positions, but finds he has to continue his process of differentiation. To be healthy, I believe we all have to do this. (You think?)
I've come back to this a few times with different thoughts. I wanted to reply with what I really feel about this topic but it also became catharsis at points. As I'm currently undergoing this I understand all too well how proceeding regardless of others' concerns develops one's self. It's all very good in situations of anger and dispute; when someone blocks your flight with and presents a conflict it is easier to go ahead alone because now it's black and white. You want to move forward but they stand in your path. Regardless of the morality of the decision you are the protagonist and they the antagonist and you fight for your corner and they for theirs. I think this is similar to rboone's situation. There's a group of people doing X or doing X in a certain way and so he does Not-X. Where he can, he does the most extreme not-X he can find and is tolerable to him. He sees the other side and he sees if he likes it. People frequently live like pendulums, swinging back and forth from extreme position to less extreme position until they find a point in the middle they like. I agree, this healthy. His message to the world? "Try the black side of your black-white divide, why is that side so wrong to you? " He wants to be free of the Us Versus Them culture that refuses to believe the enemy might have a valid point of view. I enjoy trying to see the point of view of other people and struggle greatly when I cannot appreciate what they're saying, but I think for all rboone's chastisement of the black-white man he suffers from much the same. The issue is not that we refuse to appreciate the other person's side, but that we believe these sides exist as true or false. Suppose someone blocks your flight with not anger but tears. Where they cry and say "If you think this is something you have to do". There isn't a big-bad standing in front of you. You can't do not-X of what they're doing. The obstacle to your flight isn't them anymore, but the suggestion that your own decision might be wrong and the pain you cause might be greater than what you thought. This is everyone who's moved their family for their job. Then they stand at your side telling you that the enemy that prevented your movement either isn't them anymore, or wasn't ever them. You'll hurt them by moving forwards, but you think you'll hurt yourself if you don't move forward. In most of the "black and white" situations the big bad never existed, but right now you can't even pretend it did. It's just you standing up against yourself saying "Well, what's blocking you? Go or don't, but do something." This is my shade of grey. Decisions that are entirely yours and you could conceivably be completely wrong and cause pain for no reason. You don't actually know if you'll do better if you move forward and you don't know if you'll do better by not taking the decision. That's where I believe true personal development comes from because it's hard and it means relying entirely on yourself. At this point you can't even rely on idioms. "You miss every shot you don't take". What if each shot you take comes at a cost. An action is both doing X and not doing X, and not doing something is no less or more difficult than doing something.
That's one of the most interesting responses to what I wrote that I've read (so thank you). I agree completely about the shades of grey, and your example (crying) is dead-on (digression: that's the kind of torment that makes great fiction, whereas my black/ white doesn't). When I write these things, I tend to employ a weird exaggerated technique to better outline my point. I think of it like the way I explained something to my daughter the other day, using two extremes to measure or evaluate those shades of grey. The example: Suppose you want to find out if something is farther away from you than another object, and you know these two objects are the same size. To determine which one is farther away, you think of two extremes: imagine something a mile away, then imagine something an inch from your face. Which one is bigger? Using that conclusion, you can determine which of the two objects is farther away by determining which one appears to be smaller. Reductionist, yes, but the technique works at times. It doesn't work as well in cases like this, though; it just happens to be how I think. I depend on thoughtful people like you guys to illuminate the shades of grey.