Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff Higgins
You have no idea my life experience... Just a very brief, certainly less than all inclusive rundown:
I've been on every continent but two (and have hunted on two of them), and in just short of 40 foreign countries (got arrested and jailed in two of them). Not all "friendly"...
Got evacuated from one West African schitthole by UN troops as rebels were closing in on the city in which we were working. Riding in the back of an army truck hearing broken French accented English saying "get your white" on the radio. That'd be us.
I've climbed Mt Rainier.
I've lived both out of a backpack and off of a pack string in remote wilderness for several weeks at a time (on many, many occasions), unsupported by any outside help.
I've lived and worked with the people occupying both sides of the Dead Sea for extended periods of time (and have swam in both sides), profoundly saddened by just how much they hate one another (both a fantastic peoples, and a real joy to spend time with).
None of that was "profoundly transformative", of course. Standing in the Garden of Gethsemane where Judas betrayed Jesus kinda was, though, as was walking the stations of the cross in Jerusalem, and standing in the very room in which the Last Supper was held. Seeing pyramids on three continents and understanding their profound significance to those who built them might have been as well...
I could go on. I've led a very full and rewarding life, by no means lacking in experience. It's from this perspective through which I view those simply driving their RV into the desert and paying an exorbitant fee to camp with 80,000 of their new best friends. I see them trying to convince themselves, one another, and us that they are having some sort of "profoundly transformative" experience. It's these people who are so utterly devoid of anything "profound" in their lives that they have to resort to this sort of contrived nonsense. They're fooling themselves, but no one else. Kinda sad to watch, really. But at least they are having fun...
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and in the next thread about the garden of gethsemane, if i jump in a declare it all bull crap, then you can say i don't have the necessary life experience to say that.
because you see, this isnt a thread about the garden of gethsemane ... its a thread about burning man.
ergo, life experience with burning man, and events like it, are the relevant life experience needed to comment on the topic. i dont show up in random threads, i have no life experience on, tell everyone its bull crap, and then get mad when someone with more life experience on the topic shows up now do i? i show up in threads i have some kind of relevant life experience about, and if no one else is saying what i would have already said. this is why i tend to stick to racing cars, building racing cars, gay/trans issues, religion, relationships, policing, etc ... because this is where i have a lot of life experience.
there is no shame in lacking life experience at burns or burning man.
there is a problem if you decide to tell 70,000+ people that their experience on the topic, is fake, while you, who has none, have declared yourself and your experience more important on the topic. furthermore, actively attacking people who have that experience who are like "hey, maybe you should listen for a second to people who have actually done the thing you are shooting your mouth off about?"
i have no doubt that your experience with burning man would be exactly how you project it to be. its a rorschach test after all. you see and live how you want to live, and if thats how you see it, then thats what it is for you.
im just not dumb enough to think that every single other person is having the exact same experience. becasue they arnt. just like how multiple people probably have different experiences when it comes to climbing mountains, and going to gardens.
in this thread, i see a lot of people who dont understand a thing, and instead of being curious about it, are attacking it. based on a social media projected image, which is strange, because all of these people hate social media projected images and dont think they are real, but for some reason can't fathom how that might be similarly true of the event in question. so they default to attacking it.