Cyborgs

A friend wrote -

"...my head seems to be spinning like a 18th century carouselle as i approach the end of yet another degree in something.

"I'm charging up and down corridors, hefting large boards inscribed with ritualistic markings up numerous flights of stairs, asserting my masculinity as i bang large nails into clean freshly painted white walls.

"Im even writing an extensive essay on humans manufacturing their own bodies to become more compatible with our now highly sophisticated machinery ("posthuman development"). In effect we will all be semi-organic cyborgs by 2100.

"This seems so far removed from the images you sent the other day, and i almost envy that. All that uncluttered space to think outside the heavily mediated simulation of the city machine..."

I replied -

You write so colourfully. To think that you're such a dullard in conversation. Ha.

Maningrida is a strange town. It's one of the biggest Aboriginal communities in all Arnhem Land. While there may be vastness and quiet beyond it's limits, every being and thing within its walls strives for the machismo of the city machine. Bureaucracy, broadband and bottom lines. That's what it's all about...

Growth. It's what we're selling here. Everyone is buying it in massive quanitites. If posthuman development was available it would be on the cards. It's a desperate game of catch-up... Catch-up to what? The claustrophbic clutter you've described? Must we all ride this donkey to the darkest depths of democracy?

These places are not so different, you know - Maningrida and Melbourne. The cogs of commotion are always turning. You can choose to get caught up in them as much or as little as you like. The machine is only ever a distraction.

Look at us. You long for pause, I long for perks. At the end of the day, doesn't everybody just want to take the time to plonk down on their arse, ungarded, and be allowed a beer?