Systemaniac

As a manga artist I have a goal to develop my own unique style; my own special techniques and sciences of representation. I plan to initiate that journey once I have mastered the basics of manga and storytelling (some years from now). Yet, the subject got me thinking. Just how would I create my own style? Not something simply derivative of the myriad influences I have enjoyed throughout my life (anime, RPGs, and the like), but something that would accurately project my unique ‘mode’ of thought; something that would realize the color palette of my dreams and resonate with the frequency of my imagination. As usual, I turned the mirror to myself and my life to find the answers. However, I wasn’t led to the answers I was expecting.

Examining many of the habits I have created over the years, I went through my usual, “why do I do this”, and “why do I do that” spiel. I first learned this technique from a critical thinking book when I was younger and found that it helped me to understand where I had acquired my ideas and also helped me determine if those ideas were really something I was personally interested in keeping. Since that time I have taken care to construct, destroy, and adapt ideas into my persona to form my unique identity. The most important step in this process was to honestly determine what I thought and felt about things and why I thought and felt the way I did.

Using that “Why, why, why?” technique more recently, it occurred to me that I have a certain obsession with anthropological and bionomic “systems”. Every anthropological system from the arts and sciences, to politics, economics, and religion intrigues me as do the ecological systems of Earth and the universe on every scale (quantum and relative). I have a craving to know how they work, where they originated, and most importantly how they interact with and influence each other.

I am interested in knowing why one person commits a crime while another risks life and limb to save a fellow human being. I want to know the root causes, motivations, potential factors, astrological charts, time of day, and in what era and under what social/political, economical influences the events took place.

I do not pursue these answers for the sake of understanding the particular persons or events necessarily, but more to understand the nature under which they were formed. I constantly seek to apply that information to help me understand people and events in general. Even something as simple as someone who is rather shy amongst a group of strangers versus someone who is gregarious and amiable amongst the sea of unknown identities interests me greatly. For me, these individuals are systems just waiting to be cracked and quite possibly hacked for my enlightenment and entertainment.

I might start by identifying that although they may have been molded by very different and specific experiences, their particular reasons for acting the way they do might be simplified to a few principle conditions that are shared by the human family.

Fear, for instance, could be the root cause for the actions of both introverted and extroverted personalities in the example above. The particular reasons they emote fear, however, could be endless; insecurity caused by fear of ridicule for instance or conversely, self-imposed confidence and an outgoing demeanor for fear of being socially unaccepted.

Likewise, compassion could be a motive, one that would require a more in-depth analysis, but just as an example, let’s imagine that the shy personality was actually humbled by the presence of other human beings (seeing them as fellow deities), and simply wanted to enjoy and reflect on their activities in solitude. On the other hand, what if the extroverted personality had the same views about human divinity and therefore wanted to participate with people whom they see less as strangers and more as beautiful gods with whom they may channel and exchange energies with.

Here then I have two principle motives to consider for the actions of these two individuals: fear and compassion. From these generalized starting points, I could then dig deeper into the two individual’s particular experiences that shaped them and come up with a detailed understanding of why they act the way they do (insert long Latin names here).

Anything else? Could there be any other root causes besides fear and compassion? What incentives could guide their actions? What about the mentally disabled? What about children who have yet to form concepts like psychological fear or the oneness of everything? Do they have a choice really, or is it already programmed into their genes? How do their genetics influence the formation of such concepts. On and on, etc, etc. This is just an example of how I think.

Taking this systemaniacal interest of mine and considering how I could turn it into a style did help me to formulate some interesting ideas. One idea I had was to uses pre-determined art and writing motifs as mini, self-contained systems that could be used in combination with each other to make up larger systems (or pictures). The larger systems would represent what we actually see played out in everyday life (a person committing a crime) based on the influences or lack there of, from other systems (system x- economical, system y-sociological, system z- theological, etc.).

But more than that, my exploration into my system based predilections also brought up another interesting thought…Is this even something unique to me or do all humans innately observe in this way?

From the brain’s perspective it certainly does observe and respond to the world based on pre-conceived or experienced concepts. Those concepts rely on each other to form larger pictures, so the concepts formed by the brain are systems that help it understand the larger system, which is life. The brain never stops trying to make sense out of things, even abstract concepts such as God. I believe it’s one of the reasons we have invented words like “stuff” and I also think that it’s one of the reasons we avoid not labeling other uncertainties. We crave a certain amount of order and clarity. We need a system of some sort or another. It must fit in somewhere, either by divine order or random chaos, it is part of “something”.

So if we are naturally systemaniacal observers, what overarching system governs our systemaniacalism? We are essentially the same organism as far as science and religion are concerned. So there should be a certain amount of overlap and similarity in the way we take in and rationalize information. This is a question that sort of leads back to my first post in this blog. To what degree are we in control of our own thoughts and actions and to what degree are they determined by outside “systems” such as the brain’s hardwiring, genetics, our environment, God, etc. And if we all share a similar systemaniacal way of thinking, why do our motives appear to be so different (or are they really that different at all when reduced to principle incentives such as fear and compassion)?

I’ve always had a personal belief that we do things for a reason. That everything has a function and fulfils it in one way or another; basically that everything balances out via the interactions of endless systems found in the universe. I admittedly stole this idea from nature and you can easily find it exploited in my I.P. work on Seda, which is my allegorical encyclopedia of universal systems. Therefore, I side ‘more’ with determinism than with the concept of free will (the subtleties of my position on this issue are great however, and I will discuss them at length later).

However, I have yet to settle on what I think the ultimate goal of these systems is. Perhaps all systems exist in conflict and harmony with one another simply to swing some grand pendulum back and fourth creating the vibration that perpetuates life- A universal heartbeat kept alive by the activity of its many corporeal components. I don’t think it is something I will ever truly know, but it’s fun to theorize about at least. Perhaps we are just God having fun; observing ourselves from the inside out. Therefore my unique style of expression wouldn’t be unique at all, but simply another facet of the universe; another version of the Systemaniac trying to crack its own code; for fun and perhaps more intriguingly for profit.

Doesn't Matter If You're Black or White?

This post was written by another member of this blog who has yet to actually register for an account, so I've been asked to post it for her. Cheers- Sage

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Don't matter if you're black or white eh?

So what if you're neither black nor white? A long time ago, I was sitting on the couch with the TV tuned to Oprah. Tiger woods was on. I didn't really know who he was at the time. I didn't and still don't follow Golf or any other sports, I prefer to play them. I was relaxing, half listening to the show when I managed to catch Tiger's response to a question Oprah asked. He said (paraphrased), "I don't consider myself black."

My attention snapped into focus on the TV screen. Now I don't remember much, but what I did remember was the backlash to that answer in the news and Oprah's follow up question, which was something like, Are you sure that's what you want to say?

As a person who is mixed (black father, white/Indian mother) I was very aware that I fit into neither race. In West Africa, where I was born & grew up, people there are actually the color black. To them, my brown skin was more white than black. The curly hair stood out like a sore thumb too. One of my earliest memories is of being mobbed by a pack of black school children, and being surrounded and exclaimed over by excited kids. In those parts, a live white person was a rare and foreign animal.

In North America, anyone would look at a picture of me and say black without a second thought. And that was shocking to me, when I first arrived to North America. People here considered me black, wow. I was very uneasy. I was being told two different things by two different cultures, neither of which I was fully a part of.

As I grew up in North America, I learned to ignore and eventually become indifferent to the labels. I never took part in any conversations that went too deeply into this topic because I was well aware of the Tiger Woods effect. Within me, I was well aware that if I were to step back into the home of my childhood, I would be seen as closer to white than black. And because I grew up with an African culture, I don't identify with African American culture either.

And so? What to do? The identity crisis was too much. For me, I ignored it until I was ready. My sister embraced African America culture fully, and my brother? Well, let's just say he’s doing better now.

To say that I’m black denies part of me, denies my mother’s culture. To say that I’m not, sparks outrage, as Tiger found out. My answer? I’m neither, I’m both. I prefer the middle way, the paradox that is both true and untrue.

-Bemused