PSEUDO-SYMBOLISMSomewhere around 2000, Jim was sitting quite passively in Washington Square Park when he was seized by the tremendous urge and inspiration to write a manifesto that would describe his aesthetic and life philosophy. While he might not write it in exactly the same way now as then, this is exactly what he wrote then:
Long have we talked of the duality of things in terms of positive and negative, dark and light, masculine and feminine, good and evil. I would say this supposed duality, the basis of most worldviews, represents no duality at all, but is a singular way of looking at the universe. I propose that there is, in fact, a duality, but this duality is not a matter of a thing and its opposite. It is rather the symbol of a thing (whether it be yin or yang) and the recognition that this symbol is a construct. The recognition does not negate the power of the symbol, but puts the symbol in perspective. The symbol is the reflection in the mirror, which reminds us of who we are, its other nature is the source of the reflection: ourselves. We need both the reflection and the source to retain our humanity. I call this Pseudo-Symbolism, and I say that all human beings are Pseudo-Symbolists by nature.
Of course, this is all bullshit.
Why believe in Pseudo-Symbolism?
How does Pseudo-Symbolism help anybody?
Is this a call for the abolishment of symbols? Aren't there people who are just plain believers in symbols, who question nothing, who make no choices? There are people who verge on being like that. But tell one about Pseudo-Symbolism and that he or she is a Pseudo-Symbolist. When he or she says proudly: I am not a Pseudo-Symbolist, congratulate him or her on becoming a Pseudo-Symbolist.
Why are you telling us all this?
Pseudo-symbolically yours,
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Dear Pseudo-Symbolists:
In Symbolic terms, we might think of the masks of Tragedy and Comedy as a representation of Pseudo-Symbolism, with Tragedy representing the Symbol and Comedy representing the Recognition of the symbol's design. In Pseudo-Symbolic terms, we see that the masks of Tragedy and Comedy help us understand ourselves, but removing the masks reveals naked faces, capable of simultaneous tragedy and comedy, joy and pain, love and hate, faith and doubt. And every mask our faces make is as real as it is symbolic, as genuine as it is contrived.
Well, if we acknowledge that we are all Pseudo-Symbolists, then we have the power to see through the symbols that have separated us as human beings since the beginning of our existence. That people are of different colors, shapes, sizes, sexes, preferences, etc. is absolutely true. That these qualities might mean something beyond their actuality, that they might symbolize good and evil, smart and dumb, sick and healthy, etc. is purely a symbolic notion. Pseudo-Symbolism sees through the symbolism and gives us the power to rise above it. Pseudo-Symbolism was the basis for the Civil Rights movement, Women's Liberation, the abolition of slavery. And we still need it, because there still exist people (including ourselves) who are still trapped by their symbols.