Happy Mutant Hall of Fame - Timothy Leary

Mark Frauenfelder picked Timothy Leary, high priest of the psychedelic counter culture of the 1960s and 1970s, starting with his trip to Cuernavaca, Mexico sixty years ago, when he consumed psychedelic mushrooms for the first time and drastically altered the course of his life.

Six years later, ESP Disk released his first spoke word album (link to Discogs listing of the CD re-issue with track titles, audio embedded above), using one of his most well-known phrases as the title: Turn On, Tune In, Drop Out. A year after the release of this recording, he wanted to change the phrase to "Drop out. Turn on. Drop in." (audio recording; via Wikipedia), but that first phrase stuck.

Mark also highlighted some of Dr. Leary's bibliography, some of which is available via the Internet Archive, and some of his interest in regeneration and life extension, which only brushes on his late-in-life turn towards futurism. There's also a mention of Leary with stars in his eyes and a computer in his head. Building onto the idea of the human brain being an underutilized biocomputer, his creation of the acronym SMI²LE is a succinct summary of his pre-transhumanist agenda: SM (Space Migration) + I² (intelligence increase) + LE (Life extension).

But the brief article didn't mention his 3rd revision of that lasting phrase, which seems like perfect fit for bringing this happy mutant into the home computer age. During his last decade, Leary proclaimed the "PC is the LSD of the 1990s" and tried to make "turn on, boot up, jack in" a new motto, to suggest joining the cyberdelic counterculture. He died before the dot-com bust and everything that has come after, so he didn't see his techno-utopianism get replaced by tech-bro visionaries who may use counterculture-type language of "disrupting" systems, but end up focusing on ways to profit from their systems that seem a lot like the old ways, but with black boxes "improving" connections between people. 

The Handbook was published before the good doctor departed this earthly realm, on May 31, 1996. Even in his final days, there was discussion of freezing his head. Instead, he was cremated and some of his ashes went space-ward, along with the ashes of 23 others. Also aloft in the world's first space funeral were fragments of Gene Roddenberry, who created the ''Star Trek'' television series; Gerard O'Neill, a space physicist, and scientists and pilots.

Rebooted (again)

This is "Rebooted," a short about a movie monster, made with proper oldschool VFX. I love it.

This is also a post to reboot the Happy Mutant Handbook review/ redo blog, a fan project way too long in the making.

But it's weird, quiet days, and I want to make something, so it's time to reboot this old blog. Come along, let's revisit a book from 1995 in the year 2020!

And if you're wondering what this is all about, check out my first post on this rickety old blog from June 2015.

Happy Mutant Hall of Fame - Theodore Geisel: Seuss I Am!

From porn star politician to mad genius of child-friendly rhyming stories, the second member of the Happy Mutant Hall of Fame, as picked by Mark Frauenfelder, is Theodor "Dr." Seuss Geisel, whose life story is fascinating and lengthy. Except instead of trying to skim over how an illustrator turned ad man came into the world of children's stories, and maybe noting he had made more adult art and drew political cartoons (after drawing propaganda pieces and ads for war bonds), the first third of the piece focused on the Sneetches (text only).

How has Seuss fared in the last 20 years? Since his death in 1991, his fame hasn't faded, and many of the above-linked resources were created in the years since 1995. (Remember, Wikipedia launched in January 2001). There is a lot more to read if you want to dive deeper. Or if you'd prefer, you can skip that and enjoy the animated short of The Sneetches (link to a slightly better quality video, lower quality embedded below).

Happy Mutant Hall of Fame - Cicciolina: The Little Fleshy One

Welcome to the original Happy Mutant Hall of Fame, six short profiles on a few of the world's wonderfully unique individuals. (I say Original because I'll expand this list after getting through reviewing the book.)

The first mutant mini-profile confused me at first. On reflection, I somehow mentally classified the Handbook as something of a kooky fun book for the whole family, and it mostly is. But there is definitely some material you wouldn't discuss with mini-mutants, and the story of the porn star turned politician is probably one of them.

Gareth Branwyn wrote about Ilona Staller, the Hungarian-born Italian porn star who is also her stage name, Cicciolina (which translates as "little cuddly," "little fleshy one," and "little cabbage," according to Branwyn). She got into politics in the late 1970s, and in 1987, she was elected to the Italian parliament and continued to perform in hardcore porn. She offered to have sex with a number of men in need of peace and comfort, including Saddam Hussein (twice) and Osama bin Laden, saying "My breasts have only ever helped people while Bin Laden has killed thousands of innocent victims."

So how has she fared since 1995? Though she wasn't re-elected and hasn't held office since her one term, she continued to be active in politics into her 60s, and was remembered in English language pop media/news in 2013. Otherwise, she's mostly forgotten (or unknown) outside of Italy.

Work safe video: she was the inspiration for Pop Will Eat Itself's unofficial 1990 World Cup anthem, Touched By The Hand Of Cicciolina, as seen below:

Cyberpunk vs Ribofunk

Cyberpunk is a world of silicon chip implants, stainless steel, firtual reality, and grim computer hackers. It's fun to read about, but who wants to live that way?

Mark and Carla grab onto Paul Di Filippo's notion of Ribofunk, as coined for his collection of stories with the same name. As he said,

It's a neologism of my own inventing that I hope spreads like a memetic virus throughout the intellectual community. Ribo comes from the word ribosome, which I use as a shorthand for all biology, and funk indicates a stylistic component derived mostly from funk music... a hot, skittery style in contrast to the more laid back, cerebral style that you might find in some cyberpunk...

So what is ribofunk? Carla and Mark compared it to Cyberpunk as follows:

silicon	carbon
computer hacking	biohacking
designer drugs	designer genes
control	chaos
cyborg	mutant
implants	parasites
Neuromancer	Blood Music
logic	libido
Kraftwerk	George Clinton
robotics	artificial life
Chess	Twister

How does this all look in reflection? Actually, quite contemporary. Biohacking is still a fringe topic, designer genes are far from main-stream and continue to evoke heated debates about the ethics and societal fairness of "designer babies." That debate has moved from theoretical potential of such actions and closer to reality as whole genome sequencing has significantly advanced in the past twenty years. In 1995, genome sequencing was just starting to pick up steam. Now the target is to cut the price to $1,000 USD for a complete human genome, which again comes with a range of technical, ethical and legal issues.

Artificial life and Blood Music are still future-tech, in terms of full-fledged realization, while George Clinton is still funky, and Twister is still kitschy.

The Mr. Magoo Theory of Mutant Progress

When you think about it, Mr. Magoo's exploits are the perfect metaphor for mutant progress. Like this hapless cartoon geezer, we humans, in our nearsightedness, like to look down the path we've traveled and take credit for everything that's worked out, while conveniently ignoring (or blaming others for) all our screwups. in our arrogance, we can't see all the near disasters that chance has averted. Meanwhile, futurists try to develop forecasting methods to predict what's going to happen as we drive our fume-belching autos into the sunset -- forget about it! Life's more chaotic, complex, and strange than we could ever predict.

In Gareth Branwyn's short piece on the fortunate Mr. Magoo as the personification (or cartoonification?) of mutant progress, he doesn't get into the fact that the codger initially played second fiddle to a bear who had no lines, yet Magoo was popular enough to get a series of shorts and a few movies, kind of like humans who have stumbled into their current position, thinking they're the cat's pajamas instead of a series of happy accidents, in the face of all their (unwitting) efforts to undo their progress at every turn. But overall, still an apt stand-in for mutant progress (and if you have only seen this first short, don't worry - Mr. Magoo changes from an angry old music-hater to a jolly chap, more in keeping with the happy sort of mutants).

For your viewing pleasure, the first short featuring Mr. Magoo: The Ragtime Bear (1949)

Normals, Unhappy Mutants and Happy Mutants

What is a happy mutant? Simply put, one who is fond of new ideas and high weirdness, with a DIY sensibility to make their own fun with the power of their brain; not to be confused with Normals and Unhappy Mutants:

Sea-Monkeys, a real man-modified miracle of nature!
(note: link includes embedded auto-playing video)

• Normal (neophobic sixpackus), folks concerned about "fitting in" and stability. But give 'em a good shock and behold! Mutation!
• Unhappy Mutant (neophilic pessimisticus), seek new experiences of a dark sort, miserable folks who reinforce their miserable attitudes. If they crash and burn, they might swing back and become 'born again normals'.
• Happy Mutant (neophilic optimisticus), also seek out new experiences but of the opposite end of the spectrum, desiring novelty of the gleeful sort. But without sufficient infusions of new, their grey goo could turn dull and normal.

Further examples of these different classes of creatures:

Stuff They Like

Happy Mutant	Normal	Unhappy Mutant
Brazil	Sleepless in Seattle	Faces of Death
bOING bOING	People	ANSWER Me!
They Might be Giants	Janet Jackson	GG Allin
The Happy Mutant Handbook	The Bridges of Madison County	Apocalypse Culture
Silly Putty	Golf balls	Nunchakus
Basil Wolverton	Leroy Neiman	Joe Coleman
Church of the SubGenius	Church of Elvis	Church of Satan
Sea Monkey	Irish Setter	Scorpion
Twister	Checkers	Russian Roulette
Archie McPhee	Lillian Vernon	Amok
"Why Be Normal?"	"I'm with Stupid"	"Charlie Don't Surf"
Pranks	White Collar Crime	Scams

How have these examples of Happy Mutant hijinks aged? In 1996, when this review of the Happy Mutant Handbook was written, the review might have seemed like some zesty breadcrumbs on an exciting trail into a great unknown, with the Handbook itself serving as a collection of teaser trailers for the even larger mysteries of the wider, weirder world out there. But with the ever-expanding internet, as seen in the links above, more of this kooky kind of novelty is just a click away!

Some of this is still fresh, with Brazil retaining it's place as a cult classic, while some have ebbed and flowed, like the comeback of They Might Be Giants as a "nerd-rock institution." According to the current overview on Wikipedia, bOING bOING had a maximum circulation of 17,500 copies, then transitioned from zine to website in 1995, dropping the zine all together in 1996, and it has grown and changed since then. The Church of the SubGenius also lives on, like an endless supply of sea monkeys, which oddly aren't available from Archie McPhee, the thriving internet store of weird and wonderful items.