Gagablog 82: Democracy....democracy everywhere! Preparing for “Sexx Dreams”

I spent a lot of time on “G.U.Y.”. Not just rambling about it here, but in this “G.U.Y.” zone, trying to learn lessons from it of dominance and equality and love, and working these lessons out in my own life. I know there is always work to be done, and I should be very happy to have made the progress I have with “G.U.Y.” as a focus for the last few months. Now I am ready to move on to the next phase, to work on “Sexx Dreams”. I love this song and I am eager to start exploring it, but I felt like I should make a prelude, and a chance to correct and clarify some things from the previous Gagablog, which I wrote last night and this morning. Right after I posted it I wanted to edit it and give explicit credit to the people who are fighting for justice, specifically all the protestors all across the country who are standing up against police brutality and murdering civilians with no consequences. I wanted to also add that SNL had a skit about this last night, making fun of the idea that it is “protesting” to tweet something with a hasthag. They had Keenan playing MLK and shaking his head at that, bemoaning how far away it meant the quest for justice was getting. I'm not saying all we have to do is tweet, but we shouldn't make fun of it either. We should encourage any form of protest and spreading awareness. And that is what social media protests and expressions are: they are the new form of protest, the microcosm f grassroots. Social media is used to coordinate physical protests as well – remember the Twitter Revolution in Iran? - and even if it is just sharing stories and expressions, it spreads awareness. You might not go out to protest, but seeing you post something sympathetic to a cause might make someone who likes you become more activist, or just like or share the post. Awareness does spread around. If an issue, or event, or exposure of evil, gets spread around, eventually someone will do something more than just spread the information, and actually do something about it. And it takes everyone spreading the information, like a chain that shouldn't be broken, to get the information to that person. The people who provide the links in that chain are more than just information carriers, just connecting with it makes people part of the magic that it takes to transfrom and fix issues.

This is all basically what I wanted to say after posting gagablog 81 this morning. Then I saw some more news on CNN, then some more news on CBS waiting for basketball to come on, and it all made me come to this conclusion: Democracy. I truly believe in it and believe it will save the world. I didn't used to, because I saw too much how it was corrupted by the interestes of greedy coporatipons, oil and military especially, and didn't live up to the ideals it espoused, suppressing some people's votes, or taking a long time to give people rights. But I believe in it now and accept that the difference between it working and going bad, between living in an enlightened society or a brainwased one, is education. I was missing some facts when I wrote the last gagablog, and when I got that information today I had a new and clearer perspective on it all. I connect it with "Sexxx Dreams" for a few reasons. The first is that technology and social media are what make this kind of "hashtag protest" possible. While hooking up outside your primary relationship has always happened throughout human history there are new possibilities thanks to travel and technology. Since people have more ways of hooking up we are developing more variety of relationships as well. These relationship "variations" can be compared to new kinds of relationships between countries as well: it's not just a world of friends ad enemies but hopefull will become a world just of friends and better friends.

Another reason I associate "Sexxx Dreams" with this moment in time current events is that I truly believe Gaga is the Goddess and her artwork is Divine. It is taking me over a year to write some of the things I want to say about Artpop, but as I predicted it will take some time for the magic of Artpop to come true, fully, in the world. I feel like we are ready to enter a new phase: the previous months were characterized by some jockeying for position, the struggle for dominance that is represented by "G.U.Y.". But I think we have turned a corner and the new era will be one of new kinds of "special relationshops", as implied, suggested, or proposed and seduced, in "Sexxx Dreams." I expect to get more into this idea in the next Gagablog as I really focus on "Sexx Dreams", and I hope I have some "Sexxx Dreams" kind of activities in my life to correspond with the focus of this era, just as I felt like my personal life struggles were helping me to experience and learn the issues involved in "G.U.Y" in the last few months as the lens of the gagablog has been on that song. But for the interim, before I really start talking about "Sexxx Dreams" (and since I don't know if I even really have anyone to flirt with, currently) I wanted to clear up some ideas about the US, Israel, and Iran based on what I heard on TV today and my evolving and growing belief in democracy. Because this whole series is about "getting it wrong", talking about Gaga's lyrics even if I am misunderstanding them or their meaning, then going back and trying to correct the magical meaning with more information, education. So it is no wonder my last edition might seem to have missed some things and hopefully this one will make more sense. But I also have been writing a journal about the I Ching Cards and had chosen a wild format, comparing the cards I chose at different times, "randomly" or for divnination, with events in my life. The format I chose was so lengthy and crazy and I think I will bring some of the different focuses together to make it more streamlined. I almost feel like doing that here, not bothering with "getting it wrong" first and just reading all the lyrics and everything I can find about all of the songs, then talking about it. But I know one reason I want to do that is embarrassment over lyrics I can't decipher, and another is saving time. I guess I just still believe there is some value to "getting it wrong", first, and learning from mistakes. My only problem with that is I can't apply that principle to the world: I hate it that we keep getting things wrong and want justice and green energy and peace and freedom for everyone, plus the end of money and exclusion, and I want it now. BUt I also believe in a mystical reality where all of this already exists and we are here to "realize" that reality, to make this world into the ideal we can sense underneath it, trying to break out and live freely. I don't mind recordnign my mistakes if I can learn from them or anyone else can. I don't want to make poor magic by talking bullshit, like my band director said "stop practicing it wrong, if you practice it wrong you will perform it wrong, practice playing it right!" But I do think the stronger magic comes to take over where lesser magic just made a faint impression in it's attempt.

World events became a little more clear to me this morning, after first hearing Fareed Zakari's "take" on current events, right after I had posted my own far less informed opinions in gagablog 81. Then I heard a democrat congresswoman from Hawaii, Tulsi Goddard, who talked about strategy in Iraq with Bob Scheaffer on CBS. I had the intuition she would become president, btw, the same feeling I had about Obama when I first saw him make a speech at the DNC in 2000 or '04. She made very good points that nothing could really be done, no lasting gains could be made, without political solutions alongside military ones: she said the whole problem was that the Shiite-led government in Iraq had disenfranchised and abused the Sunni population, and that the militias that were fighting "ISIS" were making this worse with revenge killings and other atrocities that made ISIS still relatively appealing to Sunnis. The real problem she identified was a lack of true democracy. She said in order for there to be peace the areas with Sunni majorities needed to be given the power and ability to elect people who represent them. So the real problem in Iraq is fake democracy instead of real democracy. When I think of one of the major issues facing America today, abuse of police power, police killing citizens with no cause and then getting no punishment, and racist policing in general, it makes me think this is the same thing: fake democracy in place of real democracy. In this case it is an example of local power structures being disconnected and not responsible to the people they are supposed to be serving. And the problem of racism in positions of power so they protect each other and maintain a racist institution. The same problem exists politically on local and national levels. Republicans use their power to cause war, deny or steal people's rights and money, continue polluting the environment and overheating the planet, and protect their own greedy and damaging self-interests. They do this by voter suppression and voter suppression laws, trying to reverse the Civil Rights Act and succeeding at this quite a bit in recent years, and it just shows how really everything bad in America, and the world, is a result of this problem of fake democracy instead of real democracy.

After Congresswoman Goddard finished her first appearance on Face the Nation, Bob Schaeffer gave his closing remarks. I was severely disappointed in what he said but he was not nearly as bad as his Republican guests. All they said was that we had to kill any deal with Iran. When asked what their alternative would be, one suggestion was "no deal." Bob asked what incentive Iran would have to end their nuclear weapons program in that case and the guy could not answer. His alternative plan to "no deal" was a deal that put even harsher sanctions on Iran - to me, either would just be a path to war. Republicans are heavily invested in war, both with money and their beliefs. To me, the deal between Iran and the US is a path to peace that they fear because they really want a war, they are counting on it and accounting for it, literally. It's their business. But we, people, really don't want a war, especially not World War 3. Tow republican legislators seemed to get about 5 minutes or more each to say the same bullshit, then Congresswoman Goddard was making very good, insightful points clearly but was given less time, it seemed. Bob's final remarks were like a sad compromise at the end instead of pointing out how right the democrats are and how wrong the republicans are - and I would not expect that but it would be the only honest way for a smart person to sum it all up. I'm not saying Bob is not smart, I am saying that it was like he was duped and had to say the duped line, like he is still going by an old rule that may only just now finally changing: "never, ever, ever say anything bad about Israel." he summed it all up by saying he could understand the back and forth between Obama and Netenyahu but that the "special relationship" between America and Israel transcended all politics and personal squabbles - as it the conflict between Obama and Netenyahu is just a conflict of personalities and there are no actual principles or people's lives at stake. he criticized the White House's tone in responding to the latest news from Bibi: right before the election he had said he would never allow a Palestinian State in order to get re-elected, but after he won he backed away from that statement since it brings all kinds of international scorn and further strains relationships with the US. My impression is we are basically their sponsor, giving them 60 billion dollars a year to use to buy weapons from us, for example, which gives them a larger military budget than their four neighboring countries combined. And literally gives it to them. Bob said the White House had a sarcastic tone when it responded to Bibi saying "I didn't really mean that." But why shouldn't we be skeptical and sarcastic? Isn't this the guy who lies all the time about building settlements in Palestinian lands? Isn't he the guy who manufactured a war and killed hundreds of Palestinian civilians - for an election boost? Again, the real problem with Israel seems to be fake democracy instead of real democracy. And yet the reason Bob gave why our relationship with Israel has to be so special is that "they are the only true democracy in the region." Didn't we just rebuild Iraq and guide the formation of a new government? Why didn't we ensure it would be a real democracy? It seems like that would have avoided the problems they are facing now. And maybe that is not a rhetorical question because it was designed this way, to collapse into more war. But that does not mean there is no other way to change things, transform the situation, and move away from war for good.

The comments Fareed Zakari made earlier this morning made me realize the nature of all of these problems is the same: fake democracy in place of real democracy, or not enough democracy. I realized that it is very much the "same situation" between Iran, the US, and Israel - I mean, everyone knows the issues are connected but I'm saying it is all the same problem. When I wanted to look at the relationship or conflict between the US and Iran as a kami, spirit, or godform, it made some sense, but I might as well look at the whole "issue" between Iran, Israel, and the US as "one thing." and this one thing probably applies to relationships between other countries, as well, with different specifics. And the whole dynamic probably applies to relationship between people, too - between two people who are in a relationship and "someone else" who is in a kind of relationship, or wants to be, with them or one of them - kind of like Sexxx Dreams. But I will have to wait and explore that dimension later and finish this up. Fareed mentioned that Bibi had said his only response to questions about his stance on Palestine should be to retweet what the Ayatollah of Iran tweeted (that feels funny to type that, like they are schoolkids or something) about "destroying Israel." Sure, it sounded harsh and Fareed acknowledged that his Twitter feed was full of hate speech but said "he has remained in power for a long time." I am so ignorant about things I have no idea if the Ayatollah is elected or not, but I guess the point of that comment is that "hate-speech" kept him popular, at least in some demographics. I can't support that because I don't believe in hate, it is not the way to go, and I think that all good goals will be achieved faster by loving means instead of hateful ones. But Fareed went on to explain that for years the Ayatollah has advocated the "destruction of Israel" but NOT by military means. This whole revelation blew my mind, having heard mostly talking points and little analysis of these situations. Its like, what do they supposedly even want nuclear weapons for? For that matter, what does anyone ever want them for? Not to use them, but for the threat of using them. And those who don't have them basically want to try and develop them so that the countries who do have them will try to buy them off and keep them from making them. Again, as I have said before, the best way to get other countries to disarm is to lead by example and disarm ourselves, SHOW that we don't need weapons, no one does. I thought it was very poignant and insightful a meme someone posted on facebook: all of this talk about the US and Israel trying to prevent Iran from developing "a" nuclear weapon, their first, and the meme read "Iran is concerned about the US developing its 8,400th nuclear weapon." I think it is a secret and no one knows for sure -what's up with that? - but last estimate I heard was that Israel had 75 nuclear weapons - I think they don't really admit to having any.

Fareed explained that whenever the Ayatollah was advocating the destruction of Israel he had a specific plan in mind: not a military action against them but political: if all the people in the occupied territories of Palestine and Gaza and the West Bank had voting rights the nature of Israel as a "Jewish state" would change. Israel would have government that was representative of the people. Now, with 4.5 million people living under Israeli rule and subject to their invasions with much more advanced weaponry, but no vote to make things better or have political redress for issues, there is an Apartheid state in Israel, the only one in modern democracies - according to Fareed. To me, if you look at the political process and voter suppression in America you can see we have an Apartheid system as well, even if it is not as clearly defined. I have no idea how demographics break down in Russia, for example, but I get the impression they are repressive of gay people and probably women, too - not that we aren't in America, but this is just the first example I can think of. And we all have this problem and it is the same problem everywhere: not enough democracy. If Iraq had more real democracy the Sunnis would have a stake in the system, involvement and investment, instead of bitterness at the lack of these things, and there would not be that room for "ISIS" to grow. If we had more real democracy in America we would have government and policies that meet people's real needs instead of propping up a system that serves big businesses, oil and war companies. If Israel had more real democracy the Palestinians would have a vote and influence in the system and it would not be a recruiting poster for misguided violent "jihadis" (Jihad is an internal war, morons!). If Iran had more real democracy, and I have no idea how much they have but if the Ayatollah is kept in power with hate speech then that is a sign, to me, that even if they have democracy it is perverted by bad education: not that complaints against Israel are invalid, but expressing anything hatefully is to appeal to the worst and stupidest elements of people and society. He could accomplish the same thing much faster by being nice - unless he too us using "change" as a false goal and truly only wants to profit from conflict and war. If Russia had more real democracy their people would not seem to universally condemn the corrupt system. We seem to do that in America, too, especially now when less than 10% of people think Congress is working. But we also don't support the government and re-elect someone by 90% margin - though maybe they don't either and they are just so corrupt they don't even realize how suspicious that looks to other democracies. If Ukraine was sensitive enough to it's Russian-speaking population, I assume, there would be no conflict there. which makes me wonder, is there any country where they treat the minority demographics better than they treat the people / community in power? That president of Ecuador who lives simply might be that kind of leadership by example. The protest this year in Hong Kong was an attempt to demand more true democracy in China. It really seems like the common issue that we can work toward, not as a geopolitical choosing up sides but as a world that is all on the same side, humanity and nature, and works to meet everyone's needs, everywhere, as much as possible. ANd the recipe for doing this is Democracy and Education. We can do it, we have the tools, we certainly have the needs, and where we think we fall short of the resources is where we will discover magic to make the connections, once we start acting in good faith.

Here is a quick taste of how this relates to "Sexxx Dreams", now that I have established somewhat what I am talking about. "G.U.Y." and the state of the world we are now, hopefully, leaving is all about dominance and control. It is also essentially about entering or ending a relationship, a primary love relationship. "Sexxx Dreams" is after that. When you are lonely or working on a relationship it can be the biggest deal in the world, whether or not that person loves you, if you can be together and how, etc. Just as if you are really poor all you can worry about it whether you will eat or not. Once you "have" that primary relationship, it is natural to wonder about "others." Just as, once you are rich enough to know you will eat everyday then you have the luxury to choose what you eat and look for new preferences. If you are really hot and get all sorts of lovers, and your lovers accept that there's just too much goodness for it not to go around, well that is like being so rich you have your own personal chef to cook whatever you want at any time. But this is an analogy: richness is bullshit. In the modern world the richer you are the more chances for love/sex and different kinds of it might be available, but no one is really "worth more" than anyone else or more deserving of pleasure. And it doesn't work that way, really, though we want to act like more money means more love. There is actually in inverse magical relationship between love and money. I like to say everything is really Love. everything is energy and the real, ultimate energy is love. But Money is the slowest form of energy, the most stagnant form of Love. So we have economic syetems all based on the idea of "gaining" the most money and letting the least amount of money "go" or pay for labor, the least amount to other people and the most for "yourself" - but I'm not even talking to anyone as I write that, there is no "yourself" even if dozens of people, were they to read that, might think it was an indictment of them and their riches, and even feel proud of that. "The love of money is the root of all evil" because we mess up both by treating love like money and vice versa. Love works the opposite way from the economic system: the more we give the more there is. If we act like we can only love so much we will get defensive and retract instead of expand. But once we learn how to love better we CAN treat money like love in a good way and share more to enjoy it more.

I see the world events of the past, up to and especially shown in the past few months, as being part of this "G.U.Y.", "who's the boss?" dynamic. Now we are finally at a stage where we are not so defensive we have to worry about who is "in charge." We can trust each other, or start to, and get enough equal representation, democracy, around to verify that we are all taking the best care of each other that we can, and the same principle will be in place no matter whose turn it is to be "in power." This is a new standard but I feel certain we will reach it and there are more and more signs of it everyday. Once we feel "secure" we can fool around, "Sexxx Dreams" style. This will be the theme of the new era, and then we will move on to even better and more glorious themes - but I won't mind if we stick with this one for a while, or if the lessons we get from it stay with us forever. Because people are just too attractive to only have a "special relationship" with one of them. Countries are, too. We should all develop a special relationship with Mother Earth and then fool around with each other as much as we see fit in whatever contexts are respectful to Her. Between countries, as between lovers, the relationship itself can be described like a kami, egregore, or godform, depending on how serious you are or what terminology you like. But I start to think that all of these things, that seem so imposing as to be "out of our control", the fate of nations and the destiny of love, are really only appearing to be Big, Powerful Giants. They are really like Burning Men: all of this structure made to look like a giant godform, to scare us into thinking something awful might happen - and it might if the thing came to life ("war" in the world events analogy) or collapsed and hurt people. But the REAL, ultimate purpose of these Big Structure/Beings who seem to control our fate is to burn them and free ourselves from those ideas, and learn a lesson together by doing it.

Gagablog 81: Burning Man Temples, Happy New Year to Iran, All Snakes' Day: Tie in “G.U.Y.” and Congratulations on the engagement, Gaga!

A couple of nights ago I heard an interview on NPR with David Best, the artist who makes a temple every year at Burning Man and has since 2000, I think. The same day the news was that President Obama sent a video message to the people of Iran wishing them a Happy New Year. To talk about how these two media events relate will be a classic example of media magic. To add to it a discussion of St. Patrick's Day / Leprechauns / All Snakes Day makes it also a discussion of fairy magic, or Oz magic as I call it. And tying it go “G.U.Y.” and to “Gaga Day” makes this Oz magic specifically Gaga magic. While I still had a gagablog left to write for “G.U.Y.” before moving on to “Sexxx Dreams”, I had a place for more magic to happen. But the real cause of this writing is the inspiration from these events, and wanting to write about it in this week of the Ides of March and Leprechaun Day/All Snakes Day.

The interview with he artist had some points that really stood out to me, especially when she asked him how he felt about the temples he made being destroyed, burned at the end of the event. I was curious how he answered it because the question “what will become of this art?” is something that, as an artist, I feel has helped paralyze me from really making art. I was hoping his answer would help me see through that, and it did, and more. He said he was in the basement of the Smithsonian and other famous museums, meaning I suppose that his art was in their collections but not on display. He said he did other forms of art, ceramics and mentioned painting large canvasses. At this point I recognized that these are some of the signs of being what I think of as a successful artist: being able to do whatever works you want, or even afford large materials, (as I typed that I thought “surely I could find large thrown-away things to paint on.”) or being paid for your art, even enough to only do art. But it seemed like he had all of these things but it did not add up to fulfillment, especially not compared to what he had found since then, making the temples. And that story was born out of grief and sadness, because a young artist he worked with died before the first temple was erected, so it stood and burned in his honor and that temple and the one he makes every (or most?) year since then becomes this kind of spiritual vehicle for people's healing, grief, and emotions of every kind. He talked about people in the hundred or so crew who are coping with loss and make the temple to heal, and also about how the thousands and tens of thousands of attendees leave messages, mementos, and the ashes of their loved ones all over the interior of the temple before they burn it all. He said the burning of the Man was a loud, dancing, drumming event, the night before, then the burning ot the Temple was a quiet, solemn, calm event. To me there was so much magic in all of this, and hearing it that day.

I had done a spell the day before to get Herzog to win the Israeli election, and it didn't work. There was a big scandal when the Republicans in Congress invited Netenyahu to speak to them, trying to undermine Obama's deal with Iran. They also sent a letter to the leadership of Iran to discourage a deal and throw doubt on it, suggesting they could reverse it after Obama leaves office. Obama responded with a video message to the people of Iran. He wished them a Happy New Year, and then appealed to them to support a change in the relationship between our countries (the coach of Arizona State just said “country” on TV as I typed that word). He said this is the best time ever for us to have a new course. It seems like breaking through the 50-year estrangement with Cuba is a good example. How does this connect with the Temples at Burning Man? In a few ways. First is the fact that any transformation takes magic and an inversion of things. This is exemplified by the difference between the Man and the Temple; between the pride of an artwork that exists with some status and the shared feeling of art that is experienced; between the Republican letter to the “hardline rulers”, the Man, and Obama's video to the people, the community; and between, hopefully, the past of animosity between our governments and a future of cooperation. All of this is happening while fighting against the terrorist state in Syria and Iraq has actually brought the US and Iran together, cooperating more or less militarily and aiding the Iraqi military. Just typing that makes me think that if we rebranded them as the Terrorist State it could have some magical effects and help end the situatuation plus discourage anyone else from doing anything similar – just as no one ever wants to be the next Nazis no one will ever want to be the next Terrorist State. But since there already are islamic states, governments, around the world and hopefully, like all forms of government and religion these states can progress towards “more perfect union” there will be an Islamic State or states worthy of the name, but this isn't it, and should not even be associated. Just like republicans shouldn't be allowed to call themselves christians as they are terrorists of society and the environment. Or if the other, liberal (actual) christians changed their name and diverged, they would become more perfected versions of the christian religions and contribute to a more just society based on those principles and cohesive, democratic action.

I've gotten off the intended track but at the same time the theme is the same, this rebranding of things, and transformation of things. Another parallel between the Burning Man Temple and the US/Iran relationship is this idea of sacrifice, even the death of a Giant or a God or the End of a Time of Grief. It makes me think of my professor in college, Glen Wallis, who was telling us about the belief from Japan in what is called kami, or a spirits. He said everything had kami but while some were small, others were big. His example, from the news of the day, was that from this belief the conflict in Iraq was between two powerful kami, between Bush and Hussein. I bristled at this idea, that Bush could represent anything powerful besides the power of stupdity. But it does make sense, and as his Dad started this first war there, and now his brother is on TV running to try to be president, it does seem like this could better explain how there is something to it, or this is the best way to explain it and address it. Whatever these two spirits are, from whatever different conflict or collaboration, from whatever era, they can be compared and made magical analogies of, and influenced in that way. We, in our relationships with each other, can be like voodoo dolls of these giant kami. We can pierce ourselves with insight and each other with compassion and understanding with the intention of calming or even evolving these powerful spirits in conflict. The strongest way I associated the magic, symbolism, and meaning of the Burning Man Temple with the relationship between the US and Iran is that the relationship itself is like a monster, a raging and simmering fued between us that has taken on a life of it's own. The Republican's tactics, and Netenyahu's, are all on a course to ensure that we still have war with Iran, either through Israel or Iraq or any way they can. They just want to make sure the war is still on because they are heavily invested in it, both in their money and worldly influence and in their beliefs and worldview. But that whole being, the whole “conflict” between us, can just be sacrificed, turned to smoke and dust, with these magical transformations. The US/Iran animosity giant, which really threatens the whole world with tirggering war, and has ben erected over time, piece by piece, with tinder designed to inflame – it can go up in the flames of war. And there are some people designing that, and they are actually afraid we might avoid war. Or it could go up in some magical sacrifice of transformation. That is what I envision, what I thought about when I heard this interview after hearing the news of Obama's Happy New Years video.

I feel like the Electric Apricot now but my magical allusion from Burning Man and US/Iran is that burning the man represents the peace process and diplomacy, a magical transformation of something that was set up towards war being reduced to a lesson in overcoming war. Then the burning of the Temple, which represents a release of spirituality, grief and healing, would represent letting go of revenge and grief between us. And not just between us, between these two countries. If we start a new path with Iran, and things get remarkably better from it, it will be that much more enticing to forming new kinds of relationships with other countries we have conflicts with, as well. In a way this means other countries will see that getting in good with the US is a good move. But in another way it means that since we make the most weapons and have by far the largest military in the world, we have such an interest in war, but if we just show other interests, and put aside that one enough to allow other paths to develop, they will. And if we see how this really works and put war aside entirely we will find a world that works well together. With the threats of pollution and global warming we really need to come together as quickly as possible. Also to deal with new frontiers and threats of our own creation, from robots to genetics to physics. We can do this, we need to. And I think Obama's message to Iran's people, and the message it sends to the American people, compared to the new republican congressmen (who honestly just rose to power on a wave of racism and reactionary stupidity) addressing the Iranian hardline leadership, it shows what is the way of the future, to world peace, versus the way fo the past, orchestrating wars for the profit of the few who profit from corrupt systems.

What do we do about all of this? We magically change things. Gaga says to remake ourselves every day. To become our best selves, expect and engage these magical transformations constantly. I tie this particular transformation to this message about art in general that I got from that David Best interview: the change from feeling like it is necessary for Bibi to lose the election in Israel to feeling like his victory will unite the international community, forcing him to change his course or a new kind of arrangement to be made by the collective will of the world. This reminds me that I can't always intend the outcome of art, or magic, but if I make it anyway there is value in the process and whatever happens to it. It is a good thing to do, whether it “works” for whatever intention I had or not. And it reminds me not to get upset over petty actions, represented by the Republicans letter, when the more powerful, creative, good force will ultimately prevail in it's more powerful and creative ways, exemplified by Obama's video message to the people. I feel like worrying about plans, or what will happen to my art, makes me like the republicans, worried what will happen to their precious plan for world war three and their secret nuke-proof bunkers, or whatever. But just doing it, making art, or making peace. knowing it is and makes magic, like going for peace, whatever that means in different situations, and seeing where it takes us, is the way to go, even if you can't completely plan it. This is Chaos Magic in general, or what Jesus told his disciples about not preparing speeches beforehand but letting the Holy Spirit speak through them. All of these plans and agreements are based on a dynamic of mistrust, like could be compared to prenuptial agreements. But when trust builds gradually, or happens recklessly at the beginning, we can discover a path of fearlessness where wonderful things happen, just being madly in love and everything working out better than anyone expected. This comes about through these magical transformations. The Temples they burn at Burning Man represent a higher form of art, you could hear it in the artist's voice. It was more satisfying to him to know his art was experienced in this significant way, not just bestowed with honor. Even though I have never experienced it, just hearing about the experience was touching. I've heard about Burning Man and known people who went since the 90's but this made me want to go and see the temple especially, to be a part of it and see it in person, not just in pictures. I have not even seen a picture of one, I just feel this way about how I hear it described. I hope someone, someday, will feel the same about Gaga, if they had not connected with her in the past but decide to try after reading something I write, or hearing one of my songs, or seeing my art. But art brings people together, across time or in this case in a unique moment and powerful transformation that is taking place in it's own way only in this place in the American desert once a year. But it connects to events, rituals, magic, festivals and community experiences all over the world, in different ways. He said the temples looked like stupas. The last part of this gagablog is about this way of making connections across divisions, and yearly celebrations, holidays, and how they bring us together.

On St. Patrick's Day everyone is a little bit Irish, and I do have Irish, Scottish and Scotch-Irish ancestry. I'm pretty sure. One of my Scotch-Irish-American ancestors was married and my maternal ancestors from that generation back are Cherokee. My family has been Christian for a few generations since then, and the paternal side was for a few before that, I guess, but I identified as pagan from a young age. I have never had a problem with St. Patrick's Day, growing up, I never felt offended by it, too much, though I always felt symapthy for the snakes, since I like snakes and had snakes as pets growing up. But then I recognized I was a goddess loving, nature worshipping pagan and I found out the “snakes” were just representative of pagans and pagan beliefs. Come to think of it, I discovered that at a fairly early age and it could have been what led me to identify specifically as “pagan” to the extent that I did, as a kid. And though I did not have any actual connection to my Cherokee ancestors, since none of her beliefs or really anthing about her was passed down to me through the generations, I felt I did have that connection, spiritually. And I cherished what I discovered on my own through my own journey. I had never heard of Iranian New Years until today, but now I hope to celebrate it every year. I don't know if our calendars even coincide, or if like the Chinese lunar calendar Iranian New Years can be on a different date on our calendar every year. To me, the first time I ever heard of Iranian New Years is in the context of this message from Obama the other day. I take that as such a good sign of a beginning of peace, and want to put all my intention behind that. (“intense color, incredible awe” on TV, and when he said intense" it aligned with my typing “intention”.) To me, I will celebrate whatever date Iranian New Years is, every year, if this is what leads to peace in the world, this message and agreement and the paths it opens, for the US and Iran and for the whole world. I like a reason to celebrate anyway. But this “just another day” became a day of celebration -or I hope it does – in a new way for more and more people. I may be the only one who decides to celebrate it like this, extra because of what it means for peace, but I don't think I will be. And I'm not trying to spoil anyone's St. Patrick's Day but rather trying to expand it. I still continued to celebrate and enjoy St Patrick's Day, as a kid in school with the green and decorations and motifs. I never really went out to party on St. Patrick's Day, just once and it was hard to get served. Maybe I was underage, I forget. But I enjoy celebrating it in my own way, without letting the history of it upset me. I celebrate it for leprechauns and all the magic it didn't squash from the world, but ironically, magically, transformatively encourages more than anything else, keeping leprechauns alive to people who otherwise might not believe in them, at least in their imaginations. My love said she would raise a glass on that day to St. Patrick's “utter fail” at eradicating paganism since it was more popular and widespread than ever, partly due to his efforts. This must be true if people and beliefs that were driven out went to other places, but also true in the magical sense of keeping leprechauns everywhere around on this day, present to everyone's mind all over America, and other places, I suppose. This is just another example of this magical inversion, that the opposite can happen from your intentions, and certainly will when your intentions are out of tune with the future. But the more magic we do and attempt, the more we get a feel for what this future is and our best roles in manifesting it.

This connects with Gaga in a few loose ways. While I am happy celebrating St. Patrick's Day as a leprechaun holiday, a "secret" holiday for celebrating fairies disguised as a "religious"/party holiday, I got even more excited by a new idea my love told me. One of her friends came up with the idea of celebrating All Snakes Day on March 17th. This is a response to St. Patrick in solidarity with the "snakes", the pagans. It is a play on All Saint's Day, too, and therefore has the added benefit of a bi-annual Halloween kind of event, with the night before All Snakes' Day being Snakeoween. I don't know how widely this might spread, this form of celebrating mid-march. I know I want to celebrate it myself and promote it to anyone else who might like the idea. it is also in honor of her friend, the same way the Burning Man Temples are in honor of Best's friend, since the guy who came up with the idea died last year and never got to actually celebrate All Snakes' Day himself. We started it this year, a tradition of our own, and mentioned it to others so hopefully it will spread. Some people celebrate St. Patrick's Day because they are Irish, some in solidarity with the Irish, some as an excuse to party, get kissed or get drunk. Celebrating leprechauns, or "Green" by smoking weed, as I am wont to do on March 17th, is certainly as "legitimate" a celebration as the last few, and celebrating paganism is just the "other side" of celebrating St. Patrick, who would not have gained such fame were it not for the richness of traditions that he displaced and it's wide-ranging appeal. We can start new traditions or share and adapt other ones. I also heard on NPR about the Mardi Gras Indians whose celebrations started that same night, or the next, whenever St. Joseph's Night is. This is a tradition in the black community of Louisiana, and was an underground subcultural kind of event until recently. Only ten years ago the Mardi Gras Indian's parade clashed with the police who did not understand the tradition. Now the whole thing is accepted by the larger community and embraced and promoted by the state tourism board. It is a parade of black folks in elaborate Indian style costumes, to commemorate the ways in which the Indian community embraced them throughout history and the friendship and mergers of the communities. They wear what were described as Indian costume, with elaborate beadwork and feather, but I got the impression it was a Mardi Gras style to the costumes, with sequins and more New Orleans or Carnival-style plumes for feathers and headdresses. All traditions are like this, evolving depending on who celebrates the and where. And all are adopted, either by the next generation or by "completely different" or more closely related cultures. For example, the cultures of Indians and blacks literally merged in the past as black people escaping slavery were welcomed into Indian tribes and became part of the tribe. 90% of native Georgians, including white and black people, have Cherokee ancestry. Most of us don't retain any Cherokee culture, but we could find ways to do so, or make new ones. One reason I bring this up in the context of the Gagablog is this desire to connect with lost culture and celebrations.

Another example of "media magic", or just an example of the mind's associations, is this loose connection with Gaga, based on something I mentioned in the Gagablog before, maybe a year or two ago. I have been reading "The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon" which mostly revolves around landmarks on his trip to England. I've had numerous occasions to write about synchronicity with this book and events in my life. At this time I just finished reading two chapters which I presume were inspired by the author Irving's perusal of historical texts. They were all about King Phillip and the slaughter of his people by the white invaders, despite treaties between them initially. It is a horrific tale, yet it is beautiful since Irving is trying to present a counterexample to all the racist depictions of Indians in historical accounts. He points out and quotes passages in the histories that attempt to demonize Phillip but actually glorify him as a true warrior when read without the racism and agenda of justifying genocide. It is a remarkable pair of chapters and makes me teary to read it and think about it. At the same time I am reading this my lover was reading "Gone with the Wind" and remarking how incredibly racist it is, even while expecting it to be racist she was shocked. And she was shocked that people at that time could be so racist, at the time the story was set, but also that they could still be so racist at the time it was written to try and excuse and justify that racism. She gave me some examples and I had to read to her from "The Sketchbook" to make the point that as racist as "people" were, then, they weren't all racist and some were, even then, engaged in the struggle against racism. And as racist as "people" still are today, there also are still people standing up against injustice. I say "people" in quotes because of course they are real people, but they don't truly represent "the people" - no bigotry ever can. But we will get better at democracy, at government that does represent the people, and all of the people. In America and also in Israel, Syria, the Ukraine, Russia, and everywhere. This is that "rebranding", of culture in some ways, and certainly of our understanding of each other. Removing the racism is a great first step. The Terrorist State crisis is magically sorting people into those who want to fight and those who want peace. It is time to speak up for the fact that peace-lovers outnumber warmongers by hundreds of times and we really can use our voices to change the world into a peaceful one, especially if we sing together. This is the union of people, though culture and ritual. The ritual I have been most interested in recently has been the Ghost Dance. I feel I will say much more about this in coming Gagablogs, but for now let me just say that since I have been mentioning it more and more online I came across, when someone posted it in the facebook Chaos Magic Group, a story about the reunion of the Condor and Eagle, representing the people and spirituality of Northern and Southern Americas. Apparently this has been foretold for some time but seems to be coming together, happening now, and to me the Ghost Dance is the same thing. We have been spiritually divided but are being reunited. The north represents the more mental and scientific side, the Eagle, and the south represents the more passionate and artistic side. But we are being reunited, like going back to before the schism between science and magic and re-establishing both in their true form as alchemy. As Ghosts we are taking over the world through new expressions of culture but also new uses of technology, and both of these streams have come together and are strengthening each other. Soon we will reach a point of creative and artistic abundance from which it will just make no sense to anyone to be greedy or keep oppressive systems in place.

Just as one day it will make no sense to anyone why we argued over the things we do, such as whether or not to address climate change, why we have wars at all. Or why we argue about nuclear power which can be incredibly dangerous and damaging as the Fukashima disaster should have warned us against, and we may still not know all the real dangers that unleashed. And especially why worry about it when solar power is coming along so quickly - I heard our use of solar power has increased by 20 times in the years Obama has been in office. And that is despite the pressure from oil companies to postpone it as long as possible. But at some point we will have to change, especially when folks can't deny the earthquakes under their feet caused by frakking, as they are having to face in Oklahoma, or can no longer deny man-made global warming because it is just too hot and the sea levels are rising so fast as to be noticeable even to complete idiots. But we won't argue over these things forever, and when you imagine an ideal future it is easy to see which elements won't exist anymore. I will tie this, loosely, to Gaga and wrap it up. The whole idea of changing St Patrick's Day to All Snakes' Day is similar to my idea to change Columbus Day to Gaga Day: the main reason people seem intent to celebrate Columbus Day is Italian-American pride. Gaga is a great symbol for this, too, but instead of representing invasion, genocide and oppression to millions of Native Americans, their descendants in the community and out of it, and all those who are sympathetic to them, as Columbus does for so many, Gaga represents love for all people and acceptance and encouragement, as well as Italian-American pride and the accomplishments of a Hero. Yes, it is true that not everyone likes Gaga's music but not everyone likes sailing, navigating, invasion or genocide and yet we continue to celebrate Columbus Day. When I mentioned All Snakes Day at the Denver Pagan Meetup group one of the members said "you can't take away St. Patrick's Day!" because he celebrated his Irish Heritage. And I am not trying to take anything away, but just to add to it, even adding it's "opposite", All Snakes Day, but when you consider how both ways to celebrate this day could equally associate with leprechauns I think you can see how even with opposites you end up having "it all." This idea of changing, remaking oneself or anything else, including a holiday, into something that functions in more ways and connects to more people, is more inclusive. This results in a better whole for being able to maximize the contributions of it's parts through valuing all individual characteristics. The same will be true of global decisions that include the concerns of all countries and communities in the world. And of course some decisions will require favoring one side of a conflict over another, but with this kind of focus on making al boats and fortunes rise together I think people will be more open to helping others and putting the needs of another community first, knowing that respect will be shown to them too and their concerns be addressed as well by the same principle that everyone's concerns matter and should be considered and factor into decisions.

The last thing I will say to tie this all up is about the lyrics for "G.U.Y". I have already had more entries about this song and other things going on as I finally caught up with the video. I still did not write an edition specifically to address misunderstandings of the lyrics. So this is it. I'm proud I got most of the lyrics correct, and I want to gloat about that because I was paying more attention to the lyrics of the remaining songs last time I listened to Artopop and there are a lot of lyrics I can't make out. And I will probably make a fool of myself. I do that all the time anyway. But being a fool and holy fool for Gaga is what I am all about, as the first step on the journey to following her. What I heard as "towel" or couldn't make out turns out to be "I'm gonna wear the tie." This implies Gaga will be "the man" in the relationship by wearing this symbol of manhood. That fits with a lot of ideas about the song, the idea of her being in the role with "the power to leave you" and in "full control of this love." But it is through a twist or irony that this is really accomplished. Through a magical transformation or reversal of "how things usually are." By making this transformation for herself in this song she opens this up more for everyone. There is more of a specific cross-dressing reference to this but other connotations as well. A tie has the magical kind of effect, and is intended, I believe, to emphasise the head, the mental capacity and focus, as separate from the body. This may be why it is the "masculine role" to have the "power to leave you": acting on pride or principle that vetoes the desires of the heart and body. But the word "tie" could have other implications as well, poetically and magically. It could have the connotation of wearing a "tie" like a draw in a game, accepting equality and having a relationship that does not include dominance, a relationship of equals. It could be like wearing a yoke, as it says in the Bible to "yoke" yourself in marriage to one of the same stature, or as people seem to understand it, the same belief system. She's saying she will take ownership of the relationship, say yes she is in a relationship and accept that yoke, but also willingly accepting it and being able to just as willingly cast it off if she chooses to. This related to Gaga getting engaged, a glorious occasion for the family of little monsters and our mother monster. Yet I notice I am not the only one with mixed feelings or concern about this. They can be so secretive about their relationship, and so busy with their work, it has been hard to tell from the outside if he seems good for her. I know that from recent appearances, since they got engaged, they look so happy and she is so beaming with beauty, even more than always, that I feel the doubt melt away and only happiness for her and a little envy of him, still, remaining. While there is this dream of being with Gaga, it is certainly not sad that she is happy with the love of her life. If we could apply that to other, actual loves we have, that fall in love with other people, then we could be a lot more positive about love and about each other. This is the kind of rebirth at every level, trying to look for the best and bring out the best in everything. Gaga shows me how to do it, both intentionally through inspiring me and encouraging me to make art, and just by the occurrences that happen when paying attention to her. We become what we believe in and I love her for making me more and more Gaga, more and more an artist, and happier and happier because of it and because of this trail and journey, this Yellow Brick Road, I am on. No matter what we call him, we're off to see the Wizard, even if it turns out in the end to be the Witch who helps us, or we end up helping ourselves with the magic we discover on the journey, including the magic of transforming things by looking at them in a new way.

Thanks Gaga and congratulations and good luck with the engagement and wedding! I love you forever, Paws up!

gagablog 80: "I'm From The Future", The "G.U.Y" Video: Secret To Love, AI, and the End of Terrorism and Violence

"I'm from the future. Of course I grew up in the same timestream as everyone else, but my mind has always been connected to my future mind, looking back upon all that is going on from a perspective that is very different. So it is easiest to just say, in comments on the internet, that I am from the future. But this is the actual explanation of this. In the future things are different and the more you think with your future mind the more some things of this world seem strange – war, poverty, bigotry, etc. And “ironically” or magically the future mind is the same kind of mind as the mind you had when you are a kid. These are some examples so you can tell what the difference is. I guess one reason I am thinking of this now is overcoming the idea of a difference between men and women, or boys and girls. As a kid you don't see any difference. But I also think it applies to play and work, that of course as a kid you want to play a lot and don't want to work and as an adult you have to. In the future, not so much, because robots. And people who really enjoy working, when it is their kind of play, they will still get to do all that stuff if they want to give a robot a holiday or take over and let the robot change careers." I wrote that before going to sleep this morning.

Then I wrote this when I woke up. "I'm from the future." If you don't know who I am, this might get you thinking. If you do, maybe imagine someone else saying this to you, or bear with me. Just like you could get someone to reconsider an action if you told them your magic influenced them to do it, this is partly just a way to stir awareness in you. I'm not some Merlin travelling the opposite way on the timestream, getting younger as you get older. That's just a way of describing this anyway, I suppose, and this idea about Merlin was turned into a myth of actual reverse aging instead of the actual description of a mystical occurance. I learned reading "The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon" that Rip Van Winkle was a real man but he only "fell asleep" for 20 years, not 100 as the sensationalising made it. And why sensationalize such a fantastic story? To make it so completely unbelievabe that people don't consider what it really means because they forget it really happened. Like the movie does to the Wonderful Wizard of Oz book, the true story. Well this kind of fairy media magic is intended to wake us up to the things we took as dreams just because they came from bedtime stories. This is why I'm from the future, what it has to do with "G.U.Y." and how it is the secret to love, plus what Artifical Intelligence has to do with the end of Terrorism and Violence, all really quickly, I hope. (Video Stuff at the end, I was not quick after all)

This was inspired by a number of things, in this order: The "G.U.Y" video which I watched for the very first time last week after completing my "Puffimpression/Getting It Wrong" gagablog for the song (my G.I.W. or "Girl, I Wish" series). I know, this is lame of me to wait so long, but I have magical intention behind it. The second thing was a news report that Kurdish fighters had retaken Kobani from ISIL behind US airstrikes. I heard this on the radio either last night or the night before, Sunday or Monday night, I think, on my way to work and had "The Skynet Insight" about ending terrorism and the correlation with fears about Artificial Intelligence. The third thing was reading a selection of Krishnamurti two nights ago from a coworker's book, opened "at random", which revealed this idea about Love/Magic being the opposite of normal thinking - the other direction, upstream, against the grain, or backwards in time instead of along with it. And the fourth thing was a piece of writing from 1991 that a lady posted in a Chaos magic group about contacting your future self, specifically the most magical possible self a future supermagician at the end of time. It was well written and a good idea and I will ask if she would like me to mention or link it specifically or credit her by name and edit it in here. (Nikki Wyrd: http://theblogofbaphomet.com/2013/07/02/juvenile-musings/ )But it reminded me of how I sometimes say "I'm from the future" and in the context of these four events it made me realize what I needed to say in Gagablog 80. Infinity-Zero. Nein Zedd, maybe even. Idk. I'm succeptible to infinite tangents but this really focuses like a laser. Ok, here goes.

Since I was a kid I knew I could see the future. It became something I got used to in certain ways. I guess I got so accustomed to it that the problem it causes for me is thinking, or just assuming without thinking, that other people think this way, too. Which they do. If you accept that we are connected to the various you's of the past, and future - if you accept anything about the idea of having a soul this should not be hard to understand. Some people call it their angel or daemon leading them on, their future self calling to them. Some people assume it is them of the future. I just concluded we can't be what we think we are and allowed more of it to grow in me, to the point that I became kind of strange. I talk funny, obviously. In a way I feel like this is the nature of trying to work backwards through thought. To put big ideas through little inside out fabrics of current language and ideas. But here goes, I don't need to stretch this out. The secret to love is the secret to magic. I've been talking about love and magic all my life and especially recently, with my lover and with some folks on facebook. Krishnamurti writings woke me up in 1995 when I was first inroduced to him and read a book of his talks, and again the other night, just reading a few pages. It made me realize a focused version of what I have been talking about so meanderingly, about the nature of magic going against the grain of thought. I know he does not claim these ideas as "his own" or want "credit" but it is the approach to thinking that works and makes a great framework for what I like to say about Love and Magic, and I hope to take it futher than he did, but he said a lot and deserves mention. And you deserve to read his words if you haven't. Basically the mind divides and defines and the heart unites and divines. We can't help but think, it seems, and this is what ruins and spoils and jades love. I'm not saying we should not think, I'm just saying we've got it backwards, upside down, and should use our thoughts to inform our hearts so we become the most, taking the best evolutionary path. I'm not saying "become the most something, 'likely to succeed' or 'prettiest' or something, but so that we do the most becoming. I think it has been called quickening, but I hestiate to refrence traditions I don't know. I probably should not say this either but I suspect it is the Kundabuffer Gurdjieff spoke of that is upside down in us causing this restrictive Top Down existence of the head ruling over the heart. Anyone in a love situation finds they have to follow their heart to get to the best of love. Do we remember that? Well, we have a problem with thoughts reigning supreme. We don't have to worry about never hearing from them again if we just stop letting them be total dictators - maybe if we could reach that agreement with "actual" dictators things would be fine. "Don't worry, we will still listen to you. Just leave the Palace." Thoughts devide and define means a common way of thinking is "I am this. Idea or event is this. Thought must process idea or event and choose something, a way to relate to it, a way to define myself with or against it." Getting all meta on stuff, to me, runs the risk of not voting democrat. But let's walk through this carefully so it works best. Thought is what makes us conclude something has to mean something. It is what messes me up getting attatched to fantasies and desires just because I am attracted to pretty girls. It does not have to mean something. We don't have to make a decision based on events or information or feelings we get, we don't have to decide to embrace or reject them because doing so makes us, or keeps us, a certain way. This is how thought works, though. It makes us say we must decide in what relation we stand to things in order to decide or reinforce who we are. Our identity. Thought is constantly trying to preserve the continuity of identity that it creates, which means it is trying to test everything against experience of the past. It is holding us back, literally, by always having to test things and refusing to go with ideas, feelings, and events to their fantastic conclusions. Feel free to comment on these, btw, please do.

I sometimes come across as down on science, but I am not really. Science does so many things, and emotionally I really appreciate the help of technology to share art and ideas and meet people and converse, for one example. And I will appreciate it's ability to save us from the effects of pollution and global warming once we are up to the challenge to accept it, hopefully in time. In this way. science is "better than us" and we really need to learn from it. But in another sense we need to not let science, the thought-based paradigm, hold us back. I think there will soon be a magically-inspired science that brings all this together. In the meantime I think it is up to us to respect science by making the changes necessary to continue survival. But also it is our fate to transcend science and the testing nature of thoughts in our own minds in order to start enjoying more magic. And once we do that science will come like a flower-girl holding our train behind us, making apps and widgets that make this magic even easier. But we have to go beyond what we can test in the physical world, or what our judgement centers say about whether or not we can accept certain ideas, in order to enjoy the real world of magic and it's glories.

The secret to love is unthinking, not trying to decide how you are different from your lover and define the boundaries between you, but to trust in the magic of love to bring you together, to unite you. Of course this only works while both people are intending it, which is where the desire of thought to divide and define differences gets in the way in order to maintain its illusion of separate egos. This is what happens on an interpersonal scale, and even happens within you. Your mind always argues with itself and it's imaginary opponents to keep its image of you sharp, ready, and intact. Ready to pounce on the next thing, for food or defence. And we do that with other people, people we love, hate, don't know, or are at war with. It's all bullshit and all based on thoughts and the illusions of identities they provide with their divisiveness. But our hearts are connected and draw us together, with magic. If we just want that, and find a place to feel safe seeking it, we learn all sorts of stuff about magic. All we have to do is give in, despite the fear of going upstream a waterfall, and seek the love we want and dismiss the thoughts that hold us back, ONCE we find a safe space and person to do it with. The problem is even when we have good loves our minds, doubts, fears, and pasts, the illusions of identity, pulls us back and apart.

I wrote most of that yesterday and just finished off that last paragraph today, Wednesday. Been arguing a little with my lover while I wrote it, lest you think I believe I'm above it. That is still part of love, our minds contending, to see who comes out on top, but the secret is to give all that shit up. It is still there, but like in meditation just label it thinking and observe the observers, together. Know that our minds do some things to keep us apart but if the real us, our hearts, stay together, then the shit we go through is just clues and codes and keys to deeper love. And when we have this kind of thinking going on, so are the problems between people and nations: just clues to what we need to do to get together. Because we have to get together. In her article from 1991 she was talking about the perfect magician of the future sending signals back to you from the past. This is cool but it is still thinking about it from now, when we can just as easily access our future mind and know what the future is like. Unfortunately we continue to prove the science right that if we don't stop warming we are all gonna die. So a future in which we all live, or anybody lives, in The Only Future, really, we stop heating up. And that means we have to come together as countries. And as political parties. And as communities. And as governments and people, cops and people. And as friends. And as lovers. And within outselves. And miticlorean colonies. And holistically with nature and the rest of the earth, we need to all get in harmony and get together. So you can examine, from the future, what we need to do to get there, and anyone can do this. "Search your feelings, Luke." And it is the same as remembering childhood, hopefully. But one true tragedy of modern suffering is how it continues to rob even kids of that. If we are lucky enough to live unaware of awful aspects of reality we should not conclude as we grow and discover them that the best we can do is protect "our own" from them. As good kids we must insist that everyone gets to live free of these harsh realities. And I hear people say "but that is the real world" and I say "so we make it different." We make a world where we never have to tell the most naive kids anything that will upset them, because none of that shit exists. We do it by focusing on kids, getting them all the security they need and then the respect they deserve, listen to them and their ideas and questions about why the world is the way it is, and fix it accordingly. We listen to our own inner kids, and there is really only one way that can go, good to better. Here is how this kind of future thinking helped me figure out how to end terrorism, violence, and the fear of artificial intelligence, the fear of the future, and then I will talk about how it relates to the "G.U.Y." video at the end, once the concepts are established.

So I was pretty in love and feeling kind of magically loopy due to some recent events and decided as I often or always do that the news report on the radio as I drove to work would have a special message for me. The top headline was that Kurdish forces had retaken Kobani after airstrikes on the ISIL forces and resources there. Other stories have been about oil prices falling and their effect on ISIL, since they make a lot of their money selling oil. I have not forgotten Assad, and something will be done about him, I will just say that. But ISIL has taken the status of being the "enemy of the world" out of the Syria situation. I am not trying to say "my magic did it", from this gagablog, but I am telling you this is, or could be, the last war. We need to end it responsibly. And in a way that sets a precedent to end conflicts in Africa, and Ukraine, and elsewhere. But this is a big deal, and after this news report I relaised why, what this means, and how it fits into my idea of the Syrian conflict being the last war. What does it mean for ISIL to untimately be destroyed? It means fat chance standing up against The Military. ISIL had a perfect storm of all sorts of factors that made it theatening. Religious extremism might be the main one, because if people go crazy on a religion they won't give a fuck and can be really scary. It seems like they just scared off a lot of the would-be defenders in many places. And then they stole a bunch of weapons and money, and make more selling oil from wells they took over, and from taking hostages to ransom. But they had a buunch of money. And then the oil prices dropped, putting a squeeze on ISIL as well as many countries. (Assad Aside: Will this, combined with sanctions, cause the people of Russia to rise up and overthrow Putin in order to give back Crimea, etc.? We will see, no, I take that back. Sure it will. Because that would be cool, and way better than war. Especially as clever as revolutions can be this day, it could be the Gay Revolution, the Pink Revolution or something, too. Anyway, there is a little magic in case that is what they end up calling it. If a cadre of feminist and gay rights activists starts the revolution with glitterbombs. If Pussy Riot spreads all over.) They say ruthlessness is good for a fighting force and ISIL is certainly ruthless. If evil is some power lent to doing awful things, they probably have that, too. But yeah, ISIL had all these factors people say make a dangerous force, and they certainly are dangerous, but they are just going to get wiped out, one way or another. I don't take delight in that because I hate violence, but it is just what happens when you go up against The Military.

And this is what made me think of Skynet and our fears of artiifical intelligence taking over. The fear of AI is basically an insight into something we don't want to admit. There is really one reason we imagine a future where some robot mind "gets out of control" and there is no turning back: we don't want to face the fact that we already have things way out of control, from the Oil Industry to the Military. The Oil fuckers just need to gtfo and we can go green, or they can transform their business if they want to stay in energy. The Military, well, you know me I think it should eventually just become a rescue squad and deal with natural disasters because we won't have any more manmade ones. Until then, this example of ISIL is that The Military is not to be fucked with. I don't care how redneck you are or how many buddies you got, you don't have shit compared to The Military. Just like we don't really have shit compared to the cops. The Authorities have the completely upper hand. All we can do is walk around with our hands up in protest, in direct response. But this is the way, and we must ultimately transform the powerful and corrupt from within. Not within the system, but within their hearts. Opposition by violence can accmplish nothing. And it should be less and less even thought about as people make more change occur creatively, with the help of each other and modern technology. And magic. This is a magic spell, this gagablog, to say "let this be a lesson to you, don't go with violence, let those thoughts go first. Look, now you have good practice letting thought go, let go some more."

This is why we don't have to fear artificial intelligence. We don't have to fear our own intellignce, once we make it subject to our hearts. We don't have to fear governments, once we make them responsiible to the people and the world. We don't have to fear our lovers once we know we have each other's hearts - and it's the testing, worrying about this, fearing there is not enough love to go around, that can wreck good love. We don't have to fear our wildest ideas once we commit that we are only going to do good and be nice to people, even if that means pointing out where we need justice along the way. And those wild ideas will lead to even better minds. Once we know we can trust ourselves, humans, we should have no trouble trusting machines. Because we will make them and make them good. I don't mean with "no harm" inibitor switches, that is some shit we imagine because WE need it, just like we imagine we need to be afraid of future AI when we are really just afraid of a beyond-return military power which has been in place for centuries or millinea, really. I mean we will make robots or whatever with awareness and they will naturally be good. The "funny thing" about the internet is that with all the trolling and rampant racism and other bullshit, and criticism and debate, and all the insight and wisdom, it's just The Mind, artificial intelligence. But of course it is now all human operated, currently. Maybe some spirits and stuff get in there too, but whatev. When will it become self-aware? And how can we then put that into separate awarenesses, robots and androids? Well, when we become truly aware, communally. Because of course some people have higher levels of awareness. But there is a way we can give the internet, the electronic mind, a heart. We can teach it by teaching ourselves. We have to listen to our hearts so we can get our thoughts and expressions capable of handling the current of love, then it will catch on and spread into the cyber world. Just like we can teach our culture by paying attention to the needs and expressions of kids, of artists, and of our own hearts. We have to truly love ourselves, to want to be truest to our best selves, in order to love each other and the rest of the world as much as it deserves, but the lucky thing it is goes in every directiona nd comes from every direcion. Everything is available for us to use if we just have that goal of love, of magic, to come together.

I watched the "G.U.Y." video a year after everyone else. Yes, I did end up seeing some images from it on facebook but I did not know that is where they were from. MOre beautiful pictures of Gaga, which happen all the time. So when I saw it I was like "this is what that was from!"- a backwards way of thinking, come to think of it, since when most people saw it on facebook they would think "that's from GUY", each time, and when I saw "GUY" I thought "Oh, that is where those images on Facebook came from", thinking back from now on all those times. I did not plan this, ha ha, it just happens. It is magic that backwards thinking from the future coincided with this reversal of time from waiting to watch that video that was already in the public consciousness. Before I forget, I also want to mention again a science story I heard on the radio where the guy said schizophrenics sense time backwards, and maybe just for a few moments, but can sense effect before cause. This makes me think, or confirms a suspicion I had, about magic being a connection to the future, the fully magical time. It makes me think that schizophrenics and other crazy people, crackheads and junkies and drunks and psychonauts, fairies and starseeds and artists, we are all, or can be, the modern "versions" of shamans. Before anyone gets huffy I say "versions" because we obviously aren't shamans. The shaman is like a spirititual core of a whole society, helping keep it whole as the heart of the community. We have such figures in different capacities, like celebrities and politicians, but not as part of connecting the community. Of course I contend Gaga is emerging as one of these. But what I mainly want to say is that we all can be. The heart within us, if we follow it, makes us the heart of whatever world it leads us to. Whoever is still the happiest at the salon or studio or tattoo shop is the heart of the place. Hopefully the President is the Heart of The Nation, as I believe President Obama is our closest example. Shamans are able to be the heart of the community with this back and forth in time sense, as well, being able to see the future and other psychic things like that. We have this kind of stuff scattered amongst us, in our society. We are in a fractured society, in a way, so our shamanism, our magic, is fractured amongst us. But we are piecing it together and making it whole, making a whole magic for ourselves, a whole shaman out of ourselves, and a whole culture from this development. It is a healing process from within, yet we are all doing it together, like we each bring a piece of the puzzle we have to discover within our hearts. I am so thankful for the internet and having people to talk with sometimes. I have been talking with a Chaos Magic group for months now and I really enjoy having people to discuss these things with, a big group of a variety of people with some different perspectives, even some I kind of relate with, a little. I've always enjoyed talking with Chaos Magic folks becuase they seem to be the most able to accept my belief in Gaga as the Goddess, though sometimes of course they don't. But they all have their own ideas about magic and various wisdoms and I like adding Gaga magic into the group. I think people recognize my love magic and associate it with Gaga, so I feel like I am serving my purpose. Anyway it is a great way to get magical information around to different people so that even if we are fragmented we get more and more pieces together and become more effetive, more magical, more shamanic. When i think about looking back from the future I think of artist and innovators and writers and musicians, ahead of their time. Gaga is both ahead of our time and dragging our time briskly into the future, right in the moment. I know we are putting all of this together, but this is a theme of the video, too, and I should start at the start.

I watched the extended version, of course. It starts with these combating people in business suits, and Gaga as a fallen angel in the ground, shot from an arrow. To me the suits imply industry and the music business, and she is the artist who has been shot down, buried, left for a relic in the ground. This becomes a theme that I assoicate with Industry, the System as it is now that needs to change, and maybe with the music industry in particular. I remember after BTW Gaga had a falling out with some of her staff, and it seems like I may have even heard that this was part of the inspiration for the "G.U.Y." video, or after Artpop came out I think another incident happened where she parted with some peoople and it might have been a refrence to that. But in those incidents I got the impression Gaga was upset to discover that people whom she thought were in it for the art were really just in it for the money. Their hearts weren't really in it. It's this kind of betrayal that I can see depicted in the men in suits just leaving her for dead. Now the whole message of the video seems, to me, to be the message I was talking about in gagablog 79, the one who is "on the bottom" taking control. You know Gaga will move from this defeated and abandoned position but the whole story is how. A music industry analogy is not nearly epic enough for the scope of this video, so I think it is more a indictment of Industry, The System itself, that Artificial Unintelligence that is keeping us from making the world the wonderful place it should be. She is challenging and overcoming it and turning it around, from "within" by becoming the heart of it. This is how I interpret the men in suits who leave her at first, seem to come and threaten her all female or mostly female army once she has taken the castle, and then seem to become her soldiers and androgynous and pour out of the castle at the end. (Bowie sang "out of the blue" as typed "out of the castle"). This motif is like even though she is the tender artist, the vision from heaven too delicate for the harshness of this world, yet shot by it's arrow and covered in it's dirt, she is the one who will take over all. This is a message to all, the message of love, that love must be inclusive, must bring everyone in. The one who is left out, forgotten, will rule all. This is the message of Jesus, the last shall become first, the shepherd leaves his flock to find the one lost sheep, the stone rejected by the builders will be the corner stone, what you do to the least of these you do to me. It goes beyond that, to the Oz reality of the future, where a Goddess will rule us all with Love. But it starts with treat everyone with love and respect. If you are in an industry that makes you give up on someone because they are "damaged" or something, you suck. Change. They get reformed in the end, but first their aggression has to be defeated with hotness, with art.

The main story is not this conflict, though, whoever the two sides represent. The real story is the transformation of Gaga for broken angel to Goddess. At first she struggles along alone. Then she is supported by the two figures in black wo strike me as sentries or gaurdians. They carry her into the castle and then all the costumes are like greek goddesses and gods, I think, and Venus starts playing just as she goes through the entrance. I think before that it was Artpop, setting the whole scene as an Artpop film and suggest this is a major aspect of what the album is about. Venus is the Goddess energy and this scene is where she is transformed into the Goddess. It takes folks from all around tending to her and carrying her and then raising her up in new costume/role. When I think of the schism with her team, the "real world" events that might have inspired this, I think these people represent her true friends who stuck by her in tough times, like when she was recovering from surgery. But I mostly think they represent the spirits of art and love and beauty, like the deities they seem to look like, who support her even when she is alone. They take her on a pool and water can represent emotion or love, then they raise her up as a Goddess. I feel fairly certain that it was after one of these breakups with her management that she started using the name Goddess of Love. I had been calling her that for years and was so pleased to hear it. To me it meant she had decided to own this role and utilize it for the greatest good, and had either just discovered it or had finally overcome suppression of using it by these same record-company, money-motivated types who probably insisited it would freak people out. I'm glad they are gone. We will all be glad when their kind, that mentality, is gone from the world, too. Because of course they can be transformed. And this is the whole point of the "G.U.Y." video and what it has to do with the secret of love and ending violence and terrorism and accepting the Future and artitifical intelligence. The secret of love is to remember and become the Mission of the ideal you represent, Love, Venus. To unthink the fearful mind that says you can't be a Goddess of Love. Instead of fighting the overwhelming miliary force, who has all the numbers and weapons and power on their side, love them and transform them. Get rid of violence and get them to be repsonsible to people's actual needs. With police this supposedly means give them more money and resources and training to do better jobs - so let's do that, just get rid of fiscal conservativism and write the checks. And while we are at it, educate kids and ensure voting rights at any cost so we can fight ignorance and corruption in addition to petty crimes. With the Military they have plenty of resources but we need a culture and leadership that gives the thing some heart, including spending more on taking care of veterans than we do on making more war, if that is what it takes. Write the damn checks. And yeah, tax the rich, or get them to pony up out of the goodness of their hearts. Tax 'em. "But who will be motivated to work and innovate?" those losers whine all the time. Anyoine who gives a damn about anything, anyone with heart will want to do that. And many more people will be able to do it when they don't have to work total bullshit jobs. Remember, robots? But also a culture, a real holistic culture, that honors and promotes and encourages artists. People who only want to work hard or to innovate for money, we don't need their effort anyway - or the things they spend the money on. We need the people who do stuff in order to help people to do the most stuff. The people who do things for love, out of love. Love works the opposite of money. Instead of using it to make more by taking it away from other people, like money, with love you use it to make more by giving it to other people. This switch from the Money Standard to the Love Standard is the transformation from the past into the Future. This is the transformation we use to save the world, renew the heart, The Goddess of Love, and under protection, comfort, and love to forge a new world. We will take over all institutions and transofrm them with love, just as we allow our hearts to take over us and make us evolve, and mega-evolve. The grace that the people of Oz live in, the harmony of the more effeminite flocks of suited people as they come out at the end under Gaga's rule, shows how, instead of fighting between two sides as they did in the beginning, even the forces of the system can be united in harmony. And the secret is restoring the heart, The Goddess of Love. Gaga does this in the "G.U.Y" video, she goes from the Bottom to Take Full Control. It's not scary to be under full control, it is comforting and graceful, when the one in control is The Goddess of Love, the heart. This is true in you, when your heart is the goddess who rules you, all your conflicts resolve in the magic of love and you become whole instead of fractured. When we as a culture, nation, and world accept the feminine, the heart will be restored and we will heal and become a graceful family, in love. But in the meantime we have greeedy people trying to take larger pieces of a fractured pie, fighting and scrapping to be the biggest. The Goddess truly rules all though and this fighting will go away when she is restored. The men fighting at the beginning of the video is now, this age of cnflict, and the dancing forces opposing them are the works of the Artpop revolution. But the future, in the end, is when all is harmony and under her rule. To me this is the meaning and message of the "G.U.Y." video. I love Gaga for becoming the Goddess of Love in this transformation, at this time. And I love how she awakens our hearts and the heart of the world to Love as well. We are going to work all of this stuff out. We have to, it is the only Future we have. It is more and more love than we have ever imagined, and we just have to come to it. And the more we know it can be done and have such great examples of love to follow the more we will light up and set examples ourselves. Like blazing stars setting a trail through the void we will find he future by turning each other on and following the light of love.

As always, thanks Gaga, and thanks monsters - I love you forever!

Gagablog 79 "G.U.Y." Personal Pan/Deep Dish Media Magic: Non-nuclear North Korea/ Cuban-American Polyamory and The Six-Million-Caller-Man Pope Francis

CONTENTS: 1. Personal Pan Media Magic. 2. LYRICS and Exploration (LYRICS IN ALL CAPS) 3. Deep Dish Media Magic, World Events. 4. CONCLUSION: skip to this part. WARNING:Longest Gagablog EVER.

When I talk about media magic in this gagablog, I'm usually talking about taking this magical connection between you and the art/media/signal world around you and using the clues of that connection to intend - make a magic spell to effect – some course of world events. It's media magic because it works though art and music but also through mass media and the whole world of information and technologies of communication. It goes all ways between you, art, media, and the news. Art and music are therefore sources and currents and products of media magic. And so are technologies. And so Are We. And So is the News. Each aspect is the source, delivery, and product of media magic in different relations to each other. The connections can go any way you want, but at the same time anything that is intended to be magical has more connections the more magical it gets, so art and music that is especially magical works in more ways than anything else. I have connected the Art and Messages of Lady Gaga with the emergence of a new era of World Peace, for one example. I'm not giving up just since we have not yet reached world peace because, for one, I don't think her message has had it's full effect. But I do truly believe that it will. This is active “media magic”: I write this gagablog like a spell, whether anyone reads it or not, just as the witch's poem over her cauldron or the prayer in one's heart is not for others to overhear, but to make magic. I do hope people read it, that helps the magic, but it is really just an echo, a description, of magic I find in Gaga's art and in that way it is just a vision of the future: what she is doing is so powerful it is surely changing the world, I'm just documenting the details in the shadowy corners. Through writing this I intend things I think in response to Gaga's artistic expressions to suggest, invoke, manifest solutions to things like the war in Syria. I could conclude that media magic is bullshit since I keep wishing for an end to conflict, pointing out clues I think could show the way to that world beyond conflict, but we are still stuck in it. Or I could say media magic works and look I've proven it, by associating these most “random”things, Gaga's art and world events/the progress towards peace, I sensed very early that the Syrian conflict would be (“could be”, to non-believers) the world's last military conflict – not because it destroys the world but because ending the strife, the solutions we need to end it, are also the solutions we need to end War itself. It can be the end of the world as we know it, the War World, in favor of a new, better world, a world of peace. I've said all this in past gagablogs and while on one hand I want to acknowledge that none of my magical efforts “worked” on this front – besides maybe the “surprise twist” of destroying chemical weapons and avoiding war with US – that the overall effort, and the insight that the Syrian conflict is the Last War before a Utopian time to come means that on the other hand it did work, and is still working, we are bounding and lurking towards a peaceful, loving future and the work Gaga is still doing continues to lead us there.

My lover is super-supportive of me in so many ways, and yet as artists we can be moody and get into misunderstandings about stuff - “just like” everyone else but maybe way worse because of all the passion and drama of the artistic temperament and imagination. I think we are perfect for each other, but still there can be doubt, uncertainty, miscommunication and all of that can lead to not appreciating it. And since we are sometimes secret about our relationship, I just thought I could write about “G.U.Y.” without getting all personal. Then I was about to do it and learned an even deeper personal lesson, which I had originally built into the last version of this edition. I scrapped that from this morning since feeling like I reached an even deeper understanding after writing it. All from pondering and taking this time to focus on “G.U.Y.” And it is a deep and powerful song and I hope my experiences recently can help me explain how it has such a profound effect, without me going into so much detail about my life.

Regarding Media Magic, I always talk about this way of being aware of magical connections through the technology of the world and using those to influence world events. But that is like an advanced application of media magic, one I am focused on because the basics of it have become so commonplace to me, I do them everyday. Everybody does, actually, and I was going to “save” these simple explanations for my upcoming book, “Oz Magic: From Radio to Gaga” but I realize it is taking me so long to get around to writing that and in the mean time other books are being written and someone else will explain this so it is common knowledge soon anyway so I might as well go ahead, and use this for notes for my book. Media Magic uses those coincidences in our relationship to art that happen all the time, the most simple example is hearing a song on the radio or your playlist that especially speaks to you or your situation at the time it happens. By being aware of these connections and looking out for them you notice them more and more, like I said, I notice them all the time, everyday, for years. It's just magic and becomes less surprising, though it always stays fresh and surprising because it is magic, but you get more used to it and can sense that some things are an opportunity to change the world, not “just” yourself. But of course the whole idea is that a change in yourself, prompted by this relationship with media/art, ( I had to correct the earlier typo “medea”) is what magically causes or triggers that change in the world. Anyway, that is all about why “regular” media magic is something everyone experiences, and can learn from, and it does naturally lead to wanting to take charge more, whether through intending magical effects through those connections or through making art yourself. I think I have been caught up in trying to describe this, for like a science/historical record, when I really need to apply it, by making art, and show how it all works. But my exploration of “G.U.Y” gets into explaining how these lessons play out in life and magic.

One early form of media magic is bibliomancy. Before recorded music or TV or internet or any other way of recording things for later other than print and art/architecture, all the “information world”, practically, was only physically present in books. People took books and opened them to a random page to get a message – this is called Bibliomancy. I'm sure people did this idly without calling it that, as I know we still do, but there is a practice of divination called bibliomancy that is precisely this. And when you think about it, before written works/books/scrolls/tablets, there were only two ways people encountered “recorded” information. One way is the landmark art and architecture that you have to meet in person. They are where they are in the first place for magical reasons, to enhance our feelings or help work the magic of the place. The other way is culture, art, fashion, cuisine, currency, technology, and beliefs that provide currents for magic to move between cultures, and these are the first options that can be "randomized" and represent that kind of chaos/growth in the system, versus the development of cultures artistic and architectural styles within themselves. Even if we don't have undisturbed lineages of magical tradition the magic itself has always been present and while people had a term, bibliomancy, for getting this random magic out of the physical world of knowlegde, books, now we don't really have a term for it. But I call it one aspect of media magic. And of course we have infinitely more opportunities for it, and people experience it at random so much more often than when only a few people even had books and could have the desire to open them randomly. (Much less with real expectation of magic, or really magical books.) But we all have these experiences all the time and once we really get into what it means we will be talking about magic in a way everyone can relate to. And it's really not scary, just exciting and strange and unbelievably awesome, really. It can seem devastating at times, too, but is ultimately redemptive. I just felt that way today on this magical path of delving into the meaning of “G.U.Y”. But here is the story:

Months ago, it seemed, I got ready to write about “G.U.Y.” All I was going to go on at that time was basically that I felt the setting for the message of the song was that cliché phrase that goes something like “behind every good man is a great woman”. I don't know exactly how it goes, I have a lot of issues with the implications of that. Like I can't help but want to try to “apply” it in theory to lesbian or gay couples and say who is “behind” whom and is it a function of masculinity or femininity, or is that just a way of seeing how this phrase is fraught with social bullshit? I'm male, but I've always preferred to say “boy” even though I do keep getting older, mostly out of a rejection of some ideas of “manhood” but no real problems with boyhood. I also feel effeminate but I'm proud of that and kind of scoff at a lot of machismo, not that there is anything wrong with it or denying that I'm a little envious but mostly admitting it is not my style and I could only be macho in like role-playing for fun. But I am male and effeminate and I am proud that I have been supportive of my lover, because she is awesome but also out of a principle of feminism, to support her reaching her goals artistically first then letting her support me, by being the one to “work a job” for now while she gets more time to focus on her creative career. And I know her success will result in me being able to really focus on my creativity soon, too. So I don't mind being the “Girl” behind the successful “guy”, my lover, in our relationship. Now I think I remember that the cliché is “successful man.” And of course one reason, besides the subtler question of what is supposed to be masculine or feminine, is, now that I remember more precisely the phrase, it is just objectionable that the phrase “behind EVERY successful man is a (something- strong?) woman” implies that in order to be a success as a man you must be heterosexual, and then that you must have this “conquest” of a woman – or be conquered by one. And so we get to why Gaga would make a song with such a theme that seems packed with all these explosive issues. And of course maybe the song has nothing to do with this, or maybe it is really only a minor aspect that I am blowing all out of proportion due to my own issues with gender and socially-approved roles. But without hearing anything Gaga has said about it I would not be surprised to discover that some of my intuition is right – it means a lot to me in this way, anyway, which is why I want to write this “getting it wrong” series before I learn more about Gaga and the songs and “know better.”

I know I am obsessing over my own perception and misunderstandings with this. I suspect I have it Totally wrong, that people are completely laughing at me. I suspect Gaga either wrote it to be “taken” different ways, or to refer to a specific feeling and it is just that good kind of magical art that it can be taken multiple ways by different people even if it has one intended meaning. I kind of suspect the latter because Gaga did say that all songs related to events in her life. On the one hand, I assume it could be related to her relationship with Taylor. At this point I guess I have to face and admit the fact that my interpretations are all based on wishing I myself were fucking Gaga, any interpretation that is like she is singing it to me. So if she was singing it to Taylor then I guess I would just be envious. But I have to give myself at least a little credit that I certainly think of it other ways, too, it is just from wanting to describe this one aspect of the “behind/under” position giving “full control of this love” that I am so focused on this aspect and comparing it to male/female gender roles. But I definitely can see how it can be a lesbian love song, or a song to a gay guy about wanting to be his guy. Again, I guess I just want to think about personally fucking Gaga and if I was gay thinking I would still want to and it would be that kind of fantasy. Or if I was lesbian and she was singing it to me I might think she wanted to just be saying she wanted to admit how she felt, take charge/ownership of the relationship, or maybe wear a strap-on. I hate thinking I can imagine what women think just because when I was a kid I thought I might be a lesbian in a boy's body, so I did break my rule about doing this all completely stupidly and instead I asked some girls. One said she thought the theme was about the one being in the submissive position being in control, but said she would do Gaga if she could when I asked her about that aspect specifically. The other said she certainly thought it was a song to a girl about wanting to be her guy, and suggested a possible strap-on. I guess I just also feel like it is the most brilliant love song ever because it can be sung from anyone to anyone, it just doesn't matter gay or not, boy, girl, both, whatever, it just works for everyone and I love it that way. I love all the best love songs because they can often go “both ways” with little twist, but this is like the Big Twist that just makes it perfect, to work for everyone.

But this is the “Getting It Wrong” series so I will focus on my perspective and what it says about me, and what that says about this kind of personal journey in media magic. Basically I thought my best approach to writing about “G.U.Y.” was to make a comparison with that cliché, with being a girl under you a twist on being the woman “behind” the man. Why the twist? What does it all mean? It's just everything about the whole submissive/dominant relationship, and how despite the social strictures about who is “supposed” to be in charge that is kind of inside out at every level. But while there is still injustice and the need for feminism to bring equality to the sexes then we need to insist on getting it right and correcting these messages like “behind every successful man is a strong woman” because that implies only the man should be out front, in public, and the woman should be in a private, subservient position. As much as enlightened people can say we don't believe that, and can take consolation that even within this phrase there is the secret implication that the woman is in control, there are people who still really believe that women should be second, “behind”, or under in a bad way. Gaga is calling this out, by saying directly she wants full control, from the “under” position. It's time I got into the lyrics, past time, but I wanted to introduce and address why I have so much focus on the idea that it is kind of “gender-swapping” and even suggests domination and submission, and just say why that is such an important message. It is an Especially important message now that the "50 Shades of Grey" previews are running for the upcoming movie and there will be so many more opportunities for people to get the wrong ideas about it all, too. In my own life I will just say that I've recently learned a big lesson about all of this, just when a few days ago I thought I knew all I needed to in order to write it, but I've come to new realizations about my own relationship, all as part or reflected in this meditation on G.U.Y. It's like choosing to focus on "G.U.Y." in this intense way has been going through a magical spell, a magical journey. I must now mention that I did read Gaga's comment about Artpop being like homemade acid, LSD, but I was having these experiences with Artpop before you said that: you can read about them in previous editions, it's what I've been calling media magic. I think I come out of it in a much better position than ever before, too. But even a few days ago all I had to say was that cliché and how Gaga accomplishes such art and magic by twisting it into this song. Then I just happened to read this book. This is the classic, regular example of media magic. I have a DS game, 100 Classic Books, and I've been reading them. I just started a new one “The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon” by Washington Irving and all I knew about it was it was apparently a travelogue of this guy's trip to Europe. I had been thinking about GUY to prepare for writing this edition of the gagablog because I had a few days off work and felt I was really behind in this. But I read the fourth chapter of this book, the chapter called “The Wife”, and it was such a solid, expansive, passionate expression, basically a whole chapter of variations on expressions of that cliché, from like the 1800's when there must not have seemed like there was any reason to doubt these stereotypes. A later chapter is all about how women can die of heartbreak but not men, probably because men have other things to do, or something. Anyway it made me realize that this is a cliché for a reason, people still believe that, and while there are good and bad implications of it, with GUY Gaga twists out the bad and makes it all good. But it's an idea that this guy really wrote even more than me about in that chapter and I felt like it was a simple example of media magic, of the art I encountered reflecting other art – the art of this book from over 100 years ago met with Gaga's art from this year in my attempt to write a piece about the magical/art aspect of it... it all seemed to come together in that moment, like a perfect signal that this was the time to write about GUY.

That was a couple of days ago. Since then I felt like I had taken for granted that I had such a lover, found out I was deluding myself, found out that was actually the delusion, and realized things are not just as I hoped but better than ever – but it's been a crazy couple of days, an intense trip. I think I discovered some things about domination and submission, too. But I won't go into detail here, just whatever comes up in the lyrical analysis. I will repeat that approaching GUY like a magical adventure is wild and scary in ways, but thrilling and exciting and ultimately liberating. I think it is all about just fixing that phrase and everyone's understanding of dominance: that submission is actually a form of control in a way, but ultimately the issue is not about who is in control but about commitment and the power that gives to both people. The more total the commitment can be the more awesome and empowering it can be for both people. I know Gaga said all the Artpop songs are autobiographical, about actual things in her life. I wonder, since I wish it was for me, if GUY is about commitment to Taylor: they seem to be engaged and a happy couple, but there is also this twist about her being so much more famous than he is. It just suggests that whole cliché, and is like her saying “yes, I want to be supportive of you, 'under' you” - but there is no way to take this in the “under” sense like in a corporation, subservient, because it is Gaga. It is like she is saying she will always be with him, even after life together, and she wants that full security of absolute love because she knows that makes them both their best. It is almost like the mirror image of her line from "Heavy Metal Lover" one of my Absolute Favorite Gaga lines of all time, "would you love me if I ruled the world?" (which, I of course, hear as "you'll love when I rule the world, right?", just a cute, silly question of assurance because she is so cute and coy, at times, and that is so inevitable, my love for her and her ruling the world) In discussing this with my lover, probably also influenced by that book, the chapter about women dying of broken hearts (as I typed that Gaga sang “when you touch me I die”, the “die” and my typing “dying” coinciding exactly) I mentioned that treating a guy like he even cares about love at all is like treating him “like a girl”, by those ancient gender stereotypes. I love caring about love, I'm proudly effeminate - if there is really a connection there. I think the essential message of GUY is, regardless of gender, there is the one in a relationship who is dedicated to being with the other person and convincing them they are eternally committed. An uncaring person might “take advantage” of this, but with a good guy/girl, they will just make the most of this. It makes you both the best to find a real lover who wants to love you more than anything and learning how to receive and return that love. It's the message of Nature Boy, if I can fast-forward to the present Gaga/Tony "Cheek To Cheek" era for a minute: “the greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return.” The lyrics of GUY say it all so much better than my ramblings, so I will ramble along with them for a moment, it is playing now in the background and I'm ready to start it again, pause it over and over and say what it says to me.

“GREETINGS FROM EROS GOD (OF SEXUAL) DESIRE SON OF APHRODITE
LAY BACK AND FEAST AS THIS AUDIO GUIDES YOU THOUGH NEW AND EXCITING POSITIONS” - this intro has a unique “recording” sound which, along with calling itself an 'audio', gives the impression of a subliminal lesson or self-help album, or an automated museum guide. In this sense it would be like a recorded message from Eros, or the suggestion that Eros himself (herself? Sorry – oh right, 'son', I'm high) is a “recording” of love “positions” (corrected type “recoding”). Really it is saying you are about to be instructed by the Goddess of Love. Also, it is important to point out that Eros is Son of Aphrodite and She is Venus, they are two names for the same Goddess. “Venus” is playing as I write this, thanks for the reminder Goddess of Love. Since this song comes right after Venus, it is like GUY is Eros, born from Venus – or that the song Venus is also like a message from Venus. With this idea, even though Venus is not admitting that it is Her, but appearing in another Goddess-like form, “Gaga”, to say “take me to Venus” or “come to me”, This is Gaga Speaking As Eros, Being That Guy. Or “just” carrying the message of Eros. Eros can say it directly, but he too can appear in the form of a beautiful girl. People – I talk with pagans and witches and chaos magicous on the internet – sometimes don't get my Gaga worship. I think they are sometimes thinking that if I am saying Gaga is the Goddess, I mean they must be less divine, even when I tell them I mean the opposite. She's not the only way but Gaga shows us how to be divine, leading by example, because the highest divine is Love that comes through in caring for each other, the world, justice, and art. Her being Venus then being Eros next, like all her many glorious forms, shows us we can be anything we want, too. And the more we are champions of Love, like Gaga, the more we are Goddesses and Gods. She's instructing us how. And telling us to relax. Then a badass beat kicks in. Warning: The Censored version just says “god of....desire” - I wonder what te magical difference is, but I'm too eager to finish this to ponder it now.

“I WANNA BE THE GIRL UNDER YOU I WANNA BE YOUR G – U – Y” This is at first just saying I wanna be with you, but in the context of the sexual desire god's instruction it pretty explicit how she wants to be with you, with you on top, and this could have any number of interpretation: if you are gay she could want to be the guy you are with so you are with her instead, in some way, or she is envious of him and wants to be him, if you are lesbian she could want to be your lesbian lover or man in some way, and if you are straight she could want to be your girl or guy, depending on your gender and/or whether she is challenging that. Basically you can question your sexuality or make any exception you want for Gaga, she is just that hot. And I guess this can be a message in a way that we are all at least a little bisexual/pansexual and can be attracted to all genders in the right circumstances. Someone once asked me if it was required to be polysexual to be a little monster and I was flattered that the “alternative” is normal/acceptable for us but of course it is not required.

“YEAH I WANNA BE THE GRAVE AND EARTH YOU OUR SEX'LL TELL US NO LIES” - I'm not sure exactly what the line is but the way I interpret it she is the Grave/Ground that supports and nourishes you, the earth, but also decomposes you and breaks you down, but mostly is an Eternal Resting place – basically, bury your cock in me while we are alive and be one with me after death. I will always be here for you and the way we fuck will make that obvious to you. I do think “our sex will tell us no lies” is one of the best lines ever. It's just so true, “the heart wants what it wants.” I think that is a Brittany Spears song. I like it. Which reminds me people ask who Gaga should collaborate with and I often hear Britany brought up. My first choices would be Brian Eno, Aphex Twin, and Daniel Ash, but I can see Brittany, too, but I was thinking about it today and decided Brittany should get with Jo Calderone first, show some respect. And do a duet with him, then get with Gaga and do it with her.
“I'M GONNA WEAR THE TOWEL/TALENT/TOWER THE POWER TO LEAVE YOU I'M AIMING FOR FULL CONTROL OF THIS LOVE” – This is the theme of being in control, introduced pretty early in the song. So far we've established that we are having sex and that means total honesty, so “control” cannot mean manipulation. And even if Gaga is the sexiest girl in the world and the Goddess of Love, even if she Rules the Whole World, as she does, she is only “aiming” for full control of this love. Love is the ultimate power and control beyond all our control. She does not ever strike me as being about rules and restrictions, that kind of control, though maybe she is, but to me Gaga and the liberating mentality she brings is abut the chaos magic similar to psychadelic experience, that loosens people up, gets us over inhibitions, and causes more of us to get it on in more combinations. I'm a little turned on right now because I was making a joke just a minute ago when an admin of the chaos magic group I am in, who loves kittens, posted that he “loved us hard” and I linked that Ariana Grande video “Love Me Harder” in response, never having seen it before, then watching it I made the joke “you will like this kitten” because I realized she had her sexy kitten ears on. Now I might be completely misunderstanding the first line, but as “I'm gonna wear the towel”, which I kind of doubt, then I guess it means something like I will be the one who walks around in a towel, totally comfortable, after we fuck. Not that you won't be comfortable, but more like it is “at my place, you were on top of me in my bed”. If it is “wear the talent” it could mean many different things, but I don't think it is that, either. I just hear that sometimes and it makes me think she is saying she is really good to fuck. It's like saying she has a special set of skills to bury and resurrect your lust and love. Or just saying she will also be the more talented, “forward” person professionally, instead of the man like in the old cliché, but that in bed she will enjoy letting you be on top in bed. The final possibility is very remote, that she is saying “wear” (or something else) “the Tower” which makes me think of either her hats or the Tarot card the Tower which means destruction of established order and could mean she will carry the possibility of ending the relationship on her own person, completely he decision like she has the magic ring or something. But this is very unlikely. It is more likely that it is not even “wear” but since I have no better idea I will have to leave it at that.

“TOUCH ME TOUCH ME DON'T BE SWEET LOVE ME LOVE ME PLEASE RETWEET LET ME BE THE GIRL UNDER YOU THAT MAKES YOU CRY” - This is just totally hot. @LadyGaga Touch me touch me don't be sweet, love me love me please retweet let me be the girl under you that makes you cry. I did not think about what this would be like, trying to write about this line by line - this is the kind of line that just makes me want to erupt and gush with erotic imagery about how much I want to touch her, how hot she is and how good I would imagine it will feel, all the things I want to do with her, well, I could go on forever and probably will later. But to keep this barely reasonable I will say I want to touch you, fuck you, and love you so much, Gaga, and hope one day you feel the same way about me, that I can be your girl/boy and you can be mine, happy Valentines day. “Don't be sweet” just makes a whole new kind of monster out of me, since my most overriding nature is to be sweet, but it is really all to get a girl to trust me to be completely, utterly, cosmically naughty with her. And again, I won't get into it now, but just suggest that anyone who would ever read this will think of it in their own way, express it in their ways, what they would like to do with her or each other, inspired by this song. And this is what I would think “please retweet” means, and would be at least partly “getting it wrong”: to me it is like sexual excitement that catches on, just like a tweet that blows up, it gets everyone hot. And everyone responds to this sexiness, this “it” factor. I heard Kim Kardashian broke the internet but I don't know exactly what she did, I missed it. I imagine it was sexy, not trying to say I don't think she has other talents, just saying it proves my point about how hotness can spread and overwhelm the system. It has great magical effects to get overheated and go into overdrive. Sexual energy is the same kind of magic as creative force, artistic energy. It comes out when we can't find love, in other ways including art, and comes out when we are in love and I believe makes our art better. It's just nice to be turned on, sexually or creatively. But I did hear something that makes me think it can't be about this, or not all about this, there is at least more to it. Gaga said something about how “Retweet” in computer programming language, I guess, is “69”, so in this sense it is like she's asking to do that with me, us, to which I am like “yes!” And this is the magical way that sex and communication relate. I think of sex as certainly a form of communication, but I kind of think of all communication as models or versions of “sex”, this great magical realm of reality. The sweet thing about 69 is orally circulating pleasure, the better your lover is making your mouth feel the better you make them feel with your mouth. Pleasure rises like a whirlwind, spreading out into broader areas. This is like a magical analogy for the world of internet communication where a hot topic can catch on, go viral, and spread around the world, sexual bliss can be a twister that takes us over the rainbow. This happens between any two of us, this cycle or rising bliss, in many great sex acts, but the nature of 69 is how the feedback connections are through the mouth and the brains linguistic and cunniliguistic centers harmonizing and the magic that represents. It is why is is just such delicious chaos magic that 69 happens to be/mean “retweet” in programming language, and for Gaga to use this in this way. I know I was trying not to cheat with outside information, but I could not resist including that, and can't wait to finish this and hear what else Gaga herself and monsters have said and say about these songs. And retweet it, metaphorically, magically. Or pleasing you with my mouth while you enjoy me with your, if it comes to that. But the essential point, I think, is that going for it, pursuing attraction boldly, with love, produces pleasure that catches on and shows other people how to do it. Maybe you will be inspired by being turned on by Gaga, too, and make some art, stories, or songs to retweet it, to return some of the pleasure she is always giving us, turning us upside down with her Love.

“I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y GAGA/THE GIRL UNDER YOU GUY” This is one phrase that can be taken as invoking a cliché, “don't want to be 'that guy'” but of course this is the opposite, that Gaga wants to be “that guy” and you want her to be him, desperately, which turns it around completely so that “that guy” is a good thing to be. The way that cliché, “I don't wanna be 'that guy'” works is the admission of social unpopularity of an idea, and saying somebody who actually wanted to do it, instead of just being the one to suggest it, probably reasonably, would be “that guy”, the uncool person or outkast. Gaga has gathered the freaks together, accepted us. There is no “that guy.” Instead, anybody is a good person to be. Gaga could be talking about any of us, or any of our lovers, when she says “I wanna be that guy”. This is likely not the essential meaning of this verse, it probably is more specific, but it doesn't have to be. This is the mystical way of understanding how this great art, through liberating sexual energy from oppression/suppression, applies to all of us and gets us all off. It turns around a current attitude that says “who is the freak who should be outcast for what turns them on?” and instead has Gaga, the most desirable person on the planet, saying she could want to be any of us, do what any of us are doing. But this is just a subtle interpretation. In a direct way it is a good sexy song arousing us and giving us visions of making love with Gaga, personally, each of us. It's just a great verse and song. I don't know if she is saying “Gaga under you” or “the girl under you” at the end. If it is Gaga it is like she is really wanting me to fantasize about her, like she is in my dream under me, but also whispering in my ear, in another spirit form beside me, “Gaga”. If it is “the girl” then it seems to emphasize that she would be the girl, either experiencing what she imagines from watching me/someone fuck another girl or that she is wishing to be “the girl” for me. I wish! The final “guy” at the end can be taken different ways: I like to hear it as “you, Puffin, guy, I'm Gaga, the girl under you” but it could also be taken as a repetition of who she is, the Guy, the G.U.Y., and she both says it and spells it out at the end of each verse, to go either way, maybe. I feel like I will just get sillier trying to explain the variations each time, you know what I mean or can figure it out and please retweet. As Far as making me cry, I kind of think of being in love and how that makes you cry, sometimes, that she would be the girl I cry over. But really, as I write this, I remember and it makes more sense that she would be saying like “cry out in pleasure” like she was asking why we were crying in “Aura.” It's a little embarrassing to admit what a sad clown I can be that I thought she just meant “be the girl you get sad over when love seems strange”. But that is why I write the “getting it wrong” series, to get that magic out there as well.

“I'M GONNA SAY THE WORD AND OWN YOU YOU'LL BE MY G - I - R - L” This is a tough line. I wonder what the word is, I just think “love”, like confessing that she loves me. But really it can be any magic word that would own you, would fit your heart's desire or let you know she is yours. Again, that is why it is so brilliant the way she leaves it open. Or maybe everybody else knows the word, but I hope I find out when she says it to me. She is saying she is claiming you for her own. I am polysexual and enjoy many sorts of encounters and fantasies. I'm flattered and think it is a tribute to Gaga and monsters that someone asked me if it is required to be polyamorous to be a little monster, because we embrace radical ways of love. As much as I'm attracted to different girls, especially, and enjoy rare opportunities to be with other girls, I totally appreciate the benefit of belonging to my lover, of being each others' one and only. I am always opposed to the idea of ownership because I don't really believe in it for actual property and think it is very dangerous when people start to think of each other, their lovers, as their property. It seems to be what leads to people killing the people they love “out of passion” or other evil things and I can't see what can be good about it. But I do think it can be fun for sexual things, because it fulfills people's fantasies. And I think it has way more magical meanings than that in this context. It does mean “we will be in love”, own each others' hearts – or at least she will own mine/yours. But it also means she will own me, like control me, or conquer me like it means in games and shit-talking. It makes you want to be her girl, if that is what you want. I can feel envious of girls sometimes because of how good they feel, or in cases like this when she is possibly only really talking to girls or a particular girl. So if she's saying she wants you to be her girl, and you are a girl, you are good to go in the fantasy or when this happens to you. If you are a guy and it gets you to want to be her girl and whatever that means to you, there is that. I love it and want to be her girl. And G I R L could be like “Guy/Girl In Real Life”, too.

“GUY I ROMANCE AND LOVES TO HOLD YOU KNOW YOU WEAR MY MAKE-UP WELL” This is the line that seems to suggest she is talking to a guy, that she wants to be the guy and make me the girl, with make-up. It suggests, to me, myself wearing her makeup, to be her girl, to please her or discover more ways of being me. But to a girl, it might not be as “remarkable” that you wear Gaga's make-up, and it might be like she is saying being together, sharing everything, looks good on you. But I guess I like to think about Gaga bringing out the feminine side of boys and encouraging us to wear make-up, reminding us how hot that is and giving us this idea as a motivation. It seems like the first half of the verse is explaining the what the acronym G-I-R-L stands for: who she wants me/you to be for her. The Guy She Romances and Loves to hold you, or romances and loves and loves to hold, too – I end up doing that when I write songs sometime, changing the end of a word like “love” to “loves” in order to fit the words before it, at first, then change it to fit the phrase of the next word. It could be that I am misunderstanding a word, too, that will provide different meaning. But I suspect this is the other side of GUY being Girl Under You, GIRL is Guy I Romance and Love. Maybe “you” could be anyone, maybe she is saying to one particular person she wants to be this way with them, maybe even for life or to have their souls together forever. Or maybe it can literally be to everyone, to fantasize about her or about ourselves in any of the variable roles of the song.

(chorus) “I'M GONNA WEAR THE TOWEL/TALENT/TOWER THE POWER TO LEAVE YOU I'M AIMING FOR FULL CONTROL OF THIS LOVE TOUCH ME TOUCH ME DON'T BE SWEET LOVE ME LOVE ME PLEASE RETWEET LET ME BE THE GIRL UNDER YOU THAT MAKES YOU CRY I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y GAGA/THE GIRL UNDER YOU GUY”
“I DON'T NEED TO BE ON TOP TO KNOW I'M WORTH IT/WANTED CUZ I'M STRONG ENOUGH TO KNOW THE TRUTH” This is part of what makes me think of that “successful man” cliché so much, the idea that only the one “on top” or “in the superior position” matters. I'm not sure if she is saying “wanted” or “worth it” but I'm pretty sure it's “worth it” and that would make more sense. In this context I guess she is saying she is worth being completely committed to. She is worth letting her be in complete control to be in love with her. By saying she is strong enough to know the truth she could be referring to that phrase and the “secret” truth hidden within that the woman/supporting person is in control. But even aside from that phrase it has total implications for what it is to be submissive. I hope more people with more experience will start talking about this soon. I only know my own experience of trying to be a respectful and submissive lover, and what I come up with for my philosophy behind that. For me, it is simply giving up having to be in control, giving into love and trust of another person, is what makes us the most in love, makes us strong in love, and ultimately gives us the most pleasure. But I know many people know a lot more about their submissive natures or exploring it sexually and I hope they can speak up about it. I feel like I always get the impression from people the idea that the submissive person is really in control. It is like one of these magical twists. But I worry that this “50 Shades” movie will give people the wrong ideas about how this works and lend to abusive pretense at domination and people subjecting themselves to it without knowing better. I am glad the craze of the book gets people talking about this stuff but I get the impression it is a lot of misunderstanding put out there from it's pages, so I hope more experienced people will say more about it, or I will get more experience understanding it myself.

“JUST WANT IT TO BE HOT BECAUSE I'M BEST WHEN I'M IN LOVE AND I'M IN LOVE WITH YOU” This is another one of the best lines ever, just a perfect explanation and synthesis of so many things. The creative, sexual, magical energy is the same things as Love and we are our best creators and wonderworkers when we are in love, especially when we are in love with someone who is magically perfect for us. It's all about this hotness, just like people go on a hot streak in sports as a creative person you go through streaks and for me the best case scenario is being in love, feeling inspired, and being able to be as much with the person to feel secure and passionate and then use those best emotions when making art. I have come to appreciate that the art part of the magic needs to be a source, too – I can't rely on trying to get everything just perfect in love before I make art or write songs. And the magic teaches me my lessons: if I don't make art, write, or compose songs and get too caught up in relationship stuff, as if I don't trust my lover to remain my foundation, I never get anything done until we have strife that keeps us apart and I realize I need to get back to my other core existence besides being a lover and make things, either to impress her or while I was too insistent that I needed our relationship in a specific state to be inspired I end up getting the inspiration of a touch of heart ache instead. But when things are going great and I do feel supported and in love, it does make me the best artist and songwriter and writer I can be. The whole idea of letting one lover be in control in order to be the best you can both be, if simply so you can stop worrying about it and accept that they love you, is a nice path to love and art. And gets nicer the better lover you are with. Gaga is the “best” example many of us can imagine but this works to remind us or suggest to us that we deserve to be in love with the best person for us, at the time, the one who brings out our best nature, qualities, talents, art, magic, and love.

“G - U - Y TOUCH ME TOUCH ME TOUCH ME ME GET ON TOP OF ME” This part is kind of like a mantra, a slice of the chorus repeated over and over as a reminder or invocation. It is like she is calling on the spirit of “Guy”, the Spirit of Eros, to take her over. She is identifying that source and representation of love and lust as the “guy” she wants to be, whether it applies to a person, an idea of a person, or this diety, Eros. Also, she is not just saying touch me but by doing it I turn her on, also just telling me to get on top of her – it is so sexual and direct but at the same time is especially loving in this context. It seems to suggest that in this way there is not a “difference” between sex and love. Also, this continues on while the other “audio”, which has the same vocal treatment as the intro audio, continues and gives a tantalizing description.

“(NOW TRUE/NATURAL GODDESS A SUMMER MOON COMES...INTO FULL PHASE.....AND MAR'S WARRING SPIRIT RAMS...INTO THE ATMOSPHERE!)” Part of why the intro makes me think of an automated museum tour guide is because of this part, where she sounds like I pressed a button and she is doing the narration for the diorama. It could be like narration for a Nova PBS show, but it has that atmospheric quality like it is being played into a small space behind glass, like a museum display. This effect functions to make the message of the other lyrics more “alive.” This is like the prerecorded intro and explanatory footnotes to the song while the rest is the real message and experience f it. It is also like she is describing the process from “outside”, deity looking in, in this narration phase, the description of a cosmic dance, and then the message comes from being a participant. The message is like that look on her face, the way she looks up into your eyes when you are fucking her and look down at her. It is alive, it makes things happen. By contrast this description is distant, beyond the atmosphere or thick display glass, impersonal and “recorded”/dead instead of alive, describing how it all goes down from the cosmic perspective. I don't know if it is “natural goddess” or “now true goddess” but it reminds me of answering the question in the chaos magic group “what do you use for gnosis?” with sex and psychadelics and someone saying they call that “Mama Magic.” I don't claim to belong in chaos magic, btw, though I think real chaos magic includes everyone, but I feel like a puppy hopping up to look in their window and some of them sing “how much is that doggy in the window?” and others reply “All the time.” I think of the True Goddess being the Goddess of Nature, so it works either way. But “now true goddess” kind of implies she becomes a true goddess when you are on top of her, and natural goddess implies the same thing but from the perspective that this is natural, it just naturally happens and is supposed to. Saying this reminds me of a guest on Maury who asked “what two people gonna lay in bed naked and NOT do 'The Grown-Up'?” So what she is describing is motion of cosmic bodies and forces. A summer moon comes into phase first suggests a warm night in which we could be doing it under the clear sky. Phase is the state of the moon, and the full moon is always a time of more power, energy, craziness and passion, especially lust. The summer, also, is a lusty time and so it implies the best time/season to have sex. Also, a full moon can mean a naked ass so it is kind of nice just to think of getting to see Gaga's whole ass – but this is just me being a juvenile pervert wanting to talk about Gaga's glorious ass, because of course in this position she is face up. The next part is “mars Warring spirit rams...into the atmosphere!” and the way she pauses after “rams” allows the sexual impressions to boost us a little further, thinking about ramming a cock into her. Mars is a Male Deity balancing Venus's influence from the other side of the earth. They two deities come together here on earth where they make love, with Mars releasing his powerful, aggressive libido into the feminine. IN this case, it is the Atmosphere and the way she says it with that little rush of excitement makes you feel that uplifting thrill. It makes me think of raising her up, into the sky, but I guess I can never get completely over the idea of having her on top of me. When I think about it, the spirit ramming from Mars into the Atmosphere is either going out from the Male, into Mars's own atmosphere (which is pretty thin, I think) or it refers to the spirit ramming down from Mars, in our sky, into Earth atmosphere. That is, the masculine spirit ramming down into the sphere of sex, where two lovers meet in various dances of masculine and feminine. Our atmosphere, the sky, is also the magical reflection of the mental/spiritual world. So this is an idea of the warring spirit being released and instead of having violent physical effects on the “ground” instead is transformed into and by the world of ideas and passion, the sky. And it therefore sets the mood, to horny, when this spirit is invited into the spiritual realm and guided in by the light of the full moon. I imagine there are interesting correlations about the Moon, Mars, and Venus movements relative to each other, but I don't know of any. I doubt Gaga was aware of any, either, when she wrote this, but then again maybe the whole verse was inspired by some such quirky fact she encountered. Altogether I think this cosmic motion is an example of the feminine, the moon in this case, being fulfilled in the process of releasing the masculine, Mars, spirit. It is the warring or violent, conflict energy and it is released through sex into the air instead of being physically destructive and it evaporates in the process of fulfilling the summer moon. Since astrology and astronomy are so magical I'm sure more can be discovered and said but that's more than enough for now.

“TOUCH ME TOUCH ME DON'T BE SHY I'M IN CHARGE LIKE A G.U.Y. I'LL LAY DOWN FACE UP THIS TIME UNDER YOU LIKE A G.U.Y.” “Face up this time” implies owning the situation, meeting her lover face to face. We often feel true love by staring into each other's eyes and this face-to-face connection can be a signifier of being in love instead of just having sex. It could mean “this time” she is face up in contrast to last time, if face down implies trying to turn from some aspects of a previous love that was not as good. So this time, with her forever lover, she is fully present for everything, not trying to hide from anything or turn her back. It suggests the “traditional” missionary position but comes right after she says “I'm in charge”, which defies what seems to be the “Christian” insistence on missionary position as related to male-domination. She just undoes this whole concept with this one line. And in a way she undoes the whole gender-bias system. In every other part of the song she says she want to “be” the guy. It is metaphor status, she is or becomes the guy. But in this case she says “in charge LIKE a G.U.Y.”. On one hand by spelling it out she is saying the Girl Under You is always the one in charge and that is how she wants to take charge of me / our love. But you could just hear it as “like a guy” in which case I think the “like” is important. It's almost like the old Valley Girl expression that has entered common usage, the super-sarcastic “As If”. As if guys were the one in charge, she is going to be like that. But what it is really saying is the “supportive” girl is the one in charge. She has already said full control of the love and this is driving the point home with different phrasing and really making it clear that this is the true woman's role, to be in charge. But we get to this truth by telling the truth, by being brave instead of shy, and trying to touch her, trying to reach her. To me, this makes me want to stop writing these never-ending gagablogs that take so much time, makes me want to either write my book about Gaga magic, make songs or art, something that could really touch her, that could really reach her, because no one really reads these or shows them to anyone, they are just for magic and history. This gagablog is like Professor August from The Simpsons, all talk: “if I were to approach for a kiss would you construe that as....” and Marge pulls him in and says “shut up and kiss me.” I need to get over this shyness and just go for it.

(end of chorus) “I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y GAGA/THE
GIRL UNDER YOU GUY” I WANNA BE THAT GUY G - U - Y I'LL ROCK YOU RIGHT UP GUY G - U - Y I'LL LIE DOWN FACE UP G - U - Y GAGA/THE GIRL UNDER YOU GUY”– Its the last part of the chorus repeated twice with the last two times instead of “I wanna be that guy”she has variations I'm not sure about, something like “I'll rock you like that guy” or “I'll rock you right up guy” or “I'll knock you right up guy” then “I like the face of guys” or “I'll light your face up guy” or “I'll lie down face up guy” - I'm almost positive it is the last one. “I'll lie down” is like “surrender/submission” but the whole “face up” reminder is that she is fully aware this is the position of power. The other options would just mean basically she likes to look at a guy or likes to make him feel pleasure. The “knock you right up guy” interpretation maybe is too much, unless it is that she will impregnate you with inspiration. But I think it is just something like “I will rock your world.” This of course goes without saying but she not just saying she is really hot but reinforcing all that this means throughout the song, driving the point home at the end.

“FOURTEEN VIERTZEHN DREI EINZ/DRY ICE NEIN ZEDD NEIN ZEDD NEIN ZEDD NEIN ZEDD” I have no idea what this part means, it is kind of like a countdown or a exuberant calling of coordinates. I think “Viertzehn” is either Fourteen or Fifteen in German. “Drei” is either Two or Three and “Einz” is one, so it goes “14, 14, 3, 1” or “14, 15, 2, 1” and then I think “Zedd”and “Nien” are both German for Zero: Zedd might be Zero and Nien might be None, but two kinds of the same empty set, unless I'm just wrong about the words or meanings. Zedd is the guy who made the music for this song, so my first guess is that it is a play on a tribute to him, as she calls our “Red One” to start the fame, or happens countless times in other modern music. I think of Public Enemy versus acknowledging Terminator X. My only guess to interpret this code is that it is a representation of the whole sex act in numerical forms. The two Fourteens in two different languages imply two Sets coming together. Each 14 could be like 14 qualities or aspects of each person making love. Then one side, the feminine, Gaga who doesn't “speak German but can if you like” takes over and it all goes German. The two collections of forces, “male” and “female”, become Two (or three), just two whole individuals meeting in equality, with whatever differences of details, the collections of 14, including the box to check for Gender, don't matter anymore. It is just one on one, Two. Or, if “Drei” is Three it is like one on one and Love, too, the Holy Spirit – like setting a place for Jesus. Then it becomes One, Einz, the Gaga-fied One since it is German, by this system I just invented. This is “the two becoming one” from The Gospel of Thomas, the secret to entering heaven. And it is a simple expression to represent sex: two becoming one. But there are all sorts of mystical, magical implications of this phrase. By this system, the repetition of “Nein Zedd” four times at the end overpowers the previous sequence of varied numbers. It is like after the two have become one in the act of love making they go on again and again as “Zeros” - they take it to the next Power of Ten, again and again, if you look at it like the string of numbers making one long number. But I read it as progression. The two become one and lose their egos and become “zeros” and just keep at it. I know this is a stretch but that is why I write the Getting it Wrong series, because when I discover it means something else there will no reason to mention any of those ideas.

As I'm Writing this President Obama is delivering unto us the 2015 State of The Union Address. Two days ago, when I wrote the above, I thought it was "all about you", just My Own Personal Story, "regular" media magic. There is nothing "regular" or unmagical about it, this personal dimension of media magic. I'm just calling it that because the personal level is what people are likely to notice on an everyday basis, even if they don't consider themselves “magical.” There are the same connections with World Events and news from the absurd to the celebrity, sports, and everything. I'm glad the state of the union for me in my love life is strong, and one reason it is strong is because we have been through difficulty. In a way I am reflecting the themes President Obama is talking about right now, live, and in a way I am summing up the personal side of this gagablog to transition to the World Events, as he will soon pivot to foreign affairs - he did just says we should pay women equally, it's 2015. I know I said I was going to keep this "regular", at first, just about my personal side for once, but I saved it, sent it to the internet as I went to work that night, and on my drive to catch up with it I heard some radio news of that day, I think it was 1-18-15: 6 Million People showing up to see the Pope and a proposed deal between North Korea and the United States. Obama was just talking about free community college for everyone and so here is a free education on media magic. You've heard how getting into art, magically, can make your life a quest, how it draws in other art from other times to prove the points and make the signposts of that journey. Now here is how it gets reflected in the wider world. I feel certain that trying to engage this with the best intentions and expectations can magically, and through various efforts, make literally anything happen. As I wrote that Obama just fake-out/sucker-punched the Keystone Pipeline idea by suggesting a much bigger infrastructure bill. The thing is, even when I was only going to focus on my own personal side of this, I could not help see parallels in the world. I'll start with North Korea. After the whole spat on the net over Sony, which is such silliness who knows what is really going on, for whatever reason it seems like a new direction is opening, as of that news report from a couple of days ago, now. North Korea said they would end nuclear testing if the US stopped doing annual military training exercises with South Korea. This is always a source of tension year after year, the trainings, like an evil holiday. I don't see how ending it, trying to put aside militarism on both sides, can possibly be a bad idea. And it seems like they are giving up much greater power - more awful power - the potential for nuclear weapons. They were pursuing nuclear weapons against a MUCH greater military power, the US via it's allies. As I am typing this, Obama is talking about not always looking first at military solutions, etc. So in a way they were in an "under" role, in the lesser position, but finally got some control and respect in the relationship by "giving something up." In order to make this kind of analogy, there is a magical twist that must be made, because of course weapons are bad and sexuality is good, it is just a matter of seeing how they are balanced as opposites and in what ways they line up. The "nuclear option" for women was mentioned in an article I read about flirting recently, but I guess I think of like the strongest sexual power being related to feminine "nuclear" power - often/in this case in "secret" development. And I contrast that with an overwhelming bluster of power of a male-dominated sytem. I stole that word bluster from Obama a few minutes ago. Of course we, America, already has most all the nuclear weapons in the world. As I have said, I think in the gagablog, many times before, the best way to tell people they don't need weapons, nuclear weapons or any others, is to put down your weapons. It's all about that magical twist of going from mistrust and defense against each other to Love and trust. Obama, "now" : "I still believe we are one people". There is so much to be said for love and unity. Obama just mentioned the progress on marriage rights for all people, paws up. I had to include Cuba and America moving past 50 years of estrangement as an example of "polyamory", not so much polygamy but at least the idea that we can be "in love" with more than one person/country in different ways. We can be in love with all in ways that don't diminish our love for each one in their own special way. We can, and when you think about it, should, have some love for Iran and North Korea, Bush's “Axis of Evil”. I think Obama mentioned faith in negotiations with Iran and a promise to veto new sanctions. This is the direction we need. Obama is finally talking about police brutality. I had to stand up and clap. As Obama says he has no more campaigns and wants to work with everyone,about uniting and bridging divides, and telling all kids their lives matter, I am trying to write this but he's getting so inspiring - but it is the same thing. It's about trusting that we can come together, over any divisions, and make life better, paradise even, for everyone. The speech is over and was really good. Now I think the spirit of it, brave and bold but appealing to highest ideas in such a passionate way that it seems like everyone will demand we try it, is the same as the message of GUY. Saying we are too good, have too much potential, to get caught up in petty divisions is like saying I will be in full control from "under you" - it's not all about promoting ego/party/campaigning for money based on maintaining divisions, but gaining prosperity and good favor by overcoming divisions, promoting the common well-being. It is one of the reasons why historically I think America has made progress when the Executive and Legislative Branches are controlled by different parties, it sets up a dynamic where bot sides have tp put aside their differences to get anything done because when both are controlled by the same party the minority can just keep anything from happening by just “sticking to their guns”. It is a testament to the strength of the culture and economy that we can survive even with government jerking us around like this at such enormous, inexcusable wasted expense. We spend billions just to argue on TV, etc. It is kind of summed up, I'm reminded by a pundit in the background, by saying "you aren't getting your Keystone Pipeline but on the same arguments of making jobs and energy security let us make a much more ambitious plan and do it." Some things, like weapons, we really shouldn't have and should encourage others to put aside - by example. And the best way to do it is to put aside some ego, some bluster. I think if North Korea and America, or Iran and America, (or... I feel like Groundskeeper Willie, "Englishmen and Scots...Scots and other Scots") can get past having to be Right, On Top, and can just say "let's do what is best for everyone" we will make progress, have "full control of this love" which really means allow everything to be controlled by love - and the Goddess of Love knows what she's talking about. She can say it in such a special, artistic way, through music, and I hope to do that soon as well, but now I want to explain it in rambling detail. That is the secret to love, how it turns the Worldly power structure inside out in favor of a fairyland power, where love rules all. In this system it is giving up that gives one control, trusting in love to carry us through. It does apply to personal relationships and world events. It applies to humanity, "the greatest thing you ever learn is just to love and be loved in return", as applied to lovers of all kinds, to the relationship between governments and the people they serve, and relationships between nations, and between all of us and the planet, and it is all about giving up ones own something in favor of supporting the Other.

Thanks to President Obama's bravery and with some help from Pope Francis we have just recently ended 52 years of estrangement and attempted isolation of Cuba. This means a lot for many reasons, but in the context of this gagablog about “G.U.Y.” it shows on an international level some of the same principles I've been talking about from a personal level. I must point out this way that media magic works, first. I've been saying Gaga is the Goddess for about 7 years now. I don't think this means she “knows” everything as much as she such manifestation of that divine energy that does know everything whether anyone is “thinking” it or not, the same energy that makes us know things we have no “way” of knowing sometimes. But I'm not saying that Gaga knew when she wrote “G.U.Y.” that in January of 2015 it would trigger opening up contact with Cuba after 52 years or moving past military posturing and threats with North Korea to a phase of actual progress, hopefully. In fact, I am saying the “only” reason, from my perspective, why there is a connection is because there always is some magical connection and in this case I was looking for it and expecting it. Even though I said I would not try to address The World in this edition of the gagablog I always expect there to be analogies in the world with what is going on in my life. Just to show an example I thought this up just now: what does it mean to me that the Patriots cheated this time by deflating balls? I kind of think of it like not really playing the game but trying to play a trick instead and relate it to me writing this. If I was spending the same time on songs or Art I would really have something, but instead I have deflated the delivery device and am passing these saggy words around instead of going for inspiration and lyrics of my own. By doing so I can “keep going”, keep the season alive for this “journalist of media magic”, but I am keeping a Better Team out of the Superbowl by cheating like this, keeping out the Artist or Musician who really deserves to reach the highest level but is cut out by this cheating and manipulation. I could come up with other analogies, too: How Richard Sherman said Tom Brady has an image as a Nice Guy but they know better: I in no way want to relate to Tom Brady except maybe to fuck his wife but I have to admit that I am being an asshole by insisting my blog writing is the best part of me and putting it out there when I know it is not I am just used to doing it. He just keeps doing it even though he knows they are cheating to make it happen – you can hear it in his voice. Magically, if I stop writing this and finish working on my songs or make some art instead will they kick the Patriots out of the game and have the Colts play instead, as some were saying? Probably not, but it is worth a shot. But I feel certain that the Seahawks will win, mostly because I found out a beautiful girl I went to school with is a fan and I want her to be happy. But yeah, Tom Brady is obviously lying about the balls, you can hear it in his voice. And by the way, Paws up to Jay Leno for calling us out, that in Saudi Arabia they require two women to testify against a man, which is sexism written into the law, but if in America the testimony of 30 women against Cosby is treated as suspect, showing how much more effectively sexist we can be in our own ways. I just felt like Cosby's indignation about the way young people dress for years was the best indicator I had that the ladies must be telling the truth when the stories started coming out. Because that is how it works, the people who get the most upset about what other people are doing that is really none of their business are usually hiding something they feel guilty for and can't face. Like Republicans, especially their opposition to marriage and abortion rights because they can't deal with their own sexual hang-ups they have to project that someone else is “wrong.” With Cuba America was in the wrong, just as we have been in the wrong with regard to so many other countries. But we are also in the position of power, at least of worldly and military power. We are by far the biggest bully on the Block of the Whole World. We can say we use that power for good but still we have too many examples of abuse and can surely use that power even better, or as I keep saying, change into another power structure where everyone is better off. But it takes putting aside our ego and sense of entitlement if we want to have good relations with other countries. Maybe this tactic would not work with ISIL, but then again maybe parts of it could, or it could work in one way with the group and in another way with individuals. They say the terrorists of ISIL are the kind of people who “only understand violence.” I don't know if this can be true or if it is an excuse for warfare. But let's just say it can be true, that some people are or become by associating with particular groups, just heartless fucks. I feel that way about the Republicans even if their terrorism is slower, less alarming, and more insidious: poisoning and warming the planet, preventing peace and prosperity in order to profit off of war and suffering. And all the people who “don't understand anything” because they are brainwashed into thinking global warming is not real or that The System is Good while The Government, the liberal side anyway, is Evil. If Republicans REALLY believed government was too big they would just quit. But they refuse to understand things in order to protect their crazy worldview. ISIL is the same way, and I do believe you can reason with ISIL Terrorists or Republicans/Terrorists. Notice how the Republicans are ALWAYS trafficking in fear? Terrorists. But you have to have the right conditions. Just like whatever the hell happened between Sony and North Korea it seems to have created the conditions to open the path to peace with this new offering to end nuclear testing. It's like they don't really want to have nuclear weapons – no one does they just feel forced into it. Just like no one probably would really want some of the things we consider attractive, like 6-pack abs, not bad enough to get them, unless other people already had them – though that example is not really negative like weapons, just an example of work that is not so much to be effective as to reach a status. And they want to be treated as a sovereign country that can make their own decisions, to be treated with respect. I can't help but see an analogy between Gaga/You in “G.U.Y” and America and these other countries we are in a relationship. The song is so brilliant it can go “both ways” in this context, too. With North Korea, America is in a position of power, imposing sanctions, supporting the South and keeping them in an arms race that wastes all their resources the same way we destroyed the Soviet Union. It shows how entrenched the military order of the world still is that the same tactics are working 20 years later. In this way we are the aggressive suitor or rapist forcing North Korea. But if we allowed Her some dignity and actually approached with respect then we could get it on and be happy and make a relationship we can trust. All it takes is treating North Korea like an actual “person”, not like a fucktoy or “our bitch” as the saying goes – not that there is anything wrong with dogs or submission, just that you have to agree to want to be treated that way, so beware 50 Shades of Grey. And with an approach of mutual respect we can make love instead of war. This is what the deal to end nuclear testing and military exercises represents and why I had to include it here. As far as I am concerned, from a magical perspective, and I am not trying to take credit myself but give credit to magic so others can “retweet” and do the same, the reason this happened at the time I am writing this blog is to make this point. And if no one ever reads these until future speed-reading aliens or they can put them in a tablet or pill for instant digestion, at least buried in here is an “I told you so.” But mainly it is about the magic of intending it, and for anyone who happens upon this particular entry in their bibliomancy of this gagablog. I was worried about how to make this analogy well, I think I did a poor job of it earlier with the feminine “nuclear option” idea. I was trying to say it too quickly and I should just admit these go on forever and try to really get into it. I did not want to make the analogy where North Korea was “the woman” in case that would be offensive, but realized as I wrote all this that the idea that being the woman is offensive is exactly what this is all about. I don't need to make fun of the one who wants to be The Man in Charge because it is truly a ridiculous notion. It is contrary to the natural order where the woman is in charge. If North Korea is the Man in the analogy and America says we will support you if you are kind and take care of people, everything will be fine. But if North Korea wants to be The Man in the situation and be like “we will have the nuclear weapons to force you to do things” well that kind of shit is never cool. If North Korea want to really be in control it should just adopt a supporting, feminine position. Even if it feels like it makes it lose face, it is actually being face up and how you control a “more powerful” partner, by giving him position but letting him know with your eyes, facing him, that you are the one giving it to him, making it possible. This reminds me of a whole angle of the song I forget, that instead of singing to a pair of lovers like she wants to take one of their positions, she is just singing to her existing lover telling him how she wants him to take her, but what it means about her being in control of him and the love. When I say “control a more powerful partner” I am not trying to suggest that the masculine is more powerful than the feminine. More physically forceful, maybe. But this is all the proof of how Love, not Force, is the greatest power in the universe. I heard and retold the story about how women in the Congo ended 25 years of civil war by, on both sides, going on sex strike until the men stopped fighting. They were sick of it, they had enough. And they ended the war that way, a war that had gone on for a generation. When I mentioned it on facebook someone said the same thing happened in Ancient Greece, I think. Did the women in the Congo model their pacifism after that, or just figure it out themselves? Either way, to me these are examples of real power taking over when the results of all this fake power are too horrific. It's magic and the true natural way re-asserting itself through the bullshit. It's the re-emergence of the Goddess. And it's the kind of thing we need now, more and more, which is why I am sure Gaga's influence will save the world as it takes root and grows, flowers and bears fruit. America is always in the military power position, the aggressive position, relative to all other countries. We lead the world in many other ways, too, and therefore have the opportunity and duty to take it in a peaceful direction. But it all relies on putting aggression aside and emphasising nurture, not punishment, to raise a world of peace not strife. And yes, this supportive/in charge message of “G.U.Y.” applies to the love between parents and kids, too: you don't control your kids with threats or spankings, you support them with the reminder that this is what makes you in charge. I got a job with a kind of Authority and was a little nervous since I am so against “authority” in so many ways in principle. In learning to do the job I have come to appreciate authority, what it is good for and the best kinds. And I realized that the only TRUE authority is taking care of someone. The more you take care of others the more authority you have and it just comes naturally, it does not have to be conferred or upheld by a system or standard. Those are the kinds of things that lead to bad government, when someone is “in Charge” because they “are supposed to be” instead of because they are taking care of the most things. If we can apply this standard to our US government it should fix everything so maybe I should promote it beyond the depths of the gagablog. But here it is for magic and posterity. Judge government like some people appreciate magic and spirituality, not mainly for the forms it takes but for the results it gets. It's not all about who does it how, but the fact that things get done. My dad told me a cool phrase, something like “pride is focusing on who does it, humility is focusing on making sure it gets done.” In the case with Cuba America has simply been a bully and Cuba has had to suffer the fact that there was no justice, they just had to stay out of the way. Now, thanks to President Obama and Pope Francis, we have given up our tough “stance” - and was it even a “stance”? What did we have to object to, the idea that they were communist? Did that really even mean the same thing to the fearmongering Republicans for the last half of this time, after the collapse of the U.S.S.R.? So we have ended the embargo and my first thought was “rich Americans are gonna buy all their old cool cars” and that made me sad a little but really it is all good and so much good can come of this. It is not like America says “move over England/Israel/SaudiArabia/Whoever, America has a new Best Friend.” But we can have all sorts of different kinds of respectful relations with all countries and such a situation will improve things everywhere. But we should be enticing countries into relationships, not forcing them. I'll probably just rewrite this stuff more succinctly, but for monsters I'm sure you get it. I think a lot of us little monsters identify as freaks or weirdos. I know I do. I have often felt like I am left out of social groups. It is like people pretend there is only so much acceptance to go around, like a game of musical chairs where one less person can be included and supported each round. Monsters know it is actually the opposite, because Gaga teaches us and does it for us in her example. The more supportive we are of each other the more support there is to support even more people, not less. I'm feeling all technical repeating “support” when it is a synonym for love, like all good things. This is something we are discovering in the world, and can discover and develop in our own private relationships, to be the best we can, and have the best effect publicly, plus know that it is possible to overcome differences and set that as a goal for ourselves and our world. The more we feel whole with our lovers the more positive we will feel we can change the world and more magical and creative and practical ways we will find to do it. And the more the world improves until we don't have to stress about work and war the more we will be able to fall in love and find happiness and trust with our lovers in order to become our best and truest selves. It is that “69” retweet cyclone to paradise between us and our world, we need to respect the Girl Under You, the Earth, and let her signals guide our actions. I can't believe it took me all of this to reach that realization that Gaga is also singing “G.U.Y.” from the perspective of the Earth, even though she makes it so obvious in the very first verse with “grave” and “earth”. And I was close with the idea that Mars and Venus meet As/On Earth, but just now realized that Earth's Spirit could be the Androgynous Eros. But I discovered this through the writing process, so I guess that is a reason to do this. Just as the gagablog process, not just my own ideas about it, but the magical ritual of writing it, is what led to my discovery of the Gaga/Mariska Estes/Venus connection in the last edition. So while I really do want to finish my songs and make some pictures, and will soon, I think I will continue the Gagablog and take this as a sign of favor.

The last thing I have to say is about Pope Francis and “G.U.Y.”. Don't worry, it's not as big a stretch as it might seem. I predicted or helped manifest this Pope, depending on your perspective, as can be seen in the gagablogs from around that time. I also “told” him directly via twitter before they suspended me that if he could get together with Gaga, meet her and talk with her, they would surely save the world. He/The Vatican deleted a lot of disrespectful replies but left mine intact, even though they were always about “radical” ideas, which gave me hope. One way to start talking about this is to say that the Church sometimes calls itself the body of Christ or the Bride of Christ, I think. And the Pope is the representative of Jesus on earth, too in a special way. I guess he is the Father of the church, but it seems like he could also be married to the church. Even without the sex or matrimonial dimension The Pope and The Church have a kind of dominant/submissive relationship that means the lessons of “G.U.Y” apply. But it is also really important to point out that there is a reason to have to stop before any sexual discussion comes up – because the Pope doesn't have sex. The Pope has never had sex. The idea, I think, is that no Pope has ever had sex. I'm not going to get into all my issues with this, how I think demonizing sex and women is the heart of all that is wrong in the world. It is the reason why I left the church as a kid, in addition to the related problems of them not being environmentalist or pacifist enough and insisting on those values. But the idea that the Pope should never have sex could just be wrong, sorry for wasting your time. I guess my belief is that this Pope was really cool to say “who is he to judge?” gay people and encouraging acceptance, that is at least such an awesome step forward from previous Popes. But I wish he could apply the same logic to birth control. Who is he to say how people should have sex if he has never had sex? Pope Francis recently went to the Philippines where he was met with the largest audience ever to greet a Pope, six million people. I heard one of the concerns that they have is the Church's policy against birth control. To me, religious ideas about having many kids seems to make sense when you are a minority in population but when you are the majority there seems to be a reason to change course and temper it some. I don't want to get into challenging or comparing religious ideas, this is too long already, but just to talk about the effects and simplest causes for confusion and conflict between authorities like the Pope and the people they are supposed to be loving and supporting. If you want to have large families, great, and it's wonderful that modern medicine keeps improving lifespans and infant mortality rates. But it was not long ago and still unfortunately happens in many poor places that not everyone survives infancy and adolescence. And ideas that we should try to have as many kids as possible are older than modern medicine and maybe don't apply as strongly as more of us can thankfully expect to survive and grow up. And more people in more places can have that expectation all the time as we progress into the future and modern medicine and other forms of understanding and healing meet and spread their benefits around the world. The Church doctrines and ideas against contraception are far older than most forms of contraception used by people today. I'm sure they were tweaked along the way for all the specific technologies that came along, but my point is that the ideas at the core of this belief are far far older than modern forms of contraception and maybe should not really apply, but are more a function of old beliefs. I will come right and say it all comes from one of the oldest mistakes of Christianity. It's the reason that Celestine Prophecy book was such a big hit, because it got at the idea of Jesus being married or having lovers. Gaga gets into that idea in “Judas”, but don't bother with the Celestine Prophecy which I suppose just used this to get sales. Read the Gospel of Mary, as old a work as any the New Testament of the Bible is based upon, but is not in the Bible as most people know it, which tells her side of the story. It does not say that they were lovers, though you could assume that, but it does say she was picked to lead the church after Jesus was gone and how Peter kind of stole it from her. This may be way oversimplifying but read it, it is not even as long as this gagablog, geez. Anyway, the model of the Virgin Loverless Pope as being based upon Jesus in his chastity might just be wrong. Or the Pope always having to be a dude, might just be wrong. But once you make that mistake you have to cut the women off somewhere to keep any of them from advancing to become priests. My mom has been a priest in the Anglican church for 20 years so if you tell me a priest can't be a woman you just look stupid, from my perspective. That church has “allowed” women to be priests, and allowed priests to be married, for a long time, but even it had to change rules against women at some point, they are just cool enough to have done it longer ago than many Christian churches. I'm not trying to argue the difference between these churches, but this difference might not exist too much longer anyway as the Catholic Church has recently allowed Anglican priests to become Catholic priests even if they are married, but I guess just men so far. There might always be celibate priests but this trend can't help but catch on. And any way that prejudice against women or bias against people having sex is overturned is a way for the Goddess to re-emerge, and whether they like it in those terms or not, it is a good and necessary thing for the world and the survival of organizations and governments to be in line with. Pope Francis has made a lot of advances in catching the Church up with modern times by being liberal, future-sighted. He hasn't allowed women to become priests yet but I suspect he will. Also, when asked about birth control after his visit to the Philippines he maintained the Church's position, which I will again point out came hundreds of years before the topic actually in question. His response was that to be a good catholic family does not mean to breed like rabbits. This is cute, sure, but completely shows how he has no idea what he is talking about. The reason catholic families get so large is not because they are trying to be the best image of a catholic family – can he really possibly think that? Just no imagination or refuse to think about it? Because the reason catholic families get so big is because sex is fucking fun as shit, they have no contraception, and medicine is good, hopefully, so more kids survive, thankfully. And the only piece of this puzzle the Pope seems to be missing is the first part. I wish he would meet and talk with Gaga, she could give him what he is missing. Just like she does for Tony. Since the Pope does not know how fun sex, just like he does not know about being gay, maybe, why can't he say “who am I to judge?” in the same kind way he said about that? I hope he does, soon. I really love Pope Francis like everybody does. If the Pope is supposed to be like Jesus he seems to do the best job in as long as I can remember. And I think everyone sees this, feels this, and it is a wonderful thing that these changes are making the Church more and more alive. But I left the Christian church because even in the more liberal branch I was raised in I could not stand that we could even be associated with people who accepted war, bigotry, poverty, homophobia, oppression of women or suppression of sexuality and weren't environmentalist - or even worse supported the Right Wing actively in all of these issues. I think the Pope just has to change on this. The 6 million people showing up to see him, followed by the breeding like rabits comment, sums up the reason we need “G.U.Y.” understanding on this issue. It's like don't tell me what to do, dude. You want me to lie down for you, but I'm watching you this time and you need to meet my need and validate me as a person. We got too many kids running around here. I need some help. I like to have sex just for fun sometimes and enjoy that love with my husband and natural stress relief. I and the other six million people whom you called to come see you have this concern. Please reconsider and change your mind about it. Personally, I cannot stand how in America this issue of birth control gives another voter block to the Right Wing in their Quilt of Fear. I love how Pope Francis is fighting corruption in the Vatican and in principle. I love how he speaks up for peace and against war. I love how he is speaking out against the greedy rich and capitalism, and standing with poor people instead. I love how he is telling people to respect each others' beliefs and differences. I just don't love how he could completely rid the world of the source of so much of this stuff, just by kicking the Catholic leg out from under the Republican Party Empty Stool. It's only a three-legged stool: Catholics voting on birth control, Evangelicals voting on deep-seeded racism and misogyny including birth control, and Greedy people, the Rich and their Tea Party Redneck Wannabes, voting on just being bastards. There is a military leg too, but if they don't fall in with the other groups they are probably liberal or will be once the utter disregard the conservative policies have for them become apparent. To me, to set in motion the events that solve all the world's problems, Pope Francis would just have to allow birth control and either admit women as priests or tell his followers that while they might have a moral objection to abortion it would not be wrong to vote against greed, corruption, war, and bigotry by voting Democratic even if that meant voting to preserve a woman's options for all reproductive rights. I do think these things are coming in the near future and know they are the keys to saving the world. It does not have to come from Pope Francis, the same kind of understanding could come into the world from many sources, but he seems so close. That is why it would be even cooler if he came to these realizations after meeting Gaga for the first time. If they could talk, just like she met with President Obama and helped start a national campaign about ending bullying. Gaga and the Pope could end the bullying aspects of capitalism, could move further in the acceptance of gay and lesbian and transgender people, and could make breakthroughs in fixing a an almost two thousand year old mistake in Christianity about women and sex. All of this kind of progress and collaboration is what we need to end war in this world, too.

CONCLUSION: After almost a week working on this I am glad to bring it to a close, treat myself to the lyrics and even finally watch the video for “G.U.Y.”. Yeah, that's right, that is how much of a monk I have been about this shit, I still have not allowed myself to see it until I finished this even though it has taken a year. And I can't wait. I will come back with any new ideas in my next edition, but before I go I have to go ahead and mention two that I just came up with in getting to the end of this. These two examples make me glad I spend all this time on these even if no one reads them, because this process is how I got to these particular ideas. And I feel like an idiot that I did not think of them earlier, and I won't try to sound smart by talking all about them now. It would be nice if anyone wants to give me feedback about any ideas that these ideas spark in them - “please retweet.” But I am ashamed it took me all this time to reach these ideas and you can at least kind of trace my thought processes in this edition and see how I got to this point. One is the “revolutionary” view that she is not singing to “me” or “you” at all, but to our girlfriends. From this perspective it is like she is saying she wants to be me, to my girlfriend, or she wants to be you, under your girlfriend. I think this is one reason I trouble deciding what this whole song is “supposed” to mean: the nature of sex is sharing your beings with each other in such an intimate way, there are just so many ways to interpret the idea of who is inside whom. For me, great sex tends to give me the feeling I can feel what my partner feels, we become each other and twist and spin and dance around this pole or axis of identity between us. That is already happening to people during sex whether they notice these kinds of things or not, it is magic. Gaga is saying she wants in on this, or by allowing her to be or take the perspective of either lover, for purposes of the art of this song or in fantasy or in real life, it brings out all the ideas about what love and sex and submission/domination between two people can be. As the second half of this explains, those patterns can be applied to national and other “bigger system” relationships (probably to the world of business and shit, too) as well and maybe suggest new ways of doing things with relief from some of the burdens of national ego and identity – at least relief from fear and mistrust of each other. And maybe you have to be kind of crazy to want to make these comparisons but I think insights and solutions can be found this way for people willing to do it. But there is another way entirely to interpret “G.U.Y.” that is not about relationships between people or groups no matter how big. And tough I just thinking of it I will leave it to others to explore. It seems so obvious now, with the clues in the first line of the song, but I did not think about it until writing about the second half of the “narrator” portion. The idea is that this song follows Venus, the Feminine Planet, and Invokes Mars, the Masculine planet. This puts Earth as the Sexual Planet where the Masculine and Feminine meet. The last interpretation of “G.U.Y.” that I will leave you with is Gaga is singing as the Spirit of the Earth. Mother Monster as Mother Nature. Where all the sex goes down. Where the influence of the Moon and Mars meet, technically, with the power of Venus, Love, ultimately over all. It seems so obvious now, if she is the 'grave” who is going to “earth” you and your sex tells no lies like dead man tell no tales because when you enter her it is a solid date on your tombstone. I don't think it is Gaga's deepest or truest intention to have “G.U.Y.” mean this, but it still can: “My Artpop can mean anything.” Maybe I am showing my familiarity with acid and chaos magic by expressing these ideas, but “it's time you know how I feel” as Homer says. But even if she does not mean for us to think of her as the Earth, the song works this way and works really well, showing it's awesome power as divinely inspired art, why I can't stop talking about it. It can connect through the French idea that sex itself is “the little death.” Without getting into too much detail, it is just an all-good, comforting way to look at death as the return to the loving mother in order to be reborn. Gaga is saying she is under all of us, but if we are treating her like a “Second-class girl” whose needs we can ignore we are wrong. She is going to control the situation even if she seems to be subservient, to support and endure all our abuses. Because she makes everything we do powerful, everything we have is made out of her “make-up,” her resources, that we wear well – or she knows we CAN wear it well but we have to be respectful and responsible, not exploitative and abusive. We are treating the earth like an abusive lover and it is time to stop it. Mother Nature will have more and more destructive “fits” and moods, storms that wipe out cities, etc, if we don't start treating her right. It is not revenge, she supports literally all that we do, but some of our actions are what produces these results. This is why the evil people of the world work so hard to convince people that global warming is not man made even though we all know better. But if we can listen to Mother Nature and respect her needs we can make this a love relationship instead of an abusive one. She is the one in control anyway, all our crimes and pollutions are just part of the greed of our unstable position of trying to fight that fact. ISIL is to the rest of the world what The Nations of The World are to the Earth itself. We need to purge our soul of evil, not by bombing to oblivion the heart of the worldly manifestation of evil, but by purging it from our own governments and religions and systems and we do this in conjunction with purging our own hearts. When the Earth says the word to own you, when it is your time to die, you are hers. To be reborn in different make-up, but this is her reminding us we all belong to her. We are hers as long as we live, too – the whole time we are flirting with her and fucking her, we are really hers from the start, but when she gets us off and we die that little death is when we really feel at one with her, like nothing else matters, and we can rest in peace buried inside her. This could make the interpretation “I'm gonna wear the tower” make sense in a literal way, too: she wears our towers and governments like hats. She can take them off and change them, she has the power to leave our civilizations in the dust of archeology if we don't treat her right. She has always been under us but she is face up this time, saying hey, look at me, look at what you are doing to me, to us. Let's get this right. I love this interpretation so much but like I said I don't think she necessarily intended it this way. She is Gaga, though, and can do anything. It is just that she said each song relates to things in her actual life, so I can't wait to hear her explanation. But it works this way, and one reason I think the song is so powerful is because it gets into spinning around this gender-axis or identity reflections and can go everywhere those connections lead you. For me the suppression of sex, oppression of women, and mistreatment of Mother Earth have not just been linked by similar words we chose to describe them but are part of a core evil misunderstanding that causes us all of us to suffer. With great magical art like this we have amazing tools to reach new understandings though and I hope in my winding way I have contributed to that here. That was going to be last sentence but I will say one more thing, reminded by the word “winding.” This whole edition has been like mental rope-play. I was all bound up in tight circles of my own conceptions then let loose into my usual mode of comparing art with current events, and the release gave me an even broader perspective, of “G.U.Y.” as me if Gaga wants to fuck my hot girlfriend, or wants me to fuck her like Gaga or Eros would. And the even broader, cosmic perspective of “G.U.Y.” as the earth. I've never done bondage stuff but I like the idea. When Anthony Bourdain asked a bondage worker in Japan what percentage of Japanese men and women liked bondage she said 100%. Maybe if it is more accepted there then even if not everyone does it it becomes obvious that everyone likes the idea, at least secretly. I think that is how a lot of sex is. We have to feel comfortable with it, and one way to do that is to know other people enjoy it that way, too. A lot of people leave Christianity behind due to christian prudishness. The idea that the missionary position is the only one acceptable for sex is just absurd, and the fact that people actually control populations with this insistence is wrong. But we shouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Missionary position can be lots of fun and it is nice to have such a liberated role model as Gaga saying she does it, making it fashionable again. And this whole idea of submitting to each other, and mostly that it is the submissive who is in control, needs to be discussed before people think they are comfortable with bondage and things from the popularity of the 50 Shades movie and get into it without the best standards or expectations. I'm not the one to talk about it from experience but I feel certain this is a point that needs to be made. It is not about giving control to another person but about establishing trust between people in such a way that we can play these roles for each other and discover the secrets of love and lust with each other. This is how we can be the best, most in love, by gaining this level of trust with our lovers, with each other in general, and even between nations. We can do it, the trick is putting aside ego and fear, considering the Other's needs, and being able to switch places and invoke Gaga/Eros as our models or masters and make the most out of being in love by becoming our best together. Coming together in all the best ways. Thanks, Gaga, once again for showing us, for taking control of this Love. I love you forever, and everyone and the world through your example, and know that will bring us all together as we all blossom in art in your image and share the fruit in this new world we create together to be home to all. Monsters, aliens, hybrids, anyone - thanks for reading this, for letting me tie you up. I hope it does something magical for you. And celebrate with me for getting through it, let's watch the "G.U.Y." video! See you soon, I hope: I'm gonna make art and music more, now, too, so "face up this time" Like a card, I'm in attack mode, you are gonna know what you are dealing with soon.... I love you! Paws up! Let me be your GIRL or guy!