- Sep 22, 2013
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The modern world is gauged by sophisticated networking (e.g., Wall Street, Facebook, European Union, eTrade, NATO, etc.). In this climate of 'ultra-fast contracts,' human beings roam around the planet almost faceless, greeting each other and trading/negotiating as 'agents of civilization grids.'
It's no wonder that Hollywood (USA) makes coordination-themed films such as Johnny Mnemonic and Robots.
The World Wide Web is filled with boards and chat rooms that invite people to socialize and/or trade/buy/sell under self-chosen aliases (or 'avatars'). Unless you're on video-conferencing (e.g., Skype), you don't see other people's faces --- you just carry out your business.
In the ancient world, artisans made pots and sculptures that symbolized a civilization interest in hunting and gathering and monument-building. I thought it would be appropriate to write a 'modern art' relevant short-story about our new world of 'faceless traffic.'
The purpose of this 'vignette' is to invite people to consider how the public persona of 'individual faces' is now some kind of social totem of 'economic grace.'
The title of this short-story, which is a horror story, is "The Ugly Face."
====
Damien was born to gypsy parents in Arizona during the 1960s. His parents were eccentrics who worshipped various forms of Wicca and taught Damien to respect beliefs in the Occult and the underworld, be they mainstream Christian or non-mainstream beliefs. Damien grew up learning about Samhain and its relationship to Halloween and Christian beliefs in the AntiChrist, the demonic adversary of Jesus the Christ. Damien also became a fan of comic books and liked reading stories of unusual comic book characters such as Jigsaw (Marvel Comics), a real psycho with an ugly face, and Lucifer Morningstar (DC Comics), who was an allusion to the Christian Devil.
Damien's parents died of a drug overdose in 1977, leaving Damien alone to grow up on his own. Damien was only 13 years-of-age and had to learn to survive on the streets of San Francisco, peddling as a street musician and finding money as a skilful pickpocketer. He was taken in by an old hippie on Haight-Ashbury Street who recruited orphaned and abandoned children as pickpockets. Damien joked and called this man, whose real name was Sal, Fagin (after the Dickens character who similarly recruited children as pickpockets), and Sal let the kids call him Fagin when Damien made it a popular nickname. 'Fagin' really liked Damien and groomed him to someday take his job, teaching him that sometimes children have nowhere to go and have to be guided by a street-wise fellow like him.
Damien had a profitable relationship with Fagin until the age of 20 when he decided he would try to get a job working for a small San Francisco newspaper. It was at this newspaper that Damien started writing what would become very popular editorials about the coming of the AntiChrist. Damien would write that the AntiChrist would probably be some kind of appealing American movie star who made films about the gluttony of Wall Street and the high-paced facelessness of the Internet. Damien was respected as one of the superior writers of his newspaper, and he was able to use his money earnings to purchase a small apartment and decent automobile (a Mercury Sable).
In 1987, Damien was the victim of a terrible drunk-driving accident, which left his face horribly scarred and disfigured. He could not afford the corrective facial-reconstructive surgery or any kind of fancy plastic surgery, so he had to make do with his new 'ugly face.' Damien usually wore a face-cloth like a veil to hide his disfigurement, and his newspaper co-employees suggested he become some kind of comic book editorial writer for the newspaper, commenting on the modern age obsession with self-image playfulness. Damien really liked this idea and started writing a running series about the comic book villain Jigsaw, who was facially disfigured, going head-to-head with the AntiChrist. Damien would write that Jigsaw challenged the AntiChrist's underworld dominion by posting photos of himself on the Internet carrying toys and water-guns and writing incendiary messages such as, "I am a disfigured 'toy-master,' and I believe the AntiChrist will dare humanity to become obsessed with loitering!"
Damien's Jigsaw-series became very popular, as popular as his previous series purely about the AntiChrist. Damien even had a profile page hosted for him on Facebook, which was linked by fans to Jigsaw's comic book page. However, Damien's popularity would come at a cost. He soon started receiving death-threat letters that read things like, "Stop connecting Jigsaw to the AntiChrist heretically, or we will kill you!" At that point, Damien became very frustrated --- with his struggle-filled life, his facial disfigurement, and his newfound challenges with fanatical readers. He was so frustrated with life (and with America) that he decided to become a street-prowler, a vigilante. Damien would roam around the streets of San Francisco late at night on Saturdays, looking for thugs, crooks, and vandals who were making trouble. He would wear a hood and cloak and face-mask and carry an electric stun-gun, which he would use liberally. Damien decided he was something like a comic book character.
One night, Damien was standing in front of his bathroom mirror, picking at his scars after another Saturday night of 'vigilante tricks' when he thought he saw a demonic face in the mirror. Damien jumped back and asked the figure, "Who the hell are you?" and the face eerily replied, "My name is Ugly Face, and I am a messenger of the AntiChrist. I want you to go on Facebook and tell everyone that Jigsaw is the AntiChrist!" Damien was so terrified, but he obeyed the command of this figure. After Damien did so, he wondered if he was simply going insane, however, he was strangely satisfied that his new terror prompted him to write something about 'presentation ghostliness' on Facebook. Damien lived a long and happy life, but he never forgot 'Ugly Face.'
====
Facebook (Wikipedia)
It's no wonder that Hollywood (USA) makes coordination-themed films such as Johnny Mnemonic and Robots.
The World Wide Web is filled with boards and chat rooms that invite people to socialize and/or trade/buy/sell under self-chosen aliases (or 'avatars'). Unless you're on video-conferencing (e.g., Skype), you don't see other people's faces --- you just carry out your business.
In the ancient world, artisans made pots and sculptures that symbolized a civilization interest in hunting and gathering and monument-building. I thought it would be appropriate to write a 'modern art' relevant short-story about our new world of 'faceless traffic.'
The purpose of this 'vignette' is to invite people to consider how the public persona of 'individual faces' is now some kind of social totem of 'economic grace.'
The title of this short-story, which is a horror story, is "The Ugly Face."
====
Damien was born to gypsy parents in Arizona during the 1960s. His parents were eccentrics who worshipped various forms of Wicca and taught Damien to respect beliefs in the Occult and the underworld, be they mainstream Christian or non-mainstream beliefs. Damien grew up learning about Samhain and its relationship to Halloween and Christian beliefs in the AntiChrist, the demonic adversary of Jesus the Christ. Damien also became a fan of comic books and liked reading stories of unusual comic book characters such as Jigsaw (Marvel Comics), a real psycho with an ugly face, and Lucifer Morningstar (DC Comics), who was an allusion to the Christian Devil.
Damien's parents died of a drug overdose in 1977, leaving Damien alone to grow up on his own. Damien was only 13 years-of-age and had to learn to survive on the streets of San Francisco, peddling as a street musician and finding money as a skilful pickpocketer. He was taken in by an old hippie on Haight-Ashbury Street who recruited orphaned and abandoned children as pickpockets. Damien joked and called this man, whose real name was Sal, Fagin (after the Dickens character who similarly recruited children as pickpockets), and Sal let the kids call him Fagin when Damien made it a popular nickname. 'Fagin' really liked Damien and groomed him to someday take his job, teaching him that sometimes children have nowhere to go and have to be guided by a street-wise fellow like him.
Damien had a profitable relationship with Fagin until the age of 20 when he decided he would try to get a job working for a small San Francisco newspaper. It was at this newspaper that Damien started writing what would become very popular editorials about the coming of the AntiChrist. Damien would write that the AntiChrist would probably be some kind of appealing American movie star who made films about the gluttony of Wall Street and the high-paced facelessness of the Internet. Damien was respected as one of the superior writers of his newspaper, and he was able to use his money earnings to purchase a small apartment and decent automobile (a Mercury Sable).
In 1987, Damien was the victim of a terrible drunk-driving accident, which left his face horribly scarred and disfigured. He could not afford the corrective facial-reconstructive surgery or any kind of fancy plastic surgery, so he had to make do with his new 'ugly face.' Damien usually wore a face-cloth like a veil to hide his disfigurement, and his newspaper co-employees suggested he become some kind of comic book editorial writer for the newspaper, commenting on the modern age obsession with self-image playfulness. Damien really liked this idea and started writing a running series about the comic book villain Jigsaw, who was facially disfigured, going head-to-head with the AntiChrist. Damien would write that Jigsaw challenged the AntiChrist's underworld dominion by posting photos of himself on the Internet carrying toys and water-guns and writing incendiary messages such as, "I am a disfigured 'toy-master,' and I believe the AntiChrist will dare humanity to become obsessed with loitering!"
Damien's Jigsaw-series became very popular, as popular as his previous series purely about the AntiChrist. Damien even had a profile page hosted for him on Facebook, which was linked by fans to Jigsaw's comic book page. However, Damien's popularity would come at a cost. He soon started receiving death-threat letters that read things like, "Stop connecting Jigsaw to the AntiChrist heretically, or we will kill you!" At that point, Damien became very frustrated --- with his struggle-filled life, his facial disfigurement, and his newfound challenges with fanatical readers. He was so frustrated with life (and with America) that he decided to become a street-prowler, a vigilante. Damien would roam around the streets of San Francisco late at night on Saturdays, looking for thugs, crooks, and vandals who were making trouble. He would wear a hood and cloak and face-mask and carry an electric stun-gun, which he would use liberally. Damien decided he was something like a comic book character.
One night, Damien was standing in front of his bathroom mirror, picking at his scars after another Saturday night of 'vigilante tricks' when he thought he saw a demonic face in the mirror. Damien jumped back and asked the figure, "Who the hell are you?" and the face eerily replied, "My name is Ugly Face, and I am a messenger of the AntiChrist. I want you to go on Facebook and tell everyone that Jigsaw is the AntiChrist!" Damien was so terrified, but he obeyed the command of this figure. After Damien did so, he wondered if he was simply going insane, however, he was strangely satisfied that his new terror prompted him to write something about 'presentation ghostliness' on Facebook. Damien lived a long and happy life, but he never forgot 'Ugly Face.'
====
Facebook (Wikipedia)
