A wonderful poem by Michael Savage:

“I am Moses,
I am Abraham.
I am Isaac,
I am Charlagmane.
I am John Wayne,
I am Coltrane.
They try to suppress me,
try to redress me.
Call me incorrect,
deserving no respect.
I am Patton,
I am Hatton,
even Mt. Batten.
I am Eisenhower,
not a wallflower.
I am Washington,
I am Pershing.
I am McArthur,
I am Kipling.
I am Audie Murphy
and I am Sky King.
They’ll steal your crown,
trample you down.
Take your good name,
and put it to shame.
I am Gene Autry,
I am Roy Rogers.
I am Tom Mix.
They try to push me,
over the river Styx.
But it won’t mix,
with my true blood,
which runs thick for America.
I am the bane,
of those vain.
I am the Weather Vein!
I am Michael Savage!“

Poem relating to Savage’s ban in the U.K.

-Michael Savage

Audio Source: mp3

Copyright 2009 Michael Savage, Talk Radio Network All Rights Reserved.

I had and intriguing tweet session (song; in my twitter terminology) with James Marcus Bach. I learned of him through Scott Bellware’s tweets and decided to start following him. I went to Bach’s website, and and learned what I could from it. From what I could glean James Bach is a self-educated man achieving goals through his own passion for life and learning. He has a contempt for the educational system in this country, which is a contempt I share. Concerning the technology sector he has done software testing and has become an expert in the field. He seems to be pursuing the status of polymath, which is a very honorable goal, one that I would like to achieve in my life time. I have read his scholarly blog posts and they are inspiring to say the least. He also has a software testing oriented blog which is a good read as well.

Our interchange began when I read his tweet about copy-editors not sharing his line of thought about the formality of his writing. For some reason I decided to tweet at him about how the future of writing is going to be stream of consciousness narrative. Which is a form a narrative that I find quite entertaining and informative. Basically, stream of consciousness is distinguished by following every thought process that occurs in the narrator’s mind at the time the are pursuing a specific conclusion or idea.

To some extent I think that the goal of twitter is to communicate people’s thought processes to others. I believe when properly utilized this can lead to informative discussions, which benefit all parties following the narrator(tweeter).

I think that the other strength of stream of consciousness is the way it humanizes the narrator and his narration. This humanization is achieved by spiritual and emotional qualities of that are intertwined throughout the narrative. This human factor is a key aspect to connecting with the user on a more intimate level. Almost every technical blog that I read uses a very detached, dry, highly technical language. They seem to take themselves too seriously, it can be amusing at times but then it becomes drab and uninteresting. I understand that the technicality of these posts is inherent in what is being discussed, but I believe stream of consciousness could enhance them greatly.

Practicing Stream of Consciousness:

I believe that there are various types of this narrative process which are expressed through subtleties in the narration. Below are the two main types that I believe exist. Each type has its usefulness and when applied properly will greatly enhance the readers/listeners experience. I go into some examples of each type to help clarify the differences.

Dissociative Stream of Consciousness -

One form occurs when there may or may not have a specific goal in mind and the author shares spontaneous thoughts. For example, while I am writing this blog post and analyzing the subject matter in my head, I am bouncing a small, foam, orange Miller Light basketball on my desk, which I acquired at a bar last year from a beer company’s beer girls. I was at a small wing restaurant drinking beer with co-workers when I received it. I am also listening to a seventies progressive rock band named Gentle Giant, and dreading having to go back through this post and link it up, it’s going to be very tedious. This style is more of a dissociative style, since you are not following a particular mental map of how you arrived at a conclusion.

Associative Stream of Consciousness -

The best way to exercise this form is to pose a question and narrate the thoughts that lead to your answer. Let’s see, what is a good question to illustrate this type. This may not even be valid, because I have to think of something and then make sure that there are enough extraneous processes for us to follow. Okay, I fear it may have to be a bit contrived for learning purposes.

What is your favorite color? Well the societal imposed norm for this question is gender based, females will say pink and males will say blue. So if I don’t say blue am I not a male? What if I am a male and say pink, does that classify me as less of a male? Why the heck is there a perceived answer to this question based on gender? It was probably promulgated by male dominance in society throughout the ages. Maybe it was actually women who promoted the distinction. I know that I have little color matching skills, an thus since I am male I can extrapolate that to all other males, . Is there some kind of predefined spectrum of colors that I can choose, like colors in the human-visible spectrum of light. Well I know my father likes green and green is green with me, but I have been partial to bright blue throughout my life. I have also always liked black, but I’m not sure that black can be an appropriate answer, because by definition it is the absence of all visible colors and white is the presence of visible colors. Can I answer with a color based on an observable object, say the color of a banana? Does the color have to be given in print or computer constructs, CMYK or RGB? Whatever, I’ll go with my gut instinct, the only hex color I know by heart #3366FF.

With the associative type we are following all of our mental paths that lead us to our conclusion. On to the twitter song that brought about this post.

The Twitter Song (in chronological order):

@jamesmarcusbach said:
You know how in old movies everyone wears a tuxedo or smoking jacket, even at home? Copy-editors want all writing to be formal. Screw them!

@seanbiefeld said:
stream of consciousness is the future

@jamesmarcusbach said:
stream of consciousness is the future? As opposed to reflection, analysis, understanding? How easily manipulated we will be!

@seanbiefeld said:
i just find that there are many writers/bloggers out there that take themeselves too seriously

@seanbiefeld said:
…they and write intellectulally stimulating articles that are missing emotional and spiritual stimulation

@seanbiefeld said:
therefore what they write tends to come off as highly technical but not satisfying the needs of the human condition

@jamesmarcusbach said:
Is stream of consciousness the route to emotional and spiritual discourse?

@seanbiefeld said:
wish twitter apps provided spell checking, themeselves = themselves, lol

@seanbiefeld said:
not necessarily the route to such things, more of a display of humanity to the reader

@jamesmarcusbach said:
serious question: do you feel that humanity comes out more in tweets? Or is it the interplay of tweets that does it?

@jamesmarcusbach said:
I find myself really confused. Conversations are sequences, but the sequences are hard to follow in Twitter. Is there a tool?

@seanbiefeld said:
tweets increase the probability of humanity coming out, but the individual must have not hesitations in what they tweet

@seanbiefeld said:
no tool that I’m aware of, disjointed is the norm, the logging aspect of tweets allows for one to piece together sequence

@jamesmarcusbach said:
So, for you, spontaneity is paramount in tweets?

@seanbiefeld said:
spontaneity can bring out humanity, the other part i see in tweets is discussion which can bring enlightenment

@seanbiefeld said:
while stream of consciousness tends to exude spontaneity it can lead to enlightenment

@jamesmarcusbach said:
Disjointed is the norm! Maybe so. I’m a bit worried that’s something a drug dealer would say to a new client.

@seanbiefeld said:
personally i have used twitter so far to increase my understanding of my craft by consuming the thoughts of my peers

@seanbiefeld said:
… and engaging myself in discussion of those thought streams

@jamesmarcusbach said:
I’m very interested in seeing an example of enlightenment by tweet. Then I could truly say that “life is tweet”.

@jamesmarcusbach said:
Twitter is conversation as a box of chocolates. Retweeting is “oooh, try this one!”

@seanbiefeld said:
my proof of personal enlightenment is a tweet session I had with @derickbailey and @bellware http://sbiefeld.com/?p=68

@seanbiefeld said:
it is somewhat recounted by that post but the post cannot encompass the entire discussion

@seanbiefeld said:
there is much promulgation of, lets call it spam, but I am a twitter novice and unsure of exact what retweeting is

@jamesmarcusbach said:
Wow! You are selling me, Sean.

@seanbiefeld RT said:
: @seanbiefeld Wow! You are selling me, Sean. – sarcasm? Electronic human interaction denies us context and inflection

@seanbiefeld said:
thus the downfall of electronic communication, subtleties in voice, facial expression, and body language

@seanbiefeld said:
but without twitter we would never had conversed, like with anything, there are good, bad and ugly

@seanbiefeld said:
i wish there was an app that allowed you to capture meaningful tweets, wait that could be a profitable idea, i claim dibs

@jamesmarcusbach said:
No sarcasm. Absolutely serious. You’re giving me a picture of how philosophy can be practiced on Twitter.

@seanbiefeld said:
I have only been using it for around a week but it seems if you want substantive tweets, limit those you follow

Conclusion:

After re-reading through the song above, I realized that i made a great number of spelling and grammatical errors, yikes, I blame sleep depravity. Twitter is a tool that encourages stream of consciousness narration, whether the users know they are actively participating in this form of narration is another matter. Twitter shines when users start up associative thought streams, which in turn generate discussions among multiple people. When this is not occurring there are a lot of inane dissociative streams, which can be good and bad. This discussion that @jamesmarcusbach and I had, furthers the proof that twitter can provide an informative outlet for those who seek it.

Signing off, seanky, to the g-funk era