My talk at the 2014 Boom Festival




Edited after a later post in this thread to reflect an ongoing resources list:

Some books that might be of interest
A People's History of the United States by Howard Zinn
Work: Capitalism. Economics. Resistance by Crimethinc
Assata: An Autobiography By Assata Shakur
Revolutionary Suicide By Huey Newton
The Failure of Nonviolence: From the Arab Spring to Occupy by Peter Gelderloos
Our Word is Our Weapon: Selected Writings by Subcomandante Marcos
Subcommander Marcos: The Man and the Mask by Nick Henck
The ABC of Anarchism by Alexander Berkman
Black Flags and Windmills: Hope, Anarchy, and the Common Ground Collective By Scott Crow
Prison Writings: My Life Is My Sun Dance by Leonard Peltier
All Things Censored by Mumia Abu-Jamal
Homage to Catalonia by George Orwell
Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution by Peter Kropotkin
Green Is the New Red: An Insider's Account of a Social Movement Under Siege by Will Potter
Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media by Noam Chomsky
Caliban and the Witch: Women, the Body and Primitive Accumulation by Silvia Federici
Recipes for Disaster: An Anarchist Cookbook by CrimethInc.
The Revenge of Gaia: Why the Earth Is Fighting Back – and How We Can Still Save Humanity by James Lovelock
Are Prisons Obsolete? by Angela Davis
The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander
Debt: The First 5,000 Years by David Graeber
Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology by David Graeber
Monocultures of the Mind: Perspectives on Biodiversity and Biotechnology by Vandana Shiva


Some zines that might be of interest
The People vs The United States
Desert
Work: Capitalism. Economics. Resistance
The Coming Insurrection
Soledad Brother The Prison Letters of George Jackson
Our Enemies in Blue

Use the Prison Books Collective Zine Catalog to search: Zine Library or The Anarchist Library or browse to see what looks good


The old documentaries thread. There are a number of newer ones that I don't have time to add at the moment, but will toss in here as time permits.

deja vu

awesome

Nicely done!

Snozz, I was able to flip through your video and watch various parts of it. It's funny how many of the things you mention I have considered and resonate with... I too was anti-drug until involvement with cannabis, at which point I realized all of the propaganda surrounding drugs, along with all of the unnecessary fear. After my first few experiences on DMT I said very similar things, especially about ho it's so fleeting... It's like the images run away from you after the experience, but it makes you value the now at all times.

Your comments about our destructive societies were also very interesting. I am a university student as well "pursuing those papers," but I am rather happy with my position. I don't have to be here, and I have plans to help as many fellow humans as I can with my degree. I have doubts about the intentions of many of my colleagues; sometimes my friend and I joke about how so many people here are little more than future-patio-furniture-consumers.

Regarding the destructive societies however, why is it that you think that things came to be this way? Was it just human ignorance paired with basic survival instincts that we can only now overcome? Also, if it is this, how do you think we would be able to overcome these innate parts of ourselves to change society as time goes on? I loved your speech and will complete the end in the coming days.

I rele enjoyed that and it was very well done snozz. It rele made me rekindle my nexus feels for w.e reason, not that I lost them but helped me remember why I came to this amazing place somehow to be able to almost unknowingly be in need of a support group lol
You rele happened to strike down on the things that I've always had a problem with in interpreting all the things you learn from the substances and having to come back to this society that is so opposite of almost everything you get shown from the psychedelic experience.
Thanks again for the great speech and hope you keep spreading the nexus gospel

Very nice. Some of the experiences you describe sound a lot like what we talk about in Zen practice; are you familiar?

Full spectrum win extract

Thanks for all the replies


For whatever it's worth, I didn't drop out of school and still collected my papers. That said, I firmly believe that the greatest good I have been able to do in this world thus far has been outside the realm of academic institutions and has had very little to do with my degrees. Granted, the process of pursuing my degree, or at least going through that stage of my life factored into many subsequent thoughts and actions. For me, it's inseparable as anything else in life, but personally I would not make the claim that I have used (or been able to use) my degree to help my fellow humans. That's neither an indictment nor an endorsement of a degree...simply my own experience.


Ha! You could write several books on these questions and not do them justice. Let me take some time and think about a brief answer and perhaps a short list of potentially interesting reading materials and get back to you on that


I have done some Zen meditation and listened to several "notable" people discuss some Zen concepts, but I am not intimately acquainted with Zen as a philosophy or practice. Would you mind elaborating?

Nice! I'm watching this.

I just realized that I had the intention of spending that psychedelic themed day at the luminal village but somehow ended up taking a rather large dose of acid and forgot all about it Another cosmic joke.

Luckily I can still see parts of it!

Wasn't able to attend the Boom even thou i was spending time in Portugal this year so this is great. I can see one of Nexus members giving a great presentation. Funny how people never look any similar to what you create in your mind. Great stuff Snozzle.

quality talk Snozz, you represent us well, cheers

Fur sure!

So one of the most notable things the stuck out to me is when you were talking about what to do after the experience... to sit with it, and to not judge it. This is basically when Zen teaches we should do with all life situations when we are doing Zazen.

I think there may have been other things, but I'll have to re-watch the talk later to be able to remember them!

Also, on a side-note, your talk has kind of inspired me to actually try to make a difference with what I am about to start going back to college for: Electrical Engineering. I feel I should use my skills to work with companies who are at least trying to use sustainable recources to make things like elecric cars and solar panals. Eventually I'd like to create a company that tries to 'sustainability profitable, and profit sustainable'. Obviously I won't make billions, but I don't care about making a ton of personal spending cash. I'd reinvest most of it into trying to reach out to other companies to help them see that it is possible to be truely sustainable and profitable at the same time. (Long-term goal btw!)

Much love!

Totally, that makes a lot of sense. I have to admit that for me it's much easier to do with psychedelic experiences than with more "mundane" life experiences, for a number of reasons. I guess that perhaps this is one of those arenas where it emphasizes the need to move beyond the common dichotomizing of psychedelics vs meditative practices and really highlights psychedelics and meditative practices as disciplines that benefit greatly from informing each other.


I'm glad to hear it, as that's really the most I could hope for. More than love or accolades (which are nice, of course), for me, success looks like getting people to think about these things and hopefully apply what makes sense in their own lives.

If I may gently point a few things out? I think we have to be careful when using words like "sustainable" to refer to things like electric cars and solar panels. In some ways they may be less detrimental than the current alternatives, but I would not go so far as to call them sustainable.

The materials and resources needed to build an electric car (and run the plants that do so) as well as the waste generated from such production are not what I would call sustainable. Also, remember, electricity is not an energy source. All of the electricity that these cars are running on is being generated somewhere and has an inherent ecological cost. Much of the waste and environmental impact from any car (electric or not) comes from the production, not the use of the car.

Solar panels also require production and refinement. The mining of resources and the refining/production processes are incredibly destructive and generate waste that (typically) disenfrachised communities have no say in and are forced to deal with. Look into LULU (locally unwanted land uses) cases in the US and you can see a pattern of these facilities being crammed down the throats of impoverished communities all over the nation. I don't know what it's like elsewhere (although I have read some horror stories about windmill production in China) but I assume it's largely the same.

I'm not saying this to discourage you, but rather to encourage you to think outside of the box. Especially if you are going to school for this now. Are their alternatives that we can dream up that carry even less ecological cost? What would they look like? How could we implement them? I don't have that level of expertise or knowledge, but hopefully people like you can explore that. And, similarly, if we reach the conclusion that we can't come up with such technologies, then let's have discussions about what alternatives we do have and what we need to do to make them a reality.

Thanks for the feedback and ongoing discussions, this is precisely what's needed, imo.

I totally understand that 'green' technologies these days have unseen costs to the people, animals, and environment. That is why I hope to one day find a way to make batteries, solar panel, and other things out of plant-based materials. It may sound a little crazy to current conservative scientist types, but if we could make a more efficient battery only using plant based materials and chemicals (that's also maybe biodegradable, or if not at least recyclable) then we could change the game so to speak. Or, if instead of relying on glass and metal mining for solar we could use hybrid chlorophyll solar cells that would be awesome too! I personally don't see us as a collective species ever giving up things like cars or electricity, so it would be really great if we could just find actually sustainable ways of producing such things!

You should be proud of what you are doing Snozz..you have really achieved so much and your words will be heard by people all around the globe..an inspiration for us all. I also could not imagine a better voice representing the DMT nexus.

Thank you for being you Snozz.

Most Eloquent. Excellent Presentation. Intuitively I believe from the tone, inflection, accent and pace of your wording that you are the kind of sincere soul who cringes at being told to be proud. Not only do you deserve to be but I and I am sure many here are proud of you. I look forward to more.

Love & Respect,




"Further up and Further In"
Aslan

Snozz,

I just wanted to say that I have much respect for the work you are doing.
In fact I could go so far as to say you are true inspiration.

Peace

Snozz..

you embody the 'Cyber-Psychedelic Revolution' that Terence spoke of..

respect and thanks

Another great talk Mr Snozz, I doff my cap to you good sir!! Great content and eloquently presented, you represent the Nexus very well, well played!