STRENGTH

 

About 20 years ago a friend at the Theosophical Society told me that I got away with things that no one else would.  I laughed and agreed.  And there was a reason why I did and still do get away with stuff that would get other people hanged.

 

I don’t follow the rules and I don’t pretend to.

 

You see it works like this.  People will tolerate just about anything as long as you are open about what you are doing.  For example, Larry Flint is a vile human being but that does not prevent him from being regarded as a hero.  Why?  Because he makes no apologies for what he is or what he does and folks admire that type of honesty.  They like their bad boys as long as they come out and say they are bad.

 

Now me, I’m an outlaw psychic researcher.  I don’t follow any canons of ethics and openly ridicule conventional morality.  I write about doing things that other researchers won’t even admit that they think about, much less take secret black project grants to work on.  And I have a lot of fun with it.

 

I’m a leader, sort of, in an alternative lifestyle—oh screw it—I’m a pervert!  I do things for fun on a weekend that in other contexts would be considered war crimes.  (And I love to see the looks on my fellow pervs faces when I remind them of that.  They turn purple!)

 

What this boils down to is that attacking me from any conventional, moral point of view is going to backfire.  As long as I am witty and charming and terrible no one who matters is going to care and no one who cares is going to matter.

 

Now, there is a rationale behind this.  A very calculated one.

 

First, I’m not a conventional thinker.  If I try to be I’m not going to accomplish very much.

 

Second, I enjoy my lifestyle and want the maximum freedom to indulge it.  Hiding limits you.

 

Third, I have people who don’t like me.  Some of them downright hate me.  If I were to pretend to be a good, honest, moral, nice person they would nail my hide to the wall in an instant because the truth is otherwise.  As it is, they are helpless.

 

As I said to a friend recently, “If you are going to be the bad guy, be the BAD guy.”