reflections on the filth thus far

It seems to me that the Filth just got a bit more complicated in the last little bit, and i'm excited to see how it all comes together. I'm really interested in the whole Feely/Slade identity and how he changes when he goes back and forth between them. Why does he like Feely's life so much? or his non-life i should say since he is just a fictional character, or so the others of the hand keep telling Slade. But how fictitious is Feely? I don't think he is really fictitious at all. Slade (or the essence of him that goes back and forth) makes Feely alive. Feely is real as long as the person living as Feely believes he is real. As for why feely/slade prefer's feely's life better... I'm not really sure. Maybe there's something to be said for the simple life. There's a lot of pressure and stress that comes along with being an officer of the hand. Even though he can't remember a lot of things about the hand, maybe he knows somewhere in him that he didn't like that life.

I also think it's interesting how he's the same person, but is so different when he's feely or slade. As feely, he's weak, dependent, and only concerned about one thing (Tony). As slade he takes charge, shows authority, and is strong and independent. As feely when he's trying to show authority, (when he's arrested and is trying to tell the officers he's above them) he just looks pathetic.

Another thing I was really interested in is the Libertania--A supposedly utopian society that ended up divided despite its efforts to avoid just that. Hughes was right by saying it's a mini model. It's a model that shows that we truly are a survival species that turns everything into a ladder to climb. We step on anything and anyone to get to the top and even when things are designed to eliminate the ladder, we just find other ways to create levels or standards of living and success and achievement. Hughes says, "in the end humans always pick themselves up, organize into roles and start piling up the building blocks of culture again. But what you saw downstairs was a super-organism. The next stage in the evolution of human civilization."

This brings up a couple good points. Humanity has survived endless traumas: war, famine, disease, genocide, deaths of leaders, things that you would think could end up in a purely chaotic mess. But somehow through it all we always reorganize and rebuild. Hughes was taking advantage of this tendency by creating the destruction himself and then molding the reconstruction process to his will. This seems similar to Hitler, after WWI, molding Germany into what he wanted. The country had been hit hard by war and was desperate for some sense, some emerging leadership, and Hitler provided that and the people were willing to follow because their instinct is to rebuild. It's an interesting notion that it's nature that people will reform and rebuild, but what exactly people will re-form or rebuild into can by controlled by someone.

Will the next in evolution be a giant super organism, as Hughes suggested? I think not. I feel that humans are becoming more and more unique, not alike. New technologies allow for individual needs, wants, and fantasies to be met. Like in Ribofunk where the new technologies gave rise to new species, new body parts, and gangs of humans that each had a unique lifestyle and physical body/skills. I don't think we're going to become a super organism like the one in the filth, that breathes, dresses and moves in unison. If we do become a super organism, it will be a very diverse and multi purposed one.