What I stand for

WHAT THE ATL STANDS FOR AND WHAT I STAND FOR

Here are the values I espouse, and here is
what the ATL stands for:

I stand for freedom of speech.
The ATL stands for censorships and repression
and thought control.

I stand for absolute honesty regardless of the
time, regardless of the place, regardless of
the reason.
The ATL stands for a willingness to twist the
truth and distort the facts and tell lies regardless
of the time, regardless of the place, regardless
of the reason.

I stand for the rough-and-tumble of freewheeling
debate in the Jeffersonian democracy of an open
society.

The ATL stands for tyrants with whips flagellating
the population into obedience, and then (because
they can't even trust each other) flagellating
one another.

I stand for common human decency.
The ATL stands for brutality and sadism and cruelty.

I cherish creativity and imagination and originality.
The ATL cherishes only dead numbers and soulless
calculatioons in the service of a debunked ideology.

I stand for freedom of thought.
The ATL stands for rigid musical ideology enforced
for threats and lies and bullying and censorship
and ostracism.

I stand for the fragile genius of the individual.
The ATL stands for the mindless changeable passions of
the raging surging mob.

I honor excellence and talent and skill.
The ATL honors only the barren manipulation
of numbers and the vacuous generation of jargon.

I praise the fragile works of individual creativity
which the human spirit produces despite the howls
of the mob and the power of ideology and
the brutal brutal conformity of large institutions.

The ATL praises only the howls of the mob and
the power of ideology and the brutal conformity
of large institutions.

I praise excellence regardless where it comes
from, whether within academia (the superb JI
compositions of Kyle Gann, the outstanding
music of Larry Polansky, the magnificent
microtonal compositions of William Schottstaedt)
or from outside academia (the sublime JI music
of Jacky Ligon, the peerless microtonal compositions
of Bill Wesley, the outstanding microtonal music
and instruments of Jeff Stayton).

The ATL praises only credentials on a piece of
paper and sneers with acid contempt at anyone
who dares to use his imagination and talent
to create without being told by committee of
sycophants that it is socially acceptable to
do so.

I stand for the vibrant human heart, tempered
by hard-won experience-based knowledge and
painstaking scholarship of the best that
has been thought and said.

The ATL stands for empty talk spouted by
blowhards who have accomplished nothing
and produced nothing and created nothing
of any significance.

I stand for truth.
The ATL stands for lies.

I stand for facts and logic.
The ATL stands for superstition.

I stand for the individual's infinite and
unimagined capacities to change the world.

The ATL stands for the collective shrieks
of the mob impelled by ideology to burn
books and tear heretics apart limb from
limb and shout down anyone who dissents
from the status quo.

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--mclaren