Orgyia leucostigma

Alien Retort: An Olive Branch

 
Communiqué from entity “P-Rod,” Q23-Level liaison to High Council of Zarg, Grand Praetor of Xarnaq IV, regarding “Alien Choke-Out”:

Salutations.
  Monitored transmissions of your rival planetary factions, along with unforeseen tactical abilities of said factions has led to a reassessment by the High Council regarding agendae, strategic goals and meta-conditional contingencies.
  The Praetorium’s stance is but a defensive one, reconnoitering far-flung worlds in search of not only self-destructive civilizations, but destructive ones that may pose a threat to others once they advance to an interstellar threshold.
  Yours is a world torn, and now the Praetorium can clearly see the divide between the constructive and destructive factions in your peculiar system.
  The process you call “pungeoning” has taken the Praetorium aback — an unforeseen advancement by your species. Basic and primitive by the Praetorium’s standards, nonetheless it is not only a sign of your progress, but also an exploitable tactic that can be applied and augmented to the psionic abilities of the Praetorium’s very own species.
  We have much to learn. We all try to see what you call “the big picture.” It is both exciting and overwhelming, even from our advanced view.
  An optimistic dialogue regarding commerce and trade has begun between our worlds. The Grand Praetor he/she/itself is much impressed with your people’s generosity and is eager to open trade relations after sampling such viable commodities you call “tobacco” and “alcohol.”
  We’ll be in touch.
— P-Rod

cc: His/Her/Its Most Exalted Highness Zarg, Grand Praetor of Xarnaq IV
cc: High Council of Xarnaq IV

Alien Choke-Out: Fading Fantasy

 
Case Study:
BBACBL SOP: Intimidation, Strong-Arm Tactics
APF SOP: PSYOPS, Pungeoning
In the contested struggle with ever-present Visitors, the action plans of certain factions (such as the BubbaCabal) default to a brawn-based approach. This method may have worked for their Neanderthal forebears millennia ago, but is currently futile against cultures millennia ahead of them.
  Still, the pipe dream persists of “getting back” at the perceived enemy, or putting the Visitor “in his [sic] place.” Smaller minds refuse to accept the fact that one can’t waterboard an alien (respective of current power differentials).
  The unstated goal of these factions is power for power’s sake, so it is no surprise that their ops are unsavoury, not to mention ineffectual.
  On the other hand, factions such as the Allied Pungeoning Front use an adaptive approach regarding the Visitors. Freedom, not power, is one of their underlying tenets, so simple brute force is a last resort, rather than a first.
  Modifying and adjusting existing tactics is a time-tested method, going back to the machinations of Machiavelli and up to the present-day ploys of pungeoning.
  In fact, pungeoning itself was the sole tactic that helped overcome the Visitors’ psionic upper hand. A taste of their own medicine, if you will.
  Forward-thinkers are behooved to eschew “alien choke-out” fantasies that lead to nowhere... or worse.
  Accommodatote, Adolescitote, Ascenditote.

De dalende Waas van de Zomer

 
Sic infit.
One first notices it off at the horizon. The air thickens with a tawny pall as the mercury climbs. Late afternoons grow lazy and the land/sky boundary blurs in a milky haze with hints of pale ochre, diluted caerulean and dishwater blonde.
  The muted palette under a heavy sun is itself a Cue for the Visions.
  This is the sky above the fields of kudzu rustling in the dying breeze off Pauskil Lane.
  The firmament over the honeysuckle-and-creosote-laden iron byways of Classic City.
  On the outskirts of town, this is the canopy above the Bad Energy Ranch. A dull train whistle in the key of G echoes in the distance through the gauze.
  Ecce: such an abstraction in the universe as a simple colour, tint and hue for the power it has to evoke visions plucked from across the spectrum of time and place.

The Tapfermann Tendency

Breakthroughs in Blame: Ancestral Confrontation

In today’s mad scramble to claim Victim status, Mom and Dad have received an undue amount of finger-pointing from surly offspring with dubious “issues.”
  It is high time to reassess the “Nature vs. Nurture” dichotomy to determine accurate castigation for the iniquities under which our maturing young adults suffer so in their lives.
  Since bullying itself has been de facto outlawed, the Orville Corporation has taken a proactive approach in helping the public deal with blamecasting their perceived inherited neuroses.

  Solution? Orville offers not Primal Therapy, but “Primate Therapy” — a clinical setting that lets individuals reframe their personal and social maladjustments towards the context of a greater congenital gestalt.

Come face-to-face with your ancestral roots.
Confront them with the frustrations you have for your own genetic shortcomings.
Virtual Bully Camp at Orville’s Ancestral Confrontation Labs: Orville behaviourists pair you with the right primate match based on a custom lesson plan. Three days of seminars and hands-on bully labs where you can apply Scream Therapy towards your primate match, or just get some aggression out of your system.
  Match specimens range across a wide variety of primates, from rhesus and pavian to chimp and gorilla.

Meet Kurt Meloskee, at Orville’s Ancestral Confrontation Labs in Orlando, Florida. Kurt asks his genetic forefathers:
“Why?”
“Why the chronic halitosis?”
 “Why the libido issues? The sweaty palms, MPB (male pattern baldness)? Why can’t my back allow me more than half a sit-up? Why the homosexual urges?”

Rest assured. It’s 2014. Nothing is your fault. If you stand up for yourself in the workplace, you’ll be out on the tiles… Your wife left you and took the kids, so no easy targets remain… Until now.
  Come to Orville’s Beratement Therapy Clinic at the Ancestral Confrontation Labs in Orlando and give the monkey a piece of your mind.

Supaiku Magajin Sū 1