Go2Go2Go2
^{Travel Exhortations by Ric Carter}

ABERRENT TRAVEL
Applying Psychopathology to Your Journeys

I recognize terror as the finest emotion and so I will try to terrorize the reader. But if I find that I cannot terrorize, I will try to horrify, and if I find that I cannot horrify, I'll go for the gross-out. —Stephen King, Danse Macabre

Terror is the object of much attention these days, but what about horror? Classic horror is woefully absent from the public consciousness, possibly because of the overwhelming mundane horrors that confront us daily: mass murder up to the scale of genocide; massive environmental devastation up to the level of ecocide; a blithe disregard for the future existence of humanity on this planet.

[Horror] is unlike terror, which is extreme and sudden fear in the face of a material threat... The terror can be dissipated by a round of buck-shot. Horror, on the other hand, is fascinated dread in the presence of an immaterial cause. The frights of nightmares cannot be dissipated by a round of buckshot; to flee them is to run into them at every turn. —Sigmund Freud, The Uncanny

But why publically ignore horror? Is horror less exploitable (politically and commercially) than mere terror? I supect that, since terror is solvable and horror isn't (as Freud noted), what is labeled a TERRORIST THREAT is actually treated as horror by propagandists and pundits and other political manipulators, who nurture a popular "fascinated dread" to justify their continuance in power. Were a material threat to be dissipated, what need would there be of the vast machinery opposing it? Attackers susceptible to police action are much more (politically) useful when transformed into global bogeys that must be fruitlessly fought forever.

The heart of aberrence is people treating others as beasts. At least we can have fun traveling to destinations where people have been or will be bestial to each other. Travelers with aberrent minds will rather enjoy the following, I suspect. Whatever.

• * TERROR HOLIDAYS - Visiting Everybody's Favorite Terror Targets
• * HORROR TRAVEL - Visiting Everybody's Favorite Horror Sites
• * GROSS-OUT TRIPS - Visiting Our Favorite Gross-Out Sites
• * TERROR REFERENCES - More Stuff For Your Reading Pleasure

TERROR TRAVEL

You always want to be where the action is, but you've already been to all the usual destinations. Ordinary vacations, even so-called "adventure" excursions, are just so old-hat, and they're always filled with the same old people. Why not try something new? Take a TERROR HOLIDAY! Visit all the places thaqt are prime terrorist targets, the most likely place for EXPLOSIVE adventure, DYNAMITE thrills, FLASHING colors and lights, jolts of excitement SHOOTING through your nerves! Here are some fabulous places to go, both the old favorites that have witnessed terror attacks many times in the past, and the new, upcoming hot spots for future insurgent action.

Everybody's Favorite Terror Targets

•   NEW YORK and WASHINGTON DC, USA - These are long-time magnets for activists from the Black Panthers to Ql-Qaeda. Don't expect that they'll be any less desirable in the future. The Big Apple and the Big Cesspool will attract violent attention as long as the USA is the world's imperialist master!
•   OKLAHOMA CITY and CHICAGO, USA - Oklahoma City (or OKC) is a landmark, America's first major domestic terror attack. Chicago is a likely (if boring) target for future terrorist actions. The OK Oiltown and the Windy City demonstrate that America's Heartland can still be a wild and crazy place!
•   LOS ANGELES and SAN FRANCISCO, USA - These glitzy Left Coast metropoli and their hi-tech suburbs are just *crying out* for the careful touch of someone with dirty nukes. With the Bay Area bridges and Silicon Valley, and LA's ports and cinema/TV production, it's only a matter of time!
•   LONDON, PARIS, ROME, MADRID - The capitols of Western Europe have been traditional hotbeds of terrorist action and activism. Even under the umbrella of American hegemony, they'll still be attractive targets for decades to come, or until Muslim patriots get hold of a few suitcase nukes.
•   MOSCOW, RUSSIA and BEIJING, CHINA - As long as Moscow tries to obliterate the Chechens, they'll return the compliment. And mix the nationalist aspirations of China's minorities with the upcoming Olympics Games, and the Forbidden City may soon be all that sticks above the encroaching sand dunes.
•   JERUSALEM, ISRAEL and MECCA, ARABIA - These two holiest of holy places in the MidEast are the most likely to be vaporized in the upcoming Final Resolution to a long, tedious conflict. When the Holy Lands are glowing, religious enthusiasts will need to find somewhere else to fight each other.
•   INFRASTRUCTURE, ALMOST ANYWHERE - Bridges and tall buildings and command-and-control centers. Nuclear and petroleum and any other power-generation or processing facilities. Bus and train stations and routes, airports and seaports and spaceports. Tourist and financial centers. Anywhere people gather. BOOM!

HORROR TRAVEL

Real horror implies something paranormal or supernatural, something that SHOULD NOT be here, but is. This is NOT the same as people merely being horrible to others, which is more accurately classified as a GROSS-OUT (see below). Horror from human agencies may SEEM to leave traces from beyond. Thus, I can't stand to go into old prisons or places of imprisonment and/or torture, because they seem to emit VERY bad vibes. But I'm probably picking up pheromonal traces, scents of ancient fears and pains embedded in the walls, not the crying-out of tortured spirits, right?

Sometimes people inflict human horror on others because of SUSPICION of supernatural links, as with witch-hunting and its attendant slaughters. Whatever. You can still seek out horror sites and soak up whatever paranormal vibes you may hope to find there. Just remember that in THE WEREWOLF OF PARIS the depredations of the undead pale beside the actual horrors inflicted by Prussian troops besieging the French capital. Horror is where you find it.

Everybody's Favorite Horror Sites, Past and Present

•   TRANSYLVANIA - A mountainous region of present-day Romania. Famous as the home of the fictional(?) Count Dracula and the actual Vlad Dracul aka the Impaler, and Blood Countess Elizabeth Bathory. In the literature, Transylvania (land "beyond the woods") is full of dark forests, superstitious peasants and fearsome undead creatures, eaters of human flesh. Historically, Transylvania was settled by German-speaking colonists, whose removal ("ethnic cleansing") constituted a more mundane horror. Now a Dracula theme park is being built, although zoning restrictions have forced its relocation. Construction is being ram-rodded by a son of a former Communist dictator who orchestrated numerous mundane horrors.
•   SALEM - A coastal town in Massachussetts, north of Boston. Famous for witch-hunts, although many more were burnt in various European locations. Fictionalized(?) by HP Lovecraft as spectre-haunted Yarmouth, home to odd mutant enthusiasts of Cthulhu worship. Ignore the existing theme-park aspects of modern Salem and you'll see the crumbling mansions, hear the rats behind the walls, smell the loathesome odors wafting through this den of evil. Or is that downtown Manhattan? Whatever. Go to Salem and have fun hexing around like everybody else. Take care which doors you approach.
•   PARIS SEWERS - Underneath the capital of France. Forget the sewage stuff; this maze of passageways connects to catacombs, subways, ancient tombs, pre-Xian temples and palaces, armaments caches, unholy wine cellars, and revenant hideaways. Many blithe spelunkers into this stygian blackness never return. But with a good supply of electric torches and silver bullets for your Uzi, you should be OK as you go exploring here. The New York City subways lead to a similar (but much newer) underworld, inhabited by the escaped souls of stockbrokers, corporate lawyers and conservative activists.
•   ZONE OF SILENCE - In the northern Mexican desert at the juncture of the states of Chihuahua, Coahuilla and Durango. Radios, computers, flashlights don't work here. Micrometeorites, crashed UFOs, shoes, and strange skeletal forms litter the sere landscape. Skinwalkers and shapeshifters and the desert kin of Sawney Bean flit at the edge of vision. Mutation rates are high among the rare local flora and fauna. Mexicans shun the area. Maybe you should too.
•   BERMUDA TRIANGLE - In the Sargasso Sea region of the western Atlantic Ocean, south of Bermuda Island and east of the Bahamas. Numerous ships and planes have disappeared in this vast expanse of demon-haunted sea, the victims screaming out their final bubbling cries as giant radioactive telepathic squids pull them beneath the waves and begin feeding on their frail bodies. The greatest mystery is, why haven't more cruise ships gone down?
•   DISNEYLAND - In Anaheim, California, just southeast of Los Angeles. Included in this listing because of the Haunted House 'attraction' which really sucks. So do just about all commercial "haunted house" and "house of mystery" scams, but this one really takes the cake. Go crawl around in the tunnels and caves of Tom Sawyer Island and use your imagination; it's more fun AND creepier.

GROSS-OUT TRAVEL

Now we get to the inhumanity that people inflict on each other. Hmmm, since it's human-on-human violence, I guess it *can't* be inhumane. It's just gross. Murder, torture, slavery, imprisonment — every sort of violation of self you can imagine. And it's so constant, so it desensitizes us to its existence. Oh gosh, another slaughter (yawn). Some more ethnic cleansing (yawn-yawn). More lies justifying horrible behaviour (zzzzz). Horrible, horrible (thunk).

Still, some people really groove on this shit, just can't get enough. Hey, another prison, another death-camp, another presidential library! Clever travel entrepreneurs organize tours of gross-out locales. So, why not get in on the action? Advertise in venues viewed by aspiring sadists, like FauxNews and Soldier Of Fortune, and you too can rake in good bucks! Why let those eco-weenies have all the fun?

Everybody's Favorite Gross-Out Sites

•   OLD PRISONS - The older and grimmer, the better, especially those that you KNOW had or have extensive torture facilities. You can just *feel* the pain and despair oozing out of the walls.
•   CONCENTRATION CAMPS - Similar to, but usually newer than, those moldy old prisons. Certain older prisons actually served double-duty, both for incarceration and extermination. But newer ones used fancier technology.
•   BATTLEFIELDS - Some of the more extensive battlefields are just *loaded* with old bones, trophies of a good slaughter. Possibly less interesting because the participants may have been volunteers.
•   BURNT CITIES - You just *know* that the screams of hapless civilian victims resounded helplessly off what's left of the walls here! Tell yourself, "It was a good day for them to die!" Smile.
•   NATIONAL PALACES - Here's where the orders were (and are) given for wars great and small, for expulsions, exterminations, inquisitions. Imagine yourself as the leader who gravely says, "Make it so."
•   NUCLEAR SITES - Fission power and processing plants, storage facilities, etc. These places will *always* be hot! Each one, a little Dead Zone that will last longer than humanity lives. Think of it!
•   TOXIC DUMPS - Similar to nukes but usually cheaper, so there are MANY MANY more of them. Entire great lakes (like the Aral Sea) can become toxic dumps, spreading misery to millions! So cost-effective!
•   TV STUDIOS - Here's where mind-deadening propaganda (political, religious, commercial, etc), brain-rot 'entertainment' programming, and sophisticated lies are produced and propagated by your favorite stars. Wow!

TERROR-HORROR REFERENCES

Knowledge is power. The more you know, the more you can do, right? The more you can do, the better you'll feel, right? Then how come I don't feel so good after knowing all this stuff? Whatever. I've put together a few terror- and horror-related items. Only for your reading pleasure, of course.

— TERROR STUFF —

Islamists: KILL the INFIDEL!
TAKFIR: Terror For All
WAHHABI: Mother of Terror
The ANTHRAX Letters
from the UNABOMBER's Journal
SATAN and W's War On Terror

— HORROR STUFF —

— GROSS-OUT STUFF —

Sorry, I'm not going there. Too much mundane, banal, horrible stuff. Even if I wanted to keep track of it (which I don't) there just isn't enough time. Do you want to be grossed out? Just read any newspaper. Have fun.