Q Org & T G Enterprises

I've noticed in a couple of Ligotti stories that he focuses on companies/organizations that literally and figuartively "suck the life" out of people. In my opinion, it's a statement on the negative effects of the corporate world where all you do is sit in a cubicle and fill out paper work and busy yourself with banal duties. Corporate horror indeed. It's almost as if these organizations are people in themselves. Our modern judicial system views corporations as having the same rights as a person. This is an interesting personification/link.

Also in the stories, we are presented with a narrator who learns about others' uh "untimely" encounters with organizations with Quine Org and Teatro Grottesco. Then, the narrator himself experiences the wrath of these organizations or finds out how they work often risking his own life gaining this knowledge.

(there may be other stories involving this theme, but I haven't gotten that far through the work and I may most likely be forgetting a couple that I have read).

But Q Org and T G Enterprises are the ones that stick out in my mind.

anyway...discuss amongst yourselves Ligotti and the Corporation/Organization and its effect on the person

anddddddd GO

I haven't actually seen the movie The Corporation, but from what I've heard, it touches on a subject that intrigues me: if we're to consider big businesses as "persons," then they fit the description of sociopaths. They're single-minded in their self-interest, and endlessly manipulative in their treatment of all other "persons" (be they corporate competitors or flesh-and-blood consumers,) without acknowledging (much less showing remorse for) the damages they wreak. The only time they pour any loot into a "good cause" is when they see a long-term potential for still greater market shares and profit margins. &c.

I suppose one could take the cynical view, that we humans are no less self-interested than the big, evil corporations. Personally, as someone who believes "all is one" (to put it crudely,) I would say that altruistic behavior is actually the most genuine form of self-interest possible; if we identify primarily with the whole, then it becomes imperative to take care of the other "parts" as much as the part that each of us happens to represent. The lovey-dovey prophets of yore weren't just naïve treehuggers, after all.

Similarly, one would think that corporations might reap greater benefits in the long run if they involved themselves primarily in the betterment of the culture, the environment, etc. (whatever that entails.) But, just as humans have a survival instinct programmed in, making it rather difficult for us to let down our various defenses and "get along," corporations are wired in such a way that survival of the individual self trumps all other concerns, even if the resulting tactics would prove self-destructive in a future too distant for present consideration.

What never ceases to amaze me is how easily and to what degree the corporate influence leaves its taint on us in our daily lives. I'd like to think I have a relatively low threshold for corporate/capitalist BS (among other kinds,) but I still have a résumé that contains phrases that mean nothing beyond, "OK, I need money to buy food and pay rent; I'll play along." And, yeah, every time I do play along in interviews or on the job, I feel as if a small part of me has died. I'm being "untrue to myself" in a palpable sense by putting (if only temporarily) what I consider to be healthy and right second to the interests of a nefarious, shadowy beast.

OK, that's my little rant! Who's next??

(edit: I forgot to mention... if you want to see some real corporate horror, check out

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Thank you, ventriloquist, for the link to this thoroughly horrifying video clip. It has had the effect of a ball-peen hammer on both my hangover and my senses. I think "Eye of the Lynx" is the quintessential Thomas Ligotti story on the theme of merger.

(I'm not saying that the stories were written to be read this way, but...)

The Q Org. and the Teatro are the same organisation- rather I think the Q Org mutated from the Teattro, or was one of several creations of Teatro artists.

The Shadow, The Darkness reads, to me, like a job interview for would-be excecutives of a soon-to-be major corporation. Our Temporary Supervisor, The Town Manager, My Case for Retributive Action... these are examples of their creations. Art has become work - life-draining work. Artists have long suffered at the hands of an ignorant public audience and agents who often take more money than they're worth... "No more." It's time to cut teh middle man out and become The Man.

I was more than a little surprised at how easily, for me, the stories fit together, hinting at something much greater. I'll post more thoughts after my second reading of the collection.

beakripped, bear in mind that Mr. Ligotti's corporate horror also includes the three tales in his collection My Work Is Not Yet Done (in chronological order: "The Nightmare Network," "I Have a Special Plan for This World," and "My Work Is Not Yet Done"). Also, "The Bells Will Sound Forever" gives us a little glimpse into the cut-throat nature of competition in the lodging house trade.

I remember feeling disappointed with The Corporation. I agree with its thesis - that if a corporation is viewed as an individual (which it is legally) then it is a sociopath. The movie goes on to list the symptoms of being a sociopath, but then gives a different example of a corporation for each symptom. BOO! Trendy graphics and trendier pop music do not make a solid argument. If they were afraid of being sued for singling out 'individual' corporations, I guess I can live with that. I'm not trying to disuade anyone from watching it, just keep an eye out for flawed reasoning.

I read somewhere that the intent of the draconian bankruptcy reform laws was to prevent corporations (and not real individuals) from getting out of repaying their debts. Unfortunately, since corporations are individuals, then what's done to them must alo be done to us. What a crock! Strip corporations of their individuality!

Cheers!

Glad you enjoyed that (absolutely terrifying) video, Phil. I couldn't help but to think of it myself while I was hungover today... the pain! (But, I did learn something today: Road House is the best movie to watch if you're hungover. It was on cable when I woke up, like a gift from the gods.)

Well, I must have corny movies on the mind (which isn't unusual,) because reading this thread again, I was reminded of The Devil's Advocate, just for the idea that the Forces of Darkness might "adapt" to our culture by infiltrating business, government, etc.

Maybe Q Org and TG are both subsidiaries of a conglomerate owned by the Rupert Murdoch of the Outer Dark. That gives me an idea for a story, somewhere between the Cthulhu Mythos and David Icke....

I agree with all that has been said about corporations, but I think that we are all missing the most important point - that of size. To use an example from literature, Scrooge and Marley was a corporation, but a very small one. Scrooge was, to state the obvious, a scrooge, but, since the story was on a small, human scale, it was believable that he could change for the better.
Ligotti's corporations, just like the large, soulless corporations that dominate our economy, are massive entities that take on a life of their own. This life is ghoulish in its parody of human life. it is the size that allows the corporation to come to life and have a kind of personality. Also, every corporation has its own personality. Bureaucracies are the same way. The Department of State is different from the Department of the Interior, for example.
the trouble with all large organizatons is that there are only a few players. Most folks involved in the daily life of the entity have no say nor power. Only a few dozen people at most have any power and in a large organization no one ever sees them. In some corporations there are so many holding companies that no one has any idea who the real players are.
And, for them it is a form of play. For us it's our paycheck but for them it's a kind of game. They are totally removed from the actual work and we are kept from the power. That's freaky.
The second horrible thing is the nature of the work. For almost everyone it is a form of assembly line work. Only the fortunate few actually do something creative. We are social, creative beings who spend our working lives in isolation involved in repetitious, brain draining tasks. Nothing is worse for us. I'll bet that mainlining heroin is less damaging.
Thomas Ligotti only highlighted the corporate life by mildly exagerating the nature of the work. He didn't have to exagerate very much since the horror is already there.

Hi, Mr. D.:

You're absolutely right; size is a crucial factor in determining whether or not corporate entities might get out of control. The "life" of these corporations is a shadow-play of sorts, in which the modest movements of many pairs of hands are blown up into something resembling monsters. If you stare at the eerie shadows on the screen, then you might not notice the flesh-and-blood hands moving in to strangle you....

I sometimes wonder if my cells/organ systems/etc. (especially my liver and my lungs) don't feel similarly about me.

ventriloquist";p="6060 said:

The "life" of these corporations is a shadow-play of sorts, in which the modest movements of many pairs of hands are blown up into something resembling monsters. If you stare at the eerie shadows on the screen, then you might not notice the flesh-and-blood hands moving in to strangle you....

Click to expand...

An interesting choice of words, ventriloquist. Note the grotesque nature of Richard's hands in "My Work Is Not Yet Done." Corporate horror up close and personal...

beakripped";p="5948 said:

(I'm not saying that the stories were written to be read this way, but...)

The Q Org. and the Teatro are the same organisation- rather I think the Q Org mutated from the Teattro, or was one of several creations of Teatro artists.

The Shadow, The Darkness reads, to me, like a job interview for would-be excecutives of a soon-to-be major corporation. Our Temporary Supervisor, The Town Manager, My Case for Retributive Action... these are examples of their creations. Art has become work - life-draining work. Artists have long suffered at the hands of an ignorant public audience and agents who often take more money than they're worth... "No more." It's time to cut teh middle man out and become The Man.

I was more than a little surprised at how easily, for me, the stories fit together, hinting at something much greater. I'll post more thoughts after my second reading of the collection.

Click to expand...

To go out even futher...

From what it appears to be, the artists of the Teatro Grottesco (which had probably had by itself existed for decades) formed an alliance with an ancient gnostic, pantheistic sect, one which appears in one form or another or is hinted at in "The Last Feast of Harlequin", "Nethescurial", "Sect of the Idiot", "The Prodigy of Dreams", and "The Order of Illusion". This entity is less one unified thing, than many small orders of various sizes, idols, and levels of secrecy. However, the primary ideal of these varied cults is that of an all-transcending deity of immense power and vaguely malign - and highly alien - nature, somewhat on par with Lovecraft's Azathoth and its "courtiers". The sectarians gained the partial service and network of the Teatro, while the Teatro gained access to the sects mysteries. They eventually fused andtransformed into another entity entirely, which gained control of a small corporation in Detroit known as the Blaine Corporation and an even smaller one in a large, politically unstable country known as the Quine Organisation. These businesses grew, Q Org eventually buying out Blaine and provoking, through specially altered or withdrawn medication, rash and bizarre action by unstable employees. Case in example one Frank Dominio. Without such behaviour, they would never be able to push the move towards the project dubbed "Oneiricon" several decades later. Ironically, the remnants of the original Teatro and the cult itself would splinter away from this, organising a sort of psychological terrorist front known as the "Nightmare Network"...