Claes Oldenburg: False Food Selection (1966)
Designed by George Maciunas, Published by Fluxus

"Find friends who will deny your heart's desire in exchange for everlasting innocence."

Subtle differences often go unnoticed. They're part of one of the oldest tricks in the book, employed by charlatans throughout history. Sell somebody the title to a property with a slight misspelling in the description, and you've sold them nothing. Promise with a pinkie pledge while slightly mispronouncing the premise; the other will almost inevitably believe they can trust you. A whole lot of what I might label Imformation exists out there that was only intended to mislead you. The unscrupulous revel in such wordplay. They are playing a game their targets never suspect is even being played. They might discover later, if they ever discover, that they were played in the most profoundly cynical way. Discouragement might be the purpose of this play.

They call them Confidence Men, though that label belies what they should elicit. They should, if only by reputation, elicit deep suspicion if not out-right disbelief, for they tend to be almost the opposite of however they might present themselves. They exist as their opposite. Theirs might be the blackest magic. They warmly welcome others into their perdition with the rough equivalent of: "Come on in, the water's fine." Their water's never fine. It's malign. It's poison. They smile like a crocodile. They encourage like a drill sergeant reassures cannon fodder. They exclusively deal in disadvantages. Their purpose is never not dominion. They discourage others to encourage them to rely on their perspective instead of their own God-given. They pretend that only they can see. They specialize in rendering everyone else blind.

Theirs has always been a wasting game, strictly time-limited. From the first pitch, a countdown clock starts ticking. Blessedly few innings ever remain before the inevitable end of this game, so play must move incredibly quickly, dizzyingly. There seems to be no time to perform any deeper due diligence. The limited-time offer expires before anyone could become properly prepared to accept anything. The false premise projects all you'll lose if you don't get in on the ground floor. The elevator's already leaving. It seems impossible that much risk could be involved in simply agreeing to play this once. The promise projected comes so unexpectedly that it's impossible to reconcile. How lucky could one possibly be? How wealthy am I likely to become? I never expected to be this fortunate. I feel so grateful you came along just when I most needed your reassurance.

All this world was never a stage, and none of us were ever merely actors in some play. When you feel that way, as if you've stumbled into a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, it will be your sacred responsibility to simply walk away. Those who stay will remember and rue the day they missed those cues that they were going to be used, abused. They were legion but unseen. They will lose whatever they invested in the enterprise once they discover that there never was an enterprise they thought they were investing in. It was a scam. That benefactor will deny any previous encounter. They will insist that they do not know you from Adam. Your life savings will have evaporated along with your innocent aspirations. You will never again be capable of aspiring so innocently. You will come to recognize that you lost the closest thing to heaven you ever possessed: warm anticipation about your future, your innocence.

The victims learn to dread. They come to understand what they were capable of. They never intended to collude against their own best interests, though that's precisely what they did. They come to distrust their intuition. They become guarded. They lick wounds that can never heal while being licked. Their promised benefactor, who later couldn't remember ever meeting them, somehow escaped prison. He went on to initiate another scam, one equally abominable, and then another, each strangely familiar. His cronies will cackle appreciatively, though they will eventually find he's taken their lunch money, too. There might never be any winners or losers. They are benefactors who seem like angels and angels who appear like devils. Find friends who will deny your heart's desire in exchange for everlasting innocence. The alternatives will never be worth mentioning.

©2025 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #NextWorld, #PureSchmaltz