Who are these Cyberpunks?
Ronin is used as a metaphor based on a japanese word for a lordless samurai. As early as the eighth century, the word ronin, translated literally as 'wave people', was used in Japan to describe people who had left their allotted, slotted, case-predetermined station in life. Samurai who had left the service of their feudal lords to become masterless. -Timothy Leary
 The cyberpunk tradition has permeated throughout history. When humans need change and progress we often call on cyberpunks to do the job. Jimi Hendrix changed the realm of music forever.  He learned to play the guitar while he was serving in the army. The catch is he is left handed, and learned to play on a right handed guitar. No one can ever hit the same chord that Jimi could because no one plucks a right handed guitar with their left hand. Jimi and his music is known for its unique notes and style. Jimi did not let the guitar or music conform him, he used his cyberpunk attitude and made the music conform to him. He did not create music, but the "Jimi Hendrix Experience." According to Leary cyberpunks are "inventors, innovative writers, techno-frontier artists, risk-taking film directors, icon-shifting composers, expressionist artists, free-agent scientists, innovative show-biz entrepreneurs, techno-creatives, computer visionaries, elegant hackers, bit-blipping Prolog adepts, special -effectives, video wizards, neurological test pilots, media explorers- all of those who boldly package and steer ideas out there where no thoughts have gone before" (Leary, 1991). With such a broad definition it is hard to understand why the world is not taken over by cyberpunks.
Another example of historic cyberpunk behavior comes from two of the most impressive cyberpunks of our century, Malcolm X and Martin Luther  King, Jr. These individuals changed the way we perceive race in the United States. American history was built upon the oppression and enslavement of African-American people, and it was not until the leadership of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King, Jr, that the collective resolve of African-Americans was mobilized to change the deep rooted racism in this country. American society needed change and progress and it called upon two cyberpunks, who came to the call. Cyberpunks do not always have to produce enormous social change, but it is the risk-taking, self-reliance of a cyberpunk that enables these changes to happen. |
