Playboy Interview 1980
Page 23
John: All we are saying is, "This
is what is happening to us." We are sending postcards. I don't let it
become "I am the awakened; you are sheep that will be shown the way."
That is the danger of saying anything, you know.
Playboy: Especially for you.
John: Listen, there's nothing wrong with following examples. We can have figure
heads and people we admire, but we don't need leaders. "Don't follow
leaders, watch the parking meters."
Playboy: You're quoting one of your peers, of sorts. Is it distressing to you
that Dylan is a born-again Christian?
John: I don't like to comment on it. For whatever reason he's doing it, it is
personal for him and he needs to do it. But the whole religion business suffers
from the "Onward, Christian Soldiers" bit. There's too much talk about
soldiers and marching and converting. I'm not pushing Buddhism, because I'm no
more a Buddhist than I am a Christian, but there's one thing I admire about the
religion: There's no proselytizing.
Playboy: Were you a Dylan fan?
John: No, I stopped listening to Dylan with both ears after "Highway
64" [sic] and "Blonde on Blonde," and even then it was because
George would sit me down and make me listen.
Playboy: Like Dylan, weren't you also looking for some kind of leader when you
did primal-scream therapy with Arthur Janov?
Yoko: I think Janov was a daddy for John. I think he has this father complex and
he's always searching for a daddy.
John: Had, dear. I had a father complex.
Playboy: Would you explain?
Yoko: I had a daddy, a real daddy, sort of a big and strong father like a Billy
Graham, but growing up, I saw his weak side. I saw the hypocrisy. So whenever I
see something that is supposed to be so big and wonderful - a guru or primal
scream - I'm very cynical.
John: She fought with Janov all the time. He couldn't deal with it.
Yoko: I'm not searching for the big daddy. I look for something else in men -
something that is tender and weak and I feel like I want to help.
John: And I was the lucky cripple she chose!
Yoko: I have this mother instinct, or whatever. But I was not hung up on finding
a father, because I had one who disillusioned me. John never had a chance to get
disillusioned about his father, since his father wasn't around, so he never
thought of him as that big man.
Playboy: Do you agree with that assessment, John?
John: A lot of us are looking for fathers. Mine was physically not there. Most
people's are not there mentally and physically, like always at the office or
busy with other things. So all these leaders, parking meters, are all substitute
fathers, whether they be religious or political... All this bit about electing a
President. We pick our own daddy out of a dog pound of daddies. This is the
daddy that looks like the daddy in the commercials. He's got the nice gray hair
and the right teeth and the parting's on the right side. OK? This is the daddy
we choose. The dog pound of daddies, which is the political arena, gives us a
President, then we put him on a platform and start punishing him and screaming
at him because Daddy can't do miracles. Daddy doesn't heal us.
Playboy: So Janov was a daddy for you. Who else?
Yoko: Before, there was Maharishi.
John: Maharishi was a father figure, Elvis Presley might have been a father
figure. I don't know. Robert Mitchum. Any male image is a father figure. There's
nothing wrong with it until you give them the right to give you sort of a recipe
for your life. What happens is somebody comes along with a good piece of truth.
Instead of the truth's being looked at, the person who brought it is looked at.
The messenger is worshiped, instead of the message. So there would be
Christianity, Mohammedanism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Marxism, Maoism -
everything - it is always about a person and never about what he says.