Alter Destiny—A Survivor’s Guide


Thomas Stanley

Sun Ra said it: Alter Destiny is a verb and a noun. Like the name of his big band, the titles of his many musical works, even his own name, it is a proprietary coinage, an indivisible part of his “brand.” It is, arguably, the entelechial apex atop a century-spanning conceptual art pyramid erected through Sun Ra’s monumental lifework.

On Oct. 6, 1990, I interviewed Sun Ra while working at the radio station WPFW-FM in Washington, D.C. When I asked him if there was a future for people on this planet, this is how he answered:

“You have to use an equation and use the vice future, the alter future. You know, in the church they use the altar, a-l-t-a-r. You got to use a-l-t-e-r, alter; that means change. In other words, you substitute a future for the one you got. The one you’ve got ain’t no good. Pull it out. You put the vice future in there, like you put the vice president in there if the president fails. Well, you’ve got a vice future. The vice future is pure—you ain’t did nothing with it. But the future is based on the past. The vice future stands by itself; it has no past. It’s never been used.”

Pull it out! The dystopian-train-wreck of a future promised us by Techno-Feudalism is neither desirable nor inevitable. Extirpate that vile nonsense. This other future—the one that is pure and not based on the past—defines a state of affairs, a direction, unlike destiny, unlike where we are going, unlike where we have been. Sun Ra gave us an idea about human development beyond the myriad racist, patriarchal, violent and often Eurocentric progressivisms that have plunged our planetary home into chaos, bloodshed and ecological catastrophe. Our cultural toolbox is empty, Sun Ra wants us to know, and there is something folded up within the occult wealth of human potentiality that must emerge—soon—lest all is lost.

Alter Destiny. If it’s on a T-shirt, it must be real. It’s a small chunk of language, a key unlocking large powers and capacities that will allow us to realize sustainable futures that are not subordinate to the same imperial regime that fucked up our planet in the first place. History is the plantation, abolitionist Ra reminds us, and it is time to break loose from these chains and leave.




Thomas Stanley (a.k.a Bushmeat Sound) is an artist, writer and activist deeply committed to audio culture in the service of noetic (r)evolution. In 2014 he authored The Execution of Sun Ra, a critical response to the cosmological prognostications of the late jazz iconoclast. His doctoral work examined Butch Morris' art of conduction as an extended meta-instrument opening unexplored avenues for musical pedagogy and ensemble consciousness. Dr. Stanley is a professor of sound art and critical theory at George Mason University.

Read next: Sun Ra, Alter Destiny and AfroFuturism Frequently Asked Questions by Thomas Stanley





Founded in 2020, Three Fold is an independent quarterly based in Detroit that presents exploratory points of view on arts, culture, and society in addition to original works in various media, including visual art, literature, film and the performing arts. We solicit and commission contributions from artists, writers, and activists around the world. Three Fold is a publication of Trinosophes Projects, a 501(c)3 non-profit organization located in the historic Eastern Market neighborhood in downtown Detroit. Click here to check out Three Fold’s events page and view a schedule of the publication’s on-site activities.

Three Fold recognizes, supports, and advocates for the sovereignty of Michigan’s twelve federally-recognized Indian nations, for historic Indigenous communities in Michigan, for Indigenous individuals and communities who live here now, and for those who were forcibly removed from their Homelands. We operate on occupied territories called Waawiiyaataanong, named by the Anishinaabeg and including the Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe (Chippewa), Odawa (Ottawa), and Bodewatomi (Potawatomi) peoples. We hold to commit to Indigenous communities in Waawiiyaataanong, their elders, both past and present, and future generations.