Re: <nettime> Obama and the dawn of ...

[Wade Tillett <wade@thefrictioninstitute.org>]

On Sat, 2008-11-15 at 16:37 +0100, CJ Hopkins wrote:
> This is my first contribution to the list, to which I've subscribed for 
> some time, so, first, thank you all, and hello from Berlin.

Thanks for the post, CJ.

> assumptions, divides us into two broad groups, namely, those who 
> perceive (real) Democracy at work, and those who perceive a Simulation 
> of Democracy at work. This division is admittedly rather simplistic, and 

By making this division, it seems you are implying a Real Democracy
beyond the (real) Democracy as Simulation. Can reality and simulation be
separated?

> perfect sense, IF one accepts (US-style) representative democracy as the 
> contextual playing field, and is invested in gaining and holding ground 

Well, yes, I'd say this is one of the major contextual playing fields as
it does affect my daily life in significant ways. However, that doesn't
necessarily mean that the best way to influence what happens in that
field is by investing in it. Forces run transversally through it. Other
fields intersect and overlay on top of it. Obama, as I implied in my
previous email, is a single point on which these multiplicities
converge. In him, contingency appears. And he will be drowned in it. He
is already carved up.

As am I (in a more pedestrian sort of way). Thus, I try to look at the
interplay and possible outcomes, to navigate "the geometry or logic of
contingency". How to influence contingency without having the forces
captured? How to "form an unfounded city within the founded city?" 


(all quotes from Serres - see my previous email)

> perfect sense, IF one believes that representative democracy, as 
> practiced in the US, is but a self-protective adaptation ritual 
> performed by the system in order to ensure its survival by absorbing and 
> sublimating potentially radical opposition, especially valuable in 
> moments of systemic crisis.

This is a dangerous line of thinking (as Olja Petrovic mentioned on
another post recently). It implies that things must get worse until we
reach a breaking point at which point everything can be rearranged (sort
of like disaster capitalism). 

I'd ask instead, How best to stoke desire as an engine of change?





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