<nettime> Morlock on the couch

[Joseph Rabie <joe@overmydeadbody.org>]

Morlock Elloi has been a longtime presence on this list. Always provocative, he even used to be funny (I have on occasion expressed appreciation for these qualities). Apart from this, his prose is generally garbled and difficult to understand, demanding too much effort to unravel (for me, anyway). 

On the one hand, he presents himself as a sort of bulwark against corporate and state predation, an evil empire that is (according to him) working towards enslaving us all, denying us our individuality and personal sovereignty. In this regard, he rants on and on, to the point where valid critique is superseded by paranoia.

We are all, (according to him), the victims of an ongoing, universal conspiracy that deliberately sets out to destroy our freedom in furthering its oligarchic aims.

On the other hand, he banalises sexual violence, notably against women, considering such denial of individuality and personal sovereignty as being of little importance.

Indeed, he dismisses those concerned by such issues as being preoccupied by petty victimhood.

The contradiction between these two positions, defending one important freedom while denying the other, is paradoxical. Perhaps, as the name Morlock Elloi (spelt by H. G. Wells with one "l", by the way) indicates, he might have split-personality issues. 

Joe.



#  distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission
#  <nettime>  is a moderated mailing list for net criticism,
#  collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets
#  more info: http://mx.kein.org/mailman/listinfo/nettime-l
#  archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@kein.org
#  @nettime_bot tweets mail w/ sender unless #ANON is in Subject: