hi matt,
i'm a little drunk so i hope this all makes sense...
> Does this imply some sort of
> 'lack'...or loss...well, I don't see that it has to, I don't see how a
> blockage is, unless valued as a lack, necassarily in any way a lack. That
> may well be why if the 'blockage' is seen as ok, ('fine'), then what is
said
> in AO can be taken back. It is not about arguing whether a revolution is
> necassary but of thinking thriough what that revolution might entail _iff_
> you already think if is necassary.
>
> in that sense I think the question of whether D&G show the necessity for a
> 'revolutionary stance' is redundant, it cannot be shown but only felt, and
> if you don't feel that it is necassary then the tools provided in AO won't
> seem necassary either. It won't work for you, it won't begin to operate
and
> produce. In that case it may be best to simply ignore it, to drop it.
>
on reflection, before and after this thread, my point has never been that
"things are fine" or that d&g's ideas of lines of flight and becomings
aren't productive, perhaps even necessary... what i distrust is posing it
in terms of revolution: that, to me, suggests bad conscience. to amplify
this: by associating these experimental programs with "revolution" on one
hand, and by giving these experiments a sort of natural imperative, on the
other ( hey! the rocks are deterritorializing... why aren't you?!) they
become less interesting or persuasive. they start to slide into the
category of "the improvers of mankind". "why haven't you been becoming?
_how_ can you hold on to that stratified territory? shame on you!!" -- this
seems to me a disasterous and somewhat absurd state of affairs! not least
because it gives way to much control to your stratified little self, who can
suddenly "choose" a becoming, or "choose to follow a line of flight" --
becoming, lines of flight: these carry us away, unbidden. they are at the
limit, they cross the limits. they desolate and destroy us. we cannot
"choose" them in the name of a revolutionary spirit... we cannot sit and
read and resolve to "become" more. it's a vast, inhuman wave that breaks
(on) us. becoming or following a line of flight is not about just becoming
more liberal or tolerant, more open-minded, less fascist, less
authoritarian: forget the cop in your head !! -- becoming isn't human, it
doesn't wear masks of power. it comes regardless of "you". it has nothing
to do with "revolution". it has to do with the unknown. d&g's
"revolutionary politics" are just a reterritorialization, a comforting
return to familiar pastures... they have much more interesting things to
say. [hey! i'm a little drunker than i thought... oops!]
> as to alienation. mmm...is this a concept much at work in D&G do you
think?
actually, no, i don't think it is there... but it seems to remain common
currency nonetheless... a puzzle? perhaps. i don't know: i think that the
talk of "liberating" desire sends people onto an identity politics/"we're
all so alienated" crying jag, ...forgetting that desire is pre-personal,
inhuman, intense multiplicity... what does the unconscious know about
alienation? nothing.
> - in fact, the idea
> of a 'moral' marxism is always, it seems to me, only one side of a much
> richer and much more radically set of strategies that can be inspired by
> marxism and there is a strong current of an anti-humanist/anti-moralistic
> marxism.
absolutely. a current that d&g tap with great results...
> There is a passage of marx where he gives one of his elusive hints
> as to what it might be like in a communist society, and in this he speaks
of
> the person acting and producing 'freely', doing one thing in the morning
and
> another in the afternoon 'as they see fit', without being within a
mediating
> structure of abstract labour. Personally that sort of autonomist vision
> appeals to me since it seems to best express the productive attitude.
> Unfortunately it seems to be only really exemplified within capitalist
> society in terms of the bohemian artist-producer.
i know the passage well. but it has lost its appeal for me somewhere along
the line... i was going to say "sadly" but i don't know if it is sad or
joyful? it seems too utopian for me to consider now. as a sort of
bourgeois fantasy of the ideal state of man: a little wood chopping, a
little reading... it sounds great to me too! but it is just a fantasy. it
never has nor will be. to me, it's part of a socialist imaginary: the world
as a moral place. but morality is just our dream...
> i realise this response doesn't really 'answer' the questions/problems
> you're posing but there you go... ;-) i'll stop because of length more
than
> any other reason cos otherwise i could ramble on far too long.
you should ramble... rambling, too, is a line of flight: you never end up
where you expect...
dan
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daniel@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
old, old web stuff:
http://www.machine75.freeserve.co.uk
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"Do not ask who I am and do not ask me to
remain the same: leave it to our bureaucrats
and our police to see that our papers are in
order. At least spare us their morality when
we write." - Michel Foucault
