Re: [ox-en] Re: [ox] Re: Oekonux and politics
- From: "Thomas Berker" <thomas.berker hf.ntnu.no>
- Date: Tue, 14 Oct 2003 11:20:19 +0200
Hi Adam
On Mon, 13 Oct 2003 01:31:30 [PHONE NUMBER REMOVED], "Adam Moran"
<adam webarchitects.co.uk> said:
hi stefan, hi list
Stefan Merten wrote:
1 hours ago Thomas Berker wrote:
As I stated above: These are all important questions if you build
dams. If you build dams you need to know how to move earth in high
quantities and make it as hard as possible, compute all the angels as
good as possible and so on. The very most of these questions are
completely meaningless when you want to build ships.
Even if you build ships you will become involved in current currents the
very same moment you want to sail away. That exactly is the limitation of
this otherwise nice metaphor.
No it is not its limitation. The water is the common denominator. But
the water in this picture IMHO is the reality or the historical
process if you like. To me this metaphor points to two different ways
to deal with reality. One way is to build dams and resist the water /
historical process another way is to build ships and sail on it.
I. i think any metaphor that gives another alternative is useful and
for
that i say thank you - however i think there is an error in us thinking
of ourselves like a ship sailing on a sea of history - we should not
abstract ourselves from the historical process
Walter Benjamin's description of Paul Klee's painting 'Angelus Novus'
[1] makes the same error; here the media is air rather than water:
I agree. I read Benjamin's 'new angel' as a dream-like vision in one of
history's darkest hours. The angel is facing all the atrocities of the
past unable to turn around and face the future. Still, he is driven
forward. I am not surprised that it lead to a dream as well in your case.
Regarding the ship builder's metaphor's I should put it more precisely: I
think it could be a worthwhile undertaking for Oekonux to unite ships
building a fleet. Your point, however, remains.
" ... "Angelus Novus" shows an angel looking as though he is about to
move away from something he is fixedly contemplating. His eyes are
staring, his mouth is open, his wings are spread. This is how one
pictures the angel of history. His face is turned toward the past.
Where we perceive a chain of events, he sees one single catastrophe
which keeps piling wreckage upon wreckage and hurls it in front of his
feet. The angel would like to stay, awaken the dead, and make whole
what has been smashed. But a storm is blowing from Paradise; it has got
caught in his wings with such violence that the angel can no longer
close them. This storm irresistibly propels him into the future to
which his back is turned, while the pile of debris before him grows
skyward. This storm is what we call progress."
II. thanks for the metaphor ... it lead to an interesting dream ;)
we were all on a ship, exchanging 'bon mots' in lots of different
languages - it was great ... '7 of 9' was there too ;) ... any way it
started to rain on the inside of the ship !
"what the f***s happening here 7 ?" i say "it's like the last scene of
'solaris[2]' !"
"we are not islands" she says "we are the water"
III. on the bigger issue of this thread 'oekonux and politics', i'm
glad
oekonux exists and think its openness alone will attract further members
over time - i think that its existing members are doing a variety of
things to 'further aid the cause' elsewhere ... and that those elsewhere
places are currently the best places to do that kind of stuff
further, i think that we should not entertain notions of being on the
'left'
question ? does any one on this list consider them selves to be
'left-wing' ? i don't - i think of left-wing and right-wing as just
wings of capital and only of passing interest to what's happening
virtually ... or moreover what could be happening virtually to the world
given this seed and our participation / precipitation
the question must be how to grow this seed to our mutual benefit ?
I confess, yes, I used to consider myself to be left-wing. However,
dividing the political spectrum into exactly two spheres (the right, the
left) is a rather rough proxy to describe what kind of politics one
stands for. So lets forget it. Yet, what I sensed in the discussion about
Oekonux' relation to the outside world (particularly in Stefan Merten's
posts), is the dismissal of another one's standpoint for being
'left-wing', whithout looking at his or her actual political orientation.
That is what I reacted to.
Best, Thomas Be
--
Thomas Berker, NTNU, Trondheim, Norway
Fax: +47-735-91327
Office phone: +47-735-51031
Mobile phone: +47-92434811
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