No subject

[johnk at cyberjava.com]

At 04:33 PM 4/10/99 +1100, you wrote:
>Doug quotes Zizek:
>
>>"All this cultural stuff is a dead end. We look at some film noir and see a
>>counterhegemonic subtext. Nonsense! We should be doing political economy
>>instead."
>
>I like this bloke more the more of him Doug feeds us.
>
>and Tavia suspects:
>
>'Could you say that the only reason we feel motivated to have these sub/heg
>debates is because we really enjoyed and/or were moved by the movie, but we
>worry that if we enjoy a mass entertainment unreflexively, we become
>complicit with some industrial-technological-entertainment complex? If so,
>arguing the political merits and demerits of a film becomes prophylaxis: a
>way to participate in the enjoyment of the film while protecting ourselves
>against the legitimating effects of that enjoyment.'
>
>I wouldn't like to make Mike Hoover cross (as I admire his posts on all
>things), but I think there's much to this.  And there's good old-fashioned
>showing off somewhere in there as well.  (I am reminded of that Ozzie art
>critic's - the one who wrote *The Culture of Complaint*, *The Shock of the
>New* and *Fatal Shore* [wassisname?  Robert something?] note that Picasso's
>*Guernica* did nothing to prevent a thousand Guernicas - you could say the
>same for a *Schindler's List* or a *Saving Private Ryan*).  Buffies and
>Matrices have nothing to do with anything that matters.
>
>But we can't get upset about that, 'coz we don't either.  I guess that's
>what should be making us cross.
>
>And as for Besancon, Doug - you can see where he's coming from, but we have
>to be very careful.  We have enough recent examples of lefties proposing
>entirely different 'truths', don't we?  They get exposed on a relatively
>minor point of empirical fact, destroying their whole project in particular
>and a big chunk of the left's credibility in general.
>
>That a kernel of truth usually underpins the greater lie is true.  To deny
>that kernel is to risk giving the lie to one's greater truth, I reckon.
>
>If it's Yugoslavia you have in mind here, I reckon a perfectly tenable
>argument can be made against NATO that need not even refer to the deeds
>NATO enumerated to justify themselves.  We needn't deny their premises; we
>just take off from a different platform:
>
>eg,
>
>that strategic bombing on its own is murder without a point (you have all
>*their* history books to point to);
>
>that evidence both leading up to the strike (failure to exhaust diplomatic
>options) and following it (failure to match the enthusiasm and commitment
>they evince in their bombing to help the very refugees in whose name
>they've been doing said bombing) point to either obscene stupidity or
>murderous deceit and opportunism (you have all *their* newspapers to poin
>to);
>
>that a plethora of perfectly foreseeable effects definitively militate
>against the interests of *anybody* with whom a reasonable person could feel
>sympathy etc etc ... (you have *their* common sense to point to).
>
>Hoist 'em on their own petard, I reckon (whatever that means).  That way,
>you're coming from where those you seek to persuade are currently at, no?
>
>Cheers,
>Rob
>
>
>
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Date: Wed, 14 Apr 1999 00:42:48 -0700
To: lbo-talk at lists.panix.com
From: John Kawakami <johnk at cyberjava.com>
Subject: Re: "Matrix", Zizek and Besancon
In-Reply-To: <l03130300b33486211de7@[137.92.41.119]>
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At 04:33 PM 4/10/99 +1100, you wrote:

John Kawakami johnk at cyberjava.com