[lbo-talk] why the water will soon be around our ankles

Jerry Monaco monacojerry at gmail.com
Sun Dec 10 10:21:13 PST 2006


On 12/10/06, Sean Andrews <cultstud76 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On 12/10/06, Colin Brace <cb at lim.nl> wrote:
> > Why don't they just open a window?
>
Sean's Explanation:> If it's like most of the buildings I work in, the windows are sealed
> shut or aren't even made to open. It's institutional technocratic
> rationality in its purest expression--and also a good example of how
> cultural norms (i.e. the use of climate controlled environment and the
> fear/insurance liability of the safety hazard of an open window in a
> building more than four stories high) determine behavior. It is a
> small scale version of the problems mentioned here about the general
> lack of choice in urban/suburban life--or the way that choice is
> circumscribed to a narrow range of possibilities, most of which result
> in the greatest profit and least risk for the developer, regardless of
> effects on the citizens or the environment involved.
> ___________________________________
>
On 12/10/06, Doug Henwood <dhenwood at panix.com> wrote:
>
> On Dec 10, 2006, at 6:51 AM, Colin Brace wrote:
>
> > Why don't they just open a window?
>
Doug's explanation> Because the air doesn't circulate to one part of the office, and
> fans, apparently, are too retro.

Monaco's moral musings on this thread:

So why do I prefer Sean's explanation to Doug's? In other words I prefer the explanation about capitalists preferring to shuffle off the consequences of their choices onto the public at large to the explanation that you can open the window and buy fans. I prefer Sean's explanation to Doug's even though it is Doug's story and Doug's office and he is an eyewitness who can tell me the truth of the matter and has no reason to lie. But Sean's explanation is so much more satisfying, and of course the two explanations are not mutually exclusive. Still, still, I want to disregard Doug's reliable reply and hold onto the safety of the fact that we can trace all of this back to capitalist profits, in the big and the small. So Doug must be lying or not telling us the whole truth. He must be. Soon I will forget what Doug said about fans being retro and only remember Sean's much more complicated, less razor-like, analysis of the externalities caused by insurance companies and real estate profits.

Not that is ideology! Now that is an instance of preferring the complicated explanation to the simple explanation when the simple explanation is true but the complicated one is more satisfying.

Hmmm, maybe I should stop criticizing Zizek and Angelus (what a flying pair) and concentrate on myself. But it is so much more fun criticizing others than trying to improve myself.

Well, back to the cartoon of life. Everything I know about myself I learned from listening to old Jack Benny radio shows.

Jerry



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