Since the term "nature" is said in many ways, Shane's comment is as meaningless as it is pompous. As usual.
--- On Thu, 5/7/09, shag carpet bomb <shag at cleandraws.com> wrote:
> From: shag carpet bomb <shag at cleandraws.com>
> Subject: [lbo-talk] Y'all Yeti for This (was: How many earths)
> To: lbo-talk at lbo-talk.org
> Date: Thursday, May 7, 2009, 4:32 PM
> Shane Mage wrote:
>
> > On May 7, 2009, at 2:42 PM, Dennis Claxton wrote:
> >> Zizek says...the premise, the
> >> first axiom even, of every radical ecology is
> “there is no Nature.”
>
> > The premise of the scientific naturalist (sometimes
> called
> > "materialist") world view is that "there is *only*
> Nature."
> > Shane Mage
>
> note to Dwayne: we really ought to write an article
> developing these
> themse or something. :)
>
> reminds me of a conversation Dwayne and I have been having,
> mostly off
> list, about conceptions of nature.
>
> I have been telling him that it would be delicious to have
> him
> consider Zizek's explorations of woman-as-thing in the
> context of
> chivalrous love, where the obvious issue is about putting
> woman on a
> pedastal and, thereby, emptying her of content,
> subjectivity. But the
> less obvious thing about the chivalrous lover is that the
> chivalrous
> lover never actually wants to have sex with the Lady,
> though that
> would seem his most obvious desire.
>
> Rather, the chivalrous lover is terrified of such a
> prospect. Rather
> than sleep with the Lady, the chivalrous lover wants
> endless
> postponement by being subjected to the lady's arbitrary and
> punishing
> demands in order, ostensibly, to win her "love" and thus
> her
> enthusiastic desire to have sex with the chivalrous lover.
>
> i think this analysis of chivalry/romantic love/etc. would
> be
> marvelous applied to the way environmentalist often
> conceive of the
> nature they claim they are part of. but in this claiming,
> there is the
> endless postponement. it is never really so, because to
> claim,
> constantly, "we *are* nature" seems to belie everything
> such a
> statement is supposed to me.
>
> More frivolously, all I can fucking think of is a bugs
> bunny cartoon
> character, Yeti.
>
> Please cue the song, "Get Ready for This" (2 Unlimited --
> dance track
> from 90s) except change the lyrics to, "Y'all Yeti for
> this?" That
> should get you in the right posit.... frame of mind.
>
> Yeti's this cute/ugly furry thing that gets carried away in
> his love
> for Bugs. He grabs him, too strongly, hugs him to his chest
> far too
> hard, and, crushing him, he says, "I'm going to love you
> and stroke
> you and squeeze you and call you george."
>
> and that is what I tend to think happens to the folks who
> don't
> realize that, in their attempt to constantly remind
> themselves that we
> are nature/ nature is us (and believe me, I'm obviously
> sympathetic to
> that view but wonder how it happens that you get to Michael
> Pollan's
> weridness in The Botany of Desire -- i've written about
> this in
> archives.)
>
> So, just remember this: "I'm gonna love you and squeeze you
> and stroke
> you and call you George." (nature)
>
> Interestingly enough, poking around, I learned that the
> Yeti
> character's destructive love for Bugs (nature) is based on
> John
> Steinbeck's character, Lennie, in _Of Mice and Men_.
>
> more here:
> http://www.etiquettehell.com/smf/index.php?PHPSESSID=45d91a1f42857dbbe88eff36f09741e3&topic=25063.msg559691#msg559691
>
> shag
> --
> http://cleandraws.com
> Wear Clean Draws
> ('coz there's 5 million ways to kill a CEO)
>
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