peter and salvoj

“sovereignty can indeed be defined as nothing other than being able to distance yourself from epidemics of opinion; that is, to refuse to be employed in the service of excitation. We live constantly in collective fields of excitation; this cannot be changed so long as we are social beings….they come from the newspaper and wind up returning to the newspaper. My sovereignty, if it exists, can only appear by letting the integrated impulsion die in me or, should this fail, by my re-transmitting it in a totally metamorphosed, verified, filtered, or re-coded form...I am free only to the extent that I interrupt escalation and that I am able to immunize myself against infections of opinion...I have neither the right nor desire to be either a conductor in a stress-semantic chain or the automaton of an ethical imperative.” Peter Sloterdijk “Neither Death Nor Sun”

...sloterdijk wrote this in the german version in 2001 and so far the english version ( 2011 ) is a book length polemic about an academic kerfluffle peate is having with jurgen habermas which isn't what i am actually looking at....this... “the endless emphasis on the necessity to act, to do something, often betrays the subjective stance of of not doing anything. The more we talk about the impending ecological catastrophe, the less we are ready to do. against such and inter-passive mode, in which we are active all the time to ensure that nothing will really change, the first truly critical step in opposing it is to withdraw into passivity and refuse to participate. This first step clears the ground for a true activity, for an act that will entirely change the co-ordinates of the constellation.” slavoj zizek. “Welcome to the Civilization of the Liar’s Paradox.”

is from the current issue of "philosophy now" and i am left wondering if slavoj has been reading peter's stuff of, possibly, these two are independently ( although somewhat delayed ) coming to the same conclusions...either way virtually all academics are derivative and philosophy explains virtually nothing since it is an escape hatch from "average everydayness" ( see william james )...reading zizek is usually a slog...he is slovenian and so may be writing in his native language with pathetic translations or, perhaps, he is writing in english as a second language and his english skills are not up to snuff with is erudition and sloterdijk ( so far ) is so intent on defending himself form habermas and the german media that his writing seems shrill if nothing else...so here we have the philosophical equivalent of masanobu fukuoka's

"do nothing" agriculture ( except fukuoka's is feasible ) which, like endless talk, would seem to "ensure that nothing will really change"...should i repost conspiracy theory bullshit on social media...why no...in that, at least, sloterdijk is valid...the rest of it seems to border on advice for quietism...you still need totalk about it ( whatever "it" is ) you should make every effort to remain factive in a seemingly fact-free society...which means you'll have to do some digging.

rote response

with a waffling ( we will pause immigration raids on businesses owned by a constituency we do not want to alienate...tariffs? 145%...or 30%...third term? well maybe not...vlad the impaler is a horrible person but a stand up kind of guy...iran? we'll see in a couple of weeks ) septuagenerian of decreasing acuity in charge it is difficult to come up with an explanation for policy based on critical thought so of course we are going to jump into ad hominem discourse with both jackboots...an authoritarian extra-due process assault on a given community of people based on ethnicity that allows the questionng of the status of even those who are citizens won't stand up to an intellectually rigorous ( or constitutional for that matter ) analysis based on the much cited rule of law that has eamnated from the constipated thought proces of the conserative faction in american politics probably since, at least, 1789...so the junior varsity has traveled to the scene of resistance to attack civil servants ( another specialty of the twisted ideology they represent ) and politicans of differing viewpoint...rendered stupid by dogma what else would ( or could ) he say?

closed

as a retirement job ( and as a hedge against the greedy bastards in whoretown whom no one with any rational sense would trust not to take everything they can ) i am working for a "retail giant" that refers to itself as the "omnichannel retailer" in a decaying and slowly dying suburban mall...which just died a little deader on the last day of march when...

the local forever 21 closed its doors for the last time...

it looks rather empty in there as a bastion of "fast fashion" seems to have found the limit to the genre...should i be saddened by the death of a retailer...hardly...there are others...i work at one...and then there is the wealth of on-line shopping to take into consideration...and that is the crux of the issue...i have to consume to survive...and even if i refuse to make purchases from one particular vendor or another...either out of preference or some political or social issue ( dei for instance ) i am still making them somewhere else and so still supporting a corporate entity and as a function of that, capitalism which seems to be a source of many issues...embedded in the system and aggrandizing it though need and, on occasion, desire...framed as much by its needs ( we're here to help you help us ) as much as by any of my own even by working supporting it...work is as much about consumption as it is earning ( what am i "earning" for ? )...work demands food, fuel, transport, clothing, time and effort to sustain...how much of my consumption is geared towards "work"? do i work to sustain myself or do i sustain myself to work? and while we are talking costs let's look at some stemming from "fast fashion"...trendy cheap-assed clothes that are discared readily...where does all that end up?

well...ghana imports a lot of used cothing from the west...and, from what i have been reading, about 40% of it ends up in landfills and along the shoreline as unsaleable...so the environmental costs ( who knows what went on during the production of said clothing? i do not allthough i do hear of workers in california earning well below minimum wage affixing labels to garments...one presumes [however cannot prove ] sweat-shops all alnong the processes ) extend to various parts of the world, developed and un...who could rationally call any of this elements of a sustainable system?

what has this accomplished II

an "unconditional discharge"...and do you suppose this makes a difference in any way...at no time did i expect donny to serve jail time...he is of the elite and they will protect their own...they are, after all, extrotionists to an individual and if one goes down there could be a cascade of criminal comeuppance...there is a long hisory of elites bending morality to suit their purposes...hypocrisy is a common weapon of power...aaron burr was indicted for murder in new jersey for killing hamilton...that was quashed as he was a sitting vice-president...donny is an incoming president and he ostensibly skated because of that...nah...just another self-promoting entitled rich ( allegedly ) guy whose base, for whatever twisted reason, thinks he is an answer to their problems rather than part of the cause...do they have a right to be angry? i'd say yes they do...it is simply anger that is misdirected, or, rather, not fully directed...missing the point somewhat in thinking that any part of the elite could possibly have anything beyond their own interests in mind when grabbing for political power...they will be disillusioned soon enough and then the need for a police force to ensure loyalty to the maga dogma will become a necessity...interesting times ahead.