Fascism!

[nikbee]

can we claim that anarchists are responsible for the 'anarchist streak' in badious ontology? i would say yes.. i welcome that.. what my problem with the anarchists is their 'regulative Idea' (to use your logic against you), means = the ends (how absolute is that?).. this leaves us with very little to do (ill see you at the organic aisle)... i often read anarchist stuff and think, this is badiou, but with a small dick complex.. why are they so afraid to confront history (but at the same time, as far as i know, are pretty quick to dismiss previous anarchist movements)?.. (separate betrayals from the Truth).

badiou as transcendental/essentialist/etc. is not an interpretation. this is revision.

i support the anarchists.. i simply worry about being ontologically stuck. this is where the Two comes in. my admittedly goofy emo burts didnt help anything, but you cannot revise badious system, and simply keep on insisting that badiou is stalin redux.

edit: for example.. you say 'another world is possible' is just stupid rhetoric.. that we can experience this momentarily now with our 'direct democracy' actions.. i absolutely believe this! this is essentially the same as badious Truth process.. but you always reduce this to pastoral humanism (because he capitalises Event?), or whatever.. i cant help but get frustrated.

edit edit: i think we need each other. and we can name it whatever you like!

 

[nomadthethird]

First of all, I said Badiou was Heidegger redux. Not Stalin.

But second, if you're going to base your entire "ontology" on a fallacious-spurious argument (No True Scotsman), I have little interest in what you're going to say.

It's the same thing as claiming that the Catholic Inquisitors weren't really Christians. Illogical. Stupid. Pointless.

Nikbee, you do realize that if the means = the ends, then non-violent means will likely produce non-violent ends, right? It's not even close to an absolute statement, it's just an observation.

What exactly are you, and Badiou, doing right now, Nikbee? Anything more than just buying/selling stuff in a marketplace? What makes you any better than anarchists?

As for Badiou being an essentialist...you have got to be kidding me. He's an ADMITTED, FLAGRANT Platonist. Platonists are IDEALISTS! They believe in "forms" for fuck's sake!! You seem a tad underread, Nikbee.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

i cant accept this.. i cant accept that an ontology of 'we', in practice, is inherently bound to fail.. communism is simply the signifier for this 'we'. this is essentially badious point, if we abandon the 'we' then we are abandoning any notion of collective action. lets let everyone worry about themselves, and be done with it. i dont think there is anything particularly provocative here. "In fact, what is imposed on us as a task, even as a philosophical obligation, is to help a new mode of existence of the hypothesis to deploy itself."

but your basic premise could not be more wrong. communism doesn't have a monopoly on "we" nor on collective action. nor is communism is simply a signifier for "we". and anyway it's never been for "we" meaning everyone, it's always been for "we" meaning the Communists. so, "abandoning" communism is abandoning communism, nothing more & nothing less.

all this is, forgive me, so typically communist...claiming that all collective action has to be communist & that anyone who rejects communism has to a nihilist (or a rightist, a reactionary, an anarchist, whatever the convenient term is at the time).

even if some of yall want me to return to the ustase! that one didnt feel good.

not me mate! it's just internet bullshitting after all.

on the other hand when you & Comrade Badiou come after me with your ontological secret police I shall be obliged to meet you gun in hand:.

 

[nikbee]

First of all, I said Badiou was Heidegger redux. Not Stalin.

But second, if you're going to base your entire "ontology" on a fallacious-spurious argument (No True Scotsman), I have little interest in what you're going to say.

It's the same thing as claiming that the Catholic Inquisitors weren't really Christians. Illogical. Stupid. Pointless.

Nikbee, you do realize that if the means = the ends, then non-violent means will likely produce non-violent ends, right? It's not even close to an absolute statement, it's just an observation.

What exactly are you, and Badiou, doing right now, Nikbee? Anything more than just buying/selling stuff in a marketplace? What makes you any better than anarchists?

As for Badiou being an essentialist...you have got to be kidding me. He's an ADMITTED, FLAGRANT Platonist. Platonists are IDEALISTS! They believe in "forms" for fuck's sake!! You seem a tad underread, Nikbee.

david graeber: "Still, everywhere one finds the same core (anarchist) principles: decentralization, voluntary association, mutual aid, the network model, and above all, the rejection of any idea that the end justifies the means, let alone that the business of a revolutionary is to seize state power and then begin imposing one's vision at the point of a gun."

also, i dont know what badiou is doing right now.. do you? i know a few things, but this is a pointless accusation to make anyway.. what do you know? about as much as i know about your education, right?

 

[nomadthethird]

Padraig, doesn't something just seem so off about the communist boner for history-as-war? I mean, is it just me? Or are the self-identified communists these days all too often the types who are the least likely to actually be able to, say, load and fire a weapon? The least likely to be soldiers or warriors?

I can't help but think it's some sort of macho fantasy for the academic nerd elite. Like they all imagine: "Just wait till I Steven Segal all of you non-believing motherfuckers!!"

 

[nomadthethird]

david graeber: "Still, everywhere one finds the same core (anarchist) principles: decentralization, voluntary association, mutual aid, the network model, and above all, the rejection of any idea that the end justifies the means, let alone that the business of a revolutionary is to seize state power and then begin imposing one's vision at the point of a gun."

also, i dont know what badiou is doing right now.. do you? i know a few things, but this is a pointless accusation to make anyway.. what do you know? about as much as i know about your education, right?

Ok, then what are YOU doing right now, Nikbee, that makes you better than an anarchist? More righteous? More politically viable?

 

[nomadthethird]

Agree with Graeber, btw, though I'm not an anarchist.

 

[nikbee]

Padraig, doesn't something just seem so off about the communist boner for history-as-war? I mean, is it just me? Or are the self-identified communists these days all too often the types who are the least likely to actually be able to, say, load and fire a weapon? The least likely to be soldiers or warriors?

I can't help but think it's not some sort of macho fantasy for the academic nerd elite. Like they all imagine: "Just wait till I Steven Segal all of you non-believing motherfuckers!!"

im quite the pussy. you are absolutely right here. unless the nazis come to my village, right?

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I think it was a misunderstanding of way in which the expression 'cultural revolution' was being referenced, on this thread I mean.

I wasn't referring to the Cultural Revolution (his views on which aside), I was referring to a communist by any other name is a communist. that you can't dodge your way out of critiques of communism by simply falling back to "betrayals" & so on.

To be a bit more charitable I suppose it is the case that he talks about communism when referencing communism, if you see what I mean. And he associates with communists because they share some common premises, antagonisms and goals. The idea is more fundamental though. It is called the communist hypothesis, which is actually not at all the same as saying 'communism', and let's remember that in the French it is the hypothesis that takes precedence, I think that might be significant.

I'm sorry but this all seems like splitting the thinnest of hairs.

tho as I said I don't really care what some old French Maoist-not a-Maoist professor rambles on about, so whatever. I'm willing to concede Badiou is not a "communist" but that he just talks about communism (I'm sorry, the "hypothesis") with other communists - which of course is nothing like "communism" - so long as we can stop talking about his naff philosophy.

 

[nomadthethird]

im quite the pussy. you are absolutely right here. unless the nazis come to my village, right?

Nikbee, I'm not a pussy. I just don't believe in violence. There's a difference.

I sure as hell know how to load and fire most shotguns, rifles, and handguns, at least.

I'm so scared of your little communist league that I might go buy myself a Desert Eagle. Ok, I just think they're cool. Imagine how heavy a .45 caliber handgun is!

 

[massrock]

There is no such thing as political hypotheses that are somehow transcendent of historical realities. "Hypotheses" don't transcend history. A political hypothesis IS a historical entity. You cannot separate a "pure" communist hypothesis from the history of the word, and the political reality, of "communism."

I would disagree, certainly new political hypotheses are not historical entities are they.

But anyway this line is becoming highly disingenuous imo. You have read exactly what is meant by the expression 'the communist hypothesis' and yet you claim not to be able to separate it from from 'communism' as you understand it. Come off it.

I think some people would do well to learn the difference between symbols, meanings and preconceptions but there you go.

 

[nomadthethird]

I would disagree, certainly new political hypotheses are not historical entities are they.

But anyway this line is becoming highly disingenuous imo. You have read exactly what is meant by the expression 'the communist hypothesis' and yet you claim not to be able to separate it from from 'communism' as you understand it. Come off it.

I think some people would do well to learn the difference between symbols, meanings and preconceptions but there you go.

Good one. You sure showed me!

 

[nomadthethird]

And yes, new political hypotheses ARE historical entities. Time passes rather quickly. Nothing is "new" forever.

 

[nikbee]

Nikbee, I'm not a pussy. I just don't believe in violence. There's a difference.

I sure as hell know how to load and fire most shotguns, rifles, and handguns, at least.

I'm so scared of your little communist league that I might go buy myself a Desert Eagle. Ok, I just think they're cool. Imagine how heavy a .45 caliber handgun is!

why this????????whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

 

[nomadthethird]

Either the communist hypothesis is the most basic ideological unit of communism, or it isn't the communist hypothesis.

This is not difficult to parse. It's simple. But inconvenient for rabid ideologues.

 

[nomadthethird]

why this????????whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy

whyyyyyyyyyyyyy????????


whyyy this essentialism and insistence on "eternal" "forms"??

whyyyyyyyyy??

why the rhetoric with no praxis? whyyyyyyyy?

 

[nikbee]

whyyyyyyyyyyyyy????????


whyyy this essentialism and insistence on "eternal" "forms"??

whyyyyyyyyy??

why the rhetoric with no praxis? whyyyyyyyy?

you are impossible! when did you fuck last time?!

 

[nomadthethird]

But anyway this line is becoming highly disingenuous imo. You have read exactly what is meant by the expression 'the communist hypothesis' and yet you claim not to be able to separate it from from 'communism' as you understand it. Come off it.

You do realize that God, I mean Badiou, himself doesn't separate the two?

I didn't choose the term "communist hypothesis" (which as you outline it is just a watered-down Marxist hypothesis), Badiou did.

If he doesn't like the associations this presents readers with, then he could always change the word. But he doesn't. Why is that, Massrock?

You still haven't proven or even nominally demonstrated that the communist hypothesis is capable of actualizing or sustaining a world/state without "a dominant class"...

 

[nomadthethird]

you are impossible! when did you fuck last time?!

Chortle.

Everyone who disagrees with me simply hasn't had sex in a while...

I like it, Nikbee. Really drives home all of your political talking points.

 

[nomadthethird]

Padraig still wins thread.