tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64168600186288983702024-03-12T21:33:53.501-07:00The importance of all thingsObservations, ideas and notes. Quite random but connected.ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.comBlogger54125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-38886565847944379872018-04-11T06:09:00.003-07:002018-04-30T03:52:49.437-07:0054. Freedom is more collective than individualFreedom is not exactly what we were told.<br />
It has something of freedom of choice, but freedom is not just freedom of choice. Freedom is about self ownership, but then we ended up discussing why we are falling to self-exploitation. Freedom has more to do with the power to execute this freedom of choice and take it to fruition. This freedom needs others. In this sense, freedom is a system of permissions, enablers and tools that are at our disposal or are within our reach to make things happen, to make our living, to create, to affect the world, etc.<br />
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A simple example would be to compare two teenagers that decided they want to study palaeontology and find two different responses from their family. The first one is congratulated, receives full financial support to conduct the studies, receives books that might be interesting, is introduced to family connections that work in this field and received emotional support in periods of frustration. The second one is critised for the poor decision, is cut off from financial support and ignored or even manipulated to redirect this wish and punished severely if unsuccessful.<br />
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Current narrative about freedom would portray the second one "you against the world" as the test for the free man, the self-made man, the hero. It is certainly a test. A test of will, a test of individuation. But this individual has been born into an environment with low intensity freedom. In different levels, we all have to break some barriers of this kind and that's why we understand and even believe that this is freedom or that this is all there is to it.<br />
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However, if we accept that this first teenager was making a free decision, receiving full permission and full support of the environment makes this teenager infinitely freer. Affluent families send their children to private schools, in part seeking to build the sort of network of connections that would open doors, that would help these children overcome obstacles in the future, but tend to sustain political views and support political speeches that speak about individual, heroic freedom as the true freedom. In a sense, the slogan "check your privilege" is pointing out at this systemic configuration that makes you freer than others, and more likely than others to succeed.<br />
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<b>Freedom as a collective phenomenon</b><br />
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When we think about freedom as a collective phenomenon we understand that the exercise of freedom is not only to develop some sort of self-awareness to make free choices, but also to free others from their limitations and build a network of reciprocal relationships. Freedom is a social enterprise that requires empathy and generosity. If this side of the equation of freedom is neglected, freedom within a society collapses.<br />
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An example that comes to mind is that of a poor woman that followed a government program to finish her school education. In her speech, she described how she had to organise her life differently, how she had to build a network of support (to care for her children while she was away, for example) to succeed. She had the feeling that the diploma itself was not as valuable as what she had to do to achieve it and that the true learning was to organise her life in a way that enabled her to achieve what she wanted. In other words to build an environment that supported her freedom.<br />
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The much-discussed freedom of speech needs at least a second person willing to hear. In a recent Whatsapp group discussion about a hot political issue, the first response of the group was censure. The group tried to "legislate" that some ideas could not be said in that group. In front of resistance and discussion about freedom of speech a member said "I'm sure you belong to other groups where you are free to discuss this", which in other words meant "in this group you are not free". It was a chilling alarm that made everyone realise that freedom requires much more work than we are told it needs. It certainly requires tolerance, but also a certain quality of relationships, a certain quality of speech to make any discussion possible.<br />
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When we look at freedom from this social perspective, we can understand how a political speech can be understood as a permission to commit hate crimes while at the same time we could discuss more deeply why political correctness is losing so many battles lately.<br />
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<b>Investing in freedom</b></div>
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Freedom understood in social terms, means that we have to actively invest in the freedom of others first and demand reciprocity in return, which means that trust is a fundamental piece of the puzzle. We cannot build a free society or freedom in a general sense if we are not actively investing in the freedom of others. This investment might be time, physical work -commitment-, attention or money (mostly through taxes). In this sense, freedom is not only about our own liberation, it comes with the demand of our involvement and commitment to sustain freedom itself. </div>
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<b>It means that we can't be truly free if we are not working first so that we are all free.</b> If I want freedom of speech, I have to invest time in listening to others, if I want access to education, I have to see that there is a system where anyone can access education.</div>
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<b>It means that freedom requires relationships of trust.</b> Trust that the others will reciprocate. And reciprocity does not follow a hard mathematical function or interest equation. We don't pay back a favour with interest. We don't pay back with the same "currency" and even we might not match exactly the favour received. However, there is a lot of wisdom in the fluid economics of reciprocity, with a very sophisticated sense of justice measuring intention, means, effort with no maths involved. </div>
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It means that freedom is what we build when we build a system of social justice. </div>
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<b>Love and freedom</b><br />
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When we think deeply about freedom in this way, the issue of love and freedom starts to come closer together. Love, not as a romantic love, but rather as a generic way to refer to a relationship that would not be broken when we or the other are expressing individuality, a relationship that we are willing to invest in, to work out, etc. The highest form of freedom is experienced within bonds while being able to break up bonds is both the minimal and the ultimate expression of freedom.<br />
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Of course, when speaking about love, hate comes to the picture too. In this video, a former leader of a neo-nazi skinhead movement, speaks about his journey in and out of the group. He describes how this group gave him a sense of power and acceptance in a negative way when he could not find it in a positive one. And how much his rejection and hate could not be reconciled with the reality of what he found when he experienced meaningful interactions with people he thought he hated. He goes further and around min 12 he says that one of the biggest problems facing America is white domestic terrorism.<br />
But the most interesting part of this video comes just after, when the case of a father "disowning" his white-supremacist son is discussed and how his cousin wanted the family to not welcome him anymore. This is a very good case where permissions, love, the limits of the relationships are discussed in a meaningful and real way (from min 15).<br />
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And finally, a video that I posted before, Zizek discusses freedom and false freedom in this video, in which he concludes inviting the viewer to question the notion of freedom itself. Something we all have to do, quickly, before we lose it.</div>
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<b>Love as unpaid work</b></div>
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In feminist economical theory, many experts speak about "love is actually unpaid work" pointing out that women are constantly investing in others (through their care work), including investing in the freedom of others without collecting much. This lack of acknowledgement of the care work that women do, implies the feminisation of poverty: women have less access to jobs, jobs generally lack the flexibility motherhood requires, non working mothers become economically dependant and normally have no access to pensions (or living pensions) in old age. </div>
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There is a pending chapter of the french revolution, where Liberté, egalité, fraternité explicitly excluded women (fraternity=brotherhood). There is a pending chapter in economics, which are based in Adam Smith's ideas, including that no one does anything that is out of benevolence but rather out of self-interest. Katrin Marcal points out in her book "Who cooked Adam Smith's dinner" that Adam Smith was living with his mum at the time he was writing the Wealth of the Nations, and even though there might be a degree self-interest in cooking his son's dinner, maternal love and maternal sense of duty cannot be reduced to self-interest.</div>
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The easy answer to the question of unpaid work tends to be universal income. But we all know that the year after universal income comes into place, national systems of education or health will become monetised too, because someone will rationally argue that there is no enough money and that now everyone has money and now everyone can pay exactly what they use blah, blah, blah. It will all be perfectly rational, but we will lose the wisdom of the other side of economics, the one that does not measure transactions with maths and interest and achieves a sense of justice regardless. In doing so, we might also be eroding this fabric of trust and social cohesion.</div>
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Love, equality, justice, freedom and economics are much more linked together than we think. </div>
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Andrea</div>
ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-12109039092507298662018-03-19T02:50:00.004-07:002018-03-20T09:36:47.785-07:0053. The collective consciousness, the male gaze and the shape of water<b>Design of images - The male gaze</b><br />
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One of the most important concepts to expand is the concept of male gaze. This idea, coined by Laula Mulvey comes from the cinema, and explains a basic design and architectural perspective: on the one hand who is framing the picture, who is holding the camera, who is "representing", and on the other hand who is being observed and what is this observation. The conclusion that Laura Mulvey arrived to is that in cinema there is a "male gaze" where men are the camera holders, the directors and women as the object being seen, and often eroticized. This is such a valuable insight, that we can reframe many things and discover that this is a gaze that is much older than cinema. The following video produced by Playground says "it is easier to enter a museum as a naked muse than as a artist with a female name. In 1985, only 5% of the artists in the Metropolitan museum of New York were women, while 85% of the nudes were female. Today, those numbers have not changed much."<br />
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<b>Image reading illiteracy </b><br />
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How images are designed is a key aspect of today's culture. We consume many more "designed images" than we did just a few years ago, and incredibly more than when most of the designed images were in temples. Only in terms of advertising experts quote that in the 70's the american public was exposed to 500 adverts per day, today that figure grew to 5000. If we add our daily quote of Netflix, YouTube or TV that figure is immense. We struggle already with dealing with speeches and complex messaging, but how much do we know about image design? Do we know how to read them in a critical way? Do we spend our time debating frames, positions, poses, lighting, who's in and who's out the picture? No, we generally don't. <b>The awareness of this image reading illiteracy </b>is crucial in today's culture for many reasons:<br />
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<li>Images are processed much faster than words, </li>
<li>images are designed and read by our subconscious and unconscious mind, they convey, produce and reproduce ideology,</li>
<li>we are consuming much more designed images than ever before,</li>
<li>ultimately the dominant gaze has a big influence in shaping our collective consciousness/unconsciousness, our idea of God, order, justice and humanity.</li>
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Why is this critical thinking important with regards with images. Because <b>they serve as templates to see and interpret reality. </b><br />
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<b>Women and minorities are the observed objects</b></div>
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One of the most poignant cases of how we are influenced by the male gaze outside the world of pictures is when we encounter a story about sexual abuse or even rape. Imagining a situation forces us to "see a picture" of what happened and probably feel something about it. We imagine the situation without thinking much and... what do we see? The default setting will probably be, seeing woman and her behaviour. We see what she is wearing, what she did or did not do, the "signs" she gave, and start to feel some criticism, disapproval of her behaviour. Basically, <i>we automatically put ourselves in the heads of the male character, ie in the heads of rapists and predators and what they saw and what they felt</i>. "Rapist are more often than not, moralists", says Rita Segato. But if we go back to ourselves, why do we adopt this perspective? Does it mean that we identify with rapists and predators? Yes and no. It mainly reveals that <b>our collective consciousness has been shaped by a male gaze and therefore we imagine this scene through the eyes of the male figure of the scene</b>, through this lens, unconsciously. In this example, the woman is "in frame" and therefore subject to our judgement. We find it easier to see, criticise and regulate behaviour of whomever is on frame. Subsequently, the narrative that follows this frame may tend to describe things in passive voice: "women are raped" (the perpetrator is absent/not named in the sentence, he is "behind the camera" figuratively speaking). But what happens if we put ourselves inside of the head of the woman? What does <i>she </i>see?</div>
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<b>The asymmetry of a binary system</b><br />
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This asymmetry makes the issue of gender (and race and minorities) not a matter of a polarised system (of two polar equal opposites) but a binary one.<br />
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These labels also create a a system of two laws: </div>
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<li><b>The object observed (The Other) is under strict scrutiny:</b> they have to control every aspect of their behaviour, every gesture, every piece of clothing, failures are considered deep flaws in character, proof of why they should be kept under ever stricter surveillance and control or even deserving of whatever bad happened to them, even if it means death. Under this logic, from a mini skirt to a petty crime can somehow justify capital punishment while any male observer of this behaviour can become instantly the judge and executioner, like the agents in the Matrix. "These executions" are outside the law we all know and discuss in congresses and parliaments, but in line with "the other law". </li>
<li><b>The observer is somehow innocent, infantilized </b>who do not bear the full weight of accountability and responsibility whose crimes can be either somehow justified, understood, be a matter of mental health (including addictions) or judged as mistakes, temporal losses of judgement or simply be fully justified. In this sense <b>the position of the observer is a position of privilege.</b> When we speak about white privilege, male privilege one of the aspects to understand is how they are observed v the rest. In his <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/mar/02/boris-johnson-white-privilege-black-woman">latest article for The Guardian</a>, Gary Younge, proposes to analyse Boris Johnson's career from this perspective and points out at how his gaffes are routinely forgiven and overlooked.</li>
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<b>Monsters: the fantastical is political</b><br />
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The Oscar winner director Guillermo del Toro has expressed in many occasions something that could be summarised as "the fantastical is political". He explained that zombie movies in the past were critical of consumerism and nowadays are some sort of "otherness hunting", where the other is completely stripped of their humanity and therefore is acceptable to hunt and kill them.<br />
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Because the two main character in The Shape of Water don't speak, it forces the viewer to see. In this way it shortens a distance between an animal world and the human world, between body and emotion. The silence offers a detachment from the detachment of language.<br />
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In this film, he tells a story with a different gaze but not quite. "I'm Mexican, I've been the otherness my whole life". It holds a different gaze regarding this otherness, because the film shows us a monster as a beautiful being, but the other is still something that is not human. It shows all the relationships and agency a poor mute woman has (she is friends with an Afro-american cleaner, a gay artist and supported by a Russian scientist), but she is a woman with no voice. It plays in this line between obedience in presentation (shape and form), and full disobedience in narrative and action. Not only because this "poor woman" is deeply disobedient, or because it is about a love story of a cleaner lady and a river monster but also because it shows the "bad guy" as part of a complex system of power relations where even the cold war is portrayed as some sort of organised improvisation of a power struggle: Russians and Americans fighting for a Latin-american river god; it shows Americans torturing it, guessing that there must be something useful there but not figuring out exactly what it is or how to find it out and Russians shown as more interested in spoiling it so the Americans do not use it against them.<br />
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"There are xenophobic films, that fear the foreigners and integrative films, where the monster is the most human character. No one cheers for the planes attacking King Kong, everyone is on the gorilla's side. I suppose this second option fits better with the way I understand the world".<br />
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The Shape of Water is a contradiction, water has no shape as love has no shape, "it can happen with someone very different to you, or have the same sex, and despite of that you recognise it".<br />
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In all the explanations that Guillermo del Toro gave about his Oscar winning film, he keeps explaining that films have a gaze, that films are political.<br />
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<b>The male collective gaze and our cultural god</b><br />
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Through the default setting of the male gaze that structures our thoughts, our values and our common sense, we see and judge life. This gaze is very close to what we think God thinks and sees. "God does not love you" might be one of the messages routinely thrown out in twitter to any outsider by anyone. If we consider god as this collective gaze, the collective consciousness, even if it is as an exercise, then we can conclude that it is the community itself and no external entity who is rejecting this person, that it is up to us to love each other. In this sense, we can change this cultural god.<br />
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Thinking about god as a collective consciousness gives us a perspective of why god is seen as evolving, it gives us the sense that we can change what we judge and how, and we can reflect on how the collective consciousness is shaped. This is important, particularly in times when media is very concentrated and <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/18/cambridge-analytica-and-facebook-accused-of-misleading-mps-over-data-breach">we are being profiled in social media</a> and targeted with customised messages by the likes of Cambridge Analytical and its anti-marketing and anti-politics, where the product does not seek to attract and convince but it is rather a shapeshifter seeking to manipulate and seduce. These images and messages designed by no public figure are shaping, magnifying and deforming the values that decide who's accepted and who's rejected, who has a voice and who doesn't, whose life is worth protection and whose doesn't. Ultimately who lives and who dies.<br />
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Andrea<br />
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-78042425132652315522017-10-29T05:15:00.000-07:002020-04-24T09:03:40.484-07:0052. Cities and invisibility: a new type of God<div>
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<b>Cities and invisibility: under the the gaze of Google and Facebook </b></div>
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In the first part of the entry (50), I argued that cities cannot keep the same idea of God as in Villages, because the collective gaze (the gaze of the "neighbour" spread through gossip) is not ever present. Cities grant a level of privacy to its citizens i.e there are more spaces in the city where the neighbour's gaze is blind. We learn that we should not expect a positive response from a neighbour or a supporting community. We are alone in our problems and should deal with them with self help techniques.<br />
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Therefore people in cities <i>feel different</i> about God's gaze:<br />
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<li>the gaze is absent (some sort of God forsaken place), </li>
<li>never existed (atheism), </li>
<li>it shapeshifts to a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpYW3qng78E">new personal God</a> that looks at you at a more personal level, responding to the atomised structure and individuality of urban life (with all the newest testaments in the form of self help books). </li>
<li>it reverses to an even more conservative view of God (evangelicals)</li>
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<b>Webcams and mobile phones</b><br />
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Cities offer indeed a more diverse view than a village. More people and more diverse people live together, share public services, bump into each other in public spaces, etc. <b>In a city we see more and we are more invisible at the same time.</b> Our neighbour is quite busy, he doesn't notice us. It's like being abandoned by the collective gaze, it simply does not have time for us. However, technology is coming to the rescue. This missing gaze is replaced by one that is directed to us -individually- by Facebook and Google. The amount of information we share highlights the eagerness to occupy a public space, to make ourselves known to a new village curated by us. This could explain why on the one hand we don't seem to bother about how much they know about us and that on the other hand we don't care either that their algorithms are acting like the new gatekeepers filtering what we should see. We all know that different people will have different results in a Google search, which it is done with the purpose of offering <i>relevant content</i>. That means there is someone "up there in the cloud" thinking about what we need. <b><u>This personal god is recreating a virtual village</u></b> (made up by friends or even friends with whom I agree) where I find normal what my virtual village finds normal.<br />
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<i><b>Technology is recreating through their relevance-ensuring algorithms the old village gaze, what's now called a filter bubble, a womb where we feel safe.</b> </i></blockquote>
This, of course, became a hot topic with two surprising election results. Brexit and Donald Trump. <b>People in big cities (in particular) were surprised with the results of the election</b>. They discovered there were tons of people "out there" that have different views that had not been "<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UG_X_7g63rY&list=PLOGi5-fAu8bGWlO_C0inok4u3TbnTnn2p">visible</a>" up to that point.</div>
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The problem of the new village's gaze, the filter bubble and the <b>infantilizing effect of "relevance" </b>is that this blindness to what tech companies deem irrelevant for us, is not very far away from makings us start to think that a different view is "not normal" and start to approve that powers in the outside world decide to make these different voices shut up and to reestablish the order of the village. Exactly as we did in ours.<br />
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It was in the context of Brexit that I was part of discussions where young people were arguing in favour of qualified voting, for example claiming that people without university degrees should not vote, and idea that is deeply antidemocratic. Even these young progressive people fell very quickly into the temptation of expulsion and avoiding the uncomfort, messiness and imperfection of the political debate. </div>
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Our contribution to the construction of the collective gaze through the acceptance of bubbles gives us as a result a new adolescent God that is happy to punish and banish all who disagree in order to keep Eden in order. As individuals, we are no longer sustaining and constructing collective freedom. More and more frequently people build arguments for censorship (let's not talk about politics/ gun control/ Brexit/ Catalunya / the AfD / the financial sector, Santiago Maldonado, etc), supported by concepts of individual freedom. They are surrounded by many more bystanders that in their passivity somehow agree that not speaking up is the best way forward for keeping peace. Silence, censorship and outright repression are being normalised for the sake of peace. For this reason I claimed in the part 1 of this entry (50) that freedom is in danger.</div>
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<b>Against the social fracture</b><br />
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Love and freedom are connected concepts. Love is the non-castrating limit of freedom. It is what allows power to show self-restraint in order to not impose itself and to avoid breaking the bond. This self-restraint was missing during the repression of the Referendum in Catalonya.<br />
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It is easy to be (or imagine ourselves) free alone, with no relationships and other interests to consider. Enabling each other's freedom within a bond is much more complicated.<br />
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And even if those conversations Salman Rushdie speaks about happen, they don't necessarily lead to anything better. In an era with access to what it seems infinite amount of information, information has been found to polarise audiences even more if they are used to disprove our inner beliefs. </div>
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<b>Our gaze, our vision of God</b><br />
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Even though in cities "the collective action" is present everywhere, we might not see it. We open a tap to get water we did not pump, we buy a salad or a tomato we did not plant, we did not watch grow, we did not water, we did not collect, we walk on floors we did not lay. Still we feel the absence of the gaze. The one that looks at us and "sees" our needs (something beyond the needs for water, and food, and infrastructure that we now take for granted). Because we are tailoring our interactions and conversations so much, we are narrowing our view of what's normal. And because of that, we are recreating a village with a more conservative god than in the old testament. The tension in the village is that it is both Eden and Egypt. This village with a narrow sense of what's accepted is Eden for those in power and Egypt for the ones considered not normal. Being a child can be Eden and Egypt. A paradise and the place where we are slaves and we want to escape from. But being dependent (of others, of the collective infrastructure, of our employers, of our country) is not the same as being slaves and being independent is not the same as being free. Is repression the only pacifying method? Is breaking all bonds the only escape?</div>
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Going back to the initial argument in entry 50. If we step back and remember that collective freedom is about all of us authorising everyone to be free (which implies a self-restricting limit of love) and, not only that: we go beyond and we confabulate to get out of ourselves every once in a while to help others overcome the restrictions they find in their way. Our gaze is our vision of God, how the collective should order itself. The difference of the village god and the city god is the subjectivity. In the village, we have "the town", "the people", the folk, "el pueblo", a collective that tends to deny the individual. In the city, <i>the citizen's subjectivity is that of an individual, that tends to deny the collective</i>. Our gaze should start to see both, the individual and the collective, and <i>become active supporters of the collective from our individuality </i>because it is only in this acknowledgement we can build Freedom (the collective), and through that our individual freedom. Freedom is first and foremost a collective phenomenon.</div>
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Andrea<br />
<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-49715973388919918272017-09-22T02:27:00.003-07:002018-05-02T16:03:59.784-07:0051. The raping gaze: Las Vegas and Weinstein <div class="separator" style="clear: both;">
(continues from entry 50.)<b> </b></div>
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<b>The raping gaze</b></div>
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Feminist theory speaks about the male gaze as the act of depicting the world from the masculine/heterosexual point of view, presenting women as objects of male desire. This gaze has a <b>violent version</b> where women appear through this lens directly as prey (an even lower category than that of objects). This gaze tears apart life, vitality, power from the victim. One of the most poignant descriptions of this, came a few days ago when Prince Harry spoke about dealing with the death of her mother. He said:</div>
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"<i>I think one of the hardest things to come to terms with is the fact that the people that chased her into the tunnel were the same people taking photographs of her while she was still dying on the back seat of the car</i>"</blockquote>
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"<i>She had quite a severe head injury, but she was very much still alive on the back seat. And those people that caused the accident, instead of helping were taking photographs of her dying on the backseat. And then those photographs made their way back to news desks in this country</i>."</blockquote>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSSEe0j_WpOBlwRFJRnvgZ5MYGGoOn_vHJDSm_WrX493KU3NxuUAP8svxACGIVNEw1J6IvqdOPZFhiLR0O4nEUOis9teXGhkBWbvFgL1SX3eP1bLWDoyLUY3B7EYZwB8uprhko4CaZIY8/s1600/gaze.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="339" data-original-width="602" height="180" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiSSEe0j_WpOBlwRFJRnvgZ5MYGGoOn_vHJDSm_WrX493KU3NxuUAP8svxACGIVNEw1J6IvqdOPZFhiLR0O4nEUOis9teXGhkBWbvFgL1SX3eP1bLWDoyLUY3B7EYZwB8uprhko4CaZIY8/s320/gaze.jpg" width="320" /></a>As I mentioned in the previous article, the "sacrifices" - the crimes and the abuse used to cleanse aggressors of their own negativity- once in a while are seen for what they really are: violence against an innocent. And every once in a while these cases provoke a change, even if temporary, imposing self-restrictions to power. In this case, the public demanded the power of the media to show self-restraint.</div>
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<b>Cruelty as a display of power</b></div>
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Feminists, like anthropologist Rita Segato, argue that in most cases <b>rape is a power crime through sexual means</b>. In this sense, not only women are subjected to it but anyone whose power must be denied through a violent act, who is forced to take the submissive, passive position in what is often <b>a public display of power </b>(with witnesses or performed by a gang). The act that includes humiliation, sexual humiliation, nudity, exposure, inflicting pain or even purposefully looking for multiple completely helpless innocent victims, <i>wants to demonstrate that there are no limits to power</i>. It is <i>a display with a public in mind</i>. This public aspect is not a minor detail. Sometimes this shadow audience is reduced to a circle (most of rapes are performed in gang or in front of a friend), sometimes is imagined (eg a message to all women, to the guardians of the woman involved; her father, a brother) but sometimes the display is addressed to the wide public, like we see in mass shootings. <b>In a violent spectacle there is a gaze that is being addressed</b>: pairs, the male brotherhood, the father, the mother, society, the state: are you looking? Can you see my power? And in an age of mass communication, mass shootings in particular are granted a lot of attention. The invisibility of the individual in the community stops. The community gaze finally sees what they did.<br />
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<b>Violence to establish the hierarchical xenophobic, racist and chauvinistic order</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGEqs-L5hTNDqmKCKjRNso0jjh815WBEl6uJEFRajuhSLG8llwROM-GL7pWU_rhh6_kI5ZfxBBn7rqimoi0EjSmm9gVemIMRWLT60tqyrdY8A7nsBJk21o_-MuRfi7BeQcaGaz6Oh7vOc/s1600/abu-ghraib-lawsuit-photos-20150316-018.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhGEqs-L5hTNDqmKCKjRNso0jjh815WBEl6uJEFRajuhSLG8llwROM-GL7pWU_rhh6_kI5ZfxBBn7rqimoi0EjSmm9gVemIMRWLT60tqyrdY8A7nsBJk21o_-MuRfi7BeQcaGaz6Oh7vOc/s200/abu-ghraib-lawsuit-photos-20150316-018.jpg" width="200" /></a>In the pictures of Abu Ghraib we, viewers, are seeing the raping gaze in action. Rita Segato, through her studies of rapists in Brazil, concluded <b>that rapists see themselves more often than not as moralists</b>. They see their act as a disciplinary act over someone who had to be put in place, with the objective of imposing an order (eg Harvey Weinstein imposing himself as the gatekeeper to be revered) or reinstating the order that was being broken. <b>Internally, this order is higher than the law itself. </b>It is indeed <b>a system of two laws (one for "us", one for "them") </b>or as it is normally referred to, it is a system of two bars or double standards. In their mind they are not breaking any law, they are following it. Sometimes it even goes beyond the animal behaviour of establishing hierarchy through sexual means, there is a desire to kill their victims morally too.<br />
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The "morality" that the rapist is enacting does not come up from nowhere. It is sustained by the culture we live in and is propagated through images and concepts that build up the ideal of masculinity, femininity, power, otherness, justice in society, order, etc. Anything that is considered "normal", is normal only through a particular gaze.</div>
Because this cultural hierarchy puts white males at the top, media struggles to condemn white crime. White men are assumed virtuous or "normal":<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb20SC8PMtc6tbFIsA0445L0X1FcO8WGO3mQjxi5t6Tnnr6ofQ6MixtuQr95las3rXI82Uhc-idy331D-zCWgDmWlmDdlH-rAsVj3HrPpt3vmFn9XdJVuc-nYRXNAiL9NMnWy18jFAB0M/s1600/racist+gaze+split.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="684" data-original-width="1368" height="160" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjb20SC8PMtc6tbFIsA0445L0X1FcO8WGO3mQjxi5t6Tnnr6ofQ6MixtuQr95las3rXI82Uhc-idy331D-zCWgDmWlmDdlH-rAsVj3HrPpt3vmFn9XdJVuc-nYRXNAiL9NMnWy18jFAB0M/s320/racist+gaze+split.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Highlight positive aspects of white men and negative aspects of victims:<br />
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They try to create empathy towards the murderer:<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiON20nDjxmuRVjDjWkkuoB_Vj2VWssW6cj3VEOEIlToe5QcViwM6FhNYLYmJ1fdpwvAlV-5EhBtIVWY4hmWECMxLmnz4EwNA-9ybs_ksOsjGdb5O04fOEtwZGv7vln0P-VDZY9d6BHPLQ/s1600/because.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="468" data-original-width="672" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiON20nDjxmuRVjDjWkkuoB_Vj2VWssW6cj3VEOEIlToe5QcViwM6FhNYLYmJ1fdpwvAlV-5EhBtIVWY4hmWECMxLmnz4EwNA-9ybs_ksOsjGdb5O04fOEtwZGv7vln0P-VDZY9d6BHPLQ/s320/because.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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All of this, came to the spotlight again with the recent Las Vegas mass shooting:</div>
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<b>Andrea</b></div>
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-59732475834007527312017-09-22T00:26:00.000-07:002017-11-04T04:12:01.871-07:0050. Collective freedom and the gaze we hold (part 1)<b>Freedom is a collective phenomenon </b><br />
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We hear speak about freedom on a daily basis. Freedom of choice, freedom of speech, freedom to love, freedom of thought, freedom of movement, etc. Individual freedom is an authorisation we receive or give ourselves to do something, even it is goes against the wishes of the group. It defines the area where we, as individuals, are sovereign. Individual freedom cannot exist without the development of <i>authority</i>: inside this territory individuals have <i>authorisation </i>to be <i>authors </i>of their words and their acts. In this sense, we need to remember that this freedom is not built by the individual alone but with the community that agrees to set this self-restraining border. However, this collective aspect of the establishment of freedom is often disregarded. It is explained as an individual enterprise. And because of this, <b>freedom is in danger </b>because some groups are losing their willingness to self-restrain and are starting to restrain others and they do so in the name of freedom.<br />
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Beyond this situation we are going through in many countries (Spain, Latin America, USA, etc), I'd like to highlight that there is an even higher order of freedom. It is the freedom that comes when the group somehow actively confabulates for its members (everyone) to be free. It takes different forms. Sometimes this is reduced to solidarity but it is more than that. Listening to a friend or colleague with a completely different opinion is not solidarity. A family that supports a kid that decides to follow an unconventional career path is not acting either upon solidarity.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPJrw4XqKl032MBoO62hPN0Xd3oM7uH55_091ViYhcZ_aY3TfwsHr3UtCJTnf9WkzFoRB5fj5PhH2V6-foxBkSlAC2PKNqu-cpW8xJmwMQafqRfK_DrzrcTTKYwSOr8Rj4BYcAzwL_2Ss/s1600/defend-free-speech.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="500" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhPJrw4XqKl032MBoO62hPN0Xd3oM7uH55_091ViYhcZ_aY3TfwsHr3UtCJTnf9WkzFoRB5fj5PhH2V6-foxBkSlAC2PKNqu-cpW8xJmwMQafqRfK_DrzrcTTKYwSOr8Rj4BYcAzwL_2Ss/s320/defend-free-speech.jpg" width="320" /></a>First of all, this freedom does not break the bond if what the person is doing does not please the rest. It does not barely tolerate either, it supports. In acts of solidarity, in freedom of speech, or in actively supporting a member of the family or a friend, what's being built is the highest order of freedom.<br />
When the individuals of a community are transcending their own individuality to support someone, the act of freedom is double: its freeing itself of its own ego and its freeing the other of their own limitations. It is not about becoming saviours of anyone. It is not heroic. It is the art of seeing, of using our gaze and be responsive.<br />
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In this building of collective freedom we all play a role. We are all builders, creators. We have a gaze that looks and acknowledges the authority of the other person, recognise their needs or desires and respond to them when it is appropriate. </div>
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This gaze is very important. It is the base of our deepest spiritual needs and beliefs but it is also how we exert power. </div>
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<b>The parents gaze</b></div>
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<i>Being looked at</i> is an essential part of our survival. How we managed to catch the attentions of our parents, how responsive they were to our needs or how they reacted to our mischief or exploration of limits is fundamental to our sense of empowerment or even to how we communicate our need of attention. But this gaze is not always the same. It develops into establishing areas of privacy. Where this gaze is blind or simply turns a blind eye. Our room in our teenage years, our conversations with friends, our exploration of sexuality, other personal explorations. Of course, privacy is a modern concept that emerged with architectural technology: the chimney that allowed the construction of private rooms. Privacy is important to explore our internal spaces, unanswered questions, concerns, look for the words and narratives that are missing or do not fit. Privacy is a limit to the disciplinary power of the external gaze, to its authority. </div>
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In the evolution of the gaze, there are also positive gazes that define us. Those who "saw" something in us. Who acknowledged, recognised our potential, our uniqueness, our authority that we may or may not even be aware of it ourselves. A teacher, a friend, our parents, an uncle, a completely random person. This is the gaze that talent shows, for example, demonstrate but it is also at play in Social Media.</div>
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<b>From the village gaze to the city gaze</b><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv0mjQYbezL3-t4AazKR6vnTXowkW5o3XIGKSsIbV7FrIEa0VFWYivcqXxXAchckWwEvIMUtIfQp7hdTKmeFDJ0mLSPtNoon4pBkjJFWa6iB1Ax7Jnu3LgyfKSPNLDoeG2lg_YzpgjlwI/s1600/egyptian+eye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="194" data-original-width="259" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiv0mjQYbezL3-t4AazKR6vnTXowkW5o3XIGKSsIbV7FrIEa0VFWYivcqXxXAchckWwEvIMUtIfQp7hdTKmeFDJ0mLSPtNoon4pBkjJFWa6iB1Ax7Jnu3LgyfKSPNLDoeG2lg_YzpgjlwI/s200/egyptian+eye.jpg" width="200" /></a><br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGjXS1i52kyGQtBrSqm1jpaGYXtSdheNQz4CXz7B7ADOvy4BMRLqmeu2_sumFYfCrq2zvwWpcMqo_MuqfD_fS_EF0dhaPHER_wr9AyX5Aig-a6WChjgYbX5osjRQUUGwGhWWSXCncu_k/s1600/triangle+eye.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="192" data-original-width="263" height="146" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQGjXS1i52kyGQtBrSqm1jpaGYXtSdheNQz4CXz7B7ADOvy4BMRLqmeu2_sumFYfCrq2zvwWpcMqo_MuqfD_fS_EF0dhaPHER_wr9AyX5Aig-a6WChjgYbX5osjRQUUGwGhWWSXCncu_k/s200/triangle+eye.jpg" width="200" /></a>Life in a village is constantly watched by a neighbours' gaze and comes alive through the information that s/he generates. This gaze could be paying attention to our needs and activate a collective action of support. It could also watch the compliance of the community norms and show disapproval in many ways. In the village or town is where this gaze is performed by all but at the same time it is external to everyone. It plays a parental role, and authority role but with no parents. This gaze is only possible within a community and therefore is a collective phenomenon. Some argue that this is what shapes our understanding of -or how we imagine- God. This phenomenon that is external to everyone can be represented by a symbol, an eye, a God, an idol to whom we attribute these two functions of the gaze of the community: "see" our needs and come to the rescue, and to "punish" the law breakers.<br />
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Villagers built this externality as an all-seeing deity.<br />
Individual freedom is a claim of space against the power of this eye and the threat of being expelled from the clan.</div>
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I would argue that is not coincidence that the faith in this sort of God changes with modernity and with urbanisation. On the one hand famines and sickness were considered the ultimate divine punishment, the definitive expulsion or the action of "nature's tyrannical arrogance". At the end of the XIX century, Paris was renovated to its current layout, the modern city, and the German bacteriologist Robert Koch postulated that bacteria caused disease which meant that death stopped to be seen as an act of God -who had been questioned for his failings in responding to prayer to prevent famines and led to a long series of religious reforms-. Soon after in 1882 Nietzsche declared (this) God dead. </div>
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In cities we are more invisible than in towns. Cities will struggle with the idea of an all seeing God. <b>Urban citizens will need a new eye, different to the eye looking over villagers. <i>Cities demand a different type of God.</i></b></div>
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<b>The WebCam: the new divine eye</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYjPhv-4XgKCK91kfKHgcKeJufpnhDW5bN38hfNulawO_5_Zp-a1X_onMC62oHnyRADxhu9gjFs5tf1oZXi_vbCiUd4F4Nx_BONvSqLrwq5knVxs0FbJwNDSl7EjFGn3121jJzSK05aKQ/s1600/webcam.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="225" data-original-width="225" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjYjPhv-4XgKCK91kfKHgcKeJufpnhDW5bN38hfNulawO_5_Zp-a1X_onMC62oHnyRADxhu9gjFs5tf1oZXi_vbCiUd4F4Nx_BONvSqLrwq5knVxs0FbJwNDSl7EjFGn3121jJzSK05aKQ/s200/webcam.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
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Even though cities made it difficult for this idea of an all seeing God to survive, it resurrected with the WebCam. Most of us live in cities, somehow alienated from the old village eye, but we are still in need of this positive gaze who acknowledges our existence and recognises our potential. So we publish stuff in social media, waiting for likes, or go to talent shows expecting to be "discovered". The camera emerged as a technology to show us the world outside and bring it closer, but it was turned around by this unsatisfied need of being looked at.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpZgXM07JXmfXXSUsTvv_U0cKUMNSHcSM3Y_Y5uhoOaYEUoKaCNohggr5W4MEjb3iz2MP0bPxkpYgdGcKFBNIyVWQQLeZ2T-EKXoE_XSMHEuLiNhDjSBLs8iYpg9J6UKny1j7cUFt-Gg0/s1600/Gogglebox.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="333" data-original-width="615" height="108" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpZgXM07JXmfXXSUsTvv_U0cKUMNSHcSM3Y_Y5uhoOaYEUoKaCNohggr5W4MEjb3iz2MP0bPxkpYgdGcKFBNIyVWQQLeZ2T-EKXoE_XSMHEuLiNhDjSBLs8iYpg9J6UKny1j7cUFt-Gg0/s200/Gogglebox.png" width="200" /></a>Television became a social mirror where we could watch not only talent shows, "reality" TV as Big Brother but also people actually watching TV, like in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2015/sep/11/gogglebox-everyones-favourite-show">Googlebox</a>. The camera turned to the viewer literally. In a way, this might offer an insight on why the public did not react very strongly to Edward Snowden revelations: being watched is not a big concern, at a certain level is reassuring.<br />
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<b>The tension</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvgDyrFsCHVKeBANS1N0NfUp-_A5x6Ud_rORNj1oA4CgzjZTcFIDUrrNOBomvnEzByeXIAXTRD_szpp2zocayAfut9DWyV-8a_v6pOn4Ou3slnqd_k5LwakjIq5S24_zjCbx1YCE54AeY/s1600/Mark-Zuckerberg-Tape-Facebook-Instagram-1-796x398-702x336.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="336" data-original-width="702" height="152" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhvgDyrFsCHVKeBANS1N0NfUp-_A5x6Ud_rORNj1oA4CgzjZTcFIDUrrNOBomvnEzByeXIAXTRD_szpp2zocayAfut9DWyV-8a_v6pOn4Ou3slnqd_k5LwakjIq5S24_zjCbx1YCE54AeY/s320/Mark-Zuckerberg-Tape-Facebook-Instagram-1-796x398-702x336.jpg" width="320" /></a>The tension clearly comes with the balance of power. The power of the gaze lies on the one holding the gaze. The one that looks. This is one of the simplest (and probably the least sophisticated) explanations on why power is invisible. Power is held by the one who sees and is not seen ie is not subjected to public regulation. This appears as a metaphor in Lord of the Rings, where the ring of power makes you invisible but also shows you what others cannot see; it is embodied by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HAL_9000">HAL 9000</a>, the computer in Kubric's Space Odyssey and its invisible algorithms and somehow are also illustrated by this picture of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/jun/22/mark-zuckerberg-tape-webcam-microphone-facebook">Mark Zuckerberg</a> taping over the webcam and microphone.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiREkuY1tqAe7hLNTm2no-MZRyW20Ryvxtc5nHj_byGdi6A3Ctc_3xjLe63UlRsMnhdFxe6OeNx0jz6qwKeyDyIU-LkE-xGZtU_8i00CquGVIT6TXzlVYv7sznwW5iHx_aMLgEq4kCe0EQ/s1600/clockwork+orange.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="174" data-original-width="290" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiREkuY1tqAe7hLNTm2no-MZRyW20Ryvxtc5nHj_byGdi6A3Ctc_3xjLe63UlRsMnhdFxe6OeNx0jz6qwKeyDyIU-LkE-xGZtU_8i00CquGVIT6TXzlVYv7sznwW5iHx_aMLgEq4kCe0EQ/s320/clockwork+orange.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
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As subjects being observed, a question emerges. <br />
Do I become passive and submissive? Do I adjust my behaviour? How do I look back? Do I accept their gaze? How do I face a power gaze? (like Alex's from the Clockwork Orange)? Do I expect society to adjust their judgement?</div>
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<b>The Big Eye (the Big Other) makes us "moral"?</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW55Y3z_TYLQ-nr1CLyvINIsEYGZipusPH-OYc072RtdeUfn9iBiX84UJRHx_xbfF0xvcUe3nnnI9HeOYy3hvHntd3jYKUsmIzJG62L-FQTnrHYwLGB54ULMKE3xbWEP6pzZWPmCN1Qjk/s1600/50132-2001_A_Space_Odyssey-HAL_9000.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="112" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiW55Y3z_TYLQ-nr1CLyvINIsEYGZipusPH-OYc072RtdeUfn9iBiX84UJRHx_xbfF0xvcUe3nnnI9HeOYy3hvHntd3jYKUsmIzJG62L-FQTnrHYwLGB54ULMKE3xbWEP6pzZWPmCN1Qjk/s200/50132-2001_A_Space_Odyssey-HAL_9000.jpg" width="200" /></a>The idea of an eye watching making us more "moral" is illustrated in this poster (the eye as the intermediary between the animal and the man) and is explained and demonstrated by Derren Brown with experiments (min 12 onward) making references to the work of Dr. Jesse Bering.</div>
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<b>Questioning the gaze - questioning morality</b><br />
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It is easy to feel identified with the role of the individual being looked at by the gaze of the village and advocate for individual freedom or even rescuing its moralising disciplinary function. However... what happens when we realise this eye is heavily skewed? What happens when we discovered that we are looking at the world through lenses that are neither impartial nor just?<br />
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The question of collective freedom comes alive when we are able to question <b><i>our own gaze and</i></b> <b><i>how our gaze plays a role in the collective gaze</i></b>. When we turn our attention away from how judged we feel to how we are judging, from how alone we feel we feel in our battles to how are we supporting others. But also when <b>we start to recognise the gaze of the community to which we belong </b>through the images we are being fed and accept as "normal". Even if the experiment mentioned above suggests that the idea of an all-seeing-eye makes us more "moral", feminists, social justice movements, amongst others argue that this eye does not see everyone in the same way, therefore morality is measured very subjectively and justice is applied differently eg with a focus in disciplining minorities, women and youngsters.<br />
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Even though, many people speak about this gaze from a psychological (the Big Other), philosophical and even an atheist point of view, Christianity itself represents a stance on this gaze, in a way disproving it. "The murder of an innocent" becomes proof that the Father is not there or at least that he won't act. He won't come to the rescue when we are victims, and he won't come to stop us when we are being violent. The eye is not external. What happens depends entirely on the gaze of the community.<br />
This murder becomes a sacrifice, something sacred to remember but proclaims that it will be the last. The last time we kill someone assuming that it will clean us. It was not. Clearly.<br />
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Throughout history, power was imposed with violence more frequently than not. But every once in a while, cases emerge that, like Christianity, have enough impact to dictate a pause and eventually a change. What sort of change? The change that recognises that power needs to be managed, needs to be self-aware and self-restrain. This change that happens when a crowd recognises it has the power to act like a god, making life and death decisions, but that it is neither just nor it cannot be. So every once in a while come new Christs, innocents that die or are murdered because the collective gaze decided so, but later it recognises the victim's innocence and therefore its own violence. These moments are always pivotal to delimit power.<br />
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One of the cases that is thought to have changed the mood of the French society and had a big influence in the emergence of human rights was the case of <a href="https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2015/03/13/broken-on-the-wheel/">Jean Calas</a>. Jean Calas was sentenced to be questioned under torture and to the capital punishment for the death of his son. He claimed in the beginning that his son had been killed by a stranger but then he said his son had committed suicide. He later explained he had lied about the intruder because the bodies of people who committed suicide were denied burial, stripped naked and dragged through the streets. Jean Calas was subjected to pulling of limbs, followed with something similar to waterboarding, then was taken to the public square, tied to a X cross and his bones were broken. He claimed his innocence all the way through. After learning about the case, Voltaire took it and through legal action and multiple publications in different languages to stir public opinion, managed to reopen the case. A retrial found Jean Calas innocent. This change affected deeply public opinion's view of capital punishment. It somehow changed its gaze. Witnessing the public torture and painful death of a guilty man is different to witnessing one of an innocent one. An act of "justice" -even if brutal- becomes a public murder. Onlookers and bystanders lost their innocence. Their gaze accepted brutality. <b>Human rights became that territory of authority where power had to show self-restraint.</b></div>
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(to be continued)<br />
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Andrea</div>
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-10161271975528085232017-03-29T12:44:00.002-07:002017-08-03T02:40:18.575-07:0049. Disconnection and depolitisationIf Foucault spoke about how the prison design with the use of a panopticon revealed the disciplinary model that would be applied in other institutions, the book about casino design "Addiction by design" by prof Natasha Dow Schüll might make us think about <b>a new disciplinary tool: disconnection</b>.<br />
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Casinos have been evolving. They are being purposefully designed with no windows, in cocoon-like spaces, no straight lines or right angles (which would force you to stop and make a decision), with no clocks, all of which create an environment where people get lost in time and space. There are no references to connect us to the now. They are designed <b>to create dependence</b>, to maximise time on the slotting machines (time on device - TOD), to offer an engaging experience with no sudden or abrupt loss/win but rather with a <b><i>progressive milking,</i></b> programmed with a schedule of reinforcement, low volatility and sensorial stimuli that produces a sense of flow. Prof Dow Schüll explains that gamblers refer to this state as "the zone", and she describes it as "a dissociative trance-like state in which they are so focused in playing the game that things like daily worries, social pressures even bodily awareness fade away". They are escaping decision-making and the volatility that surrounds them. This experience changes the common understanding of gambling as a thrill seeking sort of quest, a "getting something from nothing", to a quest where gamblers are <b>seeking nothingness itself</b>. "You are not really there. You are with the machine and that's all you are with" explained a gambler, some sort of eternal present, an immortal death. The players who experience this sensation, come back and become regular customers. And even though designers of these slotting machines do not act like Machiavellian masterminds, by focusing on the purpose of simply seeking revenue maximisation, through experimentation and mathematics... they end up being a bit Machiavellian. Habit forming and ritual establishment (deeply unconscious behaviours) are the most effective ways to <i>minimise volatility </i>in the income for any company. Ironically, in the gambling industry this plan to minimise volatility by creating dependence requires a dissociative state of mind which disregards the effect it is producing to its customers.<br />
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<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDNzzEWMPhk&t=13s">In a more recent interview</a>, Prof Dow Schüll explains that there are so many casinos in the US that people stand 30 minutes away of one, and that states have been seeking for this route to increase their own revenues instead of direct taxation, that even<span style="font-family: inherit;">tually accounts for a tax on <span style="font-family: inherit;">the poor.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Beyond that, this mechanism to disconnect people from reality, from the material world, from the here and now, that includes a sort of soothed exploitation, ends up de-sensitising and even more depolitising people. This model of offering flow states is present in consoles, phones and tablets and even, at some level, when we find some spiritual gurus that guide us through a meditation claiming that all the work is individual and is done at a spiritual level, but then adding that we should not engage in politics or worry about the news because it is some sort of dense energy that contaminate our aura, our vibe, our sense of flow. Meditation that should help us gain clarity to act, to transform, to connect with the other to collaborate, is used instead to sooth, to calm and in many cases to induce us to accept reality as it is and remain passive (or in the game). As long as our energy is positive, positive things will happen, no need to act.To remain connected with the positive energy, disconnection from reality is prescribed. It is not my intention, however, to decry spirituality or religion. In fact there a lot of humble leaders that don't embark in promises of future paradises or wonderful awakenings, but rather guide people to engage. But the other side is also present and it is nothing new, as religion was famously denounced by Marx as the opiate of the people. He was not alone in this reflection, other quotes on the subject are "<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">We have used the Bible as if it were a mere special constable's hand book, an opium dose for keeping beasts of burden patient while they were being overloaded, a mere book to keep the poor in order.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; white-space: nowrap;">", Charles Kingsley (replace the Bible with Mindfulness here as an exercise) or "</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Their so-called religion works simply as an opiate—stimulating; numbing;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> breastfeeding pain from weakness", Novalis; "</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Welcome be a religion that pours into the bitter chalice of the suffering human species some sweet, soporific drops of spiritual opium, some drops of love, hope and faith." Heinrich Heine</span>. Coincidentally, opium itself </span>and pain killers are a talked-about topic that play a role in this disconnection game.<br />
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<b>False uterus</b><br />
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A false uterus has particular characteristics. We are alone in this spaces, we are fed with something that we accept, that is predictable or at least stable. Whether we are in a filter bubble in social media, confirming how right we are with a particular news channel, drugged, charmed by candy crush or in front of a slotting machine, we remain physically disconnected from others. Some of these uterusi are built for us, but we too built walls wishing not to be disturbed by whatever is happening in the word (which -to be fair- is constantly curated to become more emotionally unbearable), "it is too much", "I don't want to vote any more". We expect these walls will protect our innocence, a sense of "I don't know" or even "I didn't know" and "It had nothing to do with me" (for any reason, I write these lines thinking of the role of the mother in John Boyne's "The Boy with the striped pyjamas"). This innocence, however, might not be guilty but it is not innocent either.<br />
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Connecting with reality and with the other is messy indeed: we cannot have a perfectly curated environment, we cannot be floating Buddhas, we have negative emotions, we make bad decisions. That's why there is something more than unconditional love (which is supposed to be the ultimate power) that we need in order to act together, to engage in any sort of relationship, in social change, to make a couple work, a job and even to have children: commitment. It is probably easier to 'unconditionally' love someone from the distance, that is to say, under the sole condition that they are a bit far away. But it is only through commitment that we decide <b>to put our body</b>, to walk through the mud together, to get dirty, to change nappies and to get transformed in the journey.<br />
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<b>Idealising disconnection</b><br />
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In the following video, several economists discuss the lack of History knowledge in the economics profession (with proposition and opposition presentations). Dr Ha-Joon Chan (min 29 onwards) compares it with the series TV hit, the Big Bang Theory, where there is a clear hierarchy: the most detached from reality, the highest it belongs in the academic hierarchy, explaining that the Theoretical physicist (Sheldon) belongs to this highest tier, followed by the experimental physicist (Leonard) and then by the Engineer from MIT (Howard) who belongs to the lowest of ranks. But then continues to highlight that without the context of History, economics cannot be properly understood. He actually says that it should be taken extremely seriously as a theory of economics can kill millions and ruin many people's lives.<br />
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Even if economics is not the only discipline where this disconnection with reality is -at some level- idealised, and this is not the first moment in history that we discuss this topic, I found it to be an interesting material.<br />
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In the following video (that even if it is old is completely worth watching), around min 14 Jon Ronson speaks about psychopaths in society and how psychopathic traits (including being detached, lack of empathy, victim blaming, etc) are rewarded. Slavoj Zizek adds his comments on Brian Victoria's book, Zen at war, on how Buddhist detachment can be used to create soldiers that detach themselves from very cruel actions.<br />
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<b>An Anti-feminist and anti-patriarchal mindset: between soothed dependence and violent extremism</b><br />
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Even if saying that a system can be anti-feminist and anti-patriarchal seems like a provocation, it is not. In the logic in which I write this blog, I suggest we go through the matriarchal and then a patriarchal stage of development in our lives and at social level and that these processes need to be understood. The matriarchy is simply a foundation-building stage which gives us basic tools, the basic building blocks for a psyche, including the most basic recognition of existence, "I am fed, therefore I live", "I am seen, therefore I exist", "I am loved, therefore I am lovable", "I am heard, therefore I have a voice" etc. All of this, whilst we are still dependent and remain highly ignorant of the world. In fact, this foundation building, this learning process, starts in the womb.<br />
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With all its shadows and the costs it had historically on women, children and minorities, the patriarchal drive is (or should be) an emancipatory impulse. <b>It is the impulse to become independent</b>, to get out of the comfort of Eden to earn our bread, to get out of the subjugation of Egypt and walk towards a promised land -which the patriarch does not reach-, the land <i>we </i>should "occupy", a place where we can affect the world; and at a personal level (whether our childhood was Eden or Egypt), to get out of the world of mum when is due. It was the impulse of modernity to develop science and stop suffering famines -being dependent on the weather-, or fight illnesses -being dependent on the "will of God" or circumstance-.<br />
Even if it has some lights, the patriarchy has destructively oversimplified the issue of dependency. It decided that dependency is bad and therefore should be cut <i>as soon as possible</i>, as abruptly as possible, which ended up causing trauma and -some feminist would argue- the oedipus complex. This mindset has been seen in many different areas of life. At the core, in trying to minimise the physical contact between mother and child. This first abrupt disconnection is key, because all subsequent disconnections are trying to recreate and somehow repair this stage. Some feminists suggest that baptism, that originally was performed in adults, came to represent a sort of re-birth into the patriarchy that then had to happen in very early infancy, in a way symbolising this urgency to separate the baby from the mother. In a different subject, but with some commonalities studies about post-cult trauma syndrome, it is now argued that what causes the trauma is the way <b>the intervention </b>to liberate people from cults is conducted, not the experience of being in a cult itself or the act of leaving; it argues that studies in the past focused only in people who were removed forcibly from cults and did not studied people leaving it in other ways. This second group of people were found to register the experience as a weird moment in their lives but do not bear the weight of trauma. <b>When and how dependency is cut is important; how involved the individual is in this process, is important too.</b><br />
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Secondly, the patriarchal drive shows a direction forward with the prohibition to go back to the dependent state, to go back in time, to get lost in this nothingness, in a false uterus, to follow the death drive. Even though in principle is a very positive aspect, in this prohibition, everything maternal was demonised both in men and women (including a range of emotions and mechanisms related to a maternal function: nurturing, negativity processing, etc), and the bodies of women were "occupied" trying to impose control over the behaviour of women not only in terms of reproduction (both to reproduce and have multiple children and to control inheritance by ensuring fatherhood) but also in the contact and relationship they establish with their children which became an area of heavy regulation. Women became patriarchal mothers, cold, distant or over-controlling, affecting the foundation stage I mentioned before, ensuring the production of a chain of angry-hungry patriarchal mothers. The final consequence of this prohibition to go back is the loss of memory. Almost the perfect crime.<br />
This had an effect on men too. Men are left incomplete, with vital functions such as nurturing and negativity processing externalised, and need to keep "a cow well tied up to be able to milk it" and a "legitimate" depository of their negativity (patriarchal men are not violent against their bosses, only with someone they consider a "legitimate target", someone with a lower hierarchical status).<br />
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From the religion evolution point of view, the patriarchy should've ended with Christianity, where motherhood had a not-demonised-representative, men were stopped from depositing their negativity onto Mary Magdalene, and the Son died with a message of assuming responsibility (carrying the cross) and stop expecting a father to come to the rescue, a father that dies with his resurrection suggesting that the crime is not perfect, that there is something that violence cannot kill. Of course this is the ultimate disobedience. Islam, that came afterwards, directly rewrote the story of Eden, changing some details: the guilt was not longer Eva's alone, and God is not referred to as a father any more. Sometimes it feels we are quite slow...<br />
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In any case, the death of the father, does not mean however, the disappearance of the disciplinary entity, it has just been internalised. It is not the "end of history" or the end of the story: that fact poses new challenges. Sometimes it is positive, when the matriarchal stage was positive enough and the emotional foundations are strong, but when this matriarchal stage was not respected, "killing the father" could mean the appearance of leaderless extreme movements (eg neo-nazism, ISIS etc).<br />
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Feminism was indeed a step forward, an emancipatory movement for women. It did not take women back to a dependent state with nature, nor it fought to "lose all control over the uterus", but rather to "own" the control. To be able to occupy their own bodies. To be connected and sovereign. It represented a move to integrate the maternal and paternal role by and in women. Recognition and emancipation. This occupation of the body should not only happen in terms of owning the control of reproduction, but also in reclaiming sovereignty in motherhood, a subject that feminism is still struggling with. But beyond the pending battles, there is an attempt of appropriation of feminism, that tries to make women join the game as it is, without trying to change it, maybe promising some marginal gains. It tries to make a label, a brand out of feminism and tries to stop feminism from taking on the real big battles, <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2017/03/48-facing-bull.html">like the economy and the production of money</a>.<br />
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Going back to the first question: how can we describe a political strategy that creates and fosters dependence on mechanisms of soothed extraction, of slow milking? a Political status quo where there is chronic high youth unemployment (up to 50% in several developed EU economies) keeping youngsters in a dependent state, unable to become adults, to have a house, to receive an income and be economical independent? or ensures they enter adulthood in debt (US, UK)? An economic system that is <b>increasingly devaluing labour and work</b>, pushing it towards the lowest paid workers in foreign countries (exposing workers to compete even with unpaid forced labour from prison systems)? A system that does not discuss fully the political implications of having increasingly larger proportion of tax-paying <i>non-voting </i>immigrants -ie formally outside of the political system- in the labour force? A political system that still relies on women working in some sort of shadow economy?<br />
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<b>It is a system that is both anti-feminist and anti-patriarchal (in its emancipatory sense) at the same time, </b>that feeds from bottom up, to then disconnect capital from countries and take it to fiscal havens or recycle it in the finance sector. At the end, when soft mediums don't work any more, the system turns easily into something more violent, more brutal, exploiting and even discarding those who oppose. Sometimes they raise with a "popular" speech, creating this idea of "we, the people", but without the emancipatory drive, on the contrary, with the promise of going back, follow the death drive. It is a system that somehow sees the economy very similarly to a company evaluating different business units or brands in a very hierarchical way. An example is the Boston Consulting Group chart, where there are <i>Stars</i>, who deliver growth and receive investment, <i>Dogs</i> -unstable and therefore disposable, question marks that need to be worked out to see if they are stars or not, and then the <i>Milk cows</i>, the cash providers, that are not seen as a unit with potential, therefore no investment beyond minimal maintenance will be committed, while it will be extracted from every drop of milk it can deliver. If and when society is looked at with these glasses, that are even reinforced with harsh judgements on the poor, little investment goes to the sectors that need more support. <b>This thinking is not surprising when more CEOs and disconnected elites <i>occupy</i> the body of government.</b><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmSLSDoPppelAhcsdKmd5wJTMkTDP_JxrIaHYFlpPdrJ_5F3gVI8N6NqlU8r0o2UHUpTAeO2RgTtP4EYQ2ICkx9hY5jCp2l4h-AdOEFBW7soa5qi60DeuNUkOQXLrVnBZXncgHTadBfpc/s1600/bcg+matrix.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="183" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmSLSDoPppelAhcsdKmd5wJTMkTDP_JxrIaHYFlpPdrJ_5F3gVI8N6NqlU8r0o2UHUpTAeO2RgTtP4EYQ2ICkx9hY5jCp2l4h-AdOEFBW7soa5qi60DeuNUkOQXLrVnBZXncgHTadBfpc/s320/bcg+matrix.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b>THE moment to connect</b><br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxmxE2UocqDnWdNTJyhHMtGhZLLce5xe11WIlLaCOh9jBi_HnG0iCr1HcLeBK_1WJv9G6ANffbNmkAUJtQiMFBT7sTlrUFtDF7IxOdUi2OsRoZr8_IIlAvBTzOjr5hVIXSLNE5zRnSxJA/s1600/us-dependence-on-foreign-oil-has-declined-significantly.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxmxE2UocqDnWdNTJyhHMtGhZLLce5xe11WIlLaCOh9jBi_HnG0iCr1HcLeBK_1WJv9G6ANffbNmkAUJtQiMFBT7sTlrUFtDF7IxOdUi2OsRoZr8_IIlAvBTzOjr5hVIXSLNE5zRnSxJA/s320/us-dependence-on-foreign-oil-has-declined-significantly.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">US dependence on foreign oil has declined significantly<br />
<a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/us-energy-revolution-charts-2015-11?r=US&IR=T/#in-fact-the-us-is-the-global-leader-in-natural-gas-production-accounting-for-about-one-fifth-of-global-production-in-2014-6">source: Business Insider</a></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
This is THE moment to connect. Brexit, Trump, the elections in France, <b>trade agreements being re-discussed and rewritten <i>de facto</i> deciding how work will be distributed globally and affecting how work will be distributed and structured internally</b>, nuclear tensions, climate change, the US energy revolution and what it means in terms of geopolitics, fake news, new political parties, etc, etc. This is the time where structural changes are being fought but there is a model that is anti-feminist and anti-patriarchal (in its emancipatory sense) that will try to gain more territory. If the end of history happened some time in the nineties, then this must be the beginning of a new history. A history we must write together.<br />
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Andrea<br />
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PS: Aatif Sulleyman for The Independent: <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/facebook-instagram-snapchat-tricks-smartphones-addictive-apps-social-media-a7678276.html">The tricks used by Facebook, Instagram and Snapchat to make smartphones so addictive</a><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-128099254142800042017-03-21T08:50:00.002-07:002017-08-03T02:40:46.944-07:0048. Facing the bull: feminism takes on the economy<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs7wwVpqyoF3T-IoEnLCY-o6y-vU9QkBcSc41qWN37XYEpl38VKHOEYtLFlXPP8MG7NdOa7KylJ37JDICsohWN5ek9ELfypAgk7nu316Bt8GPB4d8Dc8dTehZ2kluNVA4E0vu-I2EcaAQ/s1600/chargin-bull-girl-wall-street2+%25281%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhs7wwVpqyoF3T-IoEnLCY-o6y-vU9QkBcSc41qWN37XYEpl38VKHOEYtLFlXPP8MG7NdOa7KylJ37JDICsohWN5ek9ELfypAgk7nu316Bt8GPB4d8Dc8dTehZ2kluNVA4E0vu-I2EcaAQ/s640/chargin-bull-girl-wall-street2+%25281%2529.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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I found this piece of "guerrilla art" extremely moving. Kristen Visbel designed this sculpture of a girl facing the charging bull of Wall Street. <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/girl-statue-stares-down-wall-street-charging-bull-new-york-international-womens-day-a7617311.html">It was installed just before women's international day</a>. State Street Global advisors commissioned the work and explained it was calling for greater diversity in the private sector in general and financial sector in particular. However, the image suggests a bit more than that (to me at least). For example: which of the two figures transmit true authority? which of the two figures is in control of him/herself? which one truly says fearlessness? which one is free -are any of them-? what do they see in each other/do they see each other? which effect are they expecting to have on the other? can any of them have a positive effect on the other?<br />
Looking at it from a feminist point of view: is this girl speaking about contraception, abortion, abuse (the most salient feminist issues)? is she really speaking only about gender diversity in the work place (the topic the organisers claim to be symbolising) ? or is this speechless girl changing the conversation altogether? Does she only represent women? Is feminism ready to face the bull, take on the next big battle: economics?<br />
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<b>A girl facing the bull: self-contained strength v rampant hunger/anger</b><br />
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A bull in a state of frenzy might have represented a sense of triumph for Wall Street for surviving a crisis, but it is hardly an inspirational image. This became particularly clear after the 2008 crisis. However, that sense of blind hunger/anger in form of ambition, selfishness, greed was presented back then as something positive, something that was causing the economy to grow and therefore unquestionably good for all.<br />
Having ambition was the mark of someone successful even if it was becoming clear that success was an unreachable moving target that never gets satisfied. A hunger that produced tasteless, unwholesome food that in the attempt to satisfy reproduces hunger and trap us in a circular movement. A hunger that hoarded things that are not touched, are not used, are not played with. A hoarding that sucks up resources that are then recycled but are not used to produce anything else (let's remember that most of the money the finance sector moves never enters the 'real' economy).<br />
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A bull that conveys a sense of anticipation, what is about to do, what is about to win in front of a girl satisfied by her own stance, by the present moment, proposing to stop and change the game. This is a challenge as much as it is a proposal, because she does not challenge the bull from the logic of fear.<br />
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<b>A girl facing the bull: feminism in economics</b><br />
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There are many feminist voices in economics speaking up. Some of them argue for care work to be considered work, some others discuss universal income, somehow focusing on the distribution issue. <br />
I'm particularly interested (at least for the moment) in the 'female' role (nothing to do with gender) in creation: The one that creates spaces and conditions (and even probably markets), the one the makes the long term investment, not necessarily expecting a "return" on the investment through interests but rather a "forward" on the investment: whatever was invested will be paid forwardly and passed on to future generations. In previous articles, I suggested that "states" tend to adopt the female role in contra-position of the private sector.<br />
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Mariana Mazzucato speaks all around the world and wrote several books about the role of the state in innovation that tends to be invisibilised and unacknowledged:<br />
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In this video Professor Laura Bear speaks about how financial mechanisms subjugated politics to the finance sector and forces governments to austerity:<br />
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Ann Pettifor, one of the few economists that predicted the 2008 financial crisis, has just published a book speaking about the production of money, and argues that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/mar/07/philip-hammond-economic-myths-budget-international-womens-day">it is a feminist issue in this article in The Guardian</a>, where she tries to correct two of the fallacies that another woman, Margaret Tatcher, "incepted" in public common sense: comparing the economy with a household budget, and "there is no money".<br />
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The economy is <i>nothing</i> like a house budget<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
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<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; margin-bottom: 1rem; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">"On the first, the public are told that <a class="u-underline" data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/public-sector-cuts" style="background: transparent; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; touch-action: manipulation; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;" title="">cuts in spending</a> and in some benefits, combined with rises in income from taxes will – just as with a household – balance the budget. Even though a single household’s budget is a) minuscule compared to that of a government; b) does not, like the government’s, impact on the wider economy; c) does not benefit from tax revenues (now, or in the foreseeable future); and d) is not backed by a powerful central bank. Despite all these obvious differences, government budgets are deemed analogous (by economists and politicians) to a household budget.</span></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">To understand why the government/household analogy is false it is important to understand that the balance of the government budget, unlike that of a household, is entirely a function of the wider economy. If the economy slumps (as in 2008-9) and the private sector weakens, then like a see-saw the public sector deficit, and then the debt, rises. When private economic activity revives (thanks to increased investment, employment, sales etc) tax revenues rise, unemployment benefits fall, and the government deficit and debt follow the same downward trajectory.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, to balance the government’s budget, efforts must be made to revive Britain’s economy, including the indebted private sector. Because government spending (unlike a household’s spending) has a big impact on the economy, governments can use loan-financed investment to expand tax-generating employment – both public (for example, nurses and teachers) and private sector employment (construction workers)."</span></div>
<i>No money?</i><br />
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<div style="background-color: white; color: #333333; margin-bottom: 1rem; padding: 0px;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">"The second myth is that “there is no money” – for social care, the NHS, education and skilled, well-paid employment – all of which <a class="u-underline" data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/may/28/women-austerity-charities-cuts-gender-inequality" style="background: transparent; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; touch-action: manipulation; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;" title="">disproportionately impact on women’s lives</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Philip Hammond will present his budget on International Women’s Day, but has already warned against any rise in spending, and repeated a meme popular with politicians: namely that “<a class="u-underline" data-link-name="in body link" href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/03/04/budget-2017-chancellor-philip-hammond-announce-ban-baffling/" style="background: transparent; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; touch-action: manipulation; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;" title="">there is no pot of money under my desk</a>”.. His views are echoed by Labour’s shadow chancellor, John McDonnell, who argued in 2016 that <a class="u-underline" data-link-name="in body link" href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/nov/15/john-mcdonnell-labour-must-show-unbreakable-fiscal-discipline" style="background: transparent; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; touch-action: manipulation; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;" title="">“there is no proverbial magic money tree”</a>.</span></div>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">One woman can be said to have given the phrase “there is no money” much credibility. In her 1983 speech to the Conservative party conference, Margaret Thatcher declared that: “The state has no source of money, other than the money people earn themselves. If the state wishes to spend more it can only do so by borrowing your savings, or by taxing you more … There is no such thing as public money. There is only taxpayers’ money.”</span></span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">Today this framing of the debate is at odds with reality. After the financial crisis, the Bank of England injected £1,000bn into the private finance sector to prevent systemic economic failure. And after the shock of the Brexit vote, the Bank unveiled the “Term Funding Scheme” as part of a £170bn</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: inherit;"> </span><a class="u-underline" data-link-name="in body link" href="http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/Pages/news/2016/008.aspx" style="border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit; text-decoration: none; transition: 0.15s ease-out;" title="">“stimulus package”</a><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: inherit;">aimed at the private finance sector. The money was “public money” offered at a historically low interest rate – to bankers. It was not raised by cutting spending, and it was not raised from “your taxes”, even while its issue was backed by Britain’s taxpayers."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And finally, on economics and feminism: </span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><b>And while women may have broken the shackles that tie them to work in the home, they have acquired new chains: economic myths that prolong economic weakness, deny them access to the services they need, and to skilled, well-paid work that would improve living standards.</b></span></span></blockquote>
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Going back to the girl and the bull: for whom are we routing for? who should win -should any of them win-? is this a battle?<br />
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AndreaABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-43994012204324835112017-01-21T09:57:00.000-08:002018-05-02T00:39:03.735-07:0047. Women's march: Feminism carrying the patriarchal light<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf8-6pCHPkGNzNtqxoa3pxwBqTHSJmFkxQAug464MAMX9ugKQy58LDTtv9Tviqt8jB3oIH4YIow7ikpDMWk3h8_wPek1DKyGImQxhGxF8Cje3WpJspCkd4TedRzqq6JzK4Hnaq_SXur3E/s1600/stop+the+war+on+women.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhf8-6pCHPkGNzNtqxoa3pxwBqTHSJmFkxQAug464MAMX9ugKQy58LDTtv9Tviqt8jB3oIH4YIow7ikpDMWk3h8_wPek1DKyGImQxhGxF8Cje3WpJspCkd4TedRzqq6JzK4Hnaq_SXur3E/s320/stop+the+war+on+women.jpg" width="320" /></a>The women's march in Paris complaining about the price of bread led to the French revolution, the march of the suffragettes led to women earning the right to vote. Today there is a Women's March in Washington and in many other big cities around the world.<br />
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Even though it would seem that feminism is against patriarchy, I would argue that it is not quite so. It is against the invisibility of the patriarchy, it is against its shadows, it is against forgetting what the patriarchy is actually about. The patriarchy has been used as a system to subjugate women but that's mostly <i>a corruption </i>of its function. As a function, it could be simply a phase, an emancipatory process that is has historically been associated with the father but in fact does not belong to any gender. In many respects feminism as an emancipatory movement, is the integration, the appropriation of the patriarchal drive which then takes us to a post-patriarchy.<br />
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Why do I want to write about the patriarchal drive? The patriarchal drive is the one that pushes us out of a state of dependency, of ignorance. The one where we are at the mercy of external forces. <b>When women take that torch, the patriarchy is no longer needed</b>.<br />
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<b>Claiming control: occupy</b><br />
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As <b>gatherers-hunters, </b>we were at the mercy of luck, finding food, of external forces. Following the patriarchal drive, control was sought and we settled and agriculture and cattle raising began, developing techniques, knowledge, working out a schedule, a discipline. With this, private property started, and then the issue of inheritance: how do I know that the children who will inherit my property are mine? (Men would ask). Which came with a heavy price for women as it led to control women's uterus, their behaviour, their voice, their friendships, their wisdom and their freedom. Anchoring land equated to controlling women's bodies. That's why it is said that ultimately all wars are about the control of land and the body of women.<br />
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Then came the black plague that devastated Europe and triggered the biggest assault over women to force them to take on the role of repopulating the continent. So the patriarchy turned to its nastiest form: production and reproduction were assigned to different genders. The colonisation of America began and in parallel with this movement that represented an internal colonisation for Europe. Women were denied their voice, knowledge, friendship, access to land and money and ownership of their bodies. Women were disciplined through the persecution and public execution of the so-called witches.<br />
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Many centuries later, women were able to reclaim their bodies, but not by letting it at the mercy of chance to get pregnant or not (it was not about going back to nature), but to exert control over their own reproduction. This drive of claiming control, of not being at the mercy of external forces was internalised by women. Contraception (at to some extent the movement for access to safe abortions) are, in fact, patriarchal by nature. It was not about denying control. It was about owning it. In this move, the integration of the patriarchal drive, takes patriarchy to the beginning of its end. It starts to break the role-polarisation were women have control externalised (of behaviour and reproduction) in men and men have nutrition, contention and care externalised in women.<br />
This is not to say that the patriarchy came to save us and that women were lacking of control. There were some, albeit limited, knowledge of herbal contraceptives and abortives, but through the control over women's friendship this knowledge was not passed on and was prohibited. It is more to do to Rumi's notion that "the wound is the place where light enters you" or Hegel's notion that the wound heals when it finds in itself the solution. So if the patriarchy offered science as a way of cutting the dependence of nature, it was through science that the patriarchal chain on women is being cut. In a way, any intervention is patriarchal.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDQRD2WJyMK6itqh3YWXOu6EO28E94-LqzJ_7AVu02Wd0ZEGAlPIvjLnveJfic46VvgTL-QqC2BsepwMqdIGccL-UWlpi4BgVOuUCod3QKY2h8xmSDj1umeBWHNWDtz7TTKT2kvGST1cQ/s1600/still+protesting.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDQRD2WJyMK6itqh3YWXOu6EO28E94-LqzJ_7AVu02Wd0ZEGAlPIvjLnveJfic46VvgTL-QqC2BsepwMqdIGccL-UWlpi4BgVOuUCod3QKY2h8xmSDj1umeBWHNWDtz7TTKT2kvGST1cQ/s320/still+protesting.jpg" width="296" /></a>With this I don't mean to say either that the work is done, because it has not yet been institutionalised. Institutions, laws and science are still biased to take care of the rights and health of men (or not-poor men). Medical research puts special emphasis in rich men health issues, it performs most of its drug tests on men, women are more likely to be prescribed anxyolitics or symptoms being dismissed as psychosomatic. Research also shows that women are more likely to die of heart attacks when they have one, as early signs are not taken seriously. In Law, women (and poor people) are less likely to know their rights and to have less tools to defend them (access to proficient lawyers as in many cases they have to rely in those provided by the state) and even then they are more likely of being confronted by culturally biased judges. Very recently in a very advanced country, like Canada, judge <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/09/09/justice-robin-camp_n_11935626.html">Robin Camp asked a rape victim why she didn't keep her knees together and kept referring her as "the accused"</a>. This case caused an outrage. The case was reviewed, he had to go through gender-sensitivity training and he has apologised to the victim but also to the community, understanding that this sort of treatment has a bigger impact on society: undermines the efforts of other victims to come forward, deepens the sense of despair in victims and hurts justice. By no means, he is an isolated case.<br />
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This comes out of the patriarchal division of public and private spheres and property. As land is/was divided in public and private property, so are/were women. "Public women" were a property to be shared by many men and there are implicit rules of how women had to behave not to be labelled a public woman. This is why, in cases of rape, the first questions tend to be on the woman's behaviour and which "signs" she was giving. Public places were dangerous places for women. This sounds very old, but it is a code that is working to this day. A "public woman" is just a body to be used, like public facilities in some regard, she is not a person.<br />
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Ivette Cooper, Labour MP, will be speaking in Trafalgar square, during today's women march in London. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/live/2017/jan/21/womens-march-on-washington-and-other-anti-trump-protests-around-the-world-live-coverage?page=with:block-58835633e4b00b8fc2ae3352#block-58835633e4b00b8fc2ae3352">Her speech was already published.</a> A part of it speaks about women in public spaces:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
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<em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">We are marching because a talented woman MP was murdered by a far right extremist and we need to call it out as the terrorism it is.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">We are marching because we believe what Jo Cox said that we have more in common than what divides us and because we won’t stay on the sidelines any more.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">And we are not just marching, we’re singing, we are shouting, we’re tweeting, snapchatting, facebooking - standing up to the misogynists, the bullies and the haters who try to intimidate and silence people online just as for years they tried to intimidate or silence women on the street, in the pub, in the workplace.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">Thirty years ago, many of us marched to reclaim the night. Women in Leeds were being told not to go out after dark, because it wasn’t safe, there were too many attacks.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">Instead they came together - in Leeds, London and across the country to reclaim the night, to take back the streets. Our new streets are online. Social media are our new pubs and clubs. So just as we stood together to reclaim the night we will stand together to reclaim the Internet too.</em></blockquote>
Women are more likely to develop agoraphobia, the fear of open and public spaces, and stay at home, safe. Or decide not to tweet or have an androgynous name to post opinions. Reclaiming a public space is a natural step after reclaiming their bodies.<br />
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Going back to the light of the patriarchal drive, being born, separating from the parents all follow the patriarchal light. Rebelling against slavery, Moses exodus, Christ dying in the cross with the message "the father will not come to save you", Independence wars, Modernity and its drive to take people away from the dependence on the weather to avoid famines, dependence of "the will of God" to get well after falling ill, and develop modern tools, science and technology to take "control" or at least take action, all these movements of progress are following an emancipation/ patriarchal drive. Of course here there is a danger. <b>In this sense, modernity is about consciousness and assuming responsibility rather than over-promoting a complete detachment or prevalence of rationality over emotion.</b><br />
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<b>Forwards not backwards</b><br />
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The patriarchal drive has a second light: the direction is forward not backwards. It is forbidden to go back to the womb, the matriarchal world (infancy), the dependent state. This equates with the death drive, wishing to go back to mum's uterus, to let go and not engage with reality any more. We march for 40 years if it's needed, but we don't go back. With this prohibition, it brought the demonisation of women, particularly if they were powerful, as they represent the temptation to go back to mum's world. Women then are portrayed as witches, as narcissistic queens, as prostitutes, as corrupted human beings particularly if there are not fulfilling the roles of the good girl, obedient, mostly silent or not confrontative, a doll or happy to be the empty object of desire. Most women leaders and politicians have to deal with this demonisation publicly and Jo Cox suffered the ultimate consequence. It's been years of slow progress and today women are confronting. Today's march is also carrying this light: we cannot go back.<br />
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Ivette Cooper will finish her speech with the following words:<br />
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<em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">We are here because we want to take a stand against <a class="u-underline" data-component="auto-linked-tag" data-link-name="auto-linked-tag" href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/donaldtrump" style="background: transparent; border-bottom: 0.0625rem solid rgb(220, 220, 220); color: #005689; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none !important; touch-action: manipulation; transition: border-color 0.15s ease-out;">Donald Trump</a>. Millions of American women and men voted for him. Marching isn’t enough - we need to persuade, to win arguments, to challenge the deep causes of division and to build a future in common.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">We stand on the shoulders of our mothers and grandmothers - women who have gone before us and won great victories to get us equal pay, abortion rights, rape laws, child care paternity as well as maternity leave.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">But we won’t be judged on our victories but on how we deal with the setbacks. How we come together and rebuild when it feels like the clock is being turned back.</em><em style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "Guardian Text Egyptian Web", Georgia, serif;">For the sake of our children and grandchildren - our daughters and our sons - we are here because <b>we will not let the clock be turned back now.</b></em></blockquote>
But the need of moving forward not backward will come again in other political discussions: with the attempts of raising tensions again with Russia, or creating a new enemy in China. It will be discussed again in terms of workers rights, education rights, freedom of press, freedom of speech, civil rights...<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>The need of shedding some light</b><br />
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In any case, it is always important to acknowledge context. Donald Trump's election did not come out of nowhere. It came after almost two decades of stagnant wages, student debt, worse jobs requiring ever higher qualifications, rising death rates, rising opiate addition, new generations being for the first time more likely to be worse off than their parents, foreclosures. Growth as an economical recipe was sold to the public saying that if the cake is bigger, everyone piece of the cake will be bigger, but it was not the case. The cake was made bigger, but all this new excess ended up on the plate of the 1%. Occupy Wall Street back then was a very symbolic gesture. Markets seem to be like these mad forces that can take economies to the ruin like the weather used to ruin crops and cause famines. Now a new modernity is needed to create a distance with these forces and work out how to prevent their potential devastating effects, <b>a reincarnation of Nietzsche to declare the markets dead (or at least the bond markets?) or deprive them from their god-like status,</b> perhaps and take action to curb climate change soon after. A modernity to create a distance that today does not exist between politicians and Wall Street and between ideology and the economics profession as Jo Michell's article in Prime Economics explains: "<a href="http://www.primeeconomics.org/articles/khtffos9pui0bk5j91101xu84otc5f">Trump, ideology and the economics profession</a>".<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcD-08eeLPueUC0c7jJDA_NLjqMIGAqSFvXJSgjcRJsmj1o6gnnZV91ReUA1NXlSfB8DWIPe6_j5eN91uqNuDjr3inzepe0Nj2Ic8QY1F-cO5dxSN04xs-PsWwXX3pTO2dLWxkK7Rk9tU/s1600/stanley+kubrick.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcD-08eeLPueUC0c7jJDA_NLjqMIGAqSFvXJSgjcRJsmj1o6gnnZV91ReUA1NXlSfB8DWIPe6_j5eN91uqNuDjr3inzepe0Nj2Ic8QY1F-cO5dxSN04xs-PsWwXX3pTO2dLWxkK7Rk9tU/s320/stanley+kubrick.jpg" width="234" /></a>There is a context too in terms of global affairs and journalism. With news consumed daily, and the pursue of mostly the salient pieces of whatever sort of news, many global events are presented to the public as the weather report would be. It rains. An attack in Turkey killed 30. Kim Kardashian is robbed in Paris. NATO forces doing the biggest war games in Poland since WWII. It simply happens. I was very surprised some time ago, watching an otherwise interesting TED talk by a highly educated prize-winning author saying (in min 14.50) "<a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/robert_wright_on_optimism#t-886822">I want to figure out why so many people around the world hate us</a>". Five years after the twin towers were attacked not even highly educated people had a clue why. They hate us. It rains. It is a fact. Them.<br />
Now it is 2017 and we read news of Donald Trump coming out of 'scary' intelligence briefings stating "we have some big enemies out there in this country and we have some very big enemies - very big and, in some cases, strong enemies". It reminded me, funnily enough, Alec Baldwin explaining how he imagines heaven in an interview of Inside the Actors studio (I could not find the video, though). He said that he imagined that when we die, we are sat in front of a screen, like in the movies and we are explained everything, the "truth" so we can go "ahhhh, now I get it". Apocalipsis in the literal sense. The revelation.<br />
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In this sense, Wikileaks, Snowden even if they are different in purpose and circumstance are about this state of ignorance. Of course, there are many voices that have been explaining what's going on even if they don't have access to these exclusive files.<br />
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<b>Stop the war on women</b><br />
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Here is the other side of the patriarchy ending. It is not only women claiming streets, using their voice, claiming power and rights, leading public offices... men are modified too. Men need to "occupy" those spaces in their psyche that are vital but that have been abandoned and externalised in these women who won't behave: the ones that provide vital attention, emotional nutrition, digestion and processing of negativity, and provide contention. The Huffington Post has a section on "<a href="http://projects.huffingtonpost.co.uk/building-modern-men/">Building modern men</a>" talking about this subject. The crisis of masculinity that comes from not being able to fulfil the old role of the man as the provider, of feeling impotent in front of the economic reality, not being able to afford health care, being surrounded by an ideology that speaks about meritocracy while it invisibilises systemic distortions, de-politicises people and imposes some sort of tyranny of positive thinking inferring that whatever happens to you: it is your fault; plus cultural pressures on men that prevent them from discussing emotions are leading many of them to addiction and has been contributing to the rise of suicides. Some of them, may be tempted to go back, to blame women (and any personification of their vulnerability), to become reactionary against feminism stating that feminists are women who hate men and life itself (<b>as these reactionary movements tend to come with the ban of abortion and limits to access to contraceptives and sexual ed</b>). A deep sense of shame is linked with this reaction (the shame of not being able to be the man that he is supposed to be) and ultimately with fascist tendencies. Some sort of hypermasculinity that ironically sees itself as a victim. And yesterday we listened to an inauguration speech portraying the biggest economy in the world, the most powerful military force in the world, the nation that leads NATO and dictates the policies of the IMF, the World Bank and one of the few nations with a right of veto in the security council of the UN, a nation that has been bombing multiple countries... as a victim.<br />
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Feminism has a lot to offer to men in this moment, should they want to understand what is that part that is missing and how to deal with shame. That caring side that allows us to have pity on our Gollum, our shame, our shadow. The war on women is a war on everyone's feminine side. It doesn't allow men to access these tools, and look for solutions from a different place, without anger against women but rather fighting for rights, reconnecting with politics and moving forward. Staying in the patriarchy when it is time to move on is -ultimately- castrating, slavering and des-empowering, the opposite of what everyone needs.<br />
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AndreaABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-16420756823416162692017-01-20T06:56:00.000-08:002017-08-03T02:41:49.578-07:0046. Sometimes democracy hurtsIt is interesting reading or listening to political commentators using phrases "how didn't we see it coming". The question here is "who is <i>we</i>?", who is included in this selected group and who is excluded?<br />
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<b>'Democracy is not working' </b>is being suggested by <i>'the losing side'</i>, in Brexit, US elections or any other electoral contest of these days. The blame is on: Russia, the FBI, Fake news and fake news sites, Facebook, Wikileaks, the uneducated, the baby boomers, etc, etc.<br />
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And then, <i>'the winners'</i>, seem to believe that a tight electoral result grants them the right to impose some sort of 'tyranny of the winner', where the other side should stay silent and let them do what they want, let them get on with stuff as all actions are somehow validated by a result that does not even represent the majority.<br />
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<b>'Democracy does not seem to be giving the "right" answer'. </b>It is too unpredictable or uncontrollable for some. "People are looking in too much", "they are looking around, looking at their reality", so "we need an external enemy", "which is one of the easiest way to engineer consensus".<br />
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<b>Who is the enemy?</b><br />
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Historically speaking, the neighbour (the neighbouring town, city, country, empire) has been the perfect enemy. The neighbour marks the limit of what's not mine, the place where I don't have sovereignty. His house is not mine. He is not me. The neighbour is a "no". And so most of wars were between neighbouring countries or empires and ended up redrawing limits.<br />
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During the cold war, US and URSS were neighbours, who diligently fenced their claimed territories and kept fighting in disputed lands. With the fall of the Berlin wall, and then the iron curtain, the end of history was declared. US prevailed. There was no longer a neighbour to fight against.<br />
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So the enemy became internal. The collective solution failed so it is all about the individual struggle. The negativity we felt was now the enemy holding ourselves back, there was no alternative system to compare. So self-help books emerged, positive thinking. We also fought cancer and AIDS -an internal enemy- and terrorism became the political enemy, destructive cells that can covertly attack us inside our territory or hack our immune/defence systems so it does not detect the invasor is there.<br />
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Zygmunt Bauman wrote in his article "<a href="https://www.socialeurope.eu/2016/11/how-neoliberalism-prepared-the-way-for-donald-trump/">How Neoliberalism prepared the way for Donald Trump</a>" a reflection on Umberto Eco's essay Making an enemy.<br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Shortly before his death, the great Umberto Eco drew in his brilliant essay </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222;">Making an Enemy</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> the following sad conclusion from his numerous studies of the matter: “Having an enemy is important not only to define our identity but also to provide us with an obstacle against which to measure our system of values and, in seeking to overcome it, to demonstrate our own worth”. In other words: we need an enemy to know who we </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222;">are</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> and who we </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222;">are not; </em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">knowing this is indispensable for our self-approval and self-esteem. And he adds: “So when there is no enemy, we have to invent one”. A codicil: “Enemies are </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222;">different</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> from us and observe customs that are not our own. The epitome of difference is the foreigner”.</span></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;">Well, the trouble with a foreigner is that all too often he is indeed </span><em style="background-color: white; box-sizing: border-box; color: #222222;">foreign –</em><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222;"> not just in the sense of obeying alien habits, but also – and most importantly – in that of <b>residing beyond the realm of our sovereignty and so also beyond our reach and control.</b> It is not fully up to us to make of such people enemies and put our enmity in practice (unless, of course, they cross boundaries with the intention of settling in our midst). If sovereignty consists in the “decisionist” capacity of acting solely on one’s own will, then many a foreigner is unfit to perform the role of a proper enemy according to Eco. In many cases (or perhaps in all?) it is better to seek, find or invent an enemy closer to home and above all inside the gate. An enemy within sight and touch is for many reasons more proficient (and above all easier to control and manipulate) than the seldom seen or heard member of an imagined totality. Already in the Middle Ages the function of the enemy in case of Christian states was perfectly performed by heretics, Saracens and Jews – all residing inside the realms of dynasties and churches by which they had been appointed. Today, in the era that favours exclusion over inclusion while the first (but not the second) is fast becoming a routine measure to which well-nigh mechanically to resort, internal choices assume yet more attraction and facility.</span></span></blockquote>
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Today is the inauguration day, and America is torn in front of the choice of enemy. Terrorism with all its relevance, is losing its edge in terms of driving people's fears. <br />
Where is the limit of what we are not? For some, it is the president-elect himself, a property developer, salesman and expert hacker of our attention system. For others, immigrants and the fussy entity that conforms the establishment. Some are dangerously pushing for the come back of the golden enemy, Russia, or probably some small "nasty" country that appears as a more legitimate target (North Korea?). Some of those will be driven by interest in the business of a new arms race and making Europe the new disputed territory, but the public is probably more driven by denial that the same America that fantasises through Hollywood with heroic Presidents, wise and impeccable, addressing the world, fighting for freedom and defending "our way of living"... that same America... well, voted for Trump. "Russia is the one that hacked us", somehow surgically impacting the outcome of the election of the swing states (Hillary Clinton won the popular vote). "It was not us, it was fake news" even though scientific <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-will-he-win-us-presidential-election-2016-hillary-clinton-a7380621.html">predictive models</a> that take into consideration the relative strength of a candidate in the primaries pointed out at Trump as the most likely winner, against what polls were saying. Polls which also offered certainty in Brexit and the Colombian referendum, somehow making an impact on many indecisive voters who decided then not to bother.<br />
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Trump's preference -at the moment at least- seems to be China, but it is a not new idea as the encircling of China with 400 military bases has been going on for years, as <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6StL-AJLDwY">John Pilger</a> denounces in "The coming war on China". It is the third largest economy after US and the EU. China has an expansionist agenda, but less military than others. They've been investing in Latin America and Africa in infrastructure, trains, energy projects, etc. It's the biggest trading nation and developed a manufacturing sector with low wages and almost no rights whilst US needs to face the consequences of Nafta, the erosion of the manufacturing sector and a fake distribution of wealth through access to credit. US is tempted by the promise of protectionism while we now hear the Chinese communist <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/01/17/davos-2017-breaking-news-updates-world-economic-forum-begins/">President Xi Jinping speaking in Davos in the World Economic Forum in defence of globalisation</a>. This is definitely a curious change.<br />
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Hacking is about obtaining unauthorised access, but it is also about opening up short cuts, looking at system's vulnerabilities. And one of our vulnerabilities is not looking at the vulnerable. We are easily distracted by celebrities, outrageous statements and with the idea of the external enemy. An enemy is useful in rhetoric terms, it keeps us clean. It is not time for self-doubt in front of an enemy. Easily accepting a narrative that increases military tensions between nuclear powers is dangerous and should be closely scrutinised. There were real political reasons behind the break on the Democrat's administration and forgetting about those would be a distraction. Today we watch a Hollywood version of Les Miserables on TV and can deeply emphatise with their struggle. We can see, from the distance that those miserables were subjected to a system of structural injustice, when there were dreams that could not be and that we could not force a narrative of meritocracy when listening to Fantine's lament:<br />
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But are we really paying attention to Les Miserables of our time? Are we able to emphatise with their situation and their struggle?<br />
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Plurality means that sometimes we are not right, or that sometimes we are on the losing side even if we are right (of course, we are), we are forced to look at the other side of the argument and rescue whatever truth lies there.<br />
This US presidential election as well as the Brexit vote, some say, gave the wrong answer and the seed of doubt is planted: doubting the system, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2017/jan/19/democracy-brexit-trump-right-to-vote?CMP=soc_3156">doubting democracy</a>. Rather than saying that is not working, I'd say 'it's complicated' or even that sometimes 'democracy hurts'. But we should not let this pain blind us to the reality that keeps on moving and is trying to distract us from very important tasks (such as strengthening democratic values and institutions, overseeing all now open trade agreements that will define how work will be distributed and how capital will flow globally) by preparing a menu of enemies,<br />
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Andrea<br />
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PS: the 2016 Davos, predicted that Trump would lose and this year they seem to be<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2017/01/19/what-it-would-take-to-really-rethink-capitalism/?tid=sm_tw&utm_term=.5e5baef3eec4"> discussing inequality more seriously</a>...<br />
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-10132289332446282452016-12-07T01:55:00.002-08:002020-04-24T09:20:38.788-07:0045. Post-patriarchal cities and the energy revolution<br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">There are big questions on the subject of how we relate to earth and nature. I am not talking <i>yet</i> about climate change but rather the most fundamental question: <b>where do we get our energy from, both in terms of food, and consumable energy. </b>This search has been the one that defines entire historical eras and their economical systems. In fact, how we choose to respond this question is an important structuring factor of our social systems. It is more common to look at progress from the point of view of technological revolutions, but I'll stick -on purpose- to the subject of the <b>basic needs and energy revolutions</b>, as they are the most basic of all needs and the ones with the deepest roots.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">This question is so important that is actually a permanent question because we -human beings- can create many things, but not energy: we can consume it, foster it, release it, store it or transform it but we cannot create it -or at least not yet-. Our capacity as creators has that limit, and because of that we keep a dependence with nature, "mother" nature (even though some Buddhist meditators are exploring some of these frontiers too). Secondly, because in every transformation of energy, a residue, some waste is generated and how we deal with this waste requires management, it creates a limit or at least -as much as the CO2 we have to breath out- a rhythm.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nature's 'tyrannical arrongance'</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Up to "modern times" dependency on nature (or more precisely, on the sun and the rain), meant <b>no food security and</b> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_of_1315%E2%80%9317">famines</a>, It meant being at the mercy of the weather, pests and somehow "Mother nature", who figuratively speaking appeared to be powerful, authoritarian, mad and in front of whom Faust would say "man asserts himself against nature's tyrannical arrogance" (a tyrannical arrogance that he ends up embodying). Not surprisingly, modernity drove humans away from nature, from the work on the land, and from the "feminine". In this sense, and figuratively speaking again, modernity and cities are patriarchal processes and mechanisms. Here, as in the entire blog, I speak about Patriarchy as a process that drives us away from dependency, from our mothers, and forbids the desire to go back to the uterus, and in order to do so it demonises the female altogether. Being born is metaphorically the first fall from paradise, the first patriarchal step. The separation that starts to happen around 7 years of age is the second, followed by <b>periodical falls</b> when our biology or life circumstances makes us evolve beyond the limits of what we were. But during the patriarchy we remain dependent. It is a stage where some vital processes are still "externalised":</span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Nourishment -we still somehow need an external placenta feeding us with food, energy and vital attention- (Under patriarchal thinking: the more chauvinist, the more externalised this function is and the more it will be needed to tie up its source of nourishment, the more patriarchal the mother, the more she feeds her hunger from her children).</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Control -governing over the development of self mastery and self discipline- (Famously women have had throughout a big part of history control externalised (sexual, behavioural), were the ones being more harshly 'disciplined' ie punished, and were restricted in their access to education).</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Contention (the ability to deal with negativity), and our need of this external entity to absorb all our negative "emissions". </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Consciousness architecture and narrative/history writing (which limits self awareness, self empowerment and freedom), etc. </span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Even though we will probably never manage to internalise everything, we go through a process of increasing integration. As our embryonic life replicates the entire evolution of humans, our journey too replicates our social evolution.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">At social level, <b>every time we are collectively questioning the dependence/relationship with nature, "mother nature" and land we are going through one of these falls. </b>For the Western civilisation, the most recent falls were the end of medieval times with its Renaissance, modernity, the period between the two world worlds and climate change is the current one which is undoubtedly global.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In this post I argue that:</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">-W<b>e are going through a renaissance, </b>because of this we live in a very confusing moment where hope and seemingly limitless possibilities live together with a sense of the end of the world.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">-In every renaissance the most important point is the change in energy source: <b>the energy question</b>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">-Following the logic I follow in this blog of the sequence matriarchy-patriarchy-post-patriarchy, this time the energy source change includes the fundamental <b>change from consumer to prosumer </b>(or at least more evolution in this direction), term in use both web users, for people who consume and produce content and in the energy sector for individuals with solar panels and the ability to capture energy to feed the network with the excess energy they might not be consuming (produce and consume, the step beyond patriarchy is to <i>become creator</i>).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">-Structurally speaking, this change will not happen only at electricity design network level, a new business model in the energy sector and the minimisation of the use of fossil fuels (eg <a href="http://www.climatechangenews.com/2016/12/01/germany-tells-world-bank-to-quit-funding-fossil-fuels/">Germany has recently asked the World Bank to stop funding fossil fuels</a>), but also <b><u>at the level of cities</u></b>. <b>Cities are starting to change structurally or probably I should say, cities <i>must </i>change structurally for this change to take hold</b>. Modern cities are structured to allow circulation of cars, the 'daughter' technology of petrol. Modern cities are 'alienated' from nature and need energy to come 'from outside'. New cities are starting to show a new orientation to new energy sources. This is slowing appearing in public transport, city design and may include in the future energy production and more green spaces (I wonder if some level of food production will have to be integrated into cities too). While geopolitics might still be dragging on the usual question on how to secure basic resources from foreign countries, the changes happening at local level, through local politics might end up having a big impact too.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Renaissances: matters of life and death rather than life or death</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In geology, some experts are currently saying that 1950 should be considered the beginning of the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/aug/29/declare-anthropocene-epoch-experts-urge-geological-congress-human-impact-earth">Anthropocene, a new geological age</a>, where the impact of human activity is so big that affects the planet.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJpCDb2pbei-Gzh_RXe9px3CNrWen9-7eOYzk5llKpWZ_jIfe7s7CVMB7X9NMI9n-G4VdzGzlwxgRkZUOv74vvekf03nuoSIJiTglgEI7qfk7RJtbEMCsLl4ugjTaFYRtHb4nFSlRq3AA/s1600/truman.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJpCDb2pbei-Gzh_RXe9px3CNrWen9-7eOYzk5llKpWZ_jIfe7s7CVMB7X9NMI9n-G4VdzGzlwxgRkZUOv74vvekf03nuoSIJiTglgEI7qfk7RJtbEMCsLl4ugjTaFYRtHb4nFSlRq3AA/s1600/truman.jpg" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 12.8px; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: xx-small;">'The Truman Show' the moment Truman reaches the wall of the dome<br />we was living in.</span> </span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">We could imagine these historical eras as embryonic stages where we grow thinking the place we inhabit is unlimited as so is the source of energy, until we reach the walls of the uterus which then becomes more uncomfortable, we feel the pressure until we are collectively born into a new 'paradigm' (ideological and energetic) to think again that the new place we inhabit is unlimited, universal and so is the source of energy. Somehow, we are not aware of the limits of the reigning ideology, our world view, our vital energy source until we grow enough to feel its limits.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Every birth, every emancipation step, seems to co-exist with the death drive, and it is in the moment of birth that a small or big battle happens. We were conceived, we grew in a seemingly secure uterus, do we dare to be born out of it? When we are born, are we born complete or is there something in us that dies? What's that thing we'll preserve? What lives on and what dies is the battle? For anyone saying "We overcame" nazism/apartheid/or any other historical tragedy... they question is "who's we?", who was sacrificed in this transition? who was victim of <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/dakota-pipeline-america-s-indigenous-people-are-still-fighting-a-centuries-old-racist-ideology-a7469396.html">'manifest destiny'</a>? who decided?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This ambivalence of life -and more widely creativity in the form of technology and scientific discoveries- meant that progress was and still is both desired and feared, as it was used to power both the life and death drive. It is following this argument that I suggest looking at historical eras from moments where massive deaths occur and energy shifts happen, never as punctual dates but as transition moments.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">If the middle ages in Europe died soon after the <b>black plague </b>has killed between 75 to 200 million people [travelling 300 miles a day], and was <b>followed by a renaissance, where Europe is re-born as transcontinental empires, </b>in the newly discovered world America, it was small pox (that came with the conquistadores) the main responsible for decimating its strength and forcing a "renaissance" as a colonised territory. This 'reincarnation' used science to justify gender and race, pushed women to repopulate Europe (confining them to the private sphere under the threat of being burned and accused of witchcraft) and forced slaves to produce and extract natural resources. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Almost three centuries later, a similar turning point was seen during the whole period from the Independence revolutions in America, the French Revolution and Napoleonic and civil wars to the <b>massive deaths </b>brought by the world wars, the Boston Flu (badly named the Spanish flu) and famines (ca 120 million: 38 million in World War I, around 80 million in war world II) followed by the post war renaissance with women back to the kitchen to mother the </span><span style="font-family: inherit;">population explosion to become the baby boomers and all the technology developed by the military to flight the wars. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Chinese_Famine" style="font-family: inherit;">Great Chinese Famine</a><span style="font-family: inherit;"> in the late 50s that killed an estimated 15 million (official figures) and up to 43 million (unofficial figures) happened during the Great Leap forward, a series of land reforms imposed by the Communist Party.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Finally in cycles that seem to be accelerating we are now in front of new wars in Africa and the Middle East plus the acceleration of global mass extinction of animal species, followed by the gradual collapse of the old Empires and the new technological (digital) renaissance that we are in the middle of.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Reinassance and the end of the world are two sides of the same coin. For those who died in the European conquest of America's territories, during the plague, Somme, in concentration camps, under atomic bombs, a Russian Famine, the Great Chinese Famine etc, etc, they <u>lived through the <b>reality </b>of the/their world coming to an end </u>and with this we can stop and reflect the sometimes apocalyptic feeling in many news we read nowadays. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cities</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Even though cities, empires and colonies go far back in history, I'll start with medieval times as the age of discoveries was the moment the globe came together as one for the first time and I'll explore how the limits in terms of basic needs (food and energy) were felt and resolved.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">The limits of the land</span></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><br /></b>
The end of medieval times was marked by an increasing migration of population to cities triggering <b>tensions in our use of land </b>to get crops for clothing, food, forests to warm the houses in Europe going through the little ice age, and even for hay or grass to feed the horses which were logistically very important when the rivers did not do; <i>these needs were in competition with each other for <u>land</u></i>. Cities became a new structure that deepened the fragmentation of roles: transitioning from self-sustaining farms or communities to bigger cities which were not self-sustaining and needed "external" farms providing them with wood, food and clothing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">However, land and logistics represented a limit to how big a city could be. Historian Geoffrey Blainey summarised it in the following way:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">"A city could not grow too large simply because it could not secure in its neighbourhood the food and firewood it needed. A town of say, 30 000 people needed firewood on such a scale that 600 or 1000 horsedrawn carts would arrive each week with loads of firewood. The town needed another 200 cartloads of grain in an average week. As horses or oxen pulled the carts, a large area of land had to be set aside to provide grass or hay for them. A freakishly large city like ancient Rome or modern London could be sustained only by bringing food and fuel long distances by sea and river.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">...</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">In contrast tropical peoples, in their standard of living, easily kept pace with Europe until the 18th century partly because they needed little clothing and warming fuel. They needed fewer calories, for they did not have to ward off winter cold".</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>This limit that the land imposed </i>was worked out in various ways: more fragmentation and specialisation, looking for more land and -very importantly- new sources of energy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>More fragmentation/ specialisation.</b> Skilled farmers became more efficient in breeding livestock and in managing crops without exhausting the land and increasing its productivity. This reinforced the sustainability of cities.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>The alienation from the work on the land</i> that life in the city implied gave more space, <i>an excess </i>for the development of science, technology and later on the industrial revolution. Urbanisation was a key alienating mechanism. Education was another modernising instrument. In the past farmers used to refuse sending their children to school because they needed them to work the land, and in a no so distant past aboriginal children were separated from their families to be 'civilised'. In many places, parents started to be punished and sent to prison if they did not send their children to school. So children had to be "extracted" from their parents influence who subjected them to keep working on the land or were simply preserving their own way of living and culture.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">The limit of the other</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>Cities and empires </b>created the modern man, and the modern man created the modern cities and the modern empires. These cities, first, and then the empire centre became an "entity" in the mind of many politicians and in many political speeches. These cities asked, through its leaders and citizens, the question "where do I feed from?". The imperial solution to the question was: <b><i>from "outside" </i></b>(to a sort of placenta that connects with mother nature, that place that is not-yet-modern and people are inferior: colonies).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The age of discoveries, basically meant trying to work out the limits of the land by <b>looking for more land</b>, which eventually brought other solutions like corn, the "magic" crop, the potato, cotton, etc together with externalising cheap/slave labour.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">However, cities and empires were extractive devices that needed dehumanised countries that history called <b>deserts </b>to portray them as empty of people in order to enable the use of violence without affecting the sense of morality. Or even worse, it enabled the use of violence as means to kill whatever humanity resided there. The Middle East, native America, Africa,.. were all described in desertic terms.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Cities in the colonies of the new world, with grid diagrams (found in different moments of history and used by Spain to regain territory from the moors in "la reconquista"), were military by design and were imposed over the colonies by law. Symbolically, they imposed <b>order to the territory</b>, with direct routes to the ports and later railways taking resources, raw materials and food out of the colonies. The grid plan regained popularity in Europe too during the renaissance.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">But even if the outside seemed infinite at some point, this response was to find its limits on the border of neighbouring empires and in the Independence wars, finally exploding with the world wars. The first big clash was due to the tensions between France and Great Britain for North American lands. This triggered the <b>Seven years wars</b>, a mini World War fought in five continents, which redraw the world map significantly and propelled Great Britain to world's supremacy. But this war left Britain in debt which they tried to finance with higher taxes, tighter extractive economic policy to secure raw materials and markets for its nascent industries and more protection of British monopolies in North America... <b>which led to the revolutionary wars domino: first in North America, which inspired The French Revolution</b> (which was also trying to increase taxes on its own population to finance the debt of the same war in a period of bad harvests <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2010/apr/15/iceland-volcano-weather-french-revolution">apparently triggered by a volcanic eruption in Iceland</a>), <b>which subsequently triggered the revolution of Spanish colonies </b>in South America and <b>had influence even over the Russian revolution </b>more than a century later. (Post it note: let's bear in mind the sequence I've just pointed out to follow what is going on now after the 2008 financial crisis, where governments bailed out the banks and absorbed a huge debt, which they tried to finance with austerity, privatisation and cuts and the earthquakes that followed with Brexit, which inspired Donald Trump in the US... and whatever may happen in France, and its repercussions in South America and Russia after that).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Looking through the glass of basic needs, it is interesting to point out the role of the March of women to Versailles in the French revolution, when women in the market were practically rioting for the price and shortages of bread. The revolution in Britain is thought to have been avoided by reducing taxes on wheat.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">As grid plans imposed order to the territory, the market too started to be the ordering principle over the state. It is remarkable that during the Irish Famine of 1840-1852, where it lost almost 1/4 of its population to starvation and emigration, Ireland <i>kept exporting </i>food to England thanks to the political pressure of their own merchants that were against an export ban, and an English establishment in favour of <i>laissez-faire</i> economics.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">On the other side of the spectrum, the uber-control of the state with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prodrazvyorstka">Prodrazvyorstka</a>, the Bolshevik policy that confiscated all grain and agricultural produce from peasants for a fix price, ended up pushing farmers to reduce crops and opening up their trade to a black market and is thought to have been an important factor leading up to the the Russian famine 1922 that killed 5 million.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Famously, Nazy Germany spoke about the expansion in its <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lebensraum">Lebensraum </a>(habitat) that needed more arable land, resources and slaves and defining the state as a living form. And even though all imperial ideology was based on racism and violence, most genocides (of native africans, asians, australians and americans) had happened far away from Europe. In the World War II, this ideology was brought brutally to its doorstep.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>The limit of the other </i>was experienced in three ways:</span><br />
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<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">finding the neighbouring Empire, </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">colonised territories starting to show self-awareness and start to be "occupied" and claimed by their own population, </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">and being confronted with the brutality and des-humanisation of the system itself.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">But of course, this is not past History. We are witnessing some attempts of neo-colonialisation via financial power with lower levels of society "encouraged" to take on debt, with most of the south hemisphere being 'encouraged' to focus their economies to the primary sector and via military power in any land with petrol. </span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">The big energy shift and the limits of looking deep</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Going back to the cities, through its leaders and citizens, asking the question "where do I feed from?", or "where do I get my energy from?", g<b>oing underground was the other solution. </b>To relieve the competition for land, lowering the demand of some of the needs is a logical approach, so <b>coal became an alternative </b>for wood. In this <b>first energy shift,</b> we changed one land-and-solar source of energy for underground sources of energy. Great Britain passed from an annual output of 3 million tons in the beginning of 1700 to 30 million by 1830. Trains were originally created to transport the coal extracted from the mines, and came to define <i>the European mark of progress</i>. Trains together with clocks (another European technology) generated the timetable which assured trains would get to stations exactly at the time they were expected, a <i>tangible proof of control</i>. This energy shift started an era of population explosion.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Representing a vital source of energy, it became the centre of many wars and political tensions (Coal wars in America, the Customs War between Germany and Poland -a coal producer- before WWII). The left in many parts of Europe can find its roots in miners workers organising themselves in trade unions. In Britain, specifically became one of the most iconic political fights, that went from these first miners organisations to the privatisations of the mines in the north of England by Margaret Thatcher a century later that triggered a period of big social unrest. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I'll pause for a second, only to reflect how the changes at all levels of society (scientific, cultural and religious) changed the cities themselves. It is on the last phase of <b>this modern period that found in the 1870s a renovated Paris</b> (demolishing its medieval structure that was filthy, and did not allow circulation), a German bacteriologist Robert Koch who postulated that bacteria caused disease which meant that death stopped to be seen as an act of God who had been questioned for his failings in responding to prayer to prevent famines which triggered a long series of religious reforms and was subsequently declared dead by Nietzsche soon after in 1882... the same year that Edison illuminated New York street lamps with electricity.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The <b>energy shift that happened between 1880 and 1950 was huge</b>: the spread of electricity, the exploitation of petrol (it was in between the two world wars, 1938, that the largest oil reserves on earth was discovered in Saudi Arabia by American prospectors), natural gas and the emergence of nuclear power.</span><br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwTjF9ApjQDq7ffpY1cF6beQ8OaIhF2e3XQ2a-6TTMabF_Hk8pqK8xVhyphenhyphen1Rjn984vwVY_wMtD0fQB73C8m91AWzYffHsgSgmpCCRUa50bWff0vZlWtRDaChx4btYVUiHMH4VHBZpeMJOU/s1600/world-energy-consumption-by-source.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhwTjF9ApjQDq7ffpY1cF6beQ8OaIhF2e3XQ2a-6TTMabF_Hk8pqK8xVhyphenhyphen1Rjn984vwVY_wMtD0fQB73C8m91AWzYffHsgSgmpCCRUa50bWff0vZlWtRDaChx4btYVUiHMH4VHBZpeMJOU/s320/world-energy-consumption-by-source.png" width="320" /></span></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: #f1f1f1; color: #777777; font-size: 12px;">World Energy Consumption by Source, Based on Vaclav Smil estimates from Energy Transitions: History, Requirements and Prospects together with BP Statistical Data for 1965 and subsequent </span>Source: <a href="https://ourfiniteworld.com/2012/03/12/world-energy-consumption-since-1820-in-charts/">One Finite World </a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">If the European train was the technological son of coal (which later turned electric), American cars were the children of petrol and marked the American signature of progress. These two technologies were to compete and fight for resources and investment in the political sphere of many countries, forcing governments to make calls on where to put public money: behind railways or motorways as strategic infrastructure. Cars were more flexible, more individual and truck logistics was well suited for countries that did not have large populations were the order, coordination and big scale investment required by trains seemed to be less effective. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>This energy shift was the one that restructured everything. </b>From geopolitics to city dynamics. Keeping petrol, natural gas and atomic energy under tight control was a new form of imperialism and commands most of current geopolitics. An attempt to nationalise petrol reserves in Iran and to limit extraction triggered a 1953 coup in Iran. Having the middle east and OPEC under certain control became a matter of "national security" to the US, as its energy dependence was its vulnerability.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">The big shift and the Middle East</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Modernity was also transforming the middle east. New borders were drawn after the second world war and different visions of how the middle east should develop arise in a region profoundly religious.The 2015 documentary Bitter Lake by Adam Curtis, tries to explain what's going on now in the Middle East as the roots for many of the current crisis remain unclear and sometimes seem to come out of nowhere. He puts it in the context of Afghanistan having been a territory in dispute during the Cold War, and how these external and opposing modernising forces (Capitalism v Communism) were unleashed in Afghanistan but resisted and were battled from Saudi Arabia.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Modernity in US was dependent of Saudi Oil. Saudi Arabia ensured petrol supply to the US, which in turn will ensure the defence of the House of Saud structure of power. Later, this relationship evolved until oil became the backer of the US dollar, defining that all oil contracts must be signed in this denomination, ensuring a continuous demand of US currency once it broke its peg against gold. But internal tensions in the Middle East paired with US dependency on foreign oil led to a very ambiguous and unstable situation which broke into many crisis and wars. Oil was at the centre of the oil crisis in the 70's that forced many developing countries to take on debt just to ensure oil supply. Gas, in the hands of Russia, is also a big player in current geopolitics particularly in relation to Europe and NATO. Atomic technology was to be allowed or not allowed by the world powers.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Oil is also a finite resource. Oil reserves can only deplete. So while petrol companies started to invest ever increasing amount of money in exploration and high risk extraction (there are people who suggest that this was a huge capital mis-allocation and that this money would've been much better invested in research of renewables instead), biofuel was proposed as an alternative. Famously, Fidel Castro was one of the critics pointing out that it would mean a new competitor for land (first point: the limit of the land) and that food production would be affected. He argued that rich industrialised countries would take priority over the use of land for energy and poor nations would be starved of food.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">The limit of the planet</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">While everyone was very busy supporting or adverting wars and crisis, something else started to become apparent. Climate change.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Mother earth must be in that time of the month</i>...</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Alienation from the land, from mother earth, or nature, is both feared and desired, as much as our dependence with the land is feared and desired. An uncut relationship with the land, with the feminine, carries a connotation of both idyllic security (<i>alla</i> Heidi) and madness, the "weather is crazy" and a tension emerges to avoid taking responsibility of it. For the ones that would describe humankind as a white man, climate change has nothing to do with "us", this madness is natural, it is part of nature's cycles, sort of saying "Earth must be in that time of the month..." In this sense, Donald Trump's position (or rather many of his supporters) regarding climate change is very coherent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In front of climate change there are several positions:</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">The one that thinks alienation itself is the problem and we need to <i>go back</i> to be "one with the land", a sort of matriarchal response, blaming modernity for all evils,</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">the one that pushes for <i>more control</i> of the natural resources -see video below on how Peter Brabeck from Nestle spoke (and then had to deny) privatisation of water. More control of commodities producing nations, and even looking up to space instead... the typical ultra patriarchal position... </span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">the one that suggest we need 'more alienation' from the land. A sort of eco-liberal position. It suggest the solution is forwards not backwards, and that thinking ourselves as "alien" is when we truly can take responsibility of what we are doing, without assuming there will be an invisible Father (the invisible hand of the market, or God) or Mother Earth (absorbing all negativity to infinity) that will compensate for any of our excesses and restore balance. (But it could, under neoliberalism, be easily mixed with the previous position.)</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Probably, because behind a 3 there is always a 4th, an excess, the negative one, the devil to the trinity, the one that follows a destructive logic: the anti-answer to the question how are we going to survive, it denies the risks and even dare to exacerbate them, safe in their position they imply that maybe we shouldn't survive, or at least not all of us.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Some people would argue that there is only one correct answer. But all positions have something to contribute. All have their lights and their shadows.</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;"><b>It's the communities more attached to their land the ones that are more protective of it.</b> They are the ones that don't see themselves moving and therefore are more interested in the long term: the ones that are going to demand more precautions about contamination, leakage, damage, etc. as we see in when mine companies contaminate rivers or in disputes like the Dakota access pipeline. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">The patriarchal is the one that will look for a solution in technology and controlling behaviour 'externally' (through markets or laws and even earth 'interventions'). </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">The ones looking at individuality, and push not to be dependent of the state or mono/oligopolies will push for a certain degree of self-sufficiency, the prosumer move. But for this move to be smart, it needs a high degree of coordination with the state, with electrical companies. It cannot be a purely individual move, "better for me", but better for all. In their shadow side, they are less interested in collective efforts. </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">The 4th option in all its shadows, is the one we all resort to when in trying to create something new, something old has to be demolished. The part that let something dies during the renaissance. <b>Hopefully, we can use it to let old structures die instead of starting to consider some people disposable.</b></span></li>
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">Cities as patriarchal structures</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">It is at this point, when we are wondering <i>if the climate is going mad </i>caused by our emissions and our dependence of fossil fuels, US is working on its own energy independence, Africa and the Middle East are facing multiple civil wars, Saudi Arabia is facing debt and the geopolitical map is facing multiple shakes, that the world is looking at more democratic sources of energy (renewable) in wind and solar technologies, <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-16/germany-just-got-almost-all-of-its-power-from-renewable-energy">Germany is already getting most of is energy from renewables</a>, and cities are becoming to think if there is something they should do.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">In this blog, I discussed a few times the matriarchal/patriarchal/post-patriarchal cycle. With a feminist stance, I rescue what the patriarchal stage is and brings: a process where <i>we learn </i>to self-structure, to use resources, to eventually emancipate and become independent and creators. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Summary:</span></blockquote>
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Matriarchal, as the stage where we are fused to our mothers and we feed from her, it is also Eden/as the mother earth, a stage of blind love and we are dependent; </span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">Patriarchal as the stage of separation from the maternal (the fall), a moment to develop tools and technology, learn about discipline, master emotions, develop our own thinking, it is a stage of high polarisation when the maternal/feminine is demonised because 'going back' is forbidden, the age of the sword to "cut" this dependency and hate (as a form of love working out its independence), but we remain dependent of the external law (the father) and castrated. In its extreme the denial of the "feminine principle" is so strong that the masculine principle tries to replace it. Even though I argue that this is an archetypical stage, it does not mean this stage has to be brutal, violent or traumatic, on the contrary, I argue that if we go through each stage more conscious of what's about we'll save unnecessary suffering. </span></li>
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<li><span style="font-family: inherit;">The final stage is when we are born out of this paternal external uterus, and become creators and writers -the sword is swapped with the pen- (including becoming parents), we participate in the creation of structure and content integrating both feminine and masculine principles in one, the stage of true love, until we grow to discover the edges of the ideology in which we are immersed and start again.</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">If the patriarchal is a stage of separation from the maternal, a stage of order and discipline, cities are mechanism to separate us from nature, figuratively from "Mother earth". Cities polarise "civilisation" inside against "barbarism", wilderness outside. This polarisation also marks the difference between the educated urban elite, and the one labelled 'uneducated' living in more rural areas.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">But <b>in this antagonistic separation, the fundamental question of our dependency from nature in obtaining energy (food and consumable energy) and liberating the waste of its transformation is never cut</b>. However, in cities this question is more easily forgotten, particularly in modern cities with infrastructure: water comes out of a tap, heat comes out of radiators and excrement disappear almost magically.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib6yh51NSuqJ4nzyHGfe3V6OpirDzvI1CR0Dh2ZZu-beoqvhDXY62f6KgQGXFmxjRJzbhKnTirmSfR07PPN1FZaGAzhke_rVJd9kHbsZZzB3Tg307RbB4unpS3uIGyMjuciDO7VXYpcEk/s1600/paris+river+banks.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEib6yh51NSuqJ4nzyHGfe3V6OpirDzvI1CR0Dh2ZZu-beoqvhDXY62f6KgQGXFmxjRJzbhKnTirmSfR07PPN1FZaGAzhke_rVJd9kHbsZZzB3Tg307RbB4unpS3uIGyMjuciDO7VXYpcEk/s320/paris+river+banks.jpg" width="320" /></span></a><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Interestingly enough, something is happening in these cities. In this article from The Guardian <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/oct/12/global-rise-female-mayors?CMP=share_btn_tw">"Can cities be feminists?"</a> it describes how the big political questions, including energy policy are being addressed by local politics at city level with women mayors in big cities in Europe (Barcelona, Rome, Paris). If modernity culminated with a renovated Paris which was restructured to accommodate more cars (and individuality), there is a new Paris that is restructured <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/sep/26/paris-council-approves-ban-vehicles-right-bank-seine-road">to accommodate less cars </a>and through structure regulate it's energy hunger. Plans following the same logic are also emerging in</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2016/may/17/superblocks-rescue-barcelona-spain-plan-give-streets-back-residents?CMP=share_btn_tw">Barcelona</a> (looking for a way of returning the super blocks of its grid to the citizens back from the cars), <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2015/dec/09/car-free-city-oslo-helsinki-copenhagen">Oslo</a>, etc. But cities are not evenly modern, particularly in developing countries. They may have inner shanty towns which reminisce medieval cities, with sanitary problems, clothes hanging, narrow streets not fit for cars and high levels of violence, these parts of the city are still fighting for modernisation. It might be worth asking: is there a alternative path, a different, more conscious city concept these pockets would actually open up?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Even if these fundamental questions are having a positive evolution, it does not mean that there are no conflicts. This is mainly seen at national politics level, where big (liberal) cities are maintaining and even increasing their "distance" with the 'other'.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">On the one hand, and rather contradictory, people are keeping their "distance" with the 'neighbour'. Cities -that in themselves bring more people physically together- take modernity to the ultimate conclusion of the feeling of loneliness in a place full of people, through less face to face connection and common places to meet, more practice of individual consumerism in a world seen through our own tablets, ordering things online to be delivered without much human contact.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">On the other side, more distance with rural areas, with more polarisation and more 'elitist' thinking and more 'ivory tower' view of the world and reality, with increasing disdain for the discontent in non-urban areas which in turn are resorting to chauvinism and xenophobia. (<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/dec/01/stephen-hawking-dangerous-time-planet-inequality">in this sense Stephen Hawking's article about his own ivory tower is an interesting read</a>)</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: inherit;">No more sacrifices to calm the gods and nature - Facing our inner predator</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><b><br /></b>To end the patriarchal cycle, to be born out of it, it is important to integrate the polarised view of the mother (the 'crazy' side and the light side hidden by the patriarchy) but also see the shadow of the father and integrate it with its light.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;">At his point, the paternal figure showing madness, forcing more and more renunciation is the market. And with all our sacrifices, austerity does not pacify the market's hunger, and even if we are asked to pursue this idea that all the sacrifices to create an excess (more productivity, more competitiveness) are unquestionable, there is a point that we find ourselves sacrificing essential things. Ourselves, our children, our rights, or own humanity. We maybe tempted to use mindfulness to keep on working and keep our productivity up, instead of questioning if working conditions are right. We may be induced to think that trade unions are holding us back, and accept to purchase goods coming from countries with workers with no rights including the modern slaves: workers in prisons. We may accept that the only way to support the pension system is to charge more to future generations for their education, for their houses. We may start to read that there is too much democracy, some people should not be allowed to vote and some questions should not be asked. Don't think too much if you are being consumed in the process or who is being consumed by it, everything is fine when you can buy one more thing.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxd-td37nwxjUWTF4ZxXWhsGPe0lj5PquP5qtPDJVN8zVedgjANYoqJ1JD0legyn7YtqczPnGw0GaEgrtfjzoZzGY079rqfspoiaY-zPvZmU51chJo9EcPC6ogRZbclRRQ1fM7E0wJaSQ/s1600/alien+the+movie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="222" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgxd-td37nwxjUWTF4ZxXWhsGPe0lj5PquP5qtPDJVN8zVedgjANYoqJ1JD0legyn7YtqczPnGw0GaEgrtfjzoZzGY079rqfspoiaY-zPvZmU51chJo9EcPC6ogRZbclRRQ1fM7E0wJaSQ/s400/alien+the+movie.jpg" width="400" /></span></a></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So we are in this situation, where we sense "the alien" is inside the ship. That hungry predator is in the same planet, with misdirection some claim it has invaded our country, or that it belongs to a different generation, the predator is foreign, external.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTv55jg18p2jTdks7exRXArJivEervCLcb13vN-keuQ3GqQQ3NMA7FebtOoPAB1j3tjJXfAO29o9RJURlkPdIJoe3YjkwaB576my2JB9nlcmQnG_76tGauY4VTsadL96DwkMuMjcqTm14/s1600/stranger+things+monster.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTv55jg18p2jTdks7exRXArJivEervCLcb13vN-keuQ3GqQQ3NMA7FebtOoPAB1j3tjJXfAO29o9RJURlkPdIJoe3YjkwaB576my2JB9nlcmQnG_76tGauY4VTsadL96DwkMuMjcqTm14/s200/stranger+things+monster.jpg" width="200" /></span></a><span style="font-family: inherit;">At the same time, not surprisingly, in the very popular Netflix series Stranger things, the theme of the perfect predator appears: the one that is actually almost pure mouth and does not have eyes. This predator that used to live in some sort of unconscious realm is now crossing over to our world and thus we become aware of it. Different characters, with different degrees of predatory behaviour themselves need to confront it, but the one posed to be its ultimate adversary is a girl with powers.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWzrqcRx0utv6lTfZV62Bz6SIOKcjGSszR95ofXOzg4Z1WC4br-F2JoZy5ki-zyFBr96SlOP1dJyInf2o1XdmKYc5Byd0_jPz4gQwfFIIPUSoaG7islrIh6YMg3KdLKxm9TTM18R2bUSE/s1600/monster+stranger+things.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><img border="0" height="150" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgWzrqcRx0utv6lTfZV62Bz6SIOKcjGSszR95ofXOzg4Z1WC4br-F2JoZy5ki-zyFBr96SlOP1dJyInf2o1XdmKYc5Byd0_jPz4gQwfFIIPUSoaG7islrIh6YMg3KdLKxm9TTM18R2bUSE/s200/monster+stranger+things.jpg" width="200" /></span></a><span style="font-family: inherit;">But this symbolic fight does not happen at a mental realm only, It happens when we manage to materialise it not only with changes in personal behaviour and our personal relationships but also with structural changes of those common places and services we share, And this is the political realm. Energy policy and food supply at national and regional level, and cities' structural changes at local level are the foundation level of what's to come and the policies that should see more evolution, more innovation. The anti-globalisation trend we are witnessing today, it is a temporary and needed step to change and rethink it, as current geopolitics are structured at a fundamental level for the fossil fuel economy, patriarchal/colonial thinking. Of course there is a danger in falling back to old ways that will try to secure colonised territory and will declare some people disposable. That's why engagement and more conversation are so important. Ultimately, being engaged with these external changes, with "reality". with politics becomes proof that we are taming the predator within,</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Andrea</span><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-80644296457585169762016-11-10T15:30:00.001-08:002017-08-03T02:43:09.781-07:0044. Seven reasons for us, feminists, not to hate Trump1. The Patriarchy has a devastating effect on men, leaving them incomplete. They are forbidden to integrate their female side and live in an eternal infant state: missing their mothers, looking for women to plug their umbilical cord into and be breastfed. They are dependent. They do not know how to feed themselves with attention. They do not know what to do with negativity. They need objectified people to work as external organs. They need to control, dominate and keep women captive to be their placenta, they need "weak" people to be their intestines and process their negativity, otherwise they feel they die. Hate does not solve that. These men need feminism as much as women.<br />
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2. Hate is an attachment that is working out its dependence. We hate people we wish weren't so important to us.<br />
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3. When we, as a society, are put in front of a mirror, and instead of seeing a beautiful image we see our shadow, the best we can do is show a measure of pity to that image. What we have in front of us is also a part of our society and us, our inner Gollum, the ugly baby-like hungry big eyed-adult that is hidden in shame. The one that was expelled from the matriarchal paradise and feels inadequate. And shame and humiliation has a big role in what's going on. Humiliation of the ex-industrial workers that had to accept a worse job or cannot fulfil the patriarchal 'provider' role, the ones that feel their country is only paying attention to the big cities and not the deep country, for the ones that lost their homes after the 2008 crisis, the ones that cannot afford medical care, the ones that developed addiction to opioids, etc. Shame is an emotion protected by a layer of anger, misogynistic, xenophobic, racist... that looks to deposit this humiliation onto others. In fact, a lot of people in the opposite side feel now "ashamed" of their country. It is not about normalising bigotry, we need to respond to each and every point, showing that our bodies and minds are "occupied" by someone, we are not inert receptors, empty vessels; but it is not either assuming that millions of people are simply monsters.<br />
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4. There is a danger that some people would feel validated by inflammatory words and they are the ones that we need to get our attention to. <b>Blaming the leader is a way of taking responsibility away from them. </b>More than ever we need to keep each other accountable.<br />
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5. Defending rights is a matter of recognition, of empathy, of overcoming polarisation instead of sustaining it or even feed it.<br />
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6. The patriarchy has many shadows but it has light too. The patriarchy is a process to help us separate from the maternal from which we are dependent on as children (and might be still holding onto at some level), to become ourselves. It demonises women as a way of pointing out forward, mistakenly equating "forward" with "away from women". The paradise is not in our mothers uterus, we need to go in the other direction. We need to learn that our mothers are both "the good mother" and the witch/queen/stepmother and our fathers are both Obi Wan Kenobi and the Emperor, the light side and the wounded side, integrated in one person. The true move forward is being born out of the patriarchy: being able to dance in front of the patriarchal father like Billy Elliot did is the true emancipatory act, It is declaring "I don't need your approval any more".<br />
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Having the patriarchy embodied so clearly, gives us the opportunity to perform our dance. At this point we need to remember some of the "prohibitions" under the patriarchal rule:<br />
-Circles of women, female friendship, women organised (in patriarchy women should compete not collaborate or trust each other).<br />
-Women writing history, particularly their history.<br />
-Women's visibility, women speaking up<br />
-Women's anger<br />
-Women acting, reacting, exercising power and writing rules<br />
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7. <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/01/19-revolution-is-in-hands-of-women.html">Revolution is in the hands of women</a> and how we stand up for ourselves, how we raise the next generation of men and women to find in themselves their female force, to not fear it, to be nourished by it. In the meantime, we need to trust the wisdom of democracy and work through its institutions, assert the constitutional limits and the due balance of power, and if needed get involved in changing what is not working. This vote, ultimately tried to point out that something was not working in politics and we cannot give our backs to that fact. In front of something we don't like is extremely easy to cultivate anti-democratic thoughts, even <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/david-attenborough-donald-trump-shoot-radio-times-interview-michael-gove-a7390476.html">David Attenborough joked about shooting Trump </a>... proving that he is someone able to touch the anger of everyone. People that get angry against him, and people that get angry with him. Anger can turn violent and explosive, but with a constructive purpose it can also be the fire that lights up an idea, and give us the energy we need to take action.<br />
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AndreaABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-69209697298666950112016-11-08T02:26:00.001-08:002017-08-03T02:43:48.669-07:0043. The enemy is confusion<div class="tr_bq">
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<b>Elistism v populism</b><br />
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Elites fear the mass, what's "popular", they need to keep distinguishing themselves as the "true owners" -not even seekers- of beauty, truth, excellence, critique, peace, high quality, culture, consciousness, the light that guides the rest through darkness or whatever. If it's popular, it's kitsch, ugly, fake, cheap, low quality, delusional, subversive, dark, dangerous, etc.<br />
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In this polarisation, democratic forces (and post-modernity) present a challenge to the elites (economical, cultural, political) and their hierarchical structure. It tries to open up some doors and demonstrate that there is a popular consciousness too able to generate art, wisdom, capable of exercising power and in many cases demand a pen to fill in the gaps that History written by elites leave.<br />
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The Beatles in a way were an example of this: being deeply popular but able to create the foundations of how music will evolve in the future. Charly García, an argentinian musician, dares to suggest that in musical terms if we were contemporary to what now are called classical musicians, Chopin, with his melodies, would be the equivalent of a pop idol in terms of their appeal, and Beethoven would be a heavy metal rocker, and even imagine that The Beatles will enter in the pantheon of "classical music" of the future. He suggests classical music is the way it is because it hadn't received yet any African influence that brought rhythm to music. This is not meant to not recognise the mastery the classical composers had, but rather to challenge the view that 'high quality' music is something like the art of the dead, petrified, beyond reach.<br />
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Nobel laureate Mario Vargas Llosa published a book "La sociedad del espectáculo" (something like 'The show business' society) in defence of elites. He claims that in the past there was a clear distinction of what culture was and somehow asks 'how come everyone think they have culture?'<br />
He claims that in fighting the monopolisation of culture within elite circles, they got a pyrrhic victory, where the cost of this victory undermined the notion of culture itself.<br />
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But even from his defence of elites and some good points he raises, he acknowledges that petrification of elites and monopolisation of culture <i>was </i>a problem and he warns against certain 'temptations' that corrupt their purpose, particularly when following a free market logic:<br />
<br />
-In trying to massify a message, there is always a temptation of changing the original message for something more palatable and easy to convey. or package it in a way that actually affects its meaning, generating confusion.<br />
<br />
-In trying to defend hierarchies and elites and their function, there is always the temptation of petrification, closing ranks and attempt to concentrate more power and halt time and progress, generating confusion too regarding which are the open ways and opportunities to become part of any elite.<br />
<br />
Vargas Llosa speaks about the power of critique, and what's offered by the "the distance" elites keep. But who can criticise elites? One of the most significant situations, illustrating the lack of critique in elite circles was the moment <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/theroyalfamily/5912697/Queen-told-how-economists-missed-financial-crisis.html">the Queen (in the position her own distance gives her) asked academics at the London School of Economics why no one saw the credit crunch coming</a> in 2008. The Telegraph reports about the reply the Queen received a few days later:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="line-height: 1.48em; padding: 0px 0px 0.7em;">
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The letter ends: "In summary, your majesty, the failure to foresee the timing, extent and severity of the crisis and to head it off, while it had many causes, was principally a failure of the collective imagination of many bright people, both in this country and internationally, to understand the risks to the system as a whole."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">The letter talks of the "psychology of denial" that gripped the financial and political world and says "financial wizards" convinced themselves they had found ways to spread risk throughout the financial markets - a great example of "wishful thinking combined with hubris".</span></blockquote>
Vargas Llosa speaks about elites that are formed by people with "vocation, effort and talent" and criticises elites "by essence". But cultural elites tend to overlook how structurally close they remain to economic and political elites. They look at football with disdain and rarely reflect about how greater inequality and lower social mobility make cultural elites more structurally static, hereditary and far less truly meritocratic than football sporting elites, for example.<br />
<br />
Of course, not all popular music will have the significance that the Beatles' music had and not all football players can be Maradona. But both the Beatles or Maradona are examples of excellence emerging from popular places, challenging this notion that excellence seeking has some sort of exclusive proprietary process.<br />
<br />
All the anti-establishment movements, standing as far away of the elites as the elites do from them, are trying to articulate a critique. But they also fall into the same temptation of bringing an idea into our physical reality in a false body, in taking the short cut of conveying a complex subject as "the mobility economical mandate of free trade agreements" and "immigration in a context of austerity", in xenophobic terms. Let's bear in mind that people complaining about immigrants are the most reluctant to emigrate, they chose to stay and vote instead. Let's remember too that people and capital move in opposite directions (one follows higher wages, the other lower).<br />
<br />
<i>The enemy is confusion and its main weapon is confuse us regarding who the enemy is: pointing out to some visible agent and keep its own invisibility.</i><br />
<br />
Not surprisingly this confusion comes with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/04/political-memes-2016-election-hillary-clinton-donald-trump">memes </a>and illustrations, as images are read, decoded and stored in unconscious ways and can be more ambiguous than words.<br />
<br />
Elitism and populism are constantly blaming each other of lying without recognising in the other their capacity to generate truth.<br />
<br />
<b>The product is the hero: the lie in the truth and the truth in the lie</b><br />
<br />
Market logic always plays within the boundaries of the existing power structures and already accepted codes of acceptance/rejection. It only introduces products and slogans as new intermediaries.<br />
<br />
As an example, naming Wonder Woman, a sexist, polarised, american-dominance symbol, as the ambassador of women's empowerment, the UN played exactly to the tune we dance today. It only promotes further Wonder Woman as a product. Brexit was a product sold to "take back control" and Donald Trump might just as well represent the same product for the empowerment of 'hard working white Americans'. Products, playing these symbolic hero roles, promise grandiose and somehow magic solutions to beat the antiheroes, something or <a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v532/n7598/abs/nature17159.html">someone chosen to carry all negativity and be sacrificed</a>.<br />
<br />
These products/heroes falsely embody a solution <b>to a need that is not being addressed/satisfied</b>, the antiproducts/antiheroes embody the threat/the problem that remains invisible and unnamed. <i>Both the need and the problem are probably genuine but not their embodiment. </i>Political discussions can easily fall in the trap of unmasking the lie, without recognising the truth or in trying to recognise the truth, it may appear to be endorsing the "product". No clearer example of this, was Donald Trump twitting about Michael Moore's documentary as if it was an endorsement.<br />
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<br />
<br />
The complexity of this election cycle is that Hillary Clinton does not have enough "distance" with economical elites to be considered such a clear alternative for those with anti-establishment sentiments. In this sense, she does not appear to many as "recognising the truth" they want to hear recognised, and therefore not being a agent of the change needed.<br />
<br />
Renowned economist Ann Pettifor writes in "<a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2016.1229953">Brexit and its consequences</a>" about the failure of economic elites in leading the UK away from Brexit, and analyses the ambivalence of the Brexit vote. Citing Polanyi and <i>The Great Transformation</i>, sh<i>e </i>speaks about how the Brexit vote was both somehow truthful <i>and</i> misguided:<br />
<br />
<blockquote>
Karl Polanyi predicted in The Great Transformation that no sooner will today’s utopians have institutionalized their ideal of a global economy, apparently detached from political, social, and cultural relations, than powerful counter-movements—from the right no less than the left—would be mobilized (Polanyi, <a href="http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14747731.2016.1229953#">2001</a>). The Brexit vote was, to my mind, just one manifestation of the expected resistance to market fundamentalism.<br />
By doing so, they confirmed Polanyi’s firm prediction that<br />
the idea of a self-adjusting market implied a stark utopia. Such an institution could not exist for any length of time without annihilating the human and natural substance of society … . Inevitably, society took measures to protect itself, but whatever measures it took impaired the self-regulation of the market, disorganized industrial life, and thus endangered society in yet another way.<br />
<br />
Brexit has endangered British society in yet another way, but the vote was, I contend, a form of social self-protection from self-regulating markets in money, trade, and labour.</blockquote>
<b>The tedious task</b><br />
<br />
Separating the truth from everything else is a tedious, laborious task often described as finding a needle in a haystack. And it is a process that involves conversation and talking to people who don't agree with us. Truth is found in groups. The Other helps us see different perspectives. However, in the attempt to liberate the individual to express its own truth, we severed connections with groups, somehow suggesting that any group would become a mass which is ultimately deindividualising. Protecting our beliefs, "out truth" from critique meant we cannot recognise the truth that the other might have found. I read a comment today in Facebook that ironically said "to be happy I decided to read nothing but what I say".<br />
Interestingly in this video actor Michael Sheen says:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
"Our culture is a conversation. A conversation we have with each other. And it is about voices and stories coming from all over. Opinions that do clash. There has to be a healthy way to have different opinions without each of us becoming offensive and abusive and "you-are-the-worst-shitty-scam for not agreeing with what I think". That's unhealthy. A healthy argument is the one where there are different opinions, different voices and are able to be aired and you are affected by. You telling me that you disagree with me, actually changes me in some way. That's important. If we lose that we are having a one side conversation that goes round and round in circles and everyone misses out, everyone loses because of it."</blockquote>
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<br />
Culture and politics is where this conversation happens, so when this conversation stops, when there are more silos and filter bubbles, democracy crumbles and violence takes the place of the ordering principle. But there is another danger: Millennials, being the generation with the highest ever level of education and the most affected by the filter bubble, read in the analysis of the Brexit vote that it was the fault of "uneducated" people or the old generation and then some of them quickly jumped to the conclusion that they should not be allowed to vote, probably not realising that they would be denying the vote to many members of their own families, or that it was a discussion that happened a century ago, or even that many of them (particularly women) are able to vote today because some of people (many uneducated) fought for this right. The same conclusions will be drawn should Donald Trump win today. <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-10-23/democracy-turns-off-millennials-it-doesn-t-have-to">This Bloomberg article </a>denounce how Millennials are being turned off by democracy. I personally find these conclusions scary and I feel like almost begging: whatever happens in today's election, more politics, more conversation is needed, not less.<br />
<br />
AndreaABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-8397046260430758552016-10-31T01:09:00.001-07:002016-12-13T05:12:05.368-08:0042. Hey Wonder Woman! It is time to leave adolescence behindA big question mark emerged with the appointment of <a href="http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/wonderwoman/#prettyPhoto">Wonder Woman as UN ambassador for women and girls's empowerment</a>. The problem with symbols is that everything in them is -funny enough- symbolic.<br />
<br />
If you are looking for an ambassador and you decide to go for a fictional character, product of a fantasy, it kind of suggest that women's empowerment is not yet embodied in anyone and is still a fantasy. Which is not true. An obvious example would be:<br />
<br />
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<br />
<b>The problem of super heroes</b><br />
<br />
There are other problems with Super heroes having ambassadors positions beyond being not real. Super Heroes in general terms represent the crisis of adolescence.<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>They have an identity crisis, most commonly shown through a secret identity, a permanent tension between what can be shown to the world and not, always fearing the reaction the moment they show "who they really are" or "what they can do", etc. </li>
<li>They hold a polarised view of the world that divides it into good and evil, <b>with the caveat that both sides feel they are fighting the true evil. </b>Super villains feel that the authoritarian righteousness their arch-enemies represent is evil (think how political correctness is discussed nowadays).</li>
<li>They feel the potency of their sexuality which is represented in these superheroes physical power and sometimes hyper-sexualised images (this potency is rather realised through battles rather than sex). </li>
<li>They have this feeling of immortality, and their vulnerability needs to be kept very very secret. </li>
<li>Many of them are now starting to discover aspects of the family history that were not known and are dealing with cultural and familial mandates. </li>
<li>A shadow with the sex drive, secrets, shame, past traumas, transgressions, anger, vulnerability, fear of rejection, and even the death drive emerges embodied in the super villains. </li>
</ul>
<br />
These epic battles between super heroes and super villains represent the rich emotional inner life of a teenager, who is trying to work out right from wrong, I from Other, self expression and limits, individuation and death drive, etc, etc.<br />
<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi13IUnzivK8sQ-4xASS1slTFLeHe4LQR1u-3q3be9ObzMoRZasd28LE8ZXkZaSFmQ2ZeskIKorJK_09VSN4B_U8nXj0CGbycjy3qLviUhIR7s7ZTVC8c-T0hiHIyQxD9Zs9y_mw_cqVVY/s1600/WonderWoman-Ross.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi13IUnzivK8sQ-4xASS1slTFLeHe4LQR1u-3q3be9ObzMoRZasd28LE8ZXkZaSFmQ2ZeskIKorJK_09VSN4B_U8nXj0CGbycjy3qLviUhIR7s7ZTVC8c-T0hiHIyQxD9Zs9y_mw_cqVVY/s320/WonderWoman-Ross.png" width="188" /></a>The case of Wonder Woman does not escape this pattern. She represents the fantasy of a teenage boy and all his Oedipal layers. A version of a very powerful woman, overtly sexualised with impossible body figure who has left everything behind to protect him, with big breasts to feed him and in real life she is happy to leave her Princess status to be his loyal secretary in a military structure.<br />
<br />
Even if we leave aside that comics are marketed mainly for teenage boys and their conflicts, the change in hierarchy between the fantasy world and the real world embodies the contradiction of Wonder Woman as a symbol of empowerment, particularly for adult women. There is the argument, of course, that for girls that haven't gone through adolescence, finding this warrior side can be a useful emancipatory model to guide them through adolescence in the way to adulthood. Even if probably there are other less sexist symbols.<br />
But even if we are willing to give it some credit, the problem of global cultural relevance of a woman wearing an tiny outfit and the american flag crushes all argument.<br />
<br />
Not surprisingly (and fortunately!) there was a reaction.<br />
<br />
UN staffers organised a petition to change this decision and during the ceremony stood up with the fists up in opposition and left the room soon after.<br />
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<br />
Several articles in different media criticised the move:<br />
Vogue: <a href="http://www.vogue.com/13496633/wonder-woman-un-mascot-female-empowerment/"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://www.vogue.com/13496633/wonder-woman-un-mascot-female-empowerment/</span></a><br />
The Guardian: <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/oct/21/wonder-woman-un-ambassador-staff-protest"><span style="font-size: x-small;">https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/oct/21/wonder-woman-un-ambassador-staff-protest</span></a><br />
The New York Times: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/21/world/americas/wonder-woman-united-nations.html?_r=0"><span style="font-size: x-small;">http://www.nytimes.com/2016/10/21/world/americas/wonder-woman-united-nations.html?_r=0</span></a><br />
<br />
When the UN took the opportunity that the release of a Wonder Woman Hollywood's film offers, to give a truthful need of change in culture and politics a bit of PR, it banalised the cause as a mere publicity campaign. It pretends to want to change culture by playing exactly within the cultural limits that tell women they should remain pursuing -instead of transcending- an unattainable, unrealistic and even undesirable wonder woman model.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<b>Super heroes do not win</b><br />
<br />
The end of adolescence comes with integration, rather than the victory of a polarised side over the other. It comes with acceptance of our own dark sides and the maturity it comes with deciding how to behave.<br />
<br />
A super hero is hardly an aspirational character. In fact, they are not a complete and free individual able to lead a normal life. It is rather a kind of psychological aspect who remains slave to its purpose as much as the super villain. Superman cannot have a normal dinner if he knows his help is required. A Super Hero is a <i>sacrificial </i>character who triumphs in taking his/her quest up to their own demise or failure. As characters they are special because through their power and will are able to take this battle up to the point when it can be resolved but not necessarily because they can or should win.<br />
<br />
In a polarised world the inner battle is "exteriorised", forming sides, good and evil. While one side exists, the other will do too, and probably will go through periods of polarisation and integration while different generations go through their crisis of adolescence like in Star Wars. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/nov/01/haruki-murakami-hans-christian-anderdersen-prize-speech-outsiders?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Facebook">Speaking as he received the Hans Christian Andersen literature award, Haruki Murakami said</a>:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i><span style="color: #20124d;"><br /></span></i>
<span style="background-color: white; color: #20124d; font-family: "guardian text egyptian web" , "georgia" , serif;"><i>“At times we tend to avert our eyes from the shadow, those negative parts. Or else try to forcibly eliminate those aspects. Because people want to avoid, as much as possible, looking at their own dark sides, their negative qualities. But in order for a statue to appear solid and three-dimensional, you need to have shadows. Do away with shadows and all you end up with is a flat illusion. Light that doesn’t generate shadows is not true light,”</i></span></blockquote>
<br />
Super heroes do not win, because for one side to disappear, the other side would have to disappear too. But that's not what happens. Whatever we think it is killed in this battle, returns.<br />
<br />
In not "so super" characterisations, like Lord of the Rings, both Frodo and Gollum lead the way <i>together</i> towards Mount Doom to do "what has to be done" which is the integration of both characters in Sam and resolve the polarisation by destroying the externalisation of power, the dependency, that the ring symbolises. To do so, Sam increasingly takes on responsibility by killing the spider, confronting the Orcs, and carrying Frodo always at the verge of falling into the temptation of the death drive (Sauron). Frodo fails in getting rid of the ring, because it cannot be done consciously. It simply happens once he accepted "the" shadow as his own and thanks to having had pity for the ugly, squalid, grown-up dependent big-eyed baby that is Gollum, Sam's shadow. <b>Pity in the externalised shadow, meant we'll have pity with ourselves, with our own shadow in the moment of internalising it, disempowering it of its potential of causing our self destruction.</b><br />
<br />
In a way, if super heroes are so relevant today might suggest that we are collectively in some sort of adolescent period that polarises our view of the world. We read on newspapers of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/31/refugees-problem-europe-identity-crisis-migration">European Identity crisis</a>, the war against terrorism painted in black and white, political correctness v the most outrageous racist and sexist rants we've seen in a long time, the post-truth era, voters rage, etc, etc.<br />
<div>
<br />
In this sense, the Empowerment of women truly comes when Wonder Woman is no longer needed, when the inner battle finishes, <b>when we show pity to our inner shadows and we can focus our strength in changing reality</b>.<br />
<br />
Andrea<br />
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-87907675566928837192016-07-12T08:55:00.002-07:002017-08-03T02:45:06.111-07:0041. Now you see me? Now you don't<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Somehow this post will link obesity, free trade, drugs, migration, environment, truth finding and Facebook. Or at least that's the very vague plan my fingers seem to have. So let's see how it all works out.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Much is being said about the resistance to globalisation the world seems to be showing after Brexit and in this electoral period in the US.</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When understanding major crisis, on top of all the detailed analysis, we should try to step back and look at how this chain is shaking at each level: </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">land/food <-> culture/emotions <-> technology <-> economy <-> communication <-> politics <-> ideology, and how they were behaving just before the crisis. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is our food chain. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Where </span>food and energy comes from (below, above, the sides, inside?).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: large; font-weight: bold;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Now you see me? Feeding with food</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">NAFTA (or TLCAN in Spanish) gives us a good case study. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Back in 2013, and due to the 20th anniversary of the NAFTA free trade agreement, the New York times published a series of articles discussing its impact. Laura Carsen in her articles "<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/11/24/what-weve-learned-from-nafta/under-nafta-mexico-suffered-and-the-united-states-felt-its-pain">Under Nafta, Mexico suffered and the United States felt its pain</a>" and "<a href="http://fpif.org/nafta_is_starving_mexico/">Nafta is starving Mexico</a>" she makes very interesting points:</span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>Food and Land</b></i></span></span><br />
<div style="border: 0px; font-stretch: inherit; margin-bottom: 16px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;">
</div>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"As heavily subsidized U.S. corn and other staples poured into Mexico, producer prices dropped and small farmers found themselves unable to make a living. Some <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/news/is-nafta-good-for-mexicos-farmers/">two million</a> have been forced to leave their farms since Nafta. At the same time, consumer food prices rose, notably the cost of the omnipresent tortilla."</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"As a result,<a href="http://fpif.org/nafta_is_starving_mexico/"> 20 million Mexicans live in “food poverty”</a>. Twenty-five<a href="http://web.coneval.gob.mx/Paginas/principal.aspx"> percent</a> of the population does not have access to basic food and one-fifth of Mexican children suffer from malnutrition." </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Farmers lose when transnational corporations take over the land they supported their families on for generations."</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Government statistics report that <a href="http://web.coneval.gob.mx/Paginas/principal.aspx">25 percent of the population</a> does not have access to basic food."</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Since the 2008 food crisis, there has been a three percent rise in the population without adequate access to food. The number of children with malnutrition is 400,000 kids above the goal for this year. Newborns show the highest indices of malnutrition, <b><i>indicating that the tragedy begins with maternal health."</i></b></span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"The dramatic change in Mexican eating habits since NAFTA is not only reflected in the millions who go to bed hungry. On the other side of the scale, <b>Mexico has in just a decade and a half become second only to the United States worldwide in morbid obesity</b>."</span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>Culture</b></i></span></div>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"The </span><a href="http://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/Poverty_Statistics_Mexico_2013.pdf" style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">increase in people living in poverty</a><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> feeds organized crime recruitment and the breakdown of communities." </span></span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this regard, Jeff Faux's article <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeff-faux/nafta-and-the-narcos-what_b_4760372.html">NAFTA and the Narcos: What You Won’t Hear at Obama’s Meeting in Mexico </a>points out:</span></div>
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"And here’s another part of the history of NAFTA you won’t hear anything about: its role in unleashing the drug wars that have killed an estimated 80,000 Mexicans in the last six years and plunged large sections of their country into lawless violence."</span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"it became much easier and cheaper to move cocaine from Columbia, that had previously been delivered by sea, overland through Mexico."</span></li>
</ul>
<div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Mark Weisbrot, for the Guardian's article "</span><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jan/04/nafta-20-years-mexico-regret" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">20 years of regret in Mexico</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">" claims:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>Economy</b></i></span></span><br />
<ul><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">
<li>"For Mexico, NAFTA helped to consolidate the neo-liberal, anti-development economic policies that had already been implemented in the prior decade, enshrining them in an international treaty." </li>
<li>[] "its growth has remained below 1%, less than half the regional average, since 2000. And not surprisingly, Mexico's national poverty rate was 52.3% in 2012, basically the same as it was in 1994 (52.4%). Without economic growth, it is difficult to reduce poverty in a developing country. "</li>
<li>"Interestingly, when economists who have promoted NAFTA from the beginning are called upon to defend the agreement, the<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2013/11/24/what-weve-learned-from-nafta"> best that they can offer</a> is that it increased trade. <b>But trade is not, to most humans, an end in itself. </b>And neither are the blatantly mis-named "free trade agreements".</li>
</span></ul>
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><i>Both obesity and emigration seem to be raising the question to the world: <b>Now you see me?</b></i></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Before continuing, it is important to stop: we knew a lot about the Mexican immigration to the US. But did we really understand it? Do we understand TTP and TTIP?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Let's also remember the origin of the Syrian conflict, which I discussed in "Crazy, warming world", citing Timoty Snyder's article for the Guardian </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"</span><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/16/hitlers-world-may-not-be-so-far-away" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Hitler's world may not be so far away</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">":</span></span></span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"During the hot summer of 2008, fires in fields led major food suppliers to cease exports altogether, and </span><a href="http://www.globalissues.org/article/758/global-food-crisis-2008" style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">food riots</a><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"> broke out in Bolivia, Cameroon, Egypt, Haiti, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Mozambique, Senegal, Uzbekistan and Yemen. During the drought of 2010, the prices of agricultural commodities spiked again, leading to protests, revolution, ethnic cleansing and revolution in the Middle East. </span><b style="font-family: Times, "Times New Roman", serif;">The civil war in Syria began after four consecutive years of drought </b><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><b>drove farmers to overcrowded cities.</b>"</span></span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In both cases, rural areas become unsustainable and <b>produced a disconnection of people from their land </b>and unbridled mass migration.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: large;">Now you don't. Feeding emotions through information </span></b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">The role of the press in many political phenomena is under scrutiny. The press response tends to deny its influence, sometimes not even accepting a catalyst </span></span>effect and describing its role as simply reflecting what the public is saying.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: medium;"><i>Emotions and technology</i></span></b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><span style="font-size: small;">The Washington Post article </span></b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2016/06/30/facebook-news-feed-and-the-tyranny-of-positive-content/?tid=sm_tw">Facebook’s News Feed and the tyranny of ‘positive’ content</a> by Caitlin Dewey highlights the work of the blogger <a href="http://minimaxir.com/2016/06/interactive-reactions/">Max Woolf</a> in analysing emotional reactions to content. One of the his findings is that Fox News content generates mainly angry responses. </span></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVbWBw7nMilE-uCmMUtH1Rzmb9bCUGs2cW4QYwu73ceJCM8oJkGrv-i9fbY4ZLpB1KG3DLxJQ5yvmcwjGFsoID95Pzgyxn9G0toFaSPOq1aQGZh3z6Nu2APtBhvMiFBlLRHSN9DJ-ozX4/s1600/Fox+news.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><img border="0" height="363" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVbWBw7nMilE-uCmMUtH1Rzmb9bCUGs2cW4QYwu73ceJCM8oJkGrv-i9fbY4ZLpB1KG3DLxJQ5yvmcwjGFsoID95Pzgyxn9G0toFaSPOq1aQGZh3z6Nu2APtBhvMiFBlLRHSN9DJ-ozX4/s640/Fox+news.jpg" width="640" /></span></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">What's interesting about this point, is that this is probably true for both its audience as much as its non-audience: to be angry in sympathy and angry in antipathy with what it is being said. No matter if we agree or disagree with Fox News, it is successfully feeding the public with anger.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the Utopian world where everything is positive, like the old Facebook world with only the like button, content was skewed towards likeable stories and cat videos. This article ends up wondering how this new information will affect what we see in our feed, following Facebook understanding of what's relevant. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is of course important in the context that increasingly more people are using social media to get the news. The limits of this notion of what's relevant can also be analysed through </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Amazon's algorithm to build recommendations that are mainly based at our past behaviour or a matching profile, which is a very different experience to a book store when as it is not purposely custumised, we are more likely to end up buying something that was not planned, something outside our bubble.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; line-height: 24px;">In a different article "<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/media/2016/jul/12/how-technology-disrupted-the-truth">How technology disrupted the truth</a>", Katharine Viner speaks about Eli Pariser's concept of Filter Bubble: </span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Algorithms such as the one that powers Facebook’s news feed are designed to give us more of what they think we want – which means that the version of the world we encounter every day in our own personal stream has been invisibly curated to reinforce our pre-existing beliefs. When Eli Pariser, the co-founder of Upworthy, coined the term “filter bubble” in 2011, he was talking about how the personalised web – and in particular Google’s personalised search function, which means that no two people’s Google searches are the same – means that we are less likely to be exposed to information that challenges us or broadens our worldview, and less likely to encounter facts that disprove false information that others have shared."</span></li>
</ul>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It continues to comment about <span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 24px;">the British internet activist and mySociety founder, Tom Steinberg's plea to Facebook: </span></span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"I am actively searching through Facebook for people celebrating the Brexit leave victory, but the filter bubble is SO strong, and extends SO far into things like Facebook’s custom search that I can’t find anyone who is happy *despite the fact that over half the country is clearly jubilant today* and despite the fact that I’m *actively* looking to hear what they are saying. This echo-chamber problem is now SO severe and SO chronic that I can only beg any friends I have who actually work for Facebook and other major social media and technology to urgently tell their leaders that to not act on this problem now is tantamount to actively supporting and funding the tearing apart of the fabric of our societies … <b><span style="font-size: large;">We’re getting countries where one half just doesn’t know anything at all about the other."</span></b></span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>What do you see? lies and angles of the truth</b></span></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i>Communication and technology</i></b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The article continues with the tension within journalism: on the one hand its corruption, it's disconnection to its purpose for the sake of cheap clicks.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"The impact on journalism of the crisis in the business model is that, in chasing down cheap clicks at the expense of accuracy and veracity, news organisations undermine the very reason they exist: to find things out and tell readers the truth – to report, report, report."</span> </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But on the other hand, highlighting how technology could be <i>the wound that finds in itself the solution </i>pointing out that what was sold as "The Truth" by the press and the authorities about the Hillsborough tragedy would've (probably) been challenged much faster. And this is one clear example of a very old and common practice. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"It is hard to imagine that Hillsborough could happen now: if 96 people were crushed to death in front of 53,000 smartphones, with photographs and eyewitness accounts all posted to social media, would it have taken so long for the truth to come out? Today, the police – or Kelvin MacKenzie – would not have been able to lie so blatantly and for so long."</span></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i>Communication and politics </i></b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This article ends up commenting on Zeynep Tufekci argument of the positive and negative aspects of the weakening of the press gatekeepers</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"As the academic Zeynep Tufekci argued <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2016/03/31/opinion/campaign-stops/adventures-in-the-trump-twittersphere.html?_r=0">in an essay</a> earlier this year, the rise of Trump “is actually a symptom of the mass media’s growing weakness, especially in controlling the limits of what it is acceptable to say”. (A similar case could be made for the Brexit campaign.) “For decades, journalists at major media organisations acted as gatekeepers who passed judgment on what ideas could be publicly discussed, and what was considered too radical,” Tufekci wrote. The weakening of these gatekeepers is both positive and negative; there are opportunities and there are dangers.<br /><br /><br />As we can see from the past, the old gatekeepers were also capable of great harm, and they were often imperious in refusing space to arguments they deemed outside the mainstream political consensus. But without some form of consensus, it is hard for any truth to take hold. The decline of the gatekeepers has given Trump space to raise formerly taboo subjects, such as the cost of a global free-trade regime that benefits corporations rather than workers, an issue that American elites and much of the media had long dismissed – as well as, more obviously, allowing his outrageous lies to flourish."</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The other aspect that we will need to discuss in the future is if it is possible at all that a government communicates anything without it being considered propaganda, how a media controlled by corporate power does not fall into a permanent corporate bias and how we avoid technology -that democratises content creation but it is driven by quick consumption of information- becoming a hindrance in truth seeking.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;"><i><br /></i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: large;"><b>Now I see me and see you</b></span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How do we keep our right for critique, for dissent without seemingly "feeding" separation? How do we avoid the temptation of the comfort that the filter Bubble offers in these uncomfortable times? John Cleese argues for humour as a tool.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Transgressing the taboos of the current consensus, both Trump (though taboo discriminatory and xenophobic language) and Sanders (through the taboo "socialist" platform), started to put words in that shadowy space that was unnamed by politics and Americans were silencing with drugs, opioid addictions, suicides and explosions of violence. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But of course taboos are places of shame and shame is always protected by a layer of anger. It is not easy to touch taboo topics without triggering sometimes aggressive defence mechanisms.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><i>Politics and ideology</i></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">With the neoliberal focus on the individual and some sort of faith to a (<i>false)</i> perfect meritocracy, we think if we are worth it, we will succeed, and if we don't succeed then it is because we are not worthy. The pseudo-solutions come then as self-esteem and self-help books, because our struggle is purely individual disabling at the same time the political through the imposition of TINA (there is no alternative), demonising activism, accusing any collective action of mass, "robotic", manipulated, de-individualised, etc. However, it is ironic that this self-help format, with the appearance of being personalised is produced in mass, similarly to the IKEA furniture. The TINA tyranny, with a freedom narrative, is deeply de-individualising treating us all like a herd that should not think and simply trust technocracies.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here, there is also a sort of inversion. Dagoberto Rodriguez, a Salvadorian thinker, claims that the poor vote for neoliberal policies, because they eat like poor, sleep like poor, live like poor, but think as if they were rich. In the same way, we can see the rich, eating, sleeping and living like the rich, but thinking as if they were poor. (Pity The Poor bankers, pity the poor rich, it is never enough, etc). I consciously take the following quote out of context: Steve Job's "<i>stay hungry, stay foolish</i>" because I believe in the power of words I have to point out that literally speaking is an unhappy quote that <b>somehow perfectly reflects the sort of ideology that enabled Nafta in Mexico.</b> Better options would've been "Don't feel ashamed of asking simple questions" and "follow your creative drive", probably in snappier forms like "No shame, just create" or "be smart, create".</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguPG6v7jOo87RbqwLJny5zlEoqbkWjTcLNXvzZdm0trxEHuhnPs43d-sq2VkQiZXoE9h2AeJa6bWbZZeXbbXlXXULvgOx87hJQmR40xD67NDQHZG0ecVkNqstEIl5HkHHXdGaV8hLPth0/s1600/stay+hungry.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguPG6v7jOo87RbqwLJny5zlEoqbkWjTcLNXvzZdm0trxEHuhnPs43d-sq2VkQiZXoE9h2AeJa6bWbZZeXbbXlXXULvgOx87hJQmR40xD67NDQHZG0ecVkNqstEIl5HkHHXdGaV8hLPth0/s400/stay+hungry.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But also, when there is an inversion when <b>the people holding power speak as if they were in opposition</b> or in the weaker position. It would not be the same to say a person should not hold power from an opposition or minority place as to say it from a position of power (for example David Cameron asking Jeremy Corbyn to resign, or even in the American police narrative when speaking about the tensions with the black community). The former would be freedom of expression, the latter would be overt repression. Early versions of this reversion were already present in John F. Kennedy famous quote "Don't ask what this country can do for you but what you can do for this country". Even if it was taken as an empowerment call, there is already a shift of focus towards the individual and the denial of the need of government action to negotiate, lubricate, organise, make possible what at individual level is not.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Back in the early 90s, Gloria Steinam tried to bridge the gap that the self-esteem approach left open, probably developing self-esteem into the main weapon against the individualist system (the wound that find in itself the solution). She speaks about self-esteem as the one being able to deal with this inner sense of shame but without denying that it is in the outside world where we can find a "chosen family" in which we see others and feel "seen" by others, be recognised and feel free and with whom we can engage in different sorts of <b>collective action.</b> She tries to link individual and external change without falling into the trap of magical thinking, narcissism and conservatism but rather claiming that <b>the personal is political and the political is personal. </b>She explains that building and supporting the self authority of those with a different view (the one outside the consensus) is the way to truly become rebellious and change and affect the outside world. She argues that external and internal revolutions do not last without the other. You cannot have revolutions with people full of angst. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this sense, it is worth reflecting on how the Brexit vote came as a surprise to many brexiters who, submerged in the false security that their feeling of powerlessness gave them, almost unintentionally discovered that individual action counted and could account for a collective action. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Rights only emerge in the connective tissue of the collective, negotiating these in-between spaces. Without seeing and recognising "the other" and this gap that may seem empty but it is not, willingly or not, we lose our rights and through our rights, our freedom.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/01/19-revolution-is-in-hands-of-women.html">Revolution is in the hands of women</a> and <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/11/32-history-gets-erased-first-at-home.html">History got erased first at home</a>, I argued however that if a good-enough level of this self-esteem is cherished by our mothers in our early childhood, </span></span>no big external search of self-esteem will be needed. If actual family history is told and not presented to us as a curated sequence that leaves us feeling inadequate and disconnected from it, no big discomfort will be felt at hearing different versions of History. </span>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">De-individualisation comes with the disconnection with our purpose of being who we are to become what I am supposed to be; the disconnection with our capacity to feed ourselves to become part of a hierarchical <b><i>chain of hunger </i></b>where entire countries or sectors in society <i>accept to act like colonies</i> to be extracted of their resources to feed someone else instead; and the <i>disconnection with the other</i> with whom we can jointly get closer to the truth where more than one alternative is always possible.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea </span><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-68039612320054009672016-06-30T06:31:00.000-07:002018-06-08T08:27:40.304-07:0040. Who cleans up our mess?<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Looking at the picture of the <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/news/glastonbury-2016-major-festival-clean-up-leaves-worthy-farm-looking-apocalyptic-a7105276.html#gallery">big Glastonbury clean up</a>, the pictures of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2016/jun/27/argentina-messi">Messi crying </a>after his team's defeat in the Cup America final and announcing he's quitting from the Argentine team, and probably more transcendentally, all the post-Brexit debate, I started to wonder about this issue of what do we do in front of negativity: the waste left or that feeling we get the moment when we find a limit to our desire, our impotency, to "that" no.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A long time ago, I had to go through a psycho-technical test that was part of the pre-screening for a new job I got. In an interview, I had to answer a "Desiderative questionnaire", the sort that asks you "what would you like to be if you weren't a person?" and "what wouldn't you like to be if you weren't a person". First I was asked about animals and then objects. Even if it was many years ago, I remember my answers. To the question "what object wouldn't you like to be", my reply was "A toilet". I was asked to explain why, and the reasons were clear to me: "I don't want people to come and deposit their own metaphorical <i>shit</i> to me, expecting me to say nothing back, swallow it and thus making it magically disappear. Additionally, no one likes to take care of a toilet". Life or karma had me finding many perfectionists on my way, people who cannot digest their own negativity and need exactly that: to preserve their own perfection by depositing imperfections onto others.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The post-brexit reaction gave us a lot of examples from both sides: xenophobic attacks on immigrants from people who feel themselves now enabled or entitled to publicly and aggressively express their anti-immigrant sentiments. And even if not at the same scale of anti-social behaviour, the ones that needed to disqualify and express disdain for the 17 million people that in their eyes were ignorant and did not deserve a right to vote. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The post-brexit reaction gave us too a feeling of disgust. The one that comes when the limits between the outside and the inside are breached. When we are confronted with something that we know exists but it is suddenly visible. In seeking the false promise of taking back control, the UK has lost control. All the internal discontent that a carefully structured parliamentary system normally filters was made evident by a referendum. All the internal tensions in the political parties themselves were also exposed: conservatives, labour and even UKIP have shaky leaderships and divided bases. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A system that has democratically imposed TINA (there is no alternative) is left with no answers in this <b>puke-aliptic scenario</b>, also exposing that outside the current consensus there were no ideas being seriously developed.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the following video, Slavoj Zizek speaks about toilet's design (t</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">his post is heading to be a bit scatological... I know).</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and he speculates a relationship with ideology. It's not long and it is quite funny.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this video, Zizek speaks about the three main toilets designs in the European trilogy: the French approach, radical, you don't see it and has to disappear </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">quickly</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">; The German, philosophical, you have to contemplate it for a while; and the British, pragmatic, it has to float before it goes away. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2016/jun/24/european-leaders-juncker-merkel-hollande-react-uk-vote-leave-eu-video">And then we have the Brexit reactions</a>, with Junker's position -expressed in French- then followed by Hollande, the radical view: it has to happen as quickly as possible no matter how painful (also shared by Martin Schulz), Merkel took the more contemplative approach, and the British are trying to hold on to their pragmatism whilst the toilet seems painfully clogged.</span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Immigration is definitely a difficult topic. As an immigrant, and having gone through the experience of living and trying to integrate into 4 different foreign countries, I recognise that it is rather easy to stop a serious discussion getting into details and dismiss any criticism on a cultural base, but this is probably because current economic ideology prefers to remain invisible.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">As I discussed in "<a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/08/26-immigration-wall-of-language.html">Walls, resistance and adopting a new motherland</a>", immigrants act like messengers that come to challenge our view of the world, whatever that is, a view that we are not so willing to change. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Economic immigrants in particular, remind us that the prevailing economic view encourages a free-flow of capital and needs to allow a free-flow of people to enable the creation of efficient hubs and avoid concentration of trans-national capital in places people cannot follow, which would lead to transnational tensions. However, i</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">mmigration and emigration are not always cold rational economic decisions: it touches our own attachments and sense of belonging and therefore people </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">don't "free-flow" nor they root and integrate as easily as capital,</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">even if economists would prefer them to. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">An immigrant </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">may be touching our own impotency to adapt to theses rules of the game and remind us that we are expected to follow economic opportunity and leave our town or</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> learn a second language</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> (something not very popular in the UK at the moment) and leave</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> our country. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Immigrants may show us the true face of our country, that relies on them coming to avoid investing on its own people's education (which I discussed in </span><a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/06/22-education-freedom-of-being-v-system.html" style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Education: freedom of being v system architecture</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">), one of the main engines of social mobility. We can look at the picture below and see its light, the positive contribution immigrants offer in opening up to new ways of thinking, being an example of collaboration and bringing all what was invested on them on education, but also we can see that there is a shortage of trained nurses and doctors and how restrictive and inaccessible that training is and wonder what's going on in Spain that is losing highly qualified people (3 out of 7 here come from Spain). </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirvT9-2Fn1auyHxyfu0aUVzNf2CRocWjJb4lm0jIXbsiuZ2vYkzYDEdf645JjFe4q-IKZBc6Yt2P4R4WOMQicK5WTkIAIR6C-Wt9fJpdC240dVeIuvUcWutNkZen4p-7-I2KeVm6MN7ls/s1600/doctos.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEirvT9-2Fn1auyHxyfu0aUVzNf2CRocWjJb4lm0jIXbsiuZ2vYkzYDEdf645JjFe4q-IKZBc6Yt2P4R4WOMQicK5WTkIAIR6C-Wt9fJpdC240dVeIuvUcWutNkZen4p-7-I2KeVm6MN7ls/s320/doctos.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<b>The mother tongue and the narrative of our motherland</b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this video, Hannah Arendt talks about many things, but in </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">min 36 she speaks about her own emigration experience, and her relationship with German as her mother tongue in comparison to the other foreign languages she had to learn. In min 42-45 she speaks about her return to Germany after 1945, and how listening to her mother tongue being spoken gave her a feeling of joy, even if probably her relationship with Germany as a country was different and more distant.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We feel insecure if the exo-uterus in which our mother tongue used to be ever-present, changes and becomes unfamiliar but... who is working on the cultural integration that is needed? (particularly remembering that integration is something that the whole group does, not only the newcomers). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">However, immigrants are an easy target because they are visible. The things that are slowly changing and disappearing due to globalisation and technology (and in the future more things will change due to climate change) are less evident and there is a lack of narrative in this area, no one is clearly <i>naming</i> what's going on at any other level than the corporate narrative which portrays this progress is undoubtedly positive. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A government </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">impassive and unresponsive becomes unfamiliar, so it must be the fault of Europe, or so everyone was told during the previous election campaign. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">These sentiments mix economic realities with political and cultural ones.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">On the other side, these "ignorant" voters who voted for leave are also messengers to show that our view of the world, where individual success (including our own access to higher education) does not isolate us from the weakening structure that sustains society, those collective aspects and mechanisms that are based on solidarity and try to bridge opportunity gaps; nor it can deny that any economic model can be criticised and challenged by the people that feel most negatively affected. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And this is not exclusively true for Europe. <a href="https://www.facebook.com/evonomics/videos/1741779732759475/">Here</a> Joseph Stinglitz explains how making the pie bigger (increasing GDP) could benefit everybody, but that this does not mean it would. And this divide is very much real in the US.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are multilevel fractures at play: economical, cultural, educational, political, that seemed to have converged in one referendum.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Was the Brexit vote the best way to deal with these issues? Probably not. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But would any self-reflection be possible without such "an event" </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">(at UK and EU level)</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">? Sadly, maybe not.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Digesting negativity - a woman's work?</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here come the Glastonbury volunteers that make visible the clean up process and show us that it is not magical or glamorous. It takes work.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_fjlpjrLl6jUks6MqV5TXktb_lF6xDKNhCDVKOgi5M1EjCt16mds90j2je9SNajuTozjmcTM6vGIT_YkC2gmy9ZvhZb_5HS4V4Rrxu3VbkR8eC2ev5zmBybQb-aeP-HxFnvUDfE3MvAg/s1600/glastonbury.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi_fjlpjrLl6jUks6MqV5TXktb_lF6xDKNhCDVKOgi5M1EjCt16mds90j2je9SNajuTozjmcTM6vGIT_YkC2gmy9ZvhZb_5HS4V4Rrxu3VbkR8eC2ev5zmBybQb-aeP-HxFnvUDfE3MvAg/s320/glastonbury.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I talked about the missing women in politics in <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/01/19-revolution-is-in-hands-of-women.html">Revolution is in the hands of women</a>. So not surprisingly, several <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/05/sturgeon-may-leadsom-women-to-the-rescue-amid-political-turmoil">women are raising as candidates in the Brexit aftermath</a>, claiming that in a time of turmoil they would be more practical, less testosterone-driven and able to collaborate (whilst men tend to shy away of high risk positions). Iceland's PM wrote in <a href="http://europe.newsweek.com/johanna-sigurdardottir-angela-merkel-nicola-sturgeon-brexit-women-leaders-476288">an article</a>: </span></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">"When I have spoken on the importance of women taking on a greater role in the running of the world, I have sometimes quoted a poem by an Icelandic poet, Ingibjörg Haraldsdóttir, translated by Salka Guðmundsdóttir. It is simply titled “Woman”.</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">When all has been said</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">when the problems of the world</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">have been dissected discussed and settled</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">when eyes have met</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">and hands been shaken</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">in the gravity of the moment</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">—a woman always arrives</span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">to clear the table </span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">sweep the floor and open the windows </span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">to let out the cigar smoke </span></i></div>
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<i><span style="font-family: "times" , "times new roman" , serif;">It never fails"</span></i></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But also, because historically women have been this watery entity containing negative emotions, in a way acting like toilets, very practical, making it all magically disappear, or so we hope. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I do not claim that the fact of being a woman automatically makes anyone a good candidate. Nor we can ignore that men may be avoiding a leadership claim due to the high political risks to their careers. I do not know either if any of these women have the vision needed in this moment, nor I necessarily agree with some of their views that could easily follow the shock doctrine and impose even more neoliberalism. But it is interesting how in this context, the proficiency they may have is more apparent: Nicola Sturgeon is praised by her strength and Theresa May was not even in the radar when Cameron and Boris were defining the future of Europe in a pissing contest (technically speaking). Others explain that this is simply so, because men tend to run away of a situation that is politically too risky.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But women come to the scene not only for their lack of testosterone, or being this watery human device, but also because they are expecting to offer a bit of 'mothering' skills. Mothers being our most secure attachment, tend to be the person with whom we have no fear of discharging all of our negativity whilst making us feel secure. In this sense, that motherhood appears as a topic in the leadership race makes sense. On the one hand, attachment theory of motherhood was brought to the table -unlikely or not- by conservative candidate <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/06/andrea-leadsom-right-talk-babies-tory-leadership?CMP=soc_3156">Andrea Leadsom</a> (demonstrating a very deep duplicity as the current economic model moving towards ever more extraction of wealth and a rent-based economy </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">-which she supports-</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">comes from <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2016/04/37-state-tax-v-feudal-rent.html">hungry babies</a>). And on the other hand -f</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">unny enough- Theresa May is already being called the nation's nanny. Nanny. Not the prime minister, not a leader. Nanny, which indirectly suggests she has no children or that this mothering role should keep some distance and impose some discipline. We should not forget either that </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Angela Merkel is called Mutti -mummy- in Germany. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So the context in which this is happening is not demonstrating massive progress for women </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>per se</i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> (fulfilling a function of cleaner, human toilets, assuming all the risk or becoming our mothers) </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">but we can never underestimate the effect that normalising women leaders has on the future.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At the end, we can dwell to <i>infinity and beyond </i>about how to describe the social fracture: if it is generational, class-based, religion-based, race-based, education-based, urban v no urban... which side are you on, and so on. But to mend the fracture, the only thing that is important is deciding what do we do (together) with the impending reality. But before that, we need to purge this emotional waste, because if we remain in shock a lot of things can happen without anyone even being able to react.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ9hVxejpCk_jht5a_awPxUfTJLKBZf3ZjKTST-rTZrFmhDmzCWx5zD6i_AHC1PhsKUpiMD4qY5gjmJBLs1N8ZP8u3hkoiaTyXFDv6uUCgQKT3F6LppqZ2YmtST58WV8OOesH9zlFTYvA/s1600/messi+llorando.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="179" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiZ9hVxejpCk_jht5a_awPxUfTJLKBZf3ZjKTST-rTZrFmhDmzCWx5zD6i_AHC1PhsKUpiMD4qY5gjmJBLs1N8ZP8u3hkoiaTyXFDv6uUCgQKT3F6LppqZ2YmtST58WV8OOesH9zlFTYvA/s320/messi+llorando.jpg" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And here comes Messi's son, hugging his father, giving him <b><u>contention</u></b> and as <a href="http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/psicologia/9-303026-2016-06-30.html">psycoanalyst Daniel Waisbrot points out</a> learning at the same time that even the best in the world sometimes can't achieve what he wants. He suggests that Messi has saved his son in this act because i</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">f he remembers it, he won't grow up in the illusion that for some people, there are no limits to their desire, for some people "the other" does not represent a limit. And it is a reminder for us too that we should not think there are people who are not entirely human so we can rely on them to come to clean us up (the anti-hero, the depositories of our projected imperfections) or lift us all up (the superheroes) and make us believe that there is life without confronting at some point or another our impotency, the other's desire or "that no", and walk through the emotional mud it leaves behind. That limit that makes us reconsider "who are we then?" and "what do we do now?", and teaches us to acknowledge at the same time that this limit we found still hides multiple possibilities. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If he remembers that he, as a boy, was able to offer this contention, hopefully he'll become a man with this capacity too, not needing anyone to blame nor need external toilets or fake mothers when things become mess(i)y. ta-da! :) </span></div>
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-81524127884584519012016-06-17T02:21:00.005-07:002017-08-03T02:56:08.239-07:0039. Violence won't have the final word<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Solving problems through political means can be frustrating. Discussions, technicalities, irreconcilable ideological differences that no logic can bridge, and time: it takes a long time. And even then, sometimes one idea must win (or is forced to win) over the other. Decision making, in many cases, can't follow logic and reason. There can be petrified beliefs, we simply don't know enough or in both scenarios there are pros and cons. Then the decision comes by weighing in priorities: we have to think which principle is the most important to us as we fully immerse ourselves into the emotional realm. But here is where we are utterly unprepared. The emotional world can be explosive if we are educated with the repression hammer as the only tool.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Somehow, both the Brexit debate, with the assassination of <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/jo-cox-dead-brendan-cox-statement-in-full-response-a7086226.html">Jo Cox</a>, and the Orlando massacre have something in common. Violence tried to get the final word between two seemingly irreconcilable positions: accepting or not accepting homosexuality (own or others'), in or out of the European union; these two positions could also be described as a world where a an idealised (toxic) masculinity rules (even through violence) or a world where there is free expression of sexuality, empowerment of women, where the "weak" aren't so weak or invisible or discarded nor they are the sacrificial lambs who will wash away our own weaknesses; a world stuck and under control or a world that is more fluid, dynamic, multi-polar and uncertain.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This week we were left shocked with these two cases in front of the brutality, the destructive power and the lives wasted... in front of the <i style="text-decoration: underline;">sheer uselessness</i> of an explosion of a violent emotion to resolve "the" underlying conflict. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Nowadays we are going through a multilevel crisis: economical, social, environmental, communicational, political, judicial, educational, cultural, religious... <b>a crisis in truth seeking at a global level.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even though we live in a complex world, full of greys, we are being told all the time it is all black and white.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the era of information, we can't say anymore we did not know. <b>Therefore the fracture between narrative and truth is clearer than ever</b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, particularly since the Iraq invasion</span><b style="font-family: "Trebuchet MS", sans-serif;">. </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Facts are dismissed, distorted, invented. We only need to read two different newspapers to see it. Speeches are rustic and shallow. They avoid entering into any sophisticated area, simply because depth will no longer sustain this polarised view, this basic structure that tried to organise all of our lives. We read the news and do not know what to believe anymore. And then, when narrative does not work, violence comes to impose itself over social discontent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this sense, I am interested in the use of the word <b>corruption</b>, not only as a crime where someone is paid to be disloyal to their duties and favour a particular interest, a term that has been mainly used to describe the actions of the state or what's done by women. I mean corruption in a broader sense, as disloyalty to the original purpose, which requires a sort of "absence". Corrupted journalism as the one that -even if we all accept it can never be fully objective- it does not address its own underlying commercial problem and starts to follow easy sales or transform itself into a new sort of entertainment. Corrupted politics, that in order to ensure power (or personal economical gain) deviates from addressing social needs. Corrupted science, that in order to get published dismisses unwanted results, neglects entire areas of investigation and turns a blind eye to its own ideological bias. Corrupted religion, that in order to sustain the superiority of a group charges the rest with all the sins. Corrupted education, that stops trying to be an emancipating path and trap students into debt slavery, class labels and indoctrination. Corrupted agriculture that tries to control the sexuality of the land. Corrupted nutrition, that makes us dependent and fat. Corrupted law and justice, that makes corruption legal and protest and whistle-blowers illegal. Corrupted technology, that instead of being an enabler of inter-connectedness, is used to control us. Ultimately our corrupted self: the disloyalty to ourselves, to our internal truths that even if they can be emancipating, we rather not find, so we might prefer to be absent, and not "occupy" certain spaces.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Slowly and silently we are being dragged into new cold black-and-white wars opposing US and China (in Africa and in the South China sea), Iran and Saudi Arabia, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/german-foreign-minister-accuses-nato-of-warmongering-russia-military-exercises-tensions-anaconda-16-a7088936.html">Nato and Russia</a>, TTIP/TTP "aligned countries" and Brics, oligarchies and workers, Genetically Modified foods (lead by Monsanto) and organic (with its seeds in the EU and recently Russia), democracy and technocratic neoliberalism, secular and non secular governments, petrol dependent economies and climate change, speculative use of land and housing shortage, finance and real economy, rent and wages, etc, etc. We could expect violence trying to have a final word here too, with these "quick wars", drones, "carpet bomb" solutions and "the new right" that are being sold in a world that seems impassive in front of a permanent state of war and fear, and seems more at ease with fascism than with a moderate left challenging <i>some </i>of the workings of the modern world. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">However, at this point we must know already that no amount of bombs or arms or police state will solve the underlying conflicts.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to start putting words to emotion as a way of taking ownership and funnelling the emotional power towards a <b>constructive purpose </b>instead of an explosive non-purpose. Putting words to our mouth to participate in a dialogue that triggers action. Words to name and put light to spaces we decide to occupy and transform. Attention versus distraction. A world full of greys that does not simply balance itself out. We need to reclaim politics, internally and externally.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-54611368999421671242016-06-03T01:58:00.001-07:002017-04-28T00:56:49.420-07:0038. Left and right mixing up and moving towards post-patriarchal times<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In my previous entries, I argued that the <b>right tends to support the principles of the patriarchy</b>: hierarchical structures, supported by the claim of some sort of moral superiority whilst promoting effort (and justifying social position) with the vague idea of meritocracy: those who struggle bear the full fault of their struggle, those who succeed is on the account of their own merits alone, disregarding any enabling factor (their parents, the country they were born in, the education that someone planned for them, the system, the network of people they dealt with, etc, etc).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The patriarchal drive is about taking people out of their maternal fusion/paradise: even if they feel content and comfortable, this fusion is a state of dependency or even worse they don't realise they are being subjugated. <b>The left has historically played on the matriarchal utopia</b> (which includes the concentrated power of the state, central planning, over control, etc, etc) and has struggled to move on from it (I would argue that it was a <i>patriarchal-mother</i> model, though). In front of injustice, growing inequality and social disempowerment, whenever the left adopts "matriarchal" codes, speaking about protection and disadvantage, the right (following their patriarchal drive) responds with even more resolve: for them the enemy is the matriarchal left and/or the matriarchal state, this "feminine" voice is either dictatorial, irrational, incompetent and/or deeply and utterly corrupt (all the patriarchal tricks to demonize and invisibilise the "maternal"), but hiding behind this criticism, it offers no answers to the inherent problems of conservatism and/or neoliberalism. At this stage of the patriarchy, the maternal is so taboo that EU and the US feel more comfortable with extreme right parties and quasi fascist rhetoric than with non-extreme centre-left ones trying to reignite the forgotten principles behind social justice.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At the same time, traditional "people's parties" have whole heartily adopted right wing economical policies co-opting in the dismantlement of the solidarity-based post War World II welfare state, whilst the right wing parties make big efforts to present themselves as the true representatives of the hard working people. The Brexit debate was probably particularly confusing in the traditional left-right positioning, having the two extremes together voting for Brexit and the normally opposing "modern" conservatives and so-called progressives joint together voted for remain.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>So, how do we move to a post-patriarchal society? </b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here we are: seeing the right with not many answers to the growing inequality and disequilibrium happening in the world with civil wars fed by environmental crisis, with little action against the causes of the 2008 economic crisis, the new cold wars being wedged, and with hesitant standing in front of the re-emergence of extreme right views and power. They tend to put their faith on the "invisible hand of the market" re-establishing the lost equilibrium, explanation that sometimes even takes divine overtones (not few reports speak about measures to calm the markets, which sounds reminiscent of tribes offering sacrifices to calm the gods) and even disregarding the fact that in the invisible hand of the market, the state was also a player in the game. On the other hand, the left is fractured (or fractures itself easily) and cannot find its cause, its voice or even the right words (hesitating if using the word socialism, or democratic socialism or making reference to a class struggle), plays as the outsider and still can't offer a vision of progress that does not trigger the old patriarchal alarms. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We know that something is not right.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I don't think there is a simple answer to this question. What we do have are the experiences we are individually going through and that are building what would be a modern version of a family, its structure, its roles, its hierarchy; our own experience in "becoming an adult", and stories (including religious) that seem to have been essaying different approaches or different aspects of this transformation. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One of the arguments I explore in this blog, is that we -somehow- follow our own biological and psychological development </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">at a social level</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> too</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, and that these processes have been described by legends, fairy tales, religion and literary works, from classics like Don Quixote and Hamlet to modern pop tales. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here, I'll continue to mix up religion and popular books and films, not in disrespect of religion but mostly to touch the narratives that we (at least in the West) are surrounded with and to use them as a resource because we were able to imagine and understand this stories.</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">3 stages of love: </span></b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Blind love, hate and true love.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Blind love: </b>During the pregnancy of our mothers and our first infancy, we are fused to our mothers psyche, we receive "free" food, attention, a roof, etc, etc. Our psyche is structured according to our mothers words: what she names and does not name. We love our mothers, but this love is blind: we don't and can't see our mothers imperfections, her "dark side". This type of love is working to build and sustain this dependency bond. This stage is the <b>matriarchy</b>, in the bible described as Eden, in Lord of the rings, for example, as The Shire. Here, I have to make a distinction: the love of the baby is blind but the one from the mother should not <i>necessarily</i> be. Patriarchal mothers are the ones that are hungrier and might connect with their baby with blind love, where she becomes also <i>dependant</i> of her children (she needs them looking at her, giving her meaning, being the objects of her control, etc). A mother that can truly see the individuality of her child, and her own individuality will behave differently. In any case, loving without knowing the shadow of the baby (that will be discovered during teenage years) is what makes this love blind.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Of course, blind love is also felt in the "falling in love" stage, when we see our lover as perfect and feel some sort of addiction, and believe that our survival depends on our loved one, that makes us understand Mariah Carey when she sings "I can't live, if living is without you".</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Hate:</b> Hate is a type of love that is working out its way to cut its own dependency. In fact, it is an alarm bell to signal a dependency (economic, of external recognition, etc) but it is frequently misplaced towards people that just remind us we are dependent: minorities, immigrants and women. Anger and hate are the crust hiding our weak dependent self. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The patriarchy comes and demonises the mother showing only her dark side: the mother is shown as a witch, as a step mother, as an evil/narcissistic queen, as a prostitute (or corrupted), as a monstrous spider, etc or makes them invisible altogether. At the same time it demonises our own weak self dependent on her. With all its issues, it has a purpose: we would not be able to separate from the "good mother", we cannot separate if we remain blind, <i>so we are forced into a world of high polarisation. </i>This vision is still not real but it shows something we did not see before. So the figure of the matriarchal maternal should be hated, dependency should be hated and the weak and vulnerable should be hated. Here we are also dependent, but dependent of our father's approval and his law. Even if it is a freedom rhetoric, we are not free. The patriarchy is a castrating stage.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Of course, here comes the point I discussed in "<a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2016/02/36-emancipatory-anger.html">Emancipatory anger</a>" that argues that anger or rage are forces that need self-contention to become a fire that lights change instead of a destructive force that expresses an emotion explosively, without purpose. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We've read about the patriarchy zillions of times: The old Testament is full of stories of this patriarchal god, the Empire wins over the republic in Star wars, the Two Towers start a war in Lord of the rings, the orphan princesses "see" how unjust their step mothers can be, or how controlling and dangerous witches are, Pink Floyd The Wall sees the humiliation that the patriarchal order, including the one the patriarchal mother imposes, etc. But also, when men are polarised into moral beings and cruel dictators.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So the patriarchy uses hate as the sword, the scissors that would cut the umbilical cord, the dependency to the mother, <b>to stop the drive to go back instead of forward</b>, but it is also used to castrate under the law of the father.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>True love: </b>after the process of blind love, hate, comes true love: the one that loves and even admires imperfect people, the one that is not dependent, the one that sees both sides. The one were we find ourselves not longing to go back to the lost matriarchal Eden. Here, "I <i>can </i>live even if living is without you". Most importantly, that it is not dependent nor disconnected. It comes with freedom, agency and recognition of the other (which I think it is probably a better stand point that respect).</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">From patriarchy to post-patriarchy</span></b></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The <b>end of the matriarchy </b>has been shown in many many many ways:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Princesses marrying a prince or receiving a sword (integrating her masculine side), normally following a <i>disobedience</i> to the mother.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-In Lord of the Rings: Sam killing the spider (the shadow of the mother), destroying his dependent bond (the ring) and the inner drive to succumb to the temptation of going back to his mother womb (the eye of mordor) to fall into eternal dependency (the vision of Sauron winning is slavery) or <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/children-hand-him-their-suicide-notes-now-this-musician-has-120-of-their-names-tattooed-on-his-arm-a7108626.html">die as a way of going back</a> (death drive).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Hansel and Gretel killing the witch.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-A prince killing a dragon.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Probably by Jesus first public appearance and miracle at a wedding, when even if he claims it is not his hour, his mother insists and he turns water (amniotic fluid) into wine, followed by his rebirth in his baptism.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-In more modern versions, like Brave, the patriarchal mother is not killed but "enlightened", as the child is already clear that this stage is over: the mother removes her crown and reconnects to her wild side (the bear), which she needs to learn to dominate.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The end of hate does not come however with the end of the matriarchy only, but <b>the patriarchy needs to end too</b>: hate is there until we cut the dependency with <i>the external structure the father role offers</i> (reminder: it is a role not a person of a specific gender) <i>when the sword is turned to a pen. </i>And here there are also different versions, or parts of the process:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-<b>A <u>challenge from the son</u> after the patriarchy had successfully castrated or killed the son.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Jesus is killed by the (passive or active) decision of the Roman Empire (the Emperor). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Darth Vader is castrated by his symbolic father and subjected to its power (Obi Wan Kenobi and the Emperor as the polarised sides of the same symbolic father figure). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Both followed by a later <i>challenge to the law of the father</i>, even the laws of life and death. In the case of Christianity, it is completed by the command of writing the experiences (with a pen), becoming authors and spread the word.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here is where we could draw parallels to what is happening today with the rage palpable in US general elections or Brexit referendum, mainly coming from middle-age white men, who, through economic castration, feel emasculated, humiliated and left behind and some feeling attracted to speeches that feed this rage with an old fashioned and fake male uber-power <b>as a challenge</b>, portrayed either as aggressive internal politics against immigrants or external aggressive policy against old or new enemies and weak economies. This "challenge" spirit is seen in any debate about political correctness. Even if some politicians feel the need to confront this rage speaking occasionally </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">about love, knowingly or not they remain in a high polarisation stage. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This stage of rage is very confusing, and full of fear. Even if some have the intention to challenge the "authorities" in many cases, they end up voting for very repressive regimes and the ones promising to go back to the idealised past (probably, due to an unconscious fear of their own anger and their own freedom).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>-The integration of the shadow: <u>the son assuming responsibility</u></b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One of Christianity main messages is about "don't expect the father to come to save you", conveyed in many ways: by claiming the last saviour has already come, by demonstrating it with the death of Christ where there was no God who came to save him and by suggesting that each should carry our their cross, and give testimony.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In Lord of the Rings we see, a shy Sam that did not want to listen to his shadow (Gollum), progressively assumes responsibility (killing the spider, carrying Frodo), getting married, becoming a father and becoming the next writer of the story.</span><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">-The connection to paternal love: assuming paternal responsibility - Fathers restraining themselves from castrating their sons in the moment of rage/rebellion</b><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Darth Vader (even if he castrated his son, cutting his hand) finally "awakens", kills the Emperor and removes his mask when he sees his son's life in danger for refusing to follow him to the dark side.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-In Billy Elliot, the father <i>accepts the challenge</i> of his son's rebellious dance, he finally respects and supports his choice.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Hans Solo by allowing his son to kill him: versus the old Darth Vader model who represented a father that did not want to die.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">(note: in this video, when we see Padme becoming a mother in a very sterile room, with a robot as a midwife, Padme crying and Obi Wan Kenobi as a company, we are also seeing a very patriarchal setting of birth. Particularly when compared to Christian and Buddhist birth myths that portrayed women being warmed and sustained by nature -animals, trees). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>-The re-emergence of narratives portraying women, not saints, no witches: good and bad at the same time (</b>that I touched upon in different entries). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This even affects <i>the view of Europe</i>, who tends to take on female characterisation when opposed to the US. Both good and bad at the same time: utterly imperfect as you would expect in a real world.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">These later two points are probably where Christianity falls short. As Jesus did not become a father (and never tells the story of his childhood -at least officially-), it does not offer a template of what post-patriarchal fathers and mothers are or should be.</span><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">Should there be an acknowledgement of progress?</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I'll bring again the point of births and examples of discussions happening at the heart of some feminist groups. There is a re-emergence of the natural motherhood discussion, natural births, breast-feeding until much later than previously (culturally) accepted, etc. Whenever I see a text blaming the medical science of depraving women of the sacred and even sexual moment of childbirth, I wonder why do we need to antagonise with the medical science, <i>responsible of lowering both mothers and infant deaths so drastically</i>. I deeply agree with the concept of respected childbirth, the idea of recovering the wisdom of the female body, rediscover motherhood and look back and wonder what we've lost in the way of the introduction of science in childbirth, but with the reassurance that should anything go wrong there are a lot medical resources to rely on. Progress should not be denied but used even with rediscovered old wisdom. </span><br />
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<b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">Should there be an acknowledgement of loss?</b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This print was done by Grayson Perry, in a documentary about masculinity for Channel 4 UK where he explored the subject in different masculine environments. This print is called Animal Spirit and was done after exploring the city of London and its (self-denied) version of masculinity. </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisnH5sHu8g4l_gkD3aseQ51xBoocjK7zbJCWiaPPavKVhN84T0JjeGmMnfiOUJwkLMeZYKLRwaNh0PtsZosZulKoP-Kg4Y3WvaOF9spdmR8p3dYK1BlecQA4nCj_i2vUW-5T8j5yTDimg/s1600/animal+spirits+grayson+perry.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="262" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEisnH5sHu8g4l_gkD3aseQ51xBoocjK7zbJCWiaPPavKVhN84T0JjeGmMnfiOUJwkLMeZYKLRwaNh0PtsZosZulKoP-Kg4Y3WvaOF9spdmR8p3dYK1BlecQA4nCj_i2vUW-5T8j5yTDimg/s320/animal+spirits+grayson+perry.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">About it, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/art/news/grayson-perry-creates-giant-ceramic-penis-inspired-by-london-bankers-a7035956.html">he explains</a>:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"<i>I've been interested in animal spirits as a euphemism for emotional over-exuberance in the market,” he said. </i></span><i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"I started of course with the two most common animals associated with the financial markets which are the bull and the bear... this is half bull, half bear but all male. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"The masculinity you see in the City is cloaked long ago under gentlemanliness and rationality and 'good business practice'. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"The beast still lurks, but he's very well-behaved."</span></i></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">From the perspective of what I write in this blog, I cannot help but thinking that this is a portray of the patriarchal mother: a highly polarised world (black and white) where a natural mother archetype (the bear) is taken over by masculinity (the bull), to the extent that she is feeding the patriarchal narrative to a baby with a penis instead of a breast, which creates individuals that </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">under the appearance of self-control are being driven by out of control hunger (the baby is hungry for milk and motherly attention), and end up creating a very narrow view of the world where our individual issues seems so big that occupy all the space of the frame, preventing us from </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">connecting to or even seeing the sterile and dying surrounding reality. (After reading this, I do acknowledge that I need to lighten up a bit. :) smiley face!).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Basically, motherhood (and politically, the left) is a taboo but it is not about "going back" to nature and have women and babies dying at births, but to move forward.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Not the end of history</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In western society, <b><u>one of the symbols to integrate and transcend is the cross in its multiple meanings</u></b>: a symbol of torture, punishment, suffering, abuse and castration, a symbol of our personal struggle, but also a symbol of the need to integrate left and right, above and below (in terms of worldly hierarchies and spiritual ones) including as a channel of food and where food and energy comes from (from earth: agriculture, petroleum, above: spiritual, solar, wind energy, from the sides: interpersonal connections, giving and receiving). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The acknowledgement of progress and loss does not signal the end of the left and right political positions nor class struggles. I don't think there is an end game where liberal democracy wins as Fukuyama suggested in light of the fall of the Soviet Union or a sort of communist government will be established as Karl Marx anticipated due to the intrinsic pitfalls of capitalism. In this moment very radical things appear in the horizon that are more radical than any of these visions: environmental radical changes (which will affect agriculture, water supply, generate migration, etc), shortage of natural resources, technological radical changes (the current topic of robots and automation replacing more that half the jobs for the next generation), huge demographical changes and geopolitical changes: at this moment it is not even clear that the project of nation states in the current form will be everlasting.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So I don't think that <b>there is anything more radical than connecting to the current radically-changing reality,</b> acknowledging the limits of the prevailing high polarised, self-centred ideology (that can only be sustained with violence as the ordering principle) and using all the tools at hand (</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">knowledge, science, technology)</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">to <i>collaboratively </i>find new solutions to these new problems.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I also think that the matriarchy and patriarchy are stages in a process that, when not allowed to be followed, creates and extends dependency. Each role needs to be allowed to do its job, the matriarchy to feed us when we are vulnerable and dependant, recognise our existence, our rights and our potential; the patriarchy is needed to help us develop self-discipline, use the resources available and follow a purpose, and finally to cut all dependency even the one we sustain with the law of the father, and to be whole enough to understand that rest might be in different stages of this process.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span>ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-59431033542614416232016-04-12T09:04:00.001-07:002017-04-26T02:21:10.435-07:0037. State tax v rent seeking economy: in today's world Jane Austen would be an economics reporter<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">With the Panama Papers, an underground war seems to be coming to the surface: the one that confronts two models: tax-supported states v rent-seeking landlords and "servicelords" (electricity, gas, water, etc).</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The hidden structure</span></b><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Most of our mental processes are unconscious. That gives them speed and capacity for processing. Our reptilian and mammalian brain are much faster in making quick and arbitrary decisions and process information than the pre-frontal cortex and, as they deal with matters of survival, they have higher hierarchy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Most of our political ideas are governed by the brain that introduced social interaction and order to our evolution, the mammalian brain (or monkey brain). It makes decisions based on emotions and our unconscious inherited ideas of social order. In most cases, we understand politics based on our family or our ideal family structure (the structure we learned it is better to warrant our survival). We equate and respond emotionally to the candidates depending on which "family model" represent, and that's why appearing with spouses and what's their spouses profile is, are important reinforcements the candidates have to display. This is at least until we create an emotional distance with our ideas and we allow our rational mind to question why we feel what we feel and start the slow subconscious restructuring work.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this article that appeared in Evonomics, Prof. George Lakoff in his article <a href="http://evonomics.com/no-one-knows-why-trump-is-winning/">"No one knows why Trump is winning: here's what cognitive science says" </a>writes how cognitive science explains that we metaphorically associate politics with family which puts Donald Trump as the candidate for a public with male dominated family models.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This social structure has been <i>historically </i>based in presenting men (and conservatives) as pure and owners of an indisputable moral superiority, whilst women are either corrupt and deficient (or possessors of beauty as their only power), justifying male's appropriation of power, property and decision making. By highlighting her links with the establishment and Wall Street funding, the attack on Hillary's candidacy is touching on this old, untrue but still unconsciously widely accepted premise, even if it might be a reasonable concern.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But beyond this presidential race in the US, there is a wider and global phenomenon going on: a war between rent-seeking and tax paying models, that challenges the idea of a democratic nation as the basic structural global order.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">State tax and state debt</span></b><br />
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States are unconsciously perceived as feminine and maternal, so when we have an emotional response towards the state, <b>we are in some cases projecting our unresolved issues with our mothers</b>. I mean this, without removing any validity to any of the issues we may have with the state (or with our mothers!). I intend only to highlight that a lot of the emotional charge might not be entirely well placed and might blind us in finding a balanced response.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">States can be perceived as invasive (dwelling too much in private matters), predatory (eating from us), neglecting (not paying due attention to the vulnerable), corrupt (the one that sells what is supposed to protect, the one that is disconnected to its original purpose), inefficient (wasting energy or resources in things that our not <i>our </i>primary concern), dictatorial (unilateral, cruel, not listening to us, castrating), etc, etc. In all this emotional logic, paying tax equates to a deep tension: feeding my mother is wrong, when <i>she is </i>supposed to feed me (with food, attention and unconditional love).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Of course, we are all adults now, but if we were not properly recognised in our individuality and were not fed with love and attention (most likely we have been left at least partially unsatisfied), we might be holding on to a feeling that either "she <i>owes me", </i>or if our mothers were so "hungry" of attention and recognition that she fed from our attention (with narcissist or controlling attitudes), <b><u>in not paying we are staging a resistance to this unbalance, </u></b>this abuse, and gives us the feeling we are liberating ourselves from her damaging hunger.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Because this issue is so emotionally dominant, we do not create the gap needed for our reasoning to stop justifying automatically our behaviour and thoughts, and question what goes on in which level. This underlying feeling of maternal debt (=state debt), <i><u>makes us blind </u></i>to all the things the state does provide (or can or should) to us or to the wider community and how structurally important this is for society.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Neoliberlism is where old conservatives (I would argue that there is a place for a new/modern conservatism) and liberals (the political child in the trio right, left, liberalism) agree that the enemy they should get liberated from is the state (ie the mother) but without acknowledging their own dependency. In this sense, they share what I would call an "individuation paradox", they fight for cutting dependency of the state, but they are not individuated enough to see what the state is there for, or even to find business outside the state sphere.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Neoliberal ideas have a particular bias regarding the role of the state. It includes many ideas that are based on the very old need to demonise and dis-empower the state (what's female) to become "neoliberated" from it. It is not too far fetched to say there are connections that draw parallels between the old ideas regarding the role of women in society and the current ideas regarding the role of states: ideas like "women cannot have properties or run businesses" with "states should not have properties or run businesses", between "women as the temptresses and sources of all sin" with this very current idea of "all politics is corrupt, <b>let the CEOs and corporations run the show</b>" and "corrupt states"; between the control of women sexual power and uterus (women's bodies must be controlled externally) with the trade agreements that <i>externalise</i> justice and budgets that do not focus on its own <i>will to create</i>: the long term investments and innovation; "women should not interfere with men's businesses" with seeing all regulation as an undesirable state intervention; the idea that women are the ones that should sacrifice themselves (absorbing, internalising and taking ownership of an external lack) to states coming to the rescue and absorbing private debt to convert it in public debt, <i>for which then the states are to blame on how they manage it</i>, forgetting what was the real source of that debt; between "women as passive receptors" (always open to receive but never to demand) with the idea that "governments should be passive tax collectors"; "the only way to secure a future for women is to marry well" with "the only way for governments to succeed is to attract rich investors" etc. etc. <b>In today's world, Jane Austen would be an economics reporter.</b></span><br />
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<b>Rights v benefits</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In our child stage, our biology assumes we will get acceptance, recognition of existence, shelter, food and love. These are <i>rights </i>that we get for "free". We are in Eden. From this perspective, it is interesting how the word "right" has made a come back in centre-left political speech. To a child, the 700-1000 calories a mother gives him/her in the form of milk has no earthly supply chain: the mother is a divine source of food, that does not <i>need </i>anything. Mothers were not taught how to feed themselves, while the rest of the adult part of the family (especially fathers) sometimes disconnect themselves from the supporting task. The sad thing is that when communities and societies do not support mothers in good enough measure while they are doing this job, mothers may start to feel empty, unseen, unrecognised and their reptilian brain -concerned for their survival- ends up <i>rationalising </i>how much food, attention, energy, they give their children (austerity), or <i>start to feed </i>attention from them (<a href="http://voxeu.org/article/why-european-women-have-few-babies#.VyiE0B4b1Sw.twitter">or they stop having children</a> altogether).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In both cases, children are left with this feeling of maternal debt, hungry and angry. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is why in a context of economical austerity, anger arises which tends to be deflected towards immigrants, who are then blamed for the shortage of food, jobs and attention.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When a hungry mother does not challenge the social order that does not support her, she turns her attention to what's perceived as an energy drain: her mind justifies this, building a narrative where rights become benefits. And benefits can easily become expendable and fees become reasonable: the system feeds from bottom up. In this sense, putting <i>the main </i>pressure on workers to sustain society is similar to a family saying "the only way this family will survive is for this baby to eat less or even better, if he pays rent" (think of the student debt situation in the US when reading this line).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Interestingly enough, in this model, the top reaches the "Eden/paradise" <i>they feel they never had </i>and is due to them in tax havens. Let's remember that Paradise/Eden represents an idealised matriarchal stage. Let's also bear in mind that in Elite circles maternal attachment tends to be severed very early and sometimes traumatically, including through the use of boarding schools. In the individuation paradox, conservatives believe in their own patriarchal role of separating children from mothers as early as possible, as the only way for them to become individuated and independent, whilst conservatism itself is about not changing anything about the inherited ideas, sometimes not even the decoration in your inherited house.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At political level, this is reinforced by the erosion of state rights with trade agreements that <b><i>minimise competition for corporations and maximise competition amongst workers</i>. </b>It is not an anecdote that in these agreements, once a service has been privatised cannot be nationalised again. Typical public services have a rent based model profiting from infrastructure normally built by the state. In the hands of the state, services like heating or water are considered first a right then a source of income, in private hands, it is a service and an income and probably for monopolies, only income.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Rent-based societies are based on hungry babies, disempowered women and minorities, disempowered states and the erosion of the very idea of civil (and economic) rights.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>An obedient left</b> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this context, the left is mocked, presumed incapable and something between idealist and ridiculous. In its polarised female role, it is subjugated under the patriarchal law too. It is forbidden for the left to write History or claim for the forgotten chapters, to assume power, to form circles and associate. And even if it does not hold power, it is forced to show self-criticism by the media in front of any wrong from the right, as it is the one that should assume negativity and guilt. It is blamed for losing sight of the class struggle and losing the economical argument in favour of identity politics, when class tends to be the result of the right-wing hierarchical logic. They do somehow, however, play the polarised game by just 'inverting the electrical charge', by labelling positive what the other side considers negative. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In opposition to the obedient left, the right presents itself as the "true" authority by showing itself to be rule-breaker, through breaking the codes of what now is called political correctness daring to be openly misogynist, racist and xenophobic.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">An optimistic view</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The reason why I'm optimistic about the future is that we've moved away from this way of thinking, particularly in the last few years were many pennies dropped, and almost all of a sudden many issues -such as equal marriage, gender identity rights, pro-choice, etc- stopped being issues in many countries. Other issues that used to be denied or considered resolved (such as racism) are having once more a visibility push. Motherhood (which -I argue- determines a lot about society architecture) is evolving with mothers in general being a bit more relaxed, following their instincts and approaching motherhood more naturally.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If these structures have already changed or are changing at the foundations level, it will eventually and inexorably trickle up. On the same note, we always need to bear in mind that <b>any reactionary movement that on the surface deals with economical, political and even geopolitical issues, will try to revert progress picking on the issue of gender and sexuality.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Probably, this is what caused a first "shake" when the Pope felt he needed to speak about family this year. Without changing dogma or a still holding a conservative view of families, sexuality and women (which in my view is a deep rooted inconsistency), it seems to be more of a push for the church to connect to a changing reality. And the ever increasing demonstrations on the street might do the same with the leaders of the economy, who seem to be able to make decisions in complete oblivion of the effects they have in the real world (on society or on the environment).</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Tensions are good</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The sense that dependency is a drain for society is an admission of weakness. An admission of "lack of adultness", as if we do not have the resources or the tools to take care of people in dependant situations. However, accepting dependency as a possible reality of many people (children, unemployed, disabled, retired, even a worker is dependant), does not mean that there is no room for a conservative voice (embodying the patriarchal father) that sees dependency as a stage one should overcome or at least as a situation that should not stop us from the exploration of abilities. But ultimately they would however bear the weight of the responsibility without so much complaining that it is not fair.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Sharing a sense that tax is needed to enable states sustain common spaces, services, or to make high-risk and long term investments does not mean that it is not important to sustain a tension with someone who thinks the state can be corrupt and should be checked upon, or that taxes are too high and hold a battle of how much the state feeds from the private sector or the individual citizens.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even if off-shoring is "legal", the amounts that is draining out of economies now is so big that in many cases countries have an equivalent of their annual GDP off-shore. In front of these facts, we also need to sustain the other side that creates a tension against these abuses.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Balancing individualism and collectivism has to come from this tension, where there are economic rights (eg the right to shelter, to make a living or receive support when it is not possible, etc) and civil rights are granted at individual level and they are the enablers of social and individual responsibility.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The real rebellion in today's world is against the idea of TINA (there is no alternative) and these speeches that ask us to be united</b>, <b>when they actually mean we should all think the same.</b> We have to rescue the importance of the division of power and the acceptance of tensions as the natural digestive system of a democratic society.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-62815709082245250792016-02-10T16:12:00.001-08:002018-02-06T07:43:51.237-08:0036. Emancipatory anger (as opposed to destructive anger)<div class="tr_bq">
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It takes a certain amount of "aggression" and anger to use a sword or a pair of scissors that will cut our psychological dependencies and inertia. Anger, when used consciously, gives us that excess energy we don't normally need to do something we don't normally do.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For years anger has been given a bad name, and we have never been properly guided into how to use it constructively. That's why hearing a <i>Peace </i>Nobel Price winner, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kailash_Satyarthi">Kailash Satyarthi</a> explaining that everything he did for children's rights wasn't because he was content but rather because he was angry, is very relevant today. Like fire, anger can be used as a transformative force, or can be destructive if left out of control. He argues that when this anger lights an idea and this idea is taken to action, change happens.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In a similar way, Beyonce called ladies to get in formation (ie get organised) on Sunday dressed like Michael Jackson with dancers dressed like the black panthers, with proud afros, subsequently forming a triangle (uterus), an arrow and an X in reference to Malcolm X, where the X was in itself the scissors cutting his ties with the past (the inherited slave surname).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this excellent blog entry "<a href="http://newsouthnegress.com/southernslayings/">We Slay, Part I</a>" by Zandria, the Formation video is a analysed in detail the multi-layered messages as an articulation of southern blackness and resistance.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The enemy is not <i>necessarily </i>the system</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Emancipatory anger helps us to separate <b><i>not </i></b>from the place, system or person we are <i>now</i>, <b>but from a previous idealised past from which we were separated (that imaginary past when we were great, pure and innocent), </b>that pulls us back to a state of dependency driven by our hunger, our need, our lack. This does not mean that our present is not problematic. It is. But first we need to deal with the past. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this sense, as a feminist, I don't think the patriarchy is <i>the only </i>enemy. The patriarchy, with all its shadows, <b>has a purpose or at least a use. </b>The other "enemy" <i>to an adult (men and women) </i>is the matriarchy. The matriarchy is fundamental for a child, but letting go of it is also fundamental for an adult. It is the <i>feeling of wanting to go back </i>to and idealised past to find someone (our mother, lost paradise) whom should satisfy our hunger (the need to be recognised and accepted in our uniqueness, respected in our space, the need to be fed with food, love and nurturing attention) instead of moving <i>forward </i>and developing the tools to feed ourselves (individually and in collaboration with others).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Rumi said "the wound is the place where the lights enters you", or as Zizec explains about the hegelian wound, in the wound heals itself by recognising in itself the solution (video below min 20-26 approx). If the wound is the first separation from the feminine, Eden under the command of the patriarchal father who threw us out, it is in this place <i>outside </i>Eden where <b>we find the tools to heal the wound and connect to our <i>own </i>feminine -as opposed to go back to reconnect to the external one- </b>(this is both for men and women). If for feminism, one of the characteristics of the patriarchy was the control over the uterus/sexuality, it was <i>owning the control over the uterus </i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">(e.g. the pill, access to safe abortions, etc) and</span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;"> claiming the ownership of their sexuality </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what was most emancipating to women .</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In Beyonce's performance, the emancipating spirit is not showing subjugation but rather being boldly <i>american</i>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this sense, even though both Trump and Sanders are these "outsiders" representing an anger against the establishment, the greatest difference between them is that the negativity of todays' is used to lead people in opposite directions: "to make America great again" <u>is leading people backwards</u>, aiming to recover an idealised lost state whilst blaming a demonised other. Bernie Sanders' messages are more inward-looking and forward-looking, seeing the current problems as new ones.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We love, we hate, we become</span></b></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Freedom to love and create comes when we transit these stages: we love, we hate, we become. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The first love is blind. It's attachment which fuses us in a blur with the other.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In hate, love still exists but it is working towards its emancipation, to cut dependency. It is an effort to put a distance in between us and the dependence we hold with that other who is important -we only hate people who are somehow important to us, even for the wrong reasons-. And in this distance, we gain perspective, we see a fuller picture. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then we </span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">stop </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">hating. The hated one does not define us any more in any way. We become. We are not longer blind. We are no longer victims. We want people to look at us for who we are, in all our perfect imperfection. At this point we are free to love, to love freely (without the fear of loss, or the fear that in a potential loss of the loved one we will be disappear too) and we are free to create and collaborate.</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Hungry women and angry women</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Anger and hunger are closely related. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The only way to overcome the social patriarchy is that we use the tools that the patriarchy has given us to see our shadow and integrate it. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For women, we won't finish with the patriarchal process if we don't talk about motherhood for instance, and its shadowy aspects without a taboo. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to be able to see in motherhood the <i>potentiality </i>of becoming -even if it is from time to time- the <i><b>spider </b></i>of Lord of the Rings (who numbs</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, immobilize and wraps like a baby our children to feed from them), the <i><b>witch (</b></i>with the house that looks very sweet from the outside but that inside keeps the children jailed and in control), </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">the <i><b>evil queen (</b></i>the narcissist that needs to be looked at and fed with attention, impoverishing her children of attention) or the <i><b>stepmother</b></i> (the one that is not emotionally involved and able to enslave her children to do what she wants). We need to know this negative space of motherhood, this hunger. In this sense, we should take ownership of this knowledge. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Yes, we know we can be like that at times. But because we know, we can recognise it and address our hunger differently". Embodying the patriarchal mother without recognising it, <b>leaves children empty and in need, hungry</b>. In fact, I'd argue that <b style="text-decoration: underline;">the patriarchal mother is the main vector of the patriarchy </b><i>(as much as neoliberal governments are the main vector of neoliberalism)</i><b>. </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Later on this infantile hunger transforms itself into over-attachment to other forms of maternal patriarchy (abusive/intrusive or neglecting governments, cold corporations, etc), to debt, to things not changing, and anger whenever an experience reminds us of our wound (losing jobs, changing environment and our sense of collective identity, appearance of other people in greater need...). Under this logic, if poor, refugees, minority groups -in other words competition in terms of unsatisfied needs- <u>disappear</u> then my mum will be free to take care of me. <b>G</b></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>overnments will struggle to talk about helping refugees whilst imposing austerity and welfare cuts over its own population</b> (embodying the stepmother /patriarchal mother model). <b>Whenever we see "haters" complaining about others, the analysis should focus not in what they say but </b></span><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">instead in </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what their own economical situation is. </span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is probably this what makes Hillary Clinton not such a clear candidate for women yet. Her links with the establishment cast a doubt on what sort of woman she really is. Is she truly free? Is she an empowering figure? Is she able to see the others? </span>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This reflection on the patriarchal mother is not to cast blame on women, on the contrary, it is empowering because it means it is in our hands. The more women reflect on the patriarchal mother model, the more they can transform it. The biggest trap is, of course, <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/domestic-violence-is-justified-half-girls-believe-pakistan-united-nations-population-fund-report-a6866851.html">violence against women</a>. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We won't finish with the patriarchal process either if we don't confront the mandate of being the good girl, the good pupil who never uses the energy of her anger to be assertive. Famously, this has been discussed not so long ago in the press after <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/compost/wp/2015/10/13/jennifer-lawrence-has-a-point-famous-quotes-the-way-a-woman-would-have-to-say-them-during-a-meeting/">Jennifer Lawrence </a>pointed out that speaking her mind was easily taken as aggressive behaviour. In the analysis of this even, the press provided with a translator English-woman in a meeting to explain how a woman should say a famous quote without being perceived aggressive or bitchy:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><em style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; line-height: 32.4px;">“I came. I saw. I conquered.”</em></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><strong style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; line-height: 32.4px;">Woman in a Meeting: “I don’t want to toot my own horn here at all but I definitely have been to those places and was just honored to be a part of it as our team did such a wonderful job of conquering them.”</strong></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><strong style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; line-height: 32.4px;"><em style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: normal; line-height: 32.4px;">“Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.”</em></strong></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><strong style="box-sizing: border-box; color: #111111; line-height: 32.4px;"><strong style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 32.4px;">Woman in a Meeting: “I’m not an expert, Dave, but I feel like maybe you could accomplish more by maybe shifting your focus from asking things from the government and instead looking at things that we can all do ourselves? Just a thought. Just a thought. Take it for what it’s worth.”</strong></strong></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Woman-in-a-meeting language keeps us in the patriarchal process (as much as men who fear assertive women are still in doubt of their our "performance" and remain castrated by the patriarchy).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Transformative fire</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I always hypothesise that the left and the state tend to mirror the feminist issues. So a state that is aware of its own shadow (eg potential to be over-controlling, smothering, disengaged with the people and submissive to the corporate world), can start to show its teeth (to feed, to take a bite of life) and become creator again. Whilst the right and the corporate world could also reflect what would it be the post patriarchal right, the one that is against dependency but does not neglect, the one that pushes for focus and discipline but does not castrate, that one that encourage risks but assumes responsibility, ultimately the one that does not need to control or undermine the creative power of the state to succeed, nor humiliate people for them to align in pursuing a group purpose.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is </span><b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">only when we don't fear our own anger </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">that we can break away with past mandates and take action independently. In this sense, and even though I think yoga, meditation and mindfulness are very positive practices as a personal choice, I am suspicious when the corporate world encourages it actively, as its purpose could easily become to tame people's anger instead of listen to it and address the issues that might be triggering it.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is </span><b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">only when we don't fear our own anger </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">that we can use it as a transformative fire instead of a destructive explosion, claim ownership of our words, and break with the patriarchal language, not to go back to the maternal narrative but to move forward. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Both narratives need to be recognised as foreign. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Then, we become.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-50735407046879185512016-01-21T01:02:00.000-08:002018-01-30T23:38:54.982-08:0035. The not-so fragmented female experience<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are many streams within feminism, each of them dealing with different aspects of the female experience, which sometimes enter in discussions with each other.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The sometimes called "Earth mothers" support non medical intervention in births and are exploring the depths of breastfeeding, both as part of the vast territory of female sexuality. Many of them stop working to live motherhood fully, resting in the privilege of a <i>chosen </i>economic dependency -a sort of conservative feminism- (<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/justine-greening/women-girls-gender-equality_b_9030042.html?utm_hp_ref=uk">probably because it is less limiting for them than for most of women</a>), or want to break the barriers of work and home, and make children more natural in work spaces.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some voices in this stream, knowingly or not, exclude women who can't breastfeed, and are fighting against internal and external guilt.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the most hard core versions, they may exclude (and are excluded by) the women that won't breastfeed because they belong to a stream of feminism that feel that their emancipation is about decoupling motherhood and womanhood and for whom economic independence (current and future) is crucial. They may call each other "disconnected" (disconnected mother or disconnected woman), and tend to clash.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And here come too the women who have no children (up to 18% of women in their 40s in the US). Sometimes discussing if they are "child-free" or "childless" or wondering why they should be defined at all by this absent hypothetical child from whom they are free and also having to reassert their worth as women.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The same happens with those women who fight to break the glass ceiling to reach higher levels of power, who tend to forget about the women who are actually working a lot caring for others but this work is not being paid, or forget about the ones who fight for women's rights at the other end of the ladder, in the "precariat". This tension was very well exemplified by <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/sep/02/yahoo-ceo-marissa-mayer-minimal-maternity-leave-plan-prompts-dismay">Marissa Mayer's decision to take only two weeks of materinity leave being Yahoo's CEO</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the Anglosaxon world, women fight against cultural mandates that have imposed specific beauty standards onto them and want to redefine beauty. On the eastern side of Europe, women want to regain the right to express their femininity in a way that communism had frown upon when treating them as equal (here equal meant men and women were "male/ish"). Both -somehow- are exploring what it means to be a woman and how this can be expressed.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="https://www.malala.org/malalas-story">Malala </a>and many women in the middle east fight for access to education and freedom of expression (among other things). In Central Africa (and everywhere where this practice has travelled to, like Indonesia), women fight against <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/feb/05/research-finds-200m-victims-female-genital-mutilation-alive-today">female genital mutilation</a>. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jul/27/china-one-child-policy">In China</a>, women suffer -mostly in silence- the over-control the state has imposed over their uterus, rendering girls as the least desirable outcome of a pregnancy and sometimes forcing sterilisations or abortions, <a href="http://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/prochoice-activists-protest-in-london-over-northern-ireland-womans-abortion-trial-a3158076.html">while in many other countries</a> women fight for the right to access safe abortion procedures, etc. etc (there are more themes, of course).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Finally, those who campaign against violence against women are often accused of being too aggressive, which is always an interesting example of two principles: how anger is forbidden for women and how the male gaze works. The male gaze means that when seeing a situation where men and women are involved, what's being seen and judged is the women: the public consciousness imagines itself in the position of the man at the receiving end of this quite deserved anger. The discussions to break this male gaze tend to be very heated. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">These struggles may seem to have little in common or be even contradictory. But they are all the fields where women are reclaiming rights, with the common goal of defending women's right to dictate our own lives. We would be worse off if <i>any </i>of these battles is not fought, even if some of them are not ours in this particular moment in time. They might be ours later, or they might be our sister's fight, or our daughter's.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even if we enter in these debates, and we accuse each other of things and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/28/the-mummy-wars-are-the-patriarchys-latest-attempt-to-control-women">the media exploit it to wedge groups apart</a>, from sufficient distance <i>they are all very coherent. </i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Engaging into "mummy wars" and fragmenting female experience are in fact a way of avoiding diverse women to get together and exchange findings. </span><i style="font-family: "trebuchet ms", sans-serif;">Feminism is plurality and because of this, disagreements are an integral part of it. </i><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the entry "<a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/01/19-revolution-is-in-hands-of-women.html">The Revolution is in the hand of women</a>" I wondered: </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Women cannot feed others with love and attention if they don't feed themselves with love and attention. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">how women feed themselves is a mystery</b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, some sort of divine source of food. (Some assume) They don't need to be paid fairly, or recognised, or given a job at the level of their capacity, or given assistance while they search for their own food. </span></span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A response somehow came in the following video, through the mouth of these two women speaking about female friendship. Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin talk about their personal experience and even comment on the latest research done by the Harvard Medical school, pointing out at the health benefits of having close female friends, and how <a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/terms/oxytocin.htm">oxytocin</a> is increased in their presence.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Jane Fonda even claims <span style="color: #0b5394;"><b>"I have my (female) friends, therefore I am"</b></span>. Pointing out that these friendships are -in fact- the main source of recognition she received. Recognition of the self, the soul, the fact that there is a person in front who tells you "I <i>see </i>you". </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I don't mean to say that we should not claim recognition anywhere else, but as Kristen Schaal points out that we'll have flying cars before women will be paid equally... while we work for it (and wait for it) it feels like an good tip.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-17338820866170451892015-12-18T14:19:00.001-08:002017-11-21T23:57:03.472-08:0034. From symbolic matricide to bureaucratic statecide<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the age of "everything is so strange that nothing is surprising"(1), we are back again hearing and <i>reading the word fascism </i>more than we would like. I go back to some of the things I wrote in previous posts in an attempt to set a context of why this could be happening and the work we might need to do.</span><br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Believers series - Free at last<br /><a href="http://www.jacovandervaart.com/49878/7689244/drawings/believers">Jaco Van Der Art</a></span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Changing smothering for castration</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We could understand our personal biological and psychological journey through life and our individuation process as a series of birth and rebirths with particular stages. None of these stages is pure, simple and complete, but a general scheme might provide a useful reference. This process is somehow followed collectively as well (in micro and macro cycles), where the state and the left represents the feminine side and the private sector and the right tend to adopt a "masculine" role. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this journey, it is well known that there is a stage where the <i>patriarchy commits symbolic matricide</i>. Nowadays, seeing a</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ll the issues regarding sovereignty that are emerging (politics governing the EU, TTP, TISA and TTIP, developed and discussed in secret) should make us reflect if we are in front of a political/cultural patriarchy committing <b>a bureaucratic statecide </b>where democratic institutions do not govern countries and the principle of "division of power" does not keep power in balance any more eg treaties that include clauses that take corporation-states disputes out of the judicial system to secret mediation processes, and clauses that forbid the country to make certain decisions (eg once a service is privatised, it cannot be renationalised </span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">ever</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">), even castrating future generations to make their own political decisions. CEOs make decisions from their positions and if that's not enough by penetrating democratic institutions and do this job with their own hands in a similar, even if softer way, as military structures used to do.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This video is worth watching in its entirety, but this particular point is covered by Julian Assange at 1:16. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>The personal journey: </b></i></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b>First, the matriarchy</b></i></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In order to draw the parallels, I need to go back to the primal structure.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Since we are in our mothers wombs we are fused to their psyches. We grow within, we feed from her until this space is too small (even if it is unclear, <a href="http://www.britannica.com/science/parturition">it is though that the fetus releases substances that induce labour</a> ie the baby "decides" when to be born) . As a species we are born underdeveloped, and continue this process outside the womb. From this moment, <b>a long process of individuation starts: </b>the one in which we slowly realise we are our own person and are free to make our own decisions and to write our own history. But it takes some time. For the first years of our lives, <b>our mothers organise <i>with their words </i>our consciousness, </b>with their silences and disapproval, our shadow. Her narrative (even if it is patriarchal script), the combination of words and silences is the structure that represents the <i>virtual womb </i>in which we are immersed until we are born out of it by recognising it as foreign. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">During these first years, she provides food, comfort, attention, safety. <b>We are dependent but this is Eden</b>. This is the matriarchal stage. This stage builds the foundations of our personality and </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">it's almost impossible to emphasize enough <u>how fundamental it is for our future well being</u>: how well our needs were satisfied at this stage will have probably the biggest unconscious influence in our future.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">During this stage, she is perfect to our eyes. This is "the reign of the perfect mother". </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We grow, fed by this </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">physical and virtual</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">womb until it is too small for us, because </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">of course, <b>the mother is not perfect </b>and we need to be born out of the matriarchy to develop our own independence to become free: this is the primary <i>purpose </i>of the patriarchy. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Then, the patriarchy: finding our sword</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><b><br /></b></i></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At this point <b>the perfect mother dies. </b>The patriarchy kills the good mother to show us the side that was invisible to us: her shadow. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">God expels us from Eden. Eden becomes Egypt. We fall. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In almost every fairy tale, the real story begins when the "good mother" dies because <u>this is the beginning of the hero's story</u>, when we have to learn to make decisions and earn our bread. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We <i>would not be able to </i>separate ourselves from the "good mother" and that's why <i>this false perception </i>of perfection</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><u style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">has to die</u><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">.</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to challenge the narrative we have received from her so we can build our own. With all its shadows and forced hierarchies, cutting dependencies and gain freedom from the inherited narrative is the <i>true </i>purpose of the patriarchy that we should always bear in mind.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In fairy tales, the good mother and the stepmother (or witch) are two halves of the same person. When the good mother dies we start to see our mother's shadow, the side she does not acknowledge of herself: the stepmother (not completely emotionally invested) or the witch (over-controlling, eating children), the evil queen (a narcissist "feeding" attention from children), etc. In this demonisation, we find the strength to challenge some of the things we have inherited and are not ours or are not useful to us. Up to this point, fused to our mother's psyche, we could not see this shadow because our mother was blind to it. If she could not see it, neither could we. The fact that we start to see it, is <i>a sign </i>that we are becoming independent. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">During the patriarchal stage (which is by no means the final one), we need to learn four main things:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Listen to our instinct </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Re arrange our unconscious world, our beliefs </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Feed ourselves (our basic needs... <i>you shall earn your bread</i>)</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">-Learn to use our resources through the development of self-discipline and self-mastery</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Basically, to become independent.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When a princess marries a prince at the end of the story it has little to do with "only a man can rescue a woman". It is in fact the princess integrating her masculine side, the one that allows her to focus her energy and <b>with a sword cut the dependency with the "evil" stepmother.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Patriarchal language restructuring</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This stage is the patriarchy, because a father figure is the one the invite us to go outside the world of mum and penetrate the external world. He is the vector demonising the mother, <i>neutralising </i>her words and claiming power over the narrative. <b>He starts to restructure her discourse</b>, with new vocabulary or by changing the meaning of some of her words, whilst urging everyone to stop listening to the 'enchanting words of the sirens'. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">At this point, it is not difficult to begin to see a parallel between this and what the media does with anything related with more leftist opinions. <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2015/11/26/jeremy-corbyn-media-coverage_n_8653886.html">Jeremy Corbyn has been systematically attacked by the British press</a>. <a href="http://www.rollingstone.com/tv/news/watch-bernie-sanders-un-demonize-the-word-socialist-on-real-time-20151017">Whilst Bernie Sanders has been working to un-demonise the word socialism.</a> Right wing politics are now 'pragmatism' and 'realism', leaving the space of 'idealism' to the 'deluded' left. Rights become benefits or even entitlements. The ideological nature of neo-liberalism is thus invisibilized (to be fair, all ideologies work by self-invisibilization). In this video for the <a href="http://renegadeinc.com/">Renegade Economist</a>, Eliane Glaser speaks about this use of language.</span><br />
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">The point is that we are not children, the symbolic mother or the state are NOT pure evil. And the symbolic father and corporations are both liberating and <u>castrating figures:</u> <b>we need to be born out of <u>his</u> narrative</b>, which is blind to its own shadow too. </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In stories, this shadow appears as ruthless kings, emperors, fascist dictators. As an example of a patriarchal "fairy" tale: In Star Wars, Obi Wan Kenobi is the good father (the master teaching self-discipline and self-mastery), and the Emperor is <i>his </i>shadow. Two halves of the same person. It is Obi Wan Kenobi the one that cuts Anakin's legs, physically castrating him and thus subordinating him to the power of the Emperor. See this article from the <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/young-males-guns-psychology_566226e4e4b08e945fefae4c?utm_hp_ref=science&ir=Science&section=science%20precaurious%20malehood">Huffington post about this sort of precarious manhood</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Need comes first, ideology comes after</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Before I continue, I have to stop and say that <b>how much our survival needs are satisfied </b>are the most important element of how we choose to transit our lives. Desperation, hunger, exclusion, dispossession are the most basic triggers why anyone enters into a fight or flight mode, or even in submission. When fear of survival kicks in, the one in power is our "reptilian" brain. The most ancient part of the brain structure that commands survival. In situations of fear, it overrides all other circuits. In front of a tiger, it's not time to sit down and analyse. For people to engage in other thinking processes, they cannot be in fear of survival, their basic needs must be satisfied.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Patriarchy - Star Wars v Lord of the rings</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are different ways of going through the patriarchy and these two stories provide a useful example. Note: the reason I pick on 'fairy' stories as a useful tool is because they are archetypal and our minds understand the sequences they follow. Religious narrative works in a similar way. In many senses we are telling ourselves the same stories over and over again. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One of them is <b>wearing a mask </b>that hides our wounded self: the one that has been separated from the mother traumatically. This is <b>the persona </b>we adopt and show to the world. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Famously Star Wars replaced an "inefficient" Republic with the "efficient" Empire, and Darth Vader (the traumatised hero), wearing a mask, submerged himself completely into the dark side of the force, </span><i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">where he could fully enact the anger that the traumatic separation from the female created: the lack, the wound left open and claiming -by force- her service</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this process, there is a <b><i>false </i>freedom</b> (the one that lacks love), <b><i>false </i>strength</b> (the one that denies vulnerability instead of integrating it), brutally subjugating anyone that represents his own weakness: women, children, foreigners, people from other races or religions. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is resolved at the end of six movies when he is able to connect with his internal source of love: his paternal instinct. Killing the emperor marks the end of the patriarchy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is not difficult to find this logic in Boko Haram and their <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05/19/world/africa/boko-haram-militants-raped-hundreds-of-female-captives-in-nigeria.html?_r=0">brutal treatment of women</a> or in the <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/world/middle-east/2015/12/daeshbags-anonymous-attacking-isis-s-brand-toxic-masculinity-using-memes">hyper-(wounded)masculine image of ISIS</a>.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There are also "elements" of this behind the surge of right-wing populist messages appearing everywhere. In Germany, "We are Germany" demonstrations replaced the "federal republic" with "shit state" or "gang state", anger against the state, which needs to be dominated or reclaimed. The article in Der Spiegel "<a href="http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/refugee-crisis-drives-rise-of-new-right-wing-in-germany-a-1067384.html">Fear, Anger and Hatred: the rise of Germany's new right</a>" speaks about it and says: </span><br />
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<i><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "verdana" , "arial" , "helvetica" , "geneva" , sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.488px;">Such hateful slogans and sentiments against the state and foreigners are coming from law-abiding citizens from the heart of society. They display a mixture of old prejudices combined with new conspiracy theories that is typical for the movement on the right-wing of Germany's political spectrum.</span></i></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Another way, is through a more conscious journey. In the West, power is politically divided to keep it in balance like the rings of power, but also concentrated through political agreements and treaties, that might as well end up responding to "the one" ring that subjugate all the rest. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In Lord of the Rings, the passage through patriarchy is not done by wearing a mask, but enacted by a journey where Sam (the 'chief hero') walks with both his hero side (Frodo) and his shadow (the one that needs, the wounded self, Gollum) towards a place where he needs to destroy his old dependent self (the ring). Almost as if it was a psychoanalytical journey led by the shadow (Gollum) to enter the unconscious (Mordor). He can destroy the ring only once he had revisited his past with his mother (the spider living in the cave feeding from victims that are alive and wrapped-like-a-baby) and accepted his shadow: when Frodo claims "the ring is mine", he is kind of admitting "I am still hungry for the attention my mother did not give me, this need is mine". When he acknowledges his attachment his need becomes conscious and thus the unconscious need, the hungry, denied, baby-adult wounded self - Gollum- dies. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Sam integrates his hero side too, in stages: Sam carrying Frodo (he is assuming responsibility for the first time) and then when Frodo tells Sam he is now the writer of the story and leaves. So even though the war happened, the Emperor never took control. </span><br />
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<i style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;"><b>And finally... the almost happy ending</b></i><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Of course here comes the happy ending for the hero. We did our hero's journey: "we loved, we hated and we became". And we are all at the verge of the end of the patriarchy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But what happens to the step-mother and the Emperor? What happens when these two still hungry people see the empty nest? Do they know how to create again? What's their own mission and purpose? Do they <i>remember </i>how to feed themselves? </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Patriarchal economical struggle: Creditors v creators</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">For a while, there is a <i>patriarchal inertia </i>that will try to extend dependency through debts. A king needs feudalism and the rentier economy to feed from. Or else, it will empty the coffers. It will </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">keep on demonising and dis-empowering anything considered social (maternal), </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">citizens and democracies (accusing any policy of populist if it works in their interest), and crashing start-ups and entrepreneurs, that if left unchecked will destroy countries. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Mothers under patriarchy (and states under current thinking) are left lost, disconnected, not knowing where to feed from (austerity, austerity). The patriarchs</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> (bankers, insurance companies, hedge funds, private equity firms, big corporations) will pass a bill to the next generation, to the children</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. </span><br />
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<i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">These creditors </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">create a unpayable debt to extend a state of dependency and <u>avoid addressing their own emptiness</u>. This is not "conspiratorial" thinking. It's mostly survival behaviour, that in some cases turns into predatory eg <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/puerto-rico-should-close-schools-and-sack-teachers-to-pay-back-its-debts-hedge-funds-say-10421739.html">Hedge Funds arguing in favour of sacking teachers and close schools in Puerto Rico to avoid a default that would affect them</a>. This behaviour is only possible within a particular structure of institutional and social order. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to remember that t</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">he creditor's narrative will always exclude the creditor and its behaviour of </span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">lending too much and thus creating debt as means of creating dependency and concentrating power instead of being a genuine investment, </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">with its rewards and its risks I should add</span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">. </b><br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTJtZn9uGuAKDDDWdewCpImhzw2xTSmTH76I7r1pA-ql7XC69TBrUC-65V8g3vYvp5ucxXJQk-bzko1pNDWObp1YV78SIartKTCkeGKqS1WDIx_vJrEPkN0bphSKCVvW2zy8OBGGrIwWg/s1600/Blue+scream.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTJtZn9uGuAKDDDWdewCpImhzw2xTSmTH76I7r1pA-ql7XC69TBrUC-65V8g3vYvp5ucxXJQk-bzko1pNDWObp1YV78SIartKTCkeGKqS1WDIx_vJrEPkN0bphSKCVvW2zy8OBGGrIwWg/s320/Blue+scream.jpg" width="212" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.jacovandervaart.com/49874/439749/sculptures/survivors"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Blue scream - Survivor series<br />Jaco Van Der Vaart</span></a></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The first problem with <i>this </i>creditor is that <u>does not know how to create himself</u>. Does not know his own purpose. <b><i>He </i>depends on extraction of wealth or others creating for him. </b><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0PkV5G1kkE0">He has the resources but in reality does not know how to use them or what for</a>. The liberal tragedy is that it fought to become independent from the monarchy, only to concentrate as much wealth as the monarchy and start to behave similarly: unquestionable, with some sort of divine right.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">These creditors do not lend to equals. They need "empty" people fearing for their survival to capitulate their power: </span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a robot/slave (the one that does not think for itself and follows orders), </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a "prostitute"/a corrupt (the one that sells him/herself to survive), </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a coward (the one that fears the fight/cutting the dependency), </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">a child (the one that is/feels dependent).</span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Patriarchal political struggle: against the tyranny of TINA</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When there is only one correct answer, "<b>T</b>here <b>I</b>s <b>N</b>o <b>A</b>lternative", <b>democracy is made redundant</b>. It is reduced to being "managed" by technocrats. Countries have no other option rather than to sign treaties and accept the role they are given in a hierarchical world structure. </span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-weight: normal;">1989 gave us the winner. The only allowed Ideology (neoliberalism) wears a mask of "truth": it becomes the </span><b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif; font-weight: normal;">correct </b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-weight: normal;">answer we have to learn in school and masters in business administration. Then the only question open is how efficiently we are going to get there. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; font-weight: normal;">When efficiency is the priority, then </span><b style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">competition is made redundant</b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, because competition is not necessarily the most efficient model (from the corporations point of view). Concentration and cartels can be more efficient as companies are not wasting money in advertising, price finding or wage wars (even Silicon Valley played this game with a 'no poaching' agreement challenged in court). One aspect of the Euro project was to avoid competing currencies. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Work is also in danger of being made redundant</b>, as empty workers (robots, slaves, traumatised workers) are more efficient from the corporation point of view. Somehow we all ended up consuming products produced by child labour (smartphones using Cobalt mined by children, sports gear, clothing), slave work (clothing in particular), or work done in very precarious conditions with few rights.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Slavoj Zizec suggests in this video, that the gap left for <b>this lack of options in the political sphere is being filled somehow by religion. </b> In this sense, we lose a lot with the lack of diversity in politics. When religion comes to correct or express political conflicts, one of the ways that are going to be resolved is through holy wars. It is also worth noting, that the main figure speaking against a model of exclusion (a "leftist" sort of message) is the Pope (again, religion filling this gap). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Lie to me</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this game, <i>the media is doing a lot </i>to sell us TINA, demonise the left, etc. etc. and the public does little to demand more objectivity. In any of the wombs we might be submerged in (the real, the matriarchal, the patriarchal, an ideology, etc) we are being fed with acceptance, with attention, in other words with a narrative we accept. The food we take make us grow, but this food also feeds our attachment with this environment. It is a reward to our presence there. It confirms we are right and that we belong. It's not uncommon in research done in focus groups for participants to say "you have to tell me ..." this or that. They know which are the lies they should be told. If they are offered a skin care product, they would ask "tell me what's the magical ingredient! Call it pro-something. I know it's not the real thing, but at least I know you made the effort". In this state of submissive acceptance, an incongruous proposition </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">will be simply rejected. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The era of the child: finding our pen</b></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the three videos embedded here, there is a call, a need of a new idealism, a new utopia. Eliana Graser wonders if what we have is really what we want. Julian Assange suggests that some sort of new Christianity is needed, which is interesting, as Christianity showed the story of the Son, who he is, what he creates and how he overcomes the roman emperor. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">If the patriarchy arms us with the sword to cut our dependency with the matriarchy, in being born out of the patriarchy <b>this sword is turned into a pen</b>. We must start to coin our words and become authors of our story. When we write from our own individuated perspective, we can see and bring back to life the mother by seeing her and her shadow, we can overcome the empire of the patriarchy by seeing the father and his shadow. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We can create this distance, that allows us to see, accept and decide what does it mean to us and how can we act upon what we believe in. Because <b>this choice is a free choice and there is more than one alternative.</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">(1) </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Virginia Woolf, discussing Lewis Carroll's Alice's adventures in Wonderland</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span></span>ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-51692073593313208692015-12-11T15:49:00.004-08:002017-02-23T05:30:10.430-08:0033. Ambiguity and polarisation<br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Lately, there were a few of completely unrelated news, somehow touching the issue of ambiguity and polarisation particularly in identity-related subjects: gender identity, ethnic identity, religious identity, political identity, national identity or any other label that attempts to qualify the "I am" statement. The news show our difficulty in dealing with ambiguity (with the help of the media and some politicians) and how easy it is to wedge two groups apart. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Regarding sexuality and gender</span></b><br />
<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></b>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">On the one hand, a controversy generated by <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-34625512">Germaine Greer </a>after she shared her opinion that <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B8Q6D4a6TM">trans-gender men to female that have been gender reassigned are not women</a>. In her discussion with Kirsty Wark there is no alternative even discussed to the male-female polarity.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">By this time, Facebook had already introduced <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/10637968/Facebook-sex-changes-which-one-of-50-genders-are-you.html">more than 50 possible gender descriptors</a> even adding the option of customise the description, suggest a new one and choosing <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/facebook/10930654/Facebooks-71-gender-options-come-to-UK-users.html">which pronoun people should use in relation to your gender</a>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">On the opposite side of the globe, in Argentina <a href="http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/psicologia/9-286418-2015-11-19.html">a different discussion was taking place</a>. Immediately after a law that allowed people to change their gender in their official documentation became effective, people started to complain this binary definition was already old. I'm neither, I'm both, I don't know, I don't want to omit my history, these two polarised classifications don't define me. People even entered in the discussion of the complex realm of sexual identity that is composed by more than one dimension (biological, gender identification, predominant sexual preference, non-predominant sexual preference, etc.) or why should anyone be labelled (an argument that Foucault also discussed).</span><br />
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<b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Regarding ethnicity and cultural integration</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In light of the Paris attacks, a new debate emerged discussing the two different models of cultural integration that France and UK have followed: assimilation v multiculturalism, and their failures to avoid having home-grown terrorists. <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/15/multiculturalism-assimilation-britain-france">In an article for The Guardian</a>, Kenan Malik reports: </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The French critique on multicultural policies:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="background-color: white; line-height: 24px; margin-bottom: 1rem; padding: 0px;">
<i><span style="color: #666666; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Such policies, they claimed, were divisive, failing to create a common set of values or sense of nationhood. </b>As a result, many Muslims were drawn towards Islamism and violence. “Assimilationist” policies, French politicians insisted, avoided the divisive consequences of multiculturalism and allowed every individual to be treated as a citizen, not as a member of a particular racial or cultural group.</span></i></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Kenan Malik concedes:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #666666; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; line-height: 24px;"><i>Many of the French criticisms of multiculturalism were valid. British policy-makers welcomed diversity, but tried to manage it by putting people into ethnic and cultural boxes, defining individual needs and rights by virtue of the boxes into which people are put, and using those boxes to shape public policy. <b>They treated minority communities as if each were a distinct, homogenous whole, each composed of people all speaking with a single voice, each defined by a singular view of culture and faith.</b> The consequence has been the creation of a more fragmented, tribal society, which has nurtured Islamism. </i></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In the meantime, in assimilationist France, policies were officially based on tolerance and the </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; font-family: "guardian text egyptian web" , "georgia" , serif; line-height: 24px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #333333; line-height: 24px;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">“droit à la differénce” </span></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">(the right to be different), following Foucault logic of why-the-state-should-label-the-citizens (in fact, by law they cannot collect ethnic statistics) and considering that ethnic classifications <a href="http://www.economist.com/node/13377324">are a racist concept</a> that belonged to the past (colonial France or Vichy). As a result, they had little information about the reality of minorities. <a href="http://www.economist.com/news/europe/21647638-taboo-studying-immigrant-families-performance-fraying-edgy-inquiry">They did not know </a>that there was higher youth unemployment, <i>they did not know </i>there was more school desertion (that could only be observed when researches quite recently stating to use tangential data as country of origin and country of origin of parents), <i>they did not know </i>that if you presented a CV with an Islamic name it had highly significant chances of being dismissed. <i>They did not know</i>, therefore there was no programme or policy. They did not know either that most immigrants are secular and relatively liberal.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">After a big wave of North African immigration came to France and the 2005 banlieue riots happened, France moved towards more active assimilationist policies: imposing common national values, showing hostility against "divisive" symbols (eg religious) whilst making a bit more effort to "appear" diverse in public spaces. It was only in 2006 (!) that </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">the first black news reader was appointed in French TV (TF1-Harry Roselmack).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Neither putting everyone in the same box with the label "equal" -rendering their issues invisible- nor putting the minorities in boxes with the label "different" -different to the majority-, seem to have worked because neither of the approaches was truly accepting of individuality and circumstances. This seems to be particularly true for those with the </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">ambiguity </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">of feeling they belong to the collective identity that somehow <i><u>rejects them</u> </i>and thus making them feel they don't truly belong (eg the second generation immigrants/passive immigrants, <i>as much as any disfranchised teenager </i>that fantasises with finding the <b>acknowledgement of existence </b>in acts of violence or even -ambiguously- in self destruction).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Syria and the Islamic state</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b><br /></b></span>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Of course, when we read in <a href="https://theintercept.com/2015/11/17/islamic-states-goal-eliminating-the-grayzone-of-coexistence-between-muslims-and-the-west/">The Intercept </a>that ISIS goal is <b>eliminating the grey-zone of coexistence, we are in front of another polarisation attempt </b>and wedging this reaction when a group <i>rejects a minority</i>. After the Charlie Hebdo attack, the Intercept reports:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="color: #666666; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 30px;"><i>"The attack had “further [brought] division to the world,” the group said, boasting that it had polarized society and “eliminated the grayzone,” representing coexistence between religious groups. As a result, it said, Muslims living in the West would soon no longer be welcome in their own societies. Treated with increasing suspicion, distrust and hostility by their fellow citizens as a result of the deadly shooting, Western Muslims would soon be forced to “either apostatize … or they [migrate] to the Islamic State, and thereby escape persecution from the crusader governments and citizens,” the group stated, while threatening of more attacks to come.</i></span></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">They also report that it is the same strategy that Al-Qaeda used in Iraq to wedge a sectarian war:</span><br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #666666; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 30px;">In a 2004 letter to Osama bin Laden, Abu Musab Zarqawi, the Jordanian-born leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, </span><a href="http://2001-2009.state.gov/p/nea/rls/31694.htm" style="box-sizing: border-box; letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 30px; outline: none; text-decoration: none;">laid out</a><span style="letter-spacing: 0.2px; line-height: 30px;"> his proposal for provoking such a conflict, calling for terrorist attacks against the Shiite majority population that would lead to a harsh crackdown on the Sunni minority. In such a scenario, his group could then coerce the Sunni population into viewing it as their only protector. “If we succeed in dragging them into the arena of sectarian war,” Zarqawi wrote, “it will become possible to awaken the inattentive Sunnis as they feel imminent danger and annihilating death.”</span></i></span></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Slavoj Zyzec writes for the New Statesman in <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/world/middle-east/2015/12/slavoj-zizek-why-we-need-talk-about-turkey">"We need to talk about Turkey"</a>:</span><br />
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<span style="color: #666666;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 32.224px;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>This obscure background makes it clear that the “total war” against Isis should not be taken seriously – they don’t really mean it. We are definitely dealing <b>not </b>with the clash of civilisations (the Christian west versus radicalised Islam), but with a <b>clash within each civilisation: </b>in the Christian space it is the US and western Europe against Russia, in the Muslim space it is Sunnis against Shias.</i></span></span></span></span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The Heute Show, a German comedy show, has produced a fake advertising for Hasbro's wargame Risk "Syrian edition" claiming to be for 23 to 96 players (you don't need to speak German to understand the point).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Living in Wonderland</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We could write forever about the ambiguity of these times where in every action, in every piece of news there are multiple meanings and intentions sometimes conflicting, when we find "<b>everything so strange that nothing is surprising</b>" (Virginia Woolf, discussing Lewis Carroll's Alice's adventures in Wonderland - even though she could perfectly be speaking about Donald Trump).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In a time where the never-ending economic crisis and the need of stabilising mechanisms for the Euro pushes Europe towards <i>more political integration</i>, <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/culture/observations/2015/12/leader-new-intolerance">populist right movements are surging </a>in many countries aiming <i>to go backwards </i>and reclaim sovereignty back from the Union, increasing border controls, etc.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Another clear example <b>of this ambiguity is Saudi Arabia. </b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">1) They are expanding women's rights (they are holding the first election where women can stand and vote). <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/saudi-arabia-elections-meeting-the-first-women-legally-allowed-to-stand-a6768591.html">In an article for the Independent, </a>Brian Murphy reports:</span><br />
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<span style="color: #666666; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 28px;"><i>“Saudi Arabia has done a great PR job in selling these elections as part of much-touted reforms,” said Ali al-Ahmed, director of the Institute for Gulf Affairs. “<b>The reality is that not much changes.</b>”</i></span></span></span></blockquote>
<span style="color: #281e1e; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Whilst also saying:</span></span><br />
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<i><span style="background-color: white; color: #281e1e; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">"Yet to dismiss the elections as mere window dressing also fails to grasp the moment.</span></span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #281e1e; font-family: "indy serif"; font-size: 19px; line-height: 28px;">"</span></blockquote>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">2) They are fighting an oil price war apparently against the fracking industry being developed by their ally US that would cut their energy dependence (and their share of the market), but most significantly affecting the Russian economy.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">3) <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/dec/08/saudi-arabia-accused-of-trying-to-wreck-the-paris-climate-deal">They are blocking decisions at the Paris summit</a>, when the middle East is one of the regions that will probably be <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XmCdl1VMuo">uninhabitable</a> due to climate change (higher temperature, more sandstorms, more social unrest as we saw in Syria). </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">They admit to a potential future without fossil fuels and attempting to ask for compensation for the loss of future oil income. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">4) Being an ally to the US, it is claimed to be in cohort with Turkey both not being particularly transparent about their interest in fighting ISIS.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I go back to the conclusions of "The ghosts of conflicts past".</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><i>A veil that polarises everything into good and bad </i>has many advantages. A world full of nuance and imperfect decisions is uncomfortable, but <b>it is also more real.</b> A world view that can be reduced to the format of a football match with two emperors disputing territories or trying to prove their system better might be easy, even entertaining, but keeps us in the illusion that we are mere spectators. We do not connect to our reality and thus we cannot affect it.This connection with reality is particularly difficult in the fog that <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/dec/11/the-media-needs-to-tell-the-truth-on-migration-not-peddle-myths">the media creates for us</a> trying to feed our sense of identity and belonging for repeating a pre-crafted opinion, that comes with a label pro or anti (in political issues), skipping all the rational argumentation part. We should be </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">able to discuss our own ambiguity. See what Zizek says at min 14 and 39 onwards on the following video:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This veil not only polarises but also fragments. It decouples economy and politics, </span><a href="http://i100.independent.co.uk/article/caroline-lucas-made-a-point-about-the-refugee-crisis-that-most-people-refuse-to-accept--bJgb8gmk8l" style="font-family: 'trebuchet ms', sans-serif;">warfare and arms trade</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, freedom and the structures that provide opportunity, and probably most importantly past and present.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But if studies show that <a href="http://www.newstatesman.com/2015/09/scientifically-proven-way-working-out-if-someones-lying-you">we find truth in groups</a>, and that the way that thought, science and emerging structures <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQZKs75RMqM">are networks and not trees</a>, that means that each point, each individual, each nation is important. Our own personal perspective might not be "the truth" but it has a purpose and in expressing it, it can help the person next to us to drop his own confirmation bias and vice versa. And for that happening, <b>we <i><u>should not</u> </i>be all saying the same things, repeating the words of others, aligned and even less, labelled</b>.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I am. No labels.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-72623281853526394662015-11-10T06:20:00.003-08:002016-08-25T23:41:35.943-07:0032. History got erased first at home<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The silence and invisibility of women affects us all. When history is not told in full, shame and secrecy leave us wordless, unable to name what happens to us, we cannot free ourselves from our past and feel powerless.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Unveiling the hidden history</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://www.dramandaforeman.com/the-history-of-erasing-womens-history-broadly/">Dr. Amanda Foreman</a> is working to <i>unveil </i>a part of History that hasn't been told: the history of women. She was behind the four-part series on BBC called “The Ascent of Woman,” telling the story of women in civilization and is about to launch a book , The World Made By Women: A History of Women From the Apple to the Pill, is the story of humanity from the perspective of the female half. And this work to remove the invisibility cape women in History seem to be wearing is amazing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">From an initial herd social structure, a pyramidal, hierarchical structure appears to manage the new found abundance. In this structure the concept of <b>private property </b>emerges and the family structure follows as the pattern to pass on wealth to the next generations. For this, <b>women sexual power needed to be put under control </b>so men would not be raising or passing wealth to children that were not theirs. With shame governing women's sexuality, their voices got silenced. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In "<a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2014/09/8-women-invisibility-or-blindness.html">Women: invisibility or blindness</a>", I've touched upon the issue of how women get erased from History: history of science, art, literature, etc. but suggesting that it is not down to <i>their </i>invisibility but <i>our </i>blindness (all of us, women and men), and this being down to the relationship we establish with our mothers. In our early childhood, she is the narrator, that <i>voice over</i> putting words to events, describing the context. But this story is imperfect, it leaves a lot out. These <b>women, shamed by their own sexual power, made bad historians.</b> <b>Secrets became a survival tactic. History got erased first here. At home. </b>Women invisibility starts with her silence. How many secrets have we discovered in our family tree? How many abortions, extra marital children, pregnancies kept in secret, false birth dates? Without the modern day birth control methods every single family of the world <b><i>is</i></b> full with these stories. Have we discovered them yet? </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And if these quite harmless secrets were kept secret, what about the not so harmless ones such as cases of abuse?</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This issue goes far beyond a "feminist" problem. When we are not dealing with reality, we cannot affect it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Experiences lost in time</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this 7-min video from Big Think (please watch it) Dr. Vincent Felitti speaks about his work with childhood trauma, involving 17500 middle-class adults. He found that traumatic life <b>experiences in childhood that are lost in time </b>and further protected by feelings of shame, secrecy and taboo play out powerfully in adulthood and is behind many diseases, emotional states and shortening life expectancy. He found that 1 in 11 (!) </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in a middle class population </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">have experienced 6 or more of 10 categories of trauma in their childhood. These individuals are 4600% more likely to become drug addicts, and similar increases to the likelihood of attempting suicide. I cannot even imagine what the numbers would look like for deprived populations. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The prevalence is incredibly high. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">1 in 11 is a number worth pondering on. How many of the kids we went to school with could've been going through these terrible experiences? </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Acknowledging suffering is so important that our bodies and our lives can be hijacked by traumas left unnamed. People may feel that </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">not speaking about something makes it disappear or makes it less real, our silence can sustain a perfect version of our story, time will erase the memory, but in the unconscious there is no time and these feelings are stored in a state of ever-lasting-present. And if regaining the power of our lives is not attractive enough, we have to know that our traumatic experiences can be passed somehow to the next generations, who by copying our behaviour, our coping mechanisms or having to believe a history -that they sense- does not quite add up, they will carry the weight of the trauma without ever understanding where it is coming from. Without transmitting our real story, we are stopping the next generation from <b>learning to see and accept reality</b>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I don't think there will be real changes in our lives, or in the world we are living now, without opening Pandora's box. I speak about it in all its different meanings: the box as the uterus (and the feminine voice) and as the container of the things we fear, because there is nothing more toxic than secrets and nothing more healing that letting things breathe.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">PS: watch what research says about children that know more about their family history:</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-7191447180628435642015-10-23T06:10:00.000-07:002016-12-01T02:15:04.388-08:0031. Privacy is the foundation of freedom but it is not its edifice<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Moving from a big city to a small town was a shock to my system. As soon as I arrived, I took a taxi and the taxi driver knew who I was and what I was there for. Even though nothing important happened in this environment of observation and scrutiny, having this experience helped me understand why someone who was born there might develop -under the pressure to conform- more conservative views and would resort to different tactics to wear a mask in front of the others. But most importantly, I could understand why someone that crossed any line, succeeded or even failed miserably would become such a succulent piece of gossip: (very) deep inside <b>everyone longed for the freedom of simply being themselves</b>.</span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmlt7OL8Ruvhctps8d0MrD6Ffuth82WKMFZe7nTTkQeHf6AQ3OR0d4PgjwviCyMbrH0nY3MSkBcoHleJad6z73v460D3gqA9sVGqjK4kB913-5vmyVfKhRafScDIHmKhSiovbGMHQxoNI/s1600/cave+with+fire.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhmlt7OL8Ruvhctps8d0MrD6Ffuth82WKMFZe7nTTkQeHf6AQ3OR0d4PgjwviCyMbrH0nY3MSkBcoHleJad6z73v460D3gqA9sVGqjK4kB913-5vmyVfKhRafScDIHmKhSiovbGMHQxoNI/s320/cave+with+fire.JPG" width="320" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Here is the interesting part. The opportunity </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">to experiment our true self in privacy (in our own cave), protected from the overly eager correcting eye of the tribe, is the seed for the subsequent "coming out", the ability to face public exposure with self-acceptance and take the inherent risk of being rejected by the tribe. </span><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/sep/11/diaspora-somaliland-hargeysa" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">In this article</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">, Somalies living in foreign countries tell of the rejection they face when they return home for holidays.</span><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" class="YOUTUBE-iframe-video" data-thumbnail-src="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/Hhk4N9A0oCA/0.jpg" frameborder="0" height="266" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Hhk4N9A0oCA?feature=player_embedded" style="clear: right; float: right;" width="320"></iframe><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to separate ourselves a bit from outside influence to find out who we are. This "stepping out of town", crossing the barrier and entering into the underworld, is the first critical stage of our individuation process, the hero's journey. However, the point of the individuation process is not to be alone at the end, but to find a tribe where we can be who we are or say what we think. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Nowadays, our ever more connected world is making privacy a hot topic (almost as much as transparency). <b>Our online lives are deeply ambivalent</b>: on the one hand, they are <i><b>very public</b></i>, therefore we behave like we would do in the small town, always smiling, only showing what we know the others accept. At its best, it is a source of transparency and empowerment. On the other hand, and mostly through pseudonyms and avatars, <i><b>it is very private, it is our cave</b></i>: a place to look at our shadow, our desires, to find the inner fire that motivates us -as individuals- to do things that are probably in fields a bit beyond of what's conventional and accepted by the people who surround us. This search has to happen in the privacy of anonymity.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Privacy is a result of technology</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It's curious to think how <b>privacy came about as a result of technology: </b>the technology of chimneys, the ability to build individual spaces with fires -at least, for countries with winters- (Watch the 5 min video from The Guardian series "The Power of privacy"). </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The Guardian, "The power of privacy"</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Chimneys gave us the possibility to physically build our own separate cave. Fires kept groups together who had to gather around it. Families would sleep together, sex would have to happen in this sort of exposed environment. But chimneys changed that. Houses started to have separate rooms, each of them heated by its own chimney. </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Sexual exploration happened in this new private rooms and most revolutions started by groups that first gathered in secret, too. </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">technology of chimneys</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> required the development of a lot of knowledge: precise ratios to draw smoke out, brick technology to resist the heat and avoid setting the roof on fire, the knowledge of how to do its maintenance, etc. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Symbolically speaking, <b>screens are now our new chimneys:</b> TVs, tablets, smartphones are the small fires of the caves we use to explore ourselves (no wonder why sexual exploration happens a lot in this private world).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The RSA animate video illustrates a talk given in 2009 by Evgeny Morosov "The internet in<br />society: Empowering or censoring citizens?" challenges 'cyber-utopianism' - the seductive idea that the internet plays a largely emancipatory role in global politics. He describes how authoritarian governments use internet (not even with sophisticated tools) to reduce tensions and build more legitimacy (pseudo benevolent action), but also to turn people against each other and keep control of citizens.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>The keys to our house</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The awareness of how public everything is in the online world is a key learning that we need to go through. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is a first level that it is just being aware of our own naivety. When we put our lives online, we are making public a lot of information about ourselves: what we think, what we have, how much we earn, the faces of our children, their names, our favourite places, our friends, our credit card number, our credit, etc.</span> <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We are responsible if we leave a door of our house open.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But even if we are careful, the fact that there are techniques to access information we don't want to share is a big issue. And the revelations from <a href="https://www.ted.com/talks/edward_snowden_here_s_how_we_take_back_the_internet?language=en#t-520211">Edward Snowden </a>pointed out that the technology is there to build back doors into our house <i>without </i>our knowledge. How can we guard our house if we don't know of these doors? Who has the key? <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/11954186/Every-company-vulnerable-to-TalkTalk-style-hacking-attack-under-Snoopers-Charter.html">Can this key be stolen</a>?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is of course a post-9/11 world. What 9/11 changed the most, is that the american public demanded <i>to prevent </i>these things from happening beyond the capabilities intelligence services had up to that point. It is completely different to the attitude to other crimes, like mass shootings, where the prevention element is not demanded so widely. For many Americans, it is taken almost as a price to pay for the freedom of bearing arms. Prevention in this sort of cases is deeply problematic (the Minority Report movie explored it somehow). <i>It lies outside our justice system</i>, which is based in evidence, actions having taken place or at least been attempted or significantly planned. We all accept that privacy is not guaranteed in the context of an investigation of a crime that has been committed or planned, but this dwelling into anyone's privacy is progressive and must be justified to begin with. However, in <i>prevention </i>not only its investigation has to be outside the system, but also its resolution. Hence, Guantanamo, extraordinary renditions, etc.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">And then, how far back in time should we intervene to prevent something from happening? Is someone reading about a subject guilty? Many societies used to burn books because of this. Is someone with extreme/"wrong" ideas guilty? Many societies disappeared people because of their ideas. This world is the <b>heresy world</b>, the world where the <b>Inquisition </b>worked. Does it have a place in today's world?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Our cave is sacred, even if it is obscure, ambiguous, strange and we are afraid of it ourselves. But the exploration of this space is what makes us free, is the place where we gather the strength to look for alternatives, to break convention, what allows us to find ourselves, to evolve, to ditch ideas and beliefs no longer work and then get out to the world changed. Without privacy, we stop evolving. <b>Without privacy, we cannot <i>become </i>truly free.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>A light in the shadow</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Shedding light into themes that society normally puts in the shadow (sex typically is put in the shadow, but also issues of identity, individuality, conformity, etc) helps us run this search better prepared and without false expectations. The more adult dialogue happens in the real world, the better armed we will be to explore these topics in solitude. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">A cave is the place where desire and fantasy live (in all its shapes and forms) but it is <i>unreal</i>. It's a place to get in and get out. No one should </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">live </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">in the cave or being granted any sort of unconditional anonymity. It is in complete anonymity that we suffer a fracture and fall </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OsFEV35tWsg" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">into depersonalisation</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. Without the other, looking at us, we can't recognise ourselves nor the others. It is only outside the cave that we can make a connection, that we can use our desire to fire a positive action. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Ultimately, freedom is the <i>exercise of being </i>ourselves in public.</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Upside down world</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">One of the ways of eroding a social contract is turning the right of privacy upside down: granting anonymity to the actors and entities that concentrate power (<a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.com/2014/12/16-on-nonexistence.html">who become depersonalised and unaccountable</a>) and denying privacy to individuals. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">PS: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/10/frankie-boyle-theresa-may-internet-surveillance</span><br />
<br />ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6416860018628898370.post-19570357402964227032015-10-15T06:53:00.001-07:002016-11-14T02:40:42.713-08:0030. The crisis of codes<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Code has become an ubiquitous word. It's everywhere. From <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKhVupvyhKk">programming</a>, gaming to marketing or spiritual awareness (eg bio-decodage) and without forgetting the Da Vinci Code... the notion of hidden codes that command processes -and some say even our own actions- is becoming bigger and bigger.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">The movie "Inception" is a story based on the concept that an idea (in the form of a <b>metaphor</b>, a code) can be incepted in peoples' unconscious in order to command future decisions. In the movie, Leonardo Di Caprio's character is hired to incept an idea into the heir of a big business. He had incepted an idea before into his wife deep unconscious: a metaphor that she would interpret as "this is a dream". This hidden code drove her to kill herself: believing "this is a dream" even when awake, meant she could not connect with reality any more. She thought the only way to wake up was through dying. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even if this is a story, it illustrates what others also speak about: the existence of codes in life, unwritten decrees, adopted beliefs, that <i>govern </i>us in different ways. Because they are unwritten, they are not conscious. They are highly symbolic and mostly hidden from our rational filter.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Economics: Something beyond market forces</span></b><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I'll start with Economics for two reasons: the first one is that nowadays it "governs the governments" and secondly because it is an area where cultural imperatives and ideologies are not named or frequently denied whilst hiding behind the word science.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this video, Thomas Piketty, Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz discuss the current state of economics. Even though, classical economics is based on the principle that men are rational entities, looking to maximise utility, they discuss that it is self-evident that this is not the case, that there are "forces beyond the market" that dictate many behaviours.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Thomas Piketty starts (min 5) saying: "I think <b>there is a lot of ideology</b> in the economic profession. And I think many economists have a view of markets which is not only idealistic and naive. They are defending the views that markets are working efficiently, are working well."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Joseph Stiglitz comments on minimum wage: "one of the things that 'Wall Mart raising the wage to that level' illustrates it is the fact that it is not just market forces determining minimum wages... they have the power, the choice to raise the wages. [] <b>There are a lot of <i>non-market forces</i> determining what's going on</b>." Later on, he repeats this assertion in relation to male-female wage inequality and the lack of female CEOs.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Paul Krugman comments on nationalism in America and some state's entrenched opposition to national programs that would benefit them: "there is a lot of discussion in the sociological and political science literature [] on the question of false consciousness. Clearly in the US, a lot of it is back to the original sin: it is about race."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Later on he adds: "I picked up a phrase, when <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernard_Madoff">Bernie Madoff</a> scandal came, I learned a very useful phrase which is "affinity fraud": people are very easily conned by people who they think of as being like themselves, as being part of their tribe."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So if we have two Nobel price winners and a top economist saying that there is a lot of ideology and cultural beliefs being sold as "economic truths", why then the TINA (there is no alternative) principle of neo-liberalism has been so accepted?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Those structures built before us</b></span><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaT8wf2W8U_XMS-59wNJVdPFOCB0NGO10MTVwSxFwpk32X821Pvv7jqHNEsBucGCiMiEZJC8eNL2gOlY_Fcuy5W8TIeqFJY0HGziJ67WZbbRLVJ-p6RLcbFJH3XdvsX_sM4f-gAIVnP3M/s1600/privilege_general.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaT8wf2W8U_XMS-59wNJVdPFOCB0NGO10MTVwSxFwpk32X821Pvv7jqHNEsBucGCiMiEZJC8eNL2gOlY_Fcuy5W8TIeqFJY0HGziJ67WZbbRLVJ-p6RLcbFJH3XdvsX_sM4f-gAIVnP3M/s320/privilege_general.png" width="206" /></a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There were several concepts that have become quite popular in this regard:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><a href="http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/check-your-privilege"><b>Check your privilege</b></a> <span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 18.98px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 18.98px;">is an online expression used by bloggers and in twitter </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 18.98px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; line-height: 18.98px;">to remind others that the body and life they are born into comes with specific privileges we normally are blind to. This is illustrated by a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7n9IOH0NvyY">TED talk done by Michael Kimmel</a>. He tells an anecdote of how he learned about this concept (way before it was made popular by social media) having a meal with a study group. He witnessed an exchange between two women (a white woman and a black woman). The white woman says "All women face the same oppression. We are all placed in the same position in the patriarchy". The black woman replies "I'm not so sure. Let me ask you a question. When you wake up in the morning and </span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; line-height: 18.98px;">you look in the mirror, what do you see?". The white woman said "I see a woman". Then,the black woman said "You see. That's the problem. When I wake up in the morning and look in the mirror I see a black woman. To me, race is visible." </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif; line-height: 18.98px;">Being the only man in the group, he thought oh-oh and then admitted "when I look in the mirror I see a human being. I'm the generic person... I'm universally generalisable." And then comments "that's the moment when I became a middle-class white man." (he missed the adjective 'american', though).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br />Another concept being talked about is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-efficacy">Self-efficacy</a> (and attribution): the extent or strength of one's belief in one's own ability to complete tasks and reach goals; the level of confidence we have that our behaviour can actually affect what we achieve and how much of our success/failure we attribute to our actions. It's a common concept looked at in cases of burnout, obesity and mental health in general.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How are these two linked together? When we think of <b>system structure </b>and which is our place in this system in this particular moment in time.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this video, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JKO5eIdjujM">Paul Krugman discusses issues of infrastructure with Senator Elizabeth Warren</a> (min. 56 onwards). He asks "New York city is expensive.[] Why are people here? It's because of the opportunities. Where do these opportunities come from? They come from all the other people who are here, from the interaction between them, they come from the incredible infrastructure []." But then he argues "I find it incredible that somebody had made the decision to be in this crowded place, in this expensive place -because of all these opportunities- but then they say, all that money 'is money <i>I</i> made', 'you have not right', 'it's all <i>me'</i>, 'it's all <i>my </i>individual stuff'. And 'how does the government thinks it can tax some of that away?' to pay for some of the things that makes this place where I want to be. This city -and America as a whole- is an overwhelming demonstration <b>we are more than the sum of the parts</b>. And that's why we need more than markets, we need government to make things work." </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this comment, of course, he describes a misattribution of success as a </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">pure </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">individual achievement without taking into account the systemic enablers (geography, family, point in History, class, access to education, access to opportunities, etc). On the other end of the spectrum, the self-efficacy of anyone with less privileges will be greatly affected, sometimes without fully accounting for the systemic disablers. Of course when there are systemic enablers for some and systemic disablers for others, there is systemic injustice.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Codes defining systems' structures</b></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this video, </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If2Fw0z6uxY" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Fritjof Capra (introducing the book "The systems View of Life"</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">) explains that Systems science uses networks at the centre of the model to explain life in its multidimensional levels of organization, changing the old model that looked at systems as machines. Here he touches on biological, sociological and economical applications, but I'll comment on what he says when speaking about social networks (</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">min 27): social networks are networks of communication. Social networks are self-generated but what they generate is non-material: they generate thoughts and meaning. They form multiple feedback loops, which eventually produce a shared system of beliefs, explanations and values, which is known as culture. And showing </span><b style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">membership of a community means that you have to behave in a certain way</b><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. There are also restrictions on behaviour of their members, but these restrictions are generated by the members themselves.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In other words there is a </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">code of conduct</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">According to Capra systems science changes the way of thinking towards relationships, patterns and context.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Following a similar line, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DdLHMdEXjc4">"The culture code" is a marketing book by Dr. Clotaire Rampaille</a> (who has also recently launched "The global code"), that describes that most decisions we make are unconscious. They are commanded vastly by a reference system we imprint in our early years of life, are shaped by the emotions we feel any time we have a "first experience" -and even more when this is repeated and reinforced-, and embedded in our reptilian brain (the most ancient part of the brain commanding survival and reproduction processes). This reference system will work as <i>a code </i>that defines what is accepted and rejected. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some of these first experiences are very individual, and some will be transmitted by our family and by our culture. In this way, m</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">ost of our choices are decoded as survival tactics that we and <i>our tribe </i>have developed. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">According to Rampaille, this code determines what's the </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">relationship </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">we establish with an object, a subject, a notion, an idea and it is highly symbolic. The content itself is interchangeable. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Applied to marketing, if a brand of shampoo wants to sell us beauty, it will tap into the culture codes of beauty (young, slim, symmetrical, in many cases blond, unattainable, etc). Any product that wants to establish a relationship with us using beauty as a bridge, will have to build a vision of beauty similar to our own. Many brands of shampoo could achieve this. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">But he goes beyond, and suggest there are codes that define what certain cultures look in a president, how they see their countries identity, etc.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">So, if networks are relationships, and there are codes that ultimately determine relationships (by accepting/rejecting), these codes will determine the shape of the network, its structure, its geometry. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is probably in this context that what happened with the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians in North Carolina can be interpreted. The <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonkblog/wp/2015/10/08/the-remarkable-ways-a-little-money-can-change-a-childs-personality-for-life/">Washington Post shared some of the findings </a>of The Great Smoky Mountains Study of Youth that were tracking 1420 low income children, including this specific group. Suddenly, a Casino was built in the reservation which <i>saw most families increasing their income</i>. As a result <b>children showed a significant increase a personality traits that are strongly linked with positive outcomes further in life</b>: conscientiousness and agreeableness. It is hypothesised that the extra income improve the <i>relationship </i>between parents, the <i>relationship </i>between parents and children, and reduce alcohol intake, commenting that when this happens before the age of 8, these traits can become permanent. The codes that get imprinted about our most primary relationships are more positive when these relationships are healthier.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">These findings are also in line with the views of Professor Robert Putman.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>On-code, off-code or changing the code?</b><br /><br />Coherence to the code is the key to success <i>within </i>a given system. In this sense, when thinking how few women get to the top <a href="http://www.ted.com/talks/sheryl_sandberg_why_we_have_too_few_women_leaders?language=en">Sheryl Sandberg</a> makes very interesting comments. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">She speaks about self-efficacy and shares stats showing that men attribute their success to themselves, while women tend to comment on the enabling factors external to themselves. She gives cultural clues: men are positively correlated to success and likeability whilst women are negatively correlated. As a whole, she indicates to women that <b><i>being "on-code"</i></b> in business has to do with confidence, single focus on the business, individuality, challenging the rules and self-attribution-bias (even if it is partially delusional). </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">There is a lot of sense in her point of view. Of course, it is not clear if this would be really enough when there </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">are </i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">disabling systemic factors. You can hardly be more successful, committed and confident than Serena Williams, however she once said "</span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iV_GT5qf-ig" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I'm the most underestimated 8-times grand slam champion ever</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">" (after this quote she continued winning and has accumulated 21 grand slams victories -and counting-). This did not stop her to achieve all that she has achieved. But the fact she is not being truly recognised is an indication that if she had played within a structure where achievements were measured much more subjectively, her success would've probably been limited. Her experience suggests that there is a bit more than attitude that play against women and african americans. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">It is not difficult to recognise either that there are many disabling factors against </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/14/upshot/us-employment-women-not-working.html?_r=0" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">working mothers</a>: <span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">some degree of cultural disapproval (still, and coming from both sexes),none or short maternity leave, lack of flexibility and even cost of childcare being higher than their own salary (the infamous <i>I-can't-afford-to-work</i> issue). </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">We need to think too about the </span><i style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">system geometry</i><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> and the fact that men thrive in <i>pyramidal </i>structures (which is in itself a symbol of masculinity), probably trying to resolve some of their </span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oedipus_complex" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Oedypus complex</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> every time they symbolically kill their symbolic father (their boss) by taking their place and thus penetrating further their symbolic mother (the company, that feeds them). Of course, pyramids are not inclusive of <i>all </i>men, they have mechanisms to exclude any group they do not see as matching their own identity (some people will be always off-code even if they are willing to <a href="http://washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/11/06/i-taught-my-black-kids-that-their-elite-upbringing-would-protect-them-from-discrimination-i-was-wrong/">mimic on-code behaviours</a>).</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Beyond this, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hu4ZXr40bSA">studies on collective intelligence done by the MIT led by Tom Malone</a> suggest that <b>groups act more intelligently </b>when:</span><br />
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<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> there is higher social perceptiveness, </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">an </span><a href="http://time.com/3666135/sheryl-sandberg-talking-while-female-manterruptions/" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">equal share of the conversation</a><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> amongst members, </span></li>
<li><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">and a high number of women. </span></li>
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">This is a real invitation to think how <i>hierarchical and reward structures </i>could be better in accommodating and recognising members that are enablers of collective intelligence. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In this sense, it is important to remember that processes and structures cannot be decoupled.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>Changing the metaphor</b></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">In Capra's video, he states: "There is a system awareness that sees itself through a metaphor, a code, and through this code, it designs processes. Indeed at the very heart of the change in paradigm, we find a fundamental change of metaphor of understanding life as a machine as understanding it as a network."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><br /></span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even if we want to insist we are rational beings, science has shown that decisions are deeply emotional or plainly instinctive. In a world that is only trying to <i>evolve </i>through addressing the pre-frontal cortex (words and rational thinking) is neglecting most part of its brain that can only process symbolic information. The symbolic language we used to connect to in ritual once-a-week attendance to church (with all its positive and negative implications) is being used 24/7 by advertising and the entertainment industry which normally works <i>in accordance</i> to the current (mostly survival and competitive) codes. </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">How do these codes codes get changed? How do we evolve? Personally and collectively?</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">My attempt to answer these questions would be:</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>1- Back to basics</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Personally: Listening to our inner child (the one that needs), and provide him/her with the resources we have as adults. I think the awareness of our own history is important and understanding our early years is an important enabler to understand what are our codes, our most basic needs. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Collectively: <b>Improving well being of <i>all </i>children:</b> (through addressing the main causes of distress of their parents), will definitely bring a next generation with new codes. </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>2. Stepping outside our comfort zone:</b></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Personally: New habits, new experiences. According to Einstein the definition of insanity was doing the same thing over and over again, expecting different results. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Collectively: New conversations, embracing plurality, immigration<b>. </b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">When people with different views of the world interact, these conversations will slowly affect the codes of all participants but only if this works as an exercise of acceptance and integration of the 'other'. This requires the mastery of the art of brave conversations, where we are willing to speak our truth and listening to a different point of view that might even challenge it. In this regard, it is not surprising to see defence mechanisms at play through a higher level of awareness of racial tensions and <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/oct/09/right-wing-new-reactionaries-stir-up-trouble-among-french-intellectuals">anti-immigration rhetoric</a> particularly in countries where Imperial codes (of racial superiority) might still be present.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"><b>3. Embracing moments of crisis: renaissance</b></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Personally: Personal crisis are opportunities to get rid of what's not working. In this sense, <b>there is a part of us that must be <i>allowed </i>to die</b>: old ideas of ourselves, old expectations, old habits, old models. This is not a simple process and a full grieving is necessary. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Collectively: crisis are powerful symbolic collective events.<b> </b>I've touched upon <a href="http://theimportanceofallthings.blogspot.ch/2015/09/28-ghosts-of-conflicts-past.html">collective trauma in a previous entry</a>. Collective crisis should also offer the opportunity to revisit old models, too. But in a globally connected world, there are other events that get imprinted too. <b>Images that can be highly symbolic </b>like "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Blue_Marble">The Blue Marble</a>", a photograph of the earth from space was embraced by environmentalist, Western counter-culture (movements for civil rights, peace, feminism, etc) as an image that raised our awareness of unity, of earth vulnerability and challenged our ego image. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Some people say that the <b>attack on the twin towers </b>is in itself a very strong image that brought a </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">sense of something big just happened, "this means</span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;"> change" to the entire world. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">I would argue that the <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/sep/02/shocking-image-of-drowned-syrian-boy-shows-tragic-plight-of-refugees">image of Aydan Kurdi</a> has been also significant. Almost a warning telling us that point 1 is not being done properly.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Even if we can all rationally agree that the first point (well being for all children) is </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">indisputable and </span><span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">what every society wants, current economical policies are working against it and we keep voting in their support.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Somehow, the never-ending economical crisis -that triggered several national identity crisis-, the new wave of civil wars -that led to a refugee crisis- and international wars seem to have started to shake things at a much deeper level, to reach core codes and beliefs that the beginning of the crisis did not touch, the ones that we need to confront and hopefully overcome.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "trebuchet ms" , sans-serif;">Andrea</span><br />
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ABhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08811399074729282697noreply@blogger.com0