{"id":3971,"date":"2018-10-02T08:17:05","date_gmt":"2018-10-02T12:17:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/?p=3971"},"modified":"2018-10-02T08:17:05","modified_gmt":"2018-10-02T12:17:05","slug":"sophie-molyneux-homework-as-praxis-candour-exposure-commitment-navel-gazing-theory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/sophie-molyneux-homework-as-praxis-candour-exposure-commitment-navel-gazing-theory\/","title":{"rendered":"Sophie Molyneux | Homework as praxis \/ candour \/ exposure \/ commitment \/ navel-gazing \/ theory"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Sophie Molyneux<\/strong><\/p>\n

On a recent evening, sitting in a dark pub waiting for trivia to start, I spoke to new acquaintances I was trying to befriend. Standard introductory topics exhausted, we ventured into the realm of politics. Assuming a safe liberal echo chamber, a matter was brought forth and unexpectedly resisted by one person present. \u201cI don\u2019t think we\u2019re going to be friends,\u201d she said lightly. We laughed, steered around it and passed on to pleasantly red wine-sodden trivia.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The choice, immortalized in The Matrix<\/em>, of consciousness and action (the red pill) as against the lure of inertia and bliss (the blue pill) seems to be the preliminary step towards critical thought. But this is not a choice that you can safely make once and be forever activated, enlightened and engaged. At every moment, there is the prospect of abandonment, surrender and regression.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Exhausting perhaps. But Now<\/em> by the Invisible Committee (2017) warns against hoping for a final resting point where you can still and look back at the ground you have gained, satisfied. The book diagnoses something within us that yearns for\u00a0 \u201c\u2026the Sunday of life alloyed with the end of history\u201d (p 127), that \u201cis expecting solutions<\/em>\u201d (p 127). These won\u2019t come. \u201c\u2026all those who claim to offer solutions to the present disaster are really doing just one thing: imposing their <\/em>definition of the problem on us\u2026\u201d (p 128). Constant vigilance, then, is the watchword.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The moment in the pub was perhaps an act of surrender. The moment in the pub might have been one in which I succumbed to the powers at work that make me avoid conflict and maintain social bonds. Or it was a moment where we avoided an argument that we have inherited generation from generation to occupy and distract us in the hope that people can get along and bridge differences.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

I revive these potentially trivial events in the pub for two reasons. The first is to better understand whether this was an opportunity for praxis<\/em> foregone. The second is as a test to see whether discussion of how to apply theories of how to act critically to particular moments is praxis<\/em> itself. Whether baldness of expression is praxis<\/em> is my experiment.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

So, I turned to Now<\/em> to see what guidance or adjudication I could get. Here is my rough understanding (broken down into the book\u2019s chapters):<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Tomorrow is cancelled<\/u>: If it was ever possible, the world has at least now passed the point that one could hope to tinker with its systems to create improvement. Talk is meaningless and impotent. (\u201cThere\u2019s nothing to criticise in Donald Trump. As to the worst that can be said about him, he\u2019s already absorbed it, incorporated it\u2026 He displays on a gold chain all the complaints that people have ever lodged against him.\u201d (p 8)) This is not the time to linger over lost hopes for what could have been done. We must abandon this. THINGS ARE TOO MESSED UP TO MAINTAIN THE STATUS QUO.<\/li>\n
  2. Nuances of breakage<\/u>: It is not sustainable to believe in a power or a governmental force that can bind us. The world is not about a rule of law, it is about ensuring submission. (\u201cKettling is a dialectical image of current political power\u2026 It\u2019s the figure of a power that no longer promises anything, and has no other activity than locking all the exits<\/em>.\u201d (p 33)) Lawlessness is prevalent. Governments embrace it; respecting laws was never for those who made laws. (\u201cIt\u2019s common knowledge that the drug squad is the biggest hash dealer in France.\u201d (p 38); \u201cAnyone who knows the underside of power immediately ceases to respect it. Deep down, the masters have always been anarchists. It\u2019s just that they can\u2019t stand for anyone else to be that.\u201d (p 38)) The world is fragmenting, people are being driven to the edges and falling away from each other. This is a painful process. (\u201cAs something endured, the process of fragmentation of the world can drive people into misery, isolation, schizophrenia. It can be experienced as a senseless loss in the lives of human beings. We\u2019re invaded by nostalgia then.\u201d) But perhaps fragmentation is our best state and we should welcome it and find our home in that mutual separation. (\u201c[Tosquelles] observed that mental patients tended to be few in number [in the Spanish civil war] because the war, by breaking the grip of the social lie, was more therapeutic to the psychotics than the asylum\u2026 the lie of social life makes us psychotic, and embracing fragmentation is what allows us to regain a serene presence to the world.\u201d (p 46)) WE AREN\u2019T UNITED OR UNITEABLE.<\/li>\n
  3. Death to politics<\/u>: Taking political action is not about being in politics. It is false to separate politics and life; politics is not a separate sphere of speaking, debating and voting which can be departed to return to \u201cordinary life\u201d. The opportunities for hypocrisy in that bifurcated realm are extensive. So accept that politics can be found in your everyday moments and acting politically doesn\u2019t need to mean having a clear vision of a better destination; it can simply be responding to something you care about in a certain moment. (\u201cEven a marathon is always run step by step.\u201d (p 66)) If we all do it, it may not be that bad. (\u201cIf we were more serene, more sure of ourselves, if we had less fear of conflict and of the disruption an encounter might bring, their consequences would likely be less disagreeable. And perhaps not disagreeable at all.\u201d (p 67)) ALLOW POLITICAL ACTION ANYWHERE<\/li>\n
  4. Let\u2019s destitute the world<\/u>: There\u2019s no point trying to put a new, better system in place; our institutions will always be undone by the fact they are staffed by people in power:<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    For behind the fa\u00e7ade of the institution, what goes on is always something other than what it claims to be, it\u2019s precisely what the institution claimed to have delivered the world from: the very human comedy of the coexistence of networks, of loyalties, of clans, interests, lineages, dynasties even, a logic of fierce struggles for territories, resources, miserable titles, influence \u2014 stories of sexual conquest and pure folly, of old friendship and rekindled hatreds (p 72).<\/p>\n

    So rather than seek to replace these building blocks, abandon them. Move on from universities, judicial systems and hospitals, and manage your own education, your own disputes and your own health. There is nothing of value in these places but a trick of capitalism. Decline to be disciplined, to be coded, to be governed. (\u201cThe destituent gesture does not oppose<\/em> the institution. It doesn\u2019t even mount a frontal fight, it neutralises it, empties it of substance, then steps to the side and watches it expire.\u201d (p 81)) NO NEED TO DECAPITATE, SIMPLY IGNORE, DESERT<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. End of work, magical life<\/u>: Capitalism and the reduction of people, places and experiences to quantifiable economic units have pervaded every aspect of our society: (every spare bedroom is now an Airbnb income foregone, every solo drive a missed chance to cash in (p 97); \u201c[b]eing with a particular person is an unbearable sacrifice of all the other persons with whom one could<\/em> just as well be with\u201d (p 106)). Abandonment of the economy is difficult but destitution of these capitalist systems is possible through acts of subversion and distance: (\u201cThere is no \u201cother economy\u201d, there\u2019s just another relationship with the economy.<\/em> A relationship of distance and hostility, to be exact. The only relationship one can have with the structures adopted is to use them as umbrellas for doing something altogether different than what the economy authorises<\/em>.\u201d (p 109)). Commercial print shops might put through anonymous undocumented protest publications on the weekend; carpenters might use their company\u2019s equipment to build a shelter for an occupy movement, a restaurant might host unsurveilled discussions after\u2011hours. SUBVERT, HELP FRIENDS OUTSIDE THE ECONOMY<\/li>\n
    2. Everyone hates the police<\/u>: The police have gained power as governments try to counter lawlessness with an ever-expanding unbounded \u2018law enforcement\u2019. \u201cThe outrageousness of police prerogatives and the incredible expansion of the technological means of control delineate a new tactical perspective.\u201d (p 124). To adequately defeat these new tyrants, direct public action is to be avoided as it begets immediate repression and \u201ca purely conspiratorial existence\u2026 makes one politically inoffensive\u201d (p 124). We must instead work towards mass revolutionary engagement through slowly but surely establishing clandestine networks. MAKE ALLIANCES, QUIETLY<\/li>\n
    3. For the ones to come<\/u>: Do not understand yourself as a Sims <\/em>character that you can drive around from experience to experience, constructing a life narrative from interactions with other characters. People are not individual units of soul bouncing off each other: \u201cWe are no longer nihilistic enough to think that inside us there is something like a stable psychic organ \u2014 a will, let\u2019s say \u2014 that directs our other faculties. This neat invention of the theologian\u2026institute[s] a formal separation between being and acting.\u201d (p 155-6). We are rather assemblies of fragments, products of forces operating within us and outside us driving our actions:<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      \u2026what \u201cwants\u201d within us, what inclines us, is never the same thing<\/em>. That it is a simple outcome<\/em>, crucial at certain moments, of the combat waged within and outside us by a tangled network of forces, affects and inclinations, resulting in a temporary assemblage in which some force has just as temporarily subdued other forces. (p 156)<\/p>\n

      This alteration in perception allows for a much greater freedom of movement and action: \u201cWe\u2019re talking about addressing bodies and not just the head\u201d (p 158). THERE IS NO YOU, YOU\u2019RE A PUPPET MOVED BY A THOUSAND STRINGS HELD IN DIFFERENT HANDS, PULL AT CERTAIN STRINGS IN CERTAIN MOMENTS<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      By trying to apply these theories, I\u2019m grounding them, taking them out of their packaging and leaving them vulnerable to the ageing process. Times will move on, my understanding will rust.<\/p>\n

       <\/p>\n

      But here\u2019s what I\u2019m taking from this for my assessment of the pub interaction: political conversations are not to be avoided; alliances could be created so these connections are important; these smaller settings are where to have these discussions; social fear is useless; hope of agreement or coalition is redundant; make sure things are worth talking about, then act. But also having not done it, it doesn\u2019t matter: these moments are endless and will recur and tomorrow you might very well act differently depending on the forces at play.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

      By Sophie Molyneux On a recent evening, sitting in a dark pub waiting for trivia to start, I spoke to new acquaintances I was trying to befriend. Standard introductory topics exhausted, we ventured into the realm of politics. Assuming a… Continue Reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2166,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[38962],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3971","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-resources-2-13"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2166"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3971"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3971\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3971"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3971"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.law.columbia.edu\/praxis1313\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3971"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}