Ideas Are Also Weapons (Subcomandante Marcos)

[Agent Smiley <skywalker@disinfo.net>]

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On Mon, 16 Oct 2000 22:52:19 -0700 Clore Daniel C <clore@columbia-center.org> wrote:
Le Monde Diplomatique, October 2000

WHY DO WE ALL AGREE THE GLOBAL MARKET IS INEVITABLE?

'Do not forget ideas are also weapons'

by SUBCOMANDANTE MARCOS *

The purpose of this text is to fuel the debate between
right and leftwing intellectuals. It does not attempt
to explain the relation of either with governments or
changes in society. 

I. Pay-per-view global domination

The world is not square, or so we learn at school, but
on the brink of the third millennium it is not round
either. I do not know which geometrical figure best
represents the world in its present state but, in an
era of digital communication, we could see it as a
gigantic screen - one of those screens you can program
to display several pictures at the same time, one
inside the other. In our global world the pictures come
from all over the planet - but some are missing. Not
because there is not enough room on the screen but
because someone up there selected these pictures rather
than others. 

What do the pictures show? On the American continent,
we see a paramilitary group occupying the Autonomous
National University of Mexico (Unam); but the men in
grey uniforms are not there to study. Another frame
shows an armoured column thundering through a native
community in Chiapas. Beside this, we see United States
police using violence to arrest a youth in a city that
could be Seattle or Washington. The pictures in Europe
are just as grey. 

II. A memorable omission

Intellectuals have been part of society since the dawn
of humanity. Their work is analytical and critical.
They look at social facts and analyse the evidence, for
and against, looking for anything ambiguous, that is
neither one thing nor the other, revealing anything
that is not obvious - sometimes even the opposite of
what seems obvious. 

These professional critics act as a sort of impertinent
consciousness for society. They are non-conformists,
disagreeing with everything - social and political
forces, the state, government, media, arts, religion
and so on. Activists will just say "we've had enough",
but sceptical intellectuals will cautiously murmur "too
much" or "not enough". Intellectuals criticise
immobility, demand change and progress. They are,
nevertheless, part of a society, which is the scene of
endless confrontation and is split between those who
use power to maintain the status quo and those who
fight for change. 

Intellectuals must choose between their function as
intellectuals and the role that activists offer them.
It is also here that we see the split between
progressive and reactionary intellectuals. They all
continue their work of critical analysis, but whereas
the more progressive persist in criticising immobility,
permanence, hegemony and homogeneity, the reactionaries
focus their attacks on change, movement, rebellion and
diversity. So in fact, reactionary intellectuals
"forget" their true function and give up critical
thought. Their memory shrinks, excluding past and
future to focus only on the immediate and present. No
further discussion is possible. 

III. Intellectual pragmatism

Many leading rightwing intellectuals start life as
progressives. But they soon attract the attention of
the powerful, who deploy innumerable stratagems to buy
or destroy them. Progressive intellectuals are "born"
in the midst of a process of seduction and persecution.
Some resist; others, convinced that the global economy
is inevitable, look in their box of tricks and find
reasons to legitimate the existing power structure.
They are awarded with a comfortable armchair, on the
right hand of the prince they once denounced. 

They can find any number of excuses for this supposedly
"inevitable" outcome: it is the end of history; money
is everywhere and all-powerful; the police have taken
the place of politics; the present is the only possible
future; there is a rational explanation for social
inequality; there are even "good reasons" for the
unbridled exploitation of human beings and natural
resources, racism, intolerance and war. 

In an era marked by two new paradigms - communication
and the market - rightwing intellectuals have realised
that being "modern" means obeying one rule: "Adapt or
go under". They are not required to be original, just
to think like everyone else, taking their cue from
international bodies like the World Bank, the
International Monetary Fund or the World Trade
Organisation. 

Far from indulging in original, critical thought,
rightwing intellectuals become remarkably pragmatic,
echoing the advertising slogans that flood the world's
markets. In exchange for a place in the sun and the
support of certain media and governments, they cast off
their critical imagination and any form of
self-criticism and espouse the new, free market creed. 
                                
IV. Blind seers

The problem is not why the global economy is
inevitable, but why almost everyone agrees that it is.
Just as the economy is becoming increasingly global, so
is culture and information. How are we to prevent vast
media and communications companies like CNN or News
Corporation, Microsoft or AT&T, from spinning their
worldwide web? In today's world economy the major
corporations are essentially media enterprises, holding
up a huge mirror to show us what society should be, not
what it is. To paraphrase Régis Debray, what is visible
is real and consequently true (1). That, by the way, is
one of the tenets of rightwing dogma. Debray also
explains that the centre of gravity of news has shifted
from the written word to visual effects, from recorded
to live broadcasts, from signs to pictures. 

To retain their legitimacy, today's rightwing
intellectuals must fulfill their role in a visual era,
opting for what is immediate and direct, switching from
signs to images, from thought to TV commentary. 

V. Future past

In Mexico, leftwing intellectuals are very influential.
Their crime is that they get in the way. Well, one of
their crimes, because they also support the Zapatistas
in their struggle: "The Zapatista uprising heralds the
start of a new era in which native movements will
emerge as players in the fight against the neoliberal
global economy" (2). But we are neither unique nor
perfect. Just look at the natives of Ecuador and Chile,
and the demonstrations in Seattle, Washington, Prague -
and those that will follow. We are just one of the
pictures that deform the giant screen of the world
economy. 

The prince has consequently issued orders: "Attack
them! I shall supply the army and media. You come up
with the ideas". So rightwing intellectuals spend their
time insulting their leftwing counterparts, and because
of the Zapatista movement's international impact, they
are now busy rewriting our story to suit the demands of
the prince. 
                                
VI. Neoliberal fascists

In one of his books Umberto Eco provides some pointers
as to why fascism is still latent (3). He starts by
warning us that fascism is a diffuse form of
totalitarianism, then defines its characteristics:
refusal of the advance of knowledge, disregard of
rational principles, distrust of culture, fear of
difference, racism, individual or social frustration,
xenophobia, aristocratic elitism, machismo, individual
sacrifice for the benefit of the cause, televised
populism and use of Newspeak with its limited words and
rudimentary syntax.

These are the values that rightwing intellectuals
defend. Take another look at the giant screen. All that
grey is a response to disorder, reflected in demands
for law and order from all around us. But is Europe
once more the prey of fascism? We may well see
skinheads, with their swastikas, on the screen, but the
commentator is quick to reassure us that they are only
minority groups, already under control. But it may also
take other, more sinister forms (see the articles by
Christian Semler and Brigitte Pätzold in this issue). 

After the fall of the Berlin wall both sides of the
political spectrum in Europe rushed to occupy the
centre. This was all too obvious with the traditional
left, but it was also the case with the far right (4).
It went out of its way to acquire a new image, well
removed from its violent, authoritarian past,
enthusiastically espousing neoliberal dogma. 

VII. Sceptically hopeful

The task of progressive thinkers - to remain
sceptically hopeful - is not an easy one. They have
understood how things work and, noblesse oblige, they
must reveal what they know, dissect it, denounce it and
pass it on to others. But to do this, they must also
confront neoliberal dogma, backed by the media, banks,
major corporations, army and police. 

What is more, we live in a visual age - and so, to
their considerable disadvantage, progressive thinkers
must fight the power of the image with nothing but
words. But their scepticism will get them out of that
trap, and if they are equally sceptical in their
critical analysis, they will be able to see through the
virtual beauty to the real misery it conceals. So
perhaps there is reason to hope. 

There is a story that when Michelangelo sculpted his
statue of David, he had to work on a "second-hand"
piece of marble that already had holes in it. It is a
mark of his talent that he was able to create a figure
that took account of these limitations. The world we
want to transform has already been worked on by history
and is largely hollow. We must nevertheless be
inventive enough to change it and build a new world. 

Take care and do not forget that ideas are also
weapons. 

* Leader of the Zapatista National Liberation Army,
Chiapas, Mexico (excerpted from "La droite
intellectuelle et le fascisme libéral" which appeared
Le Monde diplomatique in French in August 2000; the
full version of this text is available on our internet
site in French, as is a longer version in Spanish) 

1.Croire, voir, faire, Odile Jacob, Paris, 1999. 
2.Yvon Le Bot, "Los indígenas contra el
neoliberalismo", La Jornada, 6 March 2000. 
3.Umberto Eco, Cinque scritti morali, Bompiani, Milan,
1997. 
4.See Emiliano Fruta, "La nueva derecha europea", and
Hernán R. Moheno, "Más allá de la vieja izquierda y la
nueva derecha", in Urbi et Orbi, Itam, Mexico, April
2000. 

Translated by Harry Forster
                                
-- 
---------------------------------------------------
Dan Clore

The Website of Lord We˙rdgliffe:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/9879/index.html
The Dan Clore Necronomicon Page:
http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/9879/necpage.htm

"Tho-ag in Zhi-gyu slept seven Khorlo. Zodmanas
zhiba. All Nyug bosom. Konch-hog not; Thyan-Kam
not; Lha-Chohan not; Tenbrel Chugnyi not; 
Dharmakaya ceased; Tgenchang not become; Barnang
and Ssa in Ngovonyidj; alone Tho-og Yinsin in 
night of Sun-chan and Yong-grub (Parinishpanna),
&c., &c.,"
-- The Book of Dzyan.




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