Re: No power without brain....

[Aimee <vanwagea@bc.edu>]

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Even though so many thoughts have been expressed on this 
thread, I thought I might add mine.

I think it's worth noting that a government website is 
not an "opposing point of view" or even a point of view 
for that matter.  The texts that governments produce for 
the public (usually) are expressions of the regulatory 
regime under which we live.  These texts are not really 
view points in the sense that they set the stage and the 
terms of which we live and act.  NPR, the BBC, the 
NYTimes, the TV are all going to report based on these 
texts not on ours (as (h)activists).  These texts are 
considered the neutral facts by the media while in actuality 
they betray the political regulatory regimes we live 
under. 

Many (h)activists maintain 
these regulatory regimes are oppressive and unjust.  Thus 
disruptions in the expressions of such regimes can open 
up new spaces for constructive possibility.

Let's be real.  Shutting down a Mexican government website for
 a few hours does not mean that the Mexican government's 
"view" will not be heard.  The Mexican government's 
"view" is the one that millions of Mexicans citizens live 
under.  This "view" is the view with the means to 
massacre thier own citizens as in Acteal.  

Why bother with these brief interruptions in the 
message?  Because it may also be in a one-line report on 
NPR tommorrow and I might just hear about it and check 
out the ECD website and eventually end up on this mailing 
list.  A new space like this might be created.  New 
texts might begin to rival prevailing texts.  This is but 
one scenario among many possibilities in disruption.  I 
think therein lies the promise in disruptive 
tactics--disruption is never 
closed, it creates waves and ripples in the prevailing or 
hegemonic texts without assuming from the start that 
there is ONE way to effect change and ONE new text that 
should take the place of prevailing ones.

Not sure this is making any sense,

aimee

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