Re: Big Brother Is Your Friend - simulation of surveillance

[pj lilley <pj@tao.ca>]

[: hacktivism :]


On Mon, 20 Sep 1999, ricardo dominguez wrote:

> Now of course this blasting off of the real into
> the hyperreal presents all kinds of problems
> for tradtional Marxist-Materialists, which is at
> least the general territory that I think all four
> of us either come from or at least came from
> at one time (more or less). I think this is why EDT
> has had so much trouble with the traditional stratified left.
> 
> My solution, via DeLanda really, is to take up
> the discourse of Deleuzian materialism. Without
> writing longer than I have, Deleuzian materialism
> would view Baudrillard's hyperreal not as beyond
> real, but as "stuff". This stuff interacts with and
> weaves itself in as part of all real systems. (Email
> makes itself part of the distribution of food.) Simulation
> is real "stuff", and activists have a responsibility
> (because corporationshave been busy in this regard),
> to probe the spaces of simulation and,
> paraphrasing Ricardo, invert the mirror.

   yes, the "stuff" interacts in a very real fashion.  very real, physical
dirty bodies of carbon in conflict with the hyperreal (all-too-real) state
power.  yet, as it is currently manifest, we do not have the material
control of the means of the mirror's production, do we?  some maybe...
small fragments here and there.  is that the deleuzian 'swarms' again?
spontaneously rising up?  do you think that will be adequate against the
state of indonesia next week?  mexico?  oh, how i hope, but more "stuff"
necessary!

> Of course, the thing you have to keep fighting
> in an explication of this is the equation:
> simulation=not real. Floodnet was actual, an
> ontologically real denial of service attack. A
> little like shooting at an Sherman with
> a sling-shot, but actual nevertheless. It's power was not in
> it's ability to take out a server, but in it's
> ability to let the admins know it was under "attack."

   yep, it let them know they were under attack, and boosted the stocks
and the confidence in their investments in future info-wars, more weapons
of technological sophistication, and more programmers to push their
buttons.  i don't see, in balance, how that ontological score is being
won?  so much media since then has been atrocious, framing us all up as
cyber-terrorists.   why shouldn't i want to cling to marxist materialism
in the face of such ontological machismo arrogance that picks such fights
without enough forethought to even win some small lasting ground?

> (here is an old interview with Bill Bogard--1996)
> 
> http://old.thing.net/ttreview/octrev96.02.html

  i will dutifully go and read it, consider these just my initial reaction
to brett's theoretical points.

  -=pj=-



[: hacktivism :]
[: for unsubscribe instructions or list info consult the list FAQ :]
[: http://hacktivism.tao.ca/ :]