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pan:
all i wrote about is why i haven't been as active here as i have been.
i dont think i am particularly unusual in that my statements about what i may understand to be possible in principle (as things that might be done to alter the present, grim state of affairs) fluctuates with my general view of that state of affairs.
sometimes i think that lars von trier was right in "dogville": the united states is a gangster state and the only thing to be done about it for the benefit of all is to burn it down. it is not reformable, it is not changeable. it cannot accomodate the basic demands of its own citizens, much less be coherent as the center of a global socio-economic system. these are moments that push me more into my past of involvement with left revolutionary politics.
other times i think that much could and should be done. these are my more social-democratic moments.
in the horse latitudes, i find it difficult to focus on those things that could and should be changed within the existing order: the dysfunctions of the order itself become too obvious and with that the problems appear to be of a piece with the nature of the order itself---so solutions to fundamental problems begin to migrate into functioning as elements of a more radical position.
at other times, things seem amenable to being taken apart, separations made and on that basis more local arguments can be outlined and so forth.
insofar as the forum in concerned, when i am thinking about the present state of affairs as particularly grim, the arguments that i would be likely to advance would be more radical. these would (a) require a fair amount of explanation, which i am not sure folk would necessarily want to wade through and (b) would incline me to being quite uncompromising in discussions that may or may not follow.
besides, i work out the more radical stuff in other forms.
as is the case for anyone, what happens here is separate from my other work----what functions here is particular---in the end there are tactical questions particular to the forum that shape what i am and am not inclined to talk about here--because this is a particular kind of space involving a particular community--it is not that open, frankly--in part because of the format itself (a messageboard) and in part because of the particular combination of voices that comprise the community. the community is interesting and valuable, but not all kinds of argument function equally well within it. and this is neither good nor bad in itself: it simply is.
so.
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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear
it make you sick.
-kamau brathwaite
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