Friday 19th of April 2024
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microfascism gives birth to macrofascism....

 

Long after the appearance of Deleuze and Guattari's collaborative works Anti-Oedipus (1972), and A Thousand Plateaus (1980, together volumes one and two of Capitalism and Schizophrenia), the influence of the notoriously difficult philosophers, clinical psychotherapists, and activists is, paradoxically, widespread.

Academics, graphic designers, currency traders, social media managers, security consultants, and political radicals have all have appropriated the language of multiplicities, flows, arrangements, rhizomes. This is because, as Michel Foucault claimed in his preface to Anti-Oedipus, these "seemingly abstract notions" address the question of how to proceed in an increasingly complex world. But as the above list of often antagonistic disciplines suggests, the answer to the question of how to proceed is unresolved, as is the question of whether embedded somewhere in Capitalism and Schizophrenia is a positive political program.

 

BY Cæmeron Crain (published 2013?)

 

Our goal in this series is not to provide answers to these questions, but to put in context a lexicon that has been put to work forwarding disparate agendas, and which still exerts tremendous influence on cutting-edge thought around the world. We hope that by elucidating important concepts in this important work, and by spotlighting these remarkable thinkers and practitioners, we will provide our readers with essential knowledge as we all work to determine our "how" in this world. 

 

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Perhaps the whole key to understanding what Deleuze and Guattari (hereafter D&G) are up to in their books on Capitalism and Schizophrenia (Anti-Oedipus and A Thousand Plateaus) lies in their insistence that Desire is the key economic concept. Nowadays, the term "Economy" on its own seems to refer to the financial economy, even if this is ill-defined (is “the economy” bad when the DOW goes down, or when unemployment is high, or does it have to do with GDP, or what?). We should note, first of all, that the term is broader than that. In the original Greek, "eco" means household, or habitat, or—to use a Deleuzean term—milieu, and "nomos" has to do with the law/rule/principle determining this domain. Economy is not strictly tied to money, and any college student should know that we can talk also about issues of political economy. Likewise, anyone who has dabbled in psychoanalysis or the like knows we can also talk about psychic economy. These latter senses are more important for D&G than the directly fiduciary. Indeed, they seem to suggest that the distribution of resources in terms of Capitalism is but one permutation of an underlying economy of desire, where this notion of desire is simultaneously both political and psychological.

 

According to D&G, desire is fundamentally productive; it does not depend upon some prior lack, but rather invests a social field. This means that the object of desire is not wanted on its own, as though everything else were given. Desire involves a context—a milieu—desire even structures that milieu. I do not simply want an iPhone; I want to be seen and known as a guy with an iPhone. There is a certain fantasy structure at play of which this object forms a part. This fantasy structure is already social in nature. Indeed, D&G conceive of the self as a multiplicity of what they call "desiring-machines." The question is not so much what these desiring-machines are in themselves as it is how they operate and what they produce. There is no Cartesian subject standing apart from the world on this account. One’s sense of personal identity is itself a product of desire related to a broader social structure. At its (perhaps implicit) limit, my desire relates to all of history and how I perceive my place in it.

 

What desire produces, though, is not so much objects, but rules. What I want ends up structuring my behavior. The desire for an iPhone produces new norms of behavior: taking pictures of dinner at a restaurant, or checking my email during it. By and large this may be unconscious, but it happens nonetheless. As human beings, we have not just habits, but the habit of forming habits. We tend to go along in the same way. These habits form implicit rules governing our behavior—I put the left sock on, then the right. There is no good reason I can think of for this, but it does strike me as the correct way of proceeding. This is perhaps not very interesting, but what of the rules I follow when it comes to dealing with others? Is there a real difference between my tiny personal affairs and my politics?

 

D&G’s radical answer here is: no. Not really. While it is hard to see any political significance to my left-sock-first rule, this is only because it doesn’t seem to affect anyone else. It still says something (I don’t know what—certainly it would be too much of a leap to say it indicates that I am a Leftist) about the way my desire is investing itself in “the world.” This is the idea of Micropolitics; there is ultimately nothing that is not political, because desire is always embedded to a broader social field.

 

The upshot of this is that what happens politically at the macro-level has roots in our psychic affairs and small interpersonal dealings with one another. If the macropolitical structure has become repressive, we should look at how it is pulling from and organizing desire. One of the driving questions of Anti-Oedipus is: what makes us desire Fascism? We should note the implication of the very question. We (read: human beings under certain conditions) want fascism. Fascism only happens because we want it. So the question is: why?

 

D&G’s answer relies heavily on the notion of Microfascism, which is related to the micropolitics mentioned above. It’s related to the way desire produces rules. For instance, when I ride the subway, I follow a rule that tells me to take my MetroCard out before I get to the turnstile. Or, to take another example, I try to walk on the right-hand side of the stairs. But, frequently, I find myself behind someone who doesn’t take their subway card out beforehand, or who meanders around the stairs like it doesn’t matter. In response I think: they should follow the rules!—this is microfascism. It’s fundamentally the desire for the trains to run on time. But, notice, what I want here is for others to follow my rule. Maybe I even have reasons for this—it’s a good rule, after all!—but, regardless, this amounts to imposing my desire on others. Write this large and you get Mussolini or Franco or whatever.

 

It is important to note that the distinction between the micro and macro levels of the political is not reducible to the ordinary distinction between public and private. D&G reject the latter insofar as it implies a domain of life (i.e., the private) that is not social. This does not mean, however, that the levels look the same. We perhaps all have our microfascisms, but these are diverse. They enable state fascism, but this aims for homogeneity.

 

If we in some sense want fascism, is there also a way in which we want capitalism? I think the answer here is more complex, because capitalism is intrinsically self-revolutionizing. Capitalism undermines established forms in order to replace them with something new. In D&G’s language, it is always de-territorializing desire and re-territorializing it somewhere else. Certainly, it can become fascistic, but at its core, what capitalism does is unlock the unfettered power of desire. All previous social arrangements, Deleuze will say, attempted to keep this under wraps. It may be helpful here to think of marriage arrangements in feudal societies. Strong codes structured (sexual) desire, making marriage more a matter creating affiliations between bloodlines than anything else. Love may have been possible outside of these codes, but it was certainly not encouraged. Love is a messy, disruptive desire; the kind of desire capitalism feeds on. Perhaps this is why we now tend to think marriage is about love. In another register, it would be an explanation of the capitalistic values of innovation and entrepreneurship.

 

So, perhaps the link between desire and capitalism is deeper than that between desire and fascism. Fascism would seem to be, importantly, a response to capitalism: it involves an attempt to impose order on the chaos of desire. This is what makes it reactionary, and dangerous. Fascism’s drive toward homogeneity is ultimately suicidal. We are all (only) the same in death. But this is only one of the dangers that capitalism encounters. What sense does it make, after all, to pair capitalism and schizophrenia?

 

To answer this question we must go back to the thought that desire is the central economic concept. We need to ask not only about the rules (nomoi) it creates, but also about its “household” (eco). D&G articulate the logic of capitalism in terms of de-territorialization/re-territorialization, and suggest that the same logic has something to do with schizophrenia. To get at this, however, we must first consider the meaning of Territory. This will be the subject of a future post.

The Mantle is excited to present the first in series of blog posts by Cæmeron Crain exploring key concepts in contemporary political philosophy, beginning with the work of the seminal French theorists, Gilles Deleuze and Felix Guattari.

 

READ MORE:

https://www.themantle.com/philosophy/microfascism

 

 

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joe is a fascist idiot....

US President Joe Biden has described the Ukraine conflict as entering a crucial phase, justifying Washington’s latest pledge to send more heavy weapons to Kiev. His statement came after Ukraine rejected Russia’s proposal for an Orthodox Christmas ceasefire.

“Right now, the war in Ukraine is at a critical point. We have to do everything we can to help the Ukrainians resist Russian aggression, and Russia is not attempting to slow up,” Biden said during a government meeting in the White House on Thursday. “Earlier this afternoon, I had a long discussion with [German Chancellor] Olaf Scholz and – about Ukraine – and our alliances in Europe and the EU. We have a much larger contingent of countries that share our view, including Japan and others.”

Biden highlighted Washington’s recent decision to supply Kiev with Bradley Fighting Vehicles and a Patriot air defense missile battery, in a bid to shore up Ukraine’s military capabilities. “They function well, and they’re helping a lot,” Biden said.

 

READ MORE:

https://www.rt.com/news/569473-biden-critical-point-ukraine/

 

THE "UKRAINE" KIEV GOVERNMENT IS FASCIST. IF YOU HAVE NOT REALISED THIS YET, GO AND PLAY IN THE MIDDLE OF A BUSY ROAD. THE AMERICAN EMPIRE HAS MADE ITS GOAL TO CONTROL THE ENTIRE PLANET. THIS INCLUDES THE CONQUEST OF THE HEARTLAND. WE DON'T HARP ON THIS OFTEN ENOUGH. THE AMERICAN EMPIRE IS A FASCIST EMPIRE SOMEWHAT WORSE THAT HITLER'S THIRD REICH, BECAUSE IT IS FAR MORE DEVIOUS — HIDING BEING A VEIL/SMOKE SCREEN OF RIGHTEOUSNESS AND FREEDOM THAT IS 100 PER CENT HYPOCRITICAL.

 

LOSE SOME, WIN MANY, PUTIN IS DOING WHAT HE HAS TO DO TO PROTECT RUSSIA FROM THE WOLVES OF THE FASCIST AMERICAN EMPIRE.

 

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SEE ALSO: https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/the-plan-to-carve-up-russia/

 

 

 

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blame russia.....

 

Over 80 years since the start of World War II, debates continue to rage about who is responsible for the deadliest conflict in history. Western officials and historians blame the USSR, citing the signing of the Soviet-German non-aggression pact. Revisionists contest this narrative, pointing to the British, French and US roles in Hitler’s rise.

Months after the start of the Second World War, the United Kingdom and France planned to release a blue book collection of doctored diplomatic correspondence to try to paint the USSR as the party responsible for the breakdown of the Soviet-Anglo-French defense pact talks of the summer of 1939.

A document dated January 27, 1940, citing information provided by an undercover agent inside Her Majesty’s Government, published in the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service’s digital archive, detailed plans by the British to release the blue book, and its expected contents.

“This book will consist of a number specially selected and falsified ‘documents’, which, in the view of London, will prove to the world that while ‘the English honestly negotiated with the USSR and intended to conclude a pact, the Bolsheviks played a double game, signing the Soviet-German agreement and unleashing a European war’,” the document reads.

The agent characterized the task before the blue book’s curators as a “hefty” one, given the need “to prove that white is black and in general to turn everything upside down.”

Soviet, British and French negotiators held talks in Moscow in the summer of 1939 in a last-ditch attempt to create a Soviet-Anglo-French triple alliance against Adolf Hitler’s Germany, which by that point had annexed Austria, the Sudetenland, the rest of Czechoslovakia and set its sights on Poland’s Danzig corridor.

 

READ MORE:

https://sputniknews.com/20230106/declassified-doc-reveals-how-uk-france-tried-to-whitewash-responsibility-for-wwii-1106090510.html

 

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READ ALSO: https://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/26238

 

 

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fascist france....

Full text of the letter to the Ambassador of France in the Russian Federation from Dmitri Rogozine (*Ex Head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, injured in the Donbass). Along with the letter, Rogozin sent a fragment of a 155 mm shell taken from his body, fired from a French Caesar howitzer.

 

To the Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the French Republic, Mr. Pierre Levy

Your Excellency Mr. Ambassador!

I remember with pleasure our communication with you, joint trips to the Borodino field and to Baikonur. At that time, we talked a lot and often about the prospects of Russian-French political and economic cooperation.

Unfortunately, the position of your country and the NATO countries on the rise of a military threat against Russia near our borders has led to a tragic outcome. France's words and deeds have miraculously diverged diametrically. Official Paris betrayed the cause of the great de Gaulle and became one of the most bloodthirsty states in Europe. Your country submitted to the dictates of Washington and became a puppet state in the style of the Vichy government, serving the baser instincts of the Nazis. I write about this with pain, because I have always loved the history of France, I know the language and culture of France, and I honor the memory of the glorious deeds where the Russians and the French fought together against common threats.

Recently, following a despicable act of terrorism in Donetsk, I was seriously injured. It is only thanks to the great skill and patience of Russian military and civilian doctors that I am alive and almost healthy again. In this envelope, along with my letter, you see a fragment of a shell fired by the French Caesar 155mm self-propelled artillery mount. It pierced my right shoulder and sank into the fifth cervical vertebra, within a millimeter of killing or immobilizing me. This French howitzer killed two of my young friends, leaving their wives widows and their children orphans. These guys accompanied us on a trip to Baikonur, you shook their hands. Now they are dead, killed by weapons supplied to Ukraine by your country. You probably know how many civilians were killed in Donetsk and the frontline towns of Novorossia by French guns and French mercenaries. There are hundreds of people, including children.

Mr. Ambassador, what is France doing, what are you doing in the conflict that Western politicians have kindled between the Slavic peoples? I hope you understand the extent of your personal responsibility for these murders! You are the extraordinary and plenipotentiary representative of the Fifth Republic, and you are responsible for it. And I ask you to hand over the fragment extracted by surgeons from my spine to French President Emmanuel Macron. And also tell him that no one will escape responsibility for the war crimes of France, the United States, Great Britain, Germany and the other NATO countries in the Donbass. All our victims are on your conscience, as well as the appearance of fascist Ukraine on the map of Europe is also on your conscience.

Accept, Mr. Ambassador, the assurances of my respect for your diplomatic status, but I fear that your mission has completely failed.

 

READ MORE:

https://en.reseauinternational.net/lettre-de-dmitri-rogozine-a-lambassadeur-de-france-en-russie/

 

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READ ALSO: https://www.yourdemocracy.net.au/drupal/node/26238

 

 

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outbidding deadly supplies......

 

by:Louise NORDSTROM

 

A day after France announced it was sending Western armoured vehicles to Ukraine, Germany said it would do the same. But Germany, the world’s fourth-largest arms supplier, seemed to be playing catch-up in announcing the move on Thursday, after months of dragging its feet on dispatching its stockpile of tanks to an increasingly desperate Ukraine.  

A day later, Chancellor Olaf Scholz declared in a joint statement with the United States that Germany would provide Ukraine with its Marder infantry fighting vehicles as well as a Patriot air defence missile battery. Berlin confirmed on Friday it would send a total of 40 Marders to Ukraine by the end of March. 

But the flurry of moves prompted the question of why such close European allies as Germany and France did not opt for a common approach to arming Ukraine. 

Domestically, Scholz had been the target of heckling – even from his own coalition partners – for taking his time on deciding to send tanks to Ukraine.    

“Other partner countries are once again leading the way. Now we can finally get started in the spirit of a Franco-German friendship, right? @Chancellor?,” Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann, the head of Germany’s parliamentary defence committee and a member of Scholz’s junior coalition partner Free Democrats (FDP), tweeted. “The ball is now in [Berlin’s court].”

Die anderen Partnerländer gehen wieder einmal zuerst voran. Jetzt können wir doch im Sinne der deutsch-französischen Freundschaft auch endlich mal loslegen, oder, @Bundeskanzler? Der Ball liegt jetzt in Berlin. Wir müssen ihn jetzt nur noch reinschieben. #Ukraine https://t.co/s6qFPrjgrc

— Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann (@MAStrackZi) January 4, 2023

The Green Party, which is the governing SDP’s other coalition partner, is also mostly in favour of equipping the Ukrainians with more and heavier arms, as are many young Germans. Some lawmakers have even called for Scholz to go further and supply Ukraine with Germany's main battle tank, the Leopard 2. 

Two Finnish politicians this week launched a "Free the Leopards!" campaign to "pressure" Germany into providing the tanks to Ukraine.

‘A total surprise’

Ulrike Franke, a security expert at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) in London and in Berlin, said that Macron had snubbed Scholz by going ahead with his announcement.

“Once again, Germany doesn’t look decisive, but rather like a follower – or even as if it is driven by others,” Franke said. 

Jessica Berlin, geopolitical analyst and founder of strategy consultancy CoStruct, said it does not seem that Macron had warned Scholz at all. “The Chancellery knew nothing about this; it came as a total surprise.”

Although Germany has delivered significant military aid to Ukraine since the start of the war – including Gepard anti-aircraft guns and the first of four IRIS-T surface-to-air missile systems – Scholz and his Social Democratic Party (SDP) have been increasingly under fire, both at home and within NATO, for their reluctance to provide Ukraine with badly needed Western tanks despite sitting on a stockpile of hundreds.

The Scholz Doctrine: do as little as possible as slowly as possible until forced to act by allied pressure.

— Jessica Berlin (@berlin_bridge) January 5, 2023

“Germany talks about wanting to be a leader in European security, but then it refuses to send industry stockpiles to Ukraine – literally vehicles, tanks and weapons that are just gathering dust in storage, all the while they could be saving lives in Ukraine. It’s unconscionable,” said Berlin, whose work has brought her from her base in the German capital to Ukraine four times in the past year.

Berlin said Macron's decision to make the announcement first may have been a way to try to force the chancellor’s hand.

“Instead of allowing Scholz to delay [the tank shipments] even more, this forces him to either choose to go along with it and bring Germany forward, or let it be accused of inaction and of hindering NATO's response.” 

Even so, Berlin said Germany is unlikely to interpret the move as an act of diplomatic betrayal, even if it was temporarily embarrassing for Scholz.

“For so many months, Germany had every opportunity to become the first [to make a move] and be hailed as the heroic decision-maker and take the initiative,” Berlin explained. “But instead it decided not to. So it was perfectly within France's right to take that initiative when it finally could.”

The Russian ties

She said one reason the ruling SDP has been so reluctant to provide the Ukrainians with armoured tanks is due to its former policy of rapprochement toward Russia.

“Basically they have tolerated [Russian President Vladimir] Putin’s expansionist behaviour over the past 20 years and helped make Germany and German industry dependent on this violent dictatorship,” she said, citing – among other things – Germany’s deep reliance on Russian gas.

“Thankfully, in the past year, they have recognised this as a mistake, and have taken large steps to decouple from this dependence. But this has all been a reaction to outside pressure.”

She also attributed the reluctance to the “generational fear” of nuclear escalation, like that of the Cold War in the 1980s, among SDP lawmakers.  

“But you’ll notice that in the past month, the Russian nuclear threats have all but disappeared from the headlines. Why is that? Because Putin was testing it out to see if his only trump card would work.”

Berlin said that Scholz’s policy of not going it alone had also played an important role in halting the delivery of Marders. But that argument only held up until France decided it had a large enough stockpile to start supplying Ukraine on its own this week.

Berlin said Germany’s decision to follow suit now actually presents it with an enormous opportunity.

“It can save face and change the narrative. From being the obstructionist partner in 2022 it can become the proactive partner in 2023 by being the first to send a main battle tank, the Leopard 2.”

As for the success of France’s unilateral announcement to get things moving, Berlin said: “It shows that pressure works.”

 

READ MORE:

https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20230107-did-france-surprise-germany-by-pledging-tanks-for-ukraine

 

FIRST, PUTIN NEVER MENTIONED USING THE NUCLEAR BOMB CARD. IT WAS BIDEN WHO SUGGESTED THAT PUTIN WOULD USE IT.

SECOND, ADDING MORE TANKS TO THE UKRAINIAN ARMY IS LIKE PROVIDING SUBMARINES TO THE MARTIANS.

THIRD, THE ONEUPMANSHIP BETWEEN FRANCE AND GERMANY IS CHILDISH. BOTH SHOULD STRIVE TO FIND A WAY TOWARDS PEACE RESOLUTION — AS BOTH COUNTRIES WOULD KNOW THAT RUSSIA WILL NEVER ABANDON THE DONBASS AND CRIMEA WHICH ARE NOW, THOUGH NOT RECOGNISED BY THE WEST, LEGITIMATELY RUSSIAN.

 

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