Leili on Thu, 27 Sep 2001 20:41:09 +0200 (CEST) |
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<nettime> FW: I am a person who loves my city |
I am a person who loves my city by Morgan J. Meis I am a person who loves my city (for all its massive failures) and is very critical of the country in which it is located, especially as it concerns the role that country plays in the global economic and political environment. Strangely, the country was attacked through the city. Of course, this is not so terribly strange. Those towers were perhaps the most potent symbols of that tangled web that makes up American power. They were physically imposing, almost taking on a military bearing at times. They were, in a sense, the nearest modern equivalent to the medieval towers of old: fortified, arrogant, hostile. They were more than a symbol because a symbol merely stands in for the real thing, merely serves as a place-holder. They were the thing itself, within their walls the economic motors of American power ground out its daily product. And, like everything powerful, their final moments were pitiful and sad. They simply crumbled, passing away like all things. As a political act it was horrifying, unacceptable, but none-the-less a political act. The American unwillingness to accept that basic fact is the flip side of the hubris that allows us to couch our exploitation of the populations and resources of the globe as a project of freedom and emancipation. We simply do not want to believe that we have bred this kind of hate; but we simply have. We are breeding armies of disenfranchisement that have less and less to lose. The anatomy of fanaticism is precisely that, an anatomy. This is to say that it starts at the stomach; to which, admittedly, it does not reduce. But, if our response to this event is to further equate ourselves with freedom and civilization and to further shove those suffering at our hands to the other side of the divide, then I would recommend the general avoiding of tall buildings. Those we sweep aside we also present with a tacit gift. This gift is called political will. In the right circumstances it can overcome all the technology and sophistication in the world. A box cutter and an idea can puncture an empire. These things, the event as a political event, can be understood and analyzed. In fact they must be if one is to avoid suffocating under their weight. But what of old New York? What of my precious little contradiction that is a world onto itself. What of the jewel that is solace to those of those who need protection from within the belly of the beast. Are you too wounded my darling? Have you been too wounded? Perhaps you never really wanted that dual behemoth dangling off of you in the first place. Perhaps this is a kind of shaking it free. But this tumor was ripped out with such brutality. I am so worried for you. We remember how much we worry about the things we love. Morgan J. Meis Graduate Faculty Philosophy Journal gfpj@newschool.edu www.newschool.edu/gf/phil/journa1.htm 65 Fifth Avenue--Room 250 New York, NY 10003 USA (212) 229-5735 # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net