<nettime> the silence on the rising fascism

[Allan Siegel via nettime-l <nettime-l@lists.nettime.org>]

Dear Nettimers,

I read the use of the word SILENCE in this thread of emails (starting 
with Andrew) has having multiple meanings and never detected any 
accusatory tone or intentions. Perhaps, Bergman's film The Silence might 
help unpacking the other layers of intent in this vibrant thread.

*Felix* wrote on the 21st: “We can speak "truth to power" all day long. 
Millions are marching against the war in Gaza. But, simply, arguments 
don't count… But it's more than that, power doesn't speak anymore, it 
doesn’t need argumentative justification, not even dishonest one. Has 
Trump ever made a single argument? No. Contemporary power counts. By 
that, I don't mean that it's obsessed with money -- sure it is, but that 
is no news -- but the dominant way of understanding reality has shifted.”

/“understanding how reality has shifted”/ is really essential and how 
the exercise of power has shifted also is really critical. How to 
utilize advanced communication networks to further political goals and 
social justice necessitates building durable practice based networks. 
And, a theoretical framework and  vision that can sustain these networks.

*Masha Gessen* said (after receiving the Hannah Arendt Prize for 
Political Thought): “In June 2003, British politician Oona King wrote an 
article for the *Guardian* describing her trip to Israel-Palestine. On 
her first day in the Gaza Strip, a helicopter attack killed a woman and 
her child and injured dozens more. King wrote, “The original founders of 
the Jewish state could surely not imagine the irony facing Israel today: 
in escaping the ashes of the Holocaust, they have incarcerated another 
people in a hell similar in its nature—though not its extent—to the 
Warsaw ghetto.” The comparison, of course, was controversial.”… anything 
that happens in the present is, by definition, imaginable. We can see 
it. Even small children separated from their parents at the US border 
and placed in detention are imaginable once we see pictures of them on 
our screens and hear their voices in audio recordings…We are not any 
smarter, kinder, wiser, or more moral than people who lived ninety years 
ago. We are just as likely to needlessly give up our political power and 
to remain willfully ignorant of darkness as it’s dawning. But we know 
something they didn’t know: we know that the Holocaust is possible.”

Not just the Holocaust is possible but also a nuclear armageddon fuelled 
by egos and political goals that each day become more and more obscure - 
with the only visible objectives being TO WIN at any cost. Meanwhile all 
the celebrated goals pertaining to social justice and a sustainable 
environment: the health of the planet and people’s souls, evaporates.

Best for the Holidays and New Year

Allan
--
# 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: https://www.nettime.org
# contact: nettime-l-owner@lists.nettime.org