Re: <nettime> made for TV, made for social media

On Thu, Jan 7, 2021 at 9:17 PM Brian Holmes <bhcontinentaldrift@gmail.com> wrote:

On Thu, Jan 7, 2021 at 2:27 PM Vesna Manojlovic <becha@xs4all.nl> wrote:
As someone from an (ex) country who went through "this", let me tell you:
it can be both/and.

Vesna, I am glad you wrote. Throughout these years I have thought of other peoples' experiences in the former Yugoslavia, in Hungary, in Poland, in Russia and so many other places (NL, etc) beset by the global fascist surge.

You are right: new things are going to unfold while the bullshit continues and worsens.

The question of how to deal with the "death flowers" is the essence of it. They can't exploit any more. There's no man to kick, there's no woman to rape. Ultraviolence is the immediate escape hatch when someone asks for minimum accountability.

I would like to know what other people think. US society is experiencing some kind of pathological tremor, and it's synchronous with all kinds of other places around the world.

When I spoke of a "total social fact," it's exactly the kind of political sequence that Vesna is talking about. That's the breakdown of a bad social order in favor of a worse one. And then the question of how you move forward when the breakdown has occurred.

It's hard for someone from the outside to believe that certain things happened in the 90s, even when they know. Maybe I had so many friends in the former Yugoslavia because I know so many things about the place where I come from.

be well, Brian

Here are some takes from twitter that say the same as Brian, thou:

Solitaire Townsend: https://twitter.com/GreenSolitaire/status/1347115498924871680
& the whole thread:
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1347115498924871680.html

" 'death flowering': it happens when an old tree is diseased
and rotting from the inside.

Trump, Cruz and the GOP in the US and other 'strongmen' attempts
around the world - they are death flowers
White supremacists - death flowers
INCEL misogynists - death flowers

The chaotic growth, bursting energy with no direction, the urgency against
losing entitlements, they are dying and know it, deep down. This isn't
their world anymore.
Epicormic growth isn't sustainable. It's desperation.

But, here's the kicker. You can't wait for a death flowering tree to just
fall. Foresters will get their axe when they spot them,
because these trees can infect and damage the forest itself. They are
dangerous and their rot might pass to other trees.
You gotta chop them down.
Those death flowers are destructive and need felling."

& Bill McKibben

"I can't quite figure out how to say this, but 24 hours later it feels
like there's something potentially healthy about what happened yesterday.
The festering wound is out in the open now. The pus reeks, but at least
it's open to the air. It's harder to gaslight people in daytime."

https://twitter.com/billmckibben/status/1347273450872832003

Your tweeting correspondent,
Vesna

--
community, cooperation, commons, squirrels // http://becha.home.xs4all.nl
nature, anarchy, utopia, un-anthropocene // https://www.unciv.nl // @Ms_Multicolor

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