week one
week two
The task set forth by Audre Lorde is to create interdependencies of mutuality and shared support as systems of overcoming the patriarchal world in contrast to occupying oneself with “the master’s concerns.” These systems of interdependency view difference as dialectic, difference as ways of forming new knowledge. This goes hand-in-hand with the XF call for synthesis vs mere analysis. Lorde’s “define and empower” can only come about through the privileging of the dialectical materialist method. Since the digital is always already material, one must respond to it in like, any other way would be ungrounded, unmoored, and mere reaction. XF observes: “Systemic thinking and structural analysis have largely fallen to the wayside” in favour of fragmented insurrections, such as that which was suggested by CAE. CAE argues that systemic change is impossible, so coordination for such a change is futile. CAE calls on independent non-hierarchical cells, the organization of which is to be built on trust, and for members of each cell to have a variety of skill-sets. In my opinion, this way of organizing seems inclined for a sort of post-apocalyptic dystopia, in which communication and coordination with others outside of one’s local community is impossible or unsafe. However, as we know, global capital is global and organized as such, so any attempt at affecting it must be done in the same manner, through the coordination of a global community. CAE suggests there is no materiality to the digital, though this response may be an analysis from a particular point in time, when “information” was not viewed as physical in the same way.
An idea that brought up by CAE that sparked my interested was their initial use of the term “nomadic.” I have been thinking of nomadic systems, nomadic ways of relating and living vs settled ways of relating and living to space, land, material objects, and other people. This isn’t the direction they went, but it is something I’d like to continue exploring.
I love the idea of sharing information and providing useful resources and tools for communities.
The examples presented to us led me to start thinking about the overwhelming amount of information on the internet and the anxieties it produces, such as what is found in memes such as “monitoring the situation” and prediction markets, the commodification and gamification of information. What I want is not another instance of more information, but a different relationship to it. What can produce knowledge as opposed to a conglomeration of data and a relentless barrage of facts. How can we create a space for deep thought and the space for reflection? What kind of tools can be made, shared, imagined to invite that kind of opening?
I’ve been feeling a kind of anxiety with relation to time and information online that I do’t think I’ve experienced before this war. There’s a feeling of always missing something, constantly searching for a piece of information, an event, that I could be missing. Not having direct and immediate information from those currently within Iran, I’ve felt a sort of powerlessness in the face of recent events. The constant facade, contradictory statements, violent language, violent imagery has caused me to want less and not more. I often think back to a like from the Invisible Man about sleep being a precursor to action.
week three
My notes on effective virtual sabotage:
1. there is a requirement for a certain (critical mass) number of people, otherwise the disruption is ineffectual.
2. their efforts must be coordinated
3. add friction, stall, make less efficient
also thinking of this recent article on 404 media about the recently declassified CIA manual on sabotaging fascism.
https://www.404media.co/declassified-cia-guide-to-sabotaging-fascism-is-suddenly-viral/
week seven?
I loved reading about the creative ways for leafletting on the Beautiful Trouble website. It gave me some ideas for what we can do for leafletting for the group project. They have ideas for dressing up in costume, using a literal robot to hand out leaflets, etc. It got me to thinking about dressing up as a data centre. What does a data centre even look like? I remember seeing images years ago, and I have seen images of the interior recently, but it might be interesting even to dress up as one and create curiosity that way, or maybe to create a model. I like the idea of creating a bill (the example of anti-war activists dressed up as waiters handing out bills for a war as "this is what it cost you"), or even some other sort of interactive bill. Years ago, I think an interactive poetry project as a part of a conference on Rent, using the format of a rent cheque that people could fill in like a mad-lib to create new works of poetry. What comes to mind for me, which is something that is never brought up in mainstream conversations about issues like war, data centres, or other such projects, is that the cost is actually not the real issue. It doesn't matter to those in power how much it costs, because it the cost of power for them. The real issue is making sure those of us below them can continue to be exploited. This is only possible through various processes of disempowerment and disenfranchisement. All technologies of automation are made for that purpose. A short term loss through investment in machinery or lobbying or lawsuit settlements are always overcome by long term gains. Perhaps this is the most important point that needs to be conveyed. And perhaps those are the real costs for the public and those are the costs that should be visualized or communicate through some creative means.
I am writing this a couple of days after reading the article about Why Protest Work. What I remember is how vehemently I disagreed with almost every point the author made. It put the blame on social media being used as a means for disseminating information, when I believe that in those examples, they were more like the symptom of the larger problem, or rather, just one piece of the puzzle of the picture explaining the reasons why certain recent protest movements were unable to succeed. Yes, the issue is that there were no real on the ground organizations laying the groundwork locally on which these movements could land, but the reason for that isn't that they came out of social media, but that those movements had been stripped and destroyed. During the Occupy movement I did not find out about any of the events through social media, but through word of mouth, posters, and simply showing up because I knew that they would be there every night. This is the same as the protests against the war on Iraq: I would show up the the protests every weekend because I knew they would be there. This is the same as what I have heard about ongoing protests movements around the world, specifically the most recent one in Iran as well, since the use of social media for coordinating was not even possible.