Cultural Struggle

I found a good post (non-permalink? in which case archive at March 18 "the urban experience") at a blog called Living on Less. It's a review of a book by David Harvey called "The Urban Experience" outlining the contradictions inherent in trying to create progressive autonomous communities within capitalism. I think it nicely summarizes the stalemate of urban theory. There can be no progressive theory unless this stalemate is overcome.

It outlines why "cultural" struggle is difficult -- culture is basically about consumption, the rules of objects that provide a framework for shared activity. These rules and rituals of consumption can be used to create social space, but this space can be easily trumped by the deterritorialization of the market. In order to prevent this, it would be necessary to put up very strong barriers and constantly guard against infiltration, which in turn easily gives way to paranoia and repression. This knife-edge throws the entire "progressive" nature of the project into question.

So this is obviously why struggle over production is vastly preferable. But this struggle still needs cultural support: Union struggles, for instance, cannot effectively develop if producers are seen to be screwing over consumers by waging union struggle. So we're back to the need for a culture of struggle to relate producers and consumers.

The revolutionary party is an advanced form of this culture, but we're so far away from party consciousness that discussing it is little more than a bad joke. The party is a uniform, and we don't even know how to make the appropriate fabric, let alone how to cut it. So where does that leave us?

A few ideas:

First of all, the struggle has to be waged from the side of production. It is the rule-boundedness of specific cultures that makes them so easily out-maneuvered by the market. If a subculture is appealing, and offers advantages over the dominant culture, more people want to get into it. If this culture is determined by a closed set of objects and esoteric rules for their usage, the esoterica gets swamped by the influx of new people and new needs, and the objects can be mass-produced for cheaper than the artisanal method that "cultural autonomy" implies. Checkmate.

Add to this the inestimable value of functioning urban space, and the eagerness of finance capital to realize a profit, and multiply the willingness of mayors to use police violence in service of law & order, and there's a stark limit to how far this struggle can go without a tight relation to the power of production.

Secondly, we need to take into consideration the radical recombination that now occurs daily in the urban context beneath the innocuous moniker "commuting." The socialization of transportation is historically intwined with the destruction of ghettos: police enforced street-clearance to "open up" neighborhoods, raising slums to build highways, housing projects built with the specific exclusion of jobs written into their charters, etc. The culture that has been produced, a kind of "hyper-culture," is staggering, mutated and quite monstrous, and needs to be reckoned with. The great increase in the common language has been accompanied with a vigilant scourging of that language's ability to carry collective passions.

I don't know where this is heading.

But I do know that the idea of an autonomous culture is terminally fucked. We need explosion, not erosion. My question for today is: how can the "right to rebel" be communicated across the synaptic gap between production and consumption? I'm not really sure if this is even a good question; maybe it follows "of course" from an effective organization of producers.

Leap

first blossoms in the East Village

The cart has made a quantum leap.
I am still waiting for one
in my writing and photography.

The change of season is part of it.
Moving from winter (consolidation)
to spring (dilation), with
attendant crowds on the streets
at Stanton and Ludlow.
But where's my other work going?

Cartside, my understanding of
the technology and my vision for
future changes has snapped
into sharper focus.

I've made a major innovation
in my BBQ chicken sandwich recipe.

I've changed over
to using chicken thighs --
As Jeffrey, my butcher, says
"Thighs have a better hang time."
meaning they don't dry out
if you hold them at a hot temperature.

One of my regulars says:
"They are really the better part
of the chicken."
meaning they've got more flavor
and get over this low-fat crazyness.

I can get thighs already boned-out,
a 10 lb bag for $15.

I rub them with spices
and roast them on spits,
like the chinese
cook their BBQ pork.

(One side-result of my
tests can be seen here.)

It's pretty fucking delicious,
and it fills out the menu
beautifully.

As for the rest, I'm working
on hypercities, I did this
interview on Gothamist
(which was well recieved),
I changed the template for
this page a bit...
and I'm not really sure what.
I'm waiting for a break-through...

Photos by bluejake

There have been three really cool photo series over at Bluejake. I like them alot. He's got a lot of good stuff in his archives, too. If your into it, check out his "tenement" series (I'm too lazy to pull the link, so browse).

double dawn

Go see pallalink!

Look into the hypnotic power of my eeevil eye. Now go see pallalink. Are you there already? No, you're not, you're still reading this...

Stop reading this and go look at this guy's pictures.

Jeez, you're a tough nut to crack. OK, OK. You should go see this guy's work because he's the most relentlessly innovative photoblogger I know of. Seriously, he turns my brain inside-out again and again. It's like a Burroughs cut-up, but with pictures. He uses reflections and tesselations and god-knows-what-else to make these astounding images that are what the future might look like if we're really lucky. Like this:

"shearing 10" by pallalink

Damn. That's fucking cool. His pictures should be everywhere, ten times the size of god.

Now go.

The Red Chef Presents...

I've added a new blog,
for my more food-related
ramblings
(including my new and
favorite recipes)

over at http://www.kapshow.com/redchef/

the template's still a
little fucked up,
but it's readable

and with the new
food propaganda
getting smeared around
I can't wait for a more dignified unveiling.

OK, vanity again

I have to admit to feeling little burnt
for a moment
by Stephen Fry calling
Americans self-involved,

(liking him, as I do; and not yet reading through the journalistic cut-and-paste job in effect)

speaking
As someone who has known lonliness
and therefore a certain degree
of involvement with myself

you know?
Talking in the first person,
I have to admit to that.

but it ain't that simple joe

-----------

it's really important
to keep one thing
crystal
fucking
clear:
Vanity is not the same as narcissism.

Narcissism is simple self-centeredness.
("write what you know, right?" says mol)
Vanity is systematic detachment
from other people.

they operate on entirely different frequencies,
even when combined in a single perp

-----------

A narcissist may care a great deal
about the people connected to him
or
the events that occur around her

There is a trap there,
but there is
an exit

Vanity pulls away from that border.
pulls away from other people.
that is its operation, that is its function

A narcissist may try to
pull you in, even
incorporate you.

But you are still a there for them!
still something that must be
contended with, someone else
who holds a key
to their desire
EVEN IF THAT DESIRE IS ONLY FOR YOUR PRAISE.

(So Steve, when you knock people
for eating pap
did you ever think that
a nation of invalids
might need
to work up to solid food?

There is work to be done --
but people will endure an awful lot of toil
for a little praise.)

VANITY, ON THE OTHER HAND,
ESCHEWS THE ENTIRE "OTHER PEOPLE" DEAL ALTOGETHER
any mutal implication

ANY
speaking of the two of you
in the same breath

is impossible and contraindicated
is
too horrible to be confronted.
"that's a big negatory --
These are not elements to be juxtaposed."

You see the difference?

We are self-centered
by default
naturally,
if we don't pull each other
up out of it, out of that
lonely mire of selfhood.

This is a social work,
not a personal characteristic.

Vanity, onna other hand, don't want all that --

cures the dirty lowness
that is a life alone
by rejecting life altogether!

"right quick sir
I got your
final solution right here."

This is the choice at current:
muck-filled swamp,
or sterile orb.

by hook and crook I would rather live

***and Don't fool yourself
there is no way back to Eden
the original knowledge
is all used up.
forward is the way.

There cannot be:
no life here
and life elsewhere

velocity is no savior
if there is no starting point

Life is mutual apprehension
of itself and something else.
here relating to
there

"this is the space age we are here to go"

but

our steps are on this earth
and start

in our own shoes

Two problems, one solution

I'm looking for collaboration on the pushcart.

Remember I said that the pushcart experiment was about collaboration? Well, call it foreshadowing. It is quite clear where the project needs to head if it was going to survive.

Cities are the product of massive collaboration -- the labor of many, intricately connected and layered, is what produces the space we live in. And to hold even a small piece of that space -- rent is expensive, remember -- takes cooperation.

How is this cooperation to be organized? Obviously, I am not looking for an employee. But if I need help even with my basic operation, how am I going to get it? Molly provides a pointer: "You have to let them do their own thing. You have a pushcart that they can use. You'll figure out how to help each other from there."

Equality. That is the beginning. Two problems, one solution.

Molly had a dream a few weeks ago. People had robotic dogs as pets. In the dream, Molly thought it was OK. A little weird maybe, but OK. Then she saw that people also had robotic babies, and it really started to creep her out.

We talked about it: why is an electronic baby creepy? Of course, Molly said, it could never grow up -- but that, in itself, doesn't make it monsterous. And if you didn't have to clean up all that shit and feed it too?

Where it really starts to get creepy is when you realize how perfectly a baby's attention could be simulated. It's doesn't take much more that a few simple motors to convincingly portray a baby's wide-eyed interest. Have you ever seen a beer commercial where the woman looks right at you? There was one in particular, on the subway I took to work, which for me, perfectly captured the thrill of being observed with that wide-eyed attention. It always made me start because I felt that hard-wired thrill -- biological response to a certain shape of eye. And that was a damn poster! And of a fully-grown woman, who would get pretty boring if she just goggled at you like an infant for more than a moment.

If that is enough we are over. If porn is enough we are over. There is something more than attention, there is involvement. An electronic baby will never be involved with you, which is to say you will never feed it, never clean up its shit. You may become involved with it, but it will never be involved with you. Where there is no mutual experience, there is no possibility of growth.

You have to clean up someone else's shit sometimes. You have to be prepared to take on someone else's problems if you want help with your own. Otherwise you got an "employee," which is just another way of saying "another problem."

Two problems, one solution.

rebel

to recap:

the cart is an experiment

the experiment is about collaboration

now let me throw one more thing
into the mix:

it's right to rebel.

The winter is a time of amassing strength
taking account

I've got a cart.
And I am looking for a collaborator,

a colleague in the laboratory.

I posted an ad on my alma
mater's job postings ---

Chef opportunity at gourmet pushcart, Lower East Side location. Work with
FCI graduate to develop your own food business. Set your own menu,
keep your own profits -- income in excess of $400/wk possible. Food
industry experience useful, cooperative attitude essential. Contact
owner/operator by phone or email for details.

...a startling number of fishes
took the bait right
away, and some of 'em seem to like it

we are going ahead together

so far so good.....

but are they rebels?

do they have to be?

what are the terms of this new understanding?

there's
no knowing
until the real work starts.

back online

allright folks I'm back
(more or less)
at both cart and keyboard

-------------
It's was the old caught between two lovers routine,
 and for a while I wasn't getting much action
 on either side.

The cart needed life support just
 to make it through the winter 
alive, so the blog (which freezes much better) was 
forced into hibernation.
-------------
but now
the cart's vital signs are 
       fattening up  nicely
 after a flat EKG for 
  a coupla months   there 

So here goes let's see 
    if this bitch
 will turn over
for me.


-----

postscript

I've also posted a back-dated
  snowball from the freezer
    for memories' sake