Subject: Soren /Debaser
Date: Sun, 22 Mar 1998 13:21:38 -0700 (MST)
From: Gary Norris <garyn-AT-tatteredcover.com>


> 
> I get the feeling that both of you are into the Derrida kind of
> deconstruction stuff with all this talk about poetics. 

	It is interseting, Soren, that you "get the feeling" while at the 
same time debasing what it is that poetry does with that same feeling.  
Why are you so quick to assume that because I have mentioned poetry that 
I fall into Derrida's camp?  It certainly appears that you embrace every 
word that JB writes on a page, which I might remind you is very 
dangerous.  Irony is something that should not be overlooked;  JB uses it 
often.

> You're 
> perfectly entitled to think that the world could be changed through 
> poetry, but in my view, this is an anachronistic political strategy.
>
	
	Some Marxists still believe in revolution.
 
[[I snipped out the majority of this paragraph]]
> No need to study discursive formations since the condition 
> of possibility of all discourses (the possibility of separating 
> knowledge from non-knowledge) has been destroyed with hyperreality. 
> There are no longer any limits to the sayable, and this has lead to a 
> proliferation of truths (what Eric earlier called "semiotic 
> pollution").
> 
	
	Eric has a much better grasp, I think, of what semiotics is than 
you.
	Why do you continually replace "knowledge" for "meaning?"  I mean, 
it certainly seems that for you "knowledge" and "meaning" are 
interchangeable.  (They aren't you know.)  I see it twice above, not  
explicity, but implicitly.  Poetry means something, knowledge is not  
necessary.  This is, as far as Kristeva goes, the joy we 
get FROM speaking.  The throat likes to make noises (the chora.) 


> This situation greatly diminishes the critical power of 
> deconstruction and poetics.

	I am not interested in deconstruction.  Do not attempt to pin me 
down in this crass way.

> Signification has been replaced by 
> simulation, and a sign based upon simulation cannot be cracked 
> through deconstruction and poetics in the same way as a sign based on 
> upon signification. It can only be exceeded through a Fatal Strategy.
>
	
	I was going to mention this above and decided to let it go, but 
now you have forced my hand.  Signification has not been replace by 
simulation.  Not yet, at least.  Soren has seemingly built a veritable  
fortress of Baudrillardian ISAs which he functions within signifying  
everything as if it meant nothing.  This gives me pause to remember 
MACBETH:  (to paraphrase) Life is a tale told by an idiot, full of 
sound and fury, yet signifying nothing.  As much as you would like to 
agree with JB about Fouccault, Fouccault's words have more of an affect 
upon you than you realize.  JB has mesmerized you.  Your critique 
suffers from it.

[[I snipped the discussion about Barthes]] 
> the sign.  Baudrillard kind of flips this. He argues there never is 
> original transitive content in the sign and that all signs begin as 
> intransitive. When the content of the sign is contested, ideological 
> discourse kicks in. Only then does the pretense of transitive content 
> arise. For a long time we behaved _as if_ the former were true. In 
> hyperreality there is no longer any pretense of original transitive 
> content. Operational simulation involves the arbitrary assembly of 
> systems of signs with purely intransitive content - and no apology is 
> necessary."
> 

	Hyperreality does not, cannot, and must not exist.  It is 
imaginary.  Sorry.  You might fantasize about hyperreality in the place 
in which you live, but a good portion of this earth still lives in a real 
puddle of shit.  It is physical, sensual, spiritual (at times), but don't 
confuse industrial society's impotence with your refusal to accept the 
romantic view that intentionality is still possible, the great is 
contained within the small (Holderlin, for the interested,) and 
revolution is always a few steps away.  Don't be a debaser, for the sake of 
evangelizing one man's critique of society. (And don't get me wrong, I do 
read and typically agree with JB's critiques.)


I s(t)ated:
> > >I just would like some to keep in mind that the Ideological is our
> > >IMAGINARY representations of THE real conditions of esixtence.  The
> > >chasm created by language, its power over us, obviously hasn't been
> > >considered thoroughly.  Hence, ridiculous stratements about realism
> > >vs. anti-realism.
> 

Soren replies:
> I wish you would acknowledge that Baudrillard is different from the 
> linguistic idealists referred to above. He's really not that 
> interested in language (relatively compared to, say, Derrida, 
> Barthes, Wittgenstein, Rorty, etc.). Both of you are helplessly 
> moving around inside a subject-centered philosophical universe, and 
> this is what Baudrillard wants to transcend.
> 
	
	JB better be interested in language.  It is a force that cannot 
be transcended.  You are right though to say that I am moving about in a 
subject oriented realm.  I accept that critique.  I will revel in it for 
you if you like.
	As far as language or speech goes, I prefer to stick with 
Heidegger's later essays and Merleau Ponty.

I am sending the rest of the reply in a separate post, I accidentally 
deleted it.

gary