File spoon-archives/heidegger.archive/heidegger_2003/heidegger.0311, message 477


From: "Anthony Crifasi" <crifasi-AT-hotmail.com>
Subject: RE: Liberal vs. social democracy - Gestell/Gewinnst
Date: Thu, 27 Nov 2003 17:00:58 +0000


Rene de Bakker wrote:

>rather: things MUST get out of control, in order for there to be
>an urge to control them.
>But things CANNOT be under control, basically. So Gestell is
>the obligation to do the impossible.
>
>Denying this means: saying: I, or we, CAN do it. If you have
>means (power), the less powerful pay in order to sustain your
>illusion.
>
>We're trying to understand why free democracies, with moral self-
>esteem, ARE aggressive, even independent of whether politicians
>and parties wish to be or not.

But with regard to "technological frenzy," Heidegger criticized both America 
(a free democracy) AND Russia:

"From a metaphysical point of view, Russia and America are the same; the 
same dreary technological frenzy, the same unrestricted organization of the 
average man." (Intro. to Met.)

This is also evidence, I think, that Heidegger would not say that 
corporations have more power than government to define things under the sway 
of gestell, since not only were there no corporations in Russia, but not 
even any private property (the very core of capitalism) at all. There were, 
however, corporations in America at the time he said the above, so if he had 
thought there was a lopsided contrast between corporations and government 
with regard to technologizing, he surely would have said so. But I haven't 
read what or whether he says in later writings about Russia. Anyone know of 
any texts on that?

Anthony Crifasi

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