Date: Mon, 7 Jan 2002 00:54:31 -0800 From: Judy <jaw-AT-earthlink.net> Subject: RE: Baudrillard Lois and all here is a repost of the Baudrillard essay. >> >> >> The spirit of terrorism >> Jean Baudrillard >> Le Monde 2/11/01 >> >> Translated: Dr Rachel Bloul, School of Social sciences, Australian >National >> University. >> >> In footnotes: personal comments to remind me to think about these points >> when later analyzing the piece. >> In italics, details about not-quite-direct translations. >> >> We have had many global events from Diana's death to the World Cup, or >even >> violent and real events from wars to genocides. But not one global >symbolic >> event, that is an event not only with global repercussions, but one that >> questions the very process of globalization. All through the stagnant 90s, >> there has been "la greve des evenements" (literally "an events strike", >> translated from a phrase of the Argentino writer Macedonio Fernandez). >Well, >> the strike is off. We are even facing, with the World Trade Center & New >> York hits, the absolute event, the "mother" of events, the pure event >which >> is the essence of all the events that never happened. >> >> Not only are all history and power plays disrupted, but so are the >> conditions of analysis. One must take one's time. For as long as events >were >> at a standstill, one had to anticipate and overcome them. But when they >> speed up, one must slow down; without getting lost under a mass of >> discourses and the shadow of war ("nuage de la guerre": literally clouds >> announcing war), and while keeping undiminished the unforgettable flash of >> images. >> >> All the speeches and commentaries betray a gigantic abreaction to the >event >> itself and to the fascination that it exerts. Moral condemnation and the >> sacred union against terrorism are equal to the prodigious jubilation >> engendered by witnessing this global superpower being destroyed; better, >by >> seeing it more or less self-destroying, even suiciding spectacularly. >Though >> it is (this superpower) that has, through its unbearable power, engendered >> all that violence brewing around the world, and therefore this terrorist >> imagination which -unknowingly- inhabits us all. >> >> That we have dreamed of this event, that everybody without exception has >> dreamt of it, because everybody must dream of the destruction of any power >> hegemonic to that degree, - this is unacceptable for Western moral >> conscience, but it is still a fact, and one which is justly measured by >the >> pathetic violence of all those discourses which attempt to erase it. >> >> It is almost they who did it, but we who wanted it. If one does not take >> that into account, the event lost all symbolic dimension to become a pure >> accident, an act purely arbitrary, the murderous fantasy of a few >fanatics, >> who would need only to be suppressed. But we know very well that this is >not >> so. Thus all those delirious, counter-phobic exorcisms: because evil is >> there, everywhere as an obscure object of desire. Without this deep >> complicity, the event would not have had such repercussions, and without >> doubt, terrorists know that in their symbolic strategy they can count on >> this unavowable complicity. >> >> This goes much further than hatred for the dominant global power from the >> disinherited and the exploited, those who fell on the wrong side of global >> order. That malignant desire is in the very heart of those who share (this >> order's) benefits. An allergy to all definitive order, to all definitive >> power is happily universal, and the two towers of the World Trade Center >> embodied perfectly, in their very double-ness (literally twin-ness), this >> definitive order. >> >> No need for a death wish or desire for self-destruction, not even for >> perverse effects. It is very logically, and inexorably, that the >(literally: >> "rise to power of power") exacerbates a will to destroy it. And power is >> complicit with its own destruction. When the two towers collapsed, one >could >> feel that they answered the suicide of the kamikazes by their own suicide. >> It has been said: "God cannot declare war on Itself". Well, It can. The >> West, in its God-like position (of divine power, and absolute moral >> legitimacy) becomes suicidal, and declares war on itself. >> >> Numerous disaster movies are witness to this phantasm, which they >obviously >> exorcise through images and submerge under special effects. But the >> universal attraction these movies exert, as pornography does, shows how >> (this phantasm's) realization is always close at hand - the impulse to >deny >> any system being all the stronger if such system is close to perfection or >> absolute supremacy. >> >> It is even probable that the terrorists (like the experts!) did not >> anticipate the collapse of the Twin Towers, which was, far more than (the >> attack of) the Pentagon, the deepest symbolic shock. The symbolic collapse >> of a whole system is due to an unforeseen complicity, as if, by collapsing >> (themselves), by suiciding, the towers had entered the game to complete >the >> event. >> >> In a way, it is the entire system that, by its internal fragility, helps >the >> initial action. The more the system is globally concentrated to constitute >> ultimately only one network, the more it becomes vulnerable at a single >> point (already one little Filipino hacker has succeeded, with his laptop, >to >> launch the I love you virus that wrecked entire networks). Here, eighteen >> (dix-huit in the text) kamikazes, through the absolute arm that is death >> multiplied by technological efficiency, start a global catastrophic >process. >> >> When the situation is thus monopolized by global power, when one deals >with >> this formidable condensation of all functions through technocratic >machinery >> and absolute ideological hegemony (pensee unique), what other way is >there, >> than a terrorist reversal of the situation (literally 'transfer of >> situation': am I too influenced by early translation as 'reversal'?)? It >is >> the system itself that has created the objective conditions for this >brutal >> distortion. By taking all the cards to itself, it forces the Other to >change >> the rules of the game. And the new rules are ferocious, because the stakes >> are ferocious. To a system whose excess of power creates an unsolvable >> challenge, terrorists respond by a definitive act that is also >unanswerable >> (in the text: which cannot be part of the exchange circuit). Terrorism is >an >> act that reintroduces an irreducible singularity in a generalized exchange >> system. Any singularity (whether species, individual or culture), which >has >> paid with its death for the setting up of a global circuit dominated by a >> single power, is avenged today by this terrorist situational transfer. >> >> Terror against terror - there is no more ideology behind all that. We are > >> now far from ideology and politics. No ideology, no cause, not even an >> Islamic cause, can account for the energy which feeds terror. It (energy) >> does not aim anymore to change the world, it aims (as any heresy in its >> time) to radicalize it through sacrifice, while the system aims to realize >> (the world) through force. >> >> Terrorism, like virus, is everywhere. Immersed globally, terrorism, like >the >> shadow of any system of domination, is ready everywhere to emerge as a >> double agent. There is no boundary to define it; it is in the very core of >> this culture that fights it - and the visible schism (and hatred) that >> opposes, on a global level, the exploited and the underdeveloped against >the >> Western world, is secretly linked to the internal fracture of the dominant >> system. The latter can face any visible antagonism. But with terrorism - >and >> its viral structure -, as if every domination apparatus were creating its >> own antibody, the chemistry of its own disappearance; against this almost >> automatic reversal of its own puissance, the system is powerless. And >> terrorism is the shockwave of this silent reversal. >> >> Thus, it is no shock of civilizations, of religions, and it goes much >beyond >> Islam and America, on which one attempts to focus the conflict to give the >> illusion of a visible conflict and of an attainable solution (through >> force). It certainly is a fundamental antagonism, but one which shows, >> through the spectrum of America (which maybe by itself the epicentre but >not >> the embodiment of globalization) and through the spectrum of Islam (which >is >> conversely not the embodiment of terrorism), triumphant globalization >> fighting with itself. In this way it is indeed a World War, not the third >> one, but the fourth and only truly World War, as it has as stakes >> globalization itself. The first two World Wars were classic wars. The >first >> ended European supremacy and the colonial era. The second ended Nazism. >The >> third, which did happen, as a dissuasive Cold War, ended communism. From >one >> war to the other, one went further each time toward a unique world order. >> Today the latter, virtually accomplished, is confronted by antagonistic >> forces, diffused in the very heart of the global, in all its actual >> convulsions. Fractal war in which all cells, all singularities revolt as >> antibodies do. It is a conflict so unfathomable that, from time to time, >one >> must preserve the idea of war through spectacular productions such as the >> Gulf (production) and today Afghanistan's. But the fourth World War is >> elsewhere. It is that which haunts every global order, every hegemonic >> domination; -if Islam dominated the world, terrorism would fight against >it. >> For it is the world itself which resists domination. >> >> Terrorism is immoral. The event of the World Trade Center, this symbolic >> challenge is immoral, and it answers a globalization that is immoral. Then >> let us be immoral ourselves and, if we want to understand something, let >us >> go somewhat beyond Good and Evil. As we have, for once, an event that >> challenges not only morals, but every interpretation, let us try to have >the >> intelligence of Evil. The crucial point is precisely there: in this total >> counter-meaning to Good and Evil in Western philosophy, the philosophy of >> Enlightenment. We naively believe that the progress of the Good, its rise >in >> all domains (sciences, techniques, democracy, human rights) correspond to >a >> defeat of Evil. Nobody seems to understand that Good and Evil rise >> simultaneously, and in the same movement. The triumph of the One does not >> produce the erasure of the Other. Metaphysically, one considers Evil as an >> accident, but this axiom, embedded in all manichean fights of Good against >> Evil, is illusory. Good does not reduce Evil, nor vice-versa: there are >both >> irreducible, and inextricable from each other. In fact, Good could defeat >> Evil only by renouncing itself, as by appropriating a global power >monopoly, >> it creates a response of proportional violence. >> >> In the traditional universe, there was still a balance of Good and Evil, >> according to a dialectical relation that more or less insured tension and >> equilibrium in the moral universe; - a little as in the Cold War, the >> face-to-face of the two powers insured an equilibrium of terror. Thus, >there >> was no supremacy of one on the other. This symmetry is broken as soon as >> there is a total extrapolation of the Good (an hegemony of the positive >over >> any form of negativity, an exclusion of death, of any potential >adversarial >> force: the absolute triumph of the Good). From there, the equilibrium is >> broken, and it is as if Evil regained an invisible autonomy, developing >then >> in exponential fashion. >> >> Keeping everything in proportion, it is more or less what happened in the >> political order with the erasure of communism and the global triumph of >> liberal power: a fantastical enemy appeared, diffused over the whole >planet, >> infiltrating everywhere as a virus, surging from every interstice of >power. >> Islam. But Islam is only the moving front of the crystallization of this >> antagonism. This antagonism is everywhere and it is in each of us. Thus, >> terror against terror... But asymmetrical terror... And this asymmetry >> leaves the global superpower totally disarmed. Fighting itself, it can >only >> founder in its own logic of power relations, without being able to play in >> the field of symbolic challenge and death, as it has eliminated the latter >> from its own culture. >> >> Until now this integrating power had mostly succeeded to absorb every >> crisis, every negativity, creating therefore a deeply hopeless situation >> (not only for the damned of the earth, but for the rich and the privileged >> too, in their radical comfort). The fundamental event is that terrorists >> have finished with empty suicides; they now organize their own death in >> offensive and efficient ways, according to a strategic intuition, that is >> the intuition of the immense fragility of their adversary, this system >> reaching its quasi perfection and thus vulnerable to the least spark. They >> succeeded in making their own death the absolute arm against a system that >> feeds off the exclusion of death, whose ideal is that of zero death. Any >> system of zero death is a zero sum system. And all the means of dissuasion >> and destruction are powerless against an enemy who has already made his >> death a counter-offensive. "What of American bombings! Our men want to die >> as much as Americans want to live!" This explains the asymmetry of 7, 000 >> deaths in one blow against a system of zero death. >> >> Therefore, here, death is the key (to the game) not only the brutal >> irruption of death in direct, in real time, but also the irruption of a >> more-than-real death: symbolic and sacrificial death - the absolute, no >> appeal event. >> >> This is the spirit of terrorism. >> >> Never is it to attack the system through power relations. This belongs to >> the revolutionary imaginary imposed by the system itself, which survives >by >> ceaselessly bringing those who oppose it to fight in the domain of the >real, >> which is always its own. But (it) moves the fight into the symbolic >domain, >> where the rule is the rule of challenge, of reversal, of escalation. Thus, >> death can be answered only though an equal or superior death. (Terrorism) >> challenges the system by a gift that the latter can reciprocate only >through >> its own death and its own collapse. >> >> The terrorist hypothesis is that the system itself suicides in response >to >> the multiple challenges of death and suicide. Neither the system, nor >power, >> themselves escape symbolic obligation -and in this trap resides the only >> chance of their demise (catastrophe). In this vertiginous cycle of the >> impossible exchange of death, the terrorist death is an infinitesimal >point >> that provokes a gigantic aspiration, void and convection. Around this >minute >> point, the whole system of the real and power gains in density, freezes, >> compresses, and sinks in its own super-efficacy. The tactics of terrorism >> are to provoke an excess of reality and to make the system collapse under >> the weight of this excess. The very derision of the situation, as well as >> all the piled up violence of power, flips against it, for terrorist >actions >> are both the magnifying mirror of the system's violence, and the model of >a >> symbolic violence that it cannot access, the only violence it cannot >exert: >> that of its own death. >> >> This is why all this visible power cannot react against the minute, but >> symbolic death of a few individuals. >> >> One must recognize the birth of a new terrorism, a new form of action that >> enters the game and appropriate its rules, the better to confuse it. Not >> only do these people not fight with equal arms, as they produce their own >> deaths, to which there is no possible response ("they are cowards"), but >> they appropriate all the arms of dominant power. Money and financial >> speculation, information technologies and aeronautics, the production of >> spectacle and media networks: they have assimilated all of modernity and >> globalization, while maintaining their aim to destroy it. >> >> Most cunningly, they have even used the banality of American everyday life >> as a mask and double game. Sleeping in their suburbs, reading and studying >> within families, before waking up suddenly like delayed explosive devices. >> The perfect mastery of this secretiveness is almost as terrorist as the >> spectacular action of the 11 September. For it makes one suspect: any >> inoffensive individual can be a potential terrorist! If those terrorists >> could pass unnoticed, then anyone of us is an unnoticed criminal (each >plane >> is suspect too), and ultimately, it might even be true. This might well >> correspond to an unconscious form of potential criminality, masked, >> carefully repressed, but always liable, if not to surge, at least to >> secretly vibrate with the spectacle of Evil. Thus, the event spreads out >in >> its minutiae, the source of an even more subtle psychological (mental) >> terrorism. >> >> The radical difference is that terrorists, while having at their disposal >> all the arms of the system, have also another fatal weapon: their own >death. >> If they limited themselves to fighting the system with its own weapons, >they >> would be immediately eliminated. If they did not oppose the system with >> their own death, they would disappear as quickly as a useless sacrifice; >> this has almost always been the fate of terrorism until now (thus the >> Palestinian suicidal attacks) and the reason why it could not but fail. >> >> Everything changed as soon as they allied all available modern means to >this >> highly symbolic weapon. The latter infinitely multiplies their destructive >> potential. It is the multiplication of these two factors (which seem to us >> so irreconcilable) that gives them such superiority. Conversely, the >> strategy of zero death, of a technological, 'clean' war, precisely misses >> this transfiguration of 'real' power by symbolic power. >> >> The prodigious success of such an attack poses a problem, and to >understand >> it, one must tear oneself away from our Western perspective, to apprehend >> what happens in terrorists' minds and organization. Such efficacy, for us, >> would mean maximal calculation and rationality, something we have >> difficulties imagining in others. And even then, with us, there would >always >> be, as in any rational organization or secret service, leaks and errors. >> >> Thus, the secret of such success is elsewhere. The difference, with them, >is >> that there is no work contract, but a pact and an obligation of sacrifice. >> Such obligation is secure from defection and corruption. The miracle is >the >> adaptation to a global network, to technical protocols without any loss of >> this complicity for life and to the death. Contrary to the contract, the >> pact does not link individuals, -even their 'suicide' is not individual >> heroism, it is a collective, sacrificial act, sealed by demanding ideals >> (I'm a bit free here but I feel it corresponds better to what is meant by >> 'exigence ideale'). And it is the conjunction of these two mechanisms, >born >> of an operational structure and of a symbolic pact, which makes possible >> such an excessive action. >> >> We have no idea anymore of what is such a symbolic calculation, as in >poker >> or potlatch, with minimal stakes and maximal result. That is, exactly what >> terrorists obtained in the attack on Manhattan, and which would be a good >> metaphor for chaos theory: an initial shock, provoking incalculable >> consequences, while American gigantic deployment ("Desert Storm") obtained >> only derisory effects; - the storm ending so to speak in the flutter of >> butterfly wings. >> >> Suicidal terrorism was the terrorism of the poor; this is the terrorism of >> the rich. And that is what specially frighten us: they have become rich >> (they have every means) without ceasing to want to eradicate us. >Certainly, >> according to our value system, they cheat: staking (gambling?) one's own >> death is cheating. But they could not care less, and the new rules of the >> game are not ours. >> >> We try everything to discredit their actions. Thus, we call them >"suicidal" >> and "martyrs". To add immediately that such martyrdom does not prove >> anything, that it has nothing to do with truth and even (quoting >Nietzsche) >> that it is the enemy of truth. Certainly, their death does not prove >> anything, but there is nothing to prove in a system where truth itself is >> elusive --or are we pretending to own it? Besides, such a moral argument >can >> be reversed. If the voluntary martyrdom of the kamikazes proves nothing, >> then the involuntary martyrdom of the victims cannot prove anything >either, >> and there is something obscene in making it a moral argument (the above is >> not to negate their suffering and their death). >> >> Another bad faith argument: these terrorists exchange their death for a >> place in Paradise. Their act is not gratuitous, thus it is not authentic. >It >> would be gratuitous only if they did not believe in God, if their death >was >> without hope, as is ours (yet Christian martyrs assumed just such sublime >> exchange). Thus, again, they do not fight with equal weapons if they have >> the right to a salvation we can no longer hope for. We have to lose >> everything by our death while they can pledge it for the highest stakes. >> >> Ultimately, all that - causes, proofs, truth, rewards, means and ends- >> belongs to typically Western calculation. We even put a value to death in >> terms of interest rates, and quality/price ratio. Such economic >calculations >> are the calculation of those poor who no longer have even the courage to >pay >> (the price of death?). >> >> What can happen, - apart from war, which is no more than a conventional >> protection screen? We talk of bio-terrorism, bacteriological war or >nuclear >> terrorism. But none of that belongs to the domain of symbolic challenge, >> rather it belongs to an annihilation without speech, without glory, >without >> risk - that is, to the domain of the final solution. >> >> And to see in terrorist action a purely destructive logic is nonsense. It >> seems to me that their own death is inseparable from their action ( it is >> precisely what makes it a symbolic action), and not at all the impersonal >> elimination of the Other. Everything resides in the challenge and the >duel, >> that is still in a personal, dual relation with the adversary. It is the >> power of the adversary that has humbled you, it is this power which must >be >> humbled. And not simply exterminated... One must make (the adversary) lose >> face. And this cannot be obtained by pure force and by the suppression of >> the other. The latter must be aimed at, and hurt, as a personal adversary. >> Apart from the pact that links terrorists to each other, there is >something >> like a dual pact with the adversary. It is then, exactly the opposite to >the >> cowardice of which they are accused, and it is exactly the opposite of >what >> Americans do, for example in the Gulf War (and which they are doing again >in >> Afghanistan): invisible target, operational elimination. >> >> Of all these vicissitudes, we particularly remember seeing images. And we >> must keep this proliferation of images, and their fascination, for they >> constitute, willy nilly, our primitive scene. And the New York events have >> radicalized the relation of images to reality, in the same way as they >have >> radicalized the global situation. While before we dealt with an unbroken >> abundance of banal images and an uninterrupted flow of spurious events, >the >> terrorist attack in New York has resurrected both the image and the event. >> >> Among the other weapons of the system which they have co-opted against it, >> terrorists have exploited the real time of images (not clear here if it is >> real duration, real time or images in real time), their instantaneous >global >> diffusion. They have appropriated it in the same way as they have >> appropriated financial speculation, electronic information or air traffic. >> The role of images is highly ambiguous. For they capture the event (take >it >> as hostage) at the same time as they glorify it. They can be infinitely >> multiplied, and at the same time act as a diversion and a neutralization >(as >> happened for the events of May 68). One always forgets that when one >speaks >> of the "danger" of the media. The image consumes the event, that is, it >> absorbs the latter and gives it back as consumer goods. Certainly the >image >> gives to the event an unprecedented impact, but as an image-event. >> >> What happens then to the real event, if everywhere the image, the fiction, >> the virtual, infuses reality? In this present case, one might perceive >> (maybe with a certain relief) a resurgence of the real, and of the >violence >> of the real, in a supposedly virtual universe. "This is the end of all >your >> virtual stories, - that is real!" Similarly, one could perceive a >> resurrection of history after its proclaimed death. But does reality >really >> prevail over fiction? If it seems so, it is because reality has absorbed >the >> energy of fiction, and become fiction itself. One could almost say that >> reality is jealous of fiction, that the real is jealous of the image... It >> is as if they duel, to find which is the most unimaginable. >> >> The collapse of the towers of the World Trade Center is unimaginable, but >> that is not enough to make it a real event. A surplus of violence is not >> enough to open up reality. For reality is a principle, and this principle >is >> lost. Real and fiction are inextricable, and the fascination of the attack >> is foremost the fascination by the image (the consequences, whether >> catastrophic or leading to jubilation are themselves mostly imaginary). >> >> It is therefore a case where the real is added to the image as a terror >> bonus, as yet another thrill. It is not only terrifying, it is even real. >It >> is not the violence of the real that is first there, with the added thrill >> of the image; rather the image is there first, with the added thrill of >the >> real. It is something like a prize fiction, a fiction beyond fiction. >> Ballard (after Borges) was thus speaking of reinventing the real as the >> ultimate, and most redoubtable, fiction. >> >> This terrorist violence is not then reality backfiring, no more than it is >> history backfiring. This terrorist violence is not "real". It is worse in >a >> way: it is symbolic. Violence in itself can be perfectly banal and >> innocuous. Only symbolic violence generates singularity. And in this >> singular event, in this disaster movie of Manhattan, the two elements that >> fascinate 20th century masses are joined: the white magic of movies and >the >> black magic of terrorism. >> >> One tries after the event to assign to the latter any meaning, to find any >> possible interpretation. But there is none possible, and it is only the >> radicality of the spectacle, the brutality of the spectacle that is >original >> and irreducible. The spectacle of terrorism imposes the terrorism of the >> spectacle. And against this immoral fascination (even if it engenders a >> universal moral reaction) the political order can do nothing. This is our >> theatre of cruelty, the only one left to us, -extraordinary because it >> unites the most spectacular to the most provocative. It is both the >sublime >> micro-model of a nucleus of real violence with maximal resonance - thus >the >> purest form of the spectacular, and the sacrificial model that opposes to >> historical and political order the purest symbolic form of challenge. >> >> Any slaughter would be forgiven them if it had a meaning, if it could be >> interpreted as historical violence - this is the moral axiom of >permissible >> violence. Any violence would be forgiven them if it were not broadcast by >> media ("Terrorism would be nothing without the media"). But all that is >> illusory. There is no good usage of the media, the media are part of the >> event, they are part of the terror and they are part of the game in one >way >> or another. >> >> Repressive actions travel the same unpredictable spiral as terrorist >actions >> - none can know where it may stop, and what reversals may follow. At the >> level of the image and information, there are no possible distinctions >> between the spectacular and the symbolic, between "crime" and repression. >> And this uncontrollable unraveling of reversibility is the true victory of >> terrorism. It is a victory visible in the underground and extensive >> ramifications of the event - not only in direct, economic, political, >market >> and financial recessions for the whole system, and in the moral and >> psychological regression that follows; but also in the regression of the >> value system, of all the ideology of freedom and free movement etc... that >> the Western world is so proud of, and that legitimates in its eyes its >power >> over the rest of the world. >> >> Already, the idea of freedom, a new and recent (sic) idea, is being erased >> from everyday lives and consciousness, and liberal globalization is being >> realized as its exact reverse: a 'Law and Order' globalization, a total >> control, a policing terror. Deregulation ends in maximal constraints and >> restrictions, equal to those in a fundamentalist society. >> >> Production, consumption, speculation and growth slowdowns (but not of >course >> corruption!): everything indicates a strategic retreat of the global >system, >> a heart-rending revision of its values, a regulation forced by absolute >> disorder, but one the system imposes on itself, internalizing its own >> defeat. It seems a defensive reaction to terrorism impact, but it might in >> fact respond to secret injunctions. >> >> Another side to terrorist victory is that all other forms of violence and >> destabilization of order favor it: Internet terrorism, biological >terrorism, >> anthrax terrorism and the terrorism of the rumor, all are assigned to Ben >> Laden. He could even claim natural disasters. Every form of >disorganization >> and perverse exchange benefits him. The structure of generalized global >> exchange itself favors impossible exchange. It is a form of terrorist >> automatic writing, constantly fed by the involuntary terrorism of the >news. >> With all its consequent panics: if, in that anthrax story, intoxication >> happens by itself, by instantaneous crystallization, like a chemical >> solution reacting to the contact of a molecule, it is because the system >has >> reached the critical mass that makes it vulnerable to any aggression. >> >> There is no solution to this extreme situation, especially not war that >> offers only an experience of deja-vu, with the same flooding of military >> forces, fantastic news, useless propaganda, deceitful and pathetic >> discourses and technological deployment. In other words, as in the Gulf >War, >> a non-event, an event that did not happen... >> >> There is its raison d'etre: to substitute to a real and formidable, unique >> and unforeseeable event, a repetitive and deja-vu pseudo-event. The > terrorist attack corresponded to a primacy of the event over every model >of > interpretation. Conversely, this stupidly military and technological war > corresponds to a primacy of the model over the event, that is to >fictitious > stakes and to a non-sequitur. War extends/continues the absence at the >heart > of politics through other means.
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