tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post5042204623603214100..comments2023-07-09T07:45:50.552-07:00Comments on Socialism and/or barbarism: Salvagepunk (Apocalyptic notes, 1)ECWhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/02142600295759704786noreply@blogger.comBlogger10125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-25477369202602437402009-09-01T16:17:28.418-07:002009-09-01T16:17:28.418-07:00Neolibralism is far from dead, mainly because it i...Neolibralism is far from dead, mainly because it is fast becoming the only option. I have noticed that if you look in the past you will always find 1- and really, when itch comes to scratch only 1 -great conservative republic at a time, with space inbetween them. The old conservatism is dying, and the problem is that, especially in a progressivist country like the US, even normal libralism is apt to become neolibralism (extreme in short). Libralism is, by default, undead, while conservatism is not. (It may be a bit [okay, a lot] biased to say, but I would refer to the saying: there might be heaven, but there must be hell.)Governor of Miletusnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-26637160687376222312009-03-11T15:39:00.000-07:002009-03-11T15:39:00.000-07:00Giovanni:great image.Turns out the formidable Mr. ...<I>Giovanni:<BR/>great image.</I><BR/><BR/>Turns out the formidable <A HREF="http://nastybrutalistandshort.blogspot.com/2009/03/neoliberal-undeath.htmls" REL="nofollow">Mr. Hatherley</A> had thought of it first. It must have seeped into my subconscious. Also, I have the memory of a gnat.<BR/><BR/><I>More seriously, though, the dancing on the grave is both premature and important. Not to say that shifts in the world economic order result from speech-acts, but a certain gathering storm of pessimism (combined with concrete analyses) seeps into public discourse and begins to discredit the system that produced it.</I><BR/><BR/>I'm rather more fond of the concrete analysis, I suspect the pessimism serves mostly to gets more people laid off more quickly. I'm also constitutionally a bit wary of the politics of glee, but that takes us way off track.<BR/><BR/>I've been mulling over your recent posts a little bit more (would love to have something intelligent to say about the idea of surplus life, that's a very powerful concept) and I wonder if you see merit in considering recent American cinema - dependent, as opposed to independent - as a form of salvagepunk, with its endless string of remakes, adaptations, sequels. <BR/><BR/>(Also, an appreciator of Messrs Bava and Fulci: I take the top half of my skull off to you, sir.)Giovanni Tisohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10618534731338616708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-8207335457907717282009-03-11T10:33:00.000-07:002009-03-11T10:33:00.000-07:00Giovanni:great image. Like in Bava's Black Sunday...Giovanni:<BR/><BR/>great image. Like in Bava's Black Sunday: do the killing wrong, and you end up with an enormously pissed-off undead being. (Although a Barbara Steele is infinitely preferable to that of retributive neoliberalism.)<BR/><BR/>More seriously, though, the dancing on the grave is both premature and important. Not to say that shifts in the world economic order result from speech-acts, but a certain gathering storm of pessimism (combined with concrete analyses) seeps into public discourse and begins to discredit the system that produced it.<BR/><BR/>I think the symbolic import of the bailout (as in, who needs who, whose lot has been cast where) is still unfolding. Though I strongly suspect that the soon-to-be-apparent lack of success (see GM angling for further cash) will drive the stake in properly, if not into the hegemonic weight of what remains of a neoliberal financial system but of the tattered remains of public belief in it as a project.ECWhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02142600295759704786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-29647137888290134452009-03-10T08:52:00.000-07:002009-03-10T08:52:00.000-07:00Is Salvagepunk not JUNKPUNK?We dream of steampunk ...Is Salvagepunk not JUNKPUNK?<BR/><BR/>We dream of steampunk knights, we are the junkpunkites.TOYKULThttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07389300876602188822noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-84780759340899729872009-03-04T00:35:00.000-08:002009-03-04T00:35:00.000-08:00This is brilliant, exhilarating stuff. Well done s...This is brilliant, exhilarating stuff. Well done sir. I might, if not exactly take issue with, invite further reflection on this phrase I'm hearing a lot these days<BR/><BR/><I>The end of neoliberalism happening as I write</I><BR/><BR/>I wonder if we're dancing on that particular grave a little prematurely. Isn't the bailout - that genius piece of taking over the debt without acquiring the assets - a surrender to the idea that we threw our collective lot in with the investment bankers and now we need them more than they need us? The fact that the Chinese own the US national debt suggests to me protectionism isn't coming back in a rush either - except in the form of the one-way protectionism that the big guys have always been practicing while the small guys were being bullied into slashing their tariffs and dropping their pants.<BR/><BR/>So I'll reserve my judgment but in the meantime I fear we may be witnessing the undeadening of neoliberalism - killed with the wrong weapon, it shall become immortal. Which would still tie in nicely with the funereal imagery here as well as with your zombie sequel.Giovanni Tisohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10618534731338616708noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-64925037493636156542009-02-24T08:09:00.000-08:002009-02-24T08:09:00.000-08:00Marsh:definitely. You know, I thought about Escap...Marsh:<BR/><BR/>definitely. You know, I thought about Escape from New York for this entry, but decided to deal with it in the third part of this series, primarily because it is a striking example of disjointed timescales/uneven development/call it what you will. (Besides, I like saving my dialectical twists for third.) The island of Manhattan is post-apocalyptic while the rest of the world continues as before, or so the world system likes to tell itself. We get a vision in which the end of the world is not a world-wide event, but something that lives alongside us and that we'd prefer not talking about.<BR/><BR/>We might say this is a striking part of Carpenter's treatment of space throughout a lot of his films. I'm thinking especially of Assault on Precinct 13 and the abandonment of a part of the city to its own logic of development. And Michael returning to a world that has changed without letting him know...ECWhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02142600295759704786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-30208200142675738802009-02-24T08:02:00.000-08:002009-02-24T08:02:00.000-08:00Murphy:indeed, there's something about the last li...Murphy:<BR/><BR/>indeed, there's something about the last little remnants overcompensating, of those clinging on to the illusion. I think of the families trying to stick it out in the McMansion developments, those fabricated ghost towns emerging as the bubble burst. In a perhaps different register, the account Pausanias gives of the lingering traces of mythic Greece, over-providing the lineages of history that dwarf the meager leftovers.ECWhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02142600295759704786noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-55677503985742971482009-02-24T07:41:00.000-08:002009-02-24T07:41:00.000-08:00Too easy, you pick a central example that can be t...Too easy, you pick a central example that can be treated as a symptom: what about movies that already know this stuff, e.g. Escape From NY and LA?hmarshlhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03234605878357480614noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-67314670119440329442009-02-24T06:54:00.000-08:002009-02-24T06:54:00.000-08:00I really like this post. I've said before that...I really like this post.<BR/> I've said before that there is something deeply strange about the over-provision of space, something very much <I>hauntologically</I> resonant. An almost empty city is perhaps more traumatic than an entirely abandoned one.<BR/> The best example of this conition that I ever came across was Mirabelle Airport, outside of Montreal, which had over a hundred check-in desks, but only three flights a day. The food court could seat hundreds of people, but sat empty yet open. Staff drove the buggies up and down the concourse just for something to do, it was crazy.<BR/> I suppose one could also draw parallels with tenth century Romans running lime kilns in the ruins of the Forum...Murphyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11658628800390775081noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4571055663184272276.post-61619700909294552502009-02-24T04:34:00.000-08:002009-02-24T04:34:00.000-08:00hey i think you would like the song lollipop off t...hey i think you would like the song lollipop off the album the carter iii i think it has a lot of subtle reverberations with what you are talking about hereBenladenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06972015735063159831noreply@blogger.com