Tuesday 18 March 2014

Who were the indoor anarchists? What were they really?


Nothing more can happen - it is dusk. They won't chance to go outside now but will stay inside instead. There is no reason for them to personally experience anything more, nor to assert a presence in the world. Everything has been experienced already, if not by them directly then by somebody. They can add nothing plausible to anything. Why don't they return to the cork-lined room, where they might summon up other people’s memories in peace? Perhaps from there, they might reassemble the fragments. The role set aside for them by history has been to quell themselves and reflect upon the function of that quietism. That is not to say they refuse the impersonal urge to realise a presence, but only that they are caught in a dilemma: they can participate but only on the terms that they reject, or they can preserve their terms and refuse involvement. The level  at which ‘their’ contribution might feasibly make a difference to social process is set so unfeasibly high above actually occurring events - the disparity between their consciousness and their capacity to effect changes in accordance with it - that it just proves they have come to on the wrong planet, and entirely in the wrong moment. They are doubly cursed, with the awareness of their infertility, and with the foreknowledge of their own extinction.
Nothing more can happen - we won't go out, we will stay inside instead. There is no reason to personally experience anything, nor to assert a presence in the world. Everything has been experienced already, if not by us then by somebody, we can add nothing to anything. Let us return to the cork lined room where we truly belong - stir into the thin infusion a little honey to taste. Let us summon up other people’s memories. Our allotted task, a work bestowed by history, is to quell ourselves and stepping back from the quelling, to reflect upon the function of our quietism. That is not to say we refuse the impersonal urge to realise a presence, but only that we are caught in a dilemma: we can participate but only on the terms that we reject, or we can preserve our terms and refuse involvement. The level  at which ‘our’ contribution might feasibly make a difference to social process is set so high above actually occurring events - the disparity between our consciousness and our capacity to effect changes in accordance with it - that we might only infer our having come to on the wrong planet, and entirely in the wrong moment. We are doubly cursed, with the awareness of our incapacitation, and with the foreknowledge of our own extinction.

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