"…with production one never knows where one is…" BERTOLT BRECHT
- “…distant noises from the right bank.”
Allow me a long quotation from Negri’s engagement with Derrida’s Specters of Marx. Here Negri argues that while in Derrida there is a critique of capitalism (“specter of capitalism”) the “specter of communism” is indetectable.
- What should we do with the obscene oil profits?
“Exxon Mobil reports outsized profits. So did Shell. It’s all got politicians teeing up evil-oil rhetoric, except they are leaving one thing behind: the facts.” Let’s see what this little Marketplace ideological hack job serves us as “facts”: Oil prices are set by global forces. Since the mid-1980s, actual negotiations and deliveries of oil contracts [...]
- Keynes vs. Hayek
Circulating in the attention economy of the internets is this Austrian appropriation of the hiphop vernacular. Moralist tone of the Hayekian critique of excessive borrowing aside, I find it quite interesting how the liberatory tinge of Hayek’s “I want to free the markets!” is made to contrast with Keynes’ “I want to steer the market”. [...]
- Slavoj Zizek against Bernard-Henri Levy
There are a number of important moments, in particular look for the charity as a consumption practice or the violence of charity, the problem of zionist anti-semitism, the persistence of systemic violence in West Bank, the neccessity of communism in the advent of “new” commons, palin a as fascist, Hitler as a new age philosopher [...]
- Love etc.
A new single from Pet Shop Boys. Here are the almost Veblenian, or even perhaps Lacanian, lyrics. But I especially admire the line that refers to Gerhard Richter. I also embedded the video. You need more You need more You need more You need more You need more You need more You need more You [...]
- Müzik, ruhun gıdası (Music, food for the soul)
‘Traversal of fantasy’ is one of the more elusive concepts of Lacanian psychoanalysis. As with the Escher-like diagrams of the Real (e.g. Mobius strip), it requires the mediation of representation to be made somewhat palpable (then again, what concept doesn’t?). Thanks to Lynch’s Lost Highway (and Zizek’s splendid interpretation of it in ‘The Art of [...]
- Beyond “commodity fetishism”: the Wire and the political economy of drugs
HBO series, the Wire, entered its fifth, and, unfortunately, the last season. Although I’ve wholeheartedly agreed that “the best thing ever happened to TV is Twin Peaks,” since I became an addict of the Wire, I felt the need to reconsider my allegiance. There are so many things to say about the Wire and there [...]
- Is she really breaking a taboo or finally gaining her senses?
Turkey is going through hard times, rough roads and tough plays lately. It has never been easy, but now it is seemingly harder than ever to better the situation or just to get by. Turkey is suffering from a cancerous disease, one that has been neglected for too long. It is the lack of democracy, [...]
- a wine-dark sea, indeed
for me the image of the mediterranean first came into being by way of a tv commercial. we all grew up in it, but it was different, it was never simply an image then; it was something we enjoyed, like one enjoys breathing. this particular commercial featured all the charming aspects of the mediterranean fantasy; [...]
- McLuhan & Zizek
I watched a very good documentary on Marshall McLuhan yesterday, McLuhan’s Wake, courtesy of Eko –you know, that subliminal kid. It is not so much the director (Kevin McMahon), however, that is to be credited for the success of the documentary as the subject matter himself. The most interesting parts of the documentary for me [...]
