SeeTHEORY PRINTER FRIENDLY FIRE email this article to a friend or foe
What's next to define our age, beyond pastmodernism, is "decyborging",
the empty existentialist void we feel when
"unplugged". The nausea of
reality, as we plummet into a need for
Nexium.
(I should have taken the purple
pill.[2])
What's beyond Post Post Adaptation Effects? It's not VR sickness, but, rather,
reality sickness. It's not the flashbacks you feel after taking the
glasses off from eight hours of playing a videogame, but, rather, it's
the lack of flashbacks you feel from not wearing the glasses for a
long periods of time after more than twenty years of adaptation.
Deconism is what you might experience in a disease-suspect detention
camp. Or a quarantine facility for detention of persons suspected of
having been exposed to Obedience Deficit Disorder (ODD).
This paper attempts to look beyond the obvious "look beyond" Post Modernism (i.e. deconstructionism), Post Humanism (e.g. cyborgs), and Post Adaptation Phenomena (e.g. virtual reality motion sickness and VR flashbacks).
The common thread running through all of this is my own personal and very real experience living as a "cyborg" for the last 30 years, and learning that one cannot really obtain malleability of narrative, or really deconstruct the world in a true sense. Much of this material is borrowed from my book, CYBORG published by Randomhouse Doubleday. In particular, by inventing, designing, building, and wearing "digital eyeglasses", I see the world in a different light --- laser light. The computer controlled laser light source concealed within the eyeglass frames resynthesizes visual reality. Not virtual reality, but, what I call "mediated reality", i.e. a modified sensory perception. Not some sumulacking science fiction flapdoodle, but the real thing, if there ever was an objective reality we could get back to. I call it arcalumis (murcalumis), or inverse simulacra (simulacrum). Get closer to, not further from, reality by way of inverting the reality-distortions that have been thrust upon us against our will.
Reality is not the alleged reality one sees when removing the digital
eyeglasses that have been filtering out advertising: when removing the
eyeglasses, we are back into the world of Big Business Billboards
that give us a simulacraving for cigarettes.
Anybody who says taking off your shades brings you closer to reality
is either a simulackey or shareholder in advertising and propaganda.
And there's the Sontagonism to imagery, i.e. the alleged
notion that ``all photographs are surreal''[5], which has a very
postmodern flavour. And then there's the somewhat Pastmodern
viewpoint:
"When it comes to photographs, we are all deconstructionists
now. After thirty years of Derrida, Foucault, and Baudrillard, anyone
can confidently (if incorrectly) proclaim that photographs lie,
manipulate, oppress; that they are "fictive constructs" and
"discourses of power"; that they reveal only their own prejudices, not
objective reality; that they express privilege, never truth. Yet more
and more, it is upon these presumably meretricious, morally stained
documents that we rely not just to bring us news of the world, but to
form our ethical and political consciousness and even, sometimes, to
determine our actions." [6]
After thirty years of being a "cyborg", I can't really bring myself to accept either of these. Not Sontag. Not Linfield. Not Postmodernism. Not Pastmodernism.
Eye am not a camera. Eye am a filter that filters light. Not Export Light, not Malboro Lights, but, rather, a photonic firewall that redirects packets of incoming lightspam to /dev/null.
If postmodernism can be taken to be the fragmented lack of objective reality[7], then certainly pastmodernism is the attempt to rebuild reality, not just to get back to a "new modernism", but to take responsibility for reality, in the existential sense of self determination. But maybe pastmodernism also includes the work of those who try to destroy the cyborg. The work of the state. The work of the police state. Cyborg unplugged. Wheras modernism deals with objectivity and postmodernism deals with subjectivity, instead of either of these, pastmodernism deals with subjectrights. Whereas postmodernism's attempt to revel in malleability of the reality often loses traction with reality and can become inneffective in really creating world change, pastmodernism attempts to get traction. Or question the lack of traction. Or lack of simulack. Lacra. Lacrum. Pastmodernism gets results! Or is the victim of results. And then deconism is what happens after pastmodernism [8] (partly as a result of pastmodernism). Deconism comes after the ideas and notions of Murcalumis/Arcalumis (inverse simulacra).
Not just for a new vision, but I've also rewired and reconfigured/deconfigured many other senses (e.g. a sixth and seventh sense of synthetic synesthesia). So arcalumis is not just for vision.
I have been deconstructing reality through deconfigured eyes for more than 20 years. Not a Ricky Leackock "Fly on the Wall" perspective, but more like a fly-in-the-eye perspective. Not a Brechtian distance from the audience, or constant reminder that this is just a movie that isn't real, but, rather, a kind of inverse Epic Theatre. Not surveillance, but, rather, inverse surveillance (sousveillance, if you will).
However, I would like to first disacknowledge Air Canada for providing me with a glimpse into Past Past Adaptation Phenomena (Past Past Post Adaptation Phenomena), and for performing an "unplugging" experiment on me without my consent, which has triggered much of this thinking.
Deconism attempts to go beyond deconstructing deconstruction, i.e. to go beyond post post modernism (post2modernism, or "past modernism", as I like to call it). Perhaps my deconfigured vision has made me see the incestuous[10] (or recursive, as we like to say) nature of post modernism, or at least to see the degree to which its illusion of malleability has been shattered by recent events. To understand this recursion we may introduce meta modernism, i.e., postnmodernism (deconstruction to the nth degree). Whether squared, cubed, or more, meta decon either further fragments the fragmentation, or calls into question the fragmenting, or defragmentation of the fragments, ad infinitum. And technology allows construction, not just deconstruction, to program past ideology. To program the the past (i.e. previously defined ideologies). And to program past it (i.e. to program around it, e.g. to "hack" reality as just another ideology).
Deconism then attempts to understand the way in which state-sponsored terrorism has stripped and scrubbed the fragmented or defragmented fragments of metamodernism, and put its circular argument of arguments into a circular file. Or biohazard containment disposal vessel.
The Dada movement (for example Duchamp) in breaking down interdisciplinary boundaries was a wonderful response to the absurdity of war, but the movement sowed the seeds of its own destruction, for if everything is so absurd, then so is absurdity. And if absurdity is absurd, then the absurdity of absurdity is itself absurd. Recursion once more. Like a subroutine that calls itself infinitely many times over, falling into an infinite loop, like, in some ways, the Theatre of the Absurd. If dadaism is the absurdity of war, then surely deconism is the abusrdity of pretentious preworld prewar prethree.
An important response to deconism is Existential Technology (EXISTech), namely, existence of an invention before the essence of the idea. EXISTech is technology of self-determination for an epistimology and metaphysics of choice, and mastery of some degree of our own destiny. Being bound to freedom, we agree. We agree to the Terms and Conditions of reality. Oui Agree. Ouijagree. Ouija-gree to put an end to the idea of there being a single author to our actions. As Assistant Filing Clerk Trainee, I am free to write or saw what I wish. Hamlet's mirror. Pay no attention to what I have to write, for it is simply corporate drivel.
But what to do about deconism?
Merger and Gorporate Greedom.
Merger of goverment and corporate (covernment if you will) forces. Armed forces.
Short-circuit the left and the right wing. Both are fighting for freedom. Stand back far enough and they're both on the same plane. A level plane. A level playing field. Fold the wings together, and toss it all into the circular file. Not that it's rubbish, but simply that it has no real effect. Because it doesn't matter whether it's left wing or fight wing, as long as it's out on a wing. Of an aircraft.
Order in the court: Chorder (Chaos from order), strikes a resonant chord for freedom and democracy on strike, whether picketing or profiteering from the stagnant stenographer chording the keys of justice. Or the keys of cages. Anarkey. Six by eight foot rectangles with walls made of chain-link fencing spin in unison with the wheels of justice. Lives tossed about by the machinery of justice. Machines of justice interconnected with the three branches of government! Or, in the Electric Age, the three phases of government cum covernment. Gone is the Government Convention (Gonvention, if you will). Geneva Gonvention. Gone is the media scrutiny. Prisoners "protected against insults and public scrutiny". Stripped and then "protected" from public inquiry.
Demonstrators de-monstrating de-monstrosity. Demon-stration, class demonstratification.
eResponsibility is now possible as we do an Enrun around accountability. Just put the accountants (and protestors) into six by eight foot rectangles. Outdoor cages with or without prayer mats. Or just citizens who don't comply. Because they're Titches carrying out acts of Werrorism.
Picture a middle-age accountant, run through the mills of justice, (as Milgram did). Fifteen volts for each wrong answer. Nobody objects. And if it were you or me in the cages, nobody else would object.
To reject the basic values of limits, checks, balances --- fuses in the wiring of democracy --- is to accept the values of terrorism.
Risk management to insure fascism.
Ensure, insure, assure.
Twisted and tortured, justice over twisted pair. Or braided. Braid together the t(h)ree branches of government. To start world war three.
From carrot to sticktatorship.
Back's doppelganger grappling for a ground, graces the cover of an art gallery exhibit catalog and exists in a medium that falls at the nexus of electricity and water.
My own recent work also falls at the nexus of electricity and water,
where body scanning lasers and an interactive video installation
are combined with compulsory decontamination showers for all attendees:
(Three steps: (1) Strip=Violate, (2) Wash=Rape, (3) Cover=Protect)
(1) All attendees are required to remove all clothing, jewellery, and personal
effects and check these items at the baggage counter prior to being allowed
into the museum space.
(2) They are then required to go through decontamination.
(3) Finally they line up to get their bodies scanned by a computer, in
order to automate the issuing of uniforms, so they
can receive a white jumpsuit. The jumpsuits have no pockets in which to
conceal contraband. Now the attendees are safely protected
from themselves and each other, so that they can attend
DECONference 2002
presentations by Steve Mann, Derrick de Kerckhove, Arthur Kroker, Julia Scher,
and Critical Art Ensemble.
Crandall's depiction of the military's desire "to both violate and shield ... erotic charge of combat... analyze/violate/protect" [11] is perhaps best captured in defense against bioterror (irrespective of whether the bioterror be real, imagined, or merely an "inside job").
Military computer vision systems are now turned back toward us where the hidden cameras in the public baths transform our world from Baywatch to Bathwatch. Hidden underwater cameras in municipal swimming baths, such as the network of underwater cameras at North Toronto Community Center are connected to a sophisticated network of Internet connected computers. From Baywatch (the many watching the few) to Poolwatch (the few watching the many), we become the specimens (or shall I say, specimen and speciwomen) of an experiment, perpetrated from afar, without our knowledge or consent. Is it a swim meet, or a swim meat? Perhaps by now television cameras have outnumbered television receivers. Even in places where we're not fully clothed.
To save you if you drown in the bath.
Or slip and fall in the showers. Or toilets.
Toilets Against Terrorism! Project SafeBath. Saves Water. Saves Lives.
spec.i.men Function: noun Etymology: Latin, from specere to look at, look -- more at SPY Date: 1610
Lifeguard Rescyou. To surf and protect from afar.
In Back's exhibit, we see the magnified image of a fingernail --- the voyeuristic sustained gaze focused upon what might have been bitten off --- a nail-biting frenzy of fear --- fear from the feeling of not being protected. It hangs at waist-height, as if to suggest being of the belly, being born of terror, or saliva to the abdomen. And we can only see it on TV. TV is the new reality in the age of anthrax angst. Mediated like Jacob Wrestling with a Digital Angel. Or dead flowers. Television, Terrorvision. Ten minutes of fame, Twenty dollars of Terror. Or the campground. Strong Angel. ( Shower hours)
Foucault once said "Authority loves the plague". Today he might have said "Government loves anthrax". Queue up like cattle to be stripped, scrubbed, shielded, protected, and saved. Rescyou in the resqueue.
But water cannons cum soap cannons might be the kinder cleaner nonweapons we can use on ourselves.
New soap concentrates that protect us from chemical weapons will make chemical weapons themselves unnecessary.
So are we creaming the competition or creaming ourselves? Cream the competition before they start to compete; pre-emptive Dissidents will get creamed: Rape the mirror with the cream machine. A rich creamy lather squirts across the parking lot at those suspected of being contaminated. Or those suspected of contaminating. Or those suspected.
I envision perhaps a canon with six holes drilled and tapped, around the end of the muzzle with shower nozzles screwed into each one.
In the past we trained for war by waking up on the middle of the night and quickly getting dressed to fight. Now we train for war by falling comatose to common sense and getting undressed in the middle of the day to submit. We cannot bear the thought of firepower. We have instead been taught waterpower. We are taught not to fire, but to quench our own fire. But not to quench our own anger, for that would put an end to the war. Our anger is fueled by state sponsored media, so that the state can continue to fund the war on terror, so that we can continue in our training for war. Not so we can learn to fight, but so that we can continue being trained on how to submit to authority. Showers of lead and sparks have dissolved into soap showers. Or bleach showers. Gunpowder has been replaced with a solution of nine parts water, and one part household bleach. Our standard training uniform is made out of cloth that only intelligent people can see. It's the one we were wearing when we came into this world on the day we were born. Or maybe it's a white paper jumpsuit with no pockets in which to store weapons or contraband. Submission drills are like fire drills. [12] In the past we learned how to get out of buildings. Now we learn how to get out of buildings and then get out of our clothes. Separate yourselves by gender, take off your clothes, and stand in a line to be hosed down. Then it's easier to herd you to the processing or treatment plant. The enemy is within. No longer are we fighting an external enemy, but now the enemy is inside us, inside our governments, and inside our military dictators. As a nation declares war on its own people, it must ensure its people don't fight back. It must strip its people.
Soap down the unruly unwashed masses. Soap is the solution for the great unwashed. Stop terror with suds.
A fundamentalesson on the fundamentaless. The fundamental lesson we've yet to learn is that lacking any fundamental rooting we may be washed away like topsoil that lacks age-old vegetation, leaving behind only those who are more deeply rooted than us.
Decon is about people, places, things, or shall we say, people, displaced, without their things.
No carryon. Lost luggage.
Moving PEOPLE PLACES without their THINGS.
I envision a Freedom Flight that would tie together the military industrial complex of yesteryear with today's military corporate complex and "the new DECONomy".
The title of the exhibit might be "The new deconomy of freedom" or perhaps, "Freedom Deconomics", or just "Freedom Flight", to take art to lofty new heights. Sky Art.
It could be a flight to an alleged or real offsite exhibit, but the real exhibit would be the manner in which the participants must undergo decontrabanding and decontamination before being allowed to board the flight, as a social commentary on the corporate security complex of today's terror marketplace.
Noam Chomsky once distinguished retail terrorism from wholesale terrorism, but it's getting harder to tell where all the terror is coming from. Instead of a terror factory, all we need is a new deconomy of cleansing (from ethnic cleansing to corporate cleansing). Corporate cleansing to purge the world of all that's not safe for business, leaving behind a clean world marketplace.
A Freedom Flight to "escape" from democracy, and fly out into the Free Market deconomy.
To keep the airports "clean" for business-class travellers.
Are we free; fighting to be free: how much are you worth? How much am I worth?
If a rich business executive is damaged, he can sue for damages. If he is killed, his estate can sue. And then we know how much he was worth. But otherwise, not being the wealthy businessman, we can be damaged without cost to those who damage us. Thus we don't cost anyone anything. Thus we are free --- free for the taking --- without cost. Is this what it means to be a free man?
Free to download a free seating license.
Free-market fascism, becomes, therefore, an inverse Brechtian theatre: inverse Epic theatre ("Cipe theatre). As well as theatre of the absurd. Cipe theatre was at the heart of DECONference 2002 where we required attendees to be decontrabanded and decontaminated prior to being allowed into the decontextualization museum.
Insurance.
Adjustment bureau and justice.
Godels theorem.
Goebbels theorem. The Goerbbels of Justice.
A jury of a dozen gerbils deliberates justice. To each gerbil wheel, is connected a small magnet. Like the world as a whole, the magnet has a north pole and a south pole. Around each magnet are the three coils of government. The three phases of government. The three branches of government. Spaced 120 degrees apart. And connected to red, black, and blue wires, in accordance with Part 4, Section 36 of the electrical code. Jenerating of justice. For a justice server. Mounted in a 19 inch relay rack.
The applicants fill out forms, and the forms are passed on to the jury. Twelve blind gerbils, in a dark room, cannot read the applications, but they taste their sweet devenge. The paper gives them energy, to keep the wheels of justice turning.
Silence of the rodents.
Meriones unguiculatus.
Meritones undo to us. Do us. Do you. Do me!
Merrytones and musical chairs.
Seven white mice and five black mice,
see how they run,
around the circle of fifths,
making the melody,
like singing in the (hexaphonic) shower,
six notes for men, and six for women.
Of men and mice squeaking.
12 input channels. the dirty dozen.
to emerge squeaky clean.
We're happy here, if we sing along.
The verdict of the vermin brings "justice" to verminous persons in need of being sent to a cleansing station.
Maybe then we will begin to understand deconism:
Modernism | Postmodernism Postindustrialism Posthumanism Cyborgism Cyborg adaptation phenomena | Postpostmodernism Pastmodernism Pastindustrialism Pasthumanism Postcyborgism Post adaptation phenomena VR nausism | Pastcyborgism Postinformaticism Post nausism Deconsim |
I am a Camera I am a camera with its shutter open quite passive recording not thinking. recording the man shaving at the window opposite and the woman in the kimono washing her hair. someday all this will have to be developed. carefully printed, fixed.Christopher Wm. Bradshaw Isherwood, Goodbye to Berlin, A Berlin Diary, 1939, published 1959, Hogarth Press,
His textbook entitled ``Intelligent Image Processing'' (ISBN: 0-471-40637-6, John Wiley and Sons), as well as a popular book on culture and technology, about his life as a ``cyborg'', (ISBN: 0-385-65825-7; Random House, Doubleday), further document his practice.