Dear Diary Moment 8/2/2020:
Today, while doing my study point (at the “library” (in Guattari’s Anti-Oedipus Papers, I had a surprising moment of clarity –that is given how impenetrable Guattari’s writing seems. However, a lot of elements came together and presented me with a task that, to say the least, seems rhizomatic in nature. In other words, I run the risk of going all over the place while explaining little: traversing the infinite as Deleuze might say.
I think the one point of caption I can offer is a point that Guattari made earlier in the book: that a psychoanalysis that is not revolutionary in nature is no psychoanalysis at all. And this has to do with D&G’s distinction between neurosis, which is blockages of flows of energy, and perversion which is about letting it all go wherever it wants. And Guattari’s psychoanalysis (what could be seen as the foundation of schizoanalysis (is about basically bringing out the pervert in the individual as compared to the Freudian approach that simply attempts to tame the neurotic by convincing the subject to accept their role in the Oedipal triad: Mommy, Daddy, Me.
But what brought this on was my decision to finally look up what Guattari meant by polyvocal: that which is of many voices like a symphony. And we have to compare this to what he calls bi-univocal: that which is of two voices: male as compared to female, gay as compared to straight, white as compared to dark: that which can only result in a false dichotomy. And this pretty much typifies the whole poststructuralist/postmodern agenda: breaking down those false dichotomies for the sake of changing sensibilities in general. And it will take a change in sensibility to change the mess we are in. As Chris Hedges points out in the audio book I am listening to, America: a Farewell Tour, we simply cannot think we are going to just vote our problems away. We went through this with Obama. We thought he would be the president to finally stand up to Capitalism as it was being practiced. And in some ways he did. But the results were less than expected. But this wasn’t just Obama. It was us as well for voting him in then walking away and doing our own thing. This is exactly why the tea-party was able to slip in and take over the senate. In other words, we failed to change our sensibility. We failed to follow through with our rejection of Capitalism as it was being practiced.
We, of course, reacted by retreating to the pop-cynicism of Foucault that sees no redemption in any government institution. And this is where I go all Rortyian/Pragmatic on your ass. While I fully agree with the D&G attempt to seek revolution through personal transformation, we still have to work with what we have: we have to play the channels of power. And I would far rather play that sensibility against a government controlled by Democrats than I would any Republican one.
I mean think about it: if any party represented a paranoid center (as D&G describe: would it not be the Republicans?