Dissolutions
Sort of like resolutions but their opposite. I’d resolved to post something called “Let’s talk about Alex” but I have dissolved instead. Not into tears: I am callous, heartless and unfeeling and these qualities actually do turn out to have their uses. But then – I have the advantage of knowing how this particular story goes. It’s trite and stale with nothing in it that hasn’t been said before or won’t be said again. Clichéd. Practically guaranteed to bore you witless. Suffering insomnia? Here’s a remedy. There. Truth in advertising.
In the end, what does a cat have to say to a king? Not much. “Miaow” mostly, and what a tedious lot of it there is.
Stealing (and adapting slightly) from PBJ Diddy
“Dear (BTers, Frogs, little green ribbity beasties):
I have loved you for a long time now so I feel that I must tell you what is honestly in my (heart/head/soul/closet). I (hate/loathe/detest/belch with disgust because of) each and every person I encounter on this blog lately. It’s not (you/me), it’s (me/you). I’ve been here (4 years/2 years/6 months/9 days) and I’ve been troll rated (unfairly/capriciously/violently)at least (1,000/10,000/25,000) times in the last two days. If you all hate me so much I’m (leaving/committing suicide/eating a bagel/dying my eyebrows pink) and don’t try to stop me.
I have better things in my life, such as __ BTW, all of this angst and sturm und drang is the fault of (name of popular bloggist who called the diarist on his/her bullshit recently). Don’t try looking for me I won’t be back for (ever/1 year/1 month/1 week/1 minute).
xoxo
______
Your name here”
PBJ Diddy, this is by far the funniest form letter I’ve ever seen. Especially “It’s not (you/me), it’s (me/you).” Sheer bloody genius. Alas, I am not going to fill it in, though I do think that pink eyebrows would be a startling and novel improvement. Certainly they could not make me any uglier than I already am.
Goodbye.
A belated goodbye, really, to something that I think I witnessed dissolve some months ago. It wasn’t trust, for which mercy I am profoundly grateful (see above, and add `untrusting’ right next to callous and heartless). It wasn’t solidarity exactly, and it wasn’t the hope of solidarity either, since hope is a deceiver. Perhaps it was the delusion that a cat might talk to a king. There are many things worth regretting, but delusions are not among them.
If I had to pinpoint that moment of disillusion?
“You are clearly a Middle Eastern or South Asian person. No. I take it back. You are an Egyptian. Sorry, but Nasserism is dead. Arab nationalism is dead. All that is left as opposition to the oligarchs like Mubarak are groups like the MB. I think you are probably more than a little sympathetic to these groups if not a member.
My comments were intended for people who have some sympathy for the West. You, clearly, do not and you recite all the tired cant of the Islamist.”
— 17 December 2005.
That I think, may have been the moment when the web spun wide. After that, it was perhaps inevitable that eventually the mirror would crack.
“Go elsewhere…or just stay away we are mostly American’s here and you are offensive to those of us that believe in what we stand for as a people.”
— 26 April 2006.
I haven’t attributed these quotes, since I am trying to what – explain? illustrate? Something anyway, other than to accuse. It’s certainly true that I am cruel, but I am trying not to be so here. Other statements could have replaced the second of the pair, and as for the first – well I think it marked a particular moment, but in retrospect the odds of escaping that moment were never good. It is far from impossible, moreover, that the web was already flying free long before and that that moment merely marked the point at which I noticed it.
There was of course a context: both posters felt their deeply-held views were being challenged and were responding defensively. It is true also that both were challenged for making these remarks: I do not claim there is consensus on this subject or anything remotely close to it.
But what I propose to bore you rigid about here is structural, rather than individual: Who gets heard? Who doesn’t? About which groups is it permitted to generalise? About which groups is it not? Who is allowed to generalise and who isn’t? Who is entitled to claim belonging? Who isn’t? Who can afford carelessness? Who cannot? Who is assumed to be well-intentioned? Who is not? Who is that offensive `you’ (for though it may have been intended to be singular, it is in fact a plural)? And who is that mysterious `we?’ All of which is really just a way of asking `Who has power and whom do they choose to regard as human?’ A while ago myriad wrote eloquently about this in a way that – I think – makes plain that such questions have broad political significance.
What first drew me here was the possibility, albeit remote, of internationalism.
Unfortunately some things, once invoked, prove difficult to dispel, even when everyone involved might wish otherwise.
“Go elsewhere…or just stay away we are mostly American’s here and you are offensive to those of us that believe in what we stand for as a people.”
— 26 April 2006.
