Are There Any Valid Criticisms? (aka Kalessin's Rant) - The Barrow-Downs Discussion Forum

Mithalwen · 10-27-2004, 11:22 AM

But if we stopped eating it they would try to feed us something else maybe...

Kuruharan · 10-27-2004, 11:25 AM

Ah-ha!! So in offering me biscuits you were merely trying to perpetuate an unfair social system!! I shall begin concocting plans for your violent overthrow at once!!!

If only you had offered me waffles or caviar…

Is there any hope for this poor thread?

Fordim Hedgethistle · 10-27-2004, 11:29 AM

Ah, but you see, that's just the thing with Althusser -- we can't choose to stop eating what "they" give us, because "they" do not exist: we're all part of a self-constituting "us." We all of us order our lives within ideologies that find concrete expression in what LA calls Ideological State Apparatus (and, yes, he goes on to call them ISAs). With this view, the cultural productions -- pieces of 'art' -- that we consume appeal to us because they reflect the significations that we have all developed to explain and order our world. They are not imposed on us from without, but spring up from within ourselves, all of us, trapping us all in the same prisonhouse of consumerist, ideological representation.

We are all of us the "them" that imprison each of us individually. As such we cannot produce any kind of art that is not an expression of what we have made ourselves to be in order to find existence within the ISAs that we've built to order our existence. Freedom from these is a dream.

10-27-2004, 11:22 AM	#1
Mithalwen Pilgrim Soul Join Date: May 2004 Location: watching the wonga-wonga birds circle... Posts: 9,461	But if we stopped eating it they would try to feed us something else maybe... __________________ “But Finrod walks with Finarfin his father beneath the trees in Eldamar.” Christopher Tolkien, Requiescat in pace

10-27-2004, 11:25 AM	#2
Kuruharan Regal Dwarven Shade Join Date: Jan 2002 Location: A Remote Dwarven Hold Posts: 3,593	Revolution!!!! Ah-ha!! So in offering me biscuits you were merely trying to perpetuate an unfair social system!! I shall begin concocting plans for your violent overthrow at once!!! If only you had offered me waffles or caviar… Is there any hope for this poor thread? __________________ ...finding a path that cannot be found, walking a road that cannot be seen, climbing a ladder that was never placed, or reading a paragraph that has no...

10-27-2004, 11:29 AM	#3
Fordim Hedgethistle Gibbering Gibbet Join Date: Feb 2004 Location: Beyond cloud nine Posts: 1,844	Ah, but you see, that's just the thing with Althusser -- we can't choose to stop eating what "they" give us, because "they" do not exist: we're all part of a self-constituting "us." We all of us order our lives within ideologies that find concrete expression in what LA calls Ideological State Apparatus (and, yes, he goes on to call them ISAs). With this view, the cultural productions -- pieces of 'art' -- that we consume appeal to us because they reflect the significations that we have all developed to explain and order our world. They are not imposed on us from without, but spring up from within ourselves, all of us, trapping us all in the same prisonhouse of consumerist, ideological representation. We are all of us the "them" that imprison each of us individually. As such we cannot produce any kind of art that is not an expression of what we have made ourselves to be in order to find existence within the ISAs that we've built to order our existence. Freedom from these is a dream. __________________ Scribbling scrabbling.

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