Brian Holmes on 20 Apr 2001 17:10:41 -0000 |
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<nettime> counterpowers - masks |
The world is upside down. Democracy has its face in the mud. 34 of the most violent people in the world are enclosed behind their own wall in Quebec. Outside, crowds move freely beneath the cameras of the police. The crimes inside are unbearable, the tension is too great. The Carnaval against Capital is about to start. Already last night, thousands of bandannas began to appear - orange, red, yellow, the colors of fire. They are hand printed with a fantastic, grotesque, carnavalesque smile. They are masks. Folded carefully, like a soft weapon. Every gesture, every word of resistance counts. The weapons have these words inside: The Gift of Masks "A classic crisis of legitimacy has overtaken the key institutions of global economic governance. If legitimacy is not regained, it is only a matter of time before structures collapse..." Walden Bello Inevitably as the global movements against neoliberalism and for life have grown and become more vocal, so has the repression. But with each act of repression, the men of money reveal themselves further. No longer can they meet in relative anonymity. Their unmasking has become a carnivalesque ritual, repeated in Seattle, Prague, Seoul, and Buenos Aires... Now, the fences grow ever higher and the meeting locations ever more remote as the mask of "tolerance" continues to slip further, revealing an animal that is cornered, knows its time is up, and is fighting for its survival. Besieged by those who desire justice, the men of money are getting scared. They want to name the faces of resistance name them thugs, terrorists, flat-earthers, delinquents, dreamers. They want to capture, catalogue and criminalise the faces of those who are saying "enough is enough." They want to wipe the smile of resistance off these faces forever. "Resistance is the secret of joy" Alice Walker Carnival and rebellion have identical goals: to invert the social order with joyous abandon and to celebrate our indestructible lust for life. Carnival breaks down the barriers of capital, and releases the creativity of each individual. It throws beauty back into the streets, streets in which people begin to really live again. During Carnival, as in rebellion, we wear masks to free our inhibitions, we wear masks to transform ourselves, we wear masks to show that we are your daughter, your teacher, your bus driver, your boss. Being faceless protects and unites us while they try to divide and persecute. By being faceless we show that who we are is not as important as what we want, and we want everything for everyone. So we will remain faceless because we refuse the spectacle of celebrity, we will remain faceless because the carnival beckons, we will remain faceless because the world is upside down, we will remain faceless because we are everywhere. By covering our faces we show that our words, dreams, and imaginations are more important than our biographies. By covering our faces we recover the power of our voices and our deeds. By wearing masks we become visible once again. Carnival against Capital 20-22 April, 2001 Quebec # distributed via <nettime>: no commercial use without permission # <nettime> is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: majordomo@bbs.thing.net and "info nettime-l" in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: nettime@bbs.thing.net