1. art notes
  2. unfinished

violence of peaceful (re)presentation ?

assumptions –
a familiarity with a treachery of images.
Picture of Dorian Grey writer person who also wrote about socialism and the futility from charities.

presumptions –
peacefulness and violence may seem contradictory.
the title might seem oxymoronic.
yet.
perhaps we talk here about peacefulness as a kind of lack of turbulence? An inability to have a movement.

WTF??
(Apologies for possible rudeness coming.)
Let’s say we have a certain social group that’s being ignored.
Let’s name these the IGs. (the ignored group.)
A reaction to the realization that IGs come a bit hidden in our society, tends to bring a wave of support for various kinds of
Showings, of presenting and RePresenting the
IGs.
The hope,
of intention and attention of moves towards visibilities (emancipation, even) in all manner of ways
comes, imho, regardless of the fact that historically,
focus on increased visibilities, did not bring an end to violence towards IG kinda people.
Increased representation and presentation has, historically helped IGs to feel life a bit more palatable – at best case scenario.
Which IG kinda people managed to live feeling it’s own freedom?
(vague terms.. however.. might attend to some other time(?))

Say humans who ID as Blacks or Afro-Americans – BLM came to life when the american president, no less in terms of visibility – was dark skinned. Indeed, his wife disclosed being unseen as a human, her own self, while simply going to a shop.
Therefore, perhaps, people like Lewis Gordon (afropessimism) – have a point by claiming that there’s no Hope within the society and culture we are in. (to put it roughly)
Is it not
curious that a similar position was taken by early zionists? ie saying that anti-semitism is a diseas, an illness without a cure. Hence the only way out for humans ID as Jews, comes as a move away and into their own domain. (they were thinking of argentina, uganda, and perhaps other places before deciding to fail not marginalising others in palestine..)
How about humans who ID as women?
I wonder.. More visibility, having a voice – from voting through to running organisations/states, through to discussions about the subject from any kinda media we currently have –
how come saying something like
“discrimination against women is SO prevalent” tends to illicit stuff like agreements or indignation that attempts – willingly or otherwise – to waterdown the situation by claiming
It’s getting better.
It’s much better than it Used to be.

Sure.. Maybe in your next next to later incarnation, perhaps you could live both fearless and as a woman??
———

Perhaps my pessimism isn’t too far from Lewis Gordon’s?
We can not move away in physical space – but that of cultural??!!
How does that work when – unlike afropessimism – we don’t have a rich africana to draw and evolve from??