I just remember watching Superfriends or reading Kirby X-Men and thinking how ridiculous it was that a group of people would recognize "good" or "evil" as modes to operate within and choose evil! It's an aesthetic decision - evil, regardless of its correctness, is more interesting, sexier, at least within the realm of cartoon logic that would allow Shaggy to eat a sandwich that would unfold in his throat like an accordian: words and concepts have only a surface relation to what they represent, they are mere elements of style within a semiotic system.
But it goes past that to the idea of choice in general. Or more precisely, deciding who you are (vegan, gun owner, salaryman) and sticking with that. As opposed to being aware that the choices you make are arbitrary outside of context. But then isn't constructing our personalities the most fundamental creative act as a human?
jason what you said stuck in my head, that we are actors and 'have to deal' with the roles we are given. it's a good way of thinking about things, wearing a 'fake' exterior so we can still imagine a 'real' interior. immediately thought of 'and though she feels as if she's in a play /...she is anyway' which resonated with my dad.
errrr not 'we are given' but more like, ... maybe ... well part of the role is constructed by society (no killing, etc) but maybe ... hm ... like, there's a limited amount of roles out there? or something. well, i feel like you have to choose some role that there are enough people to 'back you up'. like, being vegan in portland is kinda smart. being a gun owner really is not. if there are enough evil people or if i feel being evil is part of my 'vegan' character then i'll probably 'act' evil.
'isn't constructing our personalities the most fundamental creative act as a human'
yes totally, which is why branding and marketting are so relevent artistically today. i read some multiple choice quiz on contemporary art in some bienniale book (whitney?) that had the best questions ever. really funny and 'cutting'. one was 'through what venue does a person stay up-to-date on contemporary art?' with options like 'gossip tv' and [have spent past x minutes trying to imagine another option] alongside artforum or whatever. (what was i saying?)
I think it's the other way round: Nihilism is beyond the Absurd. Absurd is only absurd cause you're using some subject perversely. Nihilism would have no use for that kind of measure; there is equal value in mocking order and order itself: zero.
But the absurd develops a sense of humor about this kind of blankent emptiness, perhaps on the way to an acceptance, which seems "beyond" to me, given nihilism's childish temper tantrums. Historically too nihilism more or less comes out of Nietzsche and the World Wars whereas absurdism seems to follow, Beckett and existentialism being primarily post-war phenomena. Of course, these are all just infinite cycles ya feel me?
Seems like you're using "beyond" as in extra-ordinary ( from beyond!), while I'm using like it's passed a mark on a line; like if you start with a Western conception of normalcy/right/good and chart the course of it breaking down- the end of that, I think , is nihilism. A sense of the absurd seems to me to be a station in between. But yeah, one could vacillate between all of these ways of seeing within seconds.
On a related note, I used to get a real charge out of ideas about nihilism and the absurd ( something I see in a lot of younger artists work too. "Beautiful Decay".), but lately I've been thinking that that's an indicator of being sort of spoiled; we can afford to take safety, health, security and wealth for granted, to the extent that grimness ( black metal came out Norway? The richest per capita country on the planet?), or it's opposite, a romanticization of childish "purity", are now really common. It seems like a lot of art bounces around within that spectrum. I just wonder what art would look like if we couldn't take these things for granted. It starts to not be that interesting once you have to mop floors for a living, you know? Like you're really not that far from actual decay/corruption, so you can't toy with it comfortably ( decadently, degenerately, maybe?)...
I think you misread me. As I said, if you look at [the line of] history, absurdism follows nihilism as a cultural product in the 20th century. Whether or not that means one is beyond the other is up for grabs. If you look at history as an eternal return (as Nietzsche did), things look differently. I personally do not believe that absurdism is more or less mature than nihilism, but I do appreciate the sense of humor of the former (no matter how bleak) as being perhaps an improvement, although nihilism is hilarious in its own way as well. Both ideas are too negative for me. But then, I mop floors for a living ;)
I should add that I think there is a lot of absurdity in nihilism and vice versa. And a lot of fascism in Christianity. And a little bit of love in hate. I am a singer/songwriter. Please kill me.
Chronology doesn't play into to it too much for me. Yeah, Nietzche was nihilistic before absurdism took root, but you could argue that absurdism was a means to soften nihilism into something that could be lived with. It's not that simple, of course.
That was, maybe, my point, Luke. When you're staring directly at the void, just pick an arbitrary aesthetic stance and proceed from there. Stick with it. Have faith. Build a pattern with your life. But that's pretty goofy, right? You end up with Batarangs and FRUiTS and vegan buffalo wings...
Like it Jason. Captcha: richbo, which I guess is like a sub sandwich filled with (non-vegan) lobster and sirloin or something. I guess I'm fudging on that joke a little, although hey <-- there's another food reference.
Yeah, maybe, unless you figure that the void is a figment; that we might desire that, psychically, in the same way that those who brought it to our attention claim everything but the void is a helpful figment.
True, man, the void is also a strategy we use to cope with chaos, just a metaphor. Who knows? Maybe there's some entity or consciousness that structures things and an actual reality system to base your existence on.
30 comments:
wow. had you seen jtm's comics comics piece? He talks about reading Image Comics:
'I've settled into an undulating balancing act, sliding back and forth from cosmic excitement to common existential dread.'
Lot of energy in the air, maybe from Halloween?
Yeah! It was a good one! I posted this straight afterward, but I've been wanting to put something up about supervillains for some time..,
hehe i didn't realize they were supervillains. must be the whole antihero culture instilled in me.
I just remember watching Superfriends or reading Kirby X-Men and thinking how ridiculous it was that a group of people would recognize "good" or "evil" as modes to operate within and choose evil! It's an aesthetic decision - evil, regardless of its correctness, is more interesting, sexier, at least within the realm of cartoon logic that would allow Shaggy to eat a sandwich that would unfold in his throat like an accordian: words and concepts have only a surface relation to what they represent, they are mere elements of style within a semiotic system.
Fuck, I just told the joke and then explained the punchline!
But it goes past that to the idea of choice in general. Or more precisely, deciding who you are (vegan, gun owner, salaryman) and sticking with that. As opposed to being aware that the choices you make are arbitrary outside of context. But then isn't constructing our personalities the most fundamental creative act as a human?
jason what you said stuck in my head, that we are actors and 'have to deal' with the roles we are given. it's a good way of thinking about things, wearing a 'fake' exterior so we can still imagine a 'real' interior. immediately thought of 'and though she feels as if she's in a play /...she is anyway' which resonated with my dad.
errrr not 'we are given' but more like, ... maybe ... well part of the role is constructed by society (no killing, etc) but maybe ... hm ... like, there's a limited amount of roles out there? or something. well, i feel like you have to choose some role that there are enough people to 'back you up'. like, being vegan in portland is kinda smart. being a gun owner really is not. if there are enough evil people or if i feel being evil is part of my 'vegan' character then i'll probably 'act' evil.
'isn't constructing our personalities the most fundamental creative act as a human'
yes totally, which is why branding and marketting are so relevent artistically today. i read some multiple choice quiz on contemporary art in some bienniale book (whitney?) that had the best questions ever. really funny and 'cutting'. one was 'through what venue does a person stay up-to-date on contemporary art?' with options like 'gossip tv' and [have spent past x minutes trying to imagine another option] alongside artforum or whatever. (what was i saying?)
Yeah - you have to navigate society and culture and a whole bunch of other shit and find a role that works. Be an ontological flip-flopper!
This blog is like the MFA program after you get a degree from the Center for Cartoon Studies.
Congratulations, Jason, now you're ready to write "deconstructive" superhero stories like it's 1989. :)
(By the way, my word verification for this comment is "inesse," or "in esse," I guess. Methinks blogger is having a fit of Romantic irony.)
Mine was "dasein!"
And Sturm and I are beginning construction on a campus modeled after the Hall of Justice!
"Dasein," for real?
Blogger: the continental philosophy period.
(I wonder what "tuallyst" means in this context?)
just a joke!
the pelican is right. why are we paying so much money for this program?
and there's no stinkin cafeteria, but at least i have friends now.
MotherFuckingAwesome
Skerd moscente gnies allho cycersa testipol subbi inced.
now we're getting anagrammatic.
I think it's the other way round: Nihilism is beyond the Absurd. Absurd is only absurd cause you're using some subject perversely. Nihilism would have no use for that kind of measure; there is equal value in mocking order and order itself: zero.
But the absurd develops a sense of humor about this kind of blankent emptiness, perhaps on the way to an acceptance, which seems "beyond" to me, given nihilism's childish temper tantrums.
Historically too nihilism more or less comes out of Nietzsche and the World Wars whereas absurdism seems to follow, Beckett and existentialism being primarily post-war phenomena.
Of course, these are all just infinite cycles ya feel me?
Seems like you're using "beyond" as in extra-ordinary ( from beyond!), while I'm using like it's passed a mark on a line; like if you start with a Western conception of normalcy/right/good and chart the course of it breaking down- the end of that, I think , is nihilism. A sense of the absurd seems to me to be a station in between.
But yeah, one could vacillate between all of these ways of seeing within seconds.
On a related note, I used to get a real charge out of ideas about nihilism and the absurd ( something I see in a lot of younger artists work too. "Beautiful Decay".), but lately I've been thinking that that's an indicator of being sort of spoiled; we can afford to take safety, health, security and wealth for granted, to the extent that grimness ( black metal came out Norway? The richest per capita country on the planet?), or it's opposite, a romanticization of childish "purity", are now really common. It seems like a lot of art bounces around within that spectrum. I just wonder what art would look like if we couldn't take these things for granted. It starts to not be that interesting once you have to mop floors for a living, you know? Like you're really not that far from actual decay/corruption, so you can't toy with it comfortably ( decadently, degenerately, maybe?)...
I think you misread me. As I said, if you look at [the line of] history, absurdism follows nihilism as a cultural product in the 20th century. Whether or not that means one is beyond the other is up for grabs.
If you look at history as an eternal return (as Nietzsche did), things look differently. I personally do not believe that absurdism is more or less mature than nihilism, but I do appreciate the sense of humor of the former (no matter how bleak) as being perhaps an improvement, although nihilism is hilarious in its own way as well.
Both ideas are too negative for me. But then, I mop floors for a living ;)
I should add that I think there is a lot of absurdity in nihilism and vice versa. And a lot of fascism in Christianity. And a little bit of love in hate. I am a singer/songwriter. Please kill me.
Chronology doesn't play into to it too much for me. Yeah, Nietzche was nihilistic before absurdism took root, but you could argue that absurdism was a means to soften nihilism into something that could be lived with. It's not that simple, of course.
That was, maybe, my point, Luke. When you're staring directly at the void, just pick an arbitrary aesthetic stance and proceed from there. Stick with it. Have faith. Build a pattern with your life. But that's pretty goofy, right? You end up with Batarangs and FRUiTS and vegan buffalo wings...
Like it Jason. Captcha: richbo, which I guess is like a sub sandwich filled with (non-vegan) lobster and sirloin or something. I guess I'm fudging on that joke a little, although hey <-- there's another food reference.
Yeah, maybe, unless you figure that the void is a figment; that we might desire that, psychically, in the same way that those who brought it to our attention claim everything but the void is a helpful figment.
True, man, the void is also a strategy we use to cope with chaos, just a metaphor. Who knows? Maybe there's some entity or consciousness that structures things and an actual reality system to base your existence on.
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