Wednesday, November 23, 2005

Co-optability as Acceptability

1. The Political Flaneur (a sequel to my previous loss for words)

Flip through the papers. Arguments about the Gifted Education Program. Arguments about the death penalty (from one side). Limits of blogging.

The political flaneur is borne out of inanity. The metamorphosis of issues in the media turns one into a political flaneur: there is much to see, but little to say. And time passes. Look at the complaints about national servicemen who allegedly refused to give up their seats. Look at the “light punishment” (relatively so in more sense than one) Melvyn Tan was imposed. (Light punishment because others might get it worse. Like because he could have got it worse.)

We hear voices. Today’s “Voices.” Or perhaps I should say Today’s voice/s. A world of difference. A world without difference. Pro-death penalty letters collected under the heading, “Let cooler heads prevail” (Today, 23 November 2005). This is non-partisan. It seems almost perfectly synchronized when The Straits Times published another letter—from Australia, no less—claiming that Australia practices double standards. A free article accessible online. Press responsibility. (We do not want a subservient press. A responsible one will do.) At the same time, obscure Internet news articles accusing Singapore of hypocrisy do might interest the occasional political flaneur. Dr. Chee Soon Juan alleges hypocrisy. So do others, such as here and here.

We hear; we watch. This is the enjoyment and the participation. A more participatory society. A more inclusive society. Sometimes I speak and let others be the flaneurs. Sometimes I am the flaneur as others speak. After that, we could all forget about what we have said, heard or watch. It is best that memory atrophies in this age. At least, when you watch identical scenes unfold before you time and again, you won’t feel bored. Perhaps just a sense of déjà vu.

2. The Work of Journalism in the Age of Political Reproducibility

We watch crowds go by. Crowds are all different, but they are all the same too. What is the difference between the crowd in the MRT yesterday and the crowd today? They come with different faces, but they are the same: just crowds.

Political reproducibility is perfect for the political flaneur. Just like the crowds, political reproductions or repetitions gives the sense that one faces something new everyday when there is, in fact, nothing new. It is almost formulaic. Say that we are open. Do some things to show that we are. Have a sex exhibition. But use it as a chance to reinforce the Fact that we are conservative. Send the police down. Every “opening” becomes a platform to implant the signifiers of surveillance and conservatism. It is a Fact that we are conservative. They say, we believe, we become and so we are. Say that we will help the poor. At the same time, use it as a chance to lambaste welfare. Every opening is a chance for closing; every seeming destabilization is a chance to put the ideological thermostat to work (lest the thermostat gets rusty over time).

Reproduce and repeat. Chant:

There is a need to be: responsible/ transparent (although some have the right to privacy)/ethical.
We are conservative, mature, open, transparent and sovereign all at the same time.
Any threat to the power center is a threat to the nation and is hence anti-Singapore.
Threats are always external. Hence internal threats have to be purged and rendered external.
We would love to allow certain things but we have to be sensitive to whoever there is to be sensitive to.


Perhaps an even better summary: if you are outside, don’t interfere; if you are inside, be “responsible.”

The work of journalism in the age of political reproducibility is perhaps a postmodern application of the technologies of mechanical reproduction to produce the sacred. Give each repetition a different face and it repeats even more precisely than before. In the process of repeating, the aura of the sacred is created. The sacred is the inviolable, immutable residue after filtering away all the different faces/facades.

We know what to expect as we go window-shopping. We don’t expect a third-rate coffee shop (like one in some obscure part of Yishun) next to Crystal Jade Palace in Takashimaya even as we are not even aware of such knowledge. There is a character to whatever we gaze at. The political flaneur, similarly, develops an instinct. There will be no transgressions. When you are shopping in the space of LV and Gucci, surely you don’t expect a This Fashion outlet? Or perhaps one might say that transgressions are already pre-determined. The occasional tramp might tread into a Gucci boutique. But he can never afford anything; he is unlikely to even get any service.

The work of journalism in the age of political reproducibility is a work filled with immense creativity and sophistication. It is true that the press (and other media) cannot be subservient. A subservient press has no creativity. It cannot simply regurgitate and be a mere voice box. It can be propaganda but it cannot just be propaganda. Its forte is to delineate and thereby enclose the space/limits of “transgression.” It has to cast the spell of fatigue over all those who seek to transgress. Perhaps this is why many agree with one famous (even if misunderstood) line from Alfian Sa’at:

“If you care too much about Singapore, first it'll break your spirit, and finally it will break your heart.”

I don’t think the “it” refers to Singapore. Perhaps “it” does not even refer to The System. For me, “it” is precisely the activity of caring about Singapore. In caring for the country, you run round the pre-determined pseudo-transgressive domain endlessly. Unless you have the energy to do so ad infinitum, fatigue sets in. On the other hand, there is a seat of power on which the phallus rests. “Rest” not only in the sense of sitting but also in the sense of consolidating and conserving energy. The phallus, ironically, thrives on its seeming passivity.

With fatigue, the gestation of the political flaneur ends. Just let things get by. Watch the protean crowd.

3. Personalization in the Highly Rationalized Society

There is supposed to be a high degree of depersonalization in highly rationalized societies. The individual does not matter. Yet, perhaps in this late capitalist age of rationalization, there is an uncanny form of personalization. Perhaps over-personalization.

The political flaneur might seem like a detached figure. But insouciant detachment is not allowed either. He has to be forcibly (or otherwise) attached. (After all, the detached is always a threat given the fear of “external influences.”) A personalization within rationalization is the way to go. If Big Brother could, instead of looking at people as a mass, gaze at each person from head to toe, he would be very successful indeed.

The technologies of efficiency and rationalization could also be the technologies of personalization. The public can access a portal for NSmen. Here, everything seems personalized—whether one likes it or not. This is an example of personalization that really targets each and every individual in the system. This is not just any computer-generated personalization of services. Register in a forum or something else online and you might get a “personalized” email that goes: “Hi Molly Meek, ….” The MIW portal, however, targets an audience that is bound to it by law. No pseudonyms, no account terminations—nothing of this sort. You can be sure the system knows exactly who you are. Everything looks personal: MyMIW, MyUnit, etc. There is even a link that goes: “My very own Personalized Page for NS transactions and activities” (underlining mine). (I presume it is safe to cite these instances since the page to which I refer is accessible to the general public.) The last instance almost looks as if it were screaming out at the target audience about how personal the system really is.

The technology does away, one supposes, with tedious administrative processes. This is rationalization. At the same time, it does not target an undifferentiated mass. It has the capacity of catering itself to each individual. The more highly personalized it gets, the more deeply one is interpellated into the system. Every click on a My--- link becomes an acknowledgement of the specific individual’s place within the system. And, often enough, the use of the portal is inevitable. The reach of the state goes right down to specific individuals.

4. What experiences?

How does one speak of experience in this age of rationalized personalization? The technologies of personalization could even provide platforms for speaking about experiences, albeit in pre-determined ways again thanks to mechanisms of (self-)censorship. One could speak about one’s experiences, but speech could inadvertently be co-opted when by the pre-determined modes of enunciation.

In a Today article, incidentally in the “Voices” section that I have previously mentioned, Benjamin Lee (or Mr. Miyagi) discusses the latest controversy involving blogs—the controversy over NSmen blogging about NS. Lee had removed his online posts about his reservist stint but has also restored them after obtaining permission. The issue here is not one about not allowing or restricting NSmen from posting about NS. After all, it is understandable that there are concerns about security breaches. What I’m concerned with is that NSmen are actually allowed to blog about NS. While I do not object to such sort of blogging, I find the situation uncanny.

Lee puts the stand of his superiors this way: “There was no formal warning per se, but rather, a reminder from my commanders that while the Singapore Armed Forces (SAF) encouraged people to talk about their national service experience, individuals had to be mindful of operational security — like the effectiveness of the SAF's weaponry — when doing so.”

People are encouraged to talk about their national service experience.

“I've since restored my blog posts, following consultation with my NS unit superiors, who, together with their superiors, agreed that while I should have asked for permission to post photographs first, there weren't problems with the posts about army life,” Lee writes.

People are encouraged to talk about their national service experience, but they might go through a chain of command that will determine if the contents are permissible.

I don’t see why Lee’s online posts would be deemed offensive or objectionable either. After all, there is ultimately an acceptance of national service despite jibes here and there. Photographs of the reservist experience simply situate him as an interpellated subject who is accepting or at least resigned to his lot. But what would have happened if, instead of lightheartedly blogging about his reservist stint, he had blogged seriously about conscription as (for example and purely as an example) an oppressive mechanism and said that he feels enslaved and miserable enough to kill himself?

My speculation is that, as long as the message could ultimately be co-opted, the system would tolerate it. Why not? The more you speak of your experiences, the more you are entrenching the system. The NSmen’s jibes at NS become a part of our way of life, the necessary pre-condition for the jibes being that NS is accepted in the first place.

A few jibes here and there do not hurt when you have already got people to do your bidding.

Even the hypothetical example that I have given could possibly be “acceptable.” If it ever sees light, one could be sure that there would be lots of understanding members of the “authorities” who express sympathy while weaving the issue into one of necessity.

Can the subaltern speak?

As Lee mentions, a foreign paper constructed the latest blogging controversy (which perhaps never was) as the latest move by the authorities to impose restrictions on blogging.

Lee himself, having been allowed to post his entries, gladly and truthfully declares that NSmen are not barred from sharing their experiences.

I don’t know what happened to the other two servicemen who were warned about posting articles and pictures of the Australian exercise.

I don’t know about those who have unexpressed frustrations that neither foreign papers not the local media (Lee himself included) speak to/for? A frustration beyond the curtailment of free expression, beyond the rhetoric of necessity and the limits of acceptability?

Where is the silent subaltern?

Where is the speaking subaltern whose speech have been spun into the web of other discourses?

5. Breaking your Spirit, Breaking your Heart, Losing your Mind

When your experiences are factored into the dominant discourse, perhaps madness is the only recourse?

I cannot complete this article for I’m still burdened with sanity. And I’m fatigued.

Spirit broken,
Heart too;
What of the mind?

Even s/he who runs from darkness in the night (to borrow an idea from XenoBoy) will eventually see daylight because the night is never eternal. Yet, how many have experienced running away from the cycles of day/night?

10 Comments:

Blogger xenoboysg said...

Hi molly,

I think we were both at gilbert's blog at the same time! ahaha

Anyway for this entry ... wowz.
Printed it to check some references. Forgot all about Benjamin and flaneurs .. hehe

Para 2 : Probably people like cherian george could use some of the points on political reproduc-ibility. Agree on mis-reading of Alfian, in this reading, its even more poignant.

Interpellate -- a highly interesting concept, once had an hour long discussion on this word and how Lacan used it. spiralled out of control past the third bottle of wine.

Agreed on para 4. it is sometimes frustrating to see intelligents like miyagi or brown play into the state's hands of speech sanction. sigh sighz

" But what would have happened if, instead of lightheartedly blogging about his reservist stint, he had blogged seriously about conscription as (for example and purely as an example) an oppressive mechanism and said that he feels enslaved and miserable enough to kill himself?" ---> This will be the true test. But on the other hand, "flaneurship" is the hip and cool logos in sg cybersphere. Think Tomorrow.

Exploring the enemy of the flaneur ... provocateur?

3:00 AM  
Blogger Molly Meek said...

What a cyber coincidence, meeting (or rather not meeting??) someone stationed in another part of the world.

Molly is ashamed. She doesn't quite remember Benjamin or flaneurs either, but use them nonetheless.

Of course, I could be misreading Alfian too. "It" might not be referring to anything at all, as in, "It is difficult to define."

7:18 AM  
Blogger xenoboysg said...

haha, benjamin and the arcades project i think.

No use understanding, like you said, if we were to understand it means nothingness. better to be insane or more accurately, free from sanity.

11:54 AM  
Blogger Molly Meek said...

XenoBoy sure reads Molly very carefully. :)

4:19 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Request for interview - Research for Singapore Internet Research Centre
-----------------------

Dear Molly Meek,



My name is Poon Mingyang Raymond, and I belong to a pair of final-year students from the School of Communication and Information at Nanyang Technological University.



For our final-year project, we are doing research on blogging in Singapore for the Singapore Internet Research Centre (SIRC, http://www.ntu.edu.sg/sci/sirc/). Our supervisor is Dr Randolph Kluver ( trkluver@ntu.edu.sg), the executive director of SIRC.



We are conducting interviews with local bloggers to find out how they blog about issues of social importance, like the recent incident of the racist blog posts. We'll also discuss what local bloggers understand about the censorship environment in Singapore and how they cope with it.



Will you be able to help us by agreeing to a face-to-face interview? Our aim is to speak with at least 20 bloggers and the interviews will be held in the period of December.



Your thoughts on the topic are greatly appreciated. We are aiming as well to submit the research paper for a conference on media.



Please tell us if we can set an interview date with you. Do call me at 9679 2965 if you require more information. Thank you









Sincerely,

Poon Mingyang



Mob: 9679 2965

11:14 PM  
Blogger Molly Meek said...

Hi Raymond, will get back to you. Can email me at mollymeek@gmail.com or leave an email address behind?

8:16 AM  
Blogger xenoboysg said...

I think you should give a lecture Molly, coz Raymond left his phone number TWICE! ahaha

And yes, Xenoboy reads all the blogs he likes carefully coz its a sign of respect or in the words of Ali G, ResTept.

10:39 AM  
Blogger Molly Meek said...

Strange thing is how they know/think Molly is in Singapore. Is Big Brother hiding somewhere? My, my...

12:00 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

As someone who isn't located in S'pore but reads you regularly and refreshes LJ-friends obsessively, I can tell you're probably located in Singapore from the times at which you post. But probably no one else is sufficiently pathetic to notice this.

12:55 PM  
Blogger Molly Meek said...

Yes, that's one indication too. Though sometimes Molly posts at around 2 am or even 4 am here,

7:30 PM  

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