The Revolutionary Option- a ‘Night of Terrorism’



Feeling a bit sick after the excellent ‘Night of Terrorism’ on BBC4. A series of documentaries:-

-Baader Meinhof
-Multitude- the End of Capitalism
-The Angry Brigade

I photographed the telly, (which is a bit of a strange one, remediating mediation) to add to the visual raw material and reference for the new game and in an attempt to capture and encapsulate some of the key ideas presented. View images

Sick on a number of counts:-

Baader Meinhof
A very dramatic and intimately communicated documentary. It evoked in me a profound ambivalence, sympathy and revulsion for the leaders of the Red Army Faction in 1972- these middle class crazies. Psychological Germans, a power crazed man and a self destructive woman- Ulrike Meinhof who, once imprisoned, cleverly, neurotically ripped herself apart in her cell, ripping away any compassion for herself with help from the secret letters bought to her from Baader. I saw the madness, uselessness and brutality of the revolution proposed by Baader Meinhof, but at the same time saw that their actions were no more brutal than those of the state that they opposed.

They played by the same ultra violent rules as they saw the state excercising against the innocent and powerless civilians of Vietnam. Only they were not the democratically appointed brutes. Their philosophies continue to be very well articulated by surrealy committed ex-members of the RAF. They saw themselves as third world resistance fighters against Imperialist barbarity and Capitalist oppression and suppression of the human spirit.

The Multitude- The End of Capitalism
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Italian radical philosopher, Antoni Negri spent many years in jail in spite of his acquittal and remains inexplicably under house arrest. A sensible, middle class, articulate and seemingly compassionate academic, imprisoned ironically (considering the nature of his philosophy) by a faceless State.

Negri sees Capitalism as poison, anachronistic obstacle to human evolution through the creativity of the ‘multitude’.
He takes a bottom up approach. His ideas linked in with something I had read earlier on Pat Kane's blog site about the new 2nd Superpower being the global multitude linked via blogs.
Negri and Hart also talked about the power of the new networks to connect people up on single issues sometimes leading to surprising coalitions. I first became properly aware of this phenomenon when I joined the demonstration in London to stop the war against Iraq in September 2002.
Another thing that made me sick was the documentary footage of the protest marches against the Vietnam War, the 1968 riots in Paris and the anti -capitalist marches in Genoa in 2002 etc. Their ineffectiveness and the seeming implacableness of the police who become more and more like soldiers of the state.

The Angry Brigade
Finally the 'good hearted' Stoke Newington 5 who were jailed for the bombings of the ‘Angry Brigade’. Their apparent conceit, arrogance, need for attention.

Generally, I need to do a few things to stave off my mounting paranoia and anxiety. Need to tie up a good few loose ends this week, bring a bit of structure to chaos. Make a list tomorrow and work my way through it.