America as ‘horror’ film made real…or: Hell as ‘process’, not ‘place’…
January 27, 2012
America as ‘horror’ film made real…
…or: Hell is less a place we transit to than a ‘process’ we cultivate—radically and absolutely…
the final processing…
In considering the narrative of Empire from its inception and, continuing, reading the Fallujah account, please consider: what would your reaction have been if it came to light that one of our military agents—e.g., a Marine—had, nearing the culmination of battle, knelt down before the corpse of his recent victim, the abdomen torn open (the effect of ordnance) and lapped, with appreciation (and even zeal) at the still warm—but specifically—sanguineous flesh? With what emotional and intellectual metric would you have responded? Extreme dismay? Mild discomfort? Something between those two poles—e.g., apathy? As far as we know this has not occurred—or, it has not surfaced yet…
so, let us help one another, because, in Hell, there is no helping one another…
Hell, as reasoned, ought not to be viewed as a ‘place’ we embark towards, i.e., with a limen we approach and transit through. And this, in contradistinction to the literary construct of the portal notice in the Inferno, i.e., “Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch’intrate” (“abandon all hope ye who enter here…”).
Far from existing solely as a literary—or, even fantastic—notion readily dismissed (as being merely an example of cultural artifice, imagining, etc.), the contention here is that Hell is, rather, the all-too-real—and condign—effect of our freely-willed acts and behaviour, i.e., what we as sentient, interdependent beings have chosen and actualized. And this, being all the more serious as our most elemental natures are at variance with a state of interminable alienation from the Other, as is also the case with behaviour deemed self-destructive.
the opposite of helping (i.e., love, or caritas) is not hatred, but indifference…
We cultivate an ethic of indifference towards the Other—and even ourselves—and, as this willed behavior is essentially foreign to our natures as interdependent social beings, we undergo, almost imperceptibly, a…devolving—a changing at the most elemental level.
To continue: if the willed code of behaviour is sustained it would seem to follow that at some point the effect is final, and irrevocable.
our immortal souls have come undone…
But, the question arises as to the seemingly obscure progression of this moral pathology, we being heedless of the arc, from ‘worse’ to ‘worst’, without a saving sense of terror for its inevitable conclusion: no recovery, no deliverance for/from our own lapsed selves…
we, the commonwealth, never recovered…
The obscure nature of the devolving may be owing to an initial trauma—i.e., the damage occurring with the fundamental upset, leading to what the Hopi term the Koyaanisqatsi—“life out of balance”. It is altogether possible—and, in fact, even a great likelihood—that not only is there no recovery for many (which recovery presupposing an acknowledgement of personal failure and wrongdoing) but a predisposition establishes itself—a trend—and the subject corrupts, even in absolute terms. And, this sequence of malign events being as true for the Self as for the collective, or State.
More specifically for us, in broad terms the ‘trauma’ may well have been owing to the initial fact of the imperium, i.e., the Self is relegated to some demeaned status as the corporate reality is valorized. We grieve from an injustice and, prolonged, the grieving becomes an exhaustive event. We lose something of our humanity. Caring becomes dear, and we, then, cease to care. Consider, for example, the grieving we brought to Cambodia and the killing fields we then compelled. ‘Twas ever thus…
we visit our own Hell upon our neighbor…
As to our own failings as a nation, then, the false claim is made that what amounted to execrable behavior shown to, e.g., Native Americans, African Americans—or ‘minorities’, classes, etc., of every stripe—is a matter of history, i.e., “we’ve long since put ‘paid’ to what many view as our iniquitous past.” However, such self-serving, specious analysis only forestalls the reckoning of those acts of policy and procedure. And, this denial has its issue in, e.g., Fallujah. Said another way: we have put our own dis-ease into circulation.
the final processing, redux: “…there will be wailing and grinding of teeth…”
That we are in a downward arc as a collective (from My Lai, to Fallujah, to…) is apparent. That our national ethic—or, better, code of behaviour—is one of ‘safe’ uninvolvement, or indifference, is a virtual guarantee of the outcome. America, the horror film, is a work in progress, with new premises, new casting, new viewers caught in the glare of the projector…
Like morbid voyeurs, we have become inured to past horrific spectacle, and tone-deaf to the screams. We have adapted to the renewed litany of atrocities, even as we accommodate our elected Masters with monotonous detachment. Yes, Hell is less a place to which any one of us may embark upon one day than a process we’ve actualized today. Hell is here, now: we impart its features, forget that act, and the stark reality is now less apparent. We, literally, raise Hell, since misery disdains a vacuum but craves company. What a miserable thing it is to be an American, to be processed in America, to be processed by Americans…
so, let us help one another, because, in Hell, there is no helping one another…
What then does any possible alternative look like? It seems reasonable to conclude that since there is no caring for the Other—or, for the Self—in Hell (which solicitude we’ll then be in dire need of) the only true alternative is one of caritas, or caring for the Other/Self. By cultivating this practice, here and now—because that is all we’ve been vouchsafed, the ‘now’—we partake of an alternative scheme.
It is natural to our beings—to care for ourselves as we care for one another—in the same way that Empire is an unnatural fact of life. That is, Empire is aberrant, it is bizarre, it is the uncanny presence in our midst. Power exists via exclusion, and the Power-driven act begets same. Caring, by the same token, is the non-Power-driven act, par excellence. So, let us help one another. And, to that end, more is more.
