bored of this planet

“We are bored with this planet. It has seen better centuries, and the promise of better times to come eludes us. The possibilities of this world, in these times, seem dismal and dull. All it offers at best is spectacles of disintegration. Capitalism or barbarism, those are the choices. This is an epoch governed by blackmail: either more and more of the same, or the end times. Or so they say. We don’t buy it. It is time to start scheming on how to leave the twenty first century. The pessimists are right. Things can’t go on as they are. The optimists are also right. Another world is possible. The means are at our disposal. Our species-being is as builder of worlds.

- Mackenzie Wark, The Beach Beneath the Streets

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes

- Proust

Abandon Everything, Again

For the bourgeoisie and the petit bourgeoisie life is a party. Every weekend they have one. The proletariat doesn’t have parties. Only rhythmic funerals. That is going to change. The exploited will have a grand party. Memory and guillotines. Sensing it, acting it certain nights, inventing edges and humid corners, is like caressing the acidic eyes of the new spirit.

http://altarpiece.blogspot.com/2009/06/first-infrarealist-manifesto-english.html

I’m a writer, so I spend a lot of time alone at home, but I also spend a lot of time as an activist in the streets, in gatherings and things like that, and following revolutions around the world: the Velvet Revolution, Tiananmen Square, the Zapatistas … In those moments, I’ve discovered in myself and in others a deep happiness, an unknown desire that’s finally fulfilled to be purposeful, to be a part of history and society, to have a voice.

http://bombsite.com/issues/109/articles/3327