Bloggy blog blog

  Humor 
  Originally uploaded by arnold_nicholas.

It seems, several years into the blog phenomenon, few have pondered much about the medium itself.

In the previous post's comments, it would seem commenters would have Long Sunday as some sort of peer-reviewed journal, demanding, then, the sort of analyses expected by them.  Presumably, every post should be around 7000 words. 

Of course no one will suggest this, so criticism comes in on entries heavily theoretical, but given the very format, necessarily without the ability to 'back them up'.  I don't pretend to show you the links between Baudrillard and Lacan in a post, and even less in the COMMENTS TO A POST, which is where my analysis can be found.  But that's not the point.  Is there not something interesting, even liberating, about a bunch of ideas thrown in together?  (Why else read Baudrillard, McLuhan, etc...?)

Instead, I seek to probe, to open up an avenue of thought you have the choice of entering, or not, just as I might or might not when passing by the posts of other people.  I certainly avoid posts and bloggers generally that don't probe at all, rather remaining safe under the cover of already established viewpoints.

If we are to naively think this some sort of peer-reviewed journal, the language used in talking about other people's posts isn't one I recognize from any peer review process.  It is completely unhelpful, and only renders this blog (potentially) irrelevant.  A bunch of academics whining about jargon -  who cares?  Either go with the probe or don't.

Blog entries, like all good probes, should have a sense of humour.  They shouldn't take themselves too seriously, precisely because the readers aren't going to take them too seriously, that is, won't really read them.  Blog posts shouldn't be taken as some sort of definitive viewpoint, much less the comments to a post (which, again, is where my analysis can be found).

Total seriousness is important, of course, but for peer-reviewed journals!  And, again, this is not it!

(If anyone cares, and I doubt they do, my work, much of which has gone through the peer review process, locates itself at the very Real - yes, I did capitalize it, perhaps it is the German in me - intersection of Zizek and Baudrillard.)

Comments

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

Adam's point, as I took it, is that there's a difference between idle chatter and idle chatter which suggests evidence of sustained engagement with the things one chats idly about. (Not that I speak for him, mind you.)

To be brutally frank here, what you seem to want isn't a conversation, but to be oracular. You want to have the ideas you toss off treated seriously just because; whereas people who read them see them slight productions they are. You're upset because someone called you on the pretense, had the nerve to say that your pronouncement is not only unintellectual, but uninformed, uninteresting, and unfunny. (The call for others to acquire a sense of humor sounds as odd from your lips as it would from Dick Cheney's.)

You seem to think the blog empowers that undergraduate impulse, the one I see time and again in half-digested essays:

This seems related to that! I'll point that out and hope the teacher understands what I meant! Maybe s/he'll even think I'm brilliant!

You may call it an invitation to "probe," but it reads like a half-assed "insight" via juxtaposition which you hope will 1) impress others while 2) enticing them to finishing thinking through what you were to lazy to.

You do realize that--in this and related neck-of-the-woods--your conception of what's proper to a post flies in the face of what others do, don't you?

[RIPope]

That's the point of this post, Scott. And rather than you trying to create an 'us-VS-you' frame here - which seems even less than undergraduate, something like grade school - the point of this post is to open up a discussion about the medium. But of course we know you're no fan of discussion.

That 'undergraduate impulse' must for you also cover most continental thought, but we already know that about you. I'm sorry to say, but I don't think you've ever enlightened anything for me, or prodded me on to think differently. I wish it wasn't so.

A probe can never be finished, or it wouldn't be a probe - just as no blog post could ever be finished, or it wouldn't be a blog post.

I don't really know, but I suspect that not everyone here subscribes to the fantasy of the 'finished' nature of every post. Of course, and to repeat myself (but you've just done it for the millionth time, so what the hell), posts that actually DO probe and RISK thinking are more likely to be attacked, for the precise reason they cannot, in a couple hundred words, provide the necessary context with which to defend themselves...

For that, look elsewhere.

[patrick]

'posts that actually DO probe and RISK thinking are more likely to be attacked, for the precise reason they cannot, in a couple hundred words, provide the necessary context with which to defend themselves...'

But you do no such thing. You already deleted my long comment today, due to perceived attack although you left others little more (if any merciful). I used to be your lone supporter in these jousts, but while I don't support your opponents in the least, I find you by now quite inane and prissy.

[RIPope]

I did not delete any comments.

[Kenneth Rufo]

Are you seriously defining "probe" as "to open up an avenue of thought you have the choice of entering, or not"?

I appreciate you trying to channel McLuhan, but if your particular effort yields only two options - agree or ignore - and balks when someone confronts the form or content of your probe, then I think you might want to use a different term. Maybe invent something bloggy-specific, like blobe.

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

That 'undergraduate impulse' must for you also cover most continental thought, but we already know that about you.

Wow, that sentence and sense aren't even remotely acquainted. I think your point is that I believe all continental thought to consist of the particular intellectual shortcut you employed in your previous post...which is absurd. It is, as I said, typical of people who speak in an oracular fashion, i.e. those who believe their gnomic musings possesses inherent value which other people would do well to probe. It's laziness wielded from and wedded to a particular, imagined relationship of self to audience. Sometimes, as I noted, it appears as the crutch of the undergraduate who has an idea but lacks what it takes to think through its implications; and sometimes it appears as a means of entering into a "discussion" in such a way as to alert conversants that they're in the presence of someone who believes him/herself in possession of a superior mind. That is what I said, and that is what I meant. If you want to argue that this applies to continentl philosophy tout corte, that's your business.

But don't attribute the argument to me.

A probe can never be finished, or it wouldn't be a probe - just as no blog post could ever be finished, or it wouldn't be a blog post.

You know, I can't believe I had the nerve to call say you spoke in an oracular tone. I must be an idiot, because everyone knows that tomorrow's link-dump could never be completed or it wouldn't be a link-dump...despite, you know, someone dumping all the links s/he intends to and posting it. To hit post is hit post forever, or it is not to hit post at all; similarly, to eat a cheese sandwich is to eat a cheese sandwich forever, or else it is not a cheese sandwich.*

Of course, and to repeat myself (but you've just done it for the millionth time, so what the hell), posts that actually DO probe and RISK thinking are more likely to be attacked, for the precise reason they cannot, in a couple hundred words, provide the necessary context with which to defend themselves...

People don't attack what you write because you've probed some important depth. And this whole idea that throwing out two quotations and an undeveloped idea constitutes some heroic "RISK" of thought, well, keep telling yourself that. I'm sure it's really RISKY to burden others with the connections you're too lazy to forge yourself. Sadly, some people do respond, seem to enjoy doing the difficult, intellectual labor you oracular lot avoid.

*By "eat a cheese sandwich" I obviously mean "blog."

[RIPope]

The risk of thought clearly applies to my COMMENT to the post, from where the attacking departs. You added "heroic". There's something a bit absurd here.

Who, now, is attributing an oracular quality to my comment to a post? I find this somewhat bizarre. It's as if I was force-feeding everyone Lacan, though I hardly consider a blog comment an act of force.

In a comment I probed the Zidane incident through a Lacanian lens, simply because at that moment it seemed to present itself. What's remarkable is that no one, in all this, has presented a different Lacanian argument that might contradict mine. So, virtually no one is following through the probe (of the comment, that is) - though some have from the Baudrillardian side of the equation. I forged some connections, and I'm happy if others do some as well. The truth is I'm not about to write an essay on the incident, and I suspect most others are not about to either. This is something I alluded to in the preface to that comment. So perhaps a little lightening up is in order.

Of course another question is why it was/is taken so seriously, despite the preface and all...

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

I'll stop now, but I just want to point out:

The risk of thought clearly applies to my COMMENT to the post, from where the attacking departs.

vs

posts that actually DO probe and RISK thinking are more likely to be attacked

I'm not sure that "clearly" is entirely warranted. That said, note how you've obsessed at people not taking up your probe, the Lacanian one. Why would that be the only probe worthy of the name? It seems to me a genuine commitment to discourse would entail a willingness to have one's conversants understand the juxtaposition on their terms. The insistence that they do so on yours is partly me point here.

[RIPope]

Well the con-fusion between the post and the probe is one we're all engaged in here...

Everyone should understand or work through a probe on their own terms, this is true, but most of the attacks suggested there was a faulty reading of Lacan here. On THESE terms, no one has worked through it properly.

Now, one might just not want to bother with a Lacanian probe, just as some might not want to bother with a post concerning liberal niceties. But then one shouldn't, at the same time, bother to attack such posts, or even comment on them. Unless, of course, one is working towards some sort of synthesis of the two positions.

This might have been possible were it not for the multitude of inflammatory “loads of shit”. But again, flaming is a well-documented behaviour of cyberspace.

[Adam Kotsko]

Your Lacanian reading, such as it was, just didn't work. It seemed to be based on a rather naive concept of the Real -- in fact, you sometimes give evidence of thinking that "the Real" just means "actual material stuff" rather than... well, what Lacan thinks it means, or what it comes to mean in the course of Lacan's work. Or else you just use the word "real" as it is normally used, execpt you capitalize it (as in your remark above about "the very Real connections between Baudrillard and Zizek").

I've never seen any evidence that you've really wrapped your mind around these concepts at all -- you're just kind of "throwing it out there." Whereas if you had the thorough mastery of the concepts that you seem to fancy yourself as having, it should just come naturally to you. Of course, this begs the question of whether I personally am a good judge in such matters, and I'm sure that we could come up with some really amusing and edifying way to compare cock size here -- but I'm just going to say, since you're trying to cultivate a reputation as a Great Lacanian, maybe you should hit the books and get back to us.

[s0metim3s]

Richard - your initial post, on Baudrillard and the final of the World Cup - expressed strong opinions, was dismissive of football tout court, etc.

Responses to it were similarly energetic. Flaming might well be a well-documented aspect of cyberspace, but so too is flamebait. I don't think any expectation of 'serious analysis' or essay-like posts had much of anything to do with the argument that ensued.

There was disagreement, is what.

[RIPope]

Adam, I'm not going to provide you with an essay here surrounding the ways in which I use the term Real in the comments to a Long Sunday post. I'll just mention that when I say "the Real connections between Baudrillard and Lacan" I'm referring, precisely, the absent dialogue between them, the disconnect that is also, from a certain 'parallax view', a connection. I've never set myself up as a "Great Lacanian", but if you'd like to judge me, judge me by my peer-reviewed work.

s0metimes: my initial post included a quote of Baudrillard, and Johnny Rotten's, and my comments were prefaced by an encouragement to NOT take things too seriously. This WAS flaming.

[Adam Kotsko]

Okay, yeah, it was flaming.

[Kenneth Rufo]

As in a flaming load of shit.

Which means I guess we know what kind of probe it was.

Du da dum.

Alright, can we officially declare these two threads over and done?

[RIPope]

Yes, let the hysteria end.

[RIPope]

And the tedium, and the bore. I'd like to read something interesting now, that is, something I haven't read a thousand times before.

[RIPope]

And someone ought to put an end to this terminal Lord of the Flies-like environment...

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

Now, I'm not one to complain about a poor or unsubstantiated Lacanian reading. When I target Lacan, I aim for parts more fundamental...but I spy in these two posts a desire for isolation, for a space in which one can philosophize wildly, free of all constraint.

While I understand why someone would desire such a place, is it not healthier to test the mettle of your conviction against those who don't already share your assumptions? Because in your response, I sense a strong desire to live-and-let-live. But do you think your ideas are the sharper for that?

I would feel better, smarter, fitter and more productive were I to associate only with those who share my beliefs; but I think I am better, smarter, fitter and more productive because I consistently thrust 'em into the fire.

Different strokes & what-not, I understand, but I can't help but see the limits you set on these discussions--and, in particular, on what you think constitutes an "interesting" argument--as counterproductive to sustained intellectual development. By which I mean, when I hit the marketplace of ideas, I can handle sound critiques of my methodology and account for my decision to practice it anyway; but I have the feeling that, while you have the confidence (no one'll begrudge you that), you may not have the chops to handle the critique.

Consider this a bit of friendly advice--no, I'm not kidding, I mean it--but if you don't learn to think beyond limits you've imposed upon yourself, I don't think you'll make it in academia, be it here or overseas.

[Kenneth Rufo]

Well Scott, let's not kid ourselves. Many academics "make" it without thinking beyond the limits imposed upon themselves. They're not reshaping the Zeitgeist, but they do fine.

[Scott Eric Kaufman]

What are you still doing awake, E.S.T. Boy? Anyway, of course you're correct, but you shouldn't be. You're a former debate coach and I've a Master Debater plaque on my wall. I think we can agree that ideas refined are better than those asserted, no? And that we'd all be better off if we had more of the former and less of the latter?

(And yes, my high school letter jacket was the funniest thing ever.)

[Kenneth Rufo]

We can indeed agree. And I have no idea why I'm still awake.

[Charles]

To hit post is hit post forever, or it is not to hit post at all; similarly, to eat a cheese sandwich is to eat a cheese sandwich forever, or else it is not a cheese sandwich.*

Is it just me, or is this equation impotent/lacking something?

To wit: "to eat...at all"

[Adam Kotsko]

Sucks to you and your ass-mar!

[RIPope]

Scott, your argument is so completely divorced from anything approaching reality to even begin to make sense of it would be to improperly validate it. Too many assumptions in the comment to a post? WTF?? All you can do, in the most insidious and rhetorical of tones, is continually pretend that you are the protector of learning and open minds.
So the irony is that your enunciated is perpetually undermined by your place of enunciation. You say one thing, and do another.

All you ever seem to do falls in the noxious tradition of academic careerism, and you WILL have a great career in the more boring parts of academia following this through. You might not, of course, ever have an original thought in your life. Your choice.

[RIPope]

And Scott, if career ambition is what drives you through these posts, don't you think you might be wasting your time 'finding' the assumptions within a 200 word (comment to a) post? Is that something you can add to a CV?

Or, just might a hiring committee suggest you read their actual work? (I should note I do not waste my time on your site.)