Liveblogging Baudrillard

The real is not only what can be reproduced, but that which is already reproduced, the hyper-real.

Yet the pleasure of being unmasked is all.

—Fragments

This is the fate of religions: they are no longer believed, but the disincarnate practice remains.

—The Gulf War Did Not Take Place, Is It Really Taking Place?

The media promote the war, the war promotes the media, and advertising competes with the war. Promotion is the most thick-skinned parasite in our culture. It would undoubtedly survive a nuclear conflict.

—The Gulf War Did Not Take Place, Is It Really Taking Place?

Bram Tihany, “The Toast”

Bram Tihany, “The Toast”

No more than the politicians, the military personnel do not know what to make of their real function, their function of death and destruction. They are pledged to the decoy of war as the others are to the decoy of power.

—The Gulf War Did Not Take Place, Will Not Take Place

Today, power itself is an embarrassment and there is no one to assume it truly.

—The Agony of Power, Where Good Grows

This world no longer needs us. The best of all possible worlds no longer needs us.

—The Agony of Power, Where Good Grows

We are deep in the masquerade, where politics is only a game of idolatry and marketing. It is a giant step toward the end of the system of representation. This is the destiny of contemporary politicians - those who live by the show will die by the show.

—The Agony of Power, The White Terror of World Order

Lilian Coquillaud

Lilian Coquillaud

Power itself must be abolished - and not solely in the refusal to be dominated, which is at the heart of all traditional struggles - but also, just as violently, in the refusal to dominate. Intelligence cannot, can never be in power because intelligence consists of this double refusal.

—The Agony of Power, From Domination to Hegemony

Especially in times of trouble, people will vote massively for the candidate who does not ask them to think.

—The Agony of Power, From Domination to Hegemony

The religious revival is epigonal and has nothing to do with the fervor of past centuries. It is the specific product of a disenchanted situation of loss where everything that disappears is artificially revived. It is the abreactive product of a world where there is no reason left to believe in anything.

—The Agony of Power, From Domination to Hegemony

Everything dreams of transfiguring itself into its opposite without ceasing to be itself. Even good and evil dream of each other from the depths of their loneliness.

—Fragments

Sandra Selig, “Universes”

Sandra Selig, “Universes”