Journal articles on the topic 'Zizek Hegel'

<p>Con el presente artículo, se pretende contribuir al esclarecimiento de la discusión que se desarrolla actualmente en torno a la pregunta por el hombre. En esta discusión, se rechaza la posición radical acerca de la muerte del hombre, fundada<br />en la apreciación foucaultiana de la historia, y de la muerte de la representación<br />en el futuro, para inscribirse, por el contrario, en el horizonte que reclama, como lo hace Sloterdijk, la necesidad de pensar una nueva antropología. Esta posición se firma más en las argumentaciones sostenidas por Lacan y Zizek, articuladas, por supuesto, en una dinámica diferente a la de la Escuela Crítica y a la de un nihilismo escéptico. Por eso la importancia de recuperar, entre otros, el concepto de universal concreto, de conformidad con la indicación de Zizek de leer a Lacan desde Hegel y viceversa. Se profundiza así el sentido de la historia y la construcción de una subjetividad libre.</p>

El presente trabajo reúne la visión de los autores de la escuela de Frankfurt y autores post-lacanianos y analiza, no de forma sistemática, la visión más importante sobre la ingobernabilidad presente en Latinoamérica con la expresión de una constante crisis. Los aportes de Slavoj Zizek, Max Horkheimer y Theodor Adorno, bajo la atenta mirada de Hegel postulan la idea de que el goce en la sociedad es el motor primordial de la negligencia social, que encubre, tanto a gobernantes bajo la lupa de ineptos, como a la sociedad en general bajo el sino de desafortunados. Finalmente, la mano invisible que ha movido la economía es el gobierno más apropiado para el caos, es el gobierno al que no se le puede pedir cuentas y de tras de su totalidad, de su cobertura ilimitada, no existe absolutamente nada.

The article examines the dynamics of culture as a result of self-unfolding and self-knowledge of being, the agent of which is a person who is both an actor of himself, his own being, and creating culture as a shell of the "second" being, as a screen (S. Zizek), the stage on which his action unfolds, his practice of cognition of being and himself (including as part of being). There is a folding of the triad of being, man and culture, correlating with the well-known formula of Lacan: Real, Imaginary, Symbolic. Within the boundaries of this triad, there is a subject-subject dialogue between man and man, man and being as equal objects in relation to co-creation, co-being, co-cognition. The article correlates with the current search for new ontological theories (object-oriented ontology, speculative realism, assembly theory, etc.), the desire to rethink the role and meaning of the subject (which S. Zizek calls for), to rethink Hegel and actualize his philosophical heritage (again, S. Zizek's thesis), with the search for new concepts that would explain the processes taking place in culture in a better way than the postmodern theory does (L. Hutcheon). The article proposes to consider the dynamics of the genesis and evolution of culture as a correlation of autonomous phenomena of the mind, as a result of reflection by being itself through its own thinking forms - the living: the interaction of being with its own thinking forms for the inclusion of objects of being in the movement of being and its self-disclosure, the disclosure of ways to be, the essence of the immanent property of being, revealed in the procedures of the search for truth, within the boundaries of which culture arises.

En este artículo se pretende realizar un análisis del origen filosófico de uno de los puntos clave que cambiaron los cimientos de la metafísica moderna a partir de la aportación de la noción de filosofía de naturaleza de Schelling, que conlleva a abrir desde el idealismo alemán una concepción alternativa de las relaciones entre la finitud y el Absoluto a las llevadas a cabo por Fichte y Hegel. Su filosofía de la naturaleza inaugurará toda una corriente de pensamiento que incluirá tanto gran parte de la filosofía de Spinoza como el discurrir estético del Sturm und Drang alemán. Posteriormente, y previa enorme reflexión del tótem ineludible de la filosofía crítica kantiana y ruptura con la fichteana, la importancia de su legado filosófico no hará más que crecer, ya que de la influencia sus escritos participarán, de manera más o menos explícita, pensadores como Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, Freud o Heidegger, e incluso llegará hasta el siglo XXI de la mano de gran parte de los autores de la denominada época posmoderna, como Deleuze o Zizek entre otros.

This paper analyses mainly three representative photographs of the spectacles of mourning as displayed in Fig. 1, 2 and 3 that come to surface during political and social demonstrations in Kathmandu and other towns occasionally. Such spectacles used by political parties and social activists include clean-shaved-head, white linen clothes, burial shroud, bamboo bier, and fire. Together, they give a picture that a mock funeral of Hindu order is being staged. My major concern is to answer these questions: Why do Nepali youths stage such semiotics of sad worldview at times when their transitional politics and society is often praised for being dynamic? Why do they bring such religiously subjective and familial spectacles into the public ripened with politics? I argue in the line of argument developed by political philosophers Friedrich Hegel and Slavoj Zizek and psychoanalysts like Sigmund Freud and Carl G. Jung to reach a conclusion that such spectacles evoke the complex state of Nepali youths’ political subjectivity. While staging such mock funerals, they stage their helplessness of being youths of a donor-depended and Hindu patriarchal nation that has been going through transitional politics.

Op dit moment komen veel jongeren in de knel. Maar steeds blijft de focus liggen op de labiliteit van jongeren en op de wachtlijsten die in de wereld van de (jeugd)zorg ontstaan. Wat als we die focus verleggen, en kijken naar het onderwijs? Als de jongeren massaal ziek en ongelukkig zijn, wat hebben we dan te doen? En wat heeft dat te maken met de opkomst van kunst binnen het onderwijs? Onlangs sprak ik een vriend van wie de zoon vanwege een burn-out een tijd stopte met de studie. Ik had deze zoon al eerder aan de telefoon gehad. Hij vertelde dat hij op het University College heel wat te verhapstukken kreeg: teksten, films en discussie over oorlog, klimaatcrisis, vluchtelingen, discriminatie, armoede. En dat hij dat niet goed ‘verteren’ kon. Dat hij had aangegeven dat hij na een heftige film niet meteen in discussie kon, maar dat niemand, ook hijzelf niet helemaal, begreep waarom niet. En dat hij het ook ingewikkeld vond om steeds cijfers te moeten halen en daar hard voor te werken, terwijl hij intussen nog bezig was alle thema’s die op hem af kwamen te verteren. En dat hij zich vaak somber voelde. En dat de psycholoog had gezegd dat hij misschien manisch depressief was. Lang geleden, toen ik nog studeerde, kwam ik tijdens het schrijven van een paper voor een Amerikaanse universiteit, terecht in moedeloze vertwijfeling. Ik zat vast en kon niet voorof achteruit. In een vlaag van wanhoop stapte ik de spreekkamer binnen van mijn docent. Ik zei: ‘Mister Goodnight, you have to help me, I am angry and desperate’. De docent keek op van zijn werk en zei rustig ‘Aren’t we all?’ Wij moesten beiden lachen, maar in de ruimte was de herkenning van de onmacht duidelijk voelbaar, en ik voelde mij serieus genomen. Ik leerde op dat moment veel tegelijk, en de docent keek naar mijn vraagstuk en gaf me instrumentarium om mijn in de knel gekomen studie weer vlot te trekken. Hiermee wil ik zeker niet zeggen dat alle psychische problemen met een rake opmerking zijn op te lossen. Maar wel dat heel veel kinderen, jongeren en studenten nodeloos vereenzamen als de problemen die zij ontmoeten niet met herkenning tegemoet worden getreden, maar met angst en zorg.

'Bacon / Böhme . . Hegel – James', Slovenian trans. by Maja Lovrenov, ed. Mladen Dolar and Slavoj Zizek, Problemi 9-10 (2014), pp. 47-73.http://www.drustvo-dtp.si/analecta/product_info.php?products_id=207

O presente trabalho tem como objetivo problematizar a relação entre o princípio deliberdade e a ideia de natureza humana. Defendemos a tese de que o verdadeiro conceito deliberdade só pode ser pensado além dos limites (naturalmente) estabelecidos pela espécie humana.Logo, liberdade tem a ver com o domínio do inumano, não com o do humano. Desse modo,convém contrapor duas perspectivas contemporâneas que divergem radicalmente sobre o conceitode modernidade: a pragmática formal de Jürgen Habermas e o materialismo dialético de SlavojZizek. Tomamos como fio condutor, portanto, a polêmica sobre o tema da biogenética, e, a partirdaí, procuramos demonstrar como a concepção de modernidade para Zizek – apoiadoprincipalmente em Hegel e Lacan – revela-se ainda mais radical do que o projeto de umamodernidade inacabada de Habermas.

A Revista Dialectus, em seu 9º (nono) número, traz ao debate algumas facetas do pensamento do filósofo e psicanalista Slavoj Zizek. Este pensador esloveno é um autor instigante que criticamente adota como bases de sua construção teórica – em suas temáticas econômico-políticas, histórico-filosóficas, sócio-culturais, psicanalíticas e político-filosóficas – a densa argumentação de autores clássicos, como Karl Marx, Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilheim Friedrich Hegel e Jacques Lacan, entre diversos outros autores (...)

De modo controvertido, Zizek apropriou-se do pensamento de Lacan e de Hegel endossando os compromissos da modernidade, referenciando a sua construção teórica em torno do sujeito cartesiano e do potencial libertador de sua agência autorreflexiva, porém, com restrições a uma compreensão autotransparente do sujeito, visto que este é concebido como visceralmente entrelaçado com o caráter predominante do sujeito da enunciação inconsciente, de cuja inscrição significante, com seus cortes traumáticos, emerge paradoxalmente, segundo este autor (2010), uma formação de restos e excessos atados ao registro do Real (impossível de ser simbolizado), na forma de “objetos a” – enquanto objetos do desejo enviesados com a dinâmica das pulsões e do gozo.

RESUMEN El presente texto explora las dimensiones crí­ticas que el joven Marx logró poner en claro con relación a la filosofí­a de Hegel. Antes de Marx, la filosofí­a de Hegel tuvo crí­ticos de la talla de Schelling, por ejemplo; pero fue la crí­tica de Marx la que abrió un horizonte de interpretación que aún tiene vigencia en filósofos como Habermas, ya entrado el siglo XX. Nosotros intentamos en el texto reconstruir las lí­neas básicas de la crí­tica hegeliana de Marx con el objetivo de pensar los lí­mites y los aciertos de dicha crí­tica, en un momento actual en que los conceptos centrales de la dialéctica hegeliana cobran nueva importancia en autores como Zizek, Laclau y en los psicoanalistas lacanianos, por citar algunos ejemplos. Marx pensaba que la Fenomenologí­a del espí­ritu era la clave de toda la filosofí­a de Hegel. Así­, en un escrito temprano, los Manuscritos del 44, Marx crí­tica a Hegel la mitificación de la naturaleza humana y, con ello, la mitificación del trabajo. En efecto, para Marx la tesis de una posición absoluta de la autoconciencia lleva a una negación absoluta de la objetividad no sólo del hombre sino del mundo concreto y material, en el cual, el hombre, como ser vivo, necesariamente realiza su objetividad que transforma el mundo, pero que de ningún modo cancela. En nuestro texto repasamos la crí­tica de Marx, pero intentamos al mismo tiempo dar cuenta de los lí­mites de esa crí­tica no sólo en relación con la filosofí­a de Hegel, sino también con la crí­tica marxista a la religión. ABSTRACT This essay explores young Marx’s critique of Hegel’s philosophy. Before Marx, Hegel was criticized by important thinkers like Schelling for example, but it was Marx’s critique which opened up a horizon of interpretation which lasted well into the twentieth century with philosophers such as Habermas. The basic lines of Marx’s critique of Hegel are reconstructed with the aim of identifying their strengths and limitations in the context of a renewed interest in Hegelian dialectic by authors such as Zizek, Laclau as well as the Lacanian psychoanalysts. Marx thought that Hegel’s Phenomenology of Spirit was the key to his whole philosophy, and in Marx’s early writings, e.g. Manuscripts of 1844, he objects to what he sees as Hegel’s mythification of human nature and with it the mythification of labor. For Marx, the absolutist view of self-consciousness leads to an absolute negation of objectivity, not only of man, but also of the concrete, material world in which man, as a living member, necessarily exercises his objectivity which in turn transforms that world. In reviewing Marx’s critique, special attention is given to its limits, not only in relation to Hegel ́s philosophy, but also to Marxist critiques of religion.

In "On Being Ill" Virginia Woolf asks why novelists have routinely preferred certain emotions over illness for driving plot. They have canonized passions as much as plotlines: love motivates protagonists; jealousy sustains entire trilogies; loneliness wins our sympathy, but illness almost never drives an epic. Illness does, in fact, have thematic potential: the ill could be catalysts for climax because they are direct. "A childish outspokenness [exists] in illness; things are said, truths blurted out" (13). Because the sick already foresee their deaths, they invest less in the future but want more from the moment. They would find strong antagonists in their already-canonical opposites, the Vigorous. Why couldn't "The Good and the Bad" give way to "The Healthy and the Diseased"? Woolf wants to direct our attention, at least, to this possibility. She does also admit to the impracticality of reinventing our methods of interpretation. We inhabit ideologies, as Slavoj Zizek later tells us in different words. Woolf herself avoids the technical, impersonal term "ideology" but, I will argue, she develops a model of the rules that circumscribe her culture. She argues that interpretive strategies for literary and daily events motivate each other: we have come to expect a rise and fall, a tragedy and dénouement, in our lives and our books. I suggest not only that she describes ideology but that she also prefigures what could be called a modern strategy of escape: she suggests we can only figure the boundaries of ideology by performing our victimization to them. Woolf begins by offering exaggerated versions of the existing categories of the "healthy" and "sick." She positions herself - as an author of a sane, or comprehensible, text - on the side of the healthy. She finally performs a seemingly self-conscious failure by slipping onto the side of the diseased. Here she enacts the martyrdom that Slavoj Zizek has elsewhere argued is the sole way to gesture outside of symbolic systems we inhabit. Woolf and Zizek's models diverge in argumentative style but converge in an emphasis on the sick. Both suggest the sick have sole, limited access to pre-symbolic instincts, if not to pre-symbolic thinking. Both suggest communities sustain ideology through a refusal to incorporate moments of disjunction or trauma into the public stories they create. Healthy subjects refuse the destruction of extreme surprise; only the sick lack the energy necessary for the same sustained self-preservation. Woolf especially credits biology for the difference. The ill have unique access to unconventional ideas not because of intelligence or a passionate decision, but because they lack the physical resources for sustaining a public story. Of course this biological binary also partially restricts Woolf to one side of the divide: as long as she sustains a literary dialogue, she contributes to the very literary conventions that model public myth. All acts of communication (literary and other) help sustain ideology, which is simply the story that can elicit understanding between healthy members of a community. "The army of the upright marches to battle," Woolf writes (16): bakers, shoemakers, politicians, and even allegedly racial philosophers play the roles needed to allow a joint drama to run fluidly. "In health [a constant] pretence [is] kept up" (14); ultimately only when we radically, biologically change - when "the bed is called for [and we] cease to be soldiers in the army of the upright [- can] we become deserters" (14), which is also precisely why Woolf's "we" here is performative. She voices transgression while surrendering her claims to it. With "we" she recovers pre-symbolic instinct: "…still we must wriggle. We can not stiffen peaceably into glassy mounds" (17). She sometimes suggests ideology is less universal than contingently psychological: We simply want our life stories, like some long book we have started to read, to keep making the sense we have invested in. Zizek in turn consistently insists on an impermeable division between ideology and what lies beyond it. He would agree with Woolf that by merely partaking in language games, we confirm and sustain a dominant symbolic order. But Zizek harbors less hope for "escape." He argues that linguistic systems necessarily commit their inhabitants to boundaries. Language is the structure of ideology, which always successfully hides its secret, Lacan's objet petit a, within it. Symbolic systems, and the political systems that use them to instate their control, avoid the central lack, even though efforts at "avoidance" are actually unnecessary. The objet petit a is defined precisely as that surplus that escapes signification. To mention the unmentionable is already impossible. Zizek's subjects sustain public myth merely by acting sane: "Our belief is already materialized in the external ritual; in other words, we already believe unconsciously" (Object 43). Even political revolutionaries who attempt resistance contribute to a public story by weighing in on one side of an existing dichotomy. Zizek explains that the Jacobites failed because they failed to rethink the system they inhabited. They severed the head of a King instead of convincing themselves that the king was a mere human being. Admitting to the terms of monarchy meant preserving the system; and ultimately, whoever fights or argues within a system preserves some of its foundations. Zizek's model does echo Woolf's when he states that only the sick escape the cycle of perpetuity: "The subject who thinks he can avoid this paradox and really have a free choice is a psychotic subject….who is not really caught up in the signifying network" (Object 166). Those who can 'think new' are those who misread language altogether. Having established the division common to both theorists, Woolf finds herself in an impasse. She leaves herself no room for intellectual reinvention. In the end of her essay, she drops her own voice to point to someone else's work. She offers us Augustus Hare and titles him a second life-model alongside the Sick, as the Untalented. The untalented and sick relate because both fail through biological limitation; both escape genre by a natural inability to produce it. So Woolf makes a strange rhetorical move, devoting an unbalanced last fourth of her essay to summarizing Hare's bad novel, The Story of Two Noble Lives. She ends her own work with a book she says "flounders" (20); Hare's story is sick in temper, or poorly edited; he describes insignificancies when he needs clarity. She finishes on her own descriptive word, "agony," describing Hare's own suffering heroine. This final imbalance marks Woolf's refusal to finish, and it finds an important companion strategy in her choice of words. Woolf's rhetorical move here recurs often in her speeches, which benefit from the verbal play. She picks a central term that falls short of its alleged duty (here, "Illness"; in "Craftsmanship," it was "words"). She positions the refrain as if it fully encompassed the central subject of her work and positions herself as the narrator who wants to speak merely about "illness." Of course, as said, Woolf is actually talking about more than the status of the sick in literature in "On Being Ill." She is trying to suggest several possible avenues to the unexpected. She nonetheless launches the essay pretending to be talking about the ill, and throughout continues to enact her own satisfaction with the subject. Zizek clarifies again: Woolf shows some complicity in ideology by performing a game she knows to be flawed but "proceeds as if [she] did not know" (For 53). Zizek characterizes the members of any ideology by that schizophrenia: subjects know that prevailing assumptions are flawed but proceed as if they did not know. A subject would never be able to claim that 'the objet petit a lies here' or that, 'the emperor is wearing no clothes,' because the nudity or lack at the center of a symbolic system is actually defined by its inaccessibility. Efforts to name the objet petit a might, at best, shift its location. This division inherent to ideology - between knowledge and the inability to change - is also our only potential insight into its failures. We cannot unravel a story while we partake in it; we can only reinvest in its existing terms. But Zizek suggests we might be able to signify a flaw by becoming martyrs to the system we inhabit. A martyr like Socrates performs his complicity within a system but then falls victim to it, silently revealing the flaw at the center of the system that condemns him. Both Zizek and Henry Sussman mention Socrates as a subject who performs an ironic martyrdom: He refuses to fight or take sides in Athenian law but allows the performance of his failure to explain what he can not fully say, himself. Woolf becomes a similar sort of martyr when she silently surrenders to the failure of her central term. She sets the scene for her own failure, which Zizek calls the "'dramatization' [which] gives the lie to the theoretical position by bringing out its implicit presuppositions" (For 42). Woolf's refusal to note the limitations of her central term also strengthens the effect of her failure by allowing the reader to work for her own discoveries. The reader feels more allegiance to what she uncovers herself than to the issues Woolf directly develops (like the status of the sick in the canon; our forced sympathies, etc..). The reader who privately interprets also encounters a certain subtlety in the text that strengthens her relationship to her discoveries. Woolf's central term, "illness," is - however incomplete - actually not so distant from the central idea of the essay. Woolf does not use the term overtly ironically or even as a metaphor to speak of a distinct second topic. "Illness" is in fact almost sufficient for Woolf's central idea. And even though we are left to note the gap between that term in the title and the developing ideas, Woolf's emphatic embrace of the word does not entail overt acting on her part. She performs and does not perform. She, even more importantly, refuses to acknowledge her performance, leaving us to trust our own instincts in a new interpretation. The decision to trust our own interpretation is hard: with even a slight shift in our ideas about the history of reading (imagining Woolf's Victorian residue, her faith in the very language she struggles to rework), her intent looms impossibly distant. We might imagine Woolf's own complicity with her central term. Like this, she becomes Zizek's "master," a self-satisfied leader who looks away from us. We are attracted by her distraction but are suspended in our desire to know what she keeps from us. On the one hand we can guess that Woolf is satisfied with her terms. On the other hand, we note her failure and are excited by a search for her unspoken frustration. Woolf's final silence excites us to independent imagination (why doesn't she criticize her terms?). We experience a free-falling freedom that would not have come through a direct explanation of language. Woolf can find no perfect central term; she motions towards the flaws in all central terms, and somehow comments on the impossibility of health. References Woolf, Virginia. The Moment: And Other Essays. New York: Harcourt, Brace, 1948. Sussman, Henry. The Hegelian Aftermath: Readings in Hegel, Kierkegaard, Freud, Proust, and James. Baltimore: The John Hopkins University Press,1982. Zizek, Slavoj. The Sublime Object of Ideology. London: Verso, 1989. For They Know Not What They Do: Enjoyment as a Political Factor. London: Verso, 1991.

Starting from the distinction between “ideal ego”, “ego-ideal” and “superego” structured from the Imaginary-Symbolic-Real triad made by Lacan, this study investigates how is possible to distinguish the a-sexual social space from the domain of libidinally-cathexed interactions. Through the analysis of Balibar’s, Miller’s, Schuster’s and Hägglund’s ideas, paths and strategies are defined to analyze the existing dynamics between symbolic power, law and superego. What emerges is the reconstruction of a new subjectivity which is capable, at the same time, to overcome the jouissance-superego dynamic at the basis of Lacanian reflection and face the challenges of contemporary post-humanism. Therefore, what subject stands for is the inhuman core of being-human, what Hegel called selfrelating negativity, what Freud called death drive. The text proposes, in short, how the Subject is what is in a human being more than human, the immortality of the deathdrive which makes it a living dead, something that insists beyond the cycle of life and death.

Futuristic fiction almost by definition enters into a dialogue with the present as a future past. As a consequence, history haunts even the most inane visions of the future in often quite subtle ways. An excellent prompt to speculate on this issue is provided by Luc Besson's popular film The Fifth Element (1997). Like many science-fiction films, it is about a future troubled by its own promises. It almost goes without saying that while not specifically figured around Y2K, the attention to dates and time in the film combined with its late '90s release date also inscribe it within Millennial anxieties about the end of the world. History plays a series of roles in The Fifth Element. In common with many science-fiction fables, the film stages an inverted fictional genealogy, in which the viewer is actively encouraged to revel in identifying extrapolated features and concerns of the present. This heralds a basic historicity: that is, it invites us to grasp our present as history through its defamiliarisation. Moreover, like another futuristic film of the same year, Gattaca, it is aesthetically marked by the pathos of what might be called millennial "nostalgia for the future" -- that lost utopian real of Modernist aesthetic desire which seems to haunt these "post-post-apocalyptic", Space-Age futures1. This is only enhanced by quoting generously from earlier moments of the science fiction genre (such as Blade Runner). Striking, however, is that despite all of this, everyday America -- globalised and projected two hundred and fifty years hence -- is not so much dystopian or utopian as just ordinary. People still smoke, but filters makes up three-quarters of a cigarette's length; we still get stuck in chaotic traffic, even if it flies above the ground; we still eat Chinese takeaway, only now the restaurants fly to you; and cops still eat take-away at drive-through McDonald's, which are now floating fixtures in the cityscape. That individuals are so stylish (thanks to costume design, everyone is wearing Jean-Paul Gaultier) also seems significant, because this aestheticised ordinariness helps focus attention on the lived time of everyday utopian yearnings. In these ways and more, our contemporary moment is immanent in the film. However, at certain other crucial moments in the film, History is directly presented as an excess. Let me explain. Two hundred and fifty years into the future, a "Supreme Being" -- Leeloo (Milla Jovovich) -- is genetically reconstructed by scientists. Dubbed the missing "fifth element", she belongs to a highly developed extra-terrestrial species who have a protectoral relation to humanity. In the beginning, Leeloo is cut off from human language -- speaking in a tongue that combines a mixture of European dialects with baby-speak (her favourite phrase, as anyone who has seen the film will recall, is "[Big] badda-boo!"). She speaks what a priest in the film calls the "Divine language", "spoken before time was time" -- evoking the theological dream of a universal pre-symbolic language, of a pure speech that speaks the world rather than speaks of it. Her very first English word is "Help!" -- which she reads off a taxi sticker advertisement for starving black orphans. And it is perhaps no accident that she identifies with this future's expropriated. Leeloo is a body cast into marginality. Caged as an exhibit from the moment of her arrival on Earth, with her exotic appearance, wide-eyed wonderment and capacity for mimicry, she displays all the tropes of the infantilised and sexualised Other. Romanticised as a primitivist fantasy, she represents a classically vulnerable redemptive figure2. Two hundred and fifty years into the future, a "Supreme Being" -- Leeloo (Milla Jovovich) -- is genetically reconstructed by scientists. Dubbed the missing "fifth element", she belongs to a highly developed extra-terrestrial species who have a protectoral relation to humanity. In the beginning, Leeloo is cut off from human language -- speaking in a tongue that combines a mixture of European dialects with baby-speak (her favourite phrase, as anyone who has seen the film will recall, is "[Big] badda-boo!"). She speaks what a priest in the film calls the "Divine language", "spoken before time was time" -- evoking the theological dream of a universal pre-symbolic language, of a pure speech that speaks the world rather than speaks of it. Her very first English word is "Help!" -- which she reads off a taxi sticker advertisement for starving black orphans. And it is perhaps no accident that she identifies with this future's expropriated. Leeloo is a body cast into marginality. Caged as an exhibit from the moment of her arrival on Earth, with her exotic appearance, wide-eyed wonderment and capacity for mimicry, she displays all the tropes of the infantilised and sexualised Other. Romanticised as a primitivist fantasy, she represents a classically vulnerable redemptive figure2. Leaving aside for the moment the perhaps inevitably romantic resolution to this predicament, we can interpret this scene as a critique of the Enlightenment pretension to "total History". The "arbitrary" order of alphabetisation, which replaces the seemingly determined disorder of historical narratives, is akin to the Kantian dream of a cosmopolitan state of "universal history". Think, too, of the aging Hegel, writing in 1830: We witness a vast spectacle of events and actions, of infinitely varied constellations of nations, states and individuals, in restless succession. ... Everywhere we see a motley confusion ... But ... we grow weary of particulars and ask ourselves to what end they all contribute. We cannot accept that their significance is exhausted by their own particular ends; everything must be part of a single enterprise. (325-7) Leaving aside for the moment the perhaps inevitably romantic resolution to this predicament, we can interpret this scene as a critique of the Enlightenment pretension to "total History". The "arbitrary" order of alphabetisation, which replaces the seemingly determined disorder of historical narratives, is akin to the Kantian dream of a cosmopolitan state of "universal history". Think, too, of the aging Hegel, writing in 1830: We witness a vast spectacle of events and actions, of infinitely varied constellations of nations, states and individuals, in restless succession. ... Everywhere we see a motley confusion ... But ... we grow weary of particulars and ask ourselves to what end they all contribute. We cannot accept that their significance is exhausted by their own particular ends; everything must be part of a single enterprise. (325-7) If The Fifth Element critiques the universal history lesson, it also revolves around a dialectical relation between past and present. Although the opening scene in late colonial Egypt locates the film's narrative historically, these later scenes suggest a break with conventional, clean historiographical separations between the past and the present5. Leeloo's reading of History implies that embodied historical reception is in a perpetual in-between state. Not only the representation of the past as History but the experience of Time itself becomes less a matter of chronology than of a Freudian retroactivity, a "present past" with everyday variations which belong as much to future possibilities as to what we perceive as the present. The necessary absence of a determinate "past object" (referent) in historical understanding means that historicity is a traumatic process of deferral. In psychoanalytic terms, Leeloo's forced recognition of the unnatural deaths of Others is a traumatic encounter which generates a hole in the symbolic order of Leeloo's "real". Leeloo's traumatised body metaphorically becomes the singular "truth" of the symbolic world6. A global history is in fact nobody's history in particular -- belonging to everybody and nobody. This is the fate of the CD-ROM: a "memory" overwhelmingly composed of media images, and an allegory for our own situation of image saturation (whose stereotypical symbol is the isolated individual glued to a flickering screen). Yet when Leeloo enters history with a kiss, a fragile dialogical exchange in which her own life "story" begins, the fate of media images is to become socialised as part of non-synchronous particular narratives7. The grand "nightmare" of History has become comprehensible through her particular access to universal History -- and the result is an appropriated, ongoing experience with an undisclosed future. The Fifth Element thus presents a distinctly everyday solution to the problem of historical time -- and is this not how media history is experienced? No doubt in the future no less than the present, history will be less a matter of the Past itself, than of the allegorical reverberation of events documented and encountered in the everyday mediasphere. Footnotes Mark Dery recently berated the trend for retro-futurism as a Wallpaper-inspired plot, poised to generate a nostalgia for ironic dreams of fading technological utopias, while revealing the banality of design fashions that demand the ever new. See "Back to the Future", posted to Nettime (5 Sep. 1999) It is also worth noting the sublime role of the Diva in the film, whose pained operatic performance embodies what Slavoj Zizek once called the jouissance of modernity. Humanity's potential will to "creative destruction" has previously been embodied in Gary Oldman's evil business figure of Zorg, who undoubtedly represents the excesses of corporate capitalism (he illustrates his Ayn Rand-style vitalist philosophy at one point by letting a glass fall from his desk and shatter on to the ground: gleefully watching as a team of mechanical robots whiz around the floor sweeping it up, he croons: "see -- a lovely ballet ensues, adding to the great chain of life -- by creating a little destruction, I am in fact encouraging life". See Jean-François Lyotard, The Postmodern Condition: A Report on Knowledge, trans. Geoff Bennington and Brian Massumi. Vol. 10, Theory and History of Literature. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1984; Jacques Derrida, Spectres of Marx: The State of the Debt, the Work of Mourning, and the New International, trans. Peggy Kamuf. London: Routledge, 1994. Historiographical time can be distinguished from psychoanalytic time on the basis of two different ways of organising the space of memory. While the former conceives the temporal relation as one of succession and correlation, the latter treats the relation as one of imbrication and repetition. Michel de Certeau, Heterologies: Discourse on the Other. Translated by Brian Massumi. Vol. 17, Theory and History of Literature. Minneapolis: U of Minnesota P, 1986. 4. An interesting sf intertext here is Andrei Tarkovsky's Solaris, in which a woman who is a projection of a man's memory unsuccessfully attempts to kill herself to prove that she is made of historical reality. In this traumatic scene, she consumes liquid nitrogen and writhes on a metallic floor in a frozen state until she gradually thaws into human movement. Leeloo is finally brought into the "un-Historical" time of everyday embodied subjectivity with a single kiss. To borrow the language of psychoanalytic film studies, her "screen memories" are reconfigured by an imaginary resolution in the present. I use the term screen memories with a nod to both the computer screen and Freud's compelling if problematic account of repressed mnemic material. Freud writes: "As the indifferent memories owe their preservation not to their own content but to an associative relation between their content and another which is repressed, they have some claim to be called 'screen memories'". Sigmund Freud, The Psychopathology of Everyday Life. Vol. 5, The Pelican Freud Library. Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1960. 83. References Fukuyama, Francis. The End of History and the Last Man. New York: Avon Books, 1992. Hegel, G.W.F. "The Philosophical History of the World: Second Draft (1830)." German Idealist Philosophy. Ed. Rüdiger Buber. London: Penguin, 1997. 317-39. Citation reference for this article MLA style: Daniel Palmer. "Nostalgia for the Future: Everyday History and The Fifth Element." M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2.9 (2000). [your date of access] <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/0001/nostalgia.php>. Chicago style: Daniel Palmer, "Nostalgia for the Future: Everyday History and The Fifth Element," M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2, no. 9 (2000), <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/0001/nostalgia.php> ([your date of access]). APA style: Daniel Palmer. (2000) Nostalgia for the future: everyday history and The Fifth Element. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 2(9). <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/0001/nostalgia.php> ([your date of access]).

Mijn belangstelling voor de Marokkaanse traditionele geneeskunde ontstond toen ik in 1979 als psycholoog begon te werken in een Dienst voor Geestelijke Gezondheidszorg voor migranten die pas te Brussel was opgericht. Ik dankte mijn aanstelling vooral aan het feit dat ik ook antropologie had gestudeerd, mij aan het specialiseren was in de Marokkaanse cultuur en hiertoe probeerde Marokkaans-Arabisch onder de knie te krijgen. Brussel telde in die tijd bijna 60.000 Marokkanen. Hun aantal zou in de daaropvolgende jaren verdubbelen. Zij werden 'zichtbaar' in de samenleving en begonnen ook beroep te doen op de hulpverlening die tot dan toe weinig ervaring had in het begeleiden van mensen met een andere cultuur. Mij intrigeerde vooral dat Marokkanen vaak heel eigen opvattingen hadden over de oorzaak en de aard van hun ziekten. Zij beleefden hun ziek zijn ook op een eigen manier. Wat wij een psychische stoornis noemden zagen zij vaak als een aandoening die door demonen werd veroorzaakt. Ze voelden weinig resultaat van de antipsychotica die de psychiater voorschreef en geloofden meer in de tussenkomst van een gebedsgenezer dan in gesprekken met een psycholoog. Ik ondervond vaak dat ikzelf noch andere hulpverleners een antwoord hadden op de problemen waarmee zij zich aanboden. Sommige patiënten wendden zich tot genezers in Marokko. Bij hen voelden zij zich beter begrepen. In de jaren die daarop volgden trachtte ik via mijn begeleiding van Marokkaanse cliënten inzicht te krijgen in de wijze waarop zij hun ziekten, klachten en problemen begrepen en beleefden. Ook legde ik contacten met Marokkaanse genezers in België en Marokko (Hermans, 1981, 1985, 1986, 1991). In onze dienst trachtten we onze cliënten in hun eigen taal op te vangen en een therapeutisch aanbod te bieden dat rekening hield met hun cultuur (Hermans, 1991; Leman & Gailly, 1991). Ook zocht ik naar samenwerking met traditionele genezers en verwees ik sommige patiënten naar hen door.

In one of the earliest films about a whistleblower, On the Waterfront (1954), the dock worker Terry Malloy (Marlon Brando), who also works for the union boss and mobster Johnny Friendly (Lee J. Cobb), decides to testify in court against him and uncover corruption and murder. By doing so he will not only suffer retribution from Friendly but also be seen as a “stool pigeon” by his co-workers, friends, and neighbours who will shun him, and he will be “marked” forever by his deed. Nonetheless, he decides to do the right thing. Already it is clear that in most cases the whistleblowers are not simply the ones who reveal things, but they themselves are also revealed.My aim in this article is to explore the depiction of Edward Snowden and Julian Assange in fiction film and its connection to what I would like to call, with Slavoj Žižek, “Hollywood ideology”; the heroisation of the “ordinary guy” against a big institution or a corrupt individual, as it is the case in Snowden (2016) on the one hand, and at the same time the impossibility of true systemic critique when the one who is criticising is “outside of the system”, as Assange in The Fifth Estate (2013). Both films also rely on the notion of individualism and convey conflicting messages in regard to understanding the perception of whistleblowers today. Snowden and AssangeAlthough there are many so called “whistleblower films” since On the Waterfront, like Serpico (1973), All the President’s Men (1976), or Silkwood (1983), to name but a few (for a comprehensive list see https://ew.com/movies/20-whistleblower-movies-to-watch/?), in this article I will focus on the most recent films that deal with Edward Snowden and Julian Assange. These are the most prominent cases of whistleblowing in the last decade put to film. They are relevant today also regarding their subject matter—privacy. Revealing secrets that concern privacy in this day and age is of importance and is pertinent even to the current Coronavirus crisis, where the question of privacy again arises in form of possible tracking apps, in the age of ever expanding “surveillance capitalism” (Zuboff).Even if Assange is not strictly speaking a whistleblower, an engagement with his work in this context is indispensable since his outsider status, up to a point, resembles those of Snowden or Manning. They are not only important because they can be considered as “authentic heroe[s] of our time” (Žižek, Pandemic, 7), but also because of their depiction which differs in a very crucial way: while Snowden is depicted as a “classic” whistleblower (an American patriot who did his duty, someone from the “inside”), Assange’s action are coming from the outside of the established system and are interpreted as a selfish act, as it is stated in the film: “It was always about him.”Whistleblowers In his Whistleblower’s Handbook, Kohn writes: “who are these whistleblowers? Sometimes they are people you read about with admiration in the newspaper. Other times they are your co-workers or neighbours. However, most whistleblowers are regular workers performing their jobs” (Kohn, xi). A whistleblower, as the employee or a “regular worker”, can be regarded as someone who is a “nobody” at first, an invisible “cog in the wheel” of a certain institution, a supposedly devoted and loyal worker, who, through an act of “betrayal”, becomes a “somebody”. They do something truly significant, and by doing so becomes a hero to some and a traitor to others. Their persona suddenly becomes important.The wrongdoings that are uncovered by the whistleblower are for the most part not simply isolated missteps, but of a systemic nature, like the mass surveillance by the National Security Agency (NSA) uncovered by Snowden. The problem with narratives that deal with whistleblowing is that the focus inevitably shifts from the systemic problem (surveillance, war crimes, etc.) to the whistleblower as an individual. Moretti states that the interest of the media regarding whistleblowing, if one compares the reactions to the leaking of the “Pentagon Papers” regarding the Vietnam War in the 1970s by Daniel Ellsberg and to Snowden’s discoveries, shifted from the deed itself to the individual. In the case of Ellsberg, Moretti writes:the legitimate questions were not about him and what motivated him, but rather inquiry on (among other items) the relationship between government and media; whether the U.S. would be damaged militarily or diplomatically because of the release of the papers; the extent to which the media were acting as watchdogs; and why Americans needed to know about these items. (8)This shift of public interest goes along, according to Moretti, with the corporate ownership of media (7), where profit is the primary goal and therefore sensationalism is the order of the day, which is inextricably linked to the focus on the “scandalous” individual. The selfless and almost self-effacing act of whistleblowing becomes a narrative that constructs the opposite: yet another determined individual that through their sheer willpower achieves their goal, a notion that conforms to neoliberal ideology.Hollywood IdeologyThe endings of All the President’s Men and The Harder They Fall (1956), another early whistleblower film, twenty years apart, are very similar: they show the journalist eagerly typing away on his typewriter a story that will, in the case of the former, bring down the president of the United States and in the latter, bring an end to arranged fights in the boxing sport. This depiction of the free press vanquishing the evil doers, as Žižek states it, is exactly the point where “Hollywood ideology” becomes visible, which is:the ideology of such Hollywood blockbusters as All the President’s Men and The Pelican Brief, in which a couple of ordinary guys discover a scandal which reaches up to the president, forcing him to step down. Corruption is shown to reach the very top, yet the ideology of such works resides in their upbeat final message: what a great country ours must be, when a couple of ordinary guys like you and me can bring down the president, the mightiest man on Earth! (“Good Manners”)This message is of course part of Hollywood’s happy-ending convention that can be found even in films that deal with “serious” subject matters. The point of the happy end in this case is that before it is finally reached, the film can show corruption (Serpico), wrongdoings of big companies (The Insider, 1999), or sexual harassment (North Country, 2005). It is important that in the end all is—more or less—good. The happy ending need not necessarily be even truly “happy”—this depends on the general notion the film wants to convey (see for instance the ending of Silkwood, where the whistleblower is presumed to have been killed in the end). What is important in the whistleblower film is that the truth is out, justice has been served in one way or the other, the status quo has been re-established, and most importantly, there is someone out there who cares.These films, even when they appear to be critical of “the system”, are there to actually reassure their audiences in the workings of said system, which is (liberal) democracy supported by neoliberal capitalism (Frazer). Capitalism, on the other hand, is supported by the ideology of individualism which functions as a connecting tissue between the notions of democracy, capitalism, and film industry, since we are admiring exceptional individuals in performing acts of great importance. This, in turn, is encapsulated by the neoliberal mantra—“anyone can make it, only if they try heard enough”. As Bauman puts it more concretely, the risks and contradictions in a society are produced socially but are supposed to be solved individually (46).Individualism, as a part of the neoliberal capitalist ideology, is described already by Milton Friedman, who sees the individual as the “ultimate entity in the society” and the freedom of the individual as the “ultimate goal” within this society (12). What makes this an ideology is the fact that, in reality, the individual, or in the context of the market, the entrepreneur, is always-already tethered to and supported by the state, as Varoufakis has successfully proven (“Varoufakis/Chomsky discussion”). Therefore individualism is touted as an ideal to strive for, while for neoliberalism in order to function, the state is indispensable, which is often summed up in the formula “socialism for the rich, capitalism for the poor” (Polychroniou). The heroic Hollywood individual, as shown in the whistleblower film, regardless of real-life events, is the perfect embodiment of individualist ideology of neoliberal capitalism—we are not seeing a stylised version of it, a cowboy or a masked vigilante, but a “real” person. It is paradoxically precisely the realism that we see in such films that makes them ideological: the “based on a true story” preamble and all the historical details that are there in order to create a fulfilling cinematic experience. All of this supports its ideology because, as Žižek writes, “the function of ideology is not to offer us a point of escape from our reality but to offer us the social reality itself as an escape from some traumatic, real kernel” (Sublime Object 45). All the while Snowden mostly adheres to Hollywood ideology, The Fifth Estate also focuses on individualism, but goes in a different direction, and is more problematic – in the former we see the “ordinary guy” as the American hero, in the latter a disgruntled individual who reveals secrets of others for strictly personal reasons.SnowdenThere is an aspect of the whistleblower film that rings true and that is connected to Michel Foucault’s notion of power (“Truth and Power”). Snowden, through his employment at the NSA, is within a power relations network of an immensely powerful organisation. He uses “his” power, to expose the mass surveillance by the NSA. It is only through his involvement with this power network that he could get insight into and finally reveal what NSA is doing. Foucault writes that these resistances to power from the inside are “effective because they are formed right at the point where relations of power are exercised; resistance to power does not have to come from elsewhere to be real … It exists all the more by being in the same place as power” (Oushakine 206). In the case of whistleblowing, the resistance to power must come exactly from the inside in order to be effective since whistleblowers occupy the “same place as power” that they are up against and that is what in turn makes them “powerful”.Fig. 1: The Heroic Individual: Edward Snowden in SnowdenBut there is an underside to this. His “relationship” to the power structure he is confronting greatly affects his depiction as a whistleblower within the film—precisely because Snowden, unlike Assange, is someone from inside the system. He can still be seen as a patriot and a “disillusioned idealist” (Scott). In the film this is shown right at the beginning as Snowden, in his hotel room in Hong Kong, tells the documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo) and journalist Glenn Greenwald (Zachary Quinto) his name and who he is. The music swells and the film cuts to Snowden in uniform alongside other soldiers during a drill, when he was enlisted in the army before work for the NSA.Snowden resembles many of Stone’s typical characters, the all-American patriot being disillusioned by certain historical events, as in Born on the 4th of July (1989) and JFK (1991), which makes him question the government and its actions. It is generally of importance for a mainstream Hollywood film that the protagonist is relatable in order for the audiences to sympathise with them (Bordwell and Thompson 82). This is important not only regarding personal traits but, I would argue, also political views of the character. There needs to be no doubt in the mind of American audiences when it comes to films that deal with politics, that the protagonists are patriots.Stone’s film profits from this ambivalence in Snowden’s own political stance: at first he is more of a right winger who is a declared fan of Ayn Rand’s conservative-individualist manifesto Atlas Shrugged, then, after meeting his future partner Lindsey Mills, he turns slightly to the left, as he at one point states his support for President Obama. This also underlines the films ambiguity, as Oliver Stone openly stated about his Vietnam War film Platoon (1986) that “it could be embraced by … the right and the left. Essentially, most movies make their money in the middle” (Banff Centre). As Snowden takes the lie detector test as a part of the process of becoming a CIA agent, he confirms, quite sincerely it seems, that he thinks that the United States is the “greatest country in the world” and that the most important day in his life was 9/11. This again confirms his patriotic stance.Snowden is depicted as the exceptional individual, and at the same time the “ordinary guy”, who, through his act of courage, defied the all-powerful USA. During the aforementioned job interview scene, Snowden’s superior, Corbin O’Brian (Rhys Ifans), quotes Ayn Rand to him: “one man can stop the motor of the world”. Snowden states that he also believes that. The quote could serve as the film’s tagline, as a “universal truth” that seems to be at the core of American values and that also coincides with and reaffirms neoliberal ideology. Although it is undeniable that individuals can accomplish extraordinary feats, but when there is no systemic change, those can remain only solitary achievements that are only there to support the neoliberal “cult of the individual”.Snowden stands in total contrast to Assange in regard to his character and private life. There is nothing truly “problematic” about him, he seems to be an almost impeccable person, a “straight arrow”. This should make him a poster boy for American democracy and freedom of speech, and Stone tries to depict him in this way.Still, we are dealing with someone who cannot simply be redeemed as a patriot who did his duty. He cannot be unequivocally hailed as an all-American hero since betraying state secrets (and betrayal in general) is seen as a villainous act. For many Americans, and for the government, he will forever be remembered as a traitor. Greenwald writes that most of the people in the US, according to some surveys, still want to see Snowden in prison, even if they find that the surveillance by the NSA was wrong (365).Snowden remains an outcast and although the ending is not quite happy, since he must live in Russian exile, there is still a sense of an “upbeat final message” that ideologically colours the film’s ending.The Fifth EstateThe Fifth Estate is another example of the ideological view of the individual, but in this case with a twist. The film tries to be “objective” at first, showing the importance and impact of the newly established online platform WikiLeaks. However, towards the end of the film, it proceeds to dismantle Julian Assange (Benedict Cumberbatch) with the “everyone has secrets” platitude, which effectively means that none of us should ever try to reveal any secrets of those in power, since all of us must have our own secrets we do not want revealed. The film is shown from the perspective of Assange’s former disgruntled associate Daniel Domscheit-Berg (Daniel Brühl), who wrote a book about his time at WikiLeaks on which the film is partly based on (Inside WikiLeaks). We see Assange through his eyes and delve into personal moments that are supposed to reveal the “truth” about the individual behind the project. In a cynical twist, it is Daniel who is the actual whistleblower, who reveals the secrets of WikiLeaks and its founder.Assange, as it is said in the film, is denounced as a “messiah” or a “prophet”, almost a cult leader who only wants to satisfy his perverse need for other people’s secrets, except that he is literally alone and has no followers and, unlike real cult leaders, needs no followers. The point of whistleblowing is exactly in the fact that it is a radical move, it is a big step forward in ending a wrongdoing. To denounce the radical stance of WikiLeaks is to misunderstand and undermine the whole notion of whistleblowing as a part of true changes in a society.The cult aspects are often referred to in the film when Assange’s childhood is mentioned. His mother was supposed to be in a cult, called “The Family”, and we should regard this as an important (and bad) influence on his character. This notion of the “childhood trauma” seems to be a crutch that is supposed to serve as a characterisation, something the scriptwriting-guru Robert McKee criticises as a screenwriting cliché: “do not reduce characters to case studies (an episode of child abuse is the cliché in vogue at the moment), for in truth there are no definitive explanations for anyone’s behaviour” (376).Although the film does not exaggerate the childhood aspect, it is still a motive that is supposed to shed some light into the “mystery” that is Assange. And it also ties into the question of the colour of his hair as a way of dismantling his lies. In a flashback that resembles a twist ending of an M. Night Shyamalan thriller, it turns out that Assange actually dyes his hair white, witnessed in secret by Daniel, instead of it turning naturally white, as Assange explains on few occasions but stating different reasons for it. Here he seems like a true movie villain and resembles the character of the Joker from The Dark Knight (2008), who also tells different stories about the origin of his facial scars. This mystery surrounding his origin makes the villain even more dangerous and, what is most important, unpredictable.Žižek also draws a parallel between Assange and Joker of the same film, whom he sees as the “figure of truth”, as Batman and the police are using lies in order to “protect” the citizens: “the film’s take-home message is that lying is necessary to sustain public morale: only a lie can redeem us” (“Good Manners”). Rather than interpreting Assange’s role in a positive way, as Žižek does, the film truly establishes him as a villain.Fig. 2: The Problematic Individual: Julian Assange in The Fifth EstateThe Fifth Estate ends with another cheap psychologisation of Assange on Daniel’s part as he describes the “true purpose” of WikiLeaks: “only someone so obsessed with his own secrets could’ve come up with a way to reveal everyone else’s”. This faux-psychological argument paints the whole WikiLeaks endeavour as Assange’s ego-trip and makes of him an egomaniac whose secret perverted pleasure is to reveal the secrets of others.Why is this so? Why are Woodward and Bernstein in All the President’s Men depicted as heroes and Assange is not? The true underlying conflict here is between classic journalism; where journalists can publish their pieces and get the acclaim for publishing the “new Pentagon Papers”, once again ensuring the freedom of the press and “inter-systemic” critique. This way of working of the press, as the films show, always pays off. All the while, in reality, very little changes since, as Žižek writes, the “formal functioning of power” stays in place. He further states about WikiLeaks:The true targets here weren’t the dirty details and the individuals responsible for them; not those in power, in other words, so much as power itself, its structure. We shouldn’t forget that power comprises not only institutions and their rules, but also legitimate (‘normal’) ways of challenging it (an independent press, NGOs, etc.). (“Good Manners”)In the very end, the “real” journalism is being reinforced as the sole vehicle of criticism, while everything else is “extremism” and, again, can only stem from a frustrated, even “evil”, individual. If neoliberal individualism is the order of the day, then the thinking must also revolve around that notion and cannot transcend that horizon.ConclusionŽižek expresses the problem of revealing the truth in our day and age by referring to the famous fable “The Emperor’s New Clothes”, where a child is the only one who is naive and brave enough to state that the emperor is in fact naked. But for Žižek today,in our cynical era, such strategy no longer works, it has lost its disturbing power, since everyone now proclaims that the emperor is naked (that Western democracies are torturing terrorist suspects, that wars are fought for profit, etc., etc.), and yet nothing happens, nobody seems to mind, the system just goes on functioning as if the emperor were fully dressed. (Less than Nothing 92)The problem with the “Collateral Murder”, a video of the killing of Iraqi civilians by the US Army, leaked by Wikileaks and Chelsea Manning, that was presented to the public, for instance, was according to accounts in Inside Wikileaks and Inside Julian Assange’s War on Secrecy, that it did not have the desired impact. The public seems, in the end, to be indifferent to such reveals since it effectively cannot do anything about it. The return to the status quo after these reveals supports this stance, as Greenwald writes that after Snowden’s leaks there was no substantial change within the system; during the Obama administration, there was even an increase of criminal investigations of whistleblowers with an emergence of a “climate of fear” (Greenwald 368). Many whistleblower films assure us that in the end the system works; the good guys always win, the antagonists are punished, and laws have been passed. This is not to be accepted simply as a Hollywood convention, something that we also “already know”, but as an ideological stance, since these films are taken more seriously than films with similar messages but within other mainstream genres. Snowden shows that only individualism has the power to challenge the system, while The Fifth Estate draws the line that should not be crossed when it comes to privacy as a “universal” good because, again, “everyone has secrets”. Such representations of whistleblowing and disruption only further cement the notion that in our societies no real change is possible because it seems unnecessary. Whistleblowing as an act of revelation needs therefore to be understood as only one small step made by the individual that in the end depends on how society and the government decide to act upon it.References All the President’s Men. Dir. Alan J. Pakula. 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Hemdake, Cinema ‘84. 1986.Polychroniou, C.J. “Socialism for the Rich, Capitalism for the Poor: An Interview with Noam Chomsky.” Truthout, 11 Dec. 2016. 25 May 2020 <https://truthout.org/articles/socialism-for-the-rich-capitalism-for-the-poor-an-interview-with-noam-chomsky/>.Scott, A.O. “Review: ‘Snowden,’ Oliver Stone’s Restrained Portrait of a Whistle-Blower.” The New York Times, 15 Sep. 2016. 5 May 2020 <https://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/16/movies/snowden-review-oliver-stone-joseph-gordon-levitt.html>. Serpico. Dir. Sidney Lumet. Artists Entertainment Complex, Produzioni De Laurentiis. 1973. Silkwood. Dir. Mike Nichols. ABC Motion Pictures. 1983.Snowden. Dir. Oliver Stone. Krautpack Entertainment, Wild Bunch (a.o.). 2016.Žižek, Slavoj. “Good Manners in the Age of WikiLeaks.” Los Angeles Review of Books 33.2 (2011). 15 May 2020 <https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v33/n02/slavoj-zizek/good-manners-in-the-age-of-wikileaks>.———. 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RESUMEN El esquema de este trabajo queda enmarcado por la primera frase del tí­tulo. La primera palabra, autonomí­a, recoge un recorrido histórico por buena parte de la tradición filosófica que culmina en la Ilustración del siglo XVIII. La primera persona, el yo, es el centro seguro de reflexión. El siguiente apartado (re-)versus se detiene muy rápidamente en los autores de la sospecha. Éstos ayudan a ver la realidad desde otros puntos de vista. Su misión es hacer ”desconfiar” o poner en duda los cauces sobre los que la filosofí­a ha transcurrido tradicionalmente. La palabra central en el último apartado es la heteronomí­a. El Nuevo Pensamiento, basado en las raí­ces judí­as, enfoca su filosofí­a en la importancia de la segunda persona, del tú. Es evidente que este espacio no pretende analizar exhaustivamente el pensamiento de cada autor. Este esfuerzo queda lejos del espacio de una revista. Lo que se busca es descubrir las principales lí­neas del pensamiento y relacionarlas con la finalidad de dinamizar la reflexión sobre los derechos humanos. No se trata solamente de leer un listado de derechos muertos en un papel, sino de recuperar el diálogo constante entre personas y culturas para acordar cuál es el mí­nimo común que nos permite vivir a todos juntos lo mejor posible. ABSTRACT The framework of this project is encapsulated by the first sentence of the title. The first word, autonomy, traces a historic path through the philosophical tradition culminating in the Enlightenment of the eighteenth century. The first person, the ”I”, is the secure center of reflection. The second word from the title, (re-)versus, directs focus upon the authors of doubt. They assist in viewing reality from a different perspective. Their mission is to provoke ”mistrust” or place in doubt the fundamental grounding upon which philosophy has generally been erected. The third word of the title is heteronomy. The New Thought, based on Jewish sources, focuses its philosophy on the importance of the second person, the ”you”. It is evident that this space precludes an exhaustive analysis of the thought of each author. That kind of work is beyond the scope of a journal. Rather, the purpose is to present the main lines of thought and relate them to each other in order to introduce dynamism into the thinking regarding human rights. Serious reflection is not only about reading a sterile list of rights from a piece of paper, but rather, is recouping a continuous dialogue between persons and cultures in order to reach a consensus as to what is the lowest common denominator which allows everyone to live together in the best possible way. * Licenciado en ciencias religiosas, licenciado en filosofí­a, maestrí­a en filosofí­a. Actualmente es el coordinador de las materias de humanidades de la Universidad La Salle Pachuca. jpanedas@lasallep.edu.mx PRESENTACIÓN La filosofí­a, en el transcurso de su historia, ha reflexionado sobre la realidad y sobre los temas más importantes que afectan al hombre. La manera de afrontarlos ha adquirido distintos enfoques y perspectivas. Cada uno de los pensadores ha dejado su toque personal en las ideas que ha generado. Lo que queda claro es que el movimiento no termina. Pasa el tiempo, vienen nuevas épocas y nunca falta alguien que siga ”re-flexionando” sobre las preguntas definitivas. Siguiendo los caminos ya trazados, el filósofo innova profundidades diferentes. Los derechos humanos, en este esfuerzo a través del tiempo, se constituyen como principios rectores de la reflexión. Son ideas culmen a las que la humanidad ha llegado después de muchas guerras, sangre y sacrificios. Hoy en dí­a nadie en Occidente se atreverí­a a poner en duda la validez de estos principios. Sin embargo, si miramos estos derechos bajo el microscopio de otros fundamentos, lejos de debilitarlos los convertirán en más comprensibles, más profundos y, sobre todo, más justos. Tradicionalmente hemos oí­do hablar sobre los derechos humanos y su relación con el principio de autonomí­a. En este trabajo, además de apuntar las debilidades de este enfoque, aplicaremos las luces de la heteronomí­a para la mejor observación de las entretelas de los derechos humanos. I. Autonomí­a Desde los primeros albores de la filosofí­a griega, Parménides de Elea y Heráclito de Éfeso, plantearon las lí­neas generales que la filosofí­a continuarí­a durante muchos siglos (Xirau 1995:31). Parménides se constituyó en el fundador de las primeras bases ontológicas y metafí­sicas. Heráclito ofreció la contraparte: el movimiento, lo perecedero, lo inmediato. Ambos presentan las dos caras de una misma moneda. El uno necesita del otro: el movimiento y lo que permanece más allá del cambio (Marí­as 1993:28). Ambos alcanzan una fórmula que pretende expresar de manera universal lo que es la realidad. Sócrates, Platón y Aristóteles, cada quien desde su enfoque, aportaron a la cultura occidental un bagaje profundí­simo de conceptos y reflexión, un suelo sumamente feraz del cual se enriquecerán todos los pensadores posteriores. Sócrates, la eterna pregunta y el ejemplo de coherencia moral, afianza el método dialéctico. Platón, idealista por excelencia, cree resolver el problema del movimiento con la firmeza del mundo de las ideas. Aristóteles, vuelto a la realidad, elabora la respuesta más acabada a la combinación de ser y no ser o dejar de ser, de unidad y de diversidad, sin evadirse a ningún lado sino a la esencia de las cosas en cuanto entes que son. Con la cumbre del Estagirita, por fin, el pensamiento griego puede decir que alcanzó la verdad (aletheia): el ser de lo que existe. El siguiente gran cuerpo de pensamiento que descansa en los alcances griegos fue el que se desarrolló en el seno del cristianismo. Esta lí­nea monolí­tica de reflexión se prolongó desde el siglo IV hasta prácticamente el siglo XV. La época medieval será la encargada de mantener el conocimiento que habí­a acumulado en buena medida hasta entonces occidente. Las escuelas parroquiales y monásticas, los scriptoriums y bibliotecas conventuales, el nacimiento de las universidades y el comienzo de la divulgación de la cultura son, entre otros, algunos de los méritos de este tiempo. Dos conceptos son especialmente relevantes para nuestro propósito: persona y conciencia. La noción de persona como actualmente la conocemos aparece en el contexto cristiano empujado por la necesidad de aclaración teológica respecto a la manera de hablar de Dios (RATZINGER 2005: 26.27.153). La relación que el hombre establece con un Dios personal le hace partí­cipe de su dignidad. El ser hijo de Dios confiere al ser humano una calidad moral nueva, nunca antes sospechada: libertad, igualdad y dignidad son algunas de sus principales caracterí­sticas. La conciencia, siguiendo algo de lo ya apuntado por Sócrates, amplí­a la condición humana hacia la propia interioridad. El hombre, además de ser uno más entre los entes existentes, pasa a ser alguien particular porque puede relacionarse consigo mismo, puede darse cuenta de cómo y qué conoce, es capaz de relacionarse principalmente desde su conciencia con el Ser Supremo: ”Superior summo meo et interior intimo meo” (SAN AGUSTíN, Confesiones 3,6,11) Muchas de las derivaciones de estos puntos se podrán intuir bajo las revolucionarias ideas que aparecerán en la moderna Europa contemporánea. Con el declive del pensamiento medieval centrado en Dios, surge la modernidad mucho más centrada en el hombre, en su materialidad y en las ciencias naturales. Nicolás Copérnico, Galileo Galilei, Francis Bacon son algunos de los protagonistas más sobresalientes de este cambio cultural. Este caldo fecundo de cultivo será aprovechado por René Descartes. El giro racionalista ensimisma al hombre, se preocupa por el modo de llegar al conocimiento y por el análisis del pensamiento. Lo más seguro resulta ser la certeza del propio acto de pensar. Lo material, lo exterior, lo fí­sico resultan ser cuando menos dubitables. Se abre una veta que, pasando por el debate con los empiristas, culminará en Kant y Hegel. Junto con la reflexión teórica los acontecimientos sociales han ido evolucionando a la par. El viejo sistema feudal cae, comienza la aparición crecientemente importante de la burguesí­a, la economí­a se presenta como un nuevo poder, las guerras de religión que han diezmado Europa concluyen. Se alcanza la claridad de que la religión debe pasar al ámbito privado y que el derecho civil es la norma común que tiene que regir las sociedades. Estos dos tipos de libertades, interior y pública, pasan a ser parte de los derechos polí­ticos que pertenecen a los ciudadanos del estado democrático liberal europeo. El fundamento último de esta madurez en el pensamiento es la claridad de la personalidad individual como origen, fin y limitación de la actividad estatal. La universalidad del principio de libertad individual es recogido por el derecho como algo inviolable aplicado a todos los niveles. Interioridad y exterioridad, ámbito privado y público (Kant 1968: 36-37)1, religión y estado, conciencia y ley, revelación y razón son dimensiones que se combinan equilibradamente en la noción de tolerancia. En segundo lugar, el cuidado de las almas no pude pertenecer al magistrado civil, porque su poder consiste solamente en una fuerza exterior, en tanto que la religión verdadera y salvadora consiste en la persuasión interna de la mente, sin la cual nada puede ser aceptable a Dios (Locke 1994: 10). Queda clara y fijada para siempre la separación de los poderes eclesiales y estatales. Aunque la moralidad de las costumbres incumbe a ambas instituciones (Locke 1994: 49.52). …estimo necesario, sobre todas las cosas, distinguir exactamente entre las cuestiones del gobierno civil y las de la religión, fijando, de este modo, las justas fronteras que existen entre uno y otro (Locke 1994: 8.66). La autonomí­a será el concepto moral más básico de todos los que se barajan a finales del siglo XVIII: Die Autonomie des Willens ist das alleinige Prinzip aller moralischen Gesetze und der ihnen gemí¤ben Pflichten (Kant 2001: 32)2. La potestad del ser humano para poder decidir responsablemente sobre su vida implica una confianza absoluta en la razón del hombre, en su libertad y voluntad. El individuo es la medida de todas las cosas, en su conciencia reside una intención innata a la buena voluntad; como todos somos iguales todos buscamos el bien común (universalidad axiológica). Compartimos la certeza de que podemos conocer la realidad tal y como es (universalidad gnoseológica). El conocimiento abre la puerta a la seguridad tecnológica y económica (universalidad del tipo de progreso burgués). Una nueva sociedad fundada en el respeto está por imponerse. El andamiaje legal asegura la justicia y el orden social (universalidad legal). No es de extrañar que se hable de la dignidad inherente a la persona y de los derechos que les son debidos por sus semejantes y por la sociedad (universalidad de los derechos individuales y civiles). La verdad a la que se aspiraba desde los antiguos griegos se estableció de manera definitiva. La verdad es una y se presenta como el resultado de las más sesudas reflexiones de la humanidad. Eso son los derechos humanos3. Las revoluciones inglesas y de las colonias americanas, el pensamiento ilustrado y los principios ciudadanos franceses serán algunas de las realizaciones históricas de los derechos individuales (Camps 2001: 192)4. Este rapidí­simo recorrido por algunos de los principales hitos de la historia de la filosofí­a nos ha llevado hasta la cúspide de la Ilustración, el modelo valoral y vital de nuestra modernidad. Al final no todo fue oro reluciente. La sombras demandan revisión. A esto justamente, a revisar y a sospechar, se dedican los autores que vamos a ver a continuación. II. Versus5 o el ”pensamiento de la sospecha” En los mismos tiempos, siglo XVIII, existí­a una corriente de pensamiento paralela que poní­a en duda la necesidad del respeto por el otro6, la potencia de la razón y proponí­a la pasión incontrolada junto con la oscuridad más profunda del ser humano. El Marqués de Sade y Baudelaire pueden ser, desde la literatura, dos buenas expresiones de esta postura7. Todos ellos desean apartarse de la ilusión de progreso y de las convenciones seguras de su época8. Desconfí­an de los fundamentos que a los demás sostienen y de las creencias generales, aunque implique soledad e incomprensión9. A pesar de todas las buenas intenciones no podemos olvidar que algunas de las consecuencias inmediatas de nobles ideales ilustrados fueron la época del terror francesa, las desigualdades de la primera industrialización, el recorte al derecho de representación y del sufragio universal, las guerras napoleónicas y de secesión, el hambre popular… y muchos otros males que llegan claramente hasta nuestros dí­as. Empero será en el siglo XIX cuando se dé un giro en la filosofí­a para intentar ver la realidad de otro modo, destronando al individuo del centro de la misma. Los tres pensadores principales son Marx, Freud y Nietzsche (Camps 2001: 191-198)10. Esta trí­ada en general, se ocupa de desenmascarar, de poner al descubierto los platonismos o idealismos falsos en los que ha vivido la historia de la filosofí­a. Para ellos pensar es interpretar, en esto consistirí­a la sospecha. La metáfora se convierte en la figura central (Vattimo-P. A. Rovatti 2000: 1-3). No es cierto todo lo que parece, las apariencias pueden dar seguridad pero no descubren qué son las cosas. El descubrimiento del subconsciente, la importancia que las relaciones sociales tienen para la persona y la necesidad de recuperar las auténticas fuerzas o voluntades del hombre cuestionan y destruyen la seguridad del cogito cartesiano y de la conciencia autónoma. La inmersión en las profundidades del inconsciente y su relación con la vida real socava la confianza en la conciencia y siembra la duda en la definición de identidad. La necesidad de adquirir nuevos ámbitos sociales por parte de la burguesí­a, la insaciable avidez del dinero y el potencial de ocultamiento de estas pasiones desvelan (aletheia) las auténticas motivaciones capitales. Por último, Nietzsche rechaza la historia de la filosofí­a desde Sócrates (Nietzsche 1997: 129.225), promueve el nihilismo activo y ensalza la auténtica pasión humana, la voluntad de poder. Nada más contrario a la declaración de derechos humanos. En realidad el poder es el único derecho del hombre. Ninguno de los tres se resigna a reducir la realidad a un solo enfoque. La vida es polivalente, no se puede esconder su complejidad en vanas ilusiones. La caracterí­stica principal de lo existente es su dinamismo. Todo se relaciona con todo, no hay origen, ni centro, ni meta, solamente la capacidad inacabable de volverse a relacionar ”ad infinitum”. Estos sistemas de pensamiento tienen en el siglo XX no pocos seguidores de un cariz u otro. Serí­a vano intentar aquí­ ser exhaustivo. Podrí­a mencionarse a Lacan, Zizek, Baudrillard, Guattari, Deleuze, Foucault, Althusser, Chomsky, Luhmann, Ciorán… y un largo etcétera. Un denominador común de todos ellos es el cuestionamiento a la realidad y el no sometimiento a una única mirada de lo existente. Esta manera de ver las cosas se confirmará con las exageraciones del progreso y de la técnica. Los genocidios de principio, medio y fin de siglo XX; las desiguales condiciones de vida evidentemente injustas; la mortandad a causa del hambre en buena parte del mundo; las arbitrariedades militares de las potencias económicas… son reforzadores de un pensamiento escéptico y pesimista. Todo, pues, queda abierto a la interpretación y no a la sumisión del pensamiento único. Se debilitan las certezas anteriores. La conciencia se descubre determinada por lo escondido del inconsciente. La verdad (aletheia) no se queda estática en la realidad para poderse conocer. Dios, el sujeto y su segura autonomí­a mueren por innecesarios. El filósofo se obliga a permanecer en medio de la nada y de la incertidumbre como estado de vida. Si estas bases se mueven o desaparecen los resultados de la Ilustración se quedan sin piso. Los derechos del hombre están en el aire porque resulta que no hay hombre. Sin embargo, no carecen de peligros estos posicionamientos ”sospechosos”. Dos son los principales: nihilismo y dogmatismo (Foucault 1967: 182-192)11. Toda hermenéutica, incluida la de la sospecha, corre el peligro de agostarse en su propio dinamismo interpretativo o de permanecer en el terreno de la locura. El planteamiento de la sospecha quita una máscara, pero propone otra. Se debilita la noción ”dura” de verdad a través del esfuerzo interpretador. Lo que distinguirí­a a la hermenéutica de la sospecha de cualquier otra, es la constante contraposición de términos, las inacabables aporí­as aparentes desde las que se avanza en este proceso. El dogmatismo puede llegar de nuevo como muestra del cansancio ante el proceso inacabable de interpretación. Se pueden desenmascarar numerosas falsedades, pero llega un momento en el que concluye esa cadena asentándose en cualquier otra máscara o abandonándose a una idea preconcebida que condicione la significación de todo lo demás. Siempre es mejor tener algún sentido, que carecer de él. Tiene que haber algo más que confiera certeza a la vida. Derrida se suma a esta corriente hermenéutica, pero no permanece en ella, no es un hermeneuta más12. Lo que Derrida comparte con todos estos autores es, principalmente, la importancia del lenguaje, de la polémica (Peñalver 1996: 1)13 y de la sospecha. La deconstrucción recoge la estafeta de la sospecha, pero no se contenta con permanecer en ella (Derrida 1989: 47-89)14. Su esfuerzo constante consiste en no establecerse en ninguno de los extremos: ni una sola verdad, ni absoluta incertidumbre respecto a la realidad. Rechaza un ámbito de conocimiento universal, que además queda identificado como orden de saber eminentemente masculino15. Derrida quiere recuperar la profundidad inconsciente que tiene el propio lenguaje filosófico teniendo en cuenta la diversidad del lenguaje metafórico (Derrida 1989: 153). El sentido propio, fundamentado en el principio de identidad parmenideo, ha esclavizado a la filosofí­a a una reducción de la presencia. En este defecto cayeron los autores más arriba estudiados. Ésta es la labor ardua del pensamiento de Derrida, luchar contra el logocentrismo-fonocentrismo-falo(logo)centrismo e investigar la riqueza de la escritura originaria (Derrida 1989: 403), es la función de la Gramatologí­a (cf., Derrida 2000: 9-10). Pero tampoco anida su reflexión en el mero dinamismo. Queda abierto a lo diferente, al otro (Derrida 1998: 7). Es una brecha que aprovecha lo que está presente ya en el reino de la autonomí­a y que abre la puerta a otra manera de pensar. Para esto sirve el pensamiento, para afrontar lo que no es identificable en totalidad y permanece en un ámbito infinito de respeto a la otredad. La tarea del pensamiento en esta situación es la de pensar aquello que permanece oculto en la ‘cotidiana presentación’ de eso que siempre sucede; es decir, para Marx, la concreción dialéctica de los nexos que la ideologí­a esconde; para Heidegger, la verdad como aletheia, como abertura de un horizonte (o de un paradigma) que hace posible cualquier verdad entendida como conformidad a las cosas, verificación o falsificación de proposiciones” (Vattimo 2006: 81) El otro puede ser este horizonte. Es indescifrable, es imprevisible, se ubica más allá de la polí­tica en sentido estrecho. Es el horizonte de la heteronomí­a. III. Heteronomí­a Paralelo a todo este largo proceso histórico permanece otro enfoque original y distinto que hunde sus raí­ces en el judaí­smo de muchos siglos atrás. En el transcurso del mismo siglo XIX y principios del XX reaparece un punto de vista distinto a los criterios que habí­an modelado los principales conceptos del pensamiento hasta ese momento. La autonomí­a, el esfuerzo por alcanzar la universalidad y los derechos individuales pueden tener sus peligros. El desenmascaramiento de esas limitaciones y la propuesta de otra perspectiva diferente serán el resultado del pensamiento nuevo propuesto por Hermann Cohen, en primer lugar. III.1. Contexto de un Nuevo Pensamiento El pensamiento Ilustrado del dieciocho, dominador de los pensamientos distintos que hasta él se habí­an producido, unifica en un cuerpo teórico monolí­tico toda esa diversidad. El concepto, manera de conocer del logos, desecha los casos particulares para permanecer en la totalidad universal y en la separación de la cosa respecto a la persona16. Las nociones de progreso, de sujeto trascendental, de ética universal, de bienestar son derivaciones del empeño universalizador burgués (de la Garza 2002: 6-18). La intención del Nuevo Pensamiento es conquistar desde lo original judí­o una ”universalidad universal” (Mate 1997: 15). Por otro lado, aparentemente contradictorio, la Ilustración es un fenómeno particular. Se da en un espacio geográficamente determinado, con una religión establecida como raí­z oculta y un estado social desarrollado. El Weltgeist o Weltanschauung son absolutamente particulares. La universalidad occidental no pasa de ser una universalidad parcial (Metz 2002: 158)17. La organización estatal germana es la más perfecta, los derechos humanos del individuo son históricos y la religión cristiana es la superación y cumplimiento de las promesas del Antiguo Testamento. Todo ello da origen a la ”sociedad perfecta” de la historia. Y por ese mismo motivo puede justificarse la imposición de este modelo a cualquier otro tipo de cultura. La realidad, se piensa, es que se les hace un favor al plenificarlos sin que tengan que realizar el esfuerzo ni pagar los costos (guerras, sangre, pensamiento, trabajo…) que Occidente ha tenido que sufrir para lograr este status. Así­, no solamente, se hace a un lado la pluralidad, sino que, incluso, se puede justificar la intervención violenta para reducir toda diferencia a la universalidad parcial occidental. E. Levinas hace una doble distinción entre el ”amor a la sabidurí­a” y la ”sabidurí­a del amor” (Levinas 2000: 22-29). Aquélla se fundamenta en el principio de identidad, siguiendo la lí­nea parmení­dea. Da origen a la ontologí­a fundamentada en la interioridad y la conciencia. La última consecuencia es la hermenéutica de dominio18, en donde una cultura siente la fuerza suficiente como para justificar su imposición a todas las demás por ser éstas incivilizadas. La metáfora representativa de esta lí­nea es la de Ulises volviendo a ítaca, volviendo a sus raí­ces, a su identidad estática. Ésta, la sabidurí­a del amor, parte de la preeminencia del principio de negación, origen de la dialéctica. La consecuencia inmediata de este principio es la heteronomí­a (Sucasas 2002: 130-136), opuesta a la autonomí­a tan propia de la filosofí­a clásica en su afán de encontrar la verdad definitiva. Las expresiones de esta divergencia son la exterioridad, la categorí­a de huésped19 y el otro. Todas ellas se tipifican en la figura de Abraham. El patriarca del pueblo de Israel es el eternamente viante y extranjero. Es, por tanto, el prototipo de quien necesita ayuda, de quien se mantiene en permanente éxodo20, de quien provoca una respuesta ante la menesterosidad, de quien hace al yo más humano desde el cuidado ético del tú vocante. El movimiento desinteresado, el cambio sin retorno propio de Heráclito es el promotor de la dialéctica. La última consecuencia de este pensamiento es la hermenéutica de alteridad promotora de la pluralidad social21. La posición levinasiana, también la del Nuevo Pensamiento judí­o, es más cercana a la importancia del amor como contenido y búsqueda de la sabidurí­a. Su empeño consiste en conservar la permanente relación dinámica entre las personas, entre el tú y el yo. La formación de cada uno de ellos depende del otro, propiamente se trata de una con-formación. Nunca se concluye la constitución de ninguno de los dos polos necesarios, o siempre se necesitan para establecer el enriquecimiento mutuo inacabado. III.2. Aletheia o conocimiento con el otro. El primero de los fundamentos de este nuevo intento de pensamiento se expresa mediante la fábula de los tres anillos (Mate 1998: 116 n. 3). Este cuento, como cualquier otro, tiene su o sus moralejas o interpretaciones. La primera, serí­a un consejo que se darí­a a los tres hermanos que peleaban por poseer el anillo original: todos los hombres somos iguales. Antes de cualquier distinción o posesión somos todos hombres y, por tanto, con igual dignidad y derechos. En el principio del reconocimiento de la humanidad del otro se fundamentan más solidamente los derechos humanos. La segunda aplicación recalcarí­a la verdad fundamental: la verdad no es propiedad de nadie. La caracterí­stica de la verdad es justamente que es dinámica y, por tanto, que no pertenece a nadie. El cumplimiento de este fundamento implica que no existe un fundamento absoluto de la verdad. No faltan en esta lí­nea diversos apoyos y coincidencias con otros autores que defienden la búsqueda en común de parte de la verdad: La verdad no es tuya ni mí­a, sino de todos22. ¿Tu verdad? No, la Verdad, y ven conmigo a buscarla. La tuya, guárdatela (Cano 1984: 239). El Nuevo Pensamiento se decide más bien por esta segunda opción. La primera de ellas corre el grave peligro de hacer desaparecer toda distinción y diferencia. La realidad es que no todos somos iguales, sí­ podemos llegar a serlo, pero la verdad es que todaví­a no lo somos23. El discurso de los derechos humanos tiene que soportar la contrastación permanente con la realidad de su no cumplimiento en el mundo. Su fracaso es real. La tarea que nos propone esta narración es justamente la de luchar por llegar a ser hombres. Este trabajo se tiene que vivir en un tiempo que está unido í­ntimamente con la realidad del sufrimiento. A este tiempo, Rosenzweig lo denomina como ”mientras tanto” (Mate 1998: 130). Es otra manera de hablar del dolor real de la historia. Lo que está en juego en este enfoque es la necesidad de tomarse en serio la inhumanidad del individuo, sin enmascararlo con discursos trascendentales24. La responsabilidad ante las carencias de cualquier persona, especialmente de las ví­ctimas, es un principio de acción que da origen a la ética y a la idea de tolerancia. III.3. Regla de oro El segundo gran fundamento del Nuevo Pensamiento es la importancia que para la teologí­a judí­a tiene la figura del prójimo. El ”mientras tanto” nos ubica en el momento actual en el que hay que cuidar al que tenemos cerca de nosotros y de toda persona que está sufriendo25. El concepto de hospitalidad implica apertura total e incondicional a la alteridad, en todo su sentido. Implica recibir, en concreto, al foráneo en mi propia casa. Dos pasos fundamentales para esta práctica: acogida y rehén. El primer momento es previo a la propia identidad, a mi estar en casa. La irrupción del otro como antecedente de mi propia ipseidad es la expresión apropiada de mi relacionalidad. El segundo momento, expresa el sentimiento de estar invitado por el otro al recibirlo en mi casa. En mi casa resulto ser el invitado del otro. Esta situación de rehén define mi propia responsabilidad (Derrida 2001: 51). La expresión del ”¡heme aquí­!” se impone como impostergable y como obligatoria26. Esta realidad la habí­a subrayado desde muy antiguo el ”mandamiento del amor”. Jesús de Nazaret asume y ensalza hasta el lí­mite el compromiso amoroso por el otro, por los otros. La regla de oro tiene, en la historia de la Sagrada Escritura, varios enunciados (Conill 2006: 224). Empero, todos ellos, hablan de la primordialidad del prójimo. Seguir los pasos ejemplares del Galileo en la manera de estar con los demás no es una misión fácil. La compasión sin avergonzar al otro es una labor ardua y que no tiene fin. La religión y la moralidad colindan, sin ser barrera insalvable, en este concepto, el de ”compasión”. Pero pensada como concepto heurí­stico para descubrir al ser humano, la compasión se ve libre de toda sospecha y de toda apariencia de pasividad ambigua, y se vuelve un factor ético que puede ser conocido, aun cuando sólo lo sea como motor de la voluntad pura (Cohen 2004: 109). Se plantea la problemática del afecto y del sentimiento (Mate 1997: 224-231). Es inevitable volver la mirada al pensamiento cristiano y su raí­z judí­a que pone a la base de la ética el mandato de amar. Cede la razón al sentimiento de amor por el otro. La pobreza es el sufrimiento universal del género humano. La compasión tiene que salir al encuentro del sufrimiento si es que el ser humano debe por fin nacer también como un yo. Frente al hecho social del sufrimiento humano debe inflamarse el sentimiento humano original de la compasión (Mate 1997: 110). Éste es el motor que nos empuja a la acción frente al sufrimiento ajeno. La ética acepta el afecto como motor de la voluntad pura27. Y de entre los sentimientos y afectos, el más fuerte es el de compasión. La compasión no se debe entender como el reflejo pasivo del yo, en el que el ser humano es un congénere, sino como el planteamiento de un nuevo problema sobre el ser humano. La hospitalidad desemboca en la apuesta de acción responsable que respetando la diferencia, se hace solidaria con el quejido y grito de quien necesita ayuda. Desde este punto de vista el asesino necesita enfrentar a la ví­ctima y responder al cuestionamiento directo de por qué generar ese horror. Es la única manera de que la ví­ctima o futuras ví­ctimas puedan descansar en paz, sabiendo que el asesino ha dejado de serlo. Esta clase de comportamiento no puede esperar a la respuesta lenta y mezquina de la polí­tica, de las leyes o de la policí­a. En esto consiste la auténtica justicia. Se impone, a estas alturas de nuestro escrito, una redefinición de la conciencia, tan utilizada en la tradición occidental: