Skinny Puppy: The Coming Community (Tin Omen).

”The coming being is whatever being. [---] Whatever singularity, which wants to appropriate belonging itself, its own being-in-language, and thus rejects all identity and every condition of belonging, is the principle enemy of the State. Wherever these singularities peacefully demonstrate their being in common there will be a Tiananmen, and, sooner or later, the tanks will appear.”

Giorgio Agamben – The Coming Community – from the first sentence to the last two.

As I understand it, this video was projected behind Skinny Puppy on their 1990 tour for ”Too Dark Park” (although I think the track is from the album ”Rabies”). Anyway, connecting ‘89 Tiananmen with ‘70 Kent State (and general ‘68 repression). I do believe this says something about the practice of sovereignty and, along the lines of Walter Benjamin, the power of mythological violence. When Sarkozy today talks about ending the cycle of ‘68 he’s talkning about ending something very important: the spirit of rebellion or, if you like, the ”whatever-being” of protest. Sarkozy (and the other Thermidorians…) have added the discourse of liberation and humanism to their imperialist jargon, so now they must repress the spirit of these ghostly apparitions. But we can see them haunting our fortresses and barracks and the whole system of school/tv-show/parliament/think tank. The spectre of revolutions past will trouble us and not let us rest. Can history redeem itself? Can it be redeemed? It’s now up to us to find out. Don’t fall for the ruses of the enemy, because his continuing victory is a pyrrhic one. The whatever is not destiny, but it is our being!