Stefano Harney and Fred Moten - Propositions for Non-Fascist Living - video statement - October 2017

[@jdamore]

TRANSCRIPTION Harney: So I was thinking when I was reading it that these are sort of instructions to people who believe that they were subjects and had been created by power, like Foucault says and everything, or in other words people who believed it’s possible actually to be white. And I was thinking, if you believe it’s possible to be white, of course you believe in politics, which therefore also means, potentially, you know, always, fascism. But if you don’t believe you were ever put-power ever turned you into a subject, and you don’t believe in politics, then there’s really no need for nonfascist living because there’s no fascism. And then the question is, what kind of self-defense would we create for the way we do live? That’s what it seems to me. Moten: Well if… So here’s a possible formula: whiteness is the set of interpersonal relationships. Right? And if… But I don’t think… I don’t know that most… Most of the people who live in the world that don’t actually get to make a uncontested claim on being people because they don’t ever make a contested claim on being white-they don’t live the so-called life of interpersonal relationships, which are always fucked up, always violent. And then, in that respect, yeah, some kind of possibility of an antifascist life would be necessary because you always gotta be protecting yourself from whoever it is that you happen to have a crush on that day. Right? At that point, life is just a romantic comedy. … Harney: Because you put yourself in tremendous danger the moment you became a person who had a, you know, essentially like a diplomatic mission towards other people. And, you know… Moten: War is just friendship by other means. Harney: Yeah! Yeah, yeah. And therefore, also, the idea of peace that comes from interpersonal relations is also war by other means. Moten: It’s just about… you know, it’s like Denise would say, but then there’s this entanglement thing, that it’s really not about your interpersonal relationships, it really ain’t nothing to do with relationality in that way. Its… It’s really about… Its soul is deeper than that. It’s so deep, it’s (laughs)-so much deeper than that that it ain’t even on the same register, you know? And then the question becomes, given the rampant, violent, brutal unreality and that other shit? Which encroaches, you know, so violently on the real shit? You know, yeah, like you say, it’s a question of defense at that point. And that’s what makes this shit so crazy. How do you defend yourself against a fantasy? A fantasy that shoots real bullets? … Moten: I used to get embarrassed about the fact that I always thought about the university and the plantation in the same thought, and then the older I get, the more I read, the more I realize I need to stop being embarrassed about that. Harney: (laughs) … Moten: But I… You better stop me, huh, this might get me shot. But the thing is, is like, no, but I… It’s like the Baptist book, you know? Which, on the one hand, it’s completely devoted to the idea of individuation, and at the same time it’s very good about showing the brutality of individuation, you know? And you realize that’s, you know… Well here’s the interesting and fucked up question: why is it that the university is so much better of a individuation machine (-producing machine) than the plantation was? Harney: Yeah. Moten: I mean, what was it? Maybe, or was it- Harney: Well partly, it must have something to do with the labor process, as Baptiste also kinda showed. And, you know, the- Moten: The answer to the question of freedom. Harney: Freedom is the problem, yeah. Moten: Because… … Harney: I mean my nephew is out [inaudible] and, you know, I was asking what was going on in school, and he said, “Well, you know, they’re gradually getting rid of these names from the Civil War, and this and that, and replacing them with rich people.” (laughs) Moten: (laughs) Yeah… That’s when you know the Confederacy won. Harney: Yeah. Moten: The Confederacy didn’t win until they started tearing down the monuments and taking off the names. That’s when you realize, oh, they won. Harney: Well, at the very least it’s too early to tell. (laughs) Moten: Well, no, no, they won. They won. They won… And by the Confederacy, I mean the planters. Harney: Yeah. Moten: …It’s interesting. “Living.” “Living!” Antifascist living ain’t living, is it? It’s kind of like it’s all predicated on the idea there could be such a thing as a good white person. Harney: Yeah. Or their whiteness and privilege could be separated, distributed… And behind that, the idea that we should arrange ourselves through political order. Moten: You know… Antifascist living is just some shit you do when you scared not to do the real shit you know you should do. Okay? Antifascist living is just for people who scared to do communist living. Okay? Harney: Yeah, and also, I think the translation is intentional to use “nonfascist” as an even more noncommittal term. Moten: Yeah yeah yeah. Harney: I mean antifascist indicates an anarchist position. Moten: Yeah, yeah. Harney: But I think you right that it’s very specifically a moment when those guys are [inaudible] somehow not able to say communist and don’t know anything about blackness so they’re… They end up in this kind of like, you know… If you would be unkind to Foucault-which maybe I wouldn’t wanna include in the video because I’ve learned so much from him-you could say his list is a list of do’s and don’t’s. And if there’s one thing that we can always say about blackness, is it violate (inaudible) list. Right? A list like that is just there to be fucked with. And they’re built on a-and, here, I think Frank and those guys are right-they’re built on an implicit antiblackness. The very idea of do’s and don’t’s, the very vision- Moten: Well… Harney: …is like producing a set of protocols, you know? Moten: Well it’s not… I dunno. I dunno if the problem is the production of the protocols. The problem is the production-is the standardization of the protocols, right? It’s like, you could produce the protocols, and then they get violated immediately. Harney: Yeah. … Moten: I’m just thinking about the Godfather. Harney: (laughs) Moten: I just wanna tell you about your do’s and don’t’s. That’s [inaudible] the same thing as Foucault. (laughs) Harney: (laughs) … Moten: See, the trouble-see, the reason why there’s no such thing as a good white person is because there’s no such thing as a good person. Harney: Yeah. Like, everything in graduate school is premised on convincing you you could actually be one. Moten: Oh yeah. Harney: And that of course makes you schizophrenic because to be a person is to be a white person, so if you ain’t white, you’re fucked. Moten: Yeah, what the fuck? Be like… Come on, man. Harney: It’s just like two impossibilities banging their heads against each other. Moten: Yeah. Harney: …Well I think I might need another beer. Moten: That was an interesting divergence of opinion. Harney: You thought you might not need another beer? Moten: No, I said I’m hungry, man. Harney: Oh. But we can do both. Moten: Well that’s… clearly, yeah. Harney: (laughs) Moten: So we when we went out, then we got right back together.

[@jrmrtn]

thank you for this! 💜

[@mayakovskaya6710]

thanks!

[@comradehoney5655]

Gods work

[@burrellcamille892]

Thank you so much!!!

[@davitchaganava9622]

best shit these two ever said. for me personally

[@Urbanibalist]

Useful to know, as audio is not always completely discernable, that subtitles (in English) are available through the version uploaded to BAK’s vimeo channel: vimeo.com/238275888

[@luizgabrielcatoiradevascon8025]

thanks!

[@carsonfritz]

where dis?

[@carsonfritz]

also what's the 'baptiste' book?