Conflicts

The need for this essay derived from the latest bloodbath in Pal****ne. As each word is expressed or deleted, more unaware Pale******* die from i**ael* bombs. It seems that regardless of the westernised ways of classification (e.g. civilian or terrorist), every Pale******* must be annihilated. 

Watching the news and as usual, Ham** is always to blame. Beyond the terrorism, there is something that regardless of the quantity of bombs dropped, can never be eliminated. That is the need for freedom from the plaguing nation and the daily terror Pale******* go through. To the washers of the crimes, this justifies the total annihilation of the population, since one can never fully eradicate an idea, a belief or purpose. All Pal***** are a constant reminder and remainder of a country that is being denied its right to exist. What about pal***** that live abroad? We are not aware of any disappearances but only of censorship. It is known, after the violent uprooting of the natives comes settlement and according to UN resolutions, it is made illegally within the Pal***** territories (ref). Even so, there will never be enough land to claim but with the various acts of terror, the aggressor makes sure to empty it from humans and any other living organisms, endlessly being burned from phosphorus until some freshly-made ruins violently turns them into ash.

Some will say we are anti-zionists or even anti-semites. On the contrary, as we have described elsewhere we believe and practise multiculturism as a principle for change. Ironically, to have any anti prefix on any thesis, presupposes an exclusion -of sorts, of the initial thesis it (the anti-) is being mirrored from. Fascism excludes the majority of the populace. An antifascist movement then must include those who are excluded. If a fascist regime falls and the crimes they have committed - the horrors humans can do to each other, are shown with disgust, all the supporters will lay low and once again hide their predatory behaviour. Until another opportunity will rise and they will again be able to express themselves in horrendous ways. In other words, a thesis needs its antithesis in order to distinguish and identify itself in this patriarchal world we recreate daily. An identity shouldn't be killed by another. 

Self-defence. Where do you set the line? Is there a need to dwell in this question? When one appreciates how vicious the cycle is between aggression and defence the outcome can only be death. 

Words like retaliations or retributions, should only be used in our conversations about the past. There is no room for the present to be filled with these sorrows. Even so, our romanticism will not stop the terror, but that shouldn't prevent us from stating our goals and the ways to achieve them. On the contrary, it is these silly remarks that may lead to new ways of socializing and coexisting. 

I would like to know, where do you stand on this? Not in a pick-a-side fashion but on the future of the world through the resolution of the conflict. There is no doubt your belief will have no impact on the massacres committed - even though your actions will, but it certainly does affect the future of us all. To visualize this, imagine a straight line indicating the passing of time. The signifier C shows the beginning of the conflict. The signifier I, shows each and every one at the present. Now, you are alive reading this text and the conflict is alive and kicking. Neighbourhoods erased at the blink of your eye. Then there is the signifier F, to show the beloved future that seems so close and yet so distant. 

-C----I-F-

To support this, we shall need to describe how the conflict is being assimilated into the I. That doesn't mean a resolution of the conflict nor its disregard from our existence. Rather it is an open wound that pushes away the future. There is no future in which people die unwillingly from the actions of other people! There is no doubt that a peaceful coexistence is possible. Where diversity is encouraged rather than being violently avoided. 

Bear in mind that life cannot be assumed in a line. Rather, life is full of these lines which are not really lines. Every point (or pixel) has it's own conflicts that affects the various Is consciously or not. Like a tree demonstrating gloriously life in whole. We are the farthest leaf sprouting at the very tip of the 4th branch at the 7th branch from below to the right. Can you spot us? 

The topic of this essay remains the various conflicts that haunt the present peoples and obscures human progress. How a person is undoubtedly affected by a past conflict or even massacred by its toxic present-day treatment. ADDED: It is the interconnectedness that tries to be justified in this chaotic essay. 

Conflict is being encouraged. The western domination was established through violence. It has set the standards on how nations can thrive. The monetization of war is still the most precious industry as it ticks a lot of boxes. The war machine keeps turning from the unending production of bombs that will later massacre primarily non-christians. Capitalism and all fears of Other peoples are being fulfilled. With our own produced kill machines, we let them annihilate each other and diminish their numbers. Or we shall use drones that do not require men on the ground and allow for an effective annihilation. After lots of kills in the virtual world, all screens feel the same and the act of killing through it, has become the norm. One may momentarily forget that the green figures flashing on the screen are real people and that the heat that fills the human figure is life within them. Probably, that is how one manages to press the button. 

This is beyond cruelty. What lies beyond cruelty? It may be apathy. Not felling anything, not even cruelty. Killing out of boredom shouting that life is meaningless...

how to change the world vs. the world is changing

 There is no dualism. Only life in motion. 

At the root of it all, the world can only change when we change how we use language. Any language we use to communicate our selves to each other. The phrase to change the world cannot be reduced to a mere moment. Since life itself is best described as life in motion, change must also follow suit and become changing. The world is always changing. To change the world must then mean to acknowledge the changing process, and guide this motion into what you subscribe to. Since we were born in this ever-changing motion, we are part of the movement even in moments of stillness. As long as there is life within us we are actively changing the world. 

To generalize further, it's our actions that foster and recreate the world we all live in. For example, a world without violence isn't being realized through violent actions. Conclusively, language-in-use, is just another human activity that we have chosen to focus on in this essay as a (ironically) revolutionary medium we need to reclaim from the sketchy figures of authority. 

It is of no importance when these old figures have acknowledged the power of language in their quest for validation: To feed the people with certain moral values and later, the same well-fed people, will find solace and accept their authority unquestionably. Similarly on the receiving end, the language one uses shows the moral values they support. We do not believe that the effect of propaganda lies on the ballot turnout, but rather on the lives of the people that fall for it. Language-in-use, from the top to the bottom of any society, instructs the content of our conversations and obviously our thoughts. If for example, the state-owned tv stations regularly presented the various schools of thought that emerged in different epochs of the human civilization on - let's say, political economy, the political dialogue between the citizens would be a completely different experience. 

It is important to know why these silly fundamentals are not promoted to and by the general public. It is a toxic relationship that one needs the other to justify its own existence - or in this case, non-existence. Simply, if we did critize, we would surely take away their status of authority. For the religious, that doesn't mean elimination but rather the exclusion of the religious leaders from the political. When freedom to exercise one's own beliefs are guaranteed, and the concerns of the followers are dealt with utmost care, there is no space left for the involvement of the religious leaders. 

a changing world is the context of the content of our lives. 

...

It is the same old story. There is always a glass half filled or emptied, with water. The importance of it lies in the different beliefs human maintain about the same object. In a similar manner to the pessimistic and optimistic generalizations one can deduce from the observers and their attitudes towards the glass with the water, we maintain that phrasing ourselves differently, also recreates the world that the glass belongs to.

Being aware of the shared experience is a celebration to the evolutionary history. We are not aware of a response to the above question such as the following: with joyful tears and celebrations for their ability to create this situation in which they share this sensory experience and can duel in theoretical conversations. Similarly, you reading this text is also a celebration to the wonders of the human intellect and civilization. 

Not for a moment we forget and separate humans from nature. Evolution has provided for this. Mastering, exploiting and then raping our own first nature to create societies will always be an  undoubtable fact. Even so, we must not fight to return to previous stages of human civilization. Instead, we take full responsibility for continuously exploiting the earth and each other which have allowed us today to enjoy breakthrough individual technologies. 

we need to heal our relationships with nature and each other. Conclusively, the social structures and the reign of domination that has penetrated deep into our individual beings. Innocent expressions or realities (attitudes, perspectives) echoed from the depths of the history of patriarchism, only show how we unquestionably accept the current state of affairs - capitalism and neoliberalism, as the basis of our own lives and in essence our vocabulary: The content of our thoughts and even the flow they are generated. To bring up the contradictions and duel in self-reflection - for example, on the outdated cringe expression you said patronizing homosexuals, can only be achieved with the same language. Not necessarily to learn new words but to form sentences with the already known ones in helpful ways.

We created science searching for answers. Instead we got more complicated questions fuming out of the catastrophe we created. First out of ignorance then out of profit.  

..

i don't want to live in a world where death is no more. No more than a fleeing moment and yet so devastating.

 i don't want to live in a world where death is no more. No more than a fleeing moment and yet so devastating. 

When the line is crossed, man will be filled with profound feelings of fulfilment. Humanity's long relationship with death and immortality will finally reach its conclusion. They do make up in the end but their relationship will never be the same again. 

Most definitely, immortality will not be for everyone. Decades might pass before it is accessible to whoever wishes to overcome the possibility of natural death. The technology/procedure{?}, will be standardized by then and the operational costs will be at their lowest level. The hype from the techno-bourgeoisie will finally settle down and the masses will be allowed to access it and the multinational to profit from the working classes. 

...

How much of a difference does it make if the solution to death allows humans to reproduce themselves without any consequences? Would more people go for it?

Let's say immortality is normalised and humans do/can not reproduce and the last of us (the immortals) eventually kill ourselves at a peak of a never-ending existential crisis. Ghosts of the dead will haunt our dreams longing to be in our shoes. It may naturally be that to find peace with the dead one must reproduce and preserve humanity.  

agri culture

 How could a group of humans living off their hunting and gathering ventures, develop the cultivation of land or agriculture and the domestication of animals?

Could it be a pot filled with water with a single leaf placed inside? Forgotten in time, slowly but surely growing roots out of it. And when the human observed the outcome, decided to experiment with the flora around and crucially, cultivate their source of subsistence?

Perhaps it is the fruit's remaining seeds persistently thrown around the group's occupied land when eventually, the newly-grown plants around them produced the same fruit.

Perhaps they had mushrooms visualizing modernity and later, they were just striving to fulfil it...

...

I do not want to dwell in what constitutes the culture of agriculture but rather on the fact that agriculture implies some sort of culture. Since groups of humans developed some form of agriculture they have also developed a culture around agriculture. 

In other words, a culture can be observed and verified from the daily lives of the group at hand. Without the regular hardships of maintaining land and animals, agriculture wouldn't have developed. A day off can be fatal for the whole group. Thus, the alteration of the humans' daily lives to manifest the agri culture shows clearly how a culture can be established.

Whether in a social group or not, the actualisation of the cultural traits we wish to flourish lie on the individual. Of course, the manifestation or creation of a culture is better done with others but that doesn't hinder the responsibility of each one. 

START HERE greekness: a love letter to the deafening silence.

 

I do not claim to know the history of this island but i strive for it. I do know and love the fact that I will never achieve a whole and static conception of history. Yet, here i am trying to present a static somehow progression of events from yesterday, today, in an effort to expose the social traits, scars, obsessions we still haven't dealt with.

Bluntly, for the most part of its recent history (around the 20th century), a large portion of the island screamed for the unification with Greece. The uprooting, the terror, the killings were naively driven by the constant screaming of the greek community for enosis. Like a helpless baby screaming unceasingly for no obvious reason, until someone looks after it and ease the baby's pain, the greek community, ignored all efforts to develop a modern state blessed by the developed nations unless they got what they wanted - enosis. 

To clarify, anyone can identify however they want to.We are not against the greek community as we are not against any other group of people that strives to be self-determined. I do not believe i am a greek cypriot and if i have to identify as something it would be cypriot. A human that happened to be born on this geographic area. Even more, if its name wasn't republic of cyprus i could not care less. Hence, all people that were born here are its unmistakable citizens and my fellow co-patriots. Ideally, anyone who wanted to assume this identity should be encouraged to do so. 

The greek element of our upbringing is circumstantial [περιστασιακό]. With enough knowledge of any medium of knowledge and in our efforts to express our feelings, we later relate to  universal principles.  Love and care among others, are words we identify with and through our actions we bring them into being. Then, our language becomes only a means of communication. Culture is alive and we shouldn't deny its playful nature from humans.  

The fetishism of ethnic histories or the legal declarations of identities, does not solve anything: what if a nation-state declares that every human being on this world is its rightful citizen? However, it is of highly importance to encourage the perseverance of all social groups and individuals and intervene whenever the lives and wellbeing of other social groups and individuals, are under threat. To learn to appreciate other cultures and subcultures is a trait I would like to develop. 

On the other hand, the fact I was born and raised on this island - the nation-state, makes me its rightful citizen - unless the government excludes other identities that I identify with, i can proudly declare that i am a cypriot. Now, as a barely active citizen looking after the commons and imagining ways to improve the wellbeing of our lives, cannot but continuously stumble upon the open wound of the past, bleeding slowly but surely numbing the injured humans. 

There is no way to improve the future without a reconciliation with the past.

At present, I am astonished with the suppression of the glorious god-loving feelings towards the  unification of the island with greece. Judging from the extend these feelings affected the island's recent history, there is no vocal demand for enosis at present. And for good reason. The turn of the right to moderation serves only it's political goals: not communism, and shows that it has been all along a political game. Don't get me wrong, the left did it too. Men create power and then they die demanding it. It has all been a change of clothes: from the brownish outfit and the green beret of EOKA to the airy black suits and blue ties. 

Though, there's more to that. We support all efforts by the colonized peoples to liberate themselves from imperial powers. However, the revolt may be driven by different motives and ideals. That seems to explain the negative attitude AKEL maintained throughout(?) the revolt. However, as Democretos points out, this approach clearly violates fundamental principles of the revolution as examined and practiced by the Bolsheviks and V.I Lenin. Even a revolt from the middle classes is an opportunity for the proletariat to seize power.  AKEL failed to fulfil its historical and ethical obligation when the opportunity arose. The motives of the revolt, solely determined and driven by the Right and the church, rejected the Left from participating in their fight for *self-determination*. Apparently, AKEL should have ignored their authority and actively join the fight. 

Another question shines on the horizon: was it a victory for anyone? The martyrdom of the young greek cypriots, clearly presents a victory somehow to some...

...

Someone wrote that cyprus joining the European Union was a different victory for the enotikous (pro-enosis).  A reading of this statement can be through the lens of social psychology(?). In our search for validation, europe can substitute greece. Could it be the unfulfilled feeling for enosis that later shifted to europeanism in an effort to enforce and legitimize westernized morals and identities among locals? (A further expansion of the relationship between hellenism and europe might be necessary)

Could it also be a victory because of the widening of the gap between the two communities? Ironically, thinking about the genocidal europeans exploring the new world we cannot but find similarities from our recent past with the turkish-cypriots. It's as if we were conscious of their {the europeans} horrific domination of anything foreign they encountered. In other words, we [the greek cypriots] became europeans the moment we purged our copatriots. In contrast to the beloved declarations of human rights, europe was build on the lives of the colonized peoples. Thus, to exhibit and declare to the world of our shared european values, others had to be sacrificed. Also, the courage to do so, derives from anachronistic tendencies to avenge past horrors done by fallen empires.

P.S. enosis was becoming unattainable long before the non-forgotten invasion of 74. That intervention was long overdue as the very existence of the minority was under attack long before it. At present, in a similar manner, enosis with the other half of the island is increasingly becoming unfeasible...

the climax of nationalism - scene

 Under the scorching sun, humans going to and fro uncannily uninterested in the dangerous consequences of excessive exposure to sunlight, cannot but beg the question of why do they still do it. And the answer shines even brighter than the sun-rays, shining through the long history of the human civilization still burning us up here and now. 

Work cannot be normalized even further. One cannot even conceive a world in which people do not work (wage-labour) and when it spontaneously does occur at a moment of weakness, it is surely dismissed as a utopian fantasy.

In any case we are still under the suffocating sun consuming our lives away while finding solace in artificial environments. Suddenly, a familiar man runs through the busy crowd and his presence disturbs the processes of consumption that people happily partake. His swollen belly and the old stretched knitwear shows of a time where this outfit might have looked good on him. Now, it just hinders his strong will to reach somewhere further up. However, he stops to breathe and as if he is giving up on his quest, he starts shouting with all the energy he is left with, probably to transmit his message through different means. Indeed, he was a smart man.

"Cyprus has become part of Greece!" "The eternal will has finally been fulfilled!" "Ζήτω η Ένωσις!"

Naturally, all eyes were on him. Unsurprisingly, not for the best reasons. There was a unnerving silence for a long time. People that heard the god-loving words, did not know how to react. Everyone was expecting someone else's actions after the information has been initially perceived. 

"Should i jump on this public bench in ecstasy in a victorious posture now that my relatives wish has finally been fulfilled and then stop to cry at the fact that they cannot experience this moment of glory due to death?" or

"the fascists are still everywhere watering the seeds of hate and division with delusional anachronic statements. Even if true, nothing justifies his actions to disturb the lives of the consumers, at their time off work and even more,  the workers unwillingly involved. Another example of Hollywood-like love to a nation. Another script to be written showing the horrors and pain of the greek-cypriots in the struggle for Enosis. Another oscar to be won for whitewashing the bloodshed."

The few that understand his language, after a moment of a brief recollection of their scattered knowledge on a topic which is nowadays forgotten, gave in to the thoughts of their sustenance. The holy struggle lost to hunger. Turning their heads to the colourful and vivid signs of the familiar chain-restaurants, carried on with their performance of consumption...