The Banana Peel Project

Hypostatization is that trick of the mind which transforms the complex into the simple, the local into the universal, and the temporary into the eternal.  What is lost in this translation?  Is anything saved?

Addiction, the movement from an instrumental practice to an uncontrollable compulsion.

Refusal, a strategic and localized resistance that has become a principle of action.

Institution, the entrenchment of practice.

It’s a neat trick.  Uncertainty, criticism, and thought itself are rendered unnecessary when nothing seems to change across times and spaces.

“I’ve been here before.” “I’ll always need it.” “It’s the same.”

Of course, to recognize the contingency of here and now and identity and even I is to recognize that you haven’t been here before, that you don’t really know what is going to happen, and that no two things can ever really be the same.

Criticism–that strategic orientation that demands the constant reevaluation of all practices, statements, and institutions and a concomitant commitment to act accordingly–is the other side of this movement.  It is the aesthetic that allows us to change.

The refusal to criticize one’s actions, one’s situation, and one’s self is the defining characteristic of the walking dead.