The Outrageous and the Mundane

The Sunday Night Reader for 8/7/22

Aug 07, 2022

‘Swimming Lessons in the Afternoon’

Thomas Zimmer considers tension between our daily lives and our ongoing democratic crisis in The Guardian:

“In a lot of ways, things really are ‘normal’, in the sense that most of us continue the routines that dominate our daily lives, even in the midst of a political crisis around us. We have to function, we compartmentalize, we experience a strange mixture of normalcy and emergency that can sometimes feel almost disorienting. Franz Kafka famously noted in his diary on Sunday, 2 August 1914: ‘Germany has declared war on Russia. Swimming lessons in the afternoon.’ Kafka had just witnessed the beginning of what quickly escalated into the first world war. His remark captures the tension between the global and the personal, the extraordinary and the routine, history and everyday life, the outrageous and the mundane.

There is always a temptation to resolve that tension by ignoring the emergency and focusing on the ordinariness of it all – because how bad could things possibly be, the sky isn’t ever falling. This, however, is a privilege not available to the women who are dealing with the cruel consequences of their bodily autonomy being denied or the traditionally marginalized, vulnerable groups who are the targets of the reactionary offensive. Such a focus on the markers of normalcy is deceptive and politically dangerous. It is difficult for contemporaries to discern the exact nature and extent of the crisis through which they are living. We can’t necessarily see the democratic backsliding by simply looking out the window – certainly not until it may be too late – but that doesn’t mean there isn’t a continuing crisis underneath…

In this situation, simply clinging to the established idea that the public trust in institutions must not be undermined will not be good enough.

And it’s true that, in a vacuum, it is highly problematic for authorities to prosecute the leading political opponent of a sitting president. But we are not in a vacuum. We are in a situation in which the former president was the central figure in a multi-layered, multi-month scheme that amounted to an actual coup attempt. Not holding him accountable would gravely endanger the future of constitutional government…

The current situation necessarily marks a turning point. It is a veritable crisis because it will have to be resolved, one way or the other. America will either overcome this reactionary counter-mobilization and make the leap to multiracial, pluralistic democracy – or the country will regress, and let democracy perish before it’s ever been fully achieved in this land.” Read more.

Willing to Lose; Unwilling to Give Up

There are worse ways to describe a politician, and I think the “willing to lose” part is even more important than the “unwilling to give up part.” The craven behavior of so many Republican elected officials — ready to bear any indignity and immorality in order to “not lose” — has been at least as dispiriting to me as the behavior of the maniacs and true-believer authoritarians.

I have no love for Liz Cheney. But this piece by Katherine Miller does a good job of summing up my grudging respect for her current trajectory. At least she’s unwilling to be a bystander. At least she’s willing to lose.

Miller is making a broad, layered argument, so read the whole thing. But here’s a snip:

“The American social contract requires both democratic structures and perpetual individual choices in the interests of the common cause…Ms. Cheney has argued that personal agency matters since Jan. 6 took place: Institutions comprise individuals and individuals shape political reality, regardless of whether they intend to do so. Officials, she told one interviewer, have a duty ‘to recognize that we can influence events.’ She told another, ‘We clearly have a situation where elected officials have to make a decision about whether we are bystanders or leaders,’ calling it ‘irresponsible’ to act ‘as though our institutions are self-sustaining, because they’re not; it takes us, it takes people, to do that.’

…The hearings have deepened our understanding of that [January 6] period and reoriented the public’s attention toward its severity. The meaning of it all — especially the direction to go in from here — remains unresolved, a developing conversation about whether the solution is legal or political, systems and individuals.

But the case Ms. Cheney has been implicitly making since Jan. 6 is that you have to use power while you still have it and act as though you’re prepared to lose it rather than risk something worse in an effort to maintain it or concede the truth only when there’s nothing else left to do. Because, more than anything, her actions seem to reflect the ultimate individualist view of the past six years: If you don’t do it yourself, nobody is coming to help you.” Read more.

Share Last Gasp

Poem 333 (allways capitalize the We) by Andru Defeye

they say a storm is coming.

I will be scared when the sun is.

Don’t forget We are miracles please

Don’t forget We are

creation’s favorite color of chaos

carried away with ourselves

at 67,000 miles an hour

and We

have gotten pretty good at it

We decipher our location on this big rock

by looking at flaming balls of gas

through lenses We make

by smashing little rocks

and applying fire to them

Heavy Rotation

“This summer I swam in a public place / and a reservoir to boot. / At the latter I was informal / at the former I wore my suit. / I wore my swimming suit.”