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Why we took out Ann Summers on Saturday 26 March:

George, Julian, Dick, Anne and Timmy | 29.03.2011 01:36 | Analysis | Culture | Public sector cuts

A response to the confusion emerging from the broken Ann Summers windows on a march about... CUTS?!

We dropped the windows of an Ann Summers shop on Saturday 26 March. It commodifies the act of sex itself. This stands in contrast to the endless marketing of sexual attraction. There is a clear distinction between the notion that sex sells and selling sex. Sex is and should always be free. Free, as in from the logic of capitalism, not free, as in a hippy-bollocks free-for-all.

Ann Summers presents a thin veneer of respectability to what is ultimately total exploitation of our attachments, insecurities and fears. It is a point of capture for the feelings of inadequacy synthesized by capitalist marketing.

The present commodification of sex is so successful because the insecurity it generates distracts us from rejecting capitalist values as the only possible precondition for meaningful sexual relations. As if worth and value can be calculated from the frequency of orgasms. Good sex becomes quantifiable. Pleasures must be maximized. Are you missing out because you are not flirtatious, adventurous or daring enough?

But let us not spend too long missing the wood for the trees. This is the nature of the real subsumption beneath capital: once capitalist production is established it seeks to permeate every aspect of life that exists within it.

Our act was not one of destruction but one of rejection. A rejection of a process of capture. Of ensnaring and taking our desires from us. Of taking everything we want in life and returning it to us in a box. As something to work for.

It was also a rejection of the current dominant discourses. We find ourselves able to divide the anti-cuts movement into three main campaigns:
~ Tax-dodging
~ Tory-hating
~ Preserving the status quo (or at least, as it was before capitalism's crises became manifestly inescapable).

We reject all three themes for the simple reason that they expect an ideological shift within the capitalist framework, a framework that is programmed to self-perpetuate. Capitalism's function is accumulation[1], and capitalism is the most efficient means to accumulate. Therefore to fulfill its function it must ensure its existence and evolution. Begging to deny this for a set of unworkable liberal ideologies is a mere derailing of any sensible critique and possibility of escape.

The cuts ARE inevitable. This is the nature of capitalism. Capitalism is clearly not a social relation that exists to grant benevolence. Our continued denial of this obvious reality renders us impotent. We no longer act in our own interests but allow capitalism to design our playpens. Here and now we will not be penned. We are throwing our toys out of the pram and we do not subscribe to any illusions of consent or consensus[2].

We denounce any cries for unity. Unity is us all together as a unified one. Unity makes the same assumption as capital: the interchangeability of humans with interchangeable desires, as interchangeable parts within a machine. Unity again leaves us as numerical values, as quantities that must amassed and displaced to accomplish goals set out by others, since there can be no true representation.

We can only represent ourselves. We can only represent our own desires, express our own anger, and take our own action. This is not a statement of individualism, but an exposure of the myth of democracy. Just as it is impossible for a single representative to satisfy the demands of an entire electorate, so it is impossible for any unification.

Democracy is achieved by dividing the sum of desires by the number of participants. The mean, or expectation value, of a human. None of us, however, are average. So how can our differing and conflicting desires be calculated, calibrated, and returned to us a smoothed-out sameness?

Waiting for consensus is as impossible as voting for democracy. There can be no democracy within capitalism. We act because there is no alternative to this inevitability, we cannot wait for permission because there is no-one to bestow it. Neither waiting nor voting will set us free. Freeing ourselves begins and continues in an eternal now.

We free ourselves from our desires by realizing them. They are ours and only ours. Thus, we can only act alone. Solitude is not a cause for despair, but our onto-epistemology[3]. Only by accepting this can we approach the possibilities of meaningful social relations. Social relations free from comparisons, expectations and replications, none of which have ever emancipated anyone. Embracing our singularities is not severance from the world, but creation of connections between free and equal individuals.

Singularity is not synonymous with difference. Rather, it is the essential origin of commonality. Our anger erupts from our meaningful social relations, which we see as violated, exploited, and destroyed (or commodified) daily. It would be narcissistic of us to feel alone equipped and qualified to feel this anger. Common anger arising from the social condition necessitates solidarity.

In solidarity our singular actions form a multiplicity of resistances, only through which can the overcoming of capitalism become tenable.

*We say here everything we mean to say. However, we do not necessarily mean everything we say. We do this to confront mere passive readership and nurture critical engagement of all forms.*

[1] Assuming any supply is finite, accumulation necessarily implies concentration of capital.
[2] It comes as no surprise that the current economic paradigm is known as the 'Washington consensus'.
[3] Onto-epistemology is the nature of the reality of our existence, i.e. how things really are.

George, Julian, Dick, Anne and Timmy

Comments

Display the following 33 comments

  1. I agree what a disgrace... — how dare they
  2. How dare they? — Klamber
  3. i think i'm with you — fightSEXISM
  4. O.T. — anarchist
  5. An unhappy customer — catherine
  6. good work — 1q
  7. yeah — smashit
  8. love it — smashit
  9. Support it, but honestly... — Death to all ideologies and roles...
  10. All this sounds... — Dan
  11. Well done — C*
  12. Bord — noone
  13. Yeah... — Dan
  14. If it's so 'free' why no posters of men's tushies? — satori
  15. Please chose your words with care — a philosopher
  16. no posters of men's tushies? — OLD COMPTON
  17. Well you... — Dan Factor
  18. not sure that's going to win many people over — observer
  19. Thought it was all about sexism — MacF*ck
  20. People inside — Jaya
  21. Profit — Dan Factor
  22. bringing masturbation to the masses — Jessica Rabbit
  23. I dunno why Ann Summers was a Target. — Foxy
  24. Someones not getting any — t
  25. The original article — Dan Factor
  26. consent — vapidness
  27. Ann Summers' contribution to the downfall of all we hold dear overstated — A Thousand Gateaux
  28. Patronising... — Sarah
  29. The cuts are inevitable? — Sacha Ismail
  30. what a lot of arrogant bullshit! — rampant rabbit
  31. Venus and Mars... — Willie and Kate
  32. Hmmm? — Unfortunate baby
  33. Cuts not inevitable — Dan Factor