us and them

"Political space is never 'pure' but always involves some kind of reliance on pre-political violence...In human society, the political is the encompassing structuring principle, so that every neutralization of some partial content as 'non political' is a political gesture par excellence."

---Zizek.

Well, things are getting a bit edgy, a bit nervy here. Stay away from crowded places, lock your car door, sweat a bit when your car has to stop at a traffic light next to God knows who.

The state always has to mask its own violence, its own foundations. State violence is always deemed necessary or legitimate. Order, peace, security. You wonder about the word 'terror, though. Wasn't it first used in conjunction with the State? How can one ignore that most of the violence of the last century was carried about by nation-states? I know you want to forget colonialism, the Gulags, the Camps, the trenches, but can one continue to say this was a throw-back to medieval times or the irrational?

On the other hand, sympathy for non-state actors-resistance fighters in Kashmir, Palestine, etc has waned somewhat as terrorist activities closer to home have increased. Put a feather in someone's cap and give him a few stripes and all of a sudden violence is acceptable?

But is the violence of the state political, is it power?
Nation-state. The inscribing of life, birth, into the political realm. When, how? Has to be traced. Violence, perhaps it's a remnant of ancient divisions: ethico-religious ones. Violence is archaic, anarchic: blood and soil.But to think of "Friend" and "Enemy" is surely pre-political or the negation of the political?In a similar vein, can there be a politics of human rights?

Nazism: state racism, in Foucault's formulation. Bare life, not even that: a number....