It's a hot day, the kind of oppressive heat that seems to radiate from every surface. There is no wind to give any relief and it feels just the same whether you're inside or out.
I normally prefer the cold, but I find myself enjoying today. I haven't felt heat like this since Peru, or perhaps when I was gambling in Montreux. It's sometimes hard to remember you're living in a banana republic when the weather is cold and miserable, after all.
All government is violence. This troubles some people, I know, though I am not in theory opposed to it. Sure, we dress up that violence in the language of economics – government debt is really nothing more than a useful claim of the share of future profitable violence, when you think about it – and it is of course beneficial for a many great deal of people to allow the economics of the situation obscure the underlying reality.
That alone does not make a banana republic, of course. It's the configuration of monetary and political interests, aligned with violent government power. In particular, the difference between the nominal electorate and the necessary winning coalition, and the extent to which the former have a say over the latter is the crucial relationship, often forged through monetary channels between the treasury and nominally "private" actors.
As such, wherever there is money, there is also violence. When those who control the flows of money within a society are only dependent on a small coalition for their rule, they can be more free in the violence they use.
All well and good, of course. But what does that have to do with today?
Well, if money is violence, what happens when £9.2 billion of it is pumped into a city for a period of three weeks?
To be sure, the stories have already started. 13,500 soldiers are to be on duty. SAM batteries are being placed on the top of people's property. Supersonic weapons are to be mounted on boats which will patrol the Thames.
But these are only the obvious manifestations. Like a shaman who claims to be able to discern the influences of the spirit world behind mundane manifestations, with the right training, it is possible to see the "security world" behind the boring activities of everyday life.
The police are more edgy than ever. People with bags are being singled out for "stop and search", and often treated roughly in the process. More cameras are being put up, and unlike most CCTV, these are active and have humans behind them, tracking the movements of suspect individuals through the streets. Metal rails and locks are arriving in large number. Private security contracts have been finalised, with the government long ago and now with the various high-end hotels and similar establishments, where there has been a steady increase in nonchalant bystanders in brand-free clothing and the poise of someone with combat training. Armoured vans and less conspicuous but no less heavily armoured limousines are becoming a far more common sight on certain streets.
This city is preparing for a lockdown, for a war, for everything and for nothing. It's a blazing heat outside, and it's only due to get hotter.
Nice.
I like it filled me with absolute fear without resorting to the kind of sensationalism that so many conspiracy nuts get hooked to. It reminds me of that post in OK where you talked about actual conspiracies in that way. I especially like:
QuoteLike a shaman who claims to be able to discern the influences of the spirit world behind mundane manifestations, with the right training, it is possible to see the "security world" behind the boring activities of everyday life.
I almost feel that this needs to be illustrated. Like it's the beginning of some dystopian graphic novel.
Sadly, every time we try to do that, it ends up in failure.
Well we have the space at EBG, which I doubt is going to be used for an ARG with the lack of momentum and my desire and time to commit to it. One of the things I wanted to use it for was a project space, with stricter rules on editing and ownership and such, where those debates get squashed (or isolated) from creative output.
That would be a badass graphic novel intro.
Casually horrifying—very well done Cain. I can see it as a movie trailer with some foreboding trip hop quietly lurking through the background.
Very well done.
Vague enough that it took more than a moment to connect this:
++Well, if money is violence, what happens when £9.2 billion of it is pumped into a city for a period of three weeks?++
To the London Games.... Nice.