Letter From An Alien: Deconstruction #fridayflash

What would Derrida say about us? If I told him that I shall be spending today immersed in ‘texts’ I wrote a year ago? Some of them ‘letters’ to you. Some of them cries out into the ether. That I will be going over my words with a fine-toothed comb, looking for clues, looking for an escape route. That copies of my throwaway texts, some of them casual tweets, are also sat in a file in a drawer in a filing cabinet in a grey office. Waiting to be deconstructed by the little man in his grey suit whose hopes and dreams have amounted to this bureaucratic role as a servant. To the crown. Would Derrida frown and smile that wry smile of his? Would he shake his head and sadly say that you take a text out of its context at your peril? That if you try to consider words and words alone, separate from the sad desperation of the person who wrote them, separate from the blank incomprehension of the person who read them, separate from the cold officious room where the little man in his grey suit will one day be reading them out in a dead pan monotone, you lose all meaning? That deconstruction, inspite of what thousands of English  Literature Undergraduate students may believe, is not an academic exercise? It’s blood and guts.  It’s the opposite of abstract. It’s finding the life that is hidden in every text. The fear. The love.

What would Barthes say about us? He knows a thing or two about this. In his book, A Lovers Discourse, he ripped out his heart, laid it on a table, and ‘deconstructed’ it with a scalpel right infront of us. He reminded us that all those cliches we have come to associate with a trite, sentimental expression of ‘love’, are much much more. Goodbyes at train stations, scented notepaper, whispered ‘I love yous’ are merely cyphers, outward acceptable codes for a torrent of feeling, of loss, of pain, of the fear of death enacted in the scene where our Lover slams the door in our face.  I think Barthes would have some compassion for us.  If he were to join us in the cold, officious room, he’d probably be solemn as he transcribed the words coming out of the mouth of the little man in his grey suit. He’d probably find beauty in the translations of translations of words once written in great anguish. And he would save his wry smile for the moment when we started to argue about who ‘owned’ which ideas, whose texts were whose, he’d cough and mutter something about The Death of The Author. And the fact that, if we’re going to be picky about it, he has some claim to ownership of our ideas and our texts anyway.

What would Foucault say about us? I don’t know. I am not so sure he would be that concerned, no matter how much we wish he would be, about our individual feelings. Our petty struggle. He is more of a bigger picture guy. I suspect that if he too found himself with us in the cold, officious room, it could get quite crowded in there, he’d notice the lay out. Not from an interior design perspective, the State has no eye for style, but in terms of Power. Who goes where, who stands, who sits, who is left behind a glass screen. He might smile wryly too, and he might pull out an old battered copy of Discipline and Punish as he noted that whilst the days of flogging in the public square are long gone, there is still something theatrical about this scene. That the desire for rituals of public humiliation haven’t left us, we’ve just made them less gory. I hope at least, he might also spare a thought for Foucault’s Daughter, and how I said she’d get into trouble one day. How, in my fumbling attempt at fiction, I ended up doing what he does, and dissected, analysed, prophesised reality.

What would Freud say about us? For the Daddy of Psychoanalysis is also the Daddy of Deconstruction. It was he who, before anyone was ready, began to pull apart our words, and showed how words are rooted in thoughts, and thoughts are rooted in base impulses. I expect Freud would say very little. He might puff on his pipe and knot his brow. But it wouldn’t escape his attention, that it is me, not you, and not the little man in his grey suit, who has accepted that this is a psychological drama. That we have been interacting on a subconscious level, and that if I want to make sense of what has happened, I won’t find the answers in the cold, officious room, I’ll find them on the analyst’s couch, in my own mind, through my writing.

And, as much as I may have made out you to be the centre of this story, as Derrida, Barthes, Foucault and Freud know full well, it’s me I am writing to and talking to, it’s my thoughts and feelings and, yes, ideas, I have been ‘deconstructing’ all this time. The girl who wasn’t there is here. And she hasn’t finished yet.

Letter From An Alien: Nothing But Trouble

That’s another fine mess you got me into, Stanley! But it was worth it.

Because:

Male Impersonators,  Metrosexy and Anti Gay.

‘If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they’ll kill you.’  -  Oscar Wilde

Letter From An Alien: A Dangerous Method

Some notes on seeing A Dangerous Method:

I hate Keira Knight­ley usu­ally but I thought she acted quite well in this.

I liked how her con­tor­tions of emo­tional pain were exactly the same expres­sions in tone, as when she was approach­ing orgasm due to the beat­ings from Jung.

The por­trayal of female masochism as a result of child­hood ‘abuse’ was pre­dictably lame, though I thought. Isn’t sado-masochism really a NORMAL part of sexuality?

Also Fassbender/Jung just was not believ­able as a ‘dom­i­nant’ man but is any man?

I also thought that she ‘recov­ered’ rather too straight­for­wardly with her recov­ery being sig­ni­fied by mar­riage and pregnancy.

The actor who played Freud made it for me he was very con­vinc­ing. He had a pres­ence I imag­ine Freud would have had. He also showed that Freud may have been a dif­fi­cult man.

As I said to you before, my favourite scene was on the boat where Freud refused to tell Jung his dream because it would under­mine his ‘author­ity’. How apt.

http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2011/10/26/jungian-complexes-at-the-multiplex/#comment-15181

http://marksimpsonmetrosexualarchives.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/jungian-complexes-at-the-multiplex/

Letter From An Alien: It’s Over, Roland

http://www.towleroad.com/2012/02/a-marine-comes-home.html

This photo has gone viral recently. It was first posted on a ‘Gay Marines’ FB page and has since been sent round the internet, with the tagline ‘Gay Marine Comes Home’.

You know me. I am an out and proud ‘homophile’. I am bordering on being a homo myself.  My blog archives are full of pictures of men in clinches, from the sacred to the profane. But when I saw this image I was caught short. I will admit it to you, Roland. I felt a bit queasy. And I think you will understand why.

The photograph is a graphic illustration of the end of DADT, the edict that kept gay, lesbian AND BISEXUAL army personnel from being open about their sexuality. In some ways, the military was, until very recently, the last bastion of ‘pre-gay’ times. ‘Don’t ask, don’t tell’ has been the unspoken motto of men who have sex with men for eons. And now it is over.

But it is not just the repression of homosexuality that is over here. I fear some other things may be on their way out too. What about all those soldiers ’acting gay’ on video? Will they be doing that so much, when their gay colleagues are on site? Or, a story you know intimately, those plucky GIS who went gay for pay a few years back. Would that happen when being gay in the army is normalised?

I know that you and your ‘accomplice’ in homo-anthropology Steven Zeeland, have had a range of feelings about the ‘coming home’ of gayness in the military. In Male Impersonators and Barrack Buddies, you both seemed to be opposed to DADT, even though you were nostalgic for a time when homosexuality was even more hidden than it was in the army in the 1990s. You of all people are aware of the complexities and contradictions here. And you, of all people, would be unlikely to begrudge a passionate embrace between a marine and his lover, especially if it is caught on camera.

But something is well and truly lost isn’t it?

Perhaps our only consolation is that in coming home, the gay identity is also quickening its own demise. You have predicted we are nearing the end of gay. Judging by the defensive reactions mainly gay men give to me when I even dare to critique their precious identity position, I am inclined to think you are right.

A Gay Marine Comes Home. We know it’s over, Roland.

It’s over.

P.s. I am going to be honest with you, one of the things that made me feel a bit ‘queasy’ was the gender dynamics of the photo. The marine, supposedly one of those macho masculine types, has a garland round his neck and is being lifted off the floor by his big strong civilian boyfriend (who he termes ‘the giant’ on his facebook page). But I am an old-fashioned girl.

Letter From An Alien: All You Need Is Me

I thought I had read all Mark Simpson’s blog, and heard all Morrissey’s songs, but this one passed me by till now.

All You Need Is Me.

http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2007/10/17/all-you-need-is-me/

Apart from the fact Moz’s 2007 (?) performance on a chat show confirms my belief he has become a ‘psychotic lounge singer’ I couldn’t help but smile rather ashamedly at the lyrics.

In a previous post of mine about ‘subjectivity’ ‘objectification’ and narcissism, a frighteningly astute commenter likened me to Morrissey. He quoted me:

“He [Roland Barthes] positioned himself as the ‘amorous subject’ and that seemed to me like the font of his creativity and knowledge and writing and work. If you are always the ‘object’ of someone else’s affections, it is a very passive role. What do you actually do?”

And then said, damningly:

‘This is Morrissey in a nutshell. A continually fascinating aspect of his work is how melancholic longing is always a form of activity, even attack. Always pursuing, its unimaginable that the “amorous subject” of a Morrissey lyric could ever be the pursued. You are the quarry.

His work is constantly recriminating the loved object for its passivity. And here there is a secret collusion between lovers and enemies: “And what do you do? You just sit there”.’

To draw the circle back on itself, my ‘morrissey-esque’ sensibility has become rather exposed of late, since relations between me and Mr Simpson (author of Saint Morrissey) have gone sour.

Morrissey sings here:

‘You’re gonna miss me when I’m gone’.

And I am pretty sure there is an email somewhere sent by me to Mr Simpson, that uses almost those very words.

Even now, though, as I sit here, embarrassed to be ‘found out’ , I am like Morrissey, who never seems to regret anything or recriminate himself for doing or saying anything, only everyone else,  and I still think I’m right!

Mark Simpson DOES need me. I am obviously not all he needs . I am not quite as arrogant as Moz. But I do think without the inspiration, research, insights and hard work of QRG, he will struggle to dominate metrosexual theory, to be ‘The (Metro)Daddy’.

Part of me hopes I am wrong. Another, louder part, is standing on the stage next to Morrissey, two psychotic lounge singers,  certain and confident in our own necessity to someone else. All You Need Is Me.

http://quietgirlriot.wordpress.com/2011/12/05/letter-from-an-alien-subjectobjectnarcissist/

Say Something

 

Your silence is deafening…

Fade-out

fading / fade-out

Painful ordeal in which the loved being appears to withdraw from all contact, without such enigmatic indifference even being directed against the amorous subject or pronounced to the advantage of anyone else, world or rival.

- Roland Barthes, A Lover’s Discourse

 

h/t @fennerpearson

 

 

Letter From An Alien: Subject/Object/Narcissist?

In Barthes’ Lover’s Discourse he says that the ‘amorous subject’ suffers from an overload of empathy. In one sense it is the opposite of narcissism as the amorous subject focuses on the ‘loved object’ more than himself (Barthes always uses ‘he’ and ‘him’) but in another sense ‘love’ in the constructed sense of the word, is all about reflecting back on the self. There is this devestating bit in the book where he basically says every time you think you care about how your ‘loved object’ feels you are kidding yourself. You only care about how he feels in relation to you.

It really hit home to me.

But after reading it I was with Barthes all the way. He positioned himself as the ‘amorous subject’ and that seemed to me like the font of his creativity and knowledge and writing and work. If you are always the ‘object’ of someone else’s affections, it is a very passive role. What do you actually do?

http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2011/12/05/still-ill-narcissism-is-sick-again/

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This subject made me recall this, one of the first conversations I had with Mark Simpson, king of metrosexual narcissism, on his blog in 2010:

QRG: ‘Classic Pushy Bottom’ is a classic phrase!

MS: Well, I’ve enough experience of that particular species to recognise one when it pushes back at me – in Widescreen

QRG: Maybe the ‘Classic Pushy Bottoms’ and the ‘Classic Passive Tops’ should get together in a (very large) room and fight it out amongst themselves. With the cameras rolling of course, for the rest of us to enjoy the carnage.

MS: Oops, I think I may have already appeared in that movie….

http://www.marksimpson.com/blog/2006/11/20/bashing-bonds-blonde-bollocks/#comments

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Letters From An Alien: Trick

 

There is this trick (you will have played it on yourself) where a writer writes something very personal and somehow manages to convince him/herself that on finishing it, it will magically turn into just another book. That is detached from the personal things it refers to. But that is the point when it becomes even more personal. How do we manage to pull that one on ourselves?

And there is another trick. This one is where I convinced myself that finishing the story would mean the story would be finished. It feels like now, it has only just begun.

Quel con!

Letters From An Alien: The Queen Is Dead, Boys

http://www.marksimpson.com/pages/queen_is_dead.html
Dear Misters Simpson and Zeeland,

I haven’t finished with you yet.

One of the things I loved about The Queen Is Dead was the way it was written as if nobody would read it.  The letters you wrote read to me like intimate missives between two friends, as if they were meant for your eyes only. I felt at times a kind of flush of shame, reading that book, as if I was eavesdropping on a very private conversation, or reading someone’s personal diary, despite (or because of?) the sign on the front in red marker pen: PRIVATE! KEEP OUT!

The Queen Is Dead could in one sense have been the correspondance between two historical literary homos. It has that air of lost narratives, of  untold stories, hanging over it. The love that dare not speak its name. It might have been discovered after their deaths and published posthumously, without their consent or indeed their knowledge. I was flushed with another feeling on reading your words, gentlemen. I cannot describe it precisely except as a physical sensation- a tightening in my throat, and a heaviness in my heart. I suppose the nearest I can get in words is ‘loss’.

I have my own losses, that I heard echoing through  yours. I can’t pretend I didn’t transfer them a little, onto you. I have also been involved with a man who loved men, the kind of love you described, despite yourselves, so poignantly. And reading your letters, I felt a familiar stab of pain, that I used to feel with him, when I knew that he got something from his love for his brothers, that he could never get from me. I felt left out. Isn’t that queer? How can a reader feel left out from a story? But I did.

And onto that loss I/you/we have to add another. The loss that we all know is encroaching upon us. Death comes to us all, thankfully, as an everlasting life would probably be a grim affair. But no I mean the death of the homosexual. That man of letters, in breeches and boots. Who would write to his dear friend Sebastian,  pen poems to his lover, when he was supposed to be doing his accounts, or minding his children, or listening to his wife. You two meat chasers, as much as you have dragged yourselves into the neon lights of the twenty first century, you’re the last of a dying breed. You’re like two fine examples of a rare endangered species of bird, fluttering and chirping for dear life. And I am the ornithologist, in sensible shoes, cataloguing the demise of this poor, doomed creature that  she has come to know and love.  So spare a thought for me.

‘Be careful Steve, if gay studies are like murder novels then you’d better watch out for the final plot twist in which the hunter becomes the hunted, the analyser the analysed, the deducer the deducted.’ – Mark Simpson said.

It is too late Steve. The hunter has already become the hunted, the analyser the analysed, the deducer the deducted. You are not going to get away with it that easily.

There is a chance, too, that you may find my investigations irritating and intrusive. But as you know full well, queer theory has always been about intruding on the establishment:

‘David Halperin talks in Saint Foucault about ‘queering theory’ and this suggests to me that queer theory has always been about, in a way, gaining erotic pleasure from theory (and that if it is to have a future it needs to be fisted); indeed, Ed Cohen, with double entendre intended offers the motto for queer theorists: “we fuck with categories”.

http://www.inthemedievalmiddle.com/2007/03/fisting-and-other-gifts-for-graduate.html

There was one point in reading QUEEN that I began to count the number of women you mentioned in your letters. I wasn’t bored of all the bumming, I promise, I just started to wonder. That is what I do. Anyway, you mentioned Judith Butler (the most masculine dykiest dyke I can think of), Camille Paglia (who is probably actually a man), Lady Ferry (a M to F trans woman) and a porn star whose name I have forgotten.  Oh, and some nameless faceless ‘mothers’, the ones you have all spent your lives trying to escape, and ended up becoming. I am not citing these examples as an indication of a weakness in your story. I love cock as much as the next homo. But I think it is a subject that warrants further investigation, don’t you?

That was a lie. I do think it was a weakness in your story. Especially from the literary point of view. How can I fully trust a treatment of queerness, of homosexuality in literature, that does not even mention Goblin Market by Rossetti, or Nightwood by Barnes, or Sexing The Fucking Cherry by Winterson? Walt Whitman is all very well, but stood out there alone on the beach in his birthday suit in the cold, singing his ‘body electric’, he looks a bit naked, a bit limp, a bit emasculated.  It is something that ‘macho fags’ the world over never realise, and what you of all people should know – that all this obsessive focussing on the ‘masculine’, it actually makes you seem so very … faggy. Your version of homosexuality, my dear homos, in emphasising the importance of the phallus, that which makes you ‘men’, it ignores something that only a cockless cunt can truly know. It fails to acknowledge  the fact that queerness is as much about what we are missing, as what we have dangling between our legs (not to mention where we put that which dangles.  But you don’t need me to tell you about that).

‘Nobody knows what I lack’ wrote Plath.  Except she did know, didn’t she?.  And so do I.

Maybe think of it as it being time for you to take a taste of your own medicine, boys. Foucault’s Daughter is here to ensure the dosage is correct (we would not want to make a fatal mistake), and to make sure you both swallow.

I haven’t finished with you yet.  And anyway, you’re asking for it.

With love from QRG (on behalf of Foucault’s Daughters everywhere).

Metrosexy, Mark Simpson’s latest book, is out on May 24th on Amazon Kindle.

http://metrosexy.wordpress.com/2011/05/14/metrosexy-coming-soon/

Letters From An Alien: Postponement

(There is a new drug available-that ‘blocks’ the onset of puberty, that is beeng piloted to use for trans ‘children’ to make transition more practicable and less traumatic)

You: Like all this kind of new technology it will produce new sexualities – and identities. Plenty of kids, trans or otherwise, would be drawn to the idea of forever postponing puberty. It’s like the ultimate form of edging

Me: I hated puberty but I don’t think I’d have tried to postpone it. i just postponed sex which probably wasn’t a terrible idea. Though I did it in quite a S/M way by tormenting my poor boyfriend at the time. I get annoyed with all those ‘sex-positive’ people saying ‘virginity’ should not be a thing, because sex is all number of things and it is sexist to assume a girl in particular has to ‘lose’ her virginity etc. But as a good puritan I got off on all that! If I hadn’t had my purity to lose, I might never have bothered at all.

Me: Sometimes talking to you is how I imagine it’d be talking to Foucault. But Foucault was so much more precious about how his own sexuality informed his ideas. You, whether it is intentional or not, imbue all your words with – what is the phrase- a visceral sense of your own response to them. Or to the idea that led to them. I find it very compelling. And I found Foucault compelling in the first place. I am an alien, who has the good fortune to receive these notes, as brief as they may be, that throb and pulsate with the blood and desire of a real human being. (The desire, as ‘desir’ is, obviously is not aimed at me or anyone in particular, but there it is, waiting…)

Of course, I rarely think what it must be like for you, interacting with me. Tiring? Er…  I just don’t know. On one or two occasions someone has remarked on my intelligence. As if it is something they wish I didn’t possess. Or if I must have it, could I just not leave it in its box sometimes. Instead of constantly bringing it out and haranguing others with it?