The revolutionary ideas
in Russia
in the early 20th century
are radical /
People were to start anew
from the zero hour /
But other projects
were of a biopolitical nature,
resurrecting the dead for example,
rejuvenation,
or the settlement of the universe /
Philosopher and culture expert
Philosopher and culture expert
There are three great books,
There are three great books,
Boris Groys on biocosmists
There are three great books,
Boris Groys on biocosmists
Boris Groys on biocosmists
one of them is "The New Humanity:
One of them is "The New Humanity:
And the Russian avant-garde - -
and the Russian avant-garde - -
Biopolitical Utopias in Russia
at the Start of the 20th Century."
MANIFESTOS OF IMMORALITY/
at the Start of the 20th Century."
MANIFESTOS OF IMMORALITY/
MANIFESTOS OF IMMORALITY/
Not 1917,
Boris Groys
but before that as well.
On biopolitical utopias
Much earlier.
On biopolitical utopias
on biopolitical utopias
Already in the late 19th century,
Already in the late 19th century,
in Russia before and after 1917
Already in the late 19th century,
in Russia before and after 1917
in Russia before and after 1917
Nikolai Fedorov, as this book shows,
asks the question:
Is Socialism actually a just system,
a just society?
He concludes
that this is not the case,
because Socialism, as conceived
by Marx and many others,
does not incorporate the deceased.
In other words, all the people
who worked and died
for the cause of
human and historical progress
do not in any way
receive justice in Socialism.
That is why he decided
to establish a project
that provides the possibility
to correct this injustice,
by having Socialist society commit to
reconstitute all deceased people
by artificial, scientific means.
To resurrect them, so to speak,
thereby giving them the chance
to participate
in the Socialist future.
Quite ridiculous. 1789,
the rights of liberty,
equality, fraternity.
We need immortality.
We need immortality.
You see, all those human rights
and civil rights
are certainly good and important,
as long as we are finite beings,
as long as we will encounter death.
But the moment
we become immortal,
we lose, so to speak,
the last bit of private property.
That's very important. Because,
even if we, for example,
renounce all private property,
you keep temporal private property.
We thus own a piece of property.
We own a curriculum vitae.
- And that separates us from others.
As mortals, everyone
has a bit of time.
And that means, all attempts
to form a Communist society
are impossible,
unless people become immortal.
People must first become immortal,
then a material basis will be made
for the Communist society of immortals.
Do the deceased exist within us,
or do they come back from the grave?
They come back from the grave.
Fedorov proposed
using the museum
as the model for this society.
The museum,
because it is the only place
where the technology
is not progressive.
Meaning it does not serve progress,
but rather the preservation
of the old, of tradition.
The museum of all people
So he proposed building
The museum of all people
The museum of all people
a museum of all people who ever lived,
a museum of all people who ever lived,
who ever lived
a museum of all people who ever lived,
who ever lived
who ever lived
in which everyone gets a space.
In which everyone gets a space.
Today we would call it genetic code.
In general, all memories surrounding
that person would be gathered,
and eventually, when we're far enough
advanced, technically and politically,
we can bring these people
back to life.
So this museum is no a cemetery,
but rather a waiting room.
And not for Ramses II
or Czar What's-his-name,
but for simple people,
for the simple leper,
who died an unjust death in Aleppo.
- Absolutely.
For all insulted and humiliated people.
This is, so to speak,
the synthesis of Christian covenant
and Communist utopia.
Since everyone suffered
for the future,
everyone must have the right
to participate in that future.
What's important is that the museum,
the library, the cemetery
are seen as the preliminary stage
to the resurrection.
As if humankind would order ships,
which take them across the River Lethe
and back again.
Yes, but alive,
as citizens of a new society.
A society without private property.
And they held assemblies for this,
and voted on it?
This movement doesn't make it
to central Europe or France.
No, but it had a political role
in Russia after the Revolution.
There was a party, called
"Party of Biocosmists/lmmortalists."
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
They had their offices in Moscow,
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
and in Petrograd, and they were elected.
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
BIOCOSMISTS/IMMORTALISTS
It was a serious political party.
They demanded that rejuvenation
and immortality
be elevated to main objectives
of Soviet state politics.
And they demanded that a majority
of the budget be used
to attain immortality.
And rejuvenation, meaning
that while I am still alive,
I won't become an old man.
- Yes, rejuvenation.
Rejuvenation,
as it is stated in the book,
in line with Bogdanov's experiments...
Alexander Bogdanov. - His institute.
Head of the party school on Capri.
You see him playing chess with Lenin.
He is the only serious rival
of Lenin's... - Absolutely.
...whom Lenin brought to the minority.
- The entire Bolshevist movement
came about, so to speak,
out of the discussions
between Lenin and Bogdanov.
But at some point, Bogdanov
became fascinated by the idea
of immortality and rejuvenation.
And he created an institute
for the exchange of blood
between the older
and the younger generation.
So he takes a 21-year-old's blood?
- Absolutely.
He describes an example
in which the blood
of a young student
was exchanged with the blood
of an older writer.
The writer
felt much younger and better,
and she felt wiser.
So both of them were happy.
But he died of this,
after the 123rd transfusion,
which he administered himself, causing
an infection and blood poisoning,
and he died.
- That's right.
But the idea behind it was that
you can create one human body
that comprises all of humanity,
by way of these blood systems.
Through blood transfusions
he wanted to get everyone
to exchange 80% of their blood
each year.
You can say it was something
like a blood Internet,
by which all the information
and all the energy
is constantly exchanged...
Because information is disseminated?
- Yes.
And Communism is anchored
on the physical level.
That's the key aspect for me,
in contrast to biopolitics,
like that of Foucault, for example.
That kind of politics,
ultimately stems from
the individual's isolation, despite
the fact that the individual is part
of the masses. In Communism,
however, what they attempted
was to create this unity among people
on the physical level.
Not on the level of ideology.
It's not the thoughts that unite,
not the steps of the protestors,
of the marching crowd,
not the weapons that unite,
but the bodies themselves.
And not through cohabitation, sperm...
- No.
That even had to be abolished.
Sexuality as a whole was seen as
a distraction from this grand project,
and as a certain isolation,
which it actually is.
So the idea is one of a current flowing
through all humanity, all bodies.
The basis of the economy
And then, if you will,
The basis of the economy
The basis of the economy
time becomes the commodity.
Time becomes the commodity.
Is the lifespan
time becomes the commodity.
Is the lifespan
is the lifespan
It's not about consuming, but
society offers you something
you can only receive from society,
namely time,
the time of your own life.
The heartbeat, so to speak,
is not money,
the heartbeat is the motor,
the meter of the economy.
Yes. And it's an economy
that assumes
a fundamental neediness by people,
and a striving for immortality,
which is not fulfilled
by God, so to speak,
or satisfied by God, but by the state.
The state makes the commitment
to pay people with time,
not with money,
or with consumer goods, but with
their lifespan, and even immortality.
So if I'd been hard-working
and virtuous,
if I was a Socialist,
then I'd get more life.
More life, more time. - Like a garden,
to be cultivated at the end of life.
That's right. But even those who might
not have worked so hard
ultimately obtain the same thing,
through the grace of the state.
But that's no longer a state.
- Yes, it's a state...
That's horticulture.
Or museum curatorship, I would say.
The state as the museum
of its population.
Now there's this very strange person,
I think he was originally a teacher.
How do you pronounce his name?
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky.
Who was he?
Alright. He started with
very advanced ideas in geometry,
along the lines of Riban
and Lobashevsky. At some point...
A mathematician? - Yes.
- But actually a country boy? - Yes.
A small district capital.
- Yes, a dreamer.
Community college classes at night.
- Something like that.
But with a talent for mathematics.
And at the same time
he was enthusiastic about the idea
of the general resurrection
of all people.
But then there was the question
of where they all should go.
Due to the earth's population,
finding room
for all these people on earth
is virtually impossible.
So he comes up with the idea
of patriating the heavens.
Other planets should take in
the elderly, the deceased,
the reconstituted dead people?
- The heavens.
But the heavens in the sense of
a cosmic space.
So then he invents the first rockets,
as vehicles that take these deceased
to other planets,
where they can settle
so that this resurrected humanity
can spread throughout cosmic space.
And not only to other planets
in this solar system, but...
Throughout the cosmos as large.
- Towards the star Alpha Centauri,
extending across
the whole zodiac sign of the swan,
conquering the Milky Way.
- But not necessarily to settle.
Malevich, for example, said
he would simply keep on flying,
and not land anywhere at all.
Not even land? - No.
- No looking back? - No.
He likes the idea of just
flying on into the blackness.
That would be enough for him.
He refers to the cosmos as
the "Unwhite," the unwhite place.
Exactly, it's blackness.
But not black as a color,
but rather the absence of all colors,
the absence of light.
In 1913, he did fantastic stage sets,
for a famous piece, an opera.
- "Victory over the Sun."
In two acts.
- Yes.
It had the goal
of actually abolishing the sun,
and replacing sunlight
with artificial light.
Because as an artist,
he found it insulting
that the sun dictates to him
what he sees.
And that he has to copy it.
So as long as the sun shines,
the artist is not free
and not autonomous.
Is it a lamp of the soul,
lit by an inner light?
Yes, but also artificial light,
electric light,
and other lights that are man-made,
that's okay, too.
He wanted to
impose an absolute darkness,
so that every artist
could then produce his own light.
That was the idea behind
this victory over the sun.
Is that picture of black from him?
Yes, that's where
that black square comes from.
Victory over the Sun /
Victory over the Sun /
What is "Victory Over the Sun" about?
Victory over the Sun /
Victory over the Sun /
Famous poets contributed.
Famous poets contributed.
An opera in two acts
Famous poets contributed.
An opera in two acts
An opera in two acts
Yes, Velimir Khlebnikov
Yes, Velimir Khlebnikov
and Aleksei Kruchenykh.
And it's a mystery,
really an attempt,
using radical poetry,
to convince the sun
to simply step down,
and in effect to
let humanity have its own light.
Velimir Khlebnikov
I'm not sure if it's a myth or not,
Velimir Khlebnikov
Velimir Khlebnikov
but I think there's some truth
Velimir Khlebnikov
Velimir Khlebnikov
in that Khlebnikov really believed
Velimir Khlebnikov
Velimir Khlebnikov
that the sun would accept this
that the sun would accept this
after the performance of his piece,
and that it would disappear.
He spent a long time
thinking about why it didn't work.
He thought it was because
the Neva was not a holy river.
So he applied for
an entry visa to India,
in order to perform this piece
on the banks of the Ganges.
He thought that the sun
would then be forced to disappear.
However, the British government
of India at the time
turned down his request,
calling it Communist subversion.
The Socialist Rosa Luxemburg,
born in 1871,
was murdered on January 15, 1919/
Politician Prince Bernhard von Bülow
could have saved her/
He did nothing...
Von Bülow,
German Chancellor 1900-1909
LOCAL GAZETTE
Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg Killed.
ROSA LUXEMBURG
AND THE GERMAN CHANCELLOR /
A statesman loses face
Speed polka /
Alban Berg, Wozzeck, Act 3
Phillippe Jordan, piano
One of the murderers:
Kurt Vogel, first lieutenant
in the Cavalry Guard Rifle Division
Murder celebration in Hotel Eden,
on the evening of January 15, 1919
Present in the murder hotel Eden
on January 15, 1919
Count Kessler, Diaries 1918 to 1937,
Frankfurt 1962, page 112 f:
Count Kessler was long considered
illegitimate son of Emperor Wilhelm I.
"Berlin, January 24, 1919.
Friday. Breakfast at Ludwig Stein's
with Count and Countess Bülow,
Georg Berhards
and the Swiss envoy Mercier.
Of course, they talked about Spartacist.
The Bülows live in Hotel Eden,
after the shooting
drove them from the Adlon.
There they mingle with the
Rifle Division, which is based
at Hotel Eden.
The Countess says that the events
surrounding Liebknecht's
and Rosa Luxemburg's murder
went unbeknownst to her.
She said the hotel was quiet.
That her chambermaid
saw Rosa Luxemburg among soldiers
in the hall.
A small woman
who went with them quietly...
Eden Hotel
Von Bülow in the Reichstag
What is astonishing about Bülow:
He, the main culprit of the Great War,
and of Germany's downfall,
had such a clear conscience.
He has the same rosy,
well-rested, almost cute expression
that he had twenty years ago,
or even 40 years ago,
that's how long I've known him,
back when he quoted profusely
and chatted with beautiful women
in a high-brow manner.
Of all the things
that transpired in the world,
he saw above all his own rosy face
in the mirror."
An opportunist of the purist kind,
German Chancellor,
referred to as "Silver Tongue."
"It would be most awful
if all this destruction and suffering
would not be the birth pangs
of a new era,
because there would be nothing
that wanted to be born;
if all that were left is repair."
"Count Kessler, 'Diaries 1918 to 1937,'
Frankfurt 1962, page 104."
Refers to the First World War.
"Corpse of a Proud Rebel"
What does the Spartacist League want?
Anti-war demonstration
Rosa Luxemburg's prison cell (1917)
Phillippe Jordan,
piano
I was /
I am /
I will be /
Eugen Leviné, revolutionary /
His wife Rosa, his son Genja /
On leave from the front, 1916/
"We are dead men on holiday"...
v. Bülow: Plans for the fleet,
Baghdad railway, Morocco crisis
Halt, or you will be shot!
Gunned down Spartacists.
"FREEDOM is always
that of the dissenter"
With Luise Kautsky (1905)
Names,
under which Rosa Luxemburg wrote /
The canal Landwehrkanal in Berlin /
Rosa Luxemburg was thrown,
likely unconscious, from this bridge
into the water
The murdered woman...
Shame on the German Chancellor!
"I was /
I am /
I will be!"
ROSA LUXEMBURG
AND THE GERMAN CHANCELLOR /
A statesman loses face
General strike!
Lucy Redler is working on the
HISTORY OF THE POLITICAL STRIKE
in the Federal Republic since 1945/
Her political group
currently consists of 100 comrades /
She positions herself
to the left of the LEFT /
WHAT DOES RED LUCY WANT?
To the left of the LEFT /
WHAT DOES RED LUCY WANT?
WHAT DOES RED LUCY WANT?
That is not much bigger
CONVERSATION WITH THE REBEL REDLER
than the organization
with which Rosa Luxemburg
once took up the fight - -
"I BELIEVE IN SOLIDARITY!"/
Lucy Redler on the political strike
and social resistance
Originally, general strike was
the highest form of political struggle
for the workers' movement. - Yes.
The Kapp Putsch, the right's attempt
to establish a dictatorship in Germany,
brings about a general strike,
which topples the putschist government.
In 1920.
That was the working class' answer,
just as in 1948 it was the answer
to the price increase and wage freeze,
following a large wave of strikes
in companies.
Demands for
nationalization of industry, etc.
Led to the 1948 general strike.
Lucy Redler,
social economist
The last political strikes in Germany
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
weren't in 1920, as many assume,
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
when ultimately, yes,
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
bourgeois society was defended.
1948, as well as
the political strikes after that,
are not so fondly remembered
by bourgeois historians.
But in the original concepts
of political and social struggle,
as developed by, say,
Marx and Engels,
the path leads through
the general strike,
which at some point ends,
then leads to workers' councils,
and the self-organization
of production,
and it is a long march
towards changes in society.
- It was the case in 1918 as well,
in the great strike movement.
In Germany, there had long been
the discussion among Social Democrats
whether political strike
should be used or not.
In 1916 in Berlin, 300,000 workers
in the arms industry went on strike.
During the First World War
they had turned against the war.
Against martial law, so...
- They went on strike for peace.
Exactly. Economic and political
demands went hand in hand.
Then we had
the huge strike movement of 1918,
The entire 1918 Revolution
began with the strike movement,
starting with the sailors.
One of the demands
was that councils be established.
And that happened. In the course of
the Revolution, the councils
turned out to be too weak. The Communist
Party and the Spartacist League
were too weak to coordinate the
councils and implement the Revolution.
But the councils could've
coordinated themselves.
They are spontaneous endeavors,
autonomous councils.
Still, even if Rosa Luxemburg
spoke of spontaneity,
the working class, as she also said,
requires a party, requires
political leadership in the struggle.
And that's right.
But the Spartacist League
was much weaker
than the Bolsheviks in 1917 in Russia.
The Spartacist League,
how many people were in that?
Perhaps 300.
- Certainly less than the Bolsheviks,
who in the end numbered 240,000.
- And they had the majority.
Right. But half a year prior to
the Revolution, they were only 8000.
The party formed very quickly.
- If I understand
your interest in the political strike,
then you're saying
1914 was the right time
for the workers of France, England
and Germany to prevent the war.
That's right. It would've
been possible. It was made difficult
by the Social Democratic majority,
which voted for the war loans,
and thus made a truce,
and fostered enthusiasm
in certain parts of society for the war.
So the starting point was difficult.
But it quickly became apparent to
the workers' movement and the unions
on whose shoulders the war
would be waged, and
that it would be
a war waged for profit,
for markets, for
geopolitical interests and so forth,
but not in the workers' interests.
And when you say,
"My politics are realistic,"
then you're thinking about
a moment like 1914,
when it was realistic
to prevent the war.
The war is a catastrophe,
so the opposite is true,
it is profoundly unrealistic. Right?
- Yes.
Then all means should be justified,
and if necessary we should pay
compensation out of union funds
rather than pay for
the damages from this war.
If there had been general strike
in the '50s,
it's debatable whether these demands
would've been made of the unions.
I don't think so.
But I think that political strike
is back on the agenda today.
We in Germany often look to France,
where the French unite
and all take to the streets together.
It wasn't just in '68 that France
was farther along than Germany,
but also today, the way
the French utilize labor disputes
and political strikes.
You are considered to be
You are considered to be
You are considered to be
You are considered to be
You are considered to be
to the left of the Left.
To the left of the LEFT?
They are too organized for you,
to the left of the LEFT?
To the left of the LEFT?
Too willing to compromise.
To the left of the LEFT?
To the left of the LEFT?
And too involved in the discussions
And too involved in the discussions
which everyone else is involved in.
Yes, the starting point
was the situation in Berlin.
The Left in Berlin
is not the same as Lafontaine's Left
on the Federal level.
The main difference is that
in this government, the Left
is implementing neoliberal policies
with the SPD.
Which is what they proclaim to be
fighting against on the Federal level.
We are for the minimum wage,
the right to labor organizations,
against privatization.
It's the exact opposite in Berlin.
The government has continued to
undermine labor organizations,
curtailing the right
to co-determination in Berlin.
The Left is putting it into practice,
and we had to fight it.
We said, "Not with us. We will run
independently as WASG Berlin."
Lucy Redler,
social economist
That was the starting point.
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
So in our view say it's more that
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
the Left in Berlin, formerly PDS,
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Lucy Redler,
social economist
or "Linke. PDS," wasn't all that left.
Lucy Redler,
social economist
Cutting 20% of blind people's benefits,
or privatizing 120,000 apartments,
that's not leftist politics.
So that's when you have to
start looking at the labels.
They call you a Trotskyist.
What is a TROTSKYIST?
They call you a Trotskyist.
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is a TROTSKYIST?
So do you.
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is a Trotskyist?
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is the essence of Trotsky,
What is a TROTSKYIST?
What is a TROTSKYIST?
His legacy, so to speak?
His legacy, so to speak?
To me, it's a form of modern Marxism.
The term refers to Trotsky who,
starting in the '20s in the opposition,
fought Stalinization
in the Soviet Union.
In that sense he said
that the planned economy is legitimate,
as opposed to capitalism, which is
chaotic and prone to crisis,
as we are currently seeing.
The economic crisis will hit Germany.
But he said we still need
a Socialist democracy.
There must be a functioning system
of councils, there must be creativity.
You can't build up one country
at the cost of others,
but you have to
remain an internationalist.
Exactly. Socialism in one country,
as represented by Stalin since 1924,
is impossible, he said.
And in the end, it proved true.
Referring to the establishment
of true Socialist democracy
in what later became
the entire Eastern Bloc, or course.
But that wouldn't have been possible
in the Soviet Union alone.
I can still see him,
leading a demonstration in Moscow
to mark the October Revolution.
And the workers don't emerge from
the factories, as they did in 1917.
But I don't share that
very critical or negative view
about dependent workers
or the working class.
I am fairly confident
that what we recently saw
in the train driver strike in Germany,
in the strike movements we see
in France, Italy or in Greece,
where there have been
many general strikes in recent years,
will become
more widespread in Germany as well.
And that we can expect major
conflicts and movements in Germany.
That's why I don't believe the thesis
of Markuse and others from the '60s,
that the worker is a manipulated being,
manipulated by Springer & Co., and
can't defend himself. I don't buy it.
Of course that has an influence,
but I still believe
that, especially during struggles,
a different awareness comes about.
We saw this in the strike
at Bosch Siemens Appliances last year,
no, 2006, in Berlin.
At the start of the strike,
there was one group of Turkish
employees, another Vietnamese group,
a few Africans and some Germans.
They didn't mingle much at first.
But in the dispute, they grew together,
fought for their cause,
against the closing of the plant.
And increasingly they said:
We're not just fighting for our own
interests, to save our own skin.
This is also about our colleagues
at AIG Nuremberg, at BenQ,
the planned layoffs at Siemens,
the employees at Nokia Bochum...
Out of that struggle grew a different
class consciousness and solidarity.
I'm confident, and that's my optimism,
that this will continue to develop.
So you say that
the foremost political decision
is whom to trust,
and whom can you by no means trust.
And those responsible for
the First World War and 1933,
I certainly can't trust them,
Whom do I trust? /
I certainly can't trust them,
Whom do I trust? /
Whom do I trust? /
no matter how they've dispersed.
Whom do I by no means trust?
But I trust workers
Whom do I by no means trust?
Whom do I by no means trust?
Because they produce something?
Well, I think
that what Marx said about
an irreconcilable class conflict,
and that the class
of dependent workers,
to which I would count the jobless,
that they are the progressive class,
who can develop an awareness,
can reorganize production later on.
I think that this progressive class
is capable of shutting down
this entire country.
Then they can fight for
completely different conditions,
can bring about a society that revolves
around the needs of people and nature,
instead of a small minority,
like Nokia, that can't get enough.
It's pure trust on my part,
but I think that history
has shown repeatedly
what can be achieved through struggle.
What does "left" mean?
To me, being left means
What does "left" mean?
What does "left" mean?
Positioning yourself
on the correct side.
What does "left" mean?
What does "left" mean?
That's the short answer. In that sense,
What does "left" mean?
If we assume that we will continue
to live in a class society,
even if today
it takes on different forms,
and working class
no longer means only those...
When the class divisions
run within a person.
A lot of it is subjective,
is already interjected.
Marx also established the difference
between class as itself and for itself.
There are objective classes, but they
don't always see themselves as such.
That's clear. But still,
I think that being left means
taking the side of
dependent workers, the jobless,
the youth, not the side of those
who now are laying off the Nokia staff,
to put it in concrete terms,
or who decrease employee wages
and increase hours, for example.
Those who already have the cash
and are making profit.
So you have to decide.
As we did two years ago,
as WASG Berlin and SAV. We decided,
for example, to support those demanding
wage increases in the public sector.
Or to support the staff
of Charité Hospital, who are opposing
the continued privatization
of the Charité.
The leftist Berlin Senate
usually takes the other side,
and its policies, as a rule, advance
all these cuts in social benefits,
wage cuts and job cuts.
So we said, that's not our policy,
we think leftist politics means to
fundamentally change social conditions.
In my view, that doesn't mean
refusing to be a part of a government.
If you look to Bolivia,
or to Venezuela,
you see that governments
are involved in nationalization.
That doesn't go far enough for me,
but it's the right development,
it's going in the right direction.
But there were mass movements there.
Mass movements
against neoliberalism,
which were what made it possible
Hugo Chávez,
for Hugo Chávez
President of Venezuela
and Evo Morales to get elected at all,
President of Venezuela
President of Venezuela
and to make progress for the workers
and to make progress for the workers
and for the jobless.
In Germany it's a different situation.
Here, the left is on the defensive.
We're slowly going on the offensive.
Polls show a shift in perception
among the population.
How big is your organization?
At the peak of WASG Berlin,
"I BELIEVE IN SOLIDARITY!" /
At the peak of WASG Berlin,
Lucy Redler on the political strike
there were 850 members.
Lucy Redler on the political strike
Lucy Redler on the political strike
WASG Berlin no longer exists.
WASG Berlin no longer exists.
And social resistance
WASG Berlin no longer exists.
And social resistance
and social resistance
We built up the BASG as a regional
We built up the BASG as a regional
"Stay put!" - WASG Berlin
We built up the BASG as a regional
"Stay put!" - WASG Berlin
"Stay put!" - WASG Berlin
organization with 100 members.
I'm also in the SAV,
the Socialist Alternative...
Approximately as many
as were in the Spartacist League.
Except that the Spartacists
weren't only in Berlin. - No,
throughout Europe. It was made up of
people from all over Europe.
KING STEAM, EMPRESS ELECTRICITY
A day with Karl Marx
and Wilhelm Liebknecht
LONDON, DECEMBER 1850
KARL MARX AWAKENS...
IN A SHOP DISPLAY WINDOW
ON REGENT STREET...
...THE FIRST ELECTRIC LOCOMOTIVE!
"This is the breakthrough..."
...he suddenly said.
STEAM PASSION
AEG FILAMENT LAMP
ELECTRICITY
MIND
He has to talk.
His friend Liebknecht
will be visiting tonight.
OUTSIDE IT IS COLD...
THE ATMOSPHERE IS CHARGED!
TALKING, DRINKING, TALKING...
...EXHAUSTED, UNTIL DAWN/
WAITING...
WAITING...
A film by
Rudolf Kersting, Agnes Ganseforth
Based on a report by
Ulrich Erckenbrecht
What is meant by
KEYWORD:
What is meant by
KEYWORD:
KEYWORD:
A subjective-objective relation?
What does SUBJECTIVE-Objective mean?
A key term with Marx.
What does SUBJECTIVE-Objective mean?
What does SUBJECTIVE-Objective mean?
Nothing is only subjective,
What does SUBJECTIVE-Objective mean?
What does SUBJECTIVE-Objective mean?
Nothing is only objective.
Nothing is only objective.
The subjective-objective relation
is basically an intellectual machine.
It's the attempt to construct
an intellectual machine...
To understand what is really happening.
- Yes.
To understand what's happening,
but even more:
It's a machine that, like all other
machines, produces something.
No machine produces nothing.
Every machine is related to
a production assignment.
That entails two things:
A machine must be set in motion.
What's interesting
about the subjective-objective machine
is that it has two ends,
each of which have a switch
to set it in motion.
As soon as a subject starts to move,
an object world is also set in motion.
As soon as an object world moves,
a subjective moment is also
set in motion. That's the first part.
That works by way of a program.
All machines have a program.
The subjective-objective relation
is thus a relational program.
But what is produced
in this subjective-objective relation?
What is produced here, and this applies
to Hegel as well as to Marx,
what is produced here
is world, a very specific world.
Two moments are interesting here:
For one, a world of forgeries
can be produced,
a world of forgeries
in which, for example,
subjective-objective relations
produce objects
in which this subject-object relation
has disappeared.
This simulates a form of synthesis,
pretending that the objects,
or the foreign things, are available,
can be held in your hand,
and can in a way contribute to
making existence more comfortable.
This means it is a machine
for the production of illusions.
The dialectic view,
the Marxist view, would be
that this machine must be sabotaged.
"Sabot" means wooden shoe
and must be thrown into the machine.
Early industrial workers
brought the machines to a standstill
to improve their working conditions.
So this machine,
this dialectic machine,
that produces illusions,
comfortable objects...
Can it be stopped?
- It can be stopped
by raising objections,
throwing sand into the gears,
by which something is created,
which, I believe,
is the other object of production,
the other outcome:
Namely the insight
into the fundamental foreignness,
the insight into the basic
inability to appropriate
a production world,
in which this subject,
a part of this machinery,
was always a knave,
always a subordinate,
always a fragile, exploited being.
But here, it seems to me,
the machinery
of the subjective-objective matter,
meaning the insight machinery,
cannot simply be slowed down
by the wooden shoe,
but rather that a second machine
exists, one that does in fact work.
And that could appropriate, pick up on,
the subjective-objective relation,
not as an illusion, but as an actual
relation, by lowering the ego barrier,
by combining, anticipating the other.
That would be the case in love,
but also in war,
if I grasp the enemy
faster than he grasps himself,
or in the production process,
or in the case of inventions.
Now this means that if this machine
produces illusions on the one hand...
It can also produce anti-illusions.
...it can also produce truths.
Realities,
realities that are of use to people.
If it does that,
and does so in the Marxist sense,
in the sense of Marx,
in the sense of "Das Kapital,"
then there is one key aspect
in this production of truth,
namely that this truth
is no longer within me,
no longer within my person,
or in my consciousness,
but rather in the things out there,
in the relations of production...
And in between, according to Marx,
based on "Das Kapital,"
and on his analysis.
So then a strange,
distorted reflection comes about,
because this diligent Marx
analyzes, in such a righteous way,
what capital itself causes
in terms of societal change
and manipulation
of the subjective-objective relation,
but he fails to describe the flipside,
or only does so in his early work.
Namely how is it possible
to gain experience
in the in-between spaces
between two subjects,
two...
a thing and a subject, or whatever?
How does the production of realities
in society function,
in an auspicious way?
He doesn't describe that.
He does not.
At most, he gives clues.
The best definition, probably,
of what is produced,
and what is produced
in the way of truth,
is that the true or the real
always lies in between.
That which exists between us,
between me and the collective, between
me and the relations of production.
When I speak, between two speakers.
- Exactly.
That's why it's interesting
to look at the question:
How can the scene of the truth
even be found?
In which place would the truth appear?
Truth or veracity?
- Veracity.
The spaces in-between
always play an essential role.
Take the negotiating table,
for example.
It is nothing more
than an empty center,
in which truths are produced
in lengthy processes.
Or take the courtroom.
Why do witnesses, defendants,
judges, lawyers and observers
sit around an empty center?
Because they know that only
in that space can truths emerge.
In the Middle Ages,
nobles met at bridges.
Each walked to the bridge's middle,
not only for security reasons,
but because understanding is possible
at the junction between opposites.
The possibility of understanding
is transmitted, but also
the substratum of that understanding.
Call it truth, reality,
or common ground, it is transported.
But the fundamental problem
is one of architectural nature,
namely that if truths
require architectures of truth,
then truth needs the empty space,
the space that has been cleared,
the enclosed place,
even if it's only a court oak tree,
or marked by an initial barrier,
which clearly delineates between the
world and the place of negotiation.
So these truths are tied to
operations of interruption,
of cutting off,
of producing an unwritten place.
That then would be
the theater of truth.
And in our subjective-objective
machine, it would also be
the in-between place.
Neither on the side of the subject,
nor on the side of the object
can truth emerge,
but in fact only in the process
in-between, which is actually...
Which is separate, at the juncture.
So this exists in every person,
as a possibility of sensitivity.
People can do that.
But Marx never wrote the book
about this that we need.
There would have to be a book written
in which Marx demonstrates
a higher sensitivity and awareness
for his own anthropology.
In other words, for a person
he always hypothesized,
as a working person, a person who sees
himself as a thermodynamic machine,
as someone who is
chained to his production process.
But someone receptive
to the free association of producers.
Exactly. Someone capable of
seeing this relation,
the relation
of subjective-objective conditions,
without humans, without
this human reference point.
That is where there would need to be
a Marxist anti-anthropology added,
in which man is no longer
the point of reference for all things.
So he steps away from
the pre-human for a change,
and as long as he does so,
he can deal with the others,
like a citizen of the world.
Then he returns to his snail shell.
- He returns,
and it is furnished with what
18th century anthropology left behind.
Namely a high degree of self-esteem,
a high degree of
sensual-intellectual relations,
a high degree of emancipatory will,
a propensity to illusion and so on.
At this point you find with Marx,
and surely in "Das Kapital"
a blind spot, namely the emancipation
of humans, not into humans,
but the emancipation of humans
out of themselves.
This challenge, or this, call it
centrifugal movement,
was not achieved by "Das Kapital."
There is a radical aspect
in Marx's "Das Kapital."
The radical aspect is that
the reality of given conditions
can only be described
in the subtraction
of human consciousness,
with the strange reference point
of the narcissistic ego,
which thinks it can act autonomously.
That's the radical aspect.
The blind spot consists of the fact
that changes in the conditions,
which "Das Kapital" uses
as a horizon line,
these changes are only possible
by falling back on
this small, weak, humane ego.
So in a different constellation,
it emerges from itself again.
So besides work,
it develops something that something
else can appropriate. - Yes.
And the outcome of this analysis,
like an outcome of this emancipation,
is a human,
or however you want to call this being,
a human who will stand there,
whom you do not know,
who was not recognizable, who
the 19th century hadn't yet described.
He is not new, but consists
of age-old elements.
Yes, elements that already exist...
But organized differently
than the classical workforce.
Yes, with a different composition,
a different chemical make-up.
But it's an experiment,
namely to create a human
for whom these conditions
are not yet sufficient.
It's creating a human
for future situations.
A human who is,
in a way, amorphous,
who, as Nietzsche would've said,
is a yet to be determined animal.
This open question, I believe,
is depicted in "Das Kapital,"
but also strangely closed. So one
could say that here, with Marx,
there is no great difference
to Kant's anthropology,
which says that society should be
established for a society of devils.
But it might be that in the future,
there is a society of angels.
It could also be that neither
angels nor devils are sufficient
to describe this human substratum.
To put it differently,
in Marx's "Das Kapital,"
there is a presupposed anthropology
that in my view
poses problems for Marx
that he himself cannot yet solve.
THE "TOTAL WORKER" AT VERDUN /
Burrowing in the hills of Vauquois
The total worker
Beneath the village of Vauquois,
which after the battle
no longer existed,
German
and French pioneers,
carefully selected miners,
dug tunnels
from both sides
into the hilly landscape /
[...] The detonations
began with 50 kg of dynamite /
Now, on May 14, 1916,
a German charge packed
the destructive force
of 60,000 kg of explosives /
With this, the German miners
blew up a tunnel above them
that belonged to the French miners,
who otherwise
would have blown up
the German tunnel /
Looking at you here in front of me,
one could almost call you a dead man.
Or at least at death's door.
- That's true.
You're not a smoker, that's
material for igniting the charge.
Exactly.
I don't like the taste of cigars.
I'm a non-smoker.
I just wanted to show
that we, the special forces,
need the cigar
in order to light to fuse.
A cigar works better
than lighting a match
down there in the tunnel.
It's more reliable.
It's a matter of seconds, milliseconds.
- Milliseconds.
And the fuse burns for
THE MASTER BLASTER OF VAUQUOIS/
And the fuse burns for
THE MASTER BLASTER OF VAUQUOIS/
THE MASTER BLASTER OF VAUQUOIS/
half a minute, and you have to flee,
CIGAR WILLI (Helge Schneider)
And if you get out in one piece...
CIGAR WILLI (Helge Schneider)
CIGAR WILLI (Helge Schneider)
It goes well 7 out of 8 times.
It goes well 7 out of 8 times.
It's not even half a minute.
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
10 seconds, 14 seconds, then...
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
The shorter the fuse,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
the more precise you can
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
set the moment of detonation.
And you have to be fast,
as you can only decide between dying
because you're not fast enough
in terms of your own fuse,
or the enemy's fuse is faster,
and you get blown up that way.
Sometimes there are double explosions
in both tunnels,
tunnel and countertunnel,
at the same time.
That's almost the rule by now.
The French are good.
Some of them are real experts.
Some of them learned on our side,
in Oberhausen.
I even know a few of them...
You're proud of your enemy,
on account of their skill.
It's your duty
to hate them and destroy them.
There are some good guys among them.
I went to vocational school
with some of them,
that's how we got into this field.
Here you need a little more
than just talent, more than at home.
In the mines, detonations
have to be authorized.
Yes, of course.
Both digging and tunnel driving
have to be authorized, while
taking great precautions, because...
When you're at war, however,
it's unauthorized.
It's a whole different story.
And there...
There's where... the wheat
is separated from the chaff.
Normally,
when you normally do digging,
underground digging,
a lot of factors come into play,
and you have plans.
But when we operate
like we do here in Vauquois,
in close contact with the enemy,
it's an entirely different story.
Here, the enemy is not the coal,
the enemy is the French foe.
So you build a tunnel.
You put explosives at the tunnel head.
- That's right.
We drive the tunnel as far as possible.
From below, because you know
the French tunnel is above. - Exactly.
We can't dig too high,
or the detonation loses its impact.
The deeper it is, the larger the area
of the detonation's upward impact.
If we go too deep, however,
the explosion loses force.
And now you imagine
that the French are thinking the same.
They had the same teachers that we did.
Still, I don't see myself
as a total worker.
You reject that term?
- I reject it, yes.
That would mean
you are in a sense working
together in cooperation with the enemy.
As if it were sabotage, by agreement.
- You couldn't...
But there's an inner conspiracy,
by which everyone does his best.
Yes, I have... Sure,
you have respect
for the enemy's expertise,
that's how I'd put it.
There are real geniuses among them.
But we have good men too.
So if you were leading
the other side, you'd also be saying
those Germans
have some real geniuses among them.
There's no shortage of mutual respect.
- No, no shortage of that.
We cannot forget the soul.
The soul wants to express itself.
- The soul is in the tunnel.
Mankind would rather want nothing
than not want a thing.
Correct.
For example,
when we withdraw from a tunnel,
in order to make headway,
we use depth sounders
to hear how far the enemy is.
We're dealing with sediments,
with sheet rock, then clay.
And here
in Vauquois there's lots of sand.
And...
You get through that quickly.
- So on an imaginary level,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
you are linked to the enemy's soul,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
and also to his hearing,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
his senses.
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
They listen, you listen.
That's right. Without the work
that the enemy is doing,
which really is excellent work,
we wouldn't be motivated
to keep driving the tunnel forward,
nor would we have the extreme danger
involved in accepting the possibility
of encountering the enemy's tunnel.
That happens when the tunnels
are at the same elevation,
which, strangely enough,
is the desired outcome.
Although we always try
to get slightly lower, so that we...
The enemy's trying to do the same!
- Yes.
And we can't, as I said, go too deep.
The non-plus-ultra situation is if
the tunnels move toward each other,
and when the first to break through...
Then there is a detonation right away.
But it's impossible to detonate.
You can't set a charge quickly enough.
Immediately.
- No, that would kill both parties.
They look at each other in amazement.
They won't kill each other.
Yes, they will.
It has nothing to do with killing.
They use a pistol?
So they greet each other...
It would be like Christmas,
in the tunnel, if both enemies...
It's not unheard of.
...come face to face.
I've experienced it myself,
a face-to-face encounter.
It's happened to me,
but a job is a job,
and a job has to be done. Both sides
want to be first, want to be the best.
In the hills of Vauquois
I'd like to try to explain
what the term "Fatherland"
means to me, personally,
and for many, many others.
Hopefully.
For me, Fatherland
is my own skills, my commitment,
that which I am capable of.
That which I have. I don't have
bank accounts and property,
but I have my skills.
- That's right, I have my skills,
I have my qualifications.
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Perhaps more than others, I developed
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
my skills into a specialization.
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
So I can say
So I can say
that I love what I do,
and that's what Fatherland means to me.
If I were a singer, I'd have to sing.
If I were a poet, I'd have to write.
If I'm a master blaster...
- And I happen to be a master blaster.
Certainly, blasting
also has to do with annihilation,
with destruction.
But if I were a gardener,
for example...
I'd water the lawn.
...I'd water the lawn,
and that would be my Fatherland.
Then I'd be a gardener.
- If I were a gardener, I'd be...
Useless for purposes of war.
- Yes, sure.
Afterwards, as a gardener...
- You could lead the gardeners,
the German versus the French gardeners,
but there wouldn't be a battle.
No, but after the war there would be
plenty to do as a gardener.
It all ties into each other.
Or kindergartener.
Come to think of it,
a kindergartener, well...
But why should a kindergarten teacher
not see her job as her Fatherland?
And live it accordingly. My job
just happens to be master blaster.
Why is it called FATHERLAND
Why is it called FATHERLAND
Why don't they say Motherland?
And not MOTHERLAND?
There are so many single mothers,
and not MOTHERLAND?
And not MOTHERLAND?
So maybe Motherland could by now
take the place of Fatherland.
We've had the fatherless society
ever since the late '60s.
You hear that a lot.
- Yes, an awful lot.
A motherless society couldn't exist,
or else there would be no children.
But there is the term mother ship.
But that's a whole different story.
The very word "mother ship"
has much more...
That has a very different character
than Fatherland.
For me, Fatherland also
has to do with protecting,
with expansion,
with skills,
oddly enough also with war.
While mother ship has to do with...
Breast, yes.
Drinking from the breast.
Seafaring. - Seafaring.
- Supplies. - Supplies.
Yes, docking.
Arriving.
Fatherland means gushing out.
Mother ship: Waving as you leave.
- That's right.
Others wave when you return.
- Waving to the ship.
Peaceful, actually.
- So is Fatherland.
Once you step out of the area
where you represent your Fatherland,
then Fatherland is still there.
But you're not working
in the Fatherland,
you can't call the hills of Vauquois
land, they're tunnels.
Father tunnels, so to speak,
which isn't a widespread term.
I blow myself up
inside my father tunnel.
But father tunnel is Fatherland, too,
for the tunnel is in the land.
Above us is land, to be precise.
Earth is land.
Shredded land, not actually land.
You couldn't even plant a turnip.
Sand land. - Sand land.
Land of debris. - Land of debris.
Destroyed land.
The pock-marked hills of Vauquois
Original photos of detonations
June 21, 1916, 8:32 am
What you're conquering there
is actually awful.
I don't know, I really believe
that coming generations will thank us
for our actions.
And such a find, the hills of Vauquois,
could be like a memorial
you send home, as a package.
It beats sending your own ashes,
which after a detonation don't exist.
You could say that here we are
preparing a site
of mass tourism, perhaps.
It will be a famous place.
If posterity cherishes your heroism,
and doesn't deny it.
Even then.
- It could get bad, like if they say,
"We are so sick of the war,
we don't even want to ignore it."
Still. What we're doing here:
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Building tunnels,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
carrying out detonations,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
regardless of what form it takes,
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
Cigar Willi,
master blaster
it is definitely significant.
It is definitely significant.
Significant, but counterproductive.
- And, sure, why not?
Counterproductive is productive.
- Counter: Against someone else.
No matter whether it's counter
or for something. It is productive.
Okay?
If you were to give a guiding principle
for this standpoint,
what would it be? A saying?
A saying...
Perhaps I'd say: "Burrow or lose."
