Re: Violence Originating from Sameness (????) -- Mimetic Theory and Literary Study

[ Show ]

Support VoyForums

[ Shrink ]

VoyForums Announcement: Programming and providing support for this service has been a labor of love since 1997. We are one of the few services online who values our users' privacy, and have never sold your information. We have even fought hard to defend your privacy in legal cases; however, we've done it with almost no financial support -- paying out of pocket to continue providing the service. Due to the issues imposed on us by advertisers, we also stopped hosting most ads on the forums many years ago. We hope you appreciate our efforts.

Show your support by donating any amount. (Note: We are still technically a for-profit company, so your contribution is not tax-deductible.) PayPal Acct: Feedback:

Donate to VoyForums (PayPal):

[ Login ] [ Contact Forum Admin ] [ Main index ] [ Post a new message ] [ Search | Check update time | Archives: [1], 2 ]

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Date Posted: 06:10:29 03/03/08 Mon
Author: Erin Risch
Subject: Re: Violence Originating from Sameness (????)
In reply to: JPJ II 's message, "Violence Originating from Sameness (????)" on 20:28:51 03/02/08 Sun

I think an important thing to remember is that sameness comes from violence, which is based on reciprocal vengeance. Girard says "Reciprocal violence establishes uniformity of conduct" (direct quote, not sure from where). You can see this in the concept of the mimetic double, as well: when them model's possession is precarious and the subject's desire is intense, the distinction between model and subject disapperas, and they are identical, simultaneously pushing and pulling against one another, vying for the object. When the rivalry becomes so intense that the object disappears, each model is left merely wishing to be the other model, which, as you can imagine, results in a great deal of sameness. So, if I understand it correctly, sameness is an effect of violence, and also a cause of more violence. When acquisitive mimesis runs rampant in a community (all vs. all), the community intuits that this uniformity of conduct (all are participating in reciprocal violence) is concurrent with violence, and prohibits mimetic actions through prohibitions.

[ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]