REWIND 3.
Which explains
the why of this strange title and of those that will follow, which tells of the
exceptional encounter between a beetle and a perplexing being (I mean to say,
more perplexing than the beetle), and the non-circumstancial and unimportant
reflections that occurred in it, as well as the way in which, taking advantage
of an anniversary, el Sup tries to explain, without succeeding, how the
Zapatistas see their own history.
November 2013.
To Whom it may Concern:
WARNING.- As was warned in the self-named text
“Bad and Not-So Bad News,” the texts
that preceded the aforementioned were not made public. Ergo, what we are going
to do is “rewind” (or, as they say, darle
“rewind” a la cinta) to arrive at what was supposed to appear on day of the
dead. Following which, you can proceed to give a reading in reverse order of
the reverse order in which they will be appearing and then like that you will
have… hmm… forget about it, even I’ve confused the heck out of myself. The
point is to understand the sprit of, as they say, “hindsight,” in other words
one goes over there but comes back to see how it is that one got the idea to go
over there. It makes sense? Right?
WARNING TO THE WARNING.- The
texts that follow in continuation do not contain any reference to situations
which are current, circumstantial, transcendental, important, etc., nor do
they have political implications or references, nor any of that. They are
“innocent” texts, as are all of the writings by he who calls himself “the stainless-steel supcomandante” (me,
that is). Any appearance or similarity to events or persons in real life is
mere schizophrenia…yes, like the international and national situation where it
can be seen that… ok, ok, ok, nothing about politics.
WARNING CUBED.- In the very unlikely event that
you feel alluded to by what is said in continuation, you are flat-out wrong… or
you are a shameful fan of ad hoc conspiracy theories (which can be translated
as “for every fault, there is a conspiracy theory to explain everything and
repeat the mistakes”).
Moving on:
-*-
P.S.
Durito’s First Encounter with the Cat-Dog.-
Durito was stern. But not with the false imposture of just
any official from just any government. He was stern like when a great sorrow
slaps us in the face and there is nothing to be done, besides curse… or tell a
story.
Don Durito de La Lacandona lights his pipe, wandering and
erroneous gentlemen, the grieving’s comfort, the children’s joy, women’s and
others’ impossible longing, unreachable mirror for men, tyrants’ and
strongmen’s sleeplessness, uncomfortable thesis for ignorant pedantics.
Looking with enrapture at the light of our concerns, almost
in a whisper he tells, for me to transcribe:
THE STORY OF THE CAT-DOG
(On how Durito met the Cat-Dog and
on what they said that pre-dawn morning about fanaticisms).
To the naked eye, the cat-dog looks like a dog… well, more
like a cat… or a dog… until it meows… or a cat… until it barks.
The cat-dog is an unknown to biologists and marine biologists
(in what classification table for living beings do we place this case?), irresolvable
case for psychology (brain surgery cannot discover the cerebral center that
defines the dogness or catness), mystery for anthropology (the customs and
traditions at the same time similar and antithetical?), despair for
jurisprudence (what rights and responsibilities emanate from being and not
being?), the holy grail for genetic engineering (impossible to privatize that
elusive DNA). In sum: the lost link that will bring down all Darwinism of the laboratory,
seminar, symposium, reiterated scientific fashion.
But allow me to tell you what happened:
As is law, it was pre-dawn. A glimmer was enough to define
the shade. Quietly, I walked only with the steps of memory. Then I clearly
heard someone say:
“A fanatic
is someone who, with shame, hides a doubt.”
Not without first giving him credence within my innermost
being, I approached and found him. Without giving any introduction, I asked
him:
“Ah, so you are… a dog.”
“Meow,” he responded.
“… Or, a cat,” I said doubting.
“Woof ,” he retorted.
“Well, a cat-dog,” I said and said to myself.
“That’s it,” he said… or I think he said.
“And life, how’s it
going?,” I asked (and I transcribed without doubting it,
willing to not let myself be surprised by anything, since it was a beetle who
was dictating this unique story).
“At times it is worth
it,” he
responded with a kind of purr. “At times like cats and dogs,” he growled.
“Is it a problem of
identity?,” I said lighting my pipe and taking out my Smartphone-tablet
multitouch to write (it’s
really a notebook of the spiral-bound type, but Durito wants to make himself
seem very modern − scribe’s note −).
“Nope, one does not
choose who he is but does choose who he can be,” the cat-dog barked disdainfully. “And life is nothing more than that
complicated transit, achieved or cut short, from one thing to another,” he added with a meow.
“So, cat or dog?,” I asked.
“Cat-dog,” he said as if pointing out the obvious.
“And what
brings you to these lands?”
“A her, what
else?”
“Ah.”
“I am going to
sing to her, because some cats know how.”
“Err… before
your serenade, which I do not doubt will be a sublime chant to the female who
troubles you, could you clarify for me what you said at the beginning of your
participation in this story?”
“The thing
about fanaticism?”
“Yes, it was
something like there are those who hide their doubts of faith behind irrational
worship.”
“That’s it.”
“But, how to
avoid settling in to one of the gloomy rooms of that grim house of mirrors that
is fanaticism? How to resist the calls and blackmail to settle in and serve in
religious or lay fanaticism, indeed the oldest, but not the only one currently?”
“Simple,” the
cat-dog says concisely, “by not going in.
“Building many
houses, each one their own. Abandoning fear of difference.
“Because there
is something equal to or worse than a religious fanatic, and it is an
anti-religious fanatic, the lay fanatic. And I say that it can be worse because
the latter goes to reason as an alibi.
“And, clearly,
their equivalents: to the homophobic and machista, the phobia of the
heterosexual. And you may add the long etcetera of the humanity’s history.
“The fanatics
of race, color, creed, gender, politics, sports, etcetera, are, at the end of
the day, fanatics of themselves. And everyone shares the same fear of that
which is different. And they pigeonhole the whole world into a closed box of
exclusive options: ‘if you are not this, than you are the
opposite.’”
“Do you mean
to say, my dear sir, that those who criticize sports fanatics are the same?,” Durito interrupted.
“It is the
same. There you have, for example, politics and sports, both paid: in the two
fanaticisms they think that the professional is what counts; in both they are
mere spectators applauding or booing the rivals, celebrating victories that are
not theirs and lamenting defeats that do not belong to them; in both they fault
the players, the referee, the field, the opponent; in both they hope
that ‘next time we will;’ both think that if they change techniques,
strategies, or tactics then everything will be resolved; in both they pursue
the opposing fanatics; in both it is ignored that the problem is in the system.”
“Are you
talking about soccer?,” Durito
asks while he takes out a ball autographed by himself.
“Not only
about soccer. In everything, the problem is who is the one who commands, the
owner, the one who dictates the rules.
“In the two
confines what is unpaid is looked down upon: plainfolk or street soccer,
politics that does not come together in electoral periods. ‘If money is not
being made, for what then?,’ they ask themselves.”
“Ah, you are
talking about politics?”
“Not a chance.
Even though, for example, each day that passes it is more evident that what
they call ‘the Modern Nation State’ is a mountain of ruins for
sale at bargain prices, and that the respective political classes are set on
redoing, time and time again, the peak of a demolished house of cards, without
realizing that the cards at the base are completely broken and withered,
incapable of staying upright, let alone holding something up.”
“Hmm… it will
be difficult to put that in a tweet,” Durito
says while counting to see if it can be adjusted to 140 characters.
“The modern
political class contends for who will be the pilot of a plane that some time
ago crashed into neoliberal reality,” the cat-dog pronounces and Durito thanks with a nod.
“Then what is
to be done?,” Durito asks while
he carefully puts away his pennant of Los Jaguares de Chiapas.
“Elude the
trap that holds that freedom is being able to choose between two imposed
options.
“All of the conclusive
options are a trap. There are not only two paths, in the same way that there
are not two colors, two genders, two beliefs. Therefore not then, not there.
Better to make a new path that does go where one wants to go.”
“Conclusion?,” Durito asks.
“Neither dog,
nor cat. Cat-dog, not at your service.
“And may no one judge or condemn what they do not
understand, because that which is different is a demonstration that all is not
lost, that there still is a great deal to look at and listen to, that there are
other worlds yet to be discovered…”
Away went the cat-dog who, as his name indicates, has the
disadvantages of a dog and of a cat… and none of their advantages, if it is
that there were advantages.
The sun then rose when I heard a mixture of sublime meowing
and barking. It was the cat-dog singing, out of tune, to the light of our most
cherished dreams.
And on some pre-dawn morning, maybe far away still in the
calendar and in uncertain geography, she, the light that awakens and reveals
me, will understand that there were hidden lines made for her, that maybe only
then will be revealed to her or she recognizes them now in these letters, and
will know in that moment that it did not matter what paths my steps walked:
because she was, is, and will be, always, the only destination that is worth
it.
The end.
P.S.-
In which el Sup tries to explain, in post-modern multimedia form, the way in
which the Zapatistas see and are seen in their own history.
Well, the first thing that needs to be clarified is that we,
our history is not only what we have been, what has happened to us, what we
have done. It is also, and above all, what we want to be and to do.
Nevertheless, in this avalanche of audiovisual media that
ranges from 4D movies and 4K LED televisions, to polychrome and multitouch
cell-phone screens (which show reality in colors that, allow me to digress,
have nothing to do with reality), we can find, in an improbable “timeline,” our
way of seeing our history with… the kinetoscope.
Yes, I already know that I went off a ways, to the origins of
film, with the internet and the multiple wikis that abound and overflow, you
will have no problem knowing what I am referring to.
Sometimes, it may appear that we are approaching 8 and super
8 film, and even then 16 millimeter film continues being distant.
I mean to say, our way of explaining our history looks like
an image of constant and repetitive motion, with some variations that give that
sensation of mobile immobility. Always attacked and perused, always resisting;
always being annihilated, always reappearing. Maybe that is why the
denunciations by the Zapatista support bases, made through their Juntas de Buen
Gobierno, have so few reads. It is as if one has already read those before and
only the names and geographies changed.
But here also we show ourselves. For example, in:
And yes, it is somewhat as though in those motion pictures by
Edison, from 1894, in his kinetoscope (“Annie
Oackley”), we were the coin thrown into the air, while Ms. civilization
fires at us time and time again (yes, the government would be the civil servant
who throws the coin). Or as if in the Lumiere Brothers’ “Arrival of a Train,” from 1895, we were those who remained on the
platform while the train of progress arrives and leaves. At the end of the text
you will find some videos that will help you to understand this.
But herein lies that the collective that we are has and makes
each still, draws it and paints it seeing the reality that we were and are,
many times with the blacks of persecutions and prisons, with the grays of
contempt, and with the red of plunder and exploitation. But also with the color
brown and green that we are from the earth that we are.
When someone from outside takes a minute to watch our
“movie,” they usually comment: “what
a skillful sharpshooter!” or “what a daring civil servant who throws the coin into the air without
fear of being wounded!,” but nobody comments at all about the coin.
Or, on the Lumiere’s train, they say: “but what idiots, why do they stay on the platform and not get on the
train?” Or “herein lies one more
example of how the indigenous are like they are because they do not want to
progress.” Someone more adventures, “Did
you see the ridiculous clothes that they used in that time period?” But if
someone were to ask us why we do not get on that train, we would say “because the stations that follow are
‘decadence,’ ‘war,’ ‘destruction,’ and the final destination is ‘catastrophe.’
The relevant question is not why we do not get on, but why you do not get off.”
Those who come to be with us to watch us watching ourselves,
to listen to us, to learn us in the escuelita, discover that, in each still,
the Zapatistas have added an image that is not perceptible to the naked eye. As
if the movement apparent from the images hid the particulars that each still
contains. That which is not seen in the daily comings and goings is the history
that we will be. And there is no Smartphone that
can capture those images. Only with a very big heart can they be appreciated.
Of course there is no lack of those who come and tell us that
there are now tablets and cell phones with front and rear cameras, with colors
more vivid that those of reality, that there now are cameras and printers in
three dimensions, that plasma, lcd, and led, that representative democracy,
that elections, that political parties, that modernity, that progress, that
civilization.
That we ought to leave behind this collectivism thing (that,
additionally, it rhymes with primitivism): that we abandon this obsession with
caring for nature, discourse on mother earth, self-management, autonomy,
rebellion, freedom.
They tell us all this clumsily leaving out that it is in
their modernity where more atrocious crimes are committed; where infants are
burned alive and the pyromaniacs are congresspeople and senators; where
ignorance feigns the rule of a nation’s destinies; where employment sources are
destroyed; where the teachers are persecuted and slandered; where a great lie
is obscured by another larger one; where the inhumane is rewarded and held up,
and any ethical and moral value is a symptom of “cultural backwardness.”
For the great paid media, they are the modern, we the
archaic. They are the civilized, we the barbarians. They are those who work, we
the idlers. They are the “well-to-do,” we the pariahs. They the wise, we the
ignorant. They are the clean, we the dirty. They are the beautiful, we the
ugly. They are the good, we are the bad.
And they forget the fundamental: this is our history, our way
of seeing it and seeing ourselves, our form of thinking to ourselves, of making
our path. It is ours, with our errors, our falls, our colors, our lives, our
deaths. It is our freedom.
This is our history.
Because when we the Zapatistas draw a key below and to the
left in each still of our movie, we are thinking not about what door to open,
but rather about what house with what door must be constructed so that that key
has motive and destiny. And if the soundtrack of this movie has the rhythm of a
polka-balad-corrido-ranchera-cumbia-rock-ska-metal-reggae-trova-punk-hip-hop-rap-and-those-which-accumulate
it is not because we do not have musical taste. It is because that house will
have all of the colors and all of the sounds. And it will have then new gazes
and ears that will understand our determination… even if we are only silence
and shade in those coming worlds.
Ergo: we have imagination, they only have schemes with
conclusive options.
That is why their world collapses. That is why ours
reemerges, just like that glimmer that no matter its smallness is lesser when
it covers the shade.
Farewell. Cheers and let’s pass the anniversary happily, that
is to say, fighting.
El Sup confusing the heck out of himself with the videos that
he has to add in order to, as they say, put the candle on the cake that does
not say, but knows it is in its thirties.
Mexico, November 17th, 2013.
Thirtieth anniversary of the EZLN.
Translated from Spanish
by Henry Gales.
No comments:
Post a Comment