Theory
The New Vitalist International is a number of small
federated groups of people challenging our present situation. We are dedicated
to presenting a radical interdisciplinary perspective which contrasts the
artificiality of technology with the natural, hence a Critical Theory of
technology that challenges the system as a whole. We are the hope implanted in
the world that history set apart from the dehumanizing objectification of
technology can be a reality. The New Vitalist mode of being is not that of an
organization but instead a small group of persons capable of resisting economic
pressures and bureaucratic dilution. Personal choice and participation in the
decisions that effect our lives should not be divided from the process of our
social experiment. We are dedicated to creating situations set apart from the
technical process. The New Vitalist seeks open spaces and the possibilities of
moving about outside the technical grid, and so our action takes place on the
fringes of society. Regardless of what the apostles of progress posit; freedom
and autonomy does not mean choosing this or that technical gadget within the
temples of consumption. The consumer society is a failure and we have no
intention of preserving its dieing corpse. Every need necessitates the creation
or fabrication of ever more needs. This is the vicious cycle of production,
acquisition, consumption, and increased waste. The technological system
obliterates the natural environment, and a synthesis of the two is not at all
what we observe; the former is rendering the latter obsolete. The society we
hope for involves participatory democracy, personal interaction, and an actual
community where shared meaningful experiences give rise to the possibility of
culture. Today the person is at odds with his/her fellow wo/man. Competition in
the technological system makes us potential enemies to everybody, yet this
contradiction of brotherly love obliges us to act corrigible in an efficient
manner thus coercing us to play the multiplicity of roles. When real time
experience is traded in for molded models of abstraction and premeditated
behavior, a technological personality; an automatic system of thought replaces
the spontaneous/creative soul. These roles divide the unified actual self. This
competition and role playing is a factor in the internal neurotic conflicts
brought about by the tendencies of "normality". A diseased ridden system is
fertile ground for a diseased social body. To exorcise the demon in technology a
total transformation of the technological system is called for, and a total
social conversion of the collective mass must take place, which is not probable,
but should be the new necessity. We prefer the local regional order in contrast
to the corporate global economy because behind globalization exist the
technological system; with an expansionist objective. We believe it is to high a
price to pay when the expense is the loss of culture, society, and the natural
environment in which the person lives. Technique exploits the earth and implies
perpetual war and conquest (the industrial military complex) is a triumph of the
irrational empire. We are not concerned with engaging in dialogue with those who
have been assimilated to this hegemonic/totalitarian ideology of might makes
right. If we are to struggle against anything, it is power and technology is
power par excellence.
New Vitalist "transformation" implies resistance to increased and improved organization (technocracy), because large scale programs are a contradiction to what we are trying to achieve
Total Transformation rejects the culture industry. Traditional culture has been hollowed of meaning; mass consumer culture should be situated within our dialectical negation.
A New Vitalist should never feel guilty for rejecting his group, and it is also important for one to always point the finger at himself first before being critical of the other.
A Total Transformation attitude demands communicable dialogue and interaction with as little confusion as possible. Part of this new necessity is to struggle against the elitist attitude or the abstraction of technical/specialist language.
Total transformation is against all ideologies, religion; all systems of thought even revolutionary ideology is a profess enemy. Today revolution has become a common place word void of meaning everything and nothing is revolutionary. The word revolution has been imploded. By this I mean to say the dialectical polarity between revolution and technological advance have come to mean the same thing.
Efficiency in all fields of posttmodern mans field of activity should be decreased.
The seductive increased higher standard of living which goes far beyond primary needs can be resisted.
Theory, self analysis/reflection and consciousness (the social conversion) is the first step. Awareness leads to certain kinds of action situated within the context of particular creative moments.
Dasein's entertaining element or any New Vitalist art should always attempt to point to the construction of a New Vitalist society without suppressing imagination and spontaneity.
Struggle for reason- it attacks irrationality and mad rationalism.
All revolutionary cults are a declared enemy. The worthless attempts at challenging authority does not consider the fact that autonomous technology robs "authority" of its vistage of power. Technology as power is far to abstract to point fingers at certain individuals. Their personal responsibility is beyond our grasp. The division of labor and interconnectivity, the coordinated functional/systematic reification suppresses all subjective individuals: monism encroaches not only upon the bottom-feeder non-entities but also the exclusive executive non- entities hence specialization extends power to the system as a whole and increasingly saps individual power. This phenomenon can be considered social "agentic shift". I am not saying accountability and responsibility of individuals is impossible to assess, but that hierarchical authority/chains of command have intrinsic protective rights that when challenged mobilizes policies, acts laws and established systems of power that dwarf the individual ethical situation with in the scheme of things or in other words these forms of authority protect the blue print that makes them what they are. Autonomous technology protects its own state and its agent cogs. Real authority is dictated by the laws of efficiency. More attention will be needed to explain this phenomenon.
Our locus of attack should be structures (Technique, Production-Acquisition- Consumption, the State, the City, War, and (Sterilization(eugenics, birth control, abortion, and population management, genetic engineering) /systems/Multinational Corporations, but the attack will never be a violent attack, we advocate a pacifist attitude. Violence can never realize a noble aim.
The New Vitalist Society should never be considered an end in itself but a description which demands the impossible in that it serves to renew the tension between hegemonic globalization and singularity.
CONTACT:jinkman@uwm.edu