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Loltheorists [PICS]

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18:30 / 25.05.07

By dissarmament, i think i mean something akin to id's Kitteh also functions to render harmless ideas.

There is a certain powerstucture inherent to a lot of philo/theoretical debate, with people frequently using 'the word of the Lord' to stun, enfeeble or generally lower an 'opponent'. By which i mean that the power held in the way theoretical language works ('this is my system and you must step into its grounds in order to approach or critique it') automatically bars many from a potential discourse.

Obviously, loltheorist pics are an in-joke performed by those who have some knowledge of how to play the game (else they couldn't make the joke), and it may just be a condescending illusion that by using kiddyspeak to reenact the greater moments of a theory/ist, we somehow make it less powerful or cut off, but i think i like that illusion.

The game may hold value for those who know the games, though. In translating a theory, it can be argued that we move the goals somewhat - we move it out of its personal fortress and into the less stable ground of common comedic discourse. The resonance held in this act is, for me at least, quite a powerful tool and a nice grounding.

The test of any system is the real world. Or something.

LOL!?!??!!!!!!111

18:31 / 25.05.07

It is also interesting that one thread of lolcat explicitly concerns itself with the illusion of presence:

18:32 / 25.05.07

... while simultaneously testing the boundaries of a speech act.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

21:30 / 25.05.07

Well, I'd refer the reader to Lolpresidents, where Kitteh is clearly being used to send up some individuals in some cases, whilst seeming to celebrate other individuals in other cases.

I'd compare this to a phenomenon I see in pagan communities, where creating an image--perhaps to use as the icon that represents one--of one's best Gods with a suitable Kitteh caption is currently de rigeur. And yet at the same time we see Kitteh used by the same people to mock and belittle figures or ideas that they are opposed to. Content/context.

Less searchable M0rd4nt

22:52 / 25.05.07

grant: I like the invisible [object] strand, simply because it celebrates something about human consciousness: the way our minds supply missing information. However it's worth noting that whilst Invisible Bike and its imitators are fun and enjoyable for a certain kind of consciousness, they are not universally enjoyable. There exist other forms of consciousness which would be unable to interpret Invisible Bike. (It is perhaps ironic that the people who live/experience/embody such forms of consciousness are often those who cannot express same in language that Invisible [object] fans can understand.)

Also maybe we can konsider orijinz of Lol[things]. As pointed out by Joy No Wry, the Lolcat was born from the fevered brow of an intarnet mssgboard that allows anon posts (with all that this entails in the long term; I trust I do not have to draws u a picshure.) Is we import efils? Or is Kitteh purified by the alchemies of internet repetition? Or does we haves to do more workz iff kitteh we wants?

Where is kitteh? Who does kitteh serve?

Disco is My Class War

05:05 / 26.05.07

I don't know if there's any one rule to be applied to kitteh. Is it possible to resignify that infantilising character of kitteh-speak in an ironic way? And did corporations come up with lolcats? I've been thinking of it as a weird kind of graffiti or detournement. Especially with philosophy, when the image of the [usually male] philosopher connotes a whole history of solemn black-and-white portraits, traces of a philosopher's entry into History as a 'serious contender'. But at the same time, there's an homage going on, as well. Maybe it depends on the image, and of course the context, how it's read.

Also, grant, that is a beautiful observation about the 'invisible' genre. It's totally about what absence, what precise object might be read into the image as absent. On the other hand, the invisible pics I've been making are about how a particular theorist's argument was false, hence invisible. Thus, the graffiti works as a critique. Ie:

(Fukuyama claimed that we were appproaching the end of history, then he recanted in a later volume.)

Also:

(Okay, so it's the best procrastination device I've come up with for months, endlessly fulfilling. Who says it has to be defended politically?)

19:01 / 26.05.07

01:31 / 28.05.07

I'm also interested in the idea of using loltheorists as ridicule... because if kitteh is ridiculing because it posits the recipient of the message as being the intellectual equal of a kitten, then the recipient of a message in loltheorist is the equal of the theorist. I like the dual nature of semi-comprehensibility there - the idea that these plumb two boundaries of language (the language of animals, the language of philosophers) at the same time.

09:58 / 01.06.07

[talking about kitteh and lol and ridicule - it has some funny meme fall-out.]

grant, question: if because of the ridicule the recipient becomes equal to the theorist in question [as you suggest by sideline of 'recipient = kitten', to drastically shorten your suggestion], then wouldn't that mean that the ridicule is dissipated, becoming meaningless? if that's the case i'd think that loltheorists can be used to ridicule only if the recipient has a firm grasp of the original theorist's ideas, therefore [i must assume] is not the intellectual equal of a kitten. what do you think?

00:18 / 02.06.07

posture, I think. it would have to be a mockery of a particular posture.

I'm not sure they work specifically as ridicule as much as...gloss?

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