[iDC] (no subject) - ethics

[Ryan Griffis]

Mark Bartlett wrote:

> Jeffrey put it succinctly: ?But why just substitute politics for
> ethics? rather than seeing politics as ethics...Which I think you are
> suggesting.?

Or to put it another way, why not see ethics as politics?
My understanding of ethics is that it is a professionalization of  
politics (importantly, little "p" politics, which i define as  
precisely relations between agencies). Ethical behavior is modified  
by disciplinary boundaries - bio-ethics, business ethics, journalism  
ethics, etc. In most instances, ethics represents an allowable  
retreat from a larger understanding of political relationships - i.e.  
it substitutes relative "best practices" for a view of the larger  
consequences of such practices. In other words, what is the "use" of  
ethics, if acting ethically is also acting politically? The "use"  
IMHO is exactly in the obfuscation of a larger, and more complex,  
political system in favor of a malleable value system with little  
more than relative, professional/individualized stakes (seemingly).  
i, personally, don't like that business interests have a "moral  
compass" that has nothing to do with the political nature of what  
business actually is. Perhaps my understanding is too semantic?
i may not totally be behind Mark's call for "strategic universalism"  
in response to "strategic essentialism" - both seem entirely  
inadequate and even dangerous - but i am sympathetic to the  
suggestion. Certainly, i don't propose an "it's all good" "anti- 
interference" philosophy - i think my take on ethics is specifically  
a reaction to that. Perhaps i was hasty in understanding Mark's  
response to Luis as suggesting "ideological purity" (i didn't read  
this in Luis original post at all however).
i do think Danny's point about ignoring the present for the sake of a  
possible future should be more considered, however. From my  
experience in some collectives that identify (rigorously or loosely)  
as anarchist or "self organizing", many relations end up following a  
less democratic, more conservative and authoritarian model than  
formally organized hierarchies. Charismatic and forceful people  
become de facto leaders and less outspoken people drop back (and  
often this follows some very conventional demographic boundaries).  
These relations may not seem to matter in the "big picture", but an  
authoritarian structure is what it is, at any scale, and expecting  
that structure to not have an effect on the politics it is  
disseminating seems spurious. Hence, it is also why it matters that  
discussions of race have been marginal here, as Mark (via PMiller)  
points out. It's not a simple matter of the ethics of the list, but a  
matter of how the list reflects/practices politics. Maybe why the  
"personal is political" isn't so useful anymore is that it separates  
them in order to equate them, when the personal could more usefully  
be considered simply a subset of politics.
All of this said, i can't help but feel a little abstracted in these  
"conversations"... while i find a lot to grab on to from Luis'  
statements and questions, i'm unsure about the grounding of what i am  
grabbing on to in this context. Perhaps as Mark has stated, iDC isn't  
_ enough...
i've been very long-winded here - sorry. Maybe going back to Luis'  
final questions could help?
>
> Some questions worth discussing, or at least to possibly  
> contextualize our
> work: Are being rejected by the Patent Office in Berlin or by MoMA  
> in New
> York on the same ideological plane, with a difference in degree but  
> not in
> quality?  Is our primary mission as artists to produce commerce  
> fitting
> monuments to ourselves, or is it to use art to help bring ethics  
> into the
> picture. Is there good unethical art? (Which is different to good  
> art made
> by unethical people). Are we to be producers of objects or shapers of
> culture?

followed up by:

> So here, rather than disassembling ideas until they cease to exist (a
> bourgeois academic misinterpretation of subversion), the challenge  
> is to
> reappraise our function as artists and see what is to be done now.