After Accelerationism: The Xenofeminist Manifesto
"Xenofeminism is gender-abolitionist...Let a hundred sexes bloom! ...[And, let's] construct a society where traits currently assembled under the rubric of gender, no longer furnish a grid for the asymmetric operation of power… You're not exploited or oppressed because you are a wage labourer or poor; you are a labourer or poor because you are exploited..."
(The Laboria Cuboniks collective, 11 June 2015, &&& Journal)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
The Phone Box: allegory about the consequences of dehumanisation
"In a bland square in Madrid, some workers, who are wearing a strange uniform, are installing a phone box. Some moments later, an anonymous citizen, after taking his son to the school bus, gets trapped in the box for no understandable reason. As the day goes by, all kind of strangers go there to see the strange event: some of them try to free him; others make fun of him… Everyone looks interested in this little man. After a distressing delay full of surrealistic moments, the trapped man is taken to a strange factory full of thousands of phone boxes. In each one, a single corpse is trapped, in some strange ritual. The movie ends with a new phone box in another square of the city."
(Aaron Rodriguez, World Cinema Directory)
Antonio Mercero (1972). "La Cabina/The Phone Box", -phone booth location: Calle de Rodríguez San Pedro, 5, Madrid, Spain [http://filmap.tumblr.com/post/98879196634/la-cabina-antonio-mercero-1972-phone-booth-calle].
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Fredrick Winslow Taylor and the Myth of Efficiency
"[Fredrick Winslow] Taylor sought to precisely measure the movements of factory workers and their timings to make them as efficient as humanly possible. This made him beloved by executives and detested on the factory floor, and it also made him one of the world's first management consultants. In a recent article in The New Yorker, 'Not So Fast,' the historian Jill Lepore takes a hard look at Taylor and his claims for scientific management. According to new research, he was a better salesman than consultant. Many of his facts were made up, and most of his results never materialized. We now know that Lillian Gilbreth, an early proponent of scientific management, had serious doubts about the movement she helped proselytize.
All this is important because Taylor, with his system of scientific management, was the father of efficiency. From scientific management we get the lust for efficiency in business. It became part of the dogma of business schools, almost none of which existed before his time. Business schools from their earliest days have promoted efficiency and the handling of business as something like industrial engineering. From operations to finance, from marketing to sales, business school education has focused on narrowing problems, identifying resources and working to get the most out of the least."
(Adam Hartung, 16 October 2009, Forbes)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
The Stanford Prison Experiment
"Welcome to the Stanford Prison Experiment web site, which features an extensive slide show and information about this classic psychology experiment, including parallels with the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. What happens when you put good people in an evil place? Does humanity win over evil, or does evil triumph? These are some of the questions we posed in this dramatic simulation of prison life conducted in the summer of 1971 at Stanford University.
How we went about testing these questions and what we found may astound you. Our planned two–week investigation into the psychology of prison life had to be ended prematurely after only six days because of what the situation was doing to the college students who participated. In only a few days, our guards became sadistic and our prisoners became depressed and showed signs of extreme stress. Please join me on a slide tour describing this experiment and uncovering what it tells us about the nature of human nature."
(Philip G. Zimbardo)
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
Stroke: an individual struggles against a dehumanised mass
"Christine Jeffs made her directing debut with this lush, high end (35mm film, Dolby sound) short film. Dorothy (Fiona Samuel), a lone swimmer, luxuriates in tranquil bliss at a deserted pool – only to have her solitude rudely interrupted by a squad of swimmers. A wordless, strikingly choreographed conflict ensues as Dorothy attempts to assert herself against the dehumanised aggression of the swimmers. Stroke was invited to international festivals including Cannes and Sundance; and Jeffs went on to direct feature films Rain and Sunshine Cleaning."
(NZ On Screen)
Fig.1 Christine Jeffs (1994), "Stroke" (short film excerpt) Aotearoa New Zealand, 35mm 8 minutes.
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Simon PerkinsSHARE
