Daily Times

“It’s the invention of clothes and not nature, that made ‘private parts’ private” and once established as private, society reified the idea into eternal and natural. The tabooed privacy led to the repression of Eros, for Freud the midwife of neurosis but integral to the perpetuation of civilization for its dependence on the reality principal.

Freud, found the cause of human neurosis buried in the repression and denial of his instinctual gratification. In the psychoanalytic filed, it was a monumental discovery but scary of human liberation the discovery desired, he replaced the pleasure principle with the reality principle and became the gravedigger of his doctrine. Neurosis persisted albeit the discovery lost its trailblazing effect.

Liberty, equality and fraternity the ideals emanating from the scripture of capitalism have met the identical fate. The contradiction of the system cloaks the enticing slogans according to its necessity, clothing and unclothing them consistent with its needs, albeit the system remains bizarrely nude.

Whereas it produces expensive clothes, it provides the scenic sights where one finding them superfluous can cast them away. Either act is the part of the freedom, the word it loves and abhors simultaneously. Its freedom has defined limits and undefined boundaries; limited to the free market, to the free worker who has nothing to lose but his chains and free media, free to support its narrative and to create alleged enemies threatening its narrative of freedom. However, for the flow of capital its boundaries are undefined.

For the American ruling class, the judicial fuss of justice was a mere bargaining chip. Justice was neither the focus nor the goal

Being one- dimensional, its freedom is the freedom of the few. They choose the fate of the people, determine their needs and demands, define the law and imposition of its horror and to whom and when it has to be inflicted. They act like God and a silent terrorized majority obeys obsequiously. The culture of subservience enforced by the freedom becomes a non-culture; its unity of style becomes a stylized barbarity.

In promoting the subservient culture through gigantic dehumanization of thought, the role of the mass-media cannot be overemphasized. Its massive invasion of mind creating a repressive culture of unification, infusing the power of capital and inducing social conformism are all too obvious. However, mass-media is a mere tool and there has to be a visible or invisible hand that sets the tune.

Conformity is inherent in the social dynamics of the capitalist system. The mechanized individual working to earn living is an isolated, atomized, and alienated subject. He scarcely thinks but obeys, thinking needs time and time is money hence cannot be used for the wasteful purpose especially when invisible bureaucracy is already thinking for him. He prefers to live in the euphoria of his unhappiness. Alienated from the critical thoughts, as a mere receptacle he accepts what is immediately given to him.

Alienation leads to schizophrenic nihilism. Despite the inhuman system inflicting permanent pain, resistance for the ordinary citizen becomes unnecessary, if not abominable. Society of lepers treating its conscience– the nonconformist—as outcast seeks a refuge in its comfort zone, into the blind cave of self-preservation. Sadism becomes its religion and its impotence turns into indifference.

By caging Julian Assange in a glass box, humiliating and trying him in inhuman conditions, the western imperialism is unveiling its face, the face scorched by democratic unfreedom. The history of trial Socrates stood in is re-enacted. It is no ordinary case: in times of decadence, the conscience of humanity stands face to face against the jugglers disguised as judges. Julian alone is not on trial but the fate of journalism is at stake, the dice is loaded against him, a stake where once Bruno was burnt alive.

“In Britain´ Tariq Ali says, “they have a list of safe judges… who do their bidding”. Basically, she [the judge] behaves as she is the part of prosecuting team, and she behaves like that because she is the part of the prosecution team, she knows what her job is”.

“The judge Vanessa Baraitser” John Pilger adds, “is not a judge at all; she is a magistrate…. Her face was a progression of sneers and imperious indifference; she addressed Julian with an arrogance that reminded me of a magistrate presiding over apartheid South Africa’s Race-Classification-Board”.

Rights and justice are fascinating words, but they cannot transcend the economic structure of a society. The constitutional equality determined and defined by institutional inequality is inherently false. Property-less are powerless and so are those who refuse to integrate with the property owners whose property determines their power and their freedom to cry havoc and let loose the dogs of war at their whims.

A rape allegation triggered the case against Julian. It was not the defiling for dispossession, the plunder and pillage of harmless but resources-enrichedcountries savagely pulverized by the imperialist powers, the grisly acts exposed by WikiLeaks. Julian was allegedly involved in Monica Lewinsky’s kind of a travesty where the aggrieved parties were not offended. At one stage when Obama lost his interest and Sweden wanted to withdraw, latter was allegedly kept in the arena by Kier Starmer, the incumbent head of the British Labour Party, then a royal prosecutor, the charge he never denied.

“The pardon deal offered by the people purportedly representing Trump was that if Julian was willing to reveal the source of DNC-2016 election publication, he would have the pardon”. Jennifer Robinson, Julian’s lawyer states, “Trump was the subject of inquiry then and he thought revealing the source could benefit his cause”.

For the American ruling class, the judicial fuss of justice was a mere bargaining chip. Justice was neither the focus nor the goal. The whole exercise revolves around the single objective of controlling dissent. A single original thought, a single voice of dissent that foments a rebellion, and shames the system that considers itself invincible, is unacceptable.

Media, especially The Guardian that published the content of WikiLeaks, is sitting silent and snugged. If what Julian did was a crime, they were the accomplices guilty of the same crime but they are not even questioned while Julian is dragged in a glass box to the court and suffers an infernal condemnation.

The neoliberal capitalism has reached to a blind alley. It wants to feed the people and make money through technology without value creation. For the capitalists the productive process, Marx says is an unavoidable intermediate link, a necessary evil to make money and all capitalist nations are periodically seized by a feverish attempt to make money without the productive process.

This brings the system into a direct conflict with the democracy, it becomes totalitarian. It separates the human from the labour through mechanization but the very separation can create the precondition for human liberation. This happened during the COVID-19, when states were forced to provide a basic income to the people without work. The concept of decent living wage has always been an anathema for the capitalist states but COVID-19 has exposed the falsity of dearth of resources. The moment of emancipation came and went. Have the people learnt any lesson is an existential question.

The stifling of Floyd incited people’s spontaneity but Julian’s plight so far has not. For, Zizek another end of the world is possible and Julian is an embodiment of it, but for this to happen the spontaneity of the people will be integral. Else, the prisoner caught red-handed showing the feeling of human nature will have to be liquidated.

The writer has authored books on socialism and history. He can be reached at saulatnagi@hotmail.com