And so , the hope for order lies in what a vanguard can do by controlling the last allowed public word . Let us note that the response to the call of cultural help by the so-called revolutionary order exclusively comes from those who write and dominate the syntax , the meaning and the signifier , id est : the written symbol , except poetry . Neither the cinema nor the visual arts nor the music — apart from the modern anthems — nor the sculpture nor the urban culture can give oxygen to the revolutionary order . Their cultists can do it , but scarcely their works . It ultimately reveals that the whistles and laughs generated by the society become more audible . They re-emerge to stay . After all , our original condition is set by Modernity and Western civilization . And the cultural clerics are in the middle of their own Catch 22 . If they keep on ingesting and supplying soma — Christianity and alcohol without their disadvantages —, the society will become aware of its autonomy and will stop taking the pill to take on alcohol with all its drawbacks . If they decide that it ’ s time to suppress alcohol and resume purity , as it seems to be if we pay attention to the latest actions and reactions by the cultural clergy , then the increasingly louder whistles and laughs of society will continue to go elsewhere and such an escape will demonstrate the defeat of the purity revived by the cultural clergy . Defeat if they open up , defeat if they close down . And they have decided to close down due to another feature of our culture : we are ineffable ( sic ) to discouragement , which is not bad , although the real data punctually contradict us . Thus , we are witnessing a bloodless civil war in its cultural modality , imposed by the powers that be even against the constitutional and legal order . This is interesting and dangerous . Interesting , because when the power opens fire in the cultural fields , it shows and demonstrates the immanent weaknesses of its discourse ; and dangerous , because it proceeds by trampling upon the law and the constitution made by the same order that provides its firepower . The socalled legitimate right to cultural defense is nourished by an unconstitutionally granted firepower . In parallel with the updating of the socalled socioeconomic model , another socialist realism is being produced through a new diffuse commissary for all the cultural institutions . However , it is a fascinating cultural challenge for one reason : in the debate — not deliberation — on culture , the society stays ahead of the power exercised by the cultural clergy . The first advantage is structural . Modernity returns focused on the individual and on the need for selfrecognition . That is why horizontality prevails , along with collaborative mentality , deliberation as mutual learning and rational language , even among the youngest actors in all power institutions . The second advantage is technological . Few people in power have the ability and mentality needed to generate cultural products as society does , despite the monopoly imposed by the powers that be over the communications . Although such a monopoly would delight many multinationals , the society ’ s advantage is not reduced , but increased and exponentially favors the structural advantage . The third advantage is , forgive the word , epistemological . The references about what is knowledge and which are its limits are dominated more and better by society than by all the centers of academic and cultural power . The point is that critical thinking predominates in times of change or reform , or just of attempts of both . And I say critical , not self-critical , because the latter is a
98