Author: Lars Iyer

See, this whole campus can be locked down. It’s like a fortress. To keep them out.

Who’s them?

The zombies. The mind-control zombies. You’ve heard of them, haven’t you? People’s frontal lobes have been damaged. That’s what I’m hearing. People aren’t thinking as they used to. There’s a general … zombiefication. So the government’s got all these anti-zombie protocols. Zombie invasion mitigation plans. For emergencies.

For what emergencies?

Zombie invasions.

 

Don’t you see: the zombies are those who’ve fully actualised their potential. Who are nothing other than their function. But that’s what academics are. And that’s what students are!

Our mission: to save the university from total zombiefication.  

Organisational Management doesn’t understand that we’re hardly philosophers, let alone academics! That we have no place in a Russell Group University. That we’ll never take our place in the allotted order of things. That we’re wool-gatherers. Vague-o-nauts. That we’ll never vanquish our prevarication in the name of efficiency and effectiveness. That nothing we do is economically manageable. Or even measurably determinable.

Organisational Management will never see that we’re wasters, essentially. Deadlines mean nothing to us. Projects … forget them. We don’t know where to begin, let alone where to end. We turn corners, that’s all. We walk the corridors. We stumble over things. It’s like we’re endlessly browsing. Or  scrolling. We’re drifters, in other words. Lost in our labyrinths.

Organisational Management will never know that we’re without destination. Without project or orientation. Without interests, even. Without relation to future outcomes. That we’re distracted – perpetually. That we’re only capable of being incapable. Of idling all learning outcomes. Of neutralising all determinate actions.

Our resistenceless resistance. Our powerless power. Organisational Management will never see that. We’re stupefied – that’s the thing. Imitation of real academics – that’s all we can offer. A parodic alternative.  A comic suspension of growth, no development, no progress.

We can’t spell out what we’ve learnt. We can’t be sure that we’ve learnt anything at all. That’s what Organisational Management refuses to see.

Organisational Management will never grasp that we’re here only because of Cicero’s deep perversity and death drive. That Cicero brought us here to essentially destroy the university.

Students are customers. And what are they buying? The ability to remain competitive and flexible on the open market. The capacity for self-realisation! Self management! Self-direction!

It’s about skills acquisition. Don’t we all have to renew our skills if we are to remain competitive in a knowledge-driven economy? Don’t we have to be able to organise our own learning? To work to continually actualise our potentiality?

It’s about skills based implementation! The mobilisation of talent! Of human resources! It’s about becoming objects of investment. About measurable,  identifiable and commodifiable skills! It’s about self initiation! Self regulation! Self-evaluation! Reinvention!

There are new markets! Needing new skills! New talents! Always! Capitalism’s expanding – always! It’s not only about employability, it’s about being personally fulfilled. In the new world! In the coming world! It’s about entrepreneurial skills.

We have to help develop those behaviours, skills and actions that will be useful to them. Actualisation is the goal. And the method.

There’s a question of national interest. About maintaining global competitiveness! Expanding the knowledge economy! Increasing national efficiency! Effectiveness! It’s about strategic importance. Economical viability! Human capital! Economic necessity must become educational necessity. And Philosophy can be part of this adventure.

 

The great thing about philosophy is that it teaches flexibility. Keeping options open. Generic skillsets – that’s the key.

It’s about remaining entrepreneurial. It’s about being willing  to learn. It’s about maintaining self-motivation! Self-directed action! Self-generation!

 

Philosophy will have to be transformed into something socially usable. Take its place within the allotted order of things. According to the contemporary determinations of the economic! The political! The social!

It’s about economically manageable skill sets! It’s about producing professional, employable adults. That has to be the aim of philosophy just as it is the aim of every other subject area.

There has to be disorganisation somewhere. The un-fucking-manageable. The secret madness of Organisational Management. The madness that it tries to hide. Which is as mad as Organisational Management is organised and managed …

The madness at Organisational Management’s heart. Organisational Management’s own caged beast, born of caged fucking beasts. The ying to the Organisational Management yang. The counterbalance … The madwoman in the Organisational Management attic.

We should put in some joint research bid. Some humanities / Organisational Management project. Don’t you think? We could really monetise philosophy. We only have to apply ourselves. We could start philosophy spin-off companies. Put philosophy to work! Fill up our coffers (the university’s coffers.)

It’s no longer a matter of sitting in our studies. The era of the solo researcher is over! It’s all about collaboration! Cross-disciplinary teams!

Which is why the Organisational Management move was really an opportunity. Why it’s showing us the way!

Can’t you see the possibilities? We could be a success for once in our lives. Actually succeed. We could make something of ourselves … Achieve something in the real world, not the thought world! Become philosophy-entrepreneurs!

To think … we could partner up with business! Be invited to think tanks! Davos! Become ideas-people to the great and the good! We could advise business leaders on the big issues of the day!

Imagining the possibilities: Big Philosophy, like Big Pharma, like Big Agra, like Big Energy, like Big IT, like Big everything fucking thing.

 

It’s time to stop interpreting the world and time to change it! Philosophy doesn’t have to be speculative. It’s time to move philosophy into a new phase! To make a gear shift!. There’s work to be done. Philosophy needs to get down to it. Join the cultural conversation. Contribute to the debate. Get busy in the think tanks. Steer policy. There’s a new world being born!

 

That’s what the Organisational Management move allows. It’s genius. It’s an experiment, the like of which we have never seen.

Only here, at this university! What a bold experiment! What a step forward! Overturning orthodoxy! Who says the humanities and business studies can’t work alongside one another. Cross-fertilise! Synergise one another. There’s potential for dialogue!

What if I left him?

Idle thoughts.

Not so idle. What if?

We’d get a dog, have children. Get a house.

In that order? And then what?

Live, like everybody else.

Is that the life you want?

 

I went to a fortune teller once. To see what was going to happen to me.

What did you want to hear?

Some … adventure. Something exciting.

Do you have a right to ask for something exciding to happen?

A right?

You’ve got a nice house and a house in Tenerife and a property empire.

Hardly.

And you’re going to start up your own business.

One day.

Don’t you have enough without adventure?

Am I spoilt, philosopher? I probably am. I’m spoilt. I’m spoilt and bored and expect too much.

It’s unemployed negativity.

So you say.

What did the fortune teller say?

That I would have an adventure. At least one.

What sort of adventure?

An erotic one, clearly. With a tall dark stranger. But you’re hardly tall, are you?

 

Millions now living will never die. I know at least one organisational manager who wants to live forever. They’re into optimisation. It’s the optimisation movement.

Really?

Philosophers aren’t into living forever, I know that.

Philosophy’s about learning how to die. Plato said that.

Isn’t that easy? Don’t you just die?

It’s about how you relate to the fact that you’re going to die. That’s different.

Why worry? It’s probably a long way off.

Unless it happens tomorrow.

Unlikely.

But it could.

If it happens tomorrow – unlucky. I hope I’m not unlucky.

You’re a self-destructive type – I can tell.

I think you are, too.

Really?

This affair. It’s not just about the sex. It’s about fucking up your life.

Why would I do that?

Unemployed negativity. Did you ever hear of that? It’s what happens when you’ve got nothing left to do. When everything is just dandy. That’s when your real problems start. You want to smash things up, just for the sake of it.  Out of sheer perversity. It’s a kind of death-drive.

But not every desire of mine is satisfied: that’s the point. I want … more.

That’s the negativity talking.

That’s lust talking. That’s the spirit of adventure talking. That’s the not-wanting-to-settle-down talking.

Maybe I wanted a philosopher all along. Maybe that’s what I was lacking. Organisational management isn’t enough for me, right?

 

I went travelling once. On a world trip with my best friend – not my husband. I’d never had a gap year, see. And I got together with my husband so early. And I went straight from studying to work … Anyway, I had a real adventure on that trip. Fucked some guy.

Did you tell your husband?

Yes. When I got back. We talked it over.  

Did he mind?

Of course he minded. It was a crisis. But all was forgiven in the end. In fact, I think it was good for us.

The married lives of the bourgeoisie.

I’ll bet you despise us. It’s easy to despise us, I think. I half despise us. We’ve got it all: that’s what you think. We have money and lifestyle, and we’re supposed to feel guilty about it. My husband flies all over the world, earning all this consultancy money and we’re supposed to loathe ourselves. What a joke! Anyway, we aren’t that rich. We’re comfortable.

So your husband provides?

And I provide.

Not as much. You’re a junior lecturer, right? And he’s a professor. Is that a turn on: success? A second home in Mallorca? City breaks and so on.

Do you never go on holiday?

I go to conferences … Are they holidays? In, like, Dundee, or wherever. Or … Exeter … or Manchester. Hardly exotic.

You should go to overseas things.

I don’t believe in overseas. I don’t believe it exists.

You don’t think you deserve it. That’s your problem. You’re aggressively provincial. A real little Englander. You should open yourself up a little. Get some Mediterranean sun.

I don’t believe in Mediterranean sun. What would I do with Mediterranean sun?

So you never go to the Europe where your philosophers lived. Never. I didn’t have any money.

And now? You can’t be that broke, can you?

I wouldn’t know what to do there. All that sun.

What do you do with your summers, then?

Work. That’s all I ever wanted to do: work. Write. And now I have the chance.

But you don’t like what you write.

I mesmerised by how bad it is. It amazes me. I look at it and can’t believe it.

Isn’t it a bit soul destroying, doing something you think you’re no good at? Maybe you are good at it. Maybe you’re just being … aggressively modest.

 

What so great about writing anyway?

It was just something to do when I was on my own in a room.

Apart from masturbating.

I like to be alone. Other people … tire me out.

You don’t like people.

People are exhausting. Do you know what the different between an extrovert and an introvert is? An introvert finds it exhausting to be around people.

Do you find me exhausting?

Always looking for complements. Not you, maybe.

Really – why am I exempt?

Because you’re really, really hot.

I’m learning about the life of a philosopher. It’s very interesting.

I’m not a philosopher. I’m a philosopher academic, which is different.

So what are you writing?

Essays. Essays to publish and essays to give at conferences.

You’re doing more than that. All those notebooks.

Sure, I take notes.

What do you really want to write? What’s your greatest ambition?

The Work, that’s what I call it.

The Work: is that what it’s called?

That’s a … nickname.

And what’s the Work about?

Something literary. And philosophical. Something in which I can talk about everything – my failure, for one thing. Something that would let me make amends. Be penitent.

A blog?

Sure. That’s how I write it. It’s anonymous.

Maybe I should check it out.

It’s nothing … interesting.

Do you have a following?

No.

Do you have any readers?

What do you think?

Have you told your friends about it?

No.

The Work: and that’s what your blog called?

Millions Now Living Will Never Die: that’s what it’s called.

 

A writing life … that’s what you have. Up here, on the sixth floor. With your skylight. With your … unemployed negativity. Just like mine. Are you full of it too: unemployed negativity? Is life not enough for you?

Maybe.

Maybe writing’s a way of avoiding it: unemployed negativity. That’s what it sounds like to me. It sounds like you want to put negativity to work. That’s what The Work’s about, right? See, I understand you, philosopher.

My body feels like it doesn’t belong to be. Reconcile me to my body. Put me back together.

 

I can be complicated, but not too complicated. Otherwise you won’t like me. I’ll bet philosophical women are complicated. Actually, I’m boringly simple. I’m straightforward. I’m a straightforward lover.

 

I suppose good old-fashioned pleasure is out. It has to be mixed up with hatred, for you. Love and hatred, right? To be appropriately philosophical. And interesting. And sophisticated.

 

We’re ridiculous …. animals. Aren’t we? And I am the queen of sluts.

The man should always think he’s chasing right? The man likes to chase. That’s how you keep him keen. When you’re too available. It’s in all the self help books. Have you read those? Out of curiosity?

You’re hot enough not to worry about those things.

Am I? That’s something.

 

My husband senses I’m getting away. He desires me more. He can tell that he doesn’t have all my attention. He has to earn me. He likes it. He has to hunt me down. It awakens the hunter in him.

And do you like it? Does it add spice to your lovemaking?

I’ve never stopped fucking him, you know. And I’m not going to. He should be very thankful of our affair-lette. It hasn’t been this good since …

So this is revitalising your sex life? How nice. Nice that it has those benefits. I’m happy for you.

I think about you when I’m with him. And you think about him when you’re here. How lovely.

I like your jealousy, philosopher. Your jealousy is a turn-on.

 

I like it when you’re imperious. When you’re a bit rejecting. I feel like I have to earn your attention. I like that. I feel I have to seduce you all over again. I have to win you all over again.

 

You should have an erection now. Why not? What’s wrong? It should be proud and stiff and ready for me. Why isn’t it? What’s wrong with you?

 

I like your cock, philosopher. That it’s not too big. That I can fit in my mouth. Like some bird, or something.

You’d put a bird in your mouth?

You know what I mean.

 

A philosopher of the bedroom. That’s what I am. Not you, philosopher. I’m the one who philosophises in here.

I am that which wants to be fucked.

 

A guy should be able to take you without a word. 

‘Take you’.

 

Do I want to dominate you? Do I want you to dominate me? I’m unsure of my desires, philosopher. I’m unsure what you bring out in me.

 

Do you know what my fantasies are? Do you want to know what satisfies me? You don’t, do you? You don’t even care.

 

You’re totally self-reliant, with your masturbation. You don’t actually need me. Is it better with me or alone? Would you prefer I wasn’t here? Am I getting in the way of your masturbation?

That’s how you’ll spend your life: as a masturbator. Self reliant, with your books, your music, with your DVD. Above the fucking world.

 

I want you to look at me as though I was the most fascinating person in the world. Is that who I could be to you: the most fascinating person in the world?

 

I’ll bet you’d like to put the gag on me. Stop me talking.