[FRIAM] mathematics and politics

[jon zingale]

I also would have been scared as hell to be at the capitol on that day, heels
or not. Navalny, I suspect is scared too. I do not wish to pick on AOC, and
prefer to believe that she (like many women in my life) just might punch a
nazi. The appeal to vulnerability and the will to do rhetorical battle with
white supremacists in Congress, via the tools of our time, hang for me in
superposition. I assume she is defacto *more able than I* in her chosen
discipline, and that her instincts carry with them potency. It follows, for
me, that my interpretation of her actions remain open to the possibility
that she is doing something effective.

Instead, I attempt to make a point about Arrangement, territorialization in
the sense of Deleuze (to continue a certain postmodern trend in my
exposition). I am concerned with the relationship that bodies have to the
territory, what agency AOC (say) has, and the cultural process by which she
came to be selected. To riff off of Marcus' response, the *soft hands* meme
(or the "In mother Russia..." snowclone) acts at a cultural level. I wish to
understand better these forces and to do so without hurried conclusions. I
am interested in the intellectual activity of identifying the limits implied
by political actions. If it turns out to be all-for-naught, well then that
will be sad, but I have hope that abstract reasoning can be a tool for
arriving at relevant (dis)agreement. It seems right to concede that even
lions are made of soft fleshy bits[1].

ps. I am very glad that *you*, Glen, have stepped in to take an editorial
role. It is very good to get feedback about what another reads from what one
has written.

[1] Yes, the sloganeering is painful, and I am no less susceptible to it
than anyone else. If it were not so effective on me, I probably would not
react so strongly to it. Is it necessarily *machismo*? I am not sure. I
agree that it is either a reason or at least an unignorable symptom in the
differential diagnosis.



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