Identities Journal for Politics, Gender and Culture Vol. 8 / No. 2 / Summer 2011

Stanimir Panayotov Ask the Puppet Towards , The Conspiracy against the Human Race, New York: Hippocampus Press, 2010.

If I was unborn humanity becomes extinct under its “own will” to do so. I would have nothing to be grateful for And only a notion of the tragic could temporarily justify I would have never seen love I would have never held cats the affirmative spirit of the realization of that extinction. I would have never buried my friends Of course, provided tragedy itself withers away along with And prayed for their souls all extinction. For, to preserve tragedy is to preserve a In reddening churches I would never have kissed creeping life of partial extinction which does nothing to ef- And I would never have wept face all the nothingness of this world - or, as Ligotti would And I would never have seen say elsewhere, “this degenerate little town.” Black Ships eat the sky And I would have been unborn And not have seen circuses Whilst watching the flowers The leitmotif of an affirmative “rant” such as Ligotti’s Rise flags made of atoms assumes its focus against the reign of unquestionable Who will deliver me from myself? natalism from his own philosophical supposition that Who will deliver me from myself? life is MALIGNANTLY USELESS. It might seem that Current 93, Black Ships Ate the Sky Ligotti’s capitalization of this singular inference through- out the book insistently insults even the most attentive That we cannot give consideration to “nothing” is in it- readers of this always already forsaken opus post umus self not a tragedy too big to overcome. That nothing in the of humanity. Although one needs to be a cynic in order world is “inherently compelling” is also not a blunder too to write horror (per Lovecraft), dare not be that cynical terrible to swallow. Yet the fact that we have not done yet to the author: Ligotti is not interested in considering you with the massacre of life gains its significance from the emotional creatures. You are a puppet. Ask any human non-realization of the nothingness that has to follow once puppet. 145 146 cal spaceandpositionfor thosenotpronetobuyinginto (Unamuno, Camus,Sartre) andprovidesamethodologi “philosophical ” beyond its heroic versions The Conspiracyagainst theHumanRace will besmilingbeforeallsupernaturalhorror. of Earth.ForLigotti it goeswithoutsayingthatthis face become with thenothingonlytodisappearfrom face nanosecond ofenjoyingtheobliteration of theOne we in this pure manure of being we will only be given a lurk ofnothingnessanditsmomentary natality of: and there isnosenseincoming back. There istherepressed enact theworstmythever-thatofeternal return, while lawed banalities” of worthlesslife.Byasking,youonly negations? After all,thisbookprovidesonlythe“out of purest the is affirmation an such affirm to that story: ingness, andmalignant uselessness. Isthisthesameold grinning face of joylesspossibilities, meaningless noth just here: dare you ask,arealready there, facing the revealed is negation of spirit affirmative The right? all What meaningcanaskingacquire if beingalive is NOT in in/humanity if lifeisMALIGNANTLY USELESS? what useofaskingaquestiondirected at someexpert it morelucidtothereaderthat inquire another “authority” in non/existence only makes of agivenpassage,thefutilitysuchaninvitation to of ourexistence. Serving always as the rhetorical seal ation ofhumanityaboutthisorthatsaddeningrealization right,” invitesusto while lambasting the posture that being (alive) is “all ticular self-refuting rhetorical strategy of Ligotti who, supernatural horror osophical pessimism whichisbasedonthenotionof Before comingtotheoutline ofhisownbrandphil , weshouldpayattention to thepar ask this orthatbreathingimperson to askismean pushes . And ------dictum require thatshouldyouhappennottolikelife, The (secular) anti-pessimistic moral infringement and its embodiments does notmakethem morally irresponsible. anti-natalist ideas few did not put an end to their tragic be morally burdened with suicide. That in the history of makes clear, onceandforall,thatthepessimistneednot compulsory suicidal rituals ofself-effacement. Ligotti ness of lifeonlymeansthatthepessimist ness you better hurry upanddie.But to announce the useless be soforsuicide. And ifyouarewillingtoevenconsider transcendence. If “survival isforthepigs,”thenmayit one resolvethefalsedilemma of existence: suffering or natalism requiresthatonly byceasingtoprocreatecan we cannot be done with. Thus, this sort ofBuddhist anti- And withouttheRealofeverydaylifehorror living ists to “applyforstatusinlifeaffairs.” They arebeing be forsakensincetheyneverchosetoborn in order “meaning.” What ismore,pessimistsdonotchooseto of malignant uselessness fromhissignifyingorchestra of cal platitudethatLigotti evokes thescreechingsounds the absence of life. (p. 47) It is from such heartfelt logi should what that affirm positively should simists what firmative spirit endorses that we should learn to live with af That 51) (p. all.” of affirmation ambitious most the And tobe done with our existence en masse wouldbe “Without a ‘yes’ inourhearts,nothing could be done. death. to “yes” his/her and pessimist affirmative the of self” (p.172)standstheincorrigibly purposeless logic something positive, or at least equivocal, keep it to your to announce this: against the dictum “If youcannot say affirmation performative and evocative an takes it thing, stems fromtheperfunctoryabilitytojudgeso.Ifany (p. 50)that the case is such.Nothingmorally binding , theeveryday Buddha-advocates of non-existence. should not be . To overcome such a challenge, pes Stanimir Panayotov has concludedhas

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Identities Journal for Politics, Gender and Culture Vol. 8 / No. 2 / Summer 2011 that you are the joyless object of “puppet determinism” - in life-affirmative directions, e.g. Camus and Nietzsche). Ligotti’s conceptual stock-in-trade, then being a pig will It is only natural to conclude that this line of inhuman be much more joyful. With this the pessimist’s credo that thinking, in the long run of 20th century philosophical “the non-existence never hurt anyone” gains its revela- “turns,” went in the wrong direction in its being right tory momentum: be no more and if you care for Nature, and stayed outside the radar of philosophical trendset- cease to exist. Even if Nature has a special plan for us, it ters. At least it has been spared the attention of being is given to our consciousness to realize it: the conscious recognized with masters of mystical materialismsuch and controlled return to the primordial soup is impossi- as Nietzsche. In his indebtedness to Zapffe’s tragic and ble. Just as our being-made human. For, in Ligotti’s view, , Schopenhauer’s moribund Will-to-live nature’s plan produced neither consciousness nor its plan (“a virtuoso of life’s devaluation”) and Lovecraft’s su- to conquer it; and less so was the environment ever meant pernatural horror, Ligotti walks through the bestiary of for us. Consciousness, even if we take the most vulgar pessimism: Phillip Mainländer’s Will-to-die and deicide, and colonizing version of its anthropomorphization, was Carlo Michaelstaedter’s puppet and suicide, Edgar Saltus, a system bug. Being conscious of this condition of ours and other specimens of non-lifers reveals the chronology thus invites us to kill ourselves. Ask Ligotti. of Ligotti’s intellectual heirs in anti-natalism. The far- fetched end of this book is projected into the conclusion that not being is all right and we have nothing to lose but Both the title and the paradox of consciousness which our right to die and just like God’s suicide or deicide we produces the human tragedy of existence are deeply in- need to set ourselves free from life and ourselves (and debted to Norwegian philosopher Peter Wessel Zapffe the Last Messiah as the propagator of a post-divine era, is and his essay “The Last Messiah,” (Zapffe 2004) as well the quotidian Deus of the uselessness of life as its highest as other occasional chunks of his translated into English truth). After all, “Do we not deserve to die?” (p. 228) If which Ligotti disinters. The title’s “conspiracy” is more Creation is for the pessimists the worst news ever, (p. 45) precisely one that involves silence when humans agree then our only natural and single right is the right to die. to not speak in their isolating themselves from meaning- (p. 22) And, as we might suspect, it takes the abolishment lessness. This is the primeval consensus of the human of the very paradoxicality of life - consciousness - to do race against itself. Of course, that is true only if we take so quietly. it for granted that falsification theory is the true gram- mar of living. Ligotti seems endeavored to prove how inherently wrong it is to entice yourself into the per- In his introduction and the first chapter, Ligotti merely severance of a meaningless existing. He needs some makes it more luminescent why anti-natalists and pes- categorical apparatus to reign over pro-lifers, and the simist are jettisoned in the outskirts of philosophy. Since project he should reinstate to do is roughly called anti- the human condition is not one of being human, Ligotti natalism, which seems to be the more generic term for takes quite literally the figure of the puppet. As if sug- both pessimism and (both of which went wrong gesting that we are already on the other side of life, as if 147 148 deviate itself from disillusionment and the sad realization of consciousness, humanity developed finer techniques to matter of thedetermination to a with survival:itisnota matter ofchoosingtodie,itis Thus neither Zapffe norLigotti ever meant to take sides consciousness: explain mer, whoseself-styledappointee Ligotti is, onlycaredto while thelatter caredto Epicureanism, strength andenergy, andweakness). And choring, distraction, sublimation) and Tolstoy (ignorance, quadruple explanatory formulas ofZapffe (isolation, an includes the questioning of freewill and causality) by the bilities to advocate puppet determinism (which naturally puppet isthehuman.Howso?Ligotti uses twopossi sciousness whichgradually leads ustobelieve that the we inherit and reproducethean-humanparadoxofcon vides (our) being, deprived of naturalistic reasoning, Since consciousness isa system error of Nature and di less honorablequietus? that seriously ifwearetoeverproceedtowardsamoreor gone over to the other side he asks: “How to take seriously a puppet master who has from the (in)human reflection that the puppets are, (p. 17) it wasnotenoughthatweonlyselect what towantsee 2004) into upliftingpursuits,likeliterature and art.(Tangenes pressions; and“sublimation,” theconversion ofanguish ends; “distraction,” the continuous stream of divertive im specific to attachment stabilizing the “anchoring,” lence; “isolation” is therepressionofgrim facts byacodeofsi humanity’s strategies of survivalinthevortex choose ?” Dare I say we shouldtake do between these, thefor it. 1 With the evolution ------on disintegrated bones.” (p. 28)Consciousnessis“exis unself-conscious of what we are - hunks of spoiling flesh forced usintothe paradoxical position of striving to be see pp.163-5).“Thisisthetragedy: Consciousness has out it - isthe tragedy (itself able to serve as sublimation, we cannot live with consciousness but cannot live with of beinghere.Zapffe’s paradoxofconsciousness-that to involuntarily slip intothe ranksofanti-natalists (one al) responsibility. To deny free will, as Ligotti does, is of that “self”cannot relatetothenotionof(caus who and “freewill”inorder to restoreitandchooseinstead iatrocratic power totemporarily undo someone’s “self” be experienced first-hand, hence the socialized sublunary to feelitgomad,fordeterminism =madness.It cannot but wecannot feel it. (p. 97) Those whosomehowmanage lates that we areable to reasonaboutourdetermination, (p. 105)Ligotti’s puppetdeterminism vs. causality postu know there is nothing to know and nothing to know it.” cannot knowwhatyoureally are becausethenyou would “You as: it defines and meticulously reads Ligotti which I am pointing at Metzinger’s paradox from reality. self-model preciselybecauseitservesbothasimageand the product of consciousnesswhich is indiscernible as a is consciousness outside Ligotti’s) from different figure nalization of thepuppet(orwhateverothermechanistic there isnoself,too.Itmightturnoutthattheveryexter Everybody isnobody-aswellnobody’s puppet,for believe we are somebody while being nobody. (p. 201) paradox weliveinandrealize there isnowayoutifwe we are) when weare conscious enough of the identity we think we are (and thus, Nietzsche-style, become what tential liability” (p. 51): and we Stanimir Panayotov really stopbeing what Being No One

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Identities Journal for Politics, Gender and Culture Vol. 8 / No. 2 / Summer 2011 such particular case is Popper’s “elimination of suffer- from liberation. What is truly vertiginous here is that ing,” see p. 73). The unacceptable and as of yet human Ligotti asks for our liberation from ourselves. We do compromise of cognitive psychology and analytic phi- not deserve to exist: even less so as self-conscious and losophy is that despite their oft met denial of the self, quasi-paradoxical puppets. The tragedy of evolution of they only make more complex the questioning of exis- consciousness is the “parent of all horrors.” (p. 15) Kill tence. Thus, accepting/living in Metzinger’s paradox is yourself after Zapffe Socratic travesty “Know yourselves to mechanically go insane and sink into an “epidemic of - be infertile and let the earth be silent after ye,” and you madness.” It is at this moment that the nightmare of our kill the whole family: the division of being, conscious- world finally becomes visible and real, and depression ness, tragedy, paradox, liberation and survival, puppets, and meaninglessness unite into the four no’s of Ligotti: death itself. There is no significant difference between “There is nothing to do and/ there is nowhere to go/ There suicide and thanatocide on this point. The uncanny fear is nothing to be and/ there is no-one to know.” (Ligotti of not being you (p. 88-9) which is worse than death is 2000)2 And as in this stage we cannot feel anything being now alleviated once and for all. nobody, (p. 113-14) it only takes the mechanistic course of puppet determinism as the unconscious strategy of not surviving the millennia of our own survival. But there In the rant against the line-up of the heroic “freaks of sal- is something ultimately relativist about this determinism vation,” Ligotti manages to ravage such iconic nihilists which renders it irrelevant for, as Ligotti himself admits, such as Nietzsche, whose architecture of meaningless- every nihilistic/anti-natalist position is abolishable. Were ness’ ruins serves an entirely different Dionysian end that it not irrelevant, it might as well become a cause. And refashions fate into freedom. Transhumanists provide no the question which Ligotti does not address is whether more of it; they are attacked as a “secular retelling of the the self-extinction of humanity can do just fine without Christian rapture” (p. 127) whose ambition that we can itself? remake ourselves is failed because determinism would teach us that we are not even part of the process of remak- ing ourselves in isolating suffering in the world. Day by If we admit our being puppets, then we should abolish the day, we are not getting better: we are only “getting made” paradox of consciousness which will be the abolishment better and better. And the better we are made, the worse of paradox altogether as yet another “real-life” paradox we will cross the finish. Christianity itself gets a scarce thrusting existence. And this arrested development is not mention: a mere “savior on stick.” The “egoistic com- news in itself. Earlier Malthus gave it economic determi- pulsion to send emissaries into the future” (p. 178) does nation if only to preserve a higher standard of living; in not end even in the spiritual counterpart of anti-natalism the 1990s, the Boston-based Church of Euthanasia was - Buddhism, which Ligotti considers to be the religious among the pioneers of a gleeful anti-natalist gay apoca- mirror of pessimism whose popularity as opposed to lypse through their weird house music. But these are pessimism’s state of affairs is based on: (1) the fact that minor examples of merely choosing to liberate oneself operates through belief rather than truth claims and (2) 149 150 pets turn to face the puppetmaster.” (Ligotti 2000) It seems with “Themomentofconsummate disaster/ When pup living “flesh” of the paradox. If this is the case, then to hell abolishment ofself-destruction andthepreservationof should nothaveawaytoretainanypossibilities forthe puppetry isself-destruction,thenthatsystemcannot and and if for humanity this condition is consciousness, and species?) containstheconditionsofitsself-destruction, tem (andwhatelsethanasystem[error]isthe human which isnon-sense.Ifanti-natalistsassumethatevery sys natalists arenotones,fortheywillstillretainself-identity all ends,thenpuppetlogicwouldrequirethateven anti- this “onlyway”end.Iftheendisof endof It makeslittlesensetowonderorfurtheraskwheredoes puppets istheonlywaytoquittheirveryquietus. do it. And perhapsimagining that “doing” for the human killing itself. And if we are puppets, we are doomed to and creation itself; we havetobeable to kill death and then again, even ego-death is acompromise with being Death Experience (such asauthor Suzanne Sagal). But drawn themselves into the reparation of selves after Near that paradox are Krishnamurti and people who havenot understood that ego-death is the condition to abandon save you,”concludes Ligotti. And amongthosewhobest more futilethantoconsciouslylookforsomething that he orsheisone and hasa self. “There is nothing self: if one wants to get relief from suffering, one assumes ing so,Buddhismmanifests the paradox of desire and the it doesconsidertheimaginary statusoftheself.Indo gible as extinction’s intellectual credibility, butat least embrace suffering fromscratch still does notmake it eli the relief fromsuffering ( the tree-like Buddhist versionoftheDecalogue, based on dukkha ). That Buddhismdoes - - - - than that,thereisnoserious“confrontationwithmortal being, goconsciouslythroughitandterminateit:other and wehavetoabolishdeathitselfinordertranscend grasps that“thetrueisamomentofthefalse”(Debord) to beandnooneknow? This iswhenthehumanpuppet with noidentity, forhowcanithaveoneifthereisno that forLigottiself-destructionisjustthat: termine the puppet to shootitself: we merely have to from theidea ofsupernatural horrorisnottofurtherde determination all exclude To place? first the in it about the ontological status of horror), then why bother writing (p.18) Ifapuppet could determine anything (say, about prove that our life in thisworldisasupernatural horror.” cessitation of all determination. This is why “No one can their very deterministic relation should exclude the ne pernatural horror arerelated, then itseemslogical that denizens of selfhood.Sincepuppetdeterminism and su will suffocate ourselvesinpeace with thenon-existing logical ornamentation of that ontological perversity), we right,” as horror(that it issupernatural is tomeatauto If weareonlyable to accept being and living as “not all “collapse in horrorbeforethisontological perversion.” and, to answer the futile “how so?”: a character should ural horror (Lovecraft). precisely, more fiction, horror philosophical supernat of whimper of non-being in Ligotti? This is hisprivileging ined lifenotworthliving. What sparesusthewhiningand dead, himselfmakesanexamination of thekindexam in Ligotti. We purpose need to observe that he is a writer who, not yet specific a has edges their to pushed further The masteringofsucharguments whichhardlycanbe destroy the(notionof)self;itonlytakesapuppet. ity.” (p.161)Inshort,ittakesnoselfandidentityto 3 It is the paradox in flesh (p. 16) (p. flesh in paradox the is It Stanimir Panayotov

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Identities Journal for Politics, Gender and Culture Vol. 8 / No. 2 / Summer 2011 as if we decide on not determining it/us doing so, for the supernatural, (see esp. pp. 224-26) since it is “like a the absolute adieu to consciousness is either a bullet or visitation from a foreign and enigmatic sphere.” (p. 217) non-procreation. If what unites us is the Brotherhood of If there was no consciousness, it is natural that death suffering (Zapffe), then those who live a conscious live would not exist and with this all narration ends here. about suffering should let go, because they do not “go But the supernatural horror of human puppetry cannot on with things.” Since we are human puppets, and pup- be avoided because we are both consciousness-bearers pets are only relative to other playthings (p. 33, emphasis and puppets and as such orchestrate the endless rapture mine, S. P.) supporting the illusion of being real, “A uto- of life. If all is nature and we are not, then, simply put, pia in which we no longer deny the realities we presently “We are not from here.” (p. 221) “We” are the supernatu- must repress cannot be realistically hoped for.” (p. 71) ral horror that creep us all along. We are the outlandish. Thus, if the essential question was for Ligotti “Are we We are the we that are nobody. We are those who should real?,” (p. 83) some 100 pages later the entire project of not be here. We run amok outside the puppet world we answering this question is subjected to the definition of inhabit, decentering the supernatural Real in the outskirts supernatural horror as “Horror is more real than we are.” of survival but, at the end, to no avail, for “We are those (Lovecraft p. 182)4 The realization of such invariably puppets, those human puppets.” (p. 222) Consciousness mechanistic rationalization is the characterless plot of gave us an “appointment with nonexistence.” How do we the supernatural horror fiction. (Again, little do we care part with it in not procreating? With an unnatural puppet to ask for the status of reason and “rationalization” if this smile.5 And even then, as Ligotti says, what do we care? is the case.) Existence of puppets as life-dream of “life” What do we care that some puppets are being swallowed is that ontologically bittersweet concoction of subjective by a terminal anti-eternality or that we are aware of all mind and objective monstrosity. Hence, every form of that follows from that millennial farce of being-all-right? rationality and explaining horror “is irrelevant to our be- There will come the time when we will not wake up on ing afraid or not afraid of anything.” (p. 243, n. 7) Little time, outside time, when time will be swallowed by itself do monsters care about horror, if they ever care and feel. and no God will be there to digest the feces and carcasses Thus, the supernatural is the “metaphysical counterpart of those irrelevant non-beings, of those jittery puppets. of a mind that has been driven mad,” (p. 211) that is, of After all, facing “The death of tragedy in the arms of non- absolute determinism in a causeless universe. Once con- existence” (p. 228) must bring about the end of all tragic sciousness appeared, we walked out of the natural. Ever ends; it must mean - in a final paroxysm of the paradox since this system bug, everything is supernatural and we - that the puppets deserve to die. only figure in the galaxy’s cesspool. Our life is just the elusion out of this impossible and ravaging news. Taken as individuals, we do not quite resemble horror. But seen as a whole, humanity is a zombie. And if only to The Conspiracy against the Human Race ends like an unconsciously “surprise” itself with the horror that it is, apophatic narration on how not to speak about death as yes, it does survive for the sake of survival. What else is 151 152 anybody’s puppet. monument and CEASE TO EXIST? Who knows? Ask what elsecanwedobutbuild a giant stainless puppet ist,” for an ethic of the void, for a better galactic toilet, the smiles of “those who wouldnever be forced to ex unconsciousness thrive.Forthegoodofunborn, for and atomic plants still disintegrate. Non-existence and steel still shines awayattheedgeofnon-existence. Dams the smiling face of Earth some 300 years after. Stainless remains withasleight-of-hand.Puppets’ puppetsblight extinction does notfreetheworldofourconsciousness’ “life” itself. The badnews:ourowndisappearance or there isnoonetopronouncetheshibbolethsoflifeand on Earth. Good newsbroadcasted on no TV channel: we never cared to face: without us,lifeitself continues undisturbed news horrific the announce 2007) Weisman and abook, Alan Weisman’s Geographic’s mentaries (David de Vries’ after survival’squietus? Undoubtedly, yes. Twodocu tion? Will itwhistletheplanetary melodies of existence Will life as such linger on with no-one to fake its realiza and itendswithit: against the human race is made to be for the human race, conspiracy The zombification? human not if procreation 80) with everyotherlivingthingithasintroduced to pain.(p. can destroywhatithasmade ... thenmayit perish along only waytobesureitsstenchwillnotfollowus....[if]it world, wecanblowupthisplanetfromouterspace.It’s the Survival is atwo-waystreet. Once wesettle ourselves off- Aftermath: PopulationZero Life after People The World withoutUs , both2008) andNational (see - - - 3��������������������������������������������������������������������� 2 1. Butaspuppets,weareevennotdoingit: Notes: Zapffe, Peter Wessel. 2004. The lastmessiah,trans.Gisle Tangenes. Weisman,2007. Alan. Tangenes, Gisle. 2004. The view frommount Zapffe. 2000. Ligotti, Thomas. References: 5 4 . Throughout the years, Ligotti has raised the standard of acreep . See also Ligotti’s project with David Tibet: Current 93, . As Zapffe says,“All I have for facing death myself, is afoolish . Seeesp.pp.191-2:“We knowthateverything we seeisunreal, ing andunimitable styleofsimplicity much lessgrandiosethan watch?v=5fetSoZFyBw Unholy City smile.” You canonlydie.” and you cannot soar unscathed within an atmosphere of death. turn toanonerousembodiment where consciousnessisatragedy from suchadream is toloseyourfreedom from yourselfandre yet thereisparadoxically heightened realitytoitall.To awaken in aForeign Land better examples than his ored towardthedescription of being’s hollows.Icannotthinkof that of Lovecraft’s longitudinal necrostills but nolessendeav The_View_from_Mount_Zapffe Philosophy Now Dunne Books. Messiah Now Durtro. #45, (ac­ , “Nobodyis Anybody,” http://www.philosophynow.org/issue45/The_Last_ cessed 01.10.2011). . #45, I haveaspecialplanforthisworld. The worldwithout us (accessedOctober, 12011). Teatro Grottesco http://www.philosophynow.org/issue45/ Stanimir Panayotov

(accessedOctober1,2011). http://www.youtube.com/ and . New York:. Thomas In aForeign Town,

made todo Ask thePuppet Philosophy London: it. The - - -