Abstract:
One of the most important ideological observations made in the latter
half of the previous century was the unsolved problem of the paradoxical
dialectic existence between the promises made through mega socio-political
theories about a better humanity and the violent means to achieve those ends.
On one hand, the over-determined textbook dialogue of prosperity through
symbolic order and, on the other, the co-existence of underground evil of power
through social violence equated the ‘harmonious totality’ of the modern project.
If the world is a carefully calculated phenomenon of the Enlightenment man and
the reason is the fundamental driving force, it is paradoxical that evil becomes a
by-product in the modern post-enlightenment humanity. The Frankfurt School
rightly pointed out the necessary co-existence of symbolic law and authority and
the obscene supplement of reasonless violence as a fundamental paradox of the
post-enlightenment modern project. The bourgeois humanity of the
enlightenment project, therefore, carries the characteristic that educated,
cultured, mannered and charming men are fully capable of metamorphosing into
monstrous beasts within a second. The twentieth century political
circumstances witness that the ‘dialectic totality’ of both good and evil is the
‘true history’ of the modern world and its spiritual crisis is obvious through the
dual existence of its own products. To illustrate the dialectic existence of the
‘modern project’, the movie Inglorious Busterds (2009) by Quentin Tarantino can be
considered as a unique example where the violence portrayed in the movie
displays how the ‘decent’ political space has been taken over by the ‘diabolic evil’
of obscene underground or of unconscious real. Through the characters,
conversations and events depicted in the movie, this paper investigates how the
people who immerse in ‘cultivated academic environments’ are capable of
justifying violence over fellow human beings, despite whatever said about their
conscience. In relation to this, the discursive practices of the Sri Lankan
government in and after the forth Eelam war will be considered as a real life
example whenever necessary. In addition, the dirty function of the fantasy as
unconscious real, aestheticized violence and de-historization (or alternative
history) through a plastic reality will also be discussed as brand new ideological
developments.
