“Smoke & Mirrors” - Cultural Violence
The next session of the Against Global Apartheid and Planetary Ecocide (AGAPE) research group, “Smoke & Mirrors”, is on cultural violence. Through cultural violence, Empire obscures realities and mystifies histories of resistance, distorting narratives to suppress rebellion. Through its cultural machinery, Empire manufactures a false consensus in which systemic domination is normalized, rebellion is rendered futile, and resistance is framed as dangerous or delusional.
This dispatch serves as both a reflection on the gathering of this session’s co-facilitators and a primer for our upcoming conversation. At the end of this primer, you will find links to suggested media offerings to explore in preparation for our meeting.
An overview of Paris, centring on the Étoile area that Haussmann redesigned. Photograph: DigitalGlobe/Rex
Aerial view of the Palestinian village of A Taybe (left) and the Israeli settlement of Ofra, near Ramallah. Photo by Milutin Labudovic for Shalom Achshav, 2002.
Pre-Session Primer
Our conversation began with a discussion of Michel de Certeau’s The Practice of Everyday Life and its investigation of a striking metaphor embedded in the infrastructure of modern Athens, where public transportation vehicles are called metaphorai. In the rhythms of daily life, people travel across the city aboard these “metaphors,” linking distant points into coherent itineraries. De Certeau suggests that stories function in much the same way—organizing disparate places and experiences through networks of narrative pathways. These spatial trajectories, governed by implicit codes and constraints, form a kind of syntax that actively shapes space by regulating how places and experiences are interconnected through memory, knowledge, and obligation. “Every day, they traverse and organize places,” we read, “selecting and linking them together into sentences and itineraries… These stories are spatial trajectories with the status of spatial syntaxes.”
In this sense, urban design and narrative structure are deeply entwined. Both construct and constrain the possibilities for movement, encounter, and meaning within space, disciplining how individuals navigate their surroundings. Just as Georges-Eugène Haussmann’s restructuring of Paris imposed spatial order to control movement and visibility, dominant narratives discipline unruly stories by reorganizing their complexity into linear, coherent forms. Haussmann’s transformation of Paris—converting its narrow, labyrinthine streets into wide, surveillable boulevards—was not merely aesthetic. It was a strategic maneuver designed to suppress dissent, facilitating clear lines of sight and fire to preempt uprisings. This spatial restructuring becomes a powerful metaphor for narrative control: hegemonic stories sanitize overlapping and conflicting realities, imposing clarity and hierarchy over ambiguity and multiplicity. “These are the public narratives that are allowed,” we reflected. “They sweep away all possible unruliness, much like the boulevards were designed to wipe away insurrections.”
However, spaces of ambiguity—the surround—persist as sites of possibility and resistance. We discussed the notion of the surround, drawing from AbdouMaliq Simone, Stefano Harney, and Fred Moten. The surround, they explained, describes spaces where the boundaries between legality, commerce, and survival blur. “Haussmann might have described those neighborhoods as warrens of shady places and people,” we observed. Yet these unruly spaces, teeming with overlapping lives and contradictions, are precisely where counter-narratives emerge. Haussmann’s restructuring sought to erase such zones just as dominant narratives suppress stories that refuse neat categorization. Yet the surround remains generative—a relational and improvisational zone where “new itineraries are drawn, and new futures imagined.”
This dynamic between spatial arrangement and narrative control is evident in modern movements like Occupy. We reflected on how Occupy’s public square encampments, although seeking to reclaim space, inadvertently reinforced expectations of visibility and performance. The space itself dictated that protesters articulate demands in a way legible to the media and state. “It’s as though the protesters were on a stage,” we noticed. “Given that, the expectation was: perform for us. Without demands, it seemed ineffectual—because the space itself imposed a performative narrative logic.”
Modern media further amplifies these spatial and narrative constraints. We highlighted how dominant cultural narratives reinforce systemic bias, even in supposedly reformative efforts like anti-bias training. “A white family struggling is portrayed as deserving of support,” they explained, “while Black families are framed as dangerous and in need of state intervention.” Television shows like Married with Children normalize white familial dysfunction as harmless, while police procedurals like Law & Order depict Black families primarily through the lens of criminality. These mediated stories, with their high emotional resonance, shape subconscious biases and often undermine bureaucratic efforts to disrupt systemic harm. “This isn’t just workplace training versus cultural consumption,” we reflected. “It’s a war of narrative ecosystems—where the media we consume at home overrides institutional interventions.”
This tension extends to diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives, which, rather than dismantling oppressive structures, often serve as assimilationist strategies that flatten difference into bureaucratic conformity. We proposed instead that institutional transformation be rooted in decolonial practices emphasizing relational accountability that goes beyond the confines of the workplace. We also acknowledged that emergent systems of domination, which operate through decentralized networks, require fundamentally different strategies than those designed to confront hierarchical control. “This isn’t about a man behind the screen anymore,” one contributor noted. “These systems are self-perpetuating, like ecosystems embedded in culture.”
This emergent control system thrives on spectacle, pleasure, and the display of dominance. We recalled how, during the Gulf War, some Americans flaunted their national superiority through conspicuous consumption—driving massive SUVs and ordering grotesquely large steaks. “It wasn’t rational,” we noted. “It was about displaying power. A libidinal field of dominance.” This field extends into contemporary political culture, where epistemic violence operates through disorientation and incoherence. We referenced the torture scene from 1984, in which the torturer interrogates the victim by holding up four fingers and asking, “How many fingers am I holding up?” Regardless of the response, the victim is punished until he finally breaks: “Four, five, six—honestly, I don’t know.” Only then does the torturer relent. We observed, “This is a weapon, a narrative tactic to destabilize reality itself.” This tactic is emblematic of the disinformation we endure today—designed to confuse, overwhelm, and make truth itself irrelevant.
Amid these tactics of control, Indigenous epistemologies offer alternative frameworks of resistance rooted in relationality and reciprocity. We emphasized, “What defines us as indigenous is not that we were the first humans on this land, but that we are latest descendants who remember what our ancestors did, what it means to live as relatives of the earth.” These practices, grounded in mutual care with both human and non-human kin, oppose the extractive, dominative logic of colonial power. Yet, as Empire increasingly commodifies indigeneity and resistance—turning them into resources for the fashion, tourism, and entertainment industries—our task becomes even more urgent: how do we cultivate spaces and stories that remain irreducible to the linear narratives of Empire?
We returned to the need for iterative, adaptive strategies of resistance, this time through the metaphor of seasoning. Salt, pepper, herbs, and spices can enrich the flavors of a nourishing, decolonial creation, but they can also sabotage a colonial dish, making it unpalatable. This subtle yet subversive approach reshapes narrative ecosystems without relying on grand, heroic gestures. This mode of resistance, we suggested, might best be imagined as a model that emphasizes relational creativity, improvisation, and resilience over static solutions. How might such playful, adaptive strategies unsettle dominant structures and open new pathways for collective liberation and transformation?
Finally, we examined the psychological dimensions of internalized narratives, noting how cultural representations condition people to self-blame and conform. Figures of resistance, whether fictional or real, are often portrayed as doomed, perpetuating cycles of fear and resignation. Disrupting these deeply ingrained habits requires iterative processes of awareness, care, and practice.
Historical models of resistance—such as collaborations between Afrocentric schools, militant churches, and queer organizing networks in the 1980s—demonstrate how relational, multi-scalar infrastructures can cultivate enduring spaces of care, learning, and collective strength. These movements remind us that resistance is not merely reactive but generative, continually creating the conditions for new futures to take root.
Suggested Readings
Excerpt from “Spatial Stories” from The Practice of Everyday Life by Michel De Certau (2 pages)
Excerpt from “Necropolitics” by Achille Mbembe (1 page)
“Note on Method” from Wayward Lives, Beautiful Experiments Intimate Histories of Riotous Black Girls, Troublesome Women, and Queer Radicals by Saidiya Hartman (3 pages)
Excerpt from “Intimacies of Four Continents” by Lisa Lowe (1 page)
History of RT (1 page, double-sided, broadsheet zine)
Pivot Diagrams from A Liberated Mind: How to Pivot Towards What Matters by Steven C. Hayes, PhD
