on looting

has any world been readier for looting than ours? how tantalizing all the shop windows are. in a world where window shopping exists, there's only a thin line of etiquette separating us from the stuff retailers seductively dangle. what's a pane of glass? is it any wonder that someone would take something if a bit of that etiquette went away? it isn't even a change, just a simpler, less expensive shopping, it's a really good sale, paying the cost of the chaos and the unpleasantness of knowing what you're doing isn't strictly orthodox, and paying that alone for the object.

how ridiculous that anyone should expect anyone to behave otherwise when these objects have forced themselves into our mental pathways. s was telling me about an article he read justifying downloading music illegally, at least in the case of pop music, because the music, when blared in public places, has colonized, without permission, the pathways in our brains. to own the song, therefore, to have the right to listen to it whenever we want, is simply to own ourselves, to reclaim that which has already been forced on us. the shopping, the discounted shopping that is looting is the same thing. that we should be made to so constantly drool and not then act when the cost is affordably low is outrageous and unreasonable.

it would, of course, be something very different if shops weren't set up the way they are, if the windows were gray and the objects were squirreled away and dusty. i mean, if it took the tiniest bit of goddamn agency to WANT the things in the windows this would be a very different situation. looting in a state of chaos is really no state of exception at all, it isn't planning for a return to normalcy any more than it is to shop during a terrific sale.

s was arguing how looting is to plan for a return to normalcy, that looting is a kind of work where one recognizes that taking something has monetary value that will become actionable and profitable once things are back to normal. i think that's an aspect of this too that further helps to explain looting, to put a cherry on top for the particularly thoughtful looter really intent on justifying themselves, but really it's just shopping. how nice to have things.

p.s. s noted how stores had taken stuff out of their windows in anticipation of the hurricane. they're smart like the relentless flirt who's found themselves with a sexual assaulter. the retailers realize a line could easily be crossed where one could not resist.