âHistory progresses not by negation and the negation of negation, but by deciding problems and affirming differences. It is no less bloody and cruel as a result. Only the shadows of history live by negation: the good enter into it with all the power of a posited differential or a difference affirmed; they repel shadows into the shadows and deny only as the consequence of a primary positivity and affirmation. For them, as Nietzsche says, affirmation is primary; it affirms difference, while the negative is only a consequence or a reflection in which affirmation is doubled. That is why real revolutions have the atmosphere of fĂŠtes. Contradiction is not the weapon of the proletariat but, rather, the in which the bourgeoisie defends and preserves itself, the shadow behind which it maintains its claim to decide what the problems are. Contradictions are not âresolvedâ, they are dissipated by capturing the problem of which they reflect only the shadow. The negative is always a conscious reaction, a distortion of the true agent or actor.â
â
Deleuze - Difference & Repetition (via hypostaticvoid)
Yes; yes, again.
See, now Iâd thoroughly disagree with this. At best itâs a meangingless distinction due to the vagueness of the terms positive and negative as used here and at worst itâs absolutely, almost perniciously, incorrect. (Whatâs that thing Badiou says about how this sort of interpretation of dialectics could only be authentically be put forth by someone that was âilliterateâ and how Deleuze and Guattari werenât illiterate, therefore theyâre just crooks? Thatâs kind of at work here).
Speaking of the ânegation of negationâ is already missing the point. Dialectics isnât about negation or contradiction, but negativity, which is the way in which a concept or historically specific mode of practice is self-undermining and canât achieve its goal. This this operation between positive and negative here is meaningless: it doesnât map onto Hegel, Marx, or any other dialectical thinker. Itâs a farce and an excercise in almost willful misreading. (Thanks Hyppolite, damn.) Everything Deleuze is saying here about affirmation is already part of the process of negativity, but without falling into a celebration of multiplicity without content or anything else ridiculous like that. Sure, contradictions arenât âresolved.â Thatâs why itâs good that no one was claiming that.
















