It would be absurd to go to war against power in general. On the contrary, certain types of politics of power, certain types of arrangements of power, certain uses of language, notably national languages, are normalized in the context of an historical situation, which implies the seizure of power by a certain linguistic caste, the destruction of dialects, the rejection of special languages of all kinds -- professional as well as infantile or feminine--I think that is what happens. It would be absurd to oppose desire and power. Desire is power; power is desire. What is at issue is what type of politics is pursued with regard to different linguistic arrangements that exist. Because -- and this seems essential to me -- capitalist and bureaucratic socialist power infiltrate and intervene in all modes of individual semiotization; today, it proceeds more through semiotic subjugation than through direct subjugation by the police, or by explicit use of physical pressure. Capitalist power injects a microfascism into all the attitudes of the individuals, into their relation to perception, to the body, to children, to sexual partners, etc. If a struggle can be led against the capitalist system, it can only be done, in my opinion, by combining a struggle -- with visible, external objects -- against the power of the bourgeoisie, against its institutions and systems of exploitation, with a thorough understanding of all the semiotic infiltrations on which capital is based. Consequently, each time one detects an area of struggle against bureaucracy in the organizations, against reformist politics, etc., one must also see just how much we ourselves are contaminated by, are carriers of, this microfascism.
Felix Guattari, "Desire is Power, Power is Desire" from Soft Subversions, pg. 19-20
