Urban Maoism

Passport photo of @UrbanMaoism

Lucas Levi-Nietz (@UrbanMaoism on Twitter) is among Infrared's first ever guests during one of the earliest livestreams. He has been a consistent ally and source of aesthetic inspiration for the Community since. His ideological contributions are meaningful, but it is difficult to judge their scope because of their esoteric (often religious) nature and lack of explicit interconnection with Infrared's own original work. It is very likely that his aesthetic influence on the community is as significant as that of Fan Wennan because of his early appearance, but has already been mutated within the community beyond recognisability unlike the more obvious influence of People's Punk.

Aesthetics

Universal Empire

The flagship aesthetic of @UrbanMaoism is "Universal Empire", which is a first attempt at finding a modern expression for the aesthetic of Mongol Modernity. The term "Universal Empire" is used in this context in more or less explicit reference to Alexandre Kojeve's use of the term. It can also be read as general reference to the premodern land empires whose sovereigns claimed hegemony over what their people considered the whole of the world. The aesthetic binds these two readings of the term together by creating mood boards in which the aesthetics of archaic Universal Empires are displayed as a symbolic synonym-ring that constitutes a modern Universal Empire in the kojevian sense. At it's most simplest the aesthetic can be summed up as a fusion of Socialist Realism and Vorticism. Origin of the aesthetic has not yet been tracked down conclusively, but Wahaddin Trotposting (@Reach4ACopsGun) was likely the origin. He has also elaborated it into a Neo-Utopik magazine.

Nietz's Substack is named after this aesthetic, though it is not exclusively dedicated to it.

UE-posting follows the following pattern:

• Write a Tweet that reads "Universal Empire"
• Attach 4 (four) pictures compliant with the general vibe of Universal Empire
  • These images should superficially be guided by overlap with the standard motifs and composition patterns of Socialist Realism
  • The images must represent it's chosen theme through it's diverse aesthetic instantiations in a set of geographically unrelated cultures

This vibe amounts to Socialist Realism with some deviations and unique recurring motifs:

• The infrastructure of the state looks run-down, archaic and perfectly functional
• The Communist future is characterised by the transformation of work into a LARP of work due to post-scarcity economics
  • This is implicitly because "proper" work has been rendered so absurdly efficient through Socialist Construction that people don't know what to do with the vast excess of Free Time
  • The follow-up assumption that defines the aesthetic is that people would gladly show up to a work just to smoke some ciggies with their friends and fuck around
  • This culminates in the implication of a society that acts as a museum and theme-park dedicated to the memory of the hard work that made this state of leisure possible
• Smoking is cool and healthy
• The appearance of Universal Empire is always localised to the culture of a place
  • This localisation does not act as a facade for an institutionalised Universal Empire (like the sci-fi clishe of the United Nations turned into a polity)
    • Instead this localisation functions as a synonym-ring for an entirely implicit common object (Communism) whose premising institutions have withered away
  • This principle of localisation in Universal Empire has significant overlap with Infrared's theory of "Mongol Modernity"
    • The Mongol Empire did not live on as a centralised polity centered on Mongolia
    • Instead it "lived on" within it's vassals who form a synonym-ring for the concept of the "Universal Empire" founded by Genghis Khan
  • Universal Empire's principle of localisation corresponds to the principle of Multipolarity
    • This can be contrasted with the principle of Anglo-American Unipolarity which shallowly localises the unique customs and cultural products of the USA for consumption in foreign markets without any intercultural dialectic happening in the process
      • In simpler words: There is no aesthetic difference between McDonalds in Germany and the USA
      • Universal Empire, in contrast, is itself the sum of commonalities among it's expressions in different cultures
• Communism and it's excess of leisure transform the common worker into a hobby intellectual who takes the time to engage with high culture previously reserved for the bourgoise that treated "having time for it" as privilege, yet the former worker still maintains a rugged aesthetic as philosopher-barbarian

Institut d'AuGirLis

The Institut d'AuGirLis is a joint project with Aiden Chaya-Wongvajirapakdi (@parallel_pl4y on Twitter) . This project covers the interrelated thoughts of St. Augustine, René Girard and Clarice Lispector. @UrbanMaoism's Twitter feed frequently features propaganda posters signed with this organisation's seal. It's work covers aesthetics, politics, religion and the relations between them through artistic works. They have started a Podcast called "State of Exception" together.

Definition of the Institute d'AuGirLis as an "organisation" should be taken as humorous in nature, though this type of exaggeration is consistent with the Infrared Community's ongoing campaign of trolling credentialists by expropriating PhDs through debate or LARPing as self-serious suborganisations of Infrared.

Writings

Assorted writings on both (and likely more) of these aesthetics can be found on Substack.

A special Infrared Community TEI Edition of "Suspended Enthusiasm" (that is enhanced with hyperlinks for terms that would benefit from glossary definition) is available via Torrent.