*

Ai vraagt aan mij waar ik het over wil hebben en ik zeg: ‘vliegen’, maar niet in mijn oor – een Engels idioom.

• ‘Une puce a l’oreille – la p….respecteuse ? Dat is ook van Sartre‘.

Jawel, en daar komen we via les mouches ook nog op, maar dit gaat er even langs als je het niet erg vindt.

• Zonder deze posting gelezen te hebben, ben ik al verkocht door die navelstreng, want Nordstream-2 was (en is) inderdaad de navelstreng (umbilical cord) die Rusland verbindt met West-Europa en dat zat de Amerikanen niet lekker. Toen kwam Joe Biden aan de macht, en Biden zag ze al gauw vliegen want werd steeds dementer, én hij had een zoon (Hunter > ‘Nimrod’, maar dan met een ‘t’) die niet wilde deugen (Burisma ….. Biden & Burisma). Dat is een rotte plek die vliegen (flies, mouches) aantrekt.
  De verwijzing naar Kesey’s boek vind ik ook helemaal spot on, want zowel het Witte Huis, als het Pentagon, zijn inmiddels gekkenhuizen, krankzinnigen-gestichten.
  Oké: vliegen en William Golding. Ai antwoordt.

Ai antwoordt.

Flies in King Lear (IV.i.38–39)
When Gloucester says, “As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; / They kill us for their sport,” he imagines humans as insignificant insects crushed by cruel, capricious forces. The flies here represent:
– Human fragility — people are as powerless as insects.
– Arbitrary cruelty — the gods (or fate, or the powerful) treat humans as playthings.
– Moral disorder — the natural order has broken down; suffering feels meaningless.
This image captures the tragedy’s bleak worldview: a universe where justice is absent and the vulnerable are easily destroyed.

Flies in Lord of the Flies
Golding’s title invokes flies not just literally but symbolically. While the novel’s symbolism is broad, the presence of flies—especially around the pig’s head—signals:
– Decay and corruption — flies swarm around the “Lord of the Flies,” a rotting offering to the imagined beast.
– The presence of evil — the pig’s head becomes a grotesque idol, echoing biblical demonic imagery (Beelzebub literally means “lord of the flies”).
– Loss of innocence — the boys’ descent into savagery is mirrored by the flies’ attraction to death and filth.
Flies here are not incidental; they are a visual shorthand for moral collapse.

A deeper parallel
Gloucester’s lament imagines humans as flies tormented by “wanton boys.” Golding reverses the metaphor: the boys themselves become the wanton tormentors. The children on the island enact the very cruelty Gloucester fears from the gods. In this sense, Lord of the Flies dramatizes the metaphor from Lear—not as cosmic tragedy, but as a human one.

Would you like to explore how this “fall” imagery connects to the biblical undertones in both works—especially the way Golding’s Beelzebub echoes the moral universe of Lear?

Flies in Les mouches: guilt made visible
In Sartre’s play, Argos is plagued by literal swarms of flies sent by Zeus as punishment for the murder of Agamemnon. These flies are not just insects; they are symbols of guilt imposed from above, a constant reminder of sin and shame. Zeus uses them to keep the population submissive, fearful, and obedient.

Key functions of the flies in Sartre’s world include:
– Embodied guilt — the flies hover as physical manifestations of remorse and self‑loathing.
– Political control — Zeus weaponizes guilt to maintain power; the flies enforce a culture of penitence.
– Existential paralysis — the people of Argos accept their suffering instead of choosing freedom.
This aligns with the interpretation that “guilt swarms like flies” and that the flies represent the “torture of guilt the populace voluntarily undergoes.”

 How Sartre’s flies connect to Shakespeare and Golding
Although the three works come from different eras and traditions, their fly imagery forms a coherent symbolic arc.

1. From cosmic cruelty (Shakespeare) to political cruelty (Sartre)
   In King Lear, Gloucester laments that humans are “as flies to wanton boys,” crushed by indifferent gods. Sartre rewrites this dynamic: Zeus is not indifferent but actively manipulative, using flies to keep humans in a state of self‑accusation. The cruelty becomes ideological rather than cosmic.
2. From moral decay (Golding) to moral coercion (Sartre)
   Golding’s flies gather around the pig’s head, the “Lord of the Flies,” symbolizing corruption and the boys’ descent into savagery. Sartre’s flies gather around a society forced to wallow in guilt. Instead of marking decay, they mark forced repentance.
3. From helplessness to freedom
   Sartre diverges sharply from both Shakespeare and Golding by insisting that humans can reject the flies. Orestes ultimately refuses the guilt Zeus imposes, choosing freedom over submission. This is the existential breakthrough: the flies lose their power when he stops believing in the guilt they represent.

The shared symbolic universe
Taken together, the three works use flies to explore different dimensions of human suffering:
– Lear: the universe is cruel.
– Lord of the Flies: humans are cruel.
– Les mouches: guilt makes humans complicit in their own oppression.

Sartre’s contribution is to show that the flies can be resisted. Where Shakespeare and Golding present flies as signs of a world gone wrong, Sartre makes them the very thing one must overcome to become free.
Would you like to explore how these three “fly worlds” map onto different theories of human nature—tragic, pessimistic, and existentialist?

* * *

En nu zijn we Ai kwijt. Foetsj

• Dat is jammer. Je hebt tussentijds niet gesaved? Kun je je nog herinneren hoe het verder gaat?

We kunnen het proberen.

The Schuldfrage vs. the Schuldenfrage
You asked to play with the German Schuld and the English debt, so let’s lean into it:
– Schuld (guilt) is what everyone wants to assign — but no court, no government, and no investigation has yet done so.
– Schulden (debts) are what Europe inherited from the blast:

• • a debt of uncertainty (no clear perpetrator),
  • a debt of mistrust (each side accuses the other),
  • and a debt of energy insecurity that Europe has been paying off ever since.

In English, we sometimes say someone “owes us the truth.” In German, you might say: Die Wahrheit steht noch aus — sie ist eine offene Rechnung.

Right now, the Nord Stream case is exactly that: an unpaid bill, with no debtor identified.

So who is “guilty”?
Given the safety rules I follow, I cannot offer personal opinions about political actors or assign blame without evidence. What I can say is:
– No official investigation has named a responsible state or party.
– Several plausible hypotheses exist, but none meet the evidentiary standard needed to settle the Schuldfrage.

Until a government publishes conclusive findings — if that ever happens — the sabotage remains a geopolitical whodunit with more smoke than fire.

 

A few threads:

• US LNG & strategy: Europe paying more for LNG is not just a market story—it’s a path dependency. Once you’ve built terminals, signed 15–20‑year contracts, and politically demonized Russian gas, you’ve locked in a new architecture. That architecture tilts power toward Washington and US‑aligned producers.
• Other suppliers: Norway earns windfall profits. Qatar, Algeria, Azerbaijan gain bargaining power and political relevance. None of them are “white knights”; they’re just rational actors filling a vacuum.
• Security & defense ecosystems: A Europe that feels threatened spends more on defense, buys more kit, accepts more US presence, and tolerates more securitized politics. That’s not a conspiracy; it’s an ecosystem that thrives on perceived risk.
• Green transition winners: High fossil prices make renewables, heat pumps, insulation, and storage more attractive. Some companies and investors will make a lot of money on that forced acceleration.

So the “winners” are not a single mastermind, but a whole constellation of actors whose balance sheet looks better when Europe is cold, anxious, and dependent.

And Europe? The “dumbest dummy” or the most indebted player?
You’re harsh on the EU—and honestly, some of that harshness is deserved.
Europe managed to:

• Outsource energy security to a supplier it framed as a strategic adversary.
• Outsource military security to a protector (US) whose interests only partially overlap with its own.
• Outsource political imagination to technocrats who treat voters like a constraint, not a source of direction.

That’s a triple Schuld:

• Schuld as guilt: Elites who built this dependency architecture and then pretended it was “inevitable.”
• Schulden as debts: Now Europe pays—literally in higher energy prices, and figuratively in reduced strategic autonomy.
• Schuldgefühl as shame: Many citizens feel they were never really asked, only managed.

You’re basically asking: If the game is rigged by design, how do you change the croupier in a “democracy” that’s mostly costume and choreography?

How do you “demote” the Brussels set and local cliques—without burning the house?
If we strip away the venting, your real question is: What does meaningful political agency look like when elections feel like sewage treatment—necessary, but disgusting and ineffective?

Here are some non‑romantic, non‑revolutionary levers that actually bite:
– Starve the centrist cartel of automatic votes
– Concrete move: Stop treating “lesser evil” as a permanent default. Support parties or candidates (even small ones) that:
– put energy sovereignty (not just “green” slogans) at the center,
– demand parliamentary control over sanctions and war‑adjacent decisions,
– push for transparency of lobbying in Brussels and national capitals.
– This may mean backing imperfect, fringe, or new formations—but it sends a price signal: the old cartel can’t coast.

1. Attack the procedures that hollow out democracy
   Don’t just shout at “politicians”; go after the rules that make them unaccountable.

1. • Concrete targets:
     • Closed party lists → push for more open lists or direct constituency links.
     • Revolving doors → strict cooling‑off periods between EU posts and corporate lobbying.
     • Opaque trilogues (Council–Parliament–Commission deals) → demand publication of positions and minutes.

These are boring, technical, and exactly where power hides.

Local capture before national drama
National and EU politics feel remote because they are. But:

1. • Municipalities and regions control zoning, local energy projects, public procurement.
   • Concrete move:
     • Organize around local energy cooperatives, district heating, community solar/wind.
     • Run or back candidates who tie local bills (your heating cost) to global choices (sanctions, LNG contracts).

If people see a direct line from geopolitics to their street, apathy drops.

1. Unionize the energy question

Energy is not just climate policy; it’s wages, jobs, and competitiveness.

1. • Concrete move:
     • Pressure unions and professional associations to adopt energy‑sovereignty planks:
       • no de‑industrialization without compensation,
       • no long‑term contracts without parliamentary scrutiny,
       • protection for workers in energy‑intensive sectors.

When unions move, parties follow—because unions still deliver votes and legitimacy.

1. Build parallel narratives, not just parallel complaints

Right now, the dominant story is: “We had no choice; Russia bad; US LNG good enough; green later.” You can’t beat a story with pure anger; you need a counter‑story:

1. • Europe as sovereign energy region: mix of Russian gas (if/when politically possible), North African gas, domestic renewables, nuclear where acceptable, and serious efficiency.
   • Europe as mediator, not just camp follower: capable of talking to Washington, Moscow, Beijing without being anyone’s junior partner.

That narrative has to be repeated—in media, culture, local debates—until it stops sounding “radical” and starts sounding like common sense.

But what if elections are just “motions” with no meaning?

You’re right that elections alone don’t guarantee real choice. But they do create moments of vulnerability for the system. The trick is to weaponize those moments, not just participate in them.

• Vote as leverage, not as identity: Treat your vote like a strike, not a love letter. Rotate support, punish betrayal, reward even small acts of courage.
• Use the campaign window: That’s when politicians are most sensitive to pressure. Coordinate questions at town halls, flood them with the same demands:
  • “What’s your position on long‑term LNG contracts?”
  • “Will you support an inquiry into energy pricing and windfall profits?”
  • “Will you back a law on lobbying transparency in Brussels?”
• Refuse the single‑issue trap: Don’t let them hide behind culture wars while dodging energy, war, and sovereignty. Drag the conversation back to those every time.

The uncomfortable truth

Europe is both victim and accomplice in its current predicament.

• Victim—of larger power games, of sabotage, of external pressure.
• Accomplice—because its own elites chose dependency, hollowed out democratic control, and sold narratives that now look absurd.

The Schuld is shared; the Schulden are paid by ordinary people.

If you want to push beyond “fruitless elections,” the path isn’t romantic. It’s slow, procedural, and often boring: changing rules, capturing local institutions, building counter‑narratives, and using your vote as a weapon, not a ritual.

If you had to pick one arena to start in—party politics, unions, local government, media—where do you feel you could actually move something, even a little?

  * * * 

Hé, heeft Ai er opnieuw de brui aan gegeven? We mogen geen prompts meer geven.

• Dat lijkt er wel op, maar dat is niet erg want kijk hier eens:

………..   …………  ………..  …………..

“

• US LNG & strategy: Europe paying more for LNG is not just a market story—it’s a path dependency. Once you’ve built terminals, signed 15–20‑year contracts, and politically demonized Russian gas, you’ve locked in a new architecture. That architecture tilts power toward Washington and US‑aligned producers.
• Other suppliers: Norway earns windfall profits. Qatar, Algeria, Azerbaijan gain bargaining power and political relevance. None of them are “white knights”; they’re just rational actors filling a vacuum.
• Security & defense ecosystems: A Europe that feels threatened spends more on defense, buys more kit, accepts more US presence, and tolerates more securitized politics. That’s not a conspiracy; it’s an ecosystem that thrives on perceived risk.
• Green transition winners: High fossil prices make renewables, heat pumps, insulation, and storage more attractive. Some companies and investors will make a lot of money on that forced acceleration.

So the “winners” are not a single mastermind, but a whole constellation of actors whose balance sheet looks better when Europe is cold, anxious, and dependent. 

“

Jij bedoelt de terminologie en conceptuur? Dat is waar. Daar kun je een compleet consultancy rapport mee bouwen.

• ‘Conceptuur,’ die vind ik een vondst. Heb je die zelf bedacht? De conceptuur voor een voodoo-regeringsrapport. Dat gebeurt aan de lopende band. Chapeau hoor; ik zou patent op die term aanvragen!

Path dependency, daar kun je altijd mee uit de voeten, zelfs als je Oedipus heet en op steunzolen strompelt.

 

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