Ulrike Meinhof : That Is Where We Come From

ULRIKE MEINHOF (1934-1976)

Abstract from the speech of Ulrike Meinhof on Sept. 13, 1974, in Moabit prison, West Berlin (Translated by Sigrid Huth) : 

The metropole individual is discovered. He or she comes from the process of decay, the false, alienated surroundings of living in the system - factory, office, school,university, revisionist groups, apprenticeship and temporary jobs. The
results of this separation between professional and private life, the psychic deformation caused by the consumer society begun to show.

But that is us, that is where we come from: bred by the processes of elimination in metropole society, by the war of all against all, the competition between each and everybody else, the system of fear and pressure for productivity, the game of one at the expense of somebody else, the separation of people into men and women, young and old, healthy and sick, foreigners and natives,the fight for reputation.

 That is where we come from: from the isolation of the suburban home, the desolate concreted public housing, the cellprisons, asylums and special prison sections. We come to the guerrilla organization brain-washed through the media, consumerism, physical punishment and the ideology of non-violence; from depression, sickness, declassification, insult and humiliation of the individual, of all exploited people under imperialism. Eventually we perceive the misery of each of us as constituting the necessity of liberation from imperialism, the necessity of anti-imperialist struggle. We understand there is nothing to lose by destroying this system through armed struggle, but everything to win: our collective liberation, life, humanity, identity.

French theorist and critic Sylvère Lotringer, founder of Semiotext(e) with Chris Kraus said about Ulrike Meinhof's speech in an interview :

Ulrike Meinhof’s manifesto – that was crazy.  She was so sensitive to things we hardly notice anymore. The crippling effects of consumer culture – there she was talking about the “masses” – and of professional competition – in which she was obviously talking about herself and her own world. Career is so ingrained now we don’t even question it.

. . .

When I started Semiotext(e) in 1974 we were in the last gasp of Marxism, and I knew the terrorists were right, but I could not condone their actions. That is still the way I feel right now. What happened is that we forgot that capitalism even exists. It has become invisible because there’s nothing else to see. 

 

Ulrike Meinhof's whole speech was published in 
"Hatred of Capitalism / A Semiotext(e) Reader 2001", a wonderful compilation by Sylvere Lotringer and Chris Kraus of texts that had been published in Semiotext(e). 

Their are written by thinkers and writers as diverse as : 

Gilles Deleuze, Felix Guattari, Assata Shakur, Bob Flanagan, Kate Millet, Jean Baudrillard, Jack Smith, Michelle Tea, William S. Burroughs, Michel Foucault, Eileen Myles, Guy Hocquenghem, Ulrike Meinhof, Fanny Howe, Lynne Tillman, Ann Rower, David Wojnarowicz, Cookie Mueller (and many others).