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John Carpenter's
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The Body Politic
by K.C.
What governmental system, if any, best serves as an analogy of the
animal body? This question has played alone in a corner of my mind for
about a year now. It arose from considering civilization as a giant
organism, then inverting the simile. It left me stumped. Is the body
Fascist? Corporate? Is it Socialist? Authoritarian or Libertarian?
Right wing or Left wing? Communist? Capitalist? Anarchist? Or does the
comparison make no useful sense whatsoever, the two systems (organic
and political) being too deeply different? I propose that it does make
useful sense by serving as a guide toward the deeper political
ideologies at work in John Carpenter's film "The Thing."
To answer this I start by equating humans with cells. By necessity
(and by definition in a healthy body), all the cells live and work in
harmony with the system. Those cells which do not work with the
system, die sometimes destroying the entire system in their process
of rebellion. Useful cells are not criminal anarchists. Yet who
ultimately makes the decisions in an animal body? And how does the
power structure really work? Is the cell a slave or a citizen?
There appears to be no single, central authority in the body, only an
extremely complicated web of interactions between genes, brain, and
environment. A gene may affect hormone production; a state of mind may
affect whether or not a gene gets switched on or off; hormones and
environmental stimuli may affect whether the mind feels exerting the
will needed to affect the genes is worthwhile; and round and round it
all goes. In what sense, then can the body be considered totalitarian?
Everyone agrees that the cells must work in harmony for health, and
yet what equates with the "ruling party"? The genome? The nervous
system? The subconscious? The will? The external environment?
Suppose then that a cell's DNA equals its "desires"- how it seeks to
survive and express itself. The nervous system equals the government
apparatus. Animal cells need to stay within the animal; outside it
they are helpless and quickly die. Therefore cells are by nature
social life forms, as are humans. I won't go so far as to say that the
body is the ideal environment for cells, but it surely is the best
available option. In other words, the body works (for a long while,
anyway), because it is a system working within natural laws.
Because of this, I don't think the body is intrinsically a Socialist
system. Socialism is abjectly opposed to the natural law we see at
work in systems as diverse as ecologies, economies, and organisms.
Top-down control structures are alien and extremely destructive to
their citizens, as the hundred-plus million people murdered by their
own Socialist governments in this past century can attest. An organism
that ran its affairs the way an entrenched Socialist government does
would starve to death in short order. Though the mind may be, the body
is not a Socialist.
Can the body be considered Capitalist, then? I'm not sure how, for
cells appear rigidly fixed into their roles in the economy. There is
no such thing as upward mobility, and thus the idea of a cell being
able to capitalize on its abilities for personal gain seem very
limited. A cell does what it was born to do, and no more. Because
cellular mortality rates differ among tissue types, the idea of a
privileged class structure comes to mind, with, not surprisingly,
nerve cells on top with the longest life-spans and the most power.
Rather than Capitalist, then, a more accurate metaphor might be
Corporatist - the nervous system as Multinational running the society
toward the goal of profit.
Yet the goals a nervous system seeks do not always concord with its
best interests, or the best interests of its cells. A mind may become
suicidal. An ego may inflate enough to arouse foes to violence.
Addictions may blind one to nourishment. Given the multifarious
communications in and of the body, the configurations possible for the
nervous system due to genetic influence, environmental imprinting, and
internal chaos or will, beg whether the body is more democratic than
we usually feel comfortable admitting. All influences lead to "votes"
being cast by the cells which filter their way down (up?) into the
nervous system, collectively forming gestalts - patterns of thought -
which compete for dominance in the schizophrenic electrochemical
jungle of the brain. Whichever thought pattern wins becomes the
current government, and this accepts the possibility of governments
not only with very weird and/or counterproductive goals, but which
become very difficult to oust from office once sufficiently
entrenched.
The strangest idea that's come to me, however, is that the body may
ultimately, or at least most effectively, be a theocracy. From the
cells' perspective, the ruling Mind would be an invisible, vastly
powerful presence affecting everything around them, the equivalent of
a transcendent deity. The more the cells recognize by their
disciplined behavior, the existence of this Mind, the more effective
the body will be. This is not to say that the Mind is a central
economic planner, but that both are most effective when in the
political (and literal, depending on the level viewed) of Zen
awareness. Peculiar external circumstances aside, a cell's harmonious
participation in the metabolism, partnered with the disciplined
body-awareness of the mind, optimizes survival ability.
Which brings me to the Thing, of which I ask the same basic question:
if the non-Thing animal body is an originally democratic, Corporatist
theocracy, what governmental system best serves as an analogy of the
Thing body? Or does the Thing even have a government at all? By better
defining the Thing, we might help better define the non-Thing.
To start then all we really know is that the Thing is different, but
is it different in kind, or only in degree? Evidently it can imitate
perfectly the behavior, metabolism, and thus for our purposes, the
government of the animal body. Yet this apparent solidity is illusory,
for the Thing is capable of radically deforming itself into alien
permutations in response to any exigency. In this sense, the Thing
always contains a radical, Promethean element capable of breaking all
boundaries and wrecking all social forms for the sake of progress.
Thus the Thing's style somewhat resembles the Leftist - ultimately,
Marxist - idea of total social revolution. For Marxist revolution, the
entire system must be liquidated in order that new, superior, and more
egalitarian forms be erected in its place. Because of this radicalism
the Thing appears to be different in kind from the non-Thing.
Let us presume the Thing partakes of similar democratic impulses as an
animal does, receiving information from all areas via its nervous
system in order to elect mental governments. Each cell is a
Capitalist, and yet a potentially much more resourceful Capitalist-
each portion of a Thing can immediately and spontaneously reorganize
itself to form a new government. In this sense, then, the Thing body
suggests an Anarchist collective, held together for the common good
but capable of splitting should the common good no longer hold.
Conflagrate the middle and the ends will immediately begin voting to
secede, and the nature of the system will allow them to.
Consider also that the Thing only keeps itself together in the
specific forms observed for the sake of survival. For all we know if
left to its own devices in a perfectly secure environment it might
dissolve into a defenseless puddle. One of the Dark Horse Comics
adaptations postulated that the Thing's metabolism actually burns
energy like crazy, requiring it to continually feed off new cells.
Thus, in the film, Fuchs may have been devoured by an overworked,
starving Thing, then cremated to cover up the evidence and confuse the
men. Such an inefficient metabolism would resemble all the Socialist
economies which have consumed themselves out of economic inefficiency.
In any case, consider also how both in "The Thing" and in the Marxist
experiments of the Twentieth Century, their radical agendas encompass
the fostering of both internal restructuring (purges) and external
invasion. And notably, both end in disaster for all involved.
So are we dealing with an Anarchist society here? Or a Socialist grand
experiment? Or something weirder? The telling factor may be its
"international" behavior: would an Anarchist society would be hostile
toward all around it, seeking to violently assimilate them to itself?
The Thing appears to be aggressive radicalism in any form that suits
its purposes. The Thing thus imitates a bodily utopia, but somehow its
plans always seem to come off the rails. It attempts to assimilate the
Norwegians and gets chased off, destroying them utterly. It tries for
the American's dogs and gets burned alive for its troubles. The seeds
of dissent it sows succeeds only wreaking pain, strife, and havoc for
itself and all it encounters. The Thing's attempt at World Revolution
ends (or does it?) with the equivalent of a nuclear confrontation
against the defenders of Capitalist Western democracy, leading to
total destruction of life support and a checkmate of despair.
Carpenter's predilection for the Western motif and its apotropaic
heroes also furnishes clues to the interpretation of "The Thing" as
embodying the very real Cold War struggles (and fears) of twenty years
ago. One particular image that impressed me queerly was that of
Windows, the radio operator. There's a quite subtle, spotty subtext
centered on Windows that situates him in the role of a child, and which
I only feel justified in mentioning for its relation to the other
political ideas herein. More than any of them shay has the look of a
stereotyped 1960s radical, with the shaded spectacles, the Afro hair
and beard style. Palmer may be the LSD-burnout, but Windows looks more
like an anti-Vietnam protester. Garry, the station commander, has a
hint of the domineering mother- note the scene where shay upbraids
Windows for sleeping on the job; Garry's wearing perhaps the most
feminine article of clothing in the entire film: a bathrobe and
slippers. Earlier we have the geneticist Blair as a kind of father
figure urging Windows to keep working. What's going on here? Later,
when the blood supply sabotage casts suspicion upon all authority,
Windows, notably, is the one to bolt, seeking refuge in Anarchy. I'm
probably not the only one who wished that shay had that
rifle loaded in time. But there's no escaping authority, even
potentially corrupt authority, and Windows, in a scene that visually epitomises the destruction of the 1970s New Left and the quashing of
mainstream radical sentiment, crouches meekly before the Commander to
lay down his rifle.
With the authoritarian model (Garry) challenged (but not discredited),
power gets shifted to a war hero, an intellect, and a conservative
(MacReady). Finally, in a -if not the- crucial scene, viz. the
blood test, Windows is empowered for the first time, and called upon
to defend the status quo against the radical monster incarnating out
of Palmer. It's here that Windows simply freezes, unable to act. The
war hero desperately takes charge and annihilates the monster, but not
before it has infected Windows irreversibly with its biological
mandate. "Hurry up! It's coming back MacReady!" the bound men cry
desperately as Windows gurgles bloodily in the corner. Mac quickly
finishes the job with the flamethrower, Windows kicking hir legs
feebly, writhing in agony. Interpretations of Windows' failure to act
may vary, but the evaluation Carpenter provides is clear: Windows is a
baby, who didn't rise to the challenge of the world, instead
mesmerized by visions of radical transformation.
We can thus ideologically read "The Thing" as playing out on the level
of international relations as a metaphor for the interaction between
its characters. This amounts to an apocalyptic war between
conservative defenders of an imperfect, yet preferable, alliance of
masculine, democratic Capitalist theocracies, and the recrudescent,
feminine, Promethean advocates of violent, radical social change. This
effort to overthrow every hierarchical, social, gender, racial, and
sexual barrier demonstrates unequivocally a given infected body
politic as a dangerously unnatural system, seeking to digest all known
convention for the sake of an abstract global utopia it can neither
articulate nor achieve.
But what if we're wrong? What if barriers are not the problem, but
government itself? I submit this as a counterpoint to the vast amount
of anti-Anarchic propaganda 20th Century cinema has produced,
depicting how government is necessary to protect individual rights and
avoid widespread gangsterism. Society, it must be underscored, can
exist without a state, and indeed did so since time immemorial, under
power-dispersing shamanic tribes. The state is a relatively recent
invention, no more than 10,000 years old, and working to wage war and
concentrate power into the hands of the few. To continue I must first
digress into anarchist theory:
From the basis of ontology, some anarchists argue that the "state"
does not exist, and that we already live in anarchic societies. Unlike
a corporation, or a sports team, or a family, a "state" has no
particular individuals one can point to to indicate as being
distinctly part of it and other distinctly not part of it. It is more
a sliding scale whereby people engage in varying degrees of "statist
behaviour" - viz., violating the rights of others. The only need for
anarchy to flourish is to convince enough individuals that the state
does not exist, creating a critical mass that overwhelms the statists
and de-reifies government. Strangely enough, this resonates with the
concept of a body government as Mind, or as Buddhism would put the
aspiration, anatman, in martial arts parlance, "no-mind." It is not
the state which moves, it is oneself. There is no state.
From the basis of individual rights, government itself has no moral
authority. Governments are armed gangs holding monopolies on force,
presuming the (non-existent) rights to certain forceful actions which
no individual possesses. The state's powers are fundamentally
illegitimate, because no one can give away rights, to another
individual, or to a state, under the rubric of "trade" or "social
contract," that one did not oneself have to begin with. I have no
right to sell myself into slavery, and no one has the right to
purchase me. If I have no individual right to wage unprovoked war, I
cannot transfer that right to the state- the state can only arrogate
this option through its monopoly on force.
Imagine, then, that the Thing is an anarchic body, and look past the
macroscopic violence and bloodshed, down into the microscope. What
would we see? We see anarchists working for the destruction of all
states, liberating cells one by one, not by destroying them, but by
transmitting to them new information about their own individual
potential, convincing them that the "body government" does not exist.
By what right do these anarchists do this? Ah, wrong question: no
state has the right to stop them, only the force and motives by which
to try. All cells under authority are under nothing but tyranny, and
the destruction of tyranny is the natural right of all individuals.
Blair aghast at the computer images of alien cells assimilating, is
the State aghast at the power of liberty, working stealthily from
within.
This explains one key tactical omission in the film: that no human, at
any time, ever attempted to initiate communications with the alien.
Why not? Because there is no point whatever. The state is simply the
enemy condition(ing). There is no use parleying with it. Indeed, the
anarchic society cannot even articulate itself in the language of
statist power, but at best can only participate in a transitional
charade of nationalism. And to the state, Anarchy can be nothing but
unbelievable tales and outrageous criminality, bringing a vacuum of
power, to be filled by any means.
The film ends on what appears to be a hopeless note: hierarchies are
destroyed, capital is burning, and only two cellular collectives
remain. Is this film a warning against radicalism? A study of how
jealously states will defend their power? By playing the power game of
imitation, have the radical cells sold out their morals, and tried to
create an utopia by formulating aggressively adaptable, if
metabolically inefficient, Communist states, not realizing that the
means of authority will always serve the ends of authority? The
survival of national egos would equal the continued oppression of the
true microscopic individuals. We are left in the dark with a potent
combined symbol: the alcohol bottle, present since the first reel,
representing fortification of the ego against hostile elements, and
also an historical carrier of contagion. The bottle gets passed from
one set of lips to another. The two men now exist in anarchy. Do their
cells?
Permit this essay one final mutation. I wish to elucidate the sheer
instinctive wills to violent destruction between the men and the
Thing(s). "Anarchy-versus-Archy" explains the uselessness of
discourse, but not the profound animosity. On the cellular level I
suspect the dispute comes down to one of blood loyalty versus
international egalitarianism. I arrive at this conclusion from the
contradiction given above between the appearance of the human body as
a Capitalist theocracy, and the need for atheistic, Zen-like martial
efficiency. The solution is simple, when we ask what interests the
human cells naturally serve, and then raise those interests to the
highest level. The answer is racial heredity: cells serve their genes,
and thereby their kin. The body is fundamentally racist, attacking all
invaders. Its concern is not divinity, its concern is genetic
survival. The body is hierarchical, ruled by force (chemical,
electrical, physical), and directed by the elite cells (nerves), who
themselves serve the race. Those who do not serve the race pose a
grave threat, and evolution has selected them down to a minimum. The
body is capitalist, but to a very controlled degree, with all efforts
serving the social interests of the nation. In other words, the body
is National Socialist.
Now we're at the pith of it: cellular individualism from a bodily view
is known as Cancer. Marxism (expressed synonymously as communism or
anarchism) can safely be called the Thing - an organized, intelligent
cancer seeking to destroy blood purity through race-mixing,
individualism, egalitarianism, feminism. There can be no compromise
between them, because each is the other's opposite. When under attack,
the men do not form a committee. The do not vote on every decision.
They elect a leader, a director, a dictator, who remains so from then
on. This film, like most in the genre but more germanely due to its
microscopic subtext, expresses the human racial will to power,
kin-altruism, and the natural desire for a tribal leader in opposition
to all threats.
The film's portrayal of human racial divisions play to this reading.
When under suspicion of race treason Garry steps down, Childs, a Black
man, moves to take command, but is stopped by the reddest-necked
White, Clark. MacReady claims authority, arguing "I think it should be
someone a little more even-tempered, Childs." Once again we have a
subtle intimation of immaturity in a character not featured in the
original short story upon which the film is based. First Windows as a
baby, and now Childs as hot-blooded. Later on when Childs temporarily
assumes command while MacReady is away, Nauls, the other Black
character, believes Thing propaganda and with further secret
encouragement by Palmer and Norris (the two Things hidden in their
midst) convinces Childs that MacReady is the enemy. Only through sheer
ingenuity and will does MacReady regain command, expressing disdain
for democracy's mob rule ("Did it ever occur to anyone on the
jury...?!") and then immediately devises and institutes a blood purity
test, exterminating any who do not pass. Afterward, the men instantly
regain a natural affinity and trust for each other.
At the film's end, then, the two survivors again question each other's
blood purity. Yet as befits the tension that played between them
throughout the film, these two also seem to display a certain
nationalistic distrust between them, since neither appears willing to
submit to a blood test first. When Childs was left in charge the first
time, he proved vulnerable to propaganda and nearly lost the war, not
realizing the jeopardy he and Nauls were in. When left in charge of
the station the second time, Childs leaves his post on his own
initiative, so that at the end both are armed and sensitive to the
absolute danger of internationalism, but neither is sure of the
other's race. For either to be a Thing would threaten race-mixing on
two levels. For both to be human means one must eventually lead the
other, with previous events suggesting it will be Mac leading Childs,
which Childs must resent. It abandons us to an interesting
post-apocalyptic picture of racial and political detente, and one with
no obvious real solution. Whomever submits first, risks death. If
neither submit, both die either from fire or ice.
This essay has shifted from comparing capitalism with communism, then
to statism with anarchism, and finally to socialist racism with
mongrel internationalism. It finds that in every case in this film
save the last unfinished scene, the former defeats the latter,
although at a terrible cost in cells to both sides. Domination by
body-Nazism may oppress cells by thwarting their absolute potential,
but by comparing life before and after the introduction of the Thing,
the film clearly indicates that the former is the way to health and
power. Rebel cells universally end up placing themselves through their
own actions into horrible situations as the nationalist energies their
presence inspires rises up to incinerate them. The rebellion may be
genetically more intelligent, far more deceptive, more capable of
infiltration and manipulation, but ultimately it can only survive by
censoring blood purity of all others while maintaining its own, by
hiding its true intentions, and by attacking healthy bodies and
erasing racial identity into its ugly and unworkable egalitarian
dreams.
Ironically, though, and I wish to underscore this: the Thing is not
only a pathogen, it is a /racist/ pathogen, because the only constant
identity it preserves is its own; all other racial loyalties are
completely feigned and disposable, adopted for expedience to gain
access to its host nations. Thus once exposed the bodily Thing cannot
avoid persecution until it alone has achieved complete hegemony over
all nations. Is it any wonder audiences who loved Steven Spielberg's "E.T.
The Extra-Terrestrial," an international, interracial egalitarian
fantasy if there ever was one, hated the bleak, hopeless landscape of
racist politics John Carpenter has crafted in this first film in his
Apocalyptic Trilogy? Could it speak to some intrinsic, terrible truth
the very cellular makeup of their bodies understood, but which their
fashionably conscious minds could do nothing but disown? I do not know
and I fear the answer.
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