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Bridging the Various Sections of Cambodia, A book for people who find television too slow

P.J. Worsfold, 4/4/2005 An argument is most effective when the sum of its total arrives at something greater than the sum of its parts. By challenging the novel's traditional structure and purpose, Brian Fawcett's Cambodia, A book for people who find television too slow demonstrates this point masterfully. Considered on their own, the novel's thirteen short stories of the top section and continuing narrative of the bottom section offer both insightful conclusions on the inner workings of our social structures and shocking factual data on what we have done in the name of these structures. However, the thrust of Fawcett's work is not to offer statistics and truisms about our capacity for greed and the evils of television, nor is it to shed light on government conspiracy. Fawcett is after something much more concrete in Cambodia. He states his position explicitly in the following, "Cambodia is the subtext of the Global Village, and that the Global Village has had its purest apotheosis yet in Cambodia."(Fawcett 54) To understand this, the reader must consider how, by using recurring motifs and imagery throughout the numerous settings of the novel, Fawcett is systematically building his argument. Fawcett suggests that the control exerted on society through the mass media of the Global Village is simply the latest manifestation of an imperial spirit that has followed humanity throughout history. Furthermore, Fawcett posits that the nature and severity of this control is such that it parallels the events of Pol Pot's Khmer Rouge regime in Cambodia. Fawcett's novel strives to inspire reflection, question, and ultimately action in two unique ways. In a literal sense, the words of the book achieve what it strives for by presenting interrelated observations and arguments on themes of imperialism, the Global Village, and self-determination. In a conceptual sense, Fawcett's writing and the book itself ultimately achieve what is strived for by breaking from the introspective mold of the novel and thus artistic complicity in what the Global Village represents. Fawcett posits that the Global Village is simply a new form of the Imperium, which is a generic term he uses to describe any imperial structure. In Cambodia, Fawcett argues that the Imperium is a societal construct that has maintained many of the same characteristics since the time of the ancient Greeks. To understand the implications of this, we must understand Fawcett's take on imperialism. The various parts of Cambodia set forth an important theme in imperialistic actions. What starts off as a profit motive in "bringing progress and civilization to the darkness"(37) inevitably degenerates into exploitation, control, and violence. Fawcett illustrates this first with King Leopold II of Belgium's quest for rubber in the Congo Free State, which "gave new and brutal definition to the saying L'etat, c'est moi."(26) This theme is again noted in the Greek invasion of Troy, in which "the Greeks needed to put

an end to the powerful city of Troy because it sat directly in the path of all the best trade routes to Asia Minor."(179) Fawcett's connection of imperialism to violence is troubling in that it ultimately begs the question of whether profit motive is only a veil for humanity's tendency toward genocide. Something which Fawcett sees as "a visible manifestation of elements in human polity that appear to seek expression as relentlessly and resourcefully as the more kindly impulses to sing, [and] to paint."(95) Fawcett's characterization of the Imperium continues through various observations on imperial treatment of colonial subjects. To refer back to the Congo Free State, if a colony offers a resource, it is gathered as quickly and effectively as possible and with little regard for indigenous concerns. In a case such as the American involvement in Vietnam and in Cambodia, where a colony is only of strategic importance, the Imperium may institute a scorched earth policy. The result of such action is land no longer suitable for extracting anything of value. In either case, the colony's social result is "a breakdown of tribal structure and morale"(28) amounting to either physical death or the death of freedom coupled with complete dependence on the Imperium. The latter of which Fawcett grimly illustrates in the following before and after observation of Cambodia. Before the American bombing of Cambodia, "90% of its seven million people [were] engaged in agricultural activities."(110) By the end of American bombings, the country was completely dependent on "the United States for both its military and civil survival. Its two million refugees were living on American rice."(110) The actions of the Imperium are indeed brutal throughout all stages of colonization. Nothing summarizes the unchanging imperial condition quite like Saint Paul's rigmarole of chasing "stupid fucking desert rats" who "are all the same: doctrinaire, militaristic, and woefully underequipped."(43) However, to strengthen the tie between the Imperium and the Global Village and perhaps to open the door to change, Fawcett includes various examples of how the imperial instinct is protean and yet vulnerable to the new paradigm it creates. The tactics of the empire change to meet the needs of the day and bring with them the end to one world and the start to a new. This pivotal theme is the basis for the Global Village's place in the logical evolution of the Imperium. In Cambodia, Fawcett illustrates how Odysseus split perception and intention to "conceive a trick like the Trojan Horse."(146) Odysseus' tactics effectively changed the rules of engagement and reshaped Greek consciousness into "an entity distinct and separate from nature."(146) Moving the mind outside of the agreed upon rules of nature was blasphemous at the time, but it was a success. No one had ever used blasphemy "in cold blood and never as a political tactic."(146) Yet, as Lowry points out, this new sense of self-awareness was ultimately the Greeks' undoing. Unable to come to terms with the change in reality that they were responsible for, the Greeks were left "navel-gazing as the Dorian hordes overran them."(160) Fawcett's interpretation of the Trojan Horse story both from a strategic and metaphoric sense is crucial to achieving an understanding of the American experience in Vietnam and the emergence of the Global Village as the new Imperium.

Nationalism and ideology fueled the imperialism and politics of the Cold War and it was under this guise that the United States became involved with war in Vietnam. Unlike the Greeks, in this imperialist episode, American strategy did not face a physical obstacle; it faced one of public sentiment and a need for justification. The Imperium had to come up with a new trick. The result was the American political machine's domino metaphor, which was used to instill fear and to justify involvement in the war. The old imperialist instinct drove the war; it only used a different tact to express itself. The second half of the Trojan Horse metaphor is demonstrated when one considers how it was nationalism and ideology that ultimately won the war, but not for the Americans. The imperialists were defeated by the strategy that they created. This event marked a change in imperialistic strategy and the introduction of "a process of transformation that seems intent on effecting the disappearance of ideology and of nationalism."(90) The logical leap required to move from the Imperium to the Global Village is quite small when one moves over Fawcett's bridges. "Everything changes. And it does not change at all."(92) According to Cambodia, the new Imperium is the Global Village, its rulers are corporations and its Trojan Horse is technology, specifically mass communications technology. "The body of the old Imperium has been disemboweled"(160) and the new Imperium "has been made invisible."(161) The Global Village demonstrates the ubiquitous imperial profit motive as well as the subsequent violence. While previous empires controlled through physical presence and fear, the Global Village controls by lulling its subjects into passive obedience through the destruction of memory and individuality. To appreciate the Global Village as the imperial power that Fawcett defines it as, one can compare the previously mentioned characteristics of imperialism against those of the Global Village. For instance, Fawcett provides British Columbia as an example with which to explore the Imperium's treatment of its colonies. He points out that that the province has seen its "resources carelessly removed, the profits extracted and removed to distant locations."(150) Furthermore, Cambodia asks the reader to consider the imperial dependency that the Global Village has created amongst its subjects. Rather than bombs from above, Fawcett's Global Villagers receive televised manna from satellites above. Yet, this manna does not nourish them, it "diminishes and humiliates them, by presenting images of impossibly finished and stylish landscapes; images of men who are virile, welldressed, urbane and violent; women who are beautiful, sexually alluring, [and] remote in their polished perfections."(170) The new Imperium controls and perpetuates itself by teaching its colonials to purchase and in so doing it creates "an entire new class of poor a working class with middle class values that make it impossible to admit or even recognize the poverty they suffer from."(114) The Imperium of old kept control and order through military might. The Global Village uses similar techniques, but it has modified them for the times through the power of mass communications. With media coverage, the Imperium can spin conflict into justification of its own existence and an opportunity to tell us "that the authorities are on top of the situation and that everything being done is fine and orderly and rational."(13-14) Through

the mass media, the Global Village has arrived at a new and seemingly contradictory definition of violence. The relentless onslaught of televised violence, which shows death from every possible perspective, can both kill a person's very ideas and render a million deaths inconsequential. Fawcett points out that the multiplicity of violence in the Global Village reaches us, "but none of the stories we hear quite add up. They just pile up, [which is] a different kind of assault all together."(187) The Khmer Rouge revolution was a pativattana, a "return to the past"(68) and the Global Village is a push forward, with steadfast reliance on technology. Pol Pot's regime is, in at least some ways, the response to imperialism and the Global Village represents the latest manifestation of imperialism. Yet the similarities in the administration of the two social phenomena are strikingly similar. The power created by these diametrically opposed phenomena, united by common technique summarizes the progression of Fawcett's argument and adds a sense or urgency to his position. Cambodia is replete with similarities between the actions of the Khmer Rouge and the Global Village, but most striking are the ways in which both groups attempted, or are attempting to, homogenize their citizens and strip away the complexities of society. Among other things, this involves an attack on memory. These actions share with them the desire to "obliterate particularity, direction and local memory, creating in its spread a single focus on the monadic truth"(63) The Khmer Rouge wanted to return to a time of ancient Khmer glory, where all that existed was natively Cambodian, at least insofar as the Khmer Rouge defined it. An example of how Pol Pot's regime tried to accomplish this was the whitewash of Phnom Penh. Upon the Khmer Rouge liberation of the city all signs were painted over in white in an attempt to erase all that was not Khmer. However, the fact that the signs were painted over, and not removed, or replaced is especially telling. The Khmer were not trying to create new memories, they were trying to wipe it out all together. They created icons that said nothing, knowing that people without capacity to remember are easily manipulated. We see this same action now in the Global Village. Fawcett describes our modern landscape as the "Planet of the Franchises"(58) where nature and our relationship to it, has been flattened into "bizarre patterns of iconographic images."(57) Fawcett suggests that we are being beaten into submission by this never-ending blur of images, which compels us only to purchase. As we no longer see anything we can attach a unique memory to, our capacity to remember fades away and we slip ever closer toward unquestioning consumption. The "grinning Bodhisattva that communicates everything and knows nothing"(201) is an apt metaphor for the state of mass communications in the Global Village as Fawcett sees it. Cambodia suggests that in order to break free of the media's grip we need ask questions of it in order to see its true nature. Fawcett articulates this well through the actions of his narrator, who after seeing the Challenger explode for the umpteenth time reaches an epiphany. The narrator questions what he sees and finds himself "looking through the television set, and seeing how the television system was shaping the story."(170) Fawcett's observations on imperialism further reassert the power we have to

overcome our oppressors. He notes the historical truth that "the human will to achieve self-determination apparently cannot be defeated."(130) Cambodia's conclusions suggest that by acknowledging the reality of the Global Village, we may suffer a loss of innocence, but we will ultimately come to a place of understanding and power over that which currently oppresses us. Fawcett's Tibetan prayer "be lamps unto yourself"(105) articulates this sentiment perfectly. In Cambodia, Fawcett positions himself as a guerilla, an insurgent against the Global Village. His work points out that the Imperium is ultimately trapped by its own metaphor and that the cracks in our Imperium are beginning to show. Through likening the Global Village to the Khmer Rouge, Cambodia not only gives the reader a sense for the brutality we are capable of, it underscores the importance of learning from the mistakes of history. The Khmer Rouge came to power "without a program of reconstruction,"(184) they were a horrific response to a horrific action. If society today is subservient to the Global Village as Fawcett suggests, then those involved in the insurgency must begin to ask the right questions and use what they learn to build a plan for reconstruction. Otherwise, the imperial cycle will simply renew itself under a different set of rules.

Work Cited
Fawcett, Brian. Cambodia, A book for people who find television too slow. Vancouver: Talonbooks, 1986.

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