property vs. possession >> by adrian mihalache >> *spark-online9.0

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property vs. possession

by adrian mihalache

The property may be sacred according to some; a theft, according to others. Both camps refuse to realize it is a burden. It has to be maintained, nurtured, cared for, and defended. It makes you feel responsible and takes you down to earth when the inspiration calls you elsewhere. The eye of the needle is too small for the camel-property to pass through. (Contrary to Matthew 19:24, philologists have shown that it is not the camel which is supposed to pass through the eye of the needle--it would be downright ridiculous--but a camel-hair rope.)

The Rightful and the Just

The respect for property is a mark of civilization. A man of property is assumed to be proper, and concern with property suggests respect for propriety. The capitalist ideology founded the property rights on the habeas corpus, i. e. on the unquestionable authority over one's body. Indeed, the property is the natural extension of one's body, a body strained in the effort of producing it, or subject to the risk of mutilation when fighting for it. It is also the prize for the bright that managed to play skillfully the games of exchange. The right one has to possess what one has created, conquered, bought or inherited (since there is a natural continuity between my body and those of my ancestors) stems from the fundamental right one exerts over one's body, mind and soul, wherein lie power, patience, courage and talent. The respect for property is equivalent to the respect for the human being.

The laws that protect and guarantee the right to one's property provide the framework wherein the drama of possession is performed. This drama enacts the tense confrontation between the subject and the object, the desire that arises from it, and its most improbable fulfillment. Indeed, while the property is tangible and, as such, can be protected, possession is illusory; hence, deceptive. To what extent can we possess what we rightfully own? How long can we preserve what by chance we once possessed? These are questions which puzzle and obsess the righteous, as well as the just. Examining the issue of property in cyberspace may provide such questions, if not with appropriate answers, at least with some meaningful refinements.

The Site Collector

The cyber-surfer who falls into temptation while exploring a site thinks more often than not that he can fulfill his desire for possession by simple commands such as copy-and-paste or save-as, thus creating, almost painlessly, his own collection. This will be hosted at his own site, much in the same way connoisseurs filled their homes with precious acquisitions in other times. However, the appropriation of multimedia information, picked here and there, points to the failure of possession in a more clear-cut way than art collecting ever has done.

"You treat me like an object, like a painting from your collection," cries out Lady Hamilton (as portrayed by Vivien Leigh in Alexander Korda's 1941 patriotic movie). The title character is a "new woman" in revolt against aristocratic values. "You probably ignore how much I cherish my paintings," replies the dignified husband. The connoisseur is sensitive to the energetic emanations of the works of art and wants to be exposed to their daily influence. The property of a hand-made artistic object is akin to the property over a prestigious body. The painting and the sculpture preserve the corporal imprint of the movements of their creator, the surge of his or her energy. Unlike the case of the manufacturer's workmanship, here one deals with a more rare, highly gifted body to be possessed. The amateur desires the artist's body in order to expose himself to the personal energetic aura the object is still capable to emanate.

We encounter nothing of the kind in the case of the site collector. The information he gathers--as delightful as it can be--has no intimate relationship to the cyber-smith's body, so no interpersonal interaction occurs. Moreover, the possession relationship is reversed. Exploring a site made up of chunks selected from the Web suggests a fragile identity of its owner, molded and fashioned by the informational objects he had idly selected. The appropriation of information is no longer a sign of power, since it does not involve either fight or payment; it is no longer the occasion for self-improvement, since it does not trigger any intimate encounter. Once the identity of the collector is defined by his choices, it results that the property has come to possess the possessor, in the sense Blake uncovered when claiming, "One becomes what one beholds." Once the relationship to information is mostly visual, devoid of corporal involvement, the dissolution of self-ownership is almost certain.

When Property Becomes Possession

There is, however, a means to turn property into a possession: by assimilation. I undoubtedly possess what I eat, since this raw material becomes part of me, part of my body, my energy, my life. The desiring is overcome by the devouring; the food is initially destroyed, but then it is transmuted. I possess what I eat not because I sweep it off from being, but because I transform it into my being. It is easy to extend this pattern of relationship to other objects of desire than food. One is thirsty for knowledge, hungry for information. One devours a book, swallows many a story, hunts for advice, and absorbs instruction. In such cases, the destruction is nonexistent; possession involves only symbolic deconstruction, which leaves the symbolic object intact, while providing the "bricks" for another object to be constructed from. A book is not possessed by buying it and putting in on a shelf, nor by reading it with delight and immersion (in this case the book possesses you), but by penetrating its meanings, weighing up its partial truths and making it obsolete by writing another one.

The same holds for cyber-possession, which transfigures cyber-property. The cyber-surfer who does not get immersed in the delightful diversity of multimedia, but keeps his awareness alive by critical appraisal has the opportunity to reach possession by disregarding property. In the French 17th century remake of the Odyssey, the hero claims he is a little bit of all that he had met. The cyber-surfer is also a selection of sites. However, if the fragments gathered are sufficiently small and their re-composition innovative and meaningful, the wondrous transmutation of cyber-appropriation into cyber-possession becomes possible.