Existence of State

I used to live in Chicago. I love Chicago, but it felt really hard to do things in Chicago, to get creative projects off the ground. Even if made something great, it never felt like there was movement that came with creation. You make a thing, and then it sits there. People, maybe many people, see it – its existence is validated, acknowledged. People like it. But a thing has such difficulty taking on true life there.

In Los Angeles, or New York, things feel different. Projects that are created in environments where people are more receptive to the idea of a project being “legitimate” are able to exist in a more “full” way. Even with less eyes, or less local cultural impact, a thing feels more “real” if it comes out of a more “major” cultural hub.

Is it that creative projects receive more love, and thus are allowed to grow in these places? How can a project (in Chicago for example) be acknowledged, but at the same time not be legitimate?

This week Ireland, Norway and Spain recognized Palestine, having not recognized it before. As the state of Israel continues to ravage Gaza, destroying Palestinian land, murdering Palestinians, attempting to rid Palestine of its identity, of its visibility, its Statehood becomes more “legitimized”.

But what does “legitimization” of a people mean? What defines the existence of an identity, a people, a place, a project, a thing? Does there need to be some level of consensus on the legitimacy or worthiness within the zeitgeist of the context in which it exists in?

Then, does legitimacy even matter? An Al Jazeera subheader states “Now 146 out of 193 UN members recognise Palestine, but what does that mean for Palestinians?”

From Edward Said’s After the Last Sky –

“We [Palestinians] turn ourselves into objects not for sale, but for scrutiny. People ask us, as if looking into an exhibit case, ‘What is it you Palestinians want?’ — as if we can put our demands into a single neat phrase…

Do we exist? What proof do we have? The further we get from the Palestine of our past, the more precarious our status, the more disrupted our being, the more intermittent our presence. When did we become “a people”? When did we stop being one? …

Are there really such things as Palestinian intimacy and embraces or are there simply intimacy and embraces, experiences common to everyone, neither politically significant nor particular to a nation or a people?”

There is a direct inverse correlation in of Palestine’s physical existence and its place in the collective awareness, particularly in the West. As Gaza is incrementally destroyed, there is a synchronized seizure of land and property in the West Bank.

So what defines a project’s existence? Its relevance and its ability to exist in the minds and hearts of a collective people? Is a state and a peoples’ destruction no different than a beloved bar or coffee shop posting a GoFundMe following their landlord’s rent hike? Does Palestine just need a really good fundraiser event?

Another possibility – this inverse correlation could point towards a future that the times are squeezing us towards – a unified people that exist post statehood. Seeking liberation tomorrow may not involve statehood at all. It may look like achieving self-determination, stability, and safety through other means, because in the world of tomorrow, statehood may not provide any of these things. An even more appealing future: statehood won’t provide any of these things because no one will have statehood — has statehood itself not been the greatest offender of creating dispossession? Can there be unification of people and collaboration to the point that every person, regardless of creed, race, color, can be liberated?

If the connection between the title of this post – “Existence of State”, the anecdote about the likelihood of projects becoming realized based on their environment, and a national (Palestinian) identity being not tied to a state aren’t clear let me reiterate.

The common thread is state – that is, the Latin status – to stand, or, “manner of standing, condition”. A concept’s status – its condition of existence (or stay standing) is dependent on a collective belief in the status of the thing as “alive”, “legitimate”. When we attribute physical language – “alive”, “standing” – to a concept (like an idea behind a project, an identity) it clearly employs our imagination. When we connect community into this, such as when it makes news that nations recognize these concepts, or that a project is worth talking about (assuming “talking about” involves multiple parties), it becomes clear that what we are talking about is collective imagination.

Thus – the existence of state is entirely dependent on collective imagination. Our collective imagination shapes the world, and our collective imagination must be employed in order to produce a better world, a world that provides us, the people, with the things that we need to live a life that we enjoy and brings us peace.