No Freedom of the People without Indiscipline[1]

“In the days before, before all that, it was contentment, life without having to explain it”[2]

It is when liberty becomes a tightrope act that all of a sudden what arises are many singular ways of coping with the real which marks the body. The chance to create a sinthomatic way, and by the same token to risk losing it.

Each of the texts in this My Way, from that of Vlassis Skolidis to Sergio Caretto, as well as Flavia Hofstetter and Solenne Albert, places an emphasis on the singular way finagled by each subject in the meanderings of his jouissance as rooted in the body. Although current medical trends tend towards the compartmentalisation of the body, considered en masse with respect to the programming of healthcare treatments, Dr Christèle Le Gouill – medical consultant in a chemotherapy department – interviewed by Aurélien Bomy, insists that that each body must be considered One by One. This is the point on which Dr. Pietro Bartolo, who does us the honour of participating in our Plenary Session at PIPOL, is also fervent about: “each body testifies to us of the tragedy of an interminable voyage”[3].

To dare to carry this singular voice; the only path through life, the only way in terms of desire… What if this is precisely the indiscipline which Georges Beranos speaks about? And not the refusal to give voice to that which would perhaps further increase the order of provocation, of which one can discern certain connections with the norm.

This leads Pierre Parlant, in his excellent text “The Lethal Jouissance of Fascism”, to ask “why in the place of opting for an adventure of an existence which is continually constructed, the desire of a subject, a whole crowd gets off on a fascination towards death (…) wallowing in a lethal jouissance, that of beings who chose not to be, save to glorify hate and to work for death”.

The ethics of psychoanalysis invites us to free ourselves from this lethal jouissance and in treating the jouissance on the side of the living, as an interface on the path of desire, to make our way outside the norms.

Translated by Raphael Montague

[1] The title is inspired by the following quotation from Georges Beranos: “it takes a lot of indiscipline to make a free people”.

[2] Faye, Gaël., Petit pays, Grasset, 2016.

[3] Bartolo, Pietro., Les larmes de sel, JC Lattès, 2017.