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- For the Australian electro house music group known as Vandalism, see Vandalism (band).
Vandalism is the conspicuous defacement or destruction of a structure or symbol against the will of the owner/governing body. Historically, it has been justified by painter Gustave Courbet as destruction of monuments symbolizing "war and conquest". Therefore, it can be done as an expression of contempt, creativity, or both. Vandalism only makes sense in a culture that recognizes history and archaeology. Like other similar terms (Barbarian/barbary, and Philistine), the term Vandal was originally an ethnic slur referring to the Vandals, who sacked Rome in 455, but unlike the Berbers, the Vandals, like the Philistines, no longer exist as an identifiable ethnic group.
The term was coined in January 1794 during the French Revolution, by Henri Grégoire, constitutional bishop of Blois, in his report directed to the Republican Convention, where he used word Vandalisme to describe some aspects of the behaviour of the republican army. Gustave Courbet's attempt, during the 1871 Paris Commune, to dismantle the Vendôme column, a symbol of the past Napoleon III authoritarian Empire, was one of the most celebrated events of vandalism. Nietzsche himself would meditate after the Commune on the "fight against culture", taking as example the intentional burning of the Tuileries Palace on May 23 1871. "The criminal fight against culture is only the reverse side of a criminal culture" wrote Klossowski after quoting Nietzsche .
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Notes
- See Pierre Klossowski, Nietzsche and the Vicious Circle, first Chapter: What is the value of culture if those who are exploited by it destroy it? "En sorte qu'il nous faut être bien loin de vouloir, du haut de notre sentiment de nous-mêmes, imputer le crime d'un combat contre la culture exclusivement à ces malheureux. Je sais ce que cela veut dire: le combat contre la culture. (...) je me campronnai avec une conviction sérieuse à la valeur métaphysique de l'art, lequel ne saurait exister à cause des pauvres gens, mais doit accomplir des missions plus hautes. Mais, en dépit de mon extrême douleur, je n'étais pas en état de jeter la moindre pierre à ces profanateurs qui, pour moi, n'étaient que les suppôts de la culpabilité universelle, sur laquelle il y a beaucoup à méditer!" (Nietzsche quoted by Klossowski pp.29-30 French edition, who adds: "Le combat criminel contre la culture n'est lui-même que l'envers d'une culture criminelle" ("The criminal fight against culture is only the reverse side of a criminal culture")
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