Secrets

Good grief... it seems to be a pretty common opinion in the blogs I have skimmed so far that the Deleuze and Guattari reading was challenging. And my opinion is no exception; a large portion of it was definitely over my head.

Yet, I found some very interesting points within the reading (... at least from the parts I actually understood). My favorite part of the essay was Memories of the Secret where they discuss what a secret actually is. I liked how they described that a secret is not defined only by what it contains but by how it is perceived, and by how it spreads. Anybody who finds out and perceives a secret must also be a secret meaning a blackmailer isn't just going to go up to the person they are blackmailing and say "Hi, I'm blackmailing you." As well the secret inevitably spreads. When Deleuze and Guattari describe "the secret as secretion" (287) I was reminded of poison, slowly spreading through a population and I thought that was really interesting because often secrets poison the minds of the people who know them, either through guilt or through greed.

I also really liked the way Deleuze and Guattari describe the contrast between how men and women keep secrets. Men are "knights of the secret" (289) while women are essentially, according to Delueze and Guattari's argument, gossips. However, they spin this gossiping in a positive light; while women often end up disclosing a secret, they do so in such an innocent manner that people don't really seem to notice. While I am okay with, but not thrilled about, many of the stereotypes that come with being a female and feminine (I like pink, I like makeup, I like dancing, I can be ditzy but not always) being labeled a gossip simply because of my sex has always kind of stung me. I mean I can keep a secret. Yet Deleuze and Guattari almost empower being a gossip and they seem to have a very valid point. All secrets come out in the end. Maybe it's better to just tell the secret and get the reveal over with than to let it consume you.

"Some people can talk, hide nothing, not lie: they are secret by transparency, as impenetrable as water, in truth incomprehensible. Whereas the others have a secret that is always breached, even though they surround it with a thick wall or elevate it to an infinite form" (290).