Networks, Society, and Polis: Epistemological Approaches on Mediatization

Mario Carlón 232 It is what defines the specificity of the case: the mean- ings that were given to the images, the misunderstandings they unfolded. Within the framework of a non-linear perspective of communication, it is significant to note that not only did CFK post an image whose origin she probably did not know, nor did she know that it had been generated by Santos Vargas, or either that it had been adulterated. However, it is also interesting to note that none of the participants in the debate, who treated her as a liar and showed that the images were apocryphal, knew who generated the image to which they referred. That is, they accused her of being a liar but ignoring their ignorance, a situa- tion that does not seem to be an ideal condition for the construc- tion of knowledge or to point out a fault to the other. It is this phenomenon that we call overflowing circulation , considering it particular of our contemporaneity: we, subjects, are immersed in a complex magma in which we are always about to meet the same situation of CFK or the ones who challenged her. In this context, two enunciators stand out: Santos Vargas and Perucca. In a particular dimension, Santos Vargas predicts the reaction of the media that he challenges. It is what can be said of the statement “Sword of the basic subscription: let me see beyond Monday 16 .” Sword of the basic subscription, as we anticipated, re- fers to Clarín: it is a medium that, more than practicing journal - ism, is a sword 17 . What he predicts is that not only the programs of Channel 13 but also those of Channel 2 will critically compare Santa Cruz with Venezuela from the events that occurred on the 22nd. But, in the best of cases, it is a partial prediction because he never could have foreseen, for example, that his image was going to be shared by the President, and everything that this circulation was going to generate, including this article. 16 There is a double reference to Clarín in Santos Vargas’ composition. On the one hand, the logo of the newspaper is embedded in the upper part. On the other hand, the reference to the basic subscription also refers to the group since, although the newspaper is the emblem from which the holding company was built, the newspaper is part of a multimedia whose main business is the cable television service that charges a “basic subscription”. 17 One of the main journalists of the newspaper stated in a note published in Sep - tember 2018 that during the Kirchner years they practiced “war journalism”. https://www.perfil.com/noticias/medios/julio-black-periodismo-de-guerra- clarin-kirchnerismo-cambiemos-ideas.phtml.