i think this is a function of consumerism intersecting with calvinism in the west. like if you are defined by the media you consume and the media is defined by its author, then if the author is a Sinner™, so are you. i want to read a more in-depth analysis so if any of you have one please send it
Consuming media is a safe and permissible form of political expression. You can watch a movie about overthrowing empire just don’t attempt it in the real world. If your allowed range of political expression is making media, then media becomes your politics. Who you are, politically, is what media you consume. As your actual ability to participate in political action is crushed, capital allows you to sit in a corner and make believe. This is why there was so much radical art, music, poetry, etc coming out of the 60s and 70s. Actual protests were being squashed, capital made some concessions, and then stuffed all the radicals in a play pen and gave them a box of crayons. By the 80s and 90s, radicalism was just another brand and rebellion was a genre. If you are into really subversive art then you are a radical. If you don’t like that stuff then you are supporting the status quo. This is where we start to get these notions of attention and support being mystified, something that the internet would throw into overdrive. Just passively viewing something gives it power. This goes against Marxist materialism as it goes against the idea of practical activity. Viewing political actions as simply observing and making the right observations cannot lead to understanding or change.
This is how you end up with people obsessed with media choices and consumption. It also bleeds into other aspects. The internet turns everyone into a passive observer. You can observe anything anywhere at any time. It feels powerful. Couple that with a tiny range of political expression and you get your online left. You get people who obsess about the curation of online spaces and all the media that goes along with it. You have the veneration of passive observation where attention is the physical driver of politics. This is why you can easily catch people here talking about politics like it’s everyone clapping their hands for tinkerbell. If we just pay attention to the correct things, and pay attention hard enough, good things will happen. If we stop paying attention to the bad things, they wither and die. In some ways the structure of the internet does allow this to happen, like upvotes and social media algorithms that work on engagement. But that’s not reality. Passive observation does not move the needle. Social media companies abstract social relations much in the way capitalism abstracts them. They depend on everyone thinking that engagement is the same thing as Marx’s practical activity.
how do the people get so easily satisfied? i guess a lack of ideology combined with the concessions makes some movements satisfied with consuming? like how they painted that crosswalk in 2020 and a bunch of liberals immediately went back to brunch
i think this is a function of consumerism intersecting with calvinism in the west. like if you are defined by the media you consume and the media is defined by its author, then if the author is a Sinner™, so are you. i want to read a more in-depth analysis so if any of you have one please send it
Consuming media is a safe and permissible form of political expression. You can watch a movie about overthrowing empire just don’t attempt it in the real world. If your allowed range of political expression is making media, then media becomes your politics. Who you are, politically, is what media you consume. As your actual ability to participate in political action is crushed, capital allows you to sit in a corner and make believe. This is why there was so much radical art, music, poetry, etc coming out of the 60s and 70s. Actual protests were being squashed, capital made some concessions, and then stuffed all the radicals in a play pen and gave them a box of crayons. By the 80s and 90s, radicalism was just another brand and rebellion was a genre. If you are into really subversive art then you are a radical. If you don’t like that stuff then you are supporting the status quo. This is where we start to get these notions of attention and support being mystified, something that the internet would throw into overdrive. Just passively viewing something gives it power. This goes against Marxist materialism as it goes against the idea of practical activity. Viewing political actions as simply observing and making the right observations cannot lead to understanding or change.
This is how you end up with people obsessed with media choices and consumption. It also bleeds into other aspects. The internet turns everyone into a passive observer. You can observe anything anywhere at any time. It feels powerful. Couple that with a tiny range of political expression and you get your online left. You get people who obsess about the curation of online spaces and all the media that goes along with it. You have the veneration of passive observation where attention is the physical driver of politics. This is why you can easily catch people here talking about politics like it’s everyone clapping their hands for tinkerbell. If we just pay attention to the correct things, and pay attention hard enough, good things will happen. If we stop paying attention to the bad things, they wither and die. In some ways the structure of the internet does allow this to happen, like upvotes and social media algorithms that work on engagement. But that’s not reality. Passive observation does not move the needle. Social media companies abstract social relations much in the way capitalism abstracts them. They depend on everyone thinking that engagement is the same thing as Marx’s practical activity.
how do the people get so easily satisfied? i guess a lack of ideology combined with the concessions makes some movements satisfied with consuming? like how they painted that crosswalk in 2020 and a bunch of liberals immediately went back to brunch
I think SarahZ had one or a few videos about it. Something about problematic media, i think?
oh yeah i had one of those open in a tab somewhere and i forgot about it so thanks
There’s that legendary SigMarxism post about the thermian argument and all that. It’s probably what you’re looking for?
i can’t find it do you have it on hand?