The Troll’s Wager
November 23, 2013 11:43 AM   Subscribe

[T]he parrhesia in social media may set individuals against one another in pointless struggles for authenticity while precluding them from uniting politically to fight for shared goals against those remote elites. The satisfaction of those games, the “self” and “truth” that emerges from those compulsions [...] make the present tolerable or even pleasurable while altering nothing about a general condition that makes people feel overburdened, depressed, precarious, excluded, humiliated. There is a pale satisfaction in making a limited truth in the moment, even if it has no effect on the distribution of power or the way one is known by society.
In a series of recent posts at The New Inquiry, Rob Horning writes about the construction of the self in social media as novelistic pleasure, ego depletion, and Foucauldian truth game.
posted by RogerB (12 comments total) 41 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is ridiculous. For me, I think social media causes.....

In all seriousness, this is really interesting. Thanks.
posted by glaucon at 11:51 AM on November 23, 2013 [1 favorite]


We still suffer the most from idealism, where we are personally expected to improve in one way or another, and not our systems.
posted by Brian B. at 12:30 PM on November 23, 2013 [3 favorites]


Horning ends the ego depletion post with this:
Information coming in at an overwhelming rate kills pleasure. It turns pleasure into processing, which leads directly to the “machine zone” that Natasha Dow Schüll associates with video gambling. This is why efforts to accelerate consumption should always be regarded with suspicion — these do not help us achieve more; they revert us to efficiency-seeking drones. The remedy for the corrosive effects of convenience cannot be simply searching for something even more convenient.

The human’s capacity for rational choice, such as it is, is an alibi for capitalism precisely because it is the facet of humanity it strives to overcome. “Semiocapitalism,” to use Berardi’s term, has discovered that the best way to defeat rational choice is to solicit it as much as possible. Social media are on the same track.
posted by spamandkimchi at 1:12 PM on November 23, 2013 [11 favorites]


This is interesting. Thanks for posting.
posted by benito.strauss at 1:24 PM on November 23, 2013 [1 favorite]


Yep, enjoying reading these. Thanks.
posted by i_am_joe's_spleen at 2:10 PM on November 23, 2013


im banging my head against the monitor right now, trying to get these words to fit inside my eyeballs. Maybe I'll take another shot after dinner?
posted by rebent at 3:11 PM on November 23, 2013 [2 favorites]


rebent, i think this is the cogent bit: "the best way to defeat rational choice is to solicit it as much as possible."
posted by mwhybark at 5:00 PM on November 23, 2013






Sorry, Venkman. I am favourited beyond the capacity for rational choice.
posted by fullerine at 2:06 AM on November 24, 2013 [1 favorite]


Some really fascinating articles in the FPP and comments both, as well as the links within them. Even little nuggets like how Pamela models the then-novel (ha!) concept of what a reader is got me thinking. Bookmarking merrily away.
posted by comealongpole at 3:58 PM on November 25, 2013


In a series of recent posts at The New Inquiry, Rob Horning writes about the construction of the self in social media as novelistic pleasure, ego depletion,

Related post about the Tierney article which Horning mentions.
posted by homunculus at 12:03 PM on December 6, 2013


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