HyperNormalisation?
December 10, 2020 2:30 AM   Subscribe

Do we have retreated into a simplified, and often completely fake version of the world? According to social theorists Elena Louisa Lange and Joshua Pickett-Depaolis a dramaturgical approach is the best to describe what is going on : "the authoritarian excesses of left-liberal elite thinking however, find their logic in the need to construct a spectacle of mass consensus around continued neoliberal restructuring through the deployment of an alleged ‘fascist’ threat.". On the last number of Crisis and Critique, about The Year of the Virus. Very lengthy reads ahead.

From Elena Louisa Lange and Joshua Pickett-Depaolis's article:

"In the liberal left imaginary, Trump’s violations of the right to asylum or possible post-Brexit restrictions of immigration become Nazi-like atrocities to be fought whatever the cost. EU concentration camps in Libya? Not so much. Trump’s Twitter tirades against protesters are seen as Klan-like outbursts, Obama’s dismissal of protesters as “thugs” is forgotten.

Just as populism substitutes for an absent fascism in the paranoid imaginary of the liberal left, it in turn plays the same role for its right wing partner in crime. Within this logic, woke capitalism is denounced as “cultural Marxism” and investment in green energy is abhorred as the first step in a transition to communism. The only thing lacking in this theatre production is authentic antagonism. Not only is the capital relation itself beyond question, the modifications of its accumulation regime open to consideration remain narrowly constricted.

Even on the seemingly contested terrain of immigration, the differences are more apparent then real. If Trump’s wall is merely a finishing touch on what was already one of the most militarized borders in the world, the demand to “abolish ICE” is an act of rhetorical extremism which in practice constitutes a call to - restore the INS. Likewise, Corbyn calls for 10000 more policemen on the streets while Johnson in power nationalizes the railways.

If the Chinese ruling class is compelled by its mode of exercising hegemony to conceal its factional differences behind an image of monolithic unity, Western democracy conceals its monolithic unity behind an increasingly dramatic image of existential combat.

Like a television show with falling ratings, the managers of democracy resort to outrageous plot twists to hold on to a diminishing body of viewers. However, despite their best efforts the viewers increasingly recognise that the wild hijinks on the screen correspond to nothing in their own increasingly precarious lives and change the channel. The working class non-voter is essentially a realist."
posted by - (16 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: This isn't going very well, sorry. -- goodnewsfortheinsane



 
so I guess we now know the names of the wise man in the classic dril tweet: 'the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron"'

The class of criticism employed here, that it is a hypocrisy to be outraged over Trump's concentration camps but not outraged over the EU's in Libya, and thus any criticism that people shouldn't be running concentration camps is based on ideological boogeymen rather than principles, is intellectually dishonest. (I mean for one thing leftists are infamous for attacking their allies just as viciously as their enemies.) But there can be plenty of reasons that people can think that something is Bad and shouldn't exist, but also is not their priority, or another target is easier because getting allies for it is easier.

The intellectual sleight-of-hand here is the idea that left-liberals (what a conflation) are at their core authoritarian, raising the spectre of communism, when for the past thirty years liberal movements have largely flown the flag of neoliberalism, and leftist movements have been shaped primarily by the failures of Soviet Russia.

Research has consistently shown that in recent decades, at least, authoritarians tend to support right wing politics. And what we have seen in several countries around the world that penetration of broadcast TV and the internet has led to a new breed of authoritarian, one who feels no need to control the message because it's far more effective to make it impossible for people to know what truth is. This isn't 'paranoia' - we have plenty of examples before Trump, before Brexit.
posted by Merus at 3:23 AM on December 10, 2020 [27 favorites]


^this

TFA is classic theory both-sidesism from that unreconstructed netherhell of academia that believes everything went wrong after '68, and we should have stopped there.
posted by prismatic7 at 3:35 AM on December 10, 2020 [5 favorites]


I feel like this post is some sort of elaborate troll?
posted by Justinian at 3:54 AM on December 10, 2020 [10 favorites]


This looks interesting, let's start reading the abstract:

After months of an unprecedented global economic shutdown in the spring of 2020, whose political orchestration by elite liberals and conservatives kept the world in suspense...

Very clear framing. Was the lockdown "orchestrated by elites" or was it simply "implemented by governments?" I guess you want to set a tone early.

... it all suddenly seems like a memory from the past: within days, the same liberal elites, now hitching themselves to the riots against racist police violence in the US, put social distancing measures on the line.

In light of 3000 deaths a day and continued lockdown measures months later, this has not aged well as an analysis, even before we mention that the effect of the protests on virus spread was widely discussed and debated at the time and has been studied since.

Also, do not miss that we have switched from "elite liberals and conservatives" to the real target: "the liberal elites."

The volatility of the liberal imaginary, which can be seen in the view of the police as the beneficial state enforcer of the “Stay at Home, Save Lives“ -policy in one minute, and a “structurally racist“ institution in the next, is not incidental, however.

This sentence makes two primary claims, both of which are false:

1. That the police were seen as beneficial enforcers, saving lives. The lockdown was not primarily achieved through police action. Indeed, police played a very small role.
2. That criticism of the police represents "volatility," or a change from #1. Even if #1 was true, there is absolutely zero tension between having the role of "state enforcer" and being "structurally racist."

Honestly, I am tired already.
posted by Nothing at 4:06 AM on December 10, 2020 [22 favorites]


Very lengthy reads ahead.

Okay.

"the authoritarian excesses of left-liberal elite thinking ..."

And I should bother with these very lengthy reads why? This quote fails the "SJW used pejoratively" filter about as hard as anything Jordan Peterson ever wrote; why should I bother investing the time? Is there anything these people say that hasn't been said, at length, in endless bad-faith screeds before theirs?
posted by flabdablet at 4:10 AM on December 10, 2020 [9 favorites]


I would like the author of this article to please define the terms "left," "liberal" and "neoliberal."
posted by Faint of Butt at 4:13 AM on December 10, 2020 [6 favorites]


It's not the media that convinced me Republicans are violent authoritarian fascists - it's the crazy ass violent fantasy rants I've been subjected to by more conservative acquaintances.

And I share enough values with them to know why - they have to buy into increasingly wild and delusional stories to continue believing that they are the good guys and not, in fact, people who screwed up so badly in their political choices and hurt America so much that their actual level of patriotism and loyalty to this country is somewhere south of the average ISIS supporter's.
posted by Zalzidrax at 4:18 AM on December 10, 2020 [9 favorites]


I think this content is too advanced for metafilter. It requires a PhD, everyone else will just be projecting their own neoliberal fears on whatever is said or not said. Pick any random pdf from that list, it will trigger the same responses regardless of the fact that this collection of essays sources authors from humanities university departments around the world, and thus do not deserve any intellectual respect. Leftists suck.
posted by polymodus at 4:21 AM on December 10, 2020


I think this content is too advanced for metafilter. It requires a PhD

Really? Any PhD will do? I had no idea that getting a doctorate in any subject involved an initiation into subtle, abstruse intellectual mysteries far beyond what a mere holder of a master's degree could comprehend.
posted by Halloween Jack at 4:55 AM on December 10, 2020 [10 favorites]


Just to be clear, is this a PhD in the specific subject matter that is required or will any PhD do? I don't want to read something my brain is not prepared to handle.
posted by each day we work at 4:58 AM on December 10, 2020 [6 favorites]


Even on the seemingly contested terrain of immigration, the differences are more apparent then real. [...] Likewise, Corbyn calls for 10000 more policemen on the streets while Johnson in power nationalizes the railways.

I can't speak for other places, but it's surely no secret or surprise that in the UK there is are limits to the range of options which politicians believe their potential voters will entertain as ideas. And some of the specific challenges have popular or pragmatic solutions even where they are not optimal. You will rarely lose too many net votes by calling for more bobbies on the beat, and the risks/rewards and auction process in the rail franchising model the DfT have used demonstrably do not work as hoped, taking it back in-house (ie nationalising the Train Operating Company) is by far the quickest practical solution.
posted by plonkee at 5:01 AM on December 10, 2020


I think this content is too advanced for metafilter.

I dunno, I got to the part where it said “The only thing lacking in this theatre production is authentic antagonism” and thought about Heather Hayer and George Floyd and 545 children taken from their families by ICE and the growing trend of white-supremacist extremism, not to mention the almost 300,000 people dead of institutional negligence, and I wondered what counts as “authentic antagonism”, to the obviously-very-comfortable writer of this piece.

I can’t say I find your argument that we might not be not be smart enough to appreciate this reactionary word salad particularly compelling.
posted by mhoye at 5:05 AM on December 10, 2020 [20 favorites]


Pick any random pdf from that list, it will trigger the same responses...

I don't think so. The posted text is garbage for numerous reasons, and doesn't invite closer inspection of the article. On the other hand, Slavoj Zizek has an article listed as well, which begins:

The final words of the dying Big Boss from Hideo Kojima's legendary video game Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots are today more relevant than ever: “It's not about changing the world. It's about doing our best to leave the world the way it is.”1 They are relevant, but with a new twist added: with draughts, forests burning, and the virus destroying our daily lives, with poverty as the result of the new riches, we have to change the world radically if we want to have at least a chance of leaving it the way it is. If we do nothing, our world will soon become unrecognizable to its inhabitants.

Slavoj, for example, is not very popular on Metafilter, but this is objectively way better writing.
posted by Alex404 at 5:13 AM on December 10, 2020


Do we have retreated into a simplified, and often completely fake version of the world?

Yes, my world is simplified. No, it's not fake.

I take good care to curate a healthy world view which reflects how the world is, and make a lot of effort to ensure that my net effect on the world is positive. I resent the fact that I am lumped with people who are actively destructive. To be honest, I'm pretty resentful even of the people who make no effort.
posted by ambrosen at 5:15 AM on December 10, 2020


Pick any random pdf from that list, it will trigger the same responses regardless of the fact that this collection of essays sources authors from humanities university departments around the world, and thus do not deserve any intellectual respect.

I may not have a PhD—merely a puny Master's degree—but I'm sufficiently informed to recognize this as a run-on sentence containing a subject-verb disagreement.
posted by Faint of Butt at 5:36 AM on December 10, 2020


This post requires a Ph.D in knowing that liberals aren't leftists. Go back and re-read with this new understanding.
posted by Space Coyote at 5:43 AM on December 10, 2020 [4 favorites]


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