The Matrix vs Ghostbusters

[version]

I get that sense of performance when I see footage of the protests too, but a protest is a performance. You're communicating and presenting something by protesting. It does feel as though people are particularly aware of how they'll look on social media, the news and so on though when they take a knee in front of the police lines or whatever.

The conversation in the limo between Packer and Kinski in Cosmopolis is something I come back to again and again. That there's nowhere you can go to be on the outside. There is no outside. Every possible form of resistance has already been classified and absorbed by the market.

 

[version]

BLM is a marketing strategy for businesses now. It's already being neutralised.

 

[droid]

Of course, the very idea that protest, activism etc are performative, virtue signalling etc. is essentially a right wing tactic of delegitimisation, ties in with Rand's ideas about altruism, and ofc Petersons excerbale analysis. Whilst you can never know people's true motivations, actual activism and organisation takes commitment and focus. No one goes out onto the streets and into the jaws of the state violence on a whim, and encounters with the police tend to radicalise the less dedicated.

The distinction must also be made the personally performative and the symbolic performance of protest. The latter is well worn and effective strategy which sublimates the personal by necessity.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

The distinction must also be made the personally performative and the symbolic performance of protest

an important distinction, sure. I assume we were talking about the latter, but it's good to be clear.

all protest is both real - as in a real event, requires some level of personal commitment, of organization - and symbolic, in the sense of it itself isn't the mechanism to accomplish its goal (defunding the police, for example) but rather a level by which to move that actual mechanism

how a protest looks is almost always vastly more important than anything it directly it achieves, that's not new

what social media - mass participation in image creation - has done is made that more obvious

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Every possible form of resistance has already been classified and absorbed by the market

it's called recuperation. I've been banging on about it forever, here and irl.

it's easy to be trapped, paralyzed by a feeling of inevitable defeat

one has to be like Sisyphus - able to envision a future where the boulder doesn't roll back down the hill, even tho it seems inevitable

 

[IdleRich]

BLM is a marketing strategy for businesses now. It's already being neutralised.

Some people would say that if companies or whatever are starting to make business decisions in favour of BLM and seeking to profit from it then that is already a kind of success compared to when they were ignoring it or disavowing it and so on. I admit it seems like a very hollow victory though if it's any kind of victory at all.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

I'm extemporizing a bit on Camus's take

I've felt that sense of futility for a long time - the Sisyphean nature of resistance, not in its difficulty, but in its futility

Camus says to overcome futility (meaninglessness), one has to imagine Sisyphus happy (proactively imbue meaning thru one's decisions)

we're talking about something more direct than meaninglessness, but it's a similar feeling of futility

you could also just say "one has to be able to imagine a world where resistance isn't inevitably recuperated", but I like the Sisyphus metaphor

as a way to get at the idea of imagining something that feels impossible

 

[shiels]

but the idea that you're just playacting the past isn't a new and radical departure

out of curiosity, I wonder who here has actually been involved or still is with irl politics, especially horizontal politics (rather than say tea or craner's involvement with Labour, nothing against it)

Dunno if we are in disagreement. But I wasn’t being very clear. My point is words like authenticity, irony, sincerity are tricky and messy to use because they’re abused, loaded and co-opted.

Performativity is obviously not a new concept, but I’d guess that it’s a more prevalent feeling these days, more palpable, with omnipresent participatory media giving constant reminder that we’re all acting to a degree. It also kind of reveals that it always was like this. And i think we’re becoming more comfortable with our performativity, blurring boundaries further

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

it’s a more prevalent feeling these days, more palpable, with omnipresent participatory media giving constant reminder that we’re all acting to a degree. It also kind of reveals that it always was like this.

sure. see about 5 posts up where I said much the same.

that highlighting the performative, (partially) symbolic nature of public actions normalizes the feeling of performativity, surely follows

Baudrillard was onto all this 50 years ago. technology and culture have finally caught up to him.

as far as "authenticity" etc, all words are tricky and messy to use, that's the imprecise nature of humans and language

 

[shiels]

Of course, the very idea that protest, activism etc are performative, virtue signalling etc. is essentially a right wing tactic of delegitimisation, ties in with Rand's ideas about altruism, and ofc Petersons excerbale analysis. Whilst you can never know people's true motivations, actual activism and organisation takes commitment and focus. No one goes out onto the streets and into the jaws of the state violence on a whim, and encounters with the police tend to radicalise the less dedicated.

The distinction must also be made the personally performative and the symbolic performance of protest. The latter is well worn and effective strategy which sublimates the personal by necessity.

I canvassed for labour at the last election and found the performance uncomfortable at times. But as you say the sublimation of the personal is sometimes a necessity, and the discomfort gives you a lot to think about, a sense of duty made me push past it. You can observe the loss of agency that a right wing libertarian would cherish so much. And another part of you can feel the euphoric aspects of that sublimation, the connection and solidarity is its own buzz.

In terms of the right wing virtue signalling critique. I can actually sympathise with the disgust at tone, sanctimony etc. there can be a dishonesty in it. But the critique seems stupid for several reasonsm one question id ask is can we can extract morality or virtue from the social ie all virtuous acts intend to signal something to someone, dont they? even if its to yourself or god.

 

[shiels]

as far as "authenticity" etc, all words are tricky and messy to use, that's the imprecise nature of humans and language

Oh cmon ffs.

 

[version]

I've been wondering whether the way people behave on Twitter has any parallels with OCD. It can feel like asserting control over smaller things as a way of dealing with an inability to control the big. You can't do much about climate change or the economic system, but you can get a racist fired.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

Oh cmon ffs

I don't really wanna get sidetracked with this, but you're saying something so vague as to be meaningless, which gets an appropriate answer

when have those terms - authenticity, sincerity - ever not been tricky and loaded, easily abused to suit whatever ends?

it's easy to say something like "we're layers of complexity beyond" but like, what layers? beyond what?

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

It can feel like asserting control over smaller things as a way of dealing with an inability to control the big

very common human response. all those Brexit + Trump voters who felt ignored, sticking it to whatever their version of the man is.

it leads in to social atomization, alienation, etc. social scientists have been onto the decaying of the social fabric for awhile now.

a more serious and deadly version is the way it drives the less ideological side of modern lone wolf terrorism - i.e. an incel murdering women is a very fucked-up way of trying to control

 

[shiels]

You don't agree that a dichotomy of authentic/inauthentic has been distorted and abused with seemingly increasing intensity over the last couple of decades? this idea that there's something behind the curtain, some pure essence, of self or of some substance, in everything from bread to trump? It's been abused and distorted so much that It can feel like we're moving beyond being able to use those words to have meaningful conversations

 

[shiels]

I don't really wanna get sidetracked with this,

sidetracked from what? Maybe the vague shite im talking needs to take place on that thread luka mentioned but let me just note that this is a thread about matrix v ghostbusters

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

it seems more like a question of semantics, literally the meaning of words

not really disagreeing about something of substance

 

[version]

The thing i didn’t get about Elon musk etc trying to prove we’re living in simulation is: why wouldn’t all of our thoughts, tools to test the theory be simulated too, would it not be purely deterministic and therefore a closed system. And therefore is it not just a philosophical question

There's a theory that the "real world" of The Matrix - Zion etc - is just another layer of the simulation which is why Neo can influence the sentinels. It's the next tier for the humans who end up rejecting the first.

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

You don't agree that a dichotomy of authentic/inauthentic has been distorted and abused with seemingly increasing intensity over the last couple of decades?

I think that "authenticity" has always been a blurry thing

I think it's always been difficult to have meaningful conversations about authenticity

 

[padraig (u.s.)]

just another layer of the simulation

turtles all way down, brother