l'esprit

The Situationists cal­led post indust­rial life an empty existence fil­led with mea­ning by medi­a­ted ima­ges. Images that replace eve­ryt­hing that has ever lived with the notion, the correct ver­sion, of how life is to be lived. In a sig­ni­fi­cant way, this holds true in life’s most dire situ­a­tions. In some dif­ficult situ­a­tions I’ve expe­ri­enced, I’ve often seen that most people seem despe­rate to find a pre­de­fi­ned act that can help them handle the situ­a­tion. They are wil­ling to men­tally go through any num­ber of books, plays, tv shows, and movies, in order to aid them through the hard times.

Usually, fri­ends and family are also quick to respond to that same situ­a­tion by par­ting some know­ledge, or try­ing to tell their – “simi­lar” – story, however far fet­ched, in hopes of con­so­ling, or hel­ping out emo­tio­nally. The truth is I think we like it that way. Having a pre­set role to play could help you out to bet­ter handle your emo­tions if you don’t have to worry about acting “wrong”. Although, and I can­not stress this enough, it isn’t wit­hout a cost for some of us. Having the fee­ling that you’re only beha­ving in a scrip­ted fashion, some­ti­mes cau­ses more anxi­ety about your beha­vior rat­her than doing away with it, in my experiences.

However, in a more relaxed set­ting, we still like to adapt our­sel­ves to the correct ideal. We like to be as right as pos­sible, because the oppo­site is ter­ri­fy­ing. Being wrong is uni­ver­sally frow­ned upon. Luckily, the vast lib­rary of sha­red know­ledge – the Internet – is rea­dily avai­lable to a lot of humans, inclu­ding you and me, so we can effort­lessly prove our­sel­ves right.

In a way I star­ted wri­ting this to explain how I feel that the Internet could be the Holy Grail of situ­a­tions that the Situationists might have wan­ted. A large scale pro­ject that enriches huma­nity with know­ledge, that allows them to “wake up” from the night­mare of having life dis­played as a spectacle before their eyes, luring them in to join on stage, deli­ve­ring the same mono­lo­gue about the ever­lasting, neve­ren­ding, always impro­ving, modern day life. Sadly, I do not think I can find a way to get to that point.

I’d like to vali­antly say that the rea­son hip­s­ters do what hip­s­ters do – and that we since the late 1990s have been try­ing to define that what they actu­ally do – is because of the know­ledge they can par­take in. I’d like to argue that the rea­son young people are devo­ting their time to retro acti­vi­ties is because the Internet allows them to be more savvy about know­ledge from the past, that the home­grown, home baked, home­made move­ment is because of somewhat for­got­ten ideas of how to gar­den, bake, and thread a needle, finally get­ting the respect and light they deserve.

That we are – opti­misti­cally – moving towards a soci­ety that relies less on pre­fab­ri­ca­ted and mass­pro­du­ced dreams and pro­ducts and more on the intui­tive cre­a­tions of human hands. I’d love to write that we can safely ven­ture into any idea wit­hout it having pre­me­di­ta­ted rights or wrongs about that idea.

I beli­e­ved I could write somet­hing that would result in the expla­na­tion of the bet­ter­ment of huma­nity, due to this deep well of know­ledge. That somehow the retro-avantgardism of vin­tage clot­hing, hand­made, orga­nic, photo fil­te­ring, and what­not could be the effect of us fin­ding sour­ces that could dis­rupt the con­sump­tion of eve­ryday tchotch­kes, both phy­si­cal and men­tal. Even if it looks like it, at a glance, I see now that it is the other way around. They may start out as such, but they are quickly swal­lo­wed, com­mo­di­ti­zed and sold back to us, in the expan­ding umbrella named “lifestyle”.

As descri­bed by Guy Debord¹ in The Society of the Spectacle, in the­sis 12:

“What appe­ars is good; what is good appears”

And in the­sis 18:

But the spectacle is not merely a mat­ter of ima­ges, nor even of ima­ges plus sounds. It is wha­te­ver esca­pes people’s acti­vity, wha­te­ver elu­des their practi­cal recon­si­de­ra­tion and correc­tion. It is the oppo­site of dia­lo­gue. Wherever repre­sen­ta­tion becomes inde­pen­dent, the spectacle rege­ne­ra­tes itself.

My hopes of con­vey­ing a mes­sage that the Internet somehow inter­rupts the thought pat­terns of our daily lives – where being is having, and having is merely appe­a­ring (to have) – are the­re­fore quite low.

For what is the point of tchotchke acti­vi­ties, e.g. baking sour dough bread, having a color­ful fixie bike, wea­ring iro­nic clot­hes, or simi­lar “non-hipster” type things, such as retro-collectibles, orga­nic, home­grown, urban life with a max­i­mum of lei­sure time, and acti­vely trum­pe­ting every newly learnt skill, acti­vity, or hap­pe­ning to others via blogs or social media?

The point is for others to see. For there is no point for them not to see, as see­ing is beli­e­ving. Believing makes it real in their eyes, and thus in our own. So, we’re left where we star­ted. Being is having, having is appe­a­ring. It is still a “social rela­tion between people that is medi­a­ted by ima­ges”².

The rela­tion is so strong that we even fetishize not medi­a­ting that image. For every time you hear of some­one “discon­necting” from the Internet – while on vaca­tion, by going somewhere remo­tely, or just tur­ning off for some mind­ful peace – you’re hea­ring it because they want you to know that this is somet­hing they are acti­vely doing, in order to con­vey their image of them­sel­ves to you and others as being free from that rela­tion. In rea­lity, they are rea­li­zing that very same relation.

Online life is so tightly woven with off­line life that it might as well be cal­led the bro­adcloth of the 21st cen­tury. Cutting through it will recquire spe­cial tools and some cre­a­tive skills.

For the Internet to become the true pat­tern dis­rup­ter, I beli­eve it is neces­sary for acti­vi­ties of your own devo­tions to stay secret.

The sec­ret acti­vity is one of the few acti­vi­ties left, for an indi­vi­dual, where you need not to rely on others for pra­ise. It is the only way to ensure that you are not dis­tor­ting an acti­vity by loo­king for accep­tance from others³. It is how you escape try­ing to belong, it is the eva­sion of groupt­hink. It is where the sought after fee­ling of losing one­self to the real­ness of the acti­vity, when it is not made with the pur­pose of being put on display.

The Internet as such is hardly a place to keep secrets, and sadly not yet a place where one could hope to find the dis­rup­tive situ­a­tions that we, as humans, despe­ra­tely need to become more aware of the rea­li­ties around us, but shame on those who don’t try. My sug­ges­tion is simply to take the model above and think once or twice about the Community you are try­ing to engage when you keep infor­ming them of your acti­vi­ties — like this blog post for instance. That’s why I’ve deci­ded to…

1. Disclaimer: I am not a Situationist/Debord expert of any kind. [↩]
2. Thesis 4 [↩]
3. Although, a sec­ret is rarely a sec­ret if not sha­red with at least one other person—but ant­hro­po­lo­gi­cally that is for cre­a­ting and main­tai­ning rela­tions­ships, so it doesn’t aff­lict the point. [↩]