Home | Community | Message Board
You are not signed in.
Sign In New Account
Forum Index Search Posts Trusted Vendors Highlights Galleries FAQ User List Chat Store Random Growery

Sporeworks
This site includes paid links. Please support our sponsors.

General Interest > Philosophy, Sociology & Psychology
Threaded Mode Threaded  Previous topic Previous  View all topics Index  Next topic Next 

Welcome to the Shroomery Message Board! You are experiencing a small sample of what the site has to offer. Please login or register to post messages and view our exclusive members-only content. You'll gain access to additional forums, file attachments, board customizations, encrypted private messages, and much more!

Shop: Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Myyco.com Isolated Cubensis Liquid Culture For Sale

Jump to first unread post Pages: 1
Society of the Spectacle
    #2946640 -

These are excerpted from Society of the Spectacle by Guy Debord. He was the "leader" of the Situationist International. Tell me what you think!

1

In societies dominated by modern conditions of production, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles. Everything that was directly lived has receded into a representation.


2

The images detached from every aspect of life merge into a common stream in which the unity of that life can no longer be recovered. Fragmented views of reality regroup themselves into a new unity as a separate pseudoworld that can only be looked at. The specialization of images of the world evolves into a world of autonomized images where even the deceivers are deceived. The spectacle is a concrete inversion of life, an autonomous movement of the nonliving.


3

The spectacle presents itself simultaneously as society itself, as a part of society, and as a means of unification. As a part of society, it is the focal point of all vision and all consciousness. But due to the very fact that this sector is separate, it is in reality the domain of delusion and false consciousness: the unification it achieves is nothing but an official language of universal separation.


4

The spectacle is not a collection of images; it is a social relation between people that is mediated by images.


5

The spectacle cannot be understood as a mere visual deception produced by mass-media technologies. It is a worldview that has actually been materialized.


6

Understood in its totality, the spectacle is both the result and the goal of the dominant mode of production. It is not a mere decoration added to the real world. It is the very heart of this real society?s unreality. In all of its particular manifestations ? news, propaganda, advertising, entertainment ? the spectacle represents the dominant model of life. It is the omnipresent affirmation of the choices that have already been made in the sphere of production and in the consumption implied by that production. In both form and content the spectacle serves as a total justification of the conditions and goals of the existing system. The spectacle also represents the constant presence of this justification since it monopolizes the majority of the time spent outside the production process.


7

Separation is itself an integral part of the unity of this world, of a global social practice split into reality and image. The social practice confronted by an autonomous spectacle is at the same time the real totality which contains that spectacle. But the split within this totality mutilates it to the point that the spectacle seems to be its goal. The language of the spectacle consists of signs of the dominant system of production ? signs which are at the same time the ultimate end-products of that system.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx]
    #2949003 -

I read it once.

I tried to read it again

And I'll try to have an opinion by tomorrow

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: castaway]
    #2949050 -

Ditto! But it sounds right on from my point of view.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx]
    #2951605 -

Can't say I understand his terms. The quotes are a little out of context, but I can imagine what he's probably saying.

What does his point of view offer? Is it anything more than just another clever way of saying everything's fucked? I'm pretty bored with that kinda stuff.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx]
    #2951791 -


Seperate realities bound by media

the spectacle seems to be the goal of the system and production is the means of insuring stability?

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx] * 1
    #2952879 -

Wow, and it was so much better when Jean Baudrillard theorized it... :smirk:

Simulacra and Simulation, any one? ANY ONE?

-ergot :mushroom2:


--------------------
"Remain a learner, never become a knower." - Osho

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx]
    #2953347 -

all i can think of with respect to the Society of the Spectacle is...

"not me"

"not here"

"not now"

anti-warholian

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: ]
    #2953573 -

Spectacles created by the media??

if so is it the way the Media brings ethnic culture blending or normative behavior?

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: NiamhNyx]
    #2956445 -

I can't believe so few people have heard of the SI. I used to be a big Situationist fan back in the day. Memories of my rebellious youth are flooding back.  :evil:

If I could describe the situationist movement with one phrase, it would be anarchy meets decandence. As a matter of fact, situationism was perhaps the 20th century working-class version of French Decandence. People were fed up with the suppression of art and long labor hours under capitalism, fed up with images and icons replacing real tangible things, fed up with real events replaced with representations of events.

The Internet would be a Situationist's nightmare. Smiley faces representing people's emotions, chatrooms and forums replacing social interactions, and pop-up ads galore!

Readers of Adbusters magazine (www.adbusters.org) might be interested in knowing that the pranks that 'adbusters'  do are rooted in the Situationist idea of detournement. Co-opting corporate signs and infrastructures is all based on that idea, and I'd be ashamed of any Leftist who didn't know that. I'm no longer a Leftist but Situationist-style co-option is useful for any political movement.

This stuff should be taught in schools.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: ]
    #2957645 -

Now THAT is harder for me to get a handle on than the original post in this thread.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: castaway]
    #2957787 -

Hehe, you don't really need to know about the Situationist movement though to understand what Guy Debord was saying in Society of the Spectacle. Just look around you, especially to the media and it's influence on society. What is the 'spectacle'? It's mass production for production's sake. It's the work-buy-repeat cycle. Working to consume. The homogenization of culture packaged and ready for pickup at the next drive-thru window. I think almost everyone's seen the movie Fight Club. That movie (or book) sums it up perfectly. As a matter of fact, from an anti-consumerism perspective, the packaging and selling of Fight Club to the masses by Hollywood is the ultimate irony.

You said you read the book already. What did you think?

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Re: Society of the Spectacle [Re: ]
    #2957802 -

No I've only read the post and I intend to remain ignorant as long as I can maintain bliss.

Extras: Filter Print Post Top
Jump to top Pages: 1

Shop: Unfolding Nature Unfolding Nature: Being in the Implicate Order   Myyco.com Isolated Cubensis Liquid Culture For Sale

General Interest > Philosophy, Sociology & Psychology
Threaded Mode Threaded  Previous topic Previous  View all topics Index  Next topic Next 

Similar ThreadsPosterViewsRepliesLast post
* Materialistic Society And Their Toys
( 1 2 3 all )		 fireworks_godS 6,538 55 02/02/09 05:48 PM
by CosmicJoke
* Evolution and Society
( 1 2 3 all )		 DoctorJ 5,550 46 03/16/04 11:29 AM
by Phred
* Society is responsible for...
( 1 2 all )		 Epigallo 2,164 37 05/22/09 09:14 AM
by daytripper23
* appeal for a mystical society,
( 1 2 all )		 Mitchnast 4,288 34 03/19/03 05:31 PM
by Zero7a1
* Society and Who We Are RebelSteve33 1,260 16 01/23/03 05:13 PM
by RebelSteve33
* The Effect Of Porn On Society
( 1 2 3 all )		 lines 4,901 59 03/10/13 09:24 AM
by Space Monkey
* The raise of christianity, the supression of female superiority, the downfall of society.
( 1 2 3 all )		 Diaboleros 3,637 46 05/04/09 06:12 AM
by Mastamike1118
* Subconscious Guilt Of Using Drugs In A Narcophobic Society Twirling 1,017 3 08/20/04 12:10 PM
by Twirling

Extra information
You cannot start new topics / You cannot reply to topics
HTML is disabled / BBCode is enabled
Moderator: Middleman, DividedQuantum
1,237 topic views. 1 members, 107 guests and 151 web crawlers are browsing this forum.
[ Show Images Only | Sort by Score | Print Topic ]
Search this thread:

Copyright 1997-2026 Mind Media. Some rights reserved.

Generated in 0.025 seconds spending 0.007 seconds on 16 queries.