Is there such a thing as “human progress”? With each epoch does the human person become, in some sense, ‘better’ or is this idea mere self-deception? In the current political climate of populism, which emphasises hatred, bigotry and exclusionary self-interest, there seem obvious, but despairing, answers to these questions; yet these are the conclusions that are written into the narrative of populism, conclusions that cannot stand against analysis.
We appear to be stuck in a cycle of (i) non-thinking imitation that, simultaneously, (ii) imitates the sociopolitical conditions which led to the emergence of the novel in English in the early eighteenth century.
Aristotle argued that human persons are, first and foremost, imitative creatures. To put it simply, this idea forms the basis of his system of how human persons become moral: person X is held up as a paradigm of virtue and, therefore, worthy of imitation. One then consciously imitates X until such time as this behaviour becomes automatic. Once this behaviour is, as they say, “second nature”, then this makes you, too, moral. Obviously, I’m simplifying this process here because I want to talk about social media (hereafter SM), imitation and community, but I would argue that this is it in essence.
In the ‘old’ concept of community, what one might call “person to person community”, school, youth club, village, peers, family etc., imitative behaviour which was considered ‘undesirable’ would be heavily criticised or sanctioned. There were brakes on what is now described as “anti-social behaviour”. Communities were, or could be, small, tight-knit spaces which fostered “intended rebellion”, that is, a refusal or rejection of community ‘rules’ that was reasoned, even if such reasons were informed by emotion.
Imitation, on this model, followed what we might call a “standard pattern” of conformity until one’s early teenage years, then an internal debate began on what had previously been accepted as “the norm”. As one grew older, passive acceptance became active interrogation of the imitated behaviour and accepted ways of thinking.
Thus, behaviour and ways of thinking were tested by each new generation, leading to new principles emerging, and new ways of thinking being formulated. The ‘pattern’ was constantly challenged and revised, establishing its own pattern (of constant challenge and revision – something which has now changed because of the ‘nature’ of capitalism. A subject for another blog…). The emergence of this pattern took time as it was tested and continually revised/rethought. For some, it’s present tense, but I fear its a shrinking minority.
Where does the current pattern begin? In the late 40s/early 50s, as a product of the Cold War. It is, I suppose, what we could identify now as the first “culture war”. The Soviet Union is represented as a society in which individuality is sacrificed for the “good of the community”. Opposed to this is the Western capitalist notion of individuality, tied to consumerism which is represented as ‘freedom’. Freedom to buy, to consume, to own, becomes the definition of freedom. What emerges, as the sacred tenet, is putting oneself first: the prioritisation of one’s own interests over those of others; the denial of responsibility for, and obligation to, others; ‘community’ becomes something associated with communism and socialism, which are necessarily ‘bad’, a state-controlled assault on personal freedoms. This “culture war” exists through the 50s, 60s and 70s, there are still vestiges of caring for others (because that, in a phrase, is what this comes down to), but then we hit the 80s: Thatcher and Reagan transform the political and social landscape. Self-interest at the expense of others becomes de rigueur. Caring for others becomes a sign of weakness, a denial of “human nature”. The poor are poor because they are feckless and lazy. Money assumes its central position as the marker of ‘value’ and ‘worth’ as a human person. The slide into the ‘businessification’ of life begins: everything can be run as a business – healthcare, education, social services – everything should be measured in terms of profit. There is a resurgence of nationalism and with it, racism, sexism, homophobia (remember section 28?). Empathy is disparaged, compassion seen as what is now termed ‘woke’.
What accompanied this “brave new world” of unbridled investment, shareholding, house-holding and general worship of “the market” was a rejection of thought and, consequently, a rejection of self-analysis. The world, together with those in it, became (and remains) things on which to inflict your will. Relationships, whether with others or, say, nature, became transactional, instrumental. Human persons were, and are, actively encouraged to think “What benefit is in this for me?”.
Simultaneously, the spread of the internet and SM begins in the late 80s/early 90s. The initial idealism, that we would see positive globalisation, a world with far less division and an expansion of understanding per se, has proved to be illusory. A technological “brave new world”, and what happened? Capitalist colonialism. People turned themselves into products to be consumed while, at one and the same time, ceding the power to live authentic lives to others: to confirm my authenticity, I desire (crave?) the approval of other people, an approval instantiated by my use of SM . With this desire comes uniformity – a uniform desire caused by using SM…which rather suggests that SM configures the subjectivity of the human person and, at one and the same time, subjects the human person to a series of what one might call “invisible rules” – I’m tempted here to bastardise Gilbert Ryle and argue that the human person becomes “the ghost in the machine”. The machine – SM – creates a reality in which the human person can never be anything more than a ‘ghost’, trapped in a machine-curated existence over which they have no control (I think this is one explanation given by those who believe in ghosts).
SM presents a series of visual images that appear to “represent reality” whilst, simultaneously, positing these images as “aspirational reality”. Visual images are, in the context of SM, dense in that they appear to present an “entire picture” in the sense that “This is what happened. Look!”. We can say that the specialised knowledge require to ‘decipher’ visual images is not distributed in society by default. Questions of positioning, lighting, camera angles, costume, sound – all of which affect the interpretation of the visual image – are not generally considered. The visual image presents, apparently, something that is instantaneous, provides the “whole picture” and, therefore, invites an instantaneous response. The visual image is immediate, then gone – to be reconstructed in the mind of the spectator.
In this way, SM remakes the process of self-construction, of self-identity. Rather than being a process of consideration, of reflective thought, the self is a series of immediate “me now” responses. The SM visual image does not invite, or encourage, a recognition of how and why this image was constructed, how and why this image is mediated. To many, the question of mediation does not arise: the SM visual image is absolute, a ‘faithful’ display of what actually took place.
Compare this to writing. One cannot read without thought, without being aware of the space of consideration of what is being said, of what is being argued (for or against). Writing enforces space, even in its appearance: words have spaces between them which, we might argue, connects psychologically to “the space of thought”. When I read, I know that this is not the “whole picture”, what I’ve called above a “faithful display”. This applies to writing too: when I write, I must try to be as explanatory as possible in order to support my arguments. I must reflect on the words I use, the ways in which I construct sentences and paragraphs. Thus, writing (and reading) is not an instantaneous process; it does not possess the density and immediacy of an SM visual image. In short, it invites questions.
Writing and reading, therefore, require and encourage a different kind of self-construction; a process that prioritises thought and reflection, consideration before action, a process that has at its centre two questions, “Is this true?” and “Is this really the case?”. In its lack of density, and lack of immediacy, it enables the reflective construction of a self, but a self that enacts becoming, a “me now but I may change”. A self that is less certain of knowledge and beliefs because of the psychological and physical spaces that writing provides.
My encounter with the world is mine, and mine alone; as Nietzsche calls it, an “aesthetics of self-creation”. I am my own work of art that I constantly make and remake. This process never ends, a process, as Heidegger calls it, of ‘Becoming’, never ‘Being’. The space of the spaces of writing and reading are part of this process, a constant self-analysis, self-reflection, a self that is always “under review”. Questioning and curiosity are the central components of this process of Becoming. The life of the human person is one lived in a constant state of flux, of uncertainty, compassion and empathy. The act of reading enables us to inhabit not just the world of others, but their emotions – to try to understand why they behave as they do, why they feel as they do, how their environment causes them to behave and to feel. Again, reading is a process that encourages consideration, reconsideration and understanding.
Compare this to SM: the demand is for instantaneous reaction, an “identification with”, a search for people like me made simple by algorithmic curation…and what does this suggest and confirm? That you are right. Look! Here are others who all feel as you do. There’s no need to try to understand ‘them’ because they are ‘other’. Unite with your group of like-minded people. Ideas of consideration, of emotion-testing, of time become redundant. The concept of the varied community, that displays difference and disagreement, is jettisoned in the search for more of those “like me”.
SM promotes the paralysis of thought: this is what I think, so does this online ‘community’, therefore, my thought is validated without criticism. Self-analysis and self-reflection are replaced by criticism of others, as the predominant way of defining oneself, not as “this is who I am” but “this is who I’m not”. A constant ‘othering’ of the world around you – a return to binary oppositions.
The algorithm provides the connection with the rise of novel in the eighteenth century. The contemporary SM user (? used) has a desire, cultivated by using SM, to see people like themselves represented in action. These visual representations are, as the novel was, an amalgam of preceding forms: TV news; action films, YouTube videos; Tik Toks; Snapchats; TV crime series. This visual representation is instant, based on appearance: the exciting incident, the outrageous crime, the dreadful injustice, the ‘clever’ remark. The visual is instant: it appears, is consumed, then is gone. SM dictates the attention span of its spectators – or perhaps we might better call them ‘viewers’ because ‘spectators’ are those who possess the knowledge to decipher and dismantle what they see before them, rather than mistake what they see for material reality (in much the same way as some early readers mistook what they read for reality – not helped by the claims to ‘truth’ that prefaced some early novels, Robinson Crusoe or Pamela for example).
Murmurs from the Forest 