We seem to be living in an age of what might be called “renewed despair”. No matter how great the scandal – and the Epstein files are surely the greatest, hugest scandal of contemporary times – it passes by, replaced in the rolling news cycle by the next “big thing”. This is partly due to the Trump regime and fear of reprisal that’s its fascist ideology guarantees, which seems to have completely eroded journalistic integrity (although we do have to be aware of who owns the newspapers and tv stations), but is also a product of the Cold War conflict: between the USSR as being based on ‘community’, therefore, according to Western representations, intent on destroying individual freedom, and the USA as being the repository of ‘freedom’ and ‘individuality’, nostrums linked inextricably to capitalism. The latter appeared to ‘triumph’ with the fall of the Soviet Union, in that ‘individuality’ had beaten ‘community’. Under Thatcher and Reagan, individuality was released from its ‘bonds’ (state regulation), a release that coincided with the rise of the internet and social media. People seem to forget the origin of FaceBook: an online ‘tool’ that enabled men to rate the ‘attractiveness’ of women; it originated in misogyny.
What SM has done is further fragment community, whilst encouraging individuality. Within this system (and it IS a system, deliberately designed), political action and comment has become clicking a ‘like’ emoji or posting on some SM site. Political action has become individualised and, therefore, almost useless. The central questions now are “How does this effect me?”, “What do I think?” and, most importantly, “Validate my commentary (and, therefore, validate me as a person)”. The days of mass movements, of in-person meetings to discuss X, Y or Z have been deliberately diluted. SM makes politics yet another passing phase, and a passing phase that is convenient, performed (and I use that word specifically) from the comfort of your own home on phone or computer.
The question regarding demonstrations in support of Palestinians and against genocide are a special case that I’ll address later. Suffice to say, it rather gives the lie to democracy when hundreds of thousands take to the streets and are then ignored by their governments.
What SM does is make life less complex because it promotes hatred of “the other”. Existence is simplified by providing a target, and that target becomes an ‘explanation’. It provides an easy explanation for the question “Why am I poor?” (N.B. Never “Why do I think that I am poor?” or “What are the social conditions that have created these inequalities in society?”) Because ‘immigrants’, ‘anti-white racism’, ‘woke’. Even the question has been pre-programmed by the association of ‘individuality’ and ‘freedom’ with wealth. This is what these terms ‘mean’ apparently. Success means “financial success”, and to return to me opening paragraph, the financially successful do not have to follow the same ‘rules’ as the rest of us. Simplification of meaning, therefore, simplification of solutions: deport ‘immigrants’; close the ‘borders’; treat those without jobs as ‘scroungers’ and ‘lazy’; take care of yourself because you cannot rely on, or trust, anyone or anything else. Capitalism and its digital arm, SM, fosters simplicity of thought and denial of complexity. It answers the question that follows from the first, “Who has done this to me?”
You don’t have to be of above-average intelligence to see Trump as another Hitler, the Israelis as Nazis, freedom to protest being eroded (the UK) or to recognise the hysteresis of Irish ‘politics’. However, you do have to be educated. Yet look at our schools and universities as they are ‘re-set’ to better skill people for work, as they become conduits for business. Yet this is (almost) a taboo subject: SM, and the media in general, have disparaged ‘experts’ for so long that ‘educated’ is a term that has become amalgamated with ‘elitist’. The old “Just because you know more than I do, doesn’t mean that my opinion is any less valid than yours” trope…well yes, actually it does. I can reason, provide evidence from reputable sources, formulate arguments that go beyond, but are inclusive of, emotion (aesthetics being the prime example of this, climate change is another), that take account of others and the effects/affects X will have/is having on them.
Intelligence is, it appears, something that one should be ashamed of. Should be kept in check if one doesn’t want to be condemned as ‘elitist’ or ‘patronising’. Complexity of thought has become anathema – exemplified by Trump and those who support him. To take the cheap shot, “Make utter stupidity fashionable again”. There is, however, a serious point here: those who left secondary school as soon as they legally could, and who do not have third-level qualifications, are more likely to vote for him as the repository of common-sense, anti-leftist ‘values’. Nor is Ireland exempt: our own ‘politics’ is beset by the same anti-intellectualism and self-interested apathy. Why vote for change if you are ‘comfortable’?
And what is happening in our universities? They find themselves attacked for not ‘training’ students, for not giving them the ‘skills’ they will need in “the workplace”. Degree programmes are rewritten with “industry input”, focusing on “what industry wants”, departments are closed for being “non-profitable”, marketisation and metrics have become bywords that ‘guarantee’ “quality assurance”, “learning outcomes” ensure that students will know X, Y and Z.
This is capitalism triumphant. A victory parade of Gradgrinds, all waving their “economically sensible” flags. Trampled in the dust…education.
The study of knowledge and what exists for the betterment of human society (and by ‘betterment’ I do not mean a new kind of microwave or creating more ‘entrepreneurs’), the advance and progress of human society as an end in itself (not for-profit), something than can be used to benefit humanity as a (n organic) whole. Education that produces experts, that fosters curiosity, competence and creativity. For example, the Arts per se which encourage empathy, compassion, highlight injustice and promote moral thinking, but are “non-profitable”. The Arts, together with a myriad of other subjects classed as “the Humanities” (the clue is in the title) are being wilfully, and willingly, destroyed by those who tied themselves to the capitalist machine long ago. A coterie of people who made the move into university managerialism or the HEA, and their uneducated political controllers whose only aim is to be re-elected. The ‘system’ is now so smooth that obedience is ensured, even before the orders are issued. The refrain in universities nowadays, “Oh, but I’m only following orders”. Integrity, responsibility and obligation traded for a salary.
Hannah Arendt’s essay, Thinking and Moral Considerations, should be compulsory reading, even though I think her conclusions are wrong.
“Is human progress possible?” is a question that needs an additional two words: “under capitalism”. The answer is then simple: No. Capitalism is stultifying, it requires stagnation. There are only three simple interconnected tenets: individuality, profit and greed.
Individuality in that there is no such thing as society, therefore, no responsibility for, or obligation to, others. Profit at any price because human life, unless instrumental, is valueless. Greed because you can never have too much. As the Michael Douglas character says in Wall Street, “greed is good”, whether that is at the expense of other human persons, the climate or the planet. Only those who benefit you, who affect your profit-margin, should be courted; if things go wrong, politicians will bail you out, if they don’t you’ll be lionised.
The central question becomes: Who is going to challenge these attitudes now that education has been colonised by marketisation? Now that departments such as Philosophy, Art and Literature are disappearing? Now that ‘training’ and ‘skills’ are displacing these from even being talked about? Now that the last opposition to the ‘businessification’ of society has fallen to “sustainable development goals” (capitalism needs perpetual growth), “universal design” (capitalism needs uniformity of purpose, and the camouflaging of its base aims), and the plethora of bureaucratic ‘protocols’ designed to extinguish independent academic thought, is this the triumph of what Heidegger, in In Memoriam, terms “calculative thinking”? A society based entirely on economic value and exploitation?
No. Why? Because “the Arts”. Whether its a film, novel, poem, painting, photograph, any of the myriad things we call ‘Art’ – including what we create ourselves – Art is born from dissatisfaction with what exists, a conflict of perspectives, a desire to “think oneself into” the Being of another. Add to this those in university positions who resist this rush to commerce, those who are willing to engage with the bureaucracy in order subvert it, those who ignore the command & control of managerialism, those who feel compelled to create, those who constantly ask “Why?”.
Capitalism cannot, and will not, ever ‘win’. We recognise its endemic corruption, injustice and inequality. We see the trauma, the destruction and the death it causes. We might live in a time of “renewed despair”, surrounded by instances of corruption, populist ‘politics’ and the uniformity of individualism…but we recognise these, and we talk about them. They enter what we create, even though we may be unaware of this. They inhabit the narratives we tell ourselves about ourselves.
Murmurs from the Forest 