Jean Baudrillard analyzes how the modern flow of information, creating a huge number of copies and simulacra, ultimately destroys reality.
Jean Baudrillard is an intellectual "guru" of postmodernism, who once opened our eyes to the "unreality of what is happening." “We live in a world of simulacra,” he said, confirming this with a pile of examples: labor is no longer productive, it rather has a social function (“everyone should be in business”), the representative bodies of power no longer represent anyone, now they are not the basis defines a superstructure, and vice versa. So, according to Baudrillard, we have lost touch with reality and entered the era of hyperreality - an era in which the picture is more important than the content, and the connection between objects, phenomena and their signs is broken (for the concept of the film "Matrix" we just have to thank Baudrillard, although he was convinced that his ideas had been distorted).
Jean Baudrillard assigns a significant role in this process to the media: in his opinion, the modern insane flow of information creates a huge number of copies and simulacra, which ultimately destroy reality. Moreover, Baudrillard notes, the more information becomes, the less sense, although, logically, everything should be the other way around. An entire chapter of his book "Simulacra and Simulations" (1981) is devoted to the analysis of this very problem. So, we read and understand why there is a total information inflation and what to do about it.
IMPLOSION OF SENSE IN THE MEDIA
We are in a world in which there is more and more information and less and less meaning. In this regard, three hypotheses are possible:
- Either information produces meaning (a negentropic factor), but is unable to compensate for the severe loss of meaning in all areas. Attempts to re-inject it through an increasing number of media, messages and content are in vain: the loss, absorption of meaning occurs faster than its re-injection. In this case, one should look to the productive base to replace the failing media. That is, to the whole ideology of freedom of speech, the media, divided into countless separate units of broadcasting, or to the ideology of "anti-media" (radio pirates, etc.).
- Or information has nothing to do with signification at all. This is something completely different, an operating model of a different order, external to meaning and its circulation. This is, in particular, K. Shannon's hypothesis, according to which the sphere of information, a purely instrumental, technical environment, does not imply any final meaning and therefore should also not participate in a value judgment. It is a kind of code, such as a genetic one: it is what it is, it functions the way it functions, and meaning is something else that appears, so to speak, after the fact, as in Monod's work “Accident and Necessity . In this case, there simply would be no significant relationship between information inflation and meaning deflation.
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- Or, on the contrary, there is a strong and necessary correlation between these two phenomena to the extent that the information directly destroys or neutralizes meaning and signification. Thus, it turns out that the loss of meaning is directly related to the corrupting, dissuading action of information, the media and the media.
This is the most interesting hypothesis, but it runs counter to the conventional wisdom. Socialization is universally measured in terms of receptivity to media reports. Desocialized, and in fact asocial, is one who is not sufficiently receptive to the media. Information everywhere is believed to facilitate the accelerated circulation of meaning and create a surplus value of meaning similar to that which occurs in economics and is obtained as a result of the accelerated circulation of capital. Information is considered as the creator of communication, and, despite the huge non-production costs, there is a general consensus that we are dealing with a growth of meaning that is redistributed in all areas of the social - just as there is a consensus that the material production,despite failures and irrationality, it still leads to an increase in prosperity and social harmony. We are all part of this persistent myth. This is the alpha and omega of our modernity, without which the credibility of our social organization would be undermined. And yet, the fact is that it is undermined, and for this very reason: where we believe information produces meaning, the opposite happens.
Information devours its own content. It devours communication and social. And this happens for two reasons:
1. Instead of creating communication, information exhausts itself in staging communication. Instead of producing meaning, it exhausts itself in staging meaning. This is a very familiar giant simulation process. Unprepared interviews, phone calls from viewers and listeners, all kinds of interactivity, verbal blackmail: "This concerns you, the event is you, etc." More and more information is being invaded by this kind of ghostly content, this homeopathic grafting, this dream of awakening communication. A circular scheme in which what the audience desires is enacted on the stage, an anti-theater of communication, which, as you know, is always only a reuse through the negation of the traditional institution, an integrated negative scheme. Great energyaimed at keeping the simulacrum at a distance in order to avoid sudden dissimulation, which would confront us with the obvious reality of a radical loss of meaning.
It is useless to find out whether the loss of communication leads to this escalation within the simulacrum, or whether it is the simulacrum that first appears here for the purpose of apotropy, in order to prevent in advance any possibility of communication (the precession of the model that puts an end to the real). It is useless to find out that initially, neither one nor the other, because this is a cyclical process - a process of simulation, a process of the hyperreal. Hyperreality of communication and meaning. More real than real itself - that's how it is abolished.
Thus, not only communication, but also the social function in a closed loop, like a temptation to which the power of myth is applied. Trust, belief in information joins this tautological proof that the system provides about itself, duplicating the elusive reality in signs.
However, it can be assumed that this belief is as ambiguous as the belief that accompanies myths in archaic societies. They believed in them and did not believe in them. No one is tormented by doubts: "I know for sure, and yet …". This kind of reverse simulation arises among the masses, in each of us, in response to the simulation of meaning and communication in which this system encloses us. In response to the tautology of the system, ambivalence of the masses arises, in response to apotropy - discontent or a still mysterious belief. The myth continues to exist, but you should not think that people believe in it: this is the trap for critical thought, which can only work on the assumption of the naivety and stupidity of the masses.
2. In addition to this, by excessive staging of communication, the media are strenuously seeking information of an irresistible destructuring of the irrevocable social.
Thus, information decomposes meaning, decomposes the social, turns them into a kind of nebula, doomed not to the growth of the new, but on the contrary, to total entropy.
Thus, the media are not the movers of socialization, but quite the opposite, the implosion of the social among the masses. And this is only a macroscopic expansion of the implosion of meaning at the microscopic level of a sign. This implosion should be analyzed on the basis of McLuhan's formula "medium is the message", the possible conclusions from which are far from exhausted.
It means that all content of meaning is absorbed by a single dominant form of media. Media alone is an event, regardless of content, conformist or subversive. A serious problem for any counter-information, radio pirates, anti-media, etc. However, there is an even more serious problem that McLuhan himself did not discover. After all, beyond this neutralization of all content, one could hope that the media will still function in their form, and that the real can be transformed under the influence of media as a form. If all content is eliminated, there may still be a revolutionary and subversive value in using the media as such. Consequently - and this is what the McLuhan formula leads to in its ultimate meaning - there is not only implosion of the message in the media, but,in the same movement, the implosion of media in the real takes place, the implosion of media and the real into a kind of hyperreal nebula, in which the definition and its own action of the media are no longer distinguishable.
Even the “traditional” status of the media themselves, which is characteristic of our time, has been questioned. McLuhan's formula: media is a message, which is the key formula of the era of simulation (media is a message - the sender is the addressee, the closure of all poles - the end of the perspective and panoptic space - such are the alpha and omega of our modernity), this formula itself should be considered in its ultimate expression, that is: after all content and messages have evaporated into the media, the media themselves will disappear as such. In essence, it is thanks to the message that the media acquire signs of authenticity; it is it that gives the media their definite, distinct status as an intermediary of communication. Without a message, the media themselves fall into the uncertainty inherent in all our analysis and evaluation systems. Only a model, the action of which is immediate,immediately generates message, media and "real".
Finally, "media is a message" means not only the end of the message, but also the end of the media. There is no longer media in the literal sense of the word (I mean, first of all, electronic media), that is, an instance that would be an intermediary between one reality and another, between one state of the real and another. Neither in content nor in form. Actually, this is what implosion means. Mutual absorption of the poles, a short circuit between the poles of any differential system of meaning, the erasure of clear boundaries and oppositions, including the opposition between the media and the real, - hence, the impossibility of any mediated expression of one another or dialectical dependence of one on the other. Circularity of all media effects. Consequently, the impossibility of meaning in the meaning of a one-sided vector going from one pole to another. It is necessary to fully analyze this critical but original situation: this is the only thing that remains for us.
It is useless to dream of a revolution through content, it is futile to dream of a revolution through form, because the media and the real now constitute a single nebula, the truth of which cannot be deciphered.
The fact of this implosion of content, the absorption of meaning, the disappearance of the media themselves, the resorption of any dialectic of communication in the total circulation of the model, the implosion of the social among the masses may seem catastrophic and desperate. However, it only looks like this in the light of idealism, which completely dominates our understanding of information. We all abide in a fierce idealism of meaning and communication, in an idealism of communication through meaning, and in this perspective we are just waiting for the catastrophe of meaning.
However, it should be understood that the term "catastrophe" has a "catastrophic" meaning of end and destruction only with a linear vision of accumulation, entailing completeness, which the system imposes on us. The term itself etymologically means only "twist", "folding of the cycle", which leads to what could be called the "event horizon", to the horizon of meaning, beyond which it is impossible to go: there is nothing on the other side that would have meaning for us, - however, it is enough to get out of this ultimatum of meaning so that the catastrophe itself is no longer the last day of reckoning, as which it functions in our modern imaginary.
Beyond the horizon of meaning is fascination, which is the result of the neutralization and implosion of meaning. Beyond the horizon of the social are the masses, which are the result of the neutralization and implosion of the social.
It is quite obvious that there is a paradox in this complex combination of the masses and the media: either it is the media that neutralize meaning and produce an "informe" or informed [informee] mass, or it is the masses who successfully resist the media, rejecting or absorbing everything without a response. messages that they produce? Earlier, in Requiem for the Mass Media, I analyzed and described the media as an institution of an irreversible model of unanswered communication. Today? This lack of response can no longer be understood as a strategy of the government, but as a counter-strategy of the masses themselves, directed against the government. What then?
Are the media on the side of the authorities, manipulating the masses, or are they on the side of the masses and are engaged in the elimination of meaning, creating, not without a share of pleasure, violence against it? Do the media put the masses in a state of hypnosis, or is it the masses that make the media turn into a meaningless spectacle? Mogadishu-Stammheim: The media turn themselves into a means of moral condemnation of terrorism and the exploitation of fear for political purposes, but at the same time, in the most complete ambiguity, they spread the inhuman charm of a terrorist attack, they themselves are terrorists, since they themselves are subject to this charm (eternal moral dilemma, cf. Umberto Eco: how to avoid the topic of terrorism, how to find the right way to use the media - if it doesn't exist). The media carry meaning and counter-sense, they manipulate in all directions at once,no one can control this process, they are means of simulation internal to the system, and simulation that destroys the system, which fully corresponds to the Mobius strip and the logic of the ring - they exactly coincide with it. There is no alternative to this, no logical solution. Only logical exacerbation and catastrophic resolution.
With one amendment. We are face to face with this system in a bifurcated and insoluble double bind position - just like children face to face with the demands of the adult world. They are required to simultaneously become independent, responsible, free and conscious subjects and be submissive, inert, obedient, which corresponds to the object ⓘ
Note. Double bind - from English. lang. double bind, double bond; a concept that plays a key role in the theory of schizophrenia by G. Bateson. In fact, double bind is a paradoxical prescription that ultimately leads to madness: "I order you not to follow my orders." An example of this behavior is how a mother verbally asks her child to express love, but at the same time, using gestures, requires the child to keep some distance from her. This leads to the fact that any action of the child will be regarded as wrong, and in the future it may be difficult for him to somehow resolve this situation.
… The child resists in all directions and also responds to conflicting demands with a dual strategy. He opposes the requirement to be an object with all possible variants of disobedience, rebellion, emancipation, in a word, the very real claims of the subject. The requirement to be a subject, he also stubbornly and effectively opposes the resistance inherent in the object, that is, the completely opposite: infantilism, hyperconformism, complete dependence, passivity, idiocy. Neither strategy has more objective value than the other. The resistance of the subject is today one-sidedly valued higher and viewed as positive - just as in the political sphere only behavior aimed at liberation, emancipation, self-expression, becoming as a political subject is considered worthy and subversive. This means ignoring the influence, the same and certainly much more significant, of the behavior of the object, abandoning the position of the subject and awareness - this is the behavior of the masses - which we consign to oblivion under the scornful term of alienation and passivity.
Liberation behavior responds to one aspect of the system, a constant ultimatum that is presented to us in order to present us as pure objects, but it does not meet another requirement, which is that we become subjects, that we are liberated. so that we express ourselves at any cost, so that we vote, work out, make a decision, speak, take part, participate in the game - this type of blackmail and ultimatum used against us is as serious as the first, even more serious, no doubt, in Nowadays. In relation to a system whose argument is oppression and suppression, strategic resistance is the subject's emancipatory aspirations. But this reflects, rather, the previous phase of the system, and even if we are still with it in a state of afront,then this is no longer a strategic area: the actual argument of the system is the maximization of the word, the maximization of the production of meaning. This means that strategic resistance is a rejection of meaning and a word - or a hyperconformist simulation of the very mechanisms of the system, which is also a form of rejection and rejection. This is the strategy of the masses and it is tantamount to returning the system to its own logic through its doubling, and meaning, like a reflection in a mirror, without absorbing it. This strategy (if we can still talk about strategy) prevails today, because it follows from the prevailing phase of the system.and strategic resistance is a rejection of meaning and of a word - or a hyperconformist simulation of the very mechanisms of the system, which is also a form of rejection and rejection. This is the strategy of the masses and it is tantamount to returning the system to its own logic through its doubling, and meaning, like a reflection in a mirror, without absorbing it. This strategy (if we can still talk about strategy) prevails today, because it follows from the prevailing phase of the system.and strategic resistance is a rejection of meaning and of a word - or a hyperconformist simulation of the very mechanisms of the system, which is also a form of rejection and rejection. This is the strategy of the masses and it is tantamount to returning the system to its own logic through its doubling, and meaning, like a reflection in a mirror, without absorbing it. This strategy (if we can still talk about strategy) prevails today, because it follows from the prevailing phase of the system.
Making the mistake of choosing a strategy is serious. All those movements that rely only on liberation, emancipation, the revival of the subject of history, groups, words, on the consciousness (or rather unconsciousness) of subjects and masses, do not see that they are in the mainstream of the system, whose imperative today is precisely overproduction and regeneration of meaning and words.
Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulations, 1981
