/lit/ - Literature

>>12444189
not that guy, but
>I have come to the conclusion that it is not a disease of doubt, althought it entails doubt, but a disease of chronic irony.

this has been my own perspective for a while also. we went very quickly from turboo-ironic 90's/2000s irony to 2010 puritanism very quickly. one way to deal with the horrible feeling of irony is through sincerity, but that is the paradox of sincerity: rage, for example, is very authentic. it just isn't necessarily true. it can be highly blinkered. thus evolved a newer tactic: 'prove to me that you aren't an emissary of the devil that enrages me constantly.' down that road lies the inquisition. it is the trap of conspiracy theory: they work precisely because every given piece of evidence is just another more evidence of the conspiracy. when those conspiracies get co-opted - by human rights commissions, or advertising campaigns chasing Woke Capital - you can begin sculpting reality to fit the facts. the Nazis did this too: they created 'Aryan Science.' but Aryan Science was bullshit. witch-finding had a similar logic. there is no direct *evidence* of the supernatural, but if things happen that cannot be explained with the tools at hand, then...'you know, maybe it *is* witches after all.'

>Why am I saying all this? Because I have a feeling that the current capitalist Zeitgeist is suffering the same symptoms. Through our all-accessible cultural certainty provided to us by The Market, we find ourselves oversaturated by fact and thus we give everything a negative spin.
this is the tragicomic, Pyrrhic victory of advertising. when we can't tell the difference between what is market-driven and what isn't, we lose the distinction between reality and market forces. it was Baudrillard's conclusion also.

the market *works,* but also because the nature of capital is to meet needs that we don't actually have, or cannot really articulate. it's beyond a placebo effect, it's a placebo universe. all that is required is *approval.* if you are satisfied, the thing works. you are *absolved.* isn't this what you want? and so whenever we give things a negative spin, the market has a chance to respond, to fill in that gap. that is, after all, what it needs most of all: proof of its miracle-working powers. we fixed you! you weren't happy; now you are.

Don Draper: Happiness
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S9rrhKgusYs

what you find you are *forbidden* to do is *be unhappy,* because that is the challenge to the system. now you run up against the dark side of the monster: your unhappiness is threatening. maybe there is something wrong with *you.* because clearly, everybody else is satisfied...and you will conclude, if you are sensitive, that maybe they are right...