The Society of the Spectacle

When I think of the word "Spectacle"I immediately think of a circus, or something equally as chaotic. A kind of chaos that you cant look away from, that is what our society has become. The media and everything it portrays has trapped us in this circus and whats amusing is that we don't even realize it. Who knew that Guy Debord would be spot on almost 50 years later when he says 

"The loss of quality that is so evident at every level of spectacular language, from the objects it glorifies to the behavior it regulates, stems from the basic nature of a production system that shuns reality. The commodity form reduces everything to quantitative equivalence. The quantitative is what it develops, and it can develop only within the quantitative." (Debord Chapter 2, Paragraph 38)

We as a society are highly wired, we have created a digital environment where computing, telecommunications and media have converged. We purge on images twenty four seven, our reach spans worldwide and as opposed to when Debord wrote The Society of the Spectacle, we are not just viewing the "spectacle" but we have become part of it more now than ever before. 

So what does this mean for us? In Debord's writing, he criticizes the society and its infatuation with "commodity" Americans were being sold things that they didn't need and they bought and bought and we are still buying. Debord called this affair with consumerism way before we saw it coming. Have you ever thought about why we buy half of the things we buy? I can tell you for sure, that its not because we need them. 

In this piece by Christina Catalano titled - Shaping The American Woman: Feminism and Advertising in the 1950's. Catalano discusses the psychoanalytic way in which women were advertised certain products to. They were sold these products because society had told them that this was what they were supposed to do.

While over 50 years later we are still being brainwashed by advertising, its a little different now, we are still slaves to the "commodity" as Debord refers to it, but the difference is that we are more involved in the process, no matter how aware we are or not. When you log onto your Facebook page, what do you see on the right hand side of the page? Your right! Apple trying to sell you another phone you don't need, ASOS telling you to buy that dress you know you can't afford, because its on sale. The bright colors and the catchy tag lines and offers might not have differed much, but the approach is. This time society isn't telling you to buy something because they think you want/ or need it. 10/10 of the times

they know you do. 

We must understand that we are now as involved in this process as those selling these things to us, we aren't just consumers or as Debord thinks, we aren't just being brainwashed. The effects of this spectacle might still remain the same, but the difference is we are more active than ever before.

Let me explain, I went on my Instagram, over 15 times while writing this, I went on my twitter about 25 times while writing this. These are things I do unconsciously, but the brands that I chose to follow, the products that I chose to buy, I have created my personal filter and I am now being advertised to based on my preference. 

"The social Web and social media have essentially become weapons of mass persuasion," he says. "You have large numbers of people interacting with each other, so you see not only spam but political campaigns involved in this. You see evidence of governments and hate groups engaging in this."

In this war of persuasion, then, researchers want to know how to change people's minds and views of the world. " (The Power of Social Media by Lesley Kriewald)