#alientation

"Nous nous passerions peut-être des ornements de la culture : livres ou concert, mais nous ne pourrions nous passer de quelques journées de marche en montagne ou en plaine. Seuls les inconscients et les hypocrites finissent par faire de leur activité professionnelle ou politique le centre de leur vie ; c’est la race pâle des dames de comité, des jeunes filles dévouées et des militants actifs. Pour tous ceux qui ont encore un naïf désir de vivre, qui ne végètent pas dans l’estomac du monstre social, il n’y a plus qu’une solution, attendre la fin du travail ; vivre pendant des mois d’une vie ralentie ; le terme "vacances" finit par avoir une signification aussi forte pour l’adulte que pour l’élève bouclé dans un internat, car la société actuelle est aussi fermée qu’un internat. Pour combien de jeunes, toute hypocrisie philosophique mise à part, le voyage en montagne ou en mer représente le seul moment de vie possible ?"

2022 Hilton Head Island Lantern Parade 11.12.22  :: [Steve Eberhardt]

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“Soren Kierkegaard argued that it was the separation of intellect from emotion, from empathy, that doomed Western civilization. The "soul" has no role in a technocratic society.The communal has been shattered. The concept of the common good has been obliterated. Greed is celebrated. The individual is a god. The celluloid image is reality. The artistic and intellectual forces that make transcendence and the communal possible are belittled or ignored.The basest lusts are celebrated as forms of indentity and self-expression. Progress is defined exclusively by technological and material advancement. All that is human is obliterated. This creates a collective despair and anxiety that is fed by glitter, noise, and false promises of consumer-culture idols.The despair grows ever-worse, but we never acknowledge our existential dread. As Kierkegaard understood, "the specific character of despair is precisely this : it is unaware of being despair."

Those who resist are relentlessly self-critical. They ask the hard questions that mass culture, which promises an unachievable eternal youth, fame and financial success, deflects us from asking. What does it mean to be born? What does it mean to live? What does it mean to die? How do we live a life of meaning? What is justice? What is truth? What is beauty? What does our past say about our present? How do we defy radical evil?

We are in the grip of what Kierkegaard called "sickness unto death" - the numbing of the soul by despair that leads to moral and physical debasement. Those who are ruled by rational abstractions and an aloof intellectualism, Kierkegaard argued, are as depraved as those who succumb to hedonism, cravings for power, violence, and predatory sexuality. We achieve salvation when we accept the impediments of the body and the soul, the limitations of being human, yet despite these limitations seek to do good. This burning honesty, which means we always exist on the cusp of despair, leaves us, in Kierkegaard's words, in "fear and trembling". We struggle not to be brutes while acknowledging we can never be angels. We must be able to see our own face in the face of the oppressor.

The theologian Paul Tillich did not use the word "sin" to mean an act of immorality. He, like Kierkegaard, defined sin as estrangement. For Tillich, it was our deepest existential dilemma. Sin was our separation from the forces that give us ultimate meaning and purpose in life. This separation fosters the alienation, anxiety, meaninglessness, and despair that are preyed upon by mass culture. As long as we fold inward and embrace a hyper-individualism that is defined by selfishness and narcissism, we will never overcome this estrangement. We will be separated from ourselves, from others and from the sacred.

Resistance is not only about battling the forces of darkness. It is about becoming a complete human being. It is about overcoming estrangement. It is about our neighbour. It is about honoring the sacred. It is about dignity. It is about sacrifice. It is about courage. It is about freedom. It is about the capacity to love. Resistance must become our vocation."

(Chris Hedges in "America, The Farewell Tour")

A dystopian utopia, a city that had 50,000 inhabitants, all gone over the course of a few days. An abandoned perfection symbolizing how easy it is to destroy what you have created, even if by accident. But don't worry, vegetation and wild animals will take over, as they do in the end. It is us and only us we have to worry about, and Pripyat acts as a testament to that.

"Jusqu’à la fin du XIXe siècle, en Amérique et en Europe, les paysans employés dans ces établissements sont généralement très indisciplinés, car la logique industrielle heurte leurs rythmes de travail, leur conception du gain et leurs manières d’interagir. L’encadrement de tels travailleurs vise moins à les rendre productifs qu’à les rendre dociles ; il s’agit de les plier à des impératifs jusqu’alors inconnus d’eux que sont la régularité, la standardisation, la précision des tâches et le soin d’équipements qui ne leur appartiennent pas."