It should occur to the human race,
that we live in a society where conformity has taken over the dominant percentage
of people. As a whole, we fail to acknowledge that we are being highly
persuaded by what we watch and see on our television screens, radios, and billboard
advertisements. We have even joined these media outlets together to be received
on one device. These varieties of images
are put together and have generated a new relation amongst people known as a
spectacle.
The spectacle
has empowered our minds to believe that images in media are more than visions,
but they are reality. It becomes a part
of our consciousness resulting in an inability to separate what is real and
what is not. This inadequacy to
determine what is real and what isn’t concludes in a failure to also regulate
what is a need versus a simple desire. Debord
says “Consciousness of desire and desire of consciousness are the same project .
. .” (53), implying that we can no longer tell the difference between wants and
needs. This fake reality we have created
for ourselves has taken that ability away from us. An example of society as a spectacle, is the
impact of the iPhone. There was a time
where the most advanced mobile device was a beeper and people did just fine
communicating with each other. Today, it
has advanced to a point where, not only do we need a device that can connect us
to others, but it needs to be an iPhone.
Is it that we really need this device, or have we surpassed our desire
for the electronic because the media has embedded in our brains that we need
it? We as people, unify based on the media that this device is a need. The picture below demonstrates how people
will wait in line for hours to get this superficial need of theirs.
The idea
that culture becomes media, branches from the commodity of the spectacle. The
repetitive exposure to persuasive images in general has made the desire for
commodities. Also, the fact that media
has become very much mobile, we have a constant relation with the intentions of
these illustrations. “By mobilizing all human use value and monopolizing its
fulfillment, exchange value ultimately succeeded in controlling use.” We no longer have to burn our eyes on the
television, which some still do but we can see the power of the spectacle no
matter where we are. This results in a
loss of value for there is such a large quantity of media produced.
Still,
the idea of the spectacle is what allows the economy to exist. As the media continues to create this reality
for consumers, they will continue to buy. Therefore money will continue to be
made off this spectacle. “One society
discovers that it depends on the economy, the economy in fact depends on the
society,” (52). Debord is saying that
the economy needs society to continue to be fed by these false realities in
order to survive. If people came to the
realization that they were in fact in control rather than being consumed into
this falsified reality, the economy would fail because it would no longer make
money off of the biggest class that supports them, middle class.
The realization is there but the
action is nowhere to be found. As Debord
says in this chapter, as time elapses, people fail to see the advancements made
in society. This is the same way that
humans will fail to see that rather than take control, they will continue to be
pulled more and more in by the media.
Instead of conforming against this falsified reality they will only
conform to be disciplined by images, the spectacle.
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