The False World

The agent of the spectacle placed on stage as a star is the opposite of the individual, the enemy of the individual in himself as well as in others (sec. 61). --Guy Debord Society of the Spectacle

May 10, 2010 After watching Robert Downey Jr. don on his Iron Man costume (it is not a suit) for the second time to do battle with Mickey Rourke, diary, I realized that we Americans are cowards. We are cowards for one simple reason: we submit ourselves to a realm of fantasy rather than live a life of reality. How many of us clapped, cheered, and laughed during the movie? How many of us oooed and ahhhed at the special effects? For two hours at a time we as the audience were taken away by fantasy, persuaded by escapism, and dramatically swayed. But all for what? Once the credits had rolledonce the villain had been vanquished, once the heroine had been saved, and once the hero had reemergedwhat did we as a people do? We got up; we removed ourselves from the theater. In that moment of leaving the theater, reality fell on us again, and we realized the brutal truth: Iron Man does not exist. He is not real, and no matter how troubling our plight or deep our despairs, he will never exist. He is false. Everything that Hollywood has ever produced in terms of these Men in Masks is absolutely false. Remember: nothing is real on screen. The dialogue spoken by the typical chauvinistic hero and hopeless damsel-in-distress is a dialogue written by scriptwriters. Remember: the gazes and stances of these actors/actresses are not real, for they are guided by a team of directors who lead their every move. Remember: the faces we see on screenthe bodies we see on the Red Carpet, the images we see on fashion magazines, the faces we see on TV are false, for they are all decorated by makeup artists, stylists, and computer engineers who manufacture their bodies/faces as product. This we know to be true. And yet, we Americans, fearful of the conditions of our lives (the real conditions of our lives, a world filled with death, poverty, disease and unhappiness), would willingly spend time, energy, and money, to allow these false heroes/heroines to live for us. This is an act of cowardice. *** May 11 2010 Plato very much understood the dangers of mimesis (imitation), and warned of the possible implications magniloquent persuasion could have on the masses in The Republic and Ion. For the ancient Greeks, art was a form of representation that tried to imitate nature. Platos concern was how such imitation removed the individual from the Truth, and how such imitation falsely enthused society into believing in falseness. Whereas philosophers were gifted with the ability to obtain Truth, those who attempted to represent the world through mimesis with persuasion were deemed discreditable and artless.

The Interludes are various journal entries and essays written by Daniel Fischer during his time as a student. They represent his thought process and offer scholarly critiques of the world.

Plato begins this critique by investigating poetry. One must remember that for the ancient Athenians, poetry was not an act of solitary reading, but rather, a public performance. Poetry was a grand spectacle where the rhapsode stood before the mass audience reciting Homers poetry (or any of the other great poets of the time). He stood accompanied by music and was divinely inspired. This madnessthis sense of enthousiasmoswas a state of possession where the rhapsode was controlled by the Muses. In producing this spectacle, the rhapsode suddenly speaks like his characters, becomes his characters, and moves audiences to endless states of passion. This mimicking of reality disturbs Plato for it instills a sense of falseness onto the masses. It moreover provokes our passions while disregarding our logic. Thus for Plato, the entire spectacle of poetry is a superficial spectacle where every member of the audience is falsely enthused. This enthusiastic state of mind veils Truth from the individualor, rather, it at the very least moves them away from their techne, has them become what they are not along with the rhapsode, and has them forget who they are. The king weeps at tales of tragedy when he should lead; the farmer becomes embolden with rage when he should farm. Thus the audience becomes enthused with the rhapsode and temporarily forgets their reality. This chain (this magnetic analogy) goes as follows: Musespoetactor/[rhaspode]audience Once the poet and rhapsode become inspired, he is no longer himself. He is moved beyond himself, is enthused, possessed, and so, is without any identity. He has lost his techneor, rather, his techne is mere representation and nothing more. When he speaks, he speaks falsely as someone else. Yet we as the audience become moved with him, and we too are persuaded by this double falseness. Hollywood follows the same format of falseness. Beginning with the actors, we understand their inspiration is not divine but technical: actors speak what is written and given to them, act accordingly to what is pointed out to them, and follow whatever command it is given to them. None of what they do is real. It is the Director that leads them, the Scriptwriter that tells them how to speak. The actor/actress takes these commands and becomes their character. They thus are not themselves, but the simply characters they represent. They speak no I that is their own, and their actions do not represent their own Selves in realitythey thus only mimic fantasy. The scriptwriter gives Spider-Man words to speak; he does not speak himself. Computer engineers and graphic designers swing him through the city; the actor does not do this himself. The suit itself is not the actors creation, but rather, the creation of the artist and costume designer. The actors/actresses we see on screen are thus not real and do nothing. But we as a culture praise them highly, become moved by their performances, loan them our money, give them our time, and submit to them our lives. We follow their fashions, wait for their latest scandals, take delight in the smallest gossip, and simply lose ourselves in our everyday activities. Director/Scriptwriteractor/actresscharacteraudience Those who say actors are skilled are simply wrong; actors are perhaps the least skilled individuals of all of society.

They simply know basic imitation and nothing more. And yet we, as a typical American societyso saturated with sensationalism and infantile tendencies towards a world of Hollywood and fashionwould rather pay these actors and actresses more than we would pay skilled individuals who specialize in a beneficial skill for society (doctors, scientists, scholars, historians, etc.). *** May 12, 2010 The makeup artist, visual-effects team, costume-designer, lighting director, editors, etc.these individuals are all more skilled than the actor for they all specialize in a technical skill that can be utilized outside the production studio. That the actor is nothing more than a mere imitator without any proper techne is a theme playfully investigated in Platos Ion. Socrates finds Ions position as a rhapsode a curious contradiction: he can recite all of Homers poetry as the best rhapsode in all of the land, and yet, when it comes to reciting the poetry of Hesiod, the native Ephesian remains mute. As Socrates asks: doesnt the sculptor with true skill have the ability to criticize other sculptors as well as their works? Cannot the art critic criticize the work of others in the same way he would criticize his own? What then is keeping Ion from being able to speak eloquently of other poets works if in all their tales there are elements of commonality such as war and death? The answer, of course, is that Ion has no true techne, that he is simply an imitator, a mimos, an actor, and thus is unable to speak skillfully about other subject matters. His abilities as a rhapsode are not his own, but rather, abilities loaned to him from the Muses through an instance of divine possession, that is, enthousiasmos. He is divinely possessed when reciting Homers poetry, a trait that is loaned to him through the poet from the Muses, and ultimately delivered in the end to the audience (the magnet analogy). He thus speaks as a madman when on stage. Socrates recites various arts from Homers poetry. In doing so, he asks Ion: who has the greater techne when speaking about medicine? The physician? Or the rhapsode who recites passages about the physician? Who has greater skill at piloting a water vessel? The pilot? Or the rhapsode who pretends to be a pilot? Thus the rhapsode as actor has no skill, is without a techne, and should not be trusted to be a producer of knowledge, truth, or morality. Shouldnt the same critique then be made to the actors and actresses that infest Hollywood? As said before, actors and actresses have no skill, and their presence on screen is nothing more than an illusion, an imitation. And yet, despite their lacking of skill, they become the embodiment of the ideal in American culture, the highest paid individuals in society, and become the highest worshipped figures of every generation. What of the graphic designers, what of the makeup artists? What of the computer engineers who make Superman fly through the city, who gives Spider-Man his graceful swing? And, moreover: what of the scientist, what of the doctor? What of the medical student who struggles every day to learn the secrets of medicine so that she may later in life find ways to cure disease? What of the construction worker, what of the historian? The young medical student that wishes to study cancer cells but that struggles every day to pay off her debt?

Will they ever walk the Red Carpet? An actor who dons on the lab coat of a forensic scientist is not a forensic scientist; we foolishly pay money to see this illusion because we pretend we do not know better. The actor who speaks like a doctor is not a doctor outside the studioyet they will receive a greater sum of money than the authentically trained doctor for simply looking like a doctor, whereas the real doctorthe one with actual technewill save lives. Hollywood is the greatest scheme America has ever concocted. *** May 14, 2010 Why? Why do we Americans flee from reality the way we do, why do we cowardly turn away from life? In speaking of life, one can only speak of weariness and labor, for this is the hidden mantra of all capitalist societies. Life is not a linear progression filled with obtainable wishes and wants, but rather, the paying of bills and mortgages. Because capitalism asks us to compete, one must wonder: who are the losers? How do they survive? And in living under a capitalist system of winners and losers, how do the losers cope with their wretched existence? Reality is harsh, but the world of Hollywood is warm and kind. To live briefly with the heroes on screen, to fetishize the newest fashion trends, to temporarily suspend all thoughts of labor, deadlines, paying of the bills, raising disobedient children, facing heartache of losing a loved onethis moment of fleeing soon becomes an unconscious habit where life suddenly must consist of celebrities and gossip. There must be a new viral internet video that we must all follow, there must be a new blockbuster from Hollywood that we must all talk about; there must be something to compensate the weariness in our lives. Without Optimus Prime to guide us, how would we live? *** May 15, 2010 No matter how great the plot or wonderful the hero, Hollywood will not benefit the individual after leaving the theater. The reason is brutally simple: once the movie has ended, life awaits the individual outside the theater doors. He still must pay his bills; he still must wake to go to work the next morning. Batman has done nothing for him. *** May 15, 2010 We leave the theater and then must exist as we are once the movie has ended. We escape into fantasy because we are afraid of life. We are comforted by clichs in this country; we know the protagonist will triumph in the end; we know that the damsel-in-distress will be saved. How wonderful it is to know that justice will triumph at the end! In a world so random, so confusing, with death and poverty surrounding us, how wonderful it is to see the Joker put in his place! When having to see the

wrinkles on our faces every morning, how great is it to know that others are handsomer than us, prettier than us, and that they can wear fashionable clothes better than us! How great is it to see a man in a mask that can take on the weight of the world and do what we weak, pathetic, ugly, and wretched humans cannot! How great is it to be loved by a sparkling vampire that will never age and can forever nurture us! And yet. The sight of Iron Man flying through the city will not help address the gender wage-gap in this country; Captain Americas presence on screen will not build shelters for the homeless. When Batman speaks his nearly inarticulate (and laughable) dialogue, no new conversation is made to help address racism in our culture the word nigger does not exist in the world of Twilight or Peter Parkers life. Yet racism exists. Disease, poverty, death, love, life, and friendships all exist. Hollywood would only make us flee from these things rather than address them. Are all Hollywood actors and actress vilified in my view? No. I just simply dislike the spectacle that surrounds them. This is all that I dislike. I just wished that it we as a society placed greater emphasis on the sciences and humanities in the same way we do to celebrities. This is all. *** May 16, 2010 Iron Man is not real and he cannot address racism. Batman is a hoax, and he will not prevent the next young girl from becoming a rape victim. The X-Men will not help end wars, and Captain America will not end poverty or provide relief for hunger on the streets. Why we cheer for these heroes,' I dont know, but I refuse them my praise. I just absolutely refuse them. Vincit omnia veritashomo sum.