THE CUT AS SOCIETAL REALITY

This chapter will use the analogy of the cut to frame the current societal condition – an era that has and will only continue to embody Baudrillard’s fourth level of simulation. By analysing Bernays’ Propaganda, this section demonstrates that currently societal reality is governed by post-truth, hauntology, and a system of technological dependence that threatens to destroy human agency. To begin this, I will outline the main findings of Propaganda, and Baudrillard’s America and Simulacra and Simulation.

The idea of simulacra has roots in Plato’s philosophy, who determined that a simulacrum can be defined as an imperfect copy of an ideal form. Plato believed that objects are imperfect version of ideal forms that exist at a higher plane or realm of existence. Originally published in 1981, Baudrillard extrapolates Plato’s foundational philosophy, and argues that modern societies no longer function as a system of representing a base, physical reality, but are instead dominated by the presence of simulacra – copies of copies. He demonstrates the successive phases of an image’s relationship to reality:

“It is the reflection of a profound reality;
It masks and denatures a profound reality;
It masks the absence of a profound reality;
It has no relation to any reality whatsoever: it is its own pure simulacrum.”( Baudrillard, 1981)

Baudrillard argues that culture acts as sort of instructions on how to live. In the premodern era, religion filled the gap around the questions of life. During the industrial revolution and modernist period, mass media was developed and therefore several different ideas of ‘how to live’ were in juxtaposition to the previous status quo. In the postmodern era, Baudrillard describes a ‘meaning implosion’, as there is so much information being produced and received. Such information in the hyperreal world is self-referential, with a complete loss to reality.

Edward Bernays’ is perhaps one of the most significant figures of the twentieth century, famously stating “It is the purpose of propaganda to make people want things they do not want.” Bernays, the nephew of Sigmund Freud, is noted as the ‘father of public relations’ (Curtis, 2002) – although his conceptualisation of democracy and the public is rightfully criticised of eroding public dissent and manipulating the masses. Propaganda is a book that outlines the psychology of this public manipulation, and how there is a need for the masses to be controlled.

In its first chapter, Propaganda highlights the requirement of a ruling class, due to the sheer volume of data that for the sake of simplicity and practicality there are only two political parties. If every person could person vote for whomever they wanted, it would only create a state of confusion and chaos. Bernays states ‘…if all men had to study for themselves the abstruse economic, political and ethical data involved in every question, they would find it impossible to come to a conclusion without anything.’ In essence, this ideology argues that individuals are stripped of actual freedom and instead occupy a state of unknowing– there are only certain choices that the individual can make. In the film, shots are recorded of actors, playing the scene, which are then stitched together using editing. Is this system not the same as modernist living? If the choices we are allowed to make are governed by a ‘ruling class’, how can they not be said to be the same as film editors?

Eisenstein reflects this concept, writing in the Film Sense that “Cinema has the power to influence the consciousness of the masses”, meaning that cinema as a medium is not a manipulative tool, but has potential power of collective education. Since montage works directly with the subconscious - it is an emotional system rather than intellectual - then montage is only a reflection of Bernays’ use of Freudian psychological subconscious. Images (whether filmic, advertisements, or entertainment) are used to persuade, alter the thinking of and control the masses, then it is evident that the cut is an appropriate tool to diagnose objects of hyperreality. In modern life, walking down the street means that you are forced to mentally cut between advertisements, fashion, gossip etc and perhaps this is what is what is meant by life feels like a film.

This system is disguised as practicality however this the illusion of choice is what makes the modern system a hidden controlling power that eventually leads the individual caught inside the cut, unaware of the half-reality they occupy. Baudrillard’s idea of ‘meaning implosion’ is only the extension of Bernays’ writing – it is what happens when modernity is allowed to run free. Bernays lays the groundwork, Baudrillard tells us what this system becomes when continued. The motivations behind why this happens is not as malicious as one might believe as Bernays’ demonstrates, it may simply be because one manufacturer has made excessive silk, and therefore the ‘propagandist’ must create a want where there is no need - create a new fashionable silk shoe.

Bernays’ explains later the psychology of the masses, that ‘a trusted leader’ is needed to influence the masses. The masses do not think in the typical sense of the word, only has intrinsic habits, emotions and desires. The individual can be tricked into making up its mind since they usually act following ‘a trusted leader’. This acts as ‘one of the most firmly established principles of mass psychology’ (Bernays). Bernays’ writing placed the foundation of public relation and mass psychology, however as we see in Adam Curtis’ Century of the Self, this evolved tremendously. During this time, many students opted against the last 40 years of corporations and government ‘brainwashing’ of the American people. In the advertising world, these people were known as ‘inner directors. Ultimately, Ronald Reagan and Margeret Thatcher’s electoral campaigns proved that fundamentally choice does not exist when dealing with the masses. Through the development of the values and lifestyles system, these campaigners managed to convince the inner directors to vote for their party, by segmenting the masses into identifiable categories. Ultimately this proves that no matter the situation, the masses are easily influenced and controlled.

In Baudrillard’s other work, America, Baudrillard travels the American landscape, providing awork that veers more towards a memoir of American experience. Counterintuitively, Baudrillard remarks on the success of American culture – of modernity ‘stabilised’. Comparisons between America and Europe are continually made, where Europe only theorises and never fully embraces modernity, America exists as a country where modernity exists without tragedy nor history. Freedom, speed and frictionless consumption create a type of simulation that replaces the need for meaning. Baudrillard rejects that idea that America can be described as ‘fake’ but argues that simulation that America provides is more efficient than reality, stating “Simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being, or a substance. It is the generation by models of a real without origin or reality.” The desert is no longer empty, but a neutral space that where advertising acts “not as a of communication, but a form of landscape.” In what is most relevant to the discussion of the cut, Baudrillard also talks of speed and motion. America is not a place meant to be read, instead traversed. If the individual is constantly moving through America, then speed can remove the need for interiority, contemplation, or distance that allows one to be critical.

While America and Simulacra and Simulation describe the hyperreal, meaningless yet high-functioning world, Mark Fisher’s (as earlier reviewed) Ghosts of My Life theorises the loss of this meaning. Unlike Baudrillard’s diagnosis of a world without meaning, Fisher emphasises the psychological consequences of this cultural condition, suggesting the persistence of the past is not merely nostalgia but symptomatic of a culture that cannot conceive of future alternatives.

Perhaps the documentary the Social Dilemma realises the logic Baudrillard describes, with the documentary’s biggest statement being that users are no longer customers but are instead the product. Every interaction, view, click and hesitation is harvested and sold to advertisers, much like the structure of the matrix as mentioned. The documentary outlines how each the masses becomes so individualised that it creates “2.7 billion Truman shows, with their own reality with their own facts” (Orlowski, 2020). This thinking perfectly articulates Bernay’s ideas around ‘the ruling class’, which the documentary admits that “if you want to control the population of your country, there has never been as tool as powerful as Facebook” (Orlowski, 2020). The documentary outlines how social media influences identity, encourages depression and anxiety among young people, and creates a societal narrative of post-truth that “In the shortest time horizon means civil war” (Orlowski, 2020). Finally, the documentary noticed that human self-control is merely not enough – the system preys on ‘human weaknesses’ using psychological techniques and a system of manipulation will continue if the business model is viable.