About some stuff I read off the Internet

The structure of the advanced industrial society is totalitarian, self-contained and self-perpetuating by the very conditions of its structure.

Clancy Smith

I got bored of reading political Op-Eds and editorials on the web when I'm bored at work so I subscribed to local Filipino university's online philosophy journal. I read a few articles and they aren't bad but really I'm just happy that its free. I can't believe that Cambridge University thinks they can charge me 20 UK pounds just to have conditional access to an article about 8^th century Chinese pottery. Not like I would read that if it was free but I was still insulted by the absurd price.

I came across a lengthy article about the nature and structure of “advanced industrial societies”. The author was discussing the ideas of a guy named Theodore Adorno who back in the 50s and 60's wrote a bunch of sociological essays and critiques on modern society. I was exposed to some of this guys work back in university and he was one of those intellectually decadent, overly analytical sociologists that when he was supposedly talking about American television culture it sounded like astrophysics (and remember this guy wrote back in the 50's and 60's so there were only like 5 channels). It is true that I usually classify someone who writes something I don't understand as “intellectually decadent” but I think in this case it is an accurate description.

Now about that quote; I picked it out of a twenty page article but I think it is representative of what the author was trying to say in the article. In his speculation about the nature of society and our role in it, I think the author fell into the same pitfall that a great deal of sociologists and other scholars have fallen into. He takes observations of which most could agree upon, mainly that modern corporations and politicians are constantly trying and at times succeeding to superimpose needs that we did not think we had onto us. From these observations he makes a vast conclusion about the nature of society as a whole. This principally pertains to consumption and to the inflated role we expect politicians to have in our daily lives and state of being. I can see his point because it is definitely true that modern middle class Americans definitely seem to have more desires that they classify as needs (such as a car, electricity, internet, running water, etc.) as compared to some living in a poor village in Africa who cannot even imagine owning these types of things. One of this guys points is that the “advanced industrial society” inevitably becomes uncritical of itself because of these things that were luxuries which become necessary for day to day life. It's not that I don't agree with him because I am also annoyed at the vulgarity of people who demand new Iphones and whatever other crap happens to be popular nowadays but honestly its not any of my business and people can waste their money as way they want. Instead of seeing the scary apparently unethical corporations or a government that has become too controlling, this guy sees the seeds of the problem sown into the very fabric of a modern industrial nation. I can see where he is coming from and this reminds me of some other literature I've read. I know that a lot of people dislike it when people use works of literature as examples to prove a point because it comes off as elitist, but I am not trying to prove a coherent point so it's OK.

Back in the late 19^th century there was a Swedish playwright by the name of August Strindburg. He wrote a lot of plays but I only really studied Miss Julie in any depth. The play centers around one aristocratic woman known as Miss Julie and her mental collapse. She is bored with the aristocratic lifestyle and tries to relate and have fun with the servants of her father's estate. This turns out impossible mainly because of the fact that she didn't really want to know them but she merely saw them as an amusement and an escape from her own unhappiness. The gap between their two statuses was too great and although she dances and even sleeps with one of them she is not one of them. She ends up just using them to satisfy a desire she has within herself but does not understand and they end up using her vulnerability to their own advantage. In the end the chasm cannot be bridged and they could not see in each other a common humanity. She resolves at the end of the play to run away with one the servant men and start a new life but she quickly realizes she has no independence or wealth outside of her father's estate. She has a complete mental collapse and commits suicide. Different literary critics read different messages from this play but I think the play relates to the quote above. Although the author of the article about Adorno maintains a matter of fact tone as he describes the degradation of humanity by modern society, it is definitely a depressing point of view on the world. August Strindburg was quoted as saying that the world he lived was one of transition. During the 19^th century the world was transformed by industrialization and as the industry expanded so did a sense of nationalism which laid the seeds for what we call Modernity. Perhaps in Strindburg's eyes Miss Julie was a victim of this transition; unable to cope with the changing world while simultaneously unable to relate to those around her. Strindburg himself was a troubled guy and it is well known he went through a lot psychotic episodes and I think it is generally thought today that he was schizophrenic. So was Strindburg also a victim of this unforgiving and unwelcome arrival of what we call “Modernity” or was it something more basic, more natural?

Another writer I think that exemplifies this sort of struggle is Mishima Yukio. He was a very controversial character in Japan back in the 60's and 70's and he wrote a lot of books with characters that have similar identity crises and disturbed personalities like Miss Julie. Mishima's life also matched this dilemma with how to cope with the modern world. Mishima came to age and began his serious writing after the surrender of Japan to the Allies and the entire nation was in an identity crisis. Japan went from being a world superpower to being globally humiliated, symbolically stripped of its claws to assert itself on the world stage, and was forced to rebuild a nation in the wake of massive destruction. Following the war the Japanese was forced to reconstruct their nation on foreign principles imposed upon it and with the United States in the background basically dictating their foreign policy; while at the same time maintaining their cultural pride. Mishima was interesting character because he advocated for Japan to once again rise to the esteem it had before the WW2. This included acquiring nuclear weapons, reinvigorating the military, and reinstate the emperor to his traditional post as the spiritual leader of the nation. Most of the liberal Japanese were uncomfortable with his desire to get nuclear weapons and they didn't like his brand of nationalism which was too similar to the ideology that put Japan on the war path in the 1930s. However unlike a lot of right wing Japanese, Mishima never denied the war crimes the Japanese military committed nor did he sugarcoat the intentions of the Japanese military government at that time. Mishima was disgusted with the commercialization of Japanese society and culture and thought that the Japanese were losing their soul to modernity. Mishima lived in a time past the “transition” experienced by Strindburg but still felt alienated in the modern world. He became so disillusioned with the state of Japan that he attempted to rally the Japanese Defense Force into committing a coup and reinstate the emperor as the head of state. The soldiers laughed at him, called him an idiot, and just as any samurai would do in this situation, he promptly committed Harakiri. Now what can I say about Mishima? I have met very few Japanese who take him seriously and for those who don't, they may respect his literature but think he was just crazy. He became categorized as just another one of those lunatics yelling on the street that we try to ignore. I personally have a lot of respect for him. I cannot relate to what he tried to accomplish but I respect his passion and courage to actually try what millions of people just think about. He tried to shape the destiny of a country he loved and even if he might not have been in touch in reality I sympathize with his internal struggle.

Now the reason why I brought these two very different men into this is that I think they both represent those who some would say were alienated by the rise of “advanced industrial societies”. So what does this say about the world we live in? Haha not that much I don't think. I believe that human beings are fundamentally self-centered and cheesy. This “post-modern” malaise that philosophers and artist say we are going through are really their own romanticized creations. Perhaps Strindburg and Mishima were just crazy and would have been crazy if they were born in any time period. One thing I have noticed from reading texts from philosophers and historians from throughout history is that they usually see one of two things in society: either that they live during the time where civilization has reached its peak or they lament how things were so much better before. The entire Confucian tradition is based around emulating the supposedly idyllic past and I relate that to the people today who lament the “degradation” of world culture by commercialization and globalization. “People today listen to bad music and are amused by stupid things!” they say and that “At least people in the past appreciated literature, poetry, and philosophy.” I think this is funny because if you go back a few hundred years when some the most famous Western literature and poetry originated the vast majority of the population was not even able to read it. And I bet the average entertainment back in 18^th century was not much more sophisticated than Lady Gaga. The idea that almost the entire society is literate is relatively new concept and the fact that world classics now are readily available at any major bookstore would have amazed people a hundred years ago. Now I can't say I am a fan of most of what comes out of popular culture but the only reason why the culture in the past seems so much more rich is that history has selected those works of art of music that could stand the test of time. We don't know about the crap that came from those time periods because it was thrown into the dustbin of history.

So am I afraid of the growing industrialism, commercialization, over-powering nature of the modern state? Not really. People will always complain regardless of the circumstances.

Now I feel like I should relate this to the Philippines since I am here after all. Filipinos are also “plagued” by globalization and commercialization in the form of foreign fast food franchises and department stores overrunning their local economy. I wouldn't say that the government here is over-powering. If anything it's the opposite. I ask Filipinos what they think about their government and if things will or could get better. I asked one guy who was studying political science if he liked Noynoy Aquino because he pledges to be less corrupt and he told me “he's apart of the government and so by principle I don't like him.” He claimed that was the common mantra for his entire university. Apparently the government was and remains so corrupt that no one has much hope that it will get any better. I get the feeling that most Filipinos simply shrug it off and just try to make ends meet. I relate to their cynicism because I feel the same way about world governments in general. So what do we all have in common? We will never be satisfied and I just hope that those idealistic people will just stop being so cheesy.