The vaccination was the sort of surreal experience that most of the past year has been characterized by, a jumble of elements that don’t really seem to have much to do with one another all jammed up one atop the other into a confusing melange. While the past year has been full of anxiety, and many unnecessary deaths, the moments where these elements are far from my mind seem to be characterized by this sort of mostly-benign irrealism.
Read MorePart of this has to do with a thunderous absence in the contemporary period, something that has been present for so long and no longer exists in the context of our time: where is counterculture? It’s entirely possible that I have simply been passed by, that I’m no longer plugged in to the same networks that I was at one time. However, it definitely seems to me that there is a decided and somewhat worrying absence of a unified counterculture at this point in time. It feels like the moment at the top of a roller coaster when you can no longer hear the chain clanking along, but just before the drop happens — the mechanism isn’t involved any more and the mechanics have taken over.
Read MoreThe tendency of profits to decline is is what drives the supposed innovation of the capitalist system: the need to always move to a different horizon of extraction, to find untapped sources of value that can stave off this heat-death for just a little longer. Sometimes the state intervenes and slaps them away from one horizon of extraction (see: child labor laws,) but this only rarely happens.
Read MoreThe “media”, if it wants anything, wants as much of your attention as it can effectively extract for the lowest investment possible. More than any conspiracy theory about bad actors, more than any lie about modifying people’s behavior, more than anything else, this should be recognized as the root of the problem.
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