7.5 KiB
The Death of Miami
i. Into the Machine
In a spectacular society, images not only have the power to subjagate but to inspire and change. Things diffused in the media can either help people delve
futher in infantile fantasies, or awaken them to the truths of a world working against them. After all Debord's classic is distributed in print. The dual nature of media, as both subjagation and liberation is reflected well in the Cyberpunk movement. Though many would hesitate to call it movement, there's no doubt that it created an extremely accurate description of the world we live(d) in. Its motto: High Tech Low life, is the centerpiece of the movement and its main take on capita- lism. Cyberpunk focuses on the juxtaposition of seemingly god-like technology and the subjagation of an alienated and mechanized lower caste. These ideas were given life with Gibson and given a true foothold in the spectacle with movies such as Bladerunner. With the introduciton of latter, Cyberpunk and its ideas had been diffused into our collective unconscious. Between facial recognition towers and an elaborate, global surveillance system, no one could really deny we live(d) in a cyberpunk world. Its not uncommon to see a person who can barely afford to feed themselves, clutching a supercomputer.
ii. Cyberpunk as Truth, not Gospel
What happened after our entrance into the cyberpunk world was not surprising. While intially the Cyberpunk movement had a decent insurrectionary current, it
didn't take long for the domestication to seep into what was once a angry punk movement. For many, Cyberpunk was the mirror held up to society,a cautionary tale of would happen if humans became lesser than technology. The threat of of malicious technocracy was enough to inspire a wave of unix gray-breads and nerds of all breeds to create defensive software. There was an idea to take back the tools used for opression, to not only fight back, but to liberate ourselves(sometimes from the perceived burden of our own biology). Many beautiful pieces of software were made with cyberpunk ideas in mind. The honeymoon period of Cyberpunk is remembered fondly by many 20 and 30 somethings and is reflected in scattered websites[1] and modern hacker culture[2]. This is were it gets sad. As is always the case in spectacular societies, the image surpassed that which was real. The tech infused noir was initially used as a vehicle for cyberpunk's critique on capitalism or simply as a paintjob for a what was essentially a digital punk movement. Critiques in Cyberpunk media were incredibly sobering and the anger at a world that put techonology over humans was channeled into action. But as all things do Cyberpunk began to fade. And the spectacle, which perhaps recognized the threat of such ideas used its best tool to neutralize them: Commodification. Cyberpunk had become what it was destined to be, a theme used in elaborate fantasy worlds. Instead of the cold shower that jolted you to sharp awareness from a warm sleep, it was the long shower that mimicked human contact during a depression. Cyberpunk became escapism. And the cyberpunk elements that exist in the real world, only served to help further immerse people into their fantasies. Modern interpretations of the movement consider it one of the "comfy" flavors in a world lacking in taste. Long videos on the internet serve as an altar to the aesthetic's new form, a blanket of hazy purple nostalgia in a world that tries its best to erode the soul's of its inhabitants.[3]The statement, "Cyberpunk is dead" had finally become true.
iii. Rebirth
A ketamine infused cyber-stupor was now the mainstream. Fortunately, this state has been interupted by collapse. Collapse has only changed the aesthetic
landscape due to its presence becoming impossible to ignore and its migration to the forefront of the average North American's perception basically changed everything. There's no doubt that a gut wrenching panic and fear has become the background radiation. Eventually most of us became used to it. Nowadays making bad jokes about such things is commonplace. In one way or another it's clear to most people that the world is ending in some form. This sentiment was enough to bring in the next "big" player: Solarpunk. For those closer to forefront of culture(leftists,anarchists,social ecologists etc) solarpunk was the sunrise at the end of hundred year storm. While the narrative of Cyberpunk was resisting in a world where tech is used for domination(something that was incredibly dystopian);solarpunk dared to make a different claim. Solarpunk stated that in the near future, or even today, we are starting to build the bedrock of a world were nature and man are one. A world we're we have learned our lesson and work to build a sustainable society(hence the "solar" as solar energy is usually involved in this vision). Some really bold statements are being made, and the most notable thing here is the shift from a dystopian to utopian worldview. The transition from hopeless to hopeful is the cornerstone of the movment[4]. For solarpunks the train of thought goes something like this: "If the cyberpunk aesthetic actualized a world of cyberpunk, than utopia can be brought through an aesthetic of utopia!". This sentiment is only half right and the misunderstanding of what made Cyberpunk work, resulted in solarpunk dying in its infancy. Whats important to note is that the world cyberpunk made wasn't far from what was their. The machine-heavy noir it envisioned wasnt in the far off future, it essentially already had its foot in the present. Furthermore, the action it inspired worked within this imagined world and said world has increasingly indistinguishable from reality. Solarpunk was pushed by eager lefist and post-leftists in a desperate attempt to bring the world they wanted, while ignoring the world thats in front of them. There's only one thing that the solarpunks got right and that is collapse cannot be stopped. Solarpunk exists now as a flavoring for green capitalism. The Solarpunks couldn't even be called a group and those who claim that title are content to see the capitalist machine adapt to global warming. Just another sport to spectate.
iv. Answers
A good aesthetic movement accomplishes one of two things. One, it recognizes the current state of the world and two, builds a story around that state that
inspires action. So whats the state of the world? Well there is none. Collapse is quite the shakeup but its no guarantee the empires are going to die. Some areas are in the neolithic and some are in 2078. With the power of mass media we dont see one story. We see many. Collapse is a trend that will effect all the regions of the world in distinct ways. For some its the end of their world, for others it'll be something short of utopia. All that can be said is that things are definitely gonna change. Some of these ideas are reflected in Desert by Anonymous[5]. Desert released a familiar energy into the aesthetic landscape. A weaponized hopelessness. That same energy behind all fiery movements, starting with the acceptance that things cant be changed and ending with the notion that we can change how we act. What ever is coming next is building on this skeleton of hopelessness. The same skeleton that started great aesthetic movements before. What it looks like and what it is, has yet to be seen.