“Science fiction is about the shadow the future casts on the present” -- Steven Shaviro
“The future will be better tomorrow” -- Dan Quayle
The second half of Shaviro’s book turns from the vaguely unsettling predictions of authors like K.W. Jeter and attempts to paint a picture, not of the future casting a shadow on the present, but rather of the present casting a (formidable) shadow on the future. The misanthropy of predictive science fiction, ranging from dirtily noir to disgustingly horrific (e.g. the “trophy-ization” of copyright pirates) becomes grounded in a sort of all-encompassing critique of capitalism that not only depresses, but also leaves little room for the admittedly humanist emotional response to depression known colloquially as “hope”. No, former VP Quayle, the future will in fact not be better tomorrow.
Of course, in the face of such a future, can we not at least dredge up a bit of nostalgia for the past? Well, no – at least not according to Shaviro, who eviscerates nostalgia as the inevitable commodification of our own projections and fantasies of the past to be sold back to us in a sort Pynchon-ian nightmare-mall.
In the face of such a future, what recourse do we have affect some sort of change? That becomes a central question in the reading of Shaviro’s text. And indeed, he paints an intentionally dire/bleak/depressing picture of the future in a networked society in order to get the reader to think beyond vague revolutionary “fuck-the-man” ideology, and at least identify what won’t work – indeed, what won’t even be worth our time to try.
The second half of Shaviro’s book turns from the vaguely unsettling predictions of authors like K.W. Jeter and attempts to paint a picture, not of the future casting a shadow on the present, but rather of the present casting a (formidable) shadow on the future. The misanthropy of predictive science fiction, ranging from dirtily noir to disgustingly horrific (e.g. the “trophy-ization” of copyright pirates) becomes grounded in a sort of all-encompassing critique of capitalism that not only depresses, but also leaves little room for the admittedly humanist emotional response to depression known colloquially as “hope”. No, former VP Quayle, the future will in fact not be better tomorrow.
Of course, in the face of such a future, can we not at least dredge up a bit of nostalgia for the past? Well, no – at least not according to Shaviro, who eviscerates nostalgia as the inevitable commodification of our own projections and fantasies of the past to be sold back to us in a sort Pynchon-ian nightmare-mall.
In the face of such a future, what recourse do we have affect some sort of change? That becomes a central question in the reading of Shaviro’s text. And indeed, he paints an intentionally dire/bleak/depressing picture of the future in a networked society in order to get the reader to think beyond vague revolutionary “fuck-the-man” ideology, and at least identify what won’t work – indeed, what won’t even be worth our time to try.
A familiar thread of dualism/non-dualism gratefully courses through Shaviro’s text, grounding it to a larger discourse that we can latch on to; even better, the concept of ‘being-in’, of existence in the space between dualities (what Shaviro calls extrabeing) appears as a sort of holy (non)place wherein crisis and critique exist. In that regard, then, the text connects at least to the work of Frances Dyson, who, as we have already discussed, critiqued the oppositional nature of duality. Shaviro’s argument is not totally congruous to Dyson’s, but at least it establishes a forum with which to unpack an excerpt of the text.
The struggle of Cyberspace versus Homunculus can be read, ambiguously, both as homogenizing, universalizing capitalist power versus local resistance, and as cosmopolitan versus oppressive cultural conformity. Biotech companies versus indigenous peoples, but also the World Trade Center versus Al-Qaeda. This is the politics of the 21st century. As Castells suggests, the globalizing, capitalist “network society” is contested by a multitude of “local” affirmations of identity. These affirmations range from gay and feminist movements to ecological activism to various nationalisms and religious fundamentalisms. But what makes the situation even more complex is that the two sides borrow from one another. Global flows of capital invest and commodify all these local identities, even as the identity movements themselves take the form of networks, all the better to contest the networked global order. – p. 236, Connected
When Shaviro writes about Cyberspace, he means “the seamlessness and ‘unthinkable complexity’ of the system of post human, virtual existence” (i.e. the network); and what he calls Homunculus is the “stunted and shrunken residue of humanity, possibly monstrous” – referring, in part, to the zombification of the labor force (Shaviro p. 235).
The ambiguity and complexity and interchangeability that Shaviro describes I think captures the essence of the ‘extrabeing’. On the surface, the oppositional forces listed above generate conflict, but a reading of those forces as potentially non-dual reveals that “they are ways of finding ambiguous points of potential, gaps in the linear chain of causality, unexpected openings to new, emergent processes” (Shaviro p. 224). So it is not the space that exists between Cyberspace and the Homunculus that invokes extrabeing, as much as it is the fact that these societal forces have so much in common with the opposition and generate so much contradiction internally.
The ambiguity and complexity and interchangeability that Shaviro describes I think captures the essence of the ‘extrabeing’. On the surface, the oppositional forces listed above generate conflict, but a reading of those forces as potentially non-dual reveals that “they are ways of finding ambiguous points of potential, gaps in the linear chain of causality, unexpected openings to new, emergent processes” (Shaviro p. 224). So it is not the space that exists between Cyberspace and the Homunculus that invokes extrabeing, as much as it is the fact that these societal forces have so much in common with the opposition and generate so much contradiction internally.
Again we come to the overarching question that shades any reading of Shaviro’s Connected, namely, in such a harsh critique of capitalism/society/the present, dominant ideology, what (if anything) can we do to improve the present(future) condition? Secondly, Shaviro writes that we have “moved out of time and into space” (p. 249) – if this is the case, then where is a place of critique and/or change?
As I have suggested, the where is an ambiguous in-between; Shaviro seems to think that this ambiguous in-between can be a place of crisis – which he says is “a point at which we are suddenly able to think (and to demand) everything, even the impossible” (p. 225). This seems like a pretty good start; except that Shaviro then goes on to cite Stars in My Pocket Like Grains of Sand, which describes a certain general state of crisis known as “Cultural Fugue”, which is essentially total planetary annihilation.
There are a number of threads to follow here. We could perhaps affect change from outside the network, except that Shaviro believes that one cannot exist outside the network except in cases where the network actively ejects and disconnects people and places from it (p. 176). What results from such an ejection is what Shaviro calls “informational black holes” wherein peoples are stripped of their identities and individualities, to apparently become one giant orgiastic “orgynism”. Or something. What is clear is that non-networked critiques of said network are generally assumed to be impossible.
Within the network, of course, you’re either a zombie (dead labor), or you’re the elite, skimming profits from the zombified work force (p. 166). So it would seem that critique from within the network is pretty difficult as well. Herein is the critique of capitalism, namely, that the work force is becoming ever larger even as it is becoming ever more hidden and invisible. Interestingly, Shaviro writes that the zombie/workforce circulates between alienated production and conspicuous consumption (p. 172); whereas I would suggest that the two are not antithetical or even endless feedback loops: in point of fact, an alienated workforce necessarily must consume the very goods they invisibly produce.
This discussion evolves into fields of sociobiology, and I found the segment on nature and culture particularly interesting. Shaviro sets up (as he has throughout the book) dual or opposing points of view only to point out that their opposition is at the very least deceiving and usually ambiguous and/or moot. In any case, Shaviro presents the work of Richard Dawkins contra that of Susan Blackmore, and the discourse generally revolves around genetic transmission versus memetic transmission (genetic traits being those that are inherent and passed down through parental lineage vs. memetic traits, which are suggested to be learned behaviors propagated laterally – like a virus). On a more basic level, the conflict (which, recall is not really a conflict because the two principles are not antithetical) revolves around notions of purpose. That is, there seems to be some disagreement as to whether the impulse for, say, religious belief, has any Darwinian survivalist purpose other than the continued propagation of that belief. As Shaviro puts it, “these ‘selfish replicators’ work just to perpetuate themselves, even if this be at our expense”.
In a recent episode of WTF with Marc Maron, Marc talks about a microbial parasite that uses mice to make them more fearless so that cats can more easily feed on fearless mice. This is a fascinating biological phenomenon that seems to operate in nearly the same way as the so-called selfish memetic replicators Shaviro discusses.
In any case, I think it is important to return to the idea of ambiguity and extrabeing. At its most basic level, Connected is a warning to not get caught up in the glam of ubiquitous connectivity, the sexiness of devices and the concept of progress. Much as Jeremy Bailey worked to actively create an amateur and unsexy aesthetic, Shaviro works to actively remind us that the network is not the triumphant socializing force it is often made out to be. Shaviro also warns us not to get too caught up in rushing to critique the network by joining some “other”, some ideological outsider that proclaims to be persecuted by said network. That is the path, according to Shaviro, of fundamentalist extremism – which shares many of the fascist qualities of the network itself. Shaviro doesn’t offer a rosy view of the future (which is now, or at the very least coming sooner than we think – another of Shaviro’s points), nor does he offer any easy solutions. And that, I think, is the point: we are meant to be frightened by Shaviro’s perspective, and we are meant to see that there are no simple solutions, for the very reason that a solution is antithetical to a problem; and – most basically – Shaviro is critiquing the notion of dualistic opposition. Therefore, we are exhorted to reside in a state of ambiguity and uncertainty.
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