Pre-Class Baudrillard- fang

Exponentially easier to comprehend than Lyotard, Baudrillard notes some tragically true aspects of our society. He focuses on the amplified role of simulations and questions what is legitimately real in our society. His examples of Disney and 9/11 are frighteningly good examples. Baudrillard states that “simulation is no longer that of a territory, a referential being or a substance” (388) and Disneyland, as well as other spots of Los Angeles, illustrate this notion. Disneyland even has something called Tomorrowland that distinguishes between Disney real and Disney “future.” In Disneyland (or World as I have never actually been to California), princesses are common, everyone is somehow friendly, and paying $12 for a hot dog is not ridiculous.  The park “conceals the fact that true childishness is everywhere- that is that of the adults themselves who come here to act the child in order to foster illusions as to their real childishness” (393). Baudrillard utilizes Disney to illustrate the notion that we rely on a pseudo-world to live in and consistently use simulations and representations to mask our society.

Baudrillard further tackles “real” in The Spirit of Terrorism. The attacks on September 11, 2001 were real but he argues, “an excess of violence is not enough to open on to reality” (228). The fact that the attack was symbolic of terrorism and a catalyst for two wars and lives lost is what makes it “real.” For many of us, as Zizek states, 9/11 was just images on television and the way movies and other media texts are, that image of a building blowing up is not foreign to many audiences. We are desensitized to something as massive as an attack on our country and now, it is even utilized for other media texts (Homeland Season 2 Finale). Events like 9/11 are catastrophic but they need something else to be considered “real” in our society.

I haven’t finished reading Zizek and since blog posts are due at 8, I will just get to him later.