Outrage? Sure--if you'll do it for me!

One of the most familiar of Zizek's concepts is interpassivity, the way that an object does something for us, enabling us to remain passive. So, Zizek's vcr can tape a bunch of movies, watching them in Zizek's stead. Recent discussions with students have reminded me how useful this concept is. It's particularly useful for thinking about contemporary outrage.

For the past several months, 24/7 news media has repeated that the American people are outraged (imagine typical Jon Stewart mash up of relevant samples). We are outraged about the economy, the bailout, Wall Street salaries, Obama's missing birth certificate, Miss America, swine flu, taxes, and torture. But the weird thing is that there are not massive rallies in the streets. People are not storming the White House or Wall Street, for that matter. Why?

My hypothesis: blame Glen Beck and Keith Oberman. Blame Counterpunch and whatever right wing net-based publication you want. These folks are outraged for us. They are outraged in our stead, enabling us to retain our general passivity. Extreme media, in other words, doesn't stir us up: it stirs for us.

(cross-posted from I Cite)

Comments

[Alain]

I think this is a great point - that we become anesthetized by watching someone else rage in our place. There is definitely something to this.

But I still maintain that if unemployment gets high enough (I do not know what the magic number is) and enough people loose their homes and health insurance, mass rage will actually express itself in more traditional ways (protests, violence, siezure of property). Until that moment comes, I think you are right that these mediated outlets do our raging for us.

[Dave]

Yes, Jodi, but at the same time everyone is becoming a content creator, and the very creation of this content anesthatizes the impulse to action. We transfer the power of our outrage from our bodies to our words, spend our energy stirring up others (or rather, stirring for others) instead of actually stirring ourselves.

[Χάος]

I have a slightly different take.

It isn't that people rely on others to be outraged for them. People are outraged. What's different is how they express it. We express ourselves now via twitter, over blogs, on social networking sites. The internet has become a dumping ground for all of our distress, which means that rather than being channeled into action that discontent is simply transferred into the digital realm.

Protests, when they do occur, are largely ritualized, scripted affairs. We obtain a permit, show up at the designated time and place, wave a few signs, chant a few slogans, maybe even stop traffic for a little bit---and then we all go home and blog about it.

Essentially it comes down to symbolic vs direct action. Symbolic action only effects change when it's backed up by direct action.