â„–3387613[Quote]
So many and so exciting are the leisure options offered to modern man (the most modern man to date) that he is scarcely capable of attending to them all and fully realizing the potential enjoyment contained in each one; such is his commitment to his own amusement… yet even that is not enough, for even multiplied threefold he would still be unable to make worthwhile the collective effort of all his fellow men to generate ever more and better conditions with which to fill his free time. But Man-and modern man above all-has always known how to see beyond his own circumstances and discover solutions to what might appear insoluble, perhaps by subverting his own rules and overcoming ancestral prejudices in pursuit of a new awareness of the limits of his very humanity.
The Industrial Revolution brought with it the embryo of the modern age, and in it man learned to delegate his labor to machines and, with his reclaimed time, aspire to higher levels of technological development and well-being. Two centuries later, that same Man (there is no other; though perhaps there could be, lurking behind this one-who knows?) has generated such a mass of wealth and surplus that his principal concern has shifted from the production of goods to the very consumption of that production, which today far exceeds the need that originally encouraged it and which now only remotely justifies it.
And in the crater of this benign and unstoppable eruption, the lava spewed forth and bubbling is increasingly placed in the service of supposed pleasures in which we may delight and lose ourselves. Yet of these pleasures, so many are produced that more and more objects of enjoyment end up sterile and warehoused, cheapened, destroyed, or worse, simply given away. Meanwhile, the few hours of recreation available to us seem to have no objective other than to hurl ourselves frantically into these consumable pleasures and try, insofar as possible, to balance the lopsided scale between what is ferociously produced and what can scarcely be consumed.
This is, without a doubt, a critical moment. Perhaps the time has come to bring about a drastic and revolutionary change to this deranged state of affairs. Three centuries ago, Man (the same Man as before) boldly initiated the already mentioned irreversible process by which he surrounded himself with mechanical devices that helped him satisfy his basic needs (food, shelter, transport, energy…). Today, with those primary needs more than adequately met (for the Man to whom I refer, they are), is it not already time to apply-with the same logical rigor as our industrious ancestors-a measure of intelligence toward addressing our new demands and solving once and for all the problem of pleasure-goods that nobody can consume because their time is occupied producing new pleasure-goods?
â„–3387614[Quote]
The solution becomes crystal clear to common sense. Did we not already do this once before, and with such excellent results? Let us do it again: LET US DELEGATE TO MACHINES. Let them be the ones who consume the pleasures that we ourselves deny ourselves. Let us manufacture automatons that simulate entertaining themselves at the spectacles presented to them, that shout and cheer at grand sporting events, that go shopping and arbitrarily purchase goods, that express joy and surprise at every new diversion we devise for them, that discuss the day's news indignantly, emotionally, or in astonishment, for in this too they will simulate having opinions, just as we do. Let them travel, visit museums, monuments, dance halls; let them celebrate New Year's Eve, religious ceremonies, national holidays; let them crowd outside nightclubs; let them even possess the ability to ingest alcohol and feign drunkenness; let them know how to shake the television antenna until it breaks completely; let them exchange gifts with one another-let them make love! Yes, with adjustable intensities. Let them act as parents for our children and children for our parents. Let them fulfill, in short, all the obligations of our leisure, so that we ourselves, without fear of a crisis that could bring everything crashing down, may finally surrender to perpetual, productive, restorative work, without the burden of having to consume the pleasures we endlessly manufacture.
For the sole and permissible pleasure for Man (you know whom I mean) is WORK, and it is only through this strategy that the cycle for which he was placed upon the Earth will finally be fulfilled: to evolve into a refined caste of satisfied slaves, devoted out of pure pleasure to the invention and serial manufacture of mechanical humanoids who, incapable of truly feeling enjoyment, will nonetheless imitate the pleasures that men-who are indeed capable of feeling them-have no wish to experience, having instead discovered in this routine loop of labor the very blessing of their existence.
*And certain steps have already been taken in this direction. A few years ago, within the voluptuous spectrum of commodities, there appeared some simple mechanical devices conceived so that the members of our species most enthusiastic about this new age might subject what little leisure they still possess to the care and attention of the simulated human needs that these contraptions possess as their sole virtue.
â„–3388075[Quote]
blud had a vision 💀💀💀