The Society of the Spectacle is a theory formulated in the middle of the 20th century by Guy Debord, a Frenchman. He was a member, for a time, of the Situationist International, (S.I.), an "international" group made up of members from European countries.
Artists were to break down the division between individual art forms and to create situations, constructed encounters and creatively lived moments in specific urban settings, instances of a critically transformed everyday life. They were to produce settings for situations and experimental models of possible modes of transformation of the city, as well as to agitate and polemicize against the sterility and oppression of the actual environment and ruling economic and political system. http://members.ams.chello.nl/j.seegers1/e-files/si.html
Further, and from Debord's own pen:
The spectacle is not an aggregate of images but a social relation among people, mediated by images." http://www.geocities.com/aufheben2/auf_6_situ.html
The following comes from his second book concerning the matter Comments on the Society of the Spectacle, written 20 years after his original publication--his observations are still relevant as a way to orient yourself (you are born into the Spectacle, so it seems oddly natural. "Oddly" is the hinge-pin.
Section V: The society who's modernisation has reached the stage of the integrated spectacle [ if the concentrated spectacle revolves around dictatorial power, and the diffuse spectacle "drives wage-earner's to apply their 'freedom of choice' toward a vast array of new commodities," the integrated spectacle ] is characterised by the combined effect of five principle features: incessant technological renewal; integration of state and economy; generalised secrecy; unanswerable lies; an eternal present.
Generalised secrecy, unanswerable lies--this sound slightly paranoid, yes? Read further.
He says that the accelerated technological innovation of a capitalist society surrenders us to the mercy of specialists--our judgements depend on their calculations. (In that sentence I have used the same words he uses, but rearranged them to condensed the thought) and he also states that "the most useful expert is the one who can lie." In essence, those that can manipulate the numbers to achieve the desired goal, and do it with a straight face, are the "experts." Experts are usually paid by someone. For example, crib manufacturers. In 2004 (sorry, can't remember what month) Mothering Magazine published the actual numbers, and the limitations of the surveyed info. Crib sleeping is safer, right? The experts say "You could smother your baby." Well, only if one takes the amount of unexplained deaths (lack of any detailed data on the recorded death,) and adds it to the number of babies who suffocate sleeping on the couch next to the boyfriend, and those that die from being rolled on by an intoxicated, sleeping blood-parent, and *then* compare it to the crib deaths. Cribs could be called overwhelmingly safe. The implication is that "not just anyone" can prepare a safe sleeping environment--only a crib manufacturer. Now compare the number of bed-sharing infants who die of SIDS (rare) or smothering, to the amount of infants that died in cribs from SIDS (Sudden [unexplained] infant death syndrome,) or collapsing cribs, then a different picture emerges. Sleeping next to an attentive mom beats all.* This is not such a good picture for the crib manufacturers who began their business right about the time Debord's society of the spectacle emerged. Cribmakers were reponding to the call for the scientific upbringing of children, but what to do when advancements in scientific and anthropological methods prove your product inferior--Why Lie!?!
* Both cribs and bed-sharing are acceptable sleeping arrangements, for different reasons. This would've been a much more "human-scale" advertising campaign, and definitely not as profitable for the crib makers.
But back to the text: In the same paragraph he states that "economy and state have now merged", "and individual humans find it absurd to oppose them", "or question their follies." I believe he draws this conclusion from his discussion of specialists in the sense that giant corporations who sell cribs also might own media outlets, and the media filters politics. Crib-sleeping, bottle/breast feeding, "crying it out' ( a term for letting a baby cry herself to sleep in order to train her to sleep all night long.) These are all very political decisions. (The personal is political if you're a woman, remember?)
But again, I've gotten off topic. Let's explore his assertion of the second principle of Generalised secrecy? Think he's paranoid? Read this recently published commentary by NPR's Connie Rice: Website http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4052162 Or read it here /reprint/nrp_rice
But then we encounter Debord's next assertion of "unanswerable lies."
"Once one controls the mechanism which operates the only form of social verification to be fully and universally recognized, one can say what one likes. The spectacle proves its arguments simply by going round in circles: by coming back to the start, by repetition, by constant reaffirmation in the only space left where anything can be publicly affirmed, and believed, precisely because that is the only thing to which everyone is witness. Spectacular power can similarly deny what it likes, once, or three times over, and change the subject; knowing full well there is no danger of riposte, in its own space or any other." In other words, "there is no place left where people can discuss the realities that concern them, because they can never lastingly free themselves from the crushing presence of media discourse."
Also, one more sentence
"When the spectacle stops talking about something for three days, it is as if it did not exist. For then it goes on to talk about something else, and it is that which henceforth, in short, exists. The practical consequences, as we see, are enourmous."
Think about water cooler conversation. Everyone who watched TV the night before can join the conversation. Nothing more will be said than what all the various networks presented. No critical analysis, no flash of brilliant insight. The participants in the society of the spectacle are numb. Unlike men from 100 years ago who Debord claims "based their self respect on the ability to verify information."
The final category is the eternal present. It
"is achieved by the ceaseless circularity of information, always returning to the same short list of trivialities, passionately proclaimed as major discoveries" (ex: wrinkle cream.) "Meanwhile, news of what is genuinely important, and what is actually changing, comes rarely, and then in fits and starts."
In the next section of the boox, VI, he boasts the merits of history.
"History's domain was the memorable, the totality of events whose consequences would be lastingly apparant. And thus, inseperably, history was knowledge that should endure and aid in undersanding, at least in part, what was to come: 'An everlasting possession' according to Thucydides. In this way history was a measure of genuine novelty. It is in the interests of those who sell novelty at any price to eradicate the means of measuring it."
Now remember, he wrote his original theory in the 50's. There were only three network television stations. If he saw this spectacle emerging back then, it's no wonder he killed himself in 1994. My apologies for my crudeness, suicide is a complicated matter, I just mean to underline the following point: If our contemporary culture, in its infancy, displayed these characteristics, then perhaps we should worry. It's easy not to--we are the first generation raised entirely by the spectacle. As soon as you leave this page, it won't exist--unless your interest has been peaked and you actively seek more information--So I'll leave you with this piece of the text by Guy Debord...
To this list of the triumphs of power we should however, add one result which has proved negative: once the running of a state involved permanent and massive shortage of historical knowledge, that state can no longer be led strategically.