Simulacra and Simulations

Jean Baudrillard writing, Simulacra and Simulations
by 0018922

The Baudrillard writing, Simulacra and Simulations, is a confusing one. It starts off with a statement from Ecclesiastes, "[simulacrum] is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true." This paradoxical statement is not more easily understood by looking up the word, simulacrum: it means an "image or representation," or "a faint trace or semblance; as, a simulacrum of hope" [wiktionary]. Basically, the word is very similar to simulation, but with more emphasis on the image. As the two words are hard to distinguish from one another, so is the language of Baudrillard intentionally confusing, the idea of truth is challenged.

Throughout his essay, Baudrillard is constantly building up elaborate pyramid schemes of a conspiratorial nature, then quickly dismissing them as merely one perspective that is no less true or false than the alternate mundane explanation. He talks about Disneyland a "hyperreal" unreality, of Main Street America, yet this colourful faux street is an illusion for children. The cartoon childishness conceals the intention of being a place where adults get to act like children, but also to hide how it is normal for them to act like children, as if this were the only place. Then when one leaves the Disneyland Park grounds with it's charismatic manufactured busyness we are confronted by the stark inhumane parking lot with isolated complex automotive machines. And the delusion goes even further, when we see how all of America is alike with its malls and parking lots. So, Disneyland is just the same and no more an illusion than anywhere else.

I saw an extended version of this essay online. He writes a lot more beyond Disneyland but doesn't say a lot more. He takes a similar approach to attack the truth of radical political realities. He looks at a communist political revolutionary group that is dealing with the ideology of power. Yet, this group may have a co-opted discourse if they are part of the system and their rebellion only symbolic. He examines multiple perspectives on the truth of the conspiracy to overthrow power or maintain it and finds that all perspectives are equally true and equally false. The end of his essay is a cynical footnote about buying the vote in what he sarcastically describes as 'more advanced' Athens.

Baudriallard's message is one of confusion, of total imaginary and imagery saturation. I suppose this is the 'post-modern condition' then? I thought it was more about globalisation and hybrid culture, about going past the simulated grand narratives of the West to see local reality. This essay reads like a grand narrative, totally melodrama.

Is all of Post-Modernism supposed to be depressing?