Hyperreality, Orientalism, and Joyce

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FUCK WRONG IMAGE.

Here's what I meant to upload.

>>9567034
Hypperreality refers more to the inability to distinguish between the real and fantasy to the point where they are one in the same. Disillusionment isn't possible here, you can't have the fantasy shattered.

The distinction of fantasy and reality requires that an experience can differentiate the two. Baudrillard is arguing that we no longer have this experience, that the simulated is real and the real is simulated, and nothing can separate the two, making the entire distinction superfluous, an idea that no longer functions.

>>9567034
I'm having a hard time figuring out half of what you're saying, but I'll explain a few things about Araby.

You're right that the Bazaar is representative of eastern exoticism, but that's no entirely the point of the story, nor is the boy seeing the dismal stalls when he gets there. I think that calling it hyper-reality would be a big overstatement. The story is about disillusionment of childhood fantasies and notions of love and mysticism. The boy is excited to go to the bazaar because he believe it will make him seem worldly, and likable to the girl he has a crush on if he brings her something back. He goes for this purpose and slowly begins to realize that he's just being incredibly vain. The childish illusions he has of the world begin to shatter as he goes on his bleak, lonesome journey after hours to the bazaar just so he can win some girl he barely knows affection. His illusions finally just shatter when he's staring at the merchandise and realizes how meaningless it is. None of the items he could have bought there have made him seem more appealing, or made him a better person. It's a story about growing up and coming to terms with the bleak reality around you, especially that of Dublin at the time, not any sort of hyper-reality.

wtf what is a detailed, evidenced and reasoned post doing on 4chan

it would be hyperreal if the araby boy grew up to create his own bazaar in that image

>>9567076

Thanks. Would an example of this be the way pornography informs our sexual desires or even our understanding of sex?

For a 13 year old watching pornography, his understanding of sex is limited by the simulation. When he loses his virginity there's likely to be disillusionment.

So the sexual act itself is not hyperreal, we can conclude — but instead, are the sexual fantasies produced by pornographic trends (money shots, cuckold porn, "stepsister" porn most recently) an example of hyperreality? Manufactured desire?

This is, of course, assuming that all those kinds of fetishes that porn can cater to aren't latent in our unconscious but instead "injected" into our mind by the porn industry.

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>>9567034
>I'm trying to understand Debord and Baudrillard in synthesizing what can be best described as a far-right ideology informed by critical theorists and the way post/modernity destroys real human experience.

I think trying to understand Baudrillard in terms of a "far right ideology" is kind of missing the point. I've always seen Baudrillard as an elaborate trap to catch up both the left and the right. As Baudrillard brings up one after another of disturbing phenomenon (pic related) that characterize society, he left is forced into defending the orgy of values, even though they didn't really want to defend any of the things he brings up. Meanwhile, the right can look to baudrillard's evidence and say "society is degenerate! return to tradition" but such a process probably isn't possible, just windmill jousting.

Baudrillard is quite clearly a nihilist, he says so and makes no qualms about it. I'm guessing his experiences in May 68 were enough to make him cynical towards all political projects.

>>9567118
Eh... not quite. Hyperreality is the argument that all of these pornographic activities are no more or less real than having "actual sex". In Baudrillard's view, it's all "actual sex". Notice that you might become disillusioned with so called "real sex" after seeing porno, but are not likely to become disillusioned with pornography.

>>9567139
this

op is stuck on a kind of dualism

>>9567034
Read Walter Benjamin, specially the arcades project. 'postmodernity' is modernity. meshes really well with debord. The 19th century spectacular order persists in the 20th century. imageboards are just a development of the arcade form, swarming with flaneurs. I like Benjamin because of the redemptive potential in his theology, something that Baudrillard lacks entirely. There is a controversy on some quarters about whether Benjamin can be considered a political author or if his synthesis of jewish mysticism with marxism was genuinely religious or metaphorical. imo you can't separate the radical politics from the theology or the aesthetic criticism, they are all part of a whole.

>>9567139
>>9567147

Isn't the disillusionment we experience with real sex contradicting this post?

>>9567076

>>9567034

>pic related

Decadence and opulence go hand in hand. There is no dichotomy. You only assume so because you have fallen for the romanticism yourself.

>>9567322
disillusioned with the properties of what we call "real sex", not with the state of "realness" itself

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>>9567361

Yes, and in the li

>>9567340

I'm not making any moralistic judgment about the Ottomans. I'm saying that the constructed reality of the Orientalist painters did not correspond to the actual reality of the Orient, and in the case of "Araby" the boy is disappointed with the reality of the Araby bazaar. There is a parallel there, and I'm trying to determine whether or not that's an example of pre-postmodern "hyperreality."

>>9567361

Can you elaborate on the difference? I believe in pic related a hyperreal mindset is operating, as *reality itself* is being compared to a simulation of reality. I think the comparison of the real wall to a video game wall (not the other way around) indicates a disillusionment/disappointment with the real wall. This is because the video game wall is the object, or Form, and the real wall the subject. In any case the video game wall takes primacy.

>>9567390
you are still thinking dialectically. that's not hyperreality, that's just misattributing a system of logic. i'm not even sure that kind of game design element (the cliche of the false wall) would be considered simulation in itself, perhaps the video game aspect is throwing you off.

>>9567485

Wouldn't the cliche of a false wall, having no origin in reality, be an example of a simulacrum once you start noting apparent false walls in reality?

>>9567390
The kid in Araby accepts the bazaar as the true reality, and rejects his stories as romanticism. Hyper-reality to my knowledge is a concept wherein fantasy (or simulation) and reality are so equally present or accepted that the distinction becomes irreconcilably blurred. In a post modern society this occurs presumably because concrete experienced reality is draw into question, and without meaning it is as equally malleable and easily replaced to the individual as an ever-present supersaturation of media fantasy. The boy is disappointed with the reality of the bazaar and pretty much agrees it sucks. However, in accepting that it is real, he is accepting that the stories in which he was enraptured with were false. There is no blurring of lines.
That picture is not an example of hyper-reality, because it is a dumb joke making fun of video game cliches, meant for the enjoyment of those who play video games. The author, and the intent of the joke, is not to imply that video games are real and that something is actual behind that wall. In fact, the acceptance of the wall as true reality is required for that joke to be made.