“1. In societies where modern conditions of production prevail, life is presented as an immense accumulation of spectacles. Everything that was directly lived is now merely represented in the distance”.
Debord G, The Society of the Spectacle (1967)
MY VERSION: Societies which hold greater importance on materialistic aspects convey life as a series of spectacles. This means that everything that was real and directly lived is now portrayed as a spectacle.
Social media reinforces this whole notion.
Social media allows individuals the opportunity to frame reality however, they desire. Consequently, a particular ideal is commonly reinforced throughout social media, this being, the ideal of someone who ‘has it all’.
As a result once an individual has accumulated the consumeristic accoutrements that gives them this particular image it is never enough. This being as they must appear to have it as we have been transformed into active signalers of appearance.
The Society of the Spectacle (1967) also highlights the idea that the life of a consumer is synthetic, non-existent and fake. This being as, everything present in this reality only exists to be looked at and consumed as a spectacle, as something to buy and appear to have.
Consequently, advertisements do not actually sell products instead they show people what appearance they can adopt as a result of appearing to have the product. For example, when an individual buys an Apple Mac laptop they are buying the appearance of a Mac that is associated with the youth, lifestyle and being ‘cool’.
LINKS:
Twitter: simplysez
Instagram: sarahcreecy
Youtube: Simply Sez
Thanks for reading, don’t be shy to leave a comment, like the post or even follow my blog. Any of the above is appreciated :))
Simply Sez 
Leave a comment