Spectacle, Simulation, and the Selfie: Revisiting Baudrillard's Simulation and Hyperreality

Author: James O'Sullivan
Year: 2024
Source type: article/essay
Raw file: raw/articles/osullivan-2024-spectacle-simulation-selfie.md

Summary

O'Sullivan reads the rise of the selfie and social media through Debord's spectacle and Baudrillard's simulation/hyperreality. Debord: lived experience "has given way to its representation"; the selfie is "a basic unit of the spectacle" — "the spectacle democratised and intensified," a "society of the selfie." Baudrillard: we live in hyperreality where "the map precedes the territory" and images replace/determine reality; Instagram is "a Disneyland of the self," its selfies are simulacra, and increasingly we perform "authenticity" as yet another effect — up to the literal biopolitics of "Snapchat dysmorphia."

Key Claims

• Debord and the spectacle of the selfie: "All that once was directly lived has become mere representation" (Debord); on Instagram/TikTok "our social lives literally play out via images"; the selfie is "a little spectacle we create of ourselves." The spectacle "democratised and intensified" produces a "society of the selfie"; appearance "threatens to become our primary reality" ("photo, or it didn't happen").
• Baudrillard and hyperreality: simulation replaces rather than masks reality; "the map precedes the territory"; Disneyland propped up an outside already "of the order of the hyperreal." Instagram is "a Disneyland of the self" — curated feeds as "simulacra: copies without originals"; "doing it for the 'gram' makes the image the reason for the experience; "the tail (the image) is wagging the dog (the reality)."
• Performing authenticity: the "push for authenticity" (photo dumps, BeReal, #nofilter) is itself recuperated — "authenticity itself can become just another performance," "a new simulacrum arises: the simulacrum of the 'authentic me.'" Even attempts to escape the spectacle "get folded back into it."
• The spectacle is profitable: attention is monetized; "the spectacle intensifies because it is profitable"; algorithms are "automatons of the spectacle."
• Hyperreality becomes literal (Snapchat dysmorphia): people seek surgery "to resemble the perfected version of themselves" in filtered selfies — "the copy precedes the original; the simulation comes to engineer the reality."
• Ambivalence: selfies can be tools of empowerment/visibility, but the question remains whether everyone becoming an image-maker "overturn[s] the power of images, or simply multiplies them."

Connections

Concepts: Spectacle · Instagrammability · Communicative Capitalism · Semiocapitalism
Authors: James O'Sullivan · Guy Debord · Jodi Dean
Debates: (digital image economy)
Related source notes: The Society of the Spectacle (Debord) · Communicative Capitalism (Dean) · Viral Architecture (Essen)

Direct Quotes

"All that once was directly lived has become mere representation." (Debord, as quoted)

"The selfie ... becomes a basic unit of the spectacle."

"[T]he map precedes the territory." (Baudrillard)

"A new filter gets added, one that makes your photo look unfiltered."

Open Questions

• Does the selfie/Instagram era extend Debord's spectacle (and Dean's circulation) into a totalizing hyperreality that forecloses politics — or do the subversive uses of the selfie open an exit?