Dystopian Future?

Maria Martin-Aran

Dr. Steven Wexler

English 654

30 October 2012

Dystopian Future

Thomas Hirschl begins his discussion on the topic “structural unemployment” by explaining that Marx’s social revolution (whose arrival is harkened by advancements in technology, which will supplant/displace “existing property relations”) has not yet come to pass, either because his hypothesis is flawed, or because capitalism has yet to confront the “final crisis” that will plunge society into a social/economic revolution (157-8). Yet, Hirschl, by means of Marxist theory, insists that technological advances will eventually cause a “qualitative transformation” of capitalism, the only question is how (165).

It is easy to recognize the possible precursors of this “crisis” via the “structural unemployment,” created when technologies replace a portion of the human work force. For example: in most major grocery stores today there are now “self check-out” lines with four to six automated cash registers overseen by a single human cashier; ATMs have, for the most part, supplanted the need for bank tellers, and automation of manufacturing has displaced a large portion of the manual labor force. Still, the economy has, thus far, been able to reabsorb these workers by creating new jobs, primarily in the service industry. The problem then becomes what happens when artificial intelligence (AI) advances to the point where it replaces not only service but “knowledge [or information] workers” (160)? Where will these jobs go? The simple (and scary) answer is: away, at which point society will have no other option than to move toward some form of wage-less production (169). And while it may be overly optimistic to assume humanity would revert to a new artistic Renaissance period, free from the encumbrances of monetary considerations, when examining this question via the animated movie, Walt Disney’s WALL-E; a more disconcerting possibility comes to light.

WALL-E takes place in a dystopian future on an enormous spaceship, which now houses what is left of humanity once Earth is left uninhabitable as a consequence of environmental abuse and reckless consumerism. This technologically advanced ship is run by what at first seems to be a corporation, Buy N Large, whose moniker (BNL) appears everywhere--even on the replicated sun. Ironically dubbed Axiom, this ship, like any good socialist state, provides for every conceivable human need for those aboard her. Yet the absence of competitors, as well as the brash and ubiquitous nature of BNL’s “advertising” suggests that BNL is less corporation than socialist state.

The YouTube clip below begins with robots making their way through morning traffic no doubt to the manual and service labor jobs they have appropriated from humans (hairdresser, policemen etc…). Yet it is the manner in which the movie depicts the use of AI as the teacher, which represents the dangers inherent to the displacement of humans as information workers. Evocative of what many imagine to be a socialist classroom experience, BNL’s artificial “teacher” is seen spewing propaganda clearly meant to advance BNL’s agenda by brainwashing and indoctrinating the young into their collective consciousness. 

The first human depicted in this scene is discussing plans for a virtual golf game with the person right beside him; yet, no face-to-face conversation takes place. Thus, technology has also displaced human interaction. Moreover, BNL’s appropriation of the concept of “economy” from a monetary system to a destination, and the blinking “buy, buy, buy[s]” below it, reads more like a subliminal message meant to convince the members of this society to “buy” into the social system--instead of an inducement to purchase something. Indeed, no human in this society actually seem to hold a job, not even the token captain, who is depicted most of the time merely sleeping and eating on the bridge. Yet, the humans in the film are clearly consuming everything that BNL provides. In fact, the AI on this ship is so advanced that people no longer wear shoes because technology has even made walking unnecessary. Thus, as labor has been entirely removed from the equation, this social system has “transformed,” (165) beyond the restrictions of both socialism and capitalism, into a type of symbiotic relationship where BNL exists solely to provide and humans, to their detriment, solely to consume.

 

                                               Works Cited

Hirschl, Thomas. "Structural Unemployment and the Qualitative Transformation of
           Capitalism." Davis, et al. 157-174. Davis J., T. Hirschl, and M. Stack, eds.
           Cutting Edge:  Technology, Information, Capitalism and Social 
           Revolution. London: Verso, 1997. Print.

WALL-E. Dir. Andrew Stanton. Perf. Ben Burtt. Elissa Knight. Disney Pixar,

2008.  Film.

  

Schiller's Digital Capitalism

Here is the link to our blog for the class discussion of Dan Schiller's Digital Capitalism: http://digitalcapitalism.blogspot.com/

Remediation the Movie

Thought you guys might like this. I couldn't believe my luck when I found it. I wonder if it was created by someone who has taken the class before?:

Cutting Out the MiddleMan

The whole time I was reading Cutting Edge: Technology, Information, Capitalism and Social Revolutions, I kept trying to think of an example of what the end of capitalism-- due to automation-- would look like (Morris-Suzuki 14). The best thing I could come up with was the opening scene of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (staring Johnny Depp): the complete automation of the chocolate factory overseen by a handful of workers (the Oompah Loompahs):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=_GyQt7PyF90

I also remembered that protagonist's father in the movie loses his assembly line job at a toothpaste factory (placing the caps on the toothpaste tubes) to a robotic arm, and it is only when the arm is in need of repair that Charlie's father gets a new job repairing it. And though not quite the “managerial capitalist” of the “information society” envisioned by Daniel Bell and others, it is easy to imagine that society is truly moving in that direction as Charlie’s father is now only one of a handful of employees left on the assembly line floor that once held hundreds of employees (Morris-Suzuki 14).

Yet, like the movie depicts, I find it difficult if not impossible to envision a world where the human worker is rendered completely "obsolete/redundant," (Morris-Suzuki 13) if only for the fact that humans are the creators of the automation and must at the very least maintenance and repair it; thus, they can never be completely excluded from the equation. Yet you can't help but wonder: what happens to all the other workers that automation replaced--those that are not lucky enough to get retrained?

Works Cited

Morris-Suzuki, Tessa. "Robots and Capitalism." Davis, et al. 157-174. Davis J., T. Hirschl, and M. Stack,

eds. Cutting Edge:  Technology, Information, Capitalism and Social Revolution. London: Verso, 1997. Print.

Vermeer's Love Letter to Society

 While examining Johannes Vermeer’s painting, The Love Letter (c 1669) it became clear that the artist was striving for what Jay David Bolter and Richard Grusin’s work, Remediation, describes as “transparent immediacy” as we, the audience, are meant to forget that we are looking at a painting/canvas and are instead propelled into its storyline (21-2). Forced to view the work from the artist’s voyeuristic prospective—deep within the closet looking into the room, which is reinforced by the shelving at the forefront and immediate right of the scene—the audience is left with the impression that they are illicitly spying in on a very personal moment. Indeed, the canvas disappears and we are there, crouched within that closet, either with or as the artist, encroaching on this young maiden’s privacy as she plays her lute and inadvertently (or not) we witness, as the title of piece suggests, the obviously wealthy young woman’s request to her servant that she deliver a love letter. Additionally, the subject matter of this piece highlights the 17^th century’s view of women as chattel. The fact that women are first the property of their fathers then their husbands, during this time period, and used as commodity to advance the family’s social, political and monetary aspirations within the public sphere, they are, by definition, not free to choose who to love or marry. History, then, reinforces the work’s “immediacy”—as it supports the storyline advanced by the painting: a young woman with no agency is forced into an act of subterfuge with the assistance of her servant—a popular storyline utilized previously by both Ovid and Shakespeare. Therefore, even as this paper would represent a remediation of Vermeer’s work, as the “literary description” itself is a remediation of “visual art,” it is the artist’s prospective and the point in history when it was created that adds credence to the piece as a subject representative of immediacy  (45). 

Additionally, The Love Letter, would seem to bring to light issues of the public and private spheres as described by Jurgen Habermas’s work, The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into a Category of Bourgeois Society. Now, one would assume that as the scene depicts a private moment between a young woman and her servant, presumably within her own home (if not her own room) that the space itself would be defined as a private sphere. Yet, the painting could also be representative of Habermas’s assertion that the “intervention of public powers in the affairs of private people” was a byproduct of society’s inability to resolve their issues from within the private “salons” (35, 142). Essentially, the “public sphere” began as an amalgamation of private citizens, who gathered together in the hopes of affecting public change. Thus, if, as the painting’s title suggests, and the protagonist’s expression of concern as she covertly passes said letter to her servant reinforces, the “public” reaction to this young woman’s affections for the recipient of this letter is a point of contention that she is attempting to avoid, and the we, the public in the closet, are meant to be outraged by and perhaps even meant to intercede in—no doubt, for the greater good of society.

Although perhaps an innocuous subject matter when viewed from a modern day perspective, it is easy to imagine that when viewed from within the prospective of 17^th century society the information conveyed by Vermeer’s piece may well have been considered scandalous if not subversive. While it is unclear how many people would have had access to the painting when it was originally created, it could be assumed that it would have, at the very least, been prominently displayed within someone’s home and accessible to all visitors. Nevertheless, the sheer quantity of information conveyed: locking away young women may not be enough, maidens are clever, devious, disobedient, impure in thought or action, one must be the ever vigilant, like the audience in the closet etc…, would seem to add credibility to the suggestion of many scholars that far from a byproduct of post-industrial/modern societies, the information society is more than likely a “continuation of pre-established relations” (Webster 7). Thus, even as there is no doubting that with the advent of technology, the “information society” of today is afforded many more avenues for accessing information, “quantity” does not necessarily equate to “quality” information—and as Vermeer’s work demonstrates, it is not necessarily a byproduct of modernity (21-31).  Thus, as Frank Webster suggests in his work, Theories on the Information Society, “we must not confuse the indispensability of a phenomenon [(technology)] with a capacity for it to define a social order” (23) as much of the information derived from the advent of technology can easily be described as “devoid of content” (31).

Works Cited

Bolter, Jay David and Richard Grusin. Remediation: Understanding New Media.

Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2000. Print.

Habermas, JÜrgen. The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere: An Inquiry into

a Category of Bourgeois Society. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1991. Print.

Vermeer, Johannes. The Love Letter. 1669. Rijksmuseum, Amsterdam.

Webster, Frank. Theories of the Information Society. New York: Routledge, 2006. Print.