A hegemonic realism retroactively erases cultural possibilities it cannot absorb
Evidence
It’s easier to see now than it was at the time the extent to which the cultural artefacts — and the discourse surrounding them — produced in the wake of post-punk were being programmed by resurgent Kapital. A certain notion of realism began not only to prescribe what could now happen, but to airbrush out what had actually happened. The idea that pop could be more than a pleasant divertissement in the form of an easily consumable commodity, the idea that popular culture could play host to concepts that were difficult and demanding: it wasn’t sufficient to disavow these possibilities, they must also be denied. Operation Amnesia, Pacification Program: it never happened did it, it was a delusion, a folly of youth, and we’re all grown up now… — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 1009
Categorization
- XREF: Connects to ch9 and ch59 claims about realism masking ideology and Kapital making dissent unthinkable — the erased past and restricted horizon are two faces of the same foreclosure. — connects to: Contemporary culture is defined by exaggerated certainties that suppress critical hope. — James D. Kirylo (ed.), Reinventing Pedagogy of the Oppressed:…, 870; Realism is naturalized ideology, and today’s realistic was yesterday’s impossible — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 37; Ubiquitous taping destroys the illusion that an unmediated real exists — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk: The Collected and Unpublished…, 769 (+5 more)
- ADDENDUM: The ‘airbrushing out what actually happened’ as hegemonic realism echoes the Grafting essay’s interest in how an existing order edits the past to foreclose alternatives.
Broader Connections
- Capitalist realism restricts the horizon of what is politically possible
#complicates(0.75) — Mark Fisher (edited by Darren Ambrose), K-Punk, 410 - Capitalist realism makes alternatives to capitalism unthinkable
#complicates(0.75) — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 8