Capitalism had to teach people to stop paying attention to pollution.

Evidence

We often imagine that ecological sentiment comes as a reaction to industrial pollution, that we should therefore date its emergence from the beginning of the 19th century, and that previous populations did not need to pay attention to the environment since they did not have the means with which to damage it as dramatically as us. The historian shows, to the contrary, that a whole series of reflexes and collective defence mechanisms were already in place under the Ancien Régime, and that the developments of industrial capitalism (like, incidentally, those of the later communist electrification) had to instigate a programme of ‘minor disinhibitions’ to bypass, deactivate, and invalidate the self-defensive perceptions, legislations, and practices that hampered the maximization of profits. Our sensitivities, our communities and our institutions have actively learned not to pay attention to the different modes of pollution that have devastated our vital milieux – largely by invoking a ‘modernizing’ science and an economic rationality that considers the Earth from the lofty perspective of statistical aggregations. It is under the effect of these multiple ‘minor disinhibitions’ that our society has been able to overcome the instinctive (‘backward-looking’, ‘retrograde’, ‘primitive’, ‘Luddite’) resistance and the associative vigilance that hampers the triumphant advance towards development and growth. — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 324

Categorization

• QUESTION: The ‘minor disinhibitions’ concept parallels contemporary attention capture by platforms and advertising — worth chasing whether Fressoz’s framework extends to digital attention economies.
• SEED: Angle: ‘Attention was never naturally scarce-obsessed; industry had to be manufactured to blind people.’ Applies the Fressoz disinhibition framework to platform design.
• XREF: Overturns the implicit assumption that ecological awareness postdates industrialization; echoes Milgrom’s point that institutions emerge where knowledge is costly. — connects to: Capitalism requires continuous re-education of the popular classes through cultural struggle; Capitalism’s reproduction requires family, education, and media apparatuses; Industrial capitalism both produces inattention and pathologizes it — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 61 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Industrial capitalism both produces inattention and pathologizes it #expands (0.90) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 61
• Lack of collective attention lets polluting production dominate desirable lifestyles #corroborates (0.90) — Yves Citton, The Ecology of Attention, 350
• Capitalism requires continuous re-education of the popular classes through cultural struggle #expands (0.85)
• Industrialized attention extraction despoils the shared human spirit as pollution despoils water. #expands (0.85) — The Friends of Attention, Attensity!, 479
• Capitalism’s reproduction requires family, education, and media apparatuses #expands (0.80)