Culture industry commodities are useless yet disguise their uselessness as utility

Evidence

According to Adorno, the commodities created by the culture industry are devoid of use-value – or in other words, useless. However, these commodities disguise their uselessness. ‘In reality, the utility gained by recipients from their cultureindustryconsumptionisafetish,justasthecommoditiesof thecultural industry are themselves fetishes’. — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 836

Categorization

• DEFINE: Clarifies Adorno’s specific sense that culture-industry goods lack genuine use-value and that their utility is a fetish — a central term in this debate.
• XREF: connects to: The culture industry converts bare existence into a substitute for meaning and right — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 114; Technical rationalization hides who benefits from the machinery. — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 689; The culture industry’s apparent ordering function actually destroys order — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 837 (+3 more)

Broader Connections

• Culture industry products are commodities through and through, not merely commodified art #epitomizes (0.85) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 135
• Mass culture’s technical rationality masks class domination as consumer demand. #expands (0.82) — Theodor W. Adorno, Max Horkheimer, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 94