Exchange logic has fully absorbed even love, the last sphere of immediacy
Evidence
What meets its downfall in Charlus, Saint-Loup and Swann is the same thing that is lacking in the whole succeeding generation, who do not even know the name of the last poet. The eccentric psychology of decadence traces the negative anthropology of mass society: Proust gave an allergic account of what was about to befall all love. The exchange relationship that love partially withstood throughout the bourgeois age has completely absorbed it; the last immediacy falls victim to the distance of all the contracting parties from all others. Love is chilled by the value that the ego places on itself. Loving at all seems to it like loving more, and he who loves more puts himself in the wrong. — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia, 180
Categorization
- DEEPTHINKING: The core thesis that the exchange relationship, having withstood love throughout the bourgeois age, now completely absorbs it — the lover who gives more is put in the wrong, like a debtor.
- XREF: Extends the reader’s prior thread on the administered society and reification; connects to Adorno and Horkheimer’s account of instrumental reason. — connects to: Every interaction, including love and conversation, is a form of exchange. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 219; Exchange becomes totalized across society by encroaching on production — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1376; Exchange stands as the purest form of human interaction and rationalizes daily life. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 217 (+1 more)
Broader Connections
- Every interaction, including love and conversation, is a form of exchange.
#exemplifies(0.85) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 219 - Exchange becomes totalized across society by encroaching on production
#expands(0.80) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1376 - The commodity universe has passed from its mirror stage into mourning
#complicates(0.75) — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 311 - Exchange stands as the purest form of human interaction and rationalizes daily life.
#qualifies(0.72) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 217