The pretense the big Other remains ignorant sustains ordinary social reality

Evidence

Yet the distinction between what the big Other knows, i.e. what is officially accepted, and what is widely known and experienced by actual individuals, is very far from being ‘merely’ emptily formal; it is the discrepancy between the two that allows ‘ordinary’ social reality to function. When the illusion that the big Other did not know can no longer be maintained, the incorporeal fabric holding the social system together disintegrates. This is why Khrushchev’s speech in 1965, in which he ‘admitted’ the failings of the Soviet state, was so momentous. It is not as if anyone in the party was unaware of the atrocities and corruption carried out in its name, but Khrushchev’s announcement made it impossible to believe any more that the big Other was ignorant of them. — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism, 95

Categorization

• DEFINE: Elaborates the Lacanian-Zizekian ‘big Other’ concept: the collective fiction presupposed by any social field, whose constitutive ignorance enables PR and propaganda.
• XREF: Directly parallels the Ratner case immediately below, where an individual making public a known-but-unacknowledged truth collapses the social fiction — a vivid mechanism for how reputational facts are constructed. — connects to: Dreamwork’s confabulated consistency models how contemporary power maintains itself — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 123; Social systems require a fictional authority believed to be ignorant — Mark Fisher, Capitalist Realism: Is There No…, 95; Pluralistic ignorance sustains norms even after private attitudes have shifted — , The Rod and the Child: A Global History…, 7327 (+3 more)
• QUESTION: When did the Cuban Missile Crisis / Bay of Pigs disclosures produce the analogous American moment where the big Other could no longer be maintained, if such a moment is locatable?

Related

• PR and propaganda succeed because the collective fiction is allowed to stay ignorant (similarity 0.89)
• Official pretense and private knowledge must diverge for social reality to function (similarity 0.86)
• Social systems require a fictional authority believed to be ignorant (similarity 0.86)

Broader Connections

• Pluralistic ignorance sustains norms even after private attitudes have shifted #expands (0.90) — , The Rod and the Child, 7327
• Collective public commitment dissolves pluralistic ignorance by revealing shared doubt #expands (0.85) — , The Rod and the Child, 7371
• Ordinary citizens are deliberately kept ignorant of the esoteric neoliberal playbook #corroborates (0.80) — Philip Mirowski, Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste, 300
• Trust is a fragile coping device for ignorance about others’ future behavior #expands (0.75) — Diego Gambetta, Trust - Making and Breaking Cooperative…, 2719