The real has become an alibi for the model and our lost Utopia.

Evidence

Reality could go beyond fiction: that was the surest sign of the possibility of an everincreasing imaginary. But the real cannot surpass the model - it is nothing but its alibi. … The imaginary was the alibi of the real, in a world dominated by the reality principle. Today, it is the real that has become the alibi of the model, in a world controlled by the principle of simulation. And, paradoxically, it is the real that has become our true Utopia - but a Utopia that is no longer in the realm of the possible, that can only be dreamt of as one would dream of a lost object. — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 399

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The inversion — imaginary as alibi of the real flips into the real as alibi of the model, with the real becoming a lost-object Utopia — is a dense, paradigm-shifting move worth sitting with.
• XREF: Jameson’s ‘nostalgia for the present’ and loss of historicity resonate strongly with the real-as-lost-object formulation. — connects to: In the simulation order, reality has become the alibi of the model. — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 400; Sartre reduces Bloch’s Utopia to a comforting lie. — Fredric Jameson, Marxism and Form, 270

Broader Connections

• In the simulation order, reality has become the alibi of the model. #corroborates (0.98) — Jean Baudrillard, Simulacra and Simulation, 400