Total society makes even hope in posterity a conformist capitulation.

Evidence

But he underestimated stupidity: the society he represents cannot speak its own name, and as it has become total, so stupidity, like intelligence, has become absolute. This attacks the vital centres of the intellectual. He can no longer pin his hopes even on posterity without sinking into conformity, even if this were only agreement with great minds. But as soon as he abandons such hope, something blind and dogmatic comes into his work, prone to swing over to the other extreme of cynical capitulation. — Theodor W. Adorno, Minima Moralia, 114

Categorization

• XREF: Echoes the culture-industry thesis and the liquidation of autonomous art; connects to the earlier aphorisms on the economic base of aesthetic judgment. — connects to: Bureaucratic planning and cultural rationalization create a totally administered society — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the…, 35; Fully reified society is infinitely close to realizing humanity — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1058

Broader Connections

• Bureaucratic planning and cultural rationalization create a totally administered society #expands (0.80) — Herbert Marcuse, One-Dimensional Man, 35
• Fully reified society is infinitely close to realizing humanity #expands (0.75) — Dirk Braunstein, Adorno’s Critique of Political Economy, 1058