Saturday, May 18, 2024

DIGITAL RELIGION

DIGITAL RELIGION

Recently got into reading a Korean-born German philosopher Byung-Chul Han. Actually, was looking for another book, but began to read Infocracy. One of the main ideas he presents is an idea that Infocracy – the information regime – is more cruel than the disciplinary regime – the rule of domination by discipline.


There are many things could be said about the book, to make it short – it’s worth reading, knowing that his premise is way different from a regular Christian.

That’s why what caught my attention was a description of the influencers of YouTube and Instagram using religious terminology. Just hear it (p. 7-8, I re-typed carefully, saving orthography and punctuation):

The Influencers on YouTube and Instagram have internalized the neoliberal technologies of power. Whether they peddle travel, beauty or fitness, they constantly invoke freedom, creativity and authenticity. Their advertisements are not seen as annoying because the products are cleverly embedded in the influencers’ self-presentation. Whereas people use ad-blockers to remove conventional advertisement on YouTube, they intentionally seek out the influencers’ ads. Influencers are worshiped as idols, and this gives their presentations a religious character. Influencers claiming to be motivational coaches present themselves as saviours, and their followers, their disciples, take part in the influencers’ lives by buying the products the influencers pretend to consume in staged scenes from their everyday life – a king of digital Eucharist. Social media is a church: like is ‘amen’; sharing is communion; consumption is salvation. The repetition that influencers use as a dramatic tool does not bore; rather, it gives the whole affair the character of liturgy. At the same time, influencers present consumer products as means of self-realization. We consume ourselves to death while realizing ourselves to death. Consumption and identity become one. Identity itself becomes a commodity.

Based on his passage, It looks like one way or another people are expressing their longing for: 
(1) leadership, some kinda guru-mania; 
(2) ritual, using basic Biblical patterns transformed/molded into the current media; 
(3) mystery of divine, something that solves the identity crisis providing the answers from above.  

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