This was about fiction writers but it applies with equal force to too many left-wing political thinkers.
“Postmodern irony and cynicism’s become an end in itself, a measure of hip sophistication and literary savvy. Few artists dare to try to talk about ways of working toward redeeming what’s wrong, because they’ll look sentimental and naive to all the weary ironists. Irony’s gone from liberating to enslaving. There’s some great essay somewhere that has a line about irony being the song of the prisoner who’s come to love his cage… ” -David Foster Wallace
They have no idea that they’re in this cage, however.
Hmm, I would apply that to the “pragmatic” centrists, myself. But MMV.
Above my paygrade …
○ Zizek‟s Critique of Postmodernism
I would prefer to keep it simple …
Wealth and income inequality will lead to a revolution – Bernie Sanders.
I’m assuming that the first link, which is to a student essay about Slavoj Zizek, is intended to be ironic. Lord, please tell me that it is, because it’s jam-packed with postmodernist jargon.
He did say it was above his pay grade, but I don’t think he’s being ironic, since the topic is exactly what we’re talking about. The essay isn’t ironic either, but it IS a student essay, or reads like one.
This is a little easier to understand, I think:
https:/cambridgeuniversityliterarytheorysociety.wordpress.com/2011/03/03/slavoj-zizek-on-postmodern
ism-lent-050311
I’d give Zizek the befit of the doubt — in my book, anyone who criticizes postmodernism can’t be all bad. Also, Chomsky doesn’t like him, which is a good sign …
I couldn’t agree more. There’s an utterly cynical approach that pervades the political left: “Oh, you can’t try that, it’s positively Scandinavian!” and “Silly hippie, we simply don’t have the votes,” and “I think you’ll find that pragmatism is the most sophisticated and savvy approach.”
Believers in this cynical savviness are terrified of appeals to earnestness and passion, which they dismiss as infantile purity-seeking. Nothing scares them more than big naive promises, and they sigh with existential weariness at the squabbling infants.
Steggles, I’m not sure that the Church of the Savvy (as Jay Rosen calls it) is the same as cynicism. The savvy pretend to Know All, while the cynics simply smirk.
And I think that DFW quote mistakenly conflates irony and cynicism. Infinite Jest is absolutely filled with postmodern irony, although there’s no real cynicism in it.
It is Billmon who noted that the tactical disagreement hides the ideological.
I see it here all the time.
So the Sanders people see this more clearly than prior iterations of the left have. and they are far better organized than ever.
Against this force that no one saw coming the Clintons bring forth the old arguments: all born of what is presented as tactical necessity.
But they inspire no passion. Their victory will be personal.
They talk endlessly about getting things done. But they can accomplish nothing without the House. But that requires seeking a larger victory – which entails risks they are too scared to run.
Which is why Bill Clinton attacked Bernie Sanders today.
And what a moment it was. He attacked Bernie Sanders for voting Clinton’s own crime bill, noting Hillary did not vote for it (because she was first lady at the time and couldn’t).
Nevermind that Bernie isn’t a candidate anymore.
Folks stop and think about that for a second. There is so much animosity against Sanders in the Clinton crowd that they are willing to trash Bill’s record to help Hillary.
You want to know why people don’t trust the Clintons. That is it in a nutshell. It’s not the first: Hillary attacked Bernie for voting for a financial deregulation bill – not mentioning that it was BILL’s BILL – and there is no record she did anything but support it. And she did this IN A DEBATE.
So this is where we have come to.
And you really can’t invent the irony.
Bill Clinton effectively saying Bernie Sanders can’t be trusted! He voted for MY legislation!
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/politics/ct-bill-clinton-obamacare-20161004-story.htm
l
This is just straightup nonsense: “But they can accomplish nothing without the House. But that requires seeking a larger victory – which entails risks they are too scared to run.”
Actually, a president can accomplish quite a bit without the House: SCOTUS and other judicial appointments, executive orders, EPA, SEC, foreign policy, etc., etc. All of that, however, is non-legislative, and a president really needs Congress to enact a real agenda.
So what can Hillary do now to try to get the House? Not a goddamned thing. It’s much too late, if it was ever possible. That bit about “risks they are too scared to run” is nonsensical.
And people don’t trust the Clintons because they’ve been smeared more relentlessly than any other politician in at least the last century.
“So what can Hillary do now to try to get the House? Not a goddamned thing. It’s much too late, if it was ever possible. That bit about ‘risks they are too scared to run’ is nonsensical.”
What was that Steggles said above?
“There’s an utterly cynical approach that pervades the political left: ‘Oh, you can’t try that, it’s positively Scandinavian!’ and ‘Silly hippie, we simply don’t have the votes,’ and ‘I think you’ll find that pragmatism is the most sophisticated and savvy approach.'”
Heh. The whole point of the comment you’re responding to is:
That’s the analysis, of the Democrats, of the liberal vision. And you refused to discuss it.
LOL Saw this today. How appropriate to this theme.
Minnesota Senator John Marty, re MNHealthPlan:
“If twenty-first century progressives had been leading the nineteenth century abolition movement, we would still have slavery, but we would have limited slavery to a 40-hour work week, and we would be congratulating each other on the progress we had made.”
I would only add that the states would insist that the slaves be obtained through private contractors approved by the state. Oh, wait! That sounds like prison labor contractors.
I’m wondering why anyone would think that’s not a ridiculous quotation. Let’s start with the obvious fact that slavery ended with a war that killed over 600K people. Is that what Marty is proposing?
Of course not. Marty isn’t proposing anything. He’s going for a cheap soundbite that simply pretends all political obstacles can be wished away. It’s really no different from the Republicans who are still furious that the GOP didn’t magically repeal the ACA.
Hmm, can anyone imagine FDR’s folks producing the kludge of the ACA? And that is not even 19th century.
yeah since they produced Social Security in a version that was vastly inferior to the one we have today
Curious, what do you think a new Soc. Sec. Act that was drafted today would look like?
impossible to say, since when it was created it was created on the backdrop of no other US administration had ever tried to increase the size of government on the domestic front like that
It would likely cover more people than it did when FDR created it. I’m sure the benefits people receive would be less and they’d probably come up with a weird way to pay for it.
…and the states would administer it.
no way to know since the ACA is a mixture of state and federal administration
On the economy you will accomplish nothing. You will not get immigration reform. You will not get more funding for infrastructure. You cannot get real progress on climate change. You will not get any gun laws. You will not get a public option for Obamacare – which is going to become a necessity as insurers leave.
The Supreme Court is important.
But beyond that nothing much. The Iran deal survives. But Clinton is far more hawkish than Obama.
You write:
You would have had to try to run a different campaign from the very start.
But to Booman’s point, they like their cage.
It’s an appropriately gilded one.
wow
Sista Souljah 2? or is he running against Sanders now? shouldn’t be, but I’m stunned
Damn, Bill is attacking Obamacare, too.
Heads be ‘sploding.
OK, I went to that link and read the whole article, and here is the part about the ‘attack’
—————-
The former president also deflected a heckler. As he began to speak, a man yelled at him for signing a 1994 crime law that included stiffer sentences for many federal crimes. Clinton told the man “Hillary didn’t vote for the crime bill,” but noted “Senator Sanders” did, referring to Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, who challenged Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination.
—————–
LOL!
Responding to a heckler, Clinton told the truth. Seriously, this is it?
Clinton Derangement Syndrome insists that anybody can say anything they want about the Clinton’s, but any response is mud slinging.
.
Also, that you can attack him for making the compromises in that bill but you cannot point out that the progressive hero voted for the bill because he approved those compromises.
Also,
Clinton attacked Obamacare!
But how do you improve a bill unless you attack it’s flaws?
.
There is constructive criticism and then there is this, with quotes…
http://www.slate.com/blogs/moneybox/2016/10/04/clinton_calls_obamacare_the_craziest_thing_in_the_wor
ld.html
Not that he is incorrect on the points, but….not constructive, imo. Scoring points.
“The ACA is a parable of what tends to happen in American politics.” To the point in the above discussion about modern kludges.
BTW,
Those who were wondering what Booman meant by the quote above, and who it was aimed at?
I do believe you just got your answer.
The original diary had no reference to Clinton or anything at all political. But it immediately got hijacked by the usual deranged suspects.
.
He created the impression Hillary opposed the Crime Bill.
Any evidence for this?
This is a non sequitur.
You just as well have responded ‘Ya, but a blue whale has a tongue the size of a car’.
It’s beneath you. You used to be better than this.
.
“Do what you can, with what you have, where you are”
Theodore Roosevelt
.
I agree. Cynicism overtook our culture in the 1970s. I remember watching it happen as a child. It was a progressive process. People first found out the government had been lying about Vietnam. This came as a shock to many. Then Watergate sealed the deal.
As I came of age in the 1980s it was fashionable to by a cynic. All those who thought themselves smart and savvy adopted a cynical, world weary pose. It’s remained fashionable to this day.
No doubt the average person was too trusting in the 1960s. That got us into Vietnam. Of course our cynical culture didn’t keep us out of Iraq.
I guess Booman would need to weigh in here, but my strong sense is that he is referring to commenters on this blog, not to strands of thought within the political left more generally. If that’s what he means, then I plead guilty. Sometimes the Clinton-bashing and lefter-than-thou commentary feels so over the top that irony and sarcasm seem like the only appropriate modes of response. But I would ask for forbearance, as I have been trying hard to tone down that stuff.
I would agree strongly with that.
But also the political left more generally as well.
Yes, it’s a small but vocal minority.
I bash Clinton plenty, but I’m hardly a cynic.
To me a blanket cynical attitude is a mark of ignorance and intellectual laziness. I try to find out what the fuck’s actually going on, and if I do, then things start to make sense Then why should I be cynical? I believe in truth.
What is the old saying, a cynic is a disappointed idealist? I never was an idealist. But I understand there are people trying to do good in the world, amidst all the assholes. You’ve got to take the trouble to figure out which are which.
Monty Python satirized this tendency of the left the best in Life of Brian:
“BRIAN: Are you the Judean People’s Front?
REG: Fuck off!
BRIAN: What?
REG: Judean People’s Front. We’re the People’s Front of Judea! Judean People’s Front. Cawk.
FRANCIS: Wankers.
REG: Listen. If you really wanted to join the P.F.J., you’d have to really hate the Romans.
BRIAN: I do!
REG: Right. You’re in. Listen. The only people we hate more than the Romans are the fucking Judean People’s Front.
P.F.J.: Yeah…
JUDITH: Splitters.
P.F.J.: Splitters…
FRANCIS: And the Judean Popular People’s Front.
P.F.J.: Yeah. Oh, yeah. Splitters. Splitters…
LORETTA: And the People’s Front of Judea.
P.F.J.: Yeah. Splitters. Splitters…
REG: What?
LORETTA: The People’s Front of Judea. Splitters.
REG: We’re the People’s Front of Judea!
LORETTA: Oh. I thought we were the Popular Front.
REG: People’s Front! C-huh.
FRANCIS: Whatever happened to the Popular Front, Reg?
REG: He’s over there.
P.F.J.: Splitter!
What destroyed the “New Left” of the 60’s was this very tendency for everybody to scatter like cats dumped from a sack, everybody on his or her chosen tiny island of the saved, in the midst of a sea of blasphemers.
Since each is uncompromising in his moral clarity, cynical about everybody and everything not in his bubble, there’s never any need to do anything but argue about “which faction of the left of the left gets recognition from Moscow” in the famous line by Diane Keaton in Reds.
The left has been so marginalized since the 1970s that this tendency has mostly expressed itself in little tea-pot tempests that pass unnoticed by everyday society. But, with the rise of the Sanders campaign, suddenly these little ritual behaviours start to assume greater significance.
In the midst of the Reagan era, it didn’t matter much what anybody on the left thought. And during the Clinton administration, they were triangulated against. But, now any tendency to stage a purity tantrum threatens to end human civilization, if Trump should win. And suddenly, the “cool kid” worldly cynicism matters very much.
What 60s are you speaking of? ’61-11/63? 12/63-1/65? 2/65-1/68? 2/68-12/69? Hell, the music wasn’t even the same during each of those year segments. There was also something known as COINTELPRO — but that doesn’t fit your narrative that they left imploded on its own because its stupid.
Lot of truth in that. But hell, that was 45-55 years ago. I hope we have figured some of this out by now.
The reason the tension is up is that when you win 45% of the vote it suddenly occurs to everyone that in fact you AREN’T marginal.
In fact it occurs to anyone with any ambition that Bernie Sanders and his people matter a hell of a lot.
It Trump wins it won’t be Bernie’s fault, as much as the Clinton people would love for it to be so.
It will be because she is as unpopular as the status quo she defends.
But she isn’t going to lose.
Yeah, brexit didnt happen either.
If anything good came out of Sanders’ campaign it was to breath some more life into some ideas that had been sneered at for decades. What made this loss so tough was simply how close Sanders got to winning the nomination. As someone who became a young adult at a time when cynical sneering and posing was all the rage, I’d hope that the young folks who got involved especially stay involved in their communities as organizers, as candidates in local elections and so on. A different world is possible, and there is a large subsection of the public who is eager to make that different world a possibility. It won’t quite happen this year. But if those of us who were thrilled to see Sanders do as well as he did keep our eyes on what matters – laying that foundation for the future (a groundwork that the Sanders campaign organization has the chance to nurture, and that was already being nurtured by Occupy a few years ago, and currently by movements like BLM) – we may see some really beautiful things happen in the next decade. In the meantime, we have the present to deal with and doing our level best to keep Trump out of the White House is job one.
If you add Sander’s votes to the Trump votes (or even just half of them, per HC), your bury the 1%-ers. Why else the panicked attacks from Rep and Dem establishment to keep those two blocs apart?
yes
Well there is also the fact that the blocs hate each other.
Hmm. You undoubtedly have more hands on knowledge, but there is this:
“Voters disgruntled with declining economic opportunities and falling status can blame their plight on immigrants or refugees, as Trump has invited them to. Or they can be equally convinced that the culprit of American middle-class decay is a rather vicious financial industry, its incessant political lobbying, and the collapse of old supports like unions–Sanders’s message. The solutions differ, but the problem is the same.
This is why Sanders could have some luck with Trump fans, and to great effect: If the senator can convince them that their impulses against immigrants, refugees, and minorities at large arise from their own disenfranchisement, then the same anxieties that could transform (vis-a-vis Trump) into mobbish rage could be channeled into energy to advance progressive policies. If Sanders is reaching even a few Trump supporters, then, it’s not so much evidence of the two candidates’ sameness as a suggestion that even worrying fears can find constructive expression, an outcome we should all hope for.
(https://newrepublic.com/article/127442/explains-trump-sanders-crossover-vote)
CNN — Supreme Court justice invokes, then throws shade on, Kardashian robbery in oral arguments
Guess Justice Breyer isn’t to la-de-dah to pay attention to news reports and include it in a comment from the bench of the US SC. But woo betide anyone that has the audacity to mention it at the esteemed Frog Pond.
Kim Kardashian was an off-topic distraction that you introduced into the comments for this Booman diary. As one might expect, not every reader here follows celebrity culture and supermarket tabloids. Why in the world you’re remarking bitterly about that fact here, in yet another off-topic distraction, is a mystery to me.
OK, cue up the response in which you denounce me as lazy and ignorant. Tell you what, I am lazy and ignorant when it comes to reading supermarket tabloids.
funny. I read the link you gave, even NBC thought it was an inside job. for what? I’d guess the publicity. West walked out on a concert, angering the audienc, and they took the attention off Trump for 15 minutes. sort of a humorous spot in this downward spiral. truly pathetic but funny.
Her genius has been woefully under-appreciated…
Not quick on his feet but Pence is a world-class bullshit artist. Man, I would burst into flame and spontaneously combust just thinking of lies as huge as the ones he’s telling so fluently.
Shaun, I have had some really awful cases as a lawyer.
But I have to say, has anyone in modern politics ever been forced to defends a WORSE case.
I find myself wishing these two would rap it up so I can listen to the pundits. American Blandstand.
This debate was a reminder that a generic republican would win this election.
Pence has the luxury of flying under the radar because Trump sucks all the oxygen out of the room. I would put his 2020 nomination odds at somewhere close to 50:1.
Cynicism and irony is too easy now. It’s become so reflexive that even a child can do it, with all the subtlety that goes with first learning sarcasm.
That said, I don’t believe pragmatism is cynical. Or, or maybe…yes, this is it: pragmatism in the service of ideals is no vice!
Fuck it Dude, let’s go bowling.
I still don’t understand why pragmatism and idealism can’t exist in the same brain at the same time. It’s not a contradiction, and even if it were, contradictions aren’t evil. Implying otherwise is the laziest kind of cynicism.
In my experience, pragmatism has always meant setting goals and then working to achieve those goals–not simply setting goals based on “what can be achieved.” Pragmatic approaches help reshape reality, not simply reacting to it. It’s less pragmatism vs idealism than active vs. passive.
Pragmatism won’t work in a vacuum; if there are obstacles preventing achieving a goal, smart pragmatic people figure out how to work with them, around them or use judo to flip their resisting energy. I’ve done this small-scale, but I can see how it would work in a larger sense.
I say all this as someone whose natural state is decidedly not a go-getter. I had to learn how to do that to accomplish anything worth shouting about.
I look at it this way, I’m an idealist in that I know what my end ideal goal is but I’m also a pragmatist because I’m willing to accept smaller steps that get me closer to that goal.
David Foster Wallace is overrated
Although this song was directed toward what was a dying punk/hardcore subculture, it seems fitting in this context:
Have you heard about the latest craze
That’s sweepin’ across the nation
All the punks from coast to coast
Have discovered an old invention:
“Your hair’s too long
Man, you’re a queer
You’re too new wave
Put down that beer:”
and
Do the Slag-Look at ’em run
Do the Slag-Hey you scum
Do the Slag-Ain’t it fun
Do the Slag-Let’s all be dumb
Badmouth people we don’t know
Make sure it’s behind their backs
Don’t let new people in our scene
It’s more fun than having a friend
We’ll slag everyone each and every night
So we can pretend that we’re all right
Make those pricks feel just so small
We’ll show the world that we’re three feet tall
Slander their integrity
Doubt their humanity
Talk about their haircuts
Are their politics correct?
Do the Slag!
Don’t let those sissies on the floor
They’re unhip, man, they bought the wrong clothes
Let’s all do the latest craze
‘Cause having allies never pays
We’ll slag everyone each and every night
So we can pretend that we’re all right
Make those pricks feel just so small
We’ll show the world that we’re three feet tall
Oh, for heaven’s sake. The man is dead. When all you are is a writer, everything looks like a book.
If you’re not looking at this phenomenon through book-colored glasses, then what it looks like is laying down markers so that history will see who was to blame. This would be necessary even if there were effective action that could be taken today.
That quote is from ~2004, apparently. I wonder who Wallace is referring to?
Here you go: The page were he talks about it.
I am not sure who he refers to though.
I’m just hitting a paywall there.
try a couple times, that’s how I got the link. very interesting btw
I got it through a Google search on part of the quote. Maybe Google books unlocks the pages you find through Google?
John Barth, David Coover, William S. Burroughs, Vladimir Nabokov, Thomas Pynchon.
David Letterman, Gary Shandling, Rush Limbaugh.
T.C. Boyle, Bill Vollmann, Lorrie Moore.
Mark Leyner.
Mark Leyner and Limbaugh are particularly singled out here.
… later …
Mark Leyner (again), Emily Prager, and Brett Easton Ellis.
I have to admit that I’m only familiar with about half of these authors. Can’t disagree with the assessment, even if I didn’t particularly love Infinite Jest.
Twitter – DFW motivation
○ DFW On Irony
○ Conversation with DFW
As for the DFW On Irony piece, looking back at it, I didn’t so much internalize it as recognize myself in it.
Although, since I’m more political than literary, I didn’t see it as being an anti-rebel. But, in a way it is, as is it’s an effort to march the capable left back to establishmentarianism, since the goal is to run this country according to our affirmative (rather than negating) principles.
NY area viewing of the debate: watched for about 20 minutes at transit hub. [immigration beginning of terrorism] during which about 20 ppl. gathered around teevee in small bar/restaurant area near our transport, grp of ny area theater goers, business ppl. comments started with a guy who appeared to have had a few drinks already saying “b***sh*t to the teevee, followed by grumbling, then a businessperson showing us picture of HRC with bin Laden on the iphone then everyone yelling “liars! liars” at the teevee and departing for home.
Those noses are getting too long to be hidden, even from the proles. Wow.
I was laughing but also shocked at the disaffection with both parties as this looked to be on the whole a prosperous, upper middle class crowd
How brilliant, a mash-up of Hillary Clinton and Osama bin Laden to mock and show to a drunken crowd. I wish I had thought of that.
just the one guy was drunk. but yes, being on site here, as it were, ppl take major offense at politicians who would exploit sept 11 [they all do, as does the media]. on the first anniversary a neighbor said “If have to hear one more politician reading the Gettysburg address …” – all the politicians gathered here for the anniversary but none had a clue what to say [i.e. how to say something profound while promoting themselves], so they all read the Gettysburg address. [better would have been just stay away]. A colleague put it well “those guys hijacked the airliners, the politicians hijacked Sept 11”.
Irony definition:
Irony is dead. It has been killed by political and virtual reality. One cannot be ironic about what is said if it no longer contains any possible “literal meaning.”
Like dat.
Like dat, too.
Reality is now its own irony.
Bet on it.
AG