I had a conversation earlier about Situationism earlier. I tried and failed to explain why Situationist ideas still get me high. They weren’t unique in theorizing a post-scarcity society. That was common at the end of the
Trente Glorieuses.
It seemed that the economy was on an ever-upward trajectory, and we hadn’t yet reached the society-wide application of Parkinson’s law, as increasingly obscure work expanded to fill the labour power available.
It’s the situationists, though, who will always stand out for me in their fervid, semi-coherent optimism. Also because their ideas resemble those bubbling through the collective unconscious of the most delightfully
fun
communities I’ve encountered.
So at the risk of posting Yet.Another.Manifesto, here’s a call to creativity:
Against the spectacle, the realized situationist culture introduces total participation.
Against preserved art, it is the organization of the directly lived moment.
…
Against unilateral art, situationist culture will be an art of dialogue, an art of interaction.
…
At a higher stage, everyone will become an artist, i.e., inseparably a producer-consumer of total culture creation, which will help the rapid dissolution of the linear criteria of novelty. Everyone will be a situationist so to speak, with a multidimensional inflation of tendencies, experiences, or radically different “schools” — not successively, but simultaneously.
If anybody is groping towards a manifesto for their life, you could do much worse that dedicating yourself towards becoming a
total participant
in the
organization of the directly lived moment