Several years ago the word “irony” changed meaning. What had previously been a somewhat effective sociological tool that pointed out the disjuncture between form and content became hypostatized with mass society. This rupture furthered the elaboration of Adorno and Horkheimier’s Culture Industry. This new hipster irony represents  total integration placated by the ideological veneer of self-affirming disdain.
Adorno and Horkheimer argue that, “in the culture industry the individual is an illusion not merely because of the standardization of the means of production. He is tolerated only so long as his complete identification with the generality is unquestioned.” Many people have criticized the empirical accuracy of this notion of mass society, arguing that it fails to capture the plurality of dissent within mainstream culture and in the counter-culture. But, at least in the case of the counter-culture, this criticism neglects Adorno and Horkheimer’s point; dissent is possible, but it will relegate you to fringes of society.
The bohemian hipster once ruled these fringes. Eschewing bourgeois success for cultural cachet, the bohemian hipster pointed to a world where untrammelled commerce did not mediate success. Things like art, meaning, community, sincerity and expression- Pasolini’s notion of living- were deemed more important then your 501k. Here irony was a critical intellectual tool that pointed to irreconcilability of human life with mass society.
But at some point hipsters and irony changed. Irony no longer pointed to the irreconcilability of human life with mass society,; it reconciled hipsters with mass society. Suddenly, it became “hilarious” to embrace barbarian garbage, provided you made a big to do about the fact that you were being ironic.
Two parties I went to last Friday are ample illustrations of hipster irony;
The first was a party who’s theme was based on a shitty TV show from the 1990s. Instead of socializing, dancing etc. the party consisted of people criticizing episodes of the TV show.
The second was the ironic hipster spectacle of a going away party. The spectacle was the presence of a bouncy castle and strippers.  The hipster irony was that it was “hilarious” that hipsters would hire a bouncy castle and strippers and party like the squares.
In both these cases community and interaction consisted of the hipster irony of sharing in the aesthetic of ‘its so bad its good” where the full embrace of the form of mass society is peppered with flaccid collaborative criticisms of its content.
Adorno and Horkheimer’s Culture industry further describes the truth content behind hipster irony. They do this in their description of the malleability of language, where “the name…is undergoing a chemical change; a metamorphosis into capricious, manipulable designations.”For them, names “have been brought up to date either by stylization as advertising trademarks, or by collective standardization.” This is true of irony, which as hipster irony, has been brought up to date to stylize the collective standardization of hipsters.
The ramifications for the “hilarity” of hipster irony are spelled out in Horkheimer and Adorno’s comments on laughter;

“to laugh at something is always to deride it, and the life which, according to Bergson, in laughter breaks through the barrier, is actually an invading barbaric life, self-assertion prepared to parade its liberation from any scruple when the social occasion arises. Such a laughing audience is a parody of humanity. Its members are monads all dedicated to the pleasure of being ready for anything at the expense of everyone else. Their harmony is a caricature of solidarity…In the culture industry, jovial denial takes the place of the pain found in ecstasy and in ascetisism. The supreme law is that they shall not satisfy their desires at any price; they must laugh and be content with laughter. In every product of the culture industry, the permanent denial imposed by civilization is once again unmistakably  demonstrated and inflicted upon its victims.”

Like the Balzacian brilliance of the TV show, Nathan Barley,

this quote demonstrates what is at the heart of hipster irony; complete deindivduation, the destruction of genuine experience, the disavowal of art, meaning, community, sincerity, expression and the abdication of critical thought. One might also say it represents the disavowal of the possibility of human liberation.
This critique has used the old meaning of irony to point out the ironic nature of hipster irony. But, it is not enough. Hipster irony must be overcome with sincerity. Like Badiou’s call that positive thinking replace critical thinking, sincerity must embrace life. It must also assert that a better world is possible. It must not provide a nihilistic ideological embrace of the neo-liberal disaster. Instead it must focus on putting an end to the disjunctures between what is and what is possible, for these are the true tragic ironies of our times;

related  http://www.metropolismag.com/cda/story.php?artid=1854

http://www.amazon.com/Spy-Funny-Years-Kurt-Andersen/dp/1401352391/sr=1-1/qid=1162476560/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-9698313-9356019?ie=UTF8&s=books

  1. larevolution posted this