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A moral critique of capitalism, emphasizing the ways in which it leads to suffering, only reinforces capitalist realism. Poverty, famine and war can be presented as an inevitable part of reality, while the hope that these forms of suffering could be eliminated easily painted as naive utopianism. Capitalist realism can only be threatened if it is shown to be in some way inconsistent or untenable; if, that is to say, capitalism’s ostensible ‘realism’ turns out to be nothing of the sort.
Capitalist Realism
Mark Fisher
We carefully cultivate online personas—doubles of our “real” selves—that have just the right balance of sincerity and world-weariness. We hone ironic, detached voices that aren’t too promotional but do the work of promoting nonetheless. We go on social media to juice our numbers, while complaining about how much we hate the “hell sites.”
Not only “Big Brother is watching you” (a virtual Panopticon), and “Big Brother is selling your data and pitching you products” ([surveillance capitalism](https://www.publicaffairsbooks.com/titles/shoshana-zuboff/the-age-of-surveillance-capitalism/9781610395694/) writ large), but also “Big Brother’s model permeates the texts that you read and write; inscribes your thought process; monitors your keystrokes; and predicts your every utterance by making *your* patterns *its* patterns and *its* pattern *yours*.”
Now the Humanities Can Disrupt “AI”
Lauren M. E. Goodlad & Samuel Baker
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