Die or don’t. Be creative, be idiotic, be silly, be eccentric, but don’t be too smart about it, or you might reveal a bit too much about yourself…

I’m not really into the weirdness that the current charts are subjecting us to, but not even I can completely cut myself off from the hype around certain things. Lady Gaga certainly falls into my category of ‘annoying’ and ‘heap of mental debility’ or even ‘be original at any and every price’. I won’t go into the difference between ‘being original’, ‘having a personality’ and ‘having an image’ of all the above here.
No what I am far more interested in is something the Queen of Over-the-top stated a couple of weeks ago in either a press release or an interview:

“You know, I have such an appreciation for where I am in my life because I’ve struggled and because I couldn’t get signed, and because I couldn’t get played on the radio,” … “There are times when it can be a lot to deal with but always when I get up in the morning I try to find that very joyful place that reminds me that I would die if someone took it all away. If someone did that I wouldn’t be a person anymore.”

cf. Contactmusic News and a much longer, twisted version in The Independent

That strikes me as odd. Well, to be completely honest, first thoughts are ‘oh dear’… then a touch of ‘how stupid can you get’ comes in. Once those signs of rejection subside, I get down to the philosophical problem that arises.

What makes us persons in the first place? Is it what we do (ie. the good)? What we don’t do (ie. the evil)? Is it where we come from? From who we are born? From what we’ve been through or haven’t been through (ie. the good and the bad)?

Or rather: is it what we want to project to the outside? Or rather that unveiled, harsh reality that we don’t want anybody to see? Is it the friends that cherish us? The people we love? The ones we despise?

Truth be told, what looks like a stupid quib by an equally stupid person, after scrutiny, actually is the true and profound expression of Gaga’s gagaism and true existence. She is what we make her to be. We give her the canvas on which to draw her meaningless existence out into something glamorous, something eccentric, something we in our everyday trot would never dare to do. Truly, if someone were to take that away form her, the icon would die. Just as any of the megahyped media models starting from an oversexed Marilyn Monroe to a slightly disgustingly exhibitionist Madonna. They exist because we see something in them. Because they dare to drag out the craziness that our reason cannot live out. Why? Because it’s not meant to be lived out. When craziness becomes the everyday role you play, then you lose what really made you a person in the first place. Or with the terms of Lady Gaga: if you make your ‘box of insanity’ your only kingdom, what’s left in the evening when you lie in bed alone, only turned on yourself?

Now of course, such a reasoning presupposes thought and self-critique which frankly I doubt Lady Gaga has enough of to even recognize a ‘bon mot’ when it would jump under her wig and ate directly at her brain. Chances are she really believes that losing her constructed image and fame would really kill her. The humiliation clearly would be enough to stop that superficial heart of hers.

But that leads me to a comforting thought: you can be what you want, wish and dream of. You can even construct your pseudo-memories about it all and make it real for us. And with the reinforcing strength of the perspective of people around us, we can even legitimize it until we completely and utterly forget what it was to be different or before.

Comforting or terribly unsettling?

Touching your skin with cold fingers,
the sweetest sorrow of all,
pouring itself into every fibre of our being,
and wasting away the fine border that separates the you from the me,
the worst emotions from the best ones,
the hardest memories from the brightest ones,
the bitter moments from the joyful ones.

There is so much life here,
so much future in every cell and move,
so much love, it could not be contained.

My fingers’ trace is followed by my tears,
for love’s constant yearning which cannot ever be satisfied,
for lovers lost in hardship,
for death in all it’s disguises.

Your skin grows colder and colder under my hand now,
and outside the dawn is breaking…

When do we really dare to know, dare to care?
There is a silent whisper whenever the clouds separate themselves,

torn apart by insensitive finger of windy heights,
blown to the extremes of this world,

a whisper that prolonged and minded, speaks of eternity.

With words that no language can bear nor hold,
a symphony of continuous harmony,
creating ever on, like the waves that continue to roll

one after the other, into and onto this land,
into my heart and your eyes.

However this may be, I’d like to clarify several points. (Especially since someone else has sent me an email probing my interest in a volume on Depeche Mode and Philosophy…)

• I am not against the use of pop cultural references in order to bring people in contact with philosophical concepts and theories they would otherwise never have come across.
• I am not against pop culture. (In fact, I am interested in pop culture like anyone living in this world: tv shows, series, films, cinema, bestsellers, comics, music etc.)
• I do not plead for a esoteric use of philosophy in general or the history of philosophy in particular. Philosophy is for everyone. That’s the way it’s supposed to be. Period.
• I do not plead for an aristocratic use of philosophy either, where the academic philosophers are the ones that hold the only true view on the big chapter of human sciences labeled Philosophy.
• I do not hate Battlestar Galactica.

The first point seems the most important one to me. So what is all this fuss about then? If I am not against the use of popular culture in exemplifying philosophical concepts, why did I write that first lengthy entry?

Several answers are possible here and I will make it just as plain as before.

1. I don’t think that taking people to be complete imbeciles is a good way to get “normal” people in touch with philosophical concepts.
2. I don’t think that you have to water absolutely everything down in order to get academic philosophy to be understood by philosophical lay people.
3. I strongly believe that everything is a matter of code. Failed communication, lost interest, contempt for something or someone etc.: all a matter of code.
   This means that it’s about “how do I say XYZ” and not what XYZ really are. (This is why rhetorical manipulation really works btw. Watch one of the speeches of the greatest manipulators of the last century (addressing his HJ) to prove my point.)
4. Philosophy today and in history is articulated and kept alive within two distinct places: academia and agora. There are professional philosophers and there are people interested and well read in philosophy. These areas need to mingle but have to be kept distinct for the sake of the quality level on both “sides”. And the mingling is where the crux lies.

So for me the question – that obviously nobody in academic philosophy has the guts to ask due to so many prejudice surrounding our profession – that follows the first step (i.e. how can we get people in touch with philosophical concepts that they would never have otherwise approached?) is: Which code do we choose? Do we choose the code of the addressed and try to stay hip (as seen with the Gender-Inclusive Bible or the German Street Slang Version of the Bible or Strine Slang Bible) by choosing their code, or do we try to impassionate them for what we really do by showing how we do it?

As usual it all comes down to attention. And these pop cultural initiatives do have the dirty feel of attention seekers for the sake of attention by all means.

What I would wish the editors of the Blackwell Pop Culture and Philosophy series to do is choose Battlestar Galactica as a matrix for exemplifying certain theories and problems philosophy has to deal with at the moment (cloning, AI etc.) instead of claiming that Battlestar Galactica is the ultimate Philosophy Show.

In a discussion about this the comparison with Matrix has been drawn. Matrix cannot be compared to the Blackwell Project in any way. The Matrix Trilogy has been written as an application about the dream vs. reality theorem in the history of thought. It was thought up that way and the writers have been so strict about this that the end of the Matrix Revolutions can hardly be understood without a degree in Modern Realism Debate. (I wonder if J. R. Searle and H. Putnam ever got together and watched the movies in light of their ongoing quarrel…)
Matrix – for me – is the prime example how complex philosophical concepts (dating as far back as Descartes genius malignus theorem) that were thought up and published in a highly technical language can be adapted and shaped up into a modern, pop cultural visual experience without losing its profundity. Of course it lost some tech-aficionados with the third part which in my opinion is purely philosophical, but never mind that.
Matrix became a phenomenon because it was philosophical. Because it offered a whole library of possible discussion topics. Matrix did not become first a phenomenon that we discussed philosophically afterwards or tried to cut to fit into certain philosophical categories. I dearly would hope -for the sake of our profession – the editors of the Blackwell series would try to live up to this standard instead of seeking for attention by any means.

Ah, yes… and please leave Depeche Mode where it belongs: my ears and my free time. Everything can be analysed philosophically, even the wandering of the earthworm. But does it have to be?

It so happens that I am a subscriber of one of the oldest philosophy news lists on the net: PHILOSOP (run by the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, Louisiana USA.) A part from a lot of conference calls and Call for Papers, something reached me last week that prompted … well, let’s say, a strong reaction: a call for papers for a volume on Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy.

Call for Abstracts: Battlestar Galactica and Philosophy

The Blackwell Philosophy and PopCulture Series

To propose ideas for future volumes in the Blackwell series please contact (…)

Abstracts and subsequent essays should be philosophically substantial but accessible, written to engage the intelligent lay reader. Contributors of accepted essays will receive an honorarium.

Possible themes and topics might include, but are not limited to, the following:

• Rationalism vs. faith: Baltar and Adama vs. Six and Roslin
• Hybrid-speak and the Scrolls of Pythia: Interpreting ambiguities of sense and reference
• Are Cylons humans, persons, or none of the above?
• Reincarnation, resurrection, or transmigration: How do Cylon souls get around?
• “All of this has happened before, and all of it will happen again”: Eternal recurrence realized
• “God has a plan for you, Kara”: The precarious nature of Starbuck’s freedom
• Did Boomer really shoot Adama? Conscious acts, freedom, and moral responsibility
• Leaving people behind: Utilitarian ethics and the appropriateness of cutting one’s losses
• “Join the New Caprica Police”: Is collaboration ever the right move?
• “People need something to hope for, let it be Earth”: Adama’s noble lie
• Tigh’s bottle, Lee’s hooker, and Kat’s stims: The vain quest for happiness
• How many Cylons does it take to eradicate humanity? Collective moral responsibility among the seven models
• Freedom vs. survival: Roslin’s abortion policy and the black market
• Tom Zarek’s fight for democracy: But look who got elected president?
• Humanity as a “flawed creation”: Should we share the Cylon goal of “transhumanism”?
• “Worthy of survival”: Humanity’s need for redemption through atonement
• Cylon monotheism vs. Colonial polytheism: Which mode of theism is more rational?
• Starbuck’s a woman?! Gender identity and character templates

The Series of Philosophy and Pop Culture is published by Blackwell and edited by William Irwin. This series started with a great idea a while ago when a call for paper came out for South Park and Philosphy. The volume was published last year btw. The good idea behind this was that a certain meta-level was included in the contributions. The phenomenon of South Park is known to everyone and the controversial discussions about what satire, irony, comics and humour can do or are allowed to do have allowed philosophers and a large public alike to take part in a discourse about things that really matter to our society without the matrix of technical vocabulary or scholarly debate. We are still in need of those discussions, evermore so dearly, as the Danish Caricature Scandal a year back has shown.

Battlestar Galactica (BG) however, is very far from any such considerations.

Don’t get me wrong. I watched BG just as everybody did that grew up in the 80ies and 90ies. I liked the storyline and it was – like almost everything of that time – something really new… out of space new. However – I did not jump onto the new series that has been done now. Simply for the fact that I don’t see any sense in trying to redo something that was already really good to begin with. Besides, adapting something like BG to our today visual standards only helps to destroy the initial excitement we had when we watched it the first time around. This sort of feels like a Female Hollywood Star in her 50ies dressing up like a 30 year old, just to be ‘hip’. Or could you imagine the original Star Wars films being redone and just staying the same? Of course not. None of the cheesiness of the time – that had so much appeal – would make it through the editing process nowadays.

As for making professional philosophy drop it’s theoretical weight on something like BG is quite beyond me. Why can’t these “intellectuals” not let art be art, and pop culture be pop culture.
It’s really not like philosophy hasn’t more urgent questions to answer. Or did I miss when we found a clear ethical way in dealing with stemm cell research, patents on life or organisms, patient care, DNR patients, MS patients that want to kill themselves but don’t have the corporal force to do so anymore or euthanasia? And that’s just the well funded part of my profession: ethics. In ethics everything can get a funding for these important questions. In the lesser well known research areas (Ancient Philosophy; Translations; Manuscript editions; Neurophilosophy; Historical Philosophy; Philosophy of Literature, of Law, of Sociology, of Politics, of Knowledge etc. etc.) that do source work, you won’t even get funding most of the time, because it’s not what society wants us to do.

I somehow doubt that finding philosophical truth in “Battlestar Galactica” is really what we should be doing. Not because it’s pop culture. Not because it’s about a TV series. Not because it wouldn’t be worth it.

But simply because it has already been done. Not under the same label, granted. But it has been done on several levels which a look into the history of philosopy and the philosophy of literature will reveal. (NB: For almost every point that the Blackwell series offers, there is a corresponding underlying philosophical debate. Why replace the ‘real deal’ with elements of pop culture rather than offer the interested lay person the actual discussion itself?)
In taking a look into some of the major works of analysis of our culture(s), one may find that some great minds have already spent their time to examine some basic identifying traits of our texts, our literature, our history and offered a vast number of texts that show convergences, divergences and certain typologies with the idea to offer a way for a better understanding of the workings of our culture.

What else is BG, Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Eragon et altera, but a watered down rehash of history itself?

What else are these great epics of today than a standardised and exaggerated version of our own life experiences, our hopes, our dreams?

Every text – be it minor or major, may it have success or not, may it ever be read or not – wants to give a certain basic truth. It can be a huge truth (like the one a former drug addict will give you while reconsidering his life) or a small one (like the little girl that writes in her diary how hard the world is for her). (NB: Films do count as texts as well, since they do lead a dialogue with the viewer as well.)

How this truth is told, how it is characterised or how it is understood is only the exterior appearance. Appearance changes. So why should we spend time and money to discuss an exterior appearance philosophically? Would it not be far more interesting to see this convergences, these basic truths that are realised in our culture (from the beginning of time right to the Peanuts…) and analyse them?

If we go back to our Blackwell series Philosophy and Pop Culture for a second, we see that the Editor tells exactly how he wants thing to be understood:

A spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down, and a healthy helping of popular culture clears the cobwebs from Kant. Philosophy has had a bad public relations problem for a few centuries now. This series aims to change that, showing that philosophy is relevant to your life – and not just for answering the big questions like “To be or not to be?” (…)

What a brilliant and honourable idea. But is this really the way to go?
When people ask me what I do, it usually goes like this:

“So, what do you do for a living?”

“I am writing a PhD in philosophy.”

“Oh… Uh, so you read a lot don’t you?”

“Indeed.”

“But, what is it exactly what you do…?”

This is when I try to pick any odd thing around me and the person I am talking to and construct something philosophical around it. Let’s say: a coffee cup. Is it really red with cows on it or am I just dreaming that I am having coffee with someone and the cup actually isn’t there at all? Or: See the coffee cup there? What makes us call it a coffee cup? (And then I launch into some explanation about the type-token problem and the universals? Or: Better yet, I find something out of the news like our consumer society, or the war on terror and the recent turn it has taken… OR since V for Vendetta I can take something out of pop culture to exemplify a situation we are actually experiencing in the US or have been experiencing in Europe with the NSdAP.

So, what do I do that is any different than M. Irwin is doing with his books?

I choose everyday situations or things to show philosophically lay people, how philosophy can be important for them or the society. I don’t take standardised archetypes of questions from a TV show and analyse them philosophically.
The “… bad public relation problem …” that philosophy has had is not due to the fact that it did not address actuality issues, but rather that it cannot keep categories.
By all means, you philosophers out there, talk to people in lay terms and simple language about Kant, Descartes and Sartre, but please don’t make things like TV Shows into the latest philosophical hot-news.

TV Shows do not want to change the world, they want to entertain.

There is nothing wrong with that.

Let them entertain, and if they have a basic truth in it that will help people become better citizens or better parents or what-not, that’s fine.

But please, refrain from spoiling all the fun and my digestion by putting an intellectual frosting on everything.

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