Whenever I think about how the rise of consumerism has reshaped society I think about how we could potentially reshape it again to achieve a pre- or post-consumerist society, and whether or not this is in fact desirable. I'm aware of several active non-consumerist movements, such as religious asceticism. I've always been skeptical however, of philosophies that require eschewing all the goods we've accumulated for the simple fact that attachment to material possessions is too far ingrained in the social psyche to reverse course. So I wonder, could a revolutionary new good somehow break our entrapment in the spiral of endless consumption?
Years ago I stumbled across some madness on the internet that I took quite a liking to due to its sheer audacity and apparent insanity. It is an online version of a book entitled The Hedonistic Imperative (Table Of Contents) The book posits that the use of nanotechnology, psychoactive drugs, genetic engineering, and virtual reality software could produce a post-consumerist utopian world. While at first reading this tract is like wandering through the head of a madman, if the bizarre rhetoric is stripped it reveals a cohesive (but rather implausible) vision for a post-consumerist world. The basic premise is that through use of drugs, we can permanently feel physically ecstatic, while virtual reality software would permit the complete democratization of experience.
The following is an excerpt from a "Hedonistic" critique of Brave New World (link. scroll to the "Consumerist" heading)
At present, society is based on the assumption that goods and services - and the good experiences they can generate - are a finite scarce resource. But ubiquitous VR [Virtual Reality] can generate (in effect) infinite abundance. An IT [Information Technology] society supersedes the old zero-sum paradigm and Fordist mass-manufacture. It rewrites the orthodox laws of market economics. The ability of immersive multi-modal VR to make one - depending on the software title one opts for - Lord Of Creation, Casanova The Insatiable etc puts an entire universe at one's disposal. This can involve owning "trillions of dollars", heaps of "status-goods", and unlimited wealth and resources - in today's archaic terminology. In fact one will be able to have all the material goods one wants, and any virtual world one wants - and it can all seem as "unvirtual" as one desires. A few centuries hence, we may rapidly take [im]material opulence for granted. And this virtual cornucopia won't be the prerogative of a tiny elite. Information isn't like that. Nor will it depend on masses of toiling workers. Information isn't like that either. If we want it, nanotechnology promises old-fashioned abundance all round, both inside and outside synthetic VR.
That right there, that is bold. The author provides numerous defenses for the inevitable criticisms, but they are far too tiresome to bother reading in full. Instead I will provide some quick defenses of my own and then add my own critique. Now, clearly, this technocentric vision exposes itself to many obstacles in implementation and feasibility. Suffice to say, the provision of minimal material goods at a sustainable level is to be accomplished through more super-awesome future sciencey-stuff like population regulation, robotics, and a wild-eyed vision of modifying the genetic urge to procreation.
Of course, the problem here is that this vision is in fact blatant consumerism with the added twist of using false realities to create utopian abundance. Would we not be merely transferring the postmodernist hyperreality and sign-values from the physical world into a virtual reality? Some would argue that this is the logical conclusion of consumerist hyperreality's subversion of physical reality. I however, argue that this is faulty, as the redistribution (or rather, infinite distribution) or experiential wealth would fundamentally alter the meaning of sign-value. How can we relate to the world and each other through sign-values if our worlds become our own creations? Through infinite consumption of sign-values we may eliminate the relative enjoyment of commodities and the concept of luxury. Commodities then would offer us nothing besides a use-value, and even a use-value becomes meaningless when immersed in a virtual world!
Far be it from me to imagine what human desires would then encompass if commodities no longer held meaning. I suppose there would be the pre-consumerist 'basic needs' of humans, but if we are to follow the full program of these weird futuro-hedonists even these will be eliminated by genetic engineering and a worldwide distributive mechanism.
Perhaps this is why their vision hinges upon mankind consuming massive amounts of psychoactive drugs.
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