1. poop
Thus, money is pumped into everything from diet pills to weight gainer, exercise tapes to self-help books; our capitalist economy is infused with the dollars of body-conscious consumers. .
One of Marcuse's responses to the advanced, dominating industrial society that produces "false" needs is the Great Refusal. The Great Refusal is the denial of the material ease of industrial society and the embrace of freedom. His embodiment of this concept is art; art, in an accelerated state, is "the Great Refusal - the protest against that which is" (Pg 63). Art, and the realm of being it creates, alienates it in a "high culture" that refuses to trade liberation and well-being for the meager prize of consumer comfort. It has the potential to distinguish itself from the bleak, diluted reality of society by creating and commenting on this reality in a fictitious, synthesized one. The essence of its truth lies in its contradiction to the industrial actuality. Through distance, art has the ability to comment on the ills and shortcomings of society. With the advancement of technological rationality, however, art is absorbed into the manipulated mainstream culture. It loses its ability to speak honestly, to shock, and to instigate as the pedestal it had been placed upon is widdled away by technological progress and the conquest of nature. Art, once a privilege of the elite, has become readily available to the masses. Old classics are pacified and reinterpreted so as to fit comfortably in the social reality of the advanced industrial society, and the new avant-garde which aims for remoteness is incorporated into popular culture as brazen, yet manageable entertainment. "The Great Refusal," as it loses its distance and thus its capacity to explore social reality, "is in turn refused" (Pg 64).
I feel the concept of "the Great Refusal" is made even more relevant today. I, like Marcuse, see that the isolation of art to high culture was the error of another repressive society which cannot be remedied by the mass production of art.
While in France she becomes acquainted with Herbert Marcuse, a prominent political figure. Davis stated concerning a lecture, "When Marcuse walked onto the platform, situated on the lowest level of the hall, his presence dominated everything. ... Marcuse proved to be a considerable influence on Davis and his interactions with her lead to her intensified involvement with the communist party. Davis" decision to return to the US is a direct result of her relationship with Marcuse and his political beliefs. ...
In America, the media holds a powerful and effective position in politicizing and socializing the general populace. The main political function of the media is to inform and analyze while being accountable. However the question of whether the media produces a pluralist democracy, or fosters a "...
One of the leading theorists that are seen to offer a huge amount of criticism in this paradigm is Herbert Marcuse. According to Marcuse (cited in Ritzer, 2011:285) "technology, no matter how pure,' sustains and streamlines the continuum of domination". ...
The Frankfurt school was made up by four main scholars Theodor W Adorno (Philosopher, Sociologist and Musicologist), Walter Benjamin (Essayist and literacy critic), Herbert Marcuse (Philosopher), and Max Horkheimer (Philosopher, Sociologist) and later Jurgen Habermas. ...