Vice magazine (www.viceland.com) encompasses, perhaps better than any other cultural touchstone, the modern breed of sardonic postmodernism and cynicism which has become the status-quo of young urban living. Parodied succinctly in the guise of the magazine ‘SugarApe’ in the cult comedy series Nathan Barley, Vice is a collection of bleeding-edge indie fashion and art, as well as special features designed largely to be as provocative as possible. The magazine has published features such as The Vice Guide to Shagging Muslims, and many other incendiary articles in a similar vein, and whereas any ‘serious’ publication would get in extremely hot water over content such as this (“The Financial Times Guide to Statutory Rape”…), Vice, being self-proclaimed satire can, much like South Park, irreverently explore and produce content on the very edges of taste and get away with it. Although there is nothing inherently wrong with this attitude (satire is one of the most important levellers of both pretention and hypocritical taboo), there is an element to the Vice phenomenon which is representative of a particularly negative breed of postmodernist posturing.
The basic essence of Vice is that the reader who chooses to interact with it can never win. If they take the magazine seriously, they have ‘lost’ because they have been taken in completely by ludicrous subject matter dressed up with a semblance of seriousness. If the reader takes offence, they have also ‘lost’ by being prudish and guilty of moral hypocrisy. If the reader finds the magazine funny, they ‘lose’ again because they are admitting that the writers have somehow keyed into some vein of truth in society. This is a modus-operandi reminiscent of that employed by the satirical website ‘Best Page in the Universe,’ created by George Ouzounian, which features dozens of articles filled with acerbic viewa on a wide range of topics; political, commercial, and social. Grammatically, all the articles are meticulously written so as to allow almost no room for any criticism of the content, except for the reader’s views on the subject. One of the features of the site is a ‘hate mail’ section where Ouzounian replies to criticism with savage wit and intelligence, ridiculing anybody who levels any and all forms of negative feedback. Similarly, and more blatantly than in Vice, readers are berated for taking the articles seriously if they complain, and for being pathetic if they find them funny. In this sense the only way for anybody to ‘win’ is not to interact at all.
In Nathan Barley, ‘Sugar Ape’ magazine is designed to be a direct parody of Vice. In the show it is deliberately provocative, carrying such features as topless girls of legal age, all stated as being 13 or 14 years of age. The sardonic editor of the magazine describes the appeal of the publication thus: “Stupid people think it’s cool, clever people think it’s a joke; also cool.” This statement typifies the ‘problem’ of such self-referential cultures, but the theme spreads from the comedic sphere to many other levels of art and society. In many ways, assuming postmodernist attitudes of the kind typified by these examples are like trying to be an impenetrable fortress. By never being able to be wrong, and by aiming attack at those who go out on any sort of limb with the weight of serious intention behind them, those with the cynical, postmodernist attitude so prevalent among modern, well-educated 20-somethings, end up being incapable of ever fully supporting or committing to a cause. As soon as you show others that you care about something, you can come into line for criticism and ridicule. What Vice magazine mirrors is the postmodernist trend towards distancing one’s output, creative and otherwise, from any real intention, such that any criticism may be easily deflected by pointing to the critic’s perceived ignorance. A writer who genuinely wrote an article entitled The Guide to Shagging Muslims, would expect to have to seriously defend himself against being torn to shreds in the broadsheet media. By holding your cards close to your chest, you can easily claim that those actions which come under criticism are ‘satire’ or ‘a joke,’ and all those which are praised had genuine, serious intention on your part.
In this vein, Noam Chomsky has criticised the attitude of ‘postmodernist’ academics and artists for being unwilling to explain the principles and basis of what they assert or create. Ironic and self-referential modus-operandi avoid intended and static meanings, preferring to allow the freedom to choose meaning later in order to suit criticism and perception of the work. It is a lot easier to tailor respones to your attitude or work than it is to defend a prestated set of ambitions or intentions. The artist who explains his goals, then produces his art will be measured against those goals, whereas the artist who produces work and then exhibits can decide to back-fill their intentions with whatever will flatter them most for a particular response to their work. The Bruno segments on Da Ali G Show exhibited this mentality within the fashion industry beautifully, with Bruno being able to make top designers contradict themselves entirely as to the themes of their work in the space of a few minutes, so keen were they to latch onto the praise he seemed to be heaping upon what they had created. The same clothes collection thus ended up being “dark and heavy’ as well as ‘lighty and weightless,’ suggesting that the designer had no clear intention thematically or otherwise when they designed the work.
If modernsim was all about progress, and about the relentless pursuit of change and advancement through challenging norms and assumptions, the postmodernist attitude seems doomed to be almost entirely stationary. The cynical avoidance of any form of criticism, as if avoiding criticism were the highest attainable goal, requires the adherent to such a philosophy to be a critic rather than a creator. Even if the ‘postmodernist’ does choose to create something, their purposes must always be able to shape-shift in order to belittle others and deflect negative criticism. This allows for no clear morals, beliefs, or purposes. If modernism did one positive thing it was to foster an attitude of challenging assumption and fiduciary frameworks for believing or living, but the ironical, postmodernist philosophy does not allow the creation of new beliefs or purposes based upon measured thought or experience to fill the void, because it would then be open to criticism. It is particularly because it is so self-absorbed that ‘postmodernist irony’ is able to be so slammingly self-referential and acutely conscious of social quirks or customs. As a philosophy it is the equivalent of the person who will never admit that they do not know the answer to anything, straightfacedly claiming to already know things they are in fact learning for the first time. In this way, although it is seen as socially desirable to be of the cooly cynical disposition so familiar in the arts faculties of university campuses, the spread of the Vice culture castrates the possibility of serious philosophical or social advancement, requiring adherents to become immaculately fashioned, achingly cool, yet vacant critics of those who actually have the bravery to produce something fresh and then stand by it. Such cynics are like stone-age survivors, spending so much time defending themselves and finding food that there was no time to contemplate music or art or anything of a higher meaning, they may be successful in their aim to defend themselves, but it is those who have ‘got over’ their hang-ups over being criticised who are actually in a position to enjoy all the higher joys that life has to offer.
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