LA Times Obit of Baudrillard (simulacra, hyperreality, violence & death, 9/11 & Disneyland)

[Hissyspit]

http://www.latimes.com/news/obituaries/la-me-baudrillard11mar11,0,2356156.story?coll=la-home-obituaries

OBITUARIES
Jean Baudrillard, 77; kept a sharp eye on blurry reality
By Elaine Woo, Times Staff Writer
March 11, 2007

- snip -

These were, oddly enough, tributes, offered in the spirit of a guru of postmodern thought who exerted enormous influence on contemporary artists and writers, including the creators of "The Matrix" movies. The postings were plays on the claim Baudrillard, 77, had made about the Gulf War of 1991 — namely, that it "did not take place."

That war was, in his view, largely a television event, experienced by the masses more like a video game than an actual situation of violence and death. His assertion, infuriating to many, illustrated his big idea: that we no longer can distinguish between imitation and reality — and that we sometimes prefer the imitations because they seem more real than life.

This state of what Baudrillard called "hyperreality" explains why we are swamped by TV "reality shows," which are anything but. And it accounts for the perennial allure of Disneyland, which he said is "presented as imaginary in order to make us believe that the rest is real."

- snip -

He was also a caustic polemicist. In an essay titled "The Spirit of Terrorism," published in Le Monde two months after 9/11, he wrote that the World Trade Center attacks were the consequence of a "terrorist imagination" bred by an "insufferable superpower," the U.S. "In the end," he concluded, "it was they who did it, but we who wished it."

Critics condemned him for seemingly justifying the destruction, to which he replied, "One should not confuse the messenger with his message."

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[bananas]

1. and the ad next to the article:

[Hissyspit]

3. Heh.

Good catch.

[Lithos]

2. I am sad

He was a brilliant thinker who if nothing else made one think about what was reality and what wasn't.

[xchrom]

4. i always thought of him as a kind of rightful or logical heir

of mcluhan{sp} regarding his thoughts about the telley and reality.

and you can certainly see the effects of television here in this country.