Transcription
If I ask you if you can remember the last three videos you watched, the answer is no. But wait, before I bought perfume at the base, I didn't want to talk about it at all. So, personally, no.
This reflection inspired me to create this video: Why do platforms hypnotize us to this extent, yet leave no lasting trace in our minds? All day long, we are constantly stimulated, but as soon as the video ends, it disappears from our minds as if it had never existed.
We have this impression that content, which is poor in information and personal cultural connection, is increasingly promoted by platforms. It becomes viral and can even change a life 180 degrees and make you rich.
And this career? How did I create it? In what, three minutes? Now they call me, they wake me up in the morning, they tell me, "Tonight, you're going on the set of Daily," and there’s PR who dresses you. Oh, and after that, it’s business too; you earn a lot of money. Ah, I earn my living here.
There is a term we hear more and more in the media space and on social networks, following this kind of content that is a bit empty but becomes super viral: it is the culture of emptiness. Is it an emerging culture? Is it a feeling of discontent in the face of a flood of increasingly information-poor content? Or is it the beginning of a real phenomenon that affects us and could be dangerous for our generations and their future?
Are we really entering an era of the culture of emptiness? A time where the overabundance of content floods us but never really nourishes us?
Welcome to this new video test. Today, we are going to discuss the culture of emptiness.
So, today we are going to talk about emptiness on the Internet and the culture of emptiness. But the Internet is also a great resource tool, and the proof is with Rosetta Stone, who accompanies me for this video.
Rosetta Stone is an application and a website that allows you to learn 25 different languages, from the most common ones like English, Arabic, and Spanish to rarer ones like Farsi, Filipino, or even Hebrew. It is used by all professional students and even by 22,000 establishments worldwide.
If it is used so much, it is because of its practical and musical appearance, which I myself was able to test over the months and weeks when I was traveling, for example, to Japan to learn Japanese or to get back into Arabic. Since I live in the Emirates, we have vocabulary, grammar exercises, and even vocal exercises to practice the language in all aspects.
If you want even more targeted and personalized learning, you can choose the theme of your learning with courses focused a little more on travel or work. So, if you want to fill your head while using your Rosetta Stone screen, it will be your ally.
And that's good since it's almost the end of year holidays. If you want to please a loved one who uses their screen a lot but wants to use it intelligently, you can take advantage of 60% off the lifetime offer, which allows you to access the 25 languages unlimited. For that, you just have to go through my link in the info bar or in a pinned comment.
Thank you to Rosetta Stone for supporting me in this video and for supporting many people around the world in language learning.
Now, let's move on to the video.
It's not bad, let's go.
No, my mother's V, let's go. Wes, there's no getting upset. I want a burger.
In recent weeks, we have heard a lot about the culture of emptiness, and it all started with this video. Then we followed this interview with Combin.
No, my mother's life, we're going quick. Wes, I want a burger.
In fact, the video is part of the fact that we were wondering where we were going to eat tonight, and in the end, I lost it because no one was listening to me. I took out my mother's life.
We're going quick, wesh. And there, the Internet went crazy.
I want a glass of water. Can you pass me a glass of water, please? My mother's life, FC wesh. I want a tender.
That will interest who? Well, we are interested. Why do you have a buzz window of at least three weeks? In months, we will surf on it and will make at least 5 million views.
Ah yes, it is an online media focused on pop culture that I personally knew at the time of Snapchat when there were the first feeds to discover. I don't know if you remember.
As it is a media focused on pop culture, they have gradually developed formats that highlighted Internet phenomena.
But seriously, I haven't heard that one for a long time.
Due to the success of this format, can we really talk about success? Do views mean success? That's something else that I'm going to address.
Many other media have launched into this kind of section that puts Internet phenomena in the spotlight. We also had Raw.
I don't know if you remember at the time. We are in Cambodia or what? There, and we are in combat or what?
We had, for example, the daily newspaper, which invited the TikTok dancer B. Despite all the controversial opinions, the views are much higher when it concerns an Internet phenomenon or a controversy rather than a much more scientific section or a section that borders on politics, among other things, a video a little more informative.
So why does content that is described as empty by the whole web attract so much attention?
To understand what the culture of emptiness is, I had to ask myself this question. As you know, for my writings, you will be able to find them right there, right at the top.
I have to refer to the work of researchers, and in trying to find a definition of the expression "culture of emptiness," I came up against a wall.
You should know that the expression "culture of emptiness" is not a concept officially addressed in academic university research, so there is no exact definition of this term.
But just because the term has not been addressed does not mean that it does not exist, and it does not mean that the phenomenon is new.
Maybe, in fact, the culture of emptiness has always existed, but we never called it the culture of emptiness.
While doing my research, I came across an essay by a ship's guide called "The Society of the Spectacle," which was written in 1967.
It told me, but who was Guy Debord? Guy Debord was born on December 28, 1931, in Paris, from a bourgeois family. His father, who was a pharmacist, died when Guy was only 5 years old.
After this tragic event, Paulette Rousi, Guy's mother, sent him to live in Cannes with his grandparents. This had a huge impact on his identity and the way he built himself, far from his family.
He grew up with great detachment from his family and a pronounced taste for reading and reflection. He fell into rebellion and returned determined to Paris during his adolescence.
He quickly developed a provocative nonconformist attitude, totally opposed to his bourgeois education.
In 1948, at that time, Guy was only in high school, and he decided to leave school. He had such contempt for authority and the rigid structure of education that he said, "I'm sick of you."
You remember when I told you that he fell into books very young? As he grew a little isolated, he gradually became a self-taught thinker.
To help you understand a little the way he sees things, he is greatly imbued with the ideas of Marx, which are anti-capitalist and denounce dehumanization for the benefit of profit.
An important point: between 1945 and 1960, France was in a post-war context and therefore in full economic, political, and social transition.
We have major social reforms such as the creation of Social Security, the democratization of education, the baby boom, and a general improvement in living conditions with all the technical and economic progress.
This improvement in life left much more time for the French for entertainment, and that's where the shift will happen.
I had made particular reference to this in my essay on age and beauty, to what extent the post-war period and the development of media, films, and culture will have such an impact on the criteria of beauty and, in particular, the vision of success, which will be very closely linked to appearance.
It is at this time that cinema, radio, and television will take a very important place in the daily lives of the French and even widely in the Western world.
Television will take up more and more space, simply with the start of live TV rebroadcasts, including major events such as the coronation of the Queen.
That's where we will start having cult moments in history that will transform themselves a little into popular culture.
In 1958, only 10% of French people had a television at home, and in 1969, barely 10 years later, 69% of French people had a television at home.
This increased from 10% to 69% in about ten years.
Now you might be wondering why I am telling you all this.
Wait, it is in this economic and social context that Guy Debord will co-found, with other intellectuals, the International Situationist.
To summarize, they aimed to radically transform society to free individuals from the alienation imposed by capitalism, consumption, and the monotony of daily life.
They sought to create a society where creativity, freedom, and authentic experiences would replace passivity and socio-economic constraints.
Debord named a concept called "the society of the spectacle." By spectacle, he means several things.
One is that current society favors appearances over authenticity, so individuals are much more focused on taking care of their image rather than having a real role and a deep meaning to their actions or their relationships.
Have the media and entertainment taken up so much space in everyday life that individuals become passive spectators? We consume images, we consume politics, we consume entertainment, but we do not actively participate in all these things.
In fact, this is where the show comes from. He says that reality is replaced by stagings. Everyone observes, everyone imitates, but no one is acting.
To talk about passivity, we can see it in relation to what is happening in many countries in the world, whether it is in Palestine, Congo, Sudan, or even sometimes in France on our own territory.
Rather than taking concrete action to change things, that is to say, simply leaving our homes and setting fires, we do playbacks and put up lyrics.
One example that comes to mind is a photo of Justin Bieber that was posted with a filter surrounding his head while he was in his car.
Based on this image, many relayed it thinking that it was a call in support of Palestine.
What it shows is that now your fights don't count, what you say doesn't count, what you do does not matter.
What matters is what you are going to show on social networks, what you are going to stage, what you are going to show us as a show that will prove that you are leading a fight.
When Debord speaks of the fact that image takes precedence over actions, that's exactly it.
I'm not saying that it's too late since, in itself, media coverage to get a message across is important.
The fact of creating filters, for example, which will ensure that funds are collected is also good for people who cannot move.
But when it takes a more important place than actually leading a physical fight, since it is by being physically present and fighting for real that things will change, well, in fact, nothing is moving.
That's why, even beyond that, I think that someone who controls the image controls the narrative.
If you had a bad buzz but you control your image, everyone will forget that you had a bad buzz.
Why is the image important? Because the image creates the reaction, and the reaction is what is so essential now in the way the media are made.
With the increasing creation of applications that highlight short content, we have a concentration time that is increasingly reduced.
Even YouTube has brought back the short option on its application because there is a demand for shorter, more concise content.
This kind of content creates the reaction in a very short period of time. We can go through a lot of emotions.
We can see it even now with TV channels and continuous news channels. We have less and less journalism and more and more sick reactionaries.
We want to hang out at home and have the pay that comes in.
What are these people who do nothing? What are these slackers, these welfare recipients?
After a shocking event, we don't try to say something constructive; we try to create a buzz, to make the next image that will be projected on all the screens.
There is no more debate; there is only the exhibition of ideas. Everyone says what they think since everyone wants their quarter of an hour of glory, their quarter of an hour of image.
In fact, we have the impression that we are among the madmen.
I have seen that on TV sets, but we can also see it with the creation of YouTube channels like Jubil, for example.
Jubil, which I find was part of a good concept, but ultimately, we realize that it is just the invitation of people who have very constructed ideas and do not intend to deconstruct them.
They have this desire to simply expose their ideas: "I have something to say, I say it. What you think, I don't care."
And that's where, in fact, the image broke social interactions and broke social ties.
The deep connection that we have with others is that everything is in the image, everything is in the reactionary.
There is no more exchange, no more debate.
He writes, "The show is not a set of images but a social relationship between people mediated by images."
You see someone experience something terrible, and you absorb it. It gives you the impression that you too have experienced it because you have been moved, because you have been shocked.
Except that, in fact, you have not experienced it as there is the experience of a person who has been publicized.
It is as if he or she belonged to you, and it is through this that it creates a social relationship between people who have never seen each other.
Afterward, well, that is the principle a little bit of social networks.
Where does the term come from?
There is a fact to know about the brain: it is something called epistemic value. Our brain automatically attributes importance to any novelty, something that we do not know.
It will attract our attention, and that is why, whether it is news items, drama between influencers, or all kinds of new things, our brain will automatically be caught like that as soon as it hears new information.
In fact, that is the danger of TikTok. With each slide, there is something new. Each slide, you do not know what you are going to come across.
You are going to get your brain used to a gymnastics where, when I slide, there will be something new that will give me, I don't know what emotion.
Except that getting your brain used to this gymnastics is not normal.
We are not supposed to receive so much information per day.
For me, the culture of emptiness means a bit of everything and nothing in the end since the culture of emptiness is a culture that comes from a mediatization of emptiness, simply by existing through the image.
The more it goes on, the more the images are replaced very quickly.
We cling to this image, but it makes us exist as quickly as it makes us fall into oblivion.
In fact, already from one, you are not just an image. You do not exist only through the views that you are going to make, only through the attention that you are going to have, only through the trends that you will invent, or through the aesthetics that you will follow to make content.
You are a human with emotions, with a brain that you can fill throughout your life with experiences, emotions, knowledge, culture, bonds, friendship, love.
And above all, do not scroll unnecessarily.
Turn off your phone. Do not live through what you see on social networks. Do not live through others.
You have a dream? Turn off your phone.
If you want to read something, turn off your phone.
If there is a film that intrigues you, turn off your phone. Go to the cinema.
Your first reflex when you are intrigued by something should not be to open your social networks.
So, that's it for this video. I hope you liked it.
It's a video that tried to be a little shorter than the previous ones because I didn't want to spread out too much and go into all the senses.
The subject is very complex but at the same time very simple to develop.
Pay attention to yourself and turn off this phone.
Thanks to Rosetta Stone for accompanying me for this video.
Don't forget, if you want to learn a language, you can go through my link in the info bar, and you will be able to get a small discount on your language learning.
Kisses.