File spoon-archives/baudrillard.archive/baudrillard_1995/baudrillard.10-95, message 4


Date: Wed, 04 Oct 1995 02:03:01 -0500 (CDT)
From: levy-AT-UTARLG.UTA.EDU
Subject: Re: oj


The simulacrum is TRUE:  In other words, the actual guilt or innocence of 
Simson gets determined by how the trial gets acted out, specifically for the 
cameras.  The hypervisibility of high-profile court cases makes 
justice ob-scene.  The fact that the living room voyeur sees more than 
the jury serves to make him/her feel s/he sees everything.  Nothing can't 
be seen, and so the image has no depth and therefore no meaning, except 
what is generated by this difference between juror/victim and TV 
audience/consumer.  Whatever meaning can be generated depends on 
that difference.

The simulacrum is TRUE:  By definition, the system works, because all 
that is asked for is a show and a tell.  We had a trial, we have a 
verdict: the (in)justice system works!  There is no reality (what REALLY 
happened) being represented, because we can't see it, and that without 
image does not exist for us.  Without a reality by which the verdict can 
be evaluated, the (in)justice binary implodes:  The system is more just 
than justice because it serves its purpose altogether without any need or 
regard for reality.

(I'm scaring myself with this stuff!)
--Matthew Levy, University of Texas at Arlington

     ------------------

   

Driftline Main Page

 

Display software: ArchTracker © Malgosia Askanas, 2000-2005