Social media has always been fascinating to me, perhaps because I grew up with social media. I do remember my life before it, but who I am now is definitely mediated almost wholly by my early access to social media. Thus, reading Fisher’s Postcapitalist Desire analysis of Lukács’ class consciousness, and his pressing questioning of the role of the face-to-face, evokes multiple feelings within me. To summarize (Fisher on) Lukács, “social reality […] appears in the first instance as the pure object of societal events” (Fisher, 140). That is, in our everyday existence we encounter totality as a given. The capitalist system presents itself as all there is to it. It is only after reflecting on this immediacy that we can become aware of how totality actually works. As Fisher notes in an example, in everyday life the worker believes they are worker and not owner because of some failure on their end; reflection reveals that the worker’s position is determined by the system in place. 

Translating from politics to ethics, this is akin to what Dussel calls ethical-critical consciousness. The resemblance goes so deep that both Dussel and Lukács call this process consciousness, and the reference point of what we are “conscious of” is totality. This is no surprise, Lukács had an incredible influence on all Marxists. But, what is interesting is what Fisher questions about class consciousness in the 21st century. Some preambles to the question. We are in a generalized condition of ‘time-poverty’. That is, we live in an era where we are not truly able to escape capital’s time. Workers work 8 hours. In the time they take to arrive at their job they consume media which is part of the capital. In some cases they transport themselves through Uber or privatized ‘public’ transport, which are also part of the capital. And, when we ‘rest’, we consume more products in the form of social media. This encroachment, engulfment, of capital has gotten to a point where most romantic relationships in recent years have started from dating apps. So we never truly have time outside the capital, so we always live in the totality. Now, this is always the case both in Dussel and Lukács, because totality is just the system, and you cannot simply live outside totality. But both Dussel and Lukács argue that the human retains an exteriority to the totality in the form of revolutionary potential, and that this potential can only be ignited by a “coming together”. However, and this is Fisher’s question, if “everything is being hived off or routed through capital”, that is, if our social relations are capitalized, if “you need a product of capital in order to relate to another person” (Fisher, 135), what happens to class consciousness or critical-ethical consciousness?

I have not read Lukács to a great extent, so I will not try to seek an answer from his framework. But given that the question is problematic for Dussel as well, and given that I have read Dussel extensively, I am going to take the Dussel route. Recall that Dussel believes the first step to gaining ethical-critical consciousness is a love-for-the-other as an Other, a Levinasian désir methaphysique. This love-for-the-other as an Other is a human act elicited by being in the proximity of the face-to-face. This happens when “the face of a person is revealed as […] someone, as a freedom that questions, provokes” (Dussel, Philosophy of Liberation, 40). Think of it this way, when I am in front of someone it is undeniable that their presence evokes something in me. I feel phenomenically the Other person, I am not alone, but in the presence of someone else, and I will never be able to fully understand them, but I am drawn to them. Seeing their face, I see in them the history of humanity, the incredible lengths to which we have walked, toiled and bled for us to be here, and I also see the possible future. To feel anything short of love for the Other is utter alienation; un-human. Now, I do not mean all human interactions. I sometimes want to punch people in the face, especially when acting like idiots; I mean some specific moments where I am drawn to another person. * 

Now, what happens with this experience of love when the face I see is virtual; when I can not possibly feel the proximity. Or rather, can I feel the proximity of the Other virtually? I think that is the translation of Fisher’s question into Dusselian philosophy. If I have to see the Other for me to have love-for-the-Other, and, simultaneously, I relate to people through social media, can I experience face-to-face there? Byung-Chul Han, for example, argues that social media is a ‘medium with no gaze’, or that we see faces but we are not capable of developing the love-for-the-Other. Without having read much on the subject, it seems some philosophers believe the same.** However, others point to the fact that art, as a medium, elicits incredible face-to-faces. We are capable of immersing ourselves in the life of someone in a movie ––provided the movie is not shit. One need not experience being raised by an Italian cinema clerk to know the pain, nostalgia, and love that Salvatore feels when watching the kissing scenes Alfredo saved in Cinema Paradiso. Fewer things have shown me such humanity than Isabel Allende’s House of the Spirits. 

But social media makes me behave differently. I am repulsed by everyone there. It may just be that I am cranky, which I admit I am. But when I see people’s insta stories, I do not see them revealing their humanity. Some part within me has always thought that to post on social media is to post for making others believe, as opposed to getting others to know you. If I see a story of someone saying they ran 10k, I do not think: “they posted for me to know they run”. But rather: “they posted so we get the image they run”. Perhaps this is just me, or perhaps just cultural. Nonetheless, take performative activists or performative males. These archetypes demonstrate our awareness of phonyness in social media. It may just be that some users are sneaky and manipulative, but how do we discern them? How can one know whether the subject’s persona in social media is an inward look into their Being or a mirage? Furthermore, noting that we are currently re-shaped by social media, that our identity is ever more so fluid, and that next week I will have a new hobby, and new temptations, how can I show my face and get to know your face?

So all this goes to say that is not that the proximity of the Other can only happen in physical proximity. Some art does demonstrate deep Otherness which gives objects a face I can love. But social media, being so performative (wink Judith Butler), being so commodified, makes it very difficult for me, and hopefully for Others, to provide this face-to-face. This becomes problematic when we note that most of our social interactions occur in social media. And, if social interactions are the preconditions for a different system, for destroying the totality, then we need new forms of social media. The question then becomes, how do we prevent those from being absorbed by the spectacle? Or, perhaps, could we behave differently in social media? I do not think so. Honestly, I am tragically nauseated by it. I am also addicted to it because without it I feel disconnected. I want to see what my friends are doing, what they like, what they interact with. This reminds me that I have yet to speak about the new panopticon-like features of social media, where we are able to see what Others like and repost, and even comment on their likes. But, coming back, this contradiction of social media, how it is nauseating and effectively anti-revolutionary, and yet addicting and necessary just goes to show how thirsty we are for face-to-face. We desire to see the Others, to know them, to be with them. Get to know the humanity for which we live, and due to whom we are alive. To quote Daft Punk, “it is not hard to go the distance when you finally get involved in face to face”. 

* I believe this feeling of seeing the Other, of being drawn to them can also happen in nature, and with non-human animals, but this is not the point here. For that question read, Face to Face with Animals: Levinas and the Animal Question by Peter Atterton and Tamara Wright.

** See Byung-Chul Han’s The Expulsion of the Other; and Lucas D. Introna’s Virtuality and Morality: On (Not) Being Disturbed by the Other.