Yağmur Elbir
Have you ever noticed that something strange is happening in our current pop culture? The plots of nearly every Hollywood movie, the personal brands of pop stars, our contemporary pop songs all feel standardized and the same. The section “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception” in Adorno and Horkheimer (A&H)’s Dialectic of Enlightenment offers a theory about this phenomenon years before it reached the point where we can now carry this culture and its products in our pockets.
Dialectic of Enlightenment
Adorno and Horkheimer (2002) examine the contradictions within Enlightenment, a period in 17th-and 18th-century Europe during which thought shifted from tradition to reason, and argue that although Enlightenment promised to grant individuals freedom through rationality, science and progress, it was, on the contrary, used to dominate individuals, society and nature (pp. 1-2). As Jewish Germans, A&H experienced firsthand how rational thought could be used to dominate rather than liberate. Dialectic of Enlightenment which was completed in 1947, was written during the Second World War, at a time when pseudoscientific ideas like eugenics were used to systematically oppress certain groups of people. Their title “Dialectic of Enlightenment” expresses the contradiction between what was promised by Enlightenment and what was delivered.
The Culture Industry
Adorno and Horkheimer (2002) argue that as rationality was used to dominate rather than liberate, people became subordinated and standardized, like cogs in a machine rather than autonomous, free individuals (p. 21). Building on this, A&H also offer a media critique that I find extremely relevant to the present day. A&H’s concept of “the culture industry” is used to describe how mass culture like films, radio, music and the like function as a tool for social control under capitalism. A&H (2002) claim that there is no longer a need for films and radio to appear as though they are art (p. 95). The fact that they are merely for business is used to justify producing the “trash” being produced (Horkheimer et al., 2002, p. 95). They define themselves as industries and the profits they generate seem like evidence that they are socially necessary (Horkheimer et al., 2002, p. 95). Instead of providing autonomous and free art which challenges individuals and pushes them to think, they instead become standardized products of entertainment that offer escapism and distraction to the masses. A&H (2002) suggest that supporters of the culture industry claim that the standardization of products is driven by consumer needs, when in reality both consumers and their needs are being manipulated to reinforce the system (p. 95). A&H (2002) also compare the roles of the telephone and the radio: while the telephone allows us to participate and be active subjects, the radio makes us passive listeners, listening to the same type of programs across different radio stations (pp. 95-96). I wonder how A&H would respond if they could see how we interact with our smartphones now given how TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts constantly offer standardized content we can passively watch at any moment. This makes me think that A&H’s critique of the radio may have also become relevant for the smartphones we use today.
Culture as a Tool of Social Control
Adorno and Horkheimer (2002) do not only criticize the culture industry for producing lackluster content but also for serving as a tool to pacify, distract and subordinate us by invading our leisure time (p. 98). Instead of using our leisure time to think about how the world works, we use that time to keep our minds distracted with endless streams of entertainment. Movies offer simple stories with predictable endings (Horkheimer et al., 2002, p. 98). From the start of the movie we can already tell that the good guys will win and the bad guys will lose and once it happens we are satisfied (Horkheimer et al., 2002, pp. 98-99). In pop songs, we can predict the chorus that is coming and our expectations are satisfied once it comes on (Horkheimer et al., 2002, p. 99). We are fed simple, satisfying products that condition us to prefer simplicity over complexity in thought. This way, culture industry does not only create standardized products but also standardized people.
Looking at our entertainment culture through A&H’s lens makes me wonder: are we really free from the system’s control over our lives during our leisure time, or are we still functioning as cogs in the machine, just as we are during work hours? And is entertainment culture truly harmless fun, or something more?
References
Horkheimer, M., Adorno, T. W., & Noeri, G. (2002). Dialectic of enlightenment. Stanford University Press.
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