Patrick Bateman Does Not Exist?

          So we watched American Psycho in class today. And we also talked about Postmodernism/Poststructuralism with a pinch of Capitalism. For those of you who aren't philosophers (like me) would have given a blank stare at how these two coincide. Well, let me tell you how. Postmodernism is the idea that nothing is real, or genuine; everything is an imitation of something that's already been done. Andy Warhol portrayed that beautifully with his Campbell's Soup painting. Warhol didn't come up with the company's logo or design; he copied it. He didn't take credit for the creation of the actual image because that would be copyrighting and that's not allowed. BUT, there's another side to postmodernism as well. Warhol's painting not really the Campbell's Soup logo. Why? Because it's not the actual thing itself. His painting is a copy, an imitation, of the actual can for Campbell's Soup. Now take this idea and put it with American Psycho. 
          "There is an idea of a Patrick Bateman. Some kind of abstraction. But there is no real me. Only an entity; something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours, and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable, I simply am not there." This is probably the best example of postmodernism, and capitalism, there is. Postmodernism because the character clearly states that he is not real. Yes, he is flesh and bone therefore he is real but his identity is not. His identity, his character, is purely made up, something he has put together. It is constructed by the things he buys. Here is where capitalism fits in. You are what you buy. Bateman exemplifies everything that he purchases thus giving us a capitalistic view. Capitalism is a purely consumer based economy. Because Bateman is a copy, an imitation, of who Patrick Bateman is, or thought to be by his peers, he is a postmodern being; he is not genuine. Because he has created a persona for himself through his consumerism, he is a capitalist. 


Word Count: 346
Works Cited:
LionsGates Films. "American Psycho -2. "Morning Routine". Christian Bale. 9 May 2009. YouTube. 19 April 2011. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=46-WNPlCYsg

Postructuralism/Deconstruction

Differance: Meaning is an endless chain of difference. 
Deconstruction: The meaning depends on the materials used to express it and the materials are always already contradictory.
Words are full of contradictions.

Alright, so I read Geek Love for my Theories of Fiction class and had to present on it. That being said, I delved into the world of Deconstruction, headfirst, and tore that book apart. It was the perfect example of what deconstruction is. Deconstruction is the idea that a text has more than one meaning, that a text conveys complex binaries and oppositions where the narration and story works to break down these contradictions. In Geek Love, Katherine Dunns, breaks down the absurdity of what we as a people consider to be normal and freakish. One of the major binaries in this novel is normal vs freak, born vs made. The characters cling strongly to the fact that they are different, that they are freaks and that they are born that way. What they fail to realize is that they were deliberately constructed; they were created with the help of methamphetamines, radiation and a number of other drugs. They were both born and made, normal and freak. Also, they are neither normal nor freak and neither born nor made. "Deconstruction isn't about identifying the binaries themselves, it's about what's in-between."

          Why am I summarizing this story? Think about it; deconstruction is the notion that everything is what it isn’t and what it is. Nothing is everything and everything nothing. YOU, the reader, the individual, make it what you want it to be; your mind creates what it wants.

          The characters in the book live within the real world. But, they are apart from the world at the same time. Their traveling circus, Fabulon, is a world within a world. They live within this world that they have constructed and have set themselves apart from the rest of it. The normal people always walk into their world to see the newest show but it works because the people know that these people are there for the purpose entertainment and awe. However, if the family of freaks walks into the real world, which they do, they get shot at because people can’t handle anything that doesn’t make sense to them.

          That being said, this goes hand in hand with simulacra; the imitation is the truth. What is there to say that this world does not exist? Why does it have to be one or the other? Why can’t there be both the normal world, the one that we have been programmed to understand and accept, and the world of freaks, of people, ideas and things that go beyond everything we know. If the imitation of something is true, then the imitation of life is true as well.

Word Count: 466
Works Cited: 
Mark Fullmer. "Jacques Derrida in 1 Minute". 5 July 2010. YouTube. 19 April 2011. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CQbWOXxag-0&feature=player_embedded

That Bench You Are Sitting On is Fake

“The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth –it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.”

                                                                                                                  Ecclesiastes

“If I had a world of my own everything will be nonsense.
Nothing will be what it is because everything will be what it isn't…

In contrary wise what it is it wouldn't be
And what it wouldn't be it would
You see”

                                                                                    Shinedown – “Her Name is Alice”

            According to Ecclesiastes, that which is an imitation of an untruth is really the truth. The truth does not exist because the imitation, or simulacrum, is not true but in actuality it is. The imitation is the truth; it is real. Have I confused you yet? Let me explain. Take, for example, the Gas Lamp District in downtown San Diego; it is modeled after the French Quarter. Odd? I think so. Why I think this to be odd is because there has never been any connection or influence from the French in San Diego. So, ask yourself; why is downtown modeled as such? Now, downtown San Diego has itself become a simulacrum. It is an imitation of an untruth but it is really a truth in itself. The French Quarter exists. It is real. BUT, why is there an imitation of the Quarter in a place that has no French influence?

            Also, a simulacrum, as stated before, is an imitation and according to Baudrillard “it is no longer anything but a gigantic simulacrum – not unreal, but a simulacrum, never again exchanging for what is real, but exchanging in itself, in an uninterrupted circuit without reference or circumference.” (1560) As confusing as this all may be, a simulacrum is also a simulation. When you walk into the Gas Lamp District you feel as though you have walked into the actual French Quarter. Deep down you know it all to be fake, an imitation of the real thing, but on the surface you forget all that and are immersed in the simulation of the imitation.

            Now, for the lyrics to Shinedown’s song. “What it is it wouldn’t be and what it wouldn’t be it would.” Think hard about what this is saying after reading my attempt at explaining what simulacrum is. Think of Lewis Carrol’s Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass and what Alice’s world is like. Her world lacks truth but really the world that she creates is true. Her world does not hide the truth but embodies it. Wonderland is an imitation of what Alice sees in reality but because she is a child she gives it childlike qualities and appearances. So, Wonderland is real. What you think is true, really isn’t and what you think isn’t true, really is.

Word Count: 500
Works Cited:
Baudrillard, Jean. "The Precession of Simulacra".  The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism. W.W. Norton & Company; Second Edition. New York, 2001. Pages 1556 -1560. Print