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A review by stadkison
Gifts Glittering and Poisoned: Spectacle, Empire, and Metaphysics by Chanon Ross
2.0
This book does a decent job analogizing how our society has created spectacles that, metaphorically, we worship and consume, like football games, politics, or music festivals. This is compared to the Roman spectacle of the arena and gladiator games. All fine and dandy, though I think it does overstate the extent to which all people participate in these events because of their desire for transcendence, or humanity’s innate desire for a communion with something greater.
However, the problems arise in the prescription for how to oppose this. It misidentifies the cause of this secular worship, blaming postmodernism and secularization. Instead, the source is simply capitalism and the need to create consumer subjects in response to the law of the falling rate of profit. If you don’t meaningfully challenge capital by changing who owns the means of production, this will continue. This lack of understanding of Marxist points is evident in the book’s continual citing of Hardt and Negri, critiquing their Marxism not for its diagnosis of the situation (because it can’t, because their diagnosis is correct) but for its preclusion of spirituality. It’s notable that not one liberation theologian is cited, because that would give the game away. They synthesize Marxism and Christianity in a way that actually challenges the seats of power, but the book can’t admit that because it doesn’t actually want to do that.
The book instead prescribes a return to liturgy and the eucharist as a challenge to consumerism. But how would it do that? The early Christians didn’t meaningfully oppose Rome because of liturgy. They opposed Rome by challenging its economic order and providing meaning and value to the oppressed lower classes, organizing them in acts of resistance. Of course, it didn’t do them much good in the end, because through Constantine Rome absorbed, appropriated, and deradicalized Christianity. The book doesn’t once mention this, because it would demonstrate how meaningless its prescriptions actually are. Capitalism doesn’t care if we take the Eucharist. Until we meaningfully fight against the economic order, it will still exist. Read a book on liberation theology instead of this.
However, the problems arise in the prescription for how to oppose this. It misidentifies the cause of this secular worship, blaming postmodernism and secularization. Instead, the source is simply capitalism and the need to create consumer subjects in response to the law of the falling rate of profit. If you don’t meaningfully challenge capital by changing who owns the means of production, this will continue. This lack of understanding of Marxist points is evident in the book’s continual citing of Hardt and Negri, critiquing their Marxism not for its diagnosis of the situation (because it can’t, because their diagnosis is correct) but for its preclusion of spirituality. It’s notable that not one liberation theologian is cited, because that would give the game away. They synthesize Marxism and Christianity in a way that actually challenges the seats of power, but the book can’t admit that because it doesn’t actually want to do that.
The book instead prescribes a return to liturgy and the eucharist as a challenge to consumerism. But how would it do that? The early Christians didn’t meaningfully oppose Rome because of liturgy. They opposed Rome by challenging its economic order and providing meaning and value to the oppressed lower classes, organizing them in acts of resistance. Of course, it didn’t do them much good in the end, because through Constantine Rome absorbed, appropriated, and deradicalized Christianity. The book doesn’t once mention this, because it would demonstrate how meaningless its prescriptions actually are. Capitalism doesn’t care if we take the Eucharist. Until we meaningfully fight against the economic order, it will still exist. Read a book on liberation theology instead of this.