Capitalismo & Candy Crush

by Alfie Bown, Matteo Bittanti (Translator)

Enjoy! Eccolo, l’imperativo che tiene assieme i nostri consumi e il nostro stesso rapporto con i prodotti culturali, si tratti di videogiochi, serie tv, musica pop o persino arditi trattati di teoria critica. In questo testo a metà tra psicanalisi e filosofia, Alfie Bown si interroga su quale sia il senso e il valore del «godimento» nel contesto del tardocapitalismo neoliberale: cosa distingue il modo in cui «godiamo» di giochi da smartphone come Candy Crush Saga dalla maniera in cui affrontiamo la lettura di Žižek o Deleuze? E come indirizzare a fini di autentica emancipazione il piacere che sperimentiamo dalla visione di Game of Thrones o dall’ascolto di «Gangnam Style»? Una lettura dotta, originale e a tratti spiazzante per meglio capire come parlare delle cose che ci piacciono, e cosa ci piace delle cose di cui parliamo.

Genres: Nonfiction, Philosophy, Politics, Theory, Psychoanalysis, Cultural Studies, Games

136 pages, Paperback

First published December 11, 2015

Reviews

[Eylül Görmüş]

"'Üretken olmayan' keyifteki ziyadesiyle radikal potansiyelin hiçe sayıldığını, buna karşılık, 'üretken' keyifteki ziyadesiyle konformist itaatin görmezden gelindiğini göz önünde tutarak, keyif deneyimleri arasındaki farklılıkları ele almanın başka bir yoluna ihtiyaç duyduğumuzu ileri sürüyorum. Başka bir deyişle, bu kitabın yazarının altı saat Football Manager'da takılmaktan keyif almasının ille daha tercih edilir veya herkesin yararına olduğu fikrinden kurtulmamız gerekiyor. Bu anlayış ışığında, günümüzün kıraç politik manzarasına etkide bulunacak bir şey yapılmasını sağlayabilecek keyif anları ve bu anlar hakkında bu tür konuşma biçimleri bulmaya çalışabiliriz."

Manchester Üniversitesi'nde İngiliz Edebiyatı dersleri veren ve aynı zamanda eleştirel teori ve komedi üzerine yazan Alfie Bown'ın "Keyif Almak: Candy Crush & Kapitalizm" kitabı en-fes. Benim özellikle üzerine çok düşündüğüm bir meseleyi didikliyor Bown; boş zaman - boş zamanlarımızda yaptığımız "boş(?)" aktiviteler - ve bunlardan aldığımız hazzı ne yapacağımız meselesi.

Üzerine çok düşünüyorum çünkü kendine çok katı bir disiplinle neredeyse hiç boş bırakmayan biriyim ben, bıraktığım nadir boş zamanda da sahiden Candy Crush türü oyunlar oynuyorum kafamı boşaltmak için ve bir taraftan bir suçluluk duygusu hissediyor, bir taraftan bu tür oyunları da "tamamlanması gereken işler" gibi görmeye başlayıp meseleyi karmaşıklaştırıyorum - keyifle ilişkim epeyce sorunlu diyebiliriz sanırım.

Neyse, dolayısıyla kitap epeyce aydınlatıcı (ve eş zamanlı olarak da kafa karıştırıcı - ki bence olması gereken de bu) oldu benim için. (Deleuze'den keyif almamızın Deleuzecü bir yanı olmaması konusunu mesela epeyce kafamda çevireceğim gibi.) Üretken keyif, üretken olmayan keyif ve irrasyonel keyif başlıkları altında konuyu inceliyor Bown ve Lacan'dan Deleuze'e, Zizek'ten Bourdieu'ye, Kristava'ya pek çok ismin tezlerine başvurarak ve GoT'tan Gangnam Style'a pek çok popüler örneği de inceleyerek konuyu çerçeveliyor. Epeyce teorik yerleri olmakla beraber kitabın dili gayet gündelik ve anlaşılır, dolayısıyla rahat okunuyor.

Bu konulara kafa yoranlara tavsiye ederim.

[Yagmur Selin]

Müthiş bir araştırma konusu, kişisel olarak kendimin de sürekli sorguladığı bir mevzu olduğu için beklentim biraz yüksekti.

Yazarın bilgisi ve paylaşmak istedikleri çok ama savunmaları ve analizleri dağınık göründü. Orjinal dilini okumasam da Türkçe çevirisinde kelime kelime tercüme hissi aldım. Bazı çıkarımlar kaybolmuş olabilir.

Hali hazırda kısa bir analiz olmakla birlikte genel argümanlar 5-10 sayfaya sığabilirmiş.

Konuyla ilgilenenler için, alıntılar kısmı özellikle değerli olabilir. Daha önce duymadığım araştırmacılardan oluşan bir fihrist niteliğinde.

[kat]

I think I lack some of the necessary background to really follow the finer points of this (knowing nothing about Deleuze etc.) but even so, it blew my mind. Can't stop seeing everything I enjoy through this lens now. I'm still processing, but this may have fundamentally reoriented the way I approach entertainment.

[Geoff]

Actually made me interested in learning more about (Lacanian) psychoanalysis, which nothing has ever succeeded in doing before, but the specific analyses were unconvincing and suffered a logical fallacy that drives me crazy and is used a lot in the humanities:

"These two similar things are popular now, therefore they tell us something meaningful about our culture."

Problem is, he hasn't demonstrated that they are popular now, are more popular than in the past, or are more popular than other cultural artifacts that may cause you to make the opposite conclusion......

[carola]

fighissimo

[NN]

What does Alfie Bown want with this book? Stripped of its political pretensions, it would have been pretty middling - some worthwhile observations, but most of it overwrought analyses of fairly straightforward pop cultural phenomena in unelegant prose. Videogames allow us to enjoy the success we dont have in real life – you don't say. However, the book is not just a disinterested analysis, but an admonition to "look for the inconsistencies within it [the things we enjoy] and be attentive to its power over us." .

The whole book is written under the marxist adagium that the point of philosophy is to change the world, rather than interpret it. Even if this change has to be mediated by interpretation, I would like to ask the author, do you really think this book will have even the slightest impact on the world at large?

With its analysis of pop culture, it is bound to appeal to a hipster-ironist sensibility, even if the author is aware of this. Provoking thought might be his aim but where does that leave us? It will just be the rarefied pleasure of an elite and leave the world, the unwashed masses who will never ever even hear of names like Lacan and Lyotard, unchanged.

If leftists want to change the world for the better, which, all (pseudo-)profundity aside, boils down to something like increasing general happiness, this makes them utilitarians of a kind. They will balk at this suggestion, as utilitarianism has traditionally been associated with liberalism. If they truly want to make a change however, and not just wallow in hipster intellectualism, they have to take seriously the utilitarian notion of controlling and regulating enjoyment.

Just because the way capitalism organizes enjoyment has all sorts of pernicious effects, pop culture being the most obvious one - which this book nolens volens serves to justify, by bringing it together with high theory - doesn't mean that control and regulation are bad per se. In fact, happiness (again, general happiness being the implicit goal of leftism) is all about measure and moderation.

What is the alternative to control here? Just leaving things be and hope things will somehow turn out right? Of course, the meantime might very well be utilized to write hip little pamphlets, that cement your identity as a radical intellectual, accrue interest on your hipness capital and, not unimportantly, make a handsome buck. This is what Alfie Bown truly wants.

[Nicolas Lontel]

(Bon, j'imagine que noter un tel livre et faire des commentaires sur un réseau social de recommandations (généralement utilisé pour du divertissement) n'est probablement pas ce que le livre défendrait vraiment comme pratique. Bien que...)

Beaucoup, beaucoup de répétitions au sein du livre qui ne font pas vraiment avancer la réflexion, les analyses sont très courtes, souvent insuffisante à nous (en tout cas moi) convaincre. Comme dans toutes traditions philosophiques, plusieurs auteur·es (je féminise, mais je crois que seules Sara Ahmed et Julia Krista sont convoquées dans cet essai (entendre, pas juste une note de bas de page); à y regarder rapidement de plus près, seules 3 notes sur 73 citent des femmes) sont convoqué·es pour faire avancer la réflexion, c'est bien fait, leur théorie sont bien résumé et très succinctement, mais on voit mal en quoi ces philosophes permettent d'étudier les différentes analyses du livre.

Je crois que l'essai s'est un peu trompé en cours de route en voulant poursuivre une réflexion qu'il ne parvient pas vraiment à développer ni son propos d'étudier des objets à l'aide d'une "Enjoyment Studies" comme il l'introduit. Au mieux, ça pourrait être une revue de plusieurs théories et d'ouvrir la voix à plus en proposant quelques rapides analyses.

Plusieurs réflexions sont certainement intéressantes sur la jouissance, le plaisir, le divertissement et le bonheur et m'ont fait réfléchir à plusieurs pratiques et à mes propres moyens de divertissement et le plaisir que j'en retire, mais ça s'arrête malheureusement là pour moi. C'est trop court, trop rapide, ça aurait, je crois, vraiment mérité d'être approfondi.

[Audri Gonzales]

Enjoying it was a really interesting look at what types of leisure are considered acceptable and/or radical, and why. I recommend it, but I have the common complaint about it, that I didn't realize how short it would be when I ordered it (72 pages). It read like an academic paper, and I understand why it was put into book form, it helped get the subject-matter out to more people, but the writing could have been re-structured to accommodate the book format (there were many ideas that were touched on that could have been elaborated on). If anyone read this, and had a sparked curiosity (especially in the Conclusion chapter), I recommend The Happiness Industry by William Davies as a follow-up.

[CTEP]

Alfie Bown’s Enjoying It: Candy Crush and Capitalism is a very enjoyable little book about enjoyment. At the center of Bown’s argument is the question of how our enjoyment of things like Candy Crush and Football Manager function in society; why do we play these games on our portable devices at every free moment and, more importantly, when we should be working? For many, work is un-engaging, unpleasant reality that they may welcome any distraction from. These workplace distractions may seem rebellious, as if you’re “sticking it to the man.” We can also insert the idea of the “culture of distraction” here. Bown argues that this is not the case, quite the opposite. Games and entertainment like Candy Crush actually make us better, more docile workers. They act as workplace-depression suppressants.

Ideology is at its strongest when we believe we are outside of it. Enjoyment therefore is the kernel of ideology. When we are enjoying something, we feel as though it is part of our nature; “I enjoy, therefore I am.” This is not the case at all. Enjoyment is prescribed by society. The distraction of Candy Crush can help us get through the work day by acting as this veiled ideological enjoyment, keeping us from revolting against poor or undesirable working conditions. Candy Crush, among other games, is commodity sold to us. We are made to enjoy it (not to say that we shouldn’t enjoy it). Small bursts of pleasure to make the work day, and sometimes the commute to and from work, tolerable. Similar to sacrificing a good night’s sleep for several short naps. It’s more efficient but probably not very healthy. By allowing us to feel a sense of escape, we are in fact pulled in tighter to the capitalist system. “Let me just check my Facebook then back to work.”

Bown is very conscious about his position writing about pop culture from a perspective of critical theory. He covers how critical theory can give both reader and writer enjoyment. Ultimately carrying more cultural capital, critical theory gives a sense of self-actualization. Even if we do not derive pleasure from the act of reading/writing, we can see ourselves as someone who reads/writes critical theory. “You can’t be a philosopher if you haven’t read Aristotle.” This self-actualizing enjoyment is no better than the enjoyment derived from Candy Crush or “Gangnam Style.” It doesn’t necessarily matter what we enjoy but how we enjoy it. The enjoyment that truly shapes who we are, is the enjoyment we cannot explain. One of Bown’s example for this is the excessive violence in Game of Thrones, an enjoyment that is equal parts repulsive. It is at this edge between pleasure and pain that we find ourselves. This edge can be found anywhere, not only in pop culture. Bown uses "Gangnam Style" and Game of Thrones as examples, but how does all this apply to what we do?

As AmeriCorps members we, for the most part, make a conscious sacrifice of profit for work that aligns with our values. Our social work/activism is engaging and rewarding, but it is also work that we enjoy. I think this is really interesting. Why do we enjoy working with disadvantaged communities, rather than surrounding ourselves with people who are more well-to-do? As we have all shared during Corps days, working with disadvantaged communities comes with its share of affects as well as empowerment. We are not seeking out these affects, but we do understand that they are part of the job. It could be argued that it is all part of the same enjoyment. We can say that we enjoy helping people (in whatever form) but not so much when things don't quite work out. If we are only looking to see ourselves as people who would do this AmeriCorps, these affects may be a stronger deterrent. So, here is the edge of our enjoyment. It is this tension that shapes who we are. I don't think it's a stretch to say by looking at it we are able to reevaluate what we do and what we want to do. It can also be argued that our work is radical, but I'll save that for another time...

[Richárd Janczer]

La competenza di Brown è indubbia ed è un libro estremamente colto ma presenta problematiche non ignorabili. Troppa carne al fuoco, teorie complesse a volte introdotte troppo alla svelta, casi studio non lineari. A volte sembra che rientri proprio in quel "discorso dell'università" da cui prende le distanze. È un libro che rilancia bene l'eredità a sinistra di Fisher e Zizek ma che parte con un tradimento: il libro è pochissimo godibile e soprattutto non risponde alla domanda di partenza: se sia lecito moralmente godere di Candy Crush. Una domanda catchy alla quale non dà neanche quella non-risposta postmoderna del "dipende dal punto di vista". Sicuramente da leggere per le problematiche che pone e per la posizione inedita da cui le pone ma con alcune grosse riserve come quelle sopra elencate.

[Lor]

Un pamphlet dai toni abbastanza umoristici e "leggeri" (per quanto il tema trattato sia molto più complesso di quanto appaia dal titolo). Avrei preferito che l'autore si focalizzasse maggiormente sulla tematica principale (ovvero -come suggeriva anche il titolo- il rapporto tra capitalismo e piacere effimero), ma nel complesso è stata una lettura molto piacevole e stimolante. Malgrado alcuni riferimenti pop siano ormai stati superati (si citano fenomeni virali come Gangnam style e, giustappunto, Candy crush, che credo abbiano smesso di avere rilevanza da anni -il libro è uscito nel 2015-), le tematiche trattate rimangono comunque attuali.

[Giuls ✨]

Forse troppa psicoanalisi per l'intento del libro (nonostante sia una grande appassionata di psicoanalisi sopratutto di Lacan).
Spunti molto interessanti ma onestamente pensavo molto più focus sulla relazione tra capitalismo e Candy Crush.
In complesso: bello e interessante.

[Frank Karioris]

If Zizek likes it, who is to argue?!

[Baglan]

nice little book on enjoyment

[5am]

Interesting, well developed, perhaps even radical point. I enjoyed it (while realizing that everybody who read the book is obligated to make a similar if not the same exact terrible pun).

[Subliminal]

This book has some insights but feels a bit unfinished as if it were a collection of essays or blog posts. There are some articles from Alfie Bown that give you the same insights for less effort.

[Osvaldo]

It was good, but i didn't expected that much psychoanalysis on it.

[Chiara Emanuel]

Libro estremamente analitico e cinico sulla società attuale. Una riflessione su ciò che è stata, ciò che è e ciò che potrebbe diventare.

[Deniz Yıldız]

farklı bir perspektiften ziyade zaten bilenen şeylerin üzerine bir inceleme yapılmış. Bende bir kelimenin etimolojik anlamına bakma hissiyatını uyandırdı

[WM Hall]

Very interesting theses and the writer has the ability to discuss Lacan in such a way that is actually accessible, but I found the prose quite robotic and bland - it lacked poetics or flair. A short and worthwhile read, though.

[XXX]

More or less, a deduction from Bourdieu's distinction.

[Chaunceton Bird]

This short book wastes no time in cutting to the chase: contemplating why we enjoy what we enjoy helps us recognize and better understand environmental and market forces that influence our dispositions to certain types of entertainment. The author does not suggest that readers should adopt more "high-brow" forms of enjoyment (e.g. reading complex critical theory) and forsake certain other types of mindless enjoyment (e.g. playing Candy Crush). Rather, Dr. Bown places all enjoyment on a level playing field to be analyzed as more or less equal enjoyments. This approach encourages introspection from the reader into what our enjoyments are without the red herrings of analyzing how worthless some of our enjoyments are. Although Dr. Bown does provide several helpful case studies, he provides them as cairns along the path to understand the point he's getting at.

For example, we all know that playing games on our phones is usually an unproductive waste of time. But had this book made that its central focus, we'd likely miss the larger themes of enjoyment in general. All enjoyment. We'd agree that Instagram is a waste of time, vow to spend less time on our phones, and then let the new goal slowly deteriorate and disappear within a week of finishing the book. However, by not ranking or disparaging certain enjoyments, this book helps the reader recognize that even the book we're reading provides a certain enjoyment that needs to be analyzed. Why did we buy this book? What environmental and market forces drove us to purchase this book, and what is it about us that enjoys reading it?

This is an excellent essay that deserves to be read. There were a couple typos on the first few pages that contributed to a somewhat improvised feel of the book, but that only added to the experience of reading what seemed to be a thoroughly-thoughtful profound stream of thought on enjoyment.

I haven't read much critical theory, but this wasn't written for professors. This spoke well to my layman understanding, and it has encouraged me to read more critical theory.

[Stace]

‘Enjoying it’ is a small book but it gives you a lot to think about.

With only a basic knowledge of psychoanalysis and critical theory I was concerned that this may be out of my league but I found it very insightful, well-argued and in most places entertaining. I did get a little bogged down in the references to some contemporary theorists (Deleuze, Lacan and Zizek) at times but this is a book that is very much centred on everyday life.

I was soon questioning my assumed superiority because I choose to read intellectual texts and listen to Radio 4 whilst my teenagers play computer games and spend hours on snap chat.

The text argues that all forms of enjoyment just serve to prop up the capitalist system – even when we think we are being subversive. It turns out that I am not as superior as I thought I was.

Nevertheless, it was the analysis of enjoyment itself that I found most fascinating. Especially the modern phenomenon of having to be seen to be enjoying yourself at all times and to let everyone know this on social media. This really struck a chord with me.

Personal happiness is seen as of prime importance in modern society so perhaps we should re-examine what makes us happy and question why and if we are really enjoying it!

Reviewed by Sharon at www.whisperingstories.com

[Josh Kuperman]

I enjoyed this. It is a short and self-referential book about how certain modern entertainments are use to make to make powerless people feel empowered and accept their oppression, making them better workers and thus strengthening the modern neoliberal capitalist system of production. The book provides brief analysis of mindless computer games, such as Candy Crush; also, complex computer games - the author is apparently addicted to something called Football Manager. It is a short book of about 70 pages and suffers a little too little exposition of its key points. It draws very heavily on both Frankfurt School theorists and Modern (mostly French) Cultural theorists in combining a Marxist and Freudian analysis. If you are unfamiliar with Zizek, Lacan, Benjamin, Adorno, Bourdieu, Foucault, etc... this book throws a lot at you. At the same time I found it very funny in its simultaneous analysis of pop-culture and the study of pop-culture. There were brief discussions of Game of Thrones and Gangnam Style.

[Xavier Shay]

not sure if troll

"Enjoyment serves many ideological purposes, a major one being to enforce cultural divides between subjects from various classes and backgrounds, grouping people by what they enjoy and preventing communication across these enjoyment-divides."

I mean ok this is a good start. Seems legit.

"The replacement of the actual other with whom the subject competes (say, a fellow FM gamer from school) with an imaginary or virtual other (the computer AI) offers a way of bringing Freudian psychoanalysis to bear on the modern state."

uhm

"In other words, ‘Gangnam Style’ as a moment of jouissance shows us that we are not unique subjects with unique enjoyments but subjects whose enjoyment forms us in accordance with a set of rules – and that there is therefore no ‘gift of nature’ to what we enjoy at all."

I'm out.

In fairness, this is an inside book and I'm an outsider lacking any prior knowledge to which the author refers. Still..

[F.B]

I was asked by the publisher to review this book, I feel sheepish that 1) it took me so long to get around to writting this and 2) I don't really have that much to say about it.

Bown adapts the Critical theory concept of critical reading, whereby oneactivly engages with the ideological underpinnings of a text, to play - a sort of theory of critical play. This is what one would expect with regards to the subject matter, however I found his attempt to link his critique with that of Marx's critique of politcal economy unsatisfing, flimsy and superfical ar best, obfuscatory at worst.

This is disapointing as I am very much interested in, and have engaged with, the subject of play and its role within class struggle. I would suggest someone who shares such interests to read the work of Henry Flynt, who atempted from a postion of cognative nihlism to theorise a new subjective modality that would activly break from serious culture, which he called Brend, or Veramusment.

[David Carrasquillo]

The books although its just 70-pages-long, you feel that the author used was extremely efficient since he elaborates on many deep and complicated topics, in a very simple way. There is a problem. I think that people that would enjoy reading about this don't really have experience some of the things he uses as examples. In that sense, I feel like a very small audience. I might be wrong though. Just don't know many people that read about Capitalism and Critical Theory and at the same time: Play Candy Crush (which I don't but know of it's existence up close), play fantasy leagues, twerk, dance Gangdam Style and watch Game o Thrones. So... I would recommend to some, not all people.

[Kai Lin]

What might be the ideological purpose of that which seems to escape a reading altogether? Not in the surface reading of an ostensibly-ideological activity and its explicit messages, but in the very act of enjoyment as a contrast to productivity and the implicit ideology it breeds through instilling capitalistic guilt within our neoliberal subject formation.

The obvious cliché (seen from a thousand miles away) would be to say that this short monograph is enjoyable, but I do particularly have to commend it as a bite-sized introduction to psychoanalysis that, to my great surprise, makes it greatly enjoyable.

[Alexander]

Thought-provoking little jaunt through Bown's thesis about enjoyment.