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Kellan Stanner

Emir Ildiz

Philosophy of Human Nature

26 February 2017

Hyperreality in Human Nature

Perhaps one of the strangest and most inexplicable cultural

developments in human history is that of reality television. The Kardashian-

Jenner conglomerate has recently been evaluated as having a net worth of

approximately $340 million dollars1. From a Marxist historical perspective,

this is senseless. Although theyre often ascribed as being emblematic of late

capitalism, their fortune may contradict that very system. One could hardly

find justification for the claim that they have taken commodities (by any

conventional means) and turned them into capital. To adequately evaluate

and understand the nature of television in the reality era, it seems an

examination of human nature is a prerequisite. After all, the fundamental

characteristics of participants in an economic system determine how that

system functions. This paper will use the writings of Jean Baudrillard to

provide commentary on the phenomenon of reality television and what it

says about its viewers, stars, and participants.

Although the case could be made that forms of reality television existed in

primitive forms before 1973, it was then that modern reality television

1 Gerencer, Tom. "Kardashian Net Worth: Fame, Fortune and Family." Money
Nation. Money Nation, 08 Dec. 2016. Web. 14 Feb. 2017.
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began2. An American Family was a documentarian, non-fictional exploration

of the intimate dramas of a California nuclear family. The series allowed

viewers to see every sensational detail of the disarray in the Loud family as

the son came out as being gay. Television had never before been so

voyeuristic. One basic explanation for the shows success and the broader

success of reality television would be that it reveals to us something about

ourselves. In watching high drama and moments of human pain and conflict,

viewers are allowed to indulge thoughts about what they would do in the

same situations. They make connections to similar situations in their own

life, from love interests to breakups to escalating interfamilial feuding. For

Jean Baudrillard and his peers, this explanation falls flat.

His theory is predicated upon the assertion that the boundaries of truth and

falsity have been irreparably diminished. That which is perceived to be real is

actually entirely false. He dictates this theory through examples political,

social and artistic in nature. He famously declared that the Gulf War will not

take place, the Gulf War is not taking place, the Gulf War did not take place.

Essentially, he says that by the rapid speed of the first invasion of Iraq,

conducted almost exclusively by airborne bombings, knowledge of the war

never crossed Western consciousness. Obviously, as is the case in any war,

popular medias of NATO nations presented propaganda to legitimize the

2 Lim, Dennis. "Reality-TV Originals, in Dramas Lens." The New York Times.
The New York Times, 16 Apr. 2011. Web. 14 Feb. 2017.
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invasion. What Baudrillard notes as the critical difference between this

propaganda and that of the past was its polished and glamorized finish3.

Images from all facets of American media during the Gulf War are

unforgettable. They have undoubtedly shaped public perceptions of the

military until the present day. As new, high-tech tanks flying the American

flag stormed over desolate desert terrain, the media recorded the entire

invasion in such a way that it resembled an action movie. The infrared

airstrike cameras, the crushing power of the arrowhead-shaped fighter jets,

and the staged images of soldiers assisting Iraqi citizens made the war for

many people another television show to watch. Combine the medias

presentation of the conflict with the nationalistic rhetoric of the Bush

administration in the wake 9/11, the enormous violence of the Gulf War was

erased in the minds of those who watched it on television. In this sense, the

world departed from reality, and into hyperreality.

Hyperreality, a concept profound enough to fill tens of Baudrillards

books, is incredibly difficult to reduce to a simple definition. Although best

explained by its examples, hyperreality is when reality becomes a collection

of past images and is completely removed from its origin. These images are

called simulacra. In the instance of the Kardashians, their dynasty began in

the wealth of a standard family. There was nothing unique to the family until

Robert Kardashian came to national attention during the OJ trial. The entire

family eventually entered the spotlight and was approached by publicists

3 Jean Baudrillard, The Gulf War Did Not Take Place. Bloomington: Indiana
University Press, 1995
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and professionals who would craft and mold their image. After some time,

the family was only a shell of what it was once was, with everything from

their relationships to their behavior to their very bodies (by means of fashion

and plastic surgery), erecting an entirely different reality. Finally, this image

reached such grandiose that others sought to replicate it in their own reality

shows and public presences. In this way, reality becomes an image of

something that no longer exists, the Kardashian family before fame, a

simulacrum.

Consider the way in which reality for many Western societies is

constructed around certain ideals of the Greeks and Romans. Their

mythologies have informed so much of contemporary theology, in its texts,

doctrines, and ethical aspirations. While the hundreds gods of Hellenistic and

ancient Italian societies have died in worship and even their existence in the

annals of history, they are very much influential in aspects of human life

thousands of years later. Given that vanishing of these concepts over such a

span a time was possible, it isnt hard to believe that the fast-paced world of

social media and single-season television shows creates concepts that are

recreated although the originals disappear. Memes are all jokes built one on

top of the other, progressively forgetting from where it once came.

In response to Baudrillards arguments, many are frustrated. They

dutifully put in the work to understand the complex mechanisms and apply

the examples to the general theory, but in the end are unsatisfied with its

practical applications. The question is often raised, how do we escape

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hyperreality? Without a doubt, it is easy to read Umberto Eco and

Baudrillard and become overwhelmed with the paradox of hyperreality. To

these questions and frustrations I would respond that the function of this

philosophy is not liberation. It is a criticism of reality; an analytic

historiography that attempts to understand the sources of existing things

and provide insight as to how future creations might arise. Understanding

hyperreality means recognizing the way we view professional athletes as

(non-existent) superhumans, why Disney was created as an escape from

mundane reality and birth into a magical one, and why our own fantasies

have produced reality television.