Interpassivity

Andrejevic writes, in Chapter 7 "iPolitics," that "interactive networked technologies come with a built in, passive information-gathering capacity that promises broader coverage and decreased audience awareness of monitoring practice." He goes on to say that it is passive because it happens, for the most part, as a "by-product of using the technology itself." It is, he notes, what Slavoj Zizek has called "interpassivity." This is a concept from Zizek's book, The Plague of Fantasies. Zizek writes that "it is commonplace to emphasize how, with the new electronic media, the passive consumption of a text or a work of art is over: I no longer merely stare at the screen, I increasingly interact with it, entering into a dialogic relationship with it . . ." This, in and of itself, is not all that bad. Dialogue, even of a passive kind, is encouraged. One of the dangers, as Zizek says, is the interpassivity of real world suffering. Although he doesn't make this specific connection, I am tempted to say that increasing interpassivity online will enable us to deal with interpassivity (of all kinds) in the real world more easily.

Interpassivity supposedly allows for us to have passive satisfaction, "so that it is the object itself which 'enjoys the show' instead of me . . ." This, then allows us "to propose the notion of false activity: you think you are active, while your true position, as embodied in the fetish, is passive . . ." Want to be involved? Join a group on Facebook. Think you need to be more active in politics? Be a fan of a politician online. Meanwhile, we can believe that this fulfills some sort of civic duty even though it is an entirely passive enjoyment of the activity of the object. As an added bonus, anyone who happens to look through our information can now see - my political beliefs are such and such, my religious beliefs are - , my musical tastes are - , and this is how i conceptualize myself. The potential for exploitation is massive, all while we believe we are "having our say."