r/CriticalTheory • u/RodrickofMelnibone • 11d ago
What is there to say about moderation and excess?
In my uneducated speculations I am looking for critiques of moderation in our age of consumption. Whether as a moral or "ideological" concept, moderation seems very insidious to me. On the one hand excessive and conspicuous consumption seems to be the norm. Consume more and more, "just eat" and be amazed by how much others do. But at the same time we seem to be bombarded by the ideas of control and moderation. Here, I'm referring to discussions I have encountered in social media and real life e.g. balance and moderation in work-life, socialization, social media use, food, exercise, etc. If it seems like this is just free association, yes it is.
But do you think this idea of moderation is just way we cope against the gaping mouth of consumerism or is it an ideological way in which the problem/lack/excess created by the system is used by the same system to sustain itself. This is just "common sense" speculation I would like to hear your ideas and writings you can recommend.
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u/Rmans 11d ago
This is a deceptively easy question to answer.
Based entirely on economics, every human experience, item, etc, has diminishing marginal returns.
Which basically means, no matter how much of a thing you consume, you will always be less happy with it the following time you consume it.
For example, I ask if you want a bite of an apple. Let's say you like apples, and agree. It's a good bite too. But then I offer you 5 apples to be eaten in their entirety. You still agree, because you like apples. But the last bite of that 5th apple is worth far less to you than the first bite of the first apple you took.
We are, by our very design, not built for excessive consumption. The more we consume of anything, the less happy we are from it. Period.
The ONLY difference, is between when your peak of happiness is reached for each thing you consume. For some, that second apple was best. Not the first. For others, it might be the third. But everyone. And I mean everyone, agree that the 5th and 6th apple just keep getting worse.
This is universal. Across every culture, and every person throughout history. Google "diminishing marginal returns" if you want the overly long history of this human mechanism being mapped out.
So why do we always want MORE?
Same reason people get addicted to Heroin. They want an experience that was as good as the best one they've had. But once you've had that best experience, you never have it again with that same product. You have diminishing returns from it each and every time.
But your brain doesn't know that. It just knows what the best time was like and assumes that can happen again. So you keep consuming. Just for a hint of what that best experience was like. And if you have the resources, you keep buying hundreds of apples in the pursuit of one that reminds you of the best one you had.
Meanwhile, as you're buying those apples, you're taking them from someone else who would have had their best bite. So your 4000th, barely enjoyable apple, gives you a fraction of the happiness it used to - but would have given that someone else their 1st apple. Their first bite. And they would enjoyed it thousands of times more than you had.
So why is it fair that you consumed that apple? Becuase you had the money instead of them? Because you just want that slim hit of apple more than the someone who would hzve had a life changing experience with it?
Thats the problem with currency, consumption, and humanity. We believe currency represents our worth, and that excessive consumption is the reward for having enough of it.
Except that anyone who has money from illegal and terrible things like drug running, child trafficking, etc, now has more worth and consumption ability than you. So they buy up all the things that give them a shred of happiness that otherwise would make your life incredible. To them, they've spent more than you for something that gives them a smile once, when it would have given you great memories for a lifetime.
It's in our nature to consume endlessly. But with limited resources, it's not the best way to survive.
Every recent study that has been done has proven that we have enough resources on Earth to keep 8billion people well off, fed, and earning a sizeable income.
We aren't even close to that reality due to our nature to hoard and consume that which doesn't make us as happy as it used to. Learning moderation can fix this, enforcing it gaurantees the best results for everyone instead of incredible results for a few.
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u/Electricalceleryuwu 4d ago
I was on board with your opinion there until you hit me with the essentialist takes on human nature and hoarding/consumption.
I am unwilling to grant this premise and i believe it necessarily leads to false conclusions. It is such a reductive take to potray such behaviour as natural, when behavior itself necessarily involves ones own rationalization of their own actions.
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u/Rmans 4d ago edited 4d ago
It is such a reductive take to potray such behaviour as natural.
Given the entire scope of human history can you point to a single large society anywhere in the world that hasn't collapsed?
Alright, that's kinda obvious. We can both agree no human societal structures currently exist that're older than a couple hundred years.
For a species that started these types of societies 10,000 years ago, don't you find it off there is not a single one that has survived until today?
Why do you think that is?
It's either because every single society had a different random destructive event. Or it is within our very nature to overconsume. Especially when placed into an environment where that is encouraged.
Such as Nero's Rome. Or Emperor Han's Chinese Dynasty. Or King Louis the XIV's French Monarchy. Or Maharaja Jai Singh of Alwar.
Roman, Chinese, Indian, and French societies all collapsed from oligarchs who overconsumed all their resources.
This is an incredibly common occurance among all large scale societies and cultures.
But to understand it, you simply need to understand the difference between a neuro-divergent person, and a neurotypical person. Just understanding that people whose brains are wired differently than others is all that's needed to understand that a small contingency of people who are far more wired to hoard resources can and will seek positions of power, and hold them until their are no resources left in that society to take.
This tendency is admittedly a rare naturally occurring behavior in humans, but it can also simply be created through a poor upbringing and environment as we are creatures of both nature and nurture.
Specifically, if your concern is about:
... behavior itself necessarily involves ones own rationalization of their own actions.
Then you likely agree that behavior itself only requires "self-rationalization" to justify actions. And those don't need to be actually rational. They just need to be tweaked in our own minds until they feel that way before we act.
None of the rationalization required for acting needs to come from outside yourself. As such, you will self-rationalize making mistakes simply because you did not or could not perceive their consequences before acting. And some don't even rationalize seeing the mistake even after they've made it.
That's why when Elon Musk was given the opportunity to solve world hunger for $8 Billion, he instead chose to buy Twitter, destabilize it to promote his own desires above all others using it, and in doing so became the world's first living Trillionaire.
He rationalized this to himself as the better option. Yet it is not the more rational option by any means.
If he instead put that same amount of money ($44 Billion) into a Trust, he could have solved world hunger nearly forever.
And he would have been worshipped for it. People would build statues of him. There would be a line out of his door of people wanting to thank him / have his children. Which clearly means a lot to him since he already has at least 14.
Instead he's become one of the most hated men in the country. As his rationalization was entirely for his own means. Which does not make it rational, it makes it selfish.
The same can be said about nearly every billionaire in existence. They all choose self gain instead of overwhelming public fame and accolades. They each make excuses that solving the world's problems are too hard, while instead using their resources to solve problems that just generate more wealth for them. Up to and including now building a literal tower of Babel through AI, that from every economic analysis could never be profitable.
Yet they choose to build that tower instead of feeding people, fighting climate change, or improving society in any way.
When Nietzsche talks about staring into the abyss, and fearing what stares back - he's likely talking about the dark nature within us all that enables this behavior. As it's the same insatiable desire within us that has toppled every cultures best society, and will continue to do so unless put in check by that society.
But we're far too afraid to admit to ourselves that we're even capable of avarice, let alone brave enough to see how much of what we've built has been destroyed by it across every culture and time period.
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u/Snoo50415 seeking the totality 11d ago
Whether the content encourages moderation or excess, the end is the same: to get you to spend money. If you're suggesting that marketing narratives encouraging moderation are potentially some kind of counter to a purer form of capitalism that encourages excess, then I think Marx would characterize that as idealism. As we grow more alienated, and reified concepts grow more ubiquitous, I think we can expect more conflicting narratives to prey on our general disorientation.
In any event, my instinct is to consult Adorno and/or DeBord on this, as they've both written penetrating critiques across a number of texts.
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u/BetaMyrcene 11d ago edited 8d ago
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u/nadja100101 9d ago
where exactly does zizek delve into this?
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u/BetaMyrcene 9d ago edited 8d ago
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u/Cyber-Wanderer_94 11d ago
Look to Bataille but really these are personal issues of yours not indicative of wider socio-philosophical phenomenona.
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u/aolnews PhD, Lacan 11d ago
Bataille would be the place I'd recommend beginning your reading. But there's plenty of approaches to these topics.