Considerations on K-Punk

Analysis on articles in the collected book of Mark Fishers’ K-Punk blog. One of many. This instance here uses two articles to channel their concepts.

Mark Fisher– batman’s political turn right

“Anti-capitalism is nothing new in Hollywood. From Wall-E to Avatar corporations are routinely depicted as evil. The contradiction of corporate-funded films denouncing corporations is an irony capitalism cannot just absorb, but thrive on. Yet this capitalism is only allowed within limits… but any direct action against the rich, or revolutionary moves toward the redistribution of property, will lead to a dystopian nightmare.”

Mark Fisher– star wars was a sell-out from the start

“All that Star Wars added to the formula was a certain spectacle– the spectacle of technology, via then state-of-the-art special effects and of course the spectacle of its own success, which became part of the experience of the film.”

Reminiscent of what Jordan Peterson divulged in his thirteenth 2015 personality lecture on existentialism and its relation to totalitarian regimes of the 20th century; articulating the literal magic embodied and venerated from an item, or idealized object such as Elvis Presley’s guitar: 

You think: what exactly is that it makes a guitar Elvis’ guitar? It is not exactly the guitar, because it is just sitting there, like any object does, and maybe you could be able to think about it. You could take that guitar out and put a guitar just like it, and it would still be Elvis’ guitar because they wouldn’t know. So you might think that this is not really Elvis’ guitar. That is a funny thing because you would only think that if you thought that Elvis’ guitar was the thing that was made out of material that was sitting right in front of you. And that isn’t what it is. That is only one tiny little bit of it. That bloody thing is a part of an incredibly layered reality. I mean, the people who want to go look at that, they are looking at it in some sense because of the magic that is emanating from it, but the magic is actually real. The magic is the effect of that guitar, let’s say, on the entire culture. And those effects are the damn guitar too. And it is weird, because when you go look at Elvis’ guitar, you are not looking at the guitar, you are looking at the magic.

Be it as grandiose as Elvis’ guitar or the mechanical sounds of Darth Vader inhaling and exhaling before igniting his red lightsaber in the smokey corridor of rebel scum trying to save the Death Star plans at the climax to Rogue One, setting the stage for A New Hope. Movies have always had a magical element to them with their power to enthrall a person, even if the movie itself isn’t ‘good’, as does anything with such a mythical status which manages to hold itself in the eyes of loving customers, even if more than half of them criticize Disney’s handling of franchises or Machiavellian theatrics deployed by the USA in Venezuela in recent months, or Iran in the last few weeks. Fishers’ point adds up: The Empire may be a visible parable to systems seen in place by the day to day, but it would be similar to the 2025 film One Battle After Another. A fetish for change and cinema to explore it on the big screen and feel everything in safety, either way feeding the criticized apparatus. Rinse, repeat and a big-budget box office release. Tomorrow is different but it is still the same.

Film and customizable apparel, whether in line of the corporate oversight or perceived personal preference lends to a commodified presentation nonetheless and regardless of individual stance. What such pathos pulling pieces seem to do is a sort of simulation– it titillates a person’s senses enough that they’re energized, fired up. Then it dissipates as nothing truly changes quickly enough in one’s own lifetime, yet completely shifts all throughout. Maybe the window dressings change so as to peer out and allow glimpses in; creating an aesthetic, apathetic loop– rerun after remake; some memetic comedy is almost a necessary relief.

Due to popularity largely originating from the 2018 Doomer Wojak meme caricature, the Doomer concept can be likened to a more recent (than 8 years ago) meme. While dubious in nature of origin and unlikely to be correct in historical account, most speculation pointing to upon realizing his loss at Waterloo, Napoleon Bonaparte is purported to have solemnly admonished, “There’s nothing we can do”; which was lifted and taken through a spin online around the same time Ridley Scott released a ‘biopic’ on the mythical man. Pair the phrase then paste it onto a melancholic image of the French Emperor with the overlaying of a song called Armor Plastique by Adelle Castillon, usually slowed down with a hint of reverb on for added and implied effect…

Beheaded Boredom

Darwinian dice, fatalistic vice

Called it once, twice— always on the thought of paying some price

Power political pornographic infliction;

Assigned, accepted addictions of condition 

Beheaded boredom, bed on barbed wire;

Unconscious, solipsistic twosome-

Voluptuous, digitally burning fire;

Smooth slide, decreased rapid descent

Destination somewhere, destination nowhere 

All-day destitution, noticeable nuisances 

Everywhere disillusioned, cadaver conclusion

Pointless existence, inconsequential egress

International island of abundant indulgence-

Absurdist contradiction, lust in luxury;

Active brain death, comatose curation

Computing correction and everlasting electric connection 

Detective Daydream

On the public transit bus, I had payed the $2.50 fee to ride, though see others board for free. In my seat I begin to drift— mind meandering until I’m in the third person. Not so dissociative, more so all-intuitive. I think of myself as some detective from a noir flick from probably a century ago, and being in Chicago I had a perfect image and energy to feed off for such a bit. 

Going along on the way to the Museum of Science & Industry, as it would pertain to answers necessary to solving a secret case. See, some weeks ago a group, some degrees removed from old Capone and his goons, hijacked a delivery expecting booze and wound up mistakenly making it away with some leftover moon food. That dehydrated stuff they give to astronauts. Not the most glorious case to take, but one must make a name by some stakes. 

Entrance to the museum and innard exhibitions free as being on “active duty” for the case, though I’m not technically working for any agency, merely lending assistance where they screwed the pooch. There inside I find where it all would be to see, checking out some examples of what I am looking for which isn’t stolen. In order to “gain a better idea” about it all I stop in and see a small explanatory video about space— it’s a hopeless case. The stolen food is an inconsequential, although unfortunate, misstep which is likely lost forever. Dehydrated I’m not sure where it will end up beside some trash bin or dumped on the side of some road. 

Stopping at the cafe inside the monolith of a museum to have coffee and a donut prior and after the screening, coming up with this silly daydream. 

20

Like with during the exact beginning of the New Year (of this year, 2026) with crafting a poem— Time Eats—  for a technicality of Laos around the sun while even a fetus— given my birthday is March 15 (today), reason could stand I could have had higher cerebral function at the time of 2005 slipping into 2006 whilst in the womb. 

The idea then on New Years being the same as now— as well as planned since then. That being twenty lines of a poem for twenty completed years of existence. 

One hour now

I guess I’m counting down 

Pre-emptive beginning while sipping Dr Pepper;

Unpredictable routes and consequential decisions—

Diabolical, ever-active imagination; rogue, unknowable destitution 

Another year another set of marks

Another decade and another coin toss

Alive as needed, echoing existentialist 

Surviving fatalist, salience negation

Prolonged, idealized condition…

Three minutes after the hour and two decades after the mundane occurrence 

Inconsequential unpredictable fluid drenched ignorant entity

Coagulated, vital existence in odd degrees

20 years: banal, beautiful and bitter altogether 

Interesting introspective case study every other day 

Incessant inquiries and reductive rationality to passive nihilative survival

Information addict; coffee fiend

Lovely DVDs shown on small screens

Awake through nonexistent alarms

Ever queer-quotient: liquidated totality 

https://open.spotify.com/episode/2r1azTkWCIHgw55Yimkxov?si=juYSCvUAQFWwsuSoimKF_w

space bit

A poem I wrote while on a binge of media relating to the astrophysicist Brian Cox. His way of explaining space is incredible in his enthusiasm and genuine mannerisms. 

Rare Earth, scarce solar system

Dual star siphoning interstellar entity 

Intangible and unimaginable galaxy

Unswimmable ocean, unintruded swamp

Exponential growth, inconsequential replication 

Implausible detection, silent civilization 

Quieter than the dead, darker than in bed

Filled with light, cloaked in eternal night

Pitch-black stellar screen

Hypothetically immoral interference 

Intergalactic law, future fixed flaw

Or merely, tribes only rise to swiftly fall

Orchid wreckage, birthed to bloom

gone so soon; unbeatable horizon filter

Heavy hitter, advanced event spark snuffer

Eyewitness to Expiration

Continuing my interest/research into online addiction and digital manifestations of its effects, from doomerism to dopamine draining of all varieties. Condensing/collecting understanding via poetry. Also coagulated is this playlist of videos on the topic and related matters. 

Intangible long-term award

New normal, formal habitation

Relayed information, idea of influence

Instant delay as time slips away and suddenly it's day

Wasted night without a trace of fight

Evening after evening, morning screaming behind the screen

Proposed productivity, unscratchable itch now high and mighty

Untapped constant ads, ridiculous constant content

Unending fill, down and down with nowhere else to go

No bottom, never-ending circuit

More, more, more; algorithm adored until you pass out and snore

Volume up full blast; random, automated generative space

Personal unpredictable programming

Wholesome vine and a slip beyond entertainment

Focal, inconsequential nothing

Doomed, oh well still won't do shit whichever way it gets put

Eroded existence, consuming escapism

Circular glowing rut

Conclusive out-of-body hobby

Conscious, common misery

Menial memories, cracked magnificence fed with inflated insignificance 

Useless tool turned into a ligature for ape-brained fools

Contended creation, out of bag algorithmic filler

Eyewitness to expiration

Online Addiction: Analysis/Review || Extended Research

Quoted in the short read but invariably the most accurate piece of information found in research regarding Online Addiction thusfar, New Yorker writer Maria Konnikova in her article Is Internet Addiction A Real Thing stated that with how the Internet, "is changing too rapidly for researchers to keep up, and, though the immediate effects are fairly visible, there's no telling what the condition [of Internet addiction] will look like over the long term." 

Patricia Netzley's small book, topically titled Online Addiction is a useful overview in regards to its subject matter. Navigating the unsettled dust of digital existence overlapping with physical, nails it quite nicely on the head as it would seem in its short explanations. The addiction to online activity she purports stems from a variety of converging factors offline-- other mental ailments and compulsive habits-- and the Internet becoming merely another notch to scratch onto the belt; like the habitual masturbator's case divulged by Anne Lembke in her book Dopamine Nation. Where it would seem outdated however, and differing from other addictions is that within the modern scape of acknowledging addiction to the Internet there is a high awareness of it, to the point of extreme meta-irony rather than shameful admissions of guilt from the acquired compulsions. Why have shame over something so nearly unavoidable with its constant proximity and accessibility? 

The book is beneficial nonetheless, and in fact as aforementioned acknowledges its almost instantaneous out-dated data as the landscape of the World Wide Web is so constantly updating and changing shape.

Coagulating an explanation based on current affairs and contents of the book however is seemingly possible: in the modern epoch of all-access abundance mixed with incessant, near constant 'once-in-a-lifetime generational events', and all-around volume seemingly at maximum screaming coming together in moments of stillness; boredom as the being is so used to being under some form of strain, duress, that scrolling provides sufficient stimulation. Stagnant, seemingly social yet altogether solitary after an hour sitting on the toilet, screen in between knees. 

In shorter, less wordy detail the gist of Netzley's book is that extreme boredom in a more lax era of existence is to an ape with an evolved overactive imagination. 

Coffee ii collage

 

Re: Doomerism in its essentials

Something from the earlier Internet which could mark an early onset of digital addiction: Doomerism. Slingshotted post-2018 into higher popularity in usage and identification; peaking in its widespread adoption and attraction in 2020 with the tick in tuning into its more musical forms. 

The issues it confronted however still quite relevant from being listed on the Doomsday clock’s recent, somewhat fear-mongering announcement; climate change, oil, new wars. Tomorrow is different but it’s still the same. The gist being that warning signs are apparently all around, screaming that the end of days are well on their way. 

Ideation on this makes the nihilative quality of Doomerism almost religious. It’s the same expectation as with a group such as the Jehovah’s Witness’ and their ever failing prophecies of Revelations in the foreseeable future. 

Doomer, fatalist in an abundant mirror

Apocalyptic natalist, digital survivalist

Waiting, as if praying for the end—

Gotcha moment when it’s all done

Parallel prepping, Cold War style-stressing

Fearing, fetishizing the post-nuke fugue

Regurgitating nihilistic entropy;

Expected, predicted predestination 

Alien In Every Room

Conscious, constant rift

Ever-present opposition;

Impulse? Average existence?

Fly on every wall, watching and listening in on all obnoxious noxious noise within vicinity;

Varying common variables: symptomatically atypical—

Witness in meta-analytical eyes;

Third side listening to dual lies

Alien option, hesitating on humanity,

Estranged optics, encompassing isolation—

Beneficial break, tainting lamentation

Obstructing ousting, ever-clear oddity;

Similar space debris,

differing gamma outburst;

Slow, creeping, inevitable but altogether unpredictable worst,

as if it’s the first, never the final—

Always another round lined up,

Fresh paint makes flying away indescribable;

Fluttering from one wall to another,

Static, stagnant movement: incarcerating free-reign.