Desirability as a Source of Security and Hope

If one can always be desired then one can always be consumed. The ability to be consumed is a sign of relevance. In return it gives us security. Because of this, our ability to remain desirable is a main source of happiness and well-being for most in developed nations.

Many might conclude this is some result of capitalism, but it’s not. It’s more fundamental. It has to do with our relationship to time.

Modernism destroyed our reliance on the past by showing the illegitimacy of tradition and dogma. It proposed that we place our faith in the future. This temporal shift eventually gave birth to clashing utopian concepts that came crashing down in the 20th century under various totalitarian regimes. With the loss of hope in the past and future, the present is the only place society could turn. The here and now became the last space contemporary society could ground anything meaningful. Ephemerality, as a result, has become the spirit of our day and age.

Because of all of this, we feel the need to be constantly alluring to our peers and contemporaries. In this state of constant fashion, being consumed and desired is how we derive security while also maintaining autonomy. Desirableness is proof that we have value within our hypermodern era. But, just as each day brings with it a new reality, we are faced with the need to always refresh our foothold in order to avoid becoming irrelevant. The fight to have others pay us their attention in the ever present here and now.

These are some thoughts as I’m rereading Gilles Lipovetsky’s Hypermodern Times.