No Man’s Expectations
Why cultivated identities inevitably turn on the cultivators
The developers of highly-anticipated video game “No Man’s Sky” had always been fairly vague about what it was actually going to be, other than “massive.” They didn’t make a lot of specific promises — though, to be clear, some of the specific ones they did make weren’t delivered on — but those that liked the looks of it filled in the blanks. When the date finally crept up, people were nervous.
It’s just a game, though. Why get nervous? When a post on Reddit says if you rush through No Man’s Sky and play it like you’re actually trying to reach the end of something that has been touted as “endless” only takes a mere 30 hours, why does it matter? Going on what people were interested in the game for, which was not “the campaign,” why did that news matter?
Put simply, the news itself didn’t. Truly, people shouldn’t have really cared about what happens when you reach the center of the galaxy when they had 18 quintillion planets to explore (actual number). It was the contradiction to people’s internal narrative that did matter.
In fact, it really mattered.
Ownership of a creative work is something one would “know” to ascribe to the creator of that work. The dynamic is sometimes looked at as parental, with the artist giving birth to art. In today’s market-driven, neoliberal society, it’s looked at as intellectual property — which is a little more flexible regarding ownership, but generally regards ownership as a broadcast rather than a conversation. That is to say, something is owned by an entity and distributed like food — consumption does not create ownership.
On paper, we “know” the creator is “the owner” of the work because that is what we are raised to believe. It’s only fair, after all. It’s interesting, though, that in the age of lifestyle marketing this is how we ideologically view creative work. Why, you ask? Well, because in practice, we don’t think that way.
Today, buying a product means also buying accessories for it, also buying t-shirts that tell other people you like that product (and if they like it too, they should talk to you about it — you might become friends!), also subscribing to the official monthly crate for that brand (only $24 a month!), and also clicking like on that product’s page so Facebook knows to show you you whatever other ridiculous shit the company that owns the creator’s ideas comes up with over sub-par ham sandwiches from the shitty nearby deli no one goes to.
We do this because we live in a cultural environment that is not complete. The world as it is does not provide us with the opportunity to experience substance, but rather a shallow, marketable version of every place, thing, idea, or whatever. Organic identity is developed by an environment that informs our views, by other people we know and love, and by the individual’s interpretation of these things. Organic identity is not automatically good, but it’s authentic. Cultivated identity is the result of an inauthentic environment tailored to encourage consumption by means of tying it to one’s identity.
When consumption is identity, others’ creative work is potential identity. When it reaches puberty and becomes cultivated identity, we treat others’ creative work as our property. It stops being a house and becomes a home. Have you ever had someone criticize your home? It doesn’t feel good, and it causes us to do all sorts of messed-up shit.
We wouldn’t admit to operating that way, nor do we think we do… But we do.
Let’s say you rent your home. You’re asked to pay rent, then, right? Of course. You know how every single year you’re told “we need everyone to buy it so we keep making them?” Besides the obviousness of the statement, what is wrong with it? It’s reminding those people who have invested their identity in the creative work to pay up or else. Also, if your landlord really wanted to, the bastard could unlock your door and leave a goat heart on your kitchen counter every night.
“We don’t have to let you live here. We don’t care if this is your home, we made it” is a contradictory message to “we need you to buy this so that we can continue to make things and you can briefly feel whole!” Essentially, we’re being told we’re needed as well as not needed.
Given that cultivated identity is fragile and incomplete, delivering contradictory messages only serves to further confound a person already on edge with who they are — which only works to the advantage of the cultivators. The more vulnerable a person’s identity is the more likely the person is to hyperconsume. To obsessively buy everything, read everything, to fixate and aggressively advocate. Whether they advocate for or against the product itself is actually quite irrelevant — it’s simply the attention it receives that functions to sell the product. A massive backlash over something that seems very inconsequential does heighten awareness a great deal.
Normal consumption is a goal, for sure, but this subset of hyperconsumers is the goal — they’re the revenue stream. They’re on autopilot and won’t change course without input. Someone with a life centered around consumption of a brand (or, as it is today, a lifestyle — they have become one and the same) will do more marketing on behalf than a team of marketers can even think to accomplish. They’ll innovate in a way marketing experts will never begin to dream of, because marketing experts only care about how to sell it, and not about the minutia of the actual artistic work. Though, I’d assert that “toxicity” begins when actual fundamental evangelists develop around a brand.
When one’s identity is No Man’s Sky Fan (or really any kind of fan), then what the subject of their fandom actually is becomes very important to that person. Their interpretation of those works is a central tenant to who they believe they are as a person. Certainly the philosophies of artists of all kinds have bearing on this in all people, but not on this level. Consumption (particularly of creative work) affects identity but that is not a problem, nor is it what I’m talking about. When consumption effectively takes over the functions of identity, it leads to obsessive and/or abusive behaviors that have been so publicly on display as of late.
It’s completely inevitable those that legitimately identify as a “fan” feel so fractured by a decision they wouldn’t personally make. Fandom is such an unhealthily large part of their identity as the result of a creative work being shown as made specifically “for them.” Except it isn’t. Fandom is never homogeneous and never will be. As with all socially and economically diverse groups: at some point, consensus ends. This is where companies lose control of the fans, but as I said before, it doesn’t really matter to them.
A company works on numbers, not feelings. People having feelings about the company counts as engagement, which supposedly leads to profit (in one way or another) every single time. So who gives a fuck if the engagement is negative?
To say these types have been convinced is wrong — because that would imply they thought differently before and something changed their perception. I don’t believe it’s possible to have any opinion on consumption — philosophical or otherwise — as a fetus, and that would be the only time I believe one could exist outside an environment where consumption is touted as “who we are.”
This is our environment. This is where and how we live. Most of us won’t go under, but we’re all standing in the same quicksand and calling it home.
