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giving-an-account-on-youtube · 4 years

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Apology #2: clapback

James was able to gain back (some) of his respect and fan base with a revamped apology video. Let’s bring in some theory to help make sense of how he was effective at persuasion.

Strong theory vs. weak theory

Strong theory describes an unifying theory of large quantities of information, sacrificing specificity in service of generalizations (Love 237). Weak theory, on the other hand, is detail oriented, directed towards filling in gaps and affective experience.

Klein’s depressive vs. schizoid/paranoid positions:

The depressive position is a fleeting attempt to patch up damage and provide new alternative sources of support, or love (Sedgwick 128). The paranoid position is characterized by “hatred, envy, and anxiety -- is a position of terrible alterness to the dangers” of the world.

Both these positions are grounded in anxiety and hope to resolve it; the paranoid position is marked by a future-oriented anxiety about what might happen, whereas the depressive position is marked by the present anxiety of your actions having effects on others and the subsequent outcomes of those actions (Love 239).

Reparative and paranoid readings

These readings can help make sense of the type of account James takes of himself in the video.

Paranoia reading is a strong theory that takes place from the schizoid/paranoid position. It’s characteristics are:

Anticipatory: All negative possibilities have been accounted for such that there will never be a bad surprise (Sedgwick 130).

Reflexive and mimetic: "Paranoia seems to require being imitated to be understood, and it, in turn, seems to understand only by imitation. Paranoia proposes both Anything you can do (to me) I can do worse, and Anything you can do (to me) I can do ﬁrst — to myself“ (131).

A strong theory: Its generalizability means it can account for an incredible number of situations, multiplying to reach its goal of relieving negative affect (134). It can risk circular reasoning, or should we say self-confirming bias, in service of preserving its thesis (135).

A theory of negative affects: To constantly be wary of avoiding negative affect means that positive affect cannot truly be attained, or if it is cannot be appreciated outside of its protection against negative affect (136).

Places its faith in exposure: Paranoid knowledge relies on a naive narrator who believes to make said knowledge heard means attracting a cult of followers whose lives will be altered, in effect (138;141).

Reparative reading is a weak theory that takes place from the depressive position. According to Klein, the schizoid and the depressive are mutually intelligible, never fully existing as their own entities in the subject’s psyche (Love 238). Reparative readings work towards pleasure, versus the avoidance of negative affect of the paranoid position (Sedgwick 137; 144). Reparative reading is in service of an ethics of care to another and the self to protect from an externally cruel world (137).

Apology videos are not reparative.

Influencers want us to think they are performing an ethics of care for the self and for their audience. Yet, this position is merely an illusion of performativity. The eventual deletion and privatization of most apology videos and a return to an old way of address proves that creators have no intention to actual protect themselves and their audience, nor to make the world a better place. There may be some exceptions, albeit I would argue never fully reparative, where the psychic position of the influencer can be transformed in its impermanent state to enact reparative practices, for instance donating a large sum of their income to a charity for a cause which they have caused damage to. Yet, the public apology often seems to act as an avoidant strategy to negative affect caused by dealing with ones issues in private and addressing another person with care.

So are they paranoid?

Yes. Let’s look at each condition of paranoia to confirm they comply with the apology video:

Anticipatory: In general an apology video emphasizes the negative affects that the person feels and they imply they will continue to feel it, emphasizing the worst scenario in which they are not forgiven. They often discuss the repercussions of their actions and anticipate what may happen to them.

Reflexive and mimetic: Often, an influencer will expose themselves when speculations arise rather than have someone else do it to them so they don’t appear suspicious, and will often expose others at their expense.

A strong theory: The apology video is in service of the justification of oneself as good, even if one admits they are guilty. The effect of the paranoid reading of oneself, regardless if they are wrong or not, appears transparent and is centered around the assumption that they were not aware of the consequences of their actions, and thus cannot be a bad person, just a good person who made a bad mistake. This organizing principle means the influencer can never be regarded as evil.

A theory of negative affects: The apology works to ward off negative affect through the reduction of hate but rarely achieves its goal as the addressing of a situation will always bring with it people who hate against them, and the continued address brings some people to become more and more angry. In some cases, the justification of oneself means the destruction of another person, as in the case of James and Tati as you will learn, which may lead to negative affect in the form of guilt and shame for redirecting hate towards another person.

Places faith in exposure: The apology video enters with the paradoxical anticipation of the worst scenario, but with the subconscious expectation that they have succeeded in presenting a case for their innocence, such that people will take their side, albeit they are aware it will never be everyone. An audience stays divided after a scandal.

Can one truly give a paranoid account of oneself?

Yes, although it operates differently than a paranoid theory based on knowledge external to oneself. Due to the fact that it is based on internal knowledge it can be fabricated using justifications and embellishments that are unfalsifiable and thus it will always be performative. Yet, facts related to your account’s emergence will be still mimetically interpreted by readers in the same way as other paranoid readings.

Further, bias and selfish motives can never be ruled out of paranoia. Hofstader identified that skepticism and the creation of an enemy is often a “projection of the self” (qtd. in Bridle 205-206). Therefore, looking outward actually becomes a process of looking inward, and no knowledge exists without bias. Therefore, one’s own account of the self becomes more accountable and valid through paranoid knowing.

So if paranoid knowing is always a projection of the self, how can we understand its duty?

Sedgwick asks: “How, in short, is knowledge performative, and how best does one move among its causes and effects?” (124)

Sheldon responds: “Knowledge’s causes and effects are mobile and in their perambulations, they describe a shape. And we can move within that shape, along with that movement, to discover which movements work to best effect. Knowledge, then, doesn’t name a series of discrete objects and events... It is performed on and through the material substrata we call writing, reading, thinking, and listening and in concert with history of ideas from which all this emerged and into which it seeks, as we say, to make an intervention, to push the discourse in new directions” (Sheldon).

If knowledge is to engage with the world, then knowledge can thus be described as fact and fiction. Engagement with the world cannot be separable into discrete binary categories of true and false. As de Man states: ”The interest of autobiography is then not that it reveals reliable self-knowledge - it does not - but that it demonstrates in a striking way the impossibility of closure and of totalization (the impossibility of coming into being) of all textual systems made up of tropological substitutions” (de Man 922). The performative of authenticity made through a speech act becomes thus the way through which a speaker can redirect the responsibility of validation onto an audience (922-923).

So, knowledge does not have a responsibility to be true. It must, however, provide a tight-knit paranoid account in order to be believable. Here, PewDiePie’s suggestions become apparently very useful to James in order to gain trust back with his declining viewers.

Finally... James’ apology 2.0!

youtube

Let’s compare his new video to PewDiePie’s suggestions from the first video:

Keep your message clear and concise, the quicker a message is to say the quicker it will spread.

Here James spoke approximately 10x faster.

Actually address the situation for those who are not aware, otherwise you do not gain the opportunity for support.

He pulls up receipts!

James shows texts related to the vitamin scandal that make him look innocent.

He also inserts footage to show how he has supported Halo Beauty, Tati’s brand, in the past so thus he’s not a terrible friend.

Although the waiter also came out with a video saying James didn’t coerce him and that he was actually interested in him, James backed himself up with receipts of their conversation.

The sexual assault allegations were addressed and James put a disclaimer that he will never manipulate anyone for sexual favours.

There were also multiple apparently false allegations made after the backlash of his first apology video. James claims these were photoshopped or extorted and brings up some receipts to prove it is not true.

Don’t say ‘there will always be people who don’t believe me’ because you are trying to persuade these people!

James actually works in a persuasive manner here. Within the first few seconds he says he does not expect sympathy or forgiveness but for people to wait to form an opinion, which still seems a bit contradictory but at least he presented a forty minute argument rather than crying and breathing slowly again.

An apology video should be about and addressed to the people you are apologizing to.

It’s important to note that this ‘apology’ video, while James says he is still sorry for his actions, is more of an apology for his first apology video than it is towards his audiences or Tati. He is apologizing in effect for doing such a shitty job at justifying himself and takes action to make sure he will not have to again.

..It would be wiser to take time to process the situation and come up with a mature and thoughtful response.

James comments on his newer apology: ““TO ADDRESS ALL QUESTIONS: 1) Yes, this response is "planned". I said in the first few minutes of the video that I had an outline of points I needed to hit and I practiced my speaking too. Not trying to hide anything, just had a lot of things to get into one video. 2) I started taking screenshots of everything when I was in Australia, but I missed a few, and had take a few when I was back in LA. The time zones are 17 hours apart and I tried to make sure I noted every time there was a change but it looks like I missed a timestamp note in the convo with Sam. None of these screenshots are edited. Why would I risk editing a screenshot when the other party could come forward and prove me wrong? All screenshots are in chronological order...”

This shows that James thought this through and spent time looking at the facts and tried to act mature.

PewDiePie suggests a better narrative for James to use: “becoming famous so young has caused a negative impact on my personality and now that I realize that I will work to repair myself and the relationships I have damaged. I’m sorry to everyone that I hurt and disappointed. What I did was wrong.”

James mentions how this situation affected him mentally.

He also said that he wants to work on himself and rather than repair relationships with these people, find better friends! This actually is smarter on his part since he has portrayed his former friends as untrustworthy.

Due to the fact that James has justified himself as not guilty, he talked not about what he did wrong but with the problems of cancel culture and the consequences of his followers actions. I believe this was a useful tactic since it redirects the blame to the followers, rightfully so, for their quick and rash reactions.

Further, James centers his strong theory on the fact he is being criticized for messaging men because people are homophobic and this all was a double standard, as women can message men in this way without being accused of being a predator.

Reactions of followers

The comments appear to be now mostly in support of James, although the like-to-dislike ratio still shows a lot of hate. Perhaps James reported and deleted negative comments. However, here are some examples of top comments:

Light_Rxse comments: “I feel a little embarrassed after watching this video. It was so easy for me and many others to turn on James. Without facts, I just went with the crowd. James, if you ever read this, I am sorry. “

adelaide harrington proposes: “you should honestly sue them for defamation of character and your own pain and suffering what they did was literally awful “

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PBV806YTXEg

However, some speculation ensues. On the above upload of James’ since deleted first apology, Bruce Humphrey comments months after the controversy ended: “My question is, why did he upload this video totally blaming himself, but then a few days later he uploads a video "showing proof" and saying he's innocent. Something here doesn't add up...”

This proves the never ending, self confirming strength of paranoid theory. Regardless of how James justifies himself, new theories will continue to evolve. Thus, rather than having the ability to truly heal and put this behind him, James and other influencers will continue to live in the ‘the gray zone’.

The gray zone

"The gray zone is the best descriptor for a landscape inundated with unprovable facts and provable falsehoods that nevertheless stalk, zombie-like, through conversations, cajoling and persuading. The gray zone is the slippery, almost ungraspable terrain we now find ourselves in as a result of our vastly extended technological tools for knowledge making. It is a world of limited knowability and existential doubt, horrifying to the extremist and the conspiracy theorist alike. In this world we are forced to acknowledge the narrow extent of empirical reckoning and the poor returns of overwhelming flows of information.

The gray zone cannot be defeated. It cannot be drained or overrun - it is already overflowing. The conspiracy theory is the dominant narrative and the lingua franca of the times: properly read, it really does explain everything. Living consciously in the gray zone, if we should choose to do so, allows us to sample from the myriad of explanations that our limited cognition stretches like a mask over the vibrating half-truths of the world. It is a better approximation of reality than any rigid binary encoding can ever hope to be - an acknowledgement that our apprehensions are approximations, and all the more powerful for being so. The gray zone allows us to make peace with otherwise-irreconcilable, conflicting worldviews that prevent us from taking any meaningful action in the present.” (Bridle 213-214).

Finally, I would like to close off with some food-for-thought. Knowledge and self-hood and taking an account, after all are therefore relativist. “Determining what is ‘rational’ and what is not; what is sane and insane; good and bad, after all, cannot and should not play a role in the study of cultural meaning (e.g. Weber, 1948 [1919])” (Aupers 23).

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autoirishlitdiscourses · 6 years

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Discourse of Tuesday, 15 May 2018

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