THE CONFUSION OF MARXIAN AND FREUDIANFETISHISM IN ADORNO AND BENJAMIN

Donovan Mioyasaki

Both Theodor Adorno and WalterBenjamin borrow from Freudian theory intheir analyses of fetishism’s relation to thecontemporary reception of cultural prod-ucts. I will argue that both authors have con-fused the Marxian and Freudian theories offetishism, resulting in mistaken conclusionsabout artistic reception. By disentanglingthe Marxian and Freudian elements in bothauthors’ positions, I want to show that 1)Adorno’s characterization of regressive lis-tening implies, contrary to his intentions,that the current reception of artwork is in factantagonistic to fetishism, and that 2) his crit-icism of Benjamin’s optimism toward “re-ception in distraction” is nevertheless justi-fied. If I am correct, it may be necessary toreassess Adorno’s demand for asceticism inadvanced art. The current danger may not be“fetishism” at all, but rather the troublesomeconsequences of fetishism’s decline.

The Marxian Fetish of CommodityAlienation

According to Marx, a laborer’s productbecomes a commodity when produced forthe purpose of exchange rather than directuse. He compares the commodity to a reli-gious fetish because “the productions of thehuman brain appear as independent beingsendowed with life, entering into relationboth with one another and the human race.”1

However, this is not simply an illusion. Marxclaims the commodity’s fetishistic appear-ance is both true and false: “the relationsconnecting the labor of one individual withthat of the rest appear, not as direct social re-lations between individuals at work, but aswhat they really are, material relations be-tween persons and social relations betweenthings” (emphasis mine).2 Given the private

production of capitalism, it is true that labor-ers relate to one another indirectly throughthe exchange of material goods. Their socialrelations are material relations. The workers’alienation from the commodity—its seem-ing lack of direct relation to their labor—truthfully reflects the workers’ alienationfrom one another.

At the same time, commodity fetishism isillusive because this impoverished social re-lationship between laborers is attributed tocommodities: “a definite social relation be-tween men, assumes, in their eyes, the fan-tastic form of a relation between things.”3

The concrete labor-relations of humans, thevery source of commodities and their value,go unnoticed in the commodity’s abstractexchange-value. Because the link of thecommodity’s exchangeability to actual hu-man activity is shrouded, “the process ofproduction has the mastery over man, in-stead of being controlled by him.”4 The illu-sion is not this mastery (just as it is not illu-sory that the religious fetishist is subservientto the fetish-god); what is illusory is the im-plication that such a state of affairs is a“self-evident necessity imposed by nature.”5

The commodity, seemingly disconnectedfrom the worker’s activity, takes on the char-acter of external necessity or independentlaw; its existence and value appear to falloutside the realm of human control. Conse-quently, the fetishistic commodity falselyimplies the impossibility of social change.

The Freudian Fetish:The Fantasy of Reconciliation

The Freudian theory of fetishism empha-sizes, not alienation, but the illusion of a re-lation. Freud traces the origins of sexual fe-tishism to the castration complex. He claims

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that a young boy, upon discovering thatwomen do not possess a penis, interprets thisfact as a verification of the threat of castra-tion. In order to preserve his relation of de-sire to the mother without endangering hisown body, he must reject this lack: “The fe-tish is a substitute for the woman’s(mother’s) penis that the little boy once be-lieved in and . . . does not want to give up.”6

The fetish is substituted for the mother’s pe-nis, Freud tells us, “to preserve it from ex-tinction.”7

As in Marx’s view, fetishism is related to asubstitution. Here the fetish is substituted forthe “maternal phallus,” rather than ex-change-value substituting for the social rela-tions of labor.8 But while in Marx this substi-tution causes a loss of social relation to theobject and to others (the commodity’s auton-omous, alienated character), in Freud thesubstitute seemingly prevents the loss of asocial relation (prevents alienation from theopposite gender). Marx explains his use ofthe term “fetishism” by emphasizing the di-vorce of the object from the subject (the fe-tish-god’s independence). Freud, on theother hand, emphasizes the subject’s beliefthat the fetish overcomes this divorce. “Suchsubstitutes,” he says, “are with some justicelikened to the fetishes in which savages be-lieve that their gods are embodied” (my em-phasis).9

Marx and Freud do agree in their analysesof the objective social situation of fetishism.In both cases, false relations substitute forauthentic ones. They are “false” becausethey involve the loss of authentic satisfactionin social relationships. The commodity rela-tionship of laborers is an impoverished ma-terial relation between subjects, rather thanan authentic social relation. The relation ofthe Freudian fetishist to the fetish is also adegraded one; the fetishist’s desire is di-rected toward an object—a thing without di-rect relation to his desire. In Marx, the alien-ating social relationships of capitalismsubstitute for authentic society, and in Freud

submission to an object substitutes for theauthentic sexual aim of an erotic bond to ahuman subject.10

The difference between the two theorieslies in the subjective conditions—in the fe-tishistic subjects’perception of their own sit-uation. In Marx, the producers encounter thesubstitute of the commodity as alienated andwithout relation to them. They see in the ob-ject their own loss of social satisfaction. Thedanger is not this substitution, which revealstheir social privation. It is instead the com-modity’s independence, which convincesthe subjects that the loss cannot be remedied,that commodity relations are the only possi-ble human relation. In Freud, on the con-trary, the subject is unaware of alienation orloss because he has transferred his desirefrom the mother to the fetish. Far from alien-ating him, the object reassures him that thedesired relation has been achieved. Ratherthan despairing of alternatives, he simplydoes not recognize the need for any. Thedanger is heightened because he ignores hisprivation.

The Marxian and Freudian theories of fe-tishism analyze two different ways in whichsubjects can react to the loss of social rela-tion. Because my principal concern is the de-fensive attitude taken by the subject towardthe condition of social deprivation, ratherthan that condition itself, I will reserve theterm “fetishism” for the Freudian theory, and“alienation” for the Marxian one. In theFreudian sense, there is nothing fetishisticabout Marxian commodity alienation.Marx’s producer is aware of alienation andresigns, in the face of the commodity’s illu-sory authority, to the loss of social happi-ness. Freudian fetishism, on the contrary, isnot resignation toward a dissatisfying substi-tute form of society. It is instead a substitutesatisfaction, or false reconciliation.

Benjamin and the Theory of Aura

Benjamin’s notion of “aura” correspondsto the substitute social relation of the fetish,

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and not to Marxian commodity alienation.According to Benjamin, the auratic work ofart is an object appearing as a subject: “Ex-perience of the aura rests on the transposi-tion of a response common in human rela-tionships to the relationship between theinanimate or natural object and man.”11 As infetishism, the aura of an object is its ability tosubstitute for a subject in the social relation.Unlike Marx’s alienated commodities,which seem to have relations only with oneanother while being divorced from the sub-ject and her labor, in the auratic object thesubject recognizes herself, seeing humanityrather than a mere thing: “to perceive theaura of an object we look at means to invest itwith the ability to look at us in return.”12

As with fetishism, the relation to the ob-ject disguises an impoverished social rela-tion between subjects. On one hand, both thefetish and the auratic object distance humanbeings from one other. Aura, Benjamin says,is essentially an experience of distance, and“the essentially distant is the inapproach-able.”13 On the other hand, however, the sub-ject’s distance from other subjects is dis-guised by the unique presence andauthenticity of the object.14 Just as the Freud-ian fetishist believes he has achieved satis-faction in the presence of the fetish, the sub-ject in the presence of the auratic artworkbelieves she has entered into a relation withlost social human experience: “the authen-ticity of a thing is the essence of all that istransmissible from its beginning, rangingfrom its substantive duration to its testimonyto the history which it has experienced.”15

The auratic object appears, then, as an ex-ception to the commodity. Rather thancloaking its history of production, use, andexchange—that is, its connection to humanlife—under the abstract quantity of ex-change-value, it wears its history on itssleeve. Its value is inseparable from its pastconcrete relations to subjects. Like the fe-tish, aura is distance and alienation in theguise of proximity and humanity. It is notalienation but false reconciliation.

Adorno and the Fetish ofExchange-Value

As in Benjamin’s case, Adorno’s analysisof fetishism in cultural goods has more incommon with Freudian fetishism thanMarxian commodity alienation. Accordingto Adorno, commodity fetishism is the con-sumption of exchange-value under the guiseof use-value:

If the commodity in general combines ex-change-value and use-value, then the pureuse-value, whose illusion the culturalgoods must preserve in completely capital-ist society, must be replaced by pure ex-change-value, which deceptively takesover the function of use-value. . . . The feel-ings which go to the exchange value createthe appearance of immediacy at the sametime as the absence of a relation to the ob-ject belies it.16 (my emphasis)

The exchange-value of the commodity is thefetishistic substitute for the satisfaction onedesires from the product’s qualitativeuse-value. The consumer has replaced theobject of desire with the desire to exchange.As in sexual fetishism, where the fetish ob-ject replaces the sexual aim (means replacesend), the commodity is desired qua ex-changeable (the means) rather than asuse-value (the end). Adorno even borrowsFreudian terminology to describe the phe-nomenon: “as a result of the displacement offeelings into exchange-value, no demandsare really advanced in music anymore. Sub-stitutes satisfy their purpose, because the de-mand to which they adjust themselves has it-self already been substituted.” (emphasisadded).17

The crucial difference between Marxianalienation and Adorno’s Freudian use of “fe-tishism” is the subject’s perception of her sit-uation. In Marx, the subject recognizes in thecommodity a real inadequacy in her socialcondition. Relations appear “as they reallyare, material relations between persons and

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social relations between things.”18 InAdorno, on the contrary, this element oftruth is clouded; the commodity becomes il-lusory through and through. The subject seesnothing lacking in the commodity or in herrelationship to it. As with Benjamin’s auraticobject, exchange-value—the alienation ofproducers from their products—takes on thedisguise of relation. However, for Adorno,the substitute is no longer an auratic connec-tion to historical use, but the illusion of apresent and immediate utility—a directqualitative relation to the object.

Both Benjamin’s aura and Adorno’s com-modity fetishism are defensive strategiesagainst Marxian alienation, since bothfalsely suggest authentic social satisfactionachieved in relation to an object. However,Benjamin’s aura still includes nostalgia for arelation to tradition and human experience,i.e., for a social relation to other subjects viathe object, whereas Adorno’s consumergives up the other subject entirely, imaginingfull satisfaction in the object alone, in its ap-pearance as pure use-value.19

Benjamin’s Diagnosis ofAura’s Decline

In both Benjamin and Adorno’s positions,the danger is the subject’s ignorance of ac-tual privation. If fetishism were a final stateof affairs, the outlook for social changewould be grim, since the need for changewould go unrecognized. However,Benjamin has given us reason to believe fe-tishism is not, in fact, the end of the matter.His claim of a “disintegration of the aura”implies a decline of fetishism.20

According to Benjamin, mechanical re-production destroys the distance that main-tains aura. Because the reproduced object iseasily and inexpensively possessed, it incitesand satisfies “the desire of contemporarymasses to bring things ‘closer’ spatially andhumanly . . . to get hold of an object at veryclose range by way of its likeness, its repro-duction.”21 This might, at first glance, appear

to reinforce fetishism. After all, it is charac-teristic of fetishism to seek to obtainsatisfaction by possessing a substitute. Andindeed, this desire to abolish distance is mo-tivated by auratic fetishism. However, it isalso fetishism’s self-defeat.

The changes that come with the object’simmediate availability destroy precisely thatcharacter that made the object function as asubstitute. The nostalgic illusion of a con-nection to social experience is upheld by theauratic object’s historical and unique charac-ter. It comforts by showing a seemingly hu-man face. With the advance of mechanicalreproduction, however, the human qualitiesof the commodity dissolve. Because repro-duced commodities are flawless, new, andidentical—lacking uniqueness or history—“the technique of reproduction detaches thereproduced object from the domain of tradi-tion.”22 The object is brought too close for itsmagic—the appearance of humanness andsociability—to be preserved. The fetish isappropriated only to become an empty com-modity without relation to human experi-ence.

The consequence of this decline is an au-thentically Marxian form of alienation. Ac-cording to Benjamin, the auratic object’sconversion to commodity takes the form ofand “experience of shock.”23 The object’sproximity, coupled with its absence of con-nection to the human, is experienced aspain—as the constant threat of danger.Benjamin’s favorite analogy for this experi-ence is big city traffic: “Moving through thistraffic involves the individual in a series ofshocks and collisions. At dangerous inter-sections, nervous impulses flow through himin rapid succession, like the energy from abattery.”24 The comforting traces of past so-cial experience that had relieved the socialsituation begin to disappear. The subject hasnot voluntarily given up fetishism; objectiveconditions have made such evasive strategiesincreasingly difficult. What once, as aura,returned the human gaze, now confronts the

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subject as blind physical force or sheer stim-ulus.

Freudian Identification andRepetition: Reconciliation Without

Fetishism

Benjamin’s analysis of aura’s decline andconversion to shock introduces a non-fetish-istic subjective response to alienation. Thisalternative to fetishism is drawn explicitlyfrom Freud’s theory of traumatic neurosis inBeyond the Pleasure Principle.25 Freudclaims that victims of war trauma repeatedlydream about their traumatic experiences inorder to overcome shock: “these dreams areendeavouring to master the stimulus retro-spectively, by developing the anxiety whoseomission was the cause of the traumatic neu-rosis.”26 In a similar way, the subject’s expe-rience of shock in the alienated commodityis countered in two ways: 1) by habituatingto shock through its repetition, and 2) byidentifying with the active agent that pro-duced the shock.

According to Benjamin, modern culturalproducts serve as preparation for the safe re-ception and ultimate mastery of shock:“technology has subjected the humansensorium to a complex kind of training.There came a day when a new and urgentneed for stimuli was met by the film.”27 Hecompares this trained reception of shock totactile, as opposed to visual and contempla-tive, appropriation:

This mode of appropriation, developedwith reference to architecture, in certaincircumstances acquires canonical value.For the tasks which face the human appara-tus of perception at the turning points ofhistory cannot be solved by optical means,that is, by contemplation alone. They aremastered by habit, under the guidance oftactile appropriation.28

The consequence of this curious training is anew kind of artistic reception:

The painting invites the spectator to con-templation; before it the spectator canabandon himself to his associations. Be-fore the movie frame he cannot do so. Nosooner has his eye grasped a scene than it isalready changed. It cannot be arrested. . . .This constitutes the shock effect of thefilm, which like all shocks, should be cush-ioned by heightened presence of mind.29

(my emphases)

Benjamin misleadingly calls this behav-ior “reception in a state of distraction.”30 Butdistraction is not, in his sense, a state of un-consciousness or a lack of perception. On thecontrary, it is closer to attention, alertness, orbeing on guard. It is called “distraction” be-cause one is constantly attending to changesof scene, disruptions, and disconnectionsthat make immersed contemplation impossi-ble. Habituation to such disruptions allowsone to experience shock effects without be-ing harmed by them. By anticipating shock,one is ready for it and immune to it. One be-comes impervious—a “shock absorber” ofsorts. Such reception includes both attentionand distraction in the same way that theFreudian trauma patient is dreaming andpreoccupied, although alert to the source ofher suffering.

“Reception in a state of distraction” is, infact, the precondition of non-fetishistic re-ception. Through habit, the subject developsthe capacity to withstand alienation and dis-pleasure. This is contrary to fetishistic recep-tion, in which the threatening perception ofalienation is evaded through false reconcilia-tion in the fetish substitute. In non-fetishistic“distraction” one is distracted by and atten-tive to the shock of privation. One acknowl-edges precisely those elements of the socialcondition that fetishism ignores—the com-fortless tactile stimuli that “hit the spectatorlike a bullet,”31 the collisions of the crowd,street and factory, and the sudden disrup-tions of scene or camera angle that defy the

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fetishistic illusion of human, auratic experi-ence.

One is distracted from, on the other hand,precisely the auratic and fetishistic substi-tutes that disavow, cover, or draw attentionaway from shock. “The film,” Benjaminclaims, “makes the cult value recede into thebackground.”32 The subject is distractedfrom the harmonic image of the auratic thatallows for comfortable contemplation, fromthe illusion that makes her incapable of tol-erating what belies aura. As Benjamin putsit, “the man who concentrates before a workof art is absorbed by it. . . . In contrast, thedistracted mass absorbs the work of art.”33 Toconcentrate upon and be absorbed by a workrequires that the work be non-threatening; itmust have the fetishistic quality of an objectbecome human, returning and reassuringone’s gaze. A work that distracts, on the con-trary, defies this fetishistic pseudo-relation.Its shock constantly reinforces the divisionbetween the subject and the commodity.

This acknowledgement and mastery ofprivation is the precondition of the movefrom passivity to activity. We have seen that,for Marx, the alienated subject believes sheis powerless before the independent laws ofthe commodity. However, the subject’s re-peated exposure and habituation to alien-ation is the objective possibility of reconcili-ation. In this way the subject overcomessubmissiveness to, and fear of, the alienatedcommodity. In the training of repeatedshocks she subjects herself to the object,rather than being subjected to the object. Sheis training for the assumption of an activerole.

Once again, Benjamin has drawn heavilyfrom Freud’s Beyond the Pleasure Principle.There Freud describes a game in which ayoung boy throws a toy away from him witha cry of “fort” (“gone”), and retrieves it againwith a cry of “da” (“there”). Freud interpretsthe game as a reenactment of the mother’stemporary departure and return. It is, hesays,

related to the child’s great cultural achieve-ment—the instinctual renunciation . . .which he had made in allowing his motherto go away without protesting. . . . At theoutset he was in a passive situation—hewas overpowered by the experience; but,by repeating it, unpleasurable though itwas, as a game, he took on an active part.34

The child not only tolerates the loss, but alsocauses it to occur again in the game. He iden-tifies with the mother’s role. It is now thechild that takes leave, not the mother. Bymaking this identification, he anticipates hismove from the passive demand for immedi-ate satisfaction under the pleasure principleto the toleration of privation under the realityprinciple. Such toleration is essential if thechild is to recognize the reality of his priva-tion and eventually, through activity, modifythe reality that causes his displeasure.

The contrast to fetishism is striking. Thefetishist refuses to acknowledge shock, andthus maintains the illusion that no change insocial condition is required. The pleasureprinciple, passivity, and immediate gratifica-tion determine the fetishist’s actions. Repeti-tion of shock and identification are, on thecontrary, an anticipation of the reality princi-ple, self-command, and the modification ofthe real. In Freudian theory, it is preciselysuch a strategy that will allow a child to re-solve the Oedipus complex without resort-ing to the evasive strategy of fetishism.Whereas the fetishist preserves the prohib-ited desire by finding a substitute object, the“normal” child will identify with the fatherand reenact the father’s prohibition actively,rather than be subjected to it: “the child’sparents, and especially his father, were per-ceived as the obstacle to a realization of hisOedipus wishes; so his infantile ego fortifieditself for the carrying out of the repression byerecting this same obstacle within itself.”35

In Benjamin’s analysis, this identificationinvolves positioning oneself, not as passiverecipient or audience member, but rather as

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author, camera, or critic: “the audience’sidentification with the actor is really an iden-tification with the camera. Consequently theaudience takes the position of the camera; itsapproach is that of testing.”36 Benjamin evensuggests that every audience member be-comes “somewhat of an expert.”37 For ourpurposes, the audience’s true status as expertis not crucial. What is crucial is that by bothrecognizing its alienation and identifyingwith the agent of its alienation (the produc-ers of the commodity), the audience is pre-paring for the activities of judgment, produc-tion, and modification of commodities.

Two important conclusions can be drawn.First, the repetition of shock makes the fe-tishistic evasion of shock unnecessary. Sec-ond, imaginative identification with agencyis preparatory to the overcoming of Marxianalienation. It is, to be sure, only an imaginarystep. Identification is not authentic agency.Nevertheless, imagined agency truthfullysuggests the possibility of a changed relationto the commodity. The subject has, to somedegree, recognized her potential to act of herown accord, rather than in obedience to anactual, but historically conditioned, state ofaffairs.

Resistance to Fetishism in Adorno’sAnalysis of “Regressive Listening”

Like Benjamin, Adorno acknowledgesthe presence of alienation, shock, and dis-pleasure in the relation of the subject to thecommodity. He calls the reception of thealienated commodity “regressive listening”:

Regressive listening appears as soon as ad-vertising turns to terror, as soon as nothingis left for the consciousness but to capitu-late before the superior power of the adver-tised stuff and purchase spiritual peace bymaking the imposed goods literally its ownthing. In regressive listening, advertisingtakes on a compulsory character.38 (my em-phasis)

Like Benjamin, he claims that the subject’sreception of the shock of alienation involvesidentification. However, contrary toBenjamin, Adorno claims the subject identi-fies with the commodity itself, not with thecommodity’s producer:

They overcome the feeling of impotencethat creeps over them in the face of monop-olistic production by identifying them-selves with the inescapable product. Theythereby put an end to the strangeness of themusical brands which are at once distantfrom them and threateningly near.39 (myemphasis)

While Benjamin believes that the receptionof shock distracts the subject from auratic orfetishistic qualities, Adorno insists that “re-gressive listening” supports the continuedsuccess of fetishism, even given the declineof aura. The subject can fetishistically iden-tify with the commodity—that is, continueto see in it a relation to the human—becauseshe mistakes exchange-value (the commod-ity’s being-for-exchange) for use-value (itsbeing-for-human use). However, Adorno’sown analysis provides reasons to reject thisclaim. The regression of listening is not, ashe says, a “counterpart to the fetishism ofmusic.”40 It is, instead, at odds with fetish-ism.

According to Adorno, regressive listen-ing is the rejection from consciousness ofdifference—of anything that defies com-modification or exposes alternatives to it:

Whenever they have the chance, they dis-play the pinched hatred of those who reallysense the other but exclude it in order tolive in peace, and who therefore would likebest to root out the nagging possibility. Theregression is really from this existent pos-sibility, or more concretely from the possi-bility of a different and oppositional mu-sic.41

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He even explicitly characterizes regressivelistening as a neurosis:

There is actually a neurotic mechanism ofstupidity in listening too; the arrogantly ig-norant rejection of everything unfamiliar isits sure sign. Regressive listeners behavelike children. Again and again, and withstubborn malice, they demand the one dishthey have been served.42

In regressive listening, as in both neurosisand psychosis, something is prevented fromreaching consciousness.43 However, this dis-avowal of alternatives is inconsistent withfetishism. The very motivation of fetishismis to preserve a sexual relation without re-sorting to either repression of instinct or thedisavowal of external reality.44 The sexual fe-tishist fully believes that it is the fetish hewants, and nothing else. Consequently hehas no need to deny the reality of an alterna-tive to the fetish.45

In Adorno’s theory, the substitution of ex-change-value for use-value accomplishesthe same. Alternatives to the fetishistic satis-faction of the commodity pose no threat tothe fetishist, and need not be rejected by con-sciousness. Although both the disavowal ofexternal reality and fetishism counteract thetemptation to indulge in a prohibited satis-faction, they do so in entirely different ways.The disavowal of alternative satisfactionmakes fetishism unnecessary (because onecannot be tempted by unperceived alterna-tives), and fetishism makes disavowal un-necessary (because one no longer desires thealternatives). If it were true, as Adornoclaims, that the subject has fetishisticallyidentified with the commodity, then the re-fusal to be conscious of alternatives wouldbe superfluous.

But disavowal of alternatives is not sim-ply inconsistent with fetishism; it is incom-patible with fetishism. According toAdorno, the fetishist believes pleasure in theexchange-value of the commodity is actuallypleasure taken in the qualitative use-value of

the product. That is, the fetishist is unawareof a distinction between product enjoyed quacommodity or enjoyed qua use-value. Be-cause this distinction is not recognized, anypleasure incidentally occasioned byuse-value will not be distinguished from thesubstitute pleasure taken in exchange-value.The fetishist may be conscious of the alter-native (she may experience non-fetishisticpleasure), but she will not be conscious of itas an alternative. To use an example ofAdorno’s, a fetishistic concertgoer will notsee any difference between enjoyment in theprice of a concert ticket and enjoyment in themusic performed.46 Fetishism only succeedsbecause the fetishist does not distinguish au-thentic from false satisfactions.

Because regressive listeners compul-sively disavow alternatives to the fetishisticcommodity, then they must, unlike the fe-tishist, be capable of distinguishing the fe-tishistic from the non-fetishistic, ex-change-value from use-value. After all, thealternatives cannot be rejected unless recog-nized as alternatives. The listener excludesdifference “in order to live in peace” and“root out the nagging possibility.”47 But dif-ference can only pose a threat to the lis-tener’s peace provided she is able to recog-nize it as a desirable alternative—preciselywhat the fetishist does not recognize. Conse-quently, the regressive listener’s relation tothe commodity cannot be one of fetishisticpleasure in a substitute. It is, rather, one ofresignation toward acknowledged privation.

Such resignation in the face of commod-ity alienation is characteristic of Marx’sanalysis, and antagonistic to the fetishismdescribed by Freud and Adorno. Further-more, the consumers’ compulsive return tothe alienated commodity is characteristic ofBenjamin and Freud’s descriptions ofnon-fetishistic shock training. So Adorno’snotion of disavowal in regressive listeningdemonstrates, against his intentions, that fe-tishistic identification with commodities is

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becoming increasingly unsuccessful—justas Benjamin has claimed.

The Critique of Non-FetishisticReconciliation: Pathological Realism

Advancements in commodity productionlead to the decline of auratic fetishism.Given the necessity of disavowal in regres-sive listening, a similar decline must occur inthe case of exchange-value fetishism.Adorno has even provided an excellent ex-planation of the phenomenon. Commodityfetishism leads to a condition in which “inbroad areas the same thing is offered to ev-erybody by the standardized production ofconsumption goods.”48 With increased stan-dardization, it becomes increasingly diffi-cult for exchange-value to take the disguiseof use-value; the difference between the twobecomes too glaring to support the fetishisticsubstitution.49 Adorno mentions, for exam-ple, mass music’s “standardized products,”which “do not permit concentrated listeningwithout becoming unbearable to the listen-ers.”50 And he admits: “even the most insen-sitive hit song enthusiast cannot always es-cape the feeling that the child with a sweettooth comes to know in the candy store. . . .Nobody believes so completely in pre-scribed pleasure.”51

Given a decline in both fetishistic auraand the fetishism of exchange-value, itwould seem that the problem has evaporated.But we still have to contend with Marxiancommodity alienation. The crucial elementof Marx’s analysis is the illusion of necessityand helplessness. Although no longer a fe-tishist in Freud or Adorno’s sense, the re-gressive listener still considers her conditionirreparable. She recognizes her alienation inthe commodity, but feels powerless to alterit. The only defense against alienation thatapparently remains is the disavowal of alter-natives. Because such alternatives appear tothe alienated consumer as merely exceptionsto the rule, lacking the commodity’s authori-tative power, their difference can only aggra-

vate dissatisfaction with the ubiquitous com-modity. Again, Adorno has provided an ex-cellent explanation:

It suffices to remember how many sorrowshe is spared who no longer thinks too manythoughts, how much more “in accordancewith reality” a person behaves when he af-firms that the real is right, how much morecapacity to use the machinery falls to theperson who integrates himself uncom-plainingly, so that the correspondence be-tween the listener’s consciousness and thefetishized music would still remain com-prehensible even if the former did not un-equivocally reduce itself to the latter.52

It is not, then, necessary for the subject tobuy into fetishism to be passive to the com-modity. Though the regressive listener rec-ognizes the inadequacy of the commodifiedproduct, her recognition of a real state of af-fairs (the primacy of the commodity over thesubject) leads her to the conclusion—tosome extent correct—that alternatives willincrease, not remedy, her dissatisfaction.However, the subject’s resignation is onlypartly “in accordance with reality.” It may betrue that producers are subservient to pro-duction, but they are not necessarily so. Itmay also be true that a product that defiescommodification is powerless and doomedto extinction—but only given Marxian alien-ation, which is not an objectively necessarystate of affairs.53

Regressive listening is not fetishistic sub-stitute pleasure, but instead a paradoxical—perhaps even pathological—adherence tothe reality principle. Or rather, it is the realityprinciple turned against itself. The subject isso energetically committed to the recogni-tion of real privation (and thus to the rejec-tion of fetishism) that she rejects as fantasyanything in the real that defies the generalstate of affairs. In her commitment to the re-ality principle, she disavows possibility.Rather than recognize that alternative prod-ucts are evidence of the real power of pro-

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ducers over the commodity, the subject seesthem only as accidents or anomalies. She at-tributes their existence (like that of the com-modity in general) not to the agency of theproducer and consumer, but to the whims ofexchange and market. This pathologicalform of realism, far from fetishistically con-fusing alienation with satisfaction, reso-lutely accepts privation as such. It is not theillusion of satisfaction, but despair over thepossibility of alternatives. Any suggestion ofthe possibility of value beyond exchange ispathologically labeled pathology.

This “pathological realism” in regressivelistening provides the basis for a critique ofBenjamin’s optimistic theory of repeti-tion-identification. The source of his opti-mism is the subject’s identification withagency. By identifying with the producer,the alienated subject anticipates the ability totake control of the commodity and modifythe condition of privation. Privation is toler-ated only to bring about its end. But this is adangerous stra tegy. The Freudian“introjection” of the father as superego isidentification with the father, not only asagent, but also as the voice of prohibition.

In Freudian theory, the child’s instinctualprivation is necessary due to its dependenceupon its parents. However, through identifi-cation this objective condition becomes asubjective one—the father’s prohibition andauthority is moved from a perceived state ofreality to an internal psychical system. Al-though this objective condition changeswhen the child becomes an independentadult, the superego’s prohibition does not.Consequently, a conditional state of reality isgiven illusive permanence through itsintrojection. If the identification is too suc-cessful, the child will not ultimately modifythe real to allow for satisfaction, but insteadsimply take over the father’s job of prohibi-tion, reinforcing the condition of privation.Freud, unlike Benjamin, is careful to empha-size this danger:

The more powerful the Oedipus complexwas and the more rapidly it succumbed torepression (under the influence of author-ity, religious teaching, schooling and read-ing) the stricter will be the domination ofthe super-ego over the ego later on—in theform of conscience or perhaps of an uncon-scious sense of guilt.54

The super-ego retained essential featuresof the introjected persons—their strength,their severity, their inclination to superviseand to punish. As I have said elsewhere, it iseasily conceivable that, thanks to the diffu-sion of instinct that occurs along with this in-troduction into the ego, the severity was in-creased. The super-ego—the conscience atwork in the ego—may then become harsh,cruel and inexorable against the ego which isin its charge.55

Adorno’s description of regressive listen-ing fits Freud’s analysis of the excessivelysevere super-ego. The regressive listener’srefusal to recognize alternative qualities inthe commodity (and thus the possibility ofalternative forms of production) is a compul-sive obedience to historical authority at theexpense of the reality principle. As we saw inBenjamin’s theory, when the audience mas-ters the shock of the commodity, the possi-bility of controlling commodities becomesobjectively real. However, because consum-ers have identified with the self-prohibitivecharacter of the alienated producer and notwith a truly active producer, they compul-sively reject this possibility. Their eventualactivity, rather than being a rejection ofalienated production, is a repetition of it.Adorno labels this “pseudo-activity,” or “theimitative assimilation to commodity mod-els.”56

If, as Freud claims, the super-ego takes onthe character of the models with which thesubject has identified, then Adorno is right tocriticize Benjamin’s theory of distracted lis-tening. Although the audience is distractedfrom the auratic qualities of the commodity,

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fetishism is no longer the problem. Distrac-tion from fetishistic aura is also, like “regres-sive listening,” a distraction from exceptionsand alternatives to the alienated commodity.If the subject attends only to shock, and notto the possibility of its removal, then identifi-cation with the producer is training inself-betrayal. Benjaminian “expertise” pre-pares the subject for the expert reproductionof the condition of alienation:

The new listeners resemble mechanicswho are simultaneously specialized andcapable of supplying their special skills tounexpected places. . . . The more easilythey meet the demands of the day, the morerigidly they are subordinated to that sys-tem.57

Conclusion

Benjamin has, against Adorno, correctlydiagnosed a decline in Freudian-style fetish-ism, a decline evidenced by the necessity ofthe non-fetishistic strategy of disavowal ofalternatives. However, he is mistaken to im-ply that the decline of aura involves a declinein the Marxian version of commodity fetish-ism. The distracted audience’s identificationwith the expert or author does not breakdown the illusion of the alienated commod-ity’s authority. On the contrary, it may be theactive acceptance and reinforcement of thatauthority. Benjamin’s audience members de-velop a tolerance for shock and recognize theproduct’s dependence upon the producer.But this is not sufficient to cause a decline inMarxian fetishism. They must also recog-nize the producer’s possible independencefrom the dominant mode of production—that is, the producer’s ability to produce in anew way.

Given Benjamin’s theory, such recogni-tion is unlikely for two reasons. First, the au-dience’s practiced ability to endure shockand expert knowledge of current commodi-ties significantly reduces the motivation totransform production. Once the subject has

become accustomed to the alienated com-modity, it is easier to adapt to the currentforms of production rather than to transformthem. Second, distracted listening involvesattention to shock or danger and distractionfrom the illusory aura of social relation. Be-cause the subject’s real condition is alien-ation, it is only in the auratic qualities ofartworks or products that she can encounterthe possibility of an alternative. The auraticis illusory as a seemingly present social rela-tion, but not in its implication of the objec-tive possibility of such a condition. WhileBenjamin is quite aware of this element oftruth in the auratic,58 his own theories of dis-tracted reception and the decline of aura sug-gest that the truth of the auratic is likely to gounnoticed by the subject.

Adorno, on the contrary, is painfullyaware of this difficulty. He wisely rejects thenotion that repetitive-identification withcommodity models will lead to the overcom-ing of Marxian alienation. And he correctlypoints out that the changes in receptionnoted by Benjamin are in accordance withthe authority of the alienated commodity andtend to preserve Marxian alienation. How-ever, he mistakenly believes that regressivelistening includes and supports fetishism inthe Freudian sense, leading him to rejectBenjamin’s theory of a decline of fetishism.

Adorno’s mistaken view of contemporaryreception has troublesome consequences forhis demands upon contemporary artwork.The danger of the contemporary situation isnot fetishism, but what I have called the“pathological realism” of regressive listen-ing. The danger of distracted or regressivereception is that the preparation for an activerelation to production involves repeated en-counters with alienating products and identi-fication with alienated producers. The lackof attention to products that resist alienationis also an incapacity to recognize the possi-bility of alternative products and forms ofproduction. Trained in the alienated produc-tion of alienating commodities, the subject’spotential activity is likely to maintain the

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condition of social privation. If Marxianalienation can be overcome, it can only be bythe audience’s repeated exposure to excep-tions to alienated production. In Freudianlanguage, they must form their “super-egos”by identification with the producers of alter-native cultural products.

However, Adorno’s demands upon con-temporary artwork imply precisely the op-posite. He claims that regressive listeners re-ceive artworks in a vulgarized way—as acollection of isolated, culinary momentsrather than as a synthesis of those moments.In its reception, the artwork becomes onecommodity among others:

No longer do the partial moments serve asa critique of the whole; instead they sus-pend the critique which the successful es-thetic totality exerts against the flawed oneof society. . . . They [isolated moments ofenjoyment] are not bad in themselves butin their diversionary function. In the ser-vice of success they renounce that insubor-dinate character which was theirs.59

On Adorno’s view, this conversion of the art-work into commodity is fetishistic; immedi-ate pleasure in isolated, enjoyable momentsenhances the illusion of achieved satisfac-tion and obviates the need for social change(as well as the need to attend to the work as awhole).

I have argued, on the contrary, that regres-sive listening is not fetishistic. If regressivelisteners are diverted by the isolated mo-ments of the work, it is not because the mo-ments provide substitute gratification, butbecause (as Adorno has himself claimed) anartwork as a whole presents an alternative tothe commodity, and threatens the listeners’complaisance to alienation. Consequently,the conversion in listening of the artworkinto commodity simply means that the lis-teners have missed the work’s critique, notthat they have undermined it by finding fe-tishistic satisfaction in it. The audience ei-ther does not find anything at all or receives

the artwork as identical to any other com-modity—that is, as a tolerated privation offull satisfaction. If this is correct, then thevulgarization of the artwork in listening doesnot encourage fetishistic illusion. Admit-tedly, the artwork will have little critical im-pact on the audience, but it will not, at least,have a negative one. The individual “mo-ments” of the artwork lose their once “insub-ordinate character,” but they do not “con-spire against freedom.”60 They becomeinnocuous, not pernicious.

Adorno’s conviction that the partial mo-ments of the artwork have pernicious effectsgrounds his demand for an advanced, “as-cetic” form of artwork that “has renouncedconsumption.”61 The traitorous “moments ofenjoyment” (he also calls them moments ofgaiety, impulse, sensuality, charm, etc.—see272–74) must be eliminated from the art-work. This demand changes the entire natureof the artwork’s critique. Originally, the syn-thesis of these subjective moments in theunified work presented “the image of a so-cial condition in which above those particu-lar moments of happiness would be morethan mere appearance.”62 But when the mo-ments of happiness are excised, the image ofpossible social reconciliation is lost. The ad-vanced work of art instead “records nega-tively” the possibility of happiness: “thepromise of happiness, once the definition ofart, can no longer be found except where themask has been torn from the countenance offalse happiness.”63 The ascetic work of artprovides a non-fetishistic image of our realcondition rather than a hopeful image of pos-sible alternatives to that condition.

However, Adorno has repeatedBenjamin’s mistake. Both thinkers seek toovercome the fetishistic illusion of happi-ness, a danger that is already in decline. Aswe have seen in our criticism of Benjamin’stheory, the danger is precisely the oppo-site—the despair of the possibility of happi-ness. What is needed in order to bring aboutreconciliation is the presentation of alterna-

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tive satisfaction—precisely what Adornohas forbidden in art. The ascetic artwork thatAdorno endorses tells the subject preciselywhat she already knows too well: that thecurrent condition is one of alienation anddissatisfaction. More importantly, the as-cetic work reinforces the regressive lis-tener’s belief that the current condition is theonly possible one. The listener’s despair isgrounded in the faithful perception of realconditions. If artistic asceticism decreasesthe number of exceptions to alienation en-countered in the real, then the true danger—the illusion of alienation’s necessity—will

be reinforced. By renouncing the presenta-tion of possible happiness, the artwork de-spairs both of its own possibility and that ofits audience. It may be true that regressivelisteners are currently incapable of receivingan artwork as a synthesized whole, butAdorno’s demands would ensure that theyremain incapable of doing so. Ironically,Adorno’s ascetic artwork is precisely whatthe “pseudo-activity” of Benjamin’s “ex-pert” is accused of being—the dutiful repro-duction of alienation without any intimationof alternate possibility.

ENDNOTES

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1. Karl Marx, Capital: A Critique of Political Econ-

omy, trans. Samuel Moore and Edward Aveling

(New York: The Modern Library/Charles H. Kerr

and Company, 1906), p. 83.2. Ibid., p. 84.3. Ibid., p. 83.4. Ibid., p. 93.5. Ibid.6. Sigmund Freud, “Fetishism,” in The Standard Edi-

tion of the Complete Psychological Works of

Sigmund Freud, trans. James Strachey, (London:

Vintage/Random House, 2001), 21:152–53.7. Ibid.8. Note that the child’s interest in the fantasized ma-

ternal phallus is not, according to Freud, an interest

in a body-part qua object. The fetishist preserves

the maternal phallus only because it refutes the fa-

ther’s threat of castration, and not because he de-

sires an object rather than a subject. Its existence is

necessary in order for the child to defy the prohibi-

tion of incest; it represents the safety, and hence

the possibility, of an authentic relation to another

subject.9. Freud, Three Essays on the Theory of Sexuality, in

The Standard Edition, 7:153.10. It should be emphasized that Freud does not distin-

guish deviations from heterosexuality in norma-

tive terms. However, he does consider “pathologi-

cal” those forms of sexuality which (as can be the

case in fetishism) renounce the instinctual aim of

the removal of the organic stimulus of the in-

stinct—i.e., the renunciation of sexual satisfaction

(ibid., pp. 154 and 161). The analogy to Marxian

alienation holds for both pathological and

non-pathological forms of Freudian fetishism,

since in both cases a relation to an object replaces a

relation to a subject.11. Walter Benjamin, “On Some Motifs in

Baudelaire,” in Illuminations, ed. Hannah Arendt,

trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Schocken Books,

1969), p. 188.12. Ibid.13. Ibid. See also Walter Benjamin, “The Work of Art

in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” in Illu-

minations, Section III, pp. 222–23.14. Benjamin, “Work of Art,” p. 220.15. Ibid., 221.16. Theodor W. Adorno, “On the Fetish Character in

Music and the Regression of Listening,” trans.

Maurice Goldbloom, in The Essential Frankfurt

School Reader, ed. Andrew Arato and Eike

Gebhardt (New York: The Continuum Publishing

Company, 1998), p. 279.17. Ibid., 290. Compare Freud, “Splitting of the Ego in

the Process of Defense,” The Standard Edition,

23:277, “He [the fetishist] created a substitute for

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the penis which he missed in females. . . . He ef-

fected no more than a displacement of value.”18. Marx, Capital, p. 84.19. The difference between the two can be compared

to the Freudian distinction between non-patholog-

ical and pathological fetishism. In non-pathologi-

cal fetishism, the aim of a sexual relation with the

mother is not given up, but preserved through the

fetish. The fetish as phallic substitute preserves the

child’s identification with the mother, and denies

the threat of castration. By mediating his relation-

ship to another subject with an object that repre-

sents her identity to and safety for his own body, he

establishes a fantasized relation to that subject. In

pathological fetishism, on the contrary, the sexual

aim—and with it the desire for a sexual relation

with another subject—is given up as inferior to the

fetish. The fetish no longer mediates between the

child and another subject, but instead becomes the

sole object of desire. In both cases, the privation of

authentic sexual satisfaction is not acknowledged.20. Benjamin, “Baudelaire,” p. 194.21. Benjamin, “Work of Art,” p. 223.22. Ibid., p. 221.23. Benjamin, “Baudelaire,” p. 194.24. Ibid., 175. See also “Work of Art,” p. 250, note 19.25. Benjamin, “Baudelaire,” pp. 160–62.26. Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle, in The Stan-

dard Edition, 18:31–32.27. Benjamin, “Baudelaire,” p. 175.28. Benjamin, “Work of Art,” p. 270.29. Ibid., p. 238.30. Ibid., p. 240.31. Ibid., p. 238.32. Ibid., p. 240.33. Ibid., p. 239.34. Freud, Beyond the Pleasure Principle, 18:15.35. Freud, The Ego and the Id, in The Standard Edi-

tion, 19:34.36. Benjamin, “Work of Art,” pp. 228–29.37. Ibid., p. 231.38. Adorno, “On the Fetish Character in Music,” p.

287.39. Ibid., pp. 287–88.40. Ibid., p. 286. See also p. 287: “Together with sport

and film, mass music and the new listening help to

make escape from the whole infantile milieu im-

possible. The sickness has a preservative

function.” And see pp. 291–92: “Their [regressive

listeners’] revolts against fetishism only entangle

them more deeply in it.”41. Ibid., p. 286.42. Ibid., 290. See also pp. 286–87: “They are not

merely turned away from more important music,

but they are confirmed in their neurotic stupid-

ity…the assent to hit songs and debased cultural

goods belongs to the same complex of symptoms as

do those faces of which one no longer knows

whether the film has alienated them from reality or

reality has alienated them from the film . . .” (my

emphasis).43. See also Adorno, p. 278: “values are consumed and

draw feelings to themselves, without their specific

qualities being reached by the consciousness of the

consumer,” and p. 286: “the listening subjects lose,

along with freedom of choice and responsibility,

the capacity for conscious perception of music.”

This is actually more consistent with psychosis

than neurosis. Freud describes the former as dis-

avowal of an external reality, the latter as repres-

sion of an instinct (“Fetishism,” p. 155). Nonethe-

less, in both cases, a threatening idea is withheld

from consciousness.44. Freud, “The Splitting of the Ego in the Process of

Defence,” The Standard Edition, 23:275–76,

“Both of the parties to the dispute obtain their

share: the instinct is allowed to retain its satisfac-

tion and proper respect is shown to reality.”45. The sexual fetishist does not believe the castration

threat, since the presence of the fetish prevents the

seeming verification of that threat. Consequently,

the fetishist does not believe that a non-fetishistic

sexual relation with another subject is impossible,

only that it is not desired. The alternative to fetish-

ism is recognized, but devalued.46. Adorno, “On the Fetish Character in Music,” p.

278: “This is the real secret of success. It is the

mere reflection of what one pays in the market for

the product. The consumer is really worshipping

the money that he himself has paid for the ticket to

the Toscanini concert.”

University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario M5S 1A1, Canada

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47. Ibid., p. 286.48. Ibid., p. 280.49. For example, two nearly identical commodities

with drastically different exchange-values defy

the fetishistic equation of exchange-value and

use-value. A commodity fetishist would believe

that the object of higher exchange-value is more

satisfying, a belief made impossible by an ex-

tremely close qualitative similarity between the

objects. In addition, the standardization of com-

modities makes the strategy of reconciliation

through possession unnecessary. If a new com-

modity is identical to one already possessed—i.e.,

if it is overly familiar—it lacks the threat of alien-

ation that motivates consumption. Without an as-

pect of “terror” (as Adorno describes it) or “shock”

(as Benjamin puts it) there is no need to, in

Adorno’s words, “purchase spiritual peace by

making the imposed goods literally [one’s] own

thing” (p. 287). In Benjamin’s language, there is

no need for shock training when commodities

cease to shock. This results in indifference to new

commodities through familiarity (Benjamin’s

“habit”)—despite the fetishistic allure of their ex-

change-value.50. Ibid., p. 288.51. Ibid., p. 290.52. Ibid., p. 286.53. Compare ibid., p. 297: “But technically consistent,

harmonious mass music purified of all the ele-

ments of bad pretense would turn into art music

and at once lose its mass basis. All attempts at rec-

onciliation, whether by market-oriented artists or

collectively-oriented art educators, are fruitless.”

Such severely pessimistic conclusions in

Adorno’s essay bear strong traits of Marxian alien-

ation, the illusion that the given exhausts the possi-

bilities of the real.54. Freud, The Ego and the Id, pp. 34–35.55. Freud, “The Economic Problem of Masochism,”

The Standard Edition, 19:167.56. Adorno, “On the Fetish Character in Music,” p.

292.57. Ibid., p. 294.58. See, for example, “Paris, Capital of the Nineteenth

Century,” in Reflections (New York: Harvest/HBJ

Books, 1979), 148: “In the dream in which, before

the eyes of each epoch, that which is to follow ap-

pears in images, the latter appears wedded to ele-

ments from prehistory, that is, of a classless soci-

ety. Intimations of this, deposited in the

unconscious of the collective, mingle with the new

to produce the utopia that has left its traces in thou-

sands of configurations of life, from permanent

buildings to fleeting fashions.”59. Adorno, “On the Fetish Character in Music,” p.

273.60. Ibid.61. Ibid., p. 276.62. Ibid., p. 273.63. Ibid., p. 274.