Once the masses were controlled secretly or by force, today the algorithm does it publicly and with your permission. And people think they are free, because they choose the color of their own chains of slavery, says the collective Laibach in an interview for "Vreme".
Laibach has long been no longer just a former Yugoslav and Slovenian music group. It has been a planetary art collective that has been considering the phenomenon for several decades totalitarianism through all manifestations.
They first registered it in the territory of SFRY back in the eighties, and in the meantime they expanded their horizons to Europe and the world. It could be said that almost all of Laibach's predictions - at first seemingly controversial - have been fully fulfilled.
However, does the present day exceed even the wildest imagination of these innovative philosophers of the new sound? Let's say in popular culture?
"Totalitarianism in popular culture is no longer hidden - it has become explicit and even fun," answers this collective in an interview for "Vreme", which hits newsstands on Thursday (March 6).
"Once the masses were controlled secretly or by force, today an algorithm does it publicly and with your permission through songs, trends, memes and continuous stimulation." He knows what you want before you even know it. And people still think they are free, because they choose the color and length of their own chains of slavery."
The anomaly is added to the playlist
As they state, Laibach is still an anomaly in the system, but that system has become more sophisticated - it does not prohibit, but integrates.
"The danger is no longer in repression, but in absorption. Any provocation can become just another filter on Instagram, another subtitle in the entertainment industry. The distraction is not turned off, but added to the playlist. Danger? It's possible," says Laibach.
"How to screw up the system?" Maybe by giving him what he wants - but in a way he can't digest. But if we are a 'predictable error', we must behave like a virus and mutate faster than the system can recognize us. Or even more radically - let's start enjoying that system ourselves, maybe that way we'll force it to self-destruct."
Read the entire interview with Laibach in the new issue of "Vremena" from Thursday (March 6). Buy at the kiosk or subscribe to the print or online edition.
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