Guy Debord Quotes

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• Young people everywhere have been allowed to choose between love and a garbage disposal unit. Everywhere they have chosen the garbage disposal unit.

  Guy Debord

  Love, Funny, Humorous

  83 Copy quote

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• In societies where modern conditions of production prevail, all of life presents itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles. Everything that was directly lived has moved away into a representation.

  Guy Debord

  Modern, Accumulation, Representation

  Guy Debord (2012). “Society Of The Spectacle”, p.30, Bread and Circuses Publishing

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• In our society now, we prefer to see ourselves living than living.

  Guy Debord

  Our Society

  61 Copy quote

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• Where the real world changes into simple images, the simple images become real beings and effective motivations of hypnotic behavior.

  Guy Debord

  Motivation, Real, Simple

  Guy Debord (2012). “Society Of The Spectacle”, p.32, Bread and Circuses Publishing

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• Quotations are useful in periods of ignorance or obscurantist beliefs.

  Guy Debord

  Ignorance, Belief, Periods

  Panegyric pt. 1 (1989)

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• The spectacle is not a collection of images, but a social relation among people, mediated by images.

  Guy Debord

  People, Social, Relation

  Guy Debord (2012). “Society Of The Spectacle”, p.30, Bread and Circuses Publishing

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• In a world that has REALLY been turned on its head, truth is a moment of falsehood.

  Guy Debord

  World, Moments, Truth Is

  Guy Debord (1994). “The Society of the Spectacle”, Zone Books (NY)

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• Revolution is not 'showing' life to people, but making them live. A revolutionary organization must always remember that its objective is not getting its adherents to listen to convincing talks by expert leaders, but getting them to speak for themselves, in order to achieve, or at least strive toward, an equal degree of participation.

  Guy Debord

  Order, Organization, People

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• With the destruction of history, contemporary events themselves retreat into a remote and fabulous realm of unverifiable stories, uncheckable statistics, unlikely explanations and untenable reasoning.

  Guy Debord

  Events, Stories, Statistics

  Guy Debord (1998). “Comments on the Society of the Spectacle”, p.16, Verso

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• The spectacle is the bad dream of a modern society in chains and ultimately expresses nothing more than its wish for sleep. The spectacle is the guardian of that sleep.

  Guy Debord

  Dream, Sleep, Wish

  Guy Debord (2014). “The Society of the Spectacle”, p.7, Bureau of Public Secrets

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• ... just as early industrial capitalism moved the focus of existence from being to having, post-industrial culture has moved that focus from having to appearing.

  Guy Debord

  Focus, Culture, Existence

  38 Copy quote

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• The more powerful the class, the more it claims not to exist.

  Guy Debord

  Powerful, Class, Claims

  Guy Debord (2014). “The Society of the Spectacle”, p.39, Bureau of Public Secrets

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• All that once was directly lived has become mere representation.

  Guy Debord

  Representation, Mere

  Guy Debord (1994). “The Society of the Spectacle”, Zone Books (NY)

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• Boredom is always counter-revolutionary. Always.

  Guy Debord

  Boredom, Revolutionary

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• The more powerful the class, the more it claims not to exist, and its power is employed above all to enforce this claim. It is modest only on this one point, however, because this officially nonexistent bureaucracy simultaneously attributes the crowning achievements of history to its own infallible leadership. Though its existence is everywhere in evidence, the bureaucracy must be invisible as a class. As a result, all social life becomes insane.

  Guy Debord

  Powerful, Class, Achievement

  Guy Debord (2014). “The Society of the Spectacle”, p.39, Bureau of Public Secrets

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• Like lost children we live our unfinished adventures.

  Guy Debord

  Children, Adventure, Lost

  Guy Debord, Ken Knabb (2003). “Complete cinematic works: scripts, stills, documents”, A K Pr Distribution

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• He will essentially follow the language of the spectacle, for it is the only one he is familiar with.

  Guy Debord

  Language, Familiar

  Guy Debord (1998). “Comments on the Society of the Spectacle”, p.31, Verso

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• Art need no longer be an account of past sensations. It can become the direct organization of more highly evolved sensations. It is a question of producing ourselves, not things that enslave us.

  Guy Debord

  Art, Past, Organization

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• The story of terrorism is written by the state and it is therefore highly instructive… compared with terrorism, everything else must be acceptable, or in any case more rational and democratic.

  Guy Debord

  Stories, Terrorism, States

  Guy Debord (1998). “Comments on the Society of the Spectacle”, p.24, Verso

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• It is hardly surprising that children should enthusiastically start their education at an early age with the Absolute Knowledge of computer science; while they are unable to read, for reading demands making judgments at every line. Conversation is almost dead, and soon so too will be those who knew how to speak.

  Guy Debord

  Children, Reading, Age

  Guy Debord (1998). “Comments on the Society of the Spectacle”, p.29, Verso

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• Work is only justified by leisure time. To admit the emptiness of leisure time is to admit the impossibility of life.

  Guy Debord

  Leisure, Emptiness, Justified

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• people who personify the system are indeed well known for not being what they seem to be; they have achieved greatness by embracing a level of reality lower than that of the most insignificant individual life- and everyone knows it.

  Guy Debord

  Life, Reality, Greatness

  Guy Debord (1994). “The Society of the Spectacle”, Zone Books (NY)

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• None of the activity stolen by work can be regained by submitting to what work has produced. - The Society of The Spectacle

  Guy Debord

  Stolen, Activity

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• What appears is good; what is good appears.

  Guy Debord

  Guy Debord (2014). “The Society of the Spectacle”, p.5, Bureau of Public Secrets

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• Art ... can become the direct organisation of more highly evolved sensations.

  Guy Debord

  Art, Organisation, Direct

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