The consumerism of misinformation in health: the abject objects of desire

Abstract

The challenge of analyzing the infodemic distortion and avid consumption of fake news is linked to the complexity of production, dissemination, and contamination of the social imagination. The modalities of uninformative situations and gaps in the conceptual framework fall into indeterminacy, although scant attention has been devoted to the reception of messages. This paper refers to the technological and cultural circumstances from which the production and uncontrollable consumption of lies thrive, often justified for different purposes. The centrality of mass deception is highlighted as an aggression to politics and public health in a socio-cultural context in which the addiction to excitement has become structural. Analytical tools from Türcke’s Philosophy of Sensation are used to understand the phenomenon of uninterrupted production of stimuli and imagery artifacts that incite addiction in narratives of deception and interactions without any relationship. The conclusion drawn is that in the context of the current “Media Age”, new forms of ideology and alienation are involved in consumption cycles. The needs of group identity generate speech without dialogue and deterioration of communicative processes in which the power of conviction prevails over fact.