I don't think that analogizing the documentary to a thing generally associated with distaste is apt in anyway. The documentary is an art form just as an other form of film making is an art form. Bringing it to the level of textbooks or vegetables assumes a negative connotation that the documentary can rise above, rather than a high platform for it to fall from.
Documentaries do present reality from one perspective. Of course reality is something differing from every perspective and way of viewing the world. One persons reality may be different than another, most likely the documentary is true to only one such perspective of the world but in that sense it is true.
Baudrillard is not arguing that their was never a conflict but rather that their was never a war. A war implies to foes on sound footing who attack one another but the conflict in the gulf, according to Baudrillard, was rather a US assault on a foreign entity. In the end it was a showing of US strength, not of war.
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Adam, your claim that 'reality is something differ[ent] from every perspective' is provocative. This is the sort of issue that it's very hard to get our heads around, but here's something to consider: you and I can differ in our perspectives on the world, no doubt; however, aren't there times at least where one of us may be right and the other wrong? If I see a robber wearing a blue shirt and you see one wearing a red shirt, we wouldn't say we're both right, would we? Wouldn't there be a fact of the matter whether the robber was wearing a certain color shirt? Or if I say I believe 2 + 2 = 5, would you simply accept that as a different perspective?
ReplyDeleteI would agree that a documentary is more of an art form than a textbook example. The manipulation, whether it be conscious or not, of what claims to be reality must take consideration in order to more closely match or compliment the subject matter. This preparation, I would argue, relates to the preparation an artist must undergo before creating where as a textbook just informs.
ReplyDeleteI would counter the claim about their being possible definite forms of reality by saying it's only definite as long as we make it so. In George Orwell's 1984 Orwell points out that if the state declares 2+2=5 and gets enough people to believe it, then when does it stop being completely wrong and at least become drawn into question. We only know certain facts to be true because we are told they are, anything is questionable and even changeable with the right amount of force.
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