a 2018 article by Margaret McCartney
"Checking social media is the new opening the fridge
when you're not hungry."
— Matthew Kobach
“Vulgarity is too mild a word for what unfolded on the steps
of the museum, since vulgarity implies a coarse vitality. The 2026 gala was a
pageant of decay so far gone in self-parody that one struggled to know whether
to laugh, vomit, or check out eBay for a working replica of Dr Guillotin’s
invention.”[1]
David North
The Twittering Machine is a provocative and often insightful
book, drawing on psychoanalysis, cultural theory, and political economy to
argue that social media is not a neutral tool but a machine that reshapes minds.
Oliver Eagleton, in his review of the book, remarked that a
“cadre of cyber-utopian theorists” was instrumental in reshaping subjectivity,
attracting attention, and profiting from provoking outrage and anxiety.
Eagleton commended the book, acknowledging Seymour as a significant voice. He emphasised
that the book provides a critical analysis of social media platforms,
particularly Twitter and Facebook, and similar sites, concentrating on their
role as catalysts of addiction and compulsive self-disclosure within the
"social industry."[2]
Eagleton is right to point out the genuine merits in parts
of Seymour's critique. He points out
that the platforms are not neutral public spaces; they are capitalist
enterprises whose business model is the commodification of human attention and
social interaction. He is right that the dopamine-loop dynamics of
"likes," retweets, and algorithmic amplification are deliberately
engineered to maximise engagement at the cost of critical thought. And he is
right that the platforms have become instruments of surveillance capitalism, as
Shoshana Zuboff has also analysed.[3]
The Pseudo Lefts
and Social Media
However, the book's limitations reflect Seymour's own
political limitations. Seymour is associated with the British pseudo-left, a
product of the Socialist Workers Party milieu, who moved toward a kind of
post-Marxist cultural politics after the SWP's crisis. His analytical toolkit
leans heavily on psychoanalysis (particularly Lacanian concepts) and Frankfurt
School-inflected critical theory rather than on classical Marxism. This leads
to some characteristic weaknesses:
Social media platforms such as Twitter/X, Instagram, TikTok,
and Substack have become dominant spaces where pseudo-left politics often
replicates itself, for understandable reasons. The pseudo-left's focus isn't on
comprehensive political education for workers or on forming a revolutionary
party. Instead, it centres on gaining visibility, developing a brand, and
wielding cultural influence within a specific segment of the educated
upper-middle class. Social media is suited for this because it fosters outrage,
identity-driven appeals, and viral controversies, all without requiring a solid
theoretical or historical foundation. What looks like "left politics"
online is largely a spectacle: hashtag campaigns, call-out culture, aesthetic
radicalism, and the promotion of individual influencers as proxies for real
political programs. The pseudo-left thrives here because it doesn’t need to organise
workers; it only needs to attract followers who already share its class
outlook.
The most critical point that liberal and pseudo-left critics
of social media systematically miss is the class-directed character of
censorship on these platforms. It is not random or neutral. The World Socialist
Website (WSWS) was one of the first to document and expose the coordinated
campaign by Google, Facebook, and Twitter to suppress left-wing, anti-war, and
socialist content. The pseudo left's response, "break up big tech,"
regulate the platforms, and bring antitrust suits, is utterly inadequate. The
problem is not that these monopolies are too big; it is that they are private
property at all. A society that allows a single individual to own the
communications infrastructure through which billions of people engage with public
life has already surrendered democratic governance to the capitalist oligarchy.
The Oligarchs and
Social Media
A significant flaw in the book is Seymour's emphasis on
sociological and psycho-cultural factors, which undermines a comprehensive
class-based analysis. He mainly focuses on subjects, drives, libidinal
investments, and the "social industry," but neglects a thorough
materialist critique of platforms as capitalist monopolies. This includes their
ties to finance capital, involvement in state surveillance, and crucially, the
class struggles of those who control or are harmed by them. The working class,
with its unique interests and potential for revolutionary change, is barely
discussed. Instead, "users" are portrayed as a uniform group of
compulsive individuals, overlooking their exploitation—where their data and
attention are appropriated by monopoly capital.
The connection between oligarchs and social media is a vital
and complex issue at the core of current politics. This relationship is not
accidental; it reflects a basic social truth: the most influential
communications system in history is owned and controlled by a few billionaires,
who leverage it as a tool for class domination.
In Seymour's defence, he's not the only one allowing social
media oligarchs free rein. In The Social Dilemma (2020), Jeff Orlowski offers
what some critics view as a brave exposé of the social media industry,
including interviews with former employees and executives from Google, Twitter,
Facebook, Instagram, and other tech giants. It highlights significant concerns
about how these platforms influence human psychology and negatively impact
society.
However, the WSWS’s Joanne Laurier was heavily critical of
the film, saying the “film proceeds to treat social media entirely apart from
any discussion of economic life and trends, including the important issue of
who owns the giant tech companies and which class interests they pursue. In the
movie, the learned “experts” discuss issues such as mental health and threats
to democracy entirely apart from the massive economic and social crisis and the
moves toward authoritarianism by the ruling elite.
The movie insists that people need to self-censor on social
media. If not, the state should step in, as its lead analyst, Harris (himself a
millionaire), advocated at the Senate hearing. The real target of mass
censorship implemented by the technology giants, on behalf of the state, is the
left-wing political opposition, including workers’ use of social media to
organise strikes and protests outside existing unions. Google, Facebook,
Reddit, and other outlets have systematically targeted the WSWS. Having no
social reforms to offer, the ruling elites see censorship and repression as the
only means by which to prop up their rule. Consciously or not, the makers of
The Social Dilemma offer their services in this endeavour.[4]
What Is to Be
Done?
Seymour’s book concludes without suggesting a clear
political direction. While criticizing the platforms, the implied solutions are
limited to encouraging users to be more reflective or to acknowledge the
platform's underlying logic. It lacks any vision for engaging the working class
politically, connecting to the fight for democratic oversight of communication
tools, or advocating for the nationalization of platforms under workers'
management. This reflects the characteristic of the cultural-critical approach
that has mostly overtaken socialist politics in pseudo-left groups: insightful
critique but ultimately powerless.
In sum, The Twittering Machine is a
culturally alert but politically limited book. It sees capitalism's symptoms
more clearly than it sees capitalism itself, and it has no perspective for the
working class as the agent of social transformation. It is the kind of book
that is intellectually stimulating for a certain layer of the educated middle
class while leaving the working-class reader with no road forward.
[1]
What is it about the Met fashion gala that leads one to think fondly of the
guillotine?
[2]
Mind Forged Manacles? New Left Review 120 Nov/Dec 2019.
[3]
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The Age of Surveillance Capitalism
[4]
The Social Dilemma: The “curse” of social media- www.wsws.org/en/articles/2020/10/20/dile-o20.html
