Philosopher Byung-Chul Han And The ‘hell Where Everything Is The Same’
Byung-Chul Han is a philosopher and writer from South Korea. He has gained a lot of influence over the years. He thinks about many different topics, but mainly focuses on technology and how it shapes culture. He has also devoted much of his writing to working and creating.
To date, Byung-Chul Han has already published 16 books. In these books he has followed two different directions. One of these is ‘the burnout society’ and the other is the ‘transparency society.’ He is very critical of the contemporary world. According to him, people exploit themselves and are afraid of everything that is ‘different’. That’s why he talks about ‘hell where everything is the same’.
Many people will tell you that you really need to read Byung-Chul Han’s books if you want to understand the contemporary world. He has an original, deep and above all very current perspective. He is one of the few thinkers who really thinks about things like social media, privacy and the society of mental dysfunction.
He caused quite a stir in interviews during a visit to Spain. In these interviews, he summed up some of his basic concepts. We’re going to try to paint a general picture of what he was talking about.
The illusion of freedom according to Byung-Chul Han
According to him, freedom is nothing more than an illusion in this age. What we have — in his view — in place of real freedom is voluntary slavery. An example: we have the so-called freedom of expression, including on social media. However, the authorities use this as a means of keeping an eye on the people.
Byung-Chul Han says people have an almost pornographic desire to expose their private lives. We brag about our thoughts, private moments, feelings and everything we are or want to be through social media. We all do this ‘voluntarily’. The people in positions of power don’t even have to snoop around or spy on people because we release the information voluntarily.
In a similar vein, people have ‘voluntarily’ given up on a way of producing things that focuses on self-satisfaction. Byung-Chul Han says that self-satisfaction is actually more like self-exploitation. The end product of all this is an emotionally and physically exhausted, tired worker.
The hell where everything is the same and everyone is intolerant of everything that is ‘different’
Some of his thoughts are about similarity and difference. He says that the fact that people see themselves as individuals is another illusion. Everyone wants to be different because everything is the same. This desire is proof that our thinking patterns in general are very similar.
What emerges from this is radical conformism. People accept the ‘live like everyone else’ way of life. They endlessly produce things and brag about themselves for no reason because the definition of ‘success’ they have internalized demands it of them. Depression and anxiety are on the other side of that coin. We get sick for mysterious reasons. Byung-Chul Han thinks this system is stable and virtually unbreakable. He calls it ‘neoliberalism’.
According to him, we need a revolution in our use of time. There’s nothing hypocritical about his statement: “ …time spent on work is wasted time, not time for yourself. On the one hand, this means we need free time. This kind of time should feel like a vacation where you can drop everything for a while. It’s not a break where you pick up the thread a little later. He talks about personal free time where you don’t have to do anything ‘productive’ (according to neoliberalism).
The ideas of this philosopher are new and provocative. His criticism is sharp and direct. However, it is also thoughtful and well argued. Many of his books have been translated into English and you can even find some of them for free on the internet. We recommend anyone who is not happy with the way things are going to start reading these books as soon as possible.
