Somewhere in the deeps of her essay, Morse deploys the term mall
rat, whom she parenthetically defines as “nonconsuming loiterers.” So much
is suggested by this passing reference! Too mention just one association Morse’s
aside forcefully brings to mind: anyone remember Vaporwave and its love affair
with malls?
Here’s the “About” section of a Vaporwave subreddit:
Global capitalism is nearly there. At the end of the world there will only be liquid advertisement and gaseous desire. Sublimated from our bodies, our untethered senses will endlessly ride escalators through pristine artificial environments, more and less than human, drugged-up and drugged down, catalysed, consuming and consumed by a relentlessly rich economy of sensory information, valued by the pixel. The Virtual Plaza welcomes you, and you will welcome it too.
Two things are clear: vaporwave
subculture articulates the precise associations Morse and others map between
the space of the mall and desire under capitalism strikingly well, and they do
it with a totally different affect. The sparkly-shiny interiors of empty malls,
offered up for visual consumption over screens and set to glitched-out ambient
music, speak to a joyous possibility latent within the depressive conditions of life under capitalism. Like mall-ratting, vaporwave is non-purposive and redolent
of flânerie, a playground for nonconsuming loiterers.
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