Hegemonic disease

After the postmodern, the altermodern, the digimodern and performatism ("Successor states to an empire in free fall", May), how about the virmodern? Namely, that stage of capitalism where the profiteering culture spreads everywhere and into everything, living off human energies, leaving some areas as wastelands as it mobiles off to - cheaper - spots, making money for those who already have loads: the sponger mega-rich (see Stephen Haseler's Meltdown: How The 'Masters of the Universe' Destroyed The West's Power and Prosperity, 2008).

This virus, sometimes assisted by war and always by the state, brings with it virtuality: from bullshit "mission statements" (equal opportunities for all!) to virtual/digi-entertainment, the dismissal of objectivity and the lie that there is no alternative.

Mike Belbin, London.