Fake news and the ritualisation of the self

Abstract

Two hundred years have passed since the question of subjectivity (re-interpreted through Kierkegaard’s existentialism) became central in modern philosophy. Over these two centuries, multiple theories addressed and questioned the borders between authentic subjectivity and an internalized panopticon of the hegemonic views that dominate the subject. Nevertheless, they still have to be definitively defined. As we may try to point Fake News (FN) is an opponent to subjectivity, and yet it comes from the subject. FN is the intentional spreading through new technologies of false information on a global level by subjects that use social media, a process influencing not only the sense of socio-political reality but also the concept of identity. Identities (personal or collective) are in general the combination of the socially determined understanding of "who I am" and the socially and psychologically influenced "mental model" of "what the world - and the self within it - should be", all expressed and produced under the fundamental influence of our idiosyncratic characteristics.