Published: September 14, 2025
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My Adorno hot take is that the mass culture stuff is often too optimistic, since Adorno sees a lot of potential in the way that the “popular” quickly becomes obsolete such that formerly adoring fans come to relate to it spitefully, and he seems to think that through public-
facing pedagogy via radio etc. that he could maybe help people to cultivate critical self-awareness regarding this spite, about its origins in social objectivity, and that then this spite might become the fury of revolutionary praxis. For Adorno the distinction between total
catastrophe and the transformation of social reality into a paradise for all is everything and also such a tiny step.