A bit of cultural theory
Marx theorizes that since the capitalist class (in his terms, the bourgeoisie) owns the Means of Production (MOP), it is inevitable that these rich people will control as well the dominant culture of capitalist society. After all, with bourgeois wealth constantly on the increase and the wealth of the working class (the proletariat) constantly on the decrease, who else has the wherewithal to create widespread and influential social discourse and cultural products?
Marx applies the term ideology to the culture created by the bourgeoisie—a culture that celebrates and instills the ruling ideas, customs, and practices of the owning class. Needless to say, this bourgeois ideology functions to perpetuate the capitalist system. It normalizes or naturalizes capitalism, making it seem to be “human nature” or “the best of all possible worlds.” Preordained bullshit like that. According to Marx, workers consume this contrived ideology and, as a result, all too easily fall into what he calls a false consciousness. That is, the belief that this bougie bullshit is true.
Meanwhile, understandably, the bourgeoisie lives and revels in this self-aggrandizing false consciousness.
Marxist theorists vigorously have debated and developed Marx’s ideas about ideology and false consciousness. For example, Antonio Gramsci (1891-1937) famously advanced the term hegemony for how the bourgeoisie control both the economic and the cultural life of society. Similarly, Louis Althusser (1918-1990) introduced the concept of interpellation (hailing the subject) to explain the process by which individuals are indoctrinated into the status quo of capitalist society. For my money (see how ideology works?), Althusser’s take on cultural production is spot on and to the point. His basic definition of capitalist ideology is this: Ideology represents the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of existence. Moreover, the purpose of this bourgeois fabrication is to convince us that the current social system, the capitalist status quo, works for our own good.
Ideology, then, is both an illusion (the imaginary relationship) and an allusion (the convincing) for Althusser. Simultaneously, capitalist ideology leads us to mis-diagnose the world around us and sets before us a fictional view of the world to believe instead—a false view that serves to mask the inherently abusive practices of capitalism. A well-known instrument for this deception is Althusser’s concept of the Ideological State Apparatus (ISA). These are the many social institutions and customs—school, family, religion, political party, social media, advertising, literature, movies, TV—that coax and charm (and sometimes bully) us into compliance with the status quo by promising rewards for our surrender. (For a full discussion of Althusser’s ideas, please see my post “Reproducing the Regime: Ideology and the Machinery of Power,” 7 June 2023.)
A striking image Althusser offers to help up visualize the indoctrination process taking place is that of “specularity.” Placed at the Center of our cultural experience is “a Unique and Absolute Subject”—that is, in Derrida’s terms, a Transcendental Signified that is supposed to be an absolute, universal, and unquestionable Truth. (Within the ideology of Christianity, God is so placed at the Center.) All members of that society then look into that Center to see and to absorb the qualities and dictates of that Absolute Subject. In innumerable ways, obvious and subtle, that Truth is always before us, asserting its unchallengeable Truth(iness).
Moreover, by looking at that Center, we not only perceive the Absolute Subject, but we see reflected back at us, in a mirror-connection, our own image recast and modified by that Absolute Subject. That is, so inundated are we by the doctrines and beliefs of the Center, gradually we come to accept them as the true and real way of things. By this mirroring we are interpellated into the dominant culture. Or, as Althusser words it, this double specularity “subjects the subjects to the Subject.”
Capitalism is our cultural Center. The Absolute Subject we are all subjected to.
We learn to recognize ourselves and each other as subjects to the Subject. We come to believe, as Althusser writes, “the absolute guarantee that everything really is so, and that on condition that the subjects recognize what they are and behave accordingly, everything will be all right.” (For Althusser’s explanation of this process, see the final section of his essay, “Ideology and Ideological State Apparatuses.”) All ISAs participate in this specular mode of interpellation. Over and over and over again we are immersed in the rationale and the sentiments of Capitalism, so much so that they become impossible to resist and difficult to remove from our thinking and our feeling. Witness my earlier use of the commonplace phrase “for my money” to indicate a preference.
A particularly powerful ISA these days is the TV series that streams over major internet platforms and draws large audiences. We’ll turn now to a consideration of one such Centered program.
Applying this bit of cultural theory
The Gilded Age (2022-current) is a hit show streaming on Max (formerly HBO). To be blunt, The Gilded Age is a terrible and stupid show that I very much enjoy watching. It’s even worse than Downton Abbey (something I didn’t think was possible), which is likewise a show I very much enjoy watching because of its terribleness and stupidity. (One secret to Cultural Studies is that it’s often the bad products of popular culture that reveal the most.). The obvious reason why we’re taking a look at this series is because The Gilded Age places at its Center the Absolute Subject of Capitalism.
Ah, The Gilded Age. Where to start? What a shmaltzy, lightweight, faux-WOKE guilty pleasure of a show it is. It gives us a smattering of social concerns. Feminist issues in the form of plucky, young Marian Brook (Louisa Jacobson) newly arrived in the Big City and looking to earn her way. Racial issues in the form of plucky, young Peggy Scott (Denée Benton) facing down white supremacy as a fearless journalist and aspiring novelist. Class issues in the formulaic trope of the Upstairs/Downstairs divide between Master and Servant. Labor union issues in the form of a couple dozen factory workers on strike in Pittsburg.
But who are we kidding? None of these important issues are treated with anything like acumen or gravity. Each one is a superficial nod in the direction of social complexity and psychological depth of character. These matters seem larded into the script more or less as plot-fillers, simple and repeated elements designed to swell each episode to about an hour and to keep the main storyline afloat. I wouldn’t be surprised if these pseudo-social justice topics weren’t intended, as well, to help viewers feel better about themselves—that is, not quite so guiltily pleasured—by watching such a silly show. (I tell myself I’m watching it because I’m doing serious cultural study...)
Because, let’s face it, at the heart of The Gilded Age is a celebration of American Capitalism.
This celebration takes the form of a melodrama depicting the clash of Old Money versus New Money at the close of the 19th century in America. All of our real attention is wrapped up in the across-the-street rivalry between the Old Money Van Rhijn mansion and the New Money Russell mansion. About 90% of the shots in The Gilded Age situate us in various sumptuous settings of great wealth—vast and ostentatious manor houses, Newport summer homes, garden parties, wood-paneled tycoon offices, opera houses, immaculate and genteel Upper East Side streets, and the like. Honestly, the true point of the show looks to be dressing all the Fine Ladies we see in as many amazingly ornate, giant-bustle-butted costumes possible. The outfits and especially the hats are remarkable...if you’re into venerating that sort of thing.
More specifically, the Absolute Subject at the Center of The Gilded Age is the Russell family. Bertha (Carrie Coon) and George (Morgan Spector) are our melodramatic heroes. Along with their guileless son, Larry (Harry Richardson), and their ingénue daughter, Gladys (Taissa Farmiga), these are the characters for whom we are meant to cheer and with whom we are meant to identify. Why? Because they are us, that is, the present day middle- and upper-middle-class viewers most likely to waste our time watching this stupid show.
And who doesn’t like to see themselves lionized? We are, after all, the winners of the American Dream. Through our exemplary character and tireless hard work, we’ve realized the great promise of Capitalism: that anyone can make it to the top! It’s all bougie bullshit, of course. But an ideological false consciousness is very easy to settle into when you’re the one being celebrated.
To be sure, there are other characters we like and applaud in the series. Across the street, in the Van Rhijn household, Marian of course is a sweetheart as is her Aunt Ada (Cynthia Nixon). Even crotchety and snooty Aunt Agnes (Christine Baranski) betrays, at times, a well-hidden heart of gold. But the entire motion of the plotline is New Money supplanting Old Money, symbolized most in Bertha Russell’s social dueling with Mrs. Astor (Donna Murphy), who is the paragon and gatekeeper of Old Money society in New York City. In my estimation, the vital hook of the show is for us to witness the coming of age of us: the American bourgeoisie with all of our brash social energy and money-making zeal.
Just as the equally silly Downton Abbey never authentically scrutinizes the oppressive privilege of the British aristocracy, feeding us instead alluring and mind-numbing melodrama, The Gilded Age likewise glosses over the enormities of the emerging New Money in America. The show focuses most on what can be seen as the American aristocracy of Old Money falling by the wayside to be replaced by good-old Yankee-Doodle can-do go-go industrial capitalism and the illusion of increased social equality allegedly accompanying that cultural transition.
So let’s do a bit of scrutinizing.
George Russell. What a guy. Devoted husband and father. Dedicated family man. Self-made business mogul. Savvy industrialist and entrepreneur. George is the epitome of the New Money ideal in America. The apex of American hegemonic masculinity that we still worship today. How else could a twofaced orangutan like Trump rise to 40% popularity?
There is one potential downside to George Russell, however. He’s a...well...Robber Baron. One of those particularly vicious 19th-century owners of the MOP who wants all the profit for himself. Those who do the work for him be damned. If this inconvenient truth about George is upsetting to viewers of a socially progressive bent, not to worry. George also reveals himself to be a good egg.
For example, George declines to bang his wife’s personal maid, Turner (Kelley Curran), when that economically desperate servant attempts to seduce him (S1.E4). Bravo, George. In another saintly act, George tells the federal soldiers to stand down just as they are about to open fire on his economically destitute factory workers, the ones who have gone out on strike in Pittsburg. Remarks the kindhearted George, these laborers are, after all, “family men” (S2.E6). Oh, for he’s a jolly good fellow. George also underwrites and “lets” his wife do all their High Society maneuvering.
When it comes to Robber Barons, the bar for good behavior is very low.
If these un-Trump-like expressions of scruples and compassion are upsetting to viewers of a socially conservative bent, not to worry. Ever the hero-businessman, George has a shrewd plan up his sleeve to screw over his disobedient workers even more. The pay-hike he granted is temporary and designed to divide his labor force into opposing factions. In other words, George is engaging in good old-fashioned American union-busting. What a guy.
What a paragon of Capitalist Success for us to admire and emulate.
Bertha Russell. What a gal. This audacious New Money wife aims to social climb at all costs. Why? Not really sure. Apparently, that’s just what New Money does: show off its New Money. The Russell house is ridiculously huge. Its furnishings absurdly overstated. Her hats and dresses push the limits of drag show. All to engage, for some reason, in a pitched battle with Old Money in the form of Opera Wars against Mrs. Astor.
And so?
If, when boiled down, all of Bertha’s bonzo social aspiration schemes seem rather wasteful and vacuous, that’s because they are. They’re funded by George’s Robber Baron fortune; thus, all of this frivolity takes place on the backs of the working poor. The charity work engaged in by Bertha and the other High Society Ladies is better described as oppressor generosity—that is, their efforts do nothing to address the underlying economic problems causing the poverty they pretend to alleviate. Far from tearing down a stilted and haughty Old Money social order to make way for a new and better egalitarian America, then, all Bertha really is doing is striving to take its place. To be the new Mrs. Astor. To put New Money at the top of the social heap.
In other words, Bertha Russell is internalizing the oppressor.
And remember: Bertha’s social climbing is the whole point and focus of the show. Hers is the main plotline. All other story threads orbit around it. Our attention persistently is directed at watching her strategies succeed or fail, at witnessing her fortunes rise and fall. Bertha supplies us with the sharpest sentimental highs and lows of melodrama—always to emerge triumphant! What a gal.
What a paragon of New Money Womanhood for us to admire and emulate.
Therefore: at the Center of The Gilded Age is a 19th-century tradwife suburban McMansion momzilla.
Finally, the servants. Oh, the servants of The Gilded Age. Like the servants of Downton Abbey, the come in binary form: Good Servants/Bad Servants. Good Servants are loyal and uncomplaining and positively thrive in servitude to their benevolent Masters. Bad Servants, in contrast, are treacherous and peevish and chafe under the yoke of their employment. Of course, within the simplistic formula of melodrama, we’re meant to approve of the Good Servants—the humble and noble domestic!—and condemn the Bad Servants—how dare they mutiny against crap pay and zero job security! The servants of The Gilded Age are intended to be received in exactly this way.
With so many Good Servants to choose from on the show, I don’t know which one I find the most nauseating. For the sake of a quick example, let’s go with Jack Treacher (Ben Ahlers) in the employ of the Van Rhijn household. Young, wide-eyed, eager-to-please, Jack has a bright future ahead of him as a domestic slug. With hard work and steadfast devotion, one day he, too, might ascend to the position of Head Butler. Then, for the remainder of his days, he can pretend to be dignified as he shuffles around the manor performing all kinds of shit work—that is, until he grows too old and gets booted out on his ear, decrepit and pensionless.
In a uplifting turn of melodramatic good fortune, though, Jack turns out to be smart enough to repair an alarm clock and secure a patent for his clever invention. Oh, who knew servants had any brains!? These happy developments look to be setting Jack off on the pathway of well-deserved upward mobility. Gosh, he might even become a bourgeoisie Winner—like Us!
“See?” the show is telling viewers. “Capitalism works! If you’re a go-getter, anyone can work his way up to becoming the Crown of Creation: a Businessman!”
Yes, young Jack’s got his bootstraps firmly in hand.
As for the Bad Servants on The Gilded Age, they all suck. Ungrateful and disgruntled miscreants, every last one of them. The worst of the lot is the aforementioned Turner, erstwhile personal maid to Bertha Russell. Not only does Turner try to improve her lot by bedding the Master, George Russell, but she has the temerity, once dismissed from her post, to go out and latch onto a Sugar Daddy of her own, an Old Money old fart named Joshua Winterton (Dakin Matthews). As the now wealthy Mrs. Winterton, Turner then engages in open competition with her former Mistress, looking to outsmart and outshine Bertha in the Opera Wars.
At the apex of their contest, this pair of Gilded Ladies vie for the favor—and the social prestige it brings—of the Duke of Buckingham (Ben Lamb). The dastardly Mrs. Winterton tries to sabotage a splendid dinner party in honor of the Duke hosted by our heroine, Mrs. Russell (S2.E5). Mrs. Winterton enlists the aid of two fellow Bad Servants to carry out the skullduggery—a cook to oversalt the soup (Horrors!) and, when that fails, a manservant to spill hot soup on the Duke (Gadzooks!). Luckily, the sharp-eyed Good Servants of Mrs. Russell manage (Just in the nick of time!) to detect and foil these crimes, thus saving Western Civilization as we know it. Oh, how dare this lowly menial, Turner, social climb in this outrageous and unseemly manner!?
That is to say, how dare Mrs. Winterton do the exact same thing that Mrs. Russell is doing?
So what?
Marx liked Capitalism (it sure beat Feudalism). He liked it so much, in fact, that he wanted everyone to benefit from its MOP—not just the wealthy few. Soon after the French Revolution jumpstarted the decline of European aristocracy, however, the non-aristocratic rich guys decided that the Revolution had progressed quite far enough, thank you. That is, now that they, the bourgeoisie, were starting to run the economic and political show, well, the unwashed masses really shouldn’t be permitted to get too terribly out of hand. Now should they? That just didn’t make sound business sense.
Who else was going to man the factories as wage-slaves and tend to the estates as inferiors?
Consciously or not, the creators of The Gilded Age portray precisely this betrayal of one class by another. No matter how many feel-good social justice issues (feminism, racism, classism) they half-heartedly raise, by making the cynosure of the series the New Money power couple of George and Bertha Russell, the writers place at the Center of the show, for our veneration and as our guide, the Absolute Subject of a cut-throat, laissez-faire brand of Capitalism.
This ideological focal point makes The Gilded Age a grotesquely retrograde show.
Since the 1980s, we’ve been living in The Neoliberal Age. That is, within a form of Capitalism every bit as brutal, every bit as exploitative, every bit as destructive—even more so—as the unchecked Capitalism of the late 19th and early 20th century. You know, that economic free-for-all that steered Wall Street into the Great Crash of 1929 and America into the Great Depression of the 1930s.
The false consciousness being promoted by The Gilded Age only contributes to our own mad dash—ushered in by the Ultra-Wealthy—toward social disaster. Toward the shredding of our social fabric. Toward the undermining of our democratic institutions. Toward the dooming of our environment.
Not to put too fine a point on it, the ideological Ideal of the Russell Family is squarely what Trump has in mind when he declares Make America Great (sexist, racist, classist) Again.
But this is what ideology does. It disseminates and perpetuates the dominant discourse of the ruling class. Consequences be damned.
Our job is not to enjoy the melodrama but to open our eyes.