Oppositional Technophilia

Abstract

Technophilia has been routinely pathologized in the science and technology studies literature. It is variously framed as a type of dangerous psychological deviance, a form of spiritual deficit, and a source of social destruction. This essay seeks to reframe technophilia as a way of life no more pathological than homosexuality, atheism, or other traditionally disparaged identities, and to note how its oppositional forms—much like gay activism or atheist humanism—can be as politically helpful and ethically grounded as any other progressive social movement.

Keywords:

• Technophilia
• Techno‐critics
• Environmentalist

Notes

[1] Carla Freccero, Gayle Rubin, and Ellen Willis among others.

[2] See Gil Griffin’s “Taking the Wheel: Female Lowriders find their Place on the Road” in San Diego Union‐Tribune, 23 August 2004.

[3] See http://www.meredith.com/default.sph/pr_user.class?FNC=ViewRelease__Aextemplate_html___937

[4] A connection that first occurred to me when Chela’s father died, and she wrote a poem about his life as a wielder. See Chela (1999).

[5] Primitivist racism operates by making a group of people too concrete, and thus “closer to nature”—not really a culture at all, but rather beings of uncontrolled emotion and direct bodily sensation, rooted in the soil of sensuality. Orientialist racism operates by making a group of people too abstract, and thus “arabesque”— not really a natural human, but one who is devoid of emotion, caring only for money or an inscrutable spiritual transcendence.