X-Power: American Pop Culture as a Theater of the Profane

Abstract

Images in advertising and media bearing messages that promise pleasure and excitement permeate the modern social landscape, proclaiming and celebrating epicurean values. Some see these not as symptomatic signs of affluence, but rather as apocalyptic harbingers of wanton hedonism gone amok. However, there is nothing new under the sun, as the expression goes. Ancient societies throughout the world extolled epicurean lifestyles in very similar ways—with signs, graffiti, and inscriptions on public walls, in marketplaces, and even on temples. After all, it was an ancient Greek philosopher, Epicurus (c. 342–270 BCE), after whom the eponymous notion of epicureanism is derived. Epicurus believed that the human mind was disturbed by two main anxieties: fear of the deities and fear of death. The term epicurean suggests excessive bodily pleasures, but Epicurus actually taught that pleasure can best be gained by living prudently and moderately.

X is crossed swords, a battle: who will win we do not know, so the mystics made it the sign of destiny and the algebraists the sign of the unknown.

—Victor Hugo (1802–85)