This will rest on Baudrillard’s rethinking of a contemporary society where the media and simulations constitute a novel realm of experience, history and social life. From that, I will consider the role of the media in creating a hyperrealised understanding of crime and criminality in the masses. In this line of thought, it is evident that the work of the criminologist using Baudrillard is to expose that which simulations and hyperreality conceal-much like the way Baudrillard himself suggested that Disneyland ‘is presented as imaginary in order to make us believe that the rest is real’ (Baudrillard 1995b: 1) So, based on the above considerations, this essay will first sketch out a contemporary exegesis of Baudrillard’s thought, with specific emphasis on the role of the media. For example, human rights-the zenith of attempted social change-‘inscribed above the portals of all the democracies, are what get given to those who have landed up on the wrong side of the universal.’ For Baudrillard then, the law, in contemporary society, could be said to ‘ covers as it the real situation’ (Baudrillard, 2008). However, Baudrillard has described this type of thinking as ‘unbelievably naïve’ because it ‘reifies as universal’ ‘imaginary’ social ideals that, for Baudrillard, have already been abolished by their ‘impotence’ to be implemented (Baudrillard, 1983a: 86 O’Malley 1996-97, has called for criminology to consider the ‘post-social’). Or, perhaps it is because Baudrillard’s ‘anti-foundational critique’ lacks ‘an identifiable substitute for social change’, which is so often desired within the politically charged areas of law and crime (Palmer, 1990: 199). Perhaps this is because his critique of society ‘arrestingly demonstrates that we have no way to experience or conceptualise relationships between people except as these are defined by the exchange of commodities’ (Willis, 1991: 162). al., 2005: 20 (Notable attempts include: Arrigo, 2007 Campbell, 2010 M. However, applications of Baudrillard’s work in law and criminology have been limited (Arrigo et. And although his obscure prose demands extra neural attention, his key ideas of ‘simulations’ and ‘hyperreality’ seem prophetic in light of advances in today’s media dominated society. You can create your personal underground, your own black-hole, your own singularity’ (Ibid. As far as Baudrillard is concerned, postmodernism is ‘not even a concept, it’s nothing at all’ and he argues that ‘you must create your own underground because there is no more underground, no more avant-garde, no more marginality.
Indeed, to define his work as ‘postmodern’ glosses over his novel contributions contemporary social thought. Thus, he and his work sit on the margins of western philosophy and society. I am the simulacrum of myself’ (Redhead, 2008: 1). When asked to respond to his growing popularity and criticism Baudrillard has stated, ‘what I am, I don’t know. Despite these criticisms, his appeal is global as translations of his many books ‘are rapidly proliferating’ (Kellner, 1989:1). Baudrillard has even been labelled ‘ intellectual imposter’ who writes ‘fashionable nonsense’ (Sokal and Bricmont, 1999). Critic Richard Lane (2000) claims that Baudrillard has been accused ‘of being a critical terrorist … whose ideas are shallow and inaccurate’ (Ibid.). At the same time however, ‘his work is highly contentious, attracting a great deal of vitriolic criticism’ (Lane, 2000:1). Indeed, Baudrillard scholars Best and Kellner (1991) note that his ‘acolytes praise him as the “talisman” of the new postmodern universe, as the commotion who theoretically energises the scene, as the supertheorist of a new postmodernity’ Best and Kellner, 1991: 111). Jean Baudrillard is considered a ‘postmodern luminary par excellence’(Arrigo, et.
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