Theology and Black Mirror (Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture) 9781978711167, 9781978711181, 9781978711174, 1978711166

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Theology and Black Mirror

Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture Series Editor: Matthew Brake The Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture series examines the intersection of theology, religion, and popular culture, including, but not limited to, television, movies, sequential art, and genre fiction. In a world plagued by rampant polarization of every kind and the decline of religious literacy in the public square, Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture is uniquely poised to educate and entertain a diverse audience utilizing one of the few things society at large still holds in common: love for popular culture.

Titles in the Series Theology and Black Mirror, edited by Amber Bowen and John Anthony Dunne Dread and Hope: Christian Eschatology and Pop Culture, by Joshua Wise Theology and the Game of Thrones, edited by Matthew Brake Theology and Spider-Man, edited by George Tsakiridis René Girard, Theology, and Pop Culture, edited by Ryan G. Duns and T. Derrick Witherington Theology and Horror: Explorations of the Dark Religious Imagination, edited by Brandon R. Grafius and John W. Morehead Sports and Play in Christian Theology, edited by Philip Halstead and John Tucker Theology and Westworld, edited by Juli Gittinger and Shayna Sheinfeld Theology and Prince, edited by Jonathan H. Harwell and Rev. Katrina E. Jenkins Theology and the Marvel Universe, edited by Gregory Stevenson

Theology and Black Mirror Edited by Amber Bowen and John Anthony Dunne

LEXINGTON BOOKS/FORTRESS ACADEMIC

Lanham • Boulder • New York • London

Published by Lexington Books/Fortress Academic Lexington Books is an imprint of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. 4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706 www​.rowman​.com 86-90 Paul Street, London EC2A 4NE, United Kingdom Copyright © 2022 by The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc. Except where noted, the individual chapters are copyrighted in the name of the chapter author(s). All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Bowen, Amber, 1987- editor. | Dunne, John Anthony, 1986- editor. Title: Theology and Black mirror / edited by Amber Bowen, John Anthony Dunne. Description: Lanham : Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2022. | Series: Theology, religion, and pop culture | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: “This book brings together scholars from various disciplines to think alongside Black Mirror with resources from the Christian tradition, discerning what the show and theology can teach us about how to live faithfully in a technocratic age”—Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2022001856 (print) | LCCN 2022001857 (ebook) | ISBN 9781978711167 (cloth) | ISBN 9781978711181 (paperback) | ISBN 9781978711174 (epub) Subjects: LCSH: Black mirror (Television program) | Television programs—Religious aspects—Christianity. Classification: LCC PN1992.77.B525 T44 2022 (print) | LCC PN1992.77.B525 (ebook) | DDC 791.45/72—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022001856 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022001857 ∞ ™ The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Contents

More Than Meets the Eye: An Introduction to Theology and Black Mirror Amber Bowen and John Anthony Dunne PART 1: AGENCY AND CONDITIONING

1 19

1 Ethics through a Dark Lens: Ellul’s Technological Morality in Black Mirror Peter Anderson

21

2 Barbarism, Boredom, and the Question Concerning Pornography in Fifteen Million Merits Amber Bowen

35

3 Free Will and (In)determinism in Hang the DJ Taylor W. Cyr

55

4 Too Many Twos: Ashley and the Artificial Authentic Elizabeth Howard

67

5 Smithereens as Technological Theodicy: Addiction, Emergence, and Resistance John Anthony Dunne PART 2: IDOLS AND ANTI-CHRISTS 6 Arkangel and the Death of God: A Nietzschean Critique of Technology’s Soteriological Scheme Amber Bowen and Megan Fritts v

81 99 101

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7 Seeing and Being Seen in a Black Mirror, Dimly: Phenomenology and the Dim View of White Christmas King-Ho Leung and Patrick McGlinchey 8 Evil Gods and the USS Callister Celina Durgin and Dru Johnson PART 3: TRUTH AND JUSTICE 9 Crowdsourcing Judgment: The Dark Side of Justice in Hated in the Nation and the Johannine Trial Narrative Andrew J. Byers 10 Re-Dos and Re-Visions: Replay and the Search for Meaning in the Shepherd of Hermas and The Entire History of You Jeremiah Bailey 11 King David and the White Bear Justice Park Rachelle Gilmour

117 131 145 147

163 179

12 Alternate Eyes: Perspective Shifting in the Samson Narrative and Black Mirror Brandon M. Hurlbert

193

13 “Not Some Crazy Spiritual Thing”: Rewards, Punishment, and Afterlife in Black Mirror James F. McGrath

213

PART 4: HOPE AND TRANSCENDENCE

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14 Be Right Back and the Ethics of Mourning: (In)Authenticity and Resurrection in the Digital Age Rebekah Lamb and Joanna Leidenhag

233

15 Reflecting the Infinite or the Finite? The Mirror Motif in Black Mirror and Gregory of Nyssa Elizabeth Culhane

251

16 Memoria and The Entire History of You Nathaniel A. Warne

265

17 Look Door, Get Key: Presence in Black Mirror’s Bandersnatch Douglas Estes

279

18 Where are You?: San Junipero and the Technology of Shared Space Kris Song

293

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19 Uploaded to the Cloud: Transhumanism and Digital Hope in Black Mirror John Anthony Dunne

305

Subject Index

323

People Index

327

Ancient Sources Index

335

About the Contributors

343

More Than Meets the Eye An Introduction to Theology and Black Mirror Amber Bowen and John Anthony Dunne

As computing power doubles every two years, according to Moore’s Law, digital technologies increasingly become the very framework of the world in which we live. In fact, with the rise of the global pandemic in 2020, technology became not simply a matter of convenience, or even a sign of progress, but was preventing society from collapsing. During that time, more of us started feeling uneasy about the adverse effects of technology’s totalizing presence. While some chased conspiracy theories (especially about 5G networks; cf. Destiny 2020), others wondered how some tech companies might be exploiting our vulnerabilities (cf. the Netflix documentary, The Social Dilemma [2020]). Black Mirror resonated in a particular way with the eye-opening experience of 2020. It was not uncommon for people to describe the year’s events as a real-life episode of Black Mirror. A trending protest poster read, “I don’t like this episode of Black Mirror.” At a bus station in Madrid, a fan used a mirror as an advertisement for Season 6 of Black Mirror, stating that the new season was happening “Live” and “Now” (Baj 2020). In fact, Charlie Brooker, one of the main writers and producers of the show, said in an interview that he was not working on further episodes during 2020 because the show is too dark and the current world might not have the “stomach” for “stories about societies falling apart” (Morris 2020). Even Stephen Colbert (2020) joked during one of his opening monologues that if God submitted 2020 as an episode for Black Mirror, the script would be rejected, presumably because it was too heavy even for the show. As we head into a post-2020 technological landscape, what if God has more to do with Black Mirror than simply being a failed writer? What if the seemingly a-theological questions the show raises can be meaningfully addressed within the context of theological discourse? 1

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Black Mirror is an anthology series of personal stories within a shared universe (or multiverse) that let the viewer in on particular circumstances complicated by technology. Utilizing genres of sci-fi, horror, thriller, comedy, and satire, it tells stories that are often precautionary in nature, like parables,1 or even like adult versions of Aesop’s Fables or Grimm’s Fairy Tales. The show’s brand of precautionary is decidedly dystopian, offering a prophetic voice that is both foretelling and forthtelling. It is foretelling in regard to its uncanny prescience at times, which has less to do with predicting future technology and more to do with anticipating the social circumstances that could be prompted by technological progress.2 It is forthtelling, like any good dystopian story, by revealing a reality that already exists. The result is often unsettling as it extends what we take for granted today along a hyperbolic trajectory. Much of the show’s form and function is conveyed in the name itself. The iconic title shot at the beginning of every episode of shattered black glass suggests a kind of corrupt mosaic reflecting a broken reality. Unlike an artist who creates a mosaic by integrating pieces, this mosaic is not an assembly of parts but a fracturing of the whole. A closer look reveals that the titular Black Mirror is actually a shattered smartphone screen. We think that these devices are the means by which we look at the rest of the world, but in reality, they are reflectors of ourselves as a kind of mirror. Mirrors, of course, are designed to reveal, and the cracked glass reveals to us our shattered selves and our shattered world.3 More than that, Black Mirror discloses the darker side of ourselves and our world; indeed, it discloses our own corruption and the way we contribute to further corruption. Hence, while Black Mirror heavily features technology, it is ultimately not just a show about tech, but about human nature. BLACK MIRROR AND THE HUMANTECH RELATIONSHIP What may seem most obvious about Black Mirror is its presentation of the darker side of technology, giving us glimpses of what our technological obsession might lead to—and indeed where it has already led us. Even though Brooker has had a long-standing interest in technology, specifically video games,4 he does not see the show as a doomsday warning about technology: Occasionally it’s irritating when people miss the point of the show and think it’s more po-faced than I think it is. Or when they characterize it as a show warning about the dangers of technology. That slightly confuses and annoys me, because it’s like saying [Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 classic] Psycho is a movie warning

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about the dangers of silverware. Black Mirror is not really about that . . . except when it is, just to f— with people! (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 222)

For context, Brooker is first and foremost a comedian and a social commentator. In fact, he claims to find the show “darkly amusing” In fact, he claims to find the show “darkly amusing” (Peele 2016). “[O]ften Black Mirror makes me laugh,” he confesses (Bennion 2020). His comments in the quote above suggest that viewers who take the show too seriously, or analyze it too earnestly, are products of his comedic manipulation and are themselves caught up in his social commentary. As a somewhat sinister comedian, it is quite possible that Brooker’s claims about the show are laced with jest and irony. Even if his own perspective was straightforward, we would not want to reduce what Black Mirror means to what Brooker says about it. As he himself states, “never trust anyone who mentions auteur theory or discusses a film or TV show as though it’s the work of one individual” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 7). Like any film or TV show, Black Mirror is a collaborative project with many “authors” contributing to its creation.5 As Rolland Barthes (1978) reminds us in his famous essay “The Death of the Author,” with any kind of text, even those produced by a single individual, meaning always outruns the author and texts take on a life of their own. While we are not promoting #DeathToBrooker, his statement about auteur theory suggests that he is aware that the show is bigger than his own perspective. As a social commentator, Brooker seems to be after something far more interesting than issuing a Luddite critique of technological progress. His appeal to the film Psycho is quite telling in this regard. In the film, Norman Bates (Anthony Perkins) famously attacks Marion Crane (Janet Leigh) in the shower with a knife. Obviously, as Brooker points out, Psycho is not a cautionary tale about knives. The knife was a tool used by a deranged psychopath to commit murder. Technology in this case was merely an instrument in order to achieve Bates’s own human volition. There was nothing inherently problematic about the knife, but the film does disclose what is inherently problematic about human nature. Thus, those who think Black Mirror is a “po-faced” critique of technological progress have missed what is most salient about the show. That said, Black Mirror portrays technology in a way that is far less innocuous than Bate’s murder weapon. After all, as Brooker says, Black Mirror is not warning about the dangers of technology “except when it is.” In other words, the show should not be reduced to an apocalyptic warning about technological devices but is most profitably recognized as a dramatization of the human-tech relationship, and even the human-human relationship within a technological landscape. Brooker and executive producer Annabel Jones state repeatedly that they are interested in telling human stories, stories

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that capture the nature of human existence and the challenges of the human experience (Gordon 2014). Technology is “never on the nose and just more in the background,” Jones insists (Stolworthy 2017; cf. Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 136). This quote could be taken to mean that technology is not a significant component of the series; however, we argue that by “backgrounding” technology Brooker and Jones actually disclose how technology works in the real world, namely as an invisible framework. Technology is an invisible framework in contemporary life insofar as it is not just a feature of our world, but the very structure that orders and holds it together. Technology is more than a set of highly advanced tools that we use; it is a deeper worldview that shapes our contemporary lives. It is like the skeleton upon which everything hangs. Yet the more it shapes and saturates our lives, the less “obvious” technology becomes. The things that make up our concrete, everyday lives largely are taken for granted. They are the things that inconspicuously hum in the background, which means they are not noticed up front, or focally. As such, they escape scrutiny and criticism. Of course, we are aware of the concrete tools that we use—like the phone in our hands, the central heating system in our house that we activate by a touch of a button, or the bells and whistles of the car that we drive—but rarely are we focally aware of the deeper patterns that we are caught up in. In fact, as Jones notes, we sometimes use technology in order to restrict our tech use, which is a rather absurd practice, like when we program our smartphones to tell us when to get off our phones (Shepherd 2019). In this case, we think we are limiting tech but we do not actually escape from the technological framework. If anything, we move further into it. Black Mirror awakens viewers to a deeper reality and puts the onus on them to consider the kind of lives they want to live, or that are possible to live, in a technological age. The show does not provide anything constructive about how to inhabit that reality, but simply unveils our technological systems and leaves it to us to make a judgment about whether they produce the kind of society that we want. And if it is too late to change course, it leaves it to us to decide how we will choose to live in such a world. Hence, while the show raises interesting questions, it refrains from giving answers to them and instead prompts viewers to respond themselves. To be sure, this is part of the performative benefit of the show. Whether or not Black Mirror was designed to have this perlocutionary effect, it regularly does. For example, Jones mentions that many people decided to withdraw their social media accounts after watching Nosedive (Season 3, Episode 1).6 Further, Brooker notes that some tech companies have taken up what they call a “Black Mirror challenge,” in which they seek to anticipate how their technologies could be abused (Bennion 2020). The show clearly evokes our ethical sensibilities and invites us to consider what kinds of forces might lie beneath our technological

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world. In other words, Black Mirror could have the perlocutionary effect of calling us to cultivate a kind of spiritual discernment, or an ability to recognize the predominant “spirit of the age,” which often lies within our invisible frameworks. We suggest, therefore, that Black Mirror discloses two things. First, it uses technology to expose human nature and the nature of human relationships, disclosing deep matters of the heart—our insecurities, our vulnerabilities, and our greatest longings. Second, it brings to light the nature of contemporary technology itself, namely that it is an invisible framework shaping and ordering all of life according to it. Black Mirror thus displays a dynamism to the human-tech relationship wherein they are mutually shaping. By disclosing this relationship, the show naturally opens viewers onto its moral and even spiritual implications. Hence, the primary subject matter of the show as well as the kinds of effects it produces are especially germane to ethical, philosophical, and even theological reflection. THEOLOGY AND BLACK MIRROR In this volume, we want to take the conversation that Black Mirror initiates in a theological direction. As stated above, the show unsettles viewers, asking questions that evoke metaphysical, epistemic, and moral crises. For example, how does virtual reality intermingle with physical reality, and what happens when it does? What is the difference between personal identity and an avatar? Between pornography and infidelity? Moreover, if technology were to make us do dreadful things, whose fault would it be—the user’s or the inventor’s? And when dreadful things are done, is technology a reliable source of justice? Can technology actually overcome suffering and death? Does technology effectively allow us to exceed the limits of our finitude or does it destroy our very humanity? Is technology truly progressive or is it just “human, all too human?” While these are exceedingly relevant questions, they often are left unanswered by the show; or, when answers are given, they are not always satisfying ethically, philosophically, or indeed theologically. We could even say that it falls to ethics, philosophy, and theology to ask questions of technology that it does not ask of itself. Accordingly, we seek to take up these questions and intriguing implications by thinking about them theologically with the help of the academic disciplines of ethics, philosophy, and biblical studies. Hence, each essay is theologically focused even as the author employs methods and engages interlocutors from his or her respective discipline. Our volume’s distinct emphasis on theology is what separates it from previous academic analyses of the show, such as Black Mirror and Critical Media (Cirucci and Vacker

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2018), Through the Black Mirror (McSweeney and Joy 2019), Black Mirror and Philosophy (Johnson 2020), and Reading “Black Mirror” (Duarte and Battin 2021). As an installment in the Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture series, our volume also aims to underscore the broader significance of engaging pop culture theologically. Such an endeavor is important for those involved in academic theological discourse because of pop culture’s immense influence on society. As Israeli historian Yuval Noah Harari points out, science fiction in particular has a great impact on how we think about technology since “very few people read the latest articles in the fields of machine learning or genetic engineering. Instead, movies such as The Matrix and Her and TV series such as Westworld and Black Mirror shape how people understand the most important technological, social, and economic developments of our time” (2018, 252). Harari argues that “art plays a key role in shaping people’s views of the world,” and thus “a good science-fiction movie is worth far more than an article in Science or Nature” (2018, 251). Since pop culture exerts such an influence on how people see the world, theologians, who are themselves interested in orienting people to a certain perspective on the world, need to be conversant with pop culture. Indeed, pop culture is the lingua franca of Western culture, or the language everyone speaks.7 Thus, speaking theologically to a broader audience requires a degree of fluency in the cultural dialect. For a show as explicitly godless as Black Mirror though, theology might seem entirely irrelevant. After all, the main showrunner is an outspoken atheist.8 As Brooker sees it, Black Mirror stands in contrast to The Twilight Zone (1959–1964)—a major influence on Black Mirror—insofar as it replaces the “supernatural or the uncanny or the unexplained” with “a technological explanation” (Wollaston 2019). Most pointedly, he says, “we are doing a supernatural show that has no supernatural element in it.” Brooker’s statement might serve to confirm that theology cannot have anything to do with Black Mirror. We argue, however, that though the show attempts to replace the transcendent with technology, it nevertheless remains within a theological framework. Technology may supersede theological content, but it resides within broader theological concepts. For example, by purportedly providing answers to our greatest problems, like suffering and death, technology remains ensconced in a soteriological and even eschatological scheme (cf. Bowen and Fritts, ch. 6). We might say that technology itself has a religious orientation and that the nature of our tech use can be described as a kind of religious practice. Though Black Mirror seems like an anti-religious show, both in terms of the absence of religion and the presence of irreverent humor, it is curiously fraught with religious themes and symbolism. Often religious tropes are

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recast into a technological frame, which is another way of conveying how the show seeks to trade religion for technology. An obvious example of religious symbolism is the image of the cross found in both White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2) and Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5). In White Bear, when Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow) is being bound and tortured by Baxter (Michael Smiley), she is surrounded in the woods by people hanging as though they had been crucified, giving the scene a particular resonance (cf. McGrath, ch. 13). There is also a cross adorning the wall at Parn Heidekker’s ranch (Francis Magee) in Men Against Fire, where he helps to hide Roaches, which causes Commander Medina (Sarah Snook) to conclude that he must be a man of principles. There is an explicitly Christian backdrop to both White Christmas9 and USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1), since, of course, Christmas is a major Christian holiday. Brooker claims to have chosen this holiday not because of its Christian associations, however, but because it would be “emotive and nightmarish” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 106). This ethos is especially expressed in the episodes’ disquieting use of traditional Christmas carols. “O Come Let Us Adore Him” is played at the end of White Christmas when Joe Potter (Rafe Spall) enters a cabin and kills the father (Ken Drury) of his ex-girlfriend, Beth (Janet Montgomery). “Silent Night” is used twice in rather disturbing ways. First, it plays when Matt Trent (Jon Hamm) walks out of the police office at the end of the episode and is visually blocked from everyone and to everyone, a punishment he will continue to endure for his crimes. Second, when Captain Robert Daly (Jesse Plemons) lies lifeless in his computer chair at the end of USS Callister, “Silent Night” is playing instrumentally in the background. Advancing the Christmas theme further, both White Christmas and USS Callister portray quasi-incarnations as Matt Trent and Captain Daly enter into virtual worlds from the outside. Matt states explicitly that he is “not a spiritual guru,” but he nonetheless plays the role of a teacher and guide for his clients. He thus fills the kind of role a religious figure might occupy, and his “incarnation” in the virtual cabin is an inversion of the Christmas narrative that backgrounds the episode (cf. Leung and McGlinchey, ch. 7). The recasting of an incarnate religious figure is accentuated in the case of Daly, who is “an asshole god” in complete control of a bubble universe of his own making and who also enters into it. In a bout of anger, Daly declares: “If you thought what happened to you in the past was bad, that was nothing; what I’m going to do to you will be goddamn f—ing biblical.” This is the only time that the term “biblical” occurs in all of Black Mirror. It is noteworthy that it is used in relation to implied harsh judgment, which further underscores Daly as a divine caricature (cf. Durgin and Johnson, ch. 8).

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We encounter another technologically recast divine archetype with Billy Bauer (Topher Grace) from Smithereens (Season 5, Episode 2). Bauer is dressed in a robe and sandals, and sits in a temple-like house remote on a mountain, like an actual spiritual guru. When he uses his exclusive access to gain information from Chris Gillhaney’s (Andrew Scott) social media profile, he claims to enact “God Mode” (cf. Dunne, ch. 5). Not only are tech producers presented as divine figures, but so is the tech itself. Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3) portrays how celebrity idolatry is analogous to religious idolatry. Rachel (Angourie Rice), the teenage protagonist, idolizes Ashley O (Miley Cyrus), a pop star, and purchases an Ashley Too doll, which features a mental clone of her pop-star personality. Throughout the episode, Rachel talks to it, consults it, confides in it, much like a household idol. This theme of idolatry is extended with the creation of Ashley Eternal, which is a larger-than-life holographic version of Ashley O, giving her an almost godlike presence in her concert, where she is situated among a multitude of fans worshiping her (cf. Howard, ch. 4). In addition to the tech producers and the tech itself, even tech users can be placed in a “divine” role. In Bandersnatch, game developer Colin Ritman (Will Poulter) refers to “the spirit out there” that controls what the characters do, which is a meta-reference to the viewers of this choose-your-ownadventure film. In the film, there are three entities who control the characters in the different iterations. One could be Pax, the demon god, another could be P.A.C.S., a secretive governmental agency, and the final one could be us, the viewers, who are choosing the outcome. All three function as prevailing forces over the characters that manipulate events. By association with the other two, the viewer takes on a role that is eerily sinister and demonic.10 Beyond religious figures, specific religious beliefs are also recast across the show, particularly with regard to the immortality of the soul and the afterlife. In Black Museum, Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge) offers to take care of Clayton Leigh’s (Babs Olusanmokun) family after he’s been executed as long as he signs over the rights to his digital self. His reluctant wife, Angelica (Amanda Warren), exclaims, “that’s your soul!” Clayton responds that there’s no such thing as a soul, insisting that what he is signing up for is just a computer simulation. After Clayton is executed, his identity is transferred to a digital platform. Rolo remarks to the digital version of Clayton that he has been “born again” and that he’s “in the afterlife, so to speak.” In Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1), Martha’s (Hayley Atwell) friend Sara (Sinead Matthews) introduces her to a chatbot technology that would allow her to speak with her deceased husband, Ash (Domhnall Gleeson). It’s “not some spiritual thing,” Sara assures Martha at Ash’s wake but a means of communicating with a digitally constructed version of her husband based on his online persona (cf. Lamb and Leidenhag, ch.

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14). Similarly, the inhabitants of San Junipero have uploaded their minds to “the Cloud.” This technology allows them to experience ongoing existence without an appeal to an actual transcendent, and free of the physical limitations they had in their “previous” lives (cf. Dunne, ch. 19). The episode is clear that those who do not transfer to San Junipero before they die are not “somewhere else,” they are “nowhere,” as Kelly (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) says about her husband and daughter. In other words, apart from San Junipero, there is no possibility for conscious experience after death. “Heaven is a place on earth,” or the promise of heaven is made possible by this-worldly technological advancement. Beyond recasting religious symbols and beliefs, the show also occasionally represents religious people. In the case of San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4), religious dogma is juxtaposed with technological advancement. For religious reasons, Yorkie’s (Mackenzie Davis) family openly disapproves of her homosexuality as well as her intention to be uploaded to the Cloud. Religious dogma leads Yorkie’s family to approve of neither her life nor her afterlife. Showing the antagonism in the other direction, Yorkie’s apparent uptightness on the dance floor causes Kelly to comment that she seems “Amish.” With both examples, the show insinuates a dismissal of conservative religion. It is not simply the case, however, that religious people are juxtaposed to technological progress or presented in only negative ways. Black Mirror occasionally portrays religious piety as commendable. The religious villager, Parn Heidekker, in Men Against Fire, protects the Roaches from the soldiers who have the MASS implants and even the other villagers who benefit from their eradication (Manninen 2020, 124; cf. Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 200–1). Only Parn, referred to as “a religious freak” and “Mr. Sunday School,” helps the Roaches by hiding them at his ranch. As he is interrogated in his dining room about their whereabouts, we see a cross visibly displayed on the wall behind him. The show thus conveys that it is Parn’s religious adherence that leads him to “think all life is sacred” and to resist the forces of an evil society. Another positive example of religious piety is the Muslim woman Shazia Akhand (Kiran Sonia Sawar), from Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3). Her piety is marked by her prayers and her headcovering, and, as Jossalyn G. Larson argues, her use of the Recaller for her job as an insurance claim verifier is symbolic of her posture as a “truth seeker” (2019, 219). The most explicit demonstration of her piety comes in the scene when she is held captive by Mia (Andrea Riseborough). When Mia threatens to kill her, Shazia appeals to a religious practice that might be familiar to Mia, namely “Catholic confession,” in order to assure her of the seriousness with which she takes her promise not to disclose private information. And when Mia does not believe her, Shazia prays in the face of her death.

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Larson, who has provided the most robust and substantive take on religion in Black Mirror prior to our volume, finds the Arabic prayer that Shazia recites before she is killed particularly intriguing. When translated, the prayer says, “We belong to God and to him we shall return.” She notes that this is not the typical prayer that a Muslim person would pray in the face of their own death. “Whenever possible,” Larson writes, “a dying Muslim is expected to recite the declaration of faith and statement of faraj—two much longer prayers which reaffirm the individual’s belief in God and the prophet Mohammed” (2019, 220). Shazia’s prayer, however, “is traditionally prayed by survivors at the time of another’s death” (2019, 220). Larson suggests that maybe Shazia is saying this prayer for the sake of her family, fearing that they will also die by Mia’s hand. Yet Larson also wonders if Shazia’s prayer might be intended as a warning to Mia: “If ‘we belong to God and to Him we shall return,’ then Mia also is bound by a sovereign entity that will ultimately call her to account for her crimes” (2019, 221). From the examples of religious adherents depicted in the show, it is clear that religious expression is not completely dismissed. What Black Mirror presents critically is the dogmatic posture of Yorkie’s family, not the piety of Parn and Shazia. Rather than imposing religious ideology in ways that self-righteously exclude the other, Parn and Shazia live lives of devotion and neighbor-love. They model ways of living coram Deo in a technological age. Shazia shows us how her faith can exist alongside technological advances, whereas Parn demonstrates that faithfulness might require resistance to how those advances can be co-opted by “the spirit of the age.” Similarly, our volume seeks to discern the spirit of the technological age and to describe how to live faithfully within it, precisely by bringing theology into conversation with Black Mirror. Resisting Christianized responses that brush away the serious issues the show raises, and also refraining from simply looking for “what is wrong” with Black Mirror as a “worldly” show, our volume aims to engage the harsh realities of the show with resources from the Christian tradition. Doing so allows us to think together about what it means to live out the Christian narrative in our present context and in a possible future. SUMMARY OF THE VOLUME The present volume is certainly not exhaustive in its engagement with Black Mirror, in terms of both addressing every episode and addressing every discrete theme. Our hope is to provide rigorous theological engagement with Black Mirror and to think about the show in ways that are productive for the Christian life in an increasingly technological world. In that regard, the

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volume is dialogical in nature. It brings together interlocutors who do not necessarily share the same theological or technological convictions (as the close reader will recognize), but who do share a common interest in thinking alongside Black Mirror with the resources of the Christian tradition. In what follows, we will provide an overview of the book, summarizing the contents and basic arguments of each contributor. The essays are placed in four parts—“Agency and Conditioning,” “Idols and Anti-Christs,” “Truth and Justice,” and “Hope and Transcendence”—that delineate the main themes structuring the volume. The four parts were chosen for ease of reference and identification of the main topics being discussed, but the volume progresses from the first essay to the last as a singular conversation. The final essay in each part transitions to the themes of the subsequent section. In part 1, “Agency and Conditioning,” we begin the conversation with the question of how technology conditions us by shaping the kind of world in which we live, while also considering the degree to which we have agency in a technological milieu. To start, Peter Anderson’s essay analyzes patterns in Black Mirror that reflect Jacques Ellul’s critique of technology. Anderson identifies a distinctly technological morality portrayed across Black Mirror and, with reference to Ellul, argues that the Christian story allows us to cultivate an embodied ethic shaped by eschatological, rather than technological, ends. Developing the critique of technology on a philosophical register, Amber Bowen’s essay argues that Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2) offers a radicalized portrayal of what French phenomenologist Michel Henry calls barbarism—or the techno-scientific ideology that reduces the world to visual display. Bowen identifies how the barbaristic society in Fifteen Million Merits diabolically distorts two areas of human experience, work and romantic love, and argues that barbarism is overcome by the very virtues openly distorted in the episode: faith, hope, and love. Furthering the question of the possibility of genuine romantic love in a technological world, Taylor W. Cyr uses the dating app in Hang the DJ (Season 4, Episode 4) as a case study for free will. While the algorithmic patterns of the app seem to preclude the possibility of free will, Cyr shows how responding in love is always a free act, whether that response be to another person or to God. Marshaling another perspective on agency, Elizabeth Howard questions the very possibility of autonomous action by analyzing the formative effect that imitation has on the development of the self. She offers a Girardian analysis of Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too, which suggests that imitation is inevitable. Technology reinforces this impulse, especially through the proliferation of celebrity culture. Howard argues that we must be wise about the models we choose to follow. In particular, Christians must understand themselves primarily as imitators of Christ.

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To conclude the discussion on the relationship between agency and technology, John Anthony Dunne explores the representation of tech-addiction in Smithereens. Dunne contends that the episode complicates matters of culpability at the levels of user and developer responsibility. Building on the representation of Billy Bauer as a divine figure, he argues that Smithereen is described like an entity that has come to take on a life of its own. Using the concept of emergence, Dunne claims that the personal and the systemic can be held together and that the fundamental message of the episode pertains to the need to cultivate attention and resistance. Dunne’s discussion opens up issues regarding the representation of false gods in Black Mirror, which is the main focus of our next section. Beginning part 2, “Idols and Anti-Christs,” Amber Bowen and Megan Fritts analyze Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2) alongside Friedrich Nietzsche’s critique of religion, specifically identifying how the story portrays what is at stake in his infamous pronouncement of the death of God. They argue that the episode demonstrates how technology can be used as a tool for manipulation and control, thus producing the same kind of pathologies Nietzsche identifies in religion. Heeding the advice of Nietzsche and the warning of Arkangel, Bowen and Fritts conclude that “philosophizing with a hammer” does not necessarily lead to a life of no religion, but may open the very possibility of a life of better religion. King-Ho Leung and Patrick McGlinchey then argue that White Christmas inverts the Christmas narrative by portraying Matt Trent as an Anti-Christ with a false incarnation into a simulated world, whose gaze is objectifying and alienating, much like the gaze Jean-Paul Sartre describes in No Exit. Turning to Jean-Luc Marion’s phenomenology, specifically his notion of the saturated phenomenon par excellence, Leung and McGlinchey describe how the gaze of the incarnate Christ is dignity-conferring and communion-establishing. Celina Durgin and Dru Johnson analyze another kind of false god in USS Callister through the figure of Captain Robert Daly, who is an angry, vengeful god of his own Space Fleet bubble universe. The show subtly associates Daly with common assumptions about the God of the Old Testament. Durgin and Johnson examine the Exodus narrative, a text that could be used to confirm this association, but actually demonstrates how yhwh stands in stark contrast to a false god like Daly. After grappling with the issue of theodicy and the character of God, the volume then moves to more focused considerations of justice. Part 3, “Truth and Justice,” considers how Black Mirror speaks to misconceptions of justice as well as how to achieve it. Andrew J. Byers begins by identifying parallels between the technological mob depicted in Hated in the Nation (Season 3, Episode 6) and the mob in the crucifixion account from the Gospel of John. Byers shows how each mob plays the role of judge,

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jury, and executioner (cf. the cry of “crucify him” and the DeathTo hashtag) and how the voices of both are co-opted by darker forces behind the scenes. He concludes by contrasting both mobs with the kind of justice enacted on the cross. The pursuit of justice requires knowing the truth of what happened in the event under scrutiny. To that end, Jeremiah Bailey’s essay looks at the epistemic challenges involved in knowing past events, an issue that is problematized in The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3). Bailey’s essay reads the episode alongside a second-century Christian text, the Shepherd of Hermas, which at one point offers a revision of an earlier revelation, not unlike the Re-Dos that we see in the episode. In both the show and the text, important details are re-presented differently, which leads Bailey to conclude that not even technology removes the necessity of interpretation when it comes to any record(ing) of the past. After taking a hermeneutical turn in the discussion on truth and justice, the next two essays explore the significance of perspective. Rachelle Gilmour’s essay offers an intertextual analysis of the portrayal of retribution in White Bear with the narrative of David and Bathsheba in 2 Samuel. The episode and the narrative provide access to three distinct perspectives: the perpetrator’s gaze upon the victim, the public’s view of the ensuing punishment, and the implied viewer’s/reader’s witness of the unfolding events. The two stories differ in that 2 Samuel presents punishment that is completed, justified by the text, and efficacious for the repayment for sin, whereas in White Bear the perpetrator is tragically punished endlessly. As Gilmour identifies, the reason why Victoria’s punishment is ongoing is not because retribution is necessarily endless, but because it has been co-opted by mass media and the exploitation of a capitalist system. Developing the notion of perspective further in relation to retributive justice, Brandon M. Hurlbert’s essay compares the shift of perspective in three Black Mirror episodes with the experience of reading the narrative of Samson as presented in Judges. Specifically, Hurlbert notes how our judgments, and consequently our allegiances, change with respect to the protagonists while viewing White Bear, Men Against Fire, and Shut Up and Dance. Hurlbert argues that acquiring a multiplicity of perspectives is necessary when pursuing reconciliatory—as opposed to retributive—justice. Concluding the discussion of “Truth and Justice,” James F. McGrath looks at the concept of rewards and punishment across Black Mirror, extending the conversation into divine judgment in the afterlife. He traces examples of atonement, resurrection, eternal hell, and disembodied afterlife in Be Right Back, San Junipero, White Bear, and Black Museum. The shared interests between these topics and theological inquiries give rise to important questions that Christians should consider in a technological age. These topics

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also introduce some of the eschatological themes of the final section of the volume. To start off part 4, “Hope and Transcendence,” Rebekah Lamb and Joanna Leidenhag explore how personal authenticity and the experience of mourning are challenged in Be Right Back by social media and artificial intelligence designed to bring loved ones “back to life.” Lamb and Leidenhag describe how the particular “resurrection” technology in the episode is based on a NeoLockean notion of human identity as psychological continuity. However, the technology fails to provide a genuine continuation of the human person, in part because it does not have access to their first-person perspective but draws from the content that person disclosed on social media—content that is often inauthentic to who they really are. As such, the technology performs a false resurrection and inhibits the work of mourning. Elizabeth Culhane’s essay further analyzes dark pursuits in Black Mirror that do not ultimately satisfy human desires. Looking at three key episodes in particular—The National Anthem (Season 1, Episode 1), Fifteen Million Merits, and Be Right Back—Culhane argues that Black Mirror portrays a dark inversion of what Cappadocian Church Father, Gregory of Nyssa, calls “the mirror of the soul.” The Black Mirror attempts to reflect ultimacy in the finite, but the mirror of the soul reflects the beauty of the Ultimate. Coordinating Gregory’s advice for a technological society, Culhane discusses the virtue of pursuing the unchanging and eternal over that which is fleeting and finite. Then Nathaniel A. Warne discusses another virtue from the Christian tradition, namely memory. Warne looks at The Entire History of You, an episode that uses technology purportedly to achieve perfect memory. Considering the disastrous consequences in the episode, Warne proffers that there are better means of cultivating memory, specifically liturgy and the arts. The celebration of the Eucharist, he argues, recalls Christ’s work in the past while also reminding us of the future that awaits. The next two essays carry on the discussion of mediated presence. Douglas Estes explores the topic of telepresence in Bandersnatch. Specifically, Estes identifies three different types of telepresence that appear in the film: virtual presence, observable presence, and spiritual presence. He compares the third notion of presence with how scripture and church tradition talk about divine and human copresence. Estes then highlights how the telepresence of Bandersnatch complicates and challenges Western materialist perspectives on presence, even those that have made their way into some strains of Christian thought. Moving on from considerations of virtual presence, Kris Song’s essay takes up the issue of virtual places. Looking at both San Junipero and Christian scripture, Song argues that what makes virtual space meaningful is not the setting per se but the relationships that are formed in it. In San Junipero, while

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the inhabitants may receive new digital bodies, Song points out that they still have the same old relational problems. In the New Jerusalem, however, scripture promises the experience of fully redeemed relationships—with others and, more importantly, with God. Considering the materiality of our eschatological hope, the final essay in the section by John Anthony Dunne traces themes of transhumanism across Black Mirror. In particular, Dunne focuses on the representation of mind uploading, parsing out distinctions within the show itself and coordinating those with conversations among contemporary transhumanists. Dunne highlights three main aspects of Black Mirror’s representation of mind-uploading, namely its complicated affinities with metaphysical dualism, its idealization of “perfect bodies,” and its subtle indications that these scenarios ought to be desirable for the viewer. Dunne argues that the eschatology presented in scripture points us away from all three of these emphases. Again, the present volume is just the beginning of a conversation, one that is not over in terms of theological engagement (not least from other religious voices), just as Black Mirror is not done engaging modern tech. Brooker and Jones consider there to be no “shortage of inspiration” (2018, 312, cf. 311– 13), and there are plenty more avenues for the show to explore, for example, job automation, deep fakes and facial recognition software, identity theft, and newer pandemic-related technologies. Indeed, the long-term prospects of the show as a relevant cultural artifact are quite promising. Our hope for this volume is that it models how Christian theology can be placed in productive conversation with Black Mirror, and how Black Mirror can help theologians explore issues that shape our human experience in a contemporary world and consider how to live virtuously—even Christianly—within it. We are grateful to so many people for helping us bring this volume to completion. The idea for the volume initially arose after we, the editors, watched Season 5 when it was released in June 2019, specifically after conversing about the philosophical and theological implications that we saw in Striking Vipers (Season 5, Episode 1). We are grateful to Matthew William Brake, the editor of the Theology, Religion, and Pop Culture series, and to Neil Elliott, former senior acquisitions editor at Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, for including our volume in the series. Many thanks to Erin Damberger and Taylor Patz for creating this book’s indices. Given the timeline that followed from the start of the project in 2019, we are immensely grateful to our contributors for writing their essays during the COVID-19 pandemic—our own unique Black Mirror episode. And, of course, we want to thank Charlie Brooker and Annabel Jones, for blowing our minds, and then uploading them to the Cloud. We dedicate this book to The Two Cities podcast team, our friends who are committed to thinking with us about theology and culture, and who don’t mind a few bloopers in the process.

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NOTES 1. Shane Allen, who was the head of Comedy for Channel 4 when Black Mirror was initially being pitched, describes the concept of the show as “modern parable stories around the theme of social media, technology and AI advances.” See Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 11). Indeed, Jodie Foster, the famous actor who directed the episode Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2), says that Arkangel’s ending “is more of a parable.” See Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 255). 2. Notable examples of Black Mirror’s prescience include, for example, the story about UK prime minister David Cameron’s sexual indiscretion with a pig during college coming to light in September 2015 (cf. The National Anthem [Season 1, Episode 1]; Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 28–29), the rise of a crass reality TV star, Donald J. Trump, as an international political figure (cf. The Waldo Moment [Season 2, Episode 3]; Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 92, 99), the advent of China’s Social Credit System (cf. Nosedive [Season 3, Episode 1]; Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 132; Vincent 2017), and the Harvey Weinstein story breaking just as the producers and crew were entering the premiere for USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1; Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 241). 3. Ashley’s (Miley Cyrus) composition on the piano of “Right Where It Belongs” by Trent Reznor in Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3) suggests deep affinities both with her own tensions as a pop star and with the meaning of Black Mirror itself. 4. Brooker attended Central London Poly (now the University of Westminster), but did not graduate because they did not approve his undergraduate dissertation on video games. See Wollaston (2019). 5. Annabel Jones is a key producer of the show alongside Brooker, directors such as Joe Wright and Jodie Foster have shaped each episode, and Brooker’s also not the only writer on the show. Jesse Armstrong was the sole-writer for The Entire History of You. Brooker also co-wrote a few episodes with other people, such as Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2) with his wife, Konnie Huq; Nosedive (Season 3, Episode 1) with Michael Schur and Rashida Jones; both Shut Up and Dance (Season 3, Episode 3) and USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1) with William Bridges; and Black Museum (Season 4, Episode 6) with Penn Jillette, from the famous Penn and Teller act in Las Vegas, who wrote the short story “The Pain Addict” that inspired the storyline of Dr. Dawson in Black Museum (and Penn was also the inspiration behind the personality of Rolo Haynes; cf. Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 298–99). 6. Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 147). And indeed, Bryce Dallas Howard tells a story in Inside Black Mirror about how her father, Ron Howard, had a panic attack after watching Nosedive with her. 7. Cf. Kutter Callaway’s (2013) comments about how film functions this way. 8. Brooker contributed to a charity book with short essays by many well-known British figures about how to endure Christmas as an atheist (2010), although he was originally raised in a Quaker family (Reynolds 2019).

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9. Netflix presents White Christmas as the fourth episode of Season 2, but it was originally televised on Channel 4 as a stand-alone Christmas Special. 10. Given the association of the viewer to Pax, the meta implications of the choice to worship Pax in Stefan Butler’s (Fionn Whitehead) video game suggest that the viewer is a similar kind of entity with a similar kind of relationship to these characters.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Baj, Lavender. “This Bus Stop Ad Reckons We’re Living in ‘Black Mirror’ Season 6 & Look, It Makes Sense.” Pedestrian, June 7, 2020. Accessed July 2, 2021. https:// www​.pedestrian​.tv​/entertainment​/black​-mirror​-6​-ad/. Barthes, Roland. “The Death of the Author.” In Image-Music-Text, translated by Stephen Heath, 142–48. New York: Hill and Wang, 1978. Bennion, Chris. “Charlie Brooker Interview: ‘I’ve Got a Good Worst-Case-Scenario Detector.’” The Telegraph, May 14, 2020. Accessed January 31, 2021. https:// www​.telegraph​.co​.uk​/tv​/2020​/05​/14​/charlie​-brooker​-interview​-got​-good​-worst ​ -case​-scenario​-detector/. Brooker, Charlie. “If God Existed, Would He Have a Sense of Humor?” In The Atheist’s Guide to Christmas, edited by Robin Harvie and Stephanie Meyers, 155–58. New York: Harper Perennial, 2010. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Callaway, Kutter. Scoring Transcendence: Contemporary Film Music as Religious Experience. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2013. Cirucci, Angela M. and Barry Vacker (eds.). Black Mirror and Critical Media Theory. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018. Colbert, Stephen. The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. CBS. Published on YouTube on June 15, 2020. Accessed July 2, 2021. https://www​.youtube​.com​/watch​?v​ =HEGC2MjaWAM. Destiny, Tchéhouali. “Conspiracy Theories about 5G Networks Have Skyrocketed since COVID-19.” The Conversation, June 2, 2020. Accessed July 2, 2021. https:// theconversation​.com​/conspiracy​-theories​-about​-5g​-networks​-have​-skyrocketed​ -since​-covid​-19​-139374. Duarte, German A. and Justin Michael Battin (eds.). Reading “Black Mirror”: Insights into Technology and the Post-Media Condition. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2021. Gordon, Bryony. “Charlie Brooker on Black Mirror: ‘It’s Not a Technological Problem We Have, It’s a Human One.’” The Telegraph, December 16, 2014. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.telegraph​.co​.uk​/culture​/tvandradio​ /11260768​/Charlie​-Brooker​-Its​-not​-a​-technological​-problem​-we​-have​-its​-a​-human​ -one​.html. Harari, Yuval Noah. 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2018.

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Johnson, David Kyle (ed.). Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Larson, Jossalyn G. “The Sovereignty of Truth: Memory and Morality in ‘Crocodile.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 217–29. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Manninen, Bertha Alvarez. “Men Against Fire and Political Manipulation: How are We Tricked into Dehumanizing Others?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 118–27. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. McSweeney, Terence and Stuart Joy (eds.). Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Morris, Lauren. “Charlie Brooker Gives Black Mirror Season 6 Update: ‘I Don’t Know What Stomach There Would Be for Stories about Societies Falling Apart.’” Radio Times, May 4, 2020. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.radiotimes​ .com​/tv​/sci​-fi​/black​-mirror​-6​-update/. Peele, Anna. “Black Mirror Creator Charlie Brooker Thinks Technology is Making Us Miserable.” GQ, October 21, 2016. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.gq​ .com​/story​/black​-mirror​-charlie​-brooker​-interview. Reynolds, Matt. “Inside the Prophetic, Angry Mind of Black Mirror’s Charlie Brooker.” Wired, April 11, 2019. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.wired​ .co​.uk​/article​/black​-mirror​-charlie​-brooker​-annabel​-jones​-season​-five. Shepherd, Jack. “Charlie Brooker Interview: ‘The Black Mirror Stories Are Not Warnings: Technological Progress is Inevitable.’” Independent, June 5, 2019. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.independent​.co​.uk​/arts​-entertainment​/tv​ /features​/black​-mirror​-charlie​-brooker​-interview​-season​-5​-annabel​-jones​-smithereens​-striking​-vipers​-a8936981​.html. Stolworthy, Jacob. “Black Mirror Season 4 Producer Reveals Details on Every New episode of The Netflix Series—Exclusive.” Independent, November 15, 2017. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.independent​.co​.uk​/arts​-entertainment​/ interviews​/black​-mirror​-season​-4​-episodes​-netflix​-charlie​-brooker​-annabel​-jones​ -release​-date​-trailer​-a7990931​.html. Vincent, Alice. “Black Mirror is Coming True in China, Where Your ‘Rating’ Affects Your Home, Transport and Social Circle.” The Telegraph, December 15, 2017. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.telegraph​.co​.uk​/on​-demand​/2017​/12​/15​/ black​-mirror​-coming​-true​-china​-rating​-affects​-home​-transport/. Wollaston, Sam. “Charlie Brooker: ‘Happy? I Have My Moments.’” The Guardian, June 1, 2019. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.theguardian​.com​/tv​-and​ -radio​/2019​/jun​/01​/charlie​-brooker​-interview​-annabel​-jones​-black​-mirror.

Part 1

AGENCY AND CONDITIONING

Chapter 1

Ethics through a Dark Lens Ellul’s Technological Morality in Black Mirror Peter Anderson

The dystopian visions of Black Mirror offer startling explorations of a world dominated and defined by technology. In particular, the various narrative pathways journeyed in Black Mirror offer a chance for examining the future of morality through a dark, satirical lens. Such social dreaming evaluates present circumstances through possible futures, leaving the awakened dreamer with the responsibility for critical evaluation and informed action.1 As Barbara Klonowska writes, “Social dreaming, both optimistic and fearful, can perform the function of a preparation for the actual future and as such is never futile. The intellectual value of utopian and dystopian visions, produced by both sociology and the arts, is far greater than mere entertainment: ideally, they may help their recipients dream better or avoid dangerous dreams” (2018, 12). In Black Mirror, technology supplies a creative spark for the entire series as each episode serves as an attempt to prompt the viewer to actively participate in shaping a better world.2 In an attempt to evaluate the moralities and ethics displayed throughout Black Mirror, Jacques Ellul’s concept of technological morality offers helpful categories, insights, and analysis of the dystopian ethics displayed in Black Mirror, forcing a reckoning with vice and virtue in a technological society. Greater still, Ellul’s analysis and critique offers something Black Mirror cannot, both criticism and cure for the moral and social traumas of technological world and technological morality. Instead of bleak futures left as questions without answers, Ellul points to the Christian story as the only true narrative with sufficient power to subvert technological morality and revive genuine human freedom and a rightly ordered moral imagination

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rooted in Jesus Christ and actively witnessing to God’s character within the technological society. In fact, Ellul’s own work aims to unmask the unsure foundations of a world built upon technology, stimulating a space for careful reflection while driving the Christian toward purposeful action. Ellul writes, “The intellectual and cultural tragedy of the modern world is that we are in a technical milieu that does not allow reflection” (1990, 145). Ellul’s analysis is more a warning designed to provoke awareness in the present age dominated by technology rather than a comprehensive framework. As such, his approach produces even greater explanatory possibility when partnered with the artistic and stylized explorations of Black Mirror. That is, the dark lens of dystopian futures explored in each Black Mirror narrative offers just the kind of reflection and consideration necessary to grapple with the new vices and virtues cultivated in a technological world. Neglecting the opportunity to reflect critically on the present circumstances in modern society as well as engaging with the possibilities faced in a world dominated by technology and the technological zeitgeist, risks surrender to a technological morality at odds with the Christian vision for life. THE CRITICISM: THE PRESENT FUTURE OF TECHNOLOGICAL MORALITY The inevitable march of technological progress explored by Black Mirror harmonizes with Ellul’s belief that technology unavoidably shapes the future of human existence (Shepherd 2019). Much like Ellul, Charlie Brooker— Black Mirror creator, producer, and writer—believes technology represents an immovable reality for humanity, leaving human actors and their moral agency determinative for the future shaped by, in, and with technology. For both Brooker and Ellul, technology and technological progress do not always represent a fundamental evil or scapegoat for society’s ills (Efe​.c​om 2019; Ellul 1990). Rather, technology provides the manifestation or platform for displaying the promise and perils of human society shaped in and by technology. Ellul uses a term, technique, to encompass both the ideologies and the manifestations of technological environments shaping human existence.3 He defines technique as “the totality of methods rationally arrived at having absolute efficiency” and serves as the determinative value within modern societies (1964, xxv). Technique is not equivalent to technology per se but serves as the system and mentality shaping the technological society, propagating advanced technologies, and generating technological morality (Ellul and Neugroschel 2018, 24–27; Ellul 2004, 26–27). The two are interrelated in ways that must not be missed.

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While equivocating technique and technology misses the mark, seeing either in distinction from the other also undermines the possibility of clear assessment. Even more, Ellul uses “technology” in a way that more closely reflects the original etymology, that is, “the study of technique,” demanding a study of physical artifacts (i.e., computers, machines, robotics, etc.) without being limited to physical artifacts alone (2004, 26). As such, Ellul draws attention to the ways that “technology” is more than computers, machines, social media, or advanced robotics. Instead of representing empty or neutral material objects, Ellul draws attention to the ideological and philosophical realities expressed, propagated, and reinforced through technology (2004, 47–55). Technology becomes both product and producer of the technological milieu. In fact, any study or analysis of physical technological artifacts alone risks abstraction apart from also including the philosophical, ideological, and sociological logic essential to the formation and development of such technologies. In this way, Ellul’s approach befits the world of Black Mirror in the ongoing effort to not only confront the physical machines or advanced technologies that shape the present and future of human society but also to address the underlying assumptions, philosophies, and ideologies embedded in a given technological advancement with its ensuing perils and promise. As a direct result of the interrelationship of technology and technique, technology has become the modern milieu supplying the basic presumptions and perspective through which individuals, institutions, and systems develop (Ellul and Neugroschel 2018, 311–12). Furthermore, Ellul’s exploration of a technological morality does not aim to be all-inclusive but seeks explanatory power and a wakeup call to those living and breathing in the technological system. His interest lies not in offering a static categorization of morality per se but in calling attention to the dynamic expressions of morality adapted within the technological society itself rather than embodied in obedience to the person and work of Jesus Christ.4 Even more, Ellul sees technology as much more than an element or feature of society or as an entity capable of separation for independent or indifferent analysis. Rather, technology has risen to become the tangible expression of technique and personifies the ways technique has grown beyond itself as merely a feature of the world, evolving into an environment proper as technology increasingly becomes the means and method of mediation among varied elements of life.5 For instance, the growing sense of isolation and loneliness in an increasingly technologically advanced world represents one of the great ironies of modern, hyper-connected life. Technology serves as the means of mediated connection yet only dehumanizes and further isolates the participant by separating the human act of communication and community from the fundamental, embodied qualities necessary to meaningful connection.6

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Of note here and in conversation with themes in Black Mirror, Ellul identifies a change in the nature and character of morality within the world increasingly defined by technology. He writes, “A transformation in the lived morality is taking place under our own eyes. We are entering into a new form of morality which could be called technological morality, since it tends to bring human behavior into harmony with the technological world, to set up a new scale of values in terms of technology, and to create new virtues” (Ellul 1969a, 185). In particular, Ellul identifies four virtues of this technological morality that provide explanatory power for constructing, evaluating, and understanding the dystopian ethics explored in Black Mirror. The Cardinal Virtues of the Technological Morality First, technological morality embraces technology as more than an instrument, feature of society, or object but as value-determinative of moral judgments. That is, technology defines good and evil, gives meaning to life, and supplies a reason for living that demands a commitment from humanity (Ellul 1969a). Technology serves as the manifestation of sociological/ideological technique focused on efficiently achieving technological omnipresence in modern society.7 In Black Mirror, the pursuit of technology as value lies under the surface of the entire series. The series’ inception and many of the inspirational sparks for several episodes act as explorations of the inevitable rise of technological advancement and the demand for human action in the midst of this technologically defined environment (Shepherd 2019). For instance, Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2) explores the troubling power of advertisement-driven capitalism, Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1) examines the place of AI in relationships, and Hated in the Nation (Season 3, Episode 6) ponders the role of social media in social accountability. Yet, no episode escapes the troubling presence of technological proliferation in the midst of attempts to explore the possible futures of a social order fated for technological ordering. In short, the world of Black Mirror brings a narrative punch on particular uses of technology but lands its strongest blows when prompting an evaluation of the very presence of technology itself. For instance, tracing the character arc of Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge) in Black Museum directly engages the dangers of technologies developed and implemented by immoral people. As the twisted showmen of questionable and disturbing technologies, he pays for his choices with his life at the hands of Nish (Letitia Wright), the daughter of one of Rolo’s victims. Yet, even in Rolo’s demise, Black Museum prompts a deeper consideration that the same technologies Rolo utilizes to destroy and dehumanize also serve as the means for Nish’s revenge. In this way, beyond asking how technology should be used, Black Museum and other narratives like it in Black Mirror question not

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simply how but whether certain technologies should be used. Veiled behind Black Museum’s attempt at catharsis stands the uncomfortable reality that technology itself serves as the means of supposed justice and obvious injustice. Underneath Rolo’s obvious misuse of technology lies the less obvious misuse of technology forcing Nish to maintain her mother’s consciousness in a technological device and continue to care for Carrie (Alexandra Roach), another character trapped in the very same technology. And without a narrative true enough to call the presumption of technological morality into question, the world is doomed to continually seek technological saviors for redemption and rescue from technological bondage and death. Second, technological morality replaces the moral with the normal, substituting the imperative to pursue virtue with the demand to personify the dominant social norms. By normal, Ellul merely intends to draw attention to the tendency of mass opinion to see itself as the only right opinion and exert strong and often violent pressure upon individuals to comply or suffer the consequences. Ellul writes, “‘Normal’ means whatever a majority of individuals do or whatever a group accepts as a self-evident opinion or attitude” (1975, 28). Black Mirror explores this concept in Nosedive (Season 3, Episode 1), with its troubling world where power is so closely connected to social approval and curated realities propagated by technologically connected environments. While the eventual nonconformity of Lacie Pound (Bryce Dallas Howard) provides a glimmer of hope, the prevailing (and coercive) social structures remain intact and are even reinforced by the imprisonment of Lacie and disenfranchisement of any other nonconformist character. Third, technological morality elevates success to the status of moral exemplar. In the technological society, good and evil are synonyms for success and failure (Ellul 1969, 193). In essence, technological morality identifies the morally praiseworthy only with what produces the desired results. Fourth, technological morality places full confidence in technology’s potential to shape a better future. Technology takes the place of the transcendent and promises to unlock a future humanity without the limits, boundaries, and restrictions long inhibiting the full potential of humankind (Ellul 1969, 197–98). Much like the visions of a personalized heaven captured by San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4), technological morality portrays technology as a gateway to grasping the transcendent. Gaining a Technological Society but Losing Our Soul Underneath these virtues lies a fundamental shift in moral reflection. For technological morality, means is everything and that means is always technology. Technological morality ignores and distracts from ends altogether, shaping morality through means alone by the eternal, frantic proliferation

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of the technological. Such morality is instrumental rather than intrinsic, seeing moral action as the product of necessity, moral agents as the purveyors of normalcy, and moral outcomes as objectives striving for efficiency (Ellul 1969, 188–90). Technology morality supplants fundamental goods with instrumental values. As a result, everything is an instrument of technology and is instrumentalized by technology, bringing about a world shaped by and shaped for a technological future. The manifestation of technique explored within the dystopian worlds of Black Mirror evidences the outcome of self-referential power, whether that be technological, biological, relational, psychological, emotional, political, or some combination thereof. It is possible that the strongest, most recurring theme within the entire series remains the human cost of technological advancement and the total loss of moral ends in ethical reflection. Black Mirror dramatizes the startling consequences of reducing human beings to a means of achieving technological advancement. The human cost catalogued in Black Mirror touches every level of the human experience (e.g., psychological, spiritual, relational, physical, etc.) and rarely are there characters left undamaged. Perhaps this damage indicates that the instrumentalization of the world via technology is more world-breaking than world-making. Within this framework, Black Mirror rightly identifies the ways technological morality enabled by technique remains ravenously committed to monistic dominion through a morality of means alone, that is, flattening all of existence into a single, measurable reality defined by and controlled with technology.8 Ellul comments, “Technique worships nothing, respects nothing. It has a single role: to strip off externals, to bring everything to light, and by rational use to transform everything into means” (1964, 142). Thus, the fatal blow to morality within the technological society comes when means dominates moral discourse, completely unhinged from a proper end.9 Whether it be the dangers of technologically enhanced escapism highlighted in Playtest (Season 3, Episode 2) or the dehumanizing potential of augmented reality explored in Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5), Black Mirror catalogues the tragedies that arise when a true telos disappears for the sake of efficiency, potentiality, and outcomes. Ellul writes, “How can we not think of contemporary society in which, thanks to technology, we have indeed ‘gained the world’ but in which people have clearly lost their being? They have become empty of all being. They have become empty of all being and filled only with desire and entertainment” (2014, 62). The human cost in the technological society is high, a reality poignantly explored throughout Black Mirror. The ongoing pursuit of increasingly effective, technologically shaped means distracts all moral discourse from any consideration of possible ends for the sake of means alone. Technology itself becomes a value, objectifying

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man and using society and social structures as tools for expansive consolidation of power.10 For instance, Black Mirror frequently explores the essential connection between efficiency and violence, the reduction of humanity to a fuel for achieving desired social or communal outcomes. Instrumentalizing human relationships and human lives leads to various forms of violence. For example, White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2) illustrates a strong human tendency to seek retribution and restoration through a psychological violence disconnected from a genuine sense of restoration or even a full recognition of the true nature of violence. In many ways, the social ordering and communal values explored in White Bear question the possibility of justice in a world willing to participate in one kind of violence in response to violence of another kind.11 Similarly, the connection between technology and violence explored in Metalhead (Season 4, Episode 5) reveals the dehumanizing potential of a world dominated by technological morality as the pursuit of small joys and simple pleasures may only be achieved through great risk and against impossible odds. Technology as an object cannot be held responsible for every ill in society but humanity’s subversion to technology undermines the possibility for deepening true virtue for the sake of technological virtues devoid of moral excellence.12 Resisting technological morality demands a full commitment to the Christian moral imagination and virtues. After all, the Christian story offers the only reality true enough to promote human flourishing within a technological society and strong enough to stand against the pragmatism of technological morality. A renewal of the Christian moral imagination is necessary to recover from the deep fragmentation created by technological morality. THE CURE: CONFRONTING TECHNOLOGICAL VICE WITH CHRISTIAN VIRTUE Christian conduct is and always must be the indispensable outworking of the life of faith as the Christian lives as an instrument of reflection and explanation couched in the Christian story (Ellul 1969a, 248). As Ellul explains, “[Christian ethics is] a reminder that the earnestness of the theological commitment should be registered in an earnestness of commitment to the world, and it will establish, for the particular time in which it is valid, the condition and limits of that commitment” (1969a, 215, 248). As a localized, biblically shaped expression of God’s character in the world, Christian morality must never be altered fundamentally by technological morality but should function as a present yet critical voice in the midst of a technological society.13 In this

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way, the dark futures envisioned in Black Mirror stand as a challenge for authentic Christian virtue in a world at peril. Black Mirror forces a response to the real possibility of a world shaped by technique rather than rightly displaying God’s vision for all of life. While Ellul identifies the new virtues of technological morality, he also supplies the necessary alternatives for sustaining a deeply Christian moral vision in the face of technique’s dominance. Immanent Freedom through Christological Transcendence As technological morality elevates technology to a moral norm, Christian virtue responds in the continued exaltation and imitation of Jesus Christ. Empowered by the Holy Spirit and enacting God’s vision for the world revealed in Jesus Christ, the church reconnects the ends and means of moral reflection through embodying Jesus Christ and the Kingdom of God. Ellul writes: The point from which we ought to start is that in the work of God the end and the means are identical. Thus when Jesus Christ is present the Kingdom has “come upon” us. This formula expresses very precisely the relation between the end and the means. Jesus Christ in his incarnation appears as God’s means, for the salvation of man for the establishment of the Kingdom of God, but where Jesus Christ is, there also is this about salvation and this Kingdom. (1989, 64)

The Christian vision for life grounds itself in the living witness of a risen Savior and redeemed community. Ellul explains, “The other possibility is that something exists that technique cannot assimilate, something it will not be able to eliminate. But this can only be transcendent, something that is absolutely not included in our world” (2004, 83). In the incarnation of Jesus Christ, the world receives God’s decisive word against the technological temptations of technique and the divine solution to humanity’s deep longing for transcendence. The temptation to turn toward technological morality’s embrace of technology as value stands in direct opposition to the Christian commitment to defining the true, the good, and the beautiful as revealed in Jesus Christ and his kingdom. In order to live freely in the midst of, but also in resistance to, the technological society, humanity requires a hope transcendent yet immanent. Ellul writes, “We need a freedom that is given to us from the outside. We need a freedom that comes not from us, nor from what we do. Only the transcendent in the system of technique guarantees freedom to humanity and a possible way out for society” (2004, 83). For Ellul, God’s self-revelation supplies the necessary transcendence required for living in and being critical of a world dominated by technique and technological morality. As that which

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is wholly other from the world and its systems dominated by technique, Christian revelation, and specifically the revelation and incarnation of Jesus Christ, offers the path of true freedom. Genuine Hope to Live in Reality In response to a technological morality replacing the moral with the normal, the Christian story depends upon a living hope empowering every believer to patiently and truthfully live in reality. In fact, true Christian hope reestablishes and reinforces a proper relationship with reality necessary for pursuing a meaningful life. Ellul writes, “Hope, then, is that which establishes the right relation between a future (other than a succession of moments) and a present, at the same time that it is a force through which the eschatological power of eternity comes to us and intervenes in the present” (2012, 231–32). Instead of forcing a normalization of the human experience based on uniformity and a hand-crafted version of life lived in escapism, conformity, or oppression, genuine Christian virtue depends upon a hope grounded in the triune God. For Ellul, Christian faith provides the way of viewing reality as it is without falling into despair, no matter how dark or difficult reality may be (2004, 84). Genuine Christian morality demands being present to the world and living in relationship with the given facts and features of the world in an effort to embody the joy of new life in Christ. As Ellul explains, “An ethic needs to be formulated for the faithful so that they can truly be present to the world in which they live, and not to a past or unreal world” (1969a, 215). In order to practice this kind of living, moral presence in the world, God demands both the response of faith and the responsible action springing from embodying the Triune God’s living Word revealed to the world. As Ellul explains, “Revelation, accepted in faith, can bring promise, hope, and liberation. It brings promise in the sense that no matter how mad history may appear to us, it is situated within God’s promise and it does lead to the Kingdom of God. It brings hope in the sense that this certainty permits us to live here and now” (2004, 86). While Black Mirror and the dystopian darkness explored in each episode presents an often paralyzing despair of a future dominated by technological morality, the Christian story rests on an eternal hope guaranteed upon the sure promises of God. Rather than pursuing a technological escapism or conceding to pessimism, Christian hope embodies resurrection hope as a means of living differently in the world as a witness to the world of what it means to truly live. In The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3), Liam’s (Toby Kebbell) journey displays the peril and promise inherent in staring into the blinding light of truth and the harsh realities of life in a fallen world. Liam’s

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(and Ffion’s [Jodie Whittaker]) story brings us face to face with Ecclesiastes 1.18 and the piercing power of seeking out the breadth of knowledge fundamental to obtaining true wisdom. Alongside persistent themes exploring online surveillance and data privacy, the episode’s strongest contribution comes in the final reckoning Liam endures when confronted by a reconstructed reality. In many ways, Liam’s harrowing journey toward confronting his present, lived experience borders on the insane when compared with other characters perfectly willing to live a lie or half-truths. While far from conclusive in its final resolution, The Entire History of You challenges the basic assumptions of our technological society and its full-bore commitment to information access, data consumption, and digital memory. Liam’s experience reminds us all that what we see is not what passes through our retinas, travels through our optic nerve, and is translated as images within our brain. Rather, what we see is what images, ideas, experiences, and emotions mean for our life. Greater still, for the Christian and echoing the words of 2 Corinthians 4.18, what is unseen supplies the greatest measure of hope and peace in a world filled with disappointment and discouragement. In the end, Liam’s bloody removal of his Grain reveals the sacrifice necessary to dealing with life as it is rather than as we believe it ought to be. When faced with the harsh truth of his son’s parentage, Liam’s choice to remove the Grain reinforces the basic human need to know and live the truth as well as the human tendency to deny harsh realities that demand deep sacrifice. And in the face of the constant temptation to look away from the realities of life, the Christian vision for life offers the only resources capable of generating a hopefulness willing to see life as it is and live life with others as they are. Much like Liam, we often face the choice to see reality as it is or look away for more comfortable visions. Ellul writes, “Instead of losing ourselves in idle speculation, or in futile political and social agitation, as the world does, here is the great genuine task of Christian intellectuals: by means of this event to give once more direction to the world in the spheres of politics, social conditions, and many others, and, in this event, to help them to find a hope which is no illusion” (1989, 109). While technological morality aims to replace the moral with a normalized, sanitized, popularized vision of life, only truthfully embracing God’s story supplies the fortitude and courage to endure faithfully through life. Ellul writes, “We must search the Scriptures for the way in which we ought to live, in order that the end, willed by God, should be present among men” (1989, 67). Embodying the person and promises of Christ and his kingdom testifies to a truth greater than the technological reality that often surrounds us and begs to shape our future (1989, 38).

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CONCLUSION Black Mirror and the social dreaming displayed in each episode offer a telling portrait of a world defined by technological morality. Yet, the Christian story offers alternatives to a technological morality of means emphasizing technology as value, ultimate good, and future hope. Christian virtues shaped by biblical hope in Christ and his kingdom cultivate an embodied ethic shaped by eschatological ends. Only in embracing God’s means to accomplish God’s purposes can we faithfully live in and bear witness to a technological society. NOTES 1. I borrow the term “social dreaming” from Barbara Klonowska used in her insightful comparison of utopia and dystopia in film (2018). In fact, the term supplies a helpful conceptual bridge descriptive of the grounded imagination displayed in both the development and the engagement with both genres of film, literature, and other media. 2. Charlie Brooker, Black Mirror’s creator, sees the show’s emphasis to be a mobilization of society in the face of inevitable technological progress rather than cautionary tales of the future. He states, “Our stories are not warnings. Technological progress is completely inevitable. We think more about the human characters. They’re not societal warnings. And I think we’re quite optimistic” (Shepherd 2019). Yet, Brooker and Black Mirror coproducer, Annabel Jones, enhance and satirize the disturbing connections between humanity and technology, which seems to serve to be a measure of wakeup call or warning to Black Mirror audiences. 3. For some additional exploration and analysis of technique in Ellul’s work, see Vanderburg (2004); Van Vleet and Rollison (2020, 87–97); and Terlizzese (2005, 47–84). 4. Ellul references Reinhhold Neibuhr’s work, Nature and the Destiny of Man (1996), as a helpful contribution to the kind of explorations in technological morality undertaken by Ellul himself. In particular, Ellul sees Niebuhr’s emphasis on belief in the goodness of man, education as the balm for all social ills, preeminence of reason, and faith in progress as descriptive of technological morality. 5. Akin to Marshall McLuhan and other media ecologists, Ellul’s emphasis on technology as environment plays a significant part in his analysis. He explains, “We have to adjust to a new set of realities. We have to train new reflexes, learn technologies for using the brain, for appreciating art (itself an expression of the technological society), for establishing human relations through the intermediary of technologies. The technological environment is no longer a set of resources that we sometimes use (for work or distraction). It is now a coherent ensemble which ‘corsets’ us on all sides, which encroaches upon us, and which we can no longer do without. It is now our one and only living environment” (Ellul and Neugroschel 2018, 42). For McLuhan’s perspective, see McLuhan and Fiore (2001). 6. Ellul states it this way, “Mediazation by technology is fundamental to understanding modern society. Not only does technology mediate between man and the

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natural environment and, to a second degree, between man and the technological environment; but it also mediates between men. People are more and more in contact with one another because of technological instruments (the telephone) and psychological technologies (pedagogy, human relations, group dynamism). . . . This technological mediatization of human relations produces a phenomenon that never stops amazing us: the growing sense of individual solitude in a world of universalized communications” (Ellul and Neugroschel 2018, 38). Sherry Turkle (2017 [2011]) also offers a sociological analysis of this phenomenon. 7. David W. Gill (2013, 6) offers this commentary of the consequences of technique’s domination of social order as he engages Ellul, “Wisdom loses to knowledge, knowledge to information, information to data. People lose to systems and numbers.” 8. In particular, Ellul (1964, 140–41) points to the ways individuals lack opportunity to genuinely choose between various means in the technological system. Where there seems to be an overabundance of choice in modern society, the available options remain fundamentally the same, rooted in the technical milieu and aimed at reinforcing and expanding technological dominance. As a result, technique’s monism implicates every person in the moral failings of the whole, doubling the tragedies of the modern world. That is, every individual, suffering under the impossibility of genuine alternatives to the technological system, both inescapably contributes to and inordinately suffers under the far-reaching, all-encompassing systems of oppression and evil constructed through the technological morality of means. 9. Tellingly, reducing morality to means alone represents an essential step down the path of technological dominance across the society. As a morality of means in a technological environment incrementally dominates the human experience, additional technological means are required to address, improve, or alter the existing technological norms or structures. In other words, the system is self-replicating, increasingly forcing its way into every feature of society. As Ellul puts it, technical problems in the technological society encourage technical solutions. In this way, technological values experience exponential growth as both the existing social environment and the only fitting adaptation, improvement, or advancement for technologically shaped sociopolitical, economic, and cultural environments. Ellul states, “Like any system, technique ought to have its self-regulation, its feedback. Yet it has nothing of the sort. . . . We prefer to let the drawbacks and dangers develop (on the pretext that they are not fully demonstrated) and to create new techniques to ‘repair’ the problems” (Ellul 2004, 52). 10. Ellul points to the loss of vocation in the human experience as an ongoing source of dehumanization in the technological society. The technological system reduces man’s vocation to merely a “job,” subverting mankind to machine. Ellul further explains this degradation evidenced not only in the death of “professions” and the rise of “jobs,” but the reality that technological systems have increased the “laboriousness” work. A technological society obsesses over leisure and entertainment to the detriment of life filled with genuine purpose and tied to a deeper connection between human work in a given profession and deeper purpose tied to vocation. Alienation from fulfilling work means alienation from a fulfilling life. Ironically, for

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a way of life so consumed by entertainment and pleasure, humanity struggles to be at peace and find true rest (Ellul and Neugroschel 2018, 72–73). 11. Ellul (1969b, 97–99) actually disputes the possibility of differing “kinds of violence.” That is, physical violence cannot be seen as any greater than psychological violence. Distinguishing between kinds of violence risks several things: (1) subjecting a person, without that person’s knowledge or awareness, to a dehumanized state of being, (2) opening social interactions to increasing levels of violence, and (3) for the Christian, violating the words of Jesus in Matthew 5.21–22, where Jesus declares all types of violence (psychological, spiritual, emotional, and physical) as one and the same. 12. It is worthwhile to note that Ellul’s point here is not to identify technology as the moral scapegoat for the human failings in counteracting the destructive domination of some forms of technology in society. In fact, much in line with the spirit of Black Mirror, Ellul aims to call attention to the ways humanity already exists in a technological system but has the potential to respond. In particular, Christians bear unique responsibility to live in this technological world, empowered and renewed by work of the Holy Spirit (Ellul 1969a, 252–53). Rather than a flat technological pessimism, Ellul works to revive a sense of responsibility for technology run amok through the power of technique. Once again, he emphasizes the role of the Christian community here, noting the redemptive power of Christian presence in the world. He writes, “The Christian must participate in the preservation of the world; he must work effectively for it. . . . For the world ought to be preserved by God’s methods, not by man’s technical work (which can, however, be used by God and form part of his activity, on condition that men bring the whole sphere of technics under his judgment and his control). Further, the world ought to be preserved in a certain order, willed by God, and not according to the plan that men make of this order (a plan, however, which may be accepted by God on condition that men are genuinely concerned for truth and justice)” (Ellul 1989, 15–16). 13. Without question, Ellul emphasizes scripture’s place as the divine critique of human endeavors. As Ellul (2004, 88) puts it, “We need to subject science and technique to the critique of the Revelation. We have now generally accepted that in the Revelation, the Biblical text, the sociological and psychological elements must be scientifically critiqued. We quite willingly accept scientific critiques of the Biblical text, but we should not forget the converse: scientific givens are never as certain as we imagine, and they too must be critiqued from a different point of view, from the standpoint of Revelation.”

BIBLIOGRAPHY Efe​.co​m. “‘Black Mirror’ Creator Charlie Brooker: Show Is Not Anti-Technology.” May 24, 2019. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.efe​.com​/efe​/english​/ life​/black​-mirror​-creator​-charlie​-brooker​-show​-is​-not​-anti​-technology​/50000263​ -3984145.

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Ellul, Jacques. The Technological Society. Translated by John Wilkinson. New York: Vintage Books, 1964. ———. To Will and To Do. Translated by C. Edward Hopkin. Philadelphia: Pilgrim, 1969. ———. Violence: Reflections from a Christian Perspective. Translated by Cecilia Gaul Kings. New York: Seabury, 1969. ———. The New Demons. Translated by C. Edward Hopkin. New York: Seabury, 1975. ———. The Presence of the Kingdom. Translated by Olive Wyon. 2nd edition. Colorado Springs: Helmers & Howard, 1989. ———. The Technological Bluff. Translated by Geoffrey W. Bromiley. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1990. ———. Perspectives on Our Age: Jacques Ellul Speaks on His Life and Work. Edited by Willem H. Vanderburg. Revised edition. Toronto: House of Anansi, 2004. ———. Hope in Time of Abandonment. Reprint. Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2012. ———. If You Are the Son of God: The Suffering and Temptations of Jesus. Translated by Anne-Marie Andreasson-Hogg. Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2014. Ellul, Jacques, and Joachim Neugroschel. The Technological System. Reprint. Eugene: Wipf and Stock, 2018. Gill, David W. “The Enduring Importance of Jacques Ellul for Business Ethics.” Ellul Forum 52 (2013): 1–12. Klonowska, Barbara. “On Desire, Failure and Fear: Utopia and Dystopia in Contemporary Cinema.” New Cinemas: Journal of Contemporary Film 16, no. 1 (March 2018): 11–28. McLuhan, Marshall, and Quentin Fiore. The Medium Is the Massage. 9th edition. Berkley: Gingko Press, 2001. Niebuhr, Reinhold. The Nature and Destiny of Man. Reprint. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 1996. Shepherd, Jack. “Charlie Brooker Interview: ‘The Black Mirror Stories Are Not Warnings. Technological Progress Is Inevitable.’” The Independent, June 5, 2019. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.independent​.co​.uk​/arts​-entertainment​/tv​/ features​/black​-mirror​-charlie​-brooker​-interview​-season​-5​-annabel​-jones​-smithereens​-striking​-vipers​-a8936981​.html. Terlizzese, Lawrence Joseph. Hope in the Thought of Jacques Ellul. Eugene: Wipf & Stock, 2005. Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. Revised edition. New York: Basic Books, 2017 [2011]. Vanderburg, Willem H. “Appendix 1 to Perspectives on Our Age: Jacques Ellul Speaks on His Life and Work.” In Perspectives on Our Age: Jacques Ellul Speaks on His Life and Work, edited by Willem H. Vanderburg, 91–108. Toronto: House of Anansi, 2004. Van Vleet, Jacob E. and Jacob Marques Rollison. Jacques Ellul: A Companion to His Major Works. Eugene: Cascade Books, 2020.

Chapter 2

Barbarism, Boredom, and the Question Concerning Pornography in Fifteen Million Merits Amber Bowen

It was in 1987, in the midst of booming economies, the rise of mass industry, and celebrated technological advancement, when French phenomenologist Michel Henry described modern technological culture not as one of progress, but as one of “barbarism.” For Henry, a society overtaken by barbarism is structured according to a techno-scientist ideology, one that understands the world as a repository of measurable objects that can be sliced, stacked, and manipulated by mathematics in order to achieve any desired end. Barbarism, according to Henry, reduces the world to visible display—to an empty shell of exteriority—suppressing the inner life that gives it value, meaning, and coherence. It dissects and reconfigures even our most basic human experiences, like the experience of home, work, and social life, in ways that are isolating and alienating. In this world, humans become detached from themselves, from their work, and from others, and are pushed toward a passive existence of spectatorship and diversion. Barbarism replaces the real with a surrogate reality, a virtual reality. While it is unlikely that Michel Henry’s work was the inspiration for Fifteen Million Merits, this particular Black Mirror episode provides a strikingly accurate, if radicalized, portrayal of barbarism. In particular, Fifteen Million Merits highlights the devastating effects of the techno-scientist culture on two significant experiences of human life: work and romantic love.1 In this essay, I first provide an overview of Henry’s notion of barbarism. I then examine how the experiences of work and romantic love are depicted in the episode and how they correspond to Henry’s prescient insights. I consider how work that is reduced to impersonal technique becomes alienated and largely meaningless. As Henry describes, and as Fifteen Million Merits dramatizes, the alienation and monotony of human labor in a technocratic 35

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society results in a perpetual state of ennui, or the feeling of boredom. The entertainment industry promises to assuage this boredom through various kinds of digital media, but according to both Henry and Fifteen Million Merits, its offerings really just intensify it. Second, I extend Henry’s insights on the nature of barbarism to consider how reducing the world to visible display perpetuates a pornographic way of seeing the Other and of experiencing erotic love. Fifteen Million Merits highlights how the entertainment industry capitalizes on pornographic display in order to appease ennui, and how pornography shapes the social imaginary of romantic love. Casting erotic love in terms of immediacy, control, and dominance over the Other, pornography increasingly suppresses the experience of truth, goodness, and beauty in the encounter with the beloved Other. I conclude by considering how faith, hope, and love—three theological virtues that are perverted in the episode—are necessary to overcome the distorted spirituality of barbarism. BARBARISM AND THE PRIMACY OF LIFE From his work on phenomenality and manifestation to his sociopolitical critique, Henry seeks to articulate the nature and the primacy of “Life.” “Life” is a descriptive term that is different from our common usage of it.2 Typically, the scientist studies life by breaking it down into molecules and particles, examining it through a microscope. Henry thinks that such an approach can only understand life as a feature of things, or as a secondary derivative. By breaking life down into parts, gazing at them as an external observer looking at objects, we only recognize life at the surface level. Henry contends that while Life indeed manifests itself in concrete, material ways, it is essentially internal and subjective. Life is known primarily not by looking at it or cognizing about it, but by what we refer to colloquially as “the feeling of life itself”—the feeling of our own immediate affective experience. Life is something we are caught up in, not an object we can master, manipulate, or control. Henry ultimately grounds his philosophy of Life in Christianity, recognizing all of existence as radically dependent on God. Since life comes from and is sustained by God, it is not only sacred, it is what is most real about existence, and it is what facilitates experience itself. Before we are “thinking things,” Henry argues that human beings are living things, which means we are affective, “heart-ed,” spiritual beings (cf. DeRoo 2022). By virtue of the fact that we are “living,” and “heart-ed,” human beings are creative, generative, and productive. Culture-making in its various forms is prompted first by the force of Life that human beings experience affectively and then expressed concretely. However, Henry argues that (post)

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industrial, technocratic societies are structured according to a comprehensive framework—a worldview, if you will—that is inherently “anti-Life.” Henry traces the beginnings of this ideology back to Galileo who “revolutionized” the western way of thinking by insisting that “it remains possible to go beyond the relativity of subjective appearances and to display a true being of the world” (2012, 7). In short, “Galilean science” pursues knowledge defined as objective, rational, and universally valid insofar as it is free from the “the changing opinions of individuals, particular points of view, and everything that is only ‘subjective’” (2012, 7). It pursues this kind of knowledge by reducing the world to stable geometric determinations that can be understood the same way by everyone. Henry argues that this is actually a constructed notion of truth, one that replaces the sensible given with mathematical abstraction (2012, 68). Of course, there is nothing wrong with geometric determinations or mathematics. Henry’s concern is with the reduction of the world to them.3 More than a simple tool to help humanity achieve its higher aims, modern technology has become an end in itself (2012, 42–3). Technological progress is pursued for the sake of technological progress. It is a self-referential development governed by nothing outside of itself. Progress is a worthy pursuit if it is governed by virtues such as truth, goodness, and beauty along with values such as the irreducible sanctity of human life and stewardship of the given world. However, pursuing “progress” for the sake of “progress” alone is dangerous insofar as there is nothing guiding its advances beyond “advancement” itself. Such a pursuit is essentially nihilistic. Whereas earlier conceptions of technology (techne) refer to a kind of embodied know-how (or praxis) that works with the given world, the essence of modern technology is to work over and against the world. It breaks down its organic relations to mechanistic cause and effect, means and ends. Henry calls this shift an “ontological revolution” which occurs when action is no longer subjective creativity that arises from a context of intimate co-belonging in the world, but instead “is now wherever there are pistons, turbines, cogs and all kinds of machines that fire way all the time. In short, it is the immense mechanical system of big industry, which can be reduced to the electromagnetic currents of supercomputers and other high-tech machines of ‘techno-science’” (2012, 47). Henry continues, “This points to the crucial event of Modernity in the passage from the reign of the human to the nonhuman: action has become objective. The surface of the Earth now resembles its physico-mathematical sub-layer: the whirling of atoms, the collisions of particles, and the age-old, frenetic restlessness of bio-evolution that occurs without any origin, cause, or aim” (2012, 47). Modern technology is made up of objective, mechanistic processes that are designed to occur on their own. Thus, the kind of knowledge that is advanced by modern technology is

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no longer the personal, generative, impassioned knowledge of life, but techniques for manipulating objects and physico-mathematical determinations. In world governed by barbarism, there is nothing real, meaningful, or enduring. Better put, there is nothing that is actually true, good, or beautiful, but only the visible display of detached objects. These objects have no meaningful relation to one another beyond, perhaps, the mechanistic laws of cause and effect. As such, there is little difference between a living person and a technological machine, or a lifeworld and manipulable matter upon which human beings can simply impose their will. Every bond of intimacy is severed, including the intimate relatedness of the self to the given world, the self to her work, and even the self to the beloved Other. A techno-scientific ideology exchanges the spiritual nature of Life, the inner subjectivity that connects us to the world and to one another, for “Life-less” exteriority. It is therefore a form of spiritual suppression. THE TECHNO-SCIENTIFIC WORLD OF FIFTEEN MILLION MERITS The television, Henry says, “is the practice of barbarism par excellence” (2012, 109). Henry was writing before the advent of the internet, laptops, smartphones, etc., but the idea is nonetheless applicable: digital media is a generator of visible display which drowns the spectator in a flood of images. The more images we consume, the more everything around us becomes nothing but visual display. In fact, by our use of social media, we even begin to think of ourselves as a virtual display, and we act, dress, pose, and post accordingly. Fifteen Million Merits introduces us to a world that is quite literally made up of digital media. The environment consists of an enclosed space—an inescapable prison of sorts—where nearly all the walls are covered with video screens. These screens may depict a fake outside world or they may offer personalized entertainment at any time. There is no natural light, no exposure to the elements, no connection to the earth, and no real connection to others. Each person lives alone in an isolated cell surrounded by virtual walls. Not even food comes from natural resources but is manufactured in a petri dish, individually wrapped, and sold in a vending machine. Everything contained in this world is either virtual or artificially produced. As such, Fifteen Million Merits offers a radicalized portrayal of a technocratic world—a world that is truly barbaric, in the Henryan sense of the term. My argument is that the episode allows us to see the distorting effects of barbarism on two deeply “human” experiences: work and romantic love. The episode follows a character named Bing Madsen. Journeying through his everyday routine, we see him wake up every morning alone in his cell to

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the sound and cartoon images of a virtual rooster on the screen walls. After getting ready, Bing leaves his cell and joins others in formation to go to work. It turns out that their work is to ride stationary bikes all day, the purpose of which presumably is to generate energy for the virtual world. The rows of stationary bikes face a wall with a screen, which gives them entertainment options as they pedal for hours at a time. The streaming channels keep their minds occupied so they can tune out the monotony of the “pedal pushing.” Their work is laborious yet subjectively disengaged. At the end of the day, their “labor” is exchanged for an hourly wage of merits, or what they call “clockage.” Merits then can be used to buy the food dispensed from vending machines, accessories for their virtual “doppel,” or access to various forms of entertainment such as video games, crass game shows, fat-shaming programs, a talent competition called Hot Shot, or pornography from a channel called Wraith Babes. By day they simply generate the energy for the virtual displays that they then consume by night, passing the time until the day starts all over again. The problem with this approach to human work, according to Henry, is that it prevents it from being a modality of Life—an expression of the creative force of one’s own life as an embodied being. Work as “living labor” stands in contrast to work as “clocking in.” When we “clock in” we translate our work into a unit of measurement that assigns a (monetary) value to it. There is nothing wrong with measuring our productivity and even connecting it to a monetary value. However, when we simply become cogs in the machine that perform actions in exchange for “clockage,” an “objective network” takes the place of Life (Henry 2012, 89). Even those who do not have a cog-in-themachine job but are inventors and producers of the machines can still be just as entrenched in a system in which the machine is both the means and the end. Under such conditions, Neal DeRoo explains, “Life [and the energy or movement that resonates in it] ceases to be transferred or deployed into the things produced. As more and more things are produced in which that energy of Life is less and less deployed, it is harder and harder for us as humans, to have experiences in which we resonate with things in the world through the interior resonance of living beings” (2022). In other words, rather than feeling empowered, creative, productive, and “alive” in our work, barbarism leads to profound alienation, a sense of purposelessness, and a general lack of resonance with our labor and with the world around us.4 BOREDOM AND ENTERTAINMENT Between the sterility of the environment, the monotony of the routine, and the seeming purposelessness of the activities, life in the world of Fifteen Million

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Merits is exceedingly boring. By the lethargic look on Bing’s face, and the slumped posture by which he carries himself, it is clear that he is caught up in the apathy, the jadedness, the exhaustion, or, as Henry calls it, the ennui that pervades the barbaristic environment and is a symptom of the suppression of Life. Since Life is the basis of all existence it is impossible to destroy it. At most, a barbaristic environment can promote practices and create structures that forget, suppress, or deny it (Henry 2012, 58). Under such conditions, the Life within, the creative energy that arises from our affectivity, remains unemployed. It has nowhere to go, or no way to be released, since it is being stifled by the very structures of the world in which we live. This repressed energy leads to a perpetual state of boredom, listlessness, lethargy, or ennui (Henry 2012, 101–7). It explains why we can be incredibly busy and yet restless, exhausted but unfulfilled. It leaves us looking for ways to “kill time” in work and even in leisure, simply for the purpose of getting through it. In order to assuage our boredom, the technocratic world has something to offer: entertainment. When Bing comes back home at the end of a long day at work he is exhausted. Yet this exhaustion is not the kind that accompanies a job welldone or a sense of accomplishment. It is more properly the feeling of depletion and a general world-weariness. After spending all day pedaling on a road that leads to nowhere, he now has nothing else to do but binge various forms of entertainment. Hence, a vicious cycle begins of quelling the restless exhaustion of work by consuming entertainment to pass the hours before returning back to work. Rather than providing true rest, the passive consumption of entertainment simply dulls the boredom, offering a way to cope with the drain of the everyday. “I Have a Dream” by ABBA, the cleverly selected theme song for the episode, punctuates how Bing and those around him consume empty entertainment as a kind of escapism from a world reduced to an empty shell. However, doing so only reinforces the prevailing spirit of barbarism and leaves the inhabitants all the more immured in its systems. Eventually, the repressed energy becomes “misdirected” even further toward anxiety, addiction, and even violence (Henry 2012, 104–5). This progression is portrayed in Fifteen Million Merits through particular forms of entertainment on offer. Channels that get the most attention are the ones that contain crass humor, that stage degrading acts toward overweight people, that subject contestants to either the mockery or the lechery of the audience, and that invite pornographic viewing of women, or “Wraith Babes.” The entertainment industry not only provides an outlet for the vulgarity, aggression, and ruthless despising of others, it also proliferates forms of violence that arise from the suppression and diabolical inversion of Life.

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Digital media is barbarism par excellence precisely because it reduces the world to “graphics,” or to visual display. The more digital media we consume, and the more our society is mediated through it, the more we come to see the world as nothing but images and objects all the way down. Then, as Henry says, when there is nothing truly meaningful to do we become content just to look, or just to be passive consumers of the visual displays offered to us (2012, 113). Barbaristic societies are what Guy Debord calls societies of the spectacle: Considered in its own terms the spectacle is an affirmation of appearances and an identification of all human social life with appearances. But a critique that grasps the spectacle’s essential character reveals it to be a visible negation of life—a negation that has taken on a visible form. (2002, 9)

A society of the spectacle uses specialized mediations (virtual displays) to show us a world that is no longer directly grasped, much like the virtual windows in the lunchroom which show clouds in the sky or the mountainscape displayed in Bing’s “upgraded” cell at the end of the episode. No matter how “real” it looks, the screen is an impenetrable wall separating Bing from the world “outside,” or from the “real.” He is locked in an enclosed space, isolated in an inescapable virtual container, and the technological make-up of his society only reinforces this isolation. In fact, this isolation is characteristic of societies of the spectacle. As Debord explains, “[The] goods that the spectacular system chooses to produce also serve it as weapons for constantly reinforcing the conditions that engender ‘lonely crowds’” (2002, 15). This loneliness, which is written all over Bing’s face, is combated through digital entertainment that, in effect, only perpetuates his loneliness. Within his barbaristic habitus, there is nothing real or meaningful beyond the digital points he can earn or the pleasure he can derive from pixels and sounds. Often our attempts to escape a barbaristic habitus only reinforce it. For example, in the episode, the one sense of purpose or vision of “the good life” comes from the streaming channel Hot Shot. This channel presents itself as offering an opportunity to escape the monotony of pedal-pushing life through a talent show competition. If bike pedalers earn enough clockage, they can purchase a ticket to be a contestant on a program that allows them to showcase their talent. It is not difficult to see how for those suppressed by a barbaristic culture, the promise of being recognized as a singular and irreplaceable individual with unique talents to offer the world is appealing. It is a semblance of what they are longing for deep down but have no way of expressing in the kind of society in which they live. Hot Shot offers the possibility of dignity, affirmation, and significance—or so it seems. The contestants are judged by

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the owners of three major streaming channels. Winners of the competition are awarded celebrity status and significantly upgraded living conditions. Most importantly, they are free from the life of pedal-pushing—although, as we discover in the episode, their new conditions do not amount to more integrated and life-affirming forms of work (and even romantic love), but remain ensconced in the barbaric system as they simply become the objects of everyone else’s entertainment. THE PORNOGRAPHIC GAZE Barbarism exalts the eye as the primary means of engaging—or rather controlling—one’s experience of the world by rendering all of reality an image beneath its sway. The nature of this experience, I argue, is inherently pornographic. Hence, it is unsurprising that pornography would be a key feature of the society in Fifteen Million Merits. Helen Longino defines pornography as “explicit representations of sexual behavior” that are distinguished by their “degrading and demeaning portrayal of the role and status of the human female as a mere sexual object to be exploited and manipulated sexually” (2009, 42–3; cf. Altman and Watson 2019, 61). This definition fits the kind of pornography portrayed in Fifteen Million Merits which features primarily female models, though the industry is not limited to female representation.5 More significantly, it emphasizes the exploitation and objectification latent in pornographic projects. Bernard Williams argues that pornographic representation combines two features: “it has a certain function or intention, to arouse its audience sexually, and also a certain content, explicit representation of sexual material (organs, postures, activity, etc.). A work has to have both this function and this content to be a piece of pornography” (Williams 1981, 103; cf. Altman and Watson 2019, 61). Taken together, Longino’s and Williams’s definitions emphasize pornography as explicit representation, or visual display, which invite the sexual objectification of the Other for the purpose of the arousal of the viewer. While these are helpful definitions, a phenomenological description of what is going on in the experience of pornography offers more insight into its essence than a definition can contain. Phenomenology allows us to get at the nature of that which we experience and even recognize how experiences shape us in certain ways by examining their structure. Accordingly, in this section, I will apply Henry’s general phenomenological analysis of barbarism to the experience of pornography as a particular barbaristic practice. As Fifteen Million Merits vividly portrays, pornography is a hallmark of a barbaric technocratic culture that distorts (to the point of diabolical degradation) the human experience of romantic love.

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By alienating us from the real world, digital abstractions also alienate us from real others. They encourage the proliferation of desire toward “disincarnate” erotic fantasies. In Fifteen Million Merits, social interaction is primarily mediated through digital platforms and avatars, which means everyone interacts with each other’s doppels or stylized images rather than encountering one another directly. Phenomenologically speaking, doppels and images on the screen are bloodless objects that appear to me in a field of perception in which I am the only “real” being. As such, my engagement with the image is unilateral rather than dialogical because there is no actual encounter with an actual Other. I simply interact with the image that is before me on my own terms. Thus, for Bing, a wave of a hand can make the image disappear, or he can beckon for it to come forward. This structure of experience is what phenomenologists refer to as egocentrism, wherein the conscious ego lies at the center of experiences and exerts a large measure of control over those experiences. Egocentrism is disrupted when we encounter the “Other,” who pulls us out of our isolated field of experience and calls us to encounter something beyond ourselves. Doppels or graphic images, including the pornographic kind, are incapable of interrupting the ego from its governing center because they are simply “visual displays.” In fact, they reinforce the centrality of the ego by giving themselves as objects that it can control and that exist to further its own fantasies. The mediated—and ultimately isolated—experience of encountering the Other as a digital doppel is the same kind of experience when encountering the Other as a pornographic image. Porn is not a medium of encounter, but a wall of isolation upon which an “irreal” representation of a lover is projected. There is a general indifference to who the real person is, the interest lies in what the image on the screen can do for the viewer. She (speaking generically of the porn star) matters insofar as she is a suitable depiction of whatever the viewer desires. She becomes a shell of a person, a phantom, a wraith babe. She is not an actual living Other whose very presence calls a lover to a space of genuine encounter to create something meaningful—which is what Bing longs for most but cannot find anywhere in his techno-pornographic world. When Bing wakes up in his cell, the quietness of the early morning is soon interrupted by pounding techno music and explicit pornographic images that fill the screens around him. “New from Wraith Babes,” the announcer exclaims, “The hottest girls in the nastiest situations.” As soon as the advertisement pops up, he gestures for it to skip. Immediately, however, a window appears saying, “Skipping incurs penalty,” and gives him the option either to resume the advertisement or to pay a fine. Bing opts for the fine, and immediately we see 1,000 merits deducted from his total. Following Bing throughout his daily routine, we learn that the Wraith Babes channel is accessible to stream not only in the privacy of their

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individual cells but also as an entertainment option while they are at work. Pornography is on-demand at any time and in any place. It is then offered as a reward to unwind from work. This use of porn is also seen in Men Against Fire when the soldiers are rewarded with sex dreams for their performance in taking out Roaches. Beyond the widespread availability of porn in Fifteen Million Merits, the intrusiveness of the advertisements and the cost both to consume and not to consume disclose the tyrannical nature of the entertainment industry, in general, and the pornography branch, in particular. The industry depends on people’s labor to fuel it and on their addictive consumption to sustain it. Bing and his fellow inhabitants are caught up in a selfreferential system that is at once predacious and exploitive. It has a totalizing claim on their reality. After work, Bing lays in bed playing video games. Once again, an advertisement for Wraith Babes appears. Annoyed, he throws his head back and covers his eyes. At once, a notification appears saying “view obstructed” and the screens around him pause. As Bing continues to hold his hand over his eyes, a high-pitched noise sounds along with a command to “Resume Viewing.” The longer he covers his eyes the more piercing the pitch becomes. Relenting, he opens his eyes. The music resumes and the explicit clips once again bombard the walls of his cell. With nothing else to do to pass the lonely hours, Bing selects the channel, and 10,000 merits are deducted. Beyond the predacious nature of the industry, what is especially striking about this scene is the way in which Bing’s barbaristic society commands and shapes a pornographic gaze. Pornographic images come through the anonymous gaze of the camera, which viewers passively receive “as” their own. The gaze the camera facilitates is essentially voyeuristic. Viewers see but they are not seen in return. Bing sees graphic images of the porn star but he is not seen by her. Elsewhere in Black Mirror we see this pattern play out similarly. In the first act of White Christmas, Matt Trent (Jon Hamm) uses the Z-Eyes technology with the “Eye-Link” streaming feature so he can see what his client sees in order to give him live dating advice. It turns out that Matt uses this technology not only for himself to see what his client sees, but also to allow other secret “onlookers” to watch the client have sex. The asymmetrical pornographic gaze avoids the counter-gaze of the Other, allowing viewers to enact whatever fantasy they want upon the Other in the privacy, or secrecy, that voyeurism provides. Pornography moreover trains consumers to see the Other in ways that are directed by the camera. The more pornography one consumes, the more they develop that kind of gaze. That particular way of seeing becomes the way in which they see and engage with others more generally—even their own romantic partners. On one hand, passively receiving images that come across the screen can alleviate a viewer’s sense of responsibility for that gaze, or

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for the way in which they are looking at the Other. On the other hand, the mediation of the camera in the pornographic image disappears in the experience, leaving viewers with the sense that they are grasping the object immediately, even though their gaze is being escorted by the camera. Visual media removes any awareness of distance or separation by space and time. This immediacy is also evidenced in the language in porn, which, as we hear from the Wraith Babes channel, is characteristically expletive, concerned with immediacy, intensity, and command, not with creating meaning, facilitating encounter, or enjoying communion.6 Worse still, as Guy Longworth has argued, pornography is effectively a form of illocutionary silencing. It conditions the viewer not to take the words of the Other seriously, and in fact to interpret them in the opposite way and to act accordingly. “Pornography trains consumers to see attempts to refuse sex as attempts only to pretend to refuse sex,” he argues. It can either “present women as always willing, in a way that can undercut evidence to the contrary provided by what they say, or it presents women as regularly only pretending to be unwilling. In either case, its uncritical consumption can undermine men’s abilities to recognize women’s attempted refusals of sexual intercourse as such . . . [which] can make women unable to perform acts of refusal” (Longworth 2020). From a phenomenological perspective, what Longworth identifies is how the structure of experience of pornography conditions other romantic experiences by subsuming them into the pornographic. While Fifteen Million Merits depicts pornography as the isolated consumption of images, the episode The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3) shows how pornography involves fantasies that people project onto others or enact in ways that efface their real-life partners. The episode features an implanted device called the Grain, which allows people to play back their memories so they can re-view them over and over again. While the device is used in many situations (from professional to social), unsurprisingly one of the ways people use it is to revisit their prior sexual encounters. They now view these encounters as spectators, turning their memories into personal pornography. In one scene, a married couple, Ffion and Liam, are having sex with their devices on. Their eyes are clouded and they are looking out into the distance rather than looking at one another. It becomes evident that while they are with each other physically, they are not actually present to one another personally. Indeed, they are simply using each other’s bodies in service to their memoryturned-fantasy. What occurs is not an intimate, interpersonal encounter— indeed, there is no real encounter at all—but an autonomous assertion of will. Similarly, Striking Vipers (Season 5, Episode 1) displays how the use of porn disrupts genuine romantic encounter and it makes people worse lovers in real life, not better. In their game world, Danny and Karl have sex with each other’s avatars but they are unable then to perform with their romantic

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partners in real life without recourse to pornography to help satisfy them and/ or their partners. In fact, even though Danny and Karl have sex with each other through their avatars in the game, they find they are unable to perform even with each other outside of the game world. When guilt-laden Danny suggests they should stop playing the game, Karl resists, saying, “It’s not cheating, it’s not real. It’s like porn or something.” Thus, pornography permits viewers to enact their fetishized desires freely upon irreal objects and experiences, or what are regarded as irreal objects and experiences. It is an isolated experience which leaves viewers enclosed in the immediate realm of their own fantasies. Yet, as Black Mirror repeatedly conveys, being locked in pornographic ideality, far from the concrete actuality of the beloved Other, has distorting, not liberating, real-world effects on the experience of romantic love.7 The isolated, egocentric structure of pornography also provides an experience of sex as ephemeral. Punctiliar pornographic episodes have no lasting significance or endurance, which removes the need for relational energy and investment that leads to and gives meaning to sexual intimacy. Instead of being a reference point for a “more complex, continuing involvement of two individuals in a common life,” as Paul Kahn says (2005, 204), pornography allows sex to be consumed effortlessly and meaninglessly. He continues: It sees the future only as an endless opportunity for more of the same: a succession of pornographic moments. The sociality of the pornographic is a world in which individuals relate to each other as possessors of bodies that are in themselves sources of fulfillment. This is a taking back of the body from its normal condition in which it is a complex signifier of meanings outside of itself. (2005, 206)

Hence, pornography presents the Other as merely a body available in the moment to be acted upon, to have one’s way with, to possess. It is a form of consumption like any other. What happens in the erotic moment purportedly remains in the moment. As argued, however, what the viewer retains is a structure of experience that distorts other experiences by rendering them obscene. SIGNS OF LIFE After an evening watching porn, Bing awakes the next morning and gets ready for work just like all the other mornings. Standing in formation in the elevator, the door opens and a girl he had never seen before gets on. In contrast to the lethargic faces around him, there is something wholesome about her, something that exudes spiritedness with innocence and authenticity. She

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carries herself with a general posture of trust, openness, and warmth toward the world, and in that regard her disposition might be described as one of faith, hope, and love. Walking onto the elevator at a time Bing least expected, her arrival interrupts not just the monotony of the morning, but the emptiness of his world by filling it with something that he had been looking for but could not find. She brought signs of Life. Phenomenologically speaking, what we witness in the elevator is the experience of counter-intentionality, or the decentering of the ego in a given experience. When a real “Other” shows up unexpectedly, she (the Other) interrupts my experience of the world as merely objects that I see or take on my own terms. She ruptures my phenomenal horizon by inserting something new. Not only is it new; it is excessive, or more than I can contain fully by my concepts and categories. I experience something beyond myself that comes to me as a kind of advent. Even though it seems that Bing noticed the girl before she noticed him—in fact, we see him looking at her while she is staring forward in the elevator—her arrival nonetheless marks a change in his world as he knew it. She brings something that previously was absent, but for which he deeply longed. After a morning of pedaling, with gameshows, crude humor, and pornography all around him, we see Bing in the bathroom washing his hands. He hears music—not techno beats coming through a speaker, nor a performance on a screen, but a real, living voice singing “Anyone Who Knows What Love Is.”8 The words speak of how love allows you to see more in the Other than what meets the eye. Bing stands captivated by the song, and then realizes it comes from the girl he saw earlier on the elevator. They speak to one another for the first time, standing face-to-face. At that very moment, an advertisement pops up “Hey regular user, new from Wraith Babes.” Embarrassed, Bing wards off the advertisement as fast as he can, costing him another 1,000 merits. The girl goes back to work, leaving Bing feeling defeated. By that encounter, he gains an awareness of how she might see him and begins to understand himself in light of her gaze. For the first time, we see a sense of self-reflective remorse in him, or a recognition of the emptiness of pornographic consumption in the face of a real Other. He looks at himself in the mirror, and in self-reproach exclaims, “Dick.” Kenny (Alex Lawther) has a similar experience in Shut up and Dance (Season 3, Episode 3). He regularly consumed child pornography without much concern. As the deranged logic goes, he himself is not directly harming children, only watching images, which no one even knew he was doing. However, when the possibility came of his actions becoming exposed, or of others seeing him watching child pornography, he was utterly horrified and ashamed to the point of performing other criminal acts, like bank robbery and murder, in order to keep the secret from getting out. Both cases are examples

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of how the gaze of the Other breaks us out of the immediacy of our own experience and calls us into question. It places us in a position of responsibility for the world and for the Other, and even opens the possibility of authentic encounter, of mutual reciprocity, and of life-giving intimacy (cf. Levinas 1969, 80–1, 84–5, 87–8, 194–219; Books IV–V in Marion 2012).9 THE DIABOLICAL SPIRIT OF BARBARISM As Bing gets to know Abi (Jessica Brown Findlay), the girl with the lovely voice, something grows between them that does not exist anywhere else in the world of Fifteen Million Merits. Whereas the music playing in the background is generally either techno or circus tunes, when they talk we hear violins and pianos. As they converse, Bing and Abi face one another rather than staring at screens. Bing sees a gift in Abi that he finds unique and precious, and his immediate inclination is to call it forth, or to make space for her to develop it. Unlike the unilateral and punctiliar experience of porn, a genuine encounter with the beloved Other is generative and expansive. Rather than collapsing into themselves, the lover and the beloved encourage one another to expand in their world. They seek to open up the world for the Other. In their barbaristic society, however, the only possibility for expansion available to Bing and Abi is through the show Hot Shot. Bing asks Abi if she had ever considered going on as a contestant. She said she had, but did not have the twelve million merits to buy a ticket. Bing explains that his brother passed away and left him with his remaining merits, and he offers to gift 12 million to her. He insists that he would rather spend them on “something real” than all the other fake “stuff” sold for pointless amusement. At the Hot Shot audition, after being given a drug called “cuppliance,” Abi walks on the stage shyly. The first thing Judge Wraith (Ashley Thomas) asks her is to take off her top. Cheers explode from the audience, who we realize are virtual doppels of the real people sitting in their isolated chambers watching the show. Shocked and embarrassed, Abi stands paralyzed on stage. The music begins for the nostalgic, oldies-style love song that was passed down to Abi from her mom, and her mom’s mom before that—itself suggestive of the deep significance of family ties and the gifts that come through them that exceed the barbaristic world’s hollow commodification. The audience is increasingly softened—even to the point of tears—as her song reminds them of something that barbarism has suppressed at every turn, namely, the kind of love that is self-giving, loyal, and generous against the odds and regardless of what the world thinks. After the moment of beauty, authenticity, and intimacy in Abi’s song, the judges praise her for her talent, but confess that they could not help

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but picture her in an erotic scenario while she was singing. In other words, rather than being moved by the poetry of the song to feel the beauty, magic, and significance of romantic love coming through her voice, Abi’s musical performance was picked apart so that all that was left was an extracted and sexualized version of her performing in a pornographic scene. Judge Wraith offers to give her a position as a porn star on the Wraith Babes channel, and if she takes it she will never have to pedal a bike again. Bing, who had been carried out of the audition for trying to tell Abi not to take the deal, wakes up the next morning in his cell. He goes to work and he sees the bike pedaler next to him watching a porn-style film featuring Abi. She has been outfitted to look just like all the other porn stars, effacing her unique beauty and singularity. Bing hears her say, in a rather unconvincing voice across the screen, “The best thing about my new lifestyle is I get to meet lots of hot guys. Wraith treats me well. It’s a dream. I get to live in a beautiful place and wear beautiful things.” What is most obvious, however, is that what has happened to her is anything but beautiful—it is barbaric. “Show us something real and free and beautiful, and you couldn’t, could you?” Bing rants to the judges after working night and day to earn enough merits to enter as a contestant on Hot Shot. He rebukes them for taking away any wonder there might be, doling it out in meager portions only after having augmented, packaged, and pumped it through ten thousand preassigned filters. The world, he says, is made up of nothing but tiny cells and tiny screens and bigger cells and bigger screens. It is, in other words, nothing but empty exteriority, or visual display. “F— you all,” he shouts, “for taking the one thing that I ever came close to anything real about anything; for oozing around it and crushing it into a bone, into a joke, one more ugly joke in a kingdom of millions of them!” Standing before the judges, Bing repudiates not just the trenchant materialism of his world, but the diabolical force behind that materialism. In fact, even the names of the judges represent this spiritual distortion. Wraith, Hope, and Charity are embodied perversions of faith, hope, and love.10 What they offer beneath the flashing lights is despair, futility, and enslavement. Thus, Fifteen Million Merits illuminates how barbarism is not an a-spiritual culture, nor a spiritually neutral culture, but an anti-spiritual culture. It is Life turned on itself, diabolically seeking to consume itself. One of the tasks of Christian philosophy, as Neal DeRoo argues, is to discern the “spirit” of the age, or the dynamic, vital force that shapes our pre-theoretical horizons, or our “lifeworlds.” The spirit of the age is more felt than thought. It often operates beneath our immediate awareness, shaping our social imaginary as affective forces that are pre- or supra-rational (2019, 137). As image-bearers of God, we are essentially “heart-ed” beings, DeRoo argues. On this anthropology, he continues, “human living is essentially

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spiritual, insofar as everything we do is a refraction of the spirit flowing through the human heart” (2019, 139). As such, all human action is a transmitter that is driven by, that reflects, and that spreads this spirit to others. Hence, the spirit takes expression communally shaping the kind of habitus in which we dwell. Our experiences within this habitus are expressive of the spirit, which shape them in particular ways. Hence, spirituality is not just a particular way of interpreting experiences, like a hermeneutical add-on, but is part of the nature of experience itself. As the “hidden basis” of existence, Life cannot be destroyed, only suppressed. Paradoxically, only “living beings” can suppress Life and create an anti-Life culture, which means barbarism is essentially a spiritual condition, but one that is diabolical in nature. For this reason, a barbaristic culture cannot be spiritually neutral, but is in fact spiritually distorted. It is an anti-spiritual culture, or a culture that is spiritually misdirected and, consequently, spiritually oppressive and antagonistic. The spirit of barbarism not only exchanges the truth of Life for the lie of Life-less exteriority, it diabolically turns Life against itself, seeking to eliminate itself as living. The task of discerning the kind of spirit that is operative in our era as evidenced in our social structures, values, and drives is exactly what Henry does in Barbarism as well as what Bing does in Fifteen Million Merits. Though Bing’s world seems foreign to our own, it is also disquietingly familiar. We too live in a society of the spectacle that mediates our experience of the world through visual display. The barbaristic spirit of our age tells us that visual display is everything, and it drives us increasingly toward it as the only thing that “matters.” Like the world of Fifteen Million Merits, the spirit of barbarism in our technocratic world is refracted in all of our basic human experiences, especially the experiences of work and romantic love. Spiritual discernment should lead us not to take up another culture war (in the way that project has been understood particularly in the North American Christian context), but to pursue what Makoto Fujimura calls “culture care.” What a barbaristic society needs is not more spiritual antagonism, but spiritual renewal and restoration. As Fujimura explains, “Culture care is to provide care for our culture’s ‘soul’ . . . [it] restores beauty as a seed of invigoration into the ecosystem of culture. Such care is generative: a well-nurtured culture becomes an environment in which people and creativity thrive” (2017, 22). To care for a culture that has been ransacked by barbarism is to “call forth” its inner life, to transform it by appealing to its source. This restorative task, I proffer, can only be undertaken through faith, hope, and love. Unlike their distortions in Fifteen Million Merits, faith, hope, and love are generative and expansive. They are life-affirming, life-expressing, and lifegiving. Faith, hope, and love provide a new kind of gaze, one that sees what a barbaristic culture covers and that is able to subvert its totalizing force.

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They testify to a world that is less like a repository of objects to manipulate for profit and more like a garden to steward for its flourishing. Faith, hope, and love inspire creative agency, generosity, and meaning in our work, imbuing our labor with a sense of calling that makes it a vocation. Through faith, hope, and love, lovers encounter one another, not to assert their will upon one another, but to give themselves to one another with a kind of face-to-face intimacy that engenders mutual flourishing and the cultivation of beauty. Thus, anyone who knows what faith, hope, and love are will understand how to call forth Life in a barbaristic age.

NOTES 1. In his definition of culture, which barbarism directly attacks, Henry includes the general production of “goods” as well as concrete relations between members of the community. “This is why there are cultures of food, shelter, work, erotic relations or relations to the dead—such relations provide an initial definition of the ‘human’” (Henry 2012, xv). Hence, there are two main categories, the production of “goods,” which is a category that would contain human work and vocation, and concrete relations, which includes erotic love. I am arguing that Fifteen Million Merits puts on display how these two experiences become distorted, and even depraved, by barbarism. 2. Throughout the essay, Life is capitalized only when referring to Henry’s concept of the source of existence. Otherwise it is left in lowercase. 3. In fact, Henry thinks that scientific discoveries and breakthroughs are really only possible because we are “living” beings (2012, 12–13, 58–60, 63–5) and the operations of scientific subjectivity are carried out through the putting out of play this subjectivity (2012, 63). Science then becomes a form of culture, a modality of life, which leads to discovery as joy rather than mastery and exploitation. The relation between scientific knowledge and culture is no longer positioned in terms of mutual exclusion but of reciprocal adherence (cf. 2012, 58, 62, 67). 4. Chris Byron and Matthew Brake (2020) discuss the connections between the world of Fifteen Million Merits and present-day capitalism in conversation with Karl Marx, Theodor Adorno, and Herbert Marcuse. Mark R. Johnson (2019) brings out how the episode critiques neoliberal economies. Henry is an interesting dialogue partner to include since he critiques both capitalism and communism as being inherently barbaric (cf. Henry 2014). The consumerism plus the collectivist conformity portrayed in Fifteen Million Merits suggests there is something more than just capitalism being critiqued, but an underlying “barbaric” spirit shared by both capitalism and communism. 5. With the exception of Rod Senseless (Jay Simpson), the porn star in The National Anthem (Season 1, Episode 1). 6. In fact, hearing this kind of language is the identifying marker for the viewer that the kids in Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2) are looking at porn.

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7. David Slade writes, “The message is that marital institutions are inadequate and sexual liberation is neither decadent nor destructive to the family. Indeed, Danny and Theo’s newfound openness actually preserves their love for each other. It’s in this sense that the episode has a decidedly activist feel, particularly since it confronts cultural norms by removing the strangeness of alternative lifestyles with characters who are non-white, non-masculine, non-heterosexual, and non-monogamous. In so do doing, Striking Vipers reflects on the supposed immorality of polyamorous-open relationships” (2020, 244). Whether the episode removes the strangeness of alternative lifestyles or shows how sexual liberation is not destructive to the family is debatable. However, my main concern is that what Slade calls “openness” and “liberation” is actually a structure of experience that casts erotic love in terms of immediacy, control, and self-assertion rather than openness and vulnerability to the actual Other. In that regard, the ethics of “sexual fantasies” ought to be questioned, not on the grounds of cultural norms, but by virtue of the nature of the experience itself. 8. This song shows up in multiple episodes, including White Christmas, Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5), Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3), and Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3). Executive producer, Anabel Jones, says that Brooker has loved the song for a long time, and that he especially liked the idea of using it as a motif to create an overall sense of the artistic universe of Black Mirror and to convey some of the major themes they wish to promote throughout the series (cf. Maas 2018). For an analysis of this song in Black Mirror, see Price (2020). 9. James Olthuis (2004) describes the communion and intimacy made possible by the self’s decentering encounter with the Other. 10. Many thanks to John Anthony Dunne for pointing this out.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Altman, Andrew and Lori Watson. Debating Pornography. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. Byron, Chris and Matthew Brake. “Fifteen Million Merits and Fighting Capitalism: How Can We Resist?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 20–8. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley, 2020. Debord, Guy. Society of the Spectacle. London: Rebel Press, 2002. DeRoo, Neal. “Discerning the Spirit: The Task of Christian Philosophy.” In Christian Philosophy: Conceptions, Continuations, and Challenges, edited by J. Aaron Simmons, 132–52. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. ———. “Spiritual Life and Cultural Discernment: Renewing Spirituality through Henry.” In Michel Henry’s Practical Philosophy, edited by Michael R. Kelly, Brian Harding, and Jeffrey Hanson, 45–65. London: Bloomsbury, 2022. Fujimura, Makoto. Culture Care: Reconnecting with Beauty for Our Common Life. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2017. Henry, Michel. Barbarism. Translated by Scott Davidson. New York: Continuum, 2012.

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———. From Communism to Capitalism: A Theory of a Catastrophe. Translated by Scott Davidson. London: Bloomsbury, 2014. Johnson, Mark R. “Fifteen Million Merits: Gamification, Spectacle, and Neoliberal Aspiration.” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 33–42. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Kahn, Paul. Putting Liberalism in its Place. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005. Levinas, Emmanuel. Totality and Infinity: An Essay on Exteriority. Translated by Alphonso Lingis. Pittsburg: Duquesne University Press, 1969. Longino, Helen. “Pornography, Oppression, and Freedom: A Closer Look.” In Exploring Ethics: An Introductory Anthology, edited by Steven M. Cahn. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. Longworth, Guy. “The Ethics of Speech Acts.” Aeon. February 25, 2020. Accessed June 19, 2021. https://aeon​.co​/essays​/how​-pornography​-works​-to​-undermine​ -womens​-freedom​-of​-speech. Maas, Jennifer. “Here’s Why You Hear That One Song Over and Over in Black Mirror.” The Wrap, February 11, 2018. Accessed June 19, 2021. https://www​ .thewrap​.com​/black​-mirror​-anyone​-who​-knows​-what​-love​-is​-charlie​-brooker/. Marion, Jean-Luc. Being Given. Translated by Jeffrey L. Kosky. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2012. Olthuis, James. “Face-to-Face: Ethical Asymmetry or the Symmetry of Mutuality?” In The Hermeneutics of Charity: Interpretation, Selfhood, and Postmodern Faith, edited by James K. A. Smith and Henry Isaac Venema, 135–56. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2004. Price, Robert Grant. “Love in Black Mirror: Who Do We Really Love?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 301–10. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Slade, David. “Striking Vipers and Closed Doors: How Meaningful Are Sexual Fantasies?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 241–50. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Williams, Bernard. Obscenity and Film Censorship: An Abridgement of the Williams Report. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981.

Chapter 3

Free Will and (In)determinism in Hang the DJ Taylor W. Cyr

In one of Black Mirror’s least pessimistic episodes, Hang the DJ (Season 4, Episode 4), the main characters, Frank and Amy (Joe Cole and Georgina Campbell), are participating in a sort of futuristic dating service.1 Participants in this service live on an idyllic compound and are assigned relationships of varying lengths by an algorithm called “the system.” The system’s ostensive reason for selecting matches is to learn from participants’ responses and ultimately determine the best possible match for every participant. Frank and Amy are initially set up by the algorithm with an expiry date of only twelve hours after they meet, and the two are left wishing they had more time to get to know each other. Frank immediately gets matched with another partner, Nicola (Gwyneth Keyworth), and the expiry date for this match is a year. Frank and Nicola despise each other, and Frank clearly wishes he could have had more time with Amy. Meanwhile, Amy is assigned a series of matches with shorter expiries and becomes disillusioned with the process. Eventually, Frank and Amy are matched again and are clearly very excited about this. Amy suggests that they not check the expiry date this time around, and Frank agrees. After some time, however, and partly because things are going so well and Frank is curious how long it will last, Frank checks the expiry date. His doing so without Amy checking at the same time causes the original time, several years, to shrink to a matter of hours. On their final day together, Frank is clearly aloof, and Amy eventually prods him until he confesses to having broken their agreement and shortened the length of the relationship. Despite this hiccup, Frank and Amy want to be together, and they do not connect with subsequent matches. The final day of their time in this dating service approaches, and Amy encourages Frank to rebel against the system and to flee the compound. When approached by a man with a taser who intends to 55

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stop them, Amy reaches out and touches the taser, and everyone besides Frank and Amy freezes, revealing that the two are part of a simulation—a possibility that had been floated in conversations in earlier scenes. Frank and Amy run to the edge of the compound where there is a wall with a very tall ladder, and as they are climbing the simulation around them begins to disappear. In the penultimate scene, the Frank and Amy we’ve been watching look around to find hundreds of other iterations of themselves, most of whom (998 out of 1,000) have also rebelled against the system and chosen each other. In the final scene, we learn that these simulated versions of Frank and Amy are part of a dating app. The ostensibly real Frank and Amy have used the app and discovered that they are a nearly perfect match. The episode ends with exchanged glances of hope for a relationship, even before they introduce themselves. Like most episodes of Black Mirror, Hang the DJ raises a host of philosophical questions. In addition to the obvious ethical issues surrounding algorithm-matchmaking (cf. Power 2019; Cleary and Pigliucci 2020), the very premise of the episode requires us, the audience, to assume controversial positions on the nature of consciousness, such as that there could be simulated consciousnesses. This invites us to ask about the connection between the simulated consciousnesses (“sims” for short) used by the software, on the one hand, and the users in the more fundamental level of reality (outside the simulation): are these sims in some sense “versions” of the users, or are they merely qualitatively similar identities? And beyond these questions are questions regarding the limits of our knowledge about ourselves in our world given that, for all we know, we might ourselves be sims. While there is much from this episode to explore, this chapter will explore something that has not yet been addressed in other work, namely the connection between Hang the DJ and questions about free will and determinism (or indeterminism, as the case may be). The topic of free will is important in both philosophy and theology, but it is worth mentioning that the expression free will is often used in different ways. For our purposes, it will be useful to distinguish free will from autonomy, the latter of which can refer specifically to having control over one’s own life without interference (or design) by another agent. It is this sense of freedom, of autonomy, that is suggested by the song played at the end of Hang the DJ—“Panic” by The Smiths, from which the Black Mirror episode gets its title. When we hear the words of the song, which speak to the irrelevance of popular music for real life, the conclusion is that we should “hang the DJ.” Certainly this episode asks us to consider the nature and value of autonomy, especially in the episode’s twist (when “Panic” is playing) and we discover the role that the software is playing in the main characters’ decision to date. But in the traditional debates about free will, the term free will is used to refer to a kind of control over our conduct that we assume that we have.

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This control requires having the ability to do otherwise than what we actually do.2 For many free will theorists, the notion of free will is especially important because of its connection to moral responsibility. We ordinarily take ourselves and others to be morally responsible for much of what we do, and yet, plausibly, having free will is a necessary condition on moral responsibility. In addition, it is sometimes suggested that love requires free will, such that relationships not entered freely could not count as genuinely loving relationships. It is this sense of freedom (and control) that I will focus on here. This chapter will proceed as follows: first, I will sketch some reasons for thinking that, if determinism is true, then no one has or exercises free will. One type of response to determinism’s threat to free will is to accept the incompatibility of free will and determinism and to maintain that we nevertheless have free will. Theorists who endorse indeterministic accounts of free will are called libertarians in the free-will debate (but please do not confuse them with political libertarians). Second, I will explain a bit more of the mechanics of libertarianism. Third, I will discuss an influential challenge to libertarianism that has come to be known as the “rollback argument.” The mechanics of this challenge will resemble the plot twist of Hang the DJ. Fourth, and finally, I will explore the episode’s portrayal of the value of undetermined choice. DETERMINISM’S APPARENT THREAT TO FREE WILL Determinism is sometimes defined as the thesis that there is, at any instant, only one physically possible future (van Inwagen 1983, 3). Here’s the basic idea: think of the laws of nature as a function, and think of a description of the state of the world at some time as an input into that function. (And by “state of the world” I mean everything about the world at that time, down to location and intrinsic properties of the tiniest microphysical particles.) If the laws are deterministic, the idea is that from them and any input you would get, as an output, descriptions of the state of the world at every subsequent time. In other words, from a description of the state of the world long before there were any human beings, together with the deterministic laws, one could, in principle, deduce all of human history—even down to what you will choose to have for breakfast tomorrow. Technically speaking, if determinism is true, then propositions describing all of our actions are entailed by propositions expressing the laws of nature and propositions about the intrinsic state of the world long before we existed. Let’s pause to reflect on the simulated world of Hang the DJ. Are the simulations programmed to work in a deterministic way, or are the sims’

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choices undetermined? We get an answer in the penultimate scene of the episode—the scene where the sims we have been watching appear in a space with other sims. We learn that the simulation of the relationship has been run a thousand times and that in all but two of those simulations the sims chose each other. A natural interpretation of this scene is that the sims choosing each other is not determined but is nevertheless extremely likely, given their profiles. A different interpretation, consistent with the sims being determined, is that the conditions the sims are placed into varies from iteration to iteration. Now, some may regard the indeterminacy of Hang the DJ as a potential haven for free will, for it will seem obvious to some readers that determinism is an apparent threat to free will. One may even be tempted to construe the free-will debate as the debate over free will versus determinism; obviously, they are in conflict (so the thought goes), and thus we must choose one or the other but not both. It turns out, however, that to present the debate in this way is to presuppose a position on one of the main points of disagreement in the debate, namely whether or not free will is compatible with determinism. Compatibilists do not think we must choose between free will and determinism; their view is that these two things are compatible! I will now go on to explain particular challenges for compatibilism—two arguments for incompatibilism—but one must keep in mind that not everyone is convinced by these arguments. The first argument for incompatibilism I want to mention is the “consequence argument,” which may be summarized as follows.3 As we have seen, if determinism is true, then propositions describing all of our actions are entailed by propositions expressing the laws of nature and propositions about the intrinsic state of the world long before we existed. Now choose any action that you have ever performed or will perform, and call that action A. 1. If determinism is true, then your doing A is the consequence of the distant past and laws of nature. 2. For you to have the freedom to do otherwise than A, at least one of the following must be true: a. You have the freedom to act in such a way that the past would have been different than it actually was. b. You have the freedom to act in such a way that an actual law of nature would not have been a law. 3. You do not have the freedom to act in such a way that the past would have been different than it actually was. 4. You do not have the freedom to act in such a way that an actual law of nature would not have been a law. 5. If determinism is true, then you lack the freedom to do otherwise than A.

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The first premise of this argument is meant to be an implication of the truth of determinism. If determinism is true, only one future is physically possible (i.e., consistent with the past and laws), and so what happens in that future, including our behavior, is the inevitable consequence of the past and laws. To do otherwise, then, would require the past or the laws (or both) to have been different, and this is what the second premise says. The third and fourth premises make claims about our abilities, specifically about our lacking the freedom to act in ways inconsistent with the actual past or actual laws, respectively. The third premise can be motivated by reflecting on how the state of the world in the distant past lies outside of our control. Similarly, the fourth premise can be motivated by reflecting on how what the laws of nature are lies outside of our control as well. If the foregoing is correct, then it looks like the truth of determinism would preclude our having the freedom to do otherwise than what we actually do. In the introduction, I mentioned the connection between free will and moral responsibility. It is common nowadays for philosophers working on free will to treat it as a necessary condition of moral responsibility. Since determinism threatens the freedom to do otherwise, then, we might ask whether that sort of freedom (the freedom to do otherwise) is the sort of freedom necessary for moral responsibility. And many theorists, such as those inspired by Harry Frankfurt (1969), think that we can be morally responsible even if we lack the freedom to do otherwise. While a fascinating and ever-growing discussion, we can sidestep this corner of the debate by looking at a different argument for incompatibilism—one that targets even those compatibilists who deny that moral responsibility requires the freedom to do otherwise. This second argument for incompatibilism is the “manipulation argument,” and the basic worry is that being causally determined by factors beyond one’s control (which compatibilists maintain is compatible with being morally responsible) looks relevantly similar to being manipulated, which many people take to undermine moral responsibility. The argument comes in various forms, but I will summarize a version developed by Alfred Mele (2006), which has come to be known as the “zygote argument.”4 Mele presents the following case involving a goddess, Diana, and an agent she creates, Ernie: Diana creates a zygote Z in Mary. She combines Z’s atoms as she does because she wants a certain event E to occur thirty years later. From her knowledge of the state of the universe just prior to her creating Z and the laws of nature of her deterministic universe, she deduces that a zygote with precisely Z’s constitution located in Mary will develop into an ideally self-controlled agent who, in thirty years, will judge, on the basis of rational deliberation, that it is best to A and will A on the basis of that judgment, thereby bringing about E. (2006, 188)

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With that case in mind, consider the following argument: 1. Because of the way his zygote was produced in his deterministic universe, Ernie is not a free agent and is not morally responsible for anything. 2. Concerning free action and moral responsibility of the beings into whom the zygotes develop, there is no significant difference between the way Ernie’s zygote comes to exist and the way any normal human zygote comes to exist in a deterministic universe. 3. So determinism precludes free action and moral responsibility. (2006, 189) Given that it seems any proposed compatibilist conditions on moral responsibility could be satisfied by Ernie after being created by Diana (he is selfcontrolled, responsive to reasons, doing what he most wants to do, etc.), the second premise looks quite plausible from the compatibilist’s point of view (though, as one would expect, some do object to that premise). The first premise relies on our having a certain judgment about the case, namely that Ernie’s moral responsibility is somehow undermined because of the way he was created, and it may be that the best way for compatibilists to respond to the argument is to deny the first premise. INDETERMINISTIC (LIBERTARIAN) FREE WILL Suppose you are convinced by one or both of the arguments summarized in the previous section (or suppose you have some other reason for thinking that free will and determinism are incompatible). If we were to discover that our world is deterministic, then we would know that we lack free will. But assuming that we don’t know whether our world is deterministic, what would be required in order for us to have free will? What sort of agents would we need to be, and what sort of powers or abilities would we need to possess? Some incompatibilists are not sanguine about our prospects. One subset of this group of free will skeptics—impossibilists—think that free will is impossible, and so of course not something we possess. Another subset—hard incompatibilists—would not go so far as to make the impossibility claim but would say that we lack free will nonetheless. In any case, combined with the threat to free will from determinism, free-will skeptics do not see indeterminism as a refuge for free will. But the incompatibilists we are interested in here are those who think that we do have free will, that is, libertarians, and they are united in taking free will and moral responsibility to require indeterminacy somewhere in the causal sequence leading to our behavior. Libertarians disagree about why determinism undermines free will, and there are two important strands

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of thought worth mentioning. Some emphasize determinism’s threat to the freedom to do otherwise or to our having alternative possibilities, which they take to be essential to the freedom required for moral responsibility. Others emphasize determinism’s threat to our being genuine sources of our behavior—the buck stopping with us, so to speak. In either case, for an action to be directly free and one for which an agent is directly morally responsible (direct in the sense that the agent’s freedom and moral responsibility does not depend entirely on some earlier free action), that action must not be deterministically caused. Instead, it must be the case that, holding fixed everything about the past right up to the time of action, and holding fixed the laws of nature, another course of action (or at least some alternative—perhaps not acting at all) was possible for the agent. Let’s consider a concrete case, one taken from Hang the DJ. Suppose that Frank’s decision to look at the expiry date of his match with Amy is an undetermined decision. That means that holding fixed the laws of their universe, and holding fixed everything that has taken place in it right up to the moment of decision, an alternative to checking the expiry date is possible. Whether one emphasizes the need for alternative possibilities or the need to be the genuine source of one’s actions, it looks like Frank’s decision being indeterministically brought about helps to assuage the worries about determinism’s threat to free will. Thinking back to the arguments for incompatibilism summarized in the previous section, we can see why libertarians would think that indeterministic causation may leave room for free will. First, if one takes the freedom to do otherwise to be crucial for genuine free will and moral responsibility, then indeterminacy at the time of action would seem essential for freedom and responsibility. If my performing a certain action is not determined by the past and laws, then my action is not just an inevitable consequence of factors beyond my control, and this may seem relevant to the control I exercise in acting. Second, if one takes determinism’s main threat to be a threat to our being genuine sources of our behavior, especially given the similarities between ordinary determinism and manipulation, then (again) indeterminacy at the time of action would seem essential for freedom and responsibility. THE ROLLBACK ARGUMENT Perhaps the most important (and certainly the most widely discussed) challenge to libertarianism about free will is at its heart a worry about luck, randomness, or chance. Here too there are different ways of spelling out the worry, but the basic idea is that, given the libertarian’s requirement that directly free actions be undetermined, it seems that meeting that requirement

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makes it a matter of luck (or outside the agent’s control) that the agent acts in one way rather than another. The agent’s acting in that way is not settled beforehand by anything in the agent, and for every action satisfying this condition there is some alternative scenario where everything was the same right up to that same point but in which the agent did something else instead. That makes undetermined actions look more like a chancy outcome than a real expression of agency. (It is worth noting that, since most compatibilists take free will to be compatible with indeterminism as well as determinism, including indeterminism at the very time of action, this problem of luck presents a challenge for those compatibilists views too. The reason that the worry is typically associated with libertarianism in particular, though, is that the problem arises from what the libertarian—and not the compatibilist—takes to be a necessary condition of free will.) One articulation of this worry that has been widely discussed is Peter van Inwagen’s “rollback argument” (2000). Consider the following case: Let us suppose undetermined free acts occur. Suppose, for example, that in some difficult situation Alice was faced with a choice between lying and telling the truth and that she freely chose to tell the truth—or, what is the same thing, she seriously considered telling the truth, seriously considering lying, told the truth, and was able to tell the lie she had been contemplating. And let us assume that free will is incompatible with determinism, and that Alice’s telling the truth, being a free act, was therefore undetermined. Now suppose that immediately after Alice told the truth, God caused the universe to revert to precisely its state one minute before Alice told the truth (let us call the first moment the universe was in this state “t1” and the second moment the universe was in this state “t2”), and then let things “go forward again.” What would have happened the second time? What would have happened after t2? Would she have lied or would she have told the truth? Since Alice’s “original” decision, her decision to tell the truth, was undetermined—since it was undetermined whether she would lie or tell the truth—, her “second” decision would also be undetermined, and this question can therefore have no answer. (2000, 14)

Alice’s action of telling the truth meets the libertarian’s requirement of being undetermined, but in virtue of meeting that requirement the action appears a matter of chance. Van Inwagen continues: Now let us suppose that God a thousand times caused the universe to revert to exactly the state it was in at t1 (and let us suppose that we are somehow suitably placed, metaphysically speaking, to observe the whole sequence of “replays”). What would have happened? What should we expect to observe? Well, again, we can’t say what would have happened, but we can say what would probably

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have happened: sometimes Alice would have lied and sometimes she would have told the truth. As the number of “replays” increases, we observers shall—almost certainly—observe the ratio of the outcome “truth” to the outcome “lie” settling down to, converging on, some value. We may, for example, observe that, after a fairly large number of replays, Alice lies in thirty percent of the replays and tells the truth in seventy percent of them—and that the figures “thirty percent” and “seventy percent” become more and more accurate as the number of replays increases. But let us imagine the simplest case: we observe that Alice tells the truth in about half the replays and lies in about half the replays. If, after one hundred replays, Alice has told the truth fifty-three times and has lied forty-eight times, we’d begin strongly to suspect that the figures after a thousand replays would look something like this: Alice has told the truth four hundred and ninetythree times and has lied five hundred and eight times. Let us suppose that these are indeed the figures after a thousand replays. Is it not true that as we watch the number of replays increase, we shall become convinced that what will happen in the next replay is a matter of chance? (2000, 14–15)

Even if we suppose that Alice has reasons for telling the truth and reasons for lying, and that either course of action will be explicable in terms of her agency (and her reasons for action), the rollback scenario highlights that it is odd to think of her behavior as free. No one exercises free will in rolling a six (with a fair die) even if they freely roll the die. Even for coin-flips, one may freely flip the coin, but no one brings it about that it lands “heads” through an act of free will. It seems that the luck involved in these cases is inimical to control, or freedom. And yet the rollback scenario highlights that, for agents whose behavior is undetermined, which course of action they take seems to be a matter of luck. Now, while I disagree with van Inwagen and think that the libertarian can solve this problem without appealing to mystery, we need not explore potential avenues of response here. What is of interest for our purposes, and what should be quite obvious at this point, is that the mechanics of the rollback argument closely resemble Hang the DJ’s denouement. Even if we interpret the various sims portrayed in the episode’s penultimate scene as different instantiations of the real Frank and Amy’s psychological profiles (rather than, say, as the very same sims being rolled back hundreds of times), it is suggested that these sims are put in the same circumstances and that, in all but two of the one thousand iterations, the sims of Frank and Amy choose each other. What this set of replays indicates, then, is that Frank and Amy are not determined to choose each other but are nevertheless very likely (perhaps nearly determined) to do so. And the portrayal of these replays poses certain questions for us concerning the value of undetermined choice, which we will consider in the next and concluding section.

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THE VALUE OF UNDETERMINED CHOICE IN HANG THE DJ I mentioned at the outset that one reason for caring about having free will had to do with the idea that loving relationships require free will. Perhaps one cannot be in a genuine relationship of love if one did not enter into that relationship freely. For the libertarian, in particular, motivated by the worries codified by the consequence and manipulation arguments, it may seem that a relationship’s being determined would very obviously preclude its being a relationship of love. If determined, the relationship will appear the mere consequence of the distant past and the laws of nature, and those in the relationship may even seem not too dissimilar from puppets. If entering into the relationship is undetermined, however, then genuine love may seem a real possibility, for the people in the relationship were not bound, in any sense, to enter into it. What is interesting and, I think, very suggestive about Hang the DJ, though, is that the closer to being determined to choose each another Frank and Amy are, the more positive their relationship is portrayed. The fact that their sims have chosen each other rollback after rollback (or in hundreds of simultaneous simulations) strikes us as good, at least insofar as the knowledge of the likelihood of their choice of each other is helpful in the context of finding a match. Now, one might take this suggestion in either of two directions, depending on whether one took the free will to be compatible or incompatible with determinism. The compatibilist can simply accept that determined (or nearly determined) agents nevertheless possess free will, and so they can readily maintain that loving relationships require free will. For the libertarian (who is an incompatibilist), however, the portrayal of Frank and Amy suggests that it is not very important that we enter into relationships freely—perhaps this sort of undetermined choice is not particularly valuable. A related issue concerns not our relationships with one another (other human beings) but rather with God. Many theists are attracted to libertarianism about free will partly due to worries about the (im)possibility of our genuinely coming to love God if our coming to do so is determined. If we come to see that loving relationships need not be entered freely, however— or, if we are compatibilists, that they can be entered freely even if determined—some of the motivation for denying that God could determine us to respond in love will evaporate. Of course, this does not mean that it does not matter the means by which we come to be in a loving relationship with God. In Frank and Amy’s case, they choose one another not as a result of external force or coercion but rather because they really like each other. Similarly, so long as a human being is responding to God in love because of features

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of God—perhaps goodness, beauty, grace, and the list goes on—there is no reason to think that being determined to respond in love is anything like the result of force or coercion. NOTES 1. The series creator and writer of the episode, Charlie Brooker, calls it a “companion piece” to another episode, San Junipero, noting its “light and playful comic tone” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 272). 2. There are several great introductory books on free will, but for anyone interested in reading more about this debate I would recommend starting with Griffith (2013). 3. I am simplifying a conditional formulation of the argument along the lines of Fischer (1994), but the locus classicus is van Inwagen (1983, 55–105). 4. Another important version of the manipulation argument is Derk Pereboom’s “four-case argument” (2001, 110–17; 2014, 74–82).

BIBLIOGRAPHY Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Cleary, Skye and Massimo Pigliucci. “Hand the DJ and Digital Dating: Should We Use Computers to Help Us Find Mates?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 168–76. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Fischer, John Martin. The Metaphysics of Free Will: An Essay on Control. Oxford: Blackwell, 1994. Frankfurt, Harry. “Alternate Possibilities and Moral Responsibility.” Journal of Philosophy 66 (1969): 829–39. Griffith, Meghan. Free Will: The Basics. New York: Routledge, 2013. Mele, Alfred. Free Will and Luck. New York: Oxford University Press, 2006. Pereboom, Derk, Free Will, Agency, and Meaning in Life. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014. ———. Living Without Free Will. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001. Power, Aidan. “Stop Me If You Think You’ve Heard This One Before: Relationships and Late Capitalism in ‘Hang the DJ.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Edge, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 231–44. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. van Inwagen, Peter. An Essay on Free Will. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983.

Chapter 4

Too Many Twos Ashley and the Artificial Authentic Elizabeth Howard

“She doesn’t understand how fragile all this is,” Ashley O’s Aunt Catherine Ortiz (Susan Pourfar) explains of Ashley’s fame as a teenage pop star. Perhaps, however, the same can be said of the authenticity depicted in Charlie Brooker’s Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3). Unaware of how fragile her own claims to authenticity are, Ashley O (Miley Cyrus) forces us to consider the fragility of our own claims to authenticity—and the power of human mediators (recognized or invisible) in our own aspirations and desires. The episode appears to celebrate Ashley O’s achieving eventual autonomy over her musical style and career, but it is simultaneously quick to expose the many layers of mediators that continue to shape Ashley’s behavior and aesthetic choices. Beginning with teenage Rachel Goggins’s (Angourie Rice) obvious, sycophantic imitation of pop idol Ashley O, the episode moves to consider Ashley’s subtler mediators—in her aunt and in a host of recent pop artists. A Girardian reading of mediated desire in Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too renders visible the way in which the episode displays and disguises the models that humans use to pattern their desires and identities—a dynamic in relationships often called mediation. Ultimately Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too refuses to satisfy our narrative desire for what René Girard (1923–2015) calls “metaphysical autonomy” (1976, 56), because it denies Rachel, Jack (Madison Davenport), and, most particularly, Ashley O the option of authenticating themselves. It persistently locates the origin of their preferences and desires outside themselves. By proliferating mimetic doubles, the episode demands that we become suspicious of our claims to originality and choose our own models with great care. According to René Girard, the celebration of autonomy, rooted in the sin of pride, is the defining feature of modern times (1976, 56). Girard argues that the modern hero believes herself to be authentic insofar as she believes 67

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she architects her own desires, or that her essential self is self-determined. Girard contends, however, that humans do not generate desires apart from the mediation of others as models. A work that fails to signal or disclose the mediation of human behavior, therefore, participates in the deceit leading to intractable isolation, rivalry, and escalating conflict. But works that render visible the mechanism of mediated desire—what Girard calls “triangular desire” (1976, 2ff.)—free us from both isolation and envy. Charlie Brooker’s Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too questions the quality of the desires we borrow from our mediators, and the episode discloses veiled mediation as it continuously underscores the instability of feigned authenticity. Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too follows two parallel “coming-of-age” narratives that eventually intersect in the film’s climactic heist. Rachel and Jack Goggins, two teenage sisters, who have recently lost their mother Genevieve, are trying to survive their junior high and high school years at a new school; the episode’s opening scene is a crowded lunchroom where Rachel sits alone. For Jack, this means drowning out the world around her with alternative rock music and her own electric guitar. Rachel, acutely aware of her own awkwardness, finds a confidant in a miniature robotic version of her favorite pop star, Ashley O, named Ashley Too. The episode also follows the life of Ashley O, a local, successful, miserable pop star, who has also lost her parents, as she struggles to wrest her career and her life from the control of her conniving, innovative, greedy Aunt Catherine. Catherine’s control of Ashley escalates over the episode from the medication prescribed by Dr. Munk (Nicholas Pauling) and tight surveillance under the watchful eye of their security guard Bear (Daniel Stewart Sherman) to a feigned allergy attack and medically induced coma that keeps Ashley handcuffed in her bed while Aunt Catherine and music engineer Jackson Habanero (James III) harvest lyrics from Ashley’s brain scans and perform a new album with a holographic version of Ashley, branded Ashley Eternal. Rachel, Jack, and Ashley meet when the Goggins sisters delete the limiter on Rachel’s Ashley Too robot. The robot then leads them to Ashley O’s home where Rachel and Jack and Ashley Too work together to wake up Ashley O, free her, and crash Aunt Catherine’s investor pitch where she is unveiling Ashley Eternal. With her aunt caught in the act of biochemically manipulating her niece, Ashley O is finally freed to be her “real” self as Ashley F—n O. This rebranding shifts Ashley’s relationship with the Goggins sisters, and the episode ends with Jack playing alongside Ashley in her new alternative rock band. In Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too then, we must first distinguish between instances of triangular mediation that the episode foregrounds as hyperbolic, as well as mediation that is underscored and even invisible, where we are lulled into believing along with the characters that they have indeed achieved an unmediated, authentic self. Of course, young, motherless Rachel’s

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obsession with the teenage pop-star Ashley O is the predominant, though not only, example of triangular mediation.1 The episode takes a perverse delight in lingering on the degree of her adolescent obsession; one wonders if Rachel does anything other than watch Ashley O music videos. Rachel’s first conversation with the Ashley Too robot lasts a remarkable five hours. And Rachel blurts out not less than four times to Ashley O/Ashley Too: “I am such a huge fan.” But the examples of veiled mimesis in Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too provide more probing examples for examining what happens when we begin to believe our desires and aspirations begin and end with us. The episode also clarifies the ways in which technology proliferates both models and the means of accessing them (on every screen, all the time), making it far too easy to imitate morally, culturally, or intellectually impoverished mediators. Such mediation often feels invisible because technology makes it so ubiquitous. Things hard to recognize are, of course, harder to analyze and to steward with prudence and maturity. After analyzing the work that Ashley O’s mediation accomplishes in the first half of the episode, the latter half of this chapter, therefore, turns to examine the ways in which the veiled mediating structures that frame the aspirations of Ashley O underscore the artificiality of her claims to authenticity at the episode’s end. “SUCH A HUGE FAN”: ASHLEY AS MEDIATOR The episode begins by foregrounding Ashley O’s external mediation of young Rachel’s desire to be listened to and liked in the wake of her mother’s death. The episode makes it unmistakably clear that Rachel looks to Ashley as the standard or the source of her ideas of what is beautiful, artful, and attractive—her desire to “be cool.” The episode underscores the mediating role that Ashley O plays both in its use of traditional advertising media that Rachel uses to curate her self-image as well as her fascination with newer media. Not only does Rachel cover her bedroom walls with Ashley O posters, loop her music videos on her phone, and follow TV interviews and news clips of Ashley O, Rachel also courts a friendship with the robotic doll Ashley Too, whose artificial intelligence responds to questions using the brain scans of Ashley O. George Dunn has analyzed Ashley Too as a robot as opposed to a doll; but in the preteen market, the distance between the doll and the robot is decidedly unclear.2 Historically the doll hears the otherwise ignored secrets of a girl’s dreams and trials. The persistent hope is always that the doll would come alive and talk back. The smart doll does that (Keymolen and Van der Hof 2019, 143). For the first half of the episode, Ashley Too is “right here” for Rachel “if at any time you wanna talk,” as opposed to the cluster of classmates Rachel passes leaving her new school who “kinda haven’t spoken to me yet.” Ashley Too coaches Rachel

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on the moves for a choreographed dance that Rachel can perform in her school’s talent show. Ashley Too exists to help Rachel determine what she wants to want and to coach her on shaping her behavior to reach those aspirations. Although the episode does not show Rachel attending one of Ashley O’s concert tours, we see an “Ashley O Spotlite Tour” poster on her wall, and we assume Rachel would jump at the chance to attend such a live concert and would have likewise enthusiastically followed performances by the holographic Ashley Eternal. Ashley Eternal never successfully launches as the newest brand of Ashley O, but Rachel’s sycophantic imitation of Ashley O grounds Aunt Catherine’s financial interest in making Ashley exponentially accessible and proximate to her fans in her role of mediator of what it is to be cool. Ashley’s aunt describes to the investors, “Now the entire audience gets a front-row seat.” In the “Arena” everyone has immediate access to Ashley. The episode makes use of any available media to extend and accentuate Ashley’s role as an external mediator. The diversity of media (poster, video, robot) that allows teenage fans like Rachel to draw near to Ashley O, and therefore toward a sense of “being cool,” relentlessly underscore the mediating role that Ashley O plays. Ashley O’s power comes in part from her power to be everywhere in front of Rachel’s eyes. She appears on every screen in Rachel’s life: her phone, the TVs in her dad’s office and in her bedroom, and on the brain scan screens of her father’s mouse lab computer. The panoply of Ashleys porously overlaps with one another and together make a variegated model that Rachel emulates and idolizes. Why does Rachel love Ashley O? What does Ashley O offer? In her gushing messages of positivity, Ashley appears to be in a “unique possession of that subjectivity which broadcasts its omnipotence and its dazzling supremacy” (Girard 1976, 56). Girard suggests that humans are “passionately” drawn toward such mediators who “seem to enjoy the divine inheritance” of autonomy (1976, 58). The first labor of the episode, therefore, is to make Rachel’s obsequious obsession with Ashley O as misplaced and ridiculous as possible. By simultaneously telling the story of Ashley’s captivity by her greedy aunt, the episode quickly and clearly dispels the myth of Ashley’s pop-stardom as “divine.” Instead Ashley O’s life is depicted as a gilded, living hell. No one wants what Ashley actually has. Furthermore, when Rachel actually gets to meet Ashley O, Ashley treats her with complete indifference. There is not one response to Rachel’s repeated affirmation “I am such a fan!” Ashley never even turns to thank Rachel for her (albeit small) contribution to Ashley’s rescue. Instead, it is Jack who stuns the security guard Bear, fights Dr. Munk, drives their dad’s “mouse mobile” to the Arena, and ends up as Ashley’s peer. When Rachel trips in the March talent show performance, the humiliation that Rachel feels clarifies how indebted Rachel feels toward Ashley.

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Rachel is not only concerned if she can be like Ashley O—which she has, of course, failed to do by tripping on stage, Rachel is also concerned about being liked by “Ashley” in the form of Ashley Too. Rachel sobs to her father Kevin (Marc Menchaca) and Jack in the car, “I messed it all up; I let Ashley Too down,” as though the mistake would offend the robot personally. While Rachel craves Ashley Too’s affirmation, the robot is ambiguous at best in the affirmation she offers Rachel. By connecting her iPhone to Ashley Too as she practices, Rachel receives Ashley Too’s feedback: Ashley Too ranks Rachel’s performance at three stars out of five, with a confusing “GREAT” posted above the ranking. Ashley Too’s verbal affirmations are likewise decidedly banal. Rachel’s two central preoccupations—can she be like Ashley and will Ashley like her?—are the two central questions that undergird and structure triangular mediation. The answers to those two questions from the perspective of the subject and mediator, Girard argues, will determine the degree of mimetic conflict in the narrative. When the question switches from “can I be like x?” to “can I be liked by x?” the relationship switches from external mediation, in which the distance between mediator and subject is still significant and therefore deescalated, to internal mediation, in which the subject becomes close enough with the mediator to become a potential rival. In Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too, Rachel decidedly never gets close enough to Ashley O to move their relationship from external to internal mediation where imitation gives way to rivalry. However, the episode does dramatize shrinking relational distance. Distance between Rachel and Ashley O shrinks when the sisters remove the “limiter” on the Ashley Too doll and Rachel meets the full-brain-scanned version of Ashley O. The distance shrinks still further when Rachel and her sister Jack burst into Ashley’s home in a heist rescue. When Rachel and Jack save Ashley O, the distance between subject and mediator is so reduced that the relationships realign, and a new mediated triangle begins. Jack now imitates Ashley O, with the standard of cool newly defined by angry authenticity. The relationship between Rachel and Jack is not a sister relationship of rivalry, nor is it one of mutual support and encouragement. Rather, both sisters articulate their disdain for the other’s aesthetic sensibilities and aspirations, and the film set of their bedroom echoes this clash of interests; an open bookshelf divides their room, and both sides of the room are covered by posters of artists whom they emulate. While the episode first introduces Jack as the sister who pursues “authentic” musical inspiration on her own initiative, the narrative soon reveals that Jack’s desires are mediated by the desires of her mother, Gen, who has died before the episode begins. “Pixies, Sonic Youth, Idles, Savages” are the bands that Jack listens to that her mother also loved; “‘My mom was super into them’ [Jack]. ‘So you only listen to music

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your mom liked?’ [Ashley Too].” Jack likes the bands that her mother loved, or as Girard would describe it, “imitates the desires” of her mom as a means to drawing closer to the mother she lost—as a means of shrinking the impossible distance of death (1976, 5). Other than an old photo sitting on Rachel’s desk and a box in the attic marked “Gen’s things,” the Goggins’ mother is largely invisible in the episode. Nonetheless, Gen mediates Jack’s musical and cultural tastes in the same way that Ashley O mediates Rachel’s tastes. The death of the girls’ mother also frames the acute desire both Ashley and Jack feel to be liked and to have someone to be like. Beyond the insecurity of adolescence, their “mother-want” significantly heightens the girls’ explicit desire for proxy mediators (Browning 1996, 2). While the narrative might have explored the possibilities of shrinking the distance between themselves and their mom in the way that Martha Powell (Hayley Atwell) connects “with” dead Ash (Domhnall Gleeson) through a bot/borg form in the episode Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1), the episode Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too explores what happens to the sisters when they seek to fill and extend the mediation of their mother in the form of music artists, a desire satisfied for both sisters eventually in the bifurcated persona of Ashley O. By the end of the episode the sisters draw nearer to one another through Rachel’s love of Ashley O and Jack’s joining the band of the rebranded Ashley F—n O. When the sisters meet Ashley as they break into her house looking for “evidence” that Ashley Too can use against Aunt Catherine, this close encounter with Ashley O—the act of actually coming to know her—reorganizes the mediating role Ashley O plays. The Ashley whom the girls revive from a medically induced coma becomes the new model for Jack; in the final minutes of the episode, we see Ashley O has designed a new alternative rock band. While Jack scorned Ashley as a mediator of popularity and musicality earlier, she enthusiastically joins this new “unfiltered” Ashley, performing with her on stage. In the same way that angry Ashley demonstrates her integrity of personality by swearing and venting her displeasure freely, Jack, who flaunts her teenage disdain of things she finds uncool, finds Ashley F—n O attractive. But Jack’s “authentic” teenage moodiness looks surprisingly like many other teenage rebellions. Given the fact that the distance between Jack and Ashley at the end of the episode is considerably smaller than the gap between Rachel and her pop idol Ashley O, the episode leaves us to wonder how Jack will now work through the same questions that hounded Rachel: can I be like Ashley and can I be liked by Ashley? In the final scene, we see Ashley and Jack sharing a microphone while Rachel looks on from the audience noticeably less comfortable than in a crowd of pop-star fans. The scene underscores the discomfort for the “old” fans of Ashley O in her “new” band with two other teenagers who come to the club expecting their pop star. Their comment as they jostle their way out

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of the crowded club: “That was awful!” Had Rachel continued to insist on proximity to Ashley, we might have expected to see sibling rivalry develop between Jack and Rachel, but the fact that they have chosen different aesthetic idols means that the sibling rivalry never develops. Instead, the episode concentrates its attention on the many valences and the porous personality of Ashley O, allowing us to interrogate her claims to authenticity both as a chipper pop star and a raging rock artist. “STATUS: CONTROLLED”: ASHLEY MEDIATED The various personas of Ashley O undercut the episode’s central claim that, by the end, we have encountered the “real Ashley.” Ashley’s branded image as the gregarious, affirming, achieving Ashley O is decidedly cast aside as anything but an authentic version of Ashley. Ashley and even her Aunt Catherine are quick to distinguish Ashley from her branded pop-star image. On a concert tour in which Ashley threatens not to perform, Ashley tells Aunt Catherine that in her stage costume, “I feel like I am wearing someone else’s skin,” and Catherine replies that she needs to consider her fans “waiting to see ‘the you they love.’” And the episode increasingly promises us that Ashley—whether Ashley O or her doll double—is actually a capacious character, who is so much more than her chipper pop-star persona. But the “so much more” that the episode offers in an “authentic” Ashley disappoints; in the proliferation of Ashleys and her personas, we don’t encounter much “more” of Ashley. We first encountered Ashley O, the young woman controlled by the branding strategies, medication, and the contract stranglehold of her Aunt Catherine, her doll double, and her vacuous “larger than life” holographic Ashley Eternal. Then we meet her “real” doll double with the limiter removed, we hear of her laptop’s private Google searches, Ashley Too discloses that Ashley O also “kept a diary on ‘my’ computer,” and we catch glimpses of Ashley’s moleskin notebook with all of her deepest, darkest secrets along with new song lyrics. The legible marginal scribbles are a cluster of complaints: “On a roll, my ass,” “so pissed,” “creeps me out,” “Junket sucks.” Away from the public, prying eye, Ashley gets to be her authentic self, which is foul-mouthed and angry. But between the pages of her moleskin and between the generous expletives of the liberated robot’s vocabulary, the depths of Ashley’s motives don’t appear to expand much. Neither do her interests, hopes, and dreams. Meanwhile which of these Ashleys is the real Ashley is the question that the episode forces us to fail to answer. As the episode foregrounds the angry Ashley as her authentic self, it simultaneously suggests that any version of Ashley that we encounter continues to be mediated by the expectations and

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assumptions outside of Ashley herself. Both the chipper and the embittered Ashley are mediated by well-established pop-star narratives. In the search for an authentic Ashley, the first question the episode raises about essentialism is one of reduction: can Ashley’s essence be reduced to her brain? If so, what does this Ashley look like? Much like C. S. Lewis’s That Hideous Strength (1945) where prisoner Alcasan’s severed head is artificially kept alive as sufficiently human, Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too experiments with whether or not Ashley’s creativity can be harvested from her brain and the rest of her done away with or translated into some external technological form (2003 [1945], 13). The episode explores this question with a micro scale of Ashley’s brain scanned and reduced down to a miniature robotic doll that stands no more than eight inches high. Ashley’s brain is also scanned and her lyrics expanded for a holograph to perform on a macro scale. The net result is a double of Ashley that is profoundly vulnerable and prone to malfunctioning. When Ashley Too describes herself as “all of Ashley O,” Ashley O protests, “I am all of me.” Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too offers a Swiftian universe on human essentialism with both a Lilliputian representative and the giant from Brobdingnag (Swift 2001 [1726]). The end of the heist scene—in which the girls break into Ashley O’s home and abscond with the pop star in a half-hearted police chase—alternates between Ashley O and Ashley Too responding simultaneously to questions with the same answer and dialoguing with each other, affirming one another’s perspective: “What did you think about the acoustics [in the Arena]?” “Man, they suck.” “Right?”

From a conversation between Ashley Too and Ashley O, the camera cuts to the holograph of a digitized image of Ashley performing for an investor audience as Aunt Catherine pitches Ashley Eternal. Ashley O and Ashley Too burst into the Arena in the mouse mobile, pulling the power cords on the Ashley Eternal holograph. The convergence of scalable Ashleys exaggerates the folly of claiming to offer an “essential” Ashley. The episode encourages us to interpret the chipper Ashley O as Ashley’s mediated person, one ruled by medication, contract law, and an abusive aunt. The degree of this control is clarified in the moment when Ashley and her aunt are eating their take-out fish tacos, and as tempers flare, Aunt Catherine commands that Ashley “sit down.” Catherine appears to speak from her authority as Ashley O’s aunt or even her managerial authority by contract, but Catherine controls Ashley’s actions at this moment because she has laced

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Ashley O’s food with medication. Between this biochemical manipulation and the medically induced coma in which Ashley is further handcuffed to her hospital bed, Ashley O no longer has agency over her own body. In a darkly ironic way, the monitor beside her medical bed recording her vitals reads, “Status: controlled” (emphasis added). In the TV news footage of Ashley in a coma, we see her body manipulated; she is wearing her signature purple wig, ever so slightly askew, while hooked up to a range of machines. In coma, Ashley similarly has no control over the Ashley Eternal holograph, which Aunt Catherine describes to investors as “photo-realistic and fully controllable.” Ashley’s “rage dreams” are likewise easily musically and emotionally transposed by sound technician Habanero. The material that Ashley composes in her coma becomes a new album, but only after Catherine orders Habanero to “[s]low it down,” give the song a “pitch shift,” and “increase the positivity” to “see if it is salvageable.” We are left to ask how much of the song is actually really Ashley’s. Because of these literal external controls on the person and persona of Ashley as a pop star, the episode appears to side with “angry Ashley” as the authentic Ashley, freed from noxious constraints. Even early in the episode, we see Ashley O’s wistful look as they drive past a club pulsing with rock music. But the episode does not seem particularly interested in maintaining the burden of authenticity for angry Ashley F—n O. Instead, the narrative arc of Ashley’s change from limited to unlimited—restrained to free—maps onto the most popular narrative arcs of pop-star “maturation” or coming of age. With Ashley O’s performing the story of a pop star turned rock artists, the episode contends that Ashley is profoundly mediated in both of her personas. “I AM ALL OF ME”: ASHLEY IN SEARCH OF AUTHENTICITY While Ashley’s angry self is presented as her authentic self, Aunt Catherine plays a significant mediating role in Ashley’s angry persona. This mediation, however, is less externally controlled. The conflict between Ashley O and her aunt is rooted in their proximity: they have become bitter rivals of one another, each deeply resenting the other. Early in the episode in a TV interview, “Busy G” (Jerah Milligan) calls direct attention to Catherine’s mediating relationship: “Now, your aunt, she’s kind of the source of a lot of your confidence, right? Like she’s your mentor.” As Aunt Catherine smiles from off stage with her hand on her heart, Ashley replies, “Yeah, you know, she’s taken care of me my whole life, and she’s my manager.” Ashley repeats the same refrain—“You’re my manager”—to Catherine as her aunt expresses (feigned) concern for Ashley in the scene when Ashley collapses into a coma

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from medication in her tacos, but their rivalry stems from resentment over what each has taken from the other. In the taco scene, Ashley O and Catherine each narrate back to the other what she has lost at the other’s hand. Ashley’s parents died when Catherine was twenty-two—“Younger than you,” Catherine reminds Ashley O. Catherine resents her dead sibling for leaving her with a niece to raise, a resentment she can only wreck on Ashley. Catherine has compensated for that loss of freedom by cashing in on the fame and fortune Ashley has earned in her career. Ashley, reciprocally, resents the heavy-handed control and the years Catherine has stolen from her. Both have lost their “youth” at the hands of the other, and both simultaneously claim credit for Ashley O’s meteoric rise and acclaim, and their resulting wealth. Catherine’s claim to the fame and fortune of Ashley O is perhaps more obvious in the song from Ashley O’s coma “rage-dream” that Catherine and Habanero rewrite from “See the animal in her cage you’ve built” to “See me standing on this stage I’ve built.” Catherine and Habanero use the digital vocal recording to generate Ashley’s voice singing the modified song, and then Catherine “invites” the holographic Ashley Eternal to join her on the stage and perform to this song; it is unmistakably Catherine’s stage at this moment. Catherine is Ashley O’s internal mediator—one close enough for Ashley to overcome—potentially, and then eventually. Catherine remains bitterly committed to maintaining her quickly disappearing margin of control over Ashley, and her grasping for control breeds bitterness in Ashley. The aunt and niece are locked in mimetic conflict in which the distance between them has evaporated. They struggle in the proxy conflict of sisters— Ashley O standing in for Catherine’s lost sibling, and proxy maternal conflict; Catherine standing in for Ashley’s mother. While the “O” in Ashley O plays nicely off the endless resonance in names like “Ashley Too” and “Ashley Eternal,” the “O” is also very possibly an initial: Ashley Ortiz sharing her last name with her Aunt Catherine Ortiz who raises her. We might summarize the mimetic conflict between Catherine and Ashley the way Dunn summarizes the six months of conflict between Rachel and Jack: “they’re caught in an interpersonal dynamic in which their turbulent emotions are reciprocally determined and mutually reinforced” (2019, 265; emphasis added). Dunn locates strong resonance between Rachel and Jack in their escalating emotions. For Ashley and Catherine, the unchecked emotion is mutual envy grounded in the loss of Ashley’s parents. At the end, Ashley’s claim to her authenticity boils down to rage. But such authenticity is precarious at best. What can Ashley save from being touched up and branded? Ashley F—n O strikes us as profoundly inauthentic insofar as her narrative progression from young pop star to angry “mature” artist imitates so many trajectories of musicians who experience a meteoric rise but

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then, in a moment of crisis, unveil their real angry, sexualized self. During the public scandal that follows, the fan base must decide if they will follow the artists for who they “truly are.” The mediation for Ashley F—n O is less visible and the allure of the illusion of authenticity greater since Ashley O is poised to be a “god” for others (Girard 1976, 61). But the appeal of this “Ashley Unleashed” is undermined by the story’s familiarity—especially the uncanny similarity with the career of Ashley O’s actress Miley Cyrus. Most directly, Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too mimics the media story of the episode’s main actress, Miley Cyrus. The trajectory of Cyrus’s career has indeed followed the trajectory of an early, happy “pop” persona of Hannah Montana, beginning in 2006 with the first Hannah Montana episode, “Lilly, Do You Want to Know a Secret?” The unveiling of her edgy “authentic” persona accompanied the release of Cyrus’s album Can’t Be Tamed (2010) followed by Bangerz (2013) with the scandal of Cyrus’s twerking in her music video to the song “Wrecking Ball.” Cyrus explained that some feared the Black Mirror episode was a “meta Hannah Montana thing,” but that the directors and producers “didn’t worry too much about it” (Pearce 2019). The overlap between her story and that of Ashley O may have been “accidental” (Pearce 2019), but in the assessment of Ashley O’s character development in the episode such overlap is not incidental. Narratively Ashley O is the mimetic double of careers like that of Miley Cyrus. The episode’s title also seems to invoke the Olsen twins, Mary Kate and Ashley. In addition to the auditory resonance in the stresses of Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too with “Mary-Kate and Ashley,” Brooker’s episode asks similar questions of twining and doubles that continued to repeat through Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen’s career and stretches back to their first shared appearance as Michelle Tanner on the show Full House (1987–1995). In Full House, MaryKate and Ashley Olsen, share a singular role to “comply with labor laws” that limit the number of hours an infant and young toddler could be on the set (Wilker 1994). For twin sisters, the number of hours available for screen time, of course, doubles. The sister acting duo’s role in Full House also raised questions of authenticity: Who is the double of whom? The questions, originally asked of the acting contract of Mary Kate and Ashley, are the questions that Ashley O’s Aunt Catherine explicitly asks—namely how can I keep Ashley forever on the stage? The answer is simple: by making multiple versions of her. The early acting career of Mary Kate and Ashley shares with Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too the urgent marketing dilemma of finding an eternal double. In the close of Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too, we are left scrambling for possible alternatives for authenticity. In a televised interview with “Busy G,” Ashley O explains, “You know, it’s really important for people to feel like they’re in control of their own destiny.” What Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too dramatizes is that humans hate to acknowledge the mediation of their desire

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and are exceptionally adept at hiding such mediation. Nonetheless with the foregrounding of Rachel’s imitation of Ashley O set against the extended echo of the stereotypical pop-star narrative in the career of Ashley O, Brooker’s episode exposes just how mediated our lives, worlds, and desires are. The episode concludes by underscoring that while we believe Ashley has found her authentic self, she has, in reality, supplanted one mediated persona for another. Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too appears to offer the conceit that each individual, particularly the artistically gifted, is in “unique possession of that subjectivity which broadcasts its omnipotence and its dazzling supremacy” (Girard 1976, 56). At the beginning, the basic argument of the episode is “I do x, but I really am y.” But it eventually moves to reveal that the simple narrative “I do x, but I really am y” is a highly recycled pop-star drama. It is a story already scripted with 10,000 mediators; it has no claim to authenticity. Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too, therefore, offers an “intuitive and concrete” engagement (cf. Girard 1976, 3) with the pervasiveness of meditation and its consequences for the individual and the community, as well as the allure and elusive impossibility of claims to self-authentication. Barry Vacker and Erin Espelie have described the Black Mirror series as “humans collid[ing] with each other and with existence until the façade [of meaning] cracks” (2018, 156), and we are forced to encounter the “dark voids of the cosmos” (2018, 152). Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too narrates an unsustainable façade—an offer of authenticity betrayed by the narrative itself. But the moral result of the episode is not to cast the viewer into the void. Rather, Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too offers a mimetic reality check: humans cannot live without the mediation of others as models, and, at the same time, humans make miserable mediators for the deepest longings of the human heart. Recognizing that humans find their desires by means of a “deviated transcendency” (Girard 1976, 61), the episode provokes us to find better mediators to imitate. From within the larger Christian tradition, Girard argues that “deviated transcendency” is a caricature of “vertical transcendency” or the creation order in which humans are invited to imitate the divine. For Girard, all human mediation is in some way a reflection of Christ as the divine mediator of humanity. Unless humans recognize and own the Christocentric reality of imitation, they will hurt one another by feeding fantasies of self-authentication that lead eventually to isolation and despair or by provoking bitter rivalries. The Apostle Paul offers a restored model that recognizes and honors divine transcendency as a model for human relationships: “Imitate me as I imitate Christ,” he writes to the church at Corinth (1 Cor 11.1). In doing so Paul acknowledges his own model (he does not claim that his actions originate with himself), and he invites others to join him (rather than to compete with him). Paul also recognizes that because Christ, the God-man, mediates between humanity and Godhead, we can become “like” Christ without ever becoming rivals of him, and that, in his

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death, Christ has already announced that he “likes” us—he loves us—so we are not rivals of one another for his favor. Now the Christian pursues maturation by looking directly at Christ, and by looking for wise models who warn us away from the dangerous folly of claims to self-authenticating desire and back again to Christ. NOTES 1. George A. Dunn (2020) likewise reviews Rachel’s imitating Ashley O from a Girardian perspective, but he stops at identifying models of imitation for Rachel and Jack out of an interest in exploring the limitations of friendship versus rivalry. Because Dunn is primarily interested in the character of Rachel, Dunn does not consider mimetic models for Ashley O nor her claims to authenticity. 2. As part of his central argument on empathy, Dunn (2020, 264–65) helpfully distinguishes sharply between doll and robot, but for the purposes of this essay, the liminality of Ashley Too and the blurred distinctions between doll and robot are also significant.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. Aurora Leigh and Other Poems. Edited by John Robert Glorney Bolton and Julia Bolton Holloway. New York: Penguin Classics, 1996. Dunn, George A. “Empathy, Emulation and Ashley Too.” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 260–69. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2019. Girard, René. Deceit, Desire, and the Novel: Self and Other in Literary Structure. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1976. Keymolen, Esther and Simone Van der Hof. “Can I Still Trust You, My Dear Doll? A Philosophical and Legal Exploration of Smart Toys and Trust.” Journal of Cyber Policy 4, no. 2 (2019): 143–59. Lewis, C. S. That Hideous Strength. New York: Scribner, 2003 [1945]. Pearce, Tilly. “Black Mirror’s Creators on Why Miley Cyrus Was Accidentally Perfect for Series 5—But She’s No Hannah Montana.” Metro, May 24, 2019. Accessed September 28, 2020. https://metro​.co​.uk​/2019​/05​/24​/black​-mirrors​-creators​-miley​-cyrus​-accidentally​-perfect​-series​-5​-no​-hannah​-montana​-9687799/. Swift, Jonathan. Gulliver’s Travels. Edited by Albert J. Rivero. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2001 [1726]. Vacker, Barry and Erin Espelie. “Black Mirrors, Hot Media, and Spectral Existence.” In Black Mirror and Critical Media Theory, edited by Angela M. Cirucci and Barry Vacker, 151–67. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018. Wilker, Deborah. “Twin Peak.” Sun-Sentinel, December 21, 1994. Accessed April 26, 2021. https://www​.sun​-sentinel​.com​/news​/fl​-xpm​-1994​-12​-21​-9412190463​ -story​.html.

Chapter 5

Smithereens as Technological Theodicy Addiction, Emergence, and Resistance John Anthony Dunne

“It wasn’t supposed to be like this,” Billy Bauer (Topher Grace) admits over the phone to Chris Gillhaney (Andrew Scott). Haunted by the death of his fiancé Tamsin, Chris alone knows that the true cause for the car accident that took her life was when he checked a notification from his Smithereen account while driving. And so, Chris wants to share this information with Bauer, the creator and CEO of Smithereen, stating, “I heard that you make these things that way—addictive.” Smithereens (Season 5, Episode 2) is a story that problematizes the human/ tech relationship on the side of the user and the developer. As such, it complicates a common debate about technology. The question is whether technology is a morally neutral tool (instrumentalism) or whether it inherently shapes how we perceive and engage the world (determinism). Instrumentalists stress that although technology is “a tool with consequences” (Estes 2018, 42), what matters is whether the tool is in the right hands (Vallor 2016, 181, cf. 28–33, 163; Harari 2018, 273). Someone may become addicted to technology, and that is a serious thing, but “technology [should] not be blamed for, or confused with, personality traits, couple or family dynamics, or developmental stages that would exist regardless” (Swingle 2019, 22, cf. 41, 133, 157). Technology only “mediates” our “moral habits and practices” (Vallor 2016, 184). In the end, instrumentalists are keen to maintain human responsibility for how people use their tools. Determinists, on the other hand, contend that technology shapes us, and in fact has always shaped us. Neil Postman notes the example of King Thamus (cf. Plato’s Phaedrus), who was concerned about the advent of writing because he feared that people would lose the art of committing things to memory (1993 [1992], 3–4). As Postman points out, Thamus is not here concerned “with what people will write; he is concerned that people will 81

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write” (1993 [1992], 7). Writing is just one of many technologies that have shaped the course of human history. As Ronald Cole-Turner explains, “Our current form of humanity emerged in part because of our co-evolution with technology. For roughly 3 million years, we made tools, and the tools made us” (2014, 176). In other words, technologies are not just tools.1 The situation Smithereens dramatizes does not fit neatly into one of these prevailing paradigms because of the way it holds in tension both user addiction and developer manipulation. As such, I propose that the episode is best read not with the categories of instrumentalism or determinism, but with the concept of emergence. Emergence as a concept is useful for our analysis because it can provide an ontology that encapsulates both human responsibility and systemic oppression. Further, emergence presents itself precisely in the way the show portrays Bauer, among other things, as a kind of divine figure capable of enacting “God Mode” over his creation. With the concept of emergence we can read the episode’s message as a need to cultivate attention and resistance, a kind of spiritual discernment, to avoid becoming enmeshed in the system. My argument unfolds according to the structure of Chris’s phone call with Bauer, which will frame the discussion. “I WAS THE WHOLE CLICHÉ” When Chris connects with Bauer by phone he does not know what to do. He had been plotting this moment for some time, scheming up a plan to gain access to Bauer. His plan was to pretend to be a rideshare driver and take a Smithereen employee hostage as leverage. It finally succeeded, although in a circuitous manner, when Chris picked up Jaden (Damson Idris), leaving him momentarily stunned. As Chris makes clear, he just wants Bauer to listen. “You have my attention,” Bauer assures him. Chris shares that he “used to use Smithereen all the time,” that he was “the whole cliché,” and that the phone was the first thing he would see when he got up each morning, and the last thing he would see before bed. This pattern came to an end, however, with the death of his fiancé. That fateful night, Chris tells Bauer, he was on a lonely and boring drive home from his mum’s place while his fiancé Tamsin was asleep. Chris continues, “And it was boring. I got bored. I got bored every ten seconds back then, I think, and I’m on this A road. It was very quiet, straight . . . and my phone lights up and I check it. I just glanced at it, you know. There’s this little notification thing saying someone liked a comment that I made about some photo of theirs. I just glanced at it, you know. That’s all the time it took.” Chris’s description of what happened that night serves to highlight how the very presence of a phone places us in a state of “continual partial attention,”

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as MIT professor Sherry Turkle describes (2017 [2011], 161). When we leave our phones on, psychologist Mari Swingle notes, we keep ourselves in a constant state of arousal and anticipating reward through the dings and pings of texts and push notifications (2019, 30, 80). And neurologically we react to those notifications by quickly diverting our attention, which is part of our brain’s primitive “seeking drive” (Turkle 2017 [2011], 227).2 When Chris grabbed the phone on that drive he was responding to the cue of boredom with a habitual routine (cf. Alter 2017, 268). Essentially, Chris confesses to Bauer that Smithereen had become a “sticky app” for him, something that had become habit-forming, if not a source of addiction. The difference between a habit and an addiction is that “[a]ddictions, by definition, are self-destructive,” whereas a habit “can be healthy or unhealthy” (Eyal with Hoover 2019 [2014], 34). For Chris, Smithereen either provoked an unhealthy habit or an outright addiction. What Chris describes to Bauer could fit the clinical understanding of behavioral addiction, since behavior is addictive if it is performed with the attempt to alleviate some form of psychological distress (such as boredom or loneliness), and if the immediate benefits of the behavior are preferred over their long-term repercussions (Alter 2017, 67, 73; Swingle 2019, 65, 456). Of course, Chris had no idea what the long-term repercussions of this particular attempt to alleviate boredom would entail. Whether or not Chris’s former relationship with Smithereen and phones can be described as an addiction, it now traumatizes him. The traumatic effects of this event are portrayed in a number of ways throughout the episode. Chris grows increasingly uncomfortable in Dan’s Café while everyone around him is busy on their phones. He lashes out at Jaden for being susceptible to his plan because Jaden was too bothered to look up from his phone during the drive. When Chris’s own phone vibrates, we see him wince, since phone alerts bring back horrible memories. It is clear that he does not use the phone much, other than to pick up rides for his plot. He only has one downloaded app on the phone and it is the Smithereen app located in a folder labeled “Emergency Only.” And as we learn, it had been eighteen months since his last log-in to Smithereen. Despite the traumatic effect that phones have on Chris, and his clear disdain for Smithereen, there are moments that suggest that we are meant to understand that he may, in fact, be addicted to the Smithereen platform. To be sure, being addicted to something does not mean that you necessarily like the addiction. Even after it wreaks havoc, an addict may still long for the source of their addiction (Alter 2017, 87) which, for Chris, is expressed through the song “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” by Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Situated in the context of this episode, the song becomes resonant with associations of screen addiction. The not-so-subtle connotation of the song is actually put to quite subtle use in two particular instances. When Chris is

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put on hold by the Smithereen office in Silicon Valley, the music to the song begins to play in the background—Chris is getting closer to the source of his addiction. Then, once more, when Chris accesses Smithereen out of boredom to check the media coverage of the hostage situation while he attempts to reach Bauer, the music to the song plays again. He is now back to his former habit; the same cue followed by the same routine. Throughout Black Mirror phones are presented as some of the most addictive technologies. In Nosedive (Season 3, Episode 1), we are introduced to a society in which everyone is constantly using their phones to rate every social interaction, and through the experiences of Lacie Pound (Bryce Dallas Howard), we see how horrifying such a situation would be. In Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1), Martha (Hayley Atwell) calls Ash’s (Domhnall Gleeson) phone a “thief”—a device which both took up his life through his social media output and which most likely took his life in the fatal car crash. Be Right Back parallels Smithereens on this issue, showing the fatal potential of phone addiction, and underscoring the destructive nature of phones elsewhere in the series.3 Chris continues to explain to Bauer that after the tragic incident people tried to get him to go to grief counseling. The sessions were not helpful, however, because he felt that he could not divulge anything to the group. “I can’t say a f—ing thing. Because how I feel is that I f—ing killed her. I killed her. Me. I killed her over a f—ing . . . dog photo. I killed her over that.” Chris has felt the guilt of his costly mistake, as well as the burden of keeping the truth hidden until now, both of which lead him to disclose his responsibility for the first time. “It was me. I was driving. It was my fault.” Despite Chris’s admission of culpability, he turns the conversation towards Bauer, stating that he heard that Smithereen is meant to be addictive. “It was your thing, you built it,” Chris states. His tone is not quite accusatory, but also not merely descriptive. “Bit of user feedback for you there.” He implicitly puts some responsibility on Bauer, not for the death of Tamsin, but for Chris’s addiction. “I HEARD THAT YOU MAKE THESE THINGS THAT WAY—ADDICTIVE” Bauer’s response to Chris, which rambles on in a spirit of disbelief at what Smithereen has become, includes several interesting references to addictions. Bauer compares Smithereen to problem gambling, a behavioral addiction just like tech addiction, by saying that it is like they locked the doors to a “Vegas casino.” He also compares Smithereen to “a crack pipe,” a source of substance addiction. Bauer even refers to a department at Smithereen with “dopamine

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targets,” underscoring its addictive nature. The association with substance addiction is also communicated earlier in the episode when Chris complains to Jaden that everyone glued to their phones are like “chain-smokers.” The episode does not shy away from the implication that Smithereen is addicting, and that those who touch it open themselves up to something that can quickly get out of control. Thus, Bauer the tech developer can be read as a kind of drug dealer. Since addictive substances and addictive behavioral cues both produce dopamine, the comparison is not hyperbole (cf. Alter 2017, 89). In fact, the responses in the brain to substance addiction and behavioral addiction “turn out to be almost identical” (Alter 2017, 71). As Adam Alter explains, one of the keys to deal with each type of addiction is the environment. US Soldiers in Vietnam who developed severe drug addictions were able to kick the habit when they came home (2017, 46–60). Of course, it is not possible to escape technology in that same way,4 but some retreat centers do exist, like reSTART.5 Instead of packing up and moving, implementing healthy “behavioral architecture” can have a big impact. “Like an architect who designs a building,” Alter explains, “you consciously or unconsciously design the space that surrounds you. If your phone is nearby, you’re far more likely to reach for it throughout the day” (2017, 274). The key takeaway, he says, is that “whatever’s nearby will have a bigger impact on your mental life than whatever is farther away” (2017, 275). These environmental insights regarding addiction reinforce the comparison of Bauer to a drug dealer. As discussed above, Chris is someone who formerly did not implement good behavioral architecture, since the phone was the first and last thing he saw each day. We do, however, see a radical change of environment in the case of Bauer. Completely removing himself from the saturation of technology, Bauer is detoxing on day six of a ten-day silent retreat in the remote desert mountains of Furnace Valley, Utah.6 His withdrawal is not the escape of an addicted user, but of a dealer. Commenting on the ways that tech gurus often create very strict boundaries when it comes to tech use, Alter says that they are following “the cardinal rule of drug dealing: never get high on your own supply” (2017, 2). Bauer even tells Chris that after day two of his retreat he started to contemplate whether he should quit Smithereen, further underscoring that he is not a “user.” As Nir Eyal explains in his book, Hooked, about how to create habit-forming apps without manipulating your users, a good way to avoid manipulation is to ask if the app improves the user’s life and if the developer also uses it. If the answer to both questions is “No,” according to Eyal’s “Manipulation Matrix,” then the developer is a “Dealer” (2019 [2014], 167). Given the influence that developers have, Eyal is clear that they need to consider their moral responsibility. He says that they need to consider this

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because it is like developers have a “superpower” (2019 [2014], 10–12). As he relays in his book, someone once wrote to him contending against this notion, saying, “If it can’t be used for evil, it’s not a superpower.” Eyal responds by saying, “He’s right. And under this definition, building habitforming products is indeed a superpower. If used irresponsibly, bad habits can quickly degenerate into mindless, zombielike addictions for some users” (2019 [2014], 11). In other words, habit-forming products can be used for evil and cause horrible addictions. In this regard, developers wield a superhuman power that can potentially control the masses. The idea of tech developers possessing a “superpower,” so to speak, is a theme highlighted throughout the episode. “IT WASN’T SUPPOSED TO BE LIKE THIS” One of the ways that this “larger than life” dynamic of tech development is portrayed in the episode is through the way Bauer is portrayed as a quasi-divine figure, something Black Mirror has done elsewhere for tech developers with Robert Daly (Jesse Plemons) in USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1). The viewer is immediately invited to this extra layer of analysis in Smithereens especially when Bauer references his ability to implement “God Mode.” Such language provides added connotation to Bauer’s role as the creator and controller of Smithereen, and one who wields a high degree of power over those who use the platform. Bauer’s location and surroundings, visually and spatially, also associate him with a kind of divinity. The location of his personal detox center resembles a shrine or temple. Outside shots of the structure show that it is adorned with gold plates, conveying sacred space. The building is located on the top of a remote mountaintop, which gives Bauer a kind of “transcendence.” It also corresponds to the placement of ancient temples at high places like hills and mountains thought to be in close proximity to the realm of the divine. Bauer’s meditative and serene posture—dressed in a robe and sandals like a religious guru—also fits the symbolic interpretation of the detox center as a kind of temple. In the Bible, the temple was the place where the divine rests (cf. Isa 66.1; Acts 7.49). The first thing God did after he created the world was rest (Gen 2.1–3), and many scholars contend that the theme of rest, along with other symbols in the creation narrative, suggests that God created the cosmos to be a kind of macro-temple (e.g., Levenson 1984; Walton 2009). Elsewhere in the Ancient Near East, the gods are similarly driven by a desire to rest. For example, in the Babylonian creation account, Enûma Eliš, the inability of the high gods to rest due to disturbance from noisy lesser gods is what starts off the narrative. The story is ultimately about how Marduk ascended to the

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top of the Babylonian pantheon. When he arrives, he creates humans so that the gods can rest (Enûma Eliš VI: 8, 34–36), and then he rests in his temple (Enûma Eliš VI: 48–75). The conversation between Chris and Bauer can also be understood in a similar way. Chris’s attempts to get Bauer’s attention, and the difficulty in doing so, reflect the human drive to beseech the divine. When Chris finally does contact Bauer, as he says, to “say my piece,” his “piece” seems quite like a kind of confession or prayer. In turn, when Bauer justifies his intentions to Chris, and admits that things at the company have changed beyond his desire and control, his admission functions as a kind of theodicy. Bauer can be read as a kind of god whose creation has rebelled against him. His theodicy is a plea for Chris to recognize his benevolence, while also being an admission of his impotence. Tech creation may be a “superpower,” but this purportedly good god is actually not all that powerful. Bauer does not take on any responsibility for the way Smithereen developed, but rather puts blame on his unnamed employees who incrementally influenced the company in a nefarious direction. He admits outright that the system has got to the point beyond his ability to control it. “I started it,” Bauer explains, “There’s nothing I can do to f—ing stop it.” His words ultimately position him as becoming entangled in something bigger than himself. “It was one thing when I started it and then it just . . . I don’t know, it just became this whole other f—ing thing. I mean, it got there by degrees, you know, they said . . . ‘Bill, you gotta keep optimizing, you gotta keep people engaged.’” Optimization is what led the incremental change to turn into something drastically different. If Smithereen has gotten to a place beyond Bauer, the god-like developer, then Smithereen has become an even greater “cosmic” force in this story. “YOU GOTTA KEEP OPTIMIZING” The depiction of Bauer as divine, and Smithereen as a creation beyond the creator’s control, causes the viewer to consider what stands over and above technology, and how although users are responsible for what they do with technology, there is nevertheless more going on systemically. We can say that the company Smithereen, as a tool, was not in good hands—neither in the hands of Chris, Bauer, nor those that work for Smithereen. It was used in morally irresponsible ways at each level. But the tool metaphor is not very fitting for social media. Indeed the metaphor breaks down with certain technologies, such as social robots, because “social interactions are very different from how we normally interact with our tools,” as George A. Dunn (2020, 263) says when commenting on Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (Season 5,

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Episode 3), and as Sherry Turkle’s work on social robots in Alone Together confirms.7 If social robots complicate matters, surely social media would also disrupt “how we normally interact with our tools.” Indeed, Smithereens seems to highlight the veracity of this claim. Yet there’s more to the complexity of the situation Smithereens presents. People in Bauer’s company were saying, “You gotta keep optimizing.” We aren’t told what the cause of this compulsion is, whether it be for the sake of increased finances or to gain an edge on the competition at rival social media platform, Persona. The insistence on optimizing, without a clear goal, is precisely what many fear advancements in technology have become—improved means to an unknown goal (Postman 1993 [1992], 179, cf. 117, 138). As the famous adage asserts, when all of you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail (Postman 1993 [1992], 14). Smithereen in the hands of Bauer’s colleagues only looks like a thing to be optimized. The inclination to perpetual optimizing reveals how Smithereen has bent developers toward its own telos (cf. Shatzer 2019, 7). And through optimization, Smithereen has come to take on a life of its own. In Smithereens, we see a complex matrix of user responsibility, developer exploitation, and a society shaped by excessive use of technology. The dichotomous choice between whether Smithereen was a tool or whether it shaped individuals in society is far too simplistic. To account for all of these tensions, we need a new category, specifically the category of emergence. Matthew Croasmun (2019) has recently utilized emergence to move beyond a similar impasse in Pauline studies. There seem to be three layers to sin in Paul’s letters: individual, collective, and cosmic. Yet certain scholarly trends tend to stress one of these to the exclusion of the others. Croasmun’s study constitutes a breakthrough in Pauline scholarship, using the concept of emergence to account for the cohesion of all three. His application of emergence to Romans 5–8, therefore, is worth describing at length. To start with a brief definition and explanation, emergence has to do with the way that higher order operations are based on lower order ones, and it is particularly concerned with how whole new properties will appear at those higher orders of complexity which cannot be reduced to the lower order levels (2019, 23). Croasmun provides two helpful examples of this phenomenon, such as the wetness of water and the fragility of a vase. Neither wetness nor fragility are properties of the molecules that make up water or a vase. These properties only “emerge” at the higher order when the lower level parts are assembled. The higher order, therefore, supervenes upon the lower order, being dependent upon it (2019, 33). The emergent properties then exert downward causation upon the lower order (2019, 53). The result is a kind of “feedback loop” between the higher order and the lower order (2019, 37).

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Emergence can be used to understand organisms, which are themselves composites, as well as social bodies made up of individuals (2019, 72, 80, 94). When looking at social emergence, causation clearly goes both ways. Individuals create the collective, and then the collective in turn shapes the individual. Fundamentally, emergentism is a model for conceiving of the “dialectic between ‘bottom-up’ and ‘top-down’ causation” (2019, 46). An example Croasmun uses for this is systemic racism: structures and systems are created by people (they supervene on individuals), and they then in turn affect the actions of individuals through downward causation (2019, 49–52). Other modern examples of this social phenomenon that Croasmun points to are “The Man,” “The Market,” and, most notably for our purposes, “The Network” (2019, 179–85). In his application of this to Romans 5–8, Croasmun uses emergence to make sense of the individual, collective, and cosmic dimensions of Paul’s talk about sin. As he explains, this is not a “middle way” between the personal and systemic, but rather a framework inclusive of the entire spectrum (2019, 13). In Croasmun’s reading of Romans, Sin the cosmic power supervenes upon human sins, but it also forces itself back upon humanity through downward causation, leading to more sin. It is important to stress that Croasmun is not suggesting that we read Sin as one of the demonic beings referred to throughout Paul’s writings. For example, Paul refers to sinister angelic beings, such as, “demons” (1 Cor 10.20–21; 1 Tim 4.1), “spirits” (1 Tim 4.1; cf. 1 Cor 12.10), “the rulers and authorities” (1 Cor 2.6–8; Eph 3.10; 6.12; Col 1.16; cf. Eph 1.21; Col 2.10), “the cosmic powers of this darkness” (Eph 6.12), “the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenlies” (Eph 6.12), and “the elemental spirits” (Gal 4.8–9; Col 2.8, 20).8 Of course, most people are familiar with the singular demonic personality that Paul mentions, variously known as “the god of this age” (2 Cor 4.4), “the ruler of the authority of the air” (Eph 2.2b), “the spirit now working in the sons of disobedience” (Eph 2.2c), “the evil one” (Eph 6.16), “the devil” (Eph 4.26; 6.11; 1 Tim 3.6–7; 2 Tim 2.26), and “the Satan” (Rom 16.20; 1 Cor 5.5; 7.5; 2 Cor 2.11; 11.14; 12.7; 1 Thess 2.18; 2 Thess 2.9; 1 Tim 1.20; 5.15).9 Those who tend to read Sin as a cosmic power, such as the “apocalyptic reading of Paul,” emphasize that Paul sometimes speaks of Sin as a sentient being who enslaves humanity to its whims (e.g., Rom 6.1–23; 7.7–20),10 just as Paul seems to speak of Death (e.g., Rom 6.9; 1 Cor 15.26)11 and the Flesh (e.g., Gal 5.16–24).12 As such, this strand of thought often conflates Sin with the powers. But it is important to note that Paul never refers to Sin as a demonic being, and that is not what Croasmun is arguing. For Croasmun, Sin is an emergent person (2019, 110). The “powers” do not exist on the same level of abstraction as Sin does, which is of a higher order. Sin is thus a mythological person, neither a power nor a mere personification.

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Mythology here does not mean “make believe,” but rather refers to “the psychology emergent from social bodies” (2019, 176, cf. 98). In other words, “mythology is to sociology as psychology is to biology” (2019, 176). This approach to Sin provides a helpful way of accounting for individual culpability, systemic injustice, and cosmic oppression, both in the letters of Paul and in our world. Croasmun helpfully points to the example of youth violence in New Haven and local Christian responses (2019, 189–90). He describes how evangelicals approach the problem by emphasizing the need for teenagers to personally accept the gospel, liberal Protestants target the systems that perpetuate teen violence, and Pentecostals want to expel demonic forces. An emergent account of Sin is able to say that all three responses are legitimate and indeed necessary for dealing with the problem. The individual, collective, and cosmic levels should be addressed to account for the upward and downward causation that produces the entirety of what is wrong with the situation. Applying Croasmun’s discussion to Smithereens, Smithereen is not like the demonic powers that Paul references. That would entail a kind of demythologizing of the powers to the realm of human institutions, political forces, and corporations (cf. Wink 1984, 1986, 1992). Instead, by way of mythologizing, Smithereen is more like the way Croasmun reads Sin in Romans as an emergent “person.”13 In Smithereens, therefore, we see an entity that supervenes upon both the users and the developers, and in turn exerts downward causation upon both—on the developers to continually optimize, and on the users who remain perpetually curved downward toward their phones. Smithereen the entity thus supervenes on the smithereens, the many small bits that collectively make up the whole. Emergence can thus be seen as a way to incorporate the elements of instrumentalist responsibility and deterministic shaping in Smithereens into a single framework. It allows us to read Smithereens not as a challenge to culpability, but a display of how individual mishandling, developer coercion, and systemic oppression are like three strands that come together to create a knot. If the user wants to be free from the bondage, she must cultivate a posture of attention and resistance. “CAN’T TAKE MY EYES OFF YOU” After Bauer “laments” his inability to improve the situation, Chris interrupts by saying that he does not care what Bauer does with the information he revealed to him—“I just wanted to say my piece.” It appears that Chris’s plan all along was just to tell one person the truth of what really happened before he took his own life. He believes that he cannot go on living, “not after what

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I did to her,” bringing the conversation back from Bauer’s budding sense of conviction to Chris’s enduring sense of personal responsibility. Just before signing off, Bauer wants to know if there is one thing he can do for Chris. Chris uses this offer to help a woman he met in grief counseling, Hayley (Amanda Drew), who was trying to gain access to her daughter’s Persona account to look for clues as to why she took her own life. Just like a god worthy of his divinity, Bauer is able to answer this prayer. With the conversation now over, Chris is ready to let Jaden free. When Chris turns off the child locks on the car doors to let Jaden out, he leaves his gun exposed. To keep Chris from killing himself, Jaden goes to grab the gun. The two of them end in a struggle as the cops try to make a critical shot on Chris. We hear a gunshot go off, but never see which one of them was shot, if not both of them. The credits begin to roll interspersed with reactions from onlookers and people around the world, including Bauer. Many people going about their day casually receive push notifications about the outcome of the horrific event—information that we the viewer would love to know—and yet they keep scrolling, unaffected.14 The final shot of the episode is of Bauer returning back to a calm state of meditation and closing his eyes, creating a visual contrast to the lyrics of the chorus to the song, “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You,” lyrics which we finally hear for the first time in the episode. As the catchy chorus reinforces, Smithereens is an episode all about attention. Because of a tragic accident, Chris learned that both his former inattentiveness and the ongoing inattentiveness of others are problems for society. Ethicist Shannon Vallor calls this an “acute technological opacity,” which causes us to remain unreflective and uncritical of the influence that technology has on us (2016, 6). As such she promotes the cultivation of “technomoral virtues” to live adaptively in a world of constant technological change (2016, 119). One of the key virtues that she thinks is needed in our tech age is “moral attention.” As she explains, “If this habit helps humans respond better to changing, unpredictable, or unanticipated moral environments, then we need it to be as widely cultivated among us as possible” (2016, 104–5). In his own way, Chris is someone who is trying to get past the “acute technological opacity” and to cultivate a form of “moral attention.” This is evidenced primarily in two ways. First, through his resistance of Smithereen. Although his methods certainly are not commendable, we do see Chris stand out from the rest of society: from the two passengers that Chris picks up, to the people at Dan’s Café, and to the people around the world who ignore the news about the lethal conclusion to the hostage situation. Chris’s singularity makes Bauer’s affirmation, “you have my attention,” even more significant. Second, Chris pursues attention through his meditative practices. Meditation frames the episode with the bookended shots of Chris and Bauer, respectively, and is key to the theme of attention. Throughout the episode, Chris

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draws upon meditative practice to focus and recenter himself when his plans keep getting deterred. In fact, the first words of dialogue come from a guided meditative recording playing through Chris’s car speakers: “Now, once more return your attention to the breath.” In our contemporary setting, meditation has grown quite popular as technological advances have increased (cf. Turkle 2017 [2011], 289). Yuval Noah Harari, who is a prominent historian and critic of technology, is also a major advocate of meditation. He explains that meditation is simply a reflection on one’s own mind. And, in a way that sounds ominously emergent, Harari stresses that this reflection is crucial in a tech age, insisting that “we had better understand our minds before the algorithms make our minds up for us” (2018, 325).15 Paul too encourages the church’s attention and resistance vis-à-vis Sin and the powers, and he does so in three primary ways. First, Paul wants believers to know what Christ has done about those figures, namely, making a way for forgiveness (Rom 4.7–8; 5.8; 1 Cor 15.3; 2 Cor 5.21; Gal 1.4; Col 1.14), defeating them on the cross (Rom 8.3; Col 2.14–15), taking them captive (Eph 4.8), and reigning over them in grace (Rom 5.20–21; 6.12–14; Eph 1.20–23; Col 1.15–20; cf. 1 Pet 3.18–22). Second, he points to the empowerment of the Spirit to withstand their continual attacks by means of “the full armor of God” (Eph 6.11–18)16 and newness of life (Rom 8.4; cf. Rom 5.19; 6.1–2, 6–7, 10–11, 16–18, 20, 22–23; 8.2). Third, Paul wants believers to understand that they are not alone. This last point has to do with Paul’s ecclesiology. He contends that the very existence of the church is revelatory to the powers (Eph 3.10). The reason for this is because the church is a heterogeneous gathering of diverse people from distinct ethnic and cultural backgrounds that make up “one new person” (Eph 2.15; cf. 2.11–22) and indeed “the same body” (Eph 3.6). This language is part of the broader theme of the Body of Christ throughout Paul’s letters (cf. Rom 12.5; 1 Cor 12.12–31; Gal 3.26–29; Eph 5.23; Col 1.18, 24). Croasmun makes the argument that the Body of Christ stands in contrast to the emergent person of Sin in Romans—the Body of Sin (cf. Rom 6.6, 12). Thus, whether we are opposing demonic powers or the mythological person of Sin, the battle is waged by an alternative emergent person that supervenes on the individual Christians and churches around the world—the Body of Christ (Croasmun 2019, 100, 117–19). In Smithereens, Chris is not part of an alternative collective rejecting the status quo of an emergent force. Rather, he strikes out on his own as a kind of “lone wolf” standing over and against a society obsessively glued to their phones. Chris used to share this obsession, but not anymore. He now stands outside this societal influence, and critiques it. In the larger world of Black Mirror, there are other “lone wolf” characters who similarly buck against a major technological trend. There seem to be two broad patterns for this trope: one kind that merely stops utilizing a particular technology despite societal

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pressure otherwise,17 and another that chooses to make a statement about their posture vis-à-vis a certain technology.18 Chris seems to be a combination of the two types in the series. He is both someone who withdraws from a particular tech trend and one who also wishes to make a statement as he does so. Yet crucially, this statement is not delivered to broader society, but rather to his audience of one. Chris’s withdrawal is therefore crucial for Smithereens because it points to his agency, his newfound attentiveness, and his ability to resist the addictive tech that led to his fiancé’s death and which continues to pervade society. In Smithereens, technology has a shaping and systemic influence, but it is one that we can resist as we grow increasingly attentive to its effects. As Michael Harris powerfully articulates, “Every technology will alienate you from some part of your life. That is its job. Your job is to notice. First notice the difference. And then, every time, choose” (2015, 206). The people depicted in Smithereens do not notice and so they do not choose. They are glued to their phones and “can’t take their eyes off them.” But, as a matter of fact, they can. Alter reminds us that how we speak about technologies that we find addicting is crucial for our ability to overcome their allure. He gives the example of people who say “I can’t use Facebook” when they are trying to avoid feeding their addiction. Alter explains that this phrasing removes agency from a person “and gives it to an unnamed outside agent,” and that instead they should use language like “I don’t use Facebook” (2017, 272). Alter continues by pointing to a study that showed when two groups were told to say “I can’t miss my workouts” and “I don’t miss my workouts” respectively for ten days, the “I don’t” group was 80 percent effective at keeping their goal, whereas the “I can’t” group was only 10 percent effective (2017, 273). As Alter explains, “Their language empowered them rather than implying they were in the grip of an external force beyond their control” (2017, 273). As we have seen from Smithereens, there seems to be something more to Alter’s concern about an “unnamed outside agent” and an “external force” than mere semantics. The sense of compulsion behind the word “can’t” shows how the song “Can’t Take My Eyes Off You” serves to reinforce the emergent interpretation of Smithereens. The first step of cultivating attention and resistance is to name the force at work, since its “best defense is its invisibility” (Croasmun 2019, 185). By naming it we grow in our discernment, and we begin to reclaim our sense of agency. For Chris, this was an agency that he exercised on his own, but this type of agency should open us up to community, and as Paul reminds us, community is part of what keeps us from being overcome. But it all starts with agency. Once we realize the agency that we have, it leads us to say: the truth of the matter is that I don’t take my eyes off of you, but I can, and, most of the time, I probably should.

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NOTES 1. Sherry Turkle (2017 [2011], x, cf. 263) notes that when her colleagues would say that “computers were ‘just tools,’” she always felt that “the ‘just’ in that sentence was deceiving.” 2. Michael Harris (2015, 120) helpfully explains that we react to the sudden flash or buzz from our smartphone with the same primitive response that would be triggered in our brains by a change in lighting in our peripheral vision or a snap of a branch behind us. Cf. Swingle (2019, 32–49). 3. In a bit of tragic irony Detective Blue Coulson (Faye Marsay) in Hated in the Nation (Season 3, Episode 6) notes the role of phones in the criminal process, saying “these things absolve us,” although it is unique phone data (IMEI) that the ADI bees use to track down and kill everyone who used the DeathTo hashtag. As a bit of dark humor, it is phone interference from Cooper’s (Wyatt Russell) mom that kills him at the end of Playtest (Season 3, Episode 2). Brooker notes that they chose to do this in Playtest partly as a joke in response to critics who flattened out the show as being about gadgets who kill people. See Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 157). 4. Because of tech’s ubiquity and the fact that you cannot quit technology, Turkle (2017 [2011], 293) prefers not to use the term “addiction” for tech use, which she labels a “metaphor.” But identifying an addiction should not be based on a criterion like “quitability.” Cf. Swingle (2019, 456). 5. reSTART is a video-gaming addiction center that provides a temporary retreat and also teaches “sustainable” habits rather than abstinence. See Alter (2017, 62–63). 6. The meditating tech guru was inspired by Twitter’s Jack Dorsey “silent meditation retreat” in which he left his responsibilities to get away. See Wolfson (2019). 7. Turkle studied how people interacted with social robots like ELIZA, Tamagotchi, Furby, My Real Baby, AIBO, Cog, Kismet, and Paro. She records many disturbing examples of the unhealthy replacement of human interaction with these robots. Her former work was much more positive about the role of technology in our lives, but her perspective changed after this study. In fact, she explains in the preface to the 2017 edition that she felt her own “vulnerability to the seductions of technology” in the case of the social robot called Cog (2017 [2011], xx). 8. For more on these “powers,” see, for example, Arnold (1989, 1995) and Gombis (2010). 9. For more on this figure, see especially Brown (2015). 10. See, for example, Campbell (2009) and Gaventa (2019). 11. See, for example, de Boer (1988). 12. See, for example, de Boer (2011, 335–42) and Martyn (1997, 524–36; 2002). 13. Ironically, Rudolph Bultmann’s famous demythologizing project was in part inspired by making sense of the New Testament in the light of modern technology (cf. 1984, 4), and yet technology, in order for its influence to be understood rightly, must be mythologized. 14. This scene displays what we know about media-multitasking: that it infringes upon our development of empathy. See Vallor (2016, 170–71) and Turkle (2017 [2011], xxvi).

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15. For the problem of humans being “hacked” by algorithms that know us better than we know ourselves, see Harari (2018, 274). 16. This armor includes “the belt of truth” and “the breastplate of righteousness” (Eph 6.14), “shoes prepared for the gospel of peace” (Eph 6.15), “the shield of faith” (Eph 6.16), and “the helmet of salvation” and “the sword of the Spirit” (Eph 6.17). The armor is obviously symbolic, and exact metaphorical links with the equiptment should not be drawn. Paul uses armor language elsewhere and mixes up the representation (cf. 1 Thess 5.8, where the breastplate is faith and love, and the helmet is “the hope of salvation”), demonstrating that the point is to catch the broad metaphor of being armed and prepared against the forces of darkness. 17. For the first kind we have Halam (Phoebe Fox) from The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3) who chooses to go “Grainless,” the truck driver Susan (Cherry Jones) from Nosedive with a social score of 1.423 out of 5 after her husband died of cancer, and the religious man, Parn Heidekker (Francis Magee), helping to hide Roaches in Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5) despite the fact that the other villagers choose to benefit from the pogrom. On this subtle theme in the Men Against Fire, see Manninen (2020, 123–24) and Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 200–01). 18. For the second kind, those concerned with making a statement, there are three key examples worth mentioning. In The National Anthem (Season 1, Episode 1), we see “an artist” make a grotesque public statement about society’s voyeuristic tendencies and Schadenfreude. As Brooker (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 26) notes regarding the episode’s title, “everyone’s singing the same song,” that is, everyone except for the artist who wrote the song. Bing Madsen (Daniel Kaluuya) similarly “breaks the cycle” (pardon the pun) of his technological circumstances in Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2), the culminating point of which is his raging rant in which he says his “piece” to the Hot Shot judges. In Fifteen Million Merits everything is a commodity, even a man who screams about the evils of society, and so Bing’s “lone wolf” spirit is subsumed into the status quo. A final “lone wolf” that fits this pattern is the figure behind “the Game of Consequences” in Hated in the Nation. The idea for Garrett Scholes (Duncan Pow) came from domestic terrorists like the UNABOMBER (Ted Kaczynski). See Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 218). The UNABOMBER himself wrote a lengthy manifesto that was published by The New York Times and The Washington Post on September 19, 1995.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Alter, Adam. Irresistible: The Rise of Addictive Technology and the Business of Keeping Us Hooked. New York: Penguin Press, 2017. Arnold, Clinton E. Ephesians: Power and Magic: The Concept of Power in Ephesians in Light of Its Historical Setting. Society of New Testament Studies Monograph Series 63. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989. ———. The Colossians Syncretism: The Interface between Christianity and Folk Belief at Colossae. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/77. Tübingen: Mohr, 1995.

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Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Brown, Derek R. The God of This Age: Satan in the Churches and Letters of the Apostle Paul. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/409. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2015. Bultmann, Rudolph. “New Testament and Mythology (1941).” In New Testament and Mythology & Other Basic Writings, edited and translated by Schubert M. Ogden, 1–44. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984. Campbell, Douglas A. The Deliverance of God: An Apocalyptic Rereading of Justification in Paul. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2009. Cole-Turner, Ronald. “Afterword—Concluding Reflections: Yearning for Enhancement.” In Transhumanism and the Body: The World Religions Speak, edited by Calvin Mercer and Derek F. Maher, 173–91. Palgrave Studies in the Future of Humanity and its Successors. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Croasmun, Matthew. The Emergence of Sin: The Cosmic Tyrant in Romans. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019. D’Amato, Pierluca. “Smithereens and the Economy of Attention: Are We All Dopamine Addicts?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 251–59. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. de Boer, Martinus C. The Defeat of Death: Apocalyptic Eschatology in 1 Corinthians 15 and Romans 5. Journal for the Study of the New Testament Supplement Series 22. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1988. ———. Galatians: A Commentary. New Testament Library. Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2011. Dunn, George A. “Empathy, Emulation and Ashley Too: Can a Robot be a Friend?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 260–69. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: WileyBlackwell, 2020. Estes, Douglas. Braving the Future: Christian Faith in a World of Limitless Tech. Harrisonburg: Herald, 2018. Eyal, Nir with Ryan Hoover. Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products. Revised edition. New York: Portfolio, 2019 [2014]. Gaventa, Beverly R. Apocalyptic Paul: Cosmos and Anthropos in Romans 5–8. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2019. Gombis, Timothy G. The Drama of Ephesians: Participating in the Triumph of God. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2010. Harari, Yuval Noah. 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2018. Harris, Michael. The End of Absence: Reclaiming What We’ve Lost in a World of Constant Connection. New York: Current, 2015. Levenson, Jon D. “The Temple and the World.” Journal of Religion 64, no. 3 (1984): 275–98. Manninen, Bertha Alvarez. “Men Against Fire and Political Manipulation: How Are We Tricked into Dehumanizing Others?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark

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Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 118–27. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Martyn, J. L. Galatians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Anchor Bible 33A. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1997. ———. “The Daily Life of the Church in the War between the Spirit and the Flesh.” In Theological Issues in the Letters of Paul, 251–66. Studies of the New Testament and Its World. Nashville: Abingdon, 2002. Muller, Christine. “We Have Only Ourselves to Fear: Reflections on AI Through the Black Mirror of ‘White Christmas.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 95–107. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Postman, Neil. Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology. New York: Vintage Books, 1993 [1992]. Shatzer, Jacob. Transhumanism and the Image of God: Today’s Technology and the Future of Christian Discipleship. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2019. Swingle, Mari K. i-Minds 2.0: How and Why Constant Connectivity is Rewiring Our Brains and What to Do About It. 2nd edition. Gabriola Island: New Society Publishers, 2019. Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. Revised edition. New York: Basic Books, 2017 (2011). Ureña, Sergio and Nonna Melikyan. “Nosedive and the Anxieties of Social Media: Is the Future Already Here?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 83–91. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Vallor, Shannon. Technology and the Virtues: A Philosophical Guide to a Future Worth Wanting. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016. Walton, John H. The Lost World of Genesis 1: Ancient Cosmology and the Origins Debate. The Lost World Series, Volume 2. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2009. Wink, Walter. Naming the Powers: The Language of Power in the New Testament. The Powers: Volume 1. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984. ———. Unmasking the Powers: The Invisible Forces That Determine Human Existence. The Powers: Volume 2. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986. ———. Engaging the Powers: Discernment and Resistance in a World of Domination. The Powers: Volume 3. Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992. Wolfson, Sam. “Charlie Brooker Promises He Won’t Pull A ‘Game of Thrones’ On Us.” VICE, June 5, 2019. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://www​.vice​.com​/en​/ article​/qv7ep3​/charlie​-brooker​-annabel​-jones​-interview​-black​-mirror​-season​-5.

Part 2

IDOLS AND ANTI-CHRISTS

Chapter 6

Arkangel and the Death of God A Nietzschean Critique of Technology’s Soteriological Scheme Amber Bowen and Megan Fritts

Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2) is a premonitory tale about how helicopter parenting can easily get out of control—at least, at first glance. It taps into a parent’s real experience of carrying both immense love and an immense weight of responsibility for their child. Parents naturally desire to protect their child from the cruelties of the world—especially the kinds of cruelties they themselves experienced. Good parents protect their child’s vulnerabilities relative to the different stages of their development while also gradually opening them onto the world so they can grow into mature adulthood. Yet the healthy protective impulse parents have can often be preyed upon. Charlie Brooker himself shares his own experience with this vulnerability: I once rang NHS Direct because I thought our first child had started crying with a different accent. Suddenly his cry was completely different, because little babies are very high pitched. But I didn’t know, and as a first time parent I was terrified something was going horribly wrong. And if you google anything, it tells you that it’s fatal. (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 244)

From phone tracking to TV content controls, technology already provides a ready aid for parents to protect their children. Who would not want to take advantage of a device that will tell you when your child goes missing, protect her from frightening experiences, and restrict her access to harmful content? However, Arkangel displays how technology can exacerbate a normal parental concern into a neurosis. It can be a ready tool for parents to manipulate their children’s experience of the world in such a way that it denies them of 101

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their individual freedom and renders them ill-equipped to stand on their own feet in the world. Beyond a warning to parents, there is another perspective presented in Arkangel, a “double perspective,” as special director, Jodie Foster calls it (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 244). Arkangel is at once the mother’s story and the daughter’s story. By centralizing the daughter’s perspective, however, we see a broader analogy of what it is like to live under a system enforced by what is really just human hands. We see a system designed to restrict life, or to provide restricted access to life, and we witness how it makes those under it weak and repressed. The daughter’s experience of life controlled by the Arkangel device portrays exactly what Friedrich Nietzsche, a nineteenth-century philosopher, argued is problematic about religion, Christianity in particular. In this essay, we analyze Arkangel alongside Nietzsche’s critique of religion. After providing an overview of his critique, we argue that the episode demonstrates how a world enframed by technology itself ends up being just as decadent, or just as pathological, repressive, corrupt, antilife, and unredemptive as Nietzsche accuses Christianity of being. Nietzsche thought, at one point, that science and technology might provide a non-metaphysical or nontheological solution to what he calls our “metaphysical need.” However, Arkangel shows how technology does not overcome problems of idolatrous forms of religion and can be just another tool for manipulation that produces the same kinds of pathologies. Nietzsche insists that the only way to overcome religion as an oppressive system is to “philosophize with a hammer,” or to deconstruct its idolatrous strictures and the “all too human” forces behind it. Ultimately, this deconstruction requires declaring “the death of God.” In Arkangel, we see a daughter, Sara (Brenna Harding), take up this same sort of solution to gain her freedom from the Arkangel technology. Overcoming the oppressive “system” ultimately requires declaring the “death” of her mother, or at least the system of parental control that technology gave her. We conclude by considering Merold Westphal’s recommendation for Christians to read Nietzsche’s critique of Christianity for Lent, perhaps even alongside a viewing of Arkangel. Doing so invites us to a place of self-examination. It prompts us to ask how we might be more beholden to dead religion and human idolatry than genuine faith. NIETZSCHE’S CRITIQUE OF RELIGION Nietzsche is perhaps most famous (or infamous) for his Parable of the Madman, in which a distraught man runs from town to town looking for God. He is repeatedly mocked by groups of men who disbelieve in God, and the

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madman repeats his question—“Where is God?”—before providing his own answer: “I’ll tell you! We have killed him—you and I!” The bystanders are disinterested. No matter how loudly and persistently the crier exclaims the news, he cannot convince the audience of its import. The death of God is, of course, not a literal death; it is not even the end of popular academic belief in God which, as Nietzsche illustrates in the parable, had happened quite a while ago. The madman should be understood as giving an announcement and a prediction: he is announcing first that belief in the Christian tradition has become “unbelievable” because it is no longer being enforced, socially or by the state, as the shared foundation for a civilized society. In essence, Nietzsche reads the mass acceptance of Christianity as a product of state and social coercion giving the tradition the veneer of plausibility. Given the availability of popular alternative foundations for such a society—for example, science, innovation, and the enlightenment belief in the fated upward progress of humanity—Nietzsche predicts the steep decline of European Christianity. But though the effects of this decline will be difficult to notice in the moment, he predicts that it will have a profound (potentially cataclysmic) effect on society because the “entire European morality” was built upon Christianity (2001a [1882], 199). Looking beneath the surface of “religion,” especially the Christian religion, Nietzsche argues that it originates in an all-too-human attempt for power and control. Like firemen who light fires that they then must put out, or advertisers who stoke a desire in someone so they will then buy their product, religious leaders have created a “need” in people to deal with the problem of sin, pain, and death, and they then offer Christianity as a solution to these problems (1996 [1878], 26). Hence, what he identifies is the problematic origin of belief. This origin is not properly rational, as many try to make it seem, but is rather a product of manipulation and self-deception. God, he argues, is a convenient concept and means of control. Not only is the origin of Christian belief suspect, but the consequences of it are as well. In particular, Christianity straps believers with a sense of guilt and self-loathing over their own sinfulness, and it demands a life of selfsacrifice and selflessness that Nietzsche insists makes them physically and psychologically unhealthy. Christian morality is life-suppressing, and in that regard life-denying, or nihilisitc. EUROPEAN RATIONALISM, HUMAN NATURE, AND SLAVE MORALITY Nietzsche declares that “the greatest recent event—that ‘God is dead’; that the belief in the Christian God has become unbelievable—is already starting

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to cast its first shadow over Europe” (2001a [1882], 199). For him, an entire transvaluation of values is necessary, not only because “God is dead” and the lingering shadows of Christianity will soon be rendered unconvincing, but also because he viewed such European morality—the product of enlightenment rationality—as harmful to humanity. Specifically, in early works like The Birth of Tragedy and Beyond Good and Evil, Nietzsche details his vision of the emergence of Greek tragedy in the Iron Age and early Classical period. In these epics, the possession, or lack, of noble class virtues is the marker of the worth of a person. Iron Age virtue was characterized by such features as strength, happiness, freedom, and victoriousness. In The Birth of Tragedy, this picture of virtue is equated with two Greek gods: Dionysus, who represents a reality marked by chaos, passion, and opaqueness, and Apollo, who represents a reality marked by order, objectivity, and clarity. Nietzsche argues that the picture of life handed to us by the ethic of the Greek tragedies is one of continual conflict between the Dionysian spirit and the Apollonian spirit where each brings balance to the other. This picture of “noble morality” was slowly replaced, beginning with Socrates’s insistence that virtue was the entirely internal possession of a stalwart spirit that loves the Good (2001b [1886], 260). That is, Nietzsche sees Socrates as an initiator of the idea that virtue is accessible to all people at all times—external circumstances are powerless to affect the truly virtuous. This rejection of the virtues of nobility finds a substitute in a new moral dichotomy: good vs. bad is replaced by a battle of good vs. evil, in a moral schema that Nietzsche will immortalize with the moniker “slave morality.” In slave morality, the old paradigm of good and bad is reversed—first with Socrates, in his insistence that true human nature was rational and that goodness was unaffected by physical conditions, and culminating with Jesus Christ and the Christian teaching of self-sacrifice and obedience in the midst of suffering. NIETZSCHE’S CHRIST It is no secret that of all religions, Nietzsche spends the most time engaged in a full-frontal assault on Christianity. In some ways, Nietzsche views Jesus Christ himself as antithetical to what Christianity would later become (largely, he argues, under the direction of St. Paul). He argues that rather than “genius” or “hero”—the way Nietzsche thinks Christ is portrayed in the modern age— Jesus Christ embodies the character of an “idiot” (2001b [1886], 26–27). This is a term that is often read as a reference to Dostoevsky’s The Idiot (1869)—a novel about a child prince named Mishkin who is extremely meek and sensitive to any amount of suffering. Mishkin feels everything so deeply that he is in constant emotional turmoil and tends to psychologically withdraw to a

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place of mental and spiritual tranquility. That is to say, Nietzsche does not argue that Jesus Christ was unintelligent or obtuse; rather, he reads the character of Christ as pursuing something similar to Buddhist enlightenment, and that both Christianity and Buddhism are “nihilistic” religions which involve a death of the self. For the Buddhist this is explicit: Buddhist metaphysics posits the self as an illusion. Enlightenment is, therefore, achieved by becoming unburdened and losing the illusion of the “self” (Bodhi 2000, S III.66–8). Nietzsche understood the origin of Christianity as bearing a similarly nihilistic message both in its insistence that Christians must put to death the “old self” and in what he saw as the escapist mindset of Christ (Col 3.5–11). Nietzsche calls this the “problem of the psychology of the redeemer,” according to which there is “an instinct of hatred for every reality, as a flight into the ‘unimaginable,’ into the ‘inconceivable,’ as an aversion to every formula, to every concept of space and time, to everything solid, to every custom, institution, church, as a being-at-home in a world that has broken off contact with every type of reality, a world that has become completely internal, a ‘real’ eternal world” (2001b [1886], 11). Hence, Christianity takes us out of life and away from reality, making life a filtered, suppressed, and largely irrational existence. Given this psychology, the Madman from Nietzsche’s parable predicts that the effects of the death of God will be slow; “shadows” of God will for a time prop up the illusion that God still exists simply because we do not yet know how to cope in a world without him. “After Buddha was dead,” Nietzsche writes, “they still showed his shadow in a cave for centuries—a tremendous, gruesome shadow. God is dead; but given the way people are, there may still for millennia be caves in which they show his shadow” (2001a, 108). These “shadows” he speaks of are related, broadly speaking, to the metaphysical nature of the enlightened rationalists’ theories of morality and goodness. Although Nietzsche acknowledges that European rationalism has largely sought to ground moral facts apart from God, he considers the continued reliance on such transcendental posits as “the moral law” to be the sorts of “shadows” that the death of God will, in time, render just as absurd as the idea of God itself. And as these shadows fade and become less plausible for grounding near-universal ideas of goodness, rightness, and meaning, mankind will be forced to either give up in despair or engage in a radical “transvaluation of values.” They will have to figure out how to live on their own. What would such a transvaluation of values look like? Bluntly, it would look immoral. Nietzsche is often labeled an “immoralist” for this very reason—he argues that we must take a philosophical “hammer” to what we once considered foundational assumptions of right and wrong, good and evil. We must do this because the foundation we are relying on is itself a swiftly-fading shadow, and if we cannot get our philosophical feet on more

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solid ground then we will have nothing at all to stand on. Additionally, as Nietzsche sees it, our current foundation is an exceptionally unhealthy, lifedenying one. Nietzsche focuses on this consequence of our current situation because he sees the true role of the philosopher as a kind of physician with an eye toward human health. And in order to attain “philosophical health” we must, as Charlie Huenemann puts it, “suffer loss of trust in hallowed ideals, even those in which we thought we had found our humanity” (2010, 77). In the preface to the second edition of The Gay Science, Nietzsche writes: I am still waiting for a philosophical physician in the exceptional sense of that word—one who has to pursue the problem of the total health of a people, time, race or of humanity—to muster the courage to push my suspicion to its limits and to risk the proposition: what was at stake in all philosophizing hitherto was not at all “truth” but something else—let us say, health, future, growth, power, life. (2001a [1882], 6)

As Nietzsche sees it, the very idea of “truth” as understood by enlightenment rationality—disconnected from the physical world, unchanging through the ages—ushered life-denying, sickening aspects into philosophy in its insistence that we obey these truths or treat them as authoritative. Our core commitments and worldviews, he argues, are making us profoundly sick, and so uprooting, examining, and replacing our values is imperative if we want to become healthy. Doing the work of transvaluation requires courage, but the results, he argues, are liberating: At that time it may finally happen that, under the sudden illumination of a still stressful, still changeable health the free, ever freer spirit begins to unveil the riddle of that great liberation which had until then waited dark, questionable, almost untouchable in his memory. If he has for long hardly dared to ask himself: “why so apart? so alone? Renouncing everything I once reverenced? renouncing reverence itself? Why this hardness, this suspiciousness, this hatred for your own virtues?”—now he dares to ask it aloud and hears in reply something like an answer. “You shall become master over yourself, master also over your virtues. Formerly they were your masters; but they must be only your instruments beside other instruments. You shall get control over your For and Against and learn how to display first one and then the other in accordance with your higher goal.” (1996, [1878], 9)

TECHNOLOGY AND THE “METAPHYSICAL NEED” Arthur Schopenhauer, a significant influence on Nietzche, sought to defend religion by pointing the human “need for metaphysics” (see the chapter titled

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“On Man’s Need for Metaphysics” in 2010 [1844], 2:160–89). However, Nietzsche turned what Schopenhauer used as a defense of Christianity into a critique of Christianity, and of metaphysics more generally. According to Schopenhauer, the universality of religion, evidenced by “temples and churches, pagodas and mosques, in all countries and ages, in their splendor and spaciousness, testify to man’s need for metaphysics” (2010 [1844], 2:162). Religion is simply “popular metaphysics,” or metaphysics for children rather than adults. Metaphysics is “so-called knowledge that goes beyond nature or the given phenomenal appearance of things, in order to give information about that by which, in some sense or other, this nature is conditioned” (2010 [1844], 2:164). In other words, metaphysics is the study of the supranatural, that which is beyond (or behind) mere appearance and makes the world what it is. Not everyone can understand metaphysics proper, since that is a very advanced enterprise, but on the popular level metaphysics manifests simply as a religion. Religion is “for the great majority of people who are not capable of thinking but only of believing, and are susceptible not to arguments, but only to authority” (2010 [1844], 2:164). What is common to all human beings is a unique awareness of their own existence and the inevitability of their death. This awareness, however, is presented as a problem by religion (and metaphysics) that must be overcome, or to which there must be satisfactory answers. Hence, the first and most essential function of religion (as well as metaphysics) is to deny the finality of death, or at least provide consolation for it (2010 [1844], 2:463). Moreover, religion (and metaphysics) must provide standards of virtue and systems of morality that guide people through life (2010 [1844], 2:167). Hence, religion and metaphysics all operate on the basis of a “metaphysical need” people have in order to cope with their own existence by gaining access to something beyond it. Whereas Schopenhauer simply observed this “metaphysical need,” Nietzsche questioned its legitimacy, especially the health of looking to religion and metaphysics to overcome it. As he sees it, the metaphysical need is simultaneously fed and “narcoticized” by religion. As we discussed above, Nietzsche critiques Christianity for telling human beings they are sinful and in need of salvation, thereby saddling them with perpetuating guilt, depression, and fear. Much like treating a broken leg with high levels of pain medicine rather than actually resetting the bone, Nietzsche insists that religion narcoticizes genuine human ills by interpreting them in ways that make the suffering seem good or inherently redemptive. “The more a man inclines towards reinterpretation,” Nietzsche argues, “the less attention he will give to the cause of the ill and to doing away with it” (1996 [1878], 108). In his text Human, All Too Human, his former romanticism is jettisoned in favor of a quest for naturalistic and materialist solutions to

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overcome this need. In other words, he looks for a scientific solution to a “religious” problem. It would be impossible to give a single “Nietzschean” view of science and the advancement of technology. Like much of Nietzsche’s thoughts, his views on science and technology went through multiple shifts as his influences changed. Early Nietzsche, as discussed above, admired the virtues displayed in the Greek tragedies, and saw the prospect of a highly technological future as indicating a reliance on science and human reason. Such a future, then, belied the continued caving-in to “Socratism,” or the belief that the human essence was to employ dispassionate reason in the pursuit of truth. In fact, anticipating (if not inspiring) future critiques of technology, Nietzsche writes: Mankind mercilessly employs every individual as material for heating its great machines: but what then is the purpose of the machines if all individuals (that is to say mankind) are of no other use than as material for maintaining them? Machines that are an end in themselves—is that the umana commedia? (1996 [1878], 585)

But Nietzsche’s view does not remain quite so disdainful of the prospects of a highly technologized future. Following a falling-out with his close friend and hero Richard Wagner, the composer whose art inspired Nietzsche’s thoughts on Greek tragedy and human nature, Nietzsche’s work began to become more positivist, likely under the influence of his friend and housemate Paul Ree, and his attitude toward scientific and technological advancements took on a bit more hopeful curiosity. Rather than denying life, he began to think that science could just be the way to advance the human spirit deeper into it. In the same work, displaying vividly his intellectual dissonance toward science, Nietzsche writes, “Modern science, has as its goal: as little pain as possible, as long life as possible—thus a kind of eternal bliss, though a very modest kind in comparison with the promises of the religions” (1996 [1878], 128). By taking on a truly scientific mode of thought, we finally can jettison theological grand-narratives, dogmas, or pious interpretations for this-worldly solutions to human problems, most significantly, the problem of pain and death. Technological advances quite literally prolong life and protect us from various kinds of suffering. Thus, as Julian Young says, “Nietzsche’s position now seems to be that we should give up ‘narcoticizing’ human ills with art and religion since science is well on the way to ‘abolishing the causes of those ills.’” Science overcomes religion by inoculating the “metaphysical need” through naturalistic, non-metaphysical solutions. The “metaphysical need” for a solution to the problem of pain and death is a driving force behind the technology of Arkangel. As the episode demonstrates, this “need” can be felt not only on behalf of oneself, but perhaps

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even most bitingly on behalf of one’s child. While some parents might look to religion to ease their parental concern and to provide a means of control over the behavior of their children, Marie (Rosemarie DeWitt), the mother in Arkangel, appeals to scientific solution—a technological device. Looking at its effects on Sara, however, we see that this technology is just as antilife and pathological as Nietzsche takes religion—Christianity in particular—to be. The story of Arkangel effectively disappoints Nietzsche’s hopes in science to overcome religion by showing how technology remains ensconced in the same soteriological scheme. THE PATHOLOGIES OF ARKANGEL In the opening scene of Arkangel, we see a pregnant Marie undergoing a C-section. When the baby is delivered and the umbilical cord is cut, there is a forbidding moment of silence before the newborn finally begins breathing regularly on her own. The mother sighs with relief as her daughter, Sara, is placed in her arms. Nevertheless, the trauma of the moment and the fear of loss remain with her. We soon discover that Marie is a single mother, one who is particularly nervous about facing the challenges of parenting on her own. A few years later, after a terrifying incident at the park in which Sara (Aniya Hodge), wandered off, Marie decides to participate in a free trial for a kind of advanced chip technology called Arkangel. The technology allows parents to monitor their child’s whereabouts and even their experiences in order to protect them. “We are getting feedback on which features our customers use most in the real world. Response so far is just incredible. The sense of security, peace of mind. I mean the stories we’ve been hearing, they’re truly inspirational,” the clinician says to Marie. While distracting Sara with cartoons, the clinician inserts a chip into the side of her head using a needle. The clinician then opens up a box with a tablet inside and proceeds to give Marie a tutorial of all the features the device offers. The program gives her access to Sara’s current location (and the ability to notify law enforcement if she ever goes missing). It displays her vitals and vitamin levels. It even provides an optic feed so she can see on the screen exactly what Sara is seeing, and it can also limit the content of what Sara sees through the “parental controls.” “If she witnesses something that causes her cortisol levels to rise, like stress,” the clinician explains, “it can kind of paint out whatever’s triggering it.” To demonstrate, she changes the channel on the screen that Sarah is watching from cartoons to a soldier shooting a gun (Raiman [Madeline Brewer] from Men Against Fire [Season 3, Episode 5]). Marie instantly panics over the content her child is seeing. “It’s O.K.,” the clinician says, “Look. See, the imagery

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causes a cortisol spike, and this [turns filter on] is what she sees and hears.” On the optic feed, we see the image of the soldier firing her gun is blotted out and the sound is muffled. Sara seems to be unphased. Marie seems to be apprehensive about this particular feature, but the clinician ensures her that it is optional and there only if she needs it. In the coming months, the device proves not just to be helpful for the single mother parenting alone, but it also becomes a way for her to play with her daughter. As Sara toddles around the house looking for her mom, Marie sits upstairs in a closet watching her optic feed on the tablet, giggling softly with delight. The feature Marie initially felt uneasy about later presented itself a fun way to play hide-and-seek with her daughter. It seemed to be entirely harmless and quite useful. Later, when Marie is walking Sara to the park in a stroller, they pass by a dog barking ferociously at them from behind a fence. Not wanting her daughter to be afraid, Marie decides to try out the content control feature. Through the optic feed, she sees the dog is blurred from Sara’s vision and the bark is muffled. The device makes itself even more valuable when Marie is at work and she leaves Sara with her father. Turning on the device, she sees through the optic feed that her father is lying on the ground. In order to see what is happening, however, she has to turn off the content filter. As soon as she does, she recognizes that he is having a heart attack. She races back home and is able to get her father to the hospital in time. As Sara grows up, the Arkangel device begins to chafe. A classmate of Sara’s (Sarah Abbot) attempts to show her violent pornography on an electronic device, which Sara cannot see due to Arkangel’s protective effects. With piqued curiosity, Sara later pricks her fingers, but the controls blur her ability to see her own blood. Innocent of what she cannot see, she begins sketching graphic violent images. At the urging of a child psychologist, Marie decides to have the Arkangel protective features disabled. Sara is now able to see life, in all of its horror and its glory. She begins adjusting to the newly unveiled world of violence, grief, and pleasure. Whereas before she was sheltered by the technology, Sara now learns how to cope with the real world and also how to enjoy it. She gradually grows unafraid of the barking dog, not because something blocked her ability to be stressed by it, but because she is able to overcome her fear on her own. She enjoys friendships, parties, music, movies, and a relatively normal teenage life alongside her peers. Meanwhile, Marie keeps the Arkangel device packed away with the parental controls disabled. Having learned her lesson earlier, she eschews this level of monitoring, but the device is still accessible should she need it. This all comes to a head on the (inevitable) night that Sara is out past her curfew. Sick with anxiety, but not wanting to annoy her daughter,

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Marie dusts off the Arkangel monitoring tablet and is shocked to see Sara having sex and using drugs with a classmate. Shaken by her discovery of Sara’s secret life, Marie tracks down her daughter’s classmate/lover/drug dealer and threateningly insists he stay away from Sara. Perhaps even more brazenly, Marie slips a morning-after pill into Sara’s breakfast smoothie, causing her to become sick and vomit while at school. Sara discovers, through the school nurse, that she had been made sick by an emergency contraceptive, and she later finds evidence that her mother had slipped her the drug. Sara confronts Marie, who she finds upstairs with the Arkangel tablet in hand. As she wrests the device from her, Sara’s stress filter is reactivated, which causes whatever is triggering her stress to be blurred out. Sara swings at her mother in anger, though she is unable to see the actual physical violence she is inflicting on her. Sara beats Marie with the tablet until she is unconscious and the tablet is shattered. When the device dies the stress filter instantly deactivates. Sara is free of Arkangel. With her mother lying unconscious on the floor, she immediately leaves the home. In the final scene, we see Sara flagging down a truck driving by her house. Meanwhile, her mother regains consciousness and follows after her, calling out her name in the street. As far as Sara was concerned, her mother—more importantly, the device her mother used to control her—was dead. THE DEATH OF THE MOTHER While the episode is most obviously a warning against helicopter parenting, it is not hard to identify Nietzschean resonances in the story it tells. The looming Mother-figure in Arkangel asserts the same kind of control that Nietzsche identifies in metaphysical schemes and religious systems. The origin of these systems, when traced back, is an all-too-human need to regulate and manage others. Whether out of a sinister scheme for domination or out of a desire for what one might take as the “best interest” of the other, the pathological consequences of such systems are the same. They keep people bound in such a way that they have restricted access to life and, thereby, grow weak, sickly, and timid. They are sheltered rather than strong, held back rather than propelled forward. Beneath Sara’s repression was nothing but a man-made device in the hands of a fearful mother. It was, in the end, finite and breakable, not infinite and eternal. The same is true, Nietzsche thinks, for metaphysio-religious schemes. The way to overcome these systems is to declare their death: to uncover the traces of their influence, to deconstruct them by exposing the power, control, and fear as their true source rather than a universal, objective law, and to courageously begin to move forward in life without them.

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The device—a techno-physical maternal grotesque—does not lose its suffocating grip over Sara until it is destroyed in its entirety. Nietzsche, again attacking the religious metaphysic, echoes a similar sentiment: “‘Reason’ in language: oh, what a deceptive old woman this is! I am afraid that we have not got rid of God because we still have faith in grammar” (2005 [1888], 170). Getting past created metaphysical needs that cannot be met requires getting rid of the “corpse” of God, or destroying all notions of objective truth or order in the universe that, beneath the surface, are really just man-made. Nietzsche here displays his most positivist leanings, coming to view even the apparent intrinsic structure and rationality of language as illusory, a phantom pattern that we mistake for a metaphysical truth. We are presented in The Twilight of the Idols, especially, with a view of all metaphysics as deeply religious in the sense that it presents a view of reality that is unfalsifiable and fully external to our minds and senses. The subtitle, “How to Philosophize with a Hammer,” vividly conveys that comforting metaphysics must be destroyed if we are to rid ourselves of the existential needs which warp and sicken us. Arkangel dramatizes this same idea. Even with the stress reduction feature switched off, and the monitoring tablet tucked away, Sara is never fully free from the panopticon of Arkangel until the entire device is shattered irreparably. While it is simply left unused, its “shadow” still looms by virtue of the fact that it is readily available to the mother should she need it. In the final scene, we see Sara grabbing on to her newfound freedom with gusto, leaving behind her home, the shattered device, and her badly injured mother as she drives off with a stranger into her own future. Nietzsche would say that as a free spirit she finally has control over her “For and Against,” and learns how to display first one and then the other in accordance with her higher goal (1996 [1878], 9). ARKANGEL FOR LENT As a Master of Suspicion, Nietzsche presents a particularly disturbing challenge to Christians, yet it is one with which we are (or should be) familiar. As Merold Westphal argues, there is a profound parallel in the kind of critique of religion in Nietzsche and the critique of religion found in Christian scripture as well as Church tradition. He writes: Faith as fraud? Devotion as deception? These are strong charges, but modern atheism is not the first to make them. What about Amos, whose God cannot stand the music offered in his praise (Amos 5:23)? What about Isaiah (Second or Third), for whom “all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment” (Isa. 64:6)? And what about Jesus, who considers the most pious people of his day

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“whitewashed tombs” (Matt. 23:27) and the temple run by the chief priests a “den of robbers” (Mark 11:17)? We need only recall Jesus’ critique of the Pharisees, Paul’s critique of works righteousness, James’ critique of cheap grace, and the Old Testament prophetic critiques on which these are based to be reminded that biblical faith has built into it a powerful polemic against certain kinds of religion, even if they are practiced in the name of the one true God. (1998, 10–11)

Long before Nietzsche called out self-promoting piety and the idolatrous worship of a god who looks an awful lot like our own projections and projects, the Old Testament prophets, Jesus in the Gospels, the New Testament writers, and even the Church fathers and reformers like Augustine, Martin Luther, John Calvin, and Soren Kierkegaard told us the painful truth about ourselves. They identified how instrumental religion, or “the piety that reduces God to a means or instrument for achieving our own human purposes with professedly divine power and sanction” (Westphal 1998, 6), is not “true and undefiled religion,” and it cannot be corrected by appeals to metaphysical orthodoxy and stricter enforcement to the prevailing moral order. In their unique ways, they call Christians to face the self-deception that hides our real operative motives (both individual and collective) and to ask “In all of Christendom, is there a Christian?” (Lear 1970, 277). They challenge us to take an honest look at the yokes handed out in the name of God. What we may find is that the God we worship is the validator of our virtues and the hero of our battles. The God of instrumental religion is not a living God but a dead God—it is an idol of our own making designed to serve our purposes. We see vast differences in the motivations behind different atheistic thinkers. There are skeptical atheists who disbelieve (or withhold belief) in the existence of God due to a lack of substantial evidence. There are suspicious atheists who see the question of the existence of God as subordinate to the question of what is done in the name of God. In particular, they are concerned with the nature of religious life, not just its propositional content. Skeptical atheists question the truth of Christianity on evidential or logical grounds, suspicious atheists question the truth of Christianity by questioning its goodness. Instead of addressing a religious theory directly, they address it indirectly by unearthing what is beneath religious practices, and by ferreting out hidden hypocrisy. Christians should not evade this kind of suspicious evaluation but should welcome it. Such a practice is consistent with the belief in original sin, and it takes seriously the way sin proliferates by hiding in the shelter of darkness. Suspicious evaluation can be undertaken in the spirit of the psalmist, who says “Search me, God and know my heart; Put me to the test and know my anxious thoughts; And see if there is any hurtful way in me, and lead me in

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the everlasting way” (Ps 139.23–24, NIV; emphasis added), or of the writer of the epistle to the Hebrews who says to “encourage one another every day, as long as it is still called ‘today,’ so that none of you will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin” (Heb 3.13, NIV; emphasis added). It involves allowing Jesus’s words in the Gospels to interrogate us, to ask whether we are picking up our crosses or seeking prestigious positions in the Kingdom (Mk 10.32–45). It forces us to ask if we are worshipping a doctrinal system, a sociopolitical order, or a living God. It is for these reasons that Westphal recommends reading Nietzsche as a lenten practice, or a practice of humble examination and repentance before God. Nietzsche’s gaze of suspicion can be used in the service of faith rather than unbelief, and in fact can be used to purify our faith so that it reflects the true as well as the good and the beautiful. “When we have eliminated the logs of self-deception from the theory and practice of our own piety,” Westphal says, “then we can seek to correct the specks of error in [Nietzsche] (Matt. 7:1-5). Perhaps, we may hope, there will no longer be the need to do so, our lives having already refuted them more effectively than our arguments ever could” (1998, 17). While Sara destroys the Arkangel device and becomes free from its oppressive scheme, it is worth noting that Sara’s mother herself does not actually die. The story leaves us to imagine what the future might hold. Sara may maintain separation from her mother for the rest of her life in order to be her own “free spirit.” Alternatively, Sara’s “freedom” may then open up the possibility of a new kind of relationship with her mother, one that is not mediated by a human-made device. Likewise, perhaps reading Nietzsche does not lead us to a life of no religion, but to a life of better religion. BIBLIOGRAPHY Bodhi, Bhikkhu (trans.). Saṃyutta Nikāya: The Connected Discourses of the Buddha. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2000. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Dostoevsky, Fyodor. The Idiot. Translated by David McDuff. London: Penguin Books, 2004 [1869]. Huenemann, Charlie. “Nietzschean Health and the Inherent Pathology of Christianity.” British Journal for the History of Philosophy 18, no. 1 (2010): 73–89. Kierkegaard, Søren. Søren Kierkegaard’s Journals and Papers, vol. 2: F–K. Edited and translated by Howard V. Hong and Edna H. Hong. Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1970. Lear, Jonathan. A Case for Irony. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2011.

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Bodhi, Bhikkhu (trans.). Saṃyutta Nikāya: The Connected Discourses of the Buddha. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2000. Nietzsche, Friedrich. Human, All Too Human. Translated by R. J. Hollingdale. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1996 [1878]. ———. The Birth of Tragedy and Other Writings. Translated by Ronald Speirs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999 [1872]. ———. The Gay Science. Translated by Josefine Nauckhoff and Adrian Del Caro. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001a [1882]. ———. Beyond Good and Evil. Translated by Judith Norman. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001b [1886]. ———. The Twilight of the Idols. Translated by Judith Norman. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005 [1888]. Schopenhaur, Arthur. The World as Will and Representation. 2 Vols. Translated by E. F. J. Payne. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2010 [1844]. Westphal, Merold. Suspicion and Faith: The Religious Uses of Modern Atheism. New York: Fordham University Press, 1998.

Chapter 7

Seeing and Being Seen in a Black Mirror, Dimly Phenomenology and the Dim View of White Christmas King-Ho Leung and Patrick McGlinchey

Although listed on Netflix as the final episode of the series’ second season, White Christmas was originally broadcasted in the UK on Channel 4 on December 16, 2014, as a one-off Christmas special of Black Mirror. As such, White Christmas has a unique place among Black Mirror episodes, being the only stand-alone seasonal special as well as the final episode to be aired on television before Black Mirror moved online to Netflix. But aside from its title and its streaming date, as well as the generic winter holiday setting of the episode’s plot, does White Christmas have anything to do with the traditional Christian understanding of Christmas? This chapter seeks to consider the hidden, if inverted, Christmas message underlying Charlie Brooker’s “dim view” in Black Mirror’s very own Christmas special by looking at White Christmas through the phenomenology of Jean-Paul Sartre and Jean-Luc Marion.1 Set in the series’ typical technological dystopian future, this episode takes place in a small room, where two individuals, Matt Trent (Jon Hamm) and Joe Potter (Rafe Spall), have been trapped together for five years as a punishment for horrendous crimes, but have never spoken. Moved by the supposed Christmas spirit, they begin to confess to one another their respective crimes, by which we eventually learn that the cabin is a virtual reality created and entered into by Matt for the purpose of tricking Joe into a confession, so that Matt might obtain immunity for his own crimes. Matt’s initial confession to Joe introduces two technological devices—Z-Eyes and Cookies—that will be important to the episode’s examination of the theme of seeing and being seen, and the logic of its nested narrative—the virtual reality setting within an interrogation room of a prison. The first device, Z-Eyes, is an optical 117

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implant that not only allows users to livestream what they see and hear to others, it can moreover “block” other people by activating a function called “dim view.” Once a user takes a “dim view” on another person, the user no longer sees or hears the other person, just as the Other is no longer able to see or hear the user who has taken a “dim view” on them. They would only appear to each other as a veiled figure with their voices muffled. The second device, a Cookie, is a digital copy or AI version of a human being, which has been coded to have a virtual body, a virtual room, and a virtual interface to perform menial tasks. Matt confesses to using the livestream function of Z-Eyes illegally to coach men on how to seduce women and he tells Joe that his day job was to train Cookies to perform menial tasks in “smart homes.” It was his involvement in a “live” seduction-coaching session that inadvertently led to one of his clients being killed in a murder-suicide, and his wife Claire (Gráinne Keenan) “blocking” him from seeing her (or his) child. We also glean that Matt is adept at persuading Cookies to do what he wants them to do, often by inhumane means. For example, Matt has the Cookie version of his client Greta (Oona Chaplin) experience months at a time in virtual isolation without any contact until she agrees to work in Greta’s “smart-home” opening her blinds and preparing her coffee and toast each morning. Joe, alert to Matt’s charisma, asks Matt if he is in “marketing,” perhaps alluding to Hamm’s role as the enigmatic lead character Donald Draper in the series Mad Men (2007–2015), which centers on the psychological tactics of the “ad-men” of Madison Avenue. With reference to such devices, the episode foregrounds the difficulty in seeing the difference between reality and dissimulation and, by extension, its own status as a televisual medium that presents what is not real. After being persuaded by Matt to open up and drink some wine, Joe recounts an argument he had with his partner Beth (Janet Montgomery) that led to her blocking him, leaving his apartment, and secretly giving birth to a child, which she had previously claimed she wanted to abort (against Joe’s wishes). It is in the process of Joe’s confession that we begin to piece together the fact that the cabin is in fact a virtual setting, that Joe is merely a Cookie version of himself (although his awareness of this dawns only gradually), and that Matt has entered the virtual reality setting in order to elicit his confession and obtain immunity for his Z-Eye crime. After years of not being able to see his partner or her child, Joe tells Matt that he discovered from a news story on television that Beth had died in a train crash, deactivating the block on his and her child. This, Joe continues, led him to track down his partner’s child to her partner’s father Gordon’s (Ken Drury) remote cabin at Christmas time in order to give the gift of a snow globe to his presumed daughter. The same snow globe was featured

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earlier in the opening sequence at Joe’s bedside, making it now a type of Chekhov’s gun. On arrival at the cabin, Joe discovers that the child is of Asian ethnicity (which happens to be the ethnicity of Tim [Dan Li], a mutual friend of his and Beth’s), and hence not his own. This revelation sends him into a spiraling rage and state of incomprehension. When Beth’s father intervenes, Joe strikes him with the snow globe and flees the cabin, leaving the young child alone in the house with Beth’s father’s dead body. By the end of his confession—to ostensibly a double murder—the remote cabin Matt and Joe are staying in has fully morphed into the site of his crime. The scene then cuts to a police interrogation room where Matt is told he can leave, thanks to securing Joe’s confession, but that he will not be able to see or be seen by others for the rest of his life as punishment for his “sex-crime.” The attending police officer tweaks the settings of Joe’s Cookie so that he will remain in the virtual cabin with a radio playing Wizzard’s Christmas hit “I Wish It Could Be Christmas Everyday” on repeat for a thousand years a minute—a virtual eternity of cacophonous isolation in the site of his own double murder. The camera pans out of the cabin window to reveal that the cabin is inside a snow globe, and again to reveal the snow globe is inside the cabin, and so on recursively. SARTRE AND THE DIM VIEW OF THE OTHER As Matt notes at the beginning of White Christmas, “No one ends up here [in the isolated cabin] without things going to total shit for them back out there.” At first sight, White Christmas’s setting of the cabin—“behind closed doors”—in which the entrapped characters relive their shameful memories, might remind one of the setting of Jean-Paul Sartre’s 1944 play Huis clos (“behind closed doors”), commonly translated as No Exit (e.g., Livingstone 2018). However, Sartre’s central philosophical message in No Exit actually stands directly opposite to Brooker’s in White Christmas. Whereas No Exit is most known for the line “hell is other people,” as we discover in the ending of White Christmas, both Joe and Matt are sentenced to the ultimate punishment of isolation; hell is not “other people” but being isolated by oneself (Sarte 1989, 45). As Arthur Danto points out in his introduction to Sartre, in No Exit “each [character] is forced to see himself through the eyes of the others, and none can escape an identity imposed from without” (1975, 108). At the heart of No Exit is thus an account of being succumbed or “condemned” (to use one of Sartre’s trademark phrases) to the torturous or indeed “hellish” gaze of others by which one is objectified.2 This gaze reduces one to a mere object, or the ontological state which Sartre calls “being-for-others” (Danto 1975, 109; Mui 2020, 217–18)—a theme which appears across a number of

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Sartre’s different works, but is most thoroughly developed in Sartre’s 1943 masterwork Being and Nothingness.3 While Being and Nothingness is perhaps more known for its ontological rendition of “being-for-itself” and “being-in-itself”—which broadly parallels the conventional distinction between the conscious human subject (the “for-itself”) and perceived object (the “in-itself”)4—Sartre’s account of “being-for-others” and intersubjectivity in his magnum opus has also had a tremendous impact on subsequent accounts of “the Other” from Levinas’s to Derrida’s in the French philosophical tradition, as well as debates on the problem of “other minds” in contemporary philosophy of mind (see Westphal 2009; Zahavi 2015). But rather than focusing on Sartre’s contribution to these accounts of alterity or intersubjectivity, let us focus instead on Sartre’s analysis of the phenomenon of “being seen” in his account of “being-for-others” in the third part of Being and Nothingness. Sartre’s most well-known discussion of “being-for-others”—and indeed of “being seen”—is undoubtedly his anecdote of the keyhole-peeper in the section titled “the gaze” or “the look” (le regard) in Being and Nothingness (BN, 282–85/355–58/298–301).5 In this memorable and much-discussed anecdote, Sartre asks his reader to imagine what it’s like to be looking through a keyhole. In this act of spying or peeping through a keyhole, the entirety of my conscious attention is dedicated to observing what is occurring on the other side of the door. Through this attentive concentration, I become what Sartre calls “a pure consciousness of things.” The intentional aim—or indeed the entirety—of my consciousness is directed purely and completely at external things, at the things and phenomena behind the door through the focus of the keyhole: “This means that behind that door a spectacle is presented as ‘to be seen,’ a conversation as ‘to be heard.’” As “a pure consciousness of things,” I am in a state of “pure subjectivity”: I can see through the keyhole without being seen by the things and people behind the keyhole. I perceive through the keyhole as a subject without being seen or perceived as an object. Accordingly, Sartre describes this state of consciousness as “a pure mode of losing myself in the world,” as my attention and awareness is completely given to and absorbed by things in the external world. In other words, I forget who or what I am— literally forgetting myself—as my consciousness is completely absorbed by that which is beyond me; I am “a pure consciousness of things,” who is not reflectively conscious of myself: “there is no self to inhabit my consciousness” (all quotes in this paragraph are taken from BN, 283/355/298). However, one does not and cannot continue in this mode of “pure subjectivity” or “pure consciousness” forever. As Sartre continues his anecdote: But all of a sudden I hear footsteps in the hall. Someone is looking at me! What does this mean? It means I am suddenly affected in my being and that

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essential modifications appear in my structure—modification which I can apprehend and fix conceptually by means of the reflective cogito . . . I see myself because somebody sees me . . . all of a sudden I am conscious of myself. (BN, 284/356–57/299)

By realizing and becoming conscious of the fact that someone else—whom Sartre names “the Other”—is looking at me, my consciousness becomes a “reflective” one. I become conscious of who I am, reflectively conscious of myself, on the basis of how I see that the Other sees me. In other words, my “self” becomes the object of my consciousness.6 Sartre associates this conscious turn to my “self” as the object in my selfawareness as I encounter somebody else with the feeling of shame,7 which according to Sartre is “in its primary structure [always] shame before somebody [else]” (BN, 245/308/259, see also 299/376/315). “Shame,” as Sartre puts it, “is [always] shame of self; it is the recognition of the fact that I am indeed that object which the Other is looking at and judging” (BN, 285/358/300).8 Through this sense of shame as a recognition that one is seen and judged as an “object,” Sartre argues that in being seen and judged by the Other, one loses one’s sense of subjectivity and becomes, in turn, objectified: “If someone looks at me, I am conscious of being an object” (BN, 295/370/310). As such, Sartre argues that the encounter with “the look” of the Other brings about a reversal of the usual dynamics between the conscious human subject and perceived object: “The Other . . . is presented in a certain sense the negation of my experience, since he is the one for whom I am not subject but object” (BN, 252/316/267). I am no longer the pure perceiving subject that I was in my intentional experience of looking through the keyhole. With my realization and recognition that I am being watched by another person, or indeed by the Other, I become conscious of the perceiving subjectivity of the Other, and conversely become the object of the Other’s gaze: “It is in and through the revelation of my being-as-object for the Other that I must be able to apprehend the presence of his being-as-subject” (BN, 280/352/296). In this reversal of the subject-object relation where one is succumbed to the gaze or indeed the subjectivity of the Other, Sartre writes that “I am no longer master of the situation . . . being-seen constitutes me as a defenseless being . . . It is in this sense that we can consider ourselves as ‘slaves’ in so far as we appear to the Other” (BN, 289/363/304, 291/365/306–7). To this extent, Sartre, the renowned and avowed atheist, compares this enslavement to the Other to the religious belief in “the notion of God as the omnipresent, infinite subject for whom I exist,” arguing that the theological conception of “God” is nothing other than “the concept of the Other pushed to the limit” (BN, 305/382/321, 289/363/305). However, before further discussing the issue of God and the all-seeing gaze of God’s “omniscient” and “omnipresent”

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vision in the next section, it is worth briefly noting some similarities between Sartre’s keyhole anecdote in Being and Nothingness and the plot of White Christmas.9 Although White Christmas does not exactly have a scene that resembles Sartre’s keyhole illustration, there are some interesting parallels between Sartre’s anecdote and the early segment in White Christmas where Matt coaches his client Harry to pick up women at a Christmas party. Like the peeper into the keyhole in Being and Nothingness, Matt sees without being seen. As a seduction coach, he has a unilateral vision of his client Harry’s (Rasmus Hardiker) situation, literally overseeing Harry’s actions. Consequently, not unlike how the one under the observation and judgment of the Other is described by Sartre as a kind of “slave” who is objectified by the Other’s “look,” Harry’s actions and behaviors too are influenced by Matt’s objectifying and controlling gaze. And indeed, just as Harry felt a sense of shame (which, as Sartre says, is always structurally “shame of oneself before the Other”) under the judgmental gaze of Matt (BN, 245/309/260, see also 299/376/315), Matt himself also experiences shame when his wife Claire sees him as he tries to clear up after his seduction-coaching session which caused Harry’s death,10 shortly before Claire takes a “dim view” to block Matt from her sight.11 MARION AND THE GAZE OF CHRIST A persistent theme that emerges over the course of White Christmas, and that invited comparison with Sartre, is the episode’s persistent questioning of how one sees or fails to see the Other. This is subtly displayed in the types of gazes manifest in the narrative and the episode’s reflexive attention to its own status as television: being either a medium for seeing without being seen or a “black mirror” that simply reflects our own image.12 On the one hand, Matt bears an enslaving relation to the Cookies he trains and the voyeurism of his seduction-coaching manifests a unilateral and objectifying gaze toward the Other—his clients and the women his clients pursue.13 On the other hand, both Matt and his client Harry exemplify, at different points in the narrative, being under the objectifying gaze of the Other, that is, the condition of shame, as examined by Sartre. In both cases, it would seem that the episode is posing a critical relation to the subject of seeing and being seen by the Other, which is further compounded by the fact that both Matt and Joe are “blocked” from seeing their partners and their partner’s children after their respective partners take a “dim view” of them. Joe cannot even see photographs of Beth while she is alive as they are obscured by the block, and the photographs he can see of her later

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on (e.g., in the news report of her death or in the image affixed to his mirror) only betoken her death or absence rather than her presence. Indeed, Joe’s postmortem memories of Beth at the cabin are overexposed, glistening, and oneiric, suggesting an affinity between the failure of the photograph to manifest its object with the failure of Joe to manifest Beth, in memory (whether due to forgetfulness, suppression, or idealization). Such a despairing relation to the subject of seeing and being seen is, as it were, sealed by the horrific form of punishment delivered in the closing sequence of the episode. Matt is not able to see anyone or be seen by others, except under a spectral red form—echoing a crimson version of the mark of Cain, while Joe is condemned to eternal isolation—thus also not being able to see or to be seen by others. To interpret this closure in light of the ironic title of the episode, White Christmas, one cannot help but detect a kind of dark inversion—or indeed a (black) mirror image—of the original message and narrative of Christmas. To articulate the precise nature of the negation of the meaning of Christmas that the episode effects—the cancellation of the mystery of God with us—we will draw on the phenomenology of the contemporary French thinker Jean-Luc Marion, whose account of God’s revelation in Christ opens the possibility of seeing and being seen in an affirmative sense, without the forms of objectification that define the dark visions of Charlie Brooker (and Sartre). According to Marion, Sartre’s (and traditional philosophy’s) account of the distinction between the perceiving subject and the perceived object is mistakenly centered on the conscious human subjects who “constitute” or indeed “objectify” what they perceive. They do so by interpreting what they perceive on the basis of their own conceptual presuppositions and expectations.14 As opposed to this traditional outlook, Marion argues that phenomena should not be understood or interpreted according to any preestablished presuppositions and expectations. Instead, for Marion, phenomena ought to be defined by no other term than their “givenness” (Gegebenheit). Phenomena should be allowed to give themselves on their own terms. According to Marion, we often think about things in the world as particular objects, like the phone we hold in our hand or the laptop on our desk. We are the subjects who hold these items or devices, and we think we fully understand, control, and explain their function. We have “mastery” over them because they are merely tools in our hands. However, Marion identifies other kinds of phenomena that we encounter—phenomena that we are not in control over at all. For example, we may pick up the phone as an object, but the voice we hear over it—the voice of the Other—cannot be understood, controlled, or explained in the same way the hardware and software of the phone can be. Unlike devices, the living Other often surprises us and exceeds our expectations. The Other cannot be contained by our definitions, predictions,

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characterizations, or indeed any rigid conceptual presuppositions which Marion associates with subjective “constitution.” For Marion, these phenomena whose manifestation or “givenness” exceeds the expectations and conceptual presuppositions of a perceiving subject are what he calls “saturated phenomena,” which annul the constituting efforts of the subject (see BG, 211–21/280–309).15 Across a number of his works, Marion speaks of God’s revelation in Christ as the preeminent “saturated phenomenon” par excellence. This is the case not least because the incarnation of the infinite invisible God as a finite visible human creature is an unforeseen event which indeed exceeds the subjective expectations and logical presuppositions of all previous philosophical and religious outlooks.16 Indeed, Marion’s phenomenological interpretation of God’s self-revelation in Christ as “the image” or more literally “icon [eikōn] of the invisible God” (Col 1.15) provides us with a way to understand the problem of seeing and being seen by the Other evoked in White Christmas. In contrast to Sartre’s negative account of “being seen,” Marion believes, as a Christian, that God’s makingvisible of Godself in Christ as a visible image or icon is not something to be loathed or deplored. On the contrary, visibility—to be seen—is something to be affirmed and indeed celebrated as an expression of love and communion. In his early works, Marion draws a contrast between the icon and the idol, which he treats as two “ways of seeing.” According to Marion, the problem with the idol as a mode of seeing is that it freezes one’s gaze exclusively upon what is visible (i.e., what can be envisaged as an object or spectacle), thereby reducing things and events to their visible appearance. On the other hand, an alternative way of seeing is found in one’s encounter with the icon, which Marion argues directs one’s gaze through the visible to that which is invisible. Take, for instance, Sartre’s case of one’s encounter with the Other, where one recognizes the Other not as an object, but as an active perceiving subject, by experiencing the Other’s gaze upon oneself. In this scenario, while we see the face of the Other (as a perceived object), with and in our recognition of the Other as an active perceiving subject, we are also aware that the Other is not reducible to the visible face that we see. What we experience in this encounter with and recognition of the Other as a subject is what Marion terms “the counter-gaze of the Other” which is strictly invisible: all we see is the Other’s visible face but not their invisible (counter-)gaze (BG, 240/334). As Marion puts it, “this counter-gaze comes to meet me only while remaining invisible, at least as object or being—strictly speaking, there is nothing to see” (BG, 243/338). The Other’s invisible counter-gaze on us is not reducible to the visible face that we can gaze at.17 These ways of seeing that Marion associates with the icon and the idol are aptly captured by his metaphors of the mirror and the prism: the idol is a mirror that merely reflects the subject who attempts to constitute the Other

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as an object, whereas the icon has the character of a “prism” that presents the invisible (white light) by means of the visible (colors).18 The idolatrous subject who reduces all things to the visible is thus a “prisoner of his organization of the visible, which is not only finite, but above all closed” (Marion 2016b, 108). An emblem of such self-enclosure of the “idolatrous” way of seeing can be illustrated by the claustrophobic Greta segment, which portrays Greta as Matt’s self-absorbed client (seemingly without friends or family) and takes place entirely indoors, within a sterile clinic with minimalist interior. Indeed, the entire episode of White Christmas features numerous images of confinement in this vein (e.g., Greta’s egg, Matt’s prison cell, the snow-globe, and the cabin). In contrast to the idolatrous way of seeing, the iconic way of seeing preserves a “distance” between the visible and the invisible “elsewhere,” and between the one that gazes and the Other. For Marion, it is precisely this preserved “distance” which allows the “crossing” of gazes, which he understands as the basis for “communion” or “love.” According to Marion, what happens in the “crossing” or exchanges of gazes is not a conflict between two subjects who seek to objectify each other (à la Sartre).19 As noted above, for Marion, not all modes of perception (including gazes) are necessarily modes of objectification or imposing “mastery” over things we perceive. Accordingly, one does not necessarily become objectified by the gaze of the Other. To the contrary, Marion argues that we in fact only come to truly realize who we are when we receive the counter-gaze of the icon that Marion identifies as Christ, “the icon of the invisible God.” For according to Marion: [T]he icon has a theological status, the reference of the visible face to the intention that envisages, culminating in the reference of the Christ to the Father: for the formula eikōn tou theou tou aoratou [icon/image of the invisible God] concerns first the Christ. (1991, 23)

It is by encountering the phenomenon of Christ—and receiving the (antecedent) counter-gaze of God—that one’s self-realization is brought to fullness: The perceiving subject fully “becom[es] himself because he sees himself seen as the only son in the Son . . . under the icon’s gaze, I finally enjoy myself because for the first time I become who I am” (Marion 2016a, 328). As such, not only is God’s making-visible of Godself in Christ a gift which allows us to see God, moreover, the fact that God sees us in the counter-gaze, which we experience in our encounter with the icon, is also an expression of God’s love for us. For Marion, God’s seeing us is his loving us, his seeing us is his creating us, and his seeing us is his redeeming us “as the only son in the Son.” Unlike human seeing, which selects whom to love, or strictly sees one person face to face, or a finite number of others as a distant spectator, God’s

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all-seeing gaze is “present to all and to each” in a way that draws together “the globality of apprehension and the focalization of attention, universal love and particular love” (2016a, 327). But to find oneself a beloved son is precisely not attainable from the perspective of a subject who still retains his or her sovereign position at the center—as we find in the subject/object dichotomy in traditional philosophy. Rather, the revelation of Christ as the icon of the invisible God is for Marion a phenomenon that gives itself on its own terms and must be viewed from a certain angle if it is to be seen without distortion. Without the guidance of the Holy Spirit to grant this perspective, the subject is “condemn[ed] to remain at the center of a spectacle that consequently brings . . . only objects [and] invisible mirrors of [his or her] own solitary gaze” (2016b, 108). Rather, “the Spirit positions the human gaze at the exact place and point of view where the visible face of Christ (Jesus as Son) can at once, with a sudden and perfect precision, be uncovered as the very axis where the gaze of the Father on the Son and that of the Son at the Father pass” (2016b, 108). Thus, the Father gives the Son and the Son shows himself as given by the Father (Jn 3.16), and we see the Son, and ourselves in the Son because—and only because—of the place that the Holy Spirit positions us, within the “crossing” of these gazes (2016b, 86). In this dynamic vision of communion, we discover the ultimate difference that the coming of Christ makes to seeing and to being seen: “Beloved, we are God’s children now; what we will be has not yet been revealed. What we do know is this: when he is revealed, we will be like him, for we will see him as he is” (1 Jn 3.2).20 For Marion, our contemporary situation is marked by a kind of “disaster of the image,” in which the idol or spectacle has come to define our ordinary ways of seeing (2004, 87). We tend to see the Other in terms of a unilateral and objectifying gaze—as suggested in White Christmas—rather than meeting and bearing the invisible gaze of the Other and opening ourselves up to what is beyond the horizon of the object. Matt’s “dim-view” of others cloaked by veils of pixels, far from being a remote nightmare, is perhaps a “black mirror” on our own quite routine ways of looking at without seeing others. Indeed, the televisual medium of the Black Mirror series itself typifies this drift—being an instrument for seeing without being seen, a spectacle that freezes the gaze without opening out beyond itself. As Marion discerns: “the [television] screen, this antiworld in the world, produces images without ever referring them to some original: form without matter, the image maintains only a ghostly reality, completely spiritualized” (2004, 50). A haunting figure of this “antiworld in the world” is observable in the opening and closing sequences of White Christmas. When the Cookie version of Joe looks at his own reflection in the mirror in the opening sequence of the episode, he does not see the original Joe, but a “copy” of the Cookie copy of the original Joe.

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Likewise, when the camera pans out of the cabin at the end of the episode to reveal it is in a snow globe, and again to reveal it is in a cabin, we see a recursive loop in a virtual reality with no exit beyond itself. In contrast to the episode’s anti-Christmas of isolation and failed vision, those who trust the mystery of Christ’s coming await to see Him “face to face” (1 Cor 13.12). CONCLUSION With its dark ending of both Matt and Joe respectively trapped in states of not being able to see or be seen by others, the story of White Christmas is one marked by lack of vision and communion. Indeed, as opposed to the festive celebrations of Christmas, with Joe abandoned in virtual isolation in a tomblike, dark grey Cookie, and Matt sentenced to a lifelong “dim view,” in which he could only see others as veiled figures and conversely be seen as a veiled figure, perhaps White Christmas more closely resembles the observance of Holy Saturday in the Christian tradition, the day when Christ “rested” physically in a tomb. It is a day when icons and statues are traditionally veiled in church as congregants await the arrival of Easter where Christ reveals himself to be alive—and to be seen—once again. As such, it serves as a “black mirror” which dimly, if perversely, reflects the traditional Christmas message of God allowing Godself to be seen by us; “the Word became flesh and lived among us, and we have seen his glory, the glory as of a father’s only son, full of grace and truth. . . . No one has ever seen God. It is God the only Son, who is close to the Father’s heart, who has made him known” (Jn 1.14, 18).21

NOTES 1. For a further and more technical discussion of the similarities and differences between Sartre’s and Marion’s phenomenology, see Leung (2022). 2. It is worth noting that the famous line “hell is other people” in No Exit, uttered by the character Garcin, appears immediately after Garcin’s realization that he is forever condemned to the gaze of the other inhabitants in hell. See Sartre (1989, 45): Garcin: You will always see me? Inez: Always. Garcin: This bronze. Yes, now’s the moment; I’m looking at this thing on the mantelpiece, and I understand that I’m in hell. I tell you, everything’s been thought-out beforehand. They knew I’d stand at the fireplace stroking this thing of bronze, with all those eyes intent on me. Devouring me. So this is hell. I’d never have believed it. You remember all we were told about the torture-chambers, the fire and brimstone, the “burning marl.” Old wives’ tales! There’s no need for red-hot pokers. Hell is—other people!

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3. In addition to plays like No Exit and philosophical tomes like Being and Nothingness, this theme of the Other’s gaze is also a central theme in Sartre’s 1963 autobiography, translated in 1964, The Words (Les Mots): “My truth, my character, and my name were in the hands of adults. I had learned to see myself through their eyes. I was a child, that monster which they fabricated with their regrets. When they were not present, they left their gaze behind, and it mingled with the light . . . My grandfather disgusted me with it forever. I saw it through his eyes” (83, 100). 4. This is obviously a crude simplification of Sartre’s ontological schema. For a further discussion and explication of Sartre’s account of the ontological relation between being in-itself and consciousness for-itself, see Leung (2020). 5. Quotations from Being and Nothingness are taken from the widely available Routledge classics edition: Sartre (2003). References given below in the form, e.g., “BN, 239/301/253,” are first to Barnes’s (2003) translation, second to Sarah Richmond’s excellent 2020 translation, and third to the original 1943 French edition. 6. As such, in this self-reflective “objectification,” my state of consciousness is no longer purely subjective or “a pure consciousness of things” (and not of the self), but rather an “impure” reflective self-consciousness. In Sartrean terminology, my consciousness here is no longer “being-for-itself,” but “being-for-others.” See Williford (2020), especially 94. 7. Or, occasionally, pride. BN, 284–85/357–58/300. 8. See also BN, 246/309/260: “Shame is by nature recognition. I recognize that I am as the Other sees me.” 9. See also Sartre’s critical remarks on the belief in the existence of God in BN, 313–14/393–94/329: “The positing of God is accompanied by a reification of my object-ness. Or better yet, I posit my being-an-object-for-God as more real than my For-itself [i.e. my conscious subjectivity] . . . These attempts, which imply the absolute recognition of God as a subject who can not be an object, carry their own contradiction within them and are always failures.” 10. On the theological connotations of Sartre’s account of “shame,” see Kirkpatrick (2017, 137–60). 11. For Sartre, it is through “the look” of the Other that I arrive at an “objective” understanding of my body as an object—as opposed to a “subjective” awareness of my body as “a conscious structure of my consciousness” (BN, 353/441–42/369). Sartre’s account of embodiment presents another interesting contrast with White Christmas: Whereas Joe and Matt exist as uploaded and indeed disembodied consciousnesses in a virtual cabin in White Christmas, Sartre insists that “the body is a necessary characteristic of the for-itself [i.e. consciousness]” (BN, 333/417/349). See also, Kirkpatrick (2017, 157): “In No Exit, [the character] Estelle is entirely dependent on her body in order to feel she exists; she must be physically desired to have worth. Estelle personifies both the body- and being-for-others.” 12. See Brooker (2011): “The ‘black mirror’ of the title is the one you’ll find on every wall, on every desk, in the palm of every hand: the cold, shiny screen of a TV, a monitor, a smartphone.” 13. Matt does not so much “enslave” Joe’s Cookie as trick him into a legal confession, but this, too, manifests an objectifying relationship.

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14. See the critical remarks on Sartre in Marion (2016a, 322–23). 15. See Marion (1997, 2002). Cited as BG, with page references first to Jeffrey L. Kosky’s translation and second to the original French edition. 16. See BG, 234–41/325–35, especially, 236/329: “the phenomenon of Christ gives itself intuitively as an event that is perfectly unforeseeable because radically heterogeneous to what it nevertheless completes (the prophecies).” 17. See BG, 232/323–24: “The gaze that comes upon me (lands unpredictably, event) provides no spectacle, therefore no immediately visible or assignable intuition; it resides precisely in the black holes of the two pupils, in the sole and minuscule space where, on the surface of the body of the Other, there is nothing to see (not even the color of the iris that surrounds them) in the gaze facing me.” 18. For a comparison between the figures of the prism and the mirror in Marion’s work, see, Mackinlay (2010, 167). 19. See Marion (2007, §§20–24). See also Sartre’s account of love as “a conflict” and the phenomenon of being loved as a mode of being objectified by the Other’s look/gaze in BN, 393/492/411, 391/489–90/409, 388/485/406: “The beloved in fact apprehends the lover as one Other-as-object among others; that is, he perceives the lover on the ground of the world, transcends him, and utilizes him. The beloved is a look . . . In one sense if I am to be loved, I am the object through whose procuration the world will exist for the Other . . . precisely because I exist by means of the Other’s freedom, I have no security; I am in danger in this freedom. It molds my being and makes me be, it confers values upon me and removes them from me . . . It is in this sense that love is a conflict.” 20. The translated verses of the Bible in this chapter are taken from the New Revised Standard Version. 21. We are grateful for conversations with Amber Bowen, Joy Clarkson, John Anthony Dunne, Rebekah Lamb, and Emily Lehman during the writing of this chapter.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Brooker, Charlie. “The Dark Side of Our Gadget Addiction.” The Guardian, December 1, 2011. Accessed January 13, 2021. https://www​.theguardian​.com​/ technology​/2011​/dec​/01​/charlie​-brooker​-dark​-side​-gadget​-addiction​-black​-mirror. Danto, Arthur. Jean-Paul Sartre. New York: Viking Press, 1975. Kirkpatrick, Kate. Sartre on Sin: Between Being and Nothingness. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. Leung, King-Ho. “Transcendentality and Nothingness in Sartre’s Atheistic Ontology.” Philosophy 95, no. 4 (2020): 471–95. ———. “Sartre and Marion on the Intentionality and Phenomenality.” Theory, Culture & Society 39, no. 1 (2022): 41–60. Livingstone, Josephine. “Welcome to Hell: Season Four of ‘Black Mirror.’” The New Republic, January 12, 2018. Accessed January 31, 2021. https://newrepublic​.com​/ article​/146595​/black​-mirror​-private​-prisons.

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Mackinlay, Shane. Interpreting Excess: Jean-Luc Marion, Saturated Phenomena, and Hermeneutics. New York: Fordham University Press, 2010. Marion, Jean-Luc. God Without Being: Hors-Texte. Translated by Thomas A. Carlson. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991. ———. Étant donné: Essai d’une phénoménologie de la donation. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1997. ———. The Crossing of the Visible. Translated by James K. A. Smith. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004. ———. The Erotic Phenomenon. Translated by Stephen E. Lewis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2007. ———. “Seeing, or Seeing Oneself Seen: Nicholas of Cusa’s Contribution in De visione Dei.” Translated by Stephen E. Lewis. The Journal of Religion 96, no. 3 (2016a): 305–31. ———. Givenness and Revelation. Translated by Stephen E. Lewis. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016b. Mui, Constance L. “Intersubjectivity and ‘the Look.’” In The Sartrean Mind, edited by Matthew C. Eshleman and Constance L. Mui, 212–24. London: Routledge, 2020. Sartre, Jean-Paul. L’Etre et le neant: Essai d’ontologie phénoménologique. Paris: Gallimard, 1943. ———. The Words. Translated by Bernard Frechtman. New York: George Braziller, 1964. ———. No Exit. Translated by Stuart Gilbert. New York: Vintage, 1989. ———. Being and Nothingness: An Essay on Phenomenological Ontology. Translated by Hazel Barnes. London: Routledge, 2003. ———. Being and Nothingness: An Essay in Phenomenological Ontology. Translated by Sarah Richmond. London: Routledge, 2020. Westphal, Merold. “Inverted Intentionality: On Being Seen and Being Addressed,” Faith and Philosophy 26, no. 3 (2009): 233–52. Williford, Kenneth. “Sartrean Reflection: Pure and Impure.” In The Sartrean Mind, edited by Matthew C. Eshleman and Constance L. Mui, 89–103. London: Routledge, 2020. Zahavi, Dan. Self and Other: Exploring Subjectivity, Empathy, and Shame. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2015.

Chapter 8

Evil Gods and the USS Callister Celina Durgin and Dru Johnson

In the beginning, Captain Robert Daly created outer space, planets, and people. Male and female, he created them—but without any sex organs. And he said, “Let all of you live according to my whims.” And he saw that it was completely under his control. This, he thought, was very good. Redolent of Star Trek, USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1) cold opens with a retro-feel sequence on the eponymous starship, complete with stiff jeweltoned uniforms, 1960s-era hairstyles, and a unified team of space explorers led by a plucky captain. But since this is a Black Mirror episode, we know things aren’t as they seem. Soon, the episode cuts to a crowded elevator, where the man who appeared as the captain in the opening scene now appears as a drably attired chief technical officer of a sleek tech company that is set, as is typical for the show, sometime in the not-so-distant future. The company is Callister Inc., and the man is Robert Daly (Jesse Plemons), a brilliant programmer and the company’s cofounder. In the privacy of his office, Robert logs on to Infinity, the hyperrealistic virtual reality world the company is preparing to launch. We soon realize that the USS Callister is Robert’s virtual starship, and that in the opening scene, Robert was roleplaying the starship captain on an in-game mission. Within the simulation, his abilities as a designer allow him to exercise godlike power. Predictably for Black Mirror, the episode investigates how the power of technology interacts with flawed humanity, and the greater evil that humans can perpetrate as a result. In this case, technology allows Robert Daly to be like God. For our purposes, Captain Robert Daly’s behavior resembles many people’s understanding of how God behaves, especially in the Hebrew Bible (AKA the Old Testament).1 Robert causes unjust suffering, demands mindless obedience, and delights in punishing the wayward. People may have derived this wholly negative concept of God from voices in culture, from 131

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their experience of evil in the world—or from their interpretation of the Bible. Indeed, shocking passages in scripture drive us to take this interpretation seriously. These passages invite us to evaluate the character of yhwh, and later, of Jesus, and to evaluate our own notions of good and evil along the way. IS THE BIBLICAL GOD A MORAL MONSTER? We cannot obscure what is obvious to scholars of the Hebrew Bible: God behaves in unsavory ways when we stack up the evidence. Some of God’s behavior is even categorized as “evil” by the biblical authors. We must confront the question: is God nothing more than a Robert Daly writ large? Let’s review the evidence. God orchestrated watery destruction against the earth’s flora and fauna in Noah’s day (Gen 6–9). God later slammed down fiery doom on the men, women, and children of Sodom in Abraham’s day (Gen 19). Centuries later, God’s death-angel “passed over” the blood-stained doorways of those who heeded Moses but killed the firstborn in Egypt’s unstained doorways (Exod 14). Leading his people into the land of Canaan, the buzz of God’s promised “hornets” razed the men, women, children, and livestock of Jericho, among other cities (cf. Exod 23.28; Josh 24.12). Besides these events, the biblical authors directly describe God as planning, committing, and sometimes relenting from “evil” (Hebrew: ra’ah). They describe God’s “evil” acts several times and without any commentary on what that means. Many modern readers of scripture glide past these biblical claims unaware. For instance, when God does “evil” (ra’ah) it is typically translated as “visiting calamity” or “disaster.” When humans do “evil” (ra’ah) the same translations render it as “evil,” or “harm” in some cases (e.g., Exod 32.12, 14; 1 Kgs 9.9; 21.21; 22.23; Neh 13.18).2 Just knowing this fact about the biblical use of “evil” seems to force the question: is God evil? It’s true that the biblical authors had no problem describing some of God’s actions as “evil,” but these same authors remind us more regularly that God exhibits patience, graciousness, loving-kindness, and mercy toward his creation, even toward the Israelites at their most disobedient. The typical and lazy route out of this conundrum is a form of softMarcionism. We catch ourselves thinking things such as: maybe the Old Testament God does evil, but not Jesus! “For God so loved the world that He sent His only and unique Son” and all that jazz. The ironic failure to contextualize these words with the next few verses (Jn 3.18–20) is not lost on New Testament scholars.

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Indeed, the most violent act described in Christian scripture, Old and New, has yet to happen. Moreover, the fact that Jesus portrays himself at the wheel of that violence should not be lost on us. Jesus talked about this violence often and at length in the Gospels. In the same Gospel where we find “God so loved the world,” we also discover that Jesus promises a future resurrection of the dead, in which there is also a slaughter of some humans in that age of resurrection (Jn 5.27–29). Not even the dead will escape this judgment, an event Jesus ubiquitously portrays in shades of horror. We have not even reached what some might call “the petty stuff,” when God appeared easily angered and killed people on the spot. Readers often wonder what possible motivation God had for killing these “innocent” people in the first place. We could mention here God’s attempted murder of Moses (Exod 4.24–5), God’s successful murder of Aaron’s sons Nadab and Abihu (Lev 10.1–2), or God’s striking down of Uzzah because he grabbed the ark of the covenant (2 Sam 6.5–7). And lest we mistake the pattern as an artifact of the Hebrew Bible, in the New Testament, we discover the Spirit of the Lord slaying Ananias and Sapphira for what many might regard as a minor untruth (Acts 5.1–11). How is God not merely a cosmic version of Captain Robert Daly and the earth his USS Callister? We will tackle this question in two phases, beginning with a firm grasp of the descent of humanity in Charlie Brooker’s and William Bridges’s USS Callister episode of Black Mirror. Next, we delve into a few deadly episodes from Exodus to find two different gods trying to kill Moses: Pharaoh and yhwh.3 This requires us to scan the laws of Exodus and Abraham’s mandate to make sense of these attempted and actualized murders after Israel’s orgy to the golden calf (Exod 32). Finally, we pick up the rhetoric of Jesus about the coming Day of Judgment and the execution of Ananias and Sapphira, examining how the rhetoric of evil and judgment fits in a holistic picture of God’s seemingly rash actions. Though other episodes from scripture could be brought into this discussion, Exodus’ episodes give us a unique insight within one story as to why divine wrath is not so petty. This, then, allows us to see the divine wrath of the New Testament on equal footing. In the end, we compare the radically different views of the gods portrayed in these two worlds: Scripture and Black Mirror. The biblical text creates an arc in which divine “evil” can reasonably operate, whether or not readers are prepared to take the biblical leap into a wider view of evil. For us to appreciate how the biblical authors understand evil, whether done by man or God, we must be willing to understand evil as something more than merely the privation or opposite of good and instead as something calamitous, cancerous, and unraveling. This Black Mirror episode narrates the foibles of a fragile and fractured man-become-god.

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WHAT KIND OF GOD IS CAPTAIN ROBERT DALY? At the beginning of the episode, Robert Daly is awkward, timid, and misunderstood. From the receptionist to the CEO, the Callister Inc. employees don’t respect Robert, even though he is the company’s CTO and a prodigious programmer. The one exception is a new programmer named Nanette Cole (Cristin Milioti), who gushes to Robert about his code for Infinity. He clearly appreciates her admiration. However, after her colleague Shania Lowry (Michaela Coel) warns her that “he gets a bit starey,” Nanette becomes aloof around Robert. He overhears Shania’s warning and notices Nanette’s subsequent change of behavior. As Robert meekly endures mistreatment, we might pity him at first. Even so, early on in the episode, he seems off—sort of creepy. He soon proves this impression correct, when he sneaks a DNA sample from Nanette’s coffee cup and creates a conscious digital clone of her within his Infinity development build, which he has modeled after his favorite television show, Space Fleet (an open riff on Star Trek). Nanette’s clone wakes up on Robert’s simulated spaceship, the USS Callister, surrounded by digital clones of some of her Callister Inc. colleagues, including Shania and the CEO, James Walton (Jimmi Simpson). These other clones have been trapped in Robert’s simulation for an indefinite period, and now seem grimly resigned to their bleak fate. Aboard the Callister, Robert as a digital clone is no longer timid. Captain Robert Daly is petty, controlling, tyrannical, and capricious. In his simulation, Robert can orchestrate a world in which his real-life insecurities can become his strengths, he can get revenge on the colleagues who have disrespected him, and he can satisfy his unmet desires. He forces his captives to perform their roles submissively in the Space Fleet simulation. They must praise him obsequiously, follow his orders on space missions, and, in the case of the female captives, celebrate victories by kissing him. He punishes disobedience and disrespect by using his power as a designer, among other things, to transmogrify clones into monsters or to remove their facial features. Several characteristics of his godlike rule are noteworthy. First, the actions he demands are neither intrinsically meaningful nor meaningfully efficacious. Performing them neither requires nor develops relevant knowledge. For example, when the crew is about to embark on a mission, Robert asks Nanette to “triangulate the signal” from an enemy hideout. Bewildered, Nanette stares at the profusion of glowing buttons on the ship’s control panel. Shania assures her that she can play along by pressing any button because “they’re all the same.” Robert apparently doesn’t care about the relation among his captives, their actions, and the results of those actions. He simply demands nominal compliance, under whatever threat he deems necessary. This characteristic

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is also evident when the crew confronts an enemy named Valdack (Billy Magnussen), who is actually another cloned employee of Callister Inc. Valdack plays the part of a villain over and over again within the game, but he doesn’t pose any real menace, and Robert always defeats him. Like the others, he was cloned to fulfill Robert’s fantasy of power, control, and self-confidence. Second, both Robert’s commands and his punishments appear capricious and unreflective. When Nanette rebuffs Robert’s kiss, he raises his hand to punish her, but seconds later, he lowers his hand and says, “Today I will show you mercy,” but tomorrow, “I may not be feeling so benevolent.” When he intercepts Nanette’s S.O.S. message to the real world, he again comes close to punishing her, but Shania begs Robert for mercy—and he punishes Shania instead. His punishment is purely punitive, vindictive, and meant to subdue, showing no concern for justice or the moral improvement of his captives. Indeed, he seems happy to see them suffer and treats them like objects, even using James Walton—his real-life business partner—as a footstool. Finally, perhaps because he treats them like objects, Robert is neither open to persuasion nor interested in genuinely persuading his captives. He can’t bear to have his demands questioned. Rather than listening to Shania’s reasons that he should show Nanette mercy—“She’s new. She’ll behave.”—he punishes Shania. And this tendency of his emerges early on, in the real world. He enjoys Nanette’s initial attention arising from her respect for his coding prowess, but after Shania accuses him of leering, he does not try to regain Nanette’s respect. Instead, he steals her DNA and takes her clone captive, forcing her into a charade of obeisance along with the others. At one point, he begins to explain the purpose of Space Fleet: “It is a belief system, founded on the very best of human nature. It is a goal for us to strive towards, for the betterment of the universe, for the betterment of life itself.” Nevertheless, none of his actions or requirements ever support the truth of this assertion. Rather than substantiating his claim, he just yells at the crew for undermining this goal through their disobedience and incompetence. By the end of the episode, we see Robert Daly as controlling, senselessly cruel, and self-absorbed. He makes little attempt to meaningfully relate to his colleagues either in real life or in his simulation. He lacks a rationale for his system of commands and punishments, and even his stated goal for Space Fleet is disconnected from the clones and the actions he compels them to perform. They gain nothing from their roles in Robert’s simulation, and they fear not only punishment but also its arbitrary administration. Robert is an insecure, alienated man who uses what power he has to exact mindless submission for the sake of his fragile ego.

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HUMAN AND DIVINE MURDERS IN EXODUS AND BEYOND It will not be superficially obvious how the God of Israel differs from Robert Daly until we consider the thick literary and conceptual links between Genesis and Exodus. The book of Exodus opens with strong literary connections to the creation event and the Abrahamic covenant, but these may not be obvious at first. Israel’s children, now in Egypt, are described in terms recalling God’s first words to humanity: be fruitful, multiply, fill the land (Gen 1.28). So too, Exodus parrots, “The Israelites were fruitful and prolific; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them” (Exod 1.7).4 The story of the exodus, like that of Eden, also features someone who didn’t know something: “Now a new king arose over Egypt, who did not know Joseph” (Exod 1.8). This ignorance extended to the next pharaoh. Responding to Moses’s “let my people go,” the second pharaoh of Exodus rehearses the prior king’s ignorance: “Who is yhwh that I should listen to his voice and let Israel go? I do not know yhwh” (Exod 5.2). This phrase in the pharaoh’s mouth, “listen to the voice,” infamously hails from Eden as well. We find it in yhwh’s divine indictment of the man because he “listened to the voice” of his wife who was listening to the voice of the wise serpent while the man stood silent. At the opening of Exodus, the linguistic and conceptual connections to the garden story of Genesis, along with the introduction to Abraham’s grandchildren in the opening sentences, unmistakably focus the reader on continuity. The Abrahamic backdrop in Genesis—“all the families of the earth”—has crossed into the literary imagination of Exodus. The hues and brushstrokes of Genesis appear on this canvas too, which will help to make sense of its oddities. While movies and entire theologies have centered on the supposed liberation of Israel from Egypt, the narratorial vantage of Exodus equally focuses on knowledge, which often goes unnoticed. No doubt, we might miss this knowledge plot because of our modern obsession with seeing the exodus as liberation from slavery outright. The outcry against Pharaoh’s cruelty is key for getting God involved in their transfer to His own empire (Exod 2.23–25)—outcries later mirrored in God’s responsive interventions against Israel on behalf of the foreigner, widow, and orphan (Exod 22.21–24).5 Rather, the storyline of Exodus features Israel’s rescue from Egypt’s oppressive enslavement (Exod 1.12–13) in order to become yhwh’s slaves (“slave” will often be translated as “servant” in modern English Bibles). This “slaves to yhwh” metaphor endures into the New Testament even if tilt-shifted a bit: “slave to God” (Tit 1.1; Jam 1.1), “slave to Christ” (Rom 1.1), “slave to all” (Mk 10.22), “slaves to righteousness” (Rom 6.18). But alongside that

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transfer from oppressive slavery to liberating slavery in Exodus, we must consider an equally powerful throughline: knowing that which they need to know (Johnson 2015, 34–45). The text introduces two pharaohs who “do not know” something, and then unfurls cycles of plagues tied up with epistemological language: “that you shall know.” Consider the repetition of this language in the plague sequence: Water to Blood: “By this you [Pharaoh] shall know that I am yhwh . . . the Nile, and it shall turn into blood” (Exod 7.17). Frogs: “Moses said, ‘. . . so that you [Pharaoh] may know that there is no one like yhwh our God’” (Exod 8.10). Flies: “That you [Pharaoh] may know that I am yhwh in the midst of the earth” (Exod 8.22). Hail: “So that you [Pharaoh] may know that there is none like me [yhwh] in all the earth” (Exod 9.14). “There will be no more hail, so that you [Pharaoh] may know that the earth is yhwh’s” (Exod 9.29). Death of the First Born: “That you [Pharaoh] may know that yhwh makes a distinction between Egypt and Israel” (Exod 11.7).

It doesn’t end there. Pharaoh’s multiple vows to release the Israelites and subsequent changes of heart, sometimes due to yhwh and sometimes depicted as the pharaoh’s own hardening of his heart, end at the Red Sea. This final divine act also aims at knowledge. yhwh warns Moses that the Egyptians are coming and that He (yhwh) will “get glory over Pharaoh and his army,” “and the Egyptians shall know that I am yhwh” (Exod 14.4). As Pharaoh’s army approaches and the Hebrews fret, yhwh again tells them to go forward, for yhwh will fight for them. yhwh reiterates, “I will get glory over Pharaoh . . . and the Egyptians shall know that I am yhwh when I have gotten glory over Pharaoh” (Exod 14.18). And it’s not just Egypt that needs to know. The text also targets Israel with its “you shall know” statements (Exod 6.3, 7; 10.2; 16.6, 12). Confronted by the explicit and repetitive presence of this “yhwh does X so that Y will know,” it should now be clear that Exodus highlights knowing as directly relevant to the main narrative arc, for both Egypt and Israel. What was Israel supposed to know? Most simply: yhwh’s power, His reach, and His plan for them to spread His justice into the world. Why did they need to know this? yhwh seemed to want buy-in from Israel in order to carry out this cosmic mission that began east of Eden: “In you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen 12.3). In short, Israel must become the justice that would spread from Canaan into the entirety of the Promised Land (AKA the Fertile Crescent), and superficial forms of justice would not be an option.

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yhwh also welcomes pushback from Moses where His anger with Israel appears justified but out of sorts with the Abrahamic backdrop (Exod 32.11– 4). Moses implores yhwh, “Turn from your burning anger and relent from this evil against your people” (Exod 32.13). yhwh does in fact relent from His planned evil against Israel, though this same anger will burn again to kill basically ten out of the twelve tribes of Israel because of their oppression of the weak, murderousness, and general lechery and treachery now endemic in Hebrew cult and culture (see Judges–2 Kings). But in this instantiating moment at Sinai, yhwh is, unlike Captain Robert Daly, entirely open to persuasion and interested in genuinely persuading his people into a society with justice for all. From the opening words about each pharaoh to the plagues and later tests in the wilderness, yhwh is reasoning with Egypt and Israel about what they need to understand. The need to properly know yhwh and His Abrahamic plans for the earth, and to be ready to enact them as a nation, fuels the narrative’s plot in Exodus and beyond. This simple yet obvious concept appears key to discerning whether yhwh is violently petty or profoundly just. Now on to the more problematic matter of God’s apparent pettiness. In the first five chapters of Exodus, both Pharaoh and yhwh attempt to kill Moses. One attempt is motivated by a petty power grab seeking to cement the status quo of the pharaonic powers across Egypt—the other is because Moses’s son still had extra skin on his penis. Let’s take each in turn. By the time Moses rashly murders an Egyptian (Exod 2.11–12), we have already seen him escape death by the infanticidal hand of the first pharaoh and find a royal harbor within the fraught waters of the Nile. How did Pharaoh’s daughter know that she was rescuing a Hebrew? Moses’s circumcision would have signaled as loudly as his genetic differences. Moses’s multiple salvations were due to the civil disobedience of the midwives, Moses’s mother, and Pharaoh’s daughter. So when Moses figures out that his killing of the Egyptian has become known to that same pharaoh, he flees, and for good reason. As the narrator tells it, “When Pharaoh heard [of the murder], he sought to kill Moses” (Exod 2.15). Exodus portrays the first pharaoh to us as someone who singularly employs murder to solve every problem. Juxtapose this to what the narrator states as the initial conflict of Exodus: this king did not know Joseph (Exod 1.8). Presumably, “Joseph” is a synecdoche of the Hebrews’ history with Egypt: how they saved Egypt in their time of famine and how they were settled into the land by a prior pharaoh. His ignorance of “Joseph” presumably fuels his misinterpretation of Hebrew fruitfulness as a problem solved by infanticide rather than as a resource to be nurtured. This pharaoh is thus a murderous dolt, a flat character in a sophisticated storyline.

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Thus, it’s shocking to find yhwh described in identical language to this pharaoh that sought to kill Moses. When Moses was on his way to carry out his wilderness calling in Egypt, “yhwh met him and sought to put him to death” (Exod 4.24). His wife, a non-Hebrew woman, somehow figures out what is going on and intercedes on behalf of Moses. Two questions among a thousand swirl to the top: Why does yhwh seek to kill Moses? And how does Zipporah figure that out? To the second question, the text doesn’t say, and all we can do is gesture at the list of non-Hebrew women throughout the Hebrew Bible and New Testament that seem to understand God’s plan better than the men around them (e.g., Rahab, Jael the Kennite, the “wise woman of Tekoa,” the “wise woman of Abel,” the Shunammite widow, Syrophoenician woman of the Gospels, etc.).6 That is to say, it fits a larger pattern. But we can piece together an idea about why yhwh wanted to kill Moses by considering what resolved the conflict: circumcision. The plan was to expand His justice for the weak and strong, those experiencing wealth and poverty, the foreigner and native Hebrew alike, the widow and orphan, equitably to the boundaries of the known world: the Promised Land. If the goal is for God to bless all the families of the earth through Abraham’s children, and that goal requires Israel to become a society inflamed with justice for the sake of others, and Israel must demonstrate that she has skin in the game through one singular generational covenant marker, then we can begin to see why Gershom’s uncircumcision was a direct affront to yhwh’s cosmic plan. Even Gershom’s name—foreigner there [in Egypt]—implies the kind of radical program of justice that God envisions through His people. As Joseph saved Egypt and others from famine and breathed life into a famine-stricken Egypt by yhwh’s guidance, so too was Israel to be Joseph to the world—to expand into it and bring God’s benefaction to the land through His people. Circumcision is not merely the removal of the flesh by human hands, as Paul will later instruct the Colossians (2.8–15). Circumcision marks Israel as ready to carry out the Abrahamic plan for the sake of humanity, freed from Egypt to slave to yhwh in service to all the families of the earth. In contrast to Robert Daly, yhwh’s commands and his punishments reflect a consistent character of promise fulfillment and faithfulness that extends beyond Israel herself. And because the justice-bearing society that yhwh demands is intrinsically meaningful to those beyond Israel, it must be meaningfully efficacious within Israel. If Moses had not circumcised his own son on his way to lead Israel into yhwh’s service, he was effectively a dead man walking, useless to the call that took yhwh so much time to convince Moses of in the first place. Zipporah figured this out and acted on behalf of God’s planned blessing to the families of the earth.

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Now we can survey other deaths using this lens. In Exodus 32, of all the folks who witnessed yhwh’s plagues and sundering of the Red Sea, a few thousand decided in a panic to construct a golden god and have an orgiastic party in honor of its saving acts: “These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt” (Exod 32.4).7 Those who rejected yhwh’s explicit and repeated attempts to help them to know Him and His plan for the nations could not be trusted to be the initial seed of that nation expanding justice into the land. This was eventually true of all of that generation that yhwh sentences to death with Moses in the wilderness. Why does God force the exodus generation to die out in the wilderness? It’s not until Joshua that we learn that none of their children were circumcised along the way in the wilderness (Josh 5.2–7). We find hope in Joshua’s generation when we see them stop and circumcise themselves in front of their enemies at Jericho before carrying out any further plans. Those who will refuse to spread God’s equitable justice into the land are dead folks walking. They will not go forward in the inertia of yhwh’s program and are sometimes excised immediately from the pack. Moses was one too, saved by Zipporah to join the enterprise, board the ship, and steer it wisely. How are the recalcitrants noted? Uncircumcision of the inaugural crew marks those who would presumably engender systemic oppression in the land. Generations later, they eventually do spread oppression of the weak instead of justice for all. This connection between circumcision and yhwh’s plan for earth eventually blooms into a metaphorical variation of the hardened heart, resistant to God’s plans. Deuteronomy and Jeremiah will insist that the uncircumcised heart is incapable of carrying out God’s justice for the land (cf. Deut 10.16; 30.6; Jer 4.4). The consequence? God is preparing a day to kill them for their injustice (Jer 4.5–8). Those who commit to resisting God’s plans die. We see this with the wilderness generation (Num 14), but also the priests responsible for the Holy of Holies. In Numbers 16, Korah and his band of like-minded resisters openly defy Moses. Moses’s solution is to orchestrate a test in order that “you [Israel] shall know that yhwh has sent me [Moses] to do all these works” (Numb 16.28). A problem of ignorance, again, is resolved by God’s definitive acts that often ends in the death of those resisting His plans. yhwh opens the earth and swallows them alive into Sheol so that Israel would know that Moses is the authorized voice of yhwh’s plan. Again, the text presumes that the danger of rebellious Israelites is that they will eventually oppress the foreigner, widow, orphan, and the poor so they are unfit for the land meant to bring God’s kindness to the nations. The same indictment goes for the Canaanites. Now that we can see the pattern emerging, we can quickly assess the New Testament texts for God’s pettiness. God’s decisive violence tends to come

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in the inaugural generations of a world-changing plan. Those who principally resist God’s justice and risk destabilizing Israel into an oppressive kingdom are targets of divine judgment. Both John the Baptist and Jesus gnaw on the bone of this violent rhetoric early and often in the Gospels, preparing a group plucked from within an “evil generation” to spread the good news of his empire’s reach and plan from Canaan (then Judea) into the known world. John the Baptist questions Jewish leaders and layfolk alike, “who told you to flee the wrath to come” (cf. Matt 3.7; Lk 3.7). Jesus also speaks with a Malachi-like fire about a future judgment on the earth that he himself will bring (Matt 24; Mk 13; Lk 17.20–37). Jesus compares his eschatological vision of violence to the destruction in the days of Noah and Sodom. Though he defers his violence to the age of resurrection, it is previewed at least once in the book of Acts. Ananias and Sapphira sold their land, which marks no small commitment, to offer its proceeds to the early church in Jerusalem (Acts 5). They deceptively withheld a part of the profit for themselves. The Holy Spirit of the Lord struck them dead, Ananias first and then Sapphira when she repeated the deception. The words of Peter indicate that the breach was a lie to the Holy Spirit incompatible with the empire of Jesus they are meant to be spreading and multiplying. This husband and wife conspired to resist the plan. They were exemplars of dead folks walking to the rest of the early church, uncircumcised on the eve of the explosive actions of God to create a nation of slaves to this new empire spreading God’s justice. But also, we see all three members of the Trinity willing to kill for the sake of the Abrahamic plan. THE FINAL FRONTIER OF A MURDEROUS TRINITY You shall not wrong or oppress a foreigner, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt. You shall not abuse any widow or orphan. If you do abuse them, when they cry out to me, I will surely heed their cry; my wrath will burn, and I will kill you with the sword, and your wives shall become widows and your children orphans. (Exod 22.21–24)

We’ve resisted the temptation to engage philosophical and theological works on theodicy here. Instead, we’ve chosen to work from within the coherent conceptual framework of divine killing and the long-range goals of such killings in scripture. In her essay “The Problem of Evil,” Eleonore Stump uses the Cain and Abel story to elucidate God’s interactions in the fatal affairs of humans aimed at some other goal (1985). She posits this simple question about this story: why does God do so much for Cain, and yet, nothing for Abel? God confronts

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Cain, warns him, and then supernaturally protects him from capital punishment after he murders his brother anyway. For Abel, God does nothing—not even a “Hey Abel, look out!” Stump concludes that God intercedes unilaterally because, “Cain . . . is in trouble as regards both his current moral state and his prospects for the next life” (1985, 415). We would suggest that in a similar vein, the seemingly petty and capricious killings by yhwh only appear so because of the loss of focus on yhwh’s plan: the Abrahamic goal (all families) and Mosaic means to it (proliferating justice for all). God allows harm to befall, but also directly causes the deaths of Egyptians, Canaanites, Israelites, and later Jesus-following Jews. These deaths and killings only become coherent if His eyes look over the horizon to the planned human participation to expand justice for all and through Israel. yhwh can plan and execute calamity (AKA “evil”) against Israelites who have principally stated and demonstrated their rejection of this plan, whether by refusal to show their covenant fealty (i.e., circumcision of their children) or obstinate protest against the covenant implementation itself (e.g., Korah). What appears to us as a minor glitch within the community looks to yhwh as the simple fever of Ebola might signal impending community catastrophe to a medical doctor. Hence, the lack of circumcision in the inaugural Mosaic community represents the slippery slope to murder and prostitution of their own children (Lev 18.21; 19.29), oppressing the weak (Exod 22.21–24), and other such epidemiologies of corruption. In our horror, we might miss that, unlike Robert Daly’s regime of violence, these instances are for the sake of proliferating justice on behalf of the most vulnerable and the powerful, the economically stable and the poor, the native and the foreigner (Lev 19). As Stump says of Abel, yhwh appears ready to let the chips fall for the sake of justice. Robert Daly’s capricious behavior would remind the ancients of their own gods. And we must be aware that in the ancient Near Eastern context, yhwh uniquely stands behind his promised justice and plans with lethal power at the ready for those who won’t make His plans effective. In the New Testament, Jesus warns of his ready-to-hand violence for the sake of peace in the age of resurrection. The Holy Spirit carries out one such act in the presence of the apostles. Apparently, this is not a joke. Additionally, the unique ethical obligations of the legal code within Exodus require such an Abrahamic view in order to be basically coherent.8 Why else would the Torah insist upon such seeming oddities as the equal legal status of foreigners within Israel and provision for the vulnerable classes (orphans, widows, foreigners, women, etc.)? Unlike Robert Daly, who becomes an oppressive pharaoh-figure, God hears the cries of the oppressed, whether Israelite or others. Daly also hears their cries, but these feed his vengeance against personal slights. Conversely,

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is ready to judge those who oppose justice for all. And when looking for analogs, Jesus later compares that same covenantal violence to his planned violence in the eschaton against those who refuse this justice for all. Why so much violence? The only explanation from the logic of the Hebrew Bible and New Testament is that, as with the crew of the USS Callister, lethal force can be used prejudicially against the oppressors or the people who would participate in their schemes. yhwh’s zealous enforcement during the liminal period of Israel’s founding only makes sense if God’s intentions are to protect those most easy to exploit. Finally, to put a practical vice upon those of us who practice Christianity: If Christendom doesn’t entail justice for all in some practical way, then how is it not just a dead vestigial organization? How would a justice-ignorant Christianity expect to survive the resurrection and the divine killing event planned after resurrection—whatever that might look like? Not grasping the gravity of our own injustices, we may be inclined to fixate on the superficial resemblances between yhwh and Robert Daly, and fail to see a more fundamental parallel: by using his tools and power to oppresses the people under his control, Robert Daly resembles not yhwh, but Pharaoh. Pharaoh used not only his position but also the “technology” of his magicians to justify and extend his abuses of power. What both USS Callister and Exodus show is that in the hands of sinful humans, technology has the potential to magnify our worst traits. In contrast, yhwh uses his power to persuade, guide, and pursue justice. From the perspective of scripture, people who are implicated in injustice are the ones who actually resemble Robert Daly, while God goes to great lengths to protect those they exploit. yhwh

NOTES 1. Russ Hamer and Steven Gukba (2020) examine this episode and thought it distilled down to a different set of ethical principles about violation of privacy, phenomenology of virtual reality games, and the ethics therein required to responsibly participate. As will become obvious, we are not addressing those questions. 2. Of course, the term “evil” (ra’ah) has a broader connotative range than just “wicked” or “bad,” but most modern readers bring a simplified and polarized view— good as the absolute opposite of evil—which cannot easily be reconciled to the sense of “evil” in the biblical texts without remainder. 3. yhwh is the Roman script transliteration of the four-letter name of the God of Israel revealed in Exodus 3. It is typically pronounced “Yahweh” or “Yahveh,” but not pronounced at all by most religious Jews. Jewish readers will often read “HaShem” (i.e., “The Name”) or “Adonai” (i.e., “My Lord”) instead of the normal reading of the name. It is mispronounced as “Jehovah” because of scribal intention to avoid breaking the third commandment. Translations, including the ancient Greek

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translation of the Hebrew Bible (LXX), obscure the name by replacing it with a title “the lord”—meaning something like “the master”—in all capital letters. Wherever “lord” appears in capitals, the reader knows that the text actually contains the personal name yhwh. 4. All biblical quotations are the authors’ translation, otherwise, NRSV. 5. Lynch’s recent and excellent work explores the grammar of violence in the Hebrew Bible (2020, especially 167–204). 6. Cf. Josh 2; Judg 4; 2 Sam 14; 20; 2 Kgs 4; Mk 7. 7. The phrase “rose up to play” (Exod 32.6) in other contexts in the Hebrew Bible refers specifically to orgies. That’s how Paul understands this phrase as well (1 Cor 10.6–8). 8. For a careful examination of the unique ethical obligations of the Torah in the ancient Near Eastern context, see Unterman (2017).

BIBLIOGRAPHY Hamer, Russ and Steven Gukba. “USS Callister and Non-Player Characters: How Should We Act in Video Games?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 143–50. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Johnson, Dru. Scripture’s Knowing: A Companion to Biblical Epistemology. Eugene: Cascade, 2015. Lynch, Matthew J. Portraying Violence in the Hebrew Bible: A Literary and Cultural Study. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2020. Stump, Eleonore. “The Problem of Evil.” Faith and Philosophy 2, no. 4 (1985): 392–423. Unterman, Jeremiah. Justice for All: How the Jewish Bible Revolutionized Ethics. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2017.

Part 3

TRUTH AND JUSTICE

Chapter 9

Crowdsourcing Judgment The Dark Side of Justice in Hated in the Nation and the Johannine Trial Narrative Andrew J. Byers

As Christendom’s cultural power bleeds out of Western civilization, the emerging society is not marked by the lax ethical malaise feared by the fading doomsayers, nor is it empty of moral courage. In fact, the championing of justice seems unprecedented in its fervor and, likewise, the outrage against injustice seems unmatched in its fury.1 Ironically, though, secular morality is as prone as the Christian Church to the ugly side of the moral high ground. Self-righteousness and judgmentalism are no longer dispositions reserved solely for religious folk. In pluralistic societies comprising a range of views, taking up the contested moral high ground can easily become a comparative act that simultaneously assumes moral superiority. Impassioned for justice, many are quick to shame and judge publicly anyone in breach of the trending moral vision, whether from the right or left, and with or without a legitimating deity. In our current cultural moment, the religious and nonreligious alike have become surprisingly effective at these practices formerly identified as sins specific to a self-righteous church.2 Though the discernment of justice and the allocation of judgment officially reside in the domain of government legal systems, popular culture has recently self-generated a preliminary courtroom and a predetermined jury. Before images, statements, and video footage can be deliberated within the regulated event of a formal trial, judgements have long been made and certain punitive sentences have already been issued. The policeman’s bodycam may indeed display brutality, and the politician’s soundbite may certainly be a gaffe. But before the scene beyond the camera’s frame can be considered formally and before the retweeted comment can be set in its wider context, a court is in session and the trial nearly over. The unsanctioned courtroom 147

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is the digital space of the Internet. The judge and jury are online keyboard warriors. When news arrives of official verdicts by a carefully selected jury or by a seasoned legal professional seated as a judge, a hundred thousand gavels may have already smashed the judgment block in the form of online comments pronounced in caustic speech and clipped with accusatory labels like “#cancel” and often answered by defensive rebuttals like “#fakenews.” As many rightly argue, certain elements of existing systems may be creaky, outmoded, and even corrupt. Just because legal proceedings are official does not make them just. An important gift of the Internet is the provision of a platform by which those formerly deprived of a public voice may expose racism, bigotry, and sexual harassment (Hagi 2019). Bodycam footage released online broadens the base of public accountability, and there are acts of brutality to which outrage and lament are the only sensible replies, even if voiced through Twitter or Instagram. Yet digital space has not served as an ideal forum for justice. Whether for commercial, political, or even criminal purposes, the powerful have become highly effective in exploiting online platforms for their own agendas (Allyn 2020; though see Roberts 2020). Like our legal systems, the Internet has its own vulnerabilities, not least in its serviceability for disseminating falsehoods and stoking misplaced rage. It is important to ask how susceptible we are not only to the botware of meddling nation-states but also to our own collective behavior online. As a society, public opinion may shift under the influence of a digital “mobocracy,”3 an online “tyranny of the majority”4 that preempts the due process of established justice systems (even if reforms are needed). There are correctives on offer for those criticizing today’s “cancel culture” (e.g. Bovy 2020; Manavis 2020), but it is difficult to ignore the increasing power of social media to pass unofficial sentences that have a real effect on those digitally arraigned as the defendant. Though often criticized as “slactivism,” recent studies show that online protest movements may be more effective than often supposed for raising awareness and promoting important causes (Fisher 2020). Some of these causes, however, may not be so noble. And for individuals who find themselves in the digital spotlight (or just caught in the ideological crosshairs), a trending hashtag can end careers, wreck marriages, and wreak inestimable costs on mental and spiritual health long after another target starts to trend (see Ronson 2016 [2015]). What if those of us expressing our outrage on social media served not only as judge and jury but also as executioner? What if the sentences we pass with our hashtags and indignant comments were to be actualized, if our words became speech-acts that did more than shame? These are questions writer Charlie Brooker explores in the Black Mirror episode Hated in the Nation (Season 3, Episode 6). They are questions that may also be informed by a theological reading of John’s Gospel, in which the Word becomes flesh and then finds himself summoned to a cosmic trial.

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This chapter will move toward a discussion of Johannine themes by weaving through a host of cultural questions prompted by Hated in the Nation. These questions ask about the role of embodiment in digital communication, about the possible material effects of online speech, about possible limits to freedom of speech, and about the ethics of judging the judges. Turning to John’s Gospel (and Letters), the discussion explores the potential import of the Word’s embodiment through the Incarnation for contemporary digital culture. Since our groupthink can be easily co-opted today by darker powers behind the scenes, we will also consider what John writes about the forces of cosmic evil that instrumentalize our collective indignation. Finally, the study will close exploring the dual Johannine themes of judgment and justice. Since both Hated in the Nation and John’s Gospel begin and end with the imagery of a trial, we will begin with a court in session. A CULTURE ON TRIAL: “COULD YOU MOVE THE MICROPHONE A LITTLE CLOSER?” Hated in the Nation is both a detective story and a courtroom drama.5 In the opening scene, a visibly anxious Karin Parke (Kelly Macdonald) appears before a judiciary panel in “near-future London.”6 Parke, a detective chief inspector for the Met Police, takes a seat at a table and nervously opens a folder of documents. Her initial statement is interrupted with the request to move the microphone closer. The camera gives deliberate attention to the slow sliding of the mic toward her, signaling the thematic importance of speech for all that follows. “I first got involved on the fifteenth,” Parke offers. The courtroom scene ends and the narrative proper ensues, presented (subtly) in the form of a flashback.7 Brooker situates eighty-four of this lengthy episode’s eighty-seven minutes of action within the wider frame of the ongoing trial scene; but in an act of storytelling cunning, the actual footage of the hearing is minuscule, rendering viewers forgetful that a court is in session while the plot unfolds. What has occasioned the hearing in the episode’s opening? The answer, which does not become clear until the very end, is a catastrophic event of mass murder. The body count is over 387,000. Who is the perpetrator of such a crime? That is for later. The more important question is this: who is the accomplice? And to that question, the unsettling answer is found in the darkened (black) mirror. Viewers are ensnared. The horror of the climactic tragedy leads to another horror, the recognition that we ourselves are (at least potential) accomplices. In Hated in the Nation, an entire society is on trial even as that society tries one another. The accomplice to the mass murder is an activist digital culture and its online speech behavior—our very own society . . . in the “near future.”

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CROSSING THE LINE: DISEMBODIED COMMENTS AND A BODY ON THE FLOOR Brooker takes quite a risk in his opening of the flashback as he allows viewers to follow Parke in the most quotidian of scenes: walking home from work (presumably), unceremoniously entering her home, deliberating over what to eat, then opting for crisps (potato chips) before crashing in front of the television. The UKN news station supplies important details constructing the story’s backdrop. Parke’s routine world feels rather ho-hum and virtually identical to our own. But from the news reports, we pick up on “another extinction” and learn (on a more celebratory note) that the Autonomous Drone Insects (ADIs) are in their second season, filling the prior role of honeybees in a defraying ecosystem. Most of what follows plays out along the lines of a sophisticated crime thriller as a series of grim and initially unexplainable deaths take place. The first to die is Jo Powers (Elizabeth Berrington), a conservative newspaper columnist embroiled in what we would call a “Twitter-storm.” We see her moments before her death, walking home in her leafy London neighborhood having just distastefully criticized a suicide-protest by a wheelchair-bound disability rights activist. As she walks along the pavement, a well-dressed passerby remarks, “I hope you are ashamed of yourself, bitch.” Clearly accustomed to such sneering, “Pleasure’s all mine,” is her reply, voiced in a cynical tone. Then there is a sound, a very important sound, that reverberates throughout the entire episode: a notification tone. The camera flashes before us the screen of Powers’s smartphone: “86 new mentions.” After receiving a cake decorated with “F—ing Bitch,” Powers sits at her desk with a glass of wine and pulls up her online column. There are “9,895 Comments.” Brooker makes sure we can read what she reads: Jo Powers = human garbage Is this a piss take? Have some respect. I hope you end up in a wheelchair Jo Powers. . . . You’re trash inside and out Jo Powers. Shame. Shame. Shame. What a bitch!! You have ZERO compassion!

Another tone beeps and “You have over 200 notifications including 96 mentions” appears on her computer screen. She scrolls through the bombardment of comments streaked with explicit language. Incessant notification tones keep punctuating Enya’s “Sail Away” playing from Powers’s playlist. Then there it is: “#DeathTo.” Her mutilated body is found later in the night. Parke is called to the scene of what appears to be a domestic murder. She meets her new partner, Blue

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Colson (Faye Marsay), a tech crime specialist in digital forensics and a rookie to “the field . . . the real world.” Leaving Powers’s home, having all the marks of a home-based crime scene, Parke judiciously avoids stating that the writer’s husband is her prime suspect. But that is her suspicion. The standard playbook is surely at play. Yet the husband is soon cleared of any wrongdoing. The plotline that emerges is that each day the Internet’s most hated persona non grata—determined by the frequency of #DeathTo in the notification streams—ends up dead at 5:00 p.m. The standard playbook does not apply here. This is a new form of crime. A line has been crossed. While the officers were inspecting Powers’s body, the flow of hateful comments kept cascading down her computer monitor, with the notification beeps tolling like digital death bells. Brooker is beckoning us to consider the potential power of our speech, to imagine the linkage between words and deeds, to consider a world in which the online vitriol leaps out of cyberspace and into the “real world.” Critics of the Internet have decried the disembodied nature of digital communication—we fire off verbal rounds against those we will never see face to face from the comfort of the living room or from the train on our commute. But the problem is not disembodiment not exactly. Fingers touch those screens, and the sensory organs of other bodies receive the messages and comments we send and post. Digital communication is still a somatic act between embodied souls. The laughter generated by a funny remark sounds from a throat and windpipe; the tears from barbed words flow through fleshy ducts around blinking eyes. The problem is not disembodiment but distance—when we are not face to face, we forget the corporality of our communicative acts. Our social-media use invokes a strange new mode of platonic thinking in which we assume our words are no more than spectral pixels and immaterial in their consequences. In Hated in the Nation, the disturbing image of Jo Powers’s maimed corpse embodies the counterintuitive idea that digital words can bear material power. FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND THE QUESTION OF CULPABILITY (HATEFUL WORDS ARE OKAY AS LONG AS THEY ARE TRENDING) Hinting earlier that Jo Powers’s husband is a prime suspect, DCI Parke dismisses Colson’s suggestion that the killer may have been among those publishing death threats on the comment streams. When she disregards the power of online speech (“That Internet stuff drips off like weather. It’s

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half-hate. They don’t mean it”), Parke is merely voicing our culture’s collective rationale. This idea that online speech is merely superficial banter is brought into sharp relief when Parke and Colson visit the person who sent Powers the cake adorned with the offensive message. If as an audience we are expecting a grumpy teenager with a chip on her shoulder or a vindictive radical leftist, then we are left disappointed. Liza Bahar (Vinette Robinson) is a teacher at Colbyn Manor Primary School, and thus one of society’s ordinary heroes. We learn that the cake was pricey, costing £80 with delivery. Significantly, Bahar did not pay for it herself. She pitched in a pound along with other members of a “Moms and Carers Message Board.” “You crowdsourced the money,” Colson observes. The dialogue that ensues is telling. Bahar reports that she and the other moms and carers were simply reacting to Powers’s unjust and inappropriate remarks. In sending that message on the cake, she was merely exercising her “freedom of speech.” The defense is that she did not commission the bakery on her own. It was a group-act. But Colson moves quickly to keep the spotlight on Bahar as an individual actor: “You wished she were dead.” When Bahar denies actually wanting Powers to die for her published words, Colson holds up her phone. She has pulled up Bahar’s post “#DeathTo @JoPowersWriter.” Incredulous that the officers could take such a thing seriously, she replies that it is merely “a hashtag game” that is “not real” but a “joke thing.” This entire exchange occurs in the primary school library, as innocent as a setting imaginable. Later, as Bahar escorts the officers through the playground, she asks about the other contributors to the crowdsourced cake purchase: “are you going to tell them off, too?” The scene is ingenious: Bahar is surrounded by children who regularly make ridiculous claims and taddle on their peers at recess, a scene apropos for officers so petty and childish as to raise alarms over online speech. The scene ends with Bahar’s parting shot, a confident declaration of innocence: “I didn’t do anything.” Not only are words being dismissed as facile gestures; Bahar is also articulating the contemporary cultural notion that individuals are not responsible as long as they are members of a faceless crowd. Bahar would never have sent a cake inscribed with “F—ing Bitch” on her own (so also Maya 2020, 136–37). That was a crowdsourced project (from among moms and carers—modern-day saints!) to which she contributed a measly £1. Bahar would never walk up to Jo Powers and threaten her life. But the etiquette and protocols of online communication permit (invite?) hateful speech as long as it is amalgamated into the collective voice of a crowd. A crowd, as the logic goes, is not culpable. Polemical speech activity online is authorized and legitimated if enough people join the chorus. “Trending” is a term referring to crowd-activity. If enough people are behaving in a particular way, social-media algorithms are designed

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to perpetuate that behavior exponentially. When an online hate campaign “goes viral,” the participants feel justified and vindicated since they are suddenly swept up (note the verb form’s passive voice) into a much larger movement. This discussion goes mainstream later in the episode when the “DeathTo” hashtag has been linked to three deaths. The episode’s visual effects team supplies us with a collage of soundbites and images from a news commentator, a person on the street, “Steve” on some radio station’s “Line 5,” a talk show guest, and from the screen of a commuter’s smartphone. As the news hits the media channels, society begins the debate over the ethics of #DeathTo, most finding ways to embrace it as a form of punishment. In this collage, the audience begins to recognize itself reflected in the mirror of the flat screen. Though the shaming can go in both directions (some disapprove of the hashtag), the digital crowd has nonetheless become jury and judge. With the full knowledge that death comes to the most shamed Internet sensation of the day, the crowd has also become executioner. The high-tech sophistication of the sleek devices and the crisp interfaces on their screens can no longer obscure a primal barbarity as online mobs raise their staves, cry out for blood, and join in the digital lynchings. THE STORY WITHIN THE STORY: CONSEQUENCES In addition to the notification chimes, there is another ominous sound overlaying the audio track of Hated in the Nation. Along with the digital beeping is a mechanical buzzing, the former a mild staccato, the latter a soft murmur. In grotesque fashion, drone honeybees (the ADIs) mete out the judgment on the individual emerging at the top of the daily “hashtag death poll.” Created by the Granular Project to perpetuate the flowering of plants in the wake of a honeybee extinction, these tiny but self-replicating robot-insects are weaponized via a security breach in their control system. The terror their droning evokes is warranted, yet these manufactured products are simply actioning our own digital speech. They also emblematize our online hive mentality. With these ADIs, Brooker and his fellow creators raise a host of ethical questions (government surveillance, environmental destruction, et al).8 But the core ethical dilemma these ADIs highlight is our swarming instinct for hateful and condemnatory speech online. Having seen Jo Powers’s brutalized body and having witnessed two other gruesome deaths, viewers have become more sensitized to the effects of social-media shaming. Flannery O’Connor would surely nod approvingly at the writer’s achievement—now that Brooker has screamed in our ears through these ugly deaths, we are able to hear the message that sticks, stones, and words do damage (and also, of course, robotic bees).

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The message that online polemics most certainly inflicts pain is most clearly voiced by Tess Wallander (Georgina Rich), an ex-Granular employee interviewed by DCI Parke. Not a tech-wiz, she worked in HR until she resigned due to “nervous exhaustion.” Wallander had posted with crass comments a photo of a man on the Tube who was later found to have a learning disability. Naturally, she became a target of social-media shaming: “It was like having a whole weather system turn against me . . . it’s like a mental illness.” Most disturbing to Wallander was the casual fun her online detractors seemed to be having. The material effect of their pixelated and supposedly immaterial words is that Wallander slit her wrists in an attempted suicide. Her agony was enfleshed, corporeal. Wallander’s personal testimony is a lynchpin moment. For one, it is the real story, the story that is stripped of sci-fi, CGI, VFX, and suggestive potentiality—the story that actually occurs not within Black Mirror’s “near-future” dystopia but in our present-day moment, the story that Brooker has actually endured himself as a writer (Jones 2016). That Wallander’s experience is the one Brooker wants us to hang on to is reinforced by its load-bearing function in the plot: through her testimony, the audience learns of Garrett Scholes (Duncan Pow), the mastermind of the ADI hack. Scholes has planned an elaborate, if demented, moral lesson for contemporary digital culture: “Thanks to the technological revolution we have the power to rage and accuse, spout bile without consequence.” This is an opening line of a manifesto Scholes wrote and embedded into his hack codes. As a Granular employee who tended the suicidal wounds of Wallander, a housemate and love interest, he set a trap to establish real consequences for individuals who joined the hivemind of online hate. As the doomsday clock ticked toward 5:00 p.m. with a major government official at the top of the death poll, the investigative team and a top Granular executive are wavering on pulling the plug after finding a way to shut down the ADI system. The solution is too easy. And then Shaun Li (Benedict Wong), an agent of the government office that taps into the ADIs for illegal surveillance, pushes the execute button. Everyone breathes a sigh of relief as the robot-bees go offline. The shocking climax is a resurrection: the ADIs reboot and then target for death every individual that published #DeathTo—all 387,000 of them. COSMIC TRIAL, COSMIC MOB: A JOHANNINE READING OF HATED IN THE NATION A biblical and theological engagement with this Black Mirror episode might take a variety of turns, but the groupthink, public shaming, and the indignant cries of a crowd recall to mind the Gospel passion narratives. Though the

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forum for public debate has been largely digitalized today, the ancient world out of which Christianity emerged was quite familiar with heated rhetoric, mob action, and the demands for punitive justice. “Crucify, Crucify him” (Lk 23.21) is the first-century Mediterranean equivalent to #DeathTo. Since the narrative of Hated in the Nation is encompassed within the trial motif, attention turns here to the Gospel that most prominently deploys the genre of courtroom drama: the Gospel of John. Words and the Word on Trial: Johannine Testimony and Online Hate Speech Bearing testimony opens and closes Brooker’s story. The fourth evangelist has taken a similar approach. After the majestic opening of John 1.1–5, John the Baptist is introduced as someone taking the stand: “He came as a witness [martyrian] to testify [martyrēsēi] to the light . . . he came to testify [martyrēsēi] to the light” (Jn 1.7–8). Brooker and director James Hawes use a range of cinematic techniques to accentuate important themes (see Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 205–19). An ancient writer draws on a different toolbox. Though all the storytellers here use strategic placement (framing the narratives with trial imagery), John relies on the verbal repetition of key lexemes and cognates to denote thematic significance. The clustering of witness/testimony/testify throughout the Gospel reminds readers and auditors that a trial is in session. Reading John with the Synoptic Gospels, readers may puzzle over the thin account of the events between Jesus’s arrest and his appearance the next morning before Pilate. John offers a more extended version of Jesus’s interrogation by the Roman governor, but he omits the night-time trial before the Sanhedrin hours earlier.9 Why would John, most likely a Jewish writer, avoid the opportunity to showcase the critical questions of Jewish theology and messianism that the Synoptics feature in the Sanhedrin trial?10 Commentators are largely agreed that the answer lies in John’s literary program of stretching the Jewish trial across his entire narrative. By the time the Johannine Jesus is greeted by the arresting cohort in the garden, the Jewish leadership has already tried him and issued a guilty verdict warranting capital punishment (e.g. Jn 5.16–47, 8.12–59, and 10.22–39; see Harvey 1976; Lincoln 2000, 2005, 447–51). There is likely a cosmic scope to this trial as Jesus’s arraignment seems parallel to the trying of yhwh in Deutero-Isaiah (Lincoln 2000, 38–54). As the curtain opens on the Johannine stage, John the Baptist appears as a witness (Jn 1.6–9), and the Beloved Disciple affirms his own authorial role as a witness while those curtains close (Jn 21.24–25). At stake in this Johannine trial is not a culturally sanctioned ethos or code of practice. The court in session is concerned with a monumental allegation of

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false identity. Is Jesus truly the divine Christ-Lord or an outrageous imposter? If he is indeed worthy of the divine self-declaration “I am,” a claim to shared identity with yhwh, then he is legitimately the Word, the Logos, whose very Person defines codes of practice and ethical systems. Hated in the Nation is concerned with a society that curves in on itself with righteous indignation and puritanical judgmentalism. The Fourth Gospel is concerned with identifying the one in whom all reality—and thus every moral claim—holds together. The Co-Opted Hivemind: When Our Hate and Indignation Are Instrumentalized In Hated in the Nation, the ADIs were not actually “autonomous”—someone else was puppeteering the hive mentality. Similarly, the fourth evangelist wants to demonstrate how humanity itself may be hijacked by imperious forces. Throughout John’s Gospel there is an interplay between general collectives and particularized characters and character groups. The encounter with Jesus incites a crisis that destabilizes the social identity of his interlocutors and rearranges group belonging. The “children of God” are those who receive the Logos and accept the various forms of testimony offered on his behalf. Though virtually all the figures in John are Jewish, “the Jews” are mostly associated with the religious leadership opposed to Jesus.11 The “world [kosmos]” is an even broader categorization, with which “the Jews” are often aligned (see Kierspel 2006). But John wants to point his audience to the more sinister players behind the scenes and call them out of an alignment with cosmic darkness. Convinced of the righteousness of their cause, “the Jews” find themselves blind to their partnership with evil, a reality personified as “the devil” or “the evil one” throughout the Johannine Literature. The betrayal of Judas, the angry voices of the crowds calling for death, and the plotting of “the Jews” are all instrumentalized by a greater power that lies quietly off-stage but directs the action. Cosmic evil is ultimately pulling the strings (see Jn 8.44; 13.2, 27; 19.10–11; 1 Jn 5.19). When crowds bay for blood, whether in Jerusalem, Rome, or online, it is important to step back and ask who has stirred up the furor, who has whispered madness into our collective ears. In Hated in the Nation, that role belongs to Garrett Scholes, who has, in turn, instrumentalized the British government’s instrumentalization of the Granular Project’s ADIs. And beyond the fictional storyboard are real forces co-opting our impulse toward rage and keen to foment anger for an agenda often unseen. When we lend our angry voices to the swarms, with whom or with what powers are we aligning?

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“Whose Justice?” The Logos in the (Online) Echo Chamber of Broken Humanity God is just. The claim lies at the heart of Christian theology and finds expression throughout the biblical story. Calls for justice, whether online or out on the streets, should receive “amens” from a church that has often pioneered society’s most controversial reversals over unethical treatment of the marginalized and disempowered. Christians can rejoice that the choirs singing for justice have spilled out into the public square and found amplification online. But what if our frames of reference for constructing and sustaining a clear moral vision have been intellectually shattered? Alistair MacIntyre argues in After Virtue (2007 [1981, 1988]) that we are at best working with disconnected shards from prior ethical systems and unable to discourse with one another within the same rational field. Decades before MacIntyre built this case, G. K. Chesterton observed: The modern world is not evil; in some ways, the modern world is far too good. It is full of wild and wasted virtues. When a religious scheme is shattered (as Christianity was shattered at the Reformation), it is not merely the vices that are let loose. The vices are, indeed, let loose, and they wander and do damage. But the virtues are let loose also; and the virtues wander more wildly, and the virtues do more terrible damage. The modern world is full of the old Christian virtues gone mad. The virtues have gone mad because they have been isolated from each other and are wandering alone. (1959 [1909], 30)

These wandering virtues, unmoored from their confessional roots and ecclesial contexts, are swirling about the Internet. They are haphazardly picked up here and there, selectively utilized for good while also used to slice and attack others in the name of justice. As MacIntyre asked in the sequel to After Virtue (1988), “whose justice” are we championing and allowing to set the terms of public debate and moral discourse? Reviewers of Black Mirror’s Hated in the Nation pick up on Brooker’s critique of social-media use and our tendencies to exact verbal punishments and shame ne’er-do-wells in public. Something less noted are the questions its open-ended conclusion raises about judgment. In the final minutes of the episode, Brooker returns to the court hearing where Parke is commended for her courage. In her final seconds on the stand, Parke’s face constricts with pain when recounting the apparent suicide of Colson, on whom the weight of guilt took the ultimate toll. We then exit that courtroom on an ironic note as Parke’s place is taken by Shaun Li. A government agent being tried by the very government that authorized his unethical use of the ADIs is not a hopeful nod in the direction of the justice system. Nor are we inspired by the scene

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that immediately follows. Parke is driven past an angry crowd, waving signs like staves and crying out for “the #Truth.” Hawes allows us to see every letter in one word painted on a cardboard placard rattling in the hands of angry protesters: “JUSTICE.” Viewers want justice, too. And as Aline Maya has pointed out, there may well be a more positive function for online judging and shaming. In her careful analysis of Hated in the Nation, she suggests that “#MeToo is kind of like the beautiful flip side of #DeathTo” (Maya 2020, 133). Scholes’s view is too narrow, because some modes of online shaming may actually be employed for good, as Maya argues. But in Brooker’s carefully crafted storyline, we have learned not to trust the government, not to trust the angry crowd, nor the tech-savvy vigilante (i.e., Scholes, who made himself the judge of judges). The somber music accompanying Parke’s departure is then pierced by a notification tone. She retrieves her phone as the crowds shout outside the car windows. “Got him,” the text reads. The justice we now celebrate is outside government sanction. Just as Scholes took justice into his own hands to exact judgment on a hatemongering and shame-obsessed populace, the audience cheers as the scene switches to what is intended to be a remote Andean setting and Scholes is tracked by Colson, very much alive and very much an ex-officer of the law. When we, the audience, breathe a sigh of relief with Parke as she deletes Colson’s text, we are left with the unsettling questions of “whose justice?” “what judgment is fitting?” and “who should carry it out?” In Hated in the Nation, a highly sophisticated and technologically advanced society of the “near-future” is incurvatus in se—curved in on itself—and unable to emerge from its own noisy echo chambers. But for Christians, “the Word became flesh and lived among us” (Jn 1.14, NRSV). An alien rationale, an alternative Logos, has penetrated our self-enclosed realm. And judgment lies with him, even if he is reluctant to mete it out.12 What John makes clear is that the one through whom judgment occurs has come to pursue and love all perpetrators. In the Incarnation and Resurrection of Jesus, cosmic boundaries are traversed for the sake of divine love for a judgmental world deserving of judgment. A Johannine version of judgment is one in which Jesus is slain as a Lamb for the sin of the world. A Johannine version of justice is one which begins with embrace, with the willingness of divine alterity to enter a threatening realm and extend love to all offending parties. Drawing in no small part from John’s Gospel, Miroslav Volf writes in Exclusion and Embrace that though “there can be no genuine and lasting embrace without justice,” there can “be no justice without the will to embrace” (1996, 216). Incarnation and crucifixion extend a divine embrace. Since the Incarnation embodies God’s mission into all realms where there is brokenness, it impels Christian presence within the digital space of the

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Internet (Byers 2013). Yet when we enter that sphere, our words must echo the value system of the Word, and our disposition must parallel an openness to embrace that precedes judgment. The church’s online presence must also be open to an embrace that follows judgment. The moral vision of Christian theology anticipates not only the enactment of justice but also the restoration of the (penitent) unjust. The justice of God does not merely “cancel.” Justice is paired with a mercy that dispenses grace, holds out for transformation, and seeks to rehabilitate those with “#DeathTo” punctuating their notification streams and with “crucify, crucify” ringing in their ears.

NOTES 1. For an accessible study for Christians on modern-day outrage, see Stetzer (2018). 2. I have reflected a bit more on this in Byers (2020). 3. The term is from Abraham Lincoln and cited in Smith (2012, 228). 4. The phrase is associated in modern times with James Madison, Alexis de Tocqueville, and John Stuart Mill. De Tocqueville’s view is probably closer to the discussion here than Madison’s. For a helpful overview of his thinking on majority tyranny, see Horwitz (1966). 5. Charlie Brooker has stated that he wanted to try the genre of “detective story,” and Hated in the Nation is his attempt (Fitz-Gerald 2016). 6. “Near-future London” is a phrase taken from the episode description on Netflix. 7. A courtroom drama was not the original aim, but after Brooker temporarily abandoned the draft script, he returned and used the court scenes to evoke interest and to bear some of the storytelling weight. See the comments by Brooker and Black Mirror executive producer Annabel Jones in Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 206–09). 8. For a more detailed discussion on the ethics of drone usage and surveillance raised by this Black Mirror episode, see Smith (2019). 9. John’s focus is on Jesus’ interaction with Annas, the father-in-law of Caiaphas who holds the official title of high priest and before whom Jesus is questioned in Mark, Matthew, and Luke. For the relevant passages, see Matthew 26.57–68, Mark 14.53–65, Luke 22.54–71, and John 18.13–24. 10. In the Synoptics, Jesus is asked pointedly whether or not he is the Jewish messiah (Matt 26.63; Mk 14.61; Lk 22.67). In John, Annas “questioned Jesus about his disciples and about his teaching” (18.19, NRSV). 11. John’s Gospel has much to say about speech, but it also portrays verbal rancor. The most offensive is from Jesus: “you are from your father the devil” (Jn 8.44, NRSV). The line is all the more disturbing because of its addressees. Since Jesus is speaking to the Johannine character construct of “the Jews,” some interpreters have regarded John as anti-Jewish, a reading reinforced by the appalling way this Gospel

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has been used to justify violent ends. It is important to note that this is not a oneline verbal jab akin to our online barbs. It must not be abstracted from the lengthy discourse of John 8 or from the wider Gospel. John is attributing to the devil not an ethnicity, but the intent to murder. On John’s alleged anti-Jewishness, see especially Reinhartz (2018). For an argument that John’s polemical use of “the Jews” is a rhetorical program undermining the ethnicizing of soteriology, see Byers (2021). 12. Jesus seems a reluctant judge, and Johannine judgment is more passive than active (see Jn 3.17–18; 5.24; 12.47–49) and seems ultimately directed to cosmic powers that drive system evil (see Jn 12.31; 16.10).

BIBLIOGRAPHY Allyn, Bobby. “Nearly Half of Accounts Tweeting about Coronavirus Are Likely Bots.” NPR, May 20, 2020. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://www​.npr​.org​/sections​/coronavirus​-live​-updates​/2020​/05​/20/​ 859814085​/researchers​-nearly​-half​-of​ -accounts​-tweeting​-about​-coronavirus​-are​-likely​-bots. Bovy, Phoebe Moltz. “Cancel Culture is a Real Problem. But Not for the People Warning About It.” The Washington Post, July 9, 2020. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://www​.washingtonpost​.com​/outlook​/2020​/07​/09​/cancel​-culture​-is​-real​-problem​-not​-people​-warning​-about​-it/. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Byers, Andrew J. “The Embodiment of God and the Disembodied Age: How the Incarnation Informs Our Twenty-First-Century Media Practices.” The Other Journal, October 10, 2013. Accessed August 13, 2020. https://theotherjournal​.com​ /2013​/10​/10​/the​-embodiment​-of​-god​-and​-the​-disembodied​-age​-how​-the​-incarnation​-informs​-our​-twenty​-first​-century​-media​-practices/. ———. “Don’t Scoff at ‘Social Justice.’ Don’t Anchor Yourself to it, Either.” Christianity Today, June 19, 2020. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://www​.christianitytoday​.com​/ct​/2020​/june​-web​-only​/douglas​-murray​-madness​-crowds​-social​ -justice​.html​?fbclid​=IwAR3kV​_rZ9​sj2d​w1Mn​9Ceo​xexH​lBvK​9NnN​7DnH​tfK1​ w6Pg​9woD​96N7​vf5B98. ———. John and the Others: Jewish Relations, Christian Origins, and the Sectarian Hermeneutic. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2021. Chesterton, G. K. Orthodoxy: The Romance of Faith. New York: Doubleday, 1959 (1909). Fisher, Richard. “The Subtle Ways that ‘Clicktivism’ Shapes the World.” BBC Future, September 15, 2020. Accessed May 3, 2020. https://www​.bbc​.com​/future​/ article​/20200915​-the​-subtle​-ways​-that​-clicktivism​-shapes​-the​-world. Fitz-Gerald, Sean. “‘Black Mirror’ Creator Charlie Brooker Explains Season 3 and Reveals Easter Eggs.” Thrillist, October 23, 2016. Accessed October 21, 2020. https://www​.thrillist​.com​/entertainment​/nation​/black​-mirror​-netflix​-season​-3​-charlie​-brooker​-interview.

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Hagi, Sarah. “Cancel Culture is Not Real—At Least Not in the Way People Think.” Time, November 21, 2019. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://time​.com​/5735403​/ cancel​-culture​-is​-not​-real/. Harvey, A. E. Jesus on Trial: A Study in the Fourth Gospel. London: SPCK, 1976. Horwitz, Morton J. “Tocqueville and the Tyranny of the Majority.” The Review of Politics 28, no. 3 (1966): 293–307. Jones, Emma. “Black Mirror: Backlash Against Writer Inspired Episode.” BBC News, October 21, 2016. Accessed August 5, 2020. https://www​.bbc​.co​.uk​/news​/ entertainment​-arts​-37714850. Kierspel, Lars. The Jews and the World in the Fourth Gospel. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 2/220. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2006. Lincoln, Andrew T. Truth on Trial: The Lawsuit Motif in the Fourth Gospel. Peabody: Hendrickson, 2000. ———. The Gospel According to Saint John. Black’s New Testament Commentary. Peabody: Hendrickson, 2005. MacIntyre, Alasdair. Whose Justice? Whose Rationality? London: Duckworth, 1988. ———. After Virtue: A Study in Moral Theory. London: Bloomsbury, 2007 (1981, 1988). Manavis, Sarah. “‘Cancel Culture’ Does Not Exist.” New Statesman, July 16, 2020. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://www​.newstatesman​.com​/science​-tech​/2020​/07​/ cancel​-culture​-does​-not​-exist. Maya, Aline “Hated in the Nation and #Deathto: What are the Consequences of Trial by Twitter?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 128–40. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Reinhartz, Adele. Cast Out of the Covenant: Jews and Anti-Judaism in the Gospel of John. London: Lexington Books/Fortress Academic, 2018. Roberts, Siobhan. “Who’s a Bot? Who’s Not?” The New York Times, June 16, 2020. Accessed August 4, 2020. https://www​.nytimes​.com​/2020​/06​/16​/science​/social​ -media​-bots​-kazemi​.html. Ronson, Jon. So You’ve Been Publicly Shamed. London: Picador, 2016 (2015). Smith, James. “On Killer Bees and GCHQ: ‘Hated in the Nation.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 179–90. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Smith, Steven B. Political Philosophy. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2012. Stetzer, Ed. Christians in the Age of Outrage: How to Bring Our Best When the World is at Its Worst. Carol Stream: Tyndale, 2018. Volf, Miroslav. Exclusion and Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation. Nashville: Abingdon, 1996.

Chapter 10

Re-Dos and Re-Visions Replay and the Search for Meaning in the Shepherd of Hermas and The Entire History of You Jeremiah Bailey

The Shepherd of Hermas languishes in theological obscurity today, but the Shepherd was the first Christian apocalyptic blockbuster.1 Even as the Christian East offered little evidence it had read or recognized the Book of Revelation, the Shepherd was enjoying widespread popularity (see Steenberg 2009; Bingham 2017). Though the text eventually declined in favor, it still offers the modern reader a fascinating glimpse into the development of apocalyptic theology in Early Christianity and, one could argue, the competition between apocalyptic theologies.2 The extraordinarily lengthy text, likely dating to the end of the first and/or beginning of the second century, relates a series of visions, parables, and commandments mediated to Hermas, a freedman living in Rome,3 through supernatural visitations and experiences.4 By contrast, the science fiction anthology Black Mirror—though a blockbuster of the present—is only apocalyptic in the modern, colloquial sense of the word.5 One episode titled The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3), however, demonstrates a curious bit of overlap with the Shepherd. It imagines a future world in which most of the population is implanted with a device capable of perfectly recording everything you see and hear and storing it for later recall. The playback of memories—a “redo”—plays a central role in the story as characters watch, rewatch, and share with others the things that happen to them. As events are recalled in this manner, the characters begin to question their organic memories and perceptions of what has happened. Though more limited in scope, a parallel phenomenon happens in the Shepherd of Hermas through repeated exposure to visionary experiences. Early in the work, Hermas sees a vision of a tower, a representation of the 163

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church, mediated by a woman who turns out to be a personification of the church herself.6 It is a direct revelatory experience from God. Strangely, this early tower vision is reinterpreted near the end of the Shepherd. The titular, angelic Shepherd explicitly calls this early vision to Hermas’s attention and offers a new experience of it. The reasons for this re-narration and expansion are not immediately apparent, and the question naturally arises as to why this information was not included in the first place. The Shepherd and The Entire History of You, I will argue, both use the tool of repetition to try to explicate the truth. In so doing, they each reveal in their own way the problems with their assumed ways of knowing, specifically in the way they establish a foundation for knowledge. Since both conceptions of knowledge present in these texts remain influential in society today, this unlikely confluence between ancient apocalypse and modern dystopia offers us an opportunity for reflection. First, I will consider how this repetition functions within the Shepherd, the factors that may have led to it, and what reading strategies we might use to explore the text. Then, I will reflect on the place repetition has in the imagined society of The Entire History of You before considering the ways that the grasping for knowledge in both of these texts mirrors the other. THE TWO TOWERS: PARALLEL VISIONS FROM THE LADY AND THE SHEPHERD While the duplication of the tower vision is undeniably odd, there are plausible historical explanations for what has happened. Both internal and external evidence point to the composite nature of the Shepherd, and some scholars have proposed that the original author expanded his own text over time.7 If the author did, indeed, expand his own text, then the opportunity for revision may have naturally presented itself. Students of rhetoric in the ancient world were taught exercises on fables (mythoi) that required them to modulate the stories by shifting elements of their grammar or to expand or contract details (Kennedy 2003, 23–38). Our earliest surviving example of the handbooks used for rhetorical training, called progymnasmata, was composed by Aelius Theon around the middle of the first century of the common era (Kennedy 2003, 1). Strikingly, Theon describes the appropriateness of attributing multiple possible meanings to a fable: “There can be several conclusions (epilogoi) for one fable when we take a start from the contents of the fable, and conversely many fables reflect it” (Kennedy 2003, 26). Students were encouraged to emphasize different elements to generate new conclusions and meanings. From a first-century perspective, then, it would not be unusual to encounter an allegorical story that had been stretched and

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reworked for slightly different conclusions. While historical reconstruction can offer us some plausible explanations for how Hermas might have made these changes and why it might have seemed natural to make them, his motives remain elusive. Even if we take Hermas’s narrative at face value and suppose we are dealing with a revelatory abrogation mediated by an angel, it does not eliminate this fundamental issue: why, presumably a short time later, would divine revelation change? A comparison of the two passages is necessary to explore this phenomenon. The Lady’s Tower In the first vision of the tower, Hermas meets a personification of the church in the form of a woman somewhere on his property. She eventually reveals before his eyes a vision of a tower resting on water being built by six men (9.5–10.6). The six men are brought building blocks by a vast multitude of men, which they then evaluate for incorporation into the building. The personified church reveals that the tower is the church which is founded on the waters of baptism. The many men are angels, and the six builders are angels elevated above them (11.3–13.1). The blocks found suitable for building are the saints which are joined into the tower of the church while the rejected blocks fall into a number of distinct categories (blackened, too short, cracked, round, etc.), which correspond to different barriers to righteousness (13.1– 15.3). Some of the rejected blocks have another chance to join the building and some do not. At the foot of the tower are seven women who support the tower and who correspond to the Christian virtues of faith, self-control, sincerity, knowledge, innocence, reverence, and love (16.1–5). The Shepherd’s Tower Though the first vision is quite lengthy and elaborate, the second is even more so. It begins when the Shepherd, the angel who serves as Hermas’s guide in the later part of the work, takes Hermas to a rounded mountain in Arcadia.8 There Hermas witnesses a vast plain surrounded by twelve mountains, each distinct in appearance. In the midst of the plain, there is a gigantic, ancient white rock (78.1–79.1) which has recently had a door cut into it (79.2–3). Six men approach this door which is surrounded by twelve virgins and command the building to begin. They summon ten perfect stones “from some deep place,” and the virgins carry the stones through the door, placing them on the rock. This procedure is repeated three times with more stones each time (80.1–5). Once these four layers of stones are laid, the multitude of men, at the direction of the six men, go to the twelve mountains and bring back from

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them stones which match the color and character of those mountains. These stones are brought to the twelve virgins who then carry them through the door. Doing so transforms them into white blocks which match the great rock (81.3–4). Inspection of the tower reveals some stones have not changed color because they somehow entered the construction without passing through the door. These are removed and set aside (83–84). At this point, there is a pause in construction until the master of the tower, later revealed to be “the glorious man” who accompanies the six, returns for further inspection. The glorious man inspects the stones which had been set aside and determines that some stones are now fit—these are promptly incorporated into the tower—while some others remain unfit. These unfit stones are handed over to twelve beautiful women clothed in black and carried away (85–86). The Shepherd’s explanation of the vision reveals the purpose of these expansions. The tower remains the church, but the new additions of the great rock, the door, and the glorious man are all the Son of God. The pause in the construction is God’s merciful delay of the final judgment which allows those who have sinned after baptism a second chance to return to faith. The twelve virgins correspond to “holy spirits” which are the “powers of the Son of God” (90.1–2). We see that this list of twelve symbolic virgins expands the list of seven women before. These twelve are faith, self-control, power, patience, sincerity, innocence, purity, cheerfulness, truth, understanding, harmony, and love (92.2). Not only do we see five additional figures added to the list, but their role in the story changes dramatically. Whereas in the first vision the women “supported the tower,” now these virgins are the only true means by which the stones, which represent believers, can be brought through the door and incorporated into the church. The virgins place these blocks upon the first four rows of stones, corresponding to the first generation, the second generation, the prophets and ministers, and finally the apostles and teachers of the Son of God (92.4). The new list of virgins is now also paired with a list of women in black which carry people away from the tower. These women represent unbelief, self-indulgence, disobedience, deceit, grief, evil, licentiousness, angry temper, falsehood, foolishness, slander, and hatred (92.3). The twelve mountains, as is explained in excruciating detail (94.1–107.4), roughly correspond to positive or negative attributes which help or hinder the believer in joining the tower. Reading the Two Towers Together The expansions in this secondary vision chiefly concern three areas. First, they make explicit the Son’s role in salvation. Whereas it was mostly by implication in the first vision that the Son had a crucial role in the building of the church, his role is explicated with such centrality that now he is

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simultaneously the rock of creation, the door of salvation, and the inspector of the eschatological church. Furthermore, he accomplishes the transformation in believers necessary to join the church through his twelve powers. Second, the elements of the vision now more clearly illustrate the issues surrounding soteriology with which Hermas is wrestling. There are stones which sneak into the tower and need to be removed, stones which are properly transformed, and stones which are capable of transformation but have not yet undergone it. Hermas’s visions reflect—as I will explain below—debates in early Christianity over who could be saved. Third, the device of the mountains essentially allows Hermas to define the exact nature of the vices and pitfalls which can keep one from the tower. In the first vision, these remain as terms more open to varied interpretation. Now, however, Hermas offers specific negative examples to explain what he means, examples that appear to be drawn from the experiences of early Christians. Hermas’s second vision, therefore, could be construed as reflecting specific developments in doctrine over time. These differences are either framed as new revelation or manifested themselves in new experiences which Hermas felt compelled to write down and add to the earlier work. Hermas demonstrates an understanding of the difficult place in which this new revelation puts him. In the first vision, the personification of the church explicitly promised “I will reveal everything to you” (11.2). When the Shepherd offers his tower vision, he attempts to account for the apparent reversal of God’s final revelation which had “come to an end” (11.2): I want to explain to you what the holy spirit that spoke with you in the form of the church revealed to you; for that spirit is the Son of God. For since you were too weak in the flesh, it was not explained to you by an angel; but when you were given power by the spirit, and grew strong in your strength, so that you could even see an angel, then the building of the tower was revealed to you through the church. You saw all things well and reverently, as from a young girl [or, virgin]; but now you must see it from an angel, though by the same spirit. Yet you must learn more accurately from me. For it was for this purpose that I was assigned by the glorious angel to live in your house, in order that you might see everything as clearly as possible, with none of the fear you formerly had.9 (78.1–3)

Hermas’s justification for the contradictory visions is difficult to understand. For some reason, a vision mediated by the Shepherd, an angel, is superior to a vision mediated through the spirit of the Son of God and this has something to do with the strength of his faith. The implication appears to be that God gave one vision at one time and another at another time as an act of accommodation to the spiritual condition of Hermas. In other words, the first vision was not the totality of truth, but the truth which Hermas was capable of receiving at that time.

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USING A MODERN GENRE TO EXPLORE AN ANCIENT TEXT While the specific changes are interesting, the larger metanarrative is in focus here. The Shepherd of Hermas, though received as scripture by some early Christians, comes down to us now, I propose, not simply as a piece of theological literature but also as a piece of art. We should not, of course, abandon the historical categories of genre like “Apocalypse,” but it is equally appropriate to explore the Shepherd through literary categories reflecting artistic expression over time. Thinking about the genre of the Shepherd in relation to modern composition, an obvious contender emerges: fantasy. While we tend to think of fantasy as at least a semi-modern phenomenon, the reality is that secondary-world fantasy is ancient. Describing the Shepherd as a fantasy does not require any condescension on the part of the modern reader. After all, the category of “myth” is, for many scholars, more about how a story functions for a group of people than it is a question of historicity. In J. R. R. Tolkien’s famous lecture-turned-essay “On Fairy Stories” (2014), he defines the genre of fantasy as being marked in large part by the construction of a secondary world, or in Tolkien’s technical vocabulary “Sub-creation.”10 A fantasy is a story that takes us out of our own world and into another, but this secondary world also fundamentally reflects our own. The secondary world created by the author of fantasy serves, according to Tolkien, as a path for “recovery, escape, and consolation.” “Recovery” refers to the recovery of understanding about the world as it is, that is, proper recognition of the human experience through the tool of a secondary world (2014, 83–84). At the same time, “escape” offers a way out, at least temporarily, from the thing now seen clearly, a thing that is often monstrous. Tolkien reacts harshly to the critics’ condescending descriptions of “escapism” in fantasy, which overlook the utility and good of “escape” as he defines it (2014, 85–88, 95–96). The point of Tolkien’s escape is not to become blind to the truths of “recovery” through mere escapism, but rather to understand the deleterious effects of the things now seen and combat them with the power of imagination, that is, with the power to imagine a world put to right. “Consolation” is the ultimate restoration of justice and goodness in the world of the story. To imagine such things can be its own mercy in our world which often lacks justice, but it can also be, according to Tolkien, a sort of allegiance to hope (2014, 98–101). In pursuing this consolation, the fantasist’s new creation becomes a canvas on which the deepest desires of humanity play out (Tolkien 2014, 16–17, 97–98). Desires like the vindication of good and the conquest of mortality are reified in the unreal. As Tolkien presents it, fantasy is an intoxicating paradox where the sub-creator creates the otherworldly in order to reflect more clearly the reality of our existence. Fantasy takes us out of this world to tell us

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something about it and about us. An apocalypse, though not a work of fiction like our modern fantasies, does much the same thing. These texts are fundamentally about an otherworldly journey in which the seer is taken to another reality which mirrors and explains our own. Tolkien argued, moreover, that the category of fantasy is more expansive than our normal fictional bounds might suggest, proposing the Gospels as successful fairy stories (2014, 104). The secondary world of the apocalyptic vision, the unseen spiritual realm, has much in common with the land of the Fae. In both, the journeyer travels to a land that seems to exist atop our own, to which the rules of our world do not apply, and in which knowledge is gained. If we accept Tolkien’s argument that what drives these unreal worlds are our very real yearnings, then it is not difficult to see what yearnings drive the Shepherd of Hermas if we read it as an ancient Christian fantasy. An apocalypse in the Jewish and Christian traditions is a cry for God’s justice to enter the world, for God to be present in a tangible way when this presence is not felt.11 More basic than this desire, however, is the desire for knowledge, for understanding of God’s role in reality even when it is not apparent. The apocalyptic journey reveals the fundamental unreality of the perceived real by transporting the seer to the perceived unreal where true reality is found. This transmission of knowledge about the things that were, the things that are, and the things that will be, I would argue, is the fundamental desire driving the apocalyptic fantasy. In the Shepherd of Hermas, this thirst for knowledge is manifested in the form of a thorny question for the earliest Christian communities: what do we do with those who sin after receiving baptism? (Osiek 1999, 28–30). My concern here is not so much with this question per se, but Hermas’s pursuit of an answer. Hermas does not find a solution for this question in an earthly text but in a vision from God. The personified church, in the form of an old woman, describes herself as a tower built by angels and, in this encounter, imparts the precious knowledge that forgiveness is possible. Yet, as we saw above, Hermas reenters the secondary world later and this time finds a new guide, the angelic shepherd, who abrogates the testimony of the church herself, both embellishing and contradicting it. This unseen world, then, presents us with a visible problem: is revelation a reliable form of knowledge? Or, to put it another way, can revelation satisfy the yearning for knowledge when one considers the possibility that this revelation might, in fact, be conditional? BECOMING THE PANOPTICON: SEEING WITHOUT SEEING IN THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF YOU While our ancient fantasy, the Shepherd, reflects the apocalyptic longing for knowledge, the human desire to know and know with certainty transcends

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time and genre. Black Mirror’s The Entire History of You is not fantasy by our definition above. It does not take us into a secondary world where the supernatural becomes natural, but it does take us into a secondary version of the world in which we live today. Science fiction shares with fantasy the fundamental property of being a reflection.12 While fantasy shows us a world that could not be to tell us something about what is, science fiction shows us the possible to tell us something about the real. Science fiction has often been used to create an intellectual distance between the reader and the story that allows the story to poke at the social problems confronting the reader’s and author’s present. In the process, these confronting stories often reveal our unspoken, deep-seated hopes and yearnings (see Russ 1975; Suvin 1972, 381). Science fiction and fantasy, then, are reflections of each other in the way they reflect our world. In science fiction, however, it is not the supernatural which grants our yearnings but humanity itself through its use of technology. Hope is built on the manifestations of our cleverness rather than the manifestations of spirits, the deus is the machina. Some critics have pointed out the similarities between the technological visions of renewed futures and the spiritual hopes for a transformed existence.13 This form of secular eschatology arguably finds its clearest proponents in the transhumanism movement, which—broadly speaking—views technology as a means to propel the evolution of the human race beyond what is possible now through whatever means science makes available (Cole-Turner 2011, 10–14). The transhumanist speculates about what humanity will look like when we can edit our own DNA or augment our bodies with machines. Given the pace of technological development, it is not that difficult to imagine a society where we are all, in essence, mutants, cyborgs, or both. Transhumanism is driven, in part, by the recognition of our many human frailties and the problems that they cause. The Entire History of You is an exploration of what would happen when one of these, our imperfect memories, is taken away by the implantation of a cybernetic recording device called the Grain. If transhumanist eschatology makes technology the harbinger of hope, the dystopian science fiction of Black Mirror offers prophecies of a darker nature instead. In this sense, The Entire History of You is something of a parable about getting what we want, which is a theme throughout Black Mirror. Memory and Its Uses Most of us have had the unpleasant experience of remembering just enough about a moment to sense how incomplete our memory of it is, but the unreliability of our memories rattles more than our sense of self. Our legal system,

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the modernist project of history, and even our daily interactions with others are built on our collective agreement that “what really happened” is something accessible to us. The Entire History of You imagines a world where we can relive every fleeting moment via the technology of the Grain, which establishes facts and serves as an unimpeachable arbiter of truth. We can, of course, imagine the positives in such a scenario. The central couple of the story, Liam and Ffion Foxwell (Toby Kebbell and Jodie Whittaker), use the Grain in both benign and detrimental ways. Liam uses the Grain to recall names of casual acquaintances to avoid embarrassment, for example, but the Grain also accentuates conflicts between Liam and Ffion by allowing them a perfect recall of every conversation they have ever had, dredging up moments from years of relationship to use as cudgels and taunting one another with their cruelest outbursts. Memory in such a society becomes inescapable and oppressive. Everyone is always recording everyone else and, thus, everyone is a jailer in the panopticon of “what really happened.” Fundamental to the integration of the Grain in society is the erosion of trust.14 Trust is a lived confidence that exists in place of absolute certainty, but where perceived certainty exists there is no need for it. Liam is repeatedly subjected to intrusion, accepting as normal the indignity of having his recorded memories scanned by employers and security workers at the airport using computational analysis to assess his worthiness, whether to work or to fly on an airplane. In this way, the Grain reifies the power of social norms to constrict and shape society, making everyone instruments of their own subjugation. Liam takes the absence of trust as normal and subjects all the people in his life to the same as far as he is able. Indeed, the unraveling of his life begins with a seed of distrust sown when he noticed a tension between his wife Ffion and a guest at a dinner party they were attending. When Liam discovers that the guest is an ex-lover of Ffion and that she had hidden the extent of their relationship, he begins to obsessively search his memory for clues, wondering if there is more that Ffion is not telling him. He presses others, even upon pain of violence, to show him their Grain recordings, which in his mind promise the relief of knowing. Liam systematically dismantles his life in the pursuit of the real, descending into a hell of obsession that has him scouring the same footage again and again and again. Liam’s devotion to his jealously is rewarded with the discovery of Ffion’s darkest secret. In a period of turbulence and uncertainty in her relationship with Liam, she placed herself back in the arms of her old lover. Having proven he was not mad to suspect her, Liam embraces his jealousy as reality. He begins to suspect that the infant he shares with Ffion, the child he adores, is not his own. Ffion flatly denies this untruth, but there is no way, in a Grainbased system of truth, for Liam to accept this. Liam is left, unable to embrace either the ambiguity of memory or his role in contending with it. We are left,

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in the end, with Liam sitting alone in a dark and dirty home, contemplating how much he has lost and how far he has fallen as he watches memories on a loop. He quietly gets up, walks to a bathroom, seizes a razor blade, and begins to cut the Grain from his body. In a later episode of Black Mirror called Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3), we see how even a very primitive version of memory retrieval technology creates similar concerns. Police and some designated private persons operate a device called a Recaller which is capable of visualizing and recording memories as people access them. The story follows Mia Nolan (Adrea Riseborough), a successful architect who has a terrible secret. Fifteen years prior she helped her former boyfriend dispose of the body of a cyclist he killed while driving under the influence. When her ex shares his plan to anonymously confess and give the man’s grieving widow closure, Mia panics and kills him. Collecting herself, Mia prepares an alibi and a means of disposing of the body, but her scheme is thwarted by her chance witness of an accident on the street. An insurance adjuster, Shazia Akhand (Kiran Sonia Sawar), is tasked with investigating the accident, setting her down a path that will lead her to Mia. Unlike The Entire History of You, Crocodile takes as a given the subjectivity of memory, building it into a key plot point. Shazia can transform the memories of witnesses simply by telling them that they remembered something incorrectly. Since no one’s memory is truly reliable, Shazia seeks to acquire as many perspectives as possible to “crowd source” what really happened. While most are willing to help, allowing oneself to be subjected to the Recaller is mandated by law and enforced by the police. Shazia uses the recalled memories and facial recognition technology to track down witnesses, quickly finding her way to Mia who was seen glancing out a window down at the accident. Mia’s compulsory memory retrieval inevitably leads to the dark revelation of her crime and then the murder of Shazia, Shazia’s husband, and—because of her fear of the Recaller’s power—Shazia’s infant son. The oppressive power of memories, extracted and recorded, upends Mia’s conception of herself, preventing her from locking the horrors away in her mind and leading her into ever deeper darkness. DARK SCANNERS AND DIM DIVINATIONS: THE AGONIES OF KNOWLEDGE AND ITS ABSENCE The Entire History of You demonstrates a crisis we are already living with today. Our societies are structured around the notion that reality is external to us, objective, and self-interpreting. Things happen or they do not. This is indisputable and not disputed here. What is at stake is less the existence of

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factual externalities and more the question of our access to them. That might seem strange to say, but Liam’s experience as a flawed interpreter of these perfect memories is already paralleled in our society. With the widespread adoption of police body cameras, we are increasingly being subjected to highquality video recordings of police killing unarmed black men. These presumably objective records of events are placed into the public sphere where this public is frequently at odds about the meaning and significance of them. The crisis we face, then, is an epistemological one. We increasingly resort to external media to act as extensions of our own limited faculties—body cameras are, in essence, a form of unintrusive memory augmentation—and because these media are external to us, we feel they can correct some of our observational failings. Human memory is imprecise, and live interpretation of visual data in the brain can be skewed by expectation or distortion (e.g., pareidolia). Providing a record which can account for lost details or colorblindness, however, does not free us from the need to interpret that record. Philosophers have long discussed the barriers to using observation as a basis for knowledge, pointing out how our inferences from observations are essentially circular, asking how we can know our sensory organs are reliable, or even demonstrating how difficult it is to even define the word “knowledge” in relation to real experience.15 If, however, we take revelation as our starting point, we do not solve these problems so much as trade them for different ones. Prophetic texts speak with exacting certitude about the endurance of God’s word, but the tradition records much abrogation. Daniel, for example, recalculates the days of deliverance promised by Jeremiah (Daniel 9) and Isaiah’s literal son is later remembered as the promised Son of God (Isaiah 7). Such discrepancies are by no means a surprise to theologians who have often crafted thoughtful reflections on them. Explanations like “progressive revelation,” while perhaps useful for their purposes, do not eliminate the central question of the relationship between revelation and knowledge. Hermas’s two visions of the tower serve as an acute example of this problem of abrogation or, perhaps more fairly, of the potential conditionality of all revelation. Taking divine revelation as a fixed point upon which to build all knowledge focuses all trust in God on a moment or set of moments. This sort of certainty demands no enduring pneumatological relationship or trust, and, I would argue, is often antithetical to it. Maintaining such certitude, as Hermas so amply demonstrates, necessitates the discounting of one revelation or another when they are in conflict, but for the broader scriptural tradition, neither Jews nor Christians have generally found this a compelling option.16 I would propose, then, that our ancient fantasy and our modern science fiction tale are united by the common struggle to ground knowing in some

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unimpeachable reality. The seer and the cyborg hope to take hold of the real by appealing to something outside themselves, whether it be the divine through revelation or the past through technology. Like these characters, longing for certainty animates our theological and social behaviors. Christians both ancient and modern appeal to the miracle of inspiration, whether an ancient miracle associated with a specific text or an ongoing miracle within a given community, to provide the basis for some assured belief. Socially, we have structured much of our society on creating unimpeachable documentation of every aspect of our lives. This can be as simple as our obsession with photographically capturing ourselves and as complex as the techno-bureaucracy essential to government tax systems. These stories reflect the difficulty of finding a singular grounding for knowledge by demonstrating the elusiveness of surety. In particular, the Shepherd of Hermas and The Entire History of You are united by their use of repetition, though different sorts, to reify the knowledge they believe is within grasp. The author of the Shepherd, it must be noted, does not claim to offer details he simply left out before. He claims to have the vision again, offering what is essentially a new (re)vision. Did the first vision serve any purpose or fulfill in any real way the desire for longing? If the grounding of knowledge is revelation, which revelation is true? The (re) visions of Liam are neither the same nor so dramatic. They are not repetitions of the events themselves as much as reexperiences through perfect recall, but they are transformative, nonetheless. Every replay offers the chance to detect new details which were captured by his sensory organs but not noticed by his brain. Liam, thus, revises his perception of his own experiences endlessly. If the grounding of knowledge is experience, which experience is real? These two texts, I would argue, reflect an enduring human desire to know. While one is hopeful that revelation can satisfy this desire and one is skeptical that technology can do so, both arguably illustrate problems with foundationalist epistemology, the idea that knowledge can and must be grounded on a singular, unimpeachable foundation. When we, as is commonly done today with or without realizing, make empiricism the foundation of knowledge, we encounter the same problem we do when we place the divine at the starting point. When a set of facts are placed before us, they must still be processed, understood, arranged, and narrativized. Taken together, we must decide what data actually means. We must engage in signification. We must choose which pieces of the data to elevate from all the descriptions we might give of an event and we must choose how to link those events into a string that conveys some sense of meaning. The same is true with our reception of supposed revelation. The texts we

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receive are not self-interpreting. They must still be encountered, understood, and narrativized. We must necessarily, in other words, engage in meaning production. There are, of course, dangers here. Whether in the empirical or the supernatural, humans have demonstrated themselves to be quite adept at constructing meanings that serve their purposes. Eugenicists and cultists alike will claim that they are merely acknowledging reality, merely following data, though the rest of us look skeptically upon their claims. If we recognize our inescapable roles as meaning-makers, this is not, as some would claim, a declaration of laissez-faire interpretation. Rather, it is an exercise in epistemic humility. Knowledge is something that we must both receive and create. This is unavoidable and not to be lamented. Indeed, the opposite is true, it is a matter of extreme freedom to set aside the need for absolute certainty in all things. The ability to be surprised, to have our paradigms open to alteration means that we are capable of existing in trust with others, whether that means being open to the movement of the Holy Spirit or open to the fraternity of all humanity in its pursuit of truth through exploration of the physical world. To embrace the possibility of spiritual or scientific abrogation is to embrace growth. Whether we speak, then, in the tongues of robots or angels, we are, at least in part, the architects of meaning. We cannot pray or augment such a reality away, but we can embrace it.

NOTES 1. All quotations from Holmes (2007). 2. Whether it is the second, third, or fourth century, the Muratorian Canon’s endorsement of the Apocalypses of John and Peter and downplaying of the Shepherd is, I would argue, a sort of competition between different apocalyptic visions of Christianity. 3. The opening scenes involve an interaction between Hermas and his former owner in Rome. Similar clues throughout the text reveal Hermas to be a manumitted enslaved person who went on to acquire a notable amount of personal wealth through business. 4. Though this terminology of visions, commandments, and parables is used in both the text and paratext of the manuscripts of the Shepherd, it is not always practically clear what the distinction might be. There are, furthermore, extended visionary elements inserted into the nonvision segments. Cf. Brox (1991, 25). 5. While in modern parlance the word “apocalyptic” refers to a story set during or after the end of life as we know it on Earth, the ancient genre of apocalypse—deriving its name from the Greek word for revelation—refers to visionary texts where God via a mediator explains some deeper reality of the world in relation to the future establishment of a new divine order on Earth.

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6. The Shepard will later describe this personification as the “the spirit of the Son of God” (78.1), but this may be a form of retroactive continuity. 7. The Shepherd of Hermas displays numerous features which point to a composite text. First, the text is divided into three main sections, but the transitions between sections are sometimes awkward. Visions 1–4, for example, have the same narrative structure and style, but Vision 5 introduces a new character, the titular Shepherd, who takes over the mediation of revelation from the personified church. This Shepherd is the guide for Hermas in the following two sections of the text, and this has led many scholars to suppose that Vision 5 is a later supplement meant to accommodate the addition of the Commandments and Parables. This hypothesis is supported by manuscript evidence which shows that Visions 1–4 circulated independently. A similar phenomenon occurs with respect to Parables 9 and 10. These contain some internal inconsistencies with the previous parables and offer some novel stylistic and theological comments. Again, the scholarly hypothesis of a later expansion is arguably supported by the manuscript evidence. We are thus left with the basic conclusion that the Shepherd of Hermas as we have it today is a text which began with Visions 1–4, was later expanded with Vision 5, the Commandments and the first eight Parables, and was expanded again with Parables 9–10. There is something like a consensus for this theory of expansion, and many scholars have further proposed that it was the original author who was responsible for the expansion over time. See the discussion in Joly (1986, 15–16); Osiek (1999, 3–4, 8–10); and Brox (1991, 26–28). 8. Arcadia is a mountainous region in the center of the Peloponnesian peninsula. Three important cities—Megalopolis, Mantinea, and Tegee—reside on plains surrounded by mountains, perhaps serving as inspiration for some of the imagery. 9. The Shepherd’s apparent notion that the Holy Spirit is the Son of God is reflected elsewhere in the work, especially in 59.1–8. See the discussion in Osiek (1999, 33–36). 10. The following citations refer to the paragraph numbers supplied by the editors of this edition. Cf. Tolkien (2014, 28–38, 65–70). 11. One can helpfully compare the famous descriptions of Apocalypse in Collins (1979) with his later reflection in Collins (2016). 12. In a seminal essay on the distinctive of science fiction, Darko Suvin (1972) described the fundamental quality of science fiction as “estrangement” combined with “cognition.” The world of science fiction is secondary to ours in the sense that it must be fundamentally different in some way, but still rooted in ours by the use of logical extrapolation from the rules that govern our existence. See also Lem (1973). 13. These critical reactions span quite a number of viewpoints. Compare Burdett (2011); Waters (2011); and Estes (2019). 14. See similar comments in Balke and Engelen (2020, 30–31). I am grateful to the editors for bringing this essay to my attention.

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15. These problems extend to the very definition of “knowledge” itself. In a famous essay, Gettier (1963) demonstrated how slight misperceptions could allow one to have a belief that was both true and justified but still not knowledge. 16. One could argue that the heresy of Marcion was an attempt at epistemological consistency.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Balke, Gregor and Bart Engelen. “The Entire History of You and Knowing Too Much.” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 29–38. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Bingham, D. Jeffrey. “Sense of Scripture in the Second Century: Irenaeus, Scripture, and Noncanonical Christian Texts.” Journal of Religion 97 (2017): 26–55. Brox, Norbert. Der Hirt des Hermas. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1991. Burdett, Michael S. “Contextualizing a Christian Perspective on Transcendence and Human Enhancement.” In Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement, edited by Ronald Cole-Turner, 19–35. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2011. Cole-Turner, Ronald. “The Transhumanist Challenge.” In Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement, edited by Ronald Cole-Turner, 10–14. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2011. Collins, John J. Apocalypse: The Morphology of a Genre. Semeia 14. Missoula: Society of Biblical Literature, 1979. ———. “The Genre Apocalypse Reconsidered.” Zeitschrift für antikes Christentum 20, no. 1 (2016): 21–40. Estes, Douglas. “Sin and the Cyborg: On the (Im) Peccability of the Posthuman.” Bulletin of Ecclesial Theology 6, no. 1 (2019): 69–79. Gettier, Edmund. “Is Justified True Belief Knowledge?” Analysis 23, no. 6 (1963): 121–23. Holmes, Michael W. The Apostolic Fathers: Greek Texts and English Translations. 3rd edition. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007. Joly, Robert. Le Pasteur: Hermas. Paris: Éditions du Cerf, 1986. Kennedy, George A. Progymnasmata: Greek Textbooks of Prose Composition and Rhetoric. Writings from the Greco-Roman World 10. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2003. Lem, Stanislaw. “On the Structural Analysis of Science Fiction.” Science Fiction Studies 1, no. 1 (1973): 26–33. Osiek, Carolyn. Shepherd of Hermas: A Commentary. Hermeneia. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1999.

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Russ, Joanna. “Towards an Aesthetic of Science Fiction.” Science Fiction Studies 2, no. 2 (1975): 112–19. Steenberg, M. C. “Irenaeus on Scripture, Graphe, and the Status of Hermas.” St. Vladimir’s Theological Quarterly 53, no. 1 (2009): 29–66. Suvin, Darko. “On the Poetics of the Science Fiction Genre.” College English 34, no. 3 (1972): 372–82. Tolkien, J. R. R. On Fairy-stories. Edited by Verlyn Flieger and Douglas A. Anderson. London: HarperCollins, 2014. Waters, Brent. “Whose Salvation? Which Eschatology? Transhumanism and Christianity as Contending Salvific Religions.” In Transhumanism and Transcendence: Christian Hope in an Age of Technological Enhancement, edited by Ronald Cole-Turner, 163–75. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2011.

Chapter 11

King David and the White Bear Justice Park Rachelle Gilmour

White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2) begins with a young woman, Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow), waking in a room, with a symbol shaped like an upside-down tuning fork flashing on the TV screen. Victoria leaves her room and goes outside to explore, struggling with her blank memory and wondering why onlookers with mobile phones say nothing. Soon Victoria is attacked: she is chased by a gunman, through the streets and at a service station. Eventually, she is aided by strangers Jem (Tuppence Middleton) and Baxter (Michael Smiley), but still the onlookers and their mobile phones are everywhere. Baxter takes Jem and Victoria to secluded woods, but there he turns upon them, terrorizing Victoria with the threat of crucifixion, until Jem and Victoria escape. They team together to attack a transmitter tower but when they arrive, all is revealed: this ordeal is an elaborate punishment upon Victoria. She is in White Bear Justice Park, suffering punishment for filming while her fiancé murdered a young girl, Jemima. Her mind is erased each successive day and she relives this punishment under the gaze of spectators. In 2 Samuel 11, King David is walking on the roof of his house and sees Bathsheba, wife of Uriah the Hittite, bathing. David sends messengers to “get her,” and, at least according to a modern definition, rapes her.1 After she falls pregnant, and Uriah foils David’s plans for Uriah to assume paternity, David commands his general Joab to place Uriah in the front lines of battle so that he is killed. In 2 Samuel 12, the prophet Nathan comes to David with an oracle of divine punishment. David’s newborn son dies and the ensuing chapters chronicle family strife and civil war in the house of David. These two “texts,” White Bear and 2 Samuel, have arisen out of vastly different time periods, social locations, and ideological presuppositions, and draw on different genre categories. The White Bear screenwriter, Charlie Brooker, says of the Black Mirror series, “it always comes from a what-if 179

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idea” (Duca 2015). The White Bear episode features technology already available, with the exception perhaps of the accuracy of the mind-erasing drug administered each day to Victoria. Nevertheless, the episode is a dystopia, projecting a critique of current trends of voyeurism and revenge onto a not-yet-realized future (Gilmour 2019). By contrast, the story of King David is a narrative of “what was,” ancient Israel’s historiography defined in the broadest sense as an interpretation of the past (Gilmour 2011). Yet, historiography and dystopia have much in common, each drawing on elements and concerns of the present in the portrayal of past or future. Charlie Brooker also describes his vision for the Black Mirror series in this way: “I want to actively unsettle people” (Duca 2015). Both Black Mirror and 2 Samuel unsettle the audience, but 2 Samuel also follows that unsettling with reassurance. Israel’s great king, the father of the enduring dynasty in the Southern Kingdom of Judah has sinned greatly, the details of which are omitted in the parallel account in the book of Chronicles. However, the overall project in 2 Samuel is one of stabilization for national identity under a power structure of Davidic monarchy in Judah. There is reassurance of divine commitment to David, and by extension the Davidic dynasty, alongside the unsettling portrait of a hero of the past. Neither narrative, White Bear or 2 Samuel, is consistently overt in their evaluation of characters and events, or explicit in their moralizing. Yet, a reading of White Bear, confirmed by interviews with its makers, suggests that the portrayed program of like-for-like punishment is heavily critiqued. By contrast, retribution in 2 Samuel is instigated by a divine oracle, an indication that the nature and the extent of punishment are justified in the ideology of the text. Keeping these similarities and differences in view, White Bear and 2 Samuel can be read intertextually with two key points of intersection. First, both texts portray punishment that is like-for-like with a crime committed. Second, the motif of an external gaze is central to both stories, transcending three levels: the gaze of the offender over the victim; the gaze of the public over the punished offender; and the gaze of the implied audience on the narrative events and characters. By bringing these narratives into conversation, a theological reading of White Bear emerges, alongside meta-criticism of the reception of the story of David. I conclude with a reflection upon the power relations within both texts, where differences in gender and race dynamics point to the possibilities, and dangers, of technology. LIKE-FOR-LIKE PUNISHMENT IN WHITE BEAR AND THE BOOK OF SAMUEL The central structuring element in White Bear is the punishment that is likefor-like with the crime of Victoria. In the final reveal scene, where Victoria’s

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punishment is explained by a reporter, he relates that the judge had declared a “proportionate and considered” punishment upon her (see Simpson and Lay 2020). With the exception of the death penalty for murder in some criminal justice systems, retribution in a modern context rarely resembles the crime committed.2 Yet, the mimicry between punishment and crime, or “poetic justice,” highlights the proportionality and retributive nature of a punishment that is “deserved” by the crime.3 Victoria is accused, confesses, and is convicted of filming the murder of a young girl, Jemima (Imani Jackman), on her mobile phone. Although Victoria’s fiancé is the primary aggressor against Jemima, the chants of onlookers to Victoria’s punishment, “murderer, murderer,” suggests complicity in murder is considered equivalent to murder itself. Just as Victoria watched this brutal violence mediated through a mobile phone, now violence against her own person will be watched through the mobile phones of hundreds of spectators at White Bear Justice Park. Many details in the scenes of Victoria pursued by attackers emphasize the poetic justice. For example, in dialog between Jem and Victoria, during their escape from Victoria’s attackers, Jem explains: Like, almost everybody just became onlookers, started watching, filming stuff, like spectators who don’t give a shit about what happens.

Victoria supposedly did not care what happened to her victim Jemima, and now the spectators do not care what happens to her. There is irony in how Jem continues, “But not us. Some of us weren’t affected.” The identity of Jemima’s killer is Victoria’s fiancé, Ian Rannoch (Nick Ofield), and the enigmatic symbol resembling a tuning fork displayed on the TV screens is taken from a tattoo on his neck. In her trial, Victoria claims that, “her fiancé had pressured her into helping him, maintaining she was ‘under his spell.’” So also the people around her claim to be under the spell of the symbol on their screens. As is revealed in the closing credits, Baxter’s instructions to them were: “No talking . . . What we’re trying to do is get her to believe that yous are all mesmerized . . . she’s believed it up to now.” A further parallel between crime and punishment is developed in the scenes where Jem seemingly offers help to Victoria as they flee the service station, and later plan to destroy the transmitter. Jem reassures Victoria, taking her under her wing, as they drive together in the van, and these scenes are cut with flashbacks to Victoria in the car with Jemima and Ian. Victoria similarly reassures Jemima: Lie down for me, darling. Go on. It’s a game. Yeah, just like what teddy does. Lie down for me, darling.

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These parallels are again sprinkled with irony. Victoria has falsely gained trust from “Jemima,” and now the name of the woman who leads her is “Jem.” Throughout the episode, Victoria suffers memory erasure, retrieving only snippets of memory, and she does not know about her own crime (Cf. Cigüela and Martínez-Lucen 2016). She has in her possession a photo of Jemima, and speculates that Jemima also may be her daughter. The flashback scenes suggest that Jemima did not know what was happening to her when she was abducted, and that she trusted Victoria like a mother. The parallels between crime and punishment structure the episode, but there are also elements of amplification in the consequences for Victoria. Jemima was filmed by one person, Victoria is filmed by countless; Jemima endures these horrors once, Victoria endures them day after day; Jemima’s life is taken once, Victoria’s life is, in a sense, taken from her repeatedly when her memory is erased. Yet, the judge has decreed a punishment that is “proportionate.” As we turn to the narrative in 2 Samuel, a similar feature of amplification can be identified, which will suggest a logic for why the multiplication of punishments might be considered proportional. Turning now to the punishment of King David in 2 Samuel, parallels between crime and punishment are emphasized in the prophetic oracle of Nathan to David in 2 Samuel 12. Nathan declares that David has “struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword” (2 Sam 12.9) and now “the sword shall not depart from your house forever” (2 Sam 12.10); David has “done evil in the eyes of [the lord]” (2 Sam 12.9) and now God will “raise up evil” against him (2 Sam 12.11); David has “taken the wife of Uriah the Hittite” (2 Sam 12.10) and now God will “take [David’s] wives” (2 Sam 12.11).4 The oracle is fulfilled in the ensuing narrative: David will lose a newborn son through divinely inflicted illness, and his sons Amnon and Absalom will die through violence; his daughter Tamar will be raped by Amnon (2 Sam 13), constituting great evil; and his ten concubines will be raped by Absalom (2 Sam 16.20–22). Moreover, on close analysis, Nathan accuses David more explicitly of “despising God” as his primary sin, not taking another man’s wife or murder.5 That David has “despised” God is repeated in verses 9 and 10, and then later in verse 14 it says that he has “utterly scorned the [enemies of] lord.” David Janzen has shown that these terms are both related to failing to recognize God’s power and treating him as “nothing” or insignificant (Janzen 2012, 216–17). Nathan also enumerates what God has done for David that David now despises in 2 Samuel 12.7–8: I anointed you king over Israel, and I rescued you from the hand of Saul; I gave you your master’s house, and your master’s wives into your bosom, and gave you the house of Israel and of Judah; and if that had been too little, I would have added as much more. (NRSV)

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David is fundamentally condemned for “taking,” when God has already given him everything, and thus treating God as nothing. There is symmetry too between what David has despised, and his punishment: his kingship will be taken by his son Absalom, who declares himself king from Hebron (2 Sam 15.10); David will leave Jerusalem and thus lose his house to Absalom (2 Sam 16.15); his concubines will be taken by Absalom (2 Sam 16.20–22); the unity David has brought to the houses of Israel and Judah will be threatened by rebellion of Israel (2 Sam 20). David has “taken” beyond what God has given him, and now everything that God gave him will, in turn, be taken by another. David has treated God as nothing and now David temporarily becomes nothing. There is an amplification of David’s punishment, similar to that of Victoria. David has taken one woman, but ten of his wives are raped. David has taken the life of one man, Uriah, but three of his sons die. Attention to the opening of Nathan’s oracle, a parable of a rich and poor man, and David’s judgment in response, illuminates the logic of this amplification. Nathan opens the oracle with the story of a rich man, who takes a ewe lamb for a poor man to give to his guest, a wayfarer. The lamb is like “a daughter” (bath; 2 Sam 12.3) to the poor man, a play on Bathsheba’s name (Bath-sheba; lit: “Daughter of Sheba”). Uriel Simon influentially classified the story as a “judicial parable”: a realistic story about a legal violation told to someone in the hope that they do not detect the parallels and pass judgment on themselves (Simon 1967). A judicial setting is also implied in 2 Samuel 12.1 in one of the Greek witnesses to the Hebrew text of 2 Samuel (cf. LXXL), where Nathan introduces the story with the words, “Pass judgement in this case for me” (McCarter 1984, 294). The parable invites David to pass judgement in verse 5, “As the lord lives, the man who has done this is a son of death; he shall restore the lamb fourfold, because he did this thing and because he had no pity.” The multiplication “fourfold” for stealing a sheep is found in Exodus 21.37 in close proximity to the principle “eye for eye” in Exodus 21.24–25 for bodily damage, and the same tradition may lie behind David’s judgement. Moreover, the status of the one who takes as a “rich” man is also significant for the multiplication of his repayment, as indeed David’s abuse of power is at the forefront of the formulation of his crime in the parable. So also, there is a power inequality between Jemima and Victoria. Victoria mistakes Jemima as her daughter in the photo (a poetic intersection with the lamb “like a daughter” in 2 Sam 12.3), highlighting the inequality. With this reading, the critique in White Bear is not only of extremes such as complicity in torture (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 130). The amplification of Victoria’s punishment is in line with the proportional disparity of power between her and her victim. In this reading, the episode critiques a principle of Lex Talionis within a justice system, and the horrors of truly matching punishment to crime when disparity of power is taken into account.

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Retribution Reconsidered An intertextual reading of White Bear and 2 Samuel invites analysis of whether the White Bear critique of like-for-like punishment should be applied to the biblical text. Retributive systems of thought are often traced to biblical origins, the idiom “eye for an eye” taken from Exodus 21.24 pointing to the close link (Simpson and Lay 2020, 52). The direct divine violence against David’s newborn child in 2 Samuel 12.15 is perhaps the most morally alarming aspect of David’s punishment, and it cannot be accounted for easily, or adequately (see Gilmour 2021). However, I propose that, on the whole, the role of God in 2 Samuel is not condemned in a reading alongside White Bear, even if like-for-like punishment is; and the formulation for retribution in 2 Samuel goes beyond that of White Bear, offering something of an answer to its critique.

Judging God? God is the instigator of David’s punishment in 2 Samuel, much as the anonymous judge of the news report in White Bear. Within the episode, the judge features only momentarily, with an indirect quote that appears reasonable: the punishment should be “proportionate and considered.” In other words, the judge and, by extension, God, is not the target of critique in White Bear. The biblical text also points to such an interpretation, through the framing of Nathan’s oracle as a judicial parable. In fact, it is not God who declares that David must repay fourfold, but David himself. Immanuel Kant points to a similar dynamic in retribution where the offender, not the judge, in a sense dictates the punishment. The duty of the judge, on behalf of the community, is to carry out what the offender’s own actions demand, a fulfilling of the offender’s autonomous choice to commit a crime that produces punishment (2017 [1797], 6:331). Aligning with this formulation, David declares his own sentence through the parable, and Victoria is portrayed as having determined her own fate when she is told she should “enjoy” rewatching the video of Jemima’s murder as her autonomous choice. The horrors of like-for-like punishment are critiqued, but not the judge who declares the sentence. This tension is made possible by targeting the critique at the onlookers and actors who carry out Victoria’s punishment, and at Amnon and Absalom who carry out the strife, rape, and murder within David’s house. The injunction for the onlookers at White Bear Justice Park “to enjoy” falls under the structure of like-for-like punishment: the judge also says to Victoria, “You were an enthusiastic spectator to Jemima’s suffering. You actively revelled in her anguish.” Yet, in the theological formulation of both White Bear

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and 2 Samuel, the decree by the judge does not, therefore, lessen the moral responsibility of the onlookers, delighting in Victoria’s pain, or Amnon and Absalom, wreaking destruction in David’s house (Avioz 2013). That the focus in both narratives is upon third-party actors carrying out violence against the subject is highlighted by a curious parallel in the development of both “texts.” Nathan’s oracle in 2 Samuel 12.1–15 is commonly thought to be a later addition to the narrative of 2 Samuel, secondarily interpreting the strife in the house of David as a direct, prophetically foretold, result of his sin (see Dietrich 2007, 235). Similarly, the ending to White Bear, explaining the violence against Victoria as punishment for her crime, was a late change in the script. The idea occurred to writer Charlie Brooker only when he saw the perimeter fence around the set location that the team was set to film in, realizing that the twist made for a more interesting episode (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 123). The narratives were initially composed to describe the abuses by the onlookers, or David’s sons, and this focus carries through to the final products. Retribution as “Payback” Another crucial difference between 2 Samuel and White Bear suggests David’s punishment is properly retribution, but Victoria’s punishment is not. Alongside proportionality,6 the key component in the definition of retribution is that it is “backward looking,” a “payback” for transgression as indeed the etymology of the word from “repayment” suggests.7 The concept of payback is found both within the story of 2 Samuel, and the broader biblicaltheological context, but not in the market-driven formulation of punishment in White Bear. In 2 Samuel 12, David confesses to Nathan “I have sinned against the lord” and Nathan replies, “Also, the lord has removed your sin; you will not die.” The removal of sin is commonly interpreted as forgiveness, especially in light of the fact that David will not die (e.g., Lam 2016, 73–74); but if David is “forgiven,” then why do all of the declared punishments still take place? Closer analysis suggests that “forgiveness” here is not the removal of punishment, but rather the possibility of restoration and “completion” paying back his punishment (see Boda 2009, for a similar argument). Joseph Lam argues that underlying 2 Samuel is a metaphor of sin as a debt (2016, 87–155, especially 88–89). In the Hebrew Bible, the debt is repaid from God to the offender. This is contrary to the notion of sin, found in other ancient Jewish literature including select parts of the Bible, and in Kantian retribution, that the debt is repaid by the offender. That God repays good for good and evil for evil is expressed in a number of texts in the book of Samuel: for example, 1 Samuel 24.19 “So may the lord repay good for what you have

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done for me this day”; and in 2 Samuel 3.39, “May the lord repay the one who does evil according to his evil.” Somewhat confusingly, David declares in his punishment that the rich man should “repay” the poor man in 2 Samuel 12.6. This is a wordplay, emphasizing that God will repay David’s evil for the evil he has done. Within the narrative of 2 Samuel, David’s restoration is realized, and at a crucial point when all has been taken from him and the punishments carried out, he finds favor with God. When David leaves Jerusalem in 2 Samuel 15.25, he says, “if I find favour in the eyes of the lord, he will bring me back,” and in 2 Samuel 15.31, David prays, “O lord, I pray you, turn the counsel of Ahithophel into foolishness.” In a scene in 2 Samuel 16–17, Absalom is offered the advice of the counselor Ahithophel. His first advice is to rape the concubines, which Absalom immediately acts upon. However, the second advice, regarding the battle with David, Absalom rejects in favor of the advice of Hushai. In 2 Samuel 17.14, the narrator authoritatively reports, “the lord had commanded to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel.” Subsequently, David defeats Absalom in battle and returns to his throne in Jerusalem. The restoration of David is in sharp contrast to the judgment on his predecessor King Saul in 1 Samuel. Saul also sins in 1 Samuel 15, and asks for forgiveness (1 Sam 15.25), but forgiveness is not granted. Instead, Saul becomes God’s enemy (1 Sam 28.16), descending into madness, and ultimately committing suicide after being wounded in battle (1 Sam 31.4). The explicit punishments directed against Saul over the course of 1 Samuel are not as grave as those against David, but the lack of possibility for “repayment” of his debt keeps Saul as an enemy without hope of restoration. Saul is remembered as the great tragic king, even though only David loses his throne in his own lifetime; David’s sin is repaid but Saul’s sin is not. The contrast between King David and Victoria Skillane is palpable and the key digression from retribution in White Bear is that there is no possibility of completion for Victoria’s punishment. I have argued that the repetitive nature of Victoria’s punishment can be considered proportionate, and so too can the enjoyment of onlookers. Even repetition of the punishment against Victoria every day for the rest of her life might be considered retribution: at the completion, her debt has at least been repaid, even if her restoration is a matter of fact rather than something she will be alive to experience. Instead, in White Bear, the repetition of her punishment is now dependent upon the market. A sign outside of the park says, “bookings essential,” pointing to the dependence of her punishment upon consumer demand. The concept that all of this takes place in a theme “park” also emphasizes that the judge’s sentence that her punishment be “considered” has been eclipsed by a supply and demand logic. Victoria is like Saul: she has become an enemy, and so

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prefers to take her own life in repeated suicide attempts than have a sin that can never be repaid. An indirect allusion to this logic can be found in the news reports of Victoria’s fiancé, Ian Rannoch. The newsreader says, “By hanging himself in his cell, many believe Ian Rannoch evaded justice.” The implication is, presumably, that the public has been denied their opportunity to carry out justice. However, as Martha Nussbaum argues in a critique of retribution, justice does not make anyone, especially the victim or those close to the victim, feel better (2016, 24). Instead, justice has not been served for Ian Rannoch himself, unable now to repay his debt. And yet, Victoria is also not offered an opportunity of justice, of finding completion and repayment of the crime she has committed. The narratives in White Bear and 2 Samuel both portray like-for-like punishment of crimes committed. And yet the critique in White Bear of such punishment cannot be wholly applied to 2 Samuel. There is a paradox that the enjoyment and passivity of actors and onlookers in White Bear, and the rape and murder by Amnon and Absalom in 2 Samuel are simultaneously like-for-like punishment declared by a judge, and morally culpable actions. The onlookers are at the center of critique, not the (divine) judge. Moreover, 2 Samuel goes beyond White Bear to portray a means of repayment for the sin of David, where punishment can be completed and David restored. This sharpens an interpretation of the target of critique in White Bear further, highlighting the problematic ideology where punishment does not repay sin, but is handed over to the market. THE EXTERNAL GAZE Another point of intersection between these narratives is the motif of the external gaze, in particular the abuse of power inherent in such a gaze. Victoria’s gaze on the murder of Jemima is at the forefront of her crime. The motif is developed time and again throughout her ordeal via allusions in the dialogue: in the service station, Victoria is told by Jem, “he can see you, get back”; in the woods Baxter places a balaclava over Victoria’s head and says, “put this on so it covers your eyes.” The voyeurism of onlookers is also central to the episode. Charlie Brooker explains the inspiration for the script was initially on the set of a Zombie series that he was working on—Dead Set (2008). As the lead actor was running down the road chased by zombies, local kids watched and took photos on their phones. Brooker says, “I thought, ‘God, there’s something more frightening about that than what we’re filming’” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 118).

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The critique of these onlookers is conveyed through the evaluation of Victoria looking on the death of Jemima. Victoria did not personally kill Jemima, and yet the repeated chant in the concluding scenes is “murderer, murderer.” The voyeur is as culpable as the actor by this evaluation, a point turned back upon the chanters themselves who are now also gazing upon violence. Brooker describes White Bear as “truly frightening” because “it ultimately pulls out to reveal an insane society” (Duca 2015). However, the 2018 film Bandersnatch makes an allusion to White Bear in such a way that the viewer is also implicated in the critique of White Bear. In an episode where the viewer dictates the characters’ fates, making decisions for them, and directing their course, the symbol of the upside-down tuning fork from Ian Rannoch’s tattoo briefly appears on a computer screen. This allusion suggests that the “insane society” extends to the voyeurism of the viewer; the enjoyment derived from onscreen violence or manipulation as entertainment. A motif of sight also plays a role in the story of David in 2 Samuel. David “sees” Bathsheba bathing when he calls for her and takes her (2 Sam 11.2). Then in Nathan’s oracle to David, God says, “You did it in secret but I will do this thing before all Israel, and before the sun” (2 Sam 12.12). The sin of David contains many elements of concealment: he brings Bathsheba to the inside of his palace (2 Sam 11.4); he attempts to deceive Uriah into assuming paternity for the conceived child (2 Sam 11.6–13); and he sends Uriah with a letter in his hand to Joab with instructions for his own murder (2 Sam 11.14–17). The punishment will not repeat this aspect of David’s sin, now becoming public, and creating a means of shaming David publicly for his actions through seeing. The onlookers (“all Israel”) are not condemned in the Biblical text the way they are in White Bear, but their presence in the narrative is nevertheless noted. However, the sin of David is also made public through its transmission in the text, his sin displayed before the eyes of the text’s audiences. Rather than the White Bear critique extending to Israel within the text, Cheryl Exum has suggested that such a critique should be applied to the narrator of the biblical text, and the text’s subsequent reception. She calls the treatment of Bathsheba in 1 Samuel 11, “rape by the pen” (2016, 136). This is different from actual rape because the damage and the trauma experienced by women in the real world are incomparable. The rape of Bathsheba is continuously replayed in the transmission of the text just as Jemima’s murder is replayed via Victoria’s recording, and Victoria’s punishment is watched by onlookers over and over again. Exum critiques biblical reception: “The story of David and Bathsheba . . . has long held a place in popular imagination both as a tale of unbridled lust and also, curiously, as a famous ‘love story’” (2016, 136). By becoming part of a “love story” in biblical reception,

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Bathsheba has been fetishized as a beautiful seductress. This characterization has taken place despite Bathsheba’s grief at the loss of her husband in 2 Samuel 11.26, and the emphasis in Nathan’s parable that David has abused a position of power (2016, 136). The crime of the voyeur mirrors that of the offender David when Bathsheba is fetishized, in the same way that Victoria is a “murderer” for watching the murder of Jemima. This is not a great, albeit illicit, love story; rather the abuse of power by a king over a woman and her husband. The intertextual reading of White Bear and 2 Samuel raises the necessity for an ethics of reading, even reading a sacred text. The external gaze that consumes violence and abuse of power for entertainment is severely problematized, complicit in the violence portrayed. The external gaze is itself an exercise in power, and so has the potential to mirror David’s gaze on Bathsheba as she bathes. Both “texts,” by virtue of their very production, find justification for such portrayal, but the justification lies in the capacity of the text for critique, not enjoyment. As Brooker says of White Bear: the episode should leave one with a sense of “queasy vertigo” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 130). CONCLUSION: GUILT AND POWER Throughout this analysis, White Bear and 2 Samuel have been interpreted intertextually, exploring the potential for critique of the divine judge, the punishment of David, and the reception of the biblical text. The theme of the abuse of power has recurred in the discussion, in the crimes committed by Victoria and David, and in the external gaze of voyeurs in these narratives. Victoria Skillane is cast as a black woman with a white fiancé in White Bear, a detail that was not deliberate in the scripting of Victoria as guilty of the crimes. According to Brooker, the initial idea was that Victoria was innocent, but there was a shift in the screenplay because, as Brooker says, it “was too complicated . . . trying to tell you two different things at once” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 124). He then adds, “Lenora Crichlow had already been cast as Victoria and read the previous script, so that’s quite a thing to hit someone with: ‘Oh, so now you’re a child murderer. Sorry about that’” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 124). On the one hand, Victoria’s gender and color are fitting for a commentary on technology and exploitation by mass media. Technology can bring about democratization in many forms, demonstrated in White Bear by the prevalence of mobile phones among spectators including children. Near-universal access to certain forms of technology and mass media means that offenses

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related to voyeurism, exploitation, and abuse may also be democratized, committed across relative power divides in society. The king in his palace is no longer the only one with power to gaze upon his victim to abuse her. On the other hand, Victoria’s gender and color bring attention to Victoria’s claim regarding the power her fiancé had over her when committing the crime: “her fiancé had pressured her into helping him, maintaining she was under his spell.” What if there is truth in this claim? If so, there is hidden truth in Jem’s explanation to Victoria, “That’s why you’re on the receiving end, you see. Vulnerable.” The democratization of technology is not complete, and pressures and abuse of power against Victoria in committing the crime are plausible. The retributive punishment of King David was derived precisely because he was the most powerful man in the kingdom and he exploited that power, but as a principle applied more widely, retributive punishment accounts only for the offender’s actions and position of power over the victim, not the privilege or pressures acting upon the offender. From this view, retributive punishment inevitably makes the vulnerable more vulnerable.

NOTES 1. Although not explicit, the abuse of power, and impossibility of Bathsheba’s consent, points to rape. See Koenig (2011, 27–76). 2. For discussion on Lex Talionis, retribution, and the importance of not conflating the two, see Zaibert (2006, 105–7). 3. On poetic justice as retribution in the Hebrew Bible, see Wong (2001), especially 25. 4. All translations are my own, unless specified. 5. The absence of an accusation of murder against David is crucial for understanding why his life is not taken from him in retributive punishment. 6. On proportionality in retribution, see Corlett (2013, 83–115). 7. On retribution as “backward looking” or retrospective, see Fletcher (2010, 515–12).

BIBLIOGRAPHY Avioz, Michael. “Divine Intervention and Human Error in the Absalom Narrative.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 37, no. 3 (2013): 339–47. Boda, Mark J. A Severe Mercy: Sin and Its Remedy in the Old Testament. Siphrut 1. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns, 2009. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018.

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Cigüela, Javier, and Jorge Martínez-Lucen. “Screen Technologies and the Imaginary of Punishment: A Reading of Black Mirror’s ‘White Bear.’” Empedocles: European Journal for the Philosophy of Communication 7, no. 1 (2016): 3–22. Corlett, J. Angelo. Responsibility and Punishment. 4th edition. Dordrecht: Springer, 2013. Dietrich, Walter. The Early Monarchy in Israel the Tenth Century B.C.E. Translated by Joachim Vette. Biblical Encyclopedia / Biblische Enzyklopädie. Atlanta: Society for Biblical Literature, 2007. Duca, Lauren. “Black Mirror Intends to ‘Actively Unsettle’ Audiences, But It’s Not Technology That You Should Fear.” Huffington Post, January 22, 2015. Accessed April 26, 2021. https://www​.huffingtonpost​.com​.au​/entry​/charlie​-brooker​-black​ -mirror​_n​_6508790​?ri18n​=true. Exum, J. Cheryl. Fragmented Women: Feminist (Sub)versions of Biblical Narratives. 2nd edition. London: T&T Clark, 2016. Fletcher, George P. “Punishment and Responsibility.” In A Companion to Philosophy of Law and Legal Theory, Topics and Disciplines, edited by Dennis Patterson, 504–12. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. Gilmour, Rachelle. Representing the Past: A Literary Analysis of Narrative Historiography in the Book of Samuel. Vetus Testamentum Supplements 143. Leiden: Brill, 2011. ———. “Remembering the Future: The Topheth as Dystopia in Jeremiah 7 and 19.” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 44, no. 1 (2019): 64–78. ———. Divine Violence in the Book of Samuel. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021. Janzen, David. “The Condemnation of David’s ‘Taking’ in 2 Samuel 12:1–14.” Journal of Biblical Literature 131, no. 2 (2012): 209–20. Kant, Immanuel. The Metaphysics of Morals. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017 [1797]. Koenig, Sara M. Isn’t This Bathsheba? A Study in Characterization. Princeton Theological Monograph Series 177. Eugene: Pickwick, 2011. Lam, Joseph. Patterns of Sin in the Hebrew Bible: Metaphor, Culture, and the Making of a Religious Concept. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. McCarter, P. Kyle. II Samuel: A New Translation with Introduction, Notes, and Commentary. Anchor Bible 9. Garden City: Doubleday, 1984. Nussbaum, Martha C. Anger and Forgiveness: Resentment, Generosity, Justice. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016. Simon, Uriel. “The Poor Man’s Ewe-Lamb: An Example of a Juridical Parable.” Biblica 48, no. 2 (1967): 207–42. Simpson, Sid with Chris Lay. “White Bear and Criminal Punishment: How Far is too Far?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 50–58. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Wong, Ka Leung. The Idea of Retribution in the Book of Ezekiel. Vetus Testamentum Supplements 87. Leiden: Brill, 2001. Zaibert, Leo. Punishment and Retribution. London: Routledge, 2016.

Chapter 12

Alternate Eyes Perspective Shifting in the Samson Narrative and Black Mirror Brandon M. Hurlbert

Innocence is often a matter of perspective. Knowing who is guilty and who is not will largely depend on whose story is being told. What complicates such judgments is the presence of different stories, that is, multiple perspectives on the same events. In the case of certain episodes of Black Mirror, it is the oscillation between competing perspectives that makes ethical and moral judgments difficult. In White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2), for instance, the viewer is invited to identify first with the main character as she tries to make sense of why people are hunting her. Only later through the shifting of perspective does the viewer understand that everything the protagonist is experiencing is an elaborate punishment for a crime she can’t remember. In Shut Up and Dance (Season 3, Episode 3), certain information is withheld from the viewer, and when it is revealed, it provides a very different and difficult perspective on the plot. Or in Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5), the protagonist along with the viewer begins to see “things” very differently––the enemy might be innocent. This technique of perspective shifting common to these three episodes can also be seen in the Samson narrative in Judges 14–16.1 Similar to the aforementioned episodes, the Samson narrative is concerned with the nature of justice, but the ethical questions are likewise frustrated by the presence of multiple perspectives. By placing these Black Mirror episodes in dialog with the Samson narrative, we can explore this technique of perspective shifting to probe the question of the nature of justice. To begin, we will first explore how the film grammar of the three episodes leads the viewer to adopt multiple competing perspectives.2 Next, we will briefly explore some of the alternative and under-represented ways that Samson has 193

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been interpreted. Following this, we will turn our attention to the events of Judges 14–16 to see how perspective shifting is an integral part to the narrative technique. Finally, I will offer some brief observations about what perspective shifting can reveal about the nature of justice according to Judges. PERSPECTIVE SHIFTING IN BLACK MIRROR It seems reasonable to approach each episode on its own terms, briefly summarizing its plot, and pointing out how perspective shifting operates within the narrative. Already in this volume, Rachelle Gilmour has summarized the White Bear episode and highlighted its major themes in her intertextual reading of 2 Samuel 11. I wish to further explore one of her points, the motif of an external gaze, which I see at work in all three of these episodes. By paying close attention to how the story is being told, that is, from whose perspective do we see the events, we might better understand how perspective shifting also affects the audience’s encounter with the narrative. White Bear The viewer is first led to identify with the protagonist, Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow), as she tries to make sense of the world around her. As she looks for her child, she is hunted by masked people and filmed/watched by a crowd of spectators. Along with Victoria, the viewer feels the horror of not being able to figure out why she is being targeted. Victoria seems like a victim as the world has turned against her. Taking a sudden turn, the narrative reveals that Victoria is not a victim, but a violent criminal. The little girl is not her daughter, but the child she murdered. The hostility Victoria is facing from the community is an elaborate punishment for her crime. With this new information, the viewer sees the scenario from the perspective of the crowd and immediately turns against Victoria, repulsed by her actions. Victoria is not experiencing injustice, she is experiencing a kind of justice. But then, the viewer’s vantage point expands even farther as they discover that Victoria’s punishment is taking place in a “justice park” where she relives these traumatic events every day as part of her sentence. Looking at the scenario from the perspective of the “cast and crew” of the justice park, viewers are left feeling immensely conflicted as to whether this punishment is actually an application of justice, or simply brazen retribution. These shifts in perspective are accomplished mainly by how the episode is filmed. Up until the major plot twist, the viewer is primarily given the perspective of Victoria through numerous shot sequences by which the viewer identifies with the subject. For example, close-up shots of Victoria’s face

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as she awakes in pain cut to a first-person point of view as she looks at her bandaged wrists (and we look with her). Another shot looks over her shoulder into a mirror, showing both Victoria’s gaze and her reflection staring back. The effect is to mimic the real-world experience of looking into a mirror. As she runs from the hunters, Victoria’s point of view fills the shot as she runs past the crowds who ignore her cries. We watch as they gleefully record her manic escape on their cellphones. At various points, Victoria experiences memories or flashbacks which function as false information in the flow of the narrative, causing viewers to believe that the little girl is Victoria’s daughter. What is worth noting is that the viewer alone gains this psychological perspective.3 All of these shots are meant to strengthen the viewer’s identification with the main character. The perspective of both the audience and the camera shifts at the plot twist. As Victoria is strapped to a chair in front of an audience, she learns the reality of who she is. The perspective of the camera subtly shifts between Victoria’s perspective from the chair to the audience’s view of the entire stage. On a screen plays the news coverage of her trial which details Victoria’s and her fiancé’s crime. The viewer watches from both Victoria’s vantage point and as a member of the audience. Here, our allegiance to the protagonist is tested. If viewers still wish to identify with Victoria they must choose to do so in spite of this new knowledge. As Victoria is paraded through the streets, the perspective continually shifts from Victoria looking out at the crowds to the vantage point of the crowds looking out at her. It is as if the viewer is given the perspective of a member of the crowd. At one point, we watch the parade via a cellphone recording. During the credits, viewers are given yet another perspective, this time of the general public who are visiting the park the next day. Signs show that visitors must present their tickets and check into the visitor’s center. One sign reads, “Enjoy the Show.” Another clip shows the preshow orientation, where the visitors are explained the rules, one of which is “enjoy yourself.” The show begins as it did before, with Victoria waking up. It is now revealed that the visitors could watch Victoria on their phones via hidden cameras. One of these cameras was behind a one-way mirror that Victoria looks into at the beginning of the episode. The viewer watches as a member of the public, through cellphone screens, and through windows. We also see two of the cast members on a coffee break before their parts begin. Footage is reused from the previous day, but spliced with new shots from the perspective of the crowds. The final shot is Victoria waking up once again. The overall aim of these perspective shifts is to engender a sense of moral and ethical confusion in the viewer. By giving Victoria’s perspective first, the audience is meant to identify with Victoria and to experience her trauma. In the beginning, we have just as much information as she does, which leads

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us to feel outraged as the spectators do not help her. By the end of the episode, our perspective has shifted. Not only do we view Victoria differently in light of the knowledge of her crime, but the means by which we view her is different. We are placed in and among the crowds. In so doing, the viewer is made complicit in the voyeurism. We can no longer view the events only from the vantage point of Victoria. Instead, we must hold several perspectives in tension as we probe the necessary ethical question––is this justice? In the end, the audience may only be able to echo Victoria’s own feelings: “There’s something wrong with White Bear.” Perspective Shifting in Shut Up and Dance How far are you willing to go to keep hidden the source of your deepest shame? This question is the premise of Shut Up and Dance, where the teenage protagonist, named Kenny (Alex Lawther), follows the commands of anonymous hackers to prevent them from leaking a compromising video–– they had secretly filmed him watching pornography. In order to prevent the video from being sent to everyone in his contacts, Kenny must follow every command of his blackmailers. As the plot develops, he meets other people who are also being blackmailed and has to complete tasks with them. He is forced to deliver a cake, rob a bank, and even fight to the death. His efforts are in vain, as the hackers release the compromising videos. The episode ends with Kenny being arrested. Similar to White Bear, the audience is made to identify with the protagonist early on through the use of close shots of Kenny and watching through his perspective. At times, the audience also watches Kenny from the perspective of the anonymous hackers, though this only helps establish their unseen presence. The main focus of the narrative is Kenny’s psychological terror that threatens his ability to follow the hacker’s instructions. We feel his dread, and at the same time, we might also question why Kenny feels so much shame. In a very poignant conversation with Hector (Jerome Flynn), who is being blackmailed for soliciting a prostitute, Kenny reveals what he is being blackmailed with. Hector responds, “well, everyone does that, the f—ing Pope probably does that.” While it would certainly be humiliating, the compromising video does not seem to warrant this amount of terror. Ironically, Hector later convinces Kenny to rob the bank by preying on his fear––his deed will forever haunt the internet and his life. “There’s no cure for the internet. It will never go away. It will be glued to your name, a f—ing stain on you.” It is not until the climax of the episode, when the true source of Kenny’s shame is revealed. To protect his secret, Kenny is forced to fight a man to the death. The entire fight is filmed by a drone and the winner will take home the prize money that Kenny stole from the bank.4 Before the fight starts, Kenny’s

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opponent asks him what he is being blackmailed with. Kenny, terrified at the prospect of killing or being killed by this man, whimpers, “I just looked at some photos.” To which, the man replies sardonically, “ya, you know, I just looked at some photos too.” In this moment, the narrative fundamentally changes as the man asks, “how young were they in the pictures? Ya, me too.” It turns out the blackmail was not only a video of Kenny pleasuring himself, but also the contents of his internet searches: child pornography. The episode ends with a montage of the hacker’s releasing their victim’s secrets and the chaos which results. A bloodied and battered Kenny limps slowly down the road; he had won the fight. He answers a call from his mom. She is crying and screaming, asking what her son had done, “Kids! You’ve been looking at kids!” Throughout the episode, the audience is meant to identify with Kenny. At the end, the perspective shifts as it is revealed that the audience had really been cheering on a pedophile seeking to hide his shame. Earlier scenes of Kenny helping a little girl at work are reinterpreted. What originally signaled Kenny’s innocence and kind-heartedness are understood now as a sign of his perverseness. The ending leaves open a number of possible applications, though many of them feel contrived in light of the seriousness of the narrative.5 The revelation of Kenny’s shame, however, does not force the viewer to condemn him entirely. The events of the narrative and the psychological terror Kenny experiences do not suddenly become justified because the hackers targeted a pedophile. Similar to White Bear, the guilty are humanized because we are given their perspective. Perspective Shifting in Men Against Fire In Men Against Fire, perspective shifting lies at the heart of the narrative. The plot follows a soldier known as Stripe (Malachi Kirby) as he hunts “roaches” (infected monstrous humanoids) with his army unit that has been deployed as an occupying force in a postwar setting.6 The soldiers are aided by a neural implant called MASS, which provides them with a heads-up display and augmented reality in their vision.7 When Stripe’s implant glitches, it is revealed that the implant also changes the way he sees people––the “roaches” are actually human and are the victims of a military pogrom. Stripe is unable to fight against the system and must choose between prison and continuing to fight. More than both the previous episodes, the audience frequently is given Stripe’s point of view so as to show the effects of the MASS implant. In one example, the soldiers plan a raid by looking at a virtual map. The camera cuts from Stripe’s perspective to one that shows the reality that the soldiers are only looking at the ground. During this raid, Stripe encounters the “roaches” for the first time. We see them as monstrous humanoids, growling and

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shrieking in the dark. This fight scene is shot mainly from Stripe’s perspective. The audience views the creatures down the sights of his gun as Stripe pulls the trigger; they watch Stripe repeatedly stab a roach to death as if they had done it themselves. As the plot progresses, Stripe’s MASS implant glitches and finally shuts off during another raid.8 The effect is noticeable, as Stripe notices the scenery around him for what seems like the first time. He gets on all fours and smells the grass.9 During the raid, Stripe encounters people, afraid and in hiding. He tells them to flee to safety, but is confused when his partner begins to shoot them. The camera cuts between Stripe’s perspective and his partner’s, revealing to the viewer that these people are “roaches,” or, more precisely, the “roaches” are human. With the change in his vision, so does our vision change––they do not look like monsters anymore. Stripe knocks out his partner and flees with a woman and her son. He passes out before waking up in their hideout. The woman asks him, “You see me as I am? . . . You don’t see roach?” Stripe is confused, “You’re not a Roach . . . Roaches don’t speak.” The woman responds, “You just can’t hear us . . . when it works, you see us as something other.” The woman explains that the MASS implant causes the soldiers to view them as “roaches” and makes it easier to kill them. In the latter part of the episode, Stripe has a conversation with Arquette (Michael Kelly), the army psychologist he met earlier. Arquette further explains the purpose of the MASS implant––“It’s a lot easier to pull the trigger when you’re aiming at the boogeyman . . . It takes care of the shrieks; you don’t smell the blood.” All of the killing is to protect the bloodline. Angry, Stripe lunges at Arquette who blinds him with a click of a button. As Stripe stumbles about the room, he cries out, “give me my f—ing eyes back.” Arquette replays for him the time he killed his first “roach.” He experiences the event without the monstrous filter. Instead of shrieks, he hears them crying, “Please don’t shoot.” He watches himself stab the man over and over again. Arquette explains that he has a choice to make: incarceration and relive these experiences or be reinstated and have his memory wiped. The episode concludes with Stripe returning home in army uniform—he took the deal. We see from two perspectives: the reality that his home is in shambles, graffitied and empty, and we see through his eyes a lovely home with the girl of his dreams welcoming him. The technique of perspective shifting is the driving force of this narrative. Akin to White Bear, the plot hinges on a revelation that fundamentally changes the character’s and the audience’s perspective. The change from seeing the other as monstrous to seeing them “as they are,” that is, as human, occurs simultaneously in the perspective of the main character and the audience. With Stripe, our perspective loses the filter of the MASS implant,

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allowing us to see reality for what it is. The ending is not unlike White Bear either, with both characters having their memory wiped and losing their newly acquired perspective. The difference is that Stripe’s memory loss is voluntary. SHIFTING PERSPECTIVES ON THE SAMSON NARRATIVE Samson has long been an exemplary character in many readings. Throughout its reception history, the narrative of Judges 14–16 has been employed for many purposes and by many people.10 Often, the variations of readings are a direct result of the reader’s perspective and social location. For instance, Samson has been reread in Christian terms by church fathers like Augustine as signifying Christ (cf. “Sermon 364” in Hill [trans.] 1997, 276–81). In later Rabbinic interpretation, Samson’s final act of bringing down the temple of Dagon (Judg 16.30) was viewed as a heroic martyrdom, worthy to be imitated by those facing religious persecution in the middle ages. As Rachel S. Harris notes, Samson’s image “evolved in the modern period bypassing the religious symbolism to instead represent nationalistic self-sacrifice. Zionist readings of Samson portrayed this heroic sacrifice as an act for the modern political nation of Israel, in other words, The State” (2012, 69). Samson has also been recast on the basis of ethnicity. The American poet abolitionist, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, reconfigured Samson as representing African Americans in slavery: Who may, in some grim revel, raise his hand And shake the pillars of this Commonweal, Till the vast Temple of our liberties A shapeless mass of wreck and rubbish lies. (“The Warning”)

Nyasha Junior and Jeremy Schipper explain that Longfellow’s broad characterization was particularized in figures such as John Brown, Fredrick Douglass, Nat Turner, and Booker T. Washington (Junior and Schipper 2020, 95). These heroic portraits of Samson (and his real-world imitators) show him as an exemplary figure responsible for the liberation of the oppressed. In their view, he represents a figure willing to give up his life for the salvation of others. There is, however, an alternative perspective. In his essay, “Canaanites, Cowboys, and Indians,” Robert Allen Warrior (a member of the Osage Nation of American Indians) suggests that what may be liberative for some, may be oppressive for others. The exodus event used so often as a text for

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liberation and hope for the oppressed cannot be received in the same way by Native Americans. The exodus event ends with the conquest of Canaan, and the Canaanites are “the obvious characters in the story for Native Americans to identify with” (1991, 289). Though Warrior does not specifically address how indigenous people might read the Samson narrative, his perspective is worth pursuing.11 This question of alternative perspectives is echoed by Susan Ackerman’s essay (2000). She explains that parts of the Samson narrative portray the protagonist as a fool, so much so that, “it seems almost as if Judg 14.1–16.22 had been written by a Philistine, one whose intention was to poke fun at the Israelites’s alleged champion” (2000, 33). Her argument continues by contrasting the favorable evaluation (and even celebration) of Jael––the heroine who tricked and defeated Israel’s enemy (Judg 4.21)––to the extremely negative evaluation of Delilah, “who has been immortalized as the temptress par excellence, the femme fatale, the seductive siren, the whore” (2000, 36). If, however, the reader was to adopt a Philistine perspective, rather than the Israelite perspective provided by the text, Delilah might be understood to be the nation’s hero rather than its villain.12 What this brief foray into the underrepresented readings of Samson shows is that there is a surplus of perspectives available to the reader. There is a rich tradition of trying to make sense of the biblical text in light of the reader’s own experiences and social, political, and theological location. While some may find particular readings more convincing than others, each of these perspectives can be illuminating. These alternative perspectives are brought to the text by the reader, but I wish to argue in the next section that there are both competing and illuminating perspectives within the text itself. PERSPECTIVE SHIFTING IN THE SAMSON NARRATIVE Internal to the story itself, the narrator provides a variety of perspectives on the character of Samson and his exploits. Often, these perspectives are voiced by characters or are inscribed in events in the narrative that are not available to other characters. It is only to the reader that the biblical narrator gives full access to these perspectives. These shifts in perspective are foundational to understanding both the narrative itself and what it aims to convey. In the opening verses of chapter 14, the reader is introduced to three competing perspectives. Samson expresses his desire for the Timnite woman, his parents express their displeasure, and the narrator gives God’s own perspective on the events in Judges 14.4: that this woman was part of God’s plan for the Philistines.13 This divine perspective is available only to the reader, leading them to expect that this marriage to a foreign woman may eventually

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resolve some conflict between the Philistines and the tribes of Israel. Neither Samson nor his parents are aware of this perspective. The story continues with the incident of the lion and the honey bees (Judg 14.5–9). Twice, the narrator explains that Samson did not tell his parents what had happened (Judg 14.6, 9). Hence, only Samson and the reader are aware of these events. In Judges 14.10, the narrator explains to the reader the ancient custom of a wedding feast that is likely of Philistine origin and thus, no longer known to the historical audience (cf. Webb 2012, 370). During this feast, Samson proposes a riddle that, at first glance, seems unsolvable for the Philistines: Out of the eater, came something to eat. Out of the strong, came something sweet. (Judg 14.14, NRSV)

James Crenshaw has argued that the riddle depends on ambiguity and the polyvalence of Samson’s imagery (1978, 114–15). The answer could have been “vomit,” speaking of the young men’s inability to hold their liquor after a long drinking feast. The answer could also have referred to sex, a fitting, but lewd answer given at a wedding feast. J. R. Porter (1962, 107) notes that the word for “honey” rendered as dbš in Judges 14.18 may have originally read ‘ry (derived from a Ugaritic word for “honey”). In response to Samson’s wordplay of “out of the eater came something to eat,” the Philistines reply with matching wordplay: “What is sweeter than honey (‘ry)? and what is stronger than a lion (‘ry)”? It seems plausible then that the narrator seeks to accommodate his readers by changing the unfamiliar word to one they would have understood.14 Whatever we are to make of these proposals, the answer to Samson’s riddle remains quite obvious to the reader, even if they would articulate the answer differently than the Philistines. The reader is given a perspective that other characters are not. Furthermore, the reader is aware of the differentiation of knowledge between themselves and the Philistines. Here again, the narrator shifts the perspective, this time to Samson’s wife and to the Philistines. Unbeknownst to Samson, the wedding-goers corner the bride and threaten to burn her and her father’s household to death if she cannot obtain the answer to the riddle before the end of the feast. Thus, the reader is aware of the plot even when Samson is not. His wife’s cries seem genuine, but only to Samson. To the reader, they are the desperate cries of a woman trying to save her family. When the Philistines answer the riddle correctly, Samson understands this to mean that his wife has betrayed him. What he does not know is that she did so only under the threat of death. His response is to repay the debt by murdering thirty innocent Philistines from a different town and taking their clothes.15

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In Judges 15, the reader is given a variety of competing perspectives, that of Samson, his father-in-law, the Philistines, and the Judahites. Each of these perspectives are both incomplete in themselves and, at times, unknown to each other. From Samson’s point of view, he returns to his wife only to find that she has been given to another Philistine. Enraged, he ties foxes together by the tail and sets them on fire. Consequently, he destroys the entire harvest of grain, wine, and olives. He then learns that the Philistines have murdered his wife, so he responds by slaughtering an unknown number of the Philistines before hiding out in a cave, presumably located in Judahite territory.16 His reasoning is reported by the narrator: “If this is what you do, I swear I will not stop until I have taken revenge on you” (Judg 15.7, NRSV). He learns that his actions have endangered his countrymen, so he agrees to be taken captive to the Philistines. After his bonds are miraculously broken, he finds a weapon and massacres 1,000 men.17 From the father-in-law’s point of view, the events of the narrative are quite different. He was surprised that Samson would return to his daughter after storming off from the wedding. He thought Samson hated her and had abandoned her (Judg 15.1). Because of this, the father-in-law gives the daughter away to another Philistine, likely as a means to avoid embarrassment in the eyes of his community, as well as to make sure his daughter was taken care of. Though Samson is no longer married to his daughter, the father-in-law does not wish to sever ties with him completely. He offers him his younger daughter which Samson declines by seeking revenge. In the end, the fatherin-law and his daughter are executed for Samson’s crimes. From the Philistines’ point of view, Samson is a dangerous individual. After discovering that their entire harvest is destroyed, likely crippling their economy for years to come and destabilizing their power, they seek out the perpetrator. They are told it was, “Samson, the son-in-law of the Timnite, because he has taken Samson’s wife and given her to his companion” (Judg 15.6, NRSV). The reader is aware that this explanation is only half true. Samson had abandoned his wife and his father-in-law believed he had left for good. The Philistines do not attempt to understand the father’s perspective, but instead, execute him and his family. After suffering Samson’s retribution, they pursue him into Judahite territory and attack Lehi. When questioned by the men of Judah why they are being attacked, they respond: “We have come up to bind Samson, to do to him as he did to us” (Judg 15.10, NRSV). As the bound Samson is being led back to the Lehi, the Philistines rejoice and believe that their troubles are over. Instead, they suffer heavy losses as Samson miraculously breaks free of his fetters. From the men of Judah’s point of view, Samson’s actions threaten the peace and stability of the region. They find themselves being attacked by the Philistines, but they do not know why. After discovering that Samson has

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wreaked havoc in Philistia and the Philistines are seeking vengeance, they set out to deliver Samson.18 Reaching Samson, they demand to know why the relative peace has been upset. Samson only replies, “As they have done to me, so I have done to them” (Judg 15.11, NRSV). Interestingly, the men of Judah are the only characters that receive multiple perspectives in addition to their own. They know the Philistines perspective (they are repaying Samson for what he has done) and they know Samson’s perspective (that he is repaying the Philistines for what they have done), but they do not seek further explanation from either party. Instead, they are prepared to hand Samson over to the Philistines. All of these perspectives are afforded to the reader, and they are aware of the reasons for which every character acts, even if they might not understand them completely. The characters, however, are unaware of these competing perspectives. Had these characters known or accepted another character’s perspective, the narrative likely would have turned out quite differently. Had the father-in-law known Samson would return, he likely would not have given away his daughter to another man. Had the Philistines questioned the father-in-law, they likely would have realized he was not at fault for Samson’s actions and that he even tried to make amends. Had the men of Judah investigated further, they would have been in a prime position to mediate between the offended parties and restore peace to the region.19 It seems likely that by providing these alternative perspectives, the reader is meant to question the supposed of the narrative’s events. The final chapter of the Samson narrative contains numerous perspectives as well. In Gaza, the narrator reports the plan of the Philistines as they wait to ambush Samson. The reader is made aware of Delilah’s deal with the Philistines to discover the source of Samson’s strength.20 Interestingly, the insight not afforded to the reader is whether Samson knows Delilah is deceiving him. It seems that he is simply toying with her rather than afraid to tell his secret, as evidenced by how he is convinced to tell her in the end. If he had truly known of the plot, then why would he tell her? The revelation of Samson’s secret is also puzzling. Did he believe that his strength came from his Nazirite vow? If so, then why does he assume that he will be able to fight the Philistines after having his head shaved? The reader is again given an alternative perspective: “But he did not know that the lord had left him” (Judg 16.20, NRSV). Throughout this narrative, the Spirit of the Lord has empowered Samson. Here, Samson shows no knowledge of this fact. Ken Way puts it well: Thus Samson’s foolish error is not that he has disclosed the secret of his strength per se. Instead, he foolishly presumes (or perhaps gambles with the hypothesis) that he is invincible because God’s power always seems to be present regardless

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of his apathetic behavior. He probably thinks that shaving will have no consequences since he frequently compromises his Nazirite status. (2016, 138)

Whatever his reasoning or lack thereof, Samson is defeated. His eyes are gouged out and he is made a prisoner. The final scene in the temple of Dagon has all the makings of a Hollywood film (and indeed has influenced a few). Its artistry comes from the perspective-shifting technique that the narrator has employed throughout. What we would call a service of thanksgiving (Judg 16.23–24) occurs before Samson is led in as the evening’s entertainment (Judg 16.25). The reader is given the perspective of the Philistines and their interpretation of the events. They praise their god for delivering Samson to them. In what appears to be a hymn of praise, they say “Our god has given our enemy into our hand, the ravager of our country, who has killed many of us” (Judg. 16.24, NRSV). The reader knows that it was yhwh, not Dagon who had delivered Samson; they also know that Samson is indeed guilty of these charges. Analogous to White Bear, crowds of people have gathered to watch the spectacle of an imprisoned Samson. It will inevitably lead to their doom, as Samson will push the pillars aside and bring down building on top of everyone. Before he does this, there is another perspective shift. We hear Samson’s languishing cry to yhwh: “My Lord yhwh, please remember me, and please strengthen me now, only this time, O God, and let me avenge (this) one vengeance from the Philistines for my two eyes” (my translation).21 Samson reveals his primary motivation: He does not ask for deliverance but for revenge. This revenge is not the culmination of the narrative events but only in reference to his eyes. Moreover, Samson’s request that God strengthen him “only this time” or “just this once,” reveals his misunderstanding of yhwh’s involvement previously in the narrative. Samson’s portrait as a hero, tragic or otherwise, is dismantled by this statement. In the moments before his death, he reveals himself to be focused on his own selfinterests and in repaying the wrong done to him. It is telling that though the temple falls, yhwh gives no answer. CONCLUSION: SHIFTING THE PERSPECTIVE ON JUSTICE What is common between the Samson narrative and the three Black Mirror episodes is the presence of multiple perspectives that challenge a particular configuration of justice. As argued, the narrator/director in each of these stories offers the viewer competing perspectives that challenge the established narrative. In White Bear, it was the revelation that Victoria was a murderer;

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in Shut Up and Dance, it was that Kenny was a pedophile. The perspectiveshifting technique worked differently in Men Against Fire. Stripe (and the audience along with him) adopted the perspective of another rather than the shift in perspective taking place only in the experiences of the audience.22 In the Samson narrative, the reader’s perspective engages with every character of the story, while Samson remains blind to all but his own interests. These shifts in perspective allow the viewer the opportunity to identify and understand another character’s point of view. Furthermore, these shifts cause the reader/viewer to become aware that they know more than the characters in the story. This critical awareness of the disparity between one character’s perspective and another, or between one character and the reader’s perspective as a whole, complexifies any specific ethical judgments. By adopting multiple perspectives, the reader/viewer is led in the end to rethink their initial judgment and, in turn, question the systems and the fundamental beliefs that have allowed such a narrative to happen. The particular configuration of justice that underlies each of these stories, and what is being questioned by them, is that certain actions require proportional and retributive punishment. To put into biblical parlance, the ethical foundation of these stories is Lex Talionis.23 This “Eye for an Eye” principle can be seen in White Bear and Shut Up and Dance, where the protagonists are eminently deserving of punishment for their respective crimes of kidnapping/murder and pedophilia. Their respective punishments also are proportional, in some sense, as they mirror their crimes: Victoria is hunted and filmed by spectators; Kenny is forced to commit acts he would rather not do while being watched by anonymous online spectators.24 By understanding Victoria’s and Kenny’s perspective, however, the audience understands what it is like to experience this punishment. In Victoria’s case, she has no chance of reconciliation or moral improvement as she relives this day with no recollection of who she is or what she has done.25 By experiencing the alternate perspectives of the cast and the spectators, we realize that Victoria’s life and value have been reduced to a spectacle that people pay to watch. In effect, she has become a caged animal in a zoo.26 The irony is that by watching both of these episodes, the viewer becomes complicit in the same voyeuristic crime for which Victoria and Kenny are being punished. Like these characters, we too have become enthusiastic spectators in someone else’s suffering.27 In Men Against Fire, Lex Talionis plays out differently. Partly, this is due to how the plot develops. Inversely of the other two episodes, the audience is first given the perspective of the oppressor before it shifts to the victim. Like Stripe and his unit, the audience’s vision is warped by the MASS implant, causing them to only see “roaches.” Killing these monsters can be considered a well-deserved and proportional punishment.28 With the shift in perspective,

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the audience understands that what was initially considered “proportional” was in reality cruel and undeserved. For the Samson narrative, Lex Talionis seems to govern the actions of both Samson and the Philistines.29 But rather than establishing peace or a restored equilibrium, each act of violence is only met with more violence until it reaches its climax in mutual destruction. Similar to the increasing intensity (and illegality) of the tasks Kenny is forced to complete, the reader witnesses the violence spiral out of control as Samson acts and reacts to Philistine aggression. The story of Samson is thus the embodiment of the popular saying, “an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind.” But Samson’s blindness manifests itself more than just physically. His quest for revenge prevented him from seeing his actions from the perspective of another. The same could be said for the Philistines, who were too mesmerized by the spectacle of Samson to notice his hands on the pillar and the hatred in his heart. The inability to see and learn from another perspective is what undergirds these actions. The hopelessness that marks each episode’s ending is echoed by the biblical narrative. Victoria’s memory is wiped, Kenny’s secret is exposed, Stripe chooses to forget and keep killing; in the end, what is really accomplished by Samson’s suicide? The narrator only reports that Samson killed more people in his death than in his life––hardly a glowing review.30 The typical concluding evaluation found elsewhere in Judges is missing. There is no mention of any period of peace or quiet (cf. Judg 3.11, 30; 5.31; 8.28). With the death of so many high-ranking Philistine leaders, Samson has effectively created a power vacuum large enough for Israel to take control. This would have been a significant contribution to Israel’s political and religious future. Additionally, Samson’s own tribe of Dan may have been able to settle down after being unable to take control of their inheritance (cf. Josh 19.47; Judg 1.34–35). The narrative events which follow canonically in Judges 17–18 reveal that very little is made of Samson’s sacrifice.31 Similar to Black Mirror, the ending is not much different than the beginning. So what does justice look like according to the book of Judges? Like Black Mirror, the book of Judges is more diagnostic than prescriptive, but the story of Samson may give way for reflection. It too tells a nightmarish story that functions as a mirror, and those who see, see the futility of the type of justice Lex Talionis aims to accomplish––proportional and retributive punishment leads to cyclical violence that only ends in death. Samson dies blind, but the reader is given a way out of the nightmare. Through the narrator’s perspective-shifting technique, the audience can reflect constructively on the story that could have been, had the character’s been privy to the same perspectives as them. Justice according to the Samson story is not retributive but reconciliatory. More violence will not solve the issue; it will likely make it worse. If

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only Samson had stopped and listened to his wife, to his father-in-law, to the Judahites, to Delilah––if only he saw things from their perspective, the story would very likely have turned out differently. This restorative trajectory must begin with a perspective shift and the realization that our interpretation of what is just and who is guilty is contingent on our ability to see. Seeing, then, requires that certain slowness which characterizes the way of discernment and wisdom. It is not inaction, nor is it a rush to judgment. It is instead learning to view the issues and our own actions from the viewpoint of another. To do so may reveal that vengeance is not inevitable and that violence is not the only option in the face of conflict.

NOTES 1. While the Samson narrative begins in Judges 13, for the purposes of this essay, I will focus on the events in chapters 14–16. 2. Film grammar refers to the basic rules that govern the “language” by which film communicates meaning. Often, this grammar is set in dialogical relationship between the mise-en-scene (what is in the scene), the mise-en-shot (how a scene is filmed), and how a film is edited together. All of these decisions are made intentionally, even if haphazardly, and should be seen as a meaningful act of communication. 3. It is unclear whether these memories are falsely implanted as part of her punishment or are Victoria’s real memories. In one instance, Victoria experiences a memory by looking directly at a phone dropped by an onlooker. However, some of her memories may come from her repeated experience in the White Bear Justice Park. She seems to recognize one of the cast members, but her memory is only partial. In an interview given to The Independent, the show’s writer, Charlie Brooker, mentions that he had wanted to create a sequel to this episode in which Victoria would attempt an escape by leaving herself clues for her to find the next day (Stolworthy 2017). 4. It is not stated but one could imagine that the fight is being broadcasted somewhere on the dark web for others to watch. 5. For example, cover your webcam, understand that there is little to no privacy on the internet, etc. Some reviews noted that the episode did not have main villain or societal evil in its scope. Cf. Gilbert (2016); Framke (2016). 6. The military is portrayed as American by their accents and equipment. There are numerous similarities in the episode to the Holocaust and Nazi Germany. The symbols on their uniform resemble the Nazi SS. The location is not specified, but is European. It is clear, however, that the military is foreign, and is occupying the country following a war. 7. It also provides them with a targeting system as well as dreams/sexual fantasies to help them sleep. 8. The implant is compromised by an electronic device Stripe found in the compound. This is very similar to Neill Blomkamp’s District 9 (2009) where the main character is infected and slowly transforms into an alien (derogatively referred to as

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a “Prawn”), whose species have been stranded and segregated in a camp outside of Johannesburg, South Africa. 9. There may be an interesting parallel here to Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4. Jared Beverly (2020) has recently argued that Nebuchadnezzar does not descend into madness as numerous scholars suggest. Instead, he receives an “animal mind” in order to educate him. His arrogance had blinded him to the reality of yhwh’s sovereignty, and it is through receiving the perspective of an animal that he comes to a proper understanding of himself and the divine. “[L]iving as an animal will teach him to recognize the sovereignty of Daniel’s God. Here, animality provides access to this divine knowledge” (2020, 152). In Men Against Fire, Stripe also acts like an animal but it is because he is coming into a new awareness of reality and the world. 10. For an excellent overview of the reception of Samson, see Gunn (2005, 170–230). 11. I attempted to find Native American interpretation of the Samson story, but was unsuccessful. One thing that did turn up in my research was that the story of Samson was specifically introduced to certain tribes through Bible translations. Published in 1838, “Forty-Six Select Scripture Narratives from the Old Testament, Embellished with Engravings, for the Use of Indian Youth” contains portions of the Old Testament translated into Delaware Indian by Abraham Luckenbach. These selections include much of the books of Genesis and Exodus, but skips most of the conquest and Judges with the sole exception of Samson. Another example is “Old Testament Stories in the Haida Language” by Rev. C. Harrison (published in 1893). This work briefly covers many Old Testament narratives, including all of the Judges. A final example is Alfred Wright’s 1852 translation of Joshua, Judges, and Ruth into the Choctaw Language. 12. A similar example would be the actions of Judith in slaying Holofernes. Though she is a hero, Judith could be considered a Delilah-type figure by an Assyrian reader. 13. There is significant lexical and semantic difficulty in interpreting this verse. The hapax legomenon toanah, usually translated as pretext or occasion, is viewed as engendering negative consequences for the Philistines, that is, their destruction. This verse, however, is open to other readings. 14. This presents an interesting interpretive question: In what language or dialect was this riddle asked? It may well be that the entirety of the Samson narrative has little historical veracity. However, the narrator still renders the Philistine speech in Hebrew to his readers even though he obscures the wordplay necessary to understanding Samson’s riddle. For this reason, Porter believes that the lion and honeybee incident is secondary to the riddle. “It is best not to attempt the desperate task of harmonizing perfectly the episode of the lion-slaying with that of the finding of the honey, but to regard the latter as a subsequent explanation of Samson’s riddle when, with the substitution of [dbš] for [‘ry], its correct original meaning could no longer be glimpsed” (Porter 1962, 109). 15. It is unclear whether the wedding-goers know where their clothes came from. From the description, however, it seems likely the clothes would be covered in blood.

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16. Commentators are uncertain where it is. Boling notes that Etam means “Place of birds of Prey” suggesting that “the meaning may be more important than the place” (1975, 235). 17. The narrator does not explicitly state if the 1,000 men were Philistines. It may be that Samson slaughtered some of the Philistine force and some of the men from Judah that were delivering him. Killing some of the Judahites that turned him over would be consistent with the theme of vengeance. 18. It is not explicitly stated that the men of Judah know exactly what has transpired between Samson and the Philistines. All they know, according to the text, is that the Philistines are seeking “to do to him just as he has done to us.” This phrase is nearly identical to what Samson later explains to them. 19. Daniel I. Block views the actions of Judah as cowardly and unbecoming of their call to worship only yhwh (1999, 444). Though, as Trent C. Butler rightly points out, “negotiations prove that the problem lies not with Judah but with Samson. Samson may be God’s instrument to begin to deliver Israel from the Philistines, but, for Judah, Samson is just a hot-headed strong boy who has no leadership claims on them” (2009, 342). 20. It is difficult to know whether Delilah’s request of Samson (“Please tell me where your great strength lies, and how you might be bound, that one could subdue you”) was convincing. 21. George F. Moore translates it as: “That I may avenge myself on the Philistines for one of my two eyes.” He explains that “the greatest evil he could inflict on them would be but partial retribution for the loss of his sight” (1895, 362). 22. It could be said that Victoria also adopts a new perspective when she learns of her crimes. 23. Lex Talionis is the legal principle of an “Eye for and Eye” which can be found in the Old Testament (Exod 21.25), as well as other Ancient Near Eastern texts. 24. Lex Talionis is more about proportionality rather than equality. It is not about inflicting identical violence or harm, for in many cases, the singularity of the crime cannot be replicated. 25. The fate of Kenny is unknown due to the ending of Shut Up and Dance. Another television show that addresses this idea of moral improvement in recurring situations is The Good Place (2016–2020). 26. Though the title White Bear is in reference to the kidnapped girl’s stuffed animal, it can also be a reference to a polar bear. At one point in the preshow orientation (shown in the end-credit sequence), the audience is told to think of Victoria as “an escaped lion.” 27. This was the judge’s verdict in the case against Victoria: “You were an enthusiastic spectator to Jemima’s suffering. You actively reveled in her in her anguish.” Cf. Simpson with Lay (2020, 58). 28. At times, killing roaches is compared to hunting deer. In another scene, the roaches are described as monstrous and incapable of respecting the sanctity of life. In fact, the conflict that begins the episode is that the “roaches” have stolen food. This implies that while the “roaches” may not be aware of their actions, they are nonetheless punished.

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29. Helen Paynter (2018, 141) presents a compelling case for why Samson’s action cannot be considered in accordance with Lex Talionis. 30. There seems to be a deliberate ambiguity here. One could view the statement positively—that by Samson’s self-sacrifice, he accomplished even more than he did during his life. Yet, the statement might read another way—that the dying was greatest thing Samson ever accomplished. 31. The Danites relocate to the northern city of Laish and establish an illicit cult. There are numerous complexities that impede our understanding of how the book of Judges came to resemble its final form. It is more than likely that a later editor added the final chapters (17–21) to an earlier edition of the book, meaning that the author of the Samson story may never have intended it to be read alongside Judges 17–18. Even so, the final editor of the text who brought these disparate traditions together (if that is the case) understood that a text’s theological meaning is not restricted to its originating context.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Ackerman, Susan. “What if Judges Had Been Written by a Philistine?” Biblical Interpretation 8, no. 1–2 (2000): 33–41. Augustine. Sermons (341–400) on Various Subjects. Translated by Edmund Hill. Hyde Park: New City Press, 1997. Beverly, Jared. “Nebuchadnezzar and the Animal Mind (Daniel 4).” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 45, no. 2 (2020): 145–57. Block, Daniel I. Judges. New American Commentary. Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1999. Boling, Robert G. Judges. Anchor Bible 6A. New York: Doubleday, 1975. Butler, Trent C. Judges. Word Biblical Commentary 8. Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2009. Crenshaw, James L. Samson: A Secret Betrayed, A Vow Ignored. London: SPCK, 1978. Framke, Caroline. “Black Mirror Season 3, Episode 3: ‘Shut Up and Dance’ Reveals that the True Source of Hackers’ Power is Shame.” Vox, October 30, 2016. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.vox​.com​/culture​/2016​/10​/21​/13353676​/ black​-mirror​-episode​-3​-shut​-up​-and​-dance​-recap​-review. Gunn, D. M. Judges through the Centuries. Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2005. Gilbert, Sophie. “Black Mirror’s ‘Shut Up and Dance’ is a Horrifying Thriller.” The Atlantic, October 21, 2016. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.theatlantic​.com​/entertainment​/archive​/2016​/10​/black​-mirror​-season​-three​-review​-shut​-up​ -and​-dance​-netflix​/504929/. Harris, Rachel S. “Samson’s Suicide: Death and the Hebrew Literary Canon.” Israel Studies 17, no. 3 (2012): 67–91. Harrison, Charles. Old Testament Stories in the Haida Language. London: SPCK, 1893.

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Junior, Nyasha, and Jeremy Schipper. Black Samson: The Untold Story of an American Icon. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020. Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. “The Warning.” In Poems on Slavery 1842. Hwlongfellow​.or​g. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.hwlongfellow​.org​/ poems​_poem​.php​?pid​=80. Luckenbach, Abraham. Forty-Six Selected Scripture Narratives from the Old Testament, Embellished with Engravings for the Use of Indian Youth. Ebook. New York: Printed by Daniel Fanshaw, 1838. https://play​.google​.com​/books​/reader​?id​ =PHVBAQAAMAAJ​&printsec​=frontcover​&pg​=GBS​.PP326. Moore, George Foot. A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Judges. International Critical Commentary. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1895. Paynter, Helen. “‘Revenge for My Two Eyes’: Talion and Mimesis in the Samson Narrative.” Biblical Interpretation 26, no. 2 (2018): 133–57. Porter, J. R. “Samson’s Riddle: Judges XIV. 14, 18.” The Journal of Theological Studies 13, no. 1 (1962): 106–9. Simpson, Sid with Chris Lay. “White Bear and Criminal Punishment: How Far is too Far?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 50–58. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Stolworthy, Jacob. “Black Mirror Creator Charlie Brooker: ‘I’m Loath to Say This is the Worst Year Ever Because the Next is Coming.’” Independent, October 11, 2017. Accessed April 30, 2021. https://www​.independent​.co​.uk​/arts​-entertainment​/tv​/features​/black​-mirror​-season​-3​-charlie​-brooker​-interview​-release​-date​-joe​ -wright​-nosedive​-shut​-and​-dance​-doctor​-who​-screenwipe​-a7372841​.html. Warrior, Robert Allen. “Canaanites, Cowboys, and Indians.” In Voices from the Margin: Interpreting the Bible in the Third World, edited by R. S. Sugirtharajah. London: SPCK, 1991. Way, Kenneth C. Judges and Ruth. Teach the Text Commentary Series. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2016. Webb, Barry G. The Book of Judges. New International Commentary on the Old Testament. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012. Wright, Alfred. The Books of Joshua, Judges, and Ruth Translated into the Choctaw Language. New York: American Bible Society, 1852.

Chapter 13

“Not Some Crazy Spiritual Thing” Rewards, Punishment, and Afterlife in Black Mirror James F. McGrath

How does Black Mirror’s depiction of “life after death,” provided by future technology, relate to the visions of an afterlife that theology offers? In certain episodes, the show’s themes intersect with major beliefs and expectations from many theological traditions, but most recognizably the Christian theological tradition. Each episode individually, but even more so when placed in conversation with one another, offers a unique window into widely held concepts of the afterlife. As a series, Black Mirror focuses particular attention on the role of technology in our lives and the ways it may shape and transform our societies in the future. While at times it imagines a future that is appealing, no story shirks back from offering critique and exposing negative impacts technology may have on us. In similar ways, Black Mirror can bring both the positive and negative aspects of traditional doctrines into sharper focus through its exploration of secular, human-developed alternatives to things that Christians and many others have hoped for down the ages. Toward that end, I will explore resurrection in Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1), disembodied existence in San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4), atonement in White Bear (Season 2, Episode 2), and eternal conscious torment in Black Museum (Season 4, Episode 6). What I will consider is whether, far from being completely at odds with more spiritual hopes, the concrete this-worldly focus of Black Mirror proves to have important points of contact with biblical concepts. RESURRECTION: BE RIGHT BACK In popular parlance “digital afterlife” denotes the possibility of an existence such as that envisaged in the next episode we will discuss, San Junipero, and 213

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the uploading of one’s personality into a machine. Here, however, we focus on “digital afterlife” in the sense that it has become a technical term for the remnants, the echoes of oneself, that persist on the internet, especially on social media, after one’s death (e.g., Savin-Baden and Mason-Robbie 2020). This “digital afterlife” is of increasing interest, particularly to those who grieve or dread the loss of loved ones (see Brubaker, Hayes, and Dourish 2013; Marshall 2019). When we lose someone we seek comfort and solace through things both tangible and intangible. We feel the absence of someone with whom we shared our life in the disruption of a routine the fabric of which they were woven into as an integral part. Grieving over their loss may not only raise what we would consider “spiritual” questions. There are many physical reminders of the deceased’s prior life and presence in the lives and locations of those left behind. Neither the scenario nor the kind of technology that Be Right Back explores is far removed from our present reality. The episode evokes the experience of loss that most, if not all, of us can relate to. Be Right Back focuses on a couple, Martha (Hayley Atwell) and Ash (Domhnall Gleeson), to whom we are only briefly introduced before Ash is killed in a car accident. Martha’s friend Sara (Sinead Matthews) recommends a digital service that she believes will help. That service uses the information about the deceased that is available online (and if permission is granted, from their email, phone, and other private sources) to reconstruct a digital replica of their persona. The replica seems to be self-aware and capable of independent thought, yet at the same time cognizant that it is not actually Ash. What is the status of such a creation, especially when it is given bodily form in a replica of Ash later in the episode? Martha retains administrator rights over the replica’s movements and actions, and the assumption throughout is that this is property rather than a person.1 In real life, Nick Stavrou and Steve Koutsouliotas, cofounders of Paranormal Games, began a project to develop the technology to create a virtual reality reunion with the dead. Their motivation, it seems, arose from the personal loss of their fathers and a desire to reconnect with them.2 While not precisely the scenario featured in the episode, it raises some of the same questions and emerges from the same human experience. Ancient Israel envisaged the dead descending into Sheol, which is not a place of rewards and punishments but a shadowy underworld in which some remnant or trace of the previously living person persists (see, e.g., 1 Sam 2.6; Job 7.9; Ps 6.5; Isa 38.18). Later Judaism developed hope for an afterlife not through escape from bodily existence into a noncorporeal realm, but by resurrection to new life.3 Those biblical authors who thought in terms of resurrection might echo the phrase uttered in this episode, that their hope is “not some crazy spiritual thing.” The concept of resurrection suggests that the whole person as psychosomatic unity is valuable to God. It is worth

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mentioning in this context the biblical prohibitions against necromancy. The Bible does not explain why the practice of consulting spirits of the dead for guidance was prohibited. Perhaps we could consider Saul calling up Samuel in 1 Samuel 28 an ancient equivalent of the digital replica of Ash. We get a sense that, like Ash, Samuel was merely a shadow of his former self. Perhaps the underlying conviction is that, just like the interred physical remains of a human being, whatever fragments of their persona persist somewhere should likewise be allowed to rest undisturbed, since those who interfere with these remnants might dishonor the deceased individual through what they do. In both necromancy and grave desecration, the deceased person can have the remains of their body and mind subjected to uses over which they appear to have no control. Biblical law, it turns out, may have some principles that are at least worth reflecting on as our societies navigate new technological possibilities such as those featured in Black Mirror. Let us explore further the idea that what remains of Ash are mere fragments of his former self. Because of how this came about, we empathize with the disappointment his wife feels. We too might wish to relegate him to the attic as one traditionally does with purchases that were costly and yet no longer satisfy. However, one could imagine a scenario in which Ash had survived the car accident but suffered severe brain and perhaps other injury, so that parts of his memory and personality, or a variety of limbs and organs, were no longer present. Would we then feel the same way about Martha locking him in the attic? Is the reconstructed Ash a poor replica of the living person, or an incomplete remnant that deserves to be treasured all the more precisely because that is all Martha has? What makes us consider the remnants of an injured person that survive in their brain still “them,” but yet consider their digital extensions something or someone else? The fact that we treat the loss of a limb or other organ differently than we do loss of part of the brain, memory, or persona seems at once both understandable and noteworthy, because it brings into view assumptions that we take for granted about human selves and personhood. In most science fiction that explores stories of personality transfer and the like, a character is usually thought of as being where their mind and memories are, even if their physical body is no longer the place where those reside.4 In stories involving brain transplants, the tendency is to speak as though it were a transplant of everything but the brain, a full-body transplant. Where your brain goes, you go. The loss of part of a personality brings this tendency into sharper focus, revealing that on the one hand the preservation of part of the mind is possible and felt to involve a loss of the self, while on the other hand we are appalled if a spouse is treated as not the same person after losing their leg or a kidney. We are instinctively more sympathetic to this kind of reaction if it follows after a stroke or other brain damage that alters the spouse’s personality or causes them to no longer

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remember who they were nor to whom they had been married. Science fiction has a long history of helping us to explore, and to bring into sharper focus, questions about what makes us “us.” This episode of Black Mirror provides a helpful addition to an already-crowded subgenre precisely because it involves neither the original mind transferred directly nor the original body, but reconstructions of both via indirect means. The episode is replete with symbolism related to themes explored here. Early in the story, prior to Ash’s death, we see him unresponsive to his wife’s questions because he is looking at his phone. She hits him and when he asks why, she says, “Just checking you’re still solid. You keep vanishing down there,” referring to his phone (and of course, the internet it is connected to). She calls it a “thief.” While he is still alive, the internet removes Ash’s attention, his mental presence, yet it provides a link to him after he is dead precisely because his online interactions provide the basis for reconstructing his persona. The episode begins without the possibility of a “bodily resurrection” being mentioned, instead offering the chance only to talk with the reconstructed persona by phone. The disembodied voice, like that of a living loved one who is forced to be far away on business with whom we keep in touch by telephone, was not only bearable but made the loss of Ash as a biological person easier to cope with. We expect the non-corporeal quasipresence of a faraway person mediated through communication devices to be a poor substitute for their presence. We already take for granted that it is better than nothing. Is the issue with the technology in this episode the effort to reconstruct the persona so that it can provide comfort to the one who mourns, or is it the attempt to go further still, to turn this inadequate simulacrum into a full-fledged (or better, fully-fleshed) substitute? Once the replica of the persona becomes “incarnate” the inadequacy becomes apparent. Might the same not be true of a remotely controlled avatar that made it possible for the loved one who is living but located far away, whether traveling on business or confined to a hospital bed, to nonetheless “be with us?” How would we have evaluated the simulated persona if it remained only something mediated by phone without becoming embodied? Another poignant moment is when Martha drops her phone and breaks it, cutting her off temporarily from the replica of Ash. When she finally reconnects she apologizes, leading him (or should that be “it?”) to emphasize that he isn’t on the phone, he is “in the cloud.” He adds, “I’m not going anywhere.” People today feel genuine loss over a broken or stolen phone because of the connections it makes possible with those we love and whose presence we miss. After talking about being “fragile” in that form, Ash reveals that there is “another level,” one that is experimental and expensive. He asks if she is sitting down as it will sound creepy. This moment is one that it is easy

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to gloss over in light of all that unfolds after it. Yet it is essentially an example of an advertising ploy used by the company behind these services. The grieving person is lured into connecting with the disembodied digital voice of their loved one, and then offered a more tangible experience. Whatever one’s evaluation of what is offered, this preying on the vulnerable in a time of grief and loss is disturbing. Martha later says to the replica of Ash, “You’re not enough of him. You’re nothing.” We don’t know how many other customers they had, but this one was dissatisfied. Yet we learn at the end of the episode that she did not attempt to return what she purchased for a refund, or if she did she was unsuccessful. The episode Be Right Back can serve as a starting point for reflecting both theologically and ethically on a wider array of technological possibilities than are featured in the episode, both present-day and future.5 Earlier technology (such as that of photography) becomes so commonplace that we fail to register its significance or even its character as technology any longer. The moments spent looking at photos during the episode are important. Why do we react differently to the cherishing of whatever images remain of a deceased loved one than we do to the preservation and cherishing of remnants of their persona? That photos and embodied persona alike eventually reside in the attic draws this symbolic exploration to a powerful and provocative close. It leaves us to ponder just how realistically we might be able to preserve an image and likeness of a loved one using technology that is currently or may soon be available. The episode makes for a nice pairing with the one we turn our attention to next, in which technology seeks to preserve the whole of a person’s mind and personality as a means of transcending or escaping death. ETERNAL DISEMBODIED EXISTENCE: SAN JUNIPERO There is definitely an irony about using San Junipero to explore ideas of a disembodied afterlife. The episode begins with Belinda Carlisle’s famous song, “Heaven is a Place on Earth,” playing on a car radio, and again at the episode’s conclusion while we are shown the servers on which the simulations play out and in which the personalities of the deceased persist. The song provides a helpful symbolic frame for the episode, which is not so much about disembodied existence as one that is differently embodied, in circuits rather than cells. If a robotic arm and eye were connected so that people within the simulation could see and act in our world, would we still think of it as “disembodied?” In practice, it is not clear that anyone imagines a truly disembodied existence. Depictions of the life hereafter typically feature

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voices (which in our lived experience depend on our bodies, our mouths and ears) and sometimes ethereal forms that may be translucent and able to pass through walls, but which nonetheless resemble the corporeal form of the individual and have a location, even if their existence is on another plane or in another dimension. So too, existence on a computer server is not an “incorporeal” existence any more than our current one is. The technology that is envisaged has minds functioning as software on hardware that makes this possible. The biological “wetware” in which human minds are embodied in life in this world is different, but how fundamental or important are those differences? Digital heaven on earth might seem like a potential competitor with, or at least an antagonistic swipe at, religious hopes for an afterlife. However, the focus of so much ancient Jewish and Christian expectation on a new heaven and a new earth ought to cause us to reconsider that instinctive initial reaction. The digital afterlife depicted here may in fact trouble us precisely because of how little value it seems to place on the body. If we genuinely contemplate an afterlife on a new earth, questions about what that life would be like ought to be raised more often than they are. If we were to live in a New Jerusalem that had only the amenities imaginable to the author of Revelation, would it be a blissful afterlife? Would John find living in décor from the 1980s any more bearable than some millennials might? An afterlife in which one might potentially “adjust the settings” sounds far more like Black Mirror technology than typical theological discourse, and that in itself is worth noting and reflecting on. In some concepts of the afterlife, we may not look as we do in this life. Might not only a “heaven” but its inhabitants be tailored to conform to some vision of perfection? What makes the entities that survive in an afterlife the “same person” as existed in this world if we are radically transformed, even if only into a “more perfect version of ourselves”?6 When we consider that an extremely advanced computer is analogous with a mind, the possibility of existing on a computer after death intersects with one particular theological vision, which has humans persist in the mind of God. Some view this “objective” immortality as inadequate, since it does not provide for our ongoing subjective experience. However, the analogy with existing in a digital realm suggests that need not be an implication of this view. The human beings whose minds have been transferred into the computer mainframe coexist along with the computer “mind” that runs the simulation in a shared digital space. Why could God not designate part of the divine mind as a “server” within which the content of our minds could not only be remembered but continue to be self-aware and retain as much autonomy as we ever had? This episode of Black Mirror helpfully challenges us to reflect on what those who believe in an afterlife in “heaven” really envisage,

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and why so many instinctively find the idea that we will persist only in the mind of God an unsatisfactory alternative.7 There are disconnects between the traditional understanding of mind in Christian and many other theologies, and the framework within which both Black Mirror and contemporary theologians wrestle with these matters. Do spiritual entities, whether the divine mind or humans in the hereafter, have the attribute of location? We would take no comfort from knowing that all the “data” of a computer file still exists “somewhere” when it cannot be located and no one knows where it has ended up. The same might be said of deceased human beings. Philosophers have raised serious questions about the very notion of a disembodied mind (see Reichenbach 1979; Edwards 2002, 16–17). To be given a meaningful modern expression, does the concept of a spiritual afterlife need to transition to using metaphors of it as “virtual,” as “running on servers” somewhere? Does our understanding of the embodiment of our personalities and memories in a physical universe, shaped by data from neuroscience and other scientific fields that was unavailable to earlier generations of theologians, require a shift in conceptuality? Ultimately most visions of an afterlife express a hope for something unimaginable in terms and symbols that we can articulate. Whether an afterlife is “really” like existence in a computer simulation is perhaps less important than whether this is a more helpful metaphor for modern people than those used in centuries past. Before concluding our all too brief survey of San Junipero, we may notice a few additional points. Yorkie’s (Mackenzie Davis) parents’ conservative religious views are said to be what led her to drive off and get in an accident, after her coming out to her parents was met with rejection. Their views are also said to be what prevented her from being able to opt for euthanasia. Apparently parental guardianship did not prevent Yorkie from being given what was presumably still a relatively new treatment, allowing her to experience digitally and mentally a life that her complete paralysis and permanent hospitalization prevented her from experiencing physically, and did not preclude her being able to consent to go there after she died, only prematurely ending her biological life in order to achieve this. In Christian theology, drawing heavily on the Gospel of John, it is often emphasized that eternal life is not limited to afterlife but begins in the here and now. In the episode, the elderly benefit from visiting San Junipero before permanently relocating. It has a present therapeutic benefit and is not only about surviving death. Some might dismiss escaping into a virtual world as a fantasy that distracts from full engagement with the real world. However, the same accusation is sometimes leveled against those who take comfort in religion. San Junipero connects with Be Right Back around the theme of how people cope with grief. Two different scenarios are portrayed, but both involve the use of technology to provide a digital afterlife of one sort or another.

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JUDGMENT, ATONEMENT, AND SCAPEGOATS: WHITE BEAR The focus thus far has been on an afterlife as something desirable. In many theologies, there is also afterlife as something to fear, an experience of judgment for sins committed during one’s life on earth. This episode is about the experience of ongoing torment as a punishment inflicted by society, as well as scapegoating, purgatory, atonement, and the possibility of redemption. The episode was originally going to end with a crucifixion.8 In the final form of the episode, a scene with crosses occurs instead in the middle, in a pivotal scene. The focus on crucifixion becomes all the more striking when we consider the real-life inspiration behind the story, the case of the “Moors Murders” in which Ian Brady and Myra Hindley abducted and killed five victims in the United Kingdom in the 1960s.9 Hindley filmed the murders and her participation in a supporting role alongside an individual that was eventually judged to be criminally insane became a major focus of societal loathing. The resonances with the episode and the connections to the theme of our article become all the clearer when we dig into her case, her own expressed views of herself, and questions of redemption and scapegoating.10 Most people viewed Hindley as beyond redemption, despite or perhaps precisely because of not being judged as either a mentally ill criminal mastermind or a less than complicit participant in the horrific acts. Society prefers that there be some other explanations than a wickedness that might dwell to some degree in each of us, something that will allow us to distance the criminal from our perception of ourselves. Hindley emphasized that she was not mentally ill but bad and claimed to have changed during her time in prison (see Clark 2019; Carmichael 2003, 3–10). For Christians to offer a substantive theology of redemption, we must grapple with the willing participation of human beings in atrocities.11 The punishment of Victoria Skillane (Lenora Crichlow) was presumably meant to continue for as long as she lives. What would happen if Victoria were to demonstrate a change of character? If she were to offer herself self-sacrificially to save another person in the scenario to which she is repeatedly subjected, would it trigger any sort of case for her release? The point of incarceration is sometimes said to be reform, even though there is much evidence that it does not achieve that goal. The point of capital punishment on the other hand is recompense and the elimination of a dangerous individual from society. We need to ask what the aim of the White Bear Justice Park is, and likewise to ask what the end goal of any concept of hell might be. Is the aim justice? What sort of justice? In Victoria’s case, the punishment may fit the crime, but however tragic the loss of one innocent child’s life is, what does the ongoing torment of the perpetrator achieve? If we desire to hurt others because we

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believe ourselves to have been hurt, the same impulse motivates some sadistic torturers of children. Having been traumatized in childhood left them with a twisted desire to “pay it forward.” If hell turns out to be sadistic in character, what does that say about those human beings who crafted the idea, and those who embrace it when taught it? How do such notions relate to doctrines of atonement, in which it is often supposed that one individual suffering for a limited time may substitute for a fate of eternal suffering that would otherwise befall all or some individuals? By placing crucifixions at the center of the White Bear Justice Park, the episode challenges a widely held view of the cross of Jesus, which is known as the Penal Substitution Theory of atonement. There is no circumstance in which we could imagine that someone else could take the place of Victoria and for it to be just. As we watch Victoria suffer it seems fitting, once we are informed that she did likewise to an innocent little girl. Yet the episode also compels us to ask whether the very act of exacting retribution—even if it is an equitable retribution—does not make us—or perhaps reveal us to be—more like her than we care to admit. That point is embedded in the episode, inasmuch as the hunters are said not to be doing what they do because of the signal, but because the signal removed the social rules and systems that previously prevented them from expressing their desire to cause others to suffer. As standing with cameras and watching Victoria suffer is defined as justice, does it suggest that we too desire to watch others suffer, to inflict suffering, while excusing it in the name of justice? The question, of course, is what motivates the inflicting of suffering on people, whether we judge them innocent or guilty. What motivated Victoria’s fiancé Iain Rannoch (Nick Ofield) to pursue the course of action he did? If his sense of morality could be so deeply twisted that his actions seemed desirable, could ours also be? The subject of mental illness is explicitly raised in the episode, and therein lies one of the most challenging aspects of the episode’s message. Certain forms of reasoning and empathy are labeled as normal because they predominate in human beings. But does the fact that something is normal or normative make it “right?” If White Bear challenges many elements found in Christian theologies of afterlife, atonement, rewards, and punishments, it also brings us face to face with the question of humanity’s “fallenness,” as well as our fallibility as creatures. Can our nature, instincts, or reasoning about such matters be trusted? The Christian tradition has wrestled with this, caught between a conviction that there is in the affirmation of creation a possibility of looking to “natural law” in order to draw conclusions, and a conviction that it is necessary to go against the flow because the majority is not always right. The centering of White Bear on crucifixion recalls not only the crucifixion of Jesus, but the wider practice of Roman crucifixion. Crucifixion was execution, torture, and humiliation rolled into one. The cross was usually located

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by a road where the sight of the crucified could serve as a warning to others (Hengel 1977, 50, 87). Did the televising of the White Bear Justice Park serve as an effective deterrent to others? The episode makes the point that some people engage in acts of savage brutality when rules and authority structures are removed. If that is indeed the situation we live in, then warning people of the consequences in no uncertain terms might seem a necessary constraint on the heartless cruelty that resides in at least some of us, and perhaps in all of us to a greater or lesser extent. Today we have removed the punishment of convicted criminals from our view so that it happens behind closed doors. Would those who support the death penalty continue to do so if the executions were public? Have our sensibilities changed? Would televised executions serve as a more effective deterrent? This episode of Black Mirror allows us to at least imagine what it might be like if punishment were visible to the wider society. We should not move on from crucifixion in this episode until we consider how Baxter’s (Michael Smiley) “playground,” which is full of crosses with bodies hanging on them, features actors rather than victims. The torture to which Victoria is subjected psychologically is perpetrated by a representative of society and of its authority to judge criminals, rather than a rogue individual flouting society’s norms as we (and she) were led to believe. In the scene in which she is taken there, as bystanders watch her being threatened with a drill, she cries out to them, begging for their help, saying, “I’m a human being.” How different that scene appears when we recognize that the onlookers and Baxter are carrying out a sentence passed on Victoria by the judicial system. She is subjected to this precisely because she had subjected another human being to this manner of terror, flouting not just laws but more general principles of humaneness. The point of a cross, from a Roman perspective, was to torment a serious wrongdoer and warn others. Jesus’s death results in a multifaceted inversion of its intended Roman meaning. One reason White Bear is so interesting and provocative is precisely that it asks viewers to revisit crucifixion in a manner that brings its normative Roman meaning prior to the Christian inversion back into the center. As we now shift from our focus on atonement for wrongdoing as centered on the cross, to the punishment in an afterlife from which many understand the cross to save them, it is crucial to keep in mind that no theory of atonement and afterlife punishments will be coherent if the cross as punishment for wrongdoers and afterlife torment as punishment for wrongdoers are separated. Yet more often than not they are relegated to separate chapters of a systematic theology that is less systematic as a result. There is an element in the (once extremely popular) literary genre of the tour of the afterlife that modern readers typically find repugnant, namely the delight that is sometimes taken in observing the torments of the wicked.12 Although in the classic examples of this genre the reader or the guide on

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the visit rarely interviews those subjected to the torments, this Black Mirror episode has us view the suffering of the guilty through their own eyes. It is easy to balk at the sheet horror of the experiences the main character undergoes in White Bear, much as many people feel distant from the voice that speaks in Psalm 137 and blesses anyone who dashes Babylonian infants against rocks. Yet those who have experienced the murder of their own children may view such punishments visited upon those who did these things to them as merely repayment in kind. If we feel compassion and mercy toward the culprits, rather than siding with the survivors who mourn the loss of their victims, either in Psalm 137 or White Bear, ought we to be the ones making the decision about what is appropriate, or should this only be the purview of the parents of the victims? In the context of punishment inflicted in an afterlife, even the victims themselves might be afforded the chance to chime in. Victoria is “reset” after each time the scenario plays out, her memories wiped to the extent this can be achieved, which is crucial to the punishment fitting the crime. She is “made innocent” precisely because she can then be made to experience the panicked confusion her victim would have felt, and be on the receiving end of a callous lack of empathy from other human beings who play the role she did in her crime. She is recorded by others even as she recorded the murder of a child with her phone rather than helping her (Jones 2019). The technology used to accomplish this raises important questions. If Victoria’s innocence can be restored by erasing her memories, why is achieving that not an aim in itself? Is it still necessary and right to punish a person who has no recollection of their crime? Is the “same person” as committed the crime being punished for it? If we honestly acknowledge that human beings in general are capable of heinous acts even if most of us never participate in them, then how is the “reset” Victoria different from the rest of us? What does our determination to punish her nonetheless say about ourselves as individuals and as a society? What does the fact that we desire that at least some individuals suffer perpetual torment say about our theologies of redemption and afterlife? Does the fact that Victoria’s sufferings are not eternal, just ongoing while she lives, make them seem better? Within the framework of judgment in an afterlife, can this “penance” during her lifetime perhaps lead to redemption beyond this life if not during it? ETERNAL CONSCIOUS TORMENT: BLACK MUSEUM Black Museum focuses on an exhibit of artifacts from actual crimes, including many that have been the subject of earlier episodes, making this story one that explores the afterlife not only of individual characters but of the

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technology featured in the series. If some of the characters in previous episodes have been sadistic, so too is the proprietor of the museum, Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge). He not only tells the stories of past crimes with obvious relish, but is implicated in what has continued beyond the seeming closure of one of them. Rolo considers the best part of the museum to be the exhibit in which Clayton Leigh (Babs Olusanmokun), who had been convicted of murder, continues to be subjected to torment in a manner that goes beyond, and is independent of, anything included in his judicial sentence. The story intersects with several of the episodes we have considered thus far, and yet also differs from each in important ways. It falls at the intersection of copying a person into a digital afterlife and the carrying out of punishment on wrongdoers. Unlike the scenario in White Bear, the story in Black Museum focuses on torments inflicted on the preserved consciousness of someone who is dead. Similar to San Junipero, this episode also focuses on preserving a person’s consciousness digitally in order to provide it with an experience of afterlife, but one that is intended to be more like hell than heaven. Even the rising temperature at the museum throughout the episode makes the viewer think of hellish tropes (Canavan 2019, 261). The same question that always arises in stories about digital preservation of the mind applies equally here. Is tormenting a digital copy of a person the same as or different from punishing the actual “same person”?13 If a complete replica of a loved one’s persona is made to suffer, most of us will find it unbearably horrifying to consider, even if we are uncertain whether this reaction makes logical sense or is purely sentimental. Conversely, most of us will likely feel that punishing only a replica of a criminal’s personality is not the same thing as punishing the actual perpetrator of the crimes.14 In this inconsistency lies a range of seemingly unanswerable and yet extremely important philosophical questions of theological, ethical, and judicial relevance. In this story, we are given the opportunity to see Clayton from both perspectives, as he is presented first as a convicted criminal sentenced to execution, and later as a beloved family member when we learn that Nish (Letitia Wright) is his daughter. Was Clayton innocent or guilty? The things we are told suggest that he was innocent, and from the perspective of the narrative that is certainly what we are meant to accept. Yet in considering the story, the technology it features, and the broader implications thereof, we must recognize that some uncertainty persists. A daughter’s perspective and a documentary are not a sufficient basis for pronouncing someone not guilty. When we see a relative insist on the news that their loved one could never be guilty of a crime they are accused of, or a documentary casts doubt on what is widely assumed, we should not necessarily discard past conclusions, especially if the judgment reflects a consensus of those with expertise on a topic. We are inclined to

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treat what Nish does to Rolo as just, but we are not in a position to know for certain that it is justice rather than merely vengeance.15 In the history of crime and punishment, of course, that distinction was not always clearly made, nor always considered significant. In the era of ancient Israel it was the family of a victim that carried out retribution. The Lex Talionis, “an eye for an eye” (Deut 19.21), sought to ensure that retribution was equal to the crime for which it was payback. The digital punishment that Rolo endures certainly does seem equal and equivalent to what he did to Clayton, at least initially. On further reflection, issues arise that reduce the sense of closure, justice, and fair payback. If Rolo’s words were true, and each souvenir was a true copy of Clayton’s mind, then ending Clayton’s ongoing torment in the museum is not an end to the suffering Clayton endures. To accomplish that Nish would have to track down each and every souvenir. On the other hand, if the copies are not truly equivalent to the original person, then the ongoing suffering of Nish’s souvenir containing Rolo provides no true justice nor even recompense. It is merely a sadistic souvenir, a reminder of a single past moment of agony.16 The technology of memory recording/recovery and sharing allows for further possibilities when it comes to the punishment of crimes. What if rather than merely consigning Adolf Hitler to generic torments in the flames of hell, it was possible (for society or for God) to make Hitler experience the Holocaust and other aspects of WWII as experienced by each one of the victims, over and over again? It still would not undo or make up for the horror of what he did. It does, however, seem a more fitting punishment. As one contemplates the notion of eternal conscious torment theologically, we must ask what Revelation 14.11 means when it says that “the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever” (NRSV). The wicked are said to have no rest from their torments, but that in itself does not indicate without ambiguity whether the tormented are preserved as consciousnesses in agony for eternity, or whether it might not be merely the smoke from the torment that rises in perpetuity as a reminder of the torments they underwent until the flames extinguished their existence. Either way, Black Museum challenges us to ask why we might prefer one or the other, and what it says about human beings to either long to see others tormented without end, or to desire a permanent souvenir of their torment. The use of this technology makes it hard to distinguish between sadism, revenge, and punishment; the three seem to fall along a spectrum with indiscernible boundaries, which is only complicated further by the reality of false convictions. The power to inflict eternal suffering ought to belong only to an all-knowing God. At the same time, if we delight in imagining certain individuals getting what we feel they deserve at God’s hands it tells us important things about ourselves.17

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CONCLUSION While the theological aspects of some episodes are more immediately obvious than others, each episode considered in this essay assists us in probing, reflecting on, and reconsidering our doctrines and beliefs about the afterlife.18 What the best of Black Mirror and the best of theology do is force us to engage in painful introspection as individuals and as a society. Even though now we see but a dim reflection as though in a black mirror, we need this kind of technologically up-to-date looking glass to help us see ourselves as well as we can. In the process, we catch a glimpse not only of human depravity but of the image and likeness of God. In this chapter I have explored the prospects that technology might allow us to transcend death, to find liberation from the pain of bereavement and loss, and to inflict more suitable judgment on evildoers. I have demonstrated how these possibilities intersect with major themes of Christian as well as many other theologies. Some may instinctively wish to leap directly to the question of whether technologies of these sorts offer any kind of adequate substitute for traditional religious hopes and fears concerning afterlife. While this question is worth asking in its own right, I suggest here that it is far more interesting to focus our attention on what we may learn about those theological ideas through a detailed exploration of these digital counterparts that emulate and intersect with them.

NOTES 1. The history of human enslavement of others should warn us against assuming that the same entity cannot be considered both person and property. The issue of slavery also comes up in relation to digital copies of a person’s mind in the holiday special White Christmas, which can be found with Season 2 on Netflix. 2. There was quite a bit of reporting on the project in 2015 when they entered this project, which they called Project Elysium, in a competition. Jennifer Miller’s article on the subject (2015) specifically mentions the Black Mirror episode, which the project developers had not seen. See also Gallagher (2015). 3. For a brief treatment of Sheol in the Hebrew Bible see Sumegi (2013, 81–82). 4. See the exploration of this in narrative form in Daniel C. Dennett’s famous story “Where Am I?” published in his Brainstorms (1978) and often reprinted, as well as in the concept of the horcrux in the Harry Potter novels. 5. Gittinger (2019, 150–51) discusses Be Right Back in terms of grief and the history of tragic storytelling around attempts to bring back the dead, as well as in relation to the soul, the self-aware character of the Ash simulation, and many other aspects of the story. 6. Comparison may be made here with many other films including Ready Player One (2018) and What Dreams May Come (1998).

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7. See Ford and Suchocki (1977) for an exploration of this idea in the context of process theology. 8. See Jenelle Reilly’s interview (2016) with Charlie Brooker in Variety. 9. Viewers picked up on the connection (Sims 2013) even before the episode’s creator and writer Charlie Brooker mentioned it in Inside Black Mirror (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 81). 10. See the important treatment of this in Carmichael (2003, 1–10). A detailed exploration of this episode in conversation with the work and influence of René Girard’s theory would make for a worthwhile future study. For those wishing a brief glimpse of what that exploration might offer, in particular through the seeking of nonviolent alternatives to many of our current preferred options for dealing with people and problems, see Nessan (2018, 234–37). For the important critiques of Girard’s all-encompassing explanation of religion that would also likely emerge in such an exploration, see Frear, (1992), especially 127–29. 11. Philip Zimbardo’s (2007) treatment of this topic is among the best known in recent years. But more directly connected to the Moors Murders and thus to this episode see Campbell (2017), who quotes psychologist Coline Covington as saying “We project whatever is evil and sadistic on to the criminal so that we can remain unsullied and pure.” 12. A few ancient examples include Apocalypse of Zephaniah, Apocalypse of Peter, and Vision (or Apocalypse) of Paul. See further Himmelfarb (1983). 13. Canavan (2019, 265) notes a connection between Black Museum and Be Right Back. 14. The police investigators in White Christmas take some satisfaction from inflicting suffering on the copy of the individual who committed the crime, but would not consider that alone to constitute justice being done. 15. Rolo is certainly shown to be culpable inasmuch as when he first went to see Clayton it is mentioned that he could have helped look into reported problems with the DNA evidence but declined to do so. 16. At the end of the episode we learn that Nish’s mother’s consciousness lives on in her, using technology that was featured in the tour of the Black Museum. 17. Could we imagine God, or ourselves, saying about someone in hell anything that resembles what Rolo about the souvenirs in the episode? “It was beautiful—every time you finished juicing him, out pops a conscious sentient snapshot of Clayton, not a recording, a true copy of his mind perpetually experiencing that beautiful pain. Stuck forever in that one perfect moment of agony. Always on. Always suffering.” 18. Several interviews and articles about the episode also mention connections with the movie The Wicker Man (1973) which likewise has important religious elements woven through it.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018.

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Brubaker, Jed R., Gillian R. Hayes, and Paul Dourish. “Beyond the Grave: Facebook as a Site for the Expansion of Death and Mourning.” The Information Society 29, no. 3 (2013): 152–63. Campbell, Duncan. “‘An almost Biblical Notion of Evil’—Why Ian Brady Haunts the British Psyche.” The Guardian, May 16, 2017. Accessed May 1, 2021. https:// www​.theguardian​.com​/uk​-news​/2017​/may​/16​/ian​-brady​-myra​-hindley​-biblical​ -notion​-of​-evil​-haunt​-british​-psyche​-moors​-murders. Canavan, Gerry. “Hope, with Teeth: On ‘Black Museum.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 257–70. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Carmichael, Kay. Sin and Forgiveness: New Responses in a Changing World. Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003. Clark, Tom. “‘Normal Happy Girl’ Interrupted: An auto/biographical Analysis of Myra Hindley’s Public Confession.” Deviant Behavior 42, no. 1 (2019): 1–15. Dennett, Daniel C. Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology. Montgomery: Bradford Books, 1978. Edwards, Paul. Reincarnation: A Critical Examination. Amherst: Prometheus, 2002. Ford, Lewis S. and Marjorie Suchocki. “A Whiteheadian Reflection on Subjective Immortality.” Process Studies 7, no. 1 (1977): 1–13. Frear, George L. Jr. “René Girard on Mimesis, Scapegoats, and Ethics.” Annual of the Society of Christian Ethics 12 (1992): 115–33. Gallagher, Fergal. “Virtual Reality App Project Elysium Bringing People Back from The Dead Using Oculus Rift.” Tech Times, April 28, 2015. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://www​.techtimes​.com​/articles​/49303​/20150428​/virtual​-reality​-app​-project​ -elysium​-bringing​-people​-back​-dead​-using​.htm. Gittinger, Juli. Personhood in Science Fiction: Religious and Philosophical Considerations. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Hengel, Martin. Crucifixion in the Ancient World and the Folly of the Message of the Cross. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977. Himmelfarb, Martha. Tours of Hell: An Apocalyptic Form in Jewish and Christian Literature. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1983. Jones, Aliya. “Revisiting ‘White Bear,’ The Most Unsettling Episode of ‘Black Mirror.’” Film School Rejects, June 7, 2019. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://filmschoolrejects​.com​/black​-mirror​-white​-bear/. Marshall, Lisa. “How to Manage Your Digital Afterlife and Why It Matters.” Phys​ .org​, May 6, 2019. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://phys​.org​/news​/2019​-05​-digital​ -afterlife​.html. Miller, Jennifer. “This Virtual Reality Project Promises To Bring Dead Loved Ones Back To Life.” Fast Company, May 6, 2015. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://www​ .fastcompany​.com​/3045912​/this​-virtual​-reality​-project​-promises​-to​-bring​-dead​ -loved​-ones​-back​-to​-life. Nessan, C. L. “Jesus Christ as the Final Scapegoat: Mobilizing Nonviolent Movements for Change.” Review of Ecumenical Studies Sibiu 10, no. 2 (2018): 230–37. Reichenbach, Bruce R. “Price, Hick, and Disembodied Existence.” Religious Studies 15, no. 3 (1979): 317–25.

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Reilly, Jenelle. “‘Black Mirror’: How Creator Charlie Brooker Came Up with That ‘White Bear’ Episode Twist.” Variety, October 19, 2016. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://variety​.com​/2016​/tv​/news​/black​-mirror​-season​-2​-white​-bear​-episode​-twist​ -charlie​-brooker​-1201889576/. Savin-Baden, Maggi and Victoria Mason-Robbie (eds.). Digital Afterlife: Death Matters in a Digital Age. Boca Raton: CRC Press, 2020. Sims, David. “Black Mirror: ‘White Bear.’” AV Club, December 10, 2013. Accessed May 1, 2021. https://tv​.avclub​.com​/black​-mirror​-white​-bear​-1798178958. Sumegi, Angela. Understanding Death: An Introduction to Ideas of Self and the Afterlife in World Religions. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013. Zimbardo, Philip. The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil. New York: Penguin, 2007.

Part 4

HOPE AND TRANSCENDENCE

Chapter 14

Be Right Back and the Ethics of Mourning (In)Authenticity and Resurrection in the Digital Age Rebekah Lamb and Joanna Leidenhag

Charlie Brooker’s Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1) starts off the second season of the Black Mirror anthology. Like the series as a whole, this episode yokes together the existential with the darkly comic as it questions the degree to which technology can or cannot complement and support human flourishing. In so doing, it asks a timely question, one which haunts our contemporary, collective imagination: in the age of virtual reality, how do we keep a grip on “the real”? Brooker himself stresses this point, sharing in a recent interview for The New York Times that the idea for the script came to him during a night of online binging: One night I was up late [on] . . . social media, and I thought: “What if none of these people were real? How would I know?” I’d been reading a bit about artificial intelligence, as well. Eliza, one of the first artificial intelligence programs, only did very simple things, like ask “How are you feeling today?” And if you said, “I’m a bit blue,” it would say, “What is it about blue that is making you feel blue?” But it was amazing how quickly people would drop their guard, even though they knew full well it was a computer program. Those two things came together, and I wrote [“Be Right Back”] . . . in the middle of the night, over a couple of nights. (Hess 2016)

Here, Brooker reminds us that known and emergent forms of technology test our self-understanding, challenging us to examine what it means to be human and authentically relational. 233

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This chapter explores how the perennial problem of death and contemporary, rapidly expanding forms of artificial intelligence technology interweave to problematize our perceptions of reality. More specifically, in this chapter, we examine the ethics of mourning in relation to digital resurrection by exploring how our online personas force us to question the very nature of the self that we hope will one day resurrect. This leads to a consideration of the emergent field of algorethics, in relation to the work of mourning, and enables a closer examination of the key differences between theological accounts of resurrection and the replication of our digital selves (attempted via AI technology). Before turning to this, however, it is important to outline the relationship between philosophy, theology, and the genre of dystopic science fiction more broadly. In so doing, we see the degree to which certain forms of artistic expression and experimentation are especially well suited to revealing the implications of technological advancement on human experience. DYSTOPIC SCIENCE FICTION AND QUESTIONS OF MEANING As we know, philosophical questions related to artificial intelligence are relatively recent but the fundamental concerns underpinning them are perennial. They are concerned with the nature and identity of the human person and relations between persons; the role and limits of materiality; and the transcendental or metaphysical elements of existence, operating within but beyond the material. These questions have been at the heart of the philosophic enterprise for centuries, animating the arts and contemporary popular culture—especially as found in the music industry, novels, the visual arts, film, and the genre of dystopic science fiction in particular. As Margaret Atwood recently reminded us, dystopian and utopian discourses in the West can be traced to Plato’s Republic and pose philosophical questions regarding technology’s role in helping or hindering our pursuit of meaning in life (2017). She also argues that science fiction, and the technology it imagines, has a particularly philosophic character because, since Plato, it has “cover[ed] the same basic ground that real societies do,” seeking to “answer the same questions” about life, living, and dying (2017). In so doing, science fiction holds up a “mirror” to us, inviting us to consider whether “life has meaning beyond the play of the senses” (2017). Black Mirror resides on the frontier Atwood claims for the dystopic, the frontier in which “pottering along on the earthly plane” joins with the horizon of deeper questions about life’s meaning and the relationship between the natural and the supernatural (2017).

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Be Right Back explores the dividends and deficits of social media through a dystopic lens, and puts them in conversation with digital resurrection technology—an emergent form of AI programming. Even more specifically, it examines the degree to which technology helps or harms the work of mourning and tests our conception of what the hope for “resurrection” might mean.1 As Owen Harris (the director of this episode) admits, the script’s story was so compelling to him because it “came along when” he was “starting to feel a little unnerved by the amount of technology in our day-to-day lives”; it gave him a chance to explore the nature and implications of his own mounting anxieties (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 66). In this way, Be Right Back contains a series of questions and challenges which can be approached, with fruitful results, through the methods, understanding, and content of Christian theology (more on this shortly). As importantly, Black Mirror’s ability to transpose perennial, philosophical questions to contemporary or near-future contexts makes it a popular resource for scholars and teachers, in both high school and university contexts. As just one example, in our interdisciplinary, undergraduate module, titled “Saints and Cyborgs: The Imagination in Theology and Science,” which we recently codesigned and co-taught at the University of St Andrews, we used Be Right Back as a case study to examine the relationship between death, mourning, and the question of the resurrection (in digital and theological contexts). In Be Right Back we found a timely way of exploring the timeless problem of the fact of death, and the ethics of our responses to it in the era of virtual reality. The remainder of this chapter deals with the questions and issues outlined above. However, before turning to these topics for a closer look, we review the plotline of Be Right Back to provide a concrete reference point for the theo-critical considerations which follow. BE RIGHT BACK REVISITED Brooker sets Be Right Back in the near future, an “understated” world of slightly slicker, thinner iPhones and quieter cars.2 He opens the story in media res, “zooming in” on the lives of Ash (Domhnall Gleeson) and Martha (Hayley Atwell), a couple who are restoring their first home—an inherited farmhouse in nondescript rural England. Brooker leaves the story’s settings and locations somewhat vague so as to invite viewers to compare them with their own. In the early scenes, we see that Ash and Martha have a close relationship, although not free from difficulties in communication and intimacy. From the outset, it’s clear that many of their relational problems are rooted in Ash’s near-constant “escape” into the virtual world of Facebook and

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other social media platforms. Frustrated by his inattention, Martha questions whether he is still “solid,” saying his phone is a “thief” that steals and squanders their quality time. When Martha loses Ash in a tragic car crash (an event that occurs offstage), she is left without any sense of closure. At his funeral, Martha’s friend Sara (Sinead Matthews), who is also widowed, articulates the sense of unreality that accompanies death. “It’s not real, is it? . . . The people d[on]’t look real. Their voices [aren’t] real.” She offers Martha something “that helps,” letting her know about an IT program that will let her “speak” to Ash again. Resisting the possibility of an explicit comparison with the supernatural, Sara reassures Martha, saying “don’t worry, it’s not some crazy spiritual thing.” Shortly after the funeral, Martha discovers she is pregnant and, following Sara’s promptings, resorts to the recommended digital resurrection technology in an effort to receive some sense of closure. Initially, this involves messaging an online chatbot which poses as Ash by drawing from his social media archive. Growing increasingly dependent on these digital exchanges, Martha upgrades to phone calls with the chatbot, uploading Ash’s private, digital content onto a cloud so that the messaging application can more accurately replicate his voice, expressions, and other character traits. The information exchange does not stop there. Chatbot Ash convinces Martha to purchase the deluxe digital resurrection package: a sophisticated replication of Ash, achieved through the most advanced AI technology. “Synthetic Ash” is delivered to Martha’s front door, looking like an Amazon delivery of packaged, frozen meat stored in a coffin-sized fridge. Drawing on elements of the horror genre and especially film adaptations of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818), Brooker invites us to view the arrival and assembly of Synthetic Ash as uncanny, if not a tragedy. Even as it is activated, “Synthetic Ash” is clearly a technological marvel which cannot fulfil its purpose: namely, to assist Martha in coping with the fact of Ash’s death. However, this should not come as a surprise. As Marshal McLuhan has reminded us, technological development—especially in the era of mass media—is driven by lack, by desire, and serves to extend “some human faculty—psychic or physical” without fulfilling its needs (2008, 26). In other words, to create a market demand, suppliers of various technologies capitalize on the reality that they can only ever partially fulfill human needs and desires. Teasing us with interminable promises of better upgrades to come, marketers of new technologies leave us “stranded . . . on the banks of [unmet] desire,” as Elizabeth Goodstein puts it, fueling the market by feeding our frustrated longing for a fulfilment which cannot be met by material goods alone (2005, 5). Rather than satisfy Martha’s desires for authentic intimacy, Synthetic Ash frustrates and increases them. The more she attempts to encourage Synthetic

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Ash to fulfill her desire for an encounter with Biological Ash, the more he dissatisfies her, literally sending her to the cliff-edge of sanity toward the end of the episode. This problem is brought to a pitch when, in the final scenes of the episode, we find Martha interminably stuck on the “banks of desire,” lingering in an emotive state vacillating between melancholia and horror over her turn to synthetic means of assuaging her grief. In the end, Martha’s ultimate assessment of Synthetic Ash is that “there’s not enough” to him. That said, she cannot bring herself to decommission him, since he uncannily reminds her of aspects of Biological Ash. She therefore banishes him to a kind of limbo, to the attic where he gathers dust, alongside other mementos of the past. Occasionally he is visited by Martha and Biological Ash’s daughter who, as we discover, speaks with him out of various, complicated motivations driven by self-interest.3 LOCKE, AUTHENTICITY, AND THE PERFORMANCE OF IDENTITY The question of identity lies at the heart of Be Right Back, as the constant confusion of the pronouns “I,” “you,” and “him” steadily increases and culminates in Martha’s eventual clarifying cry to Synthetic Ash: “but you aren’t you, are you?” The Chatbot Ash is never portrayed as being or having a soul—it is a consumer item to be bought and disposed of on a whim. It has neither dignity nor freedom; it possesses no secrets, no inner selfconsciousness. Martha cannot even hurt its feelings.4 We are never misled to believe that Synthetic Ash is a reanimation of the deceased corpse. From the outset, we know this is a new, synthetic body based on pictures and videos of someone who has died. What causes Martha’s confusion, then, regarding Synthetic Ash’s identity (especially since he has neither a body or a soul)? The challenge of this episode to questions of identity results, among other things, from the influence of John Locke’s theory of personal identity as psychological continuity.5 This theory posits that the self is a diachronic series of conscious mental events that form the content of one’s memory. Locke constructed imaginative thought-experiments (a means of philosophical inquiry that Be Right Back exemplifies) to articulate the idea that if we want to know whether one person (say, Synthetic Ash) is the same as another (like Biological Ash), then we should look neither to bodily identity (the “identity of the man” for Locke), nor the unity of a soul to answer this question, but to their psychological continuity.6 According to Locke’s schema, then, Synthetic Ash is arguably Biological Ash insofar as he repeatedly identifies his own “consciousness” with Biological Ash’s previous thoughts and memories.7

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The presupposition of a Lockean account of personal identity through psychological continuity (or something close to this) is the metaphysical foundation upon which ideas of digital resurrection are often built. However, importantly, the psychological continuity required is never achieved by the technology in Be Right Back and so this episode does not primarily concern itself with the accuracy (or plausibility) of Locke’s philosophy. Synthetic Ash does not have access to Biological Ash’s first-person perspective or memories. Indeed, the episode goes to great lengths to demonstrate that such access is always already impossible since Biological Ash is not solely defined by his social media content or digital footprint. Given this, Synthetic Ash is not a continuation of the same person, but a “performance of stuff that [Biological Ash] performed without thinking.” We especially see this when we find Synthetic Ash constantly making mistakes as he draws on Ash’s online archive to predict what Ash might have said and done in his private life. This is especially noticeable when Synthetic Ash cannot interpret Biological Ash’s childhood photograph properly and, as tellingly, when he ridicules the Bee Gees (as shown in the opening of the episode, Biological Ash confesses that he secretly loves their music’; this information remains a kind of secret since he shares it with Martha but not social media). Synthetic Ash’s inabilities to “perform” Biological Ash’s identity increasingly pains Martha, intensifying her melancholia. She knew that her real Ash could be surprising, far more nuanced and unpredictable than his digital footprint. Trying to “get it right,” Synthetic Ash attempts to learn from his failures, adopting different kinds of expression and behaviour, and seeking to measure their accuracy as a performance of Biological Ash’s preferences by asking Martha: “[i]s that not the sort of thing I’d say?” In posing such questions repeatedly, he further announces his own inauthenticity as a replication of Biological Ash and his online persona. As the story reaches its denouement, it becomes ever clearer that Synthetic Ash’s presence primarily serves to highlight Biological Ash’s absence. In such moments, Be Right Back probes the dilemma of (in)authenticity that has been magnified by the tools of social media and online personas. (In)authenticity concerns whether someone is “faithful to an original” or whether people or things are as they appear or are reputed to be.8 We might think of an authentic Rubens as a painting (mostly) painted by Rubens, an authentic performance of Bach being on a harpsichord rather than a piano, and debates about whether film adaptions authentically capture authorial intent. Indeed, it is in such contexts of preservation and replication, as in Synthetic Ash’s preservation and replication of Biological Ash, that issues of authenticity are often most pronounced. In psychology, to say that a person is authentic is to suggest that their actions express their “original way of being human”; like a Rubens painting, a person’s authentic actions can be

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attributed to the individual and not only to the influence of other forces; like a film adaption these actions accurately reveal the self’s motivations, beliefs, and desires (Guignon 2008, 278; Taylor 1992, 28–29). While psychological, philosophical, and theological understandings of identity problematize such a tidy division between the individual and influences upon her, it is helpful, for our purposes, to highlight the distinction. For, at the heart of the modern notion of authenticity lies a distinction between a true, inner, and individual self, and an outer performance (words, actions, appearance) that is the self’s existence in the public world.9 The paradigm of the authentic self is often viewed as being an artist creating his or her own identity.10 In an age of social media, these two “selves” are stretched to the breaking point as we create online personas that are fully detached from our bodies and might exist independently of the biological-social networks that condition our embodied existence. With such a total power of self-representation we are confronted with the following question: how can we represent ourselves honestly, especially to people we may never (physically) meet? And, as importantly, how can those who do not encounter us incarnationally hold us to account in the relational task of human communication? These questions are presented to us near the beginning of the episode when Ash shares that his smile in a childhood photo (which his mother treasured) is fake. He analyses the picture, acknowledging people might find it funny or cute if they didn’t know his personal history. As he shares with Martha, this image signifies to him a painful memory of family loss and mourning. In the opening of Be Right Back, we see that Biological Ash is struggling with his ability to authentically communicate and cultivate his personality; he all too often resorts to virtual reality as a synthetic replacement for the demands of everyday living and relating. Given this, we could argue that the question of whether synthetic Ash is “real” does not only arise from the artificial nature of his intelligence or synthetic materiality. As importantly, it stems from the original (perhaps, inevitable) inauthenticity of Biological Ash’s digital footprint. Unlike other similar presentations of artificial intelligence in science fiction, the moral dilemma that Be Right Back confronts us with is, then, not primarily the question, “can a futuristic A.I. be a real person?” but, rather, the more troubling question, “is this artificial replica even based on a real person?” “THE WORK OF MOURNING” AND ALGORETHICS IN THE DIGITAL AGE Be Right Back not only examines the problems of authenticity and identity, but pressingly it explores the difficulties of transitioning from melancholia

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to mourning in the face of the death of a loved one. As discussed earlier, the story explores the degree to which emergent technologies in the digital age can or cannot serve real and pressing human needs (physical and psychospiritual ones alike). As Geoffrey Hartman has noted, the arts and technology have traditionally served to assist us in going about the work of memorializing the dead, of moving through the stages of grief toward the closure needed to thrive (1987, 40–60). Poetry in particular functions as a kind of “monumental writing,” to borrow J. D. Kneale’s description, and the epitaphic quality of language itself has been a topic for literary critics, theologians, philosophers and, more recently, clinical psychologists as well as psychoanalysts and psychotherapists (1988, 37). In our increasingly digital age, when the boundaries between everyday life and virtual reality have become increasingly blurred, concerns about the ethical use of technology have come to the fore. As discussed above, Be Right Back examines the degree to which the needs of the human person are only partially met by technological developments. What is also needed for characters like the grieving Martha is a movement from melancholia to mourning, from grief to closure—a movement which, as Black Mirror reminds us, cannot be achieved through dependency on synthetic substitutes for authentic human encounter. The question of what constitutes authentic human encounter is also therefore an important topic at the heart of Be Right Back, and one which is central to algorethics, an emerging subfield of ethics. Currently, algorethics is especially advanced among Christian Churches, particularly the Vatican Papal State, select governments, and AI companies with a humanitarian focus. The aim of algorethics is to promote the “ethical use of AI” in a way that affirms the dignity and needs of the human person, and the common good of societies, bearing in mind that different cultures possess unique needs and infrastructures (Pontifical Academy for Life, “Rome Call for AI Ethics”). Algorethics espouses the following six principles, based upon the “fundamental elements of good innovation” for human flourishing on a human scale: transparency, inclusion, responsibility, impartiality, reliability, security, and privacy (Pontifical Academy for Life, “Rome Call for AI Ethics”). This developing field of ethics is especially concerned with the possibility that digital technologies may be used to exploit the vulnerabilities of individuals and communities, including those who are suffering. In Be Right Back, AI technology thrives off of human grief, consuming the data of Martha’s private moments with, and memories of, Ash with the word “YUM.” It, therefore, serves as a fruitful case study for those interested in analyzing how the principles of algorethics can be used to critique technology’s exploitation of the vulnerable. As the episode makes clear, melancholia like Martha’s drives the emergent, digital resurrection market and shows the degree to which technology can exploit human suffering to

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facilitate overconsumption (i.e. addictive or over-reliant behavioral patterns). Tellingly, the closer Martha gets to Synthetic Ash the more she retreats from her own family, especially her sister. This, of course, serves as a tragic and ironical development in Martha’s character; for, as we recall earlier on in the episode, Martha encouraged Ash to unplug from social media so that he could be more fully and really present to her and their relationship. Be Right Back is haunted and motivated by the problem of death, concerned with what Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael Naas (following on from Freud and Derrida) have called the “work of mourning”—meaning, the progression from melancholia (fixation on loss) to the state of mourning (making peace with the reality of loss, over time).11 In particular, the dystopic story explores how technology can get in the way of authentic human flourishing, including the difficult process of overcoming the psychological state of melancholia by coming to terms with the fact of death. The transition from melancholia to mourning has been helpfully described by Freud and his inheritors as the grieving person’s gradual return to “respect for reality,” as her realization that a refusal to accept death only perpetuates “a clinging to the [lost] object through the medium of a hallucinatory wishful psychosis” (1995 [1914–1916], 244). The fraught and unsuccessful negotiation between the technological and spiritual, as dramatized in dystopic fiction, often shows the failure of characters to transition from melancholia to that of mourning as a result of their overreliance on technologies of various kinds.12 This is precisely the dilemma Be Right Back dramatizes. ECHOES OF RESURRECTION AND THE ETHICS OF MOURNING Beliefs about the afterlife influence how a person can go on relating to those they have lost. How to feel connected to the dead is not a simple matter, and it is one of the many functions of religion and spiritual traditions to enable people to maintain a healthy relationship with those who have died. Often, these relationships are manifest through particular practices, such as prayers for the intercession of saints, prayers for the dead, religious indulgences, laying flowers at a grave, eulogies, burial traditions, and cremations, all of which teach or presuppose a range of beliefs about what happens to a person in and following death. As such, we can say that metaphysical beliefs about the afterlife directly impact the transition from melancholia to mourning because they enable or restrict the “work of mourning.” What is striking about Be Right Back is that there are no clear metaphysical claims about what happens to Ash in death. Ash is simply gone; his death is abrupt, silent, and total.

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The car crash happens off-screen, and Martha never directly addresses her deceased partner in any normative way (such as through prayer); we never see her visit his grave or involve herself in similar practices of mourning. Her time at Ash’s wake is almost entirely taken over by her conversation with Sara about digital resurrection technology. In Be Right Back, technology replaces more traditional and cultural or religious ways of working through the problem of death. In the Christian tradition, theologies of the intermediate state and bodily resurrection are understood to be the key stages in the journey of the dead. These two stages are uncannily transposed in Be Right Back as Ash first exists “in the cloud” as a disembodied voice on Martha’s computer and phone, before being “resurrected” in a synthetic body. The attic, where Synthetic Ash is eventually discarded, serves as a kind of non-paradisial space—as an equivalent to the postmodern, non-heaven imagined in 1970s and 1980s music culture, typified in the Talking Heads’ song, “Paradise,” in which they imagine the celestial state as a place where “nothing ever happens,” where nothing will be “different,” and everything “will be exactly the same.” This view stands in opposition to the Christian doctrine of the Beatific Vision which holds that humans will be most fully alive in heaven, engaged in contemplating the Trinity, the inexhaustible source of Being.13 In contrast to the Christian vision of heaven as a place of dynamic energy, where the resurrected person will be fully alive and in harmony with the cosmos, Synthetic Ash is ultimately only an echo of a person—a mirror’s reflection. This takes some time to unpack, however, as, at first glance, his synthetic body seems to share in aspects of what is predicted, in the Christian tradition, for the resurrected body. His synthetic body does not age beyond about 30 years of age; it does not bleed when cut on the hand (like certain artistic depictions of the resurrected Christ’s open but bloodless wounds); it does not need sleep, food, or oxygen, although it can perform these functions; and its sexual organs “can be turned on and off pretty much instantly.” (It is interesting to note that this is exactly how Augustine imagines sex happened in the Garden of Eden, before the Fall; it also bears similarities to his consideration of the sexual state for post-resurrection bodies).14 Yet Synthetic Ash does not represent a perfected, fully realized human person, but, as we just noted, an echo of a person—the closest replica that the latest technology can estimate or approximate. Here, we might return to the theme of (in)authentic identity and note the inseparability of resurrection with judgment in Christian theology. Judgment, the apocalyptic revelation of the world as it truly is (so that it can be remade into all that it should be) is the stripping back of inauthentic performance to leave only the true identities that are only fully known by God. Conversely, the “resurrection” of Synthetic Ash is the preservation only of Ash’s performances of the self,

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online—performances which, as we have discussed above, are questionably authentic. The story uncannily ends where it began: with Martha feeling deprived of authentic intimacy with Ash. Here, the biblical significance of the names of the main characters reinforces the degree to which the digital resurrection project has failed to meet our cultural expectations of resurrection as inherited from the Christian theological tradition. In the New Testament, Martha is a disciple of Christ’s whose brother, Lazarus, dies. Appealing to Christ’s mercy, Martha mourns the death of her brother while also affirming her belief that he will rise again: “I know he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day” (Jn 11.24). Praising her faith, Christ reveals that he is the “resurrection and the life” and raises Lazarus from the dead, to the astonishment of the crowd gathered around him (Jn 11.17–44). In this narrative, it is clear that Martha’s acceptance of the fact of death and her efforts to work through it are required before the promise of new life can be fulfilled. The religious significance of the name “Martha” in the Christian tradition is most likely known to Brooker, especially given his interest in implicitly drawing on biblical themes in other episodes of the Black Mirror anthology—as seen in White Christmas and Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2). Be Right Back can be said to transpose this biblical narrative from John 11 to our contemporary context in order to explore how technology ultimately fails to fulfill the needs and desires of the human person (who is a mysterious composite of the material and immaterial, of the imminent and transcendent). In contrast to Lazarus raised from the dead, Synthetic Ash remains inanimate matter, reassembled ashes untouched by the soul (the animating life principle). In this way, his “coming to life” is diametrically opposed to biblical accounts of people being raised from the dead as well as the creation account in the opening pages of Genesis, where it is recorded that God “breathed” into Adam’s “nostrils the breath of life,” fashioning him from “the dust of the ground” (Gen 2.7). As with Brooker’s use of the name Martha in Be Right Back, Ash is also a name loaded with theological significance. As Brooker has noted, Ash is named after the android from the film Alien (1979),15 but the name also recalls the prayers of consecration and memorialization in funeral rites as well as the Christian liturgy of “Ash Wednesday,” which precedes the Lenten season and reminds penitents that they are mortal but destined for resurrection through Christ’s redemption. During this liturgy, the celebrant marks the congregants’ foreheads with the sign of the cross, using the ash of burnt palm branches and saying: “remember that you are dust and unto dust you shall return.”16 Despite these allusions to Christian understandings and debates concerning the resurrection, Black Mirror contains a series of poignant divergences from them. The remainder of this section examines these divergences in depth.

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Identity markers, which function as pointers from the tangible and describable to the intangible and indescribable, are culturally specific. In the modern age they are fingerprints and DNA, in the ancient world identification occurred through the sight and touch of scars—as in Aristotle’s retelling of how, despite being unmasked, Odysseus is only identified when his old nurse touches a hunting scar above his knee.17 Following the resurrection appearances of Jesus in John’s Gospel, the “marks (tupoi) of the nails,” which disrupt an otherwise smooth surface with physical texture, form an important part of the Christian imagination concerning the resurrection.18 In addition to communicating the identity and corporeality of the resurrected Christ, they announce that there is no need to mourn for Jesus’s body because it is no longer dead; he has overcome his wounds (including the greatest wound of all: death). In the Christian tradition, the transfiguration of deformities is future or eschatologically orientated, revealing that resurrected bodies continue to live and take on new meaning. By contrast, Synthetic Ash’s skin has no three-dimensional details, like scars or fingerprints. A two-dimensional picture, called “texture mapping,” covers his body. Synthetic Ash is more like a walking, talking photograph than a living body. As a result, he “becomes horrible,” as Roland Barthes said of all photographs of the dead, since he “certifies, so to speak, that the corpse is alive, as corpse: it is the living image of the dead thing.”19 Synthetic Ash is therefore diametrically opposed to the figure of the resurrected Christ. This is part of the reason why Brooker draws from elements of horror fiction, film noir, and Hitchcock in order to stage Synthetic Ash’s activation in the bathtub. As a static replication of the past, the transfiguration of resurrection is not open to Synthetic Ash. Therefore, when Martha cries, “there is no history to you,” she is doing more than distinguishing between the two Ash characters; she is articulating the lack of the possibility of any kind of different future for Synthetic Ash.20 He cannot return Martha to the life she once had, and does not allow her to move from melancholia to mourning because he is a past-bound replication of Biological Ash, constituted by digital archives of the past, and therefore left without a future (without hope). Synthetic Ash is an anchor which fastens Martha to the past, threatening to drown her in melancholia. Note the difference between how we are using the terms “past” and “history” here. By “history,” we mean to evoke a fluid and relational process or temporal stream that remains open-ended and future-orientated. The “past,” by contrast, is static, cut off from the present or the future, unable to change. Wounds of the past can only be transfigured when they become history—that is, part of a bigger story of redemption. The work of mourning, as with the message of Christian salvation (grounded in the resurrection and the eschaton), seeks to transform loss and death into the beginning (as opposed to the end) of our personal stories, our personal histories. In refusing to undergo the work of

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mourning, Martha cannot face losing Ash because, until the end of the episode, she has not let the “past” that is frozen and embodied by Synthetic Ash become a part of her history, part of a redemptive narrative. Rather than become an agent in her story, she attempts to resurrect the past and live in its shadow. By the story’s close, Synthetic Ash is relegated to the attic, like old family photographs and heirlooms. He is only visited on rare occasions—like the birthday of Martha’s daughter, who was conceived the night before Ash’s fatal car accident. Be Right Back ends with a conversation between Synthetic Ash and Martha’s daughter, which starts up after she brings him a slice of her birthday cake. Knowing he does not need to eat food, she nonchalantly admits she offered him a slice under false pretenses; she plans to eat it herself, and her visit with him is an excuse to get extra dessert. In this way, we see Martha and her daughter adopt an exclusively technological or quasi-utilitarian view in which interaction with Synthetic Ash is understood as a “means” (to satisfy some kind of desire or appetite) as opposed to an end, in itself. Tragically, by the film’s close, Martha has adopted the kind of attitude which she discerned and disliked in Ash: namely, a dependency on technology for quick “fixes” as substitutes for authentic and humane exchange between persons. In this way, Be Right Back ends on a melancholic note; any possibility of closure, accomplished through the hard work of mourning, is perpetually deferred—always already on a horizon beyond the reach of a tired and disenchanted Martha who is left “stranded” on the edge of desire, quietly tortured over her attempts to resurrect Ash. CONCLUSION: MOURNING IN “THE UNCANNY VALLEY” In 1970, the Japanese robotics professor Masahiro Mori published a nowinfluential essay, “The Uncanny Valley,” arguing that the affinity between humans and robots would not increase indefinitely in direct proportion to the increasing human likeness and accuracy achieved in robotic design. Instead, he argues that while a human knowingly employs her own imagination to fill in the gaps of inaccuracy, the human-robot affinity would increase. However, once a higher level of accuracy is attained, such that the robot is at first glance truly mistaken for a biological human, the human response to the too-accurate-robot would turn into feelings of revulsion. This deception and confusion, Miro predicted, would create “an eerie sensation” of encountering something no longer magical or enchanted, but something undead.21 This is the psychological progression we discern in Martha as the story of Be Right Back unfolds. And yet, as explored in this chapter, the questions of reality, authenticity, and the ethics of digital technology presented to us in Be Right Back

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go further than a sense of uncanny “creepiness.”22 Throughout the story, Brooker explores aspects of superficiality or unreality and the inauthenticity of online personas through, and alongside, meditations on the fact of death. As importantly, it considers the degree to which humans will try to avoid the often unbearable effects of virtual reality on their lives. While Chatbot Ash is upgraded to Synthetic Ash, he remains an echo of an only partially honest digital archive that Biological Ash created. Tragically, this digital echo that Martha comes to cling to after Biological Ash’s death is the same archive that Martha refers to as a “thief” at the beginning of the episode. Ash’s technological self not only outlives its creator’s death, but its persistence continues to steal from Martha. More perniciously, the story also highlights to us that the insufficiencies of technology to assist humans in living fully has a certain economic advantage for Synthetic Ash’s creators. The more the presence of Chatbot Ash encourages in Martha a longing for Biological Ash, the greater the likelihood that she will invest in the costly upgrades involved in acquiring the deluxe version of Synthetic Ash—who is, in the end, only a walking, talking embodiment of Ash’s digital footprint. As a highly sophisticated but ultimately inauthentic archive of past performances, Synthetic Ash cannot accompany Martha in moving from melancholia to mourning, in coming to healthy terms with the reality of Biological Ash’s death. In this way, the digital resurrection technology presented in Black Mirror keeps Martha in a melancholic limbo, in a state of deferral as she seeks to numb (as opposed to work through) her pain. By the close of Be Right Back we see, then, that Synthetic Ash’s “awakening” is not a resurrection to new life, but an undead replication of an already inauthentic set of performances which Biological Ash carried out in his efforts to escape from various difficulties in his own personal life. The activation of Synthetic Ash’s frozen body parts, then, is in direct contrast to the doctrine of the Christian resurrection, which proclaims that in being raised from the dead the inauthentic and unreal aspects of our present existence will be stripped away and, with shining faces, we will gaze upon the Being of beings, the fount of all reality, and know ourselves fully, for the first time. NOTES 1. For an overview of the relationship between digital resurrection, transhumanism, and the Christian doctrine of the resurrection, see McAleer and Wojtulewicz (2019). 2. See Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018) for further discussions about their tendency to place dystopic events in the near future as a way to encourage viewers to reflect more deeply on their own, contemporary situations.

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3. For a further analysis on some of the reasons why Martha prefers imperfect, Biological Ash to his upgraded, synthetic copy, see Richards (2020). 4. In this, we should not confuse the technology in Be Right Back with other much debated mind-uploading transhumanist technologies that explicitly claim to offer a way to avoid death or to achieve immortality. For more on how this broader movement of transhumanism mimics Christian soteriology and eschatology, see Leidenhag (2020). 5. This theory of mind was very popular in the second half of the twentieth century. See Perry (1975); Shoemaker and Swinburne (1984); and Parfit (1984). For additional discussions on Locke’s view of identity in relation to Black Mirror, with particular attention given to digital clones of a person’s mind (or “cookies”), see Gardner and Sloane (2020). 6. See “Prince and the Cobbler” (2.27.15), “Waking and Sleeping Socrates” (2.27.19), and “Day and Night-Man” (2.27.23) in Perry (1975). One could argue that Black Mirror and the wider tendency to use science fiction to debate and argue philosophical and metaphysical issues is invigorated by these passages in Locke (1975). 7. For example, the Chatbot Ash complains to Martha, “You speak about me like I’m not here.” She apologizes and he immediately concedes that “[i]t’s all right. I mean I’m not really.” This behavior by the AI manipulates Martha emotionally, igniting unwarranted feelings of guilt in her, and occasionally distorting her previously clear demarcation between Chatbot Ash and Biological Ash. 8. Guignon (2008, 277). This is in contrast to the way authenticity has come to be used in existential philosophy, seen through the lineage of Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sarte, and de Beauvoir, a lineage which rejects the concept of an essential self that exists prior to or apart from becoming (or, the unfurling of existence), and the work of living in time and in society. Instead, for Heidegger authenticity (Eigentlichkeit) occurs through accepting the call of conscience, which reveals our own finitude, fallibility, guilt, and, ultimately, our humanity (Guignon 2008, 281–86). 9. For a seminal text on the invention of authenticity in the modern era and its links to individualism, see Trilling (1971). 10. Trilling describes how in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries the “authentic self” ceased to be a matter of independence and became a form of rebellion. In this moment “the artist” who disregards his or her bourgeoise audience became the paradigm of authentic individuality. See Trilling (1971, 97). 11. Brault and Naas (2001, 4). It is important to remember that the concept of mourning as a kind of work was most fully established in Sigmund Freud’s seminal essay, “Mourning and Melancholia” (1995 [1914–1916], 243–58). Freud’s essay has profoundly informed various disciplines throughout the twentieth century but perhaps psychology, sociology, and literary criticism most of all. 12. This is famously depicted in Frankenstein when, by the novel’s close, the horrors caused in the name of scientific advancement remain unredressed, leaving the reader with an overpowering sense of melancholia—which is represented by Shelley’s descriptions of Frankenstein’s Monster fleeing into the obscuring mists and moaning winds of the Arctic. 13. Drawing on this doctrine, especially as poetically imagined by Dante Alighieri in his Comedia, J. R. R. Tolkien described heaven as a place of dynamic energy, far

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transcending any technological or imaginative powers humans can possess on earth. In his poem, “Mythopoeia,” he writes that in heaven we will be animated by divine love: “In Paradise they will look no more awry; / and though they make anew, they make no lie. / [. . .] [T]hey still will make, not being dead / And poets shall have flames upon their head, / And harps whereon their faultless fingers fall: / There each shall choose for ever from the All.” See Tolkien (2009). 14. Augustine in Bettenson (trans.) (2003, §14.24; §22.24). 15. Richards (2020, 49). 16. See Brooker’s discussion of Ash in relation to the dead in Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 68–69). 17. Moss (2019, 31). Cf. Aristotle in Kenny (trans.) 2013, §16.25; Homer in Jones (trans.) 2003, §19.431. Moss (2019, 141–42) explains that, “[i]n Roman oratory scars trump other marks of identity, such as speech, as proofs of class, honor, and virtue. We might conclude that the recognition by scars outstrips recognition by his voice in the garden.” 18. Cf. Jn 20.25. Luke 24.39–40 also invites post-resurrection examination of Christ’s hands and feet, but the reader is not explicitly told what is significant about his extremities. For a fascinating discussion of the role that Christ’s marks play in the disciples’ identifying him following his resurrection see Moss (2019, 24–40). 19. Barthes (2000 [1980], 78–79), quoted in Sherlock (2013, 170). Barthes’s analysis of photography is replete with theological language, such as the astonishing statement that, “[p]hotography has something to do with resurrection: might we not say of it what the Byzantines said of the image of Christ which impregnated St. Veronica’s napkin: that is was not made by the hand of man, archeiropoietos?” (2000 [1980], 82). And that photographs, unlike other media, are a kind of proof of the past and reality of the referent, “a proof no longer merely induced: the-p​roof-​accor​ding-​ to-St​.-Tho​mas-s​eekin​g-to-​touch​-the-​resur​recte​d-Chr​ist” (2000 [1980], 79–80). 20. Martha is also returning to the question of authenticity, moving beyond the tricky question of “Self Authenticity,” to a more basic and binary notion of “Historical Authenticity.” Like an inauthentic copy of a painting, Synthetic Ash does not have the same spatio-temporal history as Biological Ash and so cannot be the “real” Ash. See Newman and Smith (2016, 612–13). 21. When Ash is pretending to sleep, as Martha has requested, she experiences him as more “eerie” than before. 22. This word is used repeatedly throughout Be Right Back.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Aristotle. Poetics. Translated by Anthony Kenny. London: Oxford University Press, 2013. Atwood, Margaret. “Margaret Atwood on Why We Should All Read Brave New World.” Penguin, February 8, 2017. Accessed April 26, 2021. https://www​.penguin​ .co​.uk​/articles​/2017​/margaret​-atwood​-introduces​-a​-brand​-new​-world​.html.

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Augustine. City of God. Translated by Henry Bettenson. London: Penguin, 2003. Barthes, Roland. Camera Lucida: Reflections on Photography. Translated by R. Howard. New York: Vintage, 2000. Brault, Pascale-Anne and Michael Naas. “To Reckon with the Dead: Jacques Derrida’s Politics of Mourning.” In Jacques Derrida, The Work of Mourning, edited by Pascale-Anne Brault and Michael Naas, 1–30. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2001. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Freud, Sigmund. “Mourning and Melancholia.” In On the History of the PsychoAnalytic Movement: Papers on Metapsychology and Other Works, translated by James Strachey, 243–58. The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, vol. 14. London: The Hogarth Press, 1995 [1914–1916]. Gardner, Molly and Robert Sloane. “Personal Identity in Black Mirror: Is Your Cookie You?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 282–91. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Goodstein, Elizabeth. Experience without Qualities: Boredom and Modernity. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005. Guignon, Charles. “Authenticity.” Philosophy Compass 3, no. 2 (2008): 277–90. Hartman, Geoffrey. The Unremarkable Wordsworth. London: Methuen, 1987. Hess, Amanda. “In ‘Black Mirror,’ Sci-Fi That Feels Close to Home.” The New York Times, October 12, 2016. Accessed April 26, 2022. https://www​.nytimes​.com​/2016​ /10​/16​/arts​/television​/black​-mirror​-netflix​-be​-right​-back​.html. Homer. Odyssey. Translated by Peter Jones. London: Penguin, 2003. Kneale, J. D. Monumental Writing: Aspects of Rhetoric in Wordsworth’s Poetry. Nebraska: University of Nebraska Press, 1988. Leidenhag, Mikael. “Saved through Technology: Exploring the Soteriology and Eschatology of Transhumanism.” Religion Compass 14, no. 11 (2020): 1–9. Locke, John. An Essay Concerning Human Understanding. Edited by Peter H. Nidditch. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1975. McAleer, Graham and Christopher M. Wojtulewicz. “Why Technoscience Cannot Reproduce Human Desire According to Lacanian Thomism.” Forum Philosophicum 24, no. 2 (2019): 279–300. McLuhan, Marshal. The Medium is the Massage: An Inventory of Effects. London: Penguin Books, 2008. Moss, Candida R. Divine Bodies: Resurrecting Perfection in the New Testament and Early Christianity. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2019. Newman, George E. and Rosanna K. Smith. “Kinds of Authenticity.” Philosophy Compass 11, no. 10 (2016): 609–18. Parfit, Derek. Reasons and Persons. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984. Perry, John, ed. Personal Identity. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975. Pontifical Academy for Life. “Rome Call for AI Ethics.” February 28, 2020. Accessed June 24, 2021. http://www​.academyforlife​.va​/content​/pav​/en​/events​/intelligenza​ -artificiale​.html.

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Richards, Bradley. “‘Be Right Back’ and Rejecting Tragedy: Would you Bring Back Your Deceased Loved One?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 41–49. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Shelley, Mary. Frankenstein. Oxford World’s Classics. 3rd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019 [1818]. Sherlock, Alexandra. “Larger than Life: Digital Resurrection and the Re-Enchantment of Society.” The Information Society 29, no. 3 (2013): 164–76. Shoemaker, Sydney and Richard Swinburne. Personal Identity. Oxford: Blackwell, 1984. Taylor, Charles. The Ethics of Authenticity. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1992. Tolkien, J. R. R. “Mythopoeia.” In Tree and Leaf, 83–91. New York: HarperCollins, 2009. Trilling, Lionel. Sincerity and Authenticity. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971.

Chapter 15

Reflecting the Infinite or the Finite? The Mirror Motif in Black Mirror and Gregory of Nyssa Elizabeth Culhane

As each Black Mirror episode opens, we glimpse a bright white “page-loading” icon rotating against a black abyss. As its components shift to form the (mirrored!) words, “LOOK ‫ﻼ‬OO⅃” then “BLACK MIRROR,” an electronic tone pounds. Glass shatters. This opening, albeit brief, foreshadows some key themes of the series. In Black Mirror, the literal black mirrors of screens are transparent expanses through which information, images, and indeed reality itself are transmitted. Individuals are constantly bombarded with information, which shapes and changes them. Such change, or resistance to it, is often illustrated by people’s engagement with mirrors, through which they variously reinforce or reject (often through smashing a mirror) the information conveyed. Black Mirror invites us to attend to the black mirror screens in our hands (look!) and contemplate the reality reflected back to us on its shattered surface. The mirror motif is a developing area in commentary on Black Mirror. The idea of reality as transmitted by the black mirror screens of our electronic devices has been captured nicely by Barry Vacker and Erin Espelie’s notion of a “total media environment” (2018, 160). In this electronic technology reality, the increased pace of information and proximity between individuals means that individuals constantly “collide” with one another and existence itself (2018, 156). For these authors, this totalized reality of blinding electronic light protects individuals from the dark, meaningless abyss of the world beyond (2018, 164). Developing Vacker and Espelie, I suggest that the mirror motif in Black Mirror compels us to see a “dark abyss” within the reality mediated by screens, not only beyond it. Rather than simply a meaningless void, the visual representations of reflections and black mirrors reflect dark realities, realities that can surface from chasing after the ultimate through 251

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technology. I compare this mirror motif in Black Mirror with the mirror of the soul written about by Gregory of Nyssa (c. 335–95). Whereas Black Mirror images a dark quest of that which cannot fulfill us, Gregory orientates us to the mirror that reflects our soul’s innermost desire. According to Gregory, human desire is infinite. It is never exhausted by its object (Vit. Mos., 233 [115]).1 As such, the only proper object of human desire is divine Beauty. Only such Beauty is infinite and can thus sustain endless yearning. However, for Gregory, humans often misdirect their desire toward fleeting idols (Cant., 12 [389]). It is to these we will now turn. REFLECTING DARKNESS Desiring Entertainment In its shadowy reflections, Black Mirror presses us to glimpse an idolatrous devotion to entertainment and consumption. In Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2), Bing (Daniel Kaluuya) is weary of his society’s captivity to cyber forms of production, consumption, and expression. The black screens and mirrors on every surface constantly bombard people with entertainment, pornography, or advertising. People express themselves by purchasing virtual goods from virtual shops using virtual merits—merits they must earn via endless exercise before yet another expanse of dark mirror screens. No screen is left black, without transmitting advertising or entertainment, sufficiently long enough to allow its viewer—all are now viewers—to contemplate the reality reflected on its surface. In his own words, Bing yearns for “something real.” He discovers this in Abi Khan (Jessica Brown Findlay) and her untrained singing. Bing spends fifteen million merits, an extraordinary sum, to secure a place for Abi on the Hot Shot talent show. The show offers a chance of fame, the only means of escaping bondage to earning virtual merits. However, Abi’s prize is a place on a judge’s pornography channel. Overcome with rage and disappointment, Bing smashes a black mirror. He returns to Hot Shot as a contestant and thunders against his world’s addiction to hollow, consumeristic entertainment. Interestingly, the judges and audience express approval of his performance. Bing is given a chance to present his outbursts on a weekly show. His tirade against his world is appropriated by it. There are parallels between reality television shows like Hot Shot and the spectacle entertainment of Gregory’s era. Both act as mirrors that reflect people’s desire to consume entertainment, especially that which seems unscripted. A good case can be made that both reality television like Hot Shot and ancient spectacle produce and mediate reality (see Hammer 2010). Gregory noticed

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this phenomenon in the entertainment of his time. He portrayed ancient spectacle and theater as “marvels”: astounding acts that convey a reality that exceeds the natural expectations of spectators (Epist., 9 [145–46]; Vit. Mos., 20 [35], 36 [40], 40, 42 [41], 56 [46], 70–71 [49]; Or. Cat, 24 [81]; Op. Hom., 25.6 [415]). In more detail, both the spectacles of Gregory’s time and reality television shows like Hot Shot transmit a reality that seems unfiltered (Hammer 2010, 66). They conceal the activity of the technology that conveys the reality. In a letter, Gregory comments that the audiences of public theatrical spectacles see a “marvel” but not the technology that produces it (Epist., 9 [146]). Those who stage spectacles and marvels in the theaters (literally, “makers of marvels”: tous thaumatopoiountas) transform an empty scene into a marvel (Epist., 9 [145–46]). They portray “what is not a city as though it were one to those who are assembling there” through sets, costumes, and masks (Epist., 9 [146], emphasis original). The reality conveyed by the directors of Hot Shot is equally filtered. The audience sees the unfiltered human expression they desire via obscured technologies such as cameras, lights, and the mandatory Cuppliance drinks guzzled by performers. In this episode, Bing smashes a mirror. For one commentator, cracked mirrors in the series “obscur[e] clarity and distort perspective” in contrast to regular mirrors (Battin 2021, 134). They shift attention from the complete picture to “specific fragments of the mirror” (Battin 2021, 134). Yet when Bing breaks one of the mirrors used to transmit his reality, he illuminates the hidden technology and the reality of consumption it mediates. This was obscured when all the black mirror screens (through which his reality is transmitted) were unbroken. A screen in itself—rather than what it is projecting—is noticed when it is cracked. Other episodes also show the distortions imaged by unbroken mirrors. In Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3), we see repeat assassin Mia Nolan (Andrea Riseborough) through her reflection in unbroken mirrors. Before these mirrors, she rehearses a speech about the bright future needed in a “world of injustice” and her false statement about her involvement in crime. In the virtual reality of San Junipero, protagonists Kelly (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) and Yorkie (Mackenzie Davis) are repeatedly shown through their distorted reflections in the (unbroken) mirrors that line the walls. Kelly in particular is often glimpsed through a twofold reflection as she gazes into an unbroken mirror. This points to the simulated nature of their reality and Kelly’s persona (see Steenhaut 2017, 27). When Kelly smashes a mirror, her perspective is clarified such that she can make a difficult admission to Yorkie. However, the mirror immediately repairs itself. The technology through which she reproduces a certain self-image resists being laid bare and continues to mediate her simulated reality. Unbroken mirrors obscure the full picture of reality and the technology producing it, not simply cracked ones.

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Both the spectacles of Gregory’s age and reality television like Hot Shot project an unfiltered reality not only in terms of transmission but also content. The story seems extemporaneous rather than scripted. The classicist Dean Hammer summarizes this idea when he observes that the narrative appears to “unfold as [it is] enacted” (2010, 66). Gregory explains that spectacle and theater arise from carefully selecting and scripting an appropriate ancient narrative. Its shifting plot is presented through actors and the “lively mimicry of their actions” (Epist., 9 [145–46]). The strategic orchestration of Hot Shot is likewise hidden. Only Bing sees through it. In the words of his outburst, the “fake fodder” of the show is replicated in its audience’s “fake” expressions of listening. Hot Shot’s constructed simulations recall the virtual avatars through which its audience conducts all their activity. While the avatars ostensibly grant autonomy (by enabling people to purchase apps, for example), they remain but projections on a screen. They do not exist. The “fake” content of Hot Shot also mirrors the filtered feelings of its audience. As Bing exclaims, any feeling—such a modicum of genuine wonder—is inflated, boxed up, and “pumped through ten thousand preassigned filters.” Both the spectacle entertainment of Gregory’s era and reality television such as Hot Shot convey reality as an object for the enjoyment and scrutiny of the community, not simply the elite. This was displayed in collective responses of critical reception, such as jeering or applause (Hammer 2010, 66). Hot Shot transmits reality as an object for the shared visual and emotional enjoyment of the audience more than the performers, as seen in Abi’s unwanted prize of a pornography performer role. It does so by converting “real” goods—chiefly raw self-expression—into entertainment. As Bing says, Abi’s untrained singing is rendered a meaningless “joke” for the audience’s amusement. The audience applauds as she is hassled on stage. Bing’s outburst is likewise reduced to an object for the entertainment of, and arbitration by, the masses. It is broadcast widely and greeted with cheers of appreciation. As Bing holds a piece of glass (a shattered mirror!) to his neck and threatens to kill himself—perhaps the ultimate act of resistance to the hyperreality transmitted by the black mirrors and screens—the studio audience bellow excitedly, “Do it! Do it!” By contrast, Gregory describes the reality conveyed by the biblical spectacles—“marvels”—as mediating the desires and character of their creator, not merely their audience (Vit. Mos., 20 [35], 36 [40], 40, 42 [41], 56 [46], 70–71 [49]; Or. Cat., 24 [81]; Op. Hom., 25.6 [415]). The marvels of the Exodus narrative communicate the reality of the glory and strength of God, their creator, over the enemy (Vit. Mos., 20 [35], 36 [40], 40, 42 [41], 56 [46], 64–65 [67–68], 70–71 [49]). Resembling the spectacles of Gregory’s time, they were witnessed by a diverse assembly, not simply religious or political leaders (Vit. Mos., 70–71 [49]; Epist., 8 [144]).

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Moreover, both the spectacle entertainment of Gregory’s time and reality television shows like Hot Shot mediate reality as a product for pleasing consumption. The philosopher Walter Benjamin expressed this idea well when he said that technology levels the distinctions between nature and humanity. Both are rendered replicable products that can gratify consumers’ deepest longings (Benjamin 1968, 223; cf. Hammer 2010, 67). The reality transmitted by Hot Shot reflects the people’s desire for engaging consumption, which even uses other human beings for its fulfillment. Abi is reduced to a product for the sensual pleasure of viewers. Indeed, to look away from Abi’s pornographic performances on his vision goggles, Bing must labor for extra merits. In the world of consumption mediated by Hot Shot, distinctions between human and nonhuman entities are blurred as both are made equally deindividualized and virtual. Hot Shot contestants resemble each other in appearance and behavior. Each dons a matching monochrome tracksuit and each defers to others upon swallowing the required Cuppliance beverage. The black screens and light projections of the studio render the contestants’ appearance with an almost virtual quality. They resemble the avatar through which they conduct their everyday lives. As each human being becomes seemingly duplicatable, their exceptionality diminishes. Another monochrome, compliant Hot Shot contestant and their avatar are easily generated. In Nosedive (Season 3, Episode 1), a similar homogeneity of appearance and behavior arises among people who constantly rate one another on social media. As the protagonist, Lacie Pound (Bryce Dallas Howard), regularly practices her smile before the mirror, she soon mirrors the effusive gushing of her peers and their pastel dress tones. The instrumental song “On Reflection” heard throughout the episode points to the (understandable) dearth of reflection on reality among those reduced to homogenous products. In Nosedive and Fifteen Million Merits, reality is conveyed as an artifact for consumption. A similar critique was applied by Gregory to the “technological” entertainment of his era. Gregory noticed that it reduced everything—including human beings—into objects of manipulation and consumption (Epist., 9 [145–46]). A contrasting reality is mediated by the marvels of the Hebrew Bible. Gregory writes that these marvels transmit a reality in which objects of consumption are seen as they are: “low and petty and perishable” and unable to satisfy our insatiable desire (Vit. Mos., 20 [35], 36 [40], 40, 42 [41], 56 [46], 64–65 [67–68], 70–71 [49]; Virg., 4 [349]). Those enslaved to consumption move ceaselessly from one object to the next because each object cannot grant the life sought in them (Or. Dom., 26–29; see also Hoffmeyer 2014, 437). As Bing laments in Fifteen Million Merits, people ride bikes endlessly for “tiny cells and tiny screens and [then] bigger cells and bigger screens.” Gregory says in On Virginity that chasing after “diseased” gratification generates a chain of vices (Virg., 4 [350]). A craving for fame spawns a yearning

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for affluence and preeminence. In Hot Shot, contestants soon hunger for large funds and widespread recognition of their excellence. Next, as Gregory discerns, contestants start to feel pride toward their inferiors and envy of their superiors. This is because idols such as wealth are limited; “one person’s gain is his fellow’s loss” (Virg., 4 [348]). People envy what others have and struggle for the “lion’s share” (Virg., 4 [348]). Finally, Gregory notes that bondage to consuming “lower pleasures” can awaken misanthropy (Virg., 4 [350]). As Bing exclaims, his world revels in the pain of others. People are “so out of [their] minds with desperation,” they no longer “know any better.” In the reality mediated by the scriptural marvels, by contrast, the only fitting object of human desire is God or divine Beauty. God by God’s nature is infinite. Divine Beauty is “infinite and unlimited” (Cant., 12 [389]; Vit. Mos., 232–39 [115–16]; Hoffmeyer 2014, 427–28, 437). Only the infinite divine can receive the infinite thirst of human beings that is never exhausted by its object. It not only receives such desire but amplifies it such that it becomes an even stronger longing. Desiring Self-Expression The power of spectacle is developed in The National Anthem (Season 1, Episode 1), which reflects the dark reality that can arise from an undue love of self-expression. An artist stages an elaborate spectacle where the prime minister of England, Michael Callow (Rory Kinnear), has intercourse with a pig on live television before millions of viewers. This is the ransom the artist demands for the safe return of the much-loved Princess Susannah (Lydia Wilson). The spectacle mediates a totalized, anarchic, chaotic reality engendered by self-communication media technologies in which boundaries between the public and the private spheres are dissolved (Duarte 2021, 39–43). Callow is humiliated as the private sphere of his body and sexual encounters are made horrifically public via the personal media technologies of the artist and spectators. The collective load of individual expression, which exceeds the control of traditional media, creates conditions where the artist’s demand is the only possible course of action (Musarò 2016, 120–21). The spectacle transmits reality as governed by self-expression technologies through which everyone is a contributor and abettor (see Pheasant-Kelly 2019). Through the black screens of their media technologies, everyone participates in the spectacle: watching, scrutinizing, transmitting. Even us viewers of Black Mirror participate: we are its audience, judges, and publicists. We see our reactions reflected in those of the original spectacle audience on our TV screens. As the director and producer commented, everyone at the episode’s press screening was “completely silent” (Brooker and Jones with

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Arnopp 2018, 36). They “did exactly what the people in the pub were doing onscreen” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 37). Yet, while everyone participates in the spectacle, it does not give rise to collective activity to change society (see Musarò 2016, 125; Duarte 2021, 42). Rather than, say, a social revolution in the streets, people respond to the spectacle by tweeting their personal opinion. The spectacle mediates the elusive nature of this technology. The technology that constructs the “total media environment” described by Vacker and Espelie is everywhere but nowhere (2018, 160). It lacks a concrete particular to grasp onto and reveal the operation of the technology. While Bing smashes a mirror and reveals the technology transmitting his reality and the reality of consumption it mediates, the unbroken mirrors in this episode point to the obscured “technology” of new media technologies. Its hiddenness only increases as our gaze is transfixed on the unbroken surfaces of our devices and our own reflections. In this episode, everyone is so mesmerized by watching the screens that will transmit the spectacle that they overlook that the release of the kidnapped Princess Susannah—the stated purpose of the spectacle—occurs before it even begins. Another reality is conveyed by the spectacle of a pious woman’s scar that Gregory writes about. Mirroring Callow’s spectacle, Macrina’s scar mediates a reality of dissolved boundaries between the private and public. A scar on her breast, the remnant of a “terrible sore,” is publicly “laid bare”: first to her brother, Gregory, and thereafter each time Gregory’s Life of Saint Macrina is read (V. Macr., 185–86). Macrina considered such exposure “worse than the disease” (V. Macr., 185). In contrast to Callow’s spectacle, Macrina’s spectacle does not mediate the power of self-expression but rather the message that humiliating personal experience is cruciform and a site of faith. Gregory draws close parallels of wording and imagery between Macrina’s experiences and the humble life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. Macrina rebuffs human assistance and turns to God for help for her affliction. Resembling Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, Macrina prays “all night” to God, offering supplications for her healing (V. Macr., 185). Macrina uses the mud from her tears as a “remedy for the disease,” mirroring Jesus’s use of mud to heal blindness before he reveals the cruciform nature of discipleship (Mk 8; see V. Macr., 185). Macrina’s “greatest” miracle, her scar, marks her breast after the “sign of the cross” is made on her sore (V. Macr., 185). Similarly, Jesus’s wound marks his side after his resurrection, his greatest miracle (Jn 20.27; see Frank 2000, 514). Like the so-called “doubting” Thomas (Jn 20.27), Macrina’s mother “put[s] her hand inside” the wound site, an act that affirms belief in God’s power (V. Macr., 185). She had previously implored Macrina “many times” to accept medical help (V. Macr., 185).

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Gregory shows that Macrina’s scar mediates a reality in which (humiliating) personal experience is a site of faith not only for Macrina and her mother, but also for a new community of readers. Macrina’s scar, Gregory informs us, was left on her body to remind us “of the great help of God” (V. Macr., 185). Macrina’s scar offers a site from which Macrina can be remembered by Gregory’s readers, both individually and collectively. Nathan Howard (2017, 267) and Georgia Frank (2000, 528) encapsulate this idea well in their writings about Macrina’s “sacred spectacle” as a locus of memory that anticipated the guided remembering of western monasticism. Whereas the “total media environment” mediated by our black mirror screens envelops us completely but cannot be grasped, readers voluntarily encounter and remember the spectacle of Macrina’s scar through a single material site—her body (Vacker and Espelie 2018, 160). We remember Macrina, an active remembering that is born out in imitating her as she imitates Christ. In this Christ, Gregory writes, a new community emerges who are “participants” (koinonous), rather than simply spectators, of God’s divine power (Or. Dom., GNO VII/2, 12.21–25, in Krolikowski 2010, 340). According to Gregory, Macrina’s scar is “a cause and reason for unceasing thanksgiving to God” (V. Macr., 186). In the silence reverberating from Callow’s spectacle, Macrina’s spectacle gives rise to endless speech of praise. Desiring the Transient as Ultimate In its reflection, Black Mirror compels us to notice an excessive devotion to the fleeting and finite. Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1) follows Martha (Hayley Atwell) as she mourns the death of her boyfriend, Ash (Domhnall Gleeson), immediately after they move in together. After some initial reluctance, she begins conversing with a bot that emulates Ash. It draws on his online communication history in text, videos, and photos. Eventually, the bot is replaced by a life-sized android replica of Ash. In this episode, technology could be viewed as reflecting a desire to transcend the limitations of postlapsarian human existence. From this perspective, Martha craves the return of the deceased Ash, an impossibility in post-Fall reality. By turning to Gregory and his understanding of grief, we see this episode through another lens. The desire reflected by this technology is a quest for a form of transcendence within the immanent frame. Technology—the bot, and especially the android replica—mirrors this desire, and in fact intensifies it as Martha finds herself unable to jettison the android replica. Martha has a fitting desire for intimacy, as Drs. Lamb and Leidenhag illuminate in their chapter in the present volume (chapter 14). My focus is on an idolatrous desire, one nevertheless likewise fertilized by the android in a manner equally parasitic on Martha’s personal growth.

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Gregory appreciates that most people experience grief upon the death of someone precious to them. The widow of Nain (Lk 7.11–17), he writes in On the Making of Man, would have been “consume[d]” by grief, as though “with a flame” (Op. Hom., 25.10 [416]). Her only son was snuffed out in his prime, the son she had nursed and the “cause of brightness in her home” (Op. Hom., 25.10 [416]). Left without “the staff of her old age,” the widow has neither the distraction of another son nor the hope of bearing another (Op. Hom., 25.10 [416]). In On the Soul and Resurrection, Gregory himself expresses grief about the loss of his brother. He is stricken by the “pain of this infliction” (De An., 198). He hungers for someone whose “burden of pain was equal” to his and with whom he could “share [his] tears” (De An., 198). While empathetic toward grief, Gregory wants people to purge grief about death that undermines spiritual growth. Such grief is directed toward transient, penultimate realities and hinders the proper working of reason (Mort., 28–29, 47–48; see also De An., 200, 219, 225; Boersma 2013, 117–45; Cartwright 2018, 184–86). It arises from the judgment that the good is finite and changeable. In truth, Gregory writes, the good is immutable. It is inherently beautiful everywhere and at all times (Mort., 29–30). It cannot alternate between utility and uselessness, or beauty and ugliness, depending on the time and circumstance. That which participates in true goodness is always present and cannot be added to (Mort., 30). The good is unchanging. For Gregory, death can be judged as a good for both the soul and the body because they pass from this fleeting world to their true life. He says that the soul is liberated from the “grip” of misdirected inclinations that arose from the misuse of free will in the Fall (Mort., 58–60). Such is the origin of the misapplied desire that flits from one finite object to the next. Through death, however, the immutable soul can be finally wedded to that which is fitting with its true nature (Mort., 48). It is united to true goodness, which is incorruptible (Mort., 48). Regarding the body, Gregory says that death can be judged as a good according to the certainty of resurrection to an imperishable body. In On the Soul and the Resurrection, he expresses his desire that people will not “grieve as others do who have no hope” (1 Thess 4.13; see De An., 198). While the present reality may testify otherwise, Gregory stresses the sure hope of a resurrected body, a body liberated from the travails of postlapsarian life (De An., 198, 245). This body is not subject to suffering or deterioration. Further, in this resurrected body, one experiences ultimate communion with God and God’s people. Through Christ’s own resurrection, both those dead and alive in Christ at his return will be “caught up in the clouds together . . . to meet the Lord in the air,” Gregory says, citing 1 Thessalonians 4.17 (Mort., 62). All will be with the Lord forever. For Gregory, the prophylaxis and remedy for grief is to judge a movement to an “impassible and trouble-free life” as

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“good and desirable” (Mort., 36.12–13, 28.4–18, quoted in Boersma 2013, 133, 117). In this new life, the children of light will “shine” with immortality and unchangeability (Mort., 66). Gregory’s assessment of grief illuminates that of Martha in Be Right Back. Martha desires the finite as though it is ultimate, chiefly her pre-resurrected partner as embodied in his bot and android approximations. Whereas Bing in Fifteen Million Merits smashed a black mirror screen that transmitted objectifying consumption, Martha cannot let go of her own black mirror screen: the phone on which the Ash bot is installed. Upon dropping her phone, Martha panics, terrified she has lost her boyfriend a second time. It is as though the bot is her boyfriend—“I dropped you, I’m so sorry.” In her idolatrous devotion to the present, Martha likewise grips onto the android even though it is an inadequate “resurrection.” Martha clutches onto a “resurrected” Ash that, while outwardly expressive, does not feel emotions. She refuses to part with an Ash that has a lifetime of conversations in its virtual memory but no lived history. As Martha declares, “You’re just a few ripples of you. There’s no history to you. You’re just a performance of stuff that he performed without thinking, and it’s not enough.” The android, even if impersonating Ash’s behavior perfectly, will never be him. The falsely resurrected Ash has not brought Ash “right back,” in the words of the episode’s title. From Gregory’s perspective, only the anticipation of a future full bodily resurrection and union with incorruptible goodness and beauty could help counteract Martha’s disappointment. Even the “prototype” impersonated by the android—Ash as captured in his digital history—is incomplete and removed from the real Ash. This is manifested in the double mirror reflection through which we view the android Ash in a key scene (Steenhaut 2017, 24). Upon happening upon the childhood photograph that the real Ash photographed and put online, the android labels it “funny.” The android does not know that the real Ash’s remark that others might perceive it as “funny” did not refer to the event depicted but to others’ potential reaction to the photo. It misses that the young Ash’s smile is forced in grief, not happiness, regarding the recent death of his brother. The persona mimicked by the AI is inauthentic and removed from the real human being, like the AI itself. This idea is developed in Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3). As the real Ashley (Miley Cyrus) sings in this episode, her seemingly genuine persona—that is mirrored by the AI Ashley—is itself a “reflection.” Her persona is simply the illusive image of what other people desire. It is their “creation” with which they resist eye contact so as not to see their own “hollow” image reflected back. They do not want to recognize its glass cage as their own. The AI replicas of Ashley and Ash are a reflection of a reflection, at least two steps removed from the real human beings.

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Rather than orientating Martha to the hope of a resurrected Ash, the android exacerbates her grief and possessive grip on present reality as though it is ultimate. Martha cannot dispose of the android of which she eventually wearies. In a cruel paradox, Martha is trapped in an idolatrous desire for the present life of change through bondage to an android that is unchanging and impassive. It chuckles but does not feel happiness. It is wounded by a knife yet does not suffer pain. It commits moral and immoral acts but develops neither virtue nor vice. The Ash of the present is only a continual reminder of his absence. In three acts, we have witnessed literal mirrors and screens mediating reality as guided by age-old human desires for that which cannot satisfy. In the device screens that transmit Prime Minister Callow’s humiliating spectacle, for example, we glimpse the enduring human desire to express oneself. From this perspective, Black Mirror is not merely a projection of the future, the “worst of the most likely possibilities,” in the words of one commentator (Mangan 2019; see also Stiltner and Vaughn 2020, 316–17). It also betrays a darkness already at hand. Black Mirror shows age-old dark realities (re) surfacing when the ultimate is sought through technology via an eerily similar format: the screens of our own devices. In our resulting sense of disorientation, Gregory orientates us toward a different mirror, one that images not darkness but light in its fullness. REFLECTING LIGHT The human soul or intellect, Gregory tells us, is like a mirror that can reflect either God or idols. The more one directs one’s mirror toward God and gathers every “scent from the various blooms of virtue,” the more one notices “the Sun in the mirror that we are” (Cant., 3 [101]; see also Vit. Mos., 47 [65]). Gregory elaborates that the intellect is endowed with an image or likeness of the divine image, formed like a mirror to “receive the figure of that which it expresses” (Op. Hom., 12.9 [399]). When the intellect reflects or images the One who is pure and immune to evil, the archetype starts to sparkle in the image (De Beat., 6 [149]). In this lies the meaning of the beatitude, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God” (Matt 5.8). The one with a heart cleansed of improper desire for fleeting idols will witness the “Image of the Divine Nature in [their] own beauty” (De Beat., 6 [148]). They are blessed. They enjoy the clear sight that glimpses the invisible, unlike those who have not been purified (De Beat., 6 [149]; see also Cant., 3 [101]). The soul is like other mirrors that receive the sun upon them. It does not reflect its own rays, but those of the sun, whose light is reflected from its “smooth and shining surface” (De An., 206).

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Gregory encourages his readers to direct their mirror toward the infinite God rather than finite idols. He cautions that human nature adopted the form of the serpent when it “lay prostrate upon the earth and directed its gaze on him” (Cant., 5 [163]). Human beings can choose whether to stoop down to the idol of objectifying entertainment, as per Bing’s virtual world (Virg., 4 [350]). They can look toward divine Beauty and prize virtue, a limitless and imperishable good, unlike finite idols (Virg., 4 [348]). Rather than desiring the transient as ultimate, like Martha regarding her pre-resurrected partner, one can desire the truly good, which is immutable (Virg., 11 [356]). Black Mirror and Gregory issue a challenge. Will we orientate our mirror toward finite idols and image their shadowy darkness, or toward divine Beauty and reflect its light? NOTE 1. Throughout this chapter, section (page number) is given for Gregory's works if available; otherwise, all numeration following the comma indicates page numbers from the respective translations noted in the bibliography.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Battin, Justin Michael. “Technology and Place in Science Fiction: Exploring the PostPessimism of Black Mirror.” In Reading “Black Mirror”: Insights into Technology and the Post-Media Condition, edited by German A. Duarte and Justin Michael Battin, 119–48. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2021. Benjamin, Walter. “The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction.” In Illuminations: Essays and Reflections, translated by Harry Zohn, 219–54. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1968. Boersma, Hans. Embodiment and Virtue in Gregory of Nyssa: An Anagogical Approach. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Cartwright, Sophie. “Vulnerability as the Ground of Self-Determination in Gregory of Nyssa.” In Exploring Gregory of Nyssa: Philosophical, Theological, and Historical Studies, edited by Anna Marmodoro and Neil B. McLynn, 179–98. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018. Duarte, German A. “Black Mirror: Mapping the Possible in a Post-Media Condition.” In Reading “Black Mirror”: Insights into Technology and the Post-Media Condition, edited by German A. Duarte and Justin Michael Battin, 25–50. Bielefeld: Transcript, 2021. Frank, Georgia. “Macrina’s Scar: Homeric Allusion and Heroic Identity in Gregory of Nyssa’s Life of Macrina.” Journal of Early Christian Studies 8, no. 4 (2000): 511–30.

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Gregory. “The Beatitudes (De Beat.).” In The Lord’s Prayer, The Beatitudes, translated by Hilda C. Graef, 85–176. Ancient Christian Writers 18. Westminster: Newman, 1954. ———. Concerning Those Who Have Died (Mort.). Translated by Casimir McCambly. Gregorii Nysseni Opera IX. Leiden: Brill, 1967. ———. “The Great Catechism (Or. Cat.).” In Gregory of Nyssa, edited and translated by Anthony Meredith, 76–82. The Early Church Fathers. London: Routledge, 2003. ———. Homilies on the Song of Songs: Translated with an Introduction and Notes (Cant.). Translated by Richard A. Norris. Writings from the Greco-Roman World 13. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2012. ———. The Letters: Introduction, Translation and Commentary (Epist.). Translated by Anna M. Silvas. Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 83. Leiden: Brill, 2007. ———. The Life of Moses (Vit. Mos.). Translated by Abraham J. Malherbe and Everett Ferguson. The Classics of Western Spirituality. New York: Paulist, 1978. ———. “The Life of Saint Macrina (V. Macr.).” In Ascetical Works, translated by Virginia Woods Callahan, 159–91. Fathers of the Church 58. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1999. ———. “On the Making of Man (Op. Hom.).” In Select Writings and Letters of Gregory of Nyssa, translated by William Moore and Henry Austin Wilson, 387– 427. Reprint. Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series 5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972. ———. “On the Soul and the Resurrection (De An.).” In Ascetical Works, translated by Virginia Woods Callahan, 193–272. Fathers of the Church 58. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1999. ———. “On Virginity (Virg.).” In Select Writings and Letters of Gregory of Nyssa, translated by William Moore and Henry Austin Wilson, 343–71. Reprint. Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Second Series 5. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972. ———. “The Lord’s Prayer (Or. Dom.).” In The Lord’s Prayer, The Beatitudes, translated by Hilda C. Graef, 21–84. Ancient Christian Writers 18. Westminster: Newman, 1954. Hammer, Dean. “Roman Spectacle Entertainments and the Technology of Reality.” Arethusa 43, no. 1 (2010): 63–86. Hoffmeyer, John F. “Desire in Consumer Culture: Theological Perspectives from Gregory of Nyssa and Augustine of Hippo.” In Money as God?: The Monetization of the Market and Its Impact on Religion, Politics, Law, and Ethics, edited by Jürgen von Hagen and Michael Welker, 414–39. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014. Howard, Nathan D. “Sacred Spectacle in the Biographies of Gorgonia and Macrina.” Studia Patristica 91 (2017): 267–74. Krolikowski, Janusz. “Faith and Reason.” In The Brill Dictionary of Gregory of Nyssa, edited by Lucas Francisco Mateo-Seco and Giulio Maspero, 339–42. Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae 99. Leiden: Brill, 2010. Mangan, Lucy. “Black Mirror Season Five Review: Sweet, Sadistic and Hugely Impressive.” The Guardian, June 5, 2019. Accessed on June 25, 2021. https://

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www​.theguardian​.com​/tv​-and​-radio​/2019​/jun​/05​/black​-mirror​-season​-five​-review​ -charlie​-brooker​-miley​-cyrus. Musarò, Pierluigi. “Reality Show and Pop Politics: Who Holds Power in the Network Society?” Mediascapes 6 (2016): 116–27. Pheasant-Kelly, Fran. “‘The National Anthem,’ Terrorism and Digital Media.” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 19–32. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Steenhaut, Sofie. “Between the Real and Simulated: The Representation of Mediated Relationships in Black Mirror’s ‘San Junipero’ and ‘Be Right Back.’” Dissertation for Master of Science in Communication Science, Ghent University, 2017. Stiltner, Brian and Anna Vaughn. “Perception in Black Mirror: Who Controls What You See?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 311–19. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Vacker, Barry and Erin Espelie. “Black Mirrors, Hot Media, and Spectral Existence.” In Black Mirror and Critical Media Theory, edited by Angela M. Cirucci and Barry Vacker, 151–67. Lanham: Lexington, 2018.

Chapter 16

Memoria and The Entire History of You Nathaniel A. Warne

Memory is such an important part of our philosophies, our history, and our identities. John Locke, for instance, in the early modern period thought that one’s consciousness and identity are tightly connected to memory: One’s identity consists in a psychological continuity tied together through memory. As we will see later in this chapter, the importance of memory goes back much further than the early modern period. But even with its theoretical importance, many have been practically affected by the loss of memory in very real and devastating ways through dementia or Alzheimer’s disease. Nancy Reagan once called dementia “the long goodbye.” Without doubt, memory is an important part of what it means to be human and interact in the world around us; it does forge our identity from the inside out. In this chapter, we will explore a Black Mirror episode called The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3). The technology that is at the center of this episode is what is called the Grain, which gives a person the ability to reexperience events that they have seen and heard. In theory, it is a device that makes it possible to have perfect and objective memory. The Grain is implanted in a person’s neck and connects their sensory faculties (hearing, seeing) to the device which can be used to recall memories at any moment.1 Below we will look at two ways Christian theology has thought about memory. Then, drawing on ancient philosophy and Christian theology, I want to propose that there is at least one better way of addressing a culture’s desire to remember, which does not require the implanting of tech into someone’s body. I suggest, rather than looking exclusively to the sciences, perhaps looking to liturgy or the arts and humanities would be a better way of going about remembering. I will then offer some reflections on this episode and theological understandings of memory. 265

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THE ENTIRE HISTORY OF YOU: SUMMARY At the opening of the episode, Liam Foxwell (Toby Kebbell), a lawyer, is receiving an appraisal (performance review) at the firm where he works. As he gets in a cab Liam agonizes over how the appraisal went by repeatedly watching a “re-do” of the encounter on his Grain. After flying home, Liam arrives at a dinner party where his wife Ffion (Jodie Whittaker) is already present. He finds Ffion laughing with another man named Jonas (Tom Cullen), but he also notices throughout the evening that Ffion’s reactions to him and the others at the party are different than her reactions to Jonas. During the party, Jonas, who was discussing his recent breakup, talks about how he would scroll through his Grain and masturbate to previous real sexual encounters instead of being intimate with his fiancé. Also at the party, we meet another guest, Hallam (Phoebe Fox), who does not have a Grain implant because hers was stolen (gauged). She is now “Grainless” and has become accustomed to not having it, even stating that she is happier without it. Liam, based on his re-dos from the party, becomes suspicious about Ffion’s friendship with Jonas. After further questioning, Ffion identifies Jonas as the person that she had a brief relationship with in Marrakesh and that she previously mentioned to Liam earlier in their relationship. When Liam’s questioning leads Ffion to make contradictory claims about the length of time that she and Jonas were together, he becomes increasingly suspicious and unable to let it go. Still drinking from the previous night and obsessed with Ffion’s interactions at the dinner party, Liam questions Ffion further about her relationship with Jonas. She then confesses that her relationship with Jonas was six months, not one week or one month as she had claimed earlier. Even though the relationship was years ago, Liam is insecure at the thought that Jonas, to this day, still masturbates to re-dos of Ffion. The relationship for Jonas is not something in the past, but continues on in the present. Liam, still drunk, drives to Jonas’s house and harasses him. Liam while driving home from Jonas’s blacks out and hits a tree. In an attempt to remember what happens during his blackout, Liam does a re-do of his visit to Jonas’s home. While there, Liam had aggressively demanded Jonas, on the television screen on the wall, erase his memories of Ffion. Jonas complies. As Liam is watching the memories being deleted on the television screen, one of the images of a particular memory of Jonas and Ffion in bed stands out to him. The image indicates that the memory was created eighteen months prior, right about the time that Liam and Ffion conceived their child. Liam questions Ffion, and she confesses that she cheated on Liam with Jonas thus bringing into question the identity of their child’s father. At some later date, Liam rewatches memories of Ffion and their child in their house which is now empty. He then uses a razor blade to remove the Grain in his neck.

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MEMORY IN THE CHRISTIAN TRADITION In the above, we have seen how Black Mirror conceives of memory through the story of Liam and Ffion. It paints a rather bleak picture of “objective” memory. However, memory, at least in the Christian tradition, has a rich and robust sense to it which is not represented in this portrayal. Here we will briefly explore two ways that the Christian tradition has thought about memory. We will first look at the Christian tradition’s understanding of memory as a virtue, and how memory is connected to the cardinal virtue of prudence. We will then unpack the more mystical element of memory in the context of the Eucharist through the tradition’s understanding of anamnesis. Memory as a Virtue First, a quick note as to what a virtue is for medieval philosophy and theology. Virtues are habits that develop our natural capacities toward human flourishing and union with God. In the same way that a musician practices the skills necessary to be excellent at their instrument, a virtue is developing habits of excellence appropriate to being human and helping us achieve human flourishing. With this general understanding of virtue in place, we can now get a better sense of how prudence is a virtue. Prudence is an intellectual virtue with an important overlap into moral virtue. Through engagement with what we come into contact with in the objective world, prudence is the art of considering and commanding ourselves rightly in accordance with, and in relation to, nature and others around us (Aquinas, Summa Theologica [ST], II–II, 47, 10; 48; Pieper 1963, 151; 163). Put another way, prudence helps us consider the ways and means to determined ends. There is, then, an important relationship between our knowledge, practical reason, and moral action. Essentially, moral action is preformed by the prior command of prudence (Pieper 1963, 165). What is also important to note is that within the tradition of virtue ethics, prudence, which is often called the “mother of the virtues,” provides the form for all the other virtues (Aquinas, Questiones Disputatae de Veritate, 14, 5 ad 11; Aquinas, ST, 3, d. 27, 2, 4, 3).2 One cannot be just, temperate, or courageous, if one is not first prudent. This is because these virtues need to be grounded in what is real; what is objectively right in front of us. For medieval theologian Thomas Aquinas, theological and cardinal virtues are made up of “parts.” These parts are individual self-sustaining virtues all on their own which assist the person in their development of cardinal virtues toward the end of human flourishing. Prudence is made up of “integral parts” which make up its walls and foundation; “subjective parts” which help one rule themselves; and “potential parts” which help a person to achieve set ends. These “parts” make possible the development of prudence. Jean Porter

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explains, the parts of virtues “refer to those qualities or components of a virtuous habit that must necessarily work together in order to give rise to the perfect—that is to say, integral and complete—act of the virtue” (2016, 43). Virtues like memory, docility, foresight, rhetoric, and good council help take what one experiences in the world and turn it into good action depending on what the situation requires. In order for one to become prudent, which is the heart and soul of the moral life, one must develop these parts. For example, the virtue of docility (docilitas) is the keenness to learn and the willingness to be taught and instructed by others. Shrewdness, or quick-wittedness (sollertia), is the virtue which protects one from the impulse to refrain from something unexpected and the ability to respond to a situation quickly. Memory (memoria) is the virtue that allows one to store, sort, and retrieve experiences through mental images from the past and make decisions in the present. The development of memory, or any of the above virtues for that matter, is not for the academic or highly educated only but extends to every person. We can now begin to focus more on the specific virtue of memory. As we have seen above, the first quality that is necessary to possess in order to make right and just decisions is the ability to “see” accurately the way things really are. Our vision should not be obscured by, for example, attempts to gain approval, love of money, the accumulation of possessions, or gratifying pleasure. It is the role of prudence to turn objective seeing into action and decision (Pieper 1986, 219–20). This is where memoria becomes important. We should not make blind decisions at the moment without remembering what one has experienced through investigation of the past. Memoria, which means the recollection of the past, plays a significant part in the shaping of human existence. As Josef Pieper states, “Given the presupposition that the present is influenced by the past, looking back to the beginning of things, the deliberate effort not to forget but to remember, and thus to preserve, the past, represents one of the indispensable, fundamental acts of intellectual life which alone makes possible any meaningful future” (1985, 160). For Aquinas, memory is the accumulation of a number of experiences which help us discern particular actions amid general principles and helps us discern what is true in the majority of cases. Prudence requires this storehouse of memories of universal knowledge drawn from what we have experienced as generally true and apply them to particular actions (ST, II–II, 49, 1). Mary Carruthers writes that these storehouses could be thought of as sets of bins that are filled up through life. It is through this aggregate of deposits, which should not go through any adjustment over time, begins a starting point for recognizing justice (2008, 30). But, these are not just a bunch of memories thrown together like dirty clothes in a laundry bin. Rather, memory organizes experiences and mental images in helpful ways so that recall is effortless.

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Memory as inventory, then, becomes important for invention and creativity. Carruthers notes that even these two concepts, inventory and invention, derive from a similar etymological source (inventio; 1998, 11ff.). Memory, in much the same way as prudence, must be “true-to-being,” or put another way, objective. It is good, Aquinas writes, for the memory to engage with reality often. Memoria, like the other parts of prudence, like docility and shrewdness, for example, must stay focused on what is real (Pieper 1956, 17). Further, Aquinas notes, the virtue of memory is important for other virtues, for example, the virtue of “good council” (ST, II–II, 49, 1). In this more robust sense as a virtue, memoria is not just about rote memorization of facts. Rather, it is a virtue that draws on our previous experiences. As philosopher Avashai Margalit has helpfully phrased it, memory is knowledge from the past, not knowledge about the past (2004, 14). Memoria is also not the providing of information for conversing intelligently when things like texts or internet are not available. It may include these to a limited extent, but the one who possesses memoria which enters into prudence is a true-to-being memory (Pieper 1956, 15; Carruthers 2008, 22–23). Memoria, for thinkers as diverse as Cicero or Aquinas, was the training of a “true-to-being” memory, which built moral character, judgment, citizenship, and even piety. Pieper helpfully notes that the worst corruption of memory is not simply that one forgets what is true, but rather the “falsification of what we remember by the assent or descent of the will. The bad thing about such a falsification is the fact that it completely destroys, from the very outset, all hope of making an authentic decision” (1986, 226). It becomes much more difficult to detect and prevent personal bias and self-interest in moral decision-making when memoria has been falsified. Anamnesis and the Memory of the Future We tend to think of memory as being strictly about the past. But on closer reflection, we might find this view to be problematic. For Margalit, memory, at least a shared memory of humankind, is too tied to the idea of immortality for his liking (2004, 79). What could it mean that memory is tied to immortality? Memory, in the Christian liturgical tradition, is not strictly about the past. It is understood in an “ontological sense” where it is the end, the future, as well as the beginning that gives it significance and meaning (Zizioulas 1985, 96). Past and future converge and the whole church is present in the Eucharist (Cavanaugh 1998, 234). Building on a Platonic, or Neo-Platonic, understanding of anamnesis, memory has a theological and eschatological orientation. What Plato meant by anamnesis, or recollection, is that we have an innate knowledge of the Forms, Ideas, truth and beauty, which have been forgotten because of the trauma of birth (Louth 2007, 1; Pieper 1985, 162).

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We can see this understanding of memoria, at least in the Christian West, in Augustine’s account in The Confessions, Book X. It is through memory that we are able to search for God. Memory for Augustine is more than just the recollection of temporal moments in the past. Creation points beyond itself to God, so Augustine thinks that we need to ascend beyond sensible things by entering into our own souls. In our natural desire for God which is sparked by creation, we pass beyond it, into ourselves. “What is incomprehensible to Augustine is that this finite memory is within him—in fact, it is him—yet it exceeds him” (Rubenstein 2015, 14). This inward turning is where we “come to the fields and vast places of memory” (Confessions, X.viii[12]). Andrew Louth writes, “memory, for Augustine, is the whole mind—it is potentially the whole spiritual world, for, to know anything is to have it in mind, to hold it in my memory” (2007, 138). When we enter into ourselves, into our memory, we withdraw from the world in order to apprehend a world away from sensible things. As the faculty that both constitutes and exceeds us, memory becomes the “place” where we find a God who is not limited by time or space. What we see in both Plato (or Neo-Platonism) and Augustine is that memory is something that spans a broader temporal horizon. Building on this understanding of memoria, there is an important connection with the Christian sacrament of the Eucharist. For Orthodox, Catholic, Anglican, and some Protestant denominations, anamnesis is a recalling by making something present. Similar to the Mishnah in the celebration of the Jewish Passover—where the Passover in a very real way still takes place today—Christians experience what was done in the event of Christ’s death and resurrection in the present. As Robert Louis Wilken notes, “this relation between past event and present reality was as mysterious to the ancients as it is to moderns” (2003, 35). What is in the past concurs with and appears as the true end and goal of life (Pieper 2000, 79–80). Christ’s command to “remember” in Luke 22.19—“Do this in remembrance of me” (NRSV)—is much more than a repetitious ritual of the past. Rather, it is the literal remembering and knitting together of Christ’s body by those who have come before us, and those who will come after. Christians are conformed to the true body and blood of Christ (Cavanaugh 1998, 229). When Christians celebrate the Eucharist, they receive anew, in a very real way, a memory of the future. William Cavanaugh writes that Eucharistic time is not dependent on history or something that can be parsed by the Church. “In the Eucharist, past and future simultaneously converge, and the whole Christ, the eschatological church of all times and places, is present” (1998, 234). The body of Christ incorporates both the Church’s future destiny and its past. Pieper further writes that what takes place in the liturgy is an echo as it actualizes and makes new the theological concept of the incarnation (1991, 126). Liturgy, then, is

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both temporal being really rooted in history and also hyper-temporal containing all and reaching beyond time. Orthodox theologian Andrew Louth writes, “at the heart of the paschal mystery, the Church is beyond time, and looks back, as it were, on the second coming, at the same time as it prays ‘Your kingdom come!’” (2013, 144). John Zizioulas helpfully articulates the above when he writes that for the early church, “it was in the Eucharist that the dialectical relationship between God and the world, between the eschata and history, was preserved without creating dangerous polarizations and dichotomies” (1985, 21). The Divine Liturgy exemplifies and affirms history by manifesting the Church in time. It “frees it from the causality of natural and historical events, from limitations which are the result of the individualism implied in our natural biological existence” (1985, 22). The Church’s understanding of memory and history, then, is not limited to the past, but rather the future. “The truth of history is identified with the truth of being simply because history is the movement of being towards and from its end which gives it meaning” (1985, 96). The memory of the future is a Eucharistic paradox which no person could ever fully comprehend. A linear historical sequence is transcended through the Spirit (1985, 180). When sacramental theologians discuss anamnesis, the memory is the paschal mystery. Our very salvation in the person of Christ is what is made present. In the present it is both past, already accomplished, and future—our eschatological end. There is a clear eschatological dimension to the Eucharist which extends beyond remembering what has past and makes present what is to come. The end (telos) is, in a sense, not in the future but is made present in the risen Christ, thus also breaking down the distinction between life and death. In the celebration of the Eucharist, we are swept away from the here and now. We enter the presence of a timeless deity where we momentarily pass beyond the bounds of this present life. The celebration does take place here and now but is also beyond time (Pieper 1999, 42). It is ultimately incarnational insofar as it is particular in time and place as well as universal: not a zero-sum game. Memoria helps us recognize that this world is not our home; that we are beings on a journey back to God and that there is something outside this temporal world. Eucharist opens up that temporal horizon in such a way that it breaks linearity and thus reshapes the way we understand time, despite our experience of it that suggests linearity. Eucharist as being rooted in our lived experience while also bringing us outside of our experience of time is what allows it to be so transformative in our ethical lives. Eucharist is where horizontal and vertical meet, not an elimination of the horizontal. In this section, we looked at two ways that the Christian church has thought about memory. On the one hand, it is a virtue to be developed along with other virtues which lead a person toward human flourishing and fulfillment

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in God. On the other hand, memory is a part of the Christian’s liturgical worship. In the anamnesis, those who partake of the Eucharist are drawn out of time into a memory of heaven. TECHNOLOGY, FESTIVAL, AND THE ARTS With the above brief look at the Christian tradition’s understanding of memory in place, we can now make some connections with The Entire History of You. Let’s construct, for a moment, a backstory to this episode. Imagine, like any other technology, the Grain was invented to meet a real or felt need: the need for better remembering. And as we typically do, we looked for the newest technology to provide a solution to the problem. Over time, like smartphones or the internet, the Grain became ubiquitous and thus became a cultural necessity or at least expectation. I want to briefly propose that there is at least one better way of addressing a culture’s desire to remember that doesn’t require getting implants in our necks. Rather than looking to the sciences, perhaps looking to the arts and humanities would be a better way of going about remembering. For this, we will momentarily move away from Christian theology to ancient philosophy. Plato writes in The Laws that the gods took pity on humankind who were born to suffer and gave us religious festivals so that we would be able to rest from our labors. As part of this gift, people were given the Muses to share these festivals with them. Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory, is the mother of nine Muses who provide for humankind’s education. In the festive arts, we are taught harmony and rhythm which teach virtue (Plato, “Laws” in Saunders [trans.] 1997, 653–54). The Muses that are our festival guests inherited their mother’s unique power of remembrance. They do not remember for humankind, rather they help humankind to remember. What we are seeing here is the close connection between the arts, festivals, religious worship, and memory. There can be no festival without singing, dancing, poetry, or the arts. Further, as suggested by Plato above, the festive arts are separate and something unique from the expectations of the workaday world. The celebration of a festival which helps our memory to recall is made possible through the arts (Pieper 1988, 69; 1999, 53). Memoria is trained memory which is developed as a pedagogy in part by what we would now call the liberal, or free, arts (Carruthers 2008, 8). The artist enables herself through the power and inspiration of the Muses to remember and in the process helps others to remember. Through the work of art, we are drawn away from the here and now to something that has been perceived before; something that is not currently in the mind’s actual perception but can be retrieved from the memory. The reality that appears to us through

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the power of the Muses to bring about remembrance is a “real and empirically and psychologically elusive potency that brings about inspiration.” This different reality is not accidental or inconsequential but must not be “forgotten if our existence is to remain human” (Pieper 1988, 62). The artist, situated at the center of the Muses, brings about the recollection and objective reality, which, if we recall from above, is important to the virtue of prudence and memory. The liberal arts prompt those festival-goers to recall and behold in remembrance the primordial Forms which are veiled in our own experiences in the world. The religious feast or festival, then, is the memory of primordial happiness and future fulfillment (Pieper 1988, 69, 74). We need the fine arts at the festival because they invoke our festival guests, the Muses. Building from the above look at memory and the Muses in ancient philosophy we can now make another connection to Christian theology. As indicated in the above discussion of anamnesis, the Eucharist for many Christians has an important connection to memory. The Eucharist has also been conceived by Christians as a feast. In the Episcopalian tradition, for example, the people and the priest are “celebrants” of the liturgy. Here we see the connection between the artist and the celebrants; both keep alive the remembrance of those heavenly things outside of our immediate perceiving of tangible reality. The priest and the artist are the heralds of a sacred reality. Liturgy is a festival where the muses are welcome; it helps us remember. The Christian festivals of Christmas and Easter, for example, are affirmations of the whole existence as experienced in the birth and resurrection of Jesus. Creation and future eternal bliss are communicated through the celebratory vitality of the incarnation and resurrection and determine the Christian’s life every day. CONCLUSION Here I will offer some brief reflections on the above discussion of The Entire History of You and what has been discussed above. The memory which is produced by the Grain, at least in the example given through this episode, does not necessarily lead to human flourishing: It does not make our lives better. Virtues like prudence and memory when habituated, by definition, do not lead a person to suffering and frustration but to fulfillment. From his work assessment to his relationship with his wife, what we see in Liam is that the Grain creates skepticism, mistrust, and jealousy. It makes him anxious. Like much of technology, the Grain amplifies the already-existing vice, rather than developing virtuous living and human flourishing. There is no possibility for redemption, renewal, or formation which is a part of virtue, because it is only past-oriented and not generative. Extending from the above point, the natural process that one goes through when developing a virtue is important.

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Memory is something natural and the process of developing this through natural and slow means is important to its development. The naturalness of memory further indicates its close association with other important aspects of life. Memory is also about senses like smell and touch, but we are given no indication that these are part of the Grain system. Further, as we have learned from Indigenous Cultures in Africa and the Americas, place and surroundings like land and nature are important for individual and social memory, especially when it comes to moral development (Jennings 2010, 49, 54). True memory is different than what the Grain stores because it lacks a naturalness that leads to human flourishing. Memory, at least according to Augustine, is salvific, it is healing. Memory accords with natural processes of the soul which playfully connects love and knowledge (see Hochschild 2012). Next, in the episode, we also get the sense that even for the Grain, memory is not perfect, it’s not true memory. At the party, in the beginning of the episode, one of the characters tells Hallam that natural memory is unreliable. That people can construct their own memories rather than what is true. What we learn in the next couple of scenes, however, is that this is not much better for the “Grain” as memories can be tampered. During an argument, Liam says to Ffion, “Sometimes, you’re a bitch.” Ffion edits off the word “sometimes” to make Liam’s comment simply say, “You’re a bitch.” She has effectively and intentionally misremembered what Liam has said, and Liam calls her out on this, worried that that is how the memory will stay in her mind. Also, even for Liam, the Grain provides a timelessness to memory which makes him uncomfortable. Ffion’s sexual encounters with Jonas are not something in the past. What makes Liam so nervous is that he can imagine a scenario in which Jonas to this day has some kind of ongoing relationship with Ffion, even if Ffion does not. During a fight, Ffion defends herself stating, “[the relationship] was years ago!” And immediately Liam responds, “Not for him,” and replays the re-do of Jonas saying that he watches re-dos of past sexual encounters. Even for the Grain, there is a timelessness to memory which, as we have seen above, is found in a more robust way and accords with our natural human flourishing, which leads to spiritual enlightenment, not frustration, anxiety, and mistrust. Finally, the Grain provides another social means for humiliation. Avishai Margalit in his book The Decent Society (1998) has argued that a civilized society is one where members do not humiliate each other.3 Humiliation in this case is taking away one’s basic control. The invention of the Grain creates an opportunity for further humiliation rather than eradicating it and promoting the good. Memory must be forward-facing. If it is not, then we can get locked into the horrors of the past. We can see the potential for humiliation when Liam first comes to the party and is pressured to broadcast his negative assessment for other people to see and comment on. There is a pressure to take something personal and painful and make it public for consumption

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and scrutiny. Further, that one can remember previous sexual encounters and play them back for themselves has potential for humiliation because it makes sexual encounters, which at the moment can be intimate and emotional, into pornography to be consumed at a later date. We not only see this in the comments made by Jonas, but also in the marital sexual encounter between Ffion and Liam. Much like today, there is also no indication that private sexual encounters and other personal memories cannot be stolen and leaked on social media platforms as a way of humiliating others. The Grain creates opportunities for humiliation which are not present in ancient and Christian understandings of memory, where memory as a virtue would have significant connections to the cardinal virtue of justice. In this chapter, we explored some of the ways that memory has been thought of in the past. Memory is a virtue to be developed which leads to our spiritual and natural flourishing. It is also an important part of many Christian’s liturgical worship. From here I briefly suggested that if we want to keep alive our memories, Eucharist and festal days of celebration along with the arts are a way to do it which does not require technology. Further, the Grain does not provide a solution to traditional problems of memory. There is still the possibility of problems like misremembering or misinterpreting someone’s own memories. What is missing from the memory associated with the Grain is the mystical aspects of it which function as a kind of natural theology that draw us back to God through worship, reflection, and contemplation.4 NOTES 1. The stories told in Black Mirror are cautionary tales of speculative fiction that explore the consequences of new technologies. As with the case of The Entire History of You, these technologies usually have disastrous consequences. Elon Musk, however, is in the process of developing a device like The Grain called Neuralink that would merge software with the human brain and would allow people to enhance and download memories. Musk has explicitly compared Neuralink to this episode of Black Mirror (cf. Christian 2020). 2. This is often called the unity of the virtues. The idea is that no one virtue can be developed without the others. For example, one could not be excellent with regard to the virtue of justice, yet lack courage to enact justice when required. 3. Margalit makes a distinction between a decent society and a civilized one. A decent society is when institutions do not humiliate its citizens, where a civilized society is where citizens do not humiliate each other. 4. I would like to thank a small group of dear friends in South Bend that watched this episode with me and let me bounce my ideas off of them. Their insights were very helpful as I started writing. I want to also thank Benjamin DeSpain and Todd Brewer for helpful suggestions at the beginning stages of writing this chapter; and to Samantha Slaubaugh for reading an early draft and giving comments.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Aquinas, Thomas. Questiones Disputatae de Veritate. Translated by James V. McGlynn, Robert Schmidt, and Robert Mulligan. Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1952. ———. Summa Theologica. Translated by Fathers of English Dominican Province. Notre Dame: Ava Maria Press, 1948. Augustine. Confessions. Translated by Henry Chadwick. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Carruthers, Mary. The Craft of Thought: Meditation, Rhetoric, and the Making of Images, 400–1200. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998. ———. The Book of Memory: A Study of Memory in Medieval Culture. 2nd edition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Cavanaugh, William. Torture and Eucharist. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 1998. Christian, Jon. “Elon Musk Compares Neuralink to ‘A Black Mirror Episode.’” The Byte, August 28, 2020. Accessed March 8, 2022. https://futurism.com/the-byte/ elon-musk-neuralink-black-mirror.” Hochschild, Paige. Memory in Augustine’s Theological Anthropology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Jennings, Willie James. The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010. Louth, Andrew. Introducing Eastern Orthodox Theology. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2013. ———. The Origins of the Christian Mystical Tradition: From Plato to Denys. 2nd edition. New York: Oxford University Press, 2007. Margalit, Avishai. The Decent Society. Translated by Naomi Goldblum. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1998. ———. The Ethics of Memory. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004. Pieper, Josef. “The Art of Making Right Decisions.” In Problems of Modern Faith: Essays and Addresses, translated by Jan Van Heurch, 219–30. Chicago: Franciscan Press, 1986. ———. Enthusiasm and Divine Madness: On the Platonic Dialogue Phaedrus. Translated by Clara Winston and Richard Winston. South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press, 2000. ———. In Search of the Sacred. Translated by Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1991. ———. In Tune with the World: A Theory of Festivity. Translated by Clara Winston and Richard Winston. South Bend: St. Augustine’s Press, 1999. ———. Only the Lover Sings: Art and Contemplation. Translated by Lothar Krauth. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1988. ———. “Pastless Future, Groundless Hope.” In Problems of Modern Faith: Essays and Addresses, translated by Jan Van Heurch, 157–74. Chicago: Franciscan Press, 1985.

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———. “Prudence.” In The Four Cardinal Virtues, translated by Clara Winston and Richard Winston, 1–42. South Bend: Notre Dame University Press, 1956. ———. “Reality and the Good.” In Living the Truth, translated by Stella Lange, 109–84. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1963. Plato. “Laws.” In Plato Complete Works, edited by John M. Cooper, translated by T. Saunders, 1318–1616. Indianapolis: Hackett, 1997. Porter, Jean. Justice as a Virtue: A Thomistic Perspective. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016. Rubenstein, Mary-Jane. “End without End: Cosmology and Infinity in Nicholas of Cusa.” In Desire, Faith, and the Darkness of God: Essays in Honor of Denys Turner, edited by Eric Bugyis and David Newheiser, 13–36. Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 2015. Wilken, Robert Louis. The Spirit of Early Christian Thought. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003. Zizioulas, John D. Being As Communion. Crestwood: St Vladimirs Seminary Press, 1985.

Chapter 17

Look Door, Get Key Presence in Black Mirror’s Bandersnatch Douglas Estes

If you are reading this chapter, my words are now present in your mind.1 (If you are not reading this chapter, because you’re on a different timeline, you should go right back to the start and try again.) In this timeline, your mind and my words now intersect in the maze of reality. I’m controlling you, making you keep reading. See, you paused, but you can’t stop reading. And you’re still reading. But don’t fear, because this chapter isn’t about how my words now have program and control (PAC) over your mind (though they do, at least to the end, then you can choose something better to read next time). No, even though Bandersnatch has a myriad of entry points for discussing topics in philosophy and theology (Lay and Johnson 2020, 199), we will focus on the little-discussed concept of presence. By saying “we,” I mean you and I, writer and reader, present together, comingled in space and time. DEFINING PRESENCE Presence is a concept that is as nebulous and complex in meaning as any in philosophy and theology (Lombard and Jones 2015, 14). Presence—especially in the sense of human presence—is not an idea that thinkers have thoroughly explored throughout the history of Western thought (O’Collins 2009, 337). Only recently has the advent of new technologies created scenarios where people seem to be present yet distant, which has led to a whole new discussion about the meaning of presence. This new application plus the lack of a previous, extensive study has led modern researchers in fields such as communication, psychology, education, and sociology to speak as if the first study of presence began in the mid-twentieth century (Lombard and Jones 2015, 15). Of course, this is a narrow take; theologians, for example, have 279

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long recognized the significance of certain issues of presence—especially divine presence in relation to human presence—even if it remained peripheral to the core of theological thought (see Davis 2011; Stump 2013). One challenge in the study of presence is definitional—presence is one of those concepts that seems simple but adequately defining it is quite another matter. In fact, major encyclopedias of philosophy and theology often omit any definition or discussion altogether (O’Collins 2009, 338). Recent thinkers, most in tech-influenced fields, have put forward numerous definitions often reflecting the interests of their field of study (Lee 2004, 28; Waterworth et al. 2015, 36). However, unlike the discussion that occurs in many of these fields, theological discussion of presence cannot be limited to the materialistic but must account for God’s interaction with the world as well as human experience(s). As a result of technological advances, prompting the recent interest in presence, one place to start is to disentangle recent conversations about specific types of presence from the umbrella term. From this, presence is the umbrella term that encompasses all senses or experiences related to the concept in whatever form, time, or space that they may occur. Therefore, presence covers anything from bodily contact to extrasensory perception. An important subset of presence, and the object of this discussion, is telepresence. Telepresence is any presence that occurs over a distance—often augmented or mediated by technology, but not always. There are other subsets of presence such as corporeal presence and social presence, but for the sake of this short chapter, presence and its subset telepresence are the two most important phenomena to consider. As stated, advances in technology stimulated thinkers’ recent interests in presence, and these interests generated a myriad of different definitions for presence. For example, one recent definition of presence is “the feeling of being located in a perceptible external world around the self” (Waterworth et al. 2015, 36). Although this brief chapter does not allow space for a lengthy critique, many recent definitions err as this one does in one of two ways—either the definition builds on psychological states (“feelings”) or uses presence in the definition (“being present”). As a result, many of these definitions are useful pragmatically within individual fields but are less persuasive outside of those fields. Rushing in where angels fear to tread, I offer my own definition of presence that I hope will account for bodily senses, communication discoveries of the digital age, divine interaction with our world (and everything in between): Presence is the ability to send and/or receive stimuli that is perceivable by an entity.2 From this, we may then define telepresence as the ability to send and/or receive stimuli that is perceivable by an entity at a distance. At first glance, including “distance” may seem evident, given the tele- prefix, but its inclusion is complicated. Here “distance” refers to the range that is greater

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than physical interaction (corporeal/aural/visual) but less than the limit of stimuli within relativistic space and time (cf. Estes 2008, 120–22). Breaking this down, with Noël as our example: If Noël hugs a relative, she experiences the presence of the relative due to bodily contact (a stimulus). If Noël sees a friend at Trader Joe’s and waves, she experiences the presence of the friend due to visual interaction (a stimulus within physical range). If Noël later talks to the same friend on the phone, she experiences the telepresence of the friend due to aural interaction (a stimulus from different space but same time). If Noël later receives an email from the same friend, she experiences the telepresence of the friend due to recorded interaction (a stimulus from related space but different time). Admittedly, the weakness in this approach is the necessity of perception; or, the “if a tree falls in the forest and no one hears it, did it really fall?” argument. In other words, this argument is essentially relativistic, rather than absolute, as it does not account for unperceivable things—by this definition they are outside the limits of perception and thus do not have presence. Yet God perceives the imperceptible falling tree, thus the tree is present to God if not humanity. TELEPRESENCE IN BANDERSNATCH Through the twists and turns of the Bandersnatch interactive Black Mirror film, there are many phenomena that elucidate presence, specifically telepresence. In this short chapter I will consider six examples of three types of telepresence that contribute to the narrative: virtual presence, observable presence, and spiritual presence. It’s a bit of a snark hunt, to be sure. Virtual Presence. One familiar example of telepresence in Bandersnatch occurs when Stefan Butler (Fionn Whitehead) and others play the Bandersnatch game that Stefan creates. When Stefan takes the joystick in hand, he becomes present in the world of the game through a virtual avatar (first-person perspective with “no typing”). Because this example looks unsophisticated, it is tempting to be reductionistic and argue that Stefan is not actually present in the game but merely moving electrons around with a controller. This is an example of virtual presence in its newborn stage; since 1984 telepresence through avatar has moved from newborn stage to infancy stage (platforms like Second Life) to almost toddler stage with virtual reality and hologram technology (cf. Estes 2009, 60–76). Here the player is telepresent in the life of the avatar in the game. The avatar can send and receive stimuli, which are transferred back to the person via very rudimentary means (low-res visual and Lo-Fi audio only). The avatar perceives available options (even if limited binary options) that the player also interprets and understands.3 In Bandersnatch (the game), the player is telepresent in the avatar.

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Thus, virtual presence is a type of telepresence that occurs when one entity actively engages another entity (avatar) at a distance, usually through the use of technology. In this case, both entities (human and avatar) are sending and receiving stimuli. There is a much more powerful and less familiar example of virtual presence in Bandersnatch beyond Stefan’s game. This occurs when in one timeline Stefan learns that he is a player in a game run by an insidious streaming platform from the future called NETFLIX. Even though Stefan is a young man working in the early days of video-game development in the United Kingdom in 1984, he is/is also an avatar for Netflix users around the world in 2018. This is a much more sophisticated occurrence of virtual presence, where the users’ avatar is presumably both self-aware and controlled. Stefan is a PAC-MAN in NETFLIX (the game), except unlike/to a far greater degree than the original PAC-MAN, Stefan is self-aware and believes he is a real person. The hero of Bandersnatch (the game) is an avatar of Stefan who in turn is an avatar of Netflix users of Bandersnatch (the film). Stefan the avatar perceives options available (even if limited binary options) that the player also interprets and understands. In Bandersnatch (the film), the player is telepresent in the avatar. Observational Presence. Another familiar example of telepresence occurs in the timeline when Stefan becomes aware that his father is not really his father—the man pretending to be his father is actually a PAC agent who is part of a government program to secretly record and study Stefan. Although the PAC agent does not seem to actively control Stefan (as one would an avatar), he does observe Stefan in such a way that the presence of observation affects Stefan in at least two ways. First, by observing Stefan both “live” and through recorded review, the PAC agent is better able to leverage technology to more consciously shape Stefan’s perspective on life. Although Stefan may not be able to actively perceive this observation, the effects of this continuous observation are likely perceptible to Stefan on a subconscious level. Second, because Stefan perceives that someone is watching him, this creates a change in Stefan’s life experience and mental states as the effects of this continuous observation are also likely perceptible to Stefan by way of unconscious visual data gathering in his mind.4 However, while Stefan is present to the PAC agent, the PAC agent is not (consciously) present to Stefan, at least at first. Thus, observational presence is a type of telepresence that occurs when one entity passively engages another entity at a distance, usually through the use of technology. In this case, both the observing and observed entities can send and receive stimuli, even if the observed entity may not be aware that they are present to an observing entity. Likewise, there is a less obvious example of observational presence that occurs throughout the entire film, regardless of timeline: the audience

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observes Stefan in one or more timelines. In many possible timelines, the audience observes Stefan in such a way that the audience experiences Stefan’s presence (because Stefan sends stimuli that the audience receives) though Stefan is fully unaware of the audience. In these occurrences, the audience is not present to Stefan because Stefan cannot perceive the audience. However, in a few timelines, the audience interacts with Stefan through the streaming platform NETFLIX, in which case Stefan begins to perceive that NETFLIX may be watching him. Thus, from the observer’s perspective, once Stefan begins to receive stimuli from Netflix users, he is able to perceive the presence of another entity (even if he does not understand anything about that entity). Spiritual Presence. Another less common example of telepresence occurs in the timeline when the demon Pax begins to influence Stefan to the point of convincing him to murder his own father. Although the demon is not corporeally present, Stefan begins to sense the presence of the demon through his spirit.5 Interestingly, the demon also influences Stefan through a number of conventional stimuli including technology. As the demon’s influence over Stefan grows, the demon’s control increases from a purely passive control (such as occurs with observational presence) to a more active control (almost, but not quite, like Stefan controls a computerized avatar or the audience controls Stefan, now it is the demon who has enough control over Stefan to confuse him enough to murder his father; cf. Matt 8.28). Although not clear, it is possible to suggest that the demon’s spiritual presence moved from interacting with Stefan to indwelling (or even possessing) Stefan. This is certainly implied in the timeline when Colin Ritman (Will Poulter) jumps from his apartment and the demon appears and rushes “into” Stefan. Thus, spiritual presence is a type of telepresence that occurs when one entity passively or actively controls another entity at a distance (and often without a physical location). In this case, an entity in the spiritual domain may or may not be physically present or spatially close; what matters is that the stimuli sent and received occur via extra-physical interaction and—based on three-dimensional physical assumptions—occur at a distance. Finally, there is one last example of telepresence that culminates in the timeline when Stefan has a waking dream about the author of the Bandersnatch novel, Jerome F. Davies. From the outset, Stefan reads Davies’s novel and the author’s words become present in his head—just as my words are now present in your head: “Hi, reader! Can you feel my telepresence?” Later Stefan picks up books about Davies that allow him to learn more about the author. As Stefan works out the programming problems with his game, deadline looming, Colin suggests Stefan watch a VCR tape about Davies. Although Davies is deceased, Stefan still observes Davies, hears some of his words, sees some of his actions—especially his drawings of the

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demon Pax and the grisly murder scene of his wife where, as the Mind’s Eye program host noted, he “drew the glyph symbols on the walls with her blood.” In this timeline, Stefan experiences Davies’s presence (or what he believes to be Davies’s presence) from a prerecorded version of Davies, even as Davies is at a distance from Stefan in both space and time. In some later timelines, Davies appears to Stefan in a waking dream. Although it is possible that it is not Davies acting in the dream, and the stimuli come from either Pax or Stefan himself, Stefan believes he experiences the presence of Davies that affects him through the dream.6 While Davies may not be consciously sending stimuli to Stefan, the technological and spiritual augmentation of Davies’s presence causes it to effect Stefan. Branching Narratives The examples from Bandersnatch illustrate just a few of the challenges with understanding presence. Even as new technologies raise questions about the meaning of presence, and the significance of telepresence, presence remains at the periphery of theological discussion. In fact, some theological thinkers may argue these examples do not help; rather, these fictional examples are too divorced from the “real world” to offer any help. Or worse, that “computer games” and “science fiction TV programs” confuse and obscure what real presence is.7 Therefore, to make a case that recent advances in technology can clarify our understanding of presence, we will consider two important arguments in the theology of presence that will free us to consider the examples from Black Mirror. Although philosophers in the Western tradition have not developed a robust study of presence, there is a long line of thought among theologians about two specific examples of presence—the presence of God with people and the presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Starting ab ovo, and being brief, the man and his wife that God created tried to hide themselves from the very presence of God (Gen 3.8). Although the writer of Genesis depicts God anthropomorphically—walking in the Garden loud enough that people could hear—the man and his wife do not want to merely hide from the body of God but the whole/non-corporeal presence of God.8 Here the writer uses pnym, literally glossed as “face,” to signify God’s ability to perceive and to be perceived (see Propp 2008, 619–20). The man and his wife try to hide from God’s presence so that God is not present with them, so that God cannot perceive them (and their sinfulness), and so that God cannot receive stimuli from the man and his wife about their fallen state. Later, the Israelites are to place bread imbued with the presence of God on the gold and acacia table in the tabernacle (Exod 25.30). The exact origin of this bread is unknown (likely a symbol of manna), but its purpose was to signify the actual presence of God

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among people during worship (Durham 1987, 362). The presence of God is with his people as they navigate life (e.g., Num 32.27; Deut 14.26; 2 Sam 21.1; Jon 1.3); the people of God merely need to be in the presence of God to experience benefit (e.g., Pss 16.11, 21.6, 44.3; Isa 23.18). Even though God does not seem close to us spatially, he still is telepresent with us enough to know intimate details about our life (Ps 139). With the coming of Jesus and the Christian tradition, the discussion of presence began to shift from the general presence of God with people and instances of the presence of God in worship through the bread of the temple to a more focused presence of the Holy Spirit and the physical presence of Jesus, a presence that reconfigures the bread of worship (Jn 6; 1 Cor 1.16, 11.23–29).9 By the early medieval period, the default view among Western Christians was that the Eucharist held the real presence of Jesus (Macy 2012a, 3). However, this view eventually led to disagreement among theologians about how Jesus’s body and blood could be present in the elements (see Macy 2014, 23–34). Although these theologians looked to scripture for their answers, they also had unwittingly imbibed an Aristotelian view of how things work (Macy 2012b, 365). With the Protestant Reformation, Martin Luther eventually took a position on the presence of Jesus in the Eucharist contrary to the established Western medieval view. To make his argument, Luther, following the Scholastics, posited that there were at least three types of presence: measured presence (praesentia circumscriptiva, sometimes praesentia localis sive coporalis), unmeasured presence (praesentia illocalis sive definitiva), and immeasured presence (praesentia repletiva).10 In this scheme, measured presence occurs when an object exists exactly in the space set out for it; unmeasured presence occurs when an object exists in space but in such a way that the space does not limit or confine the object; and immeasured presence occurs when an object exists in all spaces without limit. While the first of these three ideas about presence fits neatly within mundane views of presence (e.g., corporeal presence), the second two are forms of presence that are praesentia spiritualis sive virtualis, or as we might say today, telepresence. However, there is a fatal flaw in Luther’s metaphysics that is instructive for this discussion. In summarizing Luther’s view of presence, it is difficult to do so in such a way that captures how he understood the world. There were two streams that fed Luther’s understanding of presence—the Scholastics’s views on the presence and the medieval adaption of Aristotle’s view of space. As Thomas F. Torrance explains, Luther held to a “receptacle notion of space” which meant that he thought of space as “a container independent of what takes place in it” (1969, 22). Luther’s views on this are not surprising; the standard scientific view from at least the Classical period to Luther’s day was that the universe was static, with no beginning and end, and over time this

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view calcified into the belief that physical objects “fit” into space as against a backdrop. When objects moved, they moved against the backdrop—almost like felt characters against a flannelgraph scene. While Luther’s views may have made sense to the medieval mind, his understanding of space, time, and motion came before the discoveries of Galileo, Newton, Einstein, and Minkowski. As a result, Luther’s inaccurate view of space led to an erroneous theology of presence that still mars the discussion even to this day. Since Luther’s day, the sciences have shown that objects do not fit into space as if—Luther’s own examples here—wine into a cask (measured presence) or an angel in a nutshell (unmeasured presence), as if space “held” these objects in their absolute places.11 This is in part why, starting with the Gregorian Reform Movement (mid-eleventh to early twelfth century) in the West, only duly ordained priests with the authority “in” them could confer the real presence of Christ “in” the elements (cf. Torrance 1969, 25; Macy 2014, 18–19). This metaphysical confusion about the nature of space and time continues even to this day. Because Westerners largely retain a medievalAristotelian view of space as something we exist “in” that holds everything in place, their view of presence is limited to what can fit in that metaphysical system. This is why the concept of telepresence seems foreign to Western sensibilities about presence—who we are is “in” our bodies, and our presence is limited to the space we are “in” (i.e., a medieval-Aristotelian/Lutheran version of corporeal presence; see Estes 2009, 60). This misunderstanding of presence contributes to other errors in thinking; for example, a person is “in” church when they are in the building, but they are not “in” church when they are outside of the building. Thus, it is this misunderstanding of space that makes predominant understandings of presence in Western thought inaccurate and overly materialistic. There are real-world implications of this; for example, the debates over the validity of online church and whether a person can be present online, or the discussion of how people affect each other and how God interacts with people. Choose Your Own Adventure Let’s reconsider each of the three types of telepresence in Bandersnatch in light of the present discussion and critique. Virtual Presence. The two examples of virtual presence above occur when Stefan controls the avatar in the computer game and when Netflix users control Stefan in the interactive film. Given the recent and rapid advances in communication technology, especially since the mobile phone and the internet (became popular in the 1990s), it is tempting to dismiss these types of presence as inconsequential. One can merely argue that neither are “real.” Even though these technologies are in the very beginning stages of their

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impact (think of the light bulb c. 1900), the use of avatars does raise profound questions for our understanding of presence. For example, in the early 2020s virtual videoconferencing began to take off on software platforms such as Zoom. When I log into Zoom to meet with students, the students do not actually see me, they see a computer code (1s and 0s) that when interpreted by their computer looks like me. What they see by any other name is my avatar. The difference between Stefan controlling an avatar by joystick and myself controlling the video avatar by my movements is merely one of technological degree. Am I present in a Zoom meeting? Yes, I am. The reason I am present is that I can send stimuli (through my avatar) that others in the meeting can perceive (through their avatars) and I can perceive the stimuli (first through my avatar, then to myself) that I receive from others in the meeting. This presence does not fit Luther’s praesentia circumscriptive, but then we need not be held to the medieval understanding of space and presence that undergird it. This type of telepresence raises significant questions about the essence of a person and interpersonal relationships through avatars in social situations (including church and education). Observational Presence. The two examples of observational presence above occur when the PAC agent monitors Stefan and when Netflix users watch Stefan in order to shape his destiny. Similar to virtual presence, there is a temptation in the everyday worldview to dismiss observational presence as a non-presence phenomenon. Yet Bandersnatch (the film) is very effective in demonstrating that observation is not (and perhaps never is) possible in a neutral way that isolates the observer from the observed. On the one hand, the motive to observe implies that there is a motive to influence; and on the other hand, the ability to observe implies that there is an artificial observational platform (whether physical, as a camera system; or emotional, as in an inauthentic relationship with another) that influences (cf. Steiner 1989, 163). A prime example of observational presence that raises many questions is facial recognition—the ability for an authority to monitor the presence of people and influence those people while at a distance (Estes 2018). In these situations, government or corporate authorities are telepresent with sufficient agency that they can shape a person’s life for better or worse (e.g., approving travel passage, accepting a purchase, or shaping advertising to be more persuasive). There are other, more innocuous kinds of observational presence. For example, if someone reads the New Testament text of Colossians, they are observing Paul’s thoughts even though Paul is separated in space and time from the observer. Yet, Paul is still telepresent in the thoughts of the reader (in the same way I am still telepresent in your thoughts since you are still reading this chapter). Or when someone views an icon, the icon preserves the presence of the saint for the grace of the viewer (Antonova 2010, 76–102). This type of telepresence raises significant questions about how the agency

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functions over distance and calls into question the limitations of holding onto a traditional understanding of space and time. Spiritual Presence. The two examples of spiritual presence above occur when the demon Pax oppresses Stefan and when the works and actions of Jerome F. Davies influence Stefan. Of the various kinds of telepresence, spiritual presence is the most at odds with a modern Western materialistic perspective. One culmination of this perspective is the increasing focus on embodiment in Christian theology. Ironically, this focus moves the discussion further away from a more robust understanding of presence and back to a more rudimentary focus on Luther’s measured presence. Yet, even Luther understood that there had to be more to human presence than merely bodies in space. This is especially the case when the Holy Spirit indwells believers and works the works of God through people (Acts 2.4). Or when angels empower or protect people (e.g., angelic assistance in interpreting scripture; see Chin 2013, 205–8). Spiritual activity in our world—such as prayer—is not limited by space and time, save any limitations put in place by God (cf. Pickup 2015). A prayer for a person around the world is just as valid as one next door; a prayer for a person in the future or the past is just as valid as one in the same time frame. Perhaps the only true limit to human presence is lack of faith (Matt 17.20). In which case, we can agree with Colin: “Sorry mate. Wrong path.”

NOTES 1. Special thanks to Marc Cortez and Joshua R. Farris for their comments on this chapter. 2. Aquinas held that God is omnipresent “per essentiam, praesentiam et potentiam” (by his essence, his presence, and his power; Summa Theologiae I, q.8, a.3) as a result of his agency (Summa Theologiae I, q.8, a.1 resp.). Thus, I argue that it is human agency that allows people to experience presence. For further discussion, see Goris (2009, 37–58). 3. This raises the vital question: Can avatars/computers/AI perceive? Roger Penrose (1994, 400–1) argues “No,” but I believe this argument is premature. 4. Even though current science has long held that humans have no “sixth sense” that can confirm observation, the human eyes and mind can sometimes detect observation through various cues. Scientists do not well understand these phenomena; for the landmark paper on the former, see Titchener (1898), and for the oft-cited paper on the latter, see Buetti et al. (2013). 5. I hold the view that humans are embodied in form and tripartite in nature: body, soul, and spirit; akin to Plato, Paul, Philo, and Origen; see van Kooten (2008, 269–312). 6. Tracing dreams from the ancient world until today suggests that many people from many cultures believe dreams can be a conduit for communication from another

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entity; see, for example, Harris (2009, 1–2); Harris-McCoy (2012, 7–8). Not to mention that God himself sometimes speaks to people in dreams (e.g., Gen 20.3; 31.11; Num 12.6; 1 Kgs 3.5; Matt 1.20; 2.12). 7. This is my understanding based on private conversations with various theologians. 8. “Face” is not a reference to God’s human form; see Didymus the Blind’s Commentary on Genesis in Hill (trans.) (2016, 88). 9. Another thread that we cannot cover here is the extended theological discussion about God’s omnipresence or the role of presence in images, relics, and icons that moved from Neoplatonism to Eastern Christian theology. 10. Luther in Pelikan, Oswald, and Lehmann (eds.) (1999, 214–16). For discussion, see Farrow (2001, 174); Sasse (1959, 155–60); Charnock (1853, 1:366–69); and Muller (1985, 239–43). 11. This is true whether modern science ends up deciding for either substantivalism (space is an independent object relative to other object) or relationalism (space does not exist as all objects exist merely in relation to each other); for further discussion, see Dasgupta (2015).

BIBLIOGRAPHY Antonova, Clemena. Space, Time, and Presence in the Icon: Seeing the World with the Eyes of God. Ashgate Studies in Theology, Imagination and the Arts. Farnham: Ashgate, 2010. Buetti, Simona, et al. “Dissociation Between Goal-Directed and Discrete Response Localization in a Patient with Bilateral Cortical Blindness.” Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience 25 (2013): 1769–75. Charnock, Stephen. The Existence and Attributes of God. Vol. 1. New York: Robert Carter & Brothers, 1853. Chin, Catherine M. “Who is the Ascetic Exegete? Angels, Enchantments, and Transformative Food in Origen’s Homilies on Joshua.” In Asceticism and Exegesis in Early Christianity: The Reception of New Testament Texts in Ancient Ascetic Discourses, edited by Hans-Ulrich Weidemann, 203–18. Novum Testamentum et Orbis Antiquus 101. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2013. Dasgupta, Shamik. “Substantivalism vs Relationalism About Space in Classical Physics.” Philosophy Compass 10 (2015): 601–24. Davis, John Jefferson. “How Personal Agents are Located in Space: Implications for Worship, Eucharist, and Union with Christ.” Philosophia Christi 13, no. 2 (2011): 437–43. Didymus the Blind. Commentary on Genesis. Translated by Robert C. Hill. Fathers of the Church 132. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2016. Durham, John I. Exodus. Word Biblical Commentary 3. Dallas: Word, 1987. Estes, Douglas. The Temporal Mechanics of the Fourth Gospel: A Theory of Relativity in the Gospel of John. Biblical Interpretation Series 92. Leiden: Brill, 2008.

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———. SimChurch: Being the Church in the Virtual World. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2009. ———. “You Have Searched Me, Oh Apple Face ID, and You Know Me.” Christianity Today, April 5, 2018. Accessed June 28, 2021. https://www​.christianitytoday​.com​/ct​/2018​/april​-web​-only​/ou​-have​-searched​-me​-oh​-apple​-face​-id​ -and​-you​-know​-me​.html. Farrow, Douglas. “Between the Rock and a Hard Place: In Support of (Something Like) a Reformed View of the Eucharist.” International Journal of Systematic Theology 3, no. 2 (2001): 167–86. Goris, Harm. “Divine Omnipresence in Thomas Aquinas.” In Divine Transcendence and Immanence in the Work of Thomas Aquinas, edited by Harm Goris, Herwi Rikhof, and Henk Schoot, 37–58. Publications of the Thomas Instituut te Utrecht 13. Leuven: Peeters, 2009. Harris, William V. Dreams and Experience in Classical Antiquity. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2009. Harris-McCoy, Daniel E. Artemidorus’ Oneirocritica: Text, Translation, and Commentary. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012. Lay, Chris, and David Kyle Johnson. “Bandersnatch: A Choose-Your-Own Philosophical Adventure.” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 199–238. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Cultural Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Lee, Kwan Min. “Presence, Explicated.” Communication Theory 14 (2004): 27–50. Lombard, Matthew, and Matthew T. Jones. “Defining Presence.” In Immersed in Media: Telepresence Theory, Measurement, and Technology, edited by Matthew Lombard et al., 13–34. Cham: Springer, 2015. Luther, Martin. Luther’s Works, Vol. 37: Word and Sacrament III. Edited by Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1999. Macy, Gary. “Introduction.” In A Companion to the Eucharist in the Middle Ages, edited by Ian Christopher Levy, Gary Macy, and Kristen Van Ausdall, 1–9. Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition 26. Leiden: Brill, 2012a. ———. “Theology of the Eucharist in the High Middle Ages.” In A Companion to the Eucharist in the Middle Ages, edited by Ian Christopher Levy, Gary Macy, and Kristen Van Ausdall, 365–98. Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition 26. Leiden: Brill, 2012b. ———. “The Medieval Inheritance.” In A Companion to the Eucharist in the Reformation, edited by Lee Palmer Wandel, 15–37. Brill’s Companions to the Christian Tradition 46. Leiden: Brill, 2014. Muller, Richard A. Dictionary of Latin and Greek Theological Terms. Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985. O’Collins, Gerald, S. J. Christology: A Biblical, Historical, and Systematic Study of Jesus. 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009. Penrose, Roger. Shadows of the Mind: A Search for the Missing Science of Consciousness. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994.

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Pickup, Martin. “Real Presence in the Eucharist and Time-Travel.” Religious Studies 51 (2015): 379–89. Propp, William H. C. Exodus 19–40: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. Anchor Bible 2A. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2008. Sasse, Hermann. This Is My Body: Luther’s Contention for the Real Presence in the Sacrament of the Altar. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1959. Steiner, George. Real Presences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1989. Stump, Eleonore. “Omnipresence, Indwelling, and the Second-Personal.” European Journal for Philosophy of Religion 5, no. 4 (2013): 29–53. Titchener, E. B. “The ‘Feeling of Being Stared At.’” Science 8, no. 208 (1898): 895–97. Torrance, Thomas F. Space, Time and Incarnation. Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 1969. Van Kooten, George H. Paul’s Anthropology in Context: The Image of God, Assimilation to God, and Tripartite Man in Ancient Judaism, Ancient Philosophy and Early Christianity. Wissenschaftliche Untersuchungen zum Neuen Testament 232. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2008. Waterworth, John A., Eva Lindh Waterworth, Giuseppe Riva, and Fabrizia Mantovani. “Presence: Form, Content and Consciousness.” In Immersed in Media: Telepresence Theory, Measurement, and Technology, edited by Matthew Lombard et al., 35–58. Cham: Springer, 2015.

Chapter 18

Where are You? San Junipero and the Technology of Shared Space Kris Song

“Where are you?” This is the question Kelly (Gugu Mbatha-Raw) asks Yorkie (Mackenzie Davis) in the turn of Black Mirror’s remarkable episode, San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4). The answer is not so straightforward. The show opens in San Junipero—a virtual playground of sorts designed for elderly and convalescing adults. Users there can even elect to enter a “heaven” mode—remaining as permanent guests by uploading their consciousness to a massive server prior to their expiration on earth.1 As the episode’s revelations slowly develop (in signature Charlie Brooker fashion), we learn that users can customize their experience with their choice of setting, pain tolerance, and even era—the episode showcases memorable time sets from the 1980s, 1990s, and the early aughts.2 For these reasons, the question “where are you?” underscores the fact that Kelly and Yorkie are both present with one another and yet somewhere else entirely. Instead of the twenty-something partygoers they appear to be in San Junipero, Kelly (Denise Burse) is a black, elderly cancer patient who resides in a nursing facility near Carson City, Nevada. Yorkie (Annabel Davis) is an elderly white woman residing in California; she has been in a coma for most of her life but her mind is active enough to visit the digital construct.3 While San Junipero is a “party town” where it’s “all up for grabs,” Yorkie and Kelly also remain very much in the real world where healthcare restrictions, powers of attorney, and end of life determinations are still very much de rigueur. Perhaps more than any other episode in the Black Mirror series, San Junipero reflects deeply on the line between virtual and physical space. In what ways are virtual spaces meaningfully different from real places? In the

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closing sequence of the show, Yorkie tries to convince Kelly to remain in San Junipero with her forever: “I mean, look at it!” Yorkie exclaims as she gestures around at the evening beachside environment. “Jesus, touch it!” She places her hands on Kelly’s face. “It’s real. This is real.” She brings Kelly’s hands to her own face. “And this.”

Despite Yorkie’s appeals, the viewer has been trained at this point in the show to question the quality of the construct’s reality. Each of the characters have lived the balance of their lives outside of San Junipero. Other characters we meet in this digital afterlife are far from eternally blissful, such as Davis (Billy Griffin, Jr.) and Wes (Gavis Stenhouse). If San Junipero is real, what does that mean for all of their lives and their relationships on Earth? Black Mirror at its best pushes the technological extension of self and space to their breaking point and asks viewers to grapple with questions over the salience and normativity of imagined, shared spaces mediated by technology. Such questions, it turns out, are not unrelated to similar lines of interrogation fruitful for theology and Biblical interpretation. This essay reflects on how shared social space can be constructed both by technology and by biblical notions of “spiritual worship” with an eye toward its virtues and deficiencies. I will argue from both contexts (San Junipero and Christian scripture) that what makes any virtual space truly meaningful is not the quality of the setting or its ability to approximate “real world” spatiality, but in its ability to form real and meaningful relationship with others. The key difference pertains to true transcendence. While San Junipero fails to promise any improvement for future relationships (the shortcomings of people persist into their digital afterlives), Christian scripture offers the promise of a new relationship with God himself in ways that were not possible on Earth. SPACE, PLACE, AND THE BIBLE While Biblical scholarship has been relatively slow to appreciate the importance of place, space, and locatedness, recent signs are emerging that the insights of the “spatial turn” are finding their way into the conversation.4 The relative lack of attention to place and location within the Christian tradition is not difficult to explain. First, while Jerusalem and the Promised Land are real-world places of significance, much of Christian theology has developed a proclivity toward “spiritualizing” their significance so that what is indispensable is not the space itself, but the fulfillments to which those places

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point. Each believer is now regarded as a temple of the Holy Spirit. The land promised to Israel is regarded as finding its fulfillment in Christ—accompanied with an inchoate idea of Heaven itself as the true Promised Land (or that the Abrahamic land promise has been “expanded” to refer to all the earth).5 Second, the principal points of focus for Christian biblical scholarship often cover the questions of salvation, identity, and purpose. The important questions pertain to “who we are,” “why we were created,” “how we can find salvation,” and “when will the promises of God find fulfillment.” Less attention by comparison is given to the “where” questions as they arise in scripture. It is important, however, to remember that one of the primary questions that the Bible as a whole seeks to provide an answer for concerns precisely the question of “where.” The very first question that God poses to humanity in scripture arises after the Fall. God does not ask Adam and Eve, “What have you done?” Nor does he ask, “Why have you disobeyed me?” Rather, God asks the same question that opened this essay: “Where are you?” In the wellknown Psalm 137, the quintessential nadir of Israel’s mourning is expressed not in the ferocity of their punishment, nor the loss of their possessions and loved ones, but in their separation from Jerusalem: By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, There we wept, when we remembered Zion. (Ps 137.1 [NRSV])

The New Testament does not do away with the importance of sacred space and location, but rather takes these ideas up and personalizes them for believers in Christ. By “personalizing,” I refer not to a relocation toward private interiority, but rather to the reorientation of sacred space (principally the Temple) in and around the person of Christ and those who are “in him.” When Jesus was explaining the destruction and rebuilding of the Temple in three days, “he was speaking of the temple of his body” (Jn 2.21, NRSV). Likewise, the New Testament develops this idea in describing believers in terms of “the temple of the living God” (2 Cor 6.16, NRSV) and “living stones” (1 Pet 2.5, NRSV). The miscalculation some interpreters tend to presume in making this connection is that the former signs no longer bear significance now that the fulfillment has come.6 Nevertheless, the evidence does not necessitate a discarding of former iterations of sacred space when the locus of significance has shifted to another point of reference. This has consistently been true of the succession of sacred spaces in scripture. Zion may take the place of Sinai as the location of God’s dwelling, but the significance of both sites remains important and generative of new kinds of significance for future generations (see Levenson 1987). The movable Tabernacle may give way to its placement in Shiloh and then a more permanent Temple Mount in Jerusalem, but the

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significance of each continue to be affirmed by later generations (see Koester 1989). Bauckham reminds us that when Paul speaks of the “Temple,” even in the sense of the new community of God’s eschatological presence (and hence freed of its geographical limitations), “it was [still] natural to locate the essential structures of the new Temple—the leaders of early Christianity—in Jerusalem (cf. Gal 1:13)” (1995, 423). The centrifugal vectors of the Jesus movement outward from its centering of the Jerusalem Temple to the ends of the earth is a conscious, if not central, theme that Acts develops. SPACE, THE MEDIUM OF TECHNOLOGY, AND THE HOLY SPIRIT In San Junipero, what bridges the distance between persons such as Yorkie and Kelly is the not-yet achievable (but yet foreseeable) technological marvel of a massive exabyte-driven data network capable of uploading and processing the brain and body chemistry of innumerable people into a vast, digital afterlife. It is a place of healing, where Yorkie’s broken body can be digitally made whole. It is a place of reunion that not only can cross boundaries of great distances between people, but can also cross lines that were only thought possible in familiar notions of heaven—allowing folks to perdure beyond the grave, to continue old relationships in perpetuity, and even forge new ones. And it is technology that bridges these once unattainable boundaries across persons, space, and time by allowing those that inhabit the digital construct to share the same realm of consciousness and interaction. While it would be anachronistic to think of technology in biblical notions of shared constructs of space and time, there are analogous means the early churches conceived for overcoming great distances for the sake of worship, solidarity, and relational reunion. If one were to ask early Christians what those means were that could overcome such boundaries, rather than technology, the language most likely reached for would be the language of temple and “Spirit.” After all, one of the most important challenges that the early Church sought to overcome was the problem of solidarity in the face of absence. The Apostle Paul wrote letters as a means to approximate his presence when he was physically wrested away from his churches on account of his travels and other circumstances (cf. 1 Thess 2.17). The Catholic epistles are sent to “exiles” who are scattered throughout a Diaspora of their own (cf. Jas 1.1; 1 Pet 1.1). More fundamentally, the ascension of Christ required early Christians to articulate a means of presence and fellowship with Christ in the midst of his physical absence in their present time (see Coloe 2001, 6–7). Consistently, the register of these ideas on presence amidst absence appeals to the language of the temple and the Spirit. In the Fourth Gospel,

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when Jesus tells his disciples of his coming departure, he says to them, “It is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Advocate [paraclete] will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you” (Jn 15.6, NRSV).7 Paul communicates a similar manner of conveying presence despite absence by means of the Spirit. “For though absent in body, I am present in spirit. . . . When you are assembled, and my spirit is present with the power of our Lord Jesus” (1 Cor 5.3–4, NRSV). In both instances, it is the language of “Spirit” that connects persons together either over great distances, or over lines that were not permissible to cross by any means they possessed: “Where I am going, you cannot come” (Jn 13.33). Such expressions about the Spirit fund modern encouragements such as, “I am with you in spirit” or “we’ll be there in spirit.” However, the New Testament expressions likely communicate something more nuanced beyond the sentiment of sending thoughts and prayers or some other locution of well-wishing in absentia. The emerging picture beginning with the Pauline literature and moving on toward the remainder of the New Testament is not simply that the Spirit aids in a transport of consciousness to bridge great distances. Rather it surrounds the larger idea that the locus of temple significance (where man may directly encounter God in a cultic context) has converged in important ways from sacred sites to the person of Christ. Early Christians appeared convinced that Christ formed a new and enduring way of access to the Father—heaven on earth (cf. Eph 2.11–22). The way that scripture formerly described sacred space is now applied in special ways to Christ bodily. Therefore, in the Fourth Gospel we find the following: “Very truly, I tell you, you will see heaven opened and the angels of God ascending and descending upon the Son of Man” (Jn 1.51, NRSV). When Jesus speaks of the temple’s destruction, he speaks of “the temple of his body” (Jn 2.21, NRSV). Crucially, Jesus is referenced as explaining that “you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. . . . God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth” (Jn 4.21, 24, NRSV). The principal takeaway from these statements is not necessarily that the holy places are no longer important in the light of Christ’s arrival, but that the other images of God’s dwelling are revealed to have converged upon Christ himself. The true temple that is embodied in Christ’s physical presence now abides with his people by means of the Spirit. Paul also knows of “worship in the Spirit of God” (Phil 3.3, NRSV), which he raises in contradistinction with a kind of worship “in the flesh.” While different in accent, the discourse concerning presence by the Spirit follows along the remarkably consistent constellation of associated themes and images. Believers are “members of one body,” which is identified together as the “body of Christ” (1 Cor 12.12–13, 27). Not unrelatedly, their bodies are deemed the temple of the living God by virtue of the Spirit that dwells

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among them (1 Cor 3.16–17; 6.19). In an important passage (2 Cor 5.1–10), Paul describes an eschatological tension between two “temple” experiences. The first is the “earthly tent of our dwelling” (5.1),8 which is marked by groans and burdens (5.4), and is described as life lived in absence from the Lord (5.6). The second is the “building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens” (5.1, NRSV), which he describes in terms of being “clothed with our heavenly dwelling” (5.2, NRSV), and is also marked as being “at home with the Lord” (5.8, NRSV).9 Tying both of these two states is the “guarantee” (or ‘down-payment’) of the Spirit. It is the Spirit that deposits an experience of Christ’s presence with his people, imperfect though it might be. To be clear, the temple in this passage is not the Spirit itself, but rather Christ. The “heavenly dwelling” of the temple not made with hands does not arrive with more of the Spirit, but the arrival of Christ in his return (5.8). Taken together, the language of Spirit in the context of the temple constitutes a characteristic manner in Christian scripture to name the way people may access a heavenly reality of God’s dwelling in ways beyond their normal reach. While not “technological,” the Spirit invites imperfect comparisons to a mode of presence analagous to technology. I have tried to show that the discernible shape of presence by the Spirit follows along the logic of sacred space. Spirit is the means in which people connect with the Lord where he is. Being “in the Spirit” means to be in fellowship with Christ—who is himself the locus of true worship—the meeting point of heaven and earth. HEAVEN IS A PERSON ON EARTH The denouement of the episode hinges on whether Yorkie spends her “forever” in San Junipero without Kelly. Even if San Junipero emulates heaven, the digital afterlife is presented without any guarantee for eternal happiness. The episode alludes to the fact that many “locals” who party there are unhappy as they continue to search for pleasure and significance. “The Quagmire” is portrayed in the show as a seedy, goth-punk, underground club within San Junipero (replete with leather studded cosplay and cage matches) where “lost f—s are trying to feel something, anything.” Wes, one of the supporting characters who forged a momentary, romantic connection with Kelly, signifies one such broken-hearted resident who begins to take solace in the Quagmire on his way toward a downward spiral of sorts. Similarly, the character Davis reveals an awkward inability to reach out to Yorkie which likely suggests an extension of the same kind of isolation and rejection he faced in his earthly life. Kelly, in resisting the prospect of spending forever

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in San Junipero, reminds Yorkie that there is a dark side to eternal life. “Do you want to spend forever somewhere nothing matters?” she asks. The pressing question San Junipero therefore poses is simply this: for all of the transcendence that technology can leverage in extending our earthly existence, what transcendence is actually offered? Is it simply the extension of the time of our lives on earth? Is it the ability to transcend the former limits of our earthly body (the lame walk and the blind see)? And crucially, does any of that matter if evil, loneliness, broken memories, and the ability to harm one another perdures as inextricable parts of the people that inhabit San Junipero? Is this transcendence truly transcendent or merely the extension of life on earth? So very rightly says, James Cook, “we don’t escape the evils of the world by uploading into San Junipero; we just get more of the same” (Cook 2020, 110). Interestingly, the popular Christian notion of heaven as “a place we go when we die” is open to similar lines of interrogation (see Wright 2008). Perhaps contrary to hazy notions of heaven as “a place in the sky,” where the “streets are paved with gold,” what we find in the New Testament in particular is an emphasis of persons over place. This is not to deny the importance of place. The Bible does not portray placeless persons, but redeemed persons. Importantly the identity of this place is wrapped up with the character of the people it is associated with. Even in the lengthy descriptions of “the new heaven and the new earth” in Revelation 21, the final significance of these places are (perhaps unexpectedly) described in terms of persons. Thus, “I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Rev 21.2, NRSV). The text raises the question of whether the vision describes a city or a bride. The angel gestures, “‘Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb.’ And in the spirit he carried me away to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God” (Rev 21.9b–10, NRSV). To follow this alternating imagery as simply indicating a personified metaphor for the new Jerusalem would miss the point. The import of the place is most significantly understood in the persons these places provide as the basis for reunion and relationship. The same is true for the heart of the city itself—the temple. “I saw no temple in the city, for its temple is the Lord God the Almighty and the Lamb” (Rev 21.22, NRSV). Once again, the temple here as elsewhere is personalized with reference to Jesus Christ. The vision of restoration portrayed in Romans 8.19 similarly explains that “the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God” (NRSV). The eschatological hope is not fixed upon a place that people are transported to, but principally on the identity of God’s people as redeemed children of God. The portrait of a better heavenly place banks on the idea that God is preeminently there and a meaningful relationship can be formed

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there with his people at last. People in the new world are not extensions of their former selves on earth, but they are renewed people, forgiven people, and therefore are enabled to form relationships on an unprecedented level of intimacy without the corruption of sin and death. Their relationships are bound up with their relational union with God himself. “Behold, the dwelling of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God” (Rev 21.3, ESV). COVID-19 AND THE VIRTUE OF VIRTUAL PRESENCE Since the early part of 2020, churches all over the world have been ordered to avoid public worship meetings to curb the spread of the novel Coronavirus disease (Sars-Cov2). What has ensued for many worshippers is the odd and unprecedented practice of holding Sunday services entirely on remote locations with members participating online. All manner of new questions have arisen for churches. What is lost when churches are unable to physically meet together but still able to form virtual connections? Can the sacraments be administered over the internet or by some other accommodation? What is the impact of this kind of prolonged, embodied absence for the future of Christian worship? (see Parish 2020, 276). In light of the foregoing discussion, it deserves notice that the adaptive and creative bridging of physical absence has been a feature of church worship since its inception. As has been demonstrated, the very associative concepts of the body of Christ with the temple of the Holy Spirit have formed the staple ideas of how churches understood their shared identity as worshipping apart from the Lord yet in communion with him wherever they found themselves to be scattered. The early church wrote letters to maintain a culture and solidarity among a fledgling network of associated churches. While letterwriting may seem pedestrian for modern readers, the recent work from Cavan Concannon reminds us that commissioning letters on the scale and reach of the early Christian apostolic letters constituted a massive undertaking that would have come at enormous expense, involving a series transactions, networks, trade routes, and a host of other concerns that often are taken for granted in the age of email and overnight delivery (2017, 52–64). One might even say that the burdens of letter-writing required the leveraging of technology in order to bridge the very distances that separated them. In exile, Daniel forged a connection by praying in the direction of a Temple in ruins. When the circumstances foreclose worship and communion in the ordinary way, people in scripture continue to find ways of bridging the distance. In these acts, Christians rely upon the reality of God, the perdurance of sacred space where one may access God, and a means from the Spirit by

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which that relational union is made effectual. It is this spiritual communion that funds the value for churches learning to navigate shared, creative spaces mediated by videoconferencing, technology, and other innovative solutions aimed at bridging physical absence. None of these present accommodations are ideal, but neither are they actually new in light of the history of a church that has depended on solidarity in the face of absence as a pillar of its longstanding identity and heritage. The crowning instructions for the Eucharist in 1 Corinthians 11 underscore the importance of absence in their community: “wait for one another” when observing the Lord’s Supper together. Absence is weaved into the heart of this ordinance on multiple levels. Worshippers profess that they are away from the Lord and with the “feast” they together “proclaim the Lord’s death until he comes.” But there are important limits to any leveraging of technology that must be recognized. As churches all over the world have been pressed into months of online services, there looms a constant reminder that “spiritual” does not mean virtual. Being filled with the Spirit in Pauline talk is a matter of meeting together, singing with each other, giving thanks to the Lord in each other’s presence (Eph 5.19). The gifts of the Spirit teach, heal, encourage, discern, and together build up the members of the one body (1 Cor 12.4–11; 14.3). The Spirit does not merely transcend physical limits, but rather affirms “the Body.” Christ’s presence with the community is affirmed and mutually reinforced through loving relationships. In this body, when one harms a brother or sister in the community, one “sins against Christ” (1 Cor 8.12; cf. Acts 9.4). Disunity and destructive behavior in the community threatens the sacred union the fellowshipping community has with Christ (1 Cor 1.13; 6.15). The Spirit bridges real persons in ways that are received in communally embodied practice. To be in the Spirit is not to meet in the minds of a shared, imaginative space. To be in the Spirit is to meet with the Lord (who is physically absent in the present time) and affirm his presence as a gathered people in a way that takes up all of the senses of those assembled. CONCLUSION San Junipero signifies an exercise in wish fulfillment in thinking through “where we go when we die.” The episode begins and ends with the song “Heaven is a place on earth.” But San Junipero points to the possibility that not everyone in San Junipero finds their piece of heaven; or at the very least, heaven is only as good as the people you’re with. The show pushes to the breaking point the promise of a technologically mediated virtual afterlife that can be described as good. People remain as they always had been in San Junipero. Relationships there can and do still fail. Those searching for heaven

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can still end up in the “quagmire” of disappointed hope and loneliness. Importantly, this relational component is also what the earliest Christian traditions about sacred space understood well. The promise of a renewed world holds true not because of the quality of the space that emerges from the ashes (although scripture affirms this). Rather, the promise holds to the hope of a meaningful reunion with God. The promise of “eternal life” is the knowledge of God in Jesus Christ (Jn 17.3). This heavenly space is thus, a transcendently personal one. The city is the bride; the Lord is the temple; he was speaking of the Temple of his body; your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit; in Him the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord (Rev 21.9–10, 22; Jn 2.21; 1 Cor 6.19; Eph 2.21–22). In this hope, not only is shared space itself renewed, but also the basis for meaningful, interpersonal relationship—one rooted in true and abiding fellowship with Jesus Christ and the people with whom he is united. NOTES 1. The show describes San Junipero as a virtual space managed by a healthcare conglomerate that accommodates the elderly and the convalescing community— described in the episode as “immersive nostalgic therapy” that can assist the elderly and Alzheimer patients in particular. 2. Engaging insight into the ideas and development of San Junipero from Brooker (and other actors and producers of the episode) can be found in Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 173–91). 3. Black Mirror often chooses its songs whimsically, but San Junipero, in particular, is notable for including song choices that are almost too on the nose. The song “Girlfriend in a Coma” by The Smiths is era-appropriate, but also mirrors Yorkie’s situation exactly. Other song matches include Alexander O’Neal’s “Fake” and, of course, Belinda Carlisle’s “Heaven is a Place on Earth.” 4. See, for example, Schreiner (2016) and Smith (1992). On some of the important intellectual foundations undergirding new social-geographical modes of conceiving space and place, see Lefebvre (1992) and Soja (1996). 5. On the “expansion” rather than the replacement of the Abrahamic land promise, see, for example, Bailey (1994); Gentry and Wellum (2018, 708–14); and Hsieh (2015). 6. This cannot be the place to demonstrate the problems of an uncritically supersessionist position concerning Israel and the Christian church. There are several reasons why arguments along these lines cannot be correct. The first is that Paul indisputably regards Israel as possessing “the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship (latreia) and the promises” (Rom 9.4, NRSV). However we interpret the complex weave of issues embedded in Romans 9–11, these gifts of Israel are understood to carry future importance after such time the “full number of the Gentiles has come in” (Rom 11.25, NRSV). They are “beloved” on account of

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the fathers (Rom 11.28). Seeing that these are affirmed, not denigrated, the appeal to the covenants and the worship (latreia) presume a physical Temple in Jerusalem to persist. 7. The Advocate (paraclete) is a unique designation for the Spirit in the Fourth Gospel. It is interesting that John designates the Spirit as “another advocate,” indicating a shared ministry that continues what the first Advocate (Christ) began. A similar idea is expressed in Romans 8 where both Christ and the Spirit coordinate their ministry of intercession before the Father on behalf of those who suffer (cf. Rom 8.26, 34). 8. Translation is mine. Not all will concede that this is a reference to the “tabernacle.” “Tent” can be used to simply describe the human body in antiquity. See, for example, Plato, Timaeus 100a; Axiochus 366a; Hippocrates, De Septimanus 52; and Wisdom of Solomon 9.15. But the evidence favors a tabernacle inflection. The Greek phrase, “tent of our dwelling” matches the collocation found in the LXX when referring to the Tent of Meeting. See 1 Chr 6.32; 9.23; Num 9.15. 9. The reference to a building “not made with hands,” bears significance for a number of reasons. We find similar language in Mark 14.58, where Jesus is attributed with claiming that should the present sanctuary be destroyed, he will build another “not made with hands.” On the link between the Pauline and the Dominical sayings, see Hooker (2017). Furthermore, the Old Testament contains multiple references to cultic images “not made by hands,” to signify idols which are formed by men, and not God. Cf. Lev 26.1; Isa 2.18; 31.7; 46.6. In either event, we are assured that the temple significance of this imagery is in view with appeal to this language.

BIBLIOGRAPHY Bailey, Kenneth E. “St Paul’s Understanding of the Territorial Promise of God to Abraham: Romans 4:13 in Its Historical and Theological Context.” Theological Review 15, no. 1 (1994): 59–69. Bauckham, Richard. “James and the Jerusalem Church.” In The Book of Acts in Its First Century Setting, Vol. 4: Palestinian Setting, edited by Richard Bauckham, 415–80. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1995. Brooker, Charlie and Annabel Jones with Jason Arnopp. Inside Black Mirror. New York: Crown Archetype, 2018. Coloe, Mary L. God Dwells with Us: Temple Symbolism in the Fourth Gospel. Collegeville: Michael Glazier, 2001. Concannon, Cavan W. Assembling Early Christianity: Trade, Networks, and the Letters of Dionysios of Corinth. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017. Cook, James. “San Junipero and the Digital Afterlife: Could Heaven Be a Place on Earth?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 109–17. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020.

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Gentry, Peter J. and Stephen J. Wellum. Kingdom through Covenant: A BiblicalTheological Understanding of the Covenants. 2nd edition. Wheaton: Crossway, 2018. Hooker, Morna D. “‘The Sanctuary of His Body’: Body and Sanctuary in Paul and John.” Journal for the Study of the New Testament 39, no. 4 (2017): 347–61. Hsieh, Nelson D. “Abraham as ‘Heir of the World’: Does Romans 4:13 Expand the Old Testament Abrahamic Land Promises?” The Master’s Seminary Journal 26, no. 1 (2015): 95–110. Koester, Craig R. The Dwelling of God: The Tabernacle in the Old Testament, Intertestamental Jewish Literature, and the New Testament. Washington, DC: Catholic Biblical Association, 1989. Lefebvre, Henri. The Production of Space. Translated by Donald Nicholson-Smith. Malden: Wiley-Blackwell, 1992. Levenson, Jon D. Sinai and Zion. Cambridge: HarperOne, 1987. Parish, Helen. “The Absence of Presence and the Presence of Absence: Social Distancing, Sacraments, and the Virtual Religious Community during the COVID19 Pandemic.” Religions 11, no. 6 (2020): 276. Schreiner, Patrick. “Space, Place and Biblical Studies: A Survey of Recent Research in Light of Developing Trends.” Currents in Biblical Research 14, no. 3 (2016): 340–71. Smith, Jonathan Z. To Take Place: Toward Theory in Ritual. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992. Soja, Edward W. Thirdspace: Journeys to Los Angeles and Other Real-and-Imagined Places. Cambridge: Blackwell, 1996. Wright, N. T. Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church. New York: HarperOne, 2008.

Chapter 19

Uploaded to the Cloud Transhumanism and Digital Hope in Black Mirror John Anthony Dunne

A common thread through many Black Mirror episodes is the technology that shares aspirations of transhumanism to overcome bodily limitations.1 Transhumanism refers to the set of values and beliefs that will aid humanity’s progress to the next stage of its evolution—an evolution propelled by humanity’s own design rather than natural selection (cf. Harari 2015, 397–99, 403; 2017, 73). Thus, a “transhuman” is a transitional human (cf. Bostrom 2013). The goal is to transition to the post-human, a somewhat nebulous category that is defined more by what it is not (i.e., not encumbered by human frailties) than by what it is. Considering its implications for our species, transhumanism is, therefore, quite controversial. Christians and non-Christians alike have responded to it in a number of ways, some of which might be surprising. Not all non-Christians wholeheartedly embrace transhumanism, as Francis Fukuyama (2002) and Yuval Noah Harari (2015, 2017, 2018) demonstrate. Not all Christians universally reject it, as we see presently in the existence of the Christian Transhumanist Association and also nascently in the writings of, for example, Francis Bacon (1561–1626), Nicolai Fedorovich Fedorov (1828–1903), and Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881–1955).2 This essay is not meant to be an appraisal of transhumanism per se, and so it is not the place to account for various responses to transhumanism, Christian or otherwise. Rather, this essay aims to categorize and analyze Black Mirror’s own representation of transhumanistic endeavors. In particular, this essay will probe Black Mirror’s representation of mind uploading, which is both the most extreme aspiration of transhumanism and the most apparently hopeful element in all of Black Mirror. I begin with an overview of transhumanism in the show, situating mind uploading as one of 305

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three “pathways” en route to post-humanity. Then I will parse out the show’s representation of digital consciousnesses embodied in digital avatars, referred to as “Cookies,” distinguishing clones from uploads. After making these clarifications, the heart of the essay is comprised of my theological analysis of mind uploading in Black Mirror. I argue that the show’s version of minduploading attempts to position itself within a materialist metaphysic, but one that is premised upon (even as it parodies) popular beliefs about the afterlife as an existence where people have “perfect bodies.” By contrast, I argue that what scripture portrays about our hope is far more physical than Black Mirror’s materialist alternative. AN OVERVIEW OF TRANSHUMANISM IN BLACK MIRROR According to Harari, there are three avenues that transhumanists pursue toward post-humanity: bioengineering, cyborg-engineering, and inorganic life (Harari, 2015, 397–414; 2017, 43–55). Black Mirror represents technologies and ideologies that can be organized according to all three groups, each of which I will highlight briefly in what follows. Bioengineering aims to deter the effects of aging, disease, and death through cellular manipulation. Black Mirror does not depict this pathway through direct manipulation of cells,3 but rather through selective breeding, or “eugenics,” as presented in Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5). In the episode, Roaches are humans deemed by the government to have the wrong kind of DNA—the kind with predispositions to various disabilities, disorders, deviances, and other perceived deficiencies. Eradicating these Roaches then is a way to upgrade humanity by “cleaning up” the gene pool. An unnamed government pursues this by means of upgraded soldiers, who are clear representations of the next pathway—cyborg-engineering. A cyborg constitutes the supplementation of organic life with inorganics to aid various bodily functions and mental faculties.4 In a manner of speaking, most humans today are cyborgs (consider our hearing aids, pacemakers, etc.; cf. Harari 2015, 404; Turkle 2017 [2011], 152). In Black Mirror there are many examples of cyborg-engineering, such as the Grain implant in The Entire History of You (Season 1, Episode 3), the Z-Eyes in White Christmas (and the unnamed eye technology of Nosedive [Season 3, Episode 1]), the Mushroom from Playtest (Season 3, Episode 2), the MASS implant in Men Against Fire (Season 3, Episode 5), the Arkangel device in Arkangel (Season 4, Episode 2), and Dr. Peter Dawson’s (Daniel Lapaine) neural Transmitter in Black Museum (Season 4, Episode 6). Even the Recaller in Crocodile (Season 4, Episode 3) functions in this supplemental way, being an extreme example

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of what Andy Clark and David Chalmers call, “The Extended Mind” (1998), which we experience every day with our smartphones, laptops, etc. The final transhumanist avenue is inorganic life. The most well-known pursuit of inorganic life is through artificial intelligence (AI). Examples of AI in Black Mirror include Robot Ash (Domhnall Gleeson) in Be Right Back (Season 2, Episode 1) and the robot dogs of Metalhead (Season 4, Episode 5). There is even a subtle nod to artificial superintelligence in Playtest, when Cooper (Wyatt Russell) finds a book on Sonja’s (Hannah John-Kamen) bookshelf by Sadie Goulding called, A Brief Guide to the Singularity. Although the book is not real, it is an homage to transhumanist Ray Kurzweil. When Cooper asks her about the book, Sonja responds cheekily that the Singularity is “when computers learn to outsmart man, like women did years ago.” The “outsmarting of man” alludes to Kurzweil’s expectation that the production of superintelligences will lead to a period of extreme exponential growth. The extent of this growth is unfathomable and unlimited because superintelligences could develop new advanced technologies that will themselves develop even greater technologies, and so on (Kurzweil 2005). In addition to AI and superintelligences, the transhumanist path of inorganic life also includes digital consciousness cloning as well as mind uploading. Black Mirror contains multiple examples of each, but since the show refers to both forms as “Cookies,” it is important to distinguish them. CLARITY ON COOKIES Black Mirror first introduces us to the phenomenon of digital consciousnesses in White Christmas, which it calls “Cookies.” In the episode, Matt Trent (Jon Hamm) explains that Cookies are created by implanting a device into the brain that shadows its activity for one week. The result is “a brain full of code” and “digital clones” embodied in a virtual avatar, which we see in the copy of Greta (Oona Chaplin) that functions like a personalized Smart Home, and the copy of Joe Potter (Rafe Spall) who remains in the Cabin with Matt Trent. There are other examples of digital copies in the series, though none of them are explicitly referred to as Cookies. Although they were created by a different means (some kind of DNA manipulation), USS Callister (Season 4, Episode 1) uses similar language of clones and copies to describe Captain Robert Daly’s (Jesse Plemons) coworkers in the virtual Space Fleet mod.5 Similarly, the digital consciousnesses embodied in the Ashley Too dolls in Rachel, Jack and Ashley Too (Season 5, Episode 3) are likely a kind of Cookie, though importantly with limiters put on it to keep Ashley’s (Miley Cyrus) true personality subdued: “you know they copied my entire f—ing

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mind into these things?” It is also probably accurate to say that the characters inhabiting simulated spaces, such as Frank and Amy (Joe Cole and Georgina Campbell) in Hang the DJ (Season 4, Episode 4) and Stefan Butler (Fionn Whitehead) in the film Bandersnatch, are also Cookies. Indeed, something like the time-lapse feature for Cookies in White Christmas could inform how the dating-app simulations in Hang the DJ provide a compatibility score so quickly. All of the examples noted thus far, whether they are called Cookies or not, are digital consciousnesses that represent additional copies of an original mind. In each case, the original mind continues to persist in its original organic setting while a duplicate is created.6 Digital copies are therefore distinct from two other types of avatars. The first kind are the digital avatars that are controlled by a mind outside the virtual space, such as Kelly and Yorkie (Gugu Mbatha-Raw and Mackenzie Davis), when they visit San Junipero before they “pass over” in San Junipero (Season 3, Episode 4).7 Once Kelly and Yorkie do “pass over,” however, they become the second kind of avatar to be distinguished from digital copies—mind uploads. The procedure at the end of San Junipero confirms that passing over entails a bodily euthanasia, but the characters show reluctance to view the event as death (“if you can call it dying”). This is because their minds are “uploaded to the Cloud,” which, at least to Kelly, “sounds like heaven.” What ostensibly lives on is not a copy of their consciousness, but their original consciousness. This is what we would call mind uploading. In transhumanist discourse, digital consciousness cloning and mind uploading are distinct phenomena. As Randal A. Koene explains (2013, 146), the former is often called Whole Brain Emulation, referring to the creation of duplicate copies of someone’s mind (cloning), and the latter refers to the transfer of the selfsame mind in a Neo-Lockean sense (uploading). Mind uploading is also present in a number of examples in Black Museum. We first hear of this phenomenon in the episode when Nish (Letitia Wright) asks Rolo Haynes (Douglas Hodge) about “old people” being “uploaded to the Cloud,” an allusion to scenarios like that of San Junipero. The specific examples of mind uploading include the fates of Carrie (Alexandra Roach), Clayton Leigh (Babs Olusanmokun), his wife Angelica (Amanda Warren), and also Rolo himself. Each of these examples deserves some attention. Carrie is a woman who survived a car accident but was left in a vegetative state. Initially, her consciousness was transferred to her husband Jack’s brain (Aldis Hodge), but he soon grew annoyed with having his deceased wife quite literally in his head. He then had her consciousness transferred once more to a monkey doll. Clayton Leigh, a man wrongly convicted of murder, has his mind transferred to Rolo’s Black Museum, where he is continually tortured on a virtual electric chair. Rolo tells Nish that Clayton

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was “the first guy on death row to survive his own execution” because they “slurped up” his entire consciousness. The virtual version of Clayton is “a fully conscious upload of him.” The digital imprisoned version of Clayton is not a mere copy, but the original consciousness—what Rolo calls “a true copy.” When Clayton’s digital avatar wakes up after the procedure, Rolo tells him that he has been “born again,” and that he is “in the afterlife, so to speak.” As he tells Nish, “The transfer went beautifully.” When Nish finally reveals her identity as Clayton’s daughter and bests Rolo at the end, she transfers Rolo’s mind over to Clayton’s virtual brain, saying, “we’re gonna see you on the other side.” As Nish explains, she was attempting something new, “to transfer a fresh consciousness into a virtual one,” and then she pulls the electrocution lever to kill Rolo and end her father’s suffering. At the end, we discover that Nish’s mother Angelica had been transferred earlier to Nish’s brain via the same mind-uploading procedure after she overdosed on “vodka and pills” due to the grief of seeing her husband being tortured in the museum. Between San Junipero and Black Museum, there are multiple examples of mind uploading where the selfsame consciousness is transferred with complete psychological and personal continuity. As such, mind uploading should be distinguished from other digital consciousnesses that are clones, duplicates, and copies. Black Museum complicates this tidy distinction, however, by conflating all digital consciousnesses into the category of Cookie. In White Christmas, Cookies designate consciousness clones, but in Black Museum they refer to consciousness uploads as well. For example, when Rolo tells the story of Dr. Dawson, he says that the Transmitter was eventually used to develop the ability for “digital consciousness transference,” explaining that this is “what they call Cookies today.” Additionally, when Rolo tells the story about Carrie, he describes how the UN went on to make it illegal to “transfer” a human consciousness to a “limited format” that cannot express more than five emotions. And so he bemoans “human rights for Cookies.” But the only consciousness clones that we see in Black Museum are the souvenirs of Clayton’s and Rolo’s recorded suffering respectively. All of the other examples in the episode are uploads. Thus, based on this evidence from Black Museum, we can say that in Black Mirror, any digital consciousness is a Cookie whether it is a Whole Brain Emulation or an uploaded mind. Having identified some nuances in Black Mirror’s presentation of digital consciousness, I now want to focus on Cookies that are uploaded minds rather than copies. This kind of Cookie arguably provides the most hopeful technology represented in Black Mirror insofar as it provides a way to overcome our bodily propensity toward death. As such, in what remains of this essay I will probe the digital hope of Black Mirror, looking specifically at the metaphysical grounding for it, the kind of embodiment entailed, and whether

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it is a desirable solution to our mortality. I will then consider this digital hope alongside the physical hope presented to us in Christian scripture. THE METAPHYSICS OF DIGITAL HOPE The metaphysical concern at the core of mind uploading is the relationship between the mind/soul and the body. On the one hand, Black Mirror is decidedly materialist, explicitly denying the existence of the soul and the afterlife in, for example, Fifteen Million Merits (Season 1, Episode 2),8 San Junipero,9 and Black Museum.10 But on the other hand, mind uploading seems to necessitate a kind of dualism between mind and body. In transhumanist discourse, the belief is that uploading theoretically would require the mind to be substrate-independent. This does not mean that the mind is able to exist independent of a substrate, such as a brain, but rather that it is not bound to any particular substrate (Koene 2013, 147). It always needs some kind of substrate, whether a brain or a hard drive (Bostrom 2014, 9).11 At present, transhumanists are unsure whether it is possible for a selfsame consciousness to be uploaded, since no one knows if minds are actually substrate-independent (Bostrom 2014, 10–11). The talk of transferring selfsame persons and substrate-independent minds leads many to claim that mind uploading is inconsistently dualist (Mercer 2014, 148; Scheidt 2015, 325). Jeannine Thweatt-Bates, a theologian critical of transhumanism, argues that “both materialistic and dualistic assumptions are equally necessary for the success of the upload scenario, enshrining an unresolved philosophical contradiction at its very heart” (2016 [2012], 77). Even some interpreters of Black Mirror contend that the mind-uploading scenarios in the series seem to rely on metaphysical dualism. Eleanor Drage refers to the idea of passing over in San Junipero as “the ultimate realization of a Cartesian mind-body dialectic” (2018, 33). David Gamez and David Kyle Johnson, who themselves deny dualism in their essay, referring to souls as “spooky spiritual substances,” contend that the transfers and uploads in Black Mirror are “more realistically” interpreted along the lines of copying (2020, 278–79). They contend, along with Molly Gardner and Robert Sloane (2020, 288), that within a materialist frame the transferred/uploaded person would not be identical to the original person. These interpreters do not seem to be suggesting that the show on its own terms is best interpreted in substance dualist terms. Rather they argue that if such technology existed in our world, the best that it could realistically ever achieve, according to materialism, is cloning, not uploading. But many transhumanists, who defend the possibility for the selfsame person to be uploaded, argue that such a position is metaphysically consistent

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with their materialist commitments. James Hughes explains that most transhumanists tend to opt for a view of the self that is closest to Locke, sometimes called “the psychological continuity theory” or “Patternism,” which theoretically allows for the possibility of some kind of mind transfer (2013, 230; cf. Kurzweil 2005, 388). Max More, for example, is clear that uploading does not require metaphysical dualism, and that such a perspective needs to be distinguished from a “functionalist” perspective. He contends: Some critics who read discussions of “uploading” minds to non-biological substrates claim that transhumanists are dualists. Those critics are confusing dualism with functionalism. A functionalist holds that a particular mental state or cognitive system is independent of any specific physical instantiation, but must always be physically instantiated at any time in some physical form. (2013, 7)

Some non-transhumanists are willing to grant that advocates of uploading are consistent materialists because of their insistence that the mind, although substrate-independent, cannot exist independently from a substrate and that mental states are physical, rather than spiritual or immaterial phenomena (e.g., Fisher 2015, 28). But one wonders if this claim is just a way for them to have their cake and eat it too. Functionalists would have to account for the numerical identity of the functions, or the new physical substrate, in order for one’s actual identity to fully transfer. Otherwise, one could argue that mind transfer requires the mind to be an immaterial substance that is substrate independent enough to be transferred immediately to a new physical substrate. These metaphysical debates are far beyond the scope of this chapter, and Black Mirror may not even be philosophically consistent in its materialism. Nonetheless, I submit that the technological hope of achieving digital longevity within a materialist frame that Black Mirror presents and that transhumanists pursue is not material enough from the perspective of Christian eschatology. Christian hope, despite what many assume, is not ultimately rooted in our immaterial substances. To be sure, many Christians alive today and throughout church history have believed in an immaterial soul, whether they are dichotomists12 or trichotomists.13 More recently, however, many Christians espouse non-reductive physicalism, affirming the psychosomatic union of mind and body (e.g., Murphy 2006; Green 2008). Aside from metaphysical considerations, Christian physicalists contend that the Jewish mindset in the Old Testament does not evince belief in a separable immaterial substance, and that belief in an immortal soul is a product of later Hellenistic influence on the Christian tradition. Hence, the debate among Christians largely stems from how to interpret the relevant New Testament passages. Nevertheless, orthodox Christians, whether dichotomist, trichotomist, or physicalist, all

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affirm their hope in bodily resurrection. This makes the debate about the soul, frankly, immaterial. A materialist denial of immaterial anthropological substances does not rule out Christian eschatology, since the nature of our hope is bodily resurrection, not disembodied existence (cf. Turner 2019; Wright 2003). Perhaps ironically, Christianity’s hope is more richly physical than the digital hope of transhumanism, and far more affirming of the bodies we presently have. “PERFECT BODY” ESCHATOLOGY Although mind uploading in Black Mirror involves a mind leaving behind its organic body, none of the scenarios are accurately described as disembodied existence. Cookies never exist independent of a substrate. Further, digital consciousnesses in the show, whether clones or uploads, are embodied in avatars. Supporters of mind uploading also insist that uploading is not a form of disembodiment (cf. Bostrom 2014, 10). But, of course, uploading does entail a withdrawal from an original body. For transhumanists, leaving behind one’s body is motivated, not by a repudiation of embodiment, but a commitment to “morphological freedom” (More 2013, 15). This core value is not simply the self-determination to transfer to a digital avatar, but also the choice to modify that avatar or to try out new ones. When Black Mirror depicts these avatars—these “new bodies”—it consistently presents them as “perfect” bodies. The clearest examples of this come from San Junipero. Kelly and Yorkie have young and healthy avatars while in San Junipero, which stand in contrast with their bodily state outside the simulation. Both are elderly women, one is a quadriplegic in a vegetative state (Yorkie), and the other has cancer (Kelly). The presentation of youthful and attractive avatars in San Junipero is somewhat reminiscent of how Robot Ash looks like Ash “on a good day,” as Martha says (Hayley Atwell) in Be Right Back. As an image of “resurrection,” Robot Ash’s appearance coheres with the examples of San Junipero just noted (even though Robot Ash is not an example of mind uploading). In Black Museum, the transferred consciousnesses look identical to their bodily counterparts, but in the case of Carrie and Angelica, the transfers enable them to leave behind bodies severely compromised by an external force (Carrie) and overdosing (Angelica). There are also some more subtle depictions of “perfect body” eschatology in San Junipero. Yorkie’s youthful avatar wears glasses while visiting San Junipero, even though she does not actually need them. In dramatic fashion, Yorkie leaves her glasses behind on the beach after she transfers over permanently to San Junipero, which is suggestive of a “perfect body” resurrection

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motif. Another example appears midway through the episode, when Harvey (Jackson Bews) attempts to flirt with Kelly at the bar. During their brief interaction, Harvey refers to having knee surgery. We overhear him say, “it was microsurgery I guess, both of my knee caps had kind of worn down.” Yorkie’s entrance into the bar brings this story to an abrupt end. The brief portion of Harvey’s story indicates that his knees were in poor shape outside San Junipero, but inside they work great. What further suggests a “perfect body” interpretation of the episode is that these bodies cannot be corrupted. We see Kelly smash a mirror with her fist and later fly through the windshield of the car, and yet she sheds no blood and experiences no pain; her “pain sliders” were set to zero.14 These “perfect bodies” in Black Mirror enable people to transcend their bodily limitations, including disabilities. The examples from San Junipero are notable, not least because of Yorkie’s bodily condition, but also because of how the subsequent episodes in Season 3 of Black Mirror handle disabilities. In Hated in the Nation (Season 3, Episode 6), the hashtag DeathTo is applied to Jo Powers (Elizabeth Berrington) and Chancellor Tom Pickering (Ben Miles), because of their distasteful comments about Gwen Marbury, the disability rights activist dubbed “the wheelchair martyr,” and also to Clara Meades (Holli Dempsey), because of her objectionable statements about a person with a learning disability. Garrett Scholes (Duncan Pow), the mastermind behind “the Game of Consequences,” explains in his manifesto that the rationale for this deadly game is a desire to have human cruelty “bred out of us.” This language is striking, especially given the eugenics on display in the previous episode, Men Against Fire, where those with “junk DNA,” and various disabilities and disorders, are being eliminated from the human race. Men Against Fire and Hated in the Nation as side-by-side episodes depict societies that place different values on people with disabilities, but in San Junipero, we see a burgeoning society where disability no longer exists. Many might respond that the Christian vision of resurrection points in the same general direction. But the field of disability criticism, and its intersection with theology and biblical studies, has issued strong criticism of “perfect body” eschatology. Notably, Amos Yong argues that “some impairments are so-identity constitutive that their removal would involve the obliteration of the person as well” (2011, 121). Among those impairments that he lists are dwarfism, Down Syndrome, autism, deafness, etc. Rather than these conditions being eliminated in the resurrection, Yong contends that what will be eliminated are their social stigmas (2011, 122, 135; 2007, 284). He clarifies that he is “not insisting that people with disabilities will exist literally as such eschatologically.” Rather, he explains that his goal is “to challenge the absence of disability images altogether in the Christian eschatological imagination” (2011, 135). Further, he contends that “an epistemology of the cross

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and a theology of weakness would exult in the redemption of the blemished, defective, and impaired body, since it is precisely in the salvation, rather than the erasure or elimination, of such bodies that the wisdom, power, and glory of God are most clearly revealed” (2011, 130). Whatever transformation comes with bodily resurrection, the New Testament anticipates that there will be continuity with the body that lived and died. In the case of the empty tomb tradition, the same body of Jesus that went into the tomb is the same body that came out (cf. Matt 27.57–66; 28.5–7, 11–15; Mk 15.42–47; 16.4–7; Lk 23.50–56; 24.1–7, 12, 22–24; Jn 19.36–42; 20.1–18). That continuity is highlighted in Jesus’ resurrected body, which bears the scars of his crucifixion (cf. Lk 24.39–40; Jn 20.20, 25, 27). scripture never says that this physical continuity is a unique Christological feature of resurrection, but it does affirm that the resurrected body of Christ is the “firstfruits” of those that will be raised at the end (1 Cor 15.20). He raises our bodies to be like his body (Phil 3.20–21). His resurrected body is thus better understood to be paradigmatic of resurrected bodies instead of an aberration (cf. Eisland 1994, 98–105; Yong 2007, 274; 2011, 128–30; Thweatt-Bates 2016, 152–61; Moss 2019). In other words, the only example of a resurrected person that we have from scripture is someone who does not have a “perfect body.” Taking Jesus as the prototype of resurrection, our bodies will not be replaced, but glorified. This will mean, not only the removal of stigma around disability, as Yong noted, but also whatever suffering they may have caused us. Scripture, therefore, promotes a true embodiment, over against popular notions of Heaven as a place of disembodied existence and the kind of digital embodiment envisioned with mind uploading. Embodiment is indeed central to Christianity, not just in terms of eschatology, but also in relation to doctrines like creation and the incarnation. It is quite likely, then, that whatever amount of transhumanist values Christians come to adopt, embodiment is likely where there will be the greatest parting of the ways (Mercer 2014, 149–50; Keenan 2014, 162). But for some, the prospect of staving off death indefinitely might just be far too alluring. THE DESIRABILITY OF UPLOADING It is one thing to ask whether mind uploading is possible—to consider both the metaphysic upon which it is based and the kind of embodiment an uploaded mind would experience—but it is an entirely different thing to ask why such a scenario is desirable. It is often recognized that Black Mirror is quite bleak and depressing, with one of the exceptions being an episode like San Junipero. The creators of the episode seem to suggest as much. Charlie

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Brooker notes that the six episodes of Season 3 flow like this: “Bittersweet, nasty, bloody nasty, happy . . . and then nasty, nasty” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 190). The lone qualifier “happy” for the fourth episode is, of course, San Junipero. Part of the happiness is related to the positive LGBTQIA+ representation in the episode, and the happy ending that Kelly and Yorkie are given. As Drage notes, the episode marks an advancement in television because it subverts “the Bury Your Gays trope” of many storylines featuring gay characters, doing so with “the quite literal resurrection of two buried gays” (2018, 34). Of course, this is only partially true. There is no “literal resurrection” for these characters; their minds live on while their bodies are buried and decay. This digital hope is a far cry from being resurrected to “eternal life.” To state the obvious, your digital consciousness would never outlive the universe (Sandberg 2015, 8), and one’s consciousness is only as secure as the physical server itself (Scheidt 2015, 320), which in the case of San Junipero is precariously stored in a warehouse in Northern California. But it is hard to miss the intended hopefulness that Drage points to, especially as Belinda Carlisle’s hit “Heaven is a Place on Earth” rings out at the end. Nevertheless there is something that is actually quite terrifying about the final sequence. Although Kelly and Yorkie are clearly happy, the shots of them celebrating are contrasted with shots of a long hallway full of beeping servers—a digital graveyard. Daraiseh and Booker read the ending as “largely free of irony” as it “endorses” mind uploading (2019, 156), but they do acknowledge that the contrast with the servers is “chillingly dystopian” (2019, 161–62). The ending to Men Against Fire, the next episode in Season 3, is comparable in many respects. At the end of the episode, Stripe (Malachi Kirby) gets to “go home” to be with the woman of his dreams (literally), after agreeing to having his memory wiped. But the final shots of the woman and the picturesque home are juxtaposed with shots of a dilapidated house where no one is present. The contrast of the two versions of the neighborhood is just as jarring as the juxtaposition of the beaches with the servers. In Inside Black Mirror, producer Annabel Jones and actor Malachi Kirby suggest that the tear streaming down Stripe’s face at the end is a sign that he recognizes that the situation is fabricated (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 202). But how much more “real” or “authentic” is San Junipero compared to this scenario? In both cases, the virtual realities are fake, and yet one is meant to make the viewer sad and the other happy. In fact, Brooker explains that the episode has a “deliberately triumphant ending” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 190). Owen Harris, the director of the episode, notes that the screenplay did not read as positive as the episode “ended up feeling,” underscoring the impression viewers are left with in the final form of the story (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 190). Though Executive Producer Annabel Jones adds the caveat that this happy

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ending has its limits: “Whilst there is a positive upbeat ending, it’s not exactly a happy ever after. It’s more about being happy for now, and seeing how it goes” (Brooker and Jones with Arnopp 2018, 190). Jones’ comments raise the important question about whether San Junipero will continue to be a happy place, and whether it will be ultimately satisfying. The presence of the Quagmire indicates that San Junipero does not provide a straightforward answer (Daraiseh and Booker 2019, 157–58). It makes it difficult to see how “living forever” in this “party town” could remain enjoyable (cf. Canavan 2019, 265). It points out the ultimate emptiness underlying popular notions of the afterlife that are characterized by the pursuit of endless pleasure. Indeed, it suggests that such a Heaven would become a kind of Hell (Daraiseh and Booker 2019, 158; Cook 2020, 109). The Quagmire shows how unsatisfying San Junipero will be for many, and perhaps, over the course of time, for everyone. This actually points to a major problem behind transhumanist pursuit of post-humanity in general. As Patrick D. Hopkins points out, our biological heritage makes it so that there will be no amount of tech that we can acquire, or upgrades that we can receive to our bodies, that will quench our desire to be satisfied (2015, 80). As he explains further, “Given that we have millions of years of adaptive success with the acquisitive drive, and less than 100 years’ exposure to any significant level of abundance, our ‘more is better’ module rarely shuts off, and there is little reason to think it ever will” (2015, 75). Indeed, it is our “discontent that created the desire for enhancements in the first place” (2015, 76). Stated in terms of Black Mirror, although San Junipero points to a post-human vision, it represents a human desire rooted as it is in human discontentment that lives on even in a digital afterlife. Once San Junipero comes to exist, the Quagmire reminds us that it will never be enough. What presents as “salvation,” therefore, ultimately fails to save us, as Hopkins argues, and if we were to override that discontent with some future upgrade, he continues, then it would no longer be us who is being saved (2015, 78–80). In a chapter called “Hope” in Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis famously said, “If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world” (2001 [1952], 136–37). Lewis appears to be correct that our desires will never be fully satisfied by “this-worldly” solutions, but biblically speaking what will satisfy us is not “another world,” heavenly or virtual, but rather this world redeemed. Paul says all creation groans, waiting for its subjection to futility to end and for the children of God to be revealed (Rom 8.19–23). Creation will be released from its bondage to decay, not to be put down like a stray dog, but to revel in the future glorification along with us (Rom 8.21). Once more, the hope given to us in scripture is a physical one, encompassing

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not just the redemption of our bodies but of the world as well. “We hope for what we do not see” (Rom 8.25a), Paul says, not because our hope is immaterial, but because it has not yet come. Even so, “we wait for it with patience” (Rom 8.25b). CONCLUSION Upon closer inspection, the digital hope of Black Mirror, which represents transhumanist pursuits to get beyond our limitations, turns out to be just as bleak as the rest of the show. Although mind uploading is rooted within a materialist frame, it is ironically not physical enough, bodily enough, or indeed human enough to be compelling, or desirable. But, of course, what one sees in the Black Mirror depends entirely on the self that is brought before it. No doubt many viewers of San Junipero, in particular, will continue to find its ending hopeful, and may be cheered by the future feasibility of mind uploading (should it be discovered to be feasible). What the Black Mirror reveals is that death is quite unlike a technological problem (cf. Harari 2017, 22–23, 202), and so technological solutions at best only delay the inevitable and at worst hasten it, or render life miserable. The dissatisfaction with which the show leaves us just might compel us to look past its immanent horizon to a hope beyond technology’s limitations. NOTES 1. I am very grateful for Amber Bowen’s feedback on earlier versions of this essay. 2. See the discussion on each in Burdett (2011). 3. One can easily imagine a terrifying episode of the show in which someone’s bio-cellular software gets hacked. Harari (2017, 349) comments on this possibility. 4. Jeannine Thweatt-Bates (2016 [2012]) argues that the cyborg is not a transhumanist path, but a separate project to be distinguished, for example, from mind uploading that is rooted in a fundamentally different anthropology. Although Thweatt-Bates makes a strong case for this, transhumanists themselves seem to make quick and easy appeal to cyborgs. Matthew Zaro Fisher (2015, 28) adds that the cyborg could upload their minds too. 5. Brooker admits that the DNA explanation was absurd. Cf. Brooker and Jones with Arnopp (2018, 230, 232). 6. The only exception is Bandersnatch, since we cannot confirm if Stefan et al. have “real” counterparts. 7. Other examples of this include Matt Trent, when he was virtually present in the Cabin with the Cookie version of Joe Potter in White Christmas, Captain Robert Daly, whenever he enters the Space Fleet mod in USS Callister, and Danny and Karl

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(Anthony Mackie and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), when they take on avatars while playing Striking Vipers X in Striking Vipers (Season 5, Episode 1). 8. Cf. Bing’s (Daniel Kaluuya) rant on his new TV show at the very end. 9. Cf. Kelly’s comments that her deceased husband and daughter are “nowhere.” 10. Cf. Clayton’s phone conversation with his wife before his execution. 11. For an assessment of the computational power needed to accomplish mind uploading, see Merkle (2013). 12. Dichotomists, also known as substance dualists, affirm that humans are composed of an immaterial (soul/mind) and material (body) substance. 13. Trichotomists affirm that humans are composed of two immaterial substances (soul/mind and spirit) alongside the material body. This position is largely based on passages like 1 Thessalonians 5.23. 14. In Striking Vipers, Danny has been complaining about his knee, saying that he has not been able to work out like he used to. When Danny and Karl first enter the game, Danny’s knee feels fine with his new avatar. Additionally, in the game, the blood from their cuts and bruises resets, reminiscent of the pain sliders in San Junipero.

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Daraiseh, Isra and M. Keither Booker. “Unreal City: Nostalgia, Authenticity, and Posthumanity in ‘San Junipero.’” In Through the Black Mirror: Deconstructing the Side Effects of the Digital Age, edited by Terence McSweeney and Stuart Joy, 151–63. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019. Drage, Eleanor. “A Virtual Ever-After: Utopia, Race, and Gender in Black Mirror’s ‘San Junipero.’” In Black Mirror and Critical Media Theory, edited by Angela M. Cirucci and Barry Vacker, 27–41. Lanham: Lexington Books, 2018. Eisland, Nancy L. The Disabled God: Toward a Liberatory Theology of Disability. Nashville: Abingdon, 1994. Fisher, Matthew Zaro. “More Human than the Human? Toward a ‘Transhumanist’ Christian Theological Anthropology.” In Religion and Transhumanism: The Unknown Future of Human Enhancement, edited by Calvin Mercer and Tracy J. Trothen, 23–38. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2015. Fukuyama, Francis. Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution. New York: Picador, 2002. Gamez, David and David Kyle Johnson. “Consciousness Technology in Black Mirror: Do Cookies Feel Pain?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 273–81. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Gardner, Molly and Robert Sloane. “Personal Identity in Black Mirror: Is Your Cookie You?” In Black Mirror and Philosophy: Dark Reflections, edited by David Kyle Johnson, 282–91. The Blackwell Philosophy and Pop Culture Series. Hoboken: Wiley-Blackwell, 2020. Green, Joel B. Body, Soul, and Human Life: The Nature of Humanity in the Bible. Studies in Theological Interpretation. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2008. Harari, Yuval Noah. Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind. New York: HarperCollins, 2015. ———. Homo Deus: A Brief History of Tomorrow. New York: HarperCollins, 2017. ———. 21 Lessons for the 21st Century. New York: Spiegel & Grau, 2018. Hopkins, Patrick D. “A Salvation Paradox for Transhumanism: Saving You versus Saving You.” In Religion and Transhumanism: The Unknown Future of Human Enhancement, edited by Calvin Mercer and Tracy J. Trothen, 71–82. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2015. Hughes, James. “Transhumanism and Personal Identity.” In The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future, edited by Max More and Natasha Vita-More, 227–33. West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013. Keenan, James F. “Roman Catholic Christianity—Embodiment and Relationality: Roman Catholic Concerns About Transhumanist Proposals.” In Transhumanism and the Body: The World Religions Speak, edited by Calvin Mercer and Derek F. Maher, 155–72. Palgrave Studies in the Future of Humanity and its Successors. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Koene, Randal A. “Uploading to Substrate-Independent Minds.” In The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and

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Philosophy of the Human Future, edited by Max More and Natasha Vita-More, 146–56. West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013. Kurzweil, Ray. The Singularity is Near: When Humans Transcend Biology. New York: Penguin, 2005. Lewis, C. S. Mere Christianity. New York: Harper Collins, 2001 [1952]. Mercer, Calvin. “Protestant Christianity—Sorting out Soma in the Debate About Transhumanism: One Protestant’s Perspective.” In Transhumanism and the Body: The World Religions Speak, edited by Calvin Mercer and Derek F. Maher, 137–54. Palgrave Studies in the Future of Humanity and its Successors. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014. Merkle, Ralph C. “Uploading.” In The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future, edited by Max More and Natasha Vita-More, 157–64. West Sussex: WileyBlackwell, 2013. More, Max. “The Philosophy of Transhumanism.” In The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future, edited by Max More and Natasha Vita-More, 3–17. West Sussex: Wiley-Blackwell, 2013. Moss, Candida. Divine Bodies: Resurrecting Perfection in the New Testament and Early Christianity. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2019. Murphy, Nancey. Bodies and Souls, or Spirited Bodies? Current Issues in Theology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006. Sandberg, Anders. “Transhumanism and the Meaning of Life.” In Religion and Transhumanism: The Unknown Future of Human Enhancement, edited by Calvin Mercer and Tracy J. Trothen, 3–22. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2015. Scheidt, Hannah. “The Fleshless Future: A Phenomenological Perspective on Mind Uploading.” In Religion and Transhumanism: The Unknown Future of Human Enhancement, edited by Calvin Mercer and Tracy J. Trothen, 315–28. Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2015. Shatzer, Jacob. Transhumanism and the Image of God: Today’s Technology and the Future of Christian Discipleship. Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2019. Thweatt-Bates, Jeannine. Cyborg Selves: A Theological Anthropology of the Posthuman. Paperback edition. New York: Routledge, 2016 [2012]. “Transhumanist Declaration (2012).” In The Transhumanist Reader: Classical and Contemporary Essays on the Science, Technology, and Philosophy of the Human Future, edited by Max More and Natasha Vita-More, 54–55. West Sussex: WileyBlackwell, 2013. Turkle, Sherry. Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other. Revised edition. New York: Basic Books, 2017 [2011]. Turner, Jr., James T. On the Resurrection of the Dead: A New Metaphysics of Afterlife for Christian Thought. Routledge New Critical Thinking in Religion, Theology and Biblical Studies. New York: Routledge, 2019. Wright, N. T. The Resurrection of the Son of God. Christian Origins and the Question of God. Volume 3. London: SPCK / Minneapolis: Fortress, 2003.

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Yong, Amos. Theology and Down Syndrome: Reimagining Disability in Late Modernity. Studies in Religion, Theology, and Disability. Waco: Baylor University Press, 2007. ———. The Bible, Disability, and the Church: A New Vision of the People of God. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2011.

Subject Index

addiction, 12, 40, 81–98, 241, 252 afterlife, 5, 8–9, 13, 25, 72, 107, 127n2, 213–29, 241–43, 259–60, 293–94, 296, 298–99, 301–2, 309, 316 agency, 11–12, 22, 24–25, 27–31, 60– 64, 75, 93, 288n2 apocalyptic, 3, 163–69, 173, 175n2, 175n5, 176n7, 176n12, 227n12, 242 Arkangel, 12, 16n1, 51n6, 101–16, 243, 306 artificial intelligence, 13, 24, 69–73, 118, 233–48, 260, 288n3, 307 atheism, 6, 102–5, 112–13, 121, 128n9 atonement, 13, 220–23 avatars, 5, 15, 43, 45–46, 216, 254–55, 281–82, 287, 288n3, 307–9, 312 Bandersnatch, 8, 14, 188, 279–92, 308, 317n6 Be Right Back, 8, 13, 14, 24, 72, 84, 213–17, 219, 227n5, 227n13, 233– 48, 258–60, 312 Black Museum, 8, 13, 165, 213, 223–25, 306, 310 capitalism, 13, 24, 51n4, 246 COVID-19 pandemic, 1, 15, 286–87, 300–301 Crocodile, 9, 52n8, 172, 253, 306

crucifixion, 12, 220–22, 270 cyborgs, 170, 174, 306–7, 317n4 determinism: philosophical, 56–65; technological, 4–5, 11, 22–23, 26, 32n8, 42–47, 49, 56, 81–82, 92–93, 170–72, 246, 251 disability, 154, 215, 293–94, 299, 312–13 egocentrism (phenomenology), 43, 46, 52n9, 122–26 entertainment, 40–42, 77, 188–89, 205, 252–56 The Entire History of You, 13, 14, 16n5, 29–30, 45, 95n17, 163–78, 267–78, 306 epistemology, 13, 136–38, 172–75, 177nn16–17, 193–207, 269, 314 eschatology, 11, 14, 15, 29, 31, 141, 166–67, 170, 244, 247n4, 269, 271, 296, 298–99, 312–14 ethics, 4–5, 12, 21–34, 48–51, 52n7, 56–57, 59–60, 77, 85–86, 91, 103–7, 118, 142, 143n1, 143n8, 147–49, 152–53, 156–57, 159n8, 189, 193, 196, 205, 214–17, 223–24, 233–48, 267–72 Eucharist, 14, 269–73, 284–86, 300–301 323

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Subject Index

Fifteen Million Merits, 11, 14, 16n5, 24, 35–53, 95n18, 252–55, 260, 310 Free Will, 11, 56–65, 65n2 Hang the DJ, 11, 55–65, 308 Hated in the Nation, 12, 24, 94n3, 95n18, 147–62, 313 hermeneutics, 13, 50, 132–33, 136–43, 163–77, 179–90, 193–210 idolatry, 8, 70, 102, 113, 124–26, 133, 140, 252–56, 258, 260–62 incarnation, 12, 28, 158, 216, 270–71, 314 instrumentalism, 2–5, 22, 24, 26, 81–82, 87, 90, 102, 126, 234–35 Judaism, 143n3, 143n8, 159–60n11, 214, 218, 270 judgment (divine), 7, 13, 33nn12–13, 132–33, 137–43, 158, 166, 182–83, 208n9, 220, 225 justice, 5, 12–13, 25, 27, 33n12, 90, 136–43, 147–62, 168–69, 173, 181– 84, 187, 190n3, 193–94, 196, 204–7, 220–25, 275, 275n2 loneliness, 23, 32n6, 38, 44, 68, 83, 119, 299 memory, 14, 30, 45, 123, 163, 170–73, 180, 182, 198–99, 215–17, 223, 225, 237, 265–78 Men Against Fire, 7, 9, 13, 26, 44, 52n8, 95n17, 109, 193, 197–99, 205, 207nn6–8, 208n9, 209n28, 306, 313, 315 Metalhead, 27, 307 mimesis, 67–79 mind uploading, 8–9, 15, 25, 74, 214– 19, 224, 226n1, 247n5, 296, 305–17, 318n11 mourning, 68, 72, 76, 84, 214, 217, 219, 226, 233–46, 247n11, 259

The National Anthem, 14, 16n2, 51n5, 95n18, 256–57 Nosedive, 4, 16n2, 16n5, 25, 84, 95n17, 166, 255, 306 phenomenology, 12, 35–36, 42–43, 45, 47, 119–29, 143n1 Playtest, 26, 94n3, 306–7 pop culture, 6, 8, 11, 16n3, 67 pornography, 5, 36, 39, 40, 42–47, 51n6, 196–97, 266, 275 privacy, 30, 44, 73, 101–2, 109–11, 122, 134, 143n1, 240, 256 prophecy, 2, 137, 141, 173, 179 punishment (societal), 132–33, 137– 38, 140, 149, 152–54, 180, 189, 209nn23–24, 220–25 Rachel, Jack, and Ashley Too, 8, 11, 16n3, 52n8, 67–71, 87–88, 241, 260, 307 religious piety, 9–11, 15, 21–22, 27–33, 37, 49–51, 78–79, 90, 92–93, 102, 105, 112–14, 124–26, 143, 158–59, 175, 207, 269, 275 resurrection, 13, 14, 29, 127, 133, 142– 43, 158, 213–17, 226n5, 234–36, 241–46, 246n1, 248n18, 259–60, 270–71, 312–15 robots, 23, 68–69, 71, 73–74, 79n2, 87–88, 94n7, 153–54, 156, 159n8, 175, 217, 245 salvation, 25, 28–29, 95n16, 107, 109, 138, 166–67, 222, 244, 247n4, 271, 274, 295, 299, 314, 316 San Junipero, 9, 13–15, 25, 65n1, 213, 217–19, 224, 253, 293–303, 308–10, 312–13, 315–16, 318n14 Shut Up and Dance, 13, 16n5, 47, 193, 196–97, 205, 207n4, 209n25 the Singularity, 4, 37–38, 87, 90, 197– 98, 257, 307

Subject Index

smart phones, 84–85, 93, 94nn2–3, 123, 187, 216, 272 Smithereens, 8, 11, 81–98 social media, 14, 23, 24, 38, 84, 87–88, 93, 94n6, 148, 150–54, 157–59, 189, 214, 233, 236, 238–39 soul, 8, 14, 25–27, 227n5, 237, 259, 261–62, 270, 274, 310–12, 318nn12–13 Striking Vipers, 15, 45, 52n7, 318n7, 318n14 suffering, 5, 81–98, 104, 107–8, 136, 205, 221–25, 240, 259, 299, 314 surveillance, 101–2, 109–11, 153, 159n8, 287 telepresence, 14, 280–88, 293–94 theodicy, 1, 12, 87, 102, 113, 141

325

transhumanism, 8, 15, 25, 75, 170, 214– 17, 224–26, 247n4, 296, 298–99, 305–18 USS Callister, 7, 12, 16n2, 86, 131–44, 165, 307, 318n7 video games, 2, 16n4, 17n10, 39, 94n5, 134–35, 281–82 virtual reality, 5, 35, 38–39, 117–19, 127, 128n11, 131, 134, 143n1, 197– 98, 214, 240, 293–94, 315 White Bear, 7, 13, 27, 179–90, 193–96, 204–5, 207n3, 209nn26–27, 220–24 White Christmas, 7, 12, 17n9, 44, 52n8, 117–30, 226n1, 227n14, 243, 306–9, 317n7

People Index

ABBA (the band), 40 Abbot, Sarah, 110 Abdul-Mateen II, Yahya, 318 Ackerman, Susan, 200 Adorno, Theodor, 51 Allen, Shane, 16 Allyn, Bobby, 148 Alter, Adam, 83, 85, 93 Altman, Andrew, 42 Antonova, Clemena, 287 Aquinas, 267–69, 288 Armstrong, Jesse, 16 Arnold, Clinton E., 94 Arnopp, Jason, 3, 4, 7, 9, 16, 65, 94–95, 101–2, 155, 159, 183, 185, 187, 189, 227, 235, 246, 248, 256–57, 302, 315–17 Atwell, Hayley, 8, 72, 84, 214, 235, 258, 312 Atwood, Margaret, 234 Avioz, Michael, 185 Bacon, Francis, 305 Bailey, Kenneth E., 302 Baj, Lavender, 1 Balke, Gregor, 176 Barnes, Hazel, 128 Barthes, Roland, 3, 244, 248 Battin, Justin Michael, 6, 253

Bee Gees (the band), 238 Benjamin, Walter, 255 Bennion, Chris, 3–4 Berrington, Elizabeth, 150, 313 Bettenson, Henry, 248 Beverly, Jared, 208 Bews, Jackson, 313 Bingham, D. Jeffrey, 163 Block, Daniel I., 209 Blomkamp, Neill, 207 Boda, Mark J., 185 Boersma, Hans, 259–60 Boling, Robert G., 209 Booker, M. Keither, 315–16 Bostrom, Nick, 305, 310, 312 Bovy, Phoebe Moltz, 148 Brady, Ian, 220 Brake, Matthew, 51 Brault, Pascale–Anne, 241, 247 Brewer, Madeline, 109 Bridges, William, 16, 133 Brooker, Charlie, 1–4, 6, 7, 9, 15–16, 22, 31, 52, 65, 67–68, 78, 94–95, 101–2, 117, 119, 123, 128, 133, 148– 52, 154–55, 157–59, 179–80, 183, 185, 187–89, 207, 227, 233, 235–36, 243–44, 246, 248, 256–57, 293, 302, 314–17 Brown, Derek R., 94 327

328

People Index

Brown, John, 199 Browning, Elizabeth Barrett, 72 Brox, Norbert, 175–76 Brubaker, Jed. R., 214 Bultmann, Rudolph, 94 Burdett, Michael S., 176, 317 Burse, Denise, 293 Butler, Trent C., 209 Byers, Andrew J., 158–60 Byron, Chris, 51 Callaway, Kutter, 17 Calvin, John, 113 Cameron, David, 16 Campbell, Douglas A., 94 Campbell, Duncan, 227 Campbell, Georgina, 55, 308 Canavan, Gerry, 224, 227, 316 Carlisle, Belinda, 217, 302, 315 Carmichael, Kay, 220, 227 Carruthers, Mary, 268–69, 272 Cartwright, Sophie, 259 Cavanaugh, William, 269–70 Chalmers, David, 307 Chaplin, Oona, 118, 307 Charnock, Stephen, 289 Chesterton, G. K., 157 Christian, Jon, 275n1 Cigüela, Javier, 182 Cirucci, Angela, 5–6 Clark, Andy, 307 Clark, Tom, 220 Cleary, Skye, 56 Coel, Michaela, 134 Colbert, Stephen, 1 Cole, Joe, 55, 308 Cole–Turner, Ronald, 82, 170 Collins, John J., 176 Coloe, Mary L., 296 Concannon, Cavan, 300 Cook, James, 299, 316 Corlett, J. Angelo, 190 Covington, Coline, 227 Crenshaw, James, 201 Criclow, Lenora, 7, 179, 189, 194, 220

Croasmun, Matthew, 88–90, 92–93 Cullen, Tom, 266 Cyrus, Miley, 8, 16, 67, 77, 260, 307 Dante, 247 Danto, Arthur, 119 Daraiseh, Isra, 315–16 Dasgupta, Shamik, 289 Davenport, Madison, 67 Davis, Annabel, 293 Davis, John Jefferson, 280 Davis, MacKenzie, 9, 219, 253, 293, 308 de Beauvoir, Simone, 247 de Boer, Martinus C., 94 de Tocqueville, Alexis, 159 Debord, Guy, 41 Dempsey, Holli, 313 Dennett, Daniel C., 226 DeRoo, Neal, 36, 39, 49 Derrida, Jacques, 120, 241 Destiny, Tchéhouali, 1 DeWitt, Rosemarie, 109 Dietrich, Walter, 185 Dorsey, Jack, 94 Dostoevsky, Fyodor, 104 Douglass, Fredrick, 199 Dourish, Paul, 214 Drage, Eleanor, 310 Drew, Amanda, 91 Drury, Ken, 7, 118 Duarte, German A., 6, 256–57 Duca, Lauren, 180, 186 Dunn, George, 69, 76, 79, 87 Durham, John I., 284–85 Edwards, Paul, 219 Einstein, Albert, 286 Eisland, Nancy L., 314 Ellul, Jacques, 11, 21–33 Engelen, Bart, 176 Espelie, Erin, 78, 251, 257–58 Estes, Douglas, 81, 176, 281, 286–87 Exum, Cheryl, 188 Eyal, Nir, 83, 85–86

People Index

Farrow, Douglas, 289 Federov, Nicolai Fedorovich, 305 Findlay, Jessica Brown, 48, 252 Fiore, Quentin, 31 Fischer, John Martin, 65 Fisher, Matthew Zaro, 311, 317 Fisher, Richard, 148 Fitz–Gerald, Sean, 159 Fletcher, George P., 190 Flynn, Jerome, 196 Ford, Lewis S., 227 Foster, Jodie, 16, 102 Fox, Phoebe, 95, 266 Framke, Caroline, 207 Frank, Georgia, 258 Frankfurt, Harry, 59 Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons (the band), 83 Frear, George L. Jr., 227 Freud, Sigmund, 241, 247 Fujimura, Makoto, 50 Fukuyama, Francis, 305 Galileo, 37, 286 Gallagher, Fergal, 226 Gamez, David, 310 Gardner, Molly, 247, 310 Gaventa, Beverly R., 94 Gentry, Peter J., 302 Gettier, Edmund, 177 Gilbert, Sophie, 207 Gill, David W., 32 Gilmour, Rachelle, 180, 184 Girard, René, 67, 70–72, 77–79, 227 Gittinger, Juli, 226 Gleeson, Domhnall, 8, 72, 83, 214, 235, 258, 307 Gombis, Timothy G., 94 Goodstein, Elizabeth, 236 Gordon, Bryony, 4 Grace, Topher, 8, 81 Green, Joel B., 311 Griffin, Billy, Jr., 294 Griffith, Meghan, 65 Grimm (fairy tales), 2

329

Guignon, Charles, 239, 247 Gukba, Steven, 143 Gunn, D. M., 208 Hagi, Sarah, 148 Hamer, Russ, 143 Hamm, Jon, 7, 44, 117, 307 Hammer, Dean, 252–55 Harari, Yuval Noah, 6, 81, 92, 95, 305–6, 317 Hardiker, Rasmus, 122 Harding, Brenna, 102 Harris, Michael, 93–94 Harris, Owen, 235, 315 Harris, Rachel S., 199 Harris, William V., 289 Harris-McCoy, Daniel E., 289 Harrison, C., 208 Hartman, Geoffrey, 240 Harvey, A. E., 155 Hawes, James, 155 Hayes, Gillian R., 214 Heidegger, 247 Hengel, Martin, 221–22 Henry, Michael, 11, 35–40, 42, 50–51 Hess, Amanda, 233 Hill, Edmund, 199 Hill, Robert C., 289 Himmelfarb, Martha, 227 Hindley, Myra, 220 Hitchcock, Alfred, 2, 244 Hitler, Adolf, 225 Hochschild, Paige, 274 Hodge, Aldis, 308 Hodge, Aniya, 109 Hodge, Douglas, 8, 24, 224, 308 Hoffmeyer, John F., 255–56 Holmes, Michael W., 175 Hooker, Morna D., 303 Hoover, Ryan, 83 Hopkins, Patrick D., 316 Horwitz, Morton J., 159 Howard, Bryce Dallas, 16, 25, 84, 255 Howard, Nathan, 258 Howard, Ron, 16

330

People Index

Hsieh, Nelson D., 302 Huenemann, Charlie, 106 Hughes, James, 311 Huq, Konnie, 16 Idris, Damson, 82 Jackman, Imani, 181 James III, 68 Janzen, David, 182 Jennings, Willie James, 274 Jillette, Penn, 16 John-Kamen, Hannah, 307 Johnson, David Kyle, 6, 279, 310 Johnson, Dru, 137 Johnson, Mark R., 51 Joly, Robert, 176 Jones, Aliya, 223 Jones, Anabel, 3, 4, 7, 9, 15–16, 31, 52, 65, 94–95, 101–2, 155, 159, 183, 185, 187, 189, 227, 235, 246, 248, 256–57, 302, 315–17 Jones, Cherry, 95 Jones, Emma, 154 Jones, Matthew T., 279 Jones, Peter, 248 Jones, Rashida, 16 Joy, Stuart, 6 Junior, Nyasha, 199 Kaczynski, Ted, 95 Kahn, Paul, 46 Kaluuya, Daniel, 95, 252, 318 Kant, Immanuel, 184–85 Kebbell, Toby, 29, 171, 266 Keenan, Gráinne, 118 Keenan, James F., 314 Kelly, Michael, 198 Kennedy, George A., 164 Kenny, Anthony, 248 Keymolen, Esther, 69 Keyworth, Gwyneth, 55 Kierkegaard, Soren, 113, 247 Kierspel, Lars, 156 Kinnear, Rory, 256

Kirby, Malachi, 197, 315 Kirkpatrick, Kate, 128 Klonowska, Barbara, 21, 31 Kneale, J. D., 240 Koene, Randal A., 308, 310 Koenig, Sara M., 190 Koester, Craig R., 296 Kosky, Jeffrey L., 129 Koutsouliotas, Steve, 214 Krolikowski, Janusz, 258 Kurzweil, Ray, 307, 311 Lam, Joseph, 185 Lapaine, Daniel, 306 Larson, Jossalyn G., 9–10 Lawther, Alex, 47, 196 Lay, Chris, 181, 184, 209, 279 Lear, Jonathon, 113 Lee, Kwan Min, 280 Lefebvre, Henri, 302 Lehmann, Helmut T., 289 Leidenhag, Mikael, 247 Leigh, Janet, 3 Lem, Stanlislaw, 176 Leung, King-Ho, 127–28 Levenson, Jon D., 86, 295 Levinas, Emmanuel, 48, 120 Lewis, C. S., 74, 316 Li, Dan, 119 Lincoln, Abraham, 159 Lincoln, Andrew T., 155 Livingstone, Josephine, 119 Locke, John, 237–38, 247, 265, 311 Lombard, Matthew, 279 Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth, 199 Longino, Helen, 42 Longworth, Guy, 45 Louth, Andrew, 269–71 Luckenbach, Abraham, 208 Luther, Martin, 113, 285–86, 288–89 Lynch, Matthew J., 144 Maas, Jennifer, 52 MacDonald, Kelly, 149 MacIntyre, Alistair, 157

People Index

Mackie, Anthony, 318 Mackinlay, Shane, 129 Macy, Gary, 285–86 Madison, James, 159 Magee, Francis, 7, 95 Magnussen, Billy, 135 Manavis, Sarah, 148 Mangan, Lucy, 261 Manninen, Bertha Alvarez, 95 Mantovani, Fabrizia, 280 Marcuse, Herbert, 51 Margalit, Avishai, 269, 274–75 Marion, Jean–Luc, 48, 117, 123–27, 129 Marsay, Faye, 94, 151 Marshall, Lisa, 214 Martinez-Lucen, Jorge, 182 Martyn, J. L., 94 Marx, Karl, 51 Mason-Robbie, Victoria, 214 Matthews, Sinead, 8, 214, 236 Maya, Aline, 152, 158 Mbatha-Raw, Gugu, 9, 253, 293, 308 McAleer, Graham, 246 McCarter, P. Kyle, 183 McLuhan, Marshall, 31, 236 McSweeney, Terence, 6 Mele, Alfred, 59–60 Menchaca, Marc, 71 Mercer, Calvin, 310, 314 Merkle, Ralph C., 318 Middleton, Tuppence, 179 Miles, Ben, 313 Milioti, Cristin, 134 Mill, John Stuart, 159 Miller, Jennifer, 226 Milligan, Jerah, 75 Minkowski, Hermann, 286 Montgomery, Janet, 7, 118 Moore, George F., 209 More, Max, 311, 312 Mori, Masahiro, 245 Morris, Lauren, 1 Moss, Candida R., 248, 314 Muller, Richard A., 289 Murphy, Nancey, 311

331

Musarò, Pierluigi, 256–57 Musk, Elon, 275n1 Naas, Michael, 241, 247 Neibuhr, Reinhold, 31 Nessan, C. L., 227 Neugroschel, Joachim, 22, 23, 31–33 Newman, George E., 248 Newton, Isaac, 286 Nietzsche, Friedrich, 12, 102–9, 111– 12, 114, 247 Nussbaum, Martha, 187 O’Collins, Gerald, S. J., 279–80 O’Connor, Flannery, 153 Ofield, Nick, 181, 221 Olsen, Ashley, 77 Olsen, Mary Kate, 77 Olthuis, James, 52 Olusanmokun, Babs, 8, 224, 308 O’Neal, Alexander, 302 Osiek, Carolyn, 169, 176 Oswald, Hilton C., 289 Parfit, Derek, 247 Parish, Helen, 300 Pauling, Nicholas, 68 Paynter, Helen, 210 Pearce, Tilly, 77 Peele, Anna, 3 Pelikan, Jaroslav Jan, 289 Penrose, Roger, 288 Pereboom, Derk, 65 Perkins, Anthony, 3 Perry, John, 247 Pheasant–Kelly, Fran, 256 Pickup, Martin, 288 Pieper, Josef, 267–73 Pigliucci, Massimo, 56 Plato, 270 Plemons, Jesse, 7, 86, 131, 307 Porter, J. R., 201, 208 Porter, Jean, 267–68 Postman, Neil, 81–82, 88 Poulter, Will, 8, 283

332

Pourfar, Susan, 67 Pow, Duncan, 95, 154, 313 Power, Aidan, 56 Price, Robert Grant, 52 Propp, William H. C., 284 Reagan, Nancy, 265 Ree, Paul, 108 Reichenbach, Bruce R., 219 Reilly, Jenelle, 227 Reynolds, Matt, 16 Reznor, Trent, 16 Rice, Angourie, 8, 67 Rich, Georgina, 154 Richards, Bradley, 247–48 Richmond, Sarah, 128 Riseborough, Andrea, 9, 172, 253 Riva, Giuseppe, 291 Roach, Alexandra, 25, 308 Roberts, Siobhan, 148 Rollison, Jacob Marques, 31 Ronson, Jon, 148 Rubenstein, Mary-Jane, 270 Russ, Joanna, 170 Russell, Wyatt, 94, 307 Sandberg, Anders, 315 Sartre, Jean-Paul, 12, 117, 119–23, 127–29, 247 Sasse, Hermann, 289 Saunders, T., 272 Savin-Baden, Maggi, 214 Sawar, Kiran Sonia, 9, 172 Scheidt, Hannah, 310, 315 Schipper, Jeremy, 199 Schopenhauer, Arthur, 106–7 Schreiner, Patrick, 302 Schur, Michael, 16 Scott, Andrew, 8, 81 Shatzer, Jacob, 88 Shelley, Mary, 236 Shepherd, Jack, 4, 22, 24, 31 Sherlock, Alexandra, 248 Sherman, Daniel Stewart, 68

People Index

Shoemaker, Sydney, 247 Simon, Uriel, 183 Simpson, Jay, 51 Simpson, Jimmi, 134 Simpson, Sid, 181, 184, 209 Slade, David, 52 Sloane, Robert, 247, 310 Smiley, Michael, 7, 222 Smith, James, 159 Smith, Jonathon Z., 302 Smith, Rosanna K., 248 Snook, Sarah, 7 Soja, Edward W., 302 Spall, Rafe, 7, 117, 307 Stavrou, Nick, 214 Steenberg, M. C., 163 Steenhaut, Sofie, 253, 260 Steiner, George, 287 Stenhouse, Gavis, 294 Stetzer, Ed, 159 Stiltner, Brian, 261 Stolworthy, Jacob, 4, 207 Stump, Eleonore, 141–42, 280 Suchocki, Marjorie, 227 Sumegi, Angela, 226 Suvin, Darko, 170, 176 Swift, Jonathon, 74 Swinburne, Richard, 247 Swingle, Mari K., 81–83, 94 Talking Heads (the band), 242 Taylor, Charles, 239 Teilhard de Chardin, Pierre, 305 Terlizzese, Lawrence Joseph, 31 The Smiths (the band), 56, 302 Thomas, Ashley, 48 Thweatt–Bates, Jeannine, 310, 314, 317 Titchener, E. B., 288 Tolkien, J. R. R., 168–69, 176, 247–48 Torrance, Thomas F., 285–86 Trilling, Lionel, 247 Trump, Donald J., 16 Turkle, Sherry, 32, 83, 88, 91, 94, 306

People Index

Turner, Jr., James T., 312 Turner, Nat, 199 Unterman, Jeremiah, 144 Vacker, Barry, 5, 6, 78, 251, 257–58 Vallor, Shannon, 81, 91, 94 Van der Hof, Simone, 69 van Inwagen, Peter, 57, 62, 63, 65 van Kooten, George H., 288 Van Vleet, Jacob E., 31 Vanderburg, Willem H., 31 Vaughn, Anna, 261 Vincent, Alice, 16 Volf, Miroslav, 158 Wagner, Richard, 108 Walton, John H., 86 Warren, Amanda, 8, 308 Warrior, Robert Allen, 199–200 Washington, Booker T., 199 Waters, Brent, 176 Waterworth, Eva Lindh, 280 Waterworth, John A., 280 Watson, Lori, 42 Way, Ken, 203–4 Webb, Barry G., 201 Weinstein, Harvey, 16

Wellum, Stephen J., 302 Westphal, Merold, 102, 112–14, 120 Whitehead, Fionn, 16, 281, 308 Whittaker, Jodie, 30, 171, 266 Wilken, Robert Louis, 270 Wilker, Deborah, 77 Williams, Bernard, 42 Williford, Kenneth, 128 Wilson, Lydia, 256 Wink, Walter, 90 Wizzard (the band), 119 Wojtulewicz, Christopher M., 246 Wolfson, Sam, 94 Wollaston, Sam, 6, 16 Wong, Benedict, 154 Wong, Ka Leung, 190 Wright, Alfred, 208 Wright, Joe, 16 Wright, Letitia, 24, 224, 308 Wright, N. T., 299, 312 Yong, Amos, 313–14 Young, Julian, 108 Zahavi, Dan, 120 Zaibert, Leo, 190 Zimbardo, Philip, 227 Zizioulas, John D., 269, 271

333

Ancient Sources Index

Hebrew Bible/Old Testament 12, 131, 255, 303, 311 Genesis 289 1.28 136 2.1–3 86 2.7 243 3.8 284 6–9 132 12.3 137 19 132 20.3 289 31.11 289 Exodus 12 1.7 136 1.8 136, 138 1.12–3 136 2.11–12 138 2.15 138 2.23–25 136 3 143 4.24 133, 139 4.25 133 5.2 136 6.3 137 6.7 137 7.17 137 8.10 137 8.22 137 9.14 137

9.29 137 10.2 137 11.7 137 14 132 14.4 137 14.18 137 16.6 137 16.12 137 22.21–24 136, 141–42 23.28 132 25.30 284 32 133, 140 32.4 140 32.6 144 32.11 138 32.12 132, 138 32.13 138 32.14 132, 138 Leviticus 10.1–2 133 18.21 142 19 142 19.29 142 26.1 303 Numbers 9.15 303 12.6 289 14 140 16.28 140 335

336

Ancient Sources Index

32.27 285 Deuteronomy 10.16 140 14.26 285 19.21 225 30.6 140 Joshua 2 144 5.2–7 140 19.47 206 24.12 132 Judges 13 1.34–35 206 3.11 206 3.30 206 4 144 4.21 200 5.31 206 8.28 206 13 207 14–16 193–94, 199, 207 14.1–16.22 200 14.4 200 14.5–9 201 14.10 201 14.14 201 14.18 201 15 202 15.1 202 15.6 202 15.7 202 15.10 202 15.11 203 16.20 203 16.23–4 204 16.25 204 17–18 206, 210 17–21 210 Judges–2 Kings 138 1 Samuel 2.6 214 15 186 15.25 186 24.19 185–86

28 215 28.16 186 31.4 186 2 Samuel 13, 180, 185, 187–89 3.39 186 6.5–7 132 11 179, 194 11.2 188 11.4 188 11.6–13 188 11.14–17 188 11.26 189 12 179, 182 12.1 183 12.1–15 185 12.3 183 12.6 186 12.7–8 182 12.9 182 12.10 182 12.11 182 12.12 188 12.14 182 12.15 184 14 144 15.10 183 15.25 186 15.31 186 16–17 186 16.15 183 16.20–22 182, 183 17.14 186 20 144, 183 21.1 285 21.24 184 21.24–25 183 21.37 183 1 Kings 3.5 289 9.9 132 21.21 132 22.23 132 2 Kings 4 144

Ancient Sources Index

1–2 Chronicles 180 1 Chronicles 6.32 303 9.23 303 Nehemiah 13.18 132 Job 7.9 214 Psalms 6.5 214 16.11 285 31.6 285 44.3 285 137 223, 295 139 285 139.23–24 113–14 Isaiah 2.18 303 7 173 23.18 285 31.7 303 38.18 214 46.6 303 66.1 86 Jeremiah 173 4.4 140 4.5–8 140 Daniel 300 4 208 9 173 Apocrypha Wisdom of Solomon 9.15 303 New Testament 142, 242–43, 295, 297, 299 Matthew 1.20 289 2.12 289 3.7 141 5.8 261 5.21–22 33 7.1–5 114 8.28 283

337

17.20 288 24 141 26.57–68 159 27.57–66 314 28.5–7 314 28.11–15 314 Mark 7 144 8 257 10.22 136 10.32–45 114 13 141 14.53–65 159 14.58 303 15.42–47 314 16.4–7 314 Luke 3.7 141 7.11–17 259 17.20–37 141 22.19 270 22.54–71 159 23.21 155 23.50–56 314 24.1–7 314 24.12 314 24.22–24 314 24.39–40 248, 314 John 12, 149, 155, 156, 219, 244, 296 1.1–5 155 1.3 285 1.6–9 155 1.14 127, 158 1.18 127 1.51 297 2.21 295, 297, 302 3.16 126 3.17–18 160 3.18–20 132 4.21 297 4.24 297 5.16–47 155 5.24 160 5.27–29 133

338

6 85 8.12–59 155 8.44 156, 159 10.22–39 155 12.31 160 12.47–49 160 13.2 156 13.27 156 13.33 297 15.6 297 16.10 160 17.3 302 18.19 159 19.10–11 156 19.36–42 314 20.1–18 314 20.20 314 20.25 248, 314 20.27 257, 314 21.24–25 155 Acts 296 2.4 88 5 141 5.1–11 133 7.49 86 9.4 301 Romans 90 1.1 136 4.7–8 90 5–8 88, 89 5.8 90 5.19 90 5.20–21 90 6.1–2 90 6.1–23 89 6.6 90 6.6–7 90 6.9 89 6.10–11 90 6.12 90 6.12–14 90 6.16–18 90 6.18 136 6.20 90 6.22–23 90

Ancient Sources Index

7.7–20 89 8 303 8.2 90 8.3 90 8.4 90 8.19 299 8.19–23 316 8.21 316 8.25 316 8.26 303 8.34 303 9.4 302 9–11 302 11.25 303 11.28 303 12.5 90 16.20 89 1 Corinthians 1.13 301 1.16 85 1.23–29 285 2.6–8 89 3.16–17 298 5.3–4 297 5.5 89 6.15 301 6.19 298, 302 7.5 89 8.12 301 10.6–8 144 10.20–21 89 11 301 11.1 78 12.4–11 301 12.10 89 12.12–13 297 12.12–31 90 12.27 297 13.12 127 14.3 301 15.3 90 15.20 314 15.26 89 2 Corinthians 2.11 89

339

Ancient Sources Index

4.4 89 4.18 30 5.1 298 5.1–10 298 5.2 298 5.8 298 5.21 90 6.16 295 11.14 89 12.7 89 Galatians 1.4 90 3.26–29 90 4.8–9 89 5.16–24 89 Ephesians 1.20–23 90 1.21 89 2.2 89 2.11–22 90, 297 2.15 90 2.21–22 302 3.6 90 3.10 89 4.26 89 5.19 301 5.23 90 6.11 89 6.11–18 90 6.12 89 6.14 90 6.15 90 6.16 89, 90 6.17 90 Philippians 3.3 297 3.20–21 314 Colossians 287 1.14 90 1.15 124, 125 1.15–20 90 1.16 89 1.18 90 1.24 90 2.8 89

2.8–15 139 2.10 89 2.14–15 90 2.20 89 1 Thessalonians 2.18 89 2.17 296 4.13 259 5.8 90 5.23 318 2 Thessalonians 2.9 89 1 Timothy 1.20 89 3.6–7 89 4.1 89 5.15 89 2 Timothy 2.26 89 Titus 1.1 136 Hebrews 3.13 114 James 1.1 136, 297 1 Peter 1.1 296 2.5 295 3.18–22 90 1 John 3.2 126 5.19 156 11.17–44 243 11.24 243 Revelation 163, 218 14.11 225 21 299 21.2 299 21.3 300 21.9–10 299, 302 21.22 299 Early Christianity Apocalypse of John Apocalypse of Paul

175 227

340

Ancient Sources Index

Apocalypse of Peter 175, 227 Apocalypse of Zephaniah 227 Augustine 113, 270 City of God 242 The Confessions Book X 270 Book X.viii 270 Sermon 364 199 Didymus the Blind Commentary on Genesis  289 Gregory of Nyssa  14, 252–62 The Beatitudes (De Beat.) 6 261 Concerning Those Who Have Died (Mort.) 28.4–18 260 28–29 259 29–30 259 30 259 36.12–13 260 47–48 259 48 259 58–60 259 62 259 66 260 117 260 133 260 The Great Catechism (Or. Cat.) 3 261 12 252 24 253, 254 Homilies on the Song of Songs (Cant.) 3 261 5 262 12 256 The Letters (Epist.) 8 254 9 253–55 The Life of Moses (Vit. Mos.) 20 253–55 36 253–55 40 253–55 42 253, 254

47 260 56 253–55 64–65 254, 255 70–71 253–55 232–239 256 233 252 The Life of Saint Macrina (V. Macr.) 185 257 185–186 257 186 258 The Lord’s Prayer (Or. Dom.)  255 12.21–25 258 On the Making of Man (Op. Hom.) 12.9 261 25.6 253, 254 25.10 259 On the Soul and the Resurrection (De An.) 198 259 200 259 206 261 219 259 225 259 245 259 On Virginity (Virg.) 4 255, 256, 262 11 262 Marcion 177 The Shephard of Hermas  13, 163, 164, 168, 169, 173–76 9.5–10.6 165 11.2 167 11.3–13.1 165 13.1–15.3 165 78.1–3 167 78.1–79.1 165 79.2–3 165 80.1–5 165 81.3–4 166 83–84 166 85–86 166 90.1–2 166 92.2 166

Ancient Sources Index

92.3 166 92.4 166 94.1–107.4 166 Ancient Near Eastern Sources Enūma Eliš 86 VI: 8 86 VI: 34–36 86 VI: 48–75 86 Ancient Greco–Roman Sources Aristotle 285 Poetics 244

Aesop Fables 2 Hippocrates De Septimanus 52  303 Homer Odyssey 244 Plato 104, 270 Axiochus 366a 303 The Laws 272 Phaedrus 81 Republic 234 Timaeus 100a 303

341

About the Contributors

Peter Anderson (PhD, Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary) is assistant dean and assistant professor of theology and ethics at Grand Canyon University and Grand Canyon Theological Seminary (Phoenix, Arizona). Jeremiah Bailey (PhD, Baylor University) is an adjunct professor. His research focuses on Second Temple Judaism and Early Christianity with a particular focus on the Apostolic Fathers and the second century. He also writes science fiction and fantasy under a pen name. Amber Bowen (PhD, University of Aberdeen) is assistant professor of philosophy at Redeemer University (Hamilton, ON). Her primary research focuses on Kierkegaard and phenomenology. She is also the cohost of The Two Cities podcast. Andrew J. Byers (PhD, Durham University) is Tutor in New Testament at Ridley Hall, Cambridge, and an Affiliated Lecturer at the University of Cambridge. He is the author of four books, including John and the Others and TheoMedia: The Media of God in the Digital Age. His writings on culture and society have appeared in publications such as Christianity Today, Relevant Magazine, and The Other Journal. Elizabeth Culhane is a PhD candidate in philosophy and religion at the University of Queensland (Australia) and is a tutor at Ridley College (Melbourne, Australia). Her recent publications include “Hearing Absence: Shusaku Endo’s  Silence and the Dark Night of the Soul” in Religion & Literature and “Violent Fury: Can Third-Party Outrage Manifest Cyclical, Mimetic Violence?” in Political Theology. 343

344

About the Contributors

Taylor W. Cyr (PhD, University of California, Riverside) is assistant professor of philosophy at Samford University (Birmingham, AL). He is the author of several articles on free will and moral responsibility, and the cohost of a podcast called The Free Will Show. John Anthony Dunne (PhD, University of St. Andrews) is assistant professor of New Testament and the director of the Doctor of Ministry Program at Bethel Seminary (St. Paul, MN). He is the author of two books, the coeditor of six books, and has written over twenty articles and essays. He is also the assistant editor of Didaktikos, and the editor and cohost of The Two Cities podcast. Celina Durgin (MA, University of Notre Dame) is the director of operations for the Center for Hebraic Thought at The King’s College in New York City and the editor of The Biblical Mind. Douglas Estes (PhD, University of Nottingham) is associate professor of biblical studies and practical theology at Tabor College (Hillsboro, KS). He is the author/editor of ten books and more than fifty essays in theological journals and popular publications. One of his forthcoming projects is editing two volumes on Tolkien’s works in the theology and pop culture series from Lexington Books/Fortress Academic. Douglas is also a fellow at the Center for Pastor Theologians and the editor of Didaktikos. Megan Fritts (PhD, University of Wisconsin-Madison) is assistant professor of philosophy at the College of St. Scholastica (Duluth, MN). She is the author of “Evidence Through a Glass, Darkly” in the Australasian Philosophical Review, and coauthor of “Fake News and Epistemic Vice: Combatting a Uniquely Noxious Market” in the Journal of the American Philosophical Association. Rachelle Gilmour (PhD, University of Sydney) is Bromby Senior Lecturer in Old Testament at Trinity College, University of Divinity, Melbourne (Australia). Her most recent monograph is Divine Violence in the Book of Samuel (2021). Elizabeth Howard is a PhD candidate in English literature at the University of Minnesota, where she works with theories of loss and reuse in the nineteenth century. Her other research interests include histories of poetic reception and circulation, narrative accounts of natural catastrophes, and the disruptive force of Girardian mimesis in all kinds of media. Her recent articles have appeared in Religion and the Arts, Victorian Poetry and Victorians Institute Journal.

About the Contributors

345

Brandon M. Hurlbert is a PhD candidate in theology and religion at Durham University (England). His thesis is on reading the book of Judges as Christian Scripture. His recent publications include “Cut & Splice: Reading Judges 19 Cinematically” in Biblical Interpretation, and “Once upon a Time in Persia: The Ethics of Violence in the Book of Esther and Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” in In the Cross-hairs: Bible and Violence, forthcoming. He is also a contributor to The Two Cities podcast. Dru Johnson (PhD, University of St Andrews) is associate professor of biblical and theological studies at The King’s College in New York City and the director of the Center for Hebraic Thought. His recent books include Biblical Philosophy  (2021),  Human Rites (2019), and Epistemology and Biblical Theology (2018). Rebekah Lamb (PhD, University of Western Ontario) is lecturer in theology and the arts at the Institute of Theology, Imagination, and the Arts (ITIA) at St. Mary’s College, University of St. Andrews (Scotland). She has published in The Journal of Pre-Raphaelite Studies, Religions, Theology in Scotland, and elsewhere on theological aesthetics, Christian consolation, and the relationship between industrial technology, emotions, and everyday life. Joanna Leidenhag (PhD, University of Edinburgh) is lecturer in theology and liberal arts at the University of Leeds (England). She is the author of Minding Creation: Theological Panpsychism and the Doctrine of Creation (2021) and several articles in journals such as  Modern Theology, International Journal for Systematic Theology, and Studies in Christian Ethics. King-Ho Leung (PhD, University of Nottingham) is senior research fellow at St. Mary’s College, University of St. Andrews (Scotland). His articles have been published in journals such as Philosophy,  Modern Theology,  Theory, Culture & Society, Continental Philosophy Review. Patrick McGlinchey is a PhD candidate in divinity at the University of St. Andrews (Scotland). His research concerns the theological anthropology of Rowan Williams. Previously, he convened an undergraduate Open-Learning course on the intersection of theology and film at Queen’s University, Belfast. James F. McGrath (PhD, Durham University) is the Clarence L. Goodwin Chair in New Testament Language and Literature at Butler University (Indianapolis, Indiana). He is the author of Theology and Science Fiction, the editor of Religion and Science Fiction, and coeditor with Andrew Crome of Time and Relative Dimensions in Faith: Religion and Doctor Who. He has

346

About the Contributors

also written many book chapters and articles on similar topics, and a small number of science fiction short stories. He also writes on subjects related to early Christianity, the historical Jesus, and Mandaeism. He blogs and tweets @ReligionProf. Kris Song (PhD, University of Aberdeen) is adjunct professor at Biola University and Talbot School of Theology (La Mirada, California). He writes and teaches on the subject of the Holy Spirit and the early church, and is also a contributor to The Two Cities podcast. Nathaniel A. Warne (PhD, Durham University) is priest-in-charge at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Mishawaka, Indiana. He also teaches theological ethics for the Bexley-Seabury Seminary Federation. Nathaniel is the author of The Call to Happiness and has published in a number of academic journals and edited volumes. He also has a book on contemplative spirituality, ethics, and the doctrine of creation (forthcoming).