The Dignity of Man between Earned and Manufactured Worth

The Dignity of Man between Earned and Manufactured Worth

This essay deals with the axiological value of self-worth’s intrinsic and extrinsic character. It encompasses the two aspects of socially perceived esteem as well as self-esteem.

The phenomenon I am referring here started as mass phenomenon in the last two decades of the 20th century and became more acute in the 21 century due to the awareness and need of a larger layer of populations for public recognition of merit and worth. This phenomenon was amplified by the digital era and exposure to social platforms and the internet with its armies of fans and influencers.

The neoliberal age commodified a product namely the stationary merit diploma one can fill in and frame and display on a wall,  a vanity token becoming more common today online than on paper.

The product created the want and the want was hijacked by a majority as measure or proof of self-worth in the digital age.

So what in the mid 20th century America was a supply, the product, the blank diploma to be signed and framed, by now is a demand issue, more and more individuals write, paint or create in a non professional capacity, from here their participation in communities that reward them with a vanity token, often the online diploma of excellence.

The neoliberal era pushed this want which was satisfied so far free of charge, towards vanity art galleries and publishing houses which are there ready to recognize and monetize. In this category of pay-to-play practice fall also some societies and liberal arts institutions that reward the subscribers.

This phenomenon is wide spread today in the global village and even if we can speak of validation as a symptom created by market culture, the inflation of tokens has a strong backing in the want.

More and more ordinary people crave recognition, validation, fame and publicity, notoriety, a celebrity status quo.

For these individuals the self-worth represented in these tokens is real even if it is fake. Society operates lately in a reversed manner. These fake credentials instead of being rejected by most members are sought also for themselves as personal validation of a similar merit.

This extrinsic quality of value is the form hollow of substance, virtue, real excellence, kernel of truth.

We ask ourselves how far have we gone from the aspirations of Pico della Mirandola’s Dignity of Man capable of reason, virtue and excellence.

In an era of many forms and expressions of kitsch, one more, namely, the fake self-worth of an individual is today epidemic.