Ici THK — Cyberfeminism

About the Author

Deborah Lupton worked already in 1993 on the analogy + between the communication of technology threats and of + diseases, she presents us the analogy that is voluntary + made between the computer and the body in a hygienic + society where we tend to rely on centralized organisation + to desinfect and sanitize our world. Since then the issue + of scale and control.

Sources

+ Panic computing: The viral metaphor and computer technology, + Cultural Studies, 8:3, pp.556—568, ISSN 0950-2386

Panic computing: The viral metaphor and computer technology

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The unproblematic use of the term 'virus' applied to + technological artefacts, inspire ponderings on the wider + implications of the viral metaphor. The choice of + phraseology in textual accounts and talk, the discursive + devices used, recurrent lexical patterns in describing + things, events, groups or people is revealing of the + latent ideological layer of meaning of such + communications (van Dijk, 1990; Fowler, 1991). In + particular, the intertextuality, or the ways in which + texts selectively draw upon other texts, other cultural + forms and discourses to create meaning, indicates the + political and ideological functions of texts and delimits + the boundaries within which topics may be discussed + (Fairclough, 1992; Astroff and Nyberg, 1992). *The + nomination of a type of computer technology malfunction + as a 'virus'* is a highly significant and symbolic + linguistic choice of metaphor, used to make certain + connections between otherwise unassociated subjects and + objects, to give meaning to unfamiliar events, to render + abstract feelings and intangible processes concrete. In + doing so, the metaphor shapes perception, identity and + experience, going beyond the original association by + evoking a host of multiple meanings (Clatts and Mutchler, + 1989: 106-7). As Geertz has argued, '[i]n metaphor one + has.., a stratification of meaning, in which an + incongruity of sense on one level produces an influx of + significance on another' (1973: 210).

Viruses and the computer corpus

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The present analysis examines in detail the + stratification of meaning evident in the widespread and + largely unquestioned adoption of the viral metaphor to + describe computer technology malfunction in popular + texts. It is argued that the viral metaphor used in the + context of computer technology draws upon a constellation + of discourses concerning body boundaries, erotic + pleasure, morality, invasion, disease and destruction. In + what follows, the meanings of the term 'virus' in the + medical context, the symbiotic relationship between body + and computer metaphorical systems, the symbolic danger of + viruses, the seductiveness of the human/computer, + Self/Other relationship and the cultural crisis around + issues of bodies, technologies and sexualities at the fin + de millénnium are discussed to illuminate the ambivalent + relationship of humans with computer technology in late + capitalist societies.

Morality and viral politics

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There are no "good" Germs or 'normal Germs; all Germs are + bad' (Helman, 1978: 118-19). To counter this attack, as + Cindy Patton points out, bodies are visualized as being + 'filled with tiny defending armies whose mission [is] to + return the "self" to the precarious balance of health' + (Patton, 1990: 60). The immune system is commonly + described in popular and medical texts as mounting a + 'defence' or 'siege' against 'murderous' viruses or + bacteria which are 'fought', 'attacked' or 'killed' by + white blood cells, drugs or surgical procedures (Martin, + 1990; Montgomery, 1991). This military discourse, + redolent with images of physical aggression, has become + routine and standardized to the point where its + metaphorical origins are erased: it is now a 'dead' + metaphor (Montgomery, 1991: 350).

The seduction and terror of cyberspace

The viral metaphor has been adopted in computing + terminology to express the meanings of rapid spread and + invisible invasion of an entity that is able to reproduce + itself and causes malfunctioning on the systemic + level. It is telling that this alternative use has been + so readily accepted that at least one Australian medical + journal has featured articles on computer viruses devoted + to making explicit the similarities between biological + viruses and computer viruses (Dawes, 1992a, 1992b). Just + as the immune system is described in terms of military + imagery, popular accounts of computer viruses commonly + employ the terminology of war to conceptualize the + struggle between technological order and chaos. [....] + Ways of describing computer technology have both created + new terminology which has entered the language and have + drawn upon elements of older, more established lexical + systems. In particular, drawing upon the centuries-old + body/machine discourse, there has developed a symbiotic + metaphorical relationship between computers and humans, + in which computers have been anthropomorphized while + humans have been portrayed as 'organic computers' + (Berman, 1989: 7).The immune system is also commonly + described as an information-processing system, + communicating by means of hormones. By this imagery, + there occurs 'the transformation of the human subject + into an object, a repository, or else a collision site, + for various types of detectable and useable information' + (Montgomery, 1991: 383). Indeed, according to Haraway, + bodies have conceptually become cyborgs + (cyberneticorganisms), that is, 'techno-organic, humanoid + hybrids' (Haraway, 1990:21), or compounds of machine and + body theorized in terms of communications, for which + disease may be conceptualized as 'a subspecies of + information malfunction or communications pathology' + (Haraway, 1989: 15).

The viral metaphor and technophobia

At the fin de millénnium, the body is a site of toxicity, + contamination and catastrophe, subject to and needful of + a high degree of surveillance and control. Kroker and + Kroker (1988:10 ff.) term the contemporary obsession + with clean bodily fluids as 'Body McCarthyism', an + hysterical new temperance movement. [...] 'Panic + Computing' invokes '[t]he underlying moral imperative + ... You can't trust your best friend's software any more + than you can trust his or her bodily fluids - safe + software or no software at all!' (Ross, 1991: 108). The + insertion of an 'infected' disk, that is a 'carrier' of + corruption, spells disaster for the integrity of the + computer corpus. Just as people are exhorted to grill + their sexual partners for details of their past intimate + lives, so as to be 'sure and safe' before proceeding to + exchange bodily fluids, so they are warned to verify the + source and safety of the computer disks they insert into + their PCs (Sontag, 1989: 167).