29 In other words, intentionality does not have to be conscious (Brennan 200 4 ).
30 After all, there are hundreds of mental states that we achieve every day of which we are
no longer conscious of having tried to or wanted to achieve that state. Thus critics of
Western society (e.g. Castoriadis 2003) who charge it with entering into a ‘big sleep’
may, in part, simply be describing how the imaginary is instituted.
31 Given the very great difficulty of identifying affective states, still there do seem to be
increasing rates of psychiatric morbidity in Western populations. For example, in the
UK it is estimated that 11 per cent of the population are suffering from some kind of
mixed anxiety order, while in the USA a recent National Comorbidity Survey estimated
the prevalence of depression to be 1 7 .1 per cent of the population (Wilkinson 2005).
Other surveys have produced even higher figures, though these have often been
conducted by organizations with an interest in high proportions.
32 Notice, however, that I am not concentrating on here on the individualized self-
evaluative model of creativity and innovation that cross-cuts this model (cf. McKenzie
2001)
33 Notice here that I resist the temptation to link anxiety, obsession and compulsion to
affects like fear, anger or rage that can all too easily shade off into violence. This is not
because there is no link and it is not to deny that violent fantasies and more general
hostile thought about others do seem to be a staple of many cultures (Thrift 2005b).
Thus, both men and women in Western cultures seem to routinely have homicidal
fantasies while men seem to be particularly prone to practices like stalking. Violence
seems to be a key part of human culture although whether human beings have
‘homicidal circuits’ of the kind described by evolutionary psychologists like Buss (2005:
244 ) for whom ‘killing is a marvellously effective solution to an astonishing array of
human social conflicts’, is not an argument I wish to become involved in but, at the
same time, the world clearly does not lack for contexts – being fired from a job,
humiliated by peers, beaten up by a rival, betrayed or dumped by a partner, encroached
upon by an interloper – which can generate violence. However, I want to concentrate
on affects which are part of the general hum of judgement.
34 Over 1,000 people are killed in Britain each year simply by falling down stairs. The
number of sprains and more serious injuries from pavement falls currently goes
unrecorded.
35 Although the number of formal news outlets existing outside conglomerate ownership
may be declining, news can now be obtained from many other outlets (e.g. the internat,
quasi-entertainment media, cable news, radio call-in shows, talk shows, etc.).
36 Though it is important to point out that the traffic is not all one way. For example,
certain kinds of polling techniques were originally invented to service the political sphere
but were then adapted for corporate clients, mainly as a result of political consultants
trying to find greater sources of income (see Klein 2006).
37 Though one needs to be careful here. Such a judgement often follows from under-
standing emotion as a weakness, and fear as necessarily bad, whereas fear can serve a
number of positive functions, such as promoting vigilance (Brader 2006).
38 Though I make little of it here, they are also the arts of not swaying constituencies too.
Sometimes what is needed is to ‘reduce the juice’ by inducing apathy in its many forms
(Eliasoph 1998). But apathy, as Eliasoph shows, can involve a whole series of denials,
omissions, suppressions and evasions which add up to much more than a simple absence
of thought and action.
39 But it is important to be careful. There is also motivated reasoning and conviction to
consider, both of which are based in affect.
4 0 There are an estimated 7 ,000 political consultants in the USA.
4 1 Used differently by different politicians. Bill Clinton hardly used them whilst John Kerry
was addicted to them.
4 2 Thus Karl Rove started out as a direct mail expert.
4 3 Thus Dick Morris used not just weekly but daily polls for Bill Clinton. At one point in
Notes 277