Bugmen: What are they?
What is a Bugman?
Aesthetically they’re much like their name, bug-eyed, jittery and insect-like, their very demeanour often makes one’s skin crawl. You’re more than likely surrounded by hoards of these bovine-esque people in day-to-day life. Culturally of course they’re near impossible to pin down for they cut all cultural roots at the base in fear of representation with the past. Politically many say bugmen are ‘left-leaning’ yet I’d argue the case that any affiliation with politics is entirely with the curve of the populous and thus the Bugmen – at present – inject themselves routinely with viral strains of progressivism, neoliberalism and (especially) democracy. Projected from this ambivalent attitude towards history and politics comes anti-empathetical extroversions with regard to tradition, myth, folklore, spirituality and interest, all of which, when positioned in relation to a bugman are used only alongside heavy doses of postmodernist irony. The simple matter of fact is they have zero respect or tolerance for anything antiquated or traditional, the most minor of historic morsels that doesn’t actively sell itself to them or project their personal vision of infantile-tech-utopia is cast aside. Philosophically the bugman is relatively confused, often mistaking logic, reason and rationale with one another, and replacing the idea of basic causality with their own drawn-out narcissistic assessment attempts: “Look at me, I’ve got it all figured out.” the bugman says internally.
Before you sits the social nervous system of the bugman true, a sordid mixture of fad-reverence and capitalist-lite binging. On closer inspection of the day to day life of a bugman one finds at its core the implementation of social erosion, everything that is taken from its origin is likewise bastardized into a regressive, virtual, stir-crazy version of its former self: eSports, Fantasy Football, Copy ‘n Paste Vidya (à la Bethesda/Ubisoft), New Atheism, Beards-as-personality, etc. each of these characteristics is of course filtered through the latest piece of cutting-edge high-brand technology the bugman can afford. One may have noticed already that bugmen’s ‘personalities’ are nothing more than the accumulation and composition of various popular brand names, technologies, TV shows, bands etc. The bugman is entirely defined by that which they consume. Thus the bugmen easily assimilate into their own groups, for their archetypes and traits are based off material possessions, as such grouping is quick, painless and has the added benefit of instantaneous conversation: “Sweet mechanical keyboard dude!”
There is of course a difference between a regular consumer and a bugman, there has to be, for everyone consumes. Whereas a consumer will buy a basket of groceries which they plan on eating, the bugman will purchase retro foods, meme-drinks and ironic status-tokens as a means to display the fact that they are indeed ‘in-on-it’. A consumer will buy the box-set of their favourite TV show because they genuinely enjoyed the viewing, perhaps they’ll watch 3-4 episodes a week around other commitments, a bugman on the other hand subscribes to multiple streaming services and binges series after series in the ever expanding quest for acceptance, when asked how they found Stranger Things, Rick & Morty, Bojack Horseman, Breaking Bad, Game of Thrones etc. the bugman does not offer insight into their personal opinion, only regurgitates a titbit or quote from the series as a means to display their virtue of consumption. “I too have seen the thing you have!” A network of insects whose lives are routinely controlled by ratings: theirs and others. They must advance their rating by subsuming the other which is rated highly. ‘Everyone liked this, so if I like this, everyone will like me!”
Identity and consumption merge within the bugman. Hobbies become traits in the lives of bugmen. Treating their lives like as if they were an RPG minmaxer, attempting to reach peak efficiency when it comes to popularity, assimilation and acceptance. Spewing spools of popular quotes, band-names, aphorisms and social tics, the bugman is a walking media depository incapable of its own creation. Bugmen’s ‘own’ thoughts are merely misshapen combinations of that which they’ve taken in. Revelling in their ironic displays of lower case postmodern hyperbole and sardonic middle class humour. Sincerity an impossibility for worry of social suffocation, and daft humour avoided for fear of ostracisation. When a bugman sprouts anew, the previous form of personal agency commits seppuke out of respect for others. That jittery man whose bulbous eyes are darting to and fro, the one in line for the new iPhone, that’s a bugman, consumed by the idea of being first in a line of consumers, any possibility of escape is negated by the perpetual oppression and quasi-innovations of consumerism. Just as the man’s soul glimpses at the sight of a beloved memory, his perception picks up an advert, and so the memory fades into non-existence.
I have noticed that Bugmen always refer to books, movies, and television programs as Content. With a capital C because they use it as a proper noun. They also use the word consume in preference to read or watch. You a might read a book but Bugmen consume content. It presents a creepy image in the minds eye of insatiable carpenter ants defoliating a forest, or that of a mindless homunculus gnawing on a book.
Philistine lowbrow souless zombie proles, that’s all they are. No sense of Beauty, Art and Aesthetics. Last of the Last Men. Can’t get any worse than that, they’re insects, monkeys are superior, they seem to have more of an urge to improve themselves.
Living for Content is Consumerism at its worst. It’s a virus, it’s a tiranny, it’s enslavement; it’s the end of mankind, art and culture with zero exaggeration. The more one believes I am exaggerating, the more one is a souless zombie. Most people think I am exaggerating. They think I am a snob, full of myself, arrogant, delusional…THEY are.
Have you heard of Hauntology? I seen it in a video by Cuck Philosophy, and I think it was a concept posited by Michel Foucault. Basically, it is the idea that we as a culture reach a point in which we produce nothing that is truly new, truly innovative. Instead, everything becomes simply recycled and repeated over and over again; and it all becomes self-referencial.
I think in the video made by the Youtuber I mentioned, he uses hauntology to describe the Fallout series of games. In the Fallout Universe, there was a divergent timeline which resulted in a future as envisioned by optimistic people in 1950s America. The point in that video was that our current epoch is ‘haunted’ by a future that has never come to be; in which we no longer progress as a species but simply regurgitate everything. The point with the Fallout Universe was that people in the 1950s were able to envision a better future for themselves, while nowadays any perception of what the future would be like is simply portrayed as being dystopian.
I believe the concept of “Hauntology” was formulated by marxist author Mark Fisher.
Yes
[…] soulless bugman can be described as a hollow but controlling and yet subservient person who is comfortable only among the […]
seem like ‘bugman’ is just another word for ‘normie’…a culturally unsophisticated person
I think you’ve missed the point. The term ‘Bugman’, refers to an individual who is obsessed with consumerism, anyone including; ‘nerds’ are prone to adopting the ‘Bugman’ mentality.
It’s far more likely that a person who separates themselves from society, attaches identity to ‘nerd-things’, and un-ironically uses the term “normie”, is more likely to be a bugman.
You’ve got to be careful with “culturally unsophisticated”, as that implies superiority and thus breeds narcissism; Delusions of grandeur, which is what the ‘bugman’ encompass, truly this a form of hypocrisy.
Good, but needs more cross-cultural analysis. I’ve met a bugman type from a fairly different country/culture (though still within the broad sphere of USG influence). I had no idea about their pattern of consumption, which likely was much different from your typical Brooklynite or San Franciscan. They probably rarely never ate avocado toast and never watched the games or shows the bugmen from the US watch. Yet there was something that struck me as “bugmen-like” about them — the meekness, the adherence to “proper” social opinion that they undoubtedly absorbed from watching other “proper” types like themselves express, the lack of rational/causal thinking “from first principles,” the need to be accepted by the group of similar well-educated “proper” types, the end-of-history-type confidence that *they* represent the evolved type (despite the stunningly de-evolved characteristics), etc.
It has exactly the correct amount of analysis.
Are we not men?
We are bugmen!
[…] 20. The bugman phenomenon [Link] […]
Bugmen = Kultural Kuru’
“Culture Vultures have always been with us, but now we have Cultural Cannibalism — hipsters who binge on the art and music of others yet don’t do the proverbial homework, resulting in massive amounts of content-less effluvia. There’s a reason why those Man-Purses are so big — they’re colostomy bags.”
https://pungeon.blogspot.com/2008/07/aktion-fnf-kultural-kuru.html
Try harder and don’t flail, have courage, you can do it.
I think I’m one of them. I try not to be, but in doing so I just turn into more of a bugman. I should have never gotten that retarded code monkey job.
Are bugmen actually real, or are they just caricatures of the current consumer trends?
I believe I have met some. Hopefully “the bugman” as described in this article doesn’t really exist, but the engineering department at my college was chock full of these kinds of fuckers.
lmao get with the times gramps
Bugmen go to Comicon dressed as their favorite character. Their small apartments or mother’s basements are shrines to this character or the fictional world’s this character lives in.
Bugmen have no real jokes or personality for that matter, just a regurgitation of their favorite character’s quotes.
The often get unnecessary vasectomies and wear E Pluribus Anus shirts from the TV community.
I used to be a bugman and some how, I woke up. I was one of the most buggered of all, to my eternal shame.
[…] essay collection ‘Exiting Modernity’. It’s so good. I ended up reading this essay on ‘Bugmen’ out loud in its entirety to Eve one evening. […]
Great reading, but what the hell is “Beards-as-personality”?
Some bugmen go to Comicon, others go on discord to get all their opinions and personality. Sometimes they like to show off their rare pepes. I guess because they didn’t spend money on it they think they aren’t a consumerist. It’s pretty funny. They all have the same robotic opinions but are the first one to call someone else a bugman. Look in the mirror.