ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the roots of fear, anger, and anxiety laying the foundations for conspiratorial play as a symbolic resolution to incomprehensible visions of real horror in state and elite sanctioned abuse, resulting in the Capitol riots. Set against Artaud’s ‘theatre of cruelty,’ Agamben’s ‘state of exception,’ and Preciado’s ‘immunized and de-munized,’ the Capitol riots might be understood as the result of a calculated, systemic drive to awaken the petite-bourgeois from their somnambulism, not for the aim of throwing off the shackles of an oppressive state, but rather, to more deeply embed the power of elite actors to rise above state powers. Provoking audience members within an immersive and sensually overwhelming environment, Artaud aimed to expose the banal horror lurking within, revealing the façade of civility that mediated reality. Immersive media environments occurring under COVID-19 within already hyper-saturated information flows, immersed subjects in an environment of overwhelming sensual stimulation. The impacts of provocations culminated in the storming of the US Capitol, where those aggravated by a 24/7 rage and fear machine became a predictable side-effect of contemporary media ecosystems intersecting with pandemics and climate change catastrophes.
