Whatever (novel): Difference between revisions

''Whatever'' (French: ''Extension du domain de la lutte'' literally "Extension of the domain of struggle") is the 1994 debut novel by French writer [[Michel Houellebecq|Michel Houellebecq]]. The French title refers to the main character's idea that the class struggle has extended to the realm of relations between the sexes, resulting in similarly unequal social hierarchies, stratifying the sexual marketplace into sexual 'haves' and sexual 'have nots'. The main character of the novel, Harel, lives through inceldom. It is perhaps the most frank depiction of [[inceldom]] ever in literature, containing arguments about [[inceldom]] that the media later attributed to incel forums around 2018. The novel was made into a [[Whatever - Extension du domaine de la lutte (movie)|film in 1999]].

Like most of Houellebecq's novels, it is written in a darkly humorous style, is highly offensive and vulgar at times, and contains sharp criticisms/observations of the widespread social atomization, materialism and consumerism he implies is a result of modern Capitalism and Liberalism.  Its acknowledgement of a social hierarchy as being instinctive to human sexuality makes it arguably the most [[sexual realism|sexual realist]] novels in history.<ref>https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/whatever-1994-by-michel-houellebecq-a-superb-declaration-of-hostilities-1.3919923</ref>   

The novel was likely (somewhat) influenced by another French critic of sexual liberalism, [[Michel Clouscard]], who explored similar ideas, but with an ultimately different train of thought.  Clouscard notably critiqued the sexual revolution as aiming to distract the working class from their economic poverty by promoting a range of romantic choice not within the reach of most of the working class.<ref> https://philitt.fr/2019/02/28/le-capitalisme-selon-houellebecq-une-lutte-perpetuelle-qui-ne-peut-jamais-avoir-de-fin-1-3/ In French.</ref>  Clouscard indirectly criticized feminism as consumerist and a distraction through his critique of the sexual revolution.  

Clouscard described the liberalized  sexual marketplace being chiefly the domain of what is known is classical Marxist theory as the exploiter classes , namely the bourgeois and the Capitalists and upper class, whereas Houellebecq's characters described the sexual marketplace as all-encompassing.  In other words, Clousgard focuses on classical materialist Marxist economics, and sees the values pursued in the  sexual revolution and the French student uprising in May 1968 as a distraction, whereas Houllebecqs characters directly blame the sexually successful and are often wealthy themselves. However, both Clouscard and and Houllebecqs characters describe sexual license as something less within the reach of the masses than it is promoted.  Clouscard argued that sexual liberalism has served to divide the working class against itself (by agitating women against men, through labeling all men as oppressive "Phallocrats") in what he has dubbed "The prostitution economy."<ref> http://www.marxisme.wikibis.com/michel_clouscard.php  In French.</ref>