Re: Hegemony, Homer, and neoconservativism

Re: Hegemony:

“‘Hegemony’ will allude to an absent totality, and to the diverse attempts at recomposition and rearticulation which, in overcoming this original absence, ” according to Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe, “made it possible for struggles to be given a meaning and for historical forces to be endowed with full positivity.”

What are Laclau and Mouffe talking about when they refer to an absent totality and an original absence? Some sort of pretended universality that is in fact contested and contingent? But isn't that not so much an absence as a partiality? And I can imagine how contingency could allow for the rearticulation of meaning, but what do they mean by full positivity? Is that another way of saying pretended universality?

“The emerging hegemonic culture is not merely an ideological mystification but serves the interests of ruling groups at the expense of subordinate ones."

How exactly does hegemony relate to false consciousness? In turning to the concept of hegemony as more useful than the notion of false consciousness, might we not also question whether subordinate groups are in fact acting against their interests? Might they not be acting consciously in their own best interests in buying in to the hegemonic culture? Does a hegemonic culture necessarily serve the ruling groups at the *expense* of subordinate groups? Are subordinate groups just settling for the little they can get, or are they getting more than we might recognize? Is hegemony a function of the limiting of the options of subordinate groups in such a way as to make limited options seem inevitable? And what degree of control do ruling groups actually have over the hegemonic culture? How is consciousness/agency/power distributed within a hegemonic culture? What kind of power does the rank-and-file claim by buying in to neocon nationalism? Why can neoconservativism plausibly claim to represent the interests of society at large?

(And...isn't "best interest," and especially narrowly-defined economic self-interest, ultimately an incomplete and unsatisfying way of understanding human motivation?)

Re: Homer:

What does he care about? What motivates him? How conscious is he of the power structures and societal systems that frame his life? Does he ever act against his own best interest, given his choices? To what extent is he manipulated by ruling groups? How does he exercise power? Under what circumstances would he buy in to neoconservativism?