We are no longer dealing with historical events, but with places of collapse.

Mistakes, scandals, and failures no longer signal catastrophe. The crucial thing is that they be made credible, and that the public be made aware of the efforts being expended in that direction. The marketing immunity of governments is similar to that of the major brands of washing powder.

The surprises of thought are like those of love: they wear out. But here too you can carry on for a long time doing your conjugal duty.

For the heavenly fire no longer strikes depraved cities, it is rather the lens which cuts through ordinary reality like a laser, putting it to death.

Television knows no night. It is perpetual day. TV embodies our fear of the dark, of night, of the other side of things.

... the age of simulation thus begins with a liquidation of all referentials - worse: by their artificial resurrection in systems of signs, a more ductile material than meaning... It is no longer a question of imitation, nor of reduplication, nor even of parody. It is rather a question of substituting signs of the real for the real itself.

The simulacrum is never that which conceals the truth--it is the truth which conceals that there is none. The simulacrum is true.