In this postmodern age, the Hegelian-Marxist alienation of the skier erupts as a circumstance that contrasts with the virtues of good skiing. This Aristotelian interpretation of skiing is about enjoying simple skiing, frugal consumption, and solidarity with others and the environment.
The postmodern alienation as a limitation, and the non-belonging or ignorance of their essence, as skiers, by being immersed in a social system distanced from reality, is characterized by the following aspects:
- Spatial alienation is the loss of meaning of space and familiarity due to the effects of hypermobility and dis-rootedness. In modern times, we tended to use the same skiing space out of habit; while today, the norm is the constant change of ski destinations.
- Accelerated consumerism and premature obsolescence create alienation with regard to things, to the ‘disposable‘, since these are valued in terms of novelty and not in terms of their utility or functionality.
- The alienation of actions refers to the difficulty of finding time to ski as we really want. This situation is replaced by what gives us immediate satisfaction, instead of dedicating ourselves to improving.
- Alienation over time, as we prioritize the quantity of experiences and not their duration and significance. The postmodern temporal pattern in terms of time is short-short, as we tend to have experiences of short duration and short memory. The propensity is to privilege frequent experiences over meaningful and transformative ones.
- The alienation of the self and of others, in terms of less commitment and lightness in social relations.
Conclusion
In the mountains, we might feel alienated and uncomfortable with our own actions, and we pretend to control them; both the controllable like a pair of skis as well as our technique. This is because we are unable to allocate sufficient time for self-education and enhancement of our own skiing.
Our postmodern skiing experiences may be disposable, ephemeral and continuously devalued, leading us to rush in search of novel experiences as a result of the alienation of skiing time as a symbol of postmodern acceleration, as the increased pace of skiing corresponds to a perceived scarcity of time.
We seem being ‘thrown‘ into a mountain space outside of our everyday environment, where we have our routine, our level of control and our inherent prior acceleration.
We are being co-opted by the accelerated ski consumerism that we change before they become obsolete and use as disposable things.
