One of my general thoughts when people start handwringing about certain cultural shifts that it’s not been proven to me on many of these whether or not the changes that people are fearing are even going to be bad or good, rather that they just are.
I’m stuck by Mike Hobbs, talking about the anxious generation and the current panic around phones and how we had the same panic with every other introduction of technology, and yet we never actually go back and think about what the real impact of TV radio and disco and other things that we thought were going to degrade society were. Also largely because there’s no means to only go back and look at these things because they’re still ongoing.
Yeah I think that's precisely right. Also American media lives in an eternal present and is generally loath to adopt a historical lens which doesn't help things
It seems like the fragmentation of culture is so completely both culturally and technologically that complaining about it is a waste of time. It would take structural collapse for it to not seem automatic
I don't need movies or anything else to be the center of culture, that's probably bad anyways. I want my movies to be uncorrupted, visions of the artists who make them and not those of whatever it is who is paying them. I don't even like Nolan that much, he's been hit or miss, but my main gripe with for example The Odyssey, it isn't a Cristopher Nolan movie! We have some visual hallmarks yes, some thematic elements, the ridiculous "twist", but the dialog, the casting choices, and the overarching vibe, these couldn't have been conceived by man or woman or even AI, nor any natural agglomeration of these, something else is running the show, something hostile and deeply alien, it's the same entity creates most of the ads nowadays as far as I can tell. Worse, the target audience isn't even us, we are merely a conduit, it's.. talking to itself, hyping itself up. Run.
Piracy probably helped degrade the theater and by extension movies, i dont know anyone who actually pays to see anything. Also will say communist society would be worth it just to have abolished advertising, seeing the commercials before the odyssey made me sick to my stomach.
On the current trajectory of US political economy and culture it definitely tracks media will further atomize. In the abstract, do you think a shift in the political economy towards a more democratic socialist structure would have any effect on the trajectory/halt further atomization?
It's difficult to know to be honest, because that would require a bunch of genuinely revolutionary transformations in different spheres. Truth is I just don't know.
That’s fair. Do you think this atomization of US domestic culture and media operates upstream of its foreign cultural influence? It seems that global media culture is shifting from US dominance to multipolarity in a similar manner as US hard power- the global reach of Korean cultural exports, Latin American music, Bollywood, Nigeria’s music and film industry being some examples that have taken significant bites out of US’ share
As common mass cultural phenomena diminish, one wonders if mass event artifacts (World Cup e.g.) might but enjoy disproportionate status in direct proportion to their scarcity. Also, does tension not exist for market segmentation between traditional controversy averse lowest common denominator marketing and optimizing for rage click engagement?
This is exactly why many of the Hollywood agencies are focusing so much on sports. It’s the last vestige of mass culture and thus the last vestige of big checks
ok fam let's get some discussion going in the comments! if no one discusses I'll delete this :p
One of my general thoughts when people start handwringing about certain cultural shifts that it’s not been proven to me on many of these whether or not the changes that people are fearing are even going to be bad or good, rather that they just are.
I’m stuck by Mike Hobbs, talking about the anxious generation and the current panic around phones and how we had the same panic with every other introduction of technology, and yet we never actually go back and think about what the real impact of TV radio and disco and other things that we thought were going to degrade society were. Also largely because there’s no means to only go back and look at these things because they’re still ongoing.
“Things were thought to be bad before, therefore this thing cannot be bad now” is pretty classic awful Michael Hobbes reasoning.
Yeah I think that's precisely right. Also American media lives in an eternal present and is generally loath to adopt a historical lens which doesn't help things
I am the warm and chewy center of all culture! The rhythm knows me like no other. I feel its loving embrace fumbling towards my pockets, my heart.
It seems like the fragmentation of culture is so completely both culturally and technologically that complaining about it is a waste of time. It would take structural collapse for it to not seem automatic
I don't need movies or anything else to be the center of culture, that's probably bad anyways. I want my movies to be uncorrupted, visions of the artists who make them and not those of whatever it is who is paying them. I don't even like Nolan that much, he's been hit or miss, but my main gripe with for example The Odyssey, it isn't a Cristopher Nolan movie! We have some visual hallmarks yes, some thematic elements, the ridiculous "twist", but the dialog, the casting choices, and the overarching vibe, these couldn't have been conceived by man or woman or even AI, nor any natural agglomeration of these, something else is running the show, something hostile and deeply alien, it's the same entity creates most of the ads nowadays as far as I can tell. Worse, the target audience isn't even us, we are merely a conduit, it's.. talking to itself, hyping itself up. Run.
Piracy probably helped degrade the theater and by extension movies, i dont know anyone who actually pays to see anything. Also will say communist society would be worth it just to have abolished advertising, seeing the commercials before the odyssey made me sick to my stomach.
On the current trajectory of US political economy and culture it definitely tracks media will further atomize. In the abstract, do you think a shift in the political economy towards a more democratic socialist structure would have any effect on the trajectory/halt further atomization?
It's difficult to know to be honest, because that would require a bunch of genuinely revolutionary transformations in different spheres. Truth is I just don't know.
That’s fair. Do you think this atomization of US domestic culture and media operates upstream of its foreign cultural influence? It seems that global media culture is shifting from US dominance to multipolarity in a similar manner as US hard power- the global reach of Korean cultural exports, Latin American music, Bollywood, Nigeria’s music and film industry being some examples that have taken significant bites out of US’ share
I don't think so, I think it's mostly structural incentives encouraged by capitalism's tendency to need constant growth
As common mass cultural phenomena diminish, one wonders if mass event artifacts (World Cup e.g.) might but enjoy disproportionate status in direct proportion to their scarcity. Also, does tension not exist for market segmentation between traditional controversy averse lowest common denominator marketing and optimizing for rage click engagement?
This is exactly why many of the Hollywood agencies are focusing so much on sports. It’s the last vestige of mass culture and thus the last vestige of big checks