December 19, 2002
From the desk of Mindles H. Dreck:Misanthropic Snobbery
I abhor comments like this:
"Obviously the public finds amusement in emotional exploitation of people," said Peter Soderling, a technical architect, who prefers The Osbournes brand of reality TV. "It's sad and shows that our society doesn't have a lot of value or depth in their own lives."
To turn that comment around - I always suspect that a broad condemnation of society's choice of entertainment accompanies deep unhappiness with one's own life. Such snobbery is usually a vain effort to make the mirror to one's own soul reflect something more satisfying.
Another interpretation is that the individual quoted thinks the masses need someone to show them how to use their freedom. Who likes that kind of patronizing offal? This form of cultural reactionaryism (yep, that's in the dictionary), available on both the Left (Quindlen) and the Right (Sunstein, perhaps?), is cheap, pernicious and revolting.
Article via Rachel Lucas.
Huh. How about that? My Sunstein rant was exactly one year ago today.
Posted by Mindles H. Dreck at December 19, 2002 10:10 AM | TrackBack | Technorati inbound links"); ?>Sunstein doesn't exactly qualify as right, unless Trotskyism is centrist.
Posted by: Anon Coward on December 19, 2002 10:21 AMI don't really know Sunstein's work beyond the subject linked here. Somewhere along the line I thought I heard him labeled as a conservative. Or was it the U. Chicago association?
Posted by: "Mindles H. Dreck" on December 19, 2002 10:51 AMI wouldn't call Sunstein a communist, but he's definitely leftward. On the right try Podhoretz or Bloom.
Posted by: Jane Galt on December 19, 2002 11:04 AMThere may even be a fourth interpretation: the news vendors write about entertainment and entertainers 24/7 -- mostly the same shows, events, and people that all the other vendors are writing about 24/7. To capture eyeballs much beyond refresh time there has to be some angle, so they take the day's ore-load of mined quotes and carve out a small piece that sounds critical either of those watching or those being watched -- something that either offends or reassures (usually a bias), two personal reactions that take the reader from the detachment of data acquisition to a higher level of engagement, and more attachment to the site.
Peter Soderling (whoever he is) may himself be offended by the use of his quote -- "hey, I'm a draftsman, I watch the Osbournes if I can't get a date, so when they asked what I think of people watching the Bachelor who has 25 women *he* could date, I said 'they have shallow, pitiful, empty lives!' I don't even think the guy's ever used a CAD program -- what's he got? I was trying to be funny -- maybe that's why I can't get a date. If Ozzie said the same thing, people would laugh -- even his own kids probably would."
It's possible -- don't be TOO tough on Peter.
Posted by: C. Bennett on December 19, 2002 11:37 AMI think Peter's comment was vague and too-sweeping -- "pseudo" in a word -- but I don't think he deserves this condemnation on the basis of this one quote.
Mindles' Quindlen-bashing is hilarious. Good work!
Posted by: JT on December 19, 2002 1:00 PMI backspaced through a sentence in this before I posted that said "Soderling may have been misquoted".
I abhor the sentiment. Soderling himself may be OK. Incidentally,why is he quoted?
Posted by: "Mindles H. Dreck" on December 19, 2002 1:26 PM"Society's choice of entertainment"? WHen did we get that?
Posted by: dsquared on December 20, 2002 4:16 AMAnybody here old enough to remember the reality TV show "Queen for a Day?"
Posted by: Dan Dickinson on December 20, 2002 12:47 PMComments are Closed.