tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post608252333145354690..comments2023-09-29T02:49:02.989-07:00Comments on An Emphatic Umph: The World Turned Inside Out: JudgmentDaniel Coffeenhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03912050391869734890noreply@blogger.comBlogger5125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post-72352331741305492202012-02-24T01:21:29.838-08:002012-02-24T01:21:29.838-08:00I'm reminded of a Louis C.K. bit in which he s...I'm reminded of a Louis C.K. bit in which he says, and I paraphrase: "So I walk into a coffee shop. It wasn't a Starbucks, it was one of those 'independent' coffee shops. You know, those 'independent' coffee shops where everybody sits around drinking their lattes and wearing fucking woolen hats in the summertime and telling each other all kinds of smart things like 'Yeah, me too..'"<br /><br />P.S. Been listening to your 2008 Berkeley podcast; I'm about halfway through the semester. Very engaging. Had to seek out your most recent thoughts. Thus I am stalking this blog. Speaking of which, I made up a smart-esque, philosophy-esque, pretentious-esque thing to say about the Internet age:<br /><br />I stalk, ergo you exist.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03895316071064562648noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post-17751284802771665282012-02-24T01:19:22.142-08:002012-02-24T01:19:22.142-08:00This comment has been removed by the author.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03895316071064562648noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post-49562900372235648512012-02-11T18:57:27.438-08:002012-02-11T18:57:27.438-08:00@ TV: Oh, what a nice post! Luv it!
@ Dylan: Than...@ TV: Oh, what a nice post! Luv it!<br /><br />@ Dylan: Thanks for your thoughts and words. I do think the digital is amazing and CAN be a proliferation, not an avoidance or substitution. For instance, when everyone whips out their cameras at an event, in some sense they are not living through the event but in another sense they are multiplying the event. My guess is those who are not living through were not gonna live through, anyway, camera or not.<br /><br />So while the odd social relations of the digital network trouble me, I still have some delight and joy in the digital network and its will to multiplicity, to post-identity, to acting all the way down...<br /><br />But, fuck, what do I know?Daniel Coffeenhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03912050391869734890noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post-4308965393938660882012-02-11T13:57:03.879-08:002012-02-11T13:57:03.879-08:00I think this is painfully true: how can one be a p...I think this is painfully true: how <i>can</i> one be a phoney? I wrote a violent rant a year or so ago against the "hyperreality" of the internet, the alienated self exposed on Facebook, blogs, MySpace, Twitter, whatever. We spend more time validating ourselves, and, even more peculiarly, validating our actions, through social mediums. I realise this was always the case, to a certain extent, but there <i>was</i> a time when people could enjoy themselves, feel, <i>act</i> (and I mean this in the real sense, not the "acting" sense) without having to post it online before, during and after. <br /><br />You put it perfectly: we are living externally. As someone who enjoys living internally, I find it funny when someone explains to the world (in however many characters one is limited to) that they are feeling <i>a</i> because they are doing <i>b</i>; if they really were having such a bloody good time, surely you wouldn't spend more time digitally recreating it? This is however, a personal judgement of mine. <br /><br />The inconsistency you point out, which I've often been too snobbish to notice (as I usually react to accusations of "pretentiousness" by questioning the accuser's own perspective on life), is simple and poetically hilarious. It's almost as if the "actors" have created a mainstream union, a popular collection of rules; the "overactors" are both ridiculous, because they play against the rules, and also dangerous because their "acting" exposes the general "acting".Dylan Popowiczhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04620170076096636505noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7461948747659071092.post-28370778307799722362012-02-11T10:12:03.930-08:002012-02-11T10:12:03.930-08:00Anecdote first:
"Do your work!" I hear ...Anecdote first:<br /><br />"Do your work!" I hear high school kids yell this to other high school kids who are "messin' around". Translation of "Do your work": Play the game everyone else is playing.<br /><br />When I'm in a needling mood, I'll tell a group of 14 y/o kiddies that they don't have a self... discard that idea: you're a messy changing changer who does nothing but efface the idea of a self — you are other people and other people are you.<br /><br />Reaction? You guessed it, screams of bloody murder! Tell the same group of kids that their culture is inherently destructive: it kills everything as a matter of unbending course, and the result is a lot of very "grown-up" nodding. They like that kind of nonsense. <br /><br /><br /><br />The logic of a finite game absolutely fucking dominates discourse, me argues. It's as if the entire world is a big basketball game. Rules are set, we all run around, constantly, compulsively, checking the scoreboard and game clock... not nearly enough timeouts, which I suppose is why there is such a void of strategic action — instead, HUSTLE HUSTLE HUSTLE! You can rest when you're dead!<br /><br />The logic of the finite game is really simple: YOU (or your team) play the game to WIN. That's it. And, if the rules never really change, then why would "you"... the stalwart self? Sure, you pick up some new moves, some new tricks, but you still you yo. <br /><br />To be "pretentious" is to do things that aren't concerned with winning. Just as rhetoric is commonly seen as a dressing, and ultimately bullshit, because it isn't putting any points on the board... and you're taking up a whole lot of precious potential-point-scoring time. DO YOUR WORK!<br /><br />You, Dan Y'all, like the infinite game, you play with the opposite goal: rather than ending play, by winning or losing... you seek a continuation of play (that's what all of your bullshit about infinity comes down to, no? A desire to keep playing). More play please. But this doesn't register well to the mind molded by the logic of sports and finite games. Whereas you want to constantly rewrite the rules (and they aren't even really rules) everyone else is pissed the fuck off that you're deviating the winner/loser paradigm. Allow yourself to be pinned down, asshole!<br /><br />Thumbs up? Thumbs down?<br /><br />Please tell me how you feel about what I've written... did I win? I loved it.what the Tee Vee taughthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18288852666676682547noreply@blogger.com