my personal definition of it is this: a non-essential (or classified essential, but over-the-top, exotic, extravagant, and/or inefficient for the purposes of fulfilling human need) commodity that has an unfortunate capital-T Tendency (as in, the TPRF in which it applies without fail) of being invoked in political discussions, almost always making said discussions objectively worse.
A sub-classification of treats, which I wish more people would directly invoke instead of using the broader term since it's funnier to me, is the 'adventures': escapist, less-than-nuanced fantasies that are, without fail, invoked by people to explain complex political issues.
Any additions? Disagreements? we must synthesize this before it becomes the new tankie in watered-down 'thing i dislike' applicability.
I dunno man, it's 12 am and my understimulated brain is not gonna have fun writing any of this, but my goal with this post is not to legitimize and endorse the term (I will, however, endorse adventures, as it's funny and more actually focused and describes a legitimate phenomenon of usage of less-than-nuanced and propaganda-filled media to describe complex political issues) but more so capture its current usage in discourse by what I think everyone means by invoking it before everyone starts using it in an even muddier way then it's used now. I didn't introduce treats into the discourse nor can I excise it, so I'll try to understand wtf everyone's talking about :jesse-wtf:, when they say it, i guess :vivian-shrug:
Yeah that's a symptom of cultural degeneration that's increasing as capitalism goes on and its contradictions become more apparent. Corporate mass cultural in the super structure influences how people view the world more and more as reality increasingly becomes warped, as capitalism continues to devour everything in its path and imbed itself in all aspects of life so will its corporate mass culture.
Whats interesting about marvel movies and films like that in particular is they are deeply ingrained in Pentagon and State Department propaganda(see Tom Seckers work) with Ubermensch undertones so its almost like its made for people to view other countries under that framework. But again in a real way none of this is new, American films have always promoted war and many Americans have always viewed the world through their corporate American culture(as any society with mass culture will view the world through it to differing degrees).
To answer that last part simply: Treats are just commodity's that we don't need to consume to live in biological terms. But its okay to like treats just dont have too many and try to not let them ruin your life lol.