“Capitalism is almost certainly contributing to your struggle to compete with the material, societal, and personal demands placed on you by yourself and the world around you, but there is a danger of allowing that fact to become an excuse. You may not have the agency or control you should have, but that doesn’t excuse not using the agency and control you do have. If the fact that capitalism is causing executive disfunction in you becomes a reason to not use what little agency and control you have, you will inevitably have a less meaningful and full life than you otherwise would.”
I like your version of the article a lot better, but it probably wouldn't pass the editor's scrutiny because what they want is bloviating pretension because that's what the rag's target audience expects.
Well, yes, the point of think-pieces isn't to be useful or wise, it is to give incredibly boring people like me something to talk about other than the weather.
There isn't really that much thinking going on in the article. It took what you said and then smothered it in a lot of additional words and meandering self congratulatory /r/getmotivated pep talks along with a roller coaster ride of "maybe this maybe that" whimsical prose. It's what undergrads do to pad page length and add a cute quip that the professor will hopefully like for pity points.
I kinda intended to make that point in what I said, but I guess I didn't: Nothing about most "think"-pieces includes much in the way of thought. They are, almost solely, summations of someone else's thought through the lens of someone who did half the analysis they should have in order to understand it. Their value to PMC society is not in being smart or insightful, it is to either provide a thing which can be agreed upon in order to demonstrate one's moral rectitude or it is to provide a thing which can be disagreed with in order to demonstrate the deep and thoughtful nature of the reader. They serve as an alternative to talking about whichever other cultural artifact is currently widely known and discussed, and in that they also serve as a social semaphore, signaling that the reader is sufficiently cultured or whatever.
Their value to PMC society is not in being smart or insightful, it is to either provide a thing which can be agreed upon in order to demonstrate one’s moral rectitude or it is to provide a thing which can be disagreed with in order to demonstrate the deep and thoughtful nature of the reader.
Considering some of the defense that the linked article got, yeah, I definitely see the "enjoying this implied highbrow journey makes you part of the elect intellectual elite, and if you don't like the delivery, you're an ignorant peasant" gatekeeping implied with the article's intended audience.
To put it another way, it seems like the intended audience is supposed to wave around the discourse the way a MCU consumer is supposed to have a wall of appropriate Funko Pops behind their selfies.
I like your version of the article a lot better, but it probably wouldn't pass the editor's scrutiny because what they want is bloviating pretension because that's what the rag's target audience expects.
Well, yes, the point of think-pieces isn't to be useful or wise, it is to give incredibly boring people like me something to talk about other than the weather.
There isn't really that much thinking going on in the article. It took what you said and then smothered it in a lot of additional words and meandering self congratulatory /r/getmotivated pep talks along with a roller coaster ride of "maybe this maybe that" whimsical prose. It's what undergrads do to pad page length and add a cute quip that the professor will hopefully like for pity points.
I kinda intended to make that point in what I said, but I guess I didn't: Nothing about most "think"-pieces includes much in the way of thought. They are, almost solely, summations of someone else's thought through the lens of someone who did half the analysis they should have in order to understand it. Their value to PMC society is not in being smart or insightful, it is to either provide a thing which can be agreed upon in order to demonstrate one's moral rectitude or it is to provide a thing which can be disagreed with in order to demonstrate the deep and thoughtful nature of the reader. They serve as an alternative to talking about whichever other cultural artifact is currently widely known and discussed, and in that they also serve as a social semaphore, signaling that the reader is sufficiently cultured or whatever.
Considering some of the defense that the linked article got, yeah, I definitely see the "enjoying this implied highbrow journey makes you part of the elect intellectual elite, and if you don't like the delivery, you're an ignorant peasant" gatekeeping implied with the article's intended audience.
To put it another way, it seems like the intended audience is supposed to wave around the discourse the way a MCU consumer is supposed to have a wall of appropriate Funko Pops behind their selfies.
Just wait for the Discourse Funko Pops.
:agony-minion: