I honestly wouldn’t. Not because I disagree with the concept, but because more on-point escapist media would just ensure that people will get their revolutionary fix without ever leaving the couch. We don’t need that. We need people to be angry, to be fed up, to have no other escape than to fight for it.
Capitalism has done wonders at keeping us sedated by selling us our fantasies of change and better days. It’s time we stopped taking those meds.
My only argument against this idea, which a part of me supports, is we need to start pushing forward our own propaganda against the billionaire class to get more people on board with the movement. And entertainment is an avenue for propaganda to achieve this.
I think entertainment is one of the poorest means of distribution, because, as it is now and in my opinion, entertainment exists in a state somewhere between not being taken seriously, and being taken seriously enough to pacify the subconscious.
On the other hand, populist means of distribution would be far more effective for this. Appeal to the average citizenry, make the message clear and simple, easily digestible in terms of complexity not wording, but frame it still within the context of reality.
As a concrete example, I’d offer stuff like House Of Cards, The Fall of The House of Usher, The Boys, and many, many other shows with a “calling out truths through metaphors” theme. All of these shows are on point as far as having the metaphors parallel life, but even so they are heavily misinterpreted at worst (see people being downright surprised that Homelander is supposed to be the bad guy), or consumed then forgotten at best.
We need to go beyond metaphors and tackle the Concrete, the what-is, as-is. Show the numbers, show concrete examples of how life is made worse by actual people, and call it out directly - as opposed to the luke-warm and abstract wording of news, that dilution of the truth to make it inoffensive enough as to be easily swallowed then excreted by readers, as the truth isn’t the point of news anymore, it’s getting more and more eyes on your webpage.
Edit: and it needs to be short. We don’t want to keep people entertained on the couch, we want to deliver the blow, then let them fester alone and in silence, sitting with the truth in their lap.
Edit 2: maybe this’d offer a clearer example of what I mean. We (Romania) recently had our Presidentials and narrowly avoided electing a Fascist (George Simion). The reason why his campaign was that successful (and the reason why Trump’s was as well, for that matter) was that he kept it simple. They had billboards posted across all major cities with his party name, his face, and a message saying “apartments for €30.000” (in the context of a one bedroom, ~50m² apartment now costing upwards of €100k in many larger cities). It was utter bullshit, as anyone who knows how basic economy works has said from the start and as Simion himself admitted on live television, but the message was clear and impactful enough to settle into people’s minds.
Things is, true revolutionary effort is far from exciting or interesting.
It’s literally just getting involved in local politics and forming lobbying groups with like minded people. It’s boring shit getting together with your local community to bitch about what needs to be done, how y’all will acquire the resources to get it done, and delegate who is going to do it.
Yet, that’s how all of society functions. The biggest issue with today’s society is how isolated from this process people are. We go to work and go home without ever being involved in the things that control our workplaces and homes.
This is very true, but people still need a significant push to get there. They still need to first be angry enough to not want to take it anymore, before they start looking into what can actually be done.
I honestly wouldn’t. Not because I disagree with the concept, but because more on-point escapist media would just ensure that people will get their revolutionary fix without ever leaving the couch. We don’t need that. We need people to be angry, to be fed up, to have no other escape than to fight for it.
Capitalism has done wonders at keeping us sedated by selling us our fantasies of change and better days. It’s time we stopped taking those meds.
My only argument against this idea, which a part of me supports, is we need to start pushing forward our own propaganda against the billionaire class to get more people on board with the movement. And entertainment is an avenue for propaganda to achieve this.
I think entertainment is one of the poorest means of distribution, because, as it is now and in my opinion, entertainment exists in a state somewhere between not being taken seriously, and being taken seriously enough to pacify the subconscious.
On the other hand, populist means of distribution would be far more effective for this. Appeal to the average citizenry, make the message clear and simple, easily digestible in terms of complexity not wording, but frame it still within the context of reality.
As a concrete example, I’d offer stuff like House Of Cards, The Fall of The House of Usher, The Boys, and many, many other shows with a “calling out truths through metaphors” theme. All of these shows are on point as far as having the metaphors parallel life, but even so they are heavily misinterpreted at worst (see people being downright surprised that Homelander is supposed to be the bad guy), or consumed then forgotten at best.
We need to go beyond metaphors and tackle the Concrete, the what-is, as-is. Show the numbers, show concrete examples of how life is made worse by actual people, and call it out directly - as opposed to the luke-warm and abstract wording of news, that dilution of the truth to make it inoffensive enough as to be easily swallowed then excreted by readers, as the truth isn’t the point of news anymore, it’s getting more and more eyes on your webpage.
Edit: and it needs to be short. We don’t want to keep people entertained on the couch, we want to deliver the blow, then let them fester alone and in silence, sitting with the truth in their lap.
Edit 2: maybe this’d offer a clearer example of what I mean. We (Romania) recently had our Presidentials and narrowly avoided electing a Fascist (George Simion). The reason why his campaign was that successful (and the reason why Trump’s was as well, for that matter) was that he kept it simple. They had billboards posted across all major cities with his party name, his face, and a message saying “apartments for €30.000” (in the context of a one bedroom, ~50m² apartment now costing upwards of €100k in many larger cities). It was utter bullshit, as anyone who knows how basic economy works has said from the start and as Simion himself admitted on live television, but the message was clear and impactful enough to settle into people’s minds.
Actions speak louder than words, and all the shows follow is a script. Reality is much more interesting than anything Netflix or Amazon can show us.
Let’s make it even more interesting, then!
Things is, true revolutionary effort is far from exciting or interesting.
It’s literally just getting involved in local politics and forming lobbying groups with like minded people. It’s boring shit getting together with your local community to bitch about what needs to be done, how y’all will acquire the resources to get it done, and delegate who is going to do it.
Yet, that’s how all of society functions. The biggest issue with today’s society is how isolated from this process people are. We go to work and go home without ever being involved in the things that control our workplaces and homes.
This is very true, but people still need a significant push to get there. They still need to first be angry enough to not want to take it anymore, before they start looking into what can actually be done.
I think being angry enough to kill someone may be the top.
And I think Luigi would have done nothing had he stayed submerged in escapism, is my point.
But he didn’t do anything. Luigi and the guy in the security camera look nothing alike.
Luigi was at my house playing Xbox all day that day.