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The Internet — Enabler of Guilty Pleasures
Carl Bialik from WSJ writes "'Sure, the Internet has revolutionized the spread of information and all that high-minded stuff, but its combination of reach and anonymity also makes it the greatest enabler of guilty pleasures ever invented,' Jason Fry writes in the Wall Street Journal. 'Indulgence is just a click away, and nobody needs to know, except you and some server somewhere.' For example: Fry, a rock snob, has a double secret life as a pop-music fan (secret no more, of course). From the article: 'If your secret love of "Save a Horse (Ride a Cowboy)" has caused it to creep into your iTunes list of 25 most-played songs, a simple right-click will let you reset the play count. If you want to hear Fall Out Boy, but would rather do so in secret, you can command Last.fm to ignore that the song was played — or delete it from your charts if you forget. Viewed from the standpoint of cool logic, this behavior is at least mildly insane. But who needs things that remind us of who we really are, as opposed to how we want others to see us — or how we'd like to see ourselves?'"
The first thing that came to mind when I saw the title of this article was pornography, of the general and more dubious types. I was surprised to find no mention in the article. Under the same context as the music references in the article, is there a danger in making stuff like child pornography and beastiality readily available to anyone who knows where to look? Or does that fall into the "they were fucked up to begin with" category that we already apply to subjects such as violence in videogames?
A B A C A B B
Now that doesn't mean that I haven't let a friend of mine live down that he once said he really liked Hanson.
My beliefs do not require that you agree with them.
- Hanson isn't doing mmmbop no more. Their newer material is very enjoyable, and not in a "teenage bubblegum pop" way, but more like a "classic rock/folk influenced lite rock" way.
- Hanson actually puts on a really solid live show. I'm a musician myself - took my kid sister and her schoolmates to a Hanson concert (nothing like trying to get a troop of 15yo girls to behave to give your nerves a jog) and was very much impressed. They also did a Cream cover - it was funny as hell, you could see a bunch of older brothers/fathers/grownups who had taken all the kids to the concert doing a double take while the kids had those blank looks of "huh? What song is this?"
- Hanson actually funds a small label (they split from Island) and helps upcoming local bands - that's VERY respectable, even if you aren't into three-way pop vocal harmonies
:D
Anyway, the bottom line is that I've found a lot of really enjoyable music lately that I used to think of as "off limits" due to stupid prejudice - now my collection spans from Death Metal to Tango...They say laws make honest people honest. That goes for your public reputation too.
Lack of anonymity is a chilling effect on human behavior - it encourages conformance to social and legal norms.
If you think you can do {insert pleasure here} and get away with it without any of your friends or the law finding out, you may feel free to do it.
Have friends who think alchohol is the drink of the devil? I bet you don't let them see your liquer cabinet. Your boss thinks gambling is a sin? I bet there's no football pool in your office. Live in a country that outlaws child porn and plans to track web usage? Bet you don't surf for it without taking precautions.
Seriously, how much of a wuss are you that you can't fess up to what you listen to, or silly sites you go to? My iTunes top 25 is probably embarassing as hell, but I don't care.
Now, if TFA was focused on ministers that surf hotjapanesetenticlerape.co.jp every night, that would be a different story.
I don't have an anger problem, I have an idiot problem
Why should we always have to be so fake? It's insane. If we can't even admit to our friends what music we listen to, I think there's something wrong that has nothing to do with the internet being involved or not.
Example from my own life: Most of my friends listen to metal, some of them to old-school hip hop, with random bits of jazz, world music and electronica thrown in in some cases. Basically things which don't get in the mainstream charts all that much (or only in watered down form), and carry certain associations of snobbism with them. Now, although I enjoy most of these styles of music myself and listen to them once in a while, I also listen to lots of stuff a lot of people would automatically turn their nose up at because they'd consider it so extremely mainstream. For example, I'm a reasonably big fan of Phil Collins.
But tell me - why should I be hiding that? When I like something, I like something. Why should I be having hour-long conversations about the virtues of metal and jazz when I'm among people and only be listening to my copy of Face Value secretly?
All my friends are roughly aware of what music I listen to, the bits they approve of as well as the bits they don't. And you know what? Although they largely detest Phil Collins, I still get respect from them, just for being the person I am, doing the things I do, saying the things I say, treating people the way I do. MY FRIENDS JUDGE ME ON THE BASIS OF WHAT SORT OF PERSON I AM, AND NOT ON THE BASIS OF HOW HIP I AM AND HOW ALTERNATIVE THE MUSIC I LISTEN TO IS.
That doesn't just go for friends - I don't try to hide myself before people I've only just met, either. Because frankly, people that would only be interested in me as a person if I listened to The Mars Volta but not if I listen to Genesis are not the sort of people I want to be around.
End of rant.
Basilisk Digital
I don't care who knows. That was incredible. Camp, yes, but beautiful for what it was. I loved those dancing icons in the background. Stil, it was missing something, or it was too long. It started off good, but it needs to turn it up to 11 to give it that extra kick. Let me know if you find any more of those.
Well.. maybe. Or Maybe not. But Definitely not sort of.