"Positive", "negative", it's all excitement and incitement to me, which needs to be subdued with self-medication. And the medication of course has its own problems.

Surely you have some stress when watching gore. Isn't that the point? — Mongrel

Certainly I can see what I'd analyze as aesthetic tension as being stressful for some people, especially in the case of something like extreme horror, including gore at times (although I'd say that "dramatic structure" can do tension better than gore can). It's not really stressful for me, but I always have a strong formalist and technical-oriented disposition, at least as an undercurrent, when I experience artworks. So for things like gore, I'm usually as focused on how it was done technically, how crafty it is in those techniques, etc. as I am focused on it in any other way.

I'm someone who doesn't find any films "scary" for that matter, but that's unusual--and it's unusual not to care about that--for horror fans.

I also wouldn't say that tensions in artworks are the same thing as stressful reaction-catalysts--for example, relative dissonances in music, which are tensions, I wouldn't say are necessarily stressful reaction-catalysts, even though again in a case like horror films or thrillers, precarious situations in action films, etc., tensions can definitely be stressful . . . although in a case where someone is a fan of those works, I don't think that even when they're stressful it's the same sort of thing going on physiologically as stress when, say, you're worried about a doctor's visit, or you're being pulled over by the police, or whatever. Or, say something like music in the (harsh) noise genre isn't going to be stressful to a fan of that music in the same way that the music would be stressful to someone who doesn't enjoy it yet who is subjected to it.

In my view, in general, aesthetic emotions are uniquely aesthetic. The noise/horror/etc. fan is experiencing aesthetic emotions in reaction to noise music, horror films, etc. Someone who isn't a fan, though, would simply experience non-aesthetic emotions in reaction to the works.

...your statement calls for a Virgil quote.

"When Heav'n had overturn'd the Trojan state
And Priam's throne, by too severe a fate;
When ruin'd Troy became the Grecians' prey,
... — Mongrel

I don't get your point, but there's no need to explain, just point me in the direction of the corresponding Hollywood movie.

You joke about bombing Hollywood, but making others bear the brunt of your joke is the foundation of this problem, which is getting entertainment at someone else's expense. We call it making fun of someone. The true comedian recognizes that this is unacceptable behaviour, and switches things up to make fun of oneself. But what happens when my own entertainment is a case of me making fun of myself, but all I notice is that I am entertained, and I don't notice that I am making fun of myself. I'll continue to beat myself into the ground (...and loving it!). — Metaphysician Undercover

I don't get your point, and there is a need to explain. My joke was explicit. It did what it said on the tin, so to speak. That's a difference I consider key.

Catharsis and such. — Mongrel

Glad you brought that up. Where that's done well, a movie can work and be a healthy engagement. It rarely is. Maybe Cronenberg.

Where that's done well, a movie can work and be a healthy engagement. It rarely is. Maybe Cronenberg. — Baden

Much as I like his movies, "healthy" is not a word that springs immediately to mind.

Indian medicine. They make you feel bad first and good later. Unlike Hollywood medicine, which does the opposite.

I'm usually as focused on how it was done technically, — Terrapin Station

Yep. I know your type. Ideally we can honor our diversity. The poster boy for the way I experience theater and film is Chekov. I enter into a reality bubble. I wasn't totally aware of it until I met a person like you who pays attention to the production itself. I tried doing that and found it a little exhausting.

To each his own, right?

Glad you brought that up. Where that's done well, a movie can work and be a healthy engagement. It rarely is. Maybe Cronenberg. — Baden

Isn't it easy enough to avoid movies? Are you surrounded by people who have movies blasting continuously? Is it like Clockwork Orange where you live?

Where that's done well, a movie can work and be a healthy engagement. It rarely is. — Baden

Are you mostly watching porn? O:)

Just kidding, I agree with your point. I hate watching movies for the most part, with a few exceptions.

The origins of modern mass advertising & propaganda lie in national state's need for men, arms and investment in WWI & WWII. "the [First] World War led to the discovery of propaganda by both the man in the street and the man in the study," Harold Lasswell. The nation was desperate for its whole population to get behind these wars (same as it ever was but now supported by radio and film). It became advertising patriotic mission and media was given the responsible for giving advertising and propaganda its mass appeal.

These efforts in the USA brought about The Committee for Public Information (CPI) was formed by US Gov in 1917 Wikipedia:

The purpose of the CPI was to influence American public opinion toward supporting U.S. participation in World War I via a prolonged propaganda campaign. The CPI at first used material that was based on fact, but spun it to present an upbeat picture of the American war effort. In his memoirs, Creel [head of CPI]claimed that the CPI routinely denied false or undocumented atrocity reports, fighting the crude propaganda efforts of "patriotic organizations" like the National Security League and the American Defense Society that preferred "general thundering" and wanted the CPI to "preach a gospel of hate."

After the First World War consumer groups, consumer unions formed which "objected to the industry's reliance on image and emotions to sell products, and labeled many industry practices as business propaganda and even undemocratic [From review of professor Inger Stole, book "Advertising at War." 2012] Consumer advocates demanded advertising that provided only legitimate product information and gave consumers "their money's worth". There was even legislation proposed but it never became law.

Until WWII, and again the Government needed full support of the population and it got involved in propaganda and advertising for people to be patriotic and do everything they could to support the war effort. Stole stated that "advertisers turned a situation that by all rational accounts should have worked to their disadvantage into a priceless opportunity to cement their place in a postwar society." Governments found that advertising could sell both war and peace.

Let's take the example of cheap flights, mentioned in the song. "Cheap flights", at least in the UK, is middle-class code for loutish working-class lads and lassies heading to the Costa del Sol to get drunk and have a lot of sex. But this is a stereotype. In Marx's time my forebears were poor uneducated rural labourers, and maybe some of them were recent arrivals in the cities, where they went to find work (it's mostly the upper class that can trace their ancestry with any certainty, so I can't be sure). It's unlikely they ever set foot outside Britain and Ireland. But here I am now in sunny Spain, having been to several countries in several continents, writing about politics and philosophy even though I haven't studied them in a university. I would never have been able to travel without cheap flights, and I would never have been able to read Kant without leisure. I'm pretty sure this is a cultural as well as a material enrichment, and it was made possible by capitalism. — jamalrob

My pointing out the negative effects of the push towards consumerism doesn't mean I don't recognize the positives. What I'm looking for is education regarding the side-effects of capitalism (to continue the medical metaphor) rather than an excision. I would hope that would lead to more controls in the area of advertising among other things, so that, for example, ads would have to be mostly informative rather than emotive. There would be some cost to that, but I think it would be worth the sacrifice of some economic and even some technological growth in order that human growth be focused on more. I could go on about what I mean by this. But I won't. Maybe in un's upcomng education thread.

I admit this is impressionistic and emotional, but--something about it just stinks. The critique of consumer culture and the influence of corporations appears to be often motivated by a contempt for the masses, or at least a superior paternalism, not to mention a snobbish distaste. — jamalrob

More psychological analysis. How can we know for sure what others or even ourselves or motivated by? I'd rather concentrate on identifying problems in order to solve them. I think the way advertising works is problematic. I think the solution is more controls.

There is a simplistic sanctimoniousness in the suggestion that we are mere puppets of the advertisers, and for me it's reminiscent of my heritage of Presbyterian sobriety. — jamalrob

I don't remember anyone saying we are mere puppets of the advertisers. I did say advertising affects us in undesirable ways, and that it's designed to. The chain of reasoning for a business is hardly more complicated than "Doing X will result in a greater profit than doing Y>>>Doing X is not good for consumers>>>Consumers are unaware we are doing X>>>Doing X is legal>>>Do X." So what's your stance here? That we are not emotionally manipulated in ways that are not good for us? Because if it's just that we are not "mere puppets", I'm sure we all agree.

But come to think of it, this kind of Protestant puritanism is actually a real thread in the development of radical thought, from the English Revolution onwards, so maybe it's not quite true to describe anti-consumerism as a regrettable reversal--it's been in the Left the whole time. It's just that this is not the Leftist tradition that I have sympathy with. It hates capitalism for the good it has done, not only the bad. — jamalrob

Take me out of that jar on the shelf marked "Capitalist hater". Anti-consumerism has levels and criticism is not hatred.

But wait. Did I just hypocritically denounce Leftist snobbery after having held myself up as an exemplar of the culturally enriched in contrast to the loutish working-class lads and lassies on the Costa del Sol? Not quite, I don't think. I've been on holidays like that myself. That's the point about stereotypes and caricatures: they are unfair generalizations. Thanks to cheap flights, people--non-rich people--travel now for all sorts of reasons. — jamalrob

I don't do anything but cheap flights if I can help it. Does anyone with a brain?

Isn't it easy enough to avoid movies? Are you surrounded by people who have movies blasting continuously? Is it like Clockwork Orange where you live? — Mongrel

Yes. No. Yes.

And it's pretty mainstream. Baden mentioned Hollywood and how much he hates it. — jamalrob

I was being somewhat hyperbolic. I'm quite looking forward to the summer blockbuster, Virgil vs. Baden, for example.

Since we have degenerated into politics now, I'd better remind or inform folks that at the inception of this site, I argued that it should support itself with advertising. My view has not changed.

And on that bombshell...

OMG, dude. You've got to check out Inferno. Down into the bowels of Hell, the team arrives at the bottom. Dante says to Virgil: 'So what now.. do we go back up?' Virgil says 'Watch and learn.' They climb onto Lucifer's thigh and go down instead of up. Dante then realizes they aren't going down anymore.. they're headed upward. Yes, sports fans. The earth is a sphere. Sci-fi greatness.

Sorry, kind of.

You actually weren't at the inception of this site. I was, though.

And on that bombshell... — unenlightened

I guess that's the climax. So, if this was a Hollywood movie, everyone would do hugs now. Right?

But Hollywood is full of anti-corporate sentiment, and is now firmly seated on the green anti-consumerist bandwagon — jamalrob

You are mistaken. Progressivism is the new form of organisation of capitalism. In order to get people to work for the big and large corporations (which is becoming normalised, and a matter of prestige), they introduce all sorts of PR moves such as being green, such as levelling down hierarchies, and so forth. This is a way to get people to accept their chains. On top of this, Hollywood is reshaping morality in order to maximise the efficiency of capitalism. See my post here.

I was there, feeding the fires of the discontent. It was a lot of fun.

I would never have been able to travel without cheap flights, and I would never have been able to read Kant without leisure. I'm pretty sure this is a cultural as well as a material enrichment, and it was made possible by capitalism. — jamalrob

To what use? I would have preferred all of us not to read Kant, if this was what it took for us to be more virtuous.

Thanks to cheap flights, people--non-rich people--travel now for all sorts of reasons. — jamalrob

Yeah ... what's so great about that? Honestly, what's the big deal? I've travelled my fair share, and it's nothing special. I don't see the point of it. When I hear people wanting to travel for holidays it kind of drives me mad. Is that what life is about, traveling? Honestly?! :s I think if my ancestors heard this they'd be horrified! Do you really buy this idea that traveling will necessarily enrich your life and make you happy and content?

I have great distaste for this frolicking over material conditions. As if that's what makes for a good life! This is exactly the forgetfulness of virtue that I'm always talking about.

I have great distaste for this frolicking over material conditions. — Agustino

I know, and I'm not interested.

I know, and I'm not interested. — jamalrob

You're not interested in what? If you're not interested don't worry - you'll lose in the political arena, that will be sufficient to get you interested perhaps.

I still think the old site was raided for password trafficking, so discontent was warranted.

I was immune, as my passwords for places that don't matter are simple, and easy to crack, but I use long ass pass phrases for things that do matter.

So what's your stance here? That we are not emotionally manipulated in ways that are not good for us? Because if it's just that we are not "mere puppets", I'm sure we all agree. — Baden

I'm not sure I have a stance on that, though I feel like I want to question your statement. I was talking about ideology, or about the changes in political ideas that I believe importantly frame these debates, rather than directly addressing the OP or your own points. Thus many of the positions that I imputed to my opponents might be exaggerations or simplifications that don't accurately represent the positions to be found in this discussion. Still, I thought my post was kind of relevant. It's what I'm interested in, at least.

So what's your stance here? That we are not emotionally manipulated in ways that are not good for us? — Baden

Good for us in whose assessment? The assessment of the people being emotionally manipulated?

"When Heav'n had overturn'd the Trojan state
And Priam's throne — Mongrel

It's been quite a while since I read Homer (36 years...), but as I recollect...

Isn't Virgil's line about overturning the Trojan state a concern appropriate to Rome, but not to the very distant time of Homer? And if so, isn't the existence of the Roman State the result of radically different economic circumstances than what Priam (or anybody else in the Iliad or Odyssey knew)?

Right. Supporting philosophy with advertising worked out so well for the old Philosophy Forum.

Isn't Virgil's line about overturning the Trojan state a concern appropriate to Rome, but not to the very distant time of Homer? And if so, isn't the existence of the Roman State the result of radically different economic circumstances than what Priam (or anybody else in the Iliad or Odyssey knew)? — Bitter Crank

Virgil attempts to capture the spirit of Rome in the Aeneid. The Greeks are condemned for their unjust destruction of Troy, which was supposedly done out of passion. Proper Romans have gravitas, not passion. Virgil was a Celt, by the way.

Identifying Troy as the origin of the Romans was in line with an ancient tendency to have respect for older cultures.