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Jul. 3rd, 2021 11:52 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kradeelav(via queenlua )
"To put it in clear terms: the idea of collective struggle has been successfully co-opted and commodified by various corporations, and so many people still don't even know it yet. We've become so focused on the moment-to-moment when the big picture of where these things are heading is a far murkier, darker story. In my SF Bay area trans and queer game dev scene, voices around me parroted the idea that any past that doesn't portray some kind of glorified, idealized image of marginalized struggle in the most morally transparent terms is forever tainted and needs to be scrapped completely. The idea here was that "we" had ownership of how our struggle played out in the moment, but "they" owned all the hegemonic culture of the past. That a corporation could actually be in some way exerting control over and profiting off our struggle in the present moment, but have an active interest in disappearing a great deal of culture of the past just never seemed to occur to anyone.
When I first started getting involved in that scene I think I kinda just knew if I was ever a part of any movement or group that was genuinely trying to do something new and different, I needed to find any kind of anchor I could to keep me grounded. I was scared it all could blow away with the drop of a hat otherwise, and things could end up worse than they were before. History works in strange ways, and the past is filled with moments where people are able to do something for a brief window of time that they, in no way, could do now. I recently watched the late 1960's films Easy Rider and the original Wicker Man and they both seem to inextricably bear the mark of the era they come from, particularly Easy Rider. Some may call the filmmaking techniques (lots of zooms, quick/disorienting editing) they use and the subject material focused on at time as dated. But "datedness" is an idea that doesn't hold much water to me. The late 1960's and 1970's were era where certain ideas of what a popular film could be, how it could look and how it could feel were blown wide open. Creative works that could never have been able to be made at any other time could be made during that window of time, before culture shifted in another direction. Our present possibilities (and/or lack thereof) can be just as hamstrung by the demands/expectations of the time (therefore "dated') as the past. History does not move in a straight line, and there are many ways that elements of the past can be far more open and forward-looking than the present. The only way to really wrap your brain around this is to have a broader awareness of the history.
But a lot of the the awareness of the strange progression of time I had at that point fell by the wayside for me, as much as it probably did for anyone else, as I got swept up in the constant frenzy of the moment. Any sense of curiosity applied towards trying to unlock all the seemingly arbitrary historical circumstances and characters that produced both our most celebrated works of culture and our most oppressive, evil institutions faded into the background. Any idea of a past that can't either be beacon of total moral clarity that you can idealize and look up to is reframed as a hollow pillar of an establishment that needs to be completely and utterly destroyed on one side, or they're framed as carriers of an eternal conservative wisdom thwarted by the indulgences of cancel culture on another. We lose access to culture on its own terms as something that can be shared and appreciated across boundaries, and what remains just becomes content fodder completely ripped from its context and used towards an ongoing, never-ceasing culture war."
- ellaguro, Getting High Off Your Own Supply
queenlua )"To put it in clear terms: the idea of collective struggle has been successfully co-opted and commodified by various corporations, and so many people still don't even know it yet. We've become so focused on the moment-to-moment when the big picture of where these things are heading is a far murkier, darker story. In my SF Bay area trans and queer game dev scene, voices around me parroted the idea that any past that doesn't portray some kind of glorified, idealized image of marginalized struggle in the most morally transparent terms is forever tainted and needs to be scrapped completely. The idea here was that "we" had ownership of how our struggle played out in the moment, but "they" owned all the hegemonic culture of the past. That a corporation could actually be in some way exerting control over and profiting off our struggle in the present moment, but have an active interest in disappearing a great deal of culture of the past just never seemed to occur to anyone.
When I first started getting involved in that scene I think I kinda just knew if I was ever a part of any movement or group that was genuinely trying to do something new and different, I needed to find any kind of anchor I could to keep me grounded. I was scared it all could blow away with the drop of a hat otherwise, and things could end up worse than they were before. History works in strange ways, and the past is filled with moments where people are able to do something for a brief window of time that they, in no way, could do now. I recently watched the late 1960's films Easy Rider and the original Wicker Man and they both seem to inextricably bear the mark of the era they come from, particularly Easy Rider. Some may call the filmmaking techniques (lots of zooms, quick/disorienting editing) they use and the subject material focused on at time as dated. But "datedness" is an idea that doesn't hold much water to me. The late 1960's and 1970's were era where certain ideas of what a popular film could be, how it could look and how it could feel were blown wide open. Creative works that could never have been able to be made at any other time could be made during that window of time, before culture shifted in another direction. Our present possibilities (and/or lack thereof) can be just as hamstrung by the demands/expectations of the time (therefore "dated') as the past. History does not move in a straight line, and there are many ways that elements of the past can be far more open and forward-looking than the present. The only way to really wrap your brain around this is to have a broader awareness of the history.
But a lot of the the awareness of the strange progression of time I had at that point fell by the wayside for me, as much as it probably did for anyone else, as I got swept up in the constant frenzy of the moment. Any sense of curiosity applied towards trying to unlock all the seemingly arbitrary historical circumstances and characters that produced both our most celebrated works of culture and our most oppressive, evil institutions faded into the background. Any idea of a past that can't either be beacon of total moral clarity that you can idealize and look up to is reframed as a hollow pillar of an establishment that needs to be completely and utterly destroyed on one side, or they're framed as carriers of an eternal conservative wisdom thwarted by the indulgences of cancel culture on another. We lose access to culture on its own terms as something that can be shared and appreciated across boundaries, and what remains just becomes content fodder completely ripped from its context and used towards an ongoing, never-ceasing culture war."
- ellaguro, Getting High Off Your Own Supply
