[Cause]

Taken from the TV thread

Azath Vitr (D, on 02 March 2023 - 03:26 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 02 March 2023 - 03:11 PM, said:

Azath Vitr (D, on 02 March 2023 - 01:55 PM, said:

Yellowstone's supposed right-wing bias made me reluctant to watch it, so this is interesting:

'[to] accusations that Yellowstone and its spinoffs are aimed at Republicans, Sheridan responded incredulously. "The show's talking about the displacement of Native Americans and the way Native American women were treated, and about corporate greed and the gentrification of the West, and land-grabbing. That's a red-state show?"

I mean, jeezus this is evident from the damned pilot. Like the whole first arc of the show is about these facts. As a non-American I cannot fathom how anyone could miss it and think this was a right-winger show.

I DO think that the show likely does the same thing BREAKING BAD and THE BOYS did....in that they presented a main character (or characters) who are flawed and are not meant to be admired by any stretch of the imagination, but they are admired nonetheless. FFS John Dutton, Walter White, and Homelander are different faces of the same damned coin. You are not meant to see them as any type of hero....but a portion o the audience seems to want to.

Maybe we need less ambiguous villains and heroes these days? I dunno.

Not hard to imagine some of my redneck relatives watching the horrible mistreatment of Native Americans (or other non-whites---or non-thems...) and thinking 'that looks like fun'.

I was reading this in the TV thread and it touched on something I often think avout. TV in the last decade or so, maybe longer, seems to have changed from us loving a group of charming 20/30 somethings struggling with everyday life but who are wholesome and attractive and somehow always living beyond their means to shows where the protagonists might be generously referred to as anti-heroes but are more often than not just criminals. These shows are entertaining but what effect do they have on society?

In the cases above Homelander is not the MC of the show he stars in but he does get serious screen time but his show perhaps does the best job of highlighting that he is not someone to be emulated, even as the show highlights how easy it is for the masses to root for him. However Breaking Bad has you root for Walter White, who becomes a drug kingpin in order to pay for his cancer treatments but that justification quickly goes away. John Dutton from the YouTube highlights I have seen is not a man afraid to break or at least bend the law beyond recognition to defend his land. He honors family highly but should we really see him as a hero or even respectable protagnist. We have shows like peaky blinders, movies like fast and furious that had low level criminals somehow become elite criminals who are actually good because they use their skills for the CIA. Sons of Anarchy is about a 1% biker gang who murder and throw around ethnic and misogynist remarks in every sentence. The show Banshee was about a criminal pretending to be a sheriff who beats up worse criminals.

What effect if any does this have on society long term?

Law and Order teaches me that cops are dedicated and selfless and will fight to protect me. It also excuses the character of Elliot stabler who is simultaneously the whitest knight in the special victims unit, who will stop and nothing to see justice done but also regularly has to be kept away from the rapists' and child molesters when his anger management issues might lead to him killing suspects in the interrogation room. Watching the show I always liked his character, than one day watching a rerun I realized how dodgy his character really was. He often phyiscally assualts suspects to get the information he needs. In the show the suspects are almost always guilty and we as the audience know it but it struck me that it was normalizing a behavior that in the real world would be hugely problematic.

We ape and imitate what we see on TV without even realizing it. The show Friends literally altered the way people speak and studies have shown that people who watch more TV seem to spend more. Watching a 30 something coffee shop waiter / chef / failing tv actor live in oversized apartments with giant TVs, fantastic furniture alters peoples perceptions about how their own lives should look and be. I think the show Will and Grace played a large role in normalizing gay people.

I am not against TV, I dont think watching sex on HBO will cause the fabric of society to collapse but I think it does alter us slowly and sublty in ways that may be hard to see. The same way books can, TV is just currently way more ubiquitious.

[QuickTidal]

Cool thread, I'll chime in.

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

to shows where the protagonists might be generously referred to as anti-heroes but are more often than not just criminals. These shows are entertaining but what effect do they have on society?

I would expand as say that often on these shows the HERO meant to juxtapose against the Villanous lead - to use our examples from the shows we were discussing; YELLOWSTONE, BREAKING BAD, and THE BOYS...we have Kayce Dutton, Jesse Pinkman, and Hughie Campbell...all of whom "mostly" espouse the feelings of justice to the viewers, or if not justice then the voice of reason when the seeming-leads cross constant lines into sometimes outright villainy....but they are often seen as a side character or simply not as important as the villainous ones. So it's less about the lead being a largely unchecked villain, but more the the benevolent and good side is often blurred into the background for most of the runtime. Like we don't see Jesse start to come around on BB till after WW kills his girlfriend or starts to really do some heinous shit...Jesse gets largely clean and tries very slowly to move his way out of the life...which is in fact what I feel the movie was meant to do....to show us the hero/audience insert FINALLY stepping out from behind the antagonist. And you're right, that's a feature of modern post-Milleniuim TV.

Amusingly it got a good start on sitcoms blurring the lines with people like Ted Mosby on HIMYM....in no universe is Ted a good person. He's a self-involved, often misogynistic, piece of trash who spends what 9 years telling his kids a story about how he met their dead mother, but how much he loves their "Aunt" Robin and wonders if it's okay for him to knock her boots and he has the unmitigated gall to call this set of stories "How I met Your Mother"....like fuck me. Worse the rest of the cast is filled out with other self-involved people who have little to no redeeming qualities. Hell, even Seinfeld....they are all bad people. You are not meant to find familiarity with the cast of that show...this is why the final episode was literally them all on trial for being awful....and I often wonder if the writers did this because so many people seemed inclined to think the cast are in the right. They never were. FFS he steals a marble rye from an old woman in the street. Like...

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

In the cases above Homelander is not the MC of the show he stars in but he does get serious screen time but his show perhaps does the best job of highlighting that he is not someone to be emulated, even as the show highlights how easy it is for the masses to root for him.

Worse are the people who don't understand that Billy Butcher is 100% was bad as the Seven and HL are, but the story surrounds him with people who check his baser impulses so he doesn't go full-Homelander for most of the time...but he will.

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

However Breaking Bad has you root for Walter White, who becomes a drug kingpin in order to pay for his cancer treatments but that justification quickly goes away.

Yep. And they ripped on ANYONE for daring to get in his way. Like a visceral hatred of his wife for "Checks notes" not wanting to be a part of a massive criminal enterprise and have a dickheaded mobster as a husband. This is why Jesse is so subtly the audience on that show, becuase anyone who pushed the "hero" button more often like Hank....was viewed by the audience as the bad guy. And you're right, we gotta wonder what this does to us as viewers...for me I could only watch like 2 MAYBE 3 episodes of BB in one sitting (we watched after it had finished airing) as it would turn my stomach more often than not.

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

John Dutton from the YouTube highlights I have seen is not a man afraid to break or at least bend the law beyond recognition to defend his land. He honors family highly but should we really see him as a hero or even respectable protagnist.

Indeed. Dutton is 100% a Libertarian (unless it benefits him to get the govt involved) and we should not view him as a good guy.

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

fast and furious that had low level criminals somehow become elite criminals who are actually good because they use their skills for the CIA.

I cut F&F slack because they never kill anyone in any of the films, and their initial criminality is street racing, and then some light thievery (usually from big corpos)...so I would not line them up with what we are talking about.

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

What effect if any does this have on society long term?

To answer this question we need to plumb the TV of the late 20th century and see if any of it features similar tropes, and I could not find much, but J.R. Ewing comes to mind....he was far and away the most popular character on DALLAS, while Bobby (the ostensible hero juxtapose to JR) was not nearly as revered...so maybe it's not as bad as we think in how it would socially affect us? Same with The A-Team...they had no compunction with killing and mayhem if the pay was right. Sure they had a "justice" bent, but to what end?

Cause, on 02 March 2023 - 04:14 PM, said:

Law and Order teaches me that cops are dedicated and selfless and will fight to protect me.

Oh pro-police/Law shows have been showing their ass for YEARS like this. It's annoying, and even when shows try to address it (BROOKLYN 99 did in later seasons after Floyd's death) it often comes off as hackneyed in the face of what is clearly a MAJOR problem in police as an institution that the shows ignore to show you how good they think they are. And this leans into your point. DECADES of pro-police shows have conditioned the viewing populace to think that cops are most good, and mostly heroic...when we are aware of how little that is true now....but man for many years they had us by the short and curlies with that fact. 90's TV was LITTERED with police procedurals and no one batted an eye.

in the 2010's we got stuff like THE BLACKLIST, BLINDSPOT and others stepping wide of that mold but still largely subscribing to the same notions. That even shadowy govt entities are inherently good. Are they?

[Aptorian]

I'm not sure how much better 80s and 90s TV was. A-Team, AirWolf, McGayver, Dollars, Dallas, there's always some ideological or political angle you can point a finger at.

Personally I can't wait to return to the cold war days of card board Chinese people we can have the corpse of Indiana Jones fight against.

[Chance]

While I've got a hard time seeing the racial and right/left wing bias in american television not being american and lets face it racism and politics in europe (or at least sweden) is a completely different thing from the US (not less ugly a lot of the time but very different). I usually react to the way a lot of media romantizise heavier and heavier crime. In much the same way as the characters in the shows above they somehow become heroes even if they are dispicable figures. I'm all for anti-heroes but straight up villains should be villains. Certainly makes me skip some media and its the same in some books. I can read some kind of pow's but others especially romantizised crime or abusers that don't get to face the consequences simply make me angry.

I do think such narrative in media from music, tv, videogames and even but to a much lesser extent books change public perception. For examply my brother who does socialwork, sometimes with deeply criminal kids they certainly find such characters inspirational.

This post has been edited by Chance: 02 March 2023 - 05:32 PM

[Abyss]

But just to complexificate things, the 60s-90s are characterized by an abundance of American tv and film and sheer mass Content that overwhelms any other source out there. Sure Canada churns out The Beachcombers and the UK exports Dr Who and Coronation Street and Monty Python and Japan quietly creates anime and films that creep into niche markets but the vast mass is capital A American.
The the 00s roles around the internet quickly interposes itself as a source of stuff. Get to the 10s and now the rest of the world starts churning out stuff and suddenly UK reality TV is competing w US and Japanese content is everywhere and a few years later Korea is everywhere too and the rest of the world is available and everyone's watching TV but it's on their phones and shows are competing w youtubers and tiktokers and Trump makes everyone hate/reject the US and and and and....

...and my point is the WAY we watch 'tv' has fundamentally changed and whatever the long term effects of the 80s or 90s were, it's a whole other thing now.

Also, kpop sucks.

[QuickTidal]

Abyss, on 02 March 2023 - 06:29 PM, said:

Also, kpop sucks.

HOW VERY DARE YOU.

Spoiler

Just for that, here's the STRAY KIDS to prove you wrong.



Oh Blackpink for good measure.

[Abyss]

QuickTidal, on 02 March 2023 - 06:42 PM, said:

Abyss, on 02 March 2023 - 06:29 PM, said:

Also, kpop sucks.

HOW VERY DARE YOU.

Spoiler

Just for that, here's the STRAY KIDS to prove you wrong.



Oh Blackpink for good measure.

Speak up, i can't hear you over the poor enslaved autotuned childclones trying to signal SOS with their eyelashes.

i kid, i kid, i love kpop, Gungan Style is one of my favorite songs from 1998.

[Gothos]

QuickTidal, on 02 March 2023 - 05:20 PM, said:

Yep. And they ripped on ANYONE for daring to get in his way. Like a visceral hatred of his wife for "Checks notes" not wanting to be a part of a massive criminal enterprise and have a dickheaded mobster as a husband. This is why Jesse is so subtly the audience on that show, becuase anyone who pushed the "hero" button more often like Hank....was viewed by the audience as the bad guy. And you're right, we gotta wonder what this does to us as viewers...for me I could only watch like 2 MAYBE 3 episodes of BB in one sitting (we watched after it had finished airing) as it would turn my stomach more often than not.

I actually did a rewatch last year, and this time around benefited from looking at Walt as a villain protagonist. I think many people may be misunderstanding modern series due confusing a villain protagonist with a hero. Also seems like some showrunners and filmmakers seem to mistakingly think that anti-hero equals "asshole"

Quote

Indeed. Dutton is 100% a Libertarian (unless it benefits him to get the govt involved) and we should not view him as a good guy.

You kinda lost me there with that sentence what a weird thing to say.


While we're here, I'd like to poll your views on this: shows and/or movies having their protagonist have innate strength, shrugging off every potential trial with ease, never struggling, never losing... how does that relate to a sense of entitlement, and the demonization of personal growth, investment, and effort?

[Gorefest]

Kpop is a mass-manufactured affront to music. Kill it with fire, I say.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

It's a set of empirical questions, but 'Western' IRB's may not be 'antiheroic' enough to approve randomized controlled studies with sufficient monitoring to answer them rigorously.

Also worth bearing in mind that much of 'Western' moral intuition is irrational and not grounded in any 'universal' human moral intuitions:

https://pubmed.ncbi....h.gov/20550733/

That said (regarding violence more generally---whether by 'morally uncomplicated' ('true American'?) 'heroes' or otherwise):

'Studies and research indicate that exposure to media violence is a strong predictor of aggressive behavior. [...]

Researchers think that there is a reciprocal relationship among viewing media violence at a young age, aggressive behavior and developing a taste for seeing even more media violence.

The most concerning fact is that research indicates that people learn their attitudes about violence at a very early age (eight years or younger) and, apparently once learned, those attitudes are difficult to change.

Recent research has shown that exposure to media violence causes both children and adults to behave in a much more aggressive manner, affecting them for years to come.



The intensity of desensitization of violence and tendency for violent behavior increase as the child grows and becomes an adult.'
Does Exposure to Media Violence Cause Aggressive Behavior?

On antiheroes:

'The present survey study (N = 162) extends this work by examining viewers' antisocial tendencies (Dark Triad traits, aggression, and moral disengagement) in conjunction with an affinity for antihero genres and favorite antihero characters (similarity, wishful identification, and parasocial interaction). Results show that aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy were the strongest predictors of antihero affinities.

[...] the degree of perceived character villainy and IMDB ratings of violence were inversely related to wishful identification and parasocial interaction with a favorite character.

[...] suggests that antihero media narratives and characters are more appealing to viewers with higher levels of antisocial traits such as aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. These traits predicted the frequency of viewing antihero stories as well as personally identifying with the antihero character and enjoying characters who are motivated by revenge.'
But if these shows (and US culture more generally) are cultivating these qualities, there may be a feedback loop....

'Who to himself is Law no Law doth need
Offends no Law and is a King indeed'

'But never shalt thou force me to reveal
The thing which I have vowed inviolate;
And therefore in despite of all thy threats
Pleas'd with their deaths, and eas'd with my revenge,
First take my tongue, and afterwards my heart.

[He bites out his tongue and spits it at the king, his torturers, and the audience (in the actual theater)]'

- Elizabethan drama

Antiheroes go back a long way---beyond Shakespeare and the other Elizabethans, beyond Greek tragedy....

Aristotle's 'catharsis' theory---at least as it's usually interpreted---has been extensively tested, and seems to be false (at least in those particular experiments with those particular subjects).

Old TV (/ Deuteronomy): heroic good guys commit wonderful violence and are beyond critique, yay violence, demonize its victims, they deserve it! OTOH the villains have a certain allure... it's difficult to present villains without aestheticizing them, and without a significant section of the audience identifying with them. There are elements of power, freedom, potency, mastery, dominance, status, etc. that most people find appealing to some extent.

(Deutoronomy was used to justify the genocide against Native Americans....)

New TV (/ Greek or Shakespearean tragedy): morally complicated antiheroes commit terrible violence, show implies critique; humanization diminishes the otherwise god-like power and mystique of the 'villainous'.

Still most people are able to enjoy playing at 'villainy' (a bit like old King Carnival, the temporary inversion of social norms, etc.) without committing crimes as a consequence. Do we/they become more sympathetic towards criminal behavior, more willing to allow it to go on? Certainly not necessarily, but again it's an empirical question that could be answered... a cursory internet search found surprisingly little:

I remember one flight back to Philadelphia---the guy sitting beside me was watching something like Rambo, one guy gunning down countless people, with a big grin on his face. He had what looked like they might be prison tattoos. Is the glorification of gun violence contributing to gun violence in the United States? It seems likely.

When I was a child watching Star Wars, my favorite character was the Emperor. Who wouldn't want to shoot lightning out of their fingertips? I started reflexively imitating the way he held his hands in front him iirc.

One of my earliest memories is watching a preacher ranting about the terrors of 'Leviathan' and demons and making them sound so awesome that I told my (atheist, psychiatrist) grandmother that I wanted to a be a priest because I love demons.

Personally I haven't watched Breaking Bad beyond one or two episodes because it doesn't seem to have any good role models for anything I'd like to model (except perhaps for elements of television production or dialogue). My main purpose in watching television is to find models to learn from---but not to imitate in all things of course. A charismatic psychopath who performs bad actions may nonetheless have certain qualities that in certain situations may be positives (for example, body language, charm, decisiveness...).

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 03 March 2023 - 02:20 PM

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Has the glorification of antiheroes contributed to Trumpism? Probably. But is the Biblical Go* an even more terrible antihero? He's a megalomaniacal genocidal maniac whose actions appear irrational and petulant. But He knows best, and His perfect goodness 'transcends' worldly laws, outcomes, or understandings; that's the sort of 'hero' many of Trump's supporters consider him to be: divine. And the laws, the world, and 'fallen' humanity itself so corrupt by comparison with the divine that anyone, no matter how sinful their past may have been, who is an agent of divine will transcends all that to reach the higher morality which just happens to coincide with the ideological interests of bigoted reactionaries.

[Abyss]

Gorefest, on 03 March 2023 - 01:00 AM, said:

Kpop is a mass-manufactured affront to music. Kill it with fire, I say.

I dunno, that moment a couple of years ago when the kpop fans rallied to spam Trump was pretty funny, great even.

[Macros]

Azath Vitr (D, on 03 March 2023 - 02:15 PM, said:

It's a set of empirical questions, but 'Western' IRB's may not be 'antiheroic' enough to approve randomized controlled studies with sufficient monitoring to answer them rigorously.

Also worth bearing in mind that much of 'Western' moral intuition is irrational and not grounded in any 'universal' human moral intuitions:

https://pubmed.ncbi....h.gov/20550733/

That said (regarding violence more generally---whether by 'morally uncomplicated' ('true American'?) 'heroes' or otherwise):

'Studies and research indicate that exposure to media violence is a strong predictor of aggressive behavior. [...]

Researchers think that there is a reciprocal relationship among viewing media violence at a young age, aggressive behavior and developing a taste for seeing even more media violence.

The most concerning fact is that research indicates that people learn their attitudes about violence at a very early age (eight years or younger) and, apparently once learned, those attitudes are difficult to change.

Recent research has shown that exposure to media violence causes both children and adults to behave in a much more aggressive manner, affecting them for years to come.



The intensity of desensitization of violence and tendency for violent behavior increase as the child grows and becomes an adult.'
Does Exposure to Media Violence Cause Aggressive Behavior?

On antiheroes:

'The present survey study (N = 162) extends this work by examining viewers' antisocial tendencies (Dark Triad traits, aggression, and moral disengagement) in conjunction with an affinity for antihero genres and favorite antihero characters (similarity, wishful identification, and parasocial interaction). Results show that aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy were the strongest predictors of antihero affinities.

[...] the degree of perceived character villainy and IMDB ratings of violence were inversely related to wishful identification and parasocial interaction with a favorite character.

[...] suggests that antihero media narratives and characters are more appealing to viewers with higher levels of antisocial traits such as aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. These traits predicted the frequency of viewing antihero stories as well as personally identifying with the antihero character and enjoying characters who are motivated by revenge.'
But if these shows (and US culture more generally) are cultivating these qualities, there may be a feedback loop....

'Who to himself is Law no Law doth need
Offends no Law and is a King indeed'

'But never shalt thou force me to reveal
The thing which I have vowed inviolate;
And therefore in despite of all thy threats
Pleas'd with their deaths, and eas'd with my revenge,
First take my tongue, and afterwards my heart.

[He bites out his tongue and spits it at the king, his torturers, and the audience (in the actual theater)]'

- Elizabethan drama

Antiheroes go back a long way---beyond Shakespeare and the other Elizabethans, beyond Greek tragedy....

Aristotle's 'catharsis' theory---at least as it's usually interpreted---has been extensively tested, and seems to be false (at least in those particular experiments with those particular subjects).

Old TV (/ Deuteronomy): heroic good guys commit wonderful violence and are beyond critique, yay violence, demonize its victims, they deserve it! OTOH the villains have a certain allure... it's difficult to present villains without aestheticizing them, and without a significant section of the audience identifying with them. There are elements of power, freedom, potency, mastery, dominance, status, etc. that most people find appealing to some extent.

(Deutoronomy was used to justify the genocide against Native Americans....)

New TV (/ Greek or Shakespearean tragedy): morally complicated antiheroes commit terrible violence, show implies critique; humanization diminishes the otherwise god-like power and mystique of the 'villainous'.

Still most people are able to enjoy playing at 'villainy' (a bit like old King Carnival, the temporary inversion of social norms, etc.) without committing crimes as a consequence. Do we/they become more sympathetic towards criminal behavior, more willing to allow it to go on? Certainly not necessarily, but again it's an empirical question that could be answered... a cursory internet search found surprisingly little:

I remember one flight back to Philadelphia---the guy sitting beside me was watching something like Rambo, one guy gunning down countless people, with a big grin on his face. He had what looked like they might be prison tattoos. Is the glorification of gun violence contributing to gun violence in the United States? It seems likely.

When I was a child watching Star Wars, my favorite character was the Emperor. Who wouldn't want to shoot lightning out of their fingertips? I started reflexively imitating the way he held his hands in front him iirc.

One of my earliest memories is watching a preacher ranting about the terrors of 'Leviathan' and demons and making them sound so awesome that I told my (atheist, psychiatrist) grandmother that I wanted to a be a priest because I love demons.

Personally I haven't watched Breaking Bad beyond one or two episodes because it doesn't seem to have any good role models for anything I'd like to model (except perhaps for elements of television production or dialogue). My main purpose in watching television is to find models to learn from---but not to imitate in all things of course. A charismatic psychopath who performs bad actions may nonetheless have certain qualities that in certain situations may be positives (for example, body language, charm, decisiveness...).

Please identify all pictures containing a bus.

What is your actual opinion on this Azath, tell me without any quotes.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Macros, on 03 March 2023 - 09:01 PM, said:

Azath Vitr (D, on 03 March 2023 - 02:15 PM, said:

It's a set of empirical questions, but 'Western' IRB's may not be 'antiheroic' enough to approve randomized controlled studies with sufficient monitoring to answer them rigorously.

Also worth bearing in mind that much of 'Western' moral intuition is irrational and not grounded in any 'universal' human moral intuitions:

https://pubmed.ncbi....h.gov/20550733/

That said (regarding violence more generally---whether by 'morally uncomplicated' ('true American'?) 'heroes' or otherwise):

'Studies and research indicate that exposure to media violence is a strong predictor of aggressive behavior. [...]

Researchers think that there is a reciprocal relationship among viewing media violence at a young age, aggressive behavior and developing a taste for seeing even more media violence.

The most concerning fact is that research indicates that people learn their attitudes about violence at a very early age (eight years or younger) and, apparently once learned, those attitudes are difficult to change.

Recent research has shown that exposure to media violence causes both children and adults to behave in a much more aggressive manner, affecting them for years to come.



The intensity of desensitization of violence and tendency for violent behavior increase as the child grows and becomes an adult.'
Does Exposure to Media Violence Cause Aggressive Behavior?

On antiheroes:

'The present survey study (N = 162) extends this work by examining viewers' antisocial tendencies (Dark Triad traits, aggression, and moral disengagement) in conjunction with an affinity for antihero genres and favorite antihero characters (similarity, wishful identification, and parasocial interaction). Results show that aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy were the strongest predictors of antihero affinities.

[...] the degree of perceived character villainy and IMDB ratings of violence were inversely related to wishful identification and parasocial interaction with a favorite character.

[...] suggests that antihero media narratives and characters are more appealing to viewers with higher levels of antisocial traits such as aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. These traits predicted the frequency of viewing antihero stories as well as personally identifying with the antihero character and enjoying characters who are motivated by revenge.'
But if these shows (and US culture more generally) are cultivating these qualities, there may be a feedback loop....

'Who to himself is Law no Law doth need
Offends no Law and is a King indeed'

'But never shalt thou force me to reveal
The thing which I have vowed inviolate;
And therefore in despite of all thy threats
Pleas'd with their deaths, and eas'd with my revenge,
First take my tongue, and afterwards my heart.

[He bites out his tongue and spits it at the king, his torturers, and the audience (in the actual theater)]'

- Elizabethan drama

Antiheroes go back a long way---beyond Shakespeare and the other Elizabethans, beyond Greek tragedy....

Aristotle's 'catharsis' theory---at least as it's usually interpreted---has been extensively tested, and seems to be false (at least in those particular experiments with those particular subjects).

Old TV (/ Deuteronomy): heroic good guys commit wonderful violence and are beyond critique, yay violence, demonize its victims, they deserve it! OTOH the villains have a certain allure... it's difficult to present villains without aestheticizing them, and without a significant section of the audience identifying with them. There are elements of power, freedom, potency, mastery, dominance, status, etc. that most people find appealing to some extent.

(Deutoronomy was used to justify the genocide against Native Americans....)

New TV (/ Greek or Shakespearean tragedy): morally complicated antiheroes commit terrible violence, show implies critique; humanization diminishes the otherwise god-like power and mystique of the 'villainous'.

Still most people are able to enjoy playing at 'villainy' (a bit like old King Carnival, the temporary inversion of social norms, etc.) without committing crimes as a consequence. Do we/they become more sympathetic towards criminal behavior, more willing to allow it to go on? Certainly not necessarily, but again it's an empirical question that could be answered... a cursory internet search found surprisingly little:

I remember one flight back to Philadelphia---the guy sitting beside me was watching something like Rambo, one guy gunning down countless people, with a big grin on his face. He had what looked like they might be prison tattoos. Is the glorification of gun violence contributing to gun violence in the United States? It seems likely.

When I was a child watching Star Wars, my favorite character was the Emperor. Who wouldn't want to shoot lightning out of their fingertips? I started reflexively imitating the way he held his hands in front him iirc.

One of my earliest memories is watching a preacher ranting about the terrors of 'Leviathan' and demons and making them sound so awesome that I told my (atheist, psychiatrist) grandmother that I wanted to a be a priest because I love demons.

Personally I haven't watched Breaking Bad beyond one or two episodes because it doesn't seem to have any good role models for anything I'd like to model (except perhaps for elements of television production or dialogue). My main purpose in watching television is to find models to learn from---but not to imitate in all things of course. A charismatic psychopath who performs bad actions may nonetheless have certain qualities that in certain situations may be positives (for example, body language, charm, decisiveness...).

Please identify all pictures containing a bus.

What is your actual opinion on this Azath, tell me without any quotes.

In case it's not obvious, the only quotations are the italicized parts and the lines of verse (both clearly marked as quotation). My guess is the real issue is you don't want to read that much, which is understandable. I tried indenting the quotations but the auto-formatting kept removing paragraph breaks when posted, making it harder to read. Guess I could try increasing the size of the quotation marks....

People tend to identify far too much with their 'opinions' about empirical matters, instead of acknowledging them as speculative and seeking empirical truth through empirical methods. This gets complicated. My opinion is that if you don't have any special expertise that would make your intuition into relatively rigorous empirical evidence, then 'having an opinion' that you regard as more than speculation is generally unethical---and even if you do have special expertise, putting excessive faith in your intuitions and opinions can still be bad, especially when unfamiliar situations arise (it's a major problem among experts, and has held back progress in many fields...).

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 03 March 2023 - 09:32 PM

[JPK]

Azath Vitr (D, on 03 March 2023 - 09:28 PM, said:

Macros, on 03 March 2023 - 09:01 PM, said:

Azath Vitr (D, on 03 March 2023 - 02:15 PM, said:

It's a set of empirical questions, but 'Western' IRB's may not be 'antiheroic' enough to approve randomized controlled studies with sufficient monitoring to answer them rigorously.

Also worth bearing in mind that much of 'Western' moral intuition is irrational and not grounded in any 'universal' human moral intuitions:

https://pubmed.ncbi....h.gov/20550733/

That said (regarding violence more generally---whether by 'morally uncomplicated' ('true American'?) 'heroes' or otherwise):

'Studies and research indicate that exposure to media violence is a strong predictor of aggressive behavior. [...]

Researchers think that there is a reciprocal relationship among viewing media violence at a young age, aggressive behavior and developing a taste for seeing even more media violence.

The most concerning fact is that research indicates that people learn their attitudes about violence at a very early age (eight years or younger) and, apparently once learned, those attitudes are difficult to change.

Recent research has shown that exposure to media violence causes both children and adults to behave in a much more aggressive manner, affecting them for years to come.



The intensity of desensitization of violence and tendency for violent behavior increase as the child grows and becomes an adult.'
Does Exposure to Media Violence Cause Aggressive Behavior?

On antiheroes:

'The present survey study (N = 162) extends this work by examining viewers' antisocial tendencies (Dark Triad traits, aggression, and moral disengagement) in conjunction with an affinity for antihero genres and favorite antihero characters (similarity, wishful identification, and parasocial interaction). Results show that aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy were the strongest predictors of antihero affinities.

[...] the degree of perceived character villainy and IMDB ratings of violence were inversely related to wishful identification and parasocial interaction with a favorite character.

[...] suggests that antihero media narratives and characters are more appealing to viewers with higher levels of antisocial traits such as aggression, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy. These traits predicted the frequency of viewing antihero stories as well as personally identifying with the antihero character and enjoying characters who are motivated by revenge.'
But if these shows (and US culture more generally) are cultivating these qualities, there may be a feedback loop....

'Who to himself is Law no Law doth need
Offends no Law and is a King indeed'

'But never shalt thou force me to reveal
The thing which I have vowed inviolate;
And therefore in despite of all thy threats
Pleas'd with their deaths, and eas'd with my revenge,
First take my tongue, and afterwards my heart.

[He bites out his tongue and spits it at the king, his torturers, and the audience (in the actual theater)]'

- Elizabethan drama

Antiheroes go back a long way---beyond Shakespeare and the other Elizabethans, beyond Greek tragedy....

Aristotle's 'catharsis' theory---at least as it's usually interpreted---has been extensively tested, and seems to be false (at least in those particular experiments with those particular subjects).

Old TV (/ Deuteronomy): heroic good guys commit wonderful violence and are beyond critique, yay violence, demonize its victims, they deserve it! OTOH the villains have a certain allure... it's difficult to present villains without aestheticizing them, and without a significant section of the audience identifying with them. There are elements of power, freedom, potency, mastery, dominance, status, etc. that most people find appealing to some extent.

(Deutoronomy was used to justify the genocide against Native Americans....)

New TV (/ Greek or Shakespearean tragedy): morally complicated antiheroes commit terrible violence, show implies critique; humanization diminishes the otherwise god-like power and mystique of the 'villainous'.

Still most people are able to enjoy playing at 'villainy' (a bit like old King Carnival, the temporary inversion of social norms, etc.) without committing crimes as a consequence. Do we/they become more sympathetic towards criminal behavior, more willing to allow it to go on? Certainly not necessarily, but again it's an empirical question that could be answered... a cursory internet search found surprisingly little:

I remember one flight back to Philadelphia---the guy sitting beside me was watching something like Rambo, one guy gunning down countless people, with a big grin on his face. He had what looked like they might be prison tattoos. Is the glorification of gun violence contributing to gun violence in the United States? It seems likely.

When I was a child watching Star Wars, my favorite character was the Emperor. Who wouldn't want to shoot lightning out of their fingertips? I started reflexively imitating the way he held his hands in front him iirc.

One of my earliest memories is watching a preacher ranting about the terrors of 'Leviathan' and demons and making them sound so awesome that I told my (atheist, psychiatrist) grandmother that I wanted to a be a priest because I love demons.

Personally I haven't watched Breaking Bad beyond one or two episodes because it doesn't seem to have any good role models for anything I'd like to model (except perhaps for elements of television production or dialogue). My main purpose in watching television is to find models to learn from---but not to imitate in all things of course. A charismatic psychopath who performs bad actions may nonetheless have certain qualities that in certain situations may be positives (for example, body language, charm, decisiveness...).

Please identify all pictures containing a bus.

What is your actual opinion on this Azath, tell me without any quotes.

In case it's not obvious, the only quotations are the italicized parts and the lines of verse (both clearly marked as quotation). My guess is the real issue is you don't want to read that much, which is understandable. I tried indenting the quotations but the auto-formatting kept removing paragraph breaks when posted, making it harder to read. Guess I could try increasing the size of the quotation marks....

People tend to identify far too much with their 'opinions' about empirical matters, instead of acknowledging them as speculative and seeking empirical truth through empirical methods. This gets complicated. My opinion is that if you don't have any special expertise that would make your intuition into relatively rigorous empirical evidence, then 'having an opinion' that you regard as more than speculation is generally unethical---and even if you do have special expertise, putting excessive faith in your intuitions and opinions can still be bad, especially when unfamiliar situations arise (it's a major problem among experts, and has held back progress in many fields...).

Azath... It's so much easier than you're making it. Just link the article. That's all you have to do. Really. It's ok.

[worry]

This might be a pain in mobile but another thing you can do is put quotes and excerpts into Quote Tags and it will put them in a box just like quoting a post does. You just use the open and close tags with the word “quote” in there, no need for an attribution.

[Macros]

Azath Vitr (D, on 03 March 2023 - 09:28 PM, said:

In case it's not obvious, the only quotations are the italicized parts and the lines of verse (both clearly marked as quotation). My guess is the real issue is you don't want to read that much, which is understandable. I tried indenting the quotations but the auto-formatting kept removing paragraph breaks when posted, making it harder to read. Guess I could try increasing the size of the quotation marks....

People tend to identify far too much with their 'opinions' about empirical matters, instead of acknowledging them as speculative and seeking empirical truth through empirical methods. This gets complicated. My opinion is that if you don't have any special expertise that would make your intuition into relatively rigorous empirical evidence, then 'having an opinion' that you regard as more than speculation is generally unethical---and even if you do have special expertise, putting excessive faith in your intuitions and opinions can still be bad, especially when unfamiliar situations arise (it's a major problem among experts, and has held back progress in many fields...).

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[Cause]

I just watched Barry this week. Started out fun enough but I lost internet after one season (8 epsiodes). If it’s a black comedy it’s not very funny and everyone in the shoe is garbage. Barry, his girlfriend, and the acting teacher. I thought the show was about Barry reseeming himself and finding an outlet in acting but the end of season 1 makes him a clear cut villain.

What does it say that shows like this are becoming more and more popular. It may be a childish bit I’d like my TV show characters to be idealistic paragons rather than human garbage.

The original Greek heroes just meant they had power to direct their own lives. It didn’t mean they were necessarily good but I’m not sure it’s an improvement. What does it say that form of entertainment is becoming so prominent.

Not sure if it’s true or not buts friend of mine once told methe explosion of zombie movies and tv shows was a reflection of the economy doing well. Zombies were a sort of parody on consumerism. Why are we so drawn to bad guy tv shows now?