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lauren's avatar

I love this commentary. My own books about local history are carried at CVS and Walgreens and even Costco that is a source of immense pleasure although I don’t make any money on their sales. I am interested to look at your novel Ross. Much of contemporary fiction is spoiled for me by the unconscious class privilege of the authors. I console myself by reading the classics, favorite books by many authors, no longer alive.

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Ross Barkan's avatar

That's cool, what works of local history? I'd read them. And yes, feel free to check out The Night Burns Bright. I'm biased, but it's a good one.

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lauren's avatar

My most recent book is called Lost Napa Valley. Excavating local history from a progressive perspective has turned out to be my field.

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Ryan DC's avatar

I think cultural degradation is less a product of being internet-addled than it is of the total financialization of the U.S. economy and the subsequent consolidation of the culture industry.

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Nathaniel Segal's avatar

Both and.

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

You're wrong.

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Ryan DC's avatar

The cultural is downstream of the material ;)

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

The smartphone is exceedingly material, dingus.

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Ryan DC's avatar

I know, that’s why I said it would be good to smash em up

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

You keep trying to make everything about economics first and foremost when the economy is the best for workers that it's ever been in history. It's just utterly backwards. The teen suicide rate is skyrocketing, are you going to blame that on wages too?

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Ryan DC's avatar

“the economy is the best for workers that it’s ever been in history”

[citation needed]

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StanleyTwoBrix's avatar

Another reason to tax the rich into oblivion and make life affordable again.

It's unbelievable I have to say this, but we live in an era where formerly sane people like Krugman are now berating people who spend 2/3 of their income on rent for being insufficiently grateful that they have that. When did he turn into Phil "Nation Of Whiners) Gramm?

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

You can live in Manhattan on two Walmart salaries. Don't make me numbers, because I will. It's not the economy, stupid.

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StanleyTwoBrix's avatar

I won't make you numbers, but tell me again how all you need to survive is to work two full time jobs.

If only there were Walmarts in Manhattan.

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

https://g.co/kgs/oibWHa - Target, Full-time Stocker, $18.25 an hr, x 40 hrs a week x 4 weeks a month x 2 people = $5840 monthly income

Let's be generous to you and call that $4000 after taxes.

https://streeteasy.com/for-rent/manhattan/price:-2500 - "685 Manhattan Apartments for Rent under $2,500"

Let's call rent + utilities $3000. That leaves you $1000 a month for groceries and fun. Wouldn't be saving much but that's two Target salaries in Manhattan.

If you want me to be literal and work out the numbers for commuting from Manhattan to work at a Walmart in North NJ, I can do that too, because some of those Walmarts start stockers at $20.

Numbers'd!

e: wait a second...did you think I meant one person making two full-time salaries themselves? I meant having a relationship, lol...or at least a gosh darn roommate...why is that so foreign to people these days? Single people have never historically lived alone, and it isn't good to live alone for myriad reasons. Get a girlfriend or get a roommate, sorry Charlie.

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Kitty's Corner's avatar

People don't like being told they have bad taste, and there is a lot of pearl clutching around popular novels (especially because the majority of readers are college educated white women). There's a book right now, The Fourth Wing, a fantasy romance that found its fame on tiktok and apparently if you dislike this book, you're the second coming, harbinger of evil.

A lot of book "fandom" is like that. Can't critique it because white women like it, and if you say it's poor quality you're ruining people's joy. "Let people enjoy things" was a common rejoinder for awhile.

I have been thinking a bit about my own consumption; I prefer true crime and cult (memoirs). Every once in awhile I read contemporary SFF (though I'm reading Middlesex right now) and I wonder if my tastes are poor. Most books are bad, identity politics has made them worse. But you can't say that either.

I knew someone who basically wouldn't read anything published after 1960s because she hasn't post modern literature. I don't have any interest in classic literature or The Great Books so I'm trapped with nonfiction or hoping I get lucky with something. I do try to remind myself that I don't have to read new books, and can read books published in the 90s or early 00s. I'm not obligated to stay up to date on authors or their works. Most books are bad.

Films arent that different. I stopped going to the cinema due to covid and now watch tv on my laptop. I think television is better than cinema right now. I like speculative fiction and am over the MCU. At least they still make horror films though they are mostly bad.

Everything is terrible. I'll just read this book about a cult located in an apartment complex!

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

Not reading old books would be like...like...not listening to old music, or not watching old movies, or not looking at old paintings. Who could admit such an embarrassing thing?

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Kitty's Corner's avatar

How unfortunate that a lot of people dont read Plato or watch silent films!

Life goes on. Someone else can read Madame Bovary.

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pokipsy christiansen's avatar

Wow, I've never met a genuine nincompoop before.

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