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'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

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Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#41
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Always seemed odd to me that House was even able to think clearly while high all the time, much less do his job at such a high level.

There are a lot of highly functional opioid addicts out there. You would be surprised to find out what some of the people you work with are taking.

There are also a lot of addicts who believe they're high functioning and really aren't.

I strongly suspect mandatory opioid and cocaine testing in politics - never mind finance and law - would be a very good thing.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#42
post #8

I feel like the moment you put any idea out there you have the potential to influence people unexpectedly, and be at peace with that. I saw a youtube interview of an addict who said he started taking painkillers regularly because he saw House doing it. Surely the writers didn’t know they were setting up some kid in suburban America up for addiction by giving him that mannerism

> Surely the writers didn’t know they were setting up some kid in suburban America up for addiction Ya think? I disagree. It was product placement at the time . Now, it's hard not to call it outright drug pushing.

What? It was clear right from the series start that he has problem with the drug.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#43
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Surely the writers didn’t know they were setting up some kid in suburban America up for addiction Ya think? I disagree. It was product placement at the time . Now, it's hard not to call it outright drug pushing.

House was at least in part based on Sherlock Holmes who infamously had his 7% Cocaine solution. It's not entirely unreasonable to think the writers of House would update that to be pills. Not everything is some vast conspiracy...

"vast conspiracy"?

How would "hey we can include your product in our TV show" be a "vast conspiracy"? It's done all the time, with no one hiding any aspect of the business.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#44
post #16

Tangential: I remember reading a criticism about the South Park ginger episode leading to redheads getting bullied. I was curious (and still haven't wrapped my head around) what blame can be placed, if any. 1. Shitty people had latent bullying and cruelty instincts and South Park gave them the idea of diverting that to redheads 2. People were just chilling until South Park taught them to be cruel and bully gingers

Tagging on to this, behavior wise.

We have been a household without TV ads for a little over a decade. My wife and I have not seen an ad really at all - certainly not within our home - during this time. Maybe one or two at a dentist visit or something when they play the TV, but nothing on a regular basis. Not even YouTube ads (yay adblockers and pihole!)

To save some money, we decided to go to an ad supported tier of Peacock, and within 2 weeks my wife noticed she was spending more money than usual on shopping (I don't watch Peacock shows, so I had little to no exposure).

Despite both of us trying to inoculate ourselves to marketing, some subliminal thing worked, at least in her case. We both decided that it was worth going to the ad free tier again. We haven't bought anything on Amazon for 3 months since.

Neither of us are 100% certain what to make of this experience.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#45

Kubrick’s version was a failure because he missed the most important part and the last few pages of the book. In the book at the very end Alex decides out of his own free will to stop being violent. Which is the entire point of the book: free will vs being forced to do something. It’s so powerful, I don’t think any book affected as much as that did at the time. Kubrick focused on the violence and the rapes and by lea…

[flagged]

Have you read it?

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Surely the writers didn’t know they were setting up some kid in suburban America up for addiction Ya think? I disagree. It was product placement at the time . Now, it's hard not to call it outright drug pushing.

What? It was clear right from the series start that he has problem with the drug.

His problem is that others disapprove. He goes cold turkey a couple times and proves that he's in actual pain.

I ain't watched much of the show for a while, my wife is fond of it.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#47
post #8

I feel like the moment you put any idea out there you have the potential to influence people unexpectedly, and be at peace with that. I saw a youtube interview of an addict who said he started taking painkillers regularly because he saw House doing it. Surely the writers didn’t know they were setting up some kid in suburban America up for addiction by giving him that mannerism

I think about this topic regularly, the question of how responsible a person should be for the unintentional effects of their actions.

In general society agrees that people are responsible for unintentional effects to their actions when they're obvious and predictable, such as involuntary manslaughter for killing someone while driving drunk. A reasonable person should understand the risk of that and take it into account before deciding to drive after having a number of drinks.

Where it gets more complicated and divisive is when the unintentional effects become less obvious or easily attributable.

I feel there are lots of behaviors that we're able to show empirically have negative impacts on the world yet aren't immediately obvious or unavoidably attributable, and because they're not intuitably, at-first-glance attributable there begin to be people who dismiss them despite empirical evidence proving their cause. Things like chemical dumping into rivers as an externality of an industrial process causing health impacts to surrounding communities come to mind as an example.

Where it gets even fuzzier is when impacts are social and diffuse.

A place I see a lot of discussion related to this topic is in the comedy world. You regularly see people criticize comedians for their jokes being harmful or hurtful. In my opinion these criticisms are sometimes accurate, and sometimes are inaccurate due to mistaking the topic of a joke as being the butt of it (a good example highlighting the difference I feel is Shane Gillis' jokes about autism from his standup https://youtu.be/ly14Pr2RLys, vs him calling out Andrew Shultz for jokes on the same topic but done in a derogatory manner: https://youtu.be/ENpTQ6ws3P8?t=954).

The general retort from comedians to people criticizing them is that "The intent of the joke isn't bad, it's all about the intent." I feel this is partially true, but it completely ignores the potential unintended consequences of the things they say, and the potential responsibility people have for the them.

I think this area and ones like it, involving the question of to what degree people with cultural influence should be held accountable for the unintentional impacts of their influence is really interesting and complex. I don't have much more to say beyond that I find it interesting and nuanced.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

William Gibson is the father of Cyberpunk, not Steam Punk. Though if Gibson is the father, I might say Bester is the grandfather.

Alfred Bester has fallen into obscurity for sure. How do you figure Bester and not Lem as the grandfather?

Bester and Lem are amazing in their different ways, and it's tragic that both aren't better known.

I wouldn't put one over the other, but I think Bester gets the call because his view was classic mid-century US, and was an obvious influence on Cyberpunk.

Lem had a different more subtle aesthetic.

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#49

Kubrick’s version was a failure because he missed the most important part and the last few pages of the book. In the book at the very end Alex decides out of his own free will to stop being violent. Which is the entire point of the book: free will vs being forced to do something. It’s so powerful, I don’t think any book affected as much as that did at the time. Kubrick focused on the violence and the rapes and by lea…

[deleted]

Re: 'I should not have written 'A Clockwork Orange''

#50
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of highly functional opioid addicts out there. You would be surprised to find out what some of the people you work with are taking.

There are also a lot of addicts who believe they're high functioning and really aren't. I strongly suspect mandatory opioid and cocaine testing in politics - never mind finance and law - would be a very good thing.

"Your teeth look good, have you made any diet changes?" - Dentist "Yeah, I don't eat poppy seed bagels anymore, don't want to lose my job. Oh, and no novacaine, same reason. Just get started until I pass out from the pain."

C'mon.

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