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Scott Adams has died

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Re: Scott Adams has died

#841

Post by jnaina »

I love the music of Michael Jackson, the comedy of Bill Cosby, and the biting brilliance of Scott Adams’ comics.

I also accept the uncomfortable reality that each of these men had deeply ugly sides. That knowledge hasn’t erased my appreciation for their work, even if it has complicated how I see the people behind it.

I reconcile these two aspects, by deploying them in separate Docker containers in my brain, air-gapped, sandboxed, and blocked by multiple layers of mental compliance checks.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#844

Post by pyuser583 »

krapp wrote: post #786
jchallis wrote: post #188

Scott Adams died today. I want to acknowledge something complicated. He always felt culturally like family to me. His peaks—the biting humor about corporate absurdity, the writing on systems thinking and compounding habits, the clarity about the gap between what organizations say and what they do—unquestionably made me healthier, happier, and wealthier. If you worked in tech in the 90s and 2000s, Dilbert was a shared…

He wasn't family. He created a product for money and you consumed it. Your relationship with Scott Adams was entirely transactional. Caring about the man this much is like caring about Colonel Sanders or Tony the Tiger, it's weird and kind of gross.

We have personal relationships with the authors whose work we read.

Shakespeare, Alexander Pope, Dostoyevsky have changed my life. Just as much as family.

You can loudly say “no” and I’m loudly saying “yes.”

Re: Scott Adams has died

#845

Post by dragonwriter »

pyuser583 wrote: post #844
krapp wrote: post #786

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He wasn't family. He created a product for money and you consumed it. Your relationship with Scott Adams was entirely transactional. Caring about the man this much is like caring about Colonel Sanders or Tony the Tiger, it's weird and kind of gross.

We have personal relationships with the authors whose work we read. Shakespeare, Alexander Pope, Dostoyevsky have changed my life. Just as much as family. You can loudly say “no” and I’m loudly saying “yes.”

> We have personal relationships with the authors whose work we read.

To the extent that is arguably true (and I’d argue it mostly is not, there may be a one-way effect and/or a parasocial attachment, but “personal relationship” requires two-way interaction, and confusing a parasocial attachment for a personal relationship is the start of...lots of bad things) those relationships quite literally do not share the “you don’t choose family” aspect that applies to (a subset of) family relationships.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#846

Post by nonethewiser »

SauntSolaire wrote: post #804
nonethewiser wrote: post #493

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>You don’t choose family Right. But he's not actually your family member. I dont disagree with your general sentiment but you are literally trying to pick your family.

The op didn't get to decide that Scott's work would be so important for him, or have as much influence on him as it did. There are a lot of things you don't choose, family being one of them.

Right - and he wasn't family.

Re: Scott Adams has died

#848

Post by A4ET8a8uTh0_v2 »

f30e3dfed1c9 wrote: post #814
focusgroup0 wrote: post #790

[flagged]

"Here's a man who gave so much to the world." Let's not go overboard here. He wrote a comic strip that was less popular than "Garfield." Not exactly a stunning achievement.

What exactly did you contribute to the experiment that is humanity?

Re: Scott Adams has died

#849

Post by subjectsigma »

krapp wrote: post #786
jchallis wrote: post #188

Scott Adams died today. I want to acknowledge something complicated. He always felt culturally like family to me. His peaks—the biting humor about corporate absurdity, the writing on systems thinking and compounding habits, the clarity about the gap between what organizations say and what they do—unquestionably made me healthier, happier, and wealthier. If you worked in tech in the 90s and 2000s, Dilbert was a shared…

He wasn't family. He created a product for money and you consumed it. Your relationship with Scott Adams was entirely transactional. Caring about the man this much is like caring about Colonel Sanders or Tony the Tiger, it's weird and kind of gross.

This has to be one of the more insane takes in the thread. Colonel Sanders and Tony the Tiger aren’t real people, Scott Adams is (was?) a real person.

I listen to an artist who I feel changed my life with her music. When I heard she had attempted suicide I was deeply saddened. I had this irrational but deep feeling like I should have done something to help her, without knowing what that possibly could have been, since I don’t actually know her at all.

Is that “weird and kind of gross” too? To care about people suffering and dying even if you don’t know them personally?

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