A key point in Fahrenheit 451 is that books were banned because they made people depressed and uncomfortable. The novel's protagonist, Montag, is taken into custody after he reads a poem that makes a woman cry because she realizes the emptiness of her life.
![[quoting a tweet from isabelunraveled in which she rails against depressing books that get branded as “great writing”]](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:hppum4l25hcczzffastsicpq/bafkreidzblpxefncqr2c73v7myen325wvtk767i7rw4zcc32c3hj4gzv5a@jpeg)
She did the classic Twitterism of walking back her original thought and acting like everyone else just misinterpreted what she said or something
Like I get that getting flamed on the internet isn’t fun but if you have enough influence to reach 38k followers with a single tweet you kind of have a moral obligation to only say things you actually believe in and can stand behind Or at least admit that it was a bad take
like come on she directly stated mind virus like that in and of itself is an awful phrase with super awful connotations in the context of todays age in mind.
I think Yanagihara's an asshole and a hack so it always pains me to have to defend her from these types
Good lord, this crowd really needs a character limit
I’m not necessarily against long-form tweets (I actually think they’re easier to read than a thread) but she used 5000 characters to ultimately communicate nothing substantial
I have a suspicion that this was written by ChatGPT, to be honest. A person who uses the phrase “mind virus” to mean “this book made me sad”, isn’t likely to use words like “reductive”. Which would explain why it’s so long but doesn’t really say anything.
"Offensive humor is good because it forces people to be uncomfortable!" "Uncomfortability good, got it." *Writes a book about people being sad* "Wait no not like that wait stop"
I am constantly reminding my nearly 10 year old "You can survive some moments of discomfort," and golly do I wish that there were more parents saying the same thing. 😭 (I also wish that anyone who would use that as cover for abuse a very 'swallow uranium,' obvi)
Without darkness, light has no meaning.
the screenshotted post feels like something from a blog post my conservative christian homeschooled friends and i would have made as teens after taking one debate class
the reframing of every unpleasant experience as “traumatic” certainly doesn’t help.
I left the Tumblr role-playing community all because most of the role-playing plots were too boring and some people didn't want anything bad happen to their characters.
"Harmful mind viruses" Empathy. You're talking about empathy.
Sorry Isabel, let me take care of that. :dumps entirety of Russian and/or existential literature into a shredder: I hope this helps your virus
This is off-topic, but that book did NOT end how i thought it would.
A book that makes me cry is an automatic 5 ⭐️
what the chicken fried fuck
If anyone talks to you of a "harmful mind virus" with any degree of sincerity, you have my permission to introduce them to Roko's Basilisk
mind virus = normal contemplation, reflection, and thought, apparently
That crying woman sounds like a real loser.
This just reminds me that I am always reluctant to reread my favorite comic because it always ruins my week ...yet occasionally I still reread it because it's so god damn good People that want all media to be happy and positive have no art in their souls
I guess I should mention the comic is Stray Bullets
I have never replayed Signalis because it hit me like a train and made me cry. But I'd kill to protect that story's right to exist and be experienced.
Yeaaaah, I feel similar about In Stars And Time. Hit me like a train, left me messed up for a few days afterwards, will never play again. Still glad I played it, super glad it exists.
People that want all media to be happy & positive should seek out media that's happy and positive and leave the rest for others. I don't like to read stories that make me sad, but I also don't think I should be the decider for what everyone else consumes. The world is better when it's diverse.
Harmful Mind Virus should be the name of a MAGA band.
When someone uses the phrase "mind virus" unironically, I just assume their either a bigot, or a moron. Probably both.
I love how "writing something depressing" = "installing a mind virus". I didn't realize I'm a neurohacker!
Harmful. Mind. Viruses. Uncomfortable ideas.
People with low distress tolerance tend to hold fast to the belief that others are responsible for their own discomfort. Anything uncomfortable or ambiguous is bad. Nuance is bad. And it's why those people never change either. Not when they delegate self reflection to everyone else.
Oh c'mon, if you're gonna refer to people getting bummed out as a "mind virus" it should at least be like that one unpublished manuscript L Ron Hubbard claimed to have written that made people compulsively try to off themselves
"mind viruses" lol what about the mind goblin, then?
I’m starting to think whenever anyone uses the term “mind virus” they actually just mean “ideas”.
It's like an even worse version of Fry describing ideas as "headaches with pictures"
My wife looked up this person's Twitter account and it was basically a toxic positivity wellness grifter. To her, negative feelings really are a mind virus to be avoided. Happy Thoughts Only, don't look at the injustices around you just Happy Thoughts.
Sounds like she should delete her socmed then. If all she wants is Good Vibes Only, the worst placebto find them is in the breeding grounds for the MAGA Mind Virus.
You make an excellent point. It's almost like unfettered fascism plays well with her brand of positivity. Like when people are all "the Nazis are so much nicer to me on Twitter, unlike the mean leftists on Bluesky!"
"mind viruses" isabel needs to touch grass
It is actually difficult to express how anti-humanistic this impulse is!
This is how censorship started folk. People wishing for things like this without thinking for 5 minutes about the consequences.
'Harmful mind virus' is a weird way of saying 'emotion'.
Isabel probably thinks Aldous Huxley's World State from Brave New World is a great idea.
It's certainly better than some of the other dystopias. Like, a -2 on the dystopia scale, if we put The Man in the High Castle at -5 and 1984 at -9, let's say.
The notion reading a book may "install" a "harmful mind virus" in one's brain is very typical of anti-intellectual conservatism going back at least to the medieval period in which monks routinely kept "dangerous" books (such as classical literature) under lock and key. Let people read and think.
Granted, some reading any given book may be too intellectually, mentally, psychologically, emotionally weak to handle it. Perhaps they should be advised to not read it to avoid any discomfort or unfortunate consequences. But also maintain some way for the intellectually strong to read and think.
Also "mind-virus" is a far right dog whistle
The books were chained up so they wouldn't be stolen because they were so valuable. Monks preserved and transmitted classic literature.
You propose medieval monks did not restrict access to particular books they deemed dangerous or inconsistent with their religious views? That doesn't seem consistent with things I've read elsewhere, but then I'm not an expert on the subject. Let me look into it; I might have gotten that wrong.
I looked into it for five minutes and the consensus I was getting is that religious censorship of books and reading material was common in the medieval period. However, yes, monks also preserved ancient literature for special readers they deemed able to handle it. Both statements seem correct.
Well the use of "mind virus" voids any argument for me cause thats what the fascists use for shit they don't like. Also whatever happened to choice? Don't like a sad book, don't read it. ___ shouldn't exist because *I* don't like it is idiotic.
“___ shouldn't exist because *I* don't like it” is very on-brand for MAGA and (other) fascism, and they apply it to people as well as media. 😑
I've got a few songs in my library that are almost guaranteed to make me tear up. Always fun hitting those on a shuffle-all while driving around town.
She seems to have missed that there are entire fictional genres that thrive on making the audience feel traditionally “negative” emotions
put a content warning on that says "grownup"
It was interesting looking at reviews for the original Jurassic Park. A lot of the reviews were like this, it’s just cheap tricks, Spielberg is overrated, this is just mindless popcorn slop either no awe Then he dropped Shindler’s in the same year
Okay yeah he made a lot of popcorn movies, but he had already made the fucking color purple by then, wtf??
A lot of it was just backlash. He was such a success they kind of wanted to bring down the wonder kind. This was also before there was a real reckoning among critics that things can be fun & good
The Color Purple was honestly, kind of a weird choice, with it being SO focused on African-American experiences. An extra weird thing is that Spielberg basically swapped with Scorsese Cape Fear for Schindler’s List. Giving him his more Jewish movie & Scorsese didn’t want to follow Christ with that
Ebert was merciless
i love reviews where ebert is just obviously dead wrong, like it's fine rog we all have preferences
Ebert was the one that surprised me the most on Jurassic Park. He was usually a bit forward of other reviewers in judging movies based on what they were trying to accomplish & for what audience, not just rejecting those kinds of movies. He even said something like it lacked awe & wonder.
But Ebert also seems like he never gave a top review to the movies that ended up “classics” of the era. But he was also really good about supporting Animation & pushing for people like Miyazaki
He said the Powerpuff Girls Movie was an orgy of cartoon violence and was baffled by the concept of three little girls fighting. I also can’t forgive him for what he did to the actress for Friday the 13th just because he didn’t like the movie.
I only read 102 Funniest Jokes for Toddlers, but some of those are a bit edgy, and they better not manipulate me into laughing
Or “ not written in the US”. Watership Down comes to mind.
Shoot, animorphs went hard
What I had in mind is that before Disney just copied itself it had a reputation for taking stories and ripping any pain out of them. The Little Mermaid is an obvious example. The stories were often from other culures.
I swear, the next time I hear someone use the term "mind virus", I'm going to throw them through the nearest window. This is not some creeping infection. PEOPLE ARE LITERALLY JUST ASKING PEOPLE TO USE COMMON SENSE AND THINK CRITICALLY.
Funnily enough, what she just wrote made me sad and not in a good way like those well written stories.
At this point I think the way forward is just like Enjoy what you want and let other people torture themselves with art if they want to because they don't want to be saved The fulfillment of desire is a greater good than the strict prevention of harm
I hope her tongue was firmly planted in her cheek, and she just finished some beautiful and devastating novel with plans to pick up something similar soon.
"Center agency, not victimhood" "Help, the sad books are hurting me"
Feelings. Those are called feelings.
📌
What do you expect from someone who pays for twitter?
right like they’re getting paid to be wrong and annoying enough that people Engage With Their Content! modern bluechecks have financial incentive to post bad over there!
Pretty much. But personally, think there's something mental about choosing to pay for twitter that financial and ideological incentive doesn't explain. After all that has been and is going on, for someone to pay for twitter there has to be something parasocially wrong with them.
absolutely agreed yea
Unreal. Some of the most brilliant writings in history have tragic endings. This person seems to personify the old saying, "Someone who has read many books is an interesting companion. Someone who has read but one or two books is dangerous."
"Harmful mind viruses" DOES SHE MEAN THOUGHTS?
worse, feelings
Emotions. The colonial stiff upper lip.
also most feelings
That's doubleplus ungood
And emotions!
She's drawing from a discourse that Musk has drawn from - 'woke mind virus' - which can be traced back to Dawkins' memes (perhaps further back than that?).
The idea that an empathetic expression of emotion is a "mind virus" is extremely telling. And sad.
There’s a time and a place for escapism, but when escapism is the *only* reason you read and you never challenge yourself with anything that holds up a mirror or forces you to see from a radically different perspective, you end up emotionally malnourished.
Art should sooth the disturbed and disturb the soothed.
It’s difficult to accept the emptiness we feel in the dark of night…if we are alone. Hold a hand Hug someone close It’s the best we can do
"Stop writing about the human condition because it makes me feel actual emotions" is quite the take. I swear, this constant need to water down stories because they make us feel genuine emotions is why so many modern stories are toothless when it comes to tackling anything beyond surface level.
reminds me of alan rickman's dig at tim allen on the galaxy quest set tim got funny feelings and had to go have a think about a scene they did, and rickman was like "oh my god i think he just experienced acting"
Which is all the funnier when you learn Alan didn't start out as an actor, he switched to acting in his 40s. He was originally a graphic artist.
Didn't we already do this? The Victorians changed the plots of Shakespeare because they were too dark. (Or is that an urban myth?)
Those people are without honor! (If it's true)
It sucks because it’s getting increasingly harder and harder to find narratives that actually make me feel something. So many pieces of media are already heavily sanitized.
I once saw a quote that stated "Art disturbs the comfortable and brings comfort to the disturbed" and I really carry that with me whenever I see emotional or intense art.
Been writing a video about the final destination films being empowering for this very reason.
The movies that traumatized an entire generation into never driving behind a logging truck.
Yeah, cop deserved to get logging trucked anyway who doesn't put a lid on their coffee in the car on the highway wtf and don't get me started on everyone else not fucking paying attention and shit.
Maybe if they had all paid attention while driving the accident wouldn't have happened or been so severe. But that's not the premise of the film we're here to watch them die :D
I love the Final Destination movies. The third one almost cured my rollercoaster fear. Almost.
You need to go see Salvador Dahli place in Spain. I think you would be amused.
I wonder who the fuck asked this Baba Sraka
I love the thought that an author would just decide instead to write something happy, as if the inspiration wasn't that they weren't.
Idk, seems like she didn’t read a lot of books. They’re too depressing 😐
Oh yeah i remember that Yes i read Fahrenheit 451 I was bored as a child and couldnt play online games THERE GENUINELY WASNT SHIT TO DO BACK THEN
Oh, come on, there was tons of stuff to do. I still have all of my Airfix planes. Well, the ones that survived the cat.
I read a lot back before the interbutts but I'm not sure I could have swallowed F451's prose at any age. I'm sure the story is rad but the writing style is EUUUUUGH
Read Jurassic Park when I was 9 - and rereading it 25 years later, was surprised how well I understood it at the time - so maybe there's just something wrong with me. ... or maybe Crichton isn't actually that intellectually challenging.
He's very good at making the reader feel smart when they understand what he's saying; and he's good at explaining things so the reader can understand how he's using them. That's a good talent for a sci fi writer to have.
It also helped me in Jurassic Park in particular that a lot of the more technical stuff is from the perspective of being overheard by an actual quite nerdy child.
Totally makes sense.
Hey so I read y'alls responses and oh my god so i remembered right you HAD a choice of things to do that was not 69 Houres of Vibeojame back then 0_0 Huh
"i'm strongly against people writing devastatingly depressing books that then get loads of critical acclaim and endorsement for their 'great' writing" if you can produce 'great writing' maybe don't install harmful mind viruses into everyone who picks up your book..."
To quote one of the good additions to the movies “Tauriel: If this is love, I do not want it…Why does it hurt so much? Thranduil: Because it was real.” My response to Isabel, we write and read books that hurt because that hurt comes from some place real. It’s proof that you are still human.
It also makes people who are grappling with those feelings in real life feel less alone. Especially if they’re the sorts if Bad Feelings™️ like grief, trauma, or anger that Nice, Normal People®️ aren’t supposed to talk about.
Idk if Isabel has a problem with writers writing thought provoking stuff I suggest she seek out books that are more her speed. I hear the toddlers section has some very comforting and simple books
I don’t know, those “That’s not my Fairy/Truck/Dragon/Princess textured board books are just the beginning of the Mind Virus! It’s so sad when you can’t find your Fairy/Truck etc. Kids shouldn’t be allowed to read such depressing things and get infected with the Mind Virus at such a young age.
What a thin skinned ignoramus... Art isn't supposed to make people just feel "good". It's meant to make us think. And thinking covers all human emotions. All of them.
“Install harmful mind viruses?” Sweet intellectual concept on a pogo stick 🤦♀️
"harmful mind viruses" holy shit do these people actually read what they write sometimes
I don’t think they read very much at all, tbh.
The book also opens with Montag's wife attempting to commit suicide and the ER people "cure" her by sucking the medicine she swallowed then made her forget what happened an hour before. No therapy, no comfort, just routine. No wonder Montag's main motivation was seeking ways to express his sorrow.
Like if this book came out today, I am sure so many people would rage on how many "dark subject" it's addressing in the first few pages.
AFAIK, she didn't even know she had OD'ed. As I read, she seemed like a nearly completely thoughtless person who'd ended up downing a bunch of pills. All the medics did was pump her stomach and filter her blood, and they said, "Oh, she'll be really hungry when she wakes up," and that was it.
Then Montag tried to describe, with gentle words, what just happened to her and she calls him a liar saying she would never do this. Amnesia was part of the procedure. Even the medics point out this will happen again and to give them a call when she will do this again. The routine.
I do admit she was a horrible person but even Montag points it out, even after she leaves him, that it was the system who forced her to believe being the artificial TV wife was he life's goal. He even ends up forgiving her when the bombs fall.
"What if instead of feeling emotions, we read only things that are mildly amusing and entertaining"
Why stop there? Why read when we have tiktok?
And why watch tiktok when you can just use a chip to directly stimulate the pleasure centre of your brain
harmful "mind viruses" is certainly a choice. Why in the actual fuck can people not just read what they like and ignore the other shit that displeases them? Why do we need monoculture?
Absolutely a great reference to bring out for this. In even my worst estimation of general society I never could expect we would embrace this staggering level of proud, naked anti-intellectualism.
"But we need books that affect us like a disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being banished into forests far from everyone, like a suicide. A book must be the axe for the frozen sea within us." -Franz Kafka
Bradbury is an amazing author. I love his work. I read that one in middle school.
As a librarian I can safely say that they are a whiny baby who needs a pacifier and their diaper changed.
People like Isabel are what test my patience
A grown adult using the term "mind virus" is just embarrassing.
This just in from the "empathy is bad" faction.
I will say that for those of us that have fun stuff like anxiety, depression, or that overthink it can be hard to get out of that mindset when we start thinking about that kinda stuff. I’m not saying we shouldn’t full-stop. Just providing another perspective.
Tbh I don't understand this perspective at all. I have had debilitating depression and suicidality since I was ten years old and find depressing, cynical, scary media incredibly comforting. It's the uplifting, happy stuff that makes me want to hurt myself most (thus I avoid it).
Sure, but that’s on y’all to manage/choose your level of involvement. I mean, I also have those conditions, but I’m a catharsis reader— hard emotions and a good cry help me. Some folks are sponge readers— those emotions get absorbed and stuck. It’s important to know which you are and curate.
But trying to control what other folks write and read ain’t great.
That I agree with 👊
Would it be too much to ban FB on grounds of it being hack shite?
“Install harmful mind viruses”…..I hate it here.
Can’t remember the exact quote but there’s some internal monologue when he’s struggling over burning books and it’s something along the lines of “Beatty said if you had a problem, burn it.” IE: destroy whatever bothers you
One person's harmful mind virus is another person's beneficial endosymbiote
"Don't have anything negative in your books because that makes people feel bad." How is this person legally considered an adult?
I've heard it suggested we become adults when we properly realise that someday we will die.
if that's true, I was an adult at 10
I'm still becoming adult because I'm realising more and more about it every day 😖
The line about Jesus is the one that always stuck with me (and became depressingly prescient). “I often wonder if God recognizes his own son the way we've dressed him up, or is it dressed him down?”
Yea and theirs nothing depressing in the bible right🤣
*laughs maniacally in religious trauma* Whenever I find people who look at the doctrines of "Original Sin" and "We all deserve hell because we're inherently evil" and somehow *don't* have anxiety and depression about them, I question if they even read their own damn texts.
I think they read it "everyone except ME."
No no, I've argued with people who LOUDLY insist that they're "totally inherently evil, only saved by grace I don't deserve", while also condemning believers who act in ways they don't like. No idea how they square "Grace, not works" and "Those people don't behave right, ergo they're not saved".
Calvinism, kind of.
It really says something that even when I was a devout teen, I took one look at Calvinism and was horrified.
this is the scariest kind of dystopia because it's not born of a lust for power or wealth, it's born of a misdirected urge to help
His interpretation of his own work and intended message was something closer to "TV bad, individual author good" with "he described the book as a commentary on how mass media reduces interest in reading literature". Even his own interpretations of the his own work shifted multiple times though.
"Sadness is a harmful mind virus" You don’t even need to crack Fahrenheit 451. Yhey made a Pixar movie about this. I don't know how much simpler we can make it.
Kierkegaard would like a word
Every time I see the phrase “mind virus” my knee jerk reaction is to start talking about the Khmer Rouge. It’s hyperbolic as shit in this case. But it’s always where my thoughts go.
All writers seek to spread as many mind viruses as possible. There are no cures.
Gods forbid we feel feelings. The horror.
If Fahrenheit 451 is beyond your reading level, there's a similar point in Lois Lowry's YA novel, The Giver🙃Bonus because "mind virus" sounds like something folks who preach "precision of language" would come up with
Wait until Spotify tells her about the Blues.
Without the tragedy, Robocop would've just been a tongue-in-cheek 80's action movie. Gojira would've just been another giant monster. Neither of those movies would've moved me to tears.
Fasc don't care about your feelings. Much.
Tbh, I would prefer if such pieces would come with the correct content warning list, so those who don’t want to be emotionally challenged at that time (and that’s fine to want to avoid that) can pick books knowingly. But it’s important to keep writing disturbing and depressing pieces.
“The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.” Or make you depressed.
“Harmful mind virus” like religion?
Wish my therapist would stop installing harmful mind viruses in me
“Harmful mind viruses” the only harmful mind virus I see here is the one that makes you write “harmful mind viruses” unironically. … oh no, she infected me! Aaaaa!
Maus is another book they want to remove, it's a graphic novel and pultizer prize winner regarding events during WW2.
Never trust anyone who talks about “mind viruses”. Straight-up fascist talk.
bsky.app/profile/this...
This passage stood out to me, and I see it everywhere in real life.
What is the context? Is this advice to hopeful writers?
It’s a different line from Fahrenheit 451 describing the ethos of the dystopia the characters exist in.
This is the government of Fahrenheit 451 on how to properly distract the populace and keep them unquestioning and compliant.
Keep the circuses going 24/7 and they won't notice that they're getting less and less bread
lol
This is why I was mad about all the happy Gilmore references being immediately explained after they were made. Let me feel like I won a contest! 😆 (I’m not missing the point, it just reminded me of that and cracked me up. Sometimes dumb nostalgia is what you need, just not at expense of all else)
I saw a video recently on how a lot of data and content we consume online is like the "fast food" or "candy" of information. Fills us up but doesnt actually have any nutritional value. And we're absolutely inundated with it. This passage reminded me of that video. We're living it.
MGS2 has a lot to say about all this...
Um, as a Jeopardy contestant, I feel like I'm in that dream where I'm the only one naked right now.
I don't think there's anything wrong with knowing all of these things but it's always nice to put that knowledge to use in the real world (I am a nerd who watches a lot of Jeopardy :-))
Sounds like STEM supremacy and the way "fandom" treats any media these days. No meaning, only lore, to categorize endlessly in wookipedias.
Yes, it’s the cognitive dissonance between fetishizing “STEM” as an abstract concept while destroying the actual practice of science, which requires experimentation, testing, and understanding the philosophical basis for how we know something is true (or closer to true).
tbf quite a lot of classical philosophy serves the same purpose esp the platonic ontologies
"Non combustible data". Such an excellent turn of phrase.
I've got this passage memorized, it hits so hard. i think about it constantly
I thought Fahrenheit 451 and Animal Farm were warnings. Yet they seem to be used as instruction manuals.
it’s not that they’re used as instruction manuals it’s that the regimes that inspired them are seen as models to emulate rather than horrific aberrations of fundamental human decency to be condemned to the dustbins of history accordingly
this is literally just "No Child Left Behind" and standardized testing in the US
Basically STEM above all else while disposing of the arts and music programs in school.
Well that’s just silly, the average American can’t even name their own state’s capital!
Illinois has entered the chat....
bradbury said it was a commentary on how mass media disincentives reading
"im strongly against people writing x" THEN DON'T READ IT
The point of art is to make you think. If it makes you depressed then the mirror is working.
I have major depression and I have not been able to read depressing literature in many years. The solution is....I don't read it. I don't demand that nobody else read it too.
I've been admitted for my depression. It's surprisingly easy to avoid triggering content. People who try to police what others enjoy are subhuman.
I mean, I wouldn't say "subhuman," but they're certainly terrible people.
You're probably right, I'll admit I fall into a tenfold punishment too regularly.
Reading is a way to explore things you don't normally experience. The conservative urge to squelch so much literature to homogenize culture is practically eugenics.
Don’t tell anyone that when I was going through a very dark time wonderfully dark Norwegian crime thrillers were wonderfully therapeutic
"harmful mind viruses" you mean an IDEA? jesus wept
"Installing Mind Viruses" sounds like something from SCP, not a real thing said by a real human.
Hmm a mind virus. . . As an SCP do you think it would cause creatures to gain self awareness or perhaps it grants intelligence to inanimate objects.
I do think it is all too easy to write a nihilistic book that wallows in despair, and critics are all too eager to embrace it because they think it's "edgy" and "bold" and "real." And if I'm not mistaken Montag eludes arrest.
Nobody is obliged to read the "edgy" books. You can just ignore them. Also Montag eluding arrest doesn't make the warrant right in the first place, wtf.
Just correcting the statement that he was taken into custody.
I was ready to be like, “Engh, a loud opinion that I disagree with doesn’t need my attention.” Then I saw “install harmful mind virus”. What on earth…
I feel that person took a Godannar heart breaker to the brain and science is at a loss as to how she's still alive
It hits hard! Books should'nt be banned as the author has taken so much of effort in writing it. However, they must not write stories which depress people.
Your micro-story of demanding what all writers must do depresses me, and you shouldn't have written it.
Are you naturally stupid or do you have to work at it
Nah that's bullshit.
LOL of course she follows Douglas Murray* on Twitter. *Not to be confused with fellow crapsack Charles Murray.
I feel like this is what the obsession with "cozy" does to a mf.
Gotta sand all the edges off of everything in life so that EVERYTHING we experience is as sanitized as a Disneyland attraction, complete with all those hugely fake smiling happy voices from the staff. I can feel myself becoming more goth and punk by the second just imagining that world.
Aye. "Cozy" in quotes isn't cozy, it's a graphic manual.
Anna Karenina except Count Vronsky rides into the station on a unicorn to save her.
People who sincerely use the phrase "mind virus" need to be sat in boring hours long lectures about how ridiculous they are
that's how they got like that the stiff upper lip is a deeply traditional western value
Personally I have no problem dealing with mind viruses. I guess it’s because I trust in my mind’s immune system.
I guess youve just built up natural immunity. or
I have a mind goblin that simply eats them.
mind goblin deez nuts
ayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy gottem!
thanks I wrote it my self
The gods were writing through you.
Idk fam I feel like we've kinda acknowledged for millennia that the process of growing more aware or conscious of the world around you is, generally, a route to pretty abject despair, because the reality of the world is itself the cognitohazard You can never go back into the cave unchanged
That's why i bang my head on the wall
Rare Protestant Bible W?
Yall im not even religious and its the knowledge of good and evil not just knowledge and its already done they already ate the damn pomegranate so telling yourself that by being unintelligent you are better than who you believe to be the first humans is beyond meaningless
The *Garden of Eden* story is that knowledge brings misery. It's right there at the *start* of the Bible.
The message was right in front of us 😳
I remember reading this verse and going “I have an iPhone”
Old Solomon had some bangers that ring true to this day. Reading him moan about life was pretty validating for me cuz like... "Yo, if one of the wisest and richest men in history is having some of the same struggles I'm having- maybe it's not a moral failure to be depressed"
Isn't it deeply ironic that a person with a blue tick talks on Twitter about "mind viruses"?
To Rori! Why post if you don't allow comment?
Literally 1984: robot that makes songs. Literally Fahrenheit 451: really big fireproof TV.
Writers write what they want, I, the reader, read what I want--it's a very good system.
I really need to finish reading that book
I just played Clair Obscur which has the best writing in a video game that I've played. I came out of that experience a changed human, giving new perspective and understanding to the crippling effects and process of grief. We need stories like that to show people what it is to be human.
Reeeeeeally tempted to just send that person every novel by Thomas Hardy and Franz Kafka. I mean, if they don’t want to read books with darker plots, they can just… not read those books? Without having a hissy fit on the interwebs? Or expecting books to be destroyed at their whim? 🤷
(just a note that you can (should) transcribe text images like tweets in the alt text rather than describing them like this)
these people say stuff like that and yet they're fine with people dying and having their rights taken away, I think that depresses people far more than anything in fiction
I'm failing to recall a time I've seen someone use the term "mind virus" without sounding like a total idiot. It's an Elon Musk signature move.
imagine being allergic to depressing media like bruh art isn't meant to be all sunshine and rainbows it's meant to be Human. and being Human sometimes means being devastatingly depressed
Not to mention, if one's allergic to certain media (I can't stand extremely cynical media, it makes me mad and feel like my time was just utterly wasted), we can just... Not partake in that media? There are some films that I can't stand, but I'd never want to stop them from existing.
Like lady… don’t read it then? Most books will fucking tell you on the back that this is gonna be depressing. I don’t read dark media anymore but I don’t tell other people not too.
I came by my mind viruses naturally, thank you very much. (Also I feel like the 'classics are depressing' is a very high school level take that I shared at age 16, but one grows and learns, hopefully)
Yep. And a key point in many a JRPG is that you cannot have love or joy without sadness and grief. Mother 3, half the final fantasy games, tales of Symphonia... Grief, loneliness and despair don't feel great, no... But they're all uniquely human elements that make us appreciate feeling joy
Like literally my favorite line in the entire Umamusume anime is when Mihono Bourbon comforts Rice Shower by pointing out that winning at races means you automatically have ruined the hopes and dreams of everyone else in the race and that's just how life is sometimes, you can't make everyone happy
And similarly, several JRPGs position despair in particular or occasionally nihilism as constantly threatening to unmake existence, with hope or determination working diametrically to preserve it. Personas 3-5 and the other half of the Final Fantasy titles, for instance.
I love when people say these incredibly reductive things about media, and never provide any examples. Yes, I have experienced bad media that was intending to be a downer, but I have also experienced good media that had sad, bleak, nihilistic or bittersweet endings.
It’s very intentional. Their idea of “good sanitized writing” is absolutely atrocious to anyone with sense, and their idea of “dark bad writing” is anything that discusses suffering outside of a right wing religious standpoint of passive acceptance.
I hate so much the concept that a piece of work moving you in any way that isn't utterly vapid entertainment makes it a cognito hazard people like this can't even perceive of art as anything but a product to be shoveled into their mouths
no for real i love fiction that scares me, makes me uncomfortable, disgusts me... that doesnt mean i approve of whatever was depicted irl that just means the work was good enough to get a real reaction from me even though its fake. i LOVE getting bad feelings from fiction! why are people so boring!
they can't conceive of the idea that a good story is one that makes you feel a variety of things we have managed to construct a whole brand of criticism centered entirely around someone getting icked that the author was a human being
I absolutely HATED Gone Girl, and if there is a morally evil book it might be that, but I don't think it shouldn't have been written Others can read and like it or not, who cares! These people are pathetic. Art should piss you off, make you cry or cheer with joy. Less intelligent than children
happy is the mind too small to doubt
I've met a few people in my life who absolutely refused to accept anything negative in media like this. Their opinions were all hollow. Not every piece of art is intended to create joy; Catharsis is impossible without pain, and so is learning to process negative emotions. This is merely avoidance.
Come to think of it, some people may need to be sat down and forced to watch Inside Out
Australia banned Hotline Miami 2 because it featured a scene of sexual assault at the beginning now an organization from the same country is trying to ban anything that features negative subjects in media.
Also of note Hotline Miami is explictly about how Nationalism suck your soul and life away so maybe there were other coninciding reasons it was banned.
Australia does have a certain reputation for being Like That about video games, ie banning everything that includes bad things happening
Yeah, it's been the land of the VPN for a while according to some friends who live there. The whole Visa / Mastercard bullshit is not helping either. I'm a grown ass man. I shouldn't need permission from a corporation and government if I wanna be sad or horny.
Some of my favorite art of all times has been overtly hostile to the audience. It does more than sit there and be pretty - it makes you SUFFER to experience it. Effort on the part of someone who plays a videogame is not an optional feature, just as is pain for reading or watching a tragedy.
One of the Cyberpunk 2077 Phantom Liberty endings left me jittery and mind-a-whirling for several hours recently. Couldn’t sleep at all. Next day was a write-off. I’ve never experienced that severity of reaction to any other media/film/book/etc, in 45+ years. Not even close.
The fact there's multiple (apparently very good) endings makes me nervous as I play the game the first time, because man, how am I gonna get the full experience? XD Do they let you choose them near the end, or is it more "You did this thing 10+ hours ago, you're locked in to that ending now"?
you'll know when it's time to choose. there's only one ending that requires you to make certain actions far in advance.
Awesome, looking forward to getting there once I'm done dragging my feet in Act 2 doing all the gigs and side jobs. XD (Some of those gigs have hit me hard too and I loved the game for that. I can FEEL my V changing as a person the more of Night City he experiences)
Yeah. I like that part. Lately I’ve been learning to play without the cheatcode thst is netrunning, and it’s a whole different game. Much harder Games within games
when i tried playing without net running, i got really into throwing knives.
Also that gold baseball bat you get during one of the Kerry missions
Yeah that’s what I’ve been doing too. And that electrified hatchet
Yeaaaaah, I'm running a hack build and it's super strong. Heck, forget quickhacks! Just using Ping and a Tech Revolver can delete enemies through like 4 floors and walls before they even know you're there. XD Between that and Overwatch, my V's both a Reaper AND a Surgeon.
Mission: take out Baddie Me: System Collapse through a window from outside the building Baddie: *dies* Me: *brief smug feeling* Game: “carry the body to the car” Me: “fuck”
Ahahahaha, I had to wait out like 4 Overclock timers during the "Take out baddie in the nightclub without any fighting", and it was hilariously fun. XD
In addition to @adrenajwms.bsky.social comment — there’s a “point of no return” where you’ll be warned, and prompted to save your game. You can return to that point after completing an ending and explore alternatives without another whole playthru Hasn’t stopped me doing more playthrus tho 🤘🏽
… however you will have made some irrevocable decisions before the point of no return, and some may affect *some details* of the ending. So you may still want to do more playthrus anyway
People who watch Eraserhead and don't get it are so funny. Sometimes they really get visibly angry at not understanding it. You're supposed to feel uncomfortable and sit with the feelings, mate. That's the whole point.
Ooh, baby, you want suffering? In a video game? Have I got the military shooter for you! Spec Ops: The Line made me feel like FUCKIN' SHIIIIIIIIIIIT Like, HOO, BOY, do you get to do some fucked-up shit in that game, and it refuses to let you forget what you did, all the way to the ending.
Oh, yeah, I played the shit out of it... Alas, the publisher's license expired, and it's no longer available for purchase by new people. Heart of Darkness was a good adaptation to pick for a genre-aware FPS.
I looked this post up to get further context It's about the book "A Little Life", which according to readers is just "misery porn" and involves a lot of bad happenings for the sake of it. Idk if that changes matters any. She appears to not want to post any clarifications on her thread unless asked
I just fail to see the issue. No one is forced to read anything. We can look up the synopsis and reviews of any given book in less than 5 mins thanks to the internet. Don't like it? Don't read it! Some people find "misery porn" cathartic, and it clearly did well enough to garner the convo.
I don't understand people who avoid stories that make them sad, or make them cry. I want to feel deeply, I want to feel profoundly. Not just happiness, but all of the contrasts across the emotional spectrum.
Harmful "mind viruses"?? HF! My God! How can I know you haven't injected with a fiendish "mind virus"? I used to call them thoughts and stuff. Mind viruses are go!!
"install harmful mind viruses" these people believe thinking is a disease or somethin
An idea is like a virus...
Writing my novel generated very uncomfortable answers to problematic questions. I decided it was time to quit writing, and devote my life to encouraging the happy delusions of loved ones. It was either that, or check out.
I forever do not understand people who think something is bad or wrong simply because they don’t like it.
Speaking as someone who has dealt with crippling clinical depression, and also a fan of horror and tragic fiction, being able to explore those emotions in a safe setting and experiencing the resulting catharsis has not only made me understand myself better. It has quite possibly saved my life.
Former anxiety-ridden teen who loved horror here, and I think this is exactly right. Horror is also a great way to examine what makes you irrationally terrified irl, and gives you a way to desensitize yourself to what you fear & practice being brave.
I also feel horror/tragic stories provide me with a mirror. Sometimes a character is behaving in a way that I see myself acting like, and then I get to have an objective thought about the behavior like, “Oh, this is making everything worse.” And then I reflect on trying to be different.
I also love horror because, at the end of the day, my life is generally going better than the protagonist's, and it kind of puts my problems in a different perspective. like yeah, I hate my job, but I'm not possessed by a demon trying to kill me, so it could be worse.
I'm 100% with you on that one. I have to deal with customers all day, but at least I'm not getting [REDACTED] by cenobites just because I solved a spicy rubik's cube. :P
remember when an author killed a dog in a book and a bunch of people collectively lost their shit and acted as if the author themselves killed a dog and there was an angry thread here explaining the concept of loving your dog cause the author made some snarky comments about it
I avoid heavy and depressing media which is a personal choice of mine, but also not only should it exist it's really important!
I'm such a mess, all media, even really uplifting ones, messes me up. I can't watch The Dog House without being in tears
I used to be fine when I was younger but then it seems like the horrors of the world became more real the older I got so now anything heavy (like the last of us) will send me into a spiral
there was a vet phone in on the radio yesterday and a caller was taking about having to put their pet rabbit down, I was in tears for half an hour, and I don't even like rabbits
I don’t know how you managed to listen to that; I’d find that exceptionally harrowing! 🫂 But maybe it would have helped someone going through a similar situation, or brought some peace or catharsis to someone else. And that’s why it exists.
Same here. Well before the current fascist era too.
"Harmful viruses" and it's just a focus on the more unpleasant aspects of human existence.
We as a species seem to be abandoning catharsis for fragility. It's sad but ultimately valuable, psychologically, that you're upset when Mufasa and your pet goldfish die. We raise kids in utterly antiseptic environments then wonder why they get allergies. This is the emotional equivalent.
So….time to ban social media?
Art is supposed to make you *feel* something.
Fuck right off with that shit. Good writing should make you feel something. I've read Junji Ito's adaptation of No Longer Human and appreciated the sadness of the story because its a story worth reading.
her: If you´re a creep, if you´re a weirdooooo🎶, what the hell are you doing here, you don´t belong here
if I can get just one person to think about trans people as people through my writing, even if it makes them uncomfortable, with my book, I will have done my job www.amazon.com/dp/B0FH36QVLW
its so weird cuz some of the most inspiring and healing and impactful stories I have read also have made me cry like a baby
Book make sad? Bad. Book make happy good! Good book like. Like when like.
Oh the classic "Art only exists to be fun and make me happy" sort. Must be fun being an adult with the brain of a very small child that craves only the jingling of a set of keys.
The emotional response art provokes is kinda like biological weapons, when you think about it
It’s like doing controlled burns to clear out dead undergrowth and keep the forest as a whole healthy.
emotional repression level : British
Like the people who don't like a book/film/tv series because they don't like the characters. They're not your friends, you don't have to like them. The best writers draw characters that are dislikable in interesting and challenging ways.
People disliking Dear Evan Hansen is a great example of this. He’s a flawed teenager who lies to a grieving family about their dead son, but viewers get angry about this and act like he’s supposed to be some sort of role model. So they hate the show. It’s weird.
Its so weird. "He's a bad person I can't stand it!" I mean he did bad things but he's a character. What did you want? Him to be tarred and feathered and deliver a monolog about how bad he is????
Exactly! He's a character. God forbid a character makes terrible choices and does bad things in a fictional story set to really catchy songs. Liking the show isn't showing your support for how the main character behaves in said show, but I believe some people can't separate the two things.
