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While Rob Rhinehart's original blog post is amusing, to say the least, I don't see the need for the relentless mocking. "The truth that most people are being –

While Rob Rhinehart's original blog post is amusing, to say the least, I don't see the need for the relentless mocking. "The truth that most people are being – surprisingly – too polite to point out is that Soylent is mental illness as a service." I don't know if it's that most people are being too polite. I think it's more that most people don't get delight out of ridiculing other people.

fit2rule 11y ago
Oh, I think that is a rather naive perspective .. I would even render it as glib and banal. People do of course get a rise, some sort of charge, out of ridiculing people - and this article in particular resonates because - like all good degradation - it contains enough measure of truth that the nerve is well and truly hit. It is easy to degrade Soylent, because it, in itself, is a form of degradation. Soylent, for those who buy it as a product - i.e. people who put on the consumer hat, and seriously consider their lives improved for the act of purchasing something - could be considered one of the most ribald samples of our modern displaced culture. We are all, after all, consumers. What better substance to provide to us all, as consumers, than something that attempts to satisfy the most primitive of needs while delivering a direct profit to its creators? If you've ever consumed the stuff: it is not great. There is very little pleasure to it. The only real value is the "feeling" of having consumed something extraordinarily elite. I think, the only reason to hate Soylent, is that it hasn't been wrapped up and presented to the world in the same aggressive, hyper-consumerist fashion that, say, our local Apple store used to grant you the privilege of Macbook Pro'ing your way through this article. Soylent is a kind of packet-of-ill-repute in the same way that a 4Chan or a Call of Duty packet, being sent across the ocean depths through a mostly useless pipeline, is a waste of bandwidth. Such a product can't really persist in a world where you actually have respect for other human beings. Relentless mocking is how we get most mental ills in the first place.

fit2rule 11y ago

Oh, I think that is a rather naive perspective .. I would even render it as glib and banal. People do of course get a rise, some sort of charge, out of ridiculing people - and this article in particular resonates because - like all good degradation - it contains enough measure of truth that the nerve is well and truly hit. It is easy to degrade Soylent, because it, in itself, is a form of degradation. Soylent, for those who buy it as a product - i.e. people who put on the consumer hat, and seriously consider their lives improved for the act of purchasing something - could be considered one of the most ribald samples of our modern displaced culture. We are all, after all, consumers. What better substance to provide to us all, as consumers, than something that attempts to satisfy the most primitive of needs while delivering a direct profit to its creators? If you've ever consumed the stuff: it is not great. There is very little pleasure to it. The only real value is the "feeling" of having consumed something extraordinarily elite. I think, the only reason to hate Soylent, is that it hasn't been wrapped up and presented to the world in the same aggressive, hyper-consumerist fashion that, say, our local Apple store used to grant you the privilege of Macbook Pro'ing your way through this article. Soylent is a kind of packet-of-ill-repute in the same way that a 4Chan or a Call of Duty packet, being sent across the ocean depths through a mostly useless pipeline, is a waste of bandwidth. Such a product can't really persist in a world where you actually have respect for other human beings. Relentless mocking is how we get most mental ills in the first place.