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I don't know if this comment will be found in the sea of great comments in this thread, but I think this article is the answer to Adam Curtis' film Hypernormali

by dottjt 3y ago

I don't know if this comment will be found in the sea of great comments in this thread, but I think this article is the answer to Adam Curtis' film Hypernormalisation. The premise is that humans are currently trapped in an endless cycle and we have no concept of how to break out of it, but I think this might at least provide some context as to why. I highly recommend watching it (along with his other documentaries) if you found this article fascinating. It's like this in video form.

kouru225 3y ago
Adam Curtis is honestly one of the greatest documentarians of our time. I first watched Hypernormalization, but then binged everything he ever made a few months ago. More Adam Curtis recs: the DDT episode and the Kwame Nkrumah episode of Pandora’s Box (the rest are good too), The Way of All Flesh, and The Power of Nightmares. Also, Cant Get You Out Of My Head might be his masterpiece but it’s also not very accessible.
- dottjt 3y ago
  His latest documentary on the fall of the soviet union was fascinating, although admittedly very dry and difficult to watch since there was no commentary. I feel that's really only for hardcore Curtis fans, which I'm sure, he knows would be interested in.
- dash2 3y ago
  Counterpoint: Adam Curtis is a pretentious bore. His films feature massively overegged theses, based on a flimsy evidence base. His ideas are trivial, but he thinks they are deep.
  - kouru225 3y ago
    I used to feel this way, but then I slowly realized that Curtis tends to appear to have more of a thesis than he ever actually does. The movies are less a traditional essay, and more a social history of ideas and their consequences. What the ideas mean isn’t as important to him as how the ideas influence us. By tracing the history of memes (in the Richard Dawkins sense of the word), he’s providing a service that almost no one else is providing.
sorokod 3y ago
Hypernormalisation was discussed here in the past: https://hn.algolia.com/?q=Hypernormalisation https://hn.algolia.com/?q=Hypernormalisation

by dottjt 3y ago

kouru225 3y ago

Adam Curtis is honestly one of the greatest documentarians of our time. I first watched Hypernormalization, but then binged everything he ever made a few months ago. More Adam Curtis recs: the DDT episode and the Kwame Nkrumah episode of Pandora’s Box (the rest are good too), The Way of All Flesh, and The Power of Nightmares. Also, Cant Get You Out Of My Head might be his masterpiece but it’s also not very accessible.

dottjt 3y ago
His latest documentary on the fall of the soviet union was fascinating, although admittedly very dry and difficult to watch since there was no commentary. I feel that's really only for hardcore Curtis fans, which I'm sure, he knows would be interested in.
dash2 3y ago
Counterpoint: Adam Curtis is a pretentious bore. His films feature massively overegged theses, based on a flimsy evidence base. His ideas are trivial, but he thinks they are deep.
- kouru225 3y ago
  I used to feel this way, but then I slowly realized that Curtis tends to appear to have more of a thesis than he ever actually does. The movies are less a traditional essay, and more a social history of ideas and their consequences. What the ideas mean isn’t as important to him as how the ideas influence us. By tracing the history of memes (in the Richard Dawkins sense of the word), he’s providing a service that almost no one else is providing.

sorokod 3y ago

Hypernormalisation was discussed here in the past: https://hn.algolia.com/?q=Hypernormalisation https://hn.algolia.com/?q=Hypernormalisation