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Okay? Points still stand: It’s written as an authoritative exploration of a social scene extrapolated from a few days visiting a place and attending one party.
by Aurornis 7mo ago
Okay? Points still stand: It’s written as an authoritative exploration of a social scene extrapolated from a few days visiting a place and attending one party.
If someone’s writing in journalistic style I think it’s fair to criticize it as journalism, even if it’s on Substack
- keiferski 7mo agoI read the entire post and it isn't, at all. It's a personal story with his own reflections on a scene as he experienced it. It's no different than literally any other blog post or journal entry, and at no point does it claim to be a neutral sociological study.
- stickfigure 7mo agoIt is not presented as authoritative anything, except perhaps one person's experience. And we should assume it is embellished. You are taking this far too seriously. It is a vignette which captures the flavor of a place at a particular time. And it is delightfully written.
- Aurornis 7mo ago> It is a vignette which captures the flavor of a place at a particular time. That’s my point: It captured a specific party with a small group of friends, but the blog goes on to wax philosophically about how it’s indicative of society and tech as a whole It’s a perfect motte-and-bailey setup where you’re supposed to read it as a big trend indicative of a place and a scene, but the second anyone criticizes the writing it becomes a retreat to arguments that we shouldn’t take it seriously, that’s it’s just a blog, that we should selectively believe it’s embellished however convenient to defuse any criticism.
- tptacek 7mo agoI think you're on tilt with this argument now. This is a personal essay. You disagree with some of its implications. That's fine. People disagree with each other. You should just write "I disagree with this", rather than try to critique it as formally bad journalism.
- Aurornis 7mo agoI think you’re too stuck on the word “journalism” in my post, as if reclassifying something as not-journalism means it must not be critiqued. If it helps, s/journalism/writing/g If we’re not allowed to discuss posts in the comments, what are we even supposed to discuss here?
- stickfigure 7mo agoYour critical review of Hunter S Thompson must be a real banger.
- tptacek 7mo agoHunter S. Thompson was a journalist! It's just a category error to apply critiques of his work to someone's personal essay.
- kelnos 7mo agoI do agree that it was an enjoyable read, but I didn't really like the undertone of "this is what SF is like", regardless of the intent behind it.