Too Many Sweets
We crave depth after too much exposure to a culture that often pushes superficial content
"Too. Much. Candy. #misha #halloween" by Swerz is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0.
If you turn on a commercial radio station, you will almost certainly hear lots of formulaic songs about going to a party, falling in love or breaking up with your partner. If you turn on your television at prime time, you are fairly likely to see beautiful people in swimming costumes having shallow conversations about their relationships and being melodramatic. If you check out what’s on at the local cinema, expect lots of sequels to films that weren’t very good in the first place.
Nowadays much of our culture is driven by algorithms and the search for hits. Superficial content and safe bets will always punch above their weight in this context. While we all enjoy a little trash now and then, consuming too much mainstream content can give us a similar sensation to eating too many sweets.
There is also a backlash against the formulas for a simple reason: People crave nourishment. Hip hop is now more popular than rock music. Although lots of songs are celebrations of going out to parties, when it is done well, the genre emphasises wordplay and unusual beats. Meanwhile, Breaking Bad became a huge TV hit by turning the formulas of repeatable TV upside down and instead emphasising slow character development. And once in a while a film like Arrival can become successful despite (or because of?) an unconventional plot.
Sadly, the news business is no stranger to clickbait and superficiality. We probably all read and watched hundreds of stories about COVID-19, but how many of them mentioned Ralph Baric’s research into coronaviruses? I’m guessing not many.
Of course, people crave nourishment. This means that some rebel against the superficiality of much of the news industry. Unfortunately, two of the most common ways of rebelling - conspiracy theories and hedgehog-like all-encompassing world views - are often roads to nowhere. The two are connected. Ultra-simplified worldviews about politics or health often need conspiracy theories to do the heavy lifting when the evidence just isn’t there.
The Sharpen Your Axe project is about promoting a better way. If you want to go deeper, an explorative approach to non-fiction can help provide the nourishment that is often missing from the evening news. For example, why not read Tim Marshall’s excellent book on the connections between geography and current affairs? His insights on Russia’s need for ports that don’t freeze in winter explains one dynamic behind the Ukraine war in a way that conspiracy theorists pushing Russian lies about “false flag operations” can never approach. The comments are open! See you next week!
Further Reading
Prisoners of Geography by Tim Marshall
Sharpen Your Axe is a project to develop a community who want to think critically about the media, conspiracy theories and current affairs without getting conned by gurus selling fringe views. Please subscribe to get this content in your inbox every week. Shares on social media are appreciated! If this is the first post you have seen, I recommend starting with the first-anniversary post, which includes links to a free book.
Opinions expressed on Substack and Twitter are those of Rupert Cocke as an individual and do not reflect the opinions or views of the organization where he works or its subsidiaries.