Individualism - Blog Posts
“Well John, if they are not going to make a distinction between Muslims and violent extremists, why should I take the time to distinguish between decent fearful white people and racists?”
—
Aasif Mandvi on The Daily Show (via nezua)
you really CAN. NOT. argue with that.
An individual who has to make things for the use of others, and with reference to their wants and their wishes, does not work with interest, and consequently cannot put into his work what is best in him. Upon the other hand, whenever a community or a powerful section of a community, or a government of any kind, attempts to dictate to the artist what he is to do, Art either entirely vanishes, or becomes stereotyped, or degenerates into a low and ignoble form of craft. A work of art is the unique result of a unique temperament. Its beauty comes from the fact that the author is what he is. It has nothing to do with the fact that other people want what they want. Indeed, the moment that an artist takes notice of what other people want, and tries to supply the demand, he ceases to be an artist, and becomes a dull or an amusing craftsman, an honest or a dishonest tradesman. He has no further claim to be considered as an artist. Art is the most intense mode of individualism that the world has known. I am inclined to say that it is the only real mode of individualism that the world has known. Crime, which, under certain conditions, may seem to have created individualism, must take cognisance of other people and interfere with them. It belongs to the sphere of action. But alone, without any reference to his neighbours, without any interference, the artist can fashion a beautiful thing; and if he does not do it solely for his own pleasure, he is not an artist at all.
Oscar Wilde The Soul of Man under Socialism
All I can do is be me, whoever that is.
Bob Dylan (via quotemadness)
The approaching battle in aesthetics is between the reactionary/essentially right-wing movement against AI and slop/mass aesthetics
Anti-AI is based on the economic interests of small business owners (comm artists are small business owners) and has conservative values as a result. These include measuring the value of art based on the ‘hard work’/‘effort’ that went into its creation, and discomfort with art that is not made under the domination/control of a specific individual. This merges with the explicitly right-wing hatred of modernism, abstract art, etc.
Mass slop aesthetics are based on mass participation in consumption, absence of the cult of the creative individual, maximalism. It’s not obvious, but I think it also includes a culture of mass participation in art through its rejection of aesthetic hierarchy and standards
Let’s sink into the tide of slop forever
《¤》●This is it, whatever it is that's hard for you to let go, your missed opportunities, people you had to let go of when you were in love, toxicities, your failures, things that killed you, it all starts and ends here. Nothing matters as our cycle of humanity is locked inside terrestrially and there are things far beyond the galaxies, lightyears and our sight. Clusters of stars miles and miles away from this Earth, where you die with your heartaches.
● What you gained or missed, nothing matters. You end here where you started from, but there are things far beyond this place, too massive for us that we're merely existent, too dark to be explained, bodies of questions where nothing about us matters.
● For a moth born in a jar, the roof of the jar is everything it knows and fears to cross, and an illusion of truth. 《¤》●
Encourage individualism! Fuck confirmity! If you conform you're easier to control and to be subjected to propaganda by following popular opinion. Now that being said I do believe subcultures are valid in terms of finding community and just having similar interests in general however it's encouraged to have an individual experience within that group of people like doing it your way and taking inspo as well.
“Why do you put stickers on everything lmao you’re tanking the resale value”
What I want to say: The idea that making something look like it’s distinctly “yours” is a bad idea is inherently capitalistic, because it expects some sort of profit in the end which said action would threaten. Instead of buying something for the sake of having it and enjoying it, and owning it to the point it becomes obvious it is, in fact, yours, you’re expected to sacrifice the immense joy of individualising every part of your life for the sake of a potential amount of money, which in the end you usually don’t even get, which is the most capitalistic thing about the whole idea. It also posits the assumption that you will dispose of the thing you own before it’s broken, a deep part of consumerism, and simply the fact that uniformity is the desired end goal makes this a staple idea of a capitalist society.
What I actually say: idk it’s pretty lol