(1) Cringe theory “Cringe” is a lot like “camp”: Both are modes of more or less deliberate failure. In both it is necessarily ambiguous who is in on the joke. Camp and cringe can both seem perfectly ironic or entirely without irony. Practitioners are deeply in earnest and utterly “inauthentic” at the same time; they commit to performances to a degree that forces audiences to question whether they are performing, whether they are even capable of it. Susan Sontag insists that good camp can’t be intentional, but is instead a “delicate relation between parody and self-parody,” a “seriousness that fails” and thereby succeeds.
'A friend of mine, who believes that people are basically losing the ability to discriminate between reality and fiction...'
I wonder if that is simply what media does - attack the difference between reality and fiction, or perhaps also, exaggerate it - to make it an easier target - and then blow it to pieces. This is the case even, especially, for great literature, the only difference between that great literature also makes a particular argument for what that fiction is, whereas AI simply amplifies its basic fictionality ('fictiveness, fictioness', idk), rather than giving it form.
#4 hit home for me. I write first drafts by hand and alternate between editing on the screen and printed page. I doubt I'll ever rely solely on writing into the computer.
Sampler #2
this was really nice to read, thank you.
'A friend of mine, who believes that people are basically losing the ability to discriminate between reality and fiction...'
I wonder if that is simply what media does - attack the difference between reality and fiction, or perhaps also, exaggerate it - to make it an easier target - and then blow it to pieces. This is the case even, especially, for great literature, the only difference between that great literature also makes a particular argument for what that fiction is, whereas AI simply amplifies its basic fictionality ('fictiveness, fictioness', idk), rather than giving it form.
#4 hit home for me. I write first drafts by hand and alternate between editing on the screen and printed page. I doubt I'll ever rely solely on writing into the computer.