gonna post something right now. i posted this sometime late last year but something was wrong with the font i used so it just kind of slipped under the radar (maybe). i fixed it. its kind of long so, please enjoy a special episode of [m99], for ur viewing pleasure, here:
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fixed this up because im getting the book together, of the first batch of collected comics, today. its gonna be pretty long, like 200 pages or so. ill post about it but if you want me to put you on the list to hit up when its ready u can comment here or dm me (or email, whatever)
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i was sitting in an office recently and looked down at a table of magazines. one had a decorated cake on the cover. i asked myself: is it real, or AI? all images will now be run through this hermeneutic. this is, literally, “dehumanizing”: to deprive of positive human qualities.
once again the AI image conversation should be steered away from “is it good or bad?”, “is it cool or lame?” (subjective, no way to prove these) towards: what does it mean? what does it do? but this angle is less explosively polarizing and more difficult to get attention with.
one time i worked at a traveling art exhibition. it was billed as art from egyptian tombs, but it was actually recreations of the art found in egyptian tombs. this was crazy unethical but i got the job via a long convoluted process accidentally, then quit.
zygmunt bauman (modern social theorist) says that the constantly shifting and unclear nature of our time period also applies to interpersonal relationships: no one is quite sure what it means, specifically, to be a parent, a grandparent, a friend, a coworker, and so on.
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this sounds nonsensical at first - we can define all these terms easily: what a friend or grandparent is. but no one is clear on the obligations that these relationships entail, their day to day norms, what is expected, what assumptions are being made on either side: all unclear.
you see this a lot with present discussions about new parents looking to their parents to step into the role of grandparent. what does that look like, specifically? what is to be expected? this is a huge source of frustration and tension for many people, with no clear answer.
photos instead of paintings (all this was later removed):
this is one of my favorite image parings to show people. in person when you swipe back and forth you can sometimes see it rewire something in their brain about america. same room in the white house, before and after:
it looks like the AI conversation is going to cement around “are artists are coping or not” but id like to submit a second option: that its worthy of skepticism that my broke friends are beholden to copyright laws that apparently don’t apply to tech people making a lot of money
the AI question really should be: are we doing wild west on copyright laws or not. if we are, okay - then that should apply to everyone. if we’re not - okay, then that should apply to everyone. everyone is basically arguing that now tech companies get to be the exception to them.
if my friends can get cease and desist letters for making fanart about a movie or franchise when money gets involved but a guy can also make a billion dollars feeding that movie and franchise into his image maker and selling access to it, i dont think its out of line to ask: what
one key aspect of postmodernism is that art styles are self-consciously deployed as pastiche. this means theyre just used as surface, for what they represent: they become interchangeable. these almost meaningless academic concepts will increasingly characterize your everyday life
when an entire artistic milieu is used just for what it represents, not what it actually is (this already happened a long time ago), the blowback is that it becomes impossible to genuinely use and engage with those milieus. you can’t decide to not be self aware of this process.
this is, in my opinion, the actual origin of what is called “stuck culture”. to start a “nu-metal” band would be referencing what “nu-metal” is. you and the audience would both know that you’re aware of this. that awareness is the source of the “block” - everything is self aware.
the 'people not having kids' trend: fascinating. people can do whatever. but as a larger trend, clearly something is up. likewise, when i ask the older generation why they all had kids, they don't know. they "just did"
so i looked up why non-human animals might not breed
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one fascination i have with this topic is that it seems to be instinctual, thus the turn to animals. in my parents friend group, they all had kids around the same time. i (probably too much) grilled them about why they all did this and they all gave some version of "we just did"
that's "just what you did". okay. as though compelled by something beyond them. not religious, running the spectrum of affluence, no clear answer. likewise, despite the internet obsession with this, there's no clear answer. internet? maybe. politics? maybe. nothing great, imo.