Rec | ENGAGING CRITICALLY WITH MEDIA YOU DON'T LIKE

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engaging critically with media you don't like

Watched a three hour video essay today that I found insightful in some places, and genuinely enlightening and perspective altering in others, but also for the most part really infuriating and like it was missing the forest for the trees!!!! But sitting with that and thinking about WHY it rubbed me up the wrong way, where that was a genuine fault of the creator or something it was worth me getting uncomfortable about, as well as seeing genuinely insightful commentary about it in the comments section, has probably been good for my soul, even if my rambly Tumblr post about the stuff that bothered me probably needs to be deleted before too many people see it lmao. It's good to think deeply, and to be made to think deeply and critically!

@capybarareverie

3d ago

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@floodtheflowerpot

i love this, and i agree! i’ve sat through videos on youtube i disagreed with just to understand another viewpoint. i think the world will be a better place if we learn to listen to everyone even if we don’t agree with all they say!

3d ago

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thinking critically about how we consume media + Learning from it

as someone who’s realized they are chronically online (i hate it trust me), i’ve realized that all the media consumption really has caused me brain rot lol. with that being said, i’ve been trying to watch documentaries and movies that are normally out of my comfort zone to not only learn new things but also to help me with forming thoughts about *said* things because…sometimes i go with what people are saying online because a bunch of people are saying it (once again i hate it too trust me) all this to say, dont knock something till you try it - it’s good for your brain and your soul to develop opinions

@nicoledominique

Mar 2, 2024

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Critiquing something/someone only from a place of understanding

A brief anecdote to preface this (skip to get straight to the philosophy): Today a team member and I (building a business) met with an expert in his respective field to ask some questions. After a little explanatory back-and-forth, it was clear he had a complete lack of knowledge of our sector, and had only understood the description of our project on a superficial level. Nonetheless, he proceeded to spend most of the time “pushing back”, and therefore was unable to offer much insight that we could use. ———— Critique/judgment without understanding is invalid – period. This is confusing to some critics/would-be critics/people because they conflate the accumulation of knowledge with the skill of understanding. Let’s say you’re a music critic – you know lots of stuff about many kinds of music, many eras, etc. One day something comes along your desk, you pop it on, and it sounds a bit odd. You’ve never heard of the artist before… it sounds vaguely similar to something you know of – sure, let’s compare it to that, I guess. In this moment, you may not realize that you have a blindspot. Maybe you don’t yet understand the cultural or aesthetic movement this piece of music is born from because it doesn’t overlap with your breadth of knowledge (even if it’s very wide). Your prior knowledge may inform your ability to understand, but it doesn’t replace it. A real critic will take the time, as their duty, to understand as best they can before they make any critique. Anyone else isn’t a real critic. This goes for everything and everyone, not just professional or expert criticism. It’s true on an individual level, a social/cultural level, a political level, etc. Now especially, everyone’s a critic – and that’s both great and terrible/terrifying. Criticism/judgment are perfectly valid and useful forms of human expression if and only if you seek to understand beforehand. So, we can think about that from the perspective of giving criticism and, of course, receiving it. Being open to criticism is a massively important quality to develop, but if someone hasn’t made an effort to understand you/your idea, their critiques can go into the trash can. 🚮 ———— 🩵🩵

@solomonki

Jun 4, 2024

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nuance and DIALECTICAL thought are key

and that’s the problem, people sometimes lack the nuance that’s essential to well rounded critical thought and engagement. as an hbo prestige television enjoyer, i love a morally gray or even deplorable character as long as the subject material treats the character with the “don’t condemn OR condone” mentality. the same goes for literature imo. its also largely dependent on the context in which the work is being taught (not so much when it was made bc “it was a different time” usually ends up adding fodder to frustrating arguments). for example, junior year of high school i found it really odd that my white teacher decided to use of mice and men to chastise the use of the n word, to a class of mainly black students. very weird and also not the point of the book (but she got better after this and instilled a lot of good stuff in my brain). again, not to link this to the arts as a whole, but i feel the separating the art from the artist narrative exacerbates this as well. nothing is wrong with enjoying work from a morally dubious person but i think separating their art from their morals is a weird way of engaging with work. another example: a musician i really loved who was found out to have very off putting (borderline illegal) behavior towards women but from time to time i will play a song for old times sake. however when i listen, oftentimes i realize, yes these ARE the lyrics of a man who does not take rejection well. the work exists in the contexts of the authors morals but you aren’t and don’t need to be waving a flag saying “I CONDONE EVERYTHING IN THIS WORK”. all in all, a huge key to engaging with classic lit critically is being comfortable with (not sure comfortable is the best term. familiar, maybe?) with gray area and be ready to navigate accordingly.