Recently I’ve encountered a number of people who determine someone’s intelligence or taste through their enjoyment of some sort of art or media that is acknowledged as being… well, enjoyable.
And every single time I find that the accuser has either poor taste themselves, or no taste of their own because they opted to let their likes and dislikes be dictated by their perception of the culture around them.
Some common examples of experiences that are frowned upon by these self-proclaimed experts of consumer culture include:
- Thinking Garden State is a moving film
- Not yet being “totally over” Justice
- Having a visceral reaction to Fight Club
- Enjoying, in general, the works of Chuck Palahniuk
- Being unabashedly happy with joyful things
- Being moved in any way from Avatar
- Lady GaGa
Of course I enjoyed Garden State. I was an upper-middle class high school student when it came out. Of course I thought that Fight Club was cathartic in its anti-consumerist themes, because I am an idealist American male whose rat race ennui was swelling before my toes even touched the starting line. Of course I like to dance to Phoenix. That is the kind of music that Phoenix plays.
The sort of person who that says I’m wrong or puerile or uneducated because I enjoy any of the aforementioned things designed for my enjoyment (and let’s be absolutely clear, all of these things were designed for my enjoyment) strikes me as the same sort who in elementary school clapped their hands right in front of my face then pointed and laughed and said “Hahah, you blinked!”.
Hahah, you responded to stimuli! What a dweeb.
Of course things that are happy make me happy.
Pretty sure that’s how it works.
I’m tired of pretending to care about the cultural metadata of my likes and dislikes. If you’re the kind of person whose opinions of me are formed by not the content or intention of my tastes but by your understanding of their public perception, then you’re probably not the kind of person whose opinions I respect anyway.
I’m done apologizing for what I like. And if you’re going to use things that make me happy as ammunition to make me feel bad for any reason at all, then I’m probably not gonna hang out with you. Have fun being ironic, disingenuous and unhappy. I’ll be over here enjoying myself. And probably dancing.
