Rant that occurs while waiting alone and drunk for supposedly the best pizza ever and looking at stupid pictures of Eminem and watching basketball

I find myself caring about this stupid shit. And I'm not sorry, it is stupid shit. Perfectly constructed characterizations based upon statistical findings about the public coma that has settled on the vast majority of the first world population.

I know it's easy to relate to these people we see on TV. Of course it is; that's the way they are designed. The more relatable, the more interesting (in the most formulaic sense of interesting) the setup is, the more people that watch it, the more money that is made from ad revenues. Duh. It's as though everything is a ploy and we're not just victims of it, we become the perpetrators of it through out complete belief in it and surrender to it. Ironically, reality TV is set up to be just the opposite, with its grotesque portrayal of everyday life taken as somehow candid and believable. And I enjoy it. Of course I do. I have a hard time being strong enough to resist it, considering my receptiveness, but Jesus Christ, I really fucking should. There's absolutely no fucking reason that I should be feeling sorry for the nice girl in the Office or the shrink in Bones or even the feminist in Community. Because as nuanced and complex as they seem to be, they are really cartoons. Without a doubt. The viewer must be either entirely sympathetic to them or laughing cynically at them. It's the winning equation. And it's the human condition to have this strange sense of community--we're the weirdest herd animal that has ever existed. We simultaneously pit ourselves against one another and become obsessed with one another. We need to be around friends and crowds and need validation of sorts in various ways, and we need the serenity of isolation that being by ourselves provides us.

It's like media does its job: to be a mediating force between individuals and the society to which they belong. And that is exactly the point at which we need to fight it. It does the important work for us and creates for us meaningless tasks to replace those important things with--to satisfy our chemical impulses and philosophical questions that have lost their original ends, as we surrender our decision-making to an artificial intelligence that we ourselves have created.

Which is the exact definition of a drug. It's fucking worse than any drug a person will take in her lifetime. Because she's forced to be on it 24-7 and it's the very fringe not to be, and no one is telling her there's anything wrong with it. It's perfectly normal and healthy to be not just addicted, but absorbed in it, according to our education.

I need another glass of whisky.