As nearly every reviewer has noted, the movie is bad – and the movie is bad because the book was bad. “The film and book need Appalachia to be poor, broken, and dirty, because they depend on us believing that the mountains are somewhere we want Vance to escape. They need to frame poverty as a moral failing of individuals—as opposed to systems—because they have to imply that something about Vance’s character allowed him to get away from his hillbilly roots. Hillbilly Elegy has to simplify the people and problems of Appalachia, because it has decided to tell the same old pull-yourself-up-by-your-bootstraps narrative that so many of us reject.” – The Atlantic
Tag: 11.29.20
Theatres Are Saving A Christmas Carol
Did … did it need saving? Well, perhaps the theatres do; it’s been such a large money maker for theatres in the U.S. for, well, many years. Now, as the holiday season kicks into high gear, theatres “are using every contagion-reduction strategy they have honed during the coronavirus pandemic: outdoor stagings, drive-in productions, street theater, streaming video, radio plays and even a do-it-yourself kit sent by mail.” – The New York Times
What Our Robots Tell Us About Ourselves
Building robot versions of oneself is a thing people do a lot now, and in part because there are robots everywhere online. The majority of web traffic is driven by bots, which can send and reply to emails, answer security questions, post comments, tweet, chat, and more. Last year, Twitter estimated that up to 23 million active accounts may be automated bots. – The Atlantic