Idle Thoughts on the St. Matthew Passion and Millennial Software -- 4/2/24 (Pt. IV)
Continued from:
I would much prefer the dynamics of a village, where stations are provided, or are available, evident, and clear to their purpose. Skill and talent are recognized between neighbors, rather than locked away in institutions or large corporations, where life becomes organized so that one’s efforts are slowly recognized by the institution, while remaining more or less entirely opaque to your community, save for what shows of wealth you can afford. I would prefer a world where heroes are local and their moral character and model intuitive. Instead, what we find prevails in our present method of organization, is the modality of unearned experience. From PlayStation to drug experiences, we have marketed far and wide the idea that it is worthwhile to be totally consumed in an experience, overwhelmed by the places it takes you, without any hope on the part of the experiencer that they will derive from it a lesson that can be recommended to their fellow man.
This is true of the worst species of fandom in sports. The sports obsessive, particularly if they are just a passive observer, is enthralled by the games, the media surrounding the games, and the individual personalities involved. Sports are an incredible amusement, but many Americans, particularly those who never received a superior signal about what a meaningful life is from their family, town, or nation, treat of professional sports like they are also participants in it, when really they are simply overwhelmed by the experience. This opens up a huge vector for sports betting, as it offers a financial indication about whether or not the experiencer’s experience is earned, which is not to say that they have derived a valuable insight when they win. Professional sports leagues can be viewed as a strange projection of the organization of American society write large. To have a token of one’s participation in the institution of the sports league, in the form of a winning wager, satisfies, in a sense, the desire to be acknowledged positively by important societal institutions, which many citizens never are. The town might have acknowledged the common man for his life and efforts. When too much of society gets bundled up in institutions, no such recourse presents itself, and it opens the door to societal ills of a high confection, such as our current modes of fandom and gambling.