During our discussion about Lydia Millet’s essay I was surprised to hear how many people disagreed with the line, “if I played a Mekons album for a friend and it met with indifference… I would be forced to dismiss not only the musical tastes of the friend in question, but, in all likelihood, the immortal soul…” Some people in the class felt that this came off as snobbish, as if Millet was suggesting that if a person did not like the Mekons then they were stupid or had poor taste. However, I think that what Millet feels is a sense of pity for people who cannot hear The Mekons like she does. I feel that everyone has something that they enjoy immensely but can’t interest others in.
I identified with Millet’s feeling of pity; accept instead of a band it is a TV show called Arrested Development. I find Arrested Development to be an insanely clever and funny show, but growing up I would constantly try to show it to my family and would be met with blank stares. Neither my parents nor my brother and sister could find anything remotely funny about the show. This totally perplexed me, I consider everyone in my family to be intelligent and have good taste, but time after time I would watch episodes with them, both individually and as a group, and I would see the jokes just bounce off their heads like tennis balls. Eventually, I just accepted that Arrested Development was something that my family did not find funny and I genuinely pity them for not being able to enjoy it like I do.
I was one of the people that thought the quote was snobbish, but you made a good argument and convinced me otherwise. Nice job tying the idea of that quote in with a personal experience.
ReplyDeleteI think I said in class (as I ignored the exaggeration of the essay, as I will still continue to do) that mentioning ‘the immortal soul’ in context to judgement is one of those things that implies quite a bit. Even dimming down the feel of “you must be a bad person” she mentioned distrust at some point in a very iffy way - one that goes past simply pitying them.
ReplyDeleteWhat you have with Arrested Development, the feel actually is pity over distrust or dislike. That said, to feel bad for someone because they cannot appreciate something isn’t quite a thing to grin at, save for cases of crippling mental or physical disability (and even that would be not having the potential to appreciate something, rather than lacking enjoyment). Pitying someone because they won’t even try to appreciate something is understandable - it’s close-mindedness on their parts, instead of on yours.