Elmo, 9/13

One specific quote/conversation that really stuck with me after class was, “so-called realistic representations can no longer evoke reality except as nostalgia or mockery” (Lyotard 40). This quote went along with the SNL skit mocking Sarah Palin and Hillary Clinton. After thinking about this I realized that so much of information we get concerning politics, or anything else for that matter, comes to us in the form of comedy. SNL has become very popular in US culture along with other shows such as The Chapelle Show or MadTV. All of these shows have become very mainstream and have acquired a large audience. Most of the time these shows will mock some sort of political figure and it comes off as comedy. Everyone seems to be able to relate to these shows because they take aspects of the truth or actual quotes said by a politician, or other popular figure, and spin it to make it comical. While some of the information is true, a lot of it also isn’t true. This is a problem because most people come to view these comedy sketches as reality.

Another part of our class discussion which I found very applicable to our daily lives was when we talked about new movies or books. The quote discussed was, “classicism seems to be ruled out in a world in which reality is so destabilized that it offers no occasion for experience but one for ratings and experimentation” (Lyotard 40). This applies to when there is a new film being advertised and the ad says “the best new summer blockbuster” or when a book is being advertised as “the next number one seller”. These ways of advertising are giving people a false reality; how does the advertiser know that his or her movie or book is going to be the best without even selling one ticket or one copy. They are selling something without even experiencing how it is actually is perceived in reality. I had never really thought of this before, but it actually really interesting how advertisers seem to do this.