A Good Reminder: Out of Frame
FEE’s content always feels way more relevant to me than it should be. This video practically sums up what I’m about as a creative.
I don’t know when it happened exactly, but “Showing the world as it is” went from being an explanation for why some art and media are so gritty, to just being a throw away line for depressed, immoral, Malthusian apes and other crazy people to heap tons of demoralizing crap in our faces.
We Know
Trust me, we all know how twisted, myopic, selfish, and jaw droppingly cruel people can be. Cramming that singular idea and nothing else down people’s throats is pushing our collective worldview squarely into the negative, and making us more susceptible to some of the worst, most evil ideas imaginable.
I’ve personally known several people–I’m sure you have, too, people thinking they’ve got some great insight into mankind, casually promoting the widespread destruction of millions of people. You know, the inconvenient, disagreeable people. Whomever they happen to be.
That sounds eerily familiar, doesn’t it?
Look at all of these people.
Each of them is slowly being conditioned to see the others as statistics at best, and an active, existential problem that needs dealing with at worst. That’s where the media is pushing us. It’s past time to turn around.
What To Do?
That other tangent has been brought up a million times by far more adroit people than me; I’m mainly interested in FEE’s suggestion of how to push back against all of that negativity, nihilism, and assorted Malthusian garbage.
It’s been said a lot in recent years, and I’m repeating it here: Make your own media.
That’s the way forward now.
FEE pointed out that it was bad writing that makes morally principled, virtuous, and unshakably upbeat characters boring, and they’re absolutely right. It’s far easier to write a morally gray or detestable character your audience will find interesting than the aforementioned.
The people responsible for modern entertainment in the west are in their element and they’re not coming out of it. That means anyone else with the means and the will all have an opportunity to step up and offer something different.
Thankfully, that movement has been underway for years already.
My Part
I’m also one of those people, but I’m starting out alone, so it’ll be a while before I’ve got enough content and connections to make any sort of meaningful impact on … well, anything. That’s okay. I know who I am and what I’m about. That alone keeps me going.
FEE’s latest video was a good reminder to me of at least part of what I’m trying to do, not to mention some of the reasons why.
Media is getting uglier and uglier, and too often it’s for the sake of morbid curiosity, political activism, or for the sake of ugliness itself. Trying to steer clear of that takes some inner discipline; I’m pretty cynical and worn down myself, so it’s not like this demoralized view of humanity doesn’t resonate with me at all.
It’s just one-sided and demonstrably wrong.
So for my part, I take on the challenge of following my principles while creating anything and everything I can. I want to show the world as it truly is. The Good, the Beautiful, and the True, not this thinly veiled societal sabotage.
On that note, I want to mention Lydia’s Golden Treasury. Chapter 2: The Lyre of Binding, is going to be a very good prelude to The Atoning Mirror, and more and more I’m glad I decided to rearrange the chapters the way I’m doing. Recently, I felt like Enya’s internal struggle in The Atoning Mirror, while foreshadowed, still happened too quickly in the overall story. The new preceding chapter will delve into her past and help bring her desires and goals to the forefront ahead of time.
Enya is one of those morally upright characters FEE mentioned, though she leans sharply toward the goody two-shoes end of the spectrum. It’s important to make her story interesting without putting a gun in her hand or having her physically or figuratively shove someone to their doom. It’s not just her, either. Lydia’s Golden Treasury is full of virtuous people: Lydia, Irving, Haul, Ishmael, etc. They all warrant that same treatment.
Closing
“The Good, the Beautiful, and the True.”
I keep that phrase close to my heart, and I want to check all of those boxes with each story I craft. Won’t be easy. Won’t even necessarily be fun half the time, but I must create. That’s been my drive since I was little, and it’ll be my drive forever. I’m going to get distracted, held back, attacked eventually, and more, but I must create.
