The 'Explain The Appeal Of......' Thread

[Vilageidiotx]

Whats the appeal of Sargon Of Akkad?

@Dynamo Frokane

He founded the city of Babylon and created the first empire in human history. That's some pretty big shit.

[ScreenAcne]

@Dynamo Frokane

Agreed. Most of the commentators who describe themselves as classical liberal don't really say anything original. Not like the one who are typically more right wing who tend to have more personality and say interesting shit.

and waaaay more shit talking.

Sargon is a lot like the Britisher. An obscure English guy who think he is a classical liberal. I'm half convinced that Sargon is what you get if you put a normal English guy in the oven of youtube commentary scene and take him out a few big events later.

He used to be a bit of a parrot, politically. way back but slowly balanced himself out. Still gets a bit iffy. He won't give a shit if he agrees with the argument but slap conservative or labor on it and the partisan politics still buried deep in his brain start bubbling up.

But he speaks clearly. Can make a point. Posts content regularly and generally is tolerable in character and he's one of the few portals people have to English politics because honestly...people barely want to fucking look up their own politics, yet alone look up foreign politics. So he got a bit of a double crowd there. There aren't a lot of English commentators, or well. one that don't look like they are filming with equipment from 1999 and speak with an accent so thick that anyone who isn't a Northern pig farmer will not understand them.

[Vilageidiotx]

I only saw a couple of videos Sargon did, and in them he was going after low hanging fruit. And that's part of my problem with how so many of these youtube pundit types operate - they never like getting into the guts, they just stay on the surface of the issues and come off like political cheerleaders rather than, like, intellectuals of any sort.

[pugbutter]

Yeah, Sargon has no charisma at all, and his insistence on "picking the low-hanging fruit" is definitely a part of that. He wants to say nothing which any of his fanbase can disagree with; he doesn't want to alienate any of the "rationals" in his audience through division of opinion, so he just says sweepingly generalized shit like "feminism is bad" and then rakes in the Likes and the Patreon money.

Sargon to the redpill is basically the first dose you've ever taken of your favorite drug: very small and controlled, but eventually opening the gateway to other, better channels. Or addiction, whatever.

MisterMetokur is far more interesting and entertaining to watch in just about every regard. Aurini is smart too, but he puts people off with the presentation of his ideas (the toy skull on his shelf, the cigarettes and watery whiskey, the ridiculous fashion sense). He's also one of the worst film editors I've ever seen, but when his videos are static shots of him just sitting in a chair and talking, he's pretty fucking sharp. Uh, Rags is turning out to be pretty decent, though he still lacks the charisma which makes MM's shitposting great.

[Dinh AaronMk]

Since we're talking about YouTube political commentators I've mostly stumbled on the fun world of far-left commentary through mostly through the far-left may-may side of YouTube.

Hider

Granted, the main guy I came into it through doesn't have the best microphone quality around, but I get the impression he's not neccesarily doing it for the following and just doing it because he talks to the few people who follow him so he might do stuff like this to provide an overlook on his broader views of particular topics for everyone between general memery.

[pugbutter]

@Dinh AaronMk It's pretty frightening to see people who genuinely, passionately believe in Socialism as a viable political system. Yikes.

Though I'm sure enough people on this shithole planet think the same of me for having voted Trump.

[Dinh AaronMk]

@Dinh AaronMk It's pretty frightening to see people who genuinely, passionately believe in Socialism as a viable political system. Yikes.

Though I'm sure enough people on this shithole planet think the same of me for having voted Trump.

@pugbutter

Are you saying this from the perspective that "Socialism means the government does some things, communism means government does all the things" perspective of milque toast thought?

[pugbutter]

I mean it in the context of people in the comments section using the word "bourgeoisie" unironically, kek.

[Dinh AaronMk]

I mean it in the context of people in the comments section using the word "bourgeoisie" unironically, kek.

@pugbutter

Well at the same time to left-wing thought there is only two distinctions of people: those who labor, and those who own the capital made by those who labor; or the bourgeoisie. This is versus the web of often-times arbitrary social and class distinctions of center-left and right-wing Idpol.

And in the far-left there are plenty of ways approaching how to reconcile and render irrelevant the worker-owner class and privilege distinction.

[Vilageidiotx]

I mean it in the context of people in the comments section using the word "bourgeoisie" unironically, kek.

@pugbutter

I've seen the word used in non-Marxist economic texts to describe rent-seeking. The major difference is that Marxists don't peel off entrepreneurial capitalism as meaningfully separate from rent seeking. It does recognize that there is a difference, its just that Marxist critique is so cynical about the entire process that the difference is almost seen as moot.

[Dolerman]

Following the trend of youtubers, can someone give me the appeal of Angry Joe (reviews)? again nothing against the guy, he just doesn't seem to be doing anything original or clever.

[Dinh AaronMk]

@Dynamo Frokane

The best sort of thing I can say about him without having done much looking into him is that having some sort of cynicism is seen as being the cool thing. Anything or anyone seen as angry over it might be looked up to by some as not a sell-out to the thing they're reviewing because it implies - per their brand - they're angry at it or something in it somewhere and a review that focuses itself first on the negatives balances out whatever bias might arise from it being perceived as 'mainstream' or good because it's 'popular'.

But again: I don't know much about him and this is all guesswork on my part having before watched some videos from the 'angry' sort of channel. In general I tend to avoid any individual or group that considers themselves a "reviewer" since more often than not they don't actually delve into any topics academically and exist to uphold some crowd self-image (IE: PC Master Race). They'll say something is bad and then either get lost arguing why it is or won't go anywhere into it. They exist for the validation of people like themselves by appearing - if indirectly - as a non-biased expert in the field because they're not "the other guys"; the Brietbart of video gaming journalism I suppose.

[Dolerman]

Whats the appeal of dave rubin? he has a lot of guests on but what does he offer apart from being friendly?

[Chrononaut]

Now answer me this.

Can someone explain the appeal of Game of Thrones? Song of Ice and Fire?

The only thing I've heard about it is that people die a lot in it, when people least expect it. Why would I willingly get myself into a journey where I know that people I'll start liking will get killed off left and right? What's the point in that? It feels like I would be subjecting myself to torture. What's the appeal in that?

@PlatinumSkink

I'm very late on the bandwagon here, but I think that Game of Thrones is popular primarily because A: It's dark, edgy, and scandalous and B: It has a tv show, which is easier to digest than literary fiction (it would take at least 20 hours to read one 1,000 page book), which leads to more interest in the book version for people who don't read anything that doesn't have a visual equivalent. Also, the fact the prose is poor and basic, somewhat like a dollar-store version of Steven Kings writing, makes it easier to read.

Oh also people have shit taste. That's probably the real reason.

[Erklings25]

What is the appeal of Chuck Bass! I mean, really internet? Come on!

[Lucian]

K-Pop, K-Dramas, and obsession with South Korean culture in general. I don't understand. There's nothing wrong with the culture in and of itself, but to obsess over it the way some people do... why?

[SleepingSilence]

@Lucian I'm very very inexperienced with K-Pop and other things of its kind. But I'm almost guaranteeing it's a similar reason people like wrestling. It's cheesy, and people love their cheese. I only really know of two K-Pop songs I like. Really, if you like pop music in general...it's pretty much the same kind of brainless fun/electronica you'd get anywhere else. Also just like the Japanese thinking speaking English sounds cool, some may like the language barrier. Some people like the concept of learning about others cultures, so they can get engulfed in them. Least my two cents.

I'll start light with a music question, What exactly is the appeal of "Post" genre. Post-Rock for instance, I've yet to really wrap my head around bands like it. Exactly what does it do unique to other genres...and what would you do to convince people that it was a genre worth listening to?

[tanderbolt]

Post-rock is a strange name for what is essentially a cousin to ambient music that happens to employ rock instruments. It is appealing for the same reasons ambient music is, it's about building music by focusing on atmosphere and timbre instead of melody or rhythm. So you get long songs that evoke feelings and let you sink into them instead of the usual verse-chorus structure, plus the bands have some inventive uses of guitar effects or other instruments. Although it's not universal, a lot of post-rock songs are structured around building up over time to reach an epic finale, and the anticipation of the slow build up draws the listener in. This is something that is harder to find in other ambient music, but common in places like classical music from the romantic era. Now, while all of these separate it from most typical rock music, there are plenty of other genres that have similar characteristics. I mentioned ambient as one of the closest cousins, but you can find it in classical (especially minimalist stuff), cool jazz and other places.

[SleepingSilence]

Post-rock is a strange name for what is essentially a cousin to ambient music that happens to employ rock instruments. It is appealing for the same reasons ambient music is, it's about building music by focusing on atmosphere and timbre instead of melody or rhythm. So you get long songs that evoke feelings and let you sink into them instead of the usual verse-chorus structure, plus the bands have some inventive uses of guitar effects or other instruments. Although it's not universal, a lot of post-rock songs are structured around building up over time to reach an epic finale, and the anticipation of the slow build up draws the listener in. This is something that is harder to find in other ambient music, but common in places like classical music from the romantic era. Now, while all of these separate it from most typical rock music, there are plenty of other genres that have similar characteristics. I mentioned ambient as one of the closest cousins, but you can find it in classical (especially minimalist stuff), cool jazz and other places.

@tanderbolt

Yeah, I had a feeling, "post-" had similarities with ambiance music because that is stuff that my brains just doesn't gravitate toward. (Though I do like jazz and classical elements in music, it usually it seems less simple.) Something what you said, I think you 100% right but at the same time, throwing a question for that. When you said, "Post music is usually music that slowly builds up to an epic finale." I feel that's a spot on analysis. But doesn't Prog already do that? I guess instead of a complex and layered build, you get a minimalist path instead? I guess I kind of wrap my around that.

[tanderbolt]

<Snipped quote by tanderbolt>

Yeah, I had a feeling, "post-" had similarities with ambiance music because that is stuff that my brains just doesn't gravitate toward. (Though I do like jazz and classical elements in music, it usually it seems less simple.) Something what you said, I think you 100% right but at the same time, throwing a question for that. When you said, "Post music is usually music that slowly builds up to an epic finale." I feel that's a spot on analysis. But doesn't Prog already do that? I guess instead of a complex and layered build, you get a minimalist path instead? I guess I kind of wrap my around that.

@SleepingSilence

Progressive rock does do the epic buildup, but in my experience they still do it less often than post-rock bands. While there are bands that avoid it (and genre snobs like to attack newbies who assume every band does it), I'd bet you could legitimately say that half of Explosions in the Sky's discography is songs like that, probably a similar percentage for Mono. The real difference is the way that they build in intensity. Progressive rock likes build up with techniques like adding new harmonies, developing the melodies, or giving the band members oppurtunities for virtuosic solos. Post-rock buildups like to keep the same basic melody and build the intensity through increasing the volume, adding more distortion and just sheer repetition of the same basic themes. Rather than have change the theme into something more complex and epic, they take the same theme and try to play it as powerfully as they can. Here's an example of the difference. Prog style: , starting at the nine minute mark, they build in intensity by adding layers through soloing over the same basic theme.
Post-rock style: , at 9:37 and for about a whole minute afterwards, the band takes the same music and keeps increasing the volume or adding very minor touches. If you like classical music, it's sort of like difference between Romantic composers and minimalists