"Contemporary parties, for example, are almost always based on consumption—of food, drink, drugs, sports, or other forms of entertainment. We recognize them as frivolous. This sort of fun really doesn’t matter, and neither do the friendships based on fun. Does anybody ever become close by partying together? Actually, I don’t think that joint consumption is even fun. It only passes the time painlessly by covering up a lack, and leaves us feeling all the more empty. The significance of the superficiality of our social leisure becomes apparent when we contrast that sort of “fun” with a very different activity, play. Unlike joint consumption, play is by nature creative. Joint creativity fosters relationships that are anything but superficial. But when our fun, our entertainment, is itself the object of purchase, and is created by distant and anonymous specialists for our consumption (movies, sports contests, music), then we become consumers and not producers of fun. We are no longer play-ers. play is the production of fun; entertainment is the consumption of fun. [1]
Contexts
[1] The Ascent of Humanity, by Charles Eisenstein
Tags
#notecard (See: The Notecard System)
#ascent-of-humanity (See: The Ascent of Humanity)
#index (See: #index)