Megan McArdle links to a post written by Julian "insufferably pretentious" Sanchez mocking someone who tweeted through an opera performance. This is the same man that tweeted through the McArdle/Suderman wedding, along with the rest of the party. Then they wrote posts about how special it was to twitter the wedding and share it with friends.
If it's okay to tweet through a wedding reception, surely it's okay to tweet through the opera. Unless you just want to call someone a dick to emphasize your aesthetic purity.
Look, fussing with your phone constantly—even on “minimum brightness”—is kind of a dick move at any performance, but it’s borderline sacrilegious when it comes to Wagner, whose genius was in creating such an absolutely immersive experience through the fusion of music and drama. Which makes little intrusions from your neighbors that break the spell about a thousand times more grating.
Whereas twittering during a wedding reception is just fine.
But maybe we are wrong, and it was a blessing to have the DC blogging world hunched over their tiny electronics instead of regaling the wedding guests with monologues about how The Fountainhead changed their lives, or describing the time they kicked ass in Bloggingheads.
Rhyme Of The Ancient Mariner cloud from here.
Funny, I mentioned people talking throughout a Wagner opera not long ago. (You damn kids keep out of my opera house! And theater! And movie theater!)
ReplyDeleteI view twittering during a wedding reception a bit differently than twittering during an opera, play or film, because things are more chaotic and free-form then. Twittering during the actual ceremony - apart from the couple doing it to be cute, or if they encourage it - is pretty bad. (Maybe it's horrible regardless.) Even so, I think it's sad that anyone would forego an actual experience to blather about a supposed experience. It's not exactly Zen or Be Here Now, is it? Still, I suppose it's par for the course for glibertarians – they don't know much about real life beyond the cloistered gates, and pretend(or actually think) Ayn Rand's crappily-written, self-absorbed, sociopathic rigged demos reflect reality. They've never shown any interest in real life before, so why start now? Or, as Warren Beatty said of Madonna, "What's the point if it's not on camera?"
Okay, Susan, I think we have the makings of a new reality show... Last Galt Standing, where glibertarians fight to be the last one in Atlas House, but aren't allowed to stay and "mooch" unless they're pulling their weight paying rent, by doing a series of grueling, minimum wage jobs... Things go south when Megan McArdle breaks down into Randian glossolalia ("Free markets! Think of the bankers!") and stabs Will Wilkinson with her custom-made Himalayan corkscrew.
John Stossel could host.
@ Batocchio:
ReplyDeleteNow, that's a reality show I might actually be willing to watch.
I have to agree with the first part of Batocchio's post -- a wedding reception is basically just a big party. Tweeting during it may be a bit odd compared to interacting with the actual people that are standing around you, but isn't nearly as rude as using your phone to send text messages while you're at the opera, or in a movie theater, or some other type of performance. I might could even see a case for twittering a reception for the benefit of friends who were unable to attend -- but I can't imagine any of McMegan's gliberatian friends being, for instance, unable to come up with the money for an airline ticket to her wedding if they had been invited.
-JCfromNC
Yes, a thousand times yes to "Last Galt Standing."
ReplyDelete