A new progressivism, one that embraces construction over obstruction, must find new allegories to think about technology and the future
Black Mirror fails to consistently explore the duality of technology and our reactions to it. It is a critical deficit. The show mimics the folly of Icarus and Daedalus – the original tech bros – and the hubris of Jurassic Park’s Dr Hammond. Missing are the lessons of the Prometheus myth, which shows fire as a boon for humanity, not doom, though its democratization angered benevolent gods. Absent is the plot twist of Pandora’s box that made it philosophically useful: the box also contained hope and opportunity that new knowledge brings. While Black Mirror explores how humans react to technology, it too often does so in service of a dystopian narrative, ignoring Isaac Asimov’s observation: that humans are prone to irrationally fear or resist technology.
I googled the author, he’s a Tech Bro pretending to be a media critic. Shame on The Guardian for publishing this moronic clickbait guff.
I would say the guy clearly doesn’t understand the most basic concepts of fiction, except I suspect he probably does but is ignoring them in order to push his agenda.
That’s very much what the Opinion section in the Guardian is all about: an all comers free-for-all written by anyone who cares to submit a piece. Generally unrelated their news journalism and general mission/ideology.
I see why they do it: opposing views and so on. But in the current society of headlines are everything, knee jerk reactions, polarisation and the idea of a middle ground being treason, etc, we get “Why are the Guardian saying x?!” 🤷♂️
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The term op-ed is literally short for “opposite the editorial page”, and the idea is that it is an opportunity for opposing viewpoints to be brought into the discussion for consideration. The fact that the author is a moron does not besmirch the quality of the Guardian writ large.
Despite him being a tech bro and everything, I do think we need more shows like Star Trek these days to show us what a functional future with technology could look like. I think the only examples we see any more in popular culture are dystopian, and I think we are starting to believe that those are the only possible outcomes of the path we are on. Even Star Trek these days is pretty dark.
We need to again try to imagine a world in which the better half of humanity succeeds.
It’s a shame the nu-Trek is utter mass appeal apolitical dogshit that has nothing to say about anything except that Alex Kurtzman should not be let anywhere near a production of anything other than a Big Mac.
EDIT: By the way, if anybody is looking for something with the same sort of tight drama, clever storytelling and progressive politics (but not virtue signaling for its own sake) and confronting complicated issues and good people doing what’s right overcoming them, but would also like it to be a bit more human, down to earth and character centric then trek veteran writer of TNG and DS9 - Ronald D. Moore and I - his biggest fan girl this side of the internet - would like to invite you to watch For All Mankind.
It is an alternate history show where the soviets “win” the race to the moon and the space race continues and every season is set in a new decade, or at least that is the tagline because underneath the goofy premise and out of context clips of the sea dragon or nuclear space planes or AK-47s wielded by cosmonauts on the moon, what you’ll find is a tightly written complex drama about an ensemble cast of characters and their changing relationships to themselves, each other and the tumultous world around them.
The show covers everything from the consequences of operation paperclip, misoginy, red scare and cold war distrust to civil rights, feminism, yuppie culture, privatisation of space, startup culture, homophobia, labour unions, psychedelics, PTSD, opioids, threat of nuclear war, militarization and so, so much more.
I really can’t say enough good things about it. Oh yeah - the licensed song choice is great. Petula Clark’s The World Song, M83, Smashing Pumpkins, John Lennon screaming his lungs out in ‘Well Well Well’? And that earworm song from actual IRL North Korea which is the first and only song I’ve ever heard of theirs? If only they didn’t use ‘Come as You Are’ but oh well nothing’s perfect.
The first season is a bit rough in places at the start as the show finds it’s footing and the stupid generically modern intro animation and music really sucks but S2 is an actual masterpiece of TV.
eh they try to be political they just suck at it.
That’s a relatively new phenomenon. All tech media was positive and the stuff of dreams until around the 2010s. Because we were seeing a steady and noticeable shift in the power dynamics. We were being pulled deeper under a capitalist nightmare instead of flying in a techno futuristic dreamscape. We couldn’t see anything but the piling negative aspects of our technology: it’s killing us, it’s enslaving us, its being used to spy on us, we’re being told it’s a wonder but we keep finding out it’s a horror. This isn’t on us for not being enlightened enough to see asimov’s words. We’re too aware of the active manipulation and torture. They made us the product, and they made the things we bought spy machines and tools of manipulation and deception.
We need to create better, freer tech, free from the oligarchs currently wringing us all dry while they build their multimillion dollar doomsday bunkers with the money they’re stealing from us if we are going to build the better world in which the better half of humanity succeeds. Art imitates life. And currently they’re outsourcing art to the oligarchs machines that are 10000x worse for the planet and the power dynamics.
There’s been plenty of negative portrayals of new technology throughout the history of sci-fi. Heck, the very first one is usually considered to be “Frankenstein”, and it’s all about how new technology can backfire spectacularly.
I think the problem is not the existence of negative portrayals, but the absence of positive ones. There aren’t a lot of shows for folks who want to see a positive view of the future, where technology solves problems rather than always being the source of them. That used to be the domain of things like Star Trek but modern Star Trek is a pale shadow that no longer paints a particularly rosy view of humanity’s future. The Orville took up that mantle, I suppose, but it’s stretched pretty thin.
Hard to imagine when reality keeps showing otherwise.
At the end of the day, the future is written by human beings, and unless we have a collective vision of where we are trying to go, the darker forces among us will take control and do as they wish with us.
Yes, I loved classic Trek for showing a better a future, where humans have moved beyond our greed, prejudice, and self-destructive tendencies. That was the through line in TOS and TNG, even if it wasn’t always 100% on-point and didn’t always age well (you need to view TOS in its historical context to get past the baked-in 1960s sexism, for example).
There’s a place for cautionary tales, and there’s a place for aspirational tales.
I liked Discovery well enough for what it was, but I hated its picture of a future where good humans are the exception rather than the rule.
Nowadays, I think solarpunk is where its at.
Yeah similar to what Vince Gilligan said, we need to make more stories about good people, because the media illiterate just start glamorizing the bad characters and completely miss the point
I’ll take pessimist takes on technology over calling everything porn any day.
The show’s name is Black Mirror, not Black/White Mirror. Of course it’s the monkey’s paw of tech.
…ok…was it ever supposed to? For fucks sake, some people are so far up their own ass you’d swear they could see daylight again.
This felt like reading about someone who complains that The Daily Show doesn’t have enough positive news stories on it. Dark Mirror fills a niche that people look for, it’s not something that making people think a certain way.
And no mention at all of San Junipero. I guess that would break selling it as pessimism porn when there’s examples otherwise.
The very episode that’s shown in the thumbnail had a happy ending where the crew used his own tech against him
I haven’t seen the sequel to it yet, and sort of was fine leaving it open-ended. I can see how there are dark parts to that episode, mainly from sticking with Dark Mirror’s premise that tech can be used badly. It also paints a not-so-great picture of the real people, hero worship, maybe the gaming industry? The sim copies seem to make out the best of anyone. Definitely a favorite, if I’d rate it on dark vs. positive, it’s 8/10 positive, whereas San Junipero was a 10/10 in the end. Actually San was a 9/10, as it did show that some used the tech there as escape and didn’t grow like the main characters finally did.
Hang the DJ also had a pretty positive ending too.
If anything what we need right now is a more skeptical look at the past and the future as people are trying to sell us utopian visions of either as the solution to all our problems.
Yes the future was on Black Mirrors’ shoulders
It’s not fictions job to sell your latest rentier extraction tool. The news media already does it by reprinting PR releases just be grateful for that.
If you want a positive view of the future any startup has the power to make one at any time. Then when you don’t get funding you’ll see where the real problem lies.
Because every piece of media ever created has to show a balanced view of the idealistic potential of humanity and should never be allowed to emphasize one side over the other… right?
Stephen King enters the chat
As a species we tend to always exceed the most sadistic-pessimistic fictional scenarios (through sheer hard work & determination).
So shit like this is prob overly optimistic sci-fi, give it some time.
