http://disqus.com/by/s_future/enSun, 13 Jul 2008 22:28:48 -0000http://keithgessen.tumblr.com/post/41800251#comment-883697<p>(1) I don't think a definition of "social" should exclude saying unsettling and insulting things. Novels by definition have to be unsettling and insulting and gross, but it doesn't follow from that they have to be destructive to society on those grounds. Trusting someone enough to confess evil to them is probably good for the relationship, not bad; trusting society enough to write an evil novel likewise.</p><p>(2) I don't think the Internet makes people substantially less lonely. It's impossible to wholly forget while you're on the Internet that the Internet is essentially drugs and that there is no substitute for actual shared experience in "meatspace." ("meatspace"!) Even if you can order a fetish for home delivery off of Craigslist, there's some way in which it won't and can't fit the ideal narrative in your head--the narrative in which you're the type of person who creates a fetish-rich life for himself, not the type of person who has to pay for it, put it into language. Putting fetishes into language--which the nature of the Internet just demands; language is still the most efficient means of getting things across to folks--tends to destroy your fetishes. Cannibals are historically artists rather than writers for just this reason. Are there cannibal musicians, or do they just have it all figured out?</p><p>(PS hey this is the underground, what up)</p>s_futureSun, 13 Jul 2008 22:28:48 -0000