People ask me to blog and write down my thoughts all the
time, and replies like yours is why I won't bother. Nobody
reads, and ultimately, the best points go unread or misunderstood.

>much less a blog -- so where do they fit into your 'the show
>only exists because of hyper-responsive internet culture'
>narrative?

Like Walleye alluded to, there are/haven been dozens of
shows that do the exact same thing as 'Girls', even better,
on free television.

'Girls' is not groundbreaking because of the dialogue.
Its not groundbreaking because of the characters.

It doesn't win Golden Globes because its a fun show about
women or tells us anything interesting about anything.

The controversy is 95% of the reason that the show is
on HBO to begin with.

To your female friends who watch the show: sort of my
point. If you put a show with a bunch of dumb white
women who talk about dick, it will attract millions of
views off jump, just because.

Hell, Jersey Shore's ratings went through the root just
because people like to see meatheads fight and fuck.

So that people watch it isn't really the point (its ratings
actually aren't that great). Of course some people will
watch it.

The question is why the show exists to begin with, why it
got an HBO slot, why its constantly being written about,
and why I have to waste my time debating dumb shit like
this.

Its remained popular because its creator is the child of NY
art royalty, and automatically attracted a gathering of high
brow fan/critics from the beginning:

The people who liked it called it "generation-defining" and
handed it a Golden Globe.

The people who disliked it called it offensive and indicative
of everything wrong with post-racial America.

^This is what the show is really about. The show is about
discussing what the show is about.

Let's compare it to an old show...like...'Living Single', 15
years ago.

In all seriousness, it told a much more provocative story
about a fascinating demographic:

African-American women in Clinton's America, the first time this
demographic made true professional strides in the history of
this country. This happened concurrent with the War on Drugs/end
of the War on Drugs, which created a vaccum of African-American male
counterparts, which fed an increasingly unsuccessful dating
dynamic between black men and women (that persists).

'Living Single'-lifestyle women were relatively rare in the
90s. Now there are cities with buildings full of single black
women with law and business degrees, all with wild stories
of unsuccessful dating escapades.

So this has been done before. Its been done with other white women
in shows. Its been done with men and women with shows.

The reason these shows didn't end up on HBO is because they were
about being watched, not being discussed, and didn't have the
arthouse starpower to attract a critical mass (and I mean "critical"
in the denotative sense). That is what 'Girls' has that other
shows does not have. The controversy.

And that is why it wins 'Golden Globes'.


>is it *that* impossible to believe that there is a slice of
>society that really, really responds to what Lena Dunham is
>pushing in that show without having to freak out about the
>'response' to it?

Absolutely not. There's a huge slice of society that will
pay $20.00 to watch Snookie talk about her struggles with
body image.

Same crowd that put Jersey Shore's ratings through the
roof.

And good for Snookie and Jersey Shore.

But that's the thing -- people watch Jersey Shore to see
dumb people fuck and fight.


So I'm not sure what your point is.


People like things for all kinds of dumbass reasons.


I used to sneakily watch Shannon Tweed movies as a kid
because I liked her nipples.


>you dudes acting as arbiters of what women should and should
>not like -- it's a poor look, really.


You're almost wearing a good sensitive-thoughtful-on-matters
-of-gender-man costume.

Almost.

But not.

Because you're not being sensitive or thoughtful on gender
at all.




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O_E: "Acts like an asshole and posts with imperial disdain"




"I ORBITs the solar system, listenin..."

(C)Keith Murray, "