inquiry

That there are critics at the Toronto International Film Festival calling Joker an “exploration” of or a “commentary” on mental illness scares the shit out of me. Let me remind you that people struggling with mental illness are far more likely to be the victims than the perpetrators of violent crime, and these critics calling a movie linking mental illness to violent crime an “exploration” of or “commentary” on mental illness do so at a moment when the Trump administration is considering putting the mentally ill under electronic surveillance. Thanks at least to Alissa Wilkinson for saying that “[t]he notion that Arthur’s villainy essentially stems from his untended mental illness is troubling”.

All mental is illness.

Therein, degrees.

And people of varying degrees theorizing and/or commenting on and/or determining the relevancy of theirs and others' degrees.

That, my silent internet friends, is the internet in three lines.

What, exactly, would a more internetworked blogosphere look like? What degree of internetworking even is possible, let alone desirable, in this format? It's one thing to want to encourage people to respond and react to blog posts they've read by posting to their own blogs while pinging or mentioning the original post, leaving it to the latter to decide what, if anything to do in terms of displaying, or interacting with, these reactions, but is there more? Should there be more?

The tools to enjoy it have long been available to those more interested in actually doing it than in agonizing over how it “should” be done.

ETA: One thing of relevancy in terms of community-building and positive gatekeeping: I tried to ping/mention Schlagel's post and was told my post here was spam.

Now, lemme see... where have I last experienced that scenario...............?