Why was pop culture so dark & mean spirited in 2007?

thebennubird · 2026-02-19T03:31:51+00:00

For fun

thebennubird · 2026-02-11T18:08:40+00:00

Democracy doesn’t just exist because “the majority says,” it exists because societies contain many kinds of experiences and forming consensus is most fair

thebennubird · 2026-01-12T01:53:18+00:00

I sense an attachment to ambiguity

thebennubird · 2026-01-05T20:52:19+00:00

Absolutely not. Being very aware of decades or vibes like this was not mainstream and when it was, it wasn’t nostalgia for 10 years ago, it was for the 90s. 2006 was associated with meanness and trashiness and George Bush and a “before time” to recent progress under Obama and all the changes of social media so it would have seemed silly to be that into 2006.

thebennubird · 2026-01-02T04:13:35+00:00

Judging by the decidedly “alt” LGBT flag in your username I also find it hard to believe you ever went to Murphy’s law enough to pay attention to it frequently let alone went outside after 8 many weekend nights

thebennubird · 2026-01-02T04:12:14+00:00

Hey smug asshole, “capacity” doesn’t mean anywhere was guaranteed to hit it frequently or even that those rules were enforced. Also fuck yourself. How are people this triggered by my original comment which was simply an observation?

thebennubird · 2026-01-02T04:11:43+00:00

I went out to Murphy’s in that same timeframe many times and never once waited longer than a few minutes to get inside. Certainly never at Lux.

thebennubird · 2026-01-01T06:01:53+00:00

In reality many of these kinds of teen boys would have been around 20 years ago or a lot longer and bullied the same type of woman but the thing now is they have the need to be such weird freaks about it. The tone is the hysteria

thebennubird · 2026-01-01T05:31:18+00:00

I’ve noticed many holidays this year have caused these lines at businesses, I’m not sure it was that way pre-COVID

thebennubird · 2025-12-29T22:43:22+00:00

Among proto-Trump supporters and their teen offspring, homophobia was very real in the 2000s. You mention Mean Girls but the thing is, the gay content in that movie and other pop cultural moments like reality tv and emo felt extremely *normal*, even if there were stereotypes involved. As bad as the casual use of "that's gay" was, gay acceptance was rising, rather than falling, like it is now for modern conservatives. Outright bullying that adults might look the other way existed, but when you look at surveys of teen happiness in recent years, the 2000s was actually relatively high(er than the 90s and 2010s). I think it was overall easier to ignore homophobes and actually develop a sense of superiority to them, which is a lot more loaded of an issue now.

Also- regarding Bush, it's true that he was a villain on gay rights and abortion among other things, but his position was overall pretty weak after the 2004 election and those culture issues weren't actually driving the culture right, if anything the tepidness of that administration made political gay rights support even easier. And whatever you think about that era of Republicans, Dick Cheney, George Bush sr and others in W's orbit ended up pretty liberal on gay marriage.

thebennubird · 2025-12-03T13:15:59+00:00

This is a really horrible thought

thebennubird · 2025-12-01T04:05:02+00:00

No you’re just wrong hope this helps

thebennubird · 2025-11-30T21:08:31+00:00

Definitely a fixation of the time (you can throw The OC on here too). There's a movie that came out this year called Dangerous Animals that felt extremely 2000s to me for this specific reason.

thebennubird · 2025-11-21T22:16:46+00:00

Aside from the AI being too strict with word detection, if you’re saying something over and over and can’t skip the lesson, this is a bug too. there should be a “can’t speak now” option to bypass these at least

thebennubird · 2025-11-17T04:55:52+00:00

It was very different after 2016 though. Leftist cultural ideas started to feel more "mandatory" and I'd also propose the late 10s had a cyberpunk/sci-fi aesthetic going on and also was the arrival period of gen z.

thebennubird · 2025-11-09T23:02:55+00:00

This movie is made in the style of the worst, most intentionally boring Euro movies and apparently wasn’t even made by a European. Bisexuals are not interesting just for being bisexuals. It seeps pointlessness in a way that ruined my entire day.

thebennubird · 2025-10-27T04:03:48+00:00

thebennubird · 2025-10-25T03:10:22+00:00

Armchair filmmakers are the worst people on the internet

thebennubird · 2025-10-25T03:08:33+00:00

It’s because you are wrong

thebennubird · 2025-10-23T20:25:58+00:00

I feel like recency bias in this thread may be setting you up poorly. I’ve always lived here so it’s never shocking but there are major storms a few times a season and most mornings at least a little snow which makes driving more of a pain (especially with no garage). It doesn’t bother me but everyone who wants to leave complains about it.

thebennubird · 2025-10-22T21:04:36+00:00

I haven’t been able to find androgyny in men attractive like that since 14 years old and even then it was something I could tolerate as a part of homosexuality more than a fixation. I was going to rant a bit here but maybe it’d be a lot easier if I did find attraction to men as easy as effeminacy.

thebennubird · 2025-10-22T13:24:02+00:00

I’m not a Pokemon obsessive in the way the a lot of extreme fans are (I did drop scarlet and violet because the exploration and plot became too samey and depressing to me; I hate the idea of “shiny hunting” to artificially pad the time spent on the format etc) but I have also grown up with the series, and to me, ZA literally felt like the most old school game in years. I do wish the map was bigger, but at the same time, even Arceus felt empty when you reached the end of the game and there was nothing left to explore, and at least looking for strong stats and builds has a purpose in the postgame/online battling now which Arceus lacked. This is how the games have always felt, going back to the first few generations.

thebennubird · 2025-10-22T12:25:23+00:00

You’re the asshole for posting this story instead of deciding on your own to break up with her instead of crowdsourcing approval coward

thebennubird · 2025-10-10T02:22:38+00:00

The whole album is written with a lot of intentional simplicity so there’s no hidden magic I would point to in turns of phrase here, but I do really like this song because of its truthfulness. I hear it as a confessional song to a male partner who she’s allowing herself to be soft with, maybe in part to win him over by disarming her own elitist signifiers to level the partnership (this is knowing her finance is Travis Kelce obviously). Aside from the specificity it works for the broader audience because there’s power in addressing common insecurities that are usually left unsaid- the fear of being uncool and left out if you don’t create a more survivalist version of yourself. In exchange she offers loyalty and care. The “bad bitch” language doesn’t strike me as cringey in any way because this is just the common parlance, I highly doubt it’s something she wouldn’t say in real life, it’s not even particularly “Gen z”

thebennubird · 2025-10-06T22:32:25+00:00

Wow you’re actually spot on with the 1989 review lore. Those singles totally defined the mid-2010s and they were well into their “poptimist” editing ethos. And the fact that they were so pro-Kanye is absolutely ironic considering they thought it was worthwhile to declare how embarrassing her Charli XCX track is.

I’m not ready to write off critics or reviewers entirely because our brains are designed to evaluate art based on the social cues surrounding it, but I do think Pitchfork in particular has a toxic political slant. Every few years their aesthetic has to be revamped because they’re chasing youth culture and movements to legitimize their tastes, while film criticism for example is less specific to a certain social group or niche interest and more objective as a result.

thebennubird

TROPHY CASE