The past few months have been a bit more of an emotional roller coaster for me than I’ve had in awhile. It hasn’t been tied to a particular life event; it just feels as though something shifted with my social media circle, and it’s been something to work through. The saying is “social media isn’t real life,” but the more time you spend on it, the less true that becomes, because you build relationships, and find people with common interests, and you may never meet them in person. But that doesn’t mean that their impact on your life isn’t significant. Over the past five years, at least, my online relationships- often with other film critics and podcasters- have meant as much to me as my in real life relationships, especially as my professional life has had profound changes happen in it, where I’ve gone to a well-established circle at work, to building new relationships, to now being on my own for a lot of the time.
The title of this blog is from one of my favorite moments in Cameron Crowe’s “Almost Famous”. In it, William Miller (Patrick Fugit)- Crowe’s stand-in for himself- is on the phone with his music critic mentor, Lester Bangs (Phillip Seymour Hoffman). He’s just finished up time on the road with the band he was covering for Rolling Stone, the fictional Stillwater, and he’s not sure how to write his story. He got too close. He felt like part of the band. He felt cool, for the first time in his life. He even got the girl, for a brief time. But as Lester tells him, “That’s because we’re uncool…Good-looking people don’t have any spine. Their art never lasts. They get the girls, but we’re smarter.” People like William and Lester are outsiders, by virtue of the fact that they place the “cool” in the context of the culture, and their uncool perspective. Crowe nails that idea in this scene, and during a rewatch of the film earlier in the summer, I found myself thinking about it in the context of my emotional journey.
One of the biggest changes I’ve made over the past few months was transitioning away from Twitter/X, where many of these social media friendships started, as my primary social media outlet and on to Threads. The reasons for the shift are not just because of Elon Musk’s atrocious stewardship over Twitter, although that is a part of it. Over the past decade and a half, I built up an audience of over 3800 followers, and yet, engagement with what I posted seemed to crater. Part of it is no doubt due to the algorithm, but my mind has a tendency to overthink- and take part in catastrophic thinking- and I couldn’t help but feel like I was being deliberately ignored, for reasons no one would tell me about. On top of that, it’s felt like the site had gotten truly toxic due to the politics and geopolitical issues of the past year, and it’s been jarring seeing some of what people have posted, and the tone that it’s taken. It’s as if this year, more than many others, lines have been drawn, and political purity is what matters from a person, regardless of how long you’ve known them. Fealty to an ideology over empathy for people is where extremist movements are formed, and more extremism is not what the world needs right now. This isn’t to say that all ideologies deserve a seat at the table, and not all people will want to meet others where they are, but extending empathy towards others has to be the way forward. Exclusionary politics is, by its very nature, discriminatory. This is one of the biggest reasons I’ve largely left Twitter behind; even with people with whom I nominally agree with, the discourse has been too negative, the tone too devoted to being right than understanding other people’s vantage points. Because of how many people I still follow on there, I check in, post my own links, and will try to engage with what I want to engage with (if the algorithm will show me their posts), but that’s the extent of my activity on Twitter.
Why Threads? Overall, even when it’s discussing a lot of the same topics, the vibe just feels less driven by extremist thinking. Consideration of people feels like the motive behind a lot of discourse on the site (not all, but a lot), and it has managed to find some of the same patently silly moments like Twitter (especially as more people have gravitated over there from Twitter). It feels fun. More importantly? A new group of people to engage with has revealed itself- my own generation. I am Gen X, born in 1977, and there seems to be a lot of people from my generation there. That’s been good for me, as I hit middle age, and have been working on figuring out who I am as an online presence at this point in my life. The follower count is lower, but the interaction has been more pleasant than it has been on Twitter in a while. I just feel more comfortable on Threads.
If I’ve interacted with you about movies- especially if it’s been over podcast (whether my own or someone else’s)- then I value you as a fellow movie lover, and your thoughts on the medium. There’s not a discussion I’ve had on my podcast over the past five years that I’ve regretted, and I cherish all the times I’ve been invited to be a guest on someone else’s podcast. Part of the reason I share the guest appearances I’ve taken part in on podcasts in their own posts at Sonic Cinema is not just to give these podcasts (and podcasters) an extra boost, but as a “thank you” for allowing me to be a part of YOUR movie conversation. Even if we don’t interact frequently, those times when I do with people on my platform, or theirs, matter to me, and if our conversations have extended beyond that, then it matters all the more. I’ve felt like my circle of friends has expanded exponentially. Part of why Twitter has been so disheartening the past few months is that it’s felt like that circle has shrunk. Is that codependency coming out? You bet. Part of my journey this summer has been to try and divest myself from a lot of those feelings, and focus on being the one responsible for my feelings. To make sure that the person most responsible for my emotional baseline is me. Talking with my therapist about a lot of these issues has helped me work through my feelings a lot.
I’ll admit that the past few years have had me thinking about my own mortality, partially because I’ve been getting older, but especially as I’ve had to walk with my mother as she’s moved closer to the end of her life. I’m fine, by the way; my health is in good shape, and after two near-death experiences in my life, I’m not going back to taking my health for granted. But, logic dictates that I am closer to the end of my life than the beginning, so it’s going to occupy my mind. One of the things I’ve valued about a lot of my conversations on podcasts is when I’ve been able to share about myself in many of those conversations. Sonic Cinema, and my music, are going to be a big part of what I leave behind when my time comes to pass on. I’d like those words, and those sounds, to mean something, hopefully to someone beyond me. Something I’ve been trying to do is think about conversations, and guests, I’d like to have on the podcast, and thankfully, most of those have been facilitated so far. I still have a few others to work on getting set up, but it’s been progressing nicely.
Over the summer, I had a couple more opportunities to share things about myself that matter to me. Over at Bold Journey, a fellow podcaster recommended me to them as someone to have share my story. The focus on that was in terms of dealing with anxiety and depression, and how I’ve worked to combat my mental health issues, and I hope you take a chance to read it, if you haven’t already. On the other end of the summer, a fellow member of the Atlanta Film Critics Circle, Jonathan Hickman, invited me to be a part of his “Meet the Critic” series he’s written for the Newnan Times-Herald. That ran at the end of August, and one of the things I’m most grateful for is how Jonathan took the material I gave him- which was double the interview’s eventual length- and managed to weave in all of the main points that illustrate how my music, my mom, my work in theatres, and my own thought process, ties into my love of film. It’s one of the collaborations I’ve done I’m most proud of.
Back in 2021, I tried to begin live streaming on Twitch. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve done that- in large part due to how hectic my schedule has been- but I wrote at the time that one of the reasons I wanted to start the chat was to bring more positivity to movie discourse. This isn’t to say I’m always talking about movies I like, but how I approach them is a perspective of respecting the filmmaking process. Now, I want my contributions to be more than just positive movie discussions, but discussions where healthy discussion can take place around a multitude of subjects. I also want to make sure that the people I care about and value in the cinema space know that I care about them and value them, even if I don’t always do a great job of showing it. One of my mother-in-law’s favorite sayings was, “Be kind,” and even though I already tried to live my life that way before her passing on New Year’s Day 2023, it’s something I’ve taken to heart ever since. The only way forward is to boost up what matters to us, in a way that is inclusive, and empathetic towards all. We’ve seen a lot, over the past several years, showing what hate and negativity has brought to culture. In this post, I want to double down on my desire to bring something positive to social media, and discussion of cinema. I hope you’ll join my uncool ass in doing so.
Thanks for listening,
Brian Skutle
www.sonic-cinema.com
