Anna Morgan #9
Installment #2
Installment #2
Link to installment #1: http://cophilosophy.blogspot.com/2017/12/transcendentalism.html
The transcendental ideal of self-reliance, introduced by Ralph Waldo Emerson, is best
summarized by Emerson himself:
It can be debated that contemporary forms of entertainment preserve this ideal; however, society projects a stronger message of reliance. Being self-reliant in today’s society is nearly impossible, and the message of being successful by relying on other people, money, or technology is prevalent in today’s pop-culture. Every aspect of transcendentalism exists in some form of pop-culture, but overall our society does not recognize these values as essential qualities. Self-reliance particularly is not significant in contemporary pop-culture.
In the 2007 reality TV show, Keeping Up With The Kardashians, an exceedingly wealthy family is completely obsessed with excess materialistic items, evincing the push for contemporary society to create the illusion of depending on fame, fashion, and funds for happiness. The title Keeping Up With The Kardashians itself reveals the superficiality of the entire show. Implying that common people should waste hours of their own precious life “keeping up” with an unintelligent and mercenary family is not an aspect of the modern world that Emerson would exalt. Their facile lifestyle practically ridicules transcendentalist ideals. 
Glamorizing a materialistic lifestyle, Keeping Up With The Kardashians is created to belittle the average person and make him or her feel unimportant unless resembling the beauty and designer products that the Kardashians obtain. The emphasis on materialism encourages society to conform and attempt to acquire the unrealistic beauty or over-priced products the family sells. The Kardashians have an abundance of resources to survive, but continue to invest in trivial luxuries, the opposite of transcendentalist behavior. 
Henry David Thoreau, a transcendentalist and friend of Emerson, is famous for his book Walden, that he wrote in solitude. He left his home in Massachusetts to live as simply as possible near Walden Pond. He examined life and discovered that, “men have come to such a pass that they frequently starve, not for want of necessaries, but for want of luxuries” (Thoreau 57). This observation perfectly describes society's constant desire of wanting more, a popular ideal in the capitalist world.
This absurd concept of pretending to live alone in the woods with limited resources is amusingly contradictory. I downloaded the game myself because the idea of living in the natural world without any distractions sounds so nice, but is not practical for my current lifestyle. Video games irritate me and I don't think a Macbook Pro is the ideal forum to play them, so I got bored navigating around the landscape, but it was refreshing to read the excerpts provided from the Iliad and the Odyssey; epics I haven't read in years. This paradox simply enhances the argument that society has become obsessed with material items, especially electronic devices. It is rare that I make time go on a backpacking or kayaking trip.
An Example of another modern attempt of expressing
transcendentalism is Sean Penn's film Into The Wild based
on the non-fiction book written by Jon Krakauer. Protagonist
Christopher McCandless leaves his home in the suburbs of
Virginia to live independently in nature.
This film has many transcendentalist themes but Christopher has unfortunate fate, proving his inability to genuinely live a self-sufficient life. Christopher ultimately concludes that happiness is only real when shared and that genuine happiness can only be obtained by sharing his life with other people in society. Christopher’s need for someone else to be emotionally content and sustain life implies that self-reliance is unfortunately very difficult to pursue in this generation.
Links to my comments: https://cophilosophy.blogspot.com/2017/12/how-social-media-is-effecting-our.html?showComment=1513212681034#c8373402877998541278
https://cophilosophy.blogspot.com/2017/12/10-love-and-loneliness-post-2.html?showComment=1513213119938#c7621796236138879095
Links to my comments: https://cophilosophy.blogspot.com/2017/12/how-social-media-is-effecting-our.html?showComment=1513212681034#c8373402877998541278
https://cophilosophy.blogspot.com/2017/12/10-love-and-loneliness-post-2.html?showComment=1513213119938#c7621796236138879095
I completely agree, and I don't believe it's just the Kardashians. I believe it is our entire culture now, social media has been a big proponent of this. "lets show people the fake me that's perfect. It's quite sickening honestly.
ReplyDeleteAnna Morgan
ReplyDeleteThe link to my first installment is not working so I will copy and paste it here. However it is still available for viewing on the blog. You can search "transcendentalism" and it should pop up.
Anna Morgan
Installment 1
Section # 9
Transcendentalism
Transcendentalism is a philosophy that developed in the early 1800's. It is a Western Philosophy founded in New England by American thinkers. These thinkers, or philosophers, strove to discover and understand the world beyond which we can feel with our five senses. The goal is to "transcend" beyond the observable universe. Individuals who adapted this kind of thinking did not view it as a religious belief system. They wanted to understand life and its relationship to all other things, including humans as well as other living organisms. They studied how humans connected with the Earth, themselves, animals, and other human beings. Unlike other philosophies that were becoming more profound during this time and during the breakaway from religion, transcendentalism was about intuition and imagination; feelings opposed to logic and reason. Although this philosophy attempted to transcend beyond critical thinking, it was not an organized religion in any sense. Understanding spirituality was something that most transcendentalists struggled with. Transcendentalists criticized organized religion as well as government, laws, social institutions, and the rapid growth of industrialization. Some world renowned transcendentalists were Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Fuller, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Walt Whitman, and Henry David Thoreau.