Unserious Dichotomies
Embrace not knowing in the new year
People find it much easier to make sense of the world when complex issues are reduced to black and white — good vs. evil, liberal vs. conservative, science vs. religion. Not falling for these narratives is a real challenge. The thing is, despite some powerful forces’ best efforts, these binaries do not exist. The last few months have made this abundantly clear. We are seeing the most egregious versions play out in front of us on a global scale, every day.
You can be victim and perpetrator at one and the same time. And so many people just refuse to accept this simple fact of history and think in binary terms, that one side must be 100% evil and one side must be 100% pure and just, and we just need to find to pick a side.
Fantasies of perfect justice … I can say from a historical perspective … are always destructive. —Yuval Noah Harrari
It is unrealistic to expect that everyone can or will take the time to understand the nuance of each and every topical affair. Though, I’m not even sure that that’s the goal. Something about our terminally online culture, acute exposure to rage-bait headlines, and infographic activism pressures and tricks us into (1) believing that we know about things we don’t (we’ve simply heard that they exist) and (2) that we should take a stance on everything, lest we be considered ignorant, uninformed, indifferent, self-absorbed, disconnected, or worse.
It seems that the world creates false dichotomies and then demands we pick sides. But it does not demand seriousness. In other words, it is more important to pick sides than to know something, anything, deeply. This has actually birthed an interesting inverse, wherein hearing someone I admire unabashedly admit they don’t know something — or least not enough to opine — is somehow refreshing. This should be the default state!
If you’re reading this, you’re a curious person and don’t need to be reminded that admitting you don’t know something is just the first step of learning something, not the end. Once we accept that saying “I don’t know” is, in fact, hot, the actual work begins — learning the lay of the land and updating worldviews accordingly. Still, we must reject the temptation to pick sides, ever-stronger as we continue to learn.
As it turns out, despite the discomfort and dissonance, holding two competing ideas is the intellectually honest thing to do. And those who compel us to choose a side are decidedly unserious and should be disregarded accordingly. Thus emerges the one true dichotomy I am carrying with me into this year, as both a personal North Star and a useful lens to navigate the world.
Serious vs. Unserious
Amongst those creating the footballification of every issue, is a world fraught with swindlers, losers, and posers. These are just some of the types of Unserious people. But the reality is most people are Unserious (myself included, more often than not!) Discerning the Unserious is the easy part.
Who is serious and also wtf does that even mean?
Critically, most people don’t want to be Serious, and that’s okay. Defining what it means to be Serious, identifying who is Serious, and then working to become Serious is the real challenge, worthy of lifetime pursuit.
I planned to write more about what it means to be Serious, but just yesterday discovered Visakan’s incredible piece from last year that sums this dichotomy up better than I had planned (or even could have). You should read the whole thing, it’s seriously good, but I’ve pulled together some of my highlights.
It just seemed so obvious to me that a serious life is a life well-lived, and it’s always been weird to me how uncommon this perspective really is.
not many people are really serious about anything
Some people go their whole lives without ever having met anyone else who I might describe as actually serious, so they find it hard to believe that anybody could really mean what they say, since everything everyone says is bullshit.
everyone is performing a bullshit role in a bullshit play
I haven’t lived long enough to really demonstrate just how serious I am, and I hesitate to say it because seriousness is something that really you can’t tell from an utterance. You can mainly only tell from watching how someone conducts themselves over an extended period of time.
am I being too harsh? On myself? On others? Are my expectations too high? I don’t think so. I think I just want more out of life than most people do.
It’s pretty funny when you see how, being comfortable with being disliked, actually makes you even more likeable. It’s one of the many ways in which life can be really unfair.
the fact that so many marriages end in divorce is, to me, further proof that we are not very serious.
I think what I’m trying to say is that we’re pretty unserious as a species. We don’t do enough to prepare ourselves for such a serious endeavor.
why do so many people divorce someone they thought was their favorite person? It’s not really a mystery: it’s mostly because good times are a poor predictor of how you’ll handle bad times. But as a species, as a culture, we have not truly internalized this.
And… I think we can improve it! I think we can do better. That sounds like an idealistic teenager thing to say, but I’m in my thirties now, and I believe I will continue saying this for as long as I live.
You can’t demand seriousness from other people. You can really only encourage it.
Seriousness is love and curiosity expressed earnestly. I took a bit of a roundabout way to get to saying this but I mean it.
If I was making an “in and out list” for 2024, my out column would just be “Unserious People.”
In December 2022, I met up with Tadzio in Mexico City and we became fast friends [related short banger read: find your 2%ers]. One of the first times we hung out he asked, “What is one word you would use to describe this past year?” and then, “What is one word to describe your intention for this coming year?” I’ve adopted these prompts at friends and family hangouts over the last few weeks, but haven’t felt great about my various answers. Only in writing this did it become obvious that my word for 2024 is “Serious.” What does that mean? How will I embody it? Am I really capable of it? I don’t know :) but I’m going to try.
Episode 2: Racket Sports, A Great Time for Movie Theaters, and Mental Health
I guess Jackson and I have a podcast now? I mustered up the courage to listen back to it, to know what to improve on if we record another one, but early feedback is decent! If you miss me (I miss you!) this is a fun way for us to simulate hanging out together. Call me soon to catch-up, if I don’t ring you first.
—Andrew
Movies currently in theaters (see them there!)
Covered in the pod, but we’ve been blessed with the best slate of newly released films in as long as anyone can remember. Go to the theaters and see them all. My favorites from 2023, so far.
Poor Things*
The Holdovers*
Past Lives
American Fiction*
May December*
Anatomy of a Fall
*indicates you can probably see it in theaters
I still have some more to see soon! Follow along.
—Andrew
Epicly Later’d: Nuge
It’s hard to believe that it’s been 20 years since Patrick O’Dell’s skater bioseries show Epicly Later’d first aired. And the show has been on hiatus for another handful of years, but the new year bought a new episode on legendary Baker skater Don Nguyen, known to most as “Nuge.” Like most Baker riders, Nuge’s story is a great blend of heavy skating and Behind The Music-esque rockstar moments, including crashing a van whose brakes had gone out in South Africa.
—Justin