#Goodbye to All That

[cosmic-day]

So, yeah, now that I’ve had time to process the doctor who finale, I can say finally, definitively, I am channelling my inner Chris Eccleston and am done with Doctor Who until RTD is gone.

The worst part is, it’s honestly a relief. I should have given up sooner, really, but Doctor Who is a hard show to quit. Because I’ve been a fan since childhood. Because it has always, if we are honest, been a show of wildly varying quality. Because it changes showrunners, writers, producers and cast on a regular basis. Sometimes the showrunner will make the show the way you like it. Sometimes they won’t. But, like that old joke about the Scottish weather, if you don’t like it, wait around for a while and it will change.

So I’ve been hanging on. Waiting for change. But I’m done.

I can’t get over what was done to Belinda Chandra. I can’t believe even RTD was tone deaf enough to have his POC medical companion overshadowed by her white blond predecessor TWICE. I can’t stop thinking about how the finale completely rewrote her memories and emotions and life, and this is somehow presented as a happy ending. It’s beyond horrific and makes my skin crawl to think of it.

I can’t believe RTD brought Billie Piper back again. Nothing against Piper, or even against Rose as a character. The problem is the long shadow that Rose cast over the show. The problem is that this is pretty clearly designed to cause a big social media splash and get people talking. The problem is that this is show out of ideas and relying on nostalgia.

(And by the way, regardless of who Piper is really playing, regardless of how long or short her tenure is, if you think he won’t shoehorn in a Tennant and Piper reunion, I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you.)

Last year, RTD said of the Susan Twist mystery “You just hope it will generate content". I said at the time that was the most cynical thing I had ever heard a writer say. And I stand by that. If the show feels hollow and corporate and plastic now, it’s because it is.

A lot of people are quoting Chris Eccleston’s ‘sack RTD’ comment these days. But I keep thinking of an older quote of his, from back in 2005, before things went wrong. "I like the idea of a writer as intelligent and rigorous as Russell writing for children, because I think if you can get them early with good stuff, they’re going to demand good stuff as they get older" (Christopher Eccleston (2005) | Doctor Who Interview Archive). Lovely sentiment. If only RTD shared it.

[carmillaintheflesh]

Excerpt from Goodbye to All That by Joan Didion

[wearevillaneve]

"Evil is just short for eve and villanelle." --- Comergetme/Twitter

[dysphoresque]

Joan Didion, Goodbye to All That

[elektramouthed]

[...] for the next three days I sat wrapped in blankets in a hotel room air-conditioned to 35° and tried to get over a bad cold and a high fever. It did not occur to me to call a doctor, because I knew none, and although it did occur to me to call the desk and ask that the air conditioner be turned off, I never called, because I did not know how much to tip whoever might come—was anyone ever so young? I am here to tell you that someone was. All I could do during those three days was talk long-distance to the boy I already knew I would never marry in the spring. I would stay in New York, I told him, just six months, and I could see the Brooklyn Bridge from my window. As it turned out the bridge was the Triborough, and I stayed eight years.

Joan Didion, from Goodbye To All That in: Slouching Towards Bethlehem

[northernexposureonly]

NORTHERN EXPOSURE

2.01 Goodbye To All That

[protectyouropacities]

“That was the year, my twenty-eight, when I was discovering that not all of the promises would be kept, that some things are in fact irrevocable and that it had counted after all, every evasion and every procrastination, every word, all of it.”

— Joan Didion, Goodbye to All That

[barthel]

I’m off Twitter again, hopefully for good. Nearly anyone who’s actually important is gone now, aside from the super-posters who have so much burn-in to the platform that they can never leave. But everyone’s still acting like what people say on Twitter truly, materially matters. The toxic mismatch was making me feel insane.

Insofar as Twitter was a “public square,” it’s because there were enough journalists, politicians, and rich people there that they would see thousands of people piling on some super-poster’s hot take and write a story about it or hold a hearing or yell at their other rich buddies. Things would happen. “You’re letting twitter write your headlines,” as they used to say.

But that’s not happening anymore. NPR left Twitter six months ago, after Elon tried to label them a propaganda source. It had zero effect on their audience. With Elon trying to drive news orgs away anyway, that’s just going to accelerate.

So it’s an echo chamber. That’s fine; most online discussion spaces are. But there’s too much platform mythos around Twitter being uniquely important; you saw it when Elon bought the platform and users, who’d previously referred to it as a “hell site,” started wistfully saying it had been a bulwark against anti-democratic encroachment. They’re still saying it now, even though the dynamic has totally broken down. It’s not a bulwark against anything anymore, not even itself. It’s the one place where Elon musk truly controls the public conversation. Nothing to do about that except leave.

They’re not wrong insofar as twitter did, for maybe 5 years or so, genuinely have the ability to change things, though whether for good or ill is yet to be determined. Now it’s just a place to have fun and hang out and shoot the shit. Which is fine! But when world events cranked up, this shit-shooting suddenly took on the tenor of a parliamentary debate. Which is exhausting, and manifestly not fun.

So I’m out; I probably should’ve been out sooner, but I kept on pushing the lever, hoping for another pellet. I mean this somewhat literally: I moved that awful “X” icon to the end of my phone’s Home Screen, but I still find myself absent-mindlessly tapping on the location where it used to be. Luckily, that’s now Reddit, where I’ve aggressively refused to follow any important subjects.

This is moderately inconveniencing for me; I can still find fun stuff online, but not with the volume or regularity that twitter provided it. Now I spend 10 mins on Tumblr, 10 on Reddit, 10 on Threads, 10 on Facebook, and it’s a good enough experience. But since I was spending 2 hours a day on Twitter, that’s probably a good shift. I’m losing the audience I had on Twitter, but I think a lot of them have left anyway. Maybe we’ll find each other again.

[20y2]

HOLLING: Two hundred channels. I know how you've always had your heart set on seeing the whole wide world. Well, now you can see it right from your home with me by your side.

NORTHERN EXPOSURE

2.01 Goodbye To All That

[seeking-lights]

“I do not mean ‘love’ in any colloquial way, I mean that I was in love with the city, the way you love the first person who ever touches you and never love anyone quite that way again.”

- Joan Didion, “Goodbye to All That”

[newty]

The passages originally in Robert Graves' Good-Bye to All That (1929) that prompted Siegfried Sassoon to demand a reissue of the book without them.

Pages 289-290 about Sassoon's mother, and pages 341-343 with his "suppressed poem."

[virgovampire]

Joan Didion - “Goodbye to All That.” Slouching Towards Bethlehem (1968)

[batcavescolony]

Katniss is such an unreliable narrator. She says "Then something unexpected happens. At least, I don't expect it because I don't think of District 12 as a place that cares about me" girl you deliver strawberries to the Mayor, you hunt and trade for the district, when you fell at Prim being chosen someone caught you, when you went to Prim people parted for you, when you volunteered EVERYONE stopped. Idk how to tell you but I think you're a pillar of the community.

[shelbycarpenter]

[northernexposureonly]

SHELLY: You're the closest thing to God Cicely's got. I was raised a Catholic, and when a Catholic is in trouble, they go to a priest and make a confession. I need you to hear my confession.

NORTHERN EXPOSURE

2.01 Goodbye To All That

[verkomy]

you belong with us

you can get a print here