"Leave the game before the game leaves you"
This week, we read an allegory-like piece called Marrying Absurd by Joan Didion. The short story explored the idea of marriage–specifically centered around Americans–and the transformation of meaning on conventional sentiments related to marriage. Didion starts off by unveiling marriage culture in Las Vegas; she makes clear observations and expresses her notions and sentiments towards it.
Throughout the short story, Didion conveys marriage in American culture through the persistent use of reported experiences and examples to assert her argument: marriage is hollow. Although to some it may seem like Didion is “mocking” individuals that abide in these cliques, in hindsight, she’s simply and frankly portraying how Vegas is the transparent representation of American culture. In an extreme translation, Didion is claiming how this culture is the epitome of venality itself.
This process of hollowing however, was neither natural nor inevitable primitively. It was through the craving of assimilation and validation from society that it lost purpose and meaning. This so-called “craving” is imminent in today’s world; it gets worse and worse and will continue to as facets such as the media will foster conformity and deceit people to conflate it with his or her identity–completely. It essentially becomes a ritual where unlike the Body Ritual Among the Nacirema by Horace Mitchell Miner, it does not lead us to worship or praise ourselves: it pilots us to possess veneration for it. However, we know now that without a specific purpose or intent, a “ritual” or practice is completely ineffective.
Soft launching and hard launching is something that has grown popularity synchronously to social media in communities of dating. Holistically, it’s to “show off” that you’re in a romantic relationship with a partner. Similarly to Marriage Culture in America, this trend has lost its authenticity and intimacy as more and more individuals contributed to it for social status and clout. To restore such nostalgic and pure meaning, we as a society must be exigent and be willing to never let some facets never lose meaning.
I can see it just like you can the "performativism" that is present within our culture today. I agree with you that the craving of validation is only accelerated by the media, specifically social media in its far reach across so many people. We are getting more and more self-centered and quick to subject ourselves to venality.
ReplyDeleteYour analysis thoughtfully connects Didion’s critique of marriage culture to contemporary rituals shaped by social validation, showing how meaning erodes when practices become performative rather than purposeful. The parallel you draw to social media trends effectively reinforces the idea that conformity, when left unchecked, hollows traditions that once carried genuine intent.
ReplyDeleteI like the connection you made between marrying absurd and the idea of soft launching, i also find it relatable how we are living in an era where the "performance" of a relationship has become more important than the relationship itself.
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