hi vibers.
My fears have already been confirmed: this page is becoming a reality TV recap page.
You see, I’m very busy, but not so busy that I can’t find around 6 hours a week to watch my shows. I mean Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and all that!
I’m not usually a fan of Netflix’s reality TV. On a vibes-level, they’re are usually too manufactured and grating for me. But I have been charmed by this season of Love is Blind and it has given much food for thought, vibes-wise.
The concept of the show is literally horrifying, but sort of sweet in an late-capitalism-is-making-me-cry-about-a-GoFundMe-funding-what-should-be-human-rights sort of way. I guess in our time of deep alienation, love transcending obstacles hits kind of hard?
In the show, a group of presumably heterosexual men and women are separated into two living areas and can only interact in “pods” which look like Best Western bedrooms mixed with an HR conference meeting room. In the middle is a Cheesecake Factory-style textured glass panel that hides both people’s appearance. For 10 long, crazy-making days the contestants go on “dates” without seeing who they’re talking to. If they want to finally see each-other they need to literally propose??? And then the question becomes “Is love really blind? Will they become disgusted with each other’s conventionally attractive appearance?”And then we watch the couples grapple with that in a liminal Mexican resort, yada yada.
Watching these “wine-o-clock” millennials feel out if they’re interested in being with one another while also being hidden from each other is fascinating. They can’t pick up on all the micro traits and elements of style that indicate information about their prospective partner, so they try to vibe each other out by talking about their habits of consumption. During one date, they talk about loving to go to the farmer’s market and how going to the farmer’s market is just so much better when you have someone to go with. They talk about going out dancing. They talk about loving wine. On another date, this scumbag asks what a girl is wearing and they vibe on what her “cute jogger slacks with a crop top” indicate about her. And then he says he wants her to wear his flannel? and it was like kinky? Straight people surprise me often!
Anyways it made me realize a fairly obvious point that I sometimes forget in the muddle of my critical theory mind map. That “vibes,” as in the ways that things resonate with each other across medium and form, is something we are all deeply attuned to. I’m studying vibes as they’re understood by recommendation algorithms, but outside of the logic of algorithms, we all have an understanding of what things across contexts vibe with one another.
Or in other words, it made me think about how one marginal thing can seemingly indicate a more important facet of a person even if the thing and the facet are in themselves unrelated. Correlation vibes! When those two people were waxing poetic on going to the farmers market, they were also picking up on everything that vibes with going to the farmer’s market. An appreciation for food, a politics, a sense of locality, a cosmopolitanism, and what undergirds that consumption habit: disposable income. They could probably sniff that they both have the NYT cooking app, voted for Bernie or Warren, are into The Ozarks, etc. I’m being purposefully simplistic, but I think this is seemingly intuitive. It’s the same way that my youtube recommendation algorithm can pick up on my politics because of some media criticism essays I watched and then guess from that I’m probably also a fan of certain shows. Because those that watched X also watched Y, those that like X typically like Y.
But of course this is not a science and the key factor here is that these correlation are models based on probability. “Warren voters shop at farmers markets” is a prediction based on observable frequencies, but not on objective reality in and of itself. It seems to me that it’s a given in our culture that our consumption habits indicate broader aspects about ourselves. But sussing out someone’s entire vibes-profile based on consumption habits is obviously not a sure way of seeking deeper understanding of an entire human.
I often find myself uncomfortable by the ways that people and algorithms seek to understand me based on my fleeting capitalistic behaviors. I was once dating this boy who asked to see my Spotify playlist. He wanted to see what I was listening to which is nice and normal, but to me this seemed like a strange breach of privacy. My playlists are not cute, curated little moments that demonstrate something about my vibe for public viewing. Their databases of songs I’m interested in right now. And frankly music to me is private and I feel like in many keys ways, what I’m listening to does not indicate much else about me. According to Spotify, I’m in the top 4% of Taylor Swift listeners, and TS does not vibe with the rest of my listening which includes an amalgamation of Björk, hyper pop and indie rock. And honestly, being a Swiftie, is a very random, out-of-vibe component of Tobias. Not much else can be inferred from this!
That’s why the “Spotify-wrapped” feature annoys me so much. Spotify’s year-end list of what artists and made-up Spotify-coined genres you’ve listened to the most is released with much fanfare and everyone is eager (or embarrassed) to share theirs. On it, you get playlists of your top songs and a stylized list of your most listened to artists and genres which you are encouraged to share across all of your social media profiles. It’s supposed to be this moment of unveiling: beyond what you you say you like, what do you actually listen to.
When it came out this year, I saw jokes about people who had white noise sounds as their top artist because that’s what they play while they sleep. And in that example, you see the inability of algorithms to understand our tastes. Obviously this hypothetical person’s favorite artist is not “white noise.” But even if it isn’t white noise, what if it’s your “running song” that you listen to everyday, which may suck musically but gets the job done in being the soundtrack to your jog? That very well may be your top song, but it probably isn’t your favorite, most precious song. But you’re supposed to share your “Spotify-Wrapped” as if it’s a given that your musical listening habits are a straight line to understanding your taste. And that’s not true!
Anyways I suppose this consumer-habit- vibe-sniffing business is giving me fraught vibes. And I’m thinking that these Love is Blind contestants may be sad to learn that an affinity for rosé is not actually that helpful in determining someone’s broader personhood.