When I first look at the above picture of Pyongyang, it looks like any other city. However, something about looking at it makes me feel relaxed. Upon closer inspection, you’ll find that it is completely devoid of adverts. No signs, posters, billboards, or logos of any kind. Some photos from street-level are similarly devoid of advertising, or only use it in a limited fasion.
This means that there is nothing to draw your eye, which, counterintuitively, allows you to really see what’s going on around you, (like the architecture, for example) or just lets you relax, as there are fewer distractions. This photo of Belorusskaya Metro station has a similar thing going on. Now, on the other hand, imagine if I were in a room with you, and you were trying to read a book, and I kept on saying “hey, look at me! over here! hey! look at me! LOOK AT ME! LOOK AT ME! I’M OVER HERE! FUCKING LOOK AT MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE” (pic rel)
I think I have ADHD (never diagnosed because I never knew how things were supposed to be, so I only realised recently that something was up lol), and that’s kind of what going through any public space is like for me. Sometimes it’s actually just draining, as anything which draws my attention also tires me out to an extent. I never really realised this until recently, as I have grown up in ad-heavy environments, but the contrast is absolutely night and day. Maybe it’s just because I’m a commie now and I hate consumerism, but I think there’s more to it than that.
The same is true of online environments. I highly suggest using an ad blocker, and, if you use Firefox, the Unhook YouTube browser extension. You can use it to hide end cards and recommendations (amongst other things), which has helped to stop me from going on huge YT binges. I didn’t make that add on or anything, I just find it useful.
So yeah, fuck adverts.
I’ve been to times square once and I never need to see it again. Almost gave me a panic attack from all the input and the weight of all that capitalism.
There’s that one scene at the end of the first Captain America movie and he runs out into Times Square after being in a coma for 80 years. I couldn’t imagine how much psychic damage that would do
I had to go find a church a couple streets over and just sit in dark silence for a little while afterward. Honestly shocking
When the English author G. K. Chesterton first visited America in 1921, his host took him to see Times Square at night. Chesterton stood staring in silence for several increasingly awkward moments. When someone finally asked him for his thoughts, Chesterton replied “I was thinking how beautiful this would be if I couldn’t read.”
I find it extremely difficult to enjoy anything that includes advertisements because I just end up consumed with rage at how much of the commons and the space in our heads we’ve allowed to be colonized by this shit and how intrusive it is. The rage itself becomes just as distracting as the advertisement. It’s psychic pollution.
Such a pretty city. They actually have color on their buidlings
I feel like advertisements pollute my brain. Mental pollution. It should be criminal to do so without consent
Not only are they terribly distracting but most of them are really just bullying us because insecurities seem to be a really effective way to move product. Most of what I see these days is some variation of you’re fat, ugly, poor, dumb, lonely, etc. Regardless of the truth of those descriptors, constant exposure to bullying like this is making us all worse off. It really should be something we don’t allow in public spaces, and pointing the harm done by the proliferation of ads out to those who have grown accustomed to the background noise is good.
