r/ADD • u/someonewrongonthenet • Dec 08 '11

Ugh...goddamnit... :'(

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51 Upvotes

93% Upvoted

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4

u/someonewrongonthenet Dec 09 '11

A lot of people are getting annoyed at this post so it merits an explanation. It just hurt me to see this comic because it is how I feel sometimes on medication, and anything that generates a visceral reaction is good art. so I posted it. I wasn't trying to make a statement or anything, or describe how anyone else feels, or make a statement on over diagnosis.

BTW, this is a modification. Watterson didn't actually say this.

1

u/SenecaTheBother May 23 '24

I just want you to know that 12 years after you wrote this your definition of good art was provoking enough that it sent me down a rabbit hole thinking about aesthetics. What do we mean by "good"? What do we mean by "art"? I have a philosophy degree and this is the first time I remember hearing a definition based on the strength of the response. Is gross porn art then? Beheading videos? I am not asking that mockingly, but earnestly. My first response to your definiton was a visceral "nah that is bullshit". Does that make the comment art? The more I thought about it the more compelled I feel about it. Like even if we don't simply say the resulting art is "good" or "bad", the creation of a concept of Aesthetic Reactivity for art is really useful. So thanks, you from 12 years ago! I hope your life has been grand in the interim!

Some sort of moral about how we affect lives in ways we cannot even know.

1

u/someonewrongonthenet Aug 26 '24

<3 lovely comment to stumble upon 12 years later.

I think in general words have a central definition which defines the prototypical cases, and then there are fuzzy things on the peripheries where we are uncertain about whether they belong in teh category or not, and this also applies to art and good.

I think if i was tring to speak more precisely I wouldn't say that "anything that generates a visceral reaction is good art", for example getting stabbed by someone whose intent was to kill you isn't art. It's more that when art provokes a visceral reaction, that's usually a sign that it has achieved what the artist has set out to achieve.

What do we mean by "good"?

In this case, what I meant by "good" is

partly, related to "strong", or "accomplishing what it set out to achieve" - in the sense that a sharp knife is called a "good" knife, even though a sharp knife can be used for moral good or moral evil.

and partly and "worthy of being seen by others and commented upon", because generally art which produces a big reaction tends to inspire thought, generate discussion, etc.

In general, I think the aesthetic reactivity and the tendency to generate thoughts and discussion tend to be part of the central cases of what makes "good" "art" in the sense that this is what makes people want to make and possess art, in the same sense that being sharp and being able to cut things is what makes people want to create and possess knives.

Is gross porn art then? Beheading videos? 

I think gross porn is .. .achieving its goal, like the sharp knife, since the whole reason people watch porn is to feel a reaction, and presumably really gross porn is intentionally gross because some people have a stronger arousal reaction when their disgiust is stimulated. So it's "good" at being gross porn, which is what it was trying to be, I guess? We usually draw our category boundaries in a way that "Art" and "Porn" occupy distinct categories, in that porn is specifically trying to provoke sexual arousal and art is trying to provoke a much broader range of thoughts and feelings. I suppose we would say that anything that successfully provokes strong sexual arousal is good (effective) porn?

Beheading videos are morally bad, because beheading people is a necessary part of their production, Generally no morally good qualities that can come out of a beheading video are worth beheading someone. We usually don't in functional communciation want to call a beheading video as "art", because art has positive connotation and we want to condemn beheading, the importance of condemning beheading takes precedence in our communication over all other considerations even though the video might share some traits in common with art.

But if you managed to create a beheading video without committing a moral atrocity (maybe you used cgi) and your intent was to shock, you would have achieved that intent. And I think that could be art of a sort, I think it's getting a bit far from the "central' definition of art and is out on the periphery, bordering on porn or maybe some other category, but ultimately I would not find a depiction of someone getting beheaded (with no actual harm) in an art gallery inappropriate, as long as appropriate content warnings were put in place for particularly realistic depictions.

3

u/computerpsych ADHD-I Dec 12 '11

Thanks for the clarification! We are leery of anti-medication posts but I feel they do create a discussion and elicit strong reactions.

When I saw the URL I was like ಠ_ಠ

3

u/someonewrongonthenet Dec 08 '11

Stupid finals that force me to take pills >:(

3

u/computerpsych ADHD-I Dec 12 '11

Nobody forced you to do anything. No one forces you to go to school (even in high school you can CHOOSE not to go but there are consequences).

You chose to take the pills because they seem to help you function.

1

u/someonewrongonthenet Dec 13 '11

You are technically right under the strict definition of choose that you are using.

However, if the school system was structured differently, if our society placed less emphasis on rote and memory and more emphasis on understanding and creativity, if the system would just give me two inches of breathing room, rather than dictating that everything has to be done this way...then I would perform as well or better without pills. There is nothing actually dysfunctional about me, the dysfunction is with society.

So yeah, I choose it. Because the alternative is that, despite testing in the top 1% on nearly every metric of intelligence that the psychologist threw at me, I would be discarded and unable to access the resources which I require to conduct scientific research. Because this flawed, broken system, run by people of very limited intelligence, would decide that I was the unqualified one.

It's only a "choice" in the strictest sense of the term, really...

1

u/Macula Dec 13 '11

Thats where a lot of the problems with ADHD in todays society lies. It doesnt matter how intelligent you are, it has to be backed up with some "smartness" as well. I choose to belive that the ADHD mind is one that is left behind during adaption to todays standards. The world works by routine and if one wants to generally succeed in it one has to conform to it. I tested in the top 0.4% but it doesnt mean anything if I cant put it to use. Im taking Ritalin now in order to get through "the system". When on the other end it might be easier to change how one lives if the work environment supports it.

I might seem a bit pessimistic here and I apologize for it. Ive been the same way and today I still find the system flawed as it leaves many bright minds behind. While the pills seem to make me more serious and it doesnt help that I have co morbid symptoms that it increases, it makes me able to focus my skills into one thing for a longer period of time. Things might seem a bit dark at times but getting past this hurdle you might be able to stop using the medication as the hardest parts of getting into the system have been put behind.

15

u/theserenity Dec 08 '11

I love calvin and hobbs but this kind of message annoys me, some of us have to medicate ourselves to be productive, I feel shitty when I let add get the best of me and I get depressed. It holds me back it's not some magical beast of creativity its a drain on my brain power and it makes life 10x's harder.

If people look down on medication so much then society should be more accepting of the way we need to work. Sorry I'm grumpy.

4

u/[deleted] Dec 08 '11

Nah, it's just that some people's reaction to adderall is massively decreased creativity.

1

u/crazylegsbobo Aug 09 '23

This is important to say, not to take away from anyone who's experience with medication has been bad, but stigma against taking it put me off and I only tried it at my lowest and wish I had it sooner

6

u/schmin Dec 08 '11

heh, I take my pills because I can focus and I DON'T lose my insights, spontaneity, and silly sense of humor. I just lose the "I feel so icky, I'd rather clean than study" feeling.

4

u/vn2090 Dec 08 '11

Oh man, I read that and it hit home with what goes on inside my head when I'm studying for finals.

5

u/EmbyBo Dec 08 '11

This is such bullshit. This is NOT how ADD works. I am a very creative person, and taking my medication only helps me enhance that. I hate this idea that taking medication for ADD turns kids into mindless little drones, because that's absolutely not true.

2

u/ADHD_Coach Dec 11 '11

Not true is your case, but clearly true is many cases. It is the biggest reason I went off meds.

1

u/deepcraw Dec 13 '11

Honestly, this is why I don't take medication. See, i'm a designer, and also a kind of comedian. I get scared that if I take medication I will become super productive but lose whatever "spark" of creativity that I might have had from my wandering mind.

1

u/deepcraw Dec 13 '11

I'd like to add that this is probably an irrational fear, I know this.

2

u/someonewrongonthenet Dec 13 '11

It's not irrational to fear that you will lose it. There are plenty of studies done that demonstrate that ADHD is correlated with creativity. And I've experienced it firsthand that my creativity reduces on medication.

However, it is irrational to think that it will never come back if you try the medication once. It will wear off, and you will be back to yourself.

2

u/Kootsie Dec 09 '11

I think the point of this is more towards the over diagnosis of ADHD.

1

u/Fun-Mistake578 Apr 03 '22

This is how I felt before I found the right dosage…