Our deputy editor-in-chief turned to me with a question about why there are so few poor people in TV dramas today. I said that it is not really the poor who disappear in TV dramas, but people who lead secondary lives. This is a logic of constructing an empire that can be unfolded port a port.
I used to live in a town where the famous Grand Canal runs through the city. I have walked along the river since I learned to walk, wetting my shoes and not getting wet. In the nineties, the river water transport was still prosperous, and a number of ships from the south to the north bounced around here. These boats were not only a means of transportation, but also a carrier for a number of families, who were called “boat people” by the people on the shore and had a low social status. These boats were loaded with cement, steel, timber, grain and oil, pulling black smoke, marching slowly and deliberately in the loud drum noise of the diesel engine, and gradually disappearing in the wave of major highway repair that came immediately after.
At that time, I did not know the history of this waterway. It became clear that for nearly five hundred years, this man-made object had sustained the Ming and Qing empires. One end of the canal connected to the capital and one end connected to the money and grain center, forming a complete empire. In this structure, people at both ends of the canal lived a primary life and people in the middle of the canal could live a secondary life. From the emperor’s point of view, there was really little difference between having and not having people far from the canal basin, as long as they didn’t make trouble.
Today the square character TV series plays a similar function, becoming a canal for the spirit of the times. This canal connects the prosperous cities represented by Beijing, Shanghai and Shenzhen on one side, and the remote control of every family in the vast rural and urban-rural areas on the other, showing people who live a secondary life how to live a primary life.
The builders of this canal are the writers and performers of the primary life of the prosperous metropolis – that is, the scriptwriters and actors. Before they became famous, they most likely lived in the attics and basements of prosperous cities. However, this did not prevent these people from writing 10,000 words a day celebrating the great major life.
A more typical example is our beloved Guo Xiaosi, who comes from Zigong, the central city of secondary life in the Far East continent. His perception of the primary life is an escalating process. When he was in Zigong, he thought that the primary life was Banyan Road, and after he went to Songhai, the primary life was upgraded to PRADA, and was deeply ashamed of Banyan Road. And since then, his main task is to show the young women in the urban and rural areas that PRADA can only represent the main life – the great key point.
Then again, about two years ago about this time, a female composer (first voice) in Songhai complained about the damage of the sewer of her then $10 million house and the inaction of the property, and sent out an incredible AIA astonishment: This is in Songhai! We are in the top five percent of the Songhai elite, how can such a treacherous thing happen? Obviously, the designers of the main life have not made the expected arrangements for this kind of chicken and dog, and this is not in line with “our Songhai values”.
Based on the commonality of origins and class paths of the authors of contemporary TV series, the contemporary life they present has such a class commonality, which is further defined as: only the main life is the real contemporary life, and those of you who cannot live the main life are not able to do so because you are not able to. Only by joining the tide of active and progressive living of the main life, you people will have lived your lives in vain.
In this consensus, it is desirable that the main life be immaculate and that the “values of our Sangha” be fully expressed. That is, in the main life, everyone seems to be able to have cheap decency.
You’re obviously a short, poor guy from a small town, but your counterpart in the TV show, who is also from a small town, is a rich white girl. You are obviously a bricklayer at a bank counter in Minhang or Shunyi, but your counterpart in the TV show is an investor in Lujiazui or some office building on Financial Street overlooking the lights of the universe. You obviously live in a basement with no light in spring, summer, autumn and winter, but your counterpart in the TV series is a bright little apartment. You obviously get paid $10,000 a month, but you live in a place that resembles Xintiandi – something that actually happens, except our beloved writers help you omit the existence of some small boss who underwrites you.
Then these practitioners of the secondary life, carried by this canal, have been transformed into pursuers of the primary life, or pretending to live a primary life.
And as a benefit of pursuing the main life, the chicken and dog things, “not in line with our Sangha values”, that can only belong to continue to engage in the secondary life of People. The counterpart in the film industry is the stigmatization of secondary life. The plot of “Struggle” can only take place in the great capital city, how can your small place be worthy of our great and passionate young people’s struggle? But all works related to counties, small towns or urban and rural areas cover several genres: poverty alleviation project showcase films, black and white literary films, ethical films, crime documentaries. The classic question on Zhihu: “How scary is the countryside? “”If I don’t fight for my father, do I have a way out in the human society? ” “How to look at …… “The audience once again issued what we are familiar with the AIA amazed: Oh my God, it can actually be so backward, this is too barbaric ba …… out of a trip to Sangha, with a trip to the country basically no difference … …
This is the logic of our square-word contemporary TV series, and this is why you can’t find poor people in contemporary TV series. It is the art of drawing on the primary life to fully mobilize and cajole the secondary life to provide itself with a constant stream of capital and fuel. These dramas have a unifying name: the values of our sangha.
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