pretentiousness

2024/11/20

I hate the word ‘pretentious’. I hear it used a lot to criticize art, but in almost every case it is simply a form of gatekeeping; because you created something that challenges the status quo you must have a big ego. You must think you’re better than people! How dare you be proud of what you made! This isn’t even that good - a dead fish is what it is!

What?? Why do we get upset at people for putting time and effort and passion into their work? Why do we call people ingenuine when they are actually being the opposite? Why do we discourage liking ourselves, calling it selfish?

Don’t get me wrong, it’s possible for someone to be pretentious - creating something just to please advertisers and then pretending they care. Telling other people that their experience is wrong. Ironically, calling something pretentious is in and of itself pretentious. But you’d know if you are. If you are expressing yourself genuinely, if you share things that you love and that you care about and that you are proud of, no matter the quality that others may see in it - you are not pretentious. You’re just being yourself, and that’s amazing.

wait is this a metaphor for transtrenders