Subculture and the mainstream in the internet age

Perhaps because the human nature is actually a Virgo, so always eager to classify all things, from the boundaries of the Department of the Compendium of organic and inorganic acid and alkali salts, all the fate of the classification. Naturally, such habits are more clearly extended to the cultural development of human society for thousands of years.

There are some good people who have a very academic name-subculture-of a culture that is not easily understood by ordinary people. As a whole, it seems that subculture has a great research value in an instant, and becomes a more noticeable object in the scientific and even commercial field. So, can subculture really be such a value? In its gorgeous coat inside, what kind of connotation?

Sub-culture and the mainstream

Since there is the concept of subculture, then, in contrast, there is a mainstream culture naturally. The culture that most people can understand is attributed to this category. If we take the definitions of the above two cultures and review the history of human culture, we will find that the boundaries between them are not as clear-cut as we think.

Ancient, Chinese Yi, Qin Dynasty Lisle stone inscription, Xiaozhuan to Lingbao outside of the "subculture" body throughout the central Plains, open the source of Chinese calligraphy, to become a "mainstream culture"; medieval, Florence, Italy, Dante creation of the Divine Comedy, the harsh religious system gradually disintegrated, Greece, Rome's human radiance into the Middle Ages since the Ming wilderness , becoming a "mainstream culture"; Paris, France, the Lumiere brothers to show the world of the impact of the train into the booth, the audience after the shock and fled, gladly accepted the expression and appeal of the unprecedented silver curtain, the film hundred Years, from the forefront of science and technology to mainstream entertainment, from mainstream entertainment to the seventh art, eventually become " Mainstream culture "...

It is not difficult to see that the so-called mainstream culture, in fact, is in line with the popular mainstream aesthetic culture, as long as there is a suitable opportunity and enough power, will be exposed to sharpness. Through various opportunities, a generation of subculture may be the mainstream of the next generation, and vice versa. The previous generation of rock music, has gradually become the mainstream, and the earlier generation of Beijing opera, is from the mainstream culture stage sadly exit. A subculture, whether it becomes the key of the mainstream culture, in the short term, lies in whether the core population can show enough social influence, but in the long run, it is the spirit core that can be recognized by the mainstream in the form of the culture which is difficult to be accepted by outsiders.

What is preventing subculture from becoming mainstream?

To sum up, there are no more than three sources: self, Mass, other subculture.

Look at yourself first. All cultures tend to develop vertically, but not all cultures have sufficient horizontal diffusion capability, and "curtilage culture" is a typical self restrictive culture. A otaku, if you want to have more influence outside the cultural circle, will be the life of the weight of three yuan transfer, when he successfully obtained enough social influence, it has been difficult to call "otaku." From a narrower point of view, even if the otaku just want to buy more cultural products, home culture consumption of higher economic pressure, will also force him to more in the three-dimensional world to seek economic sources. In other words, the essence of curtilage culture is introverted, contradictory to the demand of culture outward development. Although some people who have made great achievements in the cultural industry, such as the Chi Cang thousand-generation pill, have become the representative of the successful otaku, but does not mean that otaku as a group, have enough energy to radiate influence.

The resistance from the masses is well understood, everyone has more or less personal experience, the group memory of each generation is accompanied by a generation of contempt, the next generation of people despise, needless to say.

It is human nature to reject the alien culture, but for subculture, the pressure from other subculture shows a more interesting aspect. Contrary to popular understanding, this repulsion comes from understanding. Because the understanding of this culture, will be particularly objectionable, for a variety of clear-cut subculture, this is difficult to avoid. Otaku and rotten female, Korean powder and Japanese rice, public knowledge and rational faction, host Party and PC Party, "dog" and "Ren Dolphin" ... People who are familiar with these cultures may only see their names, and they will have a bloodbath in their heads. All kinds of subculture exist in each other's opposition and consumption.

The ecological map of sub-culture

Every young man has his own hobby, and in Ching or inadvertently, he may be drawn into a subculture circle. In the present time, what belong to our subculture, and what kind of development track they have? The author will choose several examples as a representative, briefly talk about.

1, Cock silk

Regardless of the number or influence, the cock silk culture is today's largest subculture, even if the people do not agree with its cultural connotation, but also must admit that it is extremely good in the dissemination of ability. Cock Silk culture originated from Baidu Post bar "Liyi it", Liyi Bar was originally by a group of Chinese football disgruntled people created, is an irony and irony and other methods to express their emotions online forum. Later, because of its lively atmosphere and humorous content, attracted more and more netizens, become Baidu's first big bar. A large number of social low-level user groups, the spiritual core of the Liyi has a subtle impact, and eventually developed a combination of the product-cock silk culture. The core of the silk culture is no longer a mockery of others, but become a mockery of their own, "cock silk" This self-proclaimed is the specific performance of this spirit. Cock Silk, originally is the circle outside Netizen to Liyi Bar Netizen's taunt, was the friend happily accepts, the reason probably is the netizen thought, the self-deprecating culture is needing such a self-deprecating name.

Although they are keen to laugh at themselves, sometimes even to the extent of insignificant, they do not mean that they are desperate. In today's society, the gap between rich and poor is still widening, and the way of the bottom citizens ' climbing is rather limited. So when they get together, this self-deprecating is a great way to vent stress. Of course, they are not in the self-deprecating numbness, when there is any social events, the most sense of justice, the voice of the largest group, is always cock silk.

In fact, the formation of cock silk culture at the beginning, quite a kind of explosion of the feeling of attack-by showing how ridiculous, to ridicule the more ridiculous social status quo. But now this color is fading, cock silk culture is becoming the most vague criterion, the threshold is also the lowest subculture: Most of the time, as long as you call yourself cock silk is enough. Some people will be cock silk culture equivalent to grass-roots culture, although the beginning is not so, but in the core of the silk culture is gradually broad now, it does show this trend of development. This simple cultural core, the direct development of the way, but also let us on cock Silk culture outbreak of the reasons for the spread of the traces can follow.

With such a large mass base as support, although the name is not elegant, cock silk culture has gradually been accepted by the mainstream culture. From the current trend of social development, the cock silk will not be reduced, will only be more and more, this let cock silk culture has a good long-term development prospects. Although it seems that the operating cock silk culture to make money are some Gaofu, but the cock silk still enjoy, after all, most of the time, cock silk in the heart are clear, just lazy tube.

Cock Silk culture: Development status ★★★★★, short-term development ★★★★★, long-term development ★★★★★

Group Creed: The world's Gaofu are the same, Dick Silk each have their own cock-like.

2. Gamers

At the E3 exhibition, the game players will be taken out alone to say. The development of the game industry, in fact, and the film has a lot of similarities. The same entertainment characteristics, the same new industries, the same technological innovation, even the development of the copyright field is the same. The movie has become the mainstream culture, the foreign game culture actually already became the mainstream, but in our society, the game still can only struggle in the subculture circle.

When it comes to game culture, the first thing to be clear is that online games and electronic sports groups should not be included in the game Culture circle. The core of online games culture is the interaction of players, which is essentially closer to the Internet culture; the essence of electric competition should be counted as sports culture. Of course, rooted in the stand-alone world view of the online game-for example, Wow and the Sword Network 3--, as well as the use of the game's stand-alone part is another matter. The composition of the game culture should be considered from two angles of the manufacturer and the game player. First of all, game manufacturers, in China, only a small number of enterprises have a sense of building a game culture, but also limited to the extent of the star characters to a family photo, the overall outlook on the establishment of a relatively indifferent. Because the Chinese game development team is mostly unstable, not enough experienced developers and lack of enough sense of mission, just want to tell their own brain ideas. The framework of the predecessors to avoid, not to mention the whole game to build a complete worldview? However, domestic game manufacturers face the competition of online games manufacturers, self-preservation still anybody, game culture, such a lack of superstructure, may be the inevitable result.

The biggest problem for gamers is, of course, copyright awareness. Most players are accustomed to free access to the game, which also causes the game to not get enough respect in most players. Face the game, regard it as a kind of good spiritual and cultural consumption of the players are few, game culture is fundamentally lost enough to develop the soil. The root causes of this phenomenon are two, first of all, the majority of gamers are teenagers, too much pressure to go to school, so as entertainment means of the game has long been demonized, a large number of potential players can not even touch the game; second, the biggest problem that has become a gamer is that The state of the game and related equipment censorship is too incomplete, a large number of outstanding works can not enter China, players can only resort to piracy, copyright awareness can not be established, game manufacturers to develop the Chinese market confidence has been declining, creating a vicious circle. The two factors combined to make the core players in the domestic number of small groups, and the latter is to build the backbone of the game culture.

This shows that the main obstacles to the development of game culture, in fact, from the national policy, and recently can see the state in the establishment of a sound review system efforts. Although the short-term results are not optimistic, but the trend, the final outcome is bound to connect with the world, to achieve the game industry and cultural prosperity.

Game Culture: Development Status ★, short-term development ¡ï ★, long-term development ★★★★★

Group Creed: No GAME no life.

3. The Rational faction

Compared with other subculture, the most obvious characteristic of rational school is that its members are almost all science students, at least they have extremely scientific thinking. They gathered in the shell nets, science squirrel will be a class of web sites, day-to-day activities is to ask and answer strange questions. This ancient Roman university-style group was supposed to be quite closed, and it could be a much more influential subculture, perhaps thanks to the rampant public-awareness rhetoric and poor advertising on social networks.

Then, it seems necessary to briefly introduce the majority of the reasons for the target-the public know.

Judging from the number of audience, it is not too much to say that public knowledge is the biggest group of discourse right on the Internet, but it cannot be classified into the mainstream culture. Because they do not represent reasonable mainstream values, but merely "big-stream values". They only say what most people want them to say, whether they are true or false. In the era of information explosion, netizens are very quick to communicate with their own tendentious information. This makes the internet most of the time a number of provocative, but no theoretical information, for the rational faction, this is unbearable. According to the foregoing, to put a lot of energy on and other groups on the pinch of subculture, development is bound to be dragged down, the rational faction seems to be an interesting example, they appear in the public, in most cases there is only one reason: the rumor.

From the "Earthquake research useless theory" when the disaster occurs frequently, to the "China Science and Technology does not act" when the Malaysia airline loses the union; from the movie star "The Collagen Hairdressing Medicine", to the mineral water brand "the aging water cannot drink". The sense of being is almost cumulative on the bodies of rumors and advertisements. Unfortunately, the social status of the social network of the user community to the government more dissatisfaction, the government's undifferentiated criticism of the natural become the public knowledge of the most enthusiastic topic. In the eyes of the netizens, who are bursting with the sense of justice and susceptible to incitement, the rational faction is mostly a five-Maoist party for the country's stability. But if you can take off the tinted glasses that are tainted with anger, you will see the rational brilliance behind these five Mao comments.

Today's social networks tend to be less anti-intellectual, perhaps partly thanks to the efforts of the rational. However, like the development of game culture, the future of the rational school will still fall on the development of society. When most people trust the government, no longer the experts as "brick Home", the network naturally no rumors and rumors of space. At that time, the rational faction would probably be able to go back to the closed circle to study the problem. Is this a retrogression or a development?

To say a digression, there is a kind of speech, although there is no social harm, but also always become the goal of rational, it is the soul of small fresh chicken soup. It's probably because the little fresh guys are always projecting their inner heart onto natural things, so that the rational ones can't see it anymore. However, in essence, the arts and science are different ways of thinking, it is difficult to distinguish right and wrong. After all, you can't ask everyone to believe that when you see a bird protecting the body of a companion, it is actually raping the corpse.

Rational culture: The status quo of development ★, short-term development ★★★, long-term development ★★★★

Group Creed: Rumor Move mouth, rumor run broken leg.

4, Curtilage

The topic of home culture, has already said a lot, but it as the status of subculture is difficult to ignore, so finally pick out again two sentences, as the end. Compared with the above several cultures, curtilage culture has almost developed into an ideology, the impact on the individual is much greater than the above several cultures. "Curtilage The Soul", "two times Yuan", all show the curtilage culture to its group influence how profound. From the narrow sense, curtilage culture refers to a kind of group of Japanese anime culture, and in a broad sense, it represents a way of life with a tendency to retreat. Separate from the two definitions, the former focus on the animation of the world to seek three times in the difficult to find the beautiful, the latter because of "home" this definition of small audience, and became a lot of subculture enthusiasts claiming. For example, in front of three cases, the rational faction also called itself "technology curtilage", the player also claimed to be "game house", As for cock Silk, whether they have consciously, their way of life is actually in the house. From this point of view, the "house" as the whole subculture of the pronoun, in a sense is not.

But the broad sense of the house is too broad, so in this paragraph we still focus on the Japanese anime enthusiasts, that is, otaku above. Otaku culture is actually very simple, summed up only two points: the pursuit of a simple way of life, and the pursuit of beauty. This two-point demand in the real world is difficult to obtain, in the pursuit of real films, novels and other works of art can not be obtained, therefore, the story of simple and beautiful anime has become a home culture of a perfect match. Anime and home culture complement each other, it is difficult to say which one on the other side of the greater impact. There is no home culture of the anime, in fact, and the general film culture is no different, but only to change the way of expression; there is no animation of curtilage culture, can only to other subculture transformation.

From the essence of curtilage culture, we can also see that it is really difficult to maintain after the otaku enter the society. Real society let the otaku most of the fantasy unsustainable, many people may continue to anime as their own safe haven, but will be with the fanatical otaku race gradually away. The above mentioned the housing culture development as the mainstream culture of material resistance, which is the corresponding spiritual resistance.

So, is the future light of curtilage culture bleak? Otaku are not always otaku, the world is always have otaku. The pursuit of truth and beauty in line with the mainstream values of mankind, animation industry has been very mature, and development throughout the world. Pure Otaku is a happy group, it has enough attraction and cohesion to develop and grow. Even if it cannot become the mainstream, it will radiate dazzling light. In the far enough future, the world of two and three dimensions is equally good, which is the ultimate dream of every otaku. Fantasy Communism?

Curtilage Culture: Development status ★★★, short-term development ★★★, long-term development???

Group Creed: A person's life is a teenager!