A rabble-rousing friend recently posted a meme on Facebook highlighting the style versus substance debate raging in the United States and much of the world. It showed an old-style Chinese menu with a comment indicating the person thought this meant bad food.
A reply showed a modern, LLM generated menu with pictures of pretty appearing food and indicated that food at such a place is almost always going to be worse than at the older, family-owned business with the faded menu and a kid doing homework in the corner. Of course, almost everyone agreed with the reply rather than the original post, if the original was even real.
I smiled and nodded in agreement but deep, in the old gray matter, an idea began forming. Style versus Substance.
What is the Style versus Substance Debate?
It’s a relatively simple question. Do you want a fancy menu with beautiful looking food that tastes overly processed, inauthentic, adequate; or a faded menu with a kid doing homework in the corner where the food is fresh, tasty, fiery, authentic?
The answer is also relatively simple. Most people say they want the better food. That’s what they say. Yet their feet, their money, their children, all flock to the fancy menu and gobble up the garbage food with a smile on their face proclaiming how it is the best thing ever. What’s going on?
It’s not Just about the Food
This debate isn’t about food. It’s about our country. Our Secretary of War wants burly, handsome soldiers. Our President wants gaudy gold draped over everything that isn’t moving and some that is. The women in power all look the same with bolt on boobs, hair extensions, fillers in their faces and who knows where else. This is the ideal. This is the goal. Flashing lights, big dollar signs, look at how pretty I am, look at the brawny soldiers, look at the gold. This is WINNING!!!
Style versus Substance isn’t a Debate it’s a Landslide
Substance isn’t just losing; it’s being squeezed to death by a dizzied population. We want pretty. We want flashy. We want that beautiful menu and when the result is, inevitably, atrocious, we just close our eyes and pretend it’s great, all the way to the end.
Apples are awful. Tomatoes taste like plastic. They sure do look good though and therefore I smile and choke them down telling everyone how great they taste. Or I complain they taste awful and then go buy more of the same.
Conclusion
We’re becoming a country that is all style. Congratulations. Winning!
Tom Liberman