Talk:The Saddle Row Review/@comment-25559529-20170529205309/@comment-27578467-20170601013551

Having about a day to think about my comment, I've decided I haven't developed my thoughts enough to try to make such a direct argument against popular trends. I honestly don't fully understand modern social trends and I don't try to keep up with them, so I admit some of what I said is probably off. I think a more accurate way to express my thoughts is this:

A lot of popular trends seem almost completely arbitrary to me, cool for the sake of being cool rather than having an actual connection with daily life. The arbitrariness of being "with the crowd" isn't new, it's a product of our natural desire to fit in that has accompanied social trends since they began. As far as I can tell, the writings that stand the test of time have as their foundation more universal, intrinsic human experiences than passing social trends, since the connection to the individual requires minimal understanding any existing contemporary cultural references. I just don't see anyone in 20 years watching the "sweep" scene and having any idea what the joke is, but of course cultural tendencies nowadays tend to be pretty difficult to predict, and I could be totally wrong.