The light/dark/light structure does call for speeches that aren’t completely positive in the middle. Ray’s book doesn’t speak only about fun celebration but says that a solstices should be scary.
It’s worth noting that if someone has a negative reaction to an event, “but the Ray/the-book says we should do it this way” isn’t actually much of a counter-argument. If everyone was reacting negatively to the darkness I’d change the darkness.
It may be that Jayson just isn’t the target audience for what the Solstice is trying to do. I have a feeling this was not so much about things getting negative/dark, but that they were dark in a way specifically reminiscent of Christian mass. (Being somewhat preachy and advocating transhumanist ideals that slot in, for good or for ill, very cleanly where the “live forever in heaven” elements are slotted out).
It’s worth noting that if someone has a negative reaction to an event,
He hadn’t. He said he liked the event in general.
“but the Ray/the-book says we should do it this way” isn’t actually much of a counter-argument. If everyone was reacting negatively to the darkness I’d change the darkness.
If someone watches a horror movie and then criticises the movie for raising uncomfortable emotions, that criticism misses the point.
If you analyse indivudal elements of an event without looking at the purpose of why those elements are there, that often leads to flawed conclusions.
Raising uncomfortable emotions to release them at the end, can make the dark portion feel uncomfortable but make the following light phase feel awesome.
Oh, I totally think you can argue the darkness is necessary. But I was made uncomfortable by the argument “Ray said it’s necessary” as opposed to “it’s useful because it helps appreciate the light.”
It’s worth noting that if someone has a negative reaction to an event, “but the Ray/the-book says we should do it this way” isn’t actually much of a counter-argument. If everyone was reacting negatively to the darkness I’d change the darkness.
It may be that Jayson just isn’t the target audience for what the Solstice is trying to do. I have a feeling this was not so much about things getting negative/dark, but that they were dark in a way specifically reminiscent of Christian mass. (Being somewhat preachy and advocating transhumanist ideals that slot in, for good or for ill, very cleanly where the “live forever in heaven” elements are slotted out).
He hadn’t. He said he liked the event in general.
If someone watches a horror movie and then criticises the movie for raising uncomfortable emotions, that criticism misses the point.
If you analyse indivudal elements of an event without looking at the purpose of why those elements are there, that often leads to flawed conclusions.
Raising uncomfortable emotions to release them at the end, can make the dark portion feel uncomfortable but make the following light phase feel awesome.
Oh, I totally think you can argue the darkness is necessary. But I was made uncomfortable by the argument “Ray said it’s necessary” as opposed to “it’s useful because it helps appreciate the light.”
I had the impression that he considered uncomfortable feelings to have been created accidently.