Material life has become abundant, but the space for spiritual life seems increasingly cramped, filled only with anxiety and restlessness, devoid of culture. Let's take a look at this flashy world; people have devolved into illiterates who can only watch images and listen to sounds, like infants who have yet to be enlightened by written language. Short videos, haphazardly edited and piled together in seconds, have invaded people's spiritual worlds, filled with the utmost vulgarity and absurdity, extreme eroticism and kitsch, along with a plethora of "experts" concocting twisted theories and spoon-feeding you poisoned platitudes.
Looking at the comment sections, it is an even filthier and more disgusting world, simply unbearable to behold. This world has provided legal avenues and public platforms for male thieves and female prostitutes, and those once constrained by traditional cultural moral values have broken free overnight, rampaging everywhere, violent and unrestrained.
The cultural life of most people, especially that of the lower classes, is not just vulgar; it is utterly chaotic. After stepping into the 21st century, time began to accelerate, technology made everything faster, material life remained mundane, while spiritual life appeared so monotonous, monotonous to the point of being tedious, even degrading to a filthy state.
Do you remember "Sister Feng"? Her emergence was met with universal disdain online. At that time, the prevailing values could not tolerate such extreme attention-seeking behavior; it was rejected. Now, it can only be said that "Sister Feng" was born at the wrong time; if placed in today's context, it seems quite normal. Today's displays of wealth and absurd humor have become unstoppable; people seem to relish this, fearing not how vulgar you are, but rather how insufficiently vulgar you are.
"Sister Feng" and "Guo Meimei" have become folk banners challenging traditional culture and values in the new century. A thousand-mile dike collapses from an ant hole, and the civilization built on piled earth has collapsed with a loud crash. Why has such a situation arisen? The lack of respect for reading and culture, leading to spiritual poverty, is one of the reasons.
Today, people's lives seem to have diverse choices, but their lifestyles and modes of thinking appear so singular. It seems that aside from scrolling through screens, there is only complaining, quickly browsing through bizarre and foolish things in the hustle and bustle, and in the noise, cursing at people and events unrelated to oneself. Books, as carriers of human civilization, have long been cast aside, leaving no trace.
More than a decade ago, "Sister Feng" could still proclaim reading "Zhiyin" and "Story Meeting," but how many people today can calm down to read serious books? Many young people today, even if they read, only skim superficially, and much of what they read consists of "overbearing CEOs," "cultivating immortals," "losers turning the tables," "harem," "absurd incest," and "scumbag idols," which promote the idea of "getting something for nothing." Little do they realize that while a pie may fall from the sky, it lands on the ground and creates a trap, ensnaring people deeply.
Long-term immersion in consumerism, materialism, and fantasy thinking has put the traditional social value system in jeopardy, exacerbating social contradictions, with breaches of etiquette and violations of propriety occurring endlessly. The authority of the ritual system has faced severe challenges, leading to the decline of traditional culture and values. The rampant spread of vulgar culture has another important reason: as Xu Zhuoyun said, "In today's world, there are only experts, no intellectuals."
After entering the new century, intellectuals have gradually become blurred as the years progress. After the comment section of poet Bei Dao's Douban homepage was overtaken by aggressive language, he wrote a line—"I will henceforth close the comment section for poetry." This line echoes Gu Cheng's famous quote—"The night has given me black eyes, but I use them to seek the light."
Why have people begun to treat intellectuals and cultural figures violently? This is not unrelated to some intellectuals and cultural figures actively catering to vulgar culture. Let's see how many people today are false intellectuals, spouting theories that are "neither here nor there" to fool the masses.
Even more despicable is the emergence of pseudo "helpers" from the intellectual community, calling themselves sociologists, public management experts, or senior media figures. They claim to represent the public while serving their own interests. When people see that they are merely fooling the masses for personal gain, they will rise up against them.
Do intellectuals still have a sense of responsibility? Xu Zhuoyun said, "Knowledge has become a commodity and a source of power; those who possess knowledge manipulate the market." "Give me a three-foot platform, and I can stir up China," do you remember this earth-shattering statement? The attention-seeking behavior and star-like status of intellectuals and cultural figures have altered the public's impression of them, exhausting the public's enthusiasm for consuming knowledge and culture, leading to growing aversion.
With the decline of intellectuals and cultural figures, they have begun to grow silent, becoming afraid to speak, directly resulting in dull thoughts, tedious entertainment, and uninteresting lives. Culture has begun to become unprecedentedly vulgar, exhibiting an unusual alternation of national spiritual schizophrenia, depression, and mania.
As the master said: "Whenever a culture is in decline, those who are shaped by that culture must feel pain; the more grandly they express this culture, the greater their suffering."