Recording at the Cinema: Tackiness and “Millennials’” Questionable Hypocricy
It has come to my attention: the contemporary uprising of complaints against Instagram users who tackily (so most opponents have claimed) take an excerpt at the movies in order for them to upload it as an Instagram story. Some young people, if not most, have vengefully posted insults against such an act and they bring forward passages from the law on piracy and so forth. I myself do not endorse recording in the cinema since the light is unpleasant to the eyes. I don’t care about the law on piracy — most people violate it anyway (though, still, the number of the violators does not justify the violation). The “Millennials”, however, exploit the case of violation as the casus belli against those who take videos at cinema. Spoilers are, thus, the most likely underlying reason, but it is not subject to the question.
It is my intention through this writing to question why such blind wrath emerges amongst “Millennials”. I take into account three possible reasons (or indicators for hypocrisy): (1) the unpleasantly beaming lights from phone screens, (2) the violation against the law, and (3) the spoilers.
Admittedly, I use my phone sometimes when I am watching a movie at the cinema. Personally, I get bored when there are only two people in frame talking to an extent that they talk to much. It is enough for me to fish my phone out of my jeans pocket and reply to those unattended WhatsApp messages. In my better days, I put my phone between my thighs at my crotch in order for the light not to annoy the people sitting behind me; in my worse, I carelessly wave it in the air for everyone to see (and to be annoyed).
While the light of phone screens is annoying, it has never induced wrath from the “Millennials”. By wrath, I mean the collective condemn given by the “Millennials” in a series of Instagram stories. I am tempted to say, “Maybe because recording for fame (to put it on Instagram stories) happens too often,” but how stupid of me! I am pretty sure (as are you, perhaps) that people who use their phones at cinemas use them to scroll through messages, not to record the movies. Not to mention that the Millennals don’t get angry because they are annoyed by the light, but they are annoyed when they see Instagram stories that show an excerpt of a movie at cinema. The annoyance of the light, therefore, is overruled.
Then, what? Violation against the law? Ask yourself. Do I get angry when I see/watch pirated movies? Do I get angry when I see somebody pirate movies? Do I really? Well, maybe not, bearing in mind that we seem to be lacking money every time our desire to watch a movie arises and, ultimately, we harbour back as the last (and the first) resort to LK-21. So, why do they keep complaining and exploiting violation against the law as an excuse for their wrath when they are completely okay with it? Is it really the violation, I might ask, or are you so allergic to people different from you?
Spoilers, definitely, are annoying (except maybe to me, as I take pleasure in reading the plot first before watching the movie). But let’s get the bigger picture. Instagram stories, to my limited knowledge, span for only fifteen seconds— not enough to spoil anything. If I completely don’t know the movie being spoiled and, thus, don’t know about all the characters, the background, the storyline, and so forth, a fifteen-second excerpt of Person A stabbing Person B to death does not make sense. I wouldn't understand the importance of Person A or Person B to the story and, most probably, by the time I go to watch the movie having been spoiled, I will have forgotten the faces.
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In conclusion, it is probably the Millennials’ tradition of being lazy, in this case, of reasoning. “I hate those people who record cinema screens for fame,” a Millennial may say, “just because.”
That’s it. Just because. Period.
