<div dir="ltr">I think, when you look at the last episode of s1, both the stuff Lumon intentionally did and the situation Dylan got himself into with the switches [trying to avoid being spoilery] we're /well/ past "extension of corporate ideology into vaguely religious territory" and /well/ into "the corporate imagery was never the point." And that's without even thinking about the book and its impact on the innies. </div><br><div class="gmail_quote gmail_quote_container"><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_attr">On Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 11:21 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex">There are quite a few corporations which in practice act somewhat like<br>
religions in real life. This series takes such examples and extends<br>
them.<br>
<br>
On Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 1:13 PM Darin Sunley via extropy-chat<br>
<<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br>
><br>
> It's not about corporate anything, any more than "Truman Show" was about reality television. It's a religious allegory, and a very good one.<br>
><br>
> Which might not be your cup of tea either, and that's fair, but the surface corporate imagery absolutely must not be confused for the substance, which is significant.<br>
><br>
> On Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 10:23 AM Adrian Tymes via extropy-chat <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br>
>><br>
>> I'd never heard of the series. After looking it up, the premise loses<br>
>> me very quickly. I can see some corporate overlords wanting such a<br>
>> system, sure, but reality does not work that way - well beyond my<br>
>> "willing suspension of disbelief" levels.<br>
>><br>
>> To take just one example: without going too much into things I<br>
>> shouldn't talk about much in public, let's just say I've worked in a<br>
>> place that attempted a lesser version of this, and it was trivial to<br>
>> smuggle messages past management. I was hired to do things they<br>
>> couldn't figure out (otherwise, they'd have done it themselves), and<br>
>> this same knowledge involved means of interacting with the outside<br>
>> world (if it didn't, there would have been no work worth doing) that<br>
>> inherently opened up means of passing information that management did<br>
>> not know how to scan for. From what I've read of the scanning systems<br>
>> in Severance, the exact same practice would have worked as-is in that<br>
>> setting too. If management was able to set up a system to scan for<br>
>> this sort of thing, they'd have little to no need for technically<br>
>> competent employees in the first place.<br>
>><br>
>> On Mon, Sep 15, 2025 at 1:29 AM Anton Sherwood via extropy-chat<br>
>> <<a href="mailto:extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org" target="_blank">extropy-chat@lists.extropy.org</a>> wrote:<br>
>> ><br>
>> > Any fans here? I have just watched the first three episodes (one dvd)<br>
>> > of «Severance», whose premise may well be known to you even if you have<br>
>> > not watched any.<br>
>> ><br>
>> > I did not imagine the ramifications of the partition; I imagined it<br>
>> > shallower, though I cannot now say how. Still, though innie-Mark asks<br>
>> > Petey (in one of his flashbacks) how he could know what "cubist" means,<br>
>> > there are plenty of signs that innies would not be lost in their home<br>
>> > culture; for example, in one scene Irving speaks of "gold, silver and<br>
>> > bronze" awards.<br>
>> ><br>
>> > Is the use of retro equipment (Seventies computer terminals, cassette<br>
>> > tape recording) meant to suggest that severance has been going on far<br>
>> > longer than we'd otherwise suppose?<br>
>> ><br>
>> > --<br>
>> > *\\* Anton Sherwood *\\* <a href="http://www.bendwavy.org" rel="noreferrer" target="_blank">www.bendwavy.org</a><br>
>> ><br>
>> > _______________________________________________<br>
>> > extropy-chat mailing list<br>
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>><br>
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