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Quantity vs. Quality of Detail

My wife and I went to see the latest James Bond film last night at a drive-in theater that opened shortly after the pandemic hit. I've enjoyed Daniel Craig in the role but I felt a bit so-so with the movie and I've tried to analyze my feelings a bit as to why.

One of the nice things about the Craig era is that the Bond films have still been silly but not felt the need to demonstrate that women are lesser beings and that foreigners are silly, evil people.  I won't say woke but having grown up with the Roger Moore Bond films there is a sizable improvement.

Still, leaving the theater I felt overwhelmed by the amount of plot detail. I think that was the issue for me and it carries over to other areas of my life so I think it's worth considering.

Very little of the plot detail in No Time to Die holds up to scrutiny, because, well, it is escapist entertainment. Well-designed and produced but escapist nonetheless.

I've been feeling this a lot in the past years, quantity versus quality of detail. In particular I've felt it from folk with a point of view to espouse: politicians to a certain degree but more so from pundits, both successful and unknown except for the dozen or so followers they have on YouTube.

I have listened to more than what I think of my share of folk opining firmly and advancing their point(s) by the rapidity of their speech, stating one non-obvious point after the other, never dwelling on justifying their points (if they could). For the more successful pundits who operate this way it seems as if there are a sizable number of folk who prefer quantity of detail to quality of detail.

Whenever I see a pundit or a politician stating the equivalent of fifty the-moon-landing-was-faked whoppers in less than five minutes, I know deep in my heart that this person means me and other listeners ill well.

We have a couple of politicians in my neck of the woods that are good communicators by virtue of picking an important issue and providing quality detail and context. Verla Insko (who sadly is retiring at the young age of 85) has ably served as my state representative since 1997. Her regular email summaries of state legislative business have been models of communication. Jeff Jackson (state senator for the district that includes Charlotte) is currently running for the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate next year. His emails and Facebook posts have typically evolved from summarizing meetings with constituents to addressing one or two key issues in remarkable depth. Are you fortunate enough to have politicians that treat you as intelligent enough to care about the details?

And then there are the folk that just run 30-second attack ads. Sigh.


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