All My Friends, Not At Once
You receive a Facebook invite to a relevant party the aesthetics of which you approve of but know you’ll never actually make it out for. You join, or attend in the old model, anyway. Is this like when Quentin Tarantino directed a token scene of Sin City?
Extended further, is it like when he “presented” all those mid-decade digital horror movies Chris Moltisanti said were fuckin’ brutal and tried to make? Did Tarantino see some rushes of Hostel and go “alright yeah yeah yeah it’s amazing put my name on it okay g2g I’m double-parked”? I do seem to remember him pretending to be excited about that one on Conan.
The Join, née Attending, option on Facebook is the social media equivalent of an executive producer credit. It’s not as condescending as a Jerry Seinfeld street sign but less enthusiastic than a Tim Pawlenty can-I-play endorsement. Tacitly you’re saying to all your subscribers if not all your friends: I approve of this event, in various forms, except I will not necessarily show my face at it because I’ll be getting wasted at home watching Android. It’s a literal status update—if I were to deign to go anywhere on said night, it would be here. Although I probably won’t deign.
