The Bigger Picture

netflix is making a hockey show called "the sticks" that is based on a very real tragedy that occured in canada in 2018.

the show follows a minnesota high school team after their bus crashes and coming back to hockey afterwards.

in 2018, the humboldt broncos' (a junior A team made up of 18-22 year olds) bus was hit by a tractor trailer on a highway intersection. 16 people (10 players, 2 coaches, and 4 team staff members) were killed, along with 13 other players severely injured.

the memory of the humboldt broncos crash is an incredibly sensitive subject carrying a lot of trauma to both the survivors, their families, and deceased's families. the trajectory of hockey in canada was changed significantly after this tragedy.

despite this, netflix has decided to make a show using the death of young hockey players for profit. they did not consult the survivors, nor the deceased's families. they stole a canadian story for a feel-good cash grab.

None of the families even knew about this show until the media started asking how they felt.

It is taking a tragedy and turning it into a cash cow.

This was such a deeply-felt issue that even the truck driver pleaded guilty and has tried to make amends. (And as he is facing deportation after his sentence, some of the families have even started supporting him being allowed to stay in the country.) There is a real story you could be telling about community and resilience that is not just turning one of the worst days for THE NATION into cheap thrills and sensationalism.

The jeans problem was the favorite lecture one of my philosophy professors in college gave about the history of jeans and how it ties into capitalism/mainstream culture absorbing and monetizing any counterculture it encounters. So prior to the 1950s jeans were mostly an item of work-wear that you wore on the job as a farmer or factory worker or miner because they were cheap, durable, and hard-wearing. If you were off the job you'd wear what we'd call now dress pants or slacks. This changes in the 1950s when youth culture start wearing jeans as regular clothing, again because they're cheap, durable, and hard-wearing. But then jeans get absorbed by the culture and we start getting designer jeans, acid-washed jeans, pre-ripped jeans, and now we got people shelling out hundreds of dollars for "povertycore" aesthetic. And now jeans aren't even cheap, durable, and hard-wearing.