What is the Point in having High Standards?

[Bridge]

This is getting into a semantic debate about what quality and high standards actually are. Having high standards doesn't necessarily mean wanting to watch a certain type of movie all of the time, for example an involving drama. So just the act of watching something light-hearted and enjoying doesn't on its own constitute lowering your standards, as the automatic processes that go on in your brain while you're watching cannot be intentionally turned off IMO. But there are varying degrees of quality when it comes to anything, say comedy. There is intelligent humor, physical humor, deadpan, dry humor and the list goes on almost endlessly. That doesn't mean that certain types are more high quality than others necessarily and there are absolutely horrible examples to be found from any conceivable genre. So the bottom line is that high quality entertainment isn't necessarily only cerebral, but when you watch examples of perhaps more brainless types of entertainment the focus is elsewhere and so the criteria by which you judge change. Essentially you don't need to be any less critical.

[Kreekakon]

So the bottom line is that high quality entertainment isn't necessarily only cerebral, but when you watch examples of perhaps more brainless types of entertainment the focus is elsewhere and so the criteria by which you judge change. Essentially you don't need to be any less critical.

So basically this would mean that as opposed to saying "adjusting your standards accordingly" you would think it more appropriate to say "adjust your form of criteria accordingly", am I right?

What about guilty pleasures then? Do you think that guilty pleasures are in a special class of their own since their enjoyment, and your critical judgment don't go hand in hand like they usually do?

[Bridge]

So the bottom line is that high quality entertainment isn't necessarily only cerebral, but when you watch examples of perhaps more brainless types of entertainment the focus is elsewhere and so the criteria by which you judge change. Essentially you don't need to be any less critical.

So basically this would mean that as opposed to saying "adjusting your standards accordingly" you would think it more appropriate to say "adjust your form of criteria accordingly", am I right?

What about guilty pleasures then? Do you think that guilty pleasures are in a special class of their own since their enjoyment, and your critical judgment don't go hand in hand like they usually do?

I don't think anybody likes anything that is completely bad. Usually something about it appeals to them so strongly that they are willing to overlook its other drawbacks. Honestly, in my experience I just use my imagination to fill in the blanks in order to create the experience I wish I was having.

Perfect example: The Splinter Cell series. The plot in each game is by no means bad but it is extremely uninteresting with limited character development. Double Agent was a lot better in this regard but in general the series has somewhat underwhelming writing. But because I am such a sucker for stealth games and I would play one no matter what the story was - I'm willing to overlook the writing. Thus my rating for say Chaos Theory is way up there, at least 8/10 because the story is less important to me in this situation. I wouldn't ever give it a 10/10 because that should be a very rare occurrence, but if it was a racing game of equal quality with the exact same story I probably wouldn't give it any higher than 5/10 or 6/10. It's not exactly a guilty pleasure - the entire series is excellent and rightly deserves its status within the gaming community, but the criteria certainly is different.

[Froge]

For me, high standards exist purely for social reasons. Most games that I play carry a degree of enjoyment, but some are more enjoyable than others, and standards allow me to explain to others why I think so. Thus, if someone asks me "hey, do you like Game A" and I thought Game B of the same genre is much better, standards allow me to say "Game A isn't that good".