"The vernacular of pornography is now embedded in our culture. Even if you’re not consuming pornography, you’re consuming its logic."

It's neither an apology nor a boast. The simple fact is I watch almost no television apart from documentaries, most of which are viewed on-line.

I haven't seen a minute of any series mentioned in this article, and probably won't watch The Deuce, either.

Rather, I read and write, and typically the way it works for me is that I read a piece about a television show, as below, and find myself intrigued by the subject matter.

Then I go out and find a book to read more about it. It's just a better use of time this way. Different strokes, and all, but "a ready-made critique of market capitalism" is precisely the sort of exercise I cherish -- so long as it isn't necessary to spend time watching it.

David Simon: ‘If you’re not consuming porn, you’re still consuming its logic’, by David Smith (The Guardian)

Alongside longtime collaborator George Pelecanos, The Wire’s creator talks about their new TV drama, The Deuce, which examines porn’s impact on US society

 ... (David) Simon is animated by the perpetual struggle between capital and labour and believes that, after the ravages of Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher and globalisation, and the anti-establishment anger that produced Donald Trump and Brexit, the argument for unions and collective bargaining is as vital as ever. Which brought him to The Deuce, his ambitious new HBO series charting the rise of the porn industry in 1970s New York.

“What I stumbled into seemed to be a ready-made critique of market capitalism, and what happens when labour has no collective voice, and that seemed to be apt for this moment because I think a lot of the lessons of the 20th century are going to have to be learned all over again thanks to Reagan and Thatcher and all the neoliberal and libertarian argument that has come after,” says Simon, 57, unfailingly intense as he leans forward on a sofa.

More socialism to brighten a dreary Monday: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show.'

Riffing on Eugene V. Debs, Pope Francis and Slavoj Zizek brought me to this spot-on indictment of the capitalist mess we've dug (Simon's words). The following excerpt is no more than a tease; you really must read the whole article.

David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show' (The Observer/The Guardian)

The creator of The Wire, David Simon, delivered an impromptu speech about the divide between rich and poor in America at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas in Sydney, and how capitalism has lost sight of its social compact. This is an edited extract

... And so in my country you're seeing a horror show. You're seeing a retrenchment in terms of family income, you're seeing the abandonment of basic services, such as public education, functional public education. You're seeing the underclass hunted through an alleged war on dangerous drugs that is in fact merely a war on the poor and has turned us into the most incarcerative state in the history of mankind, in terms of the sheer numbers of people we've put in American prisons and the percentage of Americans we put into prisons. No other country on the face of the Earth jails people at the number and rate that we are.

We have become something other than what we claim for the American dream and all because of our inability to basically share, to even contemplate a socialist impulse ...