By Derrick Jean-Baptiste

Hollywood has recently made headlines announcing a remake of a number of their previous hits. Hits such as Scarface, Memento, The Blob, Stephen King’s It and even Jumanji.

Of course, I am not necessarily excited for the idea of remaking older movies. It is not because I do not share a love for these programs, quite opposite in fact. Despite this, the feeling of nostalgia for these old cartoons is just strange. It’s causing an entire company to be lazy and instead of developing original new content they simply cling to their heyday, our nostalgia giving them a free pass to do this.

Long story short: Nostalgia is a quasi-limiting factor in our society.

There it’s finally said, we have entered a dream world. A world where there is no struggles, college is free, gas is 99 cents and the chain that has kept us collectively shackled to the rose tinted hue of the past is finally gone and we can finally live in a world where we aren’t trapped in a never ending cycle of nostalgia. Why oh why is this dream of a world with less nostalgia unobtainable?

Just why do we look back to the past with such over-encumbering reverence?

I’d like to cite one main reason: The majority of individuals who experience nostalgia are older teens or adults. They take advantage of nostalgia because they are simply idealizing their childhood. A point in time where they did not have the responsibilities they now have, so they cling to it in some crazy attempt to escape to an easier time. We as a species tend to look to the past and cling to known comforts and then to look towards an unknown and unsure future.

But of course there is reminiscing about the past, and then there is actually becoming enslaved to your nostalgia.

For example, I know many people who believe that the early 80’s produced the best music and everything produced since then is worthless trash. You become old when you stop accepting the new.

It a may be asked: But, what if the new truly is terrible? Then you are simply not looking in the right places. There’s great stuff coming out all the time in every generation; great music, great movies and great art. It’s everywhere, just not necessarily in the forefront. If you’re complaining about how everything today sucks but you’re not looking for something better, you’re just lazy.

Yet despite my feelings of nostalgia I honestly do think a small dose of nostalgia is healthy. What is the point of forming fond memories if you refuse to recall them? It can easily go too far, of course, if it falls upon us to keep our nostalgia in line.

I take a cue from any large New Year’s celebrations. That holiday is one of my favorites, because it is one of the few times of the year that we can look toward the future with hope rather than looking at the past with longing. And yet, in good tradition, just before everyone toasts the New Year and wishes each other luck and good health, we sing Auld Lang Syne.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, “And never brought to mind?”

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, “And days o’ lang syne!”

Honoring the past with tradition isn’t wrong. It should just be reined in so that it never becomes escapism or stagnated ignorance.

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