How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph) or (Feed Chatter #.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"They're also waiting to make you want things. Everything we've grown up with—the stories on the feed, the games, all of that--it's all streamlining our personalities so we're easier to sell to. I mean, they do these demographic studies that divide everyone up into a few personality types, and then you get ads based on what you're supposedly like. They try to figure out who you are, and to make you conform to one of their types for easy marketing. It's like a spiral: They keep making everything more basic so it will appeal to everyone. And gradually, everyone gets used to everything being basic, so we get less and less varied as people, more simple. So the corps make everything even simpler. And it goes on and on." (22.12)
Violet nails it. The corporations like things easy, and they like to be able to standardize their products, which makes it easier to sell things (and cheaper, too!). Eventually, people will take what's offered and their tastes will start to converge on that basis. Think about McDonald's. There's a reason they have the same menu items, whether you're in New York City, or in Toad Suck, Arkansas. And yes—there really is such a place. Maybe one day you'll even be able to buy your Big Mac on the moon.
Quote #8
I didn't know how close she was to the person who had gone completely fugue at the party. (39.32)
Violet certainly did appear to be a different person when she lost it and yelled out that Quendy was a monster, so Violet isn't even sure whether he's dealing with the cray Violet, or the normal Violet. But which Violet is the real one, anyway? And—brace yourselves for some philosophizing—who is the real "you" if you have a constant stream of advertising pouring through your head?
Quote #9
I want to dance. You know? That's this dumbass thing, because it's so cliché, but that's what I see myself doing. I want to dance with like a whole lacrosse team, maybe with them holding me up on a Formica tabletop. I can't even tell you. I want to do the things that show you're alive. I want to eat huge meals with wine. I want to go to the zoo with you.
[...]
Everything I think of when I think of really living, living to the full—all my ideas are just the opening credits of sitcoms. See what I mean? My idea of life, it's what happens when they're rolling the credits. My god. What am I, without the feed? (40.15, 23)
Violet may resist the feed but she's not immune to it. Her bucket list is nothing more than clichéd scenes straight out of a movie montage, and she knows it: she feels like she's not expressing something that's truly from within her. Her desire to dance "with a whole lacrosse team" sounds a meg cheesy musical—but admit it: we all think life would be better with a soundtrack.