Why Pop Culture Trivia Matters
It’s Not A Waste Of Time. It’s A Way To Make Your Time Matter
In 1957, a boy named James Smith became one of the first recorded Elvis impersonators. He was 16 and loved the song “Baby Don’t Care.” He was from Victoria, Canada and he did it all for the girls. And that is very important information.
Pop Culture seems frivolous by nature (after all, only something overinflated could pop). Pop Culture trivia seems even worse, like the glorification of a waste of time. At Trivia Happy, we have questions about Einstein and Liszt and Rhodesia and neutrinos. But Pop Culture trivia is there too, nestled in a sidebar, just as vaunted as “The Arts” or “Science.” That’s because it is silly, fluffy, and fun. And because it matters.
Pop Culture Trivia Makes Pop Feel Real Again. That Includes The Kardashians
Can you rank the Kardashians by education? If you’re curious, it’s Robert Kardashian Sr., Kourtney Kardashian, Kim Kardashian, and Khloé Kardashian. Of course, by definition any mention of the Kardashians is fluff—click bait at best and exploitation at worst. Yet knowing that tiny piece of trivia suddenly changes the entire context around the family.
A little trivia forces you to see the Kardashians in a new way. Instead of thinking about them the way E! wants you to—as a multiplatform glaze of products, personalities, and advertisements—you suddenly have to start thinking about them as people who once sat in desks and went to school. With trivia, the sugary carapace flakes away with each name on the list.
Then you think about Robert Kardashian—an accomplished lawyer and son of immigrants. His practice of law may not have equaled Atticus Finch’s, but he definitely wasn’t spending his time signing off on clothing collections at Sears. Thinking about him, in turn, makes you think about his death in 2003, and suddenly the superficial picture of the Kardashians has deepened from a flat screen to a full body—from images to people.
And it’s all because you answered a stupid trivia question about them.
When Our Pop Culture Is Real, It’s Awesome
Of course, there’s a point to this beyond learning about the Kardashians’ degrees (or lack thereof). Why should we even want pop culture to feel real again? Why does it matter if we have a fuller picture of the ways we waste our time?
When we don’t think about what we’re watching and consuming, we don’t get the full benefit of it. We miss out on the shades of meaning that make us feel all the things great pop culture does: joy, desire, sadness, tension. It’s like a picture with the contrast turned down. Knowing the trivia makes those feelings vivid again.
Doesn’t it make Coppola’s The Conversation more tense when you know that half of the scenes were filmed guerilla-style in San Francisco’s Union Square? Doesn’t it make Seinfeld feel more real when you know that Kenny Kramer is on the streets, giving tours? And doesn’t it make Elvis cool again when you realize that he wasn’t always the 1970s eccentric model?
Elvis was cutting edge in 1957. Elvis was cool enough that a 16 year old in Victoria, Canada impersonated him to have a better chance with girls. He made women swoon. Girls signed his movie posters just to get closer to him. He was dangerous and alive, and thanks to a little trivia, he gets to feel that way again.
At our site, Trivia Happy, you can play trivia with your friends and learn amazing things. For the record, there’s only one Kardashian question (so far).
