Why Is READ MORE So Horrid?

I think it started in advertising world. Someone correct me if I'm wrong. Then people started putting it on their online cvs and stuff. It's bad in ads and it's really really bad in non-ads. Because of course in part they become ads, but that's not even the main thing.

What's it doing in an ad?

The word read talks to the fact that everyone is some kind of ersatz knowledge worker now. Y'all get to “enjoy” the world I “enjoy” as a scholar, by doing research and editing texts. Without getting paid or promoted. It's called scrolling through and updating your Facebook page.

The word more is surely about food. Do you want some more? Please sir, can I have some more? 

It's your prurience and greed button being pushed, disguised as your intellectual curiosity button. Like I said, you get to “enjoy” the world I “enjoy” etc etc.

And of course what's actually being said is Go on, press me. Submit to this ad. You know you want to. You're just finding stuff out. 

I'm not really reading, unless read just means “perceive.” In which case why not say “see more“ or for that matter, “smell more”?

Feel more intelligent than the guy you imagine not pressing. Look, we have more information. Look, it's behind this screen--we're letting you see how this ad works and you're participating in its construction.

It's in words you see. Why the words? Why not just a  >> or some symbol that stands for it? Something nonverbal like a European traffic sign? That's the other thing. It's like an American sign: Exit ONLY, Ped Xing, Yield. 

Or even just continued or see over would be better. There isn't the offer of greedy guzzlings of lovely new chunks of fact further down the giant crisp packet of knowledge.

This isn't high versus low stuff. Like imagine how it would ruin porn completely.

Google has 4.6 billion entries for READ MORE.

There should be a Warhol soup can with READ MORE on it instead of Campbell's. Anyone want to do it?

Like I said on Twitter, imagine it at the bottom of every printed page. It's like, I know. I know to turn the page. Even if I don't, isn't it fun to find stuff out? And this idea that when I turn the page I'm going to get more. Rather than just another page. It's what Derrida would call the logic of the supplement. It interrupts while promising that you will be fulfilled. And so it ruins every reading experience, doesn't it? Just imagine it.

In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was READ MORE

It was the best of times, it was the worst of READ MORE

I have a dream, that READ MORE

Arma virumque cano READ MORE

Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita, / Mi ritrovai per una READ MORE

Please please internet, stop this utter horror.