I zeroed in on:

> and you’d prefer that it wasn’t such an unpleasant experience for you. In these sorts of circumstances, the challenge is to find a way to like the thing that you don’t already like.

To your point, he also speaks about wanting to like things for other reasons, but in my experience, the reasons people often don't do that still boils down to aversion. Admittedly this is not universal.

> He's just looking at them in some kind of anthropological way, it seems, as a detached scientific observer.

That's one way to interpret it, but what he describes also sounds closer to Buddhist and similar philosophies that encourage a more direct experiential outlook on life instead of an existence controlled/clouded by thoughts and concepts. Put another way, there is beauty to be found in even the lowest quality TV shows when viewed experientially instead of critically/intellectually. The experiential view stems from a more fundamental reframing of what you see around you, and is the opposite of an anthropological/detached stance.

I could be reading too deeply into what he's saying, but detachment isn't the only way to interpret this advice.

> From the perspective of people who have real enthusiasm and can sniff out fake enthusiasm.

What is the purpose or utility of doing so? If the enthusiasm benefits the individual practicing it, it seems the ultimate conclusion of such a stance is self-defeating.

There are various studies that explore the effects of one's mentality and how it can modulate experience [0]. As someone on a long journey out of a depression fueled by a lifetime of learned pessimism, there is a stage of the journey in which one must choose how they feel, and persist in those choices until they start to become real. This happens in conjunction with other forms of therapy, and CBT plays a big role in rewiring the problematic thought patterns.

The placebo effect lives somewhere in this realm, as do notions of learned helplessness and the opposite mode of an optimistic mindset and the resulting cascades of positive and negative effect that are left in their wake [1].

I think the use of the word "fake" is really the issue. It brings notions of wrong-ness to the forefront whether or not such notions actually make sense. If you find that you cannot tolerate enthusiasm that doesn't meet certain criteria, that's understandable, but I'd caution strongly against the inclination to rail against it, especially when to do so is purely at the expense of the happiness of others.

> it's of course important to be supportive of the interests of your loved ones, don't complain about them to your loved ones, and be willing to spend mutual time participating. That's just plain common sense and doesn't need a long-winded article

As someone who grew up in an environment that is the opposite of what you describe, and having spent years undoing the damage of that environment while meeting countless folks who lived through a similar experience, the prevalence of the kinds of problematic behavior an article like this tries to discourage is much higher than you may realize.

If it's not for you, that ok, but just move on.

- [0] https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/your-thoughts-can...

- [1] https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2003-02181-004