I forgot i said that, and mostly forget the motivations i had for saying it. but okay. I'll try.

yes, sentimentality has been parcelled out in books and films and mass media at times in varying strengths, I don't think it's really ever been fully divorced from it's emotional base and repackaged for its symbology. I think that is happening more and more, as more and more young people begin to adopt a sentimental persona in the same way the alt crowd once adopted piercings .

this is fuelled by having platforms for that persona. It's a complex thing to put out there and it takes time to craft. enter tumblr. twitter, facebook, wherein the emotional content of your being becomes a fashion accessory.

abstract enough for you?

a commodity is loosely defined as something thats content is more or less self contained and it's value can vary depending on where you get it. As in that laptop model you can get for $50 cheaper at bestbuy. Same guts, only the price varies.

my thinking was and mostly is that we are growing more and more saturated with sentimentality as an emotional tone which survives independent its origins. as in a tumblr stream where we reblog the same sappy sentiment 15,000 times. The sentiment mattering more than the source of it (which we presume to be a human being who felt that thing and had the sense to express it for others).

the original source of the sentiment is lost, obscured and made irrelevant.

this abstraction, once complete, moves sentimentality from an actual emotion or expression of an emotion, into a commodity.

the reason i say this is coming even though it's been a part of movies, music and books forever is those arms of mass media aren't really relevant anymore. They don't feel like part of us anymore. we broke away from them at some point and i think see them as distinct from us. This commodification will be part of us. will be by us.

i wish i could have seen your whole question.