I think I'm getting an idea of what this New Sincerity is, but the more I gaze into the Navel of Omniscience, the less I see it as an advancement. What is needed to counteract cynicism and nihilism is not to do an about-face and consciously reject the temptation to irony. Forcing myself to be satisfied with a meaning which I am also consciously (or at least upon reflection) creating, to the exclusion of every other possible meaning, is -- at least to me -- the epitome of nihilism and cynicism. To say, "This means nothing, therefore make it mean whatever you want," is to admit the ultimate futility of communicating or participating with others in a grander, universal "reality" that applies objectively and regardless of your own mental prodding. It feels one-sided, solipsistic, and masturbatory. Not that that's evil -- it just doesn't float my boat, man.
At the same time, any such "universal reality", even if it did exist, is unlikely to translate any more readily than a subjective meaning we individually ascribe to things. As has been shown in psychological studies, the way we experience and remember the very physical world we definitely share varies from person to person and even from time to time in the mind of a single person. Thus it's nearly impossible to communicate anything of "profound" meaning even when all the variables can be agreed upon. New Sincerity operates at this layer of experience -- the one where you and I both see Evel Knievel, gasp at his sick mid-air motor-batics, and agree "that was awesome." And it is awesome. It's exactly the right amount of awesome, too, and furthermore, that's all it needs to be. And it's a beautiful thing.
But not everything in human experience is a kickass white dude driving a motorcycle through the sky. Some things experienced are incredibly personal, incredibly subjective, and yet we still find ourselves needing to communicate these things and finding some common thread there that connects us. Sure, a lot of this stuff is hocus-pocus and superstition. But just as the distinction between "inherent" and "ascribed" meaning has not bearing on the value of that meaning, neither does the distinction between an "objective" and "subjective" experience have any bearing on the realness of that experience -- or on the inevitable desire to share it with someone. How does New Sincerity deal with these things? Do we deny the reality of spiritual experiences just because they do not register on a Gauss meter? Or do we take some cheap and entirely dissatisfying cop-out by politely smiling and nodding while some loon tells us how he had an epiphany about something, only to find ourselves met with the same vacant politeness when we try to relate our own thoughts about life, the universe, and everything?
Probably, the most reasonable and measured reaction to such a question is some variation of "meh, just educate yourself about how <scientific field> work and you'll stop fantasizing about <insert ridiculous metaphysical claptrap here>." But this sort of attitude is exactly where cynical postmodernism gets its continuing life force. It's a whack-a-mole game of shooting down every nonsensical idea that pops up in an endless array of incarnations of something that keeps refusing to be satisfied. That something is the point that, I think, New Sincerity is blind to.