|
Post by jdredd on Mar 12, 2014 17:51:13 GMT -5
When I started this thread, I wanted to make a distinction between investigating if our culture is stagnant, and fighting the cliche "culture war". Unfortunately, that is more difficult than I imagined, both subjects seem to overlap, starting with the disparate definitions of "culture". So be it, I'll just be addressing both issues.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Mar 23, 2014 4:55:16 GMT -5
One more right wing radio guy claiming we need a "cultural revolution" was Mike Slater yesterday morning. Perhaps we do, but what kind?
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Mar 23, 2014 23:28:15 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/373862/paul-ryans-white-hood-rich-lowry"In his instantly notorious interview with radio talk-show host Bill Bennett, Ryan discussed fatherlessness and the importance of role models. “We have got this tailspin of culture in our inner cities, in particular,” he said, “of men not working and just generations of men not even thinking about working or learning the value and the culture of work.” "Ryan’s critics hate the word “culture,” as if it were a concept that right-wingers came up with to justify nefarious doings rather than one that is central to understanding how the world works. Maybe for the sake of argument we can assume culture does matter, or as this writer says, "is central to understanding how the world works". But how is it defined? Is culture the arts like music or literature? Or is it ideas like democracy or "personal responsibility"? Does the Middle Class have it's own culture, different than the poor? With a concept so broad, how can you analyze whether it is vibrant or static?
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Mar 27, 2014 14:42:50 GMT -5
www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/27/deace-when-liberal-hollywood-does-republicans-job-/"Can you imagine liberal Hollywood producing a big-event film whose villains are ruling class elites who think they can control other people’s lives, and the heroine fighting for individual liberty finds her strength in the traditional family? Seems too good to be true, right? Except for the fact liberal Hollywood actually did make this film, and right now it’s the No. 1 movie in America. It’s called “Divergent,” and it’s the most overtly conservative big budget blockbuster since “The Dark Knight Rises” put the villainous Bane in charge of the Occupy Wall Street movement." "I do not know political philosophy of the author of the books the movie is based upon, or that of the filmmakers. But whether it’s intentional or just by accident, “Divergent” is a devastating critique of America’s slouch towards statism. It’s also a far better deconstruction of the American Left than what the Republican Party has been capable of producing in recent decades. “Divergent” enjoyed one of the biggest March movie openings in cinema history, which proves there is plenty of room at the box office for pro-liberty movies when the storytelling is good. Maybe this is the way to reach the next generation with the message of Americanism?"
Gosh, was that supposed to be the Occupy Movement Bane was leading in "Dark Knight Rising"? Went right over my head. I'll have to watch it again. As for "Divergent", haven't seen it yet, so it's hard to comment on.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Apr 22, 2014 3:30:25 GMT -5
I was thinking again how traditions might just be mistaken for cultural stagnation. Most people seem to appreciate the yearly circle of events. January is football playoff month, then spring is basketball (March madness) and then baseball. Summer is time off to take the wife and 1.5 kids and the dog on a vacation somewhere. Fall is the start of the new school year and football season. Then the holiday season starts with Halloween, then Thanksgiving, the the consumer frenzy of Christmas which so many retailers depend on. And then the New Year again. And repeat again and again year after year ad nauseum. I'm sure other nations have their own wacky traditions repeated over and over endlessly. And most people seem to like things that way, so who am I to disagree?
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on May 24, 2014 20:04:09 GMT -5
www.nytimes.com/2014/05/24/business/norman-rockwell-captures-the-art-markets-eye.html“Norman Rockwell was demonized by a generation of critics who not only saw him as an enemy of modern art, but of all art,” said Deborah Solomon, whose biography of Rockwell, “American Mirror,” was published last year. “He was seen as a lowly calendar artist whose work was unrelated to the lofty ambitions of art,” she said, or, as she put it in her book, “a cornball and a square.” The critical dismissal “was obviously a source of great pain throughout his life,” Ms. Solomon, a frequent contributor to The New York Times, added. But Rockwell is now undergoing a major critical and financial reappraisal. This week, the major auction houses built their spring sales of American art around two Rockwell paintings: “After the Prom,” at Sotheby’s, and “The Rookie,” at Christie’s. “After the Prom” sold for $9.1 million on Wednesday; “The Rookie” for $22.5 million on Thursday." So Rockwell's saccharine slop is now being considered mainstream fine art. So be it, but if that isn't stagnation in painting I don't know what is. Perhaps painting itself is past it's prime, and this bubble of speculation on famous paintings is doomed to burst. Of course the obituary for painting has been written many times in the past, so who knows?
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Jun 14, 2014 19:07:08 GMT -5
america.aljazeera.com/opinions/2014/6/culture-war-conservativesliberalssamesexmarriage.html"The most important difference between 2009 and today is that conservatives officially lost the culture war. In the past few years, public support for both marijuana legalization and same-sex marriage has surpassed 50 percent, with no indication that these trends are likely to reverse. Women make up more than half of the professional and technical workforce. It’s a midcentury Christian conservative’s worst nightmare: The country has been overrun by pot-smoking gays and women’s libbers. Cultural liberalism won, and there’s nothing Douthat or his pious brethren can do about that. But there are discontents still; portions of the radical left have long pursued their own case against liberalism. Instead of the “permissiveness” that Douthat constantly gripes about, the left sees an oppressive consumer culture of compulsory sexuality, where you can buy anarchy and peace, but only as sickly sweet body sprays. It’s a culture that tells women they can wear anything, as long as they stay on the sexual market — so it had better not be a hijab. It’s a culture that tells men they can have anything they want — attention, validation, sex, free labor — as long as they learn to take it from women. This is not our shining sexual liberation, this is a culture that reflects and reinforces the brutal economy beneath it." " We've become so accustomed to the post-Reagan prosperity gospel wedding Christianity and market culture that it’s hard to see these old ties fraying. But as the godless libertarian wing of the Republican Party prepares to do battle with the blasphemous corporate wing, the future of cultural conservatism is up for grabs. Douthat admits as much in his column on Marx: The taproot of agitation in 21st-century politics, [the rise of fascist parties in Europe] suggests, may indeed be a Marxian sense of everything solid melting into air. But what’s felt to be evaporating could turn out to be cultural identity — family and faith, sovereignty and community — much more than economic security." This is from Al-Jazeera, which is itself culturally conservative, despite the propaganda of the right connecting Islam to the left. No wonder everyone is confused. But confused voters are easy pickings for corporate propagandists.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Jul 21, 2014 1:27:13 GMT -5
Perhaps I am the wrong guy to take on cultural stagnation. Heck, I don't even know what a "hipster" is. Not only that, I am a fanboy who has gone to Comic-Con every year since 1976. Is comic book culture going into the mainstream yet? If so, is that evolution or devolution? Of course there is also jock culture, military culture, fashion culture, art culture, redneck culture and many others I suppose. I suspect I had delusions of grandeur when I thought I might figure out if American culture is stagnating.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 4, 2014 22:55:51 GMT -5
I've been contemplating what role religion may be playing in cultural stagnation. Religion, whether it is Christianity or Islam or whatever, usually wants the culture to stay the same in whatever area they control. In this, they are opposed to Capitalism, which thrives on the new to sell products. Look what Capitalism has done to Christmas.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 7, 2014 3:04:59 GMT -5
Some anecdotal evidence on the state of our culture today: I was in a tire store, and the music they were playing (does there HAVE to be music in all stores now?) was "country", the worst music ever. I mean, "I'm Getting Drunk on a Plane"...really? And later I was at a Wendy's and they were playing the "best" rock of the 70's and 80's. I had to leave.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 10, 2014 18:31:52 GMT -5
What was I thinking? The answer is probably obvious to everyone else: The thing that unites rednecks, hipsters, jocks, believers, geeks, and everyone else is our dominant culture: Consumerism. Everybody wants stuff, the more the better. The reason hippie culture was a failure is that it was anti-consumerism. Will mankind ever get out from under consumerism? Not as long as enough natural resources are available, I suppose.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 10, 2014 23:47:43 GMT -5
So what's wrong with Consumerism? Doesn't everyone deserve lots of stuff? Well, how about this one small example: www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/aug/10/vaquita-porpoise-brink-extinction-gulf-california/"SAN FELIPE, Mexico — For years, scientists have warned of the declining numbers of vaquita porpoise, a small and elusive sea mammal endemic to the muddy waters of the Upper Gulf of California. With fewer than 100 vaquita believed alive today, the species is now facing a new threat to its survival: growing demand for another endangered species in the region, the giant totoaba fish, whose swim bladder is valued in China for its perceived medicinal value." "Scientists say the main threat to the vaquita are the drift gill nets favored by fishermen who catch shrimp and fish in the Upper Gulf. The vaquitas are an unintended bycatch that become ensnared in the nets and drown." So this is a species on the brink of extinction because of Chinese consumerism. Should you care? If you don't, you don't, I guess.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 15, 2014 23:01:16 GMT -5
I suspect that the bogeyman de jour, ISIS, will fall about as quickly as it rose, crushed between Syria and Iran with the West's help. But I also am wondering if there is a long term vulnerability of the West to fight movements like that. What does the West really have to offer these young men who find meaning in fighting for a Caliphate and killing infidels? Being the first one of their friends to have an I-phone 6? Since Christianity has for a century at least sold out to the materialism of consumerism, how much of a motivating creed is it now? Don't only about 6% of Europeans still go to rch? Or how about the USA, where people seem to be enamored with a vague "freedom" which claims their own government is an enemy? It's hard to rally the troops with the slogan of "Every man for himself". But as I said previously, the balance of power is still with the keepers of the status quo. For now.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 17, 2014 23:49:44 GMT -5
www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2014/08/17/asia-pacific/social-issues-asia-pacific/materialism-a-tough-sell-for-pope-in-south-korea/#.U_GDPaO9Zp0"SEOUL/KKOTTONGNAE, SOUTH KOREA – Pope Francis’ appeal in South Korea for Catholics to combat the allure of materialism might be a hard sell in the newly rich and hypercompetitive country. Far from being considered an evil, the trappings of wealth are often linked there to the hard work, sacrifice and gritty persistence of generations who hustled their nation out of war, dictatorship and poverty and into an Asian powerhouse. “I don’t want to knock successful people off their pedestal just because they have a lot of money,” said Kim Eui-kyun, a 61-year-old from Seoul who described himself as a lapsed Catholic. “If someone has made a fortune for himself, fair and square, and has a lot of money, I don’t think that’s something to be condemned. I look up to them, actually, and I wonder, ‘What did I do wrong?’ ” Perhaps the Pope believes you can have only one God, either Him or wealth. And as I wondered earlier, can Western materialism defeat Islamic fundamentalism? Maybe it can, it defeated another religion: Communism.
|
|
|
Post by jdredd on Aug 28, 2014 22:17:32 GMT -5
So FX is running all 500+ Simpsons episodes non-stop. How long has Simpsons been on? 25 years?
|
|