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Post by jdredd on Dec 17, 2015 15:18:45 GMT -5
Star Wars VII is upon us. I am in no rush to see the movie. The whole shebang kind of makes me yawn in my old age. And all the Star Wars products everywhere is overwhelming. How soon before Disney burns everyone out? It's almost been forty years since the original.
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Post by jdredd on Jan 7, 2016 15:07:03 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/429348/national-review-back-future"The word for this kind of civilizational situation is “decadence.” Not the decadence of pure debauchery — there’s some of that available today, but public morals in the West probably hit bottom in the 1970s, not in our own era of stagnation. Rather it’s decadence as defined by Jacques Barzun: All that is meant by Decadence is “falling off.” . . . The forms of art as of life seem exhausted, the stages of development have been run through. Institutions function painfully. Repetition and frustration are the intolerable result. Barzun wrote these words in the late 1990s; today it’s hard to imagine a better distillation of our situation. And pace the doomsayers, decadent periods need not give way swiftly to declines and falls: They can last — especially in a society protected by oceans from the mass migrations presently yanking a decadent Europe back into history — for generations, until some external threat or internal revival finally ushers in a different, more dynamic age. Which suggests an irony for Western and particularly for American conservatives. In a less decadent era, our forefathers hoped to stop the march of history, to redirect its rushing course. In our era, history seems to have slowed to a depressing, repetitious crawl, and it might be our mission to start it moving once again." Here's a rightie complaining about what he calls "decadence". But he suggests we need to "start it moving once again". How does he picture that happening? A war with Iran or Russia or China? That seems to be what the right is into. He mentions an "internal revival". A revival of what? Surely as a rightie, he doesn't mean a revival of hippie anti-consumerism, does he? That kind of Puritanism is foreign to modern conservatives, I believe. And their cheesey God isn't helping them. According to them, He LOVES Capitalism.
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Post by jdredd on Jan 28, 2016 1:31:41 GMT -5
Since politics and culture overlap, the rise of The Donald must be having some affect on the culture. Will it be the end of the 40+ years of cultural stagnation? I bet a toxic Trump regime could really shake up the state of mind of the Millennials. Sixties redux, here we come!
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Post by jdredd on Feb 5, 2016 18:42:44 GMT -5
Some people claim that America is a classless society, and there certainly is no greater symbol of our classlessness than the Super Bowl. This year it is Super Bowl 50. Really, 50 years of this tacky spectacle? Eventually there will be a generation that will turn their back on this crude barbarism. I doubt there will be a Super Bowl 100. So what musical group will be the NFL's whores this year for the halftime? Coldplay? Figures. I still haven't forgiven U2.
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Post by jdredd on Mar 5, 2016 5:51:09 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/432325/knight-cups-terrence-malicks-cinematic-prayer"How awful was the Oscarcast? Several people told me they would never watch it “ever again.” To maintain NRO civility, I’ll just say it was a perfect foretaste of hell — what the world will be if liberals have their way. Reducing everything to political correctness — a social goal for some — leaves no room for honesty or true diversity. But conformity has its benefits: It exposes the inanity of PC cheerleaders. Host Chris Rock, long favored by black and white race hustlers, took to his undeserved role as court jester like Topsy. Rock’s undistinguished film career has been supported by no less than Steven Spielberg, seen grinning in the loges. As always, Rock said everything white liberals want to hear — both black griping and black unreason. He set the pace for an evening of aggressive political grandstanding." Well, all I can do is view the culture from my lonely suburban watchtower (I don't get out much). From my admittedly limited perspective, there are huge fault lines growing in American culture. The venom I read about black culture, from Chris Rock to Black Lives Matter, from white blowhards like NR's movie guy, amazes me. And yet he seems to be pushing what I would call "Christian Culture", which apparently involves throwing insults and hate at anything which is thought not to be motivated by Christian "values". Sadly, the polls indicate strong Evangelical support for Trump. Now there's a guy with real "values".
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Post by jdredd on Mar 26, 2016 14:35:47 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/433238/disney-georgia-gay-discrimination-bill-religious-liberty-law"But in modern America, when hypocritical social-justice warriors confront spineless Republicans, the hypocrites tend to win. They’ve already secured a watered-down bill, and now Disney and its friends are moving in for the kill. Georgia governor Nathan Deal has already echoed leftist talking points, condemning any effort to “allow discrimination in our state to protect people of faith,” but he hasn’t indicated yet whether he’ll veto the legislation. The revised bill is better than nothing, and the “compromise” now has its important use — it demonstrates beyond a shadow of a doubt that powerful corporations not only have no interest in protecting religious conscience, they’re doing an American imitation of their Chinese Communist partners’ suppression of faith and free speech. The only “compromise” they seek in Georgia is surrender. Our new hipster commissars have spoken; will Georgia obey?" I only posted this silly attack on Disney (like Republican-infested Wall Street did not ship millions of jobs to China in the name of "free trade") because of the wacky term "hipster commissars". I like it.
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Post by jdredd on Apr 7, 2016 15:25:28 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/433805/pornography-destroys-american-morals-culture"There’s a reason why so many romantic comedies end mere minutes after the promiscuous jerk vows to change his ways and runs through the rain to carry his “true love” to the world of happily-ever-after. Keep the camera running for six months, and you’ll find that same guy alone in a dark room watching celebrity sex tapes on his iPad before flipping through his Tinder options. Porn makes men pathetic. Its true toll isn’t the loss of “virility,” but the corrosion of values that sustain family life. A generation of young men are now experiencing the high cost of low character. PMO isn’t worth the price." Here's a no-doubt-religious rightie complaining about pornography. Of course, he omits condemning what I think is the biggest contributor to the porn epidemic: The right's beloved "Free Enterprise". God is good until he obstructs profit.
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Post by jdredd on Apr 8, 2016 17:59:21 GMT -5
I may have come 180 degrees about Cultural Stagnation. While a lot of the culture has been same-o same-o for years (Star Wars, hip-hop, NFL and many others), it is technology that is driving some cultural change, that is, "social media", Twitter and all that BS. Go to a coffee shop nowadays, and it's full of people on their laptops or on their "smart" phones. And of course, everywhere you go, people are annoying me making their stupid selfies. Still, there is no dent being made in consumer culture, which "social media" is a subset of.
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Post by jdredd on May 9, 2016 2:43:27 GMT -5
While social media may not be changing consumer culture, it looks like it is affecting the social fabric. As I said above, go to a restaurant and you will be seeing two or three young people sitting at a table, and they will all be on their phones instead of talking to one another. Weird. But I'm old. I still have a flip phone.
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Post by jdredd on May 10, 2016 14:04:31 GMT -5
So this is how the right is going to fight the "culture war" (if Preacher Mike on 760 KFMB is any indication): Making fun of "PC", however they define it. And sadly Seinfeld, by whining about PC on campus, has become the right's hero. NOTHING should stand in the way of humor, no matter how offensive. Or so Charlie Hebdo believed.
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Post by jdredd on May 13, 2016 16:59:00 GMT -5
In today's WSJ, billionaire blowhards Charles Koch and Mike Bloomberg write a column (I'd post it but those morons at WSJ actually expect us to PAY for their BS) condemning so-called anti-free speech "PC" types on campus allegedly intimidating people they don't agree with. Yes, free speech is lovely, especially when you are a billionaire and get your rants published in newspapers as a matter of course (as for us little people, who cares what we think?). As I said above, PC on campus is just the latest faux outrage guaranteed to get gullible people's panties all twisted up. Hey, they lost the gay marriage battle so they need something new to get out the troglodyte vote. Of course there is still transgender bathrooms.
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Post by jdredd on Jun 1, 2016 1:05:39 GMT -5
I think there is a good chance Trump could prevail over Hillary. She is such a bad campaigner, she can barely dispatch even a dufus like Bernie Sanders. So if DJT wins, what will be interesting to me is if he is as bad of a President as I think he might be, will the disasters that follow actually awake the apathetic masses to pay attention to politics? Will they finally be forced to? I don't know. But if they do, the rise of political active masses would definitely change the culture. I mean, even sports zombies might have to divert their attention. And maybe zombie shoppers too.
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Post by jdredd on Jul 3, 2016 22:44:58 GMT -5
www.nationalreview.com/article/437414/religious-liberty-america-threatened-secularism"By contrast, today’s secular cult is exemplified in the halftime show of an American Super Bowl (the most internationally watched of all television broadcasts). The Super Bowl entertainment does not honor the responsibility, duty, and triumph over one’s own desires that characterize the heroic moments of American life. On the contrary, Super Bowl entertainment displays passion and desire, “letting go,” and purposelessness. It is a liturgy of spontaneous desires, wants, and longings." Right in the middle of this tiresome tirade against secularism is this gem. This heretic is criticizing the epitome of Capitalist Free Enterprise, the NFL! Doesn't he know that Capitalism and Christianity have been soulmates for several centuries now? America can have its cake and eat it too.
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Post by jdredd on Jul 27, 2016 5:03:54 GMT -5
Perhaps what I mistook for cultural stagnation is in fact the spiritual, political, and cultural bankruptcy of the West.
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Post by jdredd on Sept 25, 2016 21:47:11 GMT -5
Even though I decided that the culture was in fact evolving, there are cultural relics still hanging on, such as "60 Minutes", which is starting it's 49th year. It is what I call "Old Fart News". For instance, tonight's episode started with what a great guy our ally the King of Jordan is. Then, they did a report on what a danger Putin and his nukes are (Cold War nostalgia?), and then a dull art story about some Picasso paintings ending up in his electrician's garage. Who cares? But you really know it's Old Fart News by the commercials: Take a river cruise! Ask your doctor about a new drug for arthritis! Makes me feel old just watching.
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