Pop culture - a rant.

[milefile]

Originally posted by jay wilkie
it's called french kissing... duh

Idiotic post #1.

I'll keep a running tally in this thread. Congratulations for being first, jay. Expecting many more.

Idiotic post running tally:

• jay wilkie, "it's called french kissing... duh"

 

[jay wilkie]

sorry about that.. was merely being a bit sarcastic about neon's post that quoted me. I had ask why u where the most hated member, and he got a bit cheeky.

 

[///M-Spec]

Originally posted by Sage
Sorry if I'm technically straying "off-topic" with what I'm about to say, but I feel it's relevant as to why "pop culture" even exists.

One big point that Ayn Rand stressed in her books was the importance of selfishness. I can't do justice to the intricate story plots that she uses to prove this point, but basically it's important for humans to do what they want to do and think how they want to think.

Now, regarding RER's comments about how people are too hung up on how they look - This facet is practically pure selflessness. People are hung up on "style", rap, slang, etc., because they don't care what they think... they care what other people think. And again, as Ayn Rand so well showed in her books, this awareness of other people's wants and conforming to those wants sets itself up for a vicious cycle that expands and starts deteriorating society as a whole.

It could be argued that this is what "pop culture" is... widespread selflessness.

I'm going to take what Sage has said here and add to it, because I think he's onto something important here.

Sage, your interpretation of Rand's message from The Fountainhead is dead on. The only thing missing element to make this message complete is motivation.

The reason so many of us are motivated to adapt and belong to this complex thing we call 'pop culture' is because human beings have a deep-seated need for group acceptance. Let's face it; man himself is a tribal creature that, by history, has come to dominate the planet because of the simple property of there being strength in numbers.

The selflessness that Rand describes in her novels are, in fact selfish --in it that the need for peer approval, a sense of belonging, a sense of community, is a primitive and strong drive in all our psyches. It just so happens that some of us have a greater need for it than others. The Howard Roark character in The Fountainhead is, in fact, an abberation of human instinct; a man completely devoid of the need for acceptance or approval. Thus, he becomes heroic in a way that he is someone that goes against the grain in which we are made; a rebel against the system.. a man fighting his destiny.

Pop culture exists because most of us are not Howard Roarks.

Milefile talks about the popular denuding of sexuality. This actually makes perfect sense to me. Of course it happens: sexuality is possibly the most powerful of the social leverages.

Look at how other animals relate to sex in a community setting and it becomes very clear how powerful and important it is. Take a wolf pack for example. Each pack has an Alpha Male and an Alpha Female. They are always the strongest, largest and physically fit pair. They mate exclusively, eat the majority of the available food and are the only ones in the pack allowed to mate. Any attempt by the other members of the pack to mate are met with severe and dire threats. The Alphas will actually kill and sometimes eat (gruesome) offspring from another couple.

Control of sexuality is one of the most basic and oldest forms of physical domination known to man --right after food and shelter. Why do you think every religion attempts to create and enforce rules and guidlines over the sexual conduct of its members?

So those 14 year old girls from Gil's story who flash their underwear is expressing a perfectly understandable desire. They have come sexually of age. They want peer acceptance. They want the social power and station that puts them above their potential competitors: They want to be the Alphas. I respectfully submit that people who have a problem with that is uncomfortable because it challenges their own sexuality.

But whether or not these actions meet with your acceptance is almost besides the point. I'm not advocating 14 year old girls should show more T&A at the mall or anything. I'm saying that the desire for these things to occur are natural and hardwired into us.

Personally, I really don't see how this or girls waving their bootylischesness at the camera in a rap video can de-value what I share with my wife. But hopefully that's because I'm just a little closer to Roark than other people are.


///M-Spec

 

[milefile]

Originally posted by ///M-Spec
I respectfully submit that people who have a problem with that is uncomfortable because it challenges their own sexuality.

Nah. It makes me feel sad that they can't find anything else worthwhile about themsleves. Anyway it is possible (and preferable) to look irresistibly attractive and not be crude.

But whether or not these actions meet with your acceptance is almost besides the point. I'm not advocating 14 year old girls should show more T&A at the mall or anything. I'm saying that the desire for these things to occur are natural and hardwired into us.

I agree. I also believe that we are not wolves. For that reason alone we are held to a higher standard, our lives have more potential, and more potential to be degraded. We are bodily, but we are more, too.

Personally, I really don't see how this or girls waving their bootylischesness at the camera in a rap video can de-value what I share with my wife. [/B]

It doesn't devalue it because you already have it. I think it may never occurr to many that they can have what you have. It is very hard to find it represented in pop-culture. That this loss could be spreading is detrimental.

My complaint is not about my life being devalued, it is about the future, even after I am gone. Why do I care? I just do.

 

[Duke]

Originally posted by jay wilkie
it's called french kissing... duh

I don't much like the French. Maybe I'll start calling it "Freedom kissing".

 

[///M-Spec]

Originally posted by milefile
Nah. It makes me feel sad that they can't find anything else worthwhile about themsleves. Anyway it is possible (and preferable) to look irresistibly attractive and not be crude.

Milefile; surely with how troubling your father's treatment of you was, did you not go through a self-esteem crisis of your own at a point in your life? What would you have done at that point to feel loved and accepted?

Originally posted by milefile
I agree. I also believe that we are not wolves. For that reason alone we are held to a higher standard, our lives have more potential, and more potential to be degraded. We are bodily, but we are more, too.

Fair enough. This I do concur with.

Originally posted by milefile
It doesn't devalue it because you already have it. I think it may never occurr to many that they can have what you have. It is very hard to find it represented in pop-culture. That this loss could be spreading is detrimental.

My complaint is not about my life being devalued, it is about the future, even after I am gone. Why do I care? I just do. [/B]

I'll quote my favorite saying of Ghandi's: "You must be the change you wish to see in the world."


///M-Spec

 

[///M-Spec]

Originally posted by neon_duke
I don't much like the French. Maybe I'll start calling it "Freedom kissing".

///M-Spec

 

[GilesGuthrie]

Originally posted by ///M-Spec
I'll quote my favorite saying of Ghandi's: "You must be the change you wish to see in the world."

///M-Spec: you've got the majority of what I wanted to say down already, which is cool.

The interesting thing is that you posted your Ghandi quote after writing this:

Milefile; surely with how troubling your father's treatment of you was, did you not go through a self-esteem crisis of your own at a point in your life? What would you have done at that point to feel loved and accepted?

This strikes me as being a little ironic. Speaking as someone who has themselves gone through a self-esteem crisis about 10 years ago, which still rears its head to this day on occasion, I turn to that Ghandi philosophy. I hadn't seen the quote before tonight, but it's interesting nonetheless, because it's the way I've been living my life since I flirted with rock bottom all the way back then.

I resolved to make sure that I could live up to my own scrutiny. That I never did things that I saw as negative things in other people. That I treated everyone honestly and fairly - because only then could I dislike them for not treating me so. That I wouldn't pick on someone's weakness, and that I would only expect what could reasonably be expected of someone.

Pop culture is, as Sage so aptly put first in this thread, the desire to fit in. It's the desire to subjugate yourself, prone at the alter of conformism. Why else could mediocrity be so consistently rewarded?

In an age when "minority" is something to be shied away from, it's actually socially acceptable to denigrate oneself. It's frowned upon to be seen as clever (thus answering jay wilkie's first question). Personally, I find this unacceptable, and rail against it at every opportunity. "Slipshod", "Slapdash" and "Lacklustre" are three of my most hated traits. Mediocrity is not acceptable. Medocrity is next to failure. And people who seek to encourage this by treating excellence perjoratively are themselves perpetrating the myth that it's OK to do the least possible.

This is, I believe, at the heart of Pop Culture. It's all about making the most money by appealing to the lowest common denominator.

And it's why I'm here, typing, instead of watching the latest cookery show on channel 317.

 

[milefile]

Originally posted by ///M-Spec
What would you have done at that point to feel loved and accepted?

I can tell what I did, in fact, do. I had a few friends and when I was seventeen I got a girlfriend and stayed with her until I was 22, loyally. Meh. Big deal. I don't have much of a response to that I guess.

But my question is, why do young people have self esteem crises? I suggest it's preventable, and that popular representations of sexuality exacerbate these crises.

But I'm glad you pointed out the importance of parents in particular and adult role models and infuences in general. I still think my dad was a better influence than Eminem, or Madonna.

 

[HondaKid86]

It bothers me that my roomate locks my television onto MTV.

MTV amazes me. I can't believe that this is what a good portion of my generation is into. That is the case, by the way -- as much as I hate stereotypes and 'ageism'.

 

[Danoff]

I’m not quite sure I completely understand this thread. The idea is to complain about what stupid people are doing? Or are they affecting you personally somehow mile?

Sure stupid people with mob mentality go out and buy clothes because they see Madonna wearing them. Sure stupid people sleep around because it’s considered the thing to do. Sure stupid people do drugs and listen to music and spend all kinds of money just to do what everyone else is doing because the grass is always greener… pop culture is stupid. But it doesn’t affect me.

I watch TV, I see the “denuding” of sexuality in every beer commercial on every football game I watch, that doesn’t mean that sex is any less emotional for me. Maybe it is for others, but that’s their problem. If you’re letting other people change your mental state, that’s your problem. If your kids are letting pop culture change their mental state, which I did and I think just about everyone has, that’s their problem, and it was mine at one point.

So if the point is to complain about idiots with mob mentality for the sake of complaining, I’m on board. If the point is that these mob driven morons are hurting me, or that doing something that is popular is always bad, I’ve got to get off the boat.

 

[milefile]

I think my concern revolves around the knowledge that my son is going to become a boy and then a man in this world, that it is mine and my wife's job to guide him through and help him understand that what is important about living, and that we will be competing with organizations operated by people who have degrees in how to manipulate people. I'm prepping myself in advance. I see parents fail all the time. I'm not worried that I will, but I can't say I know what I'm going to do when this or that happens five, ten or fifteen years from now. My perspective was the same as yours a year and a half ago. I see things differently now, more critically, and for different reasons than I did before.

That in addition to the fact that it all annoys me to no end.

 

[Danoff]

I think my concern revolves around the knowledge that my son is going to become a boy and then a man in this world, that it is mine and my wife's job to guide him through and help him understand that what is important about living, and that we will be competing with organizations operated by people who have degrees in how to manipulate people.

Someday hopefully I will have a kid and have the same thoughts. Think about how you turned out and how well your father did raising you. I think if you could realize that pop culture is a waste given your background, it is certain that your son will realize it even more quickly because his background will be better than yours. If your wife is as smart as you, your son should have at least your intelligence level to prepare himself against the world. That's my hope for my kids anyway, that they'll have at least my intelligence level (bare minimum )

I like that line... "what is important about living".

 

[Pupik]

Originally posted by milefile

Public radio and television... begging and pandering to the weakest and basest instincts in the lowest types of people.
Then don't give them a dime. But judge it like any other media you see and hear.

"Spiritual leaders"....Dali Lama, and any other stupid comfort-food-for-the-"soul" type preacher.
I'd hardly call the Dali Lama's words crap. Someone's got to be the Avalotikesvara. But I agree on the other ones.

New American Christianity.
I feel as if I've been down this road before. At least they aren't claiming the body is dirty.

The denuding of Sexuality. Very sad. If you don't know what I mean then I'm talking about you.
I haven't a clue. Meanwhile, I'm going to go have sex with my wife.

Sometimes I couldn't care less, and pop culture flows like water off a duck's back.
Yup, and that's how I keep it. The best things aren't said, sometimes.