We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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With all the disturbing developments going on in the world this week, it is a surprise to see that Mel Gibson’s drunken antics on the weekend captured so much attention. Neither his drinking habits nor his anti-Semitic views were secret; however, the timing of this latest escapade has meant that reams of newspaper space and gigabytes of bandwidth have been devoted to discussing this.
The wider question that may be asked was well put by Ann Althouse:
Gibson, on the other hand, has revealed something loathsome about his mind that affects our interpretation of the works of art that sprang from that mind. In particular, it changes “The Passion of the Christ,” which had to be defended at the time of its release from charges that it is anti-Semitic.
I did not see anything particularly anti-Semitic in that movie, myself, but I was not looking for it either. The violence of the movie left a more profound reaction on me then anything else.
In any event, there is nothing new in artistic and creatively talented people having repulsive political views or social habits, as Andrew Norton points out:
Personally, I’d want nothing to do with people who are anti-Semites. But is judging people in the arts by their social and political views a sustainable proposition? Should we not listen to Wagner’s music because he was an anti-Semite? Or if Wagner’s anti-Semitism is too much to take, how about T.S. Eliot, described as “lightly anti-Semitic in the sort of vague way which is not uncommon.” (Does being “not uncommon” make it better or worse?). And how about Philip Larkin, whose poetry I like? This appeared in a recent review of books by and about Larkin:
They [Larkin’s letters] are also in many instances extremely funny, if appallingly so. Larkin’s latest biographer, Richard Bradford, gives a representative sample of the kind of things with which Larkin the letter-writer sought to amuse his friends: He complained to [Kingsley] Amis in 1943…that “all women are stupid beings” and remarked in 1983 that he’d recently accompanied Monica [Jones] to a hospital “staffed ENTIRELY by wogs, cheerful and incompetent.” …His views on politics and class seemed to be pithily captured in a ditty he shared again with Amis. “I want to see them starving,/The so-called working class,/Their wages yearly halving,/Their women stewing grass…” For recreation he apparently found time for pornography, preferably with a hint of sado-masochism: “…I mean like WATCHING SCHOOLGIRLS SUCK EACH OTHER OFF WHILE YOU WHIP THEM.”[8] Although it is not much of a defense, one might say of Larkin that he was the victim of what our teacher-priests used to call “bad companions.”
Even as a joke, and even if prompted by ‘bad companions’, it doesn’t make Larkin look good. Unfortunately, however, I think it is entirely unrealistic to expect artistic and literary types to have attractive social and political views. While our local luvvies haven’t come up with anything as bad as Gibson (and now, of course, we think he is definitely an American) they are more than slightly prone to foolish utterances. It’s almost as if the analytical and careful thinking that leads to political views worth considering and the emotional insight and flights of imagination that lead to good art are mutually exclusive.
And of course, Hollywood and the wider literary-arts- musical establishment has been filled for years with people who have had pro-communist sympathies. Sadly, the notion that it is beyond the pale to support murderous ideologies of the left have never really taken hold in our wider society. For the thoughtful person who peruses their cultural interests, there is nothing for it but to hold one’s nose. Maybe one day artists will be judged by the content of their character, but I won’t be holding my breathe.
Pinewood Studios, the place where the latest 007 movie is being made, has been damaged so badly by fire that it may have to be demolished. Very sad. The place has been used to make James Bond and other films for many years. I wonder whether the ghost of Fleming was appalled at the choice of actor and sent down a thunderbolt?
For a whimsical look at Bond’s place in post-British film and publishing and this country’s history, this whimsical book by Simon Winder is great and rather informative about the Cold War era phase of British history, despite the odd error of detail.
The Tate Modern gallery, built in an old power station, hosts art which is frequently of no aesthetic value whatever, in my opinion, other than to demonstrate the vacuity of much that passes for Modern or post-Modern, art. Apparently, this giant sculpture is to be built:
London’s Tate Modern, the world’s most popular modern art museum, unveiled plans on Tuesday to build a giant glass pyramid-style extension which its creator described as a “pile” of boxes.
Unlike the uniform glass pyramid in the courtyard of the Louvre museum in Paris, the planned extension to the converted power station on the southern bank of the Thames is asymmetric.
The new building, which aims to ease visitor congestion, should be ready in time for the Olympic Games in London in 2012 and will cost around 165 million pounds to complete at current prices.
Makes the heart swell with patriotic pride, does it not? I love the line about the Olympics. Expect more stunts like this, paid for by the taxpayer, as the Games approach. Do not say you were not warned.
While on the subject of the dreadfulness of post-modernism, I can recommend this book.
Top of the Pops, a BBC programme that has shown Top-40 pop acts since the days of the Beatles, has been axed by the BBC. I grew up in the late 70s and 80s watching the show, including favourite bands of mine like the Stranglers, Undertones, Madness, Ian Dury (RIP) and the rest. Now it is all gone. Some of this must have been driven by shifting demographics. When ToTP started, there were relatively more folk under the age of 20 versus the rest of the population than is the case now, and the music industry tended to chase after what was thought to be a large and expanding number of young people with money in their pockets.
The development of new musical techologies, CDs, downloading and the Internet has also affected, and is continuing to change, the way that people listen to music and the sort of styles that get played. This is also affecting how folk come across music for the first time and how a band or act can make a “breakthrough”. The old music labels, under threat as they must be from the changing music industry, are no longer able to support something like a “Top 40” on which something like the old BBC programme could be based. This is neither a good or bad development, in my view, just a change driven by shifting demographics and technology.
So making it to “Number One” no longer has quite the same resonance now that it may have done in the heyday of the Beatles or Duran Duran. Some may regret the passing of all this, but I am indifferent to it. I increasingly hope that new technologies will make it possible for talented artists to circumvent Big Music and push their own offerings on to the Net, using such avenues as the wildly successful GarageBand route. (Uber-blogger Glenn Reynolds has written about this recently in a book).
Anyway, the demise of Top of the Pops should not lead one to conclude that a supposedly vibrant era of great music is going to be replaced by something worse. It is the error of any age to assume that whatever went before is better than what is happening now (a sure sign that one is getting old. I have just passed 40 and intend to resist that trap). This book by Tyler Cowen points out, for example, how the often wildly controversial music of the R&R era in the 1950s has taken on the mantle of classic music in the ears and hearts of many people (including me):
“Musical pessimists also have claimed that contemporary music provides an aesthetic that is overly accessible and directed at the lowest possible denominator. They view rock and roll and other genres as a succession of pop songs, well suited to catch the ear of the casual listener but of little lasting value. We should keep in mind, however, that many western creations have stood a test of time, one of the most significant indicators of cultural quality and depth. It has now been more than forty years since the release of the early classic works of rock and roll, such as Chuck Berry and James Brown.” (page 179)
Or this, (page 178)::
“Contemporary music, for the most part, encourages freedom, nonconformism, and a skeptical attitude towards authority. The totalitarian states of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union did not hesitate to permit Bach, Mozart and Beethoven. Jazz, swing and blues were banned. The free and vital sense of joy communicated by these musical forms clashed too obviously with adherence to totalitarian ideals. Similarly, the communist and socialist leaders in the Eastern bloc saw rock and roll as a special threat to their authority, precisely because it was based on the personality of the individual performer.”
Rock on.
Good to see the stalwarts of the entertainment industry still have it in spades.
(Seen on Manolo’s Shoe Blog. Manolo also seems to have a fetish for a certain German entertainer.)
Some weapons are marvels of technology, such as laser guided bombs or an F-22 fighter. Other weapons however use much older technology, based on something invented by Johannes Gutenberg in 1447. Such a weapon can do more damage to the cause of puritanical Islam than a thousand well aimed bombs.
The music business has fought tooth and nail against digitalisation in general and the internet in particular and I have long suspected that regardless of how it struggles, eventually Big Music will go the way of the buggy-whip industry, with music returning to its ‘craft’ roots and simply ceasing to be a big business, at least in the way that is currently understood, the mass market eventually giving way to a mass-of-niches.
I wonder if this is a sign that future has taken a step closer?
Sandi Thom, the unknown singer-songwriter who built up a huge following on the internet, went straight to No 1 with her debut single. The 24-year-old shot to fame after claims that her live performances in the basement of her home were being watched by more than 100,000 people via the web.
Regardless of sour grapes claims the viewing figures were inflated in this case, I wonder if the wave of the future has arrived?
I occasionally watch the Top Gear motoring-lads-having-a-laugh show on a Sunday evening, fronted by the bumptious Jeremy Clarkson. Clarkson is a sort of British version of P.J. O’Rourke, (although O’Rourke is at his best in print, rather than on the box) in that he loves to mock cyclists, Greens, do-gooders and other earnest protectors of our public welfare. Excellent. It is amazing really that his show has run on the BBC for so long. His mails must include a fair share of rudeness from those he mocks and it looks like he has really got up the nose of veteran Green campaigner Jonathan Porritt, a person who at one stage was very much the “reasonable” face of environmentalism.
Porritt misses the point completely. He is part of a puritanical new establishment dedicated to the removal of fun, or at least that of those other than themselves. We have had more than a decade of this, and Clarkson is rather like a shot of brandy to the half-drowned. He may be overly laddish for some people’s tastes, but he acts as handy counterweight to the scolds. Long may he sing the praises of Ferraris, supersonic jet aircraft and other fast machines.
(I have classified this post under “Arts and Entertainment” since Top Gear is purely entertainment. Do not expect to learn a lot about practical car maintenance.)
Last night Adriana showed me a very strange DVD which will probably not appeal to folks who dislike ‘art house’ movies… but if you like bizarre English phantasmagoria at its quirkiest, set in Brighton and by Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean no less, then you will probably just love Mirrormask.
Young actress Stephanie Leonidas has presence beyond her years and reminded me of the young Natalie Portman in Leon, which makes me think she may be one to watch in the future.
I particularly liked the evil sphinx-cats. It is all intensely English, in a magic mushroom induced hallucinogenic Alice in Wonderland sort of way. “We are not at home to Mister Grumpy”.
Blogger and friend Andrew Ian Dodge, at one of his many venues, Tech Central Station, offers this poser on the recent, ahem, bracing winners of the Eurovision song contest:
Does Lordi’s win reflect the rot in Europe, a final admission of rock’s power on the continent? Or is it merely an unintentional blip that Eurovision’s chiefs will seek to keep from ever recurring? Will heavy-metal find its way into Finland’s EU presidency? Is it just a silly music contest won by a bunch of rubber clad nut-cases? Oh no dear reader. It is far more than that.
Hey, heavy metal music is not exactly everyone’s cup of tea, although I often find that the most unusual sorts of people (mostly men, but some women too), will confess to a passion for the odd heavy metal track, played as loud as possible. I have had some of the funniest and most enjoyable nights out at gigs where such nutters play. Most of these people don’t take themselves remotely seriously. The very fact that their music offends “right thinking” people of the crusty left and the crunchy right only adds to the appeal. Rush, the Canadian rock band, were inspired by Ayn Rand. The Iron Maiden front man, Bruce Dickinson, is a qualified and working commercial airline pilot. Heavy rockers often seem to have an equal passion for gadgets and cars. I once visited a Royal Navy warship at London’s Docklands and went into the navigation/weaponry control room, and in the background, ACDC was playing (Very ideologically sound, if you ask me).
Meanwhile, on the subject of music competitions and the usual feelgood sense of life they tend to give out, this comment by Timothy Sandefur on the recently completed American Idol is rather nice:
Moreover, American Idol is a rebuke to those silly “crunchy conservatives” who insist that modern technology and mass production denigrates community, and so forth – in T.S. Eliot’s idiotic words, “The remarkable thing about television is that it permits several million people to laugh at the same joke and still feel lonely.” But that’s not true! The community has all joined in on this wholesome, fun, harmless moment to celebrate opportunity, singing, and lightheartedness. What could be more American than that? Lightheartedness is, I think, a profound and incredibly rare value, and one which our country has figured out how to mass produce. That may be among its greatest accomplishments ever.
The JPMorgan ‘Technology06’ show for which I was webcast editor in San Francisco finally finished up Wednesday afternoon. After the loadout, or most of it, I and four of the other techs from the show caught the red eye flight back to New York. I dumped clothes into a drawer and crashed for several hours. Despite the work schedule of the last month, I only slept a few hours… the day was just too nice to miss. Call it New York City Spring. A lovely temperature, just a nice humidity, deep blue skies and a lot of smiling faces.
After a bite to eat, some catch up on my work log and a few business calls, I decided to take myself out to a movie in Times Square. Yes, I finally get around to the title line. It was the ‘The Da Vinci Code’.
The biggest question I have after watching the movie is: “What the hell is all the fuss about???” This is a decently enough done adventure/conspiracy story, typical summer fare, not intended to be great literature or win Oscars. It is just fun. Given the infantile sensitivities of our politically correct, ‘do not dare hurt anyone’s feelings lest they cry’ era, they stuck in a bit of unnecessary dialogue to make really, really sure no one would feel slighted. Perry has already spoken of what the real Opus Dei is; and in the movie they are not the bad guys either. The bad guys are a secret inner circle which just happens to have some members there. A sort of ‘Catholic Illuminati’ as it were. Yet it is a real ‘Opus Dei’ believer who in the end saves our heroes through his belief in truth and justice.
As to the premise Mary Magdalene had a child by Jesus and she was spirited off to France and secret organizations have warred in the shadows over this for some two thousand years… I ask, if people are so terribly upset about this story, then what of the various Indiana Jones movies? Or any of a hundred novels and movies I have read or seen which use biblical history as a kick-off point for a roaring good yarn?
My conclusion is the people making noise about this movie need to get themselves unwound a bit.
Now a question. Skip the Magdalene story. Prove to me through historical, documented facts of known and cross checked authenticity and provenance that Jesus Christ never knocked up any of his adoring fans. Prove to me that prophet never got himself laid. Not once. Given two thousand years and eighty to a hundred generations, virtually all of humanity could have a bit of JC’s bloodline.
I have seen worse. Ian McKellen stole the show. Wait for the DVD.
At least I have an excuse for this…
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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