Open Thread - Thurs 12 June 2025 - Placone's Right
Placone's Right
Ron Placone recently wrote a piece on his substack entitled 'The Disdain Towards Culture Should Bother You'. I think he's making the right point here, and his article is worth a read.
Placone acknowledges that the US has always had a disdain for art, creativity and culture but that disdain has grown recently. He says,
The US is arguably the only industrialized nation that sees art as a luxury instead of part of what it means to be human. We spend about 1/10th the amount that other industrialized countries do on arts funding and even that figure is misleading because most of that 1/10th goes to the military.
We value creativity about as much as a gas station does. People of the United States have made incredible cultural contributions to the world and have done so in spite of its societal outlook, not because of it.
A Picture I took last June. Red Roses! Just 'Cause!
Then Placone gives a few recent examples. The Trump meltdown on Bruce Springsteen was pretty funny, it sure makes it obvious that Trump really knows nothing about music. Trump says Springsteen is 'not a talented guy'... hahahah. Trump's an #ss.
Anyway, Placone finishes with this:
I’ve never seen such open societal disdain towards education, literature, science, medicine, music, artists, comedy (unless of course you’re the ‘right’ kind of comic), film, creatives, and different groups of people. But, art has outpaced and outlived fascism before. It will again.
Don’t stop creating. That’s what they want.
His last line says it all. Don't do what they want!
Ok, here's the open thread! What's up, whatcha doing? Reading? Thinking? Remember, everything is interesting if you dive deep enough, so tell us about where you're diving!
Comments
Another Thursday is HERE!!!
Yay for Thursday! I hope everyone is doing as well as possible, the weather is nice where you are at, and things are looking good for the weekend. It's been warmer than normal here, but now it's back to normal. No rain, but some clouds. Having to do a bit of watering earlier than normal. But everything is still green!
What's up with you? Let us know!
If you're poor now, my friend, then you'll stay poor.
These days, only the rich get given more. -- Martial book 5:81, c. AD 100 or so
Nothing ever changes -- Sima, c. AD 2020 or so
Guernica, etc.
Guernica
https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20190620-picasso-the-ultimate-painter-of-war This article portrays The Massacre in Korea, Picasso's follow on work to Guernica.
The elites prefer abstract art being completely abstract without the social message. Then they claim it's just too abstruse for ordinary persons to understand.
Hannah Arendt, discusses the demise of the guild system which cultivated artistic endeavor which resulted in monumental works particularly in Europe still treasured today. This was the result of capitalism's emergence with industrialism, mass production, mass labor markets and consumerism. She talks about the subsequent divergence of homo faber from homo sapiens. I've had critics tell me, when I ran an art web site for a while for an artist friend who worked in ceramics, "oh, that's not art, that's just craft," an absurd contention.
Harrison Bergeron
I couldn't help thinking of Kurt Vonnegut's Harrison Bergeron, where talented people have to be handicapped so as not to offend the less gifted. Vonnegut's fiction could be taken as a critique of socialism and levelers, "equality" as an organizational fault. Yet, I think the current disdain for art and cultural expression, is that it is at base, an expression of humanism, that presents another independent authority to government and commercial messaging, with their associated manipulative content. Therefore it is a threat to the establishment. I would view the Harrison Bergeron paradigm in a contemporary light as indicative of repression of any challenge, to the billionaire oligarchy's claim that it represents some kind of "meritocracy." In order to maintain it's claim to rule, potential artistic and cultural challenges to its intolerant claim to authority need to be actively suppressed.
Thanks for the OT Sima! This is a very pertinent and challenging subject matter.
語必忠信 行必正直
Hi, good morning
.
Yeah, the starving artist routine is quite obvious in these times.
Taking my creative skills into a paying proposition leaves something
to be desired. Can't afford to work for free much anymore, but do enjoy
making things things just for the satisfaction of expression.
Thanks for the OT and have some fun!
Zionism is a social disease
Talk about creativity
.
Take three Leon
Zionism is a social disease
First off, what we have now is not "fascism."
"Fascism," the between-the-wars phenomenon, was an attribute of an expanding, adolescent capitalism. What we have now is an authoritarianism of a capitalist system in decline, characterized by careerist idiocy and a theater characterized by a large and widening distance between what Erving Goffman, in The Presentation of Self in Everyday Life, called "front," and what he called "backstage." And, for the most part, backstage is in charge.
The protests of recent are a good example of why "fascism" is not what we have here and now. Donald Trump's threats against the protesters in Los Angeles and in DC are being made in the context of a nationwide array of protests against ICE. The dispute Trump has picked with California's governor Gavin Newsom is about the generation of drama, which does not appear to be the sort of drama Trump will win.
Also important, today, is the recent "Ukrainian" attempt to assassinate Vladimir Putin and to attack Russia's nuclear war-fighting capacity. The idea that Trump did not know of the "Ukrainian" attacks is laughable, but the Russians are playing along because at least they can talk to Trump. But it's not as if there's anything to say, because backstage is in charge. I'm imagining a future scenario in which an American President is heard saying: aw, geez, sorry the "Ukrainians" tried to obliterate Moscow. I had no idea it was happening.
So I guess the next step for this nonsense is an "attack" on Iran, conducted by "Israel." The big question will not be of who will win -- I think we know that already -- but rather of what will satisfy the theatrical needs of those really in charge in the US.
"It's time for a revolution, but probably not in the terms that people imagine it" -- Frank Zappa
the theatrical needs of those really in charge in the US
.
interesting points. Agree with the the fascism mis-representations.
We are at a confrontation point. See which way the wind blows.
Zionism is a social disease
Good morning Sima. Thanks for the OT. Thie is a weird
compounded matter. The US has been very widely anti-intellectual for most of my lifetime. Artsy-fartsy stuff is, for vast numbers contaminated by the perception that is is the province of eggheads and/or the idle class. There, a complicating factor creeps in, reverse classism - "don't get caught appreciating art and such or you will be seen to be one of those wimpy, wussy, hoity-toity types who can't pound a nail or drive a screw or be in any other way useful". That outlook is, of course, exacerbated by the idle class' open scorn for those who say things like "that's pretty" upon encountering art in any form as opposed to whatever vocalizations and pronouncements the art and/or music appreciation mavens have taught them to say abut things.
A large part of this goes back to the days of yore when the whole purpose of literacy among and for the poor and working classes was so that they could read the Bible, and, excepting hymns and paintings of sacred scenes, art, music and literature was suspect on the grounds of being secular, which, being non-religious, was evil. This country was settled by Puritans, after all (and thieves, of course).
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
Hey, OTC! You might
get a kick out of this one: I stumbled across a web site where an attorney is trying to compile an exhaustive list of AI hallucinations that have had direct impact on legal decisions.
I can't speak to its overall veracity, but I have to think that it's good that somebody is paying attention...
https://www.damiencharlotin.com/hallucinations/
Enjoy!
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
Man, oh man!
I am going to pass this on to some of my attorney pals! Maybe some judges, too, while I am at it.
I can understand pro se litigants falling for the scam, but lawyers? And the State Bar just sent out a mass email announcing a continuing legal education course that will instruct new attorneys how to structure their offices with AI doing the real work. It includes instruction on how AI can market your new firm. Marketing strategies for a profession that up until recently could not advertise!
I could retire and walk away from this craziness, but wtf would I do if I ever needed an attorney?
Thanks, friend!
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
I'll be very interested
in hearing what opinions they might offer. I've been making a casual survey of AI screwups, and it is certainly, er, illuminating. Glad that you found it useful!
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
Good afternoon, sima!
What el says is spot on. Our nation was created after the Puritan Work Ethic was fully ingrained in our culture. Art is for the few and by the few. Everyone else needs to stay at their job and pay the rent. It is an unaffordable luxury for most Americans.
Guess what? I have to get back to work!
Thanks for the OT, chica!
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Obviously Bibi's motto is "If at first you don't succeed try try
again".
HIGHLY relevant
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts-letters/articles/bored-of-cultur...
In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is declared mentally ill for describing colors.
Yes Virginia, there is a Global Banking Conspiracy!
Interesting read, TLM
We do not want to be shamed, ridiculed, so we conform. We cannot color outside the lines, and feel good about it.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
And we're off and running.
Sabrina Salvati is talking about it right now. Fill up those gas tanks.
"It's time for a revolution, but probably not in the terms that people imagine it" -- Frank Zappa