• Last summer Michael Webster took some photos at Coney Island and, as is usual with him, saw the scene differently than your average joy-popper would. The package is at Burn magazine and is called "Too Many Black People in One Place." I wrote the accompanying essay. All the work predates Ferguson and Baltimore but still holds up pretty well. Give a look when you get a chance and tell me what you think.
• As we all know, my credentials as an equal-opportunity blasphemer are impeccable. Jonah Goldberg's position is similarly consistent -- that is, he was a moron before the Pamela Geller uproar and remains one today. His latest, "Progressives Love Anti-Religious Art — as Long as It’s Anti-Christian" is just another fatty serving of the same congealed ressentiment he's been dishing for years -- it even contains references to Piss Christ and "Mapplethorpe’s hide-the-bullwhip oeuvre." (It's like his mother was scared by a Duchamp readymade while she was pregnant.) Goldberg knocks people who don't think Geller has a Constitutional right to her bullshit, but who's that? Just a tiny sliver of idiots. Most normal people don't much care how the avatars of the world's major superstitions are portrayed (at least not the ones they don't believe in!) and, I would imagine, consider Geller an nuisance on the level of Fred Phelps of the Westboro Baptist Church, looking for chances to stir the shit. (You think reactionaries like Peter King are turning on Geller because they love Mohammed?) But Goldberg portrays the real problem as snotty bohos with their so-called "art" who get fans and grants while he has to float in the oceans with nutcakes and humiliate himself with his shit writing on a regular basis.
Feels like summer when I read it.
ReplyDeleteAnd if one night you see cops on horseback, riding in to take command of the street, it may seem strange but it’s something you’ve seen before, too; not here, but at anti-war demonstrations, or at Occupy Wall Street, or at the Tompkins Square Riot. That’s what they’re sent to do if there’s a threat. You don’t see a threat here, but somebody does. Obviously. They must. You can’t imagine they were sent just to get people out of the way, to make them feel — innocent as they are, as long as they’ve been coming — that they aren’t welcome.
ReplyDeleteThis is a nicely-put description of a horrible situation.
The horn of... Africa?
ReplyDeleteBoth happily and unfortunately, your essay is timeless. It poignantly captures both the simple joy of Coney's ad-hoc community and the adversarial relationship the police have with the Black community. Well done to both of you!
ReplyDeleteI think they ought to pay a crew to dig up Reagan every day, open his coffin, and piss on his face.
ReplyDeleteToo Many Black People In One Place
ReplyDeleteAtlanta used to call theirs "Freaknik."
Cut 'em out, ride 'em in,
ReplyDeleteRide 'em in, let 'em out,
Cut 'em out, ride 'em in
Rawhide!
Keep movin', movin', movin'
Though they're disapprovin'
Keep them dogies movin'
Rawhide!
Don't try to understand 'em
Just rope, and throw, and brand 'em
Soon we'll be living high and wide.
They should make their mounted officers wear cowboy clothes, carry cap-and-ball pistols, and pinch snuff...
I think you could get volunteers, and massive lemonade donations.
ReplyDeleteMore proof that there's no justice. You should be a famous writer, Edroso.
ReplyDeleteOT, but you might wanna cut Bobo some slack, Ed. He may not be a well man...
ReplyDeleteI read it now and I feel a sense of barely suppressed anger in the people described by the essay. Would I have thought that before Ferguson and all that has come to pass since? I'd like to think we're all getting an education, and with that, change is made inevitable.
ReplyDeleteThis reminds me that I should read his book, which I bought eons ago and carry everywhere on my kindle. Here -- by way of apology for not reading it yet, I'll shill:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.smashwords.com/books/view/89726
(There are books unread on my list that I bought in the 90s. I'm still psyched about them -- just a reeeaaal slow reader. So being unread by me is no mark against this book, which looks pretty great.)
The people who owned Regan are still around. He was just a marionette, and an ugly one to boot.
ReplyDeleteBut Goldberg portrays the real problem as snotty bohos with their so-called "art" who get fans and grants while he has to float in the oceans with nutcakes and humiliate himself with his shit writing on a regular basis.
ReplyDeleteThe magical free market keeps giving NRO the finger. But the problem isn't the product--it's a culture that doesn't allow for at-gunpoint purchases.
What do you expect from people who believe that someone disagreeing with them is exactly equal to being herded into a gas chamber?
ReplyDeleteAwww, poor baby!
ReplyDeleteThat's exactly what he was.
ReplyDeleteNow there's Scott Walker. I think the puppetmasters have realized that they don't even need a professional actor. All they need is somebody of low intelligence and a boundless willingness to please them (with "good hair.")
For the record, I've never been a particular fan of Mapplethorpe, and I thought that Charlie Hebdo's anti-Christian cartoons were kinda sophomoric, though I'm not part of their intended audience. On the other hand, Serrano was supposedly making a point about commercialization of religion, which I could see as a valid one, even if "Look! My own bodily substances!" has never been my favorite style of artistic expression. In which case "Piss Christ" isn't any more anti-Christian than A Charlie Brown Christmas or Mark 15:11-17. (Which are both anti-Christian by modern fundigelical standards, come to think of it.) So I'm apparently at best 1/3 progressive, or something.
ReplyDeleteIronically, there's probably art to be born from this concept - the people so stuck in one place that they can't even acknowledge that time has passed, that their understanding of civilization has become passe and even obsolete. There's a novel to be written, a triptych to be painted, a photo series to be arranged, a film to be produced. And the subjects would never see any of it, because someone made a naughty exhibit 29 years ago.
ReplyDeleteIronically, there's probably art to be born from this concept - the people so stuck in one place that they can't even acknowledge that time has passed, that their understanding of civilization has become passe and even obsolete. There's a novel to be written, a triptych to be painted, a photo series to be arranged, a film to be produced. And the subjects would never see any of it, because someone made a naughty exhibit 29 years ago.
Ironically, there's probably art to be born from this concept - the people so stuck in one place that they can't even acknowledge that time has passed, that their understanding of civilization has become passe and even obsolete. There's a novel to be written, a triptych to be painted, a photo series to be arranged, a film to be produced. And the subjects would never see any of it, because someone made a naughty exhibit 29 years ago.
Jonah's a dull and simple lad,
ReplyDeleteCannot tell Cheetos from champagne.
Is the Mapplethorpe bullwhip photo "anti-religious?" Who knew?
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm not sure Piss Christ was "anti-religious" either; it's actually quite beautiful. It didn't become "anti-religious" until Jesse Helms wanted a dog to kick so he could go after the NEA.
It may be "anti religion" more than anti-religious, being a comment on the cheapening of religion. Which surely the Doughy One is a prime example.
You have a higher tolerance for nonsense than I do. Serrano's "Piss Christ" was right up there with a bunch of other "art" that was being foisted on the public around that time--all of which served not to inform or spark serious discussion about societal problems or even made the viewer engage in thought. Rather, most of it brought out either knee-jerk rage or a combination of howls of derision (from pedestrian viewers) and credulous check writing (from supposed aficionados).
ReplyDeleteI would like to invite this comment up to my pied a terre to look at my etchings.
ReplyDelete"Cheeto Charlie is my name
ReplyDeleteCheeto Charlie is my name
Good for lying tightie-whitie boys
Oh come and join me in a skree"
There was a very striking bit on NPR yesterday evening about a video in which a cop manages to subdue someone without shooting them; almost without exception, the cops that they interviewed were quite upset that the cop didn't just shoot the guy as a matter of principle. Something that someone said not too long ago about the cops becoming militarized, not only in their gear but in their attitude toward the people they should be considering their fellow citizens, really rings true.
ReplyDeleteOh, fuck David Brooks. I'm going to have to break this down into bullet points.
ReplyDelete1.) I managed to miss that column Brooks wrote about how online dating is some sort of sign that the humanities are in collapse in what amounted to a slightly classier version of one of those Reddit threads where MRAs bitch about Tinder. You know, the woman I've been talking about here - the one whose infant son I watched while she spoke with her lawyer or went to job interviews - I met her online. We communicated for a long period of time before I knew what she looked like. That seems pretty "enchanting" to me, and I certainly don't see anything dehumanizing about the way we met. But what the fuck do I know? I don't even have a book deal. Speaking of which...
2.) Brooks has a new book out, which looks to be yet another of those "Look what I learned from these other famous people" hack jobs. He decries "resume virtues" such as "wealth, fame and status," which is pretty fucking rich coming from a guy who changed his political opinions to get a career. You know, I think I'd have a lot more sympathy for the "plight" of the publishing industry if they didn't keep finding big piles of money to throw after trash like this.
3.) ...And from his book site, I learn that they let Brooks give a TED talk. Actually, as someone who despises TED and the entire "ideas festival" concept, this actually pleases me. It means that they're being a little more honest about what these shindigs actually are - a chance for dipshit techbloggers and two-bit corporate con artists to meet people whose names they can drop later.
4.) Seriously, what the fuck is the deal with that dating piece? Does Brooks actually think that no one dated based on looks before dating websites? The industry is laying off photographers and on-the-ground journalists by the score so that they can maintain this?
The people feverishly invoking "Piss Christ" as evidence of some double standard know the artist got death threats, right?
ReplyDeleteYour interpretation is shared by noted art history/overbite-haver Sister Wendy Beckett, a person generally not considered to harbor much anti-Christian bias.
ReplyDelete"Cheeto Charlie is my name
ReplyDeleteAnd N-RO is my nation
Dumbshit is my dwelling place
And FAAAAAAAAAAAAART my destination"
I wish I could be like David Brooks!
ReplyDeleteFa fa fa fa fa, fa fa fa...
Bullwhips are for disobedient children and servants, not for kinky sex, so sayeth The Lord.
ReplyDeleteGreat Essay, great photos, great intro and great bio piece by your friend. Thanks for linking to it.
ReplyDeleteWas that in reference to the Swedish cops subduing the guys in the subway without hurting anyone?
ReplyDeleteI read that essay on Brooks at deadspin out loud to mr. Aimai--not that driftglass doesn't do as well and twice on sundays but it was still a great essay.
ReplyDeleteUm, try Googling "scott walker bald spot"
ReplyDeleteImages of the humiliation of the body of Christ and symbolic re-enactments of the humiliation, scourging, and torturing of the body of Christ are pretty standard forms of worship and mnemonics of some sects within Christianity. Preaching Christ Crucified includes a focus on suffering, degradation, and death of the godhead. Piss Christ, whatever Serrano's intentions, partook of that and if it was shocking, well, so much the better (one presumes) since it brings to the awareness of the modern viewer just how terribly shocking and novel Christ's sufferings were to his then followers. Gods have been killed before, ritually, from Osiris to Adonis but none have been degraded in that way before Christ. It behooves modern day Christians to remember this fact.
ReplyDeleteTo my mind, it's recruitment and training that's been responsible for the change in attitude. The gear has become the visible manifestation of the attitude. The training changed in the mid- to late-`80s, and by now, the belief that the community served is a battleground is firmly entrenched in the minds of the cops. And police training, I suspect, works a bit like school textbooks--what gets implemented in one big state or very large metro district eventually finds its way to the smallest towns. Add in the perverse incentives related to civil forfeiture and putting the cost of adjudicating crime (particularly non-violent crime) mostly on the backs of the poor, along with the privatization of the criminal justice system, and resentment of the police and the system they represent inexorably grows, which then, in the minds of the cops, justifies their belief that they operate in a war zone.
ReplyDeleteIt's a very destructive cycle, much of which can be traced back, yet again, to the Reagan years. I'm old enough to remember when petty theft was worth a few days in the county jail, or a fine. Now, there's no such thing as "petty" theft, and the crime is potentially worth years in prison. Illinois, for example, has made driving off without paying for gasoline a felony, with a minimum, IIRC, eighteen-month sentence. I know of one case there where a kid drove off without paying, and in fear of going to prison, led the police on a high-speed chase and the cop car (largely due to the officer's own negligence) wound up upside-down in a cornfield and the cop died after being run over by his own cruiser (wasn't wearing a seatbelt and lost control at ~ 100 mph and went out the side window). That chain of events began with a stupid theft of the equivalent of $30. An armed security guard shoots a kid in the back, paralyzing him for life, because the kid walked out of a convenience store without paying for three burritos and a bag of Cheetos. Ten or twelve bucks.
Somehow, we've lost all sense of proportion (in large part because of the drug war and because we've made so many aspects of criminal justice profitable for corporations). We could undo it, roll it back, but not with the state and national legislatures we have now.
I didn't say "GREAT hair." Besides, his other characteristics make him the ideal Republican candidate.
ReplyDeleteIt was an officer in Ohio: http://www.npr.org/2015/05/07/404913703/what-happens-when-a-police-officer-doesnt-shoot
ReplyDeleteBrooks has always been--and always will be--a supercilious twit. And that's being generous. He's probably not the first assault on the intellect perpetrated by the NYT, and probably won't be the last, but he's definitely one of the more prominent.
ReplyDelete"A matter of principle..."
ReplyDeleteWow. I don't know what else to say.
The people who whine the most about Piss Christ have likely never seen it; it looks like a crucifix behind some bubbly amber, and you'd never make the association if the title didn't do it for you.
ReplyDeleteSo, you know, they're pissed (ha) about the TITLE, not about the actual artwork itself.
That presumes his disciples saw him as a god, which assumes facts not in evidence. And in any case witnessing a crucifixion in ancient Jerusalem would not be an extraordinary event, it would be just another day.
ReplyDelete"Too many black people in one place." Reminds me of how the cops come out on horses to the craft beer festivals, theaters & stuff to disperse the crowds because there are too many white people in one place. Oh wait . . .
ReplyDeleteSeriously, great essay, great intro and terrific photos. And thanks be to Loretta Lynch - maybe she really will get some meaningful change in our police state.
I'm now envisioning Jonah with a horrible tiger mask for a face (what an improvement) and "ASSH♂LE" tattooed on his forehead.
ReplyDelete...although they pointed out that the non-shooting cop had been a Marine, and thus possibly had better intuitions as to who was and wasn't really dangerous. E.g., the suspect dropped his keys and stopped to pick them up, which to the cop meant: Not insane. (However much the guy was literally screaming, "Shoot me.")
ReplyDelete"It's like his mother was scared by a Duchamp readymade while she was pregnant."
ReplyDeleteHis and everybody else's. This is my new theory (and it is mine, etc.)--that Duchamp destroyed art. Period. Of course photography didn't help, but the Impressionists found a way. But once art was reduced to "what I say is art," it's Katie-bar-the-door, whatever that means.
How many wingnuts buy anything from similarly wingnutty "artists" ENTIRELY on the grounds it'll piss off liberals (or, anyway, the fake liberals who they have caged in their heads). The shitty SF "writer" Tom Kratman actually edits himself to make his mil-wank Muslim murdering porn as "offensive" to "progressives" as possible, which as you might expect is grounds for much LOLZ at his expense.
ReplyDeleteWell, they do want to bring back the simpler days of lynching and vigilante "justice"...
ReplyDeleteI laffed in a hearty manner at the whole thing. And the Gawker piece he linked to wasn't bad, either. I used to fisk Brooks at Huff Po, so this was v. gratifying.
ReplyDeleteI call "designated pisser".
ReplyDeleteI'm up for it. A good excuse to stay hydrated.
That's your solution to everything.
ReplyDelete"How many wingnuts buy anything from similarly wingnutty "artists"
ReplyDeleteENTIRELY on the grounds it'll piss off liberals (or, anyway, the fake
liberals who they have caged in their heads)."
I'm reminded of the "painting" of Andrew Breitbart as Viking warrior (he of the unnaturally short forearms). In that instance, pissing off liberals came with an outrageously high price, so, fine let `em keep trying until they've bankrupted themselves.
As I keep saying, I think about how stabby I feel lately - and I imagine how someone in Baltimore must feel having been through even worse shit for generations...
ReplyDeleteYou say that like there's something wrong it it.
ReplyDeleteAll three of them? Kinky!
ReplyDeleteHow man cops show up on horseback to Spring Break?
ReplyDeleteI used to fisk Brooks at Huff PoIYKWIMAITYD.
ReplyDeleteOh for a Dada revival.
ReplyDeleteThe topic of the nature and meaning of the physical suffering of Christ was a perennial one among the early Christians and came up frequently in discussions with proto-converts. It was inconceivableto the Greeks that a God could be humiliated in this way.
ReplyDeleteGood point. Which makes me think it would have been even better if the amber had been some colored liquid, but the title remained the same.
ReplyDeleteCan you handle eating asparagus 3 meals a day?
ReplyDeleteHey, Adam Savage did a great TED talk about making a dodo skeleton!
ReplyDeleteOk, I buy that it was inconceivable to the Greeks, years decades or centuries later, but crucifying and otherwise executing Jewish Messiahs (who definitely weren't all claiming divinity) was practically a league sport for the Romans.
ReplyDeleteBut, Mel Gibson's torture porn is ooooooookay. And Scorcese's "The Last Temptation of Christ," more a meditation on the crucifixion than anything else, is utter blasphemy.
ReplyDeleteChrist, how does anyone know what's art without a dogma scorecard? (He said with some amusement.)
THREAD HIJACK UPDATE: *sigh* Yes, Mom has a little friend who we have named "Chad", and we are seeing what we can do about him - personally I like the "drive radioactive needles into his head" option.
ReplyDeleteBut we're arguing at the moment because she didn't charge her new cell phone while she was in the library and I was out with the dogs making sure they were okay and do assholes called 911 to skree "ABANDONED DOGS IN HOT CAR! THEY'RE BARKING!" (what do you expect them to do, sing show tunes?) and I asked why she hadn't charged it while she was in here and she said she didn't want to leave it unattended (*er?*) and I didn't call the assclowns at ABF Freight who have all our stuff and want to sell it off for $600 in storage fees because I didn't know what to tell them and I was hoping maybe something she heard/read while she was here changed things (ha fucking ha) so she decided I was just being lazy and told me she'd all herself and I don't know what the deal is and I'm just so fucking tired of all this, figuratively and literally and it's a damn good thing I sold both Grandpa's guns he willed me before we got up here or I'd be seriously tempted to put them to some good use (I get very wingnutty sometimes when I'm really depressed).
So, yeah, another circle closer to Caina. Hopefully I get to climb out down Satan's legs once we get there, but I ain't counting on it.
It should have been that blue-flavored soda from (here I give away my affiliations) Pathmark.
ReplyDeleteLet me cook it in some white wine, garlic and butter and we're good to go.
ReplyDeleteSure, beating and crucifying people, especially Jews, was nothing new to the Romans. But once Christ was defined as an actual divinity the entire thing became very much debated. I can't say whether anyone in the actual audience for his supposed Crucifiction was worried about the issue but from certain perspectives the Gospels read like the shell shocked ex post facto interpretations of people who were really not prepared to accept what they saw in the first place. If you read Lost Christianities by Bart Ehrmann you will see the post Jesus communities trying out various explanations for Jesus's sufferings because the whole idea of Jesus as physically human was, itself, being argued over. Can't remember the details but basically there were various schools of thought about the idea of Jesus being physically human--some people thought he had been divine since birth, others thought he was a kind of human adopted by god, still others thought and argued that he didn't really have a body at all,that the body that had been crucified wasn't real so it never suffered any pain. This was a big deal from the get go because to the extent that one thinks Jesus was a real person, with real followers (and there's not any contemporary evidence that he was as far as I know) they seem to have been extremely surprised by his execution and to have spent a lot of thought trying to make that fit in with their previous ideas about what he signified.
ReplyDeleteKind of on topic - I've been grooving on this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uaFQw52wJug for the last couple weeks, and now that I look up the lyrics (I just liked it for the beat, after hearing it a couple times on "Democracy Now!") I'm gonna have to check out more Coup.
ReplyDeleteGood evening
Tonight we bring to you
Worn out streets that'll sing to you
.45 shells that'll dance to the beats
Stomachs so loud it'll cancel the speech
Checks that vanish if you blink an eye
Grace getting locked in the clink to die
A salary cap on a birth certificate
Notarized lies that burst in triplicate
Morning prayers for the car to start
A man and a whiskey in a heart-to-heart
Hope in a track suit to flash and run
While agony chases with a badge and gun
Poetry shouted from the squeal of the bus breaks
Hands in the air try to feel for an escape
Flash in my eyes like candid snaps
When we slap back, it's the magic clap
I like the notion that Coney Island is in the city, but not quite a part of it, that one can feel, briefly, outside of the city without actually leaving it. And, of course, the cops on horseback are the realization that the city is still there, lurking.
ReplyDeleteit's Katie-bar-the-door, whatever that means.
ReplyDeletePossibly what it means
Reagan's "California kitchen cabinet" pretty much ran him. Virtually everyone thinks that Star Wars was a way of poking the Russian bear (and it was), but it was a boondoggle engineered to benefit Reagan's benefactors in California. After all, the two biggest industries in CA at the time were defense aerospace and computers, precisely the two industries that would most benefit from Star Wars spending. And there's little question now that the evidence is mounting that Reagan's mind was starting to slip at the beginning of his time in office, so he was easily led and was just as easy to ignore when necessary. Nor can one forget that his career as a corporate shill was as long or longer than his acting career.
ReplyDeleteThis is cherce. Now, the announcer for the Orioles and the Balto. Colts, Chuck Thompson, used to exclaim, when something good happened, "Go to war, Miss Agnes!" Any thoughts?
ReplyDeleteVirtually everyone thinks that Star Wars was a way of poking the Russian
ReplyDeletebear (and it was), but it was a boondoggle engineered to benefit
Reagan's benefactors in California
Two taste treats in one!
*gag*
Your wish is my Google.
ReplyDeleteProbably used much like my personal phrase "FUCK ME AGNES!" which I got from an amazingly funny RPG called "HoL - Human Occupied Landfill" and which I very, very highly recommend to any other gamer Alicurati who don't already know about it.
So, overenthusiastic fans of Titus Flavius Josephus notwithstanding*, you are correct that no contemporary literary sources mention Jesus. And it is hard to reconcile that an earthly avatar of a supreme being would be executed as a common criminal, until as the early christians did, they interpreted that death as a willing sacrifice paralleling that of Abraham's interrupted sacrifice of Isaac. And that to my mind was the big narrative innovation that turned the ignominious execution of a Jewish rabble rouser into a convincing religion. Because a preacher that got himself executed has limited appeal, but a God that sacrificed his son and himself for all of humanity's sins is a catchy narrative with broad appeal.
ReplyDeleteAnd crafting that narrative took centuries. Not until Constantine made all of the major christian factions sit down together at the Council of Nicaea in 325 did christianity take its modern form, and all of those questions about the nature of Jesus divinity and humanity were answered and frozen into dogma.
*The 'Antiquities of the Jews' was written in 93-94 AD(so not all that contemporary) and mentions Jesus in a few sentences of debatable authenticity.
Oh yeah - so my browser has decided that if I'm going to cut-and-paste my comments from text, then it's going to autocorrect every paragraph to be the same as the last paragraph. I fucking love computers sometimes.
ReplyDeleteI was trying to figure out the joke. I mean, you had "triptych" in there, then you wrote the same text three times...was I missing something subtle?
ReplyDeleteI wish I was that clever, but no - just the internet playing a prank on me.
ReplyDeleteYou just don't see this artistic quality of comment in the threads at rightwing sites. I don't know why. There's any number of approved artistic sources they can draw inspiration from. Like, let's see... that writer who raided the Hugos... Leviticus and Revelations... most of your later Mamet -- so much top-shelf inspiration!
ReplyDeleteI agree that the shift from a Messiah who successfully conquers a city to a Messiah who successfuly conquers death is a major leap in Messiah marketing.
ReplyDeletePrezackly. Up until Jesus mortals who showed even the slightest disrespect for a god usually got turned into spiders (Arachne) or blasted into rubble or stripped of their skin (Marsyas) or otherwise were doomed without, of course, harming the god at all. The Jesus innovation includes 1) being tortured and killed by humans and 2) for the most part (except for Judas in most stories) forgiving the humans involved and incorporating their salvation into the story.
ReplyDeleteYour avatar's frowny face goes particularly well with this observation.
ReplyDeleteFaygo Christ, by the Blasphemous Clown Posse.
ReplyDeleteThe wicked flee where no man pursueth.
ReplyDeleteMe too! I really spent a lot of time looking for joke.
ReplyDelete"a matter of principle"
ReplyDeleteWHAT. The. FUCK.
Speaking of "facts not in evidence", I have never been presented with any reason to believe (or disbelieve: I of course discount Serrano's personal testimony, as being hopelessly compromised) that the yellow liquid in the artwork is, in fact, piss (Serrano's or anyone else's).
ReplyDeleteOh, very well done, sir.
ReplyDeleteThe linked piece about the 2012 NRO cruise was priceless. The consistent thread running throughout was: "but, there's GOT to be some way we can win elections again without having to be nice to those people."
ReplyDeleteHere ya go:
ReplyDeleteRoboChrist is the next logical step in Messianic evolution.
ReplyDeleteI saw that clip on Chris Hayes a while back, and my reaction was feeling impressed that the officer reacted that way. He could have shot the guy and it would have been called a righteous shoot. But the officer understood intuitively that the guy was trying suicide-by-cop, and the officer was not going to participate in that. It was definitely risky, but I was so proud of him. I know that sounds condescending, but I really felt that.
ReplyDeleteForgive me if I am misunderstanding the situation here, but if we're talking about lung cancer (and I hope I'm wrong), you might check out http://www.lungcanceralliance.org and click on Support and Resources, and the sub-topic More Resources which has some financial information that may be of use.
ReplyDeleteI miss Substance McGravitas.
ReplyDeleteHappy Friday, everybody. Happy end of the Semester to me! One more goddamn year and I can retire!
ReplyDeletehttps://youtu.be/b_mH9Mdlua0
I wasted part of my youth going to a certain folk festival where beer and weed were ostensibly forbidden but widely used. There must have been a police presence - thousands of people milling around who will sometimes, as people will, do stupid stuff when they're high or drunk. But I don't even remember seeing them, much less having them confronting the crowd or using horses. Or even confiscating the beer and weed.
ReplyDeleteOn the theory that anyone anywhere enjoying homoeroticism (other than _300_) is demonstrating anti-"Christian" bigotry, yes, Mapplethorpe is anti-religious.
ReplyDeleteSo ... Piss, or it didn't happen?
ReplyDeleteSee, I thought it ended up being kinda artistic.
ReplyDelete"Ah, Serrano, why don't you put the crucifix in---"
ReplyDelete"A condom machine?"
"No---"
"Super Poligrip?"
"No---"
"That blue stuff you put combs in?"
"No! Urine. Put it in your urine."
Arianna didn't pay us. I had to come away with SOMETHING.
ReplyDeleteHappy Friday, man.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the tune. That's a real pick-me-up.
You were talking about the acknowledgement of the passing of time, so I assumed that the repetition was a clever reference to the movie Groundhog Day.
ReplyDeleteNo kidding!
No doubt!
ReplyDeletePurple drank!
ReplyDeleteWhatever shall we do about those Three laws...
ReplyDeleteSeemed to me at the time--and still does--that it might have been an outtake from Tom Robbins' Skinny Legs and All.
ReplyDeleteReagan's mind was starting to slip at the beginning of his time in office
ReplyDeleteYou mean when he was elected Governor of California, right
W proved all they need is 98.6...
ReplyDeleteonline dating is some sort of sign that the humanities are in collapse
ReplyDeleteThe ironclad Law of Projection advises us that Brooks is engaging in some form of online dating himself ("I desperately want to get married again to somebody"), though he will have a euphemism for it.
The linguistic studies of his speech patterns that trace the unravelling of his semantic network* do not go that far back.
ReplyDelete* There was a summary at Language-Log a few weeks ago, which I cannot be arsed digging up.
Things Fall Apart?
ReplyDeleteThat oceanfront real estate is too nice for those people.
ReplyDeleteYears ago, I worked for an investigation firm which handled insurance cases that were too freaky to handle in-house. In one case, I had to interview a kid who had been in the car with a buddy of his who got into a fender-bender. We traced the kid to an apartment above one of the shops on the Boardwalk... his buddy was the insured paerty and the claimant was sketchy, so the kid's reluctance to give a statement was frustrating. They were both Russian immigrants, so that may have explained his reticence.
I'll never forget how desolate the area was at night in February, a chill wind whipping off the Atlantic as I stood there, pounding on the kid's door.
Your more fundamentalist believers will insist that, since the gospels don't mention Jesus losing control of his bowels or bladder in the process of being tortured to death (a likely outcome), it didn't happen.
ReplyDeleteDid no one point out the parallels to Prometheus? Or was that a bridge too far?
ReplyDeleteNice touch, Roy. And because you can never have too much Kinks...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymotion.com/video/xjkxxt_the-kinks-rainy-day-in-june_creation
To the surprise of no one, Jonah is pig-ignorant on the art world. Museums, federally funded and otherwise, weren't needed to promote the obscene and blasphemous art of Messrs Mapplethorpe and Serrano. They're not in the business of promotion; galleries and dealers are. Yes, certainly, in the real world the distinctions can get blurred. But also in the real world, those two artists and several others on the naughty list had made their mark in galleries and other public showings long before museum creators took notice of them. By that point they had become legitimate subjects for study, if you wanted to know about the current artistic environment.
ReplyDeleteWow, that's on Face To Face? I have to get that, at long last.
ReplyDeleteThe Ole Perfesser helped make "read the whole thing" into a joke, but in this case it's the best advice I could give.
ReplyDeleteThey really started taking off then. It's got "Rosie Won't You Please Come Home" and "Holiday in Waikiki" too.
ReplyDeleteWho's the puppet master? Looks like Broderick Crawford.
ReplyDeleteI thought it was your homage to The Shining's Jack Torrance.
ReplyDeletePrometheus, who was punished throughout eternity for defying the gods even though he was a god. Quite a propos to Aimai's point.
ReplyDeleteIs it true that his puppeteer used to down a fifth of scotch before every performance?
ReplyDeletewhere has he been? I haven't seen him around in ages.
ReplyDeleteWell, yeah, that's, if you'll pardon the expression, the crux of the matter: if Serrano had called the thing, I dunno, "Study for a Portrait of the Crucifixion No. 12" or something, there's probably be a fair number of wingnuts who'd have prints of it hanging on their wall today.
ReplyDeleteOffshoot of the stupid and horrible "War on Drugs".
ReplyDeleteA very talented and happy people, the New Zealanders.
ReplyDeleteNot sure. Just somebody I found on Google Image Search that I thought was suitable to use to put this together.
ReplyDeleteExcellent writing as always, Roy. The move from third person to second is particularly interesting as the piece evolves. It grows more personal and more intense as the focus moves from the macro to the micro view. Suddenly the photos seem more personal, more real. You can feel yourself inside that frame (as much as a middle aged white new englander can, of course.)
ReplyDeleteWorth noting that it later turned out the painting was originally of (IRC) a Viking and they Photoshopped Brietbart's face onto it. Intellectual property: How's that work?
ReplyDeleteGibson's Jesus torture porn certainly had major homoerotic appeal in certain quarters. Yet, it is still held up as an exemplar of both devotional film-making and "see how Christians are persecuting because reasons" bullshit.
ReplyDeleteSpeaking of which, where's Another Kiwi these days?
ReplyDeleteBack in the early '80s, my first job out of college was instructing businesses on how to operate their new telephone systems. We did a lot of installations down in Soho, and I remember walking into one gallery that had a piece out in the middle of the floor consisting of a wood barstool with a 1X6 piece of pine lying on top of it. Bolted to the piece of pine was a knife switch, a 6-volt battery, and a lightbulb. Close the switch and the light lights.
ReplyDeleteAnd it could be yours for $12,000.
No, unfortunately you're right, but thanks for the link; we'll see if there's anything there to help.
ReplyDeleteCancer is bad enough - going through it while living in a car, well, kind of explains all the stress, don't it?
I'm stealing "messiah marketing".
ReplyDeleteWait, is that Brooks at South by Southwest? Are you fucking with me? It's not like I care about keeping SXSW sacrosanct - it's hipster prom, who gives a shit - but it seems like Brooks is the last person this crowd would want to see. What, are the TED starfuckers hitting the music festival circuit now?
ReplyDeleteHmm, that would rather put the damper on the artwork and sculpture in churches....
ReplyDeleteMost logical reason: anger makes people stupid(er), and what is a RW website but an anger booster and rage machine.
ReplyDeleteI'll admit that I am petty enough to have enjoyed how Gibson fell rather fast and hard with his drunken crazy behavior soon after the movie became their rallying point and he their hero in Christ. From Jesus-lover to scary fundy papist; it was such a short trip.
ReplyDeleteTelluride? Yeah, I remember the exact same thing, and how universally white the crowd was, plus plenty of psychedelics for sale.
ReplyDeleteThere's a whole generation of black cops who served in Vietnam.
ReplyDeleteThe white cops at their side are cops because it was an easy draft exemption. Wall to wall pasty-faced chicken hawks.
-dlj.
Pere,
ReplyDeleteThe human genome is Africa plus small change. Most of the world's peoples are descendants of a few hundred, perhaps a few thousand, breeders who made it "out of Africa" in "Lucy's" time, maybe 200,000 years ago.
That means most of the variance is still over there. The tallest. The shortest. The fastest. A few on the slowest lower bound. And so on.
To the extent that intelligence is a physiological quality, the most intelligent groups are likely to be African. I would put the Dinka up next to Ashkenazi Jews in an IQ sweepstakes any day.
Sure there are a lot of blacks who feel the same way you or I do. Most of them are better than us at keeping themselves under control. 'Nuther kind of variance...
Cheers,
-dlj.
Damn. I had assumed triptych.
ReplyDeleteYou know you can edit your own stuff, don't you? I advise it: copy editors seem to have been extinct for a generation now.
-dlj.
I'm not sure, but I believe the royalties on A Charlie Brown Christmas are one of the sources of funding for the generations-long construction of the Cathedral of St. John The Divine in Manhattan.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what all those Harlem stone masons of baroque style are going to do when they get finished. On the other hand the problem doesn't pop its head up for another generation or so.
-dlj.
Oh, hey, speaking of batshit insanery from the usual suspects:
ReplyDeleteWal-Mart: 'No Truth To The Rumors' Of Tunnels Being Built To Take Over Texas
The tunnels are part of a series of conspiracy theories surrounding "Jade Helm 15,"a military training operation set to take place later this year in seven Western states. The conspiracy theorists have said the operation may be part of a covert attempt to takeover Texas and other states.
In response to the theories, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) last week issued an order for the state guard to monitor the U.S. military — a decision he defended on Monday.
I fear McG. has found that some people can have an interesting life w/o the iNternet.
ReplyDeleteI did get a silly e-mail from him around Xmas.
some people can have an interesting life w/o the iNternet
ReplyDeleteBlasphemy!
Ain't it 'though?
ReplyDeleteI'll never forget how desolate the area was at night in February, a
ReplyDeletechill wind whipping off the Atlantic as I stood there, pounding on the
kid's door.If you aren't already writing hard-boiled detective fiction, you should start. Because IMEHO, this would be a great first line.
Twitter, mainly.
ReplyDeleteMore to the point, where is ZRM to claim that Neil Finn is really an Australian?
there will come a generation that had got beyond facts, beyond impressions, a generation absolutely colourless, a generation seraphically free
ReplyDeleteFrom taint of personality
I think that he always had the trick of making it seem as if he was a deeper and more serious thinker than he ever was, and probably did have lines fed to him by his handlers from the beginning of his political career. (Even before his Hollywood career, when he was starting in radio, he used to report ball games from information coming over the wire as if he were watching the game itself. From falsifying the context of the presentation of the facts, it was probably a short step to falsifying the facts themselves extemporaneously.) But I've read that he really started to slip the cognitive sprockets after the assassination attempt.
ReplyDeleteI'm betting he was showing signs before he was shot. One incident is prominent--he'd put much of his entire career on his anti-Communism rantings and his reputation as a great thinker on national security, and yet, in his first major meeting with all the top members of his national security team--national security adviser, CIA, joint chiefs, NSC director, etc., he fell asleep about fifteen minutes into a meeting that was supposed to last all afternoon. The participants shrugged it off, let him snooze and went on with business.
ReplyDeleteThat was a week after his first inauguration.
Oh, then, I think, he was still in possession of most of his faculties. He was still mean, stupid, petty and prone to lies, manufactured facts and exaggeration, but he hadn't started losing it.
ReplyDeleteAh, portrait of the artist as a frustrated Science Fair also-ran.
ReplyDeleteThere have been fools for longer than there's been money.
Mm-hm. I saw what you did there. ;^)
ReplyDeleteDon't be so quick to go to Mars, you know that the project is going to be chock-full of transhumanist libertarians.
ReplyDelete: "but, there's GOT to be some way we can win elections again without having to be nice to those people."
ReplyDeleteOh, there is--it's called "One Dollar, One Vote"--but it's stuck in pre-production (though not for lack of effort...or funding).
I seem to recall the phrase "digital lynch mob" arising somewhere a few years ago in reference to some well-forgotten butt-hurt conservative regarding the backlash to some attempted dick-move. (Teh googl is not my friend today.)
ReplyDeleteHow's that work?
ReplyDeleteIOKIYAR, as usual.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91dW9pUA1BI
ReplyDeleteThe people feverishly invoking "Piss Christ" as evidence of some double standard know the artist got death threats, right?
ReplyDeleteWell, clearly not, since an incidental point in Goldberg's piece is that Serrano didn't get threats.
Mostly I just came away from it with a feeling that Goldberg is a very, very lazy man. Mapplethorpe and Piss Christ happened 30 god-damned years ago. Possibly the left-wing in America has changed since then!
I mean, he has a couple of examples of nitwits who think Pamela Gellar's contest isn't protected by the First Amendment, and he just sort of pads it to column length with jib-jab about the state of the NEA more than a quarter century ago.
I find it hard to get too worked up about the government spending money on bad art, just because every dollar spent on art is a dollar that isn't spent on, say, bombing civilians or spiriting people away to torture camps. So much tax money is spent on actively evil things that it's hard for me to care about comparatively tiny amounts being spent on things which are merely dubious.
Later they were very upset to see images of rot or decay associated with these deaths--Saints, for example, and Martyrs were notsupposed to rot. When Caravaggio painted this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_the_Virgin_(Caravaggio) there was some displeasure over the realism of the scene:
ReplyDeleteThe painting recalls Caravaggio's Entombment in the Vatican in scope, sobriety, and the photographic naturalism. The figures are nearly life-sized. Mary lies reclined, clad in a simple red dress. The lolling head, the hanging arm, the swollen, spread feet depict a raw and realistic view of the Virgin's mortal remains. Caravaggio completely abandons the iconography traditionally used to indicate the holiness of the Virgin. In this cast-off body, nothing of the respectful representation found in devotional paintings remains.[4]
( I remember the painting as having a blue tinge to her face and slightly more corruption in the image but I might be remembering a different painting.)
My comment should have gone under this.
ReplyDeleteNot entirely.
ReplyDeleteI doubt whether Vietnam was, for anyone, good training in respect for human life.
ReplyDeleteI really like the writing in that Wikipedia entry: "In some ways this is a silent grief, this is no wake for wailers."
ReplyDeleteOr the Fan Man: dorky, dorky, dorky . . .
ReplyDeleteI goota say that this admission is embarrassing, from a musical and musicional perspective....I thought this was a tune by "the Jam."
ReplyDeleteAs an aside, any extraneous monies that were available were spent on other things than records, though I did have friends, but no one who had the entire kinks catalogue.
Happy Happy to all of the lovliest mothers on the planet...
And yesterday, I joined the half century club, never thought I had a chance actually...
:)
Bacchus was ceremonially torn to pieces by his devotees.
ReplyDeleteThanks Roy, for writing the essay. I think it gave the piece a depth and a little dissonance it wouldn't have otherwise had.
ReplyDeleteThanks also to the Alicublog community for the kind words. They were appreciated.
That is true. I forgot about him. I definitely read about Greek objections to the scourging and execution of Christ though, on the grounds that this could not have happened to a true divine person who would have been so beautiful as to strike pity and adoration into the hearts of all who saw him. But, of course, kings and gods were sacrificed periodically. Just not shamed.
ReplyDeleteHappy birthday. Now sign up for your AARP card and get some discounts.
ReplyDeleteAlso, Maplethorpe had been dead at the time.
ReplyDeleteOriginally, it was, natch, Richard Cohen's phrase for a flood of email he got after he wrote one of his trademarked slapdash, irreversibly stupid columns.
ReplyDeleteI think Herman Cain adopted the term in the 2008 election cycle when the internet-o-sphere was all abuzz about Number 9's, um, indiscretions with female employees.
You got me at "supercillious twit."
ReplyDeleteNo. Phillie Folk Fest. I attended several Fests between the 1980s-early 90s. Some of the most fun I have ever had.
ReplyDeleteMostly I just came away from it with a feeling that Goldberg is a very, very lazy man.
ReplyDeleteThat's what the thesaurus tells me.
"It's people like that who make you realize how little you've accomplished. It is a sobering thought, for example, that when Mozart was my age, he had been dead for two years." ~ Tom Lehrer
ReplyDeleteI agree that that particular work is obvious trolling. It's a giggle with a "look what I got those suckers to pay me to create", It's a elementary school piss joke disguised as blasphemy, It's an example of how easily certain segments of christianity can be provoked. It's a skillful darkroom exercise in light and color saturation. It's a controversy that has kept people talking about Serrano for decades. So, given the amount of effort invested, it is nearly a uniquely successful work of art. Serrano has shown us just how simple it is to make 'controversial' 'provocative' art, and has also shown us that art created simply to provoke a reaction is useful, because it exposes just how many of our fellow humans can't take a joke.
ReplyDeleteI second that happy birthday. Yay! And do sign up for AARP, but remember, getting discounts on stuff only works if you have the money to buy the stuff that's discounted. May you always be able to be spendy and get those discounts. That's my birthday wish for you.
ReplyDeleteWho was it I heard once describe living on a space colony, in his estimation, as being like being at a science fiction convention you could never leave?
ReplyDeleteSHUDDER.
SHIT UPDATE: I don't know if I can do this anymore. We're broke until the 20th. I can't ask you guys for assistance, god knows you've contributed enough. Dogs are out of food. Cold has turned to hot, the sun's beating down, no shade anywhere to park in (yeah, those trees are really useless, aren't they, Ms. Rand?) and I'm fretting about the cats overheating.
ReplyDeleteI'm just at a loss for what to do.
Squeaky,
ReplyDeleteI don't know either way. My gut tell me that the guys who served, like the ones who opposed the war, are more likely to be decent human beings that the chicken hawks.
The latter, to my observation, not just gut feel, are slime.
Your last sentence is fictitious: I didn't say no white cops served in Vietnam. I guess that's why you have "rat" in your name.
-dlj.
The transhumanist libertarians all signed on for the rockets to Venus, lured by the promise of blanket trees, and ham bushes and soap roots.
ReplyDeleteHmm, that would rather put the damper on the artwork and sculpture in churches....
ReplyDeleteEveryone has weeping statues of Mary Gotta do one better.
I've been thinking about you a lot. One suggestion: go to the nearest pet store (the reputable kind that sells pet food and supplies, not actual pets) and ask if they have dog food bags that have been returned, or that got torn during unpacking. My local pet supply store routinely collects these items and transfers them to one of the local rescue groups. If the pet store can't give you any, contact the local Humane Society, or call a local rescue group. They often have services to help people in trouble to continue to take good care of their animal companions. And check craigslist: put in a "wanted - dog food" request. People who have recently lost their pets often have fresh, good food that they'd like to donate.
ReplyDeleteI had never thought to go the pet store route. Genius!
ReplyDelete