Right out of the chute, Erin immediately starts this too-long-form essay with this:
“Good parties diverge widely; all bad parties are bad in the same way.”
I wonder if Erin would include ‘party-poopers’ as contributing to “bad parties”?
7 Likes
Its a common trope that all SF is about its contemporary world, not the future. It always has to be read in the context of it’s period, Progressiveism can only be relative. Heinlein could be viewed as progressive for having a nonwhite protagonist in 1959’s Starship Trooper, an otherwise reactionary book.
7 Likes
As alumni of the Frankfurt Institut für vergleichende Irrelevanz (IvI) will confirm, this text, while in general appreciated in it’s content, lacks in rigour.
2 Likes
The guy has a bit of a point. He does go back to the original sources, and shows that J.T did not snog aliens like a space-going Napoleon Solo. Somehow the one or two times did lodge in my memory more than they should have done. Well done for that.
But…
Why do literary people like to make the simple complicated, as he does? His original point was good, but could have been put in a few paragraphs. Instead we had this complicated description of someone (was he real?) to give a strawman argument, and make us hate him. Zap Brannigan is somehow supposed to represent the ‘mainstream view’ of Kirk ( does he understand ‘funny’ at all? ). Is he saying Steven Fry trying to brainwash us by getting a quote wrong? Was William Shatner chosen because he was Jewish? Erin hints endlessly.
Normally anyone who defends J.T. gets my vote. William Shatner is practically a family member, though he may not know it. But I dunno about this guy…
9 Likes
I learned that the author thinks about Star Trek, and more specifically Kirk, a little toooo much.
6 Likes
Are you raiding my music library lately? This is the second obscure music reference that matches up with me.
2 Likes
My dear Wife has a secret crush on Captain Kirk, and I don’t like it one bit.
2 Likes
Well, good thing in Trumps america, we’re going to completely defund this sort of academic work altogether, so that you’re not all forced to read it. God forbid, you’re all force to read shitty writing about popular culture that name checks the Frankfurt school! I mean, how dare people force you to read it! Bunch of assholes, the lot of us, AMIRIGHT!!! /s
20 Likes
Yeah, ummm…that ain’t literary. I think you’re conflating (poorly constructed, lacking in concision, oft verging towards incoherent ) academic writing with literature.
/English major screed
5 Likes
I think the problem some of us barbarians have is the notion of somebody studying seriously the crap we watched as kids when we should have been doing our homework. The fact that it has had tremendous cultural significance has a hard time overcoming the “wait, what?”. It would not be the 1st time a new field of study had a rough road to “legitimacy”, Economics wasn’t in the original Nobel prizes.
1 Like
No one forced you to read the article. You can safely ignore what you consider beneath you, ME INCLUDED, and you’ll be fine.
10 Likes
If people are only willing to do the work of creating and commenting upon culture if they are bribed with money, then the deeper problem existed before Trump’s arrival. “We can’t afford our culture anymore, party’s over, everybody go home!” There is some work which I would argue people can’t afford not to do. Incentivizing that type of work is precisely the way to undermine it.
1 Like
I don’t know how you read my post as hostile rather than sympathetic to your field of study.
1 Like
I almost misread that! People thinking critically about the media they consume IS their homework, in many ways.
2 Likes
I’m gobsmacked at all the pushback this essay is getting here. From what I read, the author substantially proved her point.
Did she do it wrong?
13 Likes
The problem I have is of people snarking and bitching about people studying culture, when they aren’t being forced to read it. If they don’t like it, don’t read it. Plain and simple.
I don’t think you’re a barbarian. I don’t appreciate people thinking that just because I study culture and enjoy that, that I look down on others.
But sorry if I misunderstood. I’m just sick of being told I’m a worthless human being because I study culture.
15 Likes
In that case I would have gotten great grades in “Gilligan’s Island”.
I don’t disagree with the authors point, but I think she did herself a disservice in writing it in the way she did. I read things sometimes that are unnecessarily over the top in academic-ish language. I think a really good point should be made as accessible as possible without relying on specialized terminology, etc.
It was just really hard to wade through to her point because of the terminology, and length of the essay.
6 Likes
She did indeed, it seems - - she used big words.
Oh, and she also conveyed her disdain for toxic masculinity, while being a woman to boot - - common triggers for many around here.
15 Likes
But of course they’ll deny this to the bitter end. Because they aren’t the anti-intellectual types at all.
8 Likes
