Hello Ian, Ian Malbon wrote: > > > the unfortunate thing about dj ken etal is we are now sleepwalking. we don't > > even care about things like this anymore because we have been so inundated > > by it. [snip] > > the issue i have with > > this, however, is it changes history -- pop culture is one of the > > foundations of our history -- and as long as we don't answer this assault to > > our senses, we will be forced to mutate continuously because that's all we > > can do in answer to such atrocities. > > So, the co-opting (at worst) or discovery (at best) of dj culture > by Mattel amounts to an > "atrocity"?
I think you are both oversimplifying the issue. I think where she is coming from is that she just read a book based on a watered down version of what Situationalist International/Deleuze and Guattari/Hakim Bey/any other author dealing with ontological anarchist theory...have been kicking for a good chunk of the 20th century. I think the problem comes when you are dealing with companies that profit from mediating reality. I believe people take issue with the fact that Mattel is selling a watered down stereotype of dance culture, and it does not reflect their cultural experiences. The problem with this is that these people are in control of our representation in mass culture for all of posterity. The issue is that movies like Go, mall store raver-ware, parties as morally bankrupt no-holds barred drug orgies and DJ Ken dolls are going to be the things that define our experience to outsider for futurity. I think even Adbusters would recommend saving that > rhetoric for more important > protests. The thing that should really be bothering people is the conditions that those Barbie Dolls are made in. Mattel has sweatshops in China where they make these things in shops with horrible worker conditions. There is a big problem with shops in which they insert the hair into the dolls, there a dust like substance from the hair in those shops that causes the workers to have a problem with lung infections. The human rights situation over there for those workers is very bad. I think that is a much bigger problem than the misrepresentation and mediation of this music though corporate media. I will save the rest of this speech for the 313/WTO rants list. > > > the answer to the commodification of cool is the constant mutation > > into the new. > > "Thank you big bad marketers," I say, for the impetus to create. > Complacency, not commodification, killed the cat. But mediation stole that cat's culture and helped rob it of its quality of life. The thing your are missing is that commodification is what kills the cat. When you give a genre a name, some stars, and some general rules, you kill it through definition. It cannot grow because you have boxed it in, you have given it a set of rules. That's what commodification does, it boxes and defines things in order to make them easier to sell. It would be nice to have a culture outside of capitalism... take care, Mike > > -- > There4IM > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Michael Taylor : [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://homes.arealcity.com/Intermodal/index.html "I am still learning." Michelangelo
