Yes, in my 30 years here, this is the lowest moral level of this country I witnessed. I blame level of education in public schools last 50 years. Culture of Snooky, Sara Pailin and Glen Beck. Boris Shoshensky To: [email protected] Subject: Re: Validity of Cheerskep's Argument Date: Sun, 15 Aug 2010 17:49:36 -0700 (PDT)
A natural freedom of expression? What artist can claim that freedom when surrounded by hideous mobs who don't understand the most basic tenets of freedom? How about the mosque near Ground Zero? I am embarrassed by the mob-swell of racist bigotry against people building their mosque-center in NYC. Where did these dumb fist-shakers get their values? And why do elected senators and others inflame the rage that is so obviously contrary to every principle of American fair play and democratic tolerance? It is truly disgusting. And what is more disgusting is the smug attitude of the press happily stirring up controversy just for the sake of ratings. Obama was only being a natural president in saying that a group has the right to build its mosque on private land. Duh! All the frothing morons who disagree would be the first to insist on their own rights to build their ugly shacks on their own private, legally ordained land. This is one of those times when American right-wing extremists are polluting the national conscience with their stupid and hateful -- and actually unlawful and treasonous -- shouts. Here's an example of the ignorant mobs being stirred up by self-serving politicians, the exact problem our Founding Fathers saw and tried to avoid in their formulation of the Constitution. America has a very troubled history when it comes to fair play. Even in the period following the Revolution and before the adoption of the Constitution, there was livid strife between radicals, those who championed state's rights over a national government, and the more conservative whigs who saw that a strong national government was essential to fulfilling the aims of the revolution. Luckily, a national government concept came to pass. It favored the ideas of the "rich and the wise" who benefitted from stability and the power to enforce it by having a barrier between the lawmakers and the populace. It wasn't and isn't direct democracy. Nowadays the totally confused tea party types and their right wing fans are the "conservatives" and the "radicals" are the liberals, an exact reverse of post revolutionary. The new conservatives want to tear down national government and magnify state's rights and so-called individual freedom and exploitative economic. They repeat the antics of the post rev. "radicals" by seeking a direct democracy, akin to mob rule by a majority. The new radicals on the left, however, are the real conservatives because they want to retain the rule of law and a strong national government while pretending that they are protecting minority rights against the rich and powerful. What a mess! This slobbering and blathering rage over a mosque is indicative of a nation in increasing dementia. Been to Ellis Island? Have you seen the museum there displaying the hideous outrage against immigrants by Americans? Does anyone remember the segregation era? How about the Japanese detention camps in America? Real estate red lining? Rental ads that ended with the word "restricted" meaning no blacks and jews? Women's rights? All in my lifetime. It goes on and on. America is like any other country when it comes to racial and religious and economic and gender intolerance except it can be more extreme, as it is now. That's when we see how far we are from our doctrines and platitudes. Shame on us! Build the mosque, Cover it with marble. Shine it with lights. That'd be a tribute to the victims of 9-11 and to us all. I don't know how to do it and it may be beyond my ability as an artist, but I do think there can't be a real art of our time that ignores the mismatch between reality and myth now dominating world culture and especially, and shamefully, American culture. If I were a young artist I'd know that the torch has passed from the frilly bobble-head commerce-as-god trivia of Duchamp and Warhol, from the lightweight era of one-liner irony and conceptual parlor games, from bad taste as good taste, from obfuscating theory to a new clan of clear-eyed hardball artists who report the tragedy of this era and the aspirations of humanism. Raw, like old time journalism. Like some of the better artists America and Europe once had before the apotheosis of dandyism and NYC fetish-fashionista-fake-modernistic Bravo reality show art. wc ----- Original Message ---- From: ARMANDO BAEZA <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Sun, August 15, 2010 5:07:09 PM Subject: Re: Validity of Cheerskep's Argument Actually ,the fuzzy that we choose is precise / distinct / exact to our natural freedom of expression, and we are hopelessly happy with our aesthetic identity. mando ________________________________ From: Michael Brady <[email protected]> To: [email protected] Sent: Sun, August 15, 2010 1:18:09 PM Subject: Re: Validity of Cheerskep's Argument > i like fuzzy, because a little this way or that, in the > final design, would not alter it's aesthetic value > You might like 'indistinct' better. Every notion or idea we construct from sense data is an approximation and thus is indistinct, inexact, and fuzzy. Every idea we have about the outside world and anything we make that 'represents' something else is an approximation of the other thing. The raw sense data of our vision and hearing is less than the full range of light or sound waves, so that besides being imprecise and inexact, we hear and see only a fraction of what can potentially be heard and seen. The English language has roughly 1,000,000 words in it. About 100 of them are fixed "structure" words, such as pronouns, prepositions, and articles. These categories of words almost never add new members; they're closed. But the other 999,900 words belong to various "descriptive" categories (nouns, verbs, modifiers) that are used to describe and denote the world out there. And they aren't enough! All language and verbal communication proves to be imprecise, ambiguous, vague, open to interpretation--Cheerskep's fuzziness. As I mentioned several times before, when we are awake and alert, our daily experiences of the world seem to be more or less sharply focused, but they constantly pass before us in motion, with overlapping sounds, smells, tastes, and touches. We pick and choose how to give them priority and clarity (probably close to William's frequent remark about "projected" meaning)--except, of course, for pain and the internal alarm when our body is injured or sick. | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | Michael Brady
