• praxis
    6.2k


    I guess it's no surprise that conservatives would freak about something like this, though their reasoning is strange. Ben Crocker writes in an article published in The Federalist:

    It is the twerk that seems to evince in any crowd a manifest succumbing to the worst angels of our natures. The brainless shrieks of approval, the demented adulation for an unveiled sexuality not content with mere liberality, but further possessed of a flippant, aggressive, and unapologetically performative disposition.

    And all the more to applaud you see, because James Madison – James Madison! – bore symbolic witness to the madness.

    Can she really do that in the presence of the founding fathers?

    Of course she can. And the prepossessed audacity to exhibit that behavior — the banality, the crudity, the do-what-I-wantity — whilst in that hallowed presence, is the whole point of the exercise.

    For this is the culture that delights in the desecration of the sacred. The desecration that is sometimes unthinkingly casual, but often deliberately profane.

    Desecration of the sacred?

    Personally, I think it's beautiful that James Madison bore symbolic witness to a black woman's bold expression of empowerment, particularly because James was a typical slaveholder. He owned over a hundred human beings at one point, worked them from dawn to dusk, and never freed any of them.

    Do-what-I-fucking-wantity indeed.

    From what I briefly gather Madison wasn't particularly religious and wasn't a musician, so I assume his hallowedness is essentially founded on his being a leader of the nation. Traditionalists revere their leaders. The problem is that in modernity there are no true traditionalists. Pretty much everyone can categorize art, religion, politics, and the state. No one believes that the American presidency is somehow tied to God like a link in the great chain of being, least of all Ben Crocker who is highly critical and disrespectful of the current president of the United States. Would he care if Lizzo twerked while playing Biden's flute? No.

    Lizzo was classically trained since childhood, btw. Here she is playing with the NY Philharmonic.



    So what do you think, sacred or profane?
  • Agent Smith
    9.5k
    From one naya, profanity, from another, liberty. C'est la vie, mon ami! We either embrace freedom in every possible manner and at the same time desecrate or we curb our enthusiasm, in doing so show some respect for the sacred. Tough call, oui mes amies?

    One person, a woman, once reprimanded me, rather obliquely, that, basically, there's eating and there's dining - two very different things! No points for guessing whether I was eating or dining at the table.
  • Olivier5
    6.2k
    She's not even twerking... :groan:
  • I like sushi
    4.3k
    Great title. Other than that I am not quite sure why I should care at all about this?

    Are people that bored that this is actually ‘news’ now?
  • Deus
    320
    What was that ? insulting a dead slave owner by playing his flute or complimenting him … what actually happened and what was her message ?
  • praxis
    6.2k
    I am not quite sure why I should care at all about this?I like sushi

    I think the question is what Lizzo's art stands for versus what the art of the crystal flute stands for.

    I think it's undeniable that Lizzo's art stands for the empowerment of the marginalized, to some degree at least. She's a large woman, for instance, and unabashedly celebrates her shape. In some sense she is asking us to see beauty where we typically do not. That's what worthwhile art does.

    The flute was made by Claude Laurent, a Parisian watchmaker and mechanic, in honor of Madison’s second inauguration. Apparently, the crystal flute is a novelty item and Lizzo is the first to have played the instrument so it's not revered for its performance quality.

    I suppose the flute most distinctively stands for, by mere association/ownership, a particular founding father of the nation, James Madison. What does Madison stand for? Certainly not wokeness. Does that mean that the flute stands for anti-wokeness? It does, because people like Ben Crocker and Ben Shapiro are essentially saying that it does and those who are oblivious may follow their lead. It is their choice to claim what the flute stands for.
  • introbert
    333
    There is something to be said about the interplay of symbols in cultural life. In an important event like a state funeral, all the symbols are on point and anything out of place will be heaped with criticism. There is a cogency of symbols in most situations, even ones that are not formal, which define the culture of the people and the events. When something from one culture is appropriated by another culture, there is usually a controversy of some message being conveyed, at least sub-textually. This in some respects is like an artifact from a higher regarded society being used or appropriated by a lower regarded society. Any of the entitlements that lower society has to it, or perceptions of diminishing its value will be criticized in various ways. On the other hand, the possession of artifacts held by colonial powers of colonized peoples are only now being looked at in a negative light. On the surface without evaluation or analysis this is just a person playing a flute, but on another cognitive level it is an interplay of symbols like a political cartoon. This is the nature of events where the symbols are not entirely uniform.
  • Nils Loc
    1.3k
    When Trump sells James Madison's crystal flute after the next American civil war, Lizzo's playing of the flute will have added to its selling value.
  • I like sushi
    4.3k
    I think it's undeniable that Lizzo's art stands for the empowerment of the marginalizedpraxis

    What is her art? She is a musician right? Does she always make music about such a topic? Is she particularly political?
  • Deus
    320
    I think the topic here is over thought.


    It ain’t over till the fat lady sings.



  • praxis
    6.2k
    When Trump sells James Madison's crystal flute after the next American civil war, Lizzo's playing of the flute will have added to its selling value.Nils Loc

    That's a good point. Rather than defiling the object as some claim, Lizzo actually raised its value, and I would guess that it also, by design, raised awareness of treasures that the Library of Congress holds. How many Americans knew that there are crystal flutes, much less that Jimmyboy owned one and it could be seen at the Library of Congress? Few, I think.
  • praxis
    6.2k
    What is her art? She is a musician right? Does she always make music about such a topic? Is she particularly political?I like sushi

    I gave my impression of her as a performer or brand, if you will.
  • praxis
    6.2k
    I think the topic here is over thought.

    It ain’t over till the fat lady sings.
    Deus

    It's hard enough to take this seriously without half-baked jokes being thrown into the mix.
  • praxis
    6.2k
    the possession of artifacts held by colonial powers of colonized peoples are only now being looked at in a negative lightintrobert

    Your meaning is not clear. Could you please rephrase this for added clarity?
  • introbert
    333
    I don't know you well enough to say something that might be understandable to you, but I think you have identified the central idea to this situation from my block of text to indicate that you have made some sense of it. The artifact in this situation, the flute, was held by a symbolically colonized person and the artifact was owned by a colonizer and owner of slaves. In the case of artifacts held by a colonizer of a colonized African nation, critics on 'the left' will use the return of them as progress towards decolonization. In this case critics on 'the right' will use Lizzo's possession of the artifact as they have to proclaim something degenerative or decadent about the state of the world.
  • I like sushi
    4.3k
    but generally 99.9999999999999999999% of people do not give a flying fuck I suspect.

    I think this is a case of people imaging people care and that the people imagining this care are also imaginary.

    Praxis must be taking the piss … nothing else makes sense.
  • introbert
    333
    I'm pretty interested in this kind of thing, but I found no meaning in her playing the flute.
  • praxis
    6.2k
    I don't know you well enough to say something that might be understandable to you…introbert

    I’m fluent in English, if that’s helpful for you to know about me.

    What most interests me is the part where you touch on “only now being looked at in a negative light”. What’s that about? Can you please elucidate on that?
  • Merkwurdichliebe
    2.6k
    I think the topic here is over thought.

    It ain’t over till the fat lady sings.
    Deus

    It's hard enough to take this seriously without half-baked jokes being thrown into the mix.praxis

    The only thing serious about this spectacle is how horribly offended my eyeballs have become after seeing such a disgusting whale wearing a hooker costume.
  • Deus
    320


    You’re simply describing the way things are … if she was to devote her time to eating less hotdogs and going for some excercise … in 6 months time you’d pay for an hour of her company…

    And she plays a mean flute.
  • praxis
    6.2k
    hooker costumeMerkwurdichliebe

    Where do you live where streetwalkers can afford an outfit like that?
  • praxis
    6.2k
    Anyway, getting back to the topic, I think that @introbert may have been attempting to introduce the concept of presentism to the issue, thought better of it, and then wisely chose to abandon the discussion. Presentism is the uncritical adherence to present-day attitudes, especially the tendency to interpret past events in terms of modern values and concepts.

    Back in the day slavery and genocide were a-okay, or so say the anti-presentists. Everyone was doing it, and doing it was legal. It wasn't a-okay with those enslaved or in the process of being slaughtered, of course, and in fact we modern folk still value freedom and life. Imagine that, after two hundred years of progress and change, people still value freedom and life. The more things change the more they stay the same, it seems, doesn't it?
  • introbert
    333
    Sorry I work a day job and didn't have time to respond. I wasn't thinking of presentism, although that is interesting. It's actually a very complex reason why things have changed the way they have. I think the simple reason is that everyone in the world potentially has a voice now, so it is rather difficult to do unjust things.
  • Merkwurdichliebe
    2.6k
    You’re simply describing the way things are … if she was to devote her time to eating less hotdogs and going for some excercise … in 6 months time you’d pay for an hour of her company…Deus

    Never. I doubt she could crack the 300 barrier with diey and exercise alone. Behemoths like that require major surgery to slim down to a healthy weight.

    And she plays a mean flute.Deus

    That is always a plus in my book. Nevertheless, she is still a vomitous specimen to look at in that hooker costume.
  • Merkwurdichliebe
    2.6k
    Where do you live where streetwalkers can afford an outfit like that?praxis

    You would be surprised at the amount a good pimp will pay for clothes for his hoes.
  • javi2541997
    4.9k
    You would be surprised at the amount a good pimp will pay for clothes for his hoes.Merkwurdichliebe

    :up: :sparkle:

    They invest in show their products in the storefront.
bold
italic
underline
strike
code
quote
ulist
image
url
mention
reveal
youtube
tweet
Add a Comment