The Age of Entitlement

[St. Louis]

Very true. I remember being somewhat offended by the Beverly Hilbillies when I was younger, because they were generally made out to be a bit foolish. Granny actually looked and talked (though with a completely different accent) like my own grandmother, who was not a sophisticated woman, but who always had a sharp sense of humor and a clear line between right & wrong. Now that I'm older I see that show somewhat differently. The Clampetts always came out as decent, honest, generous people. I could be persuaded either way -- was the show making fun of country folk? Or was it a mild critique of the consumerist side of the sixties? I'm not sure now.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Take a good long look at how Mr. Drysdale was portrayed, and you'll get your answer -- it was actually a pretty trenchant critique of the money-mad side of the Sixties.

 

[Fletch]

It's interesting to me that one of the founders of the People of Wal Mart site is a law school student. I wonder what kind of a lawyer he'll turn out to be.

Don't know, but the 3 of them grew up together in Harrison City, pop. 155, in coal-diggin', steel-pourin', deer-huntin', Stillers-rootin' SW PA. So they're not too far removed from their own tank-top, snuff-and-mullet years.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

It's interesting to me that one of the founders of the People of Wal Mart site is a law school student. I wonder what kind of a lawyer he'll turn out to be.

The kind of lawyer you hope the other side has.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Don't know, but the 3 of them grew up together in Harrison City, pop. 155, in coal-diggin', steel-pourin', deer-huntin', Stillers-rootin' SW PA. So they're not too far removed from their own tank-top, snuff-and-mullet years.

Hence the insecurity that produces such a site. Nothing three high-flying "web design experts" must dread more than being sent to the mines and getting all dirty and stuff.

These fine young examples of the American Way have a whole string of similar sites. "White Trash Repairs" is another fine example of their nuanced, compassionate take on the class structure of American society. "White Trash Repairs" is a good example of how classism supplants racism -- there used to be a rather vicious racist phrase applied to the exact type of thing shown on this site, but now that it's about poor white people it's all good clean fun.

God, I can't wait for Web 2.0 to implode.

 

[Fletch]

Ya think Web 3.0 is going to be any better?

 

[LizzieMaine]

Maybe that'll be the one where the cats really do take over.

In all seriousness, though, nothing epitomizes what we've fallen to as a society, as a culture, as a *species* than the fact that these three guys are making a good living off this kind of poison. That they're doing so makes it evident that there are many millions of people who see what they're doing as just fine -- encouraging their fans to anonymously stalk and mock people who have done them no personal harm whatever just for the simple crime of *not being like them.* If there's public shaming that ought to be done, it's the specimens on the other sides of those cameras who ought to be paraded on display so we can see just how special they are.

Yes indeed. "We've Come So Far."

 

[sheeplady]

Maybe that'll be the one where the cats really do take over.

In all seriousness, though, nothing epitomizes what we've fallen to as a society, as a culture, as a *species* than the fact that these three guys are making a good living off this kind of poison. That they're doing so makes it evident that there are many millions of people who see what they're doing as just fine -- encouraging their fans to anonymously stalk and mock people who have done them no personal harm whatever just for the simple crime of *not being like them.* If there's public shaming that ought to be done, it's the specimens on the other sides of those cameras who ought to be paraded on display so we can see just how special they are.

Yes indeed. "We've Come So Far."

It absolutely flabbergasts me that people think it's appropriate to stalk and take pictures of everyday people without their permission. That's like a major social "no-no." (It's also a major professional no-no for a photographer.) But to have the audacity to take those pictures, post them publicly, for the sole purpose of mockery is beyond me. How absolutely disgusting. It makes me want to follow the mockers around with a camera whenever they are in public to make sure that I catch all their "best" moments. Except I even appreciate their rights to privacy.

The plain fact is that you never know why a person looks like they do when they run out to a store. I'm always careful about what I mock, because karma is a mighty force. I can think of situations in which I'd be forced to go to a store in my PJs, and I'd prefer to avoid those fates.

 

[CharleneC]

I don't like Walmart and I don't like what I see when I go, so I don't go. I've seen the site but don't read it because again, I don't like what I see.

I don't photograph people to humiliate them, and post the images online for everyone to bully. I have a mental picture in my head that's hard enough to get rid of. I don't like people in pajamas in public.

So, you don't like Walmart, but you go. You've seen the site enough to know you don't like it, which means you've read it, but you say you don't read it. Please explain these obvious contradictions.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Take a good long look at how Mr. Drysdale was portrayed, and you'll get your answer -- it was actually a pretty trenchant critique of the money-mad side of the Sixties.

Just like Archie Bunker/All in the Family was a seething commentary on mainstream culture and NOT critical of working class Archie.

I tried searching the lounge but couldn't find the excellent discussion on that, where you and I both stated our support for that show's genius.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Just feel the need to state that we can't assume that people in PJ's in public are "poor" or that all poor people wear pajamas in public. I don't like stereotypes. I know plenty of "poor" people who are far more well-dressed/spoken/considerate than old money.

 

[Fletch]

Maybe that'll be the one where the cats really do take over.

CATTCHA™
[________] [

]
Please prove you're not a human

 

[GoldenEraFan]

There were a lot more people in the Era who didn't forget their roots than there are now, which is part of the problem -- the rising generation doesn't realize that they aren't part of an unbroken line of well-educated, smartphoned, $5 coffee sipping, Target-shopping Normal Americans. Go back far enough in anyone's family and you'll find someone badly dressed with unkempt hair, probably smelling bad, working a dead-end job or no job at all, and suddenly all the ha ha yuck yuck won't seem so funny.

The more people remember their roots, the more likely it is that the chickens on the lower levels of the henhouse can stop pecking each other and can take a moment to look up and realize where the poop on their heads is coming from.

I think that's probably the biggest problem with society today, most people don't know (or care) about history period. Rather bizarre in retrospect when you think about it. In the old days people had the mindset to want and have everything new and modern. My family for instance had one of those atomic styled metal kitchen tables from the '50s well into the late 1960's, but at that point my mom hated it because she saw it as "old fashioned", even though it was a beautiful and well built table. It was still a time of traditions and people still celebrated their heritage. Today it's the complete opposite, we've been working harder than ever to restore and preserve whatever historical pre-1960's artifacts, cars, houses, furniture etc. still exists but people seem to know little to nothing of their own heritage/history along with history in general which is somewhat baffling since we have access to endless streams of historical information thanks to the internet. I feel this may be some of the cause for the recent generations "self entitlement", the know no history except the era of which they have lived, and anything before them is irrelevant. If their great grandparents struggled trying to create a new life in America, their grandparents struggled through the great depression and WWII, and their parents struggled through the Vietnam War and the bad economic period between the '60s-'80s it doesn't apply to them. Basically our society has become completely detached from it's own history.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Apropos the recent discussion, there's an excellent article in the new issue of Smithsonian magazine about Jaron Lanier, who was apparently one of the major forces in the creation of "Web 2.0," and who has now repudiated much of what has come to pass as a result.

But he saw anonymity as a poison seed. The way it didn't hide, but in fact bradished the ugliness of human nature beneath the anonymous screen-name masks. An enabling, and foreshadowing, of mob rule, not a growth of democracy but an accreation of tribalism.

It's taken a while for this prophecy to come true...But it is slowly turning us into a nation of hate-filled trolls.

"This is the thing that continues to scare me. You see in history the capacity of people to congeal -- like social lasers of cruelty. That capacity is constant....when everybody coheres into this cruelty beam. Look what we're setting up in the world today. We have economic fear, combined with everybody joined together in these instant twitchy social networks which are designed to create mass action. What does that sound like to you? It sounds to me like the prequel to potential social catastrophe."

A pogrom is carried out by 'a crowd,' the true horrific embodiment of the purported 'wisdom of the crowd.' You could say it made Lanier even more determined not to remain mute. To speak out against the digital barbarism he helped to create.

I strongly recommend reading the full article. Go buy a copy at a newsstand.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

It's also online, I will read it now, thanks for suggesting it!

http://www.smithsonianmag.com/ideas...d-Jaron-Lanier-Against-the-Web-183832741.html

 

[Weston]

I've only seen Lizzie tackle this issue, and gnaw on it like a bone, but she's absolutely right. It's as ugly and evil as racism. Stick to your guns. I was writing a sermon today on Matthew 7:1-5:

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."

That'll about do it right there I think.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I've only seen Lizzie tackle this issue, and gnaw on it like a bone, but she's absolutely right. It's as ugly and evil as racism. Stick to your guns. I was writing a sermon today on Matthew 7:1-5:

“Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.
“Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye."

That'll about do it right there I think.

Back to entitlements: People are entitled to their opinions and we're all flawed. Why judge those who judge? I don't think that someone who has seen People of Walmart and giggled or smirked at it is now a "sinner." I see no value in judging people to be like chickens, either.

We're all capable of great good. We can learn manners. We can learn to respect one another.

How can we facilitate that in the world?

 

[LizzieMaine]

I think we can all examine our own attitudes and how we express those attitudes -- before we snicker at a website that puts someone we've never met and never will meet up to ridicule just because of how they look, think about *why* we find that amusing, and consider what that says about our own point of view. There's a time and a place for judgement, but isn't it more worthwhile to condemn those who truly *deserve* to be condemned, and if there's some question -- as in not knowing the circumstances which led someone to dress in some bizarre outfit -- just forget about what you were thinking and move on. I've seen some outfits right here on the Lounge that I wouldn't be caught dead in, but how, exactly, is it my place to say so? Would anything be improved by my opinion on the matter? When we yuck it up over some anonymous schmo in a too-small t-shirt with a dumb slogan on the front and his big hairy belly lumping out over his shorts, how exactly are we any different from the jackasses on a certain other fashion forum who hijack the pictures *we ourselves post* and subject them to truly obscene mockery? There's a lot of people here on the Lounge who are figures of extreme fun at that site, whether they know it or not. Some of those who post here are members there too, and if they're reading this I say -- Grow up, you shoe-sniffing fifth-grade morons.

No, I'd rather save my own bile for those who genuinely deserve it -- attack the people and institutions who cause the evils in the world today, not the people who suffer as a result of them. Satire is a like a gun -- don't ever point it at anything you don't want to hurt.

Along with Weston's comment, I'll add my own bit of scriptural advice: "Everyone who humbles himself will be exalted -- but everyone who exalts himself will be humbled."

And I still think the chicken analogy is perfect: the easiest way to keep the underclasses impotent is to set them to attacking each other over pointless, stupid things -- because then they won't bother to go after the real enemy. It works in the chicken house, and it works in 21st Century America.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

I think we can all examine our own attitudes and how we express those attitudes

Agreed!

 

[PrettySquareGal]

but isn't it more worthwhile to condemn those who truly *deserve* to be condemned, and if there's some question -- as in not knowing the circumstances which led someone to dress in some bizarre outfit -- just forget about what you were thinking and move on. I've seen some outfits right here on the Lounge that I wouldn't be caught dead in, but how, exactly, is it my place to say so? Would anything be improved by my opinion on the matter? I'd rather save my own bile for those who genuinely deserve it -- attack the oppressor, not the oppressed.

For me- there are two issues- forming an opinion/judgement, and then what I do about it. Etiquette and care wouldn't permit me to be cruel to someone, nor do I feel entitled to tell everyone how they should dress. But that won't stop me from having my own private, honest option. ("Gee, I wouldn't wear that!) Knowing that people think the same about me- I wear jeans and I know many at the FL don't "approve." That's OK.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I don't see those who snicker at POWM as the enemy or object of my contempt. An unjust system that helped create such inequalities, yes.

Something else- as one who wore embarrassing clothing (ill fitting, clashing, etc) during her childhood, I am painfully aware of the "whys" behind clothing "choices." I know I can't judge someone's worth based upon what they are wearing.