From: "Eric" <ericandmary-AT-earthlink.net>
Subject: Pander and Circuses
Date: Thu, 5 Feb 2004 08:16:15 -0600


Steve,

I would phrase this differently. I see the chief characteristic of the
sublime as one of negative presentation rather than mere indeterminacy.
I also think, for this very reason, the sublime is not external to
history, that it is more concerned with formlessness than with form,
and, as Leotard presents it, it is more ontological than aesthetic. I
believe the chapter entitled 'Presentation' in "The Differed"
demonstrates this thesis.   

One question I have for you is this. Where did the quote come from: the
"avant-garde task is to undo the spiritual assumptions regarding time?
The sense of the sublime is name of this dismantling..." (Lyotard)  

I don't remember this one.  

-----------------------------------------

Back to the culture wars.... 

Isolated as you are in Great Britain, have you heard anything at all
about our momentous Superbowl scandal?

I find it ironic at a time when both the Bush and Blair administrations
are under attack for lying and manipulating intelligence reports, Sharon
is finally shown to be the corrupt figure we always suspected he was,
the proposed Bush budget will entail huge deficits and even further
social stinginess, it is now finally revealed that the Bush
administration falsified its projection of the Medicare bill costs in
order to get it passed, the only thing really being talked about over
here in the U.S. is the great Janet/Justin affair.  

What appears to fascinate everyone (like a glittering talismanic object)
is the bare breast adorned by the nipple shield.  What isn't really
discussed at all, amid all the gestures of disgust, is the fact that
this was a dramatization of a violent and aggressive act by a man
perpetuated on a defenseless woman and that this man was white and the
woman black.  

In other words, it was a display of white male domination with both
racist and sexist overtones, performed as spectacle during the half-time
of the highest rated television show of all - the Superbowl, which has
over time taken on the pomp and circumstance of our great national
holiday, the secular equivalent of Christmas, with its own kind of
consumer potlatch in the form of a fetishistic display on fondness for
the 'infant birth' of commercials.    

What only added to the frisson of the moment was the fact that earlier
CBS refused to air an ad during the game produced by the anti-war group
Move-on, bought and paid for by American citizens, because CBS said it
doesn't do advocacy ads.  This didn't stop them, however, from running
advocacy ads for Beer and Viagra, which strangely strangely and
misogynistically mirrored the content of its own unanticipated half-time
show.

Does this display of Pander and Circuses, with its censorship of free
speech, signal the end of the Republic and the inauguration of Empire?
Is George W. our own homegrown Nero/Caligula? Has American culture
become the equivalent of the Roman chariot races and gladiator
conflicts?

Who knows - but the brief moment seemed to weirdly and symbolically
crystallize the stark image of a Justin Timberlake representing America
and a Janet Jackson representing the rest of world in a Freudian pageant
that liminally crossed the threshold into our public consciousness. 

In an uncanny moment it showed us what we had actually become, even
though the elites had pompously attempted to orchestrate the event with
grandiose patriotic gestures - the Nazi-like waving of flag placards and
the public mourning of the space mission while a scantily clad MTV
singer belted out a hip-hop version of the National Anthem.

I think this moment fulfilled all the characteristics of the sublime;
that it filled us with feelings of revulsion and horror in a way we can
barely understand, and that is why Americans can't stop talking about
it.  The nipple shield is just a cover-up for what really happened.  

Eric 

 

---
Outgoing mail is certified Virus Free.
Checked by AVG anti-virus system (http://www.grisoft.com).
Version: 6.0.524 / Virus Database: 321 - Release Date: 10/6/2003