I always enjoy it when weirdo ideological alarmists try to write about pop culture. There’s something that’s just so, well, adorable about someone spewing forth angry, pompus tirades, full of bluster and overwrought prose, on the alleged culture-destroying properties of, say, Miley Cyrus.
The recent Return of Kings post “5 Things Wrong With Modern Music” is a lovely example of this genre of criticism, even though one of its points, that modern pop music is too clinically perfect for its own good, and could use a few more rough edges, is actually pretty much on the mark. But even when what author G.W. Rees says is more or less correct, the way he says it is risible. Also, he’s wildly incorrect most of the time.
So without further ado, here are My 5 Favorite Overblown Pronouncements from the Return of Kings post “5 Things Wrong With Modern Music.”
1) “Have you ever seen a room full of women in their twenties singing along to filth this shameless, while grandmothers stare catatonically on in horror, parents guffaw and smirk in direction of the floor, and the more “enlightened” boomers laugh delightfully as if the behaviour their daughters are displaying is of no significance at all?”
I’m going to go with “no” here.
2) “Whores, whores, and more whores. It seems like every other contemporary popstar parades herself with more zeal than a common street hussy.”
“Hussy.” Haven’t heard that one in a while, but then again I don’t usually spend a lot of time hanging out with 90-year-old misogynists.
3) “A dystopia where all things sexual have been reduced to an amoral form of childish amusement, and the segment of the population who have historically been the nurturers and caregivers of a society have decided to shirk the honourable traditions of their forebears and turn feral.”
It’s true. Most female pop stars are not socialized to humans and do not feel comfortable around them. They do not like to be touched. They are unlikely to “meow” in their attempts to communicate with humans. Many live in colonies with other feral pop stars.
4) “Blue jeans, fast food, Walmart, Hollywood, suburbs, and…”sick beats.” These are all emblematic of the colossally hideous Jabba The Hut-like behemoth—known as globalization—currently devouring tradition and genuine cultures.”
So you’re complaining about Hollywood colonizing the world … using a metaphor based on Jabba the Hut, a character from a blockbuster Hollywood movie that colonized the world?
5) “[T]he broadcasting of such content via mass media in conjunction with the female proclivity towards herd mentality spawns a toxic synergy. Such a combination ultimately results in debased sexual moral standards for young women and the normalization of slatternly behaviour, in turn sowing the seeds of cultural rot and the decline of our once mighty civilization.”
Ok, but it’s got a good beat, and you can dance to it. I give it a 72.
Oh, and speaking of Miley (which at least one of these quotes was doing), she’s not the only one destroying culture.
Translation:
He knows several Katies.
Feminism is just cock starved women lying about hating men for reasons.
Eventually though we are stalked and predated upon by peens (because women can’t desire and seek sex, even if they are addicted to it?), proving we were lying all along about inequality and rape.
LOGIX!
“For youth and elde is often at debaat.” – Geoffrey Chaucer.
I’m beginning ro understand that when people complain about “________ is destroying our culture!” what they really mean is that whatever they put in the blank (rock and roll, violent movies, video games, feminists, etc.) is destroying the relevance of THEIR culture to the culture as a whole.
After I started thinking about it like that, the continued alarmism in the face of overwhelming evidence to the contrary made sense.
ROK does seem to provide a rich seam to manospherian nonsense to mine for mockery. Maybe they have competitions to see who can come up with the ‘worst ever’. I am beginning to suspect that it is all about the money. Obviously they hate women, but if they didn’t make money from it I don’t think they would try as hard.
I have determined that I shall NEVER go on the site again, however irritated I may be by their constant desire to say ‘women are shit’ in a million different ways because I just do not want them to have anymore hits.
“[T]he broadcasting of such content via mass media in conjunction with the female proclivity towards herd mentality spawns a toxic synergy. Such a combination ultimately results in debased sexual moral standards for young women and the normalization of slatternly behaviour, in turn sowing the seeds of cultural rot and the decline of our once mighty civilization.”
Yeah, that Elvis fellow just isn’t cricket.
I could go further back to swing and jazz or the bloody music halls.
Where are these multigenerational clubs and parties full of grandmas, parents, and daughters?
Or is he complaining because they played “YMCA” at his cousin’s wedding and someone’s ankle was clearly visible?
I just ordered some Cultural Rot seeds from the Burpee Catalogue. “Harlot’s Glory”, “Heirloom Strip Mall” and “Britney Spears Fantasia Mix”. Going for first prize at the county fair this year!
I wonder if the entire MRA movement has been one really long viral marketing scheme for Nicki Minaj’s Anacadona single. Because after reading that list I just want to blast it as loud as I can.
I really don’t want to read that Robert Lindsey guy – it sounds terrible.
I get that his view of women is pure projection, but I wonder what he’s experienced in life that he interprets women in this way.
I have to admit, I have a sort of fascination with bad faith arguments and projection. So, I wonder what led him to interpret some women’s words as fear and/or hatred of men and then cock addiction. Could it be that a woman admitted she was afraid of strangers when she was walking alone at night? Or even in the day? (I altered a walking route because of a creepy guy that hung out on the trail where I walked. Thankfully, he hasn’t been seen in years. Does that make me “afraid of men in general”?) Did the woman in question say she hated some specific men or some stereotypical male behavior?
In any case, one thing I think is true in general is that there are lots of people who have half-formed thoughts that they don’t articulate well when put on the spot. It has taken me years to figure out the nuances of some of my beliefs so I think I can express them on the spot, but how many people have the leisure and desire to do that?
Sorry for the long post, but I have a big problem with people who try to put labels on others and point out problems in society related to said others without any sort of self-examination. A poorly worded answer to an on-the-spot question which is then filtered through a lens of projection and then dissected ad nauseum is not a basis for meaningful discussion.
I wonder how old this guy actually is. One of his gripes is “Men Don’t Sound Masculine”, complaining that there are “modern” male vocalists who don’t have deep-pitched voices. That means he’s from an era before Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, so pre-1962.
Then I looked around on Wikipedia for a few minutes and found that he’s probably from sometime before the 17th Century
At this point I’m wondering if this is a serious article, or if he’s just reprising Mel Brooks’ 2,000-year-old-man schtick.
@Ellesar – Some of us are going to have to go there to keep tabs on them though. I will agree with you on them saying the same thing in a million different ways. Constantly trying to repackage their bullshit. I guess they’re only trying to change the language so people can see their positions in a favourable light until something sticks.
“Damn feminists, get off my lawn! I swear to god, if I get one more frisbee in my yard I’m going to open a store!”
Thing is, if you pull the misogyny out of this Rees guy’s post, I don’t disagree with any of what’s quoted. I am actually really sick of pop culture reducing sex to a transaction of women’s beauty for men’s money– and the message that seeing a prospect with more of either immediately negates any obligation to the person you’re with at the time. By hip hop *especially* but kind of by everything right now, women’s bodies have been totally comodified and men are just dispensaries of cash and fancy toys. It’s certainly “an amoral form of childish amusement”; Rees only goes wrong in blaming women exclusively and including a strong vibe of Madonna-whore rhetoric.
And from what I’ve heard of Miley’s songs (admittedly little), she’s not the one pushing these themes so there’s that in her favor.
@ScarlettAthena:
“Cock addiction” is probably just “likes to have sex.” I think when you have an extreme interpretation of one thing (like interpreting a woman has fearing and hating men if she talks about being afraid to go out at night alone or does the whole “ugh, men…” thing), it drives your interpretation of everything else to the extreme as well.
In his mind, that woman obviously fears and loathes men, but she has sex so therefore her sexual desire must be strong enough to override those fears. Hence, “cock addiction.” Not because she has more sex than anyone else, just that she has sex at all.
For the mathy/sciency people out there, it’s like trying to fit a function to a set of points. If the function hits the first point at a really steep angle, it has to rebound in an extreme way to hit the next point, and you end up with a function that hits every point but is super hilly and obviously not the simplest function you could fit. Assuming one extreme to explain one trait drives you to an extreme explanation for others, even if the things you’re trying to explain are just normal, everyday things.
Buttercup, I would love a bed of Harlot’s Glory in my front yard.
Robert Lindsay is a disgrace to his first name. And his peen.
zyvlyn – That’s a really smart way to look at it.
Luckily for all the cock-addicted feminists out there, there is a safe, generic alternative to the pure stuff called a “dildo” and it’s available for purchase without the inconvenient side effect of being attached to a man who may have opinions about whether and how often and with whom you should have sex!
#5 sounds like one of those song intros where some old style announcer reads something serious and then a beat starts up and it turns into the real song. Hopefully in this case it’s one of these sexy young women that so horrify the dudes of RoK.
@Kirbirywarp
You are probably right. I imagine a scenario where this man is out with a woman who likes and is attracted to him. (She doesn’t know what a douchenozzle he is.) She complains a little about some dude at work who harasses her and how she dealt, or didn’t, with it. She jokes a little about men in general, maybe even with some irony and thinks he gets what she means. Maybe she admits that she sometimes walks to her car with her keys between her fingers because the parking deck is poorly lit and she saw some creep in the elevator. That night, they sleep together and she appears to enjoy herself.
Translation: she was full of fear and hatred to men and because she has a job she must be a feminist. He cock addiction cut right through all that though.
Of course, this is presuming the woman was out with him. Maybe he heard his mate’s girlfriend bitch about a coworker and admit to being afraid of some dude on the street. She sleeps with his friend though so she must be addicted to cock.
Basically, I’m just picturing your average woman who thinks some guys are pricks and maybe has some negative experiences with them and is afraid of some guys for specific reasons, but she likes other guys and sleeps with them. This gets filtered into: cock addiction overcomes feminizm!
Damn youth and their vaudeville with their tandem bicycles! In my day we kept pedaling within the confines of holy matrimony! And the empire was better for it!
I love it when shitlord comic book purists get their undies in a twist because their misogynistic viewpoints aren’t being validated.
I remember when they were all squawking that no one wanted female Thor, and it was going to tank, and we shouldn’t bother with it because it sounded awful.
And now Fem!Thor’s outselling dude Thor.
*snort* Oh please. 1963. I don’t care HOW BAD music is, it does not compare to that arid wasteland between Elvis’s deployment and the arrival of the Beatles. It gave us shit like Gitarzan, and Puppet on a String.
Does anyone else imagine Rorschach from Watchmen writing this? I do.
RE: Chaos-Engineer
That means he’s from an era before Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, so pre-1962.
I KNOW RIGHT? A bunch of those old soul and doo-wop singers had guys with higher voices so they could round out the sound. And before that… well, listen to the opening credits and prince songs from Cinderella and Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, the old Disney films from the 30s and 40s. The style of singing sounds kind of odd now.
And ages before that, you had castratos. Seriously, Bruno Mars has NOTHING on them.
What music do these people listen too!? Have you heard the American standards? Music then was dirty. Seriously, if you want a weird weird song, listen to the Andrews Sisters rendition of Hold tight/want some seafood mama. Then listen to the original Fats Waller recording, and youll realize what that song is actually about…
RE: Paradoxical Intention
And now Fem!Thor’s outselling dude Thor.
That’s not hard. The mainstream US comics market has been staggering for decades. The whole “girls don’t read comics” bullshit was basically invented in the 60s–back in the 40s, 90% of girls read comics according to one poll. (I read it in a Comic Book History of Comics!) And then you had the whole ‘romance’ genre of comics that were popular for a while.
I love comics, but sometimes, I wish I could take a spritzer bottle to the self-righteous fans who act like an entire genre belongs to them.
Why do asshats keep assuming that feminism and hatred of men are one and the same? Why do they also assume that lesbians, bisexuals who don’t experience attraction to men, or asexuals aren’t a thing? For fuck’s sake.
Of course transmen/transwomen aren’t a thing either. No, we feminists just love COCK, and thus that means we love MEN.
And of COURSE he says that women love cock, and thus love men. Because men are only the sum of their genitals, amirite? Such projection.
You’re gross.
Yeah, and it’s on your end.
THAT’S BECAUSE WE DON’T HATE MEN, JACKASS. NEVER HAVE, NEVER WILL.
Not liking (or hating) what men do, or not liking (or hating) specific men (like you), does NOT mean we “hate all men”. Pull your head out of your ass and stop listening to your ever-echoing poop chambers.
If you’d actually speak to a feminist (and not hand-wave her feelings aside as her “not being a real feminist” because she doesn’t fit your narrow-as-fuck world view or be otherwise condescending and assume she’s in the wrong), all this shit would be apparent. Transparent, even.
Paradoxical Intention:
Their new party line is that it’s because of her secret identity. If people knew WHO Thor is (though they often use disparaging and misogynistic ways to refer to her), they’d never buy it! This is tandem with them saying how stupid the story is because it’s so obvious who Thor is and it’s no mystery at all.
Chaos-Engineer
That also fits him thinking Jeans are some newfangled invention ruining society.