Category Archives: Politics

Katamari Damacy and Consumption

Ben Vershbow at if:Book writes of Katamari Damacy:

I’ve played a bit of Katamari lately and have enjoyed it. It’s a world charged with static electricity, everything sticks. Each object has been lovingly rendered in its peculiarity and stubbornness. If your katamari picks up something long and narrow, say, a #2 pencil, and attaches to it in such a way that it sticks out far from the clump, it will impede your movement. Each time the pencil hits the ground, you have to kind of pole vault the entire ball. It’s not hard to see how the game trains visual puzzle-solving skills, sensitivity to shape, spatial relationships (at least virtual ones), etc.

That being said, I agree with Bob and Rylish (links in original) that there is an internal economy at work here that teaches children to be consumers. A deep acquisition anxiety runs through the game, bringing to mind another Japanese pop phenom: Pokémon. Pokémon (called “Pocket Monsters” in Japan) always struck me as particularly insidious, far more predatory than anything I grew up with, because its whole narrative universe is based on consumption.

I don’t think that Katamari teaches children to be consumers. It’s not “acquisition anxiety.” Everyone knows that Katamari is about turning children into space-craving nuke-monkeys.

Consumer here is just too vague. We need a stronger link here.

Options in the list: could be greed. Could be a dehumanizing dark for mistaking people as pencils.

Could be the player has something entirely different on their minds.

Sometimes I take a look at teen magazines, like Teen People. There is darkness in these texts, weaving allure with want. Allure cannot exist without want.

Rylish’s argument is more nuanced:

so, we cannot really discuss games and learning and literacy without spending some time grounding that conversation in the economic and cultural environments which drive game production. my worry is not that games are too complicated or too violent or too masculine or too racist but that they are these things in order to perpetuate consumerism.

For the sake of perspective, what concern isn’t mixed up with some consumerist motivation or market drive? Even moraity needs a market.

Do People Get What They Ask For?

A few years back an enthusiastic segment of the electorate thought that voting John Rowland back into office was a smashing idea. At the time I thought that people would get what they asked for. And they did. With almost all of the current Washington crowd’s policies either in disarray or coming under critique and with numerous quackish chums turning their heads toward the squeak of the law’s leather shoes, it seems that there may be political parallels.

More of the Same (updated)

The strangeness (in this age I use strangeness in an extreme form, as in really really fucked up) continues. We have a man with very little experience virtually plopped into the role of Chief Justice. We have a woman nominated with no experience for the O’Connor position. Perhaps these are fine countryclubbers who will do just fine in their robes.

I just don’t get it.

Questions of Labor

From the Ordinance of Laborers, 1349

The king to the sheriff of Kent, greeting. Because a great part of the people, and especially of workmen and servants, late died of the pestilence, many seeing the necessity of masters, and great scarcity of servants, will not serve unless they may receive excessive wages, and some rather willing to beg in idleness, than by labor to get their living; we, considering the grievous incommodities, which of the lack especially of ploughmen and such laborers may hereafter come, have upon deliberation and treaty with the prelates and the nobles, and learned men assisting us, of their mutual counsel ordained:

That every man and woman of our realm of England, of what condition he be, free or bond, able in body, and within the age of threescore years, not living in merchandise, nor exercising any craft, nor having of his own whereof he may live, nor proper land, about whose tillage he may himself occupy, and not serving any other, if he in convenient service, his estate considered, be required to serve, he shall be bounden to serve him which so shall him require; and take only the wages, livery, meed, or salary, which were accustomed to be given in the places where he oweth to serve, the twentieth year of our reign of England, or five or six other commone years next before. Provided always, that the lords be preferred before other in their bondmen or their land tenants, so in their service to be retained; so that nevertheless the said lords shall retain no more than be necessary for them; and if any such man or woman, being so required to serve, will not the same do, that proved by two true men before the sheriff or the constables of the town where the same shall happen to be done, he shall anon be taken by them or any of them, and committed to the next gaol, there to remain under strait keeping, till he find surety to serve in the form aforesaid.

I was just going over this as a matter of course and thought the similarities interesting to current wage issues.

For the Love of the Camera

In a response to George W. Bush’s weird speech last night, John Kerry says: “Leadership isn’t a speech or a toll-free number.” I agree, as would EVERYONE. But there’s another oddness to such a response, as if John Kerry and most other politicians don’t love a speech or slobber at the sight of a camera. We know that “leadership” isn’t a “speech” but pardon me if much of the public square hasn’t been filled with the holy mugs of too many lens lovers over the last weeks, especially during the Robert’s hearings.

Here’s some further dislogic. Bush said in his advert

[. . . ]And that poverty has roots in a history of racial discrimination, which cut off generations from the opportunity of America. We have a duty to confront this poverty with bold action. So let us restore all that we have cherished from yesterday, and let us rise above the legacy of inequality.

When the streets are rebuilt, there should be many new businesses, including minority-owned businesses, along those streets. When the houses are rebuilt, more families should own, not rent, those houses. When the regional economy revives, local people should be prepared for the jobs being created.

Excuse me. The poverty issue has been around for some time. NOW’S the time to confront it, as if the eyes have suddenly come open? There are many kinds of poverty and many people who live in it and with it and who fight it. We know this. The locus of poverty isn’t New Orleans. Connecticut has plenty of it and in many forms, as do all the states. The reasoning in the president’s words is “Let me talk for the love of what the camera can give me” crap.

“Let us restore all that we have cherished . . .” Well shucks. Let’s.

Resources and Standards

In this country, we have the capability to provide everyone with a basic living standard. People shouldn’t have to fight for that. They should have the opportunity to compete for things beyond a basic standard and they will. I’d argue that such a program would result in more creativity, more curiosity, and less general misery. I see this in small places, in comments students write when they see something they hadn’t noticed before, even the tough ones, who think they know everything. A line of poetry nudges one to remark on an alternative, and from then on it’s up to them. It goes beyond quantification.

Just a thought.

On assassination

The various certifiable reverends are out today defending the mad cleric, who claims we should murder Hugo Chavez. I’m sure there are lots of reasons why we should do this (and who else?):

Because Venenzuela is becoming a hotbed of communisim and a harborer of mad clerics
Because of Chavez’ habitual downloads of pornography and updates from Stream
Because Chavez speaks Spanish
Because he wears tube socks to church
Because he reads the newspaper
Because he enjoys the OC
Because his dues lapsed
Because he’s forsaken true biblical readings
Because he’s been seen reading poetry

I wonder what else.

Causal chains

We should pay close attention to the notion of causal chains and consider learning from them. One thing leads to another; this causes that. And so forth.

In this context we have a conflict between public service and private sector identities. Some people think that government should be run like a for-profit concern. Others believe it should stay out of the business business and maintain a public service identity, expecting different things in return for it. One of the differences has to do with the old idea of need vs want. We don’t need Walmart, for example; Walmart could be something else, such as the local hardware store: in this country we need commerce. We also need vehicle inspections because we have trucks and steep roads and may need to get to work. Both sides of the coin are important and one couldn’t necessarily go on without the other: this is a question an identity conflict: how we think we go about accomplishing things. Of course, people who need jobs need a Walmart, but the job could be anything, such as the local hardware store. But with our democracy, we need services that allow people to make Walmarts or anything else. If one side is weakened, so will the other side.

When people say they need to find work they assume a spatial cushion that allows for such. A relatively safe and rigorous, intellectual society needs a balance between public and private identities. We will be feeling the targeted layoffs and diminishment of the public sector (which includes politicians) for years to come.

We don’t need digital televisions; we should not expect them. But we should expect the roads to be safe. In that way, we maintain in one way the intellectual environment that encourages thoughtful work .

Thoughts on a Canon, 2

I’ve basically given up in trying figure out why I like some books over others. I know that I’ve been influenced by lots of variables. I like the Gran Turismo series of simulations because I like to win races, money, and I love that heart-race when I just barely beat the oppenent. The hands shake and you go, “Yes, beat you, you bastard.” I like beating the machine and outsmarting it. It’s not a question of high mindedness or bettering myself. It’s a rollercoaster.

And why do I enjoy the stories of Alice Munro? In fiction I look for an interesting story, a fabulous sense of craft, and a dip into ideas. But those are vague criteria. Doesn’t Clive Cussler tell an interesting tale? In my mind, not at all. What about Stephen King? I don’t find Pet Cemetary interesting, no. I read Stephen King for how scary things could get (although I did find the metaphors I found in Misery appropriate). But then I found Kundera and figured that The Joke was a pretty scary tale if you looked at it through a particular lens. Kundera’s terror is a different kind of terror than King’s. The vision of The Joke is of a terrifying politics and society which resonantes with relevance, more so than Brave New World. Both novels signal possibility, but from my point of view Huxley is naive.

One of my top novels is Garcia Marquez’ One Hundred Years of Solitude. There are many reasons why I reread this novel. Stylistically (in translation), the writing is beautiful, energetic, risky, and because of this, I like to read passages outloud and to myself, just to hear the craft, the music, and the logic. Secondly, there’s the serious comedy here. Garcia Marquez draws incredibly huge characters who are also incredibly funny, serious, tragic, and honest. They’re pathetic, monstrous, masterful, crafty, hateful, and strange. You don’t want them to die or change, but they do; you don’t want them to make mistakes, but they do. Third, Marquez connects to significant human ideas such as time, memory, structure, hope, dignity, justice, history, love, sex, and want. Philosophical, political, social, and personal content is woven deeply into the work. When you talk about One Hundred Years of Solitude, you can find a lot of thing to talk about: the writing, the narrative, the sequence, the culture, history, gender, religion and a lot more. I believe also that I’ve seen a lot of what the author gets down in the novel, having traveled through Mexico and the Southwest US, an issue that is more subjective and true to my own experience of landscape, color, and light. It’s possible to say when I hear a politician say something dumb I could say I’ve already seen that in Kundera and Marquez, just as when we see the leader talk like a machine, we can say, “Oh, that’s what Orwell was referring to.” Lastly, of the many books I’ve read, One Hundred Years of Solitude has one of the best closers I’ve ever encountered. The end draws you back to the beginning with such a punch, you race through the novel just to feel its totality. Just the thought of Pico de Gallo or of Jalapenos makes my mouth water. Mention Marquez, and the same thing happens.

But, in my mind, Borges is still bigger. Why? No reason other than I enjoy his mind more than I do Marquez’. But, it’s unfair to compare them. Borges wasn’t necessarily concerned with the fictional story as he was with the very idea of “fiction.” Borges provides me with a language with which to struggle through ideas and one of those terms is “fiction.” I like the idea of an aleph as a metaphor for “reality” and “sight” and human experience.

Pedestal as Canon

My friend Neha Bawa in a comment writes

Heck, there are times when I think that post-structuralists like nothing better than to sit around a square table (round is too structured for them, I think) and knock every [sic] theory against the wall either out of pure spite or complete laziness.

On the other hand, you’re talkin’ to a Lit major here…I would never reject that feast listed up there…but I would challenge the pedestal.

I would disagree with this. Post-structuralism as a large set of approaches–which include critiques of medicine, law, and literature–to reading “the world” has produced highly rigorous and interesting points of view: I find Foucault readable and interesting. As in any area of human affairs and talk, there are bound to be cranks, hacks, and opportunists. But this doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take the work seriously. But I agree with Neha about challenging the pedestal, hence the call for other lists of “reader” points of view. This is why I don’t like top one hundred or top ten lists as totalizing paradigms. Perhaps the world does indeed stand atop an infinite stack of turtles (plugged metaphor).