Posted on 03/01/2005 9:05:26 PM PST by CHARLITE
Arguably, the biggest problem in American culture today is the fact that mere entertainers are its heroes. There is no precedent in any civilization in the history of the world for entertainers – actors, singers, dancers and directors – to be elevated to the highest positions of prominence in the culture. That's why none of us can name actors and actresses from ancient Greece or Rome. They weren't important enough to be remembered.
Sure, we can name the playwrights and we can name the satirists. We can name the politicians, the philosophers and the generals. Because literary, academic, political and military figures were always the personalities who dominated the cultural landscape. Whatever you thought of these pursuits – and many of the ancient conquerors were highly immoral men – their pursuits were at least consequential.
But entertainment? Lighthearted merriment? That's what you did in your spare time, when you needed a break from the serious things. Prior to the rise of American popular culture, entertainers could never even dream of being the most important members of a society, engaged as they were in a frivolous past-time that helped the folks escape their solemn responsibilities for a short time.
In our time, however, the incredible has happened. The court jester has become the king. Those who play the heroes have become the culture's actual heroes. Those who direct fantasy movies are directing the direction of our youth. And with entertainers as the principal people we look up to, so much of our society has become silly and trivial.
This is exactly what was going through my mind as I watched the narcissism of the Academy Awards. In America today, there exists not a single mainstream televised awards ceremony for anything other than movies, television, acting and music. Even when brave soldiers are awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor for gallantry, it is not broadcast on television.
When the president awards the Presidential Medal of Freedom to our leading thinkers, writers and civil servants, it is watched by 10 people on C-SPAN. But the awards for best actor and best actress are followed closely by hundreds of millions who take such nonsense quite seriously. That's a major change for a country whose only actor to become an historical figure, prior to the age of Hollywood, was John Wilkes Booth.
The consequences for the elevation of people who perform inconsequential tasks to the center of national attention are enormous. Even if our Hollywood celebrities were not the most damaged people in our society – drugged up, divorced, with even their kids in rehab – the results would still be tragic. By making fashion models our role models, Hollywood heroines our heroes, and singers into saints, we have created a shallow and vain society, distinguished not by sacrifice, but by indulgence. We have created a culture known not for virtue, but for vanity. And our country is becoming not more dedicated, but decadent.
American kids today, for the most part, don't want to be doctors. They want to be directors. They don't want to be rabbis, but rock stars. They don't wish to be soldiers, but superstars. And then we wonder why American kids are so messed up.
To gauge the effect of entertainers being at the epicenter of a national consciousness, just imagine if it were to happen in the life of a single individual. What if entertainment, rather than scholarship, were the foremost preoccupation of a medical student. Instead of working at a library and attending lectures for eights hours each day, our student watched eight hours of television and DVDs each day. Would you trust him with your kidney?
And now you begin to understand why so many people around the world think we Americans are so stupid and shallow. It's not because of Bush. It's because of Hollywood. The very nature of entertainment is that it is something you do in your spare time. Entertainment is designed to be on the periphery, never at the center of national endeavor. Performers dare not replace professors, cinematographers dare not replace soldiers, and comedians dare not supplant cardiologists as a country's most lionized citizens.
The future of the United States is not threatened by any existing foreign power. Less so is it threatened by any terrorist. Terrorists can harm us, but they can never defeat us. The only thing that can threaten the continuity of this great country is if it collapses from the inside. If its foundations become so eroded, its pillars so brittle, that its national edifice falls victim to the forces of historical inevitability.
If our nation is built of the marvelous marble of the Greek Parthenon or the Roman Pantheon, or the solid stone of Jerusalem's Western Wall, it will last for many centuries, and perhaps millennia, to come. But if it is built of the flimflam material of a mere Hollywood soundstage, a movie set facade that is all glitz with no substance, it will, God forbid, crumble before our very eyes.
What about athletes? I count them as more my heroes than actors and muscians. Although I'm not scared to admit I look up to some rock stars for the amount of substances they can ingest and live.
It is hard to admire generals when it seems wars are won by technology. It is hard to admire scientists when their contributions are team efforts. You cannot single out one who is the one who created something.
In my opinion, this is a stunning indictment of "all that glitters." The subject needs to be highlighted. Thanks to this insightful Rabbi, and many other good writers recently, the mask of "desperately seeking fame & glory" is being pierced and exposed.
The Academy's a wort. I knew that! {;>)]
I'd say that's being rather generous, but he does make a good point.
I think the trend that you're talking about can be seen in the glorification of figures like Mae West. However, I think that if you ask most Americans who the big stars were 20 years ago, they wouldn't even remember their names.
Interesting, isn't it, that technology is also the force that raised entertainers (I'll throw athletes into that category) to "hero" status? I hadn't thought about how the Information Age has transformed our society in this aspect, but this article has caused me to do just that.
Compare the decadence and demise of the Roman Empire against what we are experiencing today at the hands of leftist fools, drunk on the wine of 'success',, imo ... uncanny.
Thanks for the post.
Actually there are many single creaters that have created much around us. It is simply no one cares to know about it.
PING
In recent times? Obviously Edison is held up, but other inventors are forgotten in a group. Of course there are some like Bll Gates and Steve Jobs who become stars in their own worlds.
Which one are you...Beavis or Butthead?
Butthead, I always found him to be the smarter one.
"Show Biz kids, making movies of themselves..." Steely Dan had it right.
That's why President George W. Bush was voted "the worst actor." He's real. Popular culture promoted by the mainstream media offers the phony as the real and the real as phony. That which is false is revered, celebrated and rewarded while that which is authentic is undermined, discredited, disrespected.
The mark of their achievement is in convincing us that the worthless is great and good and the highest striving of humanity.
Uh, we're talking about just movies here, right?
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/1353564/posts?page=1
Excerpt:
"This brings us to the Academy Awards of Sunday night. If you watched them, you already know that the films Hollywood chose to honor had little to do with quality and everything to do with philosophy and worldview. As Christian film critic Barbara Nicolosi acerbically put it, Hollywood’s choices affirm, once again, “just how very, very sick America’s storytellers have become.”
Several awards, including Best Picture, went to Million Dollar Baby, a film that promotes euthanasia. Five Oscars went to The Aviator, a film that celebrates billionaire Howard Hughes, the man who bedded dozens of starlets, made unwelcome advances to many others, and ultimately died of syphilis-induced insanity.
Oh, and then there’s the nasty little film called Sideways. This film suggests that it’s fine—even funny—for a man to engage in an orgy of sex with strangers just before his wedding. That got an award, too. Films that were nominated, but did not receive awards, included one intended as a warning against making abortion illegal, and one that celebrates Kinsey, a twisted researcher whose now-discredited theories continue to degrade America’s view of sexuality. Meanwhile, one of the greatest films ever made, one of the biggest box-office hits of the year, worldwide, and the biggest independent film in the history of the world—that is, The Passion of the Christ—was ignored."
........and uh, yes, durasell, we're talking about just movies here........or anything else which has been culturally deteriorating, besides movies.......like, say......rap "music."
Here's the link to Colson's original Breakpoint article:
The Academy Awards....What's that????
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