Come to The Lounge at 9:00pm on Friday, July 25th and see the one and only
Mr. Wonderful Production Band.
For all of your Soul and R & B favorites, the Mr. Wonderful Production Band offers an authentic, stripped-down sound. And for the genuine dive bar experience, The Lounge offers no-frills beer at rock bottom prices. Turn off of Broadway North onto Campbell St. Proceed North on Campbell through a traffic light. Turn left on Wenzel. You’ll see a two-story white building with chairs out front and a party inside.
The 411
Friday, July 25, 2008
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Rebuttal to New Yorker cartoon critique...
A recent New Yorker cover featured a cartoon depicting Sen. Obama and his wife as anti-American jihadists and radicals. While some have taken offense to this, New Yorker apologists claim that the cartoon was meant to satirize the sentiment it portrays. Lee Siegel, in his July 20th article in the New York Times, “We’re Not Laughing at You, or With You,” offers a rebuttal to this defense, arguing that it is proper to be offended by the cartoon. According to Siegel, the New Yorker cover fails to meet the requirements of satire, and so is nothing more than a grotesque reiteration of a notion forwarded by Sen. Obama’s detractors.
(Read Siegel’s article at this link: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/weekinreview/20seigel.html?ref=weekinreview)
* * * * *
Siegel makes two central arguments to support his claim: 1) That a satirist does not ferret out a hidden social sentiment, but instead only “deposes it once it has become a visible and established part of life.” The New Yorker, however, portrays a “mad or contemptible partisan sentiment as a mainstream one,” and so fails this fundamental duty of the satirist. 2) That the New Yorker accurately reproduced this hidden social sentiment – a slur against Sen. Obama and his wife – without effectively placing the Obamas “in relation to the producers of the slur.” And, in doing so, the New Yorker has “unwittingly reiterated the misconception it meant to lampoon.”
Siegel’s argument fails in a number of ways. 1) Siegel’s definition of satire is one of his own invention 2) Siegel mischaracterizes the sentiment that was satirized 3) Siegel’s first argument misreads the American political landscape and has a distorted notion of the political mainstream 4) Siegel’s second argument takes the idea being satirized and argues as if this idea exists only in its most extreme form 5) Siegel mistakenly speaks of the cartoon as if it should be measured by its political efficacy.
* * * * *
1) Siegel argues that the satirist is not a reporter, dredging up the darkness in our social hearts and exposing it to the light of day, but rather an interrogator, who deposes this darkness, only once it is commonly recognized and understood. This definition of satire is inaccurately limiting. Merriam Webster defines satire as “trenchant wit, irony or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly” (emphasis added). Siegel’s argument fails, right out of the gate, as it is predicated on his own idiosyncratic notion of what satire is – a notion that does not conform to a simple and widely-accepted definition of the genre.
* * * * *
2) Siegel’s articulation of the subject of the cartoon is inappropriately narrow. Some of his objections (discussed at greater length below) would stand on firmer ground, if the cartoon meant to satirize only the idea that Sen. Obama is a covert jihadist and his wife a closet Black Panther. However, just because the cartoon happens to depict this particularly absurd and extreme idea – which, as Siegel himself notes, is what satire is supposed to do: offer a depiction of the most extreme manifestation of an otherwise objectionable sentiment – does not mean that it is only this limited (and bizarrely outlandish) notion that the cartoon sought to satirize.
The cartoon presented an extreme vision of Sen. Obama and his wife as rabid anti-Americans, but the idea that it meant to satirize is less bombastic, and much more common place: that Sen. Obama and his wife are insufficiently patriotic. There are a great number of people who question Sen. Obama’s allegiance to the American ideal and commitment to our national values. These people do so despite the fact that Barack Obama is a United States Senator, formerly a member of the Illinois State Legislature, and before that a Civil Rights advocate. Whatever his political ideals, the man is clearly committed to his country and to public service, a fact which those who criticize his failure to, for example, wear a flag pin on his lapel fail to recognize. It is this blind, dogmatic reliance on patriotism as a political shibboleth, and the silliness that it often inspires, that is the subject of the New Yorker’s satire.
The outlandish image of the Obamas presented by the cartoon should not be mistaken for the object of ridicule. Satire presents extreme manifestations of social sentiments in order to show their fundamental illogic. However, it is not only the most extreme manifestation of the sentiment that is actually being satirized.
* * * * *
3) Siegel’s first argument – that satire is meant only to contemplate an idea once it exists in the social mainstream – fails even if one accepts his flawed definition of satire. This failure is a consequence of Siegel’s distorted understanding of the American political mainstream. According to Siegel, the sentiment that the New Yorker has chosen to satirize is confined to “the lunatic fringe.” However, Siegel’s understanding of the lunatic fringe appears to include fully half of the Republican Party.
In a poll taken by the New York Times in early May, 22 percent of respondents characterized Sen. Obama as “not very patriotic,” while only 5 percent of respondents characterized Sen. McCain this way. While Siegel rejects this idea – and, for that matter, so do I – it is accepted by a statistically significant percentage of Americans. 22 percent of respondents to a poll may well be incorrect, or even foolish, but it is unlikely that they, collectively, represent the “lunatic fringe.”
Moreover, Siegel grossly mischaracterizes the political reality of 21st century America. He identifies Fox News as a “radically partisan” entity that is a part of the “lunatic establishment.” This argument is surely based on Siegel’s personal distaste for the sentiments expressed by Fox News, as it is lacking in any factual grounding. Fox News might present the news in a manner that reflects a political bias, or is prone to sensationalism, but it remains the most watched cable news television network. Moreover, while the New York Times Sunday edition sells roughly 1.6 million copies, the television show the O’Reilly factor is viewed by roughly 2.3 million television watchers (according to the November 2007 Nielsen ratings). Let me emphasize this statistic: on a given day at 8pm, more people tune in to Fox News to watch Bill O’Reilly than buy and read any portion of the Sunday New York Times (not to mention, quite a few of those 2.3 million O’Reilly Factor viewers would probably characterize the New York Times as a radically partisan entity). All of this is just to say that the “radically partisan entity” sword cuts both ways, and is usually employed by a person trying to cast an ad hominem argument as something more respectable than it really is.
Even if one were to accept Siegel’s notion – in the face of evidence to the contrary – that satire is meant only to contemplate a sentiment once it is articulated within the social mainstream, the New Yorker cartoon would still meet this definition.
* * * * *
4) Siegel’s second argument, that the “cartoon unwittingly reiterat[es] the misconception it meant to lampoon,” also fails, by reducing the scope of the cartoon only to the image that it literally presents. Siegel takes the idea being satirized – that Sen. Obama lacks an appropriate level of patriotic sentiment – and argues as if this idea exists only in its most extreme form – that Sen. Obama and his wife are closet anti-American radicals.
According to Siegel, The New Yorker erred by accurately representing “the right-wing caricature of the Obamas while making the fatal error of not also caricaturing the right wing.” However, he fails to acknowledge that it is not only this outlandish image of the Obamas as jihadists that is being satirized, but the many more subtle – and more socially acceptable – articulations of this same sentiment. As stated above, it is the use of some nebulous conception of patriotism as a rubric for judgment that is the object of the artist’s scorn.
The New Yorker cover is absurd, as satire demands, and it does caricature those who possess such a preposterous worldview. However, as with all good satire, the caricature is the image itself. The image is the illogical overextension of an already silly idea: the idea that superficial showings of patriotism are required to judge fitness for office, and that a person who fails to make such superficial showings lacks fitness for office, and may altogether lack any love of his country. That this image, as presented, is accepted as literal fact by some makes the cartoon all the more trenchant and stinging.
Siegel’s misunderstanding of the cartoon is quite likely a result of his obvious contempt for the right-wing, Fox News viewers and anyone who disagrees with Lee Siegel. As a result, he believes that the cartoon references only the belief that Sen. Obama and his wife are crypto-jihadists, when in fact the cartoon references an entire spectrum of notions of patriotism, while depicting only the most extreme segment of this spectrum. This device – presenting a commonly held idea taken to the point of absurdity – is Siegel’s very definition of satire. However, Siegel argues as if the idea exists only in its most extreme form (the form depicted in the cartoon).
* * * * *
5) Siegel’s analysis of the cartoon confuses art and politics. Siegel believes that the New Yorker cover cannot function effectively as satire, because “the cartoon accurately portrays a ridiculous real-life caricature that exists as literal fact in the minds of some people.” The fact that the cartoon unintentionally gives free air-time to a sentiment expressed by some portion of the opposition might be poor political strategy, but it does not place the cartoon outside of the realm of satire.
Perhaps, by displaying a “real-life caricature that exists as literal fact in the minds of some people” the artist may have unintentionally entrenched this idea further in the minds of the American Right. If the artist were a political operative for the Democratic Party, then his cartoon should be considered an abject failure.
However, the artist is not a political operative. His intention may not have been to change the minds of those who believe that Sen. Obama is secretly an anti-American radical. His intention may have been to ridicule, to condemn, or merely to shine a light upon such beliefs. If the artist had sought a mechanism of persuasion, he could have given a speech, or written an opinion column, or filmed a commercial, or designed a bumper sticker or billboard. But he didn’t. He drew a cartoon. And there is no reason to require a cartoon to have the political impact reserved for polemics and punditry.
To Siegel, the cartoon is too subtle. It should have more directly referenced the right-wing, and not just an idea held by the right-wing. However, art need not be ham-handed to satisfy the sensitivities of its critics. The artist’s subtlety may be a political problem – it may offend the sensitivities of some on the Left, and it may reify the faulty notions of some on the Right – but it does not change the fact that this cartoon is an excellent example of satire.
* * * * *
Ultimately, if Siegel’s argument seems thin, it is because the argument is carping and trivial, and fails to make the broader point that he would like to argue. If Siegel were to be honest, he would probably say what I have heard many people say regarding the New Yorker cover: there is something about it that rubs me the wrong way, although I can’t quite put my finger on it.
By employing a narrow, semantic argument about the definition of satire, Siegel seeks to legitimate his emotional response to the cartoon by articulating it in the language of analysis rather than feelings or intuition. However, feelings and intuition cannot be made universal, even when cloaked in the rhetoric of literary criticism; emotional responses are subjective and idiosyncratic things.
Some people liked the New Yorker cartoon, and others didn’t. At the end of the day, Siegel may have to leave it at that.
(Read Siegel’s article at this link: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/20/weekinreview/20seigel.html?ref=weekinreview)
* * * * *
Siegel makes two central arguments to support his claim: 1) That a satirist does not ferret out a hidden social sentiment, but instead only “deposes it once it has become a visible and established part of life.” The New Yorker, however, portrays a “mad or contemptible partisan sentiment as a mainstream one,” and so fails this fundamental duty of the satirist. 2) That the New Yorker accurately reproduced this hidden social sentiment – a slur against Sen. Obama and his wife – without effectively placing the Obamas “in relation to the producers of the slur.” And, in doing so, the New Yorker has “unwittingly reiterated the misconception it meant to lampoon.”
Siegel’s argument fails in a number of ways. 1) Siegel’s definition of satire is one of his own invention 2) Siegel mischaracterizes the sentiment that was satirized 3) Siegel’s first argument misreads the American political landscape and has a distorted notion of the political mainstream 4) Siegel’s second argument takes the idea being satirized and argues as if this idea exists only in its most extreme form 5) Siegel mistakenly speaks of the cartoon as if it should be measured by its political efficacy.
* * * * *
1) Siegel argues that the satirist is not a reporter, dredging up the darkness in our social hearts and exposing it to the light of day, but rather an interrogator, who deposes this darkness, only once it is commonly recognized and understood. This definition of satire is inaccurately limiting. Merriam Webster defines satire as “trenchant wit, irony or sarcasm used to expose and discredit vice or folly” (emphasis added). Siegel’s argument fails, right out of the gate, as it is predicated on his own idiosyncratic notion of what satire is – a notion that does not conform to a simple and widely-accepted definition of the genre.
* * * * *
2) Siegel’s articulation of the subject of the cartoon is inappropriately narrow. Some of his objections (discussed at greater length below) would stand on firmer ground, if the cartoon meant to satirize only the idea that Sen. Obama is a covert jihadist and his wife a closet Black Panther. However, just because the cartoon happens to depict this particularly absurd and extreme idea – which, as Siegel himself notes, is what satire is supposed to do: offer a depiction of the most extreme manifestation of an otherwise objectionable sentiment – does not mean that it is only this limited (and bizarrely outlandish) notion that the cartoon sought to satirize.
The cartoon presented an extreme vision of Sen. Obama and his wife as rabid anti-Americans, but the idea that it meant to satirize is less bombastic, and much more common place: that Sen. Obama and his wife are insufficiently patriotic. There are a great number of people who question Sen. Obama’s allegiance to the American ideal and commitment to our national values. These people do so despite the fact that Barack Obama is a United States Senator, formerly a member of the Illinois State Legislature, and before that a Civil Rights advocate. Whatever his political ideals, the man is clearly committed to his country and to public service, a fact which those who criticize his failure to, for example, wear a flag pin on his lapel fail to recognize. It is this blind, dogmatic reliance on patriotism as a political shibboleth, and the silliness that it often inspires, that is the subject of the New Yorker’s satire.
The outlandish image of the Obamas presented by the cartoon should not be mistaken for the object of ridicule. Satire presents extreme manifestations of social sentiments in order to show their fundamental illogic. However, it is not only the most extreme manifestation of the sentiment that is actually being satirized.
* * * * *
3) Siegel’s first argument – that satire is meant only to contemplate an idea once it exists in the social mainstream – fails even if one accepts his flawed definition of satire. This failure is a consequence of Siegel’s distorted understanding of the American political mainstream. According to Siegel, the sentiment that the New Yorker has chosen to satirize is confined to “the lunatic fringe.” However, Siegel’s understanding of the lunatic fringe appears to include fully half of the Republican Party.
In a poll taken by the New York Times in early May, 22 percent of respondents characterized Sen. Obama as “not very patriotic,” while only 5 percent of respondents characterized Sen. McCain this way. While Siegel rejects this idea – and, for that matter, so do I – it is accepted by a statistically significant percentage of Americans. 22 percent of respondents to a poll may well be incorrect, or even foolish, but it is unlikely that they, collectively, represent the “lunatic fringe.”
Moreover, Siegel grossly mischaracterizes the political reality of 21st century America. He identifies Fox News as a “radically partisan” entity that is a part of the “lunatic establishment.” This argument is surely based on Siegel’s personal distaste for the sentiments expressed by Fox News, as it is lacking in any factual grounding. Fox News might present the news in a manner that reflects a political bias, or is prone to sensationalism, but it remains the most watched cable news television network. Moreover, while the New York Times Sunday edition sells roughly 1.6 million copies, the television show the O’Reilly factor is viewed by roughly 2.3 million television watchers (according to the November 2007 Nielsen ratings). Let me emphasize this statistic: on a given day at 8pm, more people tune in to Fox News to watch Bill O’Reilly than buy and read any portion of the Sunday New York Times (not to mention, quite a few of those 2.3 million O’Reilly Factor viewers would probably characterize the New York Times as a radically partisan entity). All of this is just to say that the “radically partisan entity” sword cuts both ways, and is usually employed by a person trying to cast an ad hominem argument as something more respectable than it really is.
Even if one were to accept Siegel’s notion – in the face of evidence to the contrary – that satire is meant only to contemplate a sentiment once it is articulated within the social mainstream, the New Yorker cartoon would still meet this definition.
* * * * *
4) Siegel’s second argument, that the “cartoon unwittingly reiterat[es] the misconception it meant to lampoon,” also fails, by reducing the scope of the cartoon only to the image that it literally presents. Siegel takes the idea being satirized – that Sen. Obama lacks an appropriate level of patriotic sentiment – and argues as if this idea exists only in its most extreme form – that Sen. Obama and his wife are closet anti-American radicals.
According to Siegel, The New Yorker erred by accurately representing “the right-wing caricature of the Obamas while making the fatal error of not also caricaturing the right wing.” However, he fails to acknowledge that it is not only this outlandish image of the Obamas as jihadists that is being satirized, but the many more subtle – and more socially acceptable – articulations of this same sentiment. As stated above, it is the use of some nebulous conception of patriotism as a rubric for judgment that is the object of the artist’s scorn.
The New Yorker cover is absurd, as satire demands, and it does caricature those who possess such a preposterous worldview. However, as with all good satire, the caricature is the image itself. The image is the illogical overextension of an already silly idea: the idea that superficial showings of patriotism are required to judge fitness for office, and that a person who fails to make such superficial showings lacks fitness for office, and may altogether lack any love of his country. That this image, as presented, is accepted as literal fact by some makes the cartoon all the more trenchant and stinging.
Siegel’s misunderstanding of the cartoon is quite likely a result of his obvious contempt for the right-wing, Fox News viewers and anyone who disagrees with Lee Siegel. As a result, he believes that the cartoon references only the belief that Sen. Obama and his wife are crypto-jihadists, when in fact the cartoon references an entire spectrum of notions of patriotism, while depicting only the most extreme segment of this spectrum. This device – presenting a commonly held idea taken to the point of absurdity – is Siegel’s very definition of satire. However, Siegel argues as if the idea exists only in its most extreme form (the form depicted in the cartoon).
* * * * *
5) Siegel’s analysis of the cartoon confuses art and politics. Siegel believes that the New Yorker cover cannot function effectively as satire, because “the cartoon accurately portrays a ridiculous real-life caricature that exists as literal fact in the minds of some people.” The fact that the cartoon unintentionally gives free air-time to a sentiment expressed by some portion of the opposition might be poor political strategy, but it does not place the cartoon outside of the realm of satire.
Perhaps, by displaying a “real-life caricature that exists as literal fact in the minds of some people” the artist may have unintentionally entrenched this idea further in the minds of the American Right. If the artist were a political operative for the Democratic Party, then his cartoon should be considered an abject failure.
However, the artist is not a political operative. His intention may not have been to change the minds of those who believe that Sen. Obama is secretly an anti-American radical. His intention may have been to ridicule, to condemn, or merely to shine a light upon such beliefs. If the artist had sought a mechanism of persuasion, he could have given a speech, or written an opinion column, or filmed a commercial, or designed a bumper sticker or billboard. But he didn’t. He drew a cartoon. And there is no reason to require a cartoon to have the political impact reserved for polemics and punditry.
To Siegel, the cartoon is too subtle. It should have more directly referenced the right-wing, and not just an idea held by the right-wing. However, art need not be ham-handed to satisfy the sensitivities of its critics. The artist’s subtlety may be a political problem – it may offend the sensitivities of some on the Left, and it may reify the faulty notions of some on the Right – but it does not change the fact that this cartoon is an excellent example of satire.
* * * * *
Ultimately, if Siegel’s argument seems thin, it is because the argument is carping and trivial, and fails to make the broader point that he would like to argue. If Siegel were to be honest, he would probably say what I have heard many people say regarding the New Yorker cover: there is something about it that rubs me the wrong way, although I can’t quite put my finger on it.
By employing a narrow, semantic argument about the definition of satire, Siegel seeks to legitimate his emotional response to the cartoon by articulating it in the language of analysis rather than feelings or intuition. However, feelings and intuition cannot be made universal, even when cloaked in the rhetoric of literary criticism; emotional responses are subjective and idiosyncratic things.
Some people liked the New Yorker cartoon, and others didn’t. At the end of the day, Siegel may have to leave it at that.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Of things to come...
Welcome to Sex and Television, an account of one man’s odyssey through a crowded world. If hyper-mediated excess is truly the defining characteristic of late capitalism, then I am a creature for our Time. My world is a fuller, richer place, thanks to the eight new movies that are released every weekend. The disoriented rambling of snake-oil salesmen and carnival barkers that we have come to call news is all the more wonderfully confounding because it is true. The indulgent sanctimony of the Left and the moralistic of posturing of the Right will pass, for me, as sophisticated argumentation because – I ask you –is there anything else?
What can you expect to find on Sex and Television? Perhaps nothing but the gleeful, wholehearted response of a true Amateur to the world that he sees around him. We have enough professional analysts. Self-appointed Thinkers who offer hyper-critical, but joyless, accounts of our world. Some see in Miley Cyrus and the 37th adopted child of Brangelina and Blink 182’s reunion tour the auguries of a coming cultural apocalypse. I see damn good television. And I look forward to sharing it – and my thoughts about it – with all of you.
In the future, look for book and film reviews, look for responses to items in the news, both at home and abroad, look for thoughts on Louisville art, theater and music, look for an account of the Sisyphian nightmare that is my third year of law school and the accompanying job search.
I’ll talk to you soon.
What can you expect to find on Sex and Television? Perhaps nothing but the gleeful, wholehearted response of a true Amateur to the world that he sees around him. We have enough professional analysts. Self-appointed Thinkers who offer hyper-critical, but joyless, accounts of our world. Some see in Miley Cyrus and the 37th adopted child of Brangelina and Blink 182’s reunion tour the auguries of a coming cultural apocalypse. I see damn good television. And I look forward to sharing it – and my thoughts about it – with all of you.
In the future, look for book and film reviews, look for responses to items in the news, both at home and abroad, look for thoughts on Louisville art, theater and music, look for an account of the Sisyphian nightmare that is my third year of law school and the accompanying job search.
I’ll talk to you soon.
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