Here’s a term that you should familiarize yourself with:
“Nostalgie de la boue” means ascribing higher spiritual values to people and cultures considered “lower” than oneself, the romanticization of the faraway primitive which is also the equivalent of the lower class close to home.
Vanity Fair has a new photo-spread this month called DEPRESSION-CHIC where they dress up a bunch of celebs in rags and have them re-create iconic depression-era movie scenes. Ah, the austere fashion of poverty is so often wasted on the poor!
I’m not offended at many things (check my credit card statements and you’ll see the charges for some lewd overseas websites) but this kind of flip attitude about history really chaps my ass (coincidentally the name of my fav website!). Additionally, are we clean out of ideas? Is it impossible to create a new kind of glamour for the hard-working celebs of The Now Time? Why does Vanity Fair insist on dry-humping the asethtics of The Before time? Is it so hard to think of some way to capture the allure and persona of a celebrity? IS THIS A RECESSION OF IDEAS, PEOPLE?!
Also, this recession has moved from being some abstract financing idea to being a dreadful day-to-day reality so it’s unsurprising that it wheedles it’s way into all forms of culture. But into fashion spreads? How gross! And THE OKIES, really?! Like the skirts and overalls that reeked of oil, emaciated toddler spittle, and the desperation of the dust bowl is, like, a neat fashion motif for millionaires?! It’s grotesque to have movie stars swish around like the destitute. Oh, Stienbeck is probably steaming in the big cannery-row in the sky!
You know, I always thought when The End of Times came it would be full of murder cults and mystical shit happening. People getting mad and doing insanely cool stuff because like, everything’s going to end solet’s pull of this condom, napalm the walls, and staple these pancakes to roof cause FUCK TOMORROW! But the going idea seems to be FUCK TOMORROW AND HOORAY FOR YESTERDAY! Aww, you guys remember yesterday? When our biggest problem was racial segregation and the Germans? OMG, the GERMANS! How quaint! LOL @ Dresden!