Looking Toward The Next High

[Eric the Green]

(05-29-2018, 05:16 AM)TheNomad Wrote:

(05-28-2018, 07:48 AM)pbrower2a Wrote:

(05-28-2018, 12:13 AM)TheNomad Wrote:

(05-27-2018, 09:36 PM)pbrower2a Wrote: The 1T begins when the winners consolidate their position in the world for the rest of their lives, and establish that people go along or become losers. This might be a low time for Humanity should the Crisis wreck the world. As shown in Franco's Spain, Mainland China, and most countries of central and Balkan Europe, it can be a time of crushing repression on behalf of those who achieve power.

It is a High if most things go well. The heroic Civic generation (Republicans after the American Revolution, the Gilded --sort of -- at least in the North they took over the Civic/Hero role, and GI Generation after WWII) establish the cultural and institutional norms for all. Confident (perhaps excessively so) after their great triumph, they show a love for doing things on a big scale. They are bland.

Shortages vanish, and people feel prosperous again. Children get a new birth of indulgent child-raising, nothing hardscrabble like that that the living Civic/Hero generation knew. (Think about it -- childhood for most GI kids was terribly deprived by current standards. GI adults made America much of what it is now even if they are no longer participants in making it what it is. That's a High.

A 1T can also be a mind-numbing nightmare of rigid conformity and dehumanization.

You said: A 1T can also be a mind-numbing nightmare of rigid conformity and dehumanization. 

Boy am I aware of that.  And as a Nomad who comes from a complete disdain for rigid conformity, I am ready for some.  The times of wild rockers and rappers and a generation that looks like shit, fraks everyone and pierces everything, covers their body in ink, losers (lol) who smash xanax to snort it because they are bored.............. I'm ready for Donna Reed and even The Brady Bunch.  It's a small price to pay for a generation of SUCK music and mass conformity.  Speaking of music that sucks, I would swear that has already been for a long as I can recall.  People who don't seek out the exotic have been getting the shaft in almost all respects of mass media.

The GIs liked their culture insipid, with bland crooners and the infamously-insipid "elevator music" that one heard on FM radio stations with the letters "EZ" in their call letters. That music took show tunes, TV themes, and rock top hits and gave them gimmicky orchestrations -- but apparently no violas in the string sections. It got very boring very fast if one knew anything about music.

This is to be expected of people for whom education was more technical and vocational in objective. Once they succeed, they will want better for their kids who will get to know more leisure. STEM education will give way to a broader base of learning, one that puts more emphasis on culture (including art, music, and literature). Maybe the next Boom-like Idealist generation will get more exposure to humanizing influences. The idea may be that smart kids who listen to Bach, read Dickens, and get field trips to see Degas paintings will be less amenable to extremist ideologies.

I have yet to hear great music that goes along with Crisis eras. Haydn and Mozart in their day were about as wildly popular as Big Band
music around 1940, and for much the same reason: they were really, really good and succeeded at every esthetic level. Today we rely more upon movies for entertainment, but those are getting better. Sure, Disney's Pixar Studios produces 'mere' cartoons -- but they are good enough that the whole family can see them irrespective of the level of intellectual sophistication. Disney also got a hold on Marvel Studios, which has been producing movies of a genre that I long held in disdain -- movies rich in special effects. But with good writing and story lines, my complaints about the lack of good writing and story lines  -- or cardboard acting -- become irrelevant. Good example: I got to see Black Panther. which actually shows a largely-black cast in dignified roles of universal appeal. Don't get me wrong: there are and have been excellent African and African-American actors; the best movies involving predominantly-black casts have either been specifically about an exclusively-black world that is one of victimization that should never have happened, or about a world to which non-blacks cannot easily relate. In many cases the writing has been undignified and exploitative. so what might otherwise be good acting goes to waste.

Yes, writing matters greatly, which explains why 1939 was the "Miracle Year" for American cinema, and surrounding years were also very good. We may be seeing much the same now; if that analogy holds we may be approaching the final stage of the current Crisis Era.  Of course the difference between this Crisis and the last one is between FDR and Trump.     

You said: The GIs liked their culture insipid, with bland crooners and the infamously-insipid "elevator music" that one heard on FM radio stations with the letters "EZ" in their call letters. That music took show tunes, TV themes, and rock top hits and gave them gimmicky orchestrations -- but apparently no violas in the string sections. It got very boring very fast if one knew anything about music. 

You mostly focused on music.... I recalled a quote from S&H when jazz and r&b got "christened" by Ed Sullivan who was a "magistrate" of (I believe) Silent generation.  Maybe this wasn't from the book but elsewhere.  So, that was the beginning of the boomer culture of Beats and eventually Hippies. 

What's different with this archetype, we may not be seeing their musical taste yet come to fruition.  I can only make the observation as I have before the people of that age are clean cut as can be.  No ink, piercings, crazy hair.... and they all look the same.  The average age for Millennial first intercourse is 26.  Total lack of risk.  Total lack of non-conformity.  From what I can tell, their preferred music is not so much bland as it is innocuous.  Maybe that is the same thing.  What they listen to is not hard edge, nor angry, nor political uprising, and certainly not anything involving revolutionary themes.

These are not the people who are going to fight a war.  And they aren't ones who are going to protest over ideology.  At least, not once they assume political power.  Millennials as a mirror echo to Boomers are still held captive by Boomer culture such as music.  They really will not ever form their own outer culture.  Their station is to transform inner structure.  They aren't tripping and tuning in or dropping out.

It could be that this varies by location. CA millennials are not so conformist as that. The older Millennials I know pretty much imitated the ways of their older Gen X brothers and sisters for a while; in youth children tend to do that. They just tamped down the Xer styles a bit and normalized them. Certainly millennial era pop music has been more innocuous and upbeat, much like that of the GIs "Greatest Generation." I felt that Justin Bieber's "Baby" was a smooth groove similar to "In The Mood" by Glenn Miller. "Happy" echoes "Get Happy." More will come from the Millennials, as you say. And although some Millennials echo Boomer music, as when Bieber's "Baby" also contained the same lyric line from the Silent/Boomer era Motown sound's similar paragon of smooth-groove, "Baby Love," (and Motown sound musicians had been big band members), the you tube views suggest Millennials are focused on their own music, and they still are influenced by some Xer styles like rap music as well, and Bieber imitated Michael Jackson and Boyz to Men.

In the Mood https://youtu.be/c2aqHGaSxRI

Baby Love https://youtu.be/mQvIbkFaq18

Baby https://youtu.be/kffacxfA7G4

Notice at the end of "Baby" Justin makes the victory/peace symbol, to a Beatles-like "yeah yeah yeah"