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Wednesday, December 23, 2009

Politics / Books / Film Today in the Unfortunate Politicization of Popular Culture

Posted by on Wed, Dec 23, 2009 at 12:04 PM

1)Author and screenwriter Michael Tolkin has an unfortunate essay in the L.A. Times about how the current trend of zombies, vampires, werewolves, and wizards in young adult novels and movies is about the political environment around us. He says that the wizards who elected Barack Obama are surrounded by "Zombies, the tea baggers, a growling mob of brain-dead idiots led by the Vampires." (Sarah Palin is the supreme Vampire, of course.) And the werewolves are the independents who need to be swayed one way or another.

Way to elevate the liberal discourse, Mr. Tolkin. I've mocked the teabaggers plenty, but calling them zombies doesn't do anything but help the right wing make a case for caricaturing you and other creative types as "Hollyweird limousine liberals." This editorial is a massive fail.

2) The vampires (or are they zombies, or perhaps they are mermen or griffins?) over at the National Review have a running discussion (inspired by the knighting of Patrick Stewart) about how, even though Star Trek is a liberal show, Jean-Luc Picard is a conservative. All I have to say to that is: If he is a Republican, he's a Log Cabin Republican:

3) The conservative meltdown over James Cameron's Avatar (a.k.a. "liberal/Communist indoctrination campaign") is becoming more and more hilarious to watch as the week rolls on.

 

Comments (14) RSS

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1
Picard of the series (not the movies) is an intellectual diplomat who's unwilling to use violence unless absolutely necessary. Bullshit, he's a conservative.
Posted by keshmeshi on December 23, 2009 at 12:13 PM
elenchos 2
Picard is a badly written enough character that he can be whatever you say he is.
Posted by elenchos on December 23, 2009 at 12:17 PM
Baconcat 3
I've read these stories on the internet that say Picard is in love with Riker. But sometimes he loves Worf, but Worf is aloof and very Klingon in his demeanor except when the flames of passion erupt and he expresses emotion. One time, according to these stories (which I can only surmise are synposes of episodes), Picard installed a chip that caused Data to be completely sexually attracted to him.

I never realized there was so much sex in Star Trek.
Posted by Baconcat on December 23, 2009 at 12:27 PM
pissy mcslogbot 4
The conservatives won't even try to start talkin' smack about Captain James T Kirk. The dude is a straight up space pimp.
http://www.badassoftheweek.com/kirk4.jpg
Posted by pissy mcslogbot on December 23, 2009 at 12:40 PM
5
@2 FTW -- it was only Stewart's sheer talent that made that show even marginally watchable in its day.

We must be building to some kind of Politicopocalypse, because both ends of the spectrum in the US are getting more shrill and desperate sounding.
Posted by Peter F on December 23, 2009 at 12:47 PM
crazycatguy 6
@5
To be sure, shortly followed by a Slogpocalypse!
Posted by crazycatguy on December 23, 2009 at 12:54 PM
Zoroastronomer 7
Hm. According to the Mirror, SIR Patrick Stewart is staunchly labor. I watched every episode of TNG, and if he is a conservative, he is the kind that won't invade a foreign country on bad intelligence, AKA the Prime Directive.

http://www.mirror.co.uk/celebs/news/2009…
Posted by Zoroastronomer on December 23, 2009 at 1:03 PM
8
Thank you for the laugh-tastic video. It made a snow job of a day into a Dickensian snow globe. Live long and prosper.
Posted by Reader in New Mexico on December 23, 2009 at 1:14 PM
FreudianShrimp 9
I tried to read the Tolkin piece but couldn't get past its poorly written first sentence: "In times of political rot and confusion and pain, one needs something like cosmic silliness, not to make sense of things, but for those who don't expect a life after death, we need an experience, in this life, of the dream of heaven. "

Yikes! Unfortunate indeed.
Posted by FreudianShrimp on December 23, 2009 at 2:02 PM
10
From the Avatar review, these two gems:

"I haven't even watched the movie, but what i have read so far conveys the following plot..."

"I still listen to music from Yanni, Enya, Loreena Mckennitt, Clannad, and a myriad of other so called "new age" music. I also listen to Nickelback, Evanesence, 3 Doors Down, Bon Jovi, etc, depending on my mood, and what I want to listen to."
Posted by davis mclaughlin on December 23, 2009 at 11:48 PM
11
Picard lives in a socialist paradise and he's called a conservative??? He won't even kill nanites that are destroying his ship's computer because they may be life.
Posted by kersy on December 24, 2009 at 9:08 AM
12
Star Trek is hardly liberal. It might have a socialist economy -- if that's what it is, but you never see homosexual relationships (even the doc gets weirded out when the man she falls in love with goes through a "life change" and turns into a woman), and the women all take the man's name when they get married. The economy might be progressive but the society ain't.
Posted by idaho on December 24, 2009 at 10:26 AM
Toasterhedgehog 13
@11 Totally correct.

Captain Picard is an agnostic socialist humanist. He is pro the abolishment of any monetary system. He lives in a world with no poverty, where everyone is guaranteed a place to live, food to eat, and a free education. Anyone that thinks Picard or Roddenberry were in any way conservative is a blind idiot.

Only the rebooted Star Trek movie added capitalism to the Federation, and took the exploration out of Star Fleet. I can't wait until Kirk gives an impassioned speach about the merits of preemptive invasions in the next one.
Posted by Toasterhedgehog on December 24, 2009 at 10:37 AM
14
@12 Remember when Troi gets impregnated by the alien being? "WHO'S THE FATHER?!!" Yelled Riker. Progressive indeed.
Posted by kersy on December 30, 2009 at 4:00 PM

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