Ranxerox wrote: I also don't think that alot of the substantive issues parsed in considerable detail over these 13 pages lend themselves to resolution when the parties don't really share experiences and definitions (I mean, when the dictionary doesn't count at all what is one to do?).

I have some knowledge about a number of things, but I don't see that knowledge really helps in this thread or in these types of discussions. The passion is interesting, even admirable, but the several remarks around which much of this gab revolves are largely irreducable and simply not to be understood as truth or reality. 'Rock and roll is kitsch' is a rank opinion that says more about the individual making the statement than it does about kitsch, camp, or rock and roll. That's how it seems to me. I suppose I would like a courtesy mea culpa attached to any such statement so that the inevitable (and logical) personalization of the discussion does not get nasty and broken. There is little ground upon which a refutation might take place.

I can't speak for the other members of the forum, but I don't think that the value of such discussions as these lies in whether or not a specific argument is refuted or even challenged successfully.

I mainly post here as a way to clarify my own thoughts, to formulate them more precisely so that I can better understand why I hold certain opinions. One of the drawbacks of this sort of medium is that you don't get to know personally and experience other human beings, so it can tend to be a bit like talking into an echo chamber. But this can be made up for by the fact that the internet allows you immediate access to hundreds of people and the depersonalization aspect of the whole thing may even make them more ready to openly challenge you than they would have been in real life. That's why I enjoy coming here and bouncing ideas off of people who hold different positions. I'm not really interested in converting them to my own worldview. I want new and strange ideas against which to juxtapose my own ideas, which would become stale and dogmatic if I couldn't challenge them in this way.

So, since this isn't a court of law or an academic debate, I don't think that anyone needs to be "the winner" here. The dialogue is an end in itself and not necessarily a means to some result. That's why I think that this discussion has been valuable. I can say the same for my arguments with Rick Reuben. More often than not, I come away feeling like I have won our debate. But this matters much, much less than does the mere fact that I've subjected his and my own opinions to scrutiny and attack.

Steve

I don't mean to attack anyone and I admit that my posts have not really sought refute anyone's particular positions in re electronica v rock v high art, etc. Threadshitting. My apologies.

I suspect that you know only a relatively limited amount about the cultures of hip hop/electonica/dub, etc. Your denigrations of the various musics invovled strike me as overly broad given the above assumption. Saying you know enough to dismiss the music is fine, but making these pronouncements don't really address how they are experienced by the people that do enjoy or take sustenance from the music. That people do take sustenance does not seem arguable to me, so the question becomes 'why' or 'how.' In fact, I think that is in part what tmidgett was hoping to probe. How or why the music is created is of some interest, as well, but it is hardly the whole of the issue nor even the most important aspect of the experiences that the music creates.

What do you need to know? Well, I would be much more likely to pay attention to what you do and do not like in the realms of rock and noise, for instance, because I know that you have deeply invested in the culture, have loves and hates that are deeply rooted in experience, and that you have annealed your positions via the heat of sacrifice. You have done this with a number of others who have made similar investments. That is perhaps an extreme example of knowledge, but it speaks to the kinds of perspective that I think are important to have for sustained attacks or those that essentially dismiss the creations or tastes of another (not to mention the cultures that those creations help to engender).

Do you NEED this level or type of involvement to have an opinion or to speak in detail about that opinon? Of course not. But why, given the limited involvement you have had, you would say 'this music is horrible' rather than 'it strikes me as horrible' I do not know. I don't see that the former opinion is warranted by any of the well-thought-out positions you ahve advanced. The latter has been absolutely defensed. The former leads to pointless squabbling, the latter usually allows for the space to avoid the squabbling that goes on amongst those that do not share tastes/experiences/values, etc.

Rick Reuben wrote:

NerblyBear wrote: I'm not really interesting in converting them to my own worldview.

:roll:

NerblyBear on 9/11, June 14, 2007 wrote:I know it's difficult to consider the official story a hoax. I also thought that the alternative explanations were mere conspiracy theories.

But claiming that any alternative explanations will necessarily "deflate to nothingness" is pure prejudice. At least minimally consider the evidence before you write something off so quickly.

And then Nerbly pulled a complete 180 and started a dozen new threads on 9/11 in three days volunteeering to coach people to his worldview that the 9/11 official story is factually correct.

NerblyBear wrote:I don't think that anyone needs to be "the winner" here.

Nerbly, not trying to declare victory, June 25, 2007:

NerblyBear wrote:As I said in another thread, I am completely stopping any posts about 9/11 because nobody cares. For anyone who does care, I've done enough to completely discredit Bob.

It must be fun to live without any long-term memory, like Nerbly.

DING! DING! DING!

This thread has officially reached Clocker Bob Critical Point.

Nerbly

It isn't that a refutation must be made or that someone must win or that resolution is the end goal. I agree.

Rick

If one is going to make wildly over-wrought statements of opinion COURTESY might be served by an upfront admission that what you are saying might be incorrect, that you might be spouting out of your ass. It's just an option. I have no care to keep you from expressing anything and everything you desire. I believe that, after a point, a given belief or position is not likely to be forwarded by further pounding, but hey, I could be wrong. Keep pounding.

Still CRUD.

steve wrote:I have made a clear distinction between "electronic music," as the term was used for the first 45 years or so, and contemporary sample-based, nightclub-derived music, which I suppose you could call "electronica," though I find the term imprecise.

Well, unfortunately things aren't so tidy. What you (and many others) call "electronica" isn't necessarily sample-based or nightclub-derived. And, unlike a good deal of club-oriented music, a lot of it is a logical extension of the preceeding "electronic" music.

I'm guessing you haven't heard much of what I would consider good contemporary electronic music, or that you limit your definition of said music to that which resembles the "electronica" you've hated for years, mostly house and DnB, presumably.

Can't fault you for not knowing any better, though...takes a lotta work to find those diamonds.

But they're definitely out there.

Rick Reuben wrote:

Ranxerox wrote:Steve: Saying you know enough to dismiss the music is fine.

But you just said that it wasn't.

Ranxerox, earlier on this page wrote:I think that, after a point, folks ought to learn to leave a topic alone or admit that they are on the outer banks of their ability to meaniingfully discuss the topic.

Rick

The latter statement does not suggest that there is any sort of problem in expressing any sort of assertion, only that, after a point or due to limits of understanding, returns fall off precipitously. In fact, the point is that the issue or belief has been exhaustively discussed. Censorship is not in it. This is, by the way, an issue of self-policing, to adopt your terminology.

sparky wrote:

steve wrote:While this is a made-up word and can probably mean whatever you want it to mean, I still think this is nonsense, that I am somehow "rockist." This term seems to have been made up to create a fictional enemy of broad taste, someone who only likes rock music and only because it is rock music. To rail against this non-existent class, it needed a name, and the name chosen was "rockist."

Anyone who thinks I belong in this class, even "somewhat," ought to be able to explain both what the term means, and why it applies to me.

Please have at it.

All words are made-up at some point is my weasel caveat, but I have a strong dislike of this term. I've good friends who are far more immersed in electronic and dance music than me, and I've been subject to this condescension when I've talked about current rock bands that I like: "you are such a rockist". I was going to cut and paste a short rant that I wrote on this to the friend who's most guilty of using this vague term, but having looked it up it is somewhat embarrassing. I was quite annoyed at the time. I'll post an edited excerpt anyway:

I wrote:I am complaining – “of course”, to some of you – about this cumbersome title that speccy elektroniaks choose to foist above those of us who like music that rocks.

The cumbersomeness is deliberate: it seeks to muddy then freeze the vitality of the rock it denigrates, implying a staid movement behind the adjective, a rockism. Rock is no longer a “movement”, never was when good, so keep your own movements to yourselves; your movements are personal. There’s an odour of defensiveness, of frantic swatting at illusory assailants to this aggressiveness (surely dance is meant to transcend such machismo?); they have erected an ideological barrier; we are presented with a po-faced either/or.

....

Alongside this is another snidey, sniggering unsaid, in the –ist, which in the contexts in which “rockist” arises, links the word closer to sexist and racist, than, say, humanist, Marxist, Capitalist, Solipsist, or Desist. A dumb, unexplained sniffle of a cheap shot, this fraud, I’ve noticed, appears to help foster a bewildering sentiment of victimhood amongst some wielders. The poor, huddling, mo-po-mo masses, besieged by lager puking black leather jacket rockist monsters, potential rapists one and all... Diddums.

What this unfortunately murky writing hints at, I think, is the lack of definition to the word. It seems to exist purely as an insult to be wielded by mainly male, reasonably well-read fans of electronic music (quite popular with Wire writers I believe), who feel they've moved on from rock except in the most ear-bleeding extreme manifestations - at least from the tiny sample who I've heard use this term.

It is an insinuation which, in the usage that I'm familiar with, contains hints of sexism accusation. Since I have not seen a definition of it, I will have a brief go:-

A rockist is an insult directed towards someone which accuses them of:

1. liking rock music more than any other kind of music;
2. having an irrational hatred of sample-based music;
3. being male;
4. having lurking problems with being around women;
5. being white; and
6. never dreaming of living in Hackney.

I apology for this poverty of description, but I only have the insult in personal context to go from.

the annoying thing about it seems to be that's it's a perjorative term masquerading as a critical tool

Rick Reuben wrote:

Ranxerox wrote:If one is going to make wildly over-wrought statements of opinion

More opinion. The more you try and categorize someone's opinion with words like 'wildly over-wrought', the more you reveal your own true opinion: that only fans of electronica should have opinions on electronica. When you are confronted with the opinion of someone who does not like electronica, your reflex reaction is to insinuate that they haven't given it a fair chance. You have difficulty accepting the possibility that someone who has given electronica a fair chance has chosen to dislike most of it.

The 'quote' button is cool.

I did not say anything about fans of electronica being the only ones who should discuss it or have opinions of it. Neither have I suggested that one cannot give a type of music a chance and reasonably decide that they don't like it. Hell, I didn't even suggest that one has to give something a fighting chance before saying that enough is enough. If anything I insinuated the opposite. I have suggested that having an investment in a type of music might provide the type of insight that might allow productive conversation to be more economically (less personalized invective) undertaken over a longer period of time. People talking about things they are passionate about generally outpace those who are not when discussion is the issue. That has been my experience.

Rick Reuben wrote:

Ranxerox wrote:In fact, the point is that the issue or belief has been exhaustively discussed. Censorship is not in it.

Of course it is. Who appointed you to decide when the issue has been exhaustively discussed? Once again, you are setting parameters around a discussion based on what you want to read. Obviously, if a person who dislikes electronica continues to make posts to this thread, then they have *not* exhausted what they have to say on the subject. If they had, they would no longer post.

You miss the point with every stab. Recall the term self-policing. I am making a suggestion in re method. You make the call.

These types of threads happen with relatively infrequency, so I suppose that the kind of courtesy I am talking about, the kind of default respect for the limits of one's own position, is not all that important. In the end everybody does say what they want, the crap/not crap forum is made for comparisons that call up good-natured (I hope) denigration, and ires are not raised in ways that impede discussion.

I do believe a bit of reserve and self-editing in the direction of toning down works well. You, of course, may feel otherwise.