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News and Society > Humanities Today - The Corporate Rape of Culture
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Article rating : 0.00, 0 votes. Author : Michael Spindler
Humanities Today - The Corporate Rape of Culture
Researched and Authored by: Michael J. Spindler
The author of this paper has a pessimistic view of the humanities. Mankind’s embodiment of vanity through expressions in music, art, infrastructure, science, and math, the list of ego enhancing areas fathom the depths in various forms. In the beginning, man lived as one with the environment. Now through the passage of time, man’s egotism for expression, which means nothing to the natural world that truly counts, affects us fundamentally as this behavior ravages the natural world and society’s perception of how they fit into this world, little more than a consumer.
The humanities directly impact the following sequential generations. The classics twisted and deformed to suit a new culture. Old ideas recycled, encouraging a lack of genuine creativity. In a society where materialism reigns, nothing beats replicas or silicon and pre-molded plastics. If humanities meant anything to modern society, there would be no taxation upon the citizens to keep a pulse alive for a few egos to enjoy or to profit by.
In today’s world, art is used to sell products. Music is created to sell products. Science is used to create new products to sell. Math is used to count the sales. Infrastructure is created to house the corporations, shuttle the labor force about, and to provide a false sense of community pride, in a city where no one will give another individual the time of day.
In the following, the author will review art, music, architecture, philosophy, and literature and how these contributing factors impact the current social norm in regard to politics, socioeconomics, and technology.
In any given form, art is a lost skill in today’s modern world. If the final piece cannot sell a product, the art is tossed aside. The advertising firms’ hired by corporate America defines and what is attractive and thought provoking. If art in the form of advertising can not be used to make a companies presence stand out, the art is discarded. In affect, denying a society of experiencing and relating the ideas of the artists at an individual level. “Between pictorial art and pictorial media there is one fundamental distinction: that between exclusivity on one side and mass dissemination on the other. In essence, this distinction is neither ideological nor technological, but economic.” (Daniels, n.d.) The argument is a simple one. Mass produced replica is the only substitute the common man in any society will ever know firsthand. By virtue of mass production, the producer has removed the inherent value of a singularly uniqueness and has produced a sterile and unappreciated throw away item for a throw away society.
The author will not deny that expression through music can be a therapeutic experience. The truly innovative modern musicians will never be heard beyond closed doors. Original music has no place in the world for music that does not have mass appeal to sell out millions of albums or fill stadiums to standing room only. Music, more than any other form of art is subject to and perceived by the public at the extrinsic level. The extrinsic value means that once the public has tired and moved on to another song, the material losses value in society. To the corporate machine and sell out musicians, this loss is accepted and expected. Every recording artist and
recording label has a formula for what will sell, leading to a decade long swing of style and expression dominance that is played out until the form can be recycled no further.
Ah the beauty, impressiveness, and emboldening expression of architecture through construction using products and materials raped and pillaged from the Earth. Humankind, a visual creature by nature, finds safety and comfort through recognition of landmarks. Landmarks are perhaps the strongest commonality that man can share with one another. The landmarks real meaning does not matter, home to a large corporate polluter; or a home to a corporation in trouble, always in need of constant financial bailouts through tax dollars and other subsidies. Clearly architectural styling affects a society’s perception to the quality of life around the community, and the inhabitants’ contributions to society. Even down to the style of home, perception by others in the community as to the value of the occupant is dictated by value of the property. In the end, styling versus functionality, any and every structure shares one common theme. Yet another carbon foot print to lay further waste to an environment as so the Jones family or business can keep pace with the other Jones family or business.
Philosophy, the truest form of egotism and arrogance, an attempt by men to define thinking, logic, and the world around them and the role within that is meant to be. Perhaps in the early developments of the known civilizations, truth and understanding were sought to help educate and mold a less than characteristically bright population. But in the world of today, the insight once mulled over for years by academics, has been lost on catch phrases, Chinese fortune cookies, and an obsolete method of thinking. In the world that is now, of information overload and fast food advice, society adapts and adopts the thinking mentality that is dictated by government, employers, religious groups, special interests groups, and the list goes on. To which ever group an individual identifies them to be so shall they inherit the groups’ mentality and thinking. Free thinking in this modern age boils down to researching which store has the best price this week.
The last item for review on our misadventure through the humanities is literature. The written word is perhaps the most intelligent and articulate form of expression that has been developed through the ages. The written word and the sudden proliferation of the internet has made it possible to dilute the world with such an immense pool of information that a word written for an expression of art can be and is as easily dismissed as one for personals ad.
Perhaps the authors’ perception is skewed to the connoisseur of the expressions through the humanities that played a tremendous role in developing the world in which humankind live. Exploration and expression is the inherent and exclusive domain of humankind. The disgust with modern society is with the perversion and exploitation of the characteristics that once made us unique and one with the world as a whole.
References - Do Not Strip Article References
Daniels, D. (n.d.). Art and Media in the XX. Century. Retrieved January 11, 2008, from http://vectors.usc.edu/thoughtmesh/publish/98.php
Researched and Authored by: Michael J. Spindler
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