Why I Hate Madonna (If You Can't Beat 'Em, Join 'Em ...

[Guest guest]

This whole topic reminds me of a book I read about this societal phenomenon

that creates this notion that some people are DESERVING of that kind of

tremendous profit. What kind of message that sends to people. When football

quarter

backs make so much money and the common man is just scraping by. The whole

phenomenon of how we look to idols. It/s like we put these people up there and

feed into the system that generates so much profit for them and then marvel

at them because they have so much profit as if that makes them somehow a little

better than us.

 

Madonna makes music. She has some talent. Theatre and Vaudeville are more

the style of her theatric performances of her music and who in their right mind

would look to anything about Madonna's stage set props or costume as

"information" about any culture. I sure wouldn't. If Madonna wears a kimono or

a

jewish beanie, I don't care what she wears: it's costume. I'ts theatre, like

Vaudeville. I don't see people deconstructing Vaudeville complaining about how

symbols got mixed in. It's theatre. Symbols can have a lot of personal

meaning. Symbols from eastern cultures symbolize to Americans and the western

mind

sure, something different from what we were raised with. So Madonna is a big

deal and a lot of people listen to her music. I just never even thought of her

or any of her stage props or costume pieces as representative of any kind of

cultural reality other than one and only: HER OWN: what Madone does and

says and wears represents one thing and one thing only MADONNA -- and to the

extent that she is resonating with her audience, they listen to her music but

who looks to somebody like that for info on other cultures. I just don't see

it like that.

 

Anybody who looks to Madonna and/or any aspect of her Costume, Dress, or

Props for information about other cultures -- let me rephrase that WHO WOULD?

I

might listen to her music sometimes, but I am not watching her to pick up any

kind of info on cultures and religions. She expresses the way artists

express. Any symbols can be incorporated by the artist, just as any symbols may

appear in dreams. Maybe in a dream I might be wearing a kimono and a jewish

beanie. You can't censor dreams nor artistic expression. And nobody I know is

looking to somebody like Madonna and her stage costume for information on other

cultures and religions.

 

And as for critics, I've known a few of those and one has to remember that

even the CRITICS are in it for the money and often will write up anything on an

artist take any new angle just to snag your interest and create a sensation.

The Critic who wrote the magazine article is an artist of sorts as well, and

is just as interested in selling his/her articles and critiques, and is

stylizing him/herself also for an audience...

 

Peace,

Cathie

l In a message dated 1/14/2005 7:27:57 PM Mountain Standard Time,

devi_bhakta writes:

> Hi Paulie:

>

> Good questions. I believe writer answers the first one in the article

> itself. You ask:

>

> *** I'm really not sure about the point of this article. Why would it

> be less offensive that Madonna made crucifixes into props than when

> she made saris into props? ***

>

> Sriya replies: "I think that when Madonna stretches the boundaries of

> Catholicism, uses a cross to criticize the racist, white supremacy and

> puritanical, sexually-repressive aspects of her religion, it is quite

> different than her playing dress-up with a culture that no one owns,

> but that she can still certainly exploit."

>

> In other words, if Madonna wants to her own cultural symbolism for

> commercial purposes, she is more entitled to do so because she knows

> of what she speaks. The Hindu and Kaballah stuff is more like dress-

> up, because she is using and manipulating symbolism without any

> understanding of (or apparent interest in) what truly underlies it.

> That helps to perpetuate the problem of "exoticizing" other cultures

> into commodities rather than human expressions of, well, humanity.

>

> *** The venom that is being spewed out at the female pop idols that

> are at the front of this makes no sense to me. Why isn't there a

> thread about Rupert Murdoch? ***

>

> You are right in the sense that Lili was when she pointed out that

> the venom spewed at the Indian telemarketer girl about "stealing

> American jobs" should have been directed toward the American CEO's

> who outsourced them to boost bottom-line profits for their

> shareholders.

>

> But it is a long-held characteristic of human nature, I'm afraid,

> to "kill the messenger." Part of the reason Madonna and Britney earn

> more than the Gross National Product of many small nations is that

> they are willing to turn themselves into symbols for the privilege.

> Neither of them are victimized women, mere toys in the hands of

> corporate masterminds -- that is naive. They are both extremely savvy

> manipulators of their own images, and they realize huge rewards for

> their efforts. For all practical purposes, Madonna and Rupert Murdoch

> are peers. She weilds no less power over Western popular culture.

>

> Nora is right to note that Madonna and the rest are simply riding the

> atop the wave of history -- Tolstoy said something similar in "War &

> Peace," referring to the rise of Napolean Bonaparte. The faceless

> masses of humanity are the actual movers and shakers of history --

> they create and embody the Zeitgeist. But every Zeitgeist needs a few

> individual human figures to act as its symbols (as Paul Simon

> said, "every generation throws a hero up the pop charts"), and those

> symbols are invariably rewarded with great wealth and fame -- for as

> long as they can stay atop the wave.

>

> Another example: In the realm of politics, George W. Bush is really

> not the problem either. He is simply the most visible human symbol of

> a massive wave of popular, ugly, fin de ciecle sentiment passionately

> held by a frighteningly large number of people in the U.S. today.

> Madonna and Britney are no different. Sure, they are symbols -- but

> do symbols really deserve only the rewards of symbolism and not the

> responsibilities and blame of symbolism? I do not believe Madonna

> would still be around today if she was a puppet of corporate masters.

> In many ways, they are *her* puppets; so hypnotised by and beholden

> to the money she is capable of generating, that she is essentially

> free to say and do anything she pleases without regard for

> consequence.

>

> In my view, the woman who wrote this article is shouting up for the

> human "consequences" of Madonna's relentless climb to ever-greater

> fame. Behind her are piles of the props she's used and abandoned on

> this most lucrative personal journey. Sriya is simply saying, for

> whoever might be listening: "Remember that every prop that Madonna

> uses and throws away -- due to the sheer personal force of her

> influence in social and commercial matters -- contains consequences

> for others, long after she has moved on to new and more interesting

> toys. And sometimes those consequences are unfair and ugly."

>

> That's my take anyway ...

>

> DB

 

 

 

 

[Guest guest]

I actually heard a Critic advise a classroom full of students on how to write

a critique, saying: "Just say ANYTHING. it doesn't have to be TRUE." so,

heads up if you're taking an article written by such a person as the final

word...

> Any symbols can be incorporated by the artist, just as any symbols may

> appear in dreams. Maybe in a dream I might be wearing a kimono and a jewish

>

> beanie. You can't censor dreams nor artistic expression. And nobody I know

> is

> looking to somebody like Madonna and her stage costume for information on

> other

> cultures and religions.

>

> And as for critics, I've known a few of those and one has to remember that

> even the CRITICS are in it for the money and often will write up anything on

> an

> artist take any new angle just to snag your interest and create a sensation.

>

> The Critic who wrote the magazine article is an artist of sorts as well, and

>

> is just as interested in selling his/her articles and critiques, and is

> stylizing him/herself also for an audience...

>

> Peace,

> Cathie

>