Saying No to cultural rot
Clark Coleman writes:
Concerning your blog entry, “The evening news and Viagra ads,” perhaps there is so much rot that people are overwhelmed with the thought of responding to all of it. To combat this despair, perhaps we need to organize groups (e-mail lists?) of citizens, each group centered on just one type of cultural rot or transgression. When a commercial or TV show or magazine advertisement is seen to promote that particular type of cultural decay, the group members would broadcast details to each other and all would contact the offending party to protest. That way, each person does not face the overwhelming job of countering every form of cultural decay at once.
One group could focus on the messages that put down men. Another could focus on sexual vulgarity such as the Viagra commercials. Another could focus on the many TV situations in which parents are idiots and the all-knowing children have to live life by ignoring and bypassing the parental idiots. Another could focus on the barrage of feminization of our institutions, such as military recruitment ads that seem 100% targeted to females and have no appeal to males as warriors, or college ads that seem oblivious to the fact that more than 50% of students are already female and their numbers don’t need further bolstering, etc. We could probably devote an entire group to monitoring and protesting uses of the popular vulgar phrase “Size matters!” (Gee, I wonder what the origin of that phrase is?), which is now used at every burger joint drive-through menu in the country. Ads and shows that teach that rudeness and general bad manners are funny could be the target of another group.
There is so much rot that it really is overwhelming to tackle it all yourself. Any organizers out there? Perhaps we should contact some group such as the American Family Association (Don Wildmon’s famous boycotting group) to get organizing help.
LA replies:
This is exactly the type of thinking we need. I mentioned something like this in the entry you link.
Imagine a NumbersUSA type organization, or rather a set of such organizations, each assigned to a particular area. Let’s say one of the sub-organizations is focused on inappropriate sexual material in broadcast media, such as Viagra and other sexual enhancement ads. Like NumbersUSA, the organization sends out e-mails telling its members about this, providing phone numbers to the network, sponsor, and production company, along with talking points. A wave of phone calls and faxes descends on the offending network and sponsor.
I don’t think there’s ever been anything like this. I think it would be very powerful.
Then there could be another sub-organization focused on leftist content in broadcast media, e.g., ads that denigrate men, or PBS programs pushing a celebratory, non-critical view of Islam, or prime time entertainment promoting some leftist cause or other.
Thus traditionalists can become an active organized force pushing back against the leftist culture, not just individuals helpless and overwhelmed, as you put it, by this seemingly irresistible, demonic environment.
Kilroy M. writes:
LA writes: “I think it would be very powerful.”
On the contrary, I think it would have absolutely no effect what-so-ever. These degenerates don’t five a fig what we think; to them we are just a bunch of loons. All they want to do is sell their product, and if getting a few (even a bundle) of irate faxes and angry email spam is something they have to factor in the “expences” side of their equation, then they will just get use to it. I don’t know about you chaps, but I’m quite frankly tired of trying to reason with the unreasonable: it is truly like trying to teach a pig to sing.
Two docos that recently came to my attention have been Indoctinate U and The World Without US. I haven’t seen them yet, but the previews seem interesting—I’m not surprised the mainstream media is so silent about them; all the more reason to create our own culture rather than getting a foothold in our oppenents’.
LA replies:
But you’ve missed the point. It’s not about “reasoning” with them. It’s about exerting the force of public opinion on them. Every time mass phone calls have been directed at some elite offenders, it gets them to change. The canceling of the CBS Ronald Reagan movie, the defeat of the immigration bill in 2007, and so on.
As it is, companies are likely to change their ads, policies, etc. on the basis of just a handful of phone calls, because they assume the few who call represent thousands who haven’t. They’ve not changing because they’ve been persuaded; they’re changing because they follow public opinion.
Kilroy M. writes:
Then your experience differs radically from ours here in Australia.
Most recently, and most notably, our Parliament legalised RU486. There was a Senate inquiry about it beforehand, and approximately 85 percent of the public submissions were to the negative (about 4,000 if I remember correctly), yet it was legalised anyway.
Why?
Because it was a “women’s right.”
These abstract rights trump clear public opposition for progressive legislators just like profit will trump corporate concerns over their image among some quarters. Perhaps things are different in the U.S., but I always thought that you chaps had it worse off than we did.
I remember reading about the Folsom Street Fair, and how groups are now bombarding their sponsors with photos from the fair to get them to withdraw sponsorship … do you have any information as to the effectiveness of that campaign?
LA replies:
I’m not saying that mass popular opinion has the ability to sway the left in every circumstance (consider how Prop. 187 passed in California in 1994 was simply killed by judges and politicians). But clearly the ability is there.
Adela Gereth writes:
LA writes:
“But you’ve missed the point. It’s not about ‘reasoning’ with them. It’s about exerting the force of public opinion on them. Every time mass phone calls have been directed at some elite offenders, it gets them to change. The canceling of the CBS Ronald Reagan movie, the defeat of the immigration bill in 2007, and so on.”
Exactly.
The problem as I see it is two-fold. First, by now most Americans are so indoctrinated with leftist thought that they don’t even realize how entrenched and pervasive the cultural rot is. Second, most people want to be, and to be seen as, good people. Again, they’re so indoctrinated that they hesitate to object openly to items of the leftist agenda that they secretly find deeply objectionable for fear of being, and being perceived as, racist, sexist or classist.
But if a minority of the majority objects, civilly but consistently, to this cultural rot, it might enlighten and even embolden other members of the majority. We won’t change the minds of any leftwingers. As things stand now, the most we can hope for is to put them in check and keep them there. We’ll also be sending the unmistakable warning to the cultural and commercial interests not to push us too far nor take our compliance and complacency for granted.
I already boycott most modern movies, novels and TV and all of it made and/or promoted by “celebs”, “activists” and other known left-wingers. My husband laughs at me, saying, “Do you think they care that you don’t like them?” I know they don’t. But I also know I’m not contributing to their livelihoods. (By the way, if Robert Osborne doesn’t stop referring to the “witch hunts” and “anti-communist hysteria” of the 1950’s, TCM will be next on my list.)
Posted by Lawrence Auster at February 16, 2008 11:18 AM | Send