Go on, Gerard, tell us how you REALLY feel...

Okay, I just did. See the item above this one.

What do we know of Classical Greece? Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. Sophocles' Oedipus and Antigone. Euripides' The Trojan Women. Aristophanes' Lysistrata. Aeschylus' The Persians. Herodotus' Histories. Poems by Pindar and Sappho.

And what American "art" does most of the world see? mindless thrillers that glorify crooks and demonize American, smarmy comedies, and utterly filthy pop music produced by human refuse such as you cite.

Y'know, if we just made this stuff up and printed it, we would be the most racist carbon-based life forms with opposable thumbs in the world. However, you're just printing the facts.

WTF? I mean really, WTF?? Imagine you're some Atticus Finch type that's trying to deal with some JB Stoner type, and Stoner pulls a time machine out of his keister and flips Atticus forward to these guys making one more run through "Fuck that Shit".

I mean, what's a cracker with a good heart supposed to do? I guess it's just all my own damn fault...

Any guesses as to the real reason why devout Muslim fundamentalists hate America? When we're spewing this kind of shit all over the world through a firehose?

Of course, I don't imagine the Hollywood left and other entertainment industry types have considered that possibility.

Yes, I know, free speech is a right. Still, I don't seem to recall this rabid anti-Americanism in the Muslim world when our cultural icons were John Wayne, Jimmy Stewart and Frank Sinatra.

Notwithstanding the harm to our reputation that such filth does, you are mistaken about Muslim attitudes towards the West. For instance, check out the career of Sayyed Qtub, who conceived a genocidal hatred for America during the height of the John Wayne era. Historian Bernard Lewis notes Muslim travellers 6 or 7 hundred years ago reporting with disgust at the immorality of Europeans who actually allowed their women to go out in public, socialize, and freely express their own opinions.

Middle Eastern Muslims were murdering Jews long before Jews had the power to adequately defend themselves, much less had their own state. Why? Not because the Jews were walking around in bikinis and fornicating in the streets, but because they were educated, hard-working, prosperous, and NOT SUBMISSIVE TO MUSLIMS. The were, to make a deliberate reference to white supremacist history, "uppity infidels" who "did not know their place." No wonder people like David Duke find such a warm welcome in the Middle East.

pst314:

You're absolutely right. I've read a passage by Qutb where he recoiled in horror at men and women dancing at a church social. In the 1950's.

"Not submissive to Muslims". Yes, that's reason enough for them to hate us.

Still, it seems to me that American popular culture has been in a precipitous decline for the last 20 years or so. Some would say 40 years... but at least the 60's had some good music.

rickl, I won't argue that culture has been in a decline. I'm not sure how precipitous it is, since lots of people ignore much of pop culture, but it's not a pretty sight. On the bright side, I have read that teens are now showing signs of becoming more conservative in their values than the baby boomers. That's not something I know much about, but I'm hopeful.

In the meantime, we can boycott the garbage, and if we are fortunate enough to actually meet someone from Hollywood or the music industry, we can rudely take them to task.

By the way, have you heard of John (National Review) Derbyshire's t-shirt "pop culture is filth"? Heh.

......and then "the people's" air waves were used to watch enough money spent on clothes to re-build the gulf coast. Thank god, '06 is my year to drop 'PC' out the window at 60 MPH. No, hell, make it 75 MPH+.

IN clearer english: the red carpet scene has no bearing on any thing. We need all get our own brains back and use them for a great change...

THREE 6 MAFIA: one oscar, Martin Scorcese: zero