Link: Book Reveals Youth's Views of Politicians

Being involved or informed with politics is incredibly powerful, even if government is a depressing topic for many. Socially, few more powerful demographics exist than young people, save for corporations and their lobbyists. But to go with the reality that shook the 2008 and 2012 presidential elections, the youth demographic is typified as disenchanted and apathetic to politics, which is just as often stereotyped as an old man's game.

A book published by Professor John Street, Dr Sanna Inthorn and Dr Martin Scott, seeks to dispel ideas that young voters have no sense of care about politics.

Personally, I wish that it didn't top off at nearly 100 dollars on Amazon, but then how would they make money off college kids who need it for their courses?

Of note to me personally, the book does this by examining research about popular culture and media icons, and how young voters (aged 17-18 years old) in the UK see politics through the lens of that popular culture. By examining what young people thought about celebrity icons and if they could be 'trusted,' and then comparing those findings to what they thought about political figures, researchers like Professor Street could analyze how to appeal to younger demographics and even what might be wrong with current approaches at presentation in modern politics.

The linked article provides some interesting summary of the team's findings and some of their interview statements,

Politicians need to come across as people who care about and understand an issue, and young people like to know if someone's personal experience has informed their political views. Politicians willing to reveal a little bit about themselves, who explain why something matters to them, might not gain 'legend' status like certain musicians or celebrities, but might improve their chances of being trusted and listened to.

As a  young person myself, I wholly agree with this statement. A flaw of delineating on party issues, to me and to a lot of my peers is that understanding an issue is not a political statement to me, it is a pre-requisite for participating in a discussion at all. Much of the current political race is denial of facts and of realities that I and my peers face daily, in the most advantageous way as to appeal to party and corporate benefactors.

Many people my age can see right through politicians. You can pretend to us all you want about how much you care, but if the answer to the question, 'why are you here,' is 'because it's advantageous to me' or 'My peers think I will win the election for them and give power in the government back to their party' then we don't want that. It's an unsaid but obvious, painful throbbing reality that Street and his researchers seem to have stumbled upon: on average, younger voters want to see a personal connection to the issue.

And nothing is a more personal connection than the media we love, and the experiences we go through every single day:

"The links between popular culture and politics are dismissed when it is thought that popular culture diminishes politics, for example when politicians appear on television shows like I'm a celebrity get me out of here. The assumption is that what they are doing is a desperate attempt to appear 'relevant' or to revive a flagging career. "But there are times when these links are taken with the utmost seriousness. During the Arab Spring of 2011, much was made of the role played by music and musicians inspiring the rebellion in Tunisia or the crowds gathered in Tahrir Square in Cairo."

The media we love and the celebrities we watch and the shows we take seriously and the books we read as if they're our personal canon, matter. They are portraits of what we look for when we want something to enjoy and admire.

There's that old adage, 'be the change you wish to see.'

Well, we have hours and hours of media that's exactly what we wish to see. Why don't politicians look for something to be, there?

I absolutely promise that if you are a politician and you can pull off the presence of Optimus Prime, the wholesomeness of Superman, the kindness and duty of Steve Rogers, the responsibility and class of Captain Jean-Luc Picard, you're going to be all set.

And maybe the good looks of Tom Hiddleston, I think that would land you the tumblr vote.

And if you're not a white guy, which would be great, we need to use this fact that pop culture is relevant to make it absolutely necessary  to add more idols of color, female idols, that can have an impact in politics and beyond.

If pop culture is well-known to manifest in politics, then it becomes an imperative that pop culture be representative, else all we're going to do is promote inequality in politics.

More about → Link: Book Reveals Youth's Views of Politicians

Boycotting the Ender's Game Film, I.E. Trying to Abort a Problematic Franchise

If you're a fan of Science Fiction, and even if you're not, you should already know a few things about Orson Scott Card's Ender's Game. One, that it is famous in that pseudo-classics-written-by-a-white-dude way, and two, that Orson Scott Card is incredibly homophobic and a bigot.

Oh, and also the book is getting a big budget movie production.

The one in my middle school classroom bookshelf did not have the red sticker.

However, point two about Ender's Game is a point of guilt, especially in light of point one. Some have tried to defend seeing the film by stating that Card won't see any of the box office revenue. Even big-name actors are trying to defend the film in spite of its problematic creative origin. Others aren't buying it.

Sarah Nelson, NZ NaNoRiMo champ and blogger, delivers a convincing argument on why she's personally not swayed by the apologetics:

As for their claim that “neither the underlying book nor the film itself reflect [OSC's] views in any way, shape or form”? I agree completely. If OSC was dead and his work in the public domain, there’d be no problem with an Ender’s Game film.

But Orson Scott Card still makes money off his books. Film adaptations inevitably increase book sales. The more popular the film, the more popular the book. According to this article, Nicholas Sparks’s Dear John sold 1 million copies in the year of the film adaptation’s release — out of 2.4 million copies overall. When the first Harry Potter movie came out, the book more than tripled in sales.

This is an excellent point and part of the reason why I personally also am boycotting the film. But it also pokes holes into misunderstandings that I suspect many people hold about the nature of media, and especially that of franchised works.

Media is inter-connected and so is our consumption of it. Meaning, that while things like releases and media venues are singular, the way we actually consume those things are tightly linked. Someone who goes to see a music show and likes it is likely to see more in the same genre. Someone who sees a film they like and discovers that there is a book, is likely to read that book.

This is the basic principle that makes sequels, expanded universe entries, remakes, and other consumer media expansions profitable. It's also what prompted the creation of fanzines, and in the modern day, online fan communities and fanfiction archives.

When we like something, we want more of it.

There will never ever be enough Optimus Primes in the world, and both fans and Hasbro knows it.

But this doesn't just apply to new material being made, it also applies to the backlog of material that already existed when a new work is released.

When any work goes multimedia and consumer-targeted, it becomes a franchise. And franchises make money. We may love the material, and want to deny that fact, but that's what they exist to do.

I personally do not support enfranchising Orson Scott Card.

More about → Boycotting the Ender's Game Film, I.E. Trying to Abort a Problematic Franchise

Real Modern Day Myths

Just because we make up our own new pantheon, doesn't mean the old's gone. In fact, one of the prevailing inspirations for fiction is mythology: both ancient, and modern folklore. For a single example, David Pfanner wrote a whole thesis on the modern incarnations of King Arthur: reinterpreted and rehashed in comics, movies, literature, TV, and more. Aside from the literature aspect (think: Le Morte d'Arthur, by Sir Thomas Mallory), right off the top of my head I can name a few contemporary low-culture examples. I think there was a syndicated cartoon in the '90s from when I was a child, King Arthur and the Knights of Justice. There's definitely that HBO series Merlin. And of course, the classic Monty Python and the Holy Grail

On second thought, let's not go to Camelot. It is a silly place.

But this isn't an isolated thing. Thor is a Marvel superhero, Disney's Hercules won four Annie awards in 1997, and any kid in the 2000s who was into trading card games could tell you that Yu-Gi-Oh! superficially claimed to have an ancient Egyptian theme. The integrity of the original material in all of these is patchy at best, but they stick in our imagination, anyway. They're just grounded in pre-existing narratives enough to be vaguely familiar, and therefore meaningful. No matter how much Arthurian scholars writhe at A Kid in King Arthur's Court.

He was no Connecticut Yankee, that's for sure.

I think we can look at Sherlock Holmes to see this kind of thing in action again. Sherlock Holmes is the fictional character who has been portrayed by the greatest number of actors. There's been dozens of TV shows, from Cushing to Brett, to now Cumberbach. There's been movies to suit every generation, the most recent featuring a garrulous Robert Downey Jr. There's been Japanese anime series, from Sherlock Hound, several episodes of which were directed by Hayao Miyazaki, and Case Closed, with a protagonist inspired by Doyle's tales. There's been western animation: Disney's The Great Mouse Detective, and a DIC series Sherlock Holmes in the 22nd Century. This is to say nothing of the vast library of literary Sherlockania stretching back even to before the ink was dry on half of Doyle's original serials. Star Trek was on Sherlock, too, giving us the lovely image of Lieutenant Commander Data in a deerstalker hat.

Marvelous.

I think it is safe to say that humans will repeat what they like, and things become part of our mythology because we like them.

This raises another interesting connection, however: what is the difference between these adaptations, and the much-mocked, lowly fan fiction story.

I would argue that all of these things are actually fan fiction, too. Only that money has gone into their making, that they have been published and so are accessible and therefore respectable to audiences to consume, and that Sherlock Holmes and mythological sources are in the public domain and therefore there is no issue of copyright.

But fan fiction's a post (or series of posts, or a series of series of posts!) in of itself. For now, we'll content ourselves with the fact that in several hundred years there probably will be rampant and unchecked retellings of Star Wars and Titanic. We will probably be very happy we didn't live to see them.

More about → Real Modern Day Myths

LINK: Showcase creativity, not racism, this halloween

You really shouldn't have to ask why you can't dress like a 'Gypsy,' an 'Indian' or 'a Mexican in a sombrero,' a 'tribal person,' a 'tiki person,' or wear blackface when Halloween comes around.

But here's a reminder if you do have to, or if you want to know why.

The fact that we can thoughtlessly steal and regurgitate the images of cultures and peoples until they are a generic, meaningless mush is one of our media's least beautiful legacies: cultural appropriation. The Mass Media summarizes it thus,

Look at the models wearing those costumes. They all feature people who look pretty Anglo. They are literally playing dress-up, using another culture as a costume.

“We’re paying respect to other cultures,” some may argue. No, you’re not. If you genuinely wanted to show respect to another culture, you’d do it on a day that isn’t reserved for shenanigans and soliciting treats from strangers.

Our media is dominated by white, male, heterosexual voices. This is undeniable. But it can also lead people to internalizing that white, male, heterosexual narrative as part of their mythology without even noticing. White people don't have to think about how their culture is pictured as a savage or as minstrels. Male people don't have to think about how degrading it is to be presented nothing but revealing, straight-male-gaze inducing clothing as costume options. Straight people don't have to think about how queerness is dismissed as either clownish or threatening.

But we should think about this, because do we really want our mythology to be looked back on like this? 

More about → LINK: Showcase creativity, not racism, this halloween

Feeding the Trolls: Social Media in Politics

Anyone who has ever had access to comment boxes, discussion threads, or any kind of unmoderated forum knows what trolls are. Well, maybe not everybody; the definition's been a bit muddied, but the original one is still good: someone who posts inflammatory or obviously attention-seeking opinions with the intention to incite an angered response or backlash.

A troll draws near! (But ignore it, it's probably a cry for attention)

The point being, the poster is not sincere. A troll is not a troll when they sincerely spit a bad or stupid idea and then try to defend it with 'just trolling,' that's just an ordinary bigot that also happens to be a coward.

However, in a landscape of political conflict, trolling seems to have a new stage: a paid stage. In India, there are individuals recruited to endorse a political party on social networks by attacking opposing party speech:

Arjun, who joined Twitter in 2010, started actively tweeting in June 2011 - primarily sharing his views music, sports, recent events, life and politics. His tryst with political trolls started the day he tweeted some information about the Gujarat CM Narendra Modi.

As Arjun started taking these trolls head on, he realized that his follower count was increasing dramatically. It didn't take long for some prominent political leaders to start 'following' him and engaging in chats with him. After his tweets got featured on a television debate, he was approached by the 'recruiters'. 

Their proposition was very simple. He was asked to write blogs promoting the party's agenda and policies. In return, he was promised up to Rs 10,000 or more per blog depending on the word limit. While journalists are often termed as 'paid media', concept of 'paid trolls' is still considered to be an urban myth.

It's no secret that in the USA, social media was a huge point of force in the 2012 presidential election, and yet its power is still dismissed with the fact that some people tweet pictures of their lunch. How long until the trolls are actually fed - and clothed - by real money for their efforts?

More about → Feeding the Trolls: Social Media in Politics

Link: Blaming Rape Culture on Social Media

Thinkprogress' Tara Culp-Ressler reports on the blaming of rape culture on social media. Every media major and sociology major who reads it groans (or ought to groan) in recognition and agreement:

The takeaway from these students’ comments is that it was a very bad decision to put these things on the internet. Their statements aren’t actually condemnations of the attitudes that fuel rape culture in the first place, or expressions of horror that some women at the university have likely been subjected to these “rapebait” strategies. They’re expressions of concern that the frat brother has attached his name to something that fraternities are supposed to keep behind closed doors, something that might hurt his job prospects in the future.

Blaming social ills on modern media, technology, or progress is nothing new. No, really. It is not new. It is literally one of the oldest things that people have done.

"Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book." - Marcus Tullius Cicero (106-43 BC)

While it is true that social media reflects the social climate, and may be used to promote rape culture, rape culture is older than social media. It's a part of patriarchal dominance of culture and has only found a new expression, not a revival. There was no death of rape culture to begin with. It's not new.

The Irritating Gentleman, Berthold Woltze, 1874. This young woman is probably in mourning, and this man still thinks she ought to give him a smile or respond to his catcall anyway.

It's been proven that blaming violence on comic books wasn't scientific or at all supported by reality. Violence predates comic books, certainly. Sexism and a culture that endorses sexual harassment are also older than our modern media.

They might even be older than Cicero.

More about → Link: Blaming Rape Culture on Social Media

Link: Demanding Representation of Black Girl Nerds in Geek Culture

When Chaka Cumberbach asks her readers to name some black female superheroes, she mentions that the nerdiest among us might forgo Storm and remember Bumblebee, Nubia, or Misty Knight. However, for anybody less comics-savvy, those names are probably unknown.

True fact about me: When I was little, I thought Storm was the coolest of the X-men and I don't redact this at all today.

She also relates her own childhood as a black female nerd, and connects the issues. It's a fact that mass media doesn't adequately represent women of color. But what is the impact of this narrative, that your heroes don't look like you, on the people growing up listening to it?

We’re given so few characters that I’ve always felt that if I wanted more, I had to be grateful for what I’d been given and put my money where my mouth is. But I’m not going to lie –- that strategy doesn’t seem to be working. I’m getting really tired of just accepting whatever scraps are thrown our way. I’m completely over struggling to find the silver lining in an obvious token black character while on the other end of the spectrum, people who have never had to think about finding racial representation in popular culture feel justified in raising hell over color blind casting in a sea of predominately diversity starved movies -– yeah, I’m looking at you, people who acted like Rue’s casting in the Hunger Games was a personal slight but interestingly enough seemed completely OK with the damn near catastrophic white washing in "Avatar: The Last Airbender."

It's a fact that watching television reduces self esteem in children for every demographic except white males. And yet, the stereotype of a 'nerd' is a white male. Is it any wonder that many 'nerdy' or 'geeky' culture artifacts are media-based, then? Is it any mystery that these media-heavy cultures are exclusionary to women of color, when it's so difficult to like what you like without feeling awful about it, unless you're the dominant cultural demographic?

More about → Link: Demanding Representation of Black Girl Nerds in Geek Culture

Nature vs. Technology: A Harmful Theme in Advertising

Example: Orange Juice.

Evan Stewart at the Society Pages notes that there's not a single person in this commercial below.

Pictured: Fresh lies are a part of a balanced breakfast.

This is weird, because nice homogeneous orange juice in plastic bottles doesn't spontaneously materialize from fresh, on-tree ripe orange fruits. That most definitely isn't the processing plant where oranges become juice, those oranges didn't pick themselves, and upper management must really be full of itself if it thinks the entire world revolves around it.

And yet, we get a positive feeling from the commercial, anyway. Why is that? Even when it erases hundreds if not thousands of workers, many of them likely migrants, below the poverty line?

And what does this have to do with this blog?

Well, this commercial is trying to tell us a story. It's trying to show us an image of pastoral harmony, uncorrupted by the hands of man. This would be a useless image to try and sell to us if it didn't mean something to our culture. The fact that we understand this image is because it's part of a larger narrative.

The narrative of nature vs. technology, of course.

This commercial implies that it is anti-technology, anti-industry, despite being a product for consumer purchase. It implies that the opposite of this green, unpopulated orchard is some kind of mad science lab, or a concrete-and-steel wasteland, or other harmful cliche of modern industrialization. It names an 'enemy' without saying a word.

Where they make the other orange juice.

However, these oranges that grew in an orchard would not be as large, as resistant to frost or parasites, or as healthy if humans hadn't used technology and scientific methods over hundreds of years of selective breeding and cultivation, and the orchard would be fallow if workers hadn't been employed to tend it, and the juice would never have been delivered if there wasn't a processing plant with machinery to squeeze the juice into bottles.

In nature vs. technology narratives, 'nature' is largely conservative, and seeks to preserve a sense of past and tradition. It is unconcerned with moving forward, only that people have survived before with the old ways in the old environment. This is problematic because there has never been a 'golden age' in human history where tradition has served us well, no one has been oppressed, and we all worked in the goodness of the earth.

This is a migrant worker. He has to feed his whole family on the output of these cows and sheep. This is not a pastoral utopia, this is a peasant who will be stepped on and ignored by his largely feudal aristocracy.

Technology is framed as a more progressive approach, and sometimes also as greedy: seeking short-term gain in spite of long-term destruction of an older system. However, while it is true that western industrial complexes are largely to blame for the damage to Earth's environment, it is also impossible to solve those problems without technology and maintain a similar quality of life. As much as Simply Orange® brand juice seems to despise modernity, I don't see it complaining about the polio vaccine.

I think a good example of this trope that everybody probably knows comes from the ubiquitous Star Wars. At the end of Return of the Jedi, small, furry aliens called Ewoks were able to defeat the futuristic and militaristic forces of the Empire, with nothing but stone-age technology. Because they were good, and the evil Empire was, well, evil, they succeeded, and everyone celebrated thereafter.

No! My futuristic robot walker's only weakness! Big logs!

Nature vs. Technology has new, and startling implications in our modern world. We cannot afford to despise the industry and technology that has been western culture's handmaiden in changing our natural environment. Anti-science and regressive politics are at an all-time high. Now is not the time to erase labor for the sake of peddling 'green' products that really are just more commercial culture in disguise. We have a real problem on our hands, and technology and science are our greatest tools in solving it.

No Ewok, or spontaneously-squeezing orange juice, is going to be able to save us now.

More about → Nature vs. Technology: A Harmful Theme in Advertising

Link: Can Social Media Save NASA?

Selena Larson of ReadWrite made an interesting conclusion: For NASA's 55th anniversary on October 1, it got a government shutdown and completely frozen funding. 97% of its employees, many scientists and other highly educated professionals, have been furloughed. However, while Congress only has a 10 percent approval rating, NASA is much-beloved.

Third-party efforts seek to use social media to restore at least partial funding to its operations, and science-loving folks everywhere are down to do just that. This is a case where twitter gets political in a frustrating situation where it seems like ordinary people have no power to change things.

As if millions lots of voices employees suddenly cried out in terror, and were suddenly silenced

Especially young people. As an example, Larson reports on NASA's own social media strategies to build buzz. Invoking the name of a major celebrity popular with young girls had a dramatic effect:

One big push for NASA is to find ways to reach more young people to encourage an interest in science and technology. Twitter has been a successful platform for engaging a younger audience, including megastar Justin Bieber and his almost 45 million followers. After tweeting an invitation to help the young musician take his act into space, NASA saw a huge uptick in its follower count, including many female fans whom it might have struggled to reach through traditional means.

We all have something to say about Mr. Beiber, but his name and his media carry weight and they mean something enormous to people: people that NASA needs now more than ever. There are connections between the media that we love, media that we may consider less important than the likes of our space program, and how active we are in perceiving issues. 

More about → Link: Can Social Media Save NASA?

Link: While Superheroes Conquer Media, Comic Books Battle Stigma

This article by Melissa Rayworth of the Arkon Beacon Journal reports well on a very strange phenomenon: the mass-media bullies that once and still bully comics for being either too childish or too adult, too intellectual/nerdy or too uncultured, are cashing in on comic book idols. Meanwhile, comics themselves don't enjoy as much cultural uplift as the over $150 million gross of Marvel's The Avengers would suggest.

They've certainly cleaned up some, but it took way too long for Ant Man and Wasp to get a movie.

Rayworth quotes con-goers on their thoughts:

“If you tell somebody you read Captain America now, they know who you’re talking about,” said Sims, who blogs at websites including ComicsAlliance.com. “The characters’ being visible lessens the kind of stigma of reading comics, because people know those characters and have affection for them.”

But only to a point. Amanda Osman-Balzell is a married opera singer raising a toddler daughter while attending graduate school. When new friends visit her Tempe, Ariz., home, they raise eyebrows at her stash of comic books. 

“They see that we have comic books,” she said, “and they look at us like, ‘Really? You guys look so normal.’ ” 

She explains that many of today’s comic books boast intricate artwork and story lines far more complex and thought-provoking than their big-screen counterparts. But friends roll their eyes when she describes comics as “literature.”

There's no denying that comics have had a spotted past when it comes to integrity in storytelling. Any comic book fan can bemoan the ridiculousness of the Silver Age, and the un-needed darkening of beloved icons in recent decades.

And whatever this is. (Tarot/3 Kittens #74)

But is this really any worse or different than other forms of media? Surely written media has endured The Eye of Argon. Radio shows once were obligated to include advertisements in their actual fiction content (resulting in many a baffling radio drama about dish soap, for example). And is it any worse than television, with Toddlers and Tiaras?

Comics as a medium are older than television. And yet, television is now an ubiquitous part of our media culture. What's held comics back? Is it really the superheroes, when they score millions at the box office?

Or is it us?

More about → Link: While Superheroes Conquer Media, Comic Books Battle Stigma

Analysis of a Parthian Shot.

Is this now going to be a short series on feedback media? OK, I guess this is now a short series on feedback media.

A few days ago, I discussed how feedback can create a dialog between consumers and content producers. Then, I discussed how feedback can create a dialog between consumers and other consumers. Now, I guess I am going to talk a little bit about manifestations of feedback-based dialog in real life, and how it's part of a bigger issue.

If anybody here's brushed up on historical or period warfare, the Parthian Shot was a tactic used by ancient Parthian (which was a middle-eastern empire) mounted archers. They would retreat, or pretend to retreat, and fire arrows behind them; chasing troops would advance into the cover fire.

Old school drive ride-by.

The shot I want to look at today didn't happen in the first century AD, but on September 25, 2013, and it happened on the internet. Tech blogger Jessica Roy left the online tech journal BetaBeat, and left behind a list of all the things she's not going to miss.

The list boils down to, ultimately, 'sexism.' But there are some interesting elements to her strongly-worded displeasure. Some of the highlights worth mentioning:

8. The notion that being the slightest bit critical makes you a “hater,” and the idea that providing any kind of coverage that isn’t a big sloppy BJ shows a lack of “journalistic integrity.”

Here, Roy comments on the reception of criticism and the nature of feedback. Note the similarity to Carolyn Petit's predicament when she dared to give a popular video game a 9/10, and tell me that there isn't a pattern. What is it about this feedback culture that frames professional critics as a threat when they do their jobs and are critical of media?

Also, all those snotty mansplainers and people who called me a “cunt” for talking about women in tech, and anyone who tries to derail honest conversation about these issues by finding minor typos or formatting errors that they can use to discredit my entire perspective so that they don’t have to reflect on their own participation in a culture that so clearly devalues women’s beliefs.

We can probably assume safely that the audience giving Roy and Petit feedback is similar: men who object to the voice of a woman (and all that nasty 'perspective') in their domain of choice. But Roy isn't just talking about her experience, she is also speaking about the media she's tried to produce: it's a stone-cold fact that only a quarter of IT jobs are held by women, and that many graduates with tech degrees find they cannot be hired to apply them. The comment contributors Roy curses for dismissing her points and coverage also are dismissing reality, not merely a matter of opinion or a difference in personal worldview. And they do it on a micro-basis: in a comment box, over a misplaced comma or a typo.

It's ludicrous to think that a copy error means that a proven fact of the tech industry and the perspective of somebody actually there, are invalid. But I guess that's why Roy left.

This is a dialog where the comment box intersects the real world, and real world decisions to stay or leave employment. It's easy to dismiss the significance of a mob of anonymous strangers, but as micro-aggressions build up over time, the feedback culture has the power to override artistic integrity, stop other consumers in their tracks, and even deny reality.

More about → Analysis of a Parthian Shot.

Are Banned Books and Bad Science Connected?

According to Kevin C. Pyle  author of upcoming book Bad For You, an exploration of the 'war on fun', and Scott Cunningham: Yes. And they answer it with a comic.

The 'he' being Fredric Wertham, and the answer being 'no.'

In the wake of Banned Books Week, it's easy to ride the outrage at a seemingly over-protective and offensive decision to limit access to media. The inherent wrongness in shushing up Harry Potter and locking away Catcher in the Rye seems like a no-brainer.

Is it, though? What kind of thought (or lack of thought) went into this kind of conclusion? It's easy to dismiss it as merely a regressive political agenda, or the hysteria of an over-protective backlash to popular culture. The states with the most challenged books, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Wisconsin, Texas, and California all struggle with anti-science legislation and the push for creationism in classrooms, and book bannings are part of that anti-intellectual substitute-for-science culture. Texas needs no comment; it's host to the anti-science think tank the Institute for Creation Research,. California has a 'Creation Museum.' Pennsylvania was host to the first direct challenge to a school district that included Intelligent Design as a part of curriculum. Illinois and Wisconsin are battleground states for the issue.

But why might this be true? And what does keeping Fifty Shades of Grey off the shelves have anything to do with it?

The subject of the mini-presentation is comic books specifically, and the 'scientific' conclusion written about by Fredric Wertham’s Anti-comic manuscript Seduction of the Innocent, and its later influence on the formation of the restrictive Comics Code Authority. Pyle and Cunningham explain how Wertham's failure to adhere to the scientific method produced biased results, resulting in real-life media restrictions.

Incidentally, the method that Wertham used, is exactly the same method that some think tanks use when creating material supporting anti-science or otherwise restrictive material: starting with a conclusion, and then looking for evidence to 'support' it.

The same things that threaten science education and critical thinking in the USA are the same things that cause book bannings, 'violent video games' as a talking point, and general devaluing of otherwise very important media. These things are connected, and to let comic books slip by is what lets Intelligent Design stick its un-evolving foot in the door.

More about → Are Banned Books and Bad Science Connected?

Bill Nye the Real Fly Science Guy

I, like many others, have childhood television memories. Not to say I was parked on the couch often; I remember eating dinner (plain spaghetti, with Parmesan cheese) and watching Bill Nye the Science Guy on PBS.

BILL BILL BILL BILL BILL (inertia is a property of matter)

Educational television, I know — but I loved it, and so did thousands of other kids. William Sanford ('Bill') Nye's enthusiasm and excitement for science went hand-in-hand with my love for museums and my then-steadfast resolution to become a paleontologist. That last one didn't really work out in the long-run, but to this day I adore science and I suspect a vast fraction of young adults in STEM fields today have similar feelings.

This is why I was enchanted, and slightly baffled, when I saw Bill on Dancing with the Stars.

Pictured: Bill Nye dances the robot. What a time to be alive.

Bill Nye is not really who many of us think of as a celebrity. He's getting on in age, he's an educator, he ran a public television kids science show, he's a committee member for the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry, and a face of climate-change research efforts. But most of all, he's remembered for his kids' television show.

But he's also done battle with Fox News on the subject of climate change. He's used his star power to address creationism in schools and how anti-science sentiments might harm future generations. 

This is a great redefinition of what a celebrity is, and one I wish would happen more often. Without media that connected him to the public, Bill Nye would not be a celebrity. And he holds great meaning for the consumers he connected to, despite having no trappings of what society commonly considers as star material.

He is a population-picked celebrity. There's no agent doing publicity for him, or selling his image to magazines. He's not releasing singles, taking movie contracts, or advertising himself. And yet, everybody knows who he is, anyway, because we like him and we like to see him. He has meaning to us.

That's the power of media, I think, in its most base form. It doesn't just lift the stars above everybody else, it lifts people who would never have been stars into the sky, based on a television show that is barely considered important to popular culture.

But the consumers consider it important. And that's why Bill Nye isn't just dancing with the stars, he is a star.

More about → Bill Nye the Real Fly Science Guy

Link: Seven Things I Learned from Reading the Hobbit.

It's a geeky forecast, today.

The authors of the minimalist MS-Paint webcomic A Hard Hobbit to Break published a really great essay on the 7 largest themes in J. R. R. Tolkein's The Hobbit and how they can relate to our daily lives.

And it's not a surprise that they do. The Hobbit is high adventure, but it's also a story about a journey. Not a Hero's Journey-- that's about the adolescence and tribulations and personal growth of a hero character.

It's a story about having your life up-heaved to go on a trip that you're not sure will end well.

Plenty of us call ourselves some kind of profession, but don't feel qualified or were forced into it and now we just sort of play along... though with luck few of us are burglars.

Plenty of us have had to muddle through vast conflicts that don't even include us, and yet, we've had to make decisions that influence them.

 And plenty of us have happened across something totally by chance that's changed the entire game: sometimes, for the worse. Though hopefully none of my readers have found the One Ring.

Hopefully.

"G... Google! Blogspot!!

More about → Link: Seven Things I Learned from Reading the Hobbit.

Talk Nerdy to Me.

There's a fairly popular cultural meme that there isn't just a nerd, there is a super nerd, the one who knows Klingon and can speak it, too. Perish the thought of this being for squares only. Stephen Colbert can speak Quenya.

Here's a handy introduction to these 'constructed languages,' or 'conlangs.'

Pictured: People with lots of time on their hands.

An interesting note, though: the American public often finds other languages intimidating. Constant groans of 'when will <immigrant population of the decade> learn to speak English?' can almost be the cartoon of everyone's racist grandfather. Junot Díaz, author of titles such as The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and This Is How You Lose Her has this to say on criticism of his works' inclusion of Spanish:

Motherfuckers will read a book that’s one-third Elvish, but put two sentences in Spanish and they [white people] think we’re taking over — Junot Díaz

Exoticism has gone hand-in-hand with foreign languages for English speakers for decades. We call French the language of love, but is 'omlette du fromage' any lovelier than its English counterpart? What is our (sometimes appropriative) fascination with the mystery and intrigue of other languages, and is it any wonder that such a passion translates into learning the tongues of peoples who never even existed?

These languages are often expanded greatly by an adoring audience, in an attempt to literally talk back to the source material in the languages it brought to life.

And, languages are also our way of connecting with other people. Just because a culture is fictional does not mean that one would never want to connect with that media, and the personalities within.

pedo mellon a minno

More about → Talk Nerdy to Me.

An Interesting Obituary.

On Sept. 20th, the New York Times reported the death of Hiroshi Yamauchi, retired president of Nintendo: responsible for the happiness of both old and young consumers. However, they made an interesting error.

Minutiae this may seem, but Super Mario Bros. 2 came out in 1988, putting enchanted kids that scrambled to play it on its release at older than 30 years. Undoubtedly, it was an adult and not a child that reported this error in the iconic brothers' careers. While the Mario Bros. are common knowledge and worth millions of dollars, the reputable New York Times didn't take them seriously enough to just lean over and ask the intern down the hall, or even do a basic two-second Google search in the age of information.

Pictured: Capt. Jack Sparrow, leading woman in Titanic.

This invisible issue is what this blog is talking about. These elements of entertainment and media mean so much to a vast population, enjoy international success and are heavyweights of the whopping 71% of the American economy devoted to consumer goods, and yet they aren't taken seriously enough for basic fact checking services. 

They are elements of extreme cultural importance and worth, but very little afforded cultural value and legitimacy.

More about → An Interesting Obituary.

Comment Box Beatdown: A New and Violent Dialogue.

I'm going to assume that almost everyone reading this knows what a comment box is. There's one below every post here. Bastions of free speech: moderated comments allow anyone who cares even a vague amount to express their opinion to everybody who passes by. In the least calm and rational manner possible, in some cases.

It sort of looks like this. (Photo: Flickr user sokup)

The crux of every social media site includes comments, along with media sharing. Even sites dedicated to user-generated (rather than shared) content communities, like Deviantart, Fictonpress, Ravelry, and Etsy include comments as a focal part of their platform: allowing anyone to create written, art, or craft work and then receive feedback on it from a general audience.

As mentioned yesterday, audience feedback is a dialogue that has taken on a new form and sense of power from the presence of the internet. Fan approval or outrage can sway the sales and distribution of media, and either laud or revile the personalities that talk about it.

I'm talking about critics. The push-button-to-hate culture doesn't make it easy for them to handle what essentially is considered the general public's beloved baby.

Why did you downvote my baby?! (Gif: Spirited Away)

The fifth installment of the popular video game franchise Grand Theft Auto was recently released, after about five years of development. Fans were elated to get right back into the popular wide-open no-consequences sandbox game and start stealing cars and running over grandmas.

Then Gamespot, popular gaming community hub, rated the game a lowly 9/10.

The resulting backlash of not getting a perfect score was so great, Gamespot made a response video calling out the chaos.

Pictured: Gamespot's audience gets told.

As the host of Feedbackula eloquently states,

"There were so many comments this week saying that political discourse doesn't belong in game reviews, or that it's 'just a game' and 'we should just shut up and deal with it.' Really though, honestly, what kind of attitude is that? How does that make the gaming community look? If we ever want to see games being broadly accepted as an art form, or as anything but a slightly quirky pass-time, we have to include politics. we have to ask questions about gender, about the portrayal of characters, and about the limits of satire. Because satire isn't satire if it doesn't challenge the thing it copies; that is repetition."

As most readers can probably infer, the non-perfect score was awarded due to the limited roles of women portrayed in the game: as unsatisfied wives, hookers, straw-feminists made to mock actual strives towards gender equality, and other less-than-empowering roles. The messenger of this dissatisfaction was Carolyn Petit, a game journalist who also is a trans woman. This went over as well as one could expect in a largely unprogressive, male-dominated gamer culture.

Not well. (Creative Commons)

The theme of an insecure male-dominant fanbase (despite over 40 percent of gamers identifying as women) being uncomfortable with women being an authority on the games they are possessive of is pervasive and certainly nothing new. Raging fans created a petition to try and get Petit fired from Gamespot (since removed). Anita Sarkeesian, feminist media critic and host of Feminist Frequency received death threats for daring to make a video series commenting on sexism in video games, and one maladjusted individual even created a whole flash game about battering her.

Trying to fire Petit, and trying to silence Sarkeesian, are two unorganized, organic efforts to try and subdue a discourse that some consumers find threatening to their worldview. The studios that make these games, have nothing to do with this dialogue; consumers are yelling at other consumers, through the easy-reward-low-investment-low-accountability interface of a comment box.

Youtube is trying to clean up the veritable hive of scum and villainy that rests below every flash player on their site. Their approach involves algorithms that sort comments, burying the least valuable ones to humanity below ones that at least don't wear underwear on their heads. Theoretically, this is supposed to limit visibility of frustrating comments, so nobody reacts to them and their presence is not rewarded, discouraging their presence. Whether this is censorship is debatable. By trying to encourage people to link their google pages accounts to YouTube, Google has tried to reduce the shield of anonymity on offensive comment trolls, but with limited success.

The determination and free time of angry internet trolls are limitless, however, and one can only imagine how long it will take for someone to invent a web gadget that restores the comments to how they were before. Whether this is in defense of free and unrestricted speech, or over-entitlement to the right to call people fags behind an anonymous mask, only time and downvotes will tell.

More about → Comment Box Beatdown: A New and Violent Dialogue.

4 Rules to Make Star Wars Great Again: Fans Lay down the Law

If there's anything that permeates childhoods spanning the last 30 or so years, it's probably Star Wars. Whether you're a fan, or if it's 'that science fiction series' to you, you probably know the names of the characters. You probably know who Darth Vader is.

You also probably know that the three 'prequel' movies released between 1999 and 2005 weren't well-received.

You might even know that a third trilogy, a sequel series, is slated to begin release in 2015 with a release every 2 years.

The marketing and animation company Sincerely Truman has something to say about all of this.

Pictured: Some really good points about why the prequel series flopped.

As of this post, the main video site DearJJAbrams.com, has over 5300 supporters. However, this is more than a needy public voice demanding content from producers and directors. This raises questions. Is the public entitled to be pleased? Are the creative decisions of a content creator like a director or artist subject to be influenced by the wishes of fans? And is it a good idea to give fans what they want?

Videos like this one, as well as other similar criticisms, are a seemingly one-sided dialogue attempted between content consumers, and content creators. And they are not always unsuccessful: after an ending almost universally-regarded as terrible, public outcry convinced Bioware and EA's Mass Effect 3 developers to add DLC content to their game that modified the ending somewhat. Ethical debates about false advertising popped up; the game promised different endings based on player choices, and yet all of them shared nearly the same ending with some lighting colors changed. They didn't do this with pleasure, but to avert future disgrace with their primary consumer base. And even then, they didn't change much.

Outraged fans were called 'rebellious' by news media, and much-mocked even within game culture, to the point of other developers changing endings to mock the 'spoiled brat' public. Was the public over-entitled? Was the studio lazy, advertising false material and subsequently got called out for it? Do we spoil fans too much by listening to their demands, or are content creators spoiled too much: their final decisions protected from all criticism and consequence by artistic integrity?

This concept isn't new, despite it's shiny and new internet guise. Arthur Conan Doyle killed off Sherlock Holmes in The Final Problem in an attempt to end his series. After resisting public pressure for 8 years, he wrote The Hound of the Baskervilles to appease his raging 1901 fans, setting it before Holmes' 'death.' This didn't work. He wrote The Adventure of the Empty House and brought Holmes back to life after 2 more years of public displeasure. Today, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes are considered literary classics, and much-beloved. But what of the behavior of the very first fandom? Was it right? Even in the long-run?

It's impossible to say if J.J. Abrams will heed or ignore fans, but it is reported that the sequels are being developed with fans of the original Star Wars trilogy in mind. On one hand, this is a relief for people who felt the sequel trilogy 'ruined' their beloved Star Wars. On the other hand, this approach may exclude things fans never knew they may want, and at least some of the surprise about what to expect.

Regardless of the approach, the $307,263,857-domestic gross legacy prays for Episode VIII not to swing and miss.

Pictured: By a margin of approximately 20 inches.

More about → 4 Rules to Make Star Wars Great Again: Fans Lay down the Law

Redefining Lines: 'parody' videos and their discourse.

I'm not sure you can toss a stone on the internet without hitting somebody mad at Robert Thicke right now. Whether it's people defending his song Blurred Lines (and it's top spot on R/B charts) or ripping it to shreds, the blogosphere is eating it up.

For anyone still in the lurch, Blurred Lines and it's music video is a catchy hit that proclaims that the line between yes and no in sexual situations is 'blurred.'

Pictured: music video pretty much everyone will agree is sexist.

This philosophy is famously unpopular with progressive consumers, leading to intense outcry in the wake of Blurred Lines' popularity. Accusations include that the song promotes rape and rape culture, that the video objectifies women, and overall the combined effect is simply just too creepy. 

However, something interesting to come out of this are the multitudes of video 'parody' songs that satirize the message in Thicke's song. 

Here's the Law Revue Girls turning the tables and flipping the video's gender roles, combined with a pro-feminist message:

Pictured: a very inopportune video preview but a fairly empowering video.

Here's YouTube artist Bart Baker, who specializes in these parody songs, turning nearly every #1 hit into a comedy. This video has over 8 million hits:

Pictured: Less empowering, but does raise some good points about the video.

The song's tune was even adapted to popular TV shows and other fandoms, riding on the song's popularity. Some fans show their love for Doctor Who and forget the unfortunate naked women business:

Pictured: Their enthusiasm is adorable but nobody here should quit their day job.

This trend didn't begin with Thicke, of course: previous hits like Gagnam Style, nearly everything Lady Gaga has ever produced, and beyond have had loving fun poked at them. The genre might even be traced back to Weird Al Yankovic, who supplemented his weird and wacky albums with much-beloved parody songs of popular releases. To have a Yankovic single is even considered a badge of honor by some artists.

Under Fair Use, anybody can make a parody video without risk of legal action.

However, I think something interesting happened with Blurred Lines and its spoofs that rarely has taken place with other jibed material. The parodies on whole aren't loving. Anything but: the overwhelming message of the satire directed at this song is hateful, and it can be argued rightly so. Despite Thicke's success in the charts, his reputation has been forever tarred by the dialogue these spoofs open up.

Other media that's been poorly received (despite monetary success) by the public has been given the same treatment, even more dramatic treatment. In the case of the much-detested Twilight series, a whole satirical movie was made in protest of the themes and uncomfortable plot devices it popularized:

Pictured: Dislike strong enough to fuel an actual movie release.

Satire as not only a means of criticism from certain formal sources (See: the Daily Show, MAD magazine), but as a publicly-available weapon against toxic or hostile messages is an essential part of our modern storytelling landscape. It's one thing to publish criticism, to write protesting articles, to leave poor reviews, but it's another entirely to speak back in culture's own language.

"Hey baby," slurred Blurred Lines, a Solo cup full of tequila sloshing in one fist, "What'chu doin'?"

"You're catchy, but piss off," the public replied, and slapped the hit single's wandering hand off its vast and disapproving thigh.

More about → Redefining Lines: 'parody' videos and their discourse.

DC Creative Team Leaves after Ultimatum for Lesbian Batwoman

The 2011 run of Batwoman comes to an uncomfortable close. Citing editorial interference, creative leads W. Haden Blackman and J.H. Williams III have left the project; despite two on-panel proposals between Kate Kane (Batwoman) and Detective Maggie Sawyer, DC Comics refuses to not only feature the marriage on-page but also refuses to let it happen at all. Blackman and Williams included in their formal statement:

"...in recent months, DC has asked us to alter or completely discard many long-standing storylines in ways that we feel compromise the character and the series. We were told to ditch plans for Killer Croc’s origins; forced to drastically alter the original ending of our current arc, which would have defined Batwoman’s heroic future in bold new ways; and, most crushingly, prohibited from ever showing Kate and Maggie actually getting married. All of these editorial decisions came at the last minute, and always after a year or more of planning and plotting on our end."

 While DC Comics never clarified that their decision was anti-gay marriage, the implications of their decision are  stark clear to see, especially after trying to reap the benefits from multiple gay characters in their lineup, including a reboot of the original Green Lantern Alan Scott in the 'Earth 2' timeline. But that attempt wasn't  universally well-received either, including by the gay community. Due to unnecessary tragedy, LGBTQA+ readers found it a familiar story of needless conflict: characters punished not just by social forces but also seemingly by the narrative for being gay. Did the same editorial guidance that was the heartbreak of Alan Scott and the force that causes LGBTQA+ individuals to get murdered in media with surprising frequency also dog the 2001 Batwoman?

Batwoman #17, Kate Kane proposes to Maggie Sawyer

Beyond being just a question of social inequality, these events suggest a picture of how much of our media, including traditionally 'nerdy,' cult, or niche works is produced. The intent of the creators is very often changed for the sake of the publisher's whims. Whenever we say that we like a movie, a book, a video game, or even a comic series run, we aren't only saying that we like and approve of the primary authors or creators of the material but also the label, publisher or other media entity that controls the content released. Why are these units not subject to scrutiny as problematic or progressive as individual creators are? It is widely theorized that the reason behind DC's reluctance to make any emphasis on a progressive marriage is partially due to Orson Scott Card working on a recent run of Superman. With a notorious big-name bigot on payroll for a critical project, can DC afford to stress his (narrow) tolerance?

Is Orson Scott Card, a writer that alienates such a broad audience, worth more than two progressive, competent staff writers with a release already underway and years in the making?

DC's decision is a call for a critical eye in comics and beyond. How much other media that consumers would  (and already do) gleefully devote to has been held hostage by executive decisions like this?

More about → DC Creative Team Leaves after Ultimatum for Lesbian Batwoman

Blog: The Pilot Episode

There are at least a million popular culture blogs.

There are at least a million nerd/media culture blogs.

This is one more.

But it's not a blog about gawking. It's a blog about the significance of the media that is given a second-class label in terms of cultural value, despite their thousands-million-billion-dollar franchises and enormous impact on our social climate.

For movies alone, the top grossing film franchises in history have been to date: Harry Potter, James Bond, and Star Wars. Not exactly Wuthering Heights. Harry Potter alone grossed over 7.6 billion dollars; and yet, its considered a 'young adult' movie, rather than an actual mover and shaker of society.

We don't get to choose what becomes literature. We like to pretend the most important or the best art, the fine art, is our literature. But tell that to Arthur Conan Doyle, to J. D. Salinger. What we consider to be less valuable in our modern day, is going to be studied in classrooms as groundbreaking literature in a few decades. In some places, it's already begun.

The media genres that make the most money, in western culture, are often those deemed to have the least cultural significance, at least to the culture that 'matters':  dismissed as low art, tv-trash, mindless video games, fluff pop top-10 hits, 'kids' cartoons, YA-lit doorstops, and the constant vibrancy of social media's exchanges radiating buzz with its own half-life moment to moment.

Our modern mythology is for sale.

We like giving these thought when they serve our needs and point. We like to analyze the advertisements, and the consumerism, how in scare headlines they're killing our culture (along with Generation Y, and cell phones, but presumably not microwaves or the Polio vaccine) and that too is mass media: that conclusion is also for sale.

This blog is not for that. It's for taking the media you're afraid to admit you watch (and you do) to your co-workers seriously. This blog is for everybody who learned to read playing Pokemon. This is for everybody who couldn't keep up with the Kardashians and now can't stop hearing about them. This blog is for everybody who begs friends for a new book to read, and everybody who's shocked and appalled by DC Comics' recent terrible stance on suicide and objectification.

All of these are meaningful outcomes and issues entangled with our 'low-art' mass-media consumer culture. The point isn't to point fingers or say that what's happening is bad or good, but to take it apart and think about what it means.

And of course we can have fun along the way.

More about → Blog: The Pilot Episode