Yeah, we're all tribal...and we're all sheep. We like to think we're unique, and to a certain degree we are. But we all want what's "cool," and that means millions of us buying the same shoes, jeans, toothpaste, etc, ad infinitum, ad nauseam. I have to admit that I've never really though about it in the way Marx discusses it, though. All the times I've convinced myself I was unique and different, it turns out I really wasn't. Damn...that's kinda depressing.☺️
No, I'm pretty damn sure you ARE unique and different. You, specifically. But like Goldberg said in her op-ed piece for the NYT, Marx's book subtly shifted the way she saw the world. I know it's done that for me. I'm a huge fan.
I FEEL SO LOVED! I've got my Guardian Rachel making sure I'm not getting chummed! Thank you so much.
With your rapacious intellect, you would get a lot out of this book. It would absolutely impact the direction you take with your band. And I ain't just saying that.
Yeah, not buying into the status seeking impetus behind art. Too much poverty involved. Make a breakthrough, get wide acceptance and approval, become a bona fide star, sure the artist's status in the minds of an adoring public shoots upwards. But, the truly innovative artist can flounder for a long, long time with no assurance a breakthrough is coming.
I hear you on the floundering. My whole life, high moments and low ones, seems to have engendered a certain amount of floundering.
What Marx is saying is that seeking status however an artist defines that (e.g., money, fame, acceptance by peer group, critical acclaim) is what compels that artist to innovate. And I don't disagree with that.
OK, this just triggered so many thoughts, I'm going to write them offline rather than directly into the reply box because after the first 1,000 or so there are too many opportunities to press the wrong button and lose everything I've previously written. (Also I've a "thing" coming up in 20 mintutes -- NOT *THAT* THING, YOU FILTHY MINDED ... !!!)
First, let me say I believe this is the first time I've seen "mishigas" actually spelled out; never had a clue. Thanks!
Second, my thoughts wander around "the status you seek" vs. "the status you are accorded." For example, you (Stacey) wandered amongst various of the "status empowered" for many years. I guarantee you, nobody (famous or not) ever hit on me when I was walking on a beach.
When I was a kid I was so violently rejected from any possibility of status that, in my mind at least, I quit. That held for a long time. And then I discovered Ren(aissance) Faire.
This happened by accident. First I discovered philosopher Paul Ricouer, whose name I always misspell, who introduced me to Fernand Braudel's history of "the long 16th" through his analyses thereof. I then found Braudel's books and fell in love with 16th C. history. THEN I found Ren Faire, and realized I could get into a "full immersion" experience. (Which is all by way of tangentially mentioning that there are no straight lines.)
Having read so much about the 16th, I went into Ren a low level noble. (A disinherited German LandsHerren, Gerhard von Feldberg, a completely invented person and title.) And I fucking owned it. People around me spoke of how others came wearing garb, I simply came dressed. (You've seen the picture.) At one point a shop attendant made the mistake of addressing me as "sirrah", and it was all I could do not to slap the little snot until cried "daddy." (For those who don't know, "sirrah" is a diminuitive form of address that is far from respectful. Were a knight or a baron to call me "sirrah," we'd meet on the green and only one of us would come home. A count would only get away with it if there were enough people around to stop the gauntlet from reaching his face. If it's from a duke or The Queen, then you go home and weep into your porridge.)
Honest to goD, I never saw that coming. I mean the whole experience of it. The sensitivity to status predicated on all of the minutiae of simply how one was dressed: who you bowed to, who you did not, and so on. It was rather crazy making, and the only time in my life I became a genuinely relentless flirt. I mean, sure, NOW I know that Ren Faire is all about getting laid, but when I started the thought of being seriously desirable was not an idea I could even pretend to contemplate.
But that was status. Did I deserve it? Did I earn it? I don't believe I have any idea what those questions are even asking, much less how to answer them.
These days I live in a 30' X 8' travel trailer on property that's been in probate for three years, expecting every day to receive notice that in one month's time I'm going to be homeless. On the flip side of that coin I am (and despite how it sounds, I am not bragging) widely considered one of the leading scholars in the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead in the world. (That and a cup of coffee will get you a cup of coffee.)
Status?
As a grad student, one of the things I observed was how the women in the program almost invariably hooked up with men who were further along in the process than they were. The guys, in this regard, had higher "status." I came to detest such connections because it (also, almost invariably) meant the woman would be set back in her own scholarly and professional pursuits. Because the guy would finish sooner and go out on the job market, and she'd end up abandoning or seriously delaying her own development, in order to follow the guy around as he struggled to secure a full time, permanent job. So you had the tinker, and then you had the tinker's wife. I lost touch with most of those folks, so I can't say how those arrangements worked out in the long run.
Man, do I love me a good Gary post. This one was badass.
So, women. We aren't allowed to status seek, but we can be power- and status- adjacent. That was absolutely the way I thought when I was a young woman.
And Gares...I don't need to tell you. Maybe the status you SHOULD be accorded does or doesn't come during your lifetime, but one day it will. And from the grave, I can say I knew you when.
Stacey, I am so upper class that I *deplore* conspicuous consumption and the trappings of wealth. The subculture I'm in is Bohemian bourgeoise, but I am an Haute WASP. I am also a geek, as are most conscious people who refuse to accept societal programming.
It's convenient to never want the consumerist crap shoveled at us. I stopped wearing diamonds long since, because they were too ostentatious, so they live in the bank now. I'm saving them in case we need to flee and take easily carried valuables with us..... <visualize me glaring at the White Nationalist Christo-Fascists attempting government takeover here>
Witchcraft meant I needed to give up the social class nonsense, starting back in the early 1980s. I had to transcend my own tribal boundaries to be in the Witchcraft community. Even now, I can only think of a handful of Witches who are from a similarly upper-class background. It has been good for me to have a wider acquaintance, very educational.
If I transmit any messages non-verbally with my appearance, it's more like "there seems to have been a struggle", just like my messy and chaotic house.
But if you catch me on my way to the opera...... well, I still have the full length mink and the Hermes scarves to prove my original social class. My founding American ancestor arrived in 1632 to Jamestown, Virginia.
Southern families at best mix shame for the way their ancestors behaved, along with family pride. My great grandfather was a captain of the Confederacy, and his father in law was a Confederate congressman under Jefferson Davis. Flipping Traitors to the Constitution! In case they had not made Black people suffer enough, my great-great-grandfather bought the Chief Van House, which has been preserved by the state of Georgia, after the original owner, a Cherokee chieftain, had been put onto the Trail of Tears. Shameful! Absolutely shameful!
Meanwhile, my half-Jewish husband wrote some Very Fine Apps for smartphones and tablet computers, and those apps have made it possible for us to preserve a standard of living that is extremely comfortable. Jason wears Godzilla t shirts and jeans. You'd never know he graduated from MIT, and that his father attended Princeton, Berkeley, and Columbia, and at a time when Jews were not welcome in any of those hallowed halls. My parents were similarly educated, and you know about me already.
I judge people by their words and deeds, by what's in their heads, and by where they are going, not where they have come from, or Gods forbid, their attire.
I was told as a child that we were middle class.......just like all the other doctors, lawyers, spies, ambassadors, and judges in Chevy Chase, Maryland, eyeroll. In my first marriage, I lived only a few blocks from where that scum-sucker Kavanaugh now lives. I grew up on the "wrong" side of Chevy Chase, not in the side with Actual Mansions, and I went to public school.
Americans have so many twisted ideas about social class.....it's pathetic. Most of the people in the social class of my parents are deadly bores, social climbers, or careerists, at least in the DC area. Yawn..... Besides, most of the people in the social class in which I was born think I am not sane. We have a phrase for non-magical people: wood-heads. I fit in very VERY poorly with Wood-Heads.
You are a fascinating woman. And what a lineage! Look, no matter what side your family fought on during the Civil War, they were still Americans who'd been here a good long while. I'm pure mutt immigrant, so I admire long native bloodlines.
With your incredible storytelling and wordsmithing skills, you should absolutely write a book about your family.
Yeah, we're all tribal...and we're all sheep. We like to think we're unique, and to a certain degree we are. But we all want what's "cool," and that means millions of us buying the same shoes, jeans, toothpaste, etc, ad infinitum, ad nauseam. I have to admit that I've never really though about it in the way Marx discusses it, though. All the times I've convinced myself I was unique and different, it turns out I really wasn't. Damn...that's kinda depressing.☺️
No, I'm pretty damn sure you ARE unique and different. You, specifically. But like Goldberg said in her op-ed piece for the NYT, Marx's book subtly shifted the way she saw the world. I know it's done that for me. I'm a huge fan.
Yeah, you're right...but I think I want to be a star belly when I grow up. IF I grow up.
Now, you’d love “The Primates of Park Avenue”, a book written by an social anthropologist who lives in the Upper East Side!
I've heard of that book! And now that you've recommended it, I gotta. I just gotta.
No one is turning my Stacey into chum!!! They will have to get past me and the rest of the geek army 💪🏻
Thought provoking stuff considering I am currently trying to figure out with my band what kind of artists we want to be.
I’m happy to feel immune to desire for social status jostling, but still occasionally feel the sting of judgment from those less enlightened.
I FEEL SO LOVED! I've got my Guardian Rachel making sure I'm not getting chummed! Thank you so much.
With your rapacious intellect, you would get a lot out of this book. It would absolutely impact the direction you take with your band. And I ain't just saying that.
Yeah, not buying into the status seeking impetus behind art. Too much poverty involved. Make a breakthrough, get wide acceptance and approval, become a bona fide star, sure the artist's status in the minds of an adoring public shoots upwards. But, the truly innovative artist can flounder for a long, long time with no assurance a breakthrough is coming.
I hear you on the floundering. My whole life, high moments and low ones, seems to have engendered a certain amount of floundering.
What Marx is saying is that seeking status however an artist defines that (e.g., money, fame, acceptance by peer group, critical acclaim) is what compels that artist to innovate. And I don't disagree with that.
OK, this just triggered so many thoughts, I'm going to write them offline rather than directly into the reply box because after the first 1,000 or so there are too many opportunities to press the wrong button and lose everything I've previously written. (Also I've a "thing" coming up in 20 mintutes -- NOT *THAT* THING, YOU FILTHY MINDED ... !!!)
First, let me say I believe this is the first time I've seen "mishigas" actually spelled out; never had a clue. Thanks!
Second, my thoughts wander around "the status you seek" vs. "the status you are accorded." For example, you (Stacey) wandered amongst various of the "status empowered" for many years. I guarantee you, nobody (famous or not) ever hit on me when I was walking on a beach.
When I was a kid I was so violently rejected from any possibility of status that, in my mind at least, I quit. That held for a long time. And then I discovered Ren(aissance) Faire.
This happened by accident. First I discovered philosopher Paul Ricouer, whose name I always misspell, who introduced me to Fernand Braudel's history of "the long 16th" through his analyses thereof. I then found Braudel's books and fell in love with 16th C. history. THEN I found Ren Faire, and realized I could get into a "full immersion" experience. (Which is all by way of tangentially mentioning that there are no straight lines.)
Having read so much about the 16th, I went into Ren a low level noble. (A disinherited German LandsHerren, Gerhard von Feldberg, a completely invented person and title.) And I fucking owned it. People around me spoke of how others came wearing garb, I simply came dressed. (You've seen the picture.) At one point a shop attendant made the mistake of addressing me as "sirrah", and it was all I could do not to slap the little snot until cried "daddy." (For those who don't know, "sirrah" is a diminuitive form of address that is far from respectful. Were a knight or a baron to call me "sirrah," we'd meet on the green and only one of us would come home. A count would only get away with it if there were enough people around to stop the gauntlet from reaching his face. If it's from a duke or The Queen, then you go home and weep into your porridge.)
Honest to goD, I never saw that coming. I mean the whole experience of it. The sensitivity to status predicated on all of the minutiae of simply how one was dressed: who you bowed to, who you did not, and so on. It was rather crazy making, and the only time in my life I became a genuinely relentless flirt. I mean, sure, NOW I know that Ren Faire is all about getting laid, but when I started the thought of being seriously desirable was not an idea I could even pretend to contemplate.
But that was status. Did I deserve it? Did I earn it? I don't believe I have any idea what those questions are even asking, much less how to answer them.
These days I live in a 30' X 8' travel trailer on property that's been in probate for three years, expecting every day to receive notice that in one month's time I'm going to be homeless. On the flip side of that coin I am (and despite how it sounds, I am not bragging) widely considered one of the leading scholars in the philosophy of Alfred North Whitehead in the world. (That and a cup of coffee will get you a cup of coffee.)
Status?
As a grad student, one of the things I observed was how the women in the program almost invariably hooked up with men who were further along in the process than they were. The guys, in this regard, had higher "status." I came to detest such connections because it (also, almost invariably) meant the woman would be set back in her own scholarly and professional pursuits. Because the guy would finish sooner and go out on the job market, and she'd end up abandoning or seriously delaying her own development, in order to follow the guy around as he struggled to secure a full time, permanent job. So you had the tinker, and then you had the tinker's wife. I lost touch with most of those folks, so I can't say how those arrangements worked out in the long run.
But that was all about status.
Man, do I love me a good Gary post. This one was badass.
So, women. We aren't allowed to status seek, but we can be power- and status- adjacent. That was absolutely the way I thought when I was a young woman.
And Gares...I don't need to tell you. Maybe the status you SHOULD be accorded does or doesn't come during your lifetime, but one day it will. And from the grave, I can say I knew you when.
Stacey, I am so upper class that I *deplore* conspicuous consumption and the trappings of wealth. The subculture I'm in is Bohemian bourgeoise, but I am an Haute WASP. I am also a geek, as are most conscious people who refuse to accept societal programming.
It's convenient to never want the consumerist crap shoveled at us. I stopped wearing diamonds long since, because they were too ostentatious, so they live in the bank now. I'm saving them in case we need to flee and take easily carried valuables with us..... <visualize me glaring at the White Nationalist Christo-Fascists attempting government takeover here>
Witchcraft meant I needed to give up the social class nonsense, starting back in the early 1980s. I had to transcend my own tribal boundaries to be in the Witchcraft community. Even now, I can only think of a handful of Witches who are from a similarly upper-class background. It has been good for me to have a wider acquaintance, very educational.
If I transmit any messages non-verbally with my appearance, it's more like "there seems to have been a struggle", just like my messy and chaotic house.
But if you catch me on my way to the opera...... well, I still have the full length mink and the Hermes scarves to prove my original social class. My founding American ancestor arrived in 1632 to Jamestown, Virginia.
Southern families at best mix shame for the way their ancestors behaved, along with family pride. My great grandfather was a captain of the Confederacy, and his father in law was a Confederate congressman under Jefferson Davis. Flipping Traitors to the Constitution! In case they had not made Black people suffer enough, my great-great-grandfather bought the Chief Van House, which has been preserved by the state of Georgia, after the original owner, a Cherokee chieftain, had been put onto the Trail of Tears. Shameful! Absolutely shameful!
Meanwhile, my half-Jewish husband wrote some Very Fine Apps for smartphones and tablet computers, and those apps have made it possible for us to preserve a standard of living that is extremely comfortable. Jason wears Godzilla t shirts and jeans. You'd never know he graduated from MIT, and that his father attended Princeton, Berkeley, and Columbia, and at a time when Jews were not welcome in any of those hallowed halls. My parents were similarly educated, and you know about me already.
I judge people by their words and deeds, by what's in their heads, and by where they are going, not where they have come from, or Gods forbid, their attire.
I was told as a child that we were middle class.......just like all the other doctors, lawyers, spies, ambassadors, and judges in Chevy Chase, Maryland, eyeroll. In my first marriage, I lived only a few blocks from where that scum-sucker Kavanaugh now lives. I grew up on the "wrong" side of Chevy Chase, not in the side with Actual Mansions, and I went to public school.
Americans have so many twisted ideas about social class.....it's pathetic. Most of the people in the social class of my parents are deadly bores, social climbers, or careerists, at least in the DC area. Yawn..... Besides, most of the people in the social class in which I was born think I am not sane. We have a phrase for non-magical people: wood-heads. I fit in very VERY poorly with Wood-Heads.
I think life requires a Sense of Humor, at best.
Love and blessings to you this fine day.
You are a fascinating woman. And what a lineage! Look, no matter what side your family fought on during the Civil War, they were still Americans who'd been here a good long while. I'm pure mutt immigrant, so I admire long native bloodlines.
With your incredible storytelling and wordsmithing skills, you should absolutely write a book about your family.