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Fuck The Vessel

thebaffler.com

71–80 of 136 posts

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#71
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent poster wrote " poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money ", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Here's a way to think about it - what is the corresponding thing for the rich to hate on the poor for? Are the rich jealous of not having money? Are they envious of those who cannot pay more for housing simply because a building of questionable merit faces…

>The parent poster wrote "poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Let me make sure I understand, because I fear we may be talking past each other. Are you suggesting that the simple fact that one has more money than you is sufficient to justify animus? (I'm happy to discuss the rest of your post once we clear up this parti…

> Are you suggesting that the simple fact that one has more money than you is sufficient to justify animus?

Not if the difference is trivial, but absolutely when it is as enormous and as unmotivated as it often is. Why would it be strange that obviously unfair inequality would be a source of animus?

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#72
post #70
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent poster wrote " poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money ", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Here's a way to think about it - what is the corresponding thing for the rich to hate on the poor for? Are the rich jealous of not having money? Are they envious of those who cannot pay more for housing simply because a building of questionable merit faces…

I've noticed that a lot of the animus that the more-fortunate of us humans have against the less-fortunate is based in a very deeply-hidden, but very present understanding that it could have easily been you. Like, you have to distance yourself from unfortunate circumstances, lest you become victim to them. This is just a denial of the reality that no one is really given a choice about the circumstances of their lives…

Whatever point you were trying to make could perfectly well have been made without "some graduate student bourgeoisie cunt".

Seriously, what does that add here? It was already perfectly unambiguous you find her and her perspective abhorrent. Such hateful vulgarity actually detracts from your argument, IMO; you come across as rageful, not rational.

EDIT: Parent comment was edited to remove the quoted bit, and also significantly for tone, before being flagged to death.

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#73
post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, and many rich do say, “I hate the poor.” The difference is that the rich are actually able to fuck over the poor. And, they often blatantly do so.

Has any rich person ever actually said that? Have many rich people said that: "I hate the poor"? They might act like it, sure, but actually said that...? And the actions are more about contempt than hatred. Contempt tends to go down, and hatred up, on the social scale. I'm trying to think of actual instances... Beggars should be abolished: it is irritating to give to them and it is irritating not to. --Nietzsche. an…

Yeah, they do. It's shitty. Things like, 'Rich people are just better' and so on. Things I've actually heard come out of people's mouths.

Have also seen people who played too many video games and ten years into their adult lives have absolutely nothing to show for it other than some min wage job say 'fuck the rich'. Equally shitty.

In both cases, a healthy does of get-the-fuck-over-yourself is due.

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#74
post #39

This article is a perfect encapsulation of our current culture of contempt. It is no longer sufficient, or even possible, to just disagree or have different tastes. "I'm personally not a big fan of that building's aesthetics, but maybe there are others who do like it." That would have been a reasonable opinion to hold... instead we have: "Designed by Thomas Heatherwick, one of architecture’s premier grifters... The d…

Great writers have a firmly defined opinion, and make it well known through prose. There’s nothing worse than reading some milquetoast overview of an issue in the name of “fairness”. Not all problems have multiple valid points of view. Some things are either right or wrong, and it’s left to critics to pick a side.

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#75
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent poster wrote " poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money ", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Here's a way to think about it - what is the corresponding thing for the rich to hate on the poor for? Are the rich jealous of not having money? Are they envious of those who cannot pay more for housing simply because a building of questionable merit faces…

>The parent poster wrote "poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Let me make sure I understand, because I fear we may be talking past each other. Are you suggesting that the simple fact that one has more money than you is sufficient to justify animus? (I'm happy to discuss the rest of your post once we clear up this parti…

I think it counts as logically reasoned animus, certainly much more so than animus towards fans of an opposing sports team. Whether it's justified is a question of one's particular moral worldview, but there are coherent ways to justify it, especially if you change it from merely having more money than the opinion-haver to having money past a certain point, usually correlated in some way to one's practical needs. It gets even stronger if you change it to those who keep money for the sake of keeping money or spend it in vain ways instead of putting it to good use, where there are lots of possible definitions of "good."

(I'm not totally sure where my own worldview lies, for what it's worth. Almost certainly the strongest form, and almost certainly not the one you stated. But I think it is defensible that some worldviews believe all of these and they are not the worldviews of people too irrational to be worth understanding.)

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#76
post #39

This article is a perfect encapsulation of our current culture of contempt. It is no longer sufficient, or even possible, to just disagree or have different tastes. "I'm personally not a big fan of that building's aesthetics, but maybe there are others who do like it." That would have been a reasonable opinion to hold... instead we have: "Designed by Thomas Heatherwick, one of architecture’s premier grifters... The d…

And I hope to God I never have to live or work in one of those abhorrent bare steel&glass modernist (postmodernist? whatever the style is called) neighborhoods, yet every major city is turning into one. This style of architecture, which appears to be the only one allowed (certainly the only one being built) deserves far worse than contempt.

Yet it is architects that treat everyone else with contempt, ignoring the clear public preference for traditional architecture: https://www.dezeen.com/2009/10/16/people-prefer-traditionall...

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#77
post #70
post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The parent poster wrote " poor people who have nothing more to hate on rich people about than that they have money ", which sounds like well-founded animus to me. Here's a way to think about it - what is the corresponding thing for the rich to hate on the poor for? Are the rich jealous of not having money? Are they envious of those who cannot pay more for housing simply because a building of questionable merit faces…

I've noticed that a lot of the animus that the more-fortunate of us humans have against the less-fortunate is based in a very deeply-hidden, but very present understanding that it could have easily been you. Like, you have to distance yourself from unfortunate circumstances, lest you become victim to them. This is just a denial of the reality that no one is really given a choice about the circumstances of their lives…

> Plenty of underprivileged people in the world would literally kill for the chance to live in a mcmansion. I wouldn't, but that's me. I won't begrudge someone who does.

So this gets complicated. Plenty of underprivileged people would kill for the change to have a decent and fair shot at life with a reliable roof over their heads, and certainly I wouldn't begrudge them that. But there are also plenty of people who are stably renting a small apartment or own a small one-family house in the suburbs who would also kill for a McMansion, and I think the unfortunate but fair judgment of those people is that, were they rich, they'd behave in the ways we stereotypically dislike the rich for. The fact that they do not because they cannot is not, I think, itself a reason to avoid making that judgment.

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#78

I mean, I'm not a big fan of Hudson Yards... ...but this piece doesn't seem to make any coherent argument. Nowhere does she explain why she dislikes it aesthetically. She simply seems to dislike that it was designed to be Instagrammable (is that so bad for art/sculpture which is inherently visual?), has some bizarre thoughts on climbing staircases (she's against climbing the Eiffel Tower as well, does she hate exerci…

This seems like a good response:

https://nypost.com/2019/03/23/the-architecture-snobs-got-hud...

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#79
post #61

I mean, I'm not a big fan of Hudson Yards... ...but this piece doesn't seem to make any coherent argument. Nowhere does she explain why she dislikes it aesthetically. She simply seems to dislike that it was designed to be Instagrammable (is that so bad for art/sculpture which is inherently visual?), has some bizarre thoughts on climbing staircases (she's against climbing the Eiffel Tower as well, does she hate exerci…

The author is: " Kate Wagner is the creator of the viral blog McMansionHell, which roasts the world’s ugliest houses from top to bottom, all while teaching about architecture and design. " Judging by http://mcmansionhell.com/101 she has strong opinions which are not immediately understandable, to me, anyway. (It seems like she would believe most of the parts of Europe I've seen and all those houses in the US that hav…

It is snobbery, mostly. How dare those unwashed masses live in those houses?! And those houses are "Ewww!"

Re: Fuck The Vessel

#80
post #39

This article is a perfect encapsulation of our current culture of contempt. It is no longer sufficient, or even possible, to just disagree or have different tastes. "I'm personally not a big fan of that building's aesthetics, but maybe there are others who do like it." That would have been a reasonable opinion to hold... instead we have: "Designed by Thomas Heatherwick, one of architecture’s premier grifters... The d…

This woman probably got this gig due to her long-running blog, in which she goes on at great length about why "McMansions" are bad architecture. I think the Patreon for it pays a lot of her bills now.

Having contempt for buildings has kind of become her entire public persona. I don't think I envy that life.

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