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Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

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Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#591

Post by runarberg »

PuppyTailWags wrote: post #562
runarberg wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I think of counter culture, I think more about the cultural artifacts then some shared political believes. Sure the scene might have some shared politics, but that is a by-product, and is not necessary. I mean, see the punks and their wide range of politics. As an example, other people have mentioned furries. They do have a pretty easily distinguishable aesthetics which you’ll spot immediately when you look at t…

Cultural artifacts are still only speaking to specific aspects of culture. Punk doesn't speak to all aspects of all cultures for example.

Indeed, but for counter culture, I think the artifacts are kind of important, as it communicates your involvement inside that culture. It is kind of hard to imagine punk without the music, the cloths, the hairstyles, the graffiti, etc. Sure it is also hard to imagine punk without the Anarchy, but if you think of early punks, with their heavy drinking and male dominant behavior, and compare it to modern punk which thoroughly reject these early cultural behaviors, you’ll find that they still share the aesthetics even though their attitude has changed.

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#592

Post by uoaei »

neonnoodle wrote: post #71

The medium is the message dudes. At this point in history, what will qualify a true counterculture is NOT BEING ONLINE. Whatever the true counterculture will be, it won’t be subject to the Internet and its all-seeing eye. It won’t be made out of memes and flame wars. No matter what the political bent, we’re all very much a captive audience online. “Master’s house/master’s tools” and all that.

Absolutely. It is important to remember that consensus opinions on narrow internet forums like HN or even Twitter do not generally represent the default positions that people take on most issues. Often, they are not even in the same wheelhouse.

This extends readily also to the media spheres in which people immerse themselves. The consensus on cable news, for instance, hardly represents a good-faith analysis.

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#593

Post by z3c0 »

linksnapzz wrote: post #581
wskinner wrote: post #574

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The hippies were rooted in things that were objectively good: peace, love, self discovery, acceptance, mutual aid, egalitarianism, free thought. Then it’s worth considering why the prevailing culture at the time didn’t see it that way.

We are the people who support Good Things. Therefore, anyone who opposes us is ipso facto supporting Bad Things.

Enter the Ronald Reagan presidential campaign, stage right

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#594

Post by leshow »

throwaway894345 wrote: post #216
cfltlayoffs wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is such a superficial understanding of "support". They make their logo rainbow for a month. None of the groups you mentioned support police abolition, prison abolition, for instance. Police budgets still go up. Homeless encampments still get bulldozed. Black people are still killed by police. Capitalists have co-opted the least disruptive demands of advocates in an attempt to draw attention away from the actual…

Police budgets are up, but policing is down, killings by police are way down, and consequentially violent crime is way, way up. Protesters didn’t get everything, but they got a lot of what they asked for (reduction in policing, basically) and they seem content (no more major protests or riots since the precipitous drop in policing following the Floyd protests). It seems hard to argue that there haven’t been disruptiv…

This is such a misunderstanding of the current situation. The demands were varied, but common ask was _not_ just a reduction in policing paired with a ballooning police budget. Ironically, the "defund" movement ended up causing an even more reactionary movement such that police actually got more funding.

Protesters wanted to re-allocate resources away from the police towards other services, so that cops are not the first responders to every situation, they often wanted fewer police with more training.

Crime goes up as a result of the material conditions of people. The more unequal society is, the more poor and desperate people get, the higher crime is going to be. Acting like it's merely a function of enforcement is silly.

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#595

Post by empressplay »

Isn't the counterculture now just anyone who's questioning the narrative? And I don't mean following right-wing media -- that's a counter-narrative for sure, but it's still just another narrative, which still needs to be thoroughly(!) questioned.

Maybe the counterculture today is the few people left who practice critical thinking and make up their own minds about things. Who congregate at places like here on HN?

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#596

Post by acchow »

jjk166 wrote: post #484

If you only consume mainstream media then you may personally live in a society which lacks a counterculture. You strike up a conversation with the girl picking mushrooms in the middle of nowhere or you go to an underground death metal concert or spend a bit of time on 4chan and you'll find countercultures alive and well that you're just not part of. If you think a sense of sameness pervades the creative world then yo…

"It has never been easier to be weird nor easier to find weirdness."

Completely agree. It has also never been easier to discover sameness, broadcast sameness, or replicate sameness. The Instagrammification of the world is why the hip local coffee shop in Thailand looks like it could be in Brooklyn or Amsterdam.

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#597

Post by rngname22 »

undersuit wrote: post #341
phkahler wrote: post #321

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> LGBTQ is a minority Nope. The number of letters keeps increasing as more people are brought in. In schools these days it's trendy to be anything but straight.

LGBTQ isn't a choice, stop peddling this falsehood.

Sexuality seems to not be a choice, but gender expression (which people sort of mentally lump in) can be a choice (obviously gender dysphoria is not a choice, but not all gender expression decisions are made due to the presence of absence of dysphoria).

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#598

Post by danielvaughn »

At first glance, this article seems somewhat parochial. I'm honestly not aware of any explicit counter-culture earlier than, say, the Bohemians in 19th century Europe. Maybe the Renaissance counts. But both of those are European.

It's a question I've been interested in for a while but never explored. How common is it, historically, to have significant cultural shifts from one generation to the next?

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#599

Post by wizzwizz4 »

concordDance wrote: post #580
runarberg wrote: post #512

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When I think of counter culture, I think more about the cultural artifacts then some shared political believes. Sure the scene might have some shared politics, but that is a by-product, and is not necessary. I mean, see the punks and their wide range of politics. As an example, other people have mentioned furries. They do have a pretty easily distinguishable aesthetics which you’ll spot immediately when you look at t…

> most people have the same political view about LGBTQI+ anyway Even in the anglosphere this isn't true. Those with differing views mostly keep silent. But get them in private or anonymously (e.g. a fellow train passenger) and a wide variety of views emerge.

> But get them in private or anonymously (e.g. a fellow train passenger) and a wide variety of views emerge.

A truly stunning diversity of views and opinions… but pretty much all of them agree with the idea that everyone should be entitled to basic decency. Most of the differences I've observed are attributable to differences in personal experience (e.g. subject-matter knowledge, perception of the consensus of others) and language use, rather than anything that'd get you kicked out of a fur con.

There are people who claim to agree with famous bigots, but when you actually get them talking, they just think the sky is blue (and that others insist it's orange with bright pink spots). I've never talked to anyone who actually agrees with newspaper vitriol surrounding LGBTQIA+ stuff (which I find surprising, considering how many people seem to agree with newspaper nationalist vitriol).

I do mourn a little, that people feel they can't be open about their views. If we talked to each other more, I think we'd find we agree about more than we disagree. (Then again, the things we do openly talk about seem to be highly polarising topics; I know not what causes what.)

Re: Do we live in a society without a counterculture?

#600

Post by rcarr »

nemo44x wrote: post #162
neonnoodle wrote: post #71

The medium is the message dudes. At this point in history, what will qualify a true counterculture is NOT BEING ONLINE. Whatever the true counterculture will be, it won’t be subject to the Internet and its all-seeing eye. It won’t be made out of memes and flame wars. No matter what the political bent, we’re all very much a captive audience online. “Master’s house/master’s tools” and all that.

People should read “Gravity's Rainbow” - or at least an analysis of it. A major point/theme is that no matter what you do, if it’s useful/profitable/empowering/etc then it will be co-opted by “the man” or whatever. There’s a never ending graveyard of counter culture artifacts that existed to spit on the mainstream that were nearly merged in, packaged, and sold back to the hordes of consumers that think they’re outsid…

Bill Hicks on people who work in marketing:

Kill yourself.

Seriously. You are the ruiner of all things good.

Seriously.

No this is not a joke. You’re [going], “There’s going to be a joke coming.” There’s no fucking joke coming. You are Satan’s spawn filling the world with bile and garbage. You are fucked and you are fucking us. Kill yourself. It’s the only way to save your fucking soul. Kill yourself

Planting seeds.

I know all the marketing people are going, “He’s doing a joke…” There’s no joke here whatsoever. Suck a tail-pipe, fucking hang yourself, borrow a gun from a Yank friend – I don’t care how you do it. Rid the world of your evil fucking machinations. (Machi…) Whatever, you know what I mean.

I know what all the marketing people are thinking right now too: “Oh, you know what Bill’s doing? He’s going for that anti-marketing dollar. That’s a good market. He’s very smart.”

Oh man, I am not doing that, you fucking, evil scumbags!

“Ooh, you know what Bill’s doing now? He’s going for the righteous indignation dollar. That’s a big dollar. A lot of people are feeling that indignation. We’ve done research – huge market. He’s doing a good thing.”

Godammit, I’m not doing that, you scum-bags! Quit putting a goddamn dollar sign on every fucking thing on this planet.

“Ooh, the anger dollar. Huge. Huge in times of recession. Giant market. Bill’s very bright to do that.”

God, I’m just caught in a fucking web.

“Ooh, the trapped dollar, big dollar, huge dollar. Good market – look at our research. We see that many people feel trapped. If we play to that and then separate them into the trapped dollar…”

How do you live like that? And I bet you sleep like fucking babies at night, don’t you?

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