Is "Retromania" destroying culture?

[LizzieMaine]

In 20 years people will be huddled in the dark, wrapped in moth-eaten bearskins, and trying to remember how to light a fire.

 

[Nathan Dodge]

[video=youtube;Z4mTTigqTSA]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4mTTigqTSA[/video]

All this Singing Nuns talk has put me in a serious "Up with People" mood. I figure there's enough Fedora Loungers to match their numbers...

 

[Gingerella72]

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Gingerella 72: one could say that 2000-2009 gave rise to the fad of modern hipster-ism, which is still slouching along. The 2000s was the first decade in which I (born in 1967) felt 100% disengaged from pop culture.


LizzieMaine ... you've hit the nail on the head. Luckily, some other regions of the world are still living life as if the year 2000 hasn't happened. Yet.

Perhaps it is my age showing. I was born in '72 and like others have said, I feel completely disengaged from current culture.

So that begs the question.....do we become less interested in such things as we age? Do we reach a point where trends, fads, and pop culture pass us by without us realizing it? Is it because we reach a maturity where these things seem less important?

I used to think I was fairly "up" on what was trendy, be it music, movies, etc. but now when I read gossip news I don't know who any of the celebrities are they're talking about. The disconnect started a couple of years ago when I moved to a different department on campus where I work; my former office, I was always surrounded by and interacted with college students in the 18-21 age range. I was more exposed to what was young and hip. Now I'm more isolated and rarely see any students at all. Then the disconnect became even more pronounced this year as we no longer watch TV. Without that constant exposure and bombardment of pop culture, I'm completely out of the loop. And what's more......I don't care. I find myself wanting to crawl further and further away from modernity and embrace yesteryear. Would that be progressing, or regressing? lol

 

[Philip Adams]

I haven't thought about that song in years. I am not thanking you

I remember that one pretty clearly.

For some reason I didn't feel the need to look at the video again.....

 

[Philip Adams]

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Indeed. And this Outback Steakhouse commercial is excuse enough for Australia to nuke us:



[video=youtube;FeO6bXw8WI4]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FeO6bXw8WI4[/video]

I did look at the video for this one and really wished I hadn't....

 

[LizzieMaine]

So that begs the question.....do we become less interested in such things as we age? Do we reach a point where trends, fads, and pop culture pass us by without us realizing it? Is it because we reach a maturity where these things seem less important?

I think it's a matter of modern popular culture being increasingly youth-oriented. If you look at 1930s popular culture most of it was targeted to adults -- there were some youth-oriented elements, like the whole jitterbug fad, but even these things were focused on college-age young adults, not teenagers or pre-teenagers. But the truly mass-culture fads of the time appealed to anyone.

It's not like that now -- the target age of popular culture is moving younger and younger, it seems, and has been since the mid-fifties. And that trend shows no sign of letting up.

 

[Undertow]

In 20 years people will be huddled in the dark, wrapped in moth-eaten bearskins, and trying to remember how to light a fire.

:eusa_clap

 

[Marc Chevalier]

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Some will be huddled in the dark. Others will be huddled in their expensive, well-lighted fortresses patrolled day and night by armed guards. Oh wait ... that already exists.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

You two are really not going to thank me for this. It's a commercial for a North American chain of fake Australian steakhouses.



[video=youtube;GGG--S-kLYs]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGG--S-kLYs[/video]

The radio spots for Outback Steakhouse were even worse! I do have an ear for accents and dialects and whoever did those spots had the most atrocious Aussie accent I've ever heard -- fingernails on a chalkboard! Incidentally, I've never been there is it any good?

 

[rue]

In my opinion... no.

 

[Marc Chevalier]

The radio spots for Outback Steakhouse were even worse!

Southern California radio spots in general, for just about any product or service, are really awful these days. I'm guessing that radio ad-writing is the bottom rung of advertising: low pay, low prestige, low prospects for advancement.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Yup. Did it for years, and still do a bit of it on the freelance. It's one step above writing for fortune cookies -- which I have also done.

 

[V.C. Brunswick]

Very true. They've often more inane than the TV commercials. Though increasingly I've noticed that many ads on the radio are nothing more than the audio from the TV commercial.

 

[Gingerella72]

Yup. Did it for years, and still do a bit of it on the freelance. It's one step above writing for fortune cookies -- which I have also done.

I'm dying to know if you have ever come across a fortune cookie message that says "Help! I'm trapped in a fortune cookie factory!" ? Every time my husband and I eat Chinese we joke about this. We're easily amused.

 

[LizzieMaine]

What I wrote were mostly ads -- "Bright Picture In Your Future at Joe Blow's TV and Appliance." We did a non-ad one, though, that said "This restaurant is under surveillance -- please leave your waiter a marked bill."

The idea of selling ad space in cookies didn't go as far as it should have, alas. Somewhere in Ventura County there's a warehouse full of thirty-year-old cookies with ads in them.

 

[AtomicEraTom]

I've noticed that, as well. Some, I can almost picture the commercial playing in my head hahaha!

Very true. They've often more inane than the TV commercials. Though increasingly I've noticed that many ads on the radio are nothing more than the audio from the TV commercial.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

This is what I say to people who say I am stuck in the past: The things that originated pre-2011 and which I embrace, watch, listen to, collect, live by, are my idea of TIMELESS quality or TRUE FOR ME. I don't give a (unladylike word here) what the calendar states. If it makes sense to me and works for me, so be it. if I see something born in the current day and I like it, I won't shun it because it's new. It's called critical thinking and freedom of expression, not living in the past for nostalgia's sake. It's also possible to be a lover of retro but forward thinking.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Oh, and to go nostalgic on you, here are some Hendrix lyrics I like:

Now, if 6 turned up to be 9,
I don't mind, I don't mind.
If all the hippies cut off their hair,
I don't care, I don't care.
Cuz I got my own world to live through
And I ain't gonna copy you.

 

[PrettySquareGal]

Will nostalgia destroy pop culture?

Gee, I hope so.

Love.

 

[Mario]

Oh, and to go nostalgic on you, here are some Hendrix lyrics I like:

Now, if 6 turned up to be 9,
I don't mind, I don't mind.
If all the hippies cut off their hair,
I don't care, I don't care.
Cuz I got my own world to live through
And I ain't gonna copy you.

Great man, great song!