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Jun. 11th, 2019 05:52 pm I think there's a place for transgressive art. I think it doesn't age well; either it loses its transgressive value and it becomes just another thing (why is there just an abstract portrait, why were people so against it? it's okay I guess) or it becomes clearer why it was transgressive in the first place (oh, I see, they weren't just whining, people were in danger and the art is making light of that) and just becomes uncomfortable. I think that's okay, because all art has a context and it will never mean as much once you need a provenance (or provenience) for it. Art that's a political statement is never meant to have a long shelf life anyway.
I think there's a place for humor in art. I think humor can be a kind of art, I think the amount of thought that goes into it, it kind of has to be. I define art as 'anything intended for an audience' and that's pretty much definitional to humor. Sometimes it comes about by accident, but so does art every now and then, so that's alright.
I also believe very strongly that bad art should not be subject to different rules than good art. Because that's subjective, of course, and because it would take way too long to sort out the chaff even if we had a working definition, but also because the people who were charged with making the definition would always be dangerous to the people whose voices were drowned out. (You'll catch me saying a lot of art shouldn't have been made, but I don't mean 'the artist should have been prevented from making it' so much as 'why is this a bestseller/blockbuster/critically acclaimed TV show/international scandal'. Banksy isn't transgressive he's just every other SWM thinking he's cool.) Also because it gives people a lot of room to promote prestige artforms over new media and niche and transformative art, and fuck them.
(I also think 'pure entertainment' or 'just for fun' should actually be held to substantially higher standards than things that are intended to be artistic explorations, because society does suck, and something needs to change it, and that has to be on anything it's not harmful to regulate. We all know why art is so dangerous to regulate, but like. So many people are all 'well I'm not trying to make art' and, well, be a little less racist then, yeah? Like maybe don't make caricatures of Natives and then say how happy they are to sell off their land for pie. Especially things that are just there to make money, because we really need to lean on them, and especially things that claim to be positive role models. Not always feasible, but you'd think it might be sometimes.)
Which means there's a place for transgressive humor, too. And yes, of course it's not going to age well. But on the other hand I'm watching Friends which was never intended to be transgressive at all and was in fact the epitome of mainstream humor, and as it turns out 90% of the jokes are queerphobia and the other 10% are the friends emotionally abusing each other so I don't really think that aged well either. I imagine everything we call sweet and wholesome right now is going to look pretty damn off in ten or twenty years, too.
Because transgressive art doesn't just do the work of being interesting and shocking and uncomfortable, it does the work of delineating our society's boundaries. And without boundary work, without anything to focus on, nothing can change, and also it's stifling as fuck to have to color inside the lines all the time. Sometimes it's helpful, sometimes it's harmful, but it needs to be there; we need to see the boundaries either to enforce them or to break them down, and transgressive art, especially transgressive humor, is one of the easiest ways to shine a light on it.
What's 'hurtful' is a symptom, not a cause, and don't think I don't notice the people most likely to try addressing only the tip of the iceberg are the ones who never run into anywhere it's not explicitly. (If white people could stop telling me what is and isn't racist, if straight people could stop telling me what is and isn't queerphobic, if abled people could stop telling me what is and isn't eugenicist, that would be great!) When we're fighting for what language there is for us to have, it's always going to hurt someone, but it's going to help someone else, and the only choice is to muddle through as best we can screaming the words that mean something to us.
Anyway the point being someone said Family Guy should be banned and no one should be allowed to watch it because ThInK oF tHe ChIlDrEn and I just don't understand why mainstream liberals sound more and more like fundies every day.
Is it smart? No. Is it bigoted? Lots of the time yes! But unfortunately also less so than many other shows that get touted as Woque! Is it funny? Lots of the time, also yes! And it certainly shows us where society thinks the limits of acceptable and normal are, and we need that if we're going to improve anything for anyone, ever.
And also what fanfics have nearly as wide a reach as Family Guy? They don't set policy. Family Guy doesn't even set policy. Steven Universe sets policy. B99 sets policy. Friends sets policy.
I think there's a place for humor in art. I think humor can be a kind of art, I think the amount of thought that goes into it, it kind of has to be. I define art as 'anything intended for an audience' and that's pretty much definitional to humor. Sometimes it comes about by accident, but so does art every now and then, so that's alright.
I also believe very strongly that bad art should not be subject to different rules than good art. Because that's subjective, of course, and because it would take way too long to sort out the chaff even if we had a working definition, but also because the people who were charged with making the definition would always be dangerous to the people whose voices were drowned out. (You'll catch me saying a lot of art shouldn't have been made, but I don't mean 'the artist should have been prevented from making it' so much as 'why is this a bestseller/blockbuster/critically acclaimed TV show/international scandal'. Banksy isn't transgressive he's just every other SWM thinking he's cool.) Also because it gives people a lot of room to promote prestige artforms over new media and niche and transformative art, and fuck them.
(I also think 'pure entertainment' or 'just for fun' should actually be held to substantially higher standards than things that are intended to be artistic explorations, because society does suck, and something needs to change it, and that has to be on anything it's not harmful to regulate. We all know why art is so dangerous to regulate, but like. So many people are all 'well I'm not trying to make art' and, well, be a little less racist then, yeah? Like maybe don't make caricatures of Natives and then say how happy they are to sell off their land for pie. Especially things that are just there to make money, because we really need to lean on them, and especially things that claim to be positive role models. Not always feasible, but you'd think it might be sometimes.)
Which means there's a place for transgressive humor, too. And yes, of course it's not going to age well. But on the other hand I'm watching Friends which was never intended to be transgressive at all and was in fact the epitome of mainstream humor, and as it turns out 90% of the jokes are queerphobia and the other 10% are the friends emotionally abusing each other so I don't really think that aged well either. I imagine everything we call sweet and wholesome right now is going to look pretty damn off in ten or twenty years, too.
Because transgressive art doesn't just do the work of being interesting and shocking and uncomfortable, it does the work of delineating our society's boundaries. And without boundary work, without anything to focus on, nothing can change, and also it's stifling as fuck to have to color inside the lines all the time. Sometimes it's helpful, sometimes it's harmful, but it needs to be there; we need to see the boundaries either to enforce them or to break them down, and transgressive art, especially transgressive humor, is one of the easiest ways to shine a light on it.
What's 'hurtful' is a symptom, not a cause, and don't think I don't notice the people most likely to try addressing only the tip of the iceberg are the ones who never run into anywhere it's not explicitly. (If white people could stop telling me what is and isn't racist, if straight people could stop telling me what is and isn't queerphobic, if abled people could stop telling me what is and isn't eugenicist, that would be great!) When we're fighting for what language there is for us to have, it's always going to hurt someone, but it's going to help someone else, and the only choice is to muddle through as best we can screaming the words that mean something to us.
Anyway the point being someone said Family Guy should be banned and no one should be allowed to watch it because ThInK oF tHe ChIlDrEn and I just don't understand why mainstream liberals sound more and more like fundies every day.
Is it smart? No. Is it bigoted? Lots of the time yes! But unfortunately also less so than many other shows that get touted as Woque! Is it funny? Lots of the time, also yes! And it certainly shows us where society thinks the limits of acceptable and normal are, and we need that if we're going to improve anything for anyone, ever.
And also what fanfics have nearly as wide a reach as Family Guy? They don't set policy. Family Guy doesn't even set policy. Steven Universe sets policy. B99 sets policy. Friends sets policy.
