November 05, 2006
Hay, Yew! Shuddup An' Sang!
I just got back from seeing “Shut Up And Sing”, and I have to admit that I've never been more disgusted in my life. I'm disgusted over the amount of jingoism and false outrage generated against a trio of women by people who seem to be deluded into believing that they’re the epitome of moral behavior.
I'm disgusted by the inherent misogyny that ran fucking rampant after this happened. Even all of the Martha Stewarts of Beaver’s Cove Mobile Home Park et al completely disregarded the fact that both men and women were more than happy to call them sluts, whores, bimbos, and immediately demand that they shut up/die horribly. Nevermind that these are probably the same people who bitch about the “right to life”.
Mostly, however, I'm disgusted that people’s lives could be so hollow that they had to actively rally against a group of entertainers who (god forbid) made a statement that a cross-section of people vehemently disagreed with and therefore adopted their own personal cause. And a fair section of that cross-section of people whose heads had never before hosted a kernel of rational critical thought that wasn’t dictated to them by their favorite talking heads were suddenly completely embarrassed and ashamed by the actions of people that had absolutely fucking nothing to do with them aside from providing them some sort of diversion during their repetitive, unrewarding lives.
I know some of you who read this are going to be disgusted by this next statement (if you’re not disgusted already, I’m impressed), but: The people who we pay to entertain us don’t really owe us anything. I’m sorry, but they don’t. People claim that since we pay their salaries, blahblahblah, they owe us…but…they don’t. Just because we happen to be entertained by them doesn’t mean that we have complete control over them, and it doesn’t mean that they have to live their entire lives in subservience to the American people or the citizens of the world. Because if that were truly the case, I’m sure that there would be mass suicides throughout the various entertainment industries. I know that a lot of people want nothing more than to feel important and lord the fact that they might contribute a few bucks to someone’s well-being over that person, but this isn’t a case of someone biting the hand that feeds them. It’s someone biting the hand that throws them peanuts at their own discretion and then expects them to go away when it’s all over with.
Let’s face it. There’s nothing more dehumanizing than entertainment. We can hem and haw about it all day long, but when it’s all said and done I’d like to see their biggest detractors get up on stage and perform, or act in a movie, or write a book and then put it out for every person with a chip on their shoulder to critique and every person who needs something to obsess over to latch on to.
Dollars to donuts, the result is going to suck major ass, if the armchair critic even saddles up to the bet to start with.
Because as much as we’d like to believe, we don’t have precedence over celebrities. These are people whose talents range from “wtf?” to astonishing, and they do get as much as their audience is willing to put in. But a lot of people act like celebrities would immediately shrivel up and die if we were to stop paying attention to them, which is intellectually dishonest. Sure, they’d have to take up another line of work, but they don’t actually live and die by each and every person’s individual blessing.
Which is probably one of the most frustrating things to the detractors of the Dixie Chicks. As much as these people would love to see them crash and burn, they’re still making it. They’re still making it because a lot of people saw just what underhanded, backstabbing fucks that a crowd of supposed “fans” could be, and were disgusted. They also recognized that these women had genuine talent, and despite all of the naysayers, didn’t have to suffer at the discretion of a few thousand dimwitted yokels. I don’t claim to know what it’s like, but I can’t imagine it being easy for women in a day-to-day capacity, much less being an entertainer. Regardless, men called them sluts, called them dimwits, and generally wanted to lord over them, which is disgusting enough. But then both men and women started calling for them to die. Saying they should have been hanged for treason. Saying they didn’t deserve their fame. Forget the fact that just a few weeks beforehand these exact same people were worshipping these gals, now they were out for blood. A trio of hardworking women with families and lives were essentially told that they needed to die.
Additionally, the outrage against freedom of speech was staggering. These people were screaming for them to shut up and sing and to not bring politics into entertainment, which of course completely changed when Toby Keith started singing about boots in asses and other entertainers came out in support of Bush. I guess the only freedom of speech that mattered at the end of the day was theirs. How…contradictory. And fitting. These people acted like they were the sole voices of reason and rationale, but the last time I checked, my voice of reason didn't twang, had more than three teeth in its head, and didn't have two first names.
And now, going back to the people who spearheaded this display of witless moral outrage (not going to give them credit, just that they’re a rightwing echo chamber on the Intertron), all I see are “fat Natalie” jokes. They must be seeing a different person, because the Natalie I saw during the film was precocious, charming, and as cute as a fucking button. But I guess that’s how it goes when you have blinding irrational hatred for someone.
Too bad the blinders have taken up permanent residence on half of these people.
Posted by Jake at November 5, 2006 06:09 PM
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