The Wayback Machine™ is busted

A friend of mine asked for help researching clothing styles of the 1930s for a class on theater costuming designs. As a result, today I found myself perusing the Sears Roebuck catalog from spring of 1931.

The styles were anachronistic. All pinstripe suits and fedoras on men, all calf length dresses and water wave hairstyles for women. They advertize something called "panties" which are only slightly shorter than my standard carpenter's demin jeans. Though I do think zephyr jackets are do for a comeback, since they're advertized on the same page as those now ubitquitous shawl/poncho things.

Still, something was bothering me. Not the immense weight of the tome, or the absence of people of color. Not the grossly unfair prices, making me feel ripped off for anything I buy (I routinely pay more for individual meals than the price of a 30 gallon water heater). It wasn't that you couldn't tell any of the women apart, as they were literally all the same shape with the same face. It wasn't even the constant salespitch throughout the document, which was written in a combination of popup ad and infomercial.

then I realized it. It was the year.
1931.
Argueably the worst year of the depression. Unemployment was a 25 percent, and FDR was campaigning, but that means the New Deal hadn't begun to be put into effect. People were starving and dying across America and around the world.
And a smiling, disembodied woman's head tells me "DON'T FORGET! Most gentlemen look their BEST in BLUE" and asking me to spend $8.95 on a double-breasted, pinstripe suit.

So too do I see much of the current world: don't sweat the big stuff. Sure, there's a global war going on that will last who knows how long. Sure, to wage said war, a bunch of liars are making deals with tyrants to benefit the pocketbooks of a few rich men. But the new season of Crank Yankers is coming! listen to these puppets make fun of that woman for running a home business!

The catalog was a giant glowing head, screaming "ignore the man behind the curtain!" And we're still being told to ignore him while he wanks off at the suffering around him.

Sensory deprivation

orcinus has a good post on his appreciation of Miyazaki's work. I'll be honest, I'm a big anime fan. I've loved every film I've seem coming out of Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli. Everyone once in a while, I pull one off my DVD racks and watch one. Orcinus seems to share much of my admiration.

I have an immense admiration for Miyazaki's work, especially My Neighbor Totoro (there's a reason my blogroll features a permanent link to Totoro.org) and Spirited Away. The chief draw is what Talbot calls the "great human warmth in his films." He doesn't give many interviews, but generally chooses to let his work speak for him. And much of what attracts me to Miyazaki is the values his work encompass. The Talbot piece makes that connection even clearer. This anecdote was rather telling:

Several people who know Miyazaki told me that mothers frequently approach him to tell him that their child watches "Totoro" or "Kiki" every day, and he always acts horrified. "Don't do that!" he will say. "Let them see it once a year, at most!" In an essay he wrote in 1987, he was already concerned: "No matter how we may think of ourselves as conscientious, it is true that images such as anime stimulate only the visual and auditory sensations of children, and deprive them of the world they go out to find, touch, and taste."

This sense of the value of the real, and its discovery as a part of coming into the world, pervades Miyazaki's films.

His point is well taken. As modern life is, there is a something lost to the multi-tasking that is presented as necessary. As I write this, I have Comedy Central on the TV across the room from me, and a coffee maker running. I don't find myself focusing on any one thing in particular. I can't imagine driving anymore without a CD player. About a year ago, I got rid of my cell phone, and for this I am endlessly appreciative. Carrying a talking communication gadget with me at all times, which carries in it the option to spend money on little things for it (ringtones, games, and so forth). The cellphone companies frame this spending of money as a means of defining your individuality and personality.

In Miyazaki's films, bicycles are a ubiquitous form of transportation. I can't recall a single instance of cellphones or computers filling his movies. His stories are first of all human, which makes him so effective a storyteller.

Part of my duty here...

will be documenting life and illustrations of the zeitgeist of Red Statism.
Speaking of which, Tom Tomarrow has a pretty horrifying example of stomach churning attitudes.
I suppose it could be worse. Someone could be making these as commercial bumper stickers - which would mean there are people out there who felt this strongly enough to spend money, and enough of them to actually support a business.

more to come.

Ouroboros - or, the beginning is the end is the beginning

Welcome to my blog. I'll be posting daily-or-near-it in the future, mostly joining in the left half of the echochamber that is the political blogosphere. nice to meet you.