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Does mainstream = bad?

Viridian

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(No, this isn't a thread about hipsters.)

I've recently read a book on movies that described certain directors as "commercial", and I began thinking... Does everything that is popular or "mainstream" - however you might define the word - by definition un-progressive, whitewashed, "dumbed down", non-inclusive, "safe", or whatnot? Does something getting popular signal the meggido of its individuality/originality/convention-defying?

And does liking "mainstream" stuff say anything about you?

(Sorry if this is poorly articulated, I'm eager to clarify stuff if you ask.)
 

chickpea

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a large part of mainstream culture is really dumb or corny, but i can't stand people who completely reject it and dismiss anything mainstream without giving it a chance. it's just a form of elitism, i feel like the internet and the rising of the hipster mentality has made it more widespread. rejecting the mainstream has become kinda mainstream, at least for a lot of young people.

but i thoroughly enjoy myself while watching jersey shore and listening to radio rap. and they aren't guilty pleasures because i'm not guilty :).
 

Nicodemus

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I think the problem many people have with commercial 'art' is that it is not done the way it is done for artistic but for monetary reasons. While not everything is popular because it was designed to be popular, some things obviously are. If that - art being done without artistic intentions - is sufficient reason to disdain it depends on one's views on art and aesthetics in general. Those views, of course, are ultimately subjective.
 

jimrckhnd

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A lot of "mainstream" culture is dumbed/watered down to a LCD level and this is nothing new - newspapers used to have a mythical average reader that the paper was pitched to - who always seemed to be a not particularly bright milk man or something like that. Food in chain resturants is typically more restrained with seasonings. Compare Miles Davis with Kenny G. - very different audiences and very different approaches (and VERY different talent levels :dry: but I digress ). The list goes on.

That does not always mean its "bad" (though it very often is) but it is typically less interesting (to me anyhow).
 

funkadelik

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That does not always mean its "bad" (though it very often is) but it is typically less interesting (to me anyhow).

Yes. A lot of mainstream music (let's take popular christmas songs) are engineered to be easy listening and generally liked. It's like candy for your brain. But you listen to it too much and, depending on your tolerance (your brain's sweet tooth), it can start to drive you crazy. It may just be a matter of how tolerant people are to fluff. But it IS popular because our brains LIKE that kind of stuff. Just some of us can't take much of it, while others can.

And just think, Stevie Wonder used to be a ground-breaking musician. Now he's on numerous Easy Listening radio stations. The neural pathways of the general populace have been carved out to accept and like his music. So much so that now it's brain candy. It doesn't challenge us like it used to. But would you say his music is BAD?

I wouldn't.
 

Viridian

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Yes. A lot of mainstream music (let's take popular christmas songs) are engineered to be easy listening and generally liked. It's like candy for your brain. But you listen to it too much and, depending on your tolerance (your brain's sweet tooth), it can start to drive you crazy. It may just be a matter of how tolerant people are to fluff. But it IS popular because our brains LIKE that kind of stuff. Just some of us can't take much of it, while others can.

Does that mean "mainstream" stuff has no artistic value? :thinking:
 

jimrckhnd

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Yes. A lot of mainstream music (let's take popular christmas songs) are engineered to be easy listening and generally liked. It's like candy for your brain. But you listen to it too much and, depending on your tolerance (your brain's sweet tooth), it can start to drive you crazy. It may just be a matter of how tolerant people are to fluff. But it IS popular because our brains LIKE that kind of stuff. Just some of us can't take much of it, while others can.

And just think, Stevie Wonder used to be a ground-breaking musician. Now he's on numerous Easy Listening radio stations. The neural pathways of the general populace have been carved out to accept and like his music. So much so that now it's brain candy. It doesn't challenge us like it used to. But would you say his music is BAD?

I wouldn't.

I see similar trends in food. Twenty years ago sushi and jerked chicken were pretty exotic stuff. Now... you have mall sushi and Fridays has jerked stuff on the menu. Now it isn't as good as the "real" thing but it clearly shows that popular tastes can be modified and the exotic can become mainstream. All in all, at least with food, that isn't all together a bad thing. Your example of music is similar.

And your point about fluff (or "brain candy" as I call it) is well taken. I need it sometimes but 1) not very often and 2) not in large doses. However, I'm well aware that other people's tolerance is different. Where I do get bent out of shape with it is when there seems to be such a large number of people who seem to indulge in a steady diet of the stuff.

Moreover, tastes can be dumbed down as well as elevated. Much of the mass media is just drek at this point and people have grown to expect and accept that. Let's face it - move TV is crap and has been getting worse for decades. I don't even want to talk about the news media - too depressing.
 

Santosha

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I used to cringe at alot of mainstream, but find it inevitable. Just about anything neat will get gobbled up by the mainstream eventually. I now cringe at the anti-mainstreamers. Originality is fucking dead. Sorry, it is. There is probably not one thought, feeling, act, or expression that hasn't been done before. So eat your sushi, and be happy to be alive. =)
 

Orangey

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In terms of aesthetic value, no, the means by which a work is produced is of little relevance. Yes, this means that the music of, say, the Jonas Brothers cannot reasonably be said to be of inferior quality just because it was made for easy consumption by white, middle-class, Christian girls in their teens (i.e., for money.) Other metrics might be used instead, but it's doubtful whether these would not amount merely to elaborate rationalizations of prejudice against "mainstream" anyway.

In terms of political value, however, the category of "mainstream" becomes more important. That's because when something becomes "mainstream" it means that its political message has been absorbed and accounted for (and therefore nullified, "neutered," or disarmed) by the system it was intended to disrupt. Or if something was never intended to carry a disruptive political message at all (i.e., it was made for and by the "mainstream") then it inevitably reflects and (even if unintended or blindly) affirms the values, good and bad, of the "mainstream." Thus if you believed, for instance, anti-semitism to be bad, and you recognized it as something deeply embedded into the "mainstream" productions of your society, then works produced by the "mainstream," or subversive works reabsorbed by the "mainstream," would be of lesser political value to your goal of eradicating anti-semitism.
 

Viridian

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Okay, let's say that I get teary-eyed whenever I watch Edward Scissorhands (the book I read said Burton was a "commercial" movie director, so I assume Edward Scissorhands is "mainstream"). Does that make me a sucker? Or an enabler? Or an ISFJ (I kid, I kid! ;))?

In terms of political value, however, the category of "mainstream" becomes more important. That's because when something becomes "mainstream" it means that its political message has been absorbed and accounted for (and therefore nullified, "neutered," or disarmed) by the system it was intended to disrupt. Or if something was never intended to carry a disruptive political message at all (i.e., it was made for and by the "mainstream") then it inevitably reflects and (even if unintended or blindly) affirms the values, good and bad, of the "mainstream." Thus if you believed, for instance, anti-semitism to be bad, and you recognized it as something deeply embedded into the "mainstream" productions of your society, then works produced by the "mainstream," or subversive works reabsorbed by the "mainstream," would be of lesser political value to your goal of eradicating anti-semitism.

Re: the bolded - Do you mean to say that the "mainstream" includes every work that doesn't send a "disruptive political message", regardless of origin?
 

ICUP

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(No, this isn't a thread about hipsters.)

I've recently read a book on movies that described certain directors as "commercial", and I began thinking... Does everything that is popular or "mainstream" - however you might define the word - by definition un-progressive, whitewashed, "dumbed down", non-inclusive, "safe", or whatnot? Does something getting popular signal the meggido of its individuality/originality/convention-defying?

IDK, for the most part, this society has become about commercialism and not-about intellectual pursuits for the sake of creation. I don't find much of anything being created today to be important in the grand scheme of things, although there are some artists here-and-there who will never become mainstream because their creations have no appeal there and never could. Some of these are quite great, but only great to people who notice them and understand. They don't become recognized as "best guitarist" by Time Magazine, so they must not be. :huh:
When anything is made-for-most-anyone, sure, it's going to be dumbed-down.
And does liking "mainstream" stuff say anything about you?

I think, however, that anyone can like mainstream things temporarily, or just "for fun", shits-n-giggles, while realizing how retarded it really is.

I don't consider myself anti-mainstream. I don't consider myself an elitist. I just think mainstream stuff sucks, that it's made for someone who is apparently not me. I would rather be doing something else that satisfies me. Sometimes I entertain it just out of boredom, and because it's fun to be social with other people who like it. It can be fun sometimes, but it definitely does not define me in any way.
 

DiscoBiscuit

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(No, this isn't a thread about hipsters.)

I've recently read a book on movies that described certain directors as "commercial", and I began thinking... Does everything that is popular or "mainstream" - however you might define the word - by definition un-progressive, whitewashed, "dumbed down", non-inclusive, "safe", or whatnot? Does something getting popular signal the meggido of its individuality/originality/convention-defying?

And does liking "mainstream" stuff say anything about you?

(Sorry if this is poorly articulated, I'm eager to clarify stuff if you ask.)

Hell and no.

The misconception here is that broadly popular movies, music, books and TV are necessarily motivated almost exclusively by commercial concerns, and that "indie" (or substitute the similar adjective of your choice) efforts are motivated almost exclusively by aesthetic concerns. This is preposterous.

There are certainly mainstream works that are crassly created and marketed to a specific audience solely for financial rewards. Mostly garbage for children. But there are also consistently and massively popular artists who are universally recognized to have artistic and aesthetic merit, and who were popular right away instead of waiting to be recognized by history. (A short list includes Alfred Hitchcock, Steven Spielberg, Christopher Nolan, Tim Burton, Stephen King, J.K. Rowling, Mark Twain, William Shakespeare, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, and Led Zeppelin to name just a very few.) It's absurd to me that the work of these artists and many like them could be considered dumbed-down, impersonal, or without value because they are mainstream. Who would argue that they aren't concerned with the aesthetic and personal quality of their work? Isn't it instead possible or even likely that the market flocks to good work at least as often as the work is calibrated to pacify the market?

Likewise, very few artists set out to lose money. Indie filmmakers, writers and musicians certainly do care about the aesthetic quality of their work. But nobody sets out to sell 100 records or play in an arthouse cinema for one week. Every artist wants their work to be seen. Rather, it's the fans of such work who romanticize the fact that it's not massively popular. It allows them to set themselves apart and imagine that they have discerning tastes possessed by only a few. The actual aesthetic quality of the work in this case is of little consequence and rather beside the point.

There is bad work that is massively popular and good work that is largely ignored. But to generalize that something lots of people enjoy is necessarily compromised (bad) while something almost no one enjoys is necessarily vital (good) is not only obviously counterintuitive, it's also glib and facile. What's wrong with making things people like?
 

Orangey

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Okay, let's say that I get teary-eyed whenever I watch Edward Scissorhands (the book I read said Burton was a "commercial" movie director, so I assume Edward Scissorhands is "mainstream"). Does that make me a sucker? Or an enabler? Or an ISFJ (I kid, I kid! ;))?



Re: the bolded - Do you mean to say that the "mainstream" includes every work that doesn't send a "disruptive political message", regardless of origin?

No, I was referring to the fact that anything not disruptive is by definition complicit. Anything made for and by the "mainstream" is complicit, so I used it as an example. I guess I forgot to use e.g. instead of i.e.

Consuming and enjoying these "complicit" works does not say anything about the character of the individuals who consume and enjoy them, though, nor even of the individuals who make them; that is the hipster's/pretentious twats fallacy.
 

jimrckhnd

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It is probably useful to remember that much of what is now seen as classic arts or even works of genius were once very main stream. Think of much religious art in the middle ages and renaissance. Most of it was of course crap (but then most art probably is) but some of it has survived the test of time.
 

Viridian

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No, I was referring to the fact that anything not disruptive is by definition complicit. Anything made for and by the "mainstream" is complicit, so I used it as an example. I guess I forgot to use e.g. instead of i.e.

Consuming and enjoying these "complicit" works does not say anything about the character of the individuals who consume and enjoy them, though, nor even of the individuals who make them; that is the hipster's/pretentious twats fallacy.

On a personal note: part of my reasons for making this thread is that, not too long ago, I wanted to enjoy whatever I wanted to enjoy within my means, but... as I began studying the culture industry in my university (Adorno, Benjamin, the usual), I began to worry whether or not I was making a statement by buying a certain book or renting a certain movie, whether the sheer act was Progressive or Reactionary, Empowering or Disenfranchising, Good or Evil. Sounds a bit loony, but this stuff really gets to ya, y'know? :unsure: I just know I don't want to be an accomplice to oppression.

Also, [MENTION=325]EffEmDoubleyou[/MENTION], thanks for the response. I can see what you mean. :)
 

Rhath89

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In terms of the artistic nature of things in question, anything that starts becoming seen or heard just because "everyone else" is doing it, is mainstream and is worth evaluating, not all things that are mainstream are bad, but a majority of it can be questionable in its artistry. A mainstream band that plays and sings songs mostly written for them by others cannot, in my mind, be considered as performing artists, but simply performers.
 
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