(Somewhat) Unnecessary Creating

This time, it’ll be short.  I’m generally a long-form kind of guy.  Not because I think I am worthy of more of your time.  No.  I just don’t know how to convey my ideas in short, but effective, bursts.  I admire those who can.  It is an art.

Anyway, I have projects to finish, so I have to keep it brief.  Writing a long piece is satisfying in some ways but exhausting in others, for me and also for you, I think.  None of that today.

Rain, Steam and Speed by J.M.W. Turner, 1844

I’m going to donate the extra time that comes with writing a shorter post to some unnecessary creating, design stuff probably.  Todd Henry talks about the importance of unnecessary creating at the Accidental Creative.

He explains it better than I do, but here’s my take: it’s about creating stuff for the celebration of the thing itself, whether or not doing so has any long-term benefits.  Now that I think about it, that’s what gets me excited about writing and sketching and playing with videos and graphics, when I’m not worried about finding work or gaining respectability or finding validation.

It’s my small way of being a little less corporate today.  I’m going to play with stuff that I don’t have to do in a strictly business sense, but on the other hand, it’s something I absolutely need to do.  Do you know what I mean?

How to Avoid Being a Corporate Artist

(Normally, I aim to do updates every Saturday, but this is a subject that means a lot to me, and it took me a little longer to get things right, or as close to right as I could manage.  Sorry about that. The length is also a little longer, so you can get the main ideas from the words in bold if you prefer.)

A corporate artist is not an oxymoron. It’s what a creative-minded person can become when he or she pursues fame, money, or passing fads instead of the deepest things in his or her heart. That’s a tragic thing, but sadly it’s not an uncommon occurrence.

At its best, art inspires and enlightens.  It helps us understand each other, and it reveals the problems in our societies and the evil in ourselves.  A great piece of art encourages us to do and dream great things that are worthy of its company.   That’s why it makes me sad to see creative types become corporate artists who screw up the world in uniquely monstrous ways.

Plumbers do important work that requires training and specialized knowledge, but I’ve never a met a plumber who  puts his soul on display when fixing the sink.  (Perhaps there is such a plumber out there, and if he exists, I’d love to watch him work.)  In contrast, artists I admire, whether musicians, actors, writers, or painters, captivate me by putting at least a sliver of their souls into their work. It’s hard enough to show that part of yourself to the world, but it’s even harder to do when faced with potential rejection, criticism, and exploitation that comes with the territory.   If you think this is easy stuff, try going to work completely naked, and do your job while everyone else stays fully clothed.

Ballet Class by Edgar Degas

I’m not trying to be provocative.  There is a point to the nudity.  It is not gratuitous, and so it meets my criteria for use here.  (I apply the same criteria when considering the merit of nudity in art.  It’s like Madeleine L’engle writes in her book Walking on Water, “A painting of a nude body can glorify the wonder of incarnation, or it can titillate and degrade.”  With that said, dear Hollywood friends, you don’t tend to err on the side of wondrous incarnation very often, so be careful.)

Anyway, I believe we were meant to live in harmony, with our hearts naked and exposed to each other. They were once naked in the Garden of Eden, were they not?   There was nothing to hide from each other, so Adam and Eve could be themselves without hiding behind lifeless, corporate facades.

Good artists do what they can to slowly nudge us back toward the harmonious state of being that was once found in the Garden. But it is hard to live with an open heart, whether professionally or just in general.  Try sharing that light long enough, and some vultures and villains are sure to notice it, and they’ll try to stomp it out or consume it for their own selfish ends.  There’s a real risk that these dark forces, whether outside or inside a person, will turn an artist corporate.

Take another look at the painting above.  Look at how lovely the ballerinas are, but the dark gentleman on the right isn’t very interested in their overall beauty.  He’s a little more preoccupied with a certain part of the ballerina’s body.  His compatriot in the picture doesn’t appear to be much more noble.  Note also the disturbing blotches of black that frame the dancers, trapping them in their confined space.  When these kinds of dark forces infect artists, they corrupt them and turn them into horrific variations of Britney Spears, who is perhaps the ultimate corporate artist.

Yes, Britney is a talented dancer, she looks hot, and she’s making a lot of people a lot of money, so what the hell is wrong with that, right?

I’ll tell you.  Instead of helping me better perceive truth and beauty, corporate artists like Britney Spears try to sell me on sex, popularity, and mass produced sounds and movements. I get a cheap thrill, but each time I indulge I’m trading against the possibility of future lasting happiness with a girl who has character, who doesn’t sell everything  to anyone who will make her famous.  You see, the more I listen to Britney Spears, the less convinced I am that there are still attractive girls with integrity out there.  That’s why I’ve stopped listening to Britney Spears.

It’s so easy for us in general and for artists in particular to do things just to validate our egos or to scratch a burning impulse or to overcompensate for insecurities. I’m just as guilty as anyone of that kind of thing.  When I treat a lady like she’s a mere source of physical gratification, I am taking away something from her that she could better enjoy with a man who truly loves her.  Maybe she’ll never get married, or maybe her future relationships won’t be as sweet because of the way I used her up.

Whatever the case may be, I’m ripping the social fabric, the unseen threads that keep our society cohesive, when I act only to satisfy myself.  With the wrong focus and the right circumstances, I too could become the ultimate corporate artist, but that’s not something I want to be.  Knowing that is half the battle.

I don’t want to come up with a list of dos and don’ts for art.  I’m just asking artists to stop making decisions just to make more money, build up street cred, or do anything for the sake of doing work.  Instead, dare to build a career by bringing the depths of your heart to light. I’m not arguing that every piece of art has to be full of eternal meaning.  There is a place for light romantic comedies, singable pop songs, well choreographed dance routines, scary films, and mystery books.  Still, all of these things can be presented using good taste within the context of a moral universe, or they can be built out of a narasistic, chaotic framework that is filled with pandering to the basest human instincts. William Shakespeare, Edgar Allan Poe, and Alfred Hitchcock could convey a moral universe even when exploring darkness.   Can you?

When you undertake whatever creative ventures you pursue, dare to stand for something.  Just because so many modern artists mistake vulgarity, cheap thrills, and chaos for artistic technique doesn’t mean you have to go along with that.

I don’t mind profanity when used with restraint to make a point, but if you use it in every other sentence, I start to suspect that you are compensating for a limited vocabulary.

Also, Grace Kelly never did a super-skank stripper movie for the sake of getting more exposure to new audiences, or for proving herself as an actress, or for whatever the preferred PR phrase is these days.  I think she still did OK for herself, don’t you?  She was attractive, but she maintained a sense of class, and that is much more alluring, much more sexy, than any of the shiny, transparent strings and sequins posing as clothes that the mass-produced Britney clones wear these days.

I’m sorry ladies and gentlemen, but you can’t be everything to everyone. A writer may get acclaim for writing both family dramas and perverse sex books, but to me he is no longer someone with enough integrity to avoid writing a reprehensible book.  He’s just a corporate climber, doing anything for more money, power, and fame just like everyone else, and that will make me less likely to buy his next book.

Again, I don’t object to depictions of vice in art as long as the depiction is not the gratitious, glamourized selling point of the production.   There are prostitutes, thieves, and murderers even in the Bible, but they don’t get the glamour girl treatment, now do they? Context and purpose behind depicted vice can make all the difference.

The folks who come in to see your self-loathing play or art exhibit probably won’t know that you’ve been trying to get a break for months and months, or that you were going through a difficult divorce when you wrote that ultra-violent misogynistic film.  All they know is that they worked hard all week, faced their own difficulties, and gave you some of their money and/or time so that they could be entertained, inspired,  enlightened, or engaged by what you have to offer.  Do you really want to be the one who demoralizes them, with a reprehensible role in a reprehensible production just because you were desperate to get whatever work you could get? Is that really what you want your legacy in this world to be?

I can’t tell you what you should and shouldn’t do with your art.   You have to listen to your own conscience for that kind of thing.  But don’t be so selfish and so corporate as to not take into account how your “art” will affect other people. If a plumber’s shoddy work caused physical injuries to others, we would ask him to make amends, or we’d put him out of business.  And yet if an artist’s work strains the social fabric by encouraging infidelity and violence against the innocent, while driving people away from their God-given sense of dignity and faith , we smile and talk about the bold artistic choices involved.   That’s nonsensical corporate talk, worse than the stuff that comes out of the most corporate of meetings.

I used the word “Being” in the title instead of “Becoming” or something altogether different, because you can stop being one thing as soon as start being something else.   Just like anyone can choose to become a corporate arist by thinking only about themselves and their money and fame, anyone, even Britney Spears can choose to start being a true artist who creates from the heart and does so out of love for others.

America was once a land that inspired others with the noble sentiments found in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. Now we send the world works of hateful bloodlust, porn designed as story, and vulgarity masquerading as art.  Let’s fight to change that.  If you’re an artist, then make meaningful stuff.  If you talk about art, don’t celebrate reprehensible stuff just because it’s popular. Together, we can make the world a less corporate, and a more beatiful, more harmonious place.

Why I’ll Vote for John McCain

(This post is unusually long, so sorry about that, but sometimes you can’t say everything that needs to be said with a few fun catch phrases. Look for key words in bold to find topics of interest if you don’t wish to read the whole thing.)

Believe it or not, I have wrestled with whether or not I should or shouldn’t write this post in particular and whether I should or shouldn’t publicly discuss politics in general. After all, politics can be a polarizing subject, and I’m not immune to the passions it can stir up. Recently, I’ve had to apologize to a few people for the things I said within a political discussion. I will do best to be civil this time, so I hope that you’ll at least give me the benefit of the doubt before dismissing everything I have to say.

Since I often think with a designer mentality, I do care about what the user experience is like for my readers, and I’m sure that many readers who like design, authenticity, and a less corporate existence may disagree with me. Beyond that, as someone trying to make a living by being creative, I’m not exactly advancing my career by taking a position that goes against what most industry professionals think.

from flickr.com/respres

But, part of the function for this blog is to argue that there are more important things in life than just advancing a career. To do everything for the sake of career advancement or profit or hipness is corporate thinking, and if I can’t avoid that kind of thing when there are stakes involved, then I shouldn’t waste time writing here.

I’m not an angry left-wing blogger or a shiny celebrity, so I’m not going to throw around swear words, insults, or cheap accusations at my opponents, but I do think it is important to speak up in a respectful but firm way about what I believe.   In our world where almost every public figure feels compelled to tell us how to think, keeping quiet about politics means offering implicit consent, and that is not something I can do.

I may lose some readers and job opportunities as a result of my position.  Since creative jobs are already scarce enough, that’s a big deal. On a lighter note, I’m probably also hurting my chances of making out with the Obama girl or making it into the inter circles of the celebrity-of-the-month’s entourage.  Oh man, how will I live? [long, contemplative pause] … I will find a way.

Before going further, let me mention that I am an independent who leans right, but I don’t identify with either party anymore. I am not trying to suggest that the Republicans are always right while the Democrats are always wrong. I am only writing to explain why I believe the McCain ticket is the better choice in this particular election.

I do respect Senator Obama as a person, and I acknowledge that he’s a graceful speaker, but I believe that John McCain and Sarah Palin are better suited at resisting evil and guiding us through these troubled times. Follow along and I’ll explain.

Let’s consider a popular but misguided idea that hipster Democrats dish out: namely that anyone who values a strong military does so out of fear. I imagine that these types have a secret urge to draw up a chalkboard with love on one side and fear on the other and suggest, in Donnie Darko style, that enlightened souls should move from fear to love and avoid violence in the process. Nothing wrong with avoiding fear and choosing love, but it’s too simplistic.

There’s a difference between acting firmly with prudence and doing so with fear. Unfortunately, our popular culture doesn’t seem to understand the difference. When I rode my bike around in Boston, I locked it up when I’d go into a building. Why? Because I’m a racist? No, it’s because my bike’s actually been stolen before, so I don’t see any reason why I should make things easier for thieves. In the same way that a lock protects me from the baser impulses of the people around me, a strong military, used prudently, offers similar protection against the baser impulses of rival countries.

I’m not someone who believes that we should go to war at every opportunity, but I do believe it is important for us to stand firm in some matters, with force if necessary, if doing so allows us to preserve or expand freedom, opportunity and decency.

In John McCain, I see someone who has shown strong resolve in the face of conflict, whether it involved refusing to get released early as a prisoner of war, breaking with his own party on some prominent issues, or refusing to undermine the slow and steady progress in Iraq for easy political gain.

(We Americans have a wide range of thoughts on Iraq, and discussing whether or not we should have gotten involved is beyond the scope of this post. But at this point with the money we’ve spent and the lives we’ve lost, it would be a great tragedy if we left before bringing lasting improvement to the Iraqi people. John McCain acknowledges as much with his firm language about winning the war by stabilizing the region and then leaving when the job is done. Senator Obama doesn’t talk about achieving victory but about timetables for withdrawal. Here, McCain insists on achieving goals and doing good before exiting, while Obama talks about practical considerations and diplomacy in the region. The tougher, more principled stand comes from McCain.)

In general, I have not seen Obama take a strong stand when faced with conflict. He waited until it was politically expedient to distance himself from Rev. “God damn America” Wright, even though the Reverend had been saying similar things for years while Obama attended his church. As a member of the Illinois Senate, he voted present 130 times, which means he voted without taking a position one way or another.

In spite of his insistence on change, Obama has sponsored very little significant legislation, and only 3 of the bills he has sponsored in the Senate have been enacted. More troubling, when asked at what point babies get human rights at the Saddleback discussion, Obama responded that it “is above my pay grade” to answer. Not in your pay grade, Senator? I know you talk a lot about change, but that just sounds like more of the same positioning that politicians do to avoid taking a firm stand.

Speaking of which, I get a little disheartened by the way that the language for abortion is phrased in the context of a woman’s right and as something that makes it possible for an inconvenience to go away. Here’s what Obama said about abortion at the 2008 Democratic Compassion Forum at Messiah College Apr 13, 2008:

“People of good will can exist on both sides. That nobody wishes to be placed in a circumstance where they are even confronted with the choice of abortion. How we determine what’s right at that moment, I think, people of good will can differ.” Once again, ambivalence: a lack of a strong position one way or another. Contrast this with John Mcain who goes on record to say “at its core, abortion is a human tragedy” and that we’ve got to work at ending abortions as a society.

If we are going to insist on talking about a baby’s life in terms of woman’s rights, why should this stop at child birth? I mean, surely it is also within a woman’s right to enjoy Manhattans at lunch instead of paying for food to support the baby. Shouldn’t it also be a right for her to enjoy luxury items without having to take care of a child day after day? Why should her dreams, or those of the father for that matter, be burdened by another messy creature’s demands for food, shelter, and love?

Isn’t it time that we free ourselves from these past, oppressive traditions, and legalize child abandonment? What’s the problem as long as it’s done at government sanctioned disposal centers? A modest proposal indeed! No, let us do what we can to embrace life and avoid such a horrible future. Let us choose leaders who celebrate human life even when it’s not convenient to do. It’s hard to get sex, lust and passion right, but let us not degrade the value of human life as we struggle to deal properly with this challenging part of our lives .

So what about the economy? Yes things are kind of rocky right now. And yes, part of the problem was greed on Wall Street, but another part of the problem was due to the way Clinton-era Democrats encouraged lending organizations to make more subprime loans. These institutions were promised that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would cover the loans should the people default on them. As a result, citizens with poor credit history and low incomes were given loans that they couldn’t afford to pay back. (Read more about this under theLegislative changes 1992 heading here.)  Eventually the banking institutions wanted their money back, and when a lot of that money isn’t there to pay back, all kinds of things collapse.

We should take some measures to prevent this kind of thing from happening again, but in our concern let us not completely destroy our innovative economy in the process. We already have the second-highest tax rate in the world, so why raise it? Businesses give us jobs and innovations that improve our lives, and they let people take success into their own hands. (When was the last time you heard about the rights of the nobility in American society?) Yes, there are corrupt businesses just like there are corrupt people, but in our zeal to stamp out the corruption, let’s be careful not to also stifle innovation and incentives for success.

I don’t consider Obama to be a complete socialist, but his quote about “spreading the wealth around” does have historical connotations to socialism. Don’t believe me? Try searching the phrase “spread the wealth” on Wikipedia (or click here). Notice that a link for socialism is listed under the See Also heading. In other words it is just slightly less of a loaded phrase then something like, “soak the rich, and bleed the bourgeois, comrades!” Consider also that the National Journal found Obama to be the most liberal senator in 2007. Notably, Bernie Sanders, who is a self-described socialist, ranks number 4 on this list. So, Obama might not be an outright socialist, but he sure seems to talk and think a lot like people who are. And since Obama dramatically reversed his position on accepting public funds for his campaign, how can we be sure that he’ll keep his word about another financial matter, namely that he’ll cut taxes for anyone while expanding government programs?

Helping other people is important, but in a socialist society, the government decides how resources are redistributed.  Free economies, in comparison, allow individuals to choose the people and organizations to which they will give financial aid. Done properly, this kind of giving allows a healthy relationship to develop between the giver and the receiver. When the government becomes involved in wealth redistribution, it tends to separate the two, since giving isn’t done directly or by someone’s free will.  And so neither the giver nor the receiver fully benefit from the act of giving.

As to Sarah Palin, I don’t see her as liability. I see her as person of character, strength and inner goodness. Just because you’ve read a lot of books and can quote a lot of facts doesn’t mean you know how do what’s right or that you can effectively resist evil. I’ve had so many professors who were insanely book smart but absolutely dead inside. Sarah Palin isn’t like that. There’s an inner spark in her that gives her a certain magic and grace. Forget everything you’ve heard about her so far, and take another look with unbiased eyes. Then, maybe you’ll see what I’m talking about.

Please don’t misunderstand. I don’t write all of this with the belief that I am completely right, and whole, and good. I’m not. There are a lot of things that are crooked about me, but like Lestat de Lioncourt in Anne Rice’s Blood Canticle, I can recognize and admire goodness in others even as I acknowledge my own shortcomings.

Some people run from a goodness greater than themselves or try to muddy it into ugliness. (Perhaps this explains why there are so many derogatory Sarah Palin videos out there? Don’t get angry, folks. It’s just a thought about the unusual level of public viciousness toward a decent lady.) I am astounded by this goodness, and I want to do whatever possible to preserve it.

Like any country, we have our problems, but we are still, at our best, a noble country for good, one that openly debates problems, encourages innovation, embraces freedom, and shares compassion with the world. In these challenging times, we need leaders who will stand up for what’s right and lead with courage and decency. That’s why I’m voting for John McCain and Sarah Palin.

(OK folks, this post is already long enough, so I won’t respond to any comments here if any such comments should come. I will allow opposing positions but if you resort to degrading insults, I reserve the right to delete your comments. This will be a blog that features only civil discourse.)

Thank you for reading, and God bless.