THIS FUCKING COUNTRY: Rolling UK cultural pessimism

the new 80s as you've probably heard, thatcher reborn, diana ready for a revive in the 2k11 and the kids are finding their aldermaston. i don't really want to think about what fucking shit will soundtrack britain's return to feudalism, but the more insidious effects should be worth noting.

a sign of the new shitness is a sort of cultural flattening, where yr trad alt/left signifiers, because old, have little power to disturb the current orthodoxy - cf cameron and his love of the smiths. the slide towards political degeneracy is effaced either by a lack of avowed interest in politics -- the best tories are surely too cynical to bother -- or a general disavowal where an old etonian can start a thatcher themed nightclub and pretend it's purely neutral kitsch, like lol thatcher, a sort of chillwave for the sloaney set.

the worst aspect is probably the coarsening of all public discourse and the convergence of public school humour with lewd proletkult - cf cameron publically making joeks about wayne rooney fucking prostitutes, or to a lesser degree osborne's 'sarkozy box'. it's enough to make you nostalgic for high toryism; however risible, there is a strange dignity in not knowing who gazza or the beatles are. even the more generic thatcher/tebbitt philistinism has a kinda integrity to it, but the next gen will find a way to be worse.

So this isn't just the 'moving right show'; this is a much more pernicious amalgamation of the disparate strands of British culture into a formless miasma found in synecdoche via a cursory glance at the terrestrial television pages and their dwindling variety.

I think, conversely, that the new generation will rise against this and not stand for it. Those who grew up with the internet are going to be intrinsically aware that new British defaults are not an ideal cultural norm but the desperate lowest-common-denominator graspings of an elite which perceives its pathetically narrow limitations under increasing threat from a skeptical and disobedient public.

I think that there will be a massive fucking cultural war in this country, and I know who's going to win. We are. If politicians aren't going to espouse high rhetoric and standards of taste, then the people will do it for them. Jody McIntyre in that BBC interview spoke with more eloquence, reason and dignity on a relevant political issue than any politician I've heard in a long time. People like him will speak for Britain, not Cameron or his cunt leech retinue.

i guess maybe we've 'moved right' [via The Great Moving Right Show II: The Kirsty and Phil Years]

ha xpost

i think this government is dreadful but im afraid i don't think the apocalypse started in may

and also, though he's brave and the police are terrible, i don't think jody macintyre was that good, in the interview i saw him do (not the famous one)

I don't really care whether Cameron likes The Smiths or cracks jokes about Rooney. It was inevitable that toryism would eventually get round to coopting popular culture. I don't necessarily think the next gen will find a way to be worse. The next gen is protesting, and it is the first protesting gen in quite some time. I find that refreshing.

haha this title's better but I'm glad you've actually linked it - good discussion there, although this one's more about the struggle with banality than any direct political-climate adjustment

xps

I think that there will be a massive fucking cultural war in this country, and I know who's going to win. We are

Hey, save it for the Rolling UK cultural optimism thread.

this is the thread where we collect examples of this country being fucking shit that probably would have happened regardless of cleg'ron

then in five years time, the entire cultural landscape is like, really fucking bad and we can assume there is some conditioning involved

hmm, feel this *is* a bit like 'the great moving right show' (which IS a good title, louis, coz it's a callback to another fine social-cultural-political commentator)

the moving rightward thread is great btw, worth a full read

I stood in the middle of the Barbican yesterday, and for a moment, you could feel the moment of what was being grasped for and yet looking at the maps typeset in univers and an 'identical map' set in arial, you could see how it was all lost…with the city of london signage in its Prisoner-esque font, I looked up to the concrete towers and whispered: 'do you remember?'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U4dwEo0Oudw

family members whining about EMA only being used to go on the piss and how they will have to pay 27k in fees, despite not realising they won't because they're already at university…"I'm alright Jack" taken to the extreme of 'fuck you, I want you to SUFFER!"…but the kids - out on the street and protesting - the blair babies discovering their social conscience making me smile after our generation turned into thatcherkids.

and fuck the new K9…obviously.

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41MSE4NBZEL._SL500_AA300_.jpg

sorry but seriously, don't get into this mindset.

Everyone here is O T M.

local garda just doesn't understand the essential decency of the white man's culture

how many selfish cunt videos does u gotta embed before the irishman recognises meta

itt i guess i have to be english

i've been watching the protesters' videos a bit today, and that didn't cheer me up, but i don't think it's a flash in the pan and billy bragg might be right that they won't turn into purist, swp-type... god i seem to be using the c-word a lot at the moment

don't need to say any more.

hmm, feel this *is* a bit like 'the great moving right show' (which IS a good title, louis, coz it's a callback to another fine social-cultural-political commentator)

regarding the title, well yeah your one's a great reference and a cool title but it lacks a certain bluntness - and yeah I think this title has its drawbacks as well (i.e. I plan to be odiously optimistic here until nakhchivan relents and learns the bongos)

(although even hippy signifiers are I'm sure within the gizzard of contemporary Toryism somehow)

god i seem to be using the c-word a lot at the moment

― ohhhh we plop champagne (history mayne), Thursday, 16 December 2010 00:44 (1 minute ago)

this is what this thread is about

the entropy of ~learned~ political discourse into fuck this shit / fuck these cunts

the irish do this better tbf -- the wry apocalypticism of yr erudite irish drunk has nothing to do with pofaced sassenach coffee table CRAP TOWN / RUBBISH BLOODY BRITAIN shit, and local garda's tone deafness is a damn shame

nakhchivan the world will disappoint u

except it won't because the level of political discourse among BRITISH YOUNG is as high as it's ever been, and getting higher. you need to get yr wenger on dude

obv there's a heady melange of fuck these fucking cunts w/ a tincture of rational policy scrutiny and farsightedness but atm a thorough and wholly-merited blunt-force objection is what's required. although I feel Round One is already ended and we're back in the red corner taking stock

i know the obvious gag is that ahhh morrissey is actually rly conservative/racist, but the cameron-smiths thing *is* weird. sure, morrissey is/was conservative, but the world he wanted to return to was quite different from cameron's, and im not even sure cameron *is* a conservative, but a radical. and it doesn't matter either, none of this stuff has ever had any real-world consequences. cf people handwringing about the lack of protest music. the only point of protest music is to stop you listening to music and do something else. and we're not returning to anything, including feudalism, so far what the students and young'uns have been trying to defend is all quite new too.

like, obv, it's far from a foregone conclusion that simpering hayekite dicks like osborne are going to be worse than the ghouls of thatcherism, but we'll pretend it itt so we can feel good about feeling bad, you know, just as the stooges only wrote about the bad trips

caught in a bad political romance [via schmitt/gaga]

except it won't because the level of political discourse among BRITISH YOUNG is as high as it's ever been, and getting higher. you need to get yr wenger on dude

― schlomo replay (acoleuthic), Thursday, December 16, 2010 12:56 AM (2 minutes ago) Bookmark

is this true? ('high as it's ever been' isn't necessarily praise, but how are they doing? i want to believe.)

and im not even sure cameron *is* a conservative, but a radical

notwithstanding that he's at the left-edge of his party (this isn't quite true I think) - do you mean policy-wise?

gonna be the positivist voice of the thoreau-readin' yoof itt iirc

mayne it's a natural consequence of the first tory govt since the internet became a thing but yeah I'm seein' signs - long way to go mind

anyway hopefully we'll get some googlers here altho how they'll cope with our hyperevolved ilxpolari is yet to be seen amirite

as tony judt says, it's the left that needs to be conservative these days. 'radical' isn't a term of approbation (though it's routinely used as such).

i know the obvious gag is that ahhh morrissey is actually rly conservative/racist, but the cameron-smiths thing *is* weird. sure, morrissey is/was conservative, but the world he wanted to return to was quite different from cameron's, and im not even sure cameron *is* a conservative, but a radical. and it doesn't matter either, none of this stuff has ever had any real-world consequences. cf people handwringing about the lack of protest music. the only point of protest music is to stop you listening to music and do something else. and we're not returning to anything, including feudalism, so far what the students and young'uns have been trying to defend is all quite new too.

― ohhhh we plop champagne (history mayne), Thursday, 16 December 2010 00:59 (2 minutes ago)

smiths/cameron is only weird if u think about it, which you oughn't.....and i guess cameron himself didn't even in the 80s, it's the exclusive preserve of the very finest scions of the upper-upper mid to sing along with their would be executioners cuz their inbuilt confidence knows it's never gonna happen

protest music has, afaik, always been shit -- if it isn't shit, it isn't protest music

however, u do gotta feel some respect for the smiths et al, for just being good and popular and vaguely aesthetically troubling to mnstrm sensibilities

as tony judt says, it's the left that needs to be conservative these days

for sure the British Left needs unity above all other things, and splintering or driving wedges won't help a soul

this is the most radical tory govt of the postwar, def

yeah well the previous ones were allowed to be openly racist and whatnot so there's been 'progress' but I still think this one is a tarted-up, dumbed-down excuse to keep the people in divided bondage

the people gonna say no tho

tory radicalism is not about 'ideas', it's merely a quantitative diseasing of the state, 50% more creative destruction than thatcher (who came to an arrangement with at least some of the postwar settlement)

jeff nuttall on thatcher's arts policy is a thermonuclear warhead of indignant hatred (dude wd have strangled saatchi in public given the chance); were he alive today I'd shudder to think what he'd say

but elaborate, please!

I mean, I don't dispute what you say, I just want the details in print :)

yeah but thatcher didn't hate the arts cuz they cost a lot, she hated them for the lulz, or cuz they were patronized by the wrong sort

a green and pleasant land: akabusian positivism and the uk's diy protest movement of the 2010s

by lj phd

kip, ppl

haha yeah thatcher LOVED the arts coz they cost a lot

gal had integrity

:/

also lol akabusian, wd say more philippa forrester

had my 8 year-old self been aware of and non-repulsed by WS etc

seealsokatyhill

the jeff nuttall i've read(in the great 'bomb culture') wouldn't have been favoured by any state 'arts policy' -- in film, at any rate, the thatcherite 1980s were actually extremely favourable for snobbish, amateurish douchebees like derek jarman. it was the blair era that was compliant.

ekow eshun 4eva

ICA / CIA

IT WAS AN INSIDE JOB

BFI / FBI OMG FUCK

bfi existed first! (1933 vs 1935)

trufax: my best friend and I had drinks tonight at the BFI bar. who knew mulled cider was that good. shit's gonna power the mass consciousness shift yknow

sadly our table was bugged and ralph waldo emerson's collected works are being toothcombed by a menk in a bunker seeking possible links to terrorist factions

srsly

this is not an lj liveblog

this is not a walk in the sunlit uplands

this is celine 1945

this is the rectal prolapse of norman lamont

this is kirsty splicing a fruitknife into phil's retina

this is the living fucking end

cultural pessimism or gtfo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYIvOpJTTnQ

The Smiths' The Queen Is Dead is an anthem for our times
Jon Savage on song: The student protests of recent weeks have brought to mind the Smiths' 1986 state-of-the-nation address, which still rings proud in its portrayal of what it feels like to be an outsider

Blur's Dave Rowntree: 'David Cameron's not a real Smiths fan

i have to disagree- ant and dec have never pushed me towards desire for sobriety

Take Me Out is fucking great.

― Y Kant Torres Red (Noodle Vague), Saturday, 12 February 2011 18:20

It really truly is.

yeah the guy who is so furious all he can do is DANCE

shit wrong thread sorry

Take me out is awful, i can't believe people are watching this!

Even worse though is "comedy rocks", haven't seen anything this bad for a while.

# Student stabbed to death
# Growing Fears Over 'Unfair' Spending Cuts
# 'Family' found dead in a house
# Cameron: Big Society Not A 'Cover' For Cuts
# Electrical Cable Removed After Horse Deaths
# Dying teenager plans own funeral

?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-12442612

Hull City Council has informed the Hull Music Service that it is proposing to cut its funding to the service by 100% next year.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_U7XTRiOyOGA/SMPRAAzxIJI/AAAAAAAAA4M/y4Jn7Hepiz0/s320/IMG_1550.JPG

A sparrow on a shovel?

doesn't matter

Hull City Council has informed the Hull Music Service that it is proposing to cut its funding to the service by 100% next year.

― Y Kant Torres Red (Noodle Vague), Sunday, 13 February 2011 15:03 (1 hour ago)

lol they might has well have gone for a nultish 110%

This city is about to go into meltdown imo, flagship Lib Dem council showing out for their Tory paymasters.

Flagship torpedoed amidships

We are very slack with our moral codes for children these days. Nowadays, children find it laughably amusing to shoplift and steal.

"In Ethiopia... you might find a seven-year-old expected to take 15 goats out into the fields for the whole day with only a chapati to eat and his whistle. Why are we so afraid to give our children responsibilities like this?"

Whereas she used to find it laughably amusing to dring voddy and be an old slapper. In her TV acting job, granted....

Because you can't give a child a whistle as it contains small parts, thanks to safety conscious etc...

That's one of the most ideologically confused rants I've seen in some time.

If my recollections of old issues of Viz are correct I don't think Joanna Lumley should be using the word 'slack' to describe anyone else

Nowadays, children find it laughably amusing to shoplift and steal.

Well, at least they're doing it with a smile on their face and a twinkle in their little eyes

Laughably amusing. As opposed to Seriously amusing, yeah...

Until you can prove you can add up on your fingers or think independently in your head, you have learnt nothing

Thinking outside your head not enough for Britain's foremost intellectual J. Lumley.

Reminds me of this classic from Sweden:

http://www.lytes.se/wp-content/uploads/2007/09/barntillverkat.thumbnail.jpg

Q:
1) Do you care about whether the goods you buy are manufactured by children?
2) Do you do anything to check whether they are?

A2:
1) Yes, children have no feel for quality, it shows in the products.
2) No.

oh so that's where the word "bairn" comes from

hmmm!
http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5018/5489251752_166e7fbdf2.jpg

its the american spelling

NV, a lot of Geordie language comes from there, yep.

xpost, it's in the uk though.

xxp no that would be 'centerz'

its the canadian spelling

barn

A Scandinavian word I knew thanks to Norwegian punks Kjøtt, whose best song opens with the words "is there anything uglier than royal children?" (fins det noe styggere enn kongebarna?)

(I have no idea why I'm posting this but eh)

"There was one 'crime' during the whole time I was at school, when a fountain pen went missing. Stealing just didn't happen."

Still pissed off that she didn't get to hang with the cool kids.

NV, a lot of Geordie language comes from there, yep.

Danelaw, etc...

Lumley was educated at St Mary's Convent School in St Leonards-on-Sea, East Sussex

I'm totally sure that this place is now a hotbed of youth crime.

You went without your fountain pen at your peril!

Makes for a nice shiv, iIrc.

"Bairn" is Old English though, and not exclusive to the North East of England

Bairn" is Old English though, and not exclusive to the North East of England

My bad. I always assumed it derived from a Viking source but the word's vitality in the North and Scotland may stem from the fact that the cognate in Norse/Danish is so similar.

Scot and northern English a child
[Old English bearn; related to bearm lap, Old Norse, Old High German barn child]

lots of viking influence along ne english / scottish coasts

Well, yeah, but that's not how the word ended up here

Makes for a nice shiv, iIrc.

The pen is mightier than the shiv?

Ah, "Shiv" now...

... actually I've just realised that good Scottish word "chib" must be from "shiv"!

Yup.

Etymology
First attested 1665–1675, probably from Romani chiv (“blade”).

On the other side of this axis sits an opera house designed by another British architect: Zaha Hadid. This angular building has been particularly challenging to deliver and is Zaha Hadid’s first opera house – her competition-winning design for Cardiff was spat out by the locals and never built. The opera house looks like two angular stones washed up on the river bank.

http://lh4.ggpht.com/_bJLcML1b9aM/TUcqslFSCdI/AAAAAAAAD8c/_242bV1k_zA/guangzhou%20opera%20house_zaha%20hadid%2009%5B3%5D.jpg

do these ppl WANT to be seen as provincial no-marks? so instead of hadid the good people of wales got a huge fuck-off slab of echt blairite proletshite to call their own instead

http://i.imgur.com/7xeQL.jpg

LOL, good choice Welsh people

town planners / local govt / tinpot nationalist keeping up their rep for narrow mindedness and aesthetic bankruptcy

aaaargh my eyes

'Welcome to the Opera
 Shopping Centre'