On Giving a Shit

Don't do anything half-assed. Give a shit about what you do. I mean, c'mon.

This seems like a basic, after school or in school symposium speech, thing, but it doesn't seem like people give a shit.

This post, of course, arose from an incident. I love going to see movies, and I see about 30 every year in theaters. Unfortunately due to work, financial setbacks, and other factors I haven't been able to see any movies this month which, also unfortunately-for me at least, has led me to miss on some good movies like "Pina" and "Into the Abyss." Finally, after a long week, and an especially long day with unruly kids I received a nice paycheck and decided to see 'The Hunger Games' at the local cinema. This theater has always had issues with customers, going back to their inception. It seems to be run by wannabe turn-key operators, and consequently they've displayed a lack of concern. During the past few movies I've seen there, I have dealt with quality issues in particular with feedback. I dealt with it during 'Crazy Stupid Love.' I dealt with it during 'War Horse.' The picture quality is a bit low, but I can live with it. I, however, feel that if you pay money for something you should  receive good quality, regardless. During 'Hunger Games,' I didn't get that quality. I figured by a year they would've fixed the issue, but they didn't. I went to go get money back then. The manager, very reluctantly, gave me my money back and added "Well I guess you can pay $18 and see it in Gainesville."

Well, I will. Or I will pay $1.50 to Redbox or $8/month for netflix, or I will pay $5 for HD on Vudu.

Given the variety of options that come with seeing movies-rentals, instant queue, video on demand, you'd think that a movie theater would be appreciative of patronage, that the movie theater would care about the customers enough to ensure quality viewing to properly compete with the home viewing experience. If this were the case, the manager wouldn't have been snarky. He would have said, "Sir, I apologize for the quality and we'll work hard so your next viewing experience will be exceptional." If this were the case, there would not be a feedback problem, or it would've been fixed or the theater would wisely invest money in high quality instruments and equipment. If this were the case, they would say "even if we have to raise the price, it will be less expensive than driving to Gainesville, and people deserve quality." That's just it, though. Their mentality isn't that. Their mentality is "either give us money or pay more to drive to Gainesville." They know that people can't afford on a regular basis to go to Gainesville. They know that their quality might be substandard, that they might be able to cut corners, they might be able to charge a lot for concessions, that they can pick movies that they want rather than what an audience wants. "Don't like it, pay for the gas money to go to Gainesville." To hell with that, and to hell with this "don't like it, leave" mentality.

What happened to giving a shit about people? I'm not one to talk about how good things use to be, because I think that's primarily a load of shit. When you look at some things, you do see various circumstances that seem better. Like profit sharing; when a workplace made a profit, the profits were shared to all employees. The modern day equivalent of that is 401Ks, which do not provide exceptionally liquid assets (unless your 59 and a half), and can be a form of entrapment. Another example: Rich's. Rich's used to be a substantial retail store in the Southeast before being absorbed into Macy's. Rich's had this policy of allowing returns for a substantial time. They didn't care about losing money; they thought long term, and knew long term that keeping a customer was more vital for their business than a short term profit stemming from a purchase (I may need to blog about short term thinking versus long term thinking).

No less, in the case of the rant-and this is a rant out of frustration-I feel that the sense of entitlement that permeates in workplaces and businesses needs to cease. There's a great scene in the season 2 finale of Mad Men called "Meditations in an Emergency" where during the merger of Putnam, Powell, and Lowe meeting Duck Philips outlines his plan for Sterling Cooper, in bringing it to "financial maturity" by buying ad spaces, "the cheaper we can get it." Bert Cooper (the Objectivist of the group) is the one who says "I didn't hear the word 'client' once." This, of course, leads to Don Draper choosing to opt out of this vision because of his concern for clients and his job's duties in favor of the clients.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5N3OQklFEU

It seems as though the world has been taken over by the Duck Philips's of the world. People who don't give a shit about people, who are willing to do things half-assed so long as there are short-term profit gains and not take into consideration of long term.

Joe DiMaggio has a quote that I think is suitable for the topic of "giving a shit." When asked why he plays so hard, he said "There is always some kid who may be seeing me for the first time. I owe him my best." I think it is within our self-interests to always owe people our best and to give a shit. 

I will see 'Hunger Games' in Gainesville, by the way.

Am I a Bibliophile or a Snob? (A self-centered post)

The individuals I encounter who consider themselves bibliophiles will not stop reading a book once he or she starts, regardless of how bad.

I do not have this patience. I have dropped books as a few as 10 pages in and as far as 200 pages in because I no longer care.  

Here are my snobbish traits that will make bibliophiles cringe and my defenses.

1) I will stop reading a book after 50 pages. 

If a book cannot be interesting, compelling, whatever appropriate adjective in 50 pages it does not deserve to be read. 

2) To me, a book should ideally be within 300 pages, and should avoid being 500 pages. 

There's a quote by Elvis Costello, that "If you can't write a song in 3 minutes then you can't write" (that's more of a paraphrase). I feel there is some justification of this with Ockham's Razor, and in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Philosophy of Composition," where Poe puts forth the ideal prose work as being one that can be read within a single sitting for the "unity of effect." Like Poe, I feel a prose work loses its value and "unity of effect" after an extended period of time, often times becoming cluttered in unnecessary details and diluting dramatic action with filler. If William Faulkner, Julian Barnes, Kurt Vonnegut, and other writers can detail great insight into character under 300 pages (often under 200 pages), then most writers can. I do have exceptions, but they seem to be consistent in having a great deal of dramatic action (a la Harry Potter novels and Les Miserables). 

3) Great stories need to be dynamic

There should be a balance in great works. Reading a book shouldn't be the literary equivalent of listening to Metallica's 'Death Magnetic,' where the music is so loud that it loses it's dynamic qualities. Great literature shouldn't just be all aria and no recitative. 

4) I do not think there's something inherently wrong in not reading "Classics"

I won't lie; I do not like most 19th Century and early 20th Century English Literature. I tried reading 'Far from the Madding Crowd' by Thomas Hardy; at first it was mesmerizing to read Hardy's description of the English countryside, but he does this throughout the novel to the point where after 100 pages one says "I get it, England's beautiful. Move on." Likewise, if you read one Jane Austen book, you've read them all. Somewhat well to do but still not as rich women strive for independence and choice under the circumstances of dealing with deranged, possibly inbred, aristocrats and such. Make no mistake, it's good, but just read one and be done. Charles Dickens; melodramatic, forceful. Joseph Conrad; boring, boring, boring, racist, boring. Seriously, these are classics. Make no mistake, this period of this country has great works, like the Sherlock Holmes novels and 'Jane Eyre.' Yet, I hate seeing facebook posts with "100 Books You Should Read" listed and selected works that have been read, with this underlying pretension that you're supposed to read this. Reading is great; it enables one to become articulate, self-aware, culturally aware, and deeply critical thinkers. But a list like that is one heavily rooted in the Western Canon (ignoring Akutugawa, Lu Xun, Naghib Mahfuz, and others who are not in the Western Canon), and two asinine. There are several works of literature that can enable a person to be self-aware, and are not on that list. Roald Dahl can do that, so can Eric Carle. So can Neal Stephenson, William Gibson, Isaac Asimov, Jules Verne, Ursula Le Guin, and other scifi/fantasy/genre writers. So my personal list of "classics" would not be agreeable to this list of works that should be read. So screw that. 

Essentially I do not believe in the conventional pretension of developing into capable people, nor in the pretensions that you have to read this to be smart or know about this to not be a philistine. I'll discuss my theory of literature later, but ultimately I think this post legitimizes my snob status. 

On College

Peter Thiel, one of the co-founders of Pay Pal wrote about how the "We're in a Bubble, but it's not the internet. Thiel says it's higher education, in an interview which I will post here: http://techcrunch.com/2011/04/10/peter-thiel-were-in-a-bubble-and-its-not-the-internet-its-higher-education/.

Thiel is a highly intelligent individual, as the article describes a natural contrarian which seemingly seems unnecessary but this mindset has lead him to have a prescience that helped him avoid the dotcom and housing bubbles. This is old news, of course; this article came out in 2011 and I'm now writing about it. It is appropriate that I write about it now, however, because I am closing in on my first year from graduating from college. I have often thought about whether or not my college experience was worth it, especially since I'm a career switcher from my degree.

I agree with Thiel on several points. You don't need Stanford, Yale, or Harvard to become successful. You also shouldn't come into college with a mentality that once you graduate your ticket is set and you will come out earning $100K and have a house and kids. That's bull. You will struggle. You will have to work asinine jobs, earning barely enough. The future isn't bleak though.

The unfortunate thing is that majors in the social sciences and the humanities are saturated in markets that are predicated about scientific industry and service (ie those pesky business and science degrees that seem uncool). Also, we haven't truly developed a knowledge sector job market like other countries (who also have lesser populations). The truth of the matter is, real life sucks and college will not save you. You'll develop soft skills, and various mechanisms that will enable you to be apt critical thinkers for the job market, but businesses-especially now-want experience.

What we need to do isn't follow Thiel and believe college isn't necessary (he also graduated from Stanford and Stanford Law), but eliminate the stigma of not going to college. College isn't for everyone. This is pertinent in some people's minds when they look at a lot of internet and Silicon Valley billionaires who did not complete college a la Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and others. Also understand, though, that a lot of these individuals didn't need college, and also understand that many of the engineers behind the devices used and really the forefathers of the Computer age were college educated. Tim Berners-Lee innovated the "world wide web" and also went to Queens College, Oxford and now serves at MIT as a professor. Dennis Ritchie who helped pioneer C language and the Unix operating system went to another elitist school Harvard, and really anyone at Bell Labs and Texas Instruments were highly educated individuals who work 9 to 5 and were the opposite of Silicon Valley people.

I would like to know how many Apple employees are dropouts like Jobs and how many have advanced engineering degrees from top tier universities.

...

There's that great scene in 'Good Will Hunting' where Will is confronted by that elitist douche from Harvard about history, where the guy lifted his lines about agrarian economy in the 18th century from Gordon S. Wood. Though the Harvard guy is put in his (rightful) place the guy retorts to Will that while Will may have read the same books for less money that guy will be successful and Will will end up serving burgers.
Truth is, the Harvard guy is right. Will is too; there's nothing inherently special about the curriculum of a college or university that can't be done with really dedicated reading and home projects. The Harvard guy will get the better end of the stick (in real life) not because he learned anything more than Will. Thing is, Will's lazy. He doesn't really use his mathematics or academic knowledge for any end. That Harvard guy is someone who probably does; he's not hearing a professor talk about Gordon S. Wood, he's probably given the opportunities to work on major historical research because his professor is Gordon S. Wood's best friend.

College isn't about just going to class and eventually after four years of going to class getting a degree and winning at life. It's about using the resources that your college can afford through personnel to understand how be great at your field. Of course someone who just goes to Biology classes isn't going to find a job. If you go to UGA and major in Family and Consumer Sciences  and all you do is go to class, versus say someone who goes to a "lesser" college like Kennesaw State University and majors in Early Childhood Education and spends her time watching classes, works a job in childcare, and later student teaches at a school, you're not going to get a job probably before the latter individual. Remember those rednecks (or seemingly white trash) who didn't care about English or History and spent time talking about cars? Thing is, they went to trade school, picked up a trade like plumbing or refrigeration, and now they're earning $40K coming out with a two year or less degree. Why? Because they chose an opportunity to go to school that gives them practical experience.

Really, that's the problem with college. You shouldn't go to college without planning to work hard in non-curriculum based activities. The reason Harvard is so damn good isn't because they have an astonishing curriculum, it's because they have a really nice endowment. So if you want to be a journalist you can get the same knowledge of the field by going to wherever, but thing is if you go to Harvard you might be taught by someone who wrote for the New York Times, because Harvard can afford it. Hell, Harvard's newspaper is probably better than some professional newspapers, and that's what colleges can provide. They're Houses of Wisdom, and it's really up to you to maximum on its resources of people (both faculty and personnel) and other amenities. These opportunities are more fruitful and accessible through college. You can get them while  not going to college, but it is more difficult.

While Thiel is right, and ultimately is richer than I am, I don't completely agree with his "college is outdated" mentality. College and universities have a great utility, but it shouldn't be a stigma not to college. If you can make it without the resources of universities, more power to you. Just understand, nine times out of ten the Harvard guy is right.

I just hope that he would grow up to not be a douche.

Why My Favorite Guitarists Are Pricks

Look, I absolutely adore Dinosaur Jr. Their music is custom tailored to my taste in music with me having an interest in both their technical sonic elements (based on mutual influences) and an emotional, sometimes cathartic attachment to their songs. In particular, as a guitarist, I have an exceptional love for J Mascis (despite his hopeless interview chops). His guitar work has a healthy love of noise and feedback but he writes probably the most melodic solos by any guitarist and is far worthy of more attention.

Let me make it clear, however; J Mascis is a prick. So is Kevin Shields. So is pretty much anyone who plays a 100 watt amplifier.

Among guitarists there's a reverence for the 100 watt valve or tube guitar amplifier, especially Marshall Lead Series amps. Brian Bakker of Minor Threat and Bad Religion put as one of his "Ten Commandments of Punk Guitar" that the "holy grail" of guitar amps is the Marshall JMP 100 Watt. Jay Jay French of Twisted Sister once spoke in an interview for VH1's "Heavy: The Story of Metal" about how he turned his Marshall to 10 and was shortly after confronted by a woman working on her dissertation...four blocks down.

I sympathize with the woman.

In 2012 there's little to no reason to have a 100 watt valve amp. It's about this whole "yeah I'm a badass rockstar" mentality that really has no purpose. If you want to be heavy, you don't need volume; I'm in agreement with Roger Glover's statement "Heavy is attitude, not volume." Of course Deep Purple were one of the most notorious abusers, but they were from a different era.

In Deep Purple's era, there was a need for loud amps; as venues began to grow, there grew a need to develop stupidly loud amps like the Marshall 100W Lead or retroactively referred to the Marshall 1959, as well as other amps from Sound City (later Hiwatt) and Sunn 0))). Thing is, PA systems weren't as plentiful as they are now. How lacking were they? Well a subpar vocalist named Ozzy Osbourne who was batshit crazy was given the opportunity to sing in Black Sabbath (nee Earth) purely on the fact that he owned a PA system. Under any other circumstances he'd never be a vocalist for anyone on the level of Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler, but as Tony Iommi would recall the band couldn't get gigs unless they had a PA system. Iommi of course played a Laney 100W.

If you look at some of the old concert clips in the late 1960s and 1970s, you'll see that many bands didn't have mics on the amps, simply because that wasn't something that was done. That sort of stuff was expensive back then. Now, that's not the case. Most venues in 2012 have their own PA systems, and can mic amps. Having a stack of amps is consequently overkill, just an overindulgence reflecting this "I'm a badass rockstar" mentality. As someone who worked in mixing, I think anyone who uses a 100 Watt valve amp is a prick. I mean really?

For those who don't geek out over amps like I do, tube amps are loud. How loud? Fucking loud. A 100 watt solid state amp is not as near as loud as a 30 watt tube amp (watch me be wrong on that). Tonally, I totally get a tube amp's value; because of vacuum tubes' natural impedance on high frequencies, they have a very nice soft sound, with overdrive or soft clipping. It truly makes a difference. Guitarists, however, don't need 100 watts of tube sound. For one, 100 watts is not that much louder than 50 watts. Secondly, watts doesn't equal tone. Jimmy Page rarely used Marshalls in the studio for Led Zeppelin recordings; he used smaller amps, like Valco which was an amp sold in hardware stores. Likewise Brian May of Queen didn't get his tone from his Vox AC30's; he used a homemade 1 watt amp that he plugged into larger amps. Two highly revered figures of heavy music, who created "Whole Lotta Love" and "Tie Your Mother Down," used small amps to get their tone.

That's where J Mascis and Kevin Shields come in. Many guitarists do use only one stack, and there are some like Jack White who merely frustrate their audio mixers because they turn it up. J Mascis and Kevin Shields believe in extremes and share a love of noise. Both of them choose to be sadists, and use not one but three stacks. The sound:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0GZH-lw_P4
I've never seen MBV live, but I have seen Dinosaur Jr live and was front row center. For a day, I did not have clear hearing. That was my fault. Even without being up front, it is an assault. J Mascis use three stacks fully mic'd, as well as a Fender amp. He even uses a Marshall Major, which is a 200 watt Lead Series model. When he put on distortion for "Severed Lips" it was like a pin striking your ear drum. Is it necessary? No, not to me at least.

I understand that a lot of people like loud, and that has lead to some unfortunate circumstances like the ridiculous loud wars in sound recording ('Death Magnetic' anyone?). What I wish is that people would come to understand that while volume counts, dynamic music counts just as much. From a mixer's point of view, and even a guitarist's point of view, it's a much better concert experience to be able to hear all the instruments and vocals rather than just sludgy sludge.

Wanna be a rockstar? Don't fork out $1500 for a 100W amp. Get a 30 watt amp, and learn to play your instrument well and how to get the right tone. A mixer will help you get the right volume.

Are We Living in 1912?

In 1912, people are fighting for safer food regulations, for better working conditions (including better pay, better hours, etc), for better oversight; yet, that fight doesn't seem to go on.

In 2012 we shouldn't have to worry about pink slime being in our beef. We shouldn't worry about the quality of our poultry or our meat. That was a problem in the early 20th century, as depicted by Upton Sinclair in his overrated muckracking work 'The Jungle.' Yet, since 2001 the USDA has allowed "lean finely textured beef" or pink slime into beef, legally. I much prefer Jon Stewart's term for the meat,  "ammonia-soaked centrifuge-separated byproduct paste." Now, chicken, which really has been almost monopolized by Tyson and their hormone injection saving methods, is facing its own predicament as the USDA is allowing chicken to be inspected LESS by Federal monitors and instead face inspection through their own plants. (To get more details, check out this article from 'The Atlantic': http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2012/04/toxic-chicken-is-the-new-pink-slime/255595/) This idea is straight out of the 19th and 20th Century; it stems from the idea that plants will be motivated to be accountable because it is within their self interest to keep chicken pure based on consumer demand and the marketplace; theoretically consumers will not buy chicken that is contaminated so corporations won't allow contaminate them. No! That does not work; that is why we instigated the USDA. That does not realistically work; want evidence? Look at the early 20th century.

The same is going for working hours and working conditions. Granted, because of OSHA and other oversight organizations people aren't necessarily going to die because their owners closed up their shop (a la the Triangle Fire). There are other things, however, that were fought for in the early 20th century that we're losing.

The 40 hour work week, for instance. When I received a phone interview for a small theatre company in Indiana, I was told that the pay was $150/week. I asked the person interviewing me how many hours per week . He said usually 50-60 and on tech week 80. What the hell?
I thought this was in theatre exclusively, which notoriously have long hours for little pay, but it is something in effect for most businesses. My dad works overtime usually, but if he didn't want to he wouldn't have much of a choice. My dad's workplace, like most, have adopted a "don't like it, leave it" policy which is theoretically fine but in practice not so much. The economy is at a place where jobs are hard to get, so my dad couldn't realistically leave. He's 59, so leaving would pose enormous difficulties even though he has experience. In fact, he has 32 years of experience with his company in a highly skilled position, but he receives the brunt of corporate foolishness. If he were to work just 40 hours he'd only make $31,000 per year, and normally with his experience and for his position the rate would be $45,000+. Ultimately, when their products came back from China containing lead buttons, my dad's work forced them to come in at 3AM and work till 3PM every day until every clothing no longer contained the button. When some employees complained,  the work said "if you don't like, there's the door."

Within this situation we see that workplaces are making workers work more than 40 hours at the threat of their jobs within this environment. Yet, working 40+ hours in any job (including theatre, film, and entertainment) is wasteful and inefficient. People stop being effective at the 40 hour point; efficiency is better than long hours. Sara Robinson wrote an op-piece for Salon.com that I think gives a great point of view of the history and downfall of the 40 hour work week: http://www.salon.com/2012/03/14/bring_back_the_40_hour_work_week/. To excise a paragraph from the essay,

"This is what work looks like now. It's been this way for so long that most American workers don't realize that for most of the 20th century, the broad consensus among American business leaders was that working people more than 40 hours a week was stupid, wasteful, dangerous, and expensive--and the most telling sign of dangerously incompetent management to boot."




No job security, no fair hours and conditions, and poor food quality. This reeks of 1912, and of the individuals who wish to live like Mr. Potter from 'It's a Wonderful Life.' 


People will argue against the viability of these benefits, but look at Germany, which despite the European crisis has been doing well. 

On The Pretensions of Bibliophiles

"The book is always better than the movie."

You ever hear that? I know the specific individuals I can place this quote to. A colleague here, a fellow student there, a group of Asian & African Literature students discussing how the film to 'Jane Eyre' in 2011 was supposed to be worse than the original text (I saw the film, I disagree). 

And now-Hunger Games; the latest young adult crossover series turn super ultra mega blockbuster film. 

This, of course, has me ranting and raving to my friends (and consequently on this blog) on why this "Book is always better than the movie" policy is asinine. 

This, of course, has me making observations and rantings about other pretensions I often hear from fellow bibliophiles that I highly disagree with. 

"The book is always better than the movie." When I think of this statement I think of a counter posed by a great film professor I had named Tom Sauret. His quote: "Comparing films and novels are like comparing apples and oranges." 

He's absolutely right. Each work of artistic expression has it's own language (to also cite Sauret), what I like to call "the mechanism of presentation." Sauret defined film's language through four mechanisms: its mise en scene (what's depicted in the shot), its artistic use of light, its editing, and its artistic use of sound. This is all true, but film does have a very overt literary element to the presentation. Even non-narrative films like those by Stan Brakhage have a lyricism indicative of literary poetry. With narrative films it is more overt, but while it may seem easy to compare this literary element closely to prose, I feel that is inadequate. It is more useful to compare it with drama, which is more predicated on dramatic action or characters accomplishing objectives. 

Consequently a film adaptation of a work of prose focuses on carrying the story through dramatic action. This means that an element of the book that involves more of an in depth exploration of a character will probably not be fit for film. 

Now, television has begun the process of being a little faithful to source texts, a la 'Game of Thrones.' But fellow bibliophiles, you need to stop getting hurt by how a film interprets a text. Adaptation is not the same as copying, and likewise a film exists within its own rules and language and should be assessed on its own rather than as an extension of a book. 

I should also state that I am a cinemaphile.