cynicism and, uh, culture

I have written a version of this post half a dozen times over the past few years, but every time before I get around to publishing it, something happens to contribute to my own cynicism and I delete it. Same thing happened here-- I wrote the post below in almost a single go after watching a popular TV show about horrible people. Then I read the news this morning, and once again I have to admit that maybe people really are that awful. 

But you know, that's how the news works these days. If we get mad or upset about something, we click more often and follow the news more closely, so that's what they give us. War seems imminent at a couple of different places on the globe and our political situation is ugly, but there are also people rescuing dogs and strangers from floodwaters, neighbors checking on the elderly, and aid workers around the globe trying to help. 

It's never 100% one way or the other, so I don’t get why art has to be about ugliness and despair. I've said before that our artistic and intellectual taste has been stuck for far too long in an aesthetic of the grim and the ugly, started by a bunch of unhappily married, alcoholic white men back in the 60s and 70s. And enforced ever since by the twin weapons of contempt and disdain. Whoa. Is that too harsh? At this moment while I'm pissed, it doesn't seem too harsh to me.

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You know what I am really sick of? Nihilism posing as "being an adult." If you are person who is trying to be kind and hopeful and generous, there is a certain element of the population who will roll their eyes and tell you to be realistic and stop being so naive and grow up. 

But you know what? That kind of talk enables all kinds of bad behavior. If you're just being "realistic" when you strike first and strike hard, then you can rationalize not trying to de-escalate a situation and not trying to understand someone different than you, or even just being mean. If you excuse your own cynicism and lack of empathy because I'm not a child anymore, and anyone who still values sincerity should wake up and join the real world already, then you don't have to try, or help, or worry about anyone's interests besides your own. 

Of course you can go too far the other way, and it's possible to be overly naive or gullible. And of course there really are some horrible people in the world. But I still think it's a false equivalence, this association of intelligence with nihilism, "being an adult" with those who have no time for kindness, being sophisticated with existential indifference. 

I've said stuff like this before, and I know it's an unpopular opinion and our culture is definitely not in a place right now where kindness and honorable action can be considered to be worldly-wise. But the reason I keep bringing it up is our current entertainment options. I try to get into the shows that everyone is watching, and universally the characters on shows I've tried to watch are awful, or on the rare occasions they're not, truly awful things happen to them. 

And if you complain and say that there is not one likeable person on the show, or at least someone you could root for, then you can't handle reality and that's what real life is like, and people who are "nice" are nauseating, anyway. I never trust a nice person, because it means they're fake, I read on a reddit page just yesterday. How convenient to be able to dismiss everyone with a kindly impulse all at once.

But is that what real life is like? Aren't people a mix? Is there really someone out there who doesn't know anyone who is kind or good-natured or warm-hearted? Because I know plenty of nice people, people who are helpful and work hard to interact positively with their co-workers and friends and family. If we deny those people exist, how is that "real"? if we erase the good guys, aren't we just ceding the stage to the awful people? I mean, if you love stories full of devious, manipulative mean people, that's fine, but don't call it reality, and don't tell me I can't handle reality when I don't want to watch that stuff.

I'm pretty sure most of the time your reality is not as dire as you're insisting art should be. I remember reading a column once by a film critic who was in Cannes for the film festival, and what a disconnect it was to sit in a theater watching one artistically-astute-but-horrible-to-watch movie after another, and then he and his colleagues would head to a restaurant to talk and laugh over an outrageously expensive dinner and a $300 bottle of wine. I've never been to Cannes, but I've seen plenty of depressing movies, and I'm so tired of this glorification of the dismal.

This is the kind of thing I'm embarrassed to post, because I know I'm so far out of the mainstream of the current art/culture world (let alone the cutting edge) that it is laughable for me to even have an opinion. But this is my opinion. And since we're out of town for the next eight days, if I post it while we're gone maybe I'll have forgotten about it by the time we get back.

(And you don't have to tell me to check my privilege, because I know that. This is in some ways the most privileged thing I've posted in a long time, but on the other hand, I still think it's worth saying.)

a couple of goodreads reviews

Well, first of all, the fourth section of Trust (by Hernan Diaz) did indeed pull everything together so that it makes sense. Trust is the story of a financier who made a fortune in the 1920s, even during the stock market crash in 1929. The first section is a novel written by a man who sensationalizes the story to make it into a best seller. The second section is from the point of view of the financier himself, who wants to re-create his story after this unflattering novel has been published. He works with a ghostwriter, and the third section is told from her point of view as she meets with him, sometimes daily, to take dictation while he tells the story he wants people to hear. The fourth section is from the point of view of the financier's wife. 

The whole thing is like an intricate clockwork mechanism, or some complex origami, that folds endlessly in on itself and then opens out into a flower or a mythical beast. Layers and layers are slowly built up in the first two sections, only to be dismantled in the third and fourth sections. It's brilliant. But there's no denying it is mind-numbing to read the first half. 

Section one starts out sounding like Henry James (which I don't necessarily mind), but it goes on for far too long. (At least, that's what you think as you're reading it.) Then you get to the brusque, no-nonsense bare bones of the second section. The two male narrators are equally tedious blow-hards who have told their manipulated stories at length. Then in the third and fourth sections, the true story begins to emerge. It's fascinating. I will remember "Air like french horns" far longer than the pompous tedium of the beginning.

On the other hand, if you can't get through it, I can't say I blame you. I only kept going because I had heard it would pay off (and it did). I did it by reading 10-15 minutes a day for a couple of weeks. If you're a patient reader, it's worth the tedium in the end.

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And it took so long to tell you about Trust that I don't really have space to tell you about the others, so maybe I'll just tell you about The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory by Tim Alberta, a clear-eyed account of the rise of Christian nationalism told by a journalist who is unapologetically Evangelical. I avoid politics and political books like the plague, but I was roped into reading this one because it was the non-fiction selection for September for a book group I'm in. I ended up giving it five stars. Here's what I wrote on goodreads:

I was raised evangelical, so I had many points of contact with the history Alberta describes. My dad worked at First Baptist-Dallas back in the Criswell days, I sang in the youth choir at a different church, I attended one of the Christian colleges he describes (not Liberty), I worked at a Christian camp in the summers, the same one I had attended as a camper years before. Like Alberta, my faith was everything to me. 

But unlike Alberta, I left it behind many years ago to become what the conservatives in this book would call a squishy, woke progressive. I still have many friends and family members who are evangelical, but they are mostly of the Never-Trump variety, so the depth and breadth of the spread of Christian nationalism Alberta describes was almost shocking to me. Alberta is thoughtful and engaging. He never compromises his commitment to his conservative Christian faith, but he also never backs away from critiquing the rise of Christian nationalism. He's a brave man, and it's a highly readable account. Definitely worth reading.

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I review most books I read on Goodreads (not "real" reviews, usually just a paragraph or two), but I'm actually not a goodreads expert so I don't know how to link to my reviews. The best I can do is give you the link to my profile, in case you want to follow along.