the smedley log - suburban scrawl

So what if we’re outta tune?

“Whoever is most impertinent has the best chance.”
- Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

There are very few constants in life. One is the presence of change. Another is the fact that I will, at least 90% of the time, want to pursue things in which most people have no interest.

So I’m used to people crinkling their noses or peering in disbelief at the things I value most. But I’ll never get used to hearing intelligent people stumbling to justify allegiance to the mediocre without admitting that conformity is at least part of the reason.

Sure, people like to think they like what they like for their own reasons, rather than for conformist ones. But I suspect that comes from a desire to see ourselves as free-thinking, even when we’re afraid to think differently. I’ve caught myself making similar rationalizations more than a couple times. There are certain situations where non-conformity carries a risk, but genuine risk is rarely a factor in how we choose the music we listen to, or the fashions we wear (or the cars we drive, or the books we read, etc.)

While mulling pending changes in my own life, I was thinking we sometimes cling to mass norms because we want to feel like we’re part of something. And on some level, we all want that. There might even be a formula for this phenomenon, the way so many flock to the same lousy music or style or whatever. Maybe it has to do with the lack of deeper connections between human beings. Maybe it isn’t simply a fear of being different, but a fear of being alone.

Maybe as our personal connections become increasingly shallow, we seek out whatever semblance of a connection we can find, even if it’s just a virtual one. And my guess is the extent to which we define ourselves by pop culture preference is inversely proportional to the extent to which we actually form meaningful connections with those in our actual lives.

Or maybe I just want an explanation that makes me feel more highly evolved than the average person. Maybe we’re just wired differently, and the way I’m wired is not to care all that much what everyone else thinks. Maybe I’m just lucky to love what I love without feeling ashamed or ostracized when people around me crinkle their noses at my preferences. And maybe I’m better off not caring all that much.

Anyway, you can click here to see a live performance of the song I was listening to when I started writing this post.

So what, indeed. The conformity issue was the main reason I started blogging. I got tired of the lunch room conversations in which I was either the lone voice of dissent or the only one who wasn’t watching the “popular” TV show.

I cut my teeth listening to music that was never played on the radio and going to hear bands in small clubs, like the Umphrey’s McGee show at the Electric Factory this Friday. I can proudly say that I have never been to a stadium to hear music.

I figured that the best way to combat my feeling of solitude was to start writing about the things I was talking about, and eventually an audience of like-minded folks would find me. It isn’t in my nature to do something because others do it or behave to conform. The masses are generally swept along because they lack the will to be unique.

I have always enjoyed my own company.

I’m going to be contrarian re: your pro contrarian post, and if that’s not metaenough for you…

I’m also coming at this from someone who is pretty much 180 degrees from cool (Exhibit A: My MS in Math), but who has a pretty wide range of like -I have both Loreena McKennitt and Belinda Carlisle in my collection – including the song that makes me schizo because it’s pretty/ballady enough but she insists “” makes sense… I’m also coming at things as someone who would automatically disregard something if it was the “wrong” kind of popular. Like I hated disco in “original years” and in the 1st comeback but like some of it now.

Anyway…

Take your argument, apply it to food, and it falls apart some. Yes, most people like chicken and don’t eat bumblebees. That’s kind of neutral. That’s norm based too. Maybe we’d like bumblebees, maybe if we broadened our food scope we’d find we’d be eating rosepetals and not lettuce.

But the “norm” is out there not just because we’re sheep being led to it (although these modern days I don’t argue the cynicism of that approach-enough to say “not just”), but because it’s whitewashed on some level enough to somewhat please a lot of people instead of hardcore please a few dozen. And every day you do many things that follow that path (diet coke, color car you drive,liking football …)

You’re stating the problem in terms of the norm and I don’t think that’s your true problem (may be wrong). Enough of the talent out there HAS some level of talent, or at least the funds/equipment to disguise their lack thereof. That is why William Hung was never more than a punchline. Your problem is more of a radius problem-people unwilling to deviate too far from that center or too afraid to let their center be too far from the perceived “center norm”

Ironically- as I’ve gotten older and less uptight I can enjoy stuff that’s more frivolous in a way I couldn’t when I was young and “deeper”. I still have plenty of songs I like that I can deconstruct lyrics too but plenty that I don’t love, but like enough, to just like them even if they’re crap by most standards.

Oh – and I think you minimize the value of the commonality of the norm. I’ve spent a lot of my life watching soaps and am darned unapologetic about it. Plots – frequently crap, newbie acting – frequently crap. But what the soap geeks like is the richness that someone playing a role 15 years can bring during what may be a throwaway scene and soap geeks can acknowledge the crap but get misty over writing/continuity gems when they happen. Incidentally, on that example, I watched most devotedly the soap my mom and sisters and grandmom were most attached to, and usually dare guys who’ve watched games with their dad/grandad to disparage that sort of bond…

I guess I feel a little defensive because of why you do from another direction – I do sometimes think you are allowed to like something for amorphous reasons, just think a balance is better and denying that part of you can box you in more than it can free you.

oops – forgotten lyric – makes me want to cry (and not in a good way)

The sun comes up in china … the lights go on in rome

Actually – another tangent – I’ll shut up and go away soon – I promise.

Isn’t sharing what music (or books, or…) is for? So to some extent the “norm” is created by that sharing, and that sometimes is what lets the good indy band bubble up to a greater prominance.

I suspect what you are railing against is more the nature of some people to not want to embrace the sharing side of that part of the bond, neutral of the “value”, because this seems to be written as an emotional reaction rather than a true disdain of those with lesser taste than yours.

Again, I easily accept that at any given moment I could be full of it…

Anthony – a man after my own heart? That’s just the sort of conformity I can get on board with

Ellen – I see now (having re-read the post a few times) where I could be provoking the thoughts you seem to be expressing, or maybe not.

Suffice it to say, I was imprecise in focusing this post on what I was really trying to get to:
I wasn’t hoping to question peoples’ tastes so much as the reasons for them. In the second paragraph, when I state, “I’ll never get used to hearing intelligent people stumbling to justify allegiance to the mediocre without admitting that conformity is at least part of the reason”, I’m thinking of a very specific set of people who are probably not reading this blog, which is perhaps why I felt comfortable not elaborating. It wasn’t my intent to simply judge everyone with whom my tastes are at odds.

My point was that the technologically advanced and socially compartmentalized (maybe even crippled?) world we occupy might contribute to the monstrous popularity of many of our mass media entities.

And I do believe common experience is a huge part of this, that we can share something with others even when we don’t have time to form deeply personal bonds. I wasn’t minimizing that, just observing that a proxy relationship exists.

I don’t find that objectionable, though I do suspect there are times the herd mentality completely takes the place of real human interaction. But it is just a theory…

Though I would still quibble with a couple points you brought up.

You pointed out food as one topic where the argument falls apart, But food is just like the other things I’m thinking of. If it weren’t, would McDonalds be the most popular restaurant on the planet? Is that a case of the masses flocking to the highest quality, or just settling for the easiest, most accessible option?

Music is the other thing. I’ve known far too many immensely talented, but criminally obscure, musicians over the years to believe the cream rises to the top in the music industry. With very few exceptions, nobody hits it big on the music charts because of word or mouth.

A well-packaged, corporate-backed recording artist has an exponentially better chance of hitting with the general public than a musical genius toiling away on the local bar scene – mostly because (just like with McDonalds) they have been made more accessible to the listening public.

1- yes, but the same norm that has everyone liking Mcdonalds has everyone liking bananas, and I do not equate the 2. Sure there is plenty of crap within the norm, but there is also some noncrap.

2- yes, but even when they are giving us the new Britney, they still have to impose some sort of illusion of talent over her – that
s why they don’t dare let these people not lipsynch.

I guess where we differ is the conditional. I am trying for “norm does not imply crap” not that “norm is mutually exclusive from crap”. I am well aware that there is plenty of crap and on occassion like it enough to nbot waste the energy detesting it. I don’t like it the same way as other things, but Ilike it.

I guess what I am saying is that SOME of the criminally obscure do break thru DESPITE not being the package the execs think define the norm. Barenaked Ladies still sells more than Paris Hilton (to think of a band that broke thru from the day tat’s still pretty big). And every time one does, the norm does feel the ripple thru and the bar is raised a little further for the next set of acts. And an angel gets their wings – err – sorry – digressing bad.

This spurned a whole mess of Mathy thinking that I may turn into a post tonight or tomorrow – partially influenced by some Math essays. That’ll teach you

Perhaps I got distracted. The food and music points were tangential.

I do not disagree about the norm as it applies to things being crap. This is more a thought process on why we choose to follow norms than whether or not they are good or bad.