The Decline of America's Culture Industries: The Struggle Between Bureaucracy and Creativity

While I was in Italy  this spring I was surprised to see the pervasiveness of Bob Dylan books, art and music. There was a Dylan Retrospectum (art) in Rome, and books about or by Dylan featured in every bookstore. I struck up a conversation with a craft beer brewer in Parma regarding this observation, and he noted that it's not just Bob Dylan that America has exported, but Pop Culture in general.

This notion of American pop culture as a product being exported led to my noticing an increasing amount of commentary about the widespread dissatisfaction with the products Hollywood has been feeding us over the past decade or more. Here are some thoughts generated by feeding a sentence into ChatGPT, regurgitated in essay form.

In recent years, America's culture industries have faced a formidable challenge, grappling with the effects of decay, monopolization, and increasing bureaucracy. As the pursuit of profit has intensified, creativity has become stifled, leading to a worrying decline in the quality and diversity of cultural productions. 

Let's examine the claim that America's culture industries have been transformed into anti-competitive, risk-averse monopolists, suffocating real creativity under the weight of mind-numbing and politically driven bureaucracy.

The rise of corporate giants within the culture industries (esp. Hollywood, literature, music) has undoubtedly fostered a monopolistic environment. Large media conglomerates have acquired numerous entertainment companies, consolidating their control over various creative outlets, from music and film to television and publishing. This monopolization has led to a lack of competition, as smaller players struggle to compete in an industry dominated by a select few. As a result, fresh and daring ideas are often sidelined in favor of formulaic, mass-appealing content that guarantees a return on investment.

Furthermore, the fear of taking risks has permeated the culture industries. Executives, driven by the pressure to maximize profits, tend to prefer established franchises and sequels, diminishing the opportunities for originality and innovative storytelling. This risk-averse approach stifles the potential for groundbreaking works of art and entertainment that push the boundaries of creativity.

To compound the problem, culture industries have become entangled in layers of bureaucracy. The quest for efficiency and streamlining often results in cumbersome approval processes and decision-making hierarchies that slow down productions and impede the free flow of ideas. 

The weight of bureaucracy also affects the individual creatives, subjecting them to creative restrictions and inhibiting their ability to express themselves fully. The prioritization of market research and focus groups over genuine artistic vision further exacerbates the problem, leading to a homogenization of content and an erosion of creativity.

Moreover, the rising politicization of the culture industries has added another layer of complexity. In an attempt to appeal to specific demographics or avoid controversy, creative decisions are sometimes shaped by political considerations rather than artistic merit. This approach may lead to watered-down narratives, sanitization of historical events, or the avoidance of sensitive issues, ultimately undermining the power of storytelling to address important societal challenges. 

In conclusion, the decay of America's culture industries can be attributed to a combination of anti-competitive monopolistic practices, risk aversion, and the burdensome bureaucracy they have imposed on their productions. Creativity, once the driving force behind cultural innovation, is now suffocating under the weight of profit-driven decision-making and politically motivated constraints. To revitalize the culture industries and foster an environment of genuine creativity, it is crucial to address these issues, encourage healthy competition, and prioritize artistic vision over short-term gains. Only then can American culture industries regain their vibrancy and contribute meaningfully to the enrichment of global artistic expression.

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Here's the prompt I used to produce the above brief essay:  "As America’s culture industries have decayed into anti-competitive, risk-averse monopolists, they have imposed layers upon layers of mind-numbing and increasingly politicised bureaucracy on their productions that make real creativity all but impossible." I pulled it from a much longer essay titled America's pop-culture armageddon by David Samuel at Unherd.

In short, the more that is at stake, the less people are willing to take risks. And because the giants control the channels of distribution, the most creative, outside-the-box original ideas never see the light of day.  

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Where things go from here is anyone's guess. What do you think?

Why Do Russia's Wars Always Start with Disaster?

 

Unherd, a publication whose mission is to push back against herd mentality, today featured a story titled "How Putin enabled the Wagner revolt." The article begins with the following opening paragraph:

"Why do Russia’s wars always start with disaster? The answer is straightforward: because the autocrats who rule Russia — be they Tsars (with the exception of Napoleon’s nemesis Alexander I), Joseph Stalin or Vladimir Putin — appoint obedient toadies sadly lacking in military talent to command their forces."

According to the Unherd piece by Professor Edward Luttwak, "And none is more out-of-his-depth than Sergei Shoigu, Putin’s minister of defence."

Is  Prof. Luttwak suggestion that Putin's minister of defense is the worst Russian war leader ever or the world's worst ever? Solzhenitsyn's August 1914 goes into great detail describing the ridiculous unpreparedness of the Russian army at the outset of WWI. The lack of preparedness included inadequate equipment, outdated tactics and a lack of direction which all contributed to abysmal morale. 

What's more, Grand Duke Nicholas Nikolaevich's military command structure suffered from massive inefficiencies and poor leadership. Decision-making processes were often slow and bureaucratic, hindering quick and effective responses to changing circumstances. As Solzhenitsyn discloses, the lack of clear strategic direction and coordination among the leadership contributed to disarray and ineffective operations. In the first month of the war the bumbling and blundering was so great that after a major loss in the Battle of Tannenberg General Samsanov took his own life. 

It isn't just Russia that is prone to this problem. G.J. Meyer's WWI overview, A World Undone, devotes a chapter to the incompetence of Britain's military leaders. When you see the consequences there's nothing funny about the tens of thousands of men whose blood was pointlessly spilt. (cf. The British Generals at the Dawn of World War One)

How ready are our U.S. troops should they be called into combat? Here are a few matters of concern.

Technological vulnerabilities with regard to emerging threats include cybersecurity vulnerabilities, potential disruption of satellite communications, and reliance on outdated systems in certain areas should concern us. Maintaining readiness across all branches of the military can be challenging. Aging equipment, insufficient training resources, and personnel shortages can impact the military's ability to respond promptly and effectively to threats.

The appalling amount of red tape in all levels of government will have an impact on our capacity to respond should there be a time of need. The acquisition and procurement process of new military equipment and systems can be lengthy, bureaucratic, and prone to cost overruns. Delays and inefficiencies in acquiring cutting-edge technology will hinder military readiness and modernization efforts.

It's true that Russia has been tested and found wanting. In this country, it waits to be seen how capable and effective we'll be until we're tested. Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Read: How Putin enabled the Wagner revolt

 

Photo Credit: Photo by Dominik Sostmann on Unsplash

Five Ways Journalists Use Twitter

I believe it was an article in Politico that turned me on to the value of Twitter as a resource for journalists. I joined in July 2007 and have found it to be one of the best tools out there for staying current what is happening as well as capturing the pulse of the nation. 

Currently there are more than 280 million active users on Twitter and I personally find the platform invaluable.

I decided to ask Google's Bard (AI rival to ChatGPT) how other journalists use Twitter.  

BARD: Here are five ways that journalists use Twitter:

1. To break news. Twitter is a great platform for journalists to break news. They can use it to tweet about developing stories, share exclusive information, and get feedback from their followers. For example, in 2016, the New York Times broke the news that Donald Trump had won the US presidential election on Twitter.
2. To share their stories. Twitter is a great way for journalists to share their stories with the world. They can use it to tweet about their reporting, share their thoughts on current events, and connect with their readers. For example, the BBC's Lyse Doucet often tweets about her experiences as a journalist, sharing her insights into the latest news stories from around the world.
3. To source stories. Twitter can be a great tool for journalists to source stories. They can use it to find sources, get tips, and get feedback from their followers. For example, the Washington Post's David Fahrenthold used Twitter to source his Pulitzer Prize-winning story about Donald Trump's charitable foundation.
4. To build an audience. Twitter can be a great way for journalists to build an audience. They can use it to connect with their readers, share their work, and promote their brand. For example, the Guardian's Owen Jones has built a large following on Twitter, where he shares his thoughts on politics and current affairs.
5. To engage with the public. Twitter can be a great way for journalists to engage with the public. They can use it to answer questions, share information, and get feedback from their followers. For example, the BBC's Nick Robinson often tweets about his reporting, sharing his thoughts on current events, and answering questions from his followers.

These are just a few of the ways that journalists use Twitter. It is a powerful tool that can be used for a variety of purposes, from breaking news to building an audience to engaging with the public.

For me, one of the chief ways I use Twitter is to read the feedback to controversial Tweets. I've often gained insights as regards how divergent points of view can be. 

There are plenty of other ways to gain these insights, and many other places for more in-depth discussions. For example, the comments at The Unherd are consistently of a high caliber. 

That's all for today. 

Universities: Their Decline and Fall

This past week I read an article about the current state of England's universities. I'm sure that an American author could write a similar article on some of what has been happening in our own universities. The article was published in The Unherd, which I've been periodically reading for a year or so. What I like is their in-depth stories and non-aligned views. That is, they publish articles that would likely annoy "both sides of the aisle" so to speak. That is what I like about Reason magazine as well. 

The article that caught my attention was titled How universities were corrupted. The subhead is: Vindictive protectiveness has re-shaped our institutions

The essay by Matthew Goodwin begins like this:

When are we going to do something about the state of our universities? We must surely by now be familiar with the symbols of this unfolding crisis. Philosopher Kathleen Stock, who was harassed by students and staff to such an extent that she was forced to leave her position at the University of Sussex. Noah Carl, the promising research fellow, who was chased out of Cambridge. Tony Sewell, the government advisor who oversaw the Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities before suddenly finding his offer of an honorary doctorate at the University of Nottingham withdrawn. Tim Luckhurst, the Principal at Durham who invited Rod Liddle to speak at a dinner and was then suspended after students demanded he be disciplined.

The big concern, and what seems to be at stake here as well, is the pressure being put on schools to move away "from their founding mission to search for truth through free inquiry."

Maybe it has always been this way to some extent. Bertrand Russell's lecture and booklet Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Thought did address this last matter a century ago, but I get the impression that it has been exacerbated in recent years for a variety of reasons. One of these is spelled out in Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt's The Coddling of the American Mind.

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In a related critique of today's universities, William Deresiewicz sounds a wake-up call to American universities and institutions in an opinion piece titled American education’s new dark age . The subhead tells the story: Colleges have abandoned real learning for wokeism.

Deresiewicz's piece begins with his sharing his own wake-up experience teaching at an elite college in Southern California. "I assumed that they’d arrive with a fairly good idea of how to make an argument with an academic context and that I would be teaching them how to apply those skills to a very different set of rhetorical occasions," he writes. But he was wrong.

They not only didn't know how to construct an argument, they really hadn't learned how to read, or write or think. A little further along he realizes what led to this situation.

To understand how this predicament came to pass, one needs to understand how students manage to get into places like Harvard or the Claremont colleges in the first place. It is not by learning how to read, write, or think. It is by jumping through the endless series of hoops that elite college admissions offices have developed over the decades to winnow down their skyscraper stacks of application folders.

Not only are grades important, but involvement in a dozen extracurricular activities is essential to creating a solid, well-rounded candidate for the Ivy Leagues and other elite schools. In order to also get the sleep one needs, students learn to excel at skimming.

The author states outright that this kind of lifestyle does not produce intellectual engagement. Curiosity and passion must be suppressed, he states. The expertise students master has more to do with how to beat the system rather than learning anything.

Oh yes, they can pass tests. That's the new form of education, teaching to the test.  Don't surprise them by forcing them to think. They don't have time for that.

He goes on...

If that’s the kind of education students have received by the time they get to college, do things get better once they arrive? Not usually. Old habits die hard. Elite students, already competing for the next prize, continue to conduct their lives at the same frenetic pace. At the large mass of institutions below the level of the elite, the problem is less apt to be misdirected zeal than sheer indifference. Courses are a bother; campus culture runs to sports and beer.

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The appeal of Wokeism is that it offers relief from the unsustainable emptiness of post-modern cynicism. Wokeism gives people something that appears to me meaningful to believe in. 

You can read the full story here: American Education's New Dark Age.

Comments welcome.

EdNote: I'm interested in your take on these articles. Are they overly harsh and critical, or fairly astute? Please share in the comments.

Related Link

Bertrand Russell's Free Thought and Official Propaganda Has Much to Say about the Current State of Cancel Culture

The Fall of Seattle

Matthew Dowd    @matthewjdowd
As I said on @DeadlineWH with @NicolleDWallace
I feel like our democracy is in a Johnny Cash moment: "How high's the water, mama? Two feet high and risin'." The media does a great job covering Ukraine war, we need to do a better job covering the threat to our democracy.

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The above is a Tweet I saw this past week on Twitter. Whether our media is doing a great job or not could be argued either way. It may even be that the "threat to our democracy" can be argued either way. How serious is that threat? This is what the first year of the pandemic did for many people, especially after the George Floyd tragedy and its subsequent events. 

The March 26 story at Unherd titled "The Fall of Seattle" caught my eye because these past two years I have been following the challenges some of our cities are  facing. "How high is the water, mama?" That is, how bad is it and is it spreading? The subtitle of the piece reads, "After George Floyd died, the city turned on the police."

"The year 2020 saw a 68% spike in homicides, the highest number in 26 years, and the year 2021 saw a 40% surge in 911 calls for shots fired and a 100% surge in drive-by shootings. Petty crime plagues every neighbourhood of the city, and downtown businesses have paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund their own security."

Unherd is a British publication that I receive. They have long form essays that present more in depth coverage of issues than what is typical. The purpose of this blog post is to share this story, The Fall of Seattle. It's relevant, and disturbing.

What happened to Seattle? The answer, of course, depends on your politics. In the news section of the Seattle Times, for instance, a reader is unlikely to see any consideration of a link between policing and public safety. 

What many officers found disturbing is exemplified in this anecdote after the initial riots following the George Floyd incident:

The following morning, Magan got called into the office to start investigations of 30 to 40 people who’d been arrested for crimes such as trespass, burglary and property destruction. Five or six hours in, he began to suspect they’d given the police false names. But there was no point looking into it further. “We found out they’d all been released from custody prior to even being questioned,” he says.

If you are an officer, what is the point of putting your life on the line when there are no consequences for law breakers? 

The net result of these policies is that people begin to not feel safe in many of our cities, which then hurts business. Businesses leave, squatters burn empty buildings, and a form of urban blight begins to take hold. 

It begins with a loss of respect for law and order.* 

In the event you missed the article, here is the link: https://bit.ly/3jafVe0 

Related: Duty to Warn: More Carjacking Escapades

* It cannot be denied that some of the backlash against police has been building for a very long time. When officers do misbehave fellow officers rally round the flag and defend their own. 

Afghanistan, Afghanistan... When Will We Learn?

Photo by Andre Klimke on Unsplash

"Those who fail to learn from history are destined to repeat it." 

This morning I read an insightful article by William Dalrymple about the West's failure to learn from history when it comes to Afghanistan. That history, for most of us, is a forgotten one. For this reason Mr. Dalrymple seeks to enlighten us by filling in the details of our past relations with this foreign land and its peoples.

The article opens with these words: "Before the events of this month, the First Anglo-Afghan War was arguably the greatest military humiliation ever suffered by the West in the East." In other words, our current debacle is not the first we have experienced in that remote region. 

I should note that this story appeared in The Unherd, a British journal with very pointed insights and in-depth analysis of events. The article is titled Afghanistan always defeats the West.

Britain's first engagement with Afghanistan took place in 1839-42. The retreat from Kabul on January 6, 1842 was its worst defeat in history. An army of 18,500 was entirely wiped out by poorly equipped tribespeople. Purportedly only one man survived.

Despite the outcome of this first misadventure, Britain went for it again 30 years later.

After 9/11 Tony Blair signed up Britain to stand with America and go to war in Afghanistan yet again. Dalrymple writes, "What followed was a textbook case of Aldous Huxley’s adage that the only thing you learn from history is that no one learns from history."

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As for me, two other stories came to mind when I read this. Preceding World War Two, Italy invaded Ethiopia with modern weaponry and aircraft. By the end of 1941 they were sent packing with their tails between their legs.

And, of course, who can forget the Soviet Union's incursion into Afghanistan in 1979, a 10-year fiasco that contributed to demise of the Soviet Union. Well, it seems like we did forget. If you get a chance, I highly recommend a films titled The Beast. It's the story of a Soviet tank crew that makes a wrong turn and must fight to survive against the relentless villagers who they've just pummeled. 

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The purpose of this blog post is simply to provide a link to what I consider to be relevant observations regarding the Afghanistan situation. You can read the full story here. https://tinyurl.com/p47n79b7

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Related Links

The Decisive Battle of Dien Bien Phu: How the Viet Minh Stunned the World

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