To be honest, I don’t know how to feel about these shows. I want to feel outraged, but I fell like it’s not my place to be outraged. I feel ashamed that I am part of this kind of culture, even if it is in a lesser form now. But it mostly just makes me tired. I realize that these shows had a huge influence on the direction of music in America, but it gets me so mad that that influence had to come from something so disgusting.

It makes me wonder if everything is like that really. Does everything that has changed America come from being awful in general? This whole country’s history starts with the reckless bloodshed of its native peoples, from the Aztecs to the American Indians, and hasn’t gotten much better since. We fight off anyone who wants to have the slightest influence over us, and we build walls to make sure everyone else stays good and out. And as if that weren’t bad enough, when we get bored we go out and start trouble ourselves!

How would American culture progressed if the Minstrel shows had never been a thing? Would we have found some new way to be awful, or would we actually have done something right for a change and tried to mend a relationship. I’ve read that the reason a lot of racism still exists in America is because we never talked about slavery in an open way. We fought a war to end it (kind of) but then we immediately put it in our history. There was no discussion or accountability. It was a thing of the past, just like that. Would the American public have benefited from some kind of open dialogue? Absolutely. But we don’t have it. It’s why I feel I don’t have a right to be outraged, and why I feel ashamed of myself.

I find it so interesting that America- this crazy country that has never done anything other than whatever the hell it wants, is always chasing the past. There is nostalgia in everything we do! Not just in the music we discussed by Chess that is designed to make people homesick for the South, or country music for the same kind of thing. But nostalgia is marketed to us, literally, it is used in ad campaigns every day.

“You need this new camera to preserve memories of your kids who are growing up too fast.”

“You need to buy this light bulb to save the planet so your children can enjoy the same Earth you did.”

It’s shoved down our throats at every turn and we eat it up! Well, as a youth (ish) of this country I feel personally victimized by this (I’m being dramatic for effect, I swear I’m not a brat.) All this talk about providing a better world for the children and here I am, barely on the cusp of adulthood and reaping no benefits whatsoever from this attack. You want to give your kids a better life? How about health care? How about free higher education? How about sex ed programs in inner cities that actually teach safe sex? How about a government that doesn’t beg us for our vote one second and curse us as lazy the next? OR how about taking some of that ad money clearly going to waste and feeding some of the starving youths out there? I realize that this was in no way really related to the lesson, but that’s what it got me thinking about.

The thing I find most shocking after our discussion of the internet is that the entire world doesn’t have whiplash. This entire, world-changing thing has come around so fast! When I think about how long it’s taken the human race to get to this point and then how quickly this crazy big thing has been assimilated into our lives, it’s kind of scary. It’s like in all those old sci-fi movies where someone comes out of nowhere with a brain chip and people are all “Hey this sounds like a great idea! Let’s ALL get brain chips!” and then surprise surprise it’s a mind control device and you’re just sitting there going, ‘How the hell did you not see that one coming?’

Not that I thing the internet is a mind control device- or at least it wasn’t designed to be one in any intentionally awful way. I just think when something this good comes along this fast, it’s a sign we need to step back and chill out for a bit. I want to clarify- this is coming from a millennial- I’m not some crotchety old grandpa condemning today’s youth. I just know from personal experience- I mean when I was a kid we didn’t have internet. Now I carry it around literally in my back pocket and freak out if I don’t check it every day.  That’s not healthy.

Not that I’m going to change anything anytime soon, but at least I’m aware of my problem.

I gotta say, I’m not a huge fan of war. I mean, I don’t think anyone is really, but there are people who call it a necessity. Or, as discussed in class, that they are important to the reorganization of the world. I have a few different perspectives to throw at this statement. Firstly is my own. My dad was in the Army, and was deployed in Iraq and Saudi Arabia for nearly a decade of my childhood. He didn’t have any crazy sense of patriotism, he didn’t go voluntarily. He had joined the reserves as a job banking on the idea that no one would be stupid enough to start another war before his number was up. Thankfully he came home safe. Every day though I think, from the perspective of one little person, how incredibly pointless it was for me to miss out on the experience of having my dad home every day.

My other perspective is somewhat pro-war. Speaking as a member of the human race, I do think in the long run war makes things better, culturally. There are the reasons we discussed in class, like the wonderful pension building and the glory of the IQ test. But there are so many other things too, worldwide that would not have happened without a major cultural revamp. Violence yields a type of beauty that peace will never know- I mean look at any country, like France for example. More revolutions and invasions than you can shake a stick at. And what do you get at the end of it? A haven of exquisite food and art. I don’t know another place on Earth that has produced something that beautiful out of nothing.

My third perspective is a bit depressing, but it’s got to do with nature, and the nature of things. Is war in our nature? I can’t think of another species that wages wars to the extent that humans do. Does that make us natural or unnatural? Is that what makes us human? Our willing determination to wipe each other out? If so I’m not so sure I’m so hot on the human race anymore.

To be completely honest, the realist/idealist discussion threw me for a loop. I have always thought of myself as a realist. I like to see things as they are. Dreams and fantasies are all well and good, as long as you can keep them separate from your real-world view. In that sense I think I am a realist.

However. I’d never heard a definition of ideal like this before. It definitely struck a cord with me, because, I mean, isn’t everyone searching for the ideal version of something? I mean, no one looks at something and says, “Yes, this is the best this is ever going to be.” That’s absurd. You can look at anything and find fault with it. Nothing is perfect ever. But does that mean that I am looking for the ideal? Are we saying that acknowledging that something isn’t perfect makes you an idealist on principle?

Then I repeat, I don’t think there’s such a thing as a realist. I don’t even really understand what realism would be at this point. That’s amazing to me.  It was mentioned that an idealist wouldn’t always have to be an optimist, as it is commonly assumed. But in this case wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that all the realists would have to be optimists? I think you’d have to be. If you acknowledge that what you have is what you get- it doesn’t get better, you would have to be optimistic about it I think. Otherwise people would just off themselves.

I found the idea of the decline of dynamic range to be very bizarre. It’s certainly not something I had ever in my life thought of before, at least in terms of music. The idea that the sounds you are hearing remain at the same volume regardless of the tone with which they are spoken is kind of scary. It reminds me of another blog post I have seen in the past where it instructed the reader to try to scream in their head. No matter how hard you try, the volume inside your head doesn’t change.

This lack of dynamic range in music now kind of frightens me. It’s like they are trying to make music as though it is inside your head. That sounds kind of weird but that’s just how it feels- as though, despite that you have control over what happens in your brain to an extent, you can’t control the volume of the voices. The whole thing is kind of distressing. It’s like reading typed words as well:

This sounds quiet.

This sounds loud.

THIS SOUNDS LOUDER.

But in the end you go over them again and the volume in your head does not, in fact, change. I debate with myself whether or not the return of the dynamic range would be a good or bad thing. On the one hand I want to really listen to the music and hear voices as they would be in real life- louder or quieter depending on how the speaker or singer intends them. But on the other hand, it does take a lot more concentration to listen to that kind of music. Do I want to dedicate myself to this kind of focus every time I want to listen to a song?

Perhaps this is why classical music was so popular before compression was a thing. In that case, focusing on the words would be less relaxing than just listening to some straight instrumentals. Now however we get that same effect from every song pumped out of the radio. Maybe that’s just silly and it has nothing to do with anything. But for me I think in the end, as much as I would like to prefer music that requires focus, I’d probably just end up listening to what was easier.