miikaawaadizi opened this issue on Oct 15, 2008 · 183 posts
XENOPHONZ posted Thu, 23 October 2008 at 2:31 AM
Quote - I am nearly certain we would strongly disagree about what type of people are most frequently insisting black is white and white is black these days,
I'd say that's a safe bet. 
Quote - what exactly do you mean by the term "popular culture?"
The same thing that most people who use the term mean by it. If you're looking for a lengthy technical definition, here's a referral:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pop_culture
I like the opening line of the article. It's about as good of a definition as I've come across:
Popular culture (or pop culture) is the culture — patterns of human activity and the symbolic structures that give such activities significance and importance — which are popular, well-liked or common.
Quote - In the modern sense of that term, popular culture is a fairly recent phenomenon.
In the sense of the definition above, it's been around since humans have been around -- in one form or another. But we can get bogged down in defining terms (which, of course, might be the real goal here ). Most people know what "popular culture" is in the same way that they know what "philosophy" is. And you can spend (re: waste) entire lifetimes trying to dig into the fine details -- the "definition" -- of each.
Quote - And are you suggesting that societies in which amorality is reserved for the elite are somehow superior? Or that such societies do not also, and just as often, collapse?
Hmmmm. This is another odd rabbit trail to go chasing down. I'm not quite sure how we get from pointing out that civilizations of the past have consistently displayed a generalized cultural acceptance of amoral thinking during the last stages of their existence........over to questions about "amorality being reserved for the elite" vs. (I suppose) "amorality being for everyone". Sounds like Oppression of the Masses going on to me. How DARE the elites reserve the privilege of being amoral only to themselves?!!!!!!
That subject.......will require some Deep Thought to work out all of the implications. In the meantime, I'll continue to read the signs of our times in the light of the times of others who've already lived it -- regardless of whether their examples were for the "elite" or for the "everyman".
Where is that head-scratching smilie when you need him...........!!!!!?????