. . .whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is of good repute, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, dwell on these things.
Philippians 4:8 NASB
It is an irony that one of the stupidest shows on television is carried on The Learning Channel. This show is so stupid that it is now used as an argument by supporters of public broadcasting against the libertarian argument that the free market provides alternatives every bit on par with what you can see on PBS. This argument carries much weight as the History Channel is now flooded with conspiracy theory shows, UFO abductions, and pawnbrokers. Meanwhile, Discovery Channel gives us various people living in the wild surviving on insects and animal dung. Suddenly, a few tax dollars for Sesame Street doesn't seem so bad.
The libertarian argument against public broadcasting isn't so much a condemnation of government waste but an assault on what we can only call "cultural elitism." Advocates of public broadcasting shy away from this argument because they don't want to appear as cultural and intellectual snobs. But it is their best argument. Public dollars give us Masterpiece Theater and Nova. The free market gives us Honey Boo Boo.
The libertarian responds to this argument with a "so what?" Who do we think we are in trying to elevate a culture? At this point, even conservatives part company with libertarians because conservatives believe culture is important and is the glue that holds a society together. A debased culture leads to a debased people and vice versa. As such, the government has a compelling interest in promoting cultural values. The only debate between progressives and conservatives is over what those values should be.
The reason a show like Honey Boo Boo is picked over more elevated fare is obvious. The show is a ratings winner. The cost of production is low. And the viewers feel smarter after having watched it even if they aren't smarter in actuality. This brings us to the conundrum that every entrepreneur faces. Should we give people what they want? Or should we make people want what we have to give?
It is always easier to give the people what they want. This was the situation in Elizabethan times when Shakespeare was writing his plays and going through all that trouble to stage them. Shakes had some competition from guys like Marlowe and Jonson. But his primary competition came from the bear baiting down the street. Why produce plays when you can chain a bear to a stake and sic wild dogs on it for the delight of the crowd?
The vulgar masses always prefer the visceral and the comical over the true, the good, and the beautiful. The result is a trash culture that exalts the false, the bad, and the ugly. Many who believe in the true, the good, and the beautiful decry this tragedy, and they assert their standards and remedies. The misfortune of these people is that they usually take one element of this formula and stretch it into a distortion that is to the detriment of the other two.
People who believe in the true tend to embrace science as having all the answers. The result is that they end up subordinating good and beautiful things to purely utilitarian and economic ends. This would be the father who supports his son's desire to become a doctor but pisses on his aspirations to play piano. People who believe in the good over everything else are the ones who give us the Christian bookstore in the mall selling figurines and other trite items from their Christian ghetto. And those who exalt the beautiful over everything else usually end up starving as they try and scam NEA grants to create art out of their own excrement.
It is always easier to give the people what they want. This was the situation in Elizabethan times when Shakespeare was writing his plays and going through all that trouble to stage them. Shakes had some competition from guys like Marlowe and Jonson. But his primary competition came from the bear baiting down the street. Why produce plays when you can chain a bear to a stake and sic wild dogs on it for the delight of the crowd?
People who believe in the true tend to embrace science as having all the answers. The result is that they end up subordinating good and beautiful things to purely utilitarian and economic ends. This would be the father who supports his son's desire to become a doctor but pisses on his aspirations to play piano. People who believe in the good over everything else are the ones who give us the Christian bookstore in the mall selling figurines and other trite items from their Christian ghetto. And those who exalt the beautiful over everything else usually end up starving as they try and scam NEA grants to create art out of their own excrement.
The true, the good, and the beautiful come together. It is a package deal. Eliminate one of these from your worldview, and you don't keep what remains. You lose that as well. The postmodern nihilist does not believe in the good or the true, so he or she chooses to shock. The Christian ghetto artist believes in the good but not the beautiful or the true, so an instrument of torture and death is packaged with stuffed animals. And our beloved geeks make the world work, but they can't understand why people want simple and elegant computers.
The would be savior in all of this confusion and mess is the critic. The true, the good, and the beautiful does not reduce to a simple formula. If it did, our utilitarian minded peers would mass produce it for massive profits. Understanding what is true, good, and beautiful takes knowledge and skill. Naturally, everyone hates the critic, but the critic is the only thing we have against the rudderless chaos of the vulgar masses. Not all critics are good, true, and beautiful in their criticism. Sometimes, they are flat wrong. But we depend on the critics to determine our canons, to preserve our past, and to point out where the present gets it right. This process is not always pretty or pleasant, but it will always be necessary. Critics are the guardians of transcendant values in the culture.
The problem with the present culture and with current criticism is that a belief in transcendant values is withering thanks to deconstructionism, postmodernism, and a secular worldview that diminishes the value in anything beyond that which can make money. Art is now entertainment. Films are now eye candy with zero plot and minimal dialogue. A bestselling novel is pornography that would have been sold in a brown wrapper a generation ago. That same author even put together a classical music album under his Fifty Shades brand.
I should not sound like an alarmist or a prude here because it has always been this way. The Romans had their brothels and their Circus Maximus. Trash culture has endured as long as civilization. But it survives in much the way a barnacle clings to a ship. It is along for the ride, but it does not keep the ship afloat. It merely slows it down.
Whatever is true, good, or beautiful needs to be produced, promoted, and defended. To do this, you actually have to believe in the true, the good, and the beautiful. Unfortunately, this belief is now accorded as much respect as the believers who attend charismatic snake handling churches. This is the potent argument that libertarians wield when it comes to defunding public broadcasting, museums, and the like. In a relativistic world, how is the Guggenheim any better than South of the Border? And why is Masterpiece Theater superior to Honey Boo Boo? Since the cultural elites sawed off their own legs on this, there is nothing they can say. At the end of the day, anybody can shit in a can and call it art. You don't need a subsidy for it.
Belief in the true, the good, and the beautiful is a religious belief. You can dismiss this as silly and unsophisticated, but those silly and unsophisticated people are the only bastions we have left for the true, the good, and the beautiful. Museums are filled with garbage. Universities tell us words have no meaning. Libraries are merely centers for people to hack the firewall to download internet porn as books go unread. Music is just so much noise. Educational television gives us reality programs about stupid people. Science is less about truth than about money. Who is left to promote and defend the true, the good, and the beautiful?
Whatever is true, good, or beautiful needs to be produced, promoted, and defended. To do this, you actually have to believe in the true, the good, and the beautiful. Unfortunately, this belief is now accorded as much respect as the believers who attend charismatic snake handling churches. This is the potent argument that libertarians wield when it comes to defunding public broadcasting, museums, and the like. In a relativistic world, how is the Guggenheim any better than South of the Border? And why is Masterpiece Theater superior to Honey Boo Boo? Since the cultural elites sawed off their own legs on this, there is nothing they can say. At the end of the day, anybody can shit in a can and call it art. You don't need a subsidy for it.
Belief in the true, the good, and the beautiful is a religious belief. You can dismiss this as silly and unsophisticated, but those silly and unsophisticated people are the only bastions we have left for the true, the good, and the beautiful. Museums are filled with garbage. Universities tell us words have no meaning. Libraries are merely centers for people to hack the firewall to download internet porn as books go unread. Music is just so much noise. Educational television gives us reality programs about stupid people. Science is less about truth than about money. Who is left to promote and defend the true, the good, and the beautiful?
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