David Brooks at his BEST
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FRIDAY --- DAVID BROOKS NAILED IT TODAY
David brooks was at the top of his game today in his New York Times Piece, “Lord of the Memes”, a wonderful riff on the intellectual affectations of those insufferably better people we meet at the better parties.
A FEW TEASERS“You must remember that there have been three epochs of intellectual affectation. The first, lasting from approximately 1400 to 1965, was the great age of snobbery.”
“This code … was replaced by the code of the Higher Eclectica. The old hierarchy of the arts was dismissed as hopelessly reactionary. Instead, any cultural artifact produced by a member of a colonially oppressed out-group was deemed artistically and intellectually superior.”
“But on or about June 29, 2007, human character changed. That, of course, was the release date of the first iPhone. On that date, media displaced culture.”… “Inventors, artists and writers come and go, but buzz is forever.”
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MY OWN RIFF ON DAVID BROOKS’ RIFF
This is all about ancient wisdom, and those insufferable “one-uppers” among us.
Pop quiz:
Q: What was the Tenth Commandment?
A: 10 Do not covet or envy that which is not yours.Ah… envy, one of the top three candidates for the original sin. The tendency towards envy is so ingrained in the human psyche that it has supplied the driving force for most of the murderous mass movements of the last 88 years.
Here’s the dirty little secret. The subset of the proto-intelligentsia to which David Brooks refers do not like to see themselves as “insensitive” or “uncaring”, and many of them have at least a passing acquaintance with the Decalogue. Some of them are even willing to acknowledge that most of the “Commandments” (especially when seen as strong recommendations) have “considerable merit”.
This is why I suspect that the one-uppers have been playing an “envy trick” game by exploiting a “loophole” in the Decalogue.
The game goes like this:
“What can I do to promote your envy without actually succumbing to it myself? [Note the obvious self deception here.] “I’ll be conspicuously more sophisticated and hip than you are so that you will be as envy driven as (secretly) am I.
And that loophole, you ask? We can always avoid feeling envy by being on top.
I loved David Brooks’ article and recommend you read it before you or the link expire. Here’s the link:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/08/opinion/08brooks.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper&oref=slogin
JBG
