Turning The Dial Left

My esteemed former housemate has a post up on the current ideological state of American TV that I thought was worthy of discussion, so go read that first.

Whilst in the most general sense, I have sympathy for an argument that says that the TV deck is stacked in favour of my end of the aisle, I think the actual situation is deeply complex, and merits detailed consideration.

First of all, at the risk of being facetious, I'm not sure 2.5 M is necessarily the best case study for liberal programming. A rich playboy who beds whomever the hell he wants without consequences? That's pretty much the GOP dream. The only difference between Charlie PseudoSheen and Newt Gingrich is that Newt screwed around whilst he was already married. And then ran for President.

Dexter also strikes me as a poor example, because whilst there's certainly a good deal of shagging going on in there, the central concept of a man who decides that the legal system (controlled by the government) needs to be circumvented in favour of individual action is entirely consistent with the views of much of the American right. "Government is never the solution", as Reagan put it. 

This, indeed, points to a major problem in determining the ideology of such shows; a live-and-let-live ethos and a rejection of standard authority is at least as indicative and in many ways more indicative of right wing libertarianism than it is of what the Americans would recognise as liberalism (and what, and I'm sure Tomsk will correct me if I'm wrong, I tend to think of as "social liberalism").  One need only look - and I think I've mentioned this before - at the number of US shows that start from the premise that someone can redeem themselves for past crimes according to their own moral compass, rather than that of the state (see, for example, Angel, or (EDIT: Whoops! Forgot to actually add the second example, which I've now forgotten.   Damn.)).  That's neither a liberal nor a conservative position, so much as a libertarian one. 

Moreover, it makes for good TV, in a way that a hero turning himself into the boys in blue doesn't.  The idea of "do what thou wilt" is hardwired into an awful lot of American TV, and I'd question whether that stems from liberal leanings so much as the the veneration (I'd would say "fetishisation", but that's both an abuse of language and a topic for another time) of freedom in American culture.  In truth, I rather think in recent years American conservatives have become rather contemptuous of a whole host of freedoms, but I feel safe in assuming that this is a point neither Gooder nor FOX is attempting to make.

We should also consider that there's a real risk of selection bias here. The vast majority of British people - including me - who watch American TV shows are watching those that have already been judged impressive (or at least watchable) by some kind of international Western audience, which is of course significantly more liberal (as a general rule) than a great deal of the States. I have some vague recollection - and that's all it is, so take this with a hefty pinch of salt - that a lot of local American TV in the Bible Belt and elsewhere in the South is a lot more socially conservative, and we never get to see it.  As I say, I can't back that up at the minute with any specific examples, but it's at least worth bearing in mind when Englishmen discuss the state of American TV.

More importantly, the problem with saying things like "US TV is liberal" is that it fails to note that liberalism can be divided into social and economic arms at the very least, and also -as mentioned already - because liberalism and libertarianism, whilst very different in many respects, both have (or are supposed to have) a live-and-let-live attitude, which I think is what's really on display here.  In addition, one needs to consider what a conservative program would even look like in the first place.  I can't say what made Gooder choose the examples that he did, but the common theme would seem to be that the "liberal" programmes include things that piss of conservatives, whereas his example of a "conservative" programme, 24 , got liberals hot under the collar.  But 24 is an anomalously easy call because it explicitly deals with politics and national security, both of which have (broadly speaking) well established and mutually exclusive liberal and conservative positions.

If we're really going to compartmentalise American TV in general, though , we need a better definition of a conservative show.  Is, for example, The Cosby Show conservative? That's all about the importance of family and marriage, two things which American conservatives are convinced liberals don't give a shit about.  If a show in which a woman gets an abortion without crippling remorse or long-term psychological problems, then a) is that a liberal show, and b) what's the alternative to make the show conservative?  If she chooses to keep the baby, is that conservative (in truth, a lot of liberals argued that this was the case regarding Juno, which if nothing else serves as proof that not everyone I nominally agree with necessarily has two IQ points to rub together)?  Or does the show specifically have to show her refusing to even countenance it, or even for her to go through with it with massive negative consequences?

This is where we get to the very meat of the problem. Even at its best, American conservatism, as well as our home-grown version, is as regards its social aspect (there is of course an economic aspect which is just as important; this is another reason why breaking up TV shows into "liberal", "conservative" and "neither" is probably a bad idea) significantly, if not primarily, concerned with the importance of what is "normal".  Marriage is "normal".  Family is "normal".  Being straight, white and heterosexual is "normal".  All of which means that shows that fit in with the conservative viewpoint are by their very nature more difficult to spot [1].  I wonder what the black, Hispanic and homosexual communities would think about Gooder's suggestion that Friends is liberal.  Six white straight people with more money than sense taking it in turns to sleep with each other?  That's not the liberal dream, that Paris Hilton's Saturday afternoons.

We cannot judge a show by how many times it does something contrary to conservative thinking, because so often every time it does something in line with conservative thinking, it passes without comment.

And all of this, all nine of the above paragraphs (hey, well done for making it this far!) is without dealing with the fact that over-representation is not the same thing as bias.  There are certainly TV shows (or at least episodes) that do portray certain conservative ideas in a bad light.  But that's where studies need to be focused.   Not on how different political groups view what is portrayed, but regarding how political groups are portrayed themselves.

(Lastly, and somewhat parenthetically, I'd like to point out that the example of the Simpsons might show something other than what is intended. Far from proving that even FOX feels compelled to show liberal shows, I'd say it merely proves that FOX prefers raking in shitloads of cash to ensuring all it's programmes tow the conservative line. Indeed, the one time I'm aware of FOX giving direct orders to the Simpsons writers, it was that they were never again allowed to make fun of FOX News, after Groening et al portrayed FOX News anchors as being rabid propagandists.)

[1] Indeed, the argument that US TV is drowning in a sea of liberalism can be easily punctured thus: liberals don't like guns.  How many American shows involve people who have are not agents of the state using guns?  I can't give a precise value, but I'm estimating that it's a metric fuck ton.  And why?  Because guns can make a story interesting.  Just like divorce and constant bonking. 

In fact, I'll make Gooder a deal.  Let's go through all the American TV drama episodes we own between us (I'm only including drama because sex is far easier to get laughs out of than gunplay), and count how many of them involve sex outside of marriage, and how many involve a hero or heroine holding a gun despite being neither a cop nor a federal agent.  If the ratio ends up being more than 1:10 (a fairly generous one in scientific terms) in favour of between-the-sheets action, I'll buy you dinner. 

But not in a gay way.  I don't want this argument to have a liberal bias.

She Didn't Even Use Tongue!

Dammit!  Why did no-one tell me Slovenia was so promiscuous before I spent three weeks there as a dynamic, unattached mathematician! Number 3 on the list, for God's sake, and the only kiss I got out of it was from my host's two-year-old!

At least I'll be off to bonk-happy Austria next month, I guess, but I don't think The Other Half is going to accept "They're an extra 52% gagging for it!" as an excuse for philandering.

Not that the test seems that well-written, to be honest.   Is the number of times you fantasise about sex with people other than your partner really six times more indicative of promiscuity than how you feel about casual sex?

h/t to LGM.

Keepin' It Civil

Look, I despise Michelle Bachmann as much as the next person with an IQ above what you can roll during Yahtzee!, but I hate when people go after the spouses of Democratic politicians, and that means Republican spouses are off-limits, too.

While Rep. Michele Bachmann has forcefully denounced the Medicaid program for swelling the "welfare rolls," the mental health clinic run by her husband has been collecting annual Medicaid payments totaling over $137,000 for the treatment of patients since 2005, according to new figures obtained by NBC News.

There are cases when a spouses' actions are relevant, of course: see Thomas, Clarence: mad wife.  But all you have here is a husband using federal money for purposes his wife disagrees with.  The degree to which the Bachmann's are prepared to compromise with each other regarding divergent political beliefs is entirely their own business, and everyone else can keep their damn mouths shut.

A Tale Of Cocktails: Experiments In Intoxication

Last night The Other Half and I put the finishing touches to the beta version of our first cocktail.  I say "ours", because after multiple online searches neither of us could find these ingredients combined in any other drink.  It's possible others here have also tried it, or know of something very similar: let me know in comments.

The drink is created as follows: shake 1oz of creme de cassis and 2oz of peach Schnapps with crushed ice. Pour into a champagne glass, straining out the ice, and top up with lemonade.  Add a single mint leaf, and drink.  It tastes a lot like a woo woo (hurrah!), though a little less tart due to the absence of cranberry juice.  A single mint leaf is actually a bit weak taste wise, so adding another one might be a good idea if necessary.  We call our cocktail, almost inevitably, the impeachmint.

I briefly thought about grading this drink like I have all the others, but there's just no way I could possibly be objective. If anyone fancies giving it a go and letting me know what they think, then by all means have at it.

Essential Classic X-Men: Vol 1

Having read this for the sake of the other blog, I thought it was worth reviewing here.

Reviewing stories from before the Civil Rights movement (or for that matter congruent to it) is often a tricky task.  Some people think Tomb of the Cybermen is one of the best Doctor Who stories the program offered, but others can't get past a vision of the future where monosyllabic black men do the bidding of scheming whiteys.

Essential X-Men: Vol 1 is more or less racism free, actually [1] - you'd have to wait for the second volume for that - but there is most certainly a pervasive sexism running through the book.  Masses of it.  Oodles of it.  If the amount of sexism on display here could be measured in washing-up, you'd need at least three women to tackle it. It's everywhere.

You can either get past the fainting fits and patronising-cum-chauvinistic concern, or you can't.  I found it distracting, rather than unbearable.  It kept pulling me out of the narrative, but it's not like Stan Lee's writing was massively engrossing in any case.

Having said that, this review serves as a belated apology to Lee.  After years of dismissing Lee's work as indicative of an era that didn't know any better, even after I read this TPB for the first time, I've reconsidered.  Partially, to be sure, that's because his successor on the title was so entirely wretched.

It's more than that, though.  Part of my problem the first time around was that Lee's comics were simultaneously ridiculously po-faced and fundamentally unserious, like a performance of Hamlet in which every actor spends half their time mugging at the audience.  I still think that, actually, it's just that I enjoyed it a great deal more once I knew that was what I was getting.

I think it's a fairly common problem, actually: once you love something enough, it's difficult to see it being twisted into a parody of itself.  The fact that in this case the parody came first doesn't really make a difference.  There's just a part of your brain that can't process the discrepancy.

Once you get past that, though - and I managed this mainly through reading enough shitty contemporary X-comics to become essentially immune - Lee's books are actually really good fun.  All of that mugging I mentioned above turns out to simply be a sign of a comic determined not to take itself remotely seriously.  The secret is to realise the ridiculously overblown titles - and for that matter, stakes - are all a part of that.  Once you read "Lo! Now Shall Appear -- The Mimic!" as equivalent to Ron Burgundy exclaiming "By the hammer of Thor!", everything falls into place.

In any event, even if pun-laden soft bigotry isn't your cup of tea (that you'd better make for me post-haste, woman!) you have to salute Lee just from a world-building perspective.  Over nineteen issues, Lee introduces us to the six quintessential X-Men, over a dozen major supporting characters, and concepts from the Danger Room to the Savage Land.  As a historical document alone, this should be in the British Museum. [2]

[1] You could argue that it dips into colonialism, though, with how easily San Marco falls to Mastermind's imaginary legions.

[2] Or the American Museum, I guess.  Do the Americans have their own museum?   Doesn't matter, we'll just nick it, like the Elgin Marbles.

One Step Forward

Right.  Good.  Not before time.  As the US slides into a seemingly inescapable morass of fiscal insanity, reactionary sabre-rattling, and decreasing life expectancy (if you're a woman, at least), it's nice to know that it isn't all bad news.

Justify Your Existence

I realise that I'm no lawyer. I've picked up a few tricks from my father, and a smattering of unstructured reading. So when I learn that the US Supreme Court has thrown out a case brought by a large number of women against Walmart, alleging sexual discrimination, I realise it would be stupid to start throwing my thoughts on the legal niceties of the case.

Having said that, there is one undeniable fact in all of this, and that is that Chief Justice Scalia is an idiot. That is not to say he's wrong on this case overall (as I say, I have no idea whether he is or not), but this argument is so infuriating in its total absence of logic or thought it actually took me a little while to process its foolishness:

[L]eft to their own devices most managers in any corporation—and surely most managers in a corporation that forbids sex discrimination—would select sex-neutral, performance-based criteria for hiring and promotion.

Lemieux is appropriately gob-smacked by this line of "argument", but I don't think he's followed it through to conclusion. If we tweak the Scalia quote just a little, we get "left to their own devices most citizens in any country—and surely most citizens in a country that forbids stealing cars—would select legal currency-based methods for acquiring automobiles".

You see the problem? It's not that the statement becomes false - I'm sure that most US citizens who own cars did indeed pay for them - it's that it becomes patently absurd to utter the phrase whilst considering whether a specific individual stole a car or not. I'm not for one second suggesting we abandon the idea of "innocent until proven guilty" - though of course whether or not that applies to such cases, I am unsure - but to use the fact that most people follow the law as an argument against the prosecution is self-evidently imbecilic.  You would have thought that point would be obvious to a man whose entire profession is based around dealing with the people who don't follow the rules like the rest of us.

Most people are not murderers. Most people are not rapists. Most companies, for all I know, do not employ discriminatory hiring practices.  Unless we're going to start applying Scalia's argument to any crime we believe less than half the citizenry are guilty of, however, (and let's not forget, there's only one person in this post who believes that corporations should be treated like citizens, and it sure as hell isn't me), Scalia's position is laughable. Unfortunately, it's also entirely in keeping with his inability to argue with any coherence whenever a large company comes running to Daddy.