Subject:
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Re: Swearing?
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Tue, 4 Jan 2000 17:59:43 GMT
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Reply-To:
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johnneal@uswest.+ihatespam+net
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Viewed:
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1722 times
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Dave Schuler wrote:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, John Neal writes, in response to my questions:
> > I am working on a definition of art that enlightens through beauty. Obscene
> > "art" which tries to offend or elicit certain thoughts I would say is a form
> > of political speech. I am trying to distinguish the two.
>
> Interesting. Without reducing this debate to equivocation, I'm still
> concerned that "beauty" is too nebulous a term to use as a benchmark for
> definitions of obscenity. It might be argued, for example, that one viewer's
> beauty is another viewer's obscenity.
I agree that the term beauty is nebulous, but I wonder if beauty is so subjective
as to be *only* in the eyes of the beholder. Is there something (can there be
something) that is beautiful outside of what is thought of it? I like to think of
beautiful as something transcendent of subjectivism. Something can be beautiful,
but if you don't see the beauty, it's not that the thing isn't beautiful, it's
just that you missed it. Of course, who is to say who missed what and who didn't,
which is back to subjectivism again, but I still say that there is an absolute
somewhere. lol I guess all debates *do* eventually lead to the existence of God,
but maybe there is a reason for that.
> On a more laid-back note, what about things which are beautiful but which
> don't enlighten? Do they exist? Do they fit somewhere on an art spectrum?
Well, I think that when one encounters something beautiful, one is transformed by
its beauty; that is, affected in a positive way. I would call that enlightenment,
so I guess for me the answer would be no.
John
> > > Guilianni (sp?) made an interesting observation during the whole obscenity
> > > debacle last year when he noted that, had the work slandered a Star of David
> > > or a rendition of Muhammed, it would likely have been reviled as Hate Speech,
> > > followed by public outcry for its removal.
> >
> > Exactly. When art is *used* to manipulate rather than simply express the
> > artist's creativity I think it ceases to be art. I am not totally clear on
> > this "working" definition, but it stems from an attempt to combat the idea
> > that "everything is art" which is where one goes pretty quickly in these
> > discussions. And in my mind, everything is *not* art, such as child
> > pornography or depictions of graphic violence for instance. I hate it when
> > "artists" create such filth and hide behind the "But it's art" curtain. Not
> > in my book.
>
> Boy-oh-boy! I can't tell you how delighted I am to read that! I am _sick to
> death_ of that Postmodernist "all is art" nonsense! Such a definition seems
> to imply that anything requiring or allowing interpretation is art, and is by
> extension roughly equivalent to saying that nothing is art.
>
> Dave!
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: Swearing?
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| In lugnet.off-topic.debate, John Neal writes, in response to my questions: (...) Interesting. Without reducing this debate to equivocation, I'm still concerned that "beauty" is too nebulous a term to use as a benchmark for definitions of obscenity. (...) (25 years ago, 4-Jan-00, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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