Where is the revolutionary impulse in popular culture?

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

If you look back at the upsurge of the 60's, you see that there was a reflection of what was going on in music. There were songs about justice, change, dreams of something better, even straight up revolution. It was also reflected in other mediums.

Even in the early days of Hollywood you see a lot of stuff influenced by the revolutionary wave that the October Revolution came out of.

We are clearly in the early stages of another upsurge now, forced upon us as we respond to the brutal onslaught of capital and its puppets. The Arab Spring; the mass movements in Greece, Spain, Israel; the social explosion in Britain; Occupy; etc.. But look at popular culture. As far as I can tell, most music is divided between the nihilistic and the materialistic. Nothing but the same old garbage is coming out of Hollywood (though there have been a few really good films coming out of some of the newer "industrialized countries" like Korea in past years). Television, video games, and all the rest too.

Where is the reflection of this new awakening?

[Kadir Ateş]

I think Adorno said it best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd7Fhaji8ow

[Nothing Human Is Alien]

I don't.

And anti-war songs were hardly the only reflection of what was going on.

[Hivemind]

Pop music is too busy writing lyrics about fucking and money, mainstream movies are about really mundane topics, mainstream news is full of shit, schools are full of shit, people are full of shit...

Sounds like cultural hegemony to me.

[CornetJoyce]

I think Adorno said it best:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xd7Fhaji8ow

Adorno was out of touch.

[GiantMonkeyMan]

Popular culture has become so intrinsically meshed with American Imperialism that any form of revolutionary expression is suppressed and marginalised. This is what Ken Loach said in relation to cinema in Britain:

Just imagine, if you went into the library and the bookshelves were stacked with 63% to 80% American fiction, 15% to 30% half-American, half-British fiction, and then all the other writers in the whole world just 3%. Imagine that in the art galleries, in terms of pictures; imagine it in the theatres. You can’t, it is inconceivable – and yet this is what we do to the cinema, which we think is a most beautiful art.
A similar process has occured in music with what Adorno calls a culture industry. Popular music is made only for profit and revolutionary thought (beyond 'fuck the police!') isn't profitable. American music companies dominate the charts and prevent anything truly unique or original from emerging into culture or, if by some chance something brilliant appears, they latch onto it and bleed it dry. There are some underground revolutionary music tracts but they are played by leftist, anti-authoritarian thinkers for leftist anti-authoritarian thinkers. Such as the punk crowd that just can't get over the fact that punk won't ever become popular or relevant ever again.

[Red Rabbit]

I was just thinking about this same thing the other day. Music is especially bad about it.

[Os Cangaceiros]

I've noticed in certain films there are references (either explicitely or implicitely) to the popularly held belief that financial services are mired in fraud and corruption.

Not really a nod to revolution, but it is somewhat reflective of people's hostility towards one segment of the business community.

[PC LOAD LETTER]

The music is there if you look carefully enough

[socialistjustin]

Some video games are pretty left leaning and talk about different shit like corruption, problems with race etc. Mass Effect is a universe filled with corporations fucking over people and the Quarians who are treated like shit.

[Hivemind]

The music is there if you look carefully enough

I haven't seen much in pop music, which I guess is the theme for the thread, but yeah the music is there. I am a big fan of punk music: hardcore punk, anarcho-punk, crust punk, grindcore, and a lot of the punk music I listen to is very left leaning and blatantly anti-capitalist and pro-anarchism/communism/etc and all that jazz. Though, this kind of music doesn't appeal to as many people as pop music (expectantly).

[Commissar Rykov]

Some video games are pretty left leaning and talk about different shit like corruption, problems with race etc. Mass Effect is a universe filled with corporations fucking over people and the Quarians who are treated like shit.
Indeed, the Quarians are basically the Roma in Space. I would agree though that the video game medium has been and is still full of ideas of fighting the system and making a better tomorrow.

[PC LOAD LETTER]

Some video games are pretty left leaning and talk about different shit like corruption, problems with race etc. Mass Effect is a universe filled with corporations fucking over people and the Quarians who are treated like shit.

Red Faction: Break Shit (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Faction:_Guerrilla) ... Worker's revolution on Mars ...

BioShock ... right-wing libertarian paradise ... fucked up world


I haven't seen much in pop music, which I guess is the theme for the thread, but yeah the music is there. I am a big fan of punk music: hardcore punk, anarcho-punk, crust punk, grindcore, and a lot of the punk music I listen to is very left leaning and blatantly anti-capitalist and pro-anarchism/communism/etc and all that jazz. Though, this kind of music doesn't appeal to as many people as pop music (expectantly).
I used to be crazy into punk music ... although I haven't kept up with it in a while. Same with underground hip-hop ...

[Sendo]

I'd say "The Other Guys" really surprised me. Especially the ending credits animated slideshow about wealth disparity in the country. The whole movie was what Michael Moore had envisioned in "Bowling for Columbine." Namely, what the show "Cops" would look like if the fuzz went after white-collar criminals who bankrupted pensions, instead of chasing poor blacks with some weed.

Not revolutionary, per se, but it has no respect for private property, is pro-union, pro-pension, and levels strong complaints at the system at the end. No systemic "Das Kapital" analysis, but hey, I enjoyed it thoroughly. It was also nice to see Will Ferrell have to share the screen and follow a script. He's so much better when he's not doing a one-man improv show like in Talladega Nights.

[Os Cangaceiros]

TOG was actually one of the movies I was think of when I made my comment.

Some of the others: Wall Street 2, Tower Heist, and Inside Job.

[Grigori]

The recent movie in time is pretty revolutionary (yes the premise is dumb, go with it.) It is a pretty obvious critique on wage slavery in the west. At the end of the movie i started an ironic clap and called for revolution, angering a group of pissed middle aged white men in the process (fuck em)

[Black_Rose]

"Tower Heist"? That movie seems like a rip-off of Ocean's Eleven from what I've seen of the trailers. I only saw one movie this year and it was Moneyball; nothing revolutionary in the leftist sense, but I liked it since I am a sabermetrically oriented girl.

BTW, would anyone consider Immortal Technique? I love some of his music.

Also, would you consider these lyrics (translated from Japanese, Song is called "Start" by Nakaguichi Masataka) to be either nihilistic or materialistic:


What are you grasping for?
What good will it do you?
We're moving forward and we'll make sure to discover what

Never-ending sentiments
the passionate beats of our hearts
and the voice of truth are all what we heard

We got busted up and we learned
of where we can get stronger
I'll search through the dreams in my hand
and one day I'll lead them all to you

Shouting the signal for the START we'll do what our hearts want
and vault over our cramped and mediocre lives
We'll make a DASH and attain every bit of our brilliant futures
Embracing the bonds we so believe in we'll race toward tomorrow(It is the first ending of Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's [Japanese], and the song is linked in my signature.)

It seems like it can be used as an anthem for the revolutionary left.

[Os Cangaceiros]

*shrug* I didn't mean that it was revolutionary, just that the theme (rich old prick scams people out of their money) runs along in a general trend I've noticed in some films.

[Black_Rose]

*shrug* I didn't mean that it was revolutionary, just that the theme (rich old prick scams people out of their money) runs along in a general trend I've noticed in some films.

The movie industry will try to profit from populist anti-bank sentiment, but the movie seems to apportion culpability to the malfeasance of a single capitalist - it does not offer a systemic critique of modern capitalism. BTW, was there anything interesting or original in Tower Heist that wasn't apparent in Ocean's Eleven?

[Smyg]

The recent movie in time is pretty revolutionary (yes the premise is dumb, go with it.) It is a pretty obvious critique on wage slavery in the west. At the end of the movie i started an ironic clap and called for revolution, angering a group of pissed middle aged white men in the process (fuck em)

I actually loved this movie, mostly for the class warfare. They rob banks to attack the ruling class and free the oppressed! :lol:

There is, in my opinion, a rather large, subtle theme in many video games, as said before.