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Stop Blaming Trump
Okay, I’ll admit: The headline here is clickbait.
But here’s a data point which I think exonerates Donald J. Trump — if, in fact, he needs exoneration — from any charges of diminishing the culture. (I’m not trying to dive into the Trump vs. GOPe argument. I’m just trying to run a business here. I want people to read this post, think about the data point I’m writing about, and then join Ricochet.)
Well, two data points, actually. The first, from Mike Shatzkin at the Idea Logical Company, about publishing trends:
The good news for the publishers is that print sales erosion — at least for the moment — seems to have been stopped … A variety of industry and company sales statistics seem persuasive on that point. The percentage of revenues coming from ebooks for big publishers has declined and the sales of print have risen. And there is even some anecdotal evidence suggesting that bookstore retail shelf space is increasing again.
Oh, wow, great! They’re printing books again, and what’s even better: People are buying books! Not just ebooks, but book books.
But wait. Not so fast. A few days later came this clarification:
The other challenge was a pushback against my claim that print book sales overall are rising. The commenter pointed out that more than the entire print book sales increase shown in industry stats can be accounted for by the rise in sales of adult coloring books, a category which has taken a big leap forward in the past 12 months. For one thing, it is impossible to predict with any accuracy whether or for how long those sales will sustain. But, more importantly, the sales of print that do not include adult coloring books, which have no ebook equivalents and are the good fortune of a few selected companies, are still declining.
Go ahead, read that again: Book sales are rising, but that’s only because of the popularity of something called adult coloring books.
We now have a population of adults who buy coloring books. For themselves. To color in. Because, I guess, real books are too hard? Chapter books are complicated? They need something to do while Netflix is buffering?
There’s lots of talk about the infantilization of grown-ups. Lots of talk about the “dumbing-down” of American culture.
But those verbs seem too passive to capture what’s really happening. Grown-ups are not being infantilized. They’re actively behaving — choosing to behave — like children. The culture is not being dumbed-down. People, Americans, of all shapes and sizes and colors and creeds are doing the dumbing. It’s self-cretinization at a massive scale.
And that isn’t Trump’s fault.
Published in General
I’m a millennial and I blame social media and PC culture for everything that is wrong with our culture. Facebook has turned everyone into a wanna-be celebrity, which makes one very self-centered.
Twitter, the preferred medium, in which a millennial exchanges ideas is limited to 140 characters. (Trigger Warning) The only ideas that can be communicated in 140 characters are stupid ideas. Twitter is a venue from which a person can scream bumper sticker slogans and think they are being clever.
Finally, PC culture has corrupted our entire thought process. When I was an undergraduate taking an upper level history seminar; I witnessed PC thought paralyze a fellow student. We were discussing an article written by a British historian who happened to be black. One student kept referring to him as “African-American” and the entire class + professor kept correcting him saying, “He’s not an American, stop calling him an American.” I could see in his eyes that he could not compute this situation. He was absolutely paralyzed and couldn’t get himself out of this intellectual corner.
That’s hardly a Hollywood thing, haven’t you ever been to a Civil War Reenactment? Heaven help you if you used polyester string on your buttons.
A friend of mine who is a talented artist (watercolors, stained glass, several other media), went through a phase of taking black and white copies of medieval woodcuts and illustrations, and coloring them herself, usually with several dozen of her hundreds of watercolor markers.
The results are absolutely stunning. So I am fine with the idea of the ‘adult coloring book.’
I do agree that Trump is not responsible for the decline in other areas of the culture, though.
I’m not sure that train of thought has ever been put more succinctly or forcefully than it is here.
(For those of you who don’t have time to read the whole thing, it’s an Andy McCarthy piece entitled “Culture Rot: Donald Trump Is the Effect, Not the Cause.”)
I wholeheartedly agree.
I concur with the others that this is not a generation defining fault -though I remind people that “Paint by Numbers” is frequently a punchline or an insult. It is a way of pretending to a talent you don’t have, pretending to an interest you haven’t developed, and otherwise a symbol of wanting a reputation for virtue without putting in the work for it.
No one gripes about an amateur painter whose painting isn’t very good -nor do they gripe about amateur sketchers. It is recognized as a type of self-improvement and discipline. Paint by numbers and coloring books are skipping the self-improvement steps.
However, when I first read this I was afraid that we were referring to coloring books from adult bookstores, so given the reference point, I consider this a win, still, for Western Civilization.
Yeah, even the Game of Thrones coloring book is relatively modest.
Maybe it’s because it’s a common activity of very little kids. Like building with blocks. Or . . . Jenga. :)
I disagree with the whole idea that this is the end of civilization.
All of it.
Adults have always sought recreation in simple, childish hobbies. G. K. Chesterton built toy theatres as an adult. Ward Kimball collected and played with antique toys as an adult. Other men I knew born between 1880-1930 and lead very “adult” lives enjoyed childish pastimes. The state trooper who lived across the hill from me that had a Lionel empire in his garage, the WWII Pacific marine vet that kept a shed full of carved animals made from walnut shells and corn-cobs down the road, the other old man with his yard full of whirly-gigs he designed starting in the 1950s.
Our culture is infantile, but this isn’t necessarily any proof of it.
I’d also like to say a word in defence of paint by numbers.
Paint by numbers was a chance for some people with limited means, education, and time and above opportunity, to attempt to paint. My grandmother born 1924 and my wife’s grandmother born 1915 lacked all of the above resources. Mine was raised in near poverty in the country, my wife’s was neglected and abused as a family drudge by an alcoholic father and denied the education in the arts her mother had given her before her untimely death. For both of them, as busy housewives after WWII, it was a way to reach an aspiration otherwise out of their grasps. I don’t have any of my grandmother’s paint by numbers and deeply wish I did, we both treasure my wife’s grandmothers.
The idea that things like this are beneath contempt puts the lie to your whole noblesse oblige post that I found so moving Sabrdance.
Would it have been better had the attempt art on their own, absolutely, but both of them felt that weren’t even capable of that, both did create beautiful art in other medium as a closet full of gorgeous hand-sewn quilts testify, but they couldn’t bridge that gap. I’m glad they didn’t it would have taken them away from a talent they felt was within their ken.
Joking! I guess this whole Rob Long as GOPe is a sensitive topic? ;)
No, they go to preschool. Not joking.
That article, titled, “Why adults are buying coloring books (for themselves)”, is pretty fascinating. Most astounding are the sales figures:
I suspect I know what Mr. Long’s next book will be… ;)
It does agree with his conclusion, btw.
Actually, I follow a bunch of scientists and researchers via Twitter. There’s really some fascinating stuff on there. A lot of them have switched from blogging to Twitter, since it’s quick & easy.
Jon Gabriel’s feed is all bumper sticker slogans, though.
How about those paint-by-numbers pictures adults used to do in the 60’s ?
I colored a page of an adult coloring book on a couples get together. We were watching a movie, my wife’s friend and I colored whiles watching the movie.
Seems that if you are paying full frieght for your own life and someone else’s a pleasant half hour is perfectly reasonable.
Not my preferred past time, but ultimately enjoyable.
Serious question:
What does TL;dr mean?
I’ve seen it numerous times, and know it means something, but I’ve got no clue.
SMH.
Same here. My grandmother always was in a paint-by-number project. I have two small, and wonder who in the family has the rest of her work.
Yes, she didn’t design it, but she did attend to the detail, and I think over time, she probably became more adept at the work, and probably could have done some of her own work.
Too Long; Didn’t Read.
[edit] can’t beat the Guru
To the people going “But it’s just leisure, like paint by numbers”, it also coincides with other romper room-like activities of the past few years…. cuddle parties, adult pre-school, even even cosplay to the extent that some adults forgo buying a house or decent vehicle to spend 5 figures a year so they can dress up like Batman.
When several related things happen, we call that a trend. So there’s definitely an self-infantilizing trend occurring among adults.
We do seem to be casting the very concept aside, even mocking it, in favor of a perpetual childhood/teenaged life.
I gave the wrong impression. My point was not about the value or validity of paint by numbers or about childish pursuits. I play video games, read science fiction, and dabble in models -I am not one to throw stones. Rather, my point was that things like this have long had a mixed reputation, and thus comparing adult coloring books to paint by numbers seems to me fair, but not as exculpatory as it seems on the surface. Thus the insult -someone shows off a painting they made and the viewer responds: “what, is it a paint-by-numbers kit?” And this dates back to vaudeville.
I agree, it’s not the end of civilization. And I agree, for those who enjoy it and want to add something to their lives, there is nothing wrong with it. But much like my students’ accents, I am also aware that it is not considered so. It’s like a Thomas Kincaid Painting in that regard. Probably not on accident.
Drove the art critics crazy, and inspired Andy Warhol:
And for what its worth, my sense of noblesse oblige does not also require me to drop my aesthetic sense. There is nothing wrong with people liking Thomas Kincaid paintings. I like them too. They remain kitsch. It’s the same painting, over and over, and completely lacking in life -they exist to scratch the fantasy nostalgia desire for an idyllic world that never existed. No one is going to confuse him with a high-art landscaper like Rembrandt.
And there is nothing wrong paint by numbers for -as people say -relaxation. But it is not painting, nor is it creative. It is mass market culture, which is to say, not a culture at all.
One needn’t denigrate low culture to recognize it is low culture when compared to high culture.
Brings to my mind Venice neighbor Paul Krassner’s magazine The Realist, which in 1967 published artist Wally Wood’s very adults-only Disney parody.
You may bewail their taste and intellect, but what’s really different from before is that a critical mass of the population can focus on more than earning enough for food and shelter – on stuff that is essentially frivolous rather than materially essential or that refers to the materially essential for value.
It’s a sign of prosperity – it may have been a short lived aberration, but nonetheless.
Good grief, I do too! (Didn’t think anybody else did.)
Saber dance: ” …No one is going to confuse him with a high-art landscaper like Rembrandt.
And there is nothing wrong paint by numbers for -as people say -relaxation. But it is not painting, nor is it creative. It is mass market culture, which is to say, not a culture at all….”
So only those wealthy enough to afford a Rembrandt, or talented enough to be a Rembrandt, should enjoy or create art?
Well, that gets into weeds, and I would say there is something to it more value than you give it credit.
Trust me, I can roll in the snob factor whenever I want…hey, I’m the nerd with St. Salieri for an avatar on here after all. Trust me, I believe in high art, and I don’t think it is a purely subjective call either, I believe in an objective standard in beauty.
I think that understanding for the desire for beauty is what lays at the heart of it. The fact the some people have not had the opportunity, education, or perhaps even the gift to discern the difference is where kindness and charity should prevail. So while, you are correct in a strict sense, it is mass culture, that is about all that is left to us today, unless we limit ourselves to the past.
Much of the kitschie culture of the past at least had this striving behind it, a big difference. It was unironic.
Sorry if I was too strident.
With this I concur.
I am less certain. Maybe the purchasers of kitsch weren’t in on the joke. It seems to me there is a difference between the people who listened to Mozart or owned a print of a Monet even if they didn’t fully understand it, and buying any nostalgic-kitschie painting because a home ought to have paintings in it.
And me the same. I think our positions are more nuanced that 250 words can convey.
Ok. First of all… It’s not a coloring book. It’s called Photoshop.
I don’t know if adult coloring books are inherent offensive — I’ve never seen one of them, maybe they’re a good way to acquire drawing and painting skills? (I just looked them up — some of them do look like a good way to learn some of the basics of perspective and color; others look boring — complex patterns, rather than objects — but perhaps the pleasure is in mixing paints and exercising color judgment?) I’ve taken drawing classes as an adult, and don’t see something inherently offensive in wanting to acquire drawing and painting skills; this seems to me a reasonable way for people to learn a few of the basics and teach themselves.
I do sense that American culture is becoming more and more childish, though, and if you look at the two debate videos I dredged up the other day, you’ll see that this definitely isn’t just because I’m getting older. I don’t really understand why. It’s a whole aesthetic that saturates everything. We’re making even very solemn things, like a debate over who gets to control the nuclear codes, into events that aesthetically speaking, are geared to seven-year-olds: bright colors, balloons, lights, a circus atmosphere, hooting audiences, simple words, no presumption of any attention span or ability to follow an argument beyond a few short words, and crude, childish jokes. The most adult of events — elections — is no longer geared at an adult audience. I’m really wondering if we’ve done ourselves collective brain damage with the Internet, and perhaps also with television. I don’t really know how else to account for it.
I color all the time. It helps me understand the world. And I’ve never met an estimator who didn’t.