Trump's Biggest Miss, I Comment on the Bachelor?!, The Cultural Danger of Disney "Redeeming their Villains," What it Means to "Gamestop" the iTunes Charts, (The Five for 02/26/21)
Hey,
Welcome to The Five. I work on this newsletter for 2-3 days before it publishes. Last night, the U.S. bombed Syria on the orders of the Biden Administration. Rather than do whatever other outlet does, which is throw up a hot-take story that may be wrong…we’re going to let the facts settle and examine what happened next week.
I normally work to mix in (more or less) equal parts of U.S. current events, international politics, tech and culture happenings…all which share the common thread of being important, but not headlining stories of the day.
Today, I decided to dive into the intersection of pop culture happenings and what American society seems to value in 2021.
You might like it, or you might hate it. Either way, hit me up, or join the Discord and converse with other readers of The Five.
Before we begin:
To tell the other side of the story on the Seattle homeless shelter handing out heroin pipes I covered in the last issue, one reader sent me a couple of excellent articles on how Portugal has treated heroin addiction through decriminalization. The treatment options don’t include quitting cold turkey. You can read a more narrative driven story about that success here and take a look at some very robust research here. (Hat Tip: Rafe)
The roller-blading Police of Pakistan are a real thing…and, while not enough of a news story to be one of The Five, you should still see the video.
I do my fair share of mocking celebrities in The Five, mainly because I interacted with them for 10 years and the majority are insufferably arrogant and stupid, which is a bitter cocktail to get down. But NBA point guard Russell Westbrook deserves praise. Westbrook and his wife Nicole are starting a grade 6-12 school for low income students in South Los Angeles.
[one]
Donald Trump is allegedly pushing hard for Facebook and Instagram to re-instate his accounts. Newsweek reports:
Former President Donald Trump could be making a return to Facebook and thousands of people will have the chance to weigh in on whether his indefinite suspension should be lifted.
Trump harnessed the power of social media in a way few other politicians have but he had his direct source to the public cut off in January after the Capitol riot. Banned from Twitter for life, the former president has the chance to appeal to Facebook to allow him back on the platform and the social media company's Oversight Board has taken up the case.
Helle Thorning-Schmidt, the co-chair of Facebook's Oversight Board, told Britain's Channel 4 News on Tuesday, they decided to take Trump's case. The case is a textbook example of why the board was created because many people are interested in it and it's "very principled," according to Thorning-Schmidt.
Since the readership of The Five is pretty all over the map politically, I think I can lay out two things we can (mostly) agree on in regards to Trump:
Peace in the Middle East is amazing. Trump’s work on peace deals in the Middle East are unprecedented, making him far and away (in my opnion) the best foreign policy President of my lifetime. (Regan/Bush: CIA backed shadow wars in Central/South America that went pretty bad. Clinton: Genocide in the Balkans and Rwanda. Bush II: started two wars that we’re still in/losing. Obama: maintained those same wars, droned American citizens).
Big tech has an enormous amount of power over the average American and it would be nice if he (or Biden, or anybody) would do something about it.
Trump has an opportunity to start a new social network from scratch, or to join an emerging network, such as Minds, which has clear rules (read all of them if you care) about free speech and what’s ban-able user behavior. Instead, Trump is groveling before Mark Zuckerberg, which will just serve to reinforce the near monopoly Facebook (which also owns Instagram) and Twitter have over an entire sector of public discourse.
Trump speaks on Sunday at CPAC (Conservative Political Action Committee) and quite frankly, I don’t expect much. If he’s been reduced to begging Facebook to let him back in, I take that as a sign that his once unshakable defiance of the status quo has run out of steam and The Donald no longer holds an irresistible gravitational pull in American political and cultural life.
Breaking the power of Big Tech could have been one of Trump’s two signature accomplishments. As of right now, it looks like he’s bending the knee to the Silicon Valley overlords.
[two]
Ugh. I can’t believe I’m writing about The Bachelor, but there’s a reason we have to go there.
Until I dove into this story I had no idea that The Bachelor, which started in 2002, has been on for quite literally half my life. This all started with Rachel Lindsey, who was a former star of The Bachelorette. Here she is with host Chris Harrison.
This season, the contestant who (I guess?) won the show and was selected by this season’s Bachelor was Rachael Kirkconnel, who will be selected at the end of this season by Bachelor Matt James (pic of the two of them…to help you keep track of this extremely odd, dense, story).
After the filming of the show, information came to light that Kirkconnel attended an “Antebellum” themed fraternity formal in college, which kicked off the kind of amateur social media sleuthing that led some people to convince themselves that JFK Jr. is still alive and will return as Trump’s Vice President on the 2024 ticket.
Harrison, the show’s host, responded to the controversy in this way:
“I haven’t talked to Rachael about it,” Harrison said. “We all need to have a little grace, a little understanding, a little compassion. Because I have seen some stuff online — this judge, jury, executioner thing where people are just tearing this girl’s life apart and diving into, like, her parents, her parents’ voting record. It’s unbelievably alarming to watch this.”
At this point, former contestant Rachel Lindsey attacked Harrison, which caused Harrison to fall all over himself in apology—for asking for “a little grace, a little compassion” for someone who was being destroyed online.
And did that apology get him anywhere? Nah. Lindsey refused to accept Harrison’s apology and he’s “stepped away” (probably fired) from the show after 19 years of keeping The Bachelor at the top of the TV charts. Meanwhile, news has leaked that James and Kirkconnel have allegedly broken up, which will bomb the ratings of the remaining episodes of the show. Kirkconnel has gone on a (social) media blitz to fall all over herself apologizing. People still hate her.
Observations:
A. If there are levels of racism, how racist can Kirkconnel be and still want to marry a black man and (presumably) have bi-racial children? If racism is like belts in Karate, is she only a yellow belt or something? (Not saying she isn’t racist, I don’t know her…but how do we reconcile those two opposing facts?)
B. Does Harrison, who has zero controversy after 30+ years active in Hollywood, really deserve to lose his entire career for “asking for a little grace” for a young woman who’s life was being ripped apart by online trolls and conspiracy theorists?
C. I would never attend an Antebellum party, for several reasons. First off, I think fraternities are stupid, as someone who has the ability to make friends without paying for them. But more importantly, I started out in radio at 19 and was on in Chicago before turning 20—I had to become keenly aware of how things could look, and how even one wrong step could cost me my career. But are all teenagers this aware of how the world works now? At what point is someone far enough away from a mistake to be allowed to be on TV? Or, be a cheerleader in college years after uttering a single bad word? Or, work a job?
D. And as we zoom out…why should anyone make any public statement? Why should anyone use social media at all? Unless former contestant Rachael Lindsey has a record pure as the driven snow (and no one does…well, one guy did but they nailed him to a tree), what’s to stop trolls on the other side of this from digging up her dirt? What defense would she possibly have after leading the charge to destroy two careers and one “engagement” (I guess it’s a real “engagement?”)
E. I’ve met a couple of contestants who were on The Bachelor. It’s a disgusting show. The showrunners keep the girls running all the time, then keep them up late and give them plenty of booze so there will be the kind of emotional breakdowns and fights that keep audiences engaged. If Harrison (the host) has something to apologize for, he might first apologize for being the face of a machine that has humiliated young men and women for two decades.
[three]
This is issue is pretty heavy on the culture side of news, but again, Evie Magazine comes through with top quality writing on the forthcoming Cruella movie and the downside of our society’s obsessions with the anti-hero narrative.
The values we see on the screen do seem to trickle down to Wall Street, Main Street and (lately) even violence in the streets. I’m still going to watch Cruella because I like 70’s punk and all three leads (Emma Stone, Emma Thompson, Mark Strong), but this writing on why Disney is obsessed with redeeming their villains is worth considering if this is really a movie for kids.*
A villain’s backstory might make for an interesting one, but we fall into the trap of blurring the lines between good and evil when empathy for their decisions enters the picture. Once we begin to empathize with Maleficent as much as we did with Princess Aurora or Prince Charming, the intent of the original story told by Disney is undermined, leaving Maleficent’s actions to be considered poor, yet understandable, considering what she’s been through. This is an especially problematic development when using children’s stories and fairytales, which traditionally show good and evil in stark contrast in order to teach morality and by which young generations are incredibly heavily influenced.
It’s no secret that we’re affected by the media we consume, and children are constantly taking in information, forming their understanding of the world through the stories they absorb, and learning the difference between right and wrong. It’s natural for children, as well as adults, to emulate the characters they empathize with the most. If the next generation of children are told that morality is subjective, that damaging behavior can always be explained away, and that a villain can be the hero of a story, how can we expect their choices in life to reflect that of a moral person’s? It’s essential that we consider the detriment to society when we teach children, and even adults, that Maleficent’s actions, while unsavory, are justifiable.
*I’m not going to cast judgement on a film that hasn’t come out, but even if Cruella has a great message, the trend of showing anti-heroes to kids remains.
[four]
I went back and forth for a couple of days on whether or not this (niche, kinda weird) story about Selmer, the LGBT artist who shot to the top of the Christian iTunes charts this week with an EP chock full of profanity and drug use.
The readership of The Five, while split pretty equally between left and right, also seems to be pretty even mix of religious Christians/monotheists and intellectual atheists. Both groups share a solid tradition of reason, which is no longer on-trend in a world where many of the left believe freezing windmills resulting in power outages in Texas mean we need…more green energy?! and some on the right still believe the 2016 Pizzagate conspiracy theory is true, despite the fact that there’s no proof a pizza shop in DC was a den of organized crime and the would-be gunman was released from prison this week.
You can read the interview with Semler in Religion News Service (not a Christian publication but an outlet that covers all kinds of religion stories). Rather than pull a quote, I wanted to point out three observations:
A). The EP is REALLY good. There’s no denying the level of talent and songwriting here. Preacher’s Kid most reminds me of Bright Eyes’ I’m Wide Awake and It’s Morning, an indie singer-songwriter record that hasn’t left regular rotation since 2005.
B). The marketing is brilliant. Semler (real name: Grace Baldridge) put out a video on Tiktok saying “someone should make an album about growing up LGBT in the church” and then decided to just write the songs herself. If you believe the EP happened organically out of that, I’ve got a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you…but it’s a heck of a marketing strategy.
C). Victimhood=Reach. Balderidge grew up the daughter of an Episcopal Priest in Waterloo, Belgium in what she calls an “accepting environment.” But the EP is packed full of verses about being bullied and an outcast, which according to Balderidge herself she didn’t experience except in “wider church culture.”
To put that in perspective, I had a youth pastor call me out for not attending a winter retreat because I had basketball…so I quit, because it’s idiotic to guilt a high school kid for playing sports. So, I can also make the claim I wasn’t accepted in “wider church culture.”
The reality of 2021 is that if you want attention online, claiming to be a victim of something gets you further, faster. I’m not saying Balderidge isn’t a victim of bullying or being an outcast (I don’t know her whole life story), but the stuff she sings about doesn’t match up with the biography she’s sharing with the press.
D). It’s easier than you think to “Gamestop” the media. A big talking point on Balderidge is that she “rocketed to the top of the iTunes charts” and dethroned superstar (for the genre) Lauren Daigle.
Some context here. First off, that Lauren Daigle album has been at #1 for over two years, because nobody buys individual albums anymore. Bragging about topping the iTunes Christian chart is a bit like me saying I was a top-three-small-forward on my jr. college basketball team. Which is true. There were 3 small forwards on the team, and I was the worst.
Creating a splash in the current age of the internet is all about finding a loophole to exploit, as the Gamestop traders on Reddit did in January. According to YouTuber/Rapper Ruslan, all you need to top the iTunes Christian chart is roughly 200 albums sold. So, Semler likely reached less consumers through album sales than read this newsletter but is savvy enough to turn that into national press.
In conclusion—three things can be true at the same time. Balderidge has real songwriting chops. And appears to have a habit of lying for attention. And is clearly a brilliant marketing mind.
Despite the fact that I was (semi) critical here, I do think you should give the EP a listen if you like indie folk and have any interest in how religion is discussed in modern culture.
And if not? This is still a heck of a case study on how to go from 0 to 100mph in the short attention cycle of 2021.
[five]
Let’s head into the weekend with a pop-culture roundup:
Amythyst Kiah released a foot-stomper of an Americana/Roots single called “Black Myself,” which is a part of the growing black roots music movement that Carolina Chocolate Drops kicked off about a decade ago. Kiah is also in the black roots Supergroup Our Native Daughters, which also features former Chocolate Drops front-woman Rhiannon Giddens. Check out the song “Mama’s Cryin’ Long” as a solid introduction to that group.
The other great music discovery of the week is Australia’s Gang of Youths. The band shares common threads with The National and The Gaslight Anthem and may just be your jam if smart lyrics catch your ear. Come Down Achilles is a good song to start with. (Hat tip: Matt). If you swim in the indie rock lane, the first single from Assertion, led by Foo Fighters and Sunny Day Real Estate alum William Goldsmith may also be right up your alley.
I haven’t talked about this before, but there’s an eerie set of similarities between myself and the late Americana singer Justin Townes Earle, who overdosed last fall. We were both oddly tall (him: 6’4”, me: 6’6”), both have struggled with complicated extended family relationships, both lovers of watches, baseball and the Simpsons (which I’ve recently re-discovered via Disney+). Rolling Stone’s profile on the singer’s last days is a brilliant, heartbreaking long read. I was crushed to learn Earle was planning a joint album with Brian Fallon of The Gaslight Anthem, another of my favorite singer/songwriters. (Hat Tip: Bonnie)
More games that were once PlayStation exclusives are set to be released on PC, including Days Gone, a Sons-of-Anarchy-Meets-Zombie-Apocolypse mashup featuring a lone biker trying to survive a Walking Dead style world. I’m very excited to play this one.
And speaking of Zombies, Zach Snyder (300, Justice League) just dropped the trailer for Army of the Dead, a zombie-flick-meets-Vegas-heist-mashup movie for Netflix. Will it be a “good” movie? I doubt it. Will it be fun? Sure looks that way.
St Louis based critic (and my new Twitter friend) Dan Buffa highlighted a Banshee, a Cinemax thriller series that was largely overlooked in 2013, but finding a new audience on HBO Max:
While the popular definition of the show’s title refers to an evil spirit, it carried the name of a fictional town in Pennsylvania-where most of the show’s chaos would take place. All hell broke loose when the longtime thief with no name (Antony Starr, brilliant long before Homelander ever suited up) rides his motorcycle into Banshee, fresh out of prison and looking for his old girlfriend (Ivana Milicevic, luminous and bad to the bone all at once), finding lots of trouble instead.
Over the course of one night, the thief befriends the local bartender, Sugar (the great Frankie Faison) and gets involved with three dead bodies. Out of jail less than 12 hours and in a place that his best friend and master hacker Job (the hilarious and talented Hoon Lee) told him to stay far away from, the mysterious thief becomes a sheriff named Lucas Hood. Right before his body is pushed into the ground, the new Hood takes a call from Banshee’s mayor to be sworn into office.
That’s the first 15-20 minutes of the show’s existence.
Until the next one,
-sth