a fight for the soul of poptimism...

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

...has broken out on this thread. Since I am now using 'poptimist' with scare quotes, it may be possible that I am about to publicly 'break' with 'the' 'movement'. :-)

Comments

[juror8.livejournal.com]

"Current music: Mountain Goats"

You already have.

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

hardly.

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

i.e. not what but how.

[zenith.livejournal.com]

In any schism I am with cis and Tim Finney, I think.

It's very telling that people who have clearly completely taken over ILX/ILM still use "ilx" as the word to describe the opinions of the people they want to have a go at, in order to make themselves seem like iconoclasts striking against the consensus - "ilx in liking Paris shockah".

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

This has been happening since about 6 months in!

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

I am pulling the same trick re: poptimism today. It is an old game.

[chezghost.livejournal.com]

yeh i really hate this. would like to ban anyone who writes 'shockah' from now on (even myself).

stevem in 'hating shockah' shockah!

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

(sorry)

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

It's brilliant! 100+ posts of people being dumb and mean and not-funny and then suddenly the VANGUARD APPEARS in the form of Cis and Tim and Alex T who is not breaking with the movement at all because he is on ours side.

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

I am on the side of truth.

If truth means 'what I think'.

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

ha ha -- also 'ILX' in all being 'rockism is so over, dude we all dig that pop shit too' except when it's paris when they're all like 'dude, you like this shit?'

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

I actually have 0 idea why Paris gets so hated on (by poptimists and rockists alike) - is her sleb persona really that repulsive? It really isn't to me. She's no more vapid than Britney or Kylie, but I think because they've both been around forever they've been accepted more than she has.

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I am entirely behind the theory except the album is lousy :(

[jauntyalan.livejournal.com]

even lorraine kelly calls Paris H an "oxygen stealer"

[byebyepride.livejournal.com]

Nietzsche had harsh words for people who hate on Paris Hilton.

P1ss off grandad

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I have just realised of course that my suspicion of Lex's position in these debates is a lot down to it being EXACTLY THE KIND OF THING I'd have done when I was his age/a little older.

[spittake.livejournal.com]

paris's aunts kim and kyle >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>paris

[spittake.livejournal.com]

no disney movies with bette davis, no credibilty

Bottom line

[dickmalone.livejournal.com]

It's totally understandable for people to dislike this album without having heard it, because this is basically disliking Paris, which I think is legitimate as she is a horrible human being (if wholly entertaining as well). But the songs I've heard have very little actual Paris in there--it could basically be anyone, given that they've taken her fairly distinctive voice and treated it into oblivion (wisely, probably). So hating the actual songs based on Paris herself seems fairly unlikely; they may just not be songs the listener likes.

Also, you know, the album technically didn't come out until today, so maybe we can assume everything said before this was just (legitimate) Paris-hate and not reflective of some underlying ideological wrong-think.

Re: Bottom line

[cis.livejournal.com]

yes, & also 'disliking the album without having heard it, based entirely on yr sense of Paris Hilton' is totally poptimist!

Re: Bottom line

[juror8.livejournal.com]

a) surely some things are more important than poptimism? (ie, hating 2Pac/Jerry Lee Lewis/Public Enemy/Elvis Costello records because of them being contemptible human beings rather than the content?)
b) how about hating, say, the new James Blunt album without ever hearing it? Anti-poptimist?

Surely...

[(Anonymous)]

...it was to be expected that Paris's pop career would be treated with suspicion – she's hardly had a tougher ride than similar wouldbe singers like Naomi Campbell or Catharine Zeta-Jones or Princess Stephanie of Monaco or Andrew Cole. And, while the Lex may be baffled by this, lots of people find skinny, spoilt, rich, weirdly blank people kind of repulsive. I thought Stars Are Blind was fine until I saw that grotesque video. – Mark M

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

I did reconsider whether I was actually a poptimist 4REAL after the previous Paris thread fiasco, as I thought my objections were coming out as a bit rockist and anyway, I've been listening to a lot of Armor For Sleep lately so thought it might be time to go back to my rockist hole, after my year-and-a-half flirtation with pop but then I decided that a) I would not care if that was some session singer who was a member of the communist party and worked tirelessly for Medicins Sans Frontieres in their spare time singing a lot of those tracks, they would still be fucking shit, b) I think a lot of poptimism involves supporting the pop cause and so I'm inevitably going to frown at some twat like Paris deciding they'll have a little go at playing about being a popstar, because they can, because that makes a mockery and a sham of everything. By no means does pop need to be serious and indeed it probably shouldn't be but Paris seems the equivalent of a sleazy "talent show" judge peddling out some shit act that will die in three months/when the next season comes out just because it'll make them a few bucks and give them some exposure. I can't endorse that, this is meant to be fucking music, not Reveal magazine's 'OH MY GOD, LOOK, CELEBRITIES BREATHING' pages. :/

I didn't read the whole of that thread because it seemed to descend into wank quite soon and I'm not a member of that board so can't really understand what the hell people are saying in most of it.

Humm. I don't know, maybe I should still be expelled from the poptimist order but I feel the anti-Paris cause is totally just for totally pop-justified reasons.

[piratemoggy.livejournal.com]

That last comment was not meant to reference Popjustice, it just came out that way by accident- sorry.

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

the first hundred or so posts on that thread not by me are dreadful yes, but after you scroll swiftly past them it gets pretty decent!

(I think a lot of the 'pop cause' IS making a mockery and sham of everything)