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

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

1. I think the fact that Paris doesn't need her musical career to succeed is one of the reasons the album is so good! This is a v small-minded reason though - I would expect nothing better of rockists and so on, but many poptimists are subscribing to the Paris hate as well.

3. Beyoncé has become a global superstar with not many detractors on the back of exactly this!

[awesomewells.livejournal.com]

Surely what is putting people's back up is the fact that you're conflating the anti-Paris Poptimist stance with the anti-Paris rockist stance? As if disliking Paris is de facto anti-Poptimist (in the same way that liking The Killers is de facto anti-Poptimisit)?

(I actually want to like this album now!)

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I don't know what 'this' in "exactly this" means. She hasn't been on reality TV, she isn't notably stupid, she wasn't born rich (was she? I don't think it's part of her image anyway), she doesn't view poor people as another species, her becoming a global superstar is based largely on being the lead of the premier R&B group of her time, and shagging the premier rapper of her time (sprinkle 'arguably' there). So yeah, if all you got out of that was "there are no famous divas" then I don't think I was being clear enough.

[blue-russian.livejournal.com]

Yes, exactly. I haven't waded into this here because I made my comment on Paris in an earlier thread. But I think you (Lex) are wilfully missing the point: you can demand that we like Paris based on Paris, but you seem to expect us to love Paris the person as well (because of the album, or because of the person, I'm not sure which). But the Paris story and the Beyonce story or the Britney story are completely different. And don't pretend you don't know that. And the sex tape really isn't that important, at least to me.