Morality, My Mother, and X=3.8
Just to put you at ease, dear reader, P Kalb sent that cryptic email in response to my paper prospectus which was apparently "too long." He asked for 150 words, I gave him 570. I knew the 3.8 was too clever and contrived. But alas, I will keep these tricks in mind when I (if I) become a professor and one day have a favorite student I want to torment. Somewhere along the way, I am sure I will meet someone who's (in this case) devoted and serious efforts merit cryptic and non-appreciative response. Honestly, after he sent me an email telling me to send him a "real argument" I felt that a little research was merited and thus I collected articles from Art Forum and the like, went through the hassle of photocopying them, reading them, and then working out the questions I am going to answer in the paper, major themes, and ethical debates. Well, whatever, next time I do too much work, slap me... too late.
I had a crappy judicial hearing today. It was long, hot, and complicated... and I am 99% certain the accused was lying, as was the entire board. It sucks when that happens, there wasn't enough evidence to determine guilt - but I am sure s/he wasn't innocent either. For our deliberations, we indulged in many conspiracy theories, and well, those were crazy... but it still didn't bring any resolution or clarity to the situation, but it was a pisser just the same. When I am blatantly lied to, I feel like I am wasting my time. I like it when kids come in, prove they have thought about their actions carefully, thought long and hard what a privilege it is to be here, and share in the experience of this community... I also like to know that even if prompted by undesirable circumstances, people do think about weighty issues like character, judgment, consequence, and the like. Usually these kinds of kids bring in a "character statement" written by a friends claiming that their friend is of "high moral fiber." Really, how many people do you know who could say anything about your moral fiber? Who has moral fiber at 20 anyway? And let's say you had moral fiber, and it was proven somehow, it is likely you are a war hero or something and maybe a comrade could recount how you jumped on a live grenade to save a bus of handicapped school children or something... but really, when you are a 20 year old college student, how can your "drinking buddies" be qualified to describe your moral fiber? Yes, maybe you are nice guy who would give his last beer to a friend, wouldn't Bogart the last pizza stick, or not take advantage of a drunk girl, but c'mon people, that's not really moral fiber now, is it? Well, just the same, I despise liars. I think this is a major flaw in all justice systems... in many cases; evidence will not be conclusive so you must rely on people telling the truth. I guess I just don't have faith that people will tell the truth when it's so obviously not to their advantage.
I had a very good conversation with my Mom, a long three hours and the first night in about two weeks I haven't been in the computer lab. I applaud her for her parenting; she's been doing a wonderful job lately. She actually listened to me spout on about my thesis for an hour and we had a very interesting conversation about Minimalism, semiotics, and Andy Kaufman. My mother is actually trained as a painter and artistically talented, but she is can render the human figure with a pencil and mix oil paints - she never dabbled in conceptual art or as my newly cemented interpretation of Minimalism would suggest, philosophy in form. She had no problems accepting given artistic limits. She never made art that questioned the definition and standards of the notion of art itself... me on the other hand, I like the theory, perpetually stuck in the avant-garde, Marcel Duchamp, and think anti-art or other conceptual pieces are the cat's meow. Maybe this because it's an art for thinkers, not artists.
Tonight she added an interesting dimension to the 1960s and the art community that hasn't been adequately conveyed in my dusty old text books. Frankly, she said, "Lisa, for as much came out of the 60s in terms of art, activism, and social change, it's even more impressive considering that we were all stoned 90% of the time." I guess she is right. I spent about three thesis pages describing a performance dance event at Yoko Ono's loft that really challenges the art historical canon and other BIG ideas. I guess I got so wrapped up in that performance and it's content that I never thought about the stoned artists sitting around in sunglasses, rolling joints, talking in pretentious airs and using the performance as an excuse to have casual sex... maybe in a round about way, this was my mom's way of reminding me not to take things too seriously...
good blog, old chap.
Song of the day, "Tender is the Night," by Jackson Browne, reminds me of the good parts of the laborious summer reading Fitzgerald's same ode.
posted by lmjasinski at 12:43 AM
