A Letter to David Brooks

The following was sent to David Brooks in response to his Nov. 20 op-ed column "The Segmented Society" (I've included a link to the original article at the top of the page). Given that my letter seems to be in email limbo at the NY Times, Mr. Brooks may never read it, but you can. And a tip of the hat to Kevin O., who alerted me to the article, I presume in an effort to stoke our mutual hatred of That Dastardly Generation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/20/opinion/20brooks.html?

Dear Mr. Brooks,

With the unbridled arrogance typical of the Baby Boomer, you somehow assume that the cultural cohesion of your generation is a good thing. Back in the day, when there were only five television stations to choose from and the record industry was using a small Sahara of cocaine to bribe their way into dominating the airwaves, we didn’t have much choice but tune in to the lowest common denominator, be it “Laverne and Shirley” or “Frampton Comes Alive!” But the same technology that at one time limited options soon expanded them, and so now people can watch and listen to what they want, and the world is a better place for it.

Van Zandt is perturbed because not everyone wants to listen to his watered-down, white boy version of the blues. Well, that’s too bad, because his music is B-O-R-I-N-G. Bruce Springsteen is a gifted songwriter; it’s just unfortunate that he’s been saddled with a bunch of hacks like the E-Street Band. Nowadays, if you want to listen to a genre of music created by black musicians, you don’t have to be spoon-fed the pale imitation that dominated FM radio for 20 years. You can opt for Miles Davis rather than Chuck Mangione, Al Green instead of Tom Jones, Bob Marley rather than the Police. This has freed eclectic white musicians to pursue their own sounds, which means they can now dig deeper and explore more satisfying, varied places than when the quickest and most obvious route to success was to mimic the stylings of black folks. I’d put the musical chops and expanse of Sigur Ros or Arcade Fire against the likes of Van Zandt any day. And because they are willing to explore a deeper palate of sound, today’s rock warriors are much less likely to “stink” than the white pseudo bluesman of the 60’s and 70’s flogging the same tired 12-bar progressions over and over again.

You also have a tin ear for some of the wider cultural resonances, implying that the popularity of the Obama candidacy has been fueled by a yearning for “cohesion”. That’s a Baby Boomer conceit, and it is typified by Baby Boomer politicians, the Clintons being the most obvious example, who try to be all things to all people. When first bursting upon the scene, Obama was a revelation to many of us because it seemed like he might be the rare modern politician who would actually tell the truth, that he would tell the country what needed to be done, not what he assumed we wanted to hear. But then Obama started running for President, and he almost immediately started acting like all the other politicians, adding up constituencies and then saying whatever he thought would get their votes. Which is why the bloom has kind of come off that rose, and why much of the grass roots enthusiasm is instead being created by Ron Paul, because he at least will say what he actually believes, and people, especially those not born between the years of 1945 and 1960, find that attractive.

I look forward to Van Zandt trying to canonize his blinkered vision of what he thinks is culturally important music and promoting it as part of a standard school curriculum, because that will surely kill that tired genre once and for all, just like learning literature in school killed the joy of it for most kids, all except for the smarty pants kind who do what they’re told, get good grades, go to Ivy League universities, and then wind up writing for the Times. A pop music canon may be a lot of things, but it’s certainly not rock ‘n roll.

Sincerely,
The Asshole of the Century