quiddities and agonies of the ruling class - a rolling new york times thread

"how much authenticity is too much?" is the defining question of our age i think

I also think the 'glut of rarity' thing is kind of interesting -- I've been feeling it for several years in the world of limited edition music pressings, books, art, etc. It sort of reminds me of the baseball card bubble where you suddenly had like ten brands of super-premium cards all putting out five different even more limited editions each and 8 million 10-year-olds suddenly all shrugged their shoulders at once.

As they began furnishing their new house from scratch, they found themselves choosing pieces with clean, modern lines that “could be a backdrop for whatever we were interested in at the moment,” Mr. Siegel said. In other words, he said, “not trying to express your personality and your total individuality with every single thing in your house.”

Ms. Koons, who recently completed her doctorate in clinical psychology, calls it a “very unornamental aesthetic.”

What does that mean to her?

“No bird pillows,” she said. “And actually, we had a lot of bird pillows. I had two bird duvets. I had birds on the wall. So it’s a real about-face.”

This part just reminds me of my eventual shift from band/concert posters everywhere to barely any at all. It's not Etsy, it's just getting more comfortable with yourself internally so you don't need to constantly project it/reinforce it externally.

Also you bought all your "authentic" stuff on the internet, it's just "stuff."

Anyway aren't we basically just talking about tschotchkes? They're nothing new, I've never liked them that much, and there will always be people who do. I guess the difference being that it used to be more dominated by stuff from international travel or at least evincing a *global* sensibility ("btw I traveled to Colombia") and now it's more about *local* stuff ("btw I had a beardo make me a salad bowl")

yeah i guess these people aren't exactly "ruling class" -- they're not whining about how difficult it is to go to (and dress for!) so many parties in some tony vacation spot for rich people -- that's true
but they are still acting rather put upon for an imposition to their precious (and unique!) taste

which is kind of lol/sad

No you're misunderstanding. I'm just saying that the dude making the tables isn't really the target of this thread.

As for people complaining about how they can't buy specialness anymore, THAT is a ruling-class agony.

I think the authors are linking two arguments that aren’t really the same.
The real issue here is big box retailers trying to capitalize on handmade, when in reality, handmade is not something that is sold at West Elm, no matter how much they want to market it as such.

one of the heads of our board, discussing moving our offices to a different and less accessible part of town for both our staff and clientele noted in a recent email that "hey, it's just a short cab ride at the worst" and the first thing i thought was that i should post to this thread and the second thing i thought was too much time on ilx

"how much authenticity is too much?" is the defining question of our age i think

I kind of feel like the real questions are "what is authentic?" and "how can I be authentic without it being an affectation?" for anyone who buys into a certain amount of cultural capital.

xp re "handmade" btw: i wasn't crazy about mike daisey's new show about steve jobs/apple/apple's business practices in china but he makes one great point which is that with labor as cheap as it is overseas, nobody invests in machinery when you can get a fourteen year old girl to lay the same circuitry a zillion times a year so, in fact, nearly everything we own IS handmade
we just don't want to think about that

the first thing i thought was that i should post to this thread and the second thing i thought was too much time on ilx

Sentences that effortlessly define ilx or whatever that thread is called.

I think really what it comes down to with the article is:

- This woman bought too much shit because she thought it worked with her aesthetic and little of it actually meant anything to her
- She is actually becoming more authentic in rejecting some of her surroundings as things that no longer have an appeal

http://www.artisanalpencilsharpening.com/

Who is Artis and how is he sharpening pencils with his asshole?

ha I was joking. "how much authenticity is too much" is like the most nyt style section question of all time

oh. true, that.

the artisinal pencil sharpening is David Rees from Get Your War On and it's an elaborate and brilliant joke.

I'm going to open a boutique that just sells one handmade table. I mean not a single model of table, but just a single table.

"Do you have anything else in the store?"
"No sir, we just have this table."
"I would like to purchase the table."
"I'm sorry sir, it's been sold."

not NYT but holy hell

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204394804577010351275810044.html?mod=WSJ_NY_MIDDLELEADNewsCollection

Some New York City children take after-school classes in dance, pottery or softball. Once a week, Gillian and Hunter Randall add an unusual activity to the list: lessons on how to shake hands.

It's a class taught by SocialSklz:-), a company founded in 2009 to address deteriorating social skills in the age of iPhones, Twitter and Facebook friends.

Faye Rogaski, the founder of socialsklz:-), is attempting to wean children off junk words like "um," "ya know" and "like." WSJ visits the modern-day manners class.

"It's hard to have a real conversation anymore. And you know what? I'm guilty of it too," said the Randalls' mother, Lisa LaBarbera, noting that her 10-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son both have iPod touches and handheld videogame devices. "You get carpal tunnel, but you're not building those communication skills."

Ms. Rogaski now offers classes that range from $150 for a one-day workshop to $540 for a 12-week after-school program, with sections for children as young as 4. The classes cover skills as varied as how to host play dates, talk on the phone and hold a conversation.

SocialSklz:-) looks like a name that was created by a 60 year old soccer mom

SocialSkullz(:-[])

even though that class is patently ridiculous, i gotta say that having social skillz drilled into me at a young age has served me well in life. my mom was p aggro about her children being as well-mannered as possible. not like weird cotillion stuff, but general "how to talk to adults and not be a little twerp" stuff. seeing horrible children acting rudely in public is one of the few things that makes me feel like a big ol grouch. also sort of one of the few things that makes me feel "conservative"; i generally assume that kids behaving terribly (not just "kids being kids" cuz everyone is a lil monster at some point) have SOMEthing up at home. i understand that this isn't entirely a fair thing to think.

i think the point is not that those things are unimportant, but that only the ruling class would desire to or be able to afford to have someone teach their kids manners in a class

I was always good at talking with adults as a kid but not really very good at talking with other kids

now that I'm an adult I'm no longer good at talking with other adults :[

OTM

Someone asked me the oth day if I was "gifted" at anything as a child, and I said, Yeah, talking to adults and ordering them around since I was 3. o_O Feel like this is going to be true for a lot of us, tbh.

Ha, just ran here to post that.

It's a class taught by SocialSklz:-), a company founded in 2009 to address deteriorating social skills in the age of iPhones, Twitter and Facebook friends.

is such a crock of shit - kids have always been rude. but yeah, learning manners (and teaching that "manners") are a social code that can be used TO YOUR ADVANTAGE in pretty much any situation is def. valuable, and if the parents can't be bothered to do it on their own, and decide to pay off a third party to do it, everybody benefits from the transaction

eh feel like kids learn things like this more by observing them than via being taught, these parents are prob too rude, kids gonna be rude too

same/same

seeing horrible children acting rudely in public is one of the few things that makes me feel like a big ol grouch.

this, oh god, this. every impudent word uttered by a child fans a small flame of hatred in my heart.

worst instance this year: stuck across aisle from a shrieky little bad seed for a transcontinental flight
/strangle

I am pretty sure my parents didn't take me out in public until I was nearly 3 years of age and took me behind the woodshed if I were to speak a sideways word

It's why I know I'd suck as a parent.

"I can't shout at you as you are a child. Worse, you're my child. ARGH."

i have a pretty high tolerance for "kids being kids" but i also LOVE kids \(o_O)/

times were you could punish your child for misbehaving in a store by locking them in the car but those days are gone

*puffs pipe*

those days, you could smack someone else's kid for sassmouth, good times they were

i have a pretty high tolerance for "kids being kids" but i also LOVE kids \(o_O)/

― J0rdan S., Tuesday, November 1, 2011 2:28 PM (6 minutes ago) Bookmark

dude this is totally how i feel, fwiw, lest anyone get the wrong idea. i used to work with kids, it was great. but i still feel like there are times when it's ok/justifiable to think "ok buddy there's a line between puckish little imp and actual inconsiderate person and you just crossed it"

moreover, when i feel like a grouch, i'm actually thinking to myself "you are being a grouch, cut it out," but...i can't help it. i def had the "that's not the way it works around here" chat with several of the kids i taught, who were seemingly devoid of any social graces whatsoever (children of the 1% in entitled-attitudes shocker)

Manners are so middle-class.

one time on a plane this kid threw a non stop tantrum the whole way taking time out only to blow some milk on me through a straw

milk all over me

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