Category: Hathos Alert

Hathos Alert

Or it could be a poseur alert. It’s longer than most but the pleasure and the pain ramp up relentlessly into a truly hathetic concoction. Update from a reader:

I completely agree that the tone of that video is deserving of the Hathos award. And furthermore, Cameron Carpenter in person is obsessively humorless in his pursuit of his “artistic vision.” (I’ve had the pleasure of seeing him live in concert and in taped interviews).

But, he is a truly incredible musician, and perhaps one of the greatest organists of all time. I don’t know if non-musicians fully understand the coordination and focus needed to play a musical instrument with all four limbs simultaneously, often with four or more independent musical lines, and to not just hit the right notes – but also make music out of that choreographic exercise. In person, or in YouTube videos, Mr. Carpenter is a truly amazing.

So, I can forgive him the hair style and sartorial excess. He brings incredible substance to the surface nonsense. And in the end, the music is what matters.

Hathos Alert

http://youtu.be/g10DqPbbUuw

A reader writes:

I saw this video this afternoon and thought of the Dish. It’s basically a commercial for a classical music festival, B-Classic – they created a “Classical Comeback” video with a Korean dance team in skimpy costumes doing sexy moves to an excerpt from Dvorak’s “New World” Symphony.  The caption on YouTube says the video “gives classical music the same recognition as pop and rock music by combining the timeless emotion of classical music with the visual talent of a contemporary director.”

Just about made my head explode, it was so weird, but oddly hathetic as well.

Hathos Alert

It’s an independent Tea Party commercial designed to oust Thad Cochran from the Senate. Brace yourself, Thad.

Update from a reader:

Well, it says something that Abraham Lincoln is being used an appeal to conservative Mississipians. You wouldn’t have seen that very long ago.

Another:

The very best part about the video is that they used a picture of Daniel Day-Lewis as Lincoln in place of a picture of the real Lincoln.

Hathos Alert

This trailer for an amateur documentary called American Blogger could be renamed Dude In An RV Interviews Hot Chicks Across America. Seriously, every single blogger he films is an attractive woman:

A reader adds:

According to its own voiceover, this is the greatest documentary of all time.

Hathos Alert

A reader flags the NSFW music video seen above:

Have you heard of gay rapper Fly Young Red? Have you seen his new music video for “Throw That Boy Pussy”? All the worst aspects of rap culture have now made it to the gay community!

But you have to admit it’s pretty damn catchy. A fan of the video puts it in context:

Unfortunately I don’t get to read every Dish post, so you may have already covered the phenomenon of queer hip hop. Last week at the end of South by Southwest we had our annual Gay Bi Gay Gay party, a huge celebration of Austin’s queer community and the headlining acts were queer hip hop artists Cakes Da Killa (seen here) and Mykki Blanco (seen here).  Bounce artist and queer transwoman Big Freedia has become an icon, spreading “twerking” to the masses.  Profoundly straight rapper Macklemore has been accused of stealing the beat for “Thrift Shop” from queer rapper Le1f’s song “Wut” (judge for yourself).

The latest gay hip hop phenomenon, however, is the viral hardcore rap song “Throw That Boy Pussy” by Houston rapper Fly Young Red.

This song takes the basic hypersexual audacity of traditional hip hop and turns it on its head by applying it to boys. The result is an intensely homoerotic celebration of eating and fucking ass.  I don’t know if you are into hip hop, but for people under 40 it is our baseline music, much as rock and roll was for our parents before.  I saw your post about hip hop diplomacy to combat Islamic radicalism.  Now gay and queer artists are using it to celebrate not just “pride” and other more safe (if still powerful) expressions, but also an unapologetic gay sexuality.

I am not gay myself, though I suppose I am somewhat queer in that I have had sex with men and will again someday I would imagine.  My girlfriend is queer, my best friend is a gay man, and I spend a lot of my time at queer and gay events.  There is still plenty of house music and Britney Spears, but more and more often the best big gay parties feature not just rap music, but hardcore stuff.  Part of this is a function of the radicalized, militant queer culture in Austin, part of it is the fact that we have an upfront queer community of color that grew up on the real deal aggressive hip hop music, but part of it is that gay rap is getting really good.  I think there is some sort of story here, some sort of meditation.  I wanted to raise your attention to the phenomenon, and share some of this awesome music with you.  I hope you enjoy it!

Previous Dish on Big Freedia and sissy bounce here, and Dish on gay rappers here.

Hathos Alert

by Chris Bodenner

The GOP goes Girls:

Alex Pareene pareenes “Scott Greenberg”:

Just your typical millennial here, wearing tortoiseshell glasses and a cool leather jacket and also really concerned about gas prices. They really eat into your typical millennial’s paycheck!

Now it’s true that millennials, on average, are less likely to buy or own cars than any other current generation of Americans. One-third of households headed by millennials under 25 had no car in 2011 (and only one-third of millennials actually head their own households), and fewer 16-24-year-olds had driver’s licenses in 2011 than at any point in the last half-century.

But give the RNC some credit: Most millennials still believe that they need or will need to own a car (which, in most of America, is a completely accurate belief), they just find the cost of car ownership a burden. Just like Scott here! And that’s why Scott is a Republican: Because they support an “all of the above” energy policy, which Scott sums up as, “solar, wind, shale gas, oil, whatever!” I mean, increased domestic energy production doesn’t necessarily lower fuel prices in the U.S. because it is a worldwide market, and “all of the above” is actually the energy policy of both parties, but, you know, “whatever,” as the millennials say. “LOL,” they sext one another. “Let’s frack some shale gas, YOLO.”

Hathos Alert

And some inspiration for Cartman’s next Faith + 1 album:

Update from a reader:

It was shocking to see that mashup of Gwen Shamblin, CEO of the Weigh Down Workshop. Around 2000, she founded her own church, the Remnant Fellowship, made up of hardcore adherents of her weight-loss program. It operates like a classic religious cult, using information, emotion, and behavior control to keep members in the group. Many families have been broken up over these beliefs. I know because my wife and myself were very nearly drawn into this group and then spent years helping and counseling ex-members who had been damaged by these crazy, legalistic beliefs. And of course, the legalistic focus on food intake turns into a legalistic focus on all other behaviors by which a believer can be judged, including child discipline. You can see a few ex-member testimonies here.