So favorable, in fact, that one can go for extremely long stretches without encountering any excrement at all.

In fact, I find picking peanuts out of poop very enjoyable, indeed, as well as VERY intellectually profitable. It seems I have little choice, anyway; most of what I encounter is poop, and the peanuts are few and far between these days – but SO delicious when I find them. How lucky you are to have avoided poop your whole life. You must know a trick!

Or perhaps you find the peanut-to-poop ratio more favorable in classical music than in rap?

“What do you take me for?”
“I think we’ve already established that you’re a whore. Right now we’re just negotiating price.”

Ditto Richard Weaver. I’ve just read his “Visions of Order” and was struck by how pertinent much of it is to today’s situations, despite its having been written in the 50s.

The point is not whether or not one approves of pop culture, but the extent (if any) to which it should receive extended attention as part of the curiculuum of a serious liberal arts university.

Not that I would know anything about this personally mind you, it’s what I’ve heard.

And I do.

“I’ve heard enough hip-hop with similar themes to resist indicting the whole genre.”

I find that picking peanuts out of poop is neither a profitable nor an enjoyable enterprise.

I can think of no more worthy an opponent than the prison industrial complex or big government’s so-called ‘war on drugs’ – which is really a war on poor (usually black) communities. See the lyrics quoted below for an example, from Mos Def. He’s not exactly a front-porcher (he’s pretty far-left), but he shares some common values with us in his willingness to stand against the destruction he sees ravaging his home community – and that speaks to a lot of people.

I’ve heard enough hip-hop with similar themes to resist indicting the whole genre. Granted, there’s a lot of crap rap out there, but there’s also a lot of crap pop, crap rock, crap folk, and – yes – crap classical. Pointing fingers at hip-hop seems silly when you could also pillory punk for the same rebelliousness, pop for the same sexual looseness, rock for its self-destructiveness, or metal for its nihilism. I see far more dangerous attitudes from juggalo culture than from hip-hop culture.

When the average minimum wage is $5.15
You best believe you gotta find a new grind to get cream**
The white unemployment rate, is nearly more than triple for black
so frontliners got they gun in your back
Bubblin crack, jewel theft and robbery to combat poverty
and end up in the global jail economy
Stiffer stipulations attached to each sentence
Budget cutbacks but increased police presence
And even if you get out of prison still livin
join the other five million under state supervision
This is business, no faces just lines and statistics
from your phone, your zip code, to S-S-I digits
The system break man child and women into figures
Two columns for who is, and who ain’t niggaz

**Can’t help but interject: I’ve heard many economists refer to the illegal drug trade as the closest we’ve come to a pure free-market system. I find it interesting that the combined forces of welfare, minimum wage controls, police, and prisons are not enough to stop the free market incentives offered by the drug trade. Of course, big government both propagates and profits from these incentives, and makes the natural decision to keep drugs illegal.

It is also a vehicle of high comedy for all its violent rhythms. After all, without it, we would miss the rich hilarity of hearing a bumping and grinding car approaching from a half mile away, packed with fleshy white boys with their hats turned backwards, surly because they are so confused by the feckless culture they inhabit that hip-hop provides them some kind of clarity. Or, at least it is useful for irritating their fusty old parents who passed the mantle of confusion onto them.

Key terms being “a little” and “the proper opponents,” neither of which apply to rap and hip-hop.

“BTW hip-hop is no more dangerous than Elvis’ hip gyrations caused young girls to involuntarily drop their knickers. They are just kids.”

Hip-hop is more dangerous than Elvis in that it combines a warped post-60s sexuality with a violent spirit of rebellion.

My son, who is college bound in the fall, and I were discussing self-referential loops (via the online MIT lectures of Douglas Hofstadter’s Gödel Escher Bach). The concept that science, perhaps the most valid question in his mind, could be based on a true but unprovable statement was profound for him. He knew of Gödel’s incompleteness theorems, but (rightfully) tentative of the applications. Perhaps he is one that should go to college. (The fact that we just learned he earned a full IB diploma is an indicator too? Woo-hoo!) Forgive the proud papa syndrome, no doubt Jason is correct. Higher Ed. has been marketed with the same zeal as sub-prime mortgages with a similar and inevitable result.

BTW hip-hop is no more dangerous than Elvis’ hip gyrations caused young girls to involuntarily drop their knickers. They are just kids. Being about the same age as Jason, I bet there is a polyester disco shirt somewhere in his past, perhaps even white pants?

There’s nothing wrong with a little rebellion, disdain or incivility when facing the proper opponents. Particularly when you can do it through music, that is, nonviolently. That said, I much prefer Dylan and Dvorak to DJs.

The more you listen to classical music and traditional folk music, the more you realize what banal crap we’re being fed these days by the entertainment conglomerates. Take it from a guy who just 6 or 7 years ago was listening mostly to eclectic rock and pop 95% of the time, and had upwards of 800 CDs. Now, after listening mainly to classical music steadily for the past half-dozen years, the majority of the stuff I used to like sounds rather trite and boring.

Interesting comments from Kevin. I would agree that Richard Wagner is less culturally advanced than Tupac Shakur. Though, keep in mind Kevin, the majority of young Americans who listen to rap are consuming chart-topping songs like “Sex Room” – with lyrics not worthy of recitation (but worth googling if you care to be disgusted at the current state of popular culture).