Author Topic: Western Civilization is UGLY  (Read 7513 times)

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #60 on: May 18, 2021, 10:55:55 pm »
It's not just the dancing itself, but also the ballroom decor, the ultra-high-sexual-dimorphism outfits, the absurd etiquette. How can anyone (except Westerners) stand to be in there for even a few minutes, let alone an entire evening?

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Dancing is then a great school of "solidarity" in primitive societies; more than any other act, it brings into prominence the benefits of sociality. But this favourable result is only possible in the smaller groupings, in which at least half of the society may take part in the dance

America had precisely this during the Counterculture era (repost):


90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #61 on: May 20, 2021, 05:57:56 am »
More Homo Hubris multimedia (note the garden shots):





Now I need to watch the Pepsi commercial again just to recover.....

Zea_mays

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #62 on: May 20, 2021, 10:26:05 pm »
I suppose the Mass Games of North Korea, which involve dances, gymnastics, and music with tens of thousands of performers, would be an attempt to bring a large society together for a single social event:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_games#North_Korea

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #63 on: May 20, 2021, 11:47:39 pm »
My criticism of the Mass Games is that it is too rehearsed, and also lacks a central personality focus. The ideal would be to bring people together spontaneously with no rehearsals required. This actually appeared in the Counterculture era:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave_(audience)

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successive groups of spectators briefly stand, yell, and raise their arms. Immediately upon stretching to full height, the spectator returns to the usual seated position.

The result is a wave of standing spectators that travels through the crowd, even though individual spectators never move away from their seats. In many large arenas the crowd is seated in a contiguous circuit all the way around the sport field, and so the wave is able to travel continuously around the arena; in discontiguous seating arrangements, the wave can instead reflect back and forth through the crowd.
...
While there is general disagreement about the precise origin of the wave, most stories of the phenomenon's origin suggest that the wave first started appearing at North American sporting events during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

I think the pop concert atmosphere, where the performers do choreographed dances while the audience dances along informally best captures our values of both spontaneity and individual personality leadership. Skillfully edited music videos are able to transmit this atmosphere into people's homes where they can (and indeed feel compelled to) dance along too. Another social gathering event that satisfies all of the above criteria is 80s/90s professional wrestling. I consider any of these preferable to Mass Games, especially in terms of rewatch value. I have never felt the slightest interest in watching even the best Mass Games event more than once, whereas good pop concerts/MVs and wrestling I enjoy rewatching many times.

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #64 on: May 25, 2021, 12:16:22 am »
Orszaghaz:































What else do you expect from Vampire Land itself?

« Last Edit: May 25, 2021, 12:28:35 am by 90sRetroFan »

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #65 on: May 26, 2021, 10:50:34 pm »
Western classical singing is probably the most anti-sentimental singing to be found:






« Last Edit: June 14, 2021, 12:03:24 am by 90sRetroFan »

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #66 on: June 06, 2021, 10:23:07 pm »
Homo Hubris + fountain pen = ultra-curly ugliness (and ink wastage):



























































































Finally, can anyone even read the following?







« Last Edit: June 06, 2021, 10:30:39 pm by 90sRetroFan »

rp

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #67 on: June 06, 2021, 10:52:41 pm »
I always hated writing in cursive when I was a child...

acc9

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #68 on: June 07, 2021, 07:41:18 am »
I find what's missing in the western civilization could actually be what's conveyed in the Chinese word , a character which is comprised of 'water' and 'verdant', signifying that which is free from embellishments.

SirGalahad

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #69 on: June 07, 2021, 03:19:47 pm »
@90sRetroFan What do you think about Arabic/Islamic calligraphy? Do the same criticisms apply? How do you think it could be improved?

guest5

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #70 on: June 07, 2021, 04:17:30 pm »
And then there's Russian cursive:




90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #71 on: June 07, 2021, 11:37:49 pm »
@acc9

You are correct. In English, words that describe absence of embellishment ("plain", "bland", etc.) popularly carry negative connotations, instead of being associated with beauty (as they should be). Indeed, "plain" is a polite way of calling someone/something ugly in colonial era (and even present-day!) Western usage. This is how screwed up Western aesthetics are.

@SirGalahad

Diwani is by far the most complicated style (which I myself am not a fan of):

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Diwani_style

but even it does not embellish a single letter anywhere near as much as the Western examples I posted. (Also, Muslims do not go around claiming that Islamic civilization is the most beautiful, so there is no particular need for us to attack Islamic aesthetics. What this topic is about is showing the absurdity of such a claim being frequently made - and unhesitatingly believed by billions of Eurocentrists worldwide! - for Western civilization.)

« Last Edit: June 07, 2021, 11:39:52 pm by 90sRetroFan »

SirGalahad

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #72 on: June 08, 2021, 03:15:51 pm »
"Also, Muslims do not go around claiming that Islamic civilization is the most beautiful, so there is no particular need for us to attack Islamic aesthetics. What this topic is about is showing the absurdity of such a claim being frequently made - and unhesitatingly believed by billions of Eurocentrists worldwide! - for Western civilization."

That's fair. I just thought it would be interesting to ponder what an Islamic civilization would look like in its original cultural sphere, if it were to appropriate more of our aesthetic standards
« Last Edit: June 08, 2021, 03:20:32 pm by SirGalahad »

90sRetroFan

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #73 on: June 08, 2021, 10:44:24 pm »
There was a topic in the old forum (which I haven't yet reposted) dedicated to displaying pre-colonial non-Western aesthetics, in which I included some examples of the much earlier Kufic style calligraphy which I prefer. If you do not want to wait, please feel free to start a new topic, and I will simply repost the old content there bit by bit later.
« Last Edit: February 03, 2022, 09:12:07 pm by 90sRetroFan »

guest5

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Re: Western Civilization is UGLY
« Reply #74 on: June 08, 2021, 10:47:26 pm »
What's interesting to myself also on this topic is the fact that most graffiti writers do not even embellish a single letter as much as some of the Western characters mentioned above and a graffiti writers entire art is based on letter embellishment.