….along with “Politician-ness”, on The Landed Underclass.
David Davis
When “Landed” and I were young fellas, not only did we not know each other but also civilisation did not really contain what we now call “celebrities”. It’s true, there was The King – only briefly in my case – followed by his daughter The Queen, and her various children who began to appear, and Sir Winston Churchill, and possibly the Queen Mother, but that was about it. Pop singers didn’t really feature in the 50s, they only earned dosh in the rather princely band of about £50 to £100 a week, and probably it was the Beatles in about, er, 1963?…who got most close to celebrity status first.
Politicians, Mr Churchill apart, who we were taught was the greatest man who had ever lived as was indeed correct with the possible exception of Barnes Wallis, were sort of, er, nowhere. They were “men in grey suits”: they were little different from the town’s librarian who stamped your books each week – whom of course nearly everybody knew by sight and name (think about it.) They just went to Parliament, and has “our interests” at heart, for us. They weren’t even paid much either.
On celebrities, their making and their breaking today: one thinks of the Incas – or was it the Mayans? (who cares?) – who sculpted all those gigantic scowling stone heads to show how advanced they were, and who publicly butchered living young men and women in bloody ways on top of very large stone structures built out of whatever was to hand. Celebrities nowadays seem to occupy the same niche, as “the people” serially worship them and then trash them a few years afterward.
The problem that Landed tries to address is why the families and children of politicians and celebrities are going to be _not_ on various “databases” which are to be set up by the State the Stalinists who tyrannise us today, and are to be for our delectation, our security and our enchainment.
Is it that politicians envy the celebrities’ perceived status, power, wealth and ability to have whatever they desire (pace the Mayans or whoever!) and therefore automatically desire the same privileges? Or is it as Old Holborn says Penguin thinks, which is that politicians have been in control of the whole process of viral-mass-idolatry all along?
Are the politicians who enslave us, been Wireless Tele Visually artificially creating phantasmal celebrities out of the fabric of real people, for some years (it coincides with the Diana-Witch-Mania and the subsequent Nationalised-synchro-Grieving-Terror that was commanded to be visited upon us all, and the real rise of the “Hello!” culture too) as a cover for themselves to hide behind, later?
The comment thread which has been allowed on Old Holborn in regard to this specific matter is, I think, vituperative and unhelpful. The State watchers will target blameless white-van-men instead of us as a result. We should approach this strategic matter in an atmosphere of calm and reasoned and cold deliberation.
Dave:
The reason why you may not remember many pop celebrities is that the State monpoly BBC did not permit rock music to be broadcast on ‘their’ airwaves until 1964.
Having lived in Australia in 1958 and 1959, I lived with Top 10s, Top 20s, Top 40s and Top 100s running 24 hours on hundreds of radio stations.
But the celebrities were there.
I went to Bill Haley’s concert. Lonnie Donegan’s concerts. I listened to Peter, Paul and Mary, and many others, on Radio Luxemburg and elsewhere. I remember the Sunday Night at the London Palladium folk (one of whom, Mike Dorfman, was a close friend) trying to book Elvis Presley, and being told by Col. Parker: “That’s fine for me: now, how about my boy?”
Celebrities tended to be people like Hillary and Donald Campbell and Stirling Moss.
Try looking through the Top 10 charts for those years on Wiki. Might stir a memory or two.
Best,
Tony
PS: The horrible Beatles derailed Rock ‘n Roll, along with the equally horrible Rolling Stones.
Dave:
Try this:
“The Day the Music Died”
http://www.kyivpost.com/guide/general/34310
Best,
Tony