Monday, August 01, 2005
When I Grow Up I Wanna Be Cool
Growing up, we all thought that the right clothes, the right friends or the right car could make us cool. For the past two years, Michigan politicians have been trying to convince us that a similar thought process will revitalize our faltering communities by making them look and think cool. Just as it was in high school, this line of thinking is bullshit.
First, when was the last time you thought a politician was cool? Okay, so what makes anyone think that a politician would know cool even if it came up and bit him in his overstuffed backside? While the accoutrement of cool are superficial and politicians are the masters of the art, that doesn't mean they know cool or the arts.
The next time a politician launches into well rehearsed response on revitalizing your community with the arts and creating cool, ask him or her when was the last time he or she went to an arts event. Ask her what she considers the arts. Ask her what she is going to do to support the arts, while government at every level continues to gut and decimate funding for it. While magic tricks are entertaining, the illusion of supporting the arts is just that when politicians spout platitudes; funding fritters away and they don't even bother to attend the myriad artistic opportunities in the community.
This is not to say that I believe the government is responsible for supporting the arts. On the contrary, I believe the best art will always be self-sufficient and distance itself as much as possible from the guiding hand of government funding. But I do believe that politicians who wish to appear progressive and tout a vision for the future should know at least a little bit about what they're talking about.
Locally, politicians point to the success of such areas as Old Town, but the reality is that the success of that area stems from a passionate few not from a politician's vision. What's cool is that a group of remarkable people are trying to create a place in which they would like to live, which in turn will inspire others that would like to live in a similar place. Old Town is cool, but that's because of an energy and a drive of participants, not because of a politicians bold new view of the future.
Yes, Lansing's downtown needs to be revitalized, but there isn't a city council member or mayor, that is going to make it cool. They can make it inviting. They can remove the barriers to getting people down town, but in the end cool is something determined by some one else not manufactured by committee or council. Nor do those clamoring the loudest for the city's dwindling resources have any better connection with cool or the products/services that a younger demographic is interested in.
Some day I would like to grow up and be cool, but until then I'll enjoy a community of diverse people working to make something better than it was when they got there. I think those people are really cool and I feel very lucky to work with them now and again.
First, when was the last time you thought a politician was cool? Okay, so what makes anyone think that a politician would know cool even if it came up and bit him in his overstuffed backside? While the accoutrement of cool are superficial and politicians are the masters of the art, that doesn't mean they know cool or the arts.
The next time a politician launches into well rehearsed response on revitalizing your community with the arts and creating cool, ask him or her when was the last time he or she went to an arts event. Ask her what she considers the arts. Ask her what she is going to do to support the arts, while government at every level continues to gut and decimate funding for it. While magic tricks are entertaining, the illusion of supporting the arts is just that when politicians spout platitudes; funding fritters away and they don't even bother to attend the myriad artistic opportunities in the community.
This is not to say that I believe the government is responsible for supporting the arts. On the contrary, I believe the best art will always be self-sufficient and distance itself as much as possible from the guiding hand of government funding. But I do believe that politicians who wish to appear progressive and tout a vision for the future should know at least a little bit about what they're talking about.
Locally, politicians point to the success of such areas as Old Town, but the reality is that the success of that area stems from a passionate few not from a politician's vision. What's cool is that a group of remarkable people are trying to create a place in which they would like to live, which in turn will inspire others that would like to live in a similar place. Old Town is cool, but that's because of an energy and a drive of participants, not because of a politicians bold new view of the future.
Yes, Lansing's downtown needs to be revitalized, but there isn't a city council member or mayor, that is going to make it cool. They can make it inviting. They can remove the barriers to getting people down town, but in the end cool is something determined by some one else not manufactured by committee or council. Nor do those clamoring the loudest for the city's dwindling resources have any better connection with cool or the products/services that a younger demographic is interested in.
Some day I would like to grow up and be cool, but until then I'll enjoy a community of diverse people working to make something better than it was when they got there. I think those people are really cool and I feel very lucky to work with them now and again.
