Riots and Weddings
Aug. 9th, 2011 11:12 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annwfynI have two semi-connected rambles to post, which seem to have taken totally different directions and will probably make me look like a stinking hypocrite.
The international response to the London riots.
I find it darkly amusing that Iran and Pakistan are expressing concerns about human rights and the government’s need to listen and understand.
I'm also raising an eyebrow at the Daily Mail's insistence that it is actively irresponsible to, in any way, suggest that the riots may have anything to do with the cuts. Half of the Guardian's CiF seem to agree. I can't help but feel the urge to comment that whilst the kids in hoodies who are looting for Nike trainers probably aren't doing it as a part of a complex and well thought through political strategy, there were no mass riots in London prior to the cuts. And, in fact, the last lot of riots on this scale were, in fact, in London in 1981, when there was also a recession and a Tory government.
I also believe that if you tell poor people constantly that they are scum, that they don't deserve homes, or jobs, or any kind of safety net, and that things will not get better, then they might actually listen.
And yes, Daily Mail. I am talking to you.
Elsewhere, I have also stumbled across all the drama surrounding a US couple’s ’Hobo’ themed wedding.
For those who want a quick summary, a couple of people in the US were getting married, and decided to have a theme wedding (which, as a note, I have been totally a fan of, ever since I encountered the first ‘Harry Potter’ wedding where guests got wands instead of favours. Friends in committed relationships, please take note!) and as their theme took some kind of pseudo-1930s setting, whereby they and their guests apparently turned up to re-enact the Great Depression as portrayed in The Journey of Natty Gann. The groom wore dungarees, the guests feasted on 'moonshine', and had a giant big BBQ and there were cute vintage clothes all round.
Afterwards, flushed with contentment, they posted their wedding pictures on Etsy, only to find that not everyone found their wedding really as cute as they did. In fact, it featured in on a snark blog, and was thoroughly bitched about for having a wedding which took 'poor people' as its theme when the bride and groom weren't really poor, and, in fact, spent $15,000 on their wedding when there were people leaving comments on the blog who only earn $2.99 per year, and who's grandmother was a hobo who had to eat her own children to survive and they crawled over broken glass to leave those internet comments and don't they see how offensive it all is! (or something like that).
As you may be able to tell, my sympathy wasn't entirely with these outraged commentators. First of all, Weddings cost a lot of money. Like...a lot. This couple spent around £9k on their wedding, which, in all honesty, is pretty small for a proper big wedding. And I don't care if you got married for £50 wearing a dress you bought from Oxfam on the way there, shortly before eating a Gregg's pasty for your reception dinner. Congratulations! You had a small cheap wedding. I'm sure someone out there can tell you that they got married for £2.99, wearing a dress made out of broken glass and with a reception dinner made up of cyanide. And all of you (including those spendthrift hobos) will have paid less than Paul McCartney and Heather Mills who spent £3million on their nuptials, and then proceeded to get divorced in acrimony however many years later.
And, yeah, it was a slightly random choice, but it isn't like they weren't doing something that hasn't been done a million times before. We've been glamourizing miserable bits of history forever. History is not sacrosanct. History is full of nasty miserable bits (and by the way, all you people with your cute celtic weddings, you're aware that the people who made all those lovely knotwork designed also liked to sacrifice people?) and it's full of heartwarming, hopeful, beautiful bits which speak to people in some way or another.
I mean, was I the only child who used to bounce around her living room cheerily singing "Down Down Down" in sonourous tones along to Bugsy Malone? Did anyone else watch and re-watch Disney's plucky Depression era heroine, Natty Gann, snog John Cusack and quietly wish that they would get that bit over and done with so the film could go back to showing me more of her dog?
One fairly sensible website offered up this take on it. I think my sympathies went a little closer to the couple getting married. Indeed, I think the main lesson I took from this is that the internet is full of judgemental pricks. And, to be fair, no one looks good in dungarees.
The international response to the London riots.
I find it darkly amusing that Iran and Pakistan are expressing concerns about human rights and the government’s need to listen and understand.
I'm also raising an eyebrow at the Daily Mail's insistence that it is actively irresponsible to, in any way, suggest that the riots may have anything to do with the cuts. Half of the Guardian's CiF seem to agree. I can't help but feel the urge to comment that whilst the kids in hoodies who are looting for Nike trainers probably aren't doing it as a part of a complex and well thought through political strategy, there were no mass riots in London prior to the cuts. And, in fact, the last lot of riots on this scale were, in fact, in London in 1981, when there was also a recession and a Tory government.
I also believe that if you tell poor people constantly that they are scum, that they don't deserve homes, or jobs, or any kind of safety net, and that things will not get better, then they might actually listen.
And yes, Daily Mail. I am talking to you.
Elsewhere, I have also stumbled across all the drama surrounding a US couple’s ’Hobo’ themed wedding.
For those who want a quick summary, a couple of people in the US were getting married, and decided to have a theme wedding (which, as a note, I have been totally a fan of, ever since I encountered the first ‘Harry Potter’ wedding where guests got wands instead of favours. Friends in committed relationships, please take note!) and as their theme took some kind of pseudo-1930s setting, whereby they and their guests apparently turned up to re-enact the Great Depression as portrayed in The Journey of Natty Gann. The groom wore dungarees, the guests feasted on 'moonshine', and had a giant big BBQ and there were cute vintage clothes all round.
Afterwards, flushed with contentment, they posted their wedding pictures on Etsy, only to find that not everyone found their wedding really as cute as they did. In fact, it featured in on a snark blog, and was thoroughly bitched about for having a wedding which took 'poor people' as its theme when the bride and groom weren't really poor, and, in fact, spent $15,000 on their wedding when there were people leaving comments on the blog who only earn $2.99 per year, and who's grandmother was a hobo who had to eat her own children to survive and they crawled over broken glass to leave those internet comments and don't they see how offensive it all is! (or something like that).
As you may be able to tell, my sympathy wasn't entirely with these outraged commentators. First of all, Weddings cost a lot of money. Like...a lot. This couple spent around £9k on their wedding, which, in all honesty, is pretty small for a proper big wedding. And I don't care if you got married for £50 wearing a dress you bought from Oxfam on the way there, shortly before eating a Gregg's pasty for your reception dinner. Congratulations! You had a small cheap wedding. I'm sure someone out there can tell you that they got married for £2.99, wearing a dress made out of broken glass and with a reception dinner made up of cyanide. And all of you (including those spendthrift hobos) will have paid less than Paul McCartney and Heather Mills who spent £3million on their nuptials, and then proceeded to get divorced in acrimony however many years later.
And, yeah, it was a slightly random choice, but it isn't like they weren't doing something that hasn't been done a million times before. We've been glamourizing miserable bits of history forever. History is not sacrosanct. History is full of nasty miserable bits (and by the way, all you people with your cute celtic weddings, you're aware that the people who made all those lovely knotwork designed also liked to sacrifice people?) and it's full of heartwarming, hopeful, beautiful bits which speak to people in some way or another.
I mean, was I the only child who used to bounce around her living room cheerily singing "Down Down Down" in sonourous tones along to Bugsy Malone? Did anyone else watch and re-watch Disney's plucky Depression era heroine, Natty Gann, snog John Cusack and quietly wish that they would get that bit over and done with so the film could go back to showing me more of her dog?
One fairly sensible website offered up this take on it. I think my sympathies went a little closer to the couple getting married. Indeed, I think the main lesson I took from this is that the internet is full of judgemental pricks. And, to be fair, no one looks good in dungarees.
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no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 11:30 am (UTC)I agree with you in that we tend to "glamorize" history and only remember what we really want to. I mean, if you went to a Medieval-themed Wedding, you'd be expecting a banquet and troubadour, not the peasant's fare that was proportionally more common at the time, right ?
I think that couple was treated unfairly by the Regretsy community. I think they really tried to find a ceremony and style that reflected them.
That said... I don't know. Part of me has a hard time understanding the whole "one-upmanship" going on with weddings. This video goes too far, but the premise is something I sympathize with. And I'm not saying that every couple getting married should have the same cut-and-paste wedding. But really ... at the end of the day, a slightly cynical voice whispers that organizing a themed-wedding, no matter the theme, isn't very unique. Because you're making sure everything matches, and giving attention to little details you'll probably be the only one to notice, and how is that any different from what you to for a more "traditional" wedding?
I find it ironic that they claim to want an "unfussy" wedding and then go on to explain exactly how much trouble they went into picking and choosing every detail.
I guess I have a different take on what a wedding means than they do.In the end, what matters isn't how you do it, I don't think, but that you go through with making this incredibly crazy and optimistic commitment to someone, to love and cherish them for the rest of your lives. I don't expect my wedding day to be the happiest day of my life. Because really, it'll only be the first day of the happiest part of my life, and I'd like things to not go downhill from there ;)
When my sister got married, we were still living together, and I was roped into helping out from playing music at the ceremony to printing booklets and making bows. And the details and touches were nice and personal. But in the end, the wedding felt unique to me because it was my sister's wedding. Just like my wedding feel unique to me because it'll be my wedding. I'd rather people remember it because
no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 12:20 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 12:52 pm (UTC)I think this also. The media/government portrayal of certain segments of society is appalling. And constantly treating people like they're lazy/shiftless/dishonest/good-for-nothing just because of where they live, or how old they are, or what they like to wear, tends to have major long-term effects.
no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 01:08 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 08:58 pm (UTC)http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/camila-batmanghelidjh-caring-costs-ndash-but-so-do-riots-2333991.html
However, you do have to contrast it against the statements taken from the people actually involved. Such as this one - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-14458424
no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 01:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 05:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 05:59 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-08-09 10:07 pm (UTC)For them to start accusing other people of making things worse by distorting the story is...impressive, even by the standards of that small-minded and sordid rag.