Art Ombudsman: The Fakeness

Sometimes it isn't art.

Last night's Oscars got TWO thinking... Who decides what's art - or, more precisely, good art? The Oscars are decided by people with in the industry, and so it risks a disconnect with the people, educated or not, who are outside of it. BUT...since TWO's favorite movie, Slumdog Millionaire, won 8 awards, this won't be a commentary on the Oscars.

But it will be a commentary on something else purported to be art and the validation of the same. New York Magazine recently gave us a page on these people. The article title is quite accurate "I Go Out. I See Friends. I Take Pictures. I Post Them." The sub-heading is more questionable: "Their art is the party. Their gallery is the Internet. Four young photographers who live behind the lens."

Is this art?

TWO will not attempt to provide an all encompassing definition of art, but will be satiated if, taken as a whole, the pictures on the above sites are creative and could reasonably promote an intelligent dialogue regarding their content and meaning. All four of the sites mentioned, hanuk, hobogestapo, theskullset and nickydigital are similar in that they go to exclusive hipster night spots and take pictures. It should be noted that of the 20 pictures highlighted specifically by the article, 4 are taken at Beatrice Inn. For those who don't know, Beatrice is to hipsters what Bar Martignetti is to people who wear nantucket red pants and CK Bradley belts. That is, it is the damn Super Bowl of their genre....Beatrice is where the hipsters are at their hipsterest. Every day a hipster isn't at Beatrice is a day he's thinking about his next Beatrice outing...is this painter's hat funny, or is it a cliche now? Maybe I'll ironically wear a tie. Are my children's sunglasses clever, or is that a cliche too? Is it ever too warm to wear a scarf? The Bar Martinetti types are the same way...only different. What pastels are appropriate in the winter? Should I wear my shirt tucked in or especially tucked in? Where are the socks I wear with my ferragamo loafershahahajust kidding I never wear socks with my 'gamos. Incidentally, in 2005, a crew of Trinity College alums on their way to Martignetti stumbled across a band of NYU alums going to Beatrice....the horrible brawl that ensued was so intense that a mini big-bang occurred, resulting in both the creation of skinny jeans and an instantaneous joint Morrissey - O.A.R. shared stage concert, baffling and sedating all combatants. True story.

Anyway, back to the point. Look at the four websites....do you see art...or do you see party pictures? TWO sees the latter. While Hobo Gestappo says that they "don't just toss anything up" on the site, a look at the content would suggest otherwise. While there may be individual pictures that have some artistic merit, I think it is improper to judge those outside the context of the full body of work. The fact is, one out of a hundred pictures anyone takes might have some artisitic value, just by luck. A UGA sorority girl, taking pictures at her TriDelt - SAE Crush Night 2009 Party on Broad Street might take one picture where the lighting, shadows, positioning and facial expressions are absolutely striking. That doesn't mean that she can hand me the stack of 100 photos from that night, mostly depicting her friends sweating and holding dixie cups, and say "Here's the art."

Fake art?

TWO contends above that the content of the four above sites is party pictures...essentially indistinguishable from that which you'd find on New Jersey Guido, Chicago Scene, Patrick McMullan or Last Night's Party. What is distinguishable? The people. The unspoken message in this New York Magazine piece is that these pictures have artistic value because their subjects are fashion forward, artistically advanced people...and the pictures on New Jersey Guido have no value, because the pictures are of guidos. Who makes this call? Well, the fashion market editor of New York Magazine, who likely knows these photographers already from hanging out at Beatrice. It is a classic example of a niche group validating itself...if you are accepted into the world of New York's artists and hipsters, anything you do is art. The circularity is clear... Jack Siegel is an artist because his party pictures are art...and his party pictures are art because he's an artist.

To tie this together, I don't believe that the body of work is sufficiently creative nor dialogue inducing to justify the classification as art. TWO's body of work, however, clearly is. I would also challenge any of these photographers to a Madden 2003 game on my Playstation 2. Just saying.

In conclusion, I once played a crazy game of poker.

CSPAN Ombudsman: Ranking Presidents, Roxette

Who's the best?

In response to overwhelming public demand, CSPAN got 65 historians to take time off from their schedules to let Americans know which Presidents have been the best. A helpful article accompanies this with the breaking news that Lincoln is the top rated President. See also http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/16/presidential.survey/index.html .

I realize that we have somehow developed into a ranking society, where every show on E! and VH1 is a countdown of some kind, but the idea that a) Americans need their Presidents ranked for them and b) these rankings are definitive in any way is absurd.

As an indication of how silly this is, please read an actual excerpt: "....Bill Clinton jumped six spots from No. 21 to 15. Other recent presidents moved positions as well: Ronald Reagan advanced from No. 11 to 10, George H.W. Bush from No. 20 to 18 and Jimmy Carter fell from No. 22 to 25." Now read that again in Casey Kasem's voice, and replace Bill Clinton with Richard Marx, Ronald Reagan with Boy Meets Girl, Bush with The Bangles and Carter with Roxette, and this could be a 1989 American Top 40 transcript. But why are these Presidents advancing and falling? Either they were good or they weren't, but their performances haven't changed. What has George Washington done to deserve being dropped in the rankings? The explanation that "Today's concerns shape our views of the past..." by one of the historians does more to discredit the rankings than explain them... to judge Thomas Jefferson's presidency in light of, for example, the 2009 financial crisis, is the height of anachronism and revisionist history.

Second, and I won't go overboard in analysis here...but a couple of the rankings were very surprising. John F. Kennedy ranking 7th, ahead of Jefferson, Eisenhower, Wilson and Reagan is absurd. Kennedy was (tragically) only able to serve 3 years, and during that time did not have a particularly stellar record (see, eg the Bay of Pigs Fiasco). It is hard to defend his 3 year performance as exceeding that of so many well regarded two term presidents. Second, Jimmy Carter ranking 25th, essentially middle of the pack, is even more egregious. Jimmy Carter steered the country towards a period of high unemployment, low growth and dangerously high inflation. He received epicly low approval ratings and was internationally embarrassed by the Iran Hostage Crisis. Carter managed to win only 6 states and the District of Columbia in his 1980 reelection bid. However, Carter was ranked ahead of people like Richard Nixon (who, while far from perfect, served two terms and was popular enough to win his reelection in one of the greatest landslides in American history), Zachary Taylor (who had an effective Presidency shortened by death) and James Garfield (who only served for four months and didn't have time to lead the nation into ruin, like Carter did).

More importantly, I would like to announce that CSPAN will be teaming with VH1 to create the following jointly produced shows, to air on both networks:

1) Top 10 Totally Unbelievable Invasions. Hosted by Daisey Fuentes, historians rank various sneak attack military operations, from the fall of Troy to Quantrill's Raiders to Normandy as Michael Ian Black ("I mean, to the Germans, Eisenhower is like the anti-David Hasselhoff!!! And so is Omar Bradley!"), among others, provide commentary. Into and out of commercial breaks, the chorus to EMF's Unbelievable plays as the show's title graphic appears. From the actual show transcript...Historian: "After Ghengis Khan's invasion of Volga Bulgaria, he set his sights on Hungary, after physically crushing Russian princes to death under his eating platform" Sinbad: "DAMN!"

2) Top 30 Most Influential Christians. With quick cuts and Swizz Beatz tracks playing in the background, CSPAN/VH1 counts down through St. Augustine, various Popes, St. Peter and others. Spoiler Alert! Jesus falls one spot to #2 as host Giuliana Rancic explains that, quite simply, Jesus' name recognition has been diluted by the sheer number of Mexican boxers of the same name ("Dios Mio!" quips celebrity commenter George Lopez). Some Christian leaders attending a pre-screening have questioned Apostle Paul's #1 ranking, contending that Jesus is the central figure in their religion, but CSPAN/VH1 stands by its rating process.

3) All Access: 20 Most Controversial Supreme Court Decisions. Brooke Burke is all about controversy as she counts down an explosive list of court cases with comments from a star-studded group of celebrities. The list is comprehensive, from Plessy v. Ferguson ("That $#!* was %@#*@# up" - Ice T) to Roe v. Wade ("YEAH!" - Linda Perry) to, of course, Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. City of Hialeah ("That ordinance was neutral but was improperly motivated and thus had to be narrowly tailored to meet a compelling governmental interest!" - Tracy Morgan).

In conclusion, Roxette is a severely underrated 80s band.

Boxing Ombudsman: Missing You Like Candy

The Worlds Ombudsman se gusta el boxeo.

I am tired of the casual, unchallenged references by people that "boxing is in a decline." You can find such references to boxing's death on blogs and mainstream sites alike, and almost always it is accompanied by no statistics or even explanation: Boxing is in a decline, everyone knows it, and mixed martial arts (MMA) is so much more popular.

First - its not - boxing is by far still the more popular sport and is quite healthy. And second, there may be no sport with as many intriguing but under-publicized characters as there are in boxing.

Boxing is popular. Last month's Mosely-Margarito fight brought nearly 21,000 fans to the Staples Center in LA - the largest crowd to see any sporting event in the building's history (and this is the building where the Lakers play their home games). Boxing matches regularly get well over 1 million PPV buys (including a record of 2.4 million) while MMA's largest ever is 1.3 million. What about remuneration? Margarito and Mosely made $2.3 million and $1 million respectively for the aforementioned fight (although keep in mind that De La Hoya has made $45 million off of his fight with Floyd Mayweather). By comparison, the recent George St. Pierre - BJ Penn MMA fight paid those fighters $600,000 and $125,000 respectively. In 2008, Floyd Mayweather Jr. was the fourth highest paid athlete in the US - between Lebron James and Kobe Bryant.

And that is just in the US. Around the world, boxing is thriving. In Mexico, boxing regularly gets better TV audiences than soccer -- and as for live audiences in that country - 136,000 people saw Julio Cesar Chavez fight Greg Haugen in 1993, one of the largest crowds in history, for any sport. In the UK, Ricky Hatton drew 55,000 to Manchester Stadium for his fight with Juan Lazcano and believes that he will be able to break 136,000 given the right venue. Meanwhile, Manny Pacquaio is quite literally the Michael Jordan of the Philippines.

In addition to being the best sport to pre-game to on a Saturday night, boxing also has some incredible storylines. Many of these story lines are routinely ignored by the mainstream US media, which is the driving force behind the claim that boxing is declining. Refuse to cover enough stories, and maybe the prophecy will be self-fulfilling. But not yet.

Here are 5 boxers that have intriguing stories... if the press were doing its job, all but Miranda would be household names in this country in the same way that Lebron James, Tom Brady and Derrick Jeter are.

1) The Ageless Bernard Hopkins. The Philadelphia native was sentenced to prison by his 18th birthday for countless muggings and burglaries. Upon leaving, he told the skeptical warden "I ain't coming back." After deciding that boxing would be his salvation, he had his first fight in 1988...and lost. Twenty years later, he is considered one of boxing's all-time greats. This past October, at age 43, as many boxing pundits were predicting his retirement, Hopkins shocked the world when he upset 26 year old previously undefeated middleweight champion Kelly Pavlik. How can you not love this? The only age gap that surprised me more was today when I learned that my girl Mandy Moore is engaged to Bryan Adams. Weird.

2) The Columbian Slumdog Millionaire, Edison Miranda. Miranda was abandoned by his mother at one month old and essentially grew up as a street child in Buenaventura, eating stray cats and stealing to survive. At age 9 he was able to save enough money to search for and locate his mother in the countryside, only to have her reject him again. Back in the city, he began boxing at a local gym because they would let him sleep there. Fast forward 10 years -he's making six figures to knock people out of the ring. Speaking of rings, at least Freida Pinto is still available - go to hell Bryan Adams.

3) Manny Pacquaio, The People's Champ. The Pacman rose from poverty to be widely considered the pound-for-pound best fighter in the world as well as easily the most widely recognized celebrity in the Philippines. Pacquiao has funded countless medical clinics, schools and infrastructure work in poor areas in the Phillipines, including at one point coming back from a fight and actually handing out money to thousands of people in a poor neighborhood. So popular is Pacman, that he has already acted in movies, starred in a video game, appeared on a postage stamp and run for congress. In December he moved up significantly in weight to fight Oscar De La Hoya. Most experts predicted an easy win for the bigger De La Hoya, instead it was one of the most surprisingly one-sided fights in recent memory, as Pacquaio utterly dominated the fight, likely ending De La Hoya's career. Pacquaio is scheduled to fight Ricky Hatton in May. There have been no discussions, to my knowledge, about a future fight with the other People's Champ, Paul Wall. Paul Wall, incidentally, is the jeweler behind Mandy's engagement grill. Fact.

4) Ricky Hatton, the Everyman. Hatton, a fighter from Manchester, England, has a band of soccer-turned-boxing hooligans who follow him all over the world, drunkenly singing, pounding drums and blowing horns. Sometimes they show up at events having nothing to do with boxing and do this. Hatton, himself, is just as amusing. Accused of drinking and eating too much between fights, Hatton regularly shows up for weigh ins (and even matches) wearing a fat suit and calling himself Ricky Fatton. For reasons known only to him, he calls himself an honorary Mexican and wears a sombrero when entering the ring while Blue Moon, the Manchester City song, plays on the loudspeakers. Also, he is nasty - 45 wins with only one loss (to Floyd Mayweather). Speaking of nasty, I'm still having trouble stomaching the Mandy Moore - Ryan Cabrera news. Cabrera's twin brother, Steelers place kicker Jeff Reed, is reportedly handling bachelor party duties.

5) Pretty Boy Floyd Mayweather. One of the best boxers ever and one of the most polarizing figures in all of sports, Mayweather is undefeated, untied and technically retired. But his love of money and royal treatment lead most pundits to believe that he'll be back, probably to fight Manny Pacquaio, if Pacman can beat Hatton. How much does Floyd love money? Here's him counting sweaty packets of money he keeps in a drawer and putting them in a big duffel bag, just because. My favorite part is that at one point Floyd, apparently worried that a viewer may have just tuned in and become confused and disoriented by what he or she was seeing, helpfully says "Thats seven hundred thousand... in a bag." And that's exactly what you're seeing...just bringing everyone up to speed. Is this jewels in a satchel? Is this travellers cheques in a box? Is this gold bullion in a rucksack? What is this I'm seeing? No no no...this is seven hundred thousand...in a bag. From Dancing With The Stars, to bizarre outings with 50 cent (you'll notice Ryan Cabrera mc-ing in that clip -- come ON Mandy) Mayweather loves attention and will likely be fighting soon - stay tuned.

In conclusion, I challenge any singer on the current Billboard Adult/Contemporary Top 40 to a slap fight. You hear me Jason Mraz?

The City Ombudsman: Less Tamarama Interruptions, Please!

After referencing Tila Tequila and Lady Gaga recently, I thought it was time to get back to serious issues like The City.

Lets talk about loyalty and double standards. A few weeks ago Adam made late night kissing with some girl who was not his girlfriend Allie. What followed? Two episodes of tears and gnashing of teeth...Whitney and Erin and Allie were all about the angry talk and using terms like "liar" and "cheater" and "guy who wears clownishly enormous v-necks to Tenjune." The last one wasn't actually said but is no less true. And MTV, for their part, used clips and angles that made Adam look like a creep. It was frankly surprising that there wasn't grainy footage of him pulling up to a lower east side elementary school in a van and offering kids snow cones before peeling out when he realized the camera was on him. But fine, you shouldn't cheat and lie.

However, over the last two episodes, Erin has been cheating on her long distance boyfriend with one "JR." I'm not sure what MTV is trying to imply when they show JR waking up at Erin's apartment and struggling to put on his youth medium Affliction tee shirt, but if one reads between the lines, I think they're suggesting that Erin and JR are doing more than just kissing. And by that I mean having relations. But is there condemnation? Is Erin shown cackling maniacally as she necks with JR with a quick cut to her Canadian boyfriend crying as All Out of Love plays? No. Instead she is treated with incredulous giggles from her girlfriends who want to know how she feels and what she wants. MTV makes her out to be sort of a lovable party girl who has this difficult boy situation! And the episode ends with her talking to JR and crying.

So to recap, Adam cheats on Allie, Allie cries. Erin cheats on her boyfriend, Erin cries. What? How can this be! While Adam's and Erin's situations aren't identical, the bottom line is: both cheated! However, one person is being treated like he did something wrong by cheating, and the other person is being treated as if they have just found themselves in a difficult situation and the cheating is just an unfortunate by-product. Unfair.

Do you know whats also unfair? My having to sit through two performances by Jay's Bananarama cover band and not getting to hear Venus.

That segues nicely into my other musing, which concerns the Hotel Gansevoort rooftop. Seriously? Not sure why one of the events had to take place here. I challenge you to find a place in Manhattan that has a lower percentage of Manhattan residents among its patrons. 230 5th in the summer is probably the only serious contender, when during happy hour the area code on the rooftop actually changes from 212 to 516. Hotel Gansevoort, meanwhile, is typically filled with 24 year old suit jacketed, slick haired guys from Hoboken who live with four other roommates. In between buying rounds of Patron shots for unsuspecting FIT first years, these dudes pass the time by blackberrying each other feverishly (mostly about when the other roommates are showing up and whether its time for more Patron). The point is, again, less Meatpacking District please!

So what have we learned today? Sometimes there are apparently double standards for cheating, and B&T loves rooftops.

In conclusion, I'm burning like a silver flame.

Celebrity Ombudsman: Michael Phelps = Tila Tequila

FINA, an international swimming organization, just issued a press release praising a swimmer for taking illegal drugs....and apologizing. Lets discuss.

Sometimes celebrities emerge through their own hard work and accomplishments, and sometimes celebrities are created through confusing magic and sorcery that results in them continually being on TV but no one knows why.

Michael Phelps is an interesting combination of the two. Phelps' performance in the Olympics obviously is an example of personal accomplishment being rewarded with fame. However, instead of Phelps staying "a swimming-celebrity", like a Mark Spitz sans sensual mustache, Phelps has turned into the second kind of celebrity. Why? Because sponsors and swimming organizations see that there is a lot of money to be earned off of him.

Ideally, Phelps would have become an icon naturally, due to a dynamic personality (like a Sugar Ray Leonard) or good looks (like an Anna Kournikova). But Phelps is sort of shy and didn't really catch on as a true celebrity. So the formula, to these Phelps-opportunists, is obvious...if it doesn't happen organically, force it. Force it like the 10,000th showing of the UnderArmor"I don't even know my power" commercial, force it like Carson Daly's blaccent interviewing Ludicrus ("Luduh, I mean, the the rhymes be flowin, the crowd be feeling it -"). Force it.

All of a sudden, well after the Olympics are over, we keep seeing Michael Phelps being paraded around in crooked hats. Just appearing places constantly: wandering around at various football games, dragged to fashion shows, forced onto Entourage. I'm pretty certain that I saw him get Next-ed by Amber, a spicy 19 year old from La Jolla ("You might have all them medals, but I ain't even trying to settle") but fare better with Tamra on a lascivious episode of Real Housewives of Orange County. And always in crooked hats.

So whats the point of this post? There should be a line between the behavior of sponsors and PR firms and that of governing bodies. After Michael Phelps smoked marijuana and apologized, FINA (a swimming organization certain to benefit if Michael Phelps can become like Michael Jordan) praised him for the apology as a means of damage control. Please note that there was never a separate condemnation press release - only this one that said it was inappropriate, but that he was great and that FINA hoped he would participate in their upcoming World Championships. FINA was more concerned about losing money with the fading of Phelps' star power than they were with making certain their athletes behave themselves.

After Pacman Jones made it rain all over a strip club in Las Vegas, prompting a riot and a shooting, did the NFL praise his apology and insist that the apology alone was a sufficient guarantee that he would "continue generating respect and admiration to fans"? [*Notice, by the way, that this is "to fans" and not "from fans." According to FINA, Phelps is a machine who just can not stop admiring and respecting the people who attend swimming events. Tirelessly respecting people.*] Anyway, no, the NFL suspended Jones for a year. The point is - the role of a body like FINA is to govern the sport and the behavior of its athletes, not to be a pseudo - PR firm protecting its big names. Shame on FINA and shame on Carson Daly.

In conclusion, I swim a very competitive breaststroke.

Political Ombudsman: Don't Boss Me

Sometimes, people try to tell you what to do.

In this article, a guy named Jonathon Porritt tells people that they shouldn't have more than two kids because any more would overly burden the environment. I have a few angles.

First, the act of telling people, unprovoked, what's best for them is something that should be more widely frowned upon. How much respect, overall, would you say society has for people like Dr. Phil, Ricki Lake and Montell Williams? Probably not much. But these people are giving advice to people asking for it. Porritt is just some guy, uninvited, shouting on the street at whoever will listen and calling families around dinner time. If this were the 19th century, he would be selling elixirs out of a wagon.

Second, Porritt, a man who undoubtedly wore a scarf throughout his interview, can't back up his assertion. Porritt claims that two children should be the maximum allowed because he knows how much carbon people use (a dubious, unchallenged averment). Even if we were to assume that was true - we are still missing steps... like what is the effect of that carbon increase on temperature, and what is the effect of that temperature change on the world? No one knows with any certainty. Doesn't matter to Porritt, who wants to figuratively (perhaps literally - although this would require further research) lie in bed with husbands and wives and have a say in their decision about having children.

Third, a broader point: Throughout history, certain people have used whatever "reasons" are available to them to control the masses. The typical left-right, liberal-conservative lense is not particularly helpful when viewing these attempts at garnering power and control.

Example: Liberal Lucy might read the above article and say "My, this seems a bit extreme but I constantly worry (cry?) about living my life the right way." However, she might view an evangelical politician saying that abortion will send you to hell and think "My choice!" or "Dismantle Patriarchy!" or "Just Dance!" or whatever it is that girls say now. Functionally - what is the difference between the two? Porritt favors forced abortion and the latter favors forced not-having-an-abortion. Either way, someone is dictating what you do with your body, which should leave a bad taste in your mouth. (TWO digression - speaking of bad taste, don't buy Tropicana Light & Healthy Orange Juice Beverage, it's disgusting).

Instead of viewing things as left vs right, the question should be - is this restriction something that seems like it would ordinarily only happen in Communist Russia or Nazi Germany? If intuitively the answer is yes, then the presumption (rebuttable only in situations where the emergency is so immediate and dire that a weighing of the costs and benefits clearly favors such a restriction) should be that the advocate is an idiot, albeit a dangerous one, interested in control above all else. Unless the presumption is rebutted, does it matter if the excuse given is the good of the proletariat, the protection of nationalist interests, getting into heaven or saving the planet?

To be clear, TWO is an environmentalist. I support being smart about the environment, cutting emissions and protecting wildlife. However when the British government begins seriously talking about limiting children and rationing travel, the topic is no longer environmentalism, its control of the masses.

In conclusion, I constantly worry (cry?) about living my life the right way........and celebrate Mandy Moore's entire catalog.