Meme Thread for Both Posting and Discussing Memes

[Abhorsen]

Regarding the rest of your post: government is element of society, and just as with the rest of it, it is a reflection of psychology. So if governmental stuff looks ugly, chances are that the entire society is already ugly to begin with. You never get ugly governmental buildings and only ugly governmental buildings. Every time governmental architecture gets ugly, religious and communal architecture had gotten ugly alongside it. So while I understand the sentiment, do consider the implications.

But the feedback loop feeds back to worship of government as well. Taking kids to see the white house and congress, as if good things happen there. Part of the allure of those places begins with the architecture being nice.

But I see what you mean about ugly causing ugly. Maybe inoffensive should be the goal of a government building then.

Literally everything beautiful in Moscow was built during the Tsarist times. Which, for all the flaws, were far better than anything and everything that came afterwards. And in fact the Tsarist Russia was on the way to fixing most of its issues when World War I happened.

I was talking about the subways specifically, in reference to Bernie. Yes, they had a lot of ugly shit. They also had some 'beautiful' things. Things that, without context, would be beautiful. Again, I give as an example the chandeliers in subway stations. Or the Ukraina Hotel:

Or this Nork Museum:

See, I use beautiful in scare quotes because they are beautiful in the same way that Nazi architecture is beautiful: right in the uncanny valley. Without context, one might like how it looks, but knowing the evil it represents, it gives a disturbing revulsion.

An evil thing cannot create true beauty, because people who know feel the horror behind it. And it's attempt to imitate beauty is all the uglier for it, like it's wearing a skinsuit. Brutalism is the inverse of this: a purposeful rejection of beauty, which I can see your point as also bad.

Instead, actual, inoffensive utilitarian design is best for government, IMO, because the last thing we want is worship of government.

Enlighten me please.
Why exactly can't you take the light pole on the left and put an electric light in it?

is it gremlins? will gremlins eat the electric lightbulb if it is placed in a pretty metal pole instead of an ugly one?

Not an electric light of modern power, tbc. Basically, modern ones are more powerful, so when driving at night you might be blinded similar to a headlight shining in your eyes. Raising it above eye level & pointing it down solves that problem. Also, pointing it down means that more of the light goes where it is needed (on the street) and less into people's house windows while they are trying to sleep. Finally, raising it up allows you to take full advantage of the improved brightness, and thus have less of the poles. Basically, the pole's base design needed to be updated to better harness the new light source's properties.

 

[mrttao]

Not an electric light of modern power, tbc. Basically, modern ones are more powerful, so when driving at night you might be blinded similar to a headlight shining in your eyes. Raising it above eye level & pointing it down solves that problem. Also, pointing it down means that more of the light goes where it is needed (on the street) and less into people's house windows while they are trying to sleep. Finally, raising it up allows you to take full advantage of the improved brightness, and thus have less of the poles. Basically, the pole's base design needed to be updated to better harness the new light source's properties.

... you do realize you can just slightly adjust the lamp portion itself to make it point downwards? And still maintain the beautiful aesthetic?
you don't have to have a brutalist design to make it point down.

In fact, this is an even simpler change than making them electric

 

[Zachowon]

I see weaponry like tanks and planes sexy and they are an extension of the government

 

[Abhorsen]

... you do realize you can just slightly adjust the lamp portion itself to make it point downwards? And still maintain the beautiful aesthetic?
you don't have to have a brutalist design to make it point down.

In fact, this is an even simpler change than making them electric

The height addition for a pole is a major advantage that both spreads the area covered by a single light source, and protects drivers. It also enables the downward cone, as the issue about putting a downward cap on a close to street level light is that it further limits the lighted radius. There's a reason that the Sun is the optimal street lamp other than it being free: it's far enough away that it lights virtually everything.

I see weaponry like tanks and planes sexy and they are an extension of the government

Thank you for a shining example of why I'm wary of 'pretty = good'. You bought the psyop whole heartedly, which is prima facia evidence to not trust it. You like soldiers so much you respect the SS and Khmer Rouge soldiers:

The SS did. So did the Khmer Rouge. There's your problem. What they believe in is of paramount importance to the morality of what they do.

Yes and no.
Remeber, history is written by the victors. Do you know who helped those victors? The dead lives.
I will always honor a grave of someone that was a soldier. Even commies.

When in actuality, 99% of both groups ought to be shot then spat on, and left to the animals without a grave.

 

[Zachowon]

The height addition for a pole is a major advantage that both spreads the area covered by a single light source, and protects drivers. It also enables the downward cone, as the issue about putting a downward cap on a close to street level light is that it further limits the lighted radius. There's a reason that the Sun is the optimal street lamp other than it being free: it's far enough away that it lights virtually everything.


Thank you for a shining example of why I'm wary of 'pretty = good'. You bought the psyop whole heartedly, which is prima facia evidence to not trust it. You like soldiers so much you respect the SS and Khmer Rouge soldiers:


When in actuality, 99% of both groups ought to be shot then spat on, and left to the animals without a grave.

I domt like the German ww2 esthetic.
I like the American ww2 esthetic

 

[Aldarion]

But the feedback loop feeds back to worship of government as well. Taking kids to see the white house and congress, as if good things happen there. Part of the allure of those places begins with the architecture being nice.

But I see what you mean about ugly causing ugly. Maybe inoffensive should be the goal of a government building then.

I was talking about the subways specifically, in reference to Bernie. Yes, they had a lot of ugly shit. They also had some 'beautiful' things. Things that, without context, would be beautiful. Again, I give as an example the chandeliers in subway stations. Or the Ukraina Hotel:

Or this Nork Museum:

See, I use beautiful in scare quotes because they are beautiful in the same way that Nazi architecture is beautiful: right in the uncanny valley. Without context, one might like how it looks, but knowing the evil it represents, it gives a disturbing revulsion.

An evil thing cannot create true beauty, because people who know feel the horror behind it. And it's attempt to imitate beauty is all the uglier for it, like it's wearing a skinsuit. Brutalism is the inverse of this: a purposeful rejection of beauty, which I can see your point as also bad.

Instead, actual, inoffensive utilitarian design is best for government, IMO, because the last thing we want is worship of government.

True, but how do you achieve something that is "merely" inoffensive? Well, other than putting our government into Hobbit-like holes which... might not be the worst idea.

 

[Scottty]

I see weaponry like tanks and planes sexy and they are an extension of the government

I think this is a non-trivial point. There is a large subjective element in individual perception of beauty and ugliness.
The kind of people who worship The Government as the Great Giver Of Handouts might think Brutalist buildings look awesome.

Might I suggest that it would be better for government buildings to simply be functional? People to some extent live up to expectations, and a government employee who does his daily job inside something that looks like the Barad-dur is going to internalize that image, and it will affect how he performs his tasks.
So a government building that ordinary people need to visit to get paperwork approved, or something, should not look like a cathedral, but it should not be some horrible eyesore either.
And the civil servants inside - well, we want them to be friendly and helpful, not grumpy because they hate their job, and take it out on the customers.

 

[Scottty]

Go Elon!

 

[Robovski]

When your public spaces have beauty and difference, you create a sence of place and potentially pride in a place. Those pulling the levers can't have the plebs feeling things like that, they might care about what happens to "their" community.

 

[Skallagrim]

Yup. It's not like I disagree with @Abhorsen's criticism of government -- in fact, I agree completely. The issue here is that Abhorsen assumes (implictly) that others will share that same criticism, if presented with constant ugliness created by the government.

This is not true.

In reality, the pervastive ugliness grinds people down. It beats them into a pulp, mentally speaking. It crushes them spiritually. That's the point of it. Brutalism is meant to brutalise you. What remains is a population of beaten-down zombies who can't even conceive of the idea that they might resist.

Beauty is worth defending against evil, so evil wants beauty to be erased from the world. To go along with that is to (oft-unwittingly) serve the interests of evil.

 

[DarthOne]

Top right's Martin Luther, I'm guessing?

Otherwise, I guess the other three prove why France's reputation as the dreaded "Ogre of Europe!" may not be so warranted, at least when we look at Germany throughout the 20th century and into the 21st.

Wilhelm the II might not have been perfect but he doesn’t deserve the flak he gets. A lot of it comes from pre-WW1 and WW1 propaganda. Mostly from the British who had a vested interest in making a rising power on the European continent, like Germany, look bad.

 

[Abhorsen]

Yup. It's not like I disagree with @Abhorsen's criticism of government -- in fact, I agree completely. The issue here is that Abhorsen assumes (implictly) that others will share that same criticism, if presented with constant ugliness created by the government.

This is not true.

In reality, the pervastive ugliness grinds people down. It beats them into a pulp, mentally speaking. It crushes them spiritually. That's the point of it. Brutalism is meant to brutalise you. What remains is a population of beaten-down zombies who can't even conceive of the idea that they might resist.

Beauty is worth defending against evil, so evil wants beauty to be erased from the world. To go along with that is to (oft-unwittingly) serve the interests of evil.

Yeah, you and @Aldarion made good points about the oppressiveness of ugliness, and definitely changed my mind here. Now I'm leaning more towards inoffensive as what should be the goal of a government building, as I am still skeptical of pretty government stuff and its inherent propaganda.

 

[Aldarion]

Yeah, you and @Aldarion made good points about the oppressiveness of ugliness, and definitely changed my mind here. Now I'm leaning more towards inoffensive as what should be the goal of a government building, as I am still skeptical of pretty government stuff and its inherent propaganda.

Maybe. On one hand disconnecting the government from the people by giving it plain buildings may be a good idea - government is definitely something that should be kept at arm's length. But it could also backfire, if that disconnect leads to people allowing the government do whatever it wants.

 

[S'task]

Thank you for a shining example of why I'm wary of 'pretty = good'. You bought the psyop whole heartedly, which is prima facia evidence to not trust it.

I mean... airplanes look good because humans inherently like symmetry and "organic", that is, sleek, forms. The Laws of Aerodynamics and Principles of Radar Dispersal work together in ways that means even when designing for the purely practical reasons (which most military aircraft are), those things are going to end up looking good to human aesthetic senses. To make them ugly would actively diminish their effectiveness which, well seems counter-productive to their main purpose.

 

[Circle of Willis]

Today, in an alternate universe...

 

[Bacle]

Yeah, you and @Aldarion made good points about the oppressiveness of ugliness, and definitely changed my mind here. Now I'm leaning more towards inoffensive as what should be the goal of a government building, as I am still skeptical of pretty government stuff and its inherent propaganda.

You do realize very, very few people view a nicely designed gov building as 'propaganda', right?

It is possible to simply enjoy nicely designed buildings and want to have civic pride in having nicely designed buildings for your local gov.

 

[Abhorsen]

I mean... airplanes look good because humans inherently like symmetry and "organic", that is, sleek, forms. The Laws of Aerodynamics and Principles of Radar Dispersal work together in ways that means even when designing for the purely practical reasons (which most military aircraft are), those things are going to end up looking good to human aesthetic senses. To make them ugly would actively diminish their effectiveness which, well seems counter-productive to their main purpose.

Tbc, I'm not saying that we should make fighter jets ugly. I'm more saying that Zach's a perfect example of what I fear: he found fighter jets cool, he worships any military, and is one of the most pro government people on the site to an absurd degree.

You do realize very, very few people view a nicely designed gov building as 'propaganda', right?

It is possible to simply enjoy nicely designed buildings and want to have civic pride in having nicely designed buildings for your local gov.

I mean, whether or not they realize it as such, it definitely is. People not realizing propaganda is propaganda explains why people trust TV news. Thinking that government is good, and being happy about it is the height of stupidity and just asking to be screwed over.

 

[Aldarion]

Tbc, I'm not saying that we should make fighter jets ugly. I'm more saying that Zach's a perfect example of what I fear: he found fighter jets cool, he worships any military, and is one of the most pro government people on the site to an absurd degree.

I found fighter jets cool and I dreamed of using one to drop some high explosives on Banski Dvori and Pantovčak.

 

[Zachowon]

Tbc, I'm not saying that we should make fighter jets ugly. I'm more saying that Zach's a perfect example of what I fear: he found fighter jets cool, he worships any military, and is one of the most pro government people on the site to an absurd degree.

I mean, whether or not they realize it as such, it definitely is. People not realizing propaganda is propaganda explains why people trust TV news. Thinking that government is good, and being happy about it is the height of stupidity and just asking to be screwed over.

I do not worship any military.
I think the Russian Army is fucking hideous.
I am a pro American and western army.
My military favorite looks are the American ww2 style stuff.
German military has nice aspects, but to grey. I like the olive drab of the Americans.

And of course I love military shit.
I enjoy it cause it is why I joined the fuckin army

 

[PsihoKekec]