Calculated Perversion of Viewpoint

Art, whether it be in the written, canvas, digital or audio/visual mediums, is a form of expression. When seen by someone, a viewpoint is created in the viewer's mind of what they are looking at. This is a subjective cultivation in response to art, which is objective (music: sound waves, digital: electrons, writing/painting: photon). But, we don't need to translate the laws of physics, however. Art is...well, it's 'art'. But what is happening in the field of art deserves comment - for there are controls and balances being installed into this medium that, given that artists are the movers and shakers of the globe, will reduce the freedoms of expression and corral the purpose of art (one being to change civilisations) for other more devious purposes.

I know, I know...I'm suffering from a severe bout of 'conspiracy theorism'. Perhaps I don't know. Perhaps I'm paranoid. I don't care. But, if you hear me out, you'll see I'm only making comment - my comment - upon the direction of art in our civilisation. Perhaps this comment should be reserved for some heavy, protracted book written by a philosopher or political revolutionary theorist or something-or-other, and not a blog. Being neither of those, I'll just say 'stuff it', this is my blog and I'll write what I goddamn want to.

9/11, as it has become popularly known, was an event that stained my thinking and that of a whole generation. Several generations, in fact. It shook the ground as far away as the streets of Melbourne. If anyone recalls walking deserted city streets the following days after the towers fell, you'll know what I'm talking about.
Since then, nearly seven years have passed, but 9/11ism hasn't been totally warn off. If you remember, almost the entire western world went to war (well, the 'Coalition of the Willing' or COW, anyways) with a idea: "Terrorism". The problem was, Terrorism was nowhere to be found. COW, couldn't find this Terrorism and searched the globe for the country of Terror... couldn't find it and, of course, we all know what happened next (Afghanistan, Iraq, Weapons of Mass Distraction...I mean Destruction, etc). But, I needn't go into it, this isn't, after all, a political article.

The point is, something happened that day. Something changed. If we don't change the course of events soon, in a thousand years our ancestors will look back and remark how September 11, 2001 heralded the beginning of the Modern Dark Age when art became decadent, where spirituality was mocked, where the way we looked at art and what we thought about it was governed by politically correct undertones mores that made us uneasy to 'feel' how we did when we looked at something aesthetic. That made us change our spoken viewpoints of art and made us conform to the accepted opinions of the governed world.

Witness the recent lambasting of Australian photographer, Bill Henson. Even the PM had a swing at him for taking photos of a parentally consenting, yet underaged naked girl. The work was definitely artistic, and no malice was intended, however he was even the subject of a police investigation because of it. Fortunately, a certain sanity finally prevailed and all charges were dropped. However, this was only an opening volley of fire, an early skirmish in the war that has begun on the freedom of uncontrolled expression. But the proverbial 'line in the sand' has been drawn.

You will note that things will become politically incorrect to say or do, we will become more precious about our own safety and what we do and see will be more and more policed as time goes on. The laws passed will be for the few who transgress the good laws of our society but will blanket us all (analogous to this is the fact that it is illegal to carry even a pocket knife after an incident involving samurai swords some years back).

Do you see what is happening? We are having our viewpoints cultivated, slowly, almost below our awareness. Many of us now think things we used to partake in liberally as a severe offence. I will not provide you with a list here, but ask yourselves, what did you do 10 years ago that your would not do now? What would people think of it at the time, what would people think of it now? Some of these things are dangerous and have been duly frowned upon or outlawed, however, many of them are not.

For example, thirty years ago, my mother could take photos of me learning to swim at the local pool without the consent of anyone but herself. Now, however, she would require express written permission from the pool owners before she does so. Recently, I took out my phone camera to take a photo of my daughter and two of her friends from creche, but was stopped before I did so by a carer who imparted to me the fact that I would need the permission of the parents of her two little friends before I did so. You see, this is a law, now - one that is agreed upon thanks to the fear imparted by mass media, a form or art, that one must beware of men taking photos of children. It was made to stop people using the photos for wrongdoing, but the law also applies to me, who would only print the photo for my daughter to display in her room.


I think Bill Henson and other photographers will now think twice before they publish photographs of the naked human form of any age, something that was done by the greats as far back as Ancient Greece and Rome (who's culture and technology was extinguished by the first Dark Age nearly a thousand years ago).

We have had a neat trick played upon us, haven't we? The laws for the few have been cast over us all and, most importantly, with the consent of the people. In a most sneaky way, by the very medium we have used to change the world and the ideologies of the civilisation, we have had art turned against the populace and had the viewpoints of the culture slowly altered. The mainstream media is, of course responsible for this, we say. But, who runs the mainstream media? What about the so-called 'independent' media? If you look, this 'mainstream' sanitised ideology is working its way through here, too.

Before you take aim at me, please have a look for yourself. It's not the laws we need to be afraid of. The laws will only work with widespread agreement of the people (the mistakes of countless despots and dictators have taught the lawmakers that a government can't control a populace by force. Only with the will of the people can a government do that). No, laws need to be agreed to, first, before they can work. And, this is being done via the most cherished medium that has always worked to change civilisations for the better in every Earthly millennia: art.


So, next time you see artists being attacked, think twice before you draw your sword as to whom you will draw it upon.

Anthony Santoro
www.writersworld.com.au