iPods To Blame For Decline Of Western Civilization
Jun 15th, 2007 | By James Lewin | Category: iPods & Portable Media Players, Strange 
English artist David Hockney knows what’s to blame for the decline of western civilization.
It’s not homosexuality.
It’s not expressionistic art.
It’s iPods!
Speaking on the eve of his 70th birthday, Britain’s best-loved living painter said the proliferation of iPods and other digital music players has combined with a decline in art education to create a “fallow period of painting”.
According to Hockney, the iPod is contributing to a decline in visual awareness that is damaging art and painting. It even makes people dress badly.
“It’s all about sound,” said Hockney. “People plug in their ears and don’t look much, whereas for me my eyes are the biggest pleasure.
“You notice that on buses. People don’t look out of the window; they are plugged in and listening to something,” adds Hockney. “We are not in a very visual age and it’s producing badly dressed people. They have no interest in mass or line or things like that.”
Years ago I learned that when one of your senses is bombarded, then the others have less resource to operate. As a computer CPU is best if doing fewer actions at a time. Loud music takes resources away from your eyes, lets say, so its better to turn the music down while negotiating traffic while driving. Your senses actually use similar brain action for their actions as different as they are, i.e. sight to smell to hearing. Maybe this guy has a point but there is actually much action in the visual arts, just not what he considers in his world. Video art is something that he probably. Another thing is that our culture has become very self-centered. Younger people have their own and their small circle of friends in mind for their life. And their friends may be on the other side of the world never to be met in person… We, unfortunately, just don’t care about things and people outside of our sphere.
Its something to consider; to round out ones life into arenas where you have not treaded in the past.
I’m turning 60 this year, and I’ve become very enamored of (not necessarily iPods but) MP3 players this year. I don’t generally play my music loud, but I occasionally do, and I like to sing to it (if nobody happens to be walking in the area and will think I’m out of my mind). When I walk to the subway to go to work or when I’m on a walking tour of a city I’ve never been to before (such as Copenhagen, from which I’m writing this right now), I love to listen to my MP3 player. I have truly wonderful music on it, much of it obtained from music blogs, and I think of the experience as being very similar to the music tracks that often give movie scenes so much atmosphere and memorability. I immediately take my headphones off if I want to talk to someone, see someone who wants to talk to me, or whatever. I still notice things on the street and would also do so if I were on a bus, which is apparently David Hockney’s example. In fact, I think I notice things more, and they sometimes have more emotional meaning to me because of the music track that’s playing softly in the background. Incidentally, I’m listening to a Sandi Thom “station” on Last.fm as I write this. May I suggest that David Hockney try an MP3 player? He might be surprised. He might like it. — Sincerely, Stu Borman