"Seals are no more important than cows. If you are going to protest, make sure there are no slaughterhouses near your city first."
As a vegan I'm 100% behind that. I don't want cows killed, I don't want indigenous people killed, I don't want non-indigenous people killed and I don't want seals killed but that's absolute the least of my priorities if indigenous people need the income from the trade to live.
But realisation of a 'dual hypocrisy' doesn't excuse the meat industry or absolve them of wrongdoing... we can't just say 'well then everything's ok' if anyone isn't a fan of animal ethics at least admit that it's a huge problem, it's seriously, seriously fucking up the environment.
Let's not forget, the core of Tagaq's message is: live in harmony with your environment and if you eat meat respect the meat that you eat because you are meat too.
I watched the video yesterday and I fully agree with her that we need to be more conscious about where our food comes from, I think this is a really important thing. I just don't think that's the message that she expressed on what was one of her biggest platforms, a message that reached a lot of people and so it was a bit disappointing. In her defence, she did afterwards admit that she only has a few second to express herself during an awards acceptance speech and 'something sharp' was likely to come out, I can sympathise with that. PETA and animal rights activists did some extreme and insensitive things against her. Unfortunately something sharp did come out and it was far more destructive than it was constructive.
This was my introduction to Tagaq actually and I've learnt that I'm more aligned with her message than I initially thought. But I don't think the #sealfie phenomenon or this 'fuck PETA' thing is really effective in getting her important message out.
So thanks for the link, it clarified things more for me, but I don't retract the point that I made in the original post. I still think what she said was environmentally and ethically irresponsible, but I also don't think what she said really represents the complexity of her message; this is the problem.
Personally (as a member of a globalized, western society) I choose not to eat or wear cows or drink their milk (I'm vegan which makes me one of those evil, hated animal rights activists). Cows and pigs are the most oppressed species on the planet and the farming of them is fucking up the world in a serious way.
In our, current, society we have no reason to kill or eat seals. So don't do it, it's not worth it, it's messy for one thing. So if Tagaq is really supporting legitimate indigenous peoples' right to carry out their traditional practices why is she then endorsing everybody in the world to kill and eat seals?
The Inuit seal hunting is a complex issue wherein the Canadian commercial seal industry tries to erroneously bind their illegitimate right to kill thousands of seals with the Inuit peoples' legitimate right to subsist on the hundreds of seals that they kill.
I think Tagaq's comment is environmentally and ethically irresponsible.
I only just today watched a youtube video of Snoop Dogg talking to Mark Hoppus (!?) and he was really humble and cool and I thought "Hey, Snoop Dogg is alright" ...now this... why?
Not really talking about criticism of her music, people are free to criticise music. But, even so, with Grimes it always has more the feel of a personal attack. I think it's because she herself is quite a nice, unassuming woman who is always positive; an easy target... so it does seem particularly mean - people really seem to actually hate her, when she doesn't seem to hate anyone. I don't see that it's patronising at all to defend her from that, I would call it supportive.
Also, what's with the cynicism about positivity? I don't really get that. My world is a deeply dark and disturbing place because of the sheer amount of negativity and violence in the world. And if I can find it within me to be positive and optimistic in such a world, I think that's a good thing.
HE IS SO TALENTED AND AMAZING!!! Seriously... I saw him in Berlin last month and his sisters were there because they live there and... he seems like the nicest, coolest guy who obviously has a huge ego but not in a bad way, in a really justifiable way!! ...it felt like being at a family get together. Can't wait for Eclipse.
I think this thread has been pretty brutally in favour of brutality actually, rather than positivity.
But positivity, kindness and non-violence are GOOD THINGS. You can intellectualise it all you want (and I've been through a literature/philosophy degree so I'm more qualified than 8th grade) but you invariably end up back at Huxley:
"It is a bit embarrassing to have been concerned with the human problem all one's life and find at the end that one has no more to offer by way of advice than "Try to be a little kinder."
Or Vonnegut:
"There's only one rule that I know of, babies—God damn it, you've got to be kind."
Let me extrapolate on this "people die of diseases, it sucks" thing that you insist on ridiculing as evidence of my assumed intellectual ineptitude. I wouldn't personally torture and kill a dog, rat, monkey or bat to save myself from my own disease, so how can I excuse it when it is institutionalised by the medical industry? If humans have to cheat nature at all costs by developing ways to prolong the human life span, because they are afraid of dying and can't accept that they aren´t the turning point of this universe, let alone this earth, the least they could do is to try their treatments on themselves. It debases us morally to cause such suffering on sentient beings, I want no part of such debasement.
I didn't call you racist, sexist, homophobic or classist by the way; I called you speciesist. I was just trying to demonstrate that they all belong to the same category of hateful prejudice. Sorry if it came off that way.
Ok fine, so let's debase ourselves and torture millions upon millions of beagles, rats and monkeys to cure diseases that kill relatively few of us. If that's an animals over people stance then so be it.
Your arrogance towards extreme and massive suffering is astounding. You can't relate to the suffering of animals because you're so single minded that you can't see something of yourself in it; you just want to protect your own.
Racism. Sexism. Homophobia. Classism. Speciesism.
All forms of ugly and violent discrimination, and you are guilty of at least one.
Don't use reductive language about I've written, it's rude, engage with my stance instead.
Every time a story about animal rights comes up I get surprised by Stereogum readers' comments being so anti animal rights.
It's pretty simple, violence is bad. If humans learn not to be violent to those that can suffer (i.e. animals) then we might learn to stop being violent to human beings as well. Violence is not the answer, because it should never even be a question.
People die of diseases, it sucks, we can't let masses of animals suffer for it. The argument about 1 rat for 1 human is invalid because this specific circumstance is fictional but yes, one for one human lives are generally worth more than animal lives.
Yes I'm vegan, as if Grimes (most of the time)... going to get so downvoted for that. Whatever, wouldn't be the first time this week. Peace.
Whaaaaaat!? The song sounds excellent live, it has this added sense of melancholy and sounds even lazier and more defeated. I'm pretty sure the slightly askew (flat) vocal notes are done on purpose to add to this sense of slovenliness (that word doesn't look right). Check this, even the synth at the end sounds lazy. It's awesome.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8syAkm5x3s
"Your reading comprehension is bad and you should feel bad."
Come on man that's harsh, see above apology. My reading comprehension is fine, believe me. Chill out. Don't be mean. Be kind.
Nobody should feel bad, people need to be loved.
Whoa... ok ok. Spoon are my favourite band and this was a great article. As soon as I get to the States I'll be going straight to Chipotle... it must be a pretty good restaurant... sheesh *backs away slowly*
"Britt Daniel loves Chipotle, and dammit, so do I. Chipotle." - Ok that last sentence wasn't there, but it may as well have been.
The article seems to start after the embedded video.
um...
1. The combination of simultaneously sounded musical notes to produce a pleasing effect.
There are harmonies because (at least in this song) there is always more than 1 note happening at the same time. I think you guys are thinking of harmonies when used colloquially to mean 'vocal harmonies'... like Fleet Foxes or The Drifters.
Seeing CDs kinda makes me sad, I don't know why... They're just so worthless.
5 years ago I considered selling all my CDs on ebay for 10 bucks each but I stopped after like 3 because I felt sorry for the people buying them
It's funny to think that this kind of goofing went all the way back to In Utero
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-uet7twNu0
And they've still got it :)
Seriously excellent analysise ifeelpretty, spot on. This is a truly ridiculous accusation I'd be surprised if anyone takes it seriously and if I were Kevin Parker I'd just laugh it off and be even more confident that I was a sophisticated and awesome songwriter.
The Pitchfork review was well written and outlines exactly why they shat on it. It's stupid music dressed up as smart music for the masses. It's awful.
I think we can all agree that it was probably a pretty big mistake not to have taken the offer up.
Ah well, sounds awesome as a Grimes song, which it is, and which I personally would prefer it to be!!
In their defence (in defence of the country of Spain) it was early in the day and people were just starting to drink and they were playing a song that no one knew; probably only big fans recognised it as a new song because it wasn't announced as such. Also Spoon drew a surprisingly low crowd which was disappointing, I don't know if that reflects their recent inactivity or their lack of popularity in Spain. During the other songs people seemed to be paying more attention, it was a bit of a party atmosphere.
"Another thing – saying that a person is beyond judgement because they are another race has gotta be the most racist thing I ever heard. This vow of silence precludes dialectic between cultures and therefore progress – a more equitable world grows more remote by these deeds."
I could not have said it better myself, all of these amateur critical theorists on tumblr are doing a lot of harm to equality. It's both dangerous and bizarre.
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