things used to mean things
Time was a thing meant a thing. There were standards and there were protocols. If you said a thing it meant a thing. A symbol wasn't just a picture, it was an idea. When you saw a crying indian, then you knew there was a littering. A man with a spiderweb tattoo on his elbow had shanked a minority in prison. Shoes hanging on an electrical line meant you knew where you could get yourself into a pile of narcotics.
Now a crying indian just lost his place at the waterslide. A spiderweb tattoo is on page 17 in the lower left hand corner of book C in the flash book of every tattoo parlor in town. And a pair of shoes hanging from the sky just means that some fatty got sloppy and got hisself chased down by bullies and let his shoes get tied together and thrown up into the utilities in a procedure that can often take upwards of 7 tries.
It's just a shame that the impact is cheapened by repetition.
I guess I blame the internet.
Labels: the importance of being literal
posted by The Cruise at 3:54 PM
3 Comments:
What an observational comic you are....I have been noticing specifically the tattoo and shoe-wire issue myself. The spider-web elbow tattoo has bugged the hell out of me, since I have seen young minorities with it. I just assume they are Spider-Man fans AND the tattooist is either ignorant to the history of tattoos or just wants the money. In any event, I guess original meaning is not significant unless others in society understand that meaning.
This may be more poignant that you think. Repackaging and redefinition is the art that pays. There is no historic context, there is no reprecussions from past words or acts; in short, nothing has any intrinsic objective meaning, only observational opinion. Our society is written in the present tense.
Perhaps the young minorities are "reclaiming" the spiderweb tatoo, robing of its original meaning,thusly denying the klanish ex con's their power of expression.
Thank goodness for your blog. I was about to go get me one of those spider-web elbow tattoos, not knowing what that meant. I think I'll just get a teardrop tatoo instead. Those look cool.
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