Buzz Lightyear personifies American foreign policy. He wants to save the world. He also wants to go to the moon and back. Is he the naive face of all that is good and bad about American Neoconservatism? I don't really know what Leo Strauss, the philosopher behind the doctrine, would think about this. But it seems I am not the only one trying to connect popular culture with the slightly less cool world of academia.
A philosopher said of Toy Story 3 that it illustrated the positive side of atheistic existentialism. How could he get away with saying that in a broadsheet newspaper? Perhaps the reason my comment has often been met with a screwed up face suggesting scepticism is... well, a little bit political. "It's a kids story which makes adults cry, not Newsnight!"
Philosophy is about everyday life and dreams/daydreaming. Films inform but also more often than not lets us escape. While the line between celebrity and film star blurs to the extent that reality is Hollywood basically, cartoon characters/super heroes/toys makes you imagine that you were other than human. Philosophy offers the same escape into the boundless universal.
So it was at the library that a girl with roughed-up Converses with a massive brick of a laptop which was far too loud - I suspect the fan was broken inside - had a book. "Superheroes and Philosophy". The cover looks like a Roy Lichtenstein piece, I thought. A closer inspection shows its just a generic comic book cover. Still, some complain that popular culture has made us a dumber society, but I do really want to read that book!
See relevant links:
BBC News: Teaching philosophy with Spider-Man
The book: "Superheroes and Philosophy"
I agree, it's far too simplistic to dismiss Toy Story 3 as a "kid's film" with no political/philosophical depth.
ReplyDeleteRegarding Hollywood and reality, I would argue that rather than Hollywood becoming the new reality, real life is increasingly resembling Hollywood and becoming "unreal". The colossal success of Facebook can be attributed in part to the fact that it fulfills the innate human desire for voyuerism and narcissism. It has made everyone think they are a celebrity at the mercy of their paparazzi friends who yield a camera everywhere they go. Not to mention the endless, mindless photos they put up of themselves (I would call this the individual's attempt at PR).
It also lets people hide their true selves behind an online persona. Ultimately behaviour is affected if it has an audience.
The same argument about escaping reality, both in the sense of the real world and the real self, can be made for those who play compulsive, life-consuming computer games such as World of Warcraft and Second Life.