I see the mycelium of another politics/art megathread forming, so: even though the "keep the politics out of art" people are all shuffling nitwits, here is their rational kernel:

All those great political works of art you're about to list aren't experienced for their politics.

People aren't looking at this to mentally protest the bombing of Guernica.

A painting of similar size, perhaps a textual piece with the words DOWN WITH THE BOMBING OF GUERNICA would not be nearly as interesting.

Same with virtually anything you might name: I know plenty of people who embraced some sort of secular liberalism in part due to Star Trek, but they don't sit down and watch Star Trek over and over as a booster shot.

Also: best ep? The City on the Edge of Forever.

Some works suffer because of the context in which they are first read: Nineteen Eighty-Four and Brave New World, which are widely taught in schools by people who have no idea what they're talking about, ruin not only THOSE books, but ALL books, for young readers.

Nineteen Eight-Four is suspenseful; Brave New World is hilarious! (Unsurprisingly: one is a dystopia, the other a utopia. Don't @ me.)

But they're taught, incoherently, as propaganda pieces.

Of course, many creators like to think of themselves as politically engaged through their work—the worst of them, that is, the majority of them, see their role primarily as instructors for shuffling nitwits, who of course grow to resent such stuff if they're even exposed to it.

Want to argue? Okay, but first listen to this:

Did you like it?

No, you did not.

Okay, now listen to this:

Did you like it?

PROBABLY not. But some of you, probably those who have already steeped themselves in 20th century avant-garde music to some extent, liked some of it.

Same guy. What happened? Well, Enver Hoxha happened.

And this happens across the spectrum: politics absolutely can and turn artists into garbage. Sometimes malevolent garbage (Celine) sometimes benign garbage (usually stuff for kids but aimed at the sensibility of nervous parents) but garbage nonetheless.

Even those simpletons who so vex you, dear readers, with their croaking of "Keep politics out of art!" are responding to their real perceptions of being offered garbage—stuff that is garbage because it is political.

So when you name the great political novelists or the long-running TV franchises or the awesome superheroes who punch Nazis keep in mind that you're insisting that the garbage people are reflexively objecting to is the same as the good stuff you're pointing to.

You're playing a trick, actually on yourself, though to whatever cranky uncle or random ball-cap-selfie-in-my-car opiod-popper you're talking to, it's as though the trick is being played on them!

You're also picking and choosing: Indiana Jones the Nazi-Puncher, not Indiana Jones the Indian Stereotype-Puncher. That's cheating!

Good politics doesn't improve garbage. Bad politics doesn't necessarily ruin masterpieces, thanks to the fact that audiences do some of the work of creation mentally. We rewrite what we like in order to like it more, and rewrite what we don't like to hate it more.

Related: in my circle (SF/fantasy) every couple of months someone finds an overheated article based on a breathless book about CIA funding of various cultural organs and decides that "show don't tell" is a capitalist plot to neuter fiction by making it apolitical.

This leads to a further conclusion: "Down with realism! Up with genre fiction! We can TELL you exactly how you should be thinking as you read!"

In my other circle (the far left milieu generally) every couple of months, someone hears about the CIA funding action painters and comes to the opposite conclusion in re visual arts: "UP with realism! We can TELL you exactly how you should be thinking as you look!"

So, was realism or abstraction the CIA plot to crush didactic art? Nobody gets that far, because all they're really saying is "Up with what I already like!" anyway.

The secondary benefit, of course, is that one need not have developed one's aesthetic sense sufficiently to explain why the other said is producing bad stuff; it is enough to denounce them as oppressive, enemies of the people, elitists, etc.

This is also cheating, and revealing. The realm of politics is easier to navigate than the realm of aesthetics because our political senses are more finely honed than our aesthetic ones. So we often reduce analysis of some creative work to its perceived politics and its failings.

The whole conversation is thus a trick to talk about politics and ignore the actual attributes of the art object supposedly under discussion.

Are "politics getting in the way of the story"?

Depends: what's the story? Is it too weak to handle politics? What makes it feel inauthentic or poorly structured or inappropriately paced or or or...

A much harder conversation than "Politics rule (if they're mine)!"

So, why not try to have a harder conversation once in a while? It'll make for a more interesting megathread than the one brewing underground this Sunday night.

Take us out, Corny!

PS: the above song is actually worse than "Smash the Social Contract", which at least has a sprightly chorus. If you did find something to like in that song, please listen to "Founding of the Party" as well to get my point.