NYT plays dumb about Sundance
January 18, 2009 4:55 pm ET by Eric Boehlert
It's not often that we critique Arts coverage, but this Times piece was so dreadful and misleading and just plain pointless, it needed to be called out.
It's by Michael Cieply and headlined "The Films Are Green, but is Sundance?" The soggy point was that the famous film festival is hosting a number of movies with environmental themes but that Sundance....well, honestly we're not sure of the point. We think it's something like, but people used up gas while traveling to Sundance so therefore there's a conflict with the environmental theme. (Did we mention how pointless this exercise is?)
Some lowlights in an article that was literally brimming with them:
Still, a stroll here this week down Main Street — where a dozen idling trucks were unloading supplies and equipment, while an oversize band bus, with trailer in tow, spewed fumes outside a soon-to-be-busy party site — framed the obvious quandary: how can you cram some 46,000 people, roughly equivalent to a fifth of Hollywood’s total work force, into a pretty little mountain town without contributing mightily to the problems your films hope to solve?
Are you following? Do you see the false premise the Times constructs? If you're concerned about the environment, if you want to spread the word about environmental activism through film, than you basically shouldn't participate in our society because if you are associated with an industry in which a bus idles, than you're a hypocrite. Or more accurately, an "obvious quandary" is created.
Honestly, we expect this nonsensical logic from Lou Dobbs who points to snow storms as proof global warming might not exist. But to see the Times traffic in this kind of forced jibberish is depressing.
The groans in the article just kept coming [emphasis added]:
Los Angeles to Park City is about 692 miles by the old wagon route, though most visitors seem to come by air through Salt Lake City
Yes, the Times thought it was noteworthy that Sundance attendees did not drive to Utah.
And this:
Utility officials said there was no way to determine how much extra wattage was being poured into the valley for the festival’s spotlights and the strings of colored bulbs lining Park City’s streets.
Too dumb for words? We think so.
And those were the first two--the best two--examples the Times provided in an effort to show that Sundance was not Green.
Media Matters: The Palin chronicles
The Friday Rush: A series of conflicts
Contrary to media hype, Sarah Palin is very unpopular
This isn't playing dumb, this is payback.
A few weeks ago Robert Redford was on the Rachel Maddow show criticizing the bush administrations attempts to sell off National Park land to oil developers in a last minute fire sale.
www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/11/25/robert-redford-on-rachel_n_146234.html - 147k -
Just like with Al Gore getting asked stupid questions in the Senate by that shi**y global warming denying shill of the oil lobbyists Inhofe this is just a way of a republican to try and bash a democrat for their environmental stance. The only difference is they have one of their shills on the New York Times to do it. (Before any republican comes on to spew the mantra of the supposed liberal NYT l have just two words for ya, JUDITH MILLER)
Ah, the allure of show business.
It seems to have infected even MMFA. Those guys have a movie deal or two they want signed? A script somewhere in a drawer they're trying to sell?
The NYT article was great. Its point was simple: there was an immense amount of hypocrisy at Sundance. The article was very CLEAR about all the private jets and the plastic TRASH being thrown around the town. Complete inconsistency on "Hollywood's" part-- and Hollywood the festival is indeed all about. It hasn't been about "independents" in years.
Sundance is a joke-- has been since almost the beginning. The NYT nailed them, and the righties have a good point to make about this all as well. You can't take gas-guzzling private jets and then rail about polluters.
Good point. It's not enough to fly a CE560 to Sundance, no you have to take the G550! I'm sure the APU was run for an hour before boarding also...
When did we go back to the old format? I liked the new format where you could see the post you were responding to...
Wingnut logic:
1. If you are concerned about global warming but haven't reduced your energy usage to zero, you are a hypocrite.
2. Therefore it's obvious that the only way to not be a hypocrite is to not care about global warming.
3. Since you care about gobal warming and I don't, it then naturally follows that I am more moral than you.
4. The more vociferously I show my disdain for global warming concerns, the more I flaunt my consumption, the more moral I become.
Goodness, it's a wonderful world. Unrestrained capitalism, deregulation, global warming denial, "the earth is here for us to use up until the rapture..."
Isn't it such a wonderful coincidence that obviously the best, most moral course in all matters is to act totally out of Randian self-interest, with no empathy; like a glutton or a sociopath... and I just so happen to be a selfish prick?
Thanks, Craig, I hope you don't mind that I am printing and saving your post as a rebuttal to my global warming denying friends and relatives, and there are far too many of the latter. I particularly cherish this sentence as it encapsulates all that I detest about the "OTHER" party:
Goodness, it's a wonderful world. Unrestrained capitalism, deregulation, global warming denial, "the earth is here for us to use up until the rapture..."
I submit, not too orginally, that most of the right's thinking problems emanates from a too literal belief in what they hear in church and on the radio.
I submit, not too orginally, that most of the right's thinking problems emanates from a too literal belief in what they hear in church and on the radio.
AMEN to THAT!
Actually... Too much belief (esp literal) in the church (for which AM talk radio is little more than a comercial proxy) is the cause of MOST of sciety problems, right, left and center. The church has stood in the way of social and scientific progress since the invention of the telescope.
Add in disfunctional CORPORATE influence and you've got the Republican Party in 10 words or less.
Bottom line: The church has NEVER had a positive influence on government; and Corporate Interest, while they should have a voice (after all they employ most of us) has also grown disfucntional in the last 8 years. (Or is it the last 28?) At this point in time neither has a positive influence and AM Talk Radio is doing more to destroy this country that Al-Queada could ever dream.
1. If you are concerned about global warming but haven't reduced your energy usage to zero, you are a hypocrite.
That's not what it climed at all. The NYT article merely pointed out the wacky inconsistency of preaching green and then hauling in loads of private jets and HD TVs wrapped in tons of bubble wrap.
What is it about the movie business that makes non-Angelenos such toadies?
It is a good take on it TripleC.
I disagree in part with Alex. There was a mind set in place pior to exposure to "some" church and radio rhetoric in many folks, a predisposition if you will. They do produce and echo many talking points that produce pleasure in those minds.
There is a growing population of church going people that want to take their religeon back from the voices that sanction hate in the name of JC. I wish them and us good luck in this.
I broke it down once. By my figuring, the population of concern here equates to approxomately 3% of the population. Mind it is a media savy and very loud population
As in the misquotation of Bill Clinton :"We have to slow down the economy...."
What is needed isn't religious asceticism but better ways to do things.
Why aren't the buses sitting there waiting for their electric motors yo kick in like good hybrids? Because there aren't any. Why did people come by fossil fueled jets instead of solar powered airships? Because there aren't any.
The way to reduce greenhouse emissions is to find nom-greenhouse ways of doing things--not of not doing them.
This is abstinence only greeniness and, like the other kind, the proponents know it doesn't work, but use it for ideological purposes.
<i>Yes, the Times thought it was noteworthy that Sundance attendees did not drive to Utah.</i>
No. They thought it was noteworthy that they didn't travel by covered wagon. I guess the film canisters themselves should be shipped by pony express? Basically, if you're an environmental activist you should be living in a little house on the prairie.
Sorry guys, but on this kind of thing the O'Reillys and Hannity's of the world are correct.
Hollywood types at Sundance who travel by private jet and use energy-guzzling HD TVs, at the least, are rank hypocrites to be preaching about a 'green' world. It's incredibly stupid, too.
The NYT picked an apropos target here and nailed them good.
Question for you....
Are Republicans who personally spend a lot of money incapable of advocating spending cuts on a massive level??? Are they "hypocrites"? Does their personal spending disqualify them from advocating national/international government spending reductions?
Is Ross Perot incapable of advocating less spending because he's personally wealthy and spends a large amount of money? How about Ronald Reagan? Steve Forbes? John McCain? Grover Norquist? All of these men are/were personally wealthy and personally spend/spent large amounts of money, but can't they still advocate for less spending?
Spending in and of itself isn't a problem. Spending money that you don't have eventually is a problem.
Our economy could actually benefit from people spending a bit more money and getting the money moving. That's what Obama is hoping to have happen in the coming months if I'm not mistaken.
Lawmakers who advocate for big pork spending bills for their own constituents and then rail against big government spending are walking the hypocritical line.
Of course, it's always different when the "other guy" is doing it as opposed to yourself.
Here's one for shivering Al!
Send to friend | Print versionAlgore out in the cold
Wait, I've seen this same thing before. Wasn't it a South Park episode? And now Michael Cieply has taken on the role of Mr. Hanky The Christmas Poo.