Resistance/Containment

"The study of popular culture has tended to oscillate wildly between the two alternative poles of that dialectic - containment/resistance."
-Stuart Hall

Salt Lake City is one of the most observable cities in regards of containment/resistance. There is a constant tension within the city that lingers throughout the city, especially in relation to the rest of the state. For example:

Wow! Look at that dialectical tension. So little blue surrounded by so much red. In fact, McCain won in Utah by the third largest margin out of all the red states: by about 28 percentage points. In 2004 the disparity was even greater, with Bush receiving 72% of the popular vote in Utah. What we have here, though, is a slight majority leaning left, a side that Utah is not accustomed towards. Indeed, Obama won this county by a mere 296 votes. This does not look like much on a map, but on ground level there are signs everywhere of the containment/resistance dialectic.



Now, I'm not going to say that the Wasatch Mountains are a form of resistance or containment. To make such a judgment would be a travesty. They were here, though, which, in one way or another, led to a containment.









Containment: the Mormon church moved into the valley, settled it, irrigated it, controlled the nature of it, and so forth. The manipulation and handling of nature is apparent when one drives through the suburbs and notices the abundance of lawns in an otherwise desert environment. But the Church has done more than install plush grass upon the valley floor. Religion is the center of the capital city. The city is built on a grid, beginning from this building, the Mormon temple. Everywhere you go, your coordinates are in relation to house of God.



Resistance: The Salt Lake Temple measured a towering 64 meters when completed in 1893, making it easily the largest building in the city until this 67 meter behemoth, the Walker Center, was built in 1912, with a less religious centered theme. The giant structure thereby usurped the temple of the highest of high, at least physically, but not, perhaps, morally.






Containment: and for a while, many other buildings were built that surpassed the height of the Walker Center and the temple, and this was perfectly fine, until BAM! 1972, the LDS church built this monster measuring 128 meters, looming over every other structure at the time, putting the focus of the city back on the church, serving as a constant reminder of what cold wars can do to architecture.






Resistance: despite some strict and inane liquor laws in Utah obviously influenced by the Mormon Church, several bars notably dot the area around the temple grounds downtown, and the bar scene is very active.

The dialectical tension in Salt Lake is strong and constant. There are just a few examples of how the two elements of resistance/containment are at play in the Salt Lake environment, but I could site further progressions, such as the LDS church slowly eating up Main Street with extended temple grounds and revitalization projects, the vibrant gay pride scene in Salt Lake, and so forth.

Black Friday - Consumervilles

Starting a blog about pop culture, it is only appropriate to begin with the biggest event of the year as far as this category is concerned: black Friday. This is the day after Thanksgiving, when various retail stores offer what they call "doorbusters." I went to a Best Buy near my house to bear witness this phenomenon. The line was pretty long when I arrived at around 1 am. The sign in the picture to the right is from an adjacent store about 100 feet away. People had chosen to celebrate their love for the great outdoors by pitching their tents just outside the doors of the Best Buy. This line had reminded me of another familiar line:

A homeless shelter.
Typically a situation most people try to avoid, but for whatever reason, my pavement companions had willingly thrust themselves into the rugged life of homelessness, at least temporarily. I suppose with the markets fluctuating, the nation heading into a depression, they may have been practicing for their near inevitable future.
The fine group of people to the left are waiting to eat.




The fine group of people to the left are waiting for a $300 laptop.











There were several groups like this one waiting on the cold sidewalk outside of the store, forming a small homeless community:


So, it might not have been as intensive as the Hooverville to the right, but it certainly shared some similarities:







Perhaps we can come up with a new name, a new concept for these makeshift temporary towns that last no longer than a couple days: Consumervilles? Perhaps the name is a bit too obvious, but what it shows is how somethings do not really change. The Hoovervilles of the Depression were controlled by their capital restraints, their poverty. The Consumervilles that spring up every year after Thanksgiving are controlled by the same thing: their fetish of the commodity, capitalism. This was not the first line I had stood in during the brief reprive from work and school for the Thanksgiving holiday.

The line at the liquor store the day before Thanksgiving. Knowing its eventual closure for the holidays creepting up on them, people flocked to wait in line for their bottles of alcohol. The comparison is adequate: the people to the right are in line for the exact same reason the people in all of the lines above are waiting. They are waiting to get drunk. While the urge for actual intoxication is literal to the right, the intoxication that those in the Best Buy lines is clear: consumerism!


And while they may look like docile innocent consumers, they could turn on you at any moment.