This passage is taken from Andy Nowicki's newly-published Ruminations of a Low-Status Male, Volume 3: On Being Unwanted, now available on Kindle and in paperback)
What we must understand, again, is the degree to which efforts
are being made to pervert and undermine us, to turn us against our very own
souls, to convince us happily to consume one poison pill after another.
These malignant manipulations arise in various formats,
including but not limited to song, cinema, and other predominant genres of mass
culture. Once more, it should be emphasized that one needn’t hold that every
single jot and tittle is being micromanaged by some puppet-master lurking in
the shadows—it is more than probable that a great deal is in fact being left open
to improvisation. But even if the script isn’t always slavishly followed to a
“t,” the script still obtains, in broad outline.
How it takes us to our
prescribed destination of degradation and ruin isn’t as important to our rulers
as the fact that it surely gets us there. And of course, our degradation and their profit margin need
not be in conflict. In fact, the two quite often complement one another
perfectly, even with a certain ghastly elegance.
As a case in point, let us consider a genre of film which,
while certainly possessed of organic appeal, nevertheless also undoubtedly serves
its prescribed role as agent of
degradation.
The “teen sex comedy” reached its curious apogee in the
early to mid-1980s, but its source material came out of the 70s. The genre was
largely informed by raunchy fare like “Caddyshack,” “Animal House,” and
“Meatballs”—all of which, it is fair to admit, contain inspired moments of genuine
amusement, courtesy of a cast of gifted comedians.
Still, whatever the overall
qualities of such movies as comedies per
se, they are all infused with a certain repellent and insidious element:
propagandistically speaking, each of these films promotes libertinism as cool
and sexy while deriding traditional sexual mores as ridiculous and worthy of
contempt. In all of them, the good-looking, well put-together, worthwhile,
funny, charming, and likable people are carnally-liberated liberals, who oppose
“uptight” carnally-repressive—and usually ugly and stupid—conservative fuddy-duddies.
In the 70s, “uptight” became the slur of choice for
supposedly “now” sorts of people. Displaying restraint was “uptight.” Being
scrupulous and principled was “uptight.” Objecting to vulgarity was “uptight.” The
sex comedies of the 70s ubiquitously promoted this anti-uptightness crusade, but
most of these films were not explicitly set in high schools, with teenagers as
protagonists. The previous strictures of that paradigm expanded, however, with
the advent of the 80s, in which even adolescents were brought into the mix and
encouraged to join the seemingly mandatory orgy or else risk being castigated
as “uptight,” too.
*************
Of course, as discussed earlier, the sexualization of youth has an abundance of precedent in the
pop culture canon. But it was the “teen sex comedy” caper which was used to
promote the notion that the virginal state was a shameful condition, and that proper-thinking youth ought
therefore to engage in an all-out quest to shred their virginity as soon as
possible, by whatever means are available.
The notion of virginity as something shameful, as a sort of
“curse,” which carries a certain accompanying psychic stench, marking one as an
undesirable, is taken up with a peculiar mania in these movies. Not only is
sexual intercourse a means of obtaining pleasure, that is, it is also a bar to
clear, a rite of passage, a way of obtaining a more exalted status.
Upon “Losin’ It,” (one actual title of a movie from the
era), a boy “comes of age.” Before he loses his virginity, however, he is
depicted as awkward, a little dopey, and quite pathetic. The scenarios of these
movies are typically a mix of lowbrow slapstick humor and tantalizing softcore
peepshow, which when considered closely, is a decidedly odd combination. The
attempts at generating laughs are meant to be a cover for the underlying
soft-porn effect, but how exactly are arousal and hilarity supposed to work in
tandem with one another?
Though these movies are jam-packed with nudity and sexual
situations, they are clearly meant more to tease and titillate the viewer than
to assist him in the achievement of satiation. That is to say, the ultimate
effect upon the spectator seems to be one of agitation and frustration.
Lamely-timed slapstick “bits” alternate with the gratuitous flashing of
breasts; gross-out gags, rendered in the broadest possible fashion, closely
follow intermittent moans of female ecstasy; seemingly promising carnal
adventures in progress are abruptly cut short to make way for the execution of
dumb and pointless low-budget hijinks perpetrated by no-name actors, while
no-name bands play second-rate power pop would-be standards over the no-account
soundtrack.
The viewer emerges from an 80s “teen sex comedy” victim of a
“Ludovico Technique” of a new sort, with one’s brain crucially rewired in certain
respects. One is, first of all, in an agitated
state—aroused, yet constantly thwarted from satisfaction; on the
loins-level, he has been primed for release, just before being left on his own
in a cold, harsh, unresponsive world disinclined to show him any favors
whatsoever.
Thus even as his lust is relentlessly and remorselessly conjured,
his overall sense of psychic alienation spikes. As blood races to his groin, it
simultaneously drains from his heart.
Andy Nowicki, assistant editor of Alternative Right, is the author of eight books, including Under the Nihil, The Columbine Pilgrim, Considering Suicide, and Beauty and the Least. Visit his Soundcloud page and his YouTube channel. His author page is Alt Right Novelist.
