R.I.P. Whitney Houston (48)

[Azrael]

With all due respect, I just cannot understand all the fuss.


It's not that I don't like Whitney Houston. I don't know a thing about her. But when Montserrat Figueras died before her time last November I don't remember seeing any headlines about it, and she was an incomparably better singer.


Are people more interested in the lives (and deaths) of pop singers than in their music?

The only thing we love more than mediocre art here in America is dead celebrities. We also value vintage game show footage from the Hollywood Squares more than chess masters and prefer sentimental art over actual artistic genius. But of course the cult of dead celebrities is far and above the national past time.

That's probably why the song "American Pie" is so over-rated. It's all those things mashed together, wrapped up, with a bow on top. I can't stand the song.

[Enki]

It's simply cultural iconography. We are bound together by the things we hold in common. So it's not even so much about the icon as it is the communal display of emotion.

[Azrael]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

That is SO cruel I can't believe I'm still laughing.

You're welcome.

[Azrael]

Are you saying your heart will go on?

Don't tell me Celine Dion just died! Couldn't she have the decency to wait for Canadian History Month to die?

People give the amount of grief they actually feel, I am sure.

Certainly less grief now than if this happened twenty-five years ago.

[Azrael]

Are you saying your heart will go on?

People give the amount of grief they actually feel, I am sure.

Yes but why does the media take the opportunity to capitalize on human loss.

To generate higher ratings, which leads to higher advertising revenues.

People show up to give flowers, make signs, do youtube tributes and watch shows that glorify the passing of a celebrity all based on the fact that they were a celebrity. There are cultural practices and religious practices on what is acceptable and what is considered appropriate. With pop culture and a news cycle we have pictures of people standing somewhere weeping and folks telling the audience how this is significant. It's simply odd to manufacture these moments so that people can "do something".

People like to see people like themselves on TV "doing something".

[Enki]

The cachet of 'being on TV' is being reduced.

[Azrael]

The cachet of 'being on TV' is being reduced.

So is the cachet of being on Youtube, having a blog, etc. It's getting more and more difficult to get "cachet". Selling tickets might still get it, though.

[Enki]

The cachet of 'being on TV' is being reduced.

So is the cachet of being on Youtube, having a blog, etc. It's getting more and more difficult to get "cachet". Selling tickets might still get it, though.

Yeah. Youtube is destroying that Cachet. It's a good thing. We'll move toward a 'quality' cachet in the next generation. My wife is on the cutting edge of that industry and goes around the world to speaking engagements telling executives about 'quality' of narrative as brand strategy.

[monster_gardener]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Azrael.

Bad ....... Azrael............ Bad ............

But VERY CLEVER............

And very sad............

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

What type of Wood doesn't float..............

Jokes from the Dark Side.........

[noddy]

blaming bobby brown for corrupting the pure sweet princess is just the biggest load of steaming turdlets to me... such a simplistic and sexist viewpoint.

she liked party hard bad boys because she was of a similar mindset, i dare say a strung out whitney wasnt anymore pleasant to deal with than a strung out bobby... they quite likely bonded on that... "regular" people dont have much tolerance for such psycho behaviours.

[Miss_Faucie_Fishtits]

Good perspective on that p'int........'>........

[noddy]

WH had a great voice, however - at the risk of poor form, when one of her songs came on the radio back in the late 1980's I would change the station as, to me, the music was irritatingly bland.

couldnt agree more.

well, actually i could ... i would personally waste a single usage time travel machine to do nothing but stop dolly parton from ever writing that abomination.

guess who once lived in a small apartment with thin walls and got woken up every morning for 2 years to a certain atrocity against music at full volume by the nurse next door.

[monster_gardener]

WH had a great voice, however - at the risk of poor form, when one of her songs came on the radio back in the late 1980's I would change the station as, to me, the music was irritatingly bland.

couldnt agree more.

well, actually i could ... i would personally waste a single usage time travel machine to do nothing but stop dolly parton from ever writing that abomination.

guess who once lived in a small apartment with thin walls and got woken up every morning for 2 years to a certain atrocity against music at full volume by the nurse next door.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Noddy.

To Which abomination & which atrocity against music by the Dolly Lama/Dolly Llama do you refer?





Maybe could ask Weird Al to do a parody of it...........

Better than doing this...........



Dolly Parton lampshade

[Azrael]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Azrael.

Bad ....... Azrael............ Bad ............

But VERY CLEVER............

And very sad............

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

What type of Wood doesn't float..............

Good one.

Jokes from the Dark Side.........

Houston . . . we have a problem . . .

[Typhoon]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

Dark humour, indeed.

[Azrael]

kovGM1ZrCck

[monster_gardener]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Azrael.

Bad ....... Azrael............ Bad ............

But VERY CLEVER............

And very sad............

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

What type of Wood doesn't float..............

Good one.

Jokes from the Dark Side.........

Houston . . . we have a problem . . .

Thank you VERY Much for your post, Azrael.

And for the Kind Words............. Glad you liked.....

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

Here's Another...........Even worse...........

Q. Why didn't Natalie shower on the boat?
A. She decided she would wash up on the shore.

Sad one for Whitney.........

Seems she really did need a good bodyguard........
To guard her against herself............

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bodyguard

[Aferim]

kovGM1ZrCck

I remember seeing that on TV, what was it 10 years ago.

[monster_gardener]

First Don Cornelius and now Whitney. Man this has been a rough black history month.

You can say that again. Two more blacks are history and the month isn't even half over.

Thank you Very Much for your post, Azrael.

Bad ....... Azrael............ Bad ............

But VERY CLEVER............

And very sad............

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

What type of Wood doesn't float..............

Good one.

Jokes from the Dark Side.........

Houston . . . we have a problem . . .

Thank you VERY Much for your post, Azrael.

And for the Kind Words............. Glad you liked.....

Like those Natalie Wood jokes...........

Here's Another...........Even worse...........

Q. Why didn't Natalie shower on the boat?
A. She decided she would wash up on the shore.

Sad one for Whitney.........

Seems she really did need a good bodyguard........
To guard her against herself............

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Bodyguard

Edit: One of her bodyguards was on the radio yesterday........... Said basically the same thing......... Ultimately could not protect Whitney & Bobby from themselves AND their "friends"

[Hoosiernorm]

1NytqUdtpQI

Man these folks are completely fucked up

[Hoosiernorm]

Osama bin Laden 'had stoned fantasies about marrying Whitney Houston and murdering Bobby Brown'

[Demon of Undoing]

1NytqUdtpQI

Man these folks are completely fucked up

You can't shut down or shut up unpopular speech, no matter how much you disagree with it. You can, however, beat an asshole black and blue for being a total asshole. I mean, it's not legal, but it's still moral. This is where the knight of faith transcends the ethical. It's all very Kierkegardian, they should be fine with it.

Mostly joking.

I once thought about the possibility that their read of the Bible may be right. Modern sensibilities can be wrong, you know. But on the whole, I decided that if they're right, fuckit. I'm switching sides.

[Enki]

Jesus Christ preached love. What the Westboro Baptist church preaches is a perversion. They have decided that there is this one particular sin that they hate above all others, and they think that every other sin that they commit is less. Our lives are interwoven with sin on a daily basis. The perversion of any one homosexual is no more than the perversion that any of us grapples with infused throughout our daily lives. They never came to understand the true meaning. They never understood that the lesson of this world is that it is the marriage of Heaven and Hell, a place where the lion lays with the lamb, where sin and love are inextractibly intertwined.

They are fools. Abject, total and complete fools. Their narrow-minded bigotry as great a sin as any other.

[Demon of Undoing]

Here is a Biblical defense for their opinion, but damn that. I got better things to do than defend people I'd rather bitch slap.

[Enki]

There is a biblical rebuttal to their opinion too.