/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.16313069]

Anyone got book recs for 'reconnecting with the absolute' or something like that? Just feeling a bit down after watching a video called 'music theory is racist' which at one point poses that music is a cultural phenomenon rather than a universal one. I feel deep down that that is not the case, and I'm scared of the potential for our post-modern world to alienate us from the universal and the spiritual. I'm just worried we're sliding into some weird societal stage where all tradition and all sacred things are going to be gleefully obliterated and that terrifies me. Should I just read the bible or the gita? I've been raised atheist but very curious about religious spirituality and imagery. All recs and all replies welcome, thanks anons

[Anonymous No.16313289]

>>16313069
You sound like the type of person who would enjoy this.

[Anonymous No.16313701]

>Just feeling a bit down after watching a video called 'music theory is racist'
you mean youtube fed you something that (based on past behavior) it knew you would click on. stop clicking on things that make you angry and stop going to youtube maybe.

[Anonymous No.16313771]

>>16313069
I would recommend reading the Bible, the Gita, and the Dao De Ching, I'm a Christian but all those works were important stepping stones, I had an intuition that atheism was missing several key elements of the picture, mostly the pro-social kindness that typifies a healthy person, and that I've learned can only come with a degree of detachment from worldly things.

Now, I suppose I should say what I think is happening socially. Socially we have descended through so many levels of ironic that people are deadly serious. Comedy often comes from a place of anger at what is absurd, and once the laughter dies down, then you only have the burning coal of rebellion. God only knows why people are so angry when they've literally been given everything by capitalists. I suppose it's a result of a profound emptiness within these people.

On a deeper level, God was the only being capable of loving all creation equally. Once you reject that idea though, government is the only thing big enough to provide the features of God. What we are seeing, is a desire to replace a God that few believe in anymore with Big Brother. Orwell was right in 1984, it's about whether you "love" Big Brother, Big Brother is the God of modern man. Of course, the crazy thing is that people think, falsely, that the thing that is lovable about God is that he is a surveillance device for a society too primitive to have security cameras. But in fact what is lovable about God is that he loves us, even though we sin.

But the most difficult thing is that just like there is no perfect theory of the atonement, there is no perfect theory of evil. Even when we do bad things ourselves, we are sometimes at a loss to know our own motives, much less the motives of a whole society for tearing itself apart.

[Anonymous No.16315254]

Read the Zhuangzi (Daoism). You can't control the way society goes and you can't completely control your place in it but you can control the way you respond to it..

Zen Flesh Zen Bones is a nice read, too

[Anonymous No.16315774]

>>16313701
Nah I just saw a discussion about it happening on a music theory discord I'm in so I felt compelled to check it out. Though granted I do spend waaay too much time on the internet gaining absolutely nothing

>>16313771
Thanks for your response anon! Lots of interesting thoughts for me to ponder over. Thanks for the recs too, I'll pick up those three books soon.

>>16315254
Thanks, I'll definitely check them out. Has dao had a big impact on your life do you think?

[Anonymous No.16317493]

>>16315774
I'm not a Daoist but reading their writings encouraged me to look differently at the concepts of right and wrong, good and bad. It also encouraged me to be true to my nature and not follow fads and fashions, to not go against my nature in order to gain something.

[Anonymous No.16317537]

>construct 12 tone equal temperament because we make shitty instruments
>accidentally institute global imperialism
>crush any dissenting culture who's musical structures seem microtonal to our ears that have since been exclusively trained on 12 tone equal temperament.
OP, you are letting your feelings get in the way of the truth. It doesn't mean you should stop studying music theory or stop listening to music, but you gotta admit that our entire fundamental musical system is presupposed on a very western centric attitude.

[Anonymous No.16317548]

>>16313069
The guy who made that video spends a lot of time studying music theory and the music of different cultures. Saying something has no inherent value doesn't mean it has 'no value'. He obviously cares about music. If you have a problem with this thought process then take it up with Nietzsche. I have a problem with relativism too. It's kind of fucked up.

[Anonymous No.16317580]

>>16317537
holy shit shut up, shut the FUCK up, god i can't fucking stand you. i wish i could strangle you, you don't deserve the life you've been given and it is my singular wish that it is taken away from you at the earliest opportunity. if you die alone and miserable it will still be a better fate than you deserve

[Anonymous No.16317604]

>>16313069
>poses that music is a cultural phenomenon rather than a universal one.
Music theory makes no claims of being universal, in fact it only claims to explain a small portion of western music, mostly just the music written to its rules. There is a whole massive field of study called musicology which deals with everything that western theory can not. The video is shit and either just trying to create controversy or was made by stupid people.

[Anonymous No.16317607]

>>16317580
the truth hurts, doesn't it, OP?

[Anonymous No.16317611]

>>16313069
Our music is a cultural one, but Music exists in every cultural and is a universal Eidos.
>>16317537
>12 TET
>shit
Dude have you heard the traditional singing in other temperaments? It’s like a cat being strangled lmao. Thank god the Italians figured out bel canto cause holy shot everything else sucks

[Anonymous No.16317622]

>>16317611
>music that doesn't fit the decades of cultural indoctrination I've been exposed to sounds bad!

[Anonymous No.16317749]

>>16317604
I think the disturbing thing was the attempt to weld musicology to politics. The pianoforte is not an attempt at musical world domination and colonial imperialism, just an earnest attempt to make German music sound good. In all seriousness Volksmusik is not bad either, insulting it is just a cliché French thing like losing Alsace & Lorraine.

[Anonymous No.16317777]

>>16317749
Music influences people, people can craft the message they want through music, either intentionally or subconsciously. It all had an effect whether you like it or not.

[Anonymous No.16317787]

>>16317537
Honestly this. Music IS a cultural and spiritual phenomenon with incredible, inexplicable emotive power. It is about communicating without words and is primarily a social device. It should be done by all, all together (not solely by professionals and recordings, even if they sound better), and it shouldn't be a science, or be constrained by rules and formulas. Sure, western style might generally sound better than other stuff just like poetry that has a set rhyming pattern and rhythm is usually better than people just shitting out random line breaks. But there is still something to be said for aformulaic free verse poetry, as there is something to be said for different musical cultures. Composers are best without any musical theory study when they're just inspired and operating on a spiritual/emotional (right hemisphere) level.


Of course, OP, I havent watched your video and I don't doubt that it was a couple retards spouting mostly bullshit. But "shitty" African music sung in a circle even by people with "bad" voices with dancing is as powerful and as true to the essence of what music is as listening to a CD of the greatest Western composers ever. Both have value

[Anonymous No.16317809]

>>16317777
Checked

[Anonymous No.16317820]

>>16317777
>Music influences people either intentionally or subconsciously
Yes, but should we care?

[Anonymous No.16317823]

>>16317820
We should care, yes.

[Anonymous No.16317835]

>>16317777
Furthermore and not forgetting the (check), if music influences anyone, that may be, but music can never have an evil intent. Even if you're a total lefty and cite national anthems as an example of evil in music, you should be laughed at, since music is just how people express themselves and never can any malice be imputed to a note or verse.

[Anonymous No.16317839]

>>16317823
See >>16317835

[Anonymous No.16317849]

>>16317493
Also, a pdf of the Zhuangzi is on archive.org.

[Anonymous No.16317872]

>>16317835
But that's not true. Music communicates, thus the author must have a message they are wanting to send. That message inherently is an "expression" of themselves, but it's fundamentally communicative, there is a message in the things they are playing or singing, just as this paragraph has a message you are interpreting from it. We could say that there is no "malice" to a note or verse, but that would be wrong. There is malice and intent in all parts of music. Music made to make people aggressive, music made purely for monetary gain, music made to make people want to kill themselves, music made, like you said, such as a national anthem who's purpose is to instill an emotional state in the listener to make them easier to manipulate by other rhetorical devices into doing what the person wants to do.


To say that music is a pure not-yet deflowered virgin of the human experience is ignorant and puritan.

[Anonymous No.16317874]

>>16313069
cute birb anon, keep up the great posts.

[Anonymous No.16318004]

>>16317872
I suppose I'll concede your point, but what is to be done about it? It seems that the only fair thing about it is to do nothing. I don't want people to be arrested for singing the wrong verse of Deutschland Uber Alles. If anything is puritanical it is controls on free speech.

[Anonymous No.16318071]

>>16318004
I didn't realize we were positing a value judgement in need of a solution. You are right, we see the long history of bands like Kino and their difficulties during the period of the USSR's musical restrictions and ministry of culture's control. I'm not advocating for that. I'm simply saying that music is just another mode of communication and that people will use it in similar ways as other mediums of communication. What is to be done about the music industrial complex? I think the internet has been doing a pretty great job of sweeping under the legs of large publishers and giving platforms to more musicians than any other time in the history of the world. The thing I worry about is the psychological ramifications of such easy access to music though. I know I've caught myself many times listening to music so I don't have to deal with my own thoughts or the material world. It becomes a commodified escapism. But again, this goes back to what people value. Do you wish to go back to a world before recording, where music was ephemeral? Do you think that the rapid advancement of technology will open new avenues both for music creators and it's distribution? Is it worth the trade off? I don't know the answers to these questions, anon.

[Anonymous No.16318098]

>>16317537
AAAAaaaAaAAAAaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAaaaahhh clang clang clang clang AAAAAaAAAaaAAAAaAAaaaaaaaaa clang vlang clang clang OOOOhouloooouuOOooouHHoOooou bang bAng bANG bang

[Anonymous No.16318109]

>>16318098
Yoko! How did you get in here? Shoo! get outta' here!

[Anonymous No.16318155]

>>16318071
I agree, the only reason why I posited the solution was because I'm unable for whatever reason to see poster IDs on lit, and I was still for whatever reason, as concerned as the OP. It seems that whatever seems western these days first is censured, then there are a whole group of people who ought to be hated, because they appreciate the thing that leftists have said is politically incorrect.

It happens everywhere and to everything these days.

[Anonymous No.16318170]

>I'm just worried we're sliding into some weird societal stage where all tradition and all sacred things are going to be gleefully obliterated
Likely this'll happen and it'll be done by the state on behalf of idiots, and there's little we can do to prevent it. This is why it's so important that individuals safeguard our intellectual and spiritual traditions, and teach them to their children so they don't die out.

[Anonymous No.16318171]

>>16318155
Oh I see, you're looking for a final solution.

[Anonymous No.16318199]

>>16318171
Hopefully the solution won't have to be so final as that one, but yes, I was seeking the resolution of my own thoughts.