Not only will Bob drive 20 minutes to something he likes that's not a music festival, Bob will wake at 3 AM to get in position in the woods by 4:30. Hunters are amazing.
You've been making an interesting serial argument that there's an aspect of busybody-ness to arts policymaking and the accompanying rationalization. It strikes me as self-evident that art wouldn't need advocacy if it were truly a bountiful source of economic benefit and broad eudemonia, which it is not, but which is often claimed. It is a niche activity for the sensitive. Policy regarding it largely shouldn't exist.
I want to push back a bit on your conclusion. If everyone was Bob, there may be fewer deer, but can you claim that Bob World is impoverished? From what standpoint? Are you impoverished for never having taken down an 8-point buck? This too strikes me as an intrusion of values.
It’s why I say the world is better with Bob’s in it. But if we were all Bob’s? A story I have enjoyed is Kingsley Amis’s Russian Hide and Seek. He imagines the Soviet Union having conquered all of Europe after the Second World War, including Britain, and we are now many decades into the future, where English culture has been mostly banned, and English is a regional folk language but not the language of the rulers. In an effort to quell some unrest, the Russians decide to allow a “folk festival” of sorts, and one of their scholars digs up some copies of Shakespeare and tries to do a production of Romeo and Juliet. Which, of course, is chaos: neither the director nor the actors nor the audience have any idea what they are doing. It is lost.
Now, nobody there says “it is a great loss that we can no longer understand Shakespeare”. They have had a genuine loss, but cannot see it.
Not only will Bob drive 20 minutes to something he likes that's not a music festival, Bob will wake at 3 AM to get in position in the woods by 4:30. Hunters are amazing.
You've been making an interesting serial argument that there's an aspect of busybody-ness to arts policymaking and the accompanying rationalization. It strikes me as self-evident that art wouldn't need advocacy if it were truly a bountiful source of economic benefit and broad eudemonia, which it is not, but which is often claimed. It is a niche activity for the sensitive. Policy regarding it largely shouldn't exist.
I want to push back a bit on your conclusion. If everyone was Bob, there may be fewer deer, but can you claim that Bob World is impoverished? From what standpoint? Are you impoverished for never having taken down an 8-point buck? This too strikes me as an intrusion of values.
It’s why I say the world is better with Bob’s in it. But if we were all Bob’s? A story I have enjoyed is Kingsley Amis’s Russian Hide and Seek. He imagines the Soviet Union having conquered all of Europe after the Second World War, including Britain, and we are now many decades into the future, where English culture has been mostly banned, and English is a regional folk language but not the language of the rulers. In an effort to quell some unrest, the Russians decide to allow a “folk festival” of sorts, and one of their scholars digs up some copies of Shakespeare and tries to do a production of Romeo and Juliet. Which, of course, is chaos: neither the director nor the actors nor the audience have any idea what they are doing. It is lost.
Now, nobody there says “it is a great loss that we can no longer understand Shakespeare”. They have had a genuine loss, but cannot see it.
So I’ll stand by my high falutin conclusion :)