Upstream | July 27, 2010 | 2 comments

Lady Gaga: Pop Star for a Country and an Empire in Decline | | AlterNet

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We have made monsters out of others in order to kill them without fear. Gaga makes herself a monster to try to show us ourselves.
July 26, 2010 |

"If there are zeitgeist moments for products, movie stars, and even politicians, then such moments can exist for weaponry as well. The robotic drone is the Lady Gaga of this Pentagon moment."

So wrote Tom Engelhardt, in an essay titled "America Detached from War," and he couldn't have picked a more perfect metaphor. Gaga is sexy, ubiquitous, and oh so of-the-moment. She exists on a line between monstrous and beautiful, making us ask questions about progress, about agency, about control, about men and women, about Americans and the world. She is both a perfect embodiment of American cultural dominance and subverting what that means at every turn.

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2 comments // Lady Gaga: Pop Star for a Country and an Empire in Decline | | AlterNet

  • ahappymintleaf
    • 0
      ahappymintleaf  
    • Ahhhhh I LOVE the Metric reference, even if they had to dumb down the portmanteau. If only they didn't become apolitical.

      I wish they would have discussed this 'decline' business further. Because it is pretty evident that it's happening. I read a better written article (though drenched in postmodern art world elitist ~ness) that discussed Gaga's place in a line of pop icons that invert the popular and high culture worlds, from Warhol to Mercury to Madonna to her. two gays and two women, each running to stretch the line of the most acceptable depravity that can be massively consumed. I don't know how positive it is, but it's impressive.

    • 1 year ago
  • jubal
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