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SUNDAY_CONVENTION

 
                                              January  1-18, 2005 
 
Why would "The Maltese Falcon" 
be taken as mere camp? 
                                              SUNDAY_CAMP 
Because of the implausibility 
of the detective genre's conventions? 
 
But such things receede 
into the background 
with familiarity. 
 
The connoisseur does not giggle at 
the ballerina's tights and tutu, not 
because they're not ridiculous, but 
because the joke is too obvious, 
and also because the joke is not the 
whole story -- and someone who can 
see the joke and only the joke is as    The *Pow!* *Bang!* *Bop!*  
limited as someone who can see the      business of the Adam West  
serious and only the serious.           "Batman" is a clear sign   
                                        that the creators were out 
                                        of touch with the material.
                                                                   
                                            To the fan of superhero   
                                            comics, those visually    
                                            rendered sound effects are
                                            practically subliminal.   
                                                                      
Possibly a problem: 
kitsch corrupts taste. 
 
Sontag understands that the merely 
bad is not "camp", but the devotee 
of kitsch often seems to lose the 
ability to distinguish. 
 
For example, the homosexual subculture 
has spent so much time wallowing in 
disco that they often seem to have no         Heavy metal fans can't 
musical taste left at all.                    seem to make up their minds 
                                              if it's all a joke, but they 
You begin with "ha, isn't this funny",        can always dodge the issue by 
then it just becomes the soundtrack of        claiming that it is one. 
your life, and then giggling at it is 
as inane as laughing at a ballerina's 
tutu. 
 
The familiar is beneath contempt. 
 
 
 
          The camp stance is that you 
          are better than the material, 
          above it. 
 
          You're not really touched by 
          something as low brow and 
          formulaic as a private eye 
          movie, you're don't really take 
          such things *seriously*. 
 
                                    NULL_HINGED 
 
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