SEX, SOCIAL CLASS, AND TECHNOLOGICAL CHANGE IN NINETIES AMERICAN CULTURE

Summary: Today we will contemplate gender, sex, and the changing configuration of public and private in 1990s American culture. We will consider the Clinton-Lewinsky affair and discuss Wag the Dog. We will then consider the impact of economic and technological changes on nineties American work and private life. We will consider the examples of Dilbert, The Sopranos, The Matrix, and Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickel and Dimed.

I. Sex, Lies, and Clinton

A. Monica Lewinsky affair enters the headlines, January 1998

B. Clinton misleads the American public on television

C. Lewinsky testifies before a grand jury in August 1998

D. Clinton apologizes for misleading the public and hurting his family, but insists on legal accuracy of his denials

E. Starr Report becomes public in October 1998

E. House votes to impeach Clinton, Senate does not (highly partisan vote)

F. Clinton loyalists come to his defense: Lewinsky affair was a private affair between consenting adults

G. Democrats gain 5 seats in Congress in 1998 elections; Gingrich leaves office under a cloud of impropriety

H. Polls indicate that Americans overwhelmingly believed Clinton to be guilty but the vast majority did not want him removed from office

II. Wag the Dog, Sex, and Postmodern Politics at the End of the Twentieth Century (See Roger Ebert's review of Wag the Dog)

imdb.com's "Memorable Quotes"

Excerpts from Ebert's review:

Levinson, working from a smart, talky script by David Mamet and Hilary Henkin . . . deconstructs the media blitz that accompanies any modern international crisis. Even when a conflict is real and necessary (the Gulf War, for example), the packaging of them is invariably shallow and unquestioning; like sportswriters, war correspondents abandon any pretense of objectivity and detachment, and cheerfully root for our side.

``Why does a dog wag its tail?'' Brean asks at one point. ``Because the dog is smarter than the tail. If the tail was smarter, it would wag the dog.'' In the Breanian universe, the tail is smarter, and we, dear readers, are invited to be the dogs.

III. Broader themes:

A. Interpentration of public and private

1. emergence of a confessional culture

2. sex as a public issue

B. Economic and Technological Change

C. Anxieities about Sex and Gender

IV. Work, Class, and Culture in 1990s America

A. Changes in the national economy promote prosperity and anxiety

B. Cultural contemplations of white-collar malaise:

1. Scott Adams' Dilbert and cubicle life (see Dilbert comics archive)

"It started as a doodle at work, at a large bank. He got developed over time, also at work, and one day I realized I had something." -Scott Adams on the origins of Dilbert

2. The Sopranos (screen clips of first episode written and directed by David Chase, aired 1999)

a. commentary on manhood and confessional culture

b. interaction of public and private identity

C. De-industrialization and the growth of the service sector

D. Nickel and Dimed: Barbara Ehrenreich's undercover account of the working poor

1. Ehrenreich as public intellectual and journalist

2. Her depiction of class relations in 1990s America

Interview excerpt:

Q: Is it difficult to keep your political views and your integrity and still publish in the mainstream?
A: Yes, it sure is. It's frustrating. News has become more like entertainment. Once staid news magazines, which will go unnamed, have become more frivolous and less interested in serious analysis. There are problems writing about poverty. The mainstream media are not very interested. From 1991 to about 1997 I was a regular essayist in Time, meaning I had an essay in about once a month. But then a new administration came in about 1997 and they started rejecting the pieces I did on things like poverty, inequality, capital punishment, and only wanting me to do things on Monica, Princess Di, things like that. So, I won't work for them on a regular basis now.

Q: Is it hard to write about issues you feel so passionate about?
A: My traditional way of dealing with that is humor. Humor actually can be a way of expressing a lot of aggression. I mean, satirical humor. And I used it for years. Nobody wants to hear a rant.

 

Ehrenreich discusses Americans' reluctance to address issues of class:

The last few years, like the years when I was doing this, were known as a time of "unprecedented boom." Twenty-seven-year-old millionaires all over the place, in the dotcom industry and it was like this disappeared, it was never discussed. And I think also there was a reluctance on the part of many liberals to talk about this while Clinton was in office. Out of some sort of loyalty to the Democratic Party. But the years that I was doing this work were Clinton years. Boom years, Clinton years. In general there is a taboo about talking about class in America. We can't do that. Or it can only be approached as temporary individual misfortune. The fact that there is anything systematic going on is very hard to talk about. Or not welcome in a lot of mainstream media.

 

Conclusion to Nickel and Dimed:

"The 'working poor' as they are approvingly termed, are in fact the major philanthropists of our society. They neglect their own children so that the children of others will be cared for: they live in substandard housing so that other homes will be shiny and perfect; they endure privation so that inflation will be low and stock prices high. To be a member of the working poor is to be an anonymous donor, a nameless benefactor, to everyone else."

V. Work and Selfhood in the Internet Age: Wachowski Brothers, The Matrix (1999)

"In an anti-Utopian future, the 'real' world as we know it is nothing more than a computer construct, created by an all-powerful artificial intelligence. A small group of humans has found a way out of the construct, and are now fighting for the future of the human race."--from container.

ADDITIONAL WEB RESOURCES:

Bill Clinton's August 17 speech to the American public re: Monica Lewinsky

Excerpt from the speech emphasizing public/private tensions:

"...I know that my public comments and my silence about this matter gave a false impression. I misled people, including even my wife. I deeply regret that.

I can only tell you I was motivated by many factors. First, by a desire to protect myself from the embarrassment of my own conduct.

I was also very concerned about protecting my family. The fact that these questions were being asked in a politically inspired lawsuit, which has since been dismissed, was a consideration, too.

In addition, I had real and serious concerns about an independent counsel investigation that began with private business dealings 20 years ago, dealings I might add about which an independent federal agency found no evidence of any wrongdoing by me or my wife over two years ago...

This has gone on too long, cost too much and hurt too many innocent people.

Now, this matter is between me, the two people I love most -- my wife and our daughter -- and our God. I must put it right, and I am prepared to do whatever it takes to do so.

Nothing is more important to me personally. But it is private, and I intend to reclaim my family life for my family. It's nobody's business but ours.

Even presidents have private lives. It is time to stop the pursuit of personal destruction and the prying into private lives and get on with our national life...

And so tonight, I ask you to turn away from the spectacle of the past seven months, to repair the fabric of our national discourse, and to return our attention to all the challenges and all the promise of the next American century.

Thank you for watching. And good night.''

Washington Post Special Report: Clinton Accused

Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickel and Dimed talks with Robert Birnbaum

Notable Writer: Barbara Ehrenreich (University of Oregon page)

Graph of Presidential Election Voter Turnout 1924-2000