The Tears of Things

Einspruch seems to hate us, and he ought to honest about it, especially to himself. Better than pretending he's above such an emotion.

Prove that I hate you. Prove that I am pretending to be above the emotion of hate.

That was quick, Einspruch. Don't you have classes to teach?

Seems we touched a nerve, though I notice you have nothing to say about Catherine's earlier recognition of your hostility.

Seems also that nothing is more important than your persona. Not the issues we raised about the bloggers conference, or anything else. Just you.

First, Mr. Einspruch, you prove to Catherine and I, from your last wildly assertive comment, that we can be linked with people like Lee Seigel, Charlie Finch, and Ward Churchill, with specific examples and comparisons, using more than ten words, and then I might think about getting around to your peremptory, presumptuous demand, you pissant martinet.

JdB

I'll save you the trouble: you can't. You don't know me from Adam. Likewise for everyone else up there. Here's your example of mistaking opinion for real phenomena. This kind of thing permeates the last three posts (excepting the photograph, naturally). It's not that the issues raised at the conference don't interest me, but rather that I won't argue with someone who can't make that distinction. It would be better for all involved to debate the limits of knowledge.

In response to my last comment, the "bloated, sonorous" one, CK made some schoolyard crack to the effect that I wouldn't piss on you if you were on fire. My first thought was, Gosh, if they were on fire, I'd try to douse them somehow. I then thought, Well, these folks have divided the world into people whom they agree with and people who wish them agony and harm. Maybe I should just walk away from this one. As it happens, I don't subscribe to either category. In case you were wondering. Which I sort of don't think you are.

Not incidentally, are you interested "the issues [you] raised about the bloggers conference, or anything else"? Because I'm not sure what you think of them except that the people who came to this particular conference are bozos, as you put it, and that these things are conducted more thoroughly in academic settings all the time, to the organizer's discredit, even though this did not place in an academic setting, but in a one-hour time slot in a hotel bar with some chairs set up. If you want a debate, say something worth debating. I know you've decided otherwise, but I don't harbor a lot of concern as to whether you find me clownish. I have actually worked as a clown, so it may be an apt observation, but I don't think it's germane.

I had to look up "martinet." Your knowledge of such things is, well, revealing.

Jerome and Catherine,
Rather than continuing this ongoing harangue of the bloggers who participated in the Red Dot discussion, perhaps you should take the time to organize your own rigorous academic blogger conference, like the one you proposed in an earlier post. That way you'd have more control, and you could make sure the participants were up to your intellectual and pugilistic standards.
Sharon

We don't give a damn about a "great public battle." We don't give a damn about how many hits we get. What we care about is that when someone arrives on our site they find something worth reading, something with substance, supported by reason and soul and heart. And sometimes anger.

Listen to me Jerome and Catherine, because I'm saying this only because I believe it, not because you've done anything to deserve anyone's advice:

If you're so concerned about other blogs linking to you (and that seems to be the kernel of what you're begging for here), then do it the way the rest of us did it. Link to other blogs first, start a blog roll that shows you're interested in a dialog beyond your own first, and comment on their blogs first. The essence of any successful blog is that it's generous. You write something demeaning, email a link to those you're criticizing, and then bellyache that they're not linking back to you (all the while pretending that they discovered you on their own, which makes you liars, for the record). Your existing blog roll doesn't include one mainstream art blog. Why would any of them link back to you?

OK, so that's the end of my helpful advice. Take it or leave it.

Now for a dose of something you really need:

The fact that your blogroll includes Little Green Footballs makes me suspect you're wingnuts of the Johnson ilk and not truly interested in discussing art honestly or openly anyway.

"Dhimmi Watch?" Really??? Daniel Freakin Pipes?

Why on earth would you care that progressive art world people don't link to you? Why would you care that we don't take you seriously? Everything about your blogroll seems designed to offend someone in the art world.

On a more personal note, my boyfriend,...that's right...my boyfriend, is Muslim. Why on earth would you, with your anti-gay, anti-Muslim bias, even care what I think?

Clearly you do though. Otherwise you wouldn't keep emailing me links to your posts.

Start with a bit of honesty about what you're doing here first. Then perhaps show a bit of generosity toward those you want the approval of. THEN, perhaps, you'll get folks to read your posts full of "reason and soul and heart" here. Until then, pretend you can't find my email address.

Mr. Einspruch:

No, we've never met you, but we know some things about you from your words, from what you say yea to, and what you say nay to, for the five years I, at least, have been dropping in to artblog.net. We can come to some conclusions based on your choices of what to post. For example, it puzzles me that you get outraged at the artist sledgehammering animals, as we all should, but you're first in line to gaze upon actual plastinated human beings, which I consider desecration, but not you. If we don't know you from Adam, you don't know us from Adam and Eve, and yet you write (telepathically?):

I then thought, Well, these folks have divided the world into people whom they agree with and people who wish them agony and harm.

As if we're talking about hypotheticals. Hey, Einspruch, we have been harmed, we have been agonized and badly, because of who we are. So don't you fucking casually come around here with your twee-ass categories. Nobody denies reality around us.

You denigrate Catherine's colloquial wisdom as something from a schoolyard, but you've got no problem with Carolina Miranda, her fart jokes, her b*tt plug headline that was such a hit with everyone. This person is not an art blogger; she just links, links, links. She can't write more than a paragraph.

About the difference between a conference and a "conference." You write:

Not incidentally, are you interested [in?] "the issues [you] raised about the bloggers conference, or anything else"? Because I'm not sure what you think of them except that the people who came to this particular conference are bozos, as you put it, and that these things are conducted more thoroughly in academic settings all the time, to the organizer's discredit, even though this did not [take?] place in an academic setting, but in a one-hour time slot in a hotel bar with some chairs set up.

I called them pikers, imposters, and pretenders, and I reiterate the characterizations. A "one-hour time slot in a hotel bar etc." does not correlate with a formally-announced conference with a serious topic for discussion. We've been over this. Read the "minutes" of the meeting on Mattera's blog to see what she thinks was important to note. They're trying to hide the facts that they are lazy and the questions they raised are flaccid and narcissistic and were not about art, the art market, or the art world, but just themselves and their little world.

Ms. Butler:

The panelists should admit that they were treating this as a conference until we came along, and then it became a casual gathering. They've had literally years to come up with questions and topics, but we all read what they finally talked about.

Mr. Winkleman:

You are clueless. Our whole point is about art, not about linking, about being part of the "progressive art crowd," or about your sexuality. It's not about our blogroll. Trying to trash us as "wingnuts" and "anti-gay" is just distracting and changing the subject, which all of you so far have done.

To All of You:

The Tears of Things is about WITNESSING. That's when a person has to go on the record about how they feel even when it seems everyone else is telling them they are mistaken scum. And as the years wear on, The Tears of Things increasingly becomes an expression of FAITH in something truer and more powerfull than the "progressive art world" and its self-inflated "crowd" to which the very important Ed W. and buds belong.

Again, love you too.

You are clueless. Our whole point is about art, not about linking,

I call bullsh*t. Here's what you wrote:

I have checked around the ArtBloggers@ panelists' websites to see if any of them slipped up and acknowledged that Catherine King and I are live persons from planet Earth who criticized them.

and

Except when it comes to us, Mr. Winkleman. Then, we don't exist.

If this isn't meant to be interpreted as you moaning about others not recognizing you (and how else is one to recognize you in the context of blogs but through links), then you're abusing the English language.

Trying to trash us as "wingnuts" and "anti-gay" is just distracting

You defined yourself as such through your blogroll. Calling you on it is not "trashing" you, but merely holding up a mirror. In the context of your moaning about why you "don't exist" to other art bloggers, it's not "distracting," but rather explanatory. If you want to be defined as "interested in art" then add some art links to your blog roll.

Again, above all else, be honest about the reason you emailed people links to your abusive posts. You crave attention for yourselves.

Perhaps that attention is deserved (my jury is still out on that call). You're clearly not idiots. But you're going about this in a way that is clouding your stated interest in art. Clear the air, start again, pay some respect to those who are clear about why they're blogging, and see what comes to you (without all the bellyaching about why it's not coming to you all at once).

"progressive art world" . . . I've already laughed a bucketfull of bitter tears over that one. I guess I'm talking to Ed, tho' he won't let us speak on his megahuberblog. We're not properly deferential. So I must be demonstrating the witnessing part. Talking to myself, you know.
Catherine King

Hey, Einspruch, we have been harmed, we have been agonized and badly, because of who we are. So don't you fucking casually come around here with your twee-ass categories. Nobody denies reality around us.

I'm sorry to hear that you've been made to suffer, but again, I don't include myself either among people who agree with you or wish you harm. That's reality on my end. You're welcome to accept that if you can.

You denigrate Catherine's colloquial wisdom...

Wisdom? Ptth.

...as something from a schoolyard, but you've got no problem with Carolina Miranda, her fart jokes, her b*tt plug headline that was such a hit with everyone. This person is not an art blogger; she just links, links, links. She can't write more than a paragraph.

If you'd like to know my opinion about Carolina's work, you're welcome to ask me about it. Granted, that would take more effort than assuming I approve of it because I haven't remarked on it, but again, you can't distinguish your opinion from reality, so I don't expect you to be able to form the question.

I called them pikers, imposters, and pretenders, and I reiterate the characterizations.

Really? This is what you want to debate? I think anyone who writes anything about art and its ancillary concerns, the majority of the time, is an art blogger. It's not like there's a high barrier to entry.

A "one-hour time slot in a hotel bar etc." does not correlate with a formally-announced conference with a serious topic for discussion.

I disagree that this was formally announced. I think Joanne put up an announcement on a blog and passed some e-mails around.

They're trying to hide the facts that they are lazy and the questions they raised are flaccid and narcissistic and were not about art, the art market, or the art world, but just themselves and their little world.

And what exactly are they doing to hide those facts?

The Tears of Things is about WITNESSING.

You're kidding yourself in the worst possible way. No one who presumes this much generalized failure about people they hardly know can rightly claim to witness. The Tears of Things, at least as far as these last few posts are concerned, is really about reducing people to cartoons, and reducing debate to insult-laden, puerile back-and-forth.