the kids aren’t all right
by jebni on June 4, 2006
Today we met Lawrence Grossberg and Meaghan Morris at “Kids, Politics and Our Future”, an event organised by Lingnan University’s Cultural Studies Department. There was a weird collection of people there, from people who were obviously activists, to strangely obedient-looking students, one of whom walked in late, sat next to Lena and then asked her for her notes. There wasn’t a problem with sharing knowledge (although Lena was a bit embarrassed by the idea of handing over her commentary, complete with scathing remarks about “monolithic feminism”); rather, this person made her request as if it were homework. Yikes.
Grossberg basically outlined the argument of his latest book, Caught in the Crossfire — that the “War on Kids” isn’t so much about young people in themselves being a problem to the powers that be, but what they represent: the future. So, an inability to conceive of a future that isn’t rapacious exploitation or suicidal mania leads to the abuse and repression of the young. The contributions of the other panellists, including two from Christian NGOs, were interesting, but as a whole the event was a bit disparate. And while he was amusing, I could have done without Lui Tai-Lok’s nostalgia for shiny happy Maoist recruitment strategies of the 60s and 70s as an example of “a more diverse Left” of which contemporary activists can apparently no longer conceive. Feh. Whatever one thinks of Maoism, there should be an injunction against middle aged Leftists pitying young people for fucking living in the wrong era. Given the context of the panel, a little bit of reflexivity would have been nice. Also: despite Grossberg’s conclusions about the nature of paedocidal culture, there wasn’t one person on this first panel under the age of 25, or even 30, which was rather ironic. But all in all, we were thankful to be at the most politically critical event thus far of our stay here in Hong Kong.
Oh yeah, the event was held at the Hong Kong Scout Centre. Now, we didn’t expect it to be an ordinary Scout hall. Not at all. But we didn’t expect this:
There’s a fucking indoor heated swimming pool on the twelfth floor or something. And lots of cute but bratty Scout kids, trailed by their Filipina nannies.
[ tags: cultural-studies, lawrence-grossberg, maoism, meaghan-morris, young-people ]
3 comments
How interesting! In my book I write about Grossberg’s role in taking cultural studies to an international audience, but that the kids stuff in particular seems quite limited by its US-specificity. Would have loved to know how it sounded in Hong Kong. I also make similar observations about self-reflexivity on the age issue. Look forward to your comments on it in light of this!
by MC on 4 June 2006 at 4:49 pm. #
Yeah, well his take on his US-specificity was “write what you know,” and “intervene in your own context,” which are both true enough in a way, but which can also can become a blind-spot. I guess I’ll have to read the book (both his and yours).
by jebni on 4 June 2006 at 8:12 pm. #
Oh and yes, despite the other panellist’s attempts to draw parallels, I think it played strangely in Hong Kong, where the confluence of both Confucian and British-colonial authoritarianisms have created, I imagine, quite a different landscape for “youth” than the US context.
by jebni on 4 June 2006 at 8:16 pm. #