There are some very sick people in the world

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Happy Times

The thing that irritates is that most are financed by tax revenue when there are real artists left without support.

OH YES...!

Only that I do not know how to separate support for good things from support for bad things. you do not know in advance what a person is going to do when launching a project.

But maybe one could at least stop giving a person that screwed it up the last three times the money to mess it up a fourth time.

[Trex]

If he was serious about using nudity to embody (no pun intended) the victims of capitalism yadayada, he would have hired some street people to wave their willies at the audience. That would have shown a convincing convergence between art and reality as well as helping to address, albeit temporarily, the problems caused by capitalism.

[mrbeast]

Originally Posted by SUBMAN1

You shouldn't have to wait longer than 30 minutes. You think 3 days is good? Crazy.

-S

I said at the most and a few years ago now, last few times I phoned my GP for an appointment I was sitting in the waiting room about 3 or 4 hours later.

Well we can't all have health systems ruled by insurance companies.

[bradclark1]

What it is is a former East German small time theater in a small time former East German town trying to make the news. These are former enemies who probably aren't too thrilled with the economic realities of Democracy. It succeeded. F--- um.

[Skybird]

"Former enemies" Nice, I must remember that for next time when the former SED-people of "Die Linke" show up in the Bundestag. Those are real nerve-killers, and listening to them reminds me of the sound and phrasing of "Aktuelle Kamera"

(AK was the official major TV news program in the GDR.)

[Trex]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Only that I do not know how to separate support for good things from support for bad things. you do not know in advance what a person is going to do when launching a project.

But maybe one could at least stop giving a person that screwed it up the last three times the money to mess it up a fourth time.

The Canadian govt has introduced legislation which would give the Minister in charge of such things the right to refuse the current govt subsidy to Canadian filmmakers if the work in question is deemed not to be in the public interest, eg mere pornography or containing excessive violence.

The artistas are - predictably - up in arms, screaming about 'censorship' - which this is of course not. The art world would still be able to produce whatever it wanted to, but the govt would not subsidize, oh, take an extreme example, a movie about somebody urinating on a Koran. (At present, provided that there was sufficient Canadian content, such a flick would automatically be entitled to taxpayer funds.)

Oh, the artistic angst! The shame of it all! How unfair!

How delightful!

[bradclark1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

"Former enemies" Nice, I must remember that for next time when the former SED-people of "Die Linke" show up in the Bundestag. Those are real nerve-killers, and listening to them reminds me of the sound and phrasing of "Aktuelle Kamera"

(AK was the official major TV news program in the GDR.)

Is it still a little touchy regards employment & economics etc. between the former east and west Germany's though?

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by bradclark1

Is it still a little touchy regards employment & economics etc. between the former east and west Germany's though?

Yes, but not generally with every person. It depends, last but not least wether you are a winner or looser from unification. But there are massive differences in unemployment rates, and general perspectives. Whole regions in the East are shutting down, have lost all middle- and young-aged population, and only the oldest 15 or 20% of the original population are still living in a given city. Another problem: young women go West by marriage or by taking job options, but young men only can go West if they can compete on the Western job market, which often is not the case: and marriage is no option for them to escape, like it is for the girls. Eastgermany is the one region in europe where the ratio between males and females is more distorted and towards males than anywhere else, and that has demographic and social consequences, it prvents family-forming, which means a dysfunctional society as well, and leaves a generation of males behind that have learned one thing: that they are loosers. The lack of motivation and frustration inside society is enormous. Right wing policies become very popular here, as well as mourning that the wall is gone and the better days of the GDR are no more there. Infrastructure slowly breakes down, and medical caretaking as well. It becomes a problem to keep such systems operational if only so few people are still living in such a critical region. It costs money, but the state does not get any revenue in return. But what to do? Enforced resettlement? It is a big problem - and most politicians do not touch it at all, for fear to burn their fingers.

Add to this future economic perspectives and the demographic developement of giving the old more and more voting power and the young becoming victims of needing to pay for that - and you watch at what can only be described as a most explosive developement. I cannot rule out in principle that in 20, 30 years things blow up over here.

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by Trex

The Canadian govt has introduced legislation which would give the Minister in charge of such things the right to refuse the current govt subsidy to Canadian filmmakers if the work in question is deemed not to be in the public interest, eg mere pornography or containing excessive violence.

The artistas are - predictably - up in arms, screaming about 'censorship' - which this is of course not. The art world would still be able to produce whatever it wanted to, but the govt would not subsidize, oh, take an extreme example, a movie about somebody urinating on a Koran. (At present, provided that there was sufficient Canadian content, such a flick would automatically be entitled to taxpayer funds.)

Um, if you don't call that censorship, then what is? Seriously, the way the bill is worded, everything is at the minister's discretion. Movie against the war in Afghanistan? Ah, we're down in the poll. Not in public interest. Pro-Québec movie? Not in public interest. Movie about a right-wing dystopia that its too close to home? Not in the public interest. Movie where someone gets an abortion and the world doesn't come crashing down on her? Not in public interest.

And trust me, the federal government HAS tried to scrap project it didn't approve of in the past. 10 février 1837; Dans une Galaxie Pres de Chez Vous (Not enough canadian content, since it was a space-based sci-fi show. They stuck canadian flags and maple leafs everywhere on the uniforms, and got their fundings back... Figures)

Yeah, the artists are up in arm. And they'd better be.

[Trex]

OED defines 'censor' as the suppression, in whole or part, of books, plays, films , letters, news, etc. It defines the verb 'suppress' as "use force or authority to make cease, quell, put an end to an activity or existence of, restrain, withhold or withdraw from publicatuion, keep secret..." In short, if you censor something, you prevent people from writing, painting, filming, etc and/or you prevent them from seeing or hearing it.

China censors things. If you go to the internet in China, certain information (eg the Tiananmen Square Massacre) is blocked - you cannot access it. If you write certain things, you go to jail. If you try to send a video clip on some things, it will be blocked from transmission and you will get arrested. That is censorship.

C-10 will not prevent anybody from writing anything, painting anything, filming anything, saying anything. If somebody wants to make a film on any subject, they are perfectly free to do it; nobody will stop them. If they wish to distribute that film, there will be no penalties. Nobody wishing to view it will be prevented. All C-10 does is prevent the public purse from helping them do it. That is not censorship; it is merely the refusal to support something. There is a big difference.

[Platapus]

Originally Posted by Trex

The Canadian govt has introduced legislation which would give the Minister in charge of such things the right to refuse the current govt subsidy to Canadian filmmakers if the work in question is deemed not to be in the public interest, eg mere pornography or containing excessive violence.

The artistas are - predictably - up in arms, screaming about 'censorship' - which this is of course not. The art world would still be able to produce whatever it wanted to, but the govt would not subsidize, oh, take an extreme example, a movie about somebody urinating on a Koran. (At present, provided that there was sufficient Canadian content, such a flick would automatically be entitled to taxpayer funds.)

Oh, the artistic angst! The shame of it all! How unfair!

How delightful!

A very good point. It is not censorship when the government does not subsidize art. It is censorship when the government prohibits art.

No one is saying that an Canadian artist can't do their art. They are just saying that the government ain't payin for it.

A very sound policy.

Personally, I feel that the government (USA) should not sponsor/subsidize any art. Let the artists get their sponsorship from corporations or the public.

If their art is good people will pay for it. It it stynks people won't. Thats the way art should work.

We can save a lot of money ditching the NEA.

[Etienne]

Originally Posted by Trex

C-10 will not prevent anybody from writing anything, painting anything, filming anything, saying anything. If somebody wants to make a film on any subject, they are perfectly free to do it; nobody will stop them. If they wish to distribute that film, there will be no penalties. Nobody wishing to view it will be prevented. All C-10 does is prevent the public purse from helping them do it. That is not censorship; it is merely the refusal to support something. There is a big difference.

Indeed. Free to do it, but unable to - The canadian film industry is in such a position, economically, that the only way for filmmakers to be able to film pretty much anything is to request federal subsidies. So cutting a project's federal funding essentially kills it.

Not to mention the fact that the law can be used to slew cultural production politically. And it opens the door to Sponsorship Scandal II: Gomery's Return.

If the government is going to send money toward culture, it shouldn't be a partisan thing. C-10 allows the insertion of a huge political bias into the country's entire film and television industry.