Pharyngula

Usually I’m complaining about some fresh inanity from the religious side, but I have to be fair: this is an example of secular child abuse. It’s the Baby Loves Disco franchise, that is driving parents to bring the little kiddies to a club, where they are forced to relive the horrors of the 70s, with Travolta-esque dancers and the shrill falsettos of the Bee Gees ringing in their ears.

I lived through the 70s. I was on the dating scene in the 70s. I have been to a KC and the Sunshine Boys concert; I have seen the glitter and the flash, and heard the maddening, endless beats. I would never inflict such a nightmare on my children, nor would I want to be in a room with a disco ball — it might trigger flashbacks.

Oh, well. It could be worse. It could be Christian disco (yes, there is such a thing.)

Comments

#1 Brownian, OM
February 26, 2008

It’s half-past-two and the club is pumping. A badly dressed, sweaty man in his mid-30s is strutting his stuff to Night Fever, while a girl young enough to be his daughter smiles fondly.

As the glitterball twirls above and the light squares on the dancefloor flash, the man is transported back to his youth, when this sort of thing happened every Saturday.

Night Fever might have been rocking the clubs in this man’s youth, but even if he’s 38 now he sure as hell wasn’t old enough to be clubbing when disco was in its heyday.

This isn’t nostalgia; its creative anachronism.
#2 BicycleRepairMan
February 26, 2008

On a completely unrelated note, the Encyclopedia of Life has opened its doors today, it is the brainchild of EO Wilson

The idea is to catalogue every known species in one slick, ever-growing online encyclopedia..

http://www.videosift.com/video/2007-TED-Prize-winner-EO-Wilson-on-TEDTalks
http://www.videosift.com/video/The-Encyclopedia-of-Life

And of course, the site itself:
http://www.eol.org

Perhaps you should make an entry or comment, PZ?
#3 Andr�s
February 26, 2008

Why yes, Christian have even the Very Institute of Disco.

/me runs away.
#4 Frederik Rosenkj�r
February 26, 2008

PZ, very admirable of you, to try and be even handed about child abuse, but I’m afraid you have been beaten by the religous once again. In the news in Denmark today:

http://www.memritv.org/clip/en/1693.htm

Hamas using CHILDREN’S TV to spout nonsense about the Muhammad drawings and what should be done to the artist – Islamic ranting now from a huge bunny!
#5 MyaR
February 26, 2008

Hey, I have friends who dj/run the Brooklyn baby loves disco, and they’re awesome, not child abusers!
#6 HP
February 26, 2008

Musicianship was still valued

Yes! Most people today don’t even know what the hell musicianship is. And if you mention it, they don’t realize you’re talking about an actual, acquirable skill, but rather they think you’re just being an elitist dick. A message to young people: Actually understanding the structure of music, and knowing how to make music in real time in front of people, is not something I just made up. Grumble, grumble — get off my lawn!

I grew up during the Disco era, and I was always torn between Disco on the one hand — this skillful, well-played music whose esthetic I simply couldn’t relate to, and on the other hand unmitigated crap like AC/DC and Foghat. I spent most of the 70s listening to old Clifford Brown and Dizzy Gillespie records, which didn’t exactly help my adolescent socialization skills.

But, fuck yeah!, musicianship. Eventually I found groups like Tower of Power (“What is hip, tell me, tell me”), but by that time Disco was fading even in the Midwest, garage bands were ascendant, and then finally the synthetic, sampled, overproduced Thriller came out, and killed off the last shreds of traditional musicianship in pop music.
#7 antaresrichard
February 27, 2008

And the spoon feeding the Man in the Moon? Vile, addictive, tooth-rotting, sugar! 54?! Hell, That’s my age!
#8 Epikt
February 27, 2008

Moggie:

Christian disco, Christian rock, Christian hip-hop… anyone notice how often the word “Christian” appears to be a synonym for “not really”?

I always assumed it was an apology.
#9 MAJeff, OM
February 29, 2008

Well, my favorite disco diva at work.