The Invisible Counterpoint

Re: "Looks like I hit a nerve. Interesting. But not surprising." (Jeffrey J.) Jeffrey J., You're commending Vanessa for supporting Platrow's blog, but on that subject, Vanessa, after assuring us that it was only "cultural fascination that drove [her] to read her project" (and not, say, genuine curiosity born out of a respect for Paltrow), offers QUALIFIED praise -- she "found SOME of it to be genuinely useful" -- while still pointing out her ridiculousness ("Despite eye roll-inducing recommendations"). She then quickly slips into a more serious engagement with exactly why "it's not all that hard to understand the 'haters'," and terminates with a fearful vison of Paltrow et al.'s vacuous celebrity culture meming their way, en total, into our resisting but hopelessly permeable brains. Making Paltrow into a meming, channeling worm is not high praise for her, I assure you. In fact, the whole essay could be seen...

Paltrow writes a blog and the corporate and financial elites go nuts. Ms. Redmond writes favorably about Ms. Paltrow's blog, and certain Tyee readers go nuts. Hmmm, what does this tell us? Actually, quite a lot. The phenomenon of both events is well studied in the field known as sociology, which remains the cutting edge of intellectual analysis and thought. And for good reason. It's scholars seek to critique what ACTUALLY influences societal trends to happen. Authors such as Naomi Klein, Edward Herman, Noam Chomosky, Ben Bagdikian, Marc Edge and others have significantly educated millions of us about how societal elements operate. And once we understand how the 'template' works, each of us can in turn apply this analysis to almost any event involving powerful entities for better understanding. Speaking of which, Paltrow and/or ANY celebrity are NOT permitted to enter the realm of written discourse. Particularly female celebrties. It is overstepping their bounds ...

As the Globe's Lynn Crosbie said, "Goop is, ultimately, a nice little forum for ideas about self-improvement, ideas that are rooted in harmless acquisitiveness, simple playfulness and an exceptionally fragile sense of the mind and soul. It is this fragility that makes Goop (its name is, admittedly, dreadful) hard to dislike, as it puts forward such tentative feelers toward art and literature, spirituality and the dream of a whole, harmonious life. (Vanessa Richmond) Well, here's the professional writer at work -- the kind of mind well wrought/rot from compromise, ready-full of condescension. Sensing an advance of the amateur and genuine, her first move is to belittle and contain -- and so we get talk of "ultimately, a nice little forum," of an effort "whose fragility" "makes [it] [. . .] hard to dislike," that oh so charmingly aspires to epic reach. Vanessa evidences a better taste for it (Will Vanessa ever stop seeming the castle-caught...