Liberals Should Crawl Back Into Their iPods
By Isaiah Z. Sterrett (05/13/05)
IN A SINGLE Sunday, the New York Times managed to call iPods unhip and denounce high school theater as a “refuge of nerds and spazzes.” Talk about having one’s finger on the pulse of pop culture.
With the media in the doghouse according to mainstream America, is it really wise to insult Broadway and Apple in one day? I think we should all go Times Square and listen to “West Side Story,” freshly downloaded from iTunes, Apple’s online music store. That would send the Great Gray Lady straight “Into the Woods” for sure.
We could protest all the way to Avenue Q.
Admittedly, when it comes to “nerds and spazzes” there is no better authority than the Times. Nonetheless, defaming drama kids is tawdry. In point of fact, I happen to like drama kids. So do all those people who go to musicals, which I believe occasionally appear in New York City. In the future, if you go to Manhattan to see a show, forget the Times. The Post has a lot more Republicans—and far fewer nerds and spazzes.
“So President George W. Bush listens to an iPod,” began another pointless space-filler in the Sunday Times, “….How uncool is that?” For the record, President Bush was spared both the “nerd” label, as well as the unfortunate “spaz” classification.
“If someone as mainstream as President Bush has caught on to something allegedly so hip, what can Apple do to keep iPod chic and cutting edge?” (That was the first time in recorded history that the New York Times was caught calling Bush “mainstream.” Would that Miguel Estrada had jogged with an iPod.)
“Apple promotes the iPod…with a counterculture package of freewheeling dancers, psychedelic coloring and raucous music. The company's devotees are almost as fanatical as the Deadheads who followed the Grateful Dead on tour.” (For future reference, a Deadhead is by definition someone who followed the Grateful Dead on tour.) “With simple styling and an easy-to-use format, it is little surprise that even the president has stumbled upon the iPod. Apple has a daunting 75 percent of the digital music player market, dominating companies like Dell and Samsung.”
Puzzlingly, it was just last month that the Times was pointing out how frequently iPods are stolen on the Subway. If they’re so uncool, why do they attract thieves? Reflect on the fact that no one is stealing Molly Ivins’ new book.
Also last month, we learned that Apple Computer did fabulously well in the second fiscal quarter, beating even its own expectations. As of Tuesday afternoon, iPods or iPod accessories accounted for nearly 20% of Amazon.com’s top-selling electronics. We must ask: if Apple products were so unfashionable, why are people buying them?
Phillip Michaels of Macworld magazine reports that iPods have been so successful that radio stations are now seeking to imitate them. “Indeed, having spent a day listening to Jack FM’s Los Angeles version jump from Queen to the Sugar Beats to Jackson Browne to Midnight Oil,” he writes, “you can’t shake the impression that you’re not listening to a radio station stocked with cartridges and DJs and whatnot so much as you are plugged into some random stranger’s 20GB iPod.”
Liberals, alas, have a habit of telling consumers what to like and dislike. Liberals like capitalism only when it involves buying the things they like, such as both of the products made in France. When consumers decide for themselves what to buy, Western liberals become strict Marxists. What’s strange is that iPods, innocuous creatures as they are, have become the subject of leftist rage. Someone really should tell these Democrats that, in just one of the hand-held devices, they could store all of their old Barbra Streisand albums—not to mention various hilarious clips from Air America.
Personally, I like my iPod. But then again, I also like drama kids. When will I learn to stop listening to those nerds and spazzes at the New York Times?
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