Contrivance and Aesthetics

By Genesio Zenone
July 1st, 2004

Rather than endeavoring on yet another knee-cap job or in proctogenesis via verbally violent tear , I will address the problem, if it is indeed a problem, of Michael Moore obliquely.  Moore has had a profound effect on liberal/left thinking, not just in the US, but in many other countries where anti-Americanism has become so rampant and so venomous that its appetites can only be satiated intravenously with a Chomsky-Moore mea-culpa drip. For those interested in Aesthetics, propaganda and popular culture, this phenomenon raises an important question about Truth, art and pragmatics: Should highly effective propaganda be considered valuable art…regardless of Truth?

 Propaganda is deemed effective when it successfully reaches and persuades its target audience. For Moore, whose audiences have been growing since Roger and Me, there is little doubt about any dearth in his reach.  Observing the now familiar look of consternation on exiting moviegoers’ faces, one could surmise that Moore’s films have followed through on this reach and delivered on persuasion. Many will go see Moore’s latest movie already convinced of its conspiratorial theses; they will leave reinforced with the validation that they so crave. Others will enter “with an open mind”; these are Moore’s main targets. The distinction between open mind and credulous sucker is narrow and is further narrowed by political correctness which views skepticism as a vice (unless, of course it is directed at our government), only the opposite can be virtuous. Whatever Moore says is thus swallowed whole.

 
So we know that Moore’s propaganda is effective, but should it be considered valuable art?

To answer this, a subset of questions needs to be asked:

Should a well-told lie be considered aesthetically valuable?

Does the work of Moore consist of well told lies?

 
This first question is still the subject of debate, especially where the distinction between fiction and nonfiction is blurred. What seem to matter most are the degree and the consequence of the lie.  The Sistine Chapel depicts a scene which many do not believe in, but few critics would dare say that it is not valuable art. Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will is a brilliant Nazi propaganda piece which revolutionized certain aspects of film-making. In this case there is some controversy over the status the film, presumably because of the kind of lie it tells and because of the world-view it reinforced. Still it is taught in most film schools; most people will to an extent, insulate art from truth…as long as there is art to begin with (separate questions of truth form, say, the Protocols of Zion and you are left with art only by definition).

 
An argument can be judged on the basis of soundness and validity. A valid argument is one whose conclusion follows from its premises.  A sound argument is one which is valid and whose premises are true. We know that Moore’s films and books fail the test of soundness; many of his premises have been proved to be blatantly false. But what about validity? Do his conclusions follow from his premises?

 
If Moore’s latest two films are any indication, the answer would easy to arrive at.

In bowling for Columbine we see Moore distorting reality by staging scenes, and fighting straw men (including someone ravaged by Alzheimer’s) while wandering aimlessly in search of a thesis like a plump Pirandello character. He flirts with the {America is as violent as it is because it has so many guns} thesis, but soon discovers that Canadians have almost as many guns per capita (he fails to mention, here, that many of these are hunting rifles, not automatics and handguns). How can it be that Canadians are just as gun happy, and yet, they are so much less violent?
Here, he finally makes the movie's fundamental thesis:
-Americans are violent because of our culture of fear; our media are constantly bombarding us with information which keeps us in fear and more prone to violence. Here we are treated to the film’s most blatant contradiction: America is so terribly violent because its news media exaggerates how violent it is.

Canadians do not partake in this culture as is shown in a bunch of staged episodes of Moore happening on people whose doors are unlocked (while they in their house) in Ontario. These are non-sequiturs which could easily have been remedied with more staged events, but which, I presume out of lethargy, were not. Does it follow that because a handful of hand-picked people leave their doors unlocked that Canadians do not partake in our culture of fear? And what do the Canadian media concern themselves with if it’s not bombarding citizens with fear….Curling and Hockey?

 Fahrenheit 9-11 is like the others…only more so.

 The thesis of the film is: The bush administration (which stole the election by not allowing some Blacks to vote and conspiring with the Supreme Court) has ties to Big Oil and to the Saudi Royal Family… ties which it hides behind the specter of terrorism and perpetual war …ties which thus compromise our Freedom and safety.

The first contradiction in the documentary has to do with the house of Bush and the house of Saud being in each other’s pockets.  Either the Saudis control the bush administration or they do not. When the US invaded Afghanistan, either the Saudis opposed the invasion or it did not (they opposed it). The same is true for Iraq. Moore wants to maintain that the Saudis run our Middle East policies but is faced with the fact that we went into Afghanistan and Iraq against its will. All cognitive dissonance this could cause is ignored. He makes a lot of noise about certain Bin Laden family members being whisked out of the country while no one else could fly, but he fails to mention who allowed this to occur.  It turns out that it was none other than the great whistle-blowing hero of the movie, Richard Clarke. Either Clarke is a brave hero or he is part of the problem…which is it?

 Moore correctly assumes that he can get away with his contradictions.  As propaganda, his films do what they aim to do. But as arguments, they are neither sound nor valid; they are not well-told lies...but they are lies crafted for an audience willing to believe anything.