LET’S TALK NASTY

Last week we asked our readers to tell us what aspect of the increasingly nasty world of arts and entertainment bugged them the most. They responded. In some cases, quite nastily.

As a member of the Baby Boom generation, I feel no nostalgia for the ‘60s and ‘70s. Decades that gave us riots, sexual promiscuity and drug addition hold no allure for me.

The ‘80s have been a return to the appreciation of elegance, style and glamour, as well as a rediscovery of fundamental cultural values.

That some of our public figures have failed to live up to these ideals makes the ideals themselves no less valid and perhaps makes the people only human.

If you want Nasty and Uncivil, look at the ‘60s and ‘70s and the Cult of the Mindless and Ugly. It is the media rather than the public who have promoted the myth of these supposedly wonderful decades. (I have come to the conclusion that media people do not experience events as other mortals, their position and power insulating them as much as any Washington political office.)

The deluded idealism of the era produced a generation often unprepared to cope with the realities of life. That is why many like myself value the practical materialism of the ‘80s as a welcome relief from such sanctimonious moralizing and pseudo-”liberalism” as found in Calendar’s cover article.

The social puritanism and secular proselytizing in this nasty diatribe against our present decade is as hypocritical as the ranting of any TV evangelist. The total lack of thoughtful, insightful analysis, which is the basis of relevant cultural criticism, is exactly what I’ve come to expect from The Times.

You persist in glorifying the ‘60s and ‘70s (the one era in American history the epitomized the Nasty and Uncivil) while refusing to recognize the positive aspects of our own time because they are contrary to your moronic prejudices. What assaults my civilized sensibilities the most in today’s world?

No contest. The L.A. Times.

LINDA WARREN

Hollywood