Thursday, January 1, 2015

The symbolic meaning of X-mas decorations and...., nothing

One of my three part-time jobs, in this wrecked working-class culture of Wisconsin, has me recently toiling in Down Town Janesville, Wisconsin. Starting this new downtown project, I had little time to notice the latest nuances of said fair city. And, we went with out snow for all of December 2014 - a very rare occurrence.  So, it was basically at the 30 mile-per-hour drive-by, just another dreary downtown in Wisconsin in a snowless December. 

Deciding to take a break on Christmas Eve, and all my family out of town, I drove downtown to the site of my latest project to use it as a base for some evening debauchery. There would no doubt be a couple adult beverage haunts still open late. In other words, I was not planning on diving home.  I planned to and did indeed, just stay downtown at my studio for the night. As I drove, I took my mind off my abysmal work world, and..., I thought of my studio, my only bright spot in a city and work world ravaged by out-sourcing and left with minimum wage part-time jobs. But, when I drove to said base station early in that evening of the pending Christmas Day, it hit me between the eyes like a rock.

There were literally....., no Christmas lights in the downtown....., on Christmas Eve.

It was a stunning absence of a tradition.  It was a compelling statement of...., nothing.

Later the next night while working a production job on the evening of Christmas Day, my mind could hearken back to the former evening's discovery.  There were just nine..., yes nine, sad light-pole decorations on Main Street.  Some kind souls had paid to put them up - some lighted snow flakes as large as basketball hoops on their sides. And Main Street in Janesville oddly enough, is a side street.  The lights just happened to be on the block in front of my studio.

I had heard a few days later on the radio, the new City Manager, trying to explain his five-percent pay raise in the midst of a city with....,  no Christmas lights.  He basically said something to the effect (and paraphrasing here), "You guys need to bump up my pay or I'll leave too. If you want decorations..., you pay for it."  He makes well over 140 grand a year.  I on the other hand, got my last pay raise in 2007, and it was a 15 cent raise per hour.

There is an old theory in Communications called, "Symbolic Iteractionism."  It basically, in a nutshell, says, non-verbal signs and symbols are powerful messages.  In the Vietnamese section of greater Los Angeles for example, they still fly the old South Vietnamese flag on their light poles in Westminster (Little Saigon). In Northern Iraq, they refuse to fly the Iraqi flag and fly their own Kurdish flag. That would be like Wisconsin refusing to fly the American Flag.  Powerful omissions without speaking a word.

What was the wordless message that hit me between the eyes on that quiet Christmas Eve as I drove around the curve on East Milwaukee Street hill and looked down into Down Town Janesville? A city of some 63,000 people. The flagship County Seat city of Rock County. A county of 160,000 people.

Here is what I was told by...., the...., nothingness.

"Hi silly traveler. Why are you going through our downtown?  We don't give a fuck about our downtown. Why would you? Take another route and find another town if you want to see Christmas lights.  We damn sure don't care about our town and we sure the hell..., don't care if you care."

In the City Council meetings however...., we will ring our hands and gnash our teeth over the 50-year plight of Down Town Janesville, and say with a sly factious grin..., right after we vote the City Manager a fat pay raise....,

"We gotta fix Downtown...., so people use it!!!!"