The Cultural Front

Jennifer Klein

10667174

02/09/04

CES 440

The Cultural Front

In the USA, it seems as though there is always a revolution going on. The world is changing everyday. Everyday there is something new going on. Everyday there are people fighting for what they believe in, from social movements to political movements. Everyday people are working hard for their future. People are just trying to make it in the real world. In the the 1930’s, there was so much going on, from WWI to WWII, followed by the depression. The world was in a slump, and people were doing everything they could to make it. The cultural front involves history on the ordinary person, politics, and literature. I wish to compare some of the problems of today, with the problems of the past, discussing politics, culture, hegemony, and the working class.

USA is the richest country and has the most poor people in numbers. Our money isn’t spent on education, health, or housing projects for poor people. Recently most of our money has been going to Iraq or weapons for soldiers so they can keep the peace. Our money doesn’t go to the ordinary person. Rich people keep getting rich, and the poor keep getting poor! I don’t feel our money is put into any investments. How come our gas prices are so high? Wouldn’t it make sense to invest in oil, so the average person can have some spare change to spend on something other than gas to get from point A to B? Our system is unjust and the only way to fix it is to fight for it, and hope that someone in power hears you. When people in power say something, people automatically believe them, even if there is no basis to their knowledge. President Bush had repeatedly said that John Kerry had changed his positions about our war many times. Kerry said it wasn’t true, but people believed Bush anyways, because he is a man of power, which is a form of communism. There are ways to change our system fundamentally instead of going to war with other countries. Most of our money right now goes to our National Defense and Social Security. It’s nice the money will be there later for us when we retire, but what about those of us who need social security benefits now? There have and always will be problems with the system, and no matter what you do, you can never make everyone happy!

In the 1930’s the big political movement was the power of the CIO, The congress of Industrial Organization. They came to power at the beginning of WWII. It was considered the rise on the left, the radical change and new ideas, unionization. The working class people were representing the lower socioeconomic class, the “left”. The working class is anyone who was involved in labor power to production. Consumerism and culture began to take over.

Culture is an entire spectrum of human activities. Everything is a part of culture. Culture is political. Hollywood is a cultural enterprise, it shapes our culture. Culture has struggle, organizational activism. Capitalism creates situations where people are disassociated.

Everything is political, where there is power there is politics. People were starting to see things differently. There was no more segregation. Rich people saw things on the lower level. Women were starting to work more. Cultural front involves middle and lower class politically and culturally. People were working so hard and not seeing any benefits. The main stream media didn’t criticize capitalism, because if they so much as started to question it, they would be fired. This is a form of hegemony, ideological