Privilege Versus Entitlement

A 2009 CBS News segment tell us that:

"[Millennials] were raised by doting parents who told them they are special, played in little leagues with no winners or losers, or all winners. They are laden with trophies just for participating."
"And their priorities are simple: they come first."  
"Faced with new employees who want to roll into work with their iPods and flip flops around noon, but still be CEO by Friday, companies are realizing that the era of the buttoned down exec happy to have a job is as dead as the three-Martini lunch."
"Childhoods filled with trophies and adulation didn't prepare them for the cold realities of work."
The rest of the article is at http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-3475200.html.  There's a lot more of the same kind of rhetoric.

And since then, here's a quick history:  http://www.salon.com/2013/05/09/time_magazines_millennials_cover_a_history_of_millennials_in_the_media/

The conclusion?  Millennials get a lot of criticism, and a pile of assumptions.  Because many Millennials have more opportunities than previous generations, I think that some people might confuse privilege with entitlement.

privilege (n)

1) restricted right or benefit: an advantage, right, or benefit that is not available to everyone

2) rights and advantages enjoyed by elite: the rights and advantages enjoyed by a relatively small group of people, usually as a result of wealth or social status

3) special honor: a special treat or honor

en·ti·tle·ment (n)
1) the condition of having a right to have, do, or get something
2) the feeling or belief that you deserve to be given something (such as special privileges)
3) a type of financial help provided by the government for members of a particular group

A look at the second definition of privilege is what I would most like to point out.  I am wildly privileged.  My point is here, that it's not because of money, money only plays a small part in what privilege means.

• I am cisgender (meaning "the same", vs. transgender).  I will never have to deal with the prejudice of those unwilling to accept my identity.
• I am heterosexual.  I have married the person of my dreams without anyone holding up a sign telling me that I'm going to hell.
• I am healthy.  I do not have any mental or physical ailment or disability that prevents me from pursuing my dreams or causes others to make wrongful assumptions about my capabilities.
• I'm white.  
• I grew up in a stable, middle-class household with parents who love me.
• I have never have been the victim of (or perpetrator of) any real crime.
• I have never been the victim of traumatic events, such as a natural disaster.

So, when I went to college, I wasn't surprised I got in.  I have a lot of advantages because of the opportunities granted to me by privilege.  This is not entitlement.  I didn't believe that I deserved to go to college because of them.  I believed that I had a responsibility to make the most out of them.  I'm lucky enough to have a full-time job, which I wouldn't if I hadn't worked hard and tried to make the most out of each chance.  I'm not saying that my advantage should exist, but until the day that people are free of prejudice, some people will always have advantage over others.

What I feel might be confused for entitlement is when a Millennial graduates, realizing how many opportunities and advantages they have been given, perhaps with a better sense of what privilege is than in previous generations... and fails to find work.  The economy has taken a well-publicized nosedive.  Wages shrink, the cost of living goes up, and unemployment is higher.  Expectations for a minimum education has risen while the cost of said education has exponentially ballooned.  I could go on, but anyone who has been unemployed in the last 5 years likely knows exactly what I'm talking about.

How I've interpreted the communication from my peers, from internet blogs to personal conversations, is that we feel an responsibility, an obligation to make the most out of our advantages, and after being told for years that we could do anything we set our mind to, we are bewildered when our expectations fail to materialize.  I thought we were supposed to give back to society?  Does this mean we didn't set our mind to it?  How else are we supposed to make sense of our privilege, unless we are able to realize our potential?

I would LOVE to do a photo op, where I took pictures of people holding up signs that broke up our assumptions about what privilege is and who has it.  As the saying goes, everyone's normal till you get to know them.

I've been middle class all my life and I'm still working on how I see people with more (and less) than I have.  Instead of heaping hate on the 10%, or even the 1%, why don't we refrain from making assumptions about what privileges they may or may not have had?  If they're an asshole, it might be worth finding out why.  We are all but human, after all.

In the vein of the article "I'm a Millennial. Please Stop Being a Douche to Me", http://iambeggingmymothernottoreadthisblog.com/2013/09/18/im-a-millenial-please-stop-being-a-douche-to-me/, I'd like to ask people to reconsider how they frame entitlement & privilege, and take a moment and realize what privileges we may (or may not) have been granted.

Why I Think This Article is Wrong (and you should too)

The article in question:
http://www.clydefitchreport.com/2013/07/a-new-education-for-a-new-theatre/
Further reading at:
http://www.clydefitchreport.com/2013/06/on-saying-it-to-their-faces/

First, I'd like to point out that this article is very well-intentioned, and I think it makes some good points, but then takes them too far.  You might also call me a cynic.

Walters, in http://www.clydefitchreport.com/2013/06/business-model-the-next-frontier/, points out that the current business model of theatre is fairly unsustainable.  I agree.  He seems to think that through "innovation", Facebook, Foursquare, etc, we can start something new.  He proposes locking a number of people in a room and writing about what they say.  I'm skeptical.  I'll be getting back to this.

There's business in making actors.  Performing arts schools, theatre education classes, and high-priced theatre degrees all are making money off of people's belief that one day they can be an actor/director/theatre professional.  So it is no surprise that upon graduation, with thousands and thousands of dollars of student debt, many are surprised to find that their dream isn't quite "as seen on TV"?  Like PhDs, trained actors are flooding the market.

I agree with Walters, that actors should feel empowered to make their own art.  However, unlike writing or painting, acting is collaborative, and once the work has been produced, it is over.  The most an actor can do by themselves is a one-person show, as long as they can find a space and an audience.  Training students to start their own theatre companies will result in a lot of start-up theatre companies, which is not necessarily the best thing for any community.

The way I see it:  X number of people in a community would want to see a show.  Companies, foundations, and governments have X amount of money to donate to theatre companies.  If you double the number of theatre companies in a town, the number of audience members and available money does NOT double as well.  Everyone gets less.  Established companies close, and new companies falter to get off the ground.  No one is able to making a living at it, and so what we find is a lot of community theatres fighting each other for a limited audience.

I don't see that as a good thing.

We cannot make more audiences by wishing.  We cannot make our audiences richer by crossing our fingers.  If we want more audiences, we need to have theatres that have the funds for marketing and the will to engage the community.  These theatres need to let recent graduates in to play with them, instead of forcing them out into the world.  Give them space.  Let them come and learn.  Making the theatre community start by reaching out into its own community.  Use collaboration and joint marketing efforts to send troupes of established theatres out into small communities.

As I said before, I believe Walter has some good ideas about making the theatre education process much more realistic.  However, we also need to be cautious that we don't flood the market with theatre companies instead of actors, because then we are back at square one where no one is making a living at theatre and because of creating such a large supply, we have devalued the performance itself.

Two Roses for Richard III

Off to Stratford, and the Courtyard Theatre!

The RSC hosted a Brazilian company's work, Two Roses for Richard III, for a five day run.  It was different, and good... I think.  The play started with a nude fest (partial female nudity, full male), but did not have contexts of sexuality, and as I guessed correctly.  During the talkback we attended the following day, one audience member challenged the director on it.  She was an old British lady.  Not to stereotype, BUT...

The set reminded me of running water, and as I found out later, it was designed to show how there is no end, the "stage" just keeps going on and on.

As the director said at Unwrapped (the talkback), he is trying, with his co-director, to create a new language of theatre based in theatre and circus and acrobatics.  This company used the space, used all of it, height and width and breath.  Assassins dropped from the ceiling, people were raised up, and many interesting visuals ensued.  I can't really describe them to do them justice.

It worked in creating a new language, but I spent a lot of time trying to figure out what that language was.  Since I'm not familiar with the circus, I think I missed some ideas and allusions.  Images merged and changed and struck me and then confused me...  I enjoyed it, both intellectually and emotionally.  The biggest problem I had was that the entire production had surtitles, which meant over half the time I was reading the lines on the screen.  This half of the time I was not having as much fun, I was just trying to keep up with the speakers, didn't see any of their expressions, and missed some of the acrobatics.  I should have just let the surtitles be, but I couldn't help myself.

I'd love to see more productions by this company.  It was a palate-cleanser, showing the borders of what one can do just using Shakespeare's text... and a little of their own.  This production looked at acting, had actors speak about their characters in jarringly metatheatrical moments, which peppered the production... drawing us in... shoving us out... drawing us in once again into the world of the play...

I'd recommend it, as long as you can find reasonably priced tickets.  Any seat is good.

Days 30th, 31st, and 32nd

May 13th:

Travel day!  Really and truly.  Me and mum got on the train back to London... arrived at the Lime Tree Hotel... and crashed.  Slept.  Zzz... the entire day.  Except for one mission to acquire food.

May 14th:

Mum and I started out the day heading to St. Paul's, only to discover that it was closed for the day for some kind of event.  Disappointed, we wandered the streets for a little bit before we decided to just trolley over to the British Library, and boy was that a good decision!  The BL was incredible, really demonstrated what book and history dorks me and mum truly are.  Some of the things that we went nuts about:  Massenger prompt book, a First Folio, the original music sheets from Mozart and Handel, Beethoven's tuning fork, the Magna Carta, Davinci's sketches, one of three surviving Tyndale translations of the New Testament, the Codex Sinaiticus (aka, the Gospels version 1.0), and the St. Cuthbert Gospel (oldest European book that is still intact).  OMG SQUEE!  That was just the gallery.  The exhibition included a painting of Hobbitton-across-the-water by Tolkein, Stow's Survey of London, and original drafts from Rowling...

After that, we went to St. Martin's Cafe in the Crypt, ate a tasty spicy meal (which I got to co-opt), then checked out St. Martin's briefly before walking across the street to the National Portrait Gallery.  The Gallery is more interesting than I thought it would be.  It had a lot of images I know from textbooks... like portraits of Elizabeth, Cecil, Wolsey, Drake, Raleigh, Leicester, Dudley, Cranmer, Cromwell, Mary I, Phillip II, Richard III, Henry VIII... My previously-blown mind was turned into goo.

After all that excitement, me and mum went and got more tasty goodies from the pink shop before we crashed.

May 15th:

Mum and I's last day here.  First stop:  St. Paul's.  They let us in this time.  No pictures allowed, of course, but I was too awed to be angry for any period of time.  Even though it's not an ancient cathedral, it is still a beautiful, beautiful building.  I have the need for there to be cathedrals in the states, cathedrals like I've seen in the last month.  I've fallen in love with cathedrals.  St. Paul's threw me a bone, too... it let me climb.  Some 200 steps up are the Whispering Galleries, where you can look down into the interior of St. Paul's and peer at the little people praying.  Next, where I boldly ventured by myself, was another 200 steps of narrow, winding stairs.  At this stop was the Stone Gallery, where you can look from the edge of the dome over London.  And then after another roughly 150 stairs, very tight, lots of heights, you get to the Golden Gallery, an amazing view of London.  I was giddy.  And I took pictures.  Lots of them.  I deserved it after all that climbing :-P.  I love heights.  Going down was... interesting.  I wish the individual stairs were larger.  I trust me not to fall... but I don't trust other people, say, behind me, especially if they are larger than me.

I thought I misplaced my mother for about ten minutes, but I found her.  After St. Paul's, we went looking for souvenirs, got our luggage from the Lime Tree, and I saw Mum off on the Piccadilly Line, took the line myself to the YHA, checked in, then rushed off to the Globe where I watched 1 Henry IV (review upcoming) and the first half of 2 Henry IV.  Came back to the YHA, and now I'm spending my last bit of time here in London.

Macbeth

Well, maybe this play is cursed.  But only in Polish.

Having seen a variety of Globe to Globe productions, I was fairly confident that taking my mother to a show would be a good experience for us.  The Globe had warned me in a letter that this show contained nudity, violence, and a rape scene.  It gave me the impression of a dark, violent Macbeth, a gritty reality.

This was not reality.  Or if it was, it was a sad director trying to recreate the awesome party he had last month with a half-dozen transvestites.

The problem with this was that the audience was not completely wasted, stoned, or high.  If they had been, they might have enjoyed it.  For me, it was a bad mushroom trip.  A nightmare where the text of Macbeth is violated.  It was a rape scene... they raped Shakespeare's text.

I suppose it needs a little more description.  To say something was unrelentingly awful should require more justification than just my word.

The witches were transvestites, the only slightly clever moment (they are women, but for their beards...).  However, they were present in almost every scene, dancing, staggering drunkenly, flashing the audience, etc.  Lady Macbeth was absolutely batshit from the outset.  I could never tell what any of the actors wanted... their objectives and tactics were completely obscure.  I couldn't see Macbeth's internal struggle.  Malcomb was a violent ass.  And the party scenes went on... and on... Did the director think the overweight men running around in their underwear, resulting in fat bouncing buttocks, was remotely entertaining or contributed to the story of Macbeth?

Me and Mum left at intermission, and I only got that far because I needed a stamp for a free tour.  My soul was bleeding.

The Duchess of Malfi

Mum and I had to see something at the Old Vic, and I've wanted to see the Duchess of Malfi, so we went on Lastminute.com and grabbed some tickets in the morning for an evening show.  The theatre is lovely... I'm not used to being in a proscenium space.  There was a little mixup with the tickets... we were given tickets for seats that other folks had, so we were moved closer to the stage.  We were three rows back, center.  I don't think tickets get better than that.  We paid around 20 pounds for 50 pound tickets.  :-)

I would love to point out specific parts of this show that were especially lovely, but the work of everyone melded in such a beautiful way that it will be hard for me to praise particular aspects.  The set design and lighting design worked together.... it was amazing.  The atmosphere changed from cathedral to prison to grand hall and back again through the lighting, showing off different aspects of the set design.  Truly remarkable.

The cast was excellent.  Eve Best as the Duchess had top billing, even above John Webster (the author).  The story was clear, the actors creative and compelling, the music appropriate, and the choreography a perfect finish for this triple-layer cake of tragic decadence.  Like any baking project, this one had all the right ingredients in the right time.

Mum loved it just as much as I did.

Days 28th and 29th

May 11th:

Our first full day in Stratford!  We started out by going to Shakespeare's childhood home, which sadly was already crowded with students.  The format of the tour moved me away from their copy of a First Folio faster than I would have liked.  A First Folio... one of the most valuable books in the world.  The birthplace itself was not particularly remarkable.  It was an old building, but it had gone through so many different owners I didn't know what was from the period and what was repaired or a recreation.  The floor in the parlour was the genuine part of the house I knew of.  So I started my day by walking in Shakespeare's footsteps.  Next we went to Nash's House and the excavation of New Place, which really wasn't that interesting, really.  I don't care about his descendants that much.  No connection to them.

Then we toodled past Shakespeare's school, which is still a school, so no tour there.  We stopped at the chapel next to the school, that was cool.  I really like churches and cathedrals now, apparently.  Then we walked to Hall's Croft, where I looked at the house and the things they had and it was mildly interesting.  Last, but not least, we went to Holy Trinity where Shakespeare is buried.  I sat in front of his grave almost an hour, thinking deep thoughts and whatnot.  I felt like that was the end of my pilgrimage... I am ready to go home.  I have paid homage to the author who I studied, seen his town, seen his houses, seen the streets where he walked and now have visited his grave, the most concrete thing we have of him, except for the legacy of his work and our language.

We finished up the day by watching a production of Two Roses for Richard III, in Brazilian... review upcoming (I'll get to my reviews).

May 12th

Me and mum went to Unwrapped, an hour's discussion with the directors of Two Roses, then killed some time before the 1:30 showing of King John (review upcoming LOL).  After the show, we got hungry and bickered, fed us, then I slept.