that movie was terrible.

But....it has ELECTROLITES.

well if the pokemon cards didn't have stats then we'd never get any fights accomplished! lucario would be killing pikachu and jigglypuff would be inflating off the charts!

that's right, you better bold and apologize about my non-active techno-influenced manboy ornate imaginationlackingbraincenter.

kids my age, and older relatives say this to me about my shirts too though...

they're all like... "what does your shirt mean" i'm like listen yo!

That movie proves that Mike Judge knows too much about the south. And thus, must be detroyed.

that movie was amusing. and pretty fucking scary true.

you have a point mezo, and its especially annoying when people say that when there IS NOTHING TO GET.

that movie was terrible
and yet so poignant...

imagination may be dying, but it's still there. I am still amazed by what some little kids come up with, but maybe it's because my expectations are low.

people just need world learnings.

While its true that there is a lot more media out there and children are exposed to a lot more content, I dispute those conclusions.

As a child, video games, cartoons, and pokemón cards fueled my imagination. All my creative output as a youth was in reference to those things. I'd create my own pokemón cards with my own descriptions, I drew robots, monsters, and heroes because those were the things I was being exposed to.

Imaginative media leads to imaginative play.

Yeah, it does seem that way. I was surprised at the number of the kids at my school who were getting pumped for "meet the spartains"

this one goes in your mouth

this one goes in your butt

no wait.....

I've actually heard lots of goodthings baoutthat flick, but i haven't seen it yet. All i know about it is it wasn't released in the theaters because people "didn't get" the concept when viewing it in the previews. My head hasn't sank any lower on my body when I heard that news a bit ago.

I agree with you mezo about modern technology and many many kid's imaginations being stunted by everything being as flashy and high-tech and as specific as possible. Look at the rock that was out when we were kids (early 90's, for the sake of arguing) and the stuff that is considered top of the pops and having something to do with playing their instruments. Fucking Paramore, Relient K, etc. All shiny bands processed to the point of perfection- too much perfection to where it barely sounds like real instruments- and most of their stuff is written by the same people...i mean, fucking rock bands don't even WRITE their own stuff anymore. Also, ever since every child's toy comes with something that makes it talk to you, I've always thought that was a major imagination killer, because you used to have various adventures with everything you owned and made up conversations and a voice for the toy...now it specifically points you in every activity's direction that it is "designed" to do and really takes so much away from a child's brain and imagination and just spells it the fuck out for them.

Here here mezo, I'm giving my kids all the old school toys and Beatles music they can take. If they shoot one of their eyes out from a rocket that was deemed "unsafe" in a gi joe toy, they'll just have to wear an eyepatch like a badge of honor.

I didn't know you know Spanish,brian!

Aw, pear, I hoped you'd come in here and be stoked that you got an honorable blog mention!

You're in the age group of heavy video gaming, maltz, and you can't really compare old people. They always are curious to new trends kids come up with. Chances are they have ideas to what the shirts are, but are curious to what "you kids" see it as.

Man, warD., you're right about THAT. The south will rise (in stupidity) again!

That's right on both counts, bp. Also, HEY!

Sure, it might be hanging on by a thread phee. According to NPR's research, it IS diminishing.

It's only a thought, blame. I am not saying ALL kids/teens/early 20-somethings are this way. But the conclusions are such that MOST seem to be going this way. Curious, are your parents creative?

Oh man, trav brings up another good point. Imagination IN MOVIES is dying.

You are my lucky penny isa.

WOW- FA! You & I agree on something IMPORTANT. Cheers to you.



*** ya'll type so fast and I am drunk, so sorry replies have taken 1642345 minutes

Trav, remember amazing and completely appropriate and creative parody movies like Airplane!, The Naked Gun series, Hot Shots! movies, Kentucky Fried Movie....oh fuck, these were all done by the same people. And now they're lending their talents to Superhero movie and the like. I hate that every parody is also spelled out "epic movie", "superhero movie", "meet the shitty references", etc.

p.s. Idiocracy (which I saw for the first & last time last weekend) is terrible. The acting & script is terrible. The concept is terrible. It's terrible mainly because ... it could become true.

I was pretty excited when i read the words you were writing and i was nodding my head in agrerement mezo.

Kentucky Fried Movie! SO GOOD.

^agreed with what he said about today's music. What is really scary is the amount of freakish hero worship which is seen today amongst younger kids. Hana Montana for example. When she came to austin the papers said that tickets sold out within two hours. I can't imagine how many desperate parents were temorarily hated by thier children over something like that.

2 times agree!

haha, I was raised by a single parent- my dad's a salesman and can't draw a stick figure.

In my opinion, as a result of mass media and the constant barrage of images we're presented with, art and design has gotten MORE creative and MORE imaginative.

The sort of stuff that's out there now wasn't around 200 years ago (that of course is because of a lot of reasons though). Part of it is because imaginations weren't exactly celebrated in western culture until relatively recently, too. Funny that once we start to value them, we suddenly think we're going to lose 'em.

kids are always different from their parents.

Oh, well, kids will always idolize musicians. Problem is that today, the musicians are rarely just that. They should be called Studio Trickisians, but that's just harder to say.

i don't get this blog!

I don't think imagination is dwindling. Also, your NPR link is takes me to http:///

Art & design, blame, might be on the rise- but what about the audience? That's the point I am making. The audience is not getting it.

Were you an only child?

SHIT! Link fixed, ya'll can listen now!

Poor kids still have imagination. 'Cause they have to.

I think imagination and such is on the rise in CERTAIN kids. Overall, I think the stupid people in our society are getting stupider and the brighter kids are going leaps and bounds over stuff that creative people nowadays are putting out. It's kinda like our economy where people are either doing really bad or doing really good.

I could be wrong on this aassumption, it just seems like this.

I'll agree with THAT, ward.

I can't imagine that teenagers like me are losing their imagination.


[commentofthedayrightthere!]

Honestly, in your cross-section of teenagers who don't get the designs, I don't think that shows a lack of imagination but rather a lack of sufficient logic to put two and two together (since the title of the design often explains what there is to 'get').

Oh geez, I fully agree. It buggs me so much sometimes. I mean, it makes me feel kinda special, knowing that most of the people around me are kinda intelligent, and knowing that I sure am, but really. Did you stop and think about what you think about things after the age of 8? Did you stop listening to anything that wasn't hand-fed to you by the media?


Do I really have to explain what communism is to people when I wear that shirt? Does it really need to make sense that there are birds coming out of that feather or why Mr. Bonaparte is dressed up as an indian? I'm sorry kids, the type tees can't be the only thing I wear.

But the fact is, the more creative stuff and things that a culture put up as being important are certainly going to give kids and ADULTS even more access to more invigorating and mind-challenging art of all kinds. It's scary that when i watch television nowadays how mad i get at the television, with nearly every station being some horrific fucking reality show invading nearly every half hour slot. i just DVR The Office, LOST, The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Bill Maher, South Park, and various PBS docs and now John Adams, and I'm good to go on what quality the tv has to offer me now!

That question should be easy to answer, but I've got a crazy family! I lived with my dad with a younger sister, but spent some time at my mom's house. In total I have nine siblings! One them them is a half brother whose only a year and a half younger than I, and I have him to thank for my creativity. We were always doin' art type stuff together. Why?

But I still think more images can only make people more creative. I think of creativity as the act of synthesizing different things in order to create something new. The more things that we see, the more potential there is to go in new directions. Not to say modern media doesn't also have a paralyzing effect too.

I remember playing the original Super Smash bros as a child almost every day. Before most of the battles though, I'd come up with a back story for why this fight was going down.

Don't forget the Discovery Channel!

teenagers are cute.

yeah that movie was stupid.

but yeah it had electrolytes and that part was funny.

and what else can i comment on?

lol @ NPR

I didn't play a lot of video games. My family never advanced past regular NES. And my mom always hogged it.

haha, yeah travioli. I was always doing that sort of stuff too. My bro and I used to play this game called escape velocity a lot, it was like a space ship action game. We started getting these huge pieces of paper and then we'd "draw" the game out on the sheets, creating epic spaceship battles with crayola markers.

I blame the MTV video games!

^That's awesome.

I'd also listen to some fast-paced music and imagine a fight scene that'd go along with it. (i still do that sometimes)

I also get kinda angry at this one radiostation. Its the kind that only plays top chart crap and whatnot. Anyways, when they were trying to say the name MUSE, they pronounced it MOOZ. I can understand if youve never heard of them, but its a word in the english language.

The comments about poverty and creativity ring true to me. There are mind numbing effects to excessive tv watching, video game playing and gadget consuming on developing minds.

However, since everyone has one form or another of garbage in their life (school, home, etc.) it seems like a matter of picking your poison. If one has money they'll pay for medication or if they're less well off they'll take a piece of paper and draw like I did to self-medicate.

I think NPR does some interesting fact finding, but I'd re-evaluated much of the article on the basis of perspective. I'm not refering to politics, but it's demographic: college educated, over-protective parents who buy into the latest therapy models and how-to parenting tips. With all the parental controls suggested, I'd be surprised if children didn't have nervous breakdowns at 6.

Sorry for the lengthy response I couldn't remove anymore.

the only answer is for nerds to breed. bring me a dork with a 135IQ or higher.

Yeah, jwahashi, I think there's a lot of truth to that. Drawing was always an escape for me, and I definitely had an unstable childhood.

I think it's a completely true report, personally.

While this is true to some extent i cannot whole heartedly agree, every once in a while someone (who is around my age) will tell me that they think my shirt is amusing. Even so, these occasions are few and far between...i will oftentimes receive blank stares.