The most important Americans of the past 75 years

[revbob]

Adele because she eats puppies and millions of people love her boring sterile music.

Surely my Garth Brooks suggestion further up trumps both Elvis and Adele.

A: because Garth has outsold Elvis
B: Adele is English

Im supposed to know this?

[Dr. Medulla]

Greatest is pretty subjective, I like the Ian idea if only because he articulates a credible alternative to late-era capitalism. Maybe his influence is still yet to be fully determined. You have guys like Beto O'Rourke talking about "fugazi capitalism" so I think there's something there.

That’s my point. IM articulates—and models—a distinct alternative to the dominant way of life. The idea does suffer for a lack of influence (the quant argument) and that’s why I’d hesitate, but the ideas and behaviours are very important for demonstrating both a resistant ideology to the past 75 years but also one that expresses much older American republican values. To those who say you have no choice to go along with ruthless profiteering and a transactional view of life, IM represents the rebuttal.

[matedog]

Elvis

Why? C'mon, answers need evidence.

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

I'm no expert on this era, but I understand that he was the first superstar of what has become youth culture. Before rock and roll, I'm not really familiar with any big youth culture. What the hell were teens into in the 40s? Fuck if I know. This I think really extends into all popular music and trends associated with young people that have come since: rock and roll (obviously), hip hop, Tik Tok, etc that dominate our culture to this day.

[Dr. Medulla]

Elvis

Why? C'mon, answers need evidence.

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

Man, you're making me think this early on a cold morning .
Seriously, though, let me give it some thought.

My apologies if I came off as a jerk, but I also the think the bar is higher with the more “obvious” answers. Elvis is important, but is he important in ways that go on for decades in ways that others don’t? The exercise is trickier than it first appears, I think.

[Dr. Medulla]

Elvis

Why? C'mon, answers need evidence.

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

I'm no expert on this era, but I understand that he was the first superstar of what has become youth culture. Before rock and roll, I'm not really familiar with any big youth culture. What the hell were teens into in the 40s? Fuck if I know. This I think really extends into all popular music and trends associated with young people that have come since: rock and roll (obviously), hip hop, Tik Tok, etc that dominate our culture to this day.

Frank Sinatra has just as credible a claim for being a teen idol who made girls swoon and all that.

[JennyB]

Bing Crosby is a leftfield kind of answer that appeals to me. I was thinking about tech/culture people and leaned towards Steve Jobs, but that seems kind of easy and probably gives him more significance than he deserves. So Crosby is in the running. I also like it because it's a music answer without doing the easy Elvis response.

I also thought about medicine, but drew a complete blank there. Like, maybe Watson (and Crick) for discovering DNA?

Maybe Henrietta Lacks?

[Marky Dread]

Adele because she eats puppies and millions of people love her boring sterile music.

Surely my Garth Brooks suggestion further up trumps both Elvis and Adele.

A: because Garth has outsold Elvis
B: Adele is English

Im supposed to know this?

You seem to know way more about her than I do.

[matedog]

Why? C'mon, answers need evidence.

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

I'm no expert on this era, but I understand that he was the first superstar of what has become youth culture. Before rock and roll, I'm not really familiar with any big youth culture. What the hell were teens into in the 40s? Fuck if I know. This I think really extends into all popular music and trends associated with young people that have come since: rock and roll (obviously), hip hop, Tik Tok, etc that dominate our culture to this day.

Frank Sinatra has just as credible a claim for being a teen idol who made girls swoon and all that.

As a heartthrob sure, but he operated within a genre that wasn't teen/youth focused. His music wasn't "young people's music". That's the key distinction, that he was the first superstar of youth culture.

[Silent Majority]

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

I'm no expert on this era, but I understand that he was the first superstar of what has become youth culture. Before rock and roll, I'm not really familiar with any big youth culture. What the hell were teens into in the 40s? Fuck if I know. This I think really extends into all popular music and trends associated with young people that have come since: rock and roll (obviously), hip hop, Tik Tok, etc that dominate our culture to this day.

Frank Sinatra has just as credible a claim for being a teen idol who made girls swoon and all that.

As a heartthrob sure, but he operated within a genre that wasn't teen/youth focused. His music wasn't "young people's music". That's the key distinction, that he was the first superstar of youth culture.

Not quite true - he was seen as a bobbysoxer's idol at first emergence in the 40s. All the young women were screaming round the block to see him in New York theatres,

[Flex]

Yeah, Frank definitely started out as a Teen Idol. I think that was a distinction between him and Bing from just a few years earlier, frankly.

I dunno if I'd really nominate him, but how about Henry Kissinger for an honorable mention (if he qualifies, born in Germany but became a U.S. citizen). Besides being an actual advisor to essentially every president since he came into favor, his vision of realpolitik guided American foreign policy as its dominant outlook until at least the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and has been a key strand of it ever since, impacting essentially incalculable numbers of people on this planet (mostly for ill, I'd editorialize). He wasn't the only purveyor of realpolitik, obviously, but he seems to be its primary architect in the American context.

Addendum: Somewhat cynically, I'd similarly consider FDR for essentially co-opting labor from socialism and securing a capitalist future for America and setting us on our current, as of yet unbroken, path. The alpha to what the optimist might consider to be Ian Mackaye's omega.

[revbob]

Adele because she eats puppies and millions of people love her boring sterile music.

Surely my Garth Brooks suggestion further up trumps both Elvis and Adele.

A: because Garth has outsold Elvis
B: Adele is English

Im supposed to know this?

You seem to know way more about her than I do.

Well Ive been trying to raise awareness about the puppies but most people want to ignore it or sweep it under the rug.

Also, last 75 years? So that means from 1947 onward. Crosby died in 1977, so that's 30 years out of the last 75 that he had time to exert his influence. Sinatra had 50 years to leave his mark. Maybe if you're asking Sterling and Waldmyn they could no doubt go on about Crosby, Sinatra etc along with 5 cent cokes, malt shops and penny arcades. I guess what Im saying is no.

[Marky Dread]

Adele because she eats puppies and millions of people love her boring sterile music.

Surely my Garth Brooks suggestion further up trumps both Elvis and Adele.

A: because Garth has outsold Elvis
B: Adele is English

Im supposed to know this?

You seem to know way more about her than I do.

Well Ive been trying to raise awareness about the puppies but most people want to ignore it or sweep it under the rug.

I guess she owns a big rug.

[revbob]

Surely my Garth Brooks suggestion further up trumps both Elvis and Adele.

A: because Garth has outsold Elvis
B: Adele is English

Im supposed to know this?

You seem to know way more about her than I do.

Well Ive been trying to raise awareness about the puppies but most people want to ignore it or sweep it under the rug.

I guess she owns a big rug.

Made from all the puppy furs.

[Flex]

Yeah, Bing might scrape a little too far into the past. I dunno if I just wasn't doing the math right or not thinking that his most influential period would have been in the 30s (ditto FDR, obviously, predates the 75 year cutoff). But it's interesting to suggest that in order for someone to be important they have to be a ubiquitous household name presently. That would compel us to seriously consider Taylor Swift, no?

[WestwayKid]

Why? C'mon, answers need evidence.

He forever changed American pop culture. He was counter culture before counter culture was a thing. When he first appeared, he was unlike anything most people had ever seen, and was a direct influence on everyone from John Lennon and Paul McCartney to Joe Strummer . He opened doors, stripped away cultural barriers, opened eyes. He changed everything: music, language, style. Lennon once said that before Elvis there was nothing and he's right. Sure, maybe someone else would have come along to make that cultural change, but then again - maybe he was the only person who could have done what he did, but his presence changed the world forever.

Okay, I'm being the asshole professor here (seriously, sorry!), but what does he change and how? What exactly does he do to normalize behaviour or perspective in ways that others haven't? Just saying he changed everything is expecting your reader to fill in the blanks for you.

Man, you're making me think this early on a cold morning .
Seriously, though, let me give it some thought.

My apologies if I came off as a jerk, but I also the think the bar is higher with the more “obvious” answers. Elvis is important, but is he important in ways that go on for decades in ways that others don’t? The exercise is trickier than it first appears, I think.

No worries !

I've been kicking this around in my head for a few hours. It seems part of the question of Elvis is what was there before him? He did not invent rock music. He also wasn't the first teen idol. He actually came to mind because we started watching the new Elvis biopic last night and I spent last week in Memphis. So, if he didn't invent rock music, what did he add to the genre? I think he helped bring the genre into the public sphere. It's not as easy as saying he helped shine a light on what had been primarily an African-American thing, because rock was more than just rhythm & blues, but I think he was the guy who bridged the rhythm & blues & country model that became what we know as rock & roll. In regards to the teen idol thing, I don't know enough about early Sinatra. Did he generate the level of mania (and fear) that Elvis did? I feel like Elvis challenged some very entrenched social mores around race, sexuality, masculinity, style. Again, I don't know enough about Sinatra to be able to say he did that in the way that Elvis did.