Just in case the wars over public funding of controversial art should die down and get boring, cultural critic Camille Paglia has a scheme to keep things lively: She calls for federal funding of rock music. No less a venue than the opinion page of The New York Times hosted her plea for the nation to rescue ”Endangered Rock.”
That rock is in trouble will come as news to many. Parents who have reconciled themselves to losing their teenagers to Nirvana and Rush will need persuading that only public subsidies can keep this sound alive.
And that rock music deserves saving-with its surly, often anti-social attitude-is a proposition not every taxpayer will buy. Ms. Paglia`s own account of the ”brawling, boozing bad boys of rock, storming from city to city on their lusty, groupie-dogged trail” is hardly calculated to win over the civic-minded.
All in all, Ms. Paglia would do better to stick to another of her suggestions: that performers who have made a fortune from rock should in turn support needy musicians. Good luck to her in convincing the bad boys of what she calls their ethical obligation.
