Ursus Posted July 17, 2007 Report Share Posted July 17, 2007 What's the deal with lawn Gnomes? Why do people put these godawful ugly things in their yards? All too often I am driving along and see an otherwise perfectly kept property despoiled by these crude plastic monstrosities. What is the appeal? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
M. Porcius Cato Posted July 18, 2007 Report Share Posted July 18, 2007 Indeed, this is a burning question for our times. According to this Spiegel article, the garden gnome is "a symbol of German diligence and order" that has unjustly had "his reputation tarnished by campaigns led by mean-spirited elitist intellectuals and even perverts. To intellectuals and other touchy types, he's despised as the embodiment of kitsch and petit-bourgeois parochialism." (Elitists, intellectuals, and perverts--oh my!) Creators of the garden gnome are equally concerned with widespread scorn for their handiwork, blaming "the arrival of mass production and plastic." "Saturation of the market with garish overly 'cute', often oversized caricatures of gnomes," writes Kimmel Gnomes, "has given the gnome a bad name." My own view is that even the expensive, non-plastic things are artistic abominations and symbols of nothing but atavism, but--being an elitist capitalist intellectual--what the hell do I know? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caldrail Posted July 22, 2007 Report Share Posted July 22, 2007 I suspect there's some deep instinctual thing going on here. Its as if these gnomes are your people, that the garden is your own little kingdom where these sedate beings can fish and smile harmlessly whilst your benificent rule satisifies your craving for status and power in your own back yard. Or maybe some people just like them? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ursus Posted July 22, 2007 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2007 Or maybe some people just like them? Sickos. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pertinax Posted July 22, 2007 Report Share Posted July 22, 2007 Or maybe some people just like them? Sickos. I think they are a subliminal ithyphallic motif, they sublimate the repressed sexuality inherent in having an overly manicured garden ...they are a cthonian eruption of menacing primal lust (all those fishing rods and banjoes). Also I dont like the colours.Burn them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kosmo Posted July 26, 2007 Report Share Posted July 26, 2007 Germanic barbarism. Nimphae and horny satyrs were much better. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nephele Posted July 26, 2007 Report Share Posted July 26, 2007 I'm still trying to figure out the "charm" behind the lawn sheep craze of a few years back. Thankfully, that appears to be dying out now. If garden gnomes (as Pertinax suggested) sublimate repressed sexuality, I shudder to think what some homeowners might have been doing to their lawn sheep. Freaks. -- Nephele Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silentium Posted July 26, 2007 Report Share Posted July 26, 2007 What's the deal with lawn Gnomes? Why do people put these godawful ugly things in their yards? All too often I am driving along and see an otherwise perfectly kept property despoiled by these crude plastic monstrosities. What is the appeal? XD An offence to good taste really. Someone in France was so concerned they decided to create a garden gnome liberation front lol. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lost_Warrior Posted July 26, 2007 Report Share Posted July 26, 2007 Aww, now I actually like the well made ceramic nomes. The brightly colored plastic veriety, not so much. I wonder when the flamingo craze will die off. My neighbor once had cows in her yard, and even in her trees. She did it to annoy her daughter. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
caldrail Posted July 27, 2007 Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 I met a guy in a pub a few years back who told me he was a gnome. Naturally I was a tad suspicious so I decided to enquire further. Foremost in my questioning was the issue was why he didn't look like a gnome. According to the gnome I spoke to, this isn't unusual. Many gnomes are hiding for fear of public ridicule or violence, kidnapping etc. So, I asked, How do you change your appearance? Concrete surgery? No, he said, you just shave and take steroids. Be warned though, because these hidden gnomes are all around us, plotting to take over the world and bring gnomekind to its destiny of world supremacy. Seriously, I heard it from the horses mouth.... But when you think of it, the gnomes lot is not a happy one. They are essentially a slave race, bought in the open market quite legally. You can imprison and torture, maim, and kill these helpless beings with impunity. We let them roam around our gardens but do we ever feed them? Clothe them? Let them inside when it rains or gets cold? No, none of us do that. Think of the hazards they must deal with. Pidgeon strikes are a constant danger, and dogs may well choose to mark their territories on them. What we humans do to gnomes is frankly shocking. I say we must adress the levels of gnomism in our society. Equal rights for Gnomes! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ursus Posted July 27, 2007 Author Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 Gnomes should be deported. Where did they come from, the Nordic countries? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ASCLEPIADES Posted July 27, 2007 Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 Salve, guys and Ladies! The French link of S (F.N.L.J. = Front de Lib Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ti. Coruncanius Posted July 27, 2007 Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 I wonder when the flamingo craze will die off. Well I found this in the news awhile ago: "Union Products, the Leominster, Mass., company that manufactured plastic pink flamingos, has closed its doors and announced it will no longer be turning out the kitschy lawn ornaments." Perhaps we will see the extinction of the plastic pink flamingo in our lifetime? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Silentium Posted July 27, 2007 Report Share Posted July 27, 2007 (edited) Salve, guys and Ladies! The French link of S (F.N.L.J. = Front de Lib Edited July 27, 2007 by Silentium Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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