'List' Evaluation Criteria & Standards

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More lists! More Top 10, Top 25, Top 100... Top WHATEVER lists! MORE MORE MORE!!!!!!!!!!

Hey everyone, I was in the latrine last night and decided to write a list of my Top 25 WHATEVER and 'publish' it onto the web!

Honestly, that is how it feels sometimes on internet-based authorship sites.

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It is consistently disappointing whenever authors publish lists without any supporting criteria as to 'how' or 'why' the entries on their 'lists' are gauged. Simply making a list of TV shows, or movies or songs, et al, and calling them a ‘Top 10', ‘Top 100' or ‘Top Whatever' without providing the reader any criteria by which the author arrived said selections is an insult to the reader.

Anyone can dash off a Top Ten List, just as anyone can dash off a shopping list. The commonality between the two is that, without evaluation criteria for ‘This Top List' or ‘That top List' there is no difference between the two. In many instances a person's shopping list is far more interesting and revealing.

For instance... cigarettes, a cucumber and a bottle of Jagermeister. Now if I found THAT crumpled up on the floor of my local grocery store, I'd say those could be the ingredients for a damn good time. Or a damn fine, uh, tossed salad.

Regardless...

This is an official call to all 'listers' to establish standards and criteria by which your lists are ajudicated. Or, if you have them, to at least inform your potential readers of what, exactly, they might be. In essence, this is a call for good old fashioned Journalistic iIntegrity, to resurrect a term from my college professors, all those years ago.

For instance.....

It is for this reason that cinematic consideration for inclusion into (or in most instances, exclusion from) R. Martin Basso's list of MODERN AMERICA'S TOP 100 CULTURALLY SIGNIFICANT MOVIES, (reference other articles) is based upon the following three evaluation criteria: (1) SOCIETAL THEMES, (2) HOLY VIRTUES, and (3) DEADLY SINS.

SOCIETAL THEMES. The author recognizes seven 'Societal Themes' which bind our civilization together; sort of like the "glue" of our culture, so to speak, which constitutes our modern American society. These seven Societal Themes are: (1) Religious Identity, (2) Sexual Identity, (3) Political Affiliation, (4) Escapism, (5) Creative Ingenuity, (6) Social Consciousness, and (7) Financial Soundness.

As the author believes, we all encompass at least one of these seven societal theme elements in that which makes us who, individually, we are. Of course, we more than likely are comprised of several themes blended together. If we look at where our Modern American culture stands today, we can see anything from any one of these societal themes, up to all seven collectively representing Modern America in the most pronounced medium that represents our culture: Cinema.

Cinema is the only medium capable of delivering all other supporting creative mediums - art, dance, music, drama, comedy - that tell our respective 'stories' all at once. Any of these individually come close to defining our species, but only cinema is capable of melding all together at once into one collective sensory experience.

HOLY VIRTUES & DEADLY SINS: As a tool to gauge a society's progression and development of self, the author uses Societal Themes as one of three gauges (the other two being the traditional Seven Deadly Sins and Seven Holy Virtues) by which the significance of each film on this list is evaluated for inclusion into R. Martin Basso's list-inclusive.

There are Seven Holy Virtues which both religious tradition, and later Western idealism, recognize as being facets of our human condition: (1) Chastity, (2) Temperance, (3) Charity, (4) Diligence, (5) Patience, (6) Kindness, and (7) Humility.

The Holy Virtues are the second of three tools used to gauge a movie's placement or inclusion, as well as exclusion, on or from Basso's list.

The third gauge used to evaluate each movie on this list is the Seven Deadly Sins. These are our respective Achilles' Heels, as a species, to which we are all subject. As with their cousins, the Seven Holy Virtues (which exalt the goodness in humanity), the Seven Deadly Sins do essentially the opposite; they reveal our dark side. Initially published as religious doctrine, these 'sins' have today evolved far beyond mere religion and have equally come to represent humanity, or in our specific case, Modern America.

The Seven Deadly Sins: (1) Lust, (2) Gluttony, (3) Greed, (4) Sloth, (5) Wrath, (6) Envy, and (7) Pride.

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© 2008 - R. MARTIN BASSO & 3 Doves Media

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