Pantone is a global color clearinghouse that most visual artists work with at some point. A monolith with the last word in exact hues, they busily match alpha-numerical sequences to thousands of colors in visible light.
However, amplitude and electromagnetic radiation aren’t the only qualities of color. They have emotional effects and can be symbolic of social and cultural trends, which brings us back to Pantone and their annual “Color of the Year.”
For the first time, Pantone chose two shades, “Serenity” and “Rose Quartz,” as the “color” of the year for 2016. Any of us with a little experience in paint would just call this combination some edition of lavender and be done with it. But that would be too easy. Using singular verbiage while referring to two distinct, non-blended colors is deliberate obscurity – but it’s just another day in Transville.
Serenity and Rose Quartz are greyed down tints of blue and pink – or traditional baby colors. Pantone’s graphic for their announcement morphs from one to another, never settling. This is no accident, as Leatrice Eiseman, executive director of the Pantone Color Institute, explains in a political manifesto disguised as interior decorating advice. Scattered among platitudes such as “harmonious pairings” and embodiments “of tranquility and inner peace,” she gets to the point.
“In many parts of the world we are experiencing a gender blur as it relates to fashion” said Eiseman. “This more unilateral approach to color is coinciding with societal movements toward gender equality and fluidity … [in] a generation that has less concern about being typecast or judged.”
Well, well. Perusing their charts, customers should be warned that colors #15-3919 and #13-1520 no longer note units of hue, tint, value or saturation, but instead refer to “transgendering.”
With the rainbow co opted by homosexuality, why not sign over the entire visible spectrum, including its symbols and significance as well? No token of esteem is too high for the noble transgendered, who spend years of their lives in grimy clubs as well as inspiring countless rock stars on how to wear spandex and false eye-lashes.
Rolling out the “Serenity and Rose” carpet for transgenders required Eiseman to spout a lot of silly non-sequiturs, such as Pantone’s new “unilateral” approach to color. Since there are two or more colors here, shouldn’t that at least be “bilateral”? Or is this a forbidden word now, since it’s so close to that dreadful “binary” condition of being either male or female?
Artists on the left have supported homosexuality forever, but wildly enthusiastic vendors are a grim new sight. Consider that these corporations work tirelessly to offend parents, whose children will be their only source of clients in a few decades. They must all be financial suicide bombers.
Is science no longer valid when it doesn’t support current gay narratives? If the existence of X and Y chromosomes can be denied, all scholarship, technology, history and logic can be dumped just as easily. Imagine a world where men with big, pink hair and dog collars earn more respect than astronauts. Are we there yet?
Incidentally neither Pantone nor the president of the United States has dedicated colors, weeks or months to anyone lately except to the glory of homosexuals. Think of the things that can be accomplished – and the science unraveled – if this should continue.
Following the logic of these neo-Luddites, anything merely binary should be questioned or outright rejected. On gay sites, ranting against patriarchal, binary thought is becoming a mantra. Pantone boasts of supporting dozens of technologies, communications and manufacturers in diverse fields, and virtually all of them use binary-based communication, beginning with their computers. Perhaps they forgot to tell Leatrice Eiseman.
Imagine the effects on technology if we were to take gay narratives seriously.
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA):
IAEA inspector to supervisor of a nuclear power plant: “Are you certain all switches to the nuclear reactor pressure vessel are off and reactors are cold?”
Supervisor: “‘Hot’ and ‘cold’ are binary, Western constructs. We recognize no difference between ‘hot’ and ‘cold’ shut-downs here.”
Air traffic control:
Co-pilot to captain of filled Boeing 767 about to land: “Is the landing gear down yet?”
Captain: “We are transitioning and will no longer use absolutist ‘cis’ terms such as ‘low’ and ‘high’ or ‘up’ and ‘down.'”
Blood transfusions:
Doctor in zero-tolerance emergency room situation to patient: “What do you mean, you can only use O-negative blood or you may die? AB+ blood is every bit as good as yours and if you refuse, the donor may be offended. We won’t tolerate small-minded plasmaphobes!”
Software code is based on binary codes that use only two digits, 0 and 1. There are many possible group permutations, but they are still limited to either 0 or 1. Science fiction writers may project a day where computers decide they deeply feel they have always been a 0.73, or complain that that are “mis-numbered” … but I doubt it.
Roots of binary classification run deep in East and West, from sequence patterns in ancient Vedic poetry to genetic algorithms. The I-Ching and Yin/Yang qualities are based on binary code. Yoruban divination and Jewish priests (with the Urim and Thummim) used different types of binary “yes or no” decision making.
Polymath Gottfried Wilhelm von Leibniz believed binary arithmetic expressed a universal “core of natural theology” which all cultures had in common. More recently, Alan Turing and George Boole (Boolean algebra), Claude Shannon, Ted Hoff, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Paul Allen and Steve Wozniak worked with it. Since all computer language is based on binary systems of logic, the entire planet is affected (most would say for the best) by the work of these men via binary code.
Incorporating queer/gender theory into computing or software design would make them worthless – and everyone knows this. Corporations issue pacifying generalities and flattery for trans-crusaders in the same way Hindus hang themselves by hooks to evade the wrath of Shiva.
Pantone made a useful, soft science of color, but has now regressed into pushing controversial and useless Queer Theory. They proudly acknowledge their work with measurements, printing, packaging, photography, graphic design, video, automotive, paints, plastics, textiles, dental and medical industries. All these may be affected by sexual impositions the Queer Theorist-in-Chief and his courts decree over the land.
Eiseman presents Pantone’s socially freighted colors as “calming” – a way to “fulfill the yearning for reassurance and security” in turbulent times. The chroma may be soothing all right, but the cultural baggage and sexual innuendo they attached is hard to stomach. Who knew those delicate little bassinette tints could get dingy so fast?
Sources
- Pantone’s 2016 Color of the Year
- Binary Sequence Generation for Sanskrit Phonetic Sounds
- Encyclopædia Britannica: Binary code
- Leibniz, “Mysticism and Religion,” 1998. A.P. Coudert, R.H. Popkin, G.M. Weiner., pg 150