Quilting in the "recession"

(Quotes, as we haven't had one quarter of negative growth lately, much less the two consecutive quarters necessary to be in a recession, although God only knows what will happen after January 20...).

The most interesting part of this article on quilter spending in a shaky economy is the admission from a former business writer that journalists crave disaster.

I've noticed some interesting trends among the "dedicated quilters" on a list a read. First, they worried about the price of everything, including all the sacrifices they were making to continue to buy quilting supplies and classes (but not the price of gas, because oil is bad for Mother Gaia), which seems consistent with the article. Then the same people had a thread on why they make art for little to no money instead of working for wages (women who work for wages are chasing false idols of consumerism--that was news to me). Then I look at their blogs and they're all supporting Obama because they want "free" health care and think working people have too much money. With no sense of realization that their lifestyles are possible because their husbands are/were working for wages so their wives could afford all those week-long classes...

(I almost unsubscribed after a thread bitching about the TSA searching their sewing bags that didn't place a shred of blame on people who hijack airplanes. There's morons and power-drunk assholes at every TSA checkpoint, but I can't forget why they got that power in the first place.)

Anyway, I don't see contemporary young women taking to stitching together scraps in the evenings for cheap entertainment like they did in the 1930s; there are too many electronic entertainments available (not to mention the sexual revolution provided new acceptable ways for young women to while away an evening for no cash down). The AARP crowd, possibly. Hard to say. There was a resurgence of "traditional crafts" in the 1970s, but I think it was spurred by the bicenntenial more than Carter's economy...