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David Jones: Culture in NYC ? Bring Lots of Cash


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At last someone bring this out into the open.
As a child, visits to museums in this city were basically mandatory. Especially if it was a school trip in which you had to write a report. And admission was nearly free. Or pay what you want.
These days places like AMNH and The Planetarium have confusing multi-tier pay systems for various exhibits in the same building. So though you don't have to pay the suggested donation fee, special exhibits require a separate, sometimes even higher fee that the admission. And in most cases, they are mandatory to pay.
IMAX for instance, used to be part of the AMNH admission. As was The Hayden Planetarium with its Sky Show. No longer.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 09:52 PM on 07/09/2009
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Yes many do have "suggested" fees, but most, including important museums like the Whitney, MoMA, Natural History, the Museum of the City of New York and the New-York Historical Society all charge fees...POSTED fees. I have a pass that gets me in free as a teacher, but the general public is often screwed out of valuable exhibits.

Its an insult to all true conservatives to hide the riches of a great education behind massive fees and odd hours outside the reach of average Americans. As a teacher, I can definitely say that, yes, children can go for free, yet the times we are not preparing them for some standardized test are few and far between. Then there's transportation and food to consider. It isn't easy to get students some needed culture...bravo for this outstanding commentary.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 06:09 PM on 07/09/2009

It used to be a part of conservative, traditional American values that all people had a decent civic education and cared about culture. Now, conservatives feel that we all should just shut up and be good, dumb little workers and consumers. Any suggestion that art or culture or education are important is met with scorn and ridicule. "Hey, liberal, go look at some elephant dung!" It's impossible to even have an intelligent conversation on this because of the self-serving right-wing nonsense that's deliberately thrown in to muddy the waters.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 05:23 PM on 07/09/2009

You really gloss over the fact that admission at the Metropolitan Museum and many other museums and art institutions in NYC is a suggested donation. Being a New Yorker, I've never had cause to read a New York guidebook, but I'd bet that most of them make that point. The charter for these museums mandates that they CANNOT require even one penny for admission, but nothing prevents the "suggested donation" signs. Want to go to the Met to see some paintings? You can hand them five bucks (or whatever you want) and ask for four admission tickets (or however many you want), and that's what you'll get. A little knowledge goes a long way.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:34 PM on 07/09/2009
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Yes it reminds me of some thugs I met outside the Port Authority one late night. They " suggested" I lend them some bus fare.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 01:19 PM on 07/10/2009
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bravo. I couldn't agree with you more.

    Reply    Favorite    Flag as abusive Posted 08:52 AM on 07/09/2009

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