Manners

4 VII 2018: A. Naïve retrospective judgements, B. The siege of Khan al-Amar

1948. “Vatican Under Fire for Tapping ‘Anti-Semitic’ Priest to Become Saint” is the headline of an item in today’s Daily Beast that reported “The Vatican is under fire from several Jewish groups for its move to recognize a Polish priest as a saint despite his record of anti-Semitic remarks.” Well, it turns out that “a Polish priest” is August Cardinal Hlond, primate of Poland 1926-1948.

Who are these ‘groups’?? I am weary of this sort of reporting. I want to know who they are, where they are coming from. There is such a thing as fraternal correction, there is also such a thing as slander, telling lies about another to diminish her prestige, and detraction, telling the truth about another with a view to diminishing his prestige. I need to know more about these ‘groups’ if I’m to decide whether this is an instance of fraternal correction or an essay in detraction/slander.

However this may be, I am very weary of the denunciation of admirable figures from the past simply because they did not share all our beliefs, or, rather, our highly selective, self-aggrandizing, and self-serving versions of these beliefs. Contemporaries have set themselves up as inquisitors, seeking in people of long ago traces of some prejudice that is offensive specifically to contemporary liberals, and if found, this prejudice serves as a warrant for the categorial and complete rejection of the past. The glamorous “hermeneutic of suspicion” must to applied, it seems, to all except contemporary illiberal liberals, who alone are sufficiently free of prejudice to sit in judgement on their betters.

 

Today’s Daily Beast also brought a report from Al-Jazeera of the siege of Khan al-Amar, a Bedouin village in occupied East Jerusalem. The invaders have decided to grab some more land by evacuating all the residents and demolishing the village so that the site can be seized by the occupiers. So the occupying troops showed up with the ubiquitous demolition equipment, and beat up and/or arrested those who stepped forward to protest. We’ve seen this pattern in 1940s Europe and now again and again in the contemporary Middle East. The project is the same, sc., to seize the territory, deport or enslave the inhabitants, colonize the newly desolate land, claim it as one’s own, and at last, when the results of the aggression are irreversible, to attempt to palliate the aggression by phony legal maneuvers and appeals to a higher power. And what is odd here is this: one group of semites has forcibly dispossessed another group of semites, seizing their and driving them out or installing them in concentration camps. And yet in the world’s eyes the term anti-semitic applies to a bias against only one of these groups. Isn’t this odd. How did it come about?

19 X 2017: Unlimited free speech

Read about racist Richard Spencer’s attempts to make himself heard at the University of Florida. In a piece from the Associated Press that reported estimated cost of security for the event at $600,000, it was said that public universities “are compelled by the First Amendment to provide a speaking forum.” This is news to me. I believe the First Amendment guarantees freedom of speech, but it surely does not guarantee an audience. State universities must restrict access to some who demand to speak on campus. Otherwise they would have to accommodate speakers who assert the moon is made of green cheese, that the earth is flat, and that there is no human-caused climate change. University of Florida was silly to be suckered in by an appeal to free speech.

Once Spencer was there and given a venue, he was prevented from speaking by the hecklers who made up a majority of the audience. These were suckers also, for I’m sure Mr. Spencer gets a lot more points with his base by being shouted down than by actually speaking.

Right-wing nutcases and publicity hounds should not be allowed to speak on university campuses. “But if the students invite them ….” The students are students. They are not adults and show that they are not with some regularity.

“Oh, but we are trying to have a diverse campus.” We really ought to get rid of diverse and diversity. These terms have no commonly agreed upon meaning in political discourse. If diversity is truly insisted upon, and any group of students can invite any speaker, the number of abusers of women, liars, egomaniacs, adulterers, cheats, and frauds on campus will increase, and in addition to this familiar group of reprobates, absolute diversity would require that a place be made for sadists, cannibals, and pederasts if a student group invites them.

Will common sense and moral authority ever return to America’s universities?

3 X 2017: The Las Vegas slaughter, wholly predictable. Get over it.

The surprising thing about the shooting in Las Vegas is not that it occurred, but that such outrages do not occur far more frequently. Could anyone lead an active, half-way observant life in the U.S. without realizing how many crazies there are out there? Get out on the road, go to a football game, go to a Trump rally, go to a white supremacist or survivalist gathering, visit a  local gunshow, and you will see crazies “as thick as hasty pudding.” I’m not talking about your foam-at-the-mouth, hatchet-swinging crazies. I’m talking about your road-ragers and your internet trolls, about the crowd that wants to make the USA all white and all Christian again, about the willfully ignorant and subrational, about the multitudes that blame their own errors and deficiencies on the imagined malice of others. And firearms circulate freely in this this mental institution of a nation in incalculable numbers. We are addicted to firearms, and crave more guns and bigger guns, really ugly ones! Go to a gun show, go to a gun shop. You will not find graceful fowling pieces, single-shot target rifles, or weapons suited to the defense of house and home. You will find military grade firearms whose only real purpose is slaughter, although, thank goodness, they are more often used only to enhance b-movie inspired masturbatory fantasies. No, Vegas should be no surprise.

And yet, events like that in Vegas, thanks to our astounding capacity for denial, afford us days of 24-hour coverage of shock and surprise, hand-wringing, thrilling emotional catharsis, and political posturing, none of which ever does anything about the national maladies that create this atmosphere so conducive to mass shootings.

America has grown pathetically soft. At the time of 9-11, when we were treated to a nation-wide orgy of grief, terror, and mindless rage, I was studying at an institute that hosted a number of Israeli scholars. These Israelis offered America their condolences, up to a point. But they stopped when they saw us refuse to get over it and get on with responsible living. They observed that if Israelis went into such a paroxysm after every terrorist attack, the community and state would collapse altogether.

Whether the shooting in Las Vegas was “an act of pure evil,” or an act of mixed evil, or an exercise in self-indulgent and cowardly lunacy, we had better get past the emotional posturing and honestly confront our national sickness, hoping to prepare for future generations a more honest and rational community.

29 IX 2017: Sixties Re-enactors in Saint Louis

Read in the Saint Louis Post Disaptch about a so-called “town hall meeting” called by such broadly based groups as the Saint Louis Action Council, ArchCity Defenders. and Organization for Black Struggle. The were very upset that Mayor Krewson did not attend. Good for her! They only invited her to abuse her and shout her down. No, they can call this a “town hall meeting” if they like, but this was not a community event.

They flashed on a screen, the report says, a list of twelve demands. This reminds me of the sixties when students played at being political and used to issue lists of “non-negotiable demands.” But I’m sure this is only the beginning. Mayor Krewson could fire the Chief, resign herself and it would make no difference at all. The current “unrest” in Saint Louis is being stage managed by a group of young black political aspirants. So they will compete by upping the demands.

I have to wonder whether civil disobedience figures in the thinking of the agitators and the agitated. They go into ecstasies of rage when there are arrests at their “disruptions.” But do they think they can engage in civil disobedience without breaking the law? And do they think they, and not others, should be allowed to break the law with impunity? I think they do. But the rule of law is the rule of law, and it should apply both to the police and to the disrupters.

24 IX 2017: Podex maximus?

I saw in a news report that footballer Sean McCoy has given voice to the feelings and pereption of most of the nation when he tweeted: “It’s really sad man … our president is an assh-e.” He might have made his observation more palatable to Trumpy by saying that “our president is the biggest asshole.” But of course such a term is not fitting to the dignity of Trump’s office. So let’s fall back on Latin and call him “Podex maximus.”

Doesn’t Trump remind you of Nero?

24 VII 2017: Sons of the Old South

Two sons of the Old South clearly regard the pistol/penis as the solver of problems and key to success. It’s reported that Rep. Blake (“The Fatted Calf”) Farenthold of Texas blames female senators from the Northeast for the repeal/replace fiasco. He is so frustrated because “If it was a guy from south Texas, I might ask him to step outside and settle this Aaron Burr-style.”

Then Rep. Mo Brooks of Alabama is using bits from the footage of the shooting at the Congressional Baseball practice to parade his enthusiasm for the Second Amendment,” the lead-in on the campaign ad reading: “A Bernie Sanders supporter fires on Republican Congressmen.”

What do you suppose is the IQ of these boneheads and what do they think is the IQ of their constituents??

17 VII 2017: Ann Coulter, that vamp can vent!

I read that Ann Coulter, the dominatrix of the far-right vaudeville circuit, has been waging a twitter war with Delta Airlines. I suppose she figures that if it works for Trumpy, it can work for her. She denounces what she calls Delta’s fascist behavior, and we can be sure she knows what she is talking about. I was struck by Ms Coulter’s repeated use of the vulgarism “to suck” and impressed by her daring neologism “suckingest.” She laments her loss not only of the $30 fee she paid for her seat, but of $10,000 worth of her time. Well, she can get $30 back from Delta, and she is getting her $10,000 back in the notoriety that this silliness generates.

14 VI 2017: Don’t forget your gun when you go to baseball practice.

The injuries suffered by legislators and others at the baseball practice shooting could have been prevented if the members of Congress were armed and could plug the shooter right away (assuming that they could hit him on the first shot and not shoot a bystander). This would not be a problem in some states of the Regressive South where legislators can pack a gun.

I wrote the above in a spirit of sarcasm and irony in implying a comparison between legislators in the South and our Congress. Later I read the following on CNN:

“Georgia Rep. Barry Loudermilk, a Republican from Georgia who was on the field when the shooting happened, suggested that members of Congress should be allowed to carry guns.”

20 IV 2017: Put a cork in it!

UC Berkeley has told Ann Coulter not to come and speak to Young America’s Foundation. This constellation will guarantee a blizzard of bullshit.

 UCal Berkeley might more correctly be called the University of California at Indulgence, for almost all the protests there, loudly verbal or loutishly violent, have been enacted by over-age adolescents indulging themselves and being indulged by the academic establishment. Kids just want to have riots, and it does not matter much what the occasion. Ann Coulter is as good as any, along with dissatisfaction with food, losing the big game or winning the big game, springtime, electrical outage on campus, or institutional attempts to inhibit consumption of booze or drugs. The students are not much involved in their studies and do not do other work, so they have a vast fund of pent up energy that finds an outlet in mindless, riotous, trendy outrage.

Ann Coulter, whose profession is cozying up to one group of fools by making another group of fools angry with her, is right in her element here. Of course, she plays any role that will sell, but being martyred for free speech by left-wing campus hooligans is a dream role for her.

Young America’s Foundation is, it seems, represented in academic settings by its affiliate, Young Americans for Freedom, a Newman Club for reactionaries. The capacity here for self-righteous posturing and fuzzy thinking is boundless.

So put some popcorn in the microwave and get ready for what could be a great sitcom.