For unto us a child is born. . . .
We at The American Culture wish you a merry Christmas and a blessed new year.
General
The Dance of the Straw Men
If you're a social conservative, chances are you’ve had a conversation something like this:
Conservative: “But if we accept homosexual behavior as normal, how do we retain other traditional taboos, like the one against incest?”
Liberal: “That’s just a straw man. Nobody’s going to advocate incest.”
Now, read this, from Tauriq Moosa, tutor in ethics, bioethics and critical thinking at the University of Cape Town, South Africa (courtesy of my friend Dale Nelson):
Thirdly, and oddly, people exclaim “just” repugnant. We will examine this more closer later. Nonetheless, why should the sexual activities of two consenting adults concern us? This is the same question we can ask those who are ‘against’ homosexuality (which is like being against having blue eyes). It is none of our business what two consenting adults wish to do (as long as no one else is harmed/involved without consent). . . .
We cannot leave it up to the whims of our emotions to implement policies and laws which could, unnecessarily, cause suffering to other people, as is the case with gay people, women, and indeed the current brother-and-sister couple.
Pretty lively for a straw man, isn’t it?
In Praise of… “Functional” Technology
Writer Thomas Hayden has made quite a stir in the blogosphere recently with his provocatively titled post “In Praise of Crap Technology” on the site The Last Word On Nothing. Acting as a sort of modern day Martin Luther going up against the seemingly unassailable papal fortress of the Steve Jobs legacy, Hayden eschews high-end toys like the iPhone in favor of cheap, sturdy stuff that actually works. He cites his $20 Coby MP3 player, his Roadace 404 bike, his durable-but-unlovely pair of eyeglasses, and his son’s hand-assembled wooden garbage truck as examples of the “crap” technology he so loves. “I’ve stepped off the escalators of feature creep and planned obsolescence, and all the expense and toxic e-waste that come with them,” he says. “Crap technology, it turns out, is green technology.” Hear-hear, I say. I too am interested in a phone that functions primarily as a device for making and receiving calls. I refuse to buy a Kindle because I think the centuries-old invention of the book works just fine. My go-to guitar is a $100 ($75 on sale) Rogue acoustic that may have been thrown together in China but plays really damn well. Additionally, I have to confess
Ethos Is a Choice
Reglazing the broken windows of our popular culture — the argument from character. by Warren Moore I was discussing argumentation with my frosh this morning, and while most of the class was devoted to Stephen Toulmin’s elements of argument, we spent a little time talking about the Aristotelian idea that ethos — the appeal based on the character of the speaker — is typically formed during the rhetorical act itself. In simpler terms, this is why one should avoid spelling/grammar errors on one’s resume, for example — it diminishes the applicant’s ethos. Likewise, decisions regarding tone and diction impact a speaker’s ethical standing, and thus his rhetorical effectiveness. (Indeed, even my use of his in the preceding sentence marks me to some audiences as an old frump, and possibly sexist in the bargain, even if it’s happening under the radar.) For an example of this, consider the career of Charles Rocket, or more recently, Michael Richards. But of course, this sort of diminution of ethos can only operate when there are standards or taboos (depending on one’s perspective). This brings us to a recent article by Myron Magnet at City Journal. Magnet reviews the recent kerfuffle between the mayor of
Sonnet to Liberty
It’s not every day that an ode to liberty is waiting in your e-mail inbox, so kudos to JP for posting Oscar Wilde’s “Sonnet to Liberty” at Facebook’s “Libertarians for Arts, Music and Culture” page. I have to confess that I’m not familiar with Wilde’s work, but I never thought of him as a defender of liberty before. I don’t think “Sonnet to Liberty” is an outstanding poem, but it’s worth sharing because it recognizes that while free speech is a bulwark against tyranny, it’s also a messy melange of “dissonant cries.” Even when they are ill-informed and you disagree with them in substance, these “cries” are still worth supporting in principle. However, there must be better, or at least other, poems out there on the subject of liberty. Perhaps TAC readers who are more literate than me can suggest a few….in the meantime, here is Wilde’s “Sonnet to Liberty.” Sonnet to Liberty Not that I love thy children, whose dull eyes See nothing save their own unlovely woe, Whose minds know nothing, nothing care to know, - But that the roar of thy Democracies, Thy reigns of Terror, thy great Anarchies, Mirror my wildest passions like the sea And
Technical Difficulties
As you will have noticed if you’ve visited in the past few days, The American Culture has experienced some severe Web problems during the past week. After much investigation and an intensive search for remedies, we’re back online, albeit with just about the simplest publication design possible. We’ll be installing a new look as soon as we’re sure the site has stabilized technically, but in the meantime we hope you’ll keep returning for the same kind of unique reporting and analysis we’ve always provided. We’re also trying to restore a few lost posts and comments, and we hope to have everything shipshape soon. Welcome back, and please enjoy and be edified by the discussions here. Best, Sam Karnick, Editor, and the American Culture staff
A Chat with My Daughter
by Warren Moore My fourteen-year-old was reading about the horror in Norway this afternoon, and asked me what the news meant by “right-wing extremist.” I told her that was a term for Nazi sympathizers and the like. Then she said, “There are left-wing extremists too, right? Like the PETA folks who burn government labs and stuff?” “Or like the Greenpeacers who vandalize genetically modified crops,” I said. “Why’d they do that?” “Because the crops aren’t ‘natural.’” “Well, they aren’t plastic, are they? That’s just dumb. Like the people on Whale Wars,” she said. “I can’t stand them; they’re a bunch of self-righteous jerks. I mean, they’re attacking ships with actual human beings on them. It’s not like the whales are choosing to fight back. If the whales start going Moby Dick on the Japanese, then I’ll be impressed.” “Well,” I said, “now when the Great Aquatic Mammal Rebellion begins, you’ll be blamed as an instigator.” “Meh,” she said. “Then we’ll just have to bomb the oceans… which will suck for us, too. But it’ll look cool. And it’ll take care of those rapist dolphins, too.”
An Endangered Species Within Academia: The Western History Course
By Mike Gray For a variety of reasons, ranging from the crassly professional – scholarly specialists not wishing to waste their time on general courses of any sort – through the fashionably enlightened – a belief that concentrating on own culture is parochial – to the outright ideological – the view that our history is largely an occasion for shame — the Western history survey course, not only as a requirement, but even as an elective, looks on its way to extinction. — Stephen Balch, “Metamorphosis, or Why We Should Study the West,”Pajamas Media A recent NAS (National Association of Scholars) report supports the idea that what we (people of my generation) used to call Western Civ courses are getting progressively harder to enroll in, leading Stephen Balch to wonder: One thing history’s torrent appears to be sweeping away is, ironically, the study of its most productive wellspring, Western civilization. A NAS report . . . documents the extent of this vanishing. The traditional Western civilization survey requirement, commonplace only decades ago, has become a rarity both for students in general and history majors in particular, and most so at those institutions where America’s opinion leadership is shaped. It is
Pets’ Antics Provide a Path to the Divine
By Daniel P. Crandall G.K. Chesterton wrote, “If anybody chooses to say that I have founded all my social philosophy on the antics of a baby, I am quite satisfied to bow and smile.” The God Dog Connection is Marti Healy’s “bow and smile” as she shares numerous tales about how her pets’ antics enrich her life and deepen her faith. I met Marti Healy one afternoon while exploring downtown Aiken, a town near the Savannah River in South Carolina. I happened upon the Aiken Visitor Center, which on that particular day hosted the author. As I sat chatting with Ms. Healy about reading, writing, and living in the South, I noticed a book, on the table between us, with “Dog” in the title. Upon first glance, I thought it read “Good Dog Connection.” After looking more closely, I chuckled to myself at how I had misread the title. Perhaps it was a case of seeing what I wanted to see, for I certainly believe God is good. In a similar fashion, when I think about past pets’ behavior, it may be that I only saw what I wanted to, never going beyond the surface antics. Marti Healy’s stories provide
Prose & Poetry Update
This week’s issue begins and ends with G.K. Chesterton. Up first, the “Prophet of Common Sense” on Art, Literature and accepting the status quo: “The beautification of the world is not a work of nature, but a work of art, then it involves an artist.” – Illustrated London News, 9-18-09 “By a curious confusion, many modern critics have passed from the proposition that a masterpiece may be unpopular to the other proposition that unless it is unpopular it cannot be a masterpiece.” – On Detective Novels, Generally Speaking “And all over the world, the old literature, the popular literature, is the same. It consists of very dignified sorrow and very undignified fun. Its sad tales are of broken hearts; its happy tales are of broken heads.” – Charles Dickens “The aim of good prose words is to mean what they say. The aim of good poetical words is to mean what they do not say.” – Daily News, 4-22-05 “A dead thing can go with the stream, but only a living thing can go against it.” – The Everlasting Man, 1925 Short Fiction The Disadvantage of Having Two Heads written & illustrated by G.K. Chesterton “A little boy once looked
Prose and Poetry Update
While the Newt flames out after less than a week in the spotlight as the “Big Republican On Campus,” folks might want to think about something other than politics. How about a good story? But first, a few literary quotes on good and evil, and the love of books. “No one who can read, ever looks at a book, even unopened on a shelf, like one who cannot.” – Charles Dickens, Our Mutual Friend “When I am king, they shall not have bread and shelter only, but also teachings out of books; for a full belly is little worth where the mind is starved.” – Mark Twain, The Prince and The Pauper “The devil’s agents may be of flesh and blood, may they not?” – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles “We live in a world of transgressions and selfishness, and no pictures that represent us otherwise can be true, though, happily, for human nature, gleamings of that pure spirit in whose likeness man has been fashioned are to be seen, relieving its deformities, and mitigating if not excusing its crimes.” – James Fenimore cooper, The Deerslayer Short Fiction Luck by Mark Twain “It was at a
Prose & Poetry Weekly
“In other countries, art and literature are left to a lot of shabby bums living in attics and feeding on booze and spaghetti, but in America the successful writer or picture-painter is indistinguishable from any other decent business man; and I, for one, am only too glad that the man who has the rare skill to season his message with interesting reading matter and who shows both purpose and pep in handling his literary wares has a chance to drag down his fifty thousand bucks a year, to mingle with the biggest executives on terms of perfect equality, and to show as big a house and as swell a car as any Captain of Industry!” - Sinclair Lewis, Babbitt Short Fiction A Call to Prayer by Joy Wambeke ” ‘For the poor souls in purgatory,’ I heard my father mutter through clenched teeth. Through the shadows of the upstairs hallway, I could often see my father in my parents’ darkened room, his hands wound around his foot or grasping his knee. He always got ready for work at Sydney harbor in the dark so as not to wake mum. It was his habit to offer the inevitable bumps into furniture
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