Quickies: What I Will And What I Won’t

     “Anonymous,” that lovable rogue we all know so well, has commented on a recent post here to the effect that it’s “complete BS” and that I’m ignorant of history. As you might expect, I deleted his comment. He followed it with another to the effect that I’m a “FRAUD.” I deleted that one, too.

     “Anonymous,” if you’re still visiting my humble abode, I refer you to my comment-moderation policy, which appears in the box that enables comments:

     Comments are moderated. I am entirely arbitrary about what I allow to appear here. Toss me a bomb and I might just toss it back with interest. You have been warned.

     My Co-Contributors and I get absolutely nothing for what we write that appears here. I have no tolerance whatsoever for insults, whether to myself or to any of them.

     This is a site by and for intelligent, knowledgeable persons who show respect for one another’s intelligence and knowledge. However, any of us can be wrong. For my part, I look forward to being proved wrong, as it heralds an opportunity to learn something. But I draw the line at insults.

     Frankly, I’ve always been of two minds about permitting comments by “Anonymous,” as along with being a garrulous blowhard and a coward of neither insight nor erudition, he has the worst manners of anyone active on the Web. Occasions such as the one mentioned here cause me to reconsider allowing him to pester me. For the moment I’m resisting the urge to ban him completely, but things could change.

     Here is a non-exhaustive list of comments I will delete:

1. Insults to any Liberty’s Torch contributor or their loved ones.
2. Solicitations to criminal conduct.
3. Unsubstantiated accusations of criminal or contemptible conduct by anyone.
4. Denigrations of Christianity.
5. Denigrations of the United States of America, its Constitution, or its military.
6. Anti-Semitic rants.
7. Advertising.
8. Requests for contributions to any cause of any sort.
9. “Click-bait,” however decorated or disguised.
10. Inducements to any of the seven capital sins.

     Those who feel a need to submit such comments should keep that list handy. Use it as a labor-saving device. Rather than exhaust your precious fingers typing out a comment that will never see the light of day, consult the list, select the item that best categorizes your comment, and just send the number. You’ll get your juvenile catharsis; I’ll be spared unnecessary time and effort, and we’ll all be happy.

     Some prospective commenters will find this method of venting too terse for their tastes. In that light, I’ll make a small concession to specificity. Along with the category number:

1. Indicate which Contributor you wish to insult: “1, Fran.”
2. Indicate the category of crime: “2, arson.”
3. As with #2 above: “3, pedophilia.”
4. Indicate which branch of Christianity: “4, Seventh-Day Adventists.”
5. Indicate the general tenor of your denigration: “5, mindless baby-killing robots.”
6. Indicate whether your hatred is focused or generic, e.g.: “6, Israel” or “6, Norman Podhoretz.”
7. Indicate product category: “7, self-help.”
8. Indicate cause category: “8, homes for brain-damaged welders.”
9. Include name of website: “9, PrepubescentFilipinoGirlsInThongsAndStilettos.com”
10. Indicate which capital sin: “10, lust.” (Images not allowed.)

     Life, after all, is short. Don’t tempt me to dream about shortening yours.

Ultra-Quickies: “Trigger Warnings,” The Beginning

     Does anyone remember when the fatuous “Your Daily Horoscope” columns in the daily newspapers stopped calling the sign for June 22 through July 22 Cancer and started calling it Moon Children?

Quickies: A Dollop Of Schadenfreude

The title of this post features what’s probably the most important word borrowed from the agglutinative German language to English. Its root words would have it mean “shadow joy.” In application, it refers to the emotion of the envious man – the “successfully” envious man, who watched in joy as the target of his envy was laid low.

Plainly, Schadenfreude isn’t a emotion one should seek to experience...which doesn’t mean a middling decent person won’t feel a twinge of it now and then. This All Souls’ Day morning is such an occasion:

It used to be that both the Republican and Democratic parties included both liberals and conservatives. Since parties contained ideological multitudes, it was hard for them to be the basis of strong, personal identities. A liberal Democrat in New Jersey didn't have a lot in common with a conservative Democrat in Alabama. But now that's changed. The parties are sharply sorted by ideology. What were once fractious coalitions have become unified tribes.

You can see the rise in political identity in the surveys on marriage. As Cass Sunstein writes, "in 1960, 5 percent of Republicans and 4 percent of Democrats said that they would feel 'displeased' if their son or daughter married outside their political party. By 2010, those numbers had reached 49 percent and 33 percent."

This isn't a world in which we should be surprised that video games have been politicized. This is a world in which it was only a matter of time until video games were politicized. This is a world in which, sooner or later, most everything will get politicized.

So! This self-important twit, this strutting fool of little eloquence and less erudition, who has willingly aligned himself with a political community whose long-held, stridently proclaimed creed is that “The personal is political,” is displeased by that creed’s signal success! Might it be that he’s finally awakened to the true majority of sentiment in these United States: the great mass of decent, dignified Americans, found in every locale, every socioeconomic category, and every walk of life, whose own long-held, stridently proclaimed creed is “Mind your own business!” -- ?

After the chortles have died, what can or should one say to such a pompous ass? Beyond “You ought to have been more careful about what you asked for, moron,” that is?

---

A quick swerve and I’ll be finished for today.

A writer whom I generally despise once noted that now and then one must write a “finger exercise” or two, if only to dampen the deplorable habit of writing with one’s fists. That’s the state I find myself in just now: furious beyond my ability to express myself – in an opinion piece, that is – in any form but a bellow of rage. Now, I’m aware that some of my Gentle Readers actually like essays written with the fists. As it happens, I occasionally munch on one or two myself, just for the leavening they provide my excessively sweet temperament.

(Careful, now. Remember to breathe. Too much of anything, even raucous laughter, is bad for you. Epictetus said it, I believe it, and that settles it.)

However, when my blood pressure begins to challenge my IQ for supremacy, it’s time for a retrenchment. This is especially the case just now, owing to the heightened pressures from the impending election and my personal circumstances. Accordingly, these past few days, when I’ve found myself at the keyboard with my fists pre-balled for fury, I’ve deliberately backed away. Friday was a pinnacle experience of that sort: not only was I consciously in a rage; my vision had gone red-hazed and I had to fight to unclench my teeth. So after posting this bit of trivia, I booked a ninety-minute rubdown from my favorite masseuse Corey (a.k.a. “Thumbs of Steel”) and resolved to think of nothing political until I’d managed to de-escalate from DEFCON 1.

“Unplugging” has been an infrequent event in my life. Still, I’m about to embark upon the Next To Last Great Adventure – retirement – and it would surely be better to cultivate a modicum of serenity before taking that step. Atop which, fury over things one cannot control is less than productive, is it not?

So expect fewer political pieces and a broader indulgence in my other interests henceforward, at least for a while. After all, if I don’t make room for fiction and killing Solarii, who will?

That’s all for today, Gentle Reader. Enjoy your Sunday.

Assorted

1. "Great Men."

The most enduringly popular theory of history -- always assuming we're not being total lunatics to imagine that history could possibly have a "theory" -- is the Great Man theory, in which extraordinary individuals rise from the general population to change the courses of nations. What makes this theory popular is that historians can't seem to write history in any other fashion. Yes, they focus on political figures, but that too appears to be a built-in bias of their trade.

This morning, in a departure from the usual breakfast banter, I asked my wife whom she would nominate as the greatest figure of the Twentieth Century. After we agreed that "great" does not mean "good" but rather "doer of widely and deeply influential deeds," we immediately discarded the great majority of the persons historians would write about. Politicians so seldom actually do anything that to consider them "great" seems wrong.

Over the past hours, I've winnowed my list of candidates down to the following:

• Thomas Edison
• Nikola Tesla
• William Shockley
• Charles Drew

That's right: three engineers and a physician. All of them can lay claim to personal achievements that have directly affected many millions of lives. No politician who comes to mind can say anything comparable.

Whom would you nominate?

---

2. Idiots.

Many an idiot is treated as a great figure by those who share his idiocy. I have a particular one in mind at the moment:

This particular idiot has a mass audience and is regularly hailed as being highly intelligent. But what sort of idiot would wear tampon earrings in protest against a law that bans the murder of viable unborn children?

Clearly, the privilege of committing pre-indemnified infanticide has warped quite a lot of female minds. Of course, some come warped right out of the box, so to speak, but few of those get their own television shows.

---

3. "Futures."

I've received a number of comments and emails effusively thanking me for this recent post. My thanks in return, Gentle Readers. I can seldom say what touches off a cri de coeur such as that one, and I'm always a wee bit anxious about the response it will get, if any. But what becomes plain in the aftermath is just how many readers are hungry for that sort of material. Indeed, one correspondent begged me to go on in that vein every day.

I'm afraid I can't do that. Some sorts of pieces can only emerge when the Spirit is upon me. That's not often the case...and that's probably a good thing. I must live most of my life in this world, attentive to its immediacies and focused on the challenges it throws at me. I'm not the sort of otherworldly mystic who can utterly disregard the mundane in favor of a full-time focus on things of the spirit.

However, I promise I won't suppress the urge when it arises.

---

4. Book Notes.

No one who attempts creative work can ever be certain where he gets the ideas or the energy that make it possible. Were it otherwise, there would be a standard remedy for writer's block. (Probably a controlled substance sold only under doctor's prescription.) The range of sources of progress are forever surprising me.

One of those is another writer's statement that reading my fiction has made her writing more fluid and productive. I received a note to that effect recently. Not only did it warm the cockles of my spiny little heart, it also propelled me forward in my work on Freedom's Fury, the conclusion to the "Spooner Federation" trilogy begun with Which Art In Hope and continued in Freedom's Scion.

Fiction writers' viewpoints on political, social, and cultural matters vary greatly. Many of us attempt to embed our convictions in our stories. Sometimes the result is an unreadable polemic screed. Other times -- rarely -- it ignites a fire that illuminates or incinerates the world. But there can be nothing but good in assisting other writers, individually or severally, in finding their own stories and the energy with which to tell them. And what the hell, eh? If one produces another Mein Kampf or Protocols of the Elders of Zion we can always hunt him down and kill him, right? Right?

They Walk Among Us...

...silent and effectively undetectable. You can't tell them from normal folks by appearance, most of their statements and behavior pass unremarked, and they're on a mission, though definitely not from God:

More than 7,000 academics are gathered in Victoria, B.C., this week for the annual Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences, presenting papers on everything from the errant lessons of Grey’s Anatomy to Justin Trudeau’s political brand power. In this week-long series, the National Post showcases some of the most interesting research.

Parents who read their kids stories about happy, human-like animals like Franklin the Turtle or Arthur at bedtime are exposing their kids to racism, materialism, homophobia and patriarchal norms, according to a paper presented at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Most animals portrayed in children’s books, songs and on clothing send a bad message, according to academics Nora Timmerman and Julia Ostertag: That animals only exist for human use, that humans are better than animals, that animals don’t have their own stories to tell, that it’s fine to “demean” them by cooing over their cuteness. Perhaps worst of all, they say, animals are anthropomorphized to reinforce “socially dominant norms” like nuclear families and gender stereotypes.

Please read the rest. Any offense you give or small, valuable items you break during the subsequent fit of uncontrollable laughter are entirely your own affair.

I do believe it's time to say a few things very, very plainly:

• Normal means usual, or overwhelmingly more common than any alternative.
• Therefore, when we speak of human attitudes, convictions, and behavior, normal should be interpreted to mean "what the overwhelming majority of humans feel, think, and do."
• It follows that:
  • "Racism," when applied to the human race vis-a-vis the subhuman races, is normal.
  • "Materialism," i.e. the desire / preference for material comfort and security, is normal.
  • Heterosexuality is normal.
  • "Homophobia," whether anyone likes it or not, is normal.
  • "Patriarchal norms," to the extent the phrase was intended to convey anything more than "men are icky," are normal.

Furthermore:

• From the anthropocentric viewpoint, "animals exist only for human use" is exactly correct.
• With due respect to Caligula et alii, humans are better than animals intellectually and ethically.
• Animals have no stories to tell, regardless of whatever stories humans tell about animals.
• "Cooing over their cuteness" is far better than what PETA does to the ones it "rescues."
• Nuclear families are the basis of modern civilization.
• Assuming the "gender stereotypes" the "researchers" have in mind are the usual ones, those stereotypes are irrefutably correct.

In short, the use of animals in children's books is rational, pro-social, and pro-child-development. Indeed, the practice helps children to develop kindness toward animals. But these "researchers" are angry about it. That says a lot more about the "researchers" than about animals, their use in children's fiction, the various ideas and attitudes mentioned above, or anything else.

If you need a list of dead-giveaway words by which to detect and reject such bilge without needing to read it attentively, my favorites are:

• Racism
• Homophobia
• Heteronormative
• Patriarchal

Are these "researchers" entitled to their opinions of our "racism," "homophobia," "materialism," and "patriarchal norms?" Of course:

Porretto's Bio-Social Theorem:
Opinions are like assholes:
Everyone's gotta have one.

But the rest of us are equally entitled to laugh ourselves hoarse at their notions...and to keep them as far away from our kids as contemporary technology and the laws of physics will permit.

Of course, this is the beginning of yet another attempt to condition our children into politically correct "pre-liberal" mindsets. Its risibility should not be taken as an indication of harmlessness. (It's certainly not an exculpation.) Fortunately, harsh, derisive laughter from a multitude of sensible sources is the best detoxifying agent for such malicious nonsense. Use it!

If You're Already A Reader Of Dustbury...

...then you might have read this specimen of Charles Hill's quotidian brilliance already. But if you haven't, read it now!

Bravo, Charles.

The Mask Slips Dept.

Once in a while, a politician will say something so stupid, so wrongheaded, so completely at odds with observable reality that it offers an opportunity to demonstrate to the inattentive exactly what horrors governments are capable of:

An amended version of a bill that would extend new protections to California's homeless population cleared the Assembly Judiciary Committee on Tuesday morning.

Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, framed Assembly Bill 5 as an attempt to create a statewide baseline of homeless civil rights, citing a proliferation of municipal ordinances cracking down on behavior like lying or sleeping on the sidewalk as examples of the "criminalization of poor people."

"Today numerous laws infringe on poor peoples' ability to exist in public space, to acquire housing, employment and basic services and to equal protection under the laws," Ammiano said at a Tuesday morning hearing.

Ammiano's legislation faced a backlash from critics who said the bill would sanction behavior like urinating in public while exposing businesses to new litigation, undercutting the will of voters who had passed local ordinances and handcuffing city-level efforts to deal with homelessness. The California Chamber of Commerce included AB 5 on its annual list of "job killers" because it imposes "costly and unreasonable mandates on employers."

[Thank you, Jerry of Common Sense and Wonder, for this citation.]

So the assemblyman is concerned about "poor peoples' ability to exist in public space," is he? Well, well, well.

It's fascinating that Ammiano doesn't grasp the implications of his statement. Does he not realize that "public space" includes things like beaches, roads, and the lobbies of government buildings? Does he not grasp that a "right" to establish a static presence in such a place constitutes a privatization of that space -- a homesteading? If he were compelled to confront those realities, do you think he'd understand the problem, or would he accuse you of being "heartless" and "bigoted?"

Isabel Paterson dissected this most ably:

Theoretically, public property belongs to everybody equally, indivisibly, and simultaneously, which is absurd. If this assumption were applied, the result would be that any person presenting himself to use the property could be asked: "Are you everybody?" and he would be bound to reply: "No"; while he could not assert any claim to use any particular division of the property. The actual use of public property by the public is therefore limited to approximately two dimensional conditions, in which cubic measure, or solids, need not be taken into account, so that a man is regarded as a point in a line which is divisible into an infinite number of points; and with any number of lines intersecting without interference, on a plane surface. Thus it is practicable—whether or not it is necessary or advisable—to make roads public property, because the use of a road is to traverse it. Though the user does in fact occupy a given space at a given moment, the duration is negligible, so that there is no need to take time and space into account except by negation, a prohibition: the passenger is not allowed to remain as of right indefinitely on any one spot in the road. The same rule applies to parks and public buildings. The arrangement is sufficiently practicable in those conditions to admit the fiction of "public ownership."

Robert Ringer, in Restoring The America Dream, provides an example of what comes from dismissing this aspect of "public property:"

What would stop a gang of people from getting up early each morning and staking out fifty yards of the most desirable [public] beachfront in a given area? After all, since they would own every square inch of the beach in common with everyone else, it would be their right to do so. Is this what the original communist theoreticians had in mind -- a chaotic society that would operate on a first-come-first-served basis?

But wait a minute. Why should the gang have to arise early each morning to lay claim to the preferred area of the beach? Does communism provide for a time limit on the use of commonly owned property? Why not just have a couple of gang members guard the property at night? Technically they would merely be exercising their right to use "common property;" it's just that their use, in this particular case, would be continuous.

To carry this line of reasoning to its ultimate conclusion, why not just live on that particular area of beach on a permanent basis? And that would be the precise point at which "the people" would be engaged in something called private ownership of property.

"Public property" is inseparable from this implication. If we embrace the fiction of "public property" -- really, State-owned property to which private persons are granted conditional access -- the conditions under which it can be maintained viably come right along with it.

Assemblyman Ammiano fails to grasp these facts. Yet they are inescapable; attempting to legislate around them is like King Knut's attempt to sweep back the tide.

I once wrote a jeremiad against allowing really smart people to hold public office. It appears I'll have to write one against electing really stupid ones, too. California being what it is, I doubt it will make a difference in the Golden State.