And All Of Us But Players

     It isn’t often that I read anything anywhere that makes me re-examine fundamental convictions. I’m sure that’s partly because I’m old. Nevertheless, it’s disturbing to think that even in old age, a professional thinker could be so “set in his ways” that he never inspects his intellectual foundation for cracks. And after all, a professional thinker is what I am.

     Yes, I’ve just read something that shook me, and I recommend it to you:

I knew a woman in Montana whose eyes never changed when she laughed.

We didn't notice it at first.

She and her husband took us in when we first moved there. We were living in an old Air Force base that had been converted into a boys home, they worked there as counselors. We had… pic.twitter.com/sH1skSbL5Y

— The Biblical Man | 4 AM Field Notes (@SlayStupidity) October 8, 2025

     I hope you did read it all, Gentle Reader. Give it a few moments to percolate before continuing on.

---

     First, to set the mood, a fine old tune from sixty years ago:

     Many of our relationships are colored by grants of authority. If you work for a living, you probably have a manager or supervisor of some sort. Inasmuch as we haven’t yet rid ourselves of that pestilential, infinitely aggravating parasite, The State, there are authority relationships there, too – and sometimes they involve the use or threat of force. Then there are family relations: husband / wife, and parent / child. Those too have aspects of authority embedded in them.

     It’s in the nature of authority that the subordinate has incentives to please his superior. The superior is in a position to award rewards and penalties. The subordinate knows it. His conduct must take that into account. That doesn’t mean that the subordinate will always be “acting,” but questions such as “What does he want me to say / do?” are frequently in his thoughts.

     Even relationships that have no authoritarian aspects involve those questions. One’s membership in a social or commercial circle may depend upon saying / doing “the right things.” That’s the basis of the power of “political correctness.” (Don’t preen yourselves, conservatives; your social and commercial circles behave much the same way.) Losing such a membership can be as traumatic as a major setback in business; indeed, the former often entails the latter.

     I think the man who is never moved to “perform,” in the sense of that embedded tweet, is likely to be very rare. While the woman of whom the narrator speaks is an especially dramatic case, we’re all in the “What should I say / do to please him / them?” mindset under certain circumstances.

     Is that terrible? Does it illustrate some tragedy indelibly written into our natures? I can’t say. I only know that I’ve both witnessed it and lived it.

---

     I’m not here to rail against “performing,” in the sense of that embedded tweet. Neither am I here to exhort anyone to be “authentic,” much less “real.” I’m just noting a pattern that arises from human relationships and our desire to manipulate others’ opinions of us.

     Most of us have a desire to be liked, at least when we’re in certain company. And most of us are in positions where someone else’s opinion of us can have a material bearing on our lot in life. So we learn what would please and displease those others. We “perform for them.” And those of us who are employees go through an annual “performance review” in which we’re told how well we “performed,” sometimes even sincerely.

     It’s the same in our noncommercial relationships, except for those damned performance reviews. We learn the preferences of those whose good opinion we seek, and if it’s possible and not too expensive, we “perform to them.” This is just as applicable to romantic and domestic relationships as to any other sort.

     This is what constitutes role-playing:

• Select the role you want to perform;
• Learn your lines;
• Deliver them, with matching expressions and intonations, at the proper moments.

     The woman in the tweet didn’t get the expressions right. That was her giveaway. Still, she learned her lines and delivered them. One might even say she “lived her role,” whichever one was “on the boards” at the moment. Was she happy? I could never say. It’s possible that she couldn’t, either. It’s just as possible that the question never occurred to her.

---

     A vignette to close.

     Some months ago, I met a woman through the Net: a retired actress who’d been prominent in a “sitcom” of an earlier decade. Our conversation prospered for a while, until she did something I didn’t expect: she asked me for financial help. This, after telling me in some detail about her several businesses and how involving they were.

     No, I didn’t send her money. And yes: that was pretty much the end of the conversation. It was disappointing, as I’d come to like her quite a lot, but such is the World Wide Web in this age of ours.

     Just yesterday, I noticed her on X, and “said hello.” She responded, but within two sentences it became clear that she didn’t know me. The woman I’d conversed with months ago was an impostor. That impostor had apparently employed artificial-intelligence programs to play the role she’d chosen. She’d been utterly convincing, too.

     Is the second encounter any more to be trusted than the first one? Or is my more recent acquaintance just another impostor? One more unidentifiable role-player who’s assumed the same persona and is reading from the same script, or perhaps a slightly different one?

     And now, Gentle Reader, I must bid you adieu, for it’s time for me to change roles. I must doff this Curmudgeon Emeritus persona and don that of a storyteller whose tales enthrall... well, a few people, anyway. There’s an unfinished novel awaiting his / my / our attention.

     Do have a nice day. And remember: While Sybil was fiction, there are other, similar tales that aren’t. Perhaps you’re living one yourself. So be kind to your fellow players. A noted talespinner of yore, Henry James, has said that it’s all that matters. He might have been performing when he said it, but it’s good advice anyway.

Dynasties

     I just saw this graphic over at X:

     ...and it put me in mind of one of my favorite bits of wisdom from the Great Lawgiver:

     There are many human achievements, including some of the finest, which need more than a single lifetime for completion. The individual can compose a symphony or paint a canvas, build up a business or restore order in a city. He cannot build a cathedral or grow an avenue of oak trees. Still less can he gain the stature essential to statesmanship in a highly developed and complex society. There is a need for continuity of effort, spread over several generations, and for just such a continuity as governments lack. Given the party system more especially, under the democratic form of rule, policy is continually modified or reversed. A family can be biologically stable in a way that a modern legislature is not. It is to families, therefore, that we look for such stability as society may need. But how can the family function if subject to crippling taxes during every lifetime and partial confiscation with every death? How can one generation provide the springboard for the next? Without such a springboard, all must start alike, and none can excel; and where none can excel nothing excellent will result.

     [C. Northcote Parkinson, The Law, Complete. Emphases added by FWP.]

     If you’re familiar with the work of Cyril Northcote Parkinson, your acquaintance with him probably started with his First Law: “Work expands to fill the time available for its completion.” It was a potent insight, gleaned from Parkinson’s scrutiny of the behavior of British bureaucracies. Yet it’s a pity that so many stop there, and never become acquainted with his later oeuvre. In total, they mark him as one of the master-intellects of the Twentieth Century. He deserves the same stature and worldwide recognition as any other more frequently praised genius. The citation above is one example – one of the most penetrating yet overlooked observations of the tragedy of the Nightmare Century.

---

     I’ve written in other places that the family is the indispensable building block of the free and stable society. A society largely made up of intact, cohesive families will be highly resistant to attacks on its values and norms. That might be called the horizontal-in-time view of the family. But if we rotate the time-axis ninety degrees for a vertical-in-time view, we see something at least as important and probably much more so: the steady growth of family dynasties, each of which conserves and nurtures its family’s greatest strengths. Hearken to Hope’s foremost sociologist:

     “Families are the fundamental building blocks of a stable society. Extended families—clans—are the best conceivable environment for the rearing of children, the perpetuation of a commercial forte, and the germination of new families and their ventures. A clan like yours, Miss Albermayer, conserves a brilliant genetic line and a priceless medical specialty at the same time. A clan like yours, Mr. Morelon, makes possible a benign agricultural empire and produces natural leaders one after another while connecting Hope to its most distant origins. And all healthy families, which cherish life and bind their members to one another in unembarrassed love, can find far more to occupy and amuse them than they need.”
     “When Earth’s regard for families and their most fundamental function deteriorated, her people ceased to enjoy the sorts of ties that had held them together throughout the history of Man. Without families, and especially without children, they groped for other things to fill their time, whether to give them a sense of purpose, or to distract them from the waning of their lives. Some invested themselves in industry or commerce, but without the sense of the family line to be built up and made prominent, those things failed to satisfy. Others immersed themselves in games, toys, fripperies, and increasingly bizarre forms of entertainment, which palled on them even faster. Still others made a fetish out of sex; there was a substantial sex industry on Earth, though it tended to operate in the shadows and was seldom openly discussed. They needed emotion and substance, but all they could contrive was sensation and novelty, and they pumped an ever greater share of their effort and wealth into seeking them.”

     [Arne Stromberg, holder of the Edmond Genet Chair of Sociology at Gallatin University, the foremost center of higher learning on Altus, the northern continent of Hope.]

     Proceeding from Professor Stromberg’s insight, I have come to regard the aim to create a numerous, well-tutored family dynasty as one of the most praiseworthy of all ambitions. But how does one do that? With what sort of structure does he begin?

     It’s almost childishly simple: He begins by accepting and honoring one of the free society’s greatest strengths: the division of labor. He “hires:”

• A “breadwinner:” usually himself.
• A “procreation and nurturance expert:” a wife / mother / homemaker.
• A squad of “perpetuation engineers:” their kids.

     Moreover, he refrains from insisting that any of those “specialties” take on the labors of any of the others. Each dedicates himself to the refinement of his particular specialty and practices it assiduously, deaf to outside critics.

     And over several generations, a cathedral or an avenue of oak trees just might result.

---

     The above probably looks a bit facetious to my Gentle Readers. It’s not; it’s how the great ones of our society were produced. Ironically, the mighty family dynasties that produced them are seldom studied; all the attention goes to the “great man.” But he is a resultant. He didn’t spring forth fully formed from conception, like Athena from the brow of Zeus. It probably took three, four, or five generations of families, each building upon the legacy of its predecessors, to produce him.

     The Founding Fathers had a better grasp of this than contemporary Americans:

     “The science of government it is my duty to study, more than all other sciences; the arts of legislation and administration and negotiation ought to take the place of, indeed exclude, in a manner, all other arts. I must study politics and war, that our sons may have liberty to study mathematics and philosophy. Our sons ought to study mathematics and philosophy, geography, natural history and naval architecture, navigation, commerce and agriculture in order to give their children a right to study painting, poetry, music, architecture, statuary, tapestry and porcelain.”

     [John Adams, Letters of John Adams, Addressed to His Wife]

     Young readers (if I have any): Give it some thought.

History Always Begins Again

     This morning at X, Clay Travis of Outkick said:

There’s a strong argument America peaked around 1999. Everyone pretty much got along. Most people didn’t have cell phones. And if they did they had no cameras on them. https://t.co/5XH4fiNSPZ

— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) October 7, 2025

     (Note in particular that cell phones were not yet common. Hm. If Clay is right, it’s time to look at the correlation between cell-phone proliferation and our more recent miseries. Maybe the radiation from cell-phone towers really does cook the brain. “They” have been talking about it for a long time, but I’ve persistently dismissed it.)

     For myself, I remember significant tensions between the races in 1999. I remember the ceaseless anti-capitalist agitation of the environmentalists and their BANANA (“Build absolutely nothing anywhere near anybody”) campaigns. I remember that the media were relentless promoters of government activism. I remember that taxes were high and getting steadily higher. And of course, Black Tuesday, September 11, 2001 was drawing near.

     Yet in some ways it was a better time. America wasn’t enmeshed in foreign wars. There was no open rioting in the cities. The explosion of several destructive themes in politics was still in the future. Interracial and homosexual couples weren’t yet obligatory in TV dramas. Microprocessors hadn’t yet taken over our toasters. White babies weren’t being vaccinated against dengue fever and schistosomiasis. And I was only 47, relatively fit, and relatively healthy.

     And this joke was still being told:

Joe the COBOL Programmer

     There was once a COBOL programmer in the mid to late 1990s. For the sake of this story, we'll call him Joe. After years of being taken for granted and treated as a technological dinosaur by all the UNIX programmers and Client/Server programmers and website developers, Joe was finally getting some respect. He'd become a private consultant specializing in Year 2000 conversions. He was working short-term assignments for prestige companies, traveling all over the world on different assignments, and making more money than he'd ever dreamed of.

     Joe was working 70 and 80 and even 90 hour weeks, but it was worth it. Soon he could retire. But several years of such relentless, mind-numbing work took its toll on Joe. He had problems sleeping and began having anxiety dreams about the Year 2000. It reached a point where even the thought of the year 2000 made him nearly violent. He must have suffered some sort of breakdown, because all he could think about was how he could avoid the year 2000 and all that came with it.

     Finally, Joe decided to contact a company that specialized in cryogenics. He contracted to have himself frozen until March 15th, 2000. This was a very complex process, but totally automated and utterly reliable. He was thrilled. The next thing he would know, he'd wake up in the year 2000; after the New Year celebrations and computer debacles; after the leap day...nothing else to worry about except getting on with his life. He was put into his cryogenic capsule, the technicians set the revival date, he was given injections to slow his heartbeat to a bare minimum, and that was that.

     The next thing that Joe saw was an enormous and very modern room filled with excited people. They were all shouting, "I can't believe it!" and "It's a miracle" and "He's alive!" There were cameras unlike any he'd ever seen and equipment that looked like it came out of a science fiction movie.

     Someone who was obviously a spokesperson for the group stepped forward. Joe couldn't contain his enthusiasm. "It is over?" he asked. "Is 2000 already here? Are all the millennial parties and promotions and crises all over and done with?"

     The spokesman explained that 2000 had gone, but that there had been a problem with the programming of the timer on Joe's cryogenic receptacle - it hadn't been year 2000 compliant, and it was... well... a few years past that. But the spokesman told Joe that he shouldn't get excited as someone important wanted to speak to him.

     Suddenly a wall-sized projection screen displayed the image of a man that looked very much like Bill Gates. This man was Prime Minister of Earth. He told Joe not to be upset, that this was a wonderful time to be alive--that there was world peace and no more starvation--that the space program had been reinstated and there were colonies on the moon and on Mars--that technology had advanced to such a degree that everyone had virtual reality interfaces which allowed them to contact anyone else on the planet, or to watch any entertainment, or to hear any music recorded anywhere.

     "That sounds terrific," said Joe. "But I'm curious. Why is everybody so interested in me?"

     "Well," said the Prime Minister. "The year 10,000 is just around the corner, and it says in your files that you know COBOL.”

     <rimshot />

Encouragement Can Come From Anywhere

     Regular Gentle Readers know that I write fiction as well as the tirades that appear here. I do so for several reasons:

• I’ve been a lover of good stories well told since I was very young;
• I appreciate the power of stories to convey important truths;
• Mine are stories that most storytellers would never tell;
• I have some skill with the English language;
• And above all, it’s fun.

     For those reasons, I think of myself as a storyteller rather than a writer. The story is what matters: not the style in which it’s told, nor the images and devices used to illuminate it, nor the inclinations and proclivities of the author. The storyteller must serve the story, not the other way around. A writer who seeks to glamorize himself at the expense of the story is beneath (my) contempt.

     At this time I’ve completed nineteen novels and over a hundred short stories. A twentieth novel is approaching completion. It was badly stalled, for a while. It took some unexpected events to get it moving again. Or perhaps that should have been “to get me moving again.”

     Just as with a priest, a storyteller can have a crisis of faith, especially if his sales are poor. “Why do I spend my free time on this? What’s the point if so few people are interested in it? Am I really any good at it?” One who has elected to tell stories that other storytellers spurn is unusually vulnerable to such a crisis.

     Science fiction writer John C. Wright has penned an unusually illuminating piece about such crises. I recommend it to everyone; you don’t have to be a writer to benefit from it. He notes that one of the all-time great, hugely seminal pieces of fiction, David Lindsay’s magnificent A Voyage To Arcturus, sold fewer than 600 copies when it was published. As Lindsay died in poverty, alone and forgotten, the sense of tragedy is hard to avert.

     My stories are not popular. While I’m unlikely to die in poverty, I might be forgotten. All the love and labor that have gone into my tales could be wasted. My awareness of those things is a millstone around my storyteller’s neck. Now and then it drags me to the ground, and I stop writing.

     But I mentioned unexpected events above, didn’t I? Mostly, they’re emails from readers: people who’ve been affected by one of my books and were moved to let me know. That’s valuable reinforcement. I doubt that any writer, however prodigious his sales, could do entirely without it. Money fills the oil tank; it doesn’t warm the soul.

     Now and then another kind of unexpected event arises: an in-the-flesh encounter with a reader who’s loved one or more of my books. That’s like a shot of adrenalin. However, it’s only happened twice. One of those readers has passed away; the other continues to devour my pabulum as I produce it.

     Last but most powerful of all is an encounter with another storyteller through one of his stories. That’s happened a few times, though such contacts must be treated delicately. Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec has warned us: “The man is always less than the work.” A fair number of great writers have been persons I’d cross the street to avoid.

     The heart of the thing is that precious sense that someone else has understood. If it’s another storyteller, the emotional lift is beyond description. It once propelled me to write a whole novel I hadn’t even contemplated writing: Shadow of a Sword. If you liked that book, thank Martin McPhillips, author of my all-time-favorite thriller Corpse in Armor. It was he who convinced me that I should write it.

---

     I’m droning on like this because of a story I read just the day before yesterday. You probably haven’t heard of it, much less read it. It belongs in the category of romantic fiction, subcategory “harem fiction.” In that regard, it’s moderately unrealistic: very few women would agree to share a man with other women, at least in America today. (Yes, it does happen, but how often, really?) But it’s beautifully told in every respect. Even the several sex scenes, though explicit, are relatively tasteful.

     Here is the snippet that perked me up. (I hope the author will forgive me for such a long citation.)

     Dave let out a slow breath as he read the final line, his voice trailing off into the stillness of the shop.
     That’s it. He closed the book gently, almost reverently, and looked up. For a moment, no one moved or spoke—and then came the sound of hands clapping. First one, then another, and soon a warm, genuine applause filled the room. He smiled, the tension slipping from his shoulders, replaced by a strange flutter of disbelief.
     He stood, cleared his throat lightly. “Thank you,” he said, voice steadier now. “Thanks for listening. I hope I didn’t put anyone to sleep—or if I did, I hope it was a good nap.”
     His joke landed well, and a few warm chuckles followed.
     Chloe stepped forward with a practiced ease, her tone bright and inviting. “Dave has generously offered to take a few questions. Please raise your hand—and let’s keep it spoiler-free, if you can. That includes you, Carol.”
     That got a real laugh, especially from a woman in the front row who raised both hands in mock surrender.
     A woman in her forties near the second row leaned forward. “Do you write your love scenes first, or do you save them for when you’re in the right mood?”
     That brought a wave of laughter, and Dave chuckled along, scratching the back of his neck. “Uh… usually I save them. I need momentum to get there. But sometimes…” He glanced at Zoe and Chloe, “...sometimes the mood finds you.”
     More laughter.
     A young man in a knit beanie asked, “What inspired Kael’s character? He feels so real.”
     “That’s… hard to answer,” Dave said honestly. “Part of him is who I wish I’d been at twenty-five. Braver. More open. But also, I think he’s a mix of people I’ve known. Observed. Maybe even lost.”
     Someone else asked about the setting. Then came a question about the title and whether Book Two was on the way. Dave answered them all, surprised to find himself enjoying the back-and-forth. The crowd was kind, curious, engaged. He felt like he was part of something—for once not just a man behind a screen.
     Until he saw the raised hand at the back.
     The tall man standing at the back wall. Arms crossed. Face unreadable.
     Dave’s stomach tightened.
     Zoe had warned him, telling him to ignore that guy. But there he was—hand in the air, like he was waiting to deliver a lecture. Everything about him felt… out of place. His stiff posture, the slightly too-loud tweed jacket, and the vaguely amused look on his face like he was grading a freshman essay in his head. Dave gave a reluctant nod. “Uh, yes, you had a question?”
     The man’s voice was smooth, polished. Too polished.
     “Yes,” he said, adjusting his stance as though about to address a classroom. “I was curious about your use of metaphor in Woven for the Flame. Specifically in the fire-as-intimacy motif. Have you considered how it might fall into archetypal cliché? I’m thinking particularly of its overuse in late modernist literature. There’s a danger, wouldn’t you say, in conflating elemental imagery with emotional stakes?”
     The room fell into a hushed pause. Dave blinked.
     Was that… even a question? It sounded more like the opening statement of a lecture. For a fleeting moment, he felt oddly flattered—someone was treating his book like it was worthy of academic scrutiny, as if it belonged on a syllabus next to the classics. But the feeling didn’t last. The man wasn’t asking to understand. He was performing. Showing off his own knowledge, not seeking anyone else’s insight. A display, not a dialogue.
     He opened his mouth, unsure of where to start.
     Zoe stepped forward before Dave could answer. Her voice was calm, but firm. “Thank you for the observation, Dr. Miller,” she said evenly, her gaze steady. “But this isn’t a grad seminar. We’re not here to dissect literature like it’s a corpse on the table. We’re here to celebrate a story that’s moved a lot of people—including us.”
     She gave a small smile, polite but with a definite edge. “Tonight’s about connection, not deconstruction.”
     Murmurs of agreement rippled through the audience. Someone near the front clapped, and a few more followed.
     Dave stared at her.
     Dr. Miller.
     Ben.
     The name hit him like a slap.
     So that’s him.
     He saw it now—the smug academic aura, the passive-aggressive tone. The way he said “motif” like it came with a bonus vocabulary test.
     Dave felt his pulse quicken. A different kind of fire rose in his chest—defensive, protective. Not just of his work, but of Zoe. Ben was the one she’d almost married?
     He wasn’t just a professor. He was that kind of professor. The kind who believed books only mattered if you could tear them apart and map the entrails on a whiteboard. The kind who couldn’t help but dominate the room, intellectualize the joy out of art, and make others feel small in the process.
     For a brief moment, Dave regretted being there. Naturally, Ben would be laughing at him. He was indeed laughing. Ben was a professor with a literature PhD, whereas Dave was merely an amateur writer. He felt the urge to dismiss Ben's comment, particularly since Zoe had already addressed it on his behalf. Still, ignoring it would be cowardly. He felt obligated to stand up for himself and Zoe.
     Dave forced a polite smile and spoke calmly despite his inner turmoil. “I appreciate the perspective. I’d be happy to talk literary theory another time, but I’m not sure the rest of the room signed up for that.”
     A ripple of laughter passed through the crowd—this time louder, with a hint of relief.
     Ben offered a slight, condescending nod, as if he’d proven a point. Then he folded his arms again and said nothing more.
     Dave exhaled slowly.
     He had survived it. They had survived it.

     The citation is from Book Cafe Sisters, by Kohen King. In some ways, it’s just a specimen of erotica, but for me the passage above stands out. Protagonist Dave is a self-published writer doing a reading at an indie bookshop. The shop’s owners, Chloe and Zoe, are Dave’s “harem.” Stuffed-shirt Ben, a professor of literature, was once engaged to Zoe.

     I don’t have a harem. I haven’t been asked to do a reading from one of my novels at an indie bookstore, though there’s a prospect of such in the foreseeable future. But as a self-published writer who experiences frequent lapses of confidence and the will to continue, the above was a reminder.

     First and foremost, the storyteller must entertain. He’s not there to please “critics,” or professors of literature, or prize juries, or the producers and promoters of that contemporary abomination “message fiction.” He must write to please the reader. The reader seeks entertainment, diversion, and perhaps something to fantasize about in his private moments. The storyteller can only deliver those things by serving the story: that is, by telling it as it deserves to be told, without albatrossing it with irrelevancies or stylistic arabesques.

     Being reminded of those truths by another storyteller, through that man’s own creation, was a greatly refreshing experience.

---

     Just yesterday, I did something I’d never before contemplated. I went to Book and Mortar, an indie bookstore near me. I sought the manager – a delightful young lady named Krista – and asked her if she had any interest in carrying the works of a local, self-published writer. Krista surprised me by showing me to a bookcase filled entirely with the works of local writers: all self-published. So I gifted her three of my novels in paperback, which are now on that store’s shelves. At home, I set to work on Dreams of Days Forsaken once again.

     It probably won’t come to anything. I’m unlikely to contend with Nelson DeMille for the title of Long Island’s Best Loved Writer. But the lift I got from the above passage in Book Cafe Sisters made it irresistible. Besides, who knows what the future will bring?

Remember The Curmudgeon’s Carbohydrate Aphorism!

     I’ve been saying this for a while – well, yes; I’ve been saying many things for a while – but it seems to need repeating more often than most of my other spoutings:

The Curmudgeon’s Carbohydrate Aphorism:
Keep Thine Eye Fixed Upon The Doughnut,
Lest Thou Pass Unaware Through The Hole.

     Sounds silly, doesn’t it? The sort of farcical toss-off a no-status blatherer would emit solely for its memorability, right? So having chuckled over it, my Gentle Readers can forget it and move on to something that matters. Maybe putting pants on lamb chops or sifting the cat box.

     But no. It’s a reminder that there are reasons for things, especially the things people say and do. When a man says or does something that appears to defy all reason, we mustn’t simply dismiss it as a “brain fart.” It’s imperative that we grant him the presumption of rationality. We must probe for his reasons, not assume that he had none.

     Two days ago, a pompous ass who goes by the name of Thomas Chatterton Williams – many pompous asses sport a family name as their middle name; it suggests a pedigree the rest of us lack – penned an opinion piece for that most self-important of all East Coast publications, The Atlantic:

“Today, like five years ago, a controversial man has been transformed overnight into a one-dimensional saint, marshaled in a culture war that precludes measured thought. Once again, Americans are being asked to genuflect before an idol.” pic.twitter.com/CC1d8FG1Ll

— Thomas Chatterton Williams (@thomaschattwill) October 2, 2025

     The column is behind a paywall. However, the mite of it quoted at Fox News should suffice to convey its substance:

     "In the feverish weeks since Charlie Kirk’s assassination, the MAGA right is undergoing its own religious ferment, animated by a new martyr. Just as the left used Floyd’s death to justify and hasten all manner of political ends, the right is invoking Kirk’s name to advance illiberal aims and silence opponents," The Atlantic's Thomas Chatterton Williams argued. "In death, Kirk has become a cudgel."
     The writer claimed that Kirk, like Floyd, was a "controversial man" who had been "transformed overnight into a one-dimensional saint" — being used to fuel a culture war that defies reason.
     "Once again, Americans are being asked to genuflect before an idol," he added.

     Fox contributor Marc Tamasco notes that Williams’s column “sparked online fury.” No doubt. But ought we to stop there?

     The Carbohydrate Axiom suggests that we shouldn’t. It’s only reasonable to assume that Williams foresaw the furor. It’s equally reasonable to assume that he desired it. We should assume that a man intends the foreseeable consequences of his actions, shouldn’t we?

     That’s not to say that we shouldn’t be angry about Williams’s paralleling of a violent career criminal with a decent young man whose “crime” was to talk to college students. Anger is appropriate. But let’s not let that anger stall our thinking processes. Why did Williams set out to provoke us? What was his aim? Even a pompous ass must be assumed to intend what he can easily foresee.

     Anger is a consuming thing. It wears us out, depletes our energy for other undertakings. It also deflects our attention. The combination makes it a lot easier to “pass unaware through the hole”... and a lot more likely.

     Leftist opinion-mongers don’t expect to influence their own devotees all that much. They’re already compatibly aligned. No, it’s much more likely that Williams wrote that column and The Atlantic published it, for the effect it would have on us.

     It’s worth remembering the advice D’Artagnan gave to Louis XIV’s twin brother Philippe, who was intended to replace the Sun King on the throne of France:

     “If you are to rule this great nation, you must learn restraint. Keep cool in battle or in sports. Be angry—but in cold blood.” [Alexandre Dumas, The Man in the Iron Mask]

     Don’t give the Left’s pompous asses what they want from us.

Unachievable In The Present

     “[I]t is not real, you know. It is not stable, not solid—nothing is. Things change, change. You cannot have anything. . . . And least of all can you have the present, unless you accept with it the past and the future. Not only the past but also the future, not only the future but also the past! Because they are real: only their reality makes the present real.” [Ursula Le Guin, The Dispossessed]

     Probably the most important fact, in a space-time continuum filled with facts of every kind, is that things change. Everything. Le Guin’s insight above is fundamental to all kinds of thinking. The past is real; we experienced it, we remember it, and we can see its consequences around us. The future, too, is real; we plan for it, however ineptly, and work to achieve it according to our values, priorities, and understanding of cause and effect. But the present is more ephemeral than the mayfly. It’s gone before we can finish pronouncing its name.

     (I’m not endorsing the Anarrestis’ hostility to property here. That was Le Guin’s fictional device to create the contrasts and clashes that animated the novel. It’s a fine tale, but an anarcho-syndicalist society in which property is completely abjured would be less stable than communist egalitarianism. History has spoken on this subject. So have I.)

     Yet everyone seeks stability. Stable homes, stable incomes, stable relationships, and stable societies with stable laws and customs. It seems to be a consequence of Man’s nature as a “project pursuer.” (Cf. Loren Lomasky.) For every project aims at an end state, with all that implies. Yet upon the instant that end state is achieved, it begins to change. There’s no escaping it.

     If any kind of stability is achievable, it must be one in which the dynamics of time and change actually work to preserve it. However, while we can theorize about such a dynamic stability, we haven’t any idea about how to produce it. Among other things, we cannot answer the question “Just what would that variety of ‘stability’ actually stabilize? What aspects of it would not change?”

     The freedom advocate faces an unpleasant reality:

Free Societies Don’t Remain Free For Long.

     Freedom in these United States lasted roughly until 1900. For the century-plus from the Founding to the Oklahoma Land Rush, there was a frontier to which people unsatisfied with the constraints of “civilization” could escape. The availability of that frontier was critical to freedom elsewhere, for politicians and their hangers-on had to remain aware that they were escapable. Once America’s land frontier was closed, the State could advance upon us, gradually whittling away our supposedly guaranteed rights.

     Today, freedom is only a memory. All human action is hemmed in by laws, regulations, taxes, and the efforts of busybodies everywhere to compel us to conform. As C. S. Lewis put it in Screwtape Proposes a Toast:

     Hidden in the heart of this striving for Liberty there was also a deep hatred of personal freedom. That invaluable man Rousseau first revealed it. In his perfect democracy, you remember, only the state religion is permitted, slavery is restored, and the individual is told that he has really willed (though he didn’t know it) whatever the Government tells him to do. From that starting point, via Hegel (another indispensable propagandist on our side) we easily contrived both the Nazi and the Communist state. Even in England we were pretty successful. I heard the other day that in that country a man could not, without a permit, cut down his own tree with his own axe, make it into planks with his own saw, and use the planks to build a tool-shed in his own garden.

     Do not imagine that any society, however organized, can escape the State’s best friend: the busybody.

     A means of escaping the busybody is the best guarantor of a tolerable degree of freedom. It is not permanently stable; nothing is. But it’s the best-enduring chance we have. That implies that until we regain a frontier:

• That’s reachable by common men;
• That provides access to places where the State does not rule;
• Such places being habitable, perhaps with technological help, by those who go there;

     ...freedom will only be a sound we make from time to time. A word in the dictionary whose meaning has no referents in objective reality.

     Just now, that frontier does not exist. Yet it existed in the past. It might exist again in the future. But whereas its past form was a feature of terrestrial geography, its future form will be harder to bring about, and for a time will be accessible only to a fortunate few. Elon Musk had better find some inheritors who share both his vision and his passion for it.

Quickies: Success’s Descendants

     I have written both of the following:

     Success breeds emulation. If there are advantages to be had from the ruthless exploitation of a class privilege, over time more and more members of the class will be drawn into doing so. Thus, the coloration given to the class by its privileges will become stronger and more inclusive over time. [From here.]

     And also:

     She scowled. “My mentor liked to say that success breeds failure. You tend to repeat your old, successful moves because they worked, while your enemy is developing a new one to clobber you with.” [From here.]

     Both are true. The successful are attractive. People will tend (if not prevented) to emulate the behavior that made them successful. Initially, that means an increasing number of people doing the “successful thing.” But the more people do so, the greater the pressure becomes for a countermeasure. Eventually a countermeasure will emerge that thwarts the earlier behavior and establishes a new pattern for success. As has been said entirely too often: lather, rinse, repeat.

     Which explains how both “The trend is your friend” and “Contrarians always make money” are both true as well.