Posts
Lately, I stumbled on a web page offering a new look at the “Scopes Monkey Trial”:
http://www3.mistral.co.uk/bradburyac/tennesse.html
I have no dog in this race; the Catholic Church has no problem with Darwin or the Theory of Evolution. But it is fascinating to see how the record has been falsified.
I never tire of rediscovering the fundamental truth that anything “everyone knows” is bound to be wrong. Almost everything everyone knows about the Scopes Monkey Trial is not true.
To begin with, what exactly was “evolution,” what was being taught as “evolution,” at the time? It is interesting to realize what the banned book actually said, in its chapter on evolution. Darwin has a rather unfortunate history as a basic ideological underpinning of Fascism, Nazism, and their ideas about eugenics.
Here it is:
"The Races of Man. - At the present time there exist upon the earth five races or varieties of man, each very different from the others in instincts, social customs, and, to an extent, in structure These are the Ethiopian or negro type, originating in Africa; the Malay or brown race, from the islands of the Pacific; the American Indian; the Mongolian or yellow race, including the natives of China, Japan and the eskimos; and finally, the highest type of all, the Caucasians, represented by the civilized white inhabitants of Europe and America." (p.196)
"…Parasitism and its Cost to Society. - Hundreds of families such as those described above exist today, spreading disease, immorality, and crime to all parts of this country. The cost to society of such families is very severe. Just as certain animals or plants become parasitic on other plants or animals, these families have become parasitic on society. They not only do harm to others by corrupting, stealing, or spreading disease, but they are actually protected and cared for by the state out of public money. Largely for them the poorhouse and the asylum exist. They take from society, but they give nothing in return. They are true parasites.
"The Remedy. - If such people were lower animals, we would probably kill them off to prevent them from spreading. Humanity will not allow this, but we do have the remedy of separating the sexes in asylums or other places and in various ways preventing intermarriage and the possibilities of perpetuating such a low and degenerate race. Remedies of this sort have been tried successfully in Europe and are now meeting with some success in this country."
This is what teaching “evolution” meant in 1925. Social Darwinism was all the rage. This is what Clarence Darrow was defending as “science.” So it was considered in those days.
Contrary to what most people think, William Jennings Bryan’s objection to the text and to the teaching of evolution had to do very much with its dangers in terms of social engineering and the kind of violence it had recently promoted in the First World War, not just with its supposed conflict with a literal reading of the Bible. Bryan, after all, was a politician, not a clergyman. And he was not a Biblical literalist. Compulsory sterilization was a popular cause at the time: appealed to the Supreme Court in 1927, two years after the Scopes Trial. And found constitutional.
Bryan did not advocate, and did not believe in, a strictly literal reading of the Bible. He makes this clear and categorical. He held that the Bible used figures of speech and symbols. He did not believe the Earth was only a few thousand years old, or created in 4004 BC. He did not believe that God created the world in seven days in a literal sense.
Bryan also had no objection to teaching evolution in the schools. His position was that it should be taught as theory, not as fact.
And incidentally, contrary to popular belief, that famous date given by Bishop Ussher—4004 BC for the creation of the world—is not based solely on a literal reading of the Bible, but on a combination of sources available in his day, including the Bible, Greek historians, and Babylonian records. It was a genuinely scientific best guess of the time, before the geological record was recognized as a possible source.
Also, Bryan’s claim that Darwinian evolution was theory, not fact, was borne out by the defense’s own witnesses. Darwin was not that generally accepted by scientists themselves in 1925, the time of the Scopes trial. According to one expert witness for the defense (Scopes) at the trial: “Of recent years this theory of the causes of evolution [natural selection] has suffered a decline. No other hypothesis, however, has completely displaced it. It remains the most satisfactory explanation of the origin of adaptations, although its all-sufficiency is no longer accepted.”
Bryan’s larger point was that nothing in science is certain; it is all theory. And that this must be taught. He was exactly right: the great flaw in science teaching in the schools today is that science’s current best guess is always taught as if it were revealed truth.
This tends to be borne out by the “expert testimony” at the trial, meant to show the defense’s contention that evolution is “fact,” not “theory.” A huge amount of this actual evidence for evolution, as given in 1925, is now held by science itself to be wrong. Things like the notion that embryos, in their development, retrace the steps of evolution. Something I remember being taught in science class myself back in the Sixties. Things like Piltdown Man and Nebraska Man--who turned out to be a wild pig.
Darwin’s reputation did rise again in the thirties. It has been up and down over time. But note another interesting fact: evolution was not mentioned in most US textbooks until the 1960s. Perhaps it resurfaced in reaction to the play “Inherit the Wind,” which grossly misrepresented the Scopes trial.
At the time, 1925, there was no consensus that either side had won. Technically, of course, Bryan won, and Darrow lost. Scopes was convicted. The case was designed by the ACLU to test the constitutionality of the ban on teaching evolution; the Supreme Court of Tennessee upheld the constitutionality of the statute on appeal. It remained in force until 1967. So, in legal terms, it was a clear win for the anti-evolutionists. But the case never made it to the US Supreme Court, because the judgment was overturned on a technicality.
It is now seen as a win for the evolutionists, but only since the 1950s and the success of “Inherit the Wind.” Which extensively falsified the actual trial. In 1930, the William Jennings Bryan University was founded in Dayton Tennessee, site of the Scopes trial in honour if its namesake’s “last and greatest triumph.”
It is amazing how much of the history that is taught in the schools is straight-out false, invented to support a ruling ideology or ruling elite. Orwell was simply describing contemporary reality when he portrayed the manipulation of history in 1984. “He who controls the past, controls the future. And he who controls the present, controls the past.”
Monday, August 22, 2005
Friday, August 19, 2005
What Killed Vincent Van Gogh?
In a recent trip to Amsterdam, and the Vincent Van Gogh museum, I became fascinated by the question: What killed Van Gogh?
Of course, he committed suicide by shooting himself in a corn field. But why? Although he was lucid as he died, he did not say. He had been struggling for a couple of years with hallucinations and other symptoms, diagnosed at the time as epilepsy. But he seems to have been in good mental and physical shape at the time he actually killed himself; and this does not really answer the question, because we do not know what “mental illness” is.
Assuming that “mental” illnesses are spiritual illnesses perhaps gives an insight.
By coincidence, I saw the following recently in a book of Catholic spiritual guidance:
“Natural activity is the enemy of abandonment, without which, … there can be no real perfection. It prevents, obstructs, or spoils all the operations of grace, and substitutes, in the soul which succumbs to it, the impulsion of the human spirit for that of the divine Spirit. In fact there is no doubt that the impetuosity with which we give ourselves up to good works proceeds from a hidden source of self-confidence, and a thoughtless presumption that makes us imagine that we are doing or can do great things.” -- Jean-Pierre de Caussade.
This speaks of “good works,” but rings even more true of working too hard generally. Van Gogh was convinced—rightly—of his own genius, and worked with superhuman energy to accomplish something great. He produced all his paintings in a span of about seven years.
It is a hubris similar to that of the Tower of Babel. He was trying to do something superhuman; he was taking too much on himself. Inevitably, he was going to be reduced to confusion, as Babel was. One of his symptoms was paranoia, a conviction that everyone was trying to poison him. This seems to me a classic symptom for someone who has given himself too much importance.
Van Gogh himself says at some point that he has been risking his life and has lost half his mind to his work. He was right. Van Gogh is admirable in the way the hero in a tragedy is. He was brought down by over-ambition, yet is noble for how close he came to accomplishing it.
Again, a quote from the book of spiritual instruction: “When you feel, however confusedly, that something is acting in your soul, the stronger this impression is, the more necessary it is to keep quiet and still, and as though in a state of inaction, so that you may not spoil all by interfering unseasonably.”
Van Gogh was a good man, a moral man, and deeply spiritually sensitive. He had he longing for something more. And Van Gogh’s hallucinations might well have been “something acting in his soul.” But such things, when they come, are devastating to the ego. Vincent had too much invested in ego. He did not keep quiet and still, but imagined he had to kill himself to compensate: he cut off his ear and shot himself.
Poor man.
Living in Korea, I began to realize that he notion of art divorced from religion is quite a modern and a western idea. There is a reason why all those Renaissance paintings are of religious subjects. In East Asia, traditionally, there is almost no art that is not explicitly religious.
And art divorced from religion is a terrible mistake. For the audience, and, very much, for the artist.
Of course, he committed suicide by shooting himself in a corn field. But why? Although he was lucid as he died, he did not say. He had been struggling for a couple of years with hallucinations and other symptoms, diagnosed at the time as epilepsy. But he seems to have been in good mental and physical shape at the time he actually killed himself; and this does not really answer the question, because we do not know what “mental illness” is.
Assuming that “mental” illnesses are spiritual illnesses perhaps gives an insight.
By coincidence, I saw the following recently in a book of Catholic spiritual guidance:
“Natural activity is the enemy of abandonment, without which, … there can be no real perfection. It prevents, obstructs, or spoils all the operations of grace, and substitutes, in the soul which succumbs to it, the impulsion of the human spirit for that of the divine Spirit. In fact there is no doubt that the impetuosity with which we give ourselves up to good works proceeds from a hidden source of self-confidence, and a thoughtless presumption that makes us imagine that we are doing or can do great things.” -- Jean-Pierre de Caussade.
This speaks of “good works,” but rings even more true of working too hard generally. Van Gogh was convinced—rightly—of his own genius, and worked with superhuman energy to accomplish something great. He produced all his paintings in a span of about seven years.
It is a hubris similar to that of the Tower of Babel. He was trying to do something superhuman; he was taking too much on himself. Inevitably, he was going to be reduced to confusion, as Babel was. One of his symptoms was paranoia, a conviction that everyone was trying to poison him. This seems to me a classic symptom for someone who has given himself too much importance.
Van Gogh himself says at some point that he has been risking his life and has lost half his mind to his work. He was right. Van Gogh is admirable in the way the hero in a tragedy is. He was brought down by over-ambition, yet is noble for how close he came to accomplishing it.
Again, a quote from the book of spiritual instruction: “When you feel, however confusedly, that something is acting in your soul, the stronger this impression is, the more necessary it is to keep quiet and still, and as though in a state of inaction, so that you may not spoil all by interfering unseasonably.”
Van Gogh was a good man, a moral man, and deeply spiritually sensitive. He had he longing for something more. And Van Gogh’s hallucinations might well have been “something acting in his soul.” But such things, when they come, are devastating to the ego. Vincent had too much invested in ego. He did not keep quiet and still, but imagined he had to kill himself to compensate: he cut off his ear and shot himself.
Poor man.
Living in Korea, I began to realize that he notion of art divorced from religion is quite a modern and a western idea. There is a reason why all those Renaissance paintings are of religious subjects. In East Asia, traditionally, there is almost no art that is not explicitly religious.
And art divorced from religion is a terrible mistake. For the audience, and, very much, for the artist.
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Postmodernism and Fascism
Relativism, the heart of postmodernism, leads inevitably to Fascism.
This insight was not lost on Mussolini himself. He wrote:
“fascism is the political expression of the most modern currents of contemporary philosophy, that is to say, of relativism. Because if there is not an objective truth that we must respect, then each individual will have the right to utilize whatever power he has; physical power, intellectual power, the power to manipulate through media communications, in order to impose on others his vision of the world. And this is not what we consider to be democracy. This is the beginning of totalitarianism.”
Postmodernism is not a new idea. It is a revival of fascism.
This insight was not lost on Mussolini himself. He wrote:
“fascism is the political expression of the most modern currents of contemporary philosophy, that is to say, of relativism. Because if there is not an objective truth that we must respect, then each individual will have the right to utilize whatever power he has; physical power, intellectual power, the power to manipulate through media communications, in order to impose on others his vision of the world. And this is not what we consider to be democracy. This is the beginning of totalitarianism.”
Postmodernism is not a new idea. It is a revival of fascism.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Dead Right
Apologies today to those who come here looking for political commentary. This blog has two foci: politics and religion. The last little while it has been pretty religious. The world, after all, is taking a sabbatical from most politics for the summer months. And sabbaticals have their own traditions.
In 2002, Former New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange was diagnosed with a fatal disease, amyloidosis. He was told he had only four months to live.
He believes this is the best thing that ever happened to him.
“It’s a funny thing when you think you are dead. You’re not terrified of it any more. There’s a sort of an epiphany to religious things, … you end up with a serenity which you didn’t have before and I just simply enjoy it … It really does sound stupid but I’ve got to tell you it’s made my life.”
To a lesser extent, that is the secret joy of growing old.
In 2002, Former New Zealand Prime Minister David Lange was diagnosed with a fatal disease, amyloidosis. He was told he had only four months to live.
He believes this is the best thing that ever happened to him.
“It’s a funny thing when you think you are dead. You’re not terrified of it any more. There’s a sort of an epiphany to religious things, … you end up with a serenity which you didn’t have before and I just simply enjoy it … It really does sound stupid but I’ve got to tell you it’s made my life.”
To a lesser extent, that is the secret joy of growing old.
Monday, August 15, 2005
Playing God
If I were God, here’s what I’d do. I’d set up a world as a training ground, to raise the lovely souls I’d made. To perfect them; because, giving them free will, I know they will have to learn and make their own mistakes.
But being a lovely God, of course, I would not leave my children without guidance. Not dictation, of course, but rules somewhere in plain sight, readily available.
Some sort of conscience would be a good idea, for sure. An inner compass that did point north. And I would ensure that reason, if not too obviously, followed carefully blazed a path to me. But more than that. I would leave a book of instructions and an organization to maintain it. This book and organization would have to be fairly obvious to all, not hidden.
So, without messing with mankind’s ability to make their own organizations, I would still, behind the scenes, make sure the correct organization was, if perhaps just barely, the world’s largest religious grouping and the world’s largest religious body. I would also ensure that no other organization or book that purported to be my truth was entirely without it; that at least they would by their own inner structure ultimately point to it.
Without interfering more than strictly necessary with the ability of humans to make their own decisions, I would protect the reliability of the core of this book and organization to ensure that it continued to be available. More, I would have the book point in some not too subtle way to the organization, and the organization to point to the book, and the conscience and reason point to the organization, and both book and organization to point to conscience and reason, so that they would tend to be mutually reinforcing.
One obvious clue of my intent would be to make my chosen vessel, eventually, the world’s oldest continuously-operating organization. This would be a valuable clue that it bore my protection. And I would advise people in my book to look for just this, to look to the test of time, to the eventual fruits, and to something built as if on a rock.
I would launch my message, my book and my organization, from the point at which the world’s trade routes meet; I would design the world to have such a point to begin with, and concentrate my messages there. The joining point of Asia, Europe, and Africa, the three largest contiguous land masses. That would put it in the southern Levant—Palestine, to be precise. The Mediterranean to spread it into Europe; the Nile to spread it into Africa; and the Tigris, Euphrates and Persian Gulf to spread it into Asia; not to mention the northern silk routes over the desert beginning from this point. This way it would be reasonably accessible to all the people of at least the old world at the earliest possible date.
At first, the trade routes not having developed, I would give my full and true message to one nation: the nation at this point. The moment the trade routes have expanded to the point that any such message could be truly international and intercultural, not identified purely with one particular nation or people, I would give a new, universal revelation. That would be about in the first century AD. Although not all nations could yet hear it, it would be complete for them when the time came. But I would also make sure that the first group that eventually came in contact with the remaining small isolated populations—those in America, Australia, and the remote islands of the Pacific—would be those who had the most correct message.
And that, among other reasons, is why I am a Catholic.
But being a lovely God, of course, I would not leave my children without guidance. Not dictation, of course, but rules somewhere in plain sight, readily available.
Some sort of conscience would be a good idea, for sure. An inner compass that did point north. And I would ensure that reason, if not too obviously, followed carefully blazed a path to me. But more than that. I would leave a book of instructions and an organization to maintain it. This book and organization would have to be fairly obvious to all, not hidden.
So, without messing with mankind’s ability to make their own organizations, I would still, behind the scenes, make sure the correct organization was, if perhaps just barely, the world’s largest religious grouping and the world’s largest religious body. I would also ensure that no other organization or book that purported to be my truth was entirely without it; that at least they would by their own inner structure ultimately point to it.
Without interfering more than strictly necessary with the ability of humans to make their own decisions, I would protect the reliability of the core of this book and organization to ensure that it continued to be available. More, I would have the book point in some not too subtle way to the organization, and the organization to point to the book, and the conscience and reason point to the organization, and both book and organization to point to conscience and reason, so that they would tend to be mutually reinforcing.
One obvious clue of my intent would be to make my chosen vessel, eventually, the world’s oldest continuously-operating organization. This would be a valuable clue that it bore my protection. And I would advise people in my book to look for just this, to look to the test of time, to the eventual fruits, and to something built as if on a rock.
I would launch my message, my book and my organization, from the point at which the world’s trade routes meet; I would design the world to have such a point to begin with, and concentrate my messages there. The joining point of Asia, Europe, and Africa, the three largest contiguous land masses. That would put it in the southern Levant—Palestine, to be precise. The Mediterranean to spread it into Europe; the Nile to spread it into Africa; and the Tigris, Euphrates and Persian Gulf to spread it into Asia; not to mention the northern silk routes over the desert beginning from this point. This way it would be reasonably accessible to all the people of at least the old world at the earliest possible date.
At first, the trade routes not having developed, I would give my full and true message to one nation: the nation at this point. The moment the trade routes have expanded to the point that any such message could be truly international and intercultural, not identified purely with one particular nation or people, I would give a new, universal revelation. That would be about in the first century AD. Although not all nations could yet hear it, it would be complete for them when the time came. But I would also make sure that the first group that eventually came in contact with the remaining small isolated populations—those in America, Australia, and the remote islands of the Pacific—would be those who had the most correct message.
And that, among other reasons, is why I am a Catholic.
Sunday, August 14, 2005
You've Come a Long Way, Rachel!
It looks as though Rachel Marsden’s fifteen minutes of fame may be over. According to her web site (http://www.rachelmarsden.com/) her next TV appearance is now “TBA.” No appearance scheduled on Fox. The site explains she is no longer with the National Post, and yesterday was soliciting suggestions from readers regarding “a new adventure.” She has even pulled the National Post link from her web page. The Vancouver radio show is “on indefinite hiatus.”
Perhaps there is justice in the world.
Perhaps there is justice in the world.
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Fathers' Wrongs
Interesting info on divorce and child support in an older issue of the Western Standard. A few points:
--while wives invariably qualify for legal aid to pursue their claims against fathers, fathers almost never do. A poor man cannot afford justice; he is left without legal council. Despite the fact that non-payment of an excessive child-support obligation can result not just in fines, but in imprisonment.
--actual support payments frequently exceed the cost of raising children. They can be a long-term guaranteed income for the separating wife, and so a positive incentive for women to divorce. As one guy ruefully remarked on an email list about his ex-wife: “she opted for all the gifts and prizes that come with divorce.”
--if the father is given partial custody, no consideration is given to his costs. A father who has his kids forty percent of the time has a thirty percent lower standard of living than the mother. From the money he has earned.
--in Australia, the unemployment rate among divorced fathers is six times the national average. This is because they cannot afford to work; they then become liable for prohibitable child support payments. One study concluded that child support payments were the primary cause of unemployment in Australia. Obviously, in these cases, children are suffering too.
--in Australia, while the number of women’s suicides has remained fairly constant since 1976, men’s suicides have almost doubled. And I checked the figures for Canada: the same is true here.
One of the great oppressions in history is happening right now, right here, to ordinary Canadian and Australian men and children.
Meantime, the Canadian government has announced its intention to further toughen child support laws…
--while wives invariably qualify for legal aid to pursue their claims against fathers, fathers almost never do. A poor man cannot afford justice; he is left without legal council. Despite the fact that non-payment of an excessive child-support obligation can result not just in fines, but in imprisonment.
--actual support payments frequently exceed the cost of raising children. They can be a long-term guaranteed income for the separating wife, and so a positive incentive for women to divorce. As one guy ruefully remarked on an email list about his ex-wife: “she opted for all the gifts and prizes that come with divorce.”
--if the father is given partial custody, no consideration is given to his costs. A father who has his kids forty percent of the time has a thirty percent lower standard of living than the mother. From the money he has earned.
--in Australia, the unemployment rate among divorced fathers is six times the national average. This is because they cannot afford to work; they then become liable for prohibitable child support payments. One study concluded that child support payments were the primary cause of unemployment in Australia. Obviously, in these cases, children are suffering too.
--in Australia, while the number of women’s suicides has remained fairly constant since 1976, men’s suicides have almost doubled. And I checked the figures for Canada: the same is true here.
One of the great oppressions in history is happening right now, right here, to ordinary Canadian and Australian men and children.
Meantime, the Canadian government has announced its intention to further toughen child support laws…
Friday, August 12, 2005
A Thought for the Muslim Sabbath
Vincent Van Gogh’s brother Theo once wrote of him: “He is one of those people who have had a close look at the world, and have withdrawn from it.”
This is necessary for a great artist, an innovator of any sort, and also for anyone who is sincerely religious. Indian scientist G. Padmanabhan, on accepting the G.M. Modi Award, thanked his wife for making it possible for him: he boasted that he had not been into a bank or a shop for thirty years.
The ideal, for anyone spiritual, is to be “in the world, but not of it.” However, this is intrinsically, for psychiatry and psychology, a mental illness: “withdrawal” is not allowed. One must “be in touch with [everyday] ‘reality’.” Retiring to your own thoughts is “dissociation.” This makes psychology fundamentally insupportable.
Psychiatry, in its defense, will argue that this becomes a problem if a person is suffering: then and only then does psychiatry step in and help.
But such a decision to withdraw from the world does not come all at once, is not easy to put into practice, and is not without continuing temptations. At least for a time, more likely forever if you have family connections, you are going to be pulled both ways. And there are difficult, almost insurmountable practical issues: how are you going to manage your sustenance outside the system? All artists, in fact, seem to suffer quite a bit.
And ultimately, the problem is that the world really is a crock. And psychiatry, once it enters the picture, always seeks to push you back into it. So that, if one is mentally ill, that is, conflicted between remaining part of the world or walking away from it, psychiatry will always work against any cure. Because the cure is always walking away from the world, always withdrawal.
God himself has decreed this with the institution of death.
This is necessary for a great artist, an innovator of any sort, and also for anyone who is sincerely religious. Indian scientist G. Padmanabhan, on accepting the G.M. Modi Award, thanked his wife for making it possible for him: he boasted that he had not been into a bank or a shop for thirty years.
The ideal, for anyone spiritual, is to be “in the world, but not of it.” However, this is intrinsically, for psychiatry and psychology, a mental illness: “withdrawal” is not allowed. One must “be in touch with [everyday] ‘reality’.” Retiring to your own thoughts is “dissociation.” This makes psychology fundamentally insupportable.
Psychiatry, in its defense, will argue that this becomes a problem if a person is suffering: then and only then does psychiatry step in and help.
But such a decision to withdraw from the world does not come all at once, is not easy to put into practice, and is not without continuing temptations. At least for a time, more likely forever if you have family connections, you are going to be pulled both ways. And there are difficult, almost insurmountable practical issues: how are you going to manage your sustenance outside the system? All artists, in fact, seem to suffer quite a bit.
And ultimately, the problem is that the world really is a crock. And psychiatry, once it enters the picture, always seeks to push you back into it. So that, if one is mentally ill, that is, conflicted between remaining part of the world or walking away from it, psychiatry will always work against any cure. Because the cure is always walking away from the world, always withdrawal.
God himself has decreed this with the institution of death.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
The Good Die Young
Today's paper reports that the suicide rate in Japan is ballooning, with 71% of victims salarymen. A recent piece noted that the suicide rate among Australian males has quadrupled since 1971, while the number of women killing themselves, lower to begin with, has remained steady. The figures in Canada and the US are similar. In Canada, men kill themselves at three to four times the rate women do, and the suicide rate has roughly doubled since 1950. Despite the availablity of new anti-depressant drugs.
What could be clearer evidence that men are currently oppressed? This is a situation that needs attention, yet all efforts are focussed instead at improving the lot of women, and scapegoating men. And these figures do not even include the many other male suicides probably recorded as traffic accidents.
But then, when men kill themselves, apparently, it is their own fault. It is because they do not express their emotions enough, usually. Becuase, in the worlds of the story on Japan, they are not "comfortable with any display of public or private emotion." But if women kill themselves, it is society's fault.
Or, of course, their husband's.
What could be clearer evidence that men are currently oppressed? This is a situation that needs attention, yet all efforts are focussed instead at improving the lot of women, and scapegoating men. And these figures do not even include the many other male suicides probably recorded as traffic accidents.
But then, when men kill themselves, apparently, it is their own fault. It is because they do not express their emotions enough, usually. Becuase, in the worlds of the story on Japan, they are not "comfortable with any display of public or private emotion." But if women kill themselves, it is society's fault.
Or, of course, their husband's.
Wednesday, August 10, 2005
Alberta Unbound
Zounds! Western separatism—and the Western Standard—made the Drudge Report today. It seems a poll by the Western Standard suggests 35.6% of Westerners would consider separating from Canada. It’s up to 42 percent in Alberta. That’s a percentage similar to that for separatism in the PQ’s first Quebec referendum, on a similar question. Bad mojo here.
Even more ominously, separatism is most popular among the Western young.
There goes the neighbourhood, eh?
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2005/08/09/1165467-cp.html
Even more ominously, separatism is most popular among the Western young.
There goes the neighbourhood, eh?
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2005/08/09/1165467-cp.html
Tuesday, August 09, 2005
The Netherlands and the Tragedy of Overpopulation
The world, we have been told since the 1960s, is “overpopulated.” Disaster is certain if world population keeps growing as it has over the last century.
The world’s population growth is actually slowing down. Current UN projections suggest the world’s population will peak at about 2050, then start to decline.
But let’s leave this aside. Even if this were not true, even if world population were still growing quickly, what would it really mean?
A few weeks ago, I was vacationing in the Netherlands. The Netherlands is one of the most densely populated nations on earth. Accordingly, the quality of life in the Netherlands gives us some sense of what life would be like if the entire world were more populous.
In fact, of course, by almost any measure, life in the Netherlands is pretty pleasant.
There are no huge cities. Amsterdam is under a million. You can get from downtown into the countryside within a half an hour—by bicycle.
Greater densities do not mean the population must huddle in cities. And if it does not, for most of us urbanites, the experience of “crowding” could actually be much less than it is today.
In fact, in the developed world, big cities have generally been declining in population since the 1950s or so. With better transportation, people are spreading out. The “greater metropolitan area” does continue to grow: the growth hads been in suburbs and exurbs. But the typical urban individual lives with less pollution and less crowding than a century ago, when the population was far less. Rich or poor.
This trend, begun by the private automobile, should grow dramatically with the Internet. Populations can now be more widely and more evenly dispersed; any crowding will be purely voluntary.
Of course, a lot of people prefer many neighbours near by. Chinese or Filipinos often think we are mad to want to avoid such togetherness. Aren’t we terribly lonely in our private homes and broad unused lawns?
And we are, aren’t we? I gather I’m not the only one who finds spread-out suburbs “soul-destroying.” Part of this is the problem of underpopulation.
Many worry, of course, about the increased use of resources, in particular increased energy use: surely we’ll run out? Especially if everyone starts burning fuel at the rate of North America.
But why should they do that? The Netherlands has a far lower per capita energy use than the US, with a comparable standard of living. And this is due largely to a denser population. Things are much closer together. With more population, mass transit becomes more viable. Distances shorten. With greater densities, energy use per capita should decline.
We also already have a virtually inexhaustible source of fuel, after all: nuclear.
There are other advantages to greater population densities. I lived in South Korea, another of the world’s most populous nations, for over six years. It was wonderful to have so much going on, and so many friends, within a few hours away—all of South Korea was within a day trip from home, all of fifty million people. By contrast, living in Western Canada—Athabasca and Kamloops--seemed terribly limiting. Friends, events or opportunities in Ontario, or even Vancouver, were inaccessible. Underpopulation. That’s a tremendous limitation on one’s quality of life.
Heck, some of my best friends are people.
Unlike the Netherlands, of course, South Korea does have a large city. Seoul, at 12 million or so, is one of the world’s biggest. Although it too is dispersing. But even if this were not so, even if this were our future, are big cities really bad places to live? A lot of people pay a premium for the privilege.
Traffic gridlock and pollution? That has nothing really to do with the size or density of a city. It has to do with wealth or poverty. Pollution problems are easing in cities throughout the developed world.
And this is true of pollution more generally. Pollution is going down in the rich world, despite growing populations. Because with greater wealth, more development, there is more money for such long-term and aesthetic concerns. The worst thing we could do, accordingly, is to limit development.
There is much concern now about Kyoto and “global warming.” But wait a minute: what Kyoto seeks to limit is carbon dioxide. A harmless substance by most standards. We’re doing pretty well if our worst pollution problem is now carbon dioxide.
Traffic gridlock is a question of traffic management, of whether transit systems are capable of handling the present population. At certain thresholds of growth or wealth, there can be bottlenecks. Bangkok, with a smaller population than Seoul, has far worse traffic problems. Its poverty and its swampy site make building a transit system difficult. New York City, with a similar population, has fewer people-moving problems. On vacation there this summer, I had no trouble getting around, and saw little crowding. Its mass transit systems are better; that, not population, is the only issue.
On a purely philosophical level, to my mind, the notion of human “overpopulation” is difficult to buy. After all, human beings are an ultimate value: an end, not a means, as Kant put it. In what way, then, can there be “too many”?
Sure, we could no doubt do something dumb that might cause our extinction. But “overpopulation” by itself surely can’t do it. Underpopulation might.
I know: you are thinking of cases in nature when species use up their food resources. A lot of individuals of the species die, until the population and the food resources come back into balance.
But has this ever actually led to the extinction of a species? I doubt it. This sort of thing tends to be self-correcting.
Nor can it be avoided by a species deliberately keeping its numbers below the level of its resources. Another species will simply take up the slack, and is just as likely to overpopulate and use them up. Meaning a die-off for the first species as well. Only with greater risk of extinction, because there are fewer individuals.
In the case of the human animal, there is an additional consideration. We have a unique ability to produce, and to manage, our resources. It is therefore sheer folly, for us, to keep our population levels artificially low and yield the resources to other species. They are far more likely to deplete them than we are; with unfortunate consequences for them as well as us.
Perhaps we might run out of this or that other resource. But, with technology and development, our use of resources is actually growing more efficient; and we are always finding new substitutes for what is scarce and expensive. Better technology means greater efficiency, and this means doing more with less. Again, the worst thing would be to limit development.
Or the number of humans, as it is human minds that perform this miracle of multiplying loaves and fishes.
Go forth and multiply, dudes. How many people can live on the earth without overpopulation? I’d say about as many as the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.
The world’s population growth is actually slowing down. Current UN projections suggest the world’s population will peak at about 2050, then start to decline.
But let’s leave this aside. Even if this were not true, even if world population were still growing quickly, what would it really mean?
A few weeks ago, I was vacationing in the Netherlands. The Netherlands is one of the most densely populated nations on earth. Accordingly, the quality of life in the Netherlands gives us some sense of what life would be like if the entire world were more populous.
In fact, of course, by almost any measure, life in the Netherlands is pretty pleasant.
There are no huge cities. Amsterdam is under a million. You can get from downtown into the countryside within a half an hour—by bicycle.
Greater densities do not mean the population must huddle in cities. And if it does not, for most of us urbanites, the experience of “crowding” could actually be much less than it is today.
In fact, in the developed world, big cities have generally been declining in population since the 1950s or so. With better transportation, people are spreading out. The “greater metropolitan area” does continue to grow: the growth hads been in suburbs and exurbs. But the typical urban individual lives with less pollution and less crowding than a century ago, when the population was far less. Rich or poor.
This trend, begun by the private automobile, should grow dramatically with the Internet. Populations can now be more widely and more evenly dispersed; any crowding will be purely voluntary.
Of course, a lot of people prefer many neighbours near by. Chinese or Filipinos often think we are mad to want to avoid such togetherness. Aren’t we terribly lonely in our private homes and broad unused lawns?
And we are, aren’t we? I gather I’m not the only one who finds spread-out suburbs “soul-destroying.” Part of this is the problem of underpopulation.
Many worry, of course, about the increased use of resources, in particular increased energy use: surely we’ll run out? Especially if everyone starts burning fuel at the rate of North America.
But why should they do that? The Netherlands has a far lower per capita energy use than the US, with a comparable standard of living. And this is due largely to a denser population. Things are much closer together. With more population, mass transit becomes more viable. Distances shorten. With greater densities, energy use per capita should decline.
We also already have a virtually inexhaustible source of fuel, after all: nuclear.
There are other advantages to greater population densities. I lived in South Korea, another of the world’s most populous nations, for over six years. It was wonderful to have so much going on, and so many friends, within a few hours away—all of South Korea was within a day trip from home, all of fifty million people. By contrast, living in Western Canada—Athabasca and Kamloops--seemed terribly limiting. Friends, events or opportunities in Ontario, or even Vancouver, were inaccessible. Underpopulation. That’s a tremendous limitation on one’s quality of life.
Heck, some of my best friends are people.
Unlike the Netherlands, of course, South Korea does have a large city. Seoul, at 12 million or so, is one of the world’s biggest. Although it too is dispersing. But even if this were not so, even if this were our future, are big cities really bad places to live? A lot of people pay a premium for the privilege.
Traffic gridlock and pollution? That has nothing really to do with the size or density of a city. It has to do with wealth or poverty. Pollution problems are easing in cities throughout the developed world.
And this is true of pollution more generally. Pollution is going down in the rich world, despite growing populations. Because with greater wealth, more development, there is more money for such long-term and aesthetic concerns. The worst thing we could do, accordingly, is to limit development.
There is much concern now about Kyoto and “global warming.” But wait a minute: what Kyoto seeks to limit is carbon dioxide. A harmless substance by most standards. We’re doing pretty well if our worst pollution problem is now carbon dioxide.
Traffic gridlock is a question of traffic management, of whether transit systems are capable of handling the present population. At certain thresholds of growth or wealth, there can be bottlenecks. Bangkok, with a smaller population than Seoul, has far worse traffic problems. Its poverty and its swampy site make building a transit system difficult. New York City, with a similar population, has fewer people-moving problems. On vacation there this summer, I had no trouble getting around, and saw little crowding. Its mass transit systems are better; that, not population, is the only issue.
On a purely philosophical level, to my mind, the notion of human “overpopulation” is difficult to buy. After all, human beings are an ultimate value: an end, not a means, as Kant put it. In what way, then, can there be “too many”?
Sure, we could no doubt do something dumb that might cause our extinction. But “overpopulation” by itself surely can’t do it. Underpopulation might.
I know: you are thinking of cases in nature when species use up their food resources. A lot of individuals of the species die, until the population and the food resources come back into balance.
But has this ever actually led to the extinction of a species? I doubt it. This sort of thing tends to be self-correcting.
Nor can it be avoided by a species deliberately keeping its numbers below the level of its resources. Another species will simply take up the slack, and is just as likely to overpopulate and use them up. Meaning a die-off for the first species as well. Only with greater risk of extinction, because there are fewer individuals.
In the case of the human animal, there is an additional consideration. We have a unique ability to produce, and to manage, our resources. It is therefore sheer folly, for us, to keep our population levels artificially low and yield the resources to other species. They are far more likely to deplete them than we are; with unfortunate consequences for them as well as us.
Perhaps we might run out of this or that other resource. But, with technology and development, our use of resources is actually growing more efficient; and we are always finding new substitutes for what is scarce and expensive. Better technology means greater efficiency, and this means doing more with less. Again, the worst thing would be to limit development.
Or the number of humans, as it is human minds that perform this miracle of multiplying loaves and fishes.
Go forth and multiply, dudes. How many people can live on the earth without overpopulation? I’d say about as many as the number of angels that can dance on the head of a pin.
Monday, August 08, 2005
What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate
A new study shows that men use different parts of their brains when listening to a male or female voice. A female voice is soothing to men, but tends to lull us into inattention.
For women, it makes no difference.
It follows that sex is a valid job qualification when it comes to announcing the news or to teaching.
We have long known that a picture of a woman will sell a product better, either to men or women. We have long used female voices on subways and elevators, or women as airline attendants, for their calming abilities. And nobody really has a problem with this.
But let’s look at the other side of that equation. For the same reason, men are better at teaching, making political speeches, or reporting news. The current female dominance of the teaching profession may be one reason girls are doing better than boys in schools and universities: boys just can’t pay attention to a female voice. And this is not a matter of perversity; it is in their wiring.
Discomfort on an airline is one thing; losing an education or on participation in social discourse is more serious. We need men in these positions.
If we must, for reasons of employment equity, have both male and female teachers, there is an alternative: separate schools for men and women. With only male teachers for the men’s classes. In the case of reporters and politicians, though, the case is more difficult: I suppose conceivably men and women could vote for different houses of parliament, and a CRTC could require separate newscasts for men and women.
The bottom line is that equity for men and women is a lot more difficult than early feminism claimed; because early feminism argued that men and women were identical but for their sex organs, and that is transparently wrong.
Moreover, the truly equitable solutions, given these essential differences, begin to look more and more like the old traditional sex roles: men doing politics and news, for example; women nursing and nurturing the weak. Our ancestors, it turns out, were not complete idiots.
What a surprise.
For women, it makes no difference.
It follows that sex is a valid job qualification when it comes to announcing the news or to teaching.
We have long known that a picture of a woman will sell a product better, either to men or women. We have long used female voices on subways and elevators, or women as airline attendants, for their calming abilities. And nobody really has a problem with this.
But let’s look at the other side of that equation. For the same reason, men are better at teaching, making political speeches, or reporting news. The current female dominance of the teaching profession may be one reason girls are doing better than boys in schools and universities: boys just can’t pay attention to a female voice. And this is not a matter of perversity; it is in their wiring.
Discomfort on an airline is one thing; losing an education or on participation in social discourse is more serious. We need men in these positions.
If we must, for reasons of employment equity, have both male and female teachers, there is an alternative: separate schools for men and women. With only male teachers for the men’s classes. In the case of reporters and politicians, though, the case is more difficult: I suppose conceivably men and women could vote for different houses of parliament, and a CRTC could require separate newscasts for men and women.
The bottom line is that equity for men and women is a lot more difficult than early feminism claimed; because early feminism argued that men and women were identical but for their sex organs, and that is transparently wrong.
Moreover, the truly equitable solutions, given these essential differences, begin to look more and more like the old traditional sex roles: men doing politics and news, for example; women nursing and nurturing the weak. Our ancestors, it turns out, were not complete idiots.
What a surprise.
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Men are from Mars. Marsden is from Pluto.
I just can’t say how happy I am that the National Post has dumped Rachel Marsden after just two months as a columnist. The brief national nightmare is over. It reassures me that the world is not completely depraved, and the Post not utterly insane.
I was shocked to see she had been picked up by both the National Post and Fox as a “conservative” commentator. I knew her as a feminist bully of the most vicious sort, someone who ruined careers with false charges of rape and harassment.
Granted, she is not a bad writer. Derivative: she does an Anne Coulter impersonation. She also leans heavily on all the latest journalistic clichés. But so do many other journalists: that’s how they get to be clichés.
But my problem is not with her ability; it is with her morality.
Quick hypocrisy check here: are her ethics my business? Do I have a right to cast stones?
If it were merely a matter of personal morality, I’d say no. But she has used her gender in the courts and tribunals against others; she has trashed lives; she advertises her sexuality. She has herself made the personal political.
And when it comes down to it, if we on the right cannot hold the moral high ground, then screw it. Nothing else is worth sacrificing values. That is what values are about.
I suppose it is not easy to be, as Marsden is, bright, articulate, and quite good-looking. I suppose it poses special temptations. I suppose the rest of us should be grateful for having been spared this. Most of us would not be helped by posing semi-nude on our web pages.
Still, there is nothing creditable about exploiting one’s looks, one’s sex, and one’s sexuality to get ahead at others’ expense. Slice it any way you want; in the end, it’s still whoring.
And this woman has ego issues. A quote: “Fifty percent of people want to sleep with me, and the other fifty percent want to kill me.”
She is apparently of the opinion that Rachel Marsden, one way or the other, vitally concerns all the rest of humanity.
Fifty-one percent of the population is female; she apparently also believes that all men, plus some women, want to sleep with her.
I can vouch personally that this is not so.
Marsden is a parasite. While she may be a decent writer, there is reason to believe, since she’s dodged being judged on pure merit, that her loud voice is still drowning out someone better. All suffer from this, not least the conservative cause.
Writing, more than most other jobs, is a calling, a vocation. Writers are in a real sense direct successors to the Biblical prophets: there to speak truth and morality against the excesses of the present powers that be. Because of this office, and because writing engages so much of one’s being, one can never write without exposing one’s character. A flawed character will always out. As Jesus said of false prophets, “by their fruits you shall know them.”
Indeed, Marsden’s writing itself is ultimately immoral. Funny, but mostly wildly ad hominem; she regularly distorts to support her position. She appeals to prejudice, not reason. Does one generally learn anything by reading a Marsden column? No; one is merely encouraged in one’s prejudices.
Let’s take one recent example: she says of Jonathan Chait that “reasonable people” question his sanity. He “rants.” Jane Fonda is a “treasonous twit.” Bill Clinton’s morning jogs were round trips to his mistress’s place. The left wear “tin-foil hats”—there’s a cliché waiting eagerly for retirement. Liberal thinking—sorry, “ideology”--is “spewed forth.”
You get the drift. No thinking here, no facts, no analysis; just invective.
It is really the same garbage used on the left by someone like Michael Moore. It has poisoned our discourse, our journalism and our politics. It is deplorable, on the left or on the right.
Yes, this condemnation also applies to Anne Coulter. At least Marsden exposes Coulter for what she is, by showing how easy it is to imitate her. Anyone can be over the top. Coulter, frankly, gets away with murder because she is a good-looking woman.
Unprincipled egotists like Marsden are now flocking to the right. This is a good sign, in a way. Such people are interested in only two things: power, and self-aggrandizement. They are infinitely calculating, and they have made the calculation that the right is where power soon will be.
But if and when current conservatism becomes received wisdom, they may next be calling for the guillotine and the gulag, figuratively speaking, and greeting the rest of us with ice picks. Because power, not principle, is what they are after; and they know no ruth.
Now, thankfully, it looks as though Rachel Marsden at least will not be around to cheer the tumbrels. Good riddance.
I was shocked to see she had been picked up by both the National Post and Fox as a “conservative” commentator. I knew her as a feminist bully of the most vicious sort, someone who ruined careers with false charges of rape and harassment.
Granted, she is not a bad writer. Derivative: she does an Anne Coulter impersonation. She also leans heavily on all the latest journalistic clichés. But so do many other journalists: that’s how they get to be clichés.
But my problem is not with her ability; it is with her morality.
Quick hypocrisy check here: are her ethics my business? Do I have a right to cast stones?
If it were merely a matter of personal morality, I’d say no. But she has used her gender in the courts and tribunals against others; she has trashed lives; she advertises her sexuality. She has herself made the personal political.
And when it comes down to it, if we on the right cannot hold the moral high ground, then screw it. Nothing else is worth sacrificing values. That is what values are about.
I suppose it is not easy to be, as Marsden is, bright, articulate, and quite good-looking. I suppose it poses special temptations. I suppose the rest of us should be grateful for having been spared this. Most of us would not be helped by posing semi-nude on our web pages.
Still, there is nothing creditable about exploiting one’s looks, one’s sex, and one’s sexuality to get ahead at others’ expense. Slice it any way you want; in the end, it’s still whoring.
And this woman has ego issues. A quote: “Fifty percent of people want to sleep with me, and the other fifty percent want to kill me.”
She is apparently of the opinion that Rachel Marsden, one way or the other, vitally concerns all the rest of humanity.
Fifty-one percent of the population is female; she apparently also believes that all men, plus some women, want to sleep with her.
I can vouch personally that this is not so.
Marsden is a parasite. While she may be a decent writer, there is reason to believe, since she’s dodged being judged on pure merit, that her loud voice is still drowning out someone better. All suffer from this, not least the conservative cause.
Writing, more than most other jobs, is a calling, a vocation. Writers are in a real sense direct successors to the Biblical prophets: there to speak truth and morality against the excesses of the present powers that be. Because of this office, and because writing engages so much of one’s being, one can never write without exposing one’s character. A flawed character will always out. As Jesus said of false prophets, “by their fruits you shall know them.”
Indeed, Marsden’s writing itself is ultimately immoral. Funny, but mostly wildly ad hominem; she regularly distorts to support her position. She appeals to prejudice, not reason. Does one generally learn anything by reading a Marsden column? No; one is merely encouraged in one’s prejudices.
Let’s take one recent example: she says of Jonathan Chait that “reasonable people” question his sanity. He “rants.” Jane Fonda is a “treasonous twit.” Bill Clinton’s morning jogs were round trips to his mistress’s place. The left wear “tin-foil hats”—there’s a cliché waiting eagerly for retirement. Liberal thinking—sorry, “ideology”--is “spewed forth.”
You get the drift. No thinking here, no facts, no analysis; just invective.
It is really the same garbage used on the left by someone like Michael Moore. It has poisoned our discourse, our journalism and our politics. It is deplorable, on the left or on the right.
Yes, this condemnation also applies to Anne Coulter. At least Marsden exposes Coulter for what she is, by showing how easy it is to imitate her. Anyone can be over the top. Coulter, frankly, gets away with murder because she is a good-looking woman.
Unprincipled egotists like Marsden are now flocking to the right. This is a good sign, in a way. Such people are interested in only two things: power, and self-aggrandizement. They are infinitely calculating, and they have made the calculation that the right is where power soon will be.
But if and when current conservatism becomes received wisdom, they may next be calling for the guillotine and the gulag, figuratively speaking, and greeting the rest of us with ice picks. Because power, not principle, is what they are after; and they know no ruth.
Now, thankfully, it looks as though Rachel Marsden at least will not be around to cheer the tumbrels. Good riddance.
Friday, August 05, 2005
Jean Named Viceroy
Not knowing much about her, Michaelle Jean seems a good appointment as Governor General. I like the idea of appointing professional communicators—journalists. It matches the requirements of the post, and is a better idea than appointing retired politicians.
But let’s hear no more about “visible minorities” having a rough time of it in Canada. They are lionized in this country, and have been for as long as I have been around. Thanks to our colonial past and our colonial self-definition, we usually value what or whom has recently arrived from overseas more than the native article.
The “visible minority” population of Canada is now 13%--up from 7% in the last twenty years or so. Counting from Vincent Massey—the first Canadian to hold the post—we have had ten Canadian governors general so far. Two—20%--have now been “visible minorities.” That’s an overrepresentation, not an underrepresentation. Being a visible minority is, in Canada, a good career move.
It is the invisible minorities that lose out. By contrast, with something like 25% of the Canadian population, there has been no Governor General of Irish ancestry. No Italian, either, though there are twice as many ethnic Italians as Chinese. Haitian-Canadians, by contrast, are now doing unusually well in proportion to their numbers.
In a way, the last two governors general have been a return to an older tradition—when all Canadian governors general were foreign-born.
Welcome to the colonies.
But let’s hear no more about “visible minorities” having a rough time of it in Canada. They are lionized in this country, and have been for as long as I have been around. Thanks to our colonial past and our colonial self-definition, we usually value what or whom has recently arrived from overseas more than the native article.
The “visible minority” population of Canada is now 13%--up from 7% in the last twenty years or so. Counting from Vincent Massey—the first Canadian to hold the post—we have had ten Canadian governors general so far. Two—20%--have now been “visible minorities.” That’s an overrepresentation, not an underrepresentation. Being a visible minority is, in Canada, a good career move.
It is the invisible minorities that lose out. By contrast, with something like 25% of the Canadian population, there has been no Governor General of Irish ancestry. No Italian, either, though there are twice as many ethnic Italians as Chinese. Haitian-Canadians, by contrast, are now doing unusually well in proportion to their numbers.
In a way, the last two governors general have been a return to an older tradition—when all Canadian governors general were foreign-born.
Welcome to the colonies.
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
Launching a Canadian Conservative Magazine
Someone hoping to start to a right-wing newsmagazine for Canada asked my advice. I’ve been dying to give it. Here it is:
1. Be upbeat. Conservatives are by nature too pessimistic. But most people do not want to read things that upset them.
Rush Limbaugh figured this out; it is the secret of his success. Rush is always upbeat.
The dear old Report magazine was all doom and gloom. It scared away its audience.
WWRD: What Would Rush Do?
2. Be funny. Don’t portray the opposition as powerful and evil. Laugh at them. People do not vote out evil or corrupt governments. They vote out incompetent governments.
3. Within honourable limits, be patriotic. It is too easy for Canadians to buy the claim that, in rejecting the policies of the current government, conservatives are “rejecting Canada” or “opposing Canadian values.” To compensate, it would help to be visibly patriotic from time to time.
The Western Standard, to my mind, struggles on this score. First, its deliberate focus on Western Canada hinders this. And it runs a lot of US columnists. Canada still needs a national Conservative magazine.
It ought to be easy for Conservatives to harness patriotic sentiment. After all, the left has been trashing Canadian traditions for years.
Best to avoid always using US examples: Canada defines itself in distinction to the US. Try to find examples from other countries when possible.
4. Why cede the whole field of culture to the opposition? As in most countries, the most distinctive, lively, and durable Canadian culture is folk culture: Anne of Green Gables, William Kurelek, Stephen Leacock, Don Cherry, hockey, Tim Horton’s, Canadian Tire, President’s Choice products, poutine, Stompin’ Tom Connors, Anne Murray, Celine Dion. And folk culture tends to be conservative. Compare the left’s apparent conviction that there is “no Canadian mainstream,” that the only culture in Canada is imported from elsewhere. This ought to be a gimme for the right; instead, there is a general impression that culture is a leftist thing.
Canada is more than a medical plan.
Stressing Canadian culture, of course, also helps win the patriotism war.
5. Be aware of Catholic sensibility. I break my own rule here, but the political difference between the US, which has turned conservative, and Canada, which has not, may be due to one simple fact: since Reagan, US Catholics have swung right. Canadian Catholics still vote Liberal. That alone makes all the difference, in a 50% Catholic country.
This is anomalous, since the Liberal party has now gone so far against Catholic doctrine. It is wise for the right to point this out whenever it can.
6. Be aware of the sensibilities of recent immigrants. Again, it is madness to cede this constituency to the left, as it should by all rights be solidly in the Conservative column. Liberal big-government policies harm immigrants, who are disproportionately engaged in small business. The cultures most immigrants come from are more socially conservative than the Liberal left. The right should point this out whenever it can.
1. Be upbeat. Conservatives are by nature too pessimistic. But most people do not want to read things that upset them.
Rush Limbaugh figured this out; it is the secret of his success. Rush is always upbeat.
The dear old Report magazine was all doom and gloom. It scared away its audience.
WWRD: What Would Rush Do?
2. Be funny. Don’t portray the opposition as powerful and evil. Laugh at them. People do not vote out evil or corrupt governments. They vote out incompetent governments.
3. Within honourable limits, be patriotic. It is too easy for Canadians to buy the claim that, in rejecting the policies of the current government, conservatives are “rejecting Canada” or “opposing Canadian values.” To compensate, it would help to be visibly patriotic from time to time.
The Western Standard, to my mind, struggles on this score. First, its deliberate focus on Western Canada hinders this. And it runs a lot of US columnists. Canada still needs a national Conservative magazine.
It ought to be easy for Conservatives to harness patriotic sentiment. After all, the left has been trashing Canadian traditions for years.
Best to avoid always using US examples: Canada defines itself in distinction to the US. Try to find examples from other countries when possible.
4. Why cede the whole field of culture to the opposition? As in most countries, the most distinctive, lively, and durable Canadian culture is folk culture: Anne of Green Gables, William Kurelek, Stephen Leacock, Don Cherry, hockey, Tim Horton’s, Canadian Tire, President’s Choice products, poutine, Stompin’ Tom Connors, Anne Murray, Celine Dion. And folk culture tends to be conservative. Compare the left’s apparent conviction that there is “no Canadian mainstream,” that the only culture in Canada is imported from elsewhere. This ought to be a gimme for the right; instead, there is a general impression that culture is a leftist thing.
Canada is more than a medical plan.
Stressing Canadian culture, of course, also helps win the patriotism war.
5. Be aware of Catholic sensibility. I break my own rule here, but the political difference between the US, which has turned conservative, and Canada, which has not, may be due to one simple fact: since Reagan, US Catholics have swung right. Canadian Catholics still vote Liberal. That alone makes all the difference, in a 50% Catholic country.
This is anomalous, since the Liberal party has now gone so far against Catholic doctrine. It is wise for the right to point this out whenever it can.
6. Be aware of the sensibilities of recent immigrants. Again, it is madness to cede this constituency to the left, as it should by all rights be solidly in the Conservative column. Liberal big-government policies harm immigrants, who are disproportionately engaged in small business. The cultures most immigrants come from are more socially conservative than the Liberal left. The right should point this out whenever it can.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Culture War of the Worlds
I felt morally obliged recently to go see “War of the Worlds.” Tom Cruise is taking a lot of raps recently, partly I think for being publicly religious. This bothers me: the least I can do is see the movie he is promoting.
It was a good movie in the Hollywood tradition: a great spectacle, one big chase, full of sound and fury. The good guys were good, and the bad guys were bad. There was no character development, and the good guys won in the end.
And it showed, I thought, a shift in the Hollywood ethos reflecting the recent conservative victories in the culture wars. The hero is a redneck. His wife has run off with a rich guy from Boston—possibly John Kerry himself. The men in the movie are generally heroic and self-sacrificing. The women are vulnerable, self-absorbed, and, frankly, tend to get in the way. Fathers, and absent fathers, are represented as good guys for a change. The point is made (at long last) that this absence is hardly their choice.
Still, the movie has troubling prejudices. At one point Cruise kills another man; and there is no evidence he sees this as a moral dilemma. The man, after all, is making noise; he might attract the Martians. Never mind that he had taken Cruise and his daughter in and shared his supplies with them; I should have thought the hero’s obvious option was to leave and find his own hideout.
In the context of the movie, though, this is apparently okay, because the man had spoken to Cruise’s daughter in her father’s absence. Any man who talks to a child, apparently, is a pedophile. Does the same rule apply to women? Nope. And any pedophile deserves to die. And any citizen has the right to pass judgment and execute this sentence. Hang ‘em high.
Hollywood hasn’t quite gotten the knack of this values thing yet.
It was a good movie in the Hollywood tradition: a great spectacle, one big chase, full of sound and fury. The good guys were good, and the bad guys were bad. There was no character development, and the good guys won in the end.
And it showed, I thought, a shift in the Hollywood ethos reflecting the recent conservative victories in the culture wars. The hero is a redneck. His wife has run off with a rich guy from Boston—possibly John Kerry himself. The men in the movie are generally heroic and self-sacrificing. The women are vulnerable, self-absorbed, and, frankly, tend to get in the way. Fathers, and absent fathers, are represented as good guys for a change. The point is made (at long last) that this absence is hardly their choice.
Still, the movie has troubling prejudices. At one point Cruise kills another man; and there is no evidence he sees this as a moral dilemma. The man, after all, is making noise; he might attract the Martians. Never mind that he had taken Cruise and his daughter in and shared his supplies with them; I should have thought the hero’s obvious option was to leave and find his own hideout.
In the context of the movie, though, this is apparently okay, because the man had spoken to Cruise’s daughter in her father’s absence. Any man who talks to a child, apparently, is a pedophile. Does the same rule apply to women? Nope. And any pedophile deserves to die. And any citizen has the right to pass judgment and execute this sentence. Hang ‘em high.
Hollywood hasn’t quite gotten the knack of this values thing yet.
Sunday, July 31, 2005
Loyal She Remains
Returning to Eastern Canada after a few years away, it is striking how bizarre it all is politically. Political correctness rules; prejudices are deep.
Why? I think it is because Canadians tend to be too respectful of authority. If someone in authority tells them a thing is so, they do not question it.
This goes back to the country’s founding. Canada was loyal when the rest of America split away from the European motherlands. Loyal acquiescence to established authority is the essence of Canada as a nation. Toronto is perhaps the acme of this: “Toronto the Good,” always earnest. I smile every time I pass by the sign for Temperance Street. That’s Toronto. Political correctness is just the new orthodoxy, as moral improvement once was.
This respect for authority can be Canada’s strength. So long as the ruling elite is trustworthy and capable, it makes things efficient. Toronto, and Canada, often function like clockwork.
Until recently, the Canadian elite was indeed generally trustworthy and capable. The old idealistic, ill-paid Canadian civil service, the civil service of Lester Pearson. The old Bay and St. James Street establishment who sent their sons to spartan and competitive conditions at Upper or Lower Canada College, McGill, Western, Dalhousie or Queen’s to sink or swim, and above all to learn self-discipline and the trick of deferred gratification.
But that has changed. Since the 1960s, the idea of learning discipline has long been out of fashion. No more drafting young men to war; no more corporal punishment in the schools; no more spanking; no more sexual abstinence before marriage. As a result, I think, Canada’s elite has learned to be less responsible, more self-indulgent. With no tradition of questioning authority, this puts Canada in jeopardy.
Things are still holding together reasonably well—a good system can carry on for some time on pure momentum. But gradually, we seem to be seeing more corruption in our politicians; less restraint in our judges; less service in our civil servants; less honour in our politics. The system, in sum, is growing decadent.
The American ruling class is no doubt as corrupt; but their population is less servile. They should fare better. Europe may or may not be as corrupt; but they at least do not define themselves by their loyalty.
Canada seems doomed to a long, slow decline: culturally, economically, politically.
Americans already seem to be rebelling against this self-indulgence in the elite. If they do, rejection of self-indulgence becomes a new orthodoxy. Canada may then embrace this as it embraces all orthodoxies. The Canadian ruling classes should then straighten themselves out over a generation or so.
Still, such thoughts don’t encourage me to return from my self-imposed exile.
Why? I think it is because Canadians tend to be too respectful of authority. If someone in authority tells them a thing is so, they do not question it.
This goes back to the country’s founding. Canada was loyal when the rest of America split away from the European motherlands. Loyal acquiescence to established authority is the essence of Canada as a nation. Toronto is perhaps the acme of this: “Toronto the Good,” always earnest. I smile every time I pass by the sign for Temperance Street. That’s Toronto. Political correctness is just the new orthodoxy, as moral improvement once was.
This respect for authority can be Canada’s strength. So long as the ruling elite is trustworthy and capable, it makes things efficient. Toronto, and Canada, often function like clockwork.
Until recently, the Canadian elite was indeed generally trustworthy and capable. The old idealistic, ill-paid Canadian civil service, the civil service of Lester Pearson. The old Bay and St. James Street establishment who sent their sons to spartan and competitive conditions at Upper or Lower Canada College, McGill, Western, Dalhousie or Queen’s to sink or swim, and above all to learn self-discipline and the trick of deferred gratification.
But that has changed. Since the 1960s, the idea of learning discipline has long been out of fashion. No more drafting young men to war; no more corporal punishment in the schools; no more spanking; no more sexual abstinence before marriage. As a result, I think, Canada’s elite has learned to be less responsible, more self-indulgent. With no tradition of questioning authority, this puts Canada in jeopardy.
Things are still holding together reasonably well—a good system can carry on for some time on pure momentum. But gradually, we seem to be seeing more corruption in our politicians; less restraint in our judges; less service in our civil servants; less honour in our politics. The system, in sum, is growing decadent.
The American ruling class is no doubt as corrupt; but their population is less servile. They should fare better. Europe may or may not be as corrupt; but they at least do not define themselves by their loyalty.
Canada seems doomed to a long, slow decline: culturally, economically, politically.
Americans already seem to be rebelling against this self-indulgence in the elite. If they do, rejection of self-indulgence becomes a new orthodoxy. Canada may then embrace this as it embraces all orthodoxies. The Canadian ruling classes should then straighten themselves out over a generation or so.
Still, such thoughts don’t encourage me to return from my self-imposed exile.
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Toronto's Communion of Saints
In Toronto last week, I went to mass at St. Thomas Aquinas, associated with the University of Toronto’s Newman Centre. Not my choice; I was visiting with a friend who is a parishioner there.
But it was interesting; St. Thomas has quite a “progressive” reputation. Catholics of a certain left-wing bent go to mass there from all over Metro Toronto. Like my friend, who lives in North York.
And it is a thriving parish. It was chock full for the mass I attended, as it always has been in the past. Good rubbernecking, too: some of the parishioners are famous.
Knowing its reputation—one recent pastor was cashiered for straying too far from orthodoxy—I was on the lookout for innovations.
The most immediately obvious is that the pews are arranged in a U shape. The priest paces back and forth along the centre aisle for the sermon.
Next most obvious is that the crucifix is slightly unconventional: Jesus is not nailed to it, but apparently rising from it. It shows, it seems, the resurrection, not the crucifixion. And, more unusually, framing it is what looks like a large golden hula hoop. I’m guessing this represents the sun.
Next thing I noticed is that the congregation does not kneel. Nor can they. The traditional kneeling bar is absent.
The stained glass is also notable. Instead of depicting saints or Biblical scenes, they show people who have lived in the last century or so, and who, although often under consideration for sainthood, are not officially saints yet. Mother Theresa is there; so is Georges Vanier, a former governor general, John XXIII, Oscar Romero, and Kateri Tekakwitha. They also tend to be local, Canadian, figures. And they tend to be laity.
None of this is really unorthodox. But taken together, they seem to me to imply an unfortunate message: that all is well with the world as it is, and there is no need to work out one’s salvation in fear and trembling. These are, to my mind, rather too comfortable pews.
Indeed, the pastor of St. Thomas once actually said in a sermon I attended that “there is no need to preach to this group.”
The central aisle tends to diminish the symbolic boundary between sacred and profane: between what is and what ought to be. This is a comforting doctrine, to those in power; but not to the poor, those who mourn, or those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. The congregation, though, is very largely composed of those with some temporal status. The modern equivalent of Scribes and Pharisees, for the most part. University professors, journalists, lawyers. Some students, no doubt; but the congregation is not notably young.
Again, the rising Christ perhaps downplays the value of suffering for salvation; and the sun disk suggests that what is apparent, what is visible, is what is real. To my mind, this is a materialist, message. God appears instead in the darknesses: in the silences after the whirlwind, or on the night road to Emmaus. But it is consoling to those materially well off.
The absence of kneeling boards follows: there is no need to show humility before God. And the stained glass figures hint that sainthood is far closer and easier to achieve than we suppose. The women of the parish, of course, said all the prayers using strictly inclusive language: God is “parent,” not father, was made “flesh,” not man. I guess even better than imagining you are a saint bound for heaven is to imagine being God yourself.
I do not feel comfortable in this parish. I do not feel comfortable with this sort of Catholic “progressivism” generally, for it seems only self-indulgence and self-congratulation by a ruling elite.
But it was interesting; St. Thomas has quite a “progressive” reputation. Catholics of a certain left-wing bent go to mass there from all over Metro Toronto. Like my friend, who lives in North York.
And it is a thriving parish. It was chock full for the mass I attended, as it always has been in the past. Good rubbernecking, too: some of the parishioners are famous.
Knowing its reputation—one recent pastor was cashiered for straying too far from orthodoxy—I was on the lookout for innovations.
The most immediately obvious is that the pews are arranged in a U shape. The priest paces back and forth along the centre aisle for the sermon.
Next most obvious is that the crucifix is slightly unconventional: Jesus is not nailed to it, but apparently rising from it. It shows, it seems, the resurrection, not the crucifixion. And, more unusually, framing it is what looks like a large golden hula hoop. I’m guessing this represents the sun.
Next thing I noticed is that the congregation does not kneel. Nor can they. The traditional kneeling bar is absent.
The stained glass is also notable. Instead of depicting saints or Biblical scenes, they show people who have lived in the last century or so, and who, although often under consideration for sainthood, are not officially saints yet. Mother Theresa is there; so is Georges Vanier, a former governor general, John XXIII, Oscar Romero, and Kateri Tekakwitha. They also tend to be local, Canadian, figures. And they tend to be laity.
None of this is really unorthodox. But taken together, they seem to me to imply an unfortunate message: that all is well with the world as it is, and there is no need to work out one’s salvation in fear and trembling. These are, to my mind, rather too comfortable pews.
Indeed, the pastor of St. Thomas once actually said in a sermon I attended that “there is no need to preach to this group.”
The central aisle tends to diminish the symbolic boundary between sacred and profane: between what is and what ought to be. This is a comforting doctrine, to those in power; but not to the poor, those who mourn, or those who hunger and thirst after righteousness. The congregation, though, is very largely composed of those with some temporal status. The modern equivalent of Scribes and Pharisees, for the most part. University professors, journalists, lawyers. Some students, no doubt; but the congregation is not notably young.
Again, the rising Christ perhaps downplays the value of suffering for salvation; and the sun disk suggests that what is apparent, what is visible, is what is real. To my mind, this is a materialist, message. God appears instead in the darknesses: in the silences after the whirlwind, or on the night road to Emmaus. But it is consoling to those materially well off.
The absence of kneeling boards follows: there is no need to show humility before God. And the stained glass figures hint that sainthood is far closer and easier to achieve than we suppose. The women of the parish, of course, said all the prayers using strictly inclusive language: God is “parent,” not father, was made “flesh,” not man. I guess even better than imagining you are a saint bound for heaven is to imagine being God yourself.
I do not feel comfortable in this parish. I do not feel comfortable with this sort of Catholic “progressivism” generally, for it seems only self-indulgence and self-congratulation by a ruling elite.
Friday, July 29, 2005
Gananoque Takes the World Stage
I’m back.
By chance, last week I was in my hometown of Gananoque Ontario, usually a pretty quiet little burg of 5,000, when it hit the international news. A few women took a tour boat out to the middle of the St. Lawrence and held a ceremony which, they declared, made them Catholic priestesses.
The unreality of the event is suggested by their reason to do it in the St. Lawrence: the notion that it is international waters, and so under the jurisdiction of no Catholic diocese.
As any local knows, there are no international waters in the Thousand Islands area. But the women had so little interest in truth that they held to this fiction rather than spend the few extra dollars to get into genuine international waters off Halifax, Vancouver, or St. John’s.
That says it. Religion is about Truth above all. These people have no interest in it.
The “ordination” was by a female “bishop” who, just three years ago, was herself “ordained” a priestess in a similar fake ceremony in the Danube. Which also has no international waters. Not bad going, and emblematic of the self-indulgence of it all: from laity to bishop in three years.
Once, when the Globe and Mail seemed to be writing from behind the looking glass, claiming seven or eight impossible things at each breakfast, the National Post at least seemed refreshingly straight.
No more. It would be hard to beat the bias of their recent article on ordaining women, “Called by God, Cast out by Rome” (National Post July 23, 2005, A3). Note the implication in the head itself that these women are genuinely called by God, and that the Catholic Church is wrong to believe otherwise.
The article goes on to consistently refer to the women and their parish as “Catholic” and “Roman Catholic.” How can this be so when they are not recognized by Rome? When they have been publicly declared excommunicate? By this definition, aren’t we obliged to call Anglicans, Orthodox, Lutherans, Baptists, or anyone else who wants to use the term, “Roman Catholic”? Doesn’t it simply empty the term of meaning?
It is not, after all, as if ordaining women is the only departure here from the magisterium. These women “priests” are also, according to the article, married with children, and perform gay marriages. One wonders, if they are legitimately called to the priesthood, how is it they were not given the charism to keep their vows of celibacy and obedience? That, at least, would have given some suggestion it is all something more than self-indulgence.
The article repeatedly refers to the two priestesses as “ordained” (or, indeed, “honoured” with ordination) with no attempt to reconcile this claim with the fact that the Catholic Church does not ordain women. They were “ordained” by a woman “bishop” who herself has been formally excommunicated from the Catholic Church, and who claims she was herself ordained a bishop “secretly” by persons unnamed.
In Catholic terms, it is clear that the ceremony was outside the apostolic succession; it was not an ordination. The women, as a group, conferred this “honour” on themselves.
Leaving the question: why is this given any press attention? Any group of seven or ten women could do the same at any time. Valid ordinations are not covered by the press, and they are a genuine honour.
It is, I submit, yet another example of press bias—against religion, and against men.
By chance, last week I was in my hometown of Gananoque Ontario, usually a pretty quiet little burg of 5,000, when it hit the international news. A few women took a tour boat out to the middle of the St. Lawrence and held a ceremony which, they declared, made them Catholic priestesses.
The unreality of the event is suggested by their reason to do it in the St. Lawrence: the notion that it is international waters, and so under the jurisdiction of no Catholic diocese.
As any local knows, there are no international waters in the Thousand Islands area. But the women had so little interest in truth that they held to this fiction rather than spend the few extra dollars to get into genuine international waters off Halifax, Vancouver, or St. John’s.
That says it. Religion is about Truth above all. These people have no interest in it.
The “ordination” was by a female “bishop” who, just three years ago, was herself “ordained” a priestess in a similar fake ceremony in the Danube. Which also has no international waters. Not bad going, and emblematic of the self-indulgence of it all: from laity to bishop in three years.
Once, when the Globe and Mail seemed to be writing from behind the looking glass, claiming seven or eight impossible things at each breakfast, the National Post at least seemed refreshingly straight.
No more. It would be hard to beat the bias of their recent article on ordaining women, “Called by God, Cast out by Rome” (National Post July 23, 2005, A3). Note the implication in the head itself that these women are genuinely called by God, and that the Catholic Church is wrong to believe otherwise.
The article goes on to consistently refer to the women and their parish as “Catholic” and “Roman Catholic.” How can this be so when they are not recognized by Rome? When they have been publicly declared excommunicate? By this definition, aren’t we obliged to call Anglicans, Orthodox, Lutherans, Baptists, or anyone else who wants to use the term, “Roman Catholic”? Doesn’t it simply empty the term of meaning?
It is not, after all, as if ordaining women is the only departure here from the magisterium. These women “priests” are also, according to the article, married with children, and perform gay marriages. One wonders, if they are legitimately called to the priesthood, how is it they were not given the charism to keep their vows of celibacy and obedience? That, at least, would have given some suggestion it is all something more than self-indulgence.
The article repeatedly refers to the two priestesses as “ordained” (or, indeed, “honoured” with ordination) with no attempt to reconcile this claim with the fact that the Catholic Church does not ordain women. They were “ordained” by a woman “bishop” who herself has been formally excommunicated from the Catholic Church, and who claims she was herself ordained a bishop “secretly” by persons unnamed.
In Catholic terms, it is clear that the ceremony was outside the apostolic succession; it was not an ordination. The women, as a group, conferred this “honour” on themselves.
Leaving the question: why is this given any press attention? Any group of seven or ten women could do the same at any time. Valid ordinations are not covered by the press, and they are a genuine honour.
It is, I submit, yet another example of press bias—against religion, and against men.
Thursday, July 14, 2005
The Tragedy of Canadian Junkie Fish
Greetings from sunny Toronto, currently melting under a tropical heat wave.
Nice to see a letter in the current Maclean's haranguing the magazine for missing an important story: the worry that all the psychiatric pills we are now taking will end up in the ecosystem.
"Ïmagine what harm they might do to the birds and fish," the correspondent frets.
I'm really trying very hard to get upset about this.
Nice to see a letter in the current Maclean's haranguing the magazine for missing an important story: the worry that all the psychiatric pills we are now taking will end up in the ecosystem.
"Ïmagine what harm they might do to the birds and fish," the correspondent frets.
I'm really trying very hard to get upset about this.
Saturday, July 09, 2005
We the Village People
Folks, I apologize for the recent silence in this space. I'm on a grand tour of the headquarters of World Liberalism: Amsterdam, New York, Toronto.
Yesterday, here in New York, I saw a poster. The background was the "Rainbow" flag of the gay rights movement--or os it now the gay-bi-lesbian-transgendered rights movement? And on it the words: "We the people reject the Bush-Cheney agenda."
Your people, sir, is a great beast.
And it apparently does not vote in elections. Why?
Yesterday, here in New York, I saw a poster. The background was the "Rainbow" flag of the gay rights movement--or os it now the gay-bi-lesbian-transgendered rights movement? And on it the words: "We the people reject the Bush-Cheney agenda."
Your people, sir, is a great beast.
And it apparently does not vote in elections. Why?
Wednesday, June 29, 2005
Don't Let's Be Beastly to the Iranians
The newspapers all say Iran, in new president Ahmedinejad, has elected a hardliner; and things seem to be going from bad to worse.
Let’s not push the panic button just yet.
As an Arab academic pointed out to me recently, Iran is in fact one of the most democratic states in the Middle East. We perhaps ought to see it as a beacon of hope for the region, at least as much as the “new Iraq.”
The Majlis, the legislature, and the president, are elected.
Some object that both are subject to the Supreme Leader and the Guardian Council.
True enough, but isn’t it in about the same sense that the US President and Congress are subject to the Supreme Court? The Guardian Council is a group of legal experts there to ensure conformity with Sharia law; just as the Supreme Court ensures conformity with liberal democratic doctrine.
And the members of the Guardian Council are chosen about the same way as are the members of the Supreme Court: half are elected by the Majlis, itself popularly elected. The other half are appointed by the Supreme Leader. And the Supreme Leader is chosen by a body itself democratically elected, the Council of Experts, not unlike the Electoral College. On paper, it seems roughly comparable to the US or British system.
Ahmedinejad’s victory in itself demonstrates that Iran is a genuine democracy. He apparently won because of his popularity with the poor. The people’s choice, not that of any entrenched elite. Note that he is the first non-clergyman to win the presidency. He was not, I gather, the candidate of the mullahs. That was Rafsanjani. And Khatami was the candidate of the economic elite, the upper and middle class.
Some protest that the Iranian government is too religious in nature.
Like, er, that of the Pilgrim fathers? The Mormons of Utah?
Of course the Iranian system is not secular. The British system and the German system are also not secular, do not recognize separation of church and state; why is it an issue here and not there?
Indeed, I think this the most attractive feature of the Iranian experiment. It seems an attempt to create a fully indigenous, Islamic democratic tradition. It can be seen in these terms as an extremely hopeful sign for democracy in the region. Any suggestion that the people of the region must choose between democracy and Islam seems to me cultural chauvinism. Nor are they likely, given that stark choice, to pick democracy.
The threat from Iran to stability in the region is not to be summarily dismissed. On the other hand, I think it is not to be automatically assumed. It makes sense to wait and see, regarding this change at the top, not to man the battle stations.
Just as with Iraq, the development or possession of weapons of mass destruction is not a justification for invasion or “preemption.” The USA has a lot of weapons of mass destruction too; as of course do other countries.
If Iran is developing nuclear weapons _in violation of treaty_ (the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty), that is a more serious matter. And it probably is. But how serious? Can we justify “preemption” here when we did not preempt India, or Pakistan, or Israel, or South Africa, for the same thing? Sanctions, okay. Military action? I don’t think so.
Iran seems comparable not to Nazi Germany or Saddam’s Iraq, not to aggressive Fascist states, but to Revolutionary France or Revolutionary America in the late eighteenth century. Both were at least moderately expansionist. We do need to fear a Napoleon; but for now Iran is more an ideological, not a military, threat to its neighbours. And perhaps on the whole, like France or America, a cause for hope.
Let’s not push the panic button just yet.
As an Arab academic pointed out to me recently, Iran is in fact one of the most democratic states in the Middle East. We perhaps ought to see it as a beacon of hope for the region, at least as much as the “new Iraq.”
The Majlis, the legislature, and the president, are elected.
Some object that both are subject to the Supreme Leader and the Guardian Council.
True enough, but isn’t it in about the same sense that the US President and Congress are subject to the Supreme Court? The Guardian Council is a group of legal experts there to ensure conformity with Sharia law; just as the Supreme Court ensures conformity with liberal democratic doctrine.
And the members of the Guardian Council are chosen about the same way as are the members of the Supreme Court: half are elected by the Majlis, itself popularly elected. The other half are appointed by the Supreme Leader. And the Supreme Leader is chosen by a body itself democratically elected, the Council of Experts, not unlike the Electoral College. On paper, it seems roughly comparable to the US or British system.
Ahmedinejad’s victory in itself demonstrates that Iran is a genuine democracy. He apparently won because of his popularity with the poor. The people’s choice, not that of any entrenched elite. Note that he is the first non-clergyman to win the presidency. He was not, I gather, the candidate of the mullahs. That was Rafsanjani. And Khatami was the candidate of the economic elite, the upper and middle class.
Some protest that the Iranian government is too religious in nature.
Like, er, that of the Pilgrim fathers? The Mormons of Utah?
Of course the Iranian system is not secular. The British system and the German system are also not secular, do not recognize separation of church and state; why is it an issue here and not there?
Indeed, I think this the most attractive feature of the Iranian experiment. It seems an attempt to create a fully indigenous, Islamic democratic tradition. It can be seen in these terms as an extremely hopeful sign for democracy in the region. Any suggestion that the people of the region must choose between democracy and Islam seems to me cultural chauvinism. Nor are they likely, given that stark choice, to pick democracy.
The threat from Iran to stability in the region is not to be summarily dismissed. On the other hand, I think it is not to be automatically assumed. It makes sense to wait and see, regarding this change at the top, not to man the battle stations.
Just as with Iraq, the development or possession of weapons of mass destruction is not a justification for invasion or “preemption.” The USA has a lot of weapons of mass destruction too; as of course do other countries.
If Iran is developing nuclear weapons _in violation of treaty_ (the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty), that is a more serious matter. And it probably is. But how serious? Can we justify “preemption” here when we did not preempt India, or Pakistan, or Israel, or South Africa, for the same thing? Sanctions, okay. Military action? I don’t think so.
Iran seems comparable not to Nazi Germany or Saddam’s Iraq, not to aggressive Fascist states, but to Revolutionary France or Revolutionary America in the late eighteenth century. Both were at least moderately expansionist. We do need to fear a Napoleon; but for now Iran is more an ideological, not a military, threat to its neighbours. And perhaps on the whole, like France or America, a cause for hope.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
The Blogs of War
Today, our subject is the popular sentiment in favour of pacifism. People actually believe that all war is immoral, that pacifism is always preferable to war, and sanctions are and were the way to go. This comes up especially in discussions of the Iraq War.
Let’s reduce it to simplest terms: a woman is walking along a street, and a man jumps her from an alleyway with a knife and attempts to rape her. Is she really morally culpable? It is a moral failure; but it is not her moral failure.
So it can be in war: war can be in self-defense. Self-defense is a right and, indeed, to some extent an obligation.
And now, imagine a bystander who sees this. He is, as it happens, armed with a pistol. Would it be more moral to watch the man rape and then stab the woman to death, shrug, blame them both, and walk on, or to pull his pistol and tell the rapist to cease and desist?
In such a case, I submit there is a moral imperative to pull out the pistol; not to do so is morally depraved.
Having pulled the pistol, of course, there is also the real possibility that he will have to fire it—if, for example, the assailant refuses to desist or even lunges at him instead of desisting.
Then you are at war.
As in this example, it can often be immoral not to go to war. It can be rank cowardice. It can be pure selfishness.Sanctions as an alternative? In Iraq, for our example, sanctions did not work at all. We now know for certain Saddam was scamming the system: the Oil for Food scandal. Meantime, 500,000 Iraqis died “as a result of the sanctions”; by his own estimate.
Sanctions usually punish the innocent poor, rarely harm a corrupt leadership.
Hussein was fully capable of manufacturing weapons of mass destruction despite the sanctions, by all intelligence estimates. We do not know why he did not--if he did not.
At the time, sanctions were tried against Fascism too. They were the chief weapon of the good old League of Nations. That was the plan: sanction aggressors. So they sanctioned Mussolini as soon as he invaded Ethiopia.
It did not even slow him down. But it did prompt him to enter an alliance with Hitler.
They did not try it again. They had learned their lesson. Sanctions are counter-productive.
Someone once said generals are always perfectly prepared to fight the last war. They also generally forget all the lessons of the war before that.
Even if sanctions work, they harm the innocent, and rarely reduce the threat; but it is almost impossible to get sanctions to work. You need international unanimity. One or two well-positioned countries ignore the sanctions, and they are worse than meaningless; they only harm you, but not the target country. Plus, there is every incentive for someone to break the sanctions: any country doing so profits massively.
Given human nature, how often are sanctions likely to work?
Roughly never.
In Christian morality, there is a presumption against war, and war must be a last resort. But that is far from saying all war is immoral.
There were, you may recall, orders of Christian warrior monks whose charism included the obligation to fight: the Knights Templar, the Knights of St. John of Malta, the Lazars, the Teutonic Knights, the Knights of Santiago. There are similar Buddhist orders: the oriental martial arts began as religious practice, and are still headquartered in the head temple of world Zen Buddhism: Shaolin. Monasteries in Japan and Korea traditionally have fighting monks charged with defending the temple, the religion, and, if need be, the nation.
When, in the New Testament, Jesus was called upon to criticize soldiers, he did not. Soldiery is an honourable profession. He said only, “soldiers, be content with your wages.” The New Testament, and Jesus, give a Roman officer, a centurion, as the model of proper piety. Catholics quote him every week at mass.
Hinduism is even more explicit. The main message of the Bhagavad Gita, in practice Hinduism’s central scripture, is the duty to go to war.
We do not like war; nobody likes war. War is very unpleasant thing for all involved. As a consequence, it is too easy to scapegoat it and those who, for moral reasons, do or must pursue it.Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Confucianism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, all have explicit doctrines of the “holy war,” of a war that is not just permissible, but a moral obligation.
Let’s reduce it to simplest terms: a woman is walking along a street, and a man jumps her from an alleyway with a knife and attempts to rape her. Is she really morally culpable? It is a moral failure; but it is not her moral failure.
So it can be in war: war can be in self-defense. Self-defense is a right and, indeed, to some extent an obligation.
And now, imagine a bystander who sees this. He is, as it happens, armed with a pistol. Would it be more moral to watch the man rape and then stab the woman to death, shrug, blame them both, and walk on, or to pull his pistol and tell the rapist to cease and desist?
In such a case, I submit there is a moral imperative to pull out the pistol; not to do so is morally depraved.
Having pulled the pistol, of course, there is also the real possibility that he will have to fire it—if, for example, the assailant refuses to desist or even lunges at him instead of desisting.
Then you are at war.
As in this example, it can often be immoral not to go to war. It can be rank cowardice. It can be pure selfishness.Sanctions as an alternative? In Iraq, for our example, sanctions did not work at all. We now know for certain Saddam was scamming the system: the Oil for Food scandal. Meantime, 500,000 Iraqis died “as a result of the sanctions”; by his own estimate.
Sanctions usually punish the innocent poor, rarely harm a corrupt leadership.
Hussein was fully capable of manufacturing weapons of mass destruction despite the sanctions, by all intelligence estimates. We do not know why he did not--if he did not.
At the time, sanctions were tried against Fascism too. They were the chief weapon of the good old League of Nations. That was the plan: sanction aggressors. So they sanctioned Mussolini as soon as he invaded Ethiopia.
It did not even slow him down. But it did prompt him to enter an alliance with Hitler.
They did not try it again. They had learned their lesson. Sanctions are counter-productive.
Someone once said generals are always perfectly prepared to fight the last war. They also generally forget all the lessons of the war before that.
Even if sanctions work, they harm the innocent, and rarely reduce the threat; but it is almost impossible to get sanctions to work. You need international unanimity. One or two well-positioned countries ignore the sanctions, and they are worse than meaningless; they only harm you, but not the target country. Plus, there is every incentive for someone to break the sanctions: any country doing so profits massively.
Given human nature, how often are sanctions likely to work?
Roughly never.
In Christian morality, there is a presumption against war, and war must be a last resort. But that is far from saying all war is immoral.
There were, you may recall, orders of Christian warrior monks whose charism included the obligation to fight: the Knights Templar, the Knights of St. John of Malta, the Lazars, the Teutonic Knights, the Knights of Santiago. There are similar Buddhist orders: the oriental martial arts began as religious practice, and are still headquartered in the head temple of world Zen Buddhism: Shaolin. Monasteries in Japan and Korea traditionally have fighting monks charged with defending the temple, the religion, and, if need be, the nation.
When, in the New Testament, Jesus was called upon to criticize soldiers, he did not. Soldiery is an honourable profession. He said only, “soldiers, be content with your wages.” The New Testament, and Jesus, give a Roman officer, a centurion, as the model of proper piety. Catholics quote him every week at mass.
Hinduism is even more explicit. The main message of the Bhagavad Gita, in practice Hinduism’s central scripture, is the duty to go to war.
We do not like war; nobody likes war. War is very unpleasant thing for all involved. As a consequence, it is too easy to scapegoat it and those who, for moral reasons, do or must pursue it.Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Confucianism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Hinduism, all have explicit doctrines of the “holy war,” of a war that is not just permissible, but a moral obligation.
Monday, June 27, 2005
The Yellow Peril
Extremely alarming—I would say alarmist—piece in the Washington Times about China. It theorizes about a Chinese invasion of Taiwan in two years, leading to war with the US. It calls China a “fascist state.” It suggests China will be driven to war in any event by its growing need for oil:
http://www.washtimes.com/specialreport/20050626-122138-1088r.htm
To which I respond:
China is not going to attack Taiwan in the next two years. China is nothing if not patient, and it would screw up the Beijing Olympics.
Obviously, since it claims Taiwan as its territory, China is going to want to have the military power to take it if it should ever come to blows. What country would not? This does not demonstrate an aggressive intent. China had the military ability to take either Macao or Hong Kong or both for many years and did not.
If it came to war with the US two years from now, the US would crush China. The Chinese I know themselves are disparaging about China’s military abilities. And a sea/air power will always take a land power: the US can cut off China’s supply of strategic materials and oil at will. They might take Taiwan, but they would not be able to hold it against a determined US.
And this, of course, explains China’s need for a further military buildup. It needs the ability, if trouble came, to protect its oil supply: as it becomes more reliant on foreign oil, it needs power and influence in the Indian Ocean. No surprise if it is building a blue-water navy.
If and when China takes an aggressive stance in the world, certain natural checks and balances click in: the US would not stand alone. Japan might well rearm; India obviously has its own interests in the Indian Ocean. Smaller but quite significant powers would also be concerned: Vietnam, South Korea, Indonesia, Australia, Pakistan.
Even if its intent is ominous—and we have no indication it is--for its own best interests, China will for the foreseeable future have to tread lightly and preserve a smiling face.
By the time this is no longer so, the tide of development should have swept India, let alone the US, into rough parity.
Meantime, for how long would any present “Fascist” tendencies, if they exist, continue in China? Might China instead fairly seamlessly segue into a more democratic, liberal, and business-oriented country by the time any realistic possibilities of large-scale aggression emerged? As have South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia in their day?
Because, over the long term, Fascist countries are really left with only two alternatives. Either switch to a more open system, or be left behind by their neighbours in the race for development.
And economic prosperity does lead fairly relentlessly to political liberalization.
Me, I’m not worried.
http://www.washtimes.com/specialreport/20050626-122138-1088r.htm
To which I respond:
China is not going to attack Taiwan in the next two years. China is nothing if not patient, and it would screw up the Beijing Olympics.
Obviously, since it claims Taiwan as its territory, China is going to want to have the military power to take it if it should ever come to blows. What country would not? This does not demonstrate an aggressive intent. China had the military ability to take either Macao or Hong Kong or both for many years and did not.
If it came to war with the US two years from now, the US would crush China. The Chinese I know themselves are disparaging about China’s military abilities. And a sea/air power will always take a land power: the US can cut off China’s supply of strategic materials and oil at will. They might take Taiwan, but they would not be able to hold it against a determined US.
And this, of course, explains China’s need for a further military buildup. It needs the ability, if trouble came, to protect its oil supply: as it becomes more reliant on foreign oil, it needs power and influence in the Indian Ocean. No surprise if it is building a blue-water navy.
If and when China takes an aggressive stance in the world, certain natural checks and balances click in: the US would not stand alone. Japan might well rearm; India obviously has its own interests in the Indian Ocean. Smaller but quite significant powers would also be concerned: Vietnam, South Korea, Indonesia, Australia, Pakistan.
Even if its intent is ominous—and we have no indication it is--for its own best interests, China will for the foreseeable future have to tread lightly and preserve a smiling face.
By the time this is no longer so, the tide of development should have swept India, let alone the US, into rough parity.
Meantime, for how long would any present “Fascist” tendencies, if they exist, continue in China? Might China instead fairly seamlessly segue into a more democratic, liberal, and business-oriented country by the time any realistic possibilities of large-scale aggression emerged? As have South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, Indonesia in their day?
Because, over the long term, Fascist countries are really left with only two alternatives. Either switch to a more open system, or be left behind by their neighbours in the race for development.
And economic prosperity does lead fairly relentlessly to political liberalization.
Me, I’m not worried.
Sunday, June 26, 2005
More on the Inuit
In defense of the common use of the word “Inuit,” a correspondent writes: “People are best, and accurately, defined by themselves.”
This is a common notion these days. But it is really a novel idea. We do not extend this privilege to European ethnicities. What people call themselves in their language is more or less their own business; but what we call them in English is the business of English speakers. We do not use the native word for the Deutsch, the Francais, the Erse, the Cymru, or either of the two distinct people who call themselves the Han.
And what if one group wishes to call itself “the master race”? For that matter, a group calling themselves “the real people” (“Inuit”) is roughly equivalent; why is it tolerable for one group, but not the next?
And what if I wish to be referred to as “Your Royal Highness the Emperor of Portugal”?
While we’re at it, let’s also dispense with the old saw about “Indians” being a name given to the native people of the Americas by mistake.
From Columbus’s perspective, there was nothing particularly incorrect about calling the natives he encountered “Indians.” That is what they were, by the usage of the day.
Remember, there was no country called “India” then. “Indian” was used by Europeans to refer broadly to anyone east of the Indus River. Filipinos were also “Indians.” As late as the 1920s, Hermann Hesse referred to modern Singapore and Malaysia (in German) as “India.”
Columbus’s point was that the world was round. Therefore, the inhabitants of the West Indies were also Indians, in that they could be reached by traveling east from Europe as well as west.
You would have thought he had proved his point.
The Spanish for many years after saw America and the Far East as a unit. The Philippines were administered from Mexico.
We just happen to divide the world up differently these days. A matter of cultural perspective.
It is fine to want to change the term “Indians” now. It makes some sense, as there is now a problem of confusing North American Indians with the inhabitants of India. But it is wrong to portray Columbus and our European ancestors as merely stupid.
But what term would be better? “Aboriginal people” is no better than “Indians”: we just cause confusion with a different group, in Australia instead of India. “Native People” confuses them with those merely born in Canada; and is technically incorrect. As far as we can tell, the Indians are no more native to the Americas than are the Europeans who came later.
The currently fashionable “First Nations” is no better. How can more than one nation be first? And doesn’t this term imply different levels of citizenship? Do I get to pull rank on second-generation immigrants from India, because my ancestors arrived on this continent several generations ago?
Why not? I’m the Emperor of Portugal, after all. Right?
This is a common notion these days. But it is really a novel idea. We do not extend this privilege to European ethnicities. What people call themselves in their language is more or less their own business; but what we call them in English is the business of English speakers. We do not use the native word for the Deutsch, the Francais, the Erse, the Cymru, or either of the two distinct people who call themselves the Han.
And what if one group wishes to call itself “the master race”? For that matter, a group calling themselves “the real people” (“Inuit”) is roughly equivalent; why is it tolerable for one group, but not the next?
And what if I wish to be referred to as “Your Royal Highness the Emperor of Portugal”?
While we’re at it, let’s also dispense with the old saw about “Indians” being a name given to the native people of the Americas by mistake.
From Columbus’s perspective, there was nothing particularly incorrect about calling the natives he encountered “Indians.” That is what they were, by the usage of the day.
Remember, there was no country called “India” then. “Indian” was used by Europeans to refer broadly to anyone east of the Indus River. Filipinos were also “Indians.” As late as the 1920s, Hermann Hesse referred to modern Singapore and Malaysia (in German) as “India.”
Columbus’s point was that the world was round. Therefore, the inhabitants of the West Indies were also Indians, in that they could be reached by traveling east from Europe as well as west.
You would have thought he had proved his point.
The Spanish for many years after saw America and the Far East as a unit. The Philippines were administered from Mexico.
We just happen to divide the world up differently these days. A matter of cultural perspective.
It is fine to want to change the term “Indians” now. It makes some sense, as there is now a problem of confusing North American Indians with the inhabitants of India. But it is wrong to portray Columbus and our European ancestors as merely stupid.
But what term would be better? “Aboriginal people” is no better than “Indians”: we just cause confusion with a different group, in Australia instead of India. “Native People” confuses them with those merely born in Canada; and is technically incorrect. As far as we can tell, the Indians are no more native to the Americas than are the Europeans who came later.
The currently fashionable “First Nations” is no better. How can more than one nation be first? And doesn’t this term imply different levels of citizenship? Do I get to pull rank on second-generation immigrants from India, because my ancestors arrived on this continent several generations ago?
Why not? I’m the Emperor of Portugal, after all. Right?
Saturday, June 25, 2005
Don't Spend Your Summer Vacation in Chicago
Chicago, to its shame, has started posting on the Web photos of those charged with patronizing prostitutes. All those charged, not just those convicted. This does away with that inconvenient nonsense about presumption of innocence, let alone fussy objections about cruel and unusual punishment.
Mayor Daley explains: “It’s a terrible life, and a caring society has a responsibility to help these women turn their lives around…” Daley said the victims of prostitution are the prostitutes themselves. "Most of them are victims -- real victims," Daley said.
Poor dears.
It’s a time-hallowed practice: if a woman does something wrong, you blame the nearest man. Why is the same compassion not extended to cocaine dealers?
The ACLU has no position on the practice and no comment.
But a social worker is quoted expressing concern. Not, of course, out of concern for the men. She worries the practice might somehow, God forbid, lead to wife-beating.
I’m not making this up. New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/23/national/23prostitute.html
It gets better. State Senator James Meeks has now objected. Not at the unconstitutional discrimination against men. He sees “racial insensitivity.” It turns out too many of the men featured on the Web so far are black and Hispanic. I guess it didn't occur to the authorities that most men who frequent prostitutes are poor--men too poor to attract or support a wife.
Meeks is demanding that a quota of white faces be added.
Easy enough to fix. I guess the Chicago police can go out and pick up a few white guys at random.
I'd be nervous if I were a white male strolling the streets of Chicago.
Mayor Daley explains: “It’s a terrible life, and a caring society has a responsibility to help these women turn their lives around…” Daley said the victims of prostitution are the prostitutes themselves. "Most of them are victims -- real victims," Daley said.
Poor dears.
It’s a time-hallowed practice: if a woman does something wrong, you blame the nearest man. Why is the same compassion not extended to cocaine dealers?
The ACLU has no position on the practice and no comment.
But a social worker is quoted expressing concern. Not, of course, out of concern for the men. She worries the practice might somehow, God forbid, lead to wife-beating.
I’m not making this up. New York Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/23/national/23prostitute.html
It gets better. State Senator James Meeks has now objected. Not at the unconstitutional discrimination against men. He sees “racial insensitivity.” It turns out too many of the men featured on the Web so far are black and Hispanic. I guess it didn't occur to the authorities that most men who frequent prostitutes are poor--men too poor to attract or support a wife.
Meeks is demanding that a quota of white faces be added.
Easy enough to fix. I guess the Chicago police can go out and pick up a few white guys at random.
I'd be nervous if I were a white male strolling the streets of Chicago.
Friday, June 24, 2005
More Raw Meat for Editors
I trust you no longer use the offensive term “Eskimo”? A recent poster on the League of Canadian Poets’ email list was taken to task for doing so. As every Canadian schoolchild knows, “Eskimo” is an offensive term in a neighbouring language meaning “eater of raw meat.” “Inuit” is the correct term.
Except that it is not so. This is apparently a false etymology, embraced to cultivate a sense of victimhood, on the one hand, and of expertise, on the other.
The first problem is that, if it really means “eater of raw meat,” it is hard to see how it was intended as pejorative. The neighbouring native groups from which the term is supposed to have come, the Algonkians and specifically the Montagnais, also eat raw meat.
Etymologists have also pointed out the awkward fact that the word for “eater of raw meat” in Montagnais is quite different from “eskimo.”
More likely, the original word that has become the English “Eskimo” meant “speaker of a different language,” or “the snowshoe people” (this latter with the broad intended meaning, “northern people”).
Moreover, there are real problems with the proposed term “Inuit.” First off, it is an Inuktitut word. Not all Eskimos speak Inuktitut. It does not mean anything in the Yupik language. Yupik speakers (in Alaska) therefore prefer the term “Eskimo,” and find “Inuit” offensive.
Worse, the actual meaning of “Inuit” is “people.” In other words, to call a specific ethnic group “Inuit” is to necessarily imply that all other ethnicities are not human.
If calling someone an eater of raw meat is offensive, is it better to call them non-human?
Except that it is not so. This is apparently a false etymology, embraced to cultivate a sense of victimhood, on the one hand, and of expertise, on the other.
The first problem is that, if it really means “eater of raw meat,” it is hard to see how it was intended as pejorative. The neighbouring native groups from which the term is supposed to have come, the Algonkians and specifically the Montagnais, also eat raw meat.
Etymologists have also pointed out the awkward fact that the word for “eater of raw meat” in Montagnais is quite different from “eskimo.”
More likely, the original word that has become the English “Eskimo” meant “speaker of a different language,” or “the snowshoe people” (this latter with the broad intended meaning, “northern people”).
Moreover, there are real problems with the proposed term “Inuit.” First off, it is an Inuktitut word. Not all Eskimos speak Inuktitut. It does not mean anything in the Yupik language. Yupik speakers (in Alaska) therefore prefer the term “Eskimo,” and find “Inuit” offensive.
Worse, the actual meaning of “Inuit” is “people.” In other words, to call a specific ethnic group “Inuit” is to necessarily imply that all other ethnicities are not human.
If calling someone an eater of raw meat is offensive, is it better to call them non-human?
Wednesday, June 22, 2005
Get Sir John A off the Banknotes
Mark Steyn writes in the Western Standard that Canada is the only country in the Commonwealth that puts pictures of prime ministers on its currency.
It does strike me as crass. No offense to politicians, but if Canada is a nation worth the name, it ought to have something more to celebrate than politicians; every country necessarily has that. Shouldn’t we have pictures of significant contributors to Canadian culture instead, as most other countries do?
I’d like to see: Robert W. Service, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Gabrielle Roy, Stephen Leacock. Obverse should have reproductions of Kreighoff, Group of Seven, Emily Carr, Haida and Inuit art.
Some of these suggestions might sound corny, but I think that’s only because we tend to undervalue our own culture.
An unfortunate tendency that promoting our arts on our banknotes might help correct. Because it’s a tendency that threatens the existence of Canada as a country. As Keith Spicer lamented, we need more poetry about Canada.
In fact, we have it. But we too seldom hear it.
It does strike me as crass. No offense to politicians, but if Canada is a nation worth the name, it ought to have something more to celebrate than politicians; every country necessarily has that. Shouldn’t we have pictures of significant contributors to Canadian culture instead, as most other countries do?
I’d like to see: Robert W. Service, Lucy Maud Montgomery, Gabrielle Roy, Stephen Leacock. Obverse should have reproductions of Kreighoff, Group of Seven, Emily Carr, Haida and Inuit art.
Some of these suggestions might sound corny, but I think that’s only because we tend to undervalue our own culture.
An unfortunate tendency that promoting our arts on our banknotes might help correct. Because it’s a tendency that threatens the existence of Canada as a country. As Keith Spicer lamented, we need more poetry about Canada.
In fact, we have it. But we too seldom hear it.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
Colonialism and Neo-Colonialism
My good friend Jim Taylor, who writes a broadly left-leaning (NDP/Green/United Church) newspaper column in B.C., writes:
“If the world’s newer nations are to ‘grow up’ -- despite any negative connotations of that description -- we need to offer more than just debt relief. We need to be willing to send mentors -- the brightest and best of our youth, our managers, our doctors, our technologists -- to go and work with their people, in their conditions, in their society. Not to hold them down, but to help them up.”
Jim feels this would be better than just throwing money at the problem. And perhaps it would.
But I have my doubts.
If a lack of trained expertise is indeed the problem, the first thing we might consider is to stop stripping the Third World of their best-educated people with our immigration policies. It makes no sense to take, as we now do, all their doctors and managers, then send Canadians at public expense to replace them.
And, having often been one, I am skeptical about “foreign experts” in any case. It is not so easy for a foreigner to understand how things work, and why, in an unfamiliar culture. I think of bulls and displays of fine porcelain. Several folks I met back in Alberta had done this kind of thing in the Third World: going and showing the locals how to better do things they had been doing for a thousand years.
Is this likely to work? Aren’t the locals going to understand local conditions better than the newcomers? Are they going to share the same objectives? What does a typical Canadian really know, say, about tropical subsistence agriculture, or how community decisions are made in Sulawesi? More than a typical Sulawesian?
Unless you assume that Canadians are intrinsically racially superior beings, it defies common sense.
And heck, isn't this exactly what Kurtz was supposedly doing in the upper reaches of the Congo? Isn't this exactly the old colonial enterprise?
One guy had invented a new process for turning the soil. It was a mobile chicken coop; the chickens would naturally claw and hack away at the soil, and once it was fully chopped up, the coop was moved on to the next section. The other guy had a little solar oven for drying crops with the sun’s rays. No need for power. Both were still, years later, terribly proud of their contributions.
Their ideas were clever, in a Mother-Earth-News-article sort of way. But were they really useful? I doubt it. I suspect the chicken coop idea was practical only if you could afford to have your land fallow for months at a time while the chickens worked it over. And had some efficient way to remove all the chicken droppings, which would burn the crops.
And the solar oven might have dried faster than the sun's rays alone, but so what? Was there any financial benefit to the farmer in drying his peppers a day sooner? Enough to pay for the new equipment?
Just, I sadly suspect, a case of upper-class North Americans indulging their control fantasies with the illusion of making a big difference to world poverty. And having a good lark after college or in early retirement at taxpayer expense.
Mister Kurtz, he dead.
“If the world’s newer nations are to ‘grow up’ -- despite any negative connotations of that description -- we need to offer more than just debt relief. We need to be willing to send mentors -- the brightest and best of our youth, our managers, our doctors, our technologists -- to go and work with their people, in their conditions, in their society. Not to hold them down, but to help them up.”
Jim feels this would be better than just throwing money at the problem. And perhaps it would.
But I have my doubts.
If a lack of trained expertise is indeed the problem, the first thing we might consider is to stop stripping the Third World of their best-educated people with our immigration policies. It makes no sense to take, as we now do, all their doctors and managers, then send Canadians at public expense to replace them.
And, having often been one, I am skeptical about “foreign experts” in any case. It is not so easy for a foreigner to understand how things work, and why, in an unfamiliar culture. I think of bulls and displays of fine porcelain. Several folks I met back in Alberta had done this kind of thing in the Third World: going and showing the locals how to better do things they had been doing for a thousand years.
Is this likely to work? Aren’t the locals going to understand local conditions better than the newcomers? Are they going to share the same objectives? What does a typical Canadian really know, say, about tropical subsistence agriculture, or how community decisions are made in Sulawesi? More than a typical Sulawesian?
Unless you assume that Canadians are intrinsically racially superior beings, it defies common sense.
And heck, isn't this exactly what Kurtz was supposedly doing in the upper reaches of the Congo? Isn't this exactly the old colonial enterprise?
One guy had invented a new process for turning the soil. It was a mobile chicken coop; the chickens would naturally claw and hack away at the soil, and once it was fully chopped up, the coop was moved on to the next section. The other guy had a little solar oven for drying crops with the sun’s rays. No need for power. Both were still, years later, terribly proud of their contributions.
Their ideas were clever, in a Mother-Earth-News-article sort of way. But were they really useful? I doubt it. I suspect the chicken coop idea was practical only if you could afford to have your land fallow for months at a time while the chickens worked it over. And had some efficient way to remove all the chicken droppings, which would burn the crops.
And the solar oven might have dried faster than the sun's rays alone, but so what? Was there any financial benefit to the farmer in drying his peppers a day sooner? Enough to pay for the new equipment?
Just, I sadly suspect, a case of upper-class North Americans indulging their control fantasies with the illusion of making a big difference to world poverty. And having a good lark after college or in early retirement at taxpayer expense.
Mister Kurtz, he dead.
Monday, June 20, 2005
Pacino as Shylock and The Merchant of Venice
The best thing about the new movie version of “The Merchant of Venice” is Al Pacino. He dominates the film as Shylock with the best piece of Shakespearean acting this humble correspondent believes he has ever seen. Maybe the best acting, full stop. He is utterly real, in a way the other characters are not. It is Shylock’s play.
But then, it always was, wasn’t it?
The worst thing about the movie is the awkward attempts to deal with the “anti-Semitism” of the play. Not the director’s fault: this was necessary, so as not to fall afoul of current political correctness. But it did distort the play, and was embarrassing to watch.
Is “The Merchant of Venice” anti-Semitic? In the strictest sense, it is not. It has no interest in Shylock’s Semitism. Anti-Judaism, perhaps. And it has no interest in stirring up trouble for Jews; there were no Jews in England.
It is a very Christian play. It is an apologetic for Christianity, as Christian in its way as last year’s “The Passion.” It genuinely believes in Christianity.
It necessarily follows that it does not believe Judaism is true: two claims, if they disagree, cannot both be true, regardless of what postmodernists want to assert. Aristotle settled that one for all time.
Christianity has the right to make its argument for the falsity of Judaism.
In making the argument, though, is the play fair to Judaism?
No, it is not. It claims that Judaism lacks the concept of divine mercy, and of mercy to one’s enemies. But this concept is clear in the “Old Testament,” the Hebrew Scriptures. God forgives Nineveh; he forgives David; he forgives Israel many times. His covenant with Israel clearly does not depend on the people’s just deserts.
But the play is not really interested in disproving Judaism either. Judaism, as noted, was not a philosophy with adherents in England at the time. Judaism, and Shylock, are rather symbolic representations of an imperfect Christianity: Christianity without Christ. It is just a historical accident that the play came to be known in places where it might be misinterpreted as anti-Semitic.
That said, note too that Shylock is not just a foil, not just a comic humour, but the hero of the play. He dominates, and he is meant to dominate. No Christian character comes close to his importance to the story: the Christian lead is split three ways, among Portia, Antonio, and Bassanio, and none of them is brought to life the way Shylock is. Antonio and Portia, by contrast, seem cardboard figures; neither they nor Bassanio show any character development. It is they who are foils for Shylock.
And the central dilemma of the play is Shylock’s dilemma: the conflict between our holy thirst for righteousness, and our own need for mercy.
We accordingly, as audience, identify with Shylock, and are meant to identify with him. We feel the insults he has suffered. Note that the play was apparently commonly known, in its day, as “The Jew of Venice,” not “The Merchant of Venice.”
The title may have shifted because this seems to make the play a tragedy, not a comedy; properly, Shylock is a tragic hero.
But it is not quite that: Shylock does not go mad and die, as a tragic hero should. Instead, he must pay a fine and become a Christian. And he must forgive his daughter. This might seem harsh, but it is mostly symbolic: neither Christianity nor Judaism recognizes forced conversions.
It is, perhaps, not a comedy or a tragedy, but a morality play.
But if Shylock is a tragic hero, his tragic flaw is his righteousness—remembering that the same characteristic must be responsible both for the hero’s greatness and his undoing.
Shylock is, notably, more righteous, more honourable, than the Christian characters.
Bassanio, to begin with, is a wastrel. Antonio is arrogant; we know he has spat upon Shylock, and we see him being arrogant even when asking for the moneylender’s help. Shakespeare intends his anti-Semitism, indeed, to count against him in our eyes. It is arrogance, surely, and contempt, that tempts him into his fool’s bargain of the pound of flesh.
Both Bassanio and Antonio try to give a gratuity to a judge. This would have been morally suspect at the time just as today—Francis Bacon was up on charges for having accepted such a gratuity.
Portia’s guilt is even greater: it is of course outrageous for her to judge the trial under a false identity, with no formal qualifications, and feigning disinterest in a case in which she is vitally interested. Shylock is cheated.
In converting to Christianity, Shylock’s daughter Jessica runs off with boxes of his gold; never mind the matter of disobedience to a parent. As if this is the essence of what “becoming a Christian” means.
Shylock points out that Christians commonly do not forgive; and everyone in Shakespeare’s audience would know this to be true.
So Shylock is a good man, an upright man, and a better man than those around him. Nevertheless, he is betrayed by this very trait: by the great importance he puts on righteousness, on his covenant, his bond. For this is still not as admirable as mercy.
The story is told in small, as so often in Shakespeare, in the parable of the three boxes. Paganism, represented by Portia’s suitor, chooses “what many men desire”—it is driven purely by desire. An imperfect righteousness seeks justice: that each man get what he deserves. But a higher morality, true Christian virtue, will hazard all he has for others.
Shylock is at stage two, and the play is his journey to stage three. The audience, in being made to identify with him, is drawn with him through the same moral choice and, one hopes, the same moral revelation.
The theme of the play is the difference between justice and mercy. It only works, it seems to me, if the audience identifies with Shylock. If we do not see that we are all Jews, and scorn Shylock as a villain, we have missed the point of the play.
And called judgment upon ourselves.
But then, it always was, wasn’t it?
The worst thing about the movie is the awkward attempts to deal with the “anti-Semitism” of the play. Not the director’s fault: this was necessary, so as not to fall afoul of current political correctness. But it did distort the play, and was embarrassing to watch.
Is “The Merchant of Venice” anti-Semitic? In the strictest sense, it is not. It has no interest in Shylock’s Semitism. Anti-Judaism, perhaps. And it has no interest in stirring up trouble for Jews; there were no Jews in England.
It is a very Christian play. It is an apologetic for Christianity, as Christian in its way as last year’s “The Passion.” It genuinely believes in Christianity.
It necessarily follows that it does not believe Judaism is true: two claims, if they disagree, cannot both be true, regardless of what postmodernists want to assert. Aristotle settled that one for all time.
Christianity has the right to make its argument for the falsity of Judaism.
In making the argument, though, is the play fair to Judaism?
No, it is not. It claims that Judaism lacks the concept of divine mercy, and of mercy to one’s enemies. But this concept is clear in the “Old Testament,” the Hebrew Scriptures. God forgives Nineveh; he forgives David; he forgives Israel many times. His covenant with Israel clearly does not depend on the people’s just deserts.
But the play is not really interested in disproving Judaism either. Judaism, as noted, was not a philosophy with adherents in England at the time. Judaism, and Shylock, are rather symbolic representations of an imperfect Christianity: Christianity without Christ. It is just a historical accident that the play came to be known in places where it might be misinterpreted as anti-Semitic.
That said, note too that Shylock is not just a foil, not just a comic humour, but the hero of the play. He dominates, and he is meant to dominate. No Christian character comes close to his importance to the story: the Christian lead is split three ways, among Portia, Antonio, and Bassanio, and none of them is brought to life the way Shylock is. Antonio and Portia, by contrast, seem cardboard figures; neither they nor Bassanio show any character development. It is they who are foils for Shylock.
And the central dilemma of the play is Shylock’s dilemma: the conflict between our holy thirst for righteousness, and our own need for mercy.
We accordingly, as audience, identify with Shylock, and are meant to identify with him. We feel the insults he has suffered. Note that the play was apparently commonly known, in its day, as “The Jew of Venice,” not “The Merchant of Venice.”
The title may have shifted because this seems to make the play a tragedy, not a comedy; properly, Shylock is a tragic hero.
But it is not quite that: Shylock does not go mad and die, as a tragic hero should. Instead, he must pay a fine and become a Christian. And he must forgive his daughter. This might seem harsh, but it is mostly symbolic: neither Christianity nor Judaism recognizes forced conversions.
It is, perhaps, not a comedy or a tragedy, but a morality play.
But if Shylock is a tragic hero, his tragic flaw is his righteousness—remembering that the same characteristic must be responsible both for the hero’s greatness and his undoing.
Shylock is, notably, more righteous, more honourable, than the Christian characters.
Bassanio, to begin with, is a wastrel. Antonio is arrogant; we know he has spat upon Shylock, and we see him being arrogant even when asking for the moneylender’s help. Shakespeare intends his anti-Semitism, indeed, to count against him in our eyes. It is arrogance, surely, and contempt, that tempts him into his fool’s bargain of the pound of flesh.
Both Bassanio and Antonio try to give a gratuity to a judge. This would have been morally suspect at the time just as today—Francis Bacon was up on charges for having accepted such a gratuity.
Portia’s guilt is even greater: it is of course outrageous for her to judge the trial under a false identity, with no formal qualifications, and feigning disinterest in a case in which she is vitally interested. Shylock is cheated.
In converting to Christianity, Shylock’s daughter Jessica runs off with boxes of his gold; never mind the matter of disobedience to a parent. As if this is the essence of what “becoming a Christian” means.
Shylock points out that Christians commonly do not forgive; and everyone in Shakespeare’s audience would know this to be true.
So Shylock is a good man, an upright man, and a better man than those around him. Nevertheless, he is betrayed by this very trait: by the great importance he puts on righteousness, on his covenant, his bond. For this is still not as admirable as mercy.
The story is told in small, as so often in Shakespeare, in the parable of the three boxes. Paganism, represented by Portia’s suitor, chooses “what many men desire”—it is driven purely by desire. An imperfect righteousness seeks justice: that each man get what he deserves. But a higher morality, true Christian virtue, will hazard all he has for others.
Shylock is at stage two, and the play is his journey to stage three. The audience, in being made to identify with him, is drawn with him through the same moral choice and, one hopes, the same moral revelation.
The theme of the play is the difference between justice and mercy. It only works, it seems to me, if the audience identifies with Shylock. If we do not see that we are all Jews, and scorn Shylock as a villain, we have missed the point of the play.
And called judgment upon ourselves.
Sunday, June 19, 2005
Lest We Forget: Happy Fathers' Day
Happy Fathers' Day.
I congratulated the Dads I know at work. The response was the same every time: “Oh, is it today?”
I take it none of them got any gifts from their children. Or even special greetings.
One did recall one of his two grown daughters phoning a few weeks ago and asking if she had already missed it.
Looks like she missed it again.
A woman overheard my greeting, and said, “Oh, my goodness. Is that today? I must phone my father.”
Then, after a moment’s reflection: “Nah, screw him. I just phoned my mother yesterday.”
Me, I’m gonna go out and buy me something.
I congratulated the Dads I know at work. The response was the same every time: “Oh, is it today?”
I take it none of them got any gifts from their children. Or even special greetings.
One did recall one of his two grown daughters phoning a few weeks ago and asking if she had already missed it.
Looks like she missed it again.
A woman overheard my greeting, and said, “Oh, my goodness. Is that today? I must phone my father.”
Then, after a moment’s reflection: “Nah, screw him. I just phoned my mother yesterday.”
Me, I’m gonna go out and buy me something.
Saturday, June 18, 2005
Forum of Oppressed Husbands Forms
A female barrister in India, Aruna Mukherjee, has founded a “Forum of Oppressed Husbands” to protect the rights of men abused by their wives, at home and in the courts.
She is also lobbying for a change in the laws regarding spousal abuse, because, she says, they are “loaded in favour of women.” Unscrupulous and abusive women are able to take advantage of the law, by which only men can be charged with spousal abuse.
Mukherjee says the organization, based in the southern Indian city of Kolkata, fields 150 complaints a month.
Wouldn’t it be nice if Canada, too, had such an organization? For surely the problem is at least as prevalent in Canada. Not to have such an organization, in the face of many resources for abused women, is obviously prejudice on the basis of sex. As is often the case, they see these things more clearly in the Third World.
And why, amid all the feature stories about how women in the Third World are supposedly mistreated, do we not see stories like this in the Canadian media? A Google news search on the keywords “Forum for Oppressed Husbands,” the organization’s name, and turned up only Indian references.
More on the organization here:
http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=48919#compstory
She is also lobbying for a change in the laws regarding spousal abuse, because, she says, they are “loaded in favour of women.” Unscrupulous and abusive women are able to take advantage of the law, by which only men can be charged with spousal abuse.
Mukherjee says the organization, based in the southern Indian city of Kolkata, fields 150 complaints a month.
Wouldn’t it be nice if Canada, too, had such an organization? For surely the problem is at least as prevalent in Canada. Not to have such an organization, in the face of many resources for abused women, is obviously prejudice on the basis of sex. As is often the case, they see these things more clearly in the Third World.
And why, amid all the feature stories about how women in the Third World are supposedly mistreated, do we not see stories like this in the Canadian media? A Google news search on the keywords “Forum for Oppressed Husbands,” the organization’s name, and turned up only Indian references.
More on the organization here:
http://www.expressindia.com/fullstory.php?newsid=48919#compstory
Thursday, June 16, 2005
Chinese Spies in Canada?
Apparently the Chinese diplomat who recently defected to Australia claims China's largest spy network is in Canada:
http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/06/15/spies050615.html
Having had some experience in China proper, I believe this; intrigue is an integral part of the Chinese (PRC) scene. And I find Canadians frighteningly naive about this.
A few quotes from the article:
"How says Canada has more spies operating in it than any other country. ''
"'We estimated at CSIS that we were losing $1 billion a month, $12 billion a year, due to industrial espionage,' he [former CSIS agent] said. "
There is no real reason for panic here: as the CSIS agent implies, these spies are interested in industrial espionage--learning business secrets--and preventing groups here from organizing in opposition to the present Chinese government. They are not interested, say, in invading Canada, or subverting its system of government.
It is just that they do it by spying rather than follow the more conventional channels. It's the way things work in the PRC.
With over a thousand on the ground, though, we should have some concerns about the civil rights of our Chinese-born citizens, and the possibility that Canada's policies towards China might be unduly influenced.
http://www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2005/06/15/spies050615.html
Having had some experience in China proper, I believe this; intrigue is an integral part of the Chinese (PRC) scene. And I find Canadians frighteningly naive about this.
A few quotes from the article:
"How says Canada has more spies operating in it than any other country. ''
"'We estimated at CSIS that we were losing $1 billion a month, $12 billion a year, due to industrial espionage,' he [former CSIS agent] said. "
There is no real reason for panic here: as the CSIS agent implies, these spies are interested in industrial espionage--learning business secrets--and preventing groups here from organizing in opposition to the present Chinese government. They are not interested, say, in invading Canada, or subverting its system of government.
It is just that they do it by spying rather than follow the more conventional channels. It's the way things work in the PRC.
With over a thousand on the ground, though, we should have some concerns about the civil rights of our Chinese-born citizens, and the possibility that Canada's policies towards China might be unduly influenced.
Wednesday, June 15, 2005
Beat the Thumb Slowly
A feminist canard has been going around for years that the common expression "rule of thumb" refers to an old Canadian law (in England it is an old English law, in America an old US law) that allowed men to beat their wives with a stick no larger than the thickness fo their thumb.
A Woman's Studies professor advises that this is regularly taught in university Women's Studies courses.
It is not so.
It came up again recently on the Editors' Association of Canada email list. When someone found a reference speaking of it as a false etymology, they objected:
"I didn't think that there was any question about its origin from the laws on wife-beating. Certainly it has been quite legal for men to beat their wives in Canada."
A hard truth is always resisted; a confortable lie persists despite all evidence.
In the ensuing exchanges, despite other authorities assuring that there was no such law, and that the phrase comes from brewing or rough carpentry, she persisted. At last, she cited this bit of research from the "Word Origins" website as conclusive:
"Ms Fenick traced the idea back to a pronouncement that was supposed to have been made in 1782 by a British judge, Sir Francis Buller; this led to a fiercely satirical cartoon by James Gillray that was published on 27 November that year, in which Buller was caricatured as Judge Thumb....It might be that he never made the statement that rendered him so notorious. Edward Foss, in his Biographical Dictionary of the Judges of England of 1864 says that to Buller "is attributed the obnoxious and ungentlemanly dictum that a husband may beat his wife, so that the stick with which he administers the castigation is not thicker than his thumb", but says he can't find any evidence Buller said it. But the Dictionary of National Biography and other standard works say firmly he did, as did contemporary biographies."
She concludes from this that the phrase should still be struck by editors whenever found: "So even though this is a persistent misrepresented etymology, there must be something to a phrase and its meaning that has been perpetuated since 1782. "
I quote my reply:
"This is not true; you are mixing up several distinct things:
1. the idea that there was once a law allowing men to beat their wives with a stick;
2. the idea that the common phrase “rule of thumb” comes from this, and
3. the fact that there is a common phrase “rule of thumb,” that has persisted for centuries.
The truth of the third in no way demonstrates the truth of the first or second. Thesis one is the only one directly addressed above: whether there ever was such a law anywhere. It concludes there was not. At most, one judge once somewhere thought it was okay—and this went so much against common opinion at the time that he has never been forgiven for it. That hardly suggests an established practice.
The OED is able to trace the term “rule of thumb” back to 1692, making it impossible that the phrase comes from Judge Buller’s attributed comment in 1782. This speaks, by reasonable inference, against thesis two as well. "
It was not my intent, when setting up this blog, to have it dwell so much on men's rights. But where the need exists,...
For the record, this false etymology seems to have been invented in the 1970s for political purposes.
Christina Hoff Sommers, in Who Stole Feminism?, finds first reference in a 1976 report by Del Martin to NOW, the US feminist organization. Her defenders now say Martin’s use was "whimsical."
Which is putting it diplomatically.
Those who subscribe to the false etymology, especially knowing it is false, are signing up for the sort of political manipulation of language and of history Orwell warned against in 1984; and to a deliberate defamation of males as well. It necessarily promotes the prejudicial notion than men beat women regularly in the past. Not that different, in principle, from the older claim that Jews poisoned wells, or that Indians stole things.
A Woman's Studies professor advises that this is regularly taught in university Women's Studies courses.
It is not so.
It came up again recently on the Editors' Association of Canada email list. When someone found a reference speaking of it as a false etymology, they objected:
"I didn't think that there was any question about its origin from the laws on wife-beating. Certainly it has been quite legal for men to beat their wives in Canada."
A hard truth is always resisted; a confortable lie persists despite all evidence.
In the ensuing exchanges, despite other authorities assuring that there was no such law, and that the phrase comes from brewing or rough carpentry, she persisted. At last, she cited this bit of research from the "Word Origins" website as conclusive:
"Ms Fenick traced the idea back to a pronouncement that was supposed to have been made in 1782 by a British judge, Sir Francis Buller; this led to a fiercely satirical cartoon by James Gillray that was published on 27 November that year, in which Buller was caricatured as Judge Thumb....It might be that he never made the statement that rendered him so notorious. Edward Foss, in his Biographical Dictionary of the Judges of England of 1864 says that to Buller "is attributed the obnoxious and ungentlemanly dictum that a husband may beat his wife, so that the stick with which he administers the castigation is not thicker than his thumb", but says he can't find any evidence Buller said it. But the Dictionary of National Biography and other standard works say firmly he did, as did contemporary biographies."
She concludes from this that the phrase should still be struck by editors whenever found: "So even though this is a persistent misrepresented etymology, there must be something to a phrase and its meaning that has been perpetuated since 1782. "
I quote my reply:
"This is not true; you are mixing up several distinct things:
1. the idea that there was once a law allowing men to beat their wives with a stick;
2. the idea that the common phrase “rule of thumb” comes from this, and
3. the fact that there is a common phrase “rule of thumb,” that has persisted for centuries.
The truth of the third in no way demonstrates the truth of the first or second. Thesis one is the only one directly addressed above: whether there ever was such a law anywhere. It concludes there was not. At most, one judge once somewhere thought it was okay—and this went so much against common opinion at the time that he has never been forgiven for it. That hardly suggests an established practice.
The OED is able to trace the term “rule of thumb” back to 1692, making it impossible that the phrase comes from Judge Buller’s attributed comment in 1782. This speaks, by reasonable inference, against thesis two as well. "
It was not my intent, when setting up this blog, to have it dwell so much on men's rights. But where the need exists,...
For the record, this false etymology seems to have been invented in the 1970s for political purposes.
Christina Hoff Sommers, in Who Stole Feminism?, finds first reference in a 1976 report by Del Martin to NOW, the US feminist organization. Her defenders now say Martin’s use was "whimsical."
Which is putting it diplomatically.
Those who subscribe to the false etymology, especially knowing it is false, are signing up for the sort of political manipulation of language and of history Orwell warned against in 1984; and to a deliberate defamation of males as well. It necessarily promotes the prejudicial notion than men beat women regularly in the past. Not that different, in principle, from the older claim that Jews poisoned wells, or that Indians stole things.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
Blame America
A Canadian-born teenager has just been convicted of threatening, possibly trying, to blow up his high school, because he hated all things American.
A friend, by coincidence, notes in his current column that
“…A few weeks ago, at … [a] conference, a speaker referred to ‘American ethics.’
‘Isn’t that an oxymoron?’ I asked.
Most of the audience laughed.”
The rest of us hate to admit it, but I suspect the long-term success of the US in the world actually has a lot to do with a higher standard of morality. Throughout history, cultures and groups with a sense of high moral purpose have tended to be spectacularly successful as a result: Islam in the seventh century, Christianity in the first, Victorian England. The US, largely thanks to its “fundamentalists,” has a relatively stronger sense of moral purpose and public responsibility in comparison to the rest of the world.
This results in a relative lack of corruption throughout the society, top to bottom and bottom to top. And, as Mancur Olsen and others have shown, the main reason the poor Third World is poor is corruption. Corruption costs hugely in efficiency; morality gives efficiency a huge boost.
If we are honest about it, there are any number of examples of the US’s high moral purpose. The US crushed Germany and Japan in the Second World War. Instead of annexing them or looting them, as the USSR did, as the British and French had done in the past, and as would have been the historic norm, the US shoveled money in to help them get back on their feet, and then (other than continuing to help with their defense) withdrew and let them run their own affairs. Same now with Iraq; despite the bad press, and although possibly misguided, it is a model of international responsibility and altruism. Such altruism the rest of the world has rarely seen, and finds it hard, in fact, to accept. This illustrates the American moral edge: the rest of the world finds it literally incredible that another country could be that honourable.
Nor is constant US-bashing morally neutral. If not true, it is the sin of slander. If true, it is the sin of calumny. And it surely leads to acts like 9/11; as directly as anti-Semitism led to the Holocaust. Just remember that Canadian kid wanting to blow up his high school.
As Samuel Johnson said, patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. And the worst of patriotism is the demeaning of other nationalities. What is commonly said about Americans might be considered a hate crime if said of Jews, or Quebecois, or Africans. Try this one on your tongue: “Indian ethics is an oxymoron.”
Part of the reason I feel strongly about this is guilt. God knows, I have been guilty of America-bashing myself in my youth. I went to grad school in Syracuse, and walked around with a swagger telling the Americans, in effect, if not in so many words, how superior I was as a Canadian. Most remarkably, I got away with it. The Americans stayed my friends. I now know from experience you just can’t do that in most other countries.
It was also an American, though, in Korea, who blew the whistle on me. He pointed out that if he, as an American, acted as Canadians commonly act abroad, wearing flags and handing out pins, he would be scorned even by other Americans as an outrageous chauvinist. An Irishman in the UAE told me the same thing; he felt Canadians were over-the-top nationalistic, and unreasonably hostile to Americans.
And a Korean once floored me with the question, “Why do Canadians hate Americans so much?”
We don't, do we?
Give an American a hug today.
A friend, by coincidence, notes in his current column that
“…A few weeks ago, at … [a] conference, a speaker referred to ‘American ethics.’
‘Isn’t that an oxymoron?’ I asked.
Most of the audience laughed.”
The rest of us hate to admit it, but I suspect the long-term success of the US in the world actually has a lot to do with a higher standard of morality. Throughout history, cultures and groups with a sense of high moral purpose have tended to be spectacularly successful as a result: Islam in the seventh century, Christianity in the first, Victorian England. The US, largely thanks to its “fundamentalists,” has a relatively stronger sense of moral purpose and public responsibility in comparison to the rest of the world.
This results in a relative lack of corruption throughout the society, top to bottom and bottom to top. And, as Mancur Olsen and others have shown, the main reason the poor Third World is poor is corruption. Corruption costs hugely in efficiency; morality gives efficiency a huge boost.
If we are honest about it, there are any number of examples of the US’s high moral purpose. The US crushed Germany and Japan in the Second World War. Instead of annexing them or looting them, as the USSR did, as the British and French had done in the past, and as would have been the historic norm, the US shoveled money in to help them get back on their feet, and then (other than continuing to help with their defense) withdrew and let them run their own affairs. Same now with Iraq; despite the bad press, and although possibly misguided, it is a model of international responsibility and altruism. Such altruism the rest of the world has rarely seen, and finds it hard, in fact, to accept. This illustrates the American moral edge: the rest of the world finds it literally incredible that another country could be that honourable.
Nor is constant US-bashing morally neutral. If not true, it is the sin of slander. If true, it is the sin of calumny. And it surely leads to acts like 9/11; as directly as anti-Semitism led to the Holocaust. Just remember that Canadian kid wanting to blow up his high school.
As Samuel Johnson said, patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel. And the worst of patriotism is the demeaning of other nationalities. What is commonly said about Americans might be considered a hate crime if said of Jews, or Quebecois, or Africans. Try this one on your tongue: “Indian ethics is an oxymoron.”
Part of the reason I feel strongly about this is guilt. God knows, I have been guilty of America-bashing myself in my youth. I went to grad school in Syracuse, and walked around with a swagger telling the Americans, in effect, if not in so many words, how superior I was as a Canadian. Most remarkably, I got away with it. The Americans stayed my friends. I now know from experience you just can’t do that in most other countries.
It was also an American, though, in Korea, who blew the whistle on me. He pointed out that if he, as an American, acted as Canadians commonly act abroad, wearing flags and handing out pins, he would be scorned even by other Americans as an outrageous chauvinist. An Irishman in the UAE told me the same thing; he felt Canadians were over-the-top nationalistic, and unreasonably hostile to Americans.
And a Korean once floored me with the question, “Why do Canadians hate Americans so much?”
We don't, do we?
Give an American a hug today.
Saturday, June 11, 2005
Medicare: A Few Modest Proposals
In the wake of the Quebec Supreme Court ruling, there is perhaps new incentive to improve Canadian Medicare.
A few modest proposals:
- To prevent abuse of the system, institute at least nominal user fees or deductibles. These could be waived for those on social assistance.
- Stop funding abortions. These are, after all, at best not a necessary procedure, but a purely voluntary one. This is even aside from the moral and human rights issues involved in funding abortions.
- Allow a free market on the supply side. This has no effect on the universality of the system. Competition from the private sector should force down costs. Fund procedures (other than abortions, which, unbelievably, are already funded) at private clinics at the same rate as at public clinics, and the free market should make more care available for the same cost. If not, nothing lost.
- Allow pharmacists to issue prescriptions. They have the training; but the doctors’ monopoly prevents it. This sounds radical; but it is taken for granted in some countries. This would save huge amounts of money paid to doctors simply to renew prescriptions, for which their expertise is not needed.
- Set up and allow diagnosis, prescription, and referral by computer. Computers can do this more competently than physicians, but again the physicians’ monopoly prevents it. You don’t need a trained physician to type on a keyboard. At most you need a nurse or technician to double-check and handle referrals if necessary.
- Stop funding procedures that are not scientifically proven. According to one estimate, only 27% of current medical procedures have a solid scientific basis. But why spend money when we don’t know it is doing any good?
Besides saving a huge amount of money, this would level the playing field between “Western” medicine and alternative therapies: and so, by increasing competition, lower costs for all.
A few modest proposals:
- To prevent abuse of the system, institute at least nominal user fees or deductibles. These could be waived for those on social assistance.
- Stop funding abortions. These are, after all, at best not a necessary procedure, but a purely voluntary one. This is even aside from the moral and human rights issues involved in funding abortions.
- Allow a free market on the supply side. This has no effect on the universality of the system. Competition from the private sector should force down costs. Fund procedures (other than abortions, which, unbelievably, are already funded) at private clinics at the same rate as at public clinics, and the free market should make more care available for the same cost. If not, nothing lost.
- Allow pharmacists to issue prescriptions. They have the training; but the doctors’ monopoly prevents it. This sounds radical; but it is taken for granted in some countries. This would save huge amounts of money paid to doctors simply to renew prescriptions, for which their expertise is not needed.
- Set up and allow diagnosis, prescription, and referral by computer. Computers can do this more competently than physicians, but again the physicians’ monopoly prevents it. You don’t need a trained physician to type on a keyboard. At most you need a nurse or technician to double-check and handle referrals if necessary.
- Stop funding procedures that are not scientifically proven. According to one estimate, only 27% of current medical procedures have a solid scientific basis. But why spend money when we don’t know it is doing any good?
Besides saving a huge amount of money, this would level the playing field between “Western” medicine and alternative therapies: and so, by increasing competition, lower costs for all.
Friday, June 10, 2005
A Hip Check for Medicare
The Quebec Supreme Court has ruled that Canadians have the right to purchase health care privately.
Like the man who brought the case, my own mother has been waiting since last summer for a hip replacement. It will be at least a year. Meanwhile, in addition to the pain, she cannot walk. Kind of puts a crimp in your lifestyle. Making it illegal to get medical care is an obvious violation of human rights; the court ruled correctly. All other Western nations with universal health care seem to have so-called “two-tier” care, which allows people to opt out of the public system if they are prepared to pay for a private plan.
Predictably, though, the left is alarmed. In the Toronto Star, Ian Urquhart has called for use of the “notwithstanding” clause to override the Charter of Rights. Ontario NDP leader Howard Hampton agrees: “This is exactly the circumstance when the notwithstanding clause should be used,” he said. “At the end of the day, the people should make the decisions on these kinds of issues.”
“In its ruling yesterday,” Urquhart writes, outlining the problem, “the Supreme Court has, in effect, placed an individual's right to buy private medical insurance above the collective preference for universal and public medicare.”
God forbid. But that is exactly what the doctrine of human rights is supposed to be about: the rights of the individual against the collective.
And what spectacular hypocrisy, from those who embraced the courts’ recent interventions on homosexual rights.
Like the man who brought the case, my own mother has been waiting since last summer for a hip replacement. It will be at least a year. Meanwhile, in addition to the pain, she cannot walk. Kind of puts a crimp in your lifestyle. Making it illegal to get medical care is an obvious violation of human rights; the court ruled correctly. All other Western nations with universal health care seem to have so-called “two-tier” care, which allows people to opt out of the public system if they are prepared to pay for a private plan.
Predictably, though, the left is alarmed. In the Toronto Star, Ian Urquhart has called for use of the “notwithstanding” clause to override the Charter of Rights. Ontario NDP leader Howard Hampton agrees: “This is exactly the circumstance when the notwithstanding clause should be used,” he said. “At the end of the day, the people should make the decisions on these kinds of issues.”
“In its ruling yesterday,” Urquhart writes, outlining the problem, “the Supreme Court has, in effect, placed an individual's right to buy private medical insurance above the collective preference for universal and public medicare.”
God forbid. But that is exactly what the doctrine of human rights is supposed to be about: the rights of the individual against the collective.
And what spectacular hypocrisy, from those who embraced the courts’ recent interventions on homosexual rights.
Thursday, June 09, 2005
So Abortion is Murder after All
News just in from Texas: a 19-year-old male who helped his girlfriend abort has been sentenced to life in prison for murder in the death of the foetus (AP, June 7, 2005). The woman, of course, was not prosecuted: abortion is her constitutional right.
Could there be a clearer case of unequal protection under the law, of discrimination on the basis of sex? What is murder if a man does it, is a woman's human right. Sauce for the goose, is poison for the gander.
http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/news/4577721/detail.html
Could there be a clearer case of unequal protection under the law, of discrimination on the basis of sex? What is murder if a man does it, is a woman's human right. Sauce for the goose, is poison for the gander.
http://www.thehawaiichannel.com/news/4577721/detail.html
Wednesday, June 08, 2005
Animal Love and People Love
It is currently a truism, at least among social work types, that children who treat animals badly will go on to treat humans badly as well. Where once we thought rather little of boys tying tin cans to dogs’ tails, or pulling the wings off flies, now we believe each is a potential serial killer.
Maybe. On the other hand, there is the curious fact that, in the pages of history, those who have been particularly fond of animals have sometimes not been the nicest folks to their fellow humans. Hitler was a vegetarian and a dog lover. Ceausescu gave his dog his own chauffeur. Caligula made his horse a proconsul.
In the recent hearings on granting Karla Homolka her freedom, it turned out she too was an animal lover.
From the Toronto Star account:
“He (the prosecutor) also tried to debunk key defence contentions that Homolka suffered from battered-wife syndrome and was in the clutches of a calculating psychopath when she participated in the killings.
Ramsay referred to two occasions when Homolka stood up to Bernardo, once when he was smashing a dog's head on concrete, and a second time when he tried to force her into having sex with the family pet.
‘She was willing to risk being alone for the dog. For her sister? No. For two other young women? No. But for the dog, yes ... that says all you need to know about Ms. Homolka's character,’ he said.”
Toronto Star, June 4, 2005-06-05, “She’s Still a Danger, Court Rules.”
At a minimum, there seems to be no connection between kindness to animals and kindness to one’s fellow man. But it even seems possible that the one substitutes for the other: people can love animals as a substitute for loving humans.
It’s so much easier to love an animal, after all: they are completely subservient to you. You are in control.
Maybe. On the other hand, there is the curious fact that, in the pages of history, those who have been particularly fond of animals have sometimes not been the nicest folks to their fellow humans. Hitler was a vegetarian and a dog lover. Ceausescu gave his dog his own chauffeur. Caligula made his horse a proconsul.
In the recent hearings on granting Karla Homolka her freedom, it turned out she too was an animal lover.
From the Toronto Star account:
“He (the prosecutor) also tried to debunk key defence contentions that Homolka suffered from battered-wife syndrome and was in the clutches of a calculating psychopath when she participated in the killings.
Ramsay referred to two occasions when Homolka stood up to Bernardo, once when he was smashing a dog's head on concrete, and a second time when he tried to force her into having sex with the family pet.
‘She was willing to risk being alone for the dog. For her sister? No. For two other young women? No. But for the dog, yes ... that says all you need to know about Ms. Homolka's character,’ he said.”
Toronto Star, June 4, 2005-06-05, “She’s Still a Danger, Court Rules.”
At a minimum, there seems to be no connection between kindness to animals and kindness to one’s fellow man. But it even seems possible that the one substitutes for the other: people can love animals as a substitute for loving humans.
It’s so much easier to love an animal, after all: they are completely subservient to you. You are in control.
Sunday, June 05, 2005
Guys: Your Name in Lights
Reuters reports that in Oakland California, the faces of convicted “johns” are now being features on billboards as a type of punishment for their crime. “Other signs invite prostitutes to quit by calling a helpline.”
In Vancouver, I am told—I cannot vouch for this—johns instead are sent to “john school,” where prostitutes are hired to lecture them on the harm they have done.
Clearly, the victim is the prostitute, and the criminal is the client.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to apply this same principle to other crimes of commerce? By this logic, shouldn’t the faces of cocaine or marijuana users be put on the billboards, while owners of grow ops and traffickers are invited to call help lines? How about hiring bookies to harangue illegal bet makers on the harm they have suffered? Those who smuggle in cigarettes could similarly harangue their customers; sellers of illegal satellite dishes could also have a help line; or those who peddle pirated software.
Let’s, just for the sake of argument, forget the prohibition in both the US and Canadian constitution against “cruel and unusual punishment.” Let's trim that human rights fat when it comes to crimes against women.
For what is different, then, between these other economic crimes and prostitution, other than the sellers being female and the buyers male? Could we see gigolos similarly having a moral case against the rich widows who might employ their services? Or isn’t this just a case of scapegoating men and exonerating women for the results of their own actions.
A colleague defends the current practice by claiming that prostitutes are commonly addicted to drugs and therefore not in control of what they do. Fine; this might or might not be true. Those who have tried vouch for how hard it is to get a prostitute to leave prostitution; this makes it seem unlikely they are doing it under compulsion. It has been pointed out that prostitutes make more money than most people pursuing a more conventional career. That does seems a possible reason for choosing the trade.
But even if it is true that most prostitutes are drug addicts, this is also true of many burglars, muggers, and break and entry artists. In these cases, do we feel being a drug addict exonerates them?
No, isn’t it is their sex alone that exonerates prostitutes?
In Vancouver, I am told—I cannot vouch for this—johns instead are sent to “john school,” where prostitutes are hired to lecture them on the harm they have done.
Clearly, the victim is the prostitute, and the criminal is the client.
Wouldn’t it be interesting to apply this same principle to other crimes of commerce? By this logic, shouldn’t the faces of cocaine or marijuana users be put on the billboards, while owners of grow ops and traffickers are invited to call help lines? How about hiring bookies to harangue illegal bet makers on the harm they have suffered? Those who smuggle in cigarettes could similarly harangue their customers; sellers of illegal satellite dishes could also have a help line; or those who peddle pirated software.
Let’s, just for the sake of argument, forget the prohibition in both the US and Canadian constitution against “cruel and unusual punishment.” Let's trim that human rights fat when it comes to crimes against women.
For what is different, then, between these other economic crimes and prostitution, other than the sellers being female and the buyers male? Could we see gigolos similarly having a moral case against the rich widows who might employ their services? Or isn’t this just a case of scapegoating men and exonerating women for the results of their own actions.
A colleague defends the current practice by claiming that prostitutes are commonly addicted to drugs and therefore not in control of what they do. Fine; this might or might not be true. Those who have tried vouch for how hard it is to get a prostitute to leave prostitution; this makes it seem unlikely they are doing it under compulsion. It has been pointed out that prostitutes make more money than most people pursuing a more conventional career. That does seems a possible reason for choosing the trade.
But even if it is true that most prostitutes are drug addicts, this is also true of many burglars, muggers, and break and entry artists. In these cases, do we feel being a drug addict exonerates them?
No, isn’t it is their sex alone that exonerates prostitutes?
Saturday, June 04, 2005
Pssst--Canadian is Crowned Miss Universe
Canada's Natalie Gelbova won the Miss Universe crown this week. The story was featured on the front page of the Gulf News.
But not even mentioned in the news summaries I get daily from CBC and the Toronto Star. A Google search turns up seven pages of press stories, everywhere from China's People's Daily to the Star of Malta, before I find the first major Canadian media hit--the Winnipeg Sun.
To my mind, this illustrates how limited the Canadian media voice has become--that a Canadian who has bested the world is barely acknowledged in her home country.
And it shows the Canadian hostility to all that is traditionally and uniquely feminine, that deceptively masquerades under the name "feminism."
But not even mentioned in the news summaries I get daily from CBC and the Toronto Star. A Google search turns up seven pages of press stories, everywhere from China's People's Daily to the Star of Malta, before I find the first major Canadian media hit--the Winnipeg Sun.
To my mind, this illustrates how limited the Canadian media voice has become--that a Canadian who has bested the world is barely acknowledged in her home country.
And it shows the Canadian hostility to all that is traditionally and uniquely feminine, that deceptively masquerades under the name "feminism."
Thursday, June 02, 2005
The Secret
From the observations of someone visiting the Philippines for the second time:
“…the lives that people live there seem more real to me than the lives that people live here in the USA.”
Exactly my impression of the Philippines or Korea versus Canada.
Worth pondering why this is so. But I think Yeats hit it in speaking of the difference between England and Ireland: in Ireland, or the Philippines, each individual is unique and irreplaceable to those who know them. In England, or Canada or the US, if you dropped dead on a streetcorner, there’s be another in your place in half an hour. In Third World countries generally, people are still people, and have complete lives. In Canada, the US, England, now most of Europe, people are machines. Most of the rest of life has been sacrificed for the pursuit of material wealth and status.
It's not a life at all.
“…the lives that people live there seem more real to me than the lives that people live here in the USA.”
Exactly my impression of the Philippines or Korea versus Canada.
Worth pondering why this is so. But I think Yeats hit it in speaking of the difference between England and Ireland: in Ireland, or the Philippines, each individual is unique and irreplaceable to those who know them. In England, or Canada or the US, if you dropped dead on a streetcorner, there’s be another in your place in half an hour. In Third World countries generally, people are still people, and have complete lives. In Canada, the US, England, now most of Europe, people are machines. Most of the rest of life has been sacrificed for the pursuit of material wealth and status.
It's not a life at all.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)