Wal-mart and Columbus Day
Leftist unions (
walmartworkers@ufcw.ca) have declared that it is their intent to save Columbus Day, yet their ideological fellow-travelers are the ones who put his legacy in jeopardy in the first place.
What's interesting about this isn't how bold and brazen the breach from leftist orthodoxy, but that it is used so shamelessly to punish a perceived enemy (wal-mart) and do so to the benefit of union members. Unions are one membership association, to quote political science interest group theory, that well understands maximizing and ensuring material benefits for their members. Unions would welcome a day off to celebrate "right to work" legislation if they could get it. The Air Traffic Controllers Union would vacation during a
Reagan fires Traffic Controllers holiday if they could get it.
Columbus Day Cancelled!
It’s official: Walmart, the world’s largest corporation, is cancelling Columbus Day. It’s nothing personal, of course, but the day commemorating the world’s most famous explorer and his faith in the circumference of the globe just doesn’t jibe with the Walmart monopolization of all circular objects.
That’s right folks, that old circle-grinch Walmart is throwing cold water on all those Columbus Day traditions that you and yours look forward to every year. And, yes, if you’re a federal employee then your boss will be expecting you at work bright and early on October 12.
BUT THERE IS STILL A CHANCE TO SAVE COLUMBUS DAY!
Rally your Facebook friends. Tell them to stand up for global circumference by joining the new Facebook Cause: Save Columbus Day for Free Speech! http://apps.facebook.com/causes/366224/75716640?m=c20bb5a8
Together we stop Walmart and SAVE COLUMBUS DAY!
Labels: culture, history, unions
Why the selfish love cohabitation, and not their 'lover'
CNN asks if cohabitation is wise, even in the face of scientific studies showing it leads to divorce. Predictably, this woman makes the argument that you want to 'test drive' marriage before you start it "for real."What I think she doesn't understand, is that cohabitation entails two essential things:
1. it becomes marriage-lite
2. it facilitates the selfish desires of people, and becomes the opposite of commitment
Both of these run parallel to the 'trial run' argument, but she's then operating her life, and her major commitments, as though they were a game with a reset button. Relationships are tough, and are not a game. Breaking up, at least for me, has been an emotional rollercoaster and, often, total trainwreck. It's not something you flippantly do and then renege upon, it's not something you enter into and then decide that one's small eccentricities are too much to handle and you want that 'perfect' someone instead of just a 'good' someone. People who operate in that fashion are serial killers without the murder: emotional sociopaths who are out for number one at all costs.
Listen to how she describes her failed cohabitation situation:
Living together is a two-way street. I'm sure Jeff had no idea that I hated doing dishes, slammed doors when I was angry, liked to eat out for almost every meal, couldn't control myself around his ice cream, and hated to sit around the house doing nothing.
I mean, let's call a spade a spade, this woman is a bitch.
No wonder her boyfriend didn't marry her. She was completely in it for herself, there was no submission of her own desires to the other, there was no unity of the two souls into one. Marriage ought not be an economic arrangement a la Alyssa Rosenbaum's silly notions about relationships, it ought to be the transcendent blending of two souls into one. This is where I think the religious aspects of marriage cannot be factored out, and those who enter into marriage without that understanding, agreement and conviction are really rolling the dice with divorce. And so that brings us back to the cohabitation problem, and its significance for Christian couples, where I think, as with too many other things, Christians have integrated the Pagan ways too much recently, and as it regards cohabitation it enables their own selfishness, materialism, doubts, worries, commitment-phobia and denigration of the ones they claim they love.
Everyone knows the cliches from Corinthians about love, which is read at every single wedding I have ever been to. But they should add to it that love is also neither independent, casual, temporary, short-sighted, child-free, intimacy-lacking, tame, tempered, calm, dispassionate, cold, delaying.
Love is, or at least ought to be, wild and untamed, unpredictable and zealous. Love ought to be full of children because intimacy isn't something planned for birthdays and special treats, but the side effect from being unable to be apart emotionally, mentally and thus subsequently physically. Love is not metered like a utility, or as constant as the sunrise, but wild flares of danger and passion.
Even to write that seems cliche, as though it doesn't exist. Yet, I've felt it before. I know it's out there. I've had a muse or two and not only did they spark me to great things, they still continue to spark me to great things even though we don't talk.
That kind of love should never cohabitate, it should marry, procreate, and live life as it really is, not as a test-run to what it could be. And any love that doesn't fit that bill shouldn't live together anyway, at least not until the people involved can figure out how to really enjoy, embrace and love one another truly, fully, utterly, completely.
Labels: culture, love, society
Professor Esolen, reposted
I just can't say how much I loved this speech by Prof. Esolen, and wanted to repost it. Truth is intellectually delicious.
Labels: children, culture, history, pro-life, society
Actions to end abortion
I was somewhat remiss in feeling that I was detached or removed from the effort to reduce the number of abortions in the country, and so it was with some joy that I stumbled across the always wonderful
Fr. Frank Pavone's fine list at Priests for Life of what individuals can do to end the abortion horror.
Labels: abortion, activism, culture, society
Ethnic identity, reminding Americans of what they're missing
While searching on youtube for
the latest Coldplay song that's played on every station all the time, I ran across
this fascinating 20 minute documentary-short called "The Tribe" about the Jewish identity. At times it speaks obvious truths, at other times it speaks subtle ones, but at every point it stands so starkly in contrast with the identity that Americans want to have: that of the post-racial and post-ethnic ethic of "multiculturalism" as distinct from those who still proclaim such identities. It's interesting that white identity is now only acceptable in the most superficial of Irish identities: rooting for the Red Sox and putting the four-leaf clover on everything, as well as beer on St. Patrick's day. Being part Irish, I think this is silly. Being a mix of a few other identities, I think there's much to honor, celebrate and rejoice in that we blissfully ignore. My friend and talented writer Dan Flynn once mentioned to me in passing that such discussions about racial identity were something that was "not his bag" and he had little interest in. So, even among conservative intellectuals, this topic is either avoided, ignored or discussed very superficially. To think that someone of French descent would say, believe and defend the idea that French culture and history is superior to that of British, German and all others, is a discussion quite foreign to our conditioned minds. And so this film fills a void and through talking about one of the few acceptable distinct identities: Jews, it perhaps suggests that the rest of us, those who find that this is "not our bag" might be truly missing out on large parts of our identity. We think we know what we don't know, we think we're so enlightened compared to our ancestors who we glibly dismiss as "racist" for their "ethno-centric" beliefs. But yet I think most of us know, deep down, that those identities mean quite a bit, and define not only who we have been in the past, and who are right now, but who we will be in the future. I knew a girl who had French features, and probably French ancestry, but was convinced she was purely Irish. I knew another who thought herself English only to find out later she was more Irish than English. Neither fact seemed to play much into their personalities, but it should have-- it should matter. It does matter, but we try so hard to make it not matter. Why is it so important that our world be deprived of beautiful French women and Irish women and truly celebrate those distinctions rather than cover them up so poorly. The Jews have done a great job of preserving their identity through some of the toughest historical periods and situations imaginable, and yet in this land of prosperity, Europeans can't retain theirs at all. This is both strange and sad.
Labels: culture, race
The new W movie
So, I saw
the recent W trailer, the latest movie from Oliver Stone, and I have to say that it looks absolutely fabulous. I can't wait to see it. Conservatives, obviously, are largely skeptical of Stone, but to some degree I think that's unfair. Stone's
94 portrayal of Nixon, while not flattering, was one that many complained portrayed Nixon as too human. And I think that's a pretty fair read of the movie, and functions excellently to start deconstructing the myth of Nixon as this evil caricature of himself. The same myths have been carefully constructed by liberals around George Bush, a President whom I dislike for his policies (specifically on life, budgets, taxes/inflation, foreign adventurism) but I recognize that the enemy of my enemy, at least in this case, is not my friend. The leftists have gone nuts in their Bush hatred to the point of being irrational. Stone's movie, I suspect, will give people a different side, and a complexity, to a man they wish to dismiss with simple hyperbolic soundbites. That's real filmmaking, and real history making stuff, and even though Stone often gets his facts
wrong, and also sometimes
makes facts up. I admire his tenacity and historical pioneering spirit.
Labels: culture, movies, politics
Crime Cameras: the way to make Flint worse
Flint Michigan is
asking for donations to install crime cameras around town, ostensibly to reduce crime. Now, I admit it's cliche to talk about rights like privacy here, but when one thinks about it, that's really not the issue. We get all worked up over a right like "privacy" when in truth, the greatest threat to freedom is the growth of the state and "social control." As pointless personal history, I remember my freshman year debate camp at the University of Kansas where a "social control" disadvantage was being written in order to argue the juvenile crime topic in
policy debate that year. And I recall a judge saying that was it worth writing such a disadvantage when most of the students would never appreciate what it truly meant until later in their lives. And at the time, I took umbrage to the idea that I was unwise, and only now, some 13 years later or so, that I realize that I did not, and that most my age still do not. The growth of the state into our lives, and the control we give to them all in the name of security, will bring about dystopia. Flint has crime because it has criminals, and it has a population unwilling to do anything about it, aided by a media and a legal establishment that encourages them to wait for the police. We have become a litigious society that is passive and weak. As grows the state's social control, so declines the strength of the people: morally, physically, emotionally and spiritually.
Labels: crime, culture, society
The pricing regime at the theaters
I went to the
X-Files 2 movie this weekend, which I'm writing a brief review (I disliked it) and it occurred to me, as I paid my $10.25 for a movie ticket, that it's silly that there's one standard fixed price for movies. In an era of escalating costs, and a growing population, if anything, these prices should be coming down and we should also come to expect different prices for different first-run movies. Initially I wanted to say this concept was
variable pricing, but I don't think that's correct. In practice what this should mean is that movies that have larger budgets should have a higher ticket price, that cost should be spread out and covered by those watching the individual movie and we shouldn't be subsidizing the crap that Hollywood's been making by paying inflated prices due to the studio's method of hiding costs. I think the effect on this would be to increase niche outlets, encourage more independent movies, discourage the ridiculous Hollywood salaries and overall promote the best, highest quality, movies. It would be a little free market where it's sorely needed: Hollywood. When the viewer gets less, let's pay less.
Labels: culture, movie review, movies
No movies will be made about the causes of the credit crisis
So, the credit crisis might start reaching people as serious
now that Deutsche Bank is backing out of $450 million worth of Paramount's film financing. However, with any crisis, as Morton's Youth Leadership School teaches us, comes both danger and opportunity. And so, what is the opportunity here? Well, when one considers what I consider a general dissatisfaction with Hollywood, a recognition that their movies have for years been substandard and wanting, along with the writer's strike, a possible actor's strike, and skyrocketing costs and salaries: conservatives ought to capitalize on this chaos by producing truly great movies, such as
Bella. Several years ago, I heard various conservative schemes to make Dallas the conservative Hollywood, and I met a fellow in Louisiana who was going to try and spur conservative, Christian and good movies in the Bayou, but both schemes seem to have lost traction. There will never be a better time to give Americans what they really want: great, wholesome movies about real issues, topics, leaders and heroes. If there are any billionaires reading, please contact me and I'll spend your money wisely.
Labels: art, beauty, cinema, conservativism, culture, film, truth
The Academy Stripped Bare: Putting Your Ass in the Spotlight
I thought
this article, about a graduate student who pays his way for his graduate degree through homosexual stripping says many things about society and colleges in particular. It shows the nature of the current generation, my generation, being post-shame and entirely focused on issues of self-identity and self-gratification. Normally, I've been conditioned to think that strippers are degraded, and that they all must be single moms trying to earn a living after being laid off at the textile factory, but that obviously isn't the case. As Craig Seymour says, "The overall context was all about me" and that was part of its appeal. This modern vice, as harmless as it may seem, is tempting in so many ways: it plays on the loneliness of those shelling out dollars, and it tempts those in spiritual and financial poverty to seek affirmation by revealing themselves in a lustful way to find carnal affirmation. A former fellow AU alum, Marty Beckerman has written a book on this issue, Tom Wolfe wrote "I am Charlotte Simmons" on the general topic (which I'm now reading) and yet, even with all of these words, the full shift here isn't being understood. The entire mindset and values of the current college generation is changing. It's not just materialism or feminism or postmodernity, it's an entirely different value system which is quite frightening. It's one thing to go to a strip club, or work at one, and still at least admit it was wrong. It's quite another for it to infect your personality to such a degree that you validate it any way you can. As evidence, I think Seymour's statement about incorporating his nighttime employment into his academic pursuits is the most telling:
Seymour’s stripping had its origins, appropriately, in academic enterprise. His master’s thesis, based on participant observation and interviews but not (at that point) practice, was entitled "Desire and Dollar Bills: An Ethnography of a Gay Male Striptease Club in Washington, D.C." (He writes: "[B]y far the most controversial thing I did in the thesis – though it seemed like a good idea at the time – was to include an appendix with photocopies of pictures from gay porn magazines featuring models doing a full bent-over ass-cheek spread." The appendix complemented his argument, in which he outlined “how the anus operates as a site of desire within the context of clubs.")
He's of course lying to us and lying to himself, but it seems as though no one wants to tell the emperor that they have no clothes.
Labels: academia, culture, homosexuals, materialism, society
