Not a Potted Plant

Ten years ago, you know, everybody would’ve said, ‘We are unique. We have a specific culture.’ And now we understand that culture is created by what we do.

– Andreas Schleicher

Catholic writer Kyle Cupp writes about the difficulties of the anti-contraception argument:

Opponents of contraception face seemingly insurmountable obstacles, not the least of which is their position’s antagonism toward today’s common sense view of sexual morality. Opposition toward contraception is not common; acceptance of it as a personal and social good is. A few voices cry out in the wilderness, but they are just that: a few, and, by today’s standards, uncivilized. {…}

Opponents of contraception cannot easily dismiss its judgments or wave them away as products of a perverse age. The proposition that today’s common sense view of sexual morality is perverse requires careful demonstration. Noting the correlation between widespread use of contraceptives with other social ills does not suffice. Even if one could prove a causal relationship between common acceptance of contraception and, say, the rise of cohabitation, one would still have to show that this growing acceptance of cohabitation is also a sign of corruption.

There is something to be said for not bending with the times. Manytimes, the people telling you how you need to bend with the times… well, don’t have your best interest at heart. They are not interested in your church’s survival so much as that you get out of their way.

Having said that, a church’s perishoners do need clues on how to reconcile their membership in The Church with the modern world. And on this, The Church has failed. Most have, but few so spectacularly on this particular issue.

Now, most churches have a prohibition on premarital sex. But the reconciliation, such as it is, is to say “Well, we can’t stop you from doing it, but don’t talk about doing it, and say with us that you shouldn’t do it.” The RCC takes it a step further, by essentially saying “We can’t stop you from doing it, but we will double up on the sinfulness of it by not allowing you to take comparatively common-sense measures to protect yourself from adverse consequences.”

Most of the time, the result of this is that Catholics are among the most talkative people about their sexual sins than any other group I know. And they use contraception. And they talk about that, too.

What’s missing from all of this is exactly what The Church (and most churches) do want you to do. The focus on don’t makes sense in light of certain things, but it leaves certain logistical questions unanswered. Namely, if people are supposed to wait until marriage, and they’re not marrying until they’re 30, how realistic is this expectation?

The only church I have ever seen really tackle this problem is the LDS Church, and they have planted a flag on not waiting until you’re 30. Not just by saying “Don’t wait until you’re 30” but also by actively trying to hook their youngsters up. The basic Mormon timeline, as best as I can tell, is that boys go to K-12, go on a mission for two years, then they’re 20 and the girls graduating high school are 18 and… there you go. It’s not arranged marriages and they want you to find the right person, but the order of the day is “get moving.”

If churches really want less premarital sex, and to get rid of the 20’s sex culture, they they need to work harder to prevent it from happening. Rather than wagging their finger over the fact that it is happening. Don’t tell me that they can’t do this because The Church doesn’t want to mettle.

Rather, I think they don’t want to do it because it’s politically difficult. Even among conservatives in the US, marrying in your early twenties is rather strongly discouraged for logistical reasons. Particularly among the middle class and upper middies whose money they often need and who don’t want their church telling them they need to marry that kid with the ear-ring that their daughter just swears she’s in love with. In an odd way, it’s here they’ve chosen to bend. Not against church doctrine, but against the inevitable results of failing to do so – the results running against church doctrine. Maybe that’s a crucial distinction, but it does come across as a somewhat disingenuous one.

Now, doing so would probably be a losing battle. The Mormons themselves seem to be losing their grip, with fewer boys going on missions and the prescribed timeline being disrupted. But the Mormons have advantages (an insular entertainment culture, 1.3 states they dominate, and so on). But it’s no less crazy than asking kids to wait for sex until they’re 30.

Of course, on the contraception discussion, this only tackles one part. Once married, The Church’s path is clear. Keep having kids. Clear, but ignored. But at least they went down swinging.

I made a Tron joke elsewhere today. While debating the humor content of a follow-up comment I was considering, I got to wondering what Samuel L. Jackson would have been like cast as the Master Control Program. (“Did you not understand the words I just said? I said End! Of! Mother! ***ing! Line!”)

And then I found this. Nothing I do will ever surpass this fake movie poster for surreal awesomeness.

Pseudonymous blogging strikes the right balance, for me, between the ability to project a clear and consistent identity to those interested in exchanging ideas, and buffering my sometimes unpopular ideas from meatworld decisionmakers, some of whom hold power over ways I might want to further my career, and some of whom hold power over my ability to generate income for my law firm. Pseudonymity gives me both an outlet of self-expression and the privacy to protect my livelihood, and that of about a dozen other people, all of whom depend in part on my work for their own paychecks.

Social networking, as on Facebook and Google+, offers convenience, enjoyment, and utility only to those users who operate under their real names. To use them, you must relinquish a degree of privacy — all the more so as both companies have recently relaxed their privacy policies.

I have no Facebook nor Google+ account because a dual-identity online existence would quickly crumble, whether at my hands or by the inadvertent mistake of someone else. If I want to continue to enjoy the degree of privacy that I have found comfortable to date, I must at the same time forego the pleasures and advantages of social networking. It’s one or the other. It’s not clear to me whether I’ve made the right choice.

Convinced that a socialist revolution was doomed to failure, Mussolini now attempted to build a new movement. The original Fascist program delivered a radical message, with heavy doses of anti-clerical and republican rhetoric, vaguely left-wing in its politics and economics, strongly appealing to its lower-middle-class, urban base.

* * *

Then, sensing an opportunity to acquire power, Mussolini shrewdly abandoned the Fascist movement’s early radicalism to create the Fascist Party (PNF). Recruiting landowners, industrialists, and the middle class, the PNF adopted a new, more conservative program that emphasized a pro-business, nationalist agenda, cutting taxes and diminishing the role of the government while boosting military spending and supporting the monarchy and the Catholic Church.

* * *

Technically, Mussolini’s seizure of power occurred within the letter of the Italian constitution; at the same time, by employing systematic violence and wantonly ignoring Parliament, the Fascists destroyed what was left of traditional constitutional government.

– Charles Killinger

If we have the ability to worry about things like abortion, gay marriage, religion in politics, and contraception, then that means that our wars aren’t so bad, and the economy isn’t so bad, that we can enjoy ourselves bickering about one another’s personal lives. Which, in turn, means that we aren’t at war and our economic fundamentals are at least tolerable, which in turn means that the incumbent party in the White House has all the advantages going in to the election. In other words, if we’re not talking about the weak economy and the troubled war, then we’re looking at an Obama re-election.

Well, it’s a theory, anyway.

I have a hole in my shoulder. Not a big one; about one-eighth of an inch in diameter. This has been diagnosed in the past as a sebaceous cyst. It presents on the posterior, above the scapula. I do not remember when it originally manifested, but it’s been there at least ten years. To the naked eye it looks like a very enlarged skin pore.

So far, so good. But from here it gets a little bit gross and biological and ends with a bleg for free dermatological advice. You can skip the jump and move on to the next post if you don’t feel up to it.

Continue Reading →

Democracy and capitalism are antagonistic entities. Democracy, like individualism, is based not on personal gain but on self-sacrifice. A functioning democracy must often defy the economic interests of elites on behalf of citizens, but this is not happening.

– Chris Hedges

The following films all have something in common — Gone with the Wind, Mrs. Miniver, Going My Way, The Lost Weekend, The Best Years of Our Lives, On the Waterfront, Marty, The Bridge on the River Kwai, A Man for All Seasons, Patton, The French Connection, Annie Hall, Kramer vs. Kramer, Gandhi, Terms of Endearment, Amadeus, Rain Man, Forrest Gump, American Beauty, and The King’s Speech. This list is comprehensive.

Thanks to Russell Saunders for this week’s puzzle; he shall take the lead on hints and determining the winner in the comments.

A remote ancestor of Richard Dawkins once made a lot of money and owned a bunch of slaves, which apparently means that he is evil. Prof. Dawkins says that the wealth of his ancestors has been almost completely squandered, and that his money was earned during his own lifetime by his own endeavors. This didn’t stop the Torygraph from finding someone to demand that Dawkins make reparations for the moral misdeeds of his ancestors.

The silver lining is that now we know that this sort of idiocy is not reserved to this side of the Pond.