If one wishes for the reformation of manners in society one has to first address the reformation of manners for one's self.
The question arises as to how one is to reform one's self and what example or example one is to aspire to.
The answer is rather simple while being a bit complicated.
The "how" is answered by the word "study" followed by the word "act." Study those, both in history and literature who have exhibited the qualities of gentlemanliness and gentlewomanliness and learn from their actions, attitudes and examples. And then put those qualities into action in one's own life.
To be a gentleman or gentlewoman does not mean that one is a sucker or a sop. It means that, while may encounter others who do not measure up to one's standard of behaviour, one is never cruel or mocking to them while pointing out to that person that their behaviour is not quite up to snuff or even expressing disapproval. And sometimes bad behaviour by others demands a certain amount of violence on the part of the mannered person; a man beating a woman, a child, and old person, a dog, cat or horse deserves not only verbal condemnation, but a good thrashing. Part of a mannerly life is a concern for the weak.
A good reading of Jane Austen's novels and Anthony Trollope's novels give good examples of what manners should be. In both authors' works there are people who are often arch, but rarely cruel. The sentiments expressed by the heroes and heroines are always sincere, if occasionally mistaken. Wealth does not equal moral status. Education does not equal moral status.
Here's a short piece concerning the Victorian Gentleman that may be more illuminating:
http://artofmanliness.com/2012/11/06/honor-during-victorian-era/
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Sunday, November 18, 2012
A New Direction
For all too long this writer has been ranting and raging about politics and International affairs.
To tell the truth, your faithful correspondent is just worn out with those topics. Politics is, really, a game of whores, and international affairs make no sense whatsoever; they are based on crassest of reasons.
Instead, in the future, we here at Bloody Nib Manor, will devote ourselves to the reform of manners, dress, behaviour and language.
The social life in the United States has become crass, crude, slovenly, mean and cruel. There is no reason for these qualities except that it makes one look cool. And the definition of what is cool is dictated by the mass media. Not so much by the print medium, but more by films, television and the Internet
This is not a good thing. In fact, it is destructive for both the individual and society. We are in an age where nice boy dress like thugs, nice girls dress like sluts, cheap irony is considered smart humour, being cruel to make a joke is accepted and conversation is just plain stupid and illiterate.
How many people actually talk in complete and proper sentences? How many people can carry on a conversation of more than three sentences (ill stated and relying on gestures more than words)?
This is not good. This is a result of a crudeness and self-absorption of a people.
To speak and write properly is the sign of a civilized person. To dress properly is a gift, not only to others, but also to one's self. If one dresses like a thug others can only assume that one is a thug and one has no business complaining that other people treat one like a thug. The same holds true for those who dress like sluts. If you are a woman who insists on showing a lot of cleavage or leg why are you offended when men spend more time looking at you breasts or thighs than looking at your face? To be kind and have manners, while often a chore, are both qualities that make life more pleasant for one's self and others. Why is it not a good thing to be a nice and proper person instead of a jerk? According to the mass media, being a jerk is a good thing.
So, let us get to the very basic thing in appearance. A man in public should wear a hat, or at least a cap. And if that man wears a caps he should wear it, in public, with the bill forward. Not backward and not sideways. And when said man wears a hat or cap on the street he should tip or remove his hat when encountering a woman (not just while walking down the street, but when actually meeting her), or when meeting a man he respects. Indoors he should remove his hat, as he should do when the National Anthem is played or a prayer said. A hat or cap, in a sense, by it's style, is a self definition of a man. A man chooses a hat based on his self-image and it is an immediate indicator for others of what kind of man he is. And it does so in a way much more immediate than baggy pants.
And women should wear hats for the same reason. They are not expected to tip their hats or remove their hats (this writer is old enough to remember when it was usual for women to wear hats at church services). Women have a lot more choices in hats than men do (the portrait hat, the cloche, the bonnet, etc.) and thus are much more able to define themselves, even their moods, than men do.
A hat is a sign of respect for others. When one removes one's hat for another one is showing respect in a way that the ejaculation "Was'up" doesn't.
One doesn't have to be educated or articulate to wear a hat. One only knows how one wishes to portray one's self in a way that is not offensive or threatening to others.
To tell the truth, your faithful correspondent is just worn out with those topics. Politics is, really, a game of whores, and international affairs make no sense whatsoever; they are based on crassest of reasons.
Instead, in the future, we here at Bloody Nib Manor, will devote ourselves to the reform of manners, dress, behaviour and language.
The social life in the United States has become crass, crude, slovenly, mean and cruel. There is no reason for these qualities except that it makes one look cool. And the definition of what is cool is dictated by the mass media. Not so much by the print medium, but more by films, television and the Internet
This is not a good thing. In fact, it is destructive for both the individual and society. We are in an age where nice boy dress like thugs, nice girls dress like sluts, cheap irony is considered smart humour, being cruel to make a joke is accepted and conversation is just plain stupid and illiterate.
How many people actually talk in complete and proper sentences? How many people can carry on a conversation of more than three sentences (ill stated and relying on gestures more than words)?
This is not good. This is a result of a crudeness and self-absorption of a people.
To speak and write properly is the sign of a civilized person. To dress properly is a gift, not only to others, but also to one's self. If one dresses like a thug others can only assume that one is a thug and one has no business complaining that other people treat one like a thug. The same holds true for those who dress like sluts. If you are a woman who insists on showing a lot of cleavage or leg why are you offended when men spend more time looking at you breasts or thighs than looking at your face? To be kind and have manners, while often a chore, are both qualities that make life more pleasant for one's self and others. Why is it not a good thing to be a nice and proper person instead of a jerk? According to the mass media, being a jerk is a good thing.
So, let us get to the very basic thing in appearance. A man in public should wear a hat, or at least a cap. And if that man wears a caps he should wear it, in public, with the bill forward. Not backward and not sideways. And when said man wears a hat or cap on the street he should tip or remove his hat when encountering a woman (not just while walking down the street, but when actually meeting her), or when meeting a man he respects. Indoors he should remove his hat, as he should do when the National Anthem is played or a prayer said. A hat or cap, in a sense, by it's style, is a self definition of a man. A man chooses a hat based on his self-image and it is an immediate indicator for others of what kind of man he is. And it does so in a way much more immediate than baggy pants.
And women should wear hats for the same reason. They are not expected to tip their hats or remove their hats (this writer is old enough to remember when it was usual for women to wear hats at church services). Women have a lot more choices in hats than men do (the portrait hat, the cloche, the bonnet, etc.) and thus are much more able to define themselves, even their moods, than men do.
A hat is a sign of respect for others. When one removes one's hat for another one is showing respect in a way that the ejaculation "Was'up" doesn't.
One doesn't have to be educated or articulate to wear a hat. One only knows how one wishes to portray one's self in a way that is not offensive or threatening to others.
Sunday, November 11, 2012
A Few Things
There are a few things that this past week's election has shown to those here at Bloody Nib Manor besides the fact that it's hard to win an election against a man who likes the populace believe that he is some sort of Santa Claus.
The first is that the conservative and Republican pundits were wrong in their predictions of the outcome of the election. Some of them were very wrong predicting a landslide for Mr. Romney. If memory serves the writer correctly, many of them were just a wrong in their predictions of the outcome of the 2008 election. The conservative pundits have let themselves consider "hope" as a data point. They hoped that Romney would win and added that hope as a source of weight in their opinions. They were almost universally wrong, and instead of hanging their heads in shame they have gone on the air, cable and in print making excuses instead of owning up to the fact that they read the pre-election polls through rose tinted glasses. They forgot that hope is not a strategy.
Secondly, many conservative and Republican opinioneers and commentators, in analyzing the reasons that the Republicans lost so badly among minorities, have latched onto the idea that the re-invigorization of the GOP lies with convincing Hispanics that they are "natural" Republicans and that all the GOP has to do to get the Latino vote is craft some sort of party crafted "immigration reform" that includes an amnesty for illegal aliens. The thinkers are wrong on two points. Latinos are not "natural" Republicans. They are "natural" Democrats. And an amnesty will not result in a migration by Hispanics to the Republican Party. What these thinkers seem to think most important is the success of the GOP instead of what is good for the nation, and they are willing to sell out their own principles to sit in the big chair. In this sense, they are becoming like the mainline Christian denominations that liberalized their stand on the Gospel and the Bible hoping to attract more worshippers and, instead, driving the true believers away, thus becoming almost Potemkin churches.
Victor Davis Hanson has an interesting take on this:
http://pjmedia.com/victordavishanson/
Third, as one wit wrote this past week, "With this election the United States has become Sweden." In other words, the influence of the United states on world affairs will become greatly more diminished. Mr. Obama has shown himself to be a foreign affairs lightweight who appointed another foreign affairs lightweight to be Secretary of State. And once Mrs. Clinton pulls her freight in January it is pretty much assured that the replacement will be a lightweight. Mr. Obama seems to think that the UN is the future. And once the UN becomes the datum for United States foreign policy you will have an America whose foreign policy is directed by Third World socialists and Islamic Sharia mongers.
Melanie Phillips, from Great Britain, has a few thing to say on the matter:
America Goes Into Darkness
Fourthly and finally, passage of state measures in three states legalizing same-sex marriage, and in two states legalizing the recreational use of marijuana, shows that conservatives and Christians have done a bad job in arguing against both measures. Consider the fact the over 50% of Hispanics in the United States (those assumed "natural Republicans" and "family values" voters that conservative want to cater to) are in favor of same-sex marriage despite the fact that the church to which most of them are members is adamantly opposed to same-sex marriage. The common wisdom among some conservatives is that the argument against same-sex marriage cannot be made on religious grounds and should be made only on moral, societal and scientific grounds. The fact of the matter is that if there is no religion there are no morals. No morals make societies barbaric. Science has reduced the human to the level of an animal. There is also the argument that one must not be judgemental in arguing against same-sex marriage. That's nonsense. One judges every day. When one chose one's spouse one judged who was best for one. When one votes one judges. Even getting up in the morning requires judgement. But some reason one is not supposed to hurt another's feeling when the other is behaving in a socially destructive manner.
It is time for conservatives (and this word does not include all Republicans) to draw a line in the sand for the good of the nation. Winning is great. But if one has to sell one's soul to win one is nothing much more than a harlot. God will give the depraved over to their sins and the result may be that the nation will sink further into debt, immorality, insignificance internationally and loss of national identity, but there will be, if conservatives stand a strong stand for the idea that our Founders promoted, there will be a remnant who may be able to salvage the mess that has been made.
The first is that the conservative and Republican pundits were wrong in their predictions of the outcome of the election. Some of them were very wrong predicting a landslide for Mr. Romney. If memory serves the writer correctly, many of them were just a wrong in their predictions of the outcome of the 2008 election. The conservative pundits have let themselves consider "hope" as a data point. They hoped that Romney would win and added that hope as a source of weight in their opinions. They were almost universally wrong, and instead of hanging their heads in shame they have gone on the air, cable and in print making excuses instead of owning up to the fact that they read the pre-election polls through rose tinted glasses. They forgot that hope is not a strategy.
Secondly, many conservative and Republican opinioneers and commentators, in analyzing the reasons that the Republicans lost so badly among minorities, have latched onto the idea that the re-invigorization of the GOP lies with convincing Hispanics that they are "natural" Republicans and that all the GOP has to do to get the Latino vote is craft some sort of party crafted "immigration reform" that includes an amnesty for illegal aliens. The thinkers are wrong on two points. Latinos are not "natural" Republicans. They are "natural" Democrats. And an amnesty will not result in a migration by Hispanics to the Republican Party. What these thinkers seem to think most important is the success of the GOP instead of what is good for the nation, and they are willing to sell out their own principles to sit in the big chair. In this sense, they are becoming like the mainline Christian denominations that liberalized their stand on the Gospel and the Bible hoping to attract more worshippers and, instead, driving the true believers away, thus becoming almost Potemkin churches.
Victor Davis Hanson has an interesting take on this:
http://pjmedia.com/victordavishanson/
Third, as one wit wrote this past week, "With this election the United States has become Sweden." In other words, the influence of the United states on world affairs will become greatly more diminished. Mr. Obama has shown himself to be a foreign affairs lightweight who appointed another foreign affairs lightweight to be Secretary of State. And once Mrs. Clinton pulls her freight in January it is pretty much assured that the replacement will be a lightweight. Mr. Obama seems to think that the UN is the future. And once the UN becomes the datum for United States foreign policy you will have an America whose foreign policy is directed by Third World socialists and Islamic Sharia mongers.
Melanie Phillips, from Great Britain, has a few thing to say on the matter:
America Goes Into Darkness
Fourthly and finally, passage of state measures in three states legalizing same-sex marriage, and in two states legalizing the recreational use of marijuana, shows that conservatives and Christians have done a bad job in arguing against both measures. Consider the fact the over 50% of Hispanics in the United States (those assumed "natural Republicans" and "family values" voters that conservative want to cater to) are in favor of same-sex marriage despite the fact that the church to which most of them are members is adamantly opposed to same-sex marriage. The common wisdom among some conservatives is that the argument against same-sex marriage cannot be made on religious grounds and should be made only on moral, societal and scientific grounds. The fact of the matter is that if there is no religion there are no morals. No morals make societies barbaric. Science has reduced the human to the level of an animal. There is also the argument that one must not be judgemental in arguing against same-sex marriage. That's nonsense. One judges every day. When one chose one's spouse one judged who was best for one. When one votes one judges. Even getting up in the morning requires judgement. But some reason one is not supposed to hurt another's feeling when the other is behaving in a socially destructive manner.
It is time for conservatives (and this word does not include all Republicans) to draw a line in the sand for the good of the nation. Winning is great. But if one has to sell one's soul to win one is nothing much more than a harlot. God will give the depraved over to their sins and the result may be that the nation will sink further into debt, immorality, insignificance internationally and loss of national identity, but there will be, if conservatives stand a strong stand for the idea that our Founders promoted, there will be a remnant who may be able to salvage the mess that has been made.
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