As long time readers of this broadside are aware there has been a long running occasional feature called Men in Hats. The subject of the feature is, well, men's hats and men wearing hats. Sometimes there are histories of hats, famous men and their hats, and, as much of it as there is anymore, the culture of hats in the modern world. This is, in some ways, odd because your faithful correspondent usually wears only two types of hats (technically one type of hat and one type of cap) -- the straw boater between the Memorial Day and Labor Day and a beret the rest of the year. There is the occasional wearing of a cheap faux Panama hat worn during gardening, but really does not count because the gardening hat is not the public face of yours truly.
Be it known that this writer is a believer in men wearing hats; not as a fashion statement but more as a self-proclamation of identification and a completion of one's daily dressing. Back many years ago when your faithful correspondent was trapped in the jaws of the public school system in Southern California he came across a book in the public library entitled "Call Me Mister." At the time of the discovery the book was fairly old; perhaps first published in the mid-1950s, if not before. It was one of those books that nobody bothers to write anymore -- books for people transitioning between childhood and adulthood trying to figure out how they should present themselves to the world. It was a book about male etiquette, how to dress like a man and prepare to go out and apply for jobs and such. One of the chapters in the book dealt with men wearing hats. There was a sort of personality quiz in that section which, upon completion one received advice on, based on one's personality and aspirations, one chose one's hat. It was a bit of a sliding scale ranging from the trilby or fedora for the serious and business-like young man (for some reason the trilby was considered more serious than the fedora despite the fact that it is really a bit of a silly hat) to the pork-pie for the joker and happy-go-lucky type to the beret for the misfit. The summer hats followed the same line as the winter hats (panama fedoras and pork-pies) except for the beret which seemed to be a cap that one was to suffer with in the hottest days. The one hat, during the summer, that any type of personality that was considered good for any man, young or old, was the boater. And by the time the book was published the boater hat was pretty out of date in America. In fact, by the time the book was written hats, except for warmth in cold weather, were pretty much out of fashion. But the book made such an impression on your faithful correspondent as a callow youth that he has remembered and pretty much lived according to the teachings of the book.
So summer is here in spades and it's time to consider putting on your summer hat. One can't go wrong with a boater, whether an expensive Italian boater or a cheap Chinese boater. The boater always looks sharp, is cool and keeps one's mug out of the sun. And it doesn't make one look like one is a professional lawn mower.
Here's a history of the boater hat. This writer questions some of the facts in the article, but the writer of the article has a university education while yours truly only graduated high school, so he may have more facts than yours. At the end of the article is a photograph of the author wearing a really cheap boater and looking much more like Ted Cruz than he would probably like.
Loved and Loathed: The Straw Boater Hat, a history | Tragicocomedia
Saturday, July 04, 2015
Friday, July 03, 2015
Bad People Bad -- Good People Ignoring the Bad Badder?
Please consider reading the following piece by Ashton Blackwell:
https://ashtonwblackwell.wordpress.com/2015/06/26/nothing-to-see-here-except-an-assaulted-baby/
And once you get to the link look at the first link she provides of an attack by several people upon a young girl holding a baby. It is rather disturbing for several reasons.
The first is that the girl, about 13, is attacked for no other reason than because she was sitting in a park or a school yard for no other reason than because the attackers thought she was in "their" space. For those who haven't clicked onto the link, the girl is white and her attackers are black girls. We do not have "whites only" spaces anymore in the United States, but apparently there are "blacks only" spaces.
The second reason that this is disturbing is because the attackers care not a wit for the infant.
The third, and perhaps most important reason that the video is disturbing is that someone actually filmed the incident and did nothing to stop what happened. If there had been an incident in which a black girl holding a baby had been attacked by white girls and it had been filmed by a white boy/man who had done nothing there would have been a brouhaha that would have tired out even the most seasoned CNN talking head. And why? Because, as Orwell wrote in Animal Farm, all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal.
Some of us are given more rights than others and given excuses for bad behaviour than others by the government and the mainstream media. And the reason is not too awfully hard to figure out. It is racism pure and simple. It is racism of the worst sort. It is based on a racism that assumes that Black people, Hispanic people, Muslim people and gay people (your faithful correspondent realizes that Muslims and gays are not races, but he uses the term "race" in a loose sense such as the old writers used the term "the English race" or "American race") suffer from some biological defect that disallows them to act in a civilized manner in a civilized nation. In other words, those, to the government and media, are really not human; they are a missing link between base savage and civilized man.
The proper and civilized man and woman expects anyone in a civilized nation to act in a civilized manner. A New Guinea cannibal who has moved to this great nation is expected to quell is taste for human ribs in exchange for living in a civilized society. An Muslim is expected to be monogamous. A gay person is expected not to parade down Main Street with his dingus decorated as a candy cane.
If white trash acted in the way that the media portrays white trash as acting there would be shock stories of idiot progeny of incest littering the streets, dead people shot by 12 gauge shotguns regularly picked up after disagreements over whether Elvis is alive or not, and a bunch of guys named Cooter and and Hec and Gator would would make international news if they, wearing Confederate flags as capes, shot every black person, Muslim and homosexual within a mile radius of their shotgun shack. But there are few stories because these things rarely happen. But when they do the actors are rightly condemned , but not for the correct reasons. They are condemned, not so much because they did something bad, but because they are white people who did things that offend the sensibilities of American and European civilization. White people, apparently genetically, are supposed to know better. Minorities (except East Asians such as Japanese, Chinese and Koreans) are expected to think and behave one way and are given a pass. The rest of us are held to a standard that surpasses that of minorities. And the result is that some of the majority, a good deal of the majority, decides to follow the minority in thought and behaviour simply because it is a morally and legally easier way to go.
Ain't liberalism great?
https://ashtonwblackwell.wordpress.com/2015/06/26/nothing-to-see-here-except-an-assaulted-baby/
And once you get to the link look at the first link she provides of an attack by several people upon a young girl holding a baby. It is rather disturbing for several reasons.
The first is that the girl, about 13, is attacked for no other reason than because she was sitting in a park or a school yard for no other reason than because the attackers thought she was in "their" space. For those who haven't clicked onto the link, the girl is white and her attackers are black girls. We do not have "whites only" spaces anymore in the United States, but apparently there are "blacks only" spaces.
The second reason that this is disturbing is because the attackers care not a wit for the infant.
The third, and perhaps most important reason that the video is disturbing is that someone actually filmed the incident and did nothing to stop what happened. If there had been an incident in which a black girl holding a baby had been attacked by white girls and it had been filmed by a white boy/man who had done nothing there would have been a brouhaha that would have tired out even the most seasoned CNN talking head. And why? Because, as Orwell wrote in Animal Farm, all animals are equal, but some animals are more equal.
Some of us are given more rights than others and given excuses for bad behaviour than others by the government and the mainstream media. And the reason is not too awfully hard to figure out. It is racism pure and simple. It is racism of the worst sort. It is based on a racism that assumes that Black people, Hispanic people, Muslim people and gay people (your faithful correspondent realizes that Muslims and gays are not races, but he uses the term "race" in a loose sense such as the old writers used the term "the English race" or "American race") suffer from some biological defect that disallows them to act in a civilized manner in a civilized nation. In other words, those, to the government and media, are really not human; they are a missing link between base savage and civilized man.
The proper and civilized man and woman expects anyone in a civilized nation to act in a civilized manner. A New Guinea cannibal who has moved to this great nation is expected to quell is taste for human ribs in exchange for living in a civilized society. An Muslim is expected to be monogamous. A gay person is expected not to parade down Main Street with his dingus decorated as a candy cane.
If white trash acted in the way that the media portrays white trash as acting there would be shock stories of idiot progeny of incest littering the streets, dead people shot by 12 gauge shotguns regularly picked up after disagreements over whether Elvis is alive or not, and a bunch of guys named Cooter and and Hec and Gator would would make international news if they, wearing Confederate flags as capes, shot every black person, Muslim and homosexual within a mile radius of their shotgun shack. But there are few stories because these things rarely happen. But when they do the actors are rightly condemned , but not for the correct reasons. They are condemned, not so much because they did something bad, but because they are white people who did things that offend the sensibilities of American and European civilization. White people, apparently genetically, are supposed to know better. Minorities (except East Asians such as Japanese, Chinese and Koreans) are expected to think and behave one way and are given a pass. The rest of us are held to a standard that surpasses that of minorities. And the result is that some of the majority, a good deal of the majority, decides to follow the minority in thought and behaviour simply because it is a morally and legally easier way to go.
Ain't liberalism great?
Sunday, June 28, 2015
Gypsies
There was a time, believe it or not, when your correspondent spent a lot of time in pool rooms years past. And the reason was because of three cushion billiards table. unlike pool tables three cushion tables have no pockets. Three cushion tables are all about geometry and not trickery. To see an example of the game watch a movie called "Lady for a Day" made back in the 1930s. It is ,basically, the same story as "Pocketful Full of Miracles" made in the early 1960s. The earlier motion picture was made when pool was considered outre' and three cushion an art.
The reason that your truly brings this up at this time is because of Gypsies. Anyone who has travelled in southern Europe is aware, Gypsies are a problem. Women have to hold their handbags closely and men have to keep their hands on their wallets an passports to prevent themselves from being robbed by Gypsy children.
It may appear racist or ethincist, but the truth of the matter is that a lot of Gypsies are just damn crooks, thieves and cheaters despite what they say.
Back in the day when your faithful correspondent was haunting pool rooms it was made clear to him. Your writer had, and still has, a custom made billiard cue. There was no way that it could have been mistaken for a house cue because of the wrap on the thick end of the cue. At said pool room there were a group of gypsies looking for something they could get. One day your faithful correspondent left his cue on a billiard table for a few minutes to go get a cup of coffee. When he came back the cue was gone despite the fact that he had paid for the table for a period of time. Being pretty angry and a natural detective he started stalking through the pool room looking for his cue. He found a Gypsy boy using your writer's cue to play 9 Ball (quell horror!) among a bunch of Gypsy men. Your writer approached said boy and said, "Young man! I believe you have my billiards cue!" The boy looked at his older compatriots. One nodded to him. Then the boy gave yours the cue with the words, "I thought it was a house cue." At which this writer took the cue and returned to his billiards practice cursing under his breath that Gypsies are not romantic and that they are, by culture, crooks, cheats and thieves.
The point is that Gypsies know what they are. They know and embrace the culture in which they've been raised. And they don't get out the ACLU when someone calls them out for what they are. They are honest in that way. They know what they are and admit it. This is different than a lot of other groups who demand one's respect.
The reason that your truly brings this up at this time is because of Gypsies. Anyone who has travelled in southern Europe is aware, Gypsies are a problem. Women have to hold their handbags closely and men have to keep their hands on their wallets an passports to prevent themselves from being robbed by Gypsy children.
It may appear racist or ethincist, but the truth of the matter is that a lot of Gypsies are just damn crooks, thieves and cheaters despite what they say.
Back in the day when your faithful correspondent was haunting pool rooms it was made clear to him. Your writer had, and still has, a custom made billiard cue. There was no way that it could have been mistaken for a house cue because of the wrap on the thick end of the cue. At said pool room there were a group of gypsies looking for something they could get. One day your faithful correspondent left his cue on a billiard table for a few minutes to go get a cup of coffee. When he came back the cue was gone despite the fact that he had paid for the table for a period of time. Being pretty angry and a natural detective he started stalking through the pool room looking for his cue. He found a Gypsy boy using your writer's cue to play 9 Ball (quell horror!) among a bunch of Gypsy men. Your writer approached said boy and said, "Young man! I believe you have my billiards cue!" The boy looked at his older compatriots. One nodded to him. Then the boy gave yours the cue with the words, "I thought it was a house cue." At which this writer took the cue and returned to his billiards practice cursing under his breath that Gypsies are not romantic and that they are, by culture, crooks, cheats and thieves.
The point is that Gypsies know what they are. They know and embrace the culture in which they've been raised. And they don't get out the ACLU when someone calls them out for what they are. They are honest in that way. They know what they are and admit it. This is different than a lot of other groups who demand one's respect.
Flags, ISIS and Coathooks
This writer apologizes for having been so slow to return to the blog since his last post. But the passing of Baroness Nib and Lord Isamu in the month of February and the attendant legal and financial matters have precluded any posts due to demands on your faithful correspondent. Dear Reader, please be assured that yours truly will make every attempt to post on a weekly basis in the future.
This past week has been an interesting one that has left us here at Bloody Nib Manor rocked back on our heels for a bit. It is not that the incidents were unexpected, but more that they came so fast. An analogy would be one expecting a punch from an opponent and finding oneself at the receiving end of a fist not one time, but several times in an instant. Four punches in the time of one punch will result in one feeling confused and dopey and consider throwing in the towel. Or pulling out a sap.
Last week, after the shooting at the church in Charleston, S.C., it didn't take long for politicians, in their never ending quest for cheap solutions and get their mugs on the telly, to call for the banning of the Confederate battle flag from all governmental institutions. Governor Halley the first by calling for the flag to be removed from the state capitol grounds. Then every politician and liberal commentator jumped on that band wagon as if the Confederate battle flag is some sort of demon that drives stupid drug addled young men to do evil things. Soon thereafter merchants such as Wal-Mart, E-bay and Amazon announced that they would no longer sell Confederate battle flags or any merchandise displaying the flag (Which raises the question about what are said merchants going to do with their Lynard Skynard and Confederate Railroad CDs and downloads). And then, once the thing end of the wedge had been inserted, everything seems to have collapsed. Calls for the removal of statues of Confederate soldiers, the removal of Confederate cemeteries, changing the names of universities (Washington and Lee, for example) and streets and parks. The attempt seems to be that anything Confederate, whether the battle flag, but any and everything, is as evil as the horned god that Satanists pretend to worship. A film critic for the New York Post has even suggested that Gone With The Wind be banned from showings at governmental institutions (film museums and such). It's all silly and stupid and wrong-headed. But liberals and politicians of every stripe are often that way.
No matter what your thoughts about the rightness or wrongness of the Southern states seceding from the Union one's opinions concerning that unfortunate event have nothing to do with the Confederate battle flag and it's place in modern Southern society. In fact, this writer, based on no scholarly studies by eggheads writing doctoral dissertations or chasing tenure, posits that the Southern affection for the battle flag is not so much as nostalgia for the Old South as it is, and was after the Civil War, a reaction to Reconstruction and the burden that the Federal government put upon the Southern states after the war. The War was ended with the understanding that, for most in the South, the peace would result in life going back to that before the War. There would be no Confederates and Unionists. There would be Americans who had a sad and bloody disagreement. The reality was that the South was, in fact, if not in law, under martial law for twenty years and the Southerner was under the thumbs of often mercurial and often vengeful men who really knew nothing of the South, were often chasing money and wanted to punish those who had defied them. The reaction of the South was to grasp harder onto it's regional identity. The South had been beaten and humiliated by losing the War. Reconstruction was the North grinding it's heel into the face of the South. How could a man or woman who had suffered that humiliation not fight back in whatever way they could? The battle flag and nostalgia for Southern heroes was the reaction. It was a way to say that they are somebody worth respect, not a way to say down with blacks. Consider the fact that in some jurisdictions ex-Confederates were legally prevented for running for political office by men, from the Union, who treated black men and women worse than a Southern non-slave holder ever did. Also consider the fact that after WW II it was not uncommon for ex-Nazis to be elected to governmental office. The U.S. did what it could to bring up and help to recover from the ravages of WW II in Germany and Japan while the U.S., after the Civil War tried to do everything it could to keep the South down and in poverty. The Confederate battle flag was, and is, more a symbol of resistance to Federal over reach than it is a symbol of racism. It is the biting of an ankle of a dog that has not only been beat into submission, but kicked and starved afterwards by its master.
(N.B. Be it known that this writer has, as far as he is aware, no ancestors who fought for the South in the Civil War. One great-great grandfather was a corporal in 3rd Regiment of the Iowa Veterans Volunteers {Cavalry}under the command of Capt. John D. Brown, and a great-great grand uncle was hanged by Confederate bushwhackers under the mistaken idea that he was a spy in Jasper County, MO. So this writer has no special sympathy for the C.S.A.)
Within a week of the Confederate battle flag brouhaha the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that same sex marriage would be the law of this great nation. Immediately the Rainbow flags came out because, apparently, no one appreciates rainbows like the gays. And almost as immediately the gay (yours would use the words "sodomite" or "queer", "gayster" or "qweeb" but this writer really doesn't want to put up with a crap storm of outrage from any gays that may happen to read this) cohort has called for all churches and religious institutions to recognize, and support enthusiastically, same sex marriage. Our own Dear Leader has even gone as far as to say that religions, specifically Christian denominations, should get with the modern program and embrace the whole concept that there will be two little toy men or two little toy women on a wedding cake. "Love" is supposed to overcome all because love is, well love and love is always a good thing, right? So what religious people, people who are not religious but hold a morality based on religious values and people who are concerned about the future of the moral state of the name and society are supposed to throw out their values so that Barbie can pretend that she's married to Lucille when, in fact, in no religious tradition over fifty years old recognizes anything close to same sex marriage. 2% or, at the most 3%, of the population of the nation have somehow decided what the rest of us are to believe. And since the decision is so fabulous E-bay and Amazon are happily selling rainbow flags despite the fact that the fact of same sex marriage is ruinous to society. It's all about love, you see. And love overcomes all. And since the Supreme Court decision we are all expected to embrace our gay brothers and sisters and say that being gay is not only okay. It may be better than being straight. In fact, there should be a mandatory gay class in junior high schools so that all kids will love the gays and, perhaps, discover the fact that they are gay despite the fact that Bobby, until taking the class thought he was in love with Sally and suddenly found out that, because of the class, Jimmy was not his best friend, but potential lover.
It all reminds me of ISIS and the erasure of collective memory. Jonah Goldberg calls the phenomenon "the memory hole" based on Geo. Orwell's novel 1984. In the novel the government, once it has changed it's mind about an issue, demands that the people put their memory of the former governmental stance into a "memory hole." The memory is supposed to disappear and instead of the nation being at war with Eurasia and allied with Asia the nation is at war with Asia and allied with Eurasia and always has been. The difference is that the nation has, as of yet, not been able to perfect the "memory hole" but television and movies come pretty close. Instead, what our "betters" do is demonize our memories and tell us that what we know, experienced, believe and have studied, are not true and they will do whatever they can to try to erase those memories, at least in public, from the populace. It is not so much cover-up as it is denial and demonization. ISIS denies that there is any other form of the awful religion of Islam. It will deny that there is any other religion than their form of Islam. They clench their fists, stomp the ground and will kick over any evidence or kill anyone who denies that their form of Islam is stupider than any other form of Islam or that Christians and Jews understand the Bible better than they, or their founder, Mohammed, do.
The modern liberal and politician (whether Democrat or Republican) who caters to the news media in their attempt to be hip and with it would like to destroy everything and have forgotten everything that doesn't fit into their idea of what should be. They want the Confederate battle flag banished to the area of history that the flag of Joan of Arc in in the U.S. and want it replaced with rainbow flags. It's all about love, you see. Not morality or common sense. And besides, the gaysters spend a lot more money buying off politicians than do Southerners, on a per capita basis. The modern pol doesn't blow up Buddha statues in Afghanistan or Christian churches in Syria. They are much more under handed by making laws. They use the stiletto hidden under the cloak instead of the cosh. And we put up with it.
Regarding the coat hook, your faithful correspondent has gone on all too long this week and will address the matter of the coat hook next week. To put it short, for those who are interested, the coat hook is a metaphor for modern America. To wit, one can only hang so much on a coat hook before it rips out of the wall.
All the best from Bloody Nib Manor. There are pigs to be fed and onions to be dug up.
This past week has been an interesting one that has left us here at Bloody Nib Manor rocked back on our heels for a bit. It is not that the incidents were unexpected, but more that they came so fast. An analogy would be one expecting a punch from an opponent and finding oneself at the receiving end of a fist not one time, but several times in an instant. Four punches in the time of one punch will result in one feeling confused and dopey and consider throwing in the towel. Or pulling out a sap.
Last week, after the shooting at the church in Charleston, S.C., it didn't take long for politicians, in their never ending quest for cheap solutions and get their mugs on the telly, to call for the banning of the Confederate battle flag from all governmental institutions. Governor Halley the first by calling for the flag to be removed from the state capitol grounds. Then every politician and liberal commentator jumped on that band wagon as if the Confederate battle flag is some sort of demon that drives stupid drug addled young men to do evil things. Soon thereafter merchants such as Wal-Mart, E-bay and Amazon announced that they would no longer sell Confederate battle flags or any merchandise displaying the flag (Which raises the question about what are said merchants going to do with their Lynard Skynard and Confederate Railroad CDs and downloads). And then, once the thing end of the wedge had been inserted, everything seems to have collapsed. Calls for the removal of statues of Confederate soldiers, the removal of Confederate cemeteries, changing the names of universities (Washington and Lee, for example) and streets and parks. The attempt seems to be that anything Confederate, whether the battle flag, but any and everything, is as evil as the horned god that Satanists pretend to worship. A film critic for the New York Post has even suggested that Gone With The Wind be banned from showings at governmental institutions (film museums and such). It's all silly and stupid and wrong-headed. But liberals and politicians of every stripe are often that way.
No matter what your thoughts about the rightness or wrongness of the Southern states seceding from the Union one's opinions concerning that unfortunate event have nothing to do with the Confederate battle flag and it's place in modern Southern society. In fact, this writer, based on no scholarly studies by eggheads writing doctoral dissertations or chasing tenure, posits that the Southern affection for the battle flag is not so much as nostalgia for the Old South as it is, and was after the Civil War, a reaction to Reconstruction and the burden that the Federal government put upon the Southern states after the war. The War was ended with the understanding that, for most in the South, the peace would result in life going back to that before the War. There would be no Confederates and Unionists. There would be Americans who had a sad and bloody disagreement. The reality was that the South was, in fact, if not in law, under martial law for twenty years and the Southerner was under the thumbs of often mercurial and often vengeful men who really knew nothing of the South, were often chasing money and wanted to punish those who had defied them. The reaction of the South was to grasp harder onto it's regional identity. The South had been beaten and humiliated by losing the War. Reconstruction was the North grinding it's heel into the face of the South. How could a man or woman who had suffered that humiliation not fight back in whatever way they could? The battle flag and nostalgia for Southern heroes was the reaction. It was a way to say that they are somebody worth respect, not a way to say down with blacks. Consider the fact that in some jurisdictions ex-Confederates were legally prevented for running for political office by men, from the Union, who treated black men and women worse than a Southern non-slave holder ever did. Also consider the fact that after WW II it was not uncommon for ex-Nazis to be elected to governmental office. The U.S. did what it could to bring up and help to recover from the ravages of WW II in Germany and Japan while the U.S., after the Civil War tried to do everything it could to keep the South down and in poverty. The Confederate battle flag was, and is, more a symbol of resistance to Federal over reach than it is a symbol of racism. It is the biting of an ankle of a dog that has not only been beat into submission, but kicked and starved afterwards by its master.
(N.B. Be it known that this writer has, as far as he is aware, no ancestors who fought for the South in the Civil War. One great-great grandfather was a corporal in 3rd Regiment of the Iowa Veterans Volunteers {Cavalry}under the command of Capt. John D. Brown, and a great-great grand uncle was hanged by Confederate bushwhackers under the mistaken idea that he was a spy in Jasper County, MO. So this writer has no special sympathy for the C.S.A.)
Within a week of the Confederate battle flag brouhaha the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that same sex marriage would be the law of this great nation. Immediately the Rainbow flags came out because, apparently, no one appreciates rainbows like the gays. And almost as immediately the gay (yours would use the words "sodomite" or "queer", "gayster" or "qweeb" but this writer really doesn't want to put up with a crap storm of outrage from any gays that may happen to read this) cohort has called for all churches and religious institutions to recognize, and support enthusiastically, same sex marriage. Our own Dear Leader has even gone as far as to say that religions, specifically Christian denominations, should get with the modern program and embrace the whole concept that there will be two little toy men or two little toy women on a wedding cake. "Love" is supposed to overcome all because love is, well love and love is always a good thing, right? So what religious people, people who are not religious but hold a morality based on religious values and people who are concerned about the future of the moral state of the name and society are supposed to throw out their values so that Barbie can pretend that she's married to Lucille when, in fact, in no religious tradition over fifty years old recognizes anything close to same sex marriage. 2% or, at the most 3%, of the population of the nation have somehow decided what the rest of us are to believe. And since the decision is so fabulous E-bay and Amazon are happily selling rainbow flags despite the fact that the fact of same sex marriage is ruinous to society. It's all about love, you see. And love overcomes all. And since the Supreme Court decision we are all expected to embrace our gay brothers and sisters and say that being gay is not only okay. It may be better than being straight. In fact, there should be a mandatory gay class in junior high schools so that all kids will love the gays and, perhaps, discover the fact that they are gay despite the fact that Bobby, until taking the class thought he was in love with Sally and suddenly found out that, because of the class, Jimmy was not his best friend, but potential lover.
It all reminds me of ISIS and the erasure of collective memory. Jonah Goldberg calls the phenomenon "the memory hole" based on Geo. Orwell's novel 1984. In the novel the government, once it has changed it's mind about an issue, demands that the people put their memory of the former governmental stance into a "memory hole." The memory is supposed to disappear and instead of the nation being at war with Eurasia and allied with Asia the nation is at war with Asia and allied with Eurasia and always has been. The difference is that the nation has, as of yet, not been able to perfect the "memory hole" but television and movies come pretty close. Instead, what our "betters" do is demonize our memories and tell us that what we know, experienced, believe and have studied, are not true and they will do whatever they can to try to erase those memories, at least in public, from the populace. It is not so much cover-up as it is denial and demonization. ISIS denies that there is any other form of the awful religion of Islam. It will deny that there is any other religion than their form of Islam. They clench their fists, stomp the ground and will kick over any evidence or kill anyone who denies that their form of Islam is stupider than any other form of Islam or that Christians and Jews understand the Bible better than they, or their founder, Mohammed, do.
The modern liberal and politician (whether Democrat or Republican) who caters to the news media in their attempt to be hip and with it would like to destroy everything and have forgotten everything that doesn't fit into their idea of what should be. They want the Confederate battle flag banished to the area of history that the flag of Joan of Arc in in the U.S. and want it replaced with rainbow flags. It's all about love, you see. Not morality or common sense. And besides, the gaysters spend a lot more money buying off politicians than do Southerners, on a per capita basis. The modern pol doesn't blow up Buddha statues in Afghanistan or Christian churches in Syria. They are much more under handed by making laws. They use the stiletto hidden under the cloak instead of the cosh. And we put up with it.
Regarding the coat hook, your faithful correspondent has gone on all too long this week and will address the matter of the coat hook next week. To put it short, for those who are interested, the coat hook is a metaphor for modern America. To wit, one can only hang so much on a coat hook before it rips out of the wall.
All the best from Bloody Nib Manor. There are pigs to be fed and onions to be dug up.
Sunday, February 01, 2015
Fernandez
Richard Fernandez is a writer who used to have his own website called The Belmont Club. He has since moved his writing to PJMedia.
Your faithful correspondent knows little about Mr. Fernandez beyond the fact that he once worked with the government of the Philippines and tried to work between the government and Islamic insurgents in trying to promote some sort of peace.
He is a good thinker, a good writer and doesn't spend a lot of time on nonsense.
Here are two of his recent columns:
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2015/01/22/the-part-of-yourself-you-used-to-own/
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2015/01/22/the-part-of-yourself-you-used-to-own/
Your faithful correspondent knows little about Mr. Fernandez beyond the fact that he once worked with the government of the Philippines and tried to work between the government and Islamic insurgents in trying to promote some sort of peace.
He is a good thinker, a good writer and doesn't spend a lot of time on nonsense.
Here are two of his recent columns:
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2015/01/22/the-part-of-yourself-you-used-to-own/
http://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2015/01/22/the-part-of-yourself-you-used-to-own/
Saturday, January 24, 2015
Men in Hats (with no man)
With the return of regular posting in this blog your faithful correspondent is also bringing back the "Men in Hats" feature.
The hat for this post is the trilby hat. Or, as we at Bloody Nib Manor refer to it, "the awful trilby."
The trilby hat was inspired by the by the first stage production of George du Maurier's 1890's novel "Trilby." The novel gave us the term Svengali and the play gave us the hat. In the play the character Trilby (who was a woman) wore a hat that became so popular among the British aristocracy that it it became a "thing" with the character's name attached to it.
So, what is a trilby hat? A trilby hat is a proper fedora that has been ruined by a pair of scissors. The brim has been snipped away to unusefulness and the crown has been shortened. It's the type of thing that may look good on jeune filles or gamines, but the fact of the matter that most of them are worn by men. And they just don't work. Some of the British aristocracy used to wear them back in the day when the aristos were considered silly, but the style soon was taken up by race course hacks, betting shop owners, mods, and rockers and the "cool" crowd. At the Manor the hat has always been regarded as slightly disreputable like the pork-pie hat.
It's a bad combination of a cap and a hat.
Few people can get away with wearing a trilby. The only man that this writer and recall having done so is Rex Harrison. Young women can get away with wearing one because they can be Trilby. Besides, yours truly gives young women a lot of leeway because they are silly and cute and this writer is an old bloke.
If you're a man and have finally gotten the sense to wear a hat or cap don't wear a baseball cap (those are for kids, ball players and machine gunners in B-17s) or a trilby. Be a man, a real grown up man, and wear a real hat or cap like a Stetson, a fedora or a beret.
Here's a picture of a trilby if you don't know what one is:
Awful Trilby Hat
The hat for this post is the trilby hat. Or, as we at Bloody Nib Manor refer to it, "the awful trilby."
The trilby hat was inspired by the by the first stage production of George du Maurier's 1890's novel "Trilby." The novel gave us the term Svengali and the play gave us the hat. In the play the character Trilby (who was a woman) wore a hat that became so popular among the British aristocracy that it it became a "thing" with the character's name attached to it.
So, what is a trilby hat? A trilby hat is a proper fedora that has been ruined by a pair of scissors. The brim has been snipped away to unusefulness and the crown has been shortened. It's the type of thing that may look good on jeune filles or gamines, but the fact of the matter that most of them are worn by men. And they just don't work. Some of the British aristocracy used to wear them back in the day when the aristos were considered silly, but the style soon was taken up by race course hacks, betting shop owners, mods, and rockers and the "cool" crowd. At the Manor the hat has always been regarded as slightly disreputable like the pork-pie hat.
It's a bad combination of a cap and a hat.
Few people can get away with wearing a trilby. The only man that this writer and recall having done so is Rex Harrison. Young women can get away with wearing one because they can be Trilby. Besides, yours truly gives young women a lot of leeway because they are silly and cute and this writer is an old bloke.
If you're a man and have finally gotten the sense to wear a hat or cap don't wear a baseball cap (those are for kids, ball players and machine gunners in B-17s) or a trilby. Be a man, a real grown up man, and wear a real hat or cap like a Stetson, a fedora or a beret.
Here's a picture of a trilby if you don't know what one is:
Awful Trilby Hat
Better Minds....
While we here at Nib Manor often give the impression that we are all-wise (which is usually the case) there are occasionally men who have a better command of the distillation of ideas and the mother tongue than do we.
Such is Victor Davis Hanson, as evinced in the following:
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/?p=8154
Such is Victor Davis Hanson, as evinced in the following:
http://victorhanson.com/wordpress/?p=8154
Sunday, January 18, 2015
Why From Alan to Abdul?
It's been a while since your faithful correspondent has been faithful. He apologizes for his inconstancy. The only excuse is that things have been troubled here at Bloody Nib Manor for several months and yours truly has neglected to buy a quart of ink from the local vendor.
One of the things that this writer has paid attention to is the conversion of formerly Americans and Europeans from secular or titular Christian families to Islam and the fact that a good number of them decide that it might be a good idea to run off to the Middle East and fight against the infidel or want to shoot up the Capitol in Washington, D.C. in order to help establish a Caliphate world-wide. In other words, this writer wonders why a man (or woman) who grew up as a little tyke riding a bike on the streets of suburbia, London or Paris, watching Go Rangers on television, listening to Metallica or Katy Perry, celebrating Christmas and Easter, and perhaps attending church twice a year, would want to hook up with a desert tribe that will cut one's lips off if one is found playing "Old Folks At Home" or "Whammer Jammer" on a harmonica, expect a young man to be satisfied looked at women wearing bags, and expect one to go ass up five times a day to worship a black rock located in a place that no same person would want to visit.
While there is no empirical evidence and this is all the result of internal thought and some study, yours has come to a conclusion: The interest of the investment that Christianity has given to the western world has run out. Christianity in the West. This is not to say that only the Christian faith has been on the decline, but that the Christian ethos has declined. There's an old saying that atheists want to behave like heathens and libertines while expecting everyone else to treat in a Christian manner. The chickens have come home to roost and the elites find that their shoes are covered with chicken shit as well as finding that the shoe on the other foot pinches.
For at least sixty years the intelligentsia have denigrated Christianity and the Christian ethos. It started as a game played in the halls of academia that, in the mainstream seminaries, spread to the public and the media. Before then the average steelworker in Pittsburgh, farmer in Missouri, coster-monger in London, sewer-cleaner in Paris or mosaic worker in Sicily attended church or synagogue at least several times a year and believed in the precepts of the Christian or Jewish faiths. If the faith was not bred in the bone, at least the ethos was. And with that ethos there were boundaries. There were laws and morals that went on beyond the national laws.There were religious customs that, even if a family wasn't religious, were honored in word, if not in fact. This writer can still remember blue laws when the only stores that were open on a Sunday were drugstores and the occasional gas station and when kosher butcher shops were shut down on Saturday.
But our betters, in other words, professors wanting to get tenure and make a name for themselves, decided that the Christian ethos (and Christianity itself was a lie or misunderstood) and spent an awful lot of time denigrating the faith and its results. Their thinking was, as far as you faithful correspondent can make it out, was that if Christianity is not true and Jesus was just a kind of weak Middle Eastern Buddha, then the whole Christian ethos is worth about a much as a bag of popcorn. In other words, not much.
Now, imagine yourself a young fellow. You grow up as a nominal Christian. Being a nominal Christian is a pretty easy gig, but you know that there are limits to what you can do. If nothing else, you remember a few of the Ten Commandments and that Jesus was a pretty good guy. Then you start hearing, reading, or watching articles and shows that say that being even a nominal Christian means that you're a sucker, Jesus was a huckster and Moses is a myth. Ergo, the whole Judeo/Christian ethos takes a dive because it's based on lies. And, super ergo, you can do any damn thing you want as long as it's not illegal. You can get drunk to the point of being super-stupid, you can screw any woman who will put up with you, you can tell your parents that they are a**holes because you didn't get the Hello Kitty Fender guitar that you wanted for Christmas (which means nothing because there is no Christ and therefore no Christmas). And you can do it all while getting the approval of your liberal Protestant pastor when he's not smoking boo ,or wondering if he or she should trade in his or her two year old Volvo for an Audi or a BMW with the money they make from Christians who they really think are awful dopes.
Here's the deal in a nutshell. Young men need limits. They need boundaries. They won't admit that they need them, but they need them and want them. Once they know the boundaries they are comfortable and adapt to them. They'll kick against the goads, but after a while they'll realize why there are goads. And that's the reason why some boys (and a few girls) in the West convert to the Religion of Perpetual Bitching. In Islam there are clearly drawn boundaries. The boundaries are wrong and not true. But consider the Hare Krishna movement; same deal, but without the guns.
The constant denigration of Christianity in the West has resulted in the rise of Islam in the West because the West has forgotten itself and that Christianity is the reason for the modern West. When you little tow-head boy runs off to become a jihadi or your little blond surfer girl runs off to marry a savage living in a mud hut in the Middle East you should look at yourself. Not so much because you're a bad parent, but because you didn't place the limits that traditional Christianity places on a person.
One of the things that this writer has paid attention to is the conversion of formerly Americans and Europeans from secular or titular Christian families to Islam and the fact that a good number of them decide that it might be a good idea to run off to the Middle East and fight against the infidel or want to shoot up the Capitol in Washington, D.C. in order to help establish a Caliphate world-wide. In other words, this writer wonders why a man (or woman) who grew up as a little tyke riding a bike on the streets of suburbia, London or Paris, watching Go Rangers on television, listening to Metallica or Katy Perry, celebrating Christmas and Easter, and perhaps attending church twice a year, would want to hook up with a desert tribe that will cut one's lips off if one is found playing "Old Folks At Home" or "Whammer Jammer" on a harmonica, expect a young man to be satisfied looked at women wearing bags, and expect one to go ass up five times a day to worship a black rock located in a place that no same person would want to visit.
While there is no empirical evidence and this is all the result of internal thought and some study, yours has come to a conclusion: The interest of the investment that Christianity has given to the western world has run out. Christianity in the West. This is not to say that only the Christian faith has been on the decline, but that the Christian ethos has declined. There's an old saying that atheists want to behave like heathens and libertines while expecting everyone else to treat in a Christian manner. The chickens have come home to roost and the elites find that their shoes are covered with chicken shit as well as finding that the shoe on the other foot pinches.
For at least sixty years the intelligentsia have denigrated Christianity and the Christian ethos. It started as a game played in the halls of academia that, in the mainstream seminaries, spread to the public and the media. Before then the average steelworker in Pittsburgh, farmer in Missouri, coster-monger in London, sewer-cleaner in Paris or mosaic worker in Sicily attended church or synagogue at least several times a year and believed in the precepts of the Christian or Jewish faiths. If the faith was not bred in the bone, at least the ethos was. And with that ethos there were boundaries. There were laws and morals that went on beyond the national laws.There were religious customs that, even if a family wasn't religious, were honored in word, if not in fact. This writer can still remember blue laws when the only stores that were open on a Sunday were drugstores and the occasional gas station and when kosher butcher shops were shut down on Saturday.
But our betters, in other words, professors wanting to get tenure and make a name for themselves, decided that the Christian ethos (and Christianity itself was a lie or misunderstood) and spent an awful lot of time denigrating the faith and its results. Their thinking was, as far as you faithful correspondent can make it out, was that if Christianity is not true and Jesus was just a kind of weak Middle Eastern Buddha, then the whole Christian ethos is worth about a much as a bag of popcorn. In other words, not much.
Now, imagine yourself a young fellow. You grow up as a nominal Christian. Being a nominal Christian is a pretty easy gig, but you know that there are limits to what you can do. If nothing else, you remember a few of the Ten Commandments and that Jesus was a pretty good guy. Then you start hearing, reading, or watching articles and shows that say that being even a nominal Christian means that you're a sucker, Jesus was a huckster and Moses is a myth. Ergo, the whole Judeo/Christian ethos takes a dive because it's based on lies. And, super ergo, you can do any damn thing you want as long as it's not illegal. You can get drunk to the point of being super-stupid, you can screw any woman who will put up with you, you can tell your parents that they are a**holes because you didn't get the Hello Kitty Fender guitar that you wanted for Christmas (which means nothing because there is no Christ and therefore no Christmas). And you can do it all while getting the approval of your liberal Protestant pastor when he's not smoking boo ,or wondering if he or she should trade in his or her two year old Volvo for an Audi or a BMW with the money they make from Christians who they really think are awful dopes.
Here's the deal in a nutshell. Young men need limits. They need boundaries. They won't admit that they need them, but they need them and want them. Once they know the boundaries they are comfortable and adapt to them. They'll kick against the goads, but after a while they'll realize why there are goads. And that's the reason why some boys (and a few girls) in the West convert to the Religion of Perpetual Bitching. In Islam there are clearly drawn boundaries. The boundaries are wrong and not true. But consider the Hare Krishna movement; same deal, but without the guns.
The constant denigration of Christianity in the West has resulted in the rise of Islam in the West because the West has forgotten itself and that Christianity is the reason for the modern West. When you little tow-head boy runs off to become a jihadi or your little blond surfer girl runs off to marry a savage living in a mud hut in the Middle East you should look at yourself. Not so much because you're a bad parent, but because you didn't place the limits that traditional Christianity places on a person.
Sunday, October 12, 2014
Where Confusion Reigns
Recently the State of California passed a law that requires male college students to get explicit permission from their female partners before engaging in the sex act.. The young woman has to say," Yes. Let's have sex" before the young man is allowed to begin the act of copulation. If he doesn't receive this permission with these specific words (or a variation thereof), at a later date the young woman, having regretted the encounter for some reason, is allowed to report the young man to the college or university administration as a "sexual offender." She can claim that she was "date raped", drunk, under the influence of some sort of drug, pressured into doing the nasty or that he took advantage of her during a time when she was weak and vulnerable and just wanted a hug and that turned into a session of attempted baby-making. In other words, all the onus is on the man, and he must get explicit permission from the young woman to go farther than third base. A wink and a nod will not do. Actions will not do. He must have, at least, a verbal, out loud version of, "Do me, baby!" before his BVDs go to half mast.
What the law does not say is what happens if said young and dewy-eyed co-ed goes to the campus rape reporting desk and say that Tommy Varsity took advantage of her for his own evil pleasure and she didn't say, "Hey! Yeah! Let's do something my father would kill you for doing to me. I want to do IT!", and the brute boy, upon being dragged into the campus police station on a charge of some sort of rape (the term "rape" here is very broad) says, in response to the charge, "Gee whillikers! Sally Ann not only gave me permission. She demanded that I dip my wick. I can clearly remember her saying, 'Give me six inches of your best, big boy!' And she was stone cold sober. We'd spent the night at Starbucks drinking double espressos for three hour talking about the shading in Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" But, of course, since women are the nobler sides of human nature, at least as far as the education establishment is concerned, Tommy will be kicked out of college and Sally Ann remain in college and have the added benefit of being a victim of male sexual abuse despite the fact that she did demand that Tommy give her his best (she just regretted it later when she realized that he had been making the beast with two backs with her best friend Mary Jo a day later). Unfortunately, poor old Tommy, soon to be working the fry basket at McDonald's and trying to get an apprenticeship as a dry wall hanger (good luck with that, Tommy, since you don't speak Spanish), didn't record Sally Ann's urgency on his iPhone or have her sign a paper, written up by a lawyer, for her to sign giving him permission to do something that would shock his old grey-haired mother.
For some reason, because the state college and university systems in California seem to hold themselves apart from the rest of the great unwashed citizens of the state, claims of rape, of whatever sort, are not investigated by the local city or county law enforcement authorities. Why? Who knows? Academics hold themselves apart from the rest of society in a way that Socrates and Plato would have found laughable. By the colleges and universities police themselves and, thus, claims of rape (of whatever sort) are not investigate by trained detectives, but by university cops and "equality boards" made up of politically correct academics, usually from the Women's Studies field.
During the same week a feminist group declared that the iconic photograph of the celebration of the end of World War Two of a sailor in his summer white uniform kissing a nurse in her whites was, in actuality, not a celebration between two people of the end of an awful war, but was, in fact, a photograph of a rape. The reason given by the "fighters for women's equality and foes of patriarchy) is that the man and woman did not know one another at the time of the kiss. The man just grabbed the woman, in their opinion, and planted a big old smooch on her without, I suppose, the woman giving written and notarized consent. The man in the photograph was always unknown. Several men claimed to be the sailor. The nurse, on the other hand, was known. And she said that when the end of the War was announced on the billboard oputside the N.Y. Times building she was so happy she would have gladly kissed a duck because she was so happy. She never complained about being victimized by a swabbie. In fact, she stated that she enjoyed the kiss. But our feminist betters have decided that the nurse was just a victim of the "patriarchy" and just didn't know any better. To them the woman was as raped just as if she had been thrown onto Devil's Island as the only woman among a bunch of male hardened criminals. In other words, women before about 1970 just didn't know their own minds. They were mental slaves to the male conspiracy that wanted to make all women into either Stepford Wives, for home use, or round-heels for fun. And it might, and should be noted for the sake of this argument, that the womyn (to use the 1970s spelling of the word among the hairy armpit, short-haired and awfully loud crowd) of this professional woman victim crowd are all university or college graduates, except for a few drones of the male type with wispy beards an a lot of empathy (it's a good way to get some leg -- apologize while taking the plunge ("It's just my awful male and XX chromosome that makes me want to do this, but I can't help it. And thanks for giving me permission. Just sign on the dotted line").
Which brings us to the Seven Sisters colleges back East. The Seven Sisters colleges are women's colleges which were founded in the mid to late 1800s. Now, some over 100 years later, they are all still woman only colleges despite many of their alumni demanded that the men only colleges become co-ed. And, of course, if one to say that Vassar, for example, should start accepting male students said women would say that a female only Vassar is a great tradition and givers the "second sex" a chance of a good education away from the pressures and distraction that men cause while West Point or Virginia Military Institute gain by having women in the classes because women bring a softer side to being an Army officer. In other words, the thought is to kill the enemy with kindness instead of an A-10 Warthog or M-16.
A couple of weeks ago Mount Holyoke college, which is one of the Seven Sisters, decided that it would be a good thing to accept trans-gender people as students. Truth to tell, this writer (and all here at Bloody Nib Manor) are not quite sure what a trans-gender person is. Is it a man who dresses as a woman and says that he is a woman? Is it a man who has silicon breasts and is undergoing some sort of estrogen treatment? Is it a man who has had his man-hood removed and replaced with a plastic surgeon's version of a vagina? Could it be a guy who looks like a guy with a beard and body odor who says that he feels like he is a woman inside? This writer actually heard a recording of the president of Mount Holyoke announcing this new policy and the woman was actually in tears of joy at this change. The president of the college was awfully proud of the college being "accepting" of the "other". But the fact remains that Mount Holyoke will not accept male homosexuals, effeminate men who like women for sex partners or male gymnasts or figure skaters to its hallowed halls of academia. So the whole "accepting" thing is a bunch of nonsense. What was not stated is that would a woman who decided that she was a man and had had a penile build done in her "secret area" be accepted as a student with all the joy that a lady-boy would.
The Seven Sisters colleges seem to be the source of all the above nonsense. Back in the old days when common sense reigned a man who claimed that he was really a woman or a woman who claimed that she was really a man was not called "trans-gender." That person was called just plain crazy in the same way that most East Indians call sadhus crazy despite the fact that ignorant Western tourists or "spiritual leaders" call them "holy men."
Let's face it, universities and colleges, are the hot-houses of social idiocy. They may be great to get a technical education; nursing, engineering, chemistry, physics and avionics, but when it comes to what was once known as the liberal arts they are just, for the most part, pits of bad thinking and political correctness. A father works in a steel mill 50 or 60 hours a week and drinks cheap beer to relax on the weekends in order to send his dear little daughter to Vassar or Columbia or Long Beach State and, after about one semester, he ends up with a daughter who hates him because he's part of the patriarchy that held her down because she couldn't play (because she didn't have the stuff, but she has an excuse) Varsity football in high school, or that he didn't kill the boy he caught making out with his daughter in the boy's car after the prom in high school. In other words, since the daughter has gone to a Seven Sisters (otherwise known as the Sapphic Sisters) school or has joined a Sapphic sorority under the direction of her Women's Studies professor, Dad has become a Hitler who would be as likely to shoot her in the back of the head as give her a Christmas gift. And said daughter, with her trick education in liberal arts, is pissed off because she can't work at NASA because she doesn't have the scientific education but she blames NASA for being anti-woman because an understanding of the writings of Virginia Wolffe should be as good as an understanding of physics or astronomy to get a man (or more usually a woman to Mars). So she blames her Dad because he was a guy. And once she hits 30 and realizes that being a lesbian isn't all that great because her partner won't change the light bulb or clean out the garbage can and any kid she has will be a crap shoot from the local sperm bank, decides that she's not a dyke (excuse the crudity, but I'm an old man), and finds a nice young fellow and she becomes a suburban mommy but passes on the poison she learned in college to her spoiled rotten brats who are diagnosed with Autism or ADD or hyper-activity because she wants to talk about the oppression of the patriarchy with her Vassarite girlfriends while she doesn't discipline her kids.
We're doomed.
What the law does not say is what happens if said young and dewy-eyed co-ed goes to the campus rape reporting desk and say that Tommy Varsity took advantage of her for his own evil pleasure and she didn't say, "Hey! Yeah! Let's do something my father would kill you for doing to me. I want to do IT!", and the brute boy, upon being dragged into the campus police station on a charge of some sort of rape (the term "rape" here is very broad) says, in response to the charge, "Gee whillikers! Sally Ann not only gave me permission. She demanded that I dip my wick. I can clearly remember her saying, 'Give me six inches of your best, big boy!' And she was stone cold sober. We'd spent the night at Starbucks drinking double espressos for three hour talking about the shading in Joyce's Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man" But, of course, since women are the nobler sides of human nature, at least as far as the education establishment is concerned, Tommy will be kicked out of college and Sally Ann remain in college and have the added benefit of being a victim of male sexual abuse despite the fact that she did demand that Tommy give her his best (she just regretted it later when she realized that he had been making the beast with two backs with her best friend Mary Jo a day later). Unfortunately, poor old Tommy, soon to be working the fry basket at McDonald's and trying to get an apprenticeship as a dry wall hanger (good luck with that, Tommy, since you don't speak Spanish), didn't record Sally Ann's urgency on his iPhone or have her sign a paper, written up by a lawyer, for her to sign giving him permission to do something that would shock his old grey-haired mother.
For some reason, because the state college and university systems in California seem to hold themselves apart from the rest of the great unwashed citizens of the state, claims of rape, of whatever sort, are not investigated by the local city or county law enforcement authorities. Why? Who knows? Academics hold themselves apart from the rest of society in a way that Socrates and Plato would have found laughable. By the colleges and universities police themselves and, thus, claims of rape (of whatever sort) are not investigate by trained detectives, but by university cops and "equality boards" made up of politically correct academics, usually from the Women's Studies field.
During the same week a feminist group declared that the iconic photograph of the celebration of the end of World War Two of a sailor in his summer white uniform kissing a nurse in her whites was, in actuality, not a celebration between two people of the end of an awful war, but was, in fact, a photograph of a rape. The reason given by the "fighters for women's equality and foes of patriarchy) is that the man and woman did not know one another at the time of the kiss. The man just grabbed the woman, in their opinion, and planted a big old smooch on her without, I suppose, the woman giving written and notarized consent. The man in the photograph was always unknown. Several men claimed to be the sailor. The nurse, on the other hand, was known. And she said that when the end of the War was announced on the billboard oputside the N.Y. Times building she was so happy she would have gladly kissed a duck because she was so happy. She never complained about being victimized by a swabbie. In fact, she stated that she enjoyed the kiss. But our feminist betters have decided that the nurse was just a victim of the "patriarchy" and just didn't know any better. To them the woman was as raped just as if she had been thrown onto Devil's Island as the only woman among a bunch of male hardened criminals. In other words, women before about 1970 just didn't know their own minds. They were mental slaves to the male conspiracy that wanted to make all women into either Stepford Wives, for home use, or round-heels for fun. And it might, and should be noted for the sake of this argument, that the womyn (to use the 1970s spelling of the word among the hairy armpit, short-haired and awfully loud crowd) of this professional woman victim crowd are all university or college graduates, except for a few drones of the male type with wispy beards an a lot of empathy (it's a good way to get some leg -- apologize while taking the plunge ("It's just my awful male and XX chromosome that makes me want to do this, but I can't help it. And thanks for giving me permission. Just sign on the dotted line").
Which brings us to the Seven Sisters colleges back East. The Seven Sisters colleges are women's colleges which were founded in the mid to late 1800s. Now, some over 100 years later, they are all still woman only colleges despite many of their alumni demanded that the men only colleges become co-ed. And, of course, if one to say that Vassar, for example, should start accepting male students said women would say that a female only Vassar is a great tradition and givers the "second sex" a chance of a good education away from the pressures and distraction that men cause while West Point or Virginia Military Institute gain by having women in the classes because women bring a softer side to being an Army officer. In other words, the thought is to kill the enemy with kindness instead of an A-10 Warthog or M-16.
A couple of weeks ago Mount Holyoke college, which is one of the Seven Sisters, decided that it would be a good thing to accept trans-gender people as students. Truth to tell, this writer (and all here at Bloody Nib Manor) are not quite sure what a trans-gender person is. Is it a man who dresses as a woman and says that he is a woman? Is it a man who has silicon breasts and is undergoing some sort of estrogen treatment? Is it a man who has had his man-hood removed and replaced with a plastic surgeon's version of a vagina? Could it be a guy who looks like a guy with a beard and body odor who says that he feels like he is a woman inside? This writer actually heard a recording of the president of Mount Holyoke announcing this new policy and the woman was actually in tears of joy at this change. The president of the college was awfully proud of the college being "accepting" of the "other". But the fact remains that Mount Holyoke will not accept male homosexuals, effeminate men who like women for sex partners or male gymnasts or figure skaters to its hallowed halls of academia. So the whole "accepting" thing is a bunch of nonsense. What was not stated is that would a woman who decided that she was a man and had had a penile build done in her "secret area" be accepted as a student with all the joy that a lady-boy would.
The Seven Sisters colleges seem to be the source of all the above nonsense. Back in the old days when common sense reigned a man who claimed that he was really a woman or a woman who claimed that she was really a man was not called "trans-gender." That person was called just plain crazy in the same way that most East Indians call sadhus crazy despite the fact that ignorant Western tourists or "spiritual leaders" call them "holy men."
Let's face it, universities and colleges, are the hot-houses of social idiocy. They may be great to get a technical education; nursing, engineering, chemistry, physics and avionics, but when it comes to what was once known as the liberal arts they are just, for the most part, pits of bad thinking and political correctness. A father works in a steel mill 50 or 60 hours a week and drinks cheap beer to relax on the weekends in order to send his dear little daughter to Vassar or Columbia or Long Beach State and, after about one semester, he ends up with a daughter who hates him because he's part of the patriarchy that held her down because she couldn't play (because she didn't have the stuff, but she has an excuse) Varsity football in high school, or that he didn't kill the boy he caught making out with his daughter in the boy's car after the prom in high school. In other words, since the daughter has gone to a Seven Sisters (otherwise known as the Sapphic Sisters) school or has joined a Sapphic sorority under the direction of her Women's Studies professor, Dad has become a Hitler who would be as likely to shoot her in the back of the head as give her a Christmas gift. And said daughter, with her trick education in liberal arts, is pissed off because she can't work at NASA because she doesn't have the scientific education but she blames NASA for being anti-woman because an understanding of the writings of Virginia Wolffe should be as good as an understanding of physics or astronomy to get a man (or more usually a woman to Mars). So she blames her Dad because he was a guy. And once she hits 30 and realizes that being a lesbian isn't all that great because her partner won't change the light bulb or clean out the garbage can and any kid she has will be a crap shoot from the local sperm bank, decides that she's not a dyke (excuse the crudity, but I'm an old man), and finds a nice young fellow and she becomes a suburban mommy but passes on the poison she learned in college to her spoiled rotten brats who are diagnosed with Autism or ADD or hyper-activity because she wants to talk about the oppression of the patriarchy with her Vassarite girlfriends while she doesn't discipline her kids.
We're doomed.
Saturday, August 30, 2014
I Slam! You Slam! We All Want to Slam Islam!
Some time ago this writer publicaly stated that he was going to no longer write pieces against Islam, illegal immigration and the general idiocy of the ruling class.
Since then it has developed that due to the ineptness of the current administration "militant" Islam is on the march in Syria and Iraq. ISIS (or ISIL or the Islamic State of the Caliphate) promises to forcibly instill Mohammedanism on the whole world. The liberal "thinking class" wrings its hands telling us that ISIS is not Islam. Of course ISIS is not Islam. In the same way that all Germans were not Nazis. Islam in the Middle East just lays down and keeps quiet while ISIS goes on its march to their self-perceived world-wide victory hoping that they can come into the conquered areas and profit. Think of the French during World War Two. Most French put up with the Germans and a lot of them collaborated with the Hun. Not many resisted the Nazis ( a few Huguenot villages hid Jews, and there was as small resistance supplied by the British and Americans) but most of the French just lived with being occupied by Germans. And once the war was over and France was liberated every damn body and his grandmother claimed to be a member of the Resistance. Those who couldn't get away with the claim were shamed, but the French, being French, took the que sera sera route and not long after started honoring Nazi collaborators with literary awards.
That seems to be the way it is in Syria and Iraq. The average Mohammedan, upon being invaded by a bunch of savages, is not loathe to rat out the Christian family or Yezidhi family that his family has been living next to for centuries much the same way the French and Germans ratted out their Jewish neighbors. In news reports Christians and Yezidhis have described how their Mohammedan neighbors informed on them to ISIS.
And consider this: as far as reported, there have been no local Mohammedan militias formed to fight against ISIS. Everybody seems to think that the government army has the job of fighting while everyone else is sitting around eating pistachio nuts and drinking mint tea. And the armies would rather surrender with the knowledge that they'll be executed while on their knees rather than while standing up and fighting. Hope may spring eternal, but a study of history, especially of Mohammedan history, shows that there is little mercy when dealing with a Mohammedan with a gun or sword. The Solons of the Middle East like to say that the U.S. has a short history while the Arab nations have a long history, but it seems that the average Abdul wearing an Iraqi or Syrian army uniform never seems to recall that if he surrenders to an invading self-proclaimed Madhi he'll probably be dead withing two days after flying the white flag.
Here's a thought experiment: Imagine that some crazy Christian cult of about 13,000 (a Reconstructionist group of some sort, let's say) decided that it was about time to take over the the United States starting in Michigan. And imagine that they are trained and armed and that they are bound and determined to impose their Apocalyptic theology and governance on the nation. How far do you think they would get? Would it not be true that every Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, Jew, agnostic and atheist with a deer rifle, a rabbit gun, a .38 Special or a .45 would be out hunting that bunch once the government failed to do so? A lot of Americans would shiver at the thought of an army coming into their town, but a lot would be fighting against them. The only ones who would really lay down are those bastards on Wall Street because they are looking for profit and not right. And if the Reconstructionist Army took over Wall Street the Wall Streeters would find themselves looking at the ugly end of an M-60.
Since then it has developed that due to the ineptness of the current administration "militant" Islam is on the march in Syria and Iraq. ISIS (or ISIL or the Islamic State of the Caliphate) promises to forcibly instill Mohammedanism on the whole world. The liberal "thinking class" wrings its hands telling us that ISIS is not Islam. Of course ISIS is not Islam. In the same way that all Germans were not Nazis. Islam in the Middle East just lays down and keeps quiet while ISIS goes on its march to their self-perceived world-wide victory hoping that they can come into the conquered areas and profit. Think of the French during World War Two. Most French put up with the Germans and a lot of them collaborated with the Hun. Not many resisted the Nazis ( a few Huguenot villages hid Jews, and there was as small resistance supplied by the British and Americans) but most of the French just lived with being occupied by Germans. And once the war was over and France was liberated every damn body and his grandmother claimed to be a member of the Resistance. Those who couldn't get away with the claim were shamed, but the French, being French, took the que sera sera route and not long after started honoring Nazi collaborators with literary awards.
That seems to be the way it is in Syria and Iraq. The average Mohammedan, upon being invaded by a bunch of savages, is not loathe to rat out the Christian family or Yezidhi family that his family has been living next to for centuries much the same way the French and Germans ratted out their Jewish neighbors. In news reports Christians and Yezidhis have described how their Mohammedan neighbors informed on them to ISIS.
And consider this: as far as reported, there have been no local Mohammedan militias formed to fight against ISIS. Everybody seems to think that the government army has the job of fighting while everyone else is sitting around eating pistachio nuts and drinking mint tea. And the armies would rather surrender with the knowledge that they'll be executed while on their knees rather than while standing up and fighting. Hope may spring eternal, but a study of history, especially of Mohammedan history, shows that there is little mercy when dealing with a Mohammedan with a gun or sword. The Solons of the Middle East like to say that the U.S. has a short history while the Arab nations have a long history, but it seems that the average Abdul wearing an Iraqi or Syrian army uniform never seems to recall that if he surrenders to an invading self-proclaimed Madhi he'll probably be dead withing two days after flying the white flag.
Here's a thought experiment: Imagine that some crazy Christian cult of about 13,000 (a Reconstructionist group of some sort, let's say) decided that it was about time to take over the the United States starting in Michigan. And imagine that they are trained and armed and that they are bound and determined to impose their Apocalyptic theology and governance on the nation. How far do you think they would get? Would it not be true that every Methodist, Presbyterian, Baptist, Jew, agnostic and atheist with a deer rifle, a rabbit gun, a .38 Special or a .45 would be out hunting that bunch once the government failed to do so? A lot of Americans would shiver at the thought of an army coming into their town, but a lot would be fighting against them. The only ones who would really lay down are those bastards on Wall Street because they are looking for profit and not right. And if the Reconstructionist Army took over Wall Street the Wall Streeters would find themselves looking at the ugly end of an M-60.
Saturday, July 19, 2014
Idiocy Knows No Bounds
Political idiocy is one thing. Moral idiocy is quite another:
'Paedophilia is natural and normal for males' - Telegraph
This writer was never a big fan of comic books after the age of about 12 years old. And then the preferred comics were something like "Our Army At War" or "Sad Sack." Times have very much changed. It seems that Archie Andrews of the Archie comic books was killed protecting his gay anti-gun friend, and Thor has suddenly turned into a female called, "Thor."
Now, here's the question. Why have not the writers of the "Archie" comic books not have done something as edgy as having Veronica having an abortion after having been knocked up by Jughead or the principal of Riverdale High? Could it be that, because of the current tolerance of gays (about 1.5 to 3.0 percent of the general population) is a lot more easy to deal with instead of than difficult issues? Just imagine Veronica laying on a surgical table having an abortion as compared to Archie's friend being gay and anti-gun. The difference is what one decides to do as opposed to what one says one is.
Regarding Thor. In Old Norse mythology Thor was considered a bit of a dope with a lot of strength. He was the farmers' god. If Marvel wants to make Thor a woman instead of a man, that's their business, but they make themselves look very silly.
The Western world has gone on a fast track to not a very good place. We just don't recognize it because the path is shiny and seems clean.
'Paedophilia is natural and normal for males' - Telegraph
This writer was never a big fan of comic books after the age of about 12 years old. And then the preferred comics were something like "Our Army At War" or "Sad Sack." Times have very much changed. It seems that Archie Andrews of the Archie comic books was killed protecting his gay anti-gun friend, and Thor has suddenly turned into a female called, "Thor."
Now, here's the question. Why have not the writers of the "Archie" comic books not have done something as edgy as having Veronica having an abortion after having been knocked up by Jughead or the principal of Riverdale High? Could it be that, because of the current tolerance of gays (about 1.5 to 3.0 percent of the general population) is a lot more easy to deal with instead of than difficult issues? Just imagine Veronica laying on a surgical table having an abortion as compared to Archie's friend being gay and anti-gun. The difference is what one decides to do as opposed to what one says one is.
Regarding Thor. In Old Norse mythology Thor was considered a bit of a dope with a lot of strength. He was the farmers' god. If Marvel wants to make Thor a woman instead of a man, that's their business, but they make themselves look very silly.
The Western world has gone on a fast track to not a very good place. We just don't recognize it because the path is shiny and seems clean.
Sunday, February 16, 2014
Well, One's Musical Tastes are Really Pretty Subjective, But the Mando is Da Kine
This writer, while not being a professional writer and not particularly educated in writing, realizes when he has written a bad piece of writing. The last post by this writer was a bad piece for one main reason. It was unfocussed. While the topic of the mandolin may have seen as the focus, the actual focus should have been what the mandolin is and can do and is an often ignored instrument.
Having said that, your faithful correspondent would like to put forth the idea that classical piece do have to be played on violin to sound good.
Not everybody can play the violin in the classical style, especially nowadays when one measures one's self against a Midori or Heifetz via YouTube.
But, really, the violin is not really all that. There are several instruments that are not considered "class" instruments that can play the Western canon as well has violins and such.
Back in the late 1940s and early 1950s John Sebastian presented a number of classical musicians with a recording and asked those musicians what the instrument in the recording was. Some of the musicians said that it was an oboe and others said that it was a violin. The instrument was, in fact, a chromatic harmonica.
Here's an example of Bach's Air on a G string played on a chromatic harmonica:
▶ Bach - Air on the G String - YouTube
There is, in the above example, no string involved.
Unfortunately, there has been no readily available version of the piece done on the mandolin simply because all to many mandolinists have fallen into the "hard pick" school of playing. They'd present the piece much better using match book covers as plectrums than hard picks like bluegrass players use.
This following piece does well on a mandolin simply because the player realizes the strengths and weaknesses of the mandolin. And just a note: your faithful correspondent, for some reason, for all too a long a time, thought that this piece was called Taco Bell's Cannon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNcsyvEIzpo
A lot of mandolinists and harmoncaist really don't quite know what to do with classical music because the wider culture demands bluegrass, blues or rock. And that's pretty sad because they have limited themselves.
There is, despite what the politically correct crowd say, a Western canon of music that goes beyond the nonsense that is played on the radio and that is far more complicated and rewarding than Asian or Middle Eastern music.
The following two examples need no comment except that one is hard pressed to imagine that such music being created in Asia or the Middle East:
Air on a G String Original Instruments
Canon in D: Pachelbel
And just to show that that we at Bloody Nib Manor aren't awful snobs, consider this old thing from he 1930s. It's a great mando piece:
▶ Skillet Lickers-Hawkins Rag-1934 - YouTube
Having said that, your faithful correspondent would like to put forth the idea that classical piece do have to be played on violin to sound good.
Not everybody can play the violin in the classical style, especially nowadays when one measures one's self against a Midori or Heifetz via YouTube.
But, really, the violin is not really all that. There are several instruments that are not considered "class" instruments that can play the Western canon as well has violins and such.
Back in the late 1940s and early 1950s John Sebastian presented a number of classical musicians with a recording and asked those musicians what the instrument in the recording was. Some of the musicians said that it was an oboe and others said that it was a violin. The instrument was, in fact, a chromatic harmonica.
Here's an example of Bach's Air on a G string played on a chromatic harmonica:
▶ Bach - Air on the G String - YouTube
There is, in the above example, no string involved.
Unfortunately, there has been no readily available version of the piece done on the mandolin simply because all to many mandolinists have fallen into the "hard pick" school of playing. They'd present the piece much better using match book covers as plectrums than hard picks like bluegrass players use.
This following piece does well on a mandolin simply because the player realizes the strengths and weaknesses of the mandolin. And just a note: your faithful correspondent, for some reason, for all too a long a time, thought that this piece was called Taco Bell's Cannon:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNcsyvEIzpo
A lot of mandolinists and harmoncaist really don't quite know what to do with classical music because the wider culture demands bluegrass, blues or rock. And that's pretty sad because they have limited themselves.
There is, despite what the politically correct crowd say, a Western canon of music that goes beyond the nonsense that is played on the radio and that is far more complicated and rewarding than Asian or Middle Eastern music.
The following two examples need no comment except that one is hard pressed to imagine that such music being created in Asia or the Middle East:
Air on a G String Original Instruments
Canon in D: Pachelbel
And just to show that that we at Bloody Nib Manor aren't awful snobs, consider this old thing from he 1930s. It's a great mando piece:
▶ Skillet Lickers-Hawkins Rag-1934 - YouTube
Sunday, February 09, 2014
An Ode to the Mandolin
Those who have visited Bloody Nib Manor have probably noticed that there are a number of musical instruments laying around the shack. Some are played and some just showed up in the middle of the night, the piano being the main example of an instrument that has become a form of furniture and a place to put dust collectors. There are three guitars (one inherited from the late Baroness Masako, mother of Lady Nib, one belonging to Lady Nib, and one, the cheapest, belonging to this writer), a couple of ukuleles, a half dozen harmonicas, a quiver of tin whistles, and, most important for this article, three mandolins. One of the mandolins is of the old Neapolitan bowl back style, one is of the old Army-Navy skillet style, and the third is a cheap reproduction of the Lloyd Loar Gibson A model.
Of all these instruments the most important and most pleasing for your faithful correspondent are the mandolins. The mandolin was this writer's first musical instrument. He took lessons, at the age of about thirteen from an old Italian man who was primarily a violinist who also was the conductor of the Palos Verdes Symphony back in the 1960s. At this time the guitar, especially the electric guitar was in the ascendant and the mandolin was considered an ethnic instrument outside of areas of the South, where it was considered a bluegrass/hillbilly instrument. This writer, was, in a sense, out of time and out of place. But who knows what makes people like certain instruments and certain types of music?
To get to the point, let's look at a bit of history of the mandolin, its music and how it is under-appreciated.
The mandolin as we know it came to it's final form in the 1720s. The mandolin is really not much more than a violin that is plucked instead of bowed. A mandolin can play music written for the violin and a violin can play music written for the mandolin. The mandolin family has several members: the mandolin, the mandola (a plucked version of the viola), the mando-cello (the plucked version of a cello) and the mando-bass (the plucked version of the bass violin). There is also the piccolo mandolin, which is rarely heard because it's really a freak. The thing called an Irish Bouzuki is really a form of mandola.
The original shape was the bowl back or Neapolitan (or "tater bug") mandolin. The sound of those instruments, while loud, is also mellow. The later developments of the instrument resulted in "flat back" mandolins that were cheaper to make while being louder. The most popular models in the U.S. are now the Loar A model (a flatback with a teardrop shaped body) and the Loar F model (a flatback with a scroll shape on the right side that is often used in bluegrass music).
Vivaldi wrote pieces especially for the mandolin, and many Bach pieces translate well to playing by the mandolin:
Prelude from Partita No.3 BWV1006 - J.S. Bach - Mandolin - YouTube
For much of the 18th and 19th centuries the mandolin was considered the normal plucked instrument in Western Europe and the United States. The Spanish guitar was still in development and the English guitar (also known as the lute) was considered as old fashioned as the sackbut. The default stringed instrument at the time was the violin, but the mandolin came in a close second and was played by those who could not master the bowing technique or because who wanted to play an instrument that had a livelier sound than the fiddle. The mandolin, because of it's loud voice, was especially suited to small bands. It was also more portable than the violin (no bow and rosin required) and it was popular among sailors during the age of sail and among cowboys (that bit with Gene Autry or Roy Rodgers playing a guitar as an old West cowboy is inaccurate. A mandolin could be much more easily be carried on horseback than a guitar. Also, the guitar at that time, in the U.S., meant the parlour guitar, which was considered a instrument suited for women). The mandolin got to the U.S. before the great Italian migration to the U.S. in the 1880s/1890s, but the infusion of Italians brought a different dimension to mandolin playing in the U.S. The old joke in New York was that if one wanted to learn the mandolin all one would have to do was go to a barber shop because all barbers were Italian and all Italians played the mandolin.
From about 1890 to 1920 was the golden age for the mandolin in the U.S. There were amateur and professional mandolin bands and orchestras all across the U.S. The mandolin was used in recordings instead of the guitar because of it's ability to play loudly for mechanical recordings. The mandolin had become a mainstream instrument, but things went south for our little friend with the advent of electric recording and the idea that a guitar had more nuances than the mando. And the poor thing was banished to the ethnic hinterlands of Italian and bluegrass and old time music:
The Godfather Theme
Eskimo Waltz
Hawkins Rag
Never On Sunday
Actually, the last of the above is Greek and was originally written for bouzouki, but it plays as well on mandolin.
Later in the 20th century some Irishman decided that he wanted to play a mandola but didn't want to call his instrument a mandola (too Italian) and decided for some unknown reason to call it an Irish Bouzouki (flatback, unlike a real Greek bouzouki), and a form of mandolin took off again. Earlier Bill Monroe gave the mando a kickstart with his bluegrass music. But it's been a long time since a real mandolin master like the late Dave Appolon was on the popular music scene. Evan Marshall and Dave Grishman come close, but neither of them have the subtlety in style to make the mandolin sound anything other than nervous. The Italians and Portuguese and Japanese continue to develop the mandolin in ways that the Americans don't. They see it, as we all should, as an all round instrument with as much variety of styles and nuance as the guitar or piano. It's all in the training and technique. A mandolin is as capable, in the hands of a master, of caressing the listener as it is barking; it can cry as well as a violin and make one want to dance as much as a fiddle.
The mandolin is a great little instrument that has long been neglected for anything but folk and ethnic music, and the world is worse off for the neglect. This writer is not one of those boneheads who thinks that music will save the world, but he does believe that music will make the trip down to anarchy or dictatorship a lot more comfortable. And the mandolin is the best little wooden friend one can have during a rough time.
Of all these instruments the most important and most pleasing for your faithful correspondent are the mandolins. The mandolin was this writer's first musical instrument. He took lessons, at the age of about thirteen from an old Italian man who was primarily a violinist who also was the conductor of the Palos Verdes Symphony back in the 1960s. At this time the guitar, especially the electric guitar was in the ascendant and the mandolin was considered an ethnic instrument outside of areas of the South, where it was considered a bluegrass/hillbilly instrument. This writer, was, in a sense, out of time and out of place. But who knows what makes people like certain instruments and certain types of music?
To get to the point, let's look at a bit of history of the mandolin, its music and how it is under-appreciated.
The mandolin as we know it came to it's final form in the 1720s. The mandolin is really not much more than a violin that is plucked instead of bowed. A mandolin can play music written for the violin and a violin can play music written for the mandolin. The mandolin family has several members: the mandolin, the mandola (a plucked version of the viola), the mando-cello (the plucked version of a cello) and the mando-bass (the plucked version of the bass violin). There is also the piccolo mandolin, which is rarely heard because it's really a freak. The thing called an Irish Bouzuki is really a form of mandola.
The original shape was the bowl back or Neapolitan (or "tater bug") mandolin. The sound of those instruments, while loud, is also mellow. The later developments of the instrument resulted in "flat back" mandolins that were cheaper to make while being louder. The most popular models in the U.S. are now the Loar A model (a flatback with a teardrop shaped body) and the Loar F model (a flatback with a scroll shape on the right side that is often used in bluegrass music).
Vivaldi wrote pieces especially for the mandolin, and many Bach pieces translate well to playing by the mandolin:
Prelude from Partita No.3 BWV1006 - J.S. Bach - Mandolin - YouTube
For much of the 18th and 19th centuries the mandolin was considered the normal plucked instrument in Western Europe and the United States. The Spanish guitar was still in development and the English guitar (also known as the lute) was considered as old fashioned as the sackbut. The default stringed instrument at the time was the violin, but the mandolin came in a close second and was played by those who could not master the bowing technique or because who wanted to play an instrument that had a livelier sound than the fiddle. The mandolin, because of it's loud voice, was especially suited to small bands. It was also more portable than the violin (no bow and rosin required) and it was popular among sailors during the age of sail and among cowboys (that bit with Gene Autry or Roy Rodgers playing a guitar as an old West cowboy is inaccurate. A mandolin could be much more easily be carried on horseback than a guitar. Also, the guitar at that time, in the U.S., meant the parlour guitar, which was considered a instrument suited for women). The mandolin got to the U.S. before the great Italian migration to the U.S. in the 1880s/1890s, but the infusion of Italians brought a different dimension to mandolin playing in the U.S. The old joke in New York was that if one wanted to learn the mandolin all one would have to do was go to a barber shop because all barbers were Italian and all Italians played the mandolin.
From about 1890 to 1920 was the golden age for the mandolin in the U.S. There were amateur and professional mandolin bands and orchestras all across the U.S. The mandolin was used in recordings instead of the guitar because of it's ability to play loudly for mechanical recordings. The mandolin had become a mainstream instrument, but things went south for our little friend with the advent of electric recording and the idea that a guitar had more nuances than the mando. And the poor thing was banished to the ethnic hinterlands of Italian and bluegrass and old time music:
The Godfather Theme
Eskimo Waltz
Hawkins Rag
Never On Sunday
Actually, the last of the above is Greek and was originally written for bouzouki, but it plays as well on mandolin.
Later in the 20th century some Irishman decided that he wanted to play a mandola but didn't want to call his instrument a mandola (too Italian) and decided for some unknown reason to call it an Irish Bouzouki (flatback, unlike a real Greek bouzouki), and a form of mandolin took off again. Earlier Bill Monroe gave the mando a kickstart with his bluegrass music. But it's been a long time since a real mandolin master like the late Dave Appolon was on the popular music scene. Evan Marshall and Dave Grishman come close, but neither of them have the subtlety in style to make the mandolin sound anything other than nervous. The Italians and Portuguese and Japanese continue to develop the mandolin in ways that the Americans don't. They see it, as we all should, as an all round instrument with as much variety of styles and nuance as the guitar or piano. It's all in the training and technique. A mandolin is as capable, in the hands of a master, of caressing the listener as it is barking; it can cry as well as a violin and make one want to dance as much as a fiddle.
The mandolin is a great little instrument that has long been neglected for anything but folk and ethnic music, and the world is worse off for the neglect. This writer is not one of those boneheads who thinks that music will save the world, but he does believe that music will make the trip down to anarchy or dictatorship a lot more comfortable. And the mandolin is the best little wooden friend one can have during a rough time.
Sunday, January 19, 2014
Back Again! Unfortunately For You
It's been almost a year since this writer's last blog post.
There are two reasons for this hiatus. The first is that your faithful correspondent is a lazy man by nature and finds that writing is hard work. To paraphrase Hemingway, a blank page is like facing a white fighting bull while holding nothing more than an idea and pen. Who needs that? That's work. The second reason is because a promise had been made previously that the blog posts would be more upbeat and less critical of the international situation than they had been. But over the past near year we here at Nib Manor have looked in vain for a world getting better in those things that concern us. In other words, we have tried and been found wanting. The ever-lovely Lady Nib has spent countless hours on her fainting couch clutching a bottle of smelling salts after reading the news and such looking for the uplifting.
So it appears that yours truly will have to take the prerogative of the nobility and the politician (being of the former and disdaining the latter) and break his promise to be a Sunny Sam. Life is good, but there are a lot of dark and evil portions of the world that go unremarked by our media lords.
But to prevent the impression that this writer thinks it's a good idea to throw the unsuspecting into the deep end of the cesspool, we'll start with something that has been addressed in several previous posts and is pretty light. The topic will be: Cheap Musical Instruments!
Those who know this writer know that he has no musical talent whatsoever. But he keeps trying. After a childhood spent studying the mandolin (not bluegrass mandolin, but American popular music style mandolin) he decided that perhaps instruments such as the harmonica, the pennywhistle or the ukulele may be the vehicles to financial riches. None of those turned out very well and his carer on the music hall stage went up in flames like a Pinto at a petrol station. The mangled chords of 1920s ukulele songs, bad imitations of the Harmonicats and tin whistle versions of "English Garden" still cause the hounds to howl and Lady Nib to stuff cotton waste into her ears. But hope springs eternal (or infernal, depending on your point of view {or what you can hear}).
Music is one of those things a bit like golf. You can't buy a game or talent. But if you've got the game or the talent you can get by with either K-Mart golf clubs or an $80.00 guitar. The player makes the tool work for him. The intonation may be a bit off (in the case of guitars, dulcimers or ukes) or the balance may be a bit off for golf clubs or horse shoes, but the person who has the talent or persistence can get much more out of a cheap instrument than a person with an expensive instrument without the talent or willingness to put in the hard work. One of the most entertaining guitarists the writer has seen in person was a guy playing on the Redondo Beach pier. His guitar was cheap and it looked like it had been sat upon by a very fat person; the sound board was almost like a bowl. But they man overcame the limits of the instrument because he knew the instrument.
Having written that, while one can get by with a cheap instrument, one really can't get buy with a rotten and bad instrument. Recently this writer bought a Hohner Old Standby Harmonica. In the past the Old Standby was Hohner's second level diatonic harmonica behind the Marine Band. It was a pretty good harp and was actually favored by some professional harp players over the Marine Band because the reeds were easier to bend. Apparently now Hohner has decided that the Old Stanby is a toy harmonica dedicated to putting any young and aspiring harmonicist off the instrument. The particular harmonica in question not only had a stuck draw reed (which was soon corrected after a bit of investigation and fiddling) but at least three reeds were way out of tune. Nobody who is not willing or not knowledgeable about the mechanics of harmonicas could play a decent tune with the thing unless it was some strange Central Asian musical scale.
The point is that Hohner has really let harmonica players down by allowing this thing out of the factory in China. And it's not a matter of the thing being now made in China instead of Germany. The Chinese take harmonicas more seriously than Americans. They teach harmonica in schools. They know what is and is not a decent harmonica. Allowing this thing out of the factory is almost criminal for the simple reason that few people who want to take up a musical instrument are really interested in spending a lot of money before they decide whether or not they like playing or have a talent or are willing to put in the work for the instrument. A Marine Band costs about $30.00. A Special 20 costs more. An Old Standby costs between $10.00 and $15.00. All are cheap compared to buying a guitar or drum set, but to use the golf analogy, if one buys a set of clubs that have shafts so bent that they look like something from a Three Stooges bit it is unlikely that the aspiring harmonicist will progress beyond an out of tune version of Hot Cross Buns.
This writer has played $20.00 ukuleles that sound okay and $6.00 tin whistles that were in tune. Why cannot Hohner get out a modern version of their previous second level harp that is in tune and doesn't have stuck reeds. It makes one what to start playing the bones or the spoons.
There are two reasons for this hiatus. The first is that your faithful correspondent is a lazy man by nature and finds that writing is hard work. To paraphrase Hemingway, a blank page is like facing a white fighting bull while holding nothing more than an idea and pen. Who needs that? That's work. The second reason is because a promise had been made previously that the blog posts would be more upbeat and less critical of the international situation than they had been. But over the past near year we here at Nib Manor have looked in vain for a world getting better in those things that concern us. In other words, we have tried and been found wanting. The ever-lovely Lady Nib has spent countless hours on her fainting couch clutching a bottle of smelling salts after reading the news and such looking for the uplifting.
So it appears that yours truly will have to take the prerogative of the nobility and the politician (being of the former and disdaining the latter) and break his promise to be a Sunny Sam. Life is good, but there are a lot of dark and evil portions of the world that go unremarked by our media lords.
But to prevent the impression that this writer thinks it's a good idea to throw the unsuspecting into the deep end of the cesspool, we'll start with something that has been addressed in several previous posts and is pretty light. The topic will be: Cheap Musical Instruments!
Those who know this writer know that he has no musical talent whatsoever. But he keeps trying. After a childhood spent studying the mandolin (not bluegrass mandolin, but American popular music style mandolin) he decided that perhaps instruments such as the harmonica, the pennywhistle or the ukulele may be the vehicles to financial riches. None of those turned out very well and his carer on the music hall stage went up in flames like a Pinto at a petrol station. The mangled chords of 1920s ukulele songs, bad imitations of the Harmonicats and tin whistle versions of "English Garden" still cause the hounds to howl and Lady Nib to stuff cotton waste into her ears. But hope springs eternal (or infernal, depending on your point of view {or what you can hear}).
Music is one of those things a bit like golf. You can't buy a game or talent. But if you've got the game or the talent you can get by with either K-Mart golf clubs or an $80.00 guitar. The player makes the tool work for him. The intonation may be a bit off (in the case of guitars, dulcimers or ukes) or the balance may be a bit off for golf clubs or horse shoes, but the person who has the talent or persistence can get much more out of a cheap instrument than a person with an expensive instrument without the talent or willingness to put in the hard work. One of the most entertaining guitarists the writer has seen in person was a guy playing on the Redondo Beach pier. His guitar was cheap and it looked like it had been sat upon by a very fat person; the sound board was almost like a bowl. But they man overcame the limits of the instrument because he knew the instrument.
Having written that, while one can get by with a cheap instrument, one really can't get buy with a rotten and bad instrument. Recently this writer bought a Hohner Old Standby Harmonica. In the past the Old Standby was Hohner's second level diatonic harmonica behind the Marine Band. It was a pretty good harp and was actually favored by some professional harp players over the Marine Band because the reeds were easier to bend. Apparently now Hohner has decided that the Old Stanby is a toy harmonica dedicated to putting any young and aspiring harmonicist off the instrument. The particular harmonica in question not only had a stuck draw reed (which was soon corrected after a bit of investigation and fiddling) but at least three reeds were way out of tune. Nobody who is not willing or not knowledgeable about the mechanics of harmonicas could play a decent tune with the thing unless it was some strange Central Asian musical scale.
The point is that Hohner has really let harmonica players down by allowing this thing out of the factory in China. And it's not a matter of the thing being now made in China instead of Germany. The Chinese take harmonicas more seriously than Americans. They teach harmonica in schools. They know what is and is not a decent harmonica. Allowing this thing out of the factory is almost criminal for the simple reason that few people who want to take up a musical instrument are really interested in spending a lot of money before they decide whether or not they like playing or have a talent or are willing to put in the work for the instrument. A Marine Band costs about $30.00. A Special 20 costs more. An Old Standby costs between $10.00 and $15.00. All are cheap compared to buying a guitar or drum set, but to use the golf analogy, if one buys a set of clubs that have shafts so bent that they look like something from a Three Stooges bit it is unlikely that the aspiring harmonicist will progress beyond an out of tune version of Hot Cross Buns.
This writer has played $20.00 ukuleles that sound okay and $6.00 tin whistles that were in tune. Why cannot Hohner get out a modern version of their previous second level harp that is in tune and doesn't have stuck reeds. It makes one what to start playing the bones or the spoons.
Sunday, January 27, 2013
In Defense of the Snuggie
How many times during your television watching time have you been subjected to an "As Seen on TV" commercial? By this is meant a commercial for a product that cannot be bought at the local store but that must be purchased via telephone.
These commercials usually feature a pitch by a famed pitch man like the late Billy Mays, or the still living Anthony Sullivan (Stick Buddy) or the odious Vince Offer (Shticky, Slap Chop).
One of the few commercials of this type is the commercial for the Snuggie. The Snuggie is basically a cheap fleece blanket with sleeves so that while one is "wearing" it one can hold a book or eat or sew or knit without taking one's arms out of the blanket.
The thing is made of cheap fabric and the labor involved in making it is minimal and it is probably over-priced. But the surprising thing is that it works and works well. It looks silly, but no more silly than the afghan that your aunt gave you for Christmas.
It's a great light blanket for the summer, even if one doesn't use the sleeves. It's a great extra blanket for cold weather. It's like wearing a second pyjama top.
The only mistakes that the company that produces the thing have made are the Camo Snuggie (really! are you going to camo yourself in the living room or take the thing on a camping trip?), the addition of the pocket (why?), and not offering the thing in a better fabric (a Hudson's Bay blanket with sleeves would not only be awfully warm, but also last a lifetime).
The Snuggie has been unfairly denigrated by the cool and the hip. It's a great thing that works. And the same thing can be said of the Brooklyn Lantern (not a great lantern for the wilderness, but a good light for an emergency).
These commercials usually feature a pitch by a famed pitch man like the late Billy Mays, or the still living Anthony Sullivan (Stick Buddy) or the odious Vince Offer (Shticky, Slap Chop).
One of the few commercials of this type is the commercial for the Snuggie. The Snuggie is basically a cheap fleece blanket with sleeves so that while one is "wearing" it one can hold a book or eat or sew or knit without taking one's arms out of the blanket.
The thing is made of cheap fabric and the labor involved in making it is minimal and it is probably over-priced. But the surprising thing is that it works and works well. It looks silly, but no more silly than the afghan that your aunt gave you for Christmas.
It's a great light blanket for the summer, even if one doesn't use the sleeves. It's a great extra blanket for cold weather. It's like wearing a second pyjama top.
The only mistakes that the company that produces the thing have made are the Camo Snuggie (really! are you going to camo yourself in the living room or take the thing on a camping trip?), the addition of the pocket (why?), and not offering the thing in a better fabric (a Hudson's Bay blanket with sleeves would not only be awfully warm, but also last a lifetime).
The Snuggie has been unfairly denigrated by the cool and the hip. It's a great thing that works. And the same thing can be said of the Brooklyn Lantern (not a great lantern for the wilderness, but a good light for an emergency).
Sunday, January 06, 2013
Gentlemen and Ladies Write Letters. Not E-mails.
If you have something sincere or serious to convey to someone and you cannot do it face-to-face it is much better to do so via a proper letter or note sent through the mail. And it should be hand-written:
The Art of Letter Writing | The Art of Manliness
Ditch the idea of wax seals or having to write in fountain pen. Those are affectations and a gentleman and a lady are never affected.
The Art of Letter Writing | The Art of Manliness
Ditch the idea of wax seals or having to write in fountain pen. Those are affectations and a gentleman and a lady are never affected.
Sunday, November 25, 2012
Reformation of Manners
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/
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 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.
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Links Round-Up
Just five links:
http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_289563/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=ltZjuRap
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/halifax-woman-denied-religious-vanity-plate-094922254.html
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/12333#.UISPb3ZAZmY
http://www.alternativeright.com/main/blogs/euro-centric/generation-identitaire-s-war-takes-shape/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2219769/A-Christian-demoted-job-posting-opposition-gay-marriages-Facebook-taken-employer-court.html
http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_289563/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=ltZjuRap
http://ca.news.yahoo.com/halifax-woman-denied-religious-vanity-plate-094922254.html
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/12333#.UISPb3ZAZmY
http://www.alternativeright.com/main/blogs/euro-centric/generation-identitaire-s-war-takes-shape/
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2219769/A-Christian-demoted-job-posting-opposition-gay-marriages-Facebook-taken-employer-court.html
Sunday, October 14, 2012
Inter-Faith Nonsense
Occasionally one hears talk about "Interfaith dialogue." There was a time when, in the U.S. and Europe, this meant "dialogue" between Christians and Jews and among the various Christian denominations.
Nowadays it means talks between Christians and Muslims after something has happened that hurts or angers the Muslims. And the dialogue usually consists of Christian "leaders" apologizing to Muslims because, let's face it, Christians are just a bunch of jerks. Everybody knows that Christians are jerks because Christian "leaders" say they are. It's really surprising that said Christian "leaders" don't resign their positions of leadership or leave the faith because Christians and Christianity are just so jerky. Who, in their right mind, would want to be associated with that bunch or louts?
Well, here's the deal. Those "leaders" who engage in dialogue with Muslims are either foolish or dishonest or not even Christian. In talking to Muslims about religion there is absolutely no common ground between Christians and Muslims. It would be like having an inter-faith "dialogue" with Pagans, Hindus or Buddhists. There is no shared faith. None at all. To try to have an interfaith dialogue with Muslims is like trying to alloy iron with aluminum. It just doesn't work.
What "interfaith dialogue" really means is that a group of politically and theologically Christians (and some of them are barely Christian, others not at all -- they're in the thing because it's a good paying gig demanding not much work) are willing to become Dhimmis to the Muslims. They tug at the forelock while seeking the approval of the very people their fathers and grandfathers considered benighted heathens. If this bunch of yokels had been around during World War II there would now be a Shinto shrine or two on every corner on the West coast and the Lutheran churches on the East coast would be flying a broken cross from their steeples instead of proper crosses.
This crowd is looking for the strong horse and they think that Islam is the strong horse. They will abandon their faith in the physical Resurrection of Christ and the Salvation that he give in order ot please a bunch of savages who really worship a brick built cube in Mecca that was once a pagan shrine.
If you are a Christian who has to apologize for you faith or you deny that faith in Christ is the true faith, perhaps you'd better look somewhere else for a religion.
Christianity is true. It is the only true religion. Anything else is a fake. To even talk to a Muslim about his religion as being anywhere near equal to Christianity is to insult Our Lord and Our God.
Nowadays it means talks between Christians and Muslims after something has happened that hurts or angers the Muslims. And the dialogue usually consists of Christian "leaders" apologizing to Muslims because, let's face it, Christians are just a bunch of jerks. Everybody knows that Christians are jerks because Christian "leaders" say they are. It's really surprising that said Christian "leaders" don't resign their positions of leadership or leave the faith because Christians and Christianity are just so jerky. Who, in their right mind, would want to be associated with that bunch or louts?
Well, here's the deal. Those "leaders" who engage in dialogue with Muslims are either foolish or dishonest or not even Christian. In talking to Muslims about religion there is absolutely no common ground between Christians and Muslims. It would be like having an inter-faith "dialogue" with Pagans, Hindus or Buddhists. There is no shared faith. None at all. To try to have an interfaith dialogue with Muslims is like trying to alloy iron with aluminum. It just doesn't work.
What "interfaith dialogue" really means is that a group of politically and theologically Christians (and some of them are barely Christian, others not at all -- they're in the thing because it's a good paying gig demanding not much work) are willing to become Dhimmis to the Muslims. They tug at the forelock while seeking the approval of the very people their fathers and grandfathers considered benighted heathens. If this bunch of yokels had been around during World War II there would now be a Shinto shrine or two on every corner on the West coast and the Lutheran churches on the East coast would be flying a broken cross from their steeples instead of proper crosses.
This crowd is looking for the strong horse and they think that Islam is the strong horse. They will abandon their faith in the physical Resurrection of Christ and the Salvation that he give in order ot please a bunch of savages who really worship a brick built cube in Mecca that was once a pagan shrine.
If you are a Christian who has to apologize for you faith or you deny that faith in Christ is the true faith, perhaps you'd better look somewhere else for a religion.
Christianity is true. It is the only true religion. Anything else is a fake. To even talk to a Muslim about his religion as being anywhere near equal to Christianity is to insult Our Lord and Our God.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Orcs Gone Wild!
Well, it's old news by know that the Orcs have gotten a wild hair up their asses purportedly due to a cheap movie that portrays their prophet Mo-Ham-Head as the degenerate criminal that he was. There is speculation that much of the rioting used the film as an excuse while the real reason was that the riots had been called for by Al-Quada due to the drone strike that killed the brother of the leader.
The US media has shown only the jumping up and down in the middle East and North Africa and has ignored the riots and demonstrations in Europe and Australia. These riots and demonstrations may have the advantage of showing that multiculturalism is stupid, silly and empty.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/police-use-pepper-spray-on-anti-islamic-film-protesters-in-sydney-at-the-us-consulate/story-fndo1uez-1226474744811
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2203381/As-wave-anti-American-riots-erupts-Islamic-world--Muslims-U-S-flag-burning-protests-spread-Britain.html?openGraphAuthor=%2Fhome%2Fsearch.html%3Fs%3D%26authornamef%3DNeil%2BSears&videoPlayerURL=http%3A%2F%2Fc.brightcove.com%2Fservices%2Fviewer%2Ffederated_f9%3FisVid%3D1%26isUI%3D1%26publisherID%3D1418450360%26playerID%3D72484359001%26domain%3Dembed%26videoId%3D&hasBCVideo=true&BCVideoID=1841130212001
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/petermullen/100180868/islamist-terrorism-is-beginning-to-demolish-political-correctness/
The US media has shown only the jumping up and down in the middle East and North Africa and has ignored the riots and demonstrations in Europe and Australia. These riots and demonstrations may have the advantage of showing that multiculturalism is stupid, silly and empty.
http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/national/police-use-pepper-spray-on-anti-islamic-film-protesters-in-sydney-at-the-us-consulate/story-fndo1uez-1226474744811
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2203381/As-wave-anti-American-riots-erupts-Islamic-world--Muslims-U-S-flag-burning-protests-spread-Britain.html?openGraphAuthor=%2Fhome%2Fsearch.html%3Fs%3D%26authornamef%3DNeil%2BSears&videoPlayerURL=http%3A%2F%2Fc.brightcove.com%2Fservices%2Fviewer%2Ffederated_f9%3FisVid%3D1%26isUI%3D1%26publisherID%3D1418450360%26playerID%3D72484359001%26domain%3Dembed%26videoId%3D&hasBCVideo=true&BCVideoID=1841130212001
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/petermullen/100180868/islamist-terrorism-is-beginning-to-demolish-political-correctness/
Gates of Vienna: The European Dream Fulfilled
Gates of Vienna: The European Dream Fulfilled: Islam’s Days of Rage, as only Vlad could portray them:
Sunday, September 09, 2012
These are our "allies"
This writer is old enough to remember the war in Vietnam as an adult and to have had friends who served in the military in Vietnam.
At that time it was a given that much of the Army of South Vietnam was not up to the standard in training and dedication as the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. But in the memory of this writer there were few instances (if any) of blue on green shootings. And the ARVN tried to make their soldiers an effective and disciplined force. The ARVN soldiers seemed to believe is something even if they were not all that great about fighting against the NVA.
Apparently the same does not hold true in Afghanistan. One, after watches the first video, makes one wish the U.S. Marine Corps trainers has the power (as does the French Foreign Legion and Russian Army) to physically beat up slackers and idiots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWWWotuUwd0&playnext=1&list=PL17FE90C3AE1A2B16&feature=results_video
And apparently the police force is made up of five-year old children:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1H0mB0eK78&feature=BFa&list=PL17FE90C3AE1A2B16
This writer is coming to the opinion that the reason that Alexander the Great and the British Army left Afghanistan is due to the fact that the Afghanis are complete idiots.
At that time it was a given that much of the Army of South Vietnam was not up to the standard in training and dedication as the U.S. Army and Marine Corps. But in the memory of this writer there were few instances (if any) of blue on green shootings. And the ARVN tried to make their soldiers an effective and disciplined force. The ARVN soldiers seemed to believe is something even if they were not all that great about fighting against the NVA.
Apparently the same does not hold true in Afghanistan. One, after watches the first video, makes one wish the U.S. Marine Corps trainers has the power (as does the French Foreign Legion and Russian Army) to physically beat up slackers and idiots.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DWWWotuUwd0&playnext=1&list=PL17FE90C3AE1A2B16&feature=results_video
And apparently the police force is made up of five-year old children:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K1H0mB0eK78&feature=BFa&list=PL17FE90C3AE1A2B16
This writer is coming to the opinion that the reason that Alexander the Great and the British Army left Afghanistan is due to the fact that the Afghanis are complete idiots.
Sunday, August 19, 2012
How Weak-Willed Can These Jokers Be?
It seems that our Islamic brothers and sisters are really a weak-willed bunch. The very sight of a pig or bacon causes them to scream with outrage because they believe that the eating of pork is unclean. It is as if a nice honeyed ham on a platter will cause them to forget their religious obligations and drive into said ham with gusto. Apparently they must be protected from themselves and that we, the non-Muslims, must do the protecting. Ask yourself this question: When was the last time that you were eating a nice devilled ham sandwich or bratwurst in the company of an Orthodox Jew that resulted in said Jew exploding with outrage because you were eating pork in from of him. One the other hand, it seems that if you have a piggy bank on your desk you will soon be visited by a protest from the Council on American-Islamic Relations.
Such a case seems to have popped up in the Israeli wine country:
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/08/16/232654.html
The support by the Obama administration and Hilary Clinton for the Arab Spring has resulted in a real barbaric mess. One can only hope that the victims of the Arab Spring haunt the One and Mrs. Clinton for many years. There is no "Rest" button:
http://www.algemeiner.com/2012/08/16/muslim-brotherhood-crucifies-opponents-attacks-secular-media/
And here is the reason that Lebanon can't have nice things:
http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArchiveDetails.aspx?ID=428774
Such a case seems to have popped up in the Israeli wine country:
http://english.alarabiya.net/articles/2012/08/16/232654.html
The support by the Obama administration and Hilary Clinton for the Arab Spring has resulted in a real barbaric mess. One can only hope that the victims of the Arab Spring haunt the One and Mrs. Clinton for many years. There is no "Rest" button:
http://www.algemeiner.com/2012/08/16/muslim-brotherhood-crucifies-opponents-attacks-secular-media/
And here is the reason that Lebanon can't have nice things:
http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArchiveDetails.aspx?ID=428774
Gates of Vienna: Sidetracked
Gates of Vienna: Sidetracked: For no obvious reason, this excerpt from the The Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (Chapter 53) came into my mind tonight: If I have even just a li...
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Loose Cannons and Looser Pens
A couple of acts perpetrated by evil men have resulted in calls for tighter gun control in the United States. The shooting at the theater in Aurora, Colorado and at the Sikh Temple in Wisconsin are the results of evil minds. Not guns. Those two men, it is to be sure, would have performed similar acts using gasoline, fertilizer or blackpowder bombs. The fact that they used firearms only means that they wished to see close-up and personal the results of the havoc and deaths that they wrought. The guns did not cause them to do what they did. The guns were merely the instruments. They could have caused almost the same number of deaths using swords or axes because most people faced with those weapons find it unbelievable that they are, in a modern age, facing weapons used in the 16th century.
But, despite the fact that logic shows that an evil man will use whatever means available to carry out his evil intentions, the liberal media has decided that the problem is not evil but is the gun.
A case in point is an article written by Fareed Zakaria. It doesn't matter exactly what he wrote. It was the same old claptrap about how people are not evil and that guns are evil. Or that the availability of guns makes people evil. The interesting thing is that Zakaria, in his article, plagiarized at least one paragraph from another writer: Zakaria Suspended.
This shows something interesting to this writer. The liberal is not loathe to call for a change of the Bill of Rights in order to outlaw the personal ownership of firearms, or to restrict the practice of religion as long as that religion is a conservative form of Christianity. But they never call for a restriction of the freedom of speech or freedom of the press despite the fact that, either through intention or mistake, a writer can ruin the reputation of a person, a group or a company by lying, mis-representation or outright slander. Just a few keystrokes made from thousands of miles away by a person who has never met, or even per4sonally seen the subject of an article or opinion piece, can turn the subject from a good citizen to a monster in the public eye despite the fact that the subject has actually done nothing illegal, immoral or even ill-intentioned.
The Internet is a Wild West in a way that the real Wild West never was. It is full of word-slingers and word-snipers doing what they can to destroy, in whatever way they can, their enemies.
But despite the many cases, in both print and on the electronic media, it has been proven that ill-intentioned writers have lied or mis-represented people in a way that has destroyed lives, there has been no call for the licensing of the pen, typewriter or computer keyboard. The Press, in its various forms, seems to hold its Constitutional right as more sacrosanct than the other rights guaranteed by the Constitution. And we've put up with it and have never questioned why the guarantee of a free Press is more important than the freedom to bear arms and the freedom of religion. We've allowed ourselves to be terrorized by a bunch of pot-bellied, Audi driving, martini sipping bunch of louts and bullies whose nuclear weapon is the word "racist" instead of calling them out for a little mano a mano.
But, despite the fact that logic shows that an evil man will use whatever means available to carry out his evil intentions, the liberal media has decided that the problem is not evil but is the gun.
A case in point is an article written by Fareed Zakaria. It doesn't matter exactly what he wrote. It was the same old claptrap about how people are not evil and that guns are evil. Or that the availability of guns makes people evil. The interesting thing is that Zakaria, in his article, plagiarized at least one paragraph from another writer: Zakaria Suspended.
This shows something interesting to this writer. The liberal is not loathe to call for a change of the Bill of Rights in order to outlaw the personal ownership of firearms, or to restrict the practice of religion as long as that religion is a conservative form of Christianity. But they never call for a restriction of the freedom of speech or freedom of the press despite the fact that, either through intention or mistake, a writer can ruin the reputation of a person, a group or a company by lying, mis-representation or outright slander. Just a few keystrokes made from thousands of miles away by a person who has never met, or even per4sonally seen the subject of an article or opinion piece, can turn the subject from a good citizen to a monster in the public eye despite the fact that the subject has actually done nothing illegal, immoral or even ill-intentioned.
The Internet is a Wild West in a way that the real Wild West never was. It is full of word-slingers and word-snipers doing what they can to destroy, in whatever way they can, their enemies.
But despite the many cases, in both print and on the electronic media, it has been proven that ill-intentioned writers have lied or mis-represented people in a way that has destroyed lives, there has been no call for the licensing of the pen, typewriter or computer keyboard. The Press, in its various forms, seems to hold its Constitutional right as more sacrosanct than the other rights guaranteed by the Constitution. And we've put up with it and have never questioned why the guarantee of a free Press is more important than the freedom to bear arms and the freedom of religion. We've allowed ourselves to be terrorized by a bunch of pot-bellied, Audi driving, martini sipping bunch of louts and bullies whose nuclear weapon is the word "racist" instead of calling them out for a little mano a mano.
Sunday, August 05, 2012
The Ghey Marriage
One has to ask the question why those in favor of same sex marriage seem to make it a point to try to offend non-gays as much as possible.
When Christians protest same sex marriage they are pretty low key. Praying, buying, standing. But the gaysters seem to think that a good argument in their favor is to be vile and offensive.
Does it make any sense to think that by offending people one will draw a person to one's position? This is the thinking of an adolescent.
But, when one thinks of it, the gay world, especially the male gay world, is really made up of a bunch of eternal adolescents with hairless chests and boy haircuts. And the women gays have followed the example of their male friends. The days of the spinster school teachers or librarians living together quietly are long gone. Now every damn Sodomite has to be loud, proud and offensive. And they wonder why normal people think that they are freaks.
Here are a couple of things showing the tolerance of the inverts:
The Pope is a Pig
Homeless Man Hassled For Reading the Bible
Ain't tolerance great?
When Christians protest same sex marriage they are pretty low key. Praying, buying, standing. But the gaysters seem to think that a good argument in their favor is to be vile and offensive.
Does it make any sense to think that by offending people one will draw a person to one's position? This is the thinking of an adolescent.
But, when one thinks of it, the gay world, especially the male gay world, is really made up of a bunch of eternal adolescents with hairless chests and boy haircuts. And the women gays have followed the example of their male friends. The days of the spinster school teachers or librarians living together quietly are long gone. Now every damn Sodomite has to be loud, proud and offensive. And they wonder why normal people think that they are freaks.
Here are a couple of things showing the tolerance of the inverts:
The Pope is a Pig
Homeless Man Hassled For Reading the Bible
Ain't tolerance great?
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