Even a fool can be profound taken out of context: “If someone tells young people to ignore their history, to reject the experiences of their elders, to look down on the past and to look forward to a future that he holds out, doesn’t it then become easy to draw them along so that theyContinue reading “Place That Quote: Hitler or the Pope?”
Tag Archives: religion
Wahabbism is a Social Construct
Jeffrey Golberg interviews Saudi Arabian crown prince and ruler Mohammed bin Salman in the Atlantic The prince, in my conversation with him, divided the Middle East into two warring camps: what he called the “triangle of evil,” consisting of Iran, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Sunni terror groups; and an alliance of self-described moderate states that includesContinue reading “Wahabbism is a Social Construct”
Convention is a Cult
Evangelical Christianity surged in the wake of the Sixties, providing a home for that decade’s first casualties, and others. By 1976 it was mainstream enough that liberal Jimmy Carter could claim it without harm (there was a bit of snickering, I recall, as well as at the new term “Born Again Christianity”). At the timeContinue reading “Convention is a Cult”
Two Goys and a Jew
Good Torah Talk with the irrepressible iconoclast Luke Ford and Casey the Classicist. Prominent guests next week. 0:15 Sukkot. 2:15 The subject today, Andrew Joyce’s essay, The Alt Right and the Homosexual Question. 3:05 Luke opens talking about Dennis Prager’s essay from 1989, Judaism, Homosexuality and Civilization: When Judaism demanded that all sexual activity be channeled intoContinue reading “Two Goys and a Jew”
Science and Religion
It strikes me Western society in the post-Enlightenment was far less devout in enforcing the belief inChristianity than it is now in enforcing the belief in racial and sexual equality. But it’s really in the nature of our new quasi-religion. You didn’t have to accost your fellows at work, school, or on the street toContinue reading “Science and Religion”
Hijab Hullabaloo
Steve Sailer has been speculating Shepard Fairey’s current obsession with the hijab is something of a sexual fetish, and Fairey’s choice of a beautiful woman in ruby red lipstick that might get her arrested in one of the more moderate Muslim countries certainly suggests it is, at least, for him and other young straight maleContinue reading “Hijab Hullabaloo”
Fire and Brimstone and Fire
Westboro Baptist Church style preachers showed up at the inauguration day protests in Portland. Just as they did at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, they staked out a spot and bravely harried the crowd with intentionally offensive rhetoric. This guy held out for well over an hour. There were no other counter-protesters there. TheyContinue reading “Fire and Brimstone and Fire”
New World Order
Kevin MacDonald quotes from evolutionary anthropologist John Tooby’s article about “coalitional instincts” in response this year’s “annual question” at Edge.org, “What Scientific Concept Should be More Widely Known” (emphasis added): Coalition-mindedness makes everyone, including scientists, far stupider in coalitional collectivities than as individuals. Paradoxically, a political party united by supernatural beliefs can revise its beliefs about economicsContinue reading “New World Order”
The Carrot and the Stick All of these fatigued and serious faces showed no evidence of despair…they made their way with the resigned expression of those who are condemned to hope forever.–Charles Baudelaire, To Each His Own Chimera Human beings are, necessarily, actors who…can be divided…into the sane who know they are acting and theContinue reading
People are going to have to think less about themselves and think more about me, Fareed Zakaria…
Fareed Zakaria was born into an elite Indian Muslim family and made his way into the global elite via Harvard and Yale. He’s edited Foreign Affairs, Newsweek and Newsweek International; now he’s a host on CNN. As you can imagine, this expertise and background have given him unique insight into the inexplicable horror of the Boston Marathon bombing by two young MuslimContinue reading “People are going to have to think less about themselves and think more about me, Fareed Zakaria…”
untethered 