In Honor Of Earth Day

It's fitting to share the insights of George Carlin, who deftly mocked the insanity of environmentalism before an audience of New York middlebrows who attempted to shout him down. Ever notice how those who consider themselves intellectually superior flee from debate and choose instead to attack and censor? A true intellectual thinks for himself and comes to his own conclusions, and is capable of defending them; this is not the case with self-styled urban sophisticates, who are desperate for social status and rush to the front of whatever popular notion is marching by. And it's certainly not the case with people who reject the very notion of truth and consider all "truths" to be socially engineered, which is almost everyone today.

You've Come A Long Way, Baby

The epidemic of female teachers (many of them married) who fornicate with their underage students has become so widespread that prosecutors are reconsidering the time-honored double standard, whereby women get a slap on the wrist for conduct that would destroy a man's life forever.

Does anyone seriously still believe that it is men who are brutes and it is women who civilize us? Women can be every bit as depraved as men, the main differences being (until recently) that it was harder to prove and even harder to punish. The standard retort is that men still commit far more violent crimes than women do. Really? For one thing, women initiate domestic violence in most instances. Consider also the millions of abortions procured by women for mere convenience over the past forty years, or the untold numbers of already-born children tormented or killed by their own narcissistic mothers. And consider why violent men act as they do. If you honestly believe it has nothing to do with women and their prehistoric preferences, then pass whatever it is you're smoking. Women may domesticate men, but it is men who build and maintain civilization with abstract and universal principles that apply to everyone high or low, seen or unseen, loved or hated.

By shedding all those "evil" patriarchal institutions and narratives, we have dropped the scales from our eyes and found that many women are hairless apes, just like many men. This spells doom for civilization; without being able to sucker entice men into a life of servitude, men are leaving the plantation and living for ourselves in larger and larger numbers. Action/reaction. If this is what women wanted, great, but that proposition looks dubious.

Admiration

I'm active on the competitive chess circuit and have improved a lot over the past few years, becoming one of the top two or three players in my state. This is enjoyable because of the cerebral challenge, seeing new places, meeting new people, and defying stereotypes (I do not look like a chess player).

In a pair of recent tournaments I met a man roughly my age who was competing along with two of his sons. They were friendly, well-mannered, hardworking people who probably have never ventured outside this state. Though they were not very good players, they didn't let this dim their enthusiasm one bit, and they watched many of the advanced games with a level of excitement more frequently reserved for contact sports. After I had a wild game on the top board that ended in a draw, the father introduced himself and asked if I would send him a copy of the game, which I gladly did. Just this past weekend I saw him and even more of his sons at the state Open -- again, all of them were incredibly well-mannered and having a blast. In the final round I was playing on the top table, which included boards 1 and 2; just before play started, the father asked all four of us to sign the back of his tournament chessboard, and I shook his hand.

I was flattered by his admiration. I wonder, though, if he knows how much I admire him. He's done something I never managed to do, and he's done it well.

Neo-Paganism On Display

A media goddess attacks a lowly mortal for daring to tow her car.

Of all the people to be wary of getting caught on camera doing something incredulous, you would think a TV news reporter would know better. But Britt McHenry, a Washington D.C.-based sports reporter for ESPN, has been suspended from her position after an ugly and offensive rant she unleashed on a hapless tow truck company employee surfaced online this week. The 28-year-old, who hails from New Jersey, had her car towed from the parking lot of a Chinese restaurant in Arlington, Virginia, and the verbal attack was captured on a security camera as she paid to pick the vehicle up at the tow lot office. "I’m in the news, sweetheart, I will f-----g sue this place," McHenry can he heard saying in the video. . . .

The parking attendant can be heard in the video warning McHenry she is being filmed and threatens to "play your video". "That’s why I have a degree and you don't - I wouldn't work in a scumbag place like this," McHenry responds. "Makes my skin crawl even being here." The parking attendant patiently replies: "Well lets get you out of here quickly." McHenry then fires back: "Yep, that's all you care about - taking people's money . . . with no education, no skill set. Just wanted to clarify that."

Who does this mortal think she is? After all, the goddess appears on television; is viewed by millions of people; explains the intricate workings of adults who play games; has a degree and is therefore "educated"; and gets paid obscene amounts of money to wear makeup and read a teleprompter. So much material success, and yet this goddess lacks something that makes the mortal infinitely superior -- a soul.

BTW, notice how the news story mocks the reporterette for getting caught, not for acting like a pre-Christian.

Indiana Controversy A Sick Sign Of The Times

I've often felt I was born in the wrong era, but when I consider the public outcry over Indiana's Religious Freedom Restoration Act ("RFRA"), I'm almost convinced I was born on the wrong planet. The law in question allows, among other things, for vendors to refuse service to homosexuals on the basis of religious belief. Any society mouthing the virtues of private property, freedom of contract, and freedom of association would have only one criticism of such a law: that it doesn't go far enough. A free person can choose to do business with whomever he chooses and for whatever reason, regardless of whether that reason is religious or outright bigoted. For large portions of the American public to condemn this law as giving too much freedom or power to the vendors is sickening, and it displays a clear rejection of freedom in favor of slavery.

Consider the following two scenarios, and decide which one portrays an injustice:

1.  A person chooses of his own free will not to expend his time and labor to provide a good or service to someone else.

2. A person demands that someone else, against his will, expend his time and labor to provide a good or service.

There is no way that a moral, rational, or sane person can conclude that 1 is worse than 2. Yet this is what the prevailing mindset in America concludes while condemning anyone who even entertains the possibility of 1. As such, the prevailing mindset of modern America is immoral, irrational, and insane, QED.

The prevailing mindset is also unconstitutional, since the Thirteenth Amendment abolishes involuntary servitude except as punishment for a crime. But moral, logical, and legal qualms have no purchase on a popular mind that is spoiled and impious. America is a victim of its own success. Like the dissolute children of wealthy parents, most Americans perceive every inconvenience or displeasure as an outrage. Our patrimony is dwindling because of this despicable mindset, which will vanish out of sheer necessity when the money is gone and there is no other choice.