Yeah but. . . you know

The well of imbecility runs deep, dear reader, and in the latest demonstration of its inexhaustible depths the president has shared the following wad of wisdom:

"...if Trayvon Martin was of age and armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk? And do we actually think that he would have been justified in shooting Mr. Zimmerman, who had followed him in a car, because he felt threatened? And if the answer to that question is at least ambiguous, then it seems to me that we might want to examine those kinds of laws." -President Barack Obama, 7/19/13 [Link]

Foolishness is never more dangerous and dastardly than when disguised as wisdom and moderation. Here we have an incongruous analogy set up as a hypothetical test of a tangential issue presented as the vindication of unspecified criticism about the Zimmerman verdict. It's a good thing the president decided to, "let all the legal analysts and talking heads address those [legal] issues."

The appeal of such a statement is more peculiar and particular, though, than the logic therein, for one must ask: why would such a sentiment appeal to anyone? From whence comes the need to find a systemic problem? Can't anything happen without being part of a trend, which the newscasters love to term a "disturbing pattern of events," that necessitates rethinking, reforming, and too often, infringements on liberty? Wouldn't you be glad if something bad weren't true?

Moreover, why do some people seek to prove that America is fundamentally flawed? It is one manner to admit that your home has flaws, even grave ones, for the purpose of admonishing it, but quite another to exercise with such alarming regularity a reflexive instinct toward disparagement. On the other hand, the contrast of heedless patriotism's motto "my country right or wrong" is of course an equally deleterious condition, but I find it harder to understand the repudiating tendency which Roger Scruton has called oikophobia. First, home is the natural seat of affection. Second, the facts prove otherwise, at least in the present matter.

Now I would be less inclined to allege that "some people seek to prove America is flawed" if they didn't demonstrate their inclination so ably in the deft disregard for facts we see exemplified by the president.

I would be more cautious to allege such if the president hadn't prefaced the above statement with anecdotes which we're not only supposed to take on faith, but from which we are urged to extrapolate general truths.

There are very few African-American men in this country who haven't had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store...

There are probably very few African-American men who haven't had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars...

There are very few African-Americans who haven't had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a chance to get off...

These assertions are apparently meant to stand in lieu of factual, empirical demonstrations of racism's causes and effects. So we're supposed to concede that racism has created certain problems, but also, "not to make excuses for that fact." This is illogic masquerading as pragmatism.

Finally, I would be more likely to believe such people suffered from a mere lack of facts than an aversion to them if the president hadn't proposed pretty blandishments like collecting data on traffic stops, "resourced us training police departments" (N.B. "resource" is not a verb), and spending "some time in thinking about how do we bolster and reinforce our African-American boys?"

As if those points are not incredible enough indictments of the president's lack of seriousness, he peppers them with a sudden doubt about overweening federal legislation ("I'm not naive about the prospects of some grand new federal program") and deference for federalism, ("Traditionally, these are issues of state and local government," remarks which could scarcely have less credibility.

Overall, the president's speech is sophomoric in thought and insidious in effect. Couched in a faux-casual flurry of "you knows," the speech pretends to walk a line of moderation and pragmatism even as it exemplifies and justifies the thinking which precipitated the problem. It will only compel those who already harbor foregone conclusions, just like the case it pretends to transcend.

Double Feature Review: Pitch Perfect & Sharktopus

To paraphrase musicologist Hans Keller, great art diversifies a unity. One of the principal challenges of art, then, is crafting episodes which both stand alone and reflect the whole. The essential challenge of this craft is threefold: he must depart, do something, and return. These miniature journeys are easily observed in the musical form called the rondo, which features variation episodes punctuated by a return to the main theme, announced at the outset. In the form called the fugue, the main idea is the fugue subject and the "plot," so to speak, is the many forms which this unity can assume. In drama, the episodes, called scenes, relate back to a plot which constitutes a main idea. This is an ideal toward which all great artists struggle.

Lesser works, as Keller observed, merely unify disparate elements, elements which may or may not add up to something significant. For example, Quentin Tarantino's Pulp Fiction persuasively unifies various stories by means of plot and style, but they don't add up to anything in the way the dramatic and philosophical symmetries of Altman's Short Cuts or Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey constitute themes from which seemingly disparate rivers spring. Pulp Fiction, though, strives towards unity.

All forms are subject to degradation, though, and there are still lesser degrees of unity, the lowest of which allows each form wholly to dissipate into its constituent parts without any attempt at unity. Works at this level exist to fulfill the stock requirements of the genre, not to express ideas. Such insincere attempts at expression which merely model the forms of art are not unique to our age. Vivaldi's Venice knew too many thinly-plotted operas which were little more than vehicles for screeching sopranos and Mozart's Austria drowned in thousands of dry, drowsy string quartets. Our own age knows the phenomenon in the form of cheap genre movies.

–

Directed by Jason Moore. 2012.

Pitch Perfect doesn't care about anyone either in or watching it. No one involved bothered about doing anything new or with even a teensy bit of flair or variation. It has a weekend script which strings a series of stock elements along a plot for which it has so little concern that occasionally it skips the bother of scenes altogether, preferring to summarize the plot in narration or outright dropping action which nonetheless takes place and whose results we are forced to infer. This reduction liquefies the plot into something as complex and significant as the summary of a Chinese cookie fortune.

The movie of course does have the obligatory genre elements, namely, 1) adolescent angst, 2) spontaneous singing, 3) gross lowbrow comedy, 4) paternal finger-wagging, 5) rivalries, 6) a kinda-sorta romance, and 7) safe, oblique references to non-SWPL life, all played for cheap laughs.

There is no touchstone of direction or purpose, and certainly no attempt toward style or even tone. We only generously call it a movie.

Budget: $17,000,000 (estimated) 

Opening Weekend: $5,149,433 (USA)

Gross: $64,998,368 (USA)

–

Directed by Declan O'Brien. 2010.

At least Asylum Studios is frank about their motivations: they're gaming the system. The only fact I doubt from their remarks is that it takes so long as ten days to write one of their scripts. Just like Pitch Perfect, there's no plot to speak of, and while I wasn't looking for much, you need something. Jaws might have set in motion thirty years of inferior knock offs, but only because it perfected the formula. You had Chief Brody's awkwardness in suburbia, the interplay of the three men on the boat, and of course the looming presence of a giant killer shark, culminating in a man versus beast struggle. Sharktopus has many of the same parts, people running, people on the beach, people being eaten, and so forth. Throw in some tech gizmos, a couple of jerks to give the hero some grief, and a pretty girl, and I guess you have a movie. Unlike the terrifying Jaws, though, there is no effect because the parts are so incongruous. 

–

On the one hand these movies are a clear cash grab, but on the on the other we get a whiff of Duchamp's urinal. There's a challenge to art somewhere in the audacity, not of defining these pieces as art, but of throwing them in the ring with art. Lowbrow adventures like Raiders of the Lost Ark and Star Wars demonstrate that with enough skill you can turn even junk and old stiff models into veritable entertainment, at least. These works, though, aspire neither to craft nor effect of any kind. They are vestiges of Western art: evolved, but impotent. Most people look at such movies with a light heart, but I wonder if we ought not be at least a little offended. 

The Art of Not Having An Opinion

While swimming in the jury pool with my fellow citizens earlier this year, I found myself waiting long whiles with them in an auditorium festooned with televisions. At the time, everyone was following the trial of Oscar Pistorius, who was accused of murdering his girlfriend. Whether out of interest or deathly boredom, people freely gossiped about the courtroom drama. The ad hoc popular verdicts were unanimous in affirming his guilt, a fact which troubled your humble blogger who found these extra-legal pronouncements quite disturbing, coming as they did from people who might imminently serve on a jury.

Hours later, though, many of these same mystics and prognosticators sat with me in the courtroom for some pre-selection procedures. They asked me a good many ways whether I would be able to remain impartial: do I know anybody at the court, do I know anybody who's been involved in the case, and so forth. Then the defense reminded us about holding to the facts of the case, and the prosecution about the burden of proof. None of these reminders shattered my conceptions, but they were presented with a degree of seriousness, in an environment of such seriousness, which, combined with the gravity and procedures of an actual trial, might have snapped a few folks from their penchants for armchair adjudication. I'm not generally sanguine about the popular penchant for remaining focused, logical, and objective, but with enough prodding, it's not inconceivable.

On the other hand, I sat down at my desk yesterday morning beneath such a Vesuvius of thesaurus-emptying, fact-averse vomitus that I found sole consolation in the fact I had yet to take my shower. I wonder if people realize how insulting it is to speak about matters on which not only are they inexpert, not only which have they not studied, but with which they have not even bothered to acquaint themselves, and then, furthermore, to voice that uninformed, unexamined opinion with all the trumpets-and-drums pomp can muster, and then, crowning their abdication from reason and decency, to dare and criticize anyone who refuses to lap up their piddling blather.

I know it's shooting fish in a barrel, but look at this nonsense in response to the verdict in the Zimmerman trial. It is simply staggering how much ignorance, and inelegance, you can squeeze into 150 characters. Do these people want someone to set them straight? Does Ice Cube want someone to ask him what he could possibly mean by alleging that a whole city wanted Zimmerman acquitted? Do Chris Rock and Nicki Minaj know that 911 operators can't order you what to do, and they are not police? Does Michael Moore know his inverse hypothetical proves nothing? Does Mia Farrow equate patrolling an area which the police were apparently unable to, with "hunting?" Does Evan Rachel Wood think that every single instance resulting in death is equivalent? Do Omar Epps, Chris Brown, and Rico Love think all crimes involving guns are equivalent? Does Russell Simmons think that every instance of discrimination ought to be illegal, qua discrimination? Does John Cusack not know what a tragedy is, or does he think a fatal flaw was involved? Does Olivia Wilde think we can just "demand" a better justice system into existence ex nihilo?

As preposterous as these claims are, though, I've heard the same from people I'd heretofore thought predominantly reasonable, but who this time clamor in accord with their more famous counterparts in stupidity and hate mongering. These folks simply can't compute the fact that this case doesn't support what they think it does, which is that murder is legal, any particular people are racist, or the justice system is broken. The case, in fact, demonstrated very little: that a jury, given specific evidence and specific burden of proof, was unable to convict Zimmerman of specific charges. With no ulterior motive, one must find specific fault with the evidence, burden of proof, or criteria for self defense in order to find fault with the verdict. Stefan Molyneux did a fine job of assembling the facts of the case, but even his scrupulous video was greeted with familiar, unreasoned responses, in many cases because people see the verdict as the outcome of variables other than the evidence, namely unstated, unknown, and nefarious motives of Zimmerman, the jury, and the police. These are pitiable people tyrannized by their opinions.

There's an instructive lesson about prudence in Tom Hooper's 2008 miniseries John Adams in which Thomas Jefferson, already acclimated to the Parisian world, asks the recently arrived Mrs. Adams what she thinks of the Gallic character. Mrs. A. declines to answer on the grounds that she couldn't possibly form a just opinion in so little time, a denial which prompts Jefferson to tease that she has already done just that. Finally and to the chagrin of her silent, onlooking husband, Mrs. Adams coyly notes that even if she had, she'd not announce her opinions until experience had confirmed their wisdom or folly. Prudent advice from a lady worth the title, and how better off would we all be to follow the example.

It's not easy, though, because we all harbor preconceptions. Sometimes those thoughts are arrived at by reason and principle and sometimes they're heuristic haphazards that we've patched together. In either case, every time we encounter a new situation we're tempted to shoehorn it into our existing view and see it as yet another example of something we already know. To some extent this is necessary because we can't reevaluate every situation as if we've never seen it before, but on the other hand we need to exercise humility and prudence when the facts don't fit. It is better to educate oneself in silence than to speak out in principled error, or worse, shameless grandstanding.

Odi et Amo

Some attain immortality by doing great deeds, others by getting swept up in the affairs of great men. It's unlikely we would remember a fourth-rate crook like Gaius Verres had Cicero not so ferociously denounced the fool, nor would an obscure archbishop like Hieronymous Colloredo be remembered but for getting under the skin of a certain W. A. Mozart. Lesbia, as her lover called her, we know for her affair with the greatest poet of his age, Catullus. Her reputation fared somewhat better than those of Verres and Colloredo, who were both eviscerated to rags, but we generally remember her as the woman not who loved, but who tortured Catullus. Lesbia is not the inspirational Muse that Simonetta Vespucci played to Botticelli, inspiring thoughts of a perfected beauty to be contemplated and never defiled, but the spark of Catullus' very earthy passions of love and hate.

We really do owe to the ancient lovers a great debt, though, for the poet's pains bore one great fruit: a poignant, poetical crystallization of that curiously close kinship between love and hate.

That brilliant single couplet of poem 85, odi et amo, gets the glory, but Catullus 85 is best seen as the culmination of thoughts more fully explored in poem 72.

Here, Catullus begins by retracing his affair with Lesbia.

1 Dicebas quondam solum te nosse Catullum,
2 -----Lesbia, nec prae me velle tenere Iovem.
3 dilexi tum te non tantum ut vulgus amicam,
4 -----sed pater ut gnatos diligit et generos.
5 nunc te cognoui: quare etsi impensius uror,
6 -----multo mi tamen es uilior et levior.
7 qui potis est, inquis? quod amantem iniuria
8 -----talis cogit amare magis, sed bene velle minus.

The first two lines are a miniature masterpiece describing the good old days, a couplet structured around dicebas and te, which set up the two parallel, sequential indirect statements describing Lesbia's promise.

On the one hand Lesbia once promised that she loved Catullus alone (1), and on the other that she didn't prefer even Jove to him (2). It's a simple, even slight, notion which only someone head-over-heels could have taken to heart. I wonder just when and why made this "promise?" To coax her reticent, junior lover, maybe? In flagrante delicto? Or maybe, perish the thought, the poor, proud boy, as she ushered him out the back door, paused at the threshold and asked how much she loved him, to which she replied with invisible irony, More than Jove, darling.

Perhaps, though, Lesbia did make this promise a full-hearted confession to Catullus one afternoon in some sacred lovers' grove and for a time at least, truly meant it. Either way, Catullus seems to have thought the love both permanent and binding, seeing how he interweaves the thoughts. Notice how solum...Catullum (Catullus alone) surrounds te nosse (you knew), how Catullum runs into Lesbia on the next line, and how nec prae me (not before me) literally precedes velle tenere Iovem (you wanted to hold Jove.)

3 dilexi tum te non tantum ut vulgus amicam,
4 -----sed pater ut gnatos diligit et generos.

The word order of the next couplet is a twofold contrast. Instead of discussing Lesbia's promise we move on to Catullus' love, and instead of interweaving the thoughts, they are simple and linear. I loved you not as a crowd [loves] someone, but as a father loves his sons and sons-in-law. The contrast within the couplet is between vulgar, public, and temporary effusion, and heartfelt, private, and perpetual love.

5 nunc te cognoui: quare etsi impensius uror,
6 -----multo mi tamen es uilior et levior.

The third couplet opens with a brutal contrast, continuing the parallelism in the hexameters of leading with the main verb giving action to te (Lesbia) but viciously subverting the meaning. We move from Dicebas...te (you were saying... that you) to Dilexi te (I loved you) to Nunc te cognovi, Now I know you. All of Catullus' love seems to shatter and we expect a torrent of vituperation, but the poet twists our expectations by returning immediately to the thought of his love, which is not diminished byt amplified in impensius uror (althought I burn more strongly.) Catullus leaves us hanging at the end of line 5 and then drives home his point:

6 -----multo mi[hi] tamen es uilior et levior.
6 -----by much to me you are cheap and meaningless. 

This is the final evolution of the second person characterization of Lesbia:

Dicebas...te - you were saying that you...
Dilexi...te - I loved you
te cognovi - I know you
es vilior et levior - you are...

Here, however, Catullus opens line 6 not with Lesbia, but with his valuation (multo) and himself (mihi.)

The structure of the closing couplet encapsulates the whole of the poem, introducing by a rhetorical question Catullus' lesson: such injury urges lovers to love more, but to regard less.

What a delicious paradox: Catullus hates her for rejecting him even as that spurning betrayal inflames his ardor. As he values her less, he wants her more. It's a sentiment which has to be felt to be believed. On the one hand the rejection spurs furious outrage at the perfidy and indignity. It means nothing to be rejected by her. How could I ever have valued her highly?

On the other hand her faithlessness implants the secret suggestion that somehow, in denying you, she's demonstrated that she has higher standards, a tantalizing and infuriating fancy. Every tricksy turn, then, inspires both hate and love, and thus the full weight behind Catullus' most famous lines.

Odi et amo. quare id faciam, fortasse requiris.
-----nescio, sed fieri sentio et excrucior.

Mission Impossible

Epimetheus at the Library

I don't frequent libraries for a number of reasons, chief among them that environments in which people are trying to keep quiet perturb me even more than noisy ones. Think of all that whispering, those clopping shoes, shuffling papers, the clearing of throats–ack! Recent trips to my local branch, however, gave me pause to think.

First off, it was tidy, relatively quiet, and opened promptly, though 11PM is pushing respectability. It was even, dare I say, cheerily operated. It was also cold, and as such operating as a sort of kook-refrigerator for the morning. Kooks? Yes, kooks, and I didn't draw the conclusion lightly, say, after the wheezy octogenarian read his papers or the couple quarreled over which happy partner bore the burden of filing their taxes. Neither did I chuff at the lady reading the Pathmark flyer aloud or my table neighbor who went into some considerable detail about his, how did he put it, motherfuckin' problem. Folks watching sports highlights on YouTube? de rigueur. I was positively thrilled by the strophic cachinnations of the children following all 1,600 verses of The Wheels on the Bus.

No, I came to my conclusion about the kooky nature of my fellow bibliophiles when, as I read a little passage of Latin, I overheard that distinct clatter of pills clanking into their plastic container. The contrast of experiences juxtaposed so much that I sat astonished for a moment. How could those two experiences, reading Latin and pouring pills, occur in the same place? Nothing I'd ever experienced let me bridge the gap. I wonder whether the woman was as shocked as I, perplexed why this fellow was reading Latin where she measures out her medication.

Truly did I wonder that, because those folks were all pretty comfortable there, whereas I wasn't. They were at home in this place, probably because their homes are not particularly luxurious. This library, on those days I visited, seemed to exist less for scholarship than as a refuge. In a way that's appropriate because the selection is pretty mediocre unless you're looking for the soundtrack to Hot Tub Time Machine, film classics like Au Pair 3, and the latest issue of Seventeen.

Would that the classics section redeemed the place but alas it did not. In one way I'm not concerned, though, because the classics are freely available online, more easily and cheaply by the day. On the other hand I wonder whether the absence of serious, weighty tomes has itself shorn the library of its grave appearance and thus its serious, academic purpose. It is no library, however many computers there are, if you can't feel the presence of Athena hovering behind the shelves. Libraries need books.

Now I can see the liberal kerfuffle bouncing its way toward me like some vast tumbleweed: the budget! Ah, the budget. If the first chopped dollar snatches the celery from grandma's Meals-on-Wheels, the second saved buck is sending Moby Dick gleefully into the incinerator. It's not a question of cost, however, so much of purpose. If the goal is to educate people, then the public should know how many classics and scholarly works are checked out and we need to consider whether the present lending models are achieving as much as, say, those of Amazon and Google.

Unfortunately, the name of any company sends shivers down the spines of liberals who fear imminent privatization like a libertarian comet steered by Mr. Monopoly. If the goal is education, though, we are fools if we opt for no more empirical standards than the much touted access and exposure, and frauds if we only adopt means of education which satisfy ulterior motives.

If libraries are about something outside education, like being havens for the poor, then that's a reality we should admit. Likewise if they're about catering to popular tastes. If they're about something else, though, if they're about being places of social quiet, about research and discovery, about interior liveliness and timeless excellence, then we ought to strive for that, and not tout as success what is in fact an afterthought.

Movie Review: Snow White and the Huntsman

Nothing about Snow White and the Huntsman adds up. Not one thing.

I don't understand how a budget of $170,000,000 produced this simmering mediocrity. Where did the money go? Not on the scenery, for sure. The whole movie was clearly shot on small sets, often with foggy backgrounds so there wasn't even any green screen work, and those sets are deadly dull. The Forbidden Forest isn't particularly forbidding if there's nothing in it. There are only a handful of effects shots fancy effects shots, though they are successful. We hardly see any people in the movie, and even in the bustling scenes of towns, battles, and other confusion I'd guess there are at most a few dozen people on screen. Did the whole budget really go to the cast?

So what's with the cast anyway? Charlize Theron is so noticeably absent from the final three acts that they cut back to her every so often just so we don't forget she exists. Chris Hemsworth works as The Huntsman, mostly because he fills the same stiff, chivalrous, mold as usual. Here he's a sort of yeoman Thor, sans hammer. And please don't think that an exaggeration, for while he may be "The Huntsman," he's inordinately handy with weapons. Either The Huntsman–no, he's never named– actually is Thor, or he just really hates animals. Poor Kristen Stewart, obviously cast because she's pretty and popular, was just tossed into this movie and given no character, script, or help of any kind. How awful.

Speaking of the script, where is it? Was there one? It seems like they just loosely followed the Fellowship of the Ring pattern, fleeing from place to place, but there's no distinct impetus or activity which moves anything along or alters the course of events. In sum: Thor is taking Snow White somewhere, they meet a few people on the way, they get there, and then they come back with a few guys on horses to try and take a castle. The lack of plotting isn't even that problematic or unexpected, not nearly as problematic as the sheer lack of words in this movie. The director cuts to people looking at one another, fighting, walking, but no one says anything. Often the camera sits on characters poised to speak after some important event, yet they never say a word and everyone just stands there in awkward, preposterous silence.

For such madness two scenes stand out, both at the cost of Kristen Stewart. In the first, Snow White is set up to give a little speech to the troops before the final battle. She's all armored up and wide-eyed and standing in the middle of the people, and they give to her all of three sentences for this climactic scene. Worse, one of them is very short and another unintelligible. How can you do that to a young, inexperienced actor? Twice! The second time, Snow White has been crowned queen and she looks up with portent. . . and says nothing. The camera moves from character to character and everyone just stands around looking at each other. Where are the words? This movie makes The General look like Annie Hall. Most curious of all is that this movie has no fewer than four writing credits. This script is maybe a weekend's work for one person, and it took four people to write it?

So what do we have in this movie? A witch, Charlize Theron, steals the throne of the kingdom and imprisons Snow White in the tower. When the queen realizes she needs Snow White's blood to preserve her beauty, which is waning extra-speedily due to her witchcraft, Snow White escapes so we can have a movie. The queen doesn't really do anything though. She's stealing the youth from girls which is clearly bad, but that's not really a plot point and it doesn't create a sense of tension or purpose. The queen is also not terrorizing the kingdom so far as we can tell. In fact I don't know whether there is a kingdom. We only see one little town, actually we only see one road. And it's a really ugly castle in an awful location anyway, so who cares?

There's not even any romance between The Huntsman and Snow White. In fact there's so little dialogue and chemistry between them they could have shot the scenes separately and composited them together. I really think the plan was to put two attractive people on screen and just let the camera roll.

We do get a little humor, though, when the dwarves show up, inexplicably in the first rate cast of Ian McShane, Bob Hoskins, Ray Winstone, Brian Gleeson, Toby Jones, Eddie Marsan, and Nick Frost. I'm no expert, but if you're going to hire seven talented actors and presumably pay them money, maybe they should, I don't know, be in more of the movie! I mean they sing a little, they fight a little, and that's all well and good, but we're making a movie here, right? Can we at least try to do something special?

There actually are a few interesting moment in the movie. In one, Snow White is about to get bashed by a big old troll when suddenly the beast looks at her, is pacified, and walks off. There is almost some aesthetic or moral, well, idea at work here, as if she's so naturally pure and beautiful that even the ugliest in nature can see the perfection and will not harm it. In contrast we have the evil queen's unnatural magic which is aggressive and hated. The idea is completely undeveloped, but it's something that could have been with great result. The second moment of note is when the witch crashes into the ground as a pile of birds.

That's what you get for $170,000,000 these days.

This could have been a good movie, really, because all the pieces are here. They're just so badly handled, due laziness, incompetence, or haste, and the result so flat and lifeless–what a pity for a fairy tale!–that you can't even tell whether the movie fell apart or never came together.

Your Daily Pernicious Infusion

Drudge was linking the other day to the latest in a string of articles on preposterous  arrests and charges. Some allege a pattern of outlawing of just about everything, others see in increasingly SWAT-like tactics the militarization of police, and others see plain old brutality. I've always heard a lot about such issues in left and libertarian circles, but even the right, which is fairly quick to pull the anti-cop card, seems to be growing alarmed. There is plenty of literature on the important legal and moral issues but I would  draw two points.

First, police are not aliens: they're fellow citizens who, prudently or not, have been vested with a good deal of authority. I wonder whether police recruiters are doing enough to ensure they hire people with the proper disposition to be officers of the law, and whether they're following up with proper evaluations, for to every job there are both complementary and opposed dispositions. Also, it's quite possible that there are more positions than can be filled by proper candidates and no amount of funds or training is going to fix the problem because you can't give or incentivize character. The pool of ideal candidates for any job will vary from time to time, and employers across professions need to have the liberty to hire the worst and acquire the best as they see fit. Not everyone's good at his job and many jobs are dangerous when poorly filled.

How often, though, do we wonder about that: how well our friends and loved ones perform their jobs? Are they efficient? Respected? The thought that your friend or spouse is ineffective, or worse, at work is a surprisingly potent disappointment. We really ought to consider the needs of  our friends' qua professionals. As we noted above, not everyone is perfectly suited to their job and thus people often force a disposition, a tiring and stressful task. Police come home tired of having to be on alert, teachers tired of quieting children, managers of making endless corrections, and on and on. People need daily help, some complementary others supplementary, to get through their days, and such needs are all too easy to ignore.

Second, the public bears the fruits of its expectations. I've grown to think that, along with political caterwauling about crime rates, the fact that seemingly every night some variation of Law and Order precedes the 10PM news is having a deleterious, disquieting effect on our society. For my part, I've never flipped past either program without being appalled by the relentless fear mongering. I'm not sure whether you can spend two hours, maybe a few times a week, one speculating about fictional crimes and the next confirming them, and not grow a little paranoid. I'm not suggesting anything nefarious or the absence of criminal and dangerous activity, but Ii may simply be that in the absence of grave, imminent danger, man tends to seek some to give his activity purpose and import. Expectations seem to dictate much here.

For example, the NYC City Council recently approved of measures to increase police oversight, over the expected objections. Whether the council's reaction reflects genuine democratic sentiment I can't say, but there is a potentially troubling breakdown of trust here. Citizen's don' trust the police, who again are still their fellow citizens, neighbors, friends, and fellow New Yorkers, to leave the innocent alone, citizen's don't trust the mayor or commissioner to administer the police, the mayor and commissioner don't trust the people to hold them accountable as they see fit, and last but not least the people think a police force of such scale is necessary to protect themselves from criminals, criminals who are nonetheless fellow citizens as well. Troubling for sure, but I wonder whether our negligence and expectations have as much to do with the apparent breakdown as actual crime.

Another 4th

As we noted recently, holidays have a funny way of attracting as many naysayers and spoilsports as they do true believers. I don't mind the party-poopers so much because I myself am of two minds on holidays. On the one hand I prefer quiet solemnity to public pomp, and on the other, reflection to jubilation. The downside of reflection, especially on a day of celebration, is its liability to veer toward the pessimistic. Christmas brings fears of commercialism, Thanksgiving of waste, Earth day of arboricide. Things do seem to produce their opposites, and thus Independence Day naturally produces some loathing the loss of liberty. Is it appropriate?

By that I don't wonder whether it is honest to fear the loss of freedom: of course it is. Shouldn't, though, today as all holidays, be one of gratitude? Surely. Anyone anywhere with the slightest soft spot for liberty ought to mark the day with a little affection for America as people, union, nation, and project. The people prosper in myriad, unexpected and often untutored ways. The union circumscribes some behavior to preserve liberty. As a nation we've gone to bat for a few others. As a project the American undertaking has given everyone involved and everyone looking-on quite an education.

Surely enough, though, the other shoe falls and fearing for every cause which a free man might follow we despair for our liberty. Yet these fears, it seems to me, have a right to surface on America's Independence Day, for I can think of no day on which the Founding Fathers might have feared more for liberty than on the day they dissevered themselves from the mother country. They surely worried for their lives and property in the expectation of British suppression. They already knew the acrimony of self rule from the heated colonial conflicts among Tories, moderates, and liberals, between Levellers and aristocrats, between Diggers and capitalists, farmers and commercialists, among democrats, republicans, and monarchists, and seemingly every combination possible. What questions must have run through their minds. Who would run the war? Who would prosecute it? Who would adapt the state constitutions? How would they get along without British adjudication?  Would they be prey to other powers? What if the war were lost or, saddest of all, what if they had misjudged their readiness to govern themselves?

Familiar fears. It surely would have been easier to rush headlong or fall back, rather than prudently pave the way. While today's causes are often just we lay waste our efforts and selves when we allow any sudden gust of zeal to uproot prudence. For although we are a varied society of individuals, by dint of fate our fortunes are intertwined–more still, they have been interwoven over many years, and it is that calm with which free men walk with easy hearts among one another that bears the truth: peace finds a home not in the fool's inflamed romance with freedom but the prudent care of liberty.

TV Review: Downton Abbey

Written and created by Julian Fellowes. Seasons 1-3: 2010-2012

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity. – W. B. Yeats, The Second Coming

spoilers

I have often thought about that generation of Englishmen who broached the twentieth century. How many must have expected their privileged jubilee to carry on, how many that their antique virtues and traditions would preserve their world. Not even the soberest of them could have foreseen their culture's imminent twilight or its harbinger, the First World War. Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham, is the pole of Downton Abbey, where things go on much as they have for hundreds of years. The tenants farm the land, the townsfolk sell their wares, the servants keep the estate, and the Crawleys keep up appearances. Don't snicker too much: Robert, his wife Cora, and his Dowager Countess mother, Violet, have their hands full keeping up appearances, i.e. doing damage control in the wakes of the Crawley debutantes, Mary, Edith, and Sybil. In fact, though he loves them dearly, no father since Lear had such luck with the suffragette, the backstabber, and the tart. How proud a father he must be, cleaning up after his daughters so they don't become the Crazy Crawleys of Downton.

Aristocratic pretentions aside, Downton Abbey could have proceeded down such conventional soap opera paths, neatly laying out fodder for gossip while stringing cardboard characters along a pointless plot. Downton avoids these pitfalls by using the plot to depart from the archetypes of the pilot and actually develop the characters. We see Mary (left, center) evolve from a sneering prima donna who delights in cutting remarks and outshining her sister into a humbled spinster after a furtive fling with an exotic houseguest, to a tortured fiancé. Finally, she marries the presumptive heir to Downton, including the dwindling Crawley fortune, and she's eager to preserve what in her youth she had dashed off with indifference. Her husband, a distant cousin and middle class lawyer who's poised to inherit the estate due to Robert's lack of a son, follows a circuitous path to nobility. At first he promises that aristocratic life won't change him but slowly and surely, as he grows to love the family and appreciate life on the estate, he too wishes to preserve Downton.

Mary's youngest sister, Sybil, provides a contrast to her sibling because she does, in fact, throw away her noble life by running off not just with a commoner, not just Downton's mechanic, but a republican Catholic socialist. Robert's inability to dissuade his daughter from marrying Branson is the first sign that life isn't going back to the pre-war ways. It doesn't help that Branson is stubborn and abrasive, never choosing simply to decline an offer or remain silent but at every opportunity feeling it necessary to articulate his opinions about injustice. Yet Sybil transforms her husband from an angry rebel with a boulder on his shoulder and nothing at stake in life, into a husband, father and, while not in name, a Crawley. In an amusing scene, he meets Dowager Countess Violet, his wife's grandmother, who has invited him to dinner. After he voices his opposition to dress coats, the symbols of oppression, she promptly ignores him and has the butler dress the man for dinner; he can argue politics with Robert as much as he wants, but he's showing up properly dressed to dinner with grandma. After his wife's untimely death, he realizes that the family still cares about him and his child, and that he can fulfill his ideals by helping Downton's tenants instead of burning down the houses of noblemen.

All three men, Matthew, Branson, and Robert ultimately adjust to their postwar lives, moving from impotence to torpor to unity. They each, however, must concede what is now out of their control. Matthew can't control the fact that Mary is willful and sardonic, Branson can't control the fact that Sybil still loves and needs her family, and Robert must admit that he can neither control his daughters anymore nor run Downton alone. Finally, none of them can control the fact that they're all family now, Matthew and Branson by marrying into it, and Robert by adopting them as sons. There's a moving scene at the end of season three where the three men, having each found his place in the new world of Downton, rejoice together after a house victory in Downton's annual cricket game.

–

That's half the story, and while the other half live downstairs at Downtown they do so with no less interest and intrigue. Can we begin with anyone other than Carson, the Lord of the Staff? Every bit Lord Grantham's counterpart, the Head Butler Carson is the joyful keeper of traditions, or as he would say, standards. He deplores disorder and staves off any hint of slackening standards by a stern demeanor which holds earls, ladies, doctors, lawyers, and virtually everyone in check. He's a sort of walking constitution, making everyone upstairs and down think twice about whether their whim du jour is worth breaking tradition. Carson's not wedded to the past though, just rooted in it. However much he grumbles about newfangled gadgets, he doesn't mind that the "world change us," just not too much or soon or for the worse. He upholds the traditions and abhors poor form not as a Gradgrind but because he loves and respects the Crawleys, his family, and everyone's behavior on the estate points back to its lord and lady.

The house staff might be an even tougher lot to wrangle than their noble lords, though, with varying plots to replace, promote, embarrass, and court one another. Yet here too there's meaning and not simply vulgar utility. Anna and Bates both move from islands of maturity to friends who take solace in each other's forbearance, to agonized lovers, to parted spouses, and finally to reconciliation. The perpetually scheming Thomas and Mrs. O'Brien move from being allies to enemies until they both are transformed, O'Brien by a tragic crime, and Thomas by a love and a death.

–

All of these downstairs threads are interwoven through the goings on of the Crawleys with every manner of eavesdropping, flirting, framing, and miscommunication possible. It's quite a feat to jump around from thread to thread but writer-creator Julian Fellowes manages it so well you scarcely notice the switching. Likewise he's adept at tightening the tension on some and slackening it on others, always pleasing and confounding our expectations to keep us poised for more. Just as everything seems to be going wrong, one resolves, as everything seems to go well, something awful happens. Yes, you could probably condense all three seasons into one movie, but there's an apparent, persuasive reality to the character who unfolds over months and years and not within the confines of two or three hours. Certainly there is much which might be cut, from flower shows and missed connections to false alarms and untimely detours, but when so well done it's less bloat than too much of a good thing. Besides, who would want to give up any of the Dowager Countess' balloon-bursting quips, the endless taunting between O'Brien and Thomas, or Carson's regal decorum?

For a show which is a frank riff on the soap opera and miniseries model, Downton Abbey transcends both, the former primarily insofar as it situates its characters in circumstances to which they'll need to adapt, but also by allowing its characters to act not based on what they just did, but based on everything they've done. Downton exceeds the miniseries model by letting its characters change and not relegating them to the stiff conceptions the series started with. Most importantly, Downton exists in the larger context of a world in change and examines the transition from one where everyone knew where they stood to one in which you must constantly adapt.

This slow shift is subtly handled and the most revealing part of Downton. In the old world, the lord gave the orders and everyone followed. Yet Robert's wife and daughters no longer obey his word as law. The girls run off with different men, to varying ends, and they take what jobs they like. Two parallel scenes tell the tale: Robert and Carson each forbid their charges to be in the presence of a young prostitute whom cousin Isobel is letting work at the house, and each in turn is duly ignored. Dark times.

Yet the prewar days seem more and more distant. Before the war, young men and women felt they had to attract one another. Men had to be dapper, informed, and successful, while the women had to be charming, graceful, and deferential. Both had to be genteel. After the war and the suffrage movement, the young simply come as they are, under the premise that no one should judge or be uncomfortable just for "being themselves," as cousin Isobel says. It's the opposite of Carson's policy of strict standards. Finally, as the years roll on, the characters slowly drop the pretenses of discretion. Where once discretion reigned a supreme virtue, now candor rules and everyone more freely says what they feel when they feel it. The coarsening of manners and the liberation from tradition have gone hand in hand, with the result that instead of joining and partaking in company, everyone is aggressively themselves. Except with Carson, of course, the holding center at Downton.

Downton's not a dour place, though, and there's plenty of joy in children, romance, and the familial bonds which do endure. There's also plenty of fun in cheering for your favorite characters, from the daffy head chef Mrs. Patmore and her loyal little assistant, Daisy, to the honorable Bates, to poor Lady Edith, the middle child perpetually trying to raise herself out of spinsterhood. We even get a few running jokes, the best being the accidentally sloshed Mr. Molesley. In fact there's a rather Dickensian quality to the characters in their daily joys and plights, and ultimately it's these colorful, imperfect people we seek when we so eagerly return to Downton Abbey.

A Citizen's Examination of Conscience

1. From where did/do I derive my political ideas: Reason, tradition, emotion, et cetera?
2. Have I ever returned to study, and possibly challenge, the ideas I first learned?
3. Do I speak on, and address others about, only matters which I have thoroughly researched and considered, and on which I have opinions which I can logically and clearly articulate?
4. Of my own ideas, do I keep current on matters with which they intersect?
5. Do I stay informed on a variety of issues, or only certain ones?
6. Do I speak as appropriate to prove my case to others, or to gratify myself?
7. How often do I read scholarly books and articles?
8. How often do I read any books and articles which articulate opposing viewpoints, or do I only read ones with which I already agree?
9. Do I seek out the best opposing viewpoints to understand them and potentially challenge my own ideas, or am I content to read the most easily refuted opposing ideas?
10. Do I check the facts of articles?
11. Do I especially check the facts of articles with which I agree?
12. Do I stay informed about legislation and court cases?
13. Do I read legislation and court cases myself, or do I rely on others' opinions and summaries?
14. In evaluating political decisions, do I consider:
1. Both universal and particular law?
2. Whether the matter is of a political nature in the first place?
3. Whether the law ought to be passed or the case heard at that particular level of government?
4. The principles on which the decision rests?
5. The precedent which informs it and the precedent which it sets?
6. Potential side effects, positive and negative, and their probabilities?
7. Whether there is enough information to decide the matter at all?
8. Whether the desired outcome might be better achieved by another means?
15. In evaluating candidates for political office do I:
1. Have an objective set of criteria against which I equally compare all candidates?
2. Stay equally informed about all candidates?
3. Consider as separate, but related and relevant the character, talk, and action of the candidate?
4. Separate rhetoric from logical arguments?
5. Hold officials accountable after delegating my authority to them?
16. When disagreeing, do I do so from principle or as a reactionary or emotionally? 
17. When disagreeing, do I use facts which I can cite, or have I allowed my facts and sentiments to congeal into a sense which is no longer rooted in particulars?
18. Do I promote the good by ways other than voting?
19. Do I treat speculation with appropriate skepticism?
20. Do I expect of other citizens what I do not do myself?
21. Do I admit when I am wrong?

Post #500: A Quiz for Myself

For the 500th post, fulfilling a kind request with thanks.

1. Your favorite virtue? courage
2. Your favorite qualities in a man? self-control
3. Your favorite qualities in a woman? charm
4. Your favorite occupation? anything which requires my full attention
5. Your chief characteristic? thorough
6. Your idea of happiness? joyful piety
7. Your idea of misery? being a feminist
8. Your favorite color and flower? no preference
9. If not yourself, who would you be? Benjamin Franklin
10. Where would you like to live? at home
11. Your favorite poets? Horace, Catullus
12. Your favorite painters and composers? Botticelli, Rembrandt; Mozart, Bach
13. Your favorite heroes in real life? Cicero, John Adams
14. Your favorite heroines in real life? Abigail Adams
15. Your favorite heroes in fiction? Samwise Gamgee
16. Your favorite heroines in fiction? Susanna in Mozart's Figaro, Cordelia in King Lear, Penelope
17. Your favorite food and drink? lentil soup and cranberry juice
18. Your favorite names? m. any virile, meaningful name; f. Jennifer
19. Your pet aversion? gum chewing; see #7 below
20. What characters in history do you most dislike? Alcibiades, Gracchi Brothers 
21. What is your present state of mind? aequus
22. For what fault have you most toleration? slowness
23. Your favorite motto? Be good and do good. (John Adams to his children)

Ten Random Facts

1. Age: 27 years
2. unmarried
3. born, raised, residing in Bronx, NY
4. BA in Classical Languages
5. grouchy when hungry
6. prolix when angry
7. misophonia
8. baritone
9. right-handed
10. geek/nerd

Manus

Manus is one of the more unusual words with which the young Latinist must contend. As one might expect, manus means hand, but it also by extension can mean handwriting, and it can even mean a band of men. Never mind that, though, for the important concept for us now is that of manus as the seat of paternal authority. Ultimate power the Roman paterfamilias held in his hands over his family and property, arranging marriages, property, and all family business until his death. So too from his hands could he pass his power to (emancipate) his son, or send from his hands (manumit) a slave.

In another respect, though, were the hands of ancient man his life, for they were intimately connected with his livelihood. Across the professions the hands do the work, from the noblest farmer who puts his plow into the ground to the baker kneading dough and the soldier holding his spear. Those first Christians too must have felt the same connections as they cast their nets into the sea. In the ancient world, a man's hands were the seat, symbol, and means of his agency.

Specialization and technology have to varying degrees diminished the sense of importance otherwise obvious in the manual world. Specialization has offloaded good a deal of life's labor to others, leaving less of it for the average person. Technology has either replaced or distanced us from much work, whether it is the digital keyboard separating us from the striking of the typewriter, which itself separated us from the craft of penmanship, or firearms, which separate the act of, well, killing. Recorded music enables people to listen without playing, and cars to move, all without any sense of power, material, or process.

Sailing is perhaps the most illustrative example, for with one hand on the tiller and another grasping the sheets, you are part of the tool that is the boat. You can feel every shift, from the turbulence of the sails to the smooth groove of a good tack. With that power naturally comes responsibility, but the manual interaction forces an appreciation of the process, material, and power involved.

Is there any reason we can't cultivate such an appreciation today? Not that I can see. Apart from the general awareness it would engender, I think it would lend a little more reverence to life; perhaps people would think before getting so handsy and reckless. Most of all I should imagine a difference at mass. It's all well and good to teach children to be reverent and careful, but you can't be reverent without cultivating the skill of reverence, and you can't do that without some appreciation, however slight and inchoate, of what you are and how you meet the world.

The Odd Couple

Rain on My Parade, Please

Something about celebration invites abuse. Atheists mock Christmas, anarchists mock Election Day, pacifists Veteran's Day. Irked by the politicization of "going green" a lot of conservatives have developed a not-so-quiet loathing for Earth Day. Valentine's day seems the most loathed these days, a towering rod electrified by hate. Why?

It's not so hard to imagine a few reasons. Some folks think qui tacet consentire and that's not unreasonable. They don't want to look like they condone something they find foolish or even worse. Other people simply bask in the joy of contrarianism and relish the thought of not joining the club. Some people are too insecure about an idea, even if they assent, to affirm their accord. At the dark end of the spectrum lurks envy, where some angry people find genuine displeasure at the sight of people affirming the good.

To varying degrees and toward various groups, holidays, and celebrations, we've all felt some of those ways. Perhaps we ought endeavor, though, to curb our sarcasm and not rain on anyone's parade. That it takes so much restraint to shut one's yap, or keep hands off the keyboard, suggests that silence is often a prudent response, at least at the time of their celebrating. After all, how much of our own disagreement is not justification of principle but rather self-aggrandizement and self-assuring masquerading as reason. There are in fact very few people with whom I'll disagree in person. In fact, whether and how I disagree is based on a rather complex calculation of the appropriateness of time and place, and most of all, how likely I am to persuade the individual. Most times and places aren't occasions for debate, and most people find genuine debate irksome, which is not unreasonable.

For my part, though, I welcome the rain, but mostly because I don't hold any parades. You see, the conservative that I am isn't in unqualified love with a great many things, first because everything has unintended consequences, and second because even the intended consequences can be taken too far in degree. As such, all activity is an invitation to a great deal of harm and I find do no harm an excellent principle. When you combine that approach with philosophical and generally curmudgeonly dispositions, you'll find that activity itself is a specious enterprise. In fact I'm not a fan of any activity per se, and find much appeal in the ideal of energetic stasis. Life requires a good deal of work just to maintain itself against entropy and it requires as much affection as well.

Such doesn't mean that the present is the best of all worlds, but that enough people cared to preserve it. Maybe it is the mindless accretion of prejudice or the meaningless terminus of accident-after-accident, but you can always spot the progressive by the list of geniuses he claims to have outsmarted. Problems rise and persist, often fundamental ones, but when possible they should be pruned and filed, not exploded. Rare is the need for violent revolution, and all revolutions are violent revolutions.

The complement of energetic stasis, then, is a sanguine curmudgeonry in which everything is at once loved and loathed. This all sounds very harsh, but what good relationship is rooted in unquestioning approbation? None, of course, or the short-lived perhaps. Instead we take delight in teasing and being teased, and in all teasing there is truth and tooth in the taunt. In time we correct our ways and all that's left is the happy memory of being teased. Life as love.

Presidential Rhetoric V: James Monroe

Welcome to Part Five of our series on the rhetoric of American presidential inaugural addresses. Please feel free to take a peek at the previous entries in the series:

1. Worthy of Marble?
2. John Adams
3. Thomas Jefferson
4. James Madison

We continue with our present look at the rhetoric of James Monroe's inaugural address, delivered Tuesday, March 4, 1817. As with all of his presidential predecessors, Monroe received a Classical education. Let us see what traces remain in the First Inaugural of the last Founding Father.

As usual, the speech is available via Bartleby, which we reproduce here boldface, with my comments following.

–

[1] I SHOULD be destitute of feeling if I was not deeply affected by the strong proof which my fellow-citizens have given me of their confidence in calling me to the high office whose functions I am about to assume. [2] As the expression of their good opinion of my conduct in the public service, I derive from it a gratification which those who are conscious of having done all that they could to merit it can alone feel. [3] My sensibility is increased by a just estimate of the importance of the trust and of the nature and extent of its duties, with the proper discharge of which the highest interests of a great and free people are intimately connected. [4] Conscious of my own deficiency, I cannot enter on these duties without great anxiety for the result. [5] From a just responsibility I will never shrink, calculating with confidence that in my best efforts to promote the public welfare my motives will always be duly appreciated and my conduct be viewed with that candor and indulgence which I have experienced in other stations.

We see from the color-coding a preface dominated by first person pronouns: this is the president presenting himself to the people. More so than his predecessors, Monroe feels the need to explain who he is, which he does by the underlined phrases:

• affected by proof
• called to office
• assuming functions
• deriving gratification
• sensibilities increased
• conscious of deficiency 
• entering into duties
• not shrinking
• calculating with confidence
• promoting welfare
• duly appreciated
• conduct viewed

This most important, opening paragraph is structured around five paragraphs and five ideas:

1. The president is affected by his election
2. The president is gratified
3. The gratification is increased by understanding of the importance of the position
4. The president is humbled by this
5. The president will do his best.

Monroe begins with what is the standard praise of the president's fellow citizens, but cleverly defines his election as "proof of their confidence," presuming the reason that the people selected him. Monroe continues defining the significance of his election in the following sentence by adding how it was rooted in "their good opinion of my conduct in the public service," and then follows up the observation with a most precise bit of elaboration: on the one hand he derives gratification from their esteem, and on the other hand he characterizes his gratification as of a degree which can only be attained by anyone who has done his best. The rhetorical effect is a sense of parity between what Monroe has offered and what the people want. He continues by defining his sensibility as an appreciation of the gravity of the office, an appreciation which results in a consciousness about his deficiency, and ultimately finds fulfillment in, well, this most specific situation:

[5] From a just responsibility I will never shrink, calculating with confidence that in my best efforts to promote the public welfare my motives will always be duly appreciated and my conduct be viewed with that candor and indulgence which I have experienced in other stations.

Monroe states that he won't shrink from a just responsibility, yet he seems to predicate this derring-do on the fact that his efforts, his motives, and his conduct will be appreciated. He has of course left out an important bit of information: the consequences of his action. Monroe concludes this slick reasoning with the even more clever coda wherein he states that he hopes for the same honesty and forgiveness he's received before; he's asking the people be fair and forgiving by defining them as fair and forgiving.

Undoubtedly the most argued introduction we've seen so far. 

The Liberal Arts: Dead or Alive?

Everyone likes to declare something dead. Conservatives rejoice at the diagnosis so the idea can be lamented and progressives celebrate as they stomp it more fully into the dirt. The two parties then wag fingers at one another as the curmudgeon cackles with joy in the corner. Liberals, however, with fervor wish for everything live and it is this type of optimist who tells me that the Liberal Arts are alive and well. I want this to be true: it is not. I make this diagnosis from the observation that the Liberal Arts have no reason to exist.

I uncontroversially suggest that every thing which exists has a reason to exist, a cause. Since the Liberal Arts today lack a cause, a reason to exist held broadly by the people, where one finds them, one finds not culture but artifact. What cause does Western Civilization today have which might necessitate the Liberal Arts? Do we have a concept of any ideal to which the Liberal Arts and only the Liberal Arts will bring us? Earlier ages had purposes in mind for education: concepts like καλόν, ἀρετή, humanitas, and honor, and archetypes like the Christian man, the Renaissance man, the chevalier, the courtier, the aristocrat, the man of letters, the gentleman, or the citizen. Werner Jaeger from the introduction to his Paideia:

...the process of educating man into his true form, the real and genuine human nature. That is the true Greek paideia...It starts from the ideal, not from the individual. Above man as a member of the horde...stands man as an ideal. [Jaeger, xxiii-xxiv]

Does there exist then, in our society anything remotely resembling an ideal of man, or are we condemned to Plato's vision of the democratic "emporium of constitutions" which tempts man in a thousand different directions? In light of the above ideal and archetypes, our own vague notions seem soft and pitiable. The concept of negative liberty implies little about the ideal for man. Equality is no more vivid a concept: equal to one another but as what? Justice to us means mostly that no one ought to be aggressed against, which tells us precious little about what man ought to do. Now I'm not criticizing our ostensibly libertarian government, only observing that socially we seem to lack a motivating principle for education. Does the model of the citizen move anyone today? If the low voter turnout and the high rate of representative reelection indicate anything, it seems to me that we've contracted out civics to a class of administrators. Some ideal must remain, though, surely.

Two seem to prevail. The first is success, a word which we sometimes use as a respectable-sounding byword for power and money and sometimes as a stand-in for honor. Yet by neither success nor honor do we mean τιμή, a sense of one's cut and rightful place in society based on some merit or fulfillment of an ideal, or honoria, esteem for public service, but a vague unqualified approbation. By success we mostly mean status, which of course implies hierarchy and which today is synonymous with celebrity. It won't need much explanation to say that celebrity and the Liberal Arts have little in common.

The other ideal toward which we seem to strive is itself infamous: happiness. How often have we seen television film scenarios in which a surly conservative father castigates his son for not pursuing the proper profession whereas the good, liberal father tells him, "Whatever makes you happy." Without reference to a particular ideal, though, this is tantamount to relativism, and as such what seems so may be: that anyone who is doing well by his own standards is doing well enough. Of course this non-judgmental  approach might originate in benevolence, say, acknowledging someone's limitations and honoring them for achieving what success they can. We call such charity, or once did. On the other hand such relativism may be just that, relativism, and therefore feed into the burgeoning multiplicity of "values" among which no one is better than any other.

Perhaps if we lower our standards a bit and consider less popular ideals we may find some which might justify the Liberal Arts. Let us turn to the arts themselves, for surely they will be our refuge. The American PBS begins its television programs with the entreaty to, "Help everyone explore new worlds and ideas." To be frank: What? So "new worlds and ideas" are good for everyone? Not old ideas? Can ideas actually be new? What do they mean by "world?" Is this the best that anyone can come up with, or is this pitiful slogan the only accord we have on ideals?  Speaking of slogans, a most venerable statement has been trotted out as one. See image, left. What can Plato's famous statement possibly mean without context, though? Virtually anything, of course. Music lovers have simply recruited Plato amongst their ranks, heedless of his philosophy.

Perhaps the National Endowment for the Humanities will light the way. For starters, what does it mean to be an "independent federal agency?" Independent of what? Anyway, let us give them a chance to justify the humanities.

Because democracy demands wisdom, NEH serves and strengthens our republic by promoting excellence in the humanities and conveying the lessons of history to all Americans. The Endowment accomplishes this mission by awarding grants for top-rated proposals examined by panels of independent, external reviewers. [link]

Well that's something, but it's just a hodgepodge of words. What's wisdom? Why does democracy demand it? Why do they use democracy and republic interchangeably? What are the "lessons of history?" Is that how history works? Why does excellence in the humanities strengthen the republic? Does promoting excellence strengthen the republic by creating wisdom? Why do they say serve and strengthen? Is there a difference?

It doesn't seem like they have any actual ideas, but they plan on achieving strength and wisdom by giving grants to "top-rated proposals," which I suppose are those which will bring about the most wisdom and strength, because money will fix everything. But wait, there's less, for the NEA wants to:

• strengthen teaching and learning in schools and colleges
• facilitate research and original scholarship
• provide opportunities for lifelong learning
• preserve and provide access to cultural and educational resources
• strengthen the institutional base of the humanities

These are not ideals, or at least not beyond "learning for the sake of learning." Teaching and learning and research and scholarship and lifelong learning and resources and the "institutional base of the humanities." Are you inspired yet?

Let us at least see how they define the humanities, since they attempt to:

"The term 'humanities' includes, but is not limited to, the study and interpretation of the following: language, both modern and classical; linguistics; literature; history; jurisprudence; philosophy; archaeology; comparative religion; ethics; the history, criticism and theory of the arts; those aspects of social sciences which have humanistic content and employ humanistic methods; and the study and application of the humanities to the human environment with particular attention to reflecting our diverse heritage, traditions, and history and to the relevance of the humanities to the current conditions of national life." --National Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act, 1965, as amended

Is not limited to? Are they serious that this list is not inclusive enough? Still, that's not their most egregious error, which is prefacing their list with "the study and interpretation of." I can't imagine a more meaningless premise, that you are "doing the humanities" just by "studying" and "interpreting," regardless of where you start, what you do, and where you end up.  I cannot pass over the ridiculous which follows: humanistic content and methods? What on earth? We apply the humanities to reflect our diversity? What gobbledygook.

Whatever we think of the NEA, it offers means, not ends. That may be well and good, but still then, from where will we get a reason for the liberal arts?

Undoubtedly there exist in many people true and proper ideals which kindle the liberal arts, but they do not endure in society as a whole. It is this degradation, and not laziness, lack of funding, or rampant philistinism which has sapped the humanities of its vital energy. Jaeger again:

Since the basis of education is a general consciousness of the values which govern numan life, its history is affected by changes in the values current within the community. When these values are stable, education is firmly based; when they are displaced or destroyed, the educational process is weakened until it becomes inoperative. [Jaeger, xiv]

The educational process does not die at once but is weakened until it devolves into pedantics and nostalgia and eventually is replaced. Too the process is not one which can be flicked on like a switched or programmed into a course of study, but must be lived and seen to be alive. It must be the culture.

We can only justify the liberal arts with concrete ideals about what man is and what he ought to do. Detached from them, these arts are neither liberal nor humanistic. The fact that we have so little art which reflects ideals tells us more about the state of the humanities than do the charters and funding of the nation's massive, grinding educational apparati. Like education, art without purpose is just so much pretend and pretense. Artists make no meaningful art because they have no ideals toward which they can struggle, no vision of man, God, or life which gives context to his otherwise self-orientated world. The Liberal Arts and Humanities kindle and cultivate in the individual, and urge him to recognize in others, an ideal, without which remains nothing but the bare world.

–

Jaeger, Werner. (Highet, Gilbert. trans.) Paideia: The Ideals of Greek Culture. Oxford University Press. 1939.

Celebrate Good Obama: Scandal Remix

Update: This video after several thousand views was blocked by Viacom, evidently because they don't understand the concept of fair use.

Bullseye

I'd like to take a quick peek at an article which a friend brought to my attention this afternoon. I would preface with the fact that I'm not condoning or denying Mr. Taranto's arguments, only presenting them as I understand them and explicating them in the light of what seem to be the implications of the Media Matters "piece," which is in fact little more than an assumption hidden in a byline meant to cast a wicked spell over a series of quotations. Hard-hitting journalism at its finest.

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First, in the most recent article in question, Mr. Taranto doesn't allege or deny that the judgments in question are illegal or immoral, but rather that they "show signs of becoming" an effort to criminalize male sexuality. 

Second, what he does affirm in his most recent article is that the judicial and legislative reactions demonstrate not that any crime is acceptable, but rather that, "The presumption that reckless men are criminals while reckless women are victims makes a mockery of any notion that the sexes are equal." In other words, Taranto's point is that either A) men and women are in fact not equal and thus the law and judgments in question  in the 6/17 article are potentially and partially proper in principle, or B) men and women are equal and thus the laws and judgments should reflect that premise in their executions. Taranto predicated this argument on the fact that with equally ambiguous evidence (in the case mentioned in his 6/17 piece), the man's testimony was deemed less reliable for no apparent reason.

Third and as such, the byline is disingenuous since:

1. Taranto does not "dismiss" the allegations but asserts their handling demonstrates something
2. Where did the word "epidemic" come from and how is it substantiated here?
3. The statement "the epidemic of sexual assault in the military as a 'war on men'" is not even intelligible. It technically means that the actual assaults (presumably by men) constitute the war on men, which is of course incorrect and absurd. What it means to say was that "charging men with assault is evidence of of a war on men," which is what the subsequent quotations from Taranto's pieces are meant to suggest and which Taranto never alleges. 

The byline concludes the cutting commentary by asserting all of the following quotations demonstrate sexism, to which the commentariat replies with winning charges about Goebbels, the conservative oligarchy, 18th century mores, and one which proceeds to make Mr. Taranto's point:

Actually, [men] have the right to choose not to have unprotected sex with a woman. They know or should have known that unprotected sex can lead to pregnancy. If it does lead to pregnancy, they have the legal responsibility and the moral obligation to provide for that child that they knowingly created when they chose to have unprotected sex.

Perhaps, but the point is that in such a case men and women would not be equal, since while both parties were free to have sex, and the woman is free to abort the fetus to undo some of the consequences, the man is not free to forego any consequences by refusing paternal obligations. Again, the question Mr. Taranto concerned himself with was about apparent inconsistencies in allegedly egalitarian administration of law, which he attributed to a:

war on men—a political campaign against sexual assault in the military that shows signs of becoming an effort to criminalize male sexuality.

Taranto's argument seems to be that the apparent lack of egalitarian judgments, which he alleges occurred in the cases he cited in the 6/17 article, demonstrate that:

• The principle of egalitarianism is unworkable and thus ignored in proceedings AND/OR
• The principle of egalitarianism is ignored for the purpose of somehow harassing men, AND/OR
• Such anti-egalitarian judgment by Lt. Gen. Susan Helms was still somehow unsatisfactorily punitive for Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.

Whichever is the case, Mr. Taranto does not claim that any prosecution of sexual assault constitutes a "war on men," but that at the judicial level with Lt. Gen. Helms and/or the legislative level with Sen. McCaskill, a particular, alleged "political" pursuit "shows signs of becoming an effort to criminalize male sexuality" beyond, or instead of, trying cases based on an egalitarian justice.

Face/Off