No Americans Were Released

     John Hinderaker comments pithily:

     On October 7, Gaza murdered 31 Americans and is believed to have kidnapped 13 more, including a three-year-old child. Yesterday an initial exchange of hostages for prisoners was carried out. Ten Thais and one Filipino were let go, but no Americans were released….

     […]

     If our president were not a senile, half-witted fool, he would have told Hamas long ago that if all Americans were not freed within 12 hours, Gaza would be reduced to rubble. Not to mention that Gaza would never get another nickel of American money.

     We shouldn’t have expected any Americans to be released. Nor should we expect any to be released in the near future. They’re bargaining chips: victims of kidnap-at-ransom.

     The masters of HAMAS are, at base, extortionists. They use violence, kidnapping, and threats to extort money and forbearance from others: principally from Israel, but after that, from the United States. The U.S. has funded HAMAS rather profligately with “aid” payments for some years now. HAMAS wants more – as much more as the lives and health of those hostages will buy.

     HAMAS fancies itself a State. Remember what Lysander Spooner said about States:

     All political power, as it is called, rests practically upon this matter of money. Any number of scoundrels, having money enough to start with, can establish themselves as a “government;” because, with money, they can hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort more money; and also compel general obedience to their will. It is with government, as Cæsar said it was in war, that money and soldiers mutually supported each other; that with money he could hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort money. So these villains, who call themselves governments, well understand that their power rests primarily upon money. With money they can hire soldiers, and with soldiers extort money. And, when their authority is denied, the first use they always make of money, is to hire soldiers to kill or subdue all who refuse them more money.

     Hinderaker’s prescription is the right one: threaten to reduce HAMAS’s stronghold in Gaza to flinders and cinders, and announce that America’s checkbook has been closed to them. Does anyone doubt that Ronald Reagan or Donald Trump would have hesitated to issue that ultimatum? Does anyone doubt that the Usurper Regime will kowtow to HAMAS’s demands? After a feeble gesture at face-saving, perhaps?

     It’s time to resurrect the doctrine of peace through superior firepower. Not for Israel’s sake, but for ours.

Perhaps You’ve Wondered

     Why are there so many total nutcases infesting our world? How can there be so many terrorists, so many mass murderers, so many loonies gluing themselves to stuff to “protest” fossil fuels, or “cisgender heteronormativity,” or whatever? Omitting the ones driven by Islam, that is.

     A short while ago, it occurred to me that a classic science-fiction novel has a possible explanation for us:

     One of his men told me dryly: “It’s a matter of population, Courtenay. Have you ever heard of Albert Fish?”
     “No.”
     “He was a phenomenon of the dawn; the earliest days of the Age of Reason—1920 or thereabouts. Albert Fish stuck needles into himself, burned himself with alcohol-saturated wads of cotton, flogged himself—he liked it. He would have liked brainburning, I’ll wager. It would have been twenty delightful subjective years of being flayed, suffocated, choked, and nauseated. It would have been Albert Fish’s dream come true.
     “There was only one Albert Fish in his day. Pressures and strains of a very high order are required to produce an Albert Fish. It would be unreasonable to expect more than one to be produced out of the small and scattered population of the period—less than three billion. With our vastly larger current population there are many Albert Fishes wandering around. You only have to find them. Our matchless research facilities here at Taunton have unearthed several. They turn up at hospitals, sometimes in very grotesque shape. They are eager would-be killers; they want the delights of punishment. A man like you says we can’t hire killers because they’d be afraid of being punished. But Mr. Taunton, now, says we can hire a killer if we find one who likes being punished. And the best part of it all is, the ones who like to get hurt are the ones who just love hurting others. Hurting, for instance—you.”

     In case you’re wondering, Albert Fish was a real person, one of the first well-documented sadomasochists. He really did torture himself…and others.

     In the above-cited novel, the villain (Taunton) wanted a willing killer / torturer who actually sought to be tortured himself. Today’s villains want willing killers, destroyers, and disruptors of all kinds who seek personal validation through their “causes,” no matter the cost to themselves. There are enough humans alive today that the subgroup of thoroughly evil and / or seriously mentally ill persons who fit that description – and there are a minuscule percentage of them in any population – is sufficient for the villains to recruit what they need.

     Why, yes: I do think about such things over my morning coffee. Don’t you?

Open Tabs

Amongst the various open ta bs that I currently have on my browser are two various recipes for chaurice (the Creole version of Chorizo), the Syracuse Casing Company website, Banana Ink stickers, various school websites for my return to the classroom, and then these two articles that have given me a bit of indigestion after Thanksgiving.

The Army tries to get back Soldiers kicked out over the Jab mandate.

Army recruiters are contacting troops who were involuntarily separated from the military due to the vaccine mandate, informing them that they can now apply to rejoin.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin mandated two years ago that all service members under Pentagon authority receive COVID vaccinations, an order which was reversed at the beginning of this year only after thousands were forced out of their positions and denied their constitutional right to apply for religious accommodations. The invitation to reconsider service in the Army comes as the military endures severe recruitment shortfalls.

Yeah, that ship has probably sailed, and it ain’t coming back. You want to know the primary emotion felt by the Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines who got kicked out because they didn’t want to take an experimental shot that was illegally mandated?

ANGER.

You might get back a few who think “Well, two more years and I got my retirement.”. But the vast majority of the troops who were kicked out have lost any faith in the military. And rightly so, with “leadership” like Lloyd “fuck the troops” Austin and Mark “did you imply my gender” Milley ensuring that the military is woke, lame and gay. And the new CJCS is an even worse woke piece of crap.

There’s no accountability in the military at the top levels. It’s all just one big pathetic clown show, begging for more clowns.

The Department of Defense (DOD) is requesting approximately $114 million to finance its latest round of diversity initiatives.

Oh, they want more money for drag queens and left-handed lesbian albino midget Eskimos in the Infantry, even though they can’t be bothered to actually account for the money that they do get now. SIX FAILED AUDITS. SIX. If I couldn’t account for my budget down to the penny I got my ass handed to me by the money people at the unit. But if you’re a general I guess you can just wave your hand and make the problem disappear, right before you ask for MILLIONS more dollars. The proper response, if we had politicians with any balls or backbone, would be “Fuck off with that bullshit and if you can’t show me where all your money is being spent then the firing begins tomorrow and continues until every dipshit with a star on their shoulder is removed and replaced.”

I’ve got plenty more articles about how the military is circling the toilet bowl and going down, but I can only scream so much in one day. At least I don’t have to go shopping today. Blah. Black Friday can also fuck right the hell off. For the life of me I don’t see how it’s good to have a day full of being thankful for what you have, and then follow it up with a day where people get trampled at Wal-Mart trying to get a deal on a TV. Or a dress. It hurts my soul to have a day focused on being grateful followed by a day of greed and gimme-gimme-gimme.

I’m going to go walk my dogs and say my rosary and remember what I’m thankful for.

Thanksgiving Afterthoughts

     It’s right there in the name of the holiday: Thanksgiving Day is a day for giving thanks. But to give implies that there’s someone to receive. To whom shall our thanks be offered?

     Would anyone like a hint? Our supposedly Catholic president appears to need one:

     Since the first Thanksgiving on Plymouth Rock and its subsequent establishment as a day of thanks on Oct. 3, 1789, the recipient of that thanks on behalf of the United States of America has always been God.

     But in keeping with the destruction of everything good and virtuous in this nation, this year, God has been removed as the recipient of thanks on Thanksgiving.

     On Wednesday, President Biden released his Thanksgiving proclamation for 2023.

     For the first time in American history, the proclamation completely omitted any reference to God or faith.

     Some are shocked. I’m not. Biden’s Catholicism is insincere. That’s been clear since he entered politics. His ingressive senility makes little difference. But the Dementia-Patient-In-Chief is not the focus of my thoughts today.

***

     The evangelical atheists will be swarming for the next few weeks. The Christmas season brings them out of their warrens to berate the rest of us into accepting their faith. Apparently the idea of a celebration founded on the birth of the Son of God in human flesh is just too much for them.

     I could go into an extended rant about why the birth of Jesus of Nazareth was a big deal, entirely worth celebrating, but I’ll spare you. Suffice it to say that His travels, miracles, and teachings transformed the world. Should our species be permitted to continue for a few centuries more (a proposition that’s begun to look dubious) His words will continue to travel, penetrate, and exalt the minds and hearts of men. And that really pisses off the militant atheists.

     You want proof? There’s plenty. The exploding revival of Christian belief nationwide should suffice. A fair amount of that is in reaction to the Left’s infiltration of the churches. The reaction has been a firmer binding among the faithful to the Redeemer’s teachings. Laymen are surging out of the pews to shape up their clergy! They will not stand for a secularized, politicized church.

     Then there’s the strange, or perhaps not strange at all, case of Reverorum ib Malacht. That’s a “black metal” band from Poland which once made blasphemy the thematic core of its music. The band’s members studied the Catholic faith closely, that they might blaspheme it better…and converted one and all to Catholicism. Imagine that.

     It seems that any man who lives the Christian faith, and who’s willing to talk humbly about what he believes, can be an effective promulgator thereof. It’s not his Aquinas-like reasoning or his eloquence that does the job. It’s the power of the Gospels: Christ’s teachings themselves.

     And what is the heart of those teachings?

     But when the Pharisees had heard that he had put the Sadducees to silence, they were gathered together. Then one of them, which was a lawyer, asked him a question, tempting him, and saying, Master, which is the great commandment in the law?
     Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. [Matthew 22:34-40]

     The Christian faith, which is founded on the secret to happiness and good will toward others, has a power that can break all resistance. Ask the members of Reverorum ib Malacht.

***

     The antithesis of gratitude isn’t ingratitude but resentment. The forces that seek to destroy our nation and doom our world spread resentment over everyone and everything, like rancid peanut butter. They encourage us to think we’re owed and unfairly burdened…that anyone who’s done well must have victimized others of lesser attainments. Here! In the land where opportunity is everywhere and only coercive interference can prevent us from capitalizing on it!

     The success they’ve had among Americans is frightening. The implications for their effectiveness among others who really have been sorely tried are terrifying. And the foundation of their successes lies in turning us away from God.

     Still, one must acknowledge their cleverness. There have been many religions throughout recorded history. Each has had its own conception of God or gods. And so verbally nimble evangelists such as Stephen Roberts say things such as this:

     “I contend that we are both atheists. I just believe in one fewer god than you do. When you understand why you dismiss all the other possible gods, you will understand why I dismiss yours.”

     But a logically minded person will respond even more penetratingly:

     “Those other conceptions of God fail under rational examination. That doesn’t mean that there is no God. What matters isn’t the profusion of creeds, but the strength or weakness of the evidence for each of them.”

     Compare that to the fulminations of Richard Dawkins:

     Science, after all, is an empirical endeavor that traffics in probabilities. The probability of God, Dawkins says, while not zero, is vanishingly small. He is confident that no Flying Spaghetti Monster exists. Why should the notion of some deity that we inherited from the Bronze Age get more respectful treatment?

     Dawkins has been talking this way for years, and his best comebacks are decades old. For instance, the Flying Spaghetti Monster is a variant of the tiny orbiting teapot used by Bertrand Russell for similar rhetorical duty back in 1952. Dawkins is perfectly aware that atheism is an ancient doctrine and that little of what he has to say is likely to change the terms of this stereotyped debate. But he continues to go at it. His true interlocutors are not the Christians he confronts directly but the wavering nonbelievers or quasi believers among his listeners – people like me, potential New Atheists who might be inspired by his example.

     But science is not “an empirical endeavor that traffics in probabilities.” It’s founded on a rigorous technique for observation, inference, and the testing of hypotheses. And so a genuine logician would respond:

     There is no way to determine “the probability that God exists.” That would require:

  • The attribution of a specific, spatiotemporally based definition to God;
  • Deductions from that definition about what circumstances “should” evoke a manifestation of God;
  • A tally of observed manifestations of God and failures to observe such manifestations.

     But you have to understand induction, inference, and deduction – the bones of the scientific method – to understand that…and these are apparently things of which Richard Dawkins is ignorant.

***

     I could go on, and sometimes I do. But there’s no need. The point has been made. An open mind concerns itself with logic and evidence, not contemptuous dismissals that evade such things.

     But there is this as well: Sometimes, some of what persuades a man to accept that God exists is internal, and thus not demonstrable. Yet such private experiences are important phenomena. They’re no less real than love or desire; they’re just not usable in argument. That leads us to another question:

Has any atheist had a private experience of
No God?
What was it like, pray tell?
Who opened the heavens to say:
I do not exist — ?

     Don’t hold your breath awaiting an answer.

     Once God is admitted, gratitude – and thanksgiving – must follow.

     May He bless and keep you all.

For My Fellow Firearms Enthusiasts

     CheapAmmo.Com is once again offering …cheap ammo!

     Jack Neal emailed me with some of the sales that will go live on Friday morning:

The deals will go live on Friday morning at 9 a.m. (Eastern Time), similar to what we did last year.

We’ll have the following ready to ship. In most cases, there is a limit of one case per customer.

223 ammo – $375 per case (Fiocchi, 55 grain) with free shipping.
9mm Luger training ammo – $190 per case (Magtech, 115 grain) with free shipping.
Fiocchi 380 ACP ammo – $230 per case with free shipping.
Bulk 45 ACP Ammo – Sellier & Bellot 230 Grain FMJ with free shipping.

As you know, we tend to sell out of the more popular calibers by early afternoon. I’m hopeful the 45 ACP might last most of the day but as word spreads, there’s typically no way of knowing how quickly it’ll catch fire!

     Fellow gun nuts: Beat the Black Friday rush! Make it a point to surf on over there as early as possible Friday morning.

A Double-Edged Gift

     [This piece is an old favorite. It first appeared at The Palace of Reason on November 27, 2003. It expresses the meaning I find in the Thanksgiving celebration better than anything I’ve written since then. Twenty years later, it still rings true for me. Make of it what you will. — FWP]

***

     Thanksgiving Day, alternately known here at the Fortress of Crankitude as the Feast of St. Gluttony, has finally arrived. Across America, three- and four-person families will open their doors to company, prepare quantities of food sufficient to provision the USS Theodore Roosevelt for a three month deployment, eat about five percent of it, and spend the remainder of the day bellyaching, in several senses of the word.

  • There will be much jockeying for position at the dinner table, as if proximity to the string beans and fried onions, the pearl onions in cream, or the sweet potato casserole carried a proportional obligation to eat them.
  • There will be much cranberry sauce, most of it from Ocean Spray Corporation and bearing the trademark raised double rings fore and aft. The juveniles in the company will fight over who gets those.
  • There will be many ejaculations of “I’m stuffed fuller than that turkey” and “I couldn’t eat another bite.”
  • There will be much washing-up.
  • There will be extensive packaging of leftovers and cries of frustration over the dimensions of the refrigerator. These will be accompanied by sincere exhortations to the guests to “take a little home for later, we don’t need it all. Really!”
  • There will be football, which the menfolk will use to escape the washing-up and packaging of leftovers.
  • There will be visits from relatives whose tenuous connection to the host family is all but lost in the mists of time.
  • There will be more football, which, together with the feeling of having swallowed a tire, will dampen the traditional post-prandial displays of hostility between the aforementioned tenuously connected relatives.
  • There will be the blessed moment when all the guests go home and the hosts can cease to be hosts, a role at which most of us are terrible anyway.
  • Interspersed with all that, there will be some pro forma expressions of gratitude for this or that, whose cliche fraction will average about 83.33%, because most of us are no better at appreciating our blessings than we are at being hosts. Still, it’s important to make the effort, at least once a year.

     Thanksgiving Day is bittersweet for many, because they lack some of the above ingredients for a full-featured holiday revel. Some don’t have families. Others don’t have much fondness for turkey or the Dallas Cowboys. Still others can’t quite figure out how to get the cranberry sauce out of the can without destroying the charming double rings. For your Curmudgeon, Thanksgiving Day is a remembrance of a day he faced death for no good reason at all.

***

     Once upon a time, your Curmudgeon had a relative with wealth, who shall henceforth be called Aunt Lil. Aunt Lil had three things in great measure: money, caustic opinions, and a steely resistance to unpleasant facts. Inasmuch as the rest of the family was less than pecunious, and hoped to share in the proceeds from Aunt Lil’s much-anticipated passing to the next world, we were all unctuously deferential toward her, and far more forbearing of her less agreeable side than we ought to have been.

     When your Curmudgeon was a fuzz-chinned sprat in his middle teenage years, a promising looking apprentice adult but little more, there came a Thanksgiving when Aunt Lil decided that she, rather than your Curmudgeon’s nuclear family, would host the day’s feast. She announced this decision with the imperiousness of a Roman Caesar. She accompanied the announcement with the astonishing addendum that she, and no one else, would prepare the food.

     Aunt Lil could not cook.

     Your Curmudgeon, even though of tender years, was already an accomplished cook, having been tutored in the art by a father whose life work was in food. One of Dad’s most prized possessions was a cookbook he’d been given by the head chef at the Hunter’s Lodge in Westchester: 832 recipes for potatoes. Dad pored over that tome as if it were the Rosetta Stone. Perhaps, to him, it was; he never did manage to get “au gratin” right. Anyway, Dad had passed his knowledge and skills along to your Curmudgeon, who’d found that he enjoyed their exercise — and never more so than when the stakes were high.

     Being of tender years, your Curmudgeon dared to suggest to Aunt Lil that she accept his assistance with the Thanksgiving repast. The suggestion was dismissed with prejudice. There was a grimace of horror from Dad, who feared that your Curmudgeon would continue by Mentioning The Unmentionable: that Aunt Lil was barely competent to pour milk over cold cereal. But even in his tenderer years, your Curmudgeon wasn’t that indiscreet.

     On the appointed day, we dutifully presented ourselves at Aunt Lil’s magnificent apartment in the Bronx — yes, there was a time when people of means lived in the Bronx, and it may come again — and submitted ourselves to her culinary ministrations. True to her word, she’d done it all herself, from the appetizers to the pies. And no, it wasn’t as bad as we’d feared.

     It was worse. Much, much worse.

     Aunt Lil had somehow formed the fixed idea that you could roast a turkey in an hour, independent of its size. Since there are very few three-pound turkeys around at Thanksgiving, and none that could feed a roster of twenty-eight people, this was, if you’ll pardon the expression, a recipe for calamity. And calamity duly ensued, for every one of the invitees ate of that ruddy pink turkey and smiled while he did it.

     All became ill. Seven wound up in the hospital that evening with severe food poisoning. Your Curmudgeon was one. (Aunt Lil was not. Subsequent familial debate has not settled whether Aunt Lil ate of her own creation. No one was ever willing to state unambiguously that he saw her do so.)

     As your Curmudgeon writhed in the unique agony of an empty digestive tract that strained to empty itself still further in complete disregard for facts or logic, he pondered the train of decisions that had brought him and six of his relatives to that sorry state. He contemplated all the things he’d wanted to do with his life, that now seemed destined to remain undone. He thought about the mess he called his “priorities,” and what he might have done about them had he known that his time on Earth was to be so short.

     To cut to the credits, all who were afflicted lived. Your Curmudgeon would face death again several times: from extreme illness, from a fall off a cliff face, and from the lunatic rage of a crazy woman he’d unwisely invited to share his home. But his first confrontation with the Destroyer of Delights and Sunderer of Societies was the most important one, for the lesson it bore is one he’s never forgotten.

     Time is the ultimate gift.

***

     Time is the medium within which we temporally bound creatures must work. Time is the dimension within which we plan, and execute our plans, and reap the rewards or the lessons they generate. But time is not ours to command.

     In his masterpiece The Screwtape Letters — and really, how often has that much wisdom been compressed into that few pages? — C. S. Lewis’s devil-protagonist declaims on the folly of asserting the ownership of time, in particular the time of one’s life:

You must therefore zealously guard in his mind the curious assumption “My time is my own.” Let him have the feeling that he starts each day as the lawful possessor of twenty-four hours. Let him feel as a grievous tax that portion of this property which he has to make over to his employers, and as a generous donation that further portion which he allows to religious duties. But what he must never be permitted to doubt is that the total from which these deductions have been made was, in some mysterious sense, his own personal birthright.

     You have here a delicate task. The assumption which you want him to go on making is so absurd that, if once it is questioned, even we cannot find a shred of argument in its defence. The man can neither make, nor retain, one moment of time; it all comes to him by pure gift; he might as well regard the sun and the moon as his chattels.

     This is the forward edge on the sword of time, the somber face of the ticking clock, that two-handed engine which will one day strike, and strike no more. We cannot bottle time. We are forbidden by the laws of the universe to know how much time we’ll have. Though memory suggests otherwise, the only instant we can be sure of is now — and it slips from our grasp before we can even finish pronouncing its name.

     When a man elects to take a risk to his life, as we all do innumerable times each day, he risks the retraction of the gift of time all at once. That’s not an argument for taking no risks; it’s a reminder that the hoped-for returns from a risk ought to be measured carefully against the possible price for pursuing them.

     Twenty-seven people sat down to Aunt Lil’s table and ate of her visibly dangerous, nearly lethal turkey because they didn’t want to offend a woman worth millions of dollars. None of us really liked her personally, but we surely loved our dream of inheriting some fraction of her wealth.

     Was that a worthy end, to incur so great a risk? Even if no one else did, your Curmudgeon and his Dad knew what the risk would be. What was our excuse?

     Aunt Lil died intestate, by the way.

***

     Your Curmudgeon is growing old. The sense of time running out has been weighing heavily upon him lately. He’s been reviewing his goals, especially the ones that seem to be moving out of reach, and straining to make some sense of the things to which he’s given his life. It’s not a uniformly pleasant enterprise. It involves confronting a lot of utter folly and wondering how he could have been so stupid, as he was at Aunt Lil’s dinner table three decades and more ago.

     But it also involves appreciating how many opportunities he’s had, how every pain visited upon him carried with it a lesson that would enlarge his understanding and prove valuable later in his life, and how even his worst failures were occasions for a great deal of hope and joy. This is the rearward edge on the sword of time: the ability to look backward over one’s life and say, despite any and all regrets, “an ill favoured thing, but mine own,” and therefore precious.

     And so, on this Thanksgiving Day in the year of Our Lord 2003, your Curmudgeon will give thanks simply for having lived. For having survived to laugh at his own stupidity. For having learned how much there is to know that he will never know. For having loved, often unwisely but never unwillingly, and having been loved in return. For all the failures, all the pain, all the triumphs and all the joys. These things are inextricably bound in the thread of time, whether Clotho spins it coarse or fine, whether Lachesis weaves it loose or dense, whether Atropos lets it run luxuriantly long or hacks it cruelly short. It was all pure gift, as is whatever portion remains to come.

     Like any other sort of thread, this gift is what one makes of it.

Francis W. Porretto
Curmudgeon Emeritus to the World Wide Web
Mount Sinai, New York
November 27, 2003

A Little Pre-Thanksgiving Silliness

     I’m no longer allowed, for the sake of my health, to eat my way into a coma. That makes the annual Thanksgiving Day dinner a bittersweet event: all those goodies, and I’m allowed perhaps a tablespoonful of each! But I have my memories of Thanksgiving feasts in bygone years. They must suffice.

     But one recent development strikes me as highly relevant to Thanksgiving Day: the recliner. They’re not all that new in and of themselves, but their inclusion in all kinds of rooms and all manner of other furniture is fairly recent. And there’s nothing like kicking back in your favorite recliner after a satisfying meal, especially if the more annoying family members have vacated the premises and your home team is playing the Lions or the Cowboys.

     I was reflecting on the great importance of our five recliners – two in the living room; two in the downstairs rec room; one in my office – to life here at the Fortress of Crankitude when it occurred to me that there surely must be enough other “recliner fans” out there for a dedicated publication. I mean, why not? There are publications for far less relaxing activities and pastimes. So I set to work:

     What do you think, Gentle Reader? Would it “play in Peoria?”

Parasitism, Freedom, And The State

     There aren’t many mornings, in these waning days of my life, that I find myself heartened and energized by something a relatively conventional columnist writes in a relatively conventional media organ. This is one.

     Apparently, the election of Javier Milei to the presidency of Argentina has made possible the public exploration of ideas that would previously have been treated as unspeakable. Today at The Epoch Times, columnist Jeffrey A. Tucker treats with one such idea respectfully, even approvingly: anarcho-capitalism.

     Tucker provides an excellent, high-level description of this revolutionary idea, largely by emphasizing what it is not:

     Central to the idea is that society does not require an entrenched entity of legalized compulsion and coercion called the state in order to enjoy the enforcement of property rights, contracts, defense, and commercial society generally. The fusing of the terms anarchism and capitalism is not a plan for the social order but rather a prediction of what would happen in a civilized community in the absence of the state.

     Private property in a free-enterprise economic order is a concept with which Americans are already familiar. So is the proposition that individuals are capable enough to solve their own problems, and to assist others in solving their problems when those others require a little help. Both notions have been under furious attack for centuries. The reason “should” be “obvious:” They leave no role or room for political parasites.

     Politicians, whether empowered or aspiring, purely hate the idea that we can get along just fine – better, in fact – without their “assistance.” As Isabel Paterson wrote in The God of the Machine, politicians are a breed that strives to live through others. Their self-concept demands that others “need” them. Without those needy others, they have no reason for existence. In short, they are parasites that seek to breed other parasites to provide a justification for their “public service.”

     Give that a few moments to percolate while I refill my mug.

***

     A few years ago, a “public intellectual” of some repute addressed a gathering of his fellows in a fashion they found disturbing:

     “Gentlemen, you see that in the anarchy in which we live, society manages much as before. Take care, if our disputes last too long, that the people do not come to think that they can very easily do without us.”

     The speaker’s name was Benjamin Franklin. His audience was the Constitutional Convention that defined the federal government of the American republic. Few in that assembly were pleased by his words. They had the ring of truth.

     Of course, America in 1787 was not much like the America of today. “Things have changed,” as we’re told ceaselessly by would-be power-wielders. But the suggestion that the differences justify the existence of a massively intrusive and parasitical order that seeks to rule over every detail of our existences is not something that anyone should accept with a shrug. That we need far fewer such intrusions and far less such parasitism is the most popular proposition of our time.

     “But do we need any such entity as the State?” is a question that most react to with a flip rejection. “You’re talking anarchy!” comes the rebuke. The false cosmetics that have been troweled onto anarchism have kept it from being considered seriously for many decades. Anarchism as a concept has been successfully mis-equated with chaos.

     Yet here, in the most concise statement with which I’m familiar, is the heart of the anarchist premise:

     The state calls its own violence law, but that of the individual crime. – Max Stirner

     Or, if you prefer your political analysis with a little curry, we have this:

     The State represents violence in a concentrated and organized form. The individual has a soul, but as the State is a soulless machine, it can never be weaned from the violence to which it owes its very existence. – Mohandas “Mahatma” Gandhi

     And it would seem, from Jeffrey Tucker’s column and other, less direct treatments of the idea, that the hour is upon us for re-examining the moral and ethical bases of that peculiar institution we call the State. Those bases are not solid.

***

     I hadn’t bothered to familiarize myself with Javier Milei before his recent election. All I know about him is that he’s styled himself an anarcho-capitalist, and that he sought and has won the presidency of Argentina. Those two details might seem contradictory. That’s because they are. A man who seeks public office is acting against the anarchist principle. All the same, if Milei is philosophically an anarcho-capitalist, it will show in his policies and decisions as Argentina’s president. He bears watching.

     Please give Jeffrey Tucker’s column a look. (If you need access, email me and I’ll enable it for you.) You’ll find it stimulating, if nothing else. From there you can go on to explore the greatest science-fiction trilogy ever written. You can ask yourself – hopefully sincerely – “Would I thrive in the social order of Hope?” And if your answer is no, perhaps you’ll ask yourself “What would I have to change about myself to be able to say yes?

     Enjoy your Thanksgiving.

Why Don’t We Have Soccer Riots?

     Well, there are at least two reasons:

  1. There aren’t that many fanatic soccer fans in the United States;
  2. So we have Black Friday instead.

     “But why,” I hear you ask, “don’t the British have Black Friday?” The C.S.O. maintains that most of their energies are dispersed in soccer riots. (The rest go to murder mysteries.) Another possible explanation is that the British don’t have enough money to go commercially crazy the way Americans do:

2021 GDP 2021 Population 2021 Product per capita
United Kingdom
$3.13 trillion 67.33 million $48,487
United States
$23.32 trillion 331.9 million $70,262

     The third possibility is that the British lack sufficient closet space for all that junk, the “self storage” facility being less common Across the Water. Fourth and finally, they could just be saner than we are, though that would leave us in need of an explanation for the soccer riots.

     Whatever the case, it seems our cousins in the U.K. don’t have an after-Thanksgiving retail frenzy. Of course, they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving either, but that’s a mere detail.

     But wait a moment: America has four wildly popular nationwide professional sporting phenomena, whereas Britain has only soccer and cricket. With twice as many “big time” pro sports and the associated marketing, shouldn’t Americans’ rowdiness be dissipated more effectively than that of the British? This is a research question. (A British friend has counseled me not to discount rugby as a relief valve; he claims it has the highest body count of any pro sport played anywhere. Must make the murder mysteries seem pale by comparison.)

     Our favorite Graybeard has rung in on the madness:

     Black Friday was supposedly called that because it was the day where businesses turned their annual ledgers from red ink to black ink, but in the last few years it seems to have morphed into something else. It has been reported for years that the big deals aren’t necessarily really deals at all (2014 study), or that some companies raise their prices in the weeks (months?) before the day so that what would have been a normal, small discount from MSRP suddenly seems like a deal. It’s being reported (2016) that more and more people are carrying their smartphone into the stores to price check things, compare price and availability at other stores, or get coupons. I confess: I’ve done it and not just this time of year.

     Once there started to be a perception that good deals came on Black Friday, it was only a matter of time until it became just another way of saying “BIG SALE!” But shoppers like to think they’re getting big deals, and there are stores that put one or two items on a massive discount to get some people to line up the night before. Maybe they can get some buzz on the news. Of course, now that stores are opening on Thanksgiving itself, Friday seems like it loses some drawing power. Regardless, every year there’s some incident where people get violent (2016) over something stupid.

     Well, anyway. We’re three days from “official” Black Friday. It’s a time for great nervousness here on Long Island; the increment of traffic does unspeakable things to our roads. The accident figures are frightening, too. So the C.S.O. and I make a point of staying home. It’s an expedient I can heartily recommend. On the other hand, if you simply must get out and about – to take the pulse of the nation, as it were – for my money Becker and Fagen’s prescription remains serviceable:

     Unlikely to cost you a lot, too.

Chinese Bio-Terrorism?

Maybe. But, as the CDC refused to test samples of material labeled “Ebola”, we may never officially know.

Meanwhile, the Left and their allies in the Media are still screaming “Russia, Russia, Russia” and “Insurrection”. According to them, that is a MUCH greater threat.

I would like them to think about the threat that keeping Biden in office presents. Or, worse, installing that idiot Kamala Harris in the chief spot to replace the diminishing Biden.

For Those A Great Distance From Their Loves

     A little something from the great Tom Rush:

     To those who have their loves close by: Be grateful.

Bring back tarring and feathering

Via the Epoch times, in an article about how the IRS is planning on fining you for “underpayment of taxes” (as if the Byzantine tax code of the FUSA actually lets you figure out what you’re getting skinned for) comes this little blurb that made me see red once again.

The federal government made direct payments to individuals totaling $931 billion to help with COVID-19. However, it was challenging for the IRS and Treasury to get payments to some people.

Nine hundred and thirty-one BILLION dollars, you say? But the 2020 “stimulus” bill was TWO TRILLION DOLLARS. If the fed.gov gave away NINE HUNDRED AND THIRTY-ONE BILLION DOLLARS, then where in the hell is the rest of it? The ONE TRILLION, SIXTY-NINE BILLION DOLLARS?

In ancient Rome, before the empire fell, the Roman senate and royalty spent their time looting the treasury for their own personal benefit. How much of that $1,069,000,000,000 is sitting in the bank account of US politicians?

Rome also had puppet emperors as well, much like Drooling Joe the Chinese Hand Puppet.

Buy more ammo, folks. The train is off the rails but still going at a high rate of speed and when it finally hits something the effect is going to be horrific.

Death Cult News

     From Thaddeus G. McCotter:

     While breathing, you drive the fossil fueled vehicles to the party where the host uses his charcoal grill to smoke the meat of methane-spewing cattle raised by big agriculture and shipped by the fossil fueled vehicles to stores where it is refrigerated by coal burning electric plants, which you revile by posting on the internet using a computer running on that same electricity. Oops.

     Little wonder that within the gaggle of radical green extremists we find both socialists, who believe only government can control the masses to the extent necessary to save the planet and equitably redistribute wealth; and we find Malthusians, who believe we must eliminate the root cause of the carbon emissions propelling the climate apocalypse – again, that’s you.

     Well, okay, maybe not you, specifically, but certainly enough people to make the world less burdened by the blight upon Mother Nature that is humanity. Fewer people means fewer carbon emissions; and fewer people also means less money has to be redistributed for the sake of “equity,” which pleases rich climate cultists (looking at you, World Economic Forum), who can give more money to the cause.

     […]

     As warned previously, euthanasia is the next frontier in the Left’s battle for “liberating” one from life:

     Best to keep an eye on Canada’s MAiD [“Medical Aid in Dying”] policies. The American Left does, and they like what they see. It’s why they want to ensure Canada’s assisted-suicide laws roll downhill to America. Sure, all life’s paths lead but to the grave. But we shouldn’t hurry to get there.

     What, you don’t think it’s a serious possibility? Consider that farming is now under attack as a contributor to “climate change.” Several thousand farmers in the Netherlands have had their properties confiscated by the government, specifically as a measure against “climate change.” I think that’s also happened in one other European country.

     Fewer farms –> Less food.
     Less food –> Sustenance for fewer people.
     Sustenance for fewer people –> …?

     Add to the above the march of government-controlled medicine, the ever-tightening grip Washington has on the energy industries, and the horrifying, utterly anti-human garbage the government-run schools are force-feeding American children.

     Finish the reasoning yourself. I already have.

     Sarah Palin, where are you now that we really need you?

The Three-Percenters

     Among the interesting aspects of a constantly-changing lexicon is the process by which a word becomes attached to a particular function or occupation, the two never thereafter to be parted. A pattern of common usage, if it persists long enough, can separate the word from its original meaning. That’s the way languages work: a word acquires its meaning from the way it’s used by speakers and writers.

     There’s a common term that’s used to refer to an intermediary between two parties who seek to reach a contract with one another: agent. (Time was, we called that middleman a negotiator, but that word has declined in use. Apparently five syllables is too many for the typical pro athlete.) The agent represents one side of the exchange. He seeks to get the best deal he can for his client, in part because whatever the client gets, the agent will get a percentage: typically ten or fifteen percent.

     For many years, the prevalent agent / client agreement was for ten percent: if the client will nominally be paid $100, in fact he’ll receive $90, the remaining $10 going to the agent. As a result, another term for an agent entered common use: a ten-percenter. That term is still used to refer to an agent today, even though today the more common agreement is fifteen percent for the agent. (Cf. Shoshanna Litvak’s representation of actress Jana Tyrell in my novel Love in the Time of Cinema.)

     The percentage that interests me just now – not for what some agent is paid, however – is three percent. That’s the consensus estimate of what fraction of America’s population is homosexual, lesbian, et cetera: the somewhat fractured quasi-demographic often denoted by the letters LGBTQ.

     Consider, ever so fleetingly, how members of that quasi-demographic have become over-represented in many areas of life and society. Movies and television are practically overrun by them. While I no longer watch broadcast or cablecast TV and seldom go to a movie, I have friends who keep me abreast of such things. Apparently it’s now de rigueur to have homosexuals or lesbians featured prominently in any show in current production. Moreover, cases in which they’re cast as villains are vanishingly rare.

     Let’s pass in silence over the uses to which content providers put those characters. What I want to know is who’s negotiating for them. He’s fantastically effective…often despite the consequences for the “bottom line.” Consider this report:

     Target SLAMMED Over ‘Gay Nutcracker’ Christmas Decorations

     Target is under fire once again – this time for selling LGBTQ+ styled Christmas decorations. And conservatives are NOT having it.

     One of the new items on the chain’s inventory is a 2023 nutcracker decoration which features the nutcracker in a jacket with a pride flag running down the middle, a pride flag hat, and a pride flag in his hand. I say “his” hand loosely, as the statue also has pink hair, eyeshadow, and feminine eyelashes. Perhaps he’s a drag queen as well.

     Another new item this year is a Christmas snow globe with a rainbow heart in the middle and the phrase “love is love” in the center.

     Target also recently collaborated with an artist named Kurt S. Adler, whose creations include more gay nutcrackers, a pride drinking glass ornament, a 10-inch fabergé Pride Santa, and a pride picture frame ornament.

     Other Christmas/Pride collaborations include a rainbow “Love is Love” ornament, the description for which reads: “Spread love and acceptance this holiday season with this charming pride ‘Love is Love’ holiday ornament,” adding, “Whether you’re an ally, a member of the LGBTQ+ community, or simply someone who believes in love and equality for all, this ornament is the perfect way to showcase your support during the festive season.”

     Well, gag me with a spoon! I had no idea the “festive season” is considered a time to wave your sociopolitical affiliation in others’ faces. I had this antediluvian notion that the season is about the Nativity of Jesus of Nazareth. You know, the Christ Child. The kid who was born in a stable and got his first nap in a manger.

     But soft! The point here is that Target has already suffered bottom-line losses from kowtowing to the three-percenters. Remember the foofaurauw about Target’s marketing of transgender-themed merchandise? It wasn’t that long ago. At any rate, I doubt Target’s Board of Directors has forgotten it.

     Boards of Directors have to be sensitive to what management decisions do to the corporate bottom line. Stockholders expect it of them, and turf them out should they scamp their duties. Yet here we are again: Target is showcasing LGBTQ merchandise at the risk of offending the 97% of the nation that’s heterosexual and largely sane: i.e., the folks that penalized Target for its previous decision. Considering that, whatever ten-percenter is negotiating for the three-percenters is definitely worth his fifteen percent.

     Middlemen of the world, you have a new role model. Study his moves! Learn his secrets! Absorbing what he knows could enrich you as well. Or get you tarred, feathered, and run out of town on a rail. But what’s life without a little risk?

What’s Next – The School Choosing Your Mate?

In Miami, the teacher shortage is so acute (and chronic) that one system built a school with the top floor reserved for teacher housing.

Wow!

So, in a relatively insular environment, you will be housed with co-workers for your neighbors, in ONE-bedroom apartments. Nothing confining about that.

Say, doesn’t that remind you of the “Convenient” housing Apple does for THEIR Captive Workers in China?

Talk about the Ultimate Company Housing!

Note that this is NOT housing for families, nor for co-workers that might want to room together.

No, this is ONE prisoner to a cell housing.

If co-workers date, then break up, this could be a Recipe for Madness. Work with your ex, Live in the same small environment with your ex, and – probably – shop/work out/socialize in that same constrained environment.

Foreign teachers might not object; many of them have similar experiences in their home countries. But, I cannot see American workers putting up with this.

This Needs To Be Viewed Widely

     Not because I’m a Tucker Carlson fan or a Trump supporter…but because it’s the Gospel truth:

     Trump 2024. Make America Great Again!

Techniques In Dissimulation

     It pays to stay abreast of developments in deceit. Those who fail to do so might not recognize occasions when someone is striving to mislead them. That can lead to unpleasantness.

     One that is seldom appreciated for its ironic beauty recently poked its head above the high-slime line:

     Late Wednesday, the Capitol Police confronted violent protesters outside the DNC’s HQ in Washington, D.C. The situation was particularly tense because top members of the Democratic Party, some of whom receive a 24-hour security detail from the Capitol Police, were inside the building at the time. Multiple police officers were injured in the violence, which the Capitol Police confirmed was violent and more resembled a riot.

     […]

     “That is quite an image. We haven’t seen an image like that since January 6,” [CNN anchor Dana] Bash said of images from the violence plastered on the screen.

     Let’s pause here for a moment. A couple of years ago, Mainstream Media news figures compared the events in Washington D.C. on January 6, 2021 to recognized horrors such as those in Manhattan on September 11, 2001. They employed the latter atrocity as a standard: something by which to measure other things. That’s what standards are.

     Above, nearly three years since the January 6 disturbance at the Capitol Building, Dana Bash uses that event as a standard by comparing the riot outside DNC headquarters to it. This implies that the January 6 disorder, which was far milder than the press strove to portray it, has become a measuring stick for outbreaks of violent disorder.

     However, Bash appears to have realized immediately that she’d “overplayed her hand:” that is, that the events of January 6, 2021 were not usable as a standard for atrocities…or at least not yet:

     Reacting to the incident on CNN, network anchor Dana Bash compared scenes from the violence to Jan. 6 — before immediately trying to retract the comparison.

     “Totally different topic, totally different kind of people. I mean, I don’t want to at all compare the sort of substance of it,” Bash backtracked, “but the idea that there was violence and that there were Capitol Police officers actually hurt there.”

     Just a moleskin-gloved minute there, Colonel: Were any Capitol Police injured on January 6, 2021? There were no reports thereof, even though those selfsame police killed at least two of the protestors. But perhaps I should stick to the main point.

     The “promotion” of the scandalously slandered January 6 protest into a standard for the measurement of “other atrocities” might succeed among hard-left-wingers and the most credulous. But owing to the slow leakage of real-time videos from the Capitol protest, the percentage of Americans who are aware of the realities has grown steadily. Perhaps Bash realized that, though not quite in time to avert the comparison.

     What’s the moral here? Just to watch out for the use of a past event as a standard by which to measure something about more recent events. The more distant in time the standard becomes, it becomes more easily distorted in recollection…and the more easily are those ignorant about it to be deceived about what really happened then.

     These are dark times, Gentle Readers. Be on your guard, always.

More On “The Narrative”

     I just encountered the following image:

     The salient part here is that “the authorities” – in this case, school administrators – are deterred from doing what should be done by the fear of being called racists. This is a common problem that affects other authorities as well, including police forces. Consider, for example, that a gang of Muslims who’d immigrated to England were allowed to “groom” – i.e., sexually abuse – a large number of white girls for sixteen years, because the police feared to be called racists:

     That’s where The Narrative gets its power from: fear. Not necessarily fear of being damaged objectively; more often than not, it’s fear of being slandered.

     Now, Weird Dave, who provided the first of those images, doesn’t approve of the “Time to tribe up” approach:

     So is he right? I don’t think so. The solution has always been to live up to the American ideal of all men created equal. But to do that, we have to fight against the reality that some groups are not held to the same standards as everyone else. Illegal and anti-social behavior can not be allowed because the perpetrator belongs to a certain group or follows a certain belief. Can it be done? That’s the question. But Balkinization is not the answer.

     That would be nice…if it worked. But we tried it. The post-World-War-II period emphasized the American ideal of colorblindness and interracial harmony…among whites. This was the consequence:

     And in those places and cases where whites have followed the identitarian path, it’s worked. Assaults on whites by blacks and Muslims have declined sharply. Unfortunately, the masters of The Narrative have managed to keep the general public from learning about most of those instances.

     So we confront two prescriptions. The first, the “colorblind” path, has failed us. Nonwhites – blacks in particular – exploited it to gain legal privileges for themselves at whites’ expense. The second, the “racial identity” path, has worked in those white-majority regions where it’s been followed. Whites have “tribed up,” which deterred blacks and Muslims from violating the regional norms.

     Being a practical sort, I’d say that we should go with what works. The other path has a fine, idealistic feel to it. I wish it worked. But it didn’t – and we have no reason to believe it would work if we were to try it again. The power of The Narrative can only be countered by a greater counterpower: fear among minorities of what an energized and self-aware white majority would do were they to “act up.”

     Deterrence works. That’s why we have a military and a whole lot of big bombs. That’s why millions of Americans have armed themselves. There’s no point in insisting on following another way that has failed when we tried it.

“When what you’re doing doesn’t work,
Do something else!

—Michael Emerling—

Just in case you need a reminder

You cannot trust the government.

There is currently a cult of pedophiles that has dedicated itself to worshiping Satan and is blackmailing young girls into harming themselves. Alarming, right? I’m sure that you, like me, believe that something needs to be done to stop these miscreants from carrying out such twisted, evil deeds against impressionable youth. Unfortunately, the FBI is not really all that worried about that aspect of the situation. No, what’s concerning them is the fact that one member of the gang once uttered the “n-word,” which we all know is the unpardonable sin to the radical left in this country. 

And again, YOU CANNOT TRUST THE GOVERNMENT.

“This decision will provide millions of Americans, criminal defendants, public interest organizations, and the media an ability to see for themselves what happened that day, rather than having to rely upon the interpretation of a small group of government officials,” Johnson continued. “I commend Chairman Loudermilk and his team for their diligent work to ensure the thousands of hours of videos are promptly processed to be uploaded to the committee’s public website. Processing will involve blurring the faces of private citizens on the yet unreleased tapes to avoid any persons from being targeted for retaliation of any kind and segregating an estimated 5% of the videos that may involve sensitive security information related to the building architecture.”

The fact that Kevin McCarthy didn’t release this footage to the USA on day fucking ONE of his tenure as Speaker is reason enough for him to be removed.

YOU CANNOT TRUST THE GOVERNMENT!

According to VAERS’ standard operating procedure for COVID-19, reports must be processed quickly, within days of receipt.

But The BMJ has learned that in the face of an unprecedented 1.7 million reports since the rollout of the COVID-19 vaccines, VAERS staffing was likely not commensurate with the demands of reviewing serious reports submitted, including reports of death.

Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) documents seen by The BMJ suggest that Pfizer has more than 1,000 more full-time employees than the CDC, despite the latter’s responsibility for handling adverse event reports for all manufacturers.

What’s more, other countries have acknowledged deaths “likely” or “probably” related to mRNA vaccination, whereas the CDC, which says it has reviewed nearly 20,000 reports (far more than other countries) hasn’t acknowledged a single death linked to mRNA vaccine.

Short rant today. I’ve been working with chainsaws and I’m a bit tired.

Pride Crap

     [I’m in a bit of a state just now, for reasons that don’t bear on anything my Gentle Readers would (or should) care about, so have a reprint from January 2017, over at Liberty’s Torch V1.0. After rereading it, I must report that my attitude toward “pride crap” has only hardened and grown more hostile. — FWP]

***

     I’ve just thought of another “Please, 2017” item that really should have been in yesterday’s list: the repudiation of insane “pride” in things or conditions that are no way achievements.

     I’m not perfectly sure where this trend was ignited. It might have been the “Black Pride” nonsense of the Sixties or the “Gay Pride” garbage contemporaneous with it. If its roots go still deeper into time, I’m unable to locate them. Whatever the case, Pride Crap has been about as divisive as any insanity this nation has suffered in its 230 years.

     The laughter should be especially loud and contemptuous when the “pride” at issue is about something the “proud” claim they would never have chosen if they’d been given a say. That, of course, is the defining characteristic of Gay Pride. Of course, as homosexual conduct correlates with elevated risks of psychosis, drug abuse, physical disease, suicide, and shortened lifespan, its irrationality goes well beyond mere Pride Crap. There are other “prides” that come close, but in no case is the pressure of the contradiction quite as great.

     Glory be to God! What are these people proud of?


     Note that Pride Crap is a wholly owned and operated subsidiary of Left-Liberal Lunacy, Inc. We in the Right aren’t allowed “pride.” We’re the cause of everything unjust, hurtful, and ugly, remember? So no Men’s Pride, or White Pride, or Straight Pride shall be countenanced. Whenever such a thing dares to raise its head above the trench lip, it evokes a withering barrage of condemnation from the salaried bien pensants of the Main Stream Media…and from quite a few on the Establishment Right, as well.

     Actually, it’s worse. In keeping with the horrors for which straight white males are supposed to feel guilty, the Left insists that we must atone. We must make restitution for our many sins against them. The prescribed penance is nearly always a transfer of wealth from us to them. Shut up and write that check, straight white boy. And don’t demand to know when you’ve paid in full.

     And these…persons wonder how their anointed one, destined by the gods to become America’s First Woman President, could have lost an election to a real estate mogul from Queens.


     These past couple of years, Pride Crap has evoked several counter-trends that have shown some promise. Among these are the “red pill” movement among men fed up with pseudo-feminist BS, the “white identity” groundswell that’s risen in reaction to the epidemic of bad behavior from blacks, and the resurgence of disdain for homosexual activists who have nothing to offer but bad art and vulgar street demonstrations. Some of it has been excessive, of course – that’s always the case when the pendulum smashes into one of its stops – but in the main, it’s helped to restore some of our national perspective.

     The most striking contrast between Pride Crappers and those aligned with one or more of the counter-trends has been the juvenility of the former versus the maturity of the latter. The tantrum-wielding two-year-old is the perfect emotional and tactical model of a Pride Crapper: the screaming, crying purveyor of nothing but demands, tears, and feces. Pride Crappers insist that everyone conform to (and help to enforce) their notions of what’s offensive; their opponents merely laugh at them and maintain the right to their own practices, locutions, and opinions. Pride Crappers are full of whining demands; their opponents merely want to be left alone. In the name of “diversity and inclusion,” Pride Crappers agitate for changes in law and social custom that would invert six millennia of human norms; their opponents tell them to get stuffed, whether in the marketplace, in the media, or at the ballot box.

     It should require no great degree of insight to understand why the bastions of the industries that produce nothing of enduring value should be filling up with Pride Crappers while their opponents move to more peaceable climes.


     This map:

     …says more about the counter-trends to Pride Crap and its allegiants than any thousand words I could produce. As I noted in this essay, it’s important that we not allow it to mislead us, as maps often do. However, it’s as good an illustration of the geographic and demographic effects of Pride Crap and the reactions to it as is possible. Where Pride Crappers dominate, there is much social pathology, all the way from public crudity and open vice to outright violence. Where normal Americans dominate, such pathologies and the deviants that promote them get much shorter shrift. Social problems tend to be more rationally viewed and more effectively addressed.

     You’d think that even a Pride Crapper would eventually draw the moral. However, as my hero Jame Retief has said, “Most people are willing to give up their preconceptions, once they’ve had them tattooed on their heads with a blunt instrument.” That process still has some way to go. Perhaps 2017 will bring an inflection point. We shall see.

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